Anhur Schopenhauer. 
 
A SERIES OF ESSAYS 
 
 BY 
 
 Arthur Schopenhauer. 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 T. Bailey Saundkrs, M. A. 
 
 Vitam impendere vero. — Juvenal. 
 
 NEW YORK, 
 
 PETER ECKLER, PUBLISHER, 
 No. 35 Fulton Street. 
 
 V 
 
THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 Xe bonJieur n'est pas ehoae aiate : ilett tri»- 
 difflcile de le Mwer en nou*, el impoaaUiie 
 de le tnmver aiUeurs. 
 
 OHAMTOBT. 
 
 V 
 
 /v. 
 
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 OF Schopenhauer — as o^ many another writer — it may 
 be said that he has been ijnisunderstood and depreciated 
 just in the degree in which he i^ thought to be new ; and that, 
 in treating of the Conduct of Life, he is, in reahty, valuable 
 only in so far as he brings old truths to remembrance. His 
 name used to arouse, and in certain quarters still arouses, a 
 vague sense of alarm ; as though he had come to subvert all 
 the rules of right thinking and all the rules of good conduct, 
 rather than to proclaim once again and give a new meaning to 
 truths with which the world has long been familiar. Of its 
 philosophy in its more technical aspects, as matter upon which 
 enough, perhaps, has oeen written, no account need be taken 
 here, except as it affects the form in which he embodies these 
 truths or supplies the fresh light in which he sees them. For 
 whatever claims to originality his metaphysical theory may 
 possess, the chief interest to be found in his views of life is an 
 affair of form rather than of substance ; and he stands in a 
 sphere of his own, not because he sets new problems or opens 
 up undiscovered truths, but in the manner in which he ap- 
 proaches what has been already revealed. 
 
 He is not on that account less important ; for the great mass 
 of men at all times requires to have old truths imparted as if 
 they were new — formulated, as it were, directly for them as 
 individuals, and of special application to their own circum- 
 stanances in life. A discussion of human happiness and the 
 way to obtain it is never either unnecessary or uncalled for, if 
 one looks to the extent to which the lives of most men fall 
 short of even a poor ideal, or, again, to the difficulty of reach- 
 ing any definite and secure conclusion. For to such a mo- 
 mentous inquiry as this, the vast majority of mankind gives 
 
 (▼) 
 
vi TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 nothing more than a nominal consideration, accepting the 
 current belief, whatever it may be, on authority, and taking as 
 little thought of the grounds on which it rests as a man walking 
 takes of the motion of the earth. But for those who are not 
 indifferent — for those whose desire to fathom the mystery of 
 existence gives them the right to be called thinking beings — it 
 is just here, in regard to the conclusion to be reached, that a 
 difficulty arises, a difficulty affecting the conduct of life : for 
 while the great facts of existence are alike for all, they are 
 variously appreciated, and conclusions differ, chiefly from in- 
 nate diversity of temperament in those who draw them. It is 
 innate temperament, acting on a view of the facts necessarily 
 incomplete, that has inspired so many different teachers. The 
 tendencies of a man's own mind — the Idols of the Cave before 
 which he bows — interpret the facts in accordance with his own 
 nature : he elaborates a system containing, perhaps, a grain of 
 truth, to which the whole of life is then made to conform ; the 
 facts purporting to be the foundation of the theory, and the 
 theory in its turn giving its own color to the facts. I 
 
 Nor is this error, the manipulation of facts to suit the theory, 
 avoided in the views of life which are presented by Schopen- 
 hauer. It is true that he aimed especially at freeing himself 
 from the trammels of previous systems ; but he was caught in 
 those of his own. His natural desire was to resist the common 
 appeal to anything extramundane — anything outside or beyond 
 life — as the basis of either hope or fear. He tried to look at 
 life as it is ; but the metaphysical theory on which his whole 
 philosophy rests made it necessary for him, as he thought, to 
 regard it as an unmixed evil. He calls our present existence 
 an infinitesimal moment between two eternities, the past and 
 the future, a moment — like the life of Plato's ' ' Dwellers in the 
 Cave," — filled with the pursuit of shadows; where everything 
 is relative, phenomenal, illusory, and man is bound in the 
 servitude of ignorance, struggle and need, in the endless round 
 of effort and failure. If you confine yourself, says Schopen- 
 hauer, only to some of its small details, life may indeed appear 
 to be a comedy, because of the one or two bright spots of 
 happy circumstance to be found in it here and there; but 
 
TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. VU 
 
 when you reach a higher point of view and a broader outlook, 
 these soon become invisible, and Life, seen from the distance 
 which brings out the true proportion of all its parts, is revealed 
 as a tragedy — a long record of struggle and pain, with the 
 death of the hero as the final certainty. How then, he asks, 
 can a man make the best of his brief hour under the hard con- 
 ditions of his destiny ? What is the true Wisdom of Life ? 
 
 Schopenhauer has no pre-conceived divine plan to vindicate ; 
 no religious or moral enthusiasm to give a roseate hue to some 
 far-off event, obliging us in the end to think that all things 
 work together for good. Let poets and theologians give play 
 to imagination 1 he, at any rate, will profess no knowledge 
 of anything beyond our ken. If our existence does not entirely 
 fail of its aim, it must, he says, be suffering ; for this is what 
 meets us everywhere in the world, and it is absurd to look 
 upon it as the result of chance. Still, in the face of all this 
 suffering, and in spite of the fact that the uncertainty of life 
 destroys its value as an end in itself, every man's natural 
 desire is to preserve his existence ; so that life is a blind, un- 
 reasoning force, hurrying us we know not whither. From his 
 high metaphysical standpoint, Schopenhauer is ready to admit 
 that there are many things in life which give a short satisfaction 
 and blind us for the moment to the realities of existence, — 
 pleasures as they may be called, in so far as they are a mode 
 of relief : but that pleasure is not positive in its nature nor 
 anything more than the negation of suffering, is prov^ed by the 
 fact that, if pleasures come in abundance, pain soon returns in 
 the form of satiety ; so that the sense of illusion is all that has 
 been gained. Hence, the most a man can achieve in the way 
 of welfare is a measure of relief from this suffering ; and if 
 people were prudent, it is at this they would aim, instead of 
 trying to secure a happiness which always flies from them. 
 
 It is a trite saying that happiness is a delusion, a chimaera, the 
 fata morgana of the heart ; but here is a writer who will bring 
 our whole conduct into line with that, as a matter of practice ; 
 making pain the positive groundwork of life, and a desire to 
 escape it the spur of all effort. While most of those who treat 
 of the conduct of life come at last to the conclusion, more or 
 
vm translator's preface. 
 
 less vaguely expressed, that religion and morality form a 
 positive source of true happiness, Schopenhauer does not 
 professedly take this view ; though it is quite true that the 
 practical outcome of his remarks tends, as will be seen, in 
 support of it ; with this difference, however — he does not direct 
 the imagination to anything outside this present life as making 
 it worth while to live at all ; his object is to state the facts of 
 existence as they immediately appear, and to draw conclusions 
 as to what a wise man will do in the face of them. 
 
 In the practical outcome of Schopenhauer's ethics — the end 
 and aim of those maxims of conduct which he recommends, 
 there is nothing that is not substantially akin to theories of life 
 which, in different forms, the greater part of mankind is pre- 
 sumed to hold in reverence. It is the premises rather than 
 the conclusion of his argument which interest us as something 
 new. The whole world, he says, with all its phenomena of 
 change, growth and development, is ultimately the manifesta- 
 tion of Will — Wille und Vorstellung — a blind force conscious 
 of itself only when it reaches the stage of intellect. And life is 
 a constant self-assertion of this will ; a long desire which is 
 never fulfilled ; disillusion inevitably following upon attainment, 
 because the will, the thing-in-itself — in philosophical language, 
 the noumenon — always remains as the permanent element ; and 
 with this persistent exercise of its claim, it can never be satis- 
 fied. So life is essentially suffering ; and the only remedy for 
 it is the freedom of the intellect from the servitude imposed by 
 its master, the will. 
 
 The happiness a man can attain, is thus, in Schopenhauer's 
 view, negative only ; but how is it to be acquired ? Some 
 temporary relief, he says, may be obtained through the medium 
 of Art ; for in the apprehension of Art we are raised out of our 
 bondage, contemplating objects of thought as they are in 
 themselves, apart from their relations to our own ephemeral 
 existence, and free from any taint of the will. This contempla- 
 tion of pure thought is destroyed when Art is degraded from 
 its lofty sphere, and made an instrument in the bondage of the 
 will. How few of those who feel that the pleasure of Art 
 
 :^ 
 
translator's preface. IX 
 
 transcends all others could give such a striking explanation of 
 their feeling ! 
 
 But the highest ethical duty, and consequently the supreme 
 endeavor after happiness, is to withdraw from the struggle of 
 life, and so obtain release from the misery which that struggle 
 imposes upon all, even upon those who are for the moment 
 successful. For as will is the inmost kernel of everything, so 
 it is identical under all its manifestations ; and through the 
 mirror of the world a man may arrive at the knowledge of 
 himself. The recognition of the identity of our own nature 
 with that of others is the beginning and foundation of all true 
 morality. For once a man clearly perceives this solidarity of 
 the will, there is aroused in him a feeling oi sympathy which is 
 the main-spring of ethical conduct. This feeling of sympathy 
 must, in any true moral system, prevent our obtaining success 
 at the price of others' loss. Justice, in this theory, comes to 
 be a noble, enlightened self-interest ; it will forbid our doing 
 wrong to our fellowman, because, in injuring him, we are in- 
 juring ourselves — our own nature, which is identical with his. 
 On the other hand, the recognition of this identity of the will 
 must lead to commiseration — a feeling of sympathy with our 
 fellow-sufferers — to acts of kindness and benevolence, to the 
 manifestation of what Kant, in the Metaphysic of Ethics, calls 
 the only absolute good, the good will. In Schopenhauer's 
 phraseology, the human will, in other words, ^P"f, the love of 
 life, is in itself the root of all evil, and goodness lies in renoun- 
 cing it. Theoretically, his ethical doctrine is the extreme of 
 socialism, in a large sense ; a recognition of the inner identity, 
 and equal claims, of all men with ourselves ; a recognition 
 issuing in "yaTj/, universal benevolence, and a stifling of partic- 
 ular desires. 
 
 It may come as a surprise to those who affect to hold 
 Schopenhauer in abhorrence, without, perhaps, really know- 
 ing the nature of his views, that, in this theory of the essential 
 evil of the human will — ep"f, the common selfish idea of life — 
 he is reflecting and indeed probably borrowing what he de- 
 
X TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 scribes as the fundamental tenet of Christian theology, that (he 
 whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain,^ standing in 
 need of redemption. Though Schopenhauer was no friend to 
 Christian theology in its ordinary tendencies, he was very much 
 in sympathy with some of the doctrines which have been con- 
 nected with it. In his opinion the foremost truth which Chris- 
 tianity proclaimed to the world lay in its recognition of pes- 
 simism, its view that the world was essentially corrupt, and 
 that the devil was its prince or ruler.* It would be out of place 
 here to inquire into the exact meaning of this statement, or to 
 determine the precise form of compensation provided for the 
 ills of life under any scheme of doctrine which passes for Chris- 
 tian : and even if it were in place, the task would be an ex- 
 tremely difficult one ; for probably no system of belief has ever 
 undergone, at various periods, more radical changes than 
 Christianity. But whatever prospect of happiness it may have 
 held out, at an early date of its history, it soon came to teach 
 that the necessary preparation for happiness, as a positive 
 spiritual state, is renunciation, resignation, a looking away from 
 external life to the inner life of the soul — a kingdom not of this 
 world. So far, at least, as concerns its view of the world 
 itself, and the main lesson and duty which life teaches, there is 
 nothing in the theory of pessimism which does not accord with 
 that religion which is looked up to as the guide of life over a 
 great part of the civilized world. 
 
 What Schopenhauer does is to attempt a metaphysieal ex- 
 planation of the evil of life, without any reference to anything 
 outside it. Philosophy, he urges, should be cosmology, not 
 theology; an explanation of the world, not a scheme of divine 
 knowledge : it should leave the gods alone — to use an ancient 
 phrase — and claim to be left alone in return. Schopenhauer 
 was not concerned, as the aposties and fathers of the Church 
 were concerned, to formulate a scheme by which the ills of this 
 life should be remedied in another — an appeal to the poor and 
 oppressed, conveyed often in a material form, as, for instance, 
 in the story of Dives and Lazarus. In his theory of life as the 
 the self-assertion of will, he endeavors to account for the sin, 
 » Romans viii., 22. « John xii., 33. 
 
"^:4-* '^. "^15^ "T-- T> -^■C'T -■--'.■ iBi«pB>i^-.c;. "^ 4" »!■ 'T» ''lf"»r^-"»T|»J!"' 
 
 translator's preface. xi 
 
 misery and iniquity of the world, and to point to the way of 
 escape — the denial of the will to live. 
 
 Though Schopenhauer's views of life have this much in 
 common with certain aspects of Christian doctrine^ they are in 
 decided antagonism with another theory which, though, com- 
 paratively speaking, the birth of yesterday, has already been 
 dignified by the name of a religion, and has, no doubt, a cer- 
 tain number of followers. It is the theory which looks upon 
 the life of mankind as a continual progress towards a state of 
 perfection, and humanity in its nobler tendencies as itself 
 worthy of worship. To those who embrace this theory, it will 
 seem that because Schopenhauer does not hesitate to declare 
 the evil in the life of mankind to be far in excess of the good, 
 and that, as long as the human will remains what it is, there can 
 be no radical change for the better, he is therefore outside the 
 pale of civilization, an alien from the commonwealth of ordered 
 knowledge and progress. But it has yet to be seen whether 
 the religion of humanity will fare better, as a theory of conduct 
 or as a guide of hfe, than either Christianity or Buddhism. If 
 any doctrine may be named which has distinguished Chris- 
 tianity wherever it has been a living force among its adherents, 
 it is the doctrine of renunciation ; the same doctrine which in 
 a different shape and with other surroundings, forms the spirit 
 of Buddhism. With those great religions of the world which 
 mankind has hitherto professed to revere as the most ennobling 
 of all influences, Schopenhauer's theories, not perhaps in their 
 details, but in the principle which informs them, are in close 
 alliance. 
 
 Renunciation, according to Schopenhauer, is the truest 
 wisdom of life, from the higher ethical standpoint. His heroes 
 are the Christian ascetics of the Middle Age, and the followers 
 of Buddha who turn away from the Sansara to the Nirvana. 
 But our modern habits of thought are different. We look 
 askance at the doctrines, and we have no great enthusiasm for 
 the heroes. The system which is in vogue amongst us just 
 now objects to the identification of nature with evil, and, in 
 fact, abandons ethical dualism altogether. And if nature is not 
 evil, where, it will be asked, is the necessity or the benefit of 
 
xii translator's preface. 
 
 renunciation — a question which may even come to be generally 
 raised, in a not very distant future, on behalf of some new 
 conception of Christianity. 
 
 And from another point of view, let it be frankly admitted 
 that renunciation is incompatible with ordinary practice, with 
 the rules of life as we are compelled to formulate them ; and 
 that, to the vast majority, the doctrine seems little but a 
 mockery, a hopelessly unworkable plan, inapplicable to the 
 conditions under which men have to exist. 
 
 In spite of the fact that he is theoretically in sympathy with 
 truths which lie at the foundation of certain widely revered 
 systems, the world has not yet accepted Schopenhauer for what 
 he proclaimed himself to be, a great teacher : and probably for 
 the reason that hope is not an element in his wisdom of life, 
 and that he attenuates love into something that is not a real, 
 living force — a shadowy recognition of the identity of the will. 
 For men are disinclined to welcome a theory which neither 
 flatters their present position nor holds out any prospect of 
 better things to come. Optimism — the belief that in the end 
 everything will be for the best — is the natural creed of man- 
 kind ; and a writer who of set purpose seeks to undermine it 
 by an appeal to facts is regarded as one who tries to rob hu- 
 manity of its rights. How seldom an appeal to the facts within 
 our reach is really made ! Whether the evil of life actually 
 outweighs the good, — or, if we should look for better things, 
 what is the possibility or the nature of a Future Life, either 
 for ourselves as individuals, or as part of some great whole, or, 
 again, as contributing to a coming state of perfection ? — such 
 inquiries claim an amount of attention which the mass of men 
 everywhere is unwilling to give. But, in any case, whether it 
 is in a vague assent to current beliefs, or a blind reliance on a 
 baseless certainty, or an impartial attempt to put away what is 
 false, — hope remains as the deepest foundation of every faith 
 in a happy future. 
 
 But it should be observed that this looking to the future as a 
 complement for the present is dictated mainly by the desire to 
 remedy existing ills ; and that the great hold which religion 
 
translator's preface. xm 
 
 has on mankind, as an incentive to present happiness, is the 
 promise it makes of coming perfection. Hope for the future 
 is a tacit admission of evil in the present ; for if a man is com- 
 pletely happy in this life, and looks upon happiness as the 
 prevailing" order, he will not think so much of another. So a 
 discussion of the nature of happiness is not thought complete 
 if it takes account only of our present life, and unless it con- 
 nects what we are now and what we do here with what we may 
 be hereafter. Schopenhauer's theory does not profess to do 
 this ; it promises no positive good to the individual ; at most, 
 only relief ; he breaks the idol of the world, and sets up noth- 
 ing in its place ; and like many another iconoclast, he has long 
 been condemned by those whose temples he has desecrated. 
 If there are optimistic theories of/ life, it is not life itself, he 
 would argue, which gives color to them ; it is rather the reflec- 
 tion of some great final cause which humanity has created as 
 the last hope of its redemption : — 
 
 Heaven but the vision of fulfilled desire, 
 And hell a shadow from a soul on fire. 
 
 Cast on the darkness into which ourselves. 
 So late emerged from, shall so soon expire.^ 
 
 Still, hope, it may be said, is not knowledge, nor a real 
 answer to any question ; at most, a makeshift, a moral support 
 for intellectual weakness. The truth is that, as theories, both 
 optimism and pessimism are failures ; because they are extreme 
 views where only a very partial judgment is possible. And in 
 view of the great uncertainty of all answers, most of those who 
 do not accept a stereotyped system leave the question alone, as 
 being either of little interest, or of no bearing on the welfare 
 of their lives, which are commonly satisfied with low aims ;. 
 tacitly ridiculing those who demand an answer as the most 
 pressing affair of existence. But the fact that the final prob- 
 lems of the world are still open, makes in favor of an honest 
 attempt to think them out, in spite of all previous failure or 
 still existing difficulty ; and however old these problems may 
 be, the endeavor to solve them is one which it is always worth 
 • Omar Khayyam ; translated by E. Fitzgerald. 
 
xiv translator's preface, 
 
 while to encourage afresh. For the individual advantages 
 which attend an effort to find the true path accrue quite apart 
 from any success in reaching the goal ; and even though the 
 height we strive to climb be inaccessible, we can still see and 
 understand more than those who never leave the plain. The 
 sphere, it is true, is enormous — the study of human, life and 
 destiny as a whole ; and our mental vision is so ill-adapted to 
 a range of this extent that to aim at forming a complete scheme 
 is to attempt the impossible. It must be recognized that the 
 data are insufficient for large views, and that we ought not to 
 go beyond the facts we have, the facts of ordinary Hfe, inter- 
 preted by the common experience of every day. These form 
 our only material. The views we take must of necessity be 
 fragmentary — a mere collection of aperfus, rough guesses at 
 the undiscovered ; of the same nature, indeed, as all our pos- 
 sessions in the way of knowledge — little tracts of solid land 
 reclaimed from the mysterious ocean of the unknown. 
 
 But if we do not admit Schopenhauer to be a great teacher, 
 — because he is out of sympathy with the highest aspirations 
 of mankind, and too ready to dogmatize from partial views, — he 
 is a very suggestive writer, and eminently readable. His style 
 is brilliant, animated, forcible, pungent ; although it is also 
 discursive, irresponsible, and with a tendency to superficial 
 generalization. He brings in the most unexpected topics 
 without any very sure sense of their relative place ; everything, 
 in fact, seems to be fair game, once he has taken up his pen. 
 His irony is noteworthy ; for it extends beyond mere isolated 
 sentences, and sometimes applies to whole passages, which 
 must be read cum gratio salts. And if he has grave faults as 
 well as excellences of literary treatment, he is at least always 
 witty and amusing, and that, too, in dealing with subjects — as 
 here, for instance, with the Conduct of Life — on which many 
 others have been at once severe and dull. It is easy to com- 
 plain that though he is witty and amusing, he is often at the 
 same time bitter and ill-natured. This is in some measure the 
 unpleasant side of his uncompromising devotion to truth, his 
 resolute eagerness to dispel illusion at any cost — those defects 
 
translator's preface. XV 
 
 of his qualities which were intensified by a solitary and, until 
 his last years, unappreciated life. He was naturally more dis- 
 posed to coerce than to flatter the world into accepting his 
 views ; he was above all things un esprit fort, and at times 
 brutal in the use of his strength. If it should be urged that, 
 however great his literary qualities, he is not worth reading 
 because he takes a narrow view of life and is blind to some of 
 its greatest blessings, it will be well to remember the profound 
 truth of that line which a friend inscribed on his earliest bi- 
 ography : Sinonerrassetfecerat iile minus, ^ 3i truth which is 
 seldom without application, whatever be the form of human 
 effort. Schopenhauer cannot be neglected because he takes 
 an unpleasant view of existence, for it is a view which must 
 present itself, at some time, to every thoughtful person. To 
 be outraged by Schopenhauer means to be ignorant of many 
 of the facts of life. 
 
 In this one of his smaller works, Aphorismen zur Lebens- 
 weisheit, Schopenhauer abandons his high metaphysical stand- 
 point, and discusses, with the same zest and appreciation as in 
 fact marked his enjoyment of them, some of the pleasures which 
 a wise man will seek to obtain, — health, moderate possessions, 
 intellectual riches. And when, as in this little work, he comes 
 to speak of the wisdom of life as the practical art of living, the 
 pessimist view of human destiny is obtruded as little as possible. 
 His remarks profess to be the result of a compromise — an at- 
 tempt to treat life from the common standpoint. He is content to 
 call these witty and instructive pages a series of aphorisms ; 
 thereby indicating that he makes no claim to expound a com- 
 plete theory of conduct. It will doubtless occur to any intel- 
 ligent reader that his observations are but fragmentary thoughts 
 on various phases of life ; and, in reality, mere aphorisms — in 
 the old, Greek sense of the word — pithy distinctions, definitions 
 of facts, a marking-off, as it were, of the true from the false in 
 some of our ordinary notions of life and prosperity. Here 
 there is little that is not in complete harmony with precepts to 
 which the world has long been accustomed ; and in this respect, 
 > Slightly altered from Martial. Epigram : I. xxii. 
 
xvi TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 also, Schopenhauer offers a suggestive comparison rather than 
 a contrast with most writers on happiness. I 
 
 The philosopher in his study is conscious that the world is 
 never likely to embrace his higher metaphysical or ethical 
 standpoint, and annihilate the will to live ; nor did Schopen- 
 hauer himself do so except so far as he, in common with most 
 serious students of life, avoided the ordinary aims of mankind. 
 The theory which recommended universal benevolence as the 
 highest ethical duty, came, as a matter of practice, to mean a 
 formal standing-aloof — the ne plus ultra of individualism. The 
 Wisdom of Life, as the practical art of living, is a compromise. 
 We are here not by any choice of our own ; and while we 
 strive to make the best of it, we must not let ourselves be de- 
 ceived. If you want to be happy, he says, it will not do to 
 cherish illusions. Schopenhauer would have found nothing 
 admirable in the conclusion at which the late M. Edmond 
 Scherer, for instance, arrived. L' art de vivre, he wrote in his 
 preface to Amiel's Journal, c'est de se faire une raison, de 
 souscrire au compromis, de se prcter aux fictions. Schopen- 
 hauer conceives his mission to be, rather, to dispel illusion, to 
 tear the mask from life ; — a violent operation, not always pro- 
 ductive of good. Some illusion, he urges, may profitably be 
 dispelled by recognizing that no amount of external aid will 
 make up for inward deficiency ; and that if a man has not got 
 the elements of happiness in himself, all the pride, pleasure, 
 beauty and interests of the world will not give it to him. Suc- 
 cess in life, as gauged by the ordinary material standard, means 
 to place faith wholly in externals as the source of happiness, to 
 assert and emphasize the common will to live, in a word, to be 
 vulgar. He protests against this search for happiness — some- 
 thing subjective — in the world of our surroundings, or any- 
 where but in a man's own self; a protest the sincerity of which 
 might well be imitated by some professed advocates of spiritual 
 claims. 
 
 It would be interesting to place his utterances on this point 
 side by side with those of a distinguished interpreter of nature 
 in this country, who has recently attracted thousands of readers 
 by describing The Pleasures of Life ; in other words, the 
 
translator's preface. xvii 
 
 blessings which the world holds out to all who can enjoy 
 them — health, books, friends, travel, education, art. On the 
 common ground of their regard for these pleasures there is no 
 disagreement between the optimist and the pessimist. But a 
 characteristic difference of view may be found in the application 
 of a rule of life which Schopenhauer seems never to tire of 
 repeating ; namely, that happiness consists for the most part 
 in what a man is in himself, and that the pleasure he derives 
 from these blessings will depend entirely upon the extent to 
 which his personality really allows him to appreciate them. 
 This is a rule which runs some risk of being overlooked in the 
 operation of dazzling the mind's eye by a description of all the 
 possible sources of pleasure in the world of our surroundings ; 
 but Sir John Lubbock, in common with every one who attempts 
 a fundamental answer to the question of happiness, cannot 
 afford to overlook it. The truth of the rule is perhaps taken 
 for granted in his account of life's pleasures ; but it is significant 
 that it is only when he comes to speak of life' s troubles that he 
 freely admits the force of it. Happhiess, he says, in this latter 
 connection, depends much more on what is within than without 
 us. Yet a rigid application of this truth might perhaps dis- 
 count the effect of those pleasures with which the world is said 
 to abound. That happiness as well as unhappiness depends 
 mainly on what is within, is more clearly recognized in the case 
 of trouble : for when troubles come upon a man, they influence 
 him, as a rule, much more deeply than pleasures. How few, 
 even amongst the millions to whom these blessings are open — 
 health, books, travel, art — really find any true or permanent 
 happiness in them ! 
 
 While Schopenhauer's view of the pleasures of life may 
 be elucidated by comparing it with that of a popular writer 
 like Sir John Lubbock, and by contrasting the appeals they 
 severally make to the outer and the inner world as a source of 
 happiness ; Schopenhauer's view of life itself will stand out 
 more clearly if we remember the opinion so boldly expressed 
 by the same English writer. 1/ we resolutely look, observes 
 Sir John Lubbock, I do not say at the bright side of things, but 
 at things as they really are ; if we avail ourselves of the mani- 
 
xviii translator's preface. 
 
 fold blessings which surround us; we cannot but feel that life is 
 indeed a glorious inheritance.^ 
 
 There is a splendid excess of optimism about this state- 
 ment which well fits it to show up the darker picture drawn by 
 the German philosopher. 
 
 Finally, it should be remembered that though Schopen- 
 hauer's picture of the world is gloomy and sombre, there is 
 nothing weak or unmanly in his attitude. If a happy exist- 
 ence, he says, — not merely an existence free from pain — is 
 denied us, we can at least be heroes and face life with courage : 
 das hochste was der Mensch erlangen kann ist ein heroischer 
 Lebenslauf. 
 
 A noble character will never complain at misfortune ; 
 for if a man looks round him at other manifestations of that 
 which is his own inner nature, the will, he finds sorrows hap- 
 pening to his fellowmen harder to bear than any that have 
 come upon himself 
 
 And the ideal of nobility is to deserve the praise which 
 Hamlet — in Shakespeare's Tragedy of Pessimism — gave to 
 a friend : 
 
 7hou hast been 
 As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing. 
 
 But perhaps Schopenhauer's theory carries with it its own 
 correction. 
 
 He describes existence as a more or less violent oscil- 
 lation between pain and boredom. 
 
 If this were really the sum of life, and we had to rea- 
 son from such a partial view, it is obvious that happiness 
 would lie in action; and that life would be so constituted 
 as to supply two natural and inevitable incentives to action, 
 and thus to contain in itself the very conditions of hap- 
 piness. 
 
 Life itself reveals our destiny. 
 
 It is not the struggle which produces misery, it is the mis- 
 taken aims and the low ideals — was uns alle bdndigt, dcu 
 Genuine ! 
 
 > The Pleasures of Life. Part I., p. 5. T. B. S. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER. PAOE 
 
 Introduction i 
 
 I. Division of the Subject ..... 3 
 II. Personality, or what a Man is . . .12 
 
 III. Property, or what a Man has ... 36 
 
 IV. Position, or a Man's Place in the Estima- 
 
 tion OF others — 
 
 Sect. I. Reputation ..... 44 
 
 2. Pride. . . . . . . 51 
 
 3- Rank 53 
 
 4. Honor 54 
 
 5. Fame .85 
 
 (i^ 
 
 (C 
 
 (( 
 
 <c 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IN these pages I shall speak of Th£ Wisdom of Life in the 
 common meaning of the term, as the art, namely, of order- 
 ing our lives so as to obtain the greatest possible amount of 
 pleasure and success ; an art the theory of which may be called 
 Eudcernonology, for it teaches us how to lead a happy existence. 
 Such an existence might perhaps be defined as one which, 
 looked at from a purely objective point of view, or, rather, 
 after cool and mature reflection — for the question necessarily 
 involves subjective considerations, — would be decidedly pre- 
 ferable to non-existence ; implying that we should cling to it 
 for its own sake, and not merely from the fear of death ; and 
 further, that we should never like it to come to an end. 
 
 Now whether human life corresponds, or could possibly 
 correspond, to this conception of existence, is a question to 
 which, as is well-known, my philosophical system returns a 
 negative answer. On the eudaemonistic hypothesis, however, 
 the question must be answered in the affirmative ; and I have 
 shown, in the second volume of my chief work (ch. 49), that 
 this hypothesis is based upon a fundamental mistake. Accord- 
 ingly, in elaborating the scheme of a happy existence, I have 
 had to make a complete surrender of the higher metaphysical 
 and ethical standpoint to which my own theories lead ; and 
 everything I shall say here will to some extent rest upon a 
 compromise ; in so far, that is, as I take the common stand- 
 point of every day, and embrace the error which is at the 
 bottom of it. My remarks, therefore, will possess only a quali- 
 fied value, for the very word eudczmonology is a euphemism. 
 Further, I make no claims to completeness ; partly because 
 the subject is inexhaustible, and partly because I should other- 
 
 (I) 
 
2 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 wise have to say over again what has been already said by 
 others. 
 
 The only book composed, as far as I remember, with a like 
 purpose to that which animates this collection of aphorisms, is 
 Cardan's De ulilitate ex adversis capienda, which is well worth 
 reading, and may be used to supplement the present work. 
 Aristotle, it is true, has a few words on eudaemonology in the 
 fifth chapter of the first book of his Rhetoric ; but what he says 
 does not come to very much. As compilation is not my busi- 
 ness, I have made no use of these predecessors ; more espe- 
 cially because in the process of compiling, individuality of view 
 is lost, and individuality of view is the kernel of works of this 
 kind. In general, indeed, the wise in all ages have always 
 said the same thing, and the fools, who at all times form the 
 immense majority, have in their way too acted alike, and done 
 just the opposite ; and so it will continue. For, as Voltaire 
 says, we shall leave this world as foolish and as wicked as we 
 found it on our arrival. 
 
THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. 
 
 ARISTOTLE^ divides the blessings of life into three 
 classes — those which come to us from without, those of 
 the soul, and those of the body. Keeping nothing of this 
 division but the number, I observe that the fundamental differ- 
 ences in human lot may be reduced to three distinct classes : 
 
 (i) What a man is : that is to say, personality, in the widest 
 sense of the word ; under which are included health, strength, 
 beauty, temperament, moral character, intelligence, and educa- 
 tion. 
 
 (2) What a man has : that is, property and possessions of 
 every kind. 
 
 (3) How a man stands in the estimation of others : by which 
 is to be understood, as everybody knows, what a man is in the 
 eyes of his fellowmen, or, more strictly, the light in which they 
 regard him. This is shown by their opinion of him ; and their 
 opinion is in its turn manifested by the honor in which he is 
 held, and by his rank and reputation. 
 
 The differences which come under the first head are those 
 which Nature herself has set between man and man ; and from 
 this fact alone we may at once infer that they influence the 
 happiness or unhappiness of mankind in a much more vital 
 and radical way than those contained under the two following 
 heads, which are merely the effect of human arrangements. 
 Compared with genuine personal advantages^ such as a great 
 mind or a great heart, all the privileges of rank or birth, even 
 ^Eth. Nichotn., I. 8. 0) 
 
^ THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 of royal birth, are but as kings on the stage, to kings in real 
 life. The same thing was said long ago by Metrodorus, the 
 earliest disciple of Epicurus, who wrote as the title of one of 
 his chapters. The happifiess we receive from ourselves is greater 
 than that which we obtain from our surroundings. * And it is 
 an obvious fact, which cannot be called in question, that the 
 principal element in a man's well-being, — indeed, in the whole 
 tenor of his existence, — is what he is made of, his inner con- 
 stitution. For this is the immediate source of that inward 
 satisfaction or dissatisfaction resulting from the sum total of 
 his sensations, desires and thoughts ; whilst his surroundings, 
 on the other hand, exert only a mediate or indirect influence 
 upon him. This is why the same external events or circum- 
 stances affect no two people alike ; even with perfectly similar 
 surroundings every one Hves in a world of his own. For a 
 man has immediate apprehension only of his own ideas, feel- 
 ings and volitions ; the outer world can influence him only in 
 so far as it brings these to life. The world in which a man 
 lives shapes itself chiefly by the way in which he looks at it, 
 and so it proves different to different men ; to one it is barren, 
 dull, and superficial ; to another rich, interesting, and full of 
 meaning. On hearing of the interesting events which have 
 happened in the course of a man's experience, many people 
 will wish that similar things had happened in their lives too, 
 completely forgetting that they should be envious rather of the 
 mental aptitude whicH lent those events the significance they 
 possess when he describes them ; to a man of genius they were 
 interesting adventures ; out to the dull perceptions of an 
 ordinary individual iney would have been stale, every-day 
 occurrences. This is in the highest degree the case with many 
 of Goethe's and Byron's poems, which are obviously founded 
 upon actual facts ; where it is open to a foolish reader to envy 
 the poet because so many delightful things happened to him, 
 instead of envying that mighty power of phantasy which was 
 capable of turning a fairly common experience into something 
 so great and beautiful. 
 
 ' Cf. Clemens Alex. Strom. II., 21. 
 
DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. 5 
 
 In the same way, a person of melancholy temperament will 
 make a scene in a tragedy out of what appears to the sanguine 
 man only in the light of an interesting conflict, and to a phleg- 
 matic soul as something without any meaning ; — all of which 
 rests upon the fact that every event, in order to be realized 
 and appreciated, requires the co-operation of two factors, 
 namely, a subject and an object ; although these are as closely 
 and necessarily connected as oxygen and hydrogen in water. 
 When therefore the objective or external factor in an experience 
 is actually the same, but the subjective or personal appreciation 
 of it varies, the event is just as much a different one in the 
 eyes of different persons as if the objective factors had not been 
 ahke ; for to a blunt intelligence the fairest and best object in 
 the world presents only a poor reality, and is therefore only 
 poorly appreciated, — like a fine landscape in dull weather, or 
 in the reflection of a bad camera obscura. In plain language, 
 every man is pent up within the limits of his own conscious- 
 ness, and cannot directly get beyond those limits any more 
 than he can get beyond his own skin ; so external aid is not 
 of much use to him. On the stage, one man is a prince, 
 another a minister, a third a servant or a soldier or a general, 
 and so on, — mere external differences : the inner reality, the 
 kernel of all these appearances is the same — a poor player, 
 with all the anxieties of his lot. In life it is just the same. 
 Differences of rank and wealth give every man his part to play, 
 but this by no means implies a difference of inward happiness 
 and pleasure ; here, too, there is the same being in all — a poor 
 mortal, with his hardships and troubles. Though these may, 
 indeed, in every case proceed from dissimilar causes, they are 
 in their essential nature much the same in all their forms, with 
 degrees of intensity which vary, no doubt, but in no wise corre- 
 spond to the part a man has to play, to the presence or absence 
 of position and wealth. Since everything which exists or 
 happens for a man exists only in his consciousness and happens 
 for it alone, the most essential thing for a man is the constitu- 
 tion of this consciousness, which is in most cases far more im- 
 portant than the circumstances which go to form its contents. 
 
6 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 All the pride and pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull 
 consciousness of a fool, are poor indeed compared with the 
 imagination of Cervantes writing his Don Quixote in a miser- 
 able prison. The objective half of life and reality is in the 
 hand of fate, and accordingly takes various forms in different 
 cases : the subjective half is ourself, and in essentials it always 
 remains the same. 
 
 Hence the life of every man is stamped with the same char- 
 acter throughout, however much his external circumstances 
 may alter ; it is like a series of variations on a single theme. 
 No one can get beyond his own individuahty. An animal, 
 under whatever circumstances it is placed, remains within the 
 narrow limits to which nature has irrevocably consigned it ; 
 so that our endeavors to make a pet happy must always keep 
 within the compass of its nature, and be restricted to what it- 
 can feel. So it is with man ; the measure of the happiness he 
 can attain is determined beforehand by his individuality. More 
 especially is this the case with the mental powers, which fix 
 once for all his capacity for the higher kinds of pleasure. If 
 these powers are small, no efforts from without, nothing that 
 his fellowmen or that fortune can do for him, will suffice to 
 raise him above the ordinary degree of human happiness and 
 pleasure, half animal though it be ; his only resources are his 
 sensual appetite, — a cozy and cheerful family life at the most, — 
 low company and vulgar pastime ; even education, on the 
 whole, can avail little, if anything, for the enlargement of his 
 horizon. For the highest, most varied and lasting pleasures 
 are those of the mind, however much our youth may deceive 
 us on this point ; and the pleasures of the mind turn chiefly on 
 the powers of the mind. It is clear, then, that our happiness 
 depends in a great degree upon what we are, upon our indi- 
 viduality, whilst lot or destiny is generally taken to mean only 
 what we have, or our reputation. Our lot, in this sense, 
 may improve ; but we do not ask much of it if we are inwardly 
 rich : on the other hand, a fool remains a fool, a dull block- 
 head, to his last hour, even though he were surrounded by 
 houris in paradise. This is why Goethe, in the West-dstlichet 
 
DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. 7 
 
 Divan^ says that every man, whether he occupies a low position 
 in life, or emerges as its victor, testifies to personality as the 
 greatest factor in happiness : — 
 
 Volk und Knecht und Uherwinder 
 
 Sie gosiehen, zuj'eder Zeit, 
 H'dchstes Gluck der Erdenkinder 
 
 Set nur die Personlichkeit. 
 
 Everything confirms the fact that the subjective element in 
 life is incomparably more important for our happiness and 
 pleasure than the objective, from such sayings as Hunger is 
 the best sauce, and Youth and Age cannot live together, up to 
 the life of the Genius and the Saint. Health outweighs all 
 other blessings so much that one may really say that a healthy 
 beggar is happier than an ailing king. A quiet and cheerful 
 temperament, happy in the enjoyment of a perfectly sound 
 physique, an intellect clear, lively, penetrating and seeing 
 things as they are, a moderate and gentle will, and therefore a 
 good conscience — these are privileges which no rank or wealth 
 can make up for or replace. For what a man is in himself, 
 what accompanies him when he is alone, what no one can give 
 or take away, is obviously more essential to him than every- 
 thing he has in the way of possessions, or even what he may 
 be in the eyes of the world. An intellectual man in complete 
 solitude has excellent entertainment in his own thoughts and 
 fancies, while no amount or diversity of social pleasure, theatres, 
 excursions and amusements, can ward off boredom from a 
 dullard. A good, temperate, gentle character can be happy 
 in needy circumstances, whilst a covetous, envious and mali- 
 cious man, even if he be the richest in the world, goes miserable. 
 Nay more ; to one who has the constant delight of a special 
 individuality, with a high degree of intellect, most of the pleas- 
 ures which are run after by mankind are perfectly superfluous ; 
 they are even a trouble and a burden. And so Horace says 
 of himself, that, however many are deprived of the fancy -goods 
 of Ufe, there is one at least who can live without them : — 
 Getnmas, marmor, ebur, Tyrrhena sigilla, tabellas, 
 Argeritum, vestes Gcetulo murice tin etas 
 Sunt qui nan habeant, est qui nan curat habere ; 
 
8 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 and when Socrates saw various articles of luxury spread out for 
 sale, he exclaimed : How much there is in the world I do not want. 
 So the first and most essential element in our life's happiness 
 is what we are, — our personality, if for no other reason than 
 that it is a constant factor coming into play under all circum- 
 stances : besides, unlike the blessings which are described 
 under the other two heads, it is not the sport of destiny and 
 cannot be wrested from us ; — and, so far, it is endowed with an 
 absolute value in contrast to the merely relative worth of the 
 other two. The consequence of this is that it is much more 
 difficult than people commonly suppose to get a hold on a man 
 from without. But here the all-powerful agent, Time, comes 
 in and claims its rights, and before its influence physical and 
 mental advantages gradually waste away. Moral character 
 alone remains inaccessible to it. In view of the destructive 
 effect of time, it seems, indeed, as if the blessings named under 
 the other two heads, of which time cannot directly rob us, were 
 superior to those of the first. Another advantage might be 
 claimed for them, namely, that being in their very nature 
 objective and external, they are attainable, and every one is 
 presented with the possibility, at least, of coming into posses- 
 sion of them ; whilst what is subjective is not open to us to 
 acquire, but making its entry by a kind of divine right, it 
 remains for life, immutable, inalienable, an inexorable doom. 
 Let me quote those lines in which Goethe describes how an 
 unalterable destiny is assigned to every man at the hour of his 
 birth, so that he can develop only in the lines laid down for 
 him, as it were, by the conjunctions of the stars ; and how the 
 Sybil and the prophets declare that himself a man can never 
 escape, nor any power of time avail to change the path on 
 which his life is cast : — 
 
 Wie an dem Tag, der dich der Welt verliehen, 
 Die Sonne stand zum Grusse der Planeten, 
 Eist alsobald undfort undfort gediehen, 
 Nach detn Gesetz, wonach du angetreten. 
 So musst du sein, dir kannst du nicht entfliehen. 
 So sagten schon Sybtllen und Propheten ; 
 Und keine Zeit, und keine Macht zerstuckelt 
 Gepragte Form, die lebend sich entunckelt. 
 
DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. 9 
 
 The only thing that stands in our power to achieve, is to 
 make the most advantageous use possible of the personal 
 qualities we possess, and accordingly to follow such pursuits 
 only as will call them into play, to strive after the kind of per- 
 fection of which they admit and to avoid every other ; conse- 
 quently, to choose the position, occupation and manner of life 
 which are most suitable for their development. 
 
 Imagine a man endowed with herculean strength who is 
 compelled by circumstances to follow a sedentary occupation, 
 some minute exquisite work of the hands, for example, or to 
 engage in study and mental labor demanding quite other 
 powers, and just those which he has not got, — compelled, that 
 is, to leave unused the powers in which he is pre-eminently 
 strong ; a man placed like this will never feel happy all his life 
 through. Even more miserable will be the lot of the man with 
 intellectual powers of a very high order, who has to leave them 
 undeveloped and unemployed, in the pursuit of a calling which 
 does not require them, some bodily labor, perhaps, for which 
 his strength is insufficient. Still, in a case of this kind, it 
 should be our care, especially in youth, to avoid the precipice 
 of presumption, and not ascribe to ourselves a superfluity of 
 power which is not there. 
 
 Since the blessings described under the first head decidedly 
 outweigh those contained under the other two, it is manifestly 
 a wiser course to aim at the maintenance of our health and the 
 cultivation of our faculties, than at the amassing of wealth ; but 
 this must not be mistaken as meaning that we should neglect 
 to acquire an adequate supply of the necessaries of life. Wealth, 
 in the strict sense of the word, that is, great superfluity, can 
 do little for our happiness ; and many rich people feel unhappy 
 just because they are without any true mental culture or 
 knowledge, and consequently have no objective interests which 
 would qualify them for intellectual occupations. For beyond 
 the satisfaction of some real and natural necessities, all that the 
 possession of wealth can achieve has a very small influence 
 upon our happiness, in the proper sense of the word ; indeed, 
 wealth rather disturbs if, because the preservation of property 
 
lO THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 entails a great many unavoidable anxieties. And still men are 
 a thousand times more intent on becoming rich than on acquir- 
 ing culture, though it is quite certain that what a man is con- 
 tributes much more to his happiness than what he has. So 
 you may see many a man, as industrious as an ant, ceaselessly 
 occupied from morning to night in the endeavor to increase his 
 heap of gold. Beyond the narrow horizon of means to this 
 end, he knows nothing ; his mind is a blank, and consequently 
 unsusceptible to any other influence. The highest pleasures, 
 those of the intellect, are to him inaccessible, and he tries in 
 vain to replace them by the fleeting pleasures of sense in which 
 he indulges, lasting but a brief hour and at tremendous cost. 
 And if he is lucky, his struggles result in his having a really 
 great pile of gold, which he leaves to his heir, either to make 
 it still larger, or to squander it in extravagance. A life like 
 this, though pursued with a sense of earnestness and an air of 
 importance, is just as silly as many another which has a fool's 
 cap for its symbol. 
 
 U^t a man has in himself is, then, the chief element in his 
 happiness. Because this is, as a rule, so very little, most of 
 those who are placed beyond the struggle with penury, feel at 
 bottom quite as unhappy as those who are still engaged in it. 
 Their minds are vacant, their imagination dull, their spirits 
 poor, and so they are driven to the company of those like 
 them — for similis simili gaudet — where they make common 
 pursuit of pastime and entertainment, consisting for the most 
 part in sensual pleasure, amusement of every kind, and finally, 
 in excess and libertinism. A young man of rich family enters 
 upon life with a large patrimony, and often runs through it in 
 an incredible short space of time, in vicious extravagance ; and 
 why ? Simply because, here too, the mind is empty and void, 
 and so the man is bored with existence. He was sent forth 
 into the world outwardly rich but inwardly poor, and his vain 
 endeavor was to make his external wealth compensate for his 
 inner poverty, by trying to obtain everything/r<7W without^ 
 like an old man who seeks to strengthen himself as King David 
 or Mar6chal de Rex tried to do. And so in the end one who 
 is inwardly poor comes to be also poor outwardly. 
 
DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT. II 
 
 I need not insist upon the importance of the other two kinds 
 of blessings which make up the happiness of human life ; now- 
 a-days the value of possessing them is too well known to re- 
 quire advertisement. The third class, it is true, may seem, 
 compared with the second, of a very ethereal character, as it con- 
 sists only of other people's opinions. Still every one has to 
 strive for reputation, that is to say, a good name. Rank, on the 
 other hand, should be aspired to only by those who serve the 
 state, and fame by very few indeed. In any case, reputation 
 is looked upon as a priceless treasure, and fame as the most 
 precious of all the blessings a man can attain, — the Golden 
 Fleece, as it were, of the elect : whilst only fools will prefer 
 rank to property. The second and third classes, moreover, 
 are reciprocally cause and effect ; so far, that is, as Petronius* 
 maxim, habes habeberis, is true ; and conversely, the favor ol 
 others, in all its forms, often puts us in the way of getting what 
 we want. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 \^ .» • . .. PERSONALITYT OR WHAT A MAN IS/- ,-• 
 
 WE have already seen, in general, that what a man is 
 contributes much more to his happiness than what he 
 has., or how he is regarded by others. What a man is, and so 
 what he has in his own person, is always the chief thing to 
 consider ; for his individuality accompanies him always and 
 everywhere, and gives its color to all his experiences. In every 
 kind of enjoyment, for instance, the pleasure depends principally 
 upon the man himself. Every one admits this in regard to 
 physical, and how much truer it is of intellectual, pleasure. 
 When we use that English expression, " to enjoy one's self," 
 we are employing a very striking and appropriate phrase ; for 
 observe — one says, not * ' he enjoys Paris, ' ' but ' ' he enjoys 
 himself in Paris." To a man possessed of an ill-conditioned 
 individuality, all pleasure is like delicate wine in a mouth 
 made bitter with gall. Therefore, in the blessings as well as 
 in the ills of life, less depends upon what befalls us than upon 
 the way in which it is met, that is, upon the kind and degree 
 of our general susceptibility. What a man is and has in him- 
 self, — in a word personality, with all it entails, is the only 
 immediate and direct factor in his happiness and welfare. All 
 else is mediate and indirect, and its influence can be neutralized 
 and frustrated ; but the influence of personality never. This 
 is why the envy which personal quahties excite is the most 
 implacable of all, — as it is also the most carefully dissembled. 
 Further, the constitution of our consciousness is the ever 
 present and lasting element in all we do or suffer ; our indi- 
 viduality IS persistently at work, more or less, at every moment 
 
 (la) 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 13 
 
 of our life : all other influences are temporal, incidental, fleet- 
 ing, and subject to every kind of chance and change. This is 
 why Aristotle says: It is not wealth but character tJiat lasts} 
 
 And just for the same reason we can more easily bear a mis- 
 fortune which comes to us entirely from without, than one which 
 we have drawn upon ourselves ; for fortune may always change, 
 but not character. Therefore, subjective blessings, — a noble 
 nature, a capable head, a joyfuj .temperament, .bright spirits, a 
 well-constituted, perfectly sound physique, in a word, mens 
 Sana in corpore sano, are the first and most important elements 
 in happiness ; so that we should be more intent on promoting 
 and preserving such qualities than on the possession of external 
 wealth and external honor. 
 
 And of all these, the one which makes us the most directly 
 happy is a genial flow of good spirits ; for this excellent quality 
 is its own immediate reward. The man who is cheerful and 
 merry has always a good reason for being so, — the fact, namely, 
 that he is so. There is nothing which, like this quality, can 
 so completely replace the loss of every other blessing. If you 
 know anyone who is young, handsome, rich and esteemed, and 
 you want to know, further, if he is happy, ask. Is he cheerful 
 and genial ? — and if he is, what does it matter whether he is 
 young or old, straight or humpbacked, poor or rich ? — he is 
 happy. In my early days I once opened an old book and 
 found these words : If you laii^h a great deal, you are happy ; 
 if you cry a great deal, you are unhappy ; — a very simple re- 
 mark, no doubt ; but just because it is so simple I have never 
 been able to forget it, even though it is in the last degree a 
 truism. So if cheerfulness knocks at our door, we should 
 throw it wide open, for it never comes inopportunely ; instead 
 of that, we often make scruples about letting it in. We want 
 to be quite sure that we have every reason to be contented ; 
 then we are afraid that cheerfulness of spirits may interfere with 
 serious reflections or weighty cares. Cheerfulness is a direct 
 and immediate gain, — the very coin, as it were, of happiness, 
 ... , ' Eth. Eud., vii. 2. 37 : 
 
14 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 and not, like all else, merely a cheque upon the bank ; for it 
 alone makes us immediately happy in the present moment, and 
 that is the highest blessing for beings like us, whose existence 
 is but an infinitesimal moment between two eternities. To 
 secure and promote this feeling of cheerfulness should be the 
 supreme aim of all our endeavors after happiness. 
 
 Now it is certain that nothing contributes so little to cheer- 
 fulness as riches, or so much, as health. Is it not in the lower 
 classes, the so-called working classes, more especially those of 
 them who live in the country, that we see cheerful and con- 
 tented faces ? and is it not amongst the rich, the upper classes, 
 that we find faces full of ill-humor and vexation? Consequently 
 we should try as much as possible to maintain a high degree 
 of health ; for cheerfulness is the very flower of it. I need 
 hardly say what one must do to be healthy — avoid every kind 
 of excess, all violent and unpleasant emotion, all mental over- 
 strain, take daily exercise in the open air, cold baths and such 
 like hygienic measures. For without a proper amount of daily 
 exercise no one can remain healthy ; all the processes of life 
 demand exercise for the due performance of their functions, 
 exercise not only of the parts more immediately concerned, but 
 also of the whole body. For, as Aristotle rightly says. Life is 
 movement ; it is its very essence. Ceaseless and rapid motion 
 goes on in every part of the organism. The heart, with its 
 complicated double systole and diastole, beats strongly and 
 untiringly ; with twenty-eight beats it has to drive the whole 
 of the blood through arteries, veins and capillaries ; the lungs 
 pump like a steam-engine, without intermission ; the intestines 
 are always in peristaltic action ; the glands are all constantly 
 absorbing and secreting ; even the brain has a double motion 
 of its own, with every beat of the pulse and every breath we 
 draw. When people can get no exercise at all, as is the case 
 with the countless numbers who are condemned to a sedentary 
 life, there is a glaring and fatal disproportion between outward 
 inactivity and inner tumult. For this ceaseless internal motion 
 requires some external counterpart, and the want of it produces 
 effects like those of emotion which we are obliged to suppress. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 15 
 
 Even trees must be shaken by the wind, if they are to thrive. 
 The rule which finds its application here may be most briefly 
 expressed in Latin : omnis motus, quo celerior, eo magis tnotus. 
 
 How much our happiness depends upon our spirits, and 
 these again upon our state of health, may be seen by compar- 
 ing the influence which the same external circumstances or 
 events have upon us when we are well and strong with the 
 effects which they have when we are depressed and troubled 
 with ill-health. It is not what things are objectively and in 
 themselves, but what they are for us, in our way of looking at 
 them, that makes us happy or the reverse. As Epictetus says, 
 Men are not influenced by things, but by their thoughts about 
 things. And, in general, nine-tenths of our happiness depends 
 upon health alone. With health, everything is a source of 
 pleasure ; without it, nothing else, whatever it may be, is 
 enjoyable ; even the other personal blessings, — a great mind, 
 a happy temperament — are degraded and dwarfed for want of 
 it. So it is really with good reason that, when two people 
 meet, the first thing they do is to inquire after each other's 
 health, and to express the hope that it is good ; for good 
 health is by far the most important element in human happi- 
 ness. It follows from all this that the greatest of follies is to 
 sacrifice health for any other kind of happiness, whatever it 
 may be, for gain, advancement, learning or fame, let alone, 
 then, for fleeting sensual pleasures. Everything else should 
 rather be postponed to it. 
 
 But however much health may contribute to that flow of 
 good spirits which is so essential to our happiness, good spirits 
 do not entirely depend upon health ; for a man may be per- 
 fectly sound in his physique and still possess a melancholy 
 temperament and be generally given up to sad thoughts. The 
 ultimate cause of this is undoubtedly to be found in innate, 
 and therefore unalterable, physical constitution, especially in 
 the more or less normal relation of a man's sensitiveness to his 
 muscular and vital energy. Abnormal sensitiveness produces 
 inequality of spirits, a predominating melancholy, with peri- 
 odical fits of unrestrained liveliness. A genius is one whose 
 
l6 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 nervous power or sensitiveness is largely in excess ; as Aris- 
 totle' has very correctly observed, Men distinguished in phi- 
 losophy, politics, poetry or art, appear to be all of a melancholy 
 temperament. This is doubtless the passage which Cicero has 
 in his mind when he says, as he often does, Aristoteles aitomnes 
 ingeniosos melancholicos esse.^ Shakespeare has very neady 
 expressed this radical and innate diversity of temperament in 
 those lines in The Merchant of Venice : 
 
 Nature has framed strange fellows in her time ; 
 
 Some that will evermore peep through their eyes, 
 
 And laugh, like parrots at a bag-piper ; 
 
 And others of such vinegar aspect. 
 
 That they'll not show their teeth in way of smile, 
 
 Though Nestor swear the Jest be laughable. 
 
 This is the difference which Plato draws between evKolo^ and 
 ivoKoloi — the man of easy, and the man of difficult disposition — 
 in proof of which he refers to the varying degre.es of suscepti- 
 bility which different people show to pleasurable and painful 
 impressions ; so that one man will laugh at what makes an- 
 other despair. As a rule, the stronger the susceptibility to 
 unpleasant impressions, the weaker is the susceptibility to 
 pleasant ones, and vice versa. If it is equally possible for an 
 event to turn out well or ill, the ftmKoloc will be annoyed or 
 grieved if the issue is unfavorable, and will not rejoice, should 
 it be happy. On the other hand, the evKoXoi will neither worry 
 nor fret over an unfavorable issue, but rejoice if it turns out 
 well. If the one is successful in nine out of ten undertakings, 
 he will not be pleased, but rather annoyed that one has mis- 
 carried ; whilst the other, if only a single one succeeds, will 
 manage to find consolation in the fact and remain cheerful. 
 But here is another instance of the truth, that hardly any evil 
 is entirely without its compensation ; for the misfortunes and 
 sufferings which the vokoaol, that is, people of gloomy and 
 anxious character, have to overcome, are, on the whole, more 
 imaginary and therefore less real than those which befall the 
 
 > Probl. XXX., ep. i. « Tusc. i., 33. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 1 7 
 
 gay and careless; for a man who paints everything black, 
 who constantly fears the worst and takes measures accordingly, 
 will not be disappointed so often in this world, as one who 
 always looks upon the bright side of things. And when a 
 morbid affection of the nerves, or a derangement of the diges- 
 tive organs, plays into the hands of an innate tendency to 
 gloom, this tendency may reach such a height that permanent 
 discomfort produces a weariness of life. So arises an inclina- 
 tion to suicide, which even the most trivial unpleasantness 
 may actually bring about ; nay, when the tendency attains its 
 worst form, it may be occasioned by nothing in particular, 
 but a man may resolve to put an end to his existence, simply 
 because he is permanently unhappy, and then coolly and firmly 
 carry out his determination ; as may be seen by the way in 
 which the sufferer, when placed under supervision, as he 
 usually is, eagerly waits to seize the first ungarded moment, 
 when, without a shudder, without a struggle or recoil, he may 
 use the now natural and welcome means of effecting his release.^ 
 Even the healthiest, perhaps even the most cheerful man, may 
 resolve upon death under certain circumstances ; when, for 
 instance, his sufferings, or his fears of some inevitable mis- 
 fortune, reach such a pitch as to outweigh the terrors of death. 
 The only difference lies in the degree of suffering necessary to 
 bring about the fatal act, a degree which will be high in the 
 case of a cheerful, and low in that of a gloomy man. The 
 greater the melancholy, the lower need the degree be ; in the 
 end, it may even sink to zero. But if a man is cheerful, and 
 his spirits are supported by good health, it requires a high 
 degree of suffering to make him lay hands upon himself. There 
 are countless steps in the scale between the two extremes of 
 suicide, the suicide which springs merely from a morbid in- 
 tensification of innate gloom, and the suicide of the healthy and 
 cheerful man, who has entirely objective grounds for putting 
 an end to his existence. 
 
 ' For a detailed description of this condition of mind Cf Esquirol 
 Des maladies tnentales. 
 
I8 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 Beauty is partly an affair of health. It may be reckoned as 
 a personal advantage ; though it does not, properly speaking, 
 contribute directly to our happiness. It does so indirectly, by 
 impressing other people ; and it is no unimportant advantage, 
 even in man. Beauty is an open letter of recommendation, 
 predisposing the heart to favor the person who presents it. 
 As is well said in those lines of Homer, the gift of beauty is not 
 lightly to be thrown away, that glorious gift which none can 
 bestow save the gods alone — 
 
 ovToi dir6j3^7}T' iprl deuv ipiKvdea dupa, 
 
 baaa kcv avrbi Suaiv, iKuv S'oix uv ric iXoiro.^ 
 
 The most general survey shows us that the two foes oi 
 human happiness are pain and boredom. We may go further, 
 and say that in the degree in which we are fortunate enough 
 to get away from the one, we approach the other. Life pre- 
 sents, in fact, a more or less violent oscillation between the 
 two. The reason of this is that each of these two poles stands 
 in a double antagonism to the other, external or objective, 
 and inner or subjective. Needy surroundings and poverty 
 produce pain ; while, if a man is more than well off, he is 
 bored. Accordingly, while the lower classes are engaged in 
 a ceaseless struggle with need, in other words, with pain, the 
 upper carry on a constant and often desperate battle with bore- 
 dom.' The inner or subjective antagonism arises from the fact 
 that, in the individual, susceptibility to pain varies inversely 
 with susceptibility to boredom, because susceptibility is directly 
 proportionate to mental power. Let me explain. A dull 
 mind is, as a rule, associated with dull sensibilities, nerves which 
 no stimulus can affect, a temperament, in short, which does 
 not feel pain or anxiety very much, however great or terrible 
 it may be. Now, intellectual dullness is at the bottom of that 
 vacuity of soul which is stamped on so many faces, a state of 
 mind which betrays itself by a constant and lively attention to 
 
 ' Iliad 3, 65. 
 
 * And the extremes meet ; for the lowest state of civilization, a 
 nomad or wandering life, finds its counterpart in the highest, where 
 everyone is at times a tourist. The earlier stage was a case of neces- 
 sity ; the latter is a remedy for boredom. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 1 9 
 
 all the trivial circumstances in the external world. This is the 
 true source of boredom — a continual panting after excitement, 
 in order to have a pretext for giving the mind and spirits 
 something to occupy them. The kind of things people choose 
 for this purpose^ snows that they are not very particular, as 
 witness the miserable pastimes they have recourse to, and their 
 ideas of social pleasure and conversation : or again, the num- 
 ber of people who gossip on the doorstep or gape out of the 
 window. It is mainly because of this inner vacuity of soul 
 that people go in quest of society, diversion, amusement, lux- 
 ury of every sort, which lead many to extravagance and misery. 
 Nothing is so good a protection against such misery as inward 
 wealth, the wealth of the mind, because the greater it grows, 
 the less room it leaves for boredom. The inexhaustible act- 
 ivity of thought ! finding ever new material to work upon in 
 the multifarious phenomena of self and nature, and able and 
 ready to form new combinations of them, — there you have 
 something that invigorates the mind, and apart from moments 
 of relaxation, sets it far above the reach of boredom. 
 
 But, on the other hand, this high degree of intelligence is 
 rooted in a high degree of susceptibility, greater strength of 
 will, greater passionateness ; and from the union of these 
 qualities comes an increased capacity for emotion, an enhanced 
 sensibility to all mental and even bodily pain, greater impatience 
 of obstacles, greater resentment of interruption ; — all of which 
 tendencies are augmented by the power of the imagination, the 
 vivid character of the whole range of thought, including what 
 is disagreeable. This applies, in varying degrees, to every 
 step in the long scale of mental power, from the veriest dunce 
 to the greatest genius that ever lived. Therefore the nearer 
 anyone is, either from a subjective or from an objective point 
 of view, to one of these sources of suffering in human life, the 
 farther he is from the other. And so a man's natural bent will 
 lead him to make his objective world conform to his subjective 
 as much as possible ; that is to say, he will take the greatest 
 measures against that form of suffering to which he is most 
 liable. The wise man will, above all, strive after freedom from 
 pain and annoyance, quiet and leisure, consequently a tranquil, 
 
20 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 modest life, with as few encounters as may be ; and so, after a 
 little experience of his so-called fellowmen, he will elect to live 
 in retirement, or even, if he is a man of great intellect, in 
 solitude. For the more a man has in himself, the less he will 
 want from other people, — the less, indeed, other people can be 
 to him. This is why a high degree of intellect tends to make 
 a man unsocial. True, \{ quality of intellect could be made up 
 for by quantity, it might be worth while to live even in the 
 great world ; but unfortunately, a hundred fools together will 
 not make one wise man. 
 
 But the individual who stands at the other end of the scale is 
 no sooner free from the pangs of need than he endeavors to get 
 pastime and society at any cost, taking up with the first person 
 he meets, and avoiding nothing so much as himself For in 
 solitude, where every one is thrown upon his own resources, 
 what a man has in himself comes to light ; the fool in fine rai- 
 ment groans under the burden of his miserable personality, a 
 burden which he can never throw off, whilst the man of talent 
 peoples the waste places with his animating thoughts. Seneca 
 declares that folly is its own burden, — omnis stultitia laborai 
 fastidio sui, — a very true saying, with which may be compared 
 the words of Jesus, the son of Sirach, The life of a fool is worse 
 than deaths And, as a rule, it will be found that a man is 
 sociable just in the degree in which he is intellectually poor and 
 generally vulgar. For one's choice in this world does not go 
 much beyond solitude on one side and vulgarity on the other. 
 It is said that the most sociable of all people are the negroes ; 
 and they are at the bottom of the scale in intellect. I remember 
 reading once in a French paper' that the blacks in North 
 America, whether free or enslaved, are fond of shutting them- 
 selves up in large numbers in the smallest space, because they 
 cannot have too much of one another's snub-nosed company. 
 
 The brain may be regarded as a kind of parasite of the 
 organism, a pensioner, as it were, who dwells with the body : 
 and leisure, that is, the time one has for the free enjoyment of 
 one's consciousness or individuality, is the fruit or produce 
 of the rest of existence, which is in general only labor and 
 ' Ecclesiasticus, xxii. ii. » Le Commerce, Oct. 19th, 1837. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 21 
 
 effort. But what does most people's leisure yield ? — boredom 
 and dullness ; except, of course, when it is occupied with 
 sensual pleasure or folly. How little such leisure is worth may 
 be seen in the way in which it is spent : and, as Ariosto ob- 
 serves, how miserable are the idle hours of ignorant men ! — 
 ozio lungo d^uomini ignoranti. Ordinary people think merely 
 how they shall spend their time ; a man of any talent tries to 
 use it. The reason why people of limited intellect are apt to 
 be bored is that their intellect is absolutely nothing more than 
 the means by which the motive power of the will is put into 
 force : and whenever there is nothing particular to set the will 
 in motion, it rests, and their intellect takes a holiday, because, 
 equally with the will, it requires something external to bring 
 it into play. The result is an awful stagnation of whatever 
 power a man has — in a word, boredom. To counteract this 
 miserable feeling, men run to trivialities which please for the 
 moment they are taken up, hoping thus to engage the will in 
 order to rouse it to action, and so set the intellect in motion ; 
 for it is the latter which has to give effect to these motives of 
 the will. Compared with real and natural motives, these are 
 but as paper money to coin ; for their value is only arbitrary- 
 card games and the like, which have been invented for this 
 very purpose. And if there is nothing else to be done, a man 
 will twirl his thumbs or beat the devil's tattoo ; or a cigar may 
 be a welcome substitute for exercising his brains. Hence, in 
 all countries the chief occupation of society is card-playing,* 
 and it is the gauge of its value, and an outward sign that it is 
 bankrupt in thought. Because people have no thoughts to 
 deal in, they deal cards, and try and win one another's money. 
 Idiots ! But I do not wish to be unjust ; so let me remark 
 that it may certainly be said in defence of card-playing that it 
 is a preparation for the world and for business life, because 
 one learns thereby how to make a clever use of fortuitous but 
 
 > Translator's Note. — Card-playing to this extent is now, no doubt, 
 a thing of the past, at any rate amongst the nations of northern 
 Europe. The present fashion is rather in favor of a dilettante interest 
 in art or literature. 
 
22 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 unalterable circumstances, (cards, in this case), and to get as 
 much out of them as one can : and to do this a man must 
 learn a little dissimulation, and how to put a good face upon 
 a bad business. But, on the other hand, it is exacdy for this 
 reason that card-playing is so demoralizing, since the whole 
 object of it is to employ every kind of trick and machination 
 in order to win what belongs to another. And a habit of this 
 sort, learnt at the card-table, strikes root and pushes its way 
 into practical life ; and in the affairs of every day a man grad- 
 ually comes to regard meum and tuum in much the same light 
 as cards, and to consider that he may use to the utmost what- 
 ever advantages he possesses, so long as he does not come 
 within the arm of the law. Examples of what I mean are of 
 daily occurrence in mercantile life. Since, then, leisure is the 
 flower, or rather the fruit, of existence, as it puts a man into 
 possession of himself, those are happy indeed who possess 
 something real in themselves. But what do you get from most 
 people's leisure? — only a good-for-nothing fellow, who is ter- 
 ribly bored and a burden to himself. Let us, therefore, rejoice, 
 dear brethren, for we are not children of the bondwoman, but 
 of the free. 
 
 Further, as no land is so well off as that which requires few 
 imports, or none at all, so the happiest man is one who has 
 enough in his own inner wealth, and requires little or nothing 
 from outside for his maintenance, for imports are expensive 
 things, reveal dependence, entail danger, occasion trouble, and 
 when all is said and done, are a poor substitute for home pro- 
 duce. No man ought to expect much from others, or, in 
 general, from the external world. What one human being 
 can be to another is not. a very great deal : in the end every 
 one stands alone, and the important thing is who it is that 
 stands alone. Here, then, is another application of the general 
 truth which Goethe recognizes in Dichtung und Wahrheit 
 (Bk. III.), that in everything a man has ultimately to appeal 
 to himself; or, as Goldsmith puts it in The Traveller: 
 
 Still to ourselves in every place consign' d 
 Our own felicity we make or find. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 2$ 
 
 Himself is the source of the best and most a man can be or 
 achieve. The- more this is so — the more a man finds his 
 sources of pleasure in himself — the happier he will be. There- 
 fore, it is with great truth that Aristotle * says, To be happy 
 means to be self-sufficient. For all other sources of happiness 
 are in their nature most uncertain, precarious, fleeting, the 
 sport of chance ; and so even under the most favorable circum- 
 stances they can easily be exhausted ; nay, this is unavoidable, 
 because they are not always within reach. And in old age 
 these sources of happiness must necessarily dry up : — love 
 leavefs us then, and wit, desire to travel, delight in horses, 
 aptitude for social intercourse ; friends and relations, too, are 
 taken from us by death. Then more than ever, it depends 
 upon what a man has in himself; for this will stick to him 
 longest ; and at any period of life it is the only genuine and 
 lasting source of happiness. There is not much to be got 
 anywhere in the world. It is filled with misery and pain ; and 
 if a man escapes these, boredom lies in wait for him at every 
 corner. Nay more ; it is evil which generally has the upper 
 hand, and folly makes the most noise. Fate is cruel, and man- 
 kind is pitiable. In such a world as this, a man who is rich in 
 himself is like a bright, warm, happy room at Christmastide, 
 while without are the frost and snow of a December night. 
 Therefore, without doubt, the happiest destiny on earth is to 
 have the rare gift of a rich individuality, and, more especially, 
 to be possessed of a good endowment of intellect ; this is the 
 happiest destiny, though it may not be, after all, a very bril- 
 liant one. 
 
 There was great wisdom in that remark which Queen 
 
 Christina of Sweden made, in her nineteenth year, about 
 
 Descartes, who had then lived for twenty years in the deepest 
 
 solitude in Holland, and, apart from report, was known to her 
 
 only by a single essay : M. Descartes^ she said, is tlie happiest 
 
 of men, and his condition seems to m-e much to be envied."^ Of 
 
 course, as was the case with Descartes, e.xternal circumstances 
 
 must be favorable enough to allow a man to be master of his 
 
 ' Eth. Eud., vii. 2. 
 
 * Vie de Descartes, par Baillet. Liv. vii., ch. 10. 
 
24 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 life and happiness ; or, as we read in Ecclesiastes,^ — Wisdom 
 is good together with an inheritance, and profitable unto them 
 that see the sic7i. The man to whom nature and fate have granted 
 the blessing of wisdom, will be most anxious and careful to 
 keep open the fountains of happiness which he has in himself; 
 and for this, independence and leisure are necessary. To 
 obtain them, he will be willing to moderate his desires and 
 harbor his resources, all the more because he is not, like 
 others, restricted to the external world for his pleasures. So 
 he will not be misled by expectations of office, or money, or 
 the favor and applause of his fellowmen, into surrendering him- 
 self in order to conform to low desires and vulgar tastes ; nay, 
 in such a case he will follow the advice that Horace gives in 
 his epistle to Maecenas.' It is a great piece of folly to sacrifice 
 the inner for the outer man, to give the whole or the greater 
 part of one's quiet, leisure and independence for splendor, 
 rank, pomp, titles and honor. This is what Goethe did. My 
 good luck drew me quite in the other direction. 
 
 The truth which I am insisting upon here, the truth, namely, 
 that the chief source of human happiness is internal, is con- 
 firmed by that most accurate observation of Aristotle in the 
 Nichomachean Ethics,^ that every pleasure presupposes some 
 sort of activity, the application of some sort of power, without 
 which it cannot exist. The doctrine of Aristotle's, that a man's 
 happiness consists in the free exercise of his highest faculties, 
 is also enunciated by Stobaeus in his exposition of the Peripa- 
 tetic philosophy* : happiness, he says, means vigorous and 
 successful activity in all your undertakings ; and he explains 
 that by vigor (dperT)) he means mastery in any thing, whatever 
 it be. Now, the original purpose of those forces with which 
 nature has endowed man is to enable him to struggle against 
 the difficulties which beset him on all sides. But if this struggle 
 comes to an end, his unemployed forces become a burden to 
 him ; and he has to set to work and play with them, — to use 
 ' vii. 12. 2 Lib. I., ep. 7. 
 
 Nee somnum plebis laudo, satur a/Hlium, nee 
 Otia divitiis Arabum Uberrima muto. 
 
 » i. 7 and vii. 13, 14, * Eel. eth. ii., ch. 7. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 2$ 
 
 them, I mean, for no purpose at all, beyond avoiding the other 
 source of human suffering, boredom, to which he is at once 
 exposed. It is the upper classes, people of wealth, who are 
 the greatest victims of boredom. Lucretius long ago described 
 their miserable state, and the truth of his description may be 
 still recognized to-day, in the life of every great capital — where 
 the rich man is seldom in his own halls, because it bores him 
 to be there, and still he returns thither, because he is no better 
 off outside ; — or else he is away in post-haste to his house in 
 the country, as if it were on fire ; and he is no sooner arrived 
 there, than he is bored again, and seeks to forget everything 
 in sleep, or else hurries back to town once more. 
 
 ^;irzV saepe foras tnagnis ex csdibus ille, 
 
 Esse donii quern pertaesum est, subitoque reventat, 
 
 Quippe foris nihilo melius qui sentiai esse. 
 
 Currit, agens mannos, ad villain precipitanter, :■ 
 
 Auxilium tec lis quasi ferre ardentibus instans : 
 
 Oscitat extemplo, tetigit quunt litnina villae ; 
 
 Aut abit in somnum gravis, atque oblivia quaerii ; 
 
 Aut etiam properans urbetn petit atque revisit- • 
 
 In their youth, such people must have had a superfluity of 
 muscular and vital energy, — powers which, unlike those of the 
 mind, cannot maintain their full degree of vigor very long ; 
 and in later years they either have no mental powers at all. or 
 cannot develop any for want of employment which would bring 
 them into play ; so that they are in a wretched plight. Will, 
 however, they still possess, for this is the only power that is 
 inexhaustible ; and they try to stimulate their will by passionate 
 excitement, such as games of chance for high stakes — undoubt- 
 edly a most degrading form of vice. And one may say 
 generally that if a man finds himself with nothing to do, he is 
 sure to choose some amusement suited to the kind of power 
 in which he excels, — bowls, it may be, or chess ; hunting or 
 painting ; horse-racing or music ; cards, or poetry, heraldry, 
 philosophy, or some other dilettante interest. We might 
 classify these interests methodically, by reducing them to ex- 
 pressions of the three fundamental powers, the factors, that is 
 
 > III. 1073. 
 
26 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 to say, which go to make up the physiological constitution of 
 man ; and further, by considering these powers by themselves, 
 and apart from any of the definite aims which they may sub- 
 serve, and simply as affording three sources of possible pleasure, 
 out of which every man will choose what suits him, according 
 as he excels in one direction or another. 
 
 First of all come the pleasures oi vital energy, of food, drink, 
 digestion, rest and sleep ; and there are parts of the world 
 where it can be said that these are characteristic and national 
 pleasures. Secondly, there are the pleasures of muscular 
 energy^ such as walking, running, wrestling, dancing, fencing, 
 riding and similar athletic pursuits, which sometimes take the 
 form of sport, and sometimes of a military life and real warfare. 
 Thirdly, there are the pleasures of sensibility, such as observa- 
 tion, thought, feeling, or a taste for poetry or culture, music, 
 learning, reading, meditation, invention, philosophy and the 
 like. As regards the value, relative worth and duration of each 
 of these kinds of pleasure, a great deal might be said, which, 
 however, I leave the reader to supply. But every one will see 
 that the nobler the power which is brought into play, the 
 greater will be the pleasure which it gives ; for pleasure always 
 involves the use of one's own powers, and happiness consist in 
 a frequent repetition of pleasure. No one will deny that in 
 this respect the pleasures of sensibility occupy a higher place 
 than either of the other two fundamental kinds ; which exist 
 in an equal, nay, in a greater degree in brutes ; it is his pre- 
 ponderating amount of sensibility which distinguishes man 
 from other animals. Now, our mental powers are forms of 
 sensibility, and therefore a preponderating amount of it makes 
 us capable of that kind of pleasure which has to do with mind, 
 so-called intellectual pleasure ; and the more sensibility pre- 
 dominates, the greater the pleasure will be.^ 
 
 ' Nature exhibits a continual progress, starting from the mechanical 
 and chemical activity of the inorganic world, proceeding to the vege- 
 table, vyith its dull enjoyment of self, from that to the animal world, 
 where intelligence and consciousness begin, at first very weak, and 
 only after many intermediate stages attaining its last great develop- 
 ment in man. whose intellect is Nature's crowning point, the goal of 
 all her efforts, the most perfect and difficult of all her works. And 
 even within the range of the human intellect, there are a great many 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 27 
 
 The normal, ordinary man takes a vivid interest in anything 
 only in so fir as it excites his will, that is to say, is a matter 
 of personal interest to him. But constant excitement of the 
 will is never an unmixed good, to say the least ; in other 
 words, it involves pain. Card-playing, that universal occupa- 
 tion of ' * good society ' ' everywhere, is a device for providing 
 this kind of excitement, and that, too, by means of interests 
 so small as to produce slight and momentary, instead of real 
 and permanent, pain. Card-playing is, in fact, a mere tickling 
 of the will.^ 
 
 observable differences of degree, and it is very seldom that intellect 
 reaches its highest point, intelligence properly so-called, which in this 
 narrow and strict sense of the word, is Nature's most consummate 
 product, and so the rarest and most precious thing of which the world 
 can boast. The highest product of Nature is the clearest degree of 
 consciousness, in which the world mirrors itself more plainly and 
 completely than anywhere else. A man endowed with this form of 
 intelligence is in possession of what is noblest and best on earth ; and 
 accordingly, he has a source of pleasure in comparison with which all 
 others are small. From his surroundings he asks nothing but leisure 
 for the free enjoyment of what he has got, time, as it were, to polish 
 his diamond. All other pleasures that are not of the intellect are of a 
 lower kind ; for they are, one and all, movements of will — desires, 
 hopes, fears and ambitions, no matter to what directed : they are 
 always satisfied at the cost of pain, and in the case of ambition, gener- 
 ally with more or less of illusion. With intellectual pleasure, on the 
 other hand, truth becomes clearer and clearer. In the realm of 
 intelligence pain has no power. Knowledge is all in all. Further, 
 intellectual pleasures are accessible entirely and only through the 
 medium of the intelligence, and are limited by its capacity. For all 
 the wit there is in the world is useless to hint who has none. Still this 
 advantage is accompanied by a substantial disadvantage ; for the 
 whole of Nature shows that with the growth of intelligence comes in- 
 creased capacity for pain, and it is only with the highest degree of 
 intelligence that suffering reaches its supreme point. 
 
 ' Vulgarity is, at bottom, the kind of consciousness in which the 
 will completely predominates over the intellect, where the latter does 
 nothing more than perform the service of its master, the will. There- 
 fore, when the will makes no demands, supplies no motives, strong 
 or weak, the intellect entirely loses its power, and the result is com- 
 plete vacancy of mind. Now will without intellect is the most vulgar 
 and common thing in the world, possessed by every blockhead, who, 
 in the gratification of his passions, shows the stuff of which he is made. 
 This is the condition of mind called vulgarity, in which the only 
 active elements are the organs of sense, and that small amount of 
 intellect which is necessary for apprehending the data of sense. Ac- 
 cordingly, the vulgar man is constantly open to all sorts of impres- 
 sions, and immediately perceives all the little trifling things that go 
 
28 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 On the other hand, a man of powerful intellect is capable of 
 taking a vivid interest in things in the way of mere kyiowledge, 
 with no admixture oiwill; nay, such an interest is a necessity 
 to him. It places him in a sphere where pain is an alien, — a 
 diviner air, where the gods live serene. 
 
 QeoI 'pela ^uovTsg.^ 
 
 Look on these two pictures — the life of the masses, one long, 
 dull record of struggle and effort entirely devoted to the petty 
 interests of personal welfare, to misery in all its forms, a life 
 beset by intolerable boredom as soon as ever those aims are 
 satisfied and the man is thrown back upon himself, whence he 
 can be roused again to some sort of movement only by the 
 wild fire of passion. On the other side you have a man en- 
 dowed with a high degree of mental power, leading an existence 
 rich in thought and full of life and meaning, occupied by 
 worthy and interesting objects as soon as ever he is free to give 
 himself to them, bearing in himself a source of the noblest 
 pleasure. What external promptings he wants come from the 
 works of nature, and from the contemplation of human affairs 
 and the achievements of the great of all ages and countries, 
 which are thoroughly appreciated by a man of this type alone, 
 as being the only one who can quite understand and feel with 
 them. And so it is for him alone that those great ones have 
 really lived ; it is to him that they make their appeal ; the rest 
 are but casual hearers who only half understand either them or 
 their followers. Of course, this characteristic of the intellectual 
 man implies that he has one more need than the others, the 
 need of reading, observing, studying, meditating, practising, 
 the need, in short, of undisturbed leisure. For, as Voltaire 
 has very rightly said, /here are no real pleasures without real 
 needs ; and the need of them is why to such a man, pleasures 
 are accessible which are denied to others, — the varied beauties 
 
 on in his environment : the lightest whisper, the most trivial circum- 
 stance, is sufficient to rouse his attention ; he is just like an animal. 
 Such a man's mental condition reveals itself in his face, in his whole 
 exterior ; and hence that vulgar, repulsive appearance, which is all 
 the more offensive, if, as is usually the case, his will — the only factor 
 in his consciousness — is a base, selfish and altogether bad one. 
 ;. 'Odyssey IV., 805. 
 
* PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 29 
 
 of nature and art and literature. To heap these pleasures round 
 people who do not want them and cannot appreciate them, is 
 like expecting gray hairs to fall in love. A man who is privileg- 
 ed in this respect leads two lives, a personal and an intellectual 
 life ; and the latter gradually comes to be looked upon as the 
 true one, and the former as merely a means to it. Other peo- 
 ple make this shallow, empty and troubled existence an end in 
 itself. To the life of the intellect such a man will give the pref- 
 erence over all his other occupations : by the constant growth 
 of insight and knowledge, this intellectual life, like a slowly- 
 forming work of art, will acquire a consistency, a permanent 
 intensity, a unity which becomes ever more and more complete ; 
 compared with which, a life devoted to the attainment of per- 
 sonal comfort, a life that may broaden indeed, but can never 
 be deepened, makes but a poor show : andyet, as I have said, 
 people make this baser sort of existence an end in itself. 
 
 The ordinary life of every day, so far as it is not moved by 
 passion, is tedious and insipid ; and if it is so moved, it soon 
 becomes painful. Those alone are happy whom nature has 
 favored with some superfluity of intellect, something beyond 
 what is just necessary to carry out the behests of their will; 
 for it enables them to lead an intellectual life as well, a life un- 
 attended by pain and full of vivid interests. Mere leisure, 
 that is to say, intellect unoccupied in the service of the will, is 
 not of itself sufficient : there must be a real superfluity of 
 power, set free from the service of the will and devoted to that 
 of the intellect ; for, as Seneca says, otium. sine litteris viors est 
 et vivi hominis sepultura — illiterate leisure is a form of death, 
 a living tomb. Varying with the amount of the superfluity, 
 there will be countless developments in this second hfe, the life 
 of the mind ; it may be the mere collection and labelling of 
 insects, birds, minerals, coins, or the highest achievements of 
 poetry and philosophy. The life of the mind is not only a 
 protection against boredom ; it also wards off the pernicious 
 effe<5ls of boredom ; it keeps us from bad company, from 
 the many dangers, misfortunes, losses and extravagances 
 which the man who places his happiness entirely in the ob- 
 jective world is sure to encounter. My philosophy, for 
 
30 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 instance, has never brought me in a six-pence ; but it has 
 spared me many an expense. 
 
 The ordinary man places his life's happiness in things ex- 
 ternal to him, in property, rank, wife and children, friends, 
 society, and the like, so that when he loses them or finds them 
 disappointing, the foundation of his happiness is destroyed. 
 In other words, his centre of gravity is not in himself ; it is 
 constantly changing its place, with every wish and whim. If 
 he is a man of means, one day it will be his house in the coun- 
 try, another buying horses, or entertaining fi-iends, or travel- 
 ing, — a life, in short, of general luxury, the reason being that 
 he seeks his pleasure in things outside him. Like one whose 
 health and strength are gone, he tries to regain by the use of 
 jellies and drugs, instead of by developing his own vital power, 
 the true source of what he has lost. Before proceeding to the 
 opposite, let us compare with this common type the man who 
 comes midway between the two, endowed, it may be, not 
 exactly with distinguished powers of mind, but with somewhat 
 more than the ordinary amount of intellect. He will take a 
 dilettante interest in art, or devote his attention to some branch 
 of science — botany, for example, or physics, astronomy, his- 
 tory, and find a great deal of pleasure in such studies, and 
 amuse himself with them when external sources of happiness 
 are exhausted or fail to satisfy him any more. Of a man like 
 this it may be said that his centre of gravity is partly in him- 
 self. But a dilettante interest in art is a very different thing 
 from creative activity ; and an amateur pursuit of science is apt 
 to be superficial and not to penetrate to the heart of the matter. 
 A man cannot entirely identify himself with such pursuits, or 
 have his whole existence so completely filled and permeated 
 with them that he loses all interest in everything else. It is 
 only the highest intellectual power, what we call genius^ that 
 attains to this degree of intensity, making all time and exist- 
 ence its theme, and striving to express its peculiar conception 
 of the world, whether it contemplates life as the subject of 
 poetry or of philosophy. Hence, undisturbed occupation with 
 himself, his own thoughts and works, is a matter of urgent 
 necessity to such a man ; solitude is welcome, leisure is the 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 3I 
 
 highest good, and everything else is unnecessary, nay, even> 
 burdensome. 
 
 This is the only type of man of whom it can be said that his 
 centre of gravity is entirely in himself; which explains why it 
 is that people of this sort — and they are very rare — no matter 
 how excellent their character may be, do not show that warm 
 and unlimited interest in friends, family, and the community 
 in general, of which others are so often capable ; for if they 
 have only themselves they are not inconsolable for the loss of 
 everything else. This gives an isolation to their character, 
 which is all the more effective since other people never really 
 quite satisfy them, as being, on the whole, of a different nature: 
 nay more, since this difference is constantly forcing itself upon 
 their notice, they get accustomed to move about amongst man- 
 kind as alien beings, and in thinking of humanity in general, 
 to say they instead of we. 
 
 So the conclusion we come to is that the man whom nature 
 has endowed with intellectual wealth is the happiest ; so true 
 it is that the subjective concerns us more than the objective ; 
 for whatever the latter may be, it can work only indirectiy, 
 secondarily, and through the medium of the former — a truth 
 finely expressed by Lucian : — 
 
 TaXka S'kx^t ^tjiv irXeiova tQv kteuvuv — ' 
 
 the wealth of the soul is the only true wealth, for with all other 
 riehes comes a bane even greater than they. The man of 
 inner wealth wants nothing from outside but the negative gift 
 of undisturbed leisure, to develop and mature his intellectual 
 faculties, that is, to enjoy his wealth ; in short, he wants per- 
 mission to be himself, his whole life long, every day and every 
 hour. If he is destined to impress the character of his mind 
 upon a whole race, he has only one measure of happiness or 
 unhappiness — to succeed or fail in perfecting his powers and 
 completing his work. All else is of small consequence. Ac- 
 cordingly, the greatest minds of all ages have set the highest 
 value upon undisturbed leisure, as worth exacdy as much as 
 
 » Epigrammata, 12. 
 
^■ .^. 
 
 32 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 the man himself. Happiness appears to consist in leisure y says 
 Aristotle ; ' and Diogenes Laertius reports that Socrates praised 
 leisure as the fairest of all possessions. So, in the Nichoma- 
 chean Ethics^ Aristotle concludes that a life devoted to phi- 
 losophy is the happiest ; or, as he says in the Politics,^ the free 
 exercise of any power, whatever it may be , is happiness. This, 
 again, tallies with what Goethe says in Wilhelm Meister : The 
 man who is bom with a talent which he is meant to use, finds 
 his greatest happiness in tcsing.it. 
 
 But to be in possession of undisturbed leisure, is far from 
 being the common lot ; nay, it is something alien to human 
 nature, for the ordinary man's destiny is to spend life in pro- 
 curing what is necessary for the subsistence of himself and his 
 family ; he is a son of struggle and need, not a free intelligence. 
 So people as a rule soon get tired of undisturbed leisure, and 
 it becomes burdensome if there are no fictitious and forced 
 aims to occupy it, play, pastime and hobbies of every kind. 
 For this very reason it is full of possible danger, and difficilis 
 in otio quies is a true saying, — it is difficult to keep quiet if you 
 have nothing to do. On the other hand, a measure of intellect 
 far surpassing the ordinary, is as unnatural as it is abnormal. 
 But if it exists, and the man endowed with it is to be happy, 
 he will want precisely that undisturbed leisure which the others 
 find burdensome or pernicious ; for without it he is a Pegasus 
 in harness, and consequently unhappy. If these two unnatural 
 circumstances, external and internal, undisturbed leisure and 
 great intellect, happen to coincide in the same person, it is a 
 great piece of fortune ; and if fate is so far favorable, a man can 
 lead the higher life, the life protected from the two opposite 
 sources of human suffering, pain and boredom, from the pain- 
 ful struggle for existence, and the incapacity for enduring 
 leisure (which is free existence itself) — evils which may be 
 escaped only by being mutually neutralized. 
 
 But there is something to be said in opposition to this view. 
 Great intellectual gifts mean an activity pre-eminently nervous 
 in its character, and consequently a very high degree of sus- 
 ceptibility to pain in every form. Further, such gifts imply 
 • Eth. Nichom. x. 7. » iv. 11. 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 33 
 
 an intense temperament, larger and more vivid ideas, which, 
 as the inseparable accompaniment of great intellectual power, 
 entail on its possessor a corresponding intensity of the emo- 
 tions, making them incomparably more violent than those to 
 which the ordinary man is a prey. Now, there are more things 
 in the world productive of pain than of pleasure. Again, a 
 large endowment of intellect tends to estrange the man who 
 has it from other people and their doings ; for the more a man 
 has in himself, the less he will be able to find in them ; and 
 the hundred things in which they take delight, he will think 
 shallow and insipid. Here, then, perhaps, is another instance 
 of that law of compensation which makes itself felt everywhere. 
 How often one hears it said, and said, too, with some plaus- 
 ibility, that the narrow-minded man is at bottom the happiest, 
 even though his fortune is unenviable. I shall make no at- 
 tempt to forestall the reader's own judgment on this point; 
 more especially as Sophocles himself has given utterance to 
 two diametrically opposite opinions : — 
 
 Ilo/lXy rb (ppovslv evdai/iovia^ 
 npuTov VTapx^i-^ 
 
 he says in one place — wisdom is the greatest part of happiness ; 
 and again, in another passage, he declares that the life of the 
 thoughtless is the most pleasant of all — 
 
 'Ev ra (ppovEcv yap firjiev f/diaTO^ (iioc.^ 
 
 The philosophers of the 0/d Testament find themselves in a 
 
 like contradiction. 
 
 The life of a fool is worse than death ^ 
 
 and — 
 
 In much wisdom is much grief ; 
 
 and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.* 
 
 I may remark, however, that a man who has no mental 
 needs, because his intellect is of the narrow and normal amount, 
 is, in the strict sense of the word, what is called a philisiine — 
 an expression at first peculiar to the German language, a kind 
 of slang term at the Universities, afterwards used, by analogy, 
 
 1 Antigone, 1347-8. 2 Ajax, 554. 
 
 3 Ecclesiasticus, xxii. 11. * Ecclesiastes, i. 18. 
 
34 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 in a higher sense, though still in its original meaning, as de- 
 noting one who is not a Son of the Muses. A philistine is and 
 remains afioinoq avtip. I should prefer to take a higher point of 
 view, and apply the term philistine to people who are always 
 seriously occupied with realities which are no realities ; but as 
 such a definition would be a transcendental one, and therefore 
 not generally intelligible, it would hardly be in place in the 
 present treatise, which aims at being popular. The other 
 definition can be more easily elucidated, indicating, as it does, 
 satisfactorily enough, the essential nature of all those qualities 
 which distinguish the philistine. He is defined to be a man 
 without mental needs. From this it follows, firstly, in relation 
 to himself, that he has no intellectual pleasures ; for, as was 
 remarked before, there are no real pleasures without real needs. 
 The Philistine's life is animated by no desire to gain knowledge 
 and insight for their own sake, or to experience that true 
 aesthetic pleasure which is so nearly akin to them. If pleasures 
 of this kind are fashionable, and the philistine finds himself 
 compelled to pay attention to them, he will force himself to do 
 so, but he will take as little interest in them as possible. His 
 only real pleasures are of a sensual kind, and he thinks that 
 these indemnify him for the loss of the others. To him oysters 
 and champagne are the height of existence ; the aim of his life 
 is to procure what will contribute to his bodily welfare, and he 
 is indeed in a happy way if this causes him some trouble. If 
 the luxuries of life are heaped upon him, he will inevitably be 
 bored, and against boredom he has a great many fancied 
 remedies, balls, theatres, parties, cards, gambling, horses, 
 women, drinking, traveling and so on ; all of which can not 
 protect a man from being bored, for where there are no intel- 
 lectual needs, no intellectual pleasures are possible. The 
 peculiar characteristic of the philistine is a dull, dry kind of 
 gravity, akin to that of animals. Nothing really pleases, or 
 excites, or interests him, for sensual pleasure is quickly ex- 
 hausted, and the society of philistines soon becomes burden- 
 some, and one may even get tired of playing cards. True, the 
 pleasures of vanity are left, pleasures which he enjoys in his 
 own way, either by feeling himself superior in point of wealth, 
 
PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS. 35 
 
 or rank, or influence and power to other people, who there- 
 upon pay him honor ; or, at any rate, by going about with 
 those who have a superfluity of these blessings, sunning him- 
 self in the reflection of their splendor — what the English call 
 a snob. 
 
 From the essential nature of the philistine it follows, secondly, 
 in regard to others, that, as he possesses no intellectual, but 
 only physical needs, he will seek the society of those who can 
 satisfy the latter, but not the former. The last thing he 
 will expect from his friends is the possession of any sort of 
 intellectual capacity ; nay, if he chances to meet with it, it will 
 rouse his antipathy and even hatred ; simply because in addi- 
 tion to an unpleasant sense of inferiority, he experiences, in 
 his heart, a dull kind of envy, which has to be carefully con- 
 cealed even from himself. Nevertheless, it sometimes grows 
 into a secret feeling of rancor. But for all that, it will never 
 occur to him to make his own ideas of worth or value conform 
 to the standard of such qualities ; he will continue to give the 
 preference to rank and riches, power and influence, which in 
 his eves seem to be the only genuine adv^antages in the world ; 
 and his wish will be to excel in them himself. All this is the 
 consequence of his being a man without intellectual needs. The 
 great affliction of all philistines is that they have no interest in 
 ideas, and that, to escape being bored, they are in constant 
 need of realities. But realities are either unsatisfactory or 
 dangerous ; when they lose their interest, they become fatigu- 
 ing. But the ideal world is illimitable and calm, 
 
 something afar 
 From the sphere of our sorrow. 
 
 Note. — In these remarks on the personal qualities which, go 
 to make happiness, I have been mainly concerned with the 
 physical and intellectual nature of man. For an account of 
 the direct and immediate influence of moralify upon happiness, 
 let me refer to my prize essay on The Foundation of Morals 
 (Sec. 22.) 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 PROPERTY, OR WHAT A MAN HAS. 
 
 EPICURUS divides the needs of mankind into three classes, 
 and the division made by this great professor of happi- 
 ness is a true and a fine one. First come natural and necessary 
 needs, such as, when not satisfied, produce pain, — food and 
 clothing, victus et amictus, needs which can easily be satisfied. 
 Secondly, there are those needs which, though natural, are 
 not necessary, such as the gratification of certain of the senses. 
 I may add, however, that in the report given by Diogenes 
 Laertius, Epicurus does not mention which of the senses he 
 means ; so that on this point my account of his doctrine is 
 somewhat more definite and exact than the original. These 
 are needs rather more difficult to satisfy. The third class 
 consists of needs which are neither natural nor necessary, the 
 need of luxury and prodigality, show and splendor, which 
 never come to an end, and are very hard to satisfy.' 
 
 It is difficult, if not impossible, to define the limits which 
 reason should impose on the desire for wealth ; for there is no 
 absolute or definite amount of wealth which will satisfy a man. 
 The amount is always relative, that is to say, just so much as 
 will maintain the proportion between what he wants and what 
 he gets ; for to measure a man's happiness only by what he 
 gets, and not also by what he expects to get, is as futile as to 
 try and express a fraction which shall have a numerator but no 
 denominator. A man never feels the loss of things which it 
 never occurs to him to ask for ; he is just as happy without 
 
 • Cf. Diogenes Laertius, Bk. x., ch. xxvii,, pp. 127 and 149; also 
 Cicero de finibus, i., 13. (36) 
 
PROPERTY, OR WHAT A MAN HAS. 37 
 
 them ; whilst another, who may have a hundred times as 
 much, feels miserable because he has not got the one thing 
 which he wants. In fact, here too, every man has an horizon 
 of his own, and he will expect just as much as he thinks it is 
 possible for him to get. If an object within his horizon looks 
 as though he could confidently reckon on getting it, he is 
 happy ; but if difficulties come in the way, he is miserable. 
 What lies beyond his horizon has no effect at all upon him. 
 So it is that the vast possessions of the rich do not agitate the 
 poor, and conversely, that a wealthy man is not consoled by 
 all his wealth for the failure of his hopes. Riches, one may 
 say, are like sea-water ; the more you drink the thirstier you 
 become ; and the same is true of fame. The loss of wealth 
 and prosperity leaves a man, as soon as the first pangs of grief 
 are over, in very much the same habitual temper as before ; 
 and the reason of this is, that as soon as fate diminishes the 
 amount of his possessions, he himself immediately reduces the 
 amount of his claims. But when misfortune comes upon us, 
 to reduce the amount of our claims is just what is most painful ; 
 once that we have done so, the pain becomes less and less, and 
 is felt no more ; like an old wound which has healed. Con- 
 versely, when a piece of good fortune befalls us, our claims 
 mount higher and higher, as there is nothing to regulate them ; 
 it is in this feeling of expansion that the delight of it lies. But 
 it lasts no longer than the process itself, and when the expan- 
 sion is complete, the delight ceases ; we have become accus- 
 tomed to the increase in our claims, and consequently indifferent 
 to the amount of wealth which satisfies them. There is a 
 passage in the Odyssey^ illustrating this truth, of which I may 
 quote the last two lines : 
 
 ToZof ydp vooQ tarlv knixdoviuv uvdpuTruv 
 O'lov t<l> ^uap ayei noT^p dvSpCtv re deuv re. 
 
 — the thoughts of man that dwells on the earth are as the 
 
 day granted him by the father of gods and men. Discontent 
 
 springs from a constant endeavor to increase the amount of 
 
 our claims, when we are powerless to increase the amount 
 
 which will satisfy them. 
 
 ' xviii., 130-7 
 
 :.Jt- 
 
38 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 When we consider how full of needs the human race is, how 
 its whole existence is based upon them, it is not a matter for 
 surprise that wealth is held in more sincere esteem, nay, in 
 greater honor, than anything else in the world ; nor ought we 
 to wonder that gain is made the only goal of life, and every- 
 thing that does not lead to it pushed aside or thrown over- 
 board — philosophy, for instance, by those who profess it. 
 People are often reproached for wishing for money above all 
 things, and for loving it more than anything else ; but it is 
 natural and even inevitable for people to love that which, like 
 an unwearied Proteus, is always ready to turn itself into what- 
 ever object their wandering wishes or manifold desires may for 
 the moment fix upon. Everything else can satisfy only one 
 wish, one need : food is good only if you are hungry ; wine, if 
 you are able to enjoy it ; drugs, if you are sick ; fur for the 
 winter ; love for youth, and so on. These are all only rela- 
 tively good, ayaQa Trpof ri. Money alone is absolutely good, 
 because it is not only a concrete satisfaction of one need in 
 particular ; it is an abstract satisfaction of all. 
 
 If a man has an independent fortune, he should regard it as 
 a bulwark against the many evils and misfortunes which he 
 may encounter ; he should not look upon it as giving him leave 
 to get what pleasure he can out of the world, or as rendering 
 it incumbent upon him to spend it in this way. People who 
 are not born with a fortune, but end by making a large one 
 through the exercise of whatever talents they possess, almost 
 always come to think that their talents are their capital, and 
 that the money they have gained is merely the interest upon 
 it ; they do not lay by a part of their earnings to form a per- 
 manent capital, but spend their money much as they have 
 earned it. Accordingly, they often fall into poverty ; their 
 earnings decrease, or come to an end altogether, either because 
 their talent is exhausted by becoming antiquated, — as, for 
 mstance, very often happens in the case of fine art ; or else it 
 was valid only under a special conjunction of circumstances 
 which has now passed away. There is nothing to prevent 
 those who live on the common labor of their hands from treat- 
 ing their earnings in that way if they like ; because their kind 
 
PROPERTY, OR WHAT A MAN HAS. 39 
 
 of skill is not likely to disappear, or, if it does, it can be re- 
 placed by that of their fellow-workmen ; moreover, the kind 
 of work they do is always in demand ; so that what the proverb 
 says is quite true, a useful trade is a mine of gold. But with 
 artists and professionals of every kind the case is quite different, 
 and that is the reason why they are well paid. They ought 
 to build up a capital .out of their earnings ; but they recklessly 
 look upon them as merely interest, and end in ruin. On the 
 other hand, people who inherit money know, at least, how to 
 distinguish between capital and interest, and most of them try 
 to make their capital secure and not encroach upon it ; nay, if 
 they can, they put by at least an eighth of their interest in order 
 to meet future contingencies. So most of them maintain their 
 position. These few remarks about capital and interest are 
 not applicable to commercial life, for merchants look upon 
 money only as a means of further gain, just as a workman 
 regards his tools ; so even if their capital has been entirely the 
 result of their own efforts, they try to preserve and increase it 
 by using it. Accordingly, wealth is nowhere so much at home 
 as in the merchant class. 
 
 It will generally be found that those who know what it is to 
 have been in need and destitution are very much less afraid of 
 it, and consequently more inclined to extravagance, than those 
 who know poverty only by hearsay. People who have been 
 born and bred in good circumstances are as a rule much more 
 careful about the future, more economical, in fact, than those 
 who, by a piece of good luck, have suddenly passed from 
 poverty to wealth. This looks as if poverty were not really 
 such a very wretched thing as it appears from a distance. The 
 true reason, however, is rather the fact that the man who has 
 been born into a position of wealth comes to look upon it as 
 something without which he could no more live than he could 
 live without air ; he guards it as he does his very life ; and so 
 he is generally a lover of order, prudent and economical. But 
 the man who has been born into a poor position looks upon it 
 as the natural one, and if by any chance he comes in for a 
 fortune, he regards it as a superfluity, something to be enjoyed 
 or wasted, because, if it comes to an end, he can get on just 
 
40 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 as well as before, with one anxiety the less ; or, as Shakespeare 
 says in Henry VI. / 
 
 . , . . the adage must be verified 
 That beggars mounted run their horse to death. 
 
 But it should be said that people of this kind have a firm and 
 excessive trust, partly in fate, partly in the peculiar means 
 which have already raised them out of need and poverty, — a 
 trust not only of the head, but of the heart also ; and so they 
 do not, like the man born rich, look upon the shallows of 
 poverty as bottomless, but console themselves with the thought 
 that once they have touched ground again, they can take 
 another upward flight. It is this trait in human character 
 which explains the fact that women who were poor before their 
 marriage often make greater claims, and are more extravagant, 
 than those who have brought their husbands a rich dowry ; 
 because, as a rule, rich girls bring with them, not only a for- 
 tune, but also more eagerness, nay, more of the inherited 
 instinct, to preserve it, than poor girls do. If anyone doubts 
 the truth of this, and thinks that it is just the opposite, he will 
 find authority for his view in Ariosto's first Satire ; but, on 
 the other hand, Dr. Johnson agrees with my opinion. A 
 woman of fortune, he says, being used to the handling of money ^ 
 spends it judiciously ; but a woman who gets the cofnmand of 
 money for the first time upon her marriage, has such a gusto in 
 spending it, that she throws it away with great prof usio?i.* And 
 in any case let me advise anyone who marries a poor girl not 
 to leave her the capital but only the interest, and to take 
 especial care that she has not the management of the children's 
 fortune. 
 
 I do not by any means think that I am touching upon a 
 subject which is not worth my while to mention when I recom- 
 mend people to be careful to preserve what they have earned 
 or inherited. For to start life with just as much as will make 
 one independent, that is, allow one to live comfortably without 
 having to work — even if one has only just enough for oneself, 
 not to speak of a family — is an advantage which cannot be 
 
 ' Part III., Act I, So. 4. 
 * Boswell's Life of Johnson : ann : 1776, aetat : 67. 
 
PROPERTY, OR WHAT A MAN HAS. 4I 
 
 over-estimated ; for it means exemption and immunity from 
 that chronic disease of penury, which fastens on the life of 
 man like a plague ; it is emancipation from that forced labor 
 which is the natural lot of every mortal. Only under a favor- 
 able fate like this can a man be said to be born free, to be, in 
 the proper sense of the word, sui juris, master of his own time 
 and powers, and able to say every morning. This day is my 
 own. And just for the same reason the difference between the 
 man who has a hundred a year and the man who has a thou- 
 sand, is infinitely smaller than the difference between the 
 former and a man who has nothing at all. But inherited wealth 
 reaches its utmost value when it falls to the individual endowed 
 with mental powers of a high order, who is resolved to pursue 
 a line of life not compatible with the making of money ; for he 
 is then doubly endowed by fate and can live for his genius ; 
 and he will pay his debt to mankind a hundred times, by 
 achieving what no other could achieve, by producing some 
 work which contributes to the general good, and redounds to 
 the honor of humanity at large. Another, again, may use his 
 wealth to further philanthropic schemes, and make himself well- 
 deserving of his fellowmen. But a man who does none of 
 these things, who does not even try to do them, who never 
 attempts to learn the rudiments of any branch of knowledge so 
 that he may at least do what he can towards promoting it — 
 such a one, born as he is into riches, is a mere idler and thief 
 of time, a contemptible fellow. He will not even be happy, 
 because, in his ease, exemption from need delivers him up to 
 the other extreme of human suffering, boredom, which is such 
 martyrdom to him, that he would have been better off if pov- 
 erty had given him something to do. And as he is bored he 
 is apt to be extravagant, and so lose the advantage of which 
 he showed himself unworthy. Countless numbers of people 
 find themselves in want, simply because, when they had money, 
 they spent it only to get momentary relief from the feeling of 
 boredom which oppressed them. 
 
 It is quite another matter if one's object is success in pohtical 
 life, where favor, friends and connections are all -important, in 
 order to mount by their aid step by step on the ladder of pro- 
 
 ii*. 
 
I ' 
 
 42 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 motion, and perhaps gain the topmost rung. In this kind of 
 life, it is much better to be cast upon the world without a 
 penny ; and if the aspirant is not of noble family, but is a man 
 of some talent, it will redound to his advantage to be an 
 absolute pauper. For what every one most aims at in ordinary 
 contact with his fellows is to prove them inferior to himself ; 
 and how much more is this the case in politics. Now, it is 
 only an absolute pauper who has such a thorough conviction 
 of his own complete, profound and positive inferiority from 
 every point of view, of his own utter insignificance and worth- 
 lessness, that he can take his place quietly in the political 
 machine.* He is the only one who can keep on bowing low 
 enough, and even go right down upon his face if necessary ; 
 he alone can submit to everything and laugh at it ; he alone 
 knows the entire worthlessness of merit ; he alone uses his 
 loudest voice and his boldest type whenever he has to speak 
 or write of those who are placed over his head, or occupy any 
 position of influence ; and if they do a little scribbling, he is 
 ready to applaud it as a masterwork. He alone understands 
 how to beg, and so betimes, when he is hardly out of his boy- 
 hood, he becomes a high priest of that hidden mystery which 
 Goethe brings to light ; — 
 
 Uber's Niedertrachtige 
 
 Niemand sich beklage : 
 
 Denn es ist das Machtige 
 
 Was man dir auch sage : 
 
 — it is no use to complain of low aims ; for, whatever people 
 may say, they rule the world. 
 
 On the other hand, the man who is bom with enough to 
 live upon is generally of a somewhat independent turn of mind; 
 he is accustomed to keep his head up ; he has not learned all 
 the arts of the beggar ; perhaps he even presumes a little upon 
 the possession ol talents which, as he ought to know, can 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — Schopenhauer is probably here making one 
 of his many virulent attacks upon Hegel ; in this case on account of 
 what he thought to be the philosopher's abject servility to the govern- 
 ment of his day. Though the Hegelian system has been the fruitful 
 mother of many liberal ideas, there can be no doubt that Hegel's 
 influence, in his own lifetime, was an eflfective support of Prussian 
 bureaucracy. 
 
PROPERTY, OR WHAT A MAN HAS. 43 
 
 never compete with cringingf mediocrity ; in the long run he 
 comes to recognize the inferiority of those who are placed 
 over his head, and when they try to put insults upon him, he 
 becomes refractory and shy. This is not the way to get on in 
 the world. Nay, such a man may at least incline to the opinion 
 freely expressed by Voltaire : We have only two days to live ; 
 it is not worth Our while to spend them in cringing to contemptible 
 rascals. But alas ! let me observe by the way, that contempt- 
 ible rascal is an attribute which may be predicated of an abom- 
 inable number of people. What Juvenal says — it is difificult to 
 rise if your poverty is greater than your talent — 
 
 Hand facile emergunt quorum, virtutibus obstat 
 Res angusta domi — 
 
 is more applicable to a career of art and literature than to 
 political and social ambition. 
 
 Wife and children I have not reckoned amongst a man's 
 possessions : he is rather in their possession. It would be 
 easier to include friends under that head ; but a man's friends 
 belong to him not a whit more than he belongs to them. 
 
B 
 
 CHAP'^ER IV. 
 
 POSITION, OR A man's PLACE IN THE ESTIMATION 
 
 OF OTHERS. 
 
 Section i. — Reputation. 
 
 Y a peculiar weakness of human nature, people generally 
 think too much about the opinion which others form of 
 them ; although the slightest reflection will show that this 
 opinion, whatever it may be, is not in itself essential to happi- 
 ness. Therefore it is hard to understand why everybody feels 
 so very pleased when he sees that other people have a good 
 opinion of him, or say anything flattering to his vanity. If 
 you stroke a cat, it will purr ; and, as inevitably, if you praise 
 a man, a sweet expression of delight will appear on his foce ; 
 and even though the praise is a palpable lie, it will be welcome, 
 if the matter is one on which he prides himself If only other 
 people will applaud him, a man may console himself for down- 
 right misfortune or for the pittance he gets from the two 
 sources of human happiness already discussed : and conversely, 
 it is astonishing how infallibly a man will be annoyed, and in 
 some cases deeply pained, by any wrong done to his feeling 
 of self-importance, whatever be the nature, degree, or circum- 
 stances of the injury, or by any depreciation, slight, or dis- 
 regard. 
 
 If the feeling of honor rests upon this peculiarity of human 
 nature, it may have a very salutary effect upon the welfare of 
 a great many people, as a substitute for morality ; but upon 
 their happiness, more especially upon that peace of mind and 
 independence which are so essential to happiness, its effect will 
 be disturbing and prejudicial rather than salutary. Therefore 
 it is advisable, from our point of view, to set limits to this 
 
 (44) 
 
REPUTATION. 45 
 
 weakness, and duly to consider and rightly to estimate the 
 relative value of advantages, and thus temper, as far as possible, 
 this great susceptibility to other people's opinion, whether the 
 opinion be one flattering to our vanity, or whether it causes 
 us pain ; for in either case it is the same feeling which is 
 touched. Otherwise, a man is the slave of what other people 
 are pleased to think, — and how little it requires to disconcert 
 or soothe the mind that is greedy of praise : 
 
 Sic leve, sic parvutn est, anitnunt quod laudis avarutn 
 Submit ac reficit.^ 
 
 Therefore it will very much conduce to our happiness if we 
 duly compare the value of what a man is in and for himself 
 with what he is in the eyes of others. Under the former comes 
 everything that fills up the span of our existence and makes it 
 what it is, in short, all the advantages already considered and 
 summed up under the heads of personality and property ; and 
 the sphere in which all this takes place is the man's own con- 
 sciousness. On the other hand, the sphere of what we are for 
 other people is their consciousness, not ours ; it is the kind 
 of figure we make in their eyes, together with the thoughts 
 which this arouses.* But this is something which has no direct 
 and immediate existence for us, but can affect us only mediately 
 and indirectly, so far, that is, as other people's behavior 
 towards us is directed by it ; and even then it ought to affect 
 us only in so far as it can move us to modify what we are in 
 and for ourselves. Apart from this, what goes on in other 
 people's consciousness is, as such, a matter of indifference to 
 us ; and in time we get really indifferent to it, when we come 
 to see how superficial and futile are most people's thoughts, 
 how narrow their ideas, how mean their sentiments, how per- 
 verse their opinions, and how much of error there is in most 
 of them ; when we learn by experience with what depreciation 
 a man will speak of his fellow, when he is not obliged to fear 
 
 1 Horace, Epist : II., i, i8o. 
 ' Let me remark that people in the highest positions in life, with 
 all their brilliance, pomp, display, magnificence and general show, 
 may well say : — Our happiness lies entirely outside us, for it exists 
 only in the heads of others. 
 
46 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 him, or thinks that what he says will not come to his ears. 
 And if ever we have had an opportunity of seeing how the 
 greatest of men will meet with nothing but slight from half- 
 a-dozen blockheads, we shall understand that to lay great 
 value upon what other people say is to pay them too much 
 honor. 
 
 At all events, a man is in a very bad way, who finds no 
 source of happiness in the first two classes of blessings already 
 treated of, but has to seek it in the third, in other words, not 
 in what he is in himself, but in what he is in the opinion of 
 others. For, after all, the foundation of our whole nature, 
 and, therefore, of our happiness, is our physique, and the most 
 essential factor in happiness is health, and, next in importance 
 after health, the ability to maintain ourselves in independence 
 and freedom from care. There can be no competition or com- 
 pensation between these essential factors on the one side, and 
 honor, pomp, rank and reputation on the other, however much 
 value we may set upon the latter. No one would hesitate to 
 sacrifice the latter for the former, if it were necessary. We 
 should add very much to our happiness by a timely recogni- 
 tion of the simple truth that every man's chief and real exist- 
 ence is in his own skin, and not in other people's opinions; 
 and, consequently, that the actual conditions of our personal 
 life, — health, temperament, capacity, income, wife, children, 
 friends, home, are a hundred times more important for our 
 happiness than what other people are pleased to think of us : 
 otherwise we shall be miserable. And if people insist that 
 honor is dearer than life itself, what they really mean is that 
 existence and well-being are as nothing compared with other 
 people's opinions. Of course, this may be only an exaggerated 
 way of stating the prosaic truth that reputation, that is, the 
 opinion others have of us, is indispensable if we are to make 
 any progress in the world ; but I shall come back to that 
 presentiy. When we see that almost everything men devote 
 their lives to attain, sparing no effort and encountering a thou- 
 sand toils and dangers in the process, has, in the end, no further 
 object than to raise themselves in the estimation of others ; 
 ■when we see that not only offices, titles, decorations, but also 
 
REPUTATION. 47 
 
 wealth, nay, even knowledge ^ and art, are striven for only to 
 obtain, as the ultimate goal of all effort, greater respect from 
 one's fellowmen, — is not this a lamentable proof of the extent 
 to which human folly can go ? To set much too high a value 
 on other people's opinion is a common error everywhere ; an 
 error, it may be, rooted in human nature itself, or the result 
 of civilization and social arrangements generally ; but, what- 
 ever its source, it exercises a very immoderate influence on all 
 we do, and is very prejudicial to our happiness. We can trace 
 it from a timorous and slavish regard for what other people will 
 say, up to the feeling which made Virginius plunge the dagger 
 into his daughter's heart, or induces many a man to sacrifice 
 quiet, riches, health and even life itself, for posthumous glory. 
 Undoubtedly this feeling is a very convenient instrument in the 
 hands of those who have the control or direction of their 
 fellowmen ; and accordingly we find that in every scheme for 
 training up humanity in the way it should go, the maintenance 
 and strengthening of the feeling of honor occupies an important 
 place. But it is quite a different matter in its effect on human 
 happiness, of which it is here our object to treat ; and we 
 should rather be careful to dissuade people from setting too 
 much store by what others think of them. Daily experience 
 shows us, however, that this is just the mistake people persist 
 in making ; most men set the utmost value precisely on what 
 other people think, and are more concerned about it than 
 about what goes on in their own consciousness, which is the 
 thing most immediately and directly present to them. They 
 reverse the natural order, — regarding the opinions of others as 
 real existence and their own consciousness as something 
 shadowy ; making the derivative and secondary into the prin- 
 cipal, and considering the picture they present to the world of 
 more importance than their own selves. By thus trying to get 
 a direct and immediate result out of what has no really direct 
 or immediate existence, they fall into the kind of folly which is 
 called vanity — the appropriate term for that which has no solid 
 
 • Scire tuum nihil est nisi te scire hoc sciat alter, (Persius i. 27) — 
 knowledge is no use unless others know that you have it. 
 
48 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 or intrinsic value. Like a miser, such people forget the end 
 in their eagerness to obtain the means. 
 
