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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Tragic Sense Of Life + +Author: Miguel de Unamuno + +Release Date: January 8, 2005 [EBook #14636] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRAGIC SENSE OF LIFE *** + + + + +Produced by David Starner, Martin Pettit and the PG Online Distributed +Proofreading Team + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + + +<h1>TRAGIC SENSE OF LIFE</h1> + +<h2>MIGUEL DE UNAMUNO</h2> + +<h3>translator, J.E. CRAWFORD FLITCH</h3> + + +<h3>DOVER PUBLICATIONS, INC</h3> + +<h3>New York</h3> + +<blockquote> +<p class='center'>This Dover edition, first published in 1954, is an +unabridged and unaltered republication of the +English translation originally published by Macmillan +and Company, Ltd., in 1921. This edition +is published by special arrangement with Macmillan +and Company, Ltd.</p> + +<p class='center'>The publisher is grateful to the Library of the +University of Pennsylvania for supplying a copy of +this work for the purpose of reproduction.</p> +</blockquote> + +<blockquote><p class='center'><i>Standard Book Number: 486-20257-7<br /> +Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 54-4730</i></p> + +<p class='center'>Manufactured in the United States of America<br /> +Dover Publications, Inc.<br /> +180 Varick Street<br /> +New York, N.Y. 10014</p></blockquote> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS" />CONTENTS</h2> + +<h3><a href="#INTRODUCTORY_ESSAY">INTRODUCTORY ESSAY</a></h3> +<h3><a href="#AUTHORS_PREFACE">AUTHOR'S PREFACE</a></h3> +<h3><a href="#I">I</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>THE MAN OF FLESH AND BONE</p> + +<blockquote><p>Philosophy and the concrete man—The man Kant, the man +Butler, and the man Spinoza—Unity and continuity of the +person—Man an end not a means—Intellectual necessities +and necessities of the heart and the will—Tragic sense of +life in men and in peoples</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#II">II</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>THE STARTING-POINT</p> + +<blockquote><p>Tragedy of Paradise—Disease an element of progress—Necessity +of knowing in order to live—Instinct of preservation and +instinct of perpetuation—The sensible world and the ideal +world—Practical starting-point of all philosophy—Knowledge +an end in itself?—The man Descartes—The longing +not to die</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#III">III</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>THE HUNGER OF IMMORTALITY</p> + +<blockquote><p>Thirst of being—Cult of immortality—Plato's "glorious risk"— +Materialism—Paul's discourse to the Athenians—Intolerance +of the intellectuals—Craving for fame—Struggle +for survival</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#IV">IV</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>THE ESSENCE OF CATHOLICISM</p> + +<blockquote><p>Immortality and resurrection—Development of idea of immortality +in Judaic and Hellenic religions—Paul and the +dogma of the resurrection—Athanasius—Sacrament of the +Eucharist—Lutheranism—Modernism—The Catholic +ethic—Scholasticism—The Catholic solution</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#V">V</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>THE RATIONALIST DISSOLUTION</p> + +<blockquote><p>Materialism—Concept of substance—Substantiality of the +soul—Berkeley—Myers—Spencer—Combat of life with +reason—Theological advocacy—<i>Odium anti-theologicum</i>—The +rationalist attitude—Spinoza—Nietzsche—Truth and consolation</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#VI">VI</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>IN THE DEPTHS OF THE ABYSS</p> + +<blockquote><p>Passionate doubt and Cartesian doubt—Irrationality of the +problem of immortality—Will and intelligence—Vitalism +and rationalism—Uncertainty as basis of faith—The ethic +of despair—Pragmatical justification of despair—Summary +of preceding criticism</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#VII">VII</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>LOVE, SUFFERING, PITY, AND PERSONALITY</p> + +<blockquote><p>Sexual love—Spiritual love—Tragic love—Love and pity—Personalizing +faculty of love—God the Personalization of +the All—Anthropomorphic tendency—Consciousness of the +Universe—What is Truth?—Finality of the Universe</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#VIII">VIII</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>FROM GOD TO GOD</p> + +<blockquote><p>Concept and feeling of Divinity—Pantheism—Monotheism—The +rational God—Proofs of God's existence—Law of +necessity—Argument from <i>Consensus gentium</i>—The living +God—Individuality and personality—God a multiplicity—The +God of Reason—The God of Love—Existence of God</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#IX">IX</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>FAITH, HOPE, AND CHARITY</p> + +<blockquote><p>Personal element in faith—Creative power of faith—Wishing +that God may exist—Hope the form of faith—Love and +suffering—The suffering God—Consciousness revealed +through suffering—Spiritualization of matter</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#X">X</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>RELIGION, THE MYTHOLOGY OF THE BEYOND, +AND THE APOCATASTASIS</p> + +<blockquote><p>What is religion?—The longing for immortality—Concrete +representation of a future life—Beatific vision—St. +Teresa—Delight requisite for happiness—Degradation of +energy—Apocatastasis—Climax of the tragedy—Mystery of the +Beyond</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#XI">XI</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>THE PRACTICAL PROBLEM</p> + +<blockquote><p>Conflict as basis of conduct—Injustice of annihilation—Making +ourselves irreplaceable—Religious value of the civil occupation—Business +of religion and religion of business—Ethic +of domination—Ethic of the cloister—Passion and +culture—The Spanish soul</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#CONCLUSION">CONCLUSION</a></h3> + +<p class='center'>DON QUIXOTE IN THE CONTEMPORARY +EUROPEAN TRAGI-COMEDY</p> + +<blockquote><p>Culture—Faust—The modern Inquisition—Spain and the +scientific spirit—Cultural achievement of Spain—Thought +and language—Don Quixote the hero of Spanish thought—Religion +a transcendental economy—Tragic ridicule—Quixotesque +philosophy—Mission of Don Quixote +to-day</p></blockquote> + +<h3><a href="#INDEX">INDEX</a></h3> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="INTRODUCTORY_ESSAY" id="INTRODUCTORY_ESSAY" />INTRODUCTORY ESSAY</h2> + +<h3>DON MIGUEL DE UNAMUNO</h3> + + +<p>I sat, several years ago, at the Welsh National Eisteddfod, +under the vast tent in which the Bard of Wales was being +crowned. After the small golden crown had been placed +in unsteady equilibrium on the head of a clever-looking +pressman, several Welsh bards came on the platform +and recited little epigrams. A Welsh bard is, if young, +a pressman, and if of maturer years, a divine. In this +case, as England was at war, they were all of the +maturer kind, and, while I listened to the music of their +ditties—the sense thereof being, alas! beyond my reach—I +was struck by the fact that all of them, though +different, closely resembled Don Miguel de Unamuno. +It is not my purpose to enter into the wasp-nest of racial +disquisitions. If there is a race in the world over which +more sense and more nonsense can be freely said for lack +of definite information than the Welsh, it is surely +this ancient Basque people, whose greatest contemporary +figure is perhaps Don Miguel de Unamuno. I am +merely setting down that intuitional fact for what it may +be worth, though I do not hide my opinion that such +promptings of the inner, untutored man are worth more +than cavefuls of bones and tombfuls of undecipherable +papers.</p> + +<p>This reminiscence, moreover, which springs up into +the light of my memory every time I think of Don +Miguel de Unamuno, has to my mind a further value in +that in it the image of Don Miguel does not appear as +evoked by one man, but by many, though many of one +species, many who in depth are but one man, one type, +the Welsh divine. Now, this unity underlying a multiplicity, +these many faces, moods, and movements, traceable +to one only type, I find deeply connected in my +mind with Unamuno's person and with what he signifies +in Spanish life and letters. And when I further delve +into my impression, I first realize an undoubtedly +physical relation between the many-one Welsh divines +and the many-one Unamuno. A tall, broad-shouldered, +bony man, with high cheeks, a beak-like nose, pointed +grey beard, and a complexion the colour of the red +hematites on which Bilbao, his native town, is built, +and which Bilbao ruthlessly plucks from its very body +to exchange for gold in the markets of England—and in +the deep sockets under the high aggressive forehead +prolonged by short iron-grey hair, two eyes like gimlets +eagerly watching the world through spectacles which +seem to be purposely pointed at the object like microscopes; +a fighting expression, but of noble fighting, +above the prizes of the passing world, the contempt for +which is shown in a peculiar attire whose blackness invades +even that little triangle of white which worldly men +leave on their breast for the necktie of frivolity and the +decorations of vanity, and, blinding it, leaves but the +thinnest rim of white collar to emphasize, rather than +relieve, the priestly effect of the whole. Such is Don +Miguel de Unamuno.</p> + +<p>Such is, rather, his photograph. For Unamuno himself +is ever changing. A talker, as all good Spaniards +are nowadays, but a talker in earnest and with his heart +in it, he is varied, like the subjects of his conversation, +and, still more, like the passions which they awake in +him. And here I find an unsought reason in intellectual +support of that intuitional observation which I noted +down in starting—that Unamuno resembles the Welsh +in that he is not ashamed of showing his passions—a +thing which he has often to do, for he is very much alive +and feels therefore plenty of them. But a word of +caution may here be necessary, since that term, "passion," +having been diminished—that is, made meaner—by +the world, an erroneous impression might be +conveyed by what precedes, of the life and ways of +Unamuno. So that it may not be superfluous to say +that Don Miguel de Unamuno is a Professor of Greek +in the University of Salamanca, an ex-Rector of it who +left behind the reputation of being a strong ruler; a +father of a numerous family, and a man who has sung +the quiet and deep joys of married life with a restraint, +a vigour, and a nobility which it would be difficult to +match in any literature. <i>Yet</i> a passionate man—or, as +he would perhaps prefer to say, <i>therefore</i> a passionate +man. But in a major, not in a minor key; of strong, +not of weak passions.</p> + +<p>The difference between the two lies perhaps in that the +man with strong passions lives them, while the man with +weak passions is lived by them, so that while weak +passions paralyze the will, strong passions urge man to +action. It is such an urge towards life, such a vitality +ever awake, which inspires Unamuno's multifarious +activities in the realm of the mind. The duties of his +chair of Greek are the first claim upon his time. But +then, his reading is prodigious, as any reader of this +book will realize for himself. Not only is he familiar +with the stock-in-trade of every intellectual worker—the +Biblical, Greek, Roman, and Italian cultures—but there +is hardly anything worth reading in Europe and America +which he has not read, and, but for the Slav languages, +in the original. Though never out of Spain, and +seldom out of Salamanca, he has succeeded in establishing +direct connections with most of the intellectual +leaders of the world, and in gathering an astonishingly +accurate knowledge of the spirit and literature of foreign +peoples. It was in his library at Salamanca that he once +explained to an Englishman the meaning of a particular +Scotticism in Robert Burns; and it was there that he +congratulated another Englishman on his having read +<i>Rural Rides</i>, "the hall-mark," he said, "of the man of +letters who is no mere man of letters, but also a man." +From that corner of Castile, he has poured out his spirit +in essays, poetry, criticism, novels, philosophy, lectures, +and public meetings, and that daily toil of press article +writing which is the duty rather than the privilege of +most present-day writers in Spain. Such are the many +faces, moods, and movements in which Unamuno +appears before Spain and the world. And yet, despite +this multiplicity and this dispersion, the dominant impression +which his personality leaves behind is that of +a vigorous unity, an unswerving concentration both of +mind and purpose. Bagaria, the national caricaturist, +a genius of rhythm and character which the war revealed, +but who was too good not to be overshadowed by the +facile art of Raemaekers (imagine Goya overshadowed +by Reynolds!), once represented Unamuno as an owl. +A marvellous thrust at the heart of Unamuno's character. +For all this vitality and ever-moving activity of +mind is shot through by the absolute immobility of +two owlish eyes piercing the darkness of spiritual night. +And this intense gaze into the mystery is the steel axis +round which his spirit revolves and revolves in desperation; +the unity under his multiplicity; the one fire under +his passions and the inspiration of his whole work and +life.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>It was Unamuno himself who once said that the +Basque is the alkaloid of the Spaniard. The saying is +true, so far as it goes. But it would be more accurate +to say "one of the two alkaloids." It is probable that +if the Spanish character were analyzed—always provided +that the Mediterranean aspect of it be left +aside as a thing apart—two main principles would be +recognized in it—<i>i.e.</i>, the Basque, richer in concentration, +substance, strength; and the Andalusian, more +given to observation, grace, form. The two types +are to this day socially opposed. The Andalusian is a +people which has lived down many civilizations, and in +which even illiterate peasants possess a kind of innate +education. The Basques are a primitive people of +mountaineers and fishermen, in which even scholars +have a peasant-like roughness not unlike the roughness +of Scotch tweeds—or character. It is the even balancing +of these two elements—the force of the Northerner with +the grace of the Southerner—which gives the Castilian +his admirable poise and explains the graceful virility of +men such as Fray Luis de León and the feminine +strength of women such as Queen Isabel and Santa +Teresa. We are therefore led to expect in so forcible a +representative of the Basque race as Unamuno the more +substantial and earnest features of the Spanish spirit.</p> + +<p>Our expectation is not disappointed. And to begin +with it appears in that very concentration of his mind +and soul on the mystery of man's destiny on earth. +Unamuno is in earnest, in dead earnest, as to this +matter. This earnestness is a distinct Spanish, nay, +Basque feature in him. There is something of the stern +attitude of Loyola about his "tragic sense of life," and +on this subject—under one form or another, his only +subject—he admits no joke, no flippancy, no subterfuge. +A true heir of those great Spanish saints and mystics +whose lifework was devoted to the exploration of the +kingdoms of faith, he is more human than they in that +he has lost hold of the firm ground where they had stuck +their anchor. Yet, though loose in the modern world, +he refuses to be drawn away from the main business of +the Christian, the saving of his soul, which, in his interpretation, +means the conquest of his immortality, his +own immortality.</p> + +<p>An individualist. Certainly. And he proudly claims +the title. Nothing more refreshing in these days of +hoggish communistic cant than this great voice asserting +the divine, the eternal rights of the individual. But it +is not with political rights that he is concerned. Political +individualism, when not a mere blind for the unlimited +freedom of civil privateering, is but the outcome of that +abstract idea of man which he so energetically condemns +as pedantic—that is, inhuman. His opposition of the +individual to society is not that of a puerile anarchist to +a no less puerile socialist. There is nothing childish +about Unamuno. His assertion that society is for the +individual, not the individual for society, is made on a +transcendental plane. It is not the argument of liberty +against authority—which can be easily answered on the +rationalistic plane by showing that authority is in its +turn the liberty of the social or collective being, a higher, +more complex, and longer-living "individual" than the +individual pure and simple. It is rather the unanswerable +argument of eternity against duration. Now that +argument must rest on a religious basis. And it is on +a religious basis that Unamuno founds his individualism. +Hence the true Spanish flavour of his social theory, +which will not allow itself to be set down and analyzed +into principles of ethics and politics, with their inevitable +tendency to degenerate into mere economics, but remains +free and fluid and absolute, like the spirit.</p> + +<p>Such an individualism has therefore none of the +features of that childish half-thinking which inspires +most anarchists. It is, on the contrary, based on high +thinking, the highest of all, that which refuses to dwell +on anything less than man's origin and destination. +We are here confronted with that humanistic tendency +of the Spanish mind which can be observed as the +dominant feature of her arts and literature. All races +are of course predominantly concerned with man. But +they all manifest their concern with a difference. Man +is in Spain a concrete being, the man of flesh and bones, +and the whole man. He is neither subtilized into an +idea by pure thinking nor civilized into a gentleman by +social laws and prejudices. Spanish art and letters deal +with concrete, tangible persons. Now, there is no more +concrete, no more tangible person for every one of us +than ourself. Unamuno is therefore right in the line +of Spanish tradition in dealing predominantly—one +might almost say always—with his own person. The +feeling of the awareness of one's own personality has +seldom been more forcibly expressed than by Unamuno. +This is primarily due to the fact that he is himself +obsessed by it. But in his expression of it Unamuno +derives also some strength from his own sense of matter +and the material—again a typically Spanish element of +his character. Thus his human beings are as much +body as soul, or rather body and soul all in one, a union +which he admirably renders by bold mixtures of physical +and spiritual metaphors, as in <i>gozarse uno la carne del +alma</i> (to enjoy the flesh of one's own soul).</p> + +<p>In fact, Unamuno, as a true Spaniard which he is, +refuses to surrender life to ideas, and that is why he runs +shy of abstractions, in which he sees but shrouds wherewith +we cover dead thoughts. He is solely concerned +with his own life, nothing but his life, and the whole of +his life. An egotistical position? Perhaps. Unamuno, +however, can and does answer the charge. We can +only know and feel humanity in the one human being +which we have at hand. It is by penetrating deep into +ourselves that we find our brothers in us—branches of +the same trunk which can only touch each other by +seeking their common origin. This searching within, +Unamuno has undertaken with a sincerity, a fearlessness +which cannot be excelled. Nowhere will the reader find +the inner contradictions of a modern human being, who +is at the same time healthy and capable of thought set +down with a greater respect for truth. Here the uncompromising +tendency of the Spanish race, whose eyes +never turn away from nature, however unwelcome the +sight, is strengthened by that passion for life which +burns in Unamuno. The suppression of the slightest +thought or feeling for the sake of intellectual order would +appear to him as a despicable worldly trick. Thus it is +precisely because he does sincerely feel a passionate love +of his own life that he thinks out with such scrupulous +accuracy every argument which he finds in his mind—his +own mind, a part of his life—against the possibility +of life after death; but it is also because he feels that, +despite such conclusive arguments, his will to live perseveres, +that he refuses to his intellect the power to kill +his faith. A knight-errant of the spirit, as he himself +calls the Spanish mystics, he starts for his adventures +after having, like Hernán Cortés, burnt his ships. +But, is it necessary to enhance his figure by literary +comparison? He is what he wants to be, a man—in +the striking expression which he chose as a title for one +of his short stories, <i>nothing less than a whole man</i>. Not +a mere thinking machine, set to prove a theory, nor an +actor on the world stage, singing a well-built poem, well +built at the price of many a compromise; but a whole +man, with all his affirmations and all his negations, all +the pitiless thoughts of a penetrating mind that denies, +and all the desperate self-assertions of a soul that yearns +for eternal life.</p> + +<p>This strife between enemy truths, the truth thought +and the truth felt, or, as he himself puts it, between +veracity and sincerity, is Unamuno's <i>raison d'être</i>. And +it is because the "<i>Tragic Sense of Life</i>" is the most +direct expression of it that this book is his masterpiece. +The conflict is here seen as reflected in the person of the +author. The book opens by a definition of the Spanish +man, the "man of flesh and bones," illustrated by the +consideration of the real living men who stood behind +the bookish figures of great philosophers and consciously +or unconsciously shaped and misshaped their doctrines +in order to satisfy their own vital yearnings. This is +followed by the statement of the will to live or hunger +for immortality, in the course of which the usual subterfuges +with which this all-important issue is evaded in +philosophy, theology, or mystic literature, are exposed +and the real, concrete, "flesh and bones" character of +the immortality which men desire is reaffirmed. The +Catholic position is then explained as the <i>vital</i> attitude +in the matter, summed up in Tertullian's <i>Credo quia +absurdum</i>, and this is opposed to the critical attitude +which denies the possibility of individual survival in the +sense previously defined. Thus Unamuno leads us to +his inner deadlock: his reason can rise no higher than +scepticism, and, unable to become vital, dies sterile; his +faith, exacting anti-rational affirmations and unable therefore +to be apprehended by the logical mind, remains incommunicable. +From the bottom of this abyss Unamuno +builds up his theory of life. But is it a theory? +Unamuno does not claim for it such an intellectual +dignity. He knows too well that in the constructive +part of his book his vital self takes the leading part and +repeatedly warns his reader of the fact, lest critical +objections might be raised against this or that assumption +or self-contradiction. It is on the survival of his +will to live, after all the onslaughts of his critical intellect, +that he finds the basis for his belief—or rather for +his effort to believe. Self-compassion leads to self-love, +and this self-love, founded as it is on a universal conflict, +widens into love of all that lives and therefore wants +to survive. So, by an act of love, springing from our +own hunger for immortality, we are led to give a conscience +to the Universe—that is, to create God.</p> + +<p>Such is the process by which Unamuno, from the +transcendental pessimism of his inner contradiction, +extracts an everyday optimism founded on love. His +symbol of this attitude is the figure of Don Quixote, of +whom he truly says that his creed "can hardly be called +idealism, since he did not fight for ideas: it was +spiritualism, for he fought for the spirit." Thus he +opposes a synthetical to an analytical attitude; a religious +to an ethico-scientific ideal; Spain, his Spain—<i>i.e.</i>, +the spiritual manifestation of the Spanish race—to +Europe, his Europe—<i>i.e.</i>, the intellectual manifestation +of the white race, which he sees in Franco-Germany; +and heroic love, even when comically unpractical, to +culture, which, in this book, written in 1912, is already +prophetically spelt Kultura.</p> + +<p>This courageous work is written in a style which is the +man—for Buffon's saying, seldom true, applies here to +the letter. It is written as Carlyle wrote, not merely +with the brain, but with the whole soul and the whole +body of the man, and in such a vivid manner that one +can without much effort imagine the eager gesticulation +which now and then underlines, interprets, despises, +argues, denies, and above all asserts. In his absolute +subservience to the matter in hand this manner of writing +has its great precedent in Santa Teresa. The +differences, and they are considerable, are not of art, +absent in either case, but of nature. They are such deep +and obvious differences as obtain between the devout, +ignorant, graceful nun of sixteenth-century Avila and +the free-thinking, learned, wilful professor of twentieth-century +Salamanca. In the one case, as in the other, +the language is the most direct and simple required. +It is also the least literary and the most popular. +Unamuno, who lives in close touch with the people, has +enriched the Spanish literary language by returning +to it many a popular term. His vocabulary abounds in +racy words of the soil, and his writings gain from them +an almost peasant-like pith and directness which suits +his own Basque primitive nature. His expression occurs +simultaneously with the thoughts and feelings to be expressed, +the flow of which, but loosely controlled by the +critical mind, often breaks through the meshes of established +diction and gives birth to new forms created under +the pressure of the moment. This feature Unamuno has +also in common with Santa Teresa, but what in the Saint +was a self-ignorant charm becomes in Unamuno a +deliberate manner inspired, partly by an acute sense of +the symbolical and psychological value of word-connections, +partly by that genuine need for expansion of the +language which all true original thinkers or "feelers" +must experience, but partly also by an acquired habit of +juggling with words which is but natural in a philologist +endowed with a vigorous imagination. Unamuno revels +in words. He positively enjoys stretching them beyond +their usual meaning, twisting them, composing, opposing, +and transposing them in all sorts of possible ways. +This game—not wholly unrewarded now and then by +striking intellectual finds—seems to be the only relaxation +which he allows his usually austere mind. It +certainly is the only light feature of a style the merit of +which lies in its being the close-fitting expression of a +great mind earnestly concentrated on a great idea.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The earnestness, the intensity, and the oneness of his +predominant passion are the main cause of the strength +of Unamuno's philosophic work. They remain his +main asset, yet become also the principal cause of his +weakness, as a creative artist. Great art can only +flourish in the temperate zone of the passions, on the +return journey from the torrid. Unamuno, as a creator, +has none of the failings of those artists who have never +felt deeply. But he does show the limitations of those +artists who cannot cool down. And the most striking +of them is that at bottom he is seldom able to put himself +in a purely esthetical mood. In this, as in many other +features, Unamuno curiously resembles Wordsworth—whom, +by the way, he is one of the few Spaniards to +read and appreciate.<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1" /><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> Like him, Unamuno is an essentially +purposeful and utilitarian mind. Of the two +qualities which the work of art requires for its inception—earnestness +and detachment—both Unamuno and +Wordsworth possess the first; both are deficient in the +second. Their interest in their respective leading +thought—survival in the first, virtue in the second—is +too direct, too pressing, to allow them the "distance" +necessary for artistic work. Both are urged to work by +a lofty utilitarianism—the search for God through the +individual soul in Unamuno, the search for God through +the social soul in Wordsworth—so that their thoughts +and sensations are polarized and their spirit loses that +impartial transparence for nature's lights without which +no great art is possible. Once suggested, this parallel +is too rich in sidelights to be lightly dropped. This +single-mindedness which distinguishes them explains +that both should have consciously or unconsciously +chosen a life of semi-seclusion, for Unamuno lives in +Salamanca very much as Wordsworth lived in the Lake +District—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div class='i6'>in a still retreat</div> +<div>Sheltered, but not to social duties lost,</div></div> +</div> + +<p>hence in both a certain proclivity towards ploughing +a solitary furrow and becoming self-centred. There +are no doubt important differences. The Englishman's +sense of nature is both keener and more concrete; while +the Spaniard's knowledge of human nature is not barred +by the subtle inhibitions and innate limitations which +tend to blind its more unpleasant aspects to the eye +of the Englishman. There is more courage and passion +in the Spaniard; more harmony and goodwill in the +Englishman; the one is more like fire, the other like +light. For Wordsworth, a poem is above all an essay, +a means for conveying a lesson in forcible and easily +remembered terms to those who are in need of improvement. +For Unamuno, a poem or a novel (and he holds +that a novel is but a poem) is the outpouring of a man's +passion, the overflow of the heart which cannot help +itself and lets go. And it may be that the essential +difference between the two is to be found in this difference +between their respective purposes: Unamuno's +purpose is more intimately personal and individual; +Wordsworth's is more social and objective. Thus both +miss the temperate zone, where emotion takes shape into +the moulds of art; but while Wordsworth is driven +by his ideal of social service this side of it, into the +cold light of both moral and intellectual self-control, +Unamuno remains beyond, where the molten metal is +too near the fire of passion, and cannot cool down into +shape.</p> + +<p>Unamuno is therefore not unlike Wordsworth in the +insufficiency of his sense of form. We have just seen +the essential cause of this insufficiency to lie in the nonesthetical +attitude of his mind, and we have tried to show +one of the roots of such an attitude in the very loftiness +and earnestness of his purpose. Yet, there are others, +for living nature is many-rooted as it is many-branched. +It cannot be doubted that a certain refractoriness to form +is a typical feature of the Basque character. The sense +of form is closely in sympathy with the feminine element +in human nature, and the Basque race is strongly masculine. +The predominance of the masculine element—strength +without grace—is as typical of Unamuno as +it is of Wordsworth. The literary gifts which might +for the sake of synthesis be symbolized in a smile are +absent in both. There is as little humour in the one +as in the other. Humour, however, sometimes occurs +in Unamuno, but only in his ill-humoured moments, and +then with a curious bite of its own which adds an unconscious +element to its comic effect. Grace only visits +them in moments of inspiration, and then it is of a noble +character, enhanced as it is by the ever-present gift of +strength. And as for the sense for rhythm and music, +both Unamuno and Wordsworth seem to be limited to +the most vigorous and masculine gaits. This feature +is particularly pronounced in Unamuno, for while +Wordsworth is painstaking, all-observant, and too good +a "teacher" to underestimate the importance of pleasure +in man's progress, Unamuno knows no compromise. +His aim is not to please but to strike, and he deliberately +seeks the naked, the forceful, even the brutal word for +truth. There is in him, however, a cause of formlessness +from which Wordsworth is free—namely, an eagerness +for sincerity and veracity which brushes aside all +preparation, ordering or planning of ideas as suspect of +"dishing up," intellectual trickery, and juggling with +spontaneous truths.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Such qualities—both the positive and the negative—are +apparent in his poetry. In it, the appeal of force +and sincerity is usually stronger than that of art. This +is particularly the case in his first volume (<i>Poesías</i>, 1907), +in which a lofty inspiration, a noble attitude of mind, +a rich and racy vocabulary, a keen insight into the spirit +of places, and above all the overflowing vitality of a +strong man in the force of ripeness, contend against the +still awkward gait of the Basque and a certain rebelliousness +of rhyme. The dough of the poetic language is +here seen heavily pounded by a powerful hand, bent on +reducing its angularities and on improving its plasticity. +Nor do we need to wait for further works in order to +enjoy the reward of such efforts, for it is attained in this +very volume more than once, as for instance in <i>Muere +en el mar el ave que voló del nido</i>, a beautiful poem in +which emotion and thought are happily blended into +exquisite form.</p> + +<p>In his last poem, <i>El Cristo de Velázquez</i> (1920), +Unamuno undertakes the task of giving a poetical +rendering of his tragic sense of life, in the form of a +meditation on the Christ of Velázquez, the beautiful and +pathetic picture in the Prado. Why Velázquez's and +not Christ himself? The fact is that, though in his +references to actual forms, Unamuno closely follows +Velázquez's picture, the spiritual interpretation of it +which he develops as the poem unfolds itself is wholly +personal. It would be difficult to find two great +Spaniards wider apart than Unamuno and Velázquez, +for if Unamuno is the very incarnation of the masculine +spirit of the North—all strength and substance—Velázquez +is the image of the feminine spirit of the South—all +grace and form. Velázquez is a limpid mirror, with +a human depth, yet a mirror. That Unamuno has departed +from the image of Christ which the great Sevillian +reflected on his immortal canvas was therefore to be +expected. But then Unamuno has, while speaking of +Don Quixote, whom he has also freely and personally +interpreted,<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2" /><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> taken great care to point out that a work of +art is, for each of us, all that we see in it. And, moreover, +Unamuno has not so much departed from Velázquez's +image of Christ as delved into its depths, expanded, +enlarged it, or, if you prefer, seen in its limpid surface +the immense figure of his own inner Christ. However +free and unorthodox in its wide scope of images and +ideas, the poem is in its form a regular meditation in the +manner approved by the Catholic Church, and it is +therefore meet that it should rise from a concrete, tangible +object as it is recommended to the faithful. To this +concrete character of its origin, the poem owes much of +its suggestiveness, as witness the following passage +quoted here, with a translation sadly unworthy of the +original, as being the clearest link between the poetical +meditation and the main thought that underlies all the +work and the life of Unamuno.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div class='i4'>NUBE NEGRA</div></div> + + +<div class='stanza'><div>O es que una nube negra de los cielos</div> +<div>ese negror le dió a tu cabellera</div> +<div>de nazareno, cual de mustio sauce</div> +<div>de una noche sin luna sobre el río?</div> +<div>¿Es la sombra del ala sin perfiles</div> +<div>del ángel de la nada negadora,</div> +<div>de Luzbel, que en su caída inacabable</div> +<div>—fondo no puede dar—su eterna cuita</div> +<div>clava en tu frente, en tu razón? ¿Se vela,</div> +<div>el claro Verbo en Ti con esa nube,</div> +<div>negra cual de Luzbel las negras alas,</div> +<div>mientras brilla el Amor, todo desnudo,</div> +<div>con tu desnudo pecho por cendal?</div></div> + + +<div class='stanza'><div class='i4'>BLACK CLOUD</div></div> + +<div class='stanza'><div>Or was it then that a black cloud from heaven</div> +<div>Such blackness gave to your Nazarene's hair,</div> +<div>As of a languid willow o'er the river</div> +<div>Brooding in moonless night? Is it the shadow</div> +<div>Of the profileless wing of Luzbel, the Angel</div> +<div>Of denying nothingness, endlessly falling—</div> +<div>Bottom he ne'er can touch—whose grief eternal</div> +<div>He nails on to Thy forehead, to Thy reason?</div> +<div>Is the clear Word in Thee with that cloud veiled</div> +<div>—A cloud as black as the black wings of Luzbel—</div> +<div>While Love shines naked within Thy naked breast?</div></div> +</div> + +<p>The poem, despite its length, easily maintains this +lofty level throughout, and if he had written nothing +else Unamuno would still remain as having given to +Spanish letters the noblest and most sustained lyrical +flight in the language. It abounds in passages of ample +beauty and often strikes a note of primitive strength in +the true Old Testament style. It is most distinctively a +poem in a major key, in a group with <i>Paradise Lost</i> +and <i>The Excursion</i>, but in a tone halfway between the +two; and, as coming from the most Northern-minded +and substantial poet that Spain ever had, wholly free +from that tendency towards grandiloquence and Ciceronian +drapery which blighted previous similar efforts +in Spain. Its weakness lies in a certain monotony due to +the interplay of Unamuno's two main limitations as an +artist: the absolute surrender to one dominant thought +and a certain deficiency of form bordering here on contempt. +The plan is but a loose sequence of meditations +on successive aspects of Christ as suggested by images +or advocations of His divine person, or even of parts of +His human body: Lion, Bull, Lily, Sword, Crown, +Head, Knees. Each meditation is treated in a period +of blank verse, usually of a beautiful texture, the splendour +of which is due less to actual images than to the +inner vigour of ideas and the eagerness with which even +the simplest facts are interpreted into significant symbols. +Yet, sometimes, this blank verse becomes hard and +stony under the stubborn hammering of a too insistent +mind, and the device of ending each meditation with a +line accented on its last syllable tends but to increase the +monotony of the whole.</p> + +<p>Blank verse is never the best medium for poets of a +strong masculine inspiration, for it does not sufficiently +correct their usual deficiency in form. Such poets are +usually at their best when they bind themselves to the +discipline of existing forms and particularly when they +limit the movements of their muse to the "sonnet's +scanty plot of ground." Unamuno's best poetry, as +Wordsworth's, is in his sonnets. His <i>Rosario de +Sonetos Líricos</i>, published in 1911, contains some of the +finest sonnets in the Spanish language. There is variety +in this volume—more at least than is usual in Unamuno: +from comments on events of local politics (sonnet lii.) +which savour of the more prosaic side of Wordsworth, +to meditations on space and time such as that +sonnet xxxvii., so reminiscent of Shelley's <i>Ozymandias +of Egypt</i>; from a suggestive homily to a "Don Juan of +Ideas" whose thirst for knowledge is "not love of truth, +but intellectual lust," and whose "thought is therefore +sterile" (sonnet cvii.), to an exquisitely rendered moonlight +love scene (sonnet civ.). The author's main theme +itself, which of course occupies a prominent part in the +series, appears treated under many different lights and +in genuinely poetical moods which truly do justice to +the inherent wealth of poetical inspiration which it contains. +Many a sonnet might be quoted here, and in +particular that sombre and fateful poem <i>Nihil Novum +sub Sole</i> (cxxiii.), which defeats its own theme by the +striking originality of its inspiration.</p> + +<p>So active, so positive is the inspiration of this poetry +that the question of outside influences does not even arise. +Unamuno is probably the Spanish contemporary poet +whose manner owes least, if anything at all, to modern +developments of poetry such as those which take their +source in Baudelaire and Verlaine. These over-sensitive +and over-refined artists have no doubt enriched the +sensuous, the formal, the sentimental, even the intellectual +aspects of verse with an admirable variety of +exquisite shades, lacking which most poetry seems old-fashioned +to the fastidious palate of modern men. +Unamuno is too genuine a representative of the spiritual +and masculine variety of Spanish genius, ever impervious +to French, and generally, to intellectual, influences, to +be affected by the esthetic excellence of this art. Yet, +for all his disregard of the modern resources which it +adds to the poetic craft, Unamuno loses none of his +modernity. He is indeed more than modern. When, +as he often does, he strikes the true poetic note, he is +outside time. His appeal is not in complexity but in +strength. He is not refined: he is final.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>In the Preface to his <i>Tres Novelas Ejemplares y un +Prólogo</i> (1921) Unamuno says: " ... novelist—that is, +poet ... a novel—that is, a poem." Thus, with characteristic +decision, he sides with the lyrical conception +of the novel. There is of course an infinite variety of +types of novels. But they can probably all be reduced +to two classes—<i>i.e.</i>, the dramatic or objective, and the +lyrical or subjective, according to the mood or inspiration +which predominates in them. The present trend of +the world points towards the dramatic or objective type. +This type is more in tune with the detached and scientific +character of the age. The novel is often nowadays considered +as a document, a "slice of life," a piece of information, +a literary photograph representing places and +people which purse or time prevents us from seeing with +our own eyes. It is obvious, given what we now know +of him, that such a view of the novel cannot appeal to +Unamuno. He is a utilitarian, but not of worldly +utilities. His utilitarianism transcends our daily wants +and seeks to provide for our eternal ones. He is, moreover, +a mind whose workings turn in spiral form towards +a central idea and therefore feels an instinctive antagonism +to the dispersive habits of thought and sensation +which such detailed observation of life usually entails. +For at bottom the opposition between the lyrical and the +dramatic novel may be reduced to that between the poet +and the dramatist. Both the dramatist and the poet +create in order to link up their soul and the world in one +complete circle of experience, but this circle is travelled +in opposite directions. The poet goes inwards first, then +out to nature full of his inner experience, and back home. +The dramatist goes outwards first, then comes back to +himself, his harvest of wisdom gathered in reality. It +is the recognition of his own lyrical inward-looking +nature which makes Unamuno pronounce the identity +of the novel and the poem.</p> + +<p>Whatever we may think of it as a general theory, there +is little doubt that this opinion is in the main sound in +so far as it refers to Unamuno's own work. His novels +are created within. They are—and their author is the +first to declare it so—novels which happen in the kingdom +of the spirit. Outward points of reference in time +and space are sparingly given—in fact, reduced to a bare +minimum. In some of them, as for instance <i>Niebla</i> +(1914), the name of the town in which the action takes +place is not given, and such scanty references to the +topography and general features as are supplied would +equally apply to any other provincial town of Spain. +Action, in the current sense of the word, is correspondingly +simplified, since the material and local elements on +which it usually exerts itself are schematized, and in their +turn made, as it were, spiritual. Thus a street, a river +of colour for some, for others a series of accurately +described shops and dwellings, becomes in Unamuno +(see <i>Niebla</i>) a loom where the passions and desires of +men and women cross and recross each other and weave +the cloth of daily life. Even the physical description of +characters is reduced to a standard of utmost simplicity. +So that, in fine, Unamuno's novels, by eliminating all +other material, appear, if the boldness of the metaphor +be permitted, as the spiritual skeletons of novels, conflicts +between souls.