 The truth is that the value we set upon the opinion of others, 
 and our constant endeavor in respect of it, are each quite out 
 of proportion to any result we may reasonably hope to attain ; 
 SO that this attention to other people's attitude may be regarded 
 as a kind of universal mania which every one inherits. In all 
 we do, almost the first thing we think about is, what will peo- 
 ple say ; and nearly half the troubles and bothers of life may 
 be traced to our anxiety on this score ; it is the anxiety which 
 is at the bottom of all that feeling of self-importance, which is 
 so often mortified because it is so very morbidly sensitive. It 
 is solicitude about what others will say that underlies all our 
 vanity and pretension, yes, and all our show and swagger too. 
 Without it, there would not be a tenth part of the luxury which 
 exists. Pride in every form, point d' honneur and punctilio, 
 however varied their kind or sphere, are at bottom nothing 
 but this — anxiety about what others will say — and what sacri- 
 fices it often costs I One can see it even in a child ; and though 
 it exists at every period of life, it is strongest in age ; because, 
 when the capacity for sensual pleasure fails, vanity and pride 
 have only avarice to share their dominion. Frenchmen, per- 
 haps, afford the best example of this feeling, and amongst 
 them it is a regular epidemic, appearing sometimes in the most 
 absurd ambition, or in a ridiculous kind of national vanity and 
 the most shameless boasting. However, they frustrate their 
 own aims, for other people make fun of them and call them la . 
 grande nation. 
 
 By way of specially illustrating this perverse and exuberant 
 respect for other people's opinion, let me take a passage from 
 the Times of March 31st, 1846, giving a detailed account of 
 the execution of one Thomas Wix, an apprentice who, from 
 motives of vengeance, had murdered his master. Here we 
 have very unusual circumstances and an extraordinary char- 
 acter, though one very suitable for our purpose ; and these 
 combine to give a striking picture of this folly, which is so 
 deeply rooted in human nature, and allow us to form an ac- 
 
REPUTATION. 49 
 
 curate notion of the extent to which it will go. On the morning 
 of the execution, says the report, /^ rev. ordinary was early 
 in attendance upon him, but Wix, beyond a quiet demeanor, 
 betrayed no interest in his ministrations, appearing to feel 
 anxious 07ily to acquit himrSelf ' ' bravely ' ' before the spectators 
 of his ignominious end. . ... In the procession Wix fell 
 into his proper place with alacrity, and, as he entered the Chapel- 
 yard, remarked, sufficiently loud to be heard by several persons 
 near him, ^''Now, then, as Dr. Dodd said, I shall soon know 
 the grand secret.^ ^ On reaching the scaffold, the miserable 
 wretch mounted the drop without the slightest assistance, and 
 when he got to the centre, he bowed to the spectators twice, a pro- 
 ceeding which called forth a tremendous cheer from the degraded 
 crowd beneath. 
 
 This is an admirable example of the way in which a man, 
 with death in the most dreadful form before his very eyes, and 
 eternity beyond it, will care for nothing but the impression he 
 makes upon a crowd of gapers, and the opinion he leaves 
 behind him in their heads. There was much the same kind of 
 thing in the case of Lecompte, who was executed at Frankfurt, 
 also in 1846, for an attempt on the king's life. At the trial 
 he was very much annoyed that he was not allowed to appear, 
 in decent attire, before the Upper House ; and on the day of 
 the execution it was a special grief to him that he was not per- 
 mitted to shave. It is not only in recent times that this kind 
 of thing has been known to happen. Mateo Aleman tells us, 
 in the Introduction to his celebrated romance, fuzman de 
 -AlfaracJie, that many infatuated criminals, instead of devoting 
 their last hours to the welfare of their souls, as they ought to 
 have done, neglect this duty for the purpose of preparing 
 and committing to memory a speech to be made from the 
 scaffold. 
 
 I take these extreme cases as being the best illustrations of 
 what I mean ; for they give us a magnified reflection of our 
 own nature. The anxieties of all of us, our worries, vexations, 
 bothers, troubles, uneasy apprehensions and strenuous efforts 
 are due, in perhaps the large majority of instances, to what 
 Other people will say ; and we are just as foolish in this respect 
 
50 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 as those miserable criminals. Envy and hatred are very often 
 traceable to a similar source. 
 
 Now, it is obvious that happiness, which consists for the 
 most part in peace of mind and contentment, would be served 
 by nothing so much as by reducing this impulse of human 
 nature within reasonable limits, — which would perhaps make 
 it one fiftieth part of what it is now. By doing so, we should 
 get rid of a thorn in the flesh which is always causing us pain. 
 But it is a very difficult task, because the impulse in question 
 is a natural and innate perversity of human nature. Tacitus 
 says. The lust of fame is the last that a wise man shakes off} 
 The only way of putting an end to this universal folly is to see 
 clearly that it is a folly ; and this may be done by recognizing 
 the fact that most of the opinions in men's heads are apt to be 
 false, perverse, erroneous and absurd, and so in themselves 
 unworthy of any attention ; further, that other people's opinions 
 can have very little real and positive influence upon us in 
 most of the circumstances and affairs of life. Again, this 
 opinion is generally of such an unfavorable character that it 
 would worry a man to death to hear everything that was said 
 of him, or the tone in which he was spoken of. And finally, 
 among other things, we should be clear about the fact that 
 honor itself has no really direct, but only an indirect, value. 
 If people were generally converted from this universal folly, 
 the result would be such an addition to our piece of mind and 
 cheerfulness as at present seems inconceivable ; people would 
 present a firmer and more confident front to the world, and 
 generally behave with less embarrassment and restraint. It is 
 observable that a retired mode of life has an exceedingly bene- 
 ficial influence on our peace of mind, and this is mainly because 
 we thus escape having to live constantly in the sight of others, 
 and pay everlasting regard to their casual opinions ; in a word, 
 we are able to return upon ourselves. At the same time a 
 good deal of positive misfortune might be avoided, which we 
 are now drawn into by striving after shadows, or, to speak 
 more correctly, by indulging a mischievous piece of folly ; 
 and we should consequently have more attention to give to 
 
 • Hist. iv.. 6. 
 
PRIDE, 51 
 
 solid realities and enjoy them with less interruption than at 
 present. But ;r«^eTo rd Kokd. — what is worth doing is hard to do. 
 
 Section 2. — Pride. 
 
 The folly of our nature which we are discussing puts forth 
 three shoots, ambition, vanity and pride. The difference 
 between the last two is this : pride is an established conviction 
 of one's own paramount worth in some particular respect ; 
 while vanity is the desire of rousing such a conviction in others, 
 and it is generally accompanied by the secret hope of ultimately 
 coming to the same conviction oneself. Pride worksyV^w with- 
 in ; it is the dire6l appreciation of oneself. Vanity is the desire 
 to arrive at this appreciation indirectly, /rtw? without. So we 
 find that vain people are talkative, proud, and taciturn. But 
 the vain person ought to be aware that the good opinion of 
 others, which he strives for, may be obtained much more 
 easily and certainly by persistent silence than by speech, even 
 though he has very good things to say. Anyone who wishes 
 to affect pride is not therefore a proud man ; but he will soon 
 have to drop this, as every other, assumed character. 
 
 It is only a firm, unshakeable conviction of pre-eminent worth 
 and special value which makes a man proud in the true sense 
 of the word, — a conviction which may, no doubt, be a mistaken 
 one or rest on advantages which are of an adventitious and 
 conventional character : still pride is not the less pride for all 
 that, so long as it be present in real earnest. And since pride 
 is thus rooted in conviction, it resembles every other form of 
 knowledge in not being within our own arbitrament. Pride's 
 worst foe, — I mean its greatest obstacle, — is vanity, which 
 courts the applause of the world in order to gain the necessary 
 foundation for a high opinion of one's own worth, whilst pride 
 is based upon a pre-existing conviction of it. 
 
 It is quite true that pride is something which is generally 
 found fault with, and cried down ; but usually, I imagine, by 
 those who have nothing upon which they can pride themselves. 
 In view of the impudence and foolhardiness of most people, 
 anyone who possesses any kind of superiority or merit will do 
 
 M 
 ^ 
 
 U, OF ILL LIB. 
 
52 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 well to keep his eyes fixed on it, if he does not want it to be 
 entirely forgotten ; for if a man is good-natured enough to 
 ignore his own privileges, and hob-nob with the generality of 
 other people, as if he were quite on their level, they will be 
 sure to treat him, frankly and candidly, as one of themselves. 
 This is a piece of advice I would specially offer to those whose 
 superiority is of the highest kind — real superiority, I mean, of 
 a purely personal nature — which cannot, like orders and titles, 
 appeal to the eye or ear at every moment ; as, otherwise, they 
 will find that familiarity breeds contempt, or, as the Romans 
 used to say, S7is Minervam. Joke with a slave, and he* II soon 
 show his heels, is an excellent Arabian proverb ; nor ought we 
 to despise what Horace says, 
 
 Sume superbiam 
 Qucesitam meritis. 
 
 — usurp the fame you have deserved. No doubt, when mod- 
 esty was made a virtue, it was a very advantageous thing for 
 the fools ; for everybody is expected to speak of himself as if 
 he were one. This is leveling down indeed ; for it comes to 
 look as if there were nothing but fools in the world. 
 
 The cheapest sort of pride is national pride ; for if a man is 
 proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of 
 his own of which he can be proud ; otherwise he would not 
 have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions 
 of his fellowmen. The man who is endowed with important 
 personal qualities will be only too ready to see clearly in what 
 respects his own nation falls short, since their failings will be 
 constantly before his eyes. But every miserable fool who has 
 nothing at all of which he can be proud adopts, as a last re- 
 source, pride in the nation to which he belongs ; he is ready 
 and glad to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus 
 reimbursing himself for his own inferiority. For example, if 
 you speak of the stupid and degrading bigotry of the English 
 nation with the contempt it deserves, you will hardly find one 
 Englishman in fifty to agree with you ; but if there should be 
 one, he will generally happen to be an intelligent man. 
 
 The Germans have no national pride, wliich shows how 
 
RANK. 53 
 
 honest they are, as everybody knows ! and how dishonest are 
 those who, by a piece of ridiculous affectation, pretend that 
 they are proud of their country — the Deutsche Bruder and the 
 demagogues who flatter the mob in order to mislead it. I have 
 heard it said that gunpowder was invented by a German. I 
 doubt it. Lichtenberg asks, Why is it that a man who is not 
 a German does not care about pretending that he is one ; and 
 that if he makes any pretence at all, it is to be a Frenchman or 
 an Englishman?^ 
 
 However that may be, individuality is a far more important 
 thing than nationality, and in any given man deserves a thou- 
 sand-fold more consideration. And since you cannot speak 
 of national character without referring to large masses of peo- 
 ple, it is impossible to be loud in your praises and at the same 
 time honest. National character is only another name for the 
 particular form which the littleness, perversity and baseness of 
 mankind take in every country. If we become disgusted with 
 one, we praise another, until we get disgusted with this too. 
 Every nation mocks at other nations, and all are right. 
 
 The contents of this chapter, which treats, as I have said, of 
 what we represent in the world, or what we are in the eyes of 
 others, may be further distributed under three heads : honor, 
 rank and fame. 
 
 Section j. — Rank. 
 
 Let us take rank first, as it may be dismissed in a few words, 
 although it plays an important part in the eyes of the masses 
 and of the philistines, and is a most useful wheel in the ma- 
 chinery of the State. 
 
 It has a purely conventional value. Strictly speaking, it is 
 a sham ; its method is to exact an artificial respect, and, as a 
 matter of fact, the whole thing is a mere farce. 
 
 Orders, it may be said, are bills of exchange drawn on public 
 opinion, and the measure of their value is the credit of the 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — It should be remembered that these remarks 
 were written in the earlier part of the present century, and that a 
 German philosopher now-a-days, even though he were as apt to say 
 bitter things as Schopenhauer, could hardly write in a similar strain. 
 
54 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 drawer. Of course, as a substitute for pensions, they save the 
 State a good deal of money ; and, besides, they serve a very 
 useful purpose, if they are distributed with discrimination and 
 judgment. For people in general have eyes and ears, it is 
 true ; but not much else, very little judgment indeed, or even 
 memory. There are many services to the State quite beyond 
 the range of their understanding ; others, again, are appre- 
 ciated and made much of for a time, and then soon forgotten. 
 It seems to me, therefore, very proper, that a cross or a star 
 should proclaim to the mass of people always and everywhere. 
 This man is not like you ; he has done something. But orders 
 lose their value when they are distributed unjustly, or without 
 due selection, or in too great numbers : a prince should be as 
 careful in conferring them as a man of business is in signing a 
 bill. It is a pleonasm to inscribe on any oxA^x for distinguished 
 service ; for every order ought to be for distinguished service. 
 That stands to reason. 
 
 Section 4. — Honor. 
 
 Honor is a much larger question than rank, and more 
 difficult to discuss. Let us begin by trying to define it. 
 
 If I were to say Honor is external conscience, and conscience 
 is inward honor, no doubt a good many people would assent ; 
 but there would be more show than reality about such a de- 
 finition, and it would hardly go to the root of the matter. I 
 prefer to say. Honor is, on its objective side, other people' s 
 opinion of what we are worth ; on its subjective side, it is the 
 respect we pay to this opinion. From the latter point of view, 
 to be a m.an of honor is to exercise what is often a very whole- 
 some, but by no means a purely moral, influence. 
 
 The feelings of honor and shame exist in every man who is 
 not utterly depraved, and honor is everywhere recognized as 
 something particularly valuable. The reason of this is as 
 follows. By and in himself a man can accomplish very little ; 
 he is like Robinson Crusoe on a desert island. It is only in 
 society that a man's powers can be called into full activity. 
 He very soon finds this out when his consciousness begins to 
 develop, and there arises in him the desire to be looked upon 
 
HONOR. 55 
 
 as a useful member of society, as one, that is, who is capable 
 of playing his part as a vs\2Si— pro parte virili — thereby acquir- 
 ing a right to the benefits of social life. Now, to be a useful 
 member of society, one must do two things : firstly, what 
 everyone is expected to do everywhere ; and, secondly, what 
 one's own particular position in the world demands and 
 requires. 
 
 But a man soon discovers that everything depends upon his 
 being useful, not in his own opinion, but in the opinion of 
 others ; and so he tries his best to make that favorable im- 
 pression upon the world, to which he attaches such a high 
 value. Hence, this primitive and innate characteristic of human 
 nature, which is called the feeling of honor, or, under another 
 aspect, the feeling of shame — verecundia. It is this which 
 brings a blush to his cheek at the thought of having suddenly 
 to fall in the estimation of others, even when he knows that he 
 is innocent, nay, even if his remissness extends to no absolute 
 obligation, but only to one which he has taken upon himself 
 of his own free will. Conversely, nothing in life gives a man 
 so much courage as the attainment or renewal of the conviction 
 that other people regard him with favor ; because it means 
 that everyone joins to give him help and protection, which is 
 an infinitely stronger bulwark against the ills of life than any- 
 thing he can do himself. 
 
 The variety of relations in which a man can stand to other 
 people so as to obtain their confidence, that is, their good 
 opinion, gives rise to a distinction between several kinds of 
 honor, resting chiefly on the different bearings that meum may 
 take to tuum ; or, again, on the performance of various pledges ; 
 or finally, on the relation of the sexes. Hence, there are three 
 main kinds of honor, each of which takes various forms — civic 
 honor, official honor, and sexual honor. 
 
 Civic honor has the widest sphere of all. It consists in the 
 assumption that we shall pay unconditional respect to the 
 rights of others, and, therefore, never use any unjust or un- 
 lawful means of getting what we want. It is the condition of 
 all peaceable intercourse between man and man ; and it is 
 destroyed by anything that openly and- manifestly militates 
 
56 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 against this peaceable intercourse, anything, accordingly, which 
 entails punishment at the hands of the law, always supposing 
 that the punishment is a just one. 
 
 The ultimate foundation of honor is the conviction that moral 
 character is unalterable : a single bad action implies that future 
 actions of the same kind will, under similar circumstances, also 
 be bad. This is well expressed by the English use of the word 
 character as meaning credit, reputation, honor. Hence honor, 
 once lost, can never be recovered ; unless the loss rested on 
 some mistake, such as may occur if a man is slandered or his 
 actions viewed in a false light. So the law provides remedies 
 against slander, libel, and even insult ; for insult though it 
 amounts to no more than mere abuse, is a kind of summary 
 slander with a suppression of the reasons. What I mean may 
 be well put in the Greek phrase — not quoted from any author 
 — ecrnv ^ Aot(56pta dtaSoX^ ffwro/iof. It is true that if a man abuses 
 another, he is simply showing that he has no real or true causes 
 of complaint against him ; as, otherwise, he would bring these 
 forward as the premises, and rely upon his hearers to draw 
 the conclusion themselves : instead of which, he gives the 
 conclusion and leaves out the premises, trusting that people 
 will suppose that he has done so only for the sake of being 
 brief 
 
 Civic honor draws its existence and name from the middle 
 classes ; but it applies equally to all, not excepting the highest. 
 No man can disregard it, and it is a very serious thing, oi 
 which every one should be careful not to make light. The 
 man who breaks confidence has for ever forfeited confidence, 
 whatever he may do, and whoever he may be ; and the bitter 
 consequences of the loss of confidence can never be averted. 
 
 There is a sense in which honor may be said to have a 
 negative character in opposition to the positive character ol 
 fame. For honor is not the opinion people have of particular 
 qualities which a man may happen to possess exclusively : it 
 is rather the opinion they have of the qualities which a man 
 may be expected to exhibit, and to which he should not prove 
 false. Honor, therefore, means that a man is not exceptional ; 
 fame, that he is. Fame is something which must be won ; 
 
HONOR. , 57 
 
 honor, only something which must not be lost. The absence 
 of fame is obscurity, which is only a negative ; but loss of honor 
 is shame, which is a positive quality. This negative character 
 of honor must not be confused with anything passive; for 
 honor is above all things active in its working. It is the only 
 quality which proceeds directly from the man who exhibits it : 
 it is concerned entirely with what he does and leaves undone, 
 and has nothing to do with the actions of others or the ob- 
 stacles they place in his way. It is something entirely in our 
 own power — tuv kiju'muv. This distinction, as we shall see 
 presently, marks off true honor from the sham honor of 
 chivalry. 
 
 Slander is the only weapon by which honor can be attacked 
 from without ; and the only way to repel the attack is to con- 
 fute the slander with the proper amount of publicity, and a due 
 unmasking of him who utters it. 
 
 The reason why respect is paid to age is that old people 
 have necessarily shown in the course of their lives whether or 
 not they have been able to maintain their honor unblemished ; 
 while that of young people has not been put to the proof, 
 though they are credited with the possession of it. For 
 neither length of years, — equalled, as it is, and even excelled, 
 in the case of some of the lower animals, — nor, again, experi- 
 ence, which is only a closer knowledge of the world's ways, 
 can be any sufficient reason for the respect which the young 
 are everywhere required to show towards the old: for if it 
 were merely a matter of years, the weakness which attends on 
 age would call rather for consideration than for respect. It is, 
 however, a remarkable fact that white hair always commands 
 reverence — a reverence really innate and instinctive. Wrinkles 
 — a much surer sign of old age — command no reverence at all ; 
 you never hear any one speak of venerable wrinkles; but 
 venerable white hair is a common expression. 
 
 Honor has only an indirect value. For, as I explained at 
 the beginning of this chapter, what other people think of us, 
 if it affects us at all, can affect us only in so far as it governs 
 their behavior towards us, and only just so long as we live 
 with, or have to do with, them. But it is to society alone that 
 
58 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 we owe that safety which we and our possessions enjoy in a 
 state of civilization ; in all we do we need the help of others, 
 and they, in their turn, must have confidence in us before they 
 can have anything to do with us. Accordingly, their opinion 
 of us is, indirectly, a matter of great importance ; though I 
 cannot see how it can have a direct or immediate value. This 
 is an opinion also held by Cicero. / quite agree, he writes, 
 with what Chrysippus and Diogenes used to say, that a good 
 rep7itatio?i is not zvorth raising a finger to obtain, if it were not 
 that it is so useful.^ This truth has been insisted upon at great 
 length by Helvetius in his chief work De V Esprit,^ the conclu- 
 sion of which is that we love esteem not for its own sake, but 
 solely for the advantages which it brings. And as the means 
 can never be more than the end, that saying, of which so much 
 is made, Honor is dearer than life itself, is, as I have remarked, 
 a very exaggerated statement. So much then, for civic honor. 
 
 Official honor is the general opinion of other people that a 
 man who fills any office really has the necessary qualities for 
 the proper discharge of all the duties which appertain to it. 
 The greater and more important the duties a man has to dis- 
 charge in the State, and the higher and more influential the 
 office which he fills, the stronger must be the opinion which 
 people have of the moral and intellectual qualities which render 
 him fit for his post. Therefore, the higher his position, the 
 greater must be the degree of honor paid to him, expressed, 
 as it is, in titles, orders and the generally subservient behavior 
 of others towards him. As a rule, a man's official rank implies 
 the particular degree of honor which ought to be paid to him, 
 however much this degree may be modified by the capacity of 
 the masses to form any notion of its importance. Still, as a 
 matter of fa6t, greater honor is paid to a man who fulfills 
 special duties than to the common citizen, whose honor mainly 
 consists in keeping clear of dishonor. 
 
 Official honor demands, further, that the man who occupies 
 
 an office must maintain respe6t for it, for the sake both of his 
 
 colleagues and of those who will come after him. This respe<5t 
 
 an official can maintain by a proper observance of his duties, 
 
 ' De finibus iii., 17. * Disc: iii. 17. 
 
HONOR. 59 
 
 and by repelling any attack that may be made upon the office 
 itself or upon its occupant : he must not, for instance, pass 
 over unheeded any statement to the effe6l that the duties of 
 the office are not properly discharged, or that the office itself 
 does not conduce to the public welfare. He must prove the 
 unwarrantable nature of such attacks by enforcing the legal 
 penalty for them. 
 
 Subordinate to the honor of official personages comes that 
 of those who serve the State in any other capacity, as doctors, 
 lawyers, teachers, anyone, in short, who by graduating in any 
 subject, or by any other public declaration that he is qualified 
 to exercise some special skill, claims to pra6lice it ; in a word, 
 the honor of all those who take any public pledges whatever. 
 Under this head comes military honor, in the true sense of the 
 word, the opinion that people who have bound themselves to 
 defend their country really possess the requisite qualities which 
 will enable them to do so, especially courage, personal bravery 
 and strength, and that they are perfectly ready to defend their 
 country to the death, and never and under no circumstances 
 desert the flag to which they have once sworn allegiance. I 
 have here taken official honor in a wider sense than that in 
 which it is generally used, namely, the respect due by citizens 
 to an office itself 
 
 In treating of sexual honor and the principles on which it 
 rests, a little more attention and analysis are necessary ; and 
 what I shall say will support my contention that all honor 
 really rests upon a utilitarian basis. There are two natural 
 divisions of the subject — the honor of women and the honor of 
 men, in either side issuing in a well-understood esprit de corps. 
 The former is by far the more important of the two, because 
 the most essential feature in woman's life is her relation to 
 man. 
 
 Female honor is the general opinion in regard to a girl that 
 she is pure, and in regard to a wife that she is faithful. The 
 importance of this opinion rests upon the following considera- 
 tions. Women depend upon men in all the relations of life ; 
 men upon women, it might be said, in one only. So an ar- 
 rangement is made for mutual interdependence — man under- 
 
6o THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 taking responsibility for all woman's needs and also for the 
 children that spring from their union — an arrangement on 
 which is based the welfare of the whole female race. To carry- 
 out this plan, women have to band together with a show of 
 esprit de corps, and present one undivided front to their com- 
 mon enemy, man, — who possesses all the good things of the 
 earth, in virtue of his superior physical and intellectual power, 
 — in order to lay siege to and conquer him, and so get posses- 
 sion of him and a share of those good things. To this end the 
 honor of all women depends upon the enforcement of the rule 
 that no woman should give herself to a man except in marriage, 
 in order that every man may be forced, as it were, to surrender 
 and ally himself with a woman ; by this arrangement provision 
 is made for the whole of the female race. This is a result, 
 however, which can be obtained only by a strict observance of 
 the rule, ; and, accordingly, women everywhere show true 
 esprit de corps in carefully insisting upon its maintenance. 
 Any girl who commits a breach of the rule betrays the whole 
 female race, because its welfare would be destroyed if every 
 woman were to do likewise ; so she is cast out with shame as 
 one who has lost her honor. No woman will have anything 
 more to do with her ; she is avoided like the plague. The 
 same doom is awarded to a woman who breaks the marriage 
 tie ; for in so doing she is false to the terms upon which the 
 man capitulated ; and as her condu6l is such as to frighten 
 other men from making a similar surrender, it imperils the 
 welfare of all her sisters. Nay, more ; this deception and coarse 
 breach of troth is a crime punishable by the loss, not only of 
 personal, but also of civic honor. This is why we minimize 
 the shame of a girl, but not of a wife ; because, in the former 
 case, marriage can restore honor, while in the latter, no atone- 
 ment can be made for the breach of contrail. 
 
 Once this esprit de corps is acknowledged to be the founda- 
 tion of female honor, and is seen to be a wholesome, nay, a 
 necessary arrangement, as at bottom a matter of prudence and 
 interest, its extreme importance for the welfare of women will 
 be recognized. But it does not possess anything more than a 
 relative value. It is no absolute end, lying beyond all other 
 
HONOR. 6l 
 
 aims of existence and valued above life itself. In this view, 
 there will be nothing to applaud in the forced and extravagant 
 condu6l of a Lucretia or a Virginius — condu6l which can easily 
 degenerate into tragic farce, and produce a terrible feeling of 
 revulsion. The conclusion of Emilia Galotti, for instance, 
 makes one leave the theatre completely ill at ease ; and, on the 
 other hand, all the rules of female honor cannot prevent a cer- 
 tain sympathy with Clara in Egmont. To carry this principle 
 of female honor too far is to forget the end in thinking of the 
 means — and this is just what people often do ; for such ex- 
 aggeration suggests that the value of sexual honor is absolute ; 
 while the truth is that it is more relative than any other kind. 
 One might go so far as to say that its value is purely conven- 
 tional, when one sees from Thomasius how in all ages and 
 countries, up to the time of the Reformation, irregularities 
 were permitted and recognized by law, with no derogation 
 to female honor, — not to speak of the temple of Mylitta at 
 Babylon.* 
 
 There are also of course certain circumstances in civil life 
 which make external forms of marriage impossible, especially 
 in Catholic countries, where there is no such thing as divorce. 
 Ruling princes everywhere, would, in my opinion, do much 
 better, from a moral point of view, to dispense with forms 
 altogether rather than contract a morganatic marriage, the 
 descendants of which might raise claims to the throne if the 
 legitimate stock happened to die out ; so that there is a pos- 
 sibility, though, perhaps, a remote one, that a morganatic 
 marriage might produce a civil war. And, besides, such a 
 marriage, concluded in defiance of all outward ceremony, is a 
 concession made to women and priests — two classes of persons 
 to whom one should be most careful to give as little tether as 
 possible. It is further to be remarked that every man in a 
 country can marry the woman of his choice, except one poor 
 individual, namely, the prince. His hand belongs to his 
 country, and can be given in marriage only for reasons of 
 State, that is, for the good of the country. Still, for all that, 
 he is a man ; and, as a man, he likes to follow whither his 
 
 ' Herodotus, i. 199. 
 
62 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 heart leads. It is an unjust, ungrateful and priggish thing to 
 forbid, or to desire to forbid, a prince from following his in- 
 clinations in this matter ; of course, as long as the lady has no 
 influence upon the Government of the country. From her 
 point of view she occupies an exceptional position, and does 
 not come under the ordinary rules of sexual honor ; for she 
 has merely given herself to a man who loves her, and whom 
 she loves but cannot marry. And in general, the fact that the 
 principle of female honor has no origin in nature, is shown by 
 the many bloody sacrifices which have been offered to it, — the 
 murder of children and the mother's suicide. No doubt a girl 
 who contravenes the code commits a breach of faith against 
 her whole sex ; but this faith is one which is only secretly 
 taken for granted, and not sworn to. And since, in most 
 cases, her own prospects suffer most immediately, her folly is 
 infinitely greater than her crime. 
 
 The corresponding virtue in men is a produ6l of the one I 
 have been discussing. It is their esprit de corps, which de- 
 mands that, once a man has made that surrender of himself in 
 marriage which is so advantageous to his conqueror, he shall 
 take care that the terms of the treaty are maintained ; both in 
 order that the agreement itself may lose none of its force by 
 the permission of any laxity in its observance, and that men, 
 having given up everything, may, at least, be assured of their 
 bargain, namely, exclusive possession. Accordingly, it is part 
 of a man's honor to resent a breach of the marriage tie on the 
 part of his wife, and to punish it, at the very least by separa- 
 ting from her. If he condones the offence, his fellowmen cry 
 shame upon him ; but the shame in this case is not nearly so 
 foul as that of the woman who has lost her honor ; the stain is 
 by no means of so deep a dye — levioris notae viacula ; — because 
 a man's relation to woman is subordinate to many other and 
 more important affairs in his life. The two great dramatic 
 poets of modern times have each taken man's honor as the 
 theme of two plays ; Shakespeare in Othello and The Winter' s 
 Tale, and Calderon in El medico de su honra, (The Physician 
 of his Honor), and A secreto agravio secreta venganza, (for 
 Secret Insult Secret Vengeance). It should be said, however, 
 
HONOR. 63 
 
 that honor demands the punishment of the wife only ; to punish 
 her paramour too, is a work of supererogation. This con- 
 firms the view I have taken, that a man's honor originates in 
 esprit de corps. 
 
 The kind of honor which I have been discussing hitherto 
 has always existed in its various forms and principles amongst 
 all nations and at all times ; although the history of female 
 honor shows that its principles have undergone certain local 
 modifications at different periods. But there is another species 
 of honor which differs from this entirely, a species of honor of 
 which the Greeks and Romans had no conception, and up to 
 this day it is perfectly unknown amongst Chinese, Hindoos or 
 Mohammedans. It is a kind of honor which arose only in the 
 Middle Age, and is indigenous only to Christian Europe, nay, 
 only to an extremely small portion of the population, that is to 
 say, the higher classes of society and those who ape them. It 
 is knightly honor, ox point d^ honneur. Its principles are quite 
 different from those which underlie the kind of honor I have 
 been treating until now, and in some respe6ls are even opposed 
 to them. The sort I am referring to produces the cavalier ; 
 while the other kind creates the man of honor. As this is so, 
 I shall proceed to give an explanation of its principles, as a 
 kind of code or mirror of knightly courtesy. 
 
 (i.) To begin with, honor of this sort consists, not in other 
 people's opinion of what we are worth, but wholly and entirely 
 in whether they express it or not, no matter whether they 
 really have any opinion at all, let alone whether they know of 
 reasons for having one. Other people may entertain the worst 
 opinion of us in consequence of what we do, and may despise 
 us as much as they like ; so long as no one dares to give ex- 
 pression to his opinion, our honor remains untarnished. So 
 if our actions and qualities compel the highest respe6l from 
 other people, and they have no option but to give this respe6t, 
 — as soon as anyone, no matter how wicked or foolish he may 
 be, utters something depreciatory of us, our honor is offended, 
 "^y> gone for ever, unless we can manage to restore it. A 
 superfluous proof of what I say, namely, that knightiy honor 
 depends, not upon what people think, but upon what they say, 
 
I 
 
 64 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 is furnished by the fa6l that insults can be withdrawn, or, if 
 necessary, form the subject of an apology, which makes them 
 as though they had never been uttered. Whether the opinion 
 which underlays the expression has also been redlified, and why 
 the expression should ever have been used, are questions which 
 are perfedly unimportant : so long as the statement is with- 
 drawn, all is well. The truth is that conduct of this kind aims, 
 not at earning respect, but at extorting it. 
 
 (2.) In the second place, this sort of honor rests, not on 
 what a man does, but on what he suffers, the obstacles he 
 encounters ; differing from the honor which prevails in all else, 
 in consisting, not in what he says or does himself, but in what 
 another man says or does. His honor is thus at the mercy of 
 every man who can talk it away on the tip of his tongue ; and 
 if he attacks it, in a moment it is gone, for ever, — unless the 
 man who is attacked manages to wrest it back again by a 
 process which I shall mention presently, a process which in- 
 volves danger to his life, health, freedom, property and peace 
 of mind. A man's whole condu6l may be in accordance with 
 the most righteous and noble principles, his spirit may be the 
 purest that ever breathed, his intelle6l of the very highest 
 order ; and yet his honor may disappear the moment that 
 anyone is pleased to insult him, anyone at all who has not 
 offended against this code of honor himself, let him be the most 
 worthless rascal or the most stupid beast, an idler, gambler, 
 debtor, a man, in short, of no account at all. It is usually this 
 sort of fellow who likes to insult people ; for, as Seneca ' 
 rightly remarks, ut quisque contemtissimus et ludibrio est, ita 
 solutissimcB Ungues est, the more contemptible and ridiculous 
 a man is, — the readier he is with his tongue. His insults are 
 most likely to be dire6ted against the very kind of man I have 
 described, because people of different tastes can never be 
 friends, and the sight of pre-eminent merit is apt to raise the 
 secret ire of a ne'er-do-well. What Goethe says in the IVest- 
 ostlicher Divan is quite true, that it is useless to complain 
 against your enemies ; for they can never become your friends, 
 if your whole being is a standing reproach to them : — 
 
 ' De Constantia, 11. 
 
HONOR. 65 
 
 JJ^as klagst du uber Feinde ? 
 Sollten Sole he J e werden Freunde 
 Denen das We sen, wie du bist, 
 Im stillen ein ewiger Vorwurf ist? 
 
 It is obvious that people of this worthless description have 
 good cause to be thankful to the principle of honor, because it 
 puts them on a level with people who in every other respedl 
 stand far above them. If a fellow likes to insult any one, 
 attribute to him, for example, some bad quality, this is taken 
 prima facie as a well-founded opinion, true in fact ; a decree, 
 as it were, with all the force of law ; nay, if it is not at once 
 wiped out in blood, it is a judgment which holds good and 
 valid to all time. In other words, the man who is insulted 
 remains — in the eyes of all honorable people — what the man who 
 uttered the insult — even though he were the greatest wretch 
 on earth — was pleased to call him ; for he has put up with the 
 insult — the technical term, I believe. Accordingly, all honor- 
 able people will have nothing more to do with him, and treat 
 him like a leper, and, it may be, refuse to go into any company 
 where he may be found, and so on. 
 
 This wise proceeding may, I think, be traced back to the 
 fact that in the Middle Age, up to the fifteenth century, it was 
 not the accuser in any criminal process who had to prove the 
 guilt of the accused, but the accused who had to prove his 
 innocence.^ This he could do by swearing he was not guilty ; 
 and his backers — consacramentales — had to come and swear 
 that in their opinion he was incapable of perjury. If he could 
 find no one to help him in this way, or the accuser took objec- 
 tion to his backers, recourse was had to trial by the Judgment 
 of God, which generally meant a duel. For the accused was 
 now in disgrace,'^ and had to clear himself. Here, then, is the 
 origin of the notion of disgrace, and of that whole system 
 which prevails now-a-days amongst honorable people — only that 
 the oath is omitted. This is also the explanation of that deep 
 
 ' See C. G. von Wachter's Beitrdge zur deutschen Geschichte, 
 especially the chapter on criminal law. 
 
 " Translator' s Note. It is true that this expression has another and 
 special meaning in the technical terminology of Chivalry, but it is the 
 nearest Etiglisii equivalent which I can find for the German — ein 
 Bescholtener. 
 
66 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 feeling of indignation which honorable people are called upon 
 to show if they are given the lie ; it is a reproach which they 
 say must be wiped out in blood. It seldom comes to this pass, 
 however, though lies are of common occurrence ; but in Eng- 
 land, more than elsewhere, it is a superstition which has taken 
 very deep root. As a matter of order, a man who threatens 
 to kill another for telling a lie should never have told one 
 himself. The fact is, that the criminal trial of the Middle Age 
 also admitted of a shorter form. In reply to the charge, the 
 accused answered : That is a lie ; whereupon it was left to be 
 decided by the Judgment of God. Hence, the code of knightly 
 honor prescribes that, when the lie is given, an appeal to arms 
 follows as a matter of course. So much, then, for the theory 
 of insult. 
 
 But there is something even worse than insult, something 
 so dreadful that I must beg pardon of all honorable people iox 
 so much as mentioning it in this code of knightly honor ; for 
 I know they will shiver, and their hair will stand on end, at 
 the very thought of it — the summum malum, the greatest evil 
 on earth, worse than death and damnation. A man may give 
 another — horrible dictu / — a slap or a blow. This is such an 
 awful thing, and so utterly fatal to all honor, that, while any 
 other species of insult may be healed by blood-letting, this 
 can be cured only by the coup-de-grdce. 
 
 (3.) In the third place, this kind of honor has absolutely 
 nothing to do with what a man may be in and for himself; or, 
 again, with the question whether his moral character can ever 
 become better or worse, and all such pedantic inquiries. If 
 your honor happens to be attacked, or to all appearances gone, 
 it can very soon be restored in its entirety if you are only 
 quick enough in having recourse to the one universal remedy 
 — a duel. But if the aggressor does not belong to the classes 
 which recognize the code of knightly honor, or has himself once 
 offended against it, there is a safer way of meeting any attack 
 upon your honor, whether it consists in blows, or merely in 
 words. If you are armed, you can strike down your opponent 
 on the spot, or perhaps an hour later. This will restore your 
 honor. 
 
HONOR. 67 
 
 But if you wish to avoid such an extreme step, from fear of 
 any unpleasant consequences arising therefrom, or from un- 
 certainty as to whether the aggressor is subject to the laws of 
 knightly honor or not, there is another means of making your 
 position good, namely, the Avantage. This consists in re- 
 turning rudeness with still greater rudeness ; and if insults are 
 no use, you can try a blow, which forms a sort of climax in 
 the redemption of your honor ; for instance, a box on the ear 
 may be cured by a blow with a stick, and a blow with a stick 
 by a thrashing with a horsewhip ; and, as the approved remedy 
 for this last, some people recommend you to spit at your op- 
 ponent.* If all these means are of no avail, you must not 
 shrink from drawing blood. And the reason for these methods 
 of wiping out insult is, in this code, as follows : 
 
 (4.) To receive an insult is disgraceful ; to give one, honor- 
 able. Let me take an example. My opponent has truth, right 
 and reason on his side. Very well. I insult him. Thereupon 
 right and honor leave him and come to me, and, for the time 
 being, he has lost them — until he gets them baek, not by the 
 exercise of right or reason, but by shooting and sticking me. 
 Accordingly, rudeness is a quality which, in point of honor, is 
 a substitute for any other and outweighs them all. The rudest 
 is always right. What more do you want ? However stupid, 
 bad or wicked a man may have been, if he is only rude into 
 the bargain, he condones and legitimizes all his faults. If in 
 any discussion or conversation, another man shows more 
 knowledge, greater love of truth, a sounder judgment, better 
 understanding than we, or generally exhibits intellectual quali- 
 ties which cast ours into the shade, we can at once annul his 
 superiority and our own shallowness, and in our turn be supe- 
 rior to him, by being insulting and offensive. For rudeness is 
 better than any argument ; it totally eclipses intelledt. If our 
 opponent does not care for our mode of attack, and will not 
 answer still more rudely, so as to plunge us into the ignoble 
 rivalry of the Avantage, we are the victors and honor is on our 
 
 • Translator^ s Note. It must be remembered that Schopenhauer is 
 here describing, or perhaps caricaturing, the manners and customs of 
 the German aristocracy of half a century ago. Now, of course, nous 
 avons change tout cela ! 
 
68 ■ THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 side. Truth, knowledge, understanding, intelle6t, wit, must 
 beat a retreat and leave the field to this almighty insolence. 
 
 Honorable people immediately make a show of mounting 
 their war-horse, if anyone utters an opinion adverse to theirs, 
 or shows more intelligence than they can muster ; and if in 
 any controversy they are at a loss for a reply, they look about 
 for some weapon of rudeness, which will serve as well and 
 come readier to hand ; so they retire masters of the position. 
 It must now be obvious that people are quite right in applaud- 
 ing this principle of honor as having ennobled the tone of 
 society. This principle springs from another, which forms the 
 heart and soul of the entire code. 
 
 (5.) Fiftly, the code implies that the highest court to which 
 a man can appeal in any differences he may have with another 
 on a point of honor is the court of physical force, that is, of 
 brutality. Every piece of rudeness is, stri6lly speaking, an 
 appeal to brutality ; for it is a declaration that intellectual 
 strength and moral insight are incompetent to decide, and that 
 the battle must be fought out by physical force — a ;struggle 
 which, in the case of man, whom Franklin defines as a tool- 
 making animaly is decided by the weapons peculiar to the 
 species ; and the decision is irrevocable. This is the well- 
 known principle of right of might — irony, of course, like the 
 wit of a fool, a parallel phrase. The honor of a knight may 
 be called the glory of might. 
 
 (6.) Lastly, if, as we saw above, civic honor is very scrupu- 
 lous in the matter of meunt and tuum, paying great respedt to 
 obHgations and a promise once made, the code we are here 
 discussing displays, on the other hand, the noblest liberality. 
 There is only one word which may not be broken, the word 
 of honor — upon my honor ^ as people say — the presumption 
 being, of course, that every other form of promise may be 
 broken. Nay, if the worst comes to the worst, it is easy to 
 break even one's word of honor, and still remain honorable — 
 again by adopting that universal remedy, the duel, and fight- 
 ing with those who maintain that we pledged our word. 
 Further, there is one debt, and one alone, that under no cir- 
 cumstances must be left unpaid — a gambling debt, which has 
 
HONOR. 69 
 
 accordingly been called a debt of honor. In all other kinds of 
 debt you may cheat Jews and Christians as much as you like ; 
 and your knightly honor remains without a stain. 
 
 The unprejudiced reader will see at once that such a strange, 
 savage and ridiculous code of honor as this has no foundation 
 in human nature, nor any warrant in a healthy view of human 
 affairs. The extremely narrow sphere of its operation serves 
 only to intensify the feeling, which is exclusively confined to 
 Europe since the Middle Age, and then only to the upper 
 classes, officers and soldiers, and people who imitate them. 
 Neither Greeks nor Romans knew anything of this code of 
 honor or of its principles ; nor the highly civilized nations of 
 Asia, ancient or modern. Amongst them no other kind of 
 honor is recognized but that which I discussed first, in virtue 
 of which a man is what he shows himself to be by his actions, 
 not what any wagging tongue is pleased to say of him. They 
 thought that what a man said or did might perhaps aflfect his 
 own honor, but not any other man's. To them, a blow was 
 but a blow — and any horse or donkey could give a harder one 
 — a blow which under certain circumstances might make a 
 man angry and demand immediate vengeance ; but it had 
 nothing to do with honor. No one kept account of blows or 
 insulting words, or of the satisfaction which was demanded or 
 omitted to be demanded. Yet in personal bravery and con- 
 tempt of death, the ancients were certainly not inferior to the 
 nations of Christian Europe. The Greeks and Romans were 
 thorough heroes, if you like ; but they knew nothing about 
 point d'honneur. If they had any idea of a duel, it was totally 
 unconne6led with the life of the nobles ; it was merely the ex- 
 hibition of mercenary gladiators, slaves devoted to slaughter, 
 condemned criminals, who, alternately with wild beasts, were 
 set to butcher one another to make a Roman hohday. When 
 Christianity was introduced, gladiatorial shows were done away 
 with, and their place taken, in Christian times, by the duel, 
 which was a way of settling difficulties by the fudgment of 
 God. 
 
 If the gladiatorial fight was a cruel sacrifice to the prevailing 
 desire for great spectacles, dueling is a cruel sacrifice to exist- 
 
70 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 ing prejudices — a sacrifice, not of criminals, slaves and prisoners, 
 but of the noble and the free.' 
 
 There are a great many traits in the character of the ancients 
 which show that they were entirely free from these prejudices. 
 When, for instance, Marius was summoned to a duel by a 
 Teutonic chief, he returned answer to the effect that, if the 
 chief were tired of his life, he might go and hang himself; at 
 the same time he offered him a veteran gladiator for a round 
 or two. Plutarch relates in his life of Themistocles that Eury- 
 biades, who was in command of the fleet, once raised his stick 
 to strike him ; whereupon Themistocles, instead of drawing 
 his sword, simply said : Strike, but hear me. How sorry the 
 reader must be, if he is an honorable man, to find that we have 
 no information that the Athenian officers refused in a body to 
 serve any longer under Themistocles, if he acted like that ! 
 There is a modern French writer who declares that if anyone 
 considers Demosthenes a man of honor, his ignorance will 
 excite a smile of pity ; and that Cicero was not a man of honor 
 either!* In a certain passage in Plato's Zazf/j,* the philosopher 
 speaks at length of aUia or assault, showing us clearly enough 
 that the ancients had no notion of any feeling of honor in con- 
 nedlion with such matters. Socrates' frequent discussions were 
 often followed by his being severely handled, and he bore it all 
 mildly. Once, for instance, when somebody kicked him, the 
 patience with which he took the insult surprised one of his 
 friends. Do you thvik, said Socrates, that if an ass happened 
 to kick me, I should resent itf* On another occasion, when he 
 was asked, Has not that fellow abused and insulted you f No, 
 was his answer, what he says is not addressed to me.^ Stobaeus, 
 has preserved a long passage from Musonius, from which we 
 can see how the ancients treated insults. They knew no other 
 form of satisfaction than that which the law provided, and wise 
 people despised even this. If a Greek received a box on the 
 ear, he could get satisfaction by the aid of the law ; as is evident 
 
 > Translator' s Note. These and other remarks on dueling will no 
 doubt wear a belated look to English readers ; but they are hardly 
 yet antiquated for most parts of the Continent. 
 
 ^ Soirees litteraires : pax C T)urdind. Rouen, 1828. 
 
 ' Bk. IX. * Diogenes Laertius, ii., 21. * Ibid 36 
 
HONOR. 71 
 
 from Plato's Gorgias, where Socrates' opinion may be found. 
 The same thing may be seen in the account given by GelUus 
 of one Lucius Veratius, who had the audacity to give some 
 Roman citizens whom he met on the road a box on the ear, 
 without any provocation whatever ; but to avoid any ulterior 
 consequences, he told a slave to bring a bag of small money, 
 and on the spot paid the trivial legal penalty to the men whom 
 he had astonished by his condudl. 
 
 Crates, the celebrated Cynic philosopher, got such a box 
 on the ear from Nicodromus, the musician, that his face 
 swelled up and became black and blue ; whereupon he put a 
 label on his forehead, with the inscription, Nicodromus fecit, 
 which brought much disgrace to the fluteplayer who had 
 committed such a piece of brutality upon the man whom all 
 Athens honored as a household god.* And in a letter to 
 Melesippus, Diogenes of Sinope tells us that he got a beating 
 from the drunken sons of the Athenians ; but he adds that it 
 was a matter of no importance.* And Seneca devotes the last 
 few chapters of his De Constantia to a lengthy discussion on 
 insult — contumelia; in order to show that a wise man will take 
 no notice of it. In Chapter XIV. he says, What shall a wise 
 man do, if he is given a blow ? What Cato did, when some one 
 struck him on the mouth ; — not fire up or avenge the insult, or 
 even return the blow, but simply ignore it. 
 
 Yes, you say, but these men were philosophers. — And you are 
 fools, eh? Precisely. 
 
 It is clear that the whole code of knightly honor was utterly 
 unknown to the ancients ; for the simple reason that they 
 always took a natural and unprejudiced view of human affairs, 
 and did not allow themselves to be influenced by any such 
 vicious and abominable folly. A blow in the face was to them 
 a blow and nothing more, a trivial physical injury ; whereas 
 the moderns make a catastrophe out of it, a theme for a 
 tragedy ; as, for instance, in the Cid of Corneille, or in a 
 recent German comedy of middle-class life, called The Power 
 of Circumstance, which should have been entitled The Power, 
 
 > Diogenes Laertius, vi. 87, and Apul : Flor : p. 126. 
 * Cf. Casaubon's Note, Diog. Laert., vi. 33. 
 
72 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 of Prejudice. If a member of the National Assembly at Paris 
 got a blow on the ear, it would resound from one end of 
 Europe to the other. The examples which I have given of 
 the way in which such an occurrence would have been treated 
 in classic times may not suit the ideas of honorable people ; so 
 let me recommend to their notice, as a kind of antidote, the 
 story of Monsieur Desglands in Diderot's masterpiece, ^r^M^j 
 le fataliste. It is an excellent specimen of modern knightly 
 honor, which, no doubt, they will find enjoyable and edifying.* 
 From what I have said it must be quite evident that the 
 principle of knightly honor has no essential and spontaneous 
 origin in human nature. It is an artificial produ6l, and its 
 source is not hard to find. Its existence obviously dates from 
 the time when people used their fists more than their heads, 
 when priestcraft had enchained the human intelle<5l, the much 
 bepraised Middle Age, with its system of chivalry. That was ' 
 the time when people let the Almighty not only care for them 
 but judge for them too ; when difficult cases were decided by 
 an ordeal, a Judgment of God ; which, with few exceptions, 
 meant a duel, not only where nobles were concerned, but in 
 the case of ordinary citizens as well. There is a neat illustra- 
 tion of this in Shakespeare's Henry VI.* Every judicial sen- 
 tence was subject to an appeal to arms — a court, as it were, of 
 higher instance, namely, the Judgment of God : and this really 
 meant that physical strength and activity, that is, our animal 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. The story to which Schopenhauer here refers 
 is briefly as follows : Two gentlemen, one of whom was named Des- 
 glands, were paying court to the same lady. As they sat at table side 
 by side, with the lady opposite, Desglands did his best to charm her 
 with his conversation ; but she pretended not to hear him, and kept 
 looking at his rival. In the agony of jealousy, Desglands, as he was 
 holding a fresh egg in his hand, involuntarily crushed it ; the shell 
 broke, and its contents bespattered his rival's face. Seeing him raise 
 his hand, Desglands seized it and whispered: Sir, I take it as given. 
 The next day Desglands appeared with a large piece of black sticking- 
 plaster upon his right cheek. In the duel which followed, Desglands 
 severely wounded his rival ; upon which he reduced the size of the 
 plaster. When his rival recovered, they had another duel ; Desglands 
 drew blood again, and again made his plaster a little smaller ; and so 
 on for five or six times. After every duel Desglands' plaster grew 
 less and less, until at last his rival was killed. 
 
 « Part II., Act 2, Sc. 3. 
 
HONOR. 73 
 
 nature, usurped the place of reason on the judgment seat, 
 deciding in matters of right and wrong, not by what a man 
 had done, but by the force with which he was opposed, the 
 same system, in fact, as prevails to-day under the principles 
 of knightly honor. If any one doubts that such is really the 
 origin of our modern duel, let him read an excellent work by 
 J. B. Millingen, The History of Dueling} Nay, you may still 
 find amongst the supporters of the system, — who, by the way, 
 are not usually the most educated or thoughtful of men, — 
 some who look upon the result of a duel as really constituting 
 a divine judgment in the matter in dispute ; no doubt in con- 
 sequence of the traditional feeling on the subje6l. 
 
 But leaving aside the question of origin, it must now be 
 clear to us that the main tendency of the principle is to use 
 physical menace for the purpose of extorting an appearance of 
 respe6l which is deemed too difficult or superfluous to acquire 
 in reality ; a proceeding which comes to much the same thing 
 as if you were to prove the warmth of your room by holding 
 your hand on the thermometer and so make it rise. In fadl, 
 the kernel of the matter is this : whereas civic honor aims at 
 peaceable intercourse, and consists in the opinion of other 
 people that we deserve full confidence, because we pay uncon- 
 ditional respeft to their rights ; knightly honor, on the other 
 hand, lays down that we are to be feared, as being determined 
 at all costs to maintain our own. 
 
 As not much reliance can be placed upon human integrity, 
 the principle that it is more essential to arouse fear than to 
 Invite confidence would not, perhaps, be a false one, if we were 
 living in a state of nature, where every man would have to 
 prote6l himself and directly maintain his own rights. But in 
 civilized life, where the State undertakes the protection of our 
 person and property, the principle is no longer applicable : it 
 stands, like the castles and watch-towers of the age when might 
 was right, a useless and forlorn objedl, amidst well-tilled fields 
 and frequented roads, or even railways. 
 
 Accordingly, the application of knightly honor, which still 
 
 ' Published in 1849. 
 
74 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 recognizes this principle, is confined to those small cases of 
 personal assault which meet with but slight punishment at the 
 hands of the law, or even none at all, for de minimis non, — 
 mere trivial wrongs, committed sometimes only in jest. The 
 consequence of this limited application of the principle is that 
 it has forced itself into an exaggerated resped for the value of 
 the person, — a respect utterly alien to the nature, constitution 
 or destiny of man — which it has elevated into a species of 
 san6lity : and as it considers that the State has imposed a very 
 insufficient penalty on the commission of such trivial injuries, 
 it takes upon itself to punish them by attacking the aggressor 
 in life or Hmb. The whole thing manifestly rests upon an 
 excessive degree of arrogant pride, which, completely forget- 
 ting what man really is, claims that he shall be absolutely free 
 from all attack or even censure. Those who determine to 
 carry out this principle by main force, and announce, as their 
 rule of action, whoever insults or strikes me shall die / ought 
 for their pains to be banished the country.* 
 
 As a palliative to this rash arrogance, people are in the habit 
 of giving way on everything. If two intrepid persons meet, 
 and neither will give way, the slightest difference may cause a 
 shower of abuse, then fisticuffs, and, finally, a fatal blow : so 
 that it would really be a more decorous proceeding to omit 
 
 ' Knightly honor is the child of pride and folly, and it is need, not 
 pride, which is the heritage of the human race. It is a very remark- 
 able fa6l that this extreme form of pride should be found exclusively 
 amongst the adherents of the religion which teaches the deepest 
 humility. Still, this pride must not be put down to religion, but, 
 rather, to the feudal system, which made every nobleman a petty 
 sovereign who recognized no human judge, and learned to regard his 
 person as sacred and inviolable, and any attack upon it, or any blow 
 or insulting word, as an offence punishable with death. The pnnciple 
 of knightly honor and of the duel was at first confined to the nobles, 
 and, later on, also to officers in the army, who, enjoying a kind of 
 off-and-on relationship with the upper classes, though they were never 
 incorporated with them, were anxious not to be behind them. It is 
 true that duels were the product of the old ordeals ; but the latter are 
 not the foundation, but rather the consequence and application of the 
 principle of honor : the man who recognized no human judge appealed 
 to the divine. Ordeals, however, are not peculiar to Christendom : 
 they may be found in great force among the Hindoos, especially of 
 ancient times ; and there are traces of them even now. 
 
HONOR. 75 
 
 the intermediate steps and appeal to arms at once. An appeal 
 to arms has its own special formalties ; and these have devel- 
 oped into a rigid and precise system of laws and regulations, 
 together forming the most solemn farce there is — a regular 
 temple of honor dedicated to folly ! For if two intrepid per- 
 sons dispute over some trivial matter, (more important affairs 
 are dealt with by law), one of them, the cleverer of the two, 
 will of course yield ; and they will agree to differ. That this 
 is so is proved by the fa6l that common people, — or, rather, 
 the numerous classes of the community who do not acknowl- 
 edge the principle of knightly honor, let any dispute run its 
 natural course. Amongst these classes homicide is a hundred- 
 fold rarer than amongst those — and they amount, perhaps, in 
 all, to hardly one in a thousand, — who pay homage to the 
 principle : and even blows are of no very frequent occurrence. 
 Then it has been said that the manners and tone of good 
 society are ultimately based upon this principle of honor, 
 which, with its system of duels, is made out to be a bulwark 
 against the assaults of savagery and rudeness. But Athens, 
 Corinth and Rome could assuredly boast of good, nay, excel- 
 lent society, and manners and tone of a high order, without 
 any support from the bogey of knightly honor. It is true that 
 women did not occupy that prominent place in ancient society 
 which they hold now, when conversation has taken on a 
 frivolous and trifling character, to the exclusion of that weighty 
 discourse which distinguished the ancients. This change has 
 certainly contributed a great deal to bring about the tendency, 
 which is observable in good society now-a-days, to prefer 
 personal courage to the possession of any other quality. The 
 fa<5l is that personal courage is really a very subordinate virtue, 
 — merely the distinguishing mark oi a subaltern, — a virtue, 
 indeed, in which we are surpassed by the lower animals ; or 
 else you would not hear people say, as brave as a lion. Far 
 from being the pillar of society, knightly honor affords a sure 
 asylum, in general for dishonesty and wickedness, and also for 
 small incivilities, want of consideration and unmannerliness. 
 Rude behavior is often passed over in silence because no one 
 cares to risk his neck in corre6Ung it. 
 
76 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 After what I have said, it will not appear strange that the 
 dueling system is carried to the highest pitch of sanguinary 
 zeal precisely in that nation whose political and financial records 
 show that they are not too honorable. What that nation is 
 like in its private and domestic life, is a question which may be 
 best put to those who are experienced in the matter. Their 
 urbanity and social culture have long been conspicuous by 
 their absence. 
 
 There is no truth, then, in such pretexts. It can be urged 
 with more justice that as, when you snarl at a dog, he snarls 
 in return, and when you pet him, he fawns ; so it lies in the 
 nature of men to return hostility by hostility, and to be em- 
 bittered and irritated at any signs of depreciatory treatment or 
 hatred : and, as Cicero says, there is something so penetrating 
 in the shaft of envy that even men of wisdom and worth find its 
 wound a painful one : and nowhere in the world, except, per- 
 haps, in a few religious se6ls, is an insult or a blow taken with 
 equanimity. And yet a natural view of either would in no 
 case demand anything more than a requital proportionate to 
 the offence, and would never go to the length of assigning 
 death as the proper penalty for anyone who accuses another of 
 lying or stupidity or cowardice. The old German theory of 
 blood for a blow is a revolting superstition of the age of chivalry. 
 And in any case the return or requital of an insult is di6tated 
 by anger, and not by any such obligation of honor and duty 
 as the advocates of chivalry seek to attach to it. The fa6l is 
 that, the greater the truth, the greater the slander ; and it is 
 clear that the slightest hint of some real delinquency will give 
 much greater offence than a most terrible accusation which is 
 perfectly baseless : so that a man who is quite sure that he has 
 done nothing to deserve a reproach may treat it with contempt, 
 and will be safe in doing so. The theory of honor demands 
 that he shall show a susceptibility which he does not possess, 
 and take bloody vengeance for insults which he cannot feel. 
 A man must himself have but a poor opinion of his own worth 
 who hastens to prevent the utterance of an unfavorable opinion 
 by giving his enemy a black eye. 
 
 True appreciation of his own value will make a man really 
 
HONOR. 77 
 
 indifferent to insult ; but if he cannot help resenting it, a little 
 shrewdness and culture will enable him to save appearances 
 and dissemble his anger. If we could only get rid of this 
 superstition about honor — the idea, I mean, that it disappears 
 when you are insulted, and can be restored by returning the 
 insult ; if we could only stop people from thinking that wrong, 
 brutality and insolence can be legalized by expressing readi- 
 ness to give satisfa6lion, that is, to fight in defence of it, we 
 should all soon come to the general opinion that insult and 
 depreciation are like a battle in which the loser wins ; and 
 that, as Vincenzo Monti says, abuse resembles a church-pro- 
 cession, because it always returns to the point from which it 
 set out. If we could only get people to look upon insult in 
 this light, we should no longer have to say something rude in 
 order to prove that we are in the right. Now, unfortunately, 
 if we want to take a serious view of any question, we have first 
 of all to consider whether it will not give offence in some way 
 or other to the dullard, who generally shows alarm and resent- 
 ment at the merest sign of intelligence ; and it may easily 
 happen that the head which contains the intelligent view has 
 to be pitted against the noddle which is empty of everything 
 but narrowness and stupidity. If all this were done away with, 
 intelle6tual superiority could take the leading place in society 
 which is its due — a place now occupied, though people do not 
 like to confess it, by excellence of physique, mere fighting 
 pluck, in fact : and the natural effect of such a change would 
 be that the best kind of people would have one reason the less 
 for withdrawing from society. This would pave the way for 
 the introduction of real courtesy and genuinely good society, 
 such as undoubtedly existed in Athens, Corinth and Rome. 
 If anyone wants to see a good example of what I mean, I 
 should Uke him to read Xenophon's Banquet. 
 
 The last argument in defence of knightly honor no doubt is, 
 that, but for its existence, the world — awful thought ! — would 
 be a regular bear-garden. To which I may briefly reply that 
 nine hundred and ninety-nine people out of a thousand who 
 do not recognize the code, have often given and received a 
 blow without any fatal consequences : whereas amongst the 
 
78 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 adherents of the code a blow usually means death to one of the 
 parties. But let me examine this argument more closely. 
 
 I have often tried to find some tenable, or at any rate, plaus- 
 ible basis — other than a merely conventional one — some positive 
 reasons, that is to say, for the rooted conviction which a por- 
 tion of mankind entertains, that a blow is a very dreadful 
 thing ; but I have looked for it in vain, either in the animal 
 or in the rational side of human nature. A blow is, and always 
 will be, a trivial physical injury which one man can do to an- 
 other ; proving, thereby, nothing more than his superiority in 
 strength or skill, or that his enemy was off his guard. Analysis 
 will carry us no further. The same knight who regards a 
 blow from the human hand as the greatest of evils, if he gets a 
 ten times harder blow from his horse, will give you the assur- 
 ance, as he limps away in suppressed pain, that it is a matter 
 of no consequence whatever. So I have come to think that it 
 is the human hand which is at' the bottom of the mischief. And 
 yet in a battle the knight may get cuts and thrusts from the 
 same hand, and still assure you that his wounds are not worth 
 mentioning. Now, I hear that a blow from the flat of a sword 
 is not by any means so bad as a blow with a stick ; and that, a 
 short time ago, cadets were liable to be punished by the one 
 but not the other, and that the very greatest honor of all is the 
 accolade. This is all the psychological or moral basis that I 
 can find ; and so there is nothing left me but to pronounce the 
 whole thing an antiquated superstition that has taken deep 
 root, and one more of the many examples which show the force 
 of tradition. My view is confirmed by the well-known fact that 
 in China a beating with a bamboo is a very frequent punish- 
 ment for the common people, and even for officials of every 
 class ; which shows that human nature, even in a highly 
 civilized state, does not run in the same groove here and in 
 China. 
 
 On the contrary, an unprejudiced view of human nature 
 shows that it is just as natural for a man to beat as it is for 
 savage animals to bite and rend in pieces, or for horned beasts 
 to butt or push. Man may be eaid to be the animal that beats. 
 Hence it is revolting to our sense of the fitness of things to 
 
HONOR. 79 
 
 hear, as we sometimes do, that one man has bitten another ; 
 on the other hand, it is a natural and everyday occurrence for 
 him to get blows or give them. It is intelligible enough that, 
 as we become educated, we are glad to dispense with blows by 
 a system of mutual restraint. But it is a cruel thing to compel 
 a nation or a single class to regard a blow as an awful misfor- 
 tune which must have death and murder for its consequences. 
 There are too many genuine evils in the world to allow of our 
 increasing them by imaginary misfortunes, which bring real 
 ones in their train : and yet this is the precise effe6l of the 
 superstition, which thus proves itself at once stupid and malign. 
 
 It does not seem to me wise of governments and legislative 
 bodies to promote any such folly by attempting to do away 
 with flogging as a punishment in civil or military life. Their 
 idea is that they are ailing in the interests of humanity ; but, 
 in point of fact, they are doing just the opposite ; for the aboli- 
 tion of flogging will serve only to strengthen this inhuman and 
 abominable superstition, to which so many sacrifices have 
 already been made. For all offences, except the worst, a beat- 
 ing is the obvious, and therefore the natural penalty ; and a 
 man who will not listen to reason will yield to blows. It seems 
 to me right and proper to administer corporal punishment to 
 the man who possesses nothing and therefore cannot be fined, 
 or cannot be put in prison because his master's interests would 
 suffer by the loss of his service. There are really no arguments 
 against it ; only mere talk about the dignity of man — talk which 
 proceeds, not from any clear notions on the subjedt, but from 
 the pernicious superstition I have been describing. That it is 
 a superstition which lies at the bottom of the whole business is 
 proved by an almost laughable example. Not long ago, in 
 the military discipline of many countries, the cat was replaced 
 by the stick. In either case the obje6l was to product physical 
 pain ; but the latter method involved no disgrace, and was not 
 derogatory to honor. 
 
 By promoting this superstition, the State is playing into the 
 hands of the principle of knightly honor, and therefore of the 
 duel ; while at the same time it is trying, or at any rate it pre- 
 tends that it is trying, to abolish the duel by legislative ena6l- 
 
8o THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 ment. As a natural consequence we find that this ft"agment of 
 the theory that might is right, which has come down to us 
 from the most savage days of the Middle Age, has still in this 
 nineteenth century a good deal of life left in it — more shame 
 to us ! It is high time for the principle to be driven out bag 
 and baggage. Now-a-days no one is allowed to set dogs or 
 cocks to fight each other, — at any rate, in England it is a penal 
 offence, — but men are plunged into deadly strife, against their 
 will, by the operation of this ridiculous, superstitious and 
 absurd principle, which imposes upon us the obligation, as its 
 narrow-minded supporters and advocates declare, of fighting 
 with one another like gladiators, for any little trifle. Let me 
 recommend our purists to adopt the expression 3a//m^,' instead 
 of duel, which probably comes to us, not from the Latin 
 duellum, but from the Spanish duelo, — meaning suffering, 
 nuisance, annoyance. 
 
 In any case, we may well laugh at the pedantic excess to 
 which this foolish system has been carried. It is really re- 
 volting that this principle, with its absurd code, can form a 
 power within the State — imperium in imperio — a power too 
 easily put in motion, which, recognizing no right but might, 
 tyrannizes over the classes which come within its range, by 
 keeping up a sort of inquisition, before which any one may 
 be haled on the most flimsy pretext, and there and then be 
 tried on an issue of life and death between himself and his 
 opponent. This is the lurking place from which every rascal, 
 if he only belongs to the classes in question, may menace and 
 even exterminate the noblest and best of men, who, as such, 
 must of course be an objeft of hatred to him. Our system of 
 justice and police-prote6lion has made it impossible in these 
 days for any scoundrel in the street to attack us with — Your 
 money or your life! and common sense ought now to be able 
 to prevent rogues disturbing the peaceable intercourse of 
 society by coming at us with — Your honor or your life / An 
 end should be put to the burden which weighs upon the higher 
 classes — the burden, I mean, of having to be ready every 
 moment to expose life and limb to the mercy of anyone who 
 
 ' Ritterhetze. 
 
HONOR. 8 1 
 
 takes it Into his rascally head to be coarse, rude, foolish or 
 malicious. It is perfedlly atrocious that a pair of silly, pas- 
 sionate boys should be wounded, maimed or even killed, 
 simply because they have had a few words. 
 
 The strength of this tyrannical power within the State, and 
 the force of the superstition, may be measured by the fadl that 
 people who are prevented from restoring their knightly honor 
 by the superior or inferior rank of their aggressor, or anything 
 else that puts the persons on a different level, often come to a 
 tragic-comic end by committing suicide in sheer despair. You 
 may generally know a thing to be false and ridiculous by find- 
 ing that, if it is carried to its logical conclusion, it results in a 
 contradidlion ; and here, too, we have a very glaring absurd- 
 ity. For an officer is forbidden to take part in a duel ; but if 
 he is challenged and declines to come out, he is punished by 
 being dismissed the service. 
 
 As I am on the matter, let me be more frank still. The 
 important distin6lion, which is often insisted upon, between 
 killing your enemy in a fair fight with equal weapons, and 
 lying in ambush for him, is entirely a corollary of the fadl that 
 the power within the State, of which I have spoken, recognizes 
 no other right than might, that is, the right of the stronger, 
 and appeals to a Judgment of God as the basis of the whole 
 code. For to kill a man in a fair fight, is to prove that you 
 are superior to him in strength or skill ; and to justify the 
 deed, you must assume that the right of the stronger is really a 
 right. 
 
 But the truth is that, if my opponent is unable to defend 
 himself, it gives me the possibility, but not by any means the 
 right, of killing him. The right, the moral justification, must 
 depend entirely upon the viotives which I have for taking his 
 life. Even supposing that I have sufficient motive for taking 
 a man's Ufe, there is no reason why I should make his death 
 depend upon whether I can shoot or fence better than he. In 
 such a case, it is immaterial in what way I kill him, whether I 
 attack him from the front or the rear. From a moral point of 
 view, the right of the stronger is no more convincing than the 
 right of the more skillful ; and it is skill which is employed if 
 
82 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 you murder a man treacherously. Might and skill are in this 
 case equally right ; in a duel, for instance, both the one and 
 the other come into play ; for a feint is only another name for 
 treachery. If I consider, myself morally justified in taking a 
 man's life, it is stupid of me to try first of all whether he can 
 shoot or fence better than I ; as, if he can, he will not only 
 have wronged me, but have taken my life into the bargain. 
 
 It is Rousseau's opinion that the proper way to avenge an 
 insult is, not to fight a duel with your aggressor, but to assas- 
 sinate him, — an opinion, however, which he is cautious enough 
 only to barely indicate in a mysterious note to one of the books 
 of his Entile. This shows the philosopher so completely under 
 the influence of the mediaeval superstition of knightly honor 
 that he considers it justifiable to murder a man who accuses 
 you of lying : whilst he must have known that every man, and 
 himself especially, has deserved to have the lie given him times 
 without number. 
 
 The prejudice which justifies the killing of your adversary, 
 so long as it is done in an open contest and with equal weapons, 
 obviously looks upon might as really right, and a duel as the 
 interference of God. The Italian who, in a fit of rage, falls 
 upon his aggressor wherever he finds him, and despatches 
 him without any ceremony, a6ls, at any rate, consistently and 
 naturally : he may be cleverer, but he is not worse, than the 
 duelist. If you say, I am justified in killing my adversary in 
 a duel, because he is at the moment doing his best to kill me ; 
 I can reply that it is your challenge which has placed him 
 under the necessity of defending himself ; and that by mutually 
 putting it on the ground of self-defence, the combatants are 
 seeking a plausible pretext for committing murder. I should 
 rather justify the deed by the legal maxim Volenti non fit 
 injuria ; because the parties mutually agree to set their life 
 upon the issue. 
 
 This argument may, however, be rebutted by showing 
 that the injured party is not injured volens ; because it is 
 this tyrannical principle of knightly honor, with its absurd 
 code, which forcibly drags one at least of the combatants before 
 a bloody inquisition. 
 
HONOR. 83 
 
 I have been rather prolix on the subje6l of knightly honor, 
 but I had good reason for t>eing so, because the Augean stable 
 of moral and intelleAual enormity in this world can be cleaned 
 out only with the besom of philosophy. There are two things 
 which more than all else serve to make the social arrangements 
 of modern life compare unfavorably with those of antiquity, by 
 giving our age a gloomy, dark and sinister aspe(5l, from which 
 antiquity, fresh, natural and, as it were, in the morning of life, 
 is completely free ; I mean modem honor and modem disease, 
 — par nobile fratrum / — which have combined to poison all the 
 relations of life, whether public or private. The second of this 
 noble pair extends its influence much farther than at first 
 appears to be the case, as being not merely a physical, but 
 also a moral disease. From the time that poisoned arrows 
 have been found in Cupid's quiver, an estranging, hostile, nay, 
 devilish element has entered into the relations of men and 
 women, like a sinister thread of fear and mistmst in the warp 
 and woof of their intercourse ; indiredlly shaking the founda- 
 tions of human fellowship, and so more or less affedling the 
 whole tenor of existence. But it would be beside my present 
 purpose to pursue the subject further. 
 
 An influence analogous to this, though working on other 
 lines, is exerted by the principle of knightly honor, — that 
 solemn farce, unknown to the ancient world, which makes 
 modern society stiff", gloomy and timid, forcing us to keep the 
 stri6lest watch on every word that falls. Nor is this all. The 
 principle is a universal Minotaur ; and the goodly company of 
 the sons of noble houses which it demands in yearly tribute, 
 comes, not from one country alone, as of old, but from every 
 land in Europe. It is high time to make a regular attack upon 
 this foolish system ; and this is what I am trying to do now. 
 Would that these two monsters of the modern world might 
 disappear before the end of the century ! 
 
 Let us hope that medicine may be able to find some means 
 of preventing the one, and that, by clearing our ideas, phi- 
 losophy may put an end to the other : for it is only by clearing 
 our ideas that the evil can be eradicated. Governments have 
 tried to do so by legislation, and failed. 
 
84 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 Still, if they are really concerned to stop the dueling system ; 
 and if the small success that has attended their efforts is really 
 due only to their inability to cope with the evil, I do not mind 
 proposing a law the success of which I am prepared to guar- 
 antee. It will involve no sanguinary measures, and can be put 
 into operation without recourse either to the scaffold or the 
 gallows, or to imprisonment for life. It is a small homoeopathic 
 pilule, with no serious after effe6ls. If any man send or accept 
 a challenge, let the corporal take him before the guard house, 
 and there give him, in broad daylight, twelve strokes with a 
 stick <l /a Chinoise ; a non-commissioned officer or a private 
 to receive six. If a duel has a6lually taken place, the usual 
 criminal proceedings should be instituted. 
 
 A person with knightly notions might, perhaps, obje6l that, 
 if such a punishment were carried out, a man of honor would 
 possibly shoot himself; to which I should answer that it is 
 better for a fool like that to shoot himself rather than other 
 people. However, I know very well that governments are not 
 really in earnest about putting down dueling. Civil officials, 
 and much more so, officers in the army, (except those in 
 the highest positions), are paid most inadequately for the ser- 
 vices they perform ; and the deficiency is made up by honor, 
 which is represented by titles and orders, and, in general^ by 
 the system of rank and distinction. The duel is, so to speak, 
 a very serviceable extra-horse for people of rank : so they are 
 trained in the knowledge of it at the universities. The accidents 
 which happen to those who use it make up in blood for the 
 deficiency of the pay. 
 
 Just to complete the discussion, let me here mention the 
 subje6l o{ national honor. It is the honor of a nation as a unit 
 in the aggregate of nations. And as there is no court to appeal 
 to but the court of force ; and as every nation must be prepared 
 to defend its own interests, the honor of a nation consists in 
 establishing the opinion, not only that it may be trusted (its 
 credit), but also that it is to be feared. An attack upon its 
 rights must never be allowed to pass unheeded. It is a com- 
 bination of civic and knightly honor. 
 
FAME. 85 
 
 Section^. — Fame. 
 
 Under the heading of place in the estimation of the world 
 we have put Fame ; and this we must now proceed to con- 
 sider. 
 
 Fame and honor are twins ; and twins, too, like Castor and 
 Pollux, of whom the one was mortal and the other was not. 
 Fame is the undying brother of ephemeral honor. I speak, of 
 course, of the highest kind of fame, that is, of fame in the true 
 and genuine sense of the word ; for, to be sure, there are many- 
 sorts of fame, some of which last but a day. Honor is con- 
 cerned merely with such qualities as everyone may be expelled 
 to show under similar circumstances ; fame only of those which 
 cannot be required of any man. Honor is of qualities which 
 everyone has a right to attribute to himself ; fame only of those 
 which should be left to others to attribute. Whilst our honor 
 extends as far as people have knowledge of us ; fame runs in 
 advance, and makes us known wherever it finds its way. Every 
 one can make a claim to honor ; very few to fame, as being 
 attainable only in virtue of extraordinary achievements. 
 
 These achievements may be of two kinds, either actions or 
 works; and so to fame there are two paths open. On the path 
 of actions, a great heart is the chief recommendation ; on that 
 of works, a great head. Each of the two paths has its own 
 peculiar advantages and detriments; and the chief difference 
 between them is that actions are fleeting, while works remain. 
 The influence of an a<5lion, be it never so noble, can last but a 
 short time ; but a work of genius is a living influence, beneficial 
 and ennobling throughout the ages. All that can remain of 
 a<5lions is a memory, and that becomes weak and disfigured 
 by time — a matter of indifference to us, until at last it is extin- 
 guished altogether ; unless, indeed, history takes it up, and 
 presents it, fossilized, to posterity. Works are immortal in 
 themselves, and once committed to writing, may live for ever. 
 Of Alexander the Great we have but the name and the record"; 
 but Plato and Aristotle, Homer and Horace are alive, and as 
 diredlly at work to-day as they were in their own life-time. 
 
86 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 The Vedas, and their Upanishads, are still with us : but of all 
 contemporaneous a<Sions not a trace has come down to us.* 
 
 Another disadvantage under which a6lions labor is that they 
 depend upon chance for the possibility of coming into exist- 
 ence ; and hence, the fame they win does not flow entirely from 
 their intrinsic value, but also from the circumstances which 
 happened to lend them importance and lustre. Again, the 
 fame of actions, if, as in war, they are purely personal, depends 
 upon the testimony of fewer witnesses ; and these are not 
 always present, and even if present, are not always just or un- 
 biased observers. This disadvantage, however, is counter- 
 balanced by the fact that actions have the advantage of being 
 of a pra6lical character, and, therefore, within the range of 
 general human intelligence ; so that once the facts have been 
 correctly reported, justice is immediately done ; unless, indeed, 
 the motive underlying the action is not at first properly under- 
 stood or appreciated. No action can be really understood 
 apart from the motive which prompted it. 
 
 It is just the contrary with works. Their inception does not 
 depend upon chance, but wholly and entirely upon their author ; 
 and whoever they are in and for themselves, that they remain 
 as long as they live. Further, there is a difficulty in properly 
 judging them, which becomes all the harder, the higher their 
 
 ' Accordinffly it is a poor compliment, though sometimes a fashion- 
 able one, to try to pay honor to a work by calling it an adion. For 
 a work is something essentially higher in its nature. An action is 
 always something based on motive, and, therefore, fragmentary and 
 fleeting — a part, in fact, of that Will which is the universal and original 
 element in the constitution of the world. But a great and beautiful 
 work has a permanent character, as being of universal significance, 
 and sprung from the Intellect, which rises, like a perfume, above the 
 faults and follies of the world of Will. 
 
 The fame of a great action has this advantage, that it generally 
 starts with a loud explosion ; so loud, indeed, as to be heard all over 
 Europe : whereas the fame of a great work is slow and gradual in its 
 beginnings ; the noise it makes is at first slight, but it goes on grow- 
 ing greater, until at last, after a hundred years perhaps, it attains its 
 fiill force ; but then it remains, because the works remain, for thou- 
 sands of years. But in the other case, when the first explosion is 
 over, the noise it makes grows less and less, and is heard by fewer 
 and fewer persons ; until it ends by the action having only a shadowy 
 €xistence in the pages of history. 
 
FAMEw S7 
 
 character ; often there are no persons competent to understand 
 the work, and often no unbiased or honest critics. Their fame, 
 however, does not depend upon one judge only ; they can 
 enter an appeal to another. In the case of actions, as I have 
 said, it is only their memory which comes down to posterity, 
 and then only in the traditional form ; but works are handed 
 down themselves, and, except when parts of them have been 
 lost, in the form in which they first appeared. In this case 
 there is no room for any disfigurement of the facfts ; and any 
 circumstances which may have prejudiced them in their origin, 
 fall away with the lapse of time. Nay, it is often only after the 
 lapse of time that the persons really competent to judge them 
 appear — exceptional critics sitting in judgment on exceptional 
 works, and giving their weighty verdidls in succession. These 
 collectively form a perfectly just appreciation ; and though 
 there are cases where it has taken some hundreds of years to 
 form it, no further lapse of time is able to reverse the verdi6l ; 
 — so secure and inevitable is the fame of a great work. 
 
 Whether authors ever live to see the dawn of their fame 
 depends upon the chance of circumstance ; and the higher 
 and more important their works are, the less likelihood there 
 is of their doing so. That was an incomparable fine saying of 
 Seneca's, that fame follows merit as surely as the body casts a 
 shadow ; sometimes falling in front, and sometimes behind. 
 And he goes on to remark that though the envy of contempo- 
 raries be shown by universal silence, there will come those who 
 will judge without enmity or favor. From this remark it is 
 manifest that even in Seneca's age there were rascals who 
 understood the art of suppressing merit by maliciously ignor- 
 ing its existence, and of concealing good work from the public 
 in order to favor the bad : it is an art well understood in our 
 day, too, manifesting itself, both then and now, in an envious 
 conspiracy of silence. 
 
 As a general rule, the longer a man' s fame is likely to last, 
 the later it will be in coming ; for all excellent produ(5ls require 
 time for their development. The fame which lasts to posterity 
 is like an oak, of very slow growth ; and that which endures 
 
88 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 but a little while, like plants which spring up in a year and 
 then die ; whilst false fame is like a fungus, shooting up in a 
 night and perishing as soon. 
 
 And why ? For this reason ; the more a man belongs to 
 posterity, in other words, to humanity in general, the more 
 of an alien he is to his contemporaries ; since his work is not 
 meant for them as such, but only for them in so far as they 
 form part of mankind at large ; there is none of that familiar 
 local color about his productions which would appeal to 
 them ; and so what he does, fails of recognition because it is 
 strange. 
 
 People are more likely to appreciate the man who serves the 
 circumstances of his own brief hour, or the temper of the mo- 
 ment, — belonging to it, living and dying with it. 
 
 The general history of art and literature shows that the 
 highest achievements of the human mind are, as a rule, not 
 favorably received at first ; but remain in obscurity until they 
 win notice from intelligence of a higher order, by whose 
 influence they are brought into a position which they then 
 maintain, in virtue of the authority thus given them. 
 
 If the reason of this should be asked, it will be found that 
 ultimately, a man can really understand and appreciate those 
 things only which are of like nature with himself. The dull 
 person will like what is dull, and the common person what is 
 common ; a man whose ideas are mixed will be attracted by 
 confusion of thought ; and folly will appeal to him who has no 
 brains at all ; but best of all, a man will like his own works, as 
 being of a chara6ler thoroughly at one with himself. This is 
 a truth as old as Epicharmus of fabulous memory — 
 
 Qavftaarhv oifilv tori fie Tuvd" ovtu Xeyeiv 
 Kal uvdilveiv avroloiv avrovg, ko.) doKiiv 
 Ka/,fjf n£(f>vKEvar koI yup 6 kvuv kvvi 
 Ku2,AiaTov elfiev tpaiverai, kuI j3uvc (iot 
 'Ovof 6' livif) KuXkiaTov \_eaTii>'\, vq 6' it. 
 
 The sense of this passage — for it should not be lost — is that we 
 should not be surprised if people are pleased with themselves, 
 and fancy that they are in good case ; for to a dog the best 
 
FAME. 89 
 
 thing in the world is a dog ; to an ox, an ox ; to an ass, an 
 ass ; and to a sow, a sow. 
 
 The strongest arm is unavailing to give impetus to a feather- 
 weight ; for, instead of speeding on its way and hitting its mark 
 with effe6l, it will soon fall to the ground, having expended 
 what little energy was given to it, and possessing no mass of 
 its own to be the vehicle of momentum. So it is with great 
 and noble thoughts, nay, with the very masterpieces of genius, 
 when there are none but little, weak, and perverse minds to 
 appreciate them, — a fa<5t which has been deplored by a chorus 
 of the wise in all ages. Jesus, the son of Sirach, for instance, 
 declares that He that telleth a tale to a fool speaketh to one in 
 slumber : when he hath told his tale, he will say, What is the 
 matter f^ And Hamlet says, A knavish speech sleeps in a 
 fool's ear.^ And Goethe is of the same opinion, that a dull 
 ear mocks at the wisest word, 
 
 Das glucklichste Wort es wird verhohnt, 
 Wenn der H'drer ein Schiefohr ist: 
 
 and again, that we should not be discouraged if people are 
 stupid, for you can make no rings if you throw your stone 
 into a marsh. 
 
 Du Tvirkest nicht, Alles bleibt so stump/: 
 
 Sei guter Dinge ! 
 Der Stein in Sump/ 
 
 Macht keine Ri,nge. 
 
 Lichtenberg asks : When a head and a book come into collision, 
 and one sounds hollow, is it always the book ? And in another 
 place : Works like this are as a mirror ; if an ass looks in, you 
 cannot expe^ an apostle to look out. We should do well to 
 remember old Gellert's fine and touching lament, that the best 
 gifts of all find the fewest admirers, and that most men mistake 
 the bad for the good, — a daily evil that nothing can prevent, 
 like a plague which no remedy can cure. There is but one 
 thing to be done, though how difficult ! — the foolish must be- 
 come wise, — and that they can never be. The value of life 
 
 ' Ecclesiasticus, xxii., 8. 
 * Act iv., So. 2. 
 
90 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 they never know ; they see with the outer eye but never with 
 the mind, and praise the trivial because the good is strange 
 to them : — 
 
 Nie kennen sie den Werth der Dinge, 
 Ihr Auge schliesst, nicht ihr Ver stand; 
 
 Sie lobcn ewig das Geringe 
 Wieil sie das Gute nie gekannt. 
 
 To the intelledual incapacity which, as Goethe says, fails to 
 recognize and appreciate the good which exists, must be added 
 something which comes into play everywhere, the moral base- 
 ness of mankind, here taking the form of envy. The new 
 fame that a man wins raises him afresh over the heads of his 
 fellows, who are thus degraded in proportion. All conspicuous 
 merit is obtained at the cost of those who possess none ; or, 
 as Goethe has it in the West-ostlicher Divan, another's praise 
 is one's own depreciation — 
 
 Wenn wir Andern Ehre geben 
 Miissen wir uns selbst entadeln. 
 
 We see, then, how it is that, whatever be the form which 
 excellence takes, mediocrity, the common lot of by far the 
 greatest number, is leagued against it in a conspiracy to resist, 
 and if possible, to suppress it. The pass-word of this league 
 is d, bas le nierite. Nay more ; those who have done some- 
 thing themselves, and enjoy a certain amount of fame, do not 
 care about the appearance of a new reputation, because its 
 success is apt to throw theirs into the shade. Hence, Goethe 
 declares that if we had to depend for our life upon the favor of 
 others, we should never have lived at all ; from their desire to 
 appear important themselves, people gladly ignore our very 
 existence : — 
 
 Hdtte ich ge zander t zu werden, 
 
 Bis man mir's Leben geognnt, 
 
 Ich ware noch nicht auf Erden, 
 
 Wie ihr begreifen kbnnt, 
 
 H'enn ihr seht, wie sie sich geberden, 
 
 Die, um etwas zu scheinen, 
 
 Mich genie tnochten verneinen. 
 
FAME. 91 
 
 Honor, on the contrary, generally meets with fair apprecia- 
 tion, and is not exposed to the onslaught of envy ; nay, every 
 man is credited with the possession of it until the contrary is 
 proved. But fame has to be won in despite of envy, and the 
 tribunal which awards the laurel is composed of judges biased 
 against the applicant from the very first. Honor is something 
 which we are able and ready to share with everyone ; fame 
 suffers encroachment and is rendered more unattainable in 
 proportion as more people come by it. Further, the difficulty 
 of winning fame by any given work stands in inverse ratio to 
 the number of people who are likely to read it ; and hence it 
 is so much harder to become famous as the author of a learned 
 work than as a writer who aspires only to amuse. It is hardest 
 of all in the case of philosophical works, because the result at 
 which they aim is rather vague, and, at the same time, useless 
 from a material point of view ; they appeal chiefly to readers 
 who are working on the same lines themselves. 
 
 It is clear, then, from what I have said as to the difficulty of 
 winning fame, that those who labor, not out of love for their 
 subje6l, nor from pleasure in pursuing it, but under the stimu- 
 lus of ambition, rarely or never leave mankind a legacy of 
 immortal works. The man who seeks to do what is good and 
 genuine, must avoid what is bad, and be ready to defy the 
 opinions of the mob, nay, even to despise it and its misleaders. 
 Hence the truth of the remark, (especially insisted upon by 
 Osorius de Gloria), that fame shuns those who seek it, and 
 seeks those who shun it ; for the one adapt themselves to the 
 taste of their contemporaries, and the others work in defiance 
 of it. 
 
 But, difficult though it be to acquire fame, it is an easy 
 thing to keep when once acquired. Here, again, fame is in 
 direct opposition to honor, with which everyone is presumably 
 to be accredited. Honor has not to be won ; it must only not 
 be lost. But there lies the difficulty ! For by a single un- 
 worthy adtion, it is gone irretrievably. But fame, in the 
 proper sense of the word, can never disappear ; for the a6lion 
 or work by which it was acquired can never be undone ; and 
 
92 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 fame attaches to its author, even though* he does nothing to 
 deserve it anew. The fame which vanishes, or is outlived, 
 proves itself thereby to be spurious, in other words, unmerited, 
 and due to a momentary over-estimate of a man's work ; not 
 to speak of the kind of fame which Hegel enjoyed, and which 
 Lichtenberg describes as trumpeted forth by a clique of admir- 
 ing undergraduates — the resounding echo of empty heads ; — 
 such a fame as will m,ake posterity smile when it lights upon a 
 grotesque architecture of words ^ a fine nest with the birds long 
 ago flown ; it will knock at the door of this decayed struSlure 
 of conventionalities and find it utterly empty I — not even a trace 
 of thought there to invite the passer-by , 
 
 The truth is that fame means nothing but what a man is in 
 Gomparison with others. It is essentially relative in character, 
 and therefore only indirectly valuable ; for it vanishes the mo- 
 ment other people become what the famous man is. Absolute 
 value can be predicated only of what a man possesses under 
 any and all circumstances, — here, what a man is direAly and 
 in himself It is the possession of a great heart or a great 
 head, and not the mere fame of it, which is worth having, and 
 conducive to happiness. Not fame, but that which deserves 
 to be famous, is what a man should hold in esteem. This is, 
 as it were, the true underlying substance, and fame is only an 
 accident, affeding its subject chiefly as a kind of external 
 symptom, which serves to confirm his own opinion of himself 
 Light is not visible unless it meets with something to reflect 
 it ; and talent is sure of itself only when its fame is noised 
 abroad. But fame is not a certain symptom of merit ; because 
 you can have the one without the other ; or, as Lessing nicely 
 puts it. Some people obtain fame, and others deserve it. 
 
 It would be a miserable existence which should make its 
 value or want of value depend upon what other people think ; 
 but such would be the life of a hero or a genius if its worth 
 consisted in fame, that is, in the applause of the world. Every 
 man lives and exists on his own account, and, therefore, 
 mainly in and for himself; and what he is and the whole 
 manner of his being concern himself more than anyone else ; 
 
FAME. 93 
 
 SO if he is not worth much in this respect, he cannot be worth 
 much otherwise. The idea which other people form of his 
 existence is something secondary, derivative, exposed to all 
 the chances of fate, and in the end affecting him but very in- 
 directly. Besides, other people's heads are a wretched place 
 to be the home of a man's true happiness — a fanciful happiness 
 perhaps, but not a real one. 
 
 And what a mixed company inhabits the Temple of Uni- 
 versal Fame! — generals, ministers, charlatans, jugglers, dancers, 
 singers, millionaires and Jews ! It is a temple in which more 
 sincere recognition, more genuine esteem, is given to the 
 several excellences of such folk, than to superiority of mind, 
 even of a high order, which obtains from the great majority 
 only a verbal acknowledgment. 
 
 From the point of view of human happiness, fame is, surely, 
 nothing but a very rare and delicate morsel for the appetite 
 that feeds on pride and vanity — an appetite which, however 
 carefully concealed, exists to an immoderate degree in evely 
 man, and is, perhaps strongest of all in those who set their 
 hearts on becoming famous at any cost. Such people generally 
 have to wait some time in uncertainty as to their own value, 
 before the opportunity comes which will put it to the proof and 
 let other people see what they are made of; but until then, 
 they feel as if they were suffering secret injustice.* 
 
 But, as I explained at the beginning of this chapter, an un- 
 reasonable value is set upon other people's opinion, and one 
 quite disproportionate to its real worth. Hobbes has some 
 strong remarks on this subject ; and no doubt he is quite 
 right. Mental pleasure, he writes, and ecstasy of any kmd, 
 arise when, on comparing ourselves with others, we cotne to the 
 conclusion that we may think well of ourselves. So we can 
 easily understand the great value which is always attached to 
 fame, as worth any sacrifices if there is the slightest hope of 
 attaining it. 
 
 > Our greatest pleasure consists in being admired ; but those who 
 admire us, even if they have every reason to do so, are slow to express 
 their sentiments. Hence he is the happiest man who, no matter how, 
 manages sincerely to admire himself — so long as other people leave 
 him alone. 
 
94 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise 
 
 ( That last infirmity of noble mind ) 
 
 To scorn delights and live laborious days. ' 
 
 And again : 
 
 How hard it is to climb 
 The heights where Fame's proud temple shines afar! 
 
 We can thus understand how it is that the vainest people 
 in the world are always talking about la gloire, with the most 
 implicit faith in it as a stimulus to great a<5lions and great 
 works. But there can be no doubt that fame is something 
 secondary in its character, a mere echo or reflection — as it 
 were, a shadow or symptom — of merit : and, in any case, 
 what excites admiration must be of more value than the admi- 
 ration itself. The truth is that a man is made happy, not by 
 fame, but by that which brings him tame, by his merits, or to 
 speak more correctly, by the disposition and capacity from 
 which his merits proceed, whether they be moral or intellectual. 
 The best side of a man's nature must of necessity be more 
 important for him than for anyone else : the reflection of it, 
 the opinion which exists in the heads of others, is a matter 
 that can affe6l him only in a very subordinate degree. He 
 who deserves fame without getting it possesses by far the 
 more important element of happiness, which should console 
 him for the loss of the other. It is not that a man is thought 
 to be great by masses of incompetent and often infatuated 
 people, but that he really is great, which should move us to 
 envy his position ; and his happiness lies, not in the fa6t that 
 posterity will hear of him, but that he is the creator of thoughts 
 worthy to be treasured up and studied for hundreds of years. 
 
 Besides, if a man has done this, he possesses something 
 which cannot be wrested from him ; and, unlike fame, it is a 
 possession dependent entirely upon himself If admiration 
 were his chief aim, there would be nothing in him to admire. 
 This is just what happens in the case of false, that is, un- 
 merited, fame ; for its recipient lives upon it without actually 
 possessing the solid substratum of which fame is the outward 
 
 ' Milton. Lycidas. 
 
FAME. 95 
 
 and visible sign. False fame must often put its possessor out 
 of conceit with himself ; for the time may come when, in spite 
 of the illusions borne of self-love, he will feel giddy on the 
 heights which he was never meant to climb, or look upon 
 himself as spurious coin; and in the anguish of threatened 
 discovery and well-merited degradation, he will read the 
 sentence of posterity on the foreheads of the wise — like a man 
 who owes his property to a forged will. 
 
 The truest fame, the fame that comes after death, is never 
 heard of by its recipient ; and yet he is called a happy 
 man. 
 
 His happiness lay both in the possession of those great quali- 
 ties which won him fame, and in the opportunity that was 
 granted him of developing them — the leisure he had to a6l as 
 he pleased, to dedicate himself to his favorite pursuits. It is 
 only work done from the heart that ever gains the laurel. 
 
 Greatness of soul, or wealth of intelle6l, is what makes a 
 man happy — intelledt, such as, when stamped on its produc- 
 tions, will receive the admiration of centuries to come, — 
 thoughts which made him happy at the time, and will in their 
 turn be a source of study and delight to the noblest minds of 
 the most remote posterity. The value of posthumous fame 
 lies in deserving it ; and this is its own reward. Whether 
 works destined to fame attain it in the lifetime of their author is 
 a chance affair, of no very great importance. For the average 
 man has no critical power of his own, and is absolutely inca- 
 pable of appreciating the difficulty of a great work. People 
 are always swayed by authority ; and where fame is wide- 
 spread, it means that ninety-nine out of a hundred take it on 
 faith alone. If a man is famed far and wide in his own life- 
 time, he will, if he is wise, not set too much value upon it, 
 because it is no more than the echo of a few voices, which the 
 chance of a day has touched in his favor. 
 
 Would a musician feel flattered by the loud applause of an 
 audience if he knew that they were nearly all deaf, and that, to 
 conceal their infirmity, they set to work to clap vigorously as 
 soon as ever they saw one or two persons applauding ? And 
 
rSWTT^ 
 
 gib THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 what would he say if he got to know that those one or two 
 persons had often taken bribes to secure the loudest applause 
 for the poorest player ! 
 
 It is easy to see why contemporary praise so seldom de- 
 celopes into posthumous fame. D'Alembert, in an extremely 
 fine description of the temple of literary fame, remarks that 
 the san6tuary of the temple is inhabited by the great dead, 
 who during their life had no place there, and by a very few 
 living persons, who are nearly all ejected on their death. Let 
 me remark, in passing, that to erect a monument to a man in 
 his lifetime is as much as declaring that posterity is not to be 
 trusted in its judgment of him. If a man does happen to see 
 his own true fame, it can very rarely be before he is old, though 
 there have been artists and musicians who have been exceptions 
 to this rule, but very few philosophers. This is confirmed by 
 the portraits of people celebrated by their works ; for most of 
 them are taken only after their subje6ls have attained celebrity, 
 generally depi6ling them as old and grey ; more especially if 
 philosophy has been the work of their lives. From a eudae- 
 monistic standpoint, this is a very proper arrangement ; as 
 fame and youth are too much for a mortal at one and the same 
 time. Life is such a poor business that the stri6lest economy 
 must be exercised in its good things. Youth has enough and 
 to spare in itself, and must rest content with what it has. But 
 when the delights and joys of life fall away in old age, as the 
 leaves from a tree in autumn, fame buds forth opportunely, like 
 a plant that is green in winter. Fame is, as it were, the fruit 
 that must grow all the summer before it can be enjoyed at 
 Yule. There is no greater consolation in age than the feeling 
 of having put the whole force of one's youth into works which 
 still remain young. 
 
 Finally, let us examine a little more closely the kinds of 
 fame which attach to various intelle6lual pursuits ; for it is 
 with fame of this sort that my remarks are more immediately 
 concerned. 
 
 I think it may be said broadly that the intelle<Slual superior- 
 ity it denotes consists in forming theories, that is, new com 
 
FAME. 97 
 
 binations of certain facts. These facts may be of very differ- 
 ent kinds ; but the better they are known, and the more 
 they come within everyday experience, the greater and wider 
 will be the fame which is to be won by theorizing about 
 them. 
 
 For instance, if the facts in question are numbers or lines or 
 special branches of science, such as physics, zoology, botany, 
 anatomy, or corrupt passages in ancient authors, or unde- 
 cipherable inscriptions, written, it may be, in some unknown 
 alphabet, or obscure points in history ; the kind of fame which 
 may be obtained by correctly manipulating such facts will not 
 extend much beyond those who make a study of them — a 
 small number of persons, most of whom live retired lives and 
 are envious of others who become famous in their special 
 branch of knowledge. 
 
 But if the fa6ls be such as are known to everyone, for 
 example, the fundamental characteristics of the human mind 
 or the human heart, which are shared by all alike ; or the great 
 physical agencies which are constantly in operation before our 
 eyes, or the general course of natural laws ; the kind of fame 
 which is to be won by spreading the light of a new and mani- 
 festly true theory in regard to them, is such as in time will 
 extend almost all over the civilized world : for if the fa6ls be 
 such as everyone can grasp, the theory also will be generally 
 intelligible. But the extent of the fame will depend upon the 
 difficulties overcome ; and the more generally known the fa6ls 
 are, the harder it will be to form a theory that shall be both 
 new and true : because a great many heads will have been 
 occupied with them, and there will be little or no possibility 
 of saying anything that has not been said before. 
 
 On the other hand, fa6ls which are not accessible to every- 
 body, and can be got at only after much difficulty and labor, 
 nearly always admit of new combinations and theories ; so 
 that, if sound understanding and judgment are brought to bear 
 upon them — qualities which do not involve very high intel- 
 le6lual power — a man may easily be so fortunate as to light 
 upon some new theory in regard to them which shall be also 
 
98 THE WISDOM OF LIFE. 
 
 true. But fame won on such paths does not extend much 
 beyond those who possess a knowledge of the fafls in question. 
 To solve problems of this sort requires, no doubt, a great deal 
 of study and labor, if only to get at the fadls ; whilst on the 
 path where the greatest and most widespread fame is to be 
 won, the facts may be grasped without any labor at all. But 
 just in proportion as less labor is necessary, more talent or 
 genius is required ; and between such qualities and the drudg- 
 ery of research no comparison is possible, in respe6t either of 
 their intrinsic value, or of the estimation in which they are 
 held. 
 
 And so people who feel that they possess solid intelle6lual 
 capacity and a sound judgment, and yet cannot claim the 
 highest mental powers, should not be afraid of laborious study ; 
 for by its aid they may work themselves above the great mob 
 of humanity who have the fa6ls constantly before their eyes, 
 and reach those secluded spots which are accessible to learned 
 toil. 
 
 For this is a sphere where there are infinitely fewer 
 rivals, and a man of only moderate capacity may soon find an 
 opportunity of proclaiming a theory that shall be both new 
 and true ; nay, the merit of his discovery will partly rest upon 
 the difficulty of coming at the fa6ls. But applause from one's 
 fellow-students, who are the only persons with a knowledge of 
 the subjeA, sounds very faint to the far-oflf multitude. And if 
 we follow up this sort of fame far enough, we shall at last come 
 to a point where fadls very difficult to get at are in themselves 
 sufficient to lay a foundation of fame, without any necessity 
 for forming a theory ; — travels, for instance, in remote and 
 little-known countries, which make a man famous by what he 
 has seen, not by what he has thought. The great advantage 
 of this kind of fame is that to relate what one has seen, is 
 much easier than to impart one's thoughts, and people are apt 
 to understand descriptions better than ideas, reading the one 
 more readily than the other : for, as Asmus says, 
 
 ff'hgn one goes forth a-voyaging 
 He has a tale to tell. 
 
FAME. 99 
 
 And yet, for all that, a personal acquaintance with celebrated 
 travelers often reminds us of a line from Horace — new scenes 
 do not always mean new ideas — 
 
 Coeium non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt.^ 
 
 But if a man finds himself in possession of great mental 
 faculties, such as alone should venture on the solution of the 
 hardest of all problems — those which concern nature as a whole 
 and humanity in its widest range, he will do well to extend his 
 view equally in all directions, without ever straying too far 
 amid the intricacies of various by-paths, or invading regions little 
 known ; in other words, without occupying himself with special 
 branches of knowledge, to say nothing of their petty details. 
 There is no necessity for him to seek out subjedls difficult of 
 access, in order to escape a crowd of rivals ; the common 
 obje6ls of life will give him material for new theories at once 
 serious and true ; and the service he renders will be appreci- 
 ated by all those — and they form a great part of mankind — 
 who know the fa6ls of which he treats. What a vast distinc- 
 tion there is between students of physics, chemistry, anatomy, 
 mineralogy, zoology, philology, history, and the men who 
 deal with the great fadls of human life, the poet and the 
 philosopher ! 
 
 > Epist. I. II. 
 
COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 Le bonheur n'esipas chose atsee : il est iris- 
 difficile de le trouver en nous, et impossible 
 de le trouver aiUeurs. 
 
 Chamfort. 
 
NOTE. 
 
 FOR convenience of publication, I have divided this transla- 
 tion of Schopenhauer's Aphorismen zur Lebensweisheit 
 into two parts ; and for the sake of appearances, a new series of 
 chapters has been begun in the present volume. But it should 
 be understood that there is no such division in the original, 
 and that The Wisdom of Life and Counsels and Maxims form a 
 single treatise, devoted to a popular exposition of the author's 
 views on matter of practice. To the former volume I have 
 prefixed some remarks which may help the reader to appre- 
 ciate the value of Schopenhauer's teaching, and to determine 
 its relation to certain well-known theories of life. 
 
 T. B. S. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 Introduction 7 
 
 I. General Rules 9 
 
 II. Our Relation to Ourselves . . . . 20 
 
 III. Our Relation to Others . . . .59 
 
 IV. Worldly Fortune 88 
 
 V. The Ages of Life 100 
 
J 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IF my object in these pages were to present a complete 
 scheme of counsels and maxims for the guidance of life, I 
 should have to repeat the numerous rules — some of them ex- 
 cellent — which have been drawn up by thinkers of all ages, 
 from Theognis and Solomon* down to La Rochefoucauld ; 
 and, in so doing, I should inevitably entail upon the reader a 
 vast amount of well-worn commonplace. But the fact is that 
 in this work I make still less claim to exhaust my subject than 
 in any other of my writings, 
 
 An author who makes no claims to completeness must also, 
 in a great measure, abandon any attempt at systematic arrange- 
 ment. For his double loss in this respect, the reader may 
 console himself by reflecting that a complete and systematic' 
 treatment of such a subject as the guidance of life could hardly 
 fail to be a very wearisome business. I have simply put down 
 those of my thoughts which appear to be worth communica- 
 ting — thoughts which, as far as I know, have not been uttered, 
 or, at any rate, not just in the same form, by any one else ; so 
 that my remarks may be taken as a supplement to what has 
 been already achieved in the immense field. 
 
 However, by way of introducing some sort of order into the 
 great variety of matters upon which advice will be given in the 
 following pages, I shall distribute what I have to say under the 
 following heads: (i) general rules; (2) our relation to our- 
 selves ; (3) our relation to others ; and finally, (4) rules which 
 concern our manner of life and our worldly circumstances. I 
 shall conclude with some remarks on the changes which the 
 various periods of life produce in us. 
 
 > I refer to the proverbs and maxims ascribed, in the Old Testa- 
 ment, to the king of that name. (7) 
 
COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENERAL RULES. — SECTION I. 
 
 THE first and foremost rule for the wise conduct of life 
 seems to me to be contained in a view to which Aristotle 
 parenthetically refers in the Nichomachean Ethics : ^ 6 ^povtfioi 
 Tb aXvitov diuKei oi rb vSv, or, as it may be rendered, not pleas- 
 ure, but freedom from pain, is what the wise man will aim, at. 
 
 The truth of this remark turns upon the negative character 
 of happiness, — the fact that pleasure is only the negation of 
 pain, and that pain is the positive element in life. Though I 
 have given a detailed proof of this proposition in my chief 
 work,* I may supply one more illustration of it here, drawn 
 from a circumstance of daily occurrence. Suppose that, with 
 the exception of some sore or painful spot, we are physically 
 in a sound and healthy condition : the pain of this one spot, 
 will completely absorb our attention, causing us to lose the 
 sense of general well-being, and destroying all our comfort in 
 life. In the same way, when all our affairs but one turn out as 
 we wish, the single instance in which our aims are frustrated is 
 a constant trouble to us, even though it be something quite 
 trivial. We think a great deal about it, and very little about 
 those other and more important matters in which we have been 
 successful. In both these cases what has met with resistance 
 is the will : in the one case, as it is objectified in the organism, 
 in the other, as it presents itself in the struggle of life ; and in 
 both, it is plain that the satisfaction of the will consists in noth- 
 
 • vii. (ii) 12. 
 
 ^Weltals Wille undVorstellung. Vol. I., p. 58. (9) 
 
lO COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 ing else than that it meets with no resistance. It is, therefore,. 
 a satisfaction which is not directly felt ; at most, we can become 
 conscious of it only when we reflect upon our condition. But 
 that which checks or arrests the will is something positive ; it 
 proclaims its own presence. All pleasure consists in merely 
 removing this check — in other words, in freeing us from its 
 action ; and hence pleasure is a state which can never last very 
 long. 
 
 This is the true basis of the above excellent rule quoted from 
 Aristotle, which bids us direct our aim, not toward securing 
 what is pleasurable and agreeable in life, but toward avoiding, 
 as far as possible, its innumerable evils. If this were not the 
 right course to take, that saying of Voltaire's, Happiness is 
 btii a dream and sorrow is real, would be as false as it is, in 
 fact, true. A man who desires to make up the book of his life 
 and determine where the balance of happiness lies, must put 
 down in his accounts, not the pleasures which he has enjoyed, 
 but the evils which he has escaped. That is the true method 
 of eudsemonology ; for all eudaemonology must begin by rec- 
 ognizing that its very name is a euphemism, and that to live 
 happily only means to live less unhappily — to live a tolerable 
 life. There is no doubt that life is given us, not to be enjoyed, 
 but to be overcome — to be got over. There are numerous ex- 
 pressions illustrating this — such as degere vitam, vita defungi; 
 or in Italian, si scampa cost ; or in German, man muss suchen 
 durchzukommen ; er wird schon durch die Welt kommen, and 
 so on. In old age it is indeed a consolation to think that the 
 work of life is over and done with. The happiest lot is not to 
 have experienced the keenest delights or the greatest pleasures, 
 but to have brought life to a close without any very great pain, 
 bodily or mental. To measure the happiness of a life by its 
 delights or pleasures, is to apply a false standard. For pleas- 
 ures are and remain something negative ; that they produce 
 happiness is a delusion, cherished by envy to its own punish- 
 ment. Pain is felt to be something positive, and hence its 
 absence is the true standard of happiness. And if, over and 
 above freedom from pain, there is also an absence of boredom, 
 
GENERAL RULES. II 
 
 the essential conditions of earthly h'appiness are attained ; for 
 all else is chimerical. 
 
 It follows from this that a man should never try to purchase 
 pleasure at the cost of pain, or even at the risk of incurring it ; 
 to do so is to pay what is positive and real, for what is negative 
 and illusory ; while there is a net profit in sacrificing pleasure 
 for the sake of avoiding pain. In either case it is a matter of 
 indifference whether the pain follows the pleasure or precedes 
 it. While it is a complete inversion of the natural order to try 
 and turn this scene of misery into a garden of pleasure, to aim 
 at joy and pleasure rather than at the greatest possible freedom 
 from pain — and yet how many do it ! — there is some wisdom 
 in taking a gloomy view, in looking upon the world as a kind 
 of Hell, and in confining one's efforts to securing a little room 
 that shall not be exposed to the fire. The fool rushes after the 
 pleasures of life and finds himself their dupe ; the wise man 
 avoids its evils ; and even if, notwithstanding his precautions, 
 he falls into misfortunes, that is the fault of fate, not of his own 
 folly. As far as he is successful in his endeavors, he cannot be 
 said to have lived a life of illusion ; for the evils which he 
 shuns are very real. Even if he goes too far out of his way to 
 avoid evils, and makes an unnecessary sacrifice of pleasure, he 
 is, in reality, not the worse off for that ; for all pleasures are 
 chimerical, and to mourn for having lost any of them is a 
 frivolous, and even ridiculous proceeding. 
 
 The failure to recognize this truth — a failure promoted by 
 optimistic ideas — is the source of much unhappiness. In mo- 
 ments free from pain, our restless wishes present, as it were in 
 a mirror, the image of a happiness that has no counterpart in 
 reality, seducing us to follow it ; in doing so we bring pain up- 
 on ourselves, and that is something undeniably real. After- 
 wards, we come to look with regret upon that lost state of 
 painlessness ; it is a paradise which we have gambled away ; 
 it is no longer with us, and we long in vain to undo what has 
 been done. 
 
 One might well fancy that these visions of wishes ful- 
 filled were the work of some evil spirit, conjured up in order 
 
12 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 to entice us away from that painless state which forms our 
 highest happiness. 
 
 A careless youth may think that the world is meant to be 
 enjoyed, as though it were the abode of some real or positive 
 happiness, which only those fail to attain who are not clever 
 enough to overcome the difficulties that lie in the way. This 
 false notion takes a stronger hold on him when he comes to 
 read poetry and romance, and to be deceived by outward 
 show — the hypocrisy that chara6lerizes the world from begin- 
 ning to end ; on which I shall have something to say present- 
 ly. The result is that his life is the more or less deliberate 
 pursuit of positive happiness ; and happiness he takes to be 
 equivalent to a series of definite pleasures. In seeking for 
 these pleasures he encounters danger — a fact which should not 
 be forgotten. He hunts for game that does not exist ; and so 
 he ends by suffering some very real and positive misfortune — 
 pain, distress, sickness, loss, care, poverty, shame, and all the 
 thousand ills of life. Too late he discovers the trick that has 
 been played upon him. 
 
 But if the rule I have mentioned is observed, and a plan of 
 life is adopted which proceeds by avoiding pain — in other 
 words, by taking measures of precaution against want, sick- 
 ness, and distress in all its forms, the aim is a real one, and 
 something may be achieved which will be great in proportion 
 as the plan is not disturbed by striving after the chimera of 
 positive happiness. This agrees with the opinion expressed 
 by Goethe in the Elective Affinities, and there put into the 
 mouth of Mittler — the man who is always trying to make other 
 people happy : To desire to get rid of an evil is a definite ob- 
 ject, but to desire a better fortune than one has is blind folly. 
 The same truth is contained in that fine French proverb : le 
 mieux est t ennemi du bien — leave well alone. And, as I have 
 remarked in my chief work,^ this is the leading thought under- 
 lying the philosophical system of the Cynics. For what was it 
 led the Cynics to repudiate pleasure in every form, if it was 
 not the fad that pain is, in a greater or less degree, always 
 > Weltals Wille und Vorstellung, vol. ii., ch. i6. 
 
GENERAL RULES. 1 3 
 
 bound up with pleasure ? To go out of the way of pain seem- 
 ed to them so much easier than to secure pleasure. Deeply 
 impressed as they were by the negative nature of pleasure and 
 the positive nature of pain, they consistently devoted all their 
 efforts to the avoidance of pain. The first step to that end 
 was, in their opinion, a complete and deliberate repudiation of 
 pleasure, as something which served only to entrap the vidlim 
 in order that he might be delivered over to pain. 
 
 We are all born, as Schiller says, in Arcadia. In other 
 words, we come into the world full of claims to happiness and 
 pleasure, and we cherish the fond hope of making them good. 
 But, as a rule, Fate soon teaches us, in a rough and ready way 
 that we really possess nothing at all, but that everything in the 
 world is at its command, in virtue of an unassailable right, not 
 only to all we have or acquire, to wife or child, but even to 
 our very limbs, our arms, legs, eyes and ears, nay, even to the 
 nose in the middle of our face. And in any case, after some 
 little time, we learn by experience that happiness and pleasure 
 are a fata morgana, which, visible from afar, vanish as we ap- 
 proach ; that, on the other hand, suffering and pain are a reali- 
 ty, which makes its presence felt without any intermediary, 
 and for its effe6l, stands in no need of illusion or the play 
 of false hope. 
 
 If the teaching of experience bears fruit in us, we soon give 
 up the pursuit of pleasure and happiness, and think much 
 more about making ourselves secure against the attacks of pain 
 and suffering. We see that the best the world has to offer is 
 an existence free from pain — a quiet, tolerable life ; and we 
 confine our claims to this, as to something we can more surely 
 hope to achieve. For the safest way of not being very miser- 
 able is not to expe6l to be very happy. Merck, the friend of 
 Goethe's youth, was conscious of this truth when he wrote: 
 It is the wretched way people have of setting up a claim to happi- 
 ness — and, that to. in a measure corresponding with their de- 
 sires — that ruins everything in this world. A man will m^ke 
 progress if he can get rid of this clahn^ and desire nothing but 
 
 ' Letters to and from Merck. 
 
14 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 what he sees before him. Accordingly it is advisable to put 
 very moderate limits upon our expectations of pleasure, pos- 
 sessions, rank, honor and so on ; because it is just this striving 
 and struggling to be happy, to dazzle the world, to lead a life 
 full of pleasure, which entail great misfortune. It is prudent 
 and wise, I say, to reduce one's claims, if only for the reason 
 that it is extremely easy to be very unhappy ; while to be very 
 happy is not indeed difficult, but quite impossible. With jus- 
 tice sings the poet of life's wisdom : 
 
 Auream quisquis mediocritatem 
 Diligit, tutus caret obsoleti 
 Sordibus tecti, caret invidenda 
 Sobrius aula. 
 
 Soevius ventis agitatur ingens 
 Pinus : et celsoe graviori casu 
 Decidunt turres ; feriuntque suntmos 
 Fulgura tnontes.^ 
 
 — the golden mean is best — to live free from the squalor of a 
 mean abode, and yet not be a mark for envy. It is the tall 
 pine which is cruelly shaken by the wind, the highest summits 
 that are struck in the storm, and the lofty towers that fall so 
 heavily. 
 
 He who has taken to heart the teaching of my philosophy — 
 who knows, therefore, that our whole existence is something 
 which had better not have been, and that to disown and dis- 
 claim it is the highest wisdom — he will have no great expe6la- 
 tions from anything or any condition in life : he will spend 
 passion upon nothing in the world, nor lament over-much if he 
 fails in any of his undertakings. He will feel the deep truth of 
 what Plato' says : ovrt ti tuv dvQpooTCivoov u^iov ov jiieyu\?^<; aicovd^i 
 — nothing in human affairs is worth any great anxiety ; or, as 
 the Persian poet has it, 
 
 Though from thy grasp all worldly things should flee. 
 
 Grieve not for thetn, for they are not hi fig worth : 
 And though a world in thy possession be, 
 
 foy not, for worthless are the things of earth. 
 Since to that better world 'tis given to thee 
 To pass, speed on, for this is nothing worth.^ 
 •Horace. Odes II. x. ^Republic, x. 604. 
 
 Translator's Note. — From the Anvir-i Suhaili — The Lights of 
 Canoi)us — being the Persian version of the Table of Bidpai. Trans- 
 lated by E. B. Eastwick, ch. iii. Story vi., p. 289. 
 
GENERAL RULES. 1 5 
 
 The chief obstacle to our arriving at these salutary views is 
 that hypocrisy of the world to which I have already alluded — 
 an hypocrisy which should be early revealed to the young. 
 Most of the glories of the world are mere outward show, like 
 the scenes on a stage : there is nothing real about them. Ships 
 festooned and hung with pennants, firing of cannon, illumina- 
 tions, beating of drums and blowing of trumpets, shouting and 
 applauding — these are all the outward sign, the pretence and 
 suggestion, — as it were the hieroglyphic, — oi Joy : but just 
 there, joy is, as a rule, not to be found ; it is the only guest 
 who has declined to be present at the festival. Where this 
 guest may really be found, he comes generally without invita- 
 tion ; he is not formerly announced, but slips in quietly by 
 himself sans facon ; often making his appearance under the 
 most unimportant and trivial circumstances, and in the com- 
 monest company — anywhere, in short, but where the society is 
 brilliant and distinguished. Joy is like the gold in the Austra- 
 lian mines — found only now and then, as it were, by the caprice 
 of chance, and according to no rule or law ; oftenest in very 
 little grains, and very seldom in heaps. All that outward show 
 which I have described, is only an attempt to make people be- 
 lieve thgit it is really joy which has come to the festival ; and 
 to produce this impression upon the spe6lators is, in fa6l, the 
 whole object of it. 
 
 With mourning it is just the same. That long funeral pro- 
 cession, moving up so slowly ; how melancholy it looks ! what 
 an endless row of carriages ! But look into them — they are all 
 empty ; the coachmen of the whole town are the sole escort 
 the dead man has to his grave. Eloquent pi6lure of the friend- 
 ship and esteem of the world ! This is the falsehood, the hol- 
 lowness, the hypocrisy of human affair- \ 
 
 Take another example — a roomful of guests in full dress, be- 
 ing received with great ceremony. You could almost believe 
 that this is a noble and distinguished company ; but, as a 
 matter of fa6l, it is compulsion, pain and boredom who are the 
 .real guests. For where many are invited, it is a rabble — even 
 
l6 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 if they all wear stars. Really good society is everywhere of 
 necessity very small. In brilliant festivals and noisy entertain- 
 ments, there is always, at bottom, a sense of emptiness preva- 
 lent. A false tone is there : such gatherings are in strange 
 contrast with the misery and barrenness of our existence. The 
 contrast brings the true condition into greater relief Still, 
 these gathering are effedlive from the outside ; and that is just 
 their purpose. Chamfort* makes the excellent remark that 
 society — les cercles, les salons, ce qu' on appdle le monde — is like 
 a miserable play, or a bad opera, without any interest in itself, 
 but supported for a time by mechanical aid, costumes and 
 scenery. 
 
 And so, too, with academies and chairs of philosophy. You 
 have a kind of sign-board hung out to show the apparent 
 abode of wisdom : but wisdom is another guest who declines 
 the invitation ; she is to be found elsewhere. The chiming of 
 bells, ecclesiastical millinery, attitudes of devotion, insane an- 
 tics — these are the pretence, the false show of piety. And so 
 on. Everything in the world is like a hollow nut ; there is 
 little kernel anywhere, and when it does exist, it is still more 
 rare to find it in the shell. You may look for it elsewhere, 
 and find it, as a rule, only by chance. 
 
 Section 2. To estimate a man's condition in regard to 
 happiness, it is necessary to ask, not what things please him, 
 but what things trouble him ; and the more trivial these things 
 are in themselves, the happier the man will be. To be irrita- 
 ted by trifles, a man must be well off" ; for in misfortunes trifles 
 are unfelt. 
 
 Section 3. Care should be taken not to build the happiness 
 ofhfe upon di broad foundation — not to require a great many 
 things in order to be happy. For happiness on such a founda- 
 
 ' Translator's iVo/^.— Nicholas "Chamfort" (1741-94), a French 
 miscellaneous writer, whose brilliant conversation, power of sarcasm, 
 and epigrammatic force, coupled with an extraordinary career, render 
 him one of the most interesting and remarkable men of his time. 
 Schopenhauer undoubtedly owed much to this writer, to whom he 
 constantly refers . 
 
GENERAL RULES. 1 7 
 
 tion is the most easily undermined ; it offers many more oppor- 
 tunities for accidents ; and accidents are always happening. 
 The archite6lure of happiness follows a plan in this respe6l just 
 the opposite of that adopted in every other case, where the 
 broadest foundation offers the greatest security. Accordingly, 
 to reduce your claims to the lowest possible degree, in com- 
 parison with your means, — of whatever kind these may be — is 
 the surest way of avoiding extreme misfortune. 
 
 To make extensive preparations for life — no matter what 
 form they may take — is one of the greatest and commonest of 
 follies. Such preparations presuppose, in the first place, a 
 long Hfe, the full and complete term of years appointed to man 
 — and how few reach it ! and even if it be reached, it is still too 
 short for all the plans that have been made ; for to carry them 
 out requires more time than was thought necessary at the be- 
 ginning. And then how many mischances and obstacles stand 
 in the way ! how seldom the goal is ever reached in human 
 affairs ! 
 
 And lastly, even though the goal should be reached, the 
 changes which Time works in us have been left out of the 
 reckoning : we forget that the capacity whether for achieve- 
 ment or for enjoyment does not last a whole lifetime. So we 
 often toil for things which are no longer suited to us when we 
 attain them ; and again, the years we spend in preparing for 
 some work, unconsciously rob us of the power for carrying 
 it out. 
 
 How often it happens that a man is unable to enjoy the 
 wealth which he acquired at so much trouble and risk, and 
 that the fruits of his labor are reserved for others ; or that he 
 is incapable of filling the position which he has won after so 
 many years of toil and struggle. Fortune has come too late 
 for him ; or, contrarily, he has come too late for fortune, — 
 when, for instance, he wants to achieve great things, say, in 
 art or literature : the popular taste has changed, it may be ; a 
 new generation has grown up, which takes no interest in his 
 work ; others have gone a shorter way and got the start of 
 
1 8 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 him. These are the fa6ls of life which Horace must have had 
 in view, when he lamented the uselessness of all advice : — 
 
 quid etemis minorem 
 Consiliis anitnum fatigas f ' 
 
 The cause of this commonest of all follies is that optical illu- 
 sion of the mind from which everyone suffers, making life, at 
 its beginning, seem of long duration ; and at its end, when one 
 looks back over the course of it, how short a time it seems ! 
 There is some advantage in the illusion ; but for it, no great 
 work would ever be done. 
 
 Our life is like a journey on which, as we advance, the land- 
 scape takes a different view from that which it presented at 
 first, and changes again, as we come nearer. This is just what 
 happens — especially with our wishes. We often find something 
 else, nay, something better than what we were looking for ; 
 and what we look for, we often find on a very different path 
 from that on which we began a vain search. Instead of find- 
 ing, as we expedled, pleasure, happiness, joy, we get experi- 
 ence, insight, knowledge — a real and permanent blessing, in- 
 stead of a fleeting and illusory one. 
 
 This is the thought that runs through Wilhelm Meister, like 
 the bass in a piece of music. In this work of Goethe's, we 
 have a novel of the intelle^lual kind, and, therefore, superior 
 to all others, even to Sir Walter Scott's, which are, one and all, 
 ethical; in other words, they treat of human nature only from 
 the side of the will. So, too, in the Zauberfidte — that gro- 
 tesque, but still significant, and even ambiguous hieroglyphic 
 — the same thought is symbolized, but in great, coarse lines, 
 much in the way in which scenery is painted. Here the sym- 
 bol would be complete if Tamino were in the end to be cured 
 of his desire to possess Tamina, and received, in her stead, 
 initiation into the mysteries of the Temple of Wisdom. It is 
 quite right for Papageno, his necessary contrast, to succeed in 
 getting his Papagena. 
 
 ' Odes II. xi. 
 
GENERAL RULES. I9 
 
 Men of any worth or value soon come to see that they are 
 in the hands of Fate, and gratefully submit to be moulded by 
 its teachings. They recognize that the fruit of life is experience, 
 and not happiness ; they become accustomed and content to 
 exchange hope for insight ; and, in the end, they can say, with 
 Petrarch, that all they care for is to learn : — 
 
 Altro diletto che 'mparar, non provo. 
 
 It may even be that they to some extent still follow their old 
 wishes and aims, trifling with them, as it were, for the sake of 
 appearances ; all the while really and seriousjy looking for 
 nothing but instruction ; a process which lends them an air of 
 genius, a trait of something contemplative and sublime. 
 
 In their search for gold, the alchemists discovered other 
 things — gunpowder, china, medicines, the laws of nature. 
 There is a sense in which we are all alchemists. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. — SECTION 4. 
 
 THE masoi\ employed on the building of a house may be 
 quite ignorant of its general design ; or at any rate, he 
 may not keep it constantly in mind. So it is with man : in 
 working through the days and hours of his life, he takes little 
 thought of its character as a whole. 
 
 If there is any merit or importance attaching to a man's 
 career, if he lays himself out carefully for some special work, it 
 is all the more necessary and advisable for him to turn his at- 
 tention now and then to its plan, that is to say, the miniature 
 sketch of its general outlines. Of course, to do that, he must 
 have applied the maxim YvMi aiavrov ; he must have made 
 some little progress in the art of understanding himself He 
 must know what is his real, chief, and foremost objedl in life, — 
 what it is that he most wants in order to be happy ; and then, 
 after that, what occupies the second and third place in his 
 thoughts ; he must find out what, on the whole, his vocation 
 really is — the part he has to play, his general relation to the 
 world. If he maps out important work for himself on great 
 lines, a glance at this miniature plan of his life will, more than 
 anything else stimulate, rouse and ennoble him, urge him on 
 to adlion and keep him from false paths. 
 
 Again, just as the traveler, on reaching a height, gets a 
 conne6led view over the road he has taken, with its many 
 turns and windings ; so it is only when we have completed a 
 period in our life, or approach the end of it altogether, that we 
 recognize the true connection between all our adtions, — what 
 it is we have achieved, what work we have done. It is only 
 
 (JO) 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 21 
 
 then that we see the precise chain of cause and effedl, and the 
 exa<5l value of all our efforts. For as long as we are adlually 
 engaged in the work of life, we always a6l in accordance with 
 the nature of our chara6ler, under the influence of motive, and 
 within the limits of our capacity, — in a word, from beginning 
 to end, under a law oi necessity ; at every moment we do just 
 what appears to us right and proper. It is only afterwards, 
 when we come to look back at the whole course of our life and 
 its general result, that we see the why and wherefore of it all. 
 
 When we are a6lually doing some great deed, or creating 
 some immortal work, we are not conscious of it as such ; we 
 think only of satisfying present aims, of fulfilling the intentions 
 we happen to have at the time, of doing the right thing at the 
 moment. It is only when we come to view our life as a con- 
 nedled whole that our chara6ler and capacities show themselves 
 in their true light ; that we see how, in particular instances, 
 some happy inspiration, as it were, led us to choose the only 
 true path out of a thousand which might have brought us to 
 ruin. It was our genius that guided us, a force felt in the 
 affairs of the intelledtual as in those of the world ; and working 
 by its defe6l Justin the same way in regard to evil and disaster. 
 
 Section 5. Another important element in the wise condudl 
 of life is to preserve a proper proportion between our thought 
 for the present and our thought for the future ; in order not to 
 spoil the one by paying over-great attention to the other. 
 Many live too long in the present — frivolous people, I mean ; 
 others, too much in the future, ever anxious and full of care. 
 It is seldom that a man holds the right balance between the 
 two extremes. Those who strive and hope and live only in the 
 future, always looking ahead and impatiently anticipating what 
 is coming, as something which will make them happy when 
 they get it, are, in spite of their very clever airs, exactly like 
 those donkeys one sees in Italy, whose pace may be hurried 
 by fixing a stick on their heads with a wisp of hay at the end 
 of it ; this is always just in front of them, and they keep on 
 trying to get it. Such people are in a constant state of illusion 
 
22 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 as to their whole existence ; they go on living ad interim, un- 
 til at last they die. 
 
 Instead, therefore, of always thinking about our plans and 
 anxiously looking to the future, or of giving ourselves up to 
 regret for the past, we should never forget that the present is 
 the only reality, the only certainty ; that the future almost al- 
 ways turns out contrary to our expedations ; that the past, 
 too, was very different from what we suppose it to have been. 
 Both the past and the future are, on the whole, of less conse- 
 quence than we think. Distance, which makes obje<5^s look 
 small to the outward eye, makes them look big to the eye oi 
 thought. The present alone is true and actual ; it is the only 
 time which possesses full reality, and our existence lies in it 
 exclusively. Therefore we should always be glad of it, and 
 give it the welcome it deserves, and enjoy every hour that is 
 bearable by its freedom from pain and annoyance with a full 
 consciousness of its value. We shall hardly be able to do this 
 if we make a wry face over the failure of our hopes in the past 
 or over our anxiety for the future. It is the height of folly to 
 refuse the present hour of happiness, or wantonly to spoil it by 
 vexation at by-gones or uneasiness about what is to come. 
 There is a time, of course, for forethought, nay, even for re- 
 pentance ; but when it is over let us think of what is past as 
 of something to which we have .said farewell, of necessity sub- 
 duing our hearts — 
 
 aXTio. tH fitv npoTenixSai idrrofxev d^^vvuevoc nep 
 Ovfibv kvi aTT)Oeaai ipiXov dafiuaavreg ilvuyKy, ' 
 
 and of the future as of that which lies beyond our power, in 
 the lap of the gods — 
 
 dXX TJTOi fihi Tuvra deCtv tv ynvvaai Kilrai. * 
 
 But in regard to the present let us remember Seneca's advice, 
 and live each day as if it were our whole life, — singulas dies 
 singulas vitas puta: let us make it as agreeable as possible, it 
 is the only real time we have. 
 
 Only tho.se evils which are sure to come at a definite date 
 ^ Iliad, xix, 65. ^Ibid, xvii, 514. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 2$ 
 
 have any right to disturb us ; and how few there are which 
 fulfill this description. For evils are of two kinds ; either they 
 are possible only, at most probable ; or they are inevitable. 
 Even in the case of evils which are sure to happen, the time at 
 which they will happen is uncertain. A man who is always 
 preparing for either class of evil will not have a moment of 
 peace left him. So, if we are not to lose all comfort in life 
 through the fear of evils, some of which are uncertain in them- 
 selves, and others, in the time at which they will occur, we 
 should look upon the one kind as never likely to happen, and 
 the other as not likely to happen very soon. 
 
 Now, the less our peace of mind is disturbed by fear, the 
 more likely it is to be agitated by desire and expedlation. This 
 is the true meaning of that song of Goethe's which is such a 
 favorite with everyone : IcA had' mein' Sack' aufnichts gestellt. 
 It is only after a man has got rid of all pretension, and taken 
 refuge in mere unembellished existence, that he is able to at- 
 tain that peace of mind which is the foundation of human 
 happiness. Peace of mind ! that is something essential to any 
 enjoyment of the present moment ; and unless its separate 
 moments are enjoyed, there is an end of life's happiness as a 
 whole. We should always recoUedl that To-day comes only 
 once, and never returns. We fancy that it will come again to- 
 morrow ; but To-morrow is another day, which, in its turn, 
 comes once only. We are apt to forget that every day is an 
 integral, and therefore irreplaceable portion of life, and to look 
 upon life as though it were a collective idea or name which 
 does not suffer if one of the individuals it covers is destroyed. 
 
 We should be more likely to appreciate and enjoy the pres- 
 ent, if, in those good days when we are well and strong, we 
 did not fail to refledl how, in sickness and sorrow, every past 
 hour that was free from pain and privation seemed in our 
 memory so infinitely to be envied — as it were, a lost paradise, 
 or some one who was only then seen to have adled as a friend. 
 But we live through our days of happiness without noticing 
 them ; it is only when evil comes upon us that we wish them 
 
24 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 back. A thousand gay and pleasant hours are wasted in ill- 
 humor ; we let them slip by unenjoyed, and sigh for them in 
 vain when the sky is overcast. Those present moments that 
 are bearable, be they never so trite and common, — passed by in 
 indifference, or, it may be, impatiently pushed away, — those 
 are the moments we should honor ; never failing to remember 
 that the ebbing tide is even now hurrying them into the past, 
 where memory will store them transfigured and shining with 
 an imperishable light, — in some after-time, and above all, 
 when our days are evil, to raise the veil and present them as 
 the object of our fondest regret. 
 
 Section 6. Limitation always makes for happiness. We 
 are happy in proportion as our range of vision, our sphere of 
 work, our points of contaft with the world, are restri6led and 
 circumscribed. We are more likely to feel worried and anx- 
 ious if these limits are wide ; for it means that our cares, desires 
 and terrors are increased and intensified. That is why the 
 blind are not so unhappy as we might be inclined to suppose ; 
 otherwise there would not be that gentle and almost serene 
 expression of peace in their faces. 
 
 Another reason why limitation makes for happiness is that 
 the second half of life proves even more dreary than the first. 
 As the years wear on, the horizon of our aims and our points 
 of conta<5l with the world become more extended. In child- 
 hood our horizon is limited to the narrowest sphere about us ; 
 in youth there is already a very considerable widening of our 
 view ; in manhood it comprises the whole range of our adlivity, 
 often stretching out over a very distant sphere, — the care, for 
 instance, of a State or a nation ; in old age it embraces posterity. 
 
 But even in the affairs of the intellect, limitation is necessary 
 if we are to be happy. For the less the will is excited, the less 
 we suffer. We have seen that suffering is something positive, 
 and that happiness is only a negative condition. To limit the 
 sphere of outward a6livity is to relieve the will of external 
 stimulus : to limit the sphere of our intelle6lual efforts is to re- 
 lieve the will of internal sources of excitement. This latter kind 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 25 
 
 •of limitation is attended by the disadvantage that it opens the 
 door to boredom, which is a dire6l source of countless suffer- 
 ings ; for to banish boredom, a man will have recourse to any 
 means that may be handy — dissipation, society, extravagance, 
 gaming, and drinking, and the like, which in their turn bring 
 mischief, ruin and misery in their train. Difficiles in otio quies 
 — it is difficult to keep quiet if you have nothing to do. That 
 limitation in the sphere of outward a6livity is conducive, nay, 
 even necessary to human happiness, such as it is, may be seen 
 in the fa<5l that the only kind of poetry which depi6ts men in a 
 happy state of life — Idyllic poetry, I mean, — always aims, as 
 an intrinsic part of its treatment, at representing them in very 
 simple and restri(5led circumstances. It is this feeling, too, 
 which is at the bottom of the pleasure we take in what are call- 
 ed genre pidlures. 
 
 Simplicity^ therefore, as far as it can be attained, and even 
 monotony, in our manner of life, if it does not mean that we are 
 bored, will contribute to happiness ; just because, under such 
 circumstances, life, and consequently the burden which is the 
 essential concomitant of life, will be least felt. Our existence 
 w^ill glide on peacefully like a stream which no waves or 
 whirlpools disturb. 
 
 Section 7. Whether we are in a pleasant or a painful state 
 depends, ultimately, upon the kind of matter that pervades and 
 engrosses our consciousness. In this resped, purely intelled- 
 ual occupation, for the mind that is capable of it, will, as a rule, 
 do much more in the way of happiness than any form of prac- 
 tical life, with its constant alternations of success and failure, 
 and all the shocks and torments it produces. But it must be 
 confessed that for such occupation a pre-eminent amount of 
 intelle<5lual capacity is necessary. And in this connection it 
 may be noted that, just as a life devoted to outward a(5livity 
 will distraft and divert a man from study, and also deprive him 
 of that quiet concentration of mind which is necessary for such 
 work ; so, on the other hand, a long course of thought will 
 make him more or less unfit for the noisy pursuits of real life. 
 It is advisable, therefore, to suspend mental work for a while, 
 
26 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 if circumstances happen which demand any degree of energy 
 in affairs of a pradlical nature. 
 
 Section 8. To live a life that shall be entirely prudent and 
 discreet, and to draw from experience all the instru6lion it con- 
 tains, it is requisite to be constantly thinking back, — to make 
 a kind of recapitulation of what we have done, of our impres- 
 sions and sensations, to compare our former with our present 
 judgments — what we set before us and struggle to achieve, with 
 the a<5lual result and satisfaction we have obtained. To do this 
 is to get a repetition of the private lessons of experience, — 
 lessons which are given to every one. 
 
 Experience of the world may be looked upon as a kind of 
 text, to which reflection and knowledge form the commentary. 
 Where there is great deal of refledlion and intelledlual knowl- 
 edge, and very little experience, the result is like those books 
 which have on each page two lines of text to forty lines of 
 commentary. A great deal of experience with little refle6lion 
 and scanty knowledge, gives us books like those of the editio 
 Bipontina,'^ where there are no notes and much that is unin- 
 telligible. 
 
 The advice here given is on a par with a rule recommend- 
 ed by Pythagoras, — to review, every night before going to 
 sleep, what we have done during the day. To live at random, 
 in the hurly-burly of business or pleasure, without ever reflect- 
 ing upon the past, — to go on, as it were, pulling cotton off the 
 reel of life, — is to have no clear idea of what we are about ; and 
 a man who lives in this state will have chaos in his emotions 
 and certain confusion in his thoughts ; as is soon manifest by 
 the abrupt and fragmentary character of his conversation, 
 which becomes a kind of mincemeat. A man will be all the 
 more exposed to this fate in proportion as he lives a restless 
 life in the world, amid a crowd of various impressions and with 
 a correspondingly small amount of activity on the part of his 
 own mind. 
 
 And in this conneClion it will be in place to observe that, 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — A series of Greek, Latin and French classics 
 published at Zweibriicken in the Palatinate, from and after the year 
 1779. Cf. Butter, Ueber die Bipontiner und die editiones Bipontinae, 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 27 
 
 when events and circumstances which have influenced us pass 
 away in the course of time, we are unable to bring back and 
 renew the particular mood or state of feeling which they arousec 
 in us : but we can remember what we were led to say and do 
 in regard to them ; and this form, as it were, the result, ex- 
 pression and measure of those events. We should, therefore, 
 be careful to preserve the memory of our thoughts at import- 
 . ant points in our lif^ ; and herein lies the great advantage of 
 keeping a journal. 
 
 Section 9. To be self-sufficient, to be all in all to oneself, 
 to want for nothing, to be able to say omnia mea mecum porto 
 — that is assuredly the chief qualification for happiness. Hence 
 Aristotle's remark, }) ev6aifiovia rHv avTupxt->v ian.^ — to be happy 
 means to be self-sufiicient — cannot be too often repeated. It 
 is, at bottom, the same thought as is present in the very well- 
 turned sentence from Chamfort : 
 
 Le bonheur n' est pas chose ais'ee : il est tresdifficile de le trouver en 
 nous, et impossible de le trouver ailleurs. 
 
 For while a man cannot reckon with certainty upon anyone 
 but himself, the burdens and disadvantages, the dangers and 
 annoyances, which arise from having to do with others, are 
 not only countless but unavoidable. 
 
 There is no more mistaken path to happiness than worldli- 
 ness, revelry, high life : for the whole obje6l of it is to trans- 
 form our miserable existence into a succession of joys, delights 
 and pleasures, — a process which cannot fail to result in disap- 
 pointment and delusion ; on a par, in this respe6l, with its 
 obligato accompaniment, the interchange of lies.* 
 
 All society necessarily involves, as the first condition of its 
 existence, mutual accommodation and restraint upon the part 
 of its members. This means that the larger it is, the more in- 
 sipid will be its tone. A man can be himself only so long as 
 he is alone ; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love 
 
 ^ Eudem. Eth. VII. ii. 37. 
 * As our body is concealed by the clothes we wear, so our mind is 
 veiled in lies. The veil is always there, and it is only through it that 
 we can sometimes guess at what a man really thinks ; just as from his 
 dothes we arrive at the general shape of his body. 
 
28 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 freedom ; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free. 
 Constraint is always present in society, like a companion of 
 whom there is no riddance ; and in proportion to the greatness 
 of a man's individuality, it will be hard for him to bear the 
 sacrifices which all intercourse with others demands. Solitude 
 will be welcomed or endured or avoided, according as a man's 
 personal value is large or small, — the wretch feeling, when he 
 is alone, the whole burden of his misery ; the great intelleft 
 delighting in its greatness ; and everyone, in short, being just 
 what he is. 
 
 Further, if a man stands high in Nature's lists, it is natural 
 and inevitable that he should feel solitary. It will be an advant- 
 age to him if his surroundings do not interfere with this feeling ; 
 for if he has to see a great deal of other people who are not of 
 like charadler with himself, they will exercise a disturbing in- 
 fluence upon him, adverse to his peace of mind ; they will rob 
 him, in fa6l, of himself, and give him nothing to compensate 
 for the loss. 
 
 But while Nature sets very wide differences between man 
 and man in respe6l both of morality and of intelle6l, society 
 disregards and effaces them ; or, rather, it sets up artificial 
 differences in their stead, — gradations of rank and position, 
 which are very often diametrically opposed to those which 
 Nature establishes. The result of this arrangement is to ele- 
 vate those whom Nature has placed low, and to depress the 
 few who stand high. These latter, then, usually withdraw 
 from society, where, as soon as it is at all numerous, vulgarity 
 reigns supreme. 
 
 What offends a great intelle6l in society is the equality of 
 rights, leading to equality of pretensions, which everyone en- 
 joys ; while at the same time, inequality of capacity means a 
 corresponding disparity of social power. So-ca.\\ed good society 
 recognizes every kind of claim but that of intellect, which is a 
 contraband article ; and people are expected to exhibit an un- 
 limited amount of patience towards every form of folly and 
 stupidity, perversity and dullness ; whilst personal merit has 
 to beg pardon, as it were, for being present, or else conceal it- 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 2$ 
 
 self altogether. Intelle<ftual superiority offends by its very 
 existence, without any desire to do so. 
 
 The worst of what is called good society is not only that i 
 offers us the companionship of people who are unable to win 
 either our praise or our affe6tion, but that it does not allow of 
 our being that which we naturally are ; it compels us, for the 
 sake of harmony, to shrivel up, or even alter our shape alto- 
 gether. Intelle6lual conversation, whether grave or humorous, 
 is only fit for intelledlual society ; it is downright abhorrent to 
 ordinary people, to please whom it is absolutely necessary to 
 be commonplace and dull. This demands an a6l of severe self- 
 denial ; we have to forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to 
 become like other people. No doubt their company may be 
 set down against our loss in this respe6l ; but the more a man 
 is worth, the more he will find that what he gains does not 
 cover what he loses, and that the balance is on the debit side 
 of the account ; for the people with whom he deals are gener- 
 ally bankrupt, — that is to say, there is nothing to be got from 
 their society which can compensate either for its boredom, 
 annoyance and disagreeableness, or for the self-denial which it 
 renders necessary. Accordingly, most society is so constitu- 
 ted as to offer a good profit to anyone who will exchange it for 
 solitude. 
 
 Nor is this all. By way of providing a substitute for real — I 
 mean intelle6lual — superiority, which is seldom to be met with, 
 and intolerable when it is found, society has capriciously adopt- 
 ed a false kind of superiority, conventional in its chara(5ler, and 
 resting upon arbitrary principles, — a tradition, as it were, 
 handed down in the higher circles, and, like a password, sub- 
 ject to alteration ; I refer to don-ton fashion. Whenever this 
 kind of superiority comes into collision with the real kind, its 
 weakness is manifest. Moreover, the presence of good tone 
 means the absence oi good sense. 
 
 No man can be in perfe^l accord with any one but himself — 
 not even with a friend or the partner of his life ; differences of 
 individuality and temperament are always bringing in some 
 
30 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 degree of discord, though it may be a very slight one. That 
 genuine, profound peace of mind, that perfe<5l tranquillity of 
 soul, which, next to health, is the highest blessing the earth 
 can give, is to be attained only in solitude, and, as a permanent 
 mood, only in complete retirement ; and then, if there is any- 
 thing great and rich in the man's own self, his way of life is the 
 happiest that may be found in this wretched world. 
 
 Let me speak plainly. However close the bond of friend- 
 ship, love, marriage — a man, ultimately, looks to himself, to 
 his own welfare alone ; at most, to his child's too. The less 
 necessity there is for you to come into contadl with mankind 
 in general, in the relations whether of business or of personal 
 intimacy, the better off you are. Loneliness and solitude have 
 their evils, it is true ; but if you cannot feel them all at once, 
 you can at least see where they He ; on the other hand, society 
 is insidious in this respe6t ; as in offering you what appears to 
 be the pastime of pleasing social intercourse, it works great and 
 often irreparable mischief The young should early be trained 
 to bear being left alone ; for it is a source of happiness and 
 peace of mind. 
 
 It follows from this that a man is best off if he be thrown upon 
 his own resources and can be all in all to himself ; and Cicero 
 goes so far as to say that a man who is in this condition cannot 
 fail to be very happy — nemo potest non beatissimus esse qui est 
 ioius aptus ex sese, quique in se uno ponit omnia} The more a 
 man has in himself, the less others can be to him. The feeling 
 of self-sufficiency ! it is that which restrains those whose per- 
 sonal value is in itself great riches, from such considerable sac- 
 rifices as are demanded by intercourse with the world, let alone, 
 then, from a<5lually practicing self-denial by going out of their 
 way to seek it. Ordinary people are sociable and complaisant 
 just from the very opposite feeling ; — to bear others' company 
 is easier for them than to bear their own. Moreover, respe<5t 
 is not paid in this world to that which has real merit ; it is re- 
 served for that which has none. So retirement is at once a 
 
 ^ Paradoxa Stoidorum: II. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 3I 
 
 proof and a result of being distinguished by the possession of 
 meritorious qualities. It will therefore show real wisdom on 
 the part of any one who is worth anything in himself, to limit 
 his requirements as may be necessary, in order to preserve or 
 extend his freedom, and, — since a man must come into some 
 relations with his fellow-men — to admit them to his intimacy 
 as little as possible. 
 
 I have said that people are rendered sociable by their inabil- 
 ity to endure solitude, that is to say, their own society. They 
 become sick of themselves. It is this vacuity of soul which 
 drives them to intercourse with others, — to travels in foreign 
 countries. Their mind is wanting in elasticity ; it has no 
 movement of its own, and so they try to give it some, — by 
 drink, for instance. How much drunkenness is due to this 
 cause alone ! They are always looking for some form of ex- 
 citement, of the strongest kind they can bear — the excitement 
 of being with people of like nature with themselves ; and if 
 they fail in this, their mind sinks by its own weight, and they 
 fall into a grievous lethargy.' .Such people, it may be said, 
 possess only a small fra6lion of humanity in themselves ; and 
 it requires a great many of them put together to make up a 
 fair amount of it, — to attain any degree of consciousness as men 
 A man, in the full sense of the word, — a man par excellence — 
 
 ' It is a well-known faCl, that we can more easily bear up under 
 evils which fall upon a great many people besides ourselves. As 
 boredom seems to be an evil of this kind, people band together to offer 
 it a common resistance. The love of life is at bottom only the fear of 
 death ; and, in the same way, the social impulse does not rest direct- 
 ly upon the love of society, but upon the fear of solitude ; it is not 
 alone the charm of being in others' company that people seek, it is 
 the dreary oppression of being alone — the monotony of their own 
 consciousness — that they would avoid. They will dt) anything to 
 escape it, — even tolerate bad companions, and put up with the feeling 
 of constraint which all society involves, in this case a very burden- 
 some one. But if aversion to such society conquers the aversion to 
 being alone, they become accustomed to solitude and hardened to its 
 immediate efTefts. They no longer find solitude to be such a very 
 bad thing, and settle down comfortably to it without any hankering 
 after society ; — and this, partly because it is only indiredlly that they 
 need others' company, and partly because they have become accus- 
 tomed to the benefits of being alone. 
 
32 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 does not represent a fradlion, but a whole number : he is com- 
 plete in himself. 
 
 Ordinary society is, in this respe(ft, very like the kind of 
 music to be obtained from an orchestra composed solely of 
 Russian horns. Each horn has only one note ; and the music 
 is produced by each note coming in just at the right mo- 
 ment. In the monotonous sound of a single horn, you have a 
 precise illustration of the effeS. of most people's minds. How 
 often there seems to be only one thought there ! and no room 
 for any other. It is easy to see why people are so bored ; and 
 also why they are sociable, why they like to go about in crowds 
 — why mankind is so gregarious. It is the monotony of his 
 own nature that makes a man find solitude intolerable. Omnis 
 stuliitia laborat fastidio stU: folly is truly its own burden. Put 
 a great many men together, and you may get some result — 
 some music from your horns ! 
 
 A man of intelle6l is like an artist who gives a concert with- 
 out any help from anyone else, playing on a single instrument 
 — a piano, say, which is a little orchestra in itself Such a 
 man is a little world in himself; and the ^K&6i produced by 
 various instruments together, he produces single-handed, in 
 the unity of his own consciousness. Like the piano, he has no 
 place in a symphony : he is a soloist and performs by himself, 
 — in solitude, it may be ; or, if in company with other instru- 
 ments, only as principal ; or for setting the tone, as in singing. 
 However, those who are fond of society from time to time may 
 profit by this simile, and lay it down as a general rule that de- 
 ficiency of quality in those we meet may be to some extent 
 compensated by an increase in quantity. One man's company 
 may be quite enough, if he is clever ; but where you have only 
 ordinary people to deal with, it is advisable to have a great 
 many of them, so that some advantage may accrue by letting 
 them all work together, — on the analogy of the horns ; and 
 may Heaven grant you patience for your task ! 
 
 That mental vacuity and barrenness of soul to which I have 
 alluded, is responsible for another misfortune. When men of 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 33 
 
 the better class form a society for promoting some noble or 
 ideal aim, the result almost always is that the innumerable mob 
 of humanity comes crowding in too, as it always does every- 
 where, like vermin — their obje6l being to try and get rid of 
 boredom, or some other defe6l of their nature ; and anything 
 that will effedl that, they seize upon at once, without the 
 slighest discrimination. Some of them will slip into that 
 society, or push themselves in, and then either soon destroy 
 it altogether, or alter it so much that in the end it comes to 
 have a purpose the exaft opposite of that which it had at first. 
 
 This is not the only point of view from which the social im- 
 pulse may be regarded. On cold days people manage to get 
 some warmth by crowding together ; and you can warm your 
 mind in the same way — by bringing it into contadl with others. 
 But a man who has a great deal of intelledlual warmth in him- 
 self will stand in no need of such resources. I have written a 
 little fable illustrating this : it may be found elsewhere. ^ As a 
 general rule, it may be said that a man's sociabiUty stands very 
 nearly in inverse ratio to his intelledlual value : to say that "so 
 and so " is very unsociable, is almost tantamount to saying 
 that he is a man of great capacity. 
 
 Solitude is doubly advantageous to such a man. Firstly, it 
 allows him to be with himself, and, secondly, it prevents him 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — The passage to which Schopenhauer refers is 
 Parerga: vol. ii. \ 413 (4th edition). The fable is of certain porcu- 
 
 Eines, who huddled together for warmth on a cold day ; but as they 
 egan to prick one another with their quills, they were obliged to dis- 
 perse. However the cold drove them together again, when just the 
 same thing happened. At last, after many turns of huddling and dis- 
 persing, they discovered that they would be best off by remaining at 
 a little distance from one another. In the same way, the need of 
 society drives the human porcupines together — only to be mutually 
 repelled by the many prickly and disagreeable qualities of their na- 
 ture. The moderate distance which they at last discover to be the 
 only tolerable condition of intercourse, is the code of politeness and 
 fine manners ; and those who transgress it are roughly told— in the 
 English phrase — to keep their distance. By this arrangement the mu- 
 tual need of warmth is only very moderately satisfied, — but then 
 people do not get pricked. A man who has some heat in himself 
 prefers to remain outside, where he will neither prick other people 
 nor get pricked himself. 
 
34 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 being with others — an advantage of great moment ; for how 
 much constraint, annoyance, and even danger there is in all 
 intercourse with the world. Tozit notre vtal, says La Bruyere; 
 vient de ne pouvoir ^tre seul. It is really a very risky, nay, a 
 fatal thing, to be sociable ; because it means contaft with na- 
 tures, the great majority of which are bad morally, and dull or 
 perverse, intelledually. To be unsociable is not to care about 
 such people ; and to have enough in oneself to dispense with 
 the necessity of their company is a great piece of good for- 
 tune ; because almost all our sufferings spring from having to 
 do with other people ; and that destroys the peace of mind, 
 which, as I have said, comes next after health in the elements 
 of happiness. Peace of mind is impossible without a consider- 
 able amount of solitude. The Cynics renounced all private 
 property in order to attain the bliss of having nothing to trouble 
 them ; and to renounce society with the same objedl is the 
 wisest thing a man can do. Bernardin de Saint Pierre has the 
 very excellent and pertinent remark that to be sparing in re- 
 gard to food is a means of health ; in regard to society, a 
 means of tranquillity— /<2 diete des ailmens nous rend la sanii 
 du corps, et celle des hommes la tranquillity de Idme. To be 
 soon on friendly, or even affectionate, terms with solitude is 
 like winning a gold mine ; but this is not something which 
 everybody can do. The prime reason for social intercourse is 
 mutual need ; and as soon as that is satisfied, boredom drives 
 people together once more. If it were not for these two 
 reasons, a man would probably ele6l to remain alone ; if only 
 because solitude is the sole condition of life which gives full 
 play to that feeling of exclusive importance which every man 
 has in his own eyes, — as if he were the only person in the 
 world ! a feeling which, in the throng and press of real life, 
 soon shrivels up to nothing, getting, at every step, a painful 
 dhnenti. From this point of view it may be said that solitude 
 is the original and natural state of man, where, like another 
 Adam, he is as happy as his nature will allow. 
 
 But still, had Adam no father or mother ? There is another 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 35 
 
 sense in which solitude is not the natural state ; for, at his en- 
 trance into the world, a man finds himself with parents, broth- 
 ers, sisters, that is to say, in society, and not alone. Accord- 
 ingly it cannot be said that the love of solitude is an original 
 charaderistic of human nature ; it is rather the result of experi- 
 ence and refle6lion, and these in their turn depend upon the 
 development of intelledlual power, and increase with the years. 
 
 Speaking generally, sociability stands in inverse ratio with 
 age. A little child raises a piteous cry of fright if it is left alone 
 for only a few minutes ; and later on, to be shut up by itself is a 
 great punishment. Young people soon get on very friendly 
 terms with one another ; it is only the few among them of any 
 nobility of mind who are glad now and then to be alone ; — but 
 to spend the whole day thus would be disagreeable. A grown- 
 up man can easily do it ; it is little trouble to him to be much 
 alone, and it becomes less and less trouble as he advances in 
 years. An old man who has outlived all his friends, and is 
 either indifferent or dead to the pleasures of life, is in his prop- 
 er element in solitude ; and in individual cases the special tend- 
 ency to retirement and seclusion will always be in direct pro- 
 portion to intellectual capacity. 
 
 For this tendency is not, as I have said, a purely natural 
 one ; it does not come into existence as a diredl need of human 
 nature ; it is rather the effedl of the experience we go through, 
 the produ6l of reflection upon what our needs really are ; pro- 
 ceeding, more especially, from the insight we attain into the 
 wretched stuff of which most people are made, whether you 
 look at their morals or their intelledls. The worst of it all is 
 that, in the individual, moral and intelledlual shortcomings are 
 closely conneded and play into each other's hands, so that all 
 manner of disagreeable results are obtained, which make inter- 
 course with most people not only unpleasant but intolerable. 
 Hence, though the world contains many things which are 
 thoroughly bad, the worst thing in it is society. Even Vol- 
 taire, that sociable Frenchman, was obliged to admit that 
 there are everywhere crowds of people not worth talking to : 
 
36 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. ' 
 
 la terre est couverte de gens quine miritent pas qu' on leur park. 
 And Petrarch gives a similar reason for wishing to be alone — 
 that tender spirit ! so strong and constant in his love of seclu- 
 sion. The streams, the plains and woods know well, he says, 
 how he has tried to escape the perverse and stupid people who 
 have missed the way to heaven : — 
 
 Cercato ho sempre solitaria vita 
 {Le rive it sanno, e le catnpagne e iboschi') 
 
 Per fuggir quest' ingegni storti e loschi 
 Che la strada del del' hanno smarrita. 
 
 He pursues the same strain in that delightful book of his, De 
 Vita Solitaria, which seems to have given Zimmermann the 
 idea of his celebrated work on Solitude. It is the secondary 
 and indiredl charadler of the love of seclusion to which Cham- 
 fort alludes in the following passage, couched in his sarcastic 
 vein : O71 dit quelquefois d'un homme qui vit seul, il n'aime 
 pas la sociHi. O est souvent comme si on disait d'un homme 
 qu'il n" aime pas la promenade, sous le pretexte qu'il ne se 
 promene pas volontiers le soir dans le forH de Bondy. 
 
 You will find a similar sentiment expressed by the Persian 
 poet Sadi, in his Garden of Roses. Since that time, he says, 
 we have taken leave of society, preferring the path of seclusion ; 
 for there is safety in solitude. Angelus Silesius,* a very gentle 
 and Christian writer, confesses to the same feeling, in his own 
 mythical language. Herod, he says, is the common enemy ; 
 and when, as with Joseph, God warns us of danger, we fly 
 from the world to solitude, from Bethlehem to Egypt ; or else 
 suffering and death await us ! — 
 
 Herodes ist ein Feind ; der foseph der Ver stand, 
 
 Dem machte Gott die Gefahr itn Traum {in Geist) bekannt ; 
 
 Die Welt ist Bethlehem, Aegypten Einsatnkeit, 
 
 Fleuch, meine Seele ! fleuch, sonst stirbest du vor Leid. 
 
 Giordano Bruno also declares himself a friend of seclusion. 
 Tanti uomini, he says, che in terra hanno voluto gustare vita 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — Angelus Silesius, pseudonym for Johannes 
 Scheffler, a physician and mystic poet of the seventeenth century 
 (1624-77). 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 37 
 
 celeste y dissero con una voce, ' ' ecce elongavi fugiens et tnansi in 
 solitudine " — those who in this world have desired a foretaste 
 of the divine Hfe, have always proclaimed with one voice : 
 
 Lo / then would I wander far off ; 
 I would lodge in the wilderness.^ 
 
 And in the work from which I have already quoted, Sadi says 
 of himself : In disgust with my friends at Damascus, I with- 
 drew into the desert about Jerusalem, to seek the society of the 
 beasts of the field. In short, the same thing has been said by 
 all whom Prometheus has formed out of better clay. What 
 pleasure could they find in the company of people with whom 
 their only common ground is just what is lowest and least 
 noble in their own nature — the part of them that is common 
 place, trivial and vulgar ? What do they want with people 
 who cannot rise to a higher level, and for whom nothing re- 
 mains but to drag others down to theirs ? for this is what they 
 aim at. It is an aristocratic feeling that is at the bottom of 
 this propensity to seclusion and solitude. 
 
 Rascals are always sociable — more's the pity ! and the chief 
 sign that a man has any nobility in his charadler is the little 
 pleasure he takes in others' company. He prefers solitude 
 more and more, and, in course of time, comes to see that, with 
 few exceptions, the world offers no choice beyond solitude on 
 one side and vulgarity on the other. This may sound a hard 
 thing to say ; but even Angelus Silesius, with all his Christian 
 feelings of gentleness and love, was obliged to admit the truth 
 of it. However painful solitude may be, he says, be careful 
 not to be vulgar ; for then you may find a desert every- 
 where : — 
 
 Die Einsamkeit ist noth : doch sei nur nicht gemein, 
 So kannst du uberall in einer Waste sein. 
 
 It is natural for great minds — the true teachers of humanity 
 — to care little about the constant company of others ; just as 
 little as the schoolmaster cares for joining in the gambols of the 
 noisy crowd of boys which surrounds him. The mission of 
 
 > Psalms, Iv. 7. 
 
38 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 these great minds is to guide mankind over the sea of error to 
 the haven of truth — to draw it forth from the dark abysses of a 
 barbarous vulgarity up into the Hght of culture and refinement. 
 Men of great intelledt live in the world without really belong- 
 ing to it ; and so, from their earliest years, they feel that there 
 is a perceptible difference between them and other people. 
 But it is only gradually, with the lapse of years, that they 
 come to a clear understanding of their position. Their intel- 
 lectual isolation is then reinforced by actual seclusion in their 
 manner of life ; they let no one approach who is not in some 
 degree emancipated from the prevailing vulgarity. 
 
 From what has been said it is obvious that the love of soli- 
 tude is not a dired, original impulse in human nature, but 
 rather something secondary and of gradual growth. It is the 
 more distinguishing feature of nobler minds, developed not 
 without some conquest of natural desires, and now and then in 
 a6lual opposition to the promptings of Mephistopheles — bid- 
 ding you exchange a morose and soul-destroying soHtude for 
 life amongst men, for society ; even the worst, he says, will 
 give a sense of human fellowship : — 
 
 Hbr' auf tnit deinem Grant zit spielen, 
 Der, wie ein Geier, dir am Leben frisst : 
 Die schlechteste Gesellschaft Usst dich fuhlen 
 Dass du ein Mensch mit Menschen bist. ' 
 
 To be alone is the fate of all great minds — a fate deplored at 
 times, but still always chosen as the less grievous of two evils. 
 As the years increase, it always becomes easier to say, Dare to 
 be wise — sapere aude. And after sixty, the inclination to be 
 alone grows into a kind of real, natural instin6l ; for at that age 
 everything combines in favor of it. The strongest impulse — 
 the love of woman's society — has little or no effe6l ; it is the 
 sexless condition of old age which lays the foundation of a 
 certain self-sufficiency, and that gradually absorbs all desire for 
 others' company. A thousand illusions and follies are over- 
 come ; the active years of life are in most cases gone ; a man 
 has no more expectations or plans or intentions. The genera- 
 > Goethe's Faust, Part I., 1281-5. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 39 
 
 tion to which he belonged has passed away, and a new race 
 has sprung up which looks upon him as essentially outside its 
 sphere of adlivity. And then the years pass more quickly as 
 we become older, and we want to devote our remaining time 
 to the intellectual rather than to the practical side of life. For, 
 provided that the mind retains its faculties, the amount of 
 knowledge and experience we have acquired, together with the 
 facility we have gained in the use of our powers, makes it then 
 more than ever easy and interesting to us to pursue the study 
 of any subjedl. A thousand things become clear which were 
 formerly enveloped in obscurity, and results are obtained 
 which give a feeling of difficulties overcome. From long ex- 
 perience of men, we cease to expert much from them ; we find 
 that, on the whole, people do not gain by a nearer acquaint- 
 ance ; and that — apart from a few rare and fortunate exceptions 
 — we have come across none but defedtive specimens of human 
 nature which it is advisable to leave in peace. We are no 
 more subje6l to the ordinary illusions of life ; and as, in indi- 
 vidual instances, we soon see what a man is made of, we seldom 
 feel any inclination to come into closer relations with him. 
 Finally, isolation — our own society — has become a habit, as it 
 were a second nature with us, more especially if we have been 
 on friendly terms with it from our youth up. The love of 
 solitude which was formerly indulged only at the expense of 
 our desire for society, has now come to be the simple quality 
 of our natural disposition — the element proper to our life, as 
 water to a fish. This is why anyone who possesses a unique 
 individuality — unlike others and therefore necessarily isolated 
 — feels that, as he becomes older, his position is no longer so 
 burdensome as when he was young. 
 
 For, as a matter of fadl, this very genuine privilege of old 
 age is one which can be enjoyed only if a man is possessed of 
 a certain amount of intelle6l ; it will be appreciated most of all 
 where there is real mental power ; but in some degree by 
 every one. It is only people of very barren and vulgar nature 
 who will be just as sociable in their old age as they were in 
 their youth. But then they become troublesome to a society 
 
40 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 to which they are no longer suited, and, at most, manage to 
 be tolerated ; whereas, they were formerly in great request. 
 
 There is another aspe<5l of this inverse proportion between 
 age and sociability — the way in which it conduces to education. 
 The younger that people are, the more in every respe6t they 
 have to learn ; and it is just in youth that Nature provides a sys- 
 tem of mutual education, so that mere intercourse with others, 
 at that time of life, carries instruction with it. Human society, 
 from this point of view, resembles a huge academy of learning, 
 on the Bell and Lancaster system, opposed to the system o 
 education by means of books and schools, as something arti- 
 ficial and contrary to the institutions of Nature. It is therefore 
 a very suitable arrangement that, in his young days, a man 
 should be a very diligent student at the place of learning pro- 
 vided by Nature herself 
 
 But there is nothing in life which has not some drawback — 
 nihil est ab omni parte beatum, as Horace says ; or, in the 
 words of an Indian proverb, no lotus without a stalk. Seclu- 
 sion, which has so many advantages, has also its little annoy- 
 ances and drawbacks, which are small, however, in comparison 
 with those of society ; hence anyone who is worth much in 
 himself will get on better without other people than with them. 
 But amongst the disadvantages of seclusion there is one which 
 is not so easy to see as the rest. It is this : when people re- 
 main indoors all day, they become physically very sensitive to 
 atmospheric changes, so that every little draught is enough to 
 make them ill ; so with our temper ; a long course of seclusion 
 makes it so sensitive that the most trivial incidents, words, or 
 even looks, are sufficient to disturb or to vex and offend us — 
 little things which are unnoticed by those who live in the 
 turmoil of life. 
 
 When you find human society disagreeable and feel yourself 
 justified in flying to solitude, you may be so constituted as to 
 be unable to bear the depression of it for any length of time, 
 which will probably be the case if you are young. Let me ad- 
 vise you, then, to form the habit of taking some of your soli- 
 tude with you into society, to learn to be to some extent alone 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 41 
 
 even though you are in company ; not to say at once what you 
 think, and, on the other hand, not to attach too precise a 
 meaning to what others say ; rather, not to expe6l much of 
 them, either morally or intelleftually, and to strengthen your- 
 self in the feeling of indifference to their opinion, which is the 
 surest way of always pradlicing a praiseworthy toleration. If 
 you do that, you will not live so much with other people, 
 though you may appear to move amongst them : your relation 
 to them will be of a purely obje6live chara6ler. This precau- 
 tion will keep you from too close contaft with society, and 
 therefore secure you against being contaminated or even out- 
 raged by it.* Society is in this respedl like a fire — the wise 
 man warming himself at a proper distance from it ; not coming 
 too close, like the fool, who, on getting scorched, runs away 
 and shivers in solitude, loud in his complaint that the fire bums. 
 Section to. Envy is natural to man; and still, it is at once 
 a vice and a source of misery,' We should treat it as the 
 enemy of our happiness, and stifle it like an evil thought. This 
 is the advice given by Seneca ; as he well puts it, we shall be 
 pleased with what we have, if we avoid the self-torture of com- 
 paring our own lot with some other and happier one — nostra 
 nos sine comparatione deleSlent ; nunquam erit felix quern 
 iorquebit felicior.* And again, quum adspexeris quot te ante- 
 cedant, cogita quot sequantur* — if a great many people appear 
 to be better off than yourself, think how many there are in a 
 worse position. It is a fadl that if real calamity comes upon us, 
 the most effe6live consolation — though it springs from the 
 same source as envy — is just the thought of greater misfortunes 
 than ours ; and the next best is the society of those who are in 
 the same ill luck as we — the partners of our sorrows. 
 
 ' This restri<5led, or, as it were, entrenched kind of sociability has 
 been dramatically illustrated in a play — well worth reading — of Mora- 
 tin's, entitled £1 Cafe o sea la Comedia Nuova (The Cafe or the New 
 Comedy), chiefly by one of the characters, Don Pedro and especially 
 in the second and third scenes of the first ad;. 
 
 * Envy shows how unhappy people are ; and their constant attention 
 to what others do and leave undone, how much they are bored. 
 
 ^ De Ira: iii., 30. ^Epist. xv. 
 
II «>tl ■■ 
 
 I J" ■ Ii|i»<^B^»^«^p^^HP-^?(|!J|^^pp^^s«Jipj»fl|p^TpPHI)ll?> 
 
 42 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 So much for the envy which we may feel towards others. 
 As regards the envy which we may excite in them, it should 
 always be remembered that no form of hatred is so implacable 
 as the hatred that comes from envy ; and therefore we should 
 always carefully refrain from doing anything to rouse it ; nay, 
 as with many another form of vice, it is better altogether to 
 renounce any pleasure there may be in it, because of the seri- 
 ous nature of its consequences. 
 
 Aristocracies are of three kinds : (i) of birth and rank ; (2) of 
 wealth ; and (3) of intelledl. The last is really the most dis- 
 tinguished of the three, and its claim to occupy the first posi- 
 tion comes to be recognized, if it is only allowed time to work. 
 So eminent a king as Frederick the Great admitted it — les 
 dmes privilegiies rangent cl V igal des souverains, as he said to 
 his chamberlain, when the latter expressed his surprise that 
 Voltaire should have a seat at the table reserved for kings and 
 princes, whilst ministers and generals were relegated to the 
 chamberlain's. 
 
 Every one of these aristocracies is surrounded by a host of 
 envious persons. If you belong to one of them, they will be 
 secretly embittered against you ; and unless they are restrained 
 by fear, they will always be anxious to let you understand that 
 you are no better than they. It is by their anxiety to let you 
 know this, that they betray how greatly they are conscious 
 that the opposite is the truth. 
 
 The line of condu(5l to be pursued if you are exposed to 
 envy, is to keep the envious persons at a distance, and, as far 
 as possible, avoid all contadl with them, so that there may be a 
 wide gulf fixed between you and them ; if this cannot be done, 
 to bear their attacks with the greatest composure. In the latter 
 case, the very thing that provokes the attack will also neutral- 
 ize it. This is what appears to be generally done. 
 
 The members of one of these aristocracies usually get on 
 very well with those of another, and there is no call for envy 
 between them, because their several privileges effe<5l an equi- 
 poise. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 43 
 
 Section ii. Give mature and repeated consideration to 
 any plan before you proceed to carry it out ; and even after 
 you have thoroughly turned it over in your mind, make some 
 concession to the incompetency of human judgment ; for it 
 may always happen that circumstances which cannot be inves- 
 tigated or foreseen, will come in and upset the whole of your 
 calculation. This is a reflection that will always influence the 
 negative side of the balance — a kind of warning to refrain from 
 unnecessary a6lion in matters of importance — quieta non tnovere. 
 But having once made up your mind and begun your work, you 
 must let it run its course and abide the result — not worry your- 
 self by fresh refledtions on what is already accomplished, or by 
 a renewal of your scruples on the score of possible danger : 
 free your mind from the subje6l altogether, and refuse to go 
 into it again, secure in the thought that you gave it mature at- 
 tention at the proper time. This is the same advice as is given 
 by an Italian proverb — legala bene e poi lascia la andare — 
 which Goethe has translated thus : See well to your girths, and 
 then ride on boldly.* 
 
 And if, notwithstanding that, you fail, it is because all human 
 affairs are the sport of chance and error. Socrates, the wisest 
 of men, needed the warning voice of his good genius, or 
 iatfibviav, to enable him to do what was right in regard to his 
 own personal affairs, or at any rate, to avoid mistakes ; which 
 argues that the human intelle6l is incompetent for the purpose. 
 There is a saying — which is reported to have originated with 
 one of the Popes — that when misfortune happens to us, the 
 blame of it, at least in some degree, attaches to ourselves. If 
 this is not true absolutely and in every instance, it is certainly 
 true in the great majority of cases. It even looks as if this 
 truth had a great deal to do with the effort people make as far 
 as possible to conceal their misfortunes, and to put the best 
 face they can upon them, for fear lest their misfortunes may 
 show how much they are to blame. 
 
 ' It may be observed, in passing, that a great many of the maxims 
 which Goethe puts under the head of Proverbial, are translations, 
 from the Italian. 
 
44 " •' COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. ^ 
 
 Section 12. In the case of a misfortune which has already 
 happened and therefore cannot be altered, you should not 
 allow yourself to think that it might have been otherwise ; 
 still less, that it might have been avoided by such and such 
 means ; for reflexions of this kind will only add to your distress 
 and make it intolerable, so that you will become a tormentor 
 of yourself — lavrovTCfiupovfievo^. It is better to follow the example 
 of King David ; who, as long as his son lay on the bed of 
 sickness, assailed Jehovah with unceasing supplications and 
 entreaties for his recovery ; but when he was dead, snapped 
 his fingers and thought no more of it. If you are not light- 
 hearted enough for that, you can take refuge in fatalism, and 
 have the great truth revealed to you that everything which 
 happens is the result of necessity, and therefore inevitable. 
 
 However good this advice may be, it is one-sided and par- 
 tial. In relieving and quieting us for the moment, it is no 
 doubt effe6tive enough ; but when our misfortunes have result- 
 ed — as is usually the case — from our own carelessness or folly, 
 or, at any rate, pardy by our own fault, it is a good thing to 
 consider how they might have been avoided, and to consider 
 it often in spite of its being a tender subject — ^a salutary form 
 of self-discipline, which will make us wiser and better men for 
 the future. If we have made obvious mistakes, we should not 
 try, as we generally do, to gloss them over, or to find some- 
 thing to excuse or extenuate them ; we should admit to our- 
 selves that we have committed faults, and open our eyes wide 
 to all their enormity, in order that we may firmly resolve to 
 avoid them in time to come. To be sure, that means a great 
 deal of self-infli6led pain, in the shape of discontent, but it 
 should be remembered that to spare the rod is to spoil the 
 
 child — 6 fiT) Sapeic uvdpzmoc ov iraideverai. ' 
 
 Section 13. In all matters affe<5ling our weal or woe, we 
 should be careful not to let our imagination run away with us, 
 and build no castles in the air. In the first place, they are ex- 
 pensive to build, because we have to pull them down again 
 immediately, and that is a source of grief. We should be still 
 
 1 Menander. Monost : 422. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 45 
 
 more on our guard against distressing our hearts by depi6^ing 
 possible misfortunes. If these were misfortunes of a purely 
 imaginary kind, or very remote and unlikely, we should at 
 once see, on awaking from our dream, that the whole thing 
 was mere illusion ; we should rejoice all the more in a reality 
 better than our dreams, or, at most, be warned against mis- 
 fortunes which, though very remote, were still possible. These, 
 however, are not the sort of playthings in which imagination 
 delights ; it is only in idle hours that we build castles in the 
 air, and they are always of a pleasing description. The matter 
 which goes to form gloomy dreams are mischances which to 
 some extent really threaten us, though it be from some dis- 
 tance ; imagination makes them look larger and nearer and 
 more terrible than they are in reality. This is a kind of dream 
 which cannot be so readily shaken off on awaking as a pleasant 
 one ; for a pleasant dream is soon dispelled by reality, leaving, 
 at most, a feeble hope lying in the lap of possibility. Once 
 we have abandoned [ourselves to a fit of the blues, visions are 
 conjured up which do not so easily vanish again ; for it is always 
 just possible that the visions may be reahzed. But we are not 
 always able to estimate the exa6l degree of possibility : possi- 
 bility may easily pass into probability ; and thus we deliver 
 ourselves up to torture. Therefore we should be careful not 
 to be over-anxious on any matter affe6ling our weal or our 
 woe, not to carry our anxiety to unreasonable or injudicious 
 limits ; but coolly and dispassionately to deliberate upon the 
 matter, as though it were an abstract question which did not 
 touch us in particular. We should give no play to imagina- 
 tion here ; for imagination is not judgment — it only conjures 
 up visions, inducing an unprofitable and often very painful 
 mood. 
 
 The rule on which I am here insisting should be most care- 
 fully observed towards evening. For as darkness makes us 
 timid and apt to see terrifying shapes everywhere, there is 
 something similar in the effe61: of indistin6t thought ; and un- 
 certainty always brings with it a sense of danger. Hence, 
 
46 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 towards evening, when our powers of thought and judgment 
 are relaxed, — at the hour, as it were, of subjective darkness, — 
 the intelle<5l becomes tired, easily confused, and unable to get 
 at the bottom of things ; and if, in that state, we meditate on 
 matters of personal interest to ourselves, they soon assume a 
 dangerous and terrifying aspedl. This is mostly the case at 
 night, when we are in bed ; for then the mind is fully relaxed, 
 and the po.ver of judgment quite unequal to its duties ; but 
 imagination is still awake. Night gives a black look to every- 
 thing, whatever it may be. This is why our thoughts, just be- 
 fore we go to sleep, or as we lie awake through the hours of 
 the night, are usually such confusions and perversions of fadls 
 as dreams themselves ; and when our thoughts at that time 
 are concentrated upon our own concerns, they are generally as 
 black and monstrous as possible. In the morning all such 
 nightmares vanish like dreams : as the Spanish proverb has it, 
 noche tinta, bianco eldia — the night is colored, the day is white. 
 
 But even towards nightfall, as soon as the candles are lit, the 
 mind, like the eye, no longer sees things so clearly as by day : 
 it is a time unsuited to serious meditation, especially on un- 
 pleasant subjedls. The morning is the proper time for that — 
 as indeed for all efforts without exception, whether mental or 
 bodily. For the morning is the youth of the day, when every- 
 thing is bright, fresh, and easy of attainment ; we feel strong 
 then, and all our faculties are completely at our disposal. Do 
 not shorten the morning by getting up late, or waste it in un- 
 worthy occupations or in talk ; look upon it as the quintessence 
 of life, as to a certain extent sacred. Evening is like old age : 
 we are languid, talkative, silly. Each day is a little life : every 
 waking and rising a little birth, every fresh morning a little 
 youth, every going to rest and sleep a little death. 
 
 But condition of health, sleep, nourishment, temperature, 
 weather, surroundings, and much else that is purely external, 
 have, in general, an important influence upon our mood and 
 therefore upon our thoughts. Hence both our view of any 
 matter and our capacity for any work are very much subje<5i 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 47 
 
 to time and place. So it is best to profit by a good mood — 
 for how seldom it comes ! — 
 
 Nehmt die gute Stimmung wahr, 
 Denn sie kotnmt so selten. ' 
 
 We are not always able to form new ideas about our surround- 
 ings, or to command original thoughts : they come if they will, 
 and when they will. And so, too, we cannot always succeed in 
 completely considering some personal matter at the precise 
 time at which we have determined beforehand to consider it, 
 and just when we set ourselves to do so. For the peculiar 
 train of thought which is favorable to it may suddenly become 
 a6live without any special call being made upon it, and we 
 may then follow it up with keen interest. In this way reflec- 
 tion, too, chooses its own time. 
 
 This reining-in of the imagination which I am recommend- 
 ing, will also forbid us to summon up the memory of the past 
 misfortune, to paint a dark pi6lureof the injustice or harm that 
 has been done us, the losses we have sustained, the insults, 
 slights and annoyances to which we have been exposed : for 
 to do that is to rouse into fresh life all those hateful passions 
 long laid asleep — the anger and resentment which disturb and 
 pollute our nature. In an excellent parable, Proclus, the 
 Neoplatonist, points out how in every town the mob dwells 
 side by side with those who are rich and distinguished : so, too, 
 in every man, be he never so noble and dignified, there is, in 
 the depth of his nature, a mob of low and vulgar desires which 
 constitute him an animal. It will not do to let this mob revolt 
 or even so much as peep forth from its hiding-place ; 'it is hide- 
 ous of mien, and its rebel leaders are those flights of imagina- 
 tion which I have been describing. The smallest annoyance, 
 whether it comes from our fellow-men or from the things 
 around us, may swell up into a monster of dreadful aspe<Sl, 
 putting us at our wits' end — and all because we go on brood- 
 ing over our troubles and painting them in the most glaring 
 colors and on the largest scale. It is much better to take a 
 
 ' Goethe. 
 
48 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 very calm and prosaic view of what is disagreeable ; for that is 
 the easiest way of bearing it. 
 
 If you hold small objefls close to your eyes, you limit your 
 field of vision and shut out the world. And, in the same way, 
 the people or the things which stand nearest, even though 
 they are of the very smallest consequence, are apt to claim an 
 amount of attention much beyond their due, occupying us dis- 
 agreeably, and leaving no room for serious thoughts and 
 affairs of importance. We ought to work against this tendency. 
 
 Section 14. The sight of things which do not belong to us 
 is very apt to raise the thought : Ah, if that were only mine / 
 making us sensible of our privation. Instead of that we should 
 do better by more frequently putting to ourselves the opposite 
 case : Ah, if that were not mine. What I mean is that we 
 should sometimes try to look upon our possessions in the light 
 in which they would appear if we had lost them ; whatever 
 they may be, property, health, friends, a wife or child or some- 
 one else we love, our horse or our dog — it is usually only when 
 we have lost them that we begin to find out their value. But 
 if we come to look at things in the way I recommend, we shall 
 be doubly the gainers ; we shall at once get more pleasure out 
 of them than we did before, and we shall do everything in our 
 power to prevent the loss of them ; for instance, by not risking 
 our property, or angering our friends, or exposing our wives 
 to temptation, or being careless about our children's health, 
 and so on. 
 
 We often try to banish the gloom and despondency of the 
 present by speculating upon our chances of success in the 
 future ; a process which leads us to invent a great many chi- 
 merical hopes. Every one of them contains the germ of illu- 
 sion, and disappointment is inevitable when our hopes are 
 shattered by the hard fa6ls of life. 
 
 It is less hurtful to take the chances of misfortune as a theme 
 for speculation ; because, in doing so, we provide ourselves at 
 once with measures of precaution against it, and a pleasant sur- 
 prise when it fails to make its appearance. Is it not a fa6l that 
 we always feel a marked improvement in our spirits when we 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 49 
 
 begin to get over a period of anxiety ? I may go further and 
 say that there is some use in occasionally looking upon terrible 
 misfortunes — such as might happen to us — as though they had 
 a6tually happened, for then the trivial reverses which subse- 
 quently come in reality, are much easier to bear. It is a 
 source of consolation to look back upon those great misfor- 
 tunes which never happened. But in following out this rule, 
 care must be taken not to negle6l what I have said in the pre- 
 ceding se6tion. 
 
 Section 15. The things which engage our attention — 
 whether they are matters of business or ordinary events — are 
 of such diverse kinds, that, if taken quite separately and in no 
 fixed order or relation, they present a medley of the most glar- 
 ing contrasts, with nothing in common, except that they one 
 and all affe6t us in particular. There must be a corresponding 
 abruptness in the thoughts and anxieties which these various 
 matters arouse in us, if our thoughts are to be in keeping with 
 their various subjedls. Therefore, in setting about anything, 
 the first step is to withdraw our attention from everything else : 
 this will enable us to attend to each matter at its own time, and 
 to enjoy or put up with it, quite apart from any thought of our 
 remaining interests. Our thoughts must be arranged, as it 
 were, in little drawers, so that we may open one without dis- 
 turbing any of the others. 
 
 In this way we can keep the heavy burden of anxiety from 
 weighing upon us so much as to spoil the little pleasures of the 
 present, or from robbing us of our rest ; otherwise the con- 
 sideration of one matter will interfere with every other, and at- 
 tention to some important business may lead us to negledt 
 many affairs which happen to be of less moment. It is most 
 important for anyone who is capable of higher and nobler 
 thoughts to keep his mind from being so completely engrossed 
 with private affairs and vulgar troubles as to let them take up 
 all his attention and crowd out worthier matter ; for that is, in 
 a very real sense, to lose sight of the true end of \\i&— propter 
 vitam vivendi perdere causas. 
 
50 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 Of course for this — as for so much else — self-control is neces- 
 sary ; without it, we cannot manage ourselves in the way I 
 have described. And self-control may not appear so very 
 difficult, if we consider that every man has to submit to a great 
 deal of very severe control on the part of his surroundings, 
 and that without it no form of existence is possible. Further, 
 a litde self control at the right moment may prevent much 
 subsequent compulsion at the hands of others ; just as a very 
 small se<ftion of a circle close to the centre may correspond to 
 a part near the circumference a hundred times as large. Noth- 
 ing will prote<5l us from external compulsion so much as the 
 control of ourselves ; and, as Seneca says, to submit yourself 
 to reason is the way to make everything else submit to you — 
 St iibi vis omnia subjicere, te subjice rationi. Self-control, too, 
 is something which we have in our own power ; and if the worst 
 comes to the worst, and it touches us in a very sensitive part, 
 we can always relax its severity. But other people will pay no 
 regard to our feelings, if they have to use compulsion, and we 
 shall be treated without pity or mercy. Therefore it will be 
 prudent to anticipate compulsion by self-control. 
 
 Section i6. We must set limits to our wishes, curb our 
 desires, moderate our anger, always remembering that an in- 
 dividual can attain only an infinitesimal share in anything that 
 is worth having ; and that, on the other hand, everyone must 
 incur many of the ills of life ; in a word, we must bear and for- 
 bear — abstinere et sustinere ; and if we fail to observe this rule, 
 no position of wealth or power will prevent us from feeling 
 wretched. This is what Horace means when he recommends 
 us to study carefully and inquire diligently what will best pro- 
 mote a tranquil life — not to be always agitated by fruitless 
 desires and fears and hopes for things, which, after all; are not 
 worth very much : — 
 
 Inter cuncta leges et percontabere doSlos 
 Qua ratione queas traducere leniter aevum ; 
 Ne te semper inops agitet vexetque cupido, 
 Ne pavor, et rerum mediocriter utiliutn spes.^ 
 ' Epist. I. xviii. 97. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 5I 
 
 Section 17. Life consists in movement, says Aristotle ; 
 and he is obviously right. We exist, physically, because our 
 organism is the seat of constant motion ; and if we are to exist 
 intelle6lually, it can only be by means of continual occupation 
 — no matter with what so long as it is some form of practical 
 or mental a6tivity. You may see that this is so by the way in 
 which people who have no work or nothing to think about, 
 immediately begin to beat the devil's tattoo with their knuckles 
 or a stick or anything that comes handy. The truth is, that 
 our nature is essentially restless in its chara6ler : we very soon 
 get tired of having nothing to do ; it is intolerable boredom. 
 This impulse to adlivity should be regulated, and some sort of 
 method introduced into it, which of itself will enhance the sat- 
 isfad^ion we obtain. A6livity ! — doing something, if possible 
 creating something, at any rate learning something — how 
 fortunate it is that men cannot exist without that ! A man 
 wants to use his strength, to see, if he can, what effedl it will 
 produce ; and he will get the most complete satisfaction of this 
 desire if he can make or constru6t something — be it a book or 
 a basket. There is a dire6l pleasure in seeing work grow 
 under one's hands day by day, until at last it is finished. This 
 is the pleasure attaching to a work of art or a manuscript, or 
 even mere manual labor ; and, of course, the higher the work, 
 the greater pleasure it will give. 
 
 From this point of view, those are happiest of all who are 
 conscious of the power to produce great works animated by 
 some significant purpose : it gives a higher kind of interest — a 
 sort of rare flavor — to the whole of their life, which, by its ab- 
 sence from the life of the ordinary man, makes it, in compari- 
 son, something very insipid. For richly endowed natures, life 
 and the world have a special interest beyond the mere every 
 day personal interest which so many others share ; and some- 
 thing higher than that — a formal interest. It is from life and 
 the world that they get the material for their works ; and as 
 soon as they are freed from the pressure of personal needs, it 
 is to the diligent colle6lion of material that they devote their 
 
52 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 whole existence. So with their intellect : it is to some extent 
 of a twofold chara6ler, and devoted partly to the ordinary af- 
 fairs of every day — those matters of will which are common to 
 them and the rest of mankind, and partly to their peculiar 
 work — the pure and obje6live contemplation of existence. And 
 while, on the stage of the world, most men play their little part 
 and then pass away, the genius lives a double life, at once an 
 a(Sor and a spectator. 
 
 Let everyone, then, do something, according to the measure 
 of his capacities. To have no regular work, no set sphere of 
 a6livity — what a miserable thing it is ! How often long travels 
 undertaken for pleasure make a man downright unhappy ; be- 
 cause the absence of anything that can be called occupation 
 forces him, as it were, out of his right element. Effort, strug- 
 gles with difficulties ! that is as natural to a man as grubbing 
 in the ground is to a mole. To have all his wants satisfied is 
 something intolerable — the feeling of stagnation which comes 
 from pleasures that last too long. To overcome difficulties is 
 to experience the full delight of existence, no matter where the 
 obstacles are encountered ; whether in the affairs of life, in 
 commerce or business ; or in mental effort — the spirit of in- 
 quiry that tries to master its subje<5l. There is always some- 
 thing pleasurable in the struggle and the vi6lory. And if a 
 man has no opportunity to excite himself, he will do what he 
 can to create one, and according to his individual bent, he will 
 hunt or play Cup and Ball : or led on by this unsuspe6ted ele- 
 ment in his nature, he will pick a quarrel with some one, or 
 hatch a plot or intrigue, or take to swindling and rascally 
 courses generally — all to put an end to a state of repose which 
 is intolerable. As I have remarked, difficilis in oiio quies — it 
 is difficult to keep quiet if you have nothing to do. 
 
 Section i8. A man should avoid being led on by the 
 phantoms of his imagination. This is not the same thing as to 
 submit to the guidance of ideas clearly thought out : and yet 
 these are rules of life which most people pervert. If you ex- 
 amine closely into the circumstances which, in any deliberation, 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 53 
 
 ultimately turn the scale in favor of some particular course, 
 you will generally find that the decision is influenced, not by 
 any clear arrangement of ideas leading to a formal judgment, 
 but by some fanciful pidlure which seems to stand for one of 
 the alternatives in question. 
 
 In one of Voltaire's or Diderot's romances, — I forget the 
 precise reference, — the hero, standing like a young Hercules 
 at the parting of ways, can see no other representation of 
 Virtue than his old tutor holding a snuff'-box in his left hand, 
 from which he takes a pinch and moralizes ; whilst Vice 
 appears in the shape of his mother's chambermaid. It is in 
 youth, more especially, that the goal of our efforts comes to be 
 a fanciful pi6lure of happiness, which continues to hover be- 
 fore our eyes sometimes for half and even for the whole of our 
 life — a sort of mocking spirit ; for when we think our dream 
 is to be realized, the pidlure fades away, leaving us the knowl- 
 edge that nothing of what it promised is a6lually accomplished. 
 How often this is so with the visions of domesticity — the detail- 
 ed pi6ture of what our home will be like ; or, of life among 
 our fellow citizens and in society ; or, again, of living in the 
 country — the kind of house we shall have, its surroundings, 
 the marks of honor and respedl that will be paid to us, and so 
 on, — whatever our hobby may be ; chaque fou a sa maroite. 
 It is often the same, too, with our dreams about one we love. 
 And this is all quite natural ; for the visions we conjure up 
 affedl us dire<5lly, as though they were real objects ; and so 
 they exercise a more immediate influence upon our will than 
 an abstract idea, which gives merely a vague, general outline, 
 devoid of details ; and the details are just the real part of it. 
 We can be only indire6lly affe6led by an abstra6t idea, and yet 
 it is the abstra6l idea alone which will do as much as it prom- 
 ises ; and it is the fun6lion of education to teach us to put our 
 trust in it. Of course the abstradl idea must be occasionally 
 explained — paraphrased, as it were — by the aid of pidlures ; 
 \i\xX.(X\'6Q.XQQ.\\y, cum grano salts. 
 
 Section 19. The preceding rule may be taken as a special 
 case of the more general maxim, that a man should never let 
 
54 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 himself be mastered by the impressions of the moment, or in- 
 deed by outward appearances at all, which are incomparably 
 more powerful in their effe<5ls than the mere play of thought or 
 a train of ideas ; not because these momentary impressions are 
 rich in virtue of the data they supply, — it is often just the con- 
 trary, — but because they are something palpable to the senses 
 and dire6l in their working ; they forcibly invade our mind, 
 disturbing our repose and shattering our resolutions. 
 
 It is easy to understand that the thing which lies before our 
 very eyes will produce the whole of its effe6l at once, but that 
 time and leisure are necessary for the working of thought and 
 the appreciation of argument, as it is impossible to think of 
 everything at one and the same moment. This is why we are 
 so allured by pleasure, in spite of all our determination to re- 
 sist it ; or so much annoyed by a criticism, even though we 
 know that its author is totally incompetent to judge ; or so ir- 
 ritated by an insult, though it comes from some very con- 
 temptible quarter. In the same way, to mention no other 
 instances, ten reasons for thinking that there is no danger may 
 be outweighed by one mistaken notion that it is a<5lually at 
 hand. All this shows the radical unreason of human nature. 
 Women frequently succumb altogether to this predominating 
 influence of present impressions, and there arc few men so over- 
 weighted with reason as to escape suffering from a similar cause. 
 
 If it is impossible to resist the cffe<5ls of some external influ- 
 ence by the mere play of thought, the best thing to do is to 
 neutralize it by some contrary influence ; for example, the 
 effe6l of an insult may be overcome by seeking the society of 
 those who have a good opinion of us ; and the unpleasant 
 sensation of imminent danger may be avoided by fixing our 
 attention on the means of warding it off. Leibnitz* tells of an 
 Italian who managed to bear up under the tortures of the rack 
 by never for a moment ceasing to think of the gallows which 
 would have awaited him, had he revealed his secret ; he kept 
 on crying out : I see it! I see it ! — afterwards explaining that 
 this was part of his plan. 
 
 ^ Nouveaux Essias. Liv. I. ch. 2. Sec. 11. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 55 
 
 It is from some such reason as this, that we find it so difficult 
 to stand alone in a matter of opinion, — not to be made irreso- 
 lute by the fa6l that everyone else disagrees with us and a6ls 
 accordingly, even though we are quite sure that they are in 
 the wrong. Take the case of a fugitive king who is trying to 
 avoid capture ; how much consolation he must find in the 
 ceremonious and submissive attitude of a faithful follower, 
 exhibited secretly so as not to betray his master's stri<5l 
 incognito ; it must be almost necessary to prevent him doubt- 
 ing his own existence. 
 
 Section 20. In the first part of this work I have insisted 
 upon the great value oi health as the chief an*^ most important 
 element in happiness. Let me emphasize and confirm what I 
 have there said by giving a few general rules as to its preser- 
 vation. 
 
 The way to harden the body is to impose a great deal of 
 labor and effort upon it in the days of good health, — to exercise 
 it, both as a whole and in its several parts, and to habituate it 
 to withstand all kinds of noxious influences. But on the ap- 
 pearance of an illness or disorder, either in the body as a 
 whole or in any of its parts, a contrary course should be taken, 
 and every means used to nurse the body, or the part of it 
 which is affedled, and to spare it any effort ; for what is ailing 
 and debilitated cannot be hardened. 
 
 The muscles may be strengthened by a vigorous use of 
 them ; but not so the nerves ; they are weakened by it. 
 Therefore, while exercising the muscles in every way that is 
 suitable, care should be taken to spare the nerves as much as 
 possible. The eyes, for instance, should be prote6led from too 
 strong a light, — especially when it is refle6led light, — from any 
 straining of them in the dark, or from the long-continued ex- 
 amination of minute obje(5ls ; and the ears from too loud 
 sounds. Above all, the brain should never be forced, or used 
 too much, or at the wrong time ; let it have a rest during 
 digestion ; for then the same vital energy which forms thoughts 
 in the brain has a great deal of work to do elsewhere, — I mean 
 in the digestive organs, where it prepares chyme and chyle. 
 
56 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 For similar reasons, the brain should never be used during, or 
 immediately after, violent muscular exercise. For the motor 
 nerves are in this respedl on a par with the sensory nerves ; 
 the pain felt when a limb is wounded has its seat in the brain ; 
 and, in the same way, it is not really our legs and arms which 
 work and move, — it is the brain, or, more stri6lly, that part of 
 it which, through the medium of the spine, excites the nerves 
 in the limbs and sets them in motion. Accordingly, when our 
 arms and legs feel tired, the true seat of this feeling is in the 
 brain. This is why it is only in connedlion with those muscles 
 which are set in motion consciously and voluntarily, — in other 
 words, depend for their a6lion upon the brain, — that any feel- 
 ing of fatigue can arise ; this is not the case with those muscles 
 which work involuntarily, like the heart. It is obvious, then, 
 that injury is done to the brain if violent muscular exercise and 
 intelle6lual exertion are forced upon it at the same moment, or 
 at very short intervals. 
 
 What I say stands in no contradiction with the fadl that at 
 the beginning of a walk, or at any period of a short stroll, 
 there often comes a feeling of enhanced intelle6lual vigor. 
 The parts of the brain that come into play have had no time to 
 become tired ; and besides, slight muscular exercise conduces 
 to adlivity of the respiratory organs, and causes a purer and 
 more oxydated supply of arterial blood to mount to the brain. 
 
 It is most important to allow the brain the full measure of 
 sleep which is necessary to restore it ; for sleep is to a man's 
 whole nature what winding up is to a clock.* This measure 
 will vary dire6lly with the development and a<5livity of the 
 brain ; to overstep the measure is mere waste of time, because 
 if that is done, sleep gains only so much in length as it loses 
 in depth.* 
 
 • Q. Weltals Wille und Vorstellung, 4th Edition. Bk. II. pp. 236-40. 
 
 « Cf. los : cit: p. 275. Sleep is a morsel of death borrowed to keep 
 up and renew the part of life which is exhausted by the day — le som- 
 meil est un emprunt fait d la mort. Or it might be said that sleep is 
 the interest we have to pay on the capital which is called in at death ; 
 and the higher the rate of interest and the more regularly it is paid, 
 the further the date of redemption is postponed. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES. 57 
 
 It should be clearly understood that thought is nothing but 
 the organic function of the brain ; and it has to obey the 
 same laws in regard to exertion and repose as any other or- 
 ganic fundlion. The brain can be ruined by overstrain, just 
 like the eyes. As the fun6lion of the stomach is to digest, so 
 it is that of the brain to think. The notion of a soul — as some- 
 thing elementary and inmaterial, merely lodging in the brain 
 and needing nothing at all for the performance of its essential 
 fundlion, which consists in always and unweariedly thinking — 
 has undoubtedly driven many people to foolish pra6lices, lead- 
 ing to a deadening of the intelle(5lual powers ; Frederick the 
 Great, even, once tried to form the habit of doing without 
 sleep altogether. It would be well if professors of philosophy 
 refrained from giving currency to a notion which is attended 
 by pra6lical results of a pernicious character ; but then this is 
 just what professorial philosophy does, in its old-womanish 
 endeavor to keep on good terms with the catechism. A man 
 should accustom himself to view his intelledlual capacities in 
 no other light than that of physiological functions, and to 
 manage them accordingly — nursing or exercising them as the 
 case may be ; remembering that every kind of physical suffer- 
 ing, malady or disorder, in whatever part of the body it 
 occurs, has its effe61: upon the mind. The best advice that I 
 know on this subjedl is given by Cabanis in his Rapports du 
 physique et du moral de r homme} 
 
 Through negledl of this rule, many men of genius and great 
 scholars have become weak-minded and childish, or even gone 
 quite mad, as they grew old. To take no other instances, 
 there can be no doubt that the celebrated English poets of the 
 early part of this century, Scott, Wordsworth, Southey, be- 
 came intellectually dull and incapable towards the end of their 
 days, nay, soon after passing their sixtieth year ; and that 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — The work to which Schopenhauer here refers 
 is a series of essays by Cabanis, a French philosopher ( 1757-1808), 
 treating of mental and moral phenomena on a physiological basis. 
 In his later days, Cabanis completely abandoned his materialistic 
 standpoint. 
 
58 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 their imbecility can be traced to the fa6l that, at that period of 
 life, they were all led on, by the promise of high pay, to treat 
 literature as a trade and to write for money. This seduced 
 them into an unnatural abuse of their intelledlual powers ; and 
 a man who puts his Pegasus into harness, and urges on his 
 Muse with the whip, will have to pay a penalty similar to that 
 which is exafted by the abuse of other kinds of power. 
 
 And even in the case of Kant, I suspedl that the second 
 childhood of his last four years was due to overwork in later 
 life, and after he had succeeded in becoming a famous man. 
 
 Every month of the year has its own peculiar and dire<5t in- 
 fluence upon health and bodily condition generally ; nay, even 
 upon the state of the mind. It is an influence dependent 
 upon the weather. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. — SECTION 21. 
 
 IN making his way through life, a man will find it useful to 
 be ready and able to do two things : to look ahead and to 
 overlook : the one will proteft him from loss and injury, the 
 other from disputes and squabbles. 
 
 No one who has to live amongst men should absolutely dis- 
 card any person who has his due place in the order of nature, 
 even though he is very wicked or contemptible or ridiculous. 
 He must accept him as an unalterable fa6l — unalterable, be- 
 cause the necessary outcome of an eternal, fundamental princi- 
 ple ; and in bad cases he should remember the words of 
 Mephistopheles : es muss auch solche K'duze geben}^ — there 
 must be fools and rogues in the world. If he adts otherwise, 
 he will be committing an injustice, and giving a challenge of 
 life and death to the man he discards. No one can alter his 
 own peculiar individuality, his moral chara<5ler, his intelleAual 
 capacity, his temperament or physique ; and if we go so far as 
 to condemn a man from every point of view, there will be 
 nothing left him but to engage us in deadly confli6l ; for we 
 are pradlically allowing him the right to exist only on condi- 
 tion that he becomes another man — which is impossible ; his 
 nature forbids it. 
 
 So if you have to live amongst men, you must allow every- 
 one the right to exist in accordance with the character he has, 
 whatever it turns out to be : and all you should strive to do is 
 to make use of this charadler in such a way as its kind and 
 nature permit, rather than to hope for any alteration in it, or 
 to condemn it off-hand for what it is. This is the true sense of 
 
 •Goethe's Faust. Part I. (59) 
 
6o COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 the maxim — Live and let live. That, however, is a task which 
 is difficult in proportion as it is right ; and he is a happy man 
 who can once for all avoid having to do with a great many of 
 his fellow creatures. 
 
 The art of putting up with people may be learned by prac- 
 ticing patience on inanimate obje6ls, which, in virtue of some 
 mechanical or general physical necessity, oppose a stubborn 
 resistance to our freedom of adlion — a form of patience which 
 is required every day. The patience thus gained may be ap- 
 plied to our dealings with men, by accustoming ourselves to 
 regard their opposition, wherever we encounter it, as the in- 
 evitable outcome of their nature, which sets itself up against us 
 in virtue of the same rigid law of necessity as governs the re- 
 sistance of inanimate objefts. To become indignant at their 
 condu<5l is as foolish as to be angry with a stone because it rolls 
 into your path. And with many people the wisest thing you 
 can do, is to resolve to make use of those whom you cannot 
 alter. 
 
 Section 22. It is astonishing how easily and how quickly 
 similarity, or difference of mind and disposition, makes itself 
 felt between one man and another as soon as they begin to 
 talk : every little trifle shows it. When two people of totally 
 different natures are conversing, almost everything said by the 
 one will, in a greater or less degree, displease the other, and 
 in many cases produce positive annoyance ; even though the 
 conversation turn upon the most out-of-the-way subje6t, or one 
 in which neither of the parties has any real interest. People 
 of similar nature, on the other hand, immediately come to feel 
 a kind of general agreement ; and if they are cast very much 
 in the same mould, complete harmony or even unison will flow 
 from their intercourse. 
 
 This explain two circumstances. First of all, it shows why 
 it is that common, ordinary people are so sociable and find 
 good company wherever they go. Ah ! those good, dear, 
 brave people. It is just the contrary with those who are not 
 of the common run ; and the less they are so, the more unso- 
 ciable they become ; so that if, in their isolation, they chance 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 6l 
 
 to come across some one in whose nature they can find even a 
 single sympathetic chord, be it never so minute, they show 
 extraordinary pleasure in his society. For one man can be to 
 another only so much as the other is to him. Great minds 
 are like eagles, and build their nest in some lofty solitude. 
 
 Secondly, we are enabled to understand how it is that 
 people of like disposition so quickly get on with one another, 
 as though they were drawn together by magnetic force — kin- 
 dred souls greeting each other from afar. Of course the most 
 frequent opportunity of observing this is afforded by people of 
 vulgar tastes and inferior intelle6l, but only because their 
 name is legion ; while those who are better off in this respe<5l 
 and of a rarer nature, are not often to be met with : they are 
 called rare because you can seldom find them. 
 
 Take the case of a large number of people who have formed 
 themselves into a league for the purpose of carrying out some 
 pra6lical objedl ; if there be two rascals among them, they will 
 recognize each other as readily as if they bore a similar badge, 
 and will at once conspire for some misfeasance or treachery. 
 In the same way, if you can imagine — -per impossible — a large 
 company of very intelligent and clever people, amongst whom 
 there are only two blockheads, these two will be sure to be 
 drawn together by a feeling of sympathy, and each of them 
 will very soon secretly rejoice at having found at least one in- 
 telligent person in the whole company. It is really quite 
 curious to see how two such men, especially if they are moral- 
 ly and intelle6lually of an inferior type, will recognize each 
 other at first sight ; with what zeal they will strive to become 
 intimate ; how affably and cheerily they will run to greet each 
 other, just as though they were old friends ; — it is all so striking 
 that one is tempted to embrace the Buddhist doctrine of me- 
 tempsychosis and presume that they were on familiar terms in 
 some former state of existence. 
 
 Still, in spite of all this general agreement, men are kept 
 apart who might come together ; or, in some cases, a passing 
 discord springs up between them. This is due to diversity of 
 mood. You will hardly ever see two people exa(5lly in the 
 
62 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 same frame of mind ; for that is something which varies with 
 their condition of life, occupation, surroundings, health, the 
 train of thought they are in at the moment, and so on. These 
 differences give rise to discord between persons of the most 
 harmonious disposition. To correal the balance properly, so 
 as to remove the disturbance — to introduce, as it were, a uni- 
 form temperature, — is a work demanding a rery high degree 
 of culture. The extent to which uniformity of mood is pro- 
 ductive of good fellowship may be measured by its effe6ls up- 
 on a large company. When, for instance, a great many 
 people are gathered together and presented with some object- 
 ive interest which works upon all alike and influences them in 
 a similar way, no matter what it be — a common danger or 
 hope, some great news, a spectacle, a play, a piece of music, 
 or anything of that kind — you will find them roused to a mutu- 
 al expression of thought, and a display of sincere interest. 
 There will be a general feeling of pleasure amongst them ; for 
 that which attra(5ls their attention produces a unity of mood by 
 overpowering all private and personal interests. 
 
 And in default of some objeftive interest of the kind I have 
 mentioned, recourse is usually had to something subje6live. 
 A bottle of wine is not an uncommon means of introducing a 
 mutual feeling of fellowship ; and even tea and coffee are used 
 for a like end. 
 
 The discord which so easily finds its way into all society as 
 an effe6l of the different moods in which people happen to be 
 for the moment, also in part explains why it is that memory 
 always idealizes, and sometimes almost transfigures, the atti- 
 tude we have taken up at any period of the past — a change due 
 to our inability to remember all the fleeting influences which 
 disturbed us on any given occasion. Memory is in this re- 
 spe6l like the lens of a camera obscura : it contra6ts everything 
 within its range, and so produces a much finer pidlure than the 
 actual landscape affords. And, in the case of a man, absence 
 always goes some way towards securing this advantageous 
 light ; for though the idealizing tendency of the memory re- 
 quires time to complete its work, it begins it at once. Hence 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 63 
 
 it is a prudent thing to see your friends and acquaintances only 
 at considerable intervals of time ; and on meeting them again, 
 you will observe that memory has been at work. 
 
 Section 23. No man can see over his own height. Let me 
 explain what I mean. 
 
 You cannot see in another man any more than you have in 
 yourself; and your own intelligence stri<5lly determines the 
 €xtent to which he comes within its grasp. If your intelligence 
 is of a very low order, mental qualities in another, even though 
 they be of the highest kind, will have no effe(5l at all upon you ; 
 you will see nothing in their possessor except the meanest side 
 of his individuality — in other words, just those parts of his 
 chara6ler and disposition which are weak and defe6live. Your 
 whole estimate of the man will be confined to his defefts, and 
 his higher mental qualities will no more exist for you than 
 colors exist for those who cannot see. 
 
 Intelle6l is invisible to the man who has none. In any at- 
 tempt to criticise another's work, the range of knowledge pos- 
 sessed by the critic is as essential a part of his verdi6t as the 
 claims of the work itself 
 
 Hence intercourse with others involves a process of leveling 
 down. The qualities which are present in one man, and ab- 
 sent in another, cannot come into play when they meet ; and 
 the self-sacrifice which this entails upon one of the parties, calls 
 forth no recognition from the other. 
 
 Consider how sordid, how stupid, in a word, how vulgar 
 most men are, and you will see that it is impossible to talk to 
 them without becoming vulgar yourself for the time being. 
 Vulgarity is in this respe6l like ele6lricity ; it is easily distribu- 
 ted. You will then fully appreciate the truth and propriety of 
 the expression, to make yourself cheap ; and you will be glad 
 to avoid the society of people whose only possible point of con - 
 tadl with you is just that part of your nature of which you have 
 least reason to be proud. So you will see that, in dealing with 
 fools and blockheads, there is only one way of showing your 
 intelligence — by having nothing to do with them. That means, 
 of course, that when you go into society, you may now and 
 
64. COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 then feel like a good dancer who gets an invitation to a ball, 
 and on arriving, finds that everyone is lame : — with whom is 
 he to dance ? 
 
 Section 24. I feel respe6l for the man — and he is one in a 
 hundred — who, when he is waiting or sitting unoccupied, re- 
 frains from rattling or beating time with anything that happens 
 to be handy, — his stick, or knife and fork, or whatever else it 
 may be. The probability is that he is thinking of something. 
 
 With a large number of people, it is quite evident that their 
 power of sight completely dominates over their power of 
 thought ; they seem to be conscious of existence only when 
 they are making a noise ; unless indeed they happen to be 
 smoking, for this serves a similar end. It is for the same 
 reason that they never fail to be all eyes and ears for what is 
 going on around them. 
 
 Section 25. La Rochefoucauld makes the striking remark 
 that it is difficult to feel deep veneration and great affe6lion for 
 one and the same person. If this is so, we shall have to choose 
 whether it is veneration or love that we want from our fellow- 
 men. 
 
 Their love is always selfish, though in very different ways ; 
 and the means used to gain it are not always of a kind to make 
 us proud. A man is loved by others mainly in the degree in 
 which he moderates his claim on their good feeling and intelli- 
 gence : but he must a6t genuinely in the matter and without 
 dissimulation — not merely out of forbearance, which is at 
 bottom a kind of contempt. This calls to mind a very true 
 observation of Helvetius' : the amount of intellect necessary to 
 please us, is a most accurate m£asure of the amount of intellect 
 we have ourselves. With these remarks as premises, it is easy 
 to draw the conclusion. 
 
 Now with veneration the case is just the opposite ; it is 
 wrung from men relu6lantly, and for that very reason mosdy 
 concealed. Hence, as compared with love, veneration gives 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — Helvetius, Claude-Adrien (1715-71), a French 
 philosophical writer much esteemed by Schopenhauer. His chief 
 work, De I Esprit, excited great interest and opposition at the time of 
 its publication, on account of the author's pronounced materialism. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 65 
 
 more real satisfa6lion ; for it is connected with personal value, 
 and the same is not dire6lly true of love, which is subje<5live in 
 its nature, whilst veneration is obje6live. To be sure, it is 
 more useful to be loved than to be venerated. 
 
 Section 26. Most men are so thoroughly subje6live that 
 nothing really interests them but themselves. They always 
 think of their own case as soon as ever any remark is made, 
 and their whole attention is engrossed and absorbed by the 
 merest chance reference to anything which affe6ls them person- 
 ally, be it never so remote : with the result that they have no 
 power left for forming an objective view of things, should the 
 conversation take that turn ; neither can they admit any valid- 
 ity in arguments which tell against their interest or their vanity. 
 Hence their attention is easily distracted. They are so readi- 
 ly offended, insulted or annoyed, that in discussing any im- 
 personal matter with them, no care is too great to avoid letting 
 your remarks bear the slightest possible reference to the very 
 worthy and sensitive individuals whom you have before you ; 
 for anything you may say will perhaps hurt their feelings. 
 People really care about nothing that does not affe6t them 
 personally. True and striking observations, fine, subtle and 
 witty things are lost upon them : they cannot understand or 
 feel them. But anything that disturbs their petty vanity in 
 the most remote and indire6l way, or refle(fts prejudicially up- 
 on their exceedingly precious selves — to that, they are most 
 tenderly sensitive. In this respe<5l they are like the little dog 
 whose toes you are so apt to tread upon inadvertently — you 
 know it by the shrill bark it sets up : or, again, they resemble 
 a sick man covered with sores and boils, with whom the great- 
 est care must be taken to avoid unnecessary handling. And 
 in some people this feeling reaches such a pass that, if they are 
 talking with anyone, and he exhibits, or does not sufficiently 
 conceal, his intelligence and discernment, they look upon it as 
 a downright insult ; although for the moment they hide their 
 ill-will, and the unsuspe6ling author of it afterwards ruminates in 
 vain upon their conduct, and racks his brains to discover what 
 he could possibly have done to excite their malice and hatred. 
 
66 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 But it is just as easy to flatter and win them over ; and this is 
 why their judgment is usually corrupt, and why their opinions 
 are swayed, not by what is really true and right, but by the favor 
 of the party or class to which they belong. And the ultimate 
 reason of it all is, that in such people force of will greatly pre- 
 dominates over knowledge ; and hence their meagre intelleft 
 is wholly given up to the service of the will, and can never free 
 itself from that service for a moment. 
 
 Astrology furnishes a magnificent proof of this miserable 
 subjedlive tendency in men, which leads them to see everything 
 only as bearing upon themselves, and to think of nothing that 
 is not straightway made into a personal matter. The aim of 
 astrology is to bring the motions of the celestial bodies into re- 
 lation with the wretched Ego, and to establish a conne6Uon 
 between a comet in the sky and squabbles and rascalities on 
 earth . * 
 
 Section 27. When any wrong statement is made, whether 
 in public, or in society, or in books, and well received — or, at 
 any rate, not refuted — that is no reason why you should de- 
 spair or think that there the matter will rest. You should 
 comfort yourself with the reflexion that the question will be 
 afterwards gradually subje6led to examination ; light will be 
 thrown upon it ; it will be thought over, considered, discussed, 
 and generally in the end the corredl view will be reached ; so 
 that, after a time — the length of which will depend upon the 
 difficulty of the subject — everyone will come to understand that 
 which a clear head saw at once. 
 
 In the meantime, of course, you must have patience. He 
 who can see truly in the midst of general infatuation is like a 
 man whose watch keeps good time, when all clocks in the town 
 in which he lives are wrong. He alone knows the right time ; 
 but what use is that to him ? for everyone goes by the clocks 
 which speak false, not even excepting those who know that his 
 watch is the only one that is right. 
 
 Section 28. Men are like children, in that, if you spoil 
 them, they become naughty. 
 
 ' See, for instance. Stobaeus, Eclog. I. xxii. 9. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 67 
 
 Therefore it is well not to be too indulgent or charitable with 
 anyone. You may take it as a general rule that you will not 
 lose a friend by refusing him a loan, but that you are very 
 likely to do so by granting it ; and. for similar reasons, you 
 will not readily alienate people by being somewhat proud and 
 careless in your behavior ; but if you are very kind and com- 
 plaisant towards them, you will often make them arrogant and 
 intolerable, and so a breach will ensue. 
 
 There is one thing that, more than any other, throws people 
 absolutely off their balance — the thought that you are depend- 
 ent upon them. This is sure to produce an insolent and 
 domineering manner towards you. There are some people, 
 indeed, who become rude if you enter into any kind of relation 
 with them ; for instance, if you have occasion to converse with 
 them frequently upon confidential matters, they soon come to 
 fancy that they can take liberties with you, and so they try and 
 transgress the laws of politeness. This is why there are so few 
 with whom you care to become more intimate, and why you 
 should avoid familiarity with vulgar people. If a man comes 
 to think that I am more dependent upon him than he is upon 
 me, he at once feels as though I had stolen something from 
 him ; and his endeavor will be to have his vengeance and get 
 it back. The only way to attain superiority in dealing with 
 men, is to let it be seen that you are independent of them. 
 
 And in this view it is advisable to let everyone of your 
 acquaintance — whether man or woman — feel now and then that 
 you could very well dispense with their company. This will 
 consolidate friendship. Nay, with most people there will be 
 no harm in occasionally mixing a grain of disdain with your 
 treatment of them ; that will make them value your friendship 
 all the more. Chi non istima vien stimato, as a subtle Italian 
 proverb has it — to disregard is to win regard. But if we really 
 think very highly of a person, we should conceal it from him 
 like a crime. This is not a very gratifying thing to do, but it 
 is right. Why, a dog will not bear being treated too kindly, 
 let alone a man ! 
 
 Section 29. It is often the case that people of noble char- 
 
68 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 a6ler and great mental gifts betray a strange lack of worldly- 
 wisdom and a deficiency in the knowledge of men, more 
 especially when they are young ; with the result that it is easy 
 to deceive or mislead them ; and that, on the other hand, 
 natures of the commoner sort are more ready and successful in 
 making their way in the world. 
 
 The reason of this is that, when a man has little or no ex- 
 perience, he must judge by his own antecedent notions ; and 
 in matters demanding judgment, an antecedent notion is never 
 on the same level as experience. For, with the commoner 
 sort of people, an antecedent notion means just their own self- 
 ish point of view. This is not the case with those whose mind 
 and charadler are above the ordinary ; for it is precisely in 
 this respedl — their unselfishness — that they differ from the rest 
 of mankind ; and as they judge other people's thoughts and 
 adlions by their own high standard, the result does not always 
 tally with their calculation. 
 
 But if, in the end, a man of noble character comes to see, as 
 the effecl of his own experience, or by the lessons he learns 
 from others, what it is that may be expe<Sed of men in general, 
 — namely, that five-sixths of them are morally and intelledlual- 
 ly so constituted that, if circumstances do not place you in 
 relation with them, you had better get out of their way and 
 keep as far as possible from having anything to do with them, 
 — still, he will scarcely ever attain an adequate notion of their 
 wretchedly mean and shabby nature : all his life long he will 
 have to be extending and adding to the inferior estimate he 
 forms of them ; and in the meantime he will commit a great 
 many mistakes and do himself harm. 
 
 Then again, after he has really taken to heart the lessons 
 that have been taught him, it will occasionally happen that, 
 when he is in the society of people whom he does not know, 
 he will be surprised to find how thoroughly reasonable they all 
 appear to be, both in their conversation and in their demeanor 
 — in fadl, quite honest, sincere, virtuous and trustworthy 
 people, and at the same time shrewd and clever. 
 
 But that ought not to perplex him. Nature js not like those 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 69 
 
 bad poets, who, in setting a fool or a knave before us, do their 
 work so clumsily, and with such evident design, that you 
 might almost fancy you saw the poet standing behind each of 
 his chara6lers, and continually disavowing their sentiments, and 
 telling you in a tone of warning : This is a knave ; that is a 
 fool ; do not mind what he says. But Nature goes to work like 
 Shakespeare and Goethe, poets who make everyone of their 
 chara6lers — even if it is the devil himself ! — appear to be quite 
 in the right for the moment that they come before us in their 
 several parts ; the chara6lers are described so obje(5lively that 
 they excite our interest and compel us to sympathize with their 
 point of view ; for, like the works of Nature, everyone of 
 these charadters is evolved as the result of some hidden law or 
 principle, which makes all they say and do appear natural and 
 therefore necessary. And you will always be the prey or the 
 plaything of the devils and fools in this world, if you expe6l to 
 see them going about with horns or jangling their bells. 
 
 And it should be borne in mind that, in their intercourse 
 with others, people are like the moon, or like hunchbacks ; 
 they show you only one of their sides. Every man has an in- 
 nate talent for mimicry, — for making a mask out of his physi- 
 ognomy, so that he can always look as if he really were what 
 he pretends to be ; and since he makes his calculations always 
 within the lines of his individual nature, the appearance he 
 puts on suits him to a nicety, and its effect is extremely de- 
 ceptive. He dons his mask whenever his obje6l is to flatter 
 himself into some one's good opinion ; and you may pay just 
 as much attention to it as if it were made of wax or cardboard, 
 never forgetting that excellent Italian proverb : 7ion e si tristo 
 cane che non meni la coda, — there is no dog so bad but that he 
 will wag his tail. 
 
 In any case it is well to take care not to form a highly favorable 
 opinion of a person whose acquaintance you have only recently 
 made, for otherwise you are very likely to be disappointed ; 
 and then you will be ashamed of yourself and perhaps even 
 suffer some injury. And while I am on the subject, there is 
 another fa<5l that deserves mention. It is this. A man shows 
 
70 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 his chara<5ler just in the way in which he deals with trifles, — 
 for then he is off his guard. This will often afford a good 
 opportunity of observing the boundless egoism of man's 
 nature, and his total lack of consideration for others ; and if 
 these defedls show themselves in small things, or merely in his 
 general demeanor, you will find that they also underlie his 
 a<5lion in matters of importance, although he may disguise the 
 fa<5l. This is an opportunity which should not be missed. If 
 in the little affairs of every day, — the trifles of life, those 
 matters to which the rule de minimis n<m applies, — a man is 
 inconsiderate and seeks only what is advantageous or con- 
 venient to himself, to the prejudice of others' rights ; if he ap- 
 propriates to himself that which belongs to all alike, you may 
 be sure there is no justice in his heart, and that he would be a 
 scoundrel on a wholesale scale, only that law and compulsion 
 bind his hands. Do not trust him beyond your door. He 
 who is not afraid to break the laws of his own private circle, 
 will break those of the State when he can do so with impunity. 
 
 If the average man were so constituted that the good in him 
 outweighed the bad, it would be more advisable to rely upon 
 his sense of justice, fairness, gratitude, fidelity, love or com- 
 passion, than to work upon his fears ; but as the contrary is the 
 case, and it is the bad that outweighs the good, the opposite 
 course is the more prudent one. 
 
 If any person with whom we are associated or have to do, 
 exhibits unpleasant or annoying qualities, we have only to ask 
 ourselves whether or not this person is of so much value to us 
 that we can put up with frequent and repeated exhibitions of the 
 same qualities in a somewhat aggravated form.* In case of an 
 affimative answer to this question, there will not be much to 
 be said, because talking is very little use. We must let the 
 matter pass, with or without some notice ; but we should never- 
 theless remember that we are thereby exposing ourselves to a 
 repetition of the offence. If the answer is in the negative, we 
 must break with our worthy friend at once and forever ; or in 
 
 • To forgive and forget means to throw away dearly bought 
 experience. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 71 
 
 the case of a sen'ant, dismiss him. For he will inevitably re- 
 peat the offence, or do something tantamount to it, should the 
 occasion return, even though for the moment he is deep and 
 sincere in his assurances ot the contrary. There is nothing, 
 absolutely nothing, that a man cannot forget, — but not himself, 
 his own character. For charader is incorrigible ; because all 
 a man's a6lions emanate from an inward principle, in virtue of 
 which he must always do the same thing under like circum- 
 stances ; and he cannot do otherwise. Let me refer to my 
 prize essay on the so-called Freedom of the Will, the perusal 
 of which will dissipate any delusions the reader may have on 
 this subjed. 
 
 To become reconciled to a friend with whom you have 
 broken, is a form of weakness ; and you pay the penalty of it 
 when he takes the first opportunity of doing precisely the very 
 thing which brought about the breach ; nay, he does it the 
 more boldly, because he is secretly conscious that you cannot 
 get on without him. This is also applicable to servants whom 
 you have dismissed, and then taken into your service again. 
 
 For the same reason, you should just as little expedl people 
 to continue to a6l in a similar way under altered circumstances. 
 The truth is that men alter their demeanor and sentiments just 
 as fast as their interest changes ; and their design in this re- 
 spe6l is a bill drawn for such short payment that the man must 
 be still more short-sighted who accepts the bill without pro- 
 testing it. Accordingly, suppose you want to know how a 
 man will behave in an office into which you think of putting 
 him ; you should not build upon expedlations, on his promises 
 or assurances. For, even allowing that he is quite sincere, he 
 is speaking about a matter of which he has no knowledge. 
 The only way to calculate how he will behave, is to consider 
 the circumstances in which he will be placed, and the extent to 
 which they will confli<5l with his chara<5ler. 
 
 If you wish to get a clear and profound insight — and it is 
 very needful — into the true but melancholy elements of which 
 most men are made, you will find it a very instructive thing to 
 take the way they behave in the pages of literature as a com- 
 
72 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 mentary to their doings in pra6lical life, and vice versa. The 
 experience thus gained will be very useful in avoiding wrong 
 ideas, whether about yourself or about others. But if you 
 come across any special trait of meanness or stupidity — in life 
 or in literature, — you must be careful not to let it annoy or 
 distress you, but to look upon it merely as an addition to your 
 knowledge — a new fa6t to be considered in studying the charac- 
 ter of humanity. Your attitude towards it will be that of the 
 mineralogist who stumbles upon a very chara6leristic specimen 
 of a mineral. 
 
 Of course there are some fadls which are very exceptional, 
 and it is difficult to understand how they arise, and how it is 
 that there come to be such enormous differences between man 
 and man ; but, in general, what was said long ago is quite true, 
 and the world is in a very bad way. In savage countries they 
 eat one another, in civilized countries they deceive one an- 
 other ; and that is what people call the way of the world ! 
 What are States and all the elaborate systems of political ma- 
 chinery, and the rule offeree, whether in home or in foreign 
 affairs, — what are they but barriers against the boundless in- 
 iquity of mankind ? Does not all history show that whenever 
 a king is firmly planted on a throne, and his people reach 
 some degree of prosperity, he uses it to lead his army, like a 
 band of robbers, against adjoining countries ? Are not almost 
 all wars ultimately undertaken for purposes of plunder ? In 
 the most remote antiquity, and to some extent also in the 
 Middle Ages, the conquered became slaves, — in other words, 
 they had to work for those who conquered them ; and where 
 is the difference between that and paying war-taxes, which 
 represent the produd of our previous work ? 
 
 All war, says Voltaire, is a mattter of robbery ; and the 
 Germans should take that as a warning. j 
 
 Section 30. No man is so formed that he can be left en- 
 tirely to himself, to go his own ways ; everyone needs to be 
 guided by a preconceived plan, and to follow certain general 
 rules. But if this is carried too far, and a man tries to take on 
 a character which is not natural or innate in him, but is arti- 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 73 
 
 ficially acquired and evolved merely by a process of reasoning, 
 he will very soon discover that Nature cannot be forced, and 
 that if you drive it out, it will return despite your efforts : — 
 
 Naturatn expelles furca, tatnen usque recurret. 
 
 To understand a rule governing condu6l towards others, 
 even to discover it for oneself and to express it neatly, is easy 
 enough ; and still, very soon afterwards, the rule may be 
 broken in pra6lice. But that is no reason for despair ; and 
 you need not fancy that as it is impossible to regulate your life 
 in accordance with abstraft ideas and maxims, it is better to 
 live just as you please. Here, as in all theoretical instruction 
 that aims at a pra6lical result, the first thing to do is to under- 
 stand the rule ; the second thing is to learn the pra6lice of it. 
 The theory may be understood at once by an effort of reason, 
 and yet the pra<5lice of it acquired only in course of time. 
 
 A pupil may learn the various notes on an instrument of 
 music, or the different positions in fencing ; and when he 
 makes a mistake, as he is sure to do, however hard he tries, 
 he is apt to think it will be impossible to observe the rules, 
 when he is set to read music at sight or challenged to a furious 
 duel. But for all that, gradual pra6lice makes him perfe6l, 
 through a long series of slips, blunders and fresh efforts. It 
 is just the same in other things ; in learning to write and speak 
 Latin, a man will forget the grammatical rules ; it is only by long 
 praAice that a blockhead turns into a courtier, that a passion- 
 ate man becomes shrewd and worldly-wise, or a frank person 
 reserved, or a noble person ironical. But though self-disci- 
 pline of this kind is the result of long habit, it always works 
 by a sort of external compulsion, which Nature never ceases to 
 resist and sometimes unexpededly overcomes. The difference 
 between a6lion in accordance with abstract principles, and ac- 
 tion as the result of original, innate tendency, is the same as 
 that between a work of art, say a watch — where form and 
 movement are impressed upon shapeless and inert matter — and 
 a living organism, where form and matter are one, and each 
 is inseparable from the other. 
 
 There is a maxim attributed to the Emperor Napoleon, 
 
74 COUNSELS ANP MAXIMS. 
 
 which expresses this relation between acquired and innate 
 chara6ler, and confirms what I have said : everything that is 
 unnaturalis imperfeB ; — a rule of universal application, wheth- 
 er in the physical or in the moral sphere. The only exception 
 I can think of to this rule is aventurine,^ a substance known to 
 mineralogists, which in its natural state cannot compare with 
 the artificial preparation of it. 
 
 And in this connection let me uttei' a word of protest against 
 any and every form of affenation. It always arouses contempt ; 
 in the first place, because it argues deception, and the decep- 
 tion is cowardly, for it is based on fear ; and, secondly, it 
 argues self-condemnation, because it means that a man is try- 
 ing to appear what he is not, and therefore something which 
 he thinks better than he ac^tually is. To affe6l a quality, and 
 to plume yourself upon it, is just to confess that you have not 
 got it. Whether it is courage, or learning, or intellect, or 
 wit, or success with women, or riches, or social position, or 
 whatever else it may be that a man boasts of, you may con- 
 clude by his boasting about it that that is precisely the direc- 
 tion in which he is rather weak ; for if a man really possesses 
 any faculty to the full, it will not occur to him to make a great 
 show of aflfedling it ; he is quite content to know that he has it. 
 That is the application of the Spanish proverb : herradura que 
 chacolotea clavo le falta — a clattering hoof means a nail gone. 
 To be sure, as I said at first, no man ought to let the reins go 
 quite loose, and show himself just as he is ; for there are many 
 evil and bestial sides to our nature which require to be hidden 
 away out of sight ; and this justifies the negative attitude of 
 dissimulation, but it does not justify a positive feigning of 
 qualities which are not there. It should also be remembered 
 that affectation is recognized at once, even before it is clear 
 what it is that is being affedled. And, finally, affectation can 
 not last very long, and one day the mask will fall off. Nemo 
 potest personam diuferrefidam, says Senca ; ^ ficta cito in na- 
 
 ' Translator'' s Note. — Aventurine is a rare kind of quartz ; and the 
 same name is given to a brownish-colored glass much resembling it, 
 which is manufactured at Murano. It is so-called from the fadl that 
 the glass was discovered by chance {arventura). * De dementia, 1. 1. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 75 
 
 turarh suam recidunt — ^no one can persevere long in a fictitious 
 chara6ler ; for nature will soon re-assert itself. 
 
 Section 31. A man bears the weight of his own body 
 without knowing it, but he soon feels the weight of any other, 
 if he tries to move it ; in the same way, a man can see other 
 people's shortcomings and vices, but he is blind to his own. 
 This arrangement has one advantage : it turns other people in- 
 to a kind of mirror, in which a man can see clearly everything 
 that is vicious, faulty, ill-bred and loathsome in his own nature ; 
 only, it is generally the old story of the dog barking at its own 
 image ; it is himself that he sees and not another dog, as he 
 fancies. 
 
 He who criticises others, works at the reformation of him- 
 self. Those who form the secret habit of scrutinizing other 
 people's general behavior, and passing severe judgment upon 
 what they do and leave undone, thereby improve themselves, 
 and work out their own perfedlion : for they will have sufficient 
 sense of justice, or at any rate enough pride and vanity, to 
 avoid in their own case that which they condemn so harshly 
 elsewhere. But tolerant people are just the opposite, and 
 claim for themselves the same indulgence that they extend to 
 others — hayic veniam damns peiimus que vicissim. It is all very 
 well for the Bible to talk about the mote in another's eye and 
 the beam in one's own. The nature of the eye is to look not 
 at itself but at other things ; and therefore to observe and 
 blame faults in another is a very suitable way of becoming con- 
 scious of one's own. We require a looking glass for the due 
 dressing of our morals. 
 
 The same rule applies in the case of style and tine writing. 
 If, instead of condemning, you applaud some new folly in 
 these matters, you will imitate it. That is just why literary 
 follies have such vogue in Germany. The Germans are a very 
 tolerant people — everybody can see that ! Their maxim is — 
 Hanc veniam damns petimnsqne vicissim. 
 
 Section 32. When he is young, a man of noble character 
 ^ncies that the relations prevailing amongst mankind, and the 
 alliances to which these relations lead, are, at bottom and 
 
76 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 essentially, ideal in their nature ; that is to say, that they rest 
 upon similarity of disposition or sentiment, or taste, or intel- 
 ledlual power, and so on. 
 
 But, later on, he finds out that it is a real foundation which 
 underlies these alliances ; that they are based upon some 
 mtf/ma/ interest. This is the true foundation of almost all 
 alliances : nay, most men have no notion of an alliance resting 
 upon any other basis. Accordingly we find that a man is 
 always measured by the office ne holds, or by his occupation, 
 nationality, or family relations — in a word, by the position and 
 chara6ler which have been assigned him in the conventional 
 arrangements of life, where he is ticketed and treated as so 
 much goods. Reference to what he is in himself, as a man — 
 to the measure of his own personal qualities — is never made 
 unless for convenience' sake : and so that view of a man is 
 something exceptional, to be set aside and ignored, the mo- 
 ment that anyone finds it disagreeable ; and this is what usual- 
 ly happens. But the more of personal worth a man has, the 
 less pleasure he will take in these conventional arrangements ; 
 and he will try to withdraw from the sphere in which they 
 apply. The reason why these arrangements exist at all, is 
 simply that in this world of ours misery and need are the chief 
 features : therefore it is everywhere the essential and paramount 
 business of life to devise the means of alleviating them. 
 
 Section 33. As paper-money circulates in the world in- 
 stead of real coin, so, is the place of true esteem and genuine 
 friendship, you have the outward appearance of it — a mimic 
 show made to look as much like the real thing as possible. 
 
 On the other hand, it may be asked whether there are any 
 people who really deserve the true coin. For my own part, I 
 should certainly pay more respedl to an honest dog wagging 
 his tail than to a hundred such demonstrations of human 
 regard. 
 
 True and genuine friendship presupposes a strong sympathy 
 with the weal and woe of another — purely objective in its 
 character and quite disinterested ; and this in its turn means 
 an absolute identification of self with the obje<S of friendship. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 77 
 
 The egoism of human nature is so strongly antagonistic to any 
 such sympathy, that true friendship belongs to that class of 
 things — the sea-serpent, for instance, — with regard to which no 
 one knows whether they are fabulous or really exist somewhere 
 or other. 
 
 Still, in many cases, there is a grain of true and genuine 
 friendship in the relations of man to man, though generally, of 
 course, some secret personal interest is at the bottom of them 
 — some one among the many forms that selfishness can take. 
 But in a world where all is imperfe6l, this grain of true feeling 
 is such an ennobhng influence that it gives some warrant for 
 calling those relations by the name of friendship, for they stand 
 far above the ordinary friendships that prevail amongst man- 
 kind. The latter are so constituted that, were you to hear how 
 your dear friends speak of you behind your bacic, you would 
 never say another word to them. 
 
 Apart from the case where it would be a real help to you if your 
 friend were to make some great sacrifice to serve you, there is 
 no better means of testing the genuineness of his feelings than 
 the way in which he receives the news of a misfortune that 
 has just happened to you. At that moment the expression 
 ol his features will either show that his one thought is that of 
 true and sincere sympathy for you ; or else the absolute com- 
 posure of his countenance, or the passing trace of something 
 other than sympathy, will confirm the well-known maxim of 
 La Rochefoucauld : Dans V adversity de nos meilleurs amis, 
 nous trquvons toujours quelque chose qui ne nous diplait pas. 
 Indeed, at such a moment, the ordinary so-called friend will 
 find it hard to suppress the signs of a slight smile of pleasure. 
 There are few ways by which you can make more certain of 
 putting people into a good humor than by teUing them of some 
 trouble that has recently befallen you, or by unreservedly dis- 
 closing some personal weakness of yours. How chara<5leristic 
 this is of humanity ! 
 