</p> + +<p>Nor is this the last stage in his deepening and narrowing +of the creative furrow. For these souls are in their +turn concentrated so that the whole of their vitality burns +into one passion. If a somewhat fanciful comparison +from another art may throw any light on this feature of +his work we might say that his characters are to those of +Galdós, for instance, as counterpoint music to the complex +modern symphony. Joaquín Monegro, the true +hero of his <i>Abel Sánchez</i> (1917), is the personification of +hatred. Raquel in <i>Dos Madres</i><a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3" /><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> and Catalina in <i>El +Marqués de Lumbría</i> are two widely different but +vigorous, almost barbarous, "maternities." Alejandro, +the hero of his powerful <i>Nada Menos que Todo un +Hombre</i>, is masculine will, pure and unconquerable, +save by death. Further still, in most if not all of his +main characters, we can trace the dominant passion which +is their whole being to a mere variety of the one and only +passion which obsesses Unamuno himself, the hunger +for life, a full life, here and after. Here is, for instance, +<i>Abel Sánchez</i>, a sombre study of hatred, a modern paraphrase +of the story of Cain. Joaquín Monegro, the Cain +of the novel, has been reading Byron's poem, and writes +in his diary: "It was when I read how Lucifer declared +to Cain that he, Cain, was immortal, that I began in +terror to wonder whether I also was immortal and whether +in me would be also immortal my hatred. 'Have I a +soul?' I said to myself then. 'Is this my hatred soul?' +And I came to think that it could not be otherwise, that +such a hatred cannot be the function of a body.... +A corruptible organism could not hate as I hated."</p> + +<p>Thus Joaquín Monegro, like every other main character +in his work, appears preoccupied by the same +central preoccupation of Unamuno. In one word, all +Unamuno's characters are but incarnations of himself. +But that is what we expected to find in a lyrical novelist.</p> + +<p>There are critics who conclude from this observation +that these characters do not exist, that they are mere +arguments on legs, personified ideas. Here and there, +in Unamuno's novels, there are passages which lend +some colour of plausibility to this view. Yet, it is in +my opinion mistaken. Unamuno's characters may be +schematized, stripped of their complexities, reduced to the +mainspring of their nature; they may, moreover, reveal +mainsprings made of the same steel. But that they are +alive no one could deny who has a sense for life. The +very restraint in the use of physical details which +Unamuno has made a feature of his creative work may +have led his critics to forget the intensity of those—admirably +chosen—which are given. It is significant +that the eyes play an important part in his description +of characters and in his narrative too. His sense of the +interpenetration of body and soul is so deep that he does +not for one moment let us forget how bodily his "souls" +are, and how pregnant with spiritual significance is every +one of their words and gestures. No. These characters +are not arguments on legs. They truly are men and +women of "flesh and bones," human, terribly human.</p> + +<p>In thus emphasizing a particular feature in their +nature, Unamuno imparts to his creations a certain +deformity which savours of romantic days. Yet +Unamuno is not a romanticist, mainly because Romanticism +was an esthetic attitude, and his attitude is seldom +purely esthetic. For all their show of passion, true +Romanticists seldom gave their real selves to their art. +They created a stage double of their own selves for public +exhibitions. They sought the picturesque. Their form +was lyrical, but their substance was dramatic. Unamuno, +on the contrary, even though he often seeks expression +in dramatic form, is essentially lyrical. And if he is +always intense, he never is exuberant. He follows the +Spanish tradition for restraint—for there is one, along its +opposite tradition for grandiloquence—and, true to the +spirit of it, he seeks the maximum of effect through the +minimum of means. Then, he never shouts. Here is +an example of his quiet method, the rhythmical beauty +of which is unfortunately almost untranslatable:</p> + +<p>"Y así pasaron días de llanto y de negrura hasta que +las lágrimas fueron yéndose hacia adentro y la casa fué +derritiendo los negrores" (<i>Niebla</i>) (And thus, days of +weeping and mourning went by, till the tears began to +flow inward and the blackness to melt in the home).</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Miguel de Unamuno is to-day the greatest literary +figure of Spain. Baroja may surpass him in variety of +external experience, Azorín in delicate art, Ortega y +Gasset in philosophical subtlety, Ayala in intellectual +elegance, Valle Inclán in rhythmical grace. Even in +vitality he may have to yield the first place to that over-whelming +athlete of literature, Blasco Ibáñez. But +Unamuno is head and shoulders above them all in the +highness of his purpose and in the earnestness and +loyalty with which, Quixote-like, he has served all +through his life his unattainable Dulcinea. Then there +is another and most important reason which explains +his position as first, <i>princeps</i>, of Spanish letters, and it +is that Unamuno, by the cross which he has chosen to +bear, incarnates the spirit of modern Spain. His eternal +conflict between faith and reason, between life and +thought, between spirit and intellect, between heaven +and civilization, is the conflict of Spain herself. A +border country, like Russia, in which East and West +mix their spiritual waters, Spain wavers between two +life-philosophies and cannot rest. In Russia, this conflict +emerges in literature during the nineteenth century, +when Dostoievsky and Tolstoy stand for the East while +Turgeniev becomes the West's advocate. In Spain, a +country less articulate, and, moreover, a country in which +the blending of East and West is more intimate, for both +found a common solvent in centuries of Latin civilization, +the conflict is less clear, less on the surface. To-day +Ortega y Gasset is our Turgeniev—not without +mixture. Unamuno is our Dostoievsky, but painfully +aware of the strength of the other side within him, and +full of misgivings. Nor is it sure that when we speak of +East in this connection we really mean East. There is +a third country in Europe in which the "Eastern" view +is as forcibly put and as deeply understood as the +"Western," a third border country—England. England, +particularly in those of her racial elements conventionally +named Celtic, is closely in sympathy with the +"East." Ireland is almost purely "Eastern" in this +respect. That is perhaps why Unamuno feels so strong +an attraction for the English language and its literature, +and why, even to this day, he follows so closely the +movements of English thought.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4" /><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> For his own nature, +of a human being astride two enemy ideals, draws him +instinctively towards minds equally placed in opposition, +yet a co-operating opposition, to progress. Thus +Unamuno, whose literary qualities and defects make him +a genuine representative of the more masculine variety +of the Spanish genius, becomes in his spiritual life the +true living symbol of his country and his time. And +that he is great enough to bear this incarnation is a sufficient +measure of his greatness.</p> + +<p class='right'>S. DE MADARIAGA.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1" /><a href="#FNanchor_1_1">[1]</a> In what follows, I confess to refer not so much to the +generally admitted opinion on Wordsworth as to my own views on him and +his poetry, which I tried to explain in my essay: "The Case of Wordsworth" +(<i>Shelley and Calderón, and other Essays</i>, Constable and Co., 1920).</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2" /><a href="#FNanchor_2_2">[2]</a> <i>Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho, explicada y comentada</i>, por M. de +Unamuno: Madrid, Fernando Fé, 1905.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3" /><a href="#FNanchor_3_3">[3]</a> These three novels appeared together as <i>Tres Novelas y un Prólogo</i> +Calpe, Madrid, 1921.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4" /><a href="#FNanchor_4_4">[4]</a> "Me va interesando ese Dean Inge," he wrote to me last year.</p> + + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="AUTHORS_PREFACE" id="AUTHORS_PREFACE" />AUTHOR'S PREFACE</h2> + + +<p>I intended at first to write a short Prologue to this +English translation of my <i>Del Sentimiento Trágico de +la Vida</i>, which has been undertaken by my friend +Mr. J.E. Crawford Flitch. But upon further consideration +I have abandoned the idea, for I reflected that after +all I wrote this book not for Spaniards only, but for all +civilized and Christian men—Christian in particular, +whether consciously so or not—of whatever country they +may be.</p> + +<p>Furthermore, if I were to set about writing an Introduction +in the light of all that we see and feel now, after +the Great War, and, still more, of what we foresee and +forefeel, I should be led into writing yet another book. +And that is a thing to be done with deliberation and only +after having better digested this terrible peace, which is +nothing else but the war's painful convalescence.</p> + +<p>As for many years my spirit has been nourished +upon the very core of English literature—evidence of +which the reader may discover in the following pages—the +translator, in putting my <i>Sentimiento Trágico</i> into +English, has merely converted not a few of the thoughts +and feelings therein expressed back into their original +form of expression. Or retranslated them, perhaps. +Whereby they emerge other than they originally were, +for an idea does not pass from one language to another +without change.</p> + +<p>The fact that this English translation has been carefully +revised here, in my house in this ancient city of +Salamanca, by the translator and myself, implies not +merely some guarantee of exactitude, but also something +more—namely, a correction, in certain respects, of the +original.</p> + +<p>The truth is that, being an incorrigible Spaniard, I +am naturally given to a kind of extemporization and to +neglectfulness of a filed niceness in my works. For this +reason my original work—and likewise the Italian and +French translations of it—issued from the press with a +certain number of errors, obscurities, and faulty references. +The labour which my friend Mr. J.E. Crawford +Flitch fortunately imposed upon me in making me revise +his translation obliged me to correct these errors, to +clarify some obscurities, and to give greater exactitude +to certain quotations from foreign writers. Hence this +English translation of my <i>Sentimiento Trágico</i> presents +in some ways a more purged and correct text than that of +the original Spanish. This perhaps compensates for what +it may lose in the spontaneity of my Spanish thought, +which at times, I believe, is scarcely translatable.</p> + +<p>It would advantage me greatly if this translation, in +opening up to me a public of English-speaking readers, +should some day lead to my writing something addressed +to and concerned with this public. For just as a new +friend enriches our spirit, not so much by what he gives +us of himself, as by what he causes us to discover in our +own selves, something which, if we had never known +him, would have lain in us undeveloped, so it is with a +new public. Perhaps there may be regions in my own +Spanish spirit—my Basque spirit, and therefore doubly +Spanish—unexplored by myself, some corner hitherto +uncultivated, which I should have to cultivate in order +to offer the flowers and fruits of it to the peoples of +English speech.</p> + +<p>And now, no more.</p> + +<p>God give my English readers that inextinguishable +thirst for truth which I desire for myself.</p> + +<p class='right'>MIGUEL DE UNAMUNO.</p> + +<p>SALAMANCA,<br /> +<i>April, 1921.</i></p> + +<hr /> + +<h3>TRANSLATOR'S NOTE</h3> + +<p>Footnotes added by the Translator, other than those which merely +supplement references to writers or their works mentioned in the +text, are distinguished by his initials.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="I" id="I" /><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1" />I</h2> + +<h2>THE MAN OF FLESH AND BONE</h2> + + +<p><i>Homo sum; nihil humani a me alienum puto</i>, said the +Latin playwright. And I would rather say, <i>Nullum +hominem a me alienum puto</i>: I am a man; no other +man do I deem a stranger. For to me the adjective +<i>humanus</i> is no less suspect than its abstract substantive +<i>humanitas</i>, humanity. Neither "the human" nor +"humanity," neither the simple adjective nor the +substantivized adjective, but the concrete substantive—man. +The man of flesh and bone; the man who is born, +suffers, and dies—above all, who dies; the man who eats +and drinks and plays and sleeps and thinks and wills; +the man who is seen and heard; the brother, the real +brother.</p> + +<p>For there is another thing which is also called man, +and he is the subject of not a few lucubrations, more or +less scientific. He is the legendary featherless biped, +the <i>ζωον πολιτικον</i> of Aristotle, the social contractor of +Rousseau, the <i>homo economicus</i> of the Manchester +school, the <i>homo sapiens</i> of Linnæus, or, if you like, +the vertical mammal. A man neither of here nor there, +neither of this age nor of another, who has neither sex +nor country, who is, in brief, merely an idea. That is +to say, a no-man.</p> + +<p>The man we have to do with is the man of flesh and +bone—I, you, reader of mine, the other man yonder, all +of us who walk solidly on the earth.</p> + +<p>And this concrete man, this man of flesh and bone, +is at once the subject and the supreme object of all +<a name="Page_2" id="Page_2" />philosophy, whether certain self-styled philosophers like +it or not.</p> + +<p>In most of the histories of philosophy that I know, +philosophic systems are presented to us as if growing +out of one another spontaneously, and their authors, +the philosophers, appear only as mere pretexts. The +inner biography of the philosophers, of the men who +philosophized, occupies a secondary place. And yet it +is precisely this inner biography that explains for us +most things.</p> + +<p>It behoves us to say, before all, that philosophy lies +closer to poetry than to science. All philosophic systems +which have been constructed as a supreme concord of +the final results of the individual sciences have in every +age possessed much less consistency and life than those +which expressed the integral spiritual yearning of their +authors.</p> + +<p>And, though they concern us so greatly, and are, +indeed, indispensable for our life and thought, the +sciences are in a certain sense more foreign to us than +philosophy. They fulfil a more objective end—that is +to say, an end more external to ourselves. They are +fundamentally a matter of economics. A new scientific +discovery, of the kind called theoretical, is, like a +mechanical discovery—that of the steam-engine, the +telephone, the phonograph, or the aeroplane—a thing +which is useful for something else. Thus the telephone +may be useful to us in enabling us to communicate at a +distance with the woman we love. But she, wherefore is +she useful to us? A man takes an electric tram to go to +hear an opera, and asks himself, Which, in this case, is +the more useful, the tram or the opera?</p> + +<p>Philosophy answers to our need of forming a complete +and unitary conception of the world and of life, and as a +result of this conception, a feeling which gives birth to +an inward attitude and even to outward action. But the +fact is that this feeling, instead of being a consequence +<a name="Page_3" id="Page_3" />of this conception, is the cause of it. Our philosophy—that +is, our mode of understanding or not understanding +the world and life—springs from our feeling towards life +itself. And life, like everything affective, has roots in +subconsciousness, perhaps in unconsciousness.</p> + +<p>It is not usually our ideas that make us optimists or +pessimists, but it is our optimism or our pessimism, of +physiological or perhaps pathological origin, as much +the one as the other, that makes our ideas.</p> + +<p>Man is said to be a reasoning animal. I do not know +why he has not been defined as an affective or feeling +animal. Perhaps that which differentiates him from +other animals is feeling rather than reason. More often +I have seen a cat reason than laugh or weep. Perhaps +it weeps or laughs inwardly—but then perhaps, also +inwardly, the crab resolves equations of the second +degree.</p> + +<p>And thus, in a philosopher, what must needs most +concern us is the man.</p> + +<p>Take Kant, the man Immanuel Kant, who was born +and lived at Königsberg, in the latter part of the eighteenth +century and the beginning of the nineteenth. In +the philosophy of this man Kant, a man of heart and head—that +is to say, a man—there is a significant somersault, +as Kierkegaard, another man—and what a man!—would +have said, the somersault from the <i>Critique of Pure Reason</i> +to the <i>Critique of Practical Reason</i>. He reconstructs in +the latter what he destroyed in the former, in spite of what +those may say who do not see the man himself. After +having examined and pulverized with his analysis the +traditional proofs of the existence of God, of the Aristotelian +God, who is the God corresponding to the +<i>ζωον πολιτικον</i>, the abstract God, the unmoved prime +Mover, he reconstructs God anew; but the God of the +conscience, the Author of the moral order—the Lutheran +God, in short. This transition of Kant exists already in +embryo in the Lutheran notion of faith.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4" />The first God, the rational God, is the projection to +the outward infinite of man as he is by definition—that +is to say, of the abstract man, of the man no-man; the +other God, the God of feeling and volition, is the projection +to the inward infinite of man as he is by life, of +the concrete man, the man of flesh and bone.</p> + +<p>Kant reconstructed with the heart that which with the +head he had overthrown. And we know, from the testimony +of those who knew him and from his testimony +in his letters and private declarations, that the man +Kant, the more or less selfish old bachelor who professed +philosophy at Königsberg at the end of the century of the +Encyclopedia and the goddess of Reason, was a man +much preoccupied with the problem—I mean with the +only real vital problem, the problem that strikes at the +very root of our being, the problem of our individual +and personal destiny, of the immortality of the soul. +The man Kant was not resigned to die utterly. And +because he was not resigned to die utterly he made that +leap, that immortal somersault,<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5" /><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> from the one Critique +to the other.</p> + +<p>Whosoever reads the <i>Critique of Practical Reason</i> +carefully and without blinkers will see that, in strict fact, +the existence of God is therein deduced from the immortality +of the soul, and not the immortality of the soul +from the existence of God. The categorical imperative +leads us to a moral postulate which necessitates in its +turn, in the teleological or rather eschatological order, +the immortality of the soul, and in order to sustain this +immortality God is introduced. All the rest is the +jugglery of the professional of philosophy.</p> + +<p>The man Kant felt that morality was the basis of +eschatology, but the professor of philosophy inverted +the terms.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5" />Another professor, the professor and man William +James, has somewhere said that for the generality of +men God is the provider of immortality. Yes, for the +generality of men, including the man Kant, the man +James, and the man who writes these lines which you, +reader, are reading.</p> + +<p>Talking to a peasant one day, I proposed to him the +hypothesis that there might indeed be a God who governs +heaven and earth, a Consciousness<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6" /><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> of the Universe, but +that for all that the soul of every man may not be +immortal in the traditional and concrete sense. He +replied: "Then wherefore God?" So answered, in the +secret tribunal of their consciousness, the man Kant and +the man James. Only in their capacity as professors +they were compelled to justify rationally an attitude in +itself so little rational. Which does not mean, of course, +that the attitude is absurd.</p> + +<p>Hegel made famous his aphorism that all the rational +is real and all the real rational; but there are many of us +who, unconvinced by Hegel, continue to believe that the +real, the really real, is irrational, that reason builds upon +irrationalities. Hegel, a great framer of definitions, +attempted with definitions to reconstruct the universe, +like that artillery sergeant who said that cannon were +made by taking a hole and enclosing it with steel.</p> + +<p>Another man, the man Joseph Butler, the Anglican +bishop who lived at the beginning of the eighteenth +century and whom Cardinal Newman declared to be the +greatest man in the Anglican Church, wrote, at the conclusion +of the first chapter of his great work, <i>The Analogy +of Religion</i>, the chapter which treats of a future life, +these pregnant words: "This credibility of a future life, +which has been here insisted upon, how little soever it +may satisfy our curiosity, seems to answer all the pur<a name="Page_6" id="Page_6" />poses +of religion, in like manner as a demonstrative proof +would. Indeed a proof, even a demonstrative one, of a +future life, would not be a proof of religion. For, that +we are to live hereafter, is just as reconcilable with the +scheme of atheism, and as well to be accounted for by it, +as that we are now alive is: and therefore nothing can be +more absurd than to argue from that scheme that there +can be no future state."</p> + +<p>The man Butler, whose works were perhaps known to +the man Kant, wished to save the belief in the immortality +of the soul, and with this object he made it +independent of belief in God. The first chapter of his +<i>Analogy</i> treats, as I have said, of the future life, and +the second of the government of God by rewards and +punishments. And the fact is that, fundamentally, the +good Anglican bishop deduces the existence of God from +the immortality of the soul. And as this deduction was +the good Anglican bishop's starting-point, he had not to +make that somersault which at the close of the same +century the good Lutheran philosopher had to make. +Butler, the bishop, was one man and Kant, the professor, +another man.</p> + +<p>To be a man is to be something concrete, unitary, +and substantive; it is to be a thing—<i>res</i>. Now we know +what another man, the man Benedict Spinoza, that Portuguese +Jew who was born and lived in Holland in the +middle of the seventeenth century, wrote about the nature +of things. The sixth proposition of Part III. of his +<i>Ethic</i> states: <i>unaquoeque res, quatenus in se est, in suo +esse perseverare conatur</i>—that is, Everything, in so far +as it is in itself, endeavours to persist in its own being. +Everything in so far as it is in itself—that is to say, in +so far as it is substance, for according to him substance +is <i>id quod in se est et per se concipitur</i>—that which is in +itself and is conceived by itself. And in the following +proposition, the seventh, of the same part, he adds: +<i>conatus, quo unaquoeque res in suo esse perseverare +<a name="Page_7" id="Page_7" />conatur, nihil est proeter ipsius rei actualem essentiam</i>—that +is, the endeavour wherewith everything endeavours +to persist in its own being is nothing but the actual +essence of the thing itself. This means that your essence, +reader, mine, that of the man Spinoza, that of the man +Butler, of the man Kant, and of every man who is a man, +is nothing but the endeavour, the effort, which he makes +to continue to be a man, not to die. And the other +proposition which follows these two, the eighth, says: +<i>conatus, quo unaquoeque res in suo esse perseverare +conatur, nullum tempus finitum, sed indefinitum involvit</i>—that +is, The endeavour whereby each individual +thing endeavours to persist involves no finite time but +indefinite time. That is to say that you, I, and Spinoza +wish never to die and that this longing of ours never to +die is our actual essence. Nevertheless, this poor Portuguese +Jew, exiled in the mists of Holland, could never +attain to believing in his own personal immortality, and +all his philosophy was but a consolation which he contrived +for his lack of faith. Just as other men have a +pain in hand or foot, heart-ache or head-ache, so he had +God-ache. Unhappy man! And unhappy fellow-men!</p> + +<p>And man, this thing, is he a thing? How absurd +soever the question may appear, there are some who have +propounded it. Not long ago there went abroad a certain +doctrine called Positivism, which did much good and +much ill. And among other ills that it wrought was the +introduction of a method of analysis whereby facts were +pulverized, reduced to a dust of facts. Most of the facts +labelled as such by Positivism were really only fragments +of facts. In psychology its action was harmful. There +were even scholastics meddling in literature—I will not +say philosophers meddling in poetry, because poet and +philosopher are twin brothers, if not even one and the +same—who carried this Positivist psychological analysis +into the novel and the drama, where the main business is +to give act and motion to concrete men, men of flesh and +<a name="Page_8" id="Page_8" />bone, and by dint of studying states of consciousness, +consciousness itself disappeared. The same thing happened +to them which is said often to happen in the +examination and testing of certain complicated, organic, +living chemical compounds, when the reagents destroy +the very body which it was proposed to examine and all +that is obtained is the products of its decomposition.</p> + +<p>Taking as their starting-point the evident fact that +contradictory states pass through our consciousness, they +did not succeed in envisaging consciousness itself, the +"I." To ask a man about his "I" is like asking him +about his body. And note that in speaking of the "I," +I speak of the concrete and personal "I," not of the "I" +of Fichte, but of Fichte himself, the man Fichte.</p> + +<p>That which determines a man, that which makes him +one man, one and not another, the man he is and not the +man he is not, is a principle of unity and a principle of +continuity. A principle of unity firstly in space, thanks +to the body, and next in action and intention. When we +walk, one foot does not go forward and the other backward, +nor, when we look, if we are normal, does one eye +look towards the north and the other towards the south. +In each moment of our life we entertain some purpose, +and to this purpose the synergy of our actions is directed. +Notwithstanding the next moment we may change our +purpose. And in a certain sense a man is so much the +more a man the more unitary his action. Some there are +who throughout their whole life follow but one single +purpose, be it what it may.</p> + +<p>Also a principle of continuity in time. Without +entering upon a discussion—an unprofitable discussion—as +to whether I am or am not he who I was twenty years +ago, it appears to me to be indisputable that he who I am +to-day derives, by a continuous series of states of consciousness, +from him who was in my body twenty years +ago. Memory is the basis of individual personality, just +as tradition is the basis of the collective personality of a +<a name="Page_9" id="Page_9" />people. We live in memory and by memory, and our +spiritual life is at bottom simply the effort of our memory +to persist, to transform itself into hope, the effort of our +past to transform itself into our future.</p> + +<p>All this, I know well, is sheer platitude; but in going +about in the world one meets men who seem to have no +feeling of their own personality. One of my best friends +with whom I have walked and talked every day for many +years, whenever I spoke to him of this sense of one's own +personality, used to say: "But I have no sense of +myself; I don't know what that is."</p> + +<p>On a certain occasion this friend remarked to me: +"I should like to be So-and-so" (naming someone), and I +said: "That is what I shall never be able to understand—that +one should want to be someone else. (To want to be +someone else is to want to cease to be he who one is.) I +understand that one should wish to have what someone +else has, his wealth or his knowledge; but to be someone +else, that is a thing I cannot comprehend." It has often +been said that every man who has suffered misfortunes +prefers to be himself, even with his misfortunes, rather +than to be someone else without them. For unfortunate +men, when they preserve their normality in their misfortune—that +is to say, when they endeavour to persist +in their own being—prefer misfortune to non-existence. +For myself I can say that as a youth, and even as a +child, I remained unmoved when shown the most moving +pictures of hell, for even then nothing appeared to me +quite so horrible as nothingness itself. It was a furious +hunger of being that possessed me, an appetite for +divinity, as one of our ascetics has put it.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7" /><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p> + +<p>To propose to a man that he should be someone else, +that he should become someone else, is to propose to him +that he should cease to be himself. Everyone defends his +own personality, and only consents to a change in his +mode of thinking or of feeling in so far as this change is +<a name="Page_10" id="Page_10" />able to enter into the unity of his spirit and become +involved in its continuity; in so far as this change can +harmonize and integrate itself with all the rest of his +mode of being, thinking and feeling, and can at the +same time knit itself with his memories. Neither of a +man nor of a people—which is, in a certain sense, also a +man—can a change be demanded which breaks the unity +and continuity of the person. A man can change greatly, +almost completely even, but the change must take place +within his continuity.</p> + +<p>It is true that in certain individuals there occur what +are called changes of personality; but these are pathological +cases, and as such are studied by alienists. In +these changes of personality, memory, the basis of consciousness, +is completely destroyed, and all that is left +to the sufferer as the substratum of his individual continuity, +which has now ceased to be personal, is the +physical organism. For the subject who suffers it, such +an infirmity is equivalent to death—it is not equivalent +to death only for those who expect to inherit his fortune, +if he possesses one! And this infirmity is nothing less +than a revolution, a veritable revolution.</p> + +<p>A disease is, in a certain sense, an organic dissociation; +it is a rebellion of some element or organ of the +living body which breaks the vital synergy and seeks an +end distinct from that which the other elements co-ordinated +with it seek. Its end, considered in itself—that +is to say, in the abstract—may be more elevated, +more noble, more anything you like; but it is different. +To fly and breathe in the air may be better than to swim +and breathe in the water; but if the fins of a fish aimed +at converting themselves into wings, the fish, as a fish, +would perish. And it is useless to say that it would end +by becoming a bird, if in this becoming there was not a +process of continuity. I do not precisely know, but +perhaps it may be possible for a fish to engender a bird, +or another fish more akin to a bird than itself; but a fish, +<a name="Page_11" id="Page_11" />this fish, cannot itself and during its own lifetime become +a bird.</p> + +<p>Everything in me that conspires to break the unity and +continuity of my life conspires to destroy me and consequently +to destroy itself. Every individual in a people +who conspires to break the spiritual unity and continuity +of that people tends to destroy it and to destroy himself +as a part of that people. What if some other people is +better than our own? Very possibly, although perhaps +we do not clearly understand what is meant by better or +worse. Richer? Granted. More cultured? Granted +likewise. Happier? Well, happiness ... but still, let +it pass! A conquering people (or what is called conquering) +while we are conquered? Well and good. All this +is good—but it is something different. And that is +enough. Because for me the becoming other than I am, +the breaking of the unity and continuity of my life, is to +cease to be he who I am—that is to say, it is simply to +cease to be. And that—no! Anything rather than that!</p> + +<p>Another, you say, might play the part that I play as +well or better? Another might fulfil my function in +society? Yes, but it would not be I.</p> + +<p>"I, I, I, always I!" some reader will exclaim; "and +who are you?" I might reply in the words of Obermann, +that tremendous man Obermann: "For the universe, +nothing—for myself, everything"; but no, I would +rather remind him of a doctrine of the man Kant—to +wit, that we ought to think of our fellow-men not as +means but as ends. For the question does not touch me +alone, it touches you also, grumbling reader, it touches +each and all. Singular judgments have the value of +universal judgments, the logicians say. The singular is +not particular, it is universal.</p> + +<p>Man is an end, not a means. All civilization addresses +itself to man, to each man, to each I. What is that idol, +call it Humanity or call it what you like, to which all +men and each individual man must be sacrificed? For +<a name="Page_12" id="Page_12" />I sacrifice myself for my neighbours, for my fellow-countrymen, +for my children, and these sacrifice themselves +in their turn for theirs, and theirs again for those +that come after them, and so on in a never-ending series +of generations. And who receives the fruit of this +sacrifice?</p> + +<p>Those who talk to us about this fantastic sacrifice, this +dedication without an object, are wont to talk to us also +about the right to live. What is this right to live? They +tell me I am here to realize I know not what social end; +but I feel that I, like each one of my fellows, am here to +realize myself, to live.</p> + +<p>Yes, yes, I see it all!—an enormous social activity, a +mighty civilization, a profuseness of science, of art, of +industry, of morality, and afterwards, when we have +filled the world with industrial marvels, with great factories, +with roads, museums, and libraries, we shall fall +exhausted at the foot of it all, and it will subsist—for +whom? Was man made for science or was science made +for man?</p> + +<p>"Why!" the reader will exclaim again, "we are +coming back to what the Catechism says: '<i>Q</i>. For whom +did God create the world? <i>A</i>. For man.'" Well, why +not?—so ought the man who is a man to reply. The +ant, if it took account of these matters and were a person, +would reply "For the ant," and it would reply rightly. +The world is made for consciousness, for each consciousness.</p> + +<p>A human soul is worth all the universe, someone—I +know not whom—has said and said magnificently. A +human soul, mind you! Not a human life. Not this +life. And it happens that the less a man believes in the +soul—that is to say in his conscious immortality, personal +and concrete—the more he will exaggerate the worth of +this poor transitory life. This is the source from which +springs all that effeminate, sentimental ebullition against +war. True, a man ought not to wish to die, but the +<a name="Page_13" id="Page_13" />death to be renounced is the death of the soul. "Whosoever +will save his life shall lose it," says the Gospel; +but it does not say "whosoever will save his soul," the +immortal soul—or, at any rate, which we believe and +wish to be immortal.</p> + +<p>And what all the objectivists do not see, or rather do +not wish to see, is that when a man affirms his "I," his +personal consciousness, he affirms man, man concrete +and real, affirms the true humanism—the humanism of +man, not of the things of man—and in affirming man he +affirms consciousness. For the only consciousness of +which we have consciousness is that of man.</p> + +<p>The world is for consciousness. Or rather this <i>for</i>, +this notion of finality, and feeling rather than notion, +this teleological feeling, is born only where there is +consciousness. Consciousness and finality are fundamentally +the same thing.</p> + +<p>If the sun possessed consciousness it would think, no +doubt, that it lived in order to give light to the worlds; +but it would also and above all think that the worlds +existed in order that it might give them light and enjoy +itself in giving them light and so live. And it would +think well.</p> + +<p>And all this tragic fight of man to save himself, this +immortal craving for immortality which caused the man +Kant to make that immortal leap of which I have +spoken, all this is simply a fight for consciousness. If +consciousness is, as some inhuman thinker has said, +nothing more than a flash of light between two eternities +of darkness, then there is nothing more execrable than +existence.</p> + +<p>Some may espy a fundamental contradiction in everything +that I am saying, now expressing a longing for +unending life, now affirming that this earthly life does +not possess the value that is given to it. Contradiction? +To be sure! The contradiction of my heart that says +Yes and of my head that says No! Of course there +<a name="Page_14" id="Page_14" />is contradiction. Who does not recollect those words +of the Gospel, "Lord, I believe, help thou my unbelief"? +Contradiction! Of course! Since we only +live in and by contradictions, since life is tragedy and +the tragedy is perpetual struggle, without victory or the +hope of victory, life is contradiction.</p> + +<p>The values we are discussing are, as you see, values of +the heart, and against values of the heart reasons do not +avail. For reasons are only reasons—that is to say, they +are not even truths. There is a class of pedantic label-mongers, +pedants by nature and by grace, who remind +me of that man who, purposing to console a father +whose son has suddenly died in the flower of his years, +says to him, "Patience, my friend, we all must die!" +Would you think it strange if this father were offended +at such an impertinence? For it is an impertinence. +There are times when even an axiom can become an +impertinence. How many times may it not be said—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Para pensar cual tú, sólo es preciso</i></div> +<div><i>no tener nada mas que inteligencia</i>.<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8" /><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>There are, in fact, people who appear to think only +with the brain, or with whatever may be the specific +thinking organ; while others think with all the body and +all the soul, with the blood, with the marrow of the bones, +with the heart, with the lungs, with the belly, with the +life. And the people who think only with the brain +develop into definition-mongers; they become the +professionals of thought. And you know what a +professional is? You know what a product of the +differentiation of labour is?</p> + +<p>Take a professional boxer. He has learnt to hit with +such economy of effort that, while concentrating all his +strength in the blow, he only brings into play just those +muscles that are required for the immediate and definite +<a name="Page_15" id="Page_15" />object of his action—to knock out his opponent. A +blow given by a non-professional will not have so much +immediate, objective efficiency; but it will more greatly +vitalize the striker, causing him to bring into play almost +the whole of his body. The one is the blow of a boxer, +the other that of a man. And it is notorious that the +Hercules of the circus, the athletes of the ring, are not, +as a rule, healthy. They knock out their opponents, +they lift enormous weights, but they die of phthisis or +dyspepsia.</p> + +<p>If a philosopher is not a man, he is anything but a +philosopher; he is above all a pedant, and a pedant is +a caricature of a man. The cultivation of any branch +of science—of chemistry, of physics, of geometry, of +philology—may be a work of differentiated specialization, +and even so only within very narrow limits and +restrictions; but philosophy, like poetry, is a work of +integration and synthesis, or else it is merely pseudo-philosophical +erudition.</p> + +<p>All knowledge has an ultimate object. Knowledge for +the sake of knowledge is, say what you will, nothing but +a dismal begging of the question. We learn something +either for an immediate practical end, or in order to +complete the rest of our knowledge. Even the knowledge +that appears to us to be most theoretical—that is to say, +of least immediate application to the non-intellectual +necessities of life—answers to a necessity which is no less +real because it is intellectual, to a reason of economy in +thinking, to a principle of unity and continuity of consciousness. +But just as a scientific fact has its finality +in the rest of knowledge, so the philosophy that we would +make our own has also its extrinsic object—it refers to +our whole destiny, to our attitude in face of life and the +universe. And the most tragic problem of philosophy is +to reconcile intellectual necessities with the necessities +of the heart and the will. For it is on this rock that +every philosophy that pretends to resolve the eternal and +<a name="Page_16" id="Page_16" />tragic contradiction, the basis of our existence, breaks to +pieces. But do all men face this contradiction squarely?</p> + +<p>Little can be hoped from a ruler, for example, who has +not at some time or other been preoccupied, even if only +confusedly, with the first beginning and the ultimate end +of all things, and above all of man, with the "why" of +his origin and the "wherefore" of his destiny.</p> + +<p>And this supreme preoccupation cannot be purely +rational, it must involve the heart. It is not enough to +think about our destiny: it must be felt. And the +would-be leader of men who affirms and proclaims that +he pays no heed to the things of the spirit, is not worthy +to lead them. By which I do not mean, of course, that +any ready-made solution is to be required of him. +Solution? Is there indeed any?</p> + +<p>So far as I am concerned, I will never willingly yield +myself, nor entrust my confidence, to any popular leader +who is not penetrated with the feeling that he who +orders a people orders men, men of flesh and bone, men +who are born, suffer, and, although they do not wish to +die, die; men who are ends in themselves, not merely +means; men who must be themselves and not others; +men, in fine, who seek that which we call happiness. +It is inhuman, for example, to sacrifice one generation +of men to the generation which follows, without having +any feeling for the destiny of those who are sacrificed, +without having any regard, not for their memory, not +for their names, but for them themselves.</p> + +<p>All this talk of a man surviving in his children, or in +his works, or in the universal consciousness, is but vague +verbiage which satisfies only those who suffer from +affective stupidity, and who, for the rest, may be persons +of a certain cerebral distinction. For it is possible to +possess great talent, or what we call great talent, and yet +to be stupid as regards the feelings and even morally +imbecile. There have been instances.</p> + +<p>These clever-witted, affectively stupid persons are wont +<a name="Page_17" id="Page_17" />to say that it is useless to seek to delve in the unknowable +or to kick against the pricks. It is as if one should +say to a man whose leg has had to be amputated that it +does not help him at all to think about it. And we all +lack something; only some of us feel the lack and others +do not. Or they pretend not to feel the lack, and then +they are hypocrites.