 Distance and long absence are always prejudicial to friend- 
 ship, however disinclined a man may be to admit it. Our re- 
 gard for people whom we do not see — even though they be 
 
78' COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 our dearest friends — gradually dries up in the course of years, 
 and they become abstradl notions j so that our interest in them- 
 grows to be more and more intelle<5lual, — nay, it is kept up 
 only as a kind of tradition ; whilst we retain a lively and deep 
 interest in those who are constantly before our eyes, even if 
 they be only pet animals. This shows how much men are 
 limited by their senses, and how true is the remark that Goethe 
 makes in Tasso about the dominant influence of the present 
 moment : — 
 
 Die Gegenwart ist eine machtige GotHn.^ 
 
 Friends of the house are very rightly so called ; because they 
 are friends of the house rather than of its master ; in other 
 words, they are more like cats than dogs. 
 
 Your friends will tell you that they are sincere ; your ene- 
 mies are really so. Let your enemies' censure be like a bitter 
 medicine, to be used as a means of self-knowledge. 
 
 A friend in need, as the saying goes, is rare. Nay, it is just 
 the contrary ; no sooner have you made a friend than he is in 
 need, and asks you for a loan. 
 
 Section 34. A man must be still a greenhorn in the ways 
 of the world, if he imagines that he can make himself popular 
 in society by exhibiting intelligence and discernment. With 
 the immense majority of people, such qualities excite hatred 
 and resentment, which are rendered all the harder to bear by 
 the fa6t that people are obliged to suppress — even from them- 
 selves — the real reason of their anger. 
 
 What a6tually takes place is this. A man feels and perceives 
 that the person with whom he is conversing is intelle6tually 
 very much his superior.* He thereupon secretly and half- 
 unconsciously concludes that his interlocutor must form a pro- 
 portionately low and limited estimate of his abilities. That is 
 
 ' A<ft iv., so. 4. 
 
 * Cf. Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Bk. II. p. 256 (4th Edit.), 
 where 1 quote from Dr. Johnson, and from Merck, the friend of 
 Goethe's youth. The former says : There is nothing by which a man 
 exasperates most people more, than by displaying a superior ability of 
 brilliancy in conversation. They seem pleased at the time, but their 
 envy makes them curse him at their hearts. (Boswell's Life 0/ John- 
 son aetat : 74.) 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. fq 
 
 a method of reasoning — an enthymeme — which rouses the 
 bitterest feelings of sullen and rancorous hatred. And SO 
 Gracian is quite right in saying that the only Way tO wifl affec- 
 tion from people is to show the most animal-like simplicity Of 
 demeanor — />ara ser bien guisio, el unico medio VCStiTSe la plci 
 del mas simple de los brulos} 
 
 To show your intelligence and discernment is only an indi- 
 re(5l way of reproaching other people for being dull and in- 
 capable. And besides, it is natural for a vulgar man to be vio- 
 lently agitated by the sight of opposition in any form ; and in 
 this case envy comes in as the secret cause of his hostility. For 
 it is a matter of daily observation that people take the greatest 
 pleasure in that which satisfies their vanity ; and vanity cannot 
 be satisfied without comparison with others. Now, there is 
 nothing of which a man is prouder than of intelle6tual ability, 
 for it i.= this that gives him his commanding place in the animal 
 world. It is an exceedingly rash thing to let anyone see that 
 you are decidedly superior to him in this respect, and to let 
 other people see it too ; because he will then thirst for venge- 
 ance, and generally look about for an opportunity of taking it 
 by means of insult, because this is to pass from the sphere of 
 intelle^l to that of will — and there, all are on an equal footing 
 as regards the feeling of hostility. Hence, while rank and 
 riches may always reckon upon deferential treatment in society, 
 that is something which intelledlual ability can never expedl ; 
 to be ignored is the greatest favor shown to it ; and if people 
 notice it at all, it is because they regard it as a piece of imperti- 
 nence, or else as something to which its possessor has no 
 legitimate right, and upon which he dares to pride himself; 
 and in retaliation and revenge for his condudl, people secredy 
 try and humiliate him in some other way ; and if they wait to 
 
 ' Translator's Npte. — Balthazar Gracian, Oraculo manual, y arte dc 
 prudencia, 240. Gracian (1584-1658^ was a Spanish prose writer and 
 Jesuit, whose works deal chiefly with the observation of charaAer in 
 the various phenomena of life. Schopenhauer, among others, had a 
 great admiration for his worldly philosophy, and translated his 
 Oraculo manual — a system of rules for the conduct of life — into Ger- 
 man. The same book was translated into English towards the close . 
 of the seventeenth century. 
 
80 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 do this, it is only for a fitting opportunity. A man may be as 
 humble as possible in his demeanor, and yet hardly ever get 
 people to overlook his crime in standing intelledually above 
 them. In the Garden of Roses, Sadi makes the remark : — Vou 
 should know that foolish people are a hundredfold more averse 
 to meeting the wise than the wise are indisposed for the company 
 of the foolish. 
 
 On the other hand, it is a real recommendation to be stupid. 
 For just as warmth is agreeable to the body, so it does the 
 mind good to feel its superiority ; and a man will seek com- 
 pany likely to give him this feeling, as instindively as he will 
 approach the fire place or walk in the sun if he wants to get 
 warm. But this means that he will be disliked on account of 
 his superiority ; and if a man is to be liked, he must really be 
 inferior in point of intelledl ; and the same thing holds good of 
 a woman in point of beauty. To give proof of real and un- 
 feigned inferiority to some of the people you meet — that is a 
 very difficult business indeed ! 
 
 Consider how kindly and heartily a girl who is passably 
 pretty will welcome one who is downright ugly. Physical ad- 
 vantages are not thought so much of in the case of man, though 
 I suppose you would rather a little man sat next to you than 
 one who was bigger than yourself This is why, amongst men, 
 it is the dull and ignorant, and amongst women, the ugly, who 
 are always popular and in request.* It is likely to be said of 
 such people that they are extremely good-natured, because 
 
 > If you desire to get on in the world, friends and acquaintances are 
 by far the best passport t j fortune. The possession of a great deal of 
 abiUty makes a man proud, and therefore not apt to flatter those who 
 have very little, and from whom, on that account, the possession of 
 great ability should be carefully concealed. The consciousness of 
 small intellectual power has just the opposite efied, and is very com- 
 patible with a humble, affable and companionable nature, and with 
 respect for what is mean and wretched. This is why an inferior sort 
 of man has so many people to befriend and encourage him. 
 
 These remarks are applicable not only to advancement in political 
 life, but to all competition for places of honor and dignity, nay, even 
 for reputation in tlie world of science, literature and art. In learned 
 societies, for example, mediocrity — that very acceptable quality — is 
 always to the fore, whilst merit meets with tardy recognition, or with 
 none at all. So it is in everything. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. Si 
 
 everyone wants to find a pretext for caring about them — a pre- 
 text which will blind both himself and other people to the real 
 reason why he likes them. This is also why mental superiority 
 of any sort always tends to isolate its possessor : people run 
 away from him out of pure hatred, and say all manner of bad 
 things about him by way of justifying their action. Beauty, 
 in the case of women, has a similar effe6l : very pretty girls 
 have no friends of their own sex, and they even find it hard to 
 get another girl to keep them company. A handsome woman 
 should always avoid applying for a position as companion, be- 
 cause the moment she enters the room, her prospe6live mis- 
 tress will scowl at her beauty, as a piece of folly with which, 
 both for her own and for her daughters' sake, she can very 
 well dispense. But if the girl has advantages of rank, the case 
 is very different ; because rank, unlike personal qualities 
 which work by the force of mere contrast, produces its effe6l 
 by a process of refle6lion ; much in the same way as the par- 
 ticular hueof a person's complexion depends upon the prevail- 
 ing tone of his immediate surroundings. 
 
 Section 35. Our trust in other people often consists in 
 great measure of pure laziness, selfishness and vanity on our 
 own part : I say laziness, because, instead of making inquiries 
 ourselves, and exercising an adlive care, we prefer to trust 
 others ; selfishness, because we are led to confide in people by 
 the pressure of our own affairs ; and vanity, when we ask con- 
 fidence for a matter on which we rather pride ourselves. And 
 yet, for all that, we expe6l people to be true to the trust we 
 repose in them. 
 
 But we ought not to become angry if people put no trust in 
 us : because that really means that they pay honesty the sincere 
 compliment of regarding it as a very rare thing, — so rare, in- 
 deed, as to leave us in doubt whether its existence is not 
 merely fabulous. 
 
 Section 36. Politeness, — which the Chinese hold to be a 
 cardinal virtue, — is based upon two considerations of policy. I 
 have explained one ol these considerations in my Ethics ; the 
 other is as follows : — Politeness is a tacit agreement that 
 
S2 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 people's miserable defeats, whether moral or intelleAual, shall 
 on either side be ignored and not made the subje<5l of reproach ; 
 and since these defe6ls are thus rendered somewhat less obtru- 
 sive, the result is mutually advantageous.* 
 
 It is a wise thing to be polite ; consequentiy, it is a stupid 
 thing to be rude. To make enemies by unnecessary and willful 
 incivility, is just as insane a proceeding as to set your house 
 on fire. For politeness is like a counter — an avowedly false 
 coin, with which it is foolish to be stingy. A sensible man will 
 be generous in the use of it. It is customary in every country 
 to end a letter with the words -.—your most obedient servant — 
 votre tris-humble serviteur — suo devotissitno servo. (The Ger- 
 mans are the only people who suppress the word servant — 
 Diener — because, of course, it is not true !) However, to 
 carry politeness to such an extent as to damage your prospe<5ls, 
 is hke giving money where only counters are expe6led. 
 
 Wax, a substance naturally hard and brittle, can be made 
 soft by the application of a little warmth, so that it will take 
 any shape you please. In the same way, by being polite and 
 friendly, you can make people pliable and obhging, even 
 though they are apt to be crabbed and malevolent. Hence 
 politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax. 
 
 Of course, it is no easy matter to be polite ; in so far, I 
 mean, as it requires us to show great respe6l for everybody, 
 whereas most people deserve none at all ; and again in so far 
 as it demands that we should feign the most lively interest in 
 people, when we must be very glad that we have nothing to 
 do with them. To combine politeness with pride is a master- 
 piece of wisdom. 
 
 We should be much less ready to lose our temper over an 
 insult, — which, in the stri<5l sense of the word, means that we 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — In the passage referred to ( Grundlage der 
 Moral, colleded works, Vol. IV., pp. 187 and 198), Schopenhauer ex- 
 plains politeness as a conventional and systematic attempt to mask 
 the egoism of human nature in the small affairs of life, — an egoism so 
 repulsive that some such device is necessary for the purpose of con- 
 cealing its ugliness. The relation which politeness bears to the true 
 love of one's neighbor is analogous to that existing between justice as 
 an affair of legality, and justice as tlie real integrity of the heart. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. ^J 
 
 have not been treated with respe6l, — if, on the one hand, we have 
 not such an exaggerated estimate of our value and dignity — 
 that is to say, if we were not so immensely proud of ourselves ; 
 and, on the other hand, if we had arrived at any clear notion 
 of the judgment which, in his heart, one man generally passes 
 upon another. If most people resent the slightest hint that any 
 blame attaches to them, you may imagine their feelings if they 
 were to overhear what their acquaintances say about them. 
 You should never lose sight of the fa6l that ordinary politeness 
 is only a grinning mask : if it shifts its place a little, or is re- 
 moved for a moment, there is no use raising a hue and cry. 
 When a man is downright rude, it is as though he had taken 
 off all his clothes, and stood before you in puris ncUuralibus. 
 Like most men in this condition, he does not present a very 
 attra6live appearance. 
 
 Section 37. You ought never to take any man as a model 
 for what you should do or leave undone ; because position and 
 circumstances are in no two cases alike, and difference of 
 chara6ter gives a peculiar, individual tone to what a man does. 
 Hence dtw cum faciunt idem, non est idem — two persons may 
 do the same thing with a different result. A man should a6l in 
 accordance with his own chara6ler, as soon as he has carefully 
 deliberated on what he is about to do. 
 
 The outcome of this is that originality cannot be dispensed 
 with in practical matters : otherwise, what a man does will not 
 accord with what he is. 
 
 Section 38. Nevercombatany man's opinion ; for though 
 you reached the age of Methuselah, you would never have 
 done setting him right upon all the absurd things that he 
 believes. 
 
 It is also well to avoid corre(5ling people's mistakes in con- 
 versation, however good your intentions may be ; for it is easy 
 to offend people, and difficult, if not impossible, to mend them. 
 
 If you feel irritated by the absurd remarks of two people 
 whose conversation you happen to overhear, you should im- 
 agine that you are listening to the dialogue of two fools in a 
 comedy. Probatum est. 
 
84 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 The man who comes into the world with the notion that he 
 is really going to instru6l it in matters of the highest import- 
 ance, may thank his stars if he escapes with a whole skin. 
 
 Section 39. If you want your judgment to be accepted, 
 express it coolly and without passion. All violence has its seat 
 in the will ; and so, if your judgment is expressed with vehe- 
 mence, people will consider it an effort of will, and not the out- 
 come of knowledge, which is in its nature cold and unimpas- 
 sioned. Since the will is the primary and radical element in 
 human nature, and intellefl merely supervenes as something 
 secondary, people are more likely to believe that the opinion 
 you express with so much vehemence is due to the excited 
 state of your will, rather than that the excitement of the will 
 comes only from the ardent nature of your opinion. 
 
 Section 40. Even when you are fully justified in praising 
 yourself, you should never be seduced into doing so. For 
 vanity is so very common, and merit so very uncommon, that 
 even if a man appears to be praising himself, though very 
 indire6lly, people will be ready to lay a hundred to one that 
 he is talking out of pure vanity, and that he has not sense 
 enough to see what a fool he is making of himself. 
 
 Still, for all that, there may be some truth in Bacon's re- 
 mark that, as in the case of calumny, if you throw enough dirt, 
 some of it will stick, so it is also in regard to self-praise ; with 
 the conclusion that self-praise, in small doses, is to be recom- 
 mended.^ 
 
 Section 41. If you have reason to suspe6l that a person is 
 telling you a lie^ look as though you believed every word he 
 said. This will give him courage to go on ; he will become 
 more vehement in his assertions, and in the end betray himself. 
 
 Again, if you perceive that a person is trying to conceal 
 
 something from you, but with only partial success, look as 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — Schopenhauer alludes to the following pas- 
 sage in Bacon's De Augtnentis Scientiarutn, Bk. viii., ch. 2: Sicut 
 enitn did solet de calutnnia, audac^ter calumniare, semper aliquid 
 haeret ; sic did potest de jaSlantta , ( nisi plane de/ormis fiierit et ridi- 
 cula,) audadler te vendila, semper aliquid haeret. Haerebit certe 
 apud populutn , licet prudentiores subridea nt. Itaque existimatio parta 
 apud plurimos paiccorum fastidium abunde compensabii. 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 85 
 
 though you did not believe him. This opposition on your part 
 will provoke him into leading out his reserve of truth and 
 bringing the whole force of it to bear upon your incredulity. 
 
 Section 42. You should regard all your private affairs as 
 secrets, and, in respe6t of them, treat your acquaintances, even 
 though you are on good terms with them, as perfe6t strangers, 
 letting them know nothing more than they can see for them- 
 selves. For in course of time, and under altered circumstances, 
 you may find it a disadvantage that they know even the most 
 harmless things about you. 
 
 And, as a general rule, it is more advisable to show your in- 
 telligence by saying nothing than by speaking out ; for silence 
 is a matter of prudence, whilst speech has something in it of 
 vanity. The opportunities for displaying the one or the other 
 quality occur equally often ; but the fleeting satisfaction afford- 
 ed by speech is often preferred to the permanent advantage 
 secured by silence. 
 
 The feeling of relief which lively people experience in speak- 
 ing aloud when no one is listening, should not be indulged, lest 
 it grow into a habit ; for in this way thought establishes such 
 very friendly terms with speech, that conversation is apt to be- 
 come a process of thinking aloud. Prudence exa6ts that a wide 
 gulf should be fixed between what we think and what we say. 
 
 At times we fancy that people are utterly unable to believe 
 in the truth of some statement affe6ling us personally, whereas 
 it never occurs to them to doubt it ; but if we give them the 
 slightest opportunity of doubting it, they find it absolutely im- 
 possible to believe it any more. We often betray ourselves 
 into revealing something, simply because we suppose that 
 people cannot help noticing it. — just as a man will throw him- 
 self down from a great height because he loses his head, in 
 other words, because he fancies that he cannot retain a firm 
 footing any longer ; the torment of his position is so great, 
 that he thinks it better to put an end to it at once. This is the 
 kind of insanity which is called acrophobia. 
 
 But it should not be forgotten how clever people are in re- 
 gard to affairs which do not concern them, even though they 
 
86 - - COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 show no particular sign of acuteness in other matters. This is 
 a kind of algebra in which people are very proficient : give 
 them a single fa6l to go upon, and they will solve the most 
 complicated problems. So, if you wish to relate some event 
 that happened long ago, without mentioning any names, or 
 otherwise indicating the persons to whom you refer, you 
 should be very careful not to introduce into your narrative 
 anything that might point, however distantly, to some definite 
 fadt, whether it is a particular locality, or a date, or the name 
 of some one who was only to a small extent implicated, or any- 
 thing else that was even remotely conne6led with the event ; 
 for that at once gives people something positive to go upon, 
 and by the aid of their talent for this sort of algebra, they will 
 discover all the rest. Their curiosity in these matters becomes 
 a kind of enthusiasm : their will spurs on their intelle6l, and 
 drives it forward to the attainment of the most remote results. 
 For however unsusceptible and indifferent people may be to 
 general and universal truths, they are very ardent in the matter 
 of particular details. 
 
 In keeping with what I have said, it will be found that all 
 those who profess to give instruction in the wisdom of life are 
 specially urgent in commending the practice of silence, and as- 
 sign manifold reasons why it should be observed ; so it is not 
 necessary for me to enlarge upon the subjed any further. 
 However, I may just add one or two little-known Arabian 
 proverbs, which occur to me as peculiarly appropriate : — 
 
 Do not tell a friend ariy thing that you would conceal from 
 an enemy. 
 
 A secret is in my custody, if I keep it ; but should it escape 
 me, it is I who am the prisoner. 
 
 The tree of silence bears the fruit of peace. 
 
 Section 43. Money is never spent to so much advantage 
 as when you have been cheated out of it ; for at one stroke you 
 have purchased prudence. 
 
 Section 44. If possible, no animosity should be felt for 
 anyone. But carefully observe and remember the manner in 
 which a man condu6ts himself, so that you may take the meas- 
 
OUR RELATION TO OTHERS. 87 
 
 ure of his value, — at any rate in regard to yourself, — ^and regu- 
 late your bearing towards him accordingly ; never losing sight 
 of the faft that character is unalterable, and that to forget the 
 bad features in a man's disposition is like throwing away hard- 
 won money. Thus you will protedl yourself against the results 
 of unwise intimacy and foolish friendship. 
 
 Give way neither to love nor to hate, is one half of worldly 
 wisdom : say nothing and believe nothing, the other half Tru- 
 ly, a world where there is need of such rules as this and the 
 following, is one upon which a man may well turn his back. 
 
 Section 45. To speak angrily to a person, to show your 
 hatred by what you say or by the way you look, is an unnec- 
 essary proceeding — dangerous, foolish, ridiculous, and vulgar. 
 
 Anger or hatred should never be shown otherwise than in 
 what you do ; and feelings will be all the more effe6live in a<5tion, 
 in so far as you avoid the exhibition of them in any other way. 
 It is only cold-blooded animals whose bite is poisonous. 
 
 Section 46. To speak without emphasizing your words — 
 parler sans accent — is an old rule with those who are wise in the 
 world's ways. It means that you should leave other people to 
 discover what it is that you have said ; and as their minds are 
 slow, you can make your escape in time. On the other hand, 
 to emphasize your meaning— ^ar/fr avec accent — is to address 
 their feelings ; and the result is always the opposite of what 
 you expe6l. If you are only polite enough in your manner 
 and courteous in your tone there are many people whom you 
 may abuse outright, and yet run no immediate risk of offend- 
 ing them. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 WORLDLY FORTUNE. — SECTION 47. 
 
 HOWEVER varied the forms that human destiny may take, 
 the same elements are always present ; and so life is 
 everywhere much of a piece, whether it is passed in the cottage 
 or in the palace, in the barrack or in the cloister. Alter the 
 circumstance as much as you please ! point to strange adven- 
 tures, successes, failures ! life is like a sweet-shop, where there 
 is a great variety of things, odd in shape and diverse in color 
 — one and all made from the same paste. And when men 
 speak of some one's success, the lot of the man who has failed 
 is not so very different as it seems. The inequalities in the 
 world are like the combinations in a kaleidoscope ; at every 
 turn a fresh pi6ture strikes the eye ; and yet, in reality, you 
 see only the same bits of glass as you saw before. 
 
 Section 48. An ancient writer says, very truly, that there 
 are three great powers in the world ; Sagacity, Strength, and 
 Luck, — avveroc, Kpdroc, rvxv- I think the last is the most efficacious. 
 
 A man's life is like the voyage of a ship, where luck — secunda 
 aut adversa foriuna — a6ts the part of the wind, and speeds the 
 vessel on its way or drives it far out of its course. All that the 
 man can do for himself is of little avail ; like the rudder, 
 which, if worked hard and continuously, may help in the 
 navigation of the ship ; and yet all may be lost again by a 
 sudden squall. But if the wind is only in the right quarter, the 
 ship will sail on so as not to need any steering. The power of 
 luck is nowhere better expressed than in a certain Spanish 
 proverb : Da ventura a tu hijo, y echa lo en el mar — give 
 your son luck and throw him into the sea. 
 
 (88) 
 
WORLDLY FORTUNE. 89 
 
 Still, chance, it may be said, is a malignant power, and as 
 little as possible should be left to its agency. And yet where 
 is there any giver who, in dispensing gifts, tells us quite clear- 
 ly that we have no right to them, and that we owe them not to 
 any merit on our part, but wholly to the goodness and grace 
 of the giver — at the same time allowing us to cherish the joy- 
 ful hope of receiving, in all humility, further undeserved gifts 
 from the same hands — where is there any giver like that, unless 
 it be Chance ? who understands the kingly art of showing the 
 recipient that all merit is powerless and unavailing against the 
 royal grace and favor. 
 
 On looking back over the course of his life, — that labyrinth- 
 ine way of error, — a man must see many points where luck 
 failed him and misfortune came ; and then it is easy to carry 
 self-reproach to an unjust excess. For the course of a man's 
 life is in no wise entirely of his own making ; it is the produ<5t 
 of two fa6lors — the series of things that happened, and his own 
 resolves in regard to them, and these two are constantly inter- 
 a6ling upon and modifying each other. And besides these, 
 another influence is at work in the very limited extent of a 
 man's horizon, whether it is that he canwol see very far ahead 
 in respe6l of the plans he will adopt, or that he is still less able 
 'to predi<5l the course of future events : his knowledge is stridl- 
 ly confined to present plans and present events. Hence, as 
 long as a man's goal is far off, he cannot steer straight for it ; 
 he must be content to make a course that is approximately 
 right ; and in following the direction in which he thinks he 
 ought to go, he will often have occasion to tack. 
 
 All that a man can do is to form such resolves as from time 
 to time accord with the circumstances in which he is placed, 
 in the hope of thus managing to advance a step nearer towards 
 the final goal. It is usually the case that the position in which 
 we stand, and the obje6l at which we aim, resemble two tend- 
 encies working with dissimilar strength in different diredlions ; 
 and the course of our life is represented by their diagonal, or 
 resultant force. 
 
 Terence makes the remark that life is like a game at dice, 
 
90 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 where if the number that turns up is not precisely the one yon 
 want, you can still contrive to use it equally well : — in vita esf 
 hominum quasi aim ludas tesseris ; si illud quod maxime opus 
 est jailu non cadit, illud quod cecidit forte, id arte ut corrigas. ^ 
 Or, to put the matter more shortly, life is like a game of cards, 
 when the cards are shuffled and dealt by fate. But for my 
 present purpose, the most suitable simile would be that of a 
 game of chess, where the plan we determined to follow is con- 
 ditioned by the play of our rival, — in life, by the caprice of fate. 
 We are compelled to modify our tallies, often to such an extent 
 that, as we carry them out, hardly a single feature of the 
 original plan can be recognized. 
 
 But above and beyond all this, there is another influence 
 that makes itself felt in our lives. It is a trite saying — only too 
 frequently true — that we are often more foolish than we think. 
 On the other hand, we are often wiser than we fancy ourselves 
 to be. This, however, is a discovery which only those can 
 make, of whom it is really true ; and it takes them a long time 
 to make it. Our brains are not the wisest part of us. In the 
 great moments of life, when a man decides upon an important 
 step, his action is directed not so much by any clear knowledge 
 of the right thing to do, as by an inner impulse — you may al- 
 most call it an instin(5l — proceeding from the deepest founda- 
 tions of his being. If, later on, he attempts to criticise his ac- 
 tion by the light of hard and fast ideas of what is right in the 
 abstraft — those unprofitable ideas which are learnt by rote, or, 
 it may be, borrowed from other people ; if he begins to apply 
 general rules, the principles which have guided others, to his 
 own case, without sufficiently weighing the maxim that one 
 man's meat is another's poison, then he will run great risk of 
 doing himself an injustice. The result will show where the 
 right course lay. It is only when a man has reached the happy 
 age of wisdom that he is capable of just judgment in regard 
 either to his own a6lions or to those of others. 
 
 It may be that this impulse or instin6l is the unconscious 
 
 • He seems to have been referring to a game something like back- 
 gammoa 
 
WORLDLY FORTUNE. 9 1 
 
 effeS. of a kind of prophetic dream which is forgotten when we 
 awake — lending our Hfe a uniformity of tone, a dramatic unity, 
 such as could never result from the unstable moments of con- 
 sciousness, when we are so easily led into error, so liable to 
 strike a false note. It is in virtue of some such prophetic 
 dream that a man feels himself called to great achievements in 
 a special sphere, and works in that dire6lion from his youth up 
 out of an inner and secret feeling that that is his true path, just 
 as by a similar instind the bee is led to build up its cells in the 
 comb. This is the impulse which Balthazar Gracian calls la 
 gran sinderesis,^ — the great power of moral discernment : it is 
 something that a man instinctively feels to be his salvation 
 without which he were lost. 
 
 To a6l in accordance with abstract principles is a difficult 
 matter, and a great deal of pradlice will be required before you 
 can be even occasionally successful ; it often happens that the 
 principles do not fit in with your particular case. But every 
 man has certain innate concrete principles — a part, as it were, 
 of the very blood that flows in his veins, the sum or result, in 
 fa6t, of all his thoughts, feelings and volitions. Usually he has 
 no knowledge of them in any abstract form ; it is only when he 
 looks back upon the course his life has taken, that he becomes 
 aware of having been always led on by them — as though they 
 formed an invisible clue which he had followed unawares. 
 
 Section 49. That Time works great changes, and that all 
 
 things are in their nature fleeting — these are truths that should 
 
 ' Translator'' s Note. — This obscure word appears to be derived from 
 the Greek awrripea (N.T and Polyb. ) meaning "to observe striAly." 
 It occurs in TAe DoSlor and Student, a. series of dialogues between a 
 doiSor of divinity and a student on the laws of England, first publish- 
 ed in 1518; and is there (Dialog. I. ch. 13) explained as "a natural 
 power of the soule, set in the highest part thereof, moving and stirring 
 it to good, and abhoring evil." This passage is copied into Milton's 
 Commonplace Book, edit. Horwood, \ 79. The word is also found in 
 the Diftionary of the Spanish Academy (vol. vi. of the year 1739) i^ 
 the sense of an innate discernment of moral principles, where a quota- 
 tion is given from Madre Maria de Jesus, abbess of the convent of the 
 Conception at Agreda, a mystical writer of the seventeenth century, 
 frequently consulted by Philip IV., — and again in the Bolognese Dic- 
 tionary of 1824, with a similar meaning, illustrated from the writings 
 of Salvini (1653-1729). For these references I am indebted to the 
 kindness of Mr. Norman Maccoll. 
 
92 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 never be forgotten. Hence, in whatever case you may be, it 
 is well to pi6lure to yourself the opposite : in prosperity, to be 
 mindful of misfortune ; in friendship, of enmity ; in good 
 weather, of days when the sky is overcast ; in love, of hatred ; 
 in moments of trust, to imagine the betrayal that will make 
 you regret your confidence ; and so, too, when you are in evil 
 plight, to have a lively sense of happier times — what a lasting 
 source of true worldly wisdom were there ! We should then 
 always refle6l, and not be so very easily deceived ; because, in 
 general, we should anticipate the very changes that the years 
 will bring. 
 
 Perhaps in no form of knowledge is personal experience so 
 indispensable as in learning to see that all things are unstable 
 and transitory in this world. There is nothing that, in its own 
 place and for the time it lasts, is not a product of necessity, 
 and therefore capable of being fully justified ; and it is this fa6l 
 that makes the circumstances of every year, every month, 
 even of every day. seem as though they might maintain their 
 right to last to all eternity. But we know that this can never 
 be the case, and that in a world where all is fleeting, change 
 alone endures. He is a prudent man who is not only unde- 
 ceived by apparent stability, but is able to forecast the lines 
 upon which movement will take place.' 
 
 But people generally think that present circumstances will 
 last, and that matters will go on in the future much as they 
 have done in the past. Their mistake arises from the fa6l that 
 they do not understand the causes of the things they see — causes 
 which, unlike the effe6ls they produce, contain in themselves 
 the germ of future change. The effedls are all that people 
 know, and they hold fast to them on the supposition that 
 
 ' Chance plays so great a part in all human affairs that when a man 
 tries to ward off a remote danger by present sacrifice, the danger 
 often vanishes under some new and unforeseen development of 
 events ; and then the sacrifice, in addition to being a complete loss, 
 brings about such an altered slate of things as to be in itself a source 
 of positive danger in the face of this new development. In taking 
 measures of precaution, then, it is well not to look too far ahead, but 
 to reckon with chance ; and often to oppose a courageous front to a 
 danger, in the hope that, like many a dark thunder-cloud, it may pass 
 away without breaking. 
 
WORLDLY FORTUNE. 93 
 
 those unknown causes, which were sufficient to bring them 
 about, will also be able to maintain them as they are. This is 
 a very common error ; and the fa<5l that it is common is not 
 without its advantage, for it means that people always err in 
 unison ; and hence the calamity which results from the error 
 afFe(^ls all alike, and is therefore easy to bear ; whereas, if a 
 philosopher makes a mistake, he is alone in his error, and so 
 at a double disadvantage.* 
 
 But in saying that we should anticipate the effeds of time, I 
 mean that we should mentally forecast what they are likely to 
 be ; I do not mean that we should praftically forestall them, by 
 demanding the immediate performance of promises which time 
 alone can fulfill. The man who makes this demand will find 
 out that there is no worse or more exa6ling usurer than Time ; 
 and that, if you compel Time to give money in advance, you 
 will have to pay a rate of interest more ruinous than any Jew 
 would require. It is possible, for instance, to make a tree 
 burst forth into leaf, blossom, or even bear fruit within a few 
 days, by the application of unslaked lime and artificial heat ; 
 but after that the tree will wither away. So a young man may 
 abuse his strength — it may be only for a few weeks — by trying 
 to do at nineteen what he could easily manage at thirty, and 
 Time may give him the loan for which he asks ; but the in- 
 terest he will have to pay comes out of the strength of his later 
 years ; nay, it is part of his very life itself 
 
 There are some kinds of illness in which entire restoration 
 to health is possible only by letting the complaint run its 
 natural course ; after which it disappears without leaving any 
 trace of its existence. But if the sufferer is very impatient, 
 and, while he is still affeded, insists that he is completely well, 
 in this case, too, Time will grant the loan, and the complaint 
 may be shaken off ; but life-long weakness and chronic mis- 
 chief will be the interest paid upon it. 
 
 Again, in time of war or general disturbance, a man may 
 
 ' I may remark, parenthetically, that all this is a confirmation of the 
 principle laid down in Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung ( Bk. I. p. 
 94 : 4th edit.), that error always consists in making a wrong inference ^ 
 that is, in ascribing a given effect to something that did not cause it. 
 
94 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 require ready money at once, and have to sell out his invest- 
 ments in land or consols for a third or even a still smaller 
 fra<5lion of the sum he would have received for them, if he 
 could have waited for the market to right itself, which would 
 have happened in due course ; but he compels Time to grant 
 him a loan, and his loss is the interest he has to pay. Or per- 
 haps he wants to go on a long journey and requires the money : 
 in one or two years he could lay by a sufficient sum out of his 
 income, but he cannot afford to wait ; and so he either borrows 
 it or deducts it from his capital ; in other words, he gets Time 
 to lend him the money in advance. The interest he pays is a 
 disordered state of his accounts, and permanent and increasing 
 deficits, which he can never make good. 
 
 Such is Time's usury ; and all who cannot wait are its vic- 
 tims. There is no more thriftless proceeding than to try and 
 mend the measured pace of Time. Be careful, then, not to 
 become its debtor. 
 
 Section 50. In the daily affairs of life, you will have very 
 many opportunities of recognizing a chara<5leristic difference 
 between ordinary people and people of prudence and discre- 
 tion. In estimating the possibility of danger in connedlion 
 with any undertaking, an ordinary man will confine his in- 
 quiries to the kind of risk that has already attended such 
 undertakings in the past ; whereas a prudent person will look 
 ahead, and consider everything that might possibly happen in 
 the future, having regard to a certain Spanish maxim : lo que no 
 acaece en un ano, acaece en un rata — a thing may not happen 
 in a year, and yet may happen within two minutes. 
 
 The difference in question is, of course, quite natural ; for it 
 requires some amount of discernment to calculate possibilities ; 
 but a man need only have his senses about him to see what has 
 already happened. 
 
 Do not omit to sacrifice to evil spirits. What I mean is, 
 that a man should not hesitate about spending time, trouble, 
 and money, or giving up his comfort, or restri6ling his aims 
 and denying himself, if he can thereby shut the door on the 
 possibility of misfortune. The most terrible misfortunes are 
 
WORLDLY FORTUNE. 95 
 
 also the most improbable and remote — the least likely to occur. 
 The rule I am giving is best exemplified in the pra6lice of in- 
 surance, — a public sacrifice made on the altar of anxiety. 
 Therefore take out your policy of insurance ! . 
 
 Section 51. Whatever fate befalls you, do not give way to 
 great rejoicings or great lamentations ; partly because all things 
 are full of change, and your fortune may turn at any moment ; 
 partly because men are so apt to be deceived in their judgment 
 as to what is good or bad for them. 
 
 Almost everyone in his turn has lamented over something 
 which afterwards turned out to be the very best thing for him 
 that could have happened — or rejoiced at an event which be- 
 came the source of his greatest sufferings. The right state of 
 mind has been finely portrayed by Shakespeare : 
 
 / have felt so many quirks of joy and grief 
 That the first face of neither, on the start, 
 Can woman me unto't.^ 
 
 And, in general, it may be said that, if a man takes misfor- 
 tunes quietly, it is because he knows that very many dreadful 
 things may happen in the course of life ; and so he looks upon 
 the trouble of the moment as only a very small part of that 
 which might come. This is the Stoic temper — never to be un- 
 mindful of the sad fate of humanity — condidonis humana 
 oblitus ; but always to remember that our existence is full of 
 woe and misery : and that the ills to which we are exposed are 
 innumerable. Wherever he be, a man need only cast a look 
 around, to revive the sense of human misery : there before his 
 eyes he can see mankind struggling and floundering in tor- 
 ment, — all for the sake of a wretched existence, barren and 
 unprofitable ! 
 
 If he remembers this, a man will not expe<5l very much from 
 life, but learn to accommodate himself to a world where all is 
 relative and no perfe6l state exists ; — always looking misfortune 
 in the face, and if he cannot avoid it, meeting it with courage. 
 
 It should never be forgotten that misfortune, be it great or 
 small, is the element in which we live. But that is no reason 
 ' AIT 5 Well that Ends Well, Aa in. Sc. z. 
 
96 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 ■ 
 
 why a man should indulg*^ in fretful complaints, and, like 
 Beresford,* pull a long face over the Miseries of Human Life, 
 — and not a single hour is free from them ; or still less, call 
 upon the Deity at every flea-bite — in pulicis morsu Deum 
 invocare. Our aim should be to look well about us, to ward 
 off misfortune by going to meet it, to attain such perfe6lion 
 and refinement in averting the disagreeable things of life, — 
 whether they come from our fellow-men or from the physical 
 world. — that, Hke a clever fox, we may slip out of the way of 
 every mishap, great or small ; remembering that a mishap is 
 generally only our own awkwardness in disguise. 
 
 The main reason why misfortune falls less heavily upon us, 
 if we have looked upon its occurrence as not impossible, and, 
 as the saying is, prepared ourselves for it, may be this : if, be- 
 fore the misfortune comes, we have quietly thought over it as 
 something which may or may not happen, the whole of its ex- 
 tent and range is known to us, and we can, at least, determine 
 how far it will affedl us : so that, if it really arrives, it does not 
 depress us unduly — its weight is not felt to be greater than it 
 actually is. But if no preparation has been made to meet it, 
 and it comes unexpedledly, the mind is in a state of terror for 
 the moment and unable to measure the full extent of the calam- 
 ity ; it seems so far-reaching in its effedls that the vidlim might 
 well think there was no limit to them ; in any case, its range 
 is exaggerated. In the same way, darkness and uncertainty 
 always increase the sense of danger. And, of course, if we have 
 thought over the possibility of misfortune, we have also at the 
 same time considered the sources to which we shall look for 
 help and consolation ; or, at any rate, we have accustomed 
 ourselves to the idea of it. 
 
 There is nothing that better fits us to endure the misfortunes 
 of life with composure, than to know for certain that everything 
 that happens^'rom the smallest up to the greatest fails of ex- 
 
 ' Translator' s Note . — Rev. James Beresford (1764-1840), miscellane- 
 ous writer. The full title of this, his chief work, is "The Miseries of 
 Human Life ; or the last groans of Timothy Testy and Samuel Sensi- 
 tive, with a few supplementary sighs from Mrs. Testy." 
 
WORLDLY FORTUNE. 97 
 
 istence — happens of necessity.^ A man soon accommodates 
 himself to the inevitable — to something that must be ; and if 
 he knows that nothing can happen except of necessity, he will 
 see that things cannot be other that they are, and that even the 
 strangest chances in the world are just as much a product of 
 necessity as phenomena which obey well-known rules and turn 
 out exa6lly in accordance with expeftation. Let me here refer 
 to what I have said elsewhere on the soothing effedl of the 
 knowledge that all things are inevitable and a produ<5l of 
 necessity." 
 
 If a man is steeped in the knowledge of this truth, he will, 
 first of all, do what he can, and then readily endure what he 
 must. 
 
 We may regard the petty vexations of life that are constant- 
 ly happening, as designed to keep us in practice for bearing 
 great misfortunes, so that we may not become completely en- 
 ervated by a career of prosperity. A man should be as Sieg- 
 fried, armed cap-cL-pie, towards the small troubles of every day 
 — those little differences we have with our fellow-men, insignifi- 
 cant disputes, unbecoming condu6t in other people, petty 
 gossip, and many other similar annoyances of life ; he should 
 not feel them at all, much less take them to heart and brood 
 over them, but hold them at arm's length and push them out 
 of his way, like stones that lie in the road, and upon no ac- 
 count think about them and give them a place in his refledlions. 
 
 Section 52. What people commonly call Fate is, as a gener- 
 al rule, nothing but their own stupid and foolish conduct. 
 There is a fine passage in Homer, ^ illustrating the truth of this 
 remark, where the poet praises fifiTLt, — shrewd council ; and his 
 advice is worthy of all attention. For if wickedness is atoned 
 for only in another world, stupidity gets its reward here — al- 
 though, now and then, mercy may be shown to the offender. 
 
 ' This is a truth which I have firmly established in my prize-essay 
 on the Freedom, of the Will, where the reader will find a detailed ex- 
 planation of the grounds on which it rests. Cf. especially p. 60. 
 [Schopenhauer's Works, 4th Edit., vol. iv. — TV.] 
 
 *Cf. Weltals Willeund Vorstellung, Bk. I. p. 361, (4th edit.) 
 
 ^//iW, xxiii. 313, sqq. 
 
98 COUNSELS AND MAXIMS. 
 
 It is not ferocity but cunning that strikes fear into the heart 
 and forebodes danger ; so true it is that the human brain is a 
 more terrible weapon than the Hon's paw. 
 
 The most finished man of the world would be one who was 
 never irresolute and never in a hurry. 
 
 Section 53. Courage comes next to prudence as a quality 
 of mind very essential to happiness. It is quite true that no 
 one can endow himself with either, since a man inherits pru- 
 dence from his mother and courage from his father ; still, if he 
 has these qualities, he can do much to develop them by means 
 of resolute exercise. 
 
 In this world, where the game is played with loaded dice, a 
 man must have a temper of iron, with armor proof to the blows 
 of fate, and weapons to make his way against men. Life is one 
 long battle ; we have to fight at every step ; and Voltaire very 
 rightly says that if we succeed, it is at the point of the sword, 
 and that we die with the weapon in our hand — on ne riussit 
 dans ce monde qu'd la pointe de V ^pi, et on meurt les armes d la 
 main. It is a cowardly soul that shrinks or grows faint and 
 despondent as soon as the storm begins to gather, or even 
 when the first cloud appears on the horizon. Our motto 
 should be No Surrender ; and far from yielding to the ills of 
 life, let us take fresh courage from misfortune : — 
 
 Tu ne cede tnalis sed contra audentior ito.^ 
 
 As long as the issue of any matter fraught with peril is still 
 in doubt, and there is yet some possibility left that all may 
 come right, no one should ever tremble or think of anything 
 but resistance, — just as a man should not despair of the weather 
 if he can see a bit of blue sky anywhere. Let our attitude be 
 such that we should not quake even if the world fell in ruins 
 about us : — 
 
 Si fraSlus illabatur orbis 
 Impavidutn ferient ruincp* 
 
 Our whole life itself — let alone its blessings — would not be 
 
 worth such a cowardly trembling and shrinking of the heart 
 
 ' Virgil, ./Eneid, vi., 95. « Horace, Odes ill. 3. 
 
WORLDLY FORTUNE. 99 
 
 Therefore, let us face life courageously and show a firm front 
 to every ill : — 
 
 Quocirca vivite fortes 
 Fortiaque adversis opponite peHora rebus. 
 
 Still, it is possible for courage to be carried to an excess 
 and to degenerate into rashness. It may even be said that 
 some amount of fear is necessary, if we are to exist at all in the 
 world, and cowardice is only the exaggerated form of it. This 
 truth has been very well expressed by Bacon, in his account of 
 Terror Panicus ; and the etymological account which he gives 
 of its meaning, is very superior to the ancient explanation pre- 
 served for us by Plutarch.' He connects the expression with 
 Pan, the personification of Nature* ; and observes that fear is 
 innate in every living thing, and, in fa6l, tends to its preserva- 
 tion, but that it is apt to come into play without due cause, 
 and that man is especially exposed to it. The chief feature of 
 this Panic Terror is that there is no clear notion of any definite 
 danger bound up with it ; that it presumes rather than knows 
 that danger exists ; and that, in case of need, it pleads fright 
 itself as the reason for being afraid. 
 
 ' De hide et O stride, ch. 14. 
 
 • De Sapientia Veterum, C. 6. Natura enim rerum omnibus viven- 
 tibus indidit metum ac formidinem, vitce atque essentia sua conserva- 
 tricetn, ac mala ingtuentia vitantem. et depellentetn. Verutntam.en 
 eadem natura modum tenere nescia est: sed timoribus salutaribus 
 semper vanos et innanes admiscet ; adeo ut omnia {si intus conspici 
 darentur) Panicis terroribus plenissima sint *>raesertim humana. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 THERE is a very fine saying of Voltaire's to the effe6^ that 
 every age of life has its own peculiar mental chara6ler, 
 and that a man will feel completely unhappy if his mind is not 
 in accordance with his years : — 
 
 Qui n'a pas V esprit de son age, 
 De son dge a tout le malheur. 
 
 It will, therefore, be a fitting close to our speculations upon the 
 nature of happiness, if we glance at the changes which the 
 various periods of life produce in us. 
 
 Our whole life long it is the present, and the present alone, 
 that we a6lually possess : the only difference is that at the be- 
 ginning of life we look forward to a long future, and that to- 
 wards the end we look back upon a long past ; also that our 
 temperament, but not our chara(5ler, undergoes certain well- 
 known changes, which make the present wear a different color 
 at each period of life. 
 
 I have elsewhere stated that in childhood we are more given 
 to using our intelleil than our will ; and I have explained why 
 this is so.' It is just for this reason that the first quarter of life 
 is so happy : as we look back upon it in after years, it seems 
 a sort of lost paradise. In childhood our relations with others 
 are limited, our wants are few, — in a word, there is little stimu- 
 lus for the will ; and so our chief concern is the extension of 
 our knowledge. The intelledl — like the brain, which attains 
 
 • Translator' s Note. — Schopenhauer refers to Die Welt als Wille 
 und Vorstellung, Bk. II. c. 31, p. 451 (4th edit.), where he explains 
 that this is due to the faA that at that period of life the brain and nerv- 
 ous system are much more developed than any other part of the 
 organism, (ioo) 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE, lOI 
 
 its full size in the seventh year/ is developed early, though it 
 takes time to mature ; and it explores the whole world of its 
 surroundings in its constant search for nutriment : it is then 
 that existence is in itself an ever fresh delight, and all things 
 sparkle with the charm of novelty. 
 
 This is why the years of childhood are like a long poem. 
 For the fundion of poetry, as of all art, is to grasp the Idea — 
 in the Platonic sense ; in other words, to apprehend a particu- 
 lar obje6l in such a way as to perceive its essential nature, the 
 chara6teristics it has in common with all other objects of the 
 same kind ; so that a single obje6l appears as the representative 
 of a class, and the results of one experience hold good for a 
 thousand. 
 
 It may be thought that my remarks are opposed to fa6t, and 
 that the child is never occupied with anything beyond the in- 
 dividual obje6ls or events which are presented to it from time 
 to time, and then only in so far as they interest and excite its 
 will for the moment ; but this is not really the case. In those 
 early years, life — in the full meaning of the word, is something 
 so new and fresh, and its sensations are so keen and unblunted 
 by repetition, that, in the midst of all its pursuits and without 
 any clear consciousness of what it is doing, the child is always 
 silently occupied in grasping the nature of life itself, — in arriv- 
 ing at its fundamental chara6ler and general outline by means 
 of separate scenes and experiences ; or, to use Spinoza's 
 phraseology, the child is learning to see the things and persons 
 about it sub specie aeternitatis, — as particular manifestations of 
 universal law. 
 
 The younger we are, then, the more does every individual 
 objeft represent for us the whole class to which it belongs ; but 
 as the years increase, this becomes less and less the case. 
 That is the reason why youthful impressions are so different 
 
 » Translator' s Note. — This statement is not quite corre<5l. The 
 weight of the brain increases rapidly up to the seventh year, more 
 slowly between the sixteenth and the twentieth year, still more slow- 
 ly till between thirty and forty years of age, when it attains its maxi- 
 mum. At each decennial period after this, it is supposed to decrease 
 in weight on the average, an ounce for every ten years. 
 
102 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 from those of old age. And that is also why the slight knowl- 
 edge and experience gained in childhood and youth afterwards 
 come to stand as the permanent rubric, or heading, for all the 
 knowledge acquired in later life, — those early forms of knowl- 
 edge passing into categories, as it were, under which the re- 
 sults of subsequent experience are classified ; though a clear 
 consciousness of what is being done, does not always attend 
 upon the process. 
 
 In this way the earliest years of a man's life lay the founda- 
 tion of his view of the world, whether it be shallow or deep ; 
 and although this view may be extended and perfected later 
 on, it is not materially altered. It is an effe6l of this purely 
 obje<5live and therefore poetical view of the world, — essential 
 to the period of childhood and promoted by the as yet unde- 
 veloped state of the volitional energy — that, as children, we 
 are concerned much more with the acquisition of pure knowl- 
 edge than with exercising the power of will. Hence that grave, 
 fixed look observable in so many children, of which Raphael 
 makes such a happy use in his depiftion of cherubs, especially 
 in the pi(?ture of the Sistine Madonna. The years of childhood 
 are thus rendered so full of bliss that the memory of them is 
 always coupled with longing and regret. 
 
 While we thus eagerly apply ourselves to learning the out- 
 ward aspe6l of things, as the primitive method of understand- 
 ing the obje6ls about us, education aims at instilling into us 
 ideas. But ideas furnish no information as to the real and es- 
 sential nature of objedls, which, as the foundation and true 
 content of all knowledge, can be reached only by the process 
 called intuition. This is a kind of knowledge which can in no 
 wise be instilled into us from without ; we must arrive at it by 
 and for ourselves. 
 
 Hence a man's intelledtual as well as his moral qualities pro- 
 ceed from the depths of his own nature, and are not the result 
 of external influences ; and no educational scheme — of Pesta- 
 lozzi, or of any one else — can turn a born simpleton into a man 
 of sense. The thing is impossible ! He was born a simpleton, 
 and a simpleton he will die. 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. IO5 
 
 It is the depth and intensity of this early intuitive knowledge 
 of the external world that explain why the experiences of child- 
 hood take such a firm hold on the memory. When we were 
 young, we were completely absorbed in our immediate sur- 
 roundings ; there was nothing to distraft our attention from 
 them ; we looked upon the objects about us as though they 
 were the only ones of their kind, as though, indeed, nothing 
 else existed at all. Later on, when we come to find out how 
 many things there are in the world, this primitive state of 
 mind vanishes, and with it our patience. 
 
 I have said elsewhere * that the world, considered as objeSl, 
 — in other words, as it '\^ presented to us obje6lively, — wears in 
 general a pleasing aspe6l ; but that in the world, considered 
 as subjeH, — that is, in regard to its inner nature, which is will, 
 — pain and trouble predominate. I may be allowed to express 
 the matter, briefly, thus : the world is glorious to look at, btd 
 dreadful in reality. 
 
 Accordingly, we find that, in the years of childhood, the 
 world is much better known to us on its outer or objedlive side, 
 namely, as the presentation of will, than on the side of its inner 
 nature, namely, as the will itself Since the objedlive side 
 wears a pleasing aspe6t, and the inner or subje6tive side, with 
 its tale of horror, remains as yet Unknown, the youth, as his 
 intelligence develops, takes all the forms of beauty that he 
 sees, in nature and in art, for so many obje6ts of blissful exist- 
 ence ; they are so beautiful to the outward eye that, on their 
 inner side, they must, he thinks, be much more beautiful still. 
 So the world lies before him like another Eden ; and this is 
 the Arcadia in which we are all born. 
 
 A little later, this state of mind gives birth to a thirst for real 
 life — the impulse to do and suffer — which drives a man forth 
 into the hurly-burly of the world. There he learns the other 
 side of existence — the inner side, the will, which is thwarted at 
 every step. Then comes the great period of disillusion, a 
 
 ^Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Bk. II. c. 31, p. 426-7 (4th 
 Edit.), to which the reader is referred for a detailed explanation of 
 my meaning. 
 
I04 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 period of very gradual growth ; but once it has fairly begun, a 
 man will tell you that he has got over all his false notions — 
 r &ge des illusions est passi ; and yet the process is only be- 
 ginning, and it goes on extending its sway and applying more 
 and more to the whole of life. 
 
 So it may be said that in childhood, life looks like the scen- 
 ery in a theatre, as you view it from a distance ; and that 
 in old age it is like the same scenery when you come up quite 
 close to it. 
 
 And, lastly, there is another circumstance that contributes 
 to the happiness of childhood. As spring commences, the 
 young leaves on the trees are similar in color and much the 
 same in shape ; and in the first years of life we all resemble 
 one another and harmonize very well. But with puberty 
 divergence begins ; and, like the radii of a circle, we go fur- 
 ther and further apart. 
 
 The period of youth, which forms the remainder of this ear- 
 lier half of our existence — and how many advantages it has over 
 the later half ! — is troubled and made miserable by the pursuit 
 of happiness, as though there were no doubt that it can be met 
 with somewhere in life, — a hope that always ends in failure and 
 leads to discontent. An illusory image of some vague future 
 bliss — born of a dream and shaped by fancy — floats before our 
 eyes ; and we search for the reality in vain. So it is that the 
 young man is generally dissatisfied with the position in which 
 he finds himself, whatever it may be ; he ascribes bis disap- 
 pointment solely to the state of things that meets him on his 
 first introdu6lion to life, when he had expeded something very 
 different ; whereas it is only the vanity and wretchedness of 
 human life everywhere that he is now for the first time ex- 
 periencing. 
 
 It would be a great advantage to a young man if his early 
 training could eradicate the idea that the world has a great 
 deal to offer him. But the usual result of education is to 
 strengthen this delusion ; and our first ideas of life are general- 
 ly taken from ficlion rather than from fa6l. 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. I05 
 
 In the bright dawn of our youthful days, the poetry of life 
 spreads out a gorgeous vision before us, and we torture our- 
 selves by longing to see it realized. We might as well wish to 
 grasp the rainbow ! The youth expe6ls his career to be like 
 an interesting romance ; and there lies the germ of that disap- 
 pointment which I have been describing.' What lends a 
 charm to all these visions is just the fadl that they are visionary 
 and not real, and that in contemplating them we are in the 
 sphere of pure knowledge, which is sufficient in itself and free 
 from the noise anci struggle of life. To try and realize those 
 visions is to make them an obje<5t of will — a process which 
 always involves pain.* 
 
 If the chief feature of the earlier half of life is a never-satisfied 
 longing after happiness, the later half is chara6lerized by the 
 dread of misfortune. For, as we advance in years, it becomes 
 in a greater or less degree clear that all happiness is chimerical 
 in its nature, and that pain alone is real. Accordingly, in later 
 years, we, or, at least, the more prudent amongst us, are more 
 intent upon eliminating what is painful from our lives and mak- 
 ing our position secure, than on the pursuit of positive pleasure. 
 I may observe, by the way, that in old age we are better able 
 to prevent misfortunes from coming, and in youth better able 
 to bear them when they come. 
 
 In my young days, I was always pleased to hear a ring at 
 my door : ah ! thought I, now for something pleasant. But 
 in later life my feelings on such occasions were rather akin to 
 dismay than to pleasure : heaven help me ! thought I, what 
 am I to do ? A similar revulsion of feeling in regard to the 
 world of men takes place in all persons of any talent or distinc- 
 tion. For that very reason they cannot be said properly to 
 belong to the world ; in a greater or less degree, according to 
 the extent of their superiority, they stand alone. In their 
 youth they have a sense of being abandoned by the world ; 
 but later on, they feel as though they had escaped it. The 
 
 >Cf. loc. cit., p. 428. 
 
 * Let me refer the reader, if he is interested in the subje<5l, to the 
 volume already cited, chapter 37. 
 
I06 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 earlier feeling is an unpleasant one, and rests upon ignorance ; 
 the second is pleasurable — for in the meantime they have come 
 to know what the world is. 
 
 The consequence of this is that, as compared with the earli- 
 er, the later half of life, like the second part of a musical 
 period, has less of passionate longing and more restfulness 
 about it. And why is this the case ? Simply because, in 
 youth, a man fancies that there is a prodigious amount of 
 happiness and pleasure to be had in the world, only that it is 
 difficult to come by it ; whereas, when he becomes old, he 
 knows that there is nothing of the kind ; he makes his mind 
 completely at ease on the matter, enjoys the present hour as 
 well as he can, and even takes a pleasure in trifles. 
 
 The chief result gained by experience of life is clearness of 
 view. This is what distinguishes the man of mature age, and 
 makes the world wear such a different aspedl from that which 
 it presented in his youth or boyhood. It is only then that he 
 sees things quite plain, and takes them for that which they 
 really are : while in earlier years he saw a phantom-world, put 
 together out of the whims and crotchets of his own mind, in- 
 herited prejudice and strange delusion : the real world was 
 hidden from him, or the vision of it distorted. The first thing 
 that experience finds to do is to free us from the phantoms of 
 the brain — those false notions that have been put into us in 
 youth. 
 
 To prevent their entrance at all would, of course, be the best 
 form of education, even though it were only negative in aim : 
 but it would be a task full of difficulty. At first the child's 
 horizon would have to be limited as much as possible, and yet 
 within that limited sphere none but clear and correal notions 
 would have to be given ; only after the child had properly ap- 
 preciated everything within it, might the sphere be gradually 
 enlarged ; care being always taken that nothing was left ob- 
 scure, or half or wrongly understood. The consequence of 
 this training would be that the child's notions of men and 
 things would always be limited and simple in their character ; 
 but, one the other hand, they would be clear and corred, and 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. IO7 
 
 only need to be extended, not to be rectified. The same line 
 might be pursued on into the period of youth. This method 
 of education would lay special stress upon the prohibition of 
 novel reading ; and the place of novels would be taken by suit- 
 able biographical literature — the life of Franklin, for instance, 
 or Moritz' Anion Reiser} 
 
 In our early days we fancy that the leading events in our 
 life, and the persons who are going to play an important part in 
 it, will make their entrance to the sound of drums and trumpets ; 
 but when, in old age. we look back, we find that they all came 
 in quite quietly, slipped in, as it were, by the side-door, almost 
 unnoticed. 
 
 From the point of view we have been taking up until now, 
 life may be compared to a piece of embroidery, of which, dur- 
 ing the first half of his time, a man gets a sight of the right 
 side, and during the second half, of the wrong. The wrong 
 side is not so pretty as the right, but it is more instru6live ; it 
 shows the way in which the threads have been worked together. 
 
 Intelle6^ual superiority, even if it is of the highest kind, will 
 not secure for a man a preponderating place in conversation 
 until after he is forty years of age. For age and experience, 
 though they can never be a substitute for intelle6lual talent, 
 may far outweigh it ; and even in a person of the meanest ca- 
 pacity, they give a certain counterpoise to the power of an ex- 
 tremely intellectual man, so long as the latter is young. Of 
 course I allude here to personal superiority, not to the place a 
 man may gain by his works. 
 
 And on passing his fortieth year, any man of the slightest 
 power of mind — any man, that is, who has more than the sorry 
 share of intellect with which Nature has endowed five-sixths of 
 mankind — will hardly fail to show some trace of misanthropy. 
 For, as is natural, he has by that time inferred other people's 
 charadler from an examination of his own ; with the result that 
 he has been gradually disappointed to find that in the qualitie.^ 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — Moritz was a miscellaneous writer of the last 
 century (1757-93). His Anton Reiser, composed in the form of a 
 novel, is prad;ically an autobiography. 
 
I08 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 of the head or in those of the heart — and usually in both — he 
 reaches a level to which they do not attain ; so he gladly 
 avoids having anything more to do with them. For it may be 
 said, in general, that every man will love or hate solitude — in 
 other words, his own society — just in proportion as he is worth 
 anything in himself. Kant has some remarks upon this kind 
 of misanthropy in his Critique of the Faculty of Judgment.^ 
 
 In a young man, it is a bad sign, as well from an intelle6lual 
 as from a moral point of view, if he is precocious in under- 
 standing the ways of the world, and in adapting himself to its 
 pursuits ; if he at once knows how to deal with men, and enters 
 upon life, as it were, fully prepared. It argues a vulgar nature. 
 On the other hand, to be surprised and astonished at the way 
 people a6t, and to be clumsy and cross-grained in having to do 
 with them, indicates a charatf^er of the nobler sort. 
 
 The cheerfulness and vivacity of youth are partly due to the 
 fadl that, when we are ascending the hill of life, death is not 
 visible : it lies down at the bottom of the other side. But once 
 we have crossed the top of the hill, death comes in view — 
 death, which, until then, was known to us only by hearsay. 
 This makes our spirits droop, for at the same time we begin to 
 feel that our vital powers are on the ebb. A grave seriousness 
 now takes the place of that early extravagance of spirit ; and 
 the change is noticeable even in the expression of a man's face. 
 As long as we are young, people may tell us what they please ! 
 we look upon life as endless and use our time recklessly ; but 
 the older we become, the more we pra6lice economy. For 
 towards the close of life, every day we live gives us the same 
 kind of sensation as the criminal experiences at every step on 
 his way to be tried. 
 
 From the standpoint of youth, life seems to stretch away in- 
 to an endless future ; from the standpoint of old age, to go 
 back but a littie way into the past ; so that, at the beginning, 
 life presents us with a pi6lure in which the obje<5ls appear a 
 great way off, as though we had reversed our telescope ; while 
 in the end everything seems so close. To see how short life is, 
 
 ' Kritik der Urtheilskraft, Part I., \ 29, Note ad fin. 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. IO9 
 
 a man must have grown old, that is to say, he must have 
 lived long. 
 
 On the other hand, as the years increase, things look small- 
 er, one and all ; and Life, which had so firm and stable a base 
 in the days of our youth, now seems nothing but a rapid flight 
 of moments, every one of them illusory : we have come to see 
 that the whole world is vanity ! 
 
 Time itself seems to go at a much slower pace when we are 
 young ; so that not only is the first quarter of life the happiest, 
 it is also the longest of all ; it leaves more memories behind it. 
 If a man were put to it, he could tell you more out of the first 
 quarter of his life than out of two of the remaining periods. 
 Nay, in the spring of life, as in the spring of the year, the days 
 reach a length that is positively tiresome ; but in the autumn, 
 whether of the year or ol life, though they are short, they are 
 more genial and uniform. 
 
 But why is it that to an old man his past life appears so short ? 
 For this reason : his memory is short ; and so he fancies that 
 his life has been short too. He no longer remembers the in- 
 significant parts of it, and much that was unpleasant is now 
 forgotten ; how little, then, there is left ! For, in general, a 
 man's memory is as imperfe6l as his intelle6t ; and he musf 
 make a practice of refle6ting upon the lessons he has learned 
 and the events he has experienced, if he does not want them 
 both to sink gradually into the gulf of oblivion. Now, we are 
 unaccustomed to refled upon matters of no importance, or, as 
 a rule, upon things that we have found disagreeable, and yet 
 that is necessary if the memory of them is to be preserved. 
 But the class of things that may be called insignificant is con- 
 tinually receiving fresh additions : much that wears an air of 
 importance at first, gradually becomes of no eonsequence at all 
 from the fadl of its frequent repetition ; so that in the end we 
 a<5lually lose count of the number of times it happens. Hence 
 we are better able to remember the events of our early than of 
 our later years. The longer we live, the fewer are the things 
 that we can call important or significant enough to deserve 
 further consideration, and by this alone can they be fixed in 
 
no , THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 the memory ; in other words, they are forgotten as soon as 
 they are past. Thus it is that time runs on, leaving always 
 fewer traces of its passage. 
 
 Further, if disagreeable things have happened to us, we do 
 not care to ruminate upon them, least of all when they touch 
 our vanity, as is usually the case ; for few misfortunes fall up- 
 on us for which we can be held entirely blameless. So people 
 are very ready to forget many thing that are disagreeable, as 
 well as many that are unimportant. 
 
 It is from this double cause that our memory is so short ; 
 and a man's recolle6lion of what has happened always becomes 
 proportionately shorter, the more things that have occupied 
 him in life. The things we did in years gone by, the events 
 that happened long ago, are like those obje6ls on the coast 
 which, to the seafarer on his outward voyage, become smaller 
 every minute, more unrecognizable and harder to distinguish. 
 
 Again, it sometimes happens that memory and imagination 
 will call up some long past scene as vividly as if it had occur- 
 red only yesterday ; so that the event in question seems to 
 stand very near to the present time. The reason of this is that 
 it is impossible to call up all the intervening period in the same 
 vivid way, as there is no one figure pervading it which can be 
 taken in at a glance ; and besides, most of the things that 
 happened in that period are forgotten, and all that remains of 
 it is the general knowledge that we have lived through it — a 
 mere notion of abstract existence, not a direct vision of some 
 particular experience. It is this that causes some single event 
 of long ago to appear as though it took place but yesterday : 
 the intervening time vanishes, and the whole of life looks in- 
 credibly short Nay, there are occasional moments in old age 
 when we can scarcely believe that we are so advanced in years, 
 or that the long past lying behind us has had any real exist- 
 ence — a feeling which is mainly due to the circumstance that 
 the present always seems fixed and immovable as we look at it. 
 These and similar mental phenomena are ultimately to be 
 traced to the fa6t that it is not our nature in itself, but only the 
 outward presentation of it, that lies in time, and that the present 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. Ill 
 
 is the point of contaft between the world as subje6l and the 
 world as obje6l.' 
 
 Again, why is it that in youth we can see no end to the 
 years that seem to lie before us ? Because we are obliged to 
 find room for all the things we hope to attain in life. We 
 cram the years so full of projedls that if we were to try and 
 carry them all out, death would come prematurely though we 
 reached the age of Methuselah. 
 
 Another reason why life looks so long when we are young, 
 is that we are apt to measure its length by the few years we 
 have already lived. In those early years things are new to us, 
 and so they appear important ; we dwell upon them after they 
 have happened and often call them to mind ; and thus in youth 
 life seems replete with incident, and therefore of long duration. 
 
 Sometimes we credit ourselves with a longing to be in some 
 distant spot, whereas, in truth, we are only longing to have 
 the time back again which we spent there — days when we were 
 younger and fresher than we are now. In those moments 
 Time mocks us by wearing the mask of space ; and if we 
 travel to the spot, we can see how much we have been deceived. 
 
 There are two ways of reaching a great age, both of which 
 presuppose a sound constitution as a conditio sine qua non. 
 They may be illustrated by two lamps, one of which bums a 
 long time with very little oil, because it has a very thin wick ; 
 and the other just as long, though it has a very thick one, be- 
 cause there is plenty of oil to feed it. Here, the oil is the vital 
 energy, and the difference in the wick is the manifold way in 
 which the vital energy is used. 
 
 Up to our thirty-sixth year, we may be compared, in respect 
 of the way in which we use our vital energy, to people who 
 live on the interest of their money : what they spend to-day, 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — By this remark Schopenhauer means that will, 
 which, as he argues, forms the inner reaUty underlying all the phe- 
 nomena of life and nature, is not in itself affeded by time ; but that, 
 on the other hand, time is necessary for the obj edification of the will, 
 for the will as presented in the passing phenomena of the world. 
 Time is thus definable as the condition of change, and the present 
 time as the only point of contact between reality and appearance. 
 
112 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 they have again to-morrow. But from the age of thirty-six on- 
 wards, our position is like that of the investor who begins to 
 entrench upon his capital. At first he hardly notices any dif- 
 ference at all, as the greater part of his expenses is covered by 
 the interest of his securities ; and if the deficit is but slight, he 
 pays no attention to it. But the deficit goes on increasing, un- 
 til he awakes to the fa6t that it is becoming more serious every 
 day : his position becomes less and less secure, and he feels 
 himself growing poorer and poorer, while he has no expe6la- 
 tion of this drain upon his resources coming to an end. His 
 fall from wealth to poverty becomes faster every moment — like 
 the fall of a solid body in space, until at last he has absolutely 
 nothing left. A man is truly in a woeful plight if both the 
 terms of this comparison — his vital energy and his wealth — 
 really begin to melt away at one and the same time. It is the 
 dread of this calamity that makes love of possession increase 
 with age. 
 
 On the other hand, at the beginning of life — in the years be- 
 fore we attain majority, and for some little time afterwards — 
 the state of our vital energy puts us on a level with those who 
 each year lay by a part of their interest and add it to their 
 capital : in other words, not only does their interest come in 
 regularly, but the capital is constantly receiving additions. 
 This happy condition of affairs is sometimes brought about — 
 with health as with money — under the watchful care of some 
 honest guardian. O happy youth, and sad old age ! 
 
 Nevertheless, a man should economize his strength even 
 when he is young. Aristotle* observes that amongst those 
 who were vigors at Olympia only two or three gained a prize 
 at two different periods, once in boyhood and then again when 
 they came to be men ; and the reason of this was that the pre- 
 mature efforts which the training involved, so completely ex- 
 hausted their powers that they failed to last on into manhood. 
 As this is true of muscular, so it is still more true of nervous 
 energy, of which all intelledtual achievements are the manifest- 
 ation. Hence, those infant prodigies — ingenia praecocia — the 
 
 Politics. 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. IIJ 
 
 fruit of a hot-house education, who surprise us by their clever- 
 ness as children, afterwards turn out very ordinary folk. Nay, 
 the manner in which boys are forced into an early acquaintance 
 with the ancient tongues may, perhaps, be to blame for the 
 dullness and lack of judgment which distinguish so many 
 learned persons. 
 
 I have said that almost every man's chara(5ter seems to be 
 specially suited to some one period of life, so that on reaching 
 it the man is at his best. Some people are charming so long 
 as they are young, and afterwards there is nothing attra<5live 
 about them ; others are vigorous and aftive in manhood, and 
 then lose all the value they possess as they advance in years ; 
 many appear to best advantage in old age, when their chara6ler 
 assumes a gentler tone, as becomes men who have seen the 
 world and take life easily. This is often the case with the 
 French. 
 
 This peculiarity must be due to the fadl that the man's charac- 
 ter has something in it akin to the qualities of youth or man- 
 hood or old age — something which accords with one or another 
 of these periods of life, or perhaps a6ts as a corrective to its 
 special failings. 
 
 The mariner observes the progress he makes only by the 
 way in ^^ hich objedls on the coast fade away into the distance 
 and apparently decrease in size. In the same way a man be- 
 comes conscious that he is advancing in years when he finds 
 that people older than himself begin to seem young to him. 
 
 It has been already remarked that the older a man becomes, 
 the fewer are the traces left in his mind by all that he sees, 
 does or experiences, and the cause of this has been explained. 
 There is thus a sense in which it may be said that it is only in 
 youth that a man lives with a full degree of consciousness, and 
 that he is only half alive when he is old. As the years advance, 
 his consciousness of what goes on about him dwindles, and the 
 things of life hurry by without making any impression upon 
 him, just as none is made by a work of art seen for the 
 
114 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 thousandth time, A man does what his hand finds to do, and 
 afterwards he does not know whether he has done it or not. 
 
 As life becomes more and more unconscious, the nearer it 
 approaches the point at which all consciousness ceases, the 
 course of time itself seems to increase in rapidity. In child- 
 hood all the things and circumstances of life are novel ; and 
 that is sufficient to awake us to the full consciousness of exist- 
 ence : hence, at that age, the day seems of such immense 
 length. The same thing happens when we are traveling : one 
 month seems longer then than four spent at home. Still, 
 though time seems to last longer when we are young or on a 
 journey, the sense of novelty does not prevent it from now and 
 then in reality hanging heavily upon our hands under both 
 these circumstances, at any rate more than is the case when we 
 are old or staying at home. But the intelle6l gradually be- 
 comes so rubbed down and blunted by long habituation to 
 such impressions that things have a constant tendency to pro- 
 duce less and less impression upon us as they pass by ; and 
 this makes time seem increasingly less important, and there- 
 fore shorter in duration : the hours of the boy are longer than 
 the days of the old man. Accordingly, time goes faster and 
 faster the longer we live, like a ball rolling down a hill. Or, 
 to take another example : as in a revolving disc, the further a 
 point lies from the centre, the more rapid is its rate of pro- 
 gression, so it is in the wheel of life ; the further you stand 
 from the beginning, the faster time moves for you. Hence it 
 may be said that as far as concerns the immediate sensation 
 that time makes upon our minds, the length of any given year 
 is in dire6l proportion to the number of times it will divide our 
 whole life : for instance, at the age of fifty the year appears to 
 us only one-tenth as long at it did at the age of five. 
 
 This variation in the rate at which time appears to move, 
 exercises a most decided influence upon the whole nature of 
 our existence at every period of it. First of all, it causes 
 childhood — even though it embrace only a span of fifteen years 
 — to seem the longest period of life, and therefore the richest 
 in reminiscences. Next, it brings it about that a man is apt to 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. II5 
 
 be bored just in proportion as he is young. Consider, for in- 
 stance, that constant need of occupation — whether it is work or 
 play — that is shown by children : if they come to an end of 
 both work and play, a terrible feeling of boredom ensues. 
 Even in youth people are by no means free from this tendency, 
 and dread the hours when they have nothing to do. As man- 
 hood approaches, boredom disappears ; and old men find the 
 time too short when their days fly past them like arrows from 
 a bow. Of course, I must be understood to speak of men, not 
 of decrepit brutes. With this increased rapidity of time, bore- 
 dom mostly passes away as we advance in life ; and as the 
 passions with all their attendant pain are then laid asleep, the 
 burden of life is, on the whole, appreciably lighter in later 
 years than in youth, provided, of course, that health remains. 
 So it is that the period immediately preceding the weakness 
 and troubles of old age, receives the name of a man's best years. 
 
 That may be a true appellation, in view of the comfortable 
 feeling which those years bring ; but for all that the years of 
 youth, when our consciousness is lively and open to every sort 
 of impression, have this privilege — that then the seeds are 
 sown and the buds come forth ; it is the springtime of the 
 mind. Deep truths may be perceived, but can never be ex- 
 cogitated — that is to say, the first knowledge of them is im- 
 mediate, called forth by some momentary impression. This 
 knowledge is of such a kind as to be attainable only when the 
 impressions are strong, lively and deep ; and if we are to oe 
 acquainted with deep truths, everything depends upon a 
 proper use of our early years. In later life, we may be better 
 able to work upon other people, — upon the world, because our 
 natures are then finished and rounded off, and no more a prey 
 to fresh views ; but then the world is less able to work upon 
 us. These are the years of adlion and achievement ; while 
 youth is the time for forming fundamental conceptions, and 
 laying down the gound-work of thought. 
 
 In youth it is the outward aspe6l of things that most engages 
 us ; while in age, thought or refledlion is the predominating 
 quality of the mind. Hence, youth is the time for poetry, and 
 
Il6 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 age is more inclined to philosophy. In pradlical affairs it is 
 the same : a man shapes his resolutions in youth more by the 
 impression that the outward world makes upon him ; whereas, 
 when he is old, it is thought that determines his actions. This 
 is partly to be explained by the fadl that it is only when a man 
 is old that the results of outward observation are present in 
 sufficient numbers to allow of their being classified according 
 to the ideas they represent, — a process which in its turn causes 
 those ideas to be more fully understood in all their bearings, 
 and the exaS. value and amount of trust to be placed in them, 
 fixed and determined ; while at the same time he has grown 
 accustomed to the impressions produced by the various phe- 
 nomena of life, and their effeds on him are no longer what 
 they were. 
 
 Contrarily, in youth, the impressions that things make, that 
 is to say, the outward aspe6ls of life, are so overpoweringly 
 strong, especially in the case of people of lively and imagina- 
 tive disposition, that they view the world like a pidlure ; and 
 their chief concern is the figure they cut in it, the appearance 
 they present ; nay, they are unaware of the extent to which 
 this is the case. It is a quality of mind that shows itself — if in 
 no other way — in that personal vanity, and that love of fine 
 clothes, which distinguish young people. 
 
 There can be no doubt that the intellectual powers are most 
 capable of enduring great and sustained efforts in youth, up to 
 the age of thirty-five at latest ; from which period their 
 strength begins to decline, though very gradually. Still, the 
 later years of life, and even old age itself, are not without their 
 intellectual compensation. It is only then that a man can be 
 said to be really rich in experience or in learning ; he has then 
 had time and opportunity enough to enable him to see and 
 think over life from all its sides ; he has been able to compare 
 one thing with another, and to discover points of contadl and 
 connefting links, so that only then are the true relations of 
 things rightly understood. Further, in old age there comes 
 an increased depth in the knowledge that was acquired in 
 youth ; a man has now many more illustrations of any ideas 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. II7 
 
 he may have attained ; things which he thought he knew when 
 he was young, he now knows in reality. And besides, his 
 range of knowledge is wider ; and in whatever diredtion it ex- 
 tends, it is thorough, and therefore formed into a consistent 
 and connefted whole ; whereas in youth knowledge is always 
 defe6live and fragmentary. 
 
 A complete and adequate notion of life can never be attained 
 by any one who does not reach old age ; for it is only the old 
 man who sees life whole and knows its natural course ; it is 
 only he who is acquainted — and this is most important — not 
 only with its entrance, like the rest of mankind, but with its 
 exit too ; so that he alone has a full sense of its utter vanity ; 
 whilst the others never cease to labor under the false notion 
 that everything will come right in the end. 
 
 On the other hand, there is more conceptive power in youth, 
 and at that time of life a man can make more out of the little 
 that he knows. In age, judgment, penetration and thorough- 
 ness predominate. Youth is the time for amassing the material 
 for a knowledge of the world that shall be distincftive and 
 peculiar, — for an original view of life, in other words, the lega- 
 cy that a man of genius leaves to his fellow-men ; it is, how- 
 ever, only in later years that he becomes master of his material. 
 Accordingly it will be found that, as a rule, a' great writer 
 gives his best work to the world when he is about fifty years 
 of age. But though the tree of knowledge must reach its full 
 height before it can bear fruit, the roots of it lie in youth. 
 
 Every generation, no matter how paltry its charadler, thinks 
 itself much wiser than the one immediately preceding it, let 
 alone those that are more remote. It is just the same with the 
 different periods in a man's hfe ; and yet often, in the one case 
 no less than in the other, it is a mistaken opinion. In the 
 years of physical growth, when our powers of mind and our 
 stores of knowledge are receiving daily additions, it becomes a 
 habit for to-day to look down with contempt upon yesterday. 
 The habit strikes root, and remains even after the intellectual 
 powers have begun to decline, — when to-day should rather 
 look up with respect to yesterday. So it is that we often un- 
 
H8 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 duly depreciate the achievements as well as the judgments of 
 our youth. 
 
 This seems the place for making the general observation, 
 that, although in its main qualities a man's intelleSl or head, as 
 well as his charafler or heart, is innate, yet the former is by 
 no means so unalterable in its nature as the latter. The fadi is 
 that the intellect is subje6l to very many transformations, 
 which, as a rule, do not fail to make their adlual appearance ; 
 and this is so, partly because the intelle6l has a deep founda- 
 tion in the physique, and partly because the material with 
 which it deals is given in experience. And so, from a physical 
 point of view, we find that if a man has any peculiar power, it 
 first gradually increases in strength until it reaches its acme, 
 after which it enters upon a path of slow decadence, until it 
 ends in imbecility. But, on the other hand, we must not lose 
 sight of the fa6t that the material which gives employment to 
 a man's powers and keeps them in activity, — the subje6l-matter 
 of thought and knowledge, experience, intelle6lual attainments, 
 the practice of seeing to the bottom of things, and so a perfect 
 mental vision, form in themselves a mass which continues to 
 increase in size, until the time comes when weakness shows it- 
 self, and the man's powers suddenly fail. The way in which 
 these two distinguishable elements combine in the same nature, 
 — the one absolutely unalterable, and the other subje6l to 
 change in two diredlions opposed to each other — explains the 
 variety of mental attitude and the dissimilarity of value which 
 attach to a man at different periods of life. 
 
 The same truth may be more broadly expressed by saying 
 that the first forty years of life furnish the text, while the re- 
 maining thirty supply the commentary ; and that without the 
 commentary we are unable to understand aright the true sense 
 and coherence of the text, together with the moral it contains 
 and all the subtle application of which it admits. 
 
 Towards the close of life, much the same thing happens as 
 at the end of a bal masqu^ — the masks are taken off. Then 
 you can see who the people really are, with whom you have 
 come into contadi in your passage through the world. For by 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. II9 
 
 the end of life chara<Slers have come out in their true light, 
 actions have borne fruit, achievements have been rightly ap- 
 preciated, and all shams have fallen to pieces. For this, Time 
 was in every case requisite. 
 
 But the most curious fa6l is that it is also only towards the 
 close of life that a man really recognizes and understands his 
 own true self, — the aims and objedls he has followed in life, 
 more especially the kind of relation in which he has stood to 
 other people and to the world. It will often happen that as a 
 result of this knowledge, a man will have to assign himself a 
 lower place than he formerly thought was his due. But there 
 are exceptions to this rule ; and it will occasionally be the case 
 that he will take a higher position than he had before. This 
 will be owing to the fa6l that he had no adequate notion of the 
 baseness of the world, and that he set up a Righer aim for him- 
 self than was followed by the rest of mankind. 
 
 The progress of life shows a man the stuff of which he 
 is made. 
 
 It is customary to call youth the happy, and age the sad 
 part of life. This would be true if it were the passions that 
 made a man happy. Youth is swayed to and fro by them ; and 
 they give a great deal of pain and little pleasure. In age the 
 passions cool and leave a man at rest, and then forthwith his 
 mind takes a contemplative tone ; the intelled is set free and 
 attains the upper hand. And since, in itself, intellect is be- 
 yond the range of pain, and man feels happy just in so far as 
 his intellect is the predominating part of him. 
 
 It need only be remembered that all pleasure is negative, 
 and that pain is positive in its nature, in order to see that the 
 passions can never be a source of happiness, and that age is 
 not the less to be envied on the ground that many pleasures 
 are denied it. For every sort of pleasure is never anything 
 more than the quietive of some need or longing ; and that 
 pleasure should come to an end as soon as the need ceases, is 
 no more a subje6l of complaint than that a man cannot go on 
 eating after he has had his dinner, or fall asleep again after a 
 good night's rest. 
 
I20 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 So far from youth being the happiest period of life, there is 
 much more truth in the remark made by Plato, at the begin- 
 ning of the Republic, that the prize should rather be given to 
 old age, because then at last a man is freed from the animal 
 passion which has hitherto never ceased to disquiet him Nay, 
 it may even be said that the countless and manifold humors 
 which have their source in this passion, and the emotions that 
 spring from it, produce a mild state of madness ; and this lasts 
 as long as the man is subjedl to the spell of the impulse — this 
 evil spirit, as it were, of which there is no riddance — so that he 
 never really becomes a reasonable being until the passion is 
 extinguished. 
 
 There is no doubt that, in general, and apart from individual 
 circumstances and particular dispositions, youth is marked by 
 a certain melancholy and sadness, while genial sentiments 
 attach to old age ; and the reason of this is nothing but the 
 fa6l that the young man is still under the service, nay, the 
 forced labor, imposed by that evil spirit, which scarcely ever 
 leaves him a moment to himself To this source may be 
 traced, dire6lly or indire<5lly, almost all and every ill that be- 
 falls or menaces mankind. The old man is genial and cheer- 
 ful because, after long lying in the bonds of passion, he can 
 now move about in freedom. 
 
 Still, it should not be forgotten that, when this passion is 
 extinguished, the true kernel of life is gone, and nothing re- 
 mains but the hollow shell ; or, from another point of view, 
 life then becomes like a comedy, which, begun by real a6tors, 
 is continued and brought to an end by automata dressed in 
 their clothes. 
 
 However that may be, youth is the period of unrest, and age 
 of repose ; and from that very circumstance, the relative degree 
 of pleasure belonging to each may be inferred. The child 
 stretches out its little hands in the eager desire to seize all the 
 pretty things that meet its sight, charmed by the world be- 
 cause all its senses are still so young and fresh. Much the 
 same thing happens with the youth, and he displays greater 
 energy in his quest. He, too, is charmed by all the pretty 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. 121 
 
 things and the many pleasing shapes that surround him ; and 
 forthwith his imagination conjures up pleasures which the 
 world can never realize. So he is filled with an ardent desire 
 for he knows not what delights — robbing him of all rest and 
 making happiness impossible. But when old age is reached, 
 all this is over and done with, partly because the blood runs 
 cooler and the senses are no longer so easily allured ; partly 
 because experience has shown the true value of things and the 
 futility of pleasure, whereby illusion has been gradually dis- 
 pelled, and the strange fancies and prejudices which previous- 
 ly concealed or distorted a free and true view of the world, 
 have been dissipated and put to flight ; with the result that a 
 man can now get a juster and clearer view, and see things as 
 they are, and also in a measure attain more or less insight into 
 the nullity of all things on this earth. 
 
 It is this that gives almost every old man, no matter how 
 ordinary his faculties may be, a certain tindture of wisdom, 
 which distinguishes him from the young. But the chief result 
 of all this change is the peace of mind that ensues — a great 
 element in happiness, and, in fa6l, the condition and essence 
 of it. While the young man fancies that there is a vast 
 amount of good things in the world, if he could only come at 
 them, the old man is steeped in the truth of the Preacher's 
 words, that all things are vanity — knowing that, however 
 gilded the shell, the nut is hollow. 
 
 In these later years, and not before, a man comes to a true 
 appreciation of Horace's maxim : Nil admirari. He is diredt- 
 ly and sincerely convinced of the vanity of everything and that 
 all the glories of the world are as nothing : his illusions are 
 gone. He is no more beset with the idea that there is any 
 particular amount of happiness anywhere, in the palace or in 
 the cottage, any more than he h'mself enjoys when he is free 
 from bodily or mental pain. The worldly distindions of great 
 and small, high and low, exist for him no longer ; and in this 
 bUssful state of mind the old man may look down with a smile 
 upon all false notions. He is completely undeceived, and 
 
122 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 knows that whatever may be done to adorn human life and 
 deck it out in finery, its paltry character will soon show 
 through the glitter of its surroundings ; and that, paint and 
 bejewel it as one may, it remains everywhere much the same, 
 — an existence which has no true value except in freedom from 
 pain, and is never to be estimated by the presence of pleasure^ 
 let alone, then, of display.* 
 
 Disillusion is the chief chara6leristic of old age ; for by that 
 time the fi6^ions are gone which gave life its charm and spur- 
 red on the mind to adivity ; the splendors of the world have 
 been proved null and vain ; its pomp, grandeur and magnifi- 
 cence are faded. A man has then found out that behind most 
 ol the things he wants, and most of the pleasures he longs for, 
 there is very little after all ; and so he comes by degrees to see 
 that our existence is all empty and void. It is only when he 
 is seventy years old that he quite understands the first words 
 ol the Preacher ; and this again explains why it is that old men 
 are sometimes fretful and morose. 
 
 It is often said that the common lot of old age is disease and 
 weariness of life. Disease is by no means essential to old age ; 
 especially where a really long span of years is to be attained ; 
 for as life goes on, the conditions of health and disorder tend 
 to increase — crescente vita, crescit sanifas et morbus. And as 
 far as weariness or boredom is concerned, I have stated above 
 why old age is even less exposed to that form of evil than 
 youth. Nor is boredom by any means to be taken as a neces- 
 sary accompaniment of that solitude, which, for reasons that 
 do not require to be explained, old age certainly cannot 
 escape ; it is rather the fate that awaits those who have never 
 known any other pleasures but the gratification of the senses 
 and the delights of society — who have left their minds unen- 
 lightened and their faculties unused. It is quite true that the 
 intelle6lual faculties decline with the approach of old age ; but 
 where they were originally strong, there will always be enough 
 left to combat the onslaught of boredom. And then again, as. 
 I have said, experience, knowledge, refledlion, and skill in. 
 ' Cf. Horace, Epist. I. 12, 1-4. 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. 1 23 
 
 dealing with men, combine to give an old man an increasingly 
 accurate insight into the ways of the world ; his judgment be- 
 comes keen and he attains a coherent view of life : his mental 
 vision embraces a wider range. Constantly finding new uses for 
 his stores of knowledge and adding to them at every oppor- 
 tunity, he maintains uninterrupted that inward process of self- 
 education which gives employment and satisfaction to the 
 mind, and thus forms the due reward of all its efforts. 
 
 All this serves in some measure as a compensation for de- 
 creased intelle6tual power. And besides, Time, as I have re- 
 marked, seems to go much more quickly when we are advanc- 
 ed in years ; and this is in itself a preventive of boredom. 
 There is no great harm in the faft that a man's bodily strength 
 decreases in old age, unless, indeed, he requires it to make a 
 living. To be poor when one is old, is a great misfortune. 
 If a man is secure from that, and retains his health, old age 
 may be a very passable time of life. Its chief necessity is to be 
 comfortable and well off; and, in consequence, money is then 
 prized more than ever, because it is a substitute for failing 
 strength. Deserted by Venus, the old man likes to turn to 
 Bacchus to make him merry. In the place of wanting to see 
 things, to travel and learn, comes the desire to speak and 
 teach. It is a piece of good fortune if the old man retains 
 some of his love of study or of music or of the theatre, — if, in 
 general, he is still somewhat susceptible to the things about 
 him ; as is, indeed, the case with some people to a very late 
 age. At that time of life, what a man has in himself is of 
 greater advantage to him than ever it was before. 
 
 There can be no doubt that most people who have never 
 been anything but dull and stupid, become more and more of 
 automata as they grow old. They have always thought, said 
 and done the same things as their neighbors ; and nothing 
 that happens now can change their disposition, or make them 
 a6l otherwise. To talk to old people of this kind is like writ- 
 ing on the sand ; if you produce any impression at all, it is 
 gone almost immediately ; old age is here nothing but the 
 caput mortuum of life — all that is essential to manhood is gone. 
 
124 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 There are cases in which nature suppHes a third set of teeth in 
 old age, thereby apparently demonstrating the fa6l that that 
 period of life is a second childhood. 
 
 It is certainly a very melancholy thing that all a man's 
 faculties tend to waste away as he grows old, and at a rate 
 that increases in rapidity : but still, this is a necessary, nay, a 
 beneficial arrangement, as otherwise death, for which it is a 
 preparation, would be too hard to bear. So the greatest boon 
 that follows the attainment of extreme old age is euthanasia, — 
 an easy death, not ushered in by disease, and free from all pain 
 and struggle.* For let a man live as long as he may, he is 
 never conscious of any moment but the present, one and indi- 
 visible ; and in those late years the mind loses more every day 
 by sheer forgetfulness than ever it gains anew. 
 
 The main difference between youth and age will always be 
 
 that youth looks forward to life, and old age to death ; and 
 
 that while the one has a short past and a long future before it, 
 
 the case is just the opposite with the other. It is quite true 
 
 that when a man is old, to die is the only thing that awaits 
 
 him ; while if he is young, he may expe6^ to live ; and the 
 
 question arises which of the two fates is the more hazardous, 
 
 and if life is not a matter which, on the whole, it is better to 
 
 have behind one than before ? Does not the Preacher say : 
 
 the day of death \is better] than the day of one's birth ^ It 
 
 is certainly a rash thing to wish for long life^ ; for as the Span- 
 
 ' See Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Bk. II. ch. 41, for a fur- 
 ther description of this happy end to life. 
 
 2 Ecclesiastes vii. i. 
 
 3 The Hfe of man cannot, stri<5lly speaking, be called either long or 
 short, since it is the ultimate standard by which duration of time in re- 
 gard to all other things is measured. 
 
 In one of the Vedic Upanishads [Oupnekhal, II.) the natural length 
 of human life is put down at one hundred years. And I believe this 
 to be right. I have observed, as a matter of fact, that it is only people 
 who exceed the age of ninety who^ttain euthanasia, — who die, that 
 is to say, of no disease, apoplexy or convulsion, and pass away with- 
 out agony of any sort ; nay, who sometimes even show no pallor, but 
 expire generally in a sitting attitude, and often after a meal, — or, I 
 may say, simply cease to live rather than die. To come to one's end 
 before the age of ninety, means to die of disease, in other words, 
 prematurely. 
 
 Now the Old Testament (Psalms xc. 10) puts the limit of human life 
 
THE AGES OF LIFE. I25 
 
 ish proverb has it, it means to see much evil, — Quien larga 
 vida vive mucho mal vide. 
 
 A man's individual career is not, as Astrology wishes to 
 make out, to be predi6led from observation of the planets ; 
 but the course of human life in general, as far as the various 
 periods of it are concerned, may be likened to the succession 
 of the planets : so that we may be said to pass under the in- 
 fluence of each one of them in turn. 
 
 At ten. Mercury is in the ascendant ; and at that age, a youth, 
 like this planet, is chara6lerized by extreme mobility within a 
 narrow sphere, where trifles have a great effedl upon him ; but 
 under the guidance of so crafty and eloquent a god, he easily 
 makes great progress. Venus begins her sway during his 
 twentieth year, and then a man is wholly given up to the love 
 of women. At thirty. Mars comes to the front, and he is now 
 all energy and strength, — daring, pugnacious and arrogant. 
 
 When a man reaches the age of forty, he is under the rule 
 of the four Asteroids ; that is to say, his life has gained some- 
 thing in extension. He is frugal ; in other words, by the help 
 of CereSy he favors what is useful ; he has his own hearth, by the 
 influence of Vesta ; Pallas has taught him that which is nec- 
 essary for him to know ; and his wife — his Juno — rules as the 
 mistress of his house. 
 
 But at the age of fifty, Jupiter is the dominant influence. At 
 that period a man has outlived most of his contemporaries, and 
 
 at seventy, and if it is very long, at eighty years ; and what is more 
 noticeable still, Herodotus (i. 32 and iii. 22) says the same thing. 
 But this is wrong ; and the error is due simply to a rough and super- 
 ficial estimate of the results of daily experience. For if the natural 
 length of life were from seventy to eighty years, people would die, 
 about that time, of mere old age. Now this is certainly not the case. 
 If they die then, they die, like younger people, of disease ; and dis- 
 ease is something abnormal. Therefore it is not natural to die at that 
 age. It is only when they are between ninety and a hundred that 
 people die of old age ; die, I mean, without suffering from any disease, 
 or showing any special signs of their condition, such as a struggle, 
 death-rattle, convulsion, pallor, — the absence of all which constitutes 
 euthanasia. The natural length of human life is a hundred years ; 
 and in assigning that limit the Upanishads are right once more. 
 
126 THE AGES OF LIFE. 
 
 he can feel himself superior to the generation about him. He 
 is still in the full enjoyment of his strength, and rich in experi- 
 ence and knowledge ; and if he has any power and position of 
 his own, he is endowed with authority over all who stand in 
 his immediate surroundings. He is no more inclined to re- 
 ceive orders from others ; he wants to take command himself. 
 The work most suitable to him now is to guide and rule with- 
 in his own sphere. This is the point where Jupiter culminates, 
 and where the man of fifty years is at his best.' 
 
 Then comes Saturn, at about the age of sixty, a weight as 
 o{ lead, dull and slow : — I 
 
 Bui old folks, many feign as they were dead; 
 Unwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead.* 
 
 Last of all, Uranus ; or, as the saying is, a man goes to 
 heaven. 
 
 I cannot find a place for Neptune, as this planet has been 
 very thoughtlessly named ; because I may not call it as it 
 should be called — Eros. Otherwise I should point out how 
 Beginning and End meet together, and how closely and inti- 
 mately Eros is connected with Death : how Orcus, or Amen- 
 thes, as the Egyptians called him,* is not only the receiver but 
 the giver of all things — Xafi&dvuv koI Sidovf. Death is the great 
 reservoir of Life. Everything comes from Orcus ; everything 
 that is alive now was once there. Could we but understand 
 the great trick by which that is done, all would be clear ! 
 
 ' The other asteroids which have been discovered since, are an in- 
 novation, and I shall have nothing to do with them. My relation to 
 them is that of the professors of philosophy to me — I ignore them, be- 
 cause they do not suit my book. 
 
 * Romeo and Juliet, W. $. 
 
 • Plutarch, De hide et Osiride, c. 29. 
 
RELIGION: A DIALOGUE, ETC. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Prefatory Note, ....... v 
 
 Religion : A Dialogue, 9 
 
 A Few Words on Pantheism, . . . .46 
 
 On Books and Reading, . . . . . 49 
 
 On Physiognomy, 58 
 
 Psychological Observations, .... 67 
 
 The Christian System, , . . . . 78 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 SCHOPENHAUER is one of the few philosophers who can 
 be generally understood without a commentary. All 
 his theories claim to be drawn dire6l from the fa6ls, to be 
 suggested by observation, and to interpret the world as it is ; 
 and whatever view he takes, he is constant in his appeal to the 
 experience of common life. This characteristic endows his 
 style with a freshness and vigor which would be difficult to 
 match in the philosophical writing of any country, and impos- 
 sible in that of Germany. If it were asked whether there were 
 any circumstances, apart from heredity, to which he owed his 
 mental habit, the answer might be found in the abnormal 
 chara6ler of his early education, his acquaintance with the 
 world rather than with books, the extensive travels of his boy- 
 hood, his ardent pursuit of knowledge for its own sake and 
 without regard to the emoluments and endowments of learning. 
 He was trained in realities even more than in ideas ; and hence 
 he is original, forcible, clear, an enemy of all philosophic 
 indefiniteness and obscurity ; so that it may well be said of 
 him, in the words of a writer in the Revue Contemporaine, ee 
 n' est pas un philosophe comme Us autres, c' est un philosophe 
 qui a vu le monde. 
 
 It is not my purpose, nor would it be possible within the 
 limits of a prefatory note, to attempt an account of Schopen- 
 hauer's philosophy, to indicate its sources, or to suggest or 
 rebut the obje6lions which may be taken to it. M. Ribot, in 
 his excellent little book,* has done all that is necessary in 
 this direction. But the essays here presented need a word of 
 explanation. It should be observed, and Schopenhauer him- 
 * La Philosophic de Schopenhauer, par Th. Ribot. 
 
 <5» 
 
VI PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 self is at pains to point out, that his system is like a citadel 
 with a hundred gates : at whatever point you take it up, 
 wherever you make your entrance, you are on the road to the 
 center. In this respedt his writings resemble a series of essays 
 composed in support of a single thesis ; a circumstance which 
 led him to insist, more emphatically even than most philoso- 
 phers, that for a proper understanding of his system it was 
 necessary to read every line he had written. Perhaps it would 
 be more corre6l to describe Die Welt als Wille und Vorstel- 
 lung as his main thesis, and his other treatises as merely 
 corollary to it. The essays in this volume form part of the 
 corollary ; they are taken from a colle<5lion published towards 
 the close of Schopenhauer's life, and by him entitled Parerga 
 und Paralipomena, as being in the nature of surplusage and 
 illustrative of his main position. They are by far the most 
 popular of his works, and since their first publication in 1851, 
 they have done much to build up his fame. Written so as to 
 be intelligible enough in themselves, the tendency of many of 
 them is towards the fundamental idea on which his system is 
 based. It may therefore be convenient to summarize that 
 idea in a couple of sentences ; more especially as Schopenhauer 
 sometimes writes as if his advice had been followed and his 
 readers were acquainted with the whole of his work. 
 
 All philosophy is in some sense the endeavor to find a 
 unifying principle, to discover the most general conception 
 underlying the whole field of nature and of knowledge. By 
 one of those bold generalizations which occasionally mark a 
 real advance in Science, Schopenhauer conceived this unifying 
 principle, this underlying unity, to consist in something 
 analogous to that will which self- consciousness reveals to us. 
 Will is, according to him, the fundamental reality of the 
 world, the thing-in-itself ; and its objectivation is what is 
 presented in phenomena. The struggle of the will to realize 
 itself evolves the organism, which in its turn evolves intelli- 
 gence as the servant of the will. And in pra6lical life the 
 antagonism between the will and the intelledl arises from the 
 fa6t that the former is the metaphysical substance, the latter 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. VU 
 
 something accidental and secondary. And further, will is 
 desire, that is to say, need of something ; hence need and 
 pain are what is positive in the world, and the only possible 
 happiness is a negation, a renunciation oi the will to live. 
 
 It is instru6live to note, as M. Ribot points out, that in 
 finding the origin of all things, not in intelligence, as some of 
 his predecessors in philosophy had done, but in will, or the 
 force of nature, from which all phenomena have developed, 
 Schopenhauer was anticipating something of the scientific 
 spirit of the nineteenth century. To this it may be added that 
 in combating the method of Fichte and Hegel, who spun a 
 system out of abstra6l ideas, and in discarding it for one based 
 on observation and experience, Schopenhauer can be said to 
 have brought down philosophy from heaven to earth. 
 
 In Schopenhauer's view the various forms of Religion are 
 no less a produ6t of human ingenuity than Art or Science. 
 He holds, in eSe6i, that all religions take their rise in the 
 desire to explain the world ; and that, in regard to truth and 
 error, they differ, in the main, not by preaching monotheism, 
 polytheism or pantheism, but in so far as they recognize 
 pessimism or optimism as the true description of life. Hence 
 any religion which looked upon the world as being radically 
 evil appealed to him as containing an indestructible element of 
 truth. I have endeavored to present his view of two of the 
 great religions of the world in the extract which concludes 
 this volume, and to which I have given the title of The Christian 
 System. The tenor of it is to show that, however little he may 
 have been in sympathy with the supernatural element, he owed 
 much to the moral do(5lrines of Christianity and of Buddhism, 
 between which he traced great resemblance. In the following 
 Dialogue he applies himself to a discussion of the pradlical 
 efficacy of religious forms ; and though he was an enemy of 
 clericalism, his choice of a method which allows both the 
 affirmation and the denial of that efficacy to be presented with 
 equal force may perhaps have been diredled by the conscious- 
 ness that he could not side with either view to the exclusion of 
 the other. In any case his pra6lical philosophy was touched 
 
Vlll PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 with the spirit of Christianity. It was more than artistic 
 enthusiasm which led him in profound admiration to the 
 Madonna di San Sisto : 
 
 Sie tragi zur Welt ihn, und er schaut entsetzt 
 In ihrerGrau'l chaotische Verwirrung, 
 In ihres Tobens wilde Raserei, 
 In ihres Treibens nie geheilte Thorheit, 
 In ihrer Quaalen nie gestillten Schmerz ; 
 Entsetzt : doch strahlet Ruh' and Zuversicht 
 Und Siegesglanz sein Aug', verkiindigend 
 Schon der Eriosung ewige gewissheit. 
 
 Pessimism is commonly and erroneously supposed to be the 
 distinguishing feature of Schopenhauer's system. It is right 
 to remember that the same fundamental view of the world is 
 presented by Christianity, to say nothing of Oriental religions. 
 
 That Schopenhauer conceives life as an evil is a dedu6lion, 
 and possibly a mistaken deduction, from his metaphysical 
 theory. Whether his scheme of things is correal or not — and 
 it shares the common fate of all metaphysical systems in being 
 unverifiable, and to that extent unprofitable — he will in the 
 last resort have made good his claim to be read by his insight 
 into the varied needs of human life. It may be that a future 
 age will consign his metaphysics to the philosophical lumber- 
 room ; but he is a literary artist as well as a philosopher, and 
 he can make a bid for fame in either capacity. What is 
 remarked with much truth of many another writer, that he 
 suggests more than he achieves, is in the highest degree 
 applicable to Schopenhauer ; and his obiter difla, his sayings 
 by the way, will always find an audience. 
 
 T. B. SAUNDERS. 
 
REiUClON. 
 
 A DIALOGUE. 
 
 Demopheles. Between ourselves, my dear fellow, I don't 
 care about the way you sometimes have of exhibiting your 
 talent for philosophy ; you make religion a subje6l for sarcastic 
 remarks, and even for open ridicule. Everyone thinks his 
 religion sacred, and therefore you ought to respedl it. 
 
 Philaleihes. That doesn't follow ! I don't see why, be- 
 cause other people are simpletons, I should have any regard 
 for a pack of lies. I respe6l truth everywhere, and so I can't 
 respe6t what is opposed to it. My maxim is Vigeat Veritas ef 
 pereat mundus , like the lawyers' Fiat justitia et pereat mundus. 
 Every profession ought to have an analogous advice. 
 
 Demopheles. Then I suppose dodlors should say Fiant 
 pilulae et pereat mundus, — there wouldn't be much difficulty 
 about that ! 
 
 Philalethes. Heaven forbid ! You must take everything 
 cum grano salis. 
 
 Dem.opheles. Exactly ; that's why I want you to take 
 religion cum, grano salis. I want you to see that one must 
 meet the requirements of the people according to the measure 
 of their comprehension. Where you have masses of people, 
 of crude susceptibilities and clumsy intelligence, sordid in their 
 pursuits and sunk in drudgery, religion provides the only 
 means of proclaiming and making them feel the high import 
 of life. For the average man takes an interest, primarily, in 
 nothing but what will satisfy his physical needs and hankerings, 
 and beyond this, give him a little amusement and pastime. 
 Founders of religion and philosophers come into the world to 
 rouse him from his stupor and point to the lofty meaning of 
 
 (9) 
 
lO RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 existence ; philosophers for the few, the emancipated, founders 
 of religion for the many, for humanity at large. For, as your 
 friend Plato has said, the multitude can't be philosophers, and 
 you shouldn't forget that. Religion is the metaphysics of the 
 masses ; by all means let them keep it : let it therefore com- 
 mand external respe<5l, for to discredit it is to take it away. 
 Just as they have popular poetry, and the popular wisdom of 
 proverbs, so they must have popular metaphysics too : for 
 mankind absolutely needs an interpretation of life ; and this, 
 again, must be suited to popular comprehension. Conse- 
 quently, this interpretation is always an allegorical investiture 
 of the truth : and in practical life and in its effe6ls on the 
 feelings, that is to say, as a rule of action and as a comfort and 
 consolation in suffering and death, it accomplishes perhaps 
 just as much as the truth itself could achieve if we possessed it. 
 Don't take offense at its unkempt, grotesque and apparently 
 absurd form ; for with your education and learning, you have 
 no idea of the roundabout ways by which people in their crude 
 state have to receive their knowledge of deep truths. The 
 various religions are only various forms in which the truth, 
 which taken by itself is above their comprehension, is grasped 
 and realized by the masses ; and truth becomes inseparable 
 from these forms. Therefore, my dear sir, don't take it amiss 
 if I say that to make a mockery of these forms is both shallow 
 and unjust. 
 
 Philalethes. But isn't it every bit as shallow and unjust to 
 demand that there shall be no other system of metaphysics but 
 this one, cut out as it is to suit the requirements and compre- 
 hension of the masses ? that its dodlrine shall be the limit of 
 human speculation, the standard of all thought, so that the 
 metaphysics of the few, the emancipated, as you call them, 
 must be devoted only to confirming, strengthening, and ex- 
 plaining the metaphysics of the masses ? that the highest 
 powers of human intelligence shall remain unused and unde- 
 veloped, even be nipped in the bud, in order that their adivity 
 may not thwart the popular metaphysics ? And isn't this just 
 the very claim which religion sets up? Isn't it a little too 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. II 
 
 much to have tolerance and delicate forbearance preached by 
 what is intolerance and cruelty itself ? Think of the heretical 
 tribunals, inquisitions, religious wars, crusades, Socrates' cup 
 of poison, Bruno's and Vanini's death in the flames! Is all 
 this to-day quite a thing of the past ? How can genuine philo- 
 sophical effort, sincere search after truth, the noblest calling of 
 the noblest men, be let and hindered more completely than by 
 a conventional system of metaphysics enjoying a State mo- 
 nopoly, the principles of whieh are impressed into every head 
 in earliest youth, so earnestly, so deeply, and so firmly, that, 
 unless the mind is miraculously elastic, they remain indelible. 
 In this way the groundwork of all healthy reason is once for 
 all deranged ; that is to say, the capacity for original thought 
 and unbiased judgment, which is weak enough in itself, is, in 
 regard to those subje6ts to which it might be applied, for ever 
 paralyzed and ruined. 
 
 Demopheles. Which means, I suppose, that people have 
 arrived at a convidlion which they won't give up in order to 
 embrace yours instead. 
 
 Philalethes. Ah ! if it were only a conviction based on 
 insight. Then one could bring arguments to bear, and the 
 battle would be fought with equal weapons. But religions 
 admittedly appeal, not to convidlion as the result of argu- 
 ment, but to belief as demanded by revelation. And as the 
 capacity for believing is strongest in childhood, special care is 
 taken to make sure of this tender age. This has much more 
 to do with the do6trines of belief taking root than threats and 
 reports of miracles. If, in early childhood, certain funda- 
 mental views and do6lrines are paraded with unusual solemnity, 
 and an air of the greatest earnestness never before visible in 
 anything else ; if, at the same time, the possibility of a doubt 
 about them be completely passed over, or touched upon only 
 to indicate that doubt is the first step to eternal perdition, the 
 resulting impression will be so deep that, as a rule, that is, in 
 almost every case, doubt about them will be almost as impos- 
 sible as doubt about one's own existence. Hardly one in ten 
 thousand will have the strength of mind to ask himself seri- 
 
12 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 ously and earnestly — is that true ? To call such as can do it 
 strong minds, esprits forts, is a description more apt than is 
 generally supposed. But for the ordinary mind there is noth- 
 ing so absurd or revolting but what, if inculcated in that way, 
 the strongest belief in it will strike root. If, for example, the 
 killing of a heretic or infidel were essential to the future salva- 
 tion of his soul, almost everyone would make it the chief event 
 of his life, and in dying would draw consolation and strength 
 from the remembrance that he had succeeded. As a matter 
 of fact, almost every Spaniard in days gone by used to look 
 upon an auto da fe as the most pious of all a6ls and one most 
 agreeable to God. A parallel to this may be found in the way 
 in which the Thugs (a religious se6l in India, suppressed a 
 short time ago by the English, who executed numbers of them) 
 express their sense of religion and their veneration for the 
 goddess Kali ; they take every opportunity of murdering 
 their friends and traveling companions, with the object of 
 getting possession of their goods, and in the serious convidlion 
 that they are thereby doing a praiseworthy a6lion, conducive 
 to their eternal welfare.* The power of religious dogma, 
 when inculcated early, is such as to stifle conscience, compas- 
 sion, and finally every feeling of humanity. But if you want to 
 see with your own eyes and close at hand what timely inocu- 
 lation will accomplish, look at the English. Here is a nation 
 favored before all others by nature ; endowed, more than all 
 others, with discernment, intelligence, power of judgment, 
 strength of character ; look at them, abased and made ridicu- 
 lous, beyond all others, by their stupid ecclesiastical super- 
 stition, which appears amongst their other abilities like a fixed 
 idea or monomania. For this they have to thank the circum- 
 stance that education is in the hands of the clergy, whose 
 endeavor it is to impress all the articles of belief, at the earliest 
 age, in a way that amounts to a kind of paralysis of the brain ; 
 this in its turn expresses itself all their life in an idiotic bigotry, 
 which makes otherwise most sensible and intelligent people 
 
 * Cf. Illustrations of the history and pradlice of the Thugs, London, 
 1837 ; also the Edinburg Review, Oct.-Jaii., 1836-7. 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 1 3 
 
 amongst them degrade themselves so that one can't make 
 head or tail of them. If you consider how essential to such a 
 masterpiece is inoculation in the tender age of childhood, the 
 missionary system appears no longe/ only as the acme of 
 human importunity, arrogance and impertinence, but also as 
 an absurdity, if it doesn't confine itself to nations which are 
 still in their infancy, like Caffirs, Hottentots, South Sea Isl- 
 anders, etc. Amongst these races it is successful ; but in 
 India, the Brahmans treat the discourses of the missionaries 
 with contemptuous smiles of approbation, or simply shrug their 
 shoulders. And one may say generally that the proselytizing 
 efforts of the missionaries in India, in spite of the most advan- 
 tageous facilities, are, as a rule, a failure. An authentic report 
 in Vol. XXI. of the Asiatic Journal (1826) states that alter so 
 many years of missionary a6livity not more than three hund- 
 red living converts were to be found in the whole of India, 
 where the population of the English possessions alone comes 
 to one hundred and fifteen millions ; and at the same time it 
 is admitted that the Christian converts are distinguished for 
 their extreme immorality. Three hundred venal and bribed 
 souls out of so many millions ! There is no evidence that 
 things have gone better with Christianity in India since then, 
 in spite of thefa6l that the missionaries are now trying, con- 
 trary to stipulation and in schools exclusively designed for 
 secular English instruction, to work upon the children's minds 
 as they please, in order to smuggle in Christianity ; against 
 which the Hindoos are most jealously on their guard. As I 
 have said, childhood is the time to sow the seeds of belief, and 
 not manhood ; more especially where an earlier faith has taken 
 root. An acquired conviction such as is feigned by adults is, 
 as a rule, only the mask for some kind of personal interest. 
 And it is the feeling that this is almost bound to be the case 
 which makes a man who has changed his religion in mature 
 years an obje6l of contempt to most people everywhere ; who 
 thus show that they look upon religion, not as a matter of 
 reasoned convi<5lion, but merely as a belief inoculated in child- 
 hood, before any test can be applied. And that they are right 
 
14 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 in their view of religion is also obvious from the way in which 
 not only the masses, who are blindly credulous, but also the 
 clergy of every religion, who, as such, have faithfully and 
 zealously studied its sources, foundations, dogmas and disputed 
 points, cleave as a body to the religion of their particular 
 country ; consequently for a minister of one religion or con- 
 fession to go over to another is the rarest thing in the world. 
 The Catholic clergy, for example, are fully convinced of the 
 truth of all the tenets of their Church, and so are the Protestant 
 clergy of theirs, and both defend the principles of their creeds 
 with like zeal. And yet the convi6lion is governed merely by 
 the country native to each ; to the South German ecclesiastic 
 the truth of the Catholic dogma is quite obvious, to the North 
 German, the Protestant. If then, these convi6Uons are based 
 on obje6live reasons, the reasons must be climatic, and thrive, 
 like plants, some only here, some only there. The convi6lions 
 of those who are thus locally convinced are taken on trust and 
 believed by the masses everywhere. 
 
 Demopheles. Well, no harm is done, and it doesn't make 
 any real difference. As a fact. Protestantism is more suited 
 to the North, Catholicism to the south. 
 
 Philalethes. So it seems. Still I take a higher standpoint, 
 and keep in view a more important objecl, the progress, 
 namely, of the knowledge of truth among mankind. And 
 from this point of view, it is a terrible thing that, wherever a 
 man is born, certain propositions are inculcated in him in 
 earliest youth, and he is assured that he may never have any 
 doubts about them, under penalty of thereby forfeiting eternal 
 salvation ; propositions, I mean, which affe6t the foundation 
 of all our other knowledge and accordingly determine for ever, 
 and, if they are false, distort for ever, the point of view from 
 which our knowledge starts ; and as, further, the corollaries 
 of these propositions touch the entire system of our intelledlual 
 attainments at every point, the whole of human knowledge is 
 thoroughly adulterated by them. Evidence of this is afforded 
 by every literature ; the most striking by that of the Middle 
 Age, but in a too considerable degree by that of the fifteenth 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. I5 
 
 and sixteenth centuries. Look at even the first minds of all 
 those epochs ; how paralyzed they are by false fundamental 
 positions like these ; how, more especially, all insight into the 
 true constitution and working of nature is, as it were, blocked 
 up. During the whole of the Christian period Theism lies 
 like a mountain on all intellectual, and chiefly on all philo- 
 sophical efforts, and arrests or stunts all progress. For the 
 scientific men of these ages God, devil, angels, demons hid the 
 whole of nature ; no enquiry was followed to the end, nothing 
 ever thoroughly examined ; everything which went beyond 
 the most obvious casual nexus was immediately set down to 
 those personalities. ' ' It was at once explained by a reference 
 to God, angels or demons, ' ' as Pomponatius expressed himself 
 when the matter was being discussed, ^^ and philosophers at 
 any rate have nothing analogous^ There is, to be sure, a 
 suspicion of irony in this statement of Pomponatius, as his 
 perfidy in other matters is known ; still, he is only giving ex- 
 pression to the general way of thinking of his age. And if, 
 on the other hand, any one possessed the rare quality of an 
 elastic mind, which alone could burst the bonds, his writings 
 and he himself with them were burnt ; as happened to Bruno 
 and Vanini. How completely an ordinary mind is paralyzed 
 by that early preparation in metaphysics is seen in the most 
 vivid way and on its most ridiculous side, where such a one 
 undertakes to criticise the dodlrines of an alien creed. The 
 efforts of the ordinary man are generally found to be dire<5led 
 to a careful exhibition of the incongruity of its dogmas with 
 those of his own belief : he is at great pains to show that not 
 only do they not say, but certainly do not mean, the same 
 thing ; and with that he thinks, in his simplicity, that he has 
 demonstrated the falsehood of the alien creed. He really never 
 dreams of putting the question which of the two may be right ; 
 his own articles of belief he looks upon as d priori true and 
 certain principles. 
 
 Demopheles. So that's your higher point of view ? I assure 
 you there is a higher still. First live, then philosophize is a 
 maxim of more comprehensive import than appears at first 
 
l6 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 sight. The first thing to do is to control the raw and evil 
 dispositions of the masses, so as to keep them from pushing 
 injustice to extremes, and from committing cruel, violent and 
 disgraceful a6ts. If you were to wait until they had recognized 
 and grasped the truth, you would undoubtedly come too late ; 
 and truth, supposing that it had been found, would surpass 
 their powers of comprehension. In any case an allegorical 
 investiture of it, a parable or myth, is all that would be of any 
 service to them. As Kant said, there must be a public 
 standard of Right and Virtue ; it must always flutter high 
 overhead. It is a matter of indifference what heraldic figures 
 are inscribed on it, so long as they signify what is meant. 
 Such an allegorical representation of truth is always and every- 
 where, for humanity at large, a serviceable substitute for a truth 
 to which it can never attain, — for a philosophy which it can 
 never grasp ; let alone the fa6l that it is daily changing its 
 shape, and has in no form as yet met with general acceptance. 
 Practical aims, then, my good Philalethes, are in every respe6l 
 superior to theoretical. 
 
 Philalethes. What you say is very like the ancient advice 
 
 of Timaeus of Locrus, the Pythagorean, stop the tniyid with 
 
 falsehood if yon cati' t speed it with truth. I almost suspe6l that 
 
 your plan is the one which is so much in vogue just now, that 
 
 you want to impress upon me that 
 
 The hour is nigh 
 When we may feast in quiet. 
 