</p> + +<p>A pedant who beheld Solon weeping for the death of +a son said to him, "Why do you weep thus, if weeping +avails nothing?" And the sage answered him, "Precisely +for that reason—because it does not avail." It +is manifest that weeping avails something, even if only +the alleviation of distress; but the deep sense of Solon's +reply to the impertinent questioner is plainly seen. +And I am convinced that we should solve many things +if we all went out into the streets and uncovered our +griefs, which perhaps would prove to be but one sole +common grief, and joined together in beweeping them +and crying aloud to the heavens and calling upon God. +And this, even though God should hear us not; but He +would hear us. The chiefest sanctity of a temple is that +it is a place to which men go to weep in common. A +<i>miserere</i> sung in common by a multitude tormented by +destiny has as much value as a philosophy. It is not +enough to cure the plague: we must learn to weep for +it. Yes, we must learn to weep! Perhaps that is the +supreme wisdom. Why? Ask Solon.</p> + +<p>There is something which, for lack of a better name, +we will call the tragic sense of life, which carries with it +a whole conception of life itself and of the universe, a +whole philosophy more or less formulated, more or less +conscious. And this sense may be possessed, and is +possessed, not only by individual men but by whole +peoples. And this sense does not so much flow from +ideas as determine them, even though afterwards, as is +manifest, these ideas react upon it and confirm it. +Sometimes it may originate in a chance illness—<a name="Page_18" id="Page_18" />dyspepsia, +for example; but at other times it is constitutional. +And it is useless to speak, as we shall see, of +men who are healthy and men who are not healthy. +Apart from the fact there is no normal standard of +health, nobody has proved that man is necessarily cheerful +by nature. And further, man, by the very fact of +being man, of possessing consciousness, is, in comparison +with the ass or the crab, a diseased animal. Consciousness +is a disease.</p> + +<p>Among men of flesh and bone there have been typical +examples of those who possess this tragic sense of life. +I recall now Marcus Aurelius, St. Augustine, Pascal, +Rousseau, <i>René, Obermann</i>, Thomson,<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9" /><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> Leopardi, +Vigny, Lenau, Kleist, Amiel, Quental, Kierkegaard—men +burdened with wisdom rather than with knowledge.</p> + +<p>And there are, I believe, peoples who possess this +tragic sense of life also.</p> + +<p>It is to this that we must now turn our attention, +beginning with this matter of health and disease.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5" /><a href="#FNanchor_5_5">[5]</a> "<i>Salto inmortal</i>." There is a play here upon the term +<i>salto mortal</i>, used to denote the dangerous aerial somersault of +the acrobat, which cannot be rendered in English.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6" /><a href="#FNanchor_6_6">[6]</a> "<i>Conciencia</i>." The same word is used in Spanish to denote both +consciousness and conscience. If the latter is specifically intended, the +qualifying adjective "<i>moral</i>" or "<i>religiosa</i>" is commonly +added.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7" /><a href="#FNanchor_7_7">[7]</a> San Juan de los Angeles.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8" /><a href="#FNanchor_8_8">[8]</a> To be lacking in everything but intelligence is the necessary qualification +for thinking like you.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9" /><a href="#FNanchor_9_9">[9]</a> James Thomson, author of <i>The City of Dreadful Night</i>.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19" /><a name="II" id="II" />II</h2> + +<h2>THE STARTING-POINT</h2> + + +<p>To some, perhaps, the foregoing reflections may seem +to possess a certain morbid character. Morbid? But +what is disease precisely? And what is health?</p> + +<p>May not disease itself possibly be the essential condition +of that which we call progress and progress itself a +disease?</p> + +<p>Who does not know the mythical tragedy of Paradise? +Therein dwelt our first parents in a state of perfect health +and perfect innocence, and Jahwé gave them to eat of the +tree of life and created all things for them; but he commanded +them not to taste of the fruit of the tree of the +knowledge of good and evil. But they, tempted by the +serpent—Christ's type of prudence—tasted of the fruit +of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and became +subject to all diseases, and to death, which is their crown +and consummation, and to labour and to progress. For +progress, according to this legend, springs from original +sin. And thus it was the curiosity of Eve, of woman, of +her who is most thrall to the organic necessities of life +and of the conservation of life, that occasioned the Fall +and with the Fall the Redemption, and it was the Redemption +that set our feet on the way to God and made +it possible for us to attain to Him and to be in Him.</p> + +<p>Do you want another version of our origin? Very +well then. According to this account, man is, strictly +speaking, merely a species of gorilla, orang-outang, +chimpanzee, or the like, more or less hydrocephalous. +Once on a time an anthropoid monkey had a diseased +offspring—diseased from the strictly animal or zoological +<a name="Page_20" id="Page_20" />point of view, really diseased; and this disease, although +a source of weakness, resulted in a positive gain in the +struggle for survival. The only vertical mammal at last +succeeded in standing erect—man. The upright position +freed him from the necessity of using his hands as +means of support in walking; he was able, therefore, to +oppose the thumb to the other four fingers, to seize hold +of objects and to fashion tools; and it is well known that +the hands are great promoters of the intelligence. This +same position gave to the lungs, trachea, larynx, and +mouth an aptness for the production of articulate speech, +and speech is intelligence. Moreover, this position, +causing the head to weigh vertically upon the trunk, +facilitated its development and increase of weight, and +the head is the seat of the mind. But as this necessitated +greater strength and resistance in the bones of the pelvis +than in those of species whose head and trunk rest upon +all four extremities, the burden fell upon woman, the +author of the Fall according to Genesis, of bringing forth +larger-headed offspring through a harder framework of +bone. And Jahwé condemned her, for having sinned, +to bring forth her children in sorrow.</p> + +<p>The gorilla, the chimpanzee, the orang-outang, and +their kind, must look upon man as a feeble and infirm +animal, whose strange custom it is to store up his dead. +Wherefore?</p> + +<p>And this primary disease and all subsequent diseases—are +they not perhaps the capital element of progress? +Arthritis, for example, infects the blood and introduces +into it scoriæ, a kind of refuse, of an imperfect organic +combustion; but may not this very impurity happen to +make the blood more stimulative? May not this impure +blood promote a more active cerebration precisely because +it is impure? Water that is chemically pure is undrinkable. +And may not also blood that is physiologically +pure be unfit for the brain of the vertical mammal +that has to live by thought?</p> + +<p><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21" />The history of medicine, moreover, teaches us that +progress consists not so much in expelling the germs of +disease, or rather diseases themselves, as in accommodating +them to our organism and so perhaps enriching it, +in dissolving them in our blood. What but this is the +meaning of vaccination and all the serums, and immunity +from infection through lapse of time?</p> + +<p>If this notion of absolute health were not an abstract +category, something which does not strictly exist, we +might say that a perfectly healthy man would be no +longer a man, but an irrational animal. Irrational, +because of the lack of some disease to set a spark to his +reason. And this disease which gives us the appetite of +knowing for the sole pleasure of knowing, for the delight +of tasting of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good +and evil, is a real disease and a tragic one.</p> + +<p><i>Παντες ανθρωποι +τον εἱδεναι ορεγονται φυσει +</i>, "all men +naturally desire to know." Thus Aristotle begins his +Metaphysic, and it has been repeated a thousand times +since then that curiosity or the desire to know, which +according to Genesis led our first mother to sin, is the +origin of knowledge.</p> + +<p>But it is necessary to distinguish here between the +desire or appetite for knowing, apparently and at first +sight for the love of knowledge itself, between the eagerness +to taste of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, and +the necessity of knowing for the sake of living. The +latter, which gives us direct and immediate knowledge, +and which in a certain sense might be called, if it does +not seem too paradoxical, unconscious knowledge, is +common both to men and animals, while that which +distinguishes us from them is reflective knowledge, the +knowing that we know.</p> + +<p>Man has debated at length and will continue to debate +at length—the world having been assigned as a theatre +for his debates—concerning the origin of knowledge; +but, apart from the question as to what the real truth +<a name="Page_22" id="Page_22" />about this origin may be, which we will leave until later, +it is a certainly ascertained fact that in the apparential +order of things, in the life of beings who are endowed +with a certain more or less cloudy faculty of knowing +and perceiving, or who at any rate appear to act as if +they were so endowed, knowledge is exhibited to us as +bound up with the necessity of living and of procuring +the wherewithal to maintain life. It is a consequence of +that very essence of being, which according to Spinoza +consists in the effort to persist indefinitely in its own +being. Speaking in terms in which concreteness verges +upon grossness, it may be said that the brain, in so far as +its function is concerned, depends upon the stomach. +In beings which rank in the lowest scale of life, those +actions which present the characteristics of will, those +which appear to be connected with a more or less clear +consciousness, are actions designed to procure nourishment +for the being performing them.</p> + +<p>Such then is what we may call the historical origin of +knowledge, whatever may be its origin from another +point of view. Beings which appear to be endowed with +perception, perceive in order to be able to live, and only +perceive in so far as they require to do so in order to live. +But perhaps this stored-up knowledge, the utility in +which it had its origin being exhausted, has come to +constitute a fund of knowledge far exceeding that required +for the bare necessities of living.</p> + +<p>Thus we have, first, the necessity of knowing in order +to live, and next, arising out of this, that other knowledge +which we might call superfluous knowledge or +knowledge <i>de luxe</i>, which may in its turn come to constitute +a new necessity. Curiosity, the so-called innate +desire of knowing, only awakes and becomes operative +after the necessity of knowing for the sake of living is +satisfied; and although sometimes in the conditions +under which the human race is actually living it may not +so befall, but curiosity may prevail over necessity and +<a name="Page_23" id="Page_23" />knowledge over hunger, nevertheless the primordial +fact is that curiosity sprang from the necessity of knowing +in order to live, and this is the dead weight and +gross matter carried in the matrix of science. Aspiring +to be knowledge for the sake of knowledge, to know the +truth for the sake of the truth itself, science is forced by +the necessities of life to turn aside and put it itself at +their service. While men believe themselves to be +seeking truth for its own sake, they are in fact seeking +life in truth. The variations of science depend upon +the variations of human needs, and men of science are +wont to work, willingly or unwillingly, wittingly or +unwittingly, in the service of the powerful or in that of +a people that demands from them the confirmation of its +own desires.</p> + +<p>But is this really a dead weight that impedes the +progress of science, or is it not rather its innermost +redeeming essence? It is in fact the latter, and it is a +gross stupidity to presume to rebel against the very +condition of life.</p> + +<p>Knowledge is employed in the service of the necessity +of life and primarily in the service of the instinct of +personal preservation. This necessity and this instinct +have created in man the organs of knowledge and given +them such capacity as they possess. Man sees, hears, +touches, tastes, and smells that which it is necessary for +him to see, hear, touch, taste, and smell in order to +preserve his life. The decay or the loss of any of these +senses increases the risks with which his life is environed, +and if it increases them less in the state of society in +which we are actually living, the reason is that some see, +hear, touch, and smell for others. A blind man, by +himself and without a guide, could not live long. Society +is an additional sense; it is the true common sense.</p> + +<p>Man, then, in his quality of an isolated individual, +only sees, hears, touches, tastes, and smells in so far as +is necessary for living and self-preservation. If he does +<a name="Page_24" id="Page_24" />not perceive colours below red or above violet, the reason +perhaps is that the colours which he does perceive suffice +for the purposes of self-preservation. And the senses +themselves are simplifying apparati which eliminate +from objective reality everything that it is not necessary +to know in order to utilize objects for the purpose of +preserving life. In complete darkness an animal, if it +does not perish, ends by becoming blind. Parasites +which live in the intestines of other animals upon the +nutritive juices which they find ready prepared for them +by these animals, as they do not need either to see or +hear, do in fact neither see nor hear; they simply adhere, +a kind of receptive bag, to the being upon whom they +live. For these parasites the visible and audible world +does not exist. It is enough for them that the animals, +in whose intestines they live, see and hear.</p> + +<p>Knowledge, then, is primarily at the service of the +instinct of self-preservation, which is indeed, as we have +said with Spinoza, its very essence. And thus it may +be said that it is the instinct of self-preservation that +makes perceptible for us the reality and truth of the +world; for it is this instinct that cuts out and separates +that which exists for us from the unfathomable and +illimitable region of the possible. In effect, that which +has existence for us is precisely that which, in one way +or another, we need to know in order to exist ourselves; +objective existence, as we know it, is a dependence of +our own personal existence. And nobody can deny that +there may not exist, and perhaps do exist, aspects of +reality unknown to us, to-day at any rate, and perhaps +unknowable, because they are in no way necessary to us +for the preservation of our own actual existence.</p> + +<p>But man does not live alone; he is not an isolated +individual, but a member of society. There is not a little +truth in the saying that the individual, like the atom, is +an abstraction. Yes, the atom apart from the universe +is as much an abstraction as the universe apart from the +<a name="Page_25" id="Page_25" />atom. And if the individual maintains his existence +by the instinct of self-preservation, society owes its +being and maintenance to the individual's instinct of +perpetuation. And from this instinct, or rather from +society, springs reason.</p> + +<p>Reason, that which we call reason, reflex and reflective +knowledge, the distinguishing mark of man, is +a social product.</p> + +<p>It owes its origin, perhaps, to language. We +think articulately—<i>i.e.</i>, reflectively—thanks to articulate +language, and this language arose out of the need of +communicating our thought to our neighbours. To +think is to talk with oneself, and each one of us talks +with himself, thanks to our having had to talk with one +another. In everyday life it frequently happens that +we hit upon an idea that we were seeking and succeed +in giving it form—that is to say, we obtain the idea, +drawing it forth from the mist of dim perceptions which +it represents, thanks to the efforts which we make to +present it to others. Thought is inward language, and +the inward language originates in the outward. Hence +it results that reason is social and common. A fact +pregnant with consequences, as we shall have occasion +to see.</p> + +<p>Now if there is a reality which, in so far as we have +knowledge of it, is the creation of the instinct of personal +preservation and of the senses at the service of this instinct, +must there not be another reality, not less real than the +former, the creation, in so far as we have knowledge of it, +of the instinct of perpetuation, the instinct of the species, +and of the senses at the service of this instinct? The +instinct of preservation, hunger, is the foundation of the +human individual; the instinct of perpetuation, love, in +its most rudimentary and physiological form, is the +foundation of human society. And just as man knows +that which he needs to know in order that he may preserve +his existence, so society, or man in so far as he is +<a name="Page_26" id="Page_26" />a social being, knows that which he needs to know in +order that he may perpetuate himself in society.</p> + +<p>There is a world, the sensible world, that is the child +of hunger, and there is another world, the ideal world, +that is the child of love. And just as there are senses +employed in the service of the knowledge of the sensible +world, so there are also senses, at present for the most +part dormant, for social consciousness has scarcely +awakened, employed in the service of the knowledge of +the ideal world. And why must we deny objective +reality to the creations of love, of the instinct of perpetuation, +since we allow it to the creations of hunger or the +instinct of preservation? For if it be said that the +former creations are only the creations of our imagination, +without objective value, may it not equally be said +of the latter that they are only the creations of our +senses? Who can assert that there is not an invisible +and intangible world, perceived by the inward sense that +lives in the service of the instinct of perpetuation?</p> + +<p>Human society, as a society, possesses senses which +the individual, but for his existence in society, would +lack, just as the individual, man, who is in his turn a +kind of society, possesses senses lacking in the cells of +which he is composed. The blind cells of hearing, in +their dim consciousness, must of necessity be unaware +of the existence of the visible world, and if they should +hear it spoken of they would perhaps deem it to be the +arbitrary creation of the deaf cells of sight, while the +latter in their turn would consider as illusion the audible +world which the hearing cells create.</p> + +<p>We have remarked before that the parasites which +live in the intestines of higher animals, feeding upon the +nutritive juices which these animals supply, do not need +either to see or hear, and therefore for them the visible +and audible world does not exist. And if they possessed +a certain degree of consciousness and took account of +the fact that the animal at whose expense they live +<a name="Page_27" id="Page_27" />believed in a world of sight and hearing, they would +perhaps deem such belief to be due merely to the +extravagance of its imagination. And similarly there +are social parasites, as Mr. A.J. Balfour admirably +observes,<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10" /><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> who, receiving from the society in which they +live the motives of their moral conduct, deny that belief +in God and the other life is a necessary foundation for +good conduct and for a tolerable life, society having +prepared for them the spiritual nutriment by which they +live. An isolated individual can endure life and live it +well and even heroically without in any sort believing +either in the immortality of the soul or in God, but he +lives the life of a spiritual parasite. What we call the +sense of honour is, even in non-Christians, a Christian +product. And I will say further, that if there exists in +a man faith in God joined to a life of purity and moral +elevation, it is not so much the believing in God that +makes him good, as the being good, thanks to God, +that makes him believe in Him. Goodness is the best +source of spiritual clear-sightedness.</p> + +<p>I am well aware that it may be objected that all this +talk of man creating the sensible world and love the ideal +world, of the blind cells of hearing and the deaf cells of +sight, of spiritual parasites, etc., is merely metaphor. +So it is, and I do not claim to discuss otherwise than by +metaphor. And it is true that this social sense, the +creature of love, the creator of language, of reason, and +of the ideal world that springs from it, is at bottom +nothing other than what we call fancy or imagination. +<a name="Page_28" id="Page_28" />Out of fancy springs reason. And if by imagination is +understood a faculty which fashions images capriciously, +I will ask: What is caprice? And in any case the senses +and reason are also fallible.</p> + +<p>We shall have to enquire what is this inner social +faculty, the imagination which personalizes everything, +and which, employed in the service of the instinct of +perpetuation, reveals to us God and the immortality of +the soul—God being thus a social product.</p> + +<p>But this we will reserve till later.</p> + +<p>And now, why does man philosophize?—that is to +say, why does he investigate the first causes and ultimate +ends of things? Why does he seek the disinterested +truth? For to say that all men have a natural tendency +to know is true; but wherefore?</p> + +<p>Philosophers seek a theoretic or ideal starting-point +for their human work, the work of philosophizing; but +they are not usually concerned to seek the practical and +real starting-point, the purpose. What is the object in +making philosophy, in thinking it and then expounding it +to one's fellows? What does the philosopher seek in it +and with it? The truth for the truth's own sake? The +truth, in order that we may subject our conduct to it and +determine our spiritual attitude towards life and the +universe comformably with it?</p> + +<p>Philosophy is a product of the humanity of each +philosopher, and each philosopher is a man of flesh and +bone who addresses himself to other men of flesh and +bone like himself. And, let him do what he will, he +philosophizes not with the reason only, but with the +will, with the feelings, with the flesh and with the bones, +with the whole soul and the whole body. It is the man +that philosophizes.</p> + +<p>I do not wish here to use the word "I" in connection +with philosophizing, lest the impersonal "I" should +be understood in place of the man that philosophizes; +for this concrete, circumscribed "I," this "I" of flesh +<a name="Page_29" id="Page_29" />and bone, that suffers from tooth-ache and finds life +insupportable if death is the annihilation of the personal +consciousness, must not be confounded with that other +counterfeit "I," the theoretical "I" which Fichte +smuggled into philosophy, nor yet with the Unique, +also theoretical, of Max Stirner. It is better to say +"we," understanding, however, the "we" who are +circumscribed in space.</p> + +<p>Knowledge for the sake of knowledge! Truth for +truth's sake! This is inhuman. And if we say that +theoretical philosophy addresses itself to practical +philosophy, truth to goodness, science to ethics, I will +ask: And to what end is goodness? Is it, perhaps, an +end in itself? Good is simply that which contributes +to the preservation, perpetuation, and enrichment of +consciousness. Goodness addresses itself to man, to +the maintenance and perfection of human society which +is composed of men. And to what end is this? "So +act that your action may be a pattern to all men," Kant +tells us. That is well, but wherefore? We must needs +seek for a wherefore.</p> + +<p>In the starting-point of all philosophy, in the real +starting-point, the practical not the theoretical, there is +a wherefore. The philosopher philosophizes for something +more than for the sake of philosophizing. +<i>Primum vivere, deinde philosophari</i>, says the old Latin +adage; and as the philosopher is a man before he is a +philosopher, he must needs live before he can philosophize, +and, in fact, he philosophizes in order to live. +And usually he philosophizes either in order to resign +himself to life, or to seek some finality in it, or to distract +himself and forget his griefs, or for pastime and +amusement. A good illustration of this last case is to +be found in that terrible Athenian ironist, Socrates, of +whom Xenophon relates in his <i>Memorabilia</i> that he +discovered to Theodata, the courtesan, the wiles that +she ought to make use of in order to lure lovers to her +<a name="Page_30" id="Page_30" />house so aptly, that she begged him to act as her companion +in the chase, <i>συνθηρατης</i>, her pimp, in a word. +And philosophy is wont, in fact, not infrequently to +convert itself into a kind of art of spiritual pimping. +And sometimes into an opiate for lulling sorrows to +sleep.</p> + +<p>I take at random a book of metaphysics, the first that +comes to my hand, <i>Time and Space, a Metaphysical +Essay</i>, by Shadworth H. Hodgson. I open it, and in +the fifth paragraph of the first chapter of the first part +I read:</p> + +<p>"Metaphysics is, properly speaking, not a science +but a philosophy—that is, it is a science whose end is in +itself, in the gratification and education of the minds +which carry it on, not in external purpose, such as the +founding of any art conducive to the welfare of life." +Let us examine this. We see that metaphysics is not, +properly speaking, a science—that is, it is a science +whose end is in itself. And this science, which, properly +speaking, is not a science, has its end in itself, in the +gratification and education of the minds that cultivate +it. But what are we to understand? Is its end in itself +or is it to gratify and educate the minds that cultivate it? +Either the one or the other! Hodgson afterwards adds +that the end of metaphysics is not any external purpose, +such as that of founding an art conducive to the welfare +of life. But is not the gratification of the mind of him +who cultivates philosophy part of the well-being of his +life? Let the reader consider this passage of the +English metaphysician and tell me if it is not a tissue +of contradictions.</p> + +<p>Such a contradiction is inevitable when an attempt is +made to define humanly this theory of science, of knowledge, +whose end is in itself, of knowing for the sake +of knowing, of attaining truth for the sake of truth. +Science exists only in personal consciousness and thanks +to it; astronomy, mathematics, have no other reality +<a name="Page_31" id="Page_31" />than that which they possess as knowledge in the minds +of those who study and cultivate them. And if some +day all personal consciousness must come to an end on +the earth; if some day the human spirit must return to +the nothingness—that is to say, to the absolute unconsciousness—from +whence it sprang; and if there shall no +more be any spirit that can avail itself of all our accumulated +knowledge—then to what end is this knowledge? +For we must not lose sight of the fact that the problem +of the personal immortality of the soul involves the +future of the whole human species.</p> + +<p>This series of contradictions into which the Englishman +falls in his desire to explain the theory of a science +whose end is in itself, is easily understood when it is +remembered that it is an Englishman who speaks, and +that the Englishman is before everything else a man. +Perhaps a German specialist, a philosopher who had +made philosophy his speciality, who had first murdered +his humanity and then buried it in his philosophy, would +be better able to explain this theory of a science whose +end is in itself and of knowledge for the sake of +knowledge.</p> + +<p>Take the man Spinoza, that Portuguese Jew exiled in +Holland; read his <i>Ethic</i> as a despairing elegiac poem, +which in fact it is, and tell me if you do not hear, +beneath the disemburdened and seemingly serene propositions +<i>more geometrico</i>, the lugubrious echo of the +prophetic psalms. It is not the philosophy of resignation +but of despair. And when he wrote that the free +man thinks of nothing less than of death, and that his +wisdom consists in meditating not on death but on life—homo +liber de nulla re minus quam de morte cogitat et +eius sapientia non mortis, sed vitæ meditatio est (<i>Ethic</i>, +Part IV., Prop. LXVII.)—when he wrote that, he felt, as +we all feel, that we are slaves, and he did in fact think +about death, and he wrote it in a vain endeavour to free +himself from this thought. Nor in writing Proposition +<a name="Page_32" id="Page_32" />XLII. of Part V., that "happiness is not the reward of +virtue but virtue itself," did he feel, one may be sure, +what he wrote. For this is usually the reason why men +philosophize—in order to convince themselves, even +though they fail in the attempt. And this desire of +convincing oneself—that is to say, this desire of doing +violence to one's own human nature—is the real starting-point +of not a few philosophies.</p> + +<p>Whence do I come and whence comes the world in +which and by which I live? Whither do I go and +whither goes everything that environs me? What does +it all mean? Such are the questions that man asks as +soon as he frees himself from the brutalizing necessity +of labouring for his material sustenance. And if we +look closely, we shall see that beneath these questions +lies the wish to know not so much the "why" as the +"wherefore," not the cause but the end. Cicero's +definition of philosophy is well known—"the knowledge +of things divine and human and of the causes in which +these things are contained," <i>rerum divinarum et +humanarum, causarumque quibus hæ res continentur</i>; +but in reality these causes are, for us, ends. And what +is the Supreme Cause, God, but the Supreme End? +The "why" interests us only in view of the "wherefore." +We wish to know whence we came only in order +the better to be able to ascertain whither we are going.</p> + +<p>This Ciceronian definition, which is the Stoic definition, +is also found in that formidable intellectualist, +Clement of Alexandria, who was canonized by the +Catholic Church, and he expounds it in the fifth chapter +of the first of his <i>Stromata</i>. But this same Christian +philosopher—Christian?—in the twenty-second chapter +of his fourth <i>Stroma</i> tells us that for the gnostic—that is +to say, the intellectual—knowledge, <i>gnosis</i>, ought to +suffice, and he adds: "I will dare aver that it is not +because he wishes to be saved that he, who devotes himself +to knowledge for the sake of the divine science itself, +<a name="Page_33" id="Page_33" />chooses knowledge. For the exertion of the intellect by +exercise is prolonged to a perpetual exertion. And the +perpetual exertion of the intellect is the essence of an +intelligent being, which results from an uninterrupted +process of admixture, and remains eternal contemplation, +a living substance. Could we, then, suppose anyone +proposing to the gnostic whether he would choose +the knowledge of God or everlasting salvation, and if +these, which are entirely identical, were separable, he +would without the least hesitation choose the knowledge +of God?" May He, may God Himself, whom we long +to enjoy and possess eternally, deliver us from this +Clementine gnosticism or intellectualism!</p> + +<p>Why do I wish to know whence I come and whither +I go, whence comes and whither goes everything that +environs me, and what is the meaning of it all? For I +do not wish to die utterly, and I wish to know whether +I am to die or not definitely. If I do not die, what is +my destiny? and if I die, then nothing has any meaning +for me. And there are three solutions: (<i>a</i>) I know that +I shall die utterly, and then irremediable despair, or +(<i>b</i>) I know that I shall not die utterly, and then resignation, +or (<i>c</i>) I cannot know either one or the other, and +then resignation in despair or despair in resignation, a +desperate resignation or a resigned despair, and hence +conflict.</p> + +<p>"It is best," some reader will say, "not to concern +yourself with what cannot be known." But is it possible? +In his very beautiful poem, <i>The Ancient Sage</i>, +Tennyson said:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>Thou canst not prove the Nameless, O my son,</div> +<div>Nor canst thou prove the world thou movest in,</div> +<div>Thou canst not prove that thou art body alone,</div> +<div>Thou canst not prove that thou art spirit alone,</div> +<div>Nor canst thou prove that thou art both in one:</div> +<div>Nor canst thou prove thou art immortal, no,</div> +<div>Nor yet that thou art mortal—nay, my son,</div> +<div>Thou canst not prove that I, who speak with thee,</div> +<div>Am not thyself in converse with thyself,<a name="Page_34" id="Page_34" /></div> +<div>For nothing worthy proving can be proven,</div> +<div>Nor yet disproven: wherefore thou be wise,</div> +<div>Cleave ever to the sunnier side of doubt,</div> +<div>Cling to Faith beyond the forms of Faith!</div></div> +</div> + +<p>Yes, perhaps, as the Sage says, "nothing worthy +proving can be proven, nor yet disproven"; but can +we restrain that instinct which urges man to wish to +know, and above all to wish to know the things which +may conduce to life, to eternal life? Eternal life, not +eternal knowledge, as the Alexandrian gnostic said. +For living is one thing and knowing is another; and, +as we shall see, perhaps there is such an opposition +between the two that we may say that everything vital +is anti-rational, not merely irrational, and that everything +rational is anti-vital. And this is the basis of the +tragic sense of life.</p> + +<p>The defect of Descartes' <i>Discourse of Method</i> lies not +in the antecedent methodical doubt; not in his beginning +by resolving to doubt everything, a merely intellectual +device; but in his resolution to begin by emptying himself +of himself, of Descartes, of the real man, the man of +flesh and bone, the man who does not want to die, in +order that he might be a mere thinker—that is, an +abstraction. But the real man returned and thrust +himself into the philosophy.</p> + +<p>"<i>Le bon sens est la chose du monde la mieux +partagée</i>." Thus begins the <i>Discourse of Method</i>, and +this good sense saved him. He continues talking about +himself, about the man Descartes, telling us among +other things that he greatly esteemed eloquence and +loved poetry; that he delighted above all in mathematics +because of the evidence and certainty of its reasons, and +that he revered our theology and claimed as much as any +to attain to heaven—<i>et prétendais autant qu'aucun autre +à gagner le ciel</i>. And this pretension—a very laudable +one, I think, and above all very natural—was what +<a name="Page_35" id="Page_35" />prevented him from deducing all the consequences of +his methodical doubt. The man Descartes claimed, as +much as any other, to attain to heaven, "but having +learned as a thing very sure that the way to it is not less +open to the most ignorant than to the most learned, and +that the revealed truths which lead thither are beyond +our intelligence, I did not dare submit them to my feeble +reasonings, and I thought that to undertake to examine +them and to succeed therein, I should want some extraordinary +help from heaven and need to be more than +man." And here we have the man. Here we have the +man who "did not feel obliged, thank God, to make a +profession (<i>métier</i>) of science in order to increase his +means, and who did not pretend to play the cynic and +despise glory." And afterwards he tells us how he was +compelled to make a sojourn in Germany, and there, +shut up in a stove (<i>poêle</i>) he began to philosophize his +method. But in Germany, shut up in a stove! And +such his discourse is, a stove-discourse, and the stove +a German one, although the philosopher shut up in it +was a Frenchman who proposed to himself to attain to +heaven.</p> + +<p>And he arrives at the <i>cogito ergo sum</i>, which St. +Augustine had already anticipated; but the <i>ego</i> implicit +in this enthymeme, <i>ego cogito, ergo ego sum</i>, is an unreal—that +is, an ideal—<i>ego</i> or I, and its <i>sum</i>, its existence, +something unreal also. "I think, therefore I am," can +only mean "I think, therefore I am a thinker"; this +being of the "I am," which is deduced from "I think," +is merely a knowing; this being is knowledge, but not +life. And the primary reality is not that I think, but +that I live, for those also live who do not think. Although +this living may not be a real living. God! what contradictions +when we seek to join in wedlock life and +reason!</p> + +<p>The truth is <i>sum, ergo cogito</i>—I am, therefore I +think, although not everything that is thinks. Is not +<a name="Page_36" id="Page_36" />consciousness of thinking above all consciousness of +being? Is pure thought possible, without consciousness +of self, without personality? Can there exist pure +knowledge without feeling, without that species of +materiality which feeling lends to it? Do we not perhaps +feel thought, and do we not feel ourselves in the +act of knowing and willing? Could not the man in the +stove have said: "I feel, therefore I am"? or "I will, +therefore I am"? And to feel oneself, is it not perhaps +to feel oneself imperishable? To will oneself, is it not +to wish oneself eternal—that is to say, not to wish to +die? What the sorrowful Jew of Amsterdam called the +essence of the thing, the effort that it makes to persist +indefinitely in its own being, self-love, the longing for +immortality, is it not perhaps the primal and fundamental +condition of all reflective or human knowledge? +And is it not therefore the true base, the real starting-point, +of all philosophy, although the philosophers, +perverted by intellectualism, may not recognize it?</p> + +<p>And, moreover, it was the <i>cogito</i> that introduced a +distinction which, although fruitful of truths, has been +fruitful also of confusions, and this distinction is that +between object, <i>cogito</i>, and subject, <i>sum</i>. There is +scarcely any distinction that does not also lead to confusion. +But we will return to this later.</p> + +<p>For the present let us remain keenly suspecting that +the longing not to die, the hunger for personal immortality, +the effort whereby we tend to persist indefinitely +in our own being, which is, according to the tragic Jew, +our very essence, that this is the affective basis of all +knowledge and the personal inward starting-point of all +human philosophy, wrought by a man and for men. +And we shall see how the solution of this inward affective +problem, a solution which may be but the despairing +renunciation of the attempt at a solution, is that which +colours all the rest of philosophy. Underlying even the +so-called problem of knowledge there is simply this +<a name="Page_37" id="Page_37" />human feeling, just as underlying the enquiry into the +"why," the cause, there is simply the search for the +"wherefore," the end. All the rest is either to deceive +oneself or to wish to deceive others; and to wish to +deceive others in order to deceive oneself.</p> + +<p>And this personal and affective starting-point of all +philosophy and all religion is the tragic sense of life. +Let us now proceed to consider this.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTE:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10" /><a href="#FNanchor_10_10">[10]</a> <i>The Foundations of Belief, being Notes Introductory to the Study of +Theology</i>, by the Right Hon. Arthur James Balfour London, 1895: +"So it is with those persons who claim to show by their example that +naturalism is practically consistent with the maintenance of ethical ideals with +which naturalism has no natural affinity. Their spiritual life is parasitic: it is +sheltered by convictions which belong, not to them, but to the society of +which they form a part; it is nourished by processes in which they take no +share. And when those convictions decay, and those processes come to an +end, the alien life which they have maintained can scarce be expected to +outlast them" (Chap. iv.).</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38" /><a name="III" id="III" />III</h2> + +<h2>THE HUNGER OF IMMORTALITY</h2> + +<p>Let us pause to consider this immortal yearning for +immortality—even though the gnostics or intellectuals +may be able to say that what follows is not philosophy +but rhetoric. Moreover, the divine Plato, when he +discussed the immortality of the soul in his <i>Phædo</i>, said +that it was proper to clothe it in legend, <i>μυθολογειν</i>.</p> + +<p>First of all let us recall once again—and it will not be +for the last time—that saying of Spinoza that every +being endeavours to persist in itself, and that this +endeavour is its actual essence, and implies indefinite +time, and that the soul, in fine, sometimes with a clear +and distinct idea, sometimes confusedly, tends to persist +in its being with indefinite duration, and is aware of its +persistency (<i>Ethic</i>, Part III., Props. VI.-X.).</p> + +<p>It is impossible for us, in effect, to conceive of +ourselves as not existing, and no effort is capable of +enabling consciousness to realize absolute unconsciousness, +its own annihilation. Try, reader, to imagine to +yourself, when you are wide awake, the condition of your +soul when you are in a deep sleep; try to fill your consciousness +with the representation of no-consciousness, +and you will see the impossibility of it. The effort to +comprehend it causes the most tormenting dizziness. +We cannot conceive ourselves as not existing.</p> + +<p>The visible universe, the universe that is created by +the instinct of self-preservation, becomes all too narrow +for me. It is like a cramped cell, against the bars of +which my soul beats its wings in vain. Its lack of air +stifles me. More, more, and always more! I want to be +myself, and yet without ceasing to be myself to be others +<a name="Page_39" id="Page_39" />as well, to merge myself into the totality of things visible +and invisible, to extend myself into the illimitable of +space and to prolong myself into the infinite of time. +Not to be all and for ever is as if not to be—at least, let +me be my whole self, and be so for ever and ever. And +to be the whole of myself is to be everybody else. Either +all or nothing!</p> + +<p>All or nothing! And what other meaning can the +Shakespearean "To be or not to be" have, or that +passage in <i>Coriolanus</i> where it is said of Marcius "He +wants nothing of a god but eternity"? Eternity, +eternity!—that is the supreme desire! The thirst of +eternity is what is called love among men, and whosoever +loves another wishes to eternalize himself in him. +Nothing is real that is not eternal.</p> + +<p>From the poets of all ages and from the depths of +their souls this tremendous vision of the flowing away of +life like water has wrung bitter cries—from Pindar's +"dream of a shadow," <i>σκιας οναρ</i>, to Calderón's "life +is a dream" and Shakespeare's "we are such stuff as +dreams are made on," this last a yet more tragic sentence +than Calderón's, for whereas the Castilian only declares +that our life is a dream, but not that we ourselves are +the dreamers of it, the Englishman makes us ourselves +a dream, a dream that dreams.</p> + +<p>The vanity of the passing world and love are the two +fundamental and heart-penetrating notes of true poetry. +And they are two notes of which neither can be sounded +without causing the other to vibrate. The feeling of the +vanity of the passing world kindles love in us, the only +thing that triumphs over the vain and transitory, the +only thing that fills life again and eternalizes it. In +appearance at any rate, for in reality ... And love, +above all when it struggles against destiny, overwhelms +us with the feeling of the vanity of this world of appearances +and gives us a glimpse of another world, in which +destiny is overcome and liberty is law.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40" />Everything passes! Such is the refrain of those who +have drunk, lips to the spring, of the fountain of life, of +those who have tasted of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge +of good and evil.</p> + +<p>To be, to be for ever, to be without ending! thirst of +being, thirst of being more! hunger of God! thirst of +love eternalizing and eternal! to be for ever! to be God!</p> + +<p>"Ye shall be as gods!" we are told in Genesis that +the serpent said to the first pair of lovers (Gen. iii. 5). +"If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of +all men most miserable," wrote the Apostle (1 Cor. +xv. 19); and all religion has sprung historically from the +cult of the dead—that is to say, from the cult of +immortality.</p> + +<p>The tragic Portuguese Jew of Amsterdam wrote that +the free man thinks of nothing less than of death; but +this free man is a dead man, free from the impulse of +life, for want of love, the slave of his liberty. This +thought that I must die and the enigma of what will +come after death is the very palpitation of my consciousness. +When I contemplate the green serenity of the +fields or look into the depths of clear eyes through which +shines a fellow-soul, my consciousness dilates, I feel the +diastole of the soul and am bathed in the flood of the life +that flows about me, and I believe in my future; but +instantly the voice of mystery whispers to me, "Thou +shalt cease to be!" the angel of Death touches me with +his wing, and the systole of the soul floods the depths of +my spirit with the blood of divinity.</p> + +<p>Like Pascal, I do not understand those who assert +that they care not a farthing for these things, and this +indifference "in a matter that touches themselves, their +eternity, their all, exasperates me rather than moves me +to compassion, astonishes and shocks me," and he who +feels thus "is for me," as for Pascal, whose are the +words just quoted, "a monster."</p> + +<p>It has been said a thousand times and in a thousand +<a name="Page_41" id="Page_41" />books that ancestor-worship is for the most part the +source of primitive religions, and it may be strictly said +that what most distinguishes man from the other animals +is that, in one form or another, he guards his dead and +does not give them over to the neglect of teeming mother +earth; he is an animal that guards its dead. And from +what does he thus guard them? From what does he so +futilely protect them? The wretched consciousness +shrinks from its own annihilation, and, just as an +animal spirit, newly severed from the womb of the +world, finds itself confronted with the world and knows +itself distinct from it, so consciousness must needs +desire to possess another life than that of the world itself. +And so the earth would run the risk of becoming a vast +cemetery before the dead themselves should die again.</p> + +<p>When mud huts or straw shelters, incapable of resisting +the inclemency of the weather, sufficed for the living, +tumuli were raised for the dead, and stone was used for +sepulchres before it was used for houses. It is the +strong-builded houses of the dead that have withstood +the ages, not the houses of the living; not the temporary +lodgings but the permanent habitations.</p> + +<p>This cult, not of death but of immortality, originates +and preserves religions. In the midst of the delirium of +destruction, Robespierre induced the Convention to +declare the existence of the Supreme Being and "the +consolatory principle of the immortality of the soul," +the Incorruptible being dismayed at the idea of having +himself one day to turn to corruption.</p> + +<p>A disease? Perhaps; but he who pays no heed to his +disease is heedless of his health, and man is an animal +essentially and substantially diseased. A disease? +Perhaps it may be, like life itself to which it is thrall, +and perhaps the only health possible may be death; but +this disease is the fount of all vigorous health. From +the depth of this anguish, from the abyss of the feeling +of our mortality, we emerge into the light of another +<a name="Page_42" id="Page_42" />heaven, as from the depth of Hell Dante emerged to +behold the stars once again—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>e quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle.</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p>Although this meditation upon mortality may soon +induce in us a sense of anguish, it fortifies us in the end. +Retire, reader, into yourself and imagine a slow dissolution +of yourself—the light dimming about you—all +things becoming dumb and soundless, enveloping you +in silence—the objects that you handle crumbling away +between your hands—the ground slipping from under +your feet—your very memory vanishing as if in a swoon—everything +melting away from you into nothingness +and you yourself also melting away—the very consciousness +of nothingness, merely as the phantom harbourage +of a shadow, not even remaining to you.</p> + +<p>I have heard it related of a poor harvester who died in +a hospital bed, that when the priest went to anoint his +hands with the oil of extreme unction, he refused to open +his right hand, which clutched a few dirty coins, not +considering that very soon neither his hand nor he himself +would be his own any more. And so we close and +clench, not our hand, but our heart, seeking to clutch +the world in it.</p> + +<p>A friend confessed to me that, foreseeing while in the +full vigour of physical health the near approach of a +violent death, he proposed to concentrate his life and +spend the few days which he calculated still remained +to him in writing a book. Vanity of vanities!</p> + +<p>If at the death of the body which sustains me, and +which I call mine to distinguish it from the self that is +I, my consciousness returns to the absolute unconsciousness +from which it sprang, and if a like fate befalls all +my brothers in humanity, then is our toil-worn human +race nothing but a fatidical procession of phantoms, +going from nothingness to nothingness, and humanitarianism +the most inhuman thing known.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43" />And the remedy is not that suggested in the quatrain +that runs—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Cada vez que considero</i></div> +<div><i>que me tengo de morir,</i></div> +<div><i>tiendo la capa en el suelo</i></div> +<div><i>y no me harto de dormir.</i><a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11" /><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>No! The remedy is to consider our mortal destiny +without flinching, to fasten our gaze upon the gaze of +the Sphinx, for it is thus that the malevolence of its +spell is discharmed.</p> + +<p>If we all die utterly, wherefore does everything exist? +Wherefore? It is the Wherefore of the Sphinx; it is +the Wherefore that corrodes the marrow of the soul; it +is the begetter of that anguish which gives us the love +of hope.</p> + +<p>Among the poetic laments of the unhappy Cowper +there are some lines written under the oppression of +delirium, in which, believing himself to be the mark of +the Divine vengeance, he exclaims—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>Hell might afford my miseries a shelter.</div></div> +</div> + +<p>This is the Puritan sentiment, the preoccupation with +sin and predestination; but read the much more terrible +words of Sénancour, expressive of the Catholic, not the +Protestant, despair, when he makes his Obermann say, +"L'homme est périssable. Il se peut; mais périssons +en résistant, et, si le néant nous est réservé, ne faisons +pas que ce soit une justice." And I must confess, painful +though the confession be, that in the days of the +simple faith of my childhood, descriptions of the tortures +of hell, however terrible, never made me tremble, for I +always felt that nothingness was much more terrifying. +He who suffers lives, and he who lives suffering, even +though over the portal of his abode is written "Abandon +all hope!" loves and hopes. It is better to live in pain +<a name="Page_44" id="Page_44" />than to cease to be in peace. The truth is that I could +not believe in this atrocity of Hell, of an eternity of +punishment, nor did I see any more real hell than +nothingness and the prospect of it. And I continue in +the belief that if we all believed in our salvation from +nothingness we should all be better.</p> + +<p>What is this <i>joie de vivre</i> that they talk about nowadays? +Our hunger for God, our thirst of immortality, +of survival, will always stifle in us this pitiful enjoyment +of the life that passes and abides not. It is the frenzied +love of life, the love that would have life to be unending, +that most often urges us to long for death. "If it is +true that I am to die utterly," we say to ourselves, "then +once I am annihilated the world has ended so far as I +am concerned—it is finished. Why, then, should it not +end forthwith, so that no new consciousnesses, doomed +to suffer the tormenting illusion of a transient and +apparential existence, may come into being? If, the +illusion of living being shattered, living for the mere +sake of living or for the sake of others who are likewise +doomed to die, does not satisfy the soul, what is the +good of living? Our best remedy is death." And thus +it is that we chant the praises of the never-ending rest +because of our dread of it, and speak of liberating death.</p> + +<p>Leopardi, the poet of sorrow, of annihilation, having +lost the ultimate illusion, that of believing in his immortality—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div class='i2'><i>Peri l'inganno estremo</i></div> +<div><i>ch'eterno io mi credei</i>,</div></div> +</div> + +<p>spoke to his heart of <i>l'infinita vanitá del tutto</i>, and perceived +how close is the kinship between love and death, +and how "when love is born deep down in the heart, +simultaneously a languid and weary desire to die is felt +in the breast." The greater part of those who seek +death at their own hand are moved thereto by love; it +is the supreme longing for life, for more life, the longing +<a name="Page_45" id="Page_45" />to prolong and perpetuate life, that urges them to death, +once they are persuaded of the vanity of this longing.</p> + +<p>The problem is tragic and eternal, and the more we +seek to escape from it, the more it thrusts itself upon us. +Four-and-twenty centuries ago, in his dialogue on the +immortality of the soul, the serene Plato—but was he +serene?—spoke of the uncertainty of our dream of being +immortal and of the <i>risk</i> that the dream might be vain, +and from his own soul there escaped this profound cry—Glorious +is the risk!—<i>καλος γαρ ο κινδυνος</i>, glorious is +the risk that we are able to run of our souls never +dying—a sentence that was the germ of Pascal's famous +argument of the wager.</p> + +<p>Faced with this risk, I am presented with arguments +designed to eliminate it, arguments demonstrating the +absurdity of the belief in the immortality of the soul; +but these arguments fail to make any impression upon +me, for they are reasons and nothing more than reasons, +and it is not with reasons that the heart is appeased. I +do not want to die—no; I neither want to die nor do I +want to want to die; I want to live for ever and ever and +ever. I want this "I" to live—this poor "I" that I +am and that I feel myself to be here and now, and therefore +the problem of the duration of my soul, of my own +soul, tortures me.</p> + +<p>I am the centre of my universe, the centre of the +universe, and in my supreme anguish I cry with Michelet, +"Mon moi, ils m'arrachent mon moi!" What is a man +profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own +soul? (Matt. xvi. 26). Egoism, you say? There is +nothing more universal than the individual, for what is +the property of each is the property of all. Each man is +worth more than the whole of humanity, nor will it do to +sacrifice each to all save in so far as all sacrifice themselves +to each. That which we call egoism is the principle +of psychic gravity, the necessary postulate. "Love +thy neighbour as thyself," we are told, the presupposi<a name="Page_46" id="Page_46" />tion +being that each man loves himself; and it is not +said "Love thyself." And, nevertheless, we do not +know how to love ourselves.</p> + +<p>Put aside the persistence of your own self and ponder +what they tell you. Sacrifice yourself to your children! +And sacrifice yourself to them because they are yours, +part and prolongation of yourself, and they in their turn +will sacrifice themselves to their children, and these +children to theirs, and so it will go on without end, a +sterile sacrifice by which nobody profits. I came into +the world to create my self, and what is to become of all +our selves? Live for the True, the Good, the Beautiful! +We shall see presently the supreme vanity and the +supreme insincerity of this hypocritical attitude.</p> + +<p>"That art thou!" they tell me with the Upanishads. +And I answer: Yes, I am that, if that is I and all is mine, +and mine the totality of things. As mine I love the All, +and I love my neighbour because he lives in me and is +part of my consciousness, because he is like me, because +he is mine.</p> + +<p>Oh, to prolong this blissful moment, to sleep, to +eternalize oneself in it! Here and now, in this discreet +and diffused light, in this lake of quietude, the storm of +the heart appeased and stilled the echoes of the world! +Insatiable desire now sleeps and does not even dream; +use and wont, blessed use and wont, are the rule of my +eternity; my disillusions have died with my memories, +and with my hopes my fears.</p> + +<p>And they come seeking to deceive us with a deceit of +deceits, telling us that nothing is lost, that everything is +transformed, shifts and changes, that not the least +particle of matter is annihilated, not the least impulse of +energy is lost, and there are some who pretend to console +us with this! Futile consolation! It is not my matter +or my energy that is the cause of my disquiet, for they +are not mine if I myself am not mine—that is, if I am not +eternal. No, my longing is not to be submerged in the +<a name="Page_47" id="Page_47" />vast All, in an infinite and eternal Matter or Energy, or +in God; not to be possessed by God, but to possess Him, +to become myself God, yet without ceasing to be I myself, +I who am now speaking to you. Tricks of monism +avail us nothing; we crave the substance and not the +shadow of immortality.</p> + +<p>Materialism, you say? Materialism? Without doubt; +but either our spirit is likewise some kind of matter or it +is nothing. I dread the idea of having to tear myself +away from my flesh; I dread still more the idea of having +to tear myself away from everything sensible and +material, from all substance. Yes, perhaps this merits +the name of materialism; and if I grapple myself to God +with all my powers and all my senses, it is that He may +carry me in His arms beyond death, looking into these +eyes of mine with the light of His heaven when the light +of earth is dimming in them for ever. Self-illusion? +Talk not to me of illusion—let me live!</p> + +<p>They also call this pride—"stinking pride" Leopardi +called it—and they ask us who are we, vile earthworms, +to pretend to immortality; in virtue of what? wherefore? +by what right? "In virtue of what?" you ask; and +I reply, In virtue of what do we now live? "Wherefore?"—and +wherefore do we now exist? "By what +right?"—and by what right are we? To exist is just as +gratuitous as to go on existing for ever. Do not let us +talk of merit or of right or of the wherefore of our longing, +which is an end in itself, or we shall lose our reason +in a vortex of absurdities. I do not claim any right or +merit; it is only a necessity; I need it in order to live.</p> + +<p>And you, who are you? you ask me; and I reply with +Obermann, "For the universe, nothing; for myself, +everything!" Pride? Is it pride to want to be immortal? +Unhappy men that we are! 'Tis a tragic fate, +without a doubt, to have to base the affirmation of +immortality upon the insecure and slippery foundation +of the desire for immortality; but to condemn this +<a name="Page_48" id="Page_48" />desire on the ground that we believe it to have been +proved to be unattainable, without undertaking the proof, +is merely supine. I am dreaming ...? Let me dream, +if this dream is my life. Do not awaken me from it. I +believe in the immortal origin of this yearning for immortality, +which is the very substance of my soul. But +do I really believe in it ...? And wherefore do you +want to be immortal? you ask me, wherefore? Frankly, +I do not understand the question, for it is to ask the +reason of the reason, the end of the end, the principle of +the principle.</p> + +<p>But these are things which it is impossible to discuss.</p> + +<p>It is related in the book of the Acts of the Apostles +how wherever Paul went the Jews, moved with envy, were +stirred up to persecute him. They stoned him in +Iconium and Lystra, cities of Lycaonia, in spite of the +wonders that he worked therein; they scourged him in +Philippi of Macedonia and persecuted his brethren in +Thessalonica and Berea. He arrived at Athens, however, +the noble city of the intellectuals, over which +brooded the sublime spirit of Plato—the Plato of the +gloriousness of the risk of immortality; and there Paul +disputed with Epicureans and Stoics. And some said of +him, "What doth this babbler (<i>σπερμολογος</i>) mean?" +and others, "He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange +gods" (Acts xvii. 18), "and they took him and brought +him unto Areopagus, saying, May we know what this +new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is? for thou +bringest certain strange things to our ears; we would +know, therefore, what these things mean" (verses 19-20). +And then follows that wonderful characterization of those +Athenians of the decadence, those dainty connoisseurs of +the curious, "for all the Athenians and strangers which +were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to +tell or to hear some new thing" (verse 21). A wonderful +stroke which depicts for us the condition of mind of those +who had learned from the <i>Odyssey</i> that the gods plot and +<a name="Page_49" id="Page_49" />achieve the destruction of mortals in order that their +posterity may have something to narrate!</p> + +<p>Here Paul stands, then, before the subtle Athenians, +before the <i>græuli</i>, men of culture and tolerance, who +are ready to welcome and examine every doctrine, who +neither stone nor scourge nor imprison any man for professing +these or those doctrines—here he stands where +liberty of conscience is respected and every opinion is +given an attentive hearing. And he raises his voice in +the midst of the Areopagus and speaks to them as it was +fitting to speak to the cultured citizens of Athens, and all +listen to him, agog to hear the latest novelty. But when +he begins to speak to them of the resurrection of the dead +their stock of patience and tolerance comes to an end, +and some mock him, and others say: "We will hear +thee again of this matter!" intending not to hear him. +And a similar thing happened to him at Cæsarea when +he came before the Roman prætor Felix, likewise a +broad-minded and cultured man, who mitigated the hardships +of his imprisonment, and wished to hear and did hear +him discourse of righteousness and of temperance; but +when he spoke of the judgement to come, Felix said, +terrified (<i>εμφοβος γενομενος</i>): "Go thy way for this time; +when I have a convenient season I will call for thee" +(Acts xxiv. 22-25). And in his audience before King +Agrippa, when Festus the governor heard him speak of +the resurrection of the dead, he exclaimed: "Thou art +mad, Paul; much learning hath made thee mad" (Acts xxvi. 24).</p> + +<p>Whatever of truth there may have been in Paul's discourse +in the Areopagus, and even if there were none, it +is certain that this admirable account plainly shows how +far Attic tolerance goes and where the patience of the +intellectuals ends. They all listen to you, calmly and +smilingly, and at times they encourage you, saying: +"That's strange!" or, "He has brains!" or "That's +suggestive," or "How fine!" or "Pity that a thing so +<a name="Page_50" id="Page_50" />beautiful should not be true!" or "this makes one +think!" But as soon as you speak to them of resurrection +and life after death, they lose their patience and cut +short your remarks and exclaim, "Enough of this! we +will talk about this another day!" And it is about this, +my poor Athenians, my intolerant intellectuals, it is +about this that I am going to talk to you here.</p> + +<p>And even if this belief be absurd, why is its exposition +less tolerated than that of others much more absurd? +Why this manifest hostility to such a belief? Is it fear? +Is it, perhaps, spite provoked by inability to share it?</p> + +<p>And sensible men, those who do not intend to let themselves +be deceived, keep on dinning into our ears the +refrain that it is no use giving way to folly and kicking +against the pricks, for what cannot be is impossible. +The manly attitude, they say, is to resign oneself to fate; +since we are not immortal, do not let us want to be so; +let us submit ourselves to reason without tormenting +ourselves about what is irremediable, and so making life +more gloomy and miserable. This obsession, they add, +is a disease. Disease, madness, reason ... the +everlasting refrain! Very well then—No! I do not submit +to reason, and I rebel against it, and I persist in creating +by the energy of faith my immortalizing God, and in +forcing by my will the stars out of their courses, for if +we had faith as a grain of mustard seed we should say +to that mountain, "Remove hence," and it would +remove, and nothing would be impossible to us (Matt. xvii. 20).</p> + +<p>There you have that "thief of energies," as he<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12" /><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> so +obtusely called Christ who sought to wed nihilism with +the struggle for existence, and he talks to you about +courage. His heart craved the eternal all while his head +convinced him of nothingness, and, desperate and mad +to defend himself from himself, he cursed that which he +<a name="Page_51" id="Page_51" />most loved. Because he could not be Christ, he blasphemed +against Christ. Bursting with his own self, he +wished himself unending and dreamed his theory of +eternal recurrence, a sorry counterfeit of immortality, +and, full of pity for himself, he abominated all pity. And +there are some who say that his is the philosophy of +strong men! No, it is not. My health and my strength +urge me to perpetuate myself. His is the doctrine of +weaklings who aspire to be strong, but not of the strong +who are strong. Only the feeble resign themselves to +final death and substitute some other desire for the longing +for personal immortality. In the strong the zeal for +perpetuity overrides the doubt of realizing it, and their +superabundance of life overflows upon the other side of +death.</p> + +<p>Before this terrible mystery of mortality, face to face +with the Sphinx, man adopts different attitudes and seeks +in various ways to console himself for having been born. +And now it occurs to him to take it as a diversion, and +he says to himself with Renan that this universe is a +spectacle that God presents to Himself, and that it +behoves us to carry out the intentions of the great Stage-Manager +and contribute to make the spectacle the most +brilliant and the most varied that may be. And they +have made a religion of art, a cure for the metaphysical +evil, and invented the meaningless phrase of art for art's +sake.</p> + +<p>And it does not suffice them. If the man who tells you +that he writes, paints, sculptures, or sings for his own +amusement, gives his work to the public, he lies; he lies +if he puts his name to his writing, painting, statue, or +song. He wishes, at the least, to leave behind a shadow +of his spirit, something that may survive him. If the +<i>Imitation of Christ</i> is anonymous, it is because its author +sought the eternity of the soul and did not trouble himself +about that of the name. The man of letters who +shall tell you that he despises fame is a lying rascal. +<a name="Page_52" id="Page_52" />Of Dante, the author of those three-and-thirty vigorous +verses (<i>Purg.</i> xi. 85-117) on the vanity of worldly glory, +Boccaccio says that he relished honours and pomps more +perhaps than suited with his conspicuous virtue. The +keenest desire of his condemned souls is that they may be +remembered and talked of here on earth, and this is the +chief solace that lightens the darkness of his Inferno. +And he himself confessed that his aim in expounding the +concept of Monarchy was not merely that he might be of +service to others, but that he might win for his own glory +the palm of so great prize (<i>De Monarchia</i>, lib. i., cap. i.). +What more? Even of that holy man, seemingly the +most indifferent to worldly vanity, the Poor Little One +of Assisi, it is related in the <i>Legenda Trium Sociorum</i> +that he said: <i>Adhuc adorabor per totum mundum!</i>—You +will see how I shall yet be adored by all the world! +(II. <i>Celano</i>, i. 1). And even of God Himself the +theologians say that He created the world for the manifestation +of His glory.</p> + +<p>When doubts invade us and cloud our faith in the +immortality of the soul, a vigorous and painful impulse +is given to the anxiety to perpetuate our name and fame, +to grasp at least a shadow of immortality. And hence +this tremendous struggle to singularize ourselves, to +survive in some way in the memory of others and of +posterity. It is this struggle, a thousand times more +terrible than the struggle for life, that gives its tone, +colour, and character to our society, in which the +medieval faith in the immortal soul is passing away. +Each one seeks to affirm himself, if only in appearance.</p> + +<p>Once the needs of hunger are satisfied—and they are +soon satisfied—the vanity, the necessity—for it is a necessity—arises +of imposing ourselves upon and surviving +in others. Man habitually sacrifices his life to his purse, +but he sacrifices his purse to his vanity. He boasts even +of his weaknesses and his misfortunes, for want of anything +better to boast of, and is like a child who, in order +<a name="Page_53" id="Page_53" />to attract attention, struts about with a bandaged finger. +And vanity, what is it but eagerness for survival?</p> + +<p>The vain man is in like case with the avaricious—he +takes the means for the end; forgetting the end he +pursues the means for its own sake and goes no further. +The seeming to be something, conducive to being it, +ends by forming our objective. We need that others +should believe in our superiority to them in order that +we may believe in it ourselves, and upon their belief base +our faith in our own persistence, or at least in the persistence +of our fame. We are more grateful to him who +congratulates us on the skill with which we defend a +cause than we are to him who recognizes the truth or +the goodness of the cause itself. A rabid mania for +originality is rife in the modern intellectual world and +characterizes all individual effort. We would rather err +with genius than hit the mark with the crowd. Rousseau +has said in his <i>Émile</i> (book iv.): "Even though philosophers +should be in a position to discover the truth, +which of them would take any interest in it? Each one +knows well that his system is not better founded than +the others, but he supports it because it is his. There is +not a single one of them who, if he came to know the true +and the false, would not prefer the falsehood that he had +found to the truth discovered by another. Where is the +philosopher who would not willingly deceive mankind +for his own glory? Where is he who in the secret of his +heart does not propose to himself any other object than +to distinguish himself? Provided that he lifts himself +above the vulgar, provided that he outshines the brilliance +of his competitors, what does he demand more? +The essential thing is to think differently from others. +With believers he is an atheist; with atheists he would be +a believer." How much substantial truth there is in +these gloomy confessions of this man of painful sincerity!</p> + +<p>This violent struggle for the perpetuation of our name +extends backwards into the past, just as it aspires to +<a name="Page_54" id="Page_54" />conquer the future; we contend with the dead because +we, the living, are obscured beneath their shadow. We +are jealous of the geniuses of former times, whose names, +standing out like the landmarks of history, rescue the +ages from oblivion. The heaven of fame is not very +large, and the more there are who enter it the less is the +share of each. The great names of the past rob us of our +place in it; the space which they fill in the popular +memory they usurp from us who aspire to occupy it. +And so we rise up in revolt against them, and hence the +bitterness with which all those who seek after fame in the +world of letters judge those who have already attained it +and are in enjoyment of it. If additions continue to be +made to the wealth of literature, there will come a day +of sifting, and each one fears lest he be caught in the +meshes of the sieve. In attacking the masters, irreverent +youth is only defending itself; the iconoclast or image-breaker +is a Stylite who erects himself as an image, an +<i>icon</i>. "Comparisons are odious," says the familiar +adage, and the reason is that we wish to be unique. Do +not tell Fernandez that he is one of the most talented +Spaniards of the younger generation, for though he will +affect to be gratified by the eulogy he is really annoyed +by it; if, however, you tell him that he is the most +talented man in Spain—well and good! But even that +is not sufficient: one of the worldwide reputations would +be more to his liking, but he is only fully satisfied with +being esteemed the first in all countries and all ages. +The more alone, the nearer to that unsubstantial immortality, +the immortality of the name, for great names +diminish one another.</p> + +<p>What is the meaning of that irritation which we feel +when we believe that we are robbed of a phrase, or a +thought, or an image, which we believed to be our own, +when we are plagiarized? Robbed? Can it indeed be +ours once we have given it to the public? Only because +it is ours we prize it; and we are fonder of the false money +<a name="Page_55" id="Page_55" />that preserves our impress than of the coin of pure gold +from which our effigy and our legend has been effaced. +It very commonly happens that it is when the name of a +writer is no longer in men's mouths that he most influences +his public, his mind being then disseminated +and infused in the minds of those who have read him, +whereas he was quoted chiefly when his thoughts and +sayings, clashing with those generally received, needed +the guarantee of a name. What was his now belongs to +all, and he lives in all. But for him the garlands have +faded, and he believes himself to have failed. He hears +no more either the applause or the silent tremor of the +heart of those who go on reading him. Ask any sincere +artist which he would prefer, whether that his work +should perish and his memory survive, or that his work +should survive and his memory perish, and you will see +what he will tell you, if he is really sincere. When a +man does not work merely in order to live and carry on, +he works in order to survive. To work for the work's +sake is not work but play. And play? We will talk +about that later on.</p> + +<p>A tremendous passion is this longing that our memory +may be rescued, if it is possible, from the oblivion which +overtakes others. From it springs envy, the cause, +according to the biblical narrative, of the crime with +which human history opened: the murder of Abel by his +brother Cain. It was not a struggle for bread—it was a +struggle to survive in God, in the divine memory. Envy +is a thousand times more terrible than hunger, for it is +spiritual hunger. If what we call the problem of life, +the problem of bread, were once solved, the earth would +be turned into a hell by the emergence in a more violent +form of the struggle for survival.</p> + +<p>For the sake of a name man is ready to sacrifice not +only life but happiness—life as a matter of course. "Let +me die, but let my fame live!" exclaimed Rodrigo Arias +in <i>Las Mocedades del Cid</i> when he fell mortally wounded +<a name="Page_56" id="Page_56" />by Don Ordóñez de Lara. "Courage, Girolamo, for +you will long be remembered; death is bitter, but fame +eternal!" cried Girolamo Olgiati, the disciple of Cola +Montano and the murderer, together with his fellow-conspirators +Lampugnani and Visconti, of Galeazzo +Sforza, tyrant of Milan. And there are some who covet +even the gallows for the sake of acquiring fame, even +though it be an infamous fame: <i>avidus malæ famæ</i>, as +Tacitus says.</p> + +<p>And this erostratism, what is it at bottom but the longing +for immortality, if not for substantial and concrete +immortality, at any rate for the shadowy immortality of +the name?</p> + +<p>And in this there are degrees. If a man despises the +applause of the crowd of to-day, it is because he seeks to +survive in renewed minorities for generations. "Posterity +is an accumulation of minorities," said Gounod. +He wishes to prolong himself in time rather than in +space. The crowd soon overthrows its own idols and +the statue lies broken at the foot of the pedestal without +anyone heeding it; but those who win the hearts of the +elect will long be the objects of a fervent worship in +some shrine, small and secluded no doubt, but capable +of preserving them from the flood of oblivion. The +artist sacrifices the extensiveness of his fame to its +duration; he is anxious rather to endure for ever in some +little corner than to occupy a brilliant second place in the +whole universe; he prefers to be an atom, eternal and +conscious of himself, rather than to be for a brief moment +the consciousness of the whole universe; he sacrifices +infinitude to eternity.</p> + +<p>And they keep on wearying our ears with this chorus +of Pride! stinking Pride! Pride, to wish to leave an +ineffaceable name? Pride? It is like calling the thirst +for riches a thirst for pleasure. No, it is not so much the +longing for pleasure that drives us poor folk to seek +money as the terror of poverty, just as it was not the +<a name="Page_57" id="Page_57" />desire for glory but the terror of hell that drove men in +the Middle Ages to the cloister with its <i>acedia</i>. Neither +is this wish to leave a name pride, but terror of extinction. +We aim at being all because in that we see the +only means of escaping from being nothing. We wish +to save our memory—at any rate, our memory. How +long will it last? At most as long as the human race +lasts. And what if we shall save our memory in God?</p> + +<p>Unhappy, I know well, are these confessions; but from +the depth of unhappiness springs new life, and only by +draining the lees of spiritual sorrow can we at last taste +the honey that lies at the bottom of the cup of life. +Anguish leads us to consolation.</p> + +<p>This thirst for eternal life is appeased by many, +especially by the simple, at the fountain of religious +faith; but to drink of this is not given to all. The +institution whose primordial end is to protect this faith +in the personal immortality of the soul is Catholicism; +but Catholicism has sought to rationalize this faith by +converting religion into theology, by offering a philosophy, +and a philosophy of the thirteenth century, as a +basis for vital belief. This and its consequences we +will now proceed to examine.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11" /><a href="#FNanchor_11_11">[11]</a> Each time that I consider that it is my lot to die, I spread my cloak upon +the ground and am never surfeited with sleeping.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12" /><a href="#FNanchor_12_12">[12]</a> Nietzsche.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58" /><a name="IV" id="IV" />IV</h2> + +<h2>THE ESSENCE OF CATHOLICISM</h2> + +<p>Let us now approach the Christian, Catholic, Pauline, +or Athanasian solution of our inward vital problem, the +hunger of immortality.</p> + +<p>Christianity sprang from the confluence of two mighty +spiritual streams—the one Judaic, the other Hellenic—each +of which had already influenced the other, and +Rome finally gave it a practical stamp and social +permanence.</p> + +<p>It has been asserted, perhaps somewhat precipitately, +that primitive Christianity was an-eschatological, that +faith in another life after death is not clearly manifested +in it, but rather a belief in the proximate end of the +world and establishment of the kingdom of God, a +belief known as chiliasm. But were they not fundamentally +one and the same thing? Faith in the immortality +of the soul, the nature of which was not perhaps +very precisely defined, may be said to be a kind of +tacit understanding or supposition underlying the whole +of the Gospel; and it is the mental orientation of many of +those who read it to-day, an orientation contrary to that +of the Christians from among whom the Gospel sprang, +that prevents them from seeing this. Without doubt all +that about the second coming of Christ, when he shall +come among the clouds, clothed with majesty and great +power, to judge the quick and the dead, to open to some +the kingdom of heaven and to cast others into Gehenna, +where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, may +be understood in a chiliastic sense; and it is even said of +Christ in the Gospel (Mark ix. I), that there were with +<a name="Page_59" id="Page_59" />him some who should not taste of death till they had +seen the kingdom of God—that is, that the kingdom +should come during their generation. And in the same +chapter, verse 10, it is said of Peter and James and John, +who went up with Jesus to the Mount of Transfiguration +and heard him say that he would rise again from the +dead, that "they kept that saying within themselves, +questioning one with another what the rising from the +dead should mean." And at all events the Gospel was +written when this belief, the basis and <i>raison d'être</i> +of Christianity, was in process of formation. See +Matt. xxii. 29-32; Mark xii. 24-27; Luke xvi. 22-31; +xx. 34-37; John v. 24-29; vi. 40, 54, 58; viii. 51; xi. 25, 56; +xiv. 2, 19. And, above all, that passage in Matt. xxvii. 52, +which tells how at the resurrection of Christ "many +bodies of the saints which slept arose."</p> + +<p>And this was not a natural resurrection. No; the +Christian faith was born of the faith that Jesus did not +remain dead, but that God raised him up again, and +that this resurrection was a fact; but this did not presuppose +a mere immortality of the soul in the philosophical +sense (see Harnack, <i>Dogmengeschichte</i>, Prolegomena, +v. 4). For the first Fathers of the Church +themselves the immortality of the soul was not a thing +pertaining to the natural order; the teaching of the +Divine Scriptures, as Nimesius said, sufficed for its +demonstration, and it was, according to Lactantius, a +gift—and as such gratuitous—of God. But more of this +later.</p> + +<p>Christianity sprang, as we have said, from two great +spiritual streams—the Judaic and the Hellenic—each one +of which had arrived on its account, if not at a precise +definition of, at any rate at a definite yearning for, +another life. Among the Jews faith in another life was +neither general nor clear; but they were led to it by faith +in a personal and living God, the formation of which +faith comprises all their spiritual history.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60" />Jahwé, the Judaic God, began by being one god among +many others—the God of the people of Israel, revealed +among the thunders of the tempest on Mount Sinai. +But he was so jealous that he demanded that worship +should be paid to him alone, and it was by way of monocultism +that the Jews arrived at monotheism. He was +adored as a living force, not as a metaphysical entity, +and he was the god of battles. But this God of social +and martial origin, to whose genesis we shall have to +return later, became more inward and personal in the +prophets, and in becoming more inward and personal he +thereby became more individual and more universal. He +is the Jahwé who, instead of loving Israel because Israel +is his son, takes Israel for a son because he loves him +(Hosea xi. 1). And faith in the personal God, in the +Father of men, carries with it faith in the eternalization +of the individual man—a faith which had already dawned +in Pharisaism even before Christ.</p> + +<p>Hellenic culture, on its side, ended by discovering +death; and to discover death is to discover the hunger of +immortality. This longing does not appear in the +Homeric poems, which are not initial, but final, in their +character, marking not the start but the close of a +civilization. They indicate the transition from the old +religion of Nature, of Zeus, to the more spiritual religion +of Apollo—of redemption. But the popular and inward +religion of the Eleusinian mysteries, the worship of souls +and ancestors, always persisted underneath. "In so far +as it is possible to speak of a Delphic theology, among +its more important elements must be counted the belief +in the continuation of the life of souls after death in its +popular forms, and in the worship of the souls of the +dead."<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13" /><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> There were the Titanic and the Dionysiac +<a name="Page_61" id="Page_61" />elements, and it was the duty of man, according to the +Orphic doctrine, to free himself from the fetters of the +body, in which the soul was like a captive in a prison (see +Rohde, <i>Psyche</i>, "Die Orphiker," 4). The Nietzschean +idea of eternal recurrence is an Orphic idea. But the +idea of the immortality of the soul was not a philosophical +principle. The attempt of Empedocles to harmonize a +hylozoistic system with spiritualism proved that a philosophical +natural science cannot by itself lead to a corroboration +of the axiom of the perpetuity of the individual +soul; it could only serve as a support to a theological +speculation. It was by a contradiction that the first +Greek philosophers affirmed immortality, by abandoning +natural philosophy and intruding into theology, by +formulating not an Apollonian but a Dionysiac and +Orphic dogma. But "an immortality of the soul as +such, in virtue of its own nature and condition as +an imperishable divine force in the mortal body, was +never an object of popular Hellenic belief" (Rohde, +<i>op. cit.</i>).</p> + +<p>Recall the <i>Phædo</i> of Plato and the neo-platonic lucubrations. +In them the yearning for personal immortality +already shows itself—a yearning which, as it was left +totally unsatisfied by reason, produced the Hellenic +pessimism. For, as Pfleiderer very well observes +(<i>Religionsphilosophie auf geschichtliche Grundlage</i>, 3. +Berlin, 1896), "no people ever came upon the earth so +serene and sunny as the Greeks in the youthful days of +their historical existence ... but no people changed so +completely their idea of the value of life. The Hellenism +which ended in the religious speculations of neo-pythagorism +and neo-platonism viewed this world, which had +once appeared to it so joyous and radiant, as an abode +of darkness and error, and earthly existence as a period +of trial which could never be too quickly traversed." +Nirvana is an Hellenic idea.</p> + +<p>Thus Jews and Greeks each arrived independently at +<a name="Page_62" id="Page_62" />the real discovery of death—a discovery which occasions, +in peoples as in men, the entrance into spiritual puberty, +the realization of the tragic sense of life, and it is then +that the living God is begotten by humanity. The discovery +of death is that which reveals God to us, and the +death of the perfect man, Christ, was the supreme revelation +of death, being the death of the man who ought not +to have died yet did die.</p> + +<p>Such a discovery—that of immortality—prepared as it +was by the Judaic and Hellenic religious processes, was +a specifically Christian discovery. And its full achievement +was due above all to Paul of Tarsus, the hellenizing +Jew and Pharisee. Paul had not personally known +Jesus, and hence he discovered him as Christ. "It may +be said that the theology of the Apostle Paul is, in +general, the first Christian theology. For him it was a +necessity; it was, in a certain sense, his substitution for +the lack of a personal knowledge of Jesus," says Weizsäcker +(<i>Das apostolische Zeitalter der christlichen Kirche</i>. +Freiburg-i.-B., 1892). He did not know Jesus, but he +felt him born again in himself, and thus he could say, +"Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me."