 You recommend us, in fa6l, to take timely precautions, so that 
 the waves of the discontented raging masses mayn't disturb us 
 at table. But the whole point of view is as false as it is now- 
 a-days popular and commended ; and so I make haste to 
 enter a protest against it. It is false, that state, justice, law 
 cannot be upheld without the assistance of religion and its 
 dogmas ; and that justice and public order need religion as a 
 necessary complement, if legislative enactments are to be 
 carried out. It is false, were it repeated a hundred times. 
 An effeftive and striking argument to the contrary is afforded 
 by the ancients, especially the Greeks. They had nothing at 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 17 
 
 all of what we understand by religion. They had no sacred 
 documents, no dogma to be learned and its acceptance furthered 
 by everyone, its principles to be inculcated early on the young. 
 Just as little was moral do6lrine preached by the ministers of 
 religion, nor did the priests trouble themselves about morality 
 or about what the people did or left undone. Not at all. The 
 duty of the priests was confined to temple-ceremonial, prayers, 
 hymns, sacrifices, processions, lustrations and the like, the 
 obje6l of which was anything but the moral improvement of 
 the individual. What was called religion consisted, more 
 -especially in the cities, in giving temples here and there to 
 some of the gods of the greater tribes, in which the worship 
 described was carried on as a state matter, and was conse- 
 quently, in fa6t, an affair of police. No one, except the 
 fun6lionaries performing, was in any way compelled to attend, 
 or even to believe in it. In the whole of antiquity there is no 
 trace of any obligation to beHeve in any particular dogma. 
 Merely in the case of an open denial of the existence of the 
 gods, or any other reviling of them, a penalty was imposed, 
 and that on account of the insult offered to the state, which 
 served those gods ; beyond this it was free to everyone to 
 think of them what he pleased. If anyone wanted to gain the 
 favor of those gods privately, by prayer or sacrifice, it was 
 open to him to do so at his own expense and at his own risk ; 
 if he didn't do it, no one made any objection, least of all the 
 state. In the case of the Romans, everyone had his own 
 Lares and Penates at home ; they were, however, in reality, 
 only the venerated busts of ancestors. Of the immortality of 
 the soul and a life beyond the grave, the ancients had no firm, 
 clear or, least of all, dogmatically fixed idea, but very loose, 
 fluctuating, indefinite and problematical notions, everyone in 
 his own way : and the ideas about the gods were just as vary- 
 ing, individual and vague. There was, therefore, really no 
 religion, in our sense of the word, amongst the ancients. But 
 did anarchy and lawlessness prevail amongst them on that 
 account? Is not law and civil order, rather, so much their 
 work, that it still forms the foundation of our own ? Was 
 
l8 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 there not complete prote6lion for property, even though it 
 consisted for the most part of slaves ? And did not this state 
 of things last for more than a thousand years ? So that I can't 
 recognize, I must even protest against the practical aims and 
 the necessity of religion in the sense indicated by you, and so 
 popular now-a-days, that is, as an indispensable foundation of 
 all legislative arrangements. For, if you take that point of 
 view, the pure and sacred endeavor after truth would, to say 
 the least, appear quixotic, and even criminal, if it ventured, in 
 its feeling of justice, to denounce the authoritative creed as a 
 usurper who had taken possession of the throne of truth and 
 maintained his position by keeping up the deception. 
 
 Demopheles. But religion is not opposed to truth ; it itself 
 teaches truth. And as the range of its a6livity is not a narrow 
 le<5lure room, but the world and humanity at large, religion 
 must conform to the requirements and comprehension of an 
 audience so numerous and so mixed. Religion must not let 
 truth appear in its naked form ; or, to use a medical simile, it 
 must not exhibit it pure, but must employ a mythical vehicle, 
 a medium, as it were. You can also compare truth in this 
 respe<5l to certain chemical stuffs which in themselves are 
 gaseous, but which for medicinal uses, as also for preservation 
 or transmission, must be bound to a stable, solid base, because 
 they would otherwise volatilize. Chlorine gas, for example, is 
 for all purposes applied only in the form of chlorides. But if 
 truth, pure, abstra6l and free from all mythical alloy, is always 
 to remain unattainable, even by philosophers, it might be com- 
 pared to fluorine, which cannot even be isolated, but must 
 always appear in combination with other elements. Or, to 
 take a less scientific simile, truth, which is inexpressible except 
 by means of myth and allegory, is like water, which can be 
 carried about only in vessels ; a philosopher who insists on 
 obtaining it pure is like a man who breaks the jug in order to 
 get the water by itself This is, perhaps, an exact analogy. 
 At any rate, religion is truth allegorically and mythically ex- 
 pressed, and so rendered attainable and digestible by mankind 
 in general. Mankind couldn't possibly take it pure and 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. I9 
 
 unmixed, just as we can't breathe pure oxygen ; we require 
 an addition of four times its bulk in nitrogen. In plain lan- 
 guage, the profound meaning, the high aim of life, can only 
 be unfolded and presented to the masses symbolically, because 
 they are incapable of grasping it in its true signification. 
 Philosophy, on the other hand, should be like the Eleusinian 
 mysteries, for the few, the elite. 
 
 Philaleihes. I understand. It comes, in short, to truth 
 wearing the garment of falsehood. But in doing so it enters 
 on a fatal alliance. What a dangerous weapon is put into the 
 hands of those who are authorized to employ falsehood as the 
 vehicle of truth ! If it is as you say, I fear the damage caused 
 by the falsehood will be greater than any advantage the truth 
 could ever produce. Of course, if the allegory were admitted 
 to be such, I should raise no obje6lion ; but with the admis- 
 sion it would rob itself of all respe6t, and consequently, of all 
 utility. The allegory must, therefore, put in a claim to be 
 true in the proper sense of the word, and maintain the claim ; 
 while, at the most, it is true only in an allegorical sense. Here 
 lies the irreparable mischief, the permanent evil ; and this is 
 why religion has always been and always will be in conflict 
 with the noble endeavor after pure truth. 
 
 Demopheles. Oh no ! that danger is guarded against. If 
 religion mayn't exactly confess its allegorical nature, it gives 
 sufficient indication of it. 
 
 Philaleihes. How so ? 
 
 Demopheles. In its mysteries. ' ' Mystery, " is in reality 
 only a technical theological term for religious allegory. All 
 religions have their mysteries. Properly speaking, a mystery 
 is a dogma which is plainly absurd, but which, nevertheless, 
 conceals in itself a lofty truth, and one which by itself would 
 be completely incomprehensible to the ordinary understanding 
 of the raw multitude. The multitude accepts it in this disguise 
 on trust, and believes it, without being led astray by the 
 absurdity of it, which even to its intelligence is obvious ; and 
 in this way it participates in the kernel of the matter so far as 
 it is possible for it to do so. To explain what I mean, I may 
 
20 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 add that even in philosophy an attempt has been made to 
 make use of a mystery. Pascal, for example, who was at once 
 a pietist, a mathematician, and a philosopher, says in this 
 threefold capacity : God is everywhere center and nowhere 
 periphery. Malebranche has also the just remark : Liberty is 
 a mystery. One could go a step further and maintain that in 
 religions everything is mystery. For to impart truth, in the 
 proper sense of the word, to the multitude in its raw state is 
 absolutely impossible ; all that can fall to its lot is to be 
 enlightened by a mythological refle6lion of it. Naked truth 
 is out of place before the eyes of the profane vulgar ; it can 
 only make its appearance thickly veiled. Hence, it is unreason- 
 able to require of a religion that it shall be true in the proper 
 sense of the word ; and this, I may observe in passing, is now- 
 a-days the absurd contention of Rationalists and Supernatural- 
 ists alike. Both start from the position that religion must be 
 the real truth ; and while the former demonstrate that it is not 
 the truth, the latter obstinately maintain that it is ; or rather, 
 the former dress up and arrange the allegorical element in such 
 a way, that, in the proper sense of the word, it could be true, 
 but would be, in that case, a platitude ; while the latter wish 
 to maintain that it is true in the proper sense of the word, 
 without any further dressing ; a belief, which, as we ought to 
 know is only to be enforced by inquisitions and the stake. As 
 a fa<5l, however, myth and allegory really form the proper 
 element of religion ; and under this indispensable condition, 
 which is imposed by the intelle6lual limitation of the multitude, 
 religion provides a sufficient satisfaction for those metaphysical 
 requirements of mankind which are incestrudlible. It takes 
 the place of that pure philosophical truth which is infinitely 
 difficult and perhaps never attainable. 
 
 Philalethes. Ah ! just as a wooden leg takes the place of a 
 natural one ; it supplies what is lacking, barely does duty for 
 it, claims to be regarded as a natural leg, and is more or less 
 artfully put together. The only difference is that, whilst a 
 natural leg as a rule preceded the wooden one, religion has 
 everywhere got the start of philosophy. 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 21 
 
 Demopheles. That may be, but still for a man who hasn't a 
 natural leg, a wooden one is of great service. You must bear 
 in mind that the metaphysical needs of mankind absolutely 
 require satisfa6lion, because the horizon of men's thoughts 
 must have a background and not remain unbounded. Man 
 has, as a rule, no faculty for weighing reasons and discrimin- 
 ating between what is false and what is true ; and besides, the 
 labor which nature and the needs of nature impose upon him, 
 leaves him no time for such enquiries, or for the education 
 which they presuppose. In his case, therefore, it is no use 
 talking of a reasoned convi6lion ; he has to fall back on belief 
 and authority. If a really true philosophy were to take the 
 place of religion, nine-tenths at least of mankind would have 
 to receive it on authority ; that is to say, it too would be a 
 matter of faith, for Plato's dictum, that the multitude can't be 
 philosophers, will always remain true. Authority, however, 
 is an affair of time and circumstance alone, and so it can't be 
 bestowed on that which has only reason in its favor, it must 
 accordingly be allowed to nothing but what has acquired it in 
 the course of history, even if it is only an allegorical repre- 
 sentation of truth. Truth in this form, supported by authority, 
 appeals first of all to those elements in the human constitution 
 which are stri6lly metaphysical, that is to say, to the need man 
 feels of a theory in regard to the riddle of existence which 
 forces itself upon his notice, a need arising from the conscious- 
 ness that behind the physical in the world there is a meta- 
 physical, something permanent as the foundation of constant 
 change. Then it appeals to the will, to the fears and hopes of 
 mortal beings living in constant struggle ; for whom, accord- 
 ingly, religion creates gods and demons whom they can cry 
 to, appease and win over. Finally, it appeals to that moral 
 consciousness which is undeniably present in man, lends to it 
 that corroboration and support without which it would not 
 easily maintain itself in the struggle against so many tempta- 
 tions. It is just from this side that religion affords an inex- 
 haustible source of consolation and comfort in the innumerable 
 trials of life, a comfort which does not leave men in death, but 
 
22 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 rather then only unfolds its full efficacy. So religion may be 
 compared to one who takes a blind man by the hand and leads 
 him, because he is unable to see for himself, whose concern it 
 is to reach his destination, not to look at everything by the way. 
 
 Philalethes. That is certainly the strong point of religion. 
 If it is a fraud, it is a pious fraud; that is undeniable. But 
 this makes priests something between deceivers and teachers 
 of morality; they daren't teach the real truth, as you have 
 quite rightly explained, even if they knew it, which is not the 
 case. A true philosophy, then, can always exist, but not a 
 true religion ; true, I mean, in the proper understanding of 
 the word, not merely in that flowery or allegorical sense which 
 you have described ; a sense in which all religions would be 
 true, only in various degrees. It is quite in keeping with the 
 inextricable mixture of weal and woe, honesty and deceit, 
 good and evil, nobility and baseness, which is the average 
 chara6leristic of the world everywhere, that the most important, 
 the most lofty, the most sacred truths can make their appear- 
 ance only in combination with a lie, can even borrow strength 
 from a lie as from something that works more powerfully on 
 mankind ; and, as revelation, must be ushered in by a lie. 
 This might, indeed, be regarded as the cachet of the moral 
 world. However, we won't give up the hope that mankind 
 will eventually reach a point of maturity and education at 
 which it can on the one side produce, and on the other receive, 
 the true philosophy. Simplex sigillum veri : the naked truth 
 must be so simple and intelligible that it can be imparted to 
 all in its true form, without any admixture of myth and fable, 
 without disguising it in the form of religion. 
 
 Demopheles. You've no notion how stupid most people are. 
 
 Philalethes. I am only expressing a hope which I can't 
 give up. If it were fulfilled, truth in its simple and inteUigible 
 form would of course drive religion from the place it has so 
 long occupied as its representative, and by that very means 
 kept open for it. The time would have come when religion 
 would have carried out her objedl and completed her course : 
 the race she had brought to years of discretion she could dis- 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 2$ 
 
 miss, and herself depart in peace : that would be the euthanasia 
 of religion. But as long as she lives, she has two faces, one 
 of truth, one of fraud. According as you look at one or the 
 other, you will bear her favor or ill-will. Religion must be 
 regarded as a necessary evil, its necessity resting on the pitiful 
 imbecility of the great majority of mankind, incapable of 
 grasping the truth, and therefore requiring, in its pressing 
 need, something to take its place. 
 
 Demopheles. Really, one would think that you philosophers 
 had truth in a cupboard, and that all you had to do was to go 
 and get it ! 
 
 Philalethes. Well, if we haven't got it, it is chiefly owing to 
 the pressure put upon philosophy by religion at all times and in 
 all places. People have tried to make the expression and com- 
 munication of truth, even the contemplation and discovery of 
 it, impossible, by putting children, in their earliest years, into 
 the hands of priests to be manipulated ; to have the lines, in 
 which their fundamental thoughts are henceforth to run, laid 
 down with such firmness as, in essential matters, to be fixed 
 and determined for this whole life. When I take up the writ- 
 ings even of the best intelle<5ls of the sixteenth and seventeenth 
 centuries, (more especially if I have been engaged in Oriental 
 studies,) I am sometimes shocked to see how they are paralyzed 
 and hemmed in on all sides by Jewish ideas. How can 
 anyone think out the true philosophy when he is prepared 
 like this ? 
 
 Demopheles. Even if the true philosophy were to be dis- 
 covered, religion wouldn't disappear from the world, as you 
 seem to think. There can't be one system of metaphysics for 
 everybody ; that's rendered impossible by the natural differ 
 ences of intelle(5lual power between man and man, and the 
 differences, too, which education makes. It is a necessity for 
 the great majority of mankind to engage in that severe bodily 
 labor which cannot be dispensed with if the ceaseless require- 
 ments of the whole race are to be satisfied. Not only does 
 this leave the majority no time for education, for learning, for 
 contemplation ; but by virtue of the hard and fast antagonism 
 
24 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 between muscles and mind, the intelligence is blunted by so 
 much exhausting bodily labor, and becomes heavy, clumsy, 
 awkward, and consequently incapable of grasping any other 
 than quite simple situations. At least nine-tenths of the human 
 race falls under this category. But still the people require a 
 system of metaphysics, that is, an account of the world and 
 our existence, because such an account belongs to the most 
 natural needs of mankind, they require a popular system ; and 
 to be popular it must combine many rare qualities. It must 
 be easily understood, and at the same time possess, on the 
 proper points, a certain amount of obscurity, even of impene- 
 trability ; then a corre6l and satisfactory system of morality 
 must be bound up with its dogmas ; above all, it must afford 
 inexhaustible consolation in suffering and death ; the conse- 
 quence of all this is, that it can only be true in an allegorical 
 and not in a real sense. Further, it must have the support of 
 an authority which is impressive by its great age, by being 
 universally recognized, by its documents, their tone and utter- 
 ances ; qualities which are so extremely difficult to combine 
 that many a man wouldn't be so ready, if he considered the 
 matter, to help to undermine a religion, but would refle6l that 
 what he is attacking is a people's most sacred treasure. If you 
 want to form an opinion on religion, you should always bear 
 in mind the character of the great multitude for which it is 
 destined, and form a pi6lure to yourself of its complete inferiority, 
 moral and intelle(5fual. It is incredible how far this inferiority 
 goes, and how perseveringly a spark of truth will glimmer on 
 even under the crudest covering of monstrous fable or gro- 
 tesque ceremony, clinging indestru6libly, like the odor of 
 musk, to everything that has once come into conta6l with it. 
 In illustration of this, consider the profound wisdom of the 
 Upanishads, and then look at the mad idolatry in the India of 
 to-day, with its pilgrimages, processions and festivities, or at 
 the insane and ridiculous goings-on of the Saniassi. Still one 
 can't deny that in all this insanity and nonsense there lies some 
 obscure purpose which accords with, or is a reflection of the 
 profound wisdom I mentioned. But for the brute multitude 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 25 
 
 it had to be dressed up in this form. In such a contrast as 
 this we have the two poles of humanity, the wisdom of the 
 individual and the bestiality of the many, both of which find 
 their point of contact in the moral sphere. That saying from 
 the Kurral must occur to everybody. Base people look like 
 men, but I have never seen their exa6l counterpart. The man 
 of education may, all the same, interpret religion to himself 
 aim grano salis ; the man of learning, the contemplative spirit 
 may secretly exchange it for a philosophy. But here again 
 one philosophy wouldn't suit everybody ; by the laws of 
 affinity every system would draw to itself that public to whose 
 education and capacities it was most suited. So there is always 
 an inferior metaphysical system of the schools for the educated 
 multitude, and a higher one for the Slite. Kant's lofty doctrine, 
 for instance, had to be degraded to the level of the schools and 
 ruined by such men as Fries, Krug and Salat. In short, here, 
 if anywhere, Goethe's maxim is true. One does not suit all. 
 Pure faith m revelation and pure metaphysics are for the two 
 extremes, and for the intermediate steps mutual modifications 
 of both in innumerable combinations and gradations. And 
 this is rendered necessary by the immeasurable differences 
 which nature and education have placed between man and man. 
 
 Philalethes. The view you take reminds me seriously of the 
 mysteries of the ancients, which you mentioned just now. 
 Their fundamental purpose seems to have been to remedy 
 the evil arising from the differences of intelledlual capacity and 
 education. The plan was, out of the great multitude utterly 
 impervious to unveiled truth, to sele6l certain persons who 
 might have it revealed to them up to a given point ; out of 
 these, again, to choose others to whom more would be re- 
 vealed, as being able to grasp more ; and so on up to the 
 Epopts. These grades corresponded to the little, greater and 
 greatest mysteries. The arrangement was founded on a cor- 
 re(5l estimate of the intelle6tual inequality of mankind. 
 
 Demopheles. To some extent the education in our lower, 
 middle and high schools corresponds to the varying grades of 
 initiation into the mysteries. 
 
26 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 Philalethes. In a very approximate way ; and then only in 
 so far as subje6ls of higher icnowledge are written about ex- 
 clusively in Latin. But since that has ceased to be the case, 
 all the mysteries are profaned. 
 
 Demopheles. However that may be, I wanted to remind 
 you that you should look at religion more from the pra6lical 
 than from the theoretical side. Personified metaphysics may 
 be the enemy of religion, but all the same personified morality 
 will be its friend. Perhaps the metaphysical element in all 
 religions is false ; but the moral element in all is true. This 
 might perhaps be presumed from the fa6l that they all disagree 
 in their metaphysics, but are in accord as regards morality. 
 
 Philalethes. Which is an illustration of the rule of logic that 
 false premises may give a true conclusion. I 
 
 Demopheles. Let me hold you to your conclusion : let me 
 remind you that religion has two sides. If it can't stand when 
 looked at from its theoretical, that is, its intellectual side ; on 
 the other hand, from the moral side, it proves itself the only 
 means of guiding, controlling and mollifying those races of 
 animals endowed with reason, whose kinship with the ape does 
 not exclude a kinship with the tiger. But at the same time 
 religion is, as a rule, a sufficient satisfa6lion for their dull meta- 
 physical necessities. You don't seem to me to possess a 
 proper idea of the difference, wide as the heavens asunder, the 
 deep gulf between your man of learning and enlightenment, 
 accustomed to the process of thinking, and the heavy, clumsy, 
 dull and sluggish consciousness of humanity's beasts of bur- 
 den, whose thoughts have once and for all taken the direction 
 of anxiety about their hvelihood, and cannot be put in motion 
 in any other ; whose muscular strength is so exclusively 
 brought into play that the nervous power, which makes intelli- 
 gence, sinks to a very low ebb. People like that must have 
 something tangible which they can lay hold of on the slippery 
 and thorny pathway of their life, some sort of beautiful fable, 
 by means of which things can be imparted to them which their 
 crude intelligence can entertain only in pi6lure and parable. 
 Profound explanations and fine distindlions are thrown away 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 27 
 
 Upon them. If you conceive religion in this light, and recol- 
 le6l that its aims are above all pra<5lical, and only in a subor- 
 dinate degree theoretical, it will appear to you as something 
 worthy of the highest respe6l. 
 
 Philalethes. A respe6l which will finally rest upon the 
 principle that the end sanctifies the means. I don't feel in 
 favor of a compromise on a basis like that. Religion may be 
 an excellent means of training the perverse, obtuse and ill- 
 disposed members of the biped race : in the eyes of the friend 
 of truth every fraud, even though it be a pious one, is to be 
 condemned. A system of deception, a pack of lies, would be 
 a strange means of inculcating virtue. The flag to which I 
 have taken the oath is truth ; I shall remain faithful to it 
 everywhere, and whether I succeed or not, I shall fight for 
 light and truth ! If I see religion On the wrong side — 
 
 Demopheles. But you won't. Religion isn't a deception: 
 it is true and the most important of all truths. Because its doc- 
 trines are, as I have said, of such a lofty kind that the multi- 
 tude can't grasp them without an intermediary, because, I say, 
 its light would blind the ordinary eye, it comes forward wrapt 
 in the veil of allegory and teaches, not indeed what is exactly 
 true in itself, but what is true in respe<5l of the lofty meaning 
 contained in it; and, understood in this way, religion is the truth. 
 
 Philalethes. It would be all right if religion were only at 
 liberty to be true in a merely allegorical sense. But its con- 
 tention is that it is downright true in the proper sense of the 
 word. Herein lies the deception, and it is here that the friend 
 of truth must take up a hostile position. 
 
 Demopheles. The deception is a sine qua non. If religion 
 were to admit that it was only the allegorical meaning in its 
 do6trine which was true, it would rob itself of all efficacy. 
 Such rigorous treatment as this would destroy its invaluable 
 influence on the hearts and morals of mankind. Instead of 
 insisting on that with pedantic obstinacy, look at its great 
 achievements in the practical sphere, its furtherance of good 
 and kindly feelings, its guidance in condudl, the support and 
 consolation it gives to suflering humanity in life and death. 
 
28 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 How much you ought to guard against letting theoretical 
 cavils discredit in the eyes of the multitude, and finally wrest 
 from it, something which is an inexhaustible source of conso- 
 lation and tranquillity, something which, in its hard lot, it needs 
 so much, even more than we do. On that score alone, religion 
 should be free from attack. 
 
 Philalethes. With that kind of argument you could have 
 driven Luther from the field, when he attacked the sale of 
 indulgences. How many a one got consolation from the let- 
 ters of indulgence, a consolation which nothing else could give, 
 a complete tranquillity ; so that he joyfully departed with the 
 fullest confidence in the packet of them which he held in his 
 hand at the hour of death, convinced that they were so many 
 cards of admission to all the nine heavens. What is the use 
 of grounds of consolation and tranquillity which are constantly 
 overshadowed by the Damocles-sword of illusion ? The truth, 
 my dear sir, is the only safe thing ; the truth alone remains 
 steadfast and trusty ; it is the only solid consolation ; it is the 
 indestru6lible diamond. 
 
 Demopheles. Yes, if you had truth in your pocket, ready 
 to favor us with it on demand. All you've got are metaphysi- 
 cal systems, in which nothing is certain but the headaches they 
 cost. • Before you take anything away, you must have some- 
 thing better to put in its place. ' 
 
 Philalethes. That's what you keep on saying. To free a 
 man from error is to give, not to take away. Knowledge that 
 a thing is false is a truth. Error always does harm ; sooner 
 or later it will bring mischief to the man who harbors it. Then 
 give up deceiving people ; confess ignorance of what you 
 don't know, and leave everyone to form his own articles of 
 faith for himself Perhaps they won't turn out so bad, espe- 
 cially as they'll rub one another's corners down, and mutually 
 rectify mistakes. The existence of many views will at any 
 rate lay a foundation of tolerance. Those who possess knowl- 
 edge and capacity may betake themselves to the study of 
 philosophy, or even in their own persons carry the history of 
 philosophy a step further. 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 29 
 
 Demopheles. That'll be a pretty business ! A whole nation 
 of raw metaphysicians, wrangling and eventually coming to 
 blows with one another ! 
 
 Philalethes. Well, well, a few blows here and there are the 
 sauce of life ; or at any rate a very inconsiderable evil com- 
 pared with such things as priestly dominion, plundering of the 
 laity, persecution of heretics, courts of inquisition, crusades, 
 religious wars, massacres of St, Bartholomew. These have 
 been the result of popular metaphysics imposed from without ; 
 so I stick to the old saying that you can't get grapes from 
 thistles, nor expect good to come from a pack of lies. 
 
 Demopheles. How often must I repeat that religion is any- 
 thing but a pack of lies ? It is truth itself, only in a mythical, 
 allegorical vesture. But when you spoke of your plan of 
 everyone being his own founder of religion, I wanted to say 
 that a particularism like this is totally opposed to human nature, 
 and would consequently destroy all social order. Man is a 
 metaphysical animal, — that is to say, he has paramount meta- 
 physical necessities ; accordingly, he conceives life above all 
 in its metaphysical signification, and wishes to bring every- 
 thing into line with that. Consequently, however strange it 
 may sound in view of the uncertainty of all dogmas, agreement 
 in the fundamentals of metaphysics is the chief thing, because 
 a genuine and lasting bond of union is only possible among 
 those who are of one opinion on these points. As a result of 
 this, the main point of likeness and of contrast between nations 
 is rather religion than government, or even language ; and so 
 the fabric of society, the State, will stand firm only when 
 founded on a system of metaphysics which is acknowledged 
 by all. This, of course, can only be a popular system, — that 
 is, a religion : it becomes part and parcel of the constitution 
 of the State, of all the public manifestations of the national 
 life, and also of all solemn a6ls of individuals. This was the 
 case in ancient India, among the Persians, Egyptians, Jews, 
 Greeks and Romans ; it is still the case in the Brahman, 
 Buddhist and Mohammedan nations. In China there are three 
 
30 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. j 
 
 faiths, it is true, of which the most prevalent — Buddhism — is 
 precisely the one which is not protefted by the State : still, 
 there is a saying in China, universally acknowledged, and of 
 daily application, that "the three faiths are only one," — that 
 is to say, they agree in essentials. The Emperor confesses all 
 three together at the same time. And Europe is the union of 
 Christian States : Christianity is the basis of every one of the 
 members, and the common bond of all. Hence Turkey, though 
 geographically in Europe, is not properly to be reckoned as 
 belonging to it. In the same way, the European princes hold 
 their place "by the grace of God:" and the Pope is the 
 vicegerent of God. Accordingly, as his throne was the high- 
 est, he used to wish all thrones to be regarded as held in fee 
 from him. In the same way, too, Archbishops and Bishops, 
 as such, possessed temporal power ; and in England they 
 still have seats and votes in the Upper House. Protestant 
 princes, as such, are heads of their churches : in England, a 
 few years ago, this was a girl eighteen years old. By the 
 revolt from the Pope, the Reformation shattered the European 
 fabric, and in a special degree dissolved the true unity of Ger- 
 many by destroying its common religious faith. This union, 
 which had practically come to an end, had, accordingly, to be 
 restored later on by artificial and purely political means. You 
 see, then, how closely connedled a common faith is with the 
 social order and the constitution of every State. Faith is 
 everywhere the support of the laws and the constitution, the 
 foundation, therefore, of the social fabric, which could hardly 
 hold together at all if religion did not lend weight to the 
 authority of government and the dignity of the ruler. 
 
 Philaleihes. Oh, yes, princes use God as a kind of bogey 
 to frighten grown-up children to bed with, if nothing else 
 avails : that's why they attach so much importance to the 
 Deity. Very well. Let me, in passing, recommend our rulers 
 to give their serious attention, regularly twice every year, to 
 the fifteenth chapter of the First Book of Samuel, that they 
 may be constantly reminded of what it means to prop the 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 3I 
 
 throne on the altar. Besides, since the stake, that ultima ratio 
 theologorum, has gone out of fashion, this method of govern- 
 ment has lost its efficacy. For, as you know, religions are like 
 glow-worms ; they shine only when its dark. A certain 
 amount of general ignorance is the condition of all religions, 
 the element in which alone they can exist. And as soon as 
 astronomy, natural science, geology, history, the knowledge 
 of countries and peoples have spread their light broadcast, 
 and philosophy finally is permitted to say a word, every faith 
 founded on miracles and revelation must disappear ; and phi- 
 losophy takes its place. In Europe the day of knowledge and 
 science dawned towards the end of the fifteenth century with 
 the appearance of the Renaissance Platonists : its sun rose 
 higher in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries so rich in 
 results, and scattered the mists of the Middle Age. Church 
 and Faith were compelled to disappear in the same proportion ; 
 and so in the eighteenth century English and French philoso- 
 phers were able to take up an attitude of dire6t hostility ; until, 
 finally, under Frederick the Great, Kant appeared, and took 
 away from religious belief the support it had previously en- 
 joyed from philosophy : he emancipated the handmaid of 
 theology, and in attacking the question with German thorough- 
 ness and patience, gave it an earnest instead of a frivolous 
 tone. The consequence of this is that we see Christianity 
 undermined in the nineteenth century, a serious faith in it 
 almost completely gone ; we see it fighting even for bare • 
 existence, whilst anxious princes try to set it up a little by 
 artificial means, as a doctor uses a drug on a dying patient. 
 In this conne<5lion there is a passage in Condorcet's '' Des 
 Progres de r esprit humain,^^ which looks as if written as a 
 warning to our age : ' ' the religious zeal shown by philoso- 
 phers and great men was only a political devotion ; and every 
 religion which allows itself to be defended as a belief that may 
 usefully be left to the people, can only hope for an agony 
 more or less prolonged." In the whole course of the events 
 which I have indicated, you may always observe that faith and 
 knowledge are related as the two scales of a balance ; when the 
 
32 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 one goes up, the other goes down. So sensitive is the balance 
 that it indicates momentary influences. When, for instance, 
 at the beginning of this century, those inroads of French 
 robbers under the leadership of Bonaparte, and the enormous 
 efforts necessary for driving them out and punishing them, 
 had brought about a temporary negledl of science and conse- 
 quently a certain decline in the general increase of knowledge, 
 the Church immediately began to raise her head again and 
 Faith began to show fresh signs of life ; which, to be sure, in 
 keeping with the times, was partly poetical in its nature. On 
 the other hand, in the more than thirty years of peace which 
 followed, leisure and prosperity furthered the building up of 
 science and the spread of knowledge in an extraordinary 
 degree : the consequence of which is what I have indicated, 
 the dissolution and threatened fall of religion. Perhaps the 
 time is approaching which has so often been prophesied, when 
 religion will take her departure from European humanity, like 
 a nurse which the child has outgrown : the child will now be 
 given over to the instru6lions of a tutor. For there is no doubt 
 that religious do<5lrines which are founded merely on authority, 
 miracles and revelations, are only suited to the childhood of 
 humanity. Everyone will admit that a race, the past duration 
 of which on the earth all accounts, physical and historical, 
 agree in placing at not more than some hundred times the life 
 of a man of sixty, is as yet only in its first childhood. 
 
 Demopheles. Instead of taking an undisguised pleasure in 
 prophesying the downfall of Christianity, how I wish you 
 would consider what a measureless debt of gratitude European 
 humanity owes to it, how greatly it has benefited by the 
 religion which, after a long interval, followed it from its old 
 home in the East. Europe received from Christianity ideas 
 which were quite new to it, the knowledge, I mean, of the 
 fundamental truth that life cannot be an end-in-itself, that the 
 true end of our existence lies beyond it. The Greeks and 
 Romans had placed this end altogether in our present life, so 
 that in this sense they may certainly be called blind heathens. 
 And, in keeping with this view of life, all their virtues can be 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE 33 
 
 reduced to what is serviceable to the community, to what is 
 useful in faft. Aristotle says quite naively, Those virtues must 
 , necessarily be the greatest which are the most useful to others. 
 So the ancients thought patriotism the highest virtue, although 
 it is really a very doubtful one, since narrowness, prejudice, 
 vanity and an enlightened self-interest are main elements iu it. 
 Just before the passage I quoted, Aristotle enumerates all the 
 virtues, in order to discuss them singly. They are Justice, 
 Courage, Temperance, Magnifice7ice, Magnanimity, Liberality, 
 Gentleness, Good Sense and Wisdom,. How different from the 
 Christian virtues ! Plato himself, incomparably the most 
 transcendental philosopher of pre-Christian antiquity, knows 
 no higher virtue than Justice ; and he alone recommends it 
 unconditionally and for its own sake, whereas the rest make a 
 happy life, vita beata, the aim of all virtue, and moral condu6l 
 the way to attain it. Christianity freed European humanity 
 from this shallow, crude identification of itself with the hollow, 
 uncertain existence of every day, 
 
 coelumque tueri 
 Jussit, et ereftos ad sidera tollere vultus. 
 
 Christianity, accordingly, does not preach mere Justice, but 
 the Love of Mankind, Compassion, Good Works, Forgiveness, 
 Love of your Enemies, Patience, Humility, Resignation, Faith 
 and Hope. It even went a step further, and taught that the 
 world is of evil, and that we need deliverance. It preached 
 despisal of the world, self-denial, chastity, giving up of one's 
 will, that is, turning away from life and its illusory pleasures. 
 It taught the healing power of pain : an instrument of torture 
 is the symbol of Christianity. I am quite ready to admit that 
 this earnest, this only corre6l view of life was thousands of 
 years previously spread all over Asia in other forms, as it is 
 still, independently of Christianity ; but for European human- 
 ity it was a new and great revelation. For it is well known 
 that the population of Europe consists of Asiatic races driven 
 out as wanderers from their own homes, and gradually settling 
 down in Europe ; on their wanderings these races lost the 
 original religion of their homes, and with it the right view of 
 
34 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 life : so, under a new sky, they formed religions for them- 
 selves, which were rather crude : the worship of Odin, for 
 instance, the Druidic or the Greek religion, the metaphysical 
 content of which was little and shallow. In the meantime the 
 Greeks developed a special, one might almost say, an instin6l- 
 ive sense of beauty, belonging to them alone of all the nations 
 who have ever existed on the earth, peculiar, fine and exa€i : 
 so that their mythology took, in the mouth of their poets,^ and 
 in the hands of their artists, an exceedingly beautiful and 
 pleasing shape. On the other hand, the true and deep sig- 
 nificance of life was lost tO the Greeks and Romans. They 
 Hved on Uke grown-up children, till Christianity came and 
 recalled them to the serious side of existence 
 
 Philalethes. And to see the effe6ls one need only com- 
 pare antiquity with the Middle Age ; the time of Pericles, 
 say, with the fourteenth century. You could scarcely believe 
 you were dealing with the same kind of beings. There, the 
 finest development of humanity, excellent institutions, wise 
 laws, shrewdly apportioned offices, rationally ordered freedom, 
 all the arts, including poetry and philosophy, at their best ; 
 the produ6lion of works which, after thousands of years, are 
 unparalleled, the creations, as it were, of a higher order of 
 beings, which we can never imitate ; life embellished by the 
 noblest fellowship, as portrayed in Xenophen's Banquet. 
 Look on the other pi(5lure, if you can ; a time at which the 
 Church had enslaved the minds, and violence the bodies of 
 men, that knights and priests might lay the whole weight of 
 life upon the common beast of burden, the third estate. There, 
 you have might as right. Feudalism and Fanaticism in close 
 alliance, and in their train abominable ignorance and darkness 
 of mind, a corresponding intolerance, discord of creeds, re- 
 ligious wars, crusades, inquisitions and persecutions ; as the 
 form of fellowship, chivalry, compounded of savagery and 
 folly, with its pedantic system of ridiculous false pretences 
 carried to an extreme, its degrading superstition and apish 
 veneration for women. Gallantry is the residue of this venera- 
 tion, deservedly requited as it is by feminine arrogance ; it 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 35 
 
 affords continual food for laughter to all Asiatics, and the 
 Greeks would have joined in it. In the golden Middle Age 
 the pra6lice developed into a regular and methodical service 
 of women ; it imposed deeds of heroism, cours (V amour, bom- 
 bastic Troubadour songs, etc. ; although it is to be observed 
 that these last buffooneries, which had an intelle6tual side, 
 were chiefly at home in France ; whereas amongst the material 
 sluggish Germans, the knights distinguished themselves rather 
 by drinking and stealing ; they were good at boozing and 
 filling their castles with plunder ; though in the courts, to be 
 sure, there was no lack of insipid love songs. What caused 
 this utter transformation ? Migration and Christianity. 
 
 Demopheles. I am glad you reminded me of it. Migration 
 was the source of the evil ; Christianity the dam on which it 
 broke. It was chiefly by Christianity that the raw, wild hordes 
 which came flooding in were controlled and tamed. The 
 savage man must first of all learn to kneel, to venerate, to 
 obey ; after that he can be civilized. This was done in Ireland 
 by St. Patrick, in Germany by Winifred the Saxon, who was 
 a genuine Boniface. It was migration of peoples, the last 
 advance of Asiatic races towards Europe, followed only by the 
 fruitless attempts of those under Attila, Zenghis Khan, and 
 Timur, and as a comic afterpiece, by the gipsies, — it was this 
 movement which swept away the humanity of the ancients. 
 Christianity was precisely the principle which set itself to 
 work against this savagery ; just as later, through the whole 
 of the Middle Age, the Church and its hierarchy were most 
 necessary to set limits to the savage barbarism of those masters 
 of violence, the princes and knights : it was what broke up 
 the ice-floes in that mighty deluge. Still, the chief aim of 
 Christianity is not so much to make this life pleasant as to 
 render us worthy of a better. It looks away over this span of 
 time, over this fleeting dream, and seeks to lead us to eternal 
 welfare. Its tendency is ethical in the highest sense of the 
 word, a sense unknown in Europe till its advent ; as I have 
 shown you, by putting the morality and religion of the ancients 
 side by sid^ with those of Christendom. 
 
36 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 Philaleihes. You are quite right as regards theory : but 
 look at the pradice ! In comparison with the ages of Chris- 
 tianity the ancient world was unquestionably less cruel than 
 the Middle Age, with its deaths by exquisite torture, its 
 innumerable burnings at the stake. The ancients, further, 
 were very enduring, laid great stress on justice, frequently 
 sacrificed themselves for their country, showed such traces of 
 every kind of magnanimity, and such genuine manliness, that 
 to this day an acquaintance with their thoughts and actions is 
 called the study of Humanity. The fruits of Christianity were 
 religious wars, butcheries, crusades, inquisitions, extermina- 
 tion of the natives in America, and the introdu6lion of African 
 slaves in their place ; and among the ancients there is nothing 
 analogous to this, nothing that can be compared with it ; for 
 the slaves of the ancients, the familia, the verncSy were a con- 
 tented race, and faithfully devoted to their masters' service, 
 and as different from the miserable negroes of the sugar plarf- 
 tations, which are a disgrace to humanity, as their two colors 
 are distin6l. Those special moral delinquencies for which we 
 reproach the ancients, and which are perhaps less uncommon 
 now-a-days than appears on the surface to be the case, are 
 trifles compared with the Christian enormities I have mentioned. 
 Can you then, all considered, maintain that mankind has been 
 really made morally better by Christianity ? 
 
 Demopheles. If the results haven't everywhere been in 
 keeping with the purity and truth of the do6lrine, it may be 
 because the dodlrine has been too noble, too elevated for man- 
 kind, that its aim has been placed too high. It was so much 
 easier to come up to the heathen system, or to the Moham- 
 medan. It is precisely what is noble and dignified that is 
 most liable everywhere to misuse and fraud : abusus optimi 
 pessimus. Those high do6lrines have accordingly now and 
 then served as a pretext for the most abominable proceedings, 
 and for a6ls of unmitigated wickedness. The downfall of the 
 institutions of the old world, as well as of its arts and sciences, 
 is, as I have said, to be attributed to the inroad of foreign 
 barbarians. The inevitable result of this inroad was that 
 
RELIGION: A DIALOGUE. 37 
 
 ignorance and savagery got the upper hand ; consequently 
 violence and knavery established their dominion, and knights 
 and priests became a burden to mankind. It is partly, how- 
 ever, to be explained by the fa6l that the new religion made 
 eternal and not temporal welfare the obje6l of desire, taught 
 that simplicity of heart was to be preferred to knowledge, and 
 looked askance at all worldly pleasure. Now the arts and 
 sciences subserve worldly pleasure ; but in so far as they could 
 be made serviceable to religion they were promoted, and 
 attained a certain degree of perfe6lion. 
 
 Philalethes. In a very narrow sphere. The sciences were 
 suspicious companions, and as such, were placed under re- 
 stri6lions : on the other hand, darling ignorance, that element 
 so necessary to a system of faith, was carefully nourished. 
 
 Denwpheles. And yet mankind's possessions in the way of 
 knowledge up to that period, which were preserved in the 
 writings of the ancients, were saved from destruction by the 
 clergy, especially by those in the monasteries. How would 
 it have fared if Christianity hadn't come in just before the 
 migration of peoples? 
 
 Philalethes. It would really be a most useful inquiry to try 
 and make, with the coldest impartiality, an unprejudiced, 
 careful and accurate comparison of the advantages and disad- 
 vantages which may be put down to religion. For that, of 
 course, a much larger knowledge of historical and psychologi- 
 cal data than either of us command would be necessary. 
 Academies might make it a subje6l for a prize essay. 
 
 Denwpheles. They'll take good care not to do so. 
 
 Philalethes. I'm surprised to hear you say that : its a bad 
 look out for religion. However, there are academies which, 
 in proposing a subject for competition, make it a secret con- 
 dition that the prize is to go to the man who best interprets 
 their own view. If we could only begin by getting a statisti- 
 cian to tell us how many crimes are prevented every year by 
 religious, and how many by other motives, there would be 
 very few of the former. If a man feels tempted to commit a 
 crime, you may rely upon it that the first consideration which 
 
•\'~^: 
 
 38 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 enters his head is the penalty appointed for it, and the chances 
 that it will fall upon him : then comes, as a second considera- 
 tion, the risk to his reputation. If I am not mistaken, he will 
 ruminate by the hour on these two impediments, before he 
 ever takes a thought of religious considerations. If he gets 
 safely over those two first bulwarks against crime, I think 
 religion alone will very rarely hold him back from it. 
 
 Demopheles. I think that it will very often do so, especially 
 when its influence works through the medium of custom. An 
 atrocious a<5l is at once felt to be repulsive. What is this but 
 the effedl of early impressions? Think, for instance, how 
 often a man, especially if of noble birth, will make tremendous 
 sacrifices to perform what he has promised, motived entirely 
 by the fa<5l that his father has often earnestly impressed upon 
 him in his childhood that " a man of honor" or " a gentle- 
 man " or "a cavalier ' ' always keeps his word inviolate. 
 
 Philalethes. That's no use unless there is a certain inborn 
 honorableness. You mustn't ascribe to religion what results 
 from innate goodness of chara6ler, by which compassion for the 
 man who would suffer by his crime keeps a man from com- 
 mitting it. This is the genuine moral motive, and as such 
 it is independent of all religions. 
 
 Demopheles. But this is a motive which rarely affeds the 
 multitude unless it assumes a religious aspect. The religious 
 asped at any rate strengthens its power for good. Yet with- 
 out any such natural foundation, religious motives alone are 
 powerful to prevent crime. We need not be surprised at this 
 in the case of the multitude, when we see that even people of 
 education pass now and then under the influence, not indeed 
 of religious motives, which are founded on something which 
 is at least allegorically true, but of the most absurd super- 
 stition, and allow themselves to be guided by it all their life 
 long ; as, for instance, undertaking nothing on a Friday, re- 
 fusing to sit down thirteen at table, obeying chance omens, 
 and the like. How much more likely is the multitude to be 
 guided by such things. You can't form any adequate idea ol 
 the narrow limits of the mind in its raw state ; it is a place oi 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 39 
 
 absolute darkness, especially when, as often happens, a bad, 
 unjust and malicious heart is at the bottom of it. People in 
 this condition — and they form the great bulk of humanity — 
 must be led and controlled as well as may be, even if it be by 
 really superstitious motives ; until such time as they become 
 susceptible to truer and better ones. As an instance of the 
 dire6t working of religion, may be cited the fa<5l, common 
 enough, in Italy especially, of a thief restoring stolen goods, 
 through the influence of his confessor, who says he won't 
 absolve him if he doesn't. Think again of the case of an oath, 
 where religion shows a most decided influence ; whether it be 
 that a man places himself expressly in the position of a purely 
 moral being, and as such looks upon himself as solemnly 
 appealed to, as seems to be the case in France, where the 
 formula is simply je le jure, and also among the Quakers, 
 whose solemn ^<?a or nay is regarded as a substitute for the 
 oath ; or whether it be that a man really believes he is pro- 
 nouncing something which may affed; his eternal happiness, — 
 a belief which is presumably only the investiture of the former 
 feeling. At any rate, religious considerations are a means of 
 awakening and calling out a man's moral nature. How often 
 it happens that a man agrees to take a false oath, and then, 
 when it comes to the point, suddenly refuses, and truth and 
 right win the day. 
 
 Philalethes. Oftener still false oaths are really taken, and 
 truth and right trampled under foot, though all witnesses of 
 the oath know it well ! Still you are quite right to quote the 
 oath as an undeniable example of the practical efficacy of 
 religion. But, in spite of all you've said, I doubt whether the 
 efficacy of religion goes much beyond this. Just think ; if a 
 public proclamation were suddenly made announcing the re- 
 peal of all the criminal laws ; I fancy neither you nor I would 
 have the courage to go home from here under the prote6lion of 
 religious motives. If, m the same way, all religions were 
 declared untrue, we could, under the protection of the laws 
 alone, go on living as before, without any special addition to 
 our apprehensions or our measures of precaution I will go 
 
40 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 beyond this, and say that religions have very frequently exer- 
 cised a decidedly demoralizing influence. One may say 
 generally that duties towards God and duties towards human- 
 ity are in inverse ratio. It is easy to let adulation of the Deity 
 make amends for lack of proper behavior towards man. And 
 so we see that in all times and in all countries the great major- 
 ity of mankind find it much easier to beg their way to heaven 
 by prayers than to deserve to go there by their adlions. In 
 every religion it soon comes to be the case that faith, cere- 
 monies, rites and the like, are proclaimed to be more agreeable 
 to the Divine will than moral a6lions ; the former, especially 
 if they are bound up with the emoluments of the clergy, 
 gradually come to be looked upon as a substitute for the latter. 
 Sacrifices in temples, the saying of masses, the founding of 
 chapels, the planting of crosses by the road side, soon come to 
 be the most meritorious works, so that even great crimes are 
 expiated by them, as also by penance, subjedlion to priestly 
 authority, confessions, pilgrimages, donations to the temples 
 and the clergy, the building of monasteries and the like. The 
 consequence of all this is that the priests finally appear as 
 middlemen in the corruption of the gods. And if matters 
 don't go quite so far as that, where is the religion whose ad- 
 herents don't consider prayers, praise and manifold ad:s of 
 devotion, a substitute, at least in part, for moral condudl? 
 Look at England, where by an audacious piece of priestcraft, 
 the Christian Sunday, introduced by Constantine the Great as 
 a subjedl for the Jewish Sabbath, is in a mendacious way iden- 
 tified with it, and takes its name, — and this in order that the 
 commands of Jehovah for the Sabbath, (that is, the day on 
 which the Almighty had to rest from his six day's labor, so 
 that it is essentially the last day of the week,) might be applied 
 to the Christian Sunday, the dies solis, the first day of the 
 week which the sun opens in glory, the day of devotion and 
 joy. The consequence of this fraud is that "Sabbath-break- 
 ing," or "the desecration of the Sabbath," that is, the 
 slightest occupation, whether of business or pleasure, all games, 
 music, sewing, worldly books, are on Sundays looked upon 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE 4I 
 
 as great sins. Surely the ordinary man must believe that if, 
 as his spiritual guides impress upon him, he is only constant 
 in " a stridl observance of the holy Sabbath, "and is " a regular 
 attendant at Divine Service," that is, if he only invariably 
 idles away his time on Sundays and doesn't fail to sit two 
 hours in church to hear the same litany for the thousandth time 
 and mutter it in tune with the others, he may reckon on indul- 
 gence in regard to those little peccadilloes which he occasion- 
 ally allows himself. Those devils in human form, the slave 
 owners and slave traders in the Free States of North America 
 (they should be called the Slave States) are, as a rule, orthodox, 
 pious Anglicans who would consider it a grave sin to work 
 on Sundays ; and having confidence in this, and their regular 
 attendance at church, they hope for eternal happiness. The 
 demoralizing tendency of religion is less problematical than 
 its moral influence. How great and how certain that moral 
 influence must be to make amends for the enormities which 
 religions, especially the Christian and Mohammedan religions, 
 have produced and spread over the earth ! Think of the 
 fanaticism, the endless persecutions, the religious wars, that 
 sanguinary frenzy of which the ancients had no conception! 
 think of the crusades, a butchery lasting two hundred years 
 and inexcusable, its war cry " It is the will of God,'' its object 
 to gain possession of the grave of one who preached love and 
 sufferance ! think of the cruel expulsion and extermination of 
 the Moors and Jews from Spain ! think of the orgies of blood, 
 the inquisitions, the heretical tribunals, the bloody and terrible 
 conquests of the Mohammedans in three continents, or those 
 of Christianity in America, whose inhabitants were for the 
 most part, and in Cuba entirely, exterminated. According to 
 Las Cases, Christianity murdered twelve millions in forty 
 years, of course all in niajorem Dei gloriam, and for the propa- 
 gation of the Gospel, and because what wasn't Christian wasn't 
 even looked upon as human ! I have, it is true, touched upon 
 these matters before ; but when in our day, we hear of Latest 
 News from the Kingdom of God,^ we shall not be weary of 
 *A missionary paper, of which the 40th annual No. appeared in 1856. 
 
42 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 bringing old news to mind. And above all, don't let us forget 
 India, the cradle of the human race, or at least of that part of 
 it to which we belong, where first Mohammedans, and then 
 Christians, were most cruelly infuriated against the adherents 
 of the original faith of mankind. The destruction or disfigure- 
 ment of the ancient temples and idols, a lamentable, mischievous 
 and barbarous a6l, still bears witness to the monotheistic fury 
 of the Mohammedans, carried on from Marmud, the Ghaznevid 
 of cursed memory, down to Aureng Zeb, the fratricide, whom 
 the Portuguese Christians have zealously imitated by destruc- 
 tion of temples and the auto da fe of the inquisition at Goa. 
 Don't let us forget the chosen people of God, who after they 
 had, by Jehovah's express command, stolen from their old and 
 trusty friends in Egypt the gold and silver vessels which had 
 been lent to them, made a murderous and plundering inroad 
 into "the Promised Land," with the murderer Moses at their 
 head, to tear it from the rightful owners, — again, by the same 
 Jehovah's express and repeated commands, showing no mercy, 
 exterminating the inhabitants, women, children and all, 
 (Joshua, ch. 9 and 10). And all this, simply because they 
 weren't circumcised and didn't know Jehovah, which was 
 reason enough to justify every enormity against them ; just as 
 for the same reason, in earlier times, the infamous knavery of 
 the patriarch Jacob and his chosen people against Hamor, 
 King of Shalem, and his people, is reported to his glory be- 
 cause the people were unbelievers ! (Genesis xxxiii. 18.) 
 Truly, it is the worst side of religions that the believers of one 
 religion have allowed themselves every sin against those of 
 another, and with the utmost ruffianism and cruelty persecuted 
 them ; the Mohammedans against the Christians and Hindoos ; 
 the Christians against the Hindoos, Mohammedans, American 
 natives, Negroes, Jews, heretics, and others. 
 
 Perhaps I go too far in saying all religions. For the sake 
 of truth, I must add that the fanatical enormities perpetrated 
 in the name of religion are only to be put down to the adher- 
 ents of monotheistic creeds, that is, the Jewish faith and its two 
 branches, Christianity and Islamism. We hear of nothing of 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 43 
 
 the kind in the case of Hindoos and Buddhists. Although it 
 is a matter of common knowledge that about the fifth century 
 of our era Buddhism was driven out by the Brahmans from its 
 ancient home in the southernmost part of the Indian peninsula, 
 and afterwards spread over the whole of the rest of Asia, as 
 far as I know, we have no definite account of any crimes of 
 violence, or wars, or cruelties, perpetrated in the course 
 of it. 
 
 That may, of course, be attributable to the obscurity which 
 veils the history of those countries ; but the exceedingly mild 
 charadler of their religion, together with their unceasing incul- 
 cation of forbearance towards all living things, and the fa6l that 
 Brahmanism by its caste system properly admits no proselytes, 
 allows one to hope that their adherents ma}' be acquitted of 
 shedding blood on a large scale, and of cruelty in any form. 
 Spence Hardy, in his excellent book on Eastern Monackism , 
 praises the extraordinary tolerance of the Buddhists, and adds 
 his assurance that the annals of Buddhism will furnish fewer 
 instances of religious persecution than those of any other 
 religion. 
 
 As a matter of fa6l, it is only to monotheism that in- 
 tolerance is essential ; an only god is by his nature a jealous 
 god, who can allow no other god to exist. Polytheistic gods, 
 on the other hand, are naturally tolerant ; they live and let 
 live ; their own colleagues are the chief objecls of their suffer- 
 ance, as being gods of the same religion. This toleration is 
 afterwards extended to foreign gods, who are, accordingly, 
 hospitably received, and later on admitted, in some cases, to 
 an equality of rights ; the chief example of which is shown by 
 the fact, that the Romans willingly admitted and venerated 
 Phrygian, Egyptian and other gods. Hence it is that mono- 
 theistic religions alone furnish the spedacle of religious wars, 
 religious persecutions, heretical tribunals, that breaking of 
 idols and destru<5lion of images of the gods, that razing of 
 Indian temples, and Egyptian colossi, which had looked on 
 the sun three thousand years ; just because a jealous god had 
 said, Thou shalt make no graven image. 
 
44 RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 But to return to the chief point. You are certainly rig^ht in 
 insisting on the strong metaphysical needs of mankind ; but 
 religion appears to me to be not so much a satisfa<5lion as an 
 abuse of those needs. At any rate we have seen that in regard 
 to the furtherance of morality, its utility is, for the most part, 
 problematical, its disadvantages, and especially the atrocities 
 which have followed in its train, are patent to the light of day. 
 Of course it is quite a different matter if we consider the utility 
 of religion as a prop of thrones ; for where these are held "by 
 the grace of God," throne and altar are intimately associated ; 
 and every wise prince who loves his throne and his family will 
 appear at the head of his people as an exemplar of true religion. 
 Even Machiavelli, in the eighteenth chapter of his book, most 
 earnestly recommended religion to princes. Beyond this, one 
 may say that revealed religions stand to philosophy exa6lly in 
 the relation of "sovereigns by the grace of God," to "the 
 sovereignty of the people ; " so that the two former terms of 
 the parallel are in natural alliance, 
 
 Demopheles. Oh, don't take that tone ! You're going hand 
 in hand with ochlocracy and anarchy, the arch enemy of all 
 legislative order, all civilization and all humanity. 
 
 Philalethes. You are right. It was only a sophism of mine, 
 what the fencing master calls a feint. I retra6^ it. But see 
 how disputing sometimes makes an honest man unjust and 
 malicious. Let us stop. 
 
 Demopheles. I can't help regretting that, after all the 
 trouble I've taken, I haven't altered your disposition in regard 
 to religion. On the other hand, I can assure you that every- 
 thing you have said hasn't shaken my conviction of its high 
 value and necessity. 
 
 Philalethes. I fully believe you ; for, as we may read in 
 
 Hudibras — 
 
 A man convinc'd against his will 
 Is of the same opinion still. 
 
 My consolation is that, alike in controversies and in taking 
 mineral waters, the after effeds are the true ones. 
 
 Demopheles. Well, I hope it'll be beneficial in your case. 
 
RELIGION : A DIALOGUE. 
 
 45 
 
 Philalethes. It might be so, if I could digest a certain Span- 
 ish proverb : 
 
 Demopheles. Which is? 
 
 Philalethes. Behind the cross stands the devil. 
 
 Demopheles. Come, don't let us part with sarcasms. Let 
 us rather admit that religion, like Janus, or better still, like the 
 Brahman god of death, Yama, has two faces, and like him, 
 one friendly, the other sullen. Each of us has kept his eye 
 fixed on one alone. 
 
 Philalethes. You are right, old fellow ! 
 
A FEW WORDS ON PANTHEISM. 
 
 THE controversy between Theism and Pantheism might be 
 presented in an allegorical or dramatic form by suppos- 
 ing a dialogue between two persons in the pit of a theatre at 
 Milan during the performance of a piece. One of them, con- 
 vinced that he is in Girolamo's renowned marionette-theatre, 
 admires the art by which the diredlor gets up the dolls and 
 guides their movements. "Oh, you are quite mistaken," 
 says the other, "we're in the Teatro della Scala ; it is the 
 manager and his troupe who are on the stage ; they are the 
 persons you see before you ; the poet too is taking a part." 
 
 The chief obje6tion I have to Pantheism is that it says 
 nothing. To call the world ' ' God ' ' is not to explain it ; it 
 is only to enrich our language with a superfluous synonym for 
 the word "world." It comes to the same thing whether 
 you say "the world is God," or "God is the world." 
 But if you start from ' ' God ' ' as something that is given 
 in experience, and has to be explained, and then say, " God 
 is the world," you are affording what is to some extent an 
 explanation, in so far as you are reducing what is unknown 
 to what is partly known {ignotum per notius) ; but it is 
 only a verbal explanation. If, however, you start from what 
 is really given, that is to say, from the world, and say, "the 
 world is God," it is clear that you say nothing, or a.t least 
 you are explaining what is unknown by what is more unknown. 
 
 Hence, Pantheism presupposes Theism ; only in so far as 
 you start from a god, that is, in so far as you possess him as 
 something with which you are already familiar, can you end 
 by identifying him with the world ; and your purpose in doing 
 
A FEW WORDS ON PANTHEISM. 47 
 
 SO is to put him out of the way in a decent fashion. In other 
 words, you do not start clear from the world as something that 
 requires explanation ; you start from God as something that 
 is given, and not knowing what to do with him, you make 
 the world take over his role. This is the origin of Pantheism. 
 Taking an unprejudiced view of the world as it is, no one 
 would dream of regarding it as a god. It must be a very ill- 
 advised god who knows no better way of diverting himself 
 than by turning into such a world as ours, such a mean, shabby 
 world, there to take the form of innumerable millions' who live 
 indeed, but are fretted and tormented, and who manage to 
 exist a while together, only by preying on one another ; to 
 bear misery, need and death, without measure and without 
 objeft, in the form, for instance, of millions of negro slaves, 
 or of the three million weavers in Europe who, in hunger and 
 care, lead a miserable existence in damp rooms or the cheerless 
 halls of a factory. What a pastime this for a god, who must, 
 as such, be used to another mode of existence ! 
 
 We find accordingly that what is described as the great 
 advance from Theism to Pantheism, if looked at seriously, and 
 not simply as a masked negation of the sort indicated above, 
 is a transition from what is unproved and hardly conceivable 
 to what is absolutely absurd. For however obscure, however 
 loose or confused may be the idea which we conne6l with the 
 word ' ' God, ' ' there are two predicates which are inseparable 
 from it, the highest power and the highest wisdom. It is ab- 
 solutely absurd to think that a being endowed with these 
 qualities should have put himself into the position described 
 above. Theism, on the other hand, is something which is 
 merely unprOved ; and if it is difficult to look upon the infinite 
 world as the work of a personal, and therefore individual, 
 Being, the like of which we know only from our experience of 
 the animal world, it is nevertheless not an absolutely absurd 
 idea. That a Being, at once almighty and all-good, should 
 create a world of torment is always conceivable ; even though 
 we do not know why he does so ; and accordingly we find 
 that when people ascribe the height of goodness to this Being, 
 
48 ' A FEW WORDS ON PANTHEISM. 
 
 I 
 
 they set up the inscrutable nature of his wisdom as the refuge 
 by which the do6lrine escapes the charge of absurdity. Pan- 
 theism, however, assumes that the creative God is himself the 
 world of infinite torment, and, in this little world alone, dies 
 every second, and that entirely of his own will ; which is 
 absurd. It would be much more correal to identify the world 
 with the devil, as the venerable author of the Deutsche Theologie 
 has, in fa6l, done in a passage of his immortal work, where 
 he says, ' * Wherefore the evil spirit and nature are one, and 
 where nature is not overcome, neither is the evil adversary 
 overcome. ' ' 
 
 It is manifest that the Pantheists give the Sansara the name 
 of God. The same name is given by the Mystics to the Nir- 
 vana. The latter, however, state more about the Nirvana 
 than they know, which is not done by the Buddhists, whose 
 Nirvana is accordingly a relative nothing. It is only Jews, 
 Christians, and Mohammedans who give its proper and correal 
 meaning to the word " God." 
 
 The expression, often heard now-a-days, ' ' the world is an 
 end-in -itself," leaves it uncertain whether Pantheism or a sim- 
 ple Fatalism is to be taken as the explanation of it. But, 
 whichever it be, the expression looks upon the world from a 
 physical point of view only, and leaves out of sight its moral 
 significance, because you cannot assume a moral significance 
 without presenting the world as means to a higher end. The 
 notion that the world has a physical but not a moral meaning, 
 is the most mischievous error sprung from the greatest mental 
 perversity. 
 
ON BOOKS AND READING. 
 
 IGNORANCE is degrading only when found in company 
 with riches. The poor man is restrained by poverty and 
 need : labor occupies his thoughts, and takes the place of 
 knowledge. But rich men who are ignorant live for their 
 lusts only, and are like the beetsts of the field ; as may be seen 
 every day : and they can also be reproached for not having 
 used wealth and leisure for that which gives them their greatest 
 value. 
 
 When we read, another person thinks for us : we merely 
 repeat his mental process. In learning to write, the pupil 
 goes over with his pen what the teacher has outlined in pencil : 
 so in reading ; the greater part of the work of thought is 
 already done for us. This is why it relieves us to take up a 
 book after being occupied with our own thoughts. And in 
 reading, the mind is, in fa6l, only the playground of another's 
 thoughts. So it comes about that if anyone spends almost the 
 whole day in reading, and by way of relaxation devotes the 
 intervals to some thoughtless pastime, he gradually loses the 
 capacity for thinking ; just as the man who always rides, at 
 last forgets how to walk. This is the case with many learned 
 persons : they have read themselves stupid. For to occupy 
 every spare moment in reading, and to do nothing but read, 
 is even more paralyzing to the mind than constant manual 
 labor, which at least allows those engaged in it to follow their 
 own thoughts. A spring never free from the pressure of some 
 foreign body at last loses its elasticity ; and so, does the mind 
 if other people's thoughts are constantly forced upon it. Just 
 as you can ruin the stomach and impair the whole body by 
 taking too much nourishment, so you can overfill and choke 
 
 (49> 
 
50 ON BOOKS AND READING. 
 
 the mind by feeding it too much. The more you read, the 
 fewer are the traces left by what you have read : the inmd 
 becomes hke a tablet crossed over and over with writing. 
 There is no time for rummating, and in no other way can vou 
 assimilate what you have read. If you read on and on without 
 setting your own thoughts to work, what you have read can 
 not strike root, and is generally lost. It is, in fad, just the 
 same with mental as with bodily food : hardly the fifth part of 
 what one takes is assimilated. The rest passes off in evapora- 
 tion, respiration and the like. 
 
 The result of all this is that thoughts put on paper are 
 nothing more than footsteps in the sand : you see the way the 
 man has gone, but to know what he saw on his walk, you 
 want his eyes. 
 
 There is no quality of style that can be gained by reading 
 writers who possess it ; whether it be persuasiveness, imagin- 
 ation, the gift of drawing comparisons, boldness, bitterness, 
 brevity, grace, ease of expression or wit, unexpe6led contrasts, 
 a laconic or naive manner, and the like. But if these qualities 
 are already in us, exist, that is to say, potentially, we can call 
 them forth and bring them to consciousness ; we can learn the 
 purposes to which they can be put ; we can be strengthened 
 in our inclination to use them, or get courage to do so ; we 
 can judge by examples the effed of applying them, and so 
 acquire the correct use of them ; and of course it is only when 
 we have arrived at that point that we actually possess these 
 qualities. The only way in which reading can form style is 
 by teaching us the use to which we can put our own natural 
 gifts. We must have these gifts before we begin to learn tiie 
 use of them. Without them, reading teachers us nothing but 
 cold, dead mannerisms and makes us shallow imitators. 
 
 The strata of the earth preserve in rows the creatures which 
 lived in former ages ; and the array of books on the shelves 
 of a library stores up in like manner the errors of the past and 
 the way in which they have been exposed. Like those creat- 
 
ON BOOKS AND READING. 5I 
 
 ures, they too were full of life in their time, and made a great 
 deal of noise ; but now they are stiff and fossilized, and an 
 obje6l of curiosity to the literary palaeontologist alone. 
 
 Herodotus relates that Xerxes wept at the sight of his army, 
 which stretched further than the eye could reach, in the thought 
 that of all these, after a hundred years, not one would be alive. 
 And in looking over a huge catalogue of new books, one 
 might weep at thinking that, when ten years have passed, not 
 one of them will be heard of. 
 
 It is in literature as in life : wherever you turn, you stumble 
 at once upon the incorrigible mob of humanity, swarming in 
 all dire6lions, crowding and soiling everything, like flies in 
 summer. Hence the number, which no man can count, of 
 bad books, those rank weeds of literature, which draw nourish- 
 ment from the corn and choke it. The time, money and 
 attention of the public, which rightfully belong to good books 
 and their noble aims, they take for themselves : they are 
 written for the mere purpose of making money or procuring 
 places. So they are not only useless ; they do positive mis- 
 chief Nine-tenths of the whole of our present literature has 
 no other aim than to get a few shillings out of the pockets 
 of the public ; and to this end author, publisher and reviewer 
 are in league. 
 
 Let me mention a crafty and wicked trick, albeit a profitable 
 and successful one, pradised by litterateurs, hack writers, and 
 voluminous authors. In complete disregard of good taste and 
 the true culture of the period, they have succeeded in getting 
 the whole of the world of fashion into leading strings, so that 
 they are all trained to read in time, and all the same thing, 
 viz. , the newest books ; and that for the purpose of getting food 
 for conversation in the circles in which they move. This is 
 the aim served by bad novels, produced by writers who were 
 once celebrated, as Spindler, Bulwer Lytton, Eugene Sue. 
 What can be more miserable than the lot of a reading public 
 like this, always bound to peruse the latest works of extremely 
 
52 ON BOOKS AND READING. 
 
 commonplace persons who write for money only, and who are 
 therefore never few in number ? and for this advantage they 
 are content to know by name only the works of the few 
 superior minds of all ages and all countries. Literary news- 
 papers, too, are a singularly cunning device for robbing the 
 reading public of the time which, if culture is to be attained, 
 should be devoted to the genuine productions of literature, 
 instead of being occupied by the daily bungling of common- 
 place persons 
 
 Hence, in regard to reading, it is a very important thing to 
 be able to refrain. Skill in doing so consists in not taking into 
 one's hands any book merely because at the time it happens 
 to be extensively read ; such as political or religious pamphlets, 
 novels, poetry, and the like, which make a noise, and may 
 even attain to several editions in the first and last year of their 
 existence. Consider, rather, that the man who writes for 
 fools is always sure of a large audience ; be careful to limit 
 your time for reading, and devote it exclusively to the works 
 of those great minds of all times and countries, who o'ertop 
 the rest of humanity, those whom the voice of fame points to 
 as such. These alone really educate and instru<5l. You can 
 never read bad literature too little, nor good literature too 
 much. Bad books are intelle6lual poison ; they destroy the 
 mind. Because people always read what is new instead of the 
 best of all ages, writers remain in the narrow circle of the ideas 
 which happen to prevail in their time ; and so the period sinks 
 deeper and deeper into its own mire. 
 
 There are at all times two literatures in progress, running 
 side by side, but little known to each other ; the one real, the 
 other only apparent. The former grows into permanent litera- 
 ture : it is pursued by those who live for science or poetry ; 
 its course is sober and quiet, but extremely slow : and it pro- 
 duces in Europe scarcely a dozen works in a century ; these, 
 however, are permanent. The other kind is pursued by 
 persons who live on science or poetry ; it goes at a gallop, 
 with much noise and shouting of partisans ; and every twelve- 
 
ON BOOKS AND READING. 53 
 
 month puts a thousand works on the market. But after a few 
 years one asks, Where are they ? where is the glory which 
 came so soon and made so much clamor ? This kind may be 
 called fleeting, and the other, permanent literature. 
 
 In the history of politics, half a century is always a consider- 
 able time ; the matter which goes to form them is ever on the 
 move ; there is always something going on. But in the history 
 of literature there is often a complete standstill for the same 
 period ; nothing has happened, for clumsy attempts don't 
 count. You are just where you were fifty years previously. 
 
 To explain what I mean, let me compare the advance of 
 knowledge among mankind to the course taken by a planet. 
 The false paths on which humanity usually enters after every 
 important advance are like the epicycles in the Ptolemaic 
 system, and after passing through one of them, the world is 
 just where it was before it entered it. But the great minds, 
 who really bring the race further on its course do not accom- 
 pany it on the epicycles it makes from time to time. This 
 explains why posthumous fame is often bought at the expense 
 of contemporary praise, and vice versa. An instance of such 
 an epicycle is the philosophy started by Fichte and Schelling, 
 and crowned by Hegel's caricature of it This epicycle was a 
 deviation from the limit to which philosophy had been ulti- 
 mately brought by Kant ; and at that point I took it up again 
 afterwards, to carry it further. In the intervening period the 
 sham philosophers I have mentioned and some others went 
 through their epicycle, which had just come to an end ; so 
 that those who went with them on their course are conscious 
 of the fa6l that they are exa6lly at the point from which they 
 started. 
 
 This circumstance explains why it is that, every thirty years 
 or so, science, literature, and art, as expressed in the spirit of 
 the time, are declared bankrupt. The errors which appear 
 from time to time mount to such a height in that period that 
 the mere weight of their absurdity makes the fabric fall ; whilst 
 the opposition to them has been gathering force at the same 
 
54 ON BOOKS AND READING. 
 
 time. So an upset takes place, often followed by an error in 
 the opposite diredion. To exhibit these movements in their 
 periodical return would be the true pradical aim of the history 
 of literature : little attention, however, is paid to it. And 
 besides, the comparatively short duration of these periods 
 makes it difficult to colle6l the data of epochs long gone by, 
 so that it is most convenient to observe how the matter stands 
 in one's own generation. An instance of this tendency, drawn 
 from physical science, is supplied in the Neptunian geology of 
 Werter. 
 
 But let me keep stricdy to the example cited above, the 
 nearest we can take. In German philosophy, the brilliant 
 epoch of Kant was immediately followed by a period which 
 aimed rather at being imposing than at convincing. Instead 
 of being thorough and clear, it tried to be dazzUng, hyper- 
 bolical, and, in a special degree, unintelligible : instead of 
 seeking truth, it intrigued. Philosophy could make no pro- 
 gress in this fashion ; and at last the whole school and its 
 method became bankrupt. For the effi-ontery of Hegel and 
 his fellows came to such a pass, — whether because they talked 
 such sophisticated nonsense, or were so unscrupulously puffed, 
 or because the entire aim of this pretty piece of work was quite 
 obvious, — that in the end there was nothing to prevent the 
 charlatanry of the whole business from becoming manifest to 
 everybody : and when, in consequence of certain disclosures, 
 the favor it had enjoyed in high quarters was withdrawn, the 
 system was openly ridiculed. This most miserable of all the 
 meagre philosophies that have ever existed came to grief, and 
 dragged down with it into the abysm of discredit, the systems 
 of Fichte and Schelling which had preceded it. And so, as 
 far as Germany is concerned, the total philosophical incom- 
 petence of the first half of the century following upon Kant is 
 quite plain : and still the Germans boast of their talent for 
 philosophy in comparison with foreigners, especially since an 
 English writer has been so maliciously ironical as to call them 
 "a nation of thinkers." 
 
 For an example of the general system of epicycles drawn 
 
ON BOOKS AND READING. 55 
 
 from the history of art, look at the school of sculpture which 
 flourished in the last century and took its name from Bernini, 
 more especially at the development of it which prevailed in 
 France. The ideal of this school was not antique beauty, but 
 commonplace nature : instead of the simplicity and grace 
 of ancient art, it represented the manners of a French 
 minuet. 
 
 This tendency becr.me bankrupt when, under Winkelman's 
 direction, a return was made to the antique school. The his- 
 tory of painting furnishes an illustration in the first quarter of 
 the century, when art was looked upon merely as a means and 
 instrument of mediaeval religious sentiment, and its themes 
 consequently drawn from ecclesiastical subje6ls alone : these, 
 however, were treated by painters who had none of the true 
 earnestness of faith, and in their delusion they followed Fran- 
 cesco Francia, Pietro Perugino, Angelico da Fiesole and others 
 like them, rating them higher even than the really great 
 masters who followed. It was in view of this error, and be- 
 cause in poetry an analogous aim had at the same time found 
 favor, that Goethe wrote his parable Pfaffenspiel. This school, 
 too, got the reputation of being whimsical, became bankrupt, 
 and was followed by a return to nature, which proclaimed 
 itself in genre pi6lures and scenes of life of every kind, even 
 though it now and then strayed into what was vulgar. 
 
 The progress of the human mind in literature is similar. 
 The history of literature is for the most part like the catalogue 
 of a museum of deformities ; the spirit in which they keep 
 best is pigskin. The few creatures that have been born in 
 goodly shape need not be looked for there. They are still 
 alive, and are everywhere to be met with in the world, immor- 
 tal, and with their years ever green. They alone form what I 
 have called real literature ; the history of which, poor as it is 
 in persons, we learn from our youth up out of the mouths of 
 all educated people, before compilations recount it for us. 
 
 As an antidote to the prevailing monomania for reading 
 literary histories, in order to be able to chatter about every- 
 thing, without having any real knowledge at all, let me refer 
 
56 ON BOOKS AND READING. 
 
 to a passage in Lichtenberg's works, (vol. II., p. 302), which 
 is well worth perusal. 
 
 I believe that the over-minute acquaintance with the history of 
 science and learning, which is such a prevalent feature of our day, is 
 very prejudicial to the advance of knowledge itself. There is pleasure 
 in following up this history ; but as a matter of fa6l, it leaves the 
 mind, not empty indeed, but without any power of its own, just 
 because it makes it so full. Whoever has felt the desire, not to fill up 
 his mind, but to strengthen it, to develop his faculties and aptitudes, 
 and generally, to enlarge his powers, will have found that there is 
 nothing so weakening as intercourse with a so-called litterateur, on a 
 matter of knowledge on which he has not thought at all, though he 
 knows a thousand little fafts appertaining to its history and literature. 
 It is like reading a cookery-book when you are hungry. I believe 
 that so-called literary history will never thrive amongst thoughtful 
 people, who are conscious of their own worth and the worth of real 
 knowledge. These people are more given to employing their own 
 reason than to troubling themselves to know how others have em- 
 ployed theirs. The worst of it is that, as you will find, the more 
 knowledge takes the diredlion of literary research, the less the power 
 of promoting knowledge becomes ; the only thing that increases is 
 pride in the possession of it. Such persons believe that they possess 
 knowledge in a greater degree than those who really possess it. It is 
 surely a well founded remark, that knowledge never makes it posses- 
 sor proud. Those alone let themselves be blown out with pride, 
 who, incapable of extending knowledge in their own persons, occupy 
 themselves with clearing up dark points in its history, or are able to 
 recount what others have done. They are proud, because they con- 
 sider this occupation, which is mostly of a mechanical nature, the 
 praftice of knowledge. I could illustrate what I mean by examples, 
 but it would be an odious task. 
 
 Still, I wish some one would attempt a tragical history of 
 literature, giving the way in which the writers and artists, who 
 form the proudest possession of the various nations which 
 have given them birth, have been treated by them during 
 their lives. Such a history would exhibit the ceaseless war- 
 fare, which what was good and genuine in all times and 
 countries has had to wage with what was bad and perverse. 
 It would tell of the martyrdom of almost all those who truly 
 enlightened humanity, of almost all the great masters of every 
 
ON BOOKS AND READING. 57 
 
 kind of art : it would show us how, with few exceptions, they 
 were tormented to death, without recognition, without sym- 
 pathy, without followers ; how they lived in poverty and 
 misery, whilst fame, honor, and riches, were the lot of the 
 unworthy ; how their fate was that of Esau, who while he was 
 hunting and getting venison for his father, was robbed of the 
 blessing by Jacob, disguised in his brother's clothes, how, in 
 spite of all, they were kept up by the love of their work, until 
 at last the bitter fight of the teacher of humanity is over, until 
 the immortal laurel is held out to him, and the hour strikes 
 when it can be said : 
 
 Der schwere Panzer wird zum Flugelkleide 
 Kurz ist der Schmerz, unendlich ist die Freude. 
 
PHYSIOGNOMYc 
 
 THAT the outer man is a picture of the inner, and the face 
 an expression and revelation of the whole character, is a 
 presumption likely enough in itself, and therefore a safe one 
 to go by ; evidenced as it is by the {a6\ that people are always 
 anxious to see anyone who has made himself famous by good 
 or evil, or as the author of some extraordinary work ; or if 
 they cannot get a sight of him, to hear at any rate from others 
 what he looks like. So people go to places where they may 
 expe6l to see the person who interests them ; the press, 
 especially in England, endeavors to give a minute and striking 
 description of his appearance ; painters and engravers lose no 
 time in putting him visibly before us ; and finally photography, 
 on that very account of such high value, affords the most com- 
 plete satisfaftion of our curiosity. It is also a fa6l that in 
 private life everyone criticises the physiognomy of those he 
 comes across, first of all secretly trying to discern their intel- 
 ledlual and moral charafter from their features. This would 
 be a useless proceeding if, as some foolish people fancy, the 
 exterior of a man is a matter of no account ; if, as they think, 
 the soul is one thing and the body another, and the body 
 related to the soul merely as the coat to the man himself 
 
 On the contrary, every human face is a hieroglyphic, and a 
 hieroglyphic, too, which admits of being deciphered, the 
 alphabet of which we carry about with us already perfedled. 
 As a matter of faft, the face of a man gives us a fuller and 
 more interesting information than his tongue ; for his face is 
 the compendium of all he will ever say, as it is the one record 
 of all his thoughts and endeavors. And, moreover, the tongue 
 
 tells the thought of one man only, whereas the face expresses 
 
 (58) 
 
PHYSIOGNOMY. 59 
 
 a thought of nature itself : so that everyone is worth attentive 
 observation, even though everyone may not be worth talking 
 to. And if every individual is worth observation as a single 
 thought of nature, how much more so is beauty, since it is a 
 higher and more general conception of nature, is, in fa(5l, her 
 thought of a species. This is why beauty is so captivating : 
 it is a fundamental thought of nature : whereas the individual 
 is only a by-thought, a corollary. 
 
 In private, people always proceed upon the principle that a 
 man is what he looks ; and the principle is a right one, only 
 the difficulty lies in its application. For though the art of 
 applying the principle is partly innate and may be partly gained 
 by experience, no one is a master of it, and even the most 
 experienced is not infallible. But for all that, whatever Figaro 
 may say, it is not the face which deceives ; it is we who de- 
 ceive ourselves in reading in it what is not there. 
 
 The deciphering of a face is certainly a great and difficult 
 art, and the principles of it can never be learnt in the abstra<5l. 
 The first condition of success is to maintain a purely objedlive 
 point of view, which is no easy matter. For, as soon as the 
 faintest trace of anything subje6live is present, whether dislike 
 or favor, or fear or hope, or even the thought of the impression 
 we ourselves are making upon the object of our attention, 
 the chara6lers we are trying to decipher become confused and 
 corrupt. The sound of a language is really appreciated only 
 by one who does not understand it, and that because, in think- 
 ing of the signification of a word, we pay no regard to the 
 sign itself So, in the same way, a physiognomy is correctly 
 gauged only by one to whom it is still strange, who has not 
 grown accustomed to the face by constantly meeting and con- 
 versing with the man himself It is, therefore, stri6lly speak- 
 ing, only the first sight of a man which affords that purely 
 objedive view which is necessary for deciphering his features. 
 An odor affedls us only when we first come in contad with 
 it, and the first glass of wine is the one which gives us its 
 true taste : in the same way, it is only at the first encounter 
 that a face makes its full impression upon us. Consequently 
 
6o PHYSIOGNOMY. 
 
 the first impression should be carefully attended to and noted, 
 even written down if the subje6l of it is of personal importance, 
 provided, of course, that one can trust one's own sense of 
 physiognomy. Subsequent acquaintance and intercourse will 
 obliterate the impression, but time will one day prove whether 
 it is true. 
 
 Let us, however, not conceal from ourselves the fa6l that 
 this first impression is for the most part extremely unedifying. 
 How poor most faces are ! With the exception of those that 
 are beautiful, good-natured, or intelledlual, that is to say, the 
 very few and far between, I believe a person of any fine feeling 
 scarcely ever sees a new face without a sensation akin to a 
 shock, for the reason that it presents a new and surprising 
 combination of unedifying elements. To tell the truth, it is, 
 as a rule, a sorry sight. There are some people whose faces 
 bear the stamp of such artless vulgarity and baseness of char- 
 a<fter, such an animal limitation of intelligence, that one 
 wonders how they can appear in public with such a counte- 
 nance, instead of wearing a mask. There are faces, indeed, 
 the very sight of which produces a feeling of pollution. One 
 cannot, therefore, take it amiss of people, whose privileged 
 position admits of it, if they manage to live in retirement and 
 completely free from the painful sensation of "seeing new 
 faces." The metaphysical explanation of this circumstance 
 rests upon the consideration that the individuality of a man 
 is precisely that by the very existence of which he should be 
 reclaimed and corrected. If, on the other hand, a psychologi- 
 cal explanation is satisfadlory, let any one ask himself what 
 kind of physiognomy he may expe6l in those who have all 
 their life long, except on the rarest occasions, harbored nothing 
 but petty, base and miserable thoughts, and vulgar, selfish, 
 envious, wicked and malicious desires. Every one of these 
 thoughts and desires has set its mark upon the face during the 
 time it lasted, and by constant repetition, all these marks have 
 in course of time become furrows and blotches, so to speak. 
 Consequently, most people's appearance is such as to produce 
 a shock at first sight ; and it is 6nly gradually that one gets, 
 
PHYSIOGNOMY. 6l 
 
 accustomed to it, that is to say, becomes so deadened to the 
 impression that it has no more effe6l on one. 
 
 And that the prevaiHng facial expression is the result of a 
 long process of innumerable, fleeting and characteristic con- 
 tra6lions of the features is just the reason why intelleftual 
 countenances are of gradual formation. It is, indeed, only in 
 old age that intellectual men attain their sublime expression, 
 whilst portraits of them in their youth show only the first 
 traces of it. But on the other hand, what I have just said 
 about the shock which the first sight of a face generally pro- 
 duces, is in keeping with the remark that it is only at that first 
 sight that it makes its true and full impression. For to get a 
 purely objedlive and uncorrupted impression of it, we must 
 stand in no kind of relation to the person ; if possible, we 
 must not yet have spoken with him. For every conversation 
 places us to some extent upon a friendly footing, establishes a 
 certain rapport, a mutual subjective relation, which is at once 
 unfavorable to an objective point of view. And as everyone's 
 endeavor is to win esteem or friendship for himself, the man 
 who is under observation will at once employ all those arts of 
 dissimulation in which he is already versed, and corrupt us 
 with his airs, hypocrisies and flatteries ; so that what the first 
 look clearly showed will soon be seen by us no more. 
 
 This fa(5l is at the bottom of the saying that ' ' most people 
 gain by further acquaintance;" it ought, however, to run, 
 " delude us by it." It is only when, later on, the bad qualities 
 manifest themselves, that our first judgment as a rule receives 
 its justification and makes good its scornful verdiCl. It may 
 be that "a further acquaintance" is an unfriendly one, and if 
 that is so, we do not find in this case either that people gain 
 by it. Another reason why people apparently gain on a 
 nearer acquaintance is that the man whose first aspeCl warns 
 us from him, as soon as we converse with him, no longer 
 shows his own being and charaCler, but also his education ; 
 that is, not only what he really is by nature, but also what he 
 has appropriated to himself out of the common wealth of man- 
 kind. Three-fourths of what he says belongs not to him, but 
 
62 PHYSIOGNOMY. 
 
 to the sources from which he obtained it ; so that we are often 
 surprised to hear a minotaur speak so humanly. If we make 
 , a still closer acquaintance, the animal nature, of which his face 
 gave promise, will manifest itself "in all its splendor." If 
 one is gifted with an acute sense for physiognomy, one should 
 take special note of those verdidls which preceded a closer 
 acquaintance and were therefore genuine. For the face of 
 a man is the exa6l expression of what he is ; and if he de- 
 ceives us, that is our fault, not his. What a man says, on the 
 other hand, is what he thinks, more often what he has learned, 
 or it may be even, what he pretends to think. And besides 
 this, when we talk to him, or even hear him talking to others, 
 we pay no attention to his physiognomy proper. It is the 
 underlying substance, the fundamental datum, and we disre- 
 gard it ; what interests us is its pathognomy, its play of feature 
 during conversation. This, however, is so arranged as to turn 
 the good side upwards. 
 
 When Socrates said to a young man who was introduced to 
 him to have his capabilities tested, ' ' Talk in order that I may 
 see you," if indeed by "seeing" he did not simply mean 
 "hearing," he was right, so far as it is only in conversation 
 that the features and especially the eyes become animated, and 
 the intelle6lual resources and capacities set their mark upon 
 the countenance. This puts us in a position to form a provi- 
 sional notion of the degree and capacity of intelligence ; which 
 was in that case Socrates' aim. But in this connedlion it is to 
 be observed, firstly, that the rule does not apply to moral 
 qualities, which lie deeper ; and in the second place, that what 
 from an objective point of view we gain by the clearer develop- 
 ment of the countenance in conversation, we lose from a sub- 
 jedlive standpoint on account of the personal relation into 
 which the speaker at once enters in regard to us, and which 
 produces a slight fascination, so that, as explained above, we 
 are not left impartial observers. Consequently from the last 
 point of view we might say with greater accuracy, "Do not 
 speak in order that I may see you. ' ' 
 
 For to get a pure and fundamental conception of a man's 
 
PHYSIOGNOMY. 63 
 
 physiognomy, we must observe him when he is alone and left 
 to himself. Society of any kind and conversation throw a 
 refle6lion upon him which is not his own, generally to his ad- 
 vantage ; as he is thereby placed in a state of a(5lion and 
 rea6lioH which sets him off. But alone and left to himself, plung- 
 ed in the depths of his own thoughts and sensations, he is 
 wholly himself, and a penetrating eye for physiognomy can at 
 one glance take a general view of his entire chara<5ler. For 
 his face, looked at by and in itself, expresses the keynote of all 
 his thoughts and endeavors, the arrH irrevocable, the irrevo- 
 cable decree of his destiny, the consciousness of which only 
 comes to him when he is alone. 
 
 The study of physiognomy is one of the chief means of a 
 knowledge of mankind, because the cast of a man's face is the 
 only sphere in which his arts of dissimulation are of no avail, 
 since these arts extend only to that play of feature which is 
 akin to mimicry. And that is why I recommend such a study 
 to be undertaken when the subje6l of it is alone and given up to 
 his own thoughts, and before he is spoken to : and this partly 
 for the reason that it is only in such a condition that inspection 
 of the physiognomy pure and simple is possible, because con- 
 versation at once lets in a pathognomical element, in which a 
 man can apply the arts of dissimulation which he has learned : 
 partly again because personal contadl, even of the very slight- 
 est kind, gives a certain bias and so corrupts the judgment of 
 the observer. 
 
 And in regard to the study of physiognomy in general, it is 
 further to be observed that intelle<5tual capacity is much easier 
 of discernment than moral chara6ler. The former naturally 
 takes a much more outward dire6lion, and expresses itself not 
 only in the face and the play of feature, but also in the gait, 
 down even to the very slightest movement. One could per- 
 haps discriminate from behind between a blockhead, a fool and 
 a man of genius. The blockhead would be discerned by the 
 torpidity and sluggishness of all his movements : folly sets its 
 mark upon every gesture, and so does intelledl and a studious 
 nature. Hence that remark of La Bruyere that there is nothmg 
 
64 PHYSIOGNOMY. 
 
 SO slight, so simple or imperceptible but that our way of doing 
 it enters in and betrays us : a fool neither comes nor goes, nor 
 sits down, nor gets up, nor holds his tongue, nor moves about 
 in the same way as an intelligent man. (And this is, be it ob- 
 served by way of parenthesis, the explanation of that sure and 
 certain instinct which, according to Helvetius, ordinary folk 
 possess of discerning people of genius, and of getting out of 
 their way.) 
 
 The chief reason for this is that, the larger and more devel- 
 oped the brain, and the thinner, in relation to it, the spine and 
 nerves, the greater is the intellect ; and not the intellect alone, 
 but at the same time the mobility and pliancy of all the limbs ; 
 because the brain controls them more immediately and reso- 
 lutely ; so that everything hangs more upon a single thread, 
 every movement of which gives a precise expression to its 
 purpose. 
 
 This is analogous to, nay, is immediately conne6led with 
 the fa6l that the higher an animal stands in the scale of 
 development, the easier it becomes to kill it by wounding a 
 single spot. Take, for example, batrachia : they are slow, 
 cumbrous and sluggish in their movements ; they are unintelli- 
 gent, and, at the same time, extremely tenacious of life ; the 
 reason of which is that, with a very small brain, their spine and 
 nerves are very thick. 
 
 Now gait and movement of the arms are mainly func- 
 tions of the brain ; our limbs receive their motion and 
 every httle modification of it from the brain through the 
 medium of the spine. 
 
 This is why conscious movements fatigue us : the sensation 
 of fatigue, like that of pain, has its seat in the brain, not, 
 as people commonly suppose, in the limbs themselves ; hence 
 motion induces sleep. 
 
 On the other hand those motions which are not excited by 
 the brain, that is, the unconscious movements of organic life, 
 of the heart, of the lungs, etc., go on in their course without 
 producing fatigue. And as thought, equally with motion, is a 
 fundlion of the brain, the character of the brain's adlivity is 
 
PHYSIOGNOMY. 65 
 
 expressed equally in both, according to the constitution of 
 the individual ; stupid people move like lay-figures, while 
 every joint of an intelligent man is eloquent. 
 
 But gesture and movement are not nearly so good an 
 index of intellectual qualities as the face, the shape and size 
 of the brain, the contraction and movement of the features, and 
 above all the eye, — from the small, dull, dead-looking eye of 
 a pig up through all gradations to the irradiating, flashing eyes 
 of a genius. 
 
 The look of good sense and prudence, even of the best 
 kind, differs from that of genius, in that the former bears 
 the stamp of subjection to the will, while the latter is free 
 from it. 
 
 And therefore one can well believe the anecdote told 
 by Squarzafichi in his life of Petrarch, and taken from Joseph 
 Brivius, a contemporary of the poet, how once at the court of 
 the Visconti, when Petrarch and other noblemen and gentle- 
 men were present, Galeazzo Visconti told his son, who was 
 then a mere boy (he was afterwards first Duke of Milan), to 
 pick out the wisest of the company ; how the boy looked at 
 them all for a little, and then took Petrarch by the hand and 
 led him up to his father, to the great admiration of all pres- 
 ent. For so clearly does nature set the mark of her dignity 
 on the privileged among mankind that even a child can dis- 
 cern it. 
 
 Therefore, I should advise my sagacious countrymen, if 
 ever again they wish to trumpet about for thirty years a very 
 commonplace person as a great genius, not to choose for the 
 purpose such a beerhouse keeper physiognomy as was possess- 
 ed by that philosopher, upon whose face nature had written, 
 in her clearest characters, the familiar inscription, " common- 
 place person." 
 
 But what applies to intellectual capacity will not apply to 
 moral qualities, to character. It is more difficult to discern its 
 physiognomy, because, being of a metaphysical nature, it hes 
 incomparably deeper. 
 
 It is true that moral character is also conneCted with the 
 
66 PHYSIOGNOMY. 
 
 constitution, with the organism^ but not so immediately or in 
 such direfl connexion with definite parts of its system as is 
 intelledtual capacity. 
 
 Hence while everyone makes a show of his intelligence 
 and endeavors to exhibit it at every opportunity, as some- 
 thing with which he is in general quite contented, few expose 
 their moral qualities freely, and most people intentionally 
 cover them up ; and long pradtice makes the concealment 
 perfe6l. In the meantime, as I explained above, wicked 
 thoughts and worthless efforts gradually set their mask upon 
 the face, especially the eyes. So that, judging by physi- 
 ognomy, it is easy to warrant that a given man will never 
 produce an immortal work ; but not that he will never com- 
 mit a great crime. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 FOR every animal, and more especially for man, a certain 
 conformity and proportion between the will and the intel- 
 lect is necessary for existing or making any progress in the 
 world. The more precise and corred; the proportion which 
 nature establishes, the more easy, safe and agreeable will be 
 the passage through the world. Still, if the right point is only 
 approximately reached, it will be enough to ward off destruc- 
 tion. There are, then, certain limits within which the said 
 proportion may vary, and yet preserve a corre6l standard of 
 conformity. The normal standard is as follows. The obje6l 
 of the intellect is to light and lead the will on its path, and 
 therefore, the greater the force, impetus and passion, which 
 spurs on the will from within, the more complete and luminous 
 must be the intellect which is attached to it, that the vehement 
 strife of the will, the glow of passion, and the intensity of the 
 emotions, may not lead man astray, or urge him on to ill con- 
 sidered, false or ruinous adlion ; this will, inevitably, be the 
 result, if the will is very violent and the intellect very weak. 
 On the other hand, a phlegmatic chara6ler, a weak and lan- 
 guid will, can get on and hold its own with a small amount of 
 intelled: ; what is naturally moderate needs only moderate 
 support. The general tendency of a want of proportion be- 
 tween the will and the intelledl, in other words, of any varia- 
 tion from the normal proportion I have mentioned, is to pro- 
 duce unhappiness, whether it be that the will is greater than 
 the intelle6l, or the intelle6l greater than the will. Especially 
 is this the case \yhen the intellect is developed to an abnormal 
 degree of strength and superiority, so as to be out of all pro- 
 portion to the will, a condition which is the essence of real 
 
 (67) 
 
68 PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 genius ; the intelle6l is then not only more than enough for 
 the needs and aims of life, it is absolutely prejudicial to them. 
 The result is that, in youth, excessive energy in grasping the 
 objed^ive world, accompanied by a vivid imagination and a 
 total lack of experience, makes the mind susceptible, and an 
 easy prey to extravagant ideas, nay, even to chimeras ; and 
 the result is an eccentric and phantastic character. And when, 
 in later years, this state of mind yields and passes away under 
 the teaching of experience, still the genius never feels himself 
 at home in the common world of every day and the ordinary 
 business of life ; he will never take his place in it, and accom- 
 modate himself to it as accurately as the person of normal in- 
 telle6t ; he will be much more likely to make curious mistakes. 
 For the ordinary mind feels itself so completely at home in the 
 narrow circle of its ideas and views of the world that no one 
 can get the better of it in that sphere ; its faculties remain true 
 to their original purpose, viz., to promote the service of the 
 will ; it devotes itself steadfastly to this end, and abjures ex- 
 travagant aims. The genius, on the other hand, is at bottom 
 a monstrum per excessum ; just as, conversely, the passionate, 
 violent and unintelligent man, the brainless barbarian, is a 
 monstrum per de/enum. 
 
 The will to live, which forms the inmost core of every living 
 being, exhibits itself most conspicuously in the higher order 
 of animals, that is, the cleverer ones ; and so in them the 
 nature of the will may be seen and examined most clearly. 
 For in the lower orders its adlivity is not so evident ; it has a 
 lower degree of objedlivation ; whereas, in the class which 
 stands, above the higher order of animals, that is, in men, 
 reason enters in ; and with reason comes discretion, and with 
 discretion, the capacity for dissimulation, which throws a veil 
 over the operations of the will. And in mankind, consequent- 
 ly, the will appears without its mask only in the affections and 
 the passions. And this is the reason why passion, when it 
 speaks, always wins credence, no matter what the passion may 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 69 
 
 be ; and rightly so. For the same reason the passions are the 
 main theme of poets and the stalking horse of a6lors. The 
 conspicuousness of the will in the lower order of animals ex- 
 plains the delight we take in dogs, apes, cats, etc. ; it is the 
 entirely naive way in which they express themselves that gives 
 us so much pleasure. 
 
 The sight of any free animal going about its business undis- 
 turbed, seeking its food, or looking after its young, or mixing 
 in the company of its kind, all the time being exadlly what it 
 ought to be and can be, — what a strange pleasure it gives us ! 
 Even if it is only a bird, I can watch it for a long time with de- 
 light ; or a water rat or a hedgehog ; or better still, a weasel, 
 a deer, or a stag. The main reason why we take so much 
 pleasure in looking at animals is that we like to see our own 
 nature in such a simplified form. There is only one menda- 
 cious being in the world, and that is man. Every other is true 
 and sincere, and makes no attempt to conceal what it is, ex- 
 pressing its feelings just as they are. 
 
 Many things are put down to the force of habit which are 
 rather to be attributed to the constancy and immutability of 
 original, innate chara<5ler, according to which under like cir- 
 cumstances we always do the same thing : whether it happens 
 for the first or the hundredth time, it is in virtue of the same 
 necessity. Real force of habit, as a matter of fa6l, rests upon 
 that indolent, passive disposition which seeks to relieve the in- 
 telledl and the will of a fresh choice, and so makes us do what 
 we did yesterday and have done a hundred times before, and 
 of which we know that it will attain its obje6l. 
 
 But the truth of the matter lies deeper, and a more precise 
 explanation of it can be given than appears at first sight. 
 Bodies which may be moved by mechanical means only are 
 subje6l to the power of inertia ; and applied to bodies which 
 may be adled on by motives, this power becomes the force of 
 habit. The actions which we perform by mere habit come 
 about, in fa6l, without any individual separate motive brought 
 
yo PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 into play for the particular case : hence, in performing them, 
 we really do not think about them. A motive was present 
 only on the first few occasions on which the ad^ion happened, 
 which has since become a habit : the secondary after- effe<5l of 
 this motive is the present habit, and it is sufficient to enable 
 the a6lion to continue : just as when a body has been set in 
 motion by a push, it requires no more pushing in order to con- 
 tinue its motion ; it will go on to all eternity, if it meets with 
 no fridlion. It is the same in the case of animals : training is 
 a habit which is forced upon them. The horse goes on draw- 
 ing his cart quite contentedly, without having to be urged on : 
 the motion is the continued effect of those strokes of the whip, 
 which urged him on at first : by the law of inertia they have 
 become perpetuated as habit. All this is really more than a 
 mere parable : it is the underlying identity of the will at very 
 different degrees of its objedtivation, in virtue of which the 
 same law of motion takes such different forms. 
 
 ^ ?|C ^ «|C 
 
 Vive muchos anos is the ordinary greeting in Spain, and all 
 over the earth it is quite customary to wish people a long life. 
 It is presumably not a knowledge of life which directs such a 
 wish ; it is rather knowledge of what man is in his inmost 
 nature, the will to live. i 
 
 The wish which everyone has that he may be remembered 
 after his death, — a wish which rises to the longing for posthu- 
 mous glory in the case of those whose aims are high, — seems 
 to me to spring from this clinging to life. When the time 
 comes which cuts a man off from every possibility of real ex- 
 istence, he strives after a life which is still attainable, even 
 though it be a shadowy and ideal one. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 The deep grief we feel at the loss of a friend arises from the 
 feeling that in every individual there is something which no 
 words can express, something which is peculiarly his own and 
 therefore irreparable. Omne individuum ineffabile. 
 if. ^ i(i % 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 7 1 
 
 We may come to look upon the death of our enemies and 
 adversaries, even long after it has occurred, with just as much 
 regret as we feel for that of our friends, viz. , when we miss 
 them as witnesses of our brilliant success. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 That the sudden announcement of a very happy event may 
 easily prove fatal rests upon the fa6l that happiness and misery 
 depend merely on the proportion which our claims bear to 
 what we get. Accordingly, the good things we possess, or 
 are certain of getting, are not felt to be such ; because all 
 pleasure is in fadl of a negative nature and effeds the relief of 
 pain, while pain or evil is what is really positive ; it is the ob- 
 je6l of immediate sensation. With the possession or certain 
 expe6lation of good things our demand rises, and increases 
 our capacity for further possession and larger expedlations, 
 But if we are depressed by continual misfortune, and our claims 
 reduced to a minimum, the sudden advent of happiness finds 
 no capacity for enjoying it. Neutralized by an absence of 
 pre-existing claims, its effe6ls are apparently positive, and so 
 its whole force is brought into play ; hence it may possibly 
 break our feelings, i. e. , be fatal to them And so, as is well 
 known, one must be careful in announcing great happiness. 
 First, one must get the person to hope for it, then open up the 
 prospedl of it, then communicate part of it, and at last make it 
 fully known. Every portion of the good news loses its efficacy, 
 because it is anticipated by a demand, and room is left for an 
 increase in it. In view of all this, it may be said that our 
 stomach for good fortune is bottomless, but the entrance to it 
 is narrow. These remarks are not applicable to great mis- 
 fortunes in the same way. They are more seldom fetal, be 
 cause hope always sets itself against them. That an analogous 
 part is not played by fear in the case of happiness results from 
 the fad that we are instindively more inclined to hope than to 
 fear ; just as our eyes turn of themselves towards light rather 
 than darkness. 
 
 ♦ * * * 
 
72 PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 Hope 's the result of coniusing the desire that something 
 should take place with the probability that it will. Perhaps no 
 man is free from this folly of the heart, which deranges the 
 intelledi's corredl appreciation of probability to such an ex- 
 tent that, if the chances are a thousand to one against it, yet 
 the event is thought a likely one. Still in spite of this, a 
 sudden misfortune is like a death stroke, whilst a hope that is 
 always disappointed and still never dies, is like death by pro- 
 longed torture. 
 
 He who has lost all hope has also lost all fear ; this is the 
 meaning of the expression "desperate." It is natural to a 
 man to believe what he wishes to be true, and to believe it be- 
 cause he wishes it. If this characSleristic of our nature, at once 
 beneficial and assuaging, is rooted out by many hard blows of 
 fate, and a man comes, conversely, to a condition in which he 
 believes a thing must happen because he does not wish it, and 
 what he wishes to happen can never be, just because he wishes 
 it, this is in reality the state described as " desperation." 
 
 That we are so often deceived in others is not because our 
 judgment is at fault, but because in general, as Bacon says, 
 intelle^lus luminis sicci non est, sed recipit infusionem a volun- 
 tate et affcHibus : that is to say, trifles unconsciously bias us 
 for or against a person from the very beginning. It may also 
 be explained by our not abiding by the qualities which we 
 really discover ; we go on to conclude the presence of others 
 which we think inseparable from them, or the absence of those 
 which we consider incompatible. For instance, when we per- 
 ceive generosity, we infer justice ; from piety, we infer hones- 
 ty ; from lying, deception ; from deception, stealing, etc. ; a 
 procedure which opens the door to many false views, partly be- 
 cause human nature is so strange, partly because our stand- 
 point is so one-sided. It is true, indeed, that character always 
 forms a consistent and connected whole ; but the roots of all 
 its qualities lie too deep to allow of our concluding from particu- 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 73 
 
 lar data in a given case whether certain qualities can or cannot 
 2xist together. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 We often happen to say things that may in some way or 
 other be prejudicial to us ; but we keep silent about things 
 that might make us look ridiculous ; because in this case effe<5l 
 follows very quickly on cause. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 The pain of an unfulfilled wish is small in comparison with 
 that of repentance ; for the one stands in the presence of the 
 vast open future, whilst the other has the irrevocable past 
 closed behind it. 
 
 1* •P ^F *l* ' 
 
 Geduld, patientia, patience, especially the Spanish su/rimi- 
 ento, is strongly conne6led with the notion of suffering. It is 
 therefore a passive state, just as the opposite is an a6live state 
 of the mind, with which, when great, patience is incompatible. 
 It is the innate virtue of phlegmatic, indolent, and spiritless 
 people, as also of women. But that it is nevertheless so very 
 useful and necessary is a sign that the world is very badly 
 constituted. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Money is human happiness in the abstra<ft : he, then, who 
 is no longer capable of enjoying human happiness in the con- 
 crete, devotes his heart entirely to money. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Obstinacy is the result of the will forcing itself into the 
 place of the intelle<5l. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 If you want to find out your real opinion of anyone, ob- 
 serve the impression made upon you by the first sight of 
 a letter from him. 
 
 * * * ♦ 
 
 The course of our individual life and the events in it, as far 
 as their true meaning and connection is concerned, may be 
 
74 PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 compared to a piece of rough mosaic. So long as you stand 
 close in front of it, you cannot get a right view of the objeAs 
 presented, nor perceive their significance or beauty. Both 
 come in sight only when you stand a little way off. And in 
 the same way you often understand the true conne<5lion of im- 
 portant events in your life, not while they are going on, nor soon 
 after they are past, but only a considerable time afterwards. 
 
 Is this so, because we require the magnifying effe6l of imag- 
 ination ? or because we can get a general view only from a dis- 
 tance ? or because the school of experience makes our judgment 
 ripe ? Perhaps all of these together : but it is certain that we 
 often view in the right light the a6lions of others, and occa- 
 sionally even our own, only after the lapse of years. And as 
 it is in one's own life, so it is in history. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Happy circumstances in life are like certain groups of trees. 
 Seen from a distance they look very well : but go up to them 
 and amongst them, and the beauty vanishes ; you don't know 
 where it can be ; it is only trees you see. And so it is that 
 we often envy the lot of others. 
 
 * * * » 
 
 The dodor sees all the weakness of mankind, the lawyer all 
 the wickedness, the theologian all the stupidity. 
 
 * * * « 
 
 A person of phlegmatic disposition who is a blockhead, 
 would, with a sanguine nature, be a fool. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Now and then one learns something, but one forgets the 
 whole day long. 
 
 Moreover our memory is like a sieve, the holes of which in 
 time get larger and larger : the older we get, the quicker any- 
 thing entrusted to it slips from the memory, whereas, what 
 was fixed fast in it in early days is there still. The memory of 
 an old man gets clearer and clearer, the further it goes back, 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 75 
 
 and less clear the nearer it approaches the present time ; so 
 that his memory, like his eyes, becomes short-sighted. 
 
 3|C ^ 3|C *^ 
 
 In the process of learning you may be apprehensive about 
 bewildering and confusing the memory, but not about over- 
 loading it, in the stri6l sense of the word. The faculty for re- 
 membering is not diminished in proportion to what one has 
 learnt, just as little as the number of moulds in which you cast 
 sand, lessens its capacity for being cast in new moulds. In this 
 sense the memory is bottomless. And yet the greater and 
 more various anyone's knowledge, the longer he takes to find 
 out anything that may suddenly be asked him ; because he is 
 like a shopkeeper who has to get the article wanted from a 
 large and multifarious store ; or, more striftly speaking, be- 
 cause out of many possible trains of thought he has to recall 
 exadly that one which, as a result of previous training, leads 
 to the matter in question. For the memory is not a repository 
 of things you wish to preserve, but a mere dexterity of the 
 intelle<5tual powers ; hence the mind always contains its sum of 
 knowledge only potentially, never a6lually. 
 
 It sometimes happens that my memory will not reproduce 
 some word in a foreign language, or a name, or some artistic 
 expression, although I know it very well. After I have bother- 
 ed myself in vain about it for a longer or a shorter time, I give 
 up thinking about it altogether. An hour or two afterwards, 
 in rare cases even later still, sometimes only after four or five 
 weeks, the word I was trying to recall occurs to me while I am 
 thinking of something else, as suddenly as if some one had 
 whispered it to me. After noticing this phenomenon with 
 wonder for very many years, I have come to think that the 
 probable explanation of it is as follows. After the troublesome 
 and unsuccessful search, my will retains its craving to know the 
 word, and so sets a watch for it in the intelle<5l. Later on, in 
 the course and play of thought, some word by chance occurs 
 having the same initial letters or some other resemblance to the 
 word which is sought ; then the sentinel springs forward and 
 
76 PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 supplies what is wanting to make up the word, seizes it, and 
 suddenly brings it up in triumph, without my knowing where 
 and how he got it ; so it seems as if some one had whispered 
 it to me. It is the same process as that adopted by a teacher 
 towards a child who cannot repeat a word ; the teacher just 
 suggests the first letter of the word, or even the second too ; 
 then the child remembers it. In default of this process, you 
 can end by going methodically through all the letters of the 
 alphabet. 
 
 In the ordinary man, injustice rouses a passionate desire for 
 vengeance ; and it has often been said that vengeance is sweet. 
 How many sacrifices have been made just to enjoy the feeling 
 of vengeance, without any intention of causing an amount of 
 injury equivalent to what one has suffered. The bitter death 
 of the centaur Nessus was sweetened by the certainty that he 
 had used his last moments to work out an extremely clever 
 vengeance. Walter Scott expresses the same human inclina- 
 tion in language as true as it is strong: " Vengeance is the 
 sweetest morsel to the mouth that ever was cooked in hell ! ' ' 
 I shall now attempt a psychological explanation of it. 
 
 Suffering which falls to our lot in the course of nature, or by 
 chance, or fate, does not, ceteris paribus, seem so painful as 
 suffering which is inflifted on us by the arbitrary will of an- 
 other. This is because we look upon nature and chance as 
 the fundamental masters of the world ; we see that the blow 
 we received from them might just as well have feillen on an- 
 other. In the case of suffering which springs from this source, 
 we bewail the common lot of humanity rather than our own 
 misfortune. But that it is the arbitrary will of another which 
 inflidls the suffering, is a peculiarly bitter addition to the pain 
 or injury it causes, viz. , the consciousness that some one else 
 is superior to us, whether by force or cunning, while we lie 
 helpless. If amends are possible, amends heal the injury ; but 
 that bitter addition, " and it was you who did that to me," 
 which is often more painful than the injury itself, is only to be 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 77 
 
 neutralized by vengeance. By infli<5ling injury on the one who 
 has injured us, whether we do it by force or cunning, is to 
 show our superiority to him, and to annul the proof of his 
 superiority to us. That gives our hearts the satisfaction to- 
 wards which it yearns. So where there is a great deal of 
 pride or vanity, there also will there be a great desire of 
 vengeance. But as the fulfillment of every wish brings with it 
 more or less of a sense of disappointment, so it is with ven- 
 geance. The delight we hope to get from it is mostly embit- 
 tered by compassion. Vengeance taken will often tear the 
 heart and torment the conscience : the motive to it is no 
 longer a6tive, and what remains is the evidence of our malice. 
 
Tnr.s, 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 WHEN the Church says that, in the dogmas of religion, 
 reason is totally incompetent and blind, and its use to 
 be reprehended, it is in reality attesting the fa6l that these 
 dogmas are allegorical in their nature, and are not to be judg- 
 ed by the standard which reason, taking all things sensu proprio^ 
 can alone apply. Now the absurdities of a dogma are just the 
 mark and sign of what is allegorical and mythical in it. In the 
 case under consideration, however, the absurdities spring from 
 the facft that two such heterogeneous do6lrines as those of the 
 Old and New Testaments had to be combined. The great 
 allegory was of gradual growth. Suggested by external and 
 adventitious circumstances, it was developed by the interpreta- 
 tion put upon them, an interpretation in quiet touch with 
 certain deep-lying truths only half realized. The allegory was 
 finally completed by Augustine, who penetrated deepest into 
 its meaning, and so was able to conceive it as a systematic 
 whole and supply its defers. Hence the Augustinian doArine, 
 confirmed by Luther, is the complete form of Christianity ; and 
 the Protestants of to-day, who take Revelation sensu propria 
 and confine it to a single individual, are in error in looking 
 upon the first beginnings of Christianity as its most perfe6l ex- 
 pression. But the bad thing about all religions is that, instead 
 of being able to confess their allegorical nature, they have to 
 conceal it ; accordingly, they parade their do6lrines in all 
 seriousness as true sensu propria, and as absurdities form an 
 essential part of these do6lrines, you have the great mischief of 
 a continual fraud. And, what is worse, the day arrives when 
 they are no longer true sensu propria, and then ;here is an end 
 
 of them ; so that, in that respe6l, it would be better to admit 
 
 (78) 
 
THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 79 
 
 their allegorical nature at once. But the difficulty is to teach 
 the multitude that something can be both true and untrue at 
 the same time. And as all religions are in a greater or less 
 degree of this nature, we must recognize the fa6l that mankind 
 cannot get on without a certain amount of absurdity, that ab- 
 surdity is an element in its existence, and illusion indispens- 
 able ; as indeed other aspects of life testify. 
 
 I have said that the combination of the Old Testament with 
 the New gives rise to absurdities. Among the examples 
 which illustrate what I mean, I may cite the Christian doctrine 
 of Predestination and Grace, as formulated by Augustine and 
 adopted from him by Luther ; according to which one man is 
 endowed with grace and another is not. Grace, then, comes 
 to be a privilege received at birth and brought ready into the 
 world ; a privilege, too, in a matter second to none in import- 
 ance. What is obnoxious and absurd in this do6trine may be 
 traced to the idea contained in the Old Testament, that man is 
 the creation of an external will, which called him into exist- 
 ence out of nothing. It is quite true that genuine moral ex- 
 cellence is really innate ; but the meaning of the Christian 
 doctrine is expressed in another and more rational way by the 
 theory of metempsychosis, common to Brahmans and Budd- 
 hists. According to this theory, the qualities which distin- 
 guish one man from another are received at birth, are brought, 
 that is to say, from another world and a former life ; these 
 qualities are not an external gift of grace, but are the fruits of 
 the a6ts committed in that other world. But Augustine's 
 dogma of Predestination is connected with another dogma, 
 namely, that the mass of humanity is corrupt and doomed to 
 eternal damnation, that very few will be found righteous and 
 attain salvation, and that only in consequence of the gift of 
 grace, and because they are predestined to be saved ; whilst 
 the remainder will be overwhelmed by the perdition they have 
 deserved, viz., eternal torment in hell. Taken in its ordinary 
 meaning, the dogma is revolting, for it comes to this ; it con- 
 demns a man, who may be, perhaps, scarcely twenty years of 
 
8o THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 age, to expiate his errors, or even his unbelief, in everlasting 
 torment ; nay, more, it makes this almost universal damnation 
 the natural effe6i of original sin, and therefore the necessary 
 consequence of the Fall. This is a result which must have been 
 foreseen by him who made mankind, and who, in the first 
 place, made them not better than they are, and secondly, set 
 a trap for them into which he must have known they would 
 fall ; for he made the whole world, and nothing is hidden from 
 him. According to this doctrine, then, God created out of 
 nothing a weak race prone to sin, in order to give them over 
 to endless torment. And, as a last chara6leristic, we are told 
 that this God, who prescribes forbearance and forgiveness of 
 every fault, exercises none himself, but does the exa<5l opposite ; 
 for a punishment which comes at the end of all things, when 
 the world is over and done with, cannot have for its obje6l 
 either to improve or deter, and is therefore pure vengeance. 
 So that, on this view, the whole race is adlually destined to 
 eternal torture and damnation, and created expressly for this 
 end, the only exception being those few persons who are 
 rescued by ele<5lion of grace, from what motive one does not 
 know. 
 
 Putting these aside, it looks as if the Blessed Lord had creat- 
 ed the world for the benefit of the devil ! it would have been so 
 much better not to have made it at all. So much, then, for a 
 dogma taken sensu propria. But look at it sensu allegorico, 
 and the whole matter becomes capable of a satisfactory inter- 
 pretation. What is absurd and revolting in this dogma is, in 
 the main, as I said, the simple outcome of Jewish theism, with 
 its "creation out of nothing," and the really foolish and 
 paradoxical denial of the doctrine of metempsychosis which is 
 mvolved in that idea, a dodtrine which is natural, to a certain 
 extent self-evident, and, with the exception of the Jews, accept- 
 ed by nearly the whole human race at all times. To remove 
 the enormous evil arising from Augustine's dogma, and to 
 modify its revolting nature, Pope Gregory I., in the sixth 
 century, very prudently matured the dodlrine of Purgatory, the 
 essence of which already existed in Origen, (cf Bayle's article 
 
THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 8l 
 
 on Origen, note B.) The do6lrine was regularly incorporated 
 into the faith of the Church, so that the original view was 
 much modified, and a certain substitute provided for the 
 doctrine of metempsychosis ; for both the one and the other 
 admit a process of purification. To the same end, the doc- 
 trine of ' ' the Restoration of all things ' ' (dTroKaTaardmc) was 
 established, according to which, in the last adl of the Human 
 Comedy, the sinners one and all will be reinstated in integrum. 
 It is only Protestants, with their obstinate belief in the Bible, 
 who cannot be induced to give up eternal punishment in hell. 
 If one were spiteful, one might say, " much good may it do 
 them," but it is consoling to think that they really do not be- 
 lieve the do6lrine ; they leave it alone, thinking in their hearts, 
 " It can't be so bad as all that." 
 
 The rigid and systematic chara6ler of his mind led Augustine, 
 in his austere dogmatism and his resolute definition of doctrines 
 only just indicated in the Bible and, as a matter of fa(5t, resting 
 on very vague grounds, to give hard outlines to these doc- 
 trines and to put a harsh construction on Christianity : the re- 
 sult of which is that his views offend us, and just as in his day 
 Pelagianism arose to combat them, so now in our day Rational- 
 ism does the same. Take, for example, the case as he states 
 it generally in the De Civitate Dei. Bk. xii. ch. 21. It comes 
 to this : God creates a being out of nothing, forbids him some 
 things, and enjoins others upon him ; and because these com- 
 mands are not obeyed, he tortures him to all eternity with 
 every conceivable anguish ; and for this purpose, binds soul 
 and body inseparably together, so that, instead of the torment 
 destroying this being by splitting him up into his elements, 
 and so setting him free, he may live to eternal pain. This 
 poor creature, formed out of nothing ! At least, he has a 
 claim on his original nothing : he should be assured, as a 
 matter of right, of this last retreat, which, in any case, cannot 
 be a very evil one : it is what he has inherited. I, at any rate, 
 cannot help sympathizing with him. If you add to this 
 Augustine's remaining do6lrines, that all this does not depend 
 on the man's own sins and omissions, but was already predes- 
 
82 THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 tined to happen, one really is at a loss what to think. Our 
 highly educated Rationalists say, to be sure, "It's all false, 
 it's a mere bugbear; we're in a state of constant progress, 
 step by step raising ourselves to ever greater perfedlion." 
 Ah ! what a pity we didn't begin sooner ; we should already 
 have been there. 
 
 In the Christian system the devil is a personage of the great- 
 est importance. God is described as absolutely good, wise 
 and powerful ; and unless he were counterbalanced by the 
 devil, it would be impossible to see where the innumerable 
 and measureless evils, which predominate in the world, come 
 from, if there were no devil to account for them. And since 
 the Rationalists have done away with the devil, the damage 
 infli6^ed on the other side has gone on growing, and is becom- 
 ing more and more palpable ; as might have been foreseen, and 
 was foreseen, by the orthodox. The fa<5l is, you cannot take 
 away one pillar from a building without endangering the rest 
 of it. And this confirms the view, which has been established 
 on other grounds, that Jehovah is a transformation of Ormuzd, 
 and Satan of the Ahriman who must be taken in connection 
 with him. Ormuzd himself is a transformation of Indra. 
 