<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14" /><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> +And he preached the Cross, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, +and unto the Greeks foolishness (I Cor. i. 23), and +the central doctrine for the converted Apostle was that of +the resurrection of Christ. The important thing for him was +that Christ had been made man and had died and had +risen again, and not what he did in his life—not his +ethical work as a teacher, but his religious work as a +giver of immortality. And he it was who wrote those +immortal words: "Now if Christ be preached that He +rose from the dead, how say some among you that there +is no resurrection from the dead? But if there be no +resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen; and if +Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your +faith is also vain.... Then they also which are fallen +<a name="Page_63" id="Page_63" />asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we +have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable" +(I Cor. xv. 12-19).</p> + +<p>And it is possible to affirm that thenceforward he who +does not believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ may +be Christophile but cannot be specifically Christian. It +is true that a Justin Martyr could say that "all those are +Christians who live in accordance with reason, even +though they may be deemed to be atheists, as, among +the Greeks, Socrates and Heraclitus and other such"; +but this martyr, is he a martyr—that is to say a witness—of +Christianity? No.</p> + +<p>And it was around this dogma, inwardly experienced +by Paul, the dogma of the resurrection and immortality +of Christ, the guarantee of the resurrection and immortality +of each believer, that the whole of Christology was +built up. The God-man, the incarnate Word, came in +order that man, according to his mode, might be made +God—that is, immortal. And the Christian God, the +Father of Christ, a God necessarily anthropomorphic, is +He who—as the Catechism of Christian Doctrine which +we were made to learn by heart at school says—created +the world for man, for each man. And the end of +redemption, in spite of appearances due to an ethical +deflection of a dogma properly religious, was to save us +from death rather than from sin, or from sin in so far as +sin implies death. And Christ died, or rather rose +again, for <i>me</i>, for each one of us. And a certain +solidarity was established between God and His creature. +Malebranche said that the first man fell <i>in order that</i> +Christ might redeem us, rather than that Christ redeemed +us <i>because</i> man had fallen.</p> + +<p>After the death of Paul years passed, and generations +of Christianity wrought upon this central dogma and its +consequences in order to safeguard faith in the immortality +of the individual soul, and the Council of Nicæa +came, and with it the formidable Athanasius, whose +<a name="Page_64" id="Page_64" />name is still a battle-cry, an incarnation of the popular +faith. Athanasius was a man of little learning but of +great faith, and above all of popular faith, devoured by +the hunger of immortality. And he opposed Arianism, +which, like Unitarian and Socinian Protestantism, +threatened, although unknowingly and unintentionally, +the foundation of that belief. For the Arians, Christ +was first and foremost a teacher—a teacher of morality, +the wholly perfect man, and therefore the guarantee that +we may all attain to supreme perfection; but Athanasius +felt that Christ cannot make us gods if he has not first +made himself God; if his Divinity had been communicated, +he could not have communicated it to us. "He +was not, therefore," he said, "first man and then +became God; but He was first God and then became man +in order that He might the better deify us (<i>θεοποιηση</i>)" +(<i>Orat.</i> i. 39). It was not the Logos of the philosophers, +the cosmological Logos, that Athanasius knew and +adored;<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15" /><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> and thus he instituted a separation between +nature and revelation. The Athanasian or Nicene +Christ, who is the Catholic Christ, is not the cosmological, +nor even, strictly, the ethical Christ; he is the +eternalizing, the deifying, the religious Christ. Harnack +says of this Christ, the Christ of Nicene or Catholic +Christology, that he is essentially docetic—that is, +apparential—because the process of the divinization of +the man in Christ was made in the interests of eschatology. +But which is the real Christ? Is it, indeed, that +so-called historical Christ of rationalist exegesis who is +diluted for us in a myth or in a social atom?</p> + +<p>This same Harnack, a Protestant rationalist, tells us +that Arianism or Unitarianism would have been the +death of Christianity, reducing it to cosmology and +ethics, and that it served only as a bridge whereby the +<a name="Page_65" id="Page_65" />learned might pass over to Catholicism—that is to say, +from reason to faith. To this same learned historian +of dogmas it appears to be an indication of a perverse +state of things that the man Athanasius, who saved +Christianity as the religion of a living communion with +God, should have obliterated the Jesus of Nazareth, the +historical Jesus, whom neither Paul nor Athanasius +knew personally, nor yet Harnack himself. Among +Protestants, this historical Jesus is subjected to the +scalpel of criticism, while the Catholic Christ lives, the +really historical Christ, he who lives throughout the +centuries guaranteeing the faith in personal immortality +and personal salvation.</p> + +<p>And Athanasius had the supreme audacity of faith, +that of asserting things mutually contradictory: "The +complete contradiction that exists in the <i>ομοονσιος</i> carried +in its train a whole army of contradictions which increased +as thought advanced," says Harnack. Yes, so it +was, and so it had to be. And he adds: "Dogma took +leave for ever of clear thinking and tenable concepts, and +habituated itself to the contra-rational." In truth, it +drew closer to life, which is contra-rational and opposed +to clear thinking. Not only are judgements of worth +never rationalizable—they are anti-rational.</p> + +<p>At Nicæa, then, as afterwards at the Vatican, victory +rested with the idiots—taking this word in its proper, +primitive, and etymological sense—the simple-minded, +the rude and headstrong bishops, the representatives of +the genuine human spirit, the popular spirit, the spirit +that does not want to die, in spite of whatever reason may +say, and that seeks a guarantee, the most material possible, +for this desire.</p> + +<p><i>Quid ad æternitatem?</i> This is the capital question. +And the Creed ends with that phrase, <i>resurrectionem +mortuorum et vitam venturi sæculi</i>—the resurrection of +the dead and the life of the world to come. In the ceme<a name="Page_66" id="Page_66" />tery +of Mallona, in my native town of Bilbao, there is a +tombstone on which this verse is carved:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Aunque estamos en polvo convertidos,</i></div> +<div><i>en Ti, Señor, nuestra esperanza fía,</i></div> +<div><i>que tornaremos a vivir vestidos</i></div> +<div><i>con la carne y la piel que nos cubria.</i><a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16" /><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>"With the same bodies and souls that they had," as the +Catechism says. So much so, that it is orthodox Catholic +doctrine that the happiness of the blessed is not perfectly +complete until they recover their bodies. They lament +in heaven, says our Brother Pedro Malón de Chaide of +the Order of St. Augustine, a Spaniard and a Basque,<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17" /><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> +and "this lament springs from their not being perfectly +whole in heaven, for only the soul is there; and although +they cannot suffer, because they see God, in whom they +unspeakably delight, yet with all this it appears that they +are not wholly content. They will be so when they are +clothed with their own bodies."</p> + +<p>And to this central dogma of the resurrection in Christ +and by Christ corresponds likewise a central sacrament, +the axis of popular Catholic piety—the Sacrament of the +Eucharist. In it is administered the body of Christ, +which is the bread of immortality.</p> + +<p>This sacrament is genuinely realist—<i>dinglich</i>, as the +Germans would say—which may without great violence +be translated "material." It is the sacrament most +genuinely <i>ex opere operato</i>, for which is substituted +among Protestants the idealistic sacrament of the word. +Fundamentally it is concerned with—and I say it with +all possible respect, but without wishing to sacrifice the +expressiveness of the phrase—the eating and drinking of +God, the Eternalizer, the feeding upon Him. Little +<a name="Page_67" id="Page_67" />wonder then if St. Teresa tells us that when she was +communicating in the monastery of the Incarnation and +in the second year of her being Prioress there, on the +octave of St. Martin, and the Father, Fr. Juan de la Cruz, +divided the Host between her and another sister, she +thought that it was done not because there was any want +of Hosts, but because he wished to mortify her, "for I +had told him how much I delighted in Hosts of a large +size. Yet I was not ignorant that the size of the Host +is of no moment, for I knew that our Lord is whole and +entire in the smallest particle." Here reason pulls one +way, feeling another. And what importance for this +feeling have the thousand and one difficulties that arise +from reflecting rationally upon the mystery of this sacrament? +What is a divine body? And the body, in so +far as it is the body of Christ, is it divine? What is an +immortal and immortalizing body? What is substance +separated from the accidents? Nowadays we have +greatly refined our notion of materiality and substantiality; +but there were even some among the Fathers of +the Church to whom the immateriality of God Himself +was not a thing so clear and definite as it is for us. And +this sacrament of the Eucharist is the immortalizing +sacrament <i>par excellence</i>, and therefore the axis of +popular Catholic piety, and if it may be so said, the +most specifically religious of sacraments.</p> + +<p>For what is specific in the Catholic religion is immortalization +and not justification, in the Protestant sense. +Rather is this latter ethical. It was from Kant, in spite +of what orthodox Protestants may think of him, that +Protestantism derived its penultimate conclusions—namely, +that religion rests upon morality, and not +morality upon religion, as in Catholicism.</p> + +<p>The preoccupation of sin has never been such a matter +of anguish, or at any rate has never displayed itself with +such an appearance of anguish, among Catholics. The +sacrament of Confession contributes to this. And there +<a name="Page_68" id="Page_68" />persists, perhaps, among Catholics more than among +Protestants the substance of the primitive Judaic and +pagan conception of sin as something material and infectious +and hereditary, which is cured by baptism and +absolution. In Adam all his posterity sinned, almost +materially, and his sin was transmitted as a material +disease is transmitted. Renan, whose education was +Catholic, was right, therefore, in calling to account the +Protestant Amiel who accused him of not giving due +importance to sin. And, on the other hand, Protestantism, +absorbed in this preoccupation with justification, +which in spite of its religious guise was taken more +in an ethical sense than anything else, ends by neutralizing +and almost obliterating eschatology; it abandons the +Nicene symbol, falls into an anarchy of creeds, into pure +religious individualism and a vague esthetic, ethical, or +cultured religiosity. What we may call "other-worldliness" +(<i>Jenseitigkeit</i>) was obliterated little by little by +"this-worldliness" (<i>Diesseitigkeit</i>); and this in spite of +Kant, who wished to save it, but by destroying it. To +its earthly vocation and passive trust in God is due the +religious coarseness of Lutheranism, which was almost +at the point of expiring in the age of the Enlightenment, +of the <i>Aufklärung</i>, and which pietism, infusing into it +something of the religious sap of Catholicism, barely +succeeded in galvanizing a little. Hence the exactness +of the remarks of Oliveira Martins in his magnificent +<i>History of Iberian Civilization</i>, in which he says (book iv., +chap, iii.) that "Catholicism produced heroes and Protestantism +produced societies that are sensible, happy, +wealthy, free, as far as their outer institutions go, but +incapable of any great action, because their religion has +begun by destroying in the heart of man all that made +him capable of daring and noble self-sacrifice."</p> + +<p>Take any of the dogmatic systems that have resulted +from the latest Protestant dissolvent analysis—that of +Kaftan, the follower of Ritschl, for example—and note +<a name="Page_69" id="Page_69" />the extent to which eschatology is reduced. And his +master, Albrecht Ritschl, himself says: "The question +regarding the necessity of justification or forgiveness can +only be solved by conceiving eternal life as the direct end +and aim of that divine operation. But if the idea of +eternal life be applied merely to our state in the next life, +then its content, too, lies beyond all experience, and +cannot form the basis of knowledge of a scientific kind. +Hopes and desires, though marked by the strongest subjective +certainty, are not any the clearer for that, and +contain in themselves no guarantee of the completeness +of what one hopes or desires. Clearness and completeness +of idea, however, are the conditions of comprehending +anything—<i>i.e.</i>, of understanding the necessary connection +between the various elements of a thing, and +between the thing and its given presuppositions. The +Evangelical article of belief, therefore, that justification +by faith establishes or brings with it assurance of eternal +life, is of no use theologically, so long as this purposive +aspect of justification cannot be verified in such experience +as is possible now" (<i>Rechtfertigung und Versöhnung</i>, +vol. iii., chap. vii., 52). All this is very +rational, but ...</p> + +<p>In the first edition of Melanchthon's <i>Loci Communes</i>, +that of 1521, the first Lutheran theological work, its +author omits all Trinitarian and Christological speculations, +the dogmatic basis of eschatology. And Dr. +Hermann, professor at Marburg, the author of a book on +the Christian's commerce with God (<i>Der Verkehr des +Christen mit Gott</i>)—a book the first chapter of which +treats of the opposition between mysticism and the Christian +religion, and which is, according to Harnack, the +most perfect Lutheran manual—tells us in another place,<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18" /><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> +referring to this Christological (or Athanasian) specula<a name="Page_70" id="Page_70" />tion, +that "the effective knowledge of God and of Christ, +in which knowledge faith lives, is something entirely +different. Nothing ought to find a place in Christian +doctrine that is not capable of helping man to recognize +his sins, to obtain the grace of God, and to serve Him +in truth. Until that time—that is to say, until Luther—the +Church had accepted much as <i>doctrina sacra</i> which +cannot absolutely contribute to confer upon man liberty +of heart and tranquillity of conscience." For my part, +I cannot conceive the liberty of a heart or the tranquillity +of a conscience that are not sure of their perdurability +after death. "The desire for the soul's salvation," +Hermann continues, "must at last have led men to the +knowledge and understanding of the effective doctrine +of salvation." And in his book on the Christian's +commerce with God, this eminent Lutheran doctor is +continually discoursing upon trust in God, peace of +conscience, and an assurance of salvation that is not +strictly and precisely certainty of everlasting life, but +rather certainty of the forgiveness of sins.</p> + +<p>And I have read in a Protestant theologian, Ernst +Troeltsch, that in the conceptual order Protestantism has +attained its highest reach in music, in which art Bach +has given it its mightiest artistic expression. This, then, +is what Protestantism dissolves into—celestial music!<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19" /><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> +On the other hand we may say that the highest artistic +expression of Catholicism, or at least of Spanish +Catholicism, is in the art that is most material, tangible, +and permanent—for the vehicle of sounds is air—in +sculpture and painting, in the Christ of Velasquez, that +Christ who is for ever dying, yet never finishes dying, +in order that he may give us life.</p> + +<p>And yet Catholicism does not abandon ethics. No! +No modern religion can leave ethics on one side. But +<a name="Page_71" id="Page_71" />our religion—although its doctors may protest against +this—is fundamentally and for the most part a compromise +between eschatology and ethics; it is eschatology +pressed into the service of ethics. What else but this is +that atrocity of the eternal pains of hell, which agrees so +ill with the Pauline apocatastasis? Let us bear in mind +those words which the <i>Theologica Germanica</i>, the manual +of mysticism that Luther read, puts into the mouth of +God: "If I must recompense your evil, I must recompense +it with good, for I am and have none other." And +Christ said: "Father, forgive them, for they know not +what they do," and there is no man who perhaps knows +what he does. But it has been necessary, for the benefit +of the social order, to convert religion into a kind of +police system, and hence hell. Oriental or Greek Christianity +is predominantly eschatological, Protestantism +predominantly ethical, and Catholicism is a compromise +between the two, although with the eschatological element +preponderating. The most authentic Catholic +ethic, monastic asceticism, is an ethic of eschatology, +directed to the salvation of the individual soul rather +than to the maintenance of society. And in the cult of +virginity may there not perhaps be a certain obscure idea +that to perpetuate ourselves in others hinders our own +personal perpetuation? The ascetic morality is a negative +morality. And, strictly, what is important for a +man is not to die, whether he sins or not. It is not +necessary to take very literally, but as a lyrical, or rather +rhetorical, effusion, the words of our famous sonnet—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>No me mueve, mi Dios, para quererte</i></div> +<div><i>el cielo que me tienes prometido,</i><a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20" /><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>and the rest that follows.</p> + +<p>The real sin—perhaps it is the sin against the Holy +Ghost for which there is no remission—is the sin of +<a name="Page_72" id="Page_72" />heresy, the sin of thinking for oneself. The saying has +been heard before now, here in Spain, that to be a liberal—that +is, a heretic—is worse than being an assassin, a +thief, or an adulterer. The gravest sin is not to obey +the Church, whose infallibility protects us from reason.</p> + +<p>And why be scandalized by the infallibility of a man, +of the Pope? What difference does it make whether it +be a book that is infallible—the Bible, or a society of +men—the Church, or a single man? Does it make any +essential change in the rational difficulty? And since +the infallibility of a book or of a society of men is not +more rational than that of a single man, this supreme +offence in the eyes of reason had to be posited.</p> + +<p>It is the vital asserting itself, and in order to +assert itself it creates, with the help of its enemy, the +rational, a complete dogmatic structure, and this the +Church defends against rationalism, against Protestantism, +and against Modernism. The Church defends +life. It stood up against Galileo, and it did right; for +his discovery, in its inception and until it became assimilated +to the general body of human knowledge, tended +to shatter the anthropomorphic belief that the universe +was created for man. It opposed Darwin, and it did +right, for Darwinism tends to shatter our belief that +man is an exceptional animal, created expressly to be +eternalized. And lastly, Pius IX., the first Pontiff to +be proclaimed infallible, declared that he was irreconcilable +with the so-called modern civilization. And he did +right.</p> + +<p>Loisy, the Catholic ex-abbé, said: "I say simply this, +that the Church and theology have not looked with +favour upon the scientific movement, and that on certain +decisive occasions, so far as it lay in their power, they +have hindered it. I say, above all, that Catholic teaching +has not associated itself with, or accommodated itself +to, this movement. Theology has conducted itself, and +conducts itself still, as if it were self-possessed of a +<a name="Page_73" id="Page_73" />science of nature and a science of history, together with +that general philosophy of nature and history which +results from a scientific knowledge of them. It might +be supposed that the domain of theology and that of +science, distinct in principle and even as defined by the +Vatican Council, must not be distinct in practice. +Everything proceeds almost as if theology had nothing +to learn from modern science, natural or historical, and +as if by itself it had the power and the right to exercise +a direct and absolute control over all the activities of the +human mind" (<i>Autour d'un Petit Livre</i>, 1903, p. 211).</p> + +<p>And such must needs be, and such in fact is, the +Church's attitude in its struggle with Modernism, of +which Loisy was the learned and leading exponent.</p> + +<p>The recent struggle against Kantian and fideist +Modernism is a struggle for life. Is it indeed possible +for life, life that seeks assurance of survival, to tolerate +that a Loisy, a Catholic priest, should affirm that the +resurrection of the Saviour is not a fact of the historical +order, demonstrable and demonstrated by the testimony +of history alone? Read, moreover, the exposition of the +central dogma, that of the resurrection of Jesus, in E. Le +Roy's excellent work, <i>Dogme et Critique</i>, and tell me if +any solid ground is left for our hope to build on. Do +not the Modernists see that the question at issue is not +so much that of the immortal life of Christ, reduced, +perhaps, to a life in the collective Christian consciousness, +as that of a guarantee of our own personal resurrection +of body as well as soul? This new psychological +apologetic appeals to the moral miracle, and we, like the +Jews, seek for a sign, something that can be taken hold +of with all the powers of the soul and with all the senses +of the body. And with the hands and the feet and the +mouth, if it be possible.</p> + +<p>But alas! we do not get it. Reason attacks, and faith, +which does not feel itself secure without reason, has to +come to terms with it. And hence come those tragic con<a name="Page_74" id="Page_74" />tradictions +and lacerations of consciousness. We need +security, certainty, signs, and they give us <i>motiva +credibilitatis</i>—motives of credibility—upon which to establish +the <i>rationale obsequium</i>, and although faith precedes +reason (<i>fides præcedit rationem</i>), according to St. Augustine, +this same learned doctor and bishop sought to +travel by faith to understanding (<i>per fidem ad intellectum</i>), +and to believe in order to understand (<i>credo ut +intelligam</i>). How far is this from that superb expression +of Tertullian—<i>et sepultus resurrexit, certum est quia +impossibile est!</i>—"and he was buried and rose again; it +is certain because it is impossible!" and his sublime +<i>credo quia absurdum!</i>—the scandal of the rationalists. +How far from the <i>il faut s'abêtir</i> of Pascal and from the +"human reason loves the absurd" of our Donoso +Cortés, which he must have learned from the great +Joseph de Maistre!</p> + +<p>And a first foundation-stone was sought in the +authority of tradition and the revelation of the word of +God, and the principle of unanimous consent was +arrived at. <i>Quod apud multos unum invenitur, non est +erratum, sed traditum</i>, said Tertullian; and Lamennais +added, centuries later, that "certitude, the principle of +life and intelligence ... is, if I may be allowed the +expression, a social product."<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21" /><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> But here, as in so many +cases, the supreme formula was given by that great +Catholic, whose Catholicism was of the popular and vital +order, Count Joseph de Maistre, when he wrote: "I do +not believe that it is possible to show a single opinion +of universal utility that is not true."<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22" /><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> Here you have the +Catholic hall-mark—the deduction of the truth of a principle +from its supreme goodness or utility. And what +is there of greater, of more sovereign utility, than the +immortality of the soul? "As all is uncertain, either +we must believe all men or none," said Lactantius; but +<a name="Page_75" id="Page_75" />that great mystic and ascetic, Blessed Heinrich Seuse, the +Dominican, implored the Eternal Wisdom for one word +affirming that He was love, and when the answer came, +"All creatures proclaim that I am love," Seuse replied, +"Alas! Lord, that does not suffice for a yearning soul." +Faith feels itself secure neither with universal consent, +nor with tradition, nor with authority. It seeks the +support of its enemy, reason.</p> + +<p>And thus scholastic theology was devised, and with it +its handmaiden—<i>ancilla theologiæ</i>—scholastic philosophy, +and this handmaiden turned against her mistress. +Scholasticism, a magnificent cathedral, in which all the +problems of architectonic mechanism were resolved for +future ages, but a cathedral constructed of unbaked +bricks, gave place little by little to what is called natural +theology and is merely Christianity depotentialized. The +attempt was even made, where it was possible, to base +dogmas upon reason, to show at least that if they were +indeed super-rational they were not contra-rational, and +they were reinforced with a philosophical foundation of +Aristotelian-Neoplatonic thirteenth-century philosophy. +And such is the Thomism recommended by Leo XIII. +And now the question is not one of the enforcement of +dogma but of its philosophical, medieval, and Thomist +interpretation. It is not enough to believe that in receiving +the consecrated Host we receive the body and blood of our +Lord Jesus Christ; we must needs negotiate all those +difficulties of transubstantiation and substance separated +from accidents, and so break with the whole of the +modern rational conception of substantiality.</p> + +<p>But for this, implicit faith suffices—the faith of the +coalheaver,<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23" /><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> the faith of those who, like St. Teresa (<i>Vida</i>, +cap. xxv. 2), do not wish to avail themselves of theology. +"<a name="Page_76" id="Page_76" />Do not ask me the reason of that, for I am ignorant; +Holy Mother Church possesses doctors who will know +how to answer you," as we were made to learn in the +Catechism. It was for this, among other things, that +the priesthood was instituted, that the teaching Church +might be the depositary—"reservoir instead of river," +as Phillips Brooks said—of theological secrets. "The +work of the Nicene Creed," says Harnack (<i>Dogmengeschichte</i>, +ii. 1, cap. vii. 3), "was a victory of the priesthood +over the faith of the Christian people. The doctrine +of the Logos had already become unintelligible to those +who were not theologians. The setting up of the Niceno-Cappadocian +formula as the fundamental confession of +the Church made it perfectly impossible for the Catholic +laity to get an inner comprehension of the Christian +Faith, taking as their guide the form in which it was +presented in the doctrine of the Church. The idea +became more and more deeply implanted in men's minds +that Christianity was the revelation of the unintelligible." +And so, in truth, it is.</p> + +<p>And why was this? Because faith—that is, Life—no +longer felt sure of itself. Neither traditionalism nor the +theological positivism of Duns Scotus sufficed for it; it +sought to rationalize itself. And it sought to establish +its foundation—not, indeed, over against reason, where it +really is, but upon reason—that is to say, within reason—itself. +The nominalist or positivist or voluntarist position +of Scotus—that which maintains that law and truth +depend, not so much upon the essence as upon the free +and inscrutable will of God—by accentuating its supreme +irrationality, placed religion in danger among the +majority of believers endowed with mature reason and +not mere coalheavers. Hence the triumph of the +Thomist theological rationalism. It is no longer enough +to believe in the existence of God; but the sentence of +anathema falls on him who, though believing in it, does +not believe that His existence is demonstrable by +<a name="Page_77" id="Page_77" />rational arguments, or who believes that up to the present +nobody by means of these rational arguments has ever +demonstrated it irrefutably. However, in this connection +the remark of Pohle is perhaps capable of application: +"If eternal salvation depended upon mathematical +axioms, we should have to expect that the most odious +human sophistry would attack their universal validity as +violently as it now attacks God, the soul, and Christ."<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24" /><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a></p> + +<p>The truth is, Catholicism oscillates between mysticism, +which is the inward experience of the living God in +Christ, an intransmittible experience, the danger of +which, however, is that it absorbs our own personality in +God, and so does not save our vital longing—between +mysticism and the rationalism which it fights against (see +Weizsäcker, <i>op. cit.</i>); it oscillates between religionized +science and scientificized religion. The apocalyptic +enthusiasm changed little by little into neo-platonic +mysticism, which theology thrust further into the background. +It feared the excesses of the imagination +which was supplanting faith and creating gnostic extravagances. +But it had to sign a kind of pact with +gnosticism and another with rationalism; neither +imagination nor reason allowed itself to be completely +vanquished. And thus the body of Catholic +dogma became a system of contradictions, more or less +successfully harmonized. The Trinity was a kind of +pact between monotheism and polytheism, and humanity +and divinity sealed a peace in Christ, nature covenanted +with grace, grace with free will, free will with the Divine +prescience, and so on. And it is perhaps true, as +Hermann says (<i>loc. cit.</i>), that "as soon as we develop +religious thought to its logical conclusions, it enters into +conflict with other ideas which belong equally to the life +of religion." And this it is that gives to Catholicism its +profound vital dialectic. But at what a cost?</p> + +<p><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78" />At the cost, it must needs be said, of doing violence to +the mental exigencies of those believers in possession +of an adult reason. It demands from them that they +shall believe all or nothing, that they shall accept the +complete totality of dogma or that they shall forfeit all +merit if the least part of it be rejected. And hence the +result, as the great Unitarian preacher Channing pointed +out,<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25" /><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> that in France and Spain there are multitudes who +have proceeded from rejecting Popery to absolute +atheism, because "the fact is, that false and absurd +doctrines, when exposed, have a natural tendency to +beget scepticism in those who received them without +reflection. None are so likely to believe too little as those +who have begun by believing too much." Here is, +indeed, the terrible danger of believing too much. But +no! the terrible danger comes from another quarter—from +seeking to believe with the reason and not with life.</p> + +<p>The Catholic solution of our problem, of our unique +vital problem, the problem of the immortality and eternal +salvation of the individual soul, satisfies the will, and +therefore satisfies life; but the attempt to rationalize it +by means of dogmatic theology fails to satisfy the reason. +And reason has its exigencies as imperious as those of +life. It is no use seeking to force ourselves to consider +as super-rational what clearly appears to us to be contra-rational, +neither is it any good wishing to become coalheavers +when we are not coalheavers. Infallibility, a +notion of Hellenic origin, is in its essence a rationalistic +category.</p> + +<p>Let us now consider the rationalist or scientific solution—or, +more properly, dissolution—of our problem.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13" /><a href="#FNanchor_13_13">[13]</a> Erwin Rohde, <i>Psyche</i>, "Seelencult und Unsterblichkeitsglaube der +Griechen." Tübingen, 1907. Up to the present this is the leading +work dealing with the belief of the Greeks in the immortality of the +soul.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14" /><a href="#FNanchor_14_14">[14]</a> Gal. ii. 20.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15" /><a href="#FNanchor_15_15">[15]</a> On all relating to this question see, among others, Harnack, <i>Dogmengeschichte</i>, +ii., Teil i., Buch vii., cap. i.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Foonote_16_16" /><a href="#FNanchor_16_16">[16]</a></p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>Though we are become dust,</div> +<div>In thee, O Lord, our hope confides,</div> +<div>That we shall live again clad</div> +<div>In the flesh and skin that once covered us.</div></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17" /><a href="#FNanchor_17_17">[17]</a> <i>Libra de la Conversión de la Magdelena</i>, part iv., chap. ix.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18" /><a href="#FNanchor_18_18">[18]</a> In his exposition of Protestant dogma in <i>Systematische christliche +Religion</i>, Berlin, 1909, one of the series entitled <i>Die Kultur der Gegenwart</i>, +published by P. Hinneberg.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19" /><a href="#FNanchor_19_19">[19]</a> The common use of the expression <i>música celestial</i> to denote "nonsense, +something not worth listening to," lends it a satirical byplay which disappears +in the English rendering.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20" /><a href="#FNanchor_20_20">[20]</a> It is not Thy promised heaven, my God, that moves me to love Thee. +(Anonymous, sixteenth or seventeenth century. See <i>Oxford Book of Spanish +Verse</i>, No. 106.)</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21" /><a href="#FNanchor_21_21">[21]</a> <i>Essai sur l'indifférence en matière de religion</i>, part iii., chap. i.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22" /><a href="#FNanchor_22_22">[22]</a> <i>Les Soirées de Saint-Pétersbourg</i>, x<sup>me</sup> entretien.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23" /><a href="#FNanchor_23_23">[23]</a> The allusion is to the traditional story of the coalheaver whom the devil +sought to convince of the irrationality of belief in the Trinity. The coalheaver +took the cloak that he was wearing and folded it in three folds. +"Here are three folds," he said, "and the cloak though threefold is yet one." +And the devil departed baffled.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24" /><a href="#FNanchor_24_24">[24]</a> Joseph Pohle, "Christlich Katolische Dogmatik," in <i>Systematische +Christliche Religion</i>, Berlin, 1909. <i>Die Kultur der Gegenwart</i> series.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25" /><a href="#FNanchor_25_25">[25]</a> "Objections to Unitarian Christianity Considered," 1816, in <i>The Complete +Works of William Ellery Channing, D.D.</i>, London, 1884.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79" /><a name="V" id="V" />V</h2> + +<h2>THE RATIONALIST DISSOLUTION</h2> + +<p>The great master of rationalist phenomenalism, David +Hume, begins his essay "On the Immortality of the +Soul" with these decisive words: "It appears difficult +by the mere light of reason to prove the immortality of +the soul. The arguments in favour of it are commonly +derived from metaphysical, moral, or physical considerations. +But it is really the Gospel, and only the Gospel, +that has brought to light life and immortality." Which +is equivalent to denying the rationality of the belief that +the soul of each one of us is immortal.</p> + +<p>Kant, whose criticism found its point of departure in +Hume, attempted to establish the rationality of this longing +for immortality and the belief that it imports; and +this is the real origin, the inward origin, of his <i>Critique +of Practical Reason</i>, and of his categorical imperative +and of his God. But in spite of all this, the sceptical +affirmation of Hume holds good. There is no way of +proving the immortality of the soul rationally. There +are, on the other hand, ways of proving rationally its +mortality.</p> + +<p>It would be not merely superfluous but ridiculous to +enlarge here upon the extent to which the individual +human consciousness is dependent upon the physical +organism, pointing out how it comes to birth by slow +degrees according as the brain receives impressions from +the outside world, how it is temporarily suspended during +sleep, swoons, and other accidents, and how everything +leads us to the rational conjecture that death carries with +it the loss of consciousness. And just as before our +<a name="Page_80" id="Page_80" />birth we were not, nor have we any personal pre-natal +memory, so after our death we shall cease to be. This +is the rational position.</p> + +<p>The designation "soul" is merely a term used to +denote the individual consciousness in its integrity and +continuity; and that this soul undergoes change, that +in like manner as it is integrated so it is disintegrated, is +a thing very evident. For Aristotle it was the substantial +form of the body—the entelechy, but not a +substance. And more than one modern has called it an +epiphenomenon—an absurd term. The appellation +phenomenon suffices.</p> + +<p>Rationalism—and by rationalism I mean the doctrine +that abides solely by reason, by objective truth—is +necessarily materialist. And let not idealists be scandalized +thereby.</p> + +<p>The truth is—it is necessary to be perfectly explicit in +this matter—that what we call materialism means for us +nothing else but the doctrine which denies the immortality +of the individual soul, the persistence of personal +consciousness after death.</p> + +<p>In another sense it may be said that, as we know what +matter is no more than we know what spirit is, and as +matter is for us merely an idea, materialism is idealism. +In fact, and as regards our problem—the most vital, the +only really vital problem—it is all the same to say that +everything is matter as to say that everything is idea, or +that everything is energy, or whatever you please. +Every monist system will always seem to us materialist. +The immortality of the soul is saved only by the dualist +systems—those which teach that human consciousness is +something substantially distinct and different from the +other manifestations of phenomena. And reason is +naturally monist. For it is the function of reason to +understand and explain the universe, and in order to +understand and explain it, it is in no way necessary for the +soul to be an imperishable substance. For the purpose +<a name="Page_81" id="Page_81" />of explaining and understanding our psychic life, for +psychology, the hypothesis of the soul is unnecessary. +What was formerly called rational psychology, in opposition +to empirical psychology, is not psychology but +metaphysics, and very muddy metaphysics; neither is it +rational, but profoundly irrational, or rather contra-rational.</p> + +<p>The pretended rational doctrine of the substantiality +and spirituality of the soul, with all the apparatus that +accompanies it, is born simply of the necessity which +men feel of grounding upon reason their inexpugnable +longing for immortality and the subsequent belief in it. +All the sophistries which aim at proving that the soul is +substance, simple and incorruptible, proceed from this +source. And further, the very concept of substance, as +it was fixed and defined by scholasticism, a concept +which does not bear criticism, is a theological concept, +designed expressly to sustain faith in the immortality of +the soul.</p> + +<p>William James, in the third of the lectures which he +devoted to pragmatism in the Lowell Institute in Boston, +in December, 1906, and January, 1907<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26" /><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a>—the weakest +thing in all the work of the famous American thinker, +an extremely weak thing indeed—speaks as follows: +"Scholasticism has taken the notion of substance from +common sense and made it very technical and articulate. +Few things would seem to have fewer pragmatic consequences +for us than substances, cut off as we are from +every contact with them. Yet in one case scholasticism +has proved the importance of the substance-idea by +treating it pragmatically. I refer to certain disputes +about the mystery of the Eucharist. Substance here +would appear to have momentous pragmatic value. +Since the accidents of the wafer do not change in the +Lord's Supper, and yet it has become the very body of +<a name="Page_82" id="Page_82" />Christ, it must be that the change is in the substance +solely. The bread-substance must have been withdrawn +and the Divine substance substituted miraculously without +altering the immediate sensible properties. But +though these do not alter, a tremendous difference has +been made—no less a one than this, that we who take the +sacrament now feed upon the very substance of Divinity. +The substance-notion breaks into life, with tremendous +effect, if once you allow that substances can separate +from their accidents and exchange these latter. This is +the only pragmatic application of the substance-idea +with which I am acquainted; and it is obvious that it will +only be treated seriously by those who already believe in +the 'real presence' on independent grounds."</p> + +<p>Now, leaving on one side the question as to whether it +is good theology—and I do not say good reasoning +because all this lies outside the sphere of reason—to confound +the substance of the body—the body, not the soul—of +Christ with the very substance of Divinity—that is +to say, with God Himself—it would appear impossible +that one so ardently desirous of the immortality of the +soul as William James, a man whose whole philosophy +aims simply at establishing this belief on rational +grounds, should not have perceived that the pragmatic +application of the concept of substance to the doctrine of the +Eucharistic transubstantiation is merely a consequence of +its anterior application to the doctrine of the immortality +of the soul. As I explained in the preceding chapter, +the Sacrament of the Eucharist is simply the reflection +of the belief in immortality; it is, for the believer, the +proof, by a mystical experience, that the soul is immortal +and will enjoy God eternally. And the concept of substance +was born, above all and before all, of the concept +of the substantiality of the soul, and the latter was +affirmed in order to confirm faith in the persistence of +the soul after its separation from the body. Such was at +the same time its first pragmatic application and its +<a name="Page_83" id="Page_83" />origin. And subsequently we have transferred this concept +to external things. It is because I feel myself to be +substance—that is to say, permanent in the midst of my +changes—that I attribute substantiality to those agents +exterior to me, which are also permanent in the midst of +their changes—just as the concept of force is born of my +sensation of personal effort in putting a thing in motion.</p> + +<p>Read carefully in the first part of the <i>Summa Theologica</i> +of St. Thomas Aquinas the first six articles of +question lxxv., which discuss whether the human soul is +body, whether it is something self-subsistent, whether +such also is the soul of the lower animals, whether the soul +is the man, whether the soul is composed of matter and +form, and whether it is incorruptible, and then say if all +this is not subtly intended to support the belief that this +incorruptible substantiality of the soul renders it capable +of receiving from God immortality, for it is clear that as +He created it when He implanted it in the body, as St. +Thomas says, so at its separation from the body He could +annihilate it. And as the criticism of these proofs has +been undertaken a hundred times, it is unnecessary to +repeat it here.</p> + +<p>Is it possible for the unforewarned reason to conclude +that our soul is a substance from the fact that our consciousness +of our identity—and this within very narrow +and variable limits—persists through all the changes of +our body? We might as well say of a ship that put out +to sea and lost first one piece of timber, which was replaced +by another of the same shape and dimensions, then +lost another, and so on with all her timbers, and finally +returned to port the same ship, with the same build, the +same sea-going qualities, recognizable by everybody as +the same—we might as well say of such a ship that it +had a substantial soul. Is it possible for the unforewarned +reason to infer the simplicity of the soul from the +fact that we have to judge and unify our thoughts? +Thought is not one but complex, and for the reason the +<a name="Page_84" id="Page_84" />soul is nothing but the succession of co-ordinated states +of consciousness.</p> + +<p>In books of psychology written from the spiritualist +point of view, it is customary to begin the discussion of +the existence of the soul as a simple substance, separable +from the body, after this style: There is in me a principle +which thinks, wills, and feels.... Now this implies +a begging of the question. For it is far from being an +immediate truth that there is in me such a principle; the +immediate truth is that I think, will, and feel. And I—the +I that thinks, wills, and feels—am immediately my +living body with the states of consciousness which it +sustains. It is my living body that thinks, wills, and +feels. How? How you please.</p> + +<p>And they proceed to seek to establish the substantiality +of the soul, hypostatizing the states of consciousness, and +they begin by saying that this substance must be simple—that +is, by opposing thought to extension, after the +manner of the Cartesian dualism. And as Balmes was +one of the spiritualist writers who have given the clearest +and most concise form to the argument, I will present it +as he expounds it in the second chapter of his <i>Curso de +Filosofia Elemental</i>. "The human soul is simple," he +says, and adds: "Simplicity consists in the absence of +parts, and the soul has none. Let us suppose that it has +three parts—A, B, C. I ask, Where, then, does thought +reside? If in A only, then B and C are superfluous; +and consequently the simple subject A will be the soul. +If thought resides in A, B, and C, it follows that thought +is divided into parts, which is absurd. What sort of a +thing is a perception, a comparison, a judgement, a +ratiocination, distributed among three subjects?" A +more obvious begging of the question cannot be conceived. +Balmes begins by taking it for granted that the +whole, as a whole, is incapable of making a judgement. +He continues: "The unity of consciousness is opposed +to the division of the soul. When we think, there is a +<a name="Page_85" id="Page_85" />subject which knows everything that it thinks, and this +is impossible if parts be attributed to it. Of the thought +that is in A, B and C will know nothing, and so in the +other cases respectively. There will not, therefore, be +<i>one</i> consciousness of the whole thought: each part will +have its special consciousness, and there will be within +us as many thinking beings as there are parts." The +begging of the question continues; it is assumed without +any proof that a whole, as a whole, cannot perceive as +a unit. Balmes then proceeds to ask if these parts A, +B, and C are simple or compound, and repeats his argument +until he arrives at the conclusion that the thinking +subject must be a part which is not a whole—that is, +simple. The argument is based, as will be seen, upon +the unity of apperception and of judgement. Subsequently +he endeavours to refute the hypothesis of a communication +of the parts among themselves.</p> + +<p>Balmes—and with him the <i>a priori</i> spiritualists who +seek to rationalize faith in the immortality of the soul—ignore +the only rational explanation, which is that apperception +and judgement are a resultant, that perceptions +or ideas themselves are components which agree. They +begin by supposing something external to and distinct +from the states of consciousness, something that is not +the living body which supports these states, something +that is not I but is within me.</p> + +<p>The soul is simple, others say, because it reflects upon +itself as a complete whole. No; the state of consciousness +A, in which I think of my previous state of consciousness +B, is not the same as its predecessor. Or if +I think of my soul, I think of an idea distinct from the +act by which I think of it. To think that one thinks and +nothing more, is not to think.</p> + +<p>The soul is the principle of life, it is said. Yes; and +similarly the category of force or energy has been conceived +as the principle of movement. But these are +concepts, not phenomena, not external realities. Does +<a name="Page_86" id="Page_86" />the principle of movement move? And only that which +moves has external reality. Does the principle of life +live? Hume was right when he said that he never +encountered this idea of himself—that he only observed +himself desiring or performing or feeling something.<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27" /><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> +The idea of some individual thing—of this inkstand in +front of me, of that horse standing at my gate, of these +two and not of any other individuals of the same class—is +the fact, the phenomenon itself. The idea of myself +is myself.</p> + +<p>All the efforts to substantiate consciousness, making +it independent of extension—remember that Descartes +opposed thought to extension—are but sophistical +subtilties intended to establish the rationality of faith +in the immortality of the soul. It is sought to give the +value of objective reality to that which does not possess +it—to that whose reality exists only in thought. And +the immortality that we crave is a phenomenal immortality—it +is the continuation of this present life.</p> + +<p>The unity of consciousness is for scientific psychology—the +only rational psychology—simply a phenomenal +unity. No one can say what a substantial unity is. +And, what is more, no one can say what a substance is. +For the notion of substance is a non-phenomenal category. +It is a noumenon and belongs properly to the +unknowable—that is to say, according to the sense in +which it is understood. But in its transcendental sense +it is something really unknowable and strictly irrational. +It is precisely this concept of substance that an unforewarned +mind reduces to a use that is very far from that +pragmatic application to which William James referred.</p> + +<p>And this application is not saved by understanding it +in an idealistic sense, according to the Berkeleyan principle +that to be is to be perceived (<i>esse est percipi</i>). To +<a name="Page_87" id="Page_87" />say that everything is idea or that everything is spirit, +is the same as saying that everything is matter or that +everything is energy, for if everything is idea or everything +spirit, and if, therefore, this diamond is idea or +spirit, just as my consciousness is, it is not plain why the +diamond should not endure for ever, if my consciousness, +because it is idea or spirit, endures for ever.</p> + +<p>George Berkeley, Anglican Bishop of Cloyne and +brother in spirit to the Anglican bishop Joseph Butler, +was equally as anxious to save the belief in the immortality +of the soul. In the first words of the Preface to his +<i>Treatise concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge</i>, +he tells us that he considers that this treatise will +be useful, "particularly to those who are tainted with +scepticism, or want a demonstration of the existence and +immateriality of God, or the natural immortality of the +soul." In paragraph cxl. he lays it down that we have +an idea, or rather a notion, of spirit, and that we know +other spirits by means of our own, from which follows—so +in the next paragraph he roundly affirms—the natural +immortality of the soul. And here he enters upon a +series of confusions arising from the ambiguity with +which he invests the term notion. And after having +established the immortality of the soul, almost as it were +<i>per saltum</i>, on the ground that the soul is not passive like +the body, he proceeds to tell us in paragraph cxlvii. that +the existence of God is more evident than that of man. +And yet, in spite of this, there are still some who are +doubtful!</p> + +<p>The question was complicated by making consciousness +a property of the soul, consciousness being something +more than soul—that is to say, a substantial form +of the body, the originator of all the organic functions of +the body. The soul not only thinks, feels, and wills, +but moves the body and prompts its vital functions; in the +human soul are united the vegetative, animal, and rational +functions. Such is the theory. But the soul separated +<a name="Page_88" id="Page_88" />from the body can have neither vegetative nor animal +functions.</p> + +<p>A theory, in short, which for the reason is a veritable +contexture of confusions.</p> + +<p>After the Renaissance and the restoration of purely +rational thought, emancipated from all theology, the +doctrine of the mortality of the soul was re-established +by the newly published writings of the second-century +philosopher Alexander of Aphrodisias and by Pietro +Pomponazzi and others. And in point of fact, little or +nothing can be added to what Pomponazzi has written +in his <i>Tractatus de immortalitate animæ</i>. It is reason +itself, and it serves nothing to reiterate his arguments.</p> + +<p>Attempts have not been wanting, however, to find an +empirical support for belief in the immortality of the soul, +and among these may be counted the work of Frederic +W.H. Myers on <i>Human Personality and its Survival +of Bodily Death</i>. No one ever approached more eagerly +than myself the two thick volumes of this work in which +the leading spirit of the Society for Psychical Research +resumed that formidable mass of data relating to presentiments, +apparitions of the dead, the phenomena of +dreams, telepathy, hypnotism, sensorial automatism, +ecstasy, and all the rest that goes to furnish the spiritualist +arsenal. I entered upon the reading of it not only +without that temper of cautious suspicion which men of +science maintain in investigations of this character, but +even with a predisposition in its favour, as one who comes +to seek the confirmation of his innermost longings; but +for this reason was my disillusion all the greater. In +spite of its critical apparatus it does not differ in any +respect from medieval miracle-mongering. There is a +fundamental defect of method, of logic.</p> + +<p>And if the belief in the immortality of the soul has +been unable to find vindication in rational empiricism, +neither is it satisfied with pantheism. To say that everything +is God, and that when we die we return to God, +<a name="Page_89" id="Page_89" />or, more accurately, continue in Him, avails our longing +nothing; for if this indeed be so, then we were in God +before we were born, and if when we die we return to +where we were before being born, then the human soul, +the individual consciousness, is perishable. And since +we know very well that God, the personal and conscious +God of Christian monotheism, is simply the provider, +and above all the guarantor, of our immortality, pantheism +is said, and rightly said, to be merely atheism +disguised; and, in my opinion, undisguised. And they +were right in calling Spinoza an atheist, for his is the +most logical, the most rational, system of pantheism.</p> + +<p>Neither is the longing for immortality saved, but rather +dissolved and submerged, by agnosticism, or the doctrine +of the unknowable, which, when it has professed to wish +to leave religious feelings scathless, has always been +inspired by the most refined hypocrisy. The whole of +the first part of Spencer's <i>First Principles</i>, and especially +the fifth chapter entitled "Reconciliation"—that between +reason and faith or science and religion being understood—is +a model at the same time of philosophical superficiality +and religious insincerity, of the most refined +British cant. The unknowable, if it is something more +than the merely hitherto unknown, is but a purely negative +concept, a concept of limitation. And upon this +foundation no human feeling can be built up.</p> + +<p>The science of religion, on the other hand, of religion +considered as an individual and social psychic phenomenon +irrespective of the transcendental objective validity +of religious affirmations, is a science which, in explaining +the origin of the belief that the soul is something +that can live disjoined from the body, has destroyed the +rationality of this belief. However much the religious +man may repeat with Schleiermacher, "Science can +teach thee nothing; it is for science to learn from thee," +inwardly he thinks otherwise.</p> + +<p>From whatever side the matter is regarded, it is always +<a name="Page_90" id="Page_90" />found that reason confronts our longing for personal +immortality and contradicts it. And the truth is, in all +strictness, that reason is the enemy of life.</p> + +<p>A terrible thing is intelligence. It tends to death as +memory tends to stability. The living, the absolutely +unstable, the absolutely individual, is, strictly, unintelligible. +Logic tends to reduce everything to identities and +genera, to each representation having no more than one +single and self-same content in whatever place, time, or +relation it may occur to us. And there is nothing that +remains the same for two successive moments of its +existence. My idea of God is different each time that I +conceive it. Identity, which is death, is the goal of the +intellect. The mind seeks what is dead, for what is +living escapes it; it seeks to congeal the flowing stream in +blocks of ice; it seeks to arrest it. In order to analyze a +body it is necessary to extenuate or destroy it. In order +to understand anything it is necessary to kill it, to lay it +out rigid in the mind. Science is a cemetery of dead +ideas, even though life may issue from them. Worms +also feed upon corpses. My own thoughts, tumultuous +and agitated in the innermost recesses of my soul, once +they are torn from their roots in the heart, poured out +on to this paper and there fixed in unalterable shape, are +already only the corpses of thoughts. How, then, shall +reason open its portals to the revelation of life? It is a +tragic combat—it is the very essence of tragedy—this +combat of life with reason. And truth? Is truth something +that is lived or that is comprehended?</p> + +<p>It is only necessary to read the terrible <i>Parmenides</i> of +Plato to arrive at his tragic conclusion that "the one is +and is not, and both itself and others, in relation to themselves +and one another, are and are not, and appear to +be and appear not to be." All that is vital is irrational, +and all that is rational is anti-vital, for reason is essentially +sceptical.</p> + +<p>The rational, in effect, is simply the relational; reason +<a name="Page_91" id="Page_91" />is limited to relating irrational elements. Mathematics +is the only perfect science, inasmuch as it adds, subtracts, +multiplies, and divides numbers, but not real and substantial +things, inasmuch as it is the most formal of the +sciences. Who can extract the cube root of an ash-tree?</p> + +<p>Nevertheless we need logic, this terrible power, in +order to communicate thoughts and perceptions and even +in order to think and perceive, for we think with words, +we perceive with forms. To think is to converse with +oneself; and speech is social, and social are thought and +logic. But may they not perhaps possess a content, an +individual matter, incommunicable and untranslatable? +And may not this be the source of their power?</p> + +<p>The truth is that man, the prisoner of logic, without +which he cannot think, has always sought to make logic +subservient to his desires, and principally to his fundamental +desire. He has always sought to hold fast to +logic, and especially in the Middle Ages, in the interests +of theology and jurisprudence, both of which based themselves +on what was established by authority. It was not +until very much later that logic propounded the problem +of knowledge, the problem of its own validity, the +scrutiny of the metalogical foundations.</p> + +<p>"The Western theology," Dean Stanley wrote, "is +essentially logical in form and based on law. The +Eastern theology is rhetorical in form and based on +philosophy. The Latin divine succeeded to the Roman +advocate. The Oriental divine succeeded to the Grecian +sophist."<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28" /><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a></p> + +<p>And all the laboured arguments in support of our +hunger of immortality, which pretend to be grounded on +reason or logic, are merely advocacy and sophistry.</p> + +<p>The property and characteristic of advocacy is, in +effect, to make use of logic in the interests of a thesis that +is to be defended, while, on the other hand, the strictly +<a name="Page_92" id="Page_92" />scientific method proceeds from the facts, the data, presented +to us by reality, in order that it may arrive, or not +arrive, as the case may be, at a certain conclusion. What +is important is to define the problem clearly, whence it +follows that progress consists not seldom in undoing +what has been done. Advocacy always supposes a +<i>petitio principii</i>, and its arguments are <i>ad probandum</i>. +And theology that pretends to be rational is nothing but +advocacy.</p> + +<p>Theology proceeds from dogma, and dogma, <i>δογμα</i>, in +its primitive and most direct sense, signifies a decree, +something akin to the Latin <i>placitum</i>, that which has +seemed to the legislative authority fitting to be law. This +juridical concept is the starting-point of theology. For +the theologian, as for the advocate, dogma, law, is something +given—a starting-point which admits of discussion +only in respect of its application and its most exact +interpretation. Hence it follows that the theological or +advocatory spirit is in its principle dogmatical, while the +strictly scientific and purely rational spirit is sceptical, +<i>σκεπτικος</i>—that is, investigative. It is so at least in its +principle, for there is the other sense of the term scepticism, +that which is most usual to-day, that of a system +of doubt, suspicion, and uncertainty, and this has arisen +from the theological or advocatory use of reason, from +the abuse of dogmatism. The endeavour to apply the +law of authority, the <i>placitum</i>, the dogma, to different +and sometimes contraposed practical necessities, is what +has engendered the scepticism of doubt. It is advocacy, +or what amounts to the same thing, theology, that +teaches the distrust of reason—not true science, not the +science of investigation, sceptical in the primitive and +direct meaning of the word, which hastens towards no +predetermined solution nor proceeds save by the testing +of hypotheses.</p> + +<p>Take the <i>Summa Theologica</i> of St. Thomas, the +classical monument of the theology—that is, of the +<a name="Page_93" id="Page_93" />advocacy—of Catholicism, and open it where you please. +First comes the thesis—<i>utrum</i> ... whether such a thing +be thus or otherwise; then the objections—<i>ad primum sic +proceditur</i>; next the answers to these objections—<i>sed +contra est</i> ... or <i>respondeo dicendum</i>.... Pure +advocacy! And underlying many, perhaps most, of its +arguments you will find a logical fallacy which may be +expressed <i>more scholastico</i> by this syllogism: I do not +understand this fact save by giving it this explanation; +it is thus that I must understand it, therefore this must +be its explanation. The alternative being that I am left +without any understanding of it at all. True science +teaches, above all, to doubt and to be ignorant; advocacy +neither doubts nor believes that it does not know. It +requires a solution.</p> + +<p>To the mentality that assumes, more or less consciously, +that we must of necessity find a solution to +every problem, belongs the argument based on the +disastrous consequences of a thing. Take any book of +apologetics—that is to say, of theological advocacy—and +you will see how many times you will meet with this +phrase—"the disastrous consequences of this doctrine." +Now the disastrous consequences of a doctrine prove at +most that the doctrine is disastrous, but not that it is +false, for there is no proof that the true is necessarily that +which suits us best. The identification of the true and +the good is but a pious wish. In his <i>Études sur Blaise +Pascal</i>, A. Vinet says: "Of the two needs that unceasingly +belabour human nature, that of happiness is not +only the more universally felt and the more constantly +experienced, but it is also the more imperious. And this +need is not only of the senses; it is intellectual. It is not +only for the <i>soul</i>; it is for the <i>mind</i> that happiness is a +necessity. Happiness forms a part of truth." This last +proposition—<i>le bonheur fait partie de la verité</i>—is a +proposition of pure advocacy, but not of science or of +pure reason. It would be better to say that truth forms +<a name="Page_94" id="Page_94" />a part of happiness in a Tertullianesque sense, in the +sense of <i>credo quia absurdum</i>, which means actually +<i>credo quia consolans</i>—I believe because it is a thing consoling +to me.</p> + +<p>No, for reason, truth is that of which it can be proved +that it is, that it exists, whether it console us or not. And +reason is certainly not a consoling faculty. That terrible +Latin poet Lucretius, whose apparent serenity and +Epicurean <i>ataraxia</i> conceal so much despair, said that +piety consists in the power to contemplate all things with +a serene soul—<i>pacata posse mente omnia tueri</i>. And it +was the same Lucretius who wrote that religion can persuade +us into so great evils—<i>tantum religio potuit +suadere malorum</i>. And it is true that religion—above +all the Christian religion—has been, as the Apostle says, +to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the intellectuals +foolishness.<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29" /><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> The Christian religion, the religion of the +immortality of the soul, was called by Tacitus a pernicious +superstition (<i>exitialis superstitio</i>), and he asserted +that it involved a hatred of mankind (<i>odium generis +humani</i>).</p> + +<p>Speaking of the age in which these men lived, the +most genuinely rationalistic age in the world's history, +Flaubert, writing to Madame Roger des Genettes, +uttered these pregnant words: "You are right; we must +speak with respect of Lucretius; I see no one who can +compare with him except Byron, and Byron has not his +gravity nor the sincerity of his sadness. The melancholy +of the ancients seems to me more profound than that of +the moderns, who all more or less presuppose an immortality +on the yonder side of the <i>black hole</i>. But for the +ancients this black hole was the infinite itself; the procession +of their dreams is imaged against a background +of immutable ebony. The gods being no more and +Christ being not yet, there was between Cicero and Marcus +Aurelius a unique moment in which man stood alone. +<a name="Page_95" id="Page_95" />Nowhere else do I find this grandeur; but what renders +Lucretius intolerable is his physics, which he gives as if +positive. If he is weak, it is because he did not doubt +enough; he wished to explain, to arrive at a conclusion!"<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30" /><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a></p> + +<p>Yes, Lucretius wished to arrive at a conclusion, a +solution, and, what is worse, he wished to find consolation +in reason. For there is also an anti-theological +advocacy, and an <i>odium anti-theologicum</i>.</p> + +<p>Many, very many, men of science, the majority of those +who call themselves rationalists, are afflicted by it.</p> + +<p>The rationalist acts rationally—that is to say, he does +not speak out of his part—so long as he confines himself +to denying that reason satisfies our vital hunger for immortality; +but, furious at not being able to believe, he +soon becomes a prey to the vindictiveness of the <i>odium +anti-theologicum</i>, and exclaims with the Pharisees: "This +people who knoweth not the law are cursed." There is +much truth in these words of Soloviev: "I have a foreboding +of the near approach of a time when Christians will +gather together again in the Catacombs, because of the +persecution of the faith—a persecution less brutal, perhaps, +than that of Nero's day, but not less refined in its +severity, consummated by mendacity, derision, and all +the hypocrisies."</p> + +<p>The anti-theological hate, the scientificist—I do not say +scientific—fury, is manifest. Consider, not the more +detached scientific investigators, those who know how to +doubt, but the fanatics of rationalism, and observe with +what gross brutality they speak of faith. Vogt considered +it probable that the cranial structure of the +Apostles was of a pronounced simian character; of the +indecencies of Haeckel, that supreme incomprehender, +there is no need to speak, nor yet of those of Büchner; +even Virchow is not free from them. And others work +with more subtilty. There are people who seem not to +<a name="Page_96" id="Page_96" />be content with not believing that there is another life, +or rather, with believing that there is none, but who are +vexed and hurt that others should believe in it or even +should wish that it might exist. And this attitude is as +contemptible as that is worthy of respect which characterizes +those who, though urged by the need they have of +it to believe in another life, are unable to believe. But +of this most noble attitude of the spirit, the most profound, +the most human, and the most fruitful, the attitude +of despair, we will speak later on.</p> + +<p>And the rationalists who do not succumb to the anti-theological +fury are bent on convincing men that there +are motives for living and consolations for having been +born, even though there shall come a time, at the end of +some tens or hundreds or millions of centuries, when all +human consciousness shall have ceased to exist. And +these motives for living and working, this thing which +some call humanism, are the amazing products of the +affective and emotional hollowness of rationalism and of +its stupendous hypocrisy—a hypocrisy bent on sacrificing +sincerity to veracity, and sworn not to confess that reason +is a dissolvent and disconsolatory power.</p> + +<p>Must I repeat again what I have already said about all +this business of manufacturing culture, of progressing, +of realizing good, truth, and beauty, of establishing +justice on earth, of ameliorating life for those who shall +come after us, of subserving I know not what destiny, +and all this without our taking thought for the ultimate +end of each one of us? Must I again declare to you the +supreme vacuity of culture, of science, of art, of good, of +truth, of beauty, of justice ... of all these beautiful conceptions, +if at the last, in four days or in four millions of +centuries—it matters not which—no human consciousness +shall exist to appropriate this civilization, this +science, art, good, truth, beauty, justice, and all the rest?</p> + +<p>Many and very various have been the rationalist +devices—more or less rational—by means of which from +<a name="Page_97" id="Page_97" />the days of the Epicureans and the Stoics it has been +sought to discover rational consolation in truth and to +convince men, although those who sought so to do +remained themselves unconvinced, that there are motives +for working and lures for living, even though the human +consciousness be destined some day to disappear.</p> + +<p>The Epicurean attitude, the extreme and grossest expression +of which is "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow +we die," or the Horatian <i>carpe diem</i>, which may +be rendered by "Live for the day," does not differ in its +essence from the Stoic attitude with its "Accomplish +what the moral conscience dictates to thee, and afterward +let it be as it may be." Both attitudes have a common +base; and pleasure for pleasure's sake comes to the same +as duty for duty's sake.</p> + +<p>Spinoza, the most logical and consistent of atheists—I +mean of those who deny the persistence of individual +consciousness through indefinite future time—and at the +same time the most pious, Spinoza devoted the fifth and +last part of his <i>Ethic</i> to elucidating the path that leads to +liberty and to determining the concept of happiness. +The concept! Concept, not feeling! For Spinoza, who +was a terrible intellectualist, happiness (<i>beatitudo</i>) is a +concept, and the love of God an intellectual love. After +establishing in proposition xxi. of the fifth part that +"the mind can imagine nothing, neither can it remember +anything that is past, save during the continuance of the +body"—which is equivalent to denying the immortality +of the soul, since a soul which, disjoined from the body +in which it lived, does not remember its past, is neither +immortal nor is it a soul—he goes on to affirm in proposition +xxiii. that "the human mind cannot be absolutely +destroyed with the body, but there remains of it something +which is <i>eternal</i>," and this eternity of the mind is +a certain mode of thinking. But do not let yourselves +be deceived; there is no such eternity of the individual +mind. Everything is <i>sub æternitatis specie</i>—that is to +<a name="Page_98" id="Page_98" />say, pure illusion. Nothing could be more dreary, +nothing more desolating, nothing more anti-vital than +this happiness, this <i>beatitudo</i>, of Spinoza, that consists +in the intellectual love of the mind towards God, which +is nothing else but the very love with which God loves +Himself (prop, xxxvi.). Our happiness—that is to say, +our liberty—consists in the constant and eternal love of +God towards men. So affirms the corollary to this +thirty-sixth proposition. And all this in order to arrive +at the conclusion, which is the final and crowning proposition +of the whole <i>Ethic</i>, that happiness is not the reward +of virtue, but virtue itself. The everlasting refrain! Or, +to put it plainly, we proceed from God and to God we +return, which, translated into concrete language, the +language of life and feeling, means that my personal consciousness +sprang from nothingness, from my unconsciousness, +and to nothingness it will return.</p> + +<p>And this most dreary and desolating voice of Spinoza +is the very voice of reason. And the liberty of which he +tells us is a terrible liberty. And against Spinoza and +his doctrine of happiness there is only one irresistible +argument, the argument <i>ad hominem</i>. Was he happy, +Benedict Spinoza, while, to allay his inner unhappiness, +he was discoursing of happiness? Was he free?</p> + +<p>In the corollary to proposition xli. of this same final and +most tragic part of that tremendous tragedy of his <i>Ethic</i>, +the poor desperate Jew of Amsterdam discourses of the +common persuasion of the vulgar of the truth of eternal +life. Let us hear what he says: "It would appear that +they esteem piety and religion—and, indeed, all that is referred +to fortitude or strength of mind—as burdens which +they expect to lay down after death, when they hope to +receive a reward for their servitude, not for their piety +and religion in this life. Nor is it even this hope alone +that leads them; the fear of frightful punishments with +which they are menaced after death also influences them +to live—in so far as their impotence and poverty of spirit +<a name="Page_99" id="Page_99" />permits—in conformity with the prescription of the +Divine law. And were not this hope and this fear infused +into the minds of men—but, on the contrary, did they +believe that the soul perished with the body, and that, +beyond the grave, there was no other life prepared for the +wretched who had borne the burden <i>of piety</i> in this—they +would return to their natural inclinations, preferring to +accommodate everything to their own liking, and would +follow fortune rather than reason. But all this appears +no less absurd than it would be to suppose that a man, +because he did not believe that he could nourish his body +eternally with wholesome food, would saturate himself +with deadly poisons; or than if because believing that his +soul was not eternal and immortal, he should therefore +prefer to be without a soul (<i>amens</i>) and to live without +reason; all of which is so absurd as to be scarcely worth +refuting (<i>quæ adeo absurda sunt, ut vix recenseri +mereantur</i>)."</p> + +<p>When a thing is said to be not worth refuting you may +be sure that either it is flagrantly stupid—in which case +all comment is superfluous—or it is something formidable, +the very crux of the problem. And this it is in this +case. Yes! poor Portuguese Jew exiled in Holland, +yes! that he who is convinced without a vestige of doubt, +without the faintest hope of any saving uncertainty, that +his soul is not immortal, should prefer to be without a +soul (<i>amens</i>), or irrational, or idiot, that he should prefer +not to have been born, is a supposition that has nothing, +absolutely nothing, absurd in it. Was he happy, the +poor Jewish intellectualist definer of intellectual love and +of happiness? For that and no other is the problem. +"What does it profit thee to know the definition of compunction +if thou dost not feel it?" says à Kempis. +And what profits it to discuss or to define happiness if +you cannot thereby achieve happiness? Not inapposite +in this connection is that terrible story that Diderot tells +of a eunuch who desired to take lessons in esthetics from +<a name="Page_100" id="Page_100" />a native of Marseilles in order that he might be better +qualified to select the slaves destined for the harem of +the Sultan, his master. At the end of the first lesson, a +physiological lesson, brutally and carnally physiological, +the eunuch exclaimed bitterly, "It is evident that I shall +never know esthetics!" Even so, and just as eunuchs +will never know esthetics as applied to the selection of +beautiful women, so neither will pure rationalists ever +know ethics, nor will they ever succeed in defining happiness, +for happiness is a thing that is lived and felt, not a +thing that is reasoned about or defined.</p> + +<p>And you have another rationalist, one not sad or submissive, +like Spinoza, but rebellious, and though concealing +a despair not less bitter, making a hypocritical +pretence of light-heartedness, you have Nietzsche, who +discovered <i>mathematically</i> (!!!) that counterfeit of the +immortality of the soul which is called "eternal recurrence," +and which is in fact the most stupendous tragi-comedy +or comi-tragedy. The number of atoms or +irreducible primary elements being finite and the universe +eternal, a combination identical with that which at present +exists must at some future time be reproduced, and therefore +that which now is must be repeated an infinite number +of times. This is evident, and just as I shall live +again the life that I am now living, so I have already +lived it before an infinite number of times, for there is an +eternity that stretches into the past—<i>a parte ante</i>—just +as there will be one stretching into the future—<i>a parte +post</i>. But, unfortunately, it happens that I remember +none of my previous existences, and perhaps it is impossible +that I should remember them, for two things absolutely +and completely identical are but one. Instead of +supposing that we live in a finite universe, composed of a +finite number of irreducible primary elements, suppose +that we live in an infinite universe, without limits in +space—which concrete infinity is not less inconceivable +than the concrete eternity in time—then it will follow that +<a name="Page_101" id="Page_101" />this system of ours, that of the Milky Way, is repeated an +infinite number of times in the infinite of space, and that +therefore I am now living an infinite number of lives, all +exactly identical. A jest, as you see, but one not less +comic—that is to say, not less tragic—than that of +Nietzsche, that of the laughing lion. And why does the +lion laugh? I think he laughs with rage, because he can +never succeed in finding consolation in the thought that +he has been the same lion before and is destined to be +the same lion again.</p> + +<p>But if Spinoza and Nietzsche were indeed both +rationalists, each after his own manner, they were not +spiritual eunuchs; they had heart, feeling, and, above all, +hunger, a mad hunger for eternity, for immortality. The +physical eunuch does not feel the need of reproducing +himself carnally, in the body, and neither does the +spiritual eunuch feel the hunger for self-perpetuation.</p> + +<p>Certain it is that there are some who assert that reason +suffices them, and they counsel us to desist from seeking +to penetrate into the impenetrable. But of those who say +that they have no need of any faith in an eternal personal +life to furnish them with incentives to living and motives +for action, I know not well how to think. A man blind +from birth may also assure us that he feels no great +longing to enjoy the world of sight nor suffers any great +anguish from not having enjoyed it, and we must needs +believe him, for what is wholly unknown cannot be the +object of desire—<i>nihil volitum quin præcognitum</i>, there +can be no volition save of things already known. But I +cannot be persuaded that he who has once in his life, +either in his youth or for some other brief space of time, +cherished the belief in the immortality of the soul, will +ever find peace without it. And of this sort of blindness +from birth there are but few instances among us, and then +only by a kind of strange aberration. For the merely and +exclusively rational man is an aberration and nothing but +an aberration.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102" />More sincere, much more sincere, are those who say: +"We must not talk about it, for in talking about it we +only waste our time and weaken our will; let us do our +duty here and hereafter let come what may." But this +sincerity hides a yet deeper insincerity. May it perhaps +be that by saying "We must not talk about it," they +succeed in not thinking about it? Our will is weakened? +And what then? We lose the capacity for human +action? And what then? It is very convenient to tell +a man whom a fatal disease condemns to an early death, +and who knows it, not to think about it.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Meglio oprando obliar, senzá indagarlo,</i></div> +<div><i>Questo enorme mister del universo!</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p>"Better to work and to forget and not to probe into +this vast mystery of the universe!" Carducci wrote in his +<i>Idilio Maremmano</i>, the same Carducci who at the close +of his ode <i>Sul Monte Mario</i> tells us how the earth, the +mother of the fugitive soul, must roll its burden of glory +and sorrow round the sun "until, worn out beneath the +equator, mocked by the last flames of dying heat, the +exhausted human race is reduced to a single man and +woman, who, standing in the midst of dead woods, surrounded +by sheer mountains, livid, with glassy eyes +watch thee, O sun, set across the immense frozen waste."</p> + +<p>But is it possible for us to give ourselves to any serious +and lasting work, forgetting the vast mystery of the +universe and abandoning all attempt to understand it? +Is it possible to contemplate the vast All with a serene +soul, in the spirit of the Lucretian piety, if we are conscious +of the thought that a time must come when this All +will no longer be reflected in any human consciousness?</p> + +<p>Cain, in Byron's poem, asks of Lucifer, the prince of +the intellectuals, "Are ye happy?" and Lucifer replies, +"We are mighty." Cain questions again, "Are ye +happy?" and then the great Intellectual says to him: +"No; art thou?" And further on, this same Lucifer +says to Adah, the sister and wife of Cain: "Choose +<a name="Page_103" id="Page_103" />betwixt love and knowledge—since there is no other +choice." And in the same stupendous poem, when Cain +says that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was +a lying tree, for "we know nothing; at least it promised +knowledge at the price of death," Lucifer answers him: +"It may be death leads to the highest knowledge"—that +is to say, to nothingness.</p> + +<p>To this word <i>knowledge</i> which Lord Byron uses in the +above quotations, the Spanish <i>ciencia</i>, the French +<i>science</i>, the German <i>Wissenschaft</i>, is often opposed +the word <i>wisdom, sabiduria, sagesse, Weisheit</i>.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>Knowledge comes, but Wisdom lingers, and he bears a laden breast,</div> +<div>Full of sad experience, moving toward the stillness of his rest,</div></div> +</div> + +<p>says another lord, Tennyson, in his <i>Locksley Hall</i>. And +what is this wisdom which we have to seek chiefly in the +poets, leaving knowledge on one side? It is well +enough to say with Matthew Arnold in his Introduction +to Wordsworth's poems, that poetry is reality and +philosophy illusion; but reason is always reason and +reality is always reality, that which can be proved to +exist externally to us, whether we find in it consolation +or despair.</p> + +<p>I do not know why so many people were scandalized, +or pretended to be scandalized, when Brunetière proclaimed +again the bankruptcy of science. For science +as a substitute for religion and reason as a substitute +for faith have always fallen to pieces. Science will be +able to satisfy, and in fact does satisfy in an increasing +measure, our increasing logical or intellectual needs, +our desire to know and understand the truth; but science +does not satisfy the needs of our heart and our will, and +far from satisfying our hunger for immortality it contradicts +it. Rational truth and life stand in opposition to +one another. And is it possible that there is any other +truth than rational truth?</p> + +<p>It must remain established, therefore, that reason—human +reason—within its limits, not only does not prove +<a name="Page_104" id="Page_104" />rationally that the soul is immortal or that the human +consciousness shall preserve its indestructibility through +the tracts of time to come, but that it proves rather—within +its limits, I repeat—that the individual consciousness +cannot persist after the death of the physical +organism upon which it depends. And these limits, +within which I say that human reason proves this, are +the limits of rationality, of what is known by demonstration. +Beyond these limits is the irrational, which, +whether it be called the super-rational or the infra-rational +or the contra-rational, is all the same thing. +Beyond these limits is the absurd of Tertullian, the +impossible of the <i>certum est, quia impossibile est</i>. And +this absurd can only base itself upon the most absolute +uncertainty.</p> + +<p>The rational dissolution ends in dissolving reason +itself; it ends in the most absolute scepticism, in the +phenomenalism of Hume or in the doctrine of absolute +contingencies of Stuart Mill, the most consistent and +logical of the positivists. The supreme triumph of +reason, the analytical—that is, the destructive and dissolvent—faculty, +is to cast doubt upon its own validity. +The stomach that contains an ulcer ends by digesting +itself; and reason ends by destroying the immediate and +absolute validity of the concept of truth and of the concept +of necessity. Both concepts are relative; there is +no absolute truth, no absolute necessity. We call a +concept true which agrees with the general system of all +our concepts; and we call a perception true which does +not contradict the system of our perceptions. Truth is +coherence. But as regards the whole system, the aggregate, +as there is nothing outside of it of which we have +knowledge, we cannot say whether it is true or not. It +is conceivable that the universe, as it exists in itself, outside +of our consciousness, may be quite other than it +appears to us, although this is a supposition that has no +meaning for reason. And as regards necessity, is there +<a name="Page_105" id="Page_105" />an absolute necessity? By necessary we mean merely +that which is, and in so far as it is, for in another more +transcendental sense, what absolute necessity, logical +and independent of the fact that the universe exists, is +there that there should be a universe or anything else +at all?