 Christianity has this peculiar disadvantage, that, unlike 
 other rehgions, it is not a pure system of do6lrine : its chief 
 and essential feature is that it is a history, a series of events, a 
 coUedion of fads, a statement of the actions and sufferings of 
 individuals : it is this history which constitutes dogma, and 
 belief in it is salvation. Other religions. Buddhism, for in- 
 stance, have, it is true, historical appendages, the life, namely, 
 of their founders : this, however, is not part and parcel of the 
 dogma, but is taken along with it. For example, the Lalitav- 
 istara may be compared with the Gospel so far as it contains 
 the life of Sakya-muni, the Buddha of the present period of the 
 world's history : but this is something which is quite separate 
 and different from the dogma, from the system itself: and for 
 this reason ; the lives of former Buddhas were quite other, and 
 
THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 83 
 
 those of the future will be quite other, than the life of the 
 Buddha of to-day. The dogma is by no means one with the 
 career of its founder ; it does not rest on individual persons or 
 events ; it is something universal and equally valid at all times. 
 The Lalitavistara is not, then, a gospel in the Christian sense 
 of the word ; it is not the joyful message of an a&. of redemp- 
 tion ; it is the career of him who has shown how each one may 
 redeem himself. The historical constitution of Christianity 
 makes the Chinese laugh at missionaries as story-tellers. 
 
 I may mention here another fundamental error of Chris- 
 tianity, an error which cannot be explained away, and the 
 mischievous consequences of which are obvious every day : I 
 mean the unnatural distindlion Christianity makes between 
 man and the animal world to which he really belongs. It sets 
 up man as all-important, and looks upon animals as merely 
 things. Brahmanism and Buddhism, on the other hand, true 
 to the fa6ls, recognize in a . positive way that man is related 
 generally to the whole of nature, and specially and principally 
 to animal nature ; and in their systems man is always repre- 
 sented, by the theory of metempsychosis and otherwise, as 
 closely connecfted with the animal world. The important part 
 played by animals all through Buddhism and Brahmanism, 
 compared with the total disregard of them in Judaism and 
 Christianity, puts an end to any question as to which system is 
 nearer perfection, however much we in Europe may have be- 
 come accustomed to the absurdity of the claim. Christianity 
 contains, in fact, a great and essential imperfeAion in limiting 
 its precepts to man, and in refusing rights to the entire animal 
 world. As religion fails to prote6l animals against the rough, 
 unfeeling and often more than bestial multitude, the duty falls 
 to the police ; and as the police are unequal to the task, socie- 
 ties for the protection of animals are now formed all over 
 Europe and America. In the whole of uncircumcised Asia, 
 such a procedure would be the most superfluous thing in the 
 world, because animals are there sufficiently protected by 
 religion, which even makes them obje6ls of charity. How 
 such charitable feelings bear fruit may be seen, to take an ex- 
 
84 THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 ample, in the great hospital for animals at Surat, whither 
 Christians, Mohammedans and Jews can send their sick beasts, 
 which, if cured, are very rightly not restored to their owners. 
 In the same way when a Brahman or a Buddhist has a slice of 
 good luck, a happy issue in any affair, instead of mumbling a 
 Te Deum, he goes to the market-place and buys birds and 
 opens their cages at the city gate ; a thing which may be fre- 
 quently seen in Astrachan, where the adherents of every 
 religion meet together : and so on in a hundred similar ways. 
 On the other hand, look at the revolting ruffianism with which 
 our Christian public treats its animals ; killing them for no 
 obje<5l at all, and laughing over it, or mutilating or torturing 
 them : even its horses, who form its most dire6l means of liveli- 
 hood, are strained to the utmost in their old age, and the last 
 strength worked out of their poor bones until they succumb at 
 last under the whip. One might say with truth, Mankind are 
 the devils of the earth, and the animals the souls they torment. 
 But what can you expe6l from the masses, when there are men 
 of education, zoologists even, who, instead of admitting what 
 is so familiar to them, the essential identity of man and animal, 
 are bigoted and stupid enough to offer a zealous opposition to 
 their honest and rational colleagues, when they class man under 
 the proper head as an animal, or demonstrate the resemblance 
 between him and the chimpanzee or ourang-outang. It is a 
 revolting thing that a writer who is so pious and Christian in 
 his sentiments as Jung Stilling should use a simile like this, in 
 his Scenen aus dem Geisterreich. (Bk. II. sc. i., p. 15.) 
 ' ' Suddenly the skeleton shriveled up into an indescribably 
 hideous and dwarf-like form, just as when you bring a large 
 spider into the focus of a burning glass, and watch the purulent 
 blood hiss and bubble in the heat." This man of God then 
 was guilty of such infamy ! or looked on quietly when another 
 was committing it ! in either case it comes to the same thing 
 here. So little harm did he think of it that he tells us of it in 
 passing, and without a trace of emotion. Such are the effects 
 of the first chapter of Genesis, and, in fa<5l, of the whole of the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 85 
 
 Jewish conception of nature. The standard recognized by the 
 Hindus and Buddhists is the Mahavakya (the great word), — 
 " tat-twam-asi," (this is thyself), which may always be spoken 
 of every animal, to keep us in mind of the identity of his 
 inmost being with ours. Perfe6lion of morality, indeed ! 
 Nonsense. 
 
 The fundamental characteristics of the Jewish religion are 
 realism and optimism, views of the world which are closely 
 allied ; they form, in fa<5l, the conditions of theism. For 
 theism looks upon the material world as absolutely real, and 
 regards life as a pleasant gift bestowed upon us. On the other 
 hand, the fundamental chara6leristics of the Brahman and 
 Buddhist religions are idealism and pessimism, which look up- 
 on the existence of the world as in the nature of a dream, and 
 life as the result of our sins. In the do6lrines of the Zendavesta, 
 from which, as is well known, Judaism sprang, the pessimistic 
 element is represented by Ahriman. In Judaism, Ahriman has 
 as Satan only a subordinate position ; but, like Ahriman, he is 
 the lord of snakes, scorpions, and vermin. But the Jewish 
 system forthwith employs Satan to corredl its fundamental 
 error of optimism, and in the Fall introduces the element of 
 pessimism, a do6lrine demanded by the most obvious facts of the 
 world. There is no truer idea in Judaism than this, although 
 it transfers to the course of existence what must be represented 
 as its foundation and antecedent. 
 
 The New Testament, on the other hand, must be in some 
 way traceable to an Indian source : its ethical system, its ascetic 
 view of morality, its pessimism, and its Avatar, are all thor- 
 oughly Indian. It is its morality which places it in a position 
 of such emphatic and essential antagonism to the Old Testa- 
 ment, so that the story of the Fall is the only possible point of 
 conne6tion between the two. For when the Indian do6trine 
 was imported into the land of promise, two very different things 
 had to be combined : on the one hand the consciousness of the 
 corruption and misery of the world, its need of deliverance and 
 
86 THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 
 
 salvation through an Avatar, together with a morality based on 
 sell-denial and repentance ; on the other hand the Jewish doc- 
 trine of Monotheism, with its corollary that "all things are 
 very good," {nui'Ta KdXa ?.iav.) And the task succeeded as far 
 as it could, as far, that is, as it was possible to combine two 
 such heterogeneous and antagonistic creeds. 
 
 As ivy clings for the support and stay it wants to a rough- 
 hewn post, everywhere conforming to its irregularities and 
 showing their outline, but at the same time covering them with 
 life and grace, and changing the former aspe6l into one that is 
 pleasing to the eye ; so the Christian faith, sprung from the 
 wisdom of India, overspreads the old trunk of rude Judaism, a 
 tree of alien growth ; the original form must in part remain, 
 but it suffers a complete change and becomes full of life and 
 truth, so that it appears to be the same tree, but is really 
 another. 
 
 Judaism had represented the Creator as separated from the 
 world, which he produced out of nothing. Christianity identi- 
 fies this Creator with the Saviour, and through him, with 
 humanity : he stands as their representative ; they are redeem- 
 ed in him, just as they fell in Adam, and have lain ever since 
 in the bonds of iniquity, corruption, suffering and death. 
 Such is the view taken by Christianity in common with 
 Buddhism ; the world can no longer be looked at in the light 
 of Jewish optimism, which found "all things very good:" 
 nay, in the Christian scheme, the devil is named as its Prince 
 or Ruler, (6 ipxuv rdv koouov tovtov. John 12, 33). The world is 
 no longer an end. but a means : and the realm of everlasting 
 joy lies beyond it and the grave. Resignation in this world 
 and diredtion of all our hopes to a better, form the spirit of 
 Christianity. The way to this end is opened by the Atone- 
 ment, that is the Redemption from this world and its ways. 
 And in the moral system, instead of the law of vengeance, 
 there is the command to love your enemy ; instead of the 
 promise of mnumerable posterity, the assurance of eternal life ; 
 instead of visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children to 
 
THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM. 87 
 
 the third and fourth generations, the Holy Spirit governs and 
 overshadows all. 
 
 We see, then, that the do6lrines of the Old Testament are 
 rectified and their meaning changed by those of the New, so 
 that, in the most important and essential matters, an agreement 
 is brought about between them and the old religions of India. 
 Everything which is true in Christianity may also be found in 
 Brahmanism and Buddhism. But in Hinduism and Buddhism 
 you will look in vain for any parallel to the Jewish doftrines of 
 ' ' a nothing quickened into life, " or of " a world made in time, ' ' 
 which cannot be humble enough in its thanks and praises to 
 Jehovah for an ephemeral existence full of misery, anguish 
 and need. 
 
 Whoever seriously thinks that superhuman beings have ever 
 given our race information as to the aim of its existence and 
 that of the world, is still in his childhood. There is no other 
 revelation than the thoughts of the wise, even though these 
 thoughts, liable to error as is the lot of everything human, are 
 often clothed in strange allegories and myths under the name 
 of religion. So far, then, it is a matter of indifference whether 
 a man lives and dies in reliance on his own or another's 
 thoughts ; for it is never more than human thought, human 
 opinion, which he trusts Still, instead of trusting what their 
 own minds tell them, men have as a rule a weakness for trust- 
 ing others who pretend to supernatural sources of knowledge. 
 And in view of the enormous intelle6lual inequality between 
 man and man, it is easy to see that the thoughts of one mind 
 might appear as in some sense a revelation to another. 
 
THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 THE contents of this, as of the other volumes in the series, 
 have been drawn from Schopenhauer's Parerga, and 
 amongst the various subje6ls dealt with in that famous collec- 
 tion of essays, Literature holds an important place. Nor can 
 Schopenhauer's opinions fail to be of special value when he 
 treats of literary form and method. For, quite apart from his 
 philosophical pretensions, he claims recognition as a great 
 writer ; he is, indeed, one of the best of the few really excellent 
 prose- writers of whom Germany can boast. While he is thus 
 particularly qualified to speak of Literature as an Art, he has 
 also something to say upon those influences which, outside of 
 his own merits, contribute so much to an author's success, and 
 are so often undervalued when he obtains immediate populari- 
 ty. Schopenhauer's own sore experiences in the matter of 
 reputation lend an interest to his remarks upon that subjedl, 
 although it is too much to ask of human nature that he should 
 approach it in any dispassionate spirit. 
 
 In the following pages we have observations upon style by 
 one who was a stylist in the best sense of the word, not afre<ft- 
 ed, nor yet a phrase-monger ; on thinking for oneself by a 
 philosopher who never did anything else ; on criticism by a 
 writer who suffered much from the inability of others to under- 
 stand him ; on reputation by a candidate who, during the 
 greater part of his life, deserved without obtaining it ; and on 
 genius by one who was incontestably of the privileged order 
 
 (iii) 
 
iv translator's preface. 
 
 himself. And whatever may be thought of some of his opin- 
 ions on matters of detail — on anonymity, for instance, or on 
 the question whether good work is never done for money — 
 there can be no doubt that his general view of literature, and 
 the conditions under which it flourishes, is perfectly sound. 
 
 It might be thought, perhaps, that remarks which were 
 meant to apply to the German language would have but little 
 bearing upon one so different from it as English. This would 
 be a just obje<5lion if Schopenhauer treated literature in a petty 
 spirit, and confined himself to pedantic inquiries into matters 
 of grammar and etymology, or mere niceties of phrase. But 
 this is not so. He deals with his subject broadly, and takes 
 large and general views ; nor can anyone who knows anything 
 of the philosopher suppose this to mean that he is vague and 
 feeble. It is true that now and again in the course of these 
 essays he makes remarks which are obviously meant to apply 
 to the failings of certain writers of his own age and country ; 
 but in such a case I have generally given his sentences a turn, 
 which, while keeping them faithful to the spirit of the original, 
 secures for them a less restri6led range, and makes Schopen- 
 hauer a critic of similar faults in whatever age or country they 
 may appear. This has been done in spite of a sharp word on 
 page seventeen of this volume, addressed to translators who 
 dare to revise their author ; but the change is one with which, 
 not even Schopenhauer could quarrel. ■ ' 
 
 It is thus a significant fa(5l — a testimony to the depth of his 
 insight and, in the main, the justice of his opinions — that view* 
 of literature which appealed to his own immediate contempora- 
 ries, should be found to hold good elsewhere and at a distance 
 of fifty years. It means that what he had to say was worth 
 saying ; and since it is adapted thus equally to diverse times 
 and audiences, it is probably of permanent interest. 
 
 The intelligent reader will observe that much of the charm- 
 of Schopenhauer's writing comes from its .strongly personal 
 chara6ter, and that here he has to do, not with a mere maker of 
 books, but with a man who thinks for himself and has no false: 
 
translator's preface. V 
 
 scruples in putting his meaning plainly upon the page, or in 
 unmasking sham wherever he finds it. This is nowhere so 
 true as when he deals with literature ; and just as in his treat- 
 ment of life, he is no flatterer to men in general, so here he is 
 free and outspoken on the peculiar failings of authors. At the 
 same time he gives them good advice. He is particularly 
 happy in recommending restraint in regard to reading the 
 works of others, and the cultivation of independent thought ; 
 and herein he recalls a saying attributed to Hobbes, who was 
 not less distinguished as a writer than as a philosopher, to the 
 effedl that '' if he had read as much as other men, he should 
 have been as ignorant as they.] ' 
 
 Schopenhauer also utters a warning, which we shall do well 
 to take to heart in these days, against mingling the pursuit of 
 literature with vulgar aims. If we follow him here, we shall 
 carefully distinguish between literature as an obje6l of life and 
 literature as a means of living, between the real love of truth 
 and beauty, and that detestable false love which looks to the 
 price it will fetch in the market. I am not referring to those 
 who, while they follow a useful and honorable calling in bring- 
 ing literature before the public, are content to be known as 
 men of business. If, by the help of some second witch of 
 Endor, we could raise the ghost of Schopenhauer, it would be 
 interesting to hear his opinion of a certain kind of literary 
 enterprise which has come into vogue since his day, and now 
 receives an amount of attention very much beyond its due. 
 We may hazard a guess at the direction his opinion would 
 take. He would doubtless show us how this enterprise, which 
 is carried on by self-styled literary m^n, ends by making litera- 
 ture into a form of merchandise, and treating it as though it 
 were so much goods to be bought and sold at a profit, and 
 most likely to produce quick returns if the maker's name is 
 well known. Nor would it be the ghost of the real Schopen- 
 hauer unless we heard a vigorous denunciation of men who 
 claim a conneclion with literature by a servile flattery of suc- 
 cessful living authors — the dead connot be made to pay — in 
 
vi translator's preface. 
 
 the hope of appearing to advantage in their refle<5led h'ght and 
 turning that advantage into money. 
 
 In order to present the contents of this book in a convenient 
 form, I have not scrupled to make an arrangement with the 
 chapters somewhat different from that which exists in the orig- 
 inal ; so that two or more subje(5ls which are there dealt with 
 successively in one and the same chapter, here stand by them- 
 selves. In consequence of this, some of the titles of the sections 
 are not to be found in the original. I may state, however, 
 that the essays on Authorship and Style and the latter part 
 of that on Criticism are taken dire6l from the chapter head- 
 ed Ueber Schrifistellerei und Stil; and that the remainder of 
 the essay on Criticism, with that of Reputatioti, is supplied by 
 the remarks Ueber Urtheil, Kritik, Beifall und Ruhm. The 
 essays on The Study of Latin, on Men of Learning, and on 
 Some Forms of Literature, are taken chiefly from the four sec- 
 tions Ueber Gelehrsamkeit und Gelehrte, Ueber Sprache und 
 Worte, Ueber Lesen und Biicher: Anhang, and Zur Meta- 
 physik des Schonen. The essay on Thinking for Oneself is a 
 rendering of certain remarks under the heading Selbstdenken. 
 Genius was a favorite subje6l of speculation with Schopen- 
 hauer, and he often touches upon it in the course of his works ; 
 always, however, to put forth the same theory in regard to it 
 as may be found in the concluding se6lion of this volume. 
 Though the essay has little or nothing to do with literary 
 method, the subje6l of which it treats is the most needful ele- 
 ment of success in literature ; and I have introduced it on that 
 ground. It forms part of a chapter in the Parerga entitled 
 Den Intellekt iiberhaupt und in jeder Beziehung betreffende 
 Gedanken : Anhatig verwandter Stellen. 
 
 It has also been part of my duty to invent a title for this 
 volume ; and I am well aware that obje^lion may be made to 
 the one I have chosen, on the ground that in common language 
 it is unusual to speak of literature as an .art, and that to do so 
 is unduly to narrow its meaning and to leave out of sight its 
 main function as the record of thought. But there is no reason 
 
translator's preface. vii 
 
 why the word Literature should not be employed in that 
 double sense which is allowed to attach to Painting, Music, 
 Sculpture, as signifying either the obje6live outcome of a 
 certain mental adlivity, seeking to express itself in outward 
 form ; or else the particular kind of mental aftivity in question, 
 and the methods it follows. And we do, in fa6l, use it in this 
 latter sense, when we say of a writer that he pursues literature 
 as a calling. If, then, literature can be taken to mean a pro- 
 cess as well as a result of mental activity, there can be no error 
 in speaking of it as Art. I use that term in its broad sense, as 
 meaning skill in the display of thought ; or, more fully, a right 
 use of the rules applying to the practical exhibition of thought, 
 with whatever material it may deal. In connection with 
 literature, this is a sense and an application of the term which 
 have been sufficiently established by the example of the great 
 writers of antiquity. 
 
 It may be asked, of course, whether the true thinker, who 
 will always form the soul of the true author, will not be so 
 much occupied with what he has to say, that it will appear to 
 him a trivial thing to spend great effort on embellishing the 
 form in which he delivers it. Literature, to be worthy of the 
 name, must, it is true, deal with noble matter — the riddle of 
 our existence, the great facls of life, the changing passions of 
 the human heart, the discernment of some deep moral truth. 
 It is easy to lay too much stress upon the mere garment of 
 thought ; to be too precise ; to give to the arrangement of 
 words an attention that should rather be paid to the promotion 
 of fresh ideas. A writer who makes this mistake is like a fop 
 who spends his little mind in adorning his person. In short, 
 it may be charged against the view of literature which is taken 
 in calling it an Art, that, instead of making truth and insight 
 the author's aim, it favors sciolism and a fantastic and affeded 
 style. There is, no doubt, some justice in the objedion ; nor 
 have we in our own day, and especially amongst younger men, 
 any lack of writers who endeavor to win confidence, not by 
 adding to the stock of ideas in the world, but by despising 
 
Vlll TRANSLATOR S PREF\CE. 
 
 the use of plain language. Their faults are not new in the 
 history of literature ; and it is a pleasing sign of Schopenhauer's 
 insight that a merciless exposure of them, as they existed half 
 a century ago, is still quite applicable to their modern form. 
 
 And since these writers, who may, in the slang of the hour, 
 be called " impressionists " in literature, follow their own bad 
 taste in the manufadlure of dainty phrases, devoid of all nerve, 
 and generally with some quite commonplace meaning, it is all 
 the more necessary to discriminate carefully between artifice 
 and art. 
 
 But although they may learn something from Schopen- 
 hauer's advice, it is not chiefly to them that it is offered. It 
 is to that great mass of writers, whose business is to fill the 
 columns of the newspaper and the pages of the review, and to 
 produce the ton of novels that appear every year. Now that 
 almost everyone who can hold a pen aspires to be called an 
 author, it is well to emphasize the fa<5l that literature is an art 
 in some respe<5ls more important than any other. The prob- 
 lem of this art is the discovery of those qualities of style and 
 treatment which entitle any work to be called good litera- 
 ture. 
 
 It will be safe to warn the reader at the very outset that, if 
 he wishes to avoid being led astray, he should in his search for 
 these qualities turn to books that have stood the test of 
 time. 
 
 For such an amount of hasty writing is done in these days 
 that it is really difficult for anyone who reads much of it to avoid 
 contra6ling its faults, and thus gradually coming to terms of 
 dangerous familiarity with bad methods. This advice will be 
 especially needful if things that have little or no claim to be 
 called literature at all — the newspaper, the monthly magazine, 
 and the last new tale of intrigue or adventure — fill a large 
 measure, if not the whole, of the time given to reading. Nor 
 are those who are sincerely anxious to have the best thought 
 in the best language quite free from danger if they give too 
 much attention to contemporary authors, even though these 
 
translator's preface. be 
 
 seem to think and write excellently. For one generation alone 
 is incompetent to decide upon the merits of any author what- 
 ever ; and as literature, like all art, is a thing of human inven- 
 tion, so it can be pronounced good only if it obtains lasting 
 admiration, by establishing a permanent appeal to mankind's 
 deepest feeling for truth and beauty. 
 
 It is in this sense that Schopenhauer is perfe6tly right in 
 holding that the negle6l of the ancient classics, which are the 
 best of all models in the art of writing, will infallibly lead to 
 a degeneration of literature. 
 
 And the method of discovering the best qualities of style, 
 
 and of forming a theory of writing, is not to follow some 
 
 trick or mannerism that happens to please for the moment, 
 
 but to study the way in which great authors have done their 
 
 ^ best work. 
 
 It will be said that Schopenhauer tells us nothing we did not 
 know before. Perhaps so ; as he himself says, the best things 
 are seldom new. But he puts the old truths in a fresh and 
 forcible way ; and no one who knows anything of good litera- 
 ture will deny that these truths are just now of very fit applica- 
 tion. 
 
 It was probably to meet a real want that, a year or two 
 ago, an ingenious person succeeded in drawing a great number 
 of English and American writers into a confession of their 
 literary creed and the art they adopted in authorship ; and the 
 interesting volume in which he gave these confessions to the 
 world contained some very good advice, although most of it 
 had been said before in different forms. More recently a new 
 departure, of very doubtful use, has taken place ; and two 
 books have been issued, which aim, the one at being an 
 author's manual, the other at giving hints on essays and how 
 to write them. 
 
 A glance at these books will probably show that their 
 authors have still something to learn. 
 
 Both of these ventures seem, unhappily, to be popular ; 
 and, although they may claim a position next-door to that of 
 
TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 the present volume I beg to say that it has no connexion with 
 them whatever. Schopenhauer does not attempt to teach the 
 art of making bricks without straw. 
 
 I wish to take this opportunity of tendering my thanks to a 
 large number of reviewers for the very gratifying reception 
 given to the earlier volumes of this series. And I have great 
 pleasure in expressing my obligations to my friend Mr. W. G. 
 Collingwood, who has looked over most of my proofs and 
 often given me excellent advice in my effort to turn Schopen- 
 hauer into readable English. 
 
 T. B. S. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 — :o : — 
 
 Page 
 
 Preface, iii 
 
 On Authorship, 13 
 
 On Style, - - . - - - - . 21^ 
 
 On the Study of Latin, - - - - 38 
 
 On Men of Learning, 42 
 
 On Thinking for Oneself, - - - - - 48 
 
 On Some Forms of Literature, - - - - 59 
 
 On Criticism, 66 
 
 On Reputation, 78 
 
 On Genius, - - 94 
 
ON AUTHORSHIP. 
 
 THERE are, first of all, two kinds of authors : those who 
 write for the subjeft's sake, and those who write for writ- 
 ing's sake. While the one have had thoughts or experiences 
 which seem to them worth communicating, the others want 
 money ; and so they write, for money. Their thinking is part 
 of the business of writing. They may be recognized by the 
 way in which they spin out their thoughts to the greatest possi- 
 ble length ; then, too, by the very nature of their thoughts, 
 which are only half-true, perverse, forced, vacillating ; again, 
 by the aversion they generally show to saying anything straight 
 out, so that they may seem other than they are. Hence their 
 writing is deficient in clearness and definiteness, and it is not 
 long before they betray that their only objed in writing at all 
 is to cover paper. This sometimes happens with the best 
 authors ; now and then, for example, with Lessing in his 
 Dramaturgie, and even in many of Jean Paul's romances. As 
 soon as the reader perceives this, let him throw the book away ; 
 for time is precious. The truth is that when an author begins 
 to write for the sake of covering paper, he is cheating the 
 reader ; because he writes under the pretext that he has some- 
 thing to say. 
 
 Writing for money and reservation of copyright are, at 
 bottom, the ruin of literature. No one writes anything that is 
 worth writing, unless he writes entirely for the sake of his sub- 
 je<Sl. What an inestimable boon it would be, if in every branch 
 of literature there were only a few books, but those excellent ! 
 This can never happen, as long as money is to be made by 
 writing. It seems as though the money lay under a curse ; for 
 
 every author degenerates as soon as he begins to put pen to 
 
 (13) 
 
14 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 paper in any way for the sake of gain. The best works of the 
 greatest men all come from the time when they had to write 
 for nothing or for very little. And here, too, that Spanish 
 proverb holds goods, which declares that honor and money 
 are not to be found in the same purse — honra y provecho no 
 caben en un suco. The reason why Literature is in such a bad 
 plight nowadays is simply and solely that people write books 
 to make money. A man who is in want sits down and writes 
 a book, and the public is stupid enough to buy it. The second- 
 ary effedl of this is the ruin of language. 
 
 A great many bad writers make their whole living by that 
 foolish mania of the public for reading nothing but what has 
 just been printed, — journalists, I mean. Truly, a most appro- 
 priate name. In plain language it \s journeymen^ day -laborers ! 
 
 Again, it may be said that there are three kinds of authors. 
 First come those who write without thinking. They write 
 from a full memory, from reminiscences ; it may be, even 
 straight out of other people's books. This class is the most 
 numerous. Then come those who do their thinking whilst 
 they are writing. They think in order to write : and there is 
 no lack of them. Last of all come those authors who think 
 before they begin to write. They are rare. 
 
 Authors of the second class, who put off their thinking until 
 they come to write, are like a sportsman who goes forth at 
 random and is not likely to bring very much home. On the 
 other hand, when an author of the third or rare class writes, it 
 is like a battue. Here the game has been previously captured 
 and shut up within a very small space ; from which it is after- 
 wards let out, so many at a time, into another space, also con- 
 fined. The game cannot possibly escape the sportsman ; he 
 has nothing to do but aim and fire — in other words, write down 
 his thoughts. This is a kind of sport from which a man has 
 something to show. 
 
 But even though the number of those who really think seri- 
 ously before they begin to write is small, extremely few of them 
 think about the subje£l itself : the remainder think only about 
 
ON AUTHORSHIP. 15 
 
 the books that have been written on the subje<5l, and what has 
 been said by others. In order to think at all, such writers 
 need the more dire6l and powerful stimulus of having other 
 people's thoughts before them. These become their immedi- 
 ate theme ; and the result is that they are always under their in- 
 fluence, and so never, in any real sense of the word, are original. 
 But the former are roused to thought by the subje6l itself, to 
 which their thinking is thus immediately dire6led. This is the 
 only class that produces writers of abiding fame. 
 
 It must, of course, be understood that I am speaking here 
 oi writers who treat of great subjects ; not of writers on the 
 art of making brandy. 
 
 Unless an author takes the material on which he writes out 
 of his own head, that is to say, from his own observation, he 
 is not worth reading. Book-manufad:urers, compilers, the 
 common run of history-writers, and many others of the same 
 class, take their material immediately out of books ; and the 
 material goes straight to their finger-tips without even paying 
 freight or undergoing examination as it passes through their 
 heads, to say nothing of elaboration or revision. How very 
 learned many a man would be if he knew everything that was 
 in his own books ! The consequence of this is that these 
 writers talk in such a loose and vague manner, that the reader 
 puzzles his brains in vain to understand what it is of which 
 they are really thinking. They are thinking of nothing. It 
 may now and then be the case that the book from which they 
 copy has been composed exa6lly in the same way : so that 
 writing of this sort is like a plaster cast of a cast ; and in the 
 end, the bare outline of the face, and that, too, hardly recog- 
 nizable, is all that is left of your Antinous.. Let compilations 
 be read as seldom as possible. It is difficult to avoid them 
 altogether ; since compilations also include those text-books 
 which contain in a small space the accumulated knowledge of 
 centuries. 
 
 There is no greater mistake than to suppose that the last 
 work is always the more correal ; that what is written later on 
 is in every case an improvement on what was written before • 
 
l6 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 and that change always means progress. Real thinkers, men 
 of right judgment, people who are in earnest with their subject, 
 — these are all exceptions only. Vermin is the rule everywhere 
 in the world : it is always on the alert, taking the mature opin- 
 ions of the thinkers, and industriously seeking to improve up- 
 on them (save the mark !) in its own peculiar way. 
 
 If the reader wishes to study any subje6l, let him beware of 
 rushing to the newest books upon it, and confining his atten- 
 tion to them alone, under the notion that science is always 
 advancing, and that the old books have been drawn upon in 
 the writing of the new. They have been drawn upon, it is 
 true ; but how ? The writer of the new book often does not 
 understand the old books thoroughly, and yet he is unwilling 
 to take their exa6l words ; so he bungles them, and says in his 
 own bad way that which has been said very much better and 
 more clearly by the old writers, who wrote from their own live- 
 ly knowledge of the subje<5l. The new writer frequently omits 
 the best things they say, their most striking illustrations, their 
 happiest remarks ; because he does not see their value or feel 
 how pregnant they are. The only thing that appeals to him 
 is what is shallow and insipid. 
 
 It often happens that an old and excellent book is ousted by 
 new and bad ones, which, written for money, appear with an 
 air of great pretension and much puffing on the part ol friends. 
 In science a man tries to make his mark by bringing out some- 
 thing fresh. This often means nothing more than that he 
 attacks some received theory which is quite corre6l, in order 
 to make room for his own false notions. Sometimes the effort 
 is successful for a time ; and then a return is made to the old 
 and true theory. These innovators are serious about nothing 
 but their own precious self : it is this that they want to put 
 forward, and the quick way of doing so, as they think, is to 
 start a paradox. Their sterile heads take naturally to the path 
 of negation ; so they begin to deny truths that have long been 
 admitted — the vital power, for example, the sympathetic nerv- 
 ous system, generatio equivoca, Bichat's distindlion between 
 the working of the passions and the working of intelligence ; 
 
ON AUTHORSHIP. l^ 
 
 or else they want us to return to crass atomism, and the like. 
 Hence it frequently happens that the course of science is retro- 
 gressive. 
 
 To this class of writers belong those translators who not only 
 translate their author but also correal and revise him ; a pro- 
 ceeding which always seems to me impertinent. To such 
 writers I say : Write books yourself which are worth translat- 
 ing, and leave other people's works as they are ! 
 
 The reader should study, if he can, the real authors, the 
 men who have founded and discovered things ; or, at any rate, 
 those who are recognized as the great masters in every branch 
 of knowledge. Let him buy second-hand books rather than 
 read their contents in new ones. To be sure, it is easy to add 
 to any new discovery — inventis aliquid addere facile est ; and, 
 therefore, the student, after well mastering the rudiments of 
 his subje6l, will have to make himself acquainted with the 
 more recent additions to the knowledge of it. And, in gener- 
 al, the following rule may be laid down here as elsewhere : if 
 a thing is new, it is seldom good ; because if it is good, it is 
 only for a short time new. 
 
 What the address is to a letter, the title should be to a book ; 
 in other words, its main obje6l should be to bring the book to 
 those amongst the public who will take an interest in its con- 
 tents. It should, therefore, be expressive ; and since by its 
 very nature it must be short, it should be concise, laconic, 
 pregnant, and if possible give the contents in one word. A 
 prolix title is bad ; and so is one that says nothing, or is ob- 
 scure and ambiguous, or even, it may be, false and misleading ; 
 this last may possibly involve the book in the same fate as 
 overtakes a wrongly addressed letter. The worst titles of all 
 are those which have been stolen, those, I mean, which have 
 already been borne by other books ; for they are in the first 
 place a plagiarism, and secondly the most convincing proof of 
 a total lack of originality in the author. A man who has not 
 enough originality to invent a new title for his book, will be 
 still less able to give it new contents. Akin to these stolen 
 tides are those which have been imitated, that is to say, stolen 
 
l8 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 to the extent of one half ; for instance, long after I had pro- 
 duced my treatise On Will in Nature^ Oersted wrote a book 
 entitled On Mind in Nature. 
 
 A book can never be anything more than the impress of 
 its author's thoughts ; and the value of these will lie either in 
 the matter about which he has thought, or in ^Hcat form which 
 his thoughts take, in other words, what it is that he has 
 thought about it. 
 
 The matter of books is most various ; and various also are 
 the several excellences attaching to books on the score of their 
 matter. By matter I mean everything that comes within the 
 domain of a<5lual experience ; that is to say, the fa6ls of history 
 and the fa<5ls of nature, taken in and by themselves and in 
 their widest sense. Here it is the thing treated of, which gives 
 its peculiar chara<5ler to the book ; so that a book can be im- 
 portant, whoever it was that wrote it. 
 
 But in regard to the form, the peculiar charaAer of a book 
 depends upon the person who wrote it. It may treat of 
 matters which are accessible to everyone and well known ; but 
 it is the way in which they are treated, what it is that is 
 thought about them, that gives the book its value ; and this 
 comes from its author. If, then, from this point of view a book 
 is excellent and beyond comparison, so is its author. It fol- 
 lows that if a writer is worth reading, his merit rises just in 
 proportion as he owes little to his matter ; therefore, the better 
 known and the more hackneyed this is, the greater he will be. 
 The three great tragedians of Greece, for example, all worked 
 at the same subje6l-matter. 
 
 So when a book is celebrated, care should be taken to note 
 whether it is so on account of its matter or its form ; and a dis- 
 tinction should be made accordingly. 
 
 Books of great importance on account of their matter may 
 proceed from very ordinary and shallow people, by the fact 
 that they alone have had access to this matter ; books, for in- 
 stance, which describe journeys in distant lands, rare natural 
 phenomena, or experiments ; or historical occurrences of 
 which the writers were witnesses, or in connection with which 
 
ON AUTHORSHIP. 19 
 
 they have spent much time and trouble in the research and 
 special study of original documents. 
 
 On the other hand, where the matter is accessible to every- 
 one or very well known, everything will depend upon the 
 form ; and what it is that is thought about the matter will give 
 the book all the value it possesses. Here only a really distin- 
 guished man will be able to produce anything worth reading ; 
 for the others will think nothing but what anyone else can 
 think. They will just produce an impress of their own minds ; 
 but this is a print of which everyone possesses the origiijal. 
 
 However, the public is very much more concerned to have 
 matter than form ; and for this very reason it is deficient in any 
 high degree of culture. The public shows its preference in 
 this respect in the most laughable way when it comes to deal 
 with poetry j for there it devotes much trouble to the task of 
 tracking out the actual events or personal circumstances in the 
 life of the poet which served as the occasion of his various 
 works ; nay, these events and circumstances come in the end 
 to be of greater importance than the works themselves ; and 
 rather than read Goethe himself, people prefer to read what 
 has been written about him, and to study the legend of Faust 
 more industriously than the drama of that name. And when 
 Burger declared that ' * people would write learned disquisitions 
 on the question. Who Leonora really was," we find this 
 literally fulfilled in Goethe's case ; for we now possess a great 
 many learned disquisitions on Faust and the legend attaching 
 to him. Study of this kind is, and remains, devoted to the 
 material of the drama alone. To give such preference to the 
 matter over the form, is as though a man were to take a fine 
 Etruscan vase, not to admire its shape or coloring, but to 
 make a chemical analysis of the clay and paint of which it is 
 composed. 
 
 The attempt to produce an effect by means of the material 
 employed — an attempt which panders to this evil tendency of 
 the public — is most to be condemned in branches of literature 
 where any merit there may be lies expressly in the form ; I 
 
20 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 mean, in poetical work. For all that, it is not rare to find 
 bad dramatists trying to fill the house by means of the matter 
 about.which they write. For example, authors of this kind do 
 not shrink from putting on the stage any man who is in any 
 way celebrated, no matter whether his life may have been en- 
 tirely devoid of dramatic incident ; and sometimes, even, they 
 do not wait until the persons immediately conne6led with him 
 are dead. 
 
 The distinction between matter and form to which I am here 
 alluding also holds good of conversation. The chief qualities 
 which enable a man to converse well are intelligence, discern- 
 ment, wit and vivacity : these supply the form of conversa- 
 tion. But it is not long before attention has to be paid to the 
 matter of which he speaks ; in other words, the subje<5ls about 
 which it is possible to converse with him — his knowledge. If 
 this is very small, his conversation will not be worth anything, 
 unless he possesses the above-named formal qualities in a very 
 exceptional degree ; for he will have nothing to talk about but 
 those fads of life and nature which everybody knows. It will 
 be just the opposite, however, if a man is deficient in these 
 formal qualities, but has an amount of knowledge which lends 
 value to what he says. This value will then depend entirely 
 upon the matter of his conversation ; for, as the Spanish pro- 
 verb has it, mas sabe el necio en su casa, que el sabio en la 
 agena — a fool knows more of his own business than a wise 
 man does of others. 
 
- t.s?'*- -■J-t--. ij ; 
 
 ON STYLE. 
 
 STYLE is the physiognomy of the mind, and a safer index 
 to character than the face. To imitate another man's 
 style is like wearing a mask, which, be it never so fine, is not 
 long in arousing disgust and abhorrence, because it is lifeless ; 
 so that even the ugliest living face is better. Hence those 
 who write in Latin and copy the manner of ancient authors, 
 may be said to speak through a mask ; the reader, it is true, 
 hears what they say, but he cannot observe their physiognomy 
 too ; he cannot see their style. With the Latin works of 
 writers who think for themselves, the case is different, and 
 their style is visible ; writers, I mean, who have not conde- 
 scended to any sort of imitation, such as Scotus Erigena, 
 Petrarch, Bacon, Descartes, Spinoza, and many others. An 
 affectation in style is like making grimaces. Further, the 
 language in which a man writes is the physiognomy of the 
 nation to which he belongs ; and here there are many hard 
 and fast differences, beginning from the language of the 
 Greeks, down to that of the Caribbean islanders. 
 
 To form a provisional estimate of the value of a writer's" 
 productions, it is not diredlly necessary to know the subject 
 on which he has thought, or what it is that he has said about 
 it ; that would imply a perusal of all his works. It will be 
 enough, in the main, to know how he has thought This, 
 which means the essential temper or general quality of his 
 mind, may be precisely determined by his style. A man's 
 style shows the/^rwa/ nature of all his thoughts — the formal 
 nature which can never change, be the subjedl or the chara<5ler 
 of his thoughts what it may : it is, as it were, the dough out 
 
22 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 of which all the contents of his mind are kneaded. When 
 Eulenspiegel was asked how long it would take to walk to the 
 next village, he gave the seemingly incongruous answer : 
 Walk. He wanted to find out by the man's pace the distance 
 he would cover in a given time. In the same way, when I 
 have read a few pages of an author, I know fairly well how far 
 he can bring me. 
 
 Every mediocre writer tries to mask his own natural style, 
 because in his heart he knows the truth of what I am saying. 
 He is thus forced, at the outset, to give up any attempt at be- 
 ing frank or naive — a privilege which is thereby reserved for 
 superior minds, conscious of their own worth, and therefore 
 sure of themselves. What I mean is that these everyday 
 writers are absolutely unable to resolve upon writing just as 
 they think ; because they have a notion that, were they to do 
 so, their work might possibly look very childish and simple. 
 For all that, it would not be without its value. If they would 
 only go honestly to work, and say, quite simply, the things 
 they have really thought, and just as they have thought them, 
 these writers would be readable and, within their own proper 
 sphere, even instructive. 
 
 But instead of that, they try to make the reader believe 
 that their thoughts have gone much further and deeper than 
 is really the case. They say what they have to say in long 
 sentences that wind about in a forced and unnatural way ; 
 they coin new words and write prolix periods which go round 
 and round the thought and wrap it up in a sort of disguise. 
 They tremble between the two separate aims of communica- 
 ing what they want to say and of concealing it. Their objedl 
 is to dress it up so that it may look learned or deep, in order 
 to give people the impression that there is very much more in 
 it than for the moment meets the eye. They either jot down 
 their thoughts bit by bit, in short, ambiguous, and paradoxi- 
 cal sentences, which apparently mean much more than they 
 say, — of this kind of writing Schelling's treatises on natural 
 philosophy are a splendid instance ; or else they hold forth 
 with a deluge of words and the most intolerable diffusiveness, 
 
ON STYLE. 23 
 
 as though no end of fuss were necessary to make the reader 
 understand the deep meaning of their sentences, whereas it is 
 some quite simple if not actually trivial idea, — examples of 
 which may be found in plenty in the popular works of Fichte, 
 and the philosophical manuals of a hundred other miserable 
 dunces not worth mentioning ; or, again, they try to write in 
 some particular style which they have been pleased to take up 
 and think very grand, a style, for example, par excellence ^ro- 
 found and scientific, where the reader is tormented to death 
 by the narcotic effect of long-spun periods without a single 
 idea in them, — such as are furnished in a special measure by 
 those most impudent of all mortals, the Hegelians ; * or it may 
 be that it is an intellectual style they have striven after, where 
 it seems as though their obje6l were to go crazy altogether ; 
 and so on in many other cases. All these endeavors to put 
 off the nascetur ridiculus mus — to avoid showing the funny 
 little creature that is born after such mighty throes — often 
 make it difficult to know what it is that they really mean. 
 And then, too, they write down words, nay, even whole sen- 
 tences, without attaching any meaning to them themselves, but 
 in the hope that some one else will get sense out of them. 
 
 And what is at the bottom of all this ? Nothing but the 
 untiring effort to sell words for thoughts ; a mode of merchan- 
 dise that is always trying to make fresh openings for itself, and 
 by means of odd expressions, turns of phrase, and combina- 
 tions of every sort, whether new or used in a new sense, to 
 produce the appearance of intelledl in order to make up for 
 the very painfully felt lack of it. 
 
 It is amusing to see how writers with this objedl in view will 
 attempt first one mannerism and then another, as though they 
 were putting on the mask of intelledl ! This mask may pos- 
 sibly deceive the inexperienced for a while, until it is seen to 
 be a dead thing, with no life in it at all ; it is then laughed at 
 and exchanged for another. Such an author will at one mo- 
 
 " In their Hegel-gazette, commonly kno\vn as Jahrbiicher der wiss- 
 enschaftlichen Literatur. 
 
24 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 ment write in a dithyrambic vein, as though he were tipsy ; at 
 another, nay, on the very next page, he will be pompous, se- 
 vere, profoundly learned and prolix, stumbling on in the most 
 cumbrous way and chopping up everything very small ; like 
 the late Christian Wolf, only in a modern dress. Longest of 
 all lasts the mask of unintelligibility ; but this is only in 
 Germany, whither it was introduced by Fichte, perfe6led by 
 Schelling, and carried to its highest pitch in Hegel — always 
 with the best results. 
 
 And yet nothing is easier than to write so that no one can 
 understand ; just as contrarily, nothing is more difficult than 
 to express deep things in such a way that every one must 
 necessarily grasp them. All the arts and tricks I have been 
 mentioning are rendered superfluous if the author really has 
 any brains ; for that allows him to show himself as he is, and 
 confirms to all time Horace's maxim that good sense is the 
 source and origin of good style : — 
 
 Scribendi recte sapere est et principium et fons. 
 But those authors I have named are like certain workers in 
 metal, who try a hundred different compounds to take the 
 place of gold — the only metal which can never have any sub- 
 stitute. Rather than do that, there is nothing against which 
 a writer should be more upon his guard than the manifest en- 
 deavor to exhibit more intelledl than he really has ; because 
 this makes the reader suspect that he possesses very little ; 
 since it is always the case that if a man affects anything, what- 
 ever it may be, it is just there that he is deficient. 
 
 That is why it is praise to an author to say that he is iiaive ; 
 it means that he need not shrink from showing himself as he 
 is. Generally speaking, to be naive is to be attractive ; while 
 lack of naturalness is everywhere repulsive. As a matter of 
 fact we find that every really great writer tries to express his 
 thoughts as purely, clearly, definitely and shortly as possible. 
 Simplicity has always been held to be a mark of truth ; it is 
 also a mark of genius. Style receives its beauty from the 
 thought it expresses ; but with sham -thinkers the thoughts 
 
ON STYLE. 2$ 
 
 are supposed to be fine because of the style. Style is nothing 
 but the mere silhouette of thought ; and an obscure or bad 
 style means a dull or confused brain. 
 
 The first rule, then, for a good style is that /he author 
 should have something to say ; nay, this is in itself almost all 
 that is necessary. Ah, how much it means ! The neglecS of 
 this rule is a fundamental trait in the philosophical writing, 
 and, in fact, in all the reflective literature, of my country, more 
 especially since Fichte. These writers all let it be seen that 
 they want to appear as though they had something to say ; 
 whereas they have nothing to say. Writing of this kind was 
 brought in by the pseudo-philosophers at the Universities, 
 and now it is current everywhere, even among the first liter- 
 ary notabilities of the age. It is the mother of that strained 
 and vague style, where there seem to be two or even more 
 meanings in the sentence; also of that prolix and cumbrous 
 manner of expression, called le stile evipese ; again, of that 
 mere waste of words which consists in pouring them out like 
 a flood ; finally, of that trick of concealing the direst poverty 
 of thought under a farrago of never-ending chatter, which 
 clacks away like a windmill and quite stupefies one — stuflt 
 which a man may read for hours together without getting hold 
 of a single clearly expressed and definite idea.' However, 
 people are easy-going, and they have formed the habit of 
 reading page upon page of all sorts of such verbiage, without 
 having any particular idea of what the author really means. 
 They fancy it is all as it should be, and fail to discover that he 
 is writing simply for writing's sake. 
 
 On the other hand, a good author, fertile in ideas, soon 
 
 wins his reader's confidence that, when he writes, he has 
 
 really and truly something to say ; and this gives the inteUi- 
 
 gent reader patience to follow him with attention. Such an 
 
 author, just because he really has something to say, will never 
 
 fail to express himself in the simplest and most straightforward 
 
 • Select examples of the art of writing in this style are to be found 
 almost /aj«>« in the/aArd«i^A^r published at Halle, afterwards called 
 the Deutschen Jahrbucher. 
 
26 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 manner ; because his obje<5t is to awake the very same thought 
 in the reader that he has in himself, and no other. So he will 
 be able to affirm with Boileau that his thoughts are everywhere 
 open to the light of day, and that his verse always says some- 
 thing, whether it says it well or ill: — 
 
 Ma pensee au grand jour partout s'offre et s' expose, 
 Et mon vers, bien ou tnal, dit toujours quelque chose : 
 
 while of the writers previously described it may be asserted, 
 
 in the words of the same poet, that they talk much and never 
 
 say anything at all — qiiiparlant beaucoup ne disent jamais rien. 
 
 Another characteristic of such writers is that they always 
 avoid a positive assertion wherever they can possibly do 
 so, in order to leave a loophole for escape in case of need. 
 Hence they never fail to choose the more abstract way of ex- 
 pressing themselves ; whereas intelligent people use the more 
 concrete ; because the latter brings things more within the range 
 of actual demonstration, which is the source of all evidence. 
 
 There are many examples proving this preference for ab- 
 stract expression ; and a particularly ridiculous one is afforded 
 by the use of the verb to coyidiiion in the sense of /<? cause or to 
 produce. People say to condition something instead oito cause 
 it, because being abstra6l and indefinite it says less ; it affirms 
 that A cannot happen without B, instead of that A is caused 
 by B. A back door is always left open ; and this suits people 
 whose secret knowledge of their own incapacity inspires them 
 with a perpetual terror of all positive assertion ; while with 
 other people it is merely the effedt of that tendency by which 
 everything that is stupid in literature or bad in life is immedi- 
 ately imitated — a fa6l proved in either case by the rapid way 
 in which it spreads. The Englishman uses his own judgment 
 in what he writes as well as in what he does ; but there is no 
 nation of which this eulogy is less true than of the Germans. 
 The consequence of this state of things is that the word cause 
 has of late almost disappeared from the language of literature, 
 and people talk only of condition. The fact is worth mention- 
 ing because it is so characteristically ridiculous. 
 
ON STYLE. 27 
 
 The very fa(ft that these commonplace authors are never 
 more than half- conscious when they write, would be enough 
 to account for their dullness of mind and the tedious things 
 they produce. I say they are only half-conscious, because 
 they really do not themselves understand the meaning of the 
 words they use : they take words ready-made and commit 
 them to memory. Hence when they write, it is not so much 
 words as whole phrases that they put together— phrases ba- 
 nales. This is the explanation of that palpable lack of clearly- 
 expressed thought in what they say. The fadl is that they do 
 not possess the die to give this stamp to their writing ; clear 
 thought of their own is just what they have not got. And 
 what do we find in its place? — a vague, enigmatical intermix- 
 ture of words, current phrases, hackneyed terms, and fashion- 
 able expressions. The result is that the foggy stuff they write 
 is like a page printed with very old type. 
 
 On the other hand, an intelligent author really speaks to us 
 when he writes, and that is why he is able to rouse our in- 
 terest and commune with us. It is the intelligent author alone 
 who puts individual words together with a full consciousness 
 of their meaning, and chooses them with deliberate design. 
 Consequently, his discourse stands to that of the writer de- 
 scribed above, much as a picture that has been really painted, 
 to one that has been produced by the use of a stencil. In 
 the one case, every word, every touch of the brush, has a 
 special purpose ; in the other, all is done mechanically. The 
 same distinction may be observed in music. For just as 
 Lichtenberg says that Garrick's soul seemed to be in every 
 muscle in his body, so it is the omnipresence of intelle6l that 
 always and everywhere chara6terizes the work of genius. 
 
 I have alluded to the tediousness which marks the works of 
 these writers ; and in this conne6tion it is to be observed, 
 generally, that tediousness is of two kinds ; obje6live and sub- 
 je6live. A work is objedlively tedious when it contains the 
 defe<5l in question ; that is to say, when its author has no per- 
 feftly clear thought or knowledge to communicate. For if a man 
 
28 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 has any clear thought or knowledge in him, his aim will be to 
 communicate it, and he will dire<5l his energies to this end ; so 
 that the ideas he furnishes are everywhere clearly expressed. 
 The result is that he is neither diffuse, nor unmeaning, nor 
 confused, and consequently not tedious. In such a case, even 
 though the author is at bottom in error, the error is at any 
 rate clearly worJced out and well thought over, so that it is at 
 least formally corre6l ; and thus some value always attaches 
 to the work. But for the same reason a work that is object- 
 ively tedious is at all times devoid of any value whatever. 
 
 The other kind of tediousness is only relative : a reader 
 may find a work dull because he has no interest in the ques- 
 tion treated of in it, and this means that his intelle6l is re- 
 stricted. The best work may, therefore, be tedious subject- 
 ively, tedious, I mean, to this or that particular person ; just 
 as, contrarily, the worst work may be subjectively engrossing 
 to this or that particular person who has an interest in the 
 question treated of, or in the writer of the book. 
 
 It would generally serve writers in good stead if they would 
 see that, whilst a man should, if possible, think like a great 
 genius, he should talk the same language as everyone else. 
 Authors should use common words to say uncommon things. 
 But they do just the opposite. We find them trying to wrap 
 up trivial ideas in grand words, and to clothe their very ordi- 
 nary thoughts in the most extraordinary phrases, the most 
 far-fetched, unnatural, and out-of-the-way expressions. Their 
 sentences perpetually stalk about on stilts. They take so 
 much pleasure in bombast, and write in such a high-flown, 
 bloated, affected, hyperbolical and acrobatic style that their 
 prototype is Ancient Pistol, whom his friend Falstaff once im- 
 patiently told to say what he had to say like a man of this 
 world. * 
 
 There is no expression in any other language exaCtly 
 answering to the French stile empese ; but the thing itself ex- 
 ists all the more often. When associated with affectation, it 
 ^ King Henry IV., Part II. Act v. Sc. 3. 
 
ON STYLE. 29 
 
 is in literature what assumption of dignity, grand airs and 
 primness are in society ; and equally intolerable. Dullness of 
 mind is fond of donning this dress ; just as in ordinary life it 
 is stupid people who like being demure and formal. 
 
 An author who writes in the prim style resembles a man 
 who dresses himself up in order to avoid being confounded or 
 put on the same level with the mob — a risk never run by the 
 gentleman, even in his worst clothes. The plebeian may be 
 known by a certain showiness of attire and a wish to have 
 everything spick and span ; and, in the same way, the com- 
 monplace person is betrayed by his style. 
 
 Nevertheless, an author follows a false aim if he tries to 
 write exadtly as he speaks. There is no style of writing but 
 should have a certain trace of kinship with the epigraphic or 
 monumental style, which is, indeed, the ancestor of all styles. 
 For an author to write as he speaks is just as reprehensible 
 as the opposite fault, to speak as he writes ; for this gives a 
 pedantic effect to what he says, and at the same time makes 
 him hardly intelligible. 
 
 An obscure and vague manner of expression is always and 
 everywhere a very bad sign. In ninety-nine cases out of a 
 hundred it comes from vagueness of thought ; and this again 
 almost always meaHS that there is something radically wrong 
 and incongruous about the thought itself — in a word, that it is 
 incorre6l. When a right thought springs up in the mind, it 
 strives after expression and is not long in reaching it ; for 
 clear thought easily finds words to fit it. If a man is ca- 
 pable of thinking anything at all, he is also always able to 
 express it in clear, intelligible, and unambiguous terms. Those 
 writers who construCl difficult, obscure, involved, and equivo- 
 cal sentences, most certamly do not know aright what it is that 
 they want to say : they have only a dull consciousness of it, 
 which is still in the stage of struggle to shape itself as thought. 
 Often, indeed, their desire is to conceal from themselves and 
 others that they really have nothing at all to say. They wish 
 to appear to know what they do not know, to think what they 
 
3© THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 do not think, to say what they do not say. If a man has some 
 real communication to make, which will he choose — an indis- 
 tin(5l or a clear way of expressing himself? Even Quintilian 
 remarks that things which are said by a highly educated man 
 are often easier to understand and much clearer ; and that the 
 less educated a man is, the more obscurely he will write — 
 plerumque accidit tit faciliora sint ad intelligendum et lucidiora 
 multo que a donissimo quoque dicuntur .... Erit ergo 
 etiam obscurior quo quisque deterior. 
 
 An author should avoid enigmatical phrases ; he should 
 know whether he wants to say a thing or does not want to say 
 it. It is this indecision of style that makes so many writers 
 insipid. The only case that offers an exception to this rule 
 arises when it is necessary to make a remark that is in some 
 way improper. 
 
 As exaggeration generally produces an effedl the opposite of 
 that aimed at ; so words, it is true, serve to make thought in- 
 telligible — but only up to a certain point. If words are heaped 
 up beyond it, the thought becomes more and more obscure 
 again. To find where the point lies is the problem of style, 
 and the business of the critical faculty ; for a word too much 
 always defeats its purpose. This is what Voltaire means when 
 he says that the adje6live is the enemy of the substantive. But, 
 as we have seen, many people try to conceal their poverty of 
 thought under a flood of verbiage. 
 
 Accordingly let all redundancy be avoided, all stringing to- 
 gether of remarks which have no meaning and are not worth 
 perusal. A writer must make a sparing use of the reader's 
 time, patience and attention ; so as to lead him to believe that 
 his author writes what is worth careful study, and will reward 
 the time spent upon it. It is always better to omit some- 
 thing good than to add that which is not worth saying 
 at all. This is the right application of Hesiod's maxim, 
 •nliov fiiiiav'Ku.vro^'^- — the half is more than the whole. Le secret 
 pour Hre ennuyeux, c'est de tout dire. Therefore, if possible, 
 
 ' Works and Days, 40. 
 
ON STYLE. 31 
 
 the quintessence only ! mere leading thoughts ! nothing that 
 the reader would think for himself. To use many words to 
 communicate few thoughts is everywhere the unmistakable 
 sign of mediocrity. To gather much thought into few words 
 stamps the man of genius. 
 
 Truth is most beautiful undraped ; and the impression it 
 makes is deep in proportion as its expression has been simple. 
 This is so, partly because it then takes unobstru6ted posses- 
 sion of the hearer's whole soul, and leaves him no by-thought 
 to distradt him ; partly, also, because he feels that here he is 
 not being corrupted or cheated by the arts of rhetoric, but that 
 all the effeft of what is said comes from the thing itself For 
 instance, what declamation on the vanity of human existence 
 could ever be more telling than the words of Job ? Ma7i that 
 is born of a woman hath but a short time to live and is full of 
 misery. He cometh up, and is cut down, like a flower ; he 
 fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay. 
 
 For the same reason Goethe's naive poetry is incomparably 
 greater than Schiller's rhetoric. It is this, again, that makes 
 many popular songs so affe6ling. As in archite6lure an excess 
 of decoration is to be avoided, so in the art of literature a 
 writer must guard against all rhetorical finery, all useless am- 
 plication, and all superfluity of expression in general ; in a 
 word, he must strive after chastity of style. Every word that 
 can be spared is hurtful if it remains. The law of simplicity 
 and naivety holds good of all fine art ; for it is quite possible 
 to be at once simple and subUme. 
 
 True brevity of expression consists in everywhere saying 
 only what is worth saying, and in avoiding tedious detail about 
 things which everyone can supply for himself This involves 
 corre6l discrimination between what is necessary and what is 
 superfluous. A writer should never be brief at the expense of 
 being clear, to say nothing of being grammatical. It shows 
 lamentable want of judgment to weaken the expression of a 
 thought, or to stunt the meaning of a period for the sake of 
 using a few words less. But this is the precise endeavor of 
 that false brevity nowadays so much in vogue, which proceeds 
 
32 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 by leaving out useful words and even by sacrificing grammar 
 and logic. It is not only that such writers spare a word by 
 making a single verb or adjective do duty for several different 
 periods, so that the reader, as it were, has to grope his way 
 through them in the dark ; they also pradlice, in many other 
 respe<5ls, an unseemingly economy of speech, in the effort to 
 effe(5l what they foolishly take to be brevity of expression and 
 conciseness of style. By omitting something that might have 
 thrown a light over the whole sentence, they turn it into a 
 conundrum, which the reader tries to solve by going over it 
 again and again. ^ 
 
 It is wealth and weight of thought, and nothing else, that 
 gives brevity to style, and makes it concise and pregnant. If 
 a writer's ideas are important, luminous, and generally worth 
 communicating, they will necessarily furnish matter and sub- 
 stance enough to fill out the periods which give them expres- 
 sion, and make these in all their parts both grammatically 
 and verbally complete ; and so much will this be the case that 
 no one will ever find them hollow, empty or feeble. The dic- 
 tion will everywhere be brief and pregnant, and allow the 
 thought to find intelligible and easy expression, and even un- 
 fold and move about with grace. 
 
 Therefore instead of contracting his words and forms of 
 speech, let a writer enlarge his thoughts. If a man has been 
 thinned by illness and finds his clothes too big, it is not by 
 cutting them down, but by recovering his usual bodily condi- 
 tion, that he ought to make them fit him again. 
 
 Let me here mention an error of style very prevelent nowa- 
 days, and, in the degraded state of literature and the negledl 
 of ancient languages, always on the increase; I mean subjec- 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — In the original, Schopenhauer here enters up- 
 on a lengthy examination of certain common errors in the writing and 
 speaking of German. His remarks are addressed to his own country- 
 men, and would lose all point, even if they were intelligible, in an 
 English translation. But for those who pratlice their German by 
 conversing or corresponding with Germans, let me recommend what 
 he there says as a useful corre(^live to a slipshod style, such as can 
 easily be contracted if it is assumed that the natives of a country 
 always know their own language perfectly. 
 
ON STYLE. 33 
 
 tivity. A writer commits this error when he thinks it enough 
 if he himself knows what he means and wants to say, and takes 
 no thought for the reader, who is left to get at the bottom of it 
 as best he can. This is as though the author were holding a 
 monologue ; whereas, it ought to be a dialogue ; and a dia- 
 logue, too, in which he must express himself all the more 
 clearly inasmuch as he cannot hear the questions of his inter- 
 locutor. 
 
 Style should for this very reason never be subjedtive, but 
 objective ; and it will not be objedlive unless the words are so 
 set down that they diredtly force the reader to think precisely 
 the same thing as the author thought when he wrote them. 
 Nor will this result be obtained unless the author has always 
 been careful to remember that thought so far follows the law 
 of gravity that it travels from head to paper much more easily 
 than from paper to head ; so that he must assist the latter pas- 
 sage by every means in his power. If he does this, a writer's 
 words will have a purely obje6tive effedl, like that of a finished 
 pi6lure in oils ; whilst the subjective style is not much more 
 certain in its working than spots on the wall, which look like 
 figures only to one whose phantasy has been accidentally 
 aroused by them ; other people see nothing but spots and 
 blurs. The difference in question applies to literary method 
 as a whole ; but it is often established also in particular in- 
 stances. For example, in a recently published work I found 
 the following sentence : / have not written in order to increase 
 the number of existing books. This means just the opposite of 
 what the writer wanted to say, and is nonsense as well. 
 
 He who writes carelessly confesses thereby at the very out- 
 set that he does not attach much importance to his own 
 thoughts. For it is only where a man is convinced of the truth 
 and importance of his thoughts, that he feels the enthusiasm 
 necessary for an untiring and assiduous effort to find the clear- 
 est, finest, and strongest expression for them, — just as for 
 sacred relics or priceless works of art there are provided silvern 
 or golden receptacles. It was this feeling that led ancient 
 
34 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 authors, whose thoughts, expressed in their own words, have 
 lived thousands of years, and therefore bear the honored title 
 oi classics, always to write with care. Plato, indeed, is said to 
 have written the introdu6lion to his Republic seven times over 
 in different ways.* 
 
 As negle6l of dress betrays want of respe6l for the company 
 a man meets, so a hasty, careless, bad style shows an outra- 
 geous lack of regard for the reader, who then rightly punishes 
 it by refusing to read the book. It is especially amusing to 
 see reviewers criticising the works of others in their own most 
 careless style — the style of a hireling. It is as though a judge 
 were to come into court in dressing-gown and slippers ! If I 
 see a man badly and dirtily dressed, I feel some hesitation, at 
 first, in entering into conversation with him : and when, on 
 taking up a book, I am struck at once by the negligence of its 
 style, I put it away. 
 
 Good writing should be governed by the rule that a man can 
 think only one thing clearly at a time ; and, therefore, that he 
 should not be expe<5ted to think two or even more things in one 
 and the same moment. But this is what is done when a writer 
 breaks up his principal sentence into little pieces, for the 
 purpose of pushing into the gaps thus made two or three other 
 thoughts by way of parenthesis ; thereby unnecessarily and 
 wantonly confusing the reader. And here it is again my own 
 countrymen who are chiefly in fault. That German lends itself 
 to this way of writing, makes the thing possible, but does not 
 justify it. No prose reads more easily or pleasantly than 
 French, because, as a rule, it is free from the error in question. 
 The Frenchman strings his thoughts together, as far as he can, 
 in the most logical and natural order, and so lays them before 
 his reader one after the other for convenient deliberation, so 
 that every one of them may receive undivided attention. The 
 German, on the other hand, weaves them together into a 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — It is a fad worth mentioning that the first 
 twelve words of the Republic are placed in the exad order which 
 would be natural in English. 
 
ON STYLE. 35 
 
 sentence which he twists and crosses, and crosses and twists 
 again ; because he wants to say six things all at once, instead 
 of advancing them one by one. His aim should be to attra6l 
 and hold the reader's attention ; but, above and beyond neg- 
 le6l of this aim, he demands from the reader that he shall set 
 the above mentioned rule at defiance, and think three or 
 four different thoughts at one and the same time ; or since that 
 is impossible, that his thoughts shall succeed each other as 
 quickly as the vibrations of a cord. In this way an author 
 lays the foundation of his stile empes^, which is then carried to 
 perfedlion by the use of high-flown, pompous expressions to 
 communicate the simplest things, and other artifices of the 
 same kind. 
 
 In those long sentences rich in involved parenthesis, like a 
 box of boxes one within another, and padded out like roast 
 geese stuffed with apples, it is really the memory that is chiefly 
 taxed ; while it is the understanding and the judgment which 
 should be called into play, instead of having their a6livity 
 thereby a6lually hindered and weakened.' This kind of sen- 
 tence furnishes the reader with mere half-phrases, which he is 
 then called upon to collect carefully and store up in his 
 memory, as though they were the pieces of a torn letter, after- 
 wards to be completed and made sense of by the other halves 
 to which they respe6lively belong. He is expe6led to go on 
 reading for a little without exercising any thought, nay, exert- 
 ing only his memory, in the hope that, when he comes to the 
 end of the sentence, he may see its meaning and so receive 
 something to think about ; and he is thus given a great deal 
 to learn by heart before obtaining anything to understand. 
 This is manifestly wrong and an abuse of the reader's pa- 
 tience. 
 
 The ordinary writer has an unmistakable preference for this 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — This sentence in the original is obviously 
 meant to illustrate the fault of which it speaks. It does so by the use 
 of a constru<5lion very common in German, but happily unknown in 
 Enojlish ; where, however, the fault itself exists none the less, though 
 in different form. 
 
36 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 Style, because it causes the reader to spend time and trouble 
 in understanding that which he would have understood in a 
 moment without it ; and this makes it look as though the 
 writer had more depth and intelligence than the reader. This 
 is, indeed, one of those artifices referred to above, by means of 
 which mediocre authors unconsciously, and as it were by in- 
 stinft, strive to conceal their poverty of thought and give an 
 appearance of the opposite. Their ingenuity in this respe6t ia 
 really astounding. 
 
 It is manifestly against all sound reason to put one thought 
 obliquely on top of another, as though both together formed a 
 wooden cross. But this is what is done where a writer inter- 
 rupts what he has begun to say, for the purpose of inserting 
 some quite alien matter ; thus depositing with the reader a 
 meaningless half- sentence, and bidding him keep it until the 
 completion comes. It is much as though a man were to treat 
 his guests by handing them an empty plate, in the hope of 
 something appearing upon it. And commas used for a similar 
 purpose belong to the same family as notes at the foot of the 
 page and parenthesis in the middle of the text ; nay, all three 
 differ only in degree. If Demosthenes and Cicero occasionally 
 inserted words by ways of parenthesis, they would have done 
 better to have refrained. 
 
 But this style of writing becomes the height of absurdity 
 when the parenthesis are not even fitted into the frame of the 
 sentence, but wedged in so as dire6lly to shatter it. If, for in- 
 stance, it is an impertinent thing to interrupt another person 
 when he is speaking, it is no less impertinent to interrupt 
 oneself But all bad, careless, and hasty authors, who scribble 
 with the bread actually before their eyes, use this style of writ- 
 ing six times on a page, and rejoice in it. It consists in — it is 
 advisable to give rule and example together, wherever it is 
 possible — breaking up one phrase in order to glue in another. 
 Nor is it merely out of laziness that they write thus. They do 
 it out of stupidity ; they think there is a charming lig^reti 
 about it ; that it gives life to what they say. No doubt there 
 
ON STYLE. 37 
 
 are a few rare cases where such a form of sentence may be 
 pardonable. 
 
 Few write in the way in which an architect builds ; who, be- 
 fore he sets to work, sketches out his plan, and thinks it over 
 down to its smallest details. Nay, most people write only as 
 though they were playing dominoes ; and, as in this game, the 
 pieces are arranged half by design, half by chance, so it is with 
 the sequence and connection of their sentences. They only 
 have an idea of what the general shape of their work will be, 
 and of the aim they set before themselves. Many are ignorant 
 even of this, and write as the coral-inse<5ls build ; period joins 
 to period, and the Lord only knows what the author means. 
 
 Life now-a-days goes at a gallop ; and the way in which 
 this affedls literature is to make it extremely superficial and 
 slovenly. 
 
ON THE STUDY OF LATIN. 
 
 THE abolition of Latin as the universal language of learned 
 men, together with the rise of that provincialism which 
 attaches to national literatures, has been a real misfortune for 
 the cause of knowledge in Europe. For it was chiefly through 
 the medium of the Latin language that a learned public existed 
 in Europe at all — a public to which every book as it came out 
 dire6tly appealed. The number of minds in the whole of 
 Europe that are capable of thinking and judging is small, as it 
 is ; but when the audience is broken up and severed by differ- 
 ences of language, the good these minds can do is very much 
 weakened. This is a great disadvantage ; but a second and 
 worse one will follow, namely, that the ancient languages will 
 cease to be taught at all. The negle6l of them is rapidly gain- 
 ing ground both in France and Germany. 
 
 If it should really come to this, then farewell, humanity! 
 farewell, noble taste and high thinking ! The age of barbarism 
 will return, in spite of railways, telegraphs and balloons. We 
 shall thus in the end lose one more advantage possessed by al 
 our ancestors. For Latin is not only a key to the knowledge 
 of Roman antiquity : it also diredtly opens up to us the Middle 
 Age in every country in Europe, and modern times as well, 
 down to about the year 1750. Erigena, for example, in the 
 ninth century, John of Salisbury in the twelfth, Raimond Lully 
 in the thirteenth, with a hundred others, speak straight to us 
 in the very language that they naturally adopted in thinking 
 of learned matters. They thus come quite close to us even at 
 this distance of time : we are in dire(5l conta6l with them, and 
 really come to know them. How would it have been if every- 
 one of them spoke in the language that was peculiar to his 
 
 (38) 
 
ON THE STUDY OF LATIN. 39 
 
 time and country ? We should not understand even the half 
 of what they said. A real intelle6lual contact with them would 
 be impossible. We should see them like shadows on the 
 farthest horizon, or, may be, through the translator's telescope. 
 
 It was with an eye to the advantage of writing in Latin that 
 Bacon, as he himself expressly states, proceeded to translate 
 his Essays into that language, under the title Sermones Jideles ; 
 at which work Hobbes assisted him.' 
 
 Here let me observe, by way of parenthesis, that when 
 patriotism tries to urge its claims in the domain of knowledge, 
 it commits an offence which should not be tolerated. For in 
 those purely human questions which interest all men alike, 
 where truth, insight, beauty, should be of sole account, what 
 can be more impertinent than to let preference for the nation 
 to which a man's precious self happens to belong, affe6t the 
 balance of judgment, and thus supply a reason for doing vio- 
 lence to truth and being unjust to the great minds of a foreign 
 country in order to make much of the smaller minds of one's 
 own ! Still, there are writers in every nation in Europe who 
 afford examples of this vulgar feeling. It is this which led 
 Yriarte to caricature them in the thirty-third of his charming 
 Literary Fables."^ 
 
 In learning a language, the chief difificulty consists in mak- 
 ing acquaintance with every idea which it expresses, even 
 
 > Cf. Thomae Hobbes vita: Carolopoli apud Eleutheriutn Angli- 
 cum, 1681, p. 22. 
 
 * Translator's Note. Tomas de Yriarte (1750-91), a Spanish poet, 
 and keeper of archives in the War Office at Madrid. His two best 
 known works are a dida<5lic poem, entitled La Musica, and the Fables 
 here quoted, which satirize the pecuHar foibles of Uterary men. They 
 have been translated into many languages ; into English by Rockliffe 
 (3rd edition, 1866). The fable in question describes how, at a picnic 
 of the animals, a discussion arose as to which of them carried off the 
 palm for superiority of talent. The praises of the ant, the dog, the 
 bee, and the parrot were sung in turn ; but at last the ostrich stood up 
 and declared for the dromedary. Whereupon the dromedary stood 
 up and declared for the ostrich. No one could discover the reason 
 for this mutual compliment. Was it because both were such uncouth 
 beasts, or had such long necks, or were neither of them particularly 
 clever or beautiful? or was it because each had a hump? No! said 
 the fox, you are all zvrong. Don't you see they are both foreigners ? 
 Cannot the same be said of many men of learning ? 
 
40 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 though it should use words for which there is no exa6t equiva- 
 lent in the mother tongue ; and this often happens. In learn- 
 ing a new language a man has, as it were, to mark out in his 
 mind the boundaries of quite new spheres of ideas, with the re- 
 sult that spheres of ideas arise where none were before. Thus 
 he not only learns words, he gains ideas too. 
 
 This is nowhere so much the case as in learning ancient lan- 
 guages, for the differences they present in their mode of ex- 
 pression as compared with modern languages is greater than 
 can be found amongst modern languages as compared with 
 one another. This is shown by the fa6l that in translating in- 
 to Latin, recourse must be had to quite other turns of phrase 
 than are used in the original. The thought that is to be trans- 
 lated has to be melted down and recast ; in other words, it 
 must be analyzed and then recomposed. It is just this process 
 which makes the study of the ancient languages contribute so 
 much to the education of the mind. 
 
 It follows from this that a man's thought varies according to 
 the language in which he speaks. His ideas undergo a fresh 
 modification, a different shading, as it were, in the study of 
 every new language. Hence an acquaintance with many lan- 
 guages is not only of much indire6l advantage, but it is also a 
 direcl means of mental culture, in that it corre6ls and matures 
 ideas by giving prominence to their many-sided nature and 
 their different varieties of meaning, as also that it increases 
 dexterity of thought ; for in the process of learning many lan- 
 guages, ideas become more and more independent of words. 
 The ancient languages effe6l this to a greater degree than the 
 modern, in virtue of the difference to which I have alluded. 
 
 From what I have said, it is obvious that to imitate the style 
 of the ancients in their own language, which is so very much 
 superior to ours in point of grammatical perfection, is the best 
 way of preparing for a skillful and finished expression of thought 
 in the mother-tongue. Nay, if a man wants to be a great 
 writer, he must not omit to do this ; just as, in the case of 
 sculpture or painting, the student must educate himself by 
 copying the great masterpieces of the past, before proceeding 
 
ON THE STUDY OF LATIN. 4I 
 
 to original work. It is only by learning to write Latin that a 
 man conies to treat didlion as an art. The material in this art 
 is language, which must therefore be handled with the greatest 
 care and delicacy. 
 
 The result of such study is that a writer will pay keen atten- 
 tion to the meaning and value of words, their order and con- 
 ne6lion, their grammatical forms. He will learn how to weigh 
 them with precision, and so become an expert in the use of 
 that precious instrument which is meant not only to express 
 valuable thought, but to preserve it as well. Further, he will 
 learn to feel respe6l for the language in which he writes and 
 thus be saved from any attempt to remodel it by arbitrary and 
 capricious treatment. Without this schooling, a man's writ- 
 ing may easily degenerate into mere chatter. 
 
 To be entirely ignorant of the Latin language is like being 
 in a fine country on a misty day. The horizon is extremely 
 limited. Nothing can be seen clearly except that which is 
 quite close ; a few steps beyond, everything is buried in ob- 
 scurity. But the Latinist has a wide view, embracing modern 
 times, the Middle Age and Antiquity ; and his mental horizon 
 is still further enlarged if he studies Greek or even Sanscrit. 
 
 If a man knows no Latin, he belongs to the vulgar, even 
 though he be a great virtuoso on the ele6lrical machine and 
 have the base of hydrofluoric acid in his crucible. 
 
 There is no better recreation for the mind than the study of 
 the ancient classics. Take any one of them into your hand, be 
 it only for half an hour, and you will feel yourself refreshed, 
 relieved, purified, ennobled, strengthened ; just as though you 
 had quenched your thirst at some pure spring. Is this the 
 effe€i of the old language and its perfed expression, or is it 
 the greatness of the minds whose works remain unharmed and 
 unweakened by the lapse of a thousand years ? Perhaps both 
 together. But this I know. If the threatened calamity should 
 ever come, and the ancient languages cease to be taught, a 
 new literature will arise, of such barbarous, shallow and worth- 
 less stuff as never was seen before. 
 
ON MEN OF LEARNING. 
 
 WHEN one sees the number and variety of institutions 
 which exist for the purposes of education, and the 
 vast throng of scholars and masters, one might fancy the 
 human race to be very much concerned about truth and wis- 
 dom. But here, too, appearances are deceptive. The masters 
 teach in order to gain money, and strive, not after wisdom, 
 but the outward show and reputation of it ; and the scholars 
 learn, not for the sake of knowledge and insight, but to be 
 able to chatter and give themselves airs. Every thirty years a 
 new race comes into the world — a youngster that knows noth- 
 ing about anything, and after summarily devouring in all haste 
 the results of human knowledge as they have been accumulated 
 for thousands of years, aspires to be thought cleverer than the 
 whole of the past. For this purpose he goes to the University, 
 and takes to reading books — new books, as being of his own 
 age and standing. Everything he reads must be briefly put, 
 must be new ! he is new himself Then he falls to and criti- 
 cises. And here I am not taking the slightest account of 
 studies pursued for the sole obje6t of making a living. 
 
 Students, and learned persons of all sorts and every age, aim 
 as a rule at acquiring information rather than insight. They 
 pique themselves upon knowing about everything — stones, 
 plants, battles, experiments, and all the books in existence. It 
 never occurs to them that information is only a means of in- 
 sight, and in itself of little or no value ; that it is his way of 
 thinking that makes a man a philosopher. When I hear of 
 these portents of learning and their imposing erudition, I some- 
 times say to myself : Ah, how little they must have had to 
 
 (42) 
 
ON MEN OF LEARNING. 43 
 
 think about, to have been able to read so much ! And when 
 I a<5lually find it reported of the elder Pliny that he was con- 
 tinually reading or being read to, at table, on a journey, or in 
 his bath, the question forces itself upon my mind, whether the 
 man was so very lacking in thought of his own that he had to 
 have alien thought incessantly instilled into him ; as though he 
 were a consumptive patient taking jellies to keep himself alive. 
 And neither his undiscerning credulity nor his inexpressibly 
 repulsive and barely intelligible style — which seems like of a 
 man taking notes, and very economical of paper — is of a kind 
 to give me a high opinion of his power of independent 
 thought. 
 
 We have seen that much reading and learning is prejudicial 
 to thinking for oneself ; and, in the same way, through much 
 writing and teaching, a man loses the habit of being quite clear, 
 and therefore thorough, in regard to the things he knows and 
 understands ; simply because he has left himself no time to ac- 
 quire clearness or thoroughness. And so, when clear knowl- 
 edge fails him in his utterances, he is forced to fill out the gaps 
 with words and phrases. It is this, and not the dryness of the 
 subje6l-matter, that makes most books such tedious reading. 
 There is a saying that a good cook can make a palatable dish 
 even out of an old shoe ; and a good writer can make the dry- 
 est things interesting. 
 
 With by far the largest number of learned men, knowledge 
 is a means, not an end. That is why they will never achieve 
 any great work ; because, to do that, he who pursues knowl- 
 edge must pursue it as an end, and treat everything else, even 
 existence itself, as only a means. For everything which a man 
 fails to pursue for its own sake is but half-pursued ; and true 
 excellence, no matter in what sphere, can be attained only 
 where the work has been produced for its own sake alone, and 
 not as a means to further ends. 
 
 And so, too, no one will ever succeed in doing anything real- 
 ly great and original in the way of thought, who does not seek 
 to acquire knowledge for himself, and, making this the imme- 
 
44 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 diate obje6^ of his studies, decline to trouble himself about the 
 knowledge of others. But the average man of learning studies 
 for the purpose of being able to teach and write. His head is 
 like a stomach and intestines which let the food pass through 
 them undigested. That is just why his teaching and writing 
 is of so little use. For it is not upon undigested refuse that 
 people can be nourished, but solely upon the milk which 
 secretes from the very blood itself 
 
 The wig is the appropriate symbol of the man of learning, 
 pure and simple. It adorns the head with a copious quantity 
 of false hair, in lack of one's own : just as erudition means en- 
 dowing it with a great mass of alien thought. This, to be 
 sure, does not clothe the head so well and naturally, nor is it 
 so generally useful, nor so suited for all purposes, nor so firm- 
 ly rooted ; nor when alien thought is used up, can it be im- 
 mediately replaced by more from the same source, as is the 
 case with that which springs from soil of one's own. So we 
 find Sterne, in his Tristram Shandy, boldly asserting that an 
 ounce of a man' s own wit is worth a ton of other people' s. 
 
 And in fa6^ the most profound erudition is no more akin to 
 genius than a colle6lion of dried plants is like Nature, with its 
 constant flow of new life, ever fresh, ever young, ever chang- 
 ing. There are no two things more opposed than the childish 
 naivety of an ancient author and the learning of his com- 
 mentator. 
 
 Dilettanti, dilettanti! This is the slighting way in which 
 those who pursue any branch of art or learning for the love and 
 enjoyment of the thing, — per il loro diletto, are spoken of by 
 those who have taken it up for the sake of gain, attradled sole- 
 ly by the prospedl of money. This contempt of theirs comes 
 from the base belief that no man will seriously devote himself 
 to a subjedl, unless he is spurred on to it by want, hunger, or 
 else some form of greed. The public is of the same way of 
 thinking ; and hence its general respe6l for professionals and 
 its distrust of dilettanti. But the truth is that the dilettante 
 treats his subje6l as an end, whereas the professional, pure 
 
ON MEN OF LEARNING. 45 
 
 and simple, treats it merely as a means. He alone will be 
 really in earnest about a matter, who has a dire6l interest there- 
 in, takes to it because he likes it, and pursues it con amore. It 
 is these, and not hirelings, that have always done the great- 
 est work. 
 
 In the republic of letters it is as in other republics ; favor is 
 shown to the plain man — he who goes his way in silence and 
 does not set up to be cleverer than others. But the abnormal 
 man is looked upon as threatening danger ; people band togeth- 
 er against him, and have, oh ! such a majority on their side. 
 
 The condition of this republic is much like that of a small 
 State in America, where every man is intent only upon his 
 own advantage, and seeks reputation and power for himself, 
 quite heedless of the general weal, which then goes to ruin. 
 So it is in the republic of letters ; it is himself, and himself 
 alone, that a man puts forward, because he wants to gain fame. 
 The only thing in which all agree is in trying to keep down a 
 really eminent man, if he should chance to show himself, as 
 one who would be a common peril. From this it is easy to 
 see how it fares with knowledge as a whole. 
 
 Between professors and independent men of learning there 
 has always been from of old a certain antagonism, which may 
 perhaps be Ukened to that existing been dogs and wolves. In 
 virtue of their position, professors enjoy great facilities for be- 
 coming known to their contemporaries. Contrarily, independ- 
 ent men of learning enjoy, by their position, great facilities 
 for becoming known to posterity ; to which it is necessary 
 that, amongst other and much rarer gifts, a man should have a 
 certain leisure and freedom. As mankind takes a long time in 
 finding out on whom to bestow its attention, they may both 
 work together side by side. 
 
 He who holds a professorship may be said to receive his 
 food in the stall ; and this is the best way with ruminant ani- 
 mals. But he who finds his food for himself at the hands of 
 Nature is better off in the open field. 
 
 Of human knowledge as a whole and in every branch of it, 
 by far the largest part exists nowhere but on paper, — I mean. 
 
46 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 in books, that paper memory of mankind. Only a small part 
 of it is at any given period really a6live in the minds of particu- 
 lar persons. This is due, in the main, to the brevity and un- 
 certainty of life ; but it also comes from the fa6l that men are 
 lazy and bent on pleasure. Every generation attains, on its 
 hasty passage through existence, just so much of human 
 knowledge as it needs, and then soon disappears. Most men 
 of learning are very superficial. Then follows a new genera- 
 tion, full of hope, but ignorant, and with everything to learn 
 from the beginning. It seizes, in its turn, just so much as it 
 can grasp, or find useful on its brief journey, and then too 
 goes its way. How badly it would fare with human knowledge 
 if it were not for the art of writing and printing ! This it is 
 that makes libraries the only sure and lasting memory of the 
 human race, for its individual members have all of them but a 
 very limited and imperfe<5t one. Hence most men of learning 
 are as loth to have their knowledge examined as merchants to 
 lay bare their books. 
 
 Human knowledge extends on all sides farther than the eye 
 can reach ; and of that which would be generally worth know- 
 ing, no one man can possess even the thousandth part. 
 
 All branches of learning have thus been so much enlarged 
 that he who would " do something" has to pursue no more 
 than one subjed: and disregard all others. In his own subje6l 
 he will then, it is true, be superior to the vulgar ; but in all 
 else he will belong to it. If we add to this that negle<5l of the 
 ancient languages, which is now-a-days on the increase and is 
 doing away with all general education in the humanities — for 
 a mere smattering of Latin and Greek is of no use — we shall 
 come to have men of learning who outside their own subje6l 
 display an ignorance truly bovine. 
 
 An exclusive specialist of this kind stands on a par with a 
 workman in a fadlory, whose whole life is spent in making one 
 particular kind of screw, or catch, or handle, for some particu- 
 lar instrument or machine, in which, indeed, he attains incredi- 
 ble dexterity. The specialist may also be likened to a man 
 
ON MEN OF LEARNING. 47 
 
 who lives in his own house and never leaves it. There he is 
 perfe6lly familiar with everything, every little step, corner, or 
 board ; much as Quasimodo in Vi6lor Hugo's Notre Dame 
 knows the cathedral ; but outside it, all is strange and un- 
 known. 
 
 For true culture in the humanities it is absolutely necessary 
 that a man should be many-sided and take large views ; and 
 for a man of learning in the higher sense of the word, an ex- 
 tensive acquaintance with history is needful. He, however, 
 who wishes to be a complete philosopher, must gather into his 
 head the remotest ends of human knowledge : for where else 
 could they ever come together ? 
 
 It is precisely minds of the first order that will never be 
 specialists. For their very nature is to make the whole of ex- 
 istence their problem ; and this is a subje6t upon which they 
 will every one of them in some form provide mankind with a 
 new revelation. For he alone can deserve the name of genius 
 who takes the All, the Essential, the Universal, for the theme 
 of his achievements ; not he who spends his life in explaining 
 some special relation of things one to another. 
 
ON THINKING FOR ONESELF. 
 
 A LIBRARY may be very large ; but if it is in disorder, it is 
 not so useful as one that is small but well arranged. In 
 the same way, a man may have a great mass of knowledge, 
 but if he has not worked it up by thinking it over for himself, 
 it has much less value than a far smaller amount which he has 
 thoroughly pondered. For it is only when a man looks at his 
 knowledge from all sides, and combines the things he knows 
 by comparing truth with truth, that he obtains a complete hold 
 over it and gets it into his power. A man cannot turn over 
 anything in his mind unless he knows it ; he should, therefore, 
 learn something ; but it is only when he has turned it over 
 that he can be said to know it. 
 
 Reading and learning are things that anyone can do of his 
 own free will ; but not so thinking. Thinking must be kin- 
 dled, like a fire by a draught ; it must be sustained by some 
 interest in the matter in hand. This interest may be of purely 
 objedlive kind, or merely subje<5live. The latter comes into 
 play only in things that concern us personally. Objedlive in- 
 terest is confined to heads that think by nature ; to whom 
 thinking is as natural as breathing ; and they are very rare. 
 This is why most men of learning show so little of it. 
 
 It is incredible what a different effeft is produced upon the 
 mind by thinking for oneself, as compared with reading. It 
 carries on and intensifies that original difference in the nature 
 of two minds which leads the one to think and the other to 
 read. What I mean is that reading forces alien thoughts up- 
 on the mind — thoughts which are as foreign to the drift and 
 
 (48) 
 
ON THINKING FOR ONESELF. 49 
 
 temper in which it may be for the moment, as the seal is to the 
 wax on which it stamps its imprint. The mind is thus entirely 
 under compulsion from without ; it is driven to think this or 
 that, though for the moment it may not have the slightest im- 
 pulse or inclination to do so. 
 
 But when a man thinks for himself, he follows the impulse 
 of his own mind, which is determined for him at the time, 
 either by his environment or some particular recolle6tion. 
 The visible world of a man's surroundings does not, as read- 
 ing does, impress a single definite thought upon his mind, but 
 merely gives the matter and occasion which lead him to think 
 what is appropriate to his nature and present temper. So it 
 is, that much reading deprives the mind of all elasticity ; it is 
 like keeping a spring continually under pressure. The safest 
 way of having no thoughts of one's own is to take up a book 
 every moment one has nothing else to do. It is this practice 
 which explains why erudition makes most men more stupid 
 and silly than they are by nature, and prevents their writings 
 obtaining any measure of success. They remain, in Pope's 
 words : 
 
 Forever reading y never to be read! > 
 
 Men of learning are those who have done their reading in 
 the pages of a book. Thinkers and men of genius are those 
 who have gone straight to the book of Nature ; it is they who 
 have enlightened the world and carried humanity further on 
 its way. 
 
 If a man's thoughts are to have truth and life in them, they 
 must, after all, be his own fundamental thoughts ; for these are 
 the only ones that he can fully and wholly understand. To 
 read another's thoughts is like taking the leavings of a meal to 
 which we have not been invited, or putting on the clothes 
 which some unknown visitor has laid aside. 
 
 The thought we read is related to the thought which springs 
 up in ourselves, as the fossil-impress of some prehistoric plant 
 to a plant as it buds forth in spring-time. 
 
 • Dunctad, iii, 194. 
 
50 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 Reading is nothing more than a substitute for thought 
 of one's own. It means putting the mind into leading- 
 strings. The multitude of books serves only to show how 
 many false paths there are, and how widely astray a man may 
 wander if he follows any of them. But he who is guided by 
 his genius, he who thinks for himself, who thinks spontaneous- 
 ly and exactly, possesses the only compass by which he can 
 steer aright. A man should read only when his own thoughts 
 stagnate at their source, which will happen often enough even 
 with the best of minds. On the other hand, to take up a 
 book for the purpose of scaring away one's own original 
 thoughts is sin against the Holy Spirit. It is like running 
 away from Nature to look at a museum of dried plants or gaze 
 at a landscape in copperplate. 
 
 A man may have discovered some portion of truth or wis- 
 dom, after spending a great deal of time and trouble in think- 
 ing it over for himself and adding thought to thought ; and it 
 may sometimes happen that he could have found it all ready 
 to hand in a book and spared himself the trouble. But even 
 so, it is a hundred times more valuable if he has acquired it by 
 thinking it out for himself For it is only when we gain our 
 knowledge in this way that it enters as an integral part, a liv- 
 ing member, into the whole system of our thought ; that it 
 stands in complete and firm relation with what we know ; that 
 it is understood with all that underlies it and follows from it ; 
 that it wears the color, the precise shade, the distinguishing 
 mark, of our own way of thinking ; that it comes exadly at 
 the right time, just as we felt the necessity for it ; that it stands 
 fast and cannot be forgotten. This is the perfect application, 
 nay, the interpretation, of Goethe's advice to earn our inherit- 
 ance for ourselves so that we may really possess it : — 
 
 If^as du ererbt von deinen Vatern hast, -, 
 
 Erwtrb es, urn es zu besitzen. ' 
 
 The man who thinks for himself, forms his own opinions and 
 learns the authorities for them only later on, when they serve 
 
 ' Faust, I. 329. 
 
ON THINKING FOR ONESELF. 51 
 
 but to Strengthen his belief in them and in himself. But the 
 book-philosopher starts from the authorities. He reads other 
 people's books, colle6ls their opinions, and so forms a whole 
 for himself, which resembles an automaton made up of any- 
 thing but flesh and blood. Contrarily, he who thinks for him- 
 self creates a work like a living man as made by Nature. For 
 the work comes into being as a man does ; the thinking mind 
 is impregnated from without, and it then forms and bears 
 its child. 
 
 Truth that has been merely learned is like an artificial limb, 
 a false tooth, a waxen nose ; at best, like a nose made out of 
 another's flesh ; it adheres to us only because it is put on. 
 But truth acquired by thinking of our own is like a natural 
 limb ; it alone really belongs to us. This is the fundamental 
 difference between the thinker and the mere man of learning. 
 The intelle6lual attainments of a man who thinks for him|elf 
 resemble a fine painting, where the light and shade are correA, 
 the tone sustained, the color perfectly harmonized ; it is true 
 to life. On the other hand, the intelledual attainments of the 
 mere man of learning are like a large palette, full of all sorts of 
 colors, which at most are systematically arranged, but devoid 
 of harmony, conne6lion and meaning. 
 
 Reading is thinking with some one else's head instead of 
 one's own. To think with one's own head is always to aim at 
 developing a coherent whole — a system, even though it be not 
 a stri<5lly complete one ; and nothing hinders this so much as 
 too strong a current of others' thoughts, such as comes of con- 
 tinual reading. These thoughts, springing every one of them 
 from different minds, belonging to different systems, and ting- 
 ed with different colors, never of themselves flow together into 
 an intelle<5lual whole ; they never form a unity of knowledge, 
 or insight, or convi6lion ; but, rather, fill the head with a 
 Babylonian confusion of tongues. The mind that is over load- 
 ed with alien thought is thus deprived of all clear insight, and 
 is well-nigh disorganized. This is a state of things observable 
 in many men of learning ; and it makes them inferior in sound 
 
52 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 sense, corre6l judgment and pradlical ta6l, to many illiterate 
 persons who, after obtaining a little knowledge from without, 
 by means of experience, intercourse with others, and a small 
 amount of reading, have always subordinated it to, and em- 
 bodied it with, their own thought. 
 
 The really scientific thinker does the same thing as these illit- 
 erate persons, but on a larger scale. Although he has need 
 of much knowledge, and so must read a great deal, his mind 
 is nevertheless strong enough to master it all, to assimilate 
 and incorporate it with the system of his thoughts, and so to 
 make it fit in with the organic unity of his insight, which, 
 though vast, is always growing. And in the process, his own 
 thought, like the bass in an organ, always dominates every- 
 thing, and is never drowned by other tones, as happens with 
 minds which are full of mere antiquarian lore ; where shreds 
 of music, as it were, in every key, mingle confusedly, and no 
 fundamental note is heard at all. 
 
 Those who have spent their lives in reading, and taken their 
 wisdom from books, are like people who have obtained precise 
 information about a country from the descriptions of many 
 travellers. Such people can tell a great deal about it ; but, 
 after all, they have no connedled, clear, and profound knowl- 
 edge of its real condition. But those who have spent their 
 lives in thinking, resemble the travellers themselves ; they 
 alone really know what they are talking about ; they are ac- 
 quainted with the adlual state of affairs, and are quite at home 
 in the subjedl. 
 
 The thinker stands in the same relation to the ordinary 
 book-philosopher as an eye-witness does to the historian ; he 
 speaks from dire6l knowledge of his own. That is why all 
 those who think for themselves come, at bottom, to much the 
 same conclusion. The differences they present are due to 
 their different points of view ; and when these do not affedl 
 the matter, they all speak alike. They merely express the re- 
 sult of their own objedlive perception of things. There are 
 many passages in my works which I have given to the public 
 
ON THINKING FOR ONESELF. 53 
 
 only after some hesitation, because of their paradoxical nature ; 
 and afterwards I have experienced a pleasant surprise in find- 
 ing the same opinion recorded in the works of great men who 
 lived long ago. 
 
 The book -philosopher merely reports what one person has 
 said and another meant, or the objedlions raised by a third, 
 and so on. He compares different opinions, ponders, criti- 
 cises, and tries to get at the truth of the matter ; herein on a 
 par with the critical historian. For instance, he will set out to 
 inquire whether Leibnitz was not for some time a follower of 
 Spinoza, and questions of a like nature. The curious student 
 of such matters may find conspicuous examples of what I mean 
 in Herbart's Analytical Elucidation of Morality and Natural 
 Right, and in the same author's Letters on Freedom. Surprise 
 may be felt that a man of the kind should put himself to so 
 much trouble ; for, on the face of it, if he would only examine 
 the matter for himself, he would speedily attain his objedl by 
 the exercise of a little thought. But there is a small difficulty 
 in the way. It does not depend upon his own will. A man 
 can always sit down and read, but not — think. It is with 
 thoughts as with men ; they cannot always be summoned at 
 pleasure ; we must wait for them to come. Thought about a 
 subject must appear of itself, by a happy and harmonious com- 
 bination of external stimulus with mental temper and attention ; 
 and it is just that which never seems to come to these people. 
 
 This truth may be illustrated by what happens in the case of 
 matters affe6iing our own personal interest. When it is neces- 
 sary to come to some resolution in a matter of that kind, we 
 cannot well sit down at any given moment and think over the 
 merits of the case and make up our mind; for, if we try to do 
 so, we often find ourselves unable, at that particular moment, 
 to keep our mind fixed upon the subje(5l ; it wanders off tcj 
 other things. Aversion to the matter in question is sometimes 
 to blame for this. In such a case we should not use force, but 
 wait for the proper frame of mind to come of itself. It often 
 comes unexpectedly and returns again and again ; and the 
 
54 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 variety of temper in which we approach it at different moments 
 puts the matter always in a fresh light. It is this long process 
 which is understood by the term a ripe resolution. For the 
 work of coming to a resolution must be distributed ; and in 
 the process much that is overlooked at one moment occurs to 
 us at another ; and the repugnance vanishes when we find, as 
 we usually do, on a closer inspection, that things are not so 
 bad as they seemed. 
 
 This rule applies to the life of the intelleft as well as to 
 matters of pra6lice. A man must wait for the right moment. 
 Not even the greatest mind is capable of thinking for itself at 
 all times. Hence a great mind does well to spend its leisure 
 in reading, which, as I have said, is a substitute for thought : 
 it brings stuff to the mind by letting another person do the 
 thinking ; although that is always done in a manner not our 
 own. Therefore, a man should not read too much, in order 
 that his mind may not become accustomed to the substitute 
 and thereby forget the reality ; that it may not form the habit 
 of walking in well-worn paths ; nor by following an alien 
 course of thought grow a stranger to its own. Least of all 
 should a man quite withdraw his gaze from the real world for 
 the mere sake of reading ; as the impulse and the temper which 
 prompt to thought of one's own come far oftener from the 
 world of reality than from the world of books. The real life 
 that a man sees before him is the natural subjefl of thought ; 
 and in its strength as the primary element of existence, it can 
 more easily than anything else rouse and influence the think- 
 ing mind. 
 
 After these considerations, it will not be matter for surprise 
 that a man who thinks for himself can easily be distinguished 
 from the book-philosopher by the very way in which he talks, 
 by his marked earnestness, and the originality, diredness, and 
 personal convidlion that stamp all his thoughts and expres- 
 sions. The book-philosopher, on the other hand, lets it be 
 seen that everything he has is second-hand ; that his ideas are 
 like the lumber and trash of an old furniture-shop, colle6led 
 
ON THINKING FOR ONESELF. 55 
 
 together from all quarters. Mentally, he is dull and pointless 
 — a. copy of a copy. His literary style is made up of conven- 
 tional, nay, vulgar phrases, and terms that happen to be cur- 
 rent ; in this respeft much like a small State where all the 
 money that circulates is foreign, because it has no coinage of 
 its own. 
 
 Mere experience can as little as reading supply the place of 
 thought. It stands to thinking in the same relation in which 
 eating stands to digestion and assimilation. When experience 
 boasts that to its discoveries alone is due the advancement of 
 the human race, it is as though the mouth were to claim the 
 whole credit of maintaining the body in health. 
 
 The works of all truly capable minds are distinguished by a 
 chara(5ler of decision and definiteness, which means that they 
 are clear and free from obscurity. A truly capable mind al- 
 ways knows definitely and clearly what it is that it wants to 
 express, whether its medium is prose, verse, or music. Other 
 minds are not decisive and not definite ; and by this they may 
 be known for what they are. 
 
 The charadleristic sign of a mind of the highest order is that 
 it always judges at first hand. Everything it advances is the 
 result of thinking for itself ; and this is everywhere evident by 
 the way in which it gives its thoughts utterance. Such a mind 
 is like a Prince. In the realm of intelledl its authority is im- 
 perial, whereas the authority of minds of a lower order is dele- 
 gated only ; as may be seen in their style, which has no 
 independent stamp of its own. 
 
 Every one who really thinks for himself is so far like a mon- 
 arch. His position is undelegated and supreme. His judg- 
 ments, like royal decrees, spring from his own sovereign 
 power and proceed dire<5Hy from himself. He acknowledges 
 authority as little as a monarch admits a command ; he sub- 
 scribes to nothing but what he has himself authorized. The 
 multitude of common minds, laboring under all sorts of cur- 
 rent opinions, authorities, prejudices, is like the people, which 
 silendy obeys the law and accepts orders from above. 
 
56 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 Those who are so zealous and eager to settle debated ques- 
 tions by citing authorities, are really glad when they are able 
 to put the understanding and the insight of others into the 
 field in place of their own, which are wanting. Their number 
 is legion. For, as Seneca says, there is no man but prefers 
 belief to the exercise of judgment — unusquisque mavult credere 
 quam judicare. In their controversies such people make a 
 promiscuous use of the weapon of authority, and strike out at 
 one another with it. If any one chances to become involved 
 in such a contest, he will do well not to try reason and argu- 
 ment as a mode of defence ; for against a weapon of that kind 
 these people are like Siegfrieds, with a skin of horn, and dip- 
 ped in the flood of incapacity for thinking and judging. They 
 will meet his attack by bringing up their authorities as a way 
 of abashing him — argtimenhim ad verecundiam^ and then cry 
 out that they have won the battle. 
 
 In the real world, be it never so fair, favorable and pleasant, 
 we always live subje6l to the law of gravity which we have to 
 be constantly overcoming. But in the world of intelle6l we are 
 disembodied spirits, held in bondage to no such law, and free 
 from penury and distress. Th js it is that there exists no 
 happiness on earth like that which, at the auspicious moment, 
 a fine and fruitful mind finds in itself. ' 
 
 The presence of a thought is like the presence of a woman 
 we love. We fancy we shall never forget the thought nor be- 
 come indifferent to the dear one. But out of sight, out of 
 mind ! The finest thought runs the risk of being irrevocably 
 forgotten if we do not write it down, and the darling of being 
 deserted if we do not marry her. 
 
 There are plenty of thoughts which are valuable to the man 
 who thinks them ; but only few of them which have enough 
 strength to produce repercussive or refledl a6lion — I mean, to 
 win the reader's sympathy after they have been put on paper. 
 
 But still it must not be forgotten that a true value attaches 
 only to what a man has thought in the first instance for his 
 own case. Thinkers may be classed according as they think 
 
ON THINKING FOR ONESELF. 57 
 
 chiefly for their own case or for that of others. The former 
 are the genuine independent thinkers ; they really think and 
 are really independent ; they are the true philosophers ; they 
 alone are in earnest. The pleasure and the happiness of their 
 existence consists in thinking. The others are the sophists ; 
 they want to seem that which they are not, and seek their 
 happiness in what they hope to get from the world. They are 
 in earnest about nothing else. To which of these two classes 
 a man belongs may be seen by his whole style and manner. 
 Lichtenberg is an example for the former class ; Herder, there 
 can be no doubt, belongs to the second. 
 
 When one considers how vast and how close to us is the 
 problem of existence — this equivocal, tortured, fleeting, dream- 
 like existence of ours — so vast and so close that a man no 
 sooner discovers it than it overshadows and obscures all other 
 problems and aims ; and when one sees how all men, with few 
 and rare exceptions, have no clear consciousness of the prob- 
 lem, nay, seem to be quite unaware of its presence, but busy 
 themselves with everything rather than with this, and live on, 
 taking no thought but for the passing day and the hardly 
 longer span of their own personal future, either expressly dis- 
 carding the problem or else over-ready to come to terms with 
 it by adopting some system of popular metaphysics and letting 
 it satisfy them ; when, I say, one takes all this to heart, one 
 may come to the opinion that man may be said to be a think- 
 ing being only in a very remote sense, and henceforth feel no 
 special surprise at any trait of human thoughtlessness or folly ; 
 but know, rather, that the normd man's intelledual range of 
 vision does indeed extend beyond that of the brute, whose 
 whole existence is, as it were, a continual present, with no con- 
 sciousness of the past or the future, but not such an immeasur- 
 able distance as is generally supposed. 
 
 This is, in fa6l, corroborated by the way in which most men 
 converse ; where their thoughts are found to be chopped up 
 fine, like chaff", so that for them to spin out a discourse of any 
 length is impossible. 
 
58 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 If this world were peopled by really thinking beings, it 
 could not be that noise of every kind would be allowed such 
 generous limits, as is the case with the most horrible and at 
 the same time aimless form of it.* If Nature had meant man 
 to think, she would not have given him ears ; or, at any rate, 
 she would have furnished them with air-tight flaps, such as are 
 the enviable possession of the bat. But, in truth, man is a 
 poor animal like the rest, and his powers are meant only to 
 maintain him in the struggle for existence ; so he must need 
 keep his ears always open, to announce of themselves, by 
 night as by day, the approach of the pursuer. 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — Schopenhauer refers to the cracking of whips. 
 See the E^say On Noise in Studies in Pessimism, 
 
ON SOME FORMS OF LITERATURE. 
 
 IN the DRAMA, which is the most perfect reflection of human 
 existence, there are three stages in the presentation of the 
 subject, with a corresponding variety in the design and scope 
 of the piece. 
 
 At the first, which is also the most common, stage, the 
 drama is never anything more than merely interesting. The 
 persons gain our attention by following their own aims, which 
 resemble ours ; the a6tion advances by means of intrigue and 
 the play of chara<5ler and incident ; while wit and raillery 
 season the whole. 
 
 At the second stage, the drama becomes j-^w/zw^n/tf/. Sym- 
 pathy is roused with the hero and, indiredtiy, with ourselves. 
 The action takes a pathetic turn ; but the end is peaceful and 
 satisfa6lory. 
 
 The climax is reached with the third stage, which is the 
 most difficult. There the drama aims at being tragic. We 
 are brought face to face with great suffering and the storm and 
 stress of existence ; and the outcome of it is to show the vanity 
 of all human effort. Deeply moved, we are either dire6lly 
 prompted to disengage our will from the struggle of life, or 
 else a chord is struck in us which echoes a similar feeling. 
 
 The beginning, it is said, is always difficult. In the drama 
 it is just the contrary ; for there the difficulty always lies in the 
 end. This is proved by countless plays which promise very 
 well for the first a<5l or two, and then become muddled, stick 
 or falter — notoriously so in the fourth a6l — and finally con- 
 clude in a way that is either forced or unsatisfactory or else 
 
 (59> 
 
6o THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 long foreseen by every one. Sometimes, too, the end is posi- 
 tively revolting, as in Lessing's Emilia Galotti^ which sends 
 the sped^ators home in a temper. 
 
 This difficulty in regard to the end of a play arises partly be- 
 cause it is everywhere easier to get things into a tangle than 
 to get them out again ; partly also because at the beginning 
 we give the author carte blanche to do as he likes, but, at the 
 end, make certain definite demands upon him. Thus we ask 
 for a conclusion that shall be either quite happy or else quite 
 tragic ; whereas human affairs do not easily take so decided a 
 turn ; and then we expe6l that it shall be natural, fit and proper, 
 unlabored, and at the same time foreseen by no one. 
 
 These remarks are also applicable to an epic and to a novel ; 
 but the more compa6l nature of the drama makes the difficulty 
 plainer by increasing it. 
 
 E nihilo nihil fit. That nothing can come from nothing is 
 a maxim true in fine art as elsewhere. In composing an his- 
 torical pi6lure, a good artist will use living men as a model, 
 and take the ground-work of the faces from life ; and then 
 proceed to idealize them in point of beauty or expression. A 
 similar method, I fancy, is adopted by good novelists. In draw- 
 ing a chara6ter they take the general outline of it from some 
 real person of their acquaintance, and then idealize and com- 
 plete it to suit their purpose. 
 
 • A NOVEL will be of a high and noble order, the more it 
 represents of inner, and the less it represents of outer, life ; and 
 the ratio between the two will supply a means of judging any 
 novel, of whatever kind, from Tristram Shandy down to the 
 crudest and most sensational tale of knight or robber. Tris- 
 tram Shandy has, indeed, as good as no a<5tion at all ; and 
 there is not much in La Nouvelle Heloise and Wilhelm Meister. 
 Even Don Quixote has relatively little ; and what there is, very 
 unimportant, and introduced merely for the sake of fun. And 
 these four are the best of all existing novels. 
 
 Consider, further, the wonderful romances of jean Paul, and 
 
ON SOME FORMS OF LITERATURE. 6l 
 
 how much inner life is shown on the narrowest basis of a<5lual 
 event. Even in Walter Scott's novels there is a great pre- 
 ponderance of inner over outer life, and incident is never 
 brought in except for the purpose of giving play to thought 
 and emotion ; whereas, in bad novels, incident is there on its 
 own account. Skill consists in setting the inner life in motion 
 with the smallest possible array of circumstance ; for it is this 
 inner life that really excites our interest. 
 
 The business of the novelist is not to relate great events, but 
 to make small ones interesting. 
 
 HiSTpRY, which I like to think of as the contrary of poetry 
 {laropovfievov — nenoirifievov), is for time what geography is for 
 space ; and it is no more to be called a science, in any strict 
 sense of the word, than is geography, because it does not deal 
 with universal truths, but only with particular details.* Histo- 
 ry has always been the favorite study of those who wish to 
 learn something, without having to face the effort demanded 
 by any branch of real knowledge, which taxes the intelligence. 
 In our time history is a favorite pursuit ; as witness the numer- 
 ous books upon the subject which appear every year. 
 
 If the reader cannot help thinking, with me, that history is 
 merely the constant recurrence of similar things, just as in a 
 kaleidoscope the same bits of glass are presented, but in differ- 
 ent combinations, he will not be able to share all this lively 
 interest ; nor, however, will he censure it. But there is a 
 ridiculous and absurd claim, made by many people, to regard 
 history as a part of philosophy, nay, as philosophy itself; 
 they imagine that history can take its place. 
 
 The preference shown for history by the greater public in all 
 ages may be illustrated by the kind of conversation which is so 
 much in vogue everywhere in society. It generally consists 
 in one person relating something, and then another person re- 
 lating something else ; so that in this way everyone is sure of 
 
 ' Translator's Note. — This line of argument is not likely to be popu- 
 larnow-a-days ; but if the reader is interested by it, he will find it 
 more fully stated in Die IVe/ta/s Wi//e mid Vorsieliung, Vol. II., c. 38. 
 
62 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 receiving attention. Both here and in the case of history it is 
 plain that the mind is occupied with particular details. But as 
 in science, so also in every worthy conversation, the mind rises 
 to the consideration of some general truth. 
 
 This obje<5tion does not, however, deprive history of its 
 value. Human life is short and fleeting, and many millions of 
 individuals share in it, who are swallowed by that monster of 
 oblivion which is waiting for them with ever-open jaws. It is 
 thus a very thankworthy task to try to rescue something — the 
 memory of interesting and important events, or the leading 
 features and personages of some epoch — from the general ship- 
 wreck of the world. 
 
 , From another point of view, we might look upon histoiy as 
 the sequel to zoology ; for while with all other animals it is 
 enough to observe the species, with man individuals, and 
 therefore individual events have to be studied ; because every 
 man possesses a charader as an individual. And since individ- 
 uals and events are without number or end, an essential imper- 
 fection attaches to history. In the study of it, all that a man 
 learns never contributes to lessen that which he has still to 
 learn. With any real science, a perfe6lion of knowledge is, at 
 any rate, conceivable. 
 
 When we gain access to the histories of China and of India, 
 the endlessness of the subje<5l-matter will reveal to us the de- 
 fe6ts in the study, and force our historians to see that the 
 objedt of science Is to recognize the many in the one, to per- 
 ceive the rules in any given example, and to apply to the life 
 of nations a knowledge of mankind ; not to go on counting up 
 fadts ad iytfinitutn. 
 
 There are two kinds of history ; the history of politics and 
 the history of literature and art. The one is the history of the 
 will ; the other, that of the intelle6t. ' The first is a tale of woe, 
 even of terror : it is a record of agony, struggle, fraud, and 
 horrible murder en masse. The second is everywhere pleasing 
 and serene, like the intelle6l when left to itself, even though its 
 path be one of error. Its chief branch is the history of philoso- 
 
ON SOME FORMS OF LITERATURE. 63 
 
 phy. This is, in fa6t, its fundamental bass, and the notes of it 
 are heard even in the other kind of history. These deep tones 
 guide the formation of opinion, and opinion rules the world. 
 Hence philosophy, rightly understood, is a material force oi 
 the most powerful kind, though very slow in its working. The 
 philosophy of a period is thus the fundamental bass of its 
 history. 
 
 The NEWSPAPER is the second-hand in the clock of history ; 
 and it is not only made of baser metal than those which point 
 to the minute and the hour, but it seldom goes right. 
 
 The so-called leading article is the chorus to the drama of 
 passing events. 
 
 Exaggeration of every kind is as essential to journalism as it 
 is to the dramatic art ; for the object of journalism is to make 
 events go as far as possible. Thus it is that all journalists are, 
 in the very nature of their calling, alarmists ; and this is their 
 way of giving interest to what they write. Herein they are 
 like little dogs ; if anything stirs, they immediately set up a 
 shrill bark. 
 
 Therefore, let us carefully regulate the attention to be paid 
 to this trumpet of danger, so that it may not disturb our 
 digestion. Let us recognize that a newspaper is at best but a 
 magnifying-glass, and very often merely a shadow on the wall. 
 
 The pen is to thought what the stick is to walking ; but you 
 walk most easily when you have no stick, and you think with 
 the greatest perfe(5lion when you have no pen in your hand. 
 It is only when a man begins to be old that he likes to use a 
 stick and is glad to take up his pen. 
 
 When an hypothesis has once come to birth in the mind, or 
 gained a footing there, it leads a life so far comparable with 
 the life of an organism, as that it assimilates matter from the 
 outer world only when it is like in kind with it and beneficial ; 
 and when, contrarily, such matter is not like in kind but hurt- 
 ful, the hypothesis, equally with the organism, throws it off, 
 or, if forced to take it, gets rid of it again entire. 
 
64 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 To gain immortality an author must possess so many ex- 
 cellences that, while it will not be easy to find anyone to 
 understand and appreciate them all, there will be men in every 
 age who are able to recognize and value some of them. In 
 this way the credit of his book will be maintained throughout 
 the long course of centuries, in spite of the fa6l that human 
 interests are always changing. 
 
 An author like this, who has a claim to the continuance of 
 his life even with posterity, can only be a man who, over the 
 wide earth, will seek his like in vain, and offer a palpable con- 
 trast with everyone else in virtue of his unmistakable distinc- 
 tion. Nay, more ; were he, like the wandering Jew, to live 
 through several generations, he would still remain in the same 
 superior position. If this were not so, it would be difficult to 
 see why his thoughts should not perish like those of other men. 
 
 Metaphors and similes are of great value, in so far as they 
 explain an unknown relation by a known one. Even the more 
 detailed simile which grows into a parable or an allegory, is 
 nothing more than the exhibition of some relation in its sim- 
 plest, most visible and palpable form. The growth of ideas 
 rests, at bottom, upon similes ; because ideas arise by a pro- 
 cess of combining the similarities and negle6ling the differences 
 between things. Further, intelligence, in the strift sense of 
 the word, ultimately consists in a seizing of relations ; and a 
 clear and pure grasp of relations is all the more often attained 
 when the comparison is made between cases that lie wide apart 
 from one another, and between thmgs of quite different nature. 
 As long as a relation is known to me as existing only in a 
 single case, I have but ^n individual'idea. o{ \X. — in other words, 
 only an intuitive knowledge of it ; but as soon as I see the same 
 relation in two different cases, I have a general idea of its 
 whole nature, and this is a deeper and more perfe6l knowledge. 
 
 Since, then, similes and metaphors are such a powerful 
 engine of knowledge, it is a sign of great intelligence in a 
 writer if his similes are unusual and, at the same time, to the 
 point. Aristotle also observes that by far the most important 
 
ON SOME FORMS OF LITERATURE. 65 
 
 thing to a writer is to have this power of metaphor ; for it is a 
 gift which cannot be acquired, and it is a mark of genius. 
 
 As regards reading, to require that a man shall retain every- 
 thing he has ever read, is like asking him to carry 'about with 
 him all he has ever eaten. The one kind of food has given him 
 bodily, and the other mental, nourishment ; and it is through 
 these two means that he has grown to be what he is. The 
 body assimilates only that which is like it ; and so a man re- 
 tains in his mind only that which interests him, in other words, 
 that which suits his system of thought or his purposes in life. 
 
 If a man wants to read good books, he must make a point of 
 avoiding bad ones ; for life is short, and time and energy limited. 
 
 Repetiiio est mater studiorum. Any book that is at all im- 
 portant ought to be at once read through twice ; partly be- 
 cause, on a second reading, the conne6lion of the different 
 portions of the t>ook will be better understood, and the begin- 
 ning comprehended only when the end is known ; and partly 
 because we are not in the same temper and disposition on both 
 readings. On the second perusal we get a new view of every 
 passage and a different impression of the whole book, which 
 then appears in another light. 
 
 A man's works are the quintessence of his mind, and even 
 though he may possess very great capacity, they will always . 
 be incomparably more valuable than his conversation. Nay, 
 in all essential matters his wor'cs will not only make up for 
 the lack of personal intercourse with him, but they will far 
 surpass it in solid advantages. The writings even of a man 
 of moderate genius may be edifying, worth reading and in- 
 stru6live, because they are his quintessence — the result and 
 fruit of all his thought and study ; whilst conversation with 
 him may be unsatisfactory. 
 
 So it is that we can read books by men in whose company 
 we find nothing to please, and that a high degree of culture 
 leads us to seek entertainment almost wholly from books and 
 not from men. 
 
ON CRITICISM. 
 
 THE following brief remarks on the critical faculty are chiefly 
 intended to show that, for the most part, there is no 
 such thing. It is a rata avis ; almost as rare, indeed, as the 
 phoenix, which appears only once in five hundred years. 
 
 When we speak of taste — an expression not chosen with 
 any regard for it — we mean the discovery, or, it may be only 
 the recognition, of what is right (esthetically , apart from the 
 guidance of any rule ; and this, either because no rule has as 
 yet been extended to the matter in question, or else because, 
 if existing, it is unknown to the artist, or the critic, as the case 
 may be. Instead oi taste, we might use the expression cesthetic 
 sense, if this were not tautological. 
 