</p> + +<p>Absolute relativism, which is neither more nor less +than scepticism, in the most modern sense of the term, +is the supreme triumph of the reasoning reason.</p> + +<p>Feeling does not succeed in converting consolation +into truth, nor does reason succeed in converting truth +into consolation. But reason going beyond truth itself, +beyond the concept of reality itself, succeeds in plunging +itself into the depths of scepticism. And in this abyss +the scepticism of the reason encounters the despair of +the heart, and this encounter leads to the discovery of +a basis—a terrible basis!—for consolation to build on.</p> + +<p>Let us examine it.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26" /><a href="#FNanchor_26_26">[26]</a> <i>Pragmatism, a New Name for some Old Ways of Thinking</i>. Popular +lectures on philosophy by William James, 1907.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27" /><a href="#FNanchor_27_27">[27]</a> <i>Treatise of Human Nature</i>, book i., part iv., sect. vi., "Of Personal +Identity": "I never can catch <i>myself</i> at any time without a perception, and +never can observe anything but the perception."</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28" /><a href="#FNanchor_28_28">[28]</a> Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, <i>Lectures on the History of the Eastern Church</i>, +lecture i., sect. iii.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29" /><a href="#FNanchor_29_29">[29]</a> 1 Cor. i. 23.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30" /><a href="#FNanchor_30_30">[30]</a> Gustave Flaubert, <i>Correspondance</i>, troisième série (1854-1869). Paris, +1910.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106" /><a name="VI" id="VI" />VI</h2> + +<h2>IN THE DEPTHS OF THE ABYSS</h2> + +<blockquote><p><i>Parce unicæ spes totius orbis.</i>—TERTULLIANUS, Adversus Marcionem, 5.</p></blockquote> + + +<p>We have seen that the vital longing for human immortality +finds no consolation in reason and that reason +leaves us without incentive or consolation in life and life +itself without real finality. But here, in the depths of +the abyss, the despair of the heart and of the will and the +scepticism of reason meet face to face and embrace like +brothers. And we shall see it is from this embrace, a +tragic—that is to say, an intimately loving—embrace, +that the wellspring of life will flow, a life serious and +terrible. Scepticism, uncertainty—the position to which +reason, by practising its analysis upon itself, upon its +own validity, at last arrives—is the foundation upon +which the heart's despair must build up its hope.</p> + +<p>Disillusioned, we had to abandon the position of those +who seek to give consolation the force of rational and +logical truth, pretending to prove the rationality, or at +any rate the non-irrationality, of consolation; and we had +to abandon likewise the position of those who seek to +give rational truth the force of consolation and of a +motive for life. Neither the one nor the other of these +positions satisfied us. The one is at variance with our +reason, the other with our feeling. These two powers +can never conclude peace and we must needs live by their +war. We must make of this war, of war itself, the very +condition of our spiritual life.</p> + +<p>Neither does this high debate admit of that indecent +and repugnant expedient which the more or less parliamentary +type of politician has devised and dubbed "a +formula of agreement," the property of which is to render +<a name="Page_107" id="Page_107" />it impossible for either side to claim to be victorious. +There is no place here for a time-serving compromise. +Perhaps a degenerate and cowardly reason might bring +itself to propose some such formula of agreement, for in +truth reason lives by formulas; but life, which cannot +be formulated, life which lives and seeks to live for ever, +does not submit to formulas. Its sole formula is: all or +nothing. Feeling does not compound its differences +with middle terms.</p> + +<p><i>Initium sapientiæ timor Domini</i>, it is said, meaning +perhaps <i>timor mortis</i>, or it may be, <i>timor vitæ</i>, which is +the same thing. Always it comes about that the beginning +of wisdom is a fear.</p> + +<p>Is it true to say of this saving scepticism which I am +now going to discuss, that it is doubt? It is doubt, yes, +but it is much more than doubt. Doubt is commonly +something very cold, of very little vitalizing force, and +above all something rather artificial, especially since +Descartes degraded it to the function of a method. The +conflict between reason and life is something more than +a doubt. For doubt is easily resolved into a comic +element.</p> + +<p>The methodical doubt of Descartes is a comic doubt, a +doubt purely theoretical and provisional—that is to say, +the doubt of a man who acts as if he doubted without +really doubting. And because it was a stove-excogitated +doubt, the man who deduced that he existed from the +fact that he thought did not approve of "those turbulent +(<i>brouillonnes</i>) and restless persons who, being called +neither by birth nor by fortune to the management of +public affairs, are perpetually devising some new reformation," +and he was pained by the suspicion that there might +be something of this kind in his own writings. No, he, +Descartes, proposed only to "reform his own thoughts +and to build upon ground that was wholly his." And he +resolved not to accept anything as true when he did not +recognize it clearly to be so, and to make a clean sweep of +<a name="Page_108" id="Page_108" />all prejudices and received ideas, to the end that he might +construct his intellectual habitation anew. But "as it is +not enough, before beginning to rebuild one's dwelling-house, +to pull it down and to furnish materials and architects, +or to study architecture oneself ... but it is also +necessary to be provided with some other wherein to lodge +conveniently while the work is in progress," he framed for +himself a provisional ethic—<i>une morale de provision</i>—the +first law of which was to observe the customs of his +country and to keep always to the religion in which, by the +grace of God, he had been instructed from his infancy, +governing himself in all things according to the most +moderate opinions. Yes, exactly, a provisional religion +and even a provisional God! And he chose the most +moderate opinions "because these are always the most +convenient for practice." But it is best to proceed no +further.</p> + +<p>This methodical or theoretical Cartesian doubt, this +philosophical doubt excogitated in a stove, is not the +doubt, is not the scepticism, is not the incertitude, that I +am talking about here. No! This other doubt is a passionate +doubt, it is the eternal conflict between reason and +feeling, science and life, logic and biotic. For science +destroys the concept of personality by reducing it to a +complex in continual flux from moment to moment—that +is to say, it destroys the very foundation of the spiritual +and emotional life, which ranges itself unyieldingly +against reason.</p> + +<p>And this doubt cannot avail itself of any provisional +ethic, but has to found its ethic, as we shall see, on the conflict +itself, an ethic of battle, and itself has to serve as the +foundation of religion. And it inhabits a house which is +continually being demolished and which continually it +has to rebuild. Without ceasing the will, I mean the will +never to die, the spirit of unsubmissiveness to death, +labours to build up the house of life, and without ceasing +the keen blasts and stormy assaults of reason beat it down.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109" />And more than this, in the concrete vital problem that +concerns us, reason takes up no position whatever. In +truth, it does something worse than deny the immortality +of the soul—for that at any rate would be one solution—it +refuses even to recognize the problem as our vital desire +presents it to us. In the rational and logical sense of the +term problem, there is no such problem. This question +of the immortality of the soul, of the persistence of the +individual consciousness, is not rational, it falls outside +reason. As a problem, and whatever solution it may +receive, it is irrational. Rationally even the very propounding +of the problem lacks sense. The immortality +of the soul is as unconceivable as, in all strictness, is its +absolute mortality. For the purpose of explaining the +world and existence—and such is the task of reason—it is +not necessary that we should suppose that our soul is +either mortal or immortal. The mere enunciation of the +problem is, therefore, an irrationality.</p> + +<p>Let us hear what our brother Kierkegaard has to say. +"The danger of abstract thought is seen precisely in +respect of the problem of existence, the difficulty of which +it solves by going round it, afterwards boasting that it +has completely explained it. It explains immortality in +general, and it does so in a remarkable way by identifying +it with eternity—with the eternity which is essentially the +medium of thought. But with the immortality of each +individually existing man, wherein precisely the difficulty +lies, abstraction does not concern itself, is not interested +in it. And yet the difficulty of existence lies just in the +interest of the existing being—the man who exists is +infinitely interested in existing. Abstract thought +besteads immortality only in order that it may kill me as +an individual being with an individual existence, and so +make me immortal, pretty much in the same way as that +famous physician in one of Holberg's plays, whose +medicine, while it took away the patient's fever, took +away his life at the same time. An abstract thinker, who +<a name="Page_110" id="Page_110" />refuses to disclose and admit the relation that exists +between his abstract thought and the fact that he is an +existing being, produces a comic impression upon us, +however accomplished and distinguished he may be, for +he runs the risk of ceasing to be a man. While an +effective man, compounded of infinitude and finitude, +owes his effectiveness precisely to the conjunction of these +two elements and is infinitely interested in existing, an +abstract thinker, similarly compounded, is a double +being, a fantastical being, who lives in the pure being of +abstraction, and at times presents the sorry figure of a +professor who lays aside this abstract essence as he lays +aside his walking-stick. When one reads the Life of a +thinker of this kind—whose writings may be excellent—one +trembles at the thought of what it is to be a man. +And when one reads in his writings that thinking and +being are the same thing, one thinks, remembering his +life, that that being, which is identical with thinking, +is not precisely the same thing as being a man" +(<i>Afsluttende uvidenskabelig Efterskrift</i>, chap. iii.).</p> + +<p>What intense passion—that is to say, what truth—there +is in this bitter invective against Hegel, prototype of the +rationalist!—for the rationalist takes away our fever by +taking away our life, and promises us, instead of a concrete, +an abstract immortality, as if the hunger for +immortality that consumes us were an abstract and not a +concrete hunger!</p> + +<p>It may indeed be said that when once the dog is dead +there is an end to the rabies, and that after I have died I +shall no more be tortured by this rage of not dying, and +that the fear of death, or more properly, of nothingness, +is an irrational fear, but ... Yes, but ... <i>Eppur si +muove!</i> And it will go on moving. For it is the source +of all movement!</p> + +<p>I doubt, however, whether our brother Kierkegaard is +altogether in the right, for this same abstract thinker, +or thinker of abstractions, thinks <i>in order that</i> he may +<a name="Page_111" id="Page_111" />exist, that he may not cease to exist, or thinks perhaps in +order to forget that he will have to cease to exist. This +is the root of the passion for abstract thought. And +possibly Hegel was as infinitely interested as Kierkegaard +in his own concrete, individual existence, although the +professional decorum of the state-philosopher compelled +him to conceal the fact.</p> + +<p>Faith in immortality is irrational. And, notwithstanding, +faith, life, and reason have mutual need of one +another. This vital longing is not properly a problem, +cannot assume a logical status, cannot be formulated in +propositions susceptible of rational discussion; but it +announces itself in us as hunger announces itself. +Neither can the wolf that throws itself with the fury of +hunger upon its prey or with the fury of instinct upon +the she-wolf, enunciate its impulse rationally and as a +logical problem. Reason and faith are two enemies, +neither of which can maintain itself without the other. +The irrational demands to be rationalized and reason only +can operate on the irrational. They are compelled to +seek mutual support and association. But association in +struggle, for struggle is a mode of association.</p> + +<p>In the world of living beings the struggle for life +establishes an association, and a very close one, not only +between those who unite together in combat against a +common foe, but between the combatants themselves. +And is there any possible association more intimate than +that uniting the animal that eats another and the animal +that is eaten, between the devourer and the devoured? +And if this is clearly seen in the struggle between +individuals, it is still more evident in the struggle between +peoples. War has always been the most effective factor +of progress, even more than commerce. It is through +war that conquerors and conquered learn to know each +other and in consequence to love each other.</p> + +<p>Christianity, the foolishness of the Cross, the irrational +faith that Christ rose from the dead in order to raise us +<a name="Page_112" id="Page_112" />from the dead, was saved by the rationalistic Hellenic +culture, and this in its turn was saved by Christianity. +Without Christianity the Renaissance would have been +impossible. Without the Gospel, without St. Paul, the +peoples who had traversed the Middle Ages would have +understood neither Plato nor Aristotle. A purely +rationalist tradition is as impossible as a tradition purely +religious. It is frequently disputed whether the Reformation +was born as the child of the Renaissance or as a protest +against it, and both propositions may be said to be +true, for the son is always born as a protest against the +father. It is also said that it was the revived Greek +classics that led men like Erasmus back to St. Paul and to +primitive Christianity, which is the most irrational form +of Christianity; but it may be retorted that it was St. Paul, +that it was the Christian irrationality underlying his +Catholic theology, that led them back to the classics. +"Christianity is what it has come to be," it has been +said, "only through its alliance with antiquity, while +with the Copts and Ethiopians it is but a kind of +buffoonery. Islam developed under the influence of Persian +and Greek culture, and under that of the Turks it +has been transformed into a destructive barbarism."<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31" /><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a></p> + +<p>We have emerged from the Middle Ages, from the +medieval faith as ardent as it was at heart despairing, and +not without its inward and abysmal incertitudes, and we +have entered upon the age of rationalism, likewise not +without its incertitudes. Faith in reason is exposed to +the same rational indefensibility as all other faith. And +we may say with Robert Browning,</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>All we have gained, then, by our unbelief</div> +<div>Is a life of doubt diversified by faith</div> +<div>For one of faith diversified by doubt.</div> +<div class='i6'>(<i>Bishop Blougram's Apology</i>.)</div></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113" />And if, as I have said, faith, life, can only sustain +itself by leaning upon reason, which renders it transmissible—and +above all transmissible from myself to +myself—that is to say, reflective and conscious—it is none +the less true that reason in its turn can only sustain itself +by leaning upon faith, upon life, even if only upon faith +in reason, faith in its availability for something more +than mere knowing, faith in its availability for living. +Nevertheless, neither is faith transmissible or rational, +nor is reason vital.</p> + +<p>The will and the intelligence have need of one another, +and the reverse of that old aphorism, <i>nihil volitum quin +præcognitum</i>, nothing is willed but what is previously +known, is not so paradoxical as at first sight it may +appear—<i>nihil cognitum quin prævolitum</i>, nothing is +known but what is previously willed. Vinet, in his study +of Cousin's book on the <i>Pensées</i> of Pascal, says: "The +very knowledge of the mind as such has need of the heart. +Without the desire to see there is no seeing; in a great +materialization of life and of thought there is no believing +in the things of the spirit." We shall see presently that +to believe is, in the first instance, to wish to believe.</p> + +<p>The will and the intelligence seek opposite ends: that +we may absorb the world into ourselves, appropriate it to +ourselves, is the aim of the will; that we may be absorbed +into the world, that of the intelligence. Opposite ends?—are +they not rather one and the same? No, they are +not, although they may seem to be so. The intelligence +is monist or pantheist, the will monotheist or egoist. +The intelligence has no need of anything outside it to +exercise itself upon; it builds its foundation with ideas +themselves, while the will requires matter. To know +something is to make this something that I know myself; +but to avail myself of it, to dominate it, it has to remain +distinct from myself.</p> + +<p>Philosophy and religion are enemies, and because they +are enemies they have need of one another. There is no +<a name="Page_114" id="Page_114" />religion without some philosophic basis, no philosophy +without roots in religion. Each lives by its contrary. +The history of philosophy is, strictly speaking, a history +of religion. And the attacks which are directed against +religion from a presumed scientific or philosophical point +of view are merely attacks from another but opposing religious +point of view. "The opposition which professedly +exists between natural science and Christianity really +exists between an impulse derived from natural religion +blended with the scientific investigation of nature, and +the validity of the Christian view of the world, +which assures to spirit its pre-eminence over the entire +world of nature," says Ritschl (<i>Rechtfertgung und +Versöhnung</i>, iii. chap. iv. § 28). Now this instinct is +the instinct of rationality itself. And the critical +idealism of Kant is of religious origin, and it is +in order to save religion that Kant enlarged the limits +of reason after having in a certain sense dissolved it +in scepticism. The system of antitheses, contradictions, +and antinomies, upon which Hegel constructed his absolute +idealism, has its root and germ in Kant himself, and +this root is an irrational root.</p> + +<p>We shall see later on, when we come to deal with faith, +that faith is in its essence simply a matter of will, not of +reason, that to believe is to wish to believe, and to believe +in God is, before all and above all, to wish that there may +be a God. In the same way, to believe in the immortality +of the soul is to wish that the soul may be immortal, but +to wish it with such force that this volition shall trample +reason under foot and pass beyond it. But reason has +its revenge.</p> + +<p>The instinct of knowing and the instinct of living, or +rather of surviving, come into conflict. In his work on +the <i>Analysis of the Sensations and the Relation of the +Physical to the Psychical</i>,<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32" /><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> Dr. E. Mach tells us that not +<a name="Page_115" id="Page_115" />even the investigator, the savant, <i>der Forscher</i>, is +exempted from taking his part in the struggle for existence, +that even the roads of science lead mouth-wards, +and that in the actual conditions of the society in which +we live the pure instinct of knowing, <i>der reine Erkenntnisstrieb</i>, +is still no more than an ideal. And so it always +will be. <i>Primum vivere, deinde philosophari</i>, or perhaps +better, <i>primum supervivere</i> or <i>superesse</i>.</p> + +<p>Every position of permanent agreement or harmony +between reason and life, between philosophy and religion, +becomes impossible. And the tragic history of human +thought is simply the history of a struggle between reason +and life—reason bent on rationalizing life and forcing it +to submit to the inevitable, to mortality; life bent on +vitalizing reason and forcing it to serve as a support for +its own vital desires. And this is the history of +philosophy, inseparable from the history of religion.</p> + +<p>Our sense of the world of objective reality is necessarily +subjective, human, anthropomorphic. And vitalism will +always rise up against rationalism; reason will always +find itself confronted by will. Hence the rhythm of the +history of philosophy and the alternation of periods in +which life imposes itself, giving birth to spiritual forms, +with those in which reason imposes itself, giving birth to +materialist forms, although both of these classes of forms +of belief may be disguised by other names. Neither +reason nor life ever acknowledges itself vanquished. But +we will return to this in the next chapter.</p> + +<p>The vital consequence of rationalism would be suicide. +Kierkegaard puts it very well: "The consequence for +existence<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33" /><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> of pure thought is suicide.... We do not +praise suicide but passion. The thinker, on the contrary, +is a curious animal—for a few spells during the day he is +very intelligent, but, for the rest, he has nothing in +<a name="Page_116" id="Page_116" />common with man" (<i>Afsluttende uvidenskabelig Efterskrift</i>, +chap iii., § 1).</p> + +<p>As the thinker, in spite of all, does not cease to be a +man, he employs reason in the interests of life, whether +he knows it or not. Life cheats reason and reason cheats +life. Scholastic-Aristotelian philosophy fabricated in the +interest of life a teleologic-evolutionist system, rational in +appearance, which might serve as a support for our vital +longing. This philosophy, the basis of the orthodox +Christian supernaturalism, whether Catholic or Protestant, +was, in its essence, merely a trick on the part of +life to force reason to lend it its support. But reason +supported it with such pressure that it ended by pulverizing it.</p> + +<p>I have read that the ex-Carmelite, Hyacinthe Loyson, +declared that he could present himself before God with +tranquillity, for he was at peace with his conscience and +with his reason. With what conscience? If with his +religious conscience, then I do not understand. For it +is a truth that no man can serve two masters, and least of +all when, though they may sign truces and armistices +and compromises, these two are enemies because of +their conflicting interests.</p> + +<p>To all this someone is sure to object that life ought to +subject itself to reason, to which we will reply that nobody +ought to do what he is unable to do, and life cannot subject +itself to reason. "Ought, therefore can," some Kantian +will retort. To which we shall demur: "Cannot, +therefore ought not." And life cannot submit itself to +reason, because the end of life is living and not understanding.</p> + +<p>Again, there are those who talk of the religious duty of +resignation to mortality. This is indeed the very summit +of aberration and insincerity. But someone is sure to +oppose the idea of veracity to that of sincerity. Granted, +and yet the two may very well be reconciled. Veracity, +the homage I owe to what I believe to be rational, to what +<a name="Page_117" id="Page_117" />logically we call truth, moves me to affirm, in this case, +that the immortality of the individual soul is a contradiction +in terms, that it is something, not only irrational, +but contra-rational; but sincerity leads me to affirm also +my refusal to resign myself to this previous affirmation +and my protest against its validity. What I feel is a +truth, at any rate as much a truth as what I see, touch, +hear, or what is demonstrated to me—nay, I believe it is +more of a truth—and sincerity obliges me not to hide +what I feel.</p> + +<p>And life, quick to defend itself, searches for the weak +point in reason and finds it in scepticism, which it +straightway fastens upon, seeking to save itself by means +of this stranglehold. It needs the weakness of its adversary.</p> + +<p>Nothing is sure. Everything is elusive and in the air. +In an outburst of passion Lamennais exclaims: "But +what! Shall we, losing all hope, shut our eyes and plunge +into the voiceless depths of a universal scepticism? Shall +we doubt that we think, that we feel, that we are? Nature +does not allow it; she forces us to believe even when our +reason is not convinced. Absolute certainty and absolute +doubt are both alike forbidden to us. We hover in a +vague mean between these two extremes, as between being +and nothingness; for complete scepticism would be the +extinction of the intelligence and the total death of man. +But it is not given to man to annihilate himself; there is +in him something which invincibly resists destruction, I +know not what vital faith, indomitable even by his will. +Whether he likes it or not, he must believe, because he +must act, because he must preserve himself. His reason, +if he listened only to that, teaching him to doubt everything, +itself included, would reduce him to a state of +absolute inaction; he would perish before even he had +been able to prove to himself that he existed" (<i>Essai +sur l'indifférence en matière de religion</i>, iii<sup>e</sup> partie, +chap. lxvii.).</p> + +<p><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118" />Reason, however, does not actually lead us to absolute +scepticism. No! Reason does not lead me and cannot +lead me to doubt that I exist. Whither reason does lead +me is to vital scepticism, or more properly, to vital negation—not +merely to doubt, but to deny, that my consciousness +survives my death. Scepticism is produced by +the clash between reason and desire. And from this +clash, from this embrace between despair and scepticism, +is born that holy, that sweet, that saving incertitude, +which is our supreme consolation.</p> + +<p>The absolute and complete certainty, on the one hand, +that death is a complete, definite, irrevocable annihilation +of personal consciousness, a certainty of the same order +as the certainty that the three angles of a triangle are +equal to two right angles, or, on the other hand, the +absolute and complete certainty that our personal consciousness +is prolonged beyond death in these present or +in other conditions, and above all including in itself that +strange and adventitious addition of eternal rewards and +punishments—both of these certainties alike would make +life impossible for us. In the most secret chamber of +the spirit of him who believes himself convinced that +death puts an end to his personal consciousness, his +memory, for ever, and all unknown to him perhaps, there +lurks a shadow, a vague shadow, a shadow of shadow, of +uncertainty, and while he says within himself, "Well, let +us live this life that passes away, for there is no other!" +the silence of this secret chamber speaks to him and +murmurs, "Who knows!..." He may not think he +hears it, but he hears it nevertheless. And likewise in +some secret place of the soul of the believer who most +firmly holds the belief in a future life, there is a muffled +voice, a voice of uncertainty, which whispers in the ear +of his spirit, "Who knows!..." These voices are +like the humming of a mosquito when the south-west +wind roars through the trees in the wood; we cannot distinguish +this faint humming, yet nevertheless, merged in +<a name="Page_119" id="Page_119" />the clamour of the storm, it reaches the ear. Otherwise, +without this uncertainty, how could we live?</p> + +<p><i>"Is there?" "Is there not?"</i>—these are the bases +of our inner life. There may be a rationalist who has +never wavered in his conviction of the mortality of the +soul, and there may be a vitalist who has never wavered +in his faith in immortality; but at the most this would +only prove that just as there are natural monstrosities, so +there are those who are stupid as regards heart and +feeling, however great their intelligence, and those who +are stupid intellectually, however great their virtue. But, +in normal cases, I cannot believe those who assure me +that never, not in a fleeting moment, not in the hours of +direst loneliness and grief, has this murmur of uncertainty +breathed upon their consciousness. I do not understand +those men who tell me that the prospect of the yonder +side of death has never tormented them, that the thought +of their own annihilation never disquiets them. For my +part I do not wish to make peace between my heart and +my head, between my faith and my reason—I wish rather +that there should be war between them!</p> + +<p>In the ninth chapter of the Gospel according to Mark +it is related how a man brought unto Jesus his son who +was possessed by a dumb spirit, and wheresoever the +spirit took him it tore him, causing him to foam and gnash +his teeth and pine away, wherefore he sought to bring +him to Jesus that he might cure him. And the Master, +impatient of those who sought only for signs and wonders, +exclaimed: "O faithless generation, how long shall I +be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him unto +me" (ver. 19), and they brought him unto him. And +when the Master saw him wallowing on the ground, he +asked his father how long it was ago since this had come +unto him and the father replied that it was since he was +& child. And Jesus said unto him: "If thou canst +believe, all things are possible to him that believeth" +(ver. 23). And then the father of the epileptic or +<a name="Page_120" id="Page_120" />demoniac uttered these pregnant and immortal words: +"Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief!"—<i>Πιστευω, +κυριε, βοηθει τη απιοτια μου +</i> (ver. 24).</p> + +<p>"Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief!" A contradiction +seemingly, for if he believes, if he trusts, how +is it that he beseeches the Lord to help his lack of trust? +Nevertheless, it is this contradiction that gives to the +heart's cry of the father of the demoniac its most profound +human value. His faith is a faith that is based upon +incertitude. Because he believes—that is to say, because +he wishes to believe, because he has need that his son +should be cured—he beseeches the Lord to help his unbelief, +his doubt that such a cure could be effected. Of +such kind is human faith; of such kind was the heroic +faith that Sancho Panza had in his master, the knight +Don Quijote de la Mancha, as I think I have shown in +my <i>Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho</i>; a faith based upon +incertitude, upon doubt. Sancho Panza was indeed a +man, a whole and a true man, and he was not stupid, for +only if he had been stupid would he have believed, without +a shadow of doubt, in the follies of his master. And +his master himself did not believe in them without a +shadow of doubt, for neither was Don Quixote, though +mad, stupid. He was at heart a man of despair, as I +think I have shown in my above-mentioned book. And +because he was a man of an heroical despair, the hero +of that inward and resigned despair, he stands as the +eternal exemplar of every man whose soul is the battle-ground +of reason and immortal desire. Our Lord Don +Quixote is the prototype of the vitalist whose faith is +based upon uncertainty, and Sancho is the prototype of +the rationalist who doubts his own reason.</p> + +<p>Tormented by torturing doubts, August Hermann +Francke resolved to call upon God, a God in whom he +did not believe, or rather in whom he believed that he +did not believe, imploring Him to take pity upon him, +upon the poor pietist Francke, if perchance He really +<a name="Page_121" id="Page_121" />existed.<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34" /><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a> And from a similar state of mind came the +inspiration of the sonnet entitled "The Atheist's +Prayer," which is included in my <i>Rosario de Sonetos +Líricos</i>, and closes with these lines:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div class='i6'><i>Sufro yo a tu costa,</i></div> +<div><i>Dios no existiente, pues si tú existieras</i></div> +<div><i>existiería yo también de veras.</i><a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35" /><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>Yes, if God the guarantor of our personal immortality +existed, then should we ourselves really exist. And if +He exists not, neither do we exist.</p> + +<p>That terrible secret, that hidden will of God which, +translated into the language of theology, is known as +predestination, that idea which dictated to Luther his +<i>servum arbitrium</i>, and which gives to Calvinism its tragic +sense, that doubt of our own salvation, is in its essence +nothing but uncertainty, and this uncertainty, allied +with despair, forms the basis of faith. Faith, some say, +consists in not thinking about it, in surrendering ourselves +trustingly to the arms of God, the secrets of whose +providence are inscrutable. Yes, but infidelity also +consists in not thinking about it. This absurd faith, this +faith that knows no shadow of uncertainty, this faith of +the stupid coalheaver, joins hands with an absurd +incredulity, the incredulity that knows no shadow of +uncertainty, the incredulity of the intellectuals who are +afflicted with affective stupidity in order that they may +not think about it.</p> + +<p>And what but uncertainty, doubt, the voice of reason, +was that abyss, that terrible <i>gouffre</i>, before which Pascal +trembled? And it was that which led him to pronounce +his terrible sentence, <i>il faut s'abêtir</i>—need is that we +become fools!</p> + +<p>All Jansenism, the Catholic adaptation of Calvinism, +<a name="Page_122" id="Page_122" />bears the same impress. Port-Royal, which owed its +existence to a Basque, the Abbé de Saint-Cyran, a man +of the same race as Iñigo de Loyola and as he who writes +these lines, always preserved deep down a sediment of +religious despair, of the suicide of reason. Loyola also +slew his reason in obedience.</p> + +<p>Our affirmation is despair, our negation is despair, +and from despair we abstain from affirming and denying. +Note the greater part of our atheists and you will see +that they are atheists from a kind of rage, rage at not +being able to believe that there is a God. They are the +personal enemies of God. They have invested Nothingness +with substance and personality, and their No-God +is an Anti-God.</p> + +<p>And concerning that abject and ignoble saying, "If +there were not a God it would be necessary to invent +Him," we shall say nothing. It is the expression of the +unclean scepticism of those conservatives who look upon +religion merely as a means of government and whose +interest it is that in the other life there shall be a hell for +those who oppose their worldly interests in this life. +This repugnant and Sadducean phrase is worthy of the +time-serving sceptic to whom it is attributed.</p> + +<p>No, with all this the deep vital sense has nothing to +do. It has nothing to do with a transcendental police +regimen, or with securing order—and what an order!—upon +earth by means of promises and threats of eternal +rewards and punishments after death. All this belongs +to a lower plane—that is to say, it is merely politics, or +if you like, ethics. The vital sense has to do with living.</p> + +<p>But it is in our endeavour to represent to ourselves +what the life of the soul after death really means that +uncertainty finds its surest foundation. This it is that +most shakes our vital desire and most intensifies the +dissolvent efficacy of reason. For even if by a mighty +effort of faith we overcome that reason which tells and +teaches us that the soul is only a function of the physical +<a name="Page_123" id="Page_123" />organism, it yet remains for our imagination to conceive +an image of the immortal and eternal life of the +soul. This conception involves us in contradictions and +absurdities, and it may be that we shall arrive with +Kierkegaard at the conclusion that if the mortality of the +soul is terrible, not less terrible is its immortality.</p> + +<p>But when we have overcome the first, the only real +difficulty, when we have overcome the impediment of +reason, when we have achieved the faith, however painful +and involved in uncertainty it may be, that our personal +consciousness shall continue after death, what difficulty, +what impediment, lies in the way of our imagining to +ourselves this persistence of self in harmony with our +desire? Yes, we can imagine it as an eternal rejuvenescence, +as an eternal growth of ourselves, and as a +journeying towards God, towards the Universal Consciousness, +without ever an arrival, we can imagine it +as ... But who shall put fetters upon the imagination, +once it has broken the chain of the rational?</p> + +<p>I know that all this is dull reading, tiresome, perhaps +tedious, but it is all necessary. And I must repeat once +again that we have nothing to do with a transcendental +police system or with the conversion of God into a great +Judge or Policeman—that is to say, we are not concerned +with heaven or hell considered as buttresses to +shore up our poor earthly morality, nor are we concerned +with anything egoistic or personal. It is not I myself +alone, it is the whole human race that is involved, it is +the ultimate finality of all our civilization. I am but +one, but all men are I's.</p> + +<p>Do you remember the end of that <i>Song of the Wild +Cock</i> which Leopardi wrote in prose?—the despairing +Leopardi, the victim of reason, who never succeeded in +achieving belief. "A time will come," he says, "when +this Universe and Nature itself will be extinguished. +And just as of the grandest kingdoms and empires of +mankind and the marvellous things achieved therein, +<a name="Page_124" id="Page_124" />very famous in their own time, no vestige or memory +remains to-day, so, in like manner, of the entire world +and of the vicissitudes and calamities of all created things +there will remain not a single trace, but a naked silence +and a most profound stillness will fill the immensity of +space. And so before ever it has been uttered or understood, +this admirable and fearful secret of universal +existence will be obliterated and lost." And this they +now describe by a scientific and very rationalistic term—namely, +<i>entropia</i>. Very pretty, is it not? Spencer +invented the notion of a primordial homogeneity, from +which it is impossible to conceive how any heterogeneity +could originate. Well now, this <i>entropia</i> is a kind of +ultimate homogeneity, a state of perfect equilibrium. +For a soul avid of life, it is the most like nothingness +that the mind can conceive.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>To this point, through a series of dolorous reflections, +I have brought the reader who has had the patience to +follow me, endeavouring always to do equal justice to +the claims of reason and of feeling. I have not wished +to keep silence on matters about which others are silent; +I have sought to strip naked, not only my own soul, but +the human soul, be its nature what it may, its destiny to +disappear or not to disappear. And we have arrived at +the bottom of the abyss, at the irreconcilable conflict +between reason and vital feeling. And having arrived +here, I have told you that it is necessary to accept the +conflict as such and to live by it. Now it remains for me +to explain to you how, according to my way of feeling, +and even according to my way of thinking, this despair +may be the basis of a vigorous life, of an efficacious +activity, of an ethic, of an esthetic, of a religion and even +of a logic. But in what follows there will be as much of +imagination as of ratiocination, or rather, much more.</p> + +<p>I do not wish to deceive anyone, or to offer as +philosophy what it may be is only poetry or <a name="Page_125" id="Page_125" />phantasmagoria, +in any case a kind of mythology. The divine +Plato, after having discussed the immortality of the soul +in his dialogue <i>Phædo</i> (an ideal—that is to say, a lying—immortality), +embarked upon an interpretation of the +myths which treat of the other life, remarking that it was +also necessary to mythologize. Let us, then, mythologize.</p> + +<p>He who looks for reasons, strictly so called, scientific +arguments, technically logical reflections, may refuse to +follow me further. Throughout the remainder of these +reflections upon the tragic sense, I am going to fish for +the attention of the reader with the naked, unbaited hook; +whoever wishes to bite, let him bite, but I deceive no +one. Only in the conclusion I hope to gather everything +together and to show that this religious despair +which I have been talking about, and which is nothing +other than the tragic sense of life itself, is, though more +or less hidden, the very foundation of the consciousness +of civilized individuals and peoples to-day—that is to +say, of those individuals and those peoples who do not +suffer from stupidity of intellect or stupidity of feeling.</p> + +<p>And this tragic sense is the spring of heroic achievements.</p> + +<p>If in that which follows you shall meet with arbitrary +apothegms, brusque transitions, inconsecutive statements, +veritable somersaults of thought, do not cry out +that you have been deceived. We are about to enter—if +it be that you wish to accompany me—upon a field of +contradictions between feeling and reasoning, and we +shall have to avail ourselves of the one as well as of the +other.</p> + +<p>That which follows is not the outcome of reason but of +life, although in order that I may transmit it to you I +shall have to rationalize it after a fashion. The greater +part of it can be reduced to no logical theory or system; +but like that tremendous Yankee poet, Walt Whitman, +I charge that there be no theory or school founded out +of me" (<i>Myself and Mine</i>).</p> + +<p><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126" />Neither am I the only begetter of the fancies I am +about to set forth. By no means. They have also been +conceived by other men, if not precisely by other thinkers, +who have preceded me in this vale of tears, and who have +exhibited their life and given expression to it. Their life, +I repeat, not their thought, save in so far as it was thought +inspired by life, thought with a basis of irrationality.</p> + +<p>Does this mean that in all that follows, in the efforts +of the irrational to express itself, there is a total lack of +rationality, of all objective value? No; the absolutely, +the irrevocably irrational, is inexpressible, is intransmissible. +But not the contra-rational. Perhaps there +is no way of rationalizing the irrational; but there is a +way of rationalizing the contra-rational, and that is by +trying to explain it. Since only the rational is intelligible, +really intelligible, and since the absurd, being +devoid of sense, is condemned to be incommunicable, +you will find that whenever we succeed in giving expression +and intelligibility to anything apparently irrational +or absurd we invariably resolve it into something rational, +even though it be into the negation of that which we +affirm.</p> + +<p>The maddest dreams of the fancy have some ground of +reason, and who knows if everything that the imagination +of man can conceive either has not already happened, or +is not now happening or will not happen some time, in +some world or another? The possible combinations are +perhaps infinite. It only remains to know whether all +that is imaginable is possible.