 The perceptive critical taste is, so to speak, the female ana- 
 logue to the male quality of produ6live talent or genius. Not 
 capable of begetting great work itself, it consists in a capacity 
 of reception, that is to say, of recognizing as such what is right, 
 fit, beautiful, or the reverse ; in other words, of discriminating 
 the good from the bad, of discovering and appreciating the 
 one and condemning the other. 
 
 In appreciating a genius, criticism should not deal with the 
 errors in his produ6lions or with the poorer of his works, and 
 then proceed to rate him low ; it should attend only to the 
 qualities in which he most excels. For in the sphere of intel- 
 le6t, as in other spheres, weakness and perversity cleave so 
 firmly to human nature that even the most brilliant mind is not 
 wholly and at all times free from them. Hence the great errors 
 to be found even in the works of the greatest men ; or as 
 Horace puts it, quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus. (66) 
 
ON CRITICISM. 67 
 
 That which distinguishes genius, and should be the standard 
 for judging it, is the height to which it is able to soar when it 
 is in the proper mood and finds a fitting occasion — a height 
 always out of the reach of ordinary talent. And, in like man- 
 ner, it is a very dangerous thing to compare two great men of the 
 same class ; for instance, two great poets, or musicians, or phi- 
 losophers, or artists ; because injustice to the one or the other 
 at least for the moment, can hardly be avoided. For in mak- 
 ing a comparison of the kind the critic looks to some particular 
 merit of the one and at once discovers that it is absent in the 
 other, who is thereby disparaged. And then if the process is 
 reversed, and the critic begins with the latter and discovers 
 his peculiar merit, which is quite of a different order from that 
 presented by the former, with whom it may be looked for in 
 vain, the result is that both of them suffer undue depreciation. 
 
 There are critics who severally think that it rests with each 
 one of them what shall be accounted good, and what bad. 
 They all mistake their own toy-trumpets for the trombones 
 of fame. 
 
 A drug does not effe6l its purpose if the dose is too large ; 
 and it is the same with censure and adverse criticism when it 
 exceeds the measure of justice. 
 
 The disastrous thing for intelledlual merit is that it must wait 
 for those to praise the good who have themselves produced 
 nothing but what is bad ; nay, it is a primary misfortune that 
 it has to receive its crown at the hands of the critical power of 
 mankind — a quality of which most men possess only the weak 
 and impotent semblance, so that the reality may be numbered 
 amongst the rarest gifts of nature. Hence La Bruyere's re- 
 mark is, unhappily, as true as it is neat. Apres V esprit de 
 discemement, he says, ce qu il y a au monde de plus rare, ce 
 sont les diamans et les perles. The spirit of discernment ! the 
 critical faculty ! it is these that are lacking. Men do not know 
 how to distinguish the genuine from the false, the corn from 
 the chaff, gold from copper ; or to perceive the wide gulf that 
 separates a genius from an ordinary man. Thus we have that 
 
68 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 bad state of things described in an old-fashioned verse, which 
 gives it as the lot of the great ones here on earth to be recog- 
 nized only when they are gone : — 
 
 Es ist nun das Geschick der Grossen hier auf Erden, 
 Erst zvann sie nicht niehr sind, von uns erkannt zu werden. 
 
 When any genuine and excellent work makes its appearance, 
 
 the chief difficulty in its way is the amount of bad work it finds 
 
 already in possession of the field, and accepted as though it 
 
 were good. And then if, after a long time, the new comer 
 
 really succeeds, by a hard struggle, in vindicating his place for 
 
 himself and winning reputation, he will soon encounter fresh 
 
 difficulty from some aflre6ted, dull, awkward imitator, whom 
 
 people drag in, with the object of calmly setting him up on the 
 
 altar beside the genius ; not seeing the difference and really 
 
 thinking that here they have to do with another great man. 
 
 This is what Yriarte means by the first lines of his twenty-eighth 
 
 Fable, where he declares that the ignorant rabble always sets 
 
 equal value on the good and the bad : — 
 
 Siempre acosttimhra hacer el vulgo necio 
 De lo bueno y lo malo igual aprecio. 
 
 So even Shakespeare's dramas had, immediately after his 
 death, to give place to those of Ben Jonson, Massinger, Beau- 
 mont and Fletcher, and to yield the supremacy for a hundred 
 years. So Kant's serious philosophy was crowded out by the 
 nonsense of Fichte, Schelling, Jacobi, Hegel. And even in a 
 sphere accessible to all, we have seen unworthy imitators 
 quickly diverting public attention from the incomparable 
 Walter Scott. For, say what you will, the public has no sense 
 for excellence, and therefore no notion how very rare it is to 
 find men really capable of doing anything great in poetry, 
 philosophy, or art, or that their works are alone worthy of ex- 
 clusive-attention. The dabblers, whether in verse or in any 
 other high sphere, should be every day unsparingly reminded 
 that neither gods, nor men, nor booksellers have pardoned 
 their mediocrity : — 
 
 mediocribus esse poetis 
 Non homines, non Di, non concessere columna.^ 
 
 ' Horace, Ars Poetica, 372. 
 
ON CRITICISM. 69 
 
 Are they not the weeds that prevent the com coming up, so 
 that they may cover all the ground themselves ? And then 
 there happens that which has been well and freshly described 
 by the lamented Feuchtersleben,* who died so young : how 
 people cry out in their haste that nothing is being done, while 
 all the while great work is quietly growing to maturity ; and 
 then, when it appears, it is not seen or heard in the clamor, 
 but goes its way silently, in modest grief : — 
 
 " 1st dock,''' — rufen sie 7'ermessen — 
 '' Nichts itn Werke, nichts gethan!'''' 
 
 Und das Grosse, reift indessen 
 
 Still heran. 
 
 Es ersheint nun : niemand sieht es, 
 ■ Niemand h'drt es im Geschrei. 
 Mil bescheid'ner Trauer zieht es 
 Still vorbei. 
 
 This lamentable dearth of the critical faculty is not less obvi- 
 ous in the case of science, as is shown by the tenacious life of 
 false and disproved theories. If they are once accepted, they 
 may go on bidding defiance to truth for fifty or even a hundred 
 years and more, as stable as an iron pier in the midst of the 
 waves. The Ptolematic system was still held a century after 
 Copernicus had promulgated his theory. Bacon, Descartes 
 and Locke made their way extremely, slowly and only after a 
 long time ; as the reader may see by d'Alembert's celebrated 
 Preface to the Encyclopedia. Newton was not more successful ; 
 and this is sufficiently proved by the bitterness and contempt 
 with which Leibnitz attacked his theory of gravitation in the 
 controversy with Clarke. * Although Newton lived for almost 
 forty years after the appearance of the Priyicipia, his teaching 
 was, when he died, only to some extent accepted in his own 
 country, whilst outside England he counted scarcely twenty 
 adherents ; if we may believe the introductory note to Voltaire's 
 
 '^Translator's Note. — Ernst Freiherr von Feuchtersleben (1806-49), 
 an Austrian physician, philosopher, and poet, and a specialist in med- 
 ical psvchology. The best known of his song^s is that beg^inning "'Es 
 ist bestimmt in Gothes Rath,'' to which Mendelssohn composed one 
 of his finest melodies. 
 
 •See especially \\ 35, 113, 118, 120, 122, 128. 
 
70 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 exposition of his theory. It was, indeed, chiefly owing to this 
 treatise of Voltaire's that the system became known in France 
 nearly twenty years after Newton's death. Until then a firm, 
 resolute, and patriotic stand was made by the Cartesian Vor- 
 tices ; whilst only forty years previously, this same Cartesian 
 philosophy had been forbidden in the French schools ; and 
 now in turn d'Agnesseau, the Chancellor, refused Voltaire the 
 Imprimatur for his treatise on the Newtonian do6trine. On 
 the other hand, in our day Newton's absurd theory of color 
 still completely holds the field, forty years after the publication 
 of Goethe's. Hume, too, was disregarded up to his fiftieth 
 year, though he began very early and wrote in a thoroughly 
 popular style. And Kant, in spite of having written and talked 
 all his life long, did not become a famous man until he was 
 sixty. 
 
 Artists and poets have, to be .sure, more chance than think- 
 ers, because their public is at least a hundred times as large. 
 Still, what was thought of Beethoven and Mozart during their 
 livv-s? what of Dante? what even of Shakespeare ? If the lat- 
 ter' s contemporaries had in any way recognized his worth, at 
 least one good and accredited portrait of him would have come 
 down to us from an age when the art of painting flourished ; 
 whereas we possess only some very doubtful pictures, a bad 
 copperplate, and a still worse bust on his tomb.' And in like 
 manner, if he had been duly honored, specimens of his hand- 
 writing would have been preserved to us by the hundred, in- 
 stead of being confined, as is the case, to the signatures to a 
 few legal documents. The Portuguese are still proud of their 
 only poet Camoens. He lived, however, on alms colle6led 
 every evening in the street by a black slave whom he had 
 brought with him from the Indies. In time, no doubt, justice 
 will be done to everyone ; teynpo e galant^ uomo ; but it is as 
 late and slow in arriving as in a court of law, and the secret 
 condition of it is that the recipient shall be no longer alive. 
 
 ' A. Wivell: An Inquiry into the History, Authenticity , and Charac- 
 teristics of Shakespeare' s Portraits ; with 21 engravings. London, 1836. 
 
ON CRITICISM. 71 
 
 The precept of Jesus the son of Sirach is faithfully followed : 
 Judge none blessed before his death} He, then, who has pro- 
 duced immortal works, must find comfort by applying to them 
 the words of the Indian myth, that the minutes of life amongst 
 the immortals seem like years of earthly existence ; and so, too, 
 that years upon earth are only as the minutes of the immortals. 
 
 This lack of critical insight is also shown by the fact that, 
 while in every century the excellent work of earlier time is held 
 in honor, that of its own is misunderstood, and the attention 
 which is its due is given to bad work, such as every decade 
 carries with it only to be the sport of the next. That men are 
 slow to recognize genuine merit when it appears in their own 
 age, also proves that they do not understand or enjoy or really 
 value the long-acknowledged works of genius, which they 
 honor only on the score of authority. The crucial test is the 
 facl that bad work — Fichte's philosophy, for example — if it 
 wins any reputation, also maintains it for one or two genera- 
 tions ; and only when its public is very large does its fall 
 follow sooner. 
 
 Now, just as the sun cannot shed its light but to the eye that 
 sees it, nor music sound but to the hearing ear, so the value 
 of all masterly work in art and science is conditioned by the 
 kinship and capacity of the mind to which it speaks. It is 
 only such a mind as this that possesses the magic word to stir 
 and call forth the spirits that lie hidden in great work. To the 
 ordinary mind a masterpiece is a sealed cabinet of mystery, — 
 an unfamilar musical instrument from which the player, how- 
 ever much he may flatter himself, can draw none but confused 
 tones. How different a painting looks when seen '\n\ good 
 hght, as compared with some dark corner ! Just in the same 
 way, the impression made by a masterpiece varies with the 
 capacity of the mind to understand it. 
 
 A fine work, then, requires a mind sensitive to its beauty ; a 
 thoughtful work, a mind that can really think, if it is to exist 
 and live at all. But alas ! it may happen only too often that 
 
 ' Eidcsiasticus, xi. 28. 
 
72 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 he who gives a fine work to the world afterwards feels like a 
 maker of fireworks, who displays with enthusiasm the wonders 
 that have taken him so much time and trouble to prepare, and 
 then learns that he has come to the wrong place, and that the 
 fancied spectators were one and all inmates of an asylum for 
 the blind. Still even that is better than if his public had con- 
 sisted entirely of men who made fireworks themselves ; as in 
 this case, if his display had been extraordinarily good, it might 
 possibly have cost him his head. 
 
 The source of all pleasure and delight is the feeling of kin- 
 ship. Even with the sense of beauty it is unquestionably our 
 own species in the animal world, and then again our own race, 
 that appears to us the fairest. So, too, in intercourse with 
 others, every man shows a decided preference for those who 
 resemble him ; and a blockhead will find the society of another 
 blockhead incomparably more pleasant than that of any number 
 of great minds put together. Every man must necessarily 
 take his chief pleasure in his own work, because it is the mirror 
 of his own mind, the echo of his own thought ; and next in 
 order will come the work of people like him ; that is to say, a 
 dull, shallow and perverse man, a dealer in mere words, will 
 give his sincere and hearty applause only to that which is dull, 
 shallow, perverse or merely verbose. On the other hand, he 
 will allow merit to the work of great minds only on the score 
 of authority, in other words, because he is ashamed to speak 
 his opinion ; for in reality they give him no pleasure at all. 
 They do not appeal to him ; nay, they repel him ; and he will 
 not confess this even to himself. The works of genius cannot be 
 fully enjoyed except by those who are themselves of the privi- 
 leged order. The first recognition of them, however, when 
 they exist without authority to support them, demands con- 
 siderable superiority of mind. 
 
 When the reader takes all this into consideration, he should 
 be surprised, not that great work is so late in winning reputa- 
 tion, but that it wins it at all. And as a matter of fadt, fame 
 comer only by a slow and complex process. The stupid 
 
ON CRITICISM. 73 
 
 person is by degrees forced, and as it were, tamed, into recog- 
 nizing the superiority of one who stands immediately above 
 him ; this one in his turn bows before some one else ; and so it 
 goes on until the weight of the votes gradually prevail over 
 their number ; and this is just the condition of all genuine, in 
 other words, deserved fame. But until then, the greatest 
 genius, even after he has passed his time of trial, stands like a 
 king amidst a crowd of his own subje6ls, who do not know 
 him by sight and therefore will not do his behests ; unless, in- 
 deed, his chief ministers of state are in his train. For no 
 subordinate official can be the direct recipient of the roy: 
 commands, as he knows only the signature of his immediate 
 superior ; and this is repeated all the way up into the highest 
 ranks, where the under-secretary attests the minister's signa- 
 ture, and the minister that of the king. There are analogous 
 stages to be passed before a genius can attain wide-spread 
 fame. This is why his reputation most easily comes to a stand- 
 still at the very outset ; because the highest authorities, of 
 whom there can be but few, are most frequently not to be 
 found ; but the further down he goes in the scale the more 
 numerous are those who take the word from above, so that his 
 fame is no more arrested. 
 
 We must console ourselves for this state of things by refle6l- 
 ing that it is really fortunate that the greater number of men do 
 not form a judgment on their own responsibility, but merely 
 take it on authority. For what sort of criticism should we have 
 on Plato and Kant, Homer, Shakespeare and Goethe, if every 
 man were to form his opinion by what he really has and enjoys 
 of these writers, instead of being forced by authority to speak 
 of them in a fit and proper way, however little he may really 
 feel what he says. Unless something of this kind took place, 
 it would be impossible for true merit, in any high sphere, to 
 attain fame at all. At the same time it is also fortunate that 
 every man has just so much critical power of his own as is 
 necessary for recognizing the superiority of those who are 
 placed immediately over him, and for following their lead. 
 
74 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 This means that the many come in the end to submit to the 
 authority of the few ; and there results that hierarchy of critical 
 judgments on which is based the possibility of a steady, and 
 eventually wide-reaching, fame. ! 
 
 The lowest class in the community is quite impervious to the 
 merits of a great genius ; and for these people there is nothing 
 left but the monument raised to him, which, by the impression 
 it produces on their senses, awakes in them a dim idea of the 
 man's greatness. 
 
 Literary journals should be a dam against the unconscionable 
 scribbling of the age, and the ever-increasing deluge of bad 
 and useless books. Their judgments should be uncorrupted, 
 just and rigorous ; and every piece of bad work done by an 
 incapable person ; every device by which the empty head tries 
 to come to the assistance of the empty purse, that is to say, 
 about nine-tenths of all existing books, should be mercilessly 
 scourged. Literary journals would then perform their duty, 
 which is to keep down the craving for writing and put a check 
 upon the deception of the public, instead of furthering these 
 evils by a miserable toleration, which plays into the hands of 
 author and publisher, and robs the reader of his time and his 
 money. 
 
 If there were such a paper as I mean, every bad writer, 
 every brainless compiler, every plagiarist from others' books, 
 every hollow and incapable place-hunter, every sham-philoso- 
 pher, every vain and languishing poetaster, would shudder 
 at the prospect of the pillory in which his bad work would in- 
 evitably have to stand soon after publication. This would 
 paralyze his twitching fingers, to the true welfare of literature, 
 in which what is bad is not only useless but positively perni- 
 cious. Now, most books are bad and ought to have remained 
 unwritten. Consequently praise should be as rare as is now 
 the case with blame, which is withheld under the influence of 
 personal considerations, coupled with the maxim accedas socius, 
 laudes lauderis ut absens. 
 
 It is quite wrong to try to introduce into Hterature the same 
 
ON CRITICISM. 75 
 
 toleration as must necessarily prevail in society towards those 
 stupid, brainless people who everywhere swarm in it. In 
 literature such people are impudent intruders ; and to dispar- 
 age the bad is here duty towards the good ; for he who thinks 
 nothing bad will think nothing good either. Politeness, which 
 has its source in social relations, is in literature an alien, and 
 often injurious, element ; because it exadls that bad work shall 
 be called good. In this way the very aim of science and art is 
 dire6tly frustrated. 
 
 This ideal journal could, to be sure, be written only by 
 people who joined incorruptible honesty with rare knowledge 
 and still rarer power of judgment ; so that perhaps there could, 
 at the very most, be one, and even hardly one, in the whole 
 Cvountry ; but there it would stand, like a just Areopagus, 
 every member of which would have to be ele6led by all the 
 others. Under the system that prevails at present, hterary 
 journals are carried on by a clique, and secretly perhaps also 
 by booksellers for the good of the trade ; and they are often 
 nothing but coalitions of bad heads to prevent the good ones 
 succeeding. As Goethe once remarked to me, nowhere is 
 there so much dishonesty as in literature. 
 
 But, above all, anonymity, that shield of all literary rascali- 
 ty, would have to disappear. It was introduced under the 
 pretext of protecting the honest critic, who warned the public, 
 against the resentment of the author and his friends. But 
 where there is one case of this sort, there will be a hundred 
 where it merely serves to take all responsibility from the man 
 who cannot stand by what he has said, or possibly to conceal 
 the shame of one who has been cowardly and base enough to 
 recommmend a book to the public for the purpose of putting 
 money into his own pocket. Often enough it is only a cloak 
 for covering the obscurity, incompetence and insignificance of 
 the critic. It is incredible what impudence these fellows will 
 show, and what literary trickery they will venture to com- 
 mit, as soon as they know they are safe under the shadow of 
 anonymity. Let me recommend a general Anti-criticism, a 
 
76 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 universal medicine or panacea, to put a stop to all anonymous 
 reviewing, whether it praises the bad or blames the good : 
 Rascal ! your name / For a man to wrap himself up and draw 
 his hat over his face, and then fall upon people who are walk- 
 ing about without any disguise — this is not the part of a 
 gentleman, it is the part of a scoundrel and a knave. 
 
 An anonymous review has no more authority than an anony- 
 mous letter ; and one should be received with the same mis- 
 trust as the other. Or shall we take the name of the man who 
 consents to preside over what is, in the stri<5t sense of the word, 
 u?ie societi anonyme as a guarantee for the veracity of his 
 colleagues ? 
 
 Even Rousseau, in the preface to the Nouvelle Heloise, de- 
 clares tout honnite homme doit avouer les livres quHl public ; 
 which in plain language means that every honorable man ought 
 to sign his articles, and that no one is honorable who does not 
 do so. How much truer this is of polemical writing, which is 
 the general character of reviews ! Riemer was quite right in 
 the opinion he gives in his Reminiscences of Goethe:^ An 
 overt enem.y, he says, an enemy who vieets you face to face, is 
 an honorable man, who will treat you fairly, and with whom 
 you can come to terms and be reconciled: but an enemy who 
 conceals himself is a base, cowardly scoundrel, who has not 
 courage enough to avow his own judgment ; it is not his opinion 
 that he cares about, but only the secret pleaszire of wrecking his 
 anger without being found out or punished. This will also 
 have been Goethe's opinion, as he was generally the source 
 from which Riemer drew his observations. And, indeed, 
 Rousseau's maxim applies to every line that is printed. Would 
 a man in a mask ever be allowed to harangue a mob, or speak 
 in any assembly ; and that, too, when he was going to attack 
 others and overwhelm them with abuse ? • 
 
 Anonymity is the refuge for all literary and journalistic 
 rascality. It is a pra(5lice which must be completely stopped. 
 Every article, even in a newspaper, should be accompanied 
 
 • Preface, p. xxix. 
 
ON CRITICISM. 77 
 
 by the name of its author ; and the editor should be made 
 striftly responsible for the accuracy of the signature. The 
 freedom of the press should be thus far restridled ; so that 
 when a man publicly proclaims through the far-sounding 
 trumpet of the newspaper, he should be answerable for, at 
 any rate with his honor, if he has any ; and if he has none, 
 let his name neutralize the effedl of his words. And since 
 even the most insignificant person is known in his own circle, 
 the result of such a measure would be to put an end to two- 
 thirds of the newspaper lies, and to restrain the audacity of 
 many a poisonous tongue. 
 
ON REPUTATION. 
 
 WRITERS may be classified as meteors, planets and 
 fixed stars. A meteor makes a striking effedl for 
 a moment. You look up and cry There! and it is gone 
 for ever. Planets and wandering stars last a much longer 
 time. They often outshine the fixed stars and are confounded 
 with them by the inexperienced ; but this only because they 
 are near. It is not long before they too must yield their 
 place ; nay, the light they give is reflected only, and the sphere 
 of their influence is confined to their own orbit — their con- 
 temporaries. Their path is one of change and movement, and 
 with the circuit of a few years their tale is told. Fixed stars 
 are the only ones that are constant ; their position in the 
 firmament is secure ; they shine with a light of their own ; 
 their effect to-day is the same as it was yesterday, because, 
 having no parallax, their appearance does not alter with a 
 difference in our standpoint. They belong not to one system, 
 one nation only, but to the universe. And just because they 
 are so very far away, it is usually many years before their 
 light is visible to the inhabitants of this earth. 
 
 We have seen in the previous chapter that where a man's 
 merits are of a high order, it is difficult for him to win reputa- 
 tion, because the public is uncritical and lacks discernment. 
 But another and no less serious hindrance to fame comes from 
 the envy it has to encounter. For even in the lowest kinds of 
 work, envy balks even the beginnings of a reputation, and never 
 ceases to cleave to it up to the last. How great a part is 
 played by envy in the wicked ways of the world ! Ariosto is 
 right in saying that the dark side of our mortal life pre- 
 dominates, so full it is of this evil : — 
 
 questa assai piu oscura che serena 
 Vita mortal, tutta d'invidia piena. (78) 
 
ON REPUTATION. 79 
 
 For envy is the moving spirit of that secret and informal, 
 though flourishing, alliance everywhere made by mediocrity 
 against individual eminence, no matter of what kind. In his 
 own sphere of work no one will allow another to be dis- 
 tinguished : he is an intruder who cannot be tolerated. St 
 quelq'un excelle parmi nous, qu'll aille exceller ailleurs ! 
 this is the universal password of the second-rate. In addition, 
 then, to the rarity of true merit and the difficulty it has in be- 
 ing understood and recognized, there is the envy of thousands 
 to be reckoned with, all of them bent on suppressing, nay, on 
 smothering it altogether. No one is taken for what he is, but 
 for what others make of him ; and this is the handle used by 
 mediocrity to keep down distinction, by not letting it come up 
 as long as that can possibly be prevented. ''I 
 
 There are two ways of behaving in regard to merit : either 
 to have some of one's own, or to refuse any to others. The 
 latter method is more convenient, and so it is generally 
 adopted. As envy is a mere sign of deficiency, so to envy 
 merit argues the lack of it. My excellent Balthazar Gracian 
 has given a very fine account of this relation between envy 
 and merit in a lengthy fable, which may be found in his 
 Discreto under the heading Hombre de ostentacion. He de- 
 scribes all the birds as meeting together and conspiring against 
 the peacock, because of his magnificent feathers. If, said the 
 magpie, we could only manage to put a stop to the cursed parad- 
 ing of his tail, there would soon be an e?id of his beauty ; for 
 what is not seen is as good as what does not exist. 
 
 This explains how modesty came to be a virtue. It was in- 
 vented only as a protection against envy. That there have al- 
 ways been rascals to urge this virtue, and to rejoice heartily over 
 the bashfulness of a man of merit, has been shown at length in 
 my chief work. ^ In Lichtenberg's Miscellayieous Writiyiirs I find 
 this sentence quoted : Modesty should be the virtue of those who 
 possess no other. Goethe has a well-known saying, which 
 offends many people : It is only kyiaves who are modest / — I^ur 
 
 ' Welt als mile, Vol. II c. 37. 
 
8o THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 die Lumpen sind bescheiden! but it has its prototype in 
 Cervantes, who includes in his Jotirney up Parnassus certain 
 rules of conduct for poets, and amongst them the following : 
 Every 07ie whose verse shows him to be a poet should have a high 
 opinion of himself, relying on the proverb that he is a knave who 
 thinks himself one. And Shakespeare, in many of his Sonettes, 
 which gave him the only opportunity he had of speak- 
 ing of himself, declares, with a confidence equal to his in- 
 genuousness, that what he writes is immortal.* 
 
 A method of underrating good work often used by envy — 
 in reality, however, only the obverse side of it — consists in the 
 dishonorable and unscrupulous laudation of the bad ; for no 
 sooner does bad work gain currency than it draws attention 
 from the good. But however effe6live this method may be 
 for a while, especially if it is applied on a large scale, the day 
 of reckoning comes at last, and the fleeting credit given to bad 
 work is paid off by the lasting discredit which overtakes those 
 who abje6lly praised it. Hence these critics prefer to remain 
 anonymous. 
 
 A like fate threatens, though more remotely, those who 
 depreciate and censure good work ; and consequently many 
 are too prudent to attempt it. But there is another way ; and 
 when a man of eminent merit appears, the first effe61: he pro- 
 duces is often only to pique all his rivals, just as the peacock's 
 tail offended the birds. This reduces them to a deep silence ; 
 and their silence is so unanimous that it savors of preconcer- 
 tion. Their tongues are all paralyzed. It is the silentium 
 livoris described by Seneca. This malicious silence, which is 
 technically known as ignoring, may for a long time interfere 
 
 ' Collier, one of his critical editors, in his Introduction to the 
 Sonettes, remarks upon this point: "In many of them are to be 
 found most remarkable indications of self-confidence and of assur- 
 ance in the immortality of his verses, and in this respect the author's 
 opinion was constant and uniform. He never scruples to express 
 it, . . . and perhaps there is no writer of ancient or modern times 
 who, for the quantity of such writings left behind him, has so fre- 
 
 3uently or so strongly declared that what he had produced in this 
 epartment of poetry ' the world would not willingly let die.' " 
 
ON REPUTATION. 8l 
 
 with the growth of reputation ; if, as happens in the higher 
 walks of learning, where a man's immediate audience is wholly 
 composed of rival workers and professed students, who then 
 form the channel of his fame, the greater public is obliged to 
 use its suffrage without being able to examine the matter for 
 itself And if, in the end, that malicious silence is broken in 
 upon by the voice of praise, it will be but seldom that this 
 happens entirely apart from some ulterior aim, pursued by 
 those who thus manipulate justice. For, as Goethe says in the 
 West-ostlicher Divan, a man can get no recognition, either 
 from many persons or from only one, unless it is to publish 
 abroad the critic's own discernment : 
 
 Denn es ist kein Anerkennen, 
 Weder Vieler, noch des Einen, 
 Wenn es nicht am Tage fbrdert, 
 Wo tnan selbst was m'dchte scheinen. 
 
 The credit you allow to another man engaged in work similar 
 to your own or akin to it, must at bottom be withdrawn from 
 yourself; and you can praise him only at the expense of your 
 own claims. 
 
 Accordingly, mankind is in itself not at all inclined to award 
 praise and reputation ; it is more disposed to blame and find 
 fault, whereby it indirectly praises itself If, notwithstanding 
 this, praise is won from mankind, some extraneous motive 
 must prevail. I am not here referring to the disgraceful way 
 in which mutual friends will puff one another into a reputa- 
 tion ; outside of that, an effedlual motive is supplied by the 
 feeling that next to the merit of doing something oneself, 
 comes that of correcflly appreciating and recognizing what 
 others have done. This accords with the threefold division of 
 heads drawn up by Hesiod,* and afterwards by MachiavelU.* 
 There are, says the latter, in the capacities of mankind, three 
 varieties : one man will understand a thing by himself ; another 
 so far as it is explained to him ; a third, tieither of himself nor 
 
 • Works and Days, 293. 
 , * The Prince, ch. 22. 
 
82 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 when it is put clearly before him. He, then, who abandons 
 hope of making good his claims to the first class, will be glad 
 to seize the opportunity of taking a place in the second. It is 
 almost wholly owing to this state of things that merit may 
 always rest assured of ultimately meeting with recognition. 
 
 To this also is due the fact that when the value of a work 
 has once been recognized and may no longer be concealed or 
 denied, all men vie in praising and honoring it ; simply be- 
 cause they are conscious of thereby doing themselves an 
 honor. They act in the spirit of Xenophon's remark : he 
 viust be a wise man who knows what is wise. So when they 
 see that the prize of original merit is for ever out of their reach, 
 they hasten to possess themselves of that which comes secona 
 best — the corre6l appreciation of it. Here it happens as with 
 an army which has been forced to yield ; when, just as previ- 
 ously every man wanted to be foremost in the fight, so now 
 every man tries to be foremost in running away. They all 
 hurry forward to offer their applause to one who is now recog- 
 nized to be worthy of praise, in virtue of a recognition, as a 
 rule unconscious, of that law of homogeneity which I men- 
 tioned in the last chapter ; so that it may seem as though 
 their way of thinking and looking at things were homogeneous 
 with that of the celebrated man, and that they may at least 
 save the honor of their literary taste, since nothing else is left 
 them. 
 
 From this it is plain that, whereas it is very difficult to win 
 fame, it is not hard to keep it when once attained ; and also 
 that a reputation which comes quickly does not last very long ; 
 for here too, quod citofit, cito perit. It is obvious that if the 
 ordinary average man can easily recognize, and the rival 
 workers willingly acknowledge, the value of any performance, 
 it will not stand very much above the capacity of either of 
 them to achieve it for themselves. Tantum quisque laudat, 
 quantum se posse sperat imitari — a man will praise a thing only 
 so far as he hopes to be able to imitate it himself. Further, it 
 is a suspicious sign if a reputation comes quickly ; for an ap- 
 
ON REPUTATION. 83 
 
 plication of the laws of homogeneity will show that such a re- 
 putation is nothing but the direct applause of the multitude. 
 What this means may be seen by a remark once made by 
 Phocion, when he was interrupted in a speech by the loud 
 cheers of the mob. Turning to his friends who were standing 
 close by, he asked : Have I made a mistake and said something 
 stupid?^ 
 
 Contrarily, a reputation that is to last a long time must be 
 slow in maturing, and the centuries of its duration have 
 generally to be bought at the cost of contemporary praise. 
 For that which is to keep its position so long, must be of a 
 perfection difficult to attain ; and even to recognize this perfec- 
 tion requires men who are not always to be found, and never 
 in numbers sufficiently great to make themselves heard ; 
 whereas envy is always on the watch and doing its best to 
 smother their voice. But with moderate talent, which soon 
 meets with recognition, there is the danger that those who 
 possess it will outlive both it and themselves ; so that a youth 
 of fame may be followed by an old age of obscurity. In the 
 case of great merit, on the other hand, a man may remain un- 
 known for many years, but make up for it later on by attain- 
 ing a brilliant reputation. And if it should be that this comes 
 only after he is no more, well ! he is to be reckoned amongst 
 those of whom Jean Paul says that extreme unction is their 
 baptism. He may console himself by thinking of the Saints, 
 who also are canonized only after they are dead. 
 
 Thus what Mahlmann' has said so well in Herodes holds 
 
 good ; in this world truly great work never pleases at once, 
 
 and the god set up by the multitude keeps his place on the 
 
 altar but a short time : — 
 
 Ich denke, das wahre Grosse in der Welt 
 1st immer nur Das was nicht gleich gefallt 
 Und wen der P'obel zum Gotte weiht, 
 Der steht auf dent Altar nur kurze Zeit. 
 
 • Plutarch, Apophthegms. 
 « Translator's Note. — August Mahlmann (1771-1826), journalist, 
 poet and story-writer. His Herodes vor Bethlehem is a parody ot 
 Kotzebue's Hussiten vor Naumburg. 
 
84 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 It is worth mention that this rule is most diredlly confirmed 
 in the case of pictures, where, as connoisseurs well know, the 
 greatest masterpieces are not the first to attract attention. If 
 they make a deep impression, it is not after one, but only after 
 repeated, inspection ; but then they excite more and more 
 admiration every time they are seen. 
 
 Moreover, the chances that any given work will be quickly 
 and rightly appreciated, depend upon two conditions : firstly, 
 the character of the work, whether high or low, in other 
 words, easy or difficult to understand ; and, secondly, the 
 kind of public it attracts, whether large or small. This latter 
 condition is, no doubt, in most instances a corollary of the 
 former ; but it also partly depends upon whether the work in 
 question admits, like books and musical compositions, of be- 
 ing reproduced in great numbers. By the compound action 
 of these two conditions, achievements which serve no materi- 
 ally useful end — and these alone are under consideration here 
 — will vary in regard to the chances they have of meeting with 
 timely recognition and due appreciation ; and the order of 
 precedence, beginning with those who have the greatest 
 chance, will be somewhat as follows : acrobats, circus riders, 
 ballet-dancers, jugglers, actors, singers, musicians, composers, 
 poets (both the last on account of the multiplication of their 
 works), architects, painters, sculptors, philosophers. 
 
 The last place of all is unquestionably taken by philosophers, 
 because their works are meant not for entertainment, but for 
 instruction, and because they presume some knowledge on the 
 part of the reader, and require him to make an effort of his own 
 to understand them. This makes their public extremely small, 
 and causes their fame to be more remarkable for its length 
 than for its breadth. And, in general, it may be said that the 
 possibility of a man's fame lasting a long time, stands in almost 
 inverse ratio with the chance that it will be early in making its 
 appearance ; so that, as regards length of fame, the above 
 order of precedence may be reversed. But, then, the poet and 
 the composer will come in the end to stand on the same level 
 
ON REPUTATION. 85 
 
 as the philosopher ; since, when once a work is committed to 
 writing, it is possible to preserve it to all time. However, the 
 first place still belongs by right to the philosopher, because of 
 the much greater scarcity of good work in this sphere, and the 
 high importance of it ; and also because of the possibility it 
 offers of an almost perfect translation into any language. 
 Sometimes, indeed, it happens that a philosopher's fame out- 
 lives even his works themselves ; as has happened with Thales, 
 Empedocles, Heraclitus, Democritus, Parmenides, Epicurus, 
 and many others. 
 
 My remarks are, as I have said, confined to achievements 
 that are not of any material use. Work that serves some 
 practical end, or ministers directly to some pleasure of the 
 senses, will never have any difficulty in being duly appreciated. 
 No first-rate pastry-cook could long remain obscure in any 
 town, to say nothing of having to appeal to posterity. 
 
 Under fame of rapid growth is also to be reckoned fame of 
 a false and artificial kind ; where, for instance, a book is 
 worked into a reputation by means of unjust praise, the help 
 of friends, corrupt criticism, prompting from above and col- 
 lusion from below. All this tells upon the multitude, which is 
 rightly presumed to have no power of judging for itself. This 
 sort of fame is like a swimming bladder ; by its aid a heavy 
 body may keep afloat. It bears up for a certain time, long or 
 short according as the bladder is well sewed up and blown ; 
 but still the air comes out gradually, and the body sinks. This 
 is the inevitable fate of all works which are famous by reason 
 of something outside of themselves. False praise dies away ; 
 collusion comes to an end ; critics declare the reputation un- 
 grounded ; it vanishes, and is replaced by so much the greater 
 contempt. Contrarily, a genuine work, which, having the 
 source of its fame in itself, can kindle admiration afresh in every 
 age, resembles a body of low specific gravity, which always 
 keeps up of its own accord, and so goes floating down the 
 stream of time. 
 
 Men of great genius, whether their work be in poetry. 
 
86 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 philosophy or art, stand in all ages like isolated heroes, keep- 
 ing up single-handed a desperate struggle against the onslaught 
 of an army of opponents.' Is not this characteristic of the 
 miserable nature of mankind ? The dullness, grossness, per- 
 versity, silliness and brutality of by far the greater part of the 
 race, are always an obstacle to the efforts of the genius, what- 
 ever be the method of his art ; they so form that hostile army 
 to which at last he has to succumb. Let the isolated champion 
 achieve what he may : it is slow to be acknowledged ; it is 
 late in being appreciated, and then only on the score of author- 
 ity ; it may easily fall into neglect again, at any rate for a 
 while. Ever afresh it finds itself opposed by false, shallow, 
 and insipid ideas, which are better suited to that large majority, 
 that so generally hold the field. Though the critic may step 
 forth and say, like Hamlet when he held up the two portraits 
 to his wretched mother. Have you eyes? Have you eyes f alas ! 
 they have none. When I watch the behavior of a crowd of 
 people in the presence of some great master's work, and mark 
 the manner of their applause, they often remind me of trained 
 monkeys in a show. The monkey's gestures are, no doubt, 
 much like those of men ; but now and again they betray that 
 the real inward spirit of those gestures is not in them. Their 
 irrational nature peeps out. 
 
 It is often said of a man that he is in advance of his age ; 
 and it follows from the above remarks that this must be taken 
 to mean that he is in advance of humanity in general. Just 
 because of this fact, a genius makes no direft appeal except 
 to those who are themselves considerably above the average 
 in capacity ; and these are too rare to allow of their ever form- 
 ing a numerous body at any one period. If he is in this re- 
 spect not particularly favored by fortune, he will be misunder- 
 
 ' Translator' s Note.— At this point Schopenhauer interrupts the 
 thread of his discourse to speak at length upon an example of false 
 fame. Those who are at all acquainted with the philosopher's views 
 will not be surprised to find that the writer thus held up to scorn is 
 Hegel ; and readers of the other volumes in this series will, with the 
 translator, have had by now quite enough of the subject. The pas- 
 sage is therefore omitted. 
 
ON REPUTATION. 87 
 
 stood by his own age ; in other words, he will remain unaccepted 
 until time gradually brings together the voices of those few per- 
 sons who are capable of judging a work of such high character. 
 Then posterity will say : This man was in advance of his age, 
 mst^^d oi in advance 0/ humanity ; because humanity will be 
 glad to lay the burden of its own faults upon a single epoch. 
 
 Hence, if a man has been superior to his own age, he would 
 also have been superior to any other : provided that, in that 
 age, by some rare and happy chance, a few just men, capable of 
 judging in the sphere of his achievements, had been born at 
 the same time with him ; just as when, according to a beauti- 
 ful Indian myth, Vischnu becomes incarnate as a hero, so, too, 
 Brahma at the same time appears as the singer of his deeds ; 
 and hence Valmiki, Vyasa and Kalidasa are incarnations of 
 Brahma. 
 
 In this sense, then, it may be said that every immortal work 
 puts its age to the proof, whether or no it will be able to recog- 
 nize the merit of it. As a rule, the men of any age stand such 
 a test no better than the neighbors of Philemon and Baucis, 
 who expelled the deities they failed to recognize. Accordingly, 
 the right standard for judging the intelledlual worth of any 
 generation is supplied, not by the great minds that make their 
 appearance in it — for their capacities are the work of Nature, 
 and the possibility of cultivating them a matter of chance 
 circumstance — but by the way in which contemporaries receive 
 their works ; whether, I mean, they give their applause soon 
 and with a will, or late and in niggardly fashion, or leave it to 
 be bestowed altogether by posterity. 
 
 This last fate will be specially reserved for works of a high 
 chara6ler. For the happy chance mentioned above will be all 
 the more certain not to come, in proportion as there are few 
 to appreciate the kind of work done by great minds. Herein 
 lies the immeasurable advantage possessed by poets in respe<ft 
 of reputation ; because their work is accessible to almost every 
 one. If it had been possible for Sir Walter Scott to be read 
 and criticised by only some hundred persons, perhaps in his 
 
88 , THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 life-time any common scribbler would have been preferred to 
 him ; and afterwards, when he had taken his proper place, it 
 would also have been said in his honor that he was in advance 
 of his age. But if envy, dishonesty and the pursuit of personal 
 aims are added to the incapacity of those hundred persons who, 
 in the name of their generation, are called upon to pass judg- 
 ment on a work, then indeed it meets with the same sad fate as 
 attends a suitor who pleads before a tribunal of judges one 
 and all corrupt. 
 
 In corroboration of this, we find that the history of literature 
 generally shows all those who made knowledge and insight 
 their goal to have remained unrecognized and negledled, whilst 
 those who paraded with the vain show of it received the admira- 
 tion of their contemporaries, together with the emoluments. 
 
 The effe6liveness of an author turns chiefly upon his getting 
 the reputation that he should be read. But by pra6licing 
 various arts, by the operation of chance, and by certain natural 
 affinities, this reputation is quickly won by a hundred worth- 
 less people : while a worthy writer may come by it very slowly 
 and tardily. The former possess friends to help them ; for the 
 rabble is always a numerous body which holds well together. 
 The latter has nothing but enemies ; because intelledlual supe- 
 riority is everywhere and under all circumstances the most 
 hateful thing in the world, and especially to bunglers in the 
 same line of work, who want to pass for something themselves.* 
 
 This being so, it is a prime condition for doing any great 
 
 work — any work which is to outlive its own age, that a man 
 
 pay no heed to his contemporaries, their views and opinions, 
 
 and the praise or blame which they bestow. This condition 
 
 is, however, fulfilled of itself when a man really does anything 
 
 great, and it is fortunate that it is so. For if, in producing 
 
 such a work, he were to look to the general opinion or the 
 
 judgment of his colleagues, they would lead him astray at 
 
 every step. Hence, if a man wants to go down to posterity, 
 
 ' If the professors of philosophy should chance to think that I am 
 here hinting at them and the tactics they have for more than thirty 
 years pursued toward my works, they have hit the nail upon the head. 
 
ON REPUTATION. 89 
 
 he must withdraw from the influence of his own age. This 
 will, of course, generally mean that he must also renounce any 
 influence upon it, and be ready to buy centuries of fame by 
 foregoing the applause of his contemporaries. 
 
 For when any new and wide-reaching truth comes into the 
 world — and if it is new, it must be paradoxical — an obstinate 
 stand will be made against it as long as possible ; nay, people 
 will continue to deny it even after they slacken their opposition 
 and are almost convinced of its truth. Meanwhile it goes on 
 quietly working its way, and, like an acid, undermining every- 
 thing around it. From time to time a crash is heard ; the old 
 error comes tottering to the ground, and suddenly the new 
 fabric of thought stands revealed, as though it were a monu- 
 ment just uncovered. Everyone recognizes and admires it. 
 To be sure, this all comes to pass for the most part very slowly. 
 As a rule, people discover a man to be worth listening to only 
 after he is gone ; their hear, hear ! resounds when the orator 
 has left the platform. 
 
 Works of the ordinary type meet with a better fate. Aris- 
 ing as they do in the course of, and in conne6tion with, the 
 general advance in contemporary culture, they are in close 
 alliance with the spirit of their age — in other words, just those 
 opinions which happen to be prevalent at the time. They aim 
 at suiting the needs of the moment. If they have any merit, 
 it is soon recognized ; and they gain currency as books which 
 refle6t the latest ideas. Justice, nay, more than justice, is done 
 to them. They afford little scope for envy ; since, as was said 
 above, a man will praise a thing only so far as he hopes to be 
 able to imitate it himself 
 
 But those rare works which are destined to become the prop- 
 erty of all mankind and to live for centuries, are, at their origin, 
 too far in advance of the point at which culture happens to 
 stand, and on that very account foreign to it and the spirit of 
 their own time. They neither belong to it nor are they in any 
 connexion with it, and hence they excite no interest in those 
 who are dominated by it. They belong to another, a higher 
 
90 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 Stage of culture, and a time that is still far off. Their course 
 is related to that of ordinary works as the orbit of Uranus to 
 the orbit of Mercury. For the moment they get no justice 
 done to them. People are at a loss how to treat them ; so they 
 leave them alone, and go their own snail's pace for themselves. 
 Does the worm see the eagle as it soars aloft ? 
 
 Of the number of books written in any language about one 
 in 100,000 forms a part of its real and permanent literature. 
 What a fate this one book has to endure before it outstrips 
 those 100,000 and gains its due place of honor ! Such a book 
 is the work of an extraordinary and eminent mind, and there- 
 fore it is specifically different from the others ; a fa6l which 
 sooner or later becomes manifest. 
 
 Let no one fancy that things will ever improve in this re- 
 spect. No ! the miserable constitution of humanity never 
 changes, though it may, to be sure, take somewhat varying 
 forms with every generation. A distinguished mind seldom 
 has its full effeft in the life-time of its possessor ; because, at 
 bottom, it is completely and properly understood only by 
 minds already akin to it. 
 
 As it is a rare thing for even one man out of many millions 
 to tread the path that leads to immortality, he must of neces- 
 sity be very lonely. The journey to posterity lies through a 
 horribly dreary region, like the Lybian desert, of which, as is 
 well-known, no one has any idea who has not seen it for him- 
 self. Meanwhile let me before all things recommend the 
 traveler to take light baggage with him ; otherwise he will 
 have to throw away too much on the road. Let him never for- 
 get the words of Balthazar Gracian : lo bueno si breve, dos 
 vezes bueno — good work is doubly good if it is short. This 
 advice is specially applicable to my own countrymen. 
 
 Compared with the short span of time they live, men of great 
 intellect are like huge buildings, standing on a small plot of 
 ground. The size of the building cannot be seen by anyone, 
 just in front of it ; nor, for an analogous reason, can the 
 greatness of a genius be estimated while he lives. But when a 
 
ON REPUTATION. 9I 
 
 century has passed, the world recognizes it and wishes him 
 back again. 
 
 If the perishable son of time has produced an imperishable 
 work, how short his own life seems compared with that of his 
 child ! He is like Semela or Maia — a mortal mother who gave 
 birth to an immortal son ; or, contrarily, he is like Achilles in 
 regard to Thetis. What a contrast there is between what is 
 fleeting and what is permanent ! The short span of a man's 
 life, his necessitous, afflicted, unstable existence, will seldom 
 allow of his seeing even the beginning of his immortal child's 
 brilliant career ; nor will the father himself be taken for that 
 which he really is. It may be said, indeed, that a man whose 
 fame comes after him is the reverse of a nobleman, who is pre- 
 ceded by it. 
 
 However, the only difference that it ultimately makes to a 
 man to receive his fame at the hands of contemporaries rather 
 than from posterity is that, in the former case, his admirers 
 are separated from him by space, and in the latter by time. 
 For even in the case of contemporary fame, a man does not, 
 as a rule, see his admirers actually before him. Reverence can- 
 not endure close proximity ; it almost always dwells at some 
 distance from its obje6l: ; and in the presence of the person 
 revered it melts like butter in the sun. Accordingly, if a man 
 is celebrated with his contemporaries, nine-tenths of those 
 amongst whom he lives will let their esteem be guided by his 
 rank and fortune ; and the remaining tenth may perhaps have 
 a dull consciousness of his high qualities, because they have 
 heard about him from remote quarters. There is a fine Latin 
 letter of Petrarch's on this incompatibility between reverence 
 and the presence of the person, and between fame and life. It 
 comes second in his Epistolce familiares ,^ and it is addressed 
 to Thomas Messanensis. He there observes, amongst other 
 things, that the learned men of his age all made it a rule to 
 think little of a man's writings if they had even once seen him. 
 
 Since distance, then, is essential if a famous man is to be 
 " In the Venetian edition of 1492. 
 
92 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 recognized and revered, it does not matter whether it is dis- 
 tance of space or of time. It is true that he may sometimes hear 
 of his fame in the one case, but never m the other ; but still, 
 genuine and great merit may make up for this by confidently 
 anticipating its posthumous fame. Nay, he who produces 
 some really great thought is conscious of his connexion with 
 coming generations at the very moment he conceives it ; so 
 that he feels the extension of his existence through centuries 
 and thus lives with posterity as well 2is/or it. And when, after 
 enjoying a great man's work, we are seized with admiration 
 for him, and wish him back, so that we might see and speak 
 with him, and have him in our possession, this desire of ours 
 is not unrequited ; for he, too, has had his longing for that 
 posterity which will grant the recognition, honor, gratitude 
 and love denied by envious contemporaries. 
 
 If intellectual works of the highest order are not allowed 
 their due until they come before the tribunal of posterity, a 
 contrary fate is prepared for certain brilliant errors which 
 proceed from men of talent, and appear with an air of being 
 well grounded. These errors are defended with so much 
 acumen and learning that they actually become famous with 
 their own age, and maintain their position at least during their 
 author's lifetime. Of this sort are many false theories and 
 wrong criticisms ; also poems and works of art, which exhibit 
 some false taste or mannerism favored by contemporary prej- 
 udice. They gain reputation and currency simply because no 
 one is yet forthcoming who knows how to refute them or other- 
 wise prove their falsity ; and when he appears, as he usually 
 does, in the next generation, the glory of these works is brought 
 to an end. Posthumous judges, be their decision favorable to 
 the appellant or not, form the proper court for quashing the 
 verdict of contemporaries. That is why it is so difficult and so 
 rare to be victorious alike in both tribunals. 
 
 The unfailing tendency of time to correct knowledge and 
 judgment should always be kept in view as a means of allaying 
 anxiety, whenever any grievous error appears, whether in art, 
 
ON REPUTATION. 93 
 
 or science, or practical life, and gains ground ; or when some 
 false and thoroughly perverse policy or movement is under- 
 taken and receives applause at the hands of men. No one 
 should be angry, or, still less, despondent ; but simply imagine 
 that the world has already abandoned the error in question, 
 and now only requires time and experience to recognize of its 
 own accord that which a clear vision detected at the first 
 glance. 
 
 When the facts themselves are eloquent of a truth, there is 
 no need to rush to its aid with words : for time will give it a 
 thousand tongues. How long it may be before they speak, 
 will of course depend upon the difficulty of the subje6l and the 
 plausibility of the error ; but come they will, and often it would 
 be of no avail to try to anticipate them. In the worst cases it 
 will happen with theories as it happens with affairs in practical 
 life ; where sham and deception, emboldened by success, ad- 
 vance to greater and greater lengths, until discovery is made 
 almost inevitable. It is just so with theories : through the 
 blind confidence of the blockheads who broach them, their 
 absurdity reaches such a pitch that at last it is obvious even to 
 the dullest eye. We may thus say to such people : the wilder 
 your statements, the better. 
 
 There is also some comfort to be found in reflecting upon 
 all the whims and crotchets which had their day and have now 
 utterly vanished. In style, in grammar, in spelling, there are 
 false notions of this sort which last only three or four years. 
 But when the errors are on a large scale, while we lament the 
 brevity of human life, we shall in any case, do well to lag be- 
 hind our own age when we see it on a downward path. For 
 there are two ways of not keeping on a level with the times. 
 A man may be below it ; or he may be above it. 
 
ON GENIUS. 
 
 No difference of rank, position, or birth, is so great as the 
 gulf that separates the countless millions who use their 
 head only in the service of their belly, in other words, look 
 upon it as an instrument of the will, and those very few and 
 rare persons who have the courage to say : No ! it is too good 
 for that ; my head shall be adlive only in its own service ; it 
 shall try to comprehend the wondrous and varied spe6lacle of 
 this world, and then reproduce it in some form, whether as art 
 or as literature, that may answer to my charafter as an individ- 
 ual. These are the truly noble, the real noblesse of the world. 
 The others are serfs and go with the soil — glebes adscripti. Of 
 course, I am here referring to those who have not only the 
 courage, but also the call, and therefore the right, to order the . 
 head to quit the service of the will ; with a result that proves 
 the sacrifice to have been worth the making. In the case of 
 those to whom all this can only partially apply, the gulf is not 
 so wide ; but even though their talent be small, so long as it is 
 real, there will always be a sharp line of demarcation between 
 them and the millions.^ 
 
 1 The corre<5l scale for adjusting the hierarchy of intelligences is 
 furnished by the degree in which the mind takes merely individual or 
 approaches universal views of things. The brute recognizes only the 
 individual as such : its comprehension does not extend beyond the 
 limits of the individual. But man reduces the individual to the gener- 
 al ; herein lies the exercise of his reason ; and the higher his intelli- 
 gence reaches, the nearer do his general ideas approach the point at 
 which they become universal. If his grasp of the universal is so deep 
 as to be intuitive, and to apply not only to general ideas, but to an in- 
 dividual obje<5l by itself, then there arises a knowledge of the Ideas in 
 the sense used by Plato. This knowledge is of an aesthetic character ; 
 when it is self-a<5iive, it rises to genius, and reaches the highest degree 
 of intensity when it becomes philosophic : for then the whole oi life 
 
 (94^ 
 
ON GENIUS. 95 
 
 The works of fine art, poetry and philosophy produced by 
 a nation are the outcome of the superfluous intelle6l existing 
 in it. 
 
 For him who can understand aright — cum grano salts — the 
 relation between the genius and the normal man may, perhaps, 
 be best expressed as follows : A genius has a double intelle(5l, 
 one for himself and the service of his will ; the other for the 
 world, of which he becomes the mirror, in virtue of his purely 
 obje6live attitude towards it. The work of art or poetry or 
 philosophy produced by the genius is simply the result, or 
 quintessence, of this contemplative attitude, elaborated accord- 
 ing to certain technical rules. 
 
 The normal man, on the other hand, has only a single 
 intelle6t, which may be called subjeSlive by contrast with the 
 objeHive intelle6l of genius. However acute this subjective 
 intelle6l may be — and it exists in very various degrees of per- 
 fection — it is never on the same level with the double intelleft 
 of genius ; just as the open chest notes of the human voice, 
 however high, are essentially different from the falsetto notes. 
 These, like the two upper octaves of the flute and the harmonics 
 of the violin, are produced by the column of air dividing itself 
 into two vibrating halves, with a node between, them ; while the 
 open chest notes of the human voice and the lower o6lave of 
 the flute are produced by the undivided column of air vibrat- 
 ing as a whole. This illustration may help the reader to 
 understand that specific peculiarity of genius which is unmis- 
 takably stamped on the works, and even on the physiognomy, 
 of him who is gifted with it. At the same time it is obvious 
 that a double intelle6l like this must, as a rule, obstru6l the 
 service of the will ; and this explains the poor capacity often 
 shown by genius in the condu(5t of life. And what specially 
 chara6lerizes genius is that it has none of that sobriety of 
 
 and existence as it passes away, the world and all it contains, are 
 grasped in their true nature by an ad of intuition, and appear in a form 
 which forces itself upon consciousness as an object of meditation. 
 Here reflection attains its highest point. Between it and the merely 
 animal perception there are countless stages, which differ according to 
 the approach made to a universal view of things. 
 
96 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 temper which is always to be found in the ordinary simple in- 
 telled, be it acute or dull. 
 
 The brain may be likened to a parasite which is nourished 
 as a part of the human frame without contributing dire6Hy to 
 its inner economy ; it is securely housed in the topmost story, 
 and there leads a self-sufficient and independent life. In the 
 same way it may be said that a man endowed with great men- 
 tal gifts leads, apart from the individual life common to all, a 
 second life, purely of the intellect. He devotes himself to the 
 constant increase, rectification and extension, not of mere learn- 
 ing, but of real systematic knowledge and insight ; and remains 
 untouched by the fate that overtakes him personally, so long 
 as it does not disturb him in his work. It is thus a life which 
 raises a man and sets him above fate and its changes. Always 
 thinking, learning, experimenting, pradicing his knowledge, 
 the man soon comes to look upon this second life as the chief 
 mode of existence, and his merely personal life as something 
 subordinate, serving only to advance ends higher than itself. 
 
 An example of this independent, separate existence is jfiir- 
 nished by Goethe. During the war in the Champagne, and 
 amid all the bustle of the camp, he made observations for his 
 theory of color ; and as soon as the numberless calamities of 
 that war allowed of his retiring for a short time to the fortress 
 of Luxembourg, he took up the manuscript of his Farbenlehre. 
 This is an example which we, the salt of the earth, should en- 
 deavor to follow, by never letting anything disturb us in the 
 pursuit of our intelle6lual life, however much the storm of the 
 world may invade and agitate our personal environment ; 
 always remembering that we are the sons, not of the bond- 
 woman, but of the free. As our emblem and coat of arms, I 
 propose a tree mightily shaken by the wind, but still bearing 
 its ruddy fruit on every branch ; with the motto Dutn convellor 
 tnitescunt, or Conquassaia sed ferax. 
 
 That purely intellectual life of the individual has its counter- 
 part in humanity as a whole. For there, too, the real life is 
 the life of the will, both in the empirical and in the transcend- 
 
ON GENIUS. 97 
 
 ental meaning of the word. The purely intelledlual life of 
 humanity lies in its effort to increase knowledge by means of 
 the sciences, and its desire to perfect the arts. Both science 
 and art thus advance slowly from one generation to another, 
 and grow with the centuries, every race as it hurries by furnish- 
 ing its contribution. This intelledlual life, like some gift from 
 heaven, hovers over the stir and movement of the world ; or 
 it is, as it were, a sweet-scented air developed out of the fer- 
 ment itself — the real life of mankind, dominated by will ; and 
 side by side with the history of nations, the history of philoso- 
 phy, science and art takes its innocent and bloodless way. 
 
 The difference between the genius and the ordinary man is, 
 no doubt, a quantitative one, in so far as it is a difference of 
 degree ; but I am tempted to regard it also as qualitative, in 
 view of the fa6l that ordinary minds, notwithstanding individual 
 variation, have a certain tendency to think alike. Thus on 
 similar occasions their thoughts at once all take a similar direc- 
 tion, and run on the same lines ; and this explains why their 
 judgments constantly agree — not, however, because they are 
 based on truth. To such lengths does this go that certain 
 fundamental views obtain among,st mankind at all times, and 
 are always being repeated and brought forward anew, whilst 
 the great minds of all ages are in open or secret opposition 
 to them. 
 
 A genius is a man in whose mind the world is presented as 
 an obje6l is presented in a mirror, but with a degree more of 
 clearness and a greater distin6lion of outline than is attained 
 by ordinary people. It is from him that humanity may look 
 for most instrudlion ; for the deepest insight into the most im- 
 portant matters is to be acquired, notjby an observant attention 
 to detail, but by a close study of things as a whole. And if his 
 mind reaches maturity, the instruAion he gives will be convey- 
 ed now in one form, now in another. Thus genius may be de- 
 fined as an eminently clear consciousness of things in general, 
 and therefore, also of that which is opposed to them, namely, 
 one's own self. 
 
98 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 The world looks up to a man thus endowed, and expedls to 
 learn something about life and its real nature. But several 
 highly favorable circumstances must combine to produce gen- 
 ius, and this is a very rare event. It happens only now and 
 then, let us say once in a century, that a man is born whose 
 intellect so perceptibly surpasses the normal measure as to 
 amount to that second faculty which seems to be accidental, as 
 it is out of all relation to the will. He may remain a long time 
 without being recognized or appreciated, stupidity preventing 
 the one and envy the other. But should this once come to 
 pass, mankind will crowd round him and his works, in the hope 
 that he may be able to enlighten some of the darkness of their 
 existence or inform them about it. His message is, to some 
 extent, a revelation, and he himself a higher being, even 
 though he may be but little above the ordinary standard. 
 
 Like the ordinary man, the genius is what he is chiefly for 
 himself. This is essential to his nature : a fa6i which can 
 neither be avoided nor altered. What he may be for others 
 remains a matter of chance and of secondary importance. In 
 no case can people receive from his mind more than a reflec- 
 tion, and then only when he joins with them in the attempt to 
 get his thought into their heads ; where, however, it is never 
 anything but an exotic plant, stunted and frail. 
 
 In order to have original, uncommon, and perhaps even im- 
 mortal thoughts, it is enough to estrange oneself so fully from 
 the world of things for a few moments, that the most ordinary 
 objects and events appear quite new and unfamiliar. In this 
 way their true nature is disclosed. What is here demanded 
 cannot, perhaps, be said to be difficult ; it is not in our power 
 at all, but is just the province of genius. 
 
 By itself, genius can produce original thoughts just as little 
 as a woman by herself can bear children. Outward circum- 
 stances must come to frudify genius, and be, as it were, 
 a father to its progeny. 
 
 The mind of genius is among other minds what the carbuncle 
 is among precious stones : it sends forth light of its own, while 
 
ON GENIUS. 99 
 
 the others refle6l only that which they have received. The 
 relation of the genius to the ordinary mind may also be described 
 as that of an idio-ele<5lrical body to one which merely is a con- 
 du6lor of ele6lricity . 
 
 The mere man of learning, who spends his life in teaching 
 what he has learned, is not stri6Uy to be called a man of genius ; 
 just as idio-electrical bodies are not conduAors. Nay, genius 
 stands to mere learning as the words to the music in a song. 
 A man of learning is a man who has learned a great deal ; a 
 man of genius, one from whom we learn something which the 
 genius has learned from nobody. Great minds, of which there 
 is scarcely one in a hundred millions, are thus the lighthouses 
 of humanity ; and without them mankind would lose itself in 
 the boundless sea of monstrous error and bewilderment. 
 
 And so the simple man of learning, in the stri6l sense of the 
 word — the ordinary professor, for instance — looks upon the 
 genius much as we look upon a hare, which is good to eat 
 after it has been killed and dressed up. So long as it is alive, 
 it is only good to shoot at. 
 
 He who wishes to experience gratitude from his contempora- 
 ries, must adjust his pace to theirs. But great things are never 
 produced in this way. And he who wants to do great things 
 must diredl his gaze to posterity, and in firm confidence elabo- 
 rate his work for coming generations. No doubt, the result 
 may be that he will remain quite unknown to his contempora- 
 ries, and comparable to a man who, compelled to spend his life 
 upon a lonely island, with great effort sets up a monument 
 there, to transmit to future sea-farers the knowledge of his ex- 
 istence. If he thinks it a hard fate, let him console himself 
 with the reflection that the ordinary man who lives for praAical 
 aims only, often suffers a like fate, without having any com- 
 pensation to hope for ; inasmuch as he may, under favorable 
 conditions, spend a life of material produftion, earning, buy- 
 ing, building, fertilizing, laying out, founding, establishing, 
 beautifying, with daily effort and unflagging zeal, and all the 
 time think that he is working for himself ; and yet in the end 
 
lOO THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 it is his descendants who reap the benefit of it all, and some- 
 times not even his descendants. It is the same with the man 
 of genius ; he, too, hopes for his reward and for honor at 
 least ; and at last finds that he has worked for posterity alone. 
 Both, to be sure, have inherited a great deal from their 
 ancestors. 
 
 The compensation I have mentioned as the privilege of gen- 
 ius lies, not in what it is to others, but in what it is to itself. 
 What man has in any real sense lived more than he whose 
 moments of thought make their echoes heard through the 
 tumult of centuries? Perhaps, after all, it would be the best 
 thing for a genius to attain undisturbed possession of himself, 
 by spending his life in enjoying the pleasure of his own 
 thoughts, his own works, and by admitting the world only as 
 the heir of his ample existence. Then the world would find the 
 mark of his existence only after his death, as it finds that of 
 the Ichnolith.' 
 
 It is not only in the a6livity of his highest powers that the 
 genius surpasses ordinary people. A man who is unusually well- 
 knit, supple and agile, will perform all his movements with 
 exceptional ease, even with comfort, because he takes a direft 
 pleasure in an activity for which he is particularly well-equip- 
 ped, and therefore often exercises it without any obje6l. Fur- 
 ther, if he is an acrobat or a dancer, not only does he take leaps 
 which other people cannot execute, but he also betrays rare 
 elasticity and agility in those easier steps which others can also 
 perform, and even in ordinary walking. In the same way a 
 man of superior mind will not only produce thoughts and 
 works which could never have come from another ; it will not 
 be here alone that he will show his greatness ; but as knowl- 
 edge and thought form a mode of adlivity natural and easy to 
 him, he will also delight himself in them at all times, and so 
 apprehend small matters which are within the range of other 
 minds, more easily, quickly and correctly than they. Thus he 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. — For an illustration of this feeling in poetry, 
 Schopenhauer refers the reader to Byron's Prophecy of Dante: 
 introd. to C. 4. 
 
ON GENIUS. lOI 
 
 will take a dire6land lively pleasure in every increase ol knowl- 
 edge, every problem solved, every witty thought, whether of 
 his own or another's ; and so his mind will have no further 
 aim than to be constantly aftive. This will be an inexhaustible 
 spring of delight ; and boredom, that spectre which haunts the 
 ordinary man, can never come near him. 
 
 Then, too, the masterpieces of past and contemporary men 
 of genius exist in their fullness for him alone. If a great 
 produ6l of genius is recommended to the ordinary, simple 
 mind, it will take as much pleasure in it as the vi(5lim of gout 
 receives in being invited to a ball. The one goes for the sake 
 of formality, and the other reads the book so as not to be in 
 arrear. For La Bruyere was quite right when he said : All 
 the wit in the world is lost upon him who has none. The whole 
 range of thought of a man of talent, or of a genius, compared 
 with the thoughts of the common man, is, even when dire6led 
 to objedls essentially the same, like a brilliant oil-painting, full 
 of life, compared with a mere outline or a weak sketch in 
 water-color. 
 
 All this is part of the reward of genius, and compensates him 
 for a lonely existence in a world with which he has nothing in 
 common and no sympathies. But since size is relative, it 
 comes to the same thing whether I say, Caius was a great man, 
 or Caius has to live amongst wretchedly small people : for 
 Brobdingnack and Lilliput vary only in the point from which 
 they start. However great, then, however admirable or in- 
 structive, a long posterity may think the author of immortal 
 works, during his lifetime he will appear to his contemporaries 
 small, wretched, and insipid in proportion. This is what I 
 mean by saying that as there are three hundred degrees from 
 the base of a tower to the summit, so there are exadlly three 
 hundred from the summit to the base. Great minds thus owe 
 little ones some indulgence ; for it is only in virtue of these 
 little minds that they themselves are great. 
 
 Let us, then, not be surprised if we find men of genius gener- 
 ally unsociable and repellent. It is not their want of sociability 
 that is to blame. Their path through the world is like that of 
 
I02 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 a man who goes for a walk on a bright summer morning. He 
 gazes with delight on the beauty and freshness of nature, but 
 he has to rely wholly on that for entertainment ; for he can 
 find no society but the peasants as they bend over the earth 
 and cultivate the soil. It is often the case that a great mind 
 prefers soliloquy to the dialogue he may have in this world. 
 If he condescends to it now and then, the hollowness of it may 
 possibly drive him back to his soliloquy ; for in forgetfulness 
 of his interlocutor, or caring little whether he understands or 
 not, he talks to him as a child talks to a doll. 
 
 Modesty in a great mind would, no doubt, be pleasing to 
 the world ; but, unluckily, it is a contradinio in adje£lo. It 
 would compel a genius to give the thoughts and opinions, nay, 
 even the method and style, of the million preference over his 
 own ; to set a higher value upon them ; and, wide apart as 
 they are, to bring his views into harmony with theirs, or even 
 suppress them altogether, so as to let the others hold the field. 
 In that case, however, he would either produce nothing at all, 
 or else his achievements would be just upon a level with theirs. 
 Great, genuine and extraordinary work can be done only in so far 
 as its author disregards the method, the thoughts, the opinions 
 of his contemporaries, and quietly works on, in spite of their 
 criticism, on his side despising what they praise. No one be- 
 comes great without arrogance of this sort. Should his life 
 and work fall upon a time which cannot recognize and appre- 
 ciate him, he is at any rate true to himself ; like some noble 
 traveler forced to pass the night in a miserable inn ; when 
 morning comes, he contentedly goes his way. 
 
 A poet or philosopher should have no fault to find with his 
 age if it only permits him to do his work undisturbed in his 
 own corner ; nor with his fate if the corner granted him allows 
 of his following his vocation without having to think about 
 other people. 
 
 For the brain to be a mere laborer in the service of the belly, 
 is indeed the common lot of almost all those who do not live 
 on the work of their hands ; and they are far from being dis- 
 
ON GENIUS. 103 
 
 contented with their lot. But it strikes despair into a man of 
 great mind, whose brain-power goes beyond the measure nec- 
 essary for the service of the will ; and he prefers, if need be, to 
 live in the narrowest circumstances, so long as they afford him 
 the free use of his time for the development and application of 
 his faculties ; in other words, if they give him the leisure which 
 is invaluable to him. 
 
 It is otherwise with ordinary people : for them leisure has 
 no value in itself, nor is it, indeed, without its dangers, as these 
 people seem to know. The technical work of our time, which 
 is done to an unprecedented perfection, has, by increasing 
 and multiplying obje6ls of luxury, given the favorites of fortune 
 a choice between more leisure and culture upon the one side, 
 and additional luxury and good living, but with increased 
 activity, upon the other ; and, true to their chara<5ler, they 
 choose the latter, and prefer champagne to freedom. And 
 they are consistent in their choice ; for, to them, every exertion 
 of the mind which does not serve the aims of the will is folly. 
 Intellectual effort for its own sake, they call eccentricity. 
 Therefore, persistence in the aims of the will and the belly will 
 be concentricity ; and, to be sure, the will is the centre, the 
 kernel of the world. 
 
 But in general it is very seldom that any such alternative is 
 presented. For as with money, most men have no superfluity, 
 but only just enough for their needs, so with intelligence ; they 
 possess just what will suffice for the service of the will, that is, 
 for the carrying on of their business. Having made their 
 fortune, they are content to gape or to indulge in sensual 
 pleasures or childish amusements, cards or dice ; or they will 
 talk in the dullest way, or dress up and make obeisance to one 
 another. And how few are those who have even a little super 
 fluity of intellectual power ! Like the others they too make 
 themselves a pleasure ; but it is a pleasure of the intellect. 
 Either they will pursue some liberal study which brings them 
 in nothing, or they will practice some art ; and in general, 
 they will be capable of taking an objective interest in things. 
 
I04 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 SO that it will be possible to converse with them. But with the 
 others it is better not to enter into any relations at all ; for, 
 except when they tell the results of their own experience or 
 g^ive an account of their special vocation, or at any rate impart 
 what they have learned from some one else, their conversation 
 will not be worth listening to ; and if anything is said to them, 
 they will rarely grasp or understand it aright, and it will in 
 most cases be opposed to their own opinions. Balthazar 
 Gracian describes them very strikingly as men who are not 
 men — hombres che non lo son. And Giordano Bruno says the 
 same thing : What a difference there is in having to do with 
 men compared with those who are only made in their image and 
 likeness/^ And how wonderfully this passage agrees with 
 that remark in the Kurral : The common people look like men 
 but I have never seen anything quite like them. If the reader 
 will consider the extent to which these ideas agree in thought 
 and even in expression, and the wide difference between them 
 in point of date and nationality, he cannot doubt but that they 
 are at one with the facts of life. It was certainly not under the 
 influence of those passages that, about twenty years ago, I 
 tried to get a snuff-box made, the lid of which should have 
 two fine chestnuts represented upon it, if possible in mosaic ; 
 together with a leaf which was to show that they were horse- 
 chestnuts. This symbol was meant to keep the thought con- 
 stantly before my mind. If anyone wishes for entertainment, 
 such as will prevent him feeling solitary even when he is alone, 
 let me recommend the company of dogs, whose moral and 
 intellectual qualities may almost always afford delight and 
 gratification. 
 
 Still, we should always be careful to avoid being unjust. I 
 am often surprised by the cleverness, and now and again by 
 the stupidity, of my dog ; and I have similar experiences with 
 mankind. Countless times, in indignation at their incapacity, 
 their total lack of discernment, their bestiality, I have been 
 forced to echo the old complaint that folly is the mother and 
 the nurse of the human race : — 
 
 ' Opera : ed. Wagner, I. 224. 
 
ON GENIUS. 105 
 
 Humani generis mater nutrixque profeHo 
 Stultilia est. 
 
 But at other times I have been astounded that from such a 
 race there could have gone forth so many arts and sciences, 
 abounding in so much use and beauty, even though it has al- 
 ways been the few that produce them. Yet these arts and 
 sciences have struck root, established and perfected them- 
 selves : and the race has with persistent fidelity preserved 
 Homer, Plato, Horace and others for thousands of years, by 
 copying and treasuring their writings, thus saving them from 
 oblivion, in spite of all the evils and atrocities that have happened 
 in the world. Thus the race has proved that it appreciates the 
 value of these things, and at the same tir«e it can form a cor- 
 rect view of special achievements or estimate signs of judgment 
 and intelligence. When this takes place amongst those who 
 belong to the great multitude, it is by a kind of inspiration. 
 Sometimes a corre6l opinion will be formed by the multitude 
 itself; but this is only when the chorus of praise has grown 
 full and complete. It is then like the sound of untrained 
 voices ; where there are enough of them, it is always har- 
 monious. 
 
 Those who emerge from the multitude, those who are called 
 men of genius, are merely the lucida intervalla of the whole 
 human race. They achieve that which others could not pos- 
 sibly achieve. Their originality is so great that not only is 
 their divergence from others obvious, but their individuality 
 is expressed with such force, that all the men of genius who 
 have ever existed show, everyone of them, peculiarities of 
 character and mind ; so that the gift of his works is one 
 which he alone of all men could ever have presented to the 
 world. This is what makes that simile of Ariosto's so true 
 and so justly celebrated : Natura lofece e poi ruppe lo siampo. 
 After Nature stamps a man of genius, she breaks the die. 
 
 But there is always a limit to human capacity ; and no one 
 can be a great genius without having some decidedly weak 
 side, it may even be, some intellectual narrowness. In other 
 words, there will be some faculty in which he is now and then 
 
I06 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 inferior to men of moderate endowments. It will be a faculty 
 which, if strong, might have been an obstacle to the exercise 
 of the qualities in which he excels. What this weak point is, 
 it will always be hard to define with any accuracy even in a 
 given case. It maybe better expressed indirectly ; thus Plato's 
 weak point is exactly that in which Aristotle is strong, and 
 vice versa; and so, too, Kant is deficient just where Goethe 
 is great. 
 
 Now, mankind is fond of venerating something ; but its 
 veneration is generally directed to the wrong obje6l, and it 
 remains so directed until posterity comes to set it right. But 
 the educated public is no sooner set right in this, than the 
 honor which is due to genius degenerates ; just as the honor 
 which the faithful pay to their saints easily passes into a frivo- 
 lous worship of relics. Thousands of Christians adore the 
 relics of a saint whose life and doctrine are unknown to them ; 
 and the religion of thousands of Buddhists lies more in venera- 
 tion of the Holy Tooth or some such object, or the vessel that 
 contains it, or the Holy Bowl, or the fossil footstep, or the Holy 
 Tree which Buddha planted, than in the thorough knowledge 
 and faithful practice of his high teaching. Petrarch's house in 
 Arqua ; Tasso's supposed prison in Ferrara ; Shakespeare's 
 house in Stratford, with his chair ; Goethe's house in Weimar, 
 with its furniture; Kant's old hat; the autographs of great 
 men ; these things are gaped at with interest and awe by many 
 who have never read their works. They cannot do anything 
 more than just gape. 
 
 The intelligent amongst them are moved by the wish to see 
 the obje6ls which the great man habitually had before his eyes ; 
 and by a strange illusion, these produce the mistaken notion 
 that with the obje6ts they are bringing back the man himself, 
 or that something of him must cling to them. Akin to such 
 people are those who earnestly strive to 'acquaint themselves 
 with the subje6l-matter of a poet's works, or to unravel the 
 personal circumstances and events in his life which have sug- 
 gested particular passages. This is as though the audience in 
 
ON GENIUS. 107 
 
 a theatre were to admire a fine scene and then rush upon the 
 stage to look at the scaffolding that supports it. There are in 
 our day enough instances of these critical investigators, and 
 they prove the truth of the saying that mankind is interested, 
 not in the form of a work, that is, in its manner of treatment, 
 but in its actual matter. All it cares for is the theme. To read 
 a philosopher's biography, instead of studying his thoughts, is 
 like neglecting a picture and attending only to the style of its 
 frame, debating whether it is carved well or ill, and how much 
 it cost to gild it. 
 
 This is all very well. However, there is another class 01 
 persons whose interest is also direded to material and personal 
 considerations, but they go much further and carry it to a 
 point where it becomes absolutely futile. Because a great man 
 has opened up to them the treasures of his inmost being, and, 
 by a supreme effort of his faculties, produced works which not 
 only redound to their elevation and enlightenment, but will also 
 benefit their posterity to the tenth and twentieth generation ; 
 because he has presented mankind with a matchless gift, these 
 varlets think themselves justified in sitting in judgment upon 
 his personal morality, and trying if they cannot discover here 
 or there some spot in him which will soothe the pain they feel 
 at the sight of so great a mind, compared with the overwhelm- 
 ing feeling of their own nothingness. 
 
 This is the real source of all those prolix discussions, carried 
 on in countless books and reviews, on the moral aspe<S 01 
 Goethe's life, and whether he ought not to have married one 
 or other of the girls with whom he fell in love in his young 
 days ; whether, again, instead of honestly devoting himself to 
 the service of his master, he should not have been a man 01 
 the people, a German patriot, worthy of a seat in the Pauls- 
 kirche, and so on. Such crying ingratitude and malicious de- 
 tradlion prove that these self-constituted judges are as great 
 knaves morally as they are intellectually, which is saying a 
 great deal. 
 
 A man of talent will strive for money and reputation ; but 
 
I08 THE ART OF LITERATURE. 
 
 the spring that moves genius to the produflion of its works is 
 not so easy to name. Wealth is seldom its reward. Nor is it 
 reputation or glory ; only a Frenchman could mean that. 
 Glory is such an uncertain thing, and, if you look at it closely, 
 of so little value. Besides it never corresponds to the effort 
 you have made : — 
 
 Responsura tuo nunquam est par fama labori. 
 
 Nor, again, is it exactly the pleasure it gives you ; for this is 
 almost outweighed by the greatness of the effort. It is rather 
 a peculiar kind of instinct, which drives the man of genius to 
 give permanent form to what he sees and feels, without being 
 conscious of any further motive. It works, in the main, by a 
 necessity similar to that which makes a tree bear its fruit ; and 
 no external condition is needed but the ground upon which it 
 is to thrive. 
 
 On a closer examination, it seems as though, in the case of 
 a genius, the will to live, which is the spirit of the human 
 species, were conscious of having, by some rare chance, and 
 for a brief period, attained a greater clearness of vision, and 
 were now trying to secure it, or at least the outcome of it, for 
 the whole species, to which the individual genius in his inmost 
 being belongs ; so that the light which he sheds about him 
 may pierce the darkness and dullness of ordinary human con- 
 sciousness and there produce some good effect. 
 
 Arising in some such way, this instinct drives the genius to 
 carry his work to completion, without thinking of reward or 
 applause or sympathy ; to leave all care for his own personal 
 welfare ; to make his life one of industrious solitude, and to 
 strain his faculties to the utmost. He thus comes to think 
 more about posterity than about contemporaries ; because, 
 while the latter can only lead him astray, posterity forms the 
 majority of the species, and time will gradually bring the dis- 
 cerning few who can appreciate him. Meanwhile it is with 
 him as with the artist described by Goethe ; he has no princely 
 patron to prize his talents, no friend to rejoice with him : — 
 
ON GENIUS. 109 
 
 Ein Furst der die Talente schatzt, 
 Ein Freund, der sich tnit mir ergotzt. 
 Die haben leider mir gefehlt. 
 
 His work is, as it were, a sacred obje<5l and the true fruit of 
 his life, and his aim in storing it away for a more discerning 
 posterity will be to make it the property of mankind. An aim 
 like this far surpasses all others, and for it he wears the crown 
 of thorns which is one day to bloom into a wreath of laurel. 
 All his powers are concentrated in the effort to complete and 
 secure his work ; just as the inseA, in the last stage of its 
 development, uses its whole strength on behalf of a brood it 
 will never live to see ; it puts its eggs in some place of safety, 
 where, as it well knows, the young will one day find life and 
 nourishment, and then dies in confidence. 
 
STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
NOTE. 
 
 THE Essays here presented form a further sele<5boiv from 
 Schopenhauer's Parerga, brought together under a title 
 which is not to be found in the original, and does not claim to 
 apply to every chapter in the volume. The first essay is, in 
 the main, a rendering of the philosopher's remarks under the 
 heading of Nachtrdge zur Lehre oom Leiden der Welt, to- 
 gether with certain parts of another se6lion entitled Nachtrdge 
 zur Lehre von der Bejahung und Vemeinung des Willens zum 
 Leben. Such omissions as I have made are directed chiefly by 
 the desire to avoid repeating arguments already familiar to 
 readers of the other volumes in this series. The Dialogue on 
 Immortality sums up views expressed at length in the philoso- 
 pher's chief work, and treated again in the Parerga. The 
 Psychological Observations in this and the previous volume 
 practically exhaust the chapter of the original which bears 
 this tide. 
 
 The essay on Women must not be taken in jest. It expresses 
 Schopenhauer's serious convictions ; and, as a penetrating ob- 
 server of the faults of humanity, he may be allowed a hearing 
 on a question which is just now receiving a good deal of atten- 
 tion among us. 
 
 T. B. S. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 — — 
 
 On the Sufferings of the World, - - - 7 
 On the Vanity of Existence, - - - - 22 
 
 On Suicide, -------- 27 
 
 Immortality : A Dialogue, ----- 33 
 
 Psychological Observations, - - - - 38 
 
 On Education, - - - - - - 59 
 
 Of Women, -...---- 67 
 
 On Noise, -..-----82 
 
 A Few Parables, .------87 
 
ON THE SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 UNLESS suffering is the dire<5l and immediate obje(5l of 
 life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim. It is 
 absurd to look upon the enormous amount of pain that abounds 
 everywhere in the world, and originates in needs and necessities 
 inseparable from life itself, as serving no purpose at all and the 
 result of mere chance. Each separate misfortune, as it comes, 
 seems, no doubt, to be something exceptional ; but misfortune 
 in general is the rule. 
 
 I know of no greater absurdity than that propounded by 
 most systems of philosophy in declaring evil to be negative in 
 its chara6ler. Evil is just what is positive ; it makes its own 
 existence felt. Leibnitz is particularly concerned to defend 
 this absurdity ; and he seeks to strengthen his position by 
 using a palpable and paltry sophism.^ It is the good which is 
 negative ; in other words, happiness and satisfa(5lion always 
 imply some desire fulfilled, some state of pain brought to 
 an end. 
 
 This explains the fa(5l that we generally find pleasure to be 
 not nearly so pleasant as we expelled, and pain very much 
 more painful. 
 
 The pleasure in this world, it has been said, outweighs the 
 pain ; or, at any rate, there is an even balance between the 
 
 " Translator' s Note, of. Theod, § 153. Leibnitz argued that evil is 
 a negative quality — i.e., the absence of good ; and that its active and 
 seemingly positive character is an incidental and not an essential part 
 of its nature Cold, he said, is only the absence of the power of heat, 
 and the adlive power of expansion in freezing water is an incidental 
 and not an essential part of the nature of cold. The faft is, that the 
 power of expansion in freezing water is really an increase of repulsion 
 amongst its molecules ; and Schopenhauer is quite right in calling the 
 whole argument a sophism. (7) 
 
8 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 two. If the reader wishes to see shortly whether this statement 
 is true, let him compare the respective feelings of two animals, 
 one of which is engaged in eating the other. 
 
 The best consolation in misfortune or affli6tion of any kind 
 will be the thought of other people who are in a still worse 
 plight than yourself ; and this is a form of consolation open to 
 every one. But what an awful fate this means for mankind 
 as a whole ! 
 
 We are like lambs in a field, disporting themselves under the 
 eye of the butcher, who chooses out first one and then another 
 for his prey. So it is that in our good days we are all uncon- 
 scious of the evil Fate may have presently in store for us — 
 sickness, poverty, mutilation, loss of sight or reason. 
 
 No little part of the torment of existence lies in this, that 
 Time is continually pressing upon us, never letting us take 
 breath, but always coming after us, like a taskmaster with a 
 whip. If at any moment Time stays his hand, it is only when 
 we are delivered over to the misery of boredom. 
 
 But misfortune has its uses ; for, as our bodily frame would 
 burst asunder if the pressure of the atmosphere were removed, 
 so, if the lives of men were relieved of all need, hardship and 
 adversity ; if everything they took in hand were successful, 
 they would be so swollen with arrogance that, though they 
 might not burst, they would present the spectacle of unbridled 
 folly — nay, they would go mad. And I may say, further, that 
 a certain amount of care or pain or trouble is necessary for 
 every man at all times. A ship without ballast is unstable and 
 will not go straight. 
 
 Certain it is that work, worry, labor and trouble^ form the 
 lot of almost all men their whole life long. But if all wishes 
 were fulfilled as soon as they arose, how would men occupy 
 their lives ? what would they do with their time ? If the world 
 were a paradise of luxury and ease, a land flowing with milk 
 and honey, where every Jack obtained his Jill ai once and with- 
 out any difficulty, men would either die of boredom or hang 
 themselves ; or there would be wars, massacres, and murders ; 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. 9 
 
 SO that in the end mankind would infliA more suffering on it- 
 self than it has now to accept at the hands of Nature. 
 
 In early youth, as we contemplate our coming life, we are 
 like children in a theatre before the curtain is raised, sitting 
 there in high spirits and eagerly waiting for the play to begin. 
 It is a blessing that we do not know what is really going to 
 happen. Could we foresee it, there are times when children 
 might seem like innocent prisoners, condemned, not to death, 
 but to life, and as yet all unconscious of what their sentence 
 means. Nevertheless, every man desires to reach old age ; in 
 other words, a stale of life of which it may be said : " It is bad 
 to-day, and it will be worse to-morrow ; and so on till the worst 
 of all." 
 
 If you try to imagine, as nearly as you can, what an amount 
 of misery, pain and suffering of every kind the sun shines upon 
 in its course, you will admit that it would be much better if, 
 on the earth as little as on the moon, the sun were able to call 
 forth the phenomena of lite ; and if, here as there, the surface 
 were still in a crystalline state. 
 
 Again, you may look upon life as an unprofitable episode, 
 disturbing the blessed calm of non-existence. And, in any 
 case, even though things have gone with you tolerably well, 
 the longer you live the more clearly you will feel that, on the 
 whole, life is a disappointment, nay, a cheat. 
 
 If two men who were friends in their youth meet again when 
 they are old, after being separated for a life-time, the chief feeling 
 they will have at the sight of each other will be one of complete 
 disappointment at life as a whole ; because their thoughts will 
 be carried back to that ealier time when life seemed so fair as it 
 lay spread out before them in the rosy light of dawn, promised 
 so much — and then performed so little. This feeling will so 
 completely predominate over every other that they will not 
 even consider it necessary to give it words ; but on either side 
 it will be silently assumed, and form the ground-work of all 
 they have to talk about. 
 
 He who lives to see two or three generations is like a man 
 
lO STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 who sits some time in the conjurer's booth at a fair, and wit- 
 nesses the performance twice or thrice in succession. The 
 tricks were meant to be seen only once ; and when they are no 
 longer a novelty and cease to deceive, their effe6l is gone. 
 
 While no man is much to be envied for his lot, there are 
 countless numbers whose fate is to be deplored. 
 
 Life is a task to be done. It is a fine thing to say defun^us 
 est ; it means that the man has done his task. 
 
 If children were brought into the world by an a<5l of pure 
 reason alone, would the human race continue to exist ? Would 
 not a man rather have so much sympathy with the coming 
 generation as to spare it the burden of existence ? or at any 
 rate not take it upon himself to impose that burden upon it in 
 cold blood. ! 
 
 I shall be told, I suppose, that my philosophy is comfortless 
 — because I speak the truth ; and people prefer to be assured 
 that everything the Lord has made is good. Go to the priests, 
 then, and leave philosophers in peace ! At any rate, do not 
 ask us to accommodate our doctrines to the lessons you have 
 been taught. That is what those rascals of sham philosophers 
 will do for you Ask them for any doctine you please, and 
 you will get it. Your University professors are bound to 
 preach optimism ; and it is an easy and agreeable task to upset 
 their theories. 
 
 I have reminded the reader that every state of welfare, every 
 feeling of satisfa<5lion, is negative in its charadler ; that is to 
 say, it consists in freedom from pain, which is the positive ele- 
 ment of existence. It follows, therefore, that the happiness of 
 any given life is to be measured, not by its joys and pleasures, 
 but by the extent to which it has been free from suffering — from 
 positive evil. If this is the true standpoint, the lower animals 
 appear to enjoy a happier destiny than man. Let us examine 
 the matter a little more closely. 
 
 However varied the forms that human happiness and misery 
 may take, leading a man to seek the one and shun the other, 
 the material basis of it all is bodily pleasure or bodily pain. 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. II 
 
 This basis is very restri6led : it is simply health, food, protec- 
 tion from wet and cold, the satisfaAion of the sexual instinct ; 
 or else the absence of these things. Consequentiy, as far as 
 real physical pleasure is concerned, the man is not better off 
 than the brute, except in so far as the higher possibilities of 
 his nervous system make him more sensitive to every kind of 
 pleasure, but also, it must be remembered, to every kind of 
 pain. But then compared with the brute, how much stronger 
 are the passions aroused in him ! what an immeasurable differ- 
 ence there is in the depth and vehemence of his emotions ! — 
 and yet, in the one case, as in the other, all to produce the 
 same result in the end : namely, health, food, clothing, and 
 so on. 
 
 The chief source of all this passion is that thought for what 
 is absent and future, which, with man, exercises such a power- 
 ful influence upon all he does. It is this that is the real origin 
 of his cares, his hopes, his fears — emotions which affect him 
 much more deeply than could ever be the case with those 
 present joys and sufferings to which the brute is confined. In 
 his powers of reflexion, memory and foresight, man possesses, 
 as it were, a machine for condensing and storing up his pleas- 
 ures and his sorrows. But the brute has nothing of the kind ; 
 whenever it is in pain, it is as though it were suffering for the 
 first time, even though the same thing should have previously 
 happened to it times out of number. It has no power of sum- 
 ming up its feelings. Hence its careless and placid temper : 
 how much it is to be envied ! But in man reflexion comes in, 
 with all the emotions to which it gives rise ; and taking up the 
 same elements of pleasure and pain which are common to him 
 and the brute, it develops his susceptibility to happiness and 
 misery to such a degree that, at one moment the man is 
 brought in an instant to a state of delight that may even prove 
 fatal, at another to the depths of despair and suicide. 
 
 If we carry our analysis a step farther, we shall find that, in 
 order to increase his pleasures, man has intentionally added to 
 the number and pressure of his needs, which in their original 
 
12 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 State were not much more difficult to satisfy than those of the 
 brute. Hence luxury in all its forms ; delicate food, the use 
 of tobacco and opium, spirituous liquors, fine clothes, and the 
 thousand and one things that he considers necessary to his 
 existence. 
 
 And above and beyond all this, there is a separate and pecu- 
 liar source of pleasure, and consequently of pain, which man 
 has established for himself, also as the result of using his pow- 
 ers of reflection ; and this occupies him out of all proportion 
 to its value, nay, almost more than all his other interests put 
 together — I mean ambition and the feeling of honor and shame ; 
 in plain words, what he thinks about the opinion other people 
 have of him. Taking a thousand forms, often very strange 
 ones, this becomes the goal of almost all the efforts he makes 
 that are not rooted in physical pleasure or pain. It is true that 
 besides the sources of pleasure which he has in common with 
 the brute, man has the pleasures of the mind as well. These 
 admit of many gradations, from the most innocent trifling or 
 the merest talk up to the highest intellectual achievements ; 
 but there is the accompanying boredom to be set against them 
 on the side of suffering. Boredom is a form of suffering un- 
 known to brutes, at any rate in their natural state ; it is only 
 the very cleverest of them who show faint traces of it when 
 they are domesticated ; whereas in the case of man it has be- 
 come a downright scourge. The crowd of miserable wretches 
 whose one aim in life is to fill their purses but never to put 
 anything into their heads, offers a singular instance of this 
 torment of boredom. Their wealth becomes a punishment by 
 delivering them up to the misery of having nothing to do ; for, 
 to escape it, they will rush about in all directions, traveling 
 here, there and everywhere. No sooner do they arrive in a 
 place than they are anxious to know what amusements it af- 
 fords ; just as though they were beggars asking where they 
 could receive a dole ! Of a truth, need and boredom are the 
 two poles of human life. Finally, I may mention that as 
 regards the sexual relation, man is committed to a peculiar 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. I3 
 
 arrangement which drives him obstinately to choose one per- 
 son. This feeling grows, now and then, into a more or less 
 passionate love,* which is the source of little pleasure and 
 much suffering. 
 
 It is, however, a wonderful thing that the mere addition of 
 thought should serve to raise such a vast and lofty stru6lure of 
 human happiness and misery ; resting, too, on the same nar- 
 row basis of joy and sorrow as man holds in common with the 
 brute, and exposing him to such violent emotions, to so many 
 storms of passion, so much convulsion of feeling, that what he 
 has suffered stands written and may be read in the lines on his 
 face. And yet, when all is told, he has been struggling ulti- 
 mately for the very same things as the brute has attained, and 
 with an incomparably smaller expenditure of passion and pain. 
 
 But all this contributes to increase the measure of suffering 
 in human life out of all proportion to its pleasures ; and the 
 pains of life are made much worse for man by the fad that 
 death is something very real to him. The brute flies from 
 death instinctively without really knowing what it is, and 
 therefore without ever contemplating it in the way natural to a 
 man, who has this prospedl always before his eyes. So that 
 even if only a few brutes die a natural death, and most of them 
 live only just long enough to transmit their species, and then, 
 if not earlier, become the prey of some other animal, — whilst 
 man, on the other hand, manages to make so-called natural 
 death the rule> to which, however, there are a good many ex- 
 ceptions, — the advantage is on the side of the brute, for the 
 reason stated above. But the fa6l is that man attains the 
 natural term of years just as seldom as the brute ; because the 
 unnatural way in which he lives, and the strain of work and 
 emotion, lead to a degeneration of the race ; and so his goal 
 is not often reached. 
 
 The brute is much more content with mere existence than 
 man ; the plant is wholly so ; and man finds satisfaction in it 
 
 ' I have treated this subjedl at length in a special chapter of the 
 second volume of my chief work. 
 
14 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 just in proportion as he is dull and obtuse. Accordingly, the 
 life of the brute carries less of sorrow with it, but also less of 
 joy, when compared with the life of man ; and while this may 
 be traced, on the one side, to freedom from the torment of care 
 and anxiety, it is also due to the fa6l that hope, in any real 
 sense, is unknown to the brute. It is thus deprived of any 
 share in that which gives us the most and the best of our joys 
 and pleasures, the mental anticipation of a happy future, and 
 the inspiriting play of phantasy, both of which we owe to our 
 power of imagination. If the brute is free from care, it is also, 
 in this sense, without hope ; in either case, because its con- 
 sciousness is limited to the present moment, to what it can 
 actually see before it. The brute is an embodiment of present 
 impulses, and hence what elements of fear and hope exist in 
 its nature — and they do not go very far — arise only in relation 
 to obje6ts that lie before it and within reach of those impulses : 
 whereas a man's range of vision embraces the whole of his 
 life, and extends far into the past and future. 
 
 Following upon this, there is one respedl in which brutes 
 show real wisdom when compared with us — I mean, their quiet, 
 placid enjoyment of the present moment. The tranquillity of 
 mind which this seems to give them often puts us to shame 
 for the many times we allow our thoughts and our cares to 
 make us restless and discontented. And, in fa6l, those pleasures 
 of hope and anticipation which I have been mentioning are 
 not to be had for nothing. The delight which a man has in 
 hoping for and looking forward to some special satisfa6lion is 
 a part of the real pleasure attaching to it enjoyed in advance. 
 This is afterwards dedu<5led ; for the more we look forward to 
 anything, the less satisfa6lion we find in it when it comes. 
 But the brute's enjoyment is not anticipated, and therefore, 
 suffers no dedu6lion ; so that the a6lual pleasure of the mo- 
 ment comes to it whole and unimpaired. In the same way, 
 too, evil presses upon the brute only with its own intrinsic 
 weight ; whereas with us the fear of its coming often makes 
 its burden ten times more grievous. 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. 1 5 
 
 It is just this chara6leristic way in which the brute gives 
 itself up entirely to the present moment that contributes so 
 much to the delight we take in our domestic pets. They are 
 the present moment personified, and in some respe6ls they 
 make us feel the value of every hour that is free from trouble 
 and annoyance, which we, with our thoughts and preoccupa- 
 tions, mostly disregard. But man, that selfish and heartless 
 creature, misuses this quality of the brute to be more content 
 than we are with mere existence, and often works it to such 
 an extent that he allows the brute absolutely nothing more 
 than mere, bare life. The bird which was made so that 
 it might rove over half of the world, he shuts up into the space 
 of a cubic foot, there to die a slow death in longing and cry- 
 ing for freedom ; for in a cage it does not sing for the pleasure 
 of it. And when I see how man misuses the dog, his best 
 friend ; how he ties up this intelligent animal with a chain, I 
 feel the deepest sympathy with the brute and burning indig- 
 nation against its master. 
 
 We shall see later that by taking a very high standpoint it 
 is possible to justify the sufferings of mankind. But this justi- 
 fication cannot apply to animals, whose sufferings, while in a 
 great measure brought about by men, are often considerable 
 even apart from their agency.' And so we are forced to ask. 
 Why and for what purpose does all this torment and agony 
 exist? There is nothing here to give the will pause ; it is not 
 free to deny itself and so obtain redemption. There is only 
 one consideration that may serve to explain the sufferings of 
 animals. It is this : that the will to hve, which underlies the 
 whole world of phenomena, must, in their case satisfy its crav- 
 ings by feeding upon itself. This it does by forming a grada- 
 tion of phenomena, every one of which exists at the expense 
 of another. I have shown, however, that the capacity for 
 suffering is less in animals than in man. Any further expla- 
 nation that may be given of their fate will be in the nature 
 of hypothesis, if not actually mythical in its character ; and 
 • Cf. Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, vol. ii. p. 404. 
 
l6 I STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 I may leave the reader to speculate upon the matter for 
 himself. 
 
 Brahma is said to have produced the world by a kind of fall 
 or mistake ; and in order to atone for his folly, he is bound to 
 remain in it himself until he works out his redemption. As 
 an account of the origin of things, that is admirable ! Accord- 
 ing to the do6lrines of Buddhism, the world came into being 
 as the result of some inexplicable disturbance in the heavenly 
 calm of Nirvana, that blessed state obtained by expiation, 
 which had endured so long a time — the change taking place 
 by a kind of fatality. This explanation must be understood as 
 having at bottom some moral bearing ; although it is illus- 
 trated by an exadlly parallel theory in the domain of physical 
 science, which places the origin of the sun in a primitive streak 
 of mist, formed one knows not how. Subsequently, by a 
 series of moral errors, the world became gradually worse and 
 worse — true of the physical orders as well — until it assumed 
 the dismal aspe6l it wears to-day. Excellent ! The Greeks 
 looked upon the world and the gods as the work of an inscrut- 
 able necessity. A passable explanation : we may be content 
 with it until we can get a better. Again, Orm,uzd znA Ahriman 
 are rival powers, continually at war. That is not bad. But 
 that a God like Jehovah should have created this world of 
 misery and woe, out of pure caprice, and because he enjoyed 
 doing it, and should then have clapped his hands in praise of 
 his own work, and declared everything to be very good — that 
 will not do at all ! In its explanation of the origin of the 
 world, Judaism is inferior to any other form of religious doc- 
 trine professed by a civilized nation ; and it is quite in keeping 
 with this that it is the only one which presents no trace what- 
 ever of any belief in the immortality of the soul.' 
 
 Even though Leibnitz' contention, that this is the best of 
 all possible worlds, were corre6l, that would not justify God in 
 having created it. For he is the Creator not of the world 
 
 > See Parerga, vol i. pp. 139 et seg. 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. 1 7 
 
 only, but of possibility itself; and, therefore, he ought to have 
 so ordered possibility as that it would admit of something better. 
 
 There are two things which make it impossible to believe 
 that this world is the successful work of an all wise, all-good, 
 and, at the same time, all-powerful Being ; firstly, the misery 
 which abounds in it everywhere ; and secondly, the obvious 
 imperfe6lion of its highest produ6t, man, who is a burlesque of 
 what he should be. These things cannot be reconciled with 
 any such belief On the contrary, they are just the fa<5ls which 
 support what I have been saying ; they are our authority for 
 viewing the world as the outcome of our own misdeeds, and 
 therefore, as something that had better not have been. Whilst, 
 under the former hypothesis, they amount to a bitter accusa- 
 tion against the Creator, and supply material for sarcasm ; 
 under the latter they form an indi6lment against our own 
 nature, our own will, and teach us a lesson of humility. They 
 lead us to see that, like the children of a libertine, we come 
 into the world with the burden of sin upon us ; and that it is 
 only through having continually to atone for this sin that our 
 existence is so miserable, and that its end is death. 
 
 There is nothing more certain than the general truth that it 
 is the grievous sin of the world which has produced the griev- 
 ous suffering of the world. I am not referring here to the 
 physical connection between these two things lying in the realm 
 of experience ; my meaning is metaphysical. Accordingly, 
 the sole thing that reconciles me to the Old Testament is the 
 story of the Fall. In my eyes, it is the only metaphysical 
 truth in that book, even though it appears in the form of an 
 allegory. There seems to me no better explanation of our 
 existence than that it is the result of some false step, some sin 
 of which we are paying the penalty. I cannot refrain from rec- 
 ommending the thoughtful reader a popular, but at the same 
 time, profound treatise on this subje<5t by Claudius ' which 
 
 > Translator's Note. Matthias Claudius (1740-1815), a popular 
 poet, and friend of Klopstock, Herder and Lessing. He edited the 
 Wandsbecker Bote, in the fourth part of which appeared the treatise 
 mentioned above. He generally wrote under the pseudonym of 
 Asmus, and Schopenhauer often refers to him by this name. 
 
l8 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 exhibits the essentially pessimistic spirit of Christianity. It is 
 entitled : Cursed is the ground for thy sake. 
 
 Between the ethics of the Greeks and the ethics of the 
 Hindoos, there is a glaring contrast. In the one case (with 
 the exception, it must be confessed, of Plato), the obje6l of 
 ethics is to enable a man to lead a happy life ; in the other, it 
 is to free and redeem him from life altogether — as is diredlly 
 stated in the very first words of the Sankhya Karika. 
 
 Allied with this is the contrast between the Greek and the 
 Christian idea of death. It is strikingly presented in a visible 
 form on a fine antique sarcophagus in the gallery at Florence, 
 which exhibits, in relief, the whole series of ceremonies attend- 
 ing a wedding in ancient times, from the formal offer to the 
 evening when Hymen's torch lights the hapjDy couple home. 
 Compare with that the Christian coffin, draped in mournful 
 black and surmounted with a crucifix ! How much significance 
 there is in these two ways of finding comfort in death. They 
 are opposed to each other, but each is right. The one points 
 to the affirmation of the will to live, which remains sure of life 
 for all time, however rapidly its forms may change. The other, 
 in the symbol of suffering and death, points to the denial of 
 the will to live, to redemption from this world, the domain of 
 death and devil. And in the question between the affirmation 
 and the denial of the will to live, Christianity is in the last 
 resort right. 
 
 The contrast which the New Testament presents when 
 compared with the old, according to the ecclesiastical view 
 of the matter, is just that existing between my ethical system 
 and the moral philosophy of Europe. The Old Testament rep- 
 resents man as under the dominion of Law, in which, how- 
 ever, there is no redemption. The New Testament declares 
 Law to have failed, frees man from its dominion,' and in its 
 stead preaches the kingdom of grace, to be won by faith, love 
 of neighbor and entire sacrifice of self This is the path of re- 
 demption from the evil of the world. The spirit of the New 
 
 ' Cf. Romans vii ; Galatians ii, iii. 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. I9 
 
 Testament is undoubtedly asceticism, however your protestants 
 and rationalists may twist it to suit their purpose. Asceticism 
 is the denial of the will to live ; and the transition from the Old 
 Testament to the New, from the dominion of Law to that of 
 Faith, from justification by works to redemption through the 
 Mediator, from the domain of sin and death to eternal life in 
 Christ, means, when taken in its real sense, the transition from 
 the merely moral virtues to the denial of the will to live. My 
 philosophy shows the metaphysical foundation of justice and 
 the love of mankind, and points to the goal to which these 
 virtues necessarily lead, if they are pra6lised in perfedlion. At 
 the same time it is candid in confessing that a man must turn 
 his back upon the world, and that the denial of the will to live 
 is the way of redemption. It is therefore really at one with 
 the spirit of the New Testament, whilst all other systems are 
 couched in the spirit of the Old ; that is to say, theoretically 
 as well as practically, their result is Judaism — mere despotic 
 theism. In this sense, then, my do6lrine might be called 
 the only true Christian philosophy — however paradoxical a 
 statement this may seem to people who take superficial views 
 instead of penetr?.ting to the heart of the matter. 
 
 If you want a safe compass to guide you through life, and to 
 banish all doubt as to the right way of looking at it, you can- 
 not do better than accustom yourself to regard this world as a 
 penitentiary, a sort of penal colony, or ipyaaTi/piov, as the earli- 
 est philosopher called it.^ Amongst the Christian Fathers, 
 Origen, with praiseworthy courage, took this view,* which is 
 further justified by certain objedive theories of life. I refer, 
 not to my own philosophy alone, but to the wisdom of all 
 ages, as expressed in Brahmanism and Buddhism, and in the say- 
 ings of Greek philosophers like Empedocles and Pythagoras ; 
 as also by Cicero, in his remark that the wise men of old used 
 to teach that we come into this world to pay the penalty of 
 
 ' Cf. Clem. Alex. Strom. L. iii., c. 3, p. 399. 
 > Augustine de civitate Dei., L. xi. c. 23. 
 
20 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 crime committed in another state of existence — a doftrine 
 which formed part of the initiation into the mysteries/ And 
 Vanini — whom his contemporaries burned, finding that an easier 
 task than to confute him — puts the same thing in a very 
 forcible way. Man, he says, is so full of every kind of 
 misery that, were it not repugnayit to the Christian religion, 
 I should venture to affirm that if evil spirits exist at all, they 
 have passed into human form and are now atoning for their 
 crimes.^ And true Christianity — using the word in its right 
 sense — also regards our existence as the consequence of sin 
 and error. 
 
 If you accustom yourself to this view of life you will regulate 
 your expedlations accordingly, and cease to look upon all its 
 disagreeable incidents, great and small, its sufferings, its wor- 
 ries, its misery, as anything unusual or irregular ; nay, you will 
 find that everything is as it should be, in a world where each 
 of us pays the penalty of existence in his own peculiar way. 
 Amongst the evils of a penal colony is the society of those who 
 form it ; and if the reader is worthy of better company, he will 
 need no words from me to remind him of what he has to put 
 up with at present. If he has a soul above the common, or if 
 he is a man of genius, he will occasionally feel like some noble 
 prisoner of state, condemned to work in the galleys with com- 
 mon criminals ; and he will follow his example and try to iso- 
 late himself. 
 
 In general, however, it should be said that this view of life 
 will enable us to contemplate the so-called imperfections of the 
 great majority of men, their moral and intelledual deficiencies 
 and the resulting base type of countenance, without any sur- 
 prise, to say nothing of indignation ; for we shall never cease 
 to refledl where we are, and that the men about us are beings 
 conceived and born in sin, and living to atone for it. That is 
 what Christianity means in speaking of the sinful nature of man. 
 
 • Cf. Fragmenta de philosophia. 
 
 * De admirandis naturce arcanis ; dial L. p. 35. 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. 21 
 
 Pardon's the word to all ! * Whatever folly men commit, be 
 their shortcomings or their vices what they may, let us exercise 
 forbearance ; remembering that when these faults appear in 
 others, it is our follies and vices that we behold. They are the 
 shortcomings of humanity, to which we belong ; whose faults, 
 one and all, we share ; yes, even those very faults at which we 
 now wax so indignant, merely because they have not yet ap- 
 peared in ourselves. They are faults that do not lie on the 
 surface. But they exist down there in the depths of our nature ; . 
 and should anything call them forth, they will come and show 
 themselves, just as we now see them in others. One man, it is 
 true, may have faults that are absent in his fellow ; and it is 
 undeniable that the sum total of bad qualities is in some cases 
 very large ; for the difference of individuality between man and 
 man passes all measure. 
 
 In fadl, the convi<5lion that the world and man is something 
 that had better not have been, is of a kind to fill us with indul- 
 gence towards one another. Nay, from this point of view, we 
 might well consider the proper form of address to be, not 
 Monsieur, Sir, mein Herr, but my fellow-sufferer, Soc( mado- 
 rum, compagnon de miseres / This may perhaps sound strange, 
 but it is in keeping with the fa<5ls ; it puts others in a right 
 light ; and it reminds us of that which is after all the most 
 necessary thing in life — the tolerance, patience, regard, and 
 love of neighbor, of which everyone stands in need, and which, . 
 therefore, every man owes to his fellow, 
 
 » "Cymbeline," Act v. Sc. 5. 
 
THE VANITY OF EXISTENCE. 
 
 THIS vanity finds expression in the whole way in which 
 things exist ; in the infinite nature of Time and Space, 
 as opposed to the finite nature of the individual in both; in the 
 ever-passing present moment as the only mode of a<5lual exist- 
 ence ; in the interdependence and relativity of all things ; in 
 continual Becoming without ever Being ; in constant wishing 
 and never being satisfied ; in the long battle which forms the 
 history of life, where every effort is checked by difficulties, 
 and stopped until they are overcome. Time is that in which 
 all things pass away ; it is merely the form under which the 
 will to live — the thing-in-itself and therefore imperishable — 
 has revealed to it that its efforts are in vain ; it is that agent 
 by which at every moment all things in our hands become as 
 nothing, and lose any real value they possess. 
 
 That which has been exists no more ; it exists as little as 
 that which has never been. But of everything that exists you 
 must say, in the next moment, that it has been. Hence some- 
 thing of great importance now past is inferior to something of 
 little importance now present, in that the latter is a reality, 
 and related to the former as something to nothing. 
 
 A man finds himself, to his great astonishment suddenly exist- 
 ing, after thousands and thousands of years of non-existence : he 
 lives for a little while ; and then, again, comes an equally long 
 period when he must exist no more. The heart rebels against 
 this, and feels that it cannot be true. The crudest intelled 
 cannot speculate on such a subje<5l without having a presenti- 
 ment that Time is something ideal in its nature. This ideality 
 of Time and Space is the key to every true system of meta- 
 
 (22) 
 
THE VANITY OF EXISTENCE. 23 
 
 physics ; because it provides for quite another order of things 
 than is to be met with in the domain of nature. This is why 
 Kant is so great. 
 
 Of every event in our Ufe we can say only for one moment 
 that it is ; for ever after, that it was. Every evening we are 
 poorer by a day. It might, perhaps, make us mad to see how 
 rapidly our short span of time ebbs away ; if it were not that 
 in the furthest depths of our being we are secretly conscious 
 of our share in the inexhaustible spring of eternity, so that we 
 can always hope to find life in it again. 
 
 Consideration of the kind, touched on above, might, indeed, 
 lead us to embrace the belief that the greatest wisdom is to 
 make the enjoyment of the present the supreme object of life ; 
 because that is the only reality, all else being merely the play 
 of thought. On the other hand, such a course might just as 
 well be called the greatest folly : for that which in the next 
 moment exists no more, and vanishes utterly, like a dream, 
 can never be worth a serious effort. 
 
 The whole foundation on which our existence rests is the 
 present — the ever-fleeting present. It lies, then, in the very 
 nature of our existence to take the form of constant motion, 
 and to offer no possibility of our ever attaining the rest for 
 which we are always striving. We are like a man running 
 downhill, who cannot keep on his legs unless he runs on, and 
 will inevitably fall if he stops ; or, again, like a pole balanced 
 on the tip of one's finger; or like a planet, which would fall 
 into its sun the moment it ceased to hurry forward on its way. 
 Unrest is the mark of existence. 
 
 In a world where all is unstable, and nought can endure, but 
 is swept onwards at once in the hurrying whirlpool of change ; 
 where a man, if he is to keep eredl at all, must always be ad- 
 vancing and moving, like an acrobat on a rope — in such a 
 world, happiness is inconceivable. How can it dwell where, 
 as Plato says, continual Becoming and never Being is the sole 
 form of existence ? In the first place, a man never is happy, 
 but spends his whole life in striving after something which he 
 thinks will make him so ; he seldom attains his goal, and 
 
24 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 when he does, it is only to be disappointed ; he is mostly 
 shipwrecked in the end, and comes into harbor with masts and 
 rigging gone. And then, it is all one whether he has been 
 happy or miserable ; for his life was never anything more than 
 a present moment always vanishing ; and now it is over. 
 
 At the same time it is a wonderful thing that, in the world 
 of human beings as in that of animals in general, this manifold 
 restless motion is produced and kept up by the agency of two 
 simple impulses — hunger and the sexual instin<5l ; aided a 
 little, perhaps, by the influence of boredom, but by nothing 
 else ; and that, in the theatre of life, these suffice to form the 
 primum mobile of how complicated a machinery, setting in 
 motion how strange and varied a scene ! 
 
 On looking a little closer, we find that inorganic matter pre- 
 sents a constant confli<5l between chemical forces, which event- 
 ually works dissolution ; and on the other hand, that organic 
 life is impossible without continual change of matter, and can- 
 not exist if it does not receive perpetual help from without. 
 This is the realm oi finality ; and its opposite would be an 
 infinite existence, exposed to no attack from without, and 
 needing nothing to support it ; dri uadvTui dv, the realm of 
 eternal peace ; aire ytyvnfievov ovre uno/iAviitvov, some timeless, 
 changeless state, one and undi versified ; the negative knowl- 
 edge of which forms the dominant note of the Platonic philos- 
 ophy. It is to some such state as this that the denial of the 
 will to live opens up the way. 
 
 The scenes of our life are like pi6lures done in rough mosaic. 
 Looked at close, they produce no effect. There is nothing 
 beautiful to be found in them, unless you stand some distance 
 off. So, to gain anything we have longed for is only to dis- 
 cover how vain and empty it is ; and even though we are 
 always living in expectation of better things, at the same time 
 we often repent and long to have the past back again. We 
 look upon the present as something to be put up with while it 
 lasts, and serving only as the way towards our goal. Hence 
 most people, if they glance back when they come to the end 
 of life, will find that all along they have been living ad interim : 
 
THE VANITY OF EXISTENCE. 25 
 
 they will be surprised to find that the very thing they disre- 
 garded and let slip by unenjoyed, was just the life in the 
 expedation of which they passed all their time. Of how many 
 a man may it not be said that hope made a fool of him until he 
 danced into the arms of death ! 
 
 Then again, how insatiable a creature is man ! Every satis- 
 fa6lion he attains lays the seeds of some new desire, so that 
 there is no end to the wishes of each individual will. And why 
 is this? The real reason is simply that, taken in itself, Will is 
 the lord of all worlds : everything belongs to it, and therefore 
 no one single thing can ever give it satisfa6lion, but only the 
 whole, which is endless. For all that, it must rouse our sym- 
 pathy to think how very little the Will, this lord of the world, 
 really gets when it takes the form of an individual ; usually only 
 just enough to keep the body together. This is why man is 
 so very miserable. 
 
 Life presents itself chiefly as a task — the task, I mean, of 
 subsisting at all, gagner sa vie. If this is accomplished, life is 
 a burden, and then there comes the second task of doing some- 
 thing with that which has been won — of warding off boredom, 
 which, like a bird of prey, hovers over us, ready to fall wher- 
 ever it sees a life secure from need. The first task is to win 
 something ; the second, to banish the feeling that it has been 
 won ; otherwise it is a burden. 
 
 Human hfe must be some kind of mistake. The truth of 
 this will be sufficiently obvious if we only remember that man 
 is a compound of needs and necessities hard to satisfy ; and 
 that even when they are satisfied, all he obtains is a state of 
 painlessness, where nothing remains to him but abandonment 
 to boredom. This is direct proof that existence has no real 
 value in itself ; for what is boredom but the feeling of the 
 emptiness of life ? If life — the craving for which is the very es- 
 sence of our being — were possessed of any positive intrinsic 
 value, there would be no such thing as boredom at all : mere 
 existence would satisfiy us in itself, and we should want for 
 nothing. But as it is, we take no delight in existence except 
 when we are struggling for something ; and then distance and 
 
26 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 difficulties to be overcome make our goal look as though it 
 would satisfy us — an illusion which vanishes when we reach it ; 
 or else when we are occupied with some purely intelle6lual in- 
 terest — where in reality we have stepped forth from life to look 
 upon it from the outside, much after the manner of spectators 
 at a play. And even sensual pleasure itself means nothing but 
 a struggle and aspiration, ceasing the moment its aim is attained. 
 Whenever we are not occupied in one of these ways, but cast 
 upon existence itself, its vain and worthless nature is brought 
 home to us ; and this is what we mean by boredom. The 
 hankering after what is strange and uncommon — an innate and 
 ineradicable tendency of human nature — shows how glad we 
 are at any interruption of that natural course of affairs which is 
 so very tedious. 
 
 That this most perfe6l manifestation of the will to live, the 
 human organism, with the cunning and complex working of its 
 machinery, must fall to dust and yield up itself and all its striv- 
 ings to extinction — this is the naive way in which Nature, who 
 is always so true and sincere in what she says, proclaims the 
 whole struggle of this will as in its very essence barren and un- 
 profitable. Were it of any value in itself, anything uncon- 
 ditioned and absolute, it could not thus end in mere nothing. 
 
 If we turn from contemplating the world as a whole, and, in 
 particular, the generations of men as they live their little hour 
 of mock-existence and then are swept away in rapid succession ; 
 if we turn from this, and look at life in its small details, as pre- 
 sented, say, in a comedy, how ridiculous it all seems ! It is 
 like a drop of water seen through a microscope, a single drop 
 teeming with infusoria ; or a speck of cheese full of mites in- 
 visible to the naked eye. How we laugh as they bustle about 
 so eagerly, and struggle with one another is so tiny a space ! 
 And whether here, or in the little span of human life, this 
 terrible aClivity produces a comic effe6t. 
 
 It is only in the microscope that our life looks so big. It is 
 an indivisible point, drawn out and magnified by the powerful 
 lenses of Time and Space. 
 
ON SUICIDE. 
 
 As far as I know, none but the votaries of monotheistic, 
 that is to say, Jewish religions, look upon suicide as 
 a crime. This is all the more striking, inasmuch as neither 
 in the Old nor in the New Testament is there to be found any 
 prohibition or positive disapproval of it ; so that religious 
 teachers are forced to base their condemnation of suicide on 
 philosophical grounds of their own invention. These are so 
 very bad that writers of this kind endeavor to make up for the 
 weakness of their arguments by the strong terms in which they 
 express their abhorrence of the pra6lice ; in other words, they 
 declaim against it. They tell us that suicide is the greatest 
 piece of cowardice ; that only a madman could be guilty of it ; 
 and other insipidities of the same kind ; or else they make the 
 nonsensical remark that suicide is wrong ; when it is quite 
 obvious that there is nothing in the world to which every man 
 has a more unassailable title than to his own life and person. 
 
 Suicide, as I have said, is a6lually accounted a crime ; and 
 a crime which, especially under the vulgar bigotry that prevails 
 in England, is followed by an ignominious burial and the 
 seizure of the man's property ; and for that reason, in a case 
 of suicide, the jury almost always bring in a verdi6l of insanity. 
 Now let the reader's own moral feelings decide as to whether 
 or not suicide is a criminal a6^. Think of the impression that 
 would be made upon you by the news that some one you know 
 had committed the crime, say, of murder or theft, or been 
 guilty of some adl of cruelty or deception ; and compare it with 
 your feelings when you hear that he has met a voluntary death. 
 
 While in the one case a lively sense of indignation and extreme 
 
 (27) 
 
28 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 resentment will be aroused, and you will call loudly for punish- 
 ment or revenge, in the other you will be moved to grief and 
 sympathy ; and mingled with your thoughts will be admiration 
 for his courage, rather than the moral disapproval which follows 
 upon a wicked adion. Who has not had acquaintances, 
 friends, relations, who of their own free will have left this 
 world ; and are these to be thought of with horror as crimin- 
 als ? Most emphatically, No ! I am rather of opinion that 
 the clergy should be challenged to explain what right they 
 have to go into the pulpit, or take up their pens, and stamp as 
 a crime an action which many men whom we hold in affeftion 
 and honor have committed ; and to refuse an honorable burial 
 to those who relinquish this world voluntarily. They have no 
 Biblical authority to boast of, as justifying their condemnation 
 of suicide ; nay, not even any philosophical arguments that 
 will hold water ; and it must be understood that it is arguments 
 we want, and that we will not be put off with mere phrases or 
 words of abuse. If the criminal law forbids suicide, that is not 
 an argument valid in the Church ; and besides, the prohibition 
 is ridiculous ; for what penalty can frighten a man who is not 
 afraid of death itself? If the law punishes people for trying to 
 commit suicide, it is punishing the want of skill that makes the 
 attempt a failure. 
 
 The ancients, moreover, were very far from regarding the 
 matter in that light. Pliny says : Life is not so desirable a 
 thing as to be protra6led at any cost. Whoever you are, you 
 are sure to die, even though your life has been full of abomina- 
 tion and crime. The chief of all remedies for a troubled mirid 
 is the feeling that amo7ig the blessings which Nature gives to 
 mafi. there is none greater than ati opportune death ; and the 
 best of it is that every one can avail himself of it.^ And else- 
 where the same writer declares : Not even to God are all things 
 possible; for he could not compass his own death, if he willed to 
 die, and yet in all the miseries of our earthly life, this is the 
 best of his gifts to man.* Nay, in Massilia and on the isle of 
 
 • Hist. Nai. Lib. xxviii., i. • Loc. cit. Lib. ii. c. 7. 
 
ON SUICIDE. 29 
 
 Ceos, the man who could give valid reasons for relinquishing 
 his life, was handed the cup of hemlock by the magistrate ; and 
 that, too, in public' And in ancient times, how many heroes 
 and wise men died a voluntary death, Aristotle,' it is true, 
 declared suicide to be an offence against the State, although 
 not against the person ; but in Stobaeus' exposition of the 
 Peripatetic philosophy there is the following remark : The 
 good man should flee life when his misfortunes becom.e too great ; 
 the bad man, also, when he is too prosperous. And similarly : 
 So he will m.arry and beget children and take part in the affairs 
 of the State, and, generally, praHice virtue atid continue to live ; 
 and then, again, if 7ieed be, and at any tim£ necessity com.pels 
 him, he will depart to his place of refuge in the tomb.* And 
 we find that the Stoics actually praised suicide as a noble and 
 heroic action, as hundreds of passages show ; above all in the 
 works of Seneca, who expresses the strongest approval of it. 
 As is well known, the Hindoos look upon suicide as a religious 
 act, especially when it takes the form of self-immolation by 
 widows ; but also when it consists in casting oneself under the 
 wheels of the chariot of the god at Juggernaut, or being eaten by 
 crocodiles in the Ganges, or being drowned in the holy tanks in 
 the temples, and so on. The same thing occurs on the stage — 
 that mirror of life. For example, in Z' Orphelin de la Chifie,* 
 a celebrated Chinese play, almost all the noble characters end 
 by suicide ; without the slightest hint anywhere, or any impres- 
 sion being produced on the spectator, that they are committing 
 a crime. And in our own theatre it is much the same — 
 Palmira, for instance, in Mahomet, or Mortimer in Maria 
 Stuart, Othello, Countess Terzky.* Is Hamlet's monologue 
 
 ' Valerius Maximus ; hist. Lib. ii., c. 6, § 7 et 8. Heraclides Ponticus; 
 fragmenta de rebus publicis, ix. Aeliani variae historiae, iii., 37. 
 Strabo ; Lib. x., c. 5, 6. 
 
 * Eth. Nichotn., v. 15. 
 
 ' Stobaeus. Eel. Eth. ii., c. 7, pp. 286, 312. 
 
 * Traduit par St. Julien, 1834. 
 
 * Translator' s Note. Palmira : a female slave in Goethe's play of 
 Mahomet. Mortimer : a would-be lover and rescuer of Mary in 
 Schiller's Maria Stuart. Countess Terzky : a leading character in 
 Schiller's WaUenstein's Tod. 
 
so STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 the meditation of a criminal? He merely declares that if we 
 had any certainty of being annihilated by it, death would 
 be infinitely preferable to the world as it is. But ^herg lies 
 the rub f 
 
 The reasons advanced against suicide by the clergy of 
 monotheistic, that is to say, Jewish religions, and by those 
 philosophers who adapt themselves thereto, are weak sophisms 
 which can easily be refuted.* The most thorough-going refuta- 
 tion of them is given by Hume in his Essay on Suicide. This 
 did not appear until after his death, when it was immediately 
 suppressed, owing to the scandalous bigotry and outrageous 
 ecclesiastical tyranny that prevailed in England ; and hence 
 only a very few copies of it were sold under cover of secrecy 
 and at a high price. This and another treatise by that great 
 man have come to us from Basle, and we may be thankful for 
 the reprint.' It is a great disgrace to the English nation that 
 a purely philosophical treatise, which, proceeding from one of 
 the first thinkers and writers in England, aimed at refuting the 
 current arguments against suicide by the light of cold reason, 
 should be forced to sneak about in that country, as though it 
 were some rascally production, until at last it found refuge on 
 the Continent. At the same time it shows what a good con- 
 science the Church has in such matters. 
 
 In my chief work I have explained the only valid reason 
 existing against suicide on the score of morality. It is this : 
 that suicide thwarts the attainment of the highest moral aim by 
 the fact that, for a real release from this world of misery, it 
 substitutes one that is merely apparent. But from a mistake 
 to a crime is a far cry ; and it is as a crime that the clergy 
 of Christendom wish us to regard suicide. 
 
 The inmost kernel of Christianity is the truth that suffering — 
 the Cross — is the real end and objedl of life. Hence Christianity 
 condemns suicide as thwarting this end ; whilst the ancient 
 
 > See my treatise on the Foundation of Morals, I 5. 
 
 » Essays on Suicide and the Immortality of the Soul, by the late 
 David Hume, Basle, 1799, sold by James Decker. 
 
ON SUICIDE. 31 
 
 world, taking a lower point of view, held it in approval, nay, 
 in honor.* But if that is to be accounted a valid reason against 
 suicide, it involves the recognition of asceticism ; that is to 
 say, it is valid only from a much higher ethical standpoint than 
 has ever been adopted by moral philosophers in Europe. If 
 we abandon that high standpoint, there is no tenable reason 
 left, on the score of morality, for condemning suicide. The 
 extraordinary energy and zeal with which the clergy of mono- 
 theistic religions attack suicide is not supported either by any 
 passages in the Bible or by any considerations of weight ; so 
 that it looks as though they must have some secret reason for 
 their contention. May it not be this — that the voluntary sur- 
 render of life is a bad compliment for him who said that all 
 things were very good? If this is so, it offers another instance 
 of the crass optimism of these religions, — denouncing suicide to 
 escape being denounced by it. 
 
 It will generally be found that, as soon as the terrors of life 
 reach the point at which they outweigh the terrors of death, a 
 man will put an end to his life. But the terrors of death offer 
 considerable resistance ; they stand like a sentinel at the gate 
 leading out of this world. Perhaps there is no man alive who 
 would not have already put an end to his life, if this end had 
 been of a purely negative character, a sudden stoppage of ex- 
 istence. There is something positive about it ; it is the 
 destruction of the body ; and a man shrinks from that, because 
 his body is the manifestation of the will to live. 
 
 However, the struggle with that sentinel is, as a rule, not so 
 
 hard as it may seem from a long way off, mainly in consequence 
 
 ' Translator' s Note Schopenhauer refers to Die Welt als Wille 
 und Vorstellung, vol. i., \ 69, where the reader may find the same 
 argument stated at somewhat greater length. According to Schopen- 
 hauer, moral freedom — the highest ethical aim — is to be obtained 
 only by a denial of the will to live. Far from being a denial, suicide 
 is an emphatic assertion of this will. For it is in fleeing from the 
 pleasures, not from the sufferings of life, that this denial consists. 
 When a man destroys his existence as an individual, he is not by any 
 means destroying his will to live. On the contrary, he would like to 
 live if he could do so with satisfaction to himself; if he could assert 
 his will against the power of circumstance ; but circumstance is too 
 strong for him. 
 
32 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 of the antagonism between the ills of the body and the ills of 
 the mind. If we are in great bodily pain, or the pain lasts a 
 long time, we become indifferent to other troubles ; all we 
 think about is to get well. In the same way great mental 
 suffering makes us insensible to bodily pain ; we despise it ; 
 nay, if it should outweigh the other, it distrads our thoughts, 
 and we welcome it as a pause in mental suffering. It is this 
 feeling that makes suicide easy ; for the bodily pain that ac- 
 companies it loses all significance in the eyes of one who is 
 tortured by an excess of mental suffering. This is especially 
 evident in the case of those who are driven to suicide by some 
 . purely morbid and exaggerated ill-humor. No special effort 
 to overcome their feelings is necessary, nor do such people re- 
 quire to be worked up in order to take the step ; but as soon 
 as the keeper into whose charge they are given leaves them for 
 a couple of minutes, they quickly bring their life to an end. 
 
 When, in some dreadful and ghastly dream, we reach the 
 moment of greatest horror, it awakes us ; thereby banishing all 
 the hideous shapes that were born of the night. And life is a 
 dream : when the moment of greatest horror compels us to 
 break it off, the same thing happens. 
 
 Suicide may also be regarded as an experiment — a question 
 which man puts to Nature, trying to force her to an answer. 
 The question is this : What change will death produce in a 
 man's existence and in his insight into the nature of things? 
 It is a clumsy experiment to make ; for it involves the destruc- 
 tion of the very consciousness which puts the question and 
 awaits the answer. 
 
IMMORTALITY :' A DIALOGUE. 
 
 Thrasymachos — Philalethes. 
 
 Thrasymachos . Tell me now, in one word, what shall I be 
 after my death ? And mind you be clear and precise. 
 
 Philalethes. All and nothing ! 
 
 Thrasymachos. I thought so ! I gave you a problem, and 
 you solve it by a contradidlion. That's a very stale trick. 
 
 Philalethes. Yes, but you raise transcendental questions, 
 and you expe6l me to answer them in language that is only 
 made for immanent knowledge. It's no wonder that a contra- 
 diction ensues. 
 
 Thrasymachos. What do you mean by transcendental 
 questions and immanent knowledge ? I've heard these expres- 
 sions before, of course ; they are not new to me. The 
 Professor was fond of using them, but only as predicates of 
 the Deity, and he never talked of anything else ; which was 
 all quite right and proper. He argued thus : if the Deity was 
 in the world itself, he was immanent ; if he was somewhere 
 outside it, he was transcendent. Nothing could be clearer 
 and more obvious ! You knew where you were. But this 
 
 ' Translator's Note. The word immortality ~ [/nster6ltchkeit — 
 does not occur in the original ; nor would it, in its usual application, 
 find a place in Schopenhauer's vocabulary. The word he uses is 
 Unzerst'orbarkeit — indestru£libility. But I have preferred imtnortality, 
 because that word is commonly associated with the subjecl: touched 
 upon in this little debate. If any critic doubts the wisdom of this 
 preference, let me ask him to try his hand at a short, concise, and, at 
 the same time, popularly intelligible rendering of the German original, 
 which runs thus : Z:ir Lehre von der Unzerstorbarkeit unseres wahren 
 We sens durch den Tod: kleine dialogische Schlussbelustigung. 
 
 (33) 
 
34 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 Kantian rigmarole won't do any more : it's antiquated and no 
 longer applicable to modern ideas. Why, we've had a whole 
 row of eminent men in the metropolis of German learning — 
 
 Philalethes. (aside.) German humbug, he means. 
 
 Thrasymachos. — The mighty Schleiermacher, for instance, 
 and that gigantic intelled, Hegel ; and at this time of day 
 we've abandoned that nonsense. I should rather say we're so 
 far beyond it that we can't put up with it any more. What's 
 the use of it then ? What does it all mean ? 
 
 Philalethes. Transcendental knowledge is knowledge which 
 passes beyond the bounds of possible experience, and strives 
 to determine the nature of things as they are in themselves. 
 Immanent knowledge, on the other hand, is knowledge which 
 confines itself entirely within those bounds ; so that it cannot 
 apply to anything but a6lual phenomena. As far as you are 
 an individual, death will be the end of you. But your individ- 
 uaHty is not your true and inmost being : it is only the 
 outward manifestation of it. It is not the thing -in-itself\ but 
 only the phenomenon presented in the form of time ; and there- 
 fore with a beginning and an end. But your real being knows 
 neither time, nor beginning, nor end, nor yet the limits of any 
 given individual. It is everywhere present in every individual ; 
 and no individual can exist apart from it. So when death 
 comes, on the one hand you are annihilated as an individual ; 
 on the other, you are and remain everything. That is what I 
 meant when I said that after your death you would be all and 
 nothing. It is difficult to find a more precise answer to your 
 question and at the same time be brief The answer is con- 
 tradi6lory, I admit ; but it is so simply because your life is in 
 time, and the immortal part of you in eternity. You may put 
 the matter thus : Your immortal part is something that does 
 not last in time and yet is indestru6lible ; but there you have 
 another contradi6lion ! You see what happens by trying to 
 bring the transcendental within the limits of immanent knowl- 
 edge. It is in some sort doing violence to the latter by 
 misusing it for ends it was never meant to serve. 
 
IMMORTALITY. 35 
 
 Thrasymachos. Look here, I shan't give twopence for your 
 immortality unless I'm to remain an individual. 
 
 Philalethes. Well, perhaps I may be able to satisfy you on 
 this point. Suppose I guarantee that after death you shall 
 remain an individual, but only on condition that you first 
 spend three months of complete unconsciousness. 
 
 Thrasymachos. I shall have no objedlion to that. 
 
 Philalethes. But remember, if people are completely uncon- 
 scious, they take no account of time. So, when you are dead, 
 it's all the same to you whether three months pass in the world 
 of consciousness, or ten thousand years. In the one case as 
 in the other, it is simply a matter of believing what is told you 
 when you awake. So far, then, you can afford to be indiffer- 
 ent whether it is three months or ten thousand years that pass 
 before you recover your individuality. 
 
 Thrasymachos. Yes, if it comes to that, I suppose you're 
 right. 
 
 Philalethes. And if by chance, after those ten thousand 
 years have gone by, no one ever thinks of awakenmg you, I 
 fancy it would be no great misfortune. You would have be- 
 come quite accustomed to non-existence after so long a spell 
 of it — following upon such a very few years of life. At any 
 rate you may be sure you would be perfedlly ignorant of the 
 whole thing. Further, if you knew that the mysterious power 
 which keeps you in your present state of life had never once 
 ceased in those ten thousand years to bring forth other phe- 
 nomena like yourself, and to endow them with life, it would 
 fully console you. 
 
 Thrasymachos. Indeed ! So you think you're quietly 
 going to do me out of my individuality with all this fine talk. 
 But I'm up to your tricks. I tell you I won't exist unless I 
 can have my individuality. I'm not going to be put off with 
 * mysterious powers,' and what you call 'phenomena.' I can't 
 do without my individuality, and I won't give it up. 
 
 Philalethes. You mean, I suppose, that your individuality 
 is such a delightful thing, so splendid, so perfed, and beyond 
 
36 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 compare — that you can't imagine anything better. Aren't 
 you ready to exchange your present state for one which, if we 
 can judge by what is told us, may possibly be superior and 
 more endurable? 
 
 Thrasymachos. Don't you see that my individuality, be it 
 what it may, is my very self? To me it is the most important 
 thing in the world, 
 
 Fdr God is God and lam J. 
 
 I want to exist, /, /. That's the main thing, I don't care 
 about an existence which has to be proved to be mine, before 
 I can believe it. 
 
 Philalethes. Think what you' re doing ! When you say I^ 
 / / want to exist, it is not you alone that says this. Everything 
 says it, absolutely everything that has the faintest trace of con- 
 sciousness. It follows, then, that this desire of yours is just 
 the part of you that is not individual — the part that is common 
 to all things without distin(5lion. It is the cry, not of the in- 
 dividual, but of existence itself ; it is the intrinsic element in 
 everything that exists, nay, it is the cause of anything existing 
 at all. This desire craves for, and so is satisfied with, nothing 
 less than existence in general — not any definite individual ex- 
 istence. No ! that is not its aim. It seems to be so only 
 because this desire — this Will — attains consciousness only in 
 the individual, and therefore looks as though it were con- 
 cerned with nothing but the individual. There lies the illusion 
 — an illusion, it is true, in which the individual is held fast : 
 but, if he refleds, he can break the fetters and set himself free. 
 It is only indiredlly, I say, that the individual has this violent 
 craving for existence. It is /^ W^7//<? Z,zW which is the real 
 and dire6l aspirant — alike and identical in all things. Since, 
 then, existence is the free work, nay, the mere refledion of the 
 will, where existence is, there, too, must be will ; and for the 
 moment, the will finds its satisfa6lion in existence itself ; so far, 
 I mean, as that which never rests, but presses forward eternally, 
 can ever find any satisfa6lion at all. The will is careless of the 
 individual : the individual is not its business ; although, as I 
 
IMMORTALITY. 37 
 
 have said, this seems to be the case, because the individual 
 has no diredl consciousness of will except in himself. The 
 effeS. of this is to make the individual careful to maintain his 
 own existence ; and if this were not so, there would be no 
 surety for the preservation of the species. From all this it is 
 clear that individuality is not a form of perfe<5tion, but rather 
 of limitation ; and so to be freed from it is not loss but gain. 
 Trouble yourself no more about the matter. Once thoroughly 
 recognize what you are, what your existence really is, namely, 
 the universal will to live, and the whole question will seem to 
 you childish, and most ridiculous ! 
 
 Thrasymachos. You're childish yourself, and most ridicu- 
 lous, like all philosophers ! and if a man of my age lets himself 
 in for a quarter-of-an-hour's talk with such fools, it is only be- 
 cause it amuses me and passes the time. I've more important 
 business to attend to, so Good-bye. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 THERE is an unconscious proprietj'^ in the way in which, 
 in all European languages, the word person is commonly 
 used to denote a human being. The real meaning of persona 
 is a mask, such as actors were accustomed to wear on the 
 ancient stage ; and it is quite true that no one shows himself 
 as he is, but wears his mask and plays his part. Indeed, the 
 whole of our social arrangements may be likened to a per- 
 petual comedy ; and this is why a man who is worth anything 
 finds society so insipid, while a blockhead is quite at home 
 in it. 
 
 Reason deserves to be called a prophet ; for in showing us 
 the consequence and effeft of our adlions in the present, does 
 it not tell us what the future will be ? This is precisely why 
 reason is such an excellent power of restraint in moments 
 when we are possessed by some base passion, some fit of anger, 
 some covetous desire, that will lead us to do things whereof 
 we must presently repent. 
 
 • •••••• 
 
 Hatred comes from the heart ; contempt from the head ; and 
 neither feeling is quite within our control. For we cannot alter 
 our heart ; its bias is determined by motives ; and our head 
 deals with obje6live fa6ls, and applies to them rules which are 
 immutable. Any given individual is the union of a particular 
 heart with a particular head. 
 
 Hatred and contempt are diametrically opposed and mutually 
 exclusive. There are even not a few cases where hatred of a 
 
 (38) 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 39 
 
 person is rooted in nothing but forced esteem for his qualities. 
 And besides, if a man sets out to hate all the miserable creat- 
 ures he meets, he will not have much energy left for anything 
 else : whereas he can despise them, one and all, with the 
 greatest ease. True, genuine contempt is just the reverse of 
 true, genuine pride ; it keeps quite quiet and gives no sign of 
 its existence. For if a man shows that he despises you, he 
 signifies at least this much regard for you, that he wants to let 
 you know how little he appreciates you ; and his wish is 
 dictated by hatred, which cannot exist with real contempt. On 
 the contrary, if it is genuine, it is simply the convi6lion that 
 the object of it is a man of no value at all. Contempt is not 
 incompatible with indulgent and kindly treatment, and for the 
 sake of one's own peace and safety, this should not be 
 omitted ; it will prevent irritation ; and there is no one who 
 cannot do harm if he is roused to it. But if this pure, cold, 
 sincere contempt ever shows itself, it will be met with the most 
 truculent hatred ; for the despised person is not in a position 
 to fight contempt with its own weapons. 
 
 Melancholy is a very different thing from bad humor, and of 
 the two, it is not nearly so far removed from a gay and happy 
 temperament. Melancholy attra6ls, while bad humor repels. 
 
 Hypochondria is a species of torment which not only makes 
 us unreasonably cross with the things of the present ; not only 
 fills us with groundless anxiety on the score of future mis- 
 fortunes entirely of our own manufacture ; but also leads to 
 unmerited self-reproach for what we have done in the past. 
 
 Hypochondria shows itself in a perpetual hunting after things 
 that vex and annoy, and then brooding over them. The cause 
 of it is an inward morbid discontent, often co -existing with a 
 naturally restless temperament. In their extreme form, this 
 discontent and this unrest lead to suicide. 
 
 Any incident, however trivial, that rouses disagreeable emo- 
 tion, leaves an after-effe6l in our mind, which for the time it 
 
40 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 lasts, prevents our taking a clear obje6live view of the things 
 about us, and tinges all our thoughts : just as a small objedl 
 held close to the eye limits and distorts our field of vision. 
 
 What makes people hard-hearted is this, that each man has, 
 or fancies he has, as much as he can bear in his own troubles. 
 Hence, if a man suddenly finds himself in an unusually happy 
 position, it will in most cases result in his being sympathetic 
 and kind. But if he has never been in any other than a happy 
 position, or this becomes his permanent state, the effe6l of it is 
 often just the contrary : it so far removes him from suffering that 
 he is incapable of feeling any more sympathy with it. So it is that 
 the poor often show themselves more ready to help than the rich. 
 
 At times it seems as though we both wanted and did not 
 want the same thing, and felt at once glad and sorry about it. 
 For instance, if on some fixed date we are going to be put to 
 a decisive test about anything in which it would be a great 
 advantage to us to come off vi6lorious, we shall be anxious for 
 it to take place at once, and at the same time we shall tremble 
 at the thought of its approach. And if, in the meantime, we 
 hear that, for once in a way, the date has been postponed, we 
 shall experience a feeling both of pleasure and of annoyance; for 
 the news is disappointing, but nevertheless it affords us moment- 
 ary relief. It is just the same thing if we are expe<5ling some im- 
 portant letter carrying a definite decision, and it fails to arrive. 
 
 In such cases there are really two different motives at work 
 in us ; the stronger but more distant of the two being the desire 
 to stand the test and to have the decision given in our favor; 
 and the weaker, which touches us more nearly, the wish to be 
 left for the present in peace and quiet, and accordingly in 
 further enjoyment of the advantage which at any rate attaches 
 to a state of hopeful uncertainty, compared with the possibility 
 that the issue may be unfavorable. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 4I 
 
 In my head there is a permanent opposition -party ; and when- 
 ever I take any step or come to any decision — though I may 
 have given the matter mature consideration — it afterwards 
 attacks what I have done, without, however, being each time 
 necessarily in the right. This is, I suppose, only a form of 
 rectification on the part of the spirit of scrutiny ; but it often 
 reproaches me when I do not deserve it. The same thing, no 
 doubt, happens to many others as well ; for where is the man 
 who can help thinking that, after all, it were better not to have 
 done something that he did with great deliberation : — 
 
 Qnid tarn dextro pede concipis ut te 
 Conatus non poeniteat votique peraEli f 
 
 Why is it that common is an expression of contempt ? and 
 that uncomm.on, extraordinary, distinguished, denote appro- 
 bation ? Why is everything that is common contemptible ? 
 
 Common in its original meaning denotes that which is pecu- 
 liar to all men, i. <?., shared equally by the whole species, and 
 therefore an inherent part of its nature. Accordingly, if an 
 individual possesses no qualities beyond those which attach to 
 mankind in general, he is a common man. Ordinary is a much 
 milder word, and refers rather to intellectual character ; 
 whereas common has more of a moral application. 
 
 What value can a creature have that is not a whit different 
 from millions of its kind ? Millions, do I say ? nay an infinitude 
 of creatures which, century after century, in never-ending flow, 
 Nature sends bubbling up from her inexhaustible springs ; as 
 generous with them as the smith with the useless sparks that 
 fly around his anvil. 
 
 It is obviously quite right that a creature which has no quali- 
 ties except those of the species, should have to confine its 
 claim to an existence entirely within the limits of the species, 
 and live a life conditioned by those limits. 
 
 In various passages of my works, ^ I have argued that whilst 
 
 • Grundprobleme der Ethik, p. 48 ; Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, 
 vol. i. p. 338. 
 
42 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 a lower animal possesses nothing more than the generic char- 
 a<5ler of its species, man is the only being which can lay claim 
 to possess an individual chara6ler. But in most men this in- 
 dividual character comes to very little in reality ; and they 
 may be almost all ranged under certain classes : ce sont des 
 especes. Their thoughts and desires, like their faces, are those 
 of the species, or, at any rate, those of the class to which they 
 belong ; and accordingly, they are of a trivial, every-day, 
 common character, and exist by the thousand. You can 
 usually tell beforehand what they are likely to do and say. 
 They have no special stamp or mark to distinguish them ; 
 they are like manufactured goods, all of a piece. 
 
 If, then, their nature is merged in that of the species, how 
 shall their existence go beyond it ? The curse of vulgarity 
 puts men on a par with the lower animals, by allowing them 
 none but a generic nature, a generic form of existence. 
 
 Anything that is high or great or noble, must then, as a 
 matter of course, and by its very nature, stand alone in a 
 world where no better expression can be found to denote what 
 is base and contemptible than that which I have mentioned as 
 in general use, namely, common. 
 
 Will, as the thing -in-itself, is the foundation of all being ; 
 it is part and parcel of every creature, and the permanent ele- 
 ment in everything. Will, then, is that which we possess in 
 common with all men, nay, with all animals, and even with 
 lower forms of existence ; and in so far we are akin to every- 
 thing — so far, that is, as everything is filled to overflowing 
 with will. On the other hand, that which places one being 
 over another, and sets differences between man and man, is 
 intelle(5l and knowledge ; therefore in every manifestation of 
 self we should, as far as possible, give play to the intelleft 
 alone ; for, as we have seen, the will is the common part of us. 
 Every violent exhibition of will is common and vulgar ; in 
 other words, it reduces us to the level of the species, and 
 makes us a mere type and example of it ; in that it is just the 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 43 
 
 charaAer of the species that we are showing. So every fit of 
 anger is something common — every unrestrained display of joy, 
 or of hate, or fear — in short, every form of emotion ; in other 
 words, every movement of the will, if it is so strong as decidedly 
 to outweigh the intelledlual element in consciousness, and to 
 make the man appear as a being that wills rather than knows. 
 
 In giving way to emotion of this violent kind, the greatest 
 genius puts himself on a level with the commonest son of earth. 
 Contrarily, if a man desires to be absolutely uncommon, in 
 other words, great, he should never allow his consciousness to 
 be taken possession of and dominated by the movement of his 
 will, however much he may be solicited thereto. For example, 
 he must be able to observe that other people are badly dis- 
 posed towards him, without feeling any hatred towards them 
 himself; nay, there is no surer sign of a great mind than that 
 it refuses to notice annoying and insulting expressions, but 
 straightway ascribes them, as it ascribes countless other mis- 
 takes, to the defe6live knowledge of the speaker, and so merely 
 observes without feeling them. This is the meaning of that 
 remark of Gracian, that nothing is more unworthy of a man 
 than to let it be seen that he is one — el mayor desdoro de un 
 hombre es dar micestras de que es hombre. 
 
 And even in the drama, which is the peculiar province of 
 the passions and emotions, it is easy for them to appear com- 
 mon and vulgar. And this is specially observable in the works 
 of the French tragic writers, who set no other aim before 
 themselves but the delineation of the passions ; and by indulg- 
 ing at one moment in a vaporous kind of pathos which makes 
 them ridiculous, at another in epigrammatic witticisms, en- 
 deavor to conceal the vulgarity of their subjeA. I remember 
 seeing the celebrated Mademoiselle Rachel as Maria Stuart : 
 and when she burst out in fury against Elizabeth — though 
 she did it very well — I could not help thinking of a washer- 
 woman. She played the final parting in such a way as to 
 deprive it of all true tragic feeling, of which, indeed, the French 
 have no notion at all. The same part was incomparably better 
 
44 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 played by the Italian Ristori ; and, in fa6l, the Italian nature^ 
 though in many respe<5ls very different from the German, 
 shares its appreciation tor what is deep, serious, and true in 
 Art ; herein opposed to the French, which everywhere betrays 
 that it possesses none of this feeling whatever. 
 
 The noble, in other words, the uncommon, element in the 
 drama — nay, what is subHme in it — is not reached until the 
 intellect is set to work, as opposed to the will ; until it takes 
 a free flight over all those passionate movements of the will, 
 and makes them the subject of its contemplation. Shakespeare, 
 in particular, shows that this is his general method, more es- 
 pecially in Hamlet. And only when intelledl rises to the point 
 where the vanity of all effort is manifest, and the will proceeds 
 to an adl of self-annulment, is the drama tragic in the true 
 sense of the word ; it is then that it reaches its highest aim in 
 becoming really sublime. 
 
 Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the 
 limits of the world. This is an error of the intelle6l as inevit- 
 able as that error of the eye which lets us fancy that on the 
 horizon heaven and earth meet. This explains many things, 
 and among them the fa6l that everyone measures us with his 
 own standard — generally about as long as a tailor's tape, and 
 we have to put up with it : as also that no one will allow us to 
 be taller than himself — a supposition which is once for all taken 
 for granted. 
 
 There is no doubt that many a man owes his good fortune 
 in life solely to the circumstance that he has a pleasant way of 
 smiling, and so wins the heart in his favor. 
 
 However, the heart would do better to be careful, and to 
 remember what Hamlet put down in his tablets — that one may 
 smile, and smile, and be a villain. 
 
 Everything that is really fundamental in a man, and therefore 
 genuine works, as such, unconsciously ; in this respect like the 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 45 
 
 power of nature. That which has passed through the domain 
 of consciousness is thereby transformed into an idea or picture ; 
 and so if it comes to be uttered, it is only an idea or picture 
 which passes from one person to another. 
 
 Accordingly, any quality of mind or chara6ler that is genu- 
 ine and lasting, is originally unconscious ; and it is only when 
 unconsciously brought into play that it makes a profound 
 impression. If any like quality is consciously exercised, it means 
 that it has been worked up ; it becomes intentional, and there- 
 fore matter of affe6lation, in other words, of deception. 
 
 If a man does a thing unconsciously, it costs him no trouble ; 
 but if he tries to do it by taking trouble, he fails. This applies 
 to the origin of those fundamental ideas which form the pith 
 and marrow of all genuine work. Only that which is innate 
 is genuine and will hold water ; and every man who wants to 
 achieve something, whether in pradlical life, in literature, or in 
 art, must follow the rules without knowing them. 
 
 Men of very great capacity, will as a rule, find the company 
 of very stupid people preferable to that of the common run ; 
 for the same reason that the tyrant and the mob, the grand- 
 father and the grandchildren, are natural allies. 
 
 That line of Ovid's, 
 
 Pronaque cum speElent animalia cetera terrain, 
 can be applied in its true physical sense to the lower animals 
 alone ; but in a metaphorical and spiritual sense it is, alas ! 
 true of nearly all men as well. All their plans and projedls are 
 merged in the desire of physical enjoyment, physical well-being. 
 They may, indeed, have personal interests, often embracing a 
 very varied sphere ; but still these latter receive their import- 
 ance entirely from the relation in which they stand to the 
 former. This is not only proved by their manner of hfe and 
 the things they say, but it even shows itself in the way they 
 look, the expression of their physiognomy, their gait and 
 gesticulations. Everything about them cries out ; in terrain 
 pronal 
 
46 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 It is not to them, it is only to the nobler and more highly 
 endowed natures — men who really think and look about them 
 in the world, and form exceptional specimens of humanity — 
 that the next lines are applicable ; 
 
 Os homini sublime dedit coelumque tueri 
 Jussit et ere^os ad sidera tollere vultus. 
 
 No one knows what capacities for doing and suffering he 
 has in himself, until something comes to rouse them to a6livity : 
 just as in a pond of still water, lying there like a mirror, there 
 is no sign of the roar and thunder with which it can leap from 
 the precipice, and yet remain what it is ; or again, rise high in 
 the air as a fountain. When water is as cold as ice, you can 
 have no idea of the latent warmth contained in it. 
 
 Why is it that, in spite of all the mirrors in the world, no 
 one really knows what he looks like ? 
 
 A man may call to mind the face of his friend, but not his 
 own. Here, then, is an initial difficulty in the way of applying 
 the maxim. Know thyself. 
 
 This is partly, no doubt, to be explained by the fa<5l that it 
 is physically impossible for a man to see himself in the glass 
 except with face turned straight towards it and perfe6lly motion- 
 less ; where the expression of the eye, which counts for so 
 much, and really gives its whole character to the face, is to a 
 great extent lost. But co-existing with this physical impossi- 
 bility, there seems to me to be an ethical impossibility of an 
 analogous nature, and producing the same effect. A man can- 
 not look upon his own refle6lion as though the person present- 
 ed there were a stranger to him ; and yet this is necessary if 
 he is to take an objeilive view. In the last resort, an objeftive 
 view means a deep-rooted feeling on the part of the individual, 
 as a moral being, that that which he is contemplating is not 
 himself: * and unless he can take this point of view, he will not 
 see things in a really true light, which is possible only if he is 
 ^Q,{. Grundprobleme der Ethik. p. TT]^. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 47 
 
 alive to their actual defe<5ls, exadly as they are. Instead of 
 that, when a man sees himself in the glass, something out of 
 his own egotistic nature whispers to him to take care to remem- 
 ber that it is no stranger, but himself, that he is looking at ; 
 and this operates as a noli me tangere, and prevents him taking 
 an objective view. It seems, indeed, as if, without the leaven 
 of a grain of maUce, such a view were impossible. 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 According as a man's mental energy is exerted or relaxed, 
 will life appear to him either so short, and petty, and fleeting, 
 that nothing can possibly happen over which it is worth his 
 while to spend emotion ; that nothing really matters, whether it 
 is pleasure or riches, or even fame, and that in whatever way 
 a man may have failed, he cannot have lost much — or, on the 
 other hand, life will seem so long, so important, so all in all, 
 so momentous and so full of difficulty that we have to plunge 
 into it with our whole soul if we are to obtain a share of its 
 goods, make sure of its prizes, and carry out our plans. This 
 latter is the immanent and common view of life ; it is what 
 Gracian means when he speaks of the serious way of looking 
 at things — tomar muy de veras el vivir. The former is the 
 transcendental view, which is well expressed in Ovid's non est 
 tanti — it is not worth so much trouble ; still better, however, 
 by Plato's remark that nothing in human affairs is worth any 
 
 great anxiety — ovrt n tuv dvdpuirivuv a^LOV karl fieydTyrjc anovdfjq. This 
 
 condition of mind is due to the intelledl having got the upper 
 hand in the domain of consciousiiess, where, freed from the 
 mere service of the will, it looks upon the phenomena of life 
 obje6lively, and so cannot fail to gain a clear insight into its 
 vain and futile character. But in the other condition of mind, 
 will predominates ; and the intellect exists only to light it on 
 its way to the attainment of its desires. 
 
 A man is great or small according as he leans to the one or 
 the other of these views of life. 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 People of very brilliant ability think little of admitting their 
 errors and weaknesses, or of letting others see them. They 
 
48 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 look upon them as something for which they have duly paid ; 
 and instead of fancying that these weaknesses are a disgrace to 
 them, they consider they are doing them an honor. This is 
 especially the case when the errors are of the kind that hang 
 together with their qualities — conditiones sine quibus non — or, 
 as George Sand said, les difauts de ses vertus. 
 
 Contrarily, there are people of good chara<5ler and irre- 
 proachable intelle6lual capacity, who, far from admitting the 
 few little weaknesses they have, conceal them with care, and 
 show themselves very sensitive to any suggestion of their exist- 
 ence ; and this, just because their whole merit consists in being 
 free from error and infirmity. If these people are found to have 
 done anything wrong, their reputation immediately suffers. 
 
 With people of only moderate ability, modesty is mere 
 honesty ; but with those who possess great talent, it is hypoc- 
 risy. Hence, it is just as becoming in the latter to make no 
 secret of the respe6l they bear themselves and no disguise of 
 the fa6t that they are conscious of unusual power, as it is in the 
 former to be modest. Valerius Maximus gives some very neat 
 examples of this in his chapter on self-confidence, de fiducia sui. 
 
 Not to go to the theatre is like making one's toilet without 
 a mirror. But it is still worse to take a decision without con- 
 sulting a friend. For a man may have the most excellent 
 judgment in all other matters, and yet go wrong in those which 
 concern himself; because here the will comes in and deranges 
 the intelle6l at once. Therefore let a man take counsel of a 
 friend. A doctor can cure everyone but himself; if he falls 
 ill, he sends for a colleague. 
 
 In all that we do, we wish, more or less, to come to the end ; 
 we are impatient to finish and glad to be done. But the last 
 scene of all, the general end, is something that, as a rule, we 
 wish as far off as may be. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. , 49 
 
 Every parting gives a foretaste of death ; every coming to- 
 gether again a foretaste of the resurre6lion. This is why even 
 people who were indifferent to each other, rejoice so much if 
 they come together again after twenty or thirty years' sepa- 
 ration. 
 
 • • « • • • ^ 
 
 Intellects differ from one another in a very real and funda- 
 mental way : but no comparison can well be made by merely 
 general observations. It is necessary to come close, and to 
 go into details ; for the difference that exists cannot be seen 
 from afar ; and it is not easy to judge by outward appearances, 
 as in the several cases of education, leisure and occupation. 
 But even judging by these alone, it must be admitted that 
 many a man has a degree of existence at least ten times as high 
 as another — in other words, exists ten times as much. 
 
 I am not speaking here of savages whose life is often only 
 one degree above that of the apes in their woods Consider, 
 for instance, a porter in Naples or Venice, (in the north of 
 Europe solicitude for the winter months rriakes people more 
 thoughtful and therefore refie6tive) ; look at the life he leads, 
 from its beginning to its end : — driven by poverty ; living on 
 his physical strength ; meeting the needs of every day, nay, of 
 every hour, by hard work, great effort, constant tumult, want 
 in all its forms, no care for the morrow ; his only comfort, rest 
 after exhaustion ; continuous quarreling ; not a moment free 
 for reflection ; such sensual delights as a mild climate and only 
 just sufficient food will permit of; and then, finally, as the 
 metaphysical element, the crass superstition of his church ; the 
 whole forming a manner of life with only a iow degree of con- 
 sciousness, where a man hustles, or rather is hustled, through 
 his existence. This restless and confused dream forms the life 
 of how many millions ! 
 
 Such men think only just so much as is necessary to carry 
 out their will for the moment. They never refiedl upon their 
 life as a connected whole, let alone, then, upon existence in 
 general ; to a certain extent they may be said to exist without 
 
50 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 really knowing it. The existence of the mobsman or the slave 
 who lives on in this unthinking way, stands very much nearer 
 than ours to that of the brute, which is confined entirely to the 
 present moment ; but, for that very reason, it has also less of 
 pain in it than ours. Nay, since all pleasure is in its nature 
 negative, that is to say, consists in freedom from some form of 
 misery or need, the constant and rapid interchange between 
 setting about something and getting it done, which is the 
 permanent accompaniment of the work they do, and then 
 again the augmented form which this takes when they go 
 from work to rest and the satisfaction of their needs — all this 
 gives them a constant source of enjoyment ; and the fadi that 
 it is much commoner to see happy faces amongst the poor 
 than amongst the rich, is a sure proof that it is used to good 
 advantage. 
 
 Passing from this kind of man, consider, next, the sober, 
 sensible merchant, who leads a life of speculation, thinks long 
 over his plans and carries them out with great care, founds a 
 house, and provides for his wife, his children and descendants ; 
 takes his share, too, in the life of a community. It is obvious 
 that a man like this has a much higher degree of consciousness 
 than the former, and so his existence has a higher degree of 
 reality. 
 
 Then look at the man of learning, who investigates, it may 
 be, the history of the past. He will have reached the point 
 at which a man becomes conscious of existence as a whole, 
 sees beyond the period of his own life, beyond his own personal 
 interests, thinking over the whole course of the world's history. 
 
 Then, finally, look at the poet or the philosopher, in whom 
 refledlion has reached such a height, that, instead of being 
 drawn on to investigate any one particular phenomenon of 
 existence, he stands in amazement before existence itself, this 
 great sphinx, and makes it his problem. In him conscious- 
 ness has reached the degree of clearness at which it embraces 
 the world itself : his intelle6t has completely abandoned its 
 function as the servant of his will, and now holds the world 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. $1 
 
 before him ; and the world calls upon him much more to ex- 
 amine and consider it, than to play a part in it himself. If, 
 then, the degree of consciousness is the degree of reality, such 
 a man will be said to exist most of all, and there will be sense 
 and significance in so describing him. 
 
 Between the two extremes here sketched, and the interven- 
 ing stages, everyone will be able to find the place at which he 
 himself stands. 
 
 • •••••• 
 
 We know that man is in general superior to all other animals, 
 and this is also the case in his capacity for being trained. 
 Mohammedans are trained to pray with their faces turned 
 towards Mecca, five times a day ; and they never fail to do it. 
 Christians are trained to cross themselves on certain occasions, 
 to bow, and so on. Indeed, it may be said that religion is the 
 chef d' ceuvre of the art of training, because it trains people in 
 the way they shall think : and, as is well known, you cannot 
 begin the process too early. There is no absurdity so palpable 
 but that it may be firmly planted in the human head if you 
 only begin to inculcate it before the age of five, by constantly 
 repeating it with an air of great solemnity. For as in the case 
 of animals, so in that of men, training is successful only when 
 you begin in early youth. 
 
 Noblemen and gentlemen are trained to hold nothing sacred 
 but their word of honor — to maintain a zealous, rigid, and 
 unshaken belief in the ridiculous code of chivalry ; and if they 
 are called upon to do so, to seal their belief by dying for it, 
 and seriously to regard a king as a being of a higher order. 
 
 Again, our expressions of politeness, the compliments we 
 make, in particular, the respecflful attentions we pay to ladies, 
 are a matter of training ; as also our esteem for good birth, 
 rank, titles, and so on. Of the same charad^er is the resent- 
 ment we feel at any insult direded against us ; and the measure 
 of this resentment may be exa6tly determined by the nature of 
 the insult. An Englishman, for instance, thinks it a deadly 
 insult to be told that he is no gentleman, or, still worse, that 
 
52 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 he is a liar ; a Frenchman has the same feeling if you call him 
 a coward, and a German if you say he is stupid. 
 
 There are many persons who are trained to be stridly hon- 
 orable in regard to one particular matter, while they have 
 little honor to boast of in anything else. Many a man, for 
 instance, will not steal your money ; but he will lay hands on 
 everything of yours that he can enjoy without having to pay 
 for it. A man of business will often deceive you without the 
 slightest scruple, but he will absolutely refuse to commit a 
 theft. 
 
 • •••••• 
 
 Imagination is strong in a man when that particular funftion 
 of the brain which enables him to observe is roused to activity 
 without any necessary excitement of the senses. Accordingly, 
 we find that imagination is adlive just in proportion as our 
 senses are not excited by external objects. A long period of 
 solitude, whether in prison or in a sick room ; quiet, twilight, 
 darkness — these are the things that promote its adlivity ; and 
 under their influence it comes into play of itself. On the other 
 hand, when a great deal of material is presented to our faculties 
 of observation, as happens on a journey, or in the hurly-burly 
 of the world, or, again, in broad daylight, the imagination is 
 idle, and, even though call may be made upon it, refuses to 
 l)ecome a<5live, as though it understood that that was not its 
 proper time. 
 
 However, if the imagination is to yield any real produ6l, it 
 must have received a great deal of material from the external 
 world. This is the only way in which its storehouse can be 
 filled. The phantasy is nourished much in the same way as 
 the body, which is least capable of any work and enjoys doing 
 nothing just in the very moment when it receives its food 
 >vhich it has to digest. And yet it is to this very food that it 
 owes the power which it afterwards puts forth at the right 
 time. : 
 
 • •••••• 
 
 Opinion is like a pendulum and obeys the same law. If it 
 goes past the centre of gravity on one side, it must go a like 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 53 
 
 distance on the other ; and it is only after a certain time that it 
 finds the true point at which it can remain at rest. 
 
 By a process of contradlion, distance in space makes things 
 look small, and therefore free from defe6l. This is why a 
 landscape looks so much better in a contra6ting mirror or 
 in a camera obscura, than it is in reality. The same effect 
 is produced by distance in time. The scenes and events of 
 long ago, and the persons who took part in them, wear a 
 charming aspeft to the eye of memory, which sees only the 
 outlines and takes no note of disagreeable details. The pres- 
 ent enjoys no such advantage, and so it always seems de- 
 fective. 
 
 And again, as regards space, small objects close to us look 
 big, and if they are very close, we may be able to see nothing 
 else, but when we go a little way off, they become minute and 
 invisible. It is the same again as regards time. The little 
 incidents and accidents of every day fill us with emotion, 
 anxiety, annoyance, passion, as long as they are close to us, 
 when they appear so big, so important, so serious ; but as 
 soon as they are borne down the restless stream of time, they 
 lose what significance they had ; we think no more of them 
 and soon forget them altogether. They were big only because 
 they were near. 
 
 Joy and sorrow are not ideas of the mind, but affedlions of 
 the will, and so they do not lie in the domain of memory. We 
 cannot recall our joys and sorrows ; by which I mean that we 
 cannot renew ihem. We can recall only the ideas that ac- 
 companied them ; and, in particular, the things we were led to 
 say ; and these form a gauge of our feelings at the time. 
 Hence, our memory of joys and sorrows is always imperfect, 
 and they become a matter of indifference to us as soon as they 
 are over. This explains the vanity of the attempt, which we 
 sometimes make, to revive the pleasures and the pains of the 
 past. Pleasure and pain are essentially an affair of the will ; 
 and the will, as such, is not possessed of memory, which is a 
 
54 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 function of the intellect ; and this in its turn gives out and 
 takes in nothing but thoughts and ideas, which are not here in 
 question. 
 
 It is a curious fact that in bad days we can very vividly 
 recall the good time that is now no more ; but that in good 
 days, we have only a very cold and imperfect memory of 
 the bad. 
 
 We have a much better memory of actual objects or pictures 
 than for mere iSeas. Hence a good imagination makes it 
 easier to learn languages ; for by its aid, the new word is at 
 once united with the actual object to which it refers ; whereas, 
 if there is no imagination, it is simply put on a parallel with 
 the equivalent word in the mother tongue. 
 
 Mnemonics should not only mean the art of keeping some- 
 thing indirectly in the memory by the use of some direct pun 
 or witticism ; it should, rather, be applied to a systematic 
 theory of memory, and explain its several attributes by refer- 
 ence both to its real nature, and to the relation in which these 
 attributes stand to one another. 
 
 • • • • • • m . 
 
 There are moments in life when our senses obtain a higher 
 and rarer degree of clearness, apart from any particular oc- 
 casion for it in the nature of our surroundings ; and explicable, 
 rather, on physiological grounds alone, as the result of some 
 enhanced state of susceptibility, working from within outwards. 
 Such moments remain indelibly impressed upon the memory, 
 and preserve themselves in their individuality entire. We can 
 assign no reason for it, nor explain why this among so many 
 thousand moments like it should be specially remembered. 
 It seems as much a matter of chance as when single specimens 
 of a whole race of animals now extinct are discovered in the 
 layers of a rock ; or when, on opening a book, we light 
 upon an insect accidentally crushed within the leaves. Mem- 
 ories of this kind are always sweet and pleasant. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 55 
 
 It occasionally happens that, for no particular reason, long- 
 forgotten scenes suddenly start up in the memory. This may 
 in many cases be due to the aftion of some hardly perceptible 
 odor, which accompanied those scenes and now recurs exa6lly 
 the same as before. For it is well known that the sense of 
 smell is specially effedlive in awakening memories, and that 
 in general it does not require much to rouse a train of ideas. 
 And I may say, in passing, that the sense of sight is conneAed . 
 with the understanding,* the sense of hearing with the reason,* 
 and, as we see in the present case, the sense of smell with the 
 memory. Touch and Taste are more material and dependent 
 upon conta6l. They have no ideal side. 
 
 • • • • • ' • • - 
 
 It must also be reckoned among the peculiar attributes of 
 memory that a slight state of intoxication often so greatly 
 enhances the recoUeftion of past times and scenes, that all the 
 circumstances conne6led with them come back much more 
 clearly than would be possible in a state of sobriety ; but that, 
 on the other hand, the recolledlion of what one said or did 
 while the intoxication lasted, is more than usually imperfedl ; 
 nay, that if one has been absolutely tipsy, it is gone altogether. 
 We may say, then, that whilst intoxication enhances the 
 memory for what is past, it allows it to remember litde of the 
 present. 
 
 Men need some kind of external activity, because they are 
 inactive within. Contrarily, if they are a6live within, they do 
 not care to be dragged out of themselves ; it disturbs and 
 impedes their thoughts in a way that is often most ruinous 
 to them. 
 
 • • • • f • 
 
 I am not surprised that some people are bored when they 
 find themselves alone ; for they cannot laugh if they are 
 quite by themselves. The very idea of it seems folly to them. 
 
 Are we, then, to look upon laughter as merely a signal for 
 
 ^Vier/ache Wurze' § 21. *Pctrerga vol. ii., § 311. 
 
56 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 Others — a mere sign, like a word ? What makes it impossible 
 for people to laugh when they are alone is nothing but want of 
 imagination, dullness of mind generally — dvaiadijaia koi (SpaSv-riii 
 'h'xvc, as Theophrastus has it.* The lower animals never laugh, 
 either alone or in company. Myson, the misanthropist, was 
 once surprised by one of these people as he was laughing to 
 himself Why do you laugh ? he asked ; there is no one with 
 you. That is just why I am laughing, said Myson. 
 
 Natural gesticulation, such as commonly accompanies any 
 lively talk, is a language of its own, more widespread, even, 
 than the language of words — so far, I mean, as it is inde- 
 pendent of words and alike in all nations. It is true that 
 nations make use of it in proportion as they are vivacious, and 
 that in particular cases, amongst the Italians, for instance, it is 
 supplemented by certain peculiar gestures which are merely 
 conventional, and therefore possessed of nothing more than a 
 local value. 
 
 In the universal use made of it, gesticulation has some analogy 
 with logic and grammar, in that it has to do with the form, 
 rather than with the matter of conversation ; but on the other 
 hand it is distinguishable from them by the fa6l that it has more 
 of a moral than of an intelledual bearing ; in other words, it 
 refle6ls the movements of the will. As an accompaniment of 
 conversation it is like the bass of a melody ; and if, as in 
 music, it keeps true to the progress of the treble, it serves to 
 heighten the effedt. 
 
 In a conversation, the gesture depends upon the form in 
 which the subje6l-matter is conveyed ; and it is interesting to 
 observe that, whatever that subje6t-matter may be, with a 
 recurrence of the form, the very same gesture is repeated. So 
 if I happen to see — from my window, say — two persons carry- 
 ing on a lively conversation, without my being able to catch a 
 word, I can, nevertheless, understand the general nature of it 
 perfe<5lly well ; I mean, the kind of thing that is being said and 
 
 ^Charailers, c. 27. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 57 
 
 the form it takes. There is no mistake about it. The speaker 
 is arguing about something, advancing his reasons, then Umit- 
 ing their application, then driving them home and drawing the 
 conclusion in triumph ; or he is recounting his experiences, 
 proving, perhaps, beyond the shadow of a doubt, how much 
 he has been injured, but bringing the clearest and most dam- 
 ning evidence to show that his opponents were foolish and 
 obstinate people who would not be convinced ; or else he is 
 telling of the splendid plan he laid, and how he carried it to a 
 successful issue, or perhaps failed because the luck was against 
 him ; or, it may be, he is saying that he was completely at a 
 loss to know what to do, or that he was quick in seeing some 
 traps set for him, and that by insisting on his rights or by 
 applying a little force, he succeeded in frustrating and punish- 
 ing his enemies ; and so on in hundreds of cases of a similar 
 kind. 
 
 Strictly speaking, however, what I get from gesticulation 
 alone is an abstract notion of the essential drift of what is being 
 said, and that, too, whether I judge from a moral or an in- 
 tellectual point of view. It is the quintessence, the true sub- 
 stance of the conversation, and this remains identical, no 
 matter what may have given rise to the conversation, or what 
 it may be about ; the relation between the two being that of a 
 general idea or class name to the individuals which it covers. 
 
 As I have said, the most interesting and amusing part of the 
 matter is the complete identity and solidarity of the gestures 
 used to denote the same set of circumstances, even though by 
 people of very different temperament ; so that the gestures be- 
 come exactly like words of a language, alike for every one, 
 and subject only to such small modifications as depend upon 
 variety of accent and education. And yet there can be no 
 doubt but that these standing gestures, which every one uses, 
 are the result of no convention or collusion. They are original 
 and innate — a true language of nature ; consolidated, it may 
 be, by imitation and the influence of custom. 
 
 It is well known that it is part of an actor's duty to make 
 
58 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 a careful study of gesture ; and the same thing is true, to a 
 somewhat smaller degree, of a public speaker. This study 
 must consist chiefly in watching others and imitating their 
 movements, for there are no abstract rules fairly applicable to 
 the matter, with the exception of some very general leading 
 principles, such as — to take an example — that the gesture must 
 not follow the word, but rather come immediately before it, by 
 way of announcing its approach and attracting the hearer's 
 attention. 
 
 Englishmen entertain a peculiar contempt for gesticulation, 
 and look upon it as something vulgar and undignified. This 
 seems to me a silly prejudice on their part, and the outcome 
 of their general prudery. For here we have a language which 
 nature has given to every one, and which every one under- 
 stands ; and to do away with and forbid it for no better reason 
 than that it is opposed to that much -lauded thing, gendemanly 
 feeling, is a very questionable proceeding. 
 
ON EDUCATION. 
 
 THE human intelled is said to be so constituted thaX general 
 ideas arise by abstra6lion from particular observations ^ 
 and therefore come after them in point of time. If this is what 
 a6lually occurs, as happens in the case of a man who has to 
 depend solely upon his own experience for what he learns — who 
 has no teacher and no book, — such a man knows quite well 
 which of his particular observations belong to and are repre- 
 sented by each of his general ideas. He has a perfe6l acquaint- 
 ance with both sides of his experience, and accordingly, he 
 treats everything that comes in his way from a right standpoint. 
 This might be called the natural method of education. 
 
 Contrarily, the artificial method is to hear what other people 
 say, to learn and to read, and so to get your head crammed 
 full of general ideas before you have any sort of extended 
 acquaintance with the world as it is, and as you may see it for 
 yourself. You will be told that the particular observations 
 which go to make these general ideas will come to you later 
 on in the course of experience ; but until that time arrives, 
 you apply your general ideas wrongly, you judge men and 
 things from a wrong standpoint, you see them in a wrong 
 light, and treat them in a wrong way. So it is that education 
 perverts the mind. " 
 
 This explains why it so frequently happens that, after a long 
 course of learning and reading, we enter upon the world in our 
 youth, partly with an artless ignorance of things, partly with 
 wrong notions about them ; so that our demeanor savors at 
 one moment of a nervous anxiety, at another of a mistaken 
 
 (59) 
 
6o STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 confidence. The reason of this is simply that our head is full 
 of general ideas which we are now trying to turn to some use, 
 but which we hardly ever apply rightly. This is the result of 
 acting in direct opposition to the natural development of the 
 mind by obtaining general ideas first, and particular observa- 
 tions last : it is putting the cart before the horse. Instead of 
 developing the child's own faculties of discernment, and 
 teaching it to judge and think for itself, the teacher uses all 
 his energies to stuff its head full of the ready-made thoughts 
 of other people. The mistaken views of life, which spring 
 from a false application of general ideas, have afterwards to be 
 corrected by long years of experience ; and it is seldom that 
 they are wholly corrected. This is why so few men of 
 learning are possessed of common-sense, such as is often to be 
 met with in people who have had no instruction at all. 
 
 To acquire a knowledge of the world might be defined as the 
 aim of all education ; and it follows from what I have said that 
 special stress should be laid upon beginning to acquire this 
 knowledge at the right end. As I have shown, this means, in 
 the main, that the particular observation of a thing shall precede 
 the general idea of it ; further, that narrow and circumscribed 
 ideas shall come before ideas of a wide range. It means, there- 
 fore, that the whole system of education shall follow in the 
 steps that must have been taken by the ideas themselves in the 
 course of their formation. But whenever any of these steps 
 are skipped or left out, the instruction is defective, and the 
 ideas obtained are false ; and, finally, a distorted view of the 
 world arises, peculiar to the individual himself — a view such 
 as almost everyone entertains for some time, and most men 
 for as long as they live. No one can look into his own mind 
 without seeing that it was only after reaching a very mature 
 age, and in some cases when he least expected it, that he came 
 to a right understanding or a clear view of many matters in his 
 life, that, after all, were not very difficult or complicated. Up 
 till then, they were points in his knowledge of the world which 
 were still obscure, due to his having skipped some particular 
 
ON EDUCATION. 6 1 
 
 lesson in those early days of his education, whatever it may 
 have been like — whether artificial and conventional, or of that 
 natural kind which is based upon individual experience. 
 
 It follows that an attempt should be made to find out the 
 strictly natural course of knowledge, so that education may 
 proceed methodically by keeping to it ; and that children may 
 become acquainted with the ways of the world, without getting 
 wrong ideas into their heads, which very often cannot be got 
 out again. If this plan were adopted, special care would have 
 to be taken to prevent children from using words without clearly 
 understanding their meaning and application. The fatal tend- 
 ency to be satisfied with words instead of trying to understand 
 things — to learn phrases by heart, so that they may prove a 
 refuge in time of need, exists, as a rule, even in children ; and 
 the tendency lasts on into manhood, making the knowledge of 
 many learned persons to consist in mere verbiage. 
 
 However, the main endeavor must always be to let particular 
 observations precede general ideas, and not vice versa, as is 
 usually and unfortunately the case ; as though a child should 
 come feet foremost into the world, or a verse be begun by 
 writing down the rhyme ! The ordinary method is to imprint 
 ideas and opinions, in the strict sense of the word, prejudices, 
 on the mind of the child, before it has had any but a very few 
 particular observations. It is thus that he afterwards comes to 
 view the world and gather experience through the medium of 
 those ready-made ideas, rather than to let his ideas be formed 
 for him out of his own experience of life, as they ought to be. 
 
 A man sees a great many things when he looks at the world 
 for himself, and he sees them from many sides ; but this 
 method of learning is not nearly so short or so quick as the 
 method which employs ab.^tra<5l ideas and makes hasty gener- 
 alizations about everything. Experience, therefore, will be a 
 long time in correcting preconceived ideas, or perhaps never 
 bring its task to an end ; for wherever a man finds that the 
 aspe6l of things seems to contradi6l the general ideas he has 
 formed, he will begin by rejecting the evidence it offers as 
 
62 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 partial and one-sided ; nay, he will shut his eyes to it alto- 
 gether and deny that it stands in any contradiction at all with 
 his preconceived notions, in order that he may thus preserve 
 them uninjured. So it is that many a man carries about a 
 burden of wrong notions all his life long — crotchets, whims, 
 fancies, prejudices, which at last become fixed ideas. The fa6l 
 is that he has never tried to form his fundamental ideas for 
 himself out of his own experience of life, his own way of look- 
 ing at the world, because he has taken over his ideas ready- 
 made from other people ; and this it is that makes him — as it 
 makes how many others ! — so shallow and superficial. 
 
 Instead of that method of instru6lion, care should be taken 
 to educate children on the natural lines. No idea should ever 
 be established in a child's mind otherwise than by what the 
 child can see for itself, or at any rate it should be verified by the 
 same means ; and the result of this would be that the child's 
 ideas, if few, would be well-grounded and accurate. It would 
 learn how to measure things by its own standard rarher than 
 by another's ; and so it would escape a thousand strange 
 fancies and prejudices, and not need to have them eradicated 
 by the lessons it will subsequentiy be taught in the school of 
 life. The child would, in this way, have its mind once for all 
 habituated to clear views and thorough-going knowledge ; it 
 would use its own judgment and take an unbiased estimate of 
 things. 
 
 And, in general, children should not form their notions of 
 what life is like from the copy before they have learned it from 
 the original, to whatever aspe6t of it their attention may be 
 dire<5led. Instead, therefore, of hastening to place books, and 
 books alone, in their hands, let them be made acquainted, step 
 by step, with thi7igs — with the a6iual circumstances of human 
 life. And above all let care be taken to bring them to a clear 
 and objective view of the world as it is, to educate them always 
 to derive their ideas dire6lly from real life, and to shape them 
 in conformity with it — not to fetch them from other sources, 
 such as books, fairy tales, or what people say — then to apply 
 them ready-made to real life. For this will mean that their 
 
ON EDUCATION. 63 
 
 heads are full of wrong notions, and that they will either see 
 things in a false light or try in vain to remodel the world to suit 
 their views, and so enter upon false paths ; and that, too, 
 whether they are only constructing theories of life or engaged 
 in the a(5lual business of it. It is incredible how much harm is 
 done when the seeds of wrong notions are laid in the mind in 
 those early years, later on to bear a crop of prejudice ; for the 
 subsequent lessons which are learned from real life in the world 
 have to be devoted mainly to their extirpation. To unlearn 
 the evil was the answer which, according to Diogenes Laertius,' 
 Antisthenes gave, when he was asked what branch of knowl- 
 edge was most necessary ; and we can see what he meant. 
 
 No child under the age of fifteen should receive instruction 
 in subje6ls which may possibly be the vehicle of serious error, 
 such as philosophy, religion, or any other branch of knowledge 
 where it is necessary to take large views ; because wrong no- 
 tions imbibed early can seldom be rooted out, and of all the 
 intellectual faculties, judgment is the last to arrive at maturity. 
 The child should give its attention either to subjedls where no 
 error is possible at all, such as mathematics, or to those in 
 which there is no particular danger in making a mistake, such 
 as languages, natural science, history and so on. And in 
 general, the branches of knowledge which are to be studied at 
 any period of life should be such as the mind is equal to at that 
 period and can perfedlly understand. Childhood and youth 
 form the time for colle6ting materials, for getting a special and 
 thorough knowledge of individual and particular things. In 
 those years it is too early to form views on a large scale ; and 
 ultimate explanations must be put off to a later date. The 
 faculty of judgment, which cannot come into play without 
 mature experience, should be left to itself; and care should be 
 taken not to anticipate its aClion by inculcating prejudice, 
 which will paralyze it for ever. 
 
 On the other hand, the memory should be specially taxed 
 in youth, since it is then that it is strongest and most tenacious. 
 But in choosing the things that should be committed to mem- 
 
 'vi. 7. 
 
64 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 ory the utmost care and forethought must be exercised ; as 
 lessons well learnt in youth are never forgotten. This precious 
 soil must therefore be cultivated so as to bear as much fruit as 
 possible. If you think how deeply rooted in your memory 
 are those persons whom you knew in the first twelve years of 
 your life, how indelible the impression made upon you by the 
 events of those years, how clear your recollection of most of 
 the things that happened to you then, most of what was told 
 or taught you, it will seem a natural thing to take the suscepti- 
 bility and tenacity of the mind at that period as the groundwork 
 of education. This may be done by a stri6l observance of 
 method, and a systematic regulation of the impressions which 
 the mind is to receive. 
 
 But the years of youth allotted to man are short, and memory 
 is, in general, bound within narrow limits ; still more so, the 
 memory of any one individual. Since this is the case, it is all- 
 important to fill the memory with what is essential and mate- 
 rial in any branch of knowledge, to the exclusion of every- 
 thing else. The decision as to what is essential and material 
 should rest with the master-minds in every department of 
 thought ; their choice should be made after the most mature 
 deliberation, and the outcome of it fixed and determined. 
 Such a choice would have to proceed by sifting the things 
 which it is necessary and important for a man to know in 
 general, and then, necessary and important for him to know 
 in any particular business or calling. Knowledge of the first 
 kind would have to be classified, after an encyclopaedic fashion, 
 in graduated courses, adapted to the degree of general culture 
 which a man may be expe6led to have in the circumstances in 
 which he is placed ; beginning with a course limited to the 
 necessary requirements of primary education, and extending 
 upwards to the subje6ls treated of in all the branches of philo- 
 sophical thought. The regulation of the second kind of 
 knowledge would be left to those who had shown genuine 
 mastery in the several departments into which it is divided ; 
 and the whole system would provide an elaborate rule or canon 
 
ON EDUCATION. 65 
 
 for intellectual education, which would, of course, have to be 
 revised every ten years. Some such arrangement as this 
 would employ the youthful power of the memory to best ad- 
 vantage, and supply excellent working material to the faculty 
 of judgment, when it made its appearance later on. 
 
 A man's knowledge may be said to be mature, in other 
 words, it has reached the most complete state of perfection to 
 which he. as an individual, is capable of bringing it, when an 
 exact correspondence is established between the whole of his 
 abstract ideas and the things he has actually perceived for him- 
 self This will mean that each of his abstract ideas rests, 
 directly or indirectly, upon a basis of observation, which alone 
 endows it with any real value ; and also that he is able to 
 place every observation he makes under the right abstradl 
 idea which belongs to it. Maturity is the work of experience 
 alone ; and therefore it requires time. The knowledge we 
 derive from our own observation is usually distinct from that 
 which we acquire through the medium of abstract ideas ; the 
 one coming to us in the natural way, the other by what people 
 tell us, and the course of instruction we receive, whether it is 
 good or bad. The result is, that in youth there is generally 
 very little agreement or correspondence between our abstract 
 ideas, which are merely phrases in the mind, and that real 
 knowledge which we have obtained by our own observation. 
 It is only later on that a gradual approach takes place between 
 these two kinds of knowledge, accompanied by a mutual cor- 
 rection of error ; and knowledge is not mature until this coali- 
 tion is accomplished. This maturity or perfection of knowledge 
 is something quite independent of another kind of perfection, 
 which may be of a high or a low order — the perfection, I mean, 
 to which a man may bring his own individual faculties ; which 
 is measured, not by any correspondence between the two kinds 
 of knowledge, but by the degree of intensity which each kind 
 attains. 
 
 For the practical man the most needful thing is to acquire 
 an accurate and profound knowledge of the ways of the world. 
 
66 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 But this, though the most needful, is also the most wearisome 
 of all studies, as a man may reach a great age without coming 
 to the end of his task ; whereas, in the domain of the sciences, 
 he masters the more important facts when he is still young. 
 In acquiring that knowledge of the world, it is while he is a 
 novice, namely, in boyhood and in youth, that the first and 
 hardest lessons are put before him ; but it often happens that 
 even in later years there is still a great deal to be learned. 
 
 The study is difficult enough in itself ; but the difficulty is 
 doubled by novels, which represent a state of things in life and 
 the world, such as, in fact, does not exist. Youth is credulous, 
 and accepts these views of life, which then become part and 
 parcel of the mind ; so that, instead of a merely negative con- 
 dition of ignorance, you have positive error — ^a whole tissue of 
 false notions to start with ; and at a later date these actually 
 spoil the schooling of experience, and put a wrong construc- 
 tion on the lessons it teaches. If, before this, the youth had 
 no light at all to guide him, he is now misled by a will-o'-the 
 wisp ; still more often is this the case with a girl. They have 
 both had a false view of things foisted on them by reading 
 novels ; and expectations have been aroused which can never 
 be fulfilled. This generally exercises a baneful influence on 
 their whole life. In this respect those whose youth has allowed 
 them no time or opportunity for reading novels — those who 
 work with their hands and the like — are in a position of decided 
 advantage. There are a few novels to which this reproach can- 
 not be addressed — nay, which have an effect the contrary of 
 bad. First and foremost, to give an example, Gil Bias, and 
 the other works of Le Sage (or rather their Spanish originals); 
 further, The Vicar of Wakefield, and, to some extent, Sir 
 Walter Scott's novels. Don Quixote may be regarded as a 
 satirical exhibition of the error to which I am referring. 
 
OF WOMEN. 
 
 SCHILLER'S poem in honor of women, Wurde der 
 Frauen, is the result of much careful thought, and it 
 appeals to the reader by its antithetic style and its use of con- 
 trast ; but as an expression of the true praise which should be 
 accorded to them, it is, I think, inferior to these few words of 
 Jouy's : Without women, the beginning of our life would be 
 helpless ; the middle^ devoid of pleasure ; and the end, of con- 
 solation. The same thing is more feelingly expressed by 
 Byron in Sardanapalus : — 
 
 The very first 
 Of human life must spring from woman's breast, 
 Your first sm,all words are taught you from, her lips. 
 Your first tears quench' d by her, and your last sighs 
 Too often breathed out in a woman's hearing. 
 When men have shrunk from, the ignoble care 
 Of watching the last hour of him. who led them,. 
 
 (^Act I. Scene 2 ) 
 
 These two passages indicate the right standpoint for the 
 appreciation of women. 
 
 You need only look at the way in which she is formed, to 
 see that woman is not meant to undergo great labor, whether 
 of the mind or of the body. She pays the debt of life not by 
 what she does, but by what she suffers ; by the pains of child- 
 bearing and care for the child, and by submission to her 
 husband, to whom she should be a patient and cheering 
 companion. The keenest sorrows and joys are not for her, 
 nor is she called upon to display a great deal of strength. 
 The current of her life should be more gentle, peaceful and 
 trivial than man's, without being essentially happier or 
 unhappier. (67) 
 
68 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 Women are dire<5lly fitted for a<5Hng as the nurses and 
 teachers of our early childhood by the fa<5l that they are them- 
 selves childish, frivolous and short-sighted ; in a word, they 
 are big children all their life long — a kind of intermediate stage 
 between the child and the full-grown man, who is man in the 
 stri^l sense of the word. See how a girl will fondle a child for 
 days together, dance with it and sing to it ; and then think 
 what a man, with the best will in the world, could do if he 
 were put in her place. 
 
 With young girls Nature seems to have had in view what, 
 in the language of the drama, is called a striking effe£l ; as 
 for a few years she dowers them with a wealth of beauty and 
 is lavish in her gift of charm, at the expense of all the rest of 
 their life ; so that during those years they may capture the 
 fantasy of some man to such a degree that he is hurried away 
 into undertaking the honorable care of them, in some form or 
 other, as long as they live — a step for which there would not 
 appear to be any sufficient warranty if reason only diredled his 
 thoughts. Accordingly, Nature has equipped woman, as she 
 does all her creatures, with the weapons and implements 
 requisite for the safeguarding of her existence, and for just as 
 long as it is necessary for her to have them. Here, as else- 
 where. Nature proceeds with her usual economy ; for just as 
 the female ant, after fecundation, loses her wings, which are 
 then superfluous, nay, adlually a danger to the business of 
 breeding ; so, after giving birth to one or two children, a 
 woman generally loses her beauty ; probably, indeed, for 
 similar reasons. 
 
 And so we find that young girls, in their hearts, look upon 
 domestic affairs or work of any kind as of secondary import- 
 ance, if not adually as a mere jest. The only business that 
 really claims their earnest attention is love, making conquests, 
 and everything conne6led with this — dress, dancing, and so on. 
 
 The nobler and more perfe6l a thing is, the later and slower 
 it is in arriving at maturity. A man reaches the maturity of 
 his reasoning powers and mental faculties hardly before the 
 age of twenty-eight ; a woman, at eighteen. And then, too, 
 
OF WOMEN. 69 
 
 in the case of woman, it is only reason of a sort — very niggard 
 in its dimensions. That is why women remain children their 
 whole life long ; never seeing anything but what is quite close 
 to them, cleaving to the present moment, taking appearance 
 for reality, and preferring trifles to matters of the first import- 
 ance. For it is by virtue of his reasoning faculty that man 
 does not live in the present only, like the brute, but looks 
 about him and considers the past and the future ; and this is 
 the origin of prudence, as well as of that care and anxiety 
 which so many people exhibit. Both the advantages and the 
 disadvantages which this involves, are shared in by the woman 
 to a smaller extent because of her weaker power of reasoning. 
 She may, in fa6l, be described as intelle(5lually shortsighted, 
 because, while she has an intuitive understanding of what lies 
 quite close to her, her field of vision is narrow and does not 
 reach to what is remote ; so that things which are absent, or 
 past, or to come, have much less effe6t upon women than upon 
 men. This is the reason why women are more often inclined 
 to be extravagant, and sometimes carry their inclination to a 
 length that borders upon madness. In their hearts, women 
 think that it is men's business to earn money and theirs to 
 spend it — if possible during their husband's life, but, at any 
 rate, after his death. The very fadl that their husband hands 
 them over his earnings for purposes of housekeeping, 
 strengthens them in this belief. 
 
 However many disadvantages all this may involve, there is 
 at least this to be said in its favor ; that the woman lives more 
 in the present than the man, and that, if the present is at all 
 tolerable, she enjoys it more eagerly. This is the source of 
 that cheerfulness which is peculiar to women, fitting her to 
 amuse man in his hours of recreation, and, in case of need, 
 to console him when he is borne down by the weight of 
 his cares. 
 
 It is by no means a bad plan to consult women in matters of 
 difficulty, as the Germans used to do in ancient times ; for 
 their way of looking at things is quite different from ours, 
 chiefly in the fadl that they like to take the shortest way to 
 
70 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 their goal, and, in general, manage to fix their eyes upon 
 what lies before them ; while we, as a rule, see far beyond it, 
 iust because it is in front of our noses. In cases like this, we 
 need to be brought back to the right standpoint, so as to re- 
 cover the near and simple view. 
 
 Then, again, women are decidedly more sober in their 
 judgment than we are, so that they do not see more in things 
 than is really there ; whilst, if our passions are aroused, we 
 are apt to see things in an exaggerated way, or imagine what 
 does not exist. 
 
 The weakness of their reasoning faculty also explains why it 
 is that women show more sympathy for the unfortunate than 
 men do, and so treat them with more kindness and interest ; 
 and why it is that, on the contrary, they are inferior to men 
 in point of justice, and less honorable and conscientious. For 
 it is just because their reasoning power is weak that present 
 circumstances have such a hold over them, and those concrete 
 things, which lie dire6lly before their eyes, exercise a power 
 which is seldom countera<5led to any extent by abstract prin- 
 ciples of thought, by fixed rules of condu6^, firm resolutions, 
 or, in general, by consideration for the past and the future, or 
 regard lor what is absent and remote. Accordingly, they 
 possess the first and main elements that go to make a virtuous 
 charadler, but they are deficient in those secondary qualities 
 which are often a necessary instrument in the formation of it.' 
 
 Hence, it will be found that the fundamental fault of the 
 female chara6ter is that it has no sense of justice. This is mainly 
 due to the fa6l, already mentioned, that women are defe6^ive 
 in the powers of reasoning and deliberation ; but it is also 
 traceable to the position which Nature has assigned to them 
 as the weaker sex. They are dependent, not upon strength, 
 but upon craft; and hence their instindtive capacity for cunning, 
 and their ineradicable tendency to say what is not true. For 
 as lions are provided with claws and teeth, and elephants and 
 boars with tusks, bulls with horns, and the cuttle fish with its 
 
 ' In this respect they may be compared to an animal organism 
 which contains a liver but no gall-bladder. Here let me refer to what 
 I have said in my treatise on The Foundation of Morals, \ 17. 
 
OF WOMEN. 71 
 
 clouds of- inky fluid, so Nature has equipped woman, for her 
 defence and proteftion, with the arts of dissimulation ; and all 
 the power which Nature has conferred upon man in the shape 
 of physical strength and reason, has been bestowed upon 
 women in this form. Hence, dissimulation is innate in woman, 
 and almost as much a quality of the stupid as of the clever. It 
 is as natural for them to make use of it on every occasion as it 
 is for those animals to employ their means of defence when 
 they are attacked ; they have a feeling that in doing so they 
 are only within their rights. Therefore a woman who is per- 
 fe6lly truthful and not given to dissimulation is perhaps an 
 impossibility, and for this very reason they are so quick at see- 
 ing through dissimulation in others that it is not a wise thing 
 to attempt it with them. But this fundamental defe6l which I 
 have stated, with all that it entails, gives rise to falsity, faith- 
 lessness, treachery, ingratitude, and so on. Perjury in a court 
 of justice is more often committed by women than by men It 
 may, indeed, be generally questioned whether women ought 
 to be sworn at all. From time to time one finds repeated cases 
 everywhere of ladies, who want for nothing, taking things 
 from shop-counters when no one is looking, and making off 
 with them. 
 
 Nature has appointed that the propagation of the species 
 shall be the business of men who are young, strong and hand- 
 some ; so that the race may not degenerate. . This is the firm 
 will and purpose of Nature in regard to the species, and it 
 finds its expression in the passions of women. There is no law 
 that is older or more powerful than this. Woe, then, to the 
 man who sets up claims and interests that will conflidl with 
 it ; whatever he may say and do, they will be unmercifully 
 crushed at the first serious encounter. For the innate rule 
 that governs women's conduct, though it is secret and un- 
 formulated, nay, unconscious in its working, is this : We are 
 justified in deceiving those who think they have acquired rights 
 over the species by paying little atte?ition to the individual, that 
 is, to us. The constitution and, therefore, the welfare of the 
 species have been placed in our hands and committed to our care. 
 
72 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 through the control we obtain over the next generation, which 
 proceeds /ro7ti us ; let us discharge our duties conscieiitiously. 
 But women have no abstract knowledge of this leading prin- 
 ciple ; they are conscious of it only as a concrete fact ; and 
 they have no other method of giving expression to it than the 
 way in which they act when the opportunity arrives. And then 
 their conscience does not trouble them so much as we fancy ; 
 for in the darkest recesses of their heart, they are aware that 
 in committing a breach of their duty towards the individual, 
 they have all the better fulfilled their duty towards the species, 
 which is infinitely greater.' 
 
 And since women exist in the main solely for the propaga- 
 tion of the species, and are not destined for anything else, they 
 live, as a rule, more for the species than for the individual, 
 and in their hearts take the affairs of the species more seriously 
 than those of the individual. This gives their whole life and 
 being a certain levity ; the general bent of their character is in 
 a dire6^ion fundamentally different from that of man ; and it is 
 this which produces that discord in married life which is so 
 frequent, and almost the normal state. 
 
 The natural feeling between men is mere indifference, but 
 between women it is a6lual enmity. The reason of this is that 
 trade -jealousy — odium Jigulinum — which, in the case of men 
 does not go beyond the confines of their own particular pur- 
 suit ; but, with women, embraces the whole sex ; since they 
 have only one kind of business. Even when they meet in the 
 street, women look at one another like Guelphs and GhibeUines. 
 And it is a patent fa6l that when two women make first ac- 
 quaintance with each other, they behave with more constraint 
 and dissimulation than two men would show in a like case ; 
 and hence it is that an exchange of compliments between two 
 women is a much more ridiculous proceeding than between 
 two men. Further, whilst a man will, as a general rule, al- 
 ways preserve a certain amount of consideration and humanity 
 in speaking to others, even to those who are in a very inferior 
 
 ' A more detailed discussion of the matter in question may be found 
 in my chief work, Die Welt als Wille unci VorstelIun<r^ vol. ii. ch. 44. 
 
OF WOMEN. 73 
 
 position, it is intolerable to see how proudly and disdainfully 
 a fine lady will generally behave towards one who is in a lower 
 social rank (I do not mean a woman who is in her service, j 
 whenever she speaks to her. The reason of this may be that, 
 with women, differences of rank are much more precarious 
 than with us ; because, while a hundred considerations carry 
 weight in our case, in theirs there is only one, namely, with 
 which man they have found favor ; as also that they stand in 
 much nearer relations with one another than men do, in con- 
 sequence of the one-sided nature of their calling. This makes 
 them endeavor to lay stress upon differences of rank. 
 
 It is only the man whose intelleft is clouded by his sexual 
 impulses that could give the name oi the fair sex to that under- 
 sized, narrow-shouldered, broad-hipped, and short-legged 
 race ; for the whole beauty of the sex is bound up with this 
 impulse. Instead of calling them beautiful, there would be 
 more warrant for describing women as the unaesthetic sex. 
 Neither for music, nor for poetry, nor for fine art, have they 
 really and truly any sense or susceptibility ; it is a mere mock- 
 ery if they make a pretence of it in order to assist their 
 endeavor to please. Hence, as a result of this, they are 
 incapable of taking a purely objective interest \n anything ; and 
 the reason of it seems to me to be as follows. A man tries to 
 acquire direfi mastery over things, either by understanding 
 them, or by forcing them to do his will. But a woman is 
 always and everywhere reduced to obtaining this mastery 
 indireHly, namely, through a man ; and whatever dire6l 
 mastery she may have is entirely confined to him. And so it 
 lies in woman's nature to look upon everything only as a 
 means for conquering man ; and if she takes an interest in 
 anything else, it is simulated — a mere roundabout way of 
 gaining her ends by coquetry, and feigning what she does not 
 feel. Hence, even Rousseau declared : Women have, in gen- 
 eral, no love of any art ; they have no proper knowledge of any ; 
 and they have no genius} 
 
 > Lettre ^ d' Alembert. Note xx. 
 
74 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 No one who sees at all below the surface can have failed to 
 remark the same thing. You need only observe the kind of 
 attention women bestow upon a concert, an opera, or a play — 
 the childish simplicity, for example, with which they keep on 
 chattering during the finest passages in the greatest master- 
 pieces. If it is true that the Greeks excluded women from 
 their theatres, they were quite right in what they did ; at any 
 rate you would have been able to hear what was said upon the 
 stage. In our day, besides, or in lieu of saying, Let a woman 
 keep silence in the church, it would be much to the point to 
 say. Let a woman keep silence in the theatre. This might, 
 perhaps, be put up in big letters on the curtain. 
 
 And you cannot expe<5l anything else of women if you con- 
 sider that the most distinguished intelledts among the whole 
 sex have never managed to produce a single achievement in 
 the fine arts that is really great, genuine, and original ; or 
 given to the world any work of permanent value in any sphere. 
 This is most strikingly shown in regard to painting, where 
 mastery of technique is at least as much within their power as 
 within ours — and hence they are diligent in cultivating it ; but 
 still, they have not a single great painting to boast of, just 
 because they are deficient in that objectivity of mind which is 
 so dire6lly indispensable in painting. They never get beyond 
 a subje<ftive point of view. It is quite in keeping with this that 
 ordinary women have no real susceptibility for art at all ; for 
 Nature proceeds in stri6l sequence — non facit saltum. And 
 Huarte' in his Exam£n de ingenios para las scienzias — a book 
 which has been famous for three hundred years — denies 
 women the possession of all the higher faculties. The case is 
 not altered by particular and partial exceptions ; taken as a 
 whole, women are, and remain, thorough-going Philistines, 
 and quite incurable. Hence, with that absurd arrangement 
 which allows them to share the rank and title of their hus- 
 bands, they are a constant stimulus to his ignoble ambitions. 
 
 ' Translator's Note. Juan Huarte (1520?- 1590) practised as a 
 physician at Madrid. The work cited by Schopenhauer is well 
 known, and has been translated into many languages. 
 
ON EDUCATION. - . . ^^ 
 
 And, further, it is just because they are Philistines that modem 
 society, where they take the lead and set the tone, is in such 
 a bad way. Napoleon's saying — that women have no rank — 
 should be adopted as the right standpoint in determining their 
 position in society ; and as regards their other qualities, 
 Chamfort * makes the very true remark : They are made to 
 trade with our own weaknesses and our follies, but not with our 
 reason. The sympathies that exist between them and men are 
 skin-deep only, and do not touch the mind or the feelings or the 
 character. They form the sexus sequior — the second sex, 
 inferior in every respe6l to the first ; their infirmities should 
 be treated with consideration ; but to show them great rever- 
 ence is extremely ridiculous, and lowers us in their eyes. 
 When Nature made two divisions of the human race, she did 
 not draw the line exadly through the middle. These divisions 
 are polar and opposed to each other, it is true ; but the differ- 
 ence between them is not qualitative merely, it is also quanti- 
 tative. 
 
 This is just the view which the ancients took of woman, and 
 the view which people in the East take now ; and their judg- 
 ment as to her proper position is much more correft than ours, 
 with our old French notions of gallantry and our preposterous 
 system of reverence — that highest produd; of Teutonico- 
 Christian stupidity. These notions have served only to make 
 women more arrogant and overbearing ; so that one is occa- 
 sionally reminded of the holy apes in Benares, who in the 
 consciousness of their sanctity and inviolable position, think 
 they can do exadlly as they please. 
 
 But in the West, the woman, and especially the lady, finds 
 herself in a false position ; for woman, rightly called by the 
 ancients, sexus sequior, is by no means fit to be the object of 
 our honor and veneration, or to hold her head higher than 
 man and be on equal terms with him. The consequences of 
 this false position are sufficiently obvious. Accordingly, it 
 would be a very desirable thing if this Number-Two of the 
 
 " Translator's Note. See Counsels and Maxims, p. 12, Note. 
 
76 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 human race were in Europe also relegated to her natural 
 place, and an end put to that lady nuisance, which not only 
 moves all Asia to laughter, but would have been ridiculed by 
 Greece and Rome as well. It is impossible to calculate the 
 good effe6^s which such a change would bring about in our 
 social, civil and political arrangements. There would be no 
 necessity for the Salic law : it would be a superfluous truism. 
 In Europe the lady, stri6lly so-called, is a being who should 
 not exist at all ; she should be either a housewife or a girl 
 who hopes to become one ; and she should be brought up, 
 not to be arrogant, but to be thrifty and submissive. It is just 
 because there are such people as ladies in Europe that the 
 women of the lower classes, that is to say, the great majority 
 of the sex, are much more unhappy than they are in the East. 
 And even Lord Byron says: Thous^ fit of the state of women under 
 the ancient Greeks — convenient enough. Present state, a rem- 
 nant of the barbarism of the chivalric and the fetidal ages — 
 artificial and unnatural. They ought to mind home — and be 
 well fed and clothed — but not mixed in society. Well educated, 
 too, in religion — bid to read neither poetry nor politics — nothing 
 but books of piety and cookery. Music — drawiiig — dancing — 
 also a little gardening and ploughing now and then. I have 
 seen them mending the roads in Epirus with good success. Why 
 not, as well as hay-making and milking ? 
 
 The laws of marriage prevailing in Europe consider the 
 woman as the equivalent of the man — start, that is to say, from 
 a wrong position. In our part of the world where monogamy 
 is the rule, to marry means to halve one's rights and double 
 one's duties. Now, when the laws gave women equal rights 
 with man, they ought to have also endowed her with a mascu- 
 line intelle6l. But the fa(5l is, that just in proportion as the 
 honors and privileges which the laws accord to women, exceed 
 the amount which nature gives, is there a diminution in the 
 number of women who really participate in these privileges ; 
 and all the remainder are deprived of their natural rights by 
 just so much as is given to the others over and above their 
 share. For the institution of monogamy, and the laws of 
 
OF WOMEN. 77 
 
 marriage which it entails, bestow upon the woman an unnatural 
 position of privilege, by considering her throughout as the 
 full equivalent of the man, which is by no means the case ; and 
 seeing this, men who are shrewd and prudent very often 
 scruple to make so great a sacrifice and to acquiesce in so 
 unfair an arrangement. 
 
 Consequently, whilst among polygamous nations every 
 woman is provided for, where monogamy prevails the number 
 of married women is limited ; and there remains over a large 
 number of women without stay or support, who, in the upper 
 classes, vegetate as useless old maids, and in the lower suc- 
 cumb to hard work for which they are not suited ; or else 
 become yil/es de joie, whose life is as destitute of joy as it is of 
 honor. But under the circumstances they become a necessity ; 
 and their position is openly recognized as serving the special 
 end of warding off temptation from those women favored by 
 fate, who have found, or may hope to tind, husbands. In 
 London alone there are 80,000 prostitutes. What are they 
 but the women, who, under the institution of monogamy have 
 come off worse? Theirs is a dreadful fate : they are human 
 sacrifices offered up on the altar of monogamy. The women 
 whose wretched position is here described are the inevitable 
 set-off to the European lady with her arrogance and pretension. 
 Polygamy is therefore a real benefit to the female sex if it is 
 taken as a whole. And, from another point of view, there is 
 no true reason why a man whose wife suffers from chronic ill- 
 ness, or remains barren, or has gradually become too old for 
 him, should not take a second. The motives which induce so 
 many people to become converts to Mormonism' appear to 
 be just those which militate against the unnatural institution 
 of monogamy. 
 
 Moreover, the bestowal of unnatural rights upon women has 
 imposed upon them unnatural duties, and, nevertheless, a 
 breach of these duties makes them unhappy. Let me explain. 
 A man may often think that his social or financial position will 
 
 ' Translator' s Note. The Mormt>ns have recently given up polyg- 
 amy, and received the American franchise in its stead. 
 
78 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 suffer if he marries, unless he makes some brilliant alliance. 
 His desire will then be to win a woman of his own choice 
 under conditions other than those of marriage, such as will 
 secure her position and that of the children. However fair, 
 reasonable, fit and proper these conditions may be, and the 
 women consents by foregoing that undue amount of privilege 
 which marriage alone can bestow, she to some extent loses her 
 honor, because marriage is the basis of civic society ; and she 
 will lead an unhappy life, since human nature is so constituted 
 that we pay an attention to the opinion of other people which 
 is out of all proportion to its value. On the other hand, if 
 she does not consent, she runs the risk either of having to be 
 given in marriage to a man whom she does not like, or of 
 being landed high and dry as an old maid ; for the period 
 during which she has a chance of being settled for life is very 
 short. And in view of this aspe<5l of the institution of monog- 
 amy, Thomasius' profoundly learned treatise, de Concubinatu, 
 is well worth reading ; for it shows that, amongst all nations 
 and in all ages, down to the Lutheran Reformation, concubin- 
 age was permitted ; nay, that it was an institution which was 
 to a certain extent adlually recognized by law, and attended 
 with no dishonor. It was only the Lutheran Reformation 
 that degraded it from this position. It was seen to be a fur- 
 ther justification for the marriage of the clergy ; and then, 
 after that, the Catholic Church did not dare to remain behind- 
 hand in the matter. ? 
 
 There is no use arguing about polygamy ; it must be taken as 
 de fa£lo existing everywhere, and the only question is as to how 
 it shall be regulated. Where are there, then, any real mon- 
 ogomists ■? We all live, at any rate, for a time, and most of 
 us, always, in polygamy. And so, since every man needs 
 many women, there is nothing fairer than to allow him, nay, 
 to make it incumbent upon him, to provide for many women. 
 This will reduce woman to her true and natural position as a 
 subordinate being ; and the lady — that monster of European 
 civilization and Teutonico-Christian stupidity — will disappear 
 
OF WOMEN. 79 
 
 from the world, leaving only women, but no more unhappy 
 women, of whom Europe is now full. 
 
 In India, no woman is ever independent, but in accordance 
 with the law of Manu,' she stands under the control of her 
 father, her husband, her brother or her son. It is, to be sure, 
 a revolting thing that a widow should immolate herself upon 
 her husband's funeral pyre ; but it is also revolting that she 
 should spend her husband's money with her paramours — the 
 money for which he toiled his whol life Ion in the consoling 
 belief that he was providing for his children. Happy are those 
 who have kept the middle course — medium tenuere beati. 
 
 The first love of a mother for her child is, with the lower 
 animals as with men, of a purely instinctive chara6ler, and so 
 it ceases when the child is no longer in a physically helpless 
 condition. After that, the first love should give way to one 
 that is based on habit and reason ; but this often fails to make 
 its appearance, especially where the mother did not love the 
 father. The love of a father for his child is of a different order, 
 and more likely to last ; because it has its foundation in the 
 fa6l that in the child he recognizes his own inner self; that is 
 to say, his love for it is metaphysical in its origin. 
 
 In almost all nations, whether of the ancient or the modem 
 world, even amongst the Hottentots, property is inherited by 
 the male descendants alone ; it is only in Europe that a de- 
 parture has taken place ; but not amongst the nobility, how- 
 ever. That the property which has cost men long years ^i 
 toil and effort, and been won with so much difficulty, should 
 afterwards come into the hands of women, who then, in their 
 lack of reason, squander it in a short time, or otherwise fool it 
 away, is a grieveance and a wrong, as ; rious as it is common, 
 which should be prevented by limiting the right of women to 
 inherit. In my opinion, the best arrangement would be that 
 by which women, whether widows or daughters, should never 
 receive anything beyond the interest for life on property 
 
 «Ch. v., v. 148, 
 
 • Leroy, Lettres philosophiques sur V intelligence et la per/eBibiliti 
 des anitnaux, avec que Iques lettres sur I'homme, p. 298, Paris, 1802. 
 
80 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 secured by mortgage, and in no case the property itself, or the 
 capital, except where all male descendants fail. The people 
 who make money are men, not women ; and it follows from 
 this that women are neither justified in having unconditional 
 possession of it, nor fit persons to be entrusted with its ad- 
 ministration. When wealth, in any true sense of the word, that 
 is to say, funds, houses or land, is to go to them as an in- 
 heritance, they should never be allowed the free disposition of 
 it. In their case a guardian should always be appointed ; and 
 hence they should never be given the free control of their own 
 children, wherever it can be avoided. The vanity of women, 
 even though it should not prove to be greater than that of 
 men, has this much danger in it, that it takes an entirely 
 material dire6lion. They are vain, I mean, of their personal 
 beauty, and then of finery, show and magnificence. That is 
 just why they are so much in their element in society. It is 
 this, too, which makes them so inclined to be extravagant, all 
 the more as their reasoning power is low. Accordingly we 
 find an ancient writer describing woman as in general of an 
 extravagant nature — Twi) rb arivoXov ian danavvpbv ♦tiffci.' But with 
 men vanity often takes the diredlion of non-material advant- 
 ages, such as intelledl, learning, courage. 
 
 In the Politick Aristotle explains the great disadvantage 
 which accrued to the Spartans from the fa6l that they conceded 
 too much to their women, by giving thcni the right of in- 
 heritance and dower, and a great amount of independence ; 
 and he shows how much this contributed to Sparta's fall. May 
 it not be the case in France that the influence of women, which 
 went on increasing steadily from the time of Louis XIII.. was 
 to blame for that gradual corruption of the Court and the 
 Government, which brought about the Revolution of 1789, of 
 which all subsequent disturbances have been the fruit ? How- 
 ever that may be, the false position which women occupy, 
 
 'Brunck's Gnomici poetae graeci, v. 115. 
 *Bk. I.,cn. 9. 
 
OF WOMEN. Si 
 
 demonstrated as it is, in the most glaring way, by the institu- 
 tion of the lady, is a fundamental defeat in our social scheme, 
 and this defe6l, proceeding from the very heart of it, must 
 spread its baneful influence in all dire6lions. 
 
 That woman is by nature meant to obey may be seen by the 
 fa6l that every woman who is placed in the unnatural position 
 of complete independence, immediately attaches herself to 
 some man, by whom she allows herself to be guided and ruled. 
 It is because she needs a lord and master. If she is young, it 
 will be a lover ; if she is old, a priest. 
 
ON NOISE. 
 
 KANT wrote a treatise on The Vital Powers. I should 
 prefer to write a dirge for them. The super-abundant 
 display of vitality, which takes the form of knocking, hammer- 
 ing, and tumbling things about, has proved a daily torment to 
 me all my life long. There are people, it is true — nay, a great 
 many people — who smile at such things, because they are not 
 sensitive to noise ; but they are just the very people who are 
 also not sensitive to argument, or thought, or poetry, or art, 
 in a word, to any kind of intelle6lual influence. The reason 
 of it is that the tissue of their brains is of a very rough and 
 coarse quality. On the other hand, noise is a torture to 
 intelle6tual people. In the biographies of almost all great 
 writers, or wherever else their personal utterances are recorded, 
 I find complaints about it ; in the case of Kant, for instance, 
 Goethe, Lichtenberg, Jean Paul ; and if it should happen that 
 any writer has omitted to express himself on the matter, it is 
 only for want of an opportunity. 
 
 This aversion to noise I should explain as follows : If you 
 cut up a large diamond into little bits, it will entirely lose the 
 value it had as a whole ; and an army divided up into small 
 bodies of soldiers, loses all its strength. So a great intelle(5t 
 sinks to the level of an ordinary one, as soon as it is interrupted 
 and disturbed, its attention distra6led and drawn off from the 
 matter in hand ; for its superiority depends upon its power of 
 concentration — of bringing all its strength to bear upon one 
 theme, in the same way as a concave mirror collects into one 
 point all the rays of light that strike upon it. Noisy inter- 
 ruption is a hindrance to this concentration. That is why dis- 
 
 (82) 
 
ON NOISE. '3 
 
 tinguished minds have always shown such an extreme dislike to 
 disturbance in any form, as something that breaks in upon and 
 distrads their thoughts. Above all have they been averse to 
 that violent interruption that comes from noise. Ordinary 
 people are not much put out by anything of the sort. The 
 most sensible and intelligent of all the nations in Europe lays 
 down the rule, Never Interrupt! as the eleventh command- 
 ment. Noise is the most impertinent of all forms of interrup- 
 tion. It is not only an interruption, but also a disruption of 
 thought. Of course, where there is nothing to interrupt, 
 noise will not be so particularly painful. Occasionally it hap- 
 pens that some slight but constant noise continues to bother 
 and distra<^\ me for a time before I become distin6tly conscious 
 of it. All I feel is a steady increase in the labor of thinking — 
 just as though I were trying to walk with a weight on my foot. 
 At last I find out what it is. 
 
 Let me now, however, pass from genus to species. The 
 most inexcusable and disgraceful of all noises is the cracking 
 of whips — a truly infernal thing when it is done in the narrow 
 resounding streets of a town. I denounce it as making a 
 peaceful life impossible ; it puts an end to all quiet thought. 
 That this cracking of whips should be allowed at all seems to 
 me to show in the clearest way how senseless and thoughtless 
 is the nature of mankind. No one with anything like an idea 
 in his head can avoid a feeling of a<5iual pain at this sudden, 
 sharp crack, which paralyzes the brain, rends the thread of 
 reflection, and murders thought. Every time this noise is 
 made, it must disturb a hundred people who are applying their 
 minds to business of some sort, no matter how trivial it may 
 be ; while on the thinker its effe6l is woeful and disastrous, 
 cutting his thoughts asunder, much as the executioner's axe 
 severs the head from the body. No sound, be it ever so shrill, 
 cuts so sharply into the brain as this cursed cracking of whips ; 
 you feel the sting of the lash right inside your head ; and it 
 affe<5ls the brain in the same way as touch affects a sensitive 
 plant, and for the same length of time. 
 
84 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 With all due respedl for the most holy do6lrine of utility, I 
 really cannot see why a fellow who is taking away a wagon- 
 load of gravel or dung should thereby obtain the right to kill 
 in the bud the thoughts which may happen to be springing 
 up in ten thousand heads — the number he will disturb one after 
 another in half an hour's drive through the town. Hammer- 
 ing, the barking of dogs, and the crying of children are 
 horrible to hear ; but your only genuine assassin of thought is 
 the crack of a whip ; it exists for the purpose of destroying 
 every pleasant moment of quiet thought that any one may now 
 and then enjoy. If the driver had no other way of urging on 
 his horse than by making this most abominable of all noises, 
 it would be excusable ; but quite the contrary is the case. 
 This cursed cracking of whips is not only unnecessary, but 
 even useless. Its aim is to produce an effect upon the 
 intelligence of the horse ; but through the constant abuse 
 of it, the animal becomes habituated to the sound, which 
 falls upon blunted feelings and produces no effe6l at all. 
 The horse does not go any the faster for it. You have 
 a remarkable example of this in the ceaseless cracking of 
 his whip on the part of a cab-driver, while he is pro- 
 ceeding at a slow pace on the lookout for a fare. If he 
 were to give his horse the slightest touch with the whip, it 
 would have much more effedl. Supposing, however, that it 
 were absolutely necessary to crack the whip in order to keep 
 the horse constantly in mind of its presence, it would be enough 
 to make the hundredth part of the noise. For it is a well- 
 known fa<5t that, in regard to sight and hearing, animals are 
 sensitive to even the faintest indications ; they are alive to 
 things that we can scarcely perceive. The most surprising 
 instances of this are furnished by trained dogs and canary birds. 
 
 It is obvious, therefore, that here we have to do with an a6l 
 of pure wantonness ; nay, with an impudent defiance offered 
 to those members of the community who work with their 
 heads by those who work with their hands. That such 
 infamy should be tolerated in a town is a piece of bar- 
 
ON NOISE. 9S 
 
 barity and iniquity, all the more as it could easily be 
 remedied by a police-notice to the effe6l that every lash 
 shall have a knot at the end of it. There can be no harm in 
 drawing the attention of the mob to the fa6l that the classes 
 above them work with their heads, for any kind of headwork 
 is mortal anguish to the man in the street. A fellow who rides 
 through the narrow alleys of a populous town with unemployed 
 post horses or cart-horses, and keeps on cracking a whip 
 several yards long with all his might, deserves there and 
 then to stand down and receive five really good blows with 
 a stick. 
 
 All the philanthropists in the world, and all the legislators, 
 meeting to advocate and decree the total abolition of corporal 
 punishment, will never persuade me to the contrary ! There 
 is something even more disgraceful than what I have just men- 
 tioned. Often enough you may see a carter w^alking along 
 the street, quite alone, without any horses, and still cracking 
 away incessantly ; so accustomed has the wretch become to it 
 in consequence of the unwarrantable toleration of this praftice. 
 A man's body and the needs of his body are now every- 
 where treated with a tender indulgence. Is the thinking 
 mind then, to be the only thing that is never to obtain the 
 slightest measure of consideration or prote<5lion, to say nothing 
 of respe6l ? Carters, porters, messengers — these are the beasts 
 of burden amongst mankind ; by all means let them be treated 
 justly, fairly, indulgently, and with forethought ; but they must 
 not be permitted to stand in the way of the higher endeavors 
 of humanity by wantonly making a noise. How many great 
 and splendid thoughts, I should like to know, have been lost 
 to the world by the crack of a whip ? If I had the upper hand, 
 I should soon produce in the heads of these people an indis- 
 soluble association of ideas between cracking a whip and getting 
 a whipping. 
 
 Let us hope that the more intelligent and refined among 
 the nations will make a beginning in this matter, and 
 then that the Germans may take example by it and follow 
 
86 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 suit.* Meanwhile, I may quote what Thomas Hood says of 
 them' : For a musical nation, they are the most noisy I ever 
 met with. That they are so is due to the fa6l, not that they 
 are more fond of making a noise than other people — they 
 would deny it if you asked them — but that their senses are 
 obtuse ; consequently, when they hear a noise, it does not 
 affe<^l them much. It does not disturb them in reading or 
 thinking, simply because they do not think ; they only smoke, 
 which is their substitute for thought. The general toleration 
 of unnecessary noise — the slamming of doors, for instance, a 
 very unmannerly and ill-bred thing — is dire6l evidence that 
 the prevailing habit of mind is dullness and lack of thought. In 
 Germany it seems as though care were taken that no one 
 should ever think for mere noise — to mention one form of it, 
 the way in which drumming goes on for no pilmose at all. 
 
 Finally, as regards the literature of the subject treated of in 
 this chapter, I have only one work to recommend, but it is a 
 good one. I refer to a poetical epistle in terzo rimo by the 
 famous painter Bronzino, entitled De'' Romori : a Messer Luca 
 Martini. It gives a detailed description of the torture to which 
 people are put by the various noises of a small Italian town. 
 Written in a tragi-comic style, it is very amusing. The epistle 
 may be found in Opere burlesche del Berni, Aretino ed altri. 
 Vol. II., p. 258 ; apparently published in Utrecht in 1771. 
 
 ' According to a notice issued by the Society for the Prote<Sion of 
 Animals in Munich, the superfluous whipping and the cracking of 
 whips were, in December, 1858, positively forbidden in Nuremberg. 
 
 » In Up the Rhine. 
 
A FEW PARABLES. 
 
 IN a field of ripening corn I came to a place which had 
 been trampled down by some ruthless foot ; and as I 
 glanced amongst the countless stalks, every one of them alike, 
 standing there so ere6l and bearing the full weight of the ear, 
 I saw a multitude of different flowers, red and blue and violet. 
 How pretty they looked as they grew there so naturally with 
 their little foliage ! But, thought I, they are quite useless ; 
 they bear no fruit ; they are mere weeds, suffered to remain 
 only because thefe is no getting rid of them. And yet, but 
 for these flowers, there would be nothing to charm the eye 
 in that wilderness of stalks. They are emblematic of poetry 
 and art, which, in civic life — so severe, but still useful and not 
 without its fruit — play the same part as flowers in the corn. 
 
 There are some really beautiful landscapes in the world, but 
 the human figures in them are poor, and you had not better 
 look at them. 
 
 • • • • • • - 
 
 The fly should be used as the symbol of impertinence and 
 audacity ; for whilst all other animals shun man more than 
 anything else, and run away even before he comes near them, 
 the fly lights upon his very nose. 
 
 Two Chinamen traveling in Europe went to the theatre for 
 the first time. One of them did nothing but study the machin- 
 ery, and he succeeded in finding out how it was worked. The 
 other tried to get at the meaning of the piece in spite of his 
 
 (87) 
 
88 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 ignorance of the language. Here you have the Astronomer 
 and the Philosopher. 
 
 • • • • • • 
 
 Wisdom which is only theoretical and never put into prac- 
 tice, is like a double rose ; its color and perfume are delightful, 
 but it withers away and leaves no seed. 
 
 No rose without a thorn. Yes, but many a thorn without 
 a rose. 
 
 • ••••« 
 
 A wide-spreading apple-tree stood in full bloom, and behind 
 it a straight fir raised its dark and tapering head. Look at the 
 thousands of gay blossoms which cover me everywhere^ said the 
 apple-tree ; what have you to show i7i comparison ? Dark-green 
 needles f That is true, replied the fir, but when winter comes, 
 you will be bared of your glory ; and I shall be as I am now. 
 
 Once, as I was botanizing under an oak, I found amongst 
 a number of other plants of similar height one that was dark in 
 color, with tightly closed leaves and a stalk that was very 
 straight and stiff. When I touched it, it said to me in firm tones : 
 L.et me alo7ie ; I am not for your collenion, like these plants to 
 which Nature has given only a single year of life. I am a 
 little oak. 
 
 So it is with a man whose influence is to last for hundreds of 
 years. As a child, as a youth, often even as a full-grown man, 
 nay, his whole life long, he goes about among his fellows, look- 
 ing Uke them and seemingly as unimportant. But let him 
 alone ; he will not die. Time will come and bring those who 
 know how to value him. 
 
 ■ ••••• 
 
 The man who goes up in a balloon does not feel as though 
 he were ascending ; he only sees the earth sinking deeper 
 under him. 
 
 This is a mystery which only those will understand who feel 
 the truth of it. 
 
A FEW PARABLES. 89 
 
 Your estimation of a man's size will be affe6led by the 
 distance at which you stand from him, but in two entirely 
 opposite ways according as it is his physical or his mental 
 stature that you are considering. The one will seem smaller, 
 the farther off you move ; the other, greater. . 
 
 Nature covers all her works with a varnish of beauty, like 
 the tender bloom that is breathed, as it were, on the surface of 
 a peach or a plum. Painters and poets lay themselves out to 
 take off this varnish, to store it up, and give it us to be enjoyed 
 at our leisure. We drink deep of this beauty long before we 
 entLi upon life itself; and when afterwards we come to see the 
 works of Nature for ourselves, the varnish is gone : the artists 
 have used it up and we have enjoyed it in advance. Thus it is 
 that the world so often appears harsh and devoid of charm, 
 nay, a6lually repulsive. It were better to leave us to discover 
 the varnish for ourselves. This would mean that we should 
 not enjoy it all at once and in large quantities ; we should 
 have no finished pictures, no perfe6t poems ; but we should 
 look at all things in that genial and pleasing light in which 
 even now a child of Nature sometimes sees them — some one 
 who has not anticipated his aesthetic pleasures by the help of 
 art, or taken the charms of life too early. 
 
 The Cathedral in Mayence is so shut in by the houses that 
 are built round about it, that there is no one spot from which 
 you can see it as a whole. This is symbolic of everything 
 great or beautiful in the world. It ought to exist for its own 
 sake alone, but before very long it is misused to serve alien 
 ends. People come from all directions wanting to find in it 
 support and maintenance for themselves ; they stand in the 
 way and spoil its effect. To be sure, there is nothing surpris- 
 ing in this, for in a world of need and imperfe6lion everything 
 is seized upon which can be used to satisfy want. Nothing is 
 exempt from this service, no, not even those very things whicli 
 
90 STUDIES IN PESSIMISM. 
 
 arise only when need and want are for a moment lost sight of — 
 the beautiful and the true, sought for their own sakes. 
 
 This is especially illustrated and corroborated in the case of 
 institutions — whether great or small, wealthy or poor, founded, 
 no matter in what century or in what land, to maintain and 
 advance human knowledge, and generally to afford help to 
 those intelledual efforts which enoble the race. Wherever 
 these institutions may be, it is not long before people sneak up 
 to them under the pretence of wishing to further those special 
 ends, while they are really led on by the desire to secure the 
 emoluments which have been left for their furtherance, and 
 thus to satisfy certain coarse and brutal instin6ls of their own. 
 Thus it IS that we come to have so many charlatans in every 
 branch of knowledge. The charlatan takes very different 
 shapes according to circumstances ; but at bottom he is a man 
 who cares nothing about knowledge for its own sake, and only 
 strives to gain the semblance of it that he may use it for his 
 own personal ends, which are always selfish and material. 
 
 Every hero is a Samson. The strong man succumbs to the 
 intrigues of the weak and the many ; and if in the end he 
 loses all patience he crushes both them and himself Or he is 
 like Gulliver at Liliput, overwhelmed by an enormous number 
 of little men. 
 
 A mother gave her children ^sop's fables to read, in the 
 hope of educating and improving their minds ; but they very 
 soon brought the book back, and the eldest, wise beyond his 
 years, delivered himself as follows: This is no book for us; 
 it's much too childish and stupid. You can't make us believe 
 that foxes and wolves and ravens are able to talk ; we've got 
 beyond stories of that kind! 
 
 In these young hopefuls you have the enlightened Rational- 
 ists of the future. 
 
A FEW PARABLES. 9 1 
 
 A number of porcupines huddled together for warmth on a 
 cold day in winter ; but, as they began to prick one another 
 with their quills, they were obliged to disperse. However the 
 cold drove them together again, when just the same thing 
 happened. At last, after many turns of huddhng and dis- 
 persing, they discovered that they would be best off by remain- 
 ing at a littie distance from one another. In the same way the 
 need of society drives the human porcupines together, only to 
 be mutually repelled by the many prickly and disagreeable 
 qualities of their nature. The moderate distance which they at 
 last discover to be the only tolerable condition of intercourse, 
 is the code of politeness and fine manners ; and those who 
 transgress it are roughly told — in the English phrase — io keep 
 their distance. By this arrangement the mutual need of warmth 
 is only very moderately satisfied ; but then people do not get 
 pricked. A man who has some heat in himself prefers to 
 remain outside, where he will neither prick other people nor 
 get pricked himself. 
 
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 Force and Matter, 
 Immortality of Matter, 
 Immortality of Force. 
 Infinity of Matter, 
 Value of Matter, 
 Motion, Form. 
 
 Immutability of Natural 
 
 Laws, 
 Universality of Natnral 
 
 Laws. 
 
 C02T'rE3iT'rS : 
 
 The Heavens, 
 Periods of the Creation 
 
 the Earth, 
 Original Generation, 
 Secular Generation, 
 The Fitness of Things in 
 
 Nature, (Teleology), 
 Man, 
 
 Brain and Mind, 
 Thought, 
 
 Consciousness, 
 
 Seat of the Soul, 
 
 Innate Ideas, 
 
 The Idea of God, 
 
 Personal Continuance, 
 
 Vital Force, 
 
 The Soul of Brutes, 
 
 Free Will, 
 
 Morality, 
 
 Concluding Observations. 
 
Sbjc l^ibfcral Classics, (»». i.) 
 
 History of Christianity 
 
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 of " SoMB Pamagks in thk Fifteenth and Sixteenth Chapters." by 
 
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 — ifh* M offtmi ne of Arryiriran HiKtryni 
 
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 A NEW EDITION, JUST PUBLISHED, OF 
 
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 THE LAW OF NATURE, 
 
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 rOLNEY'S ANSWER TO DR. PRIESTLY, A BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE 
 
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 ** YoLNBT's Auifu will be read with aa much interest to-day as it was a hnndrsd yaan ac*. 
 It la a book that was bom to immortality and a hnadied yean to eoma It will b* aa I 
 tt to to^ay"— SsNffio-PMfoMipMeai JomimI. 
 
JvLst r'Tjilollslieca.. TliO 
 
 LIFE OF JESUS. 
 
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 WISDOM OF LIFE 
 
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 LEHERS ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, 
 
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 Philosophy of History. 
 
 By Toltair«. (With superb portrait of the EmpreM Catherine.) 
 
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The Wilderness of Worlds 
 
 A Secular and up-to-date Scientific Work / 
 
 FOR over two-score years, Mr. G. W. Morehouse, the well- 
 known author, scientist, and astronomer, has been active- 
 ly engaged in gathering the materials for his grand work called 
 The Wilderness of Worlds. 
 
 This book is a popular treatise on the " Evolution of Matter 
 from Nebula to Man, and the Life-Orbit of a Star." 
 
 The facts given by Mr. Morehouse are based on the latest dis- 
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 most advanced thinkers and specialists in the various branches 
 of scientific enquiry ; the arguments used are as plain and clear 
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 Indeed, The Wilderness of Worlds, is so plain, so earnest, so 
 impartial, and so reasonable, that, to quote a popular scriptural 
 text, even "The wayfaring man, though [not necessarily] a 
 fool, need not err therein." In his preface, the author says : 
 
 " I have in my mind a wilderness of trees. Those near me are of 
 gigantic size ; in the distance they seem smaller and smaller, fading 
 gradually until the utmost limit of vision is reached. Not a single 
 clearing is to be seen. The ground is covered with seeds, many of 
 which are beginning to vegetate. There are innumerable seedlings 
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 the dead, and the prostrate, mouldering trunks — a fair, a wonderful, 
 but natural scene. 
 
 " I raise my eyes and look outward into space. I see the wilderness 
 of worlds. The one on which I stand seems of immense size. The 
 innumerable multitude beyond fade in the distance. I run to the 
 telescope ; my vision is extended a thousand-fold ; millions more 
 come into view, and in the thousand times more distant circle of 
 vision fade gradually until in the outer limits only glimpses can be 
 caught of faint points of light. The worlds, too, are of all ages like 
 the trees, and the great deep of space is strewn with their dust, and is 
 pulsating with the potency of new births. 
 
 "How grand, complete and sublime are the works and workings 
 of Nature. We stand with bowed heads, entranced and speechless 
 in the presence of the Universe. Held in its all-embracing arms, we 
 are of It, — one and inseparable." 
 
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 interest and value to the text ; and, to insure a large sale, the price 
 has been placed at $i.oo per copy. 
 
 PETER ECKLER, Publisher, 35 Fulton St., N. Y. 
 
%he %xyxetnl Classics^ (9«. 2.) 
 
 Voltaire's Romances. 
 
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 that under the appearance of fable, there may appear some latent truth, obvious to 
 the discerning eye, though it escape the observation of the vulgar. " — V»Uair: 
 
 OONTENTS. 
 
 Thk White Bull; a Satirica' Romance. 
 Zadig ; OR Fatb. An Orientat History. 
 Thk Sack and Thk Athkist. 
 Thk Princkss of Babylon. 
 Thk Man ok Forty Crowns. 
 Thk Huron; or Pupil of NATtntK. 
 MiCROMKCAs. A satire on mankind. 
 The World as it Goks. 
 Thk Black and Thk Whitk. 
 Mkmnon the Philosopher. 
 Andre Drs Touches at Siam. 
 
 Bababec. 
 
 Thk Study of Nature. 
 
 A Conversation with a Cmij 
 
 Plato's Dream. 
 
 A Pleasure in Having no Plbasvr*. 
 
 An Adventure in India. 
 
 Jeannot and Colin. 
 
 Travels of Scarmsntado. 
 
 The Good Bramin. 
 
 The Two Comfortbrs. 
 
 Ancient Faith and Fable. 
 
 Ob* t*L, |Mst 8to, 480 imi^s, wltk Portrait and 88 IHastratloiM. P»pMr, $1.M| 
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