</p> + +<p>It may also be said, and with justice, that much of what +I am about to set forth is merely a repetition of ideas +which have been expressed a hundred times before and a +hundred times refuted; but the repetition of an idea +really implies that its refutation has not been final. And +as I do not pretend that the majority of these fancies are +new, so neither do I pretend, obviously, that other voices +before mine have not spoken to the winds the same +<a name="Page_127" id="Page_127" />laments. But when yet another voice echoes the same +eternal lament it can only be inferred that the same grief +still dwells in the heart.</p> + +<p>And it comes not amiss to repeat yet once again the +same eternal lamentations that were already old in the +days of Job and Ecclesiastes, and even to repeat them +in the same words, to the end that the devotees of progress +may see that there is something that never dies. Whosoever +repeats the "Vanity of vanities" of Ecclesiastes or +the lamentations of Job, even though without changing a +letter, having first experienced them in his soul, performs +a work of admonition. Need is to repeat without +ceasing the <i>memento mori</i>.</p> + +<p>"But to what end?" you will ask. Even though it be +only to the end that some people should be irritated and +should see that these things are not dead and, so long as +men exist, cannot die; to the end that they should be +convinced that to-day, in the twentieth century, all the +bygone centuries and all of them alive, are still subsisting. +When a supposed error reappears, it must be, +believe me, that it has not ceased to be true in part, just +as when one who was dead reappears, it must be that he +was not wholly dead.</p> + +<p>Yes, I know well that others before me have felt what +I feel and express; that many others feel it to-day, +although they keep silence about it. Why do I not keep +silence about it too? Well, for the very reason that +most of those who feel it are silent about it; and yet, +though they are silent, they obey in silence that inner +voice. And I do not keep silence about it because it is +for many the thing which must not be spoken, the +abomination of abominations—<i>infandum</i>—and I believe +that it is necessary now and again to speak the thing +which must not be spoken. But if it leads to nothing? +Even if it should lead only to irritating the devotees of +progress, those who believe that truth is consolation, it +would lead to not a little. To irritating them and making +<a name="Page_128" id="Page_128" />them say: Poor fellow! if he would only use his intelligence +to better purpose!... Someone perhaps will +add that I do not know what I say, to which I shall reply +that perhaps he may be right—and being right is such a +little thing!—but that I feel what I say and I know what +I feel and that suffices me. And that it is better to be +lacking in reason than to have too much of it.</p> + +<p>And the reader who perseveres in reading me will also +see how out of this abyss of despair hope may arise, and +how this critical position may be the well-spring of +human, profoundly human, action and effort, and of +solidarity and even of progress. He will see its pragmatic +justification. And he will see how, in order to +work, and to work efficaciously and morally, there is no +need of either of these two conflicting certainties, either +that of faith or that of reason, and how still less is there +any need—this never under any circumstances—to shirk +the problem of the immortality of the soul, or to distort +it idealistically—that is to say, hypocritically. The +reader will see how this uncertainty, with the suffering +that accompanies it, and the fruitless struggle to escape +from it, may be and is a basis for action and morals.</p> + +<p>And in the fact that it serves as a basis for action and +morals, this feeling of uncertainty and the inward +struggle between reason on the one hand and faith and +the passionate longing for eternal life on the other, should +find their justification in the eyes of the pragmatist. But +it must be clearly stated that I do not adduce this practical +consequence in order to justify the feeling, but +merely because I encounter it in my inward experience. +I neither desire to seek, nor ought I to seek, any justification +for this state of inward struggle and uncertainty and +longing; it is a fact and that suffices. And if anyone +finding himself in this state, in the depth of the abyss, +fails to find there motives for and incentives to life and +action, and concludes by committing bodily or spiritual +suicide, whether he kills himself or he abandons all +<a name="Page_129" id="Page_129" />co-operation with his fellows in human endeavour, it will +not be I who will pass censure upon him. And apart +from the fact that the evil consequences of a doctrine, or +rather those which we call evil, only prove, I repeat, that +the doctrine is disastrous for our desires, but not that it +is false in itself, the consequences themselves depend not +so much upon the doctrine as upon him who deduces +them. The same principle may furnish one man with +grounds for action and another man with grounds for +abstaining from action, it may lead one man to direct his +effort towards a certain end and another man towards a +directly opposite end. For the truth is that our doctrines +are usually only the justification <i>a posteriori</i> of our conduct, +or else they are our way of trying to explain that +conduct to ourselves.</p> + +<p>Man, in effect, is unwilling to remain in ignorance of +the motives of his own conduct. And just as a man who +has been led to perform a certain action by hypnotic suggestion +will afterwards invent reasons which would +justify it and make it appear logical to himself and others, +being unaware all the time of the real cause of his action, +so every man—for since "life is a dream" every man +is in a condition of hypnotism—seeks to find reasons +for his conduct. And if the pieces on a chessboard were +endowed with consciousness, they would probably have +little difficulty in ascribing their moves to freewill—that +is to say, they would claim for them a finalist rationality. +And thus it comes about that every philosophic theory +serves to explain and justify an ethic, a doctrine of conduct, +which has its real origin in the inward moral feeling +of the author of the theory. But he who harbours +this feeling may possibly himself have no clear consciousness +of its true reason or cause.</p> + +<p>Consequently, if my reason, which is in a certain +sense a part of the reason of all my brothers in humanity +in time and space, teaches me this absolute scepticism +in respect of what concerns my longing for never-<a name="Page_130" id="Page_130" />ending +life, I think that I can assume that my feeling +of life, which is the essence of life itself, my vitality, +my boundless appetite for living and my abhorrence +of dying, my refusal to submit to death—that it is this +which suggests to me the doctrines with which I try +to counter-check the working of the reason. Have +these doctrines an objective value? someone will ask +me, and I shall answer that I do not understand what +this objective value of a doctrine is. I will not say that +the more or less poetical and unphilosophical doctrines +that I am about to set forth are those which make me +live; but I will venture to say that it is my longing to +live and to live for ever that inspires these doctrines within +me. And if by means of them I succeed in strengthening +and sustaining this same longing in another, perhaps +when it was all but dead, then I shall have performed a +man's work and, above all, I shall have lived. In a word, +be it with reason or without reason or against reason, I +am resolved not to die. And if, when at last I die out, +I die out altogether, then I shall not have died out of +myself—that is, I shall not have yielded myself to death, +but my human destiny will have killed me. Unless I +come to lose my head, or rather my heart, I will not +abdicate from life—life will be wrested from me.</p> + +<p>To have recourse to those, ambiguous words, +"optimism" and "pessimism," does not assist us in +any way, for frequently they express the very contrary of +what those who use them mean to express. To ticket a +doctrine with the label of pessimism is not to impugn its +validity, and the so-called optimists are not the most +efficient in action. I believe, on the contrary, that many +of the greatest heroes, perhaps the greatest of all, have +been men of despair and that by despair they have accomplished +their mighty works. Apart from this, however, +and accepting in all their ambiguity these denominations +of optimism and pessimism, that there exists a certain +transcendental pessimism which may be the begetter of +<a name="Page_131" id="Page_131" />a temporal and terrestrial optimism, is a matter that I +propose to develop in the following part of this treatise.</p> + +<p>Very different, well I know, is the attitude of our progressives, +the partisans of "the central current of contemporary +European thought"; but I cannot bring myself +to believe that these individuals do not voluntarily close +their eyes to the grand problem of existence and that, in +endeavouring to stifle this feeling of the tragedy of life, +they themselves are not living a lie.</p> + +<p>The foregoing reflections are a kind of practical summary +of the criticism developed in the first six chapters +of this treatise, a kind of definition of the practical position +to which such a criticism is capable of leading whosoever +will not renounce life and will not renounce reason +and who is compelled to live and act between these upper +and nether millstones which grind upon the soul. The +reader who follows me further is now aware that I am +about to carry him into the region of the imagination, of +imagination not destitute of reason, for without reason +nothing subsists, but of imagination founded on feeling. +And as regards its truth, the real truth, that which is +independent of ourselves, beyond the reach of our logic +and of our heart—of this truth who knows aught?</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31" /><a href="#FNanchor_31_31">[31]</a> See Troeltsch, <i>Systematische christliche Religion</i>, in <i>Die Kultur der +Gegenwart</i> series.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32" /><a href="#FNanchor_32_32">[32]</a> <i>Die Analyse der Empfindigungen und das Verhältniss des Physischen +zum Psychischen</i>, i., § 12, note.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33" /><a href="#FNanchor_33_33">[33]</a> I have left the original expression here, almost without translating it—<i>Existents-Consequents</i>. +It means the existential or practical, not the purely +rational or logical, consequence. (Author's note.)</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34" /><a href="#FNanchor_34_34">[34]</a> Albrecht Ritschl: <i>Geschichte des Pietismus</i>, ii., Abt. i., Bonn, 1884, +p. 251.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35" /><a href="#FNanchor_35_35">[35]</a> Thou art the cause of my suffering, O non-existing God, for if Thou +didst exist, then should I also really exist.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII" /><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132" />VII</h2> + +<h2>LOVE, SUFFERING, PITY, AND PERSONALITY</h2> + +<blockquote><div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>CAIN: Let me, or happy or unhappy, learn</div> +<div class='i4'>To anticipate my immortality.</div> +<div>LUCIFER: Thou didst before I came upon thee.</div> +<div>CAIN: + How?</div> +<div>LUCIFER: By suffering.</div> +<div class='i12'>BYRON: <i>Cain</i>, Act II., Scene I.</div></div> +</div></blockquote> + + +<p>The most tragic thing in the world and in life, readers +and brothers of mine, is love. Love is the child of +illusion and the parent of disillusion; love is consolation +in desolation; it is the sole medicine against death, for +it is death's brother.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Fratelli, a un tempo stesso, Amore e Morte</i></div> +<div><i>Ingeneró la sorte</i>,</div></div> +</div> + +<p>as Leopardi sang.</p> + +<p>Love seeks with fury, through the medium of the +beloved, something beyond, and since it finds it not, it +despairs.</p> + +<p>Whenever we speak of love there is always present in +our memory the idea of sexual love, the love between +man and woman, whose end is the perpetuation of the +human race upon the earth. Hence it is that we never +succeed in reducing love either to a purely intellectual +or to a purely volitional element, putting aside that part +in it which belongs to the feeling, or, if you like, to the +senses. For, in its essence, love is neither idea nor +volition; rather it is desire, feeling; it is something +<a name="Page_133" id="Page_133" />carnal in spirit itself. Thanks to love, we feel all that +spirit has of flesh in it.</p> + +<p>Sexual love is the generative type of every other love. +In love and by love we seek to perpetuate ourselves, and +we perpetuate ourselves on the earth only on condition +that we die, that we yield up our life to others. The +humblest forms of animal life, the lowest of living +beings, multiply by dividing themselves, by splitting +into two, by ceasing to be the unit which they previously +formed.</p> + +<p>But when at last the vitality of the being that multiplies +itself by division is exhausted, the species must +renew the source of life from time to time by means of +the union of two wasting individuals, by means of what +is called, among protozoaria, conjugation. They unite +in order to begin dividing again with more vigour. +And every act of generation consists in a being's ceasing +to be what it was, either wholly or in part, in a splitting up, +in a partial death. To live is to give oneself, to perpetuate +oneself, and to perpetuate oneself and to give oneself is +to die. The supreme delight of begetting is perhaps +nothing but a foretaste of death, the eradication of our +own vital essence. We unite with another, but it is to +divide ourselves; this most intimate embrace is only a +most intimate sundering. In its essence, the delight of +sexual love, the genetic spasm, is a sensation of resurrection, +of renewing our life in another, for only in others +can we renew our life and so perpetuate ourselves.</p> + +<p>Without doubt there is something tragically destructive +in the essence of love, as it presents itself to us in its +primitive animal form, in the unconquerable instinct which +impels the male and the female to mix their being in a +fury of conjunction. The same impulse that joins their +bodies, separates, in a certain sense, their souls; they +hate one another, while they embrace, no less than they +love, and above all they contend with one another, they +contend for a third life, which as yet is without life. Love +<a name="Page_134" id="Page_134" />is a contention, and there are animal species in which the +male maltreats the female in his union with her, and other +in which the female devours the male after being fertilized +by him.</p> + +<p>It has been said that love is a mutual selfishness; and, +in fact, each one of the lovers seeks to possess the other, +and in seeking his own perpetuation through the instrumentality +of the other, though without being at the time +conscious of it or purposing it, he thereby seeks his own +enjoyment. Each one of the lovers is an immediate +instrument of enjoyment and a mediate instrument of +perpetuation, for the other. And thus they are tyrants +and slaves, each one at once the tyrant and slave of the +other.</p> + +<p>Is there really anything strange in the fact that the +deepest religious feeling has condemned carnal love and +exalted virginity? Avarice, said the Apostle, is the root +of all evil, and the reason is because avarice takes riches, +which are only a means, for an end; and therein lies the +essence of sin, in taking means for ends, in not recognizing +or in disesteeming the end. And since it takes +enjoyment for the end, whereas it is only the means, and +not perpetuation, which is the true end, what is carnal +love but avarice? And it is possible that there are some +who preserve their virginity in order the better to perpetuate +themselves, and in order to perpetuate something +more human than the flesh.</p> + +<p>For it is the suffering flesh, it is suffering, it is death, +that lovers perpetuate upon the earth. Love is at once +the brother, son, and father of death, which is its sister, +mother, and daughter. And thus it is that in the depth +of love there is a depth of eternal despair, out of which +spring hope and consolation. For out of this carnal and +primitive love of which I have been speaking, out of this +love of the whole body with all its senses, which is the +animal origin of human society, out of this loving-fondness, +rises spiritual and sorrowful love.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135" />This other form of love, this spiritual love, is born of +sorrow, is born of the death of carnal love, is born also +of the feeling of compassion and protection which parents +feel in the presence of a stricken child. Lovers never +attain to a love of self abandonment, of true fusion of +soul and not merely of body, until the heavy pestle of +sorrow has bruised their hearts and crushed them in the +same mortar of suffering. Sensual love joined their +bodies but disjoined their souls; it kept their souls +strangers to one another; but of this love is begotten a +fruit of their flesh—a child. And perchance this child, +begotten in death, falls sick and dies. Then it comes to +pass that over the fruit of their carnal fusion and spiritual +separation and estrangement, their bodies now separated +and cold with sorrow but united by sorrow their souls, +the lovers, the parents, join in an embrace of despair, +and then is born, of the death of the child of their flesh, +the true spiritual love. Or rather, when the bond of +flesh which united them is broken, they breathe with a +sigh of relief. For men love one another with a spiritual +love only when they have suffered the same sorrow +together, when through long days they have ploughed +the stony ground bowed beneath the common yoke of a +common grief. It is then that they know one another +and feel one another, and feel with one another in their +common anguish, they pity one another and love one +another. For to love is to pity; and if bodies are united +by pleasure, souls are united by pain.</p> + +<p>And this is felt with still more clearness and force in +the seeding, the taking root, and the blossoming of one +of those tragic loves which are doomed to contend with +the diamond-hard laws of Destiny—one of those loves +which are born out of due time and season, before or +after the moment, or out of the normal mode in which +the world, which is custom, would have been willing to +welcome them. The more barriers Destiny and the +world and its law interpose between the lovers, the +<a name="Page_136" id="Page_136" />stronger is the impulse that urges them towards one +another, and their happiness in loving one another turns +to bitterness, and their unhappiness in not being able to +love freely and openly grows heavier, and they pity one +another from the bottom of their hearts; and this common +pity, which is their common misery and their +common happiness, gives fire and fuel to their love. +And they suffer their joy, enjoying their suffering. And +they establish their love beyond the confines of the world, +and the strength of this poor love suffering beneath the +yoke of Destiny gives them intuition of another world +where there is no other law than the liberty of love—another +world where there are no barriers because there +is no flesh. For nothing inspires us more with hope and +faith in another world than the impossibility of our love +truly fructifying in this world of flesh and of appearances.</p> + +<p>And what is maternal love but compassion for the +weak, helpless, defenceless infant that craves the mother's +milk and the comfort of her breast? And woman's love +is all maternal.</p> + +<p>To love with the spirit is to pity, and he who pities +most loves most. Men aflame with a burning charity +towards their neighbours are thus enkindled because they +have touched the depth of their own misery, their own +apparentiality, their own nothingness, and then, turning +their newly opened eyes upon their fellows, they have +seen that they also are miserable, apparential, condemned +to nothingness, and they have pitied them and loved +them.</p> + +<p>Man yearns to be loved, or, what is the same thing, to +be pitied. Man wishes others to feel and share his hardships +and his sorrows. The roadside beggar's exhibition +of his sores and gangrened mutilations is something more +than a device to extort alms from the passer-by. True +alms is pity rather than the pittance that alleviates the +material hardships of life. The beggar shows little +gratitude for alms thrown to him by one who hurries past +<a name="Page_137" id="Page_137" />with averted face; he is more grateful to him who pities +him but does not help than to him who helps but does +not pity, although from another point of view he may +prefer the latter. Observe with what satisfaction he +relates his woes to one who is moved by the story of them. +He desires to be pitied, to be loved.</p> + +<p>Woman's love, above all, as I have remarked, is always +compassionate in its essence—maternal. Woman yields +herself to the lover because she feels that his desire makes +him suffer. Isabel had compassion upon Lorenzo, Juliet +upon Romeo, Francesca upon Paolo. Woman seems to +say: "Come, poor one, thou shalt not suffer so for my +sake!" And therefore is her love more loving and +purer than that of man, braver and more enduring.</p> + +<p>Pity, then, is the essence of human spiritual love, of +the love that is conscious of being love, of the love that +is not purely animal, of the love, in a word, of a rational +person. Love pities, and pities most when it loves most.</p> + +<p>Reversing the terms of the adage <i>nihil volitum quin +præcognitum</i>, I have told you that <i>nihil cognitum quin +prævolitum</i>, that we know nothing save what we have +first, in one way or another, desired; and it may even be +added that we can know nothing well save what we love, +save what we pity.</p> + +<p>As love grows, this restless yearning to pierce to the +uttermost and to the innermost, so it continually embraces +all that it sees, and pities all that it embraces. +According as you turn inwards and penetrate more +deeply into yourself, you will discover more and more +your own emptiness, that you are not all that you are +not, that you are not what you would wish to be, that +you are, in a word, only a nonentity. And in touching +your own nothingness, in not feeling your permanent +base, in not reaching your own infinity, still less your +own eternity, you will have a whole-hearted pity for +yourself, and you will burn with a sorrowful love for +yourself—a love that will consume your so-called self-<a name="Page_138" id="Page_138" />love, +which is merely a species of sensual self-delectation, +the self-enjoyment, as it were, of the flesh of your +soul.</p> + +<p>Spiritual self-love, the pity that one feels for oneself, +may perhaps be called egotism; but nothing could be +more opposed to ordinary egoism. For this love or pity +for yourself, this intense despair, bred of the consciousness +that just as before you were born you were not, so +after your death you will cease to be, will lead you to pity—that +is, to love—all your fellows and brothers in this +world of appearance, these unhappy shadows who pass +from nothingness to nothingness, these sparks of consciousness +which shine for a moment in the infinite and +eternal darkness. And this compassionate feeling for +other men, for your fellows, beginning with those most +akin to you, those with whom you live, will expand into +a universal pity for all living things, and perhaps even +for things that have not life but merely existence. That +distant star which shines up there in the night will some +day be quenched and will turn to dust and will cease to +shine and cease to exist. And so, too, it will be with the +whole of the star-strewn heavens. Unhappy heavens!</p> + +<p>And if it is grievous to be doomed one day to cease to +be, perhaps it would be more grievous still to go on +being always oneself, and no more than oneself, without +being able to be at the same time other, without being +able to be at the same time everything else, without +being able to be all.</p> + +<p>If you look at the universe as closely and as inwardly +as you are able to look—that is to say, if you look within +yourself; if you not only contemplate but feel all things +in your own consciousness, upon which all things have +traced their painful impression—you will arrive at the +abyss of the tedium, not merely of life, but of something +more: at the tedium of existence, at the bottomless pit +of the vanity of vanities. And thus you will come to +pity all things; you will arrive at universal love.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139" />In order to love everything, in order to pity everything, +human and extra-human, living and non-living, +you must feel everything within yourself, you must personalize +everything. For everything that it loves, everything +that it pities, love personalizes. We only pity—that +is to say, we only love—that which is like ourselves +and in so far as it is like ourselves, and the more like it +is the more we love; and thus our pity for things, and +with it our love, grows in proportion as we discover in +them the likenesses which they have with ourselves. Or, +rather, it is love itself, which of itself tends to grow, that +reveals these resemblances to us. If I am moved to pity +and love the luckless star that one day will vanish from +the face of heaven, it is because love, pity, makes me feel +that it has a consciousness, more or less dim, which +makes it suffer because it is no more than a star, and a +star that is doomed one day to cease to be. For all consciousness +is consciousness of death and of suffering.</p> + +<p>Consciousness (<i>conscientia</i>) is participated knowledge, +is co-feeling, and co-feeling is com-passion. Love personalizes +all that it loves. Only by personalizing it can +we fall in love with an idea. And when love is so great +and so vital, so strong and so overflowing, that it loves +everything, then it personalizes everything and discovers +that the total All, that the Universe, is also a Person +possessing a Consciousness, a Consciousness which in its +turn suffers, pities, and loves, and therefore is consciousness. +And this Consciousness of the Universe, which +love, personalizing all that it loves, discovers, is what we +call God. And thus the soul pities God and feels itself +pitied by Him; loves Him and feels itself loved by Him, +sheltering its misery in the bosom of the eternal and +infinite misery, which, in eternalizing itself and infinitizing +itself, is the supreme happiness itself.</p> + +<p>God is, then, the personalization of the All; He is the +eternal and infinite Consciousness of the Universe—Consciousness +taken captive by matter and struggling to +<a name="Page_140" id="Page_140" />free himself from it. We personalize the All in order to +save ourselves from Nothingness; and the only mystery +really mysterious is the mystery of suffering.</p> + +<p>Suffering is the path of consciousness, and by it living +beings arrive at the possession of self-consciousness. +For to possess consciousness of oneself, to possess personality, +is to know oneself and to feel oneself distinct +from other beings, and this feeling of distinction is only +reached through an act of collision, through suffering +more or less severe, through the sense of one's own +limits. Consciousness of oneself is simply consciousness +of one's own limitation. I feel myself when I feel that I +am not others; to know and to feel the extent of my being +is to know at what point I cease to be, the point beyond +which I no longer am.</p> + +<p>And how do we know that we exist if we do not suffer, +little or much? How can we turn upon ourselves, +acquire reflective consciousness, save by suffering? +When we enjoy ourselves we forget ourselves, forget that +we exist; we pass over into another, an alien being, we +alienate ourselves. And we become centred in ourselves +again, we return to ourselves, only by suffering.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div class='i4'><i>Nessun maggior dolore</i></div> +<div><i>che ricordarsi del tempo felice</i></div> +<div><i>nella miseria</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p>are the words that Dante puts into the mouth of Francesca +da Rimini (<i>Inferno</i>, v., 121-123); but if there is no greater +sorrow than the recollection in adversity of happy bygone +days, there is, on the other hand, no pleasure in remembering +adversity in days of prosperity.</p> + +<p>"The bitterest sorrow that man can know is to aspire +to do much and to achieve nothing" (<i>πολλα φρονεοιτα +μηδενος χρατεειν</i>)— +so Herodotus relates that a Persian said +to a Theban at a banquet (book ix., chap. xvi.). And it +is true. With knowledge and desire we can embrace +everything, or almost everything; with the will nothing, +<a name="Page_141" id="Page_141" />or almost nothing. And contemplation is not happiness—no! +not if this contemplation implies impotence. And +out of this collision between our knowledge and our +power pity arises.</p> + +<p>We pity what is like ourselves, and the greater and +clearer our sense of its likeness with ourselves, the greater +our pity. And if we may say that this likeness provokes +our pity, it may also be maintained that it is our reservoir +of pity, eager to diffuse itself over everything, that makes +us discover the likeness of things with ourselves, the +common bond that unites us with them in suffering.</p> + +<p>Our own struggle to acquire, preserve, and increase +our own consciousness makes us discover in the endeavours +and movements and revolutions of all things a +struggle to acquire, preserve, and increase consciousness, +to which everything tends. Beneath the actions of those +most akin to myself, of my fellow-men, I feel—or, rather, +I co-feel—a state of consciousness similar to that which +lies beneath my own actions. On hearing my brother +give a cry of pain, my own pain awakes and cries in the +depth of my consciousness. And in the same way I feel +the pain of animals, and the pain of a tree when one of its +branches is being cut off, and I feel it most when my +imagination is alive, for the imagination is the faculty of +intuition, of inward vision.</p> + +<p>Proceeding from ourselves, from our own human consciousness, +the only consciousness which we feel from +within and in which feeling is identical with being, we +attribute some sort of consciousness, more or less dim, +to all living things, and even to the stones themselves, for +they also live. And the evolution of organic beings is +simply a struggle to realize fullness of consciousness +through suffering, a continual aspiration to be others +without ceasing to be themselves, to break and yet to +preserve their proper limits.</p> + +<p>And this process of personalization or subjectivization +of everything external, phenomenal, or objective, is none +<a name="Page_142" id="Page_142" />other than the vital process of philosophy in the contest +of life against reason and of reason against life. We +have already indicated it in the preceding chapter, and +we must now confirm it by developing it further.</p> + +<p>Giovanni Baptista Vico, with his profound esthetic +penetration into the soul of antiquity, saw that the spontaneous +philosophy of man was to make of himself the +norm of the universe, guided by the <i>instinto d'animazione</i>. +Language, necessarily anthropomorphic, mythopeic, +engenders thought. "Poetic wisdom, which was the +primitive wisdom of paganism," says Vico in his <i>Scienza +Nuova</i>, "must have begun with a metaphysic, not +reasoned and abstract, like that of modern educated men, +but felt and imagined, such as must have been that of +primitive men. This was their own poetry, which with +them was inborn, an innate faculty, for nature had +furnished them with such feelings and such imaginations, +a faculty born of the ignorance of causes, and therefore +begetting a universal sense of wonder, for knowing +nothing they marvelled greatly at everything. This +poetry had a divine origin, for, while they invented the +causes of things out of their own imagination, at the same +time they regarded these causes with feelings of wonder +as gods. In this way the first men of the pagan peoples, +as children of the growing human race, fashioned things +out of their ideas.... This nature of human things +has bequeathed that eternal property which Tacitus +elucidated with a fine phrase when he said, not without +reason, that men in their terror <i>fingunt simul creduntque</i>."</p> + +<p>And then, passing from the age of imagination, Vico +proceeds to show us the age of reason, this age of ours +in which the mind, even the popular mind, is too remote +from the senses, "with so many abstractions of which all +languages are full," an age in which "the ability to conceive +an immense image of such a personage as we call +sympathetic Nature is denied to us, for though the phrase +'Dame Nature' may be on our lips, there is nothing in our +<a name="Page_143" id="Page_143" />minds that corresponds with it, our minds being occupied +with the false, the non-existent." "To-day," Vico continues, +"it is naturally impossible for us to enter into the +vast imagination of these primitive men." But is this +certain? Do not we continue to live by the creations of +their imagination, embodied for ever in the language +with which we think, or, rather, the language which +thinks in us?</p> + +<p>It was in vain that Comte declared that human thought +had already emerged from the age of theology and was +now emerging from the age of metaphysics into the age +of positivism; the three ages coexist, and although +antagonistic they lend one another mutual support. +High-sounding positivism, whenever it ceases to deny +and begins to affirm something, whenever it becomes +really positive, is nothing but metaphysics; and metaphysics, +in its essence, is always theology, and theology +is born of imagination yoked to the service of life, of life +with its craving for immortality.</p> + +<p>Our feeling of the world, upon which is based our +understanding of it, is necessarily anthropomorphic and +mythopeic. When rationalism dawned with Thales of +Miletus, this philosopher abandoned Oceanus and Thetis, +gods and the progenitors of gods, and attributed the +origin of things to water; but this water was a god +in disguise. Beneath nature (<i>φυσις</i>) and the world +(<i>κοσμος</i>), mythical and anthropomorphic creations +throbbed with life. They were implicated in the structure +of language itself. Xenophon tells us (<i>Memorabilia</i>, +i., i., 6-9) that among phenomena Socrates distinguished +between those which were within the scope of human +study and those which the gods had reserved for themselves, +and that he execrated the attempt of Anaxagoras +to explain everything rationally. His contemporary, +Hippocrates, regarded diseases as of divine origin, and +Plato believed that the sun and stars were animated gods +with their souls (<i>Philebus</i>, cap. xvi., <i>Laws</i>, x.), and +<a name="Page_144" id="Page_144" />only permitted astronomical investigation so long as it +abstained from blasphemy against these gods. And +Aristotle in his <i>Physics</i> tells us that Zeus rains not in +order that the corn may grow, but by necessity +(<i>εξ αναρχης</i>). They tried to mechanize and rationalize +God, but God rebelled against them.</p> + +<p>And what is the concept of God, a concept continually +renewed because springing out of the eternal feeling of +God in man, but the eternal protest of life against reason, +the unconquerable instinct of personalization? And +what is the notion of substance itself but the objectivization +of that which is most subjective—that is, of the will +or consciousness? For consciousness, even before it +knows itself as reason, feels itself, is palpable to itself, is +most in harmony with itself, as will, and as will not to +die. Hence that rhythm, of which we spoke, in the +history of thought. Positivism inducted us into an age +of rationalism—that is to say, of materialism, mechanism, +or mortalism; and behold now the return of vitalism, of +spiritualism. What was the effort of pragmatism but +an effort to restore faith in the human finality of the +universe? What is the effort of a Bergson, for example, +especially in his work on creative evolution, but an +attempt to re-integrate the personal God and eternal consciousness? +Life never surrenders.</p> + +<p>And it avails us nothing to seek to repress this mythopeic +or anthropomorphic process and to rationalize our +thought, as if we thought only for the sake of thinking +and knowing, and not for the sake of living. The very +language with which we think prevents us from so doing. +Language, the substance of thought, is a system of metaphors +with a mythic and anthropomorphic base. And to +construct a purely rational philosophy it would be necessary +to construct it by means of algebraic formulas or to +create a new language for it, an inhuman language—that +is to say, one inapt for the needs of life—as indeed +Dr. Richard Avenarius, professor of philosophy at +<a name="Page_145" id="Page_145" />Zürich, attempted to do in his <i>Critique of Pure Experience +(Kritik der reinen Erfahrung</i>), in order to avoid +preconceptions. And this rigorous attempt of Avenarius, +the chief of the critics of experience, ends strictly in pure +scepticism. He himself says at the end of the Prologue +to the work above mentioned: "The childish confidence +that it is granted to us to discover truth has long since +disappeared; as we progress we become aware of the +difficulties that lie in the way of its discovery and of the +limitation of our powers. And what is the end?... +If we could only succeed in seeing clearly into ourselves!"</p> + +<p>Seeing clearly! seeing clearly! Clear vision would be +only attainable by a pure thinker who used algebra instead +of language and was able to divest himself of his +own humanity—that is to say, by an unsubstantial, +merely objective being: a no-being, in short. In spite of +reason we are compelled to think with life, and in spite +of life we are compelled to rationalize thought.</p> + +<p>This animation, this personification, interpenetrates +our very knowledge. "Who is it that sends the rain? +Who is it that thunders?" old Strepsiades asks of +Socrates in <i>The Clouds</i> of Aristophanes, and the philosopher +replies: "Not Zeus, but the clouds." "But," +questions Strepsiades, "who but Zeus makes the clouds +sweep along?" to which Socrates answers: "Not a bit +of it; it is atmospheric whirligig." "Whirligig?" +muses Strepsiades; "I never thought of that—that Zeus +is gone and that Son Whirligig rules now in his stead." +And so the old man goes on personifying and animating +the whirlwind, as if the whirlwind were now a king, not +without consciousness of his kingship. And in exchanging +a Zeus for a whirlwind—God for matter, for example—we +all do the same thing. And the reason is because +philosophy does not work upon the objective reality +which we perceive with the senses, but upon the complex +of ideas, images, notions, perceptions, etc., embodied in +language and transmitted to us with our language by our +<a name="Page_146" id="Page_146" />ancestors. That which we call the world, the objective +world, is a social tradition. It is given to us ready made.</p> + +<p>Man does not submit to being, as consciousness, alone +in the Universe, nor to being merely one objective +phenomenon the more. He wishes to save his vital or +passional subjectivity by attributing life, personality, +spirit, to the whole Universe. In order to realize his +wish he has discovered God and substance; God and +substance continually reappear in his thought cloaked in +different disguises. Because we are conscious, we feel +that we exist, which is quite another thing from knowing +that we exist, and we wish to feel the existence of everything +else; we wish that of all the other individual things +each one should also be an "I."</p> + +<p>The most consistent, although the most incongruous +and vacillating, idealism, that of Berkeley, who denied +the existence of matter, of something inert and extended +and passive, as the cause of our sensations and the substratum +of external phenomena, is in its essence nothing +but an absolute spiritualism or dynamism, the supposition +that every sensation comes to us, causatively, from +another spirit—that is, from another consciousness. And +his doctrine has a certain affinity with those of Schopenhauer +and Hartmann. The former's doctrine of the Will +and the latter's doctrine of the Unconscious are already +implied in the Berkeleyan theory that to be is to be perceived. +To which must be added: and to cause others +to perceive what is. Thus the old adage <i>operari sequitur +esse</i> (action follows being) must be modified by saying +that to be is to act, and only that which acts—the active—exists, +and in so far as it acts.</p> + +<p>As regards Schopenhauer, there is no need to endeavour +to show that the will, which he posits as the essence of +things, proceeds from consciousness. And it is only +necessary to read his book on the Will in Nature to see +how he attributed a certain spirit and even a certain personality +to the plants themselves. And this doctrine of +<a name="Page_147" id="Page_147" />his carried him logically to pessimism, for the true +property and most inward function of the will is to suffer. +The will is a force which feels itself—that is, which +suffers. And, someone will add, which enjoys. But +the capacity to enjoy is impossible without the capacity +to suffer; and the faculty of enjoyment is one with that +of pain. Whosoever does not suffer does not enjoy, just +as whosoever is insensible to cold is insensible to heat.</p> + +<p>And it is also quite logical that Schopenhauer, who +deduced pessimism from the voluntarist doctrine or +doctrine of universal personalization, should have +deduced from both of these that the foundation of morals +is compassion. Only his lack of the social and historical +sense, his inability to feel that humanity also is a person, +although a collective one, his egoism, in short, prevented +him from feeling God, prevented him from individualizing +and personalizing the total and collective Will—the +Will of the Universe.</p> + +<p>On the other hand, it is easy to understand his aversion +from purely empirical, evolutionist, or transformist +doctrines, such as those set forth in the works of Lamarck +and Darwin which came to his notice. Judging Darwin's +theory solely by an extensive extract in <i>The Times</i>, he +described it, in a letter to Adam Louis von Doss (March 1, +1860), as "downright empiricism" <i>(platter Empirismus)</i>. +In fact, for a voluntarist like Schopenhauer, a theory so +sanely and cautiously empirical and rational as that of +Darwin left out of account the inward force, the essential +motive, of evolution. For what is, in effect, the hidden +force, the ultimate agent, which impels organisms to +perpetuate themselves and to fight for their persistence +and propagation? Selection, adaptation, heredity, these +are only external conditions. This inner, essential force +has been called will on the supposition that there exists +also in other beings that which we feel in ourselves as a +feeling of will, the impulse to be everything, to be others +as well as ourselves yet without ceasing to be what we are. +<a name="Page_148" id="Page_148" />And it may be said that this force is the divine in us, that +it is God Himself who works in us because He suffers +in us.</p> + +<p>And sympathy teaches us to discover this force, this +aspiration towards consciousness, in all things. It +moves and activates the most minute living creatures; +it moves and activates, perhaps, the very cells of our +own bodily organism, which is a confederation, more or +less solidary, of living beings; it moves the very globules +of our blood. Our life is composed of lives, our vital +aspiration of aspirations existing perhaps in the limbo +of subconsciousness. Not more absurd than so many +other dreams which pass as valid theories is the belief +that our cells, our globules, may possess something akin +to a rudimentary cellular, globular consciousness or basis +of consciousness. Or that they may arrive at possessing +such consciousness. And since we have given a loose +rein to the fancy, we may fancy that these cells may communicate +with one another, and that some of them may +express their belief that they form part of a superior +organism endowed with a collective personal consciousness. +And more than once in the history of human +feeling this fancy has been expressed in the surmisal of +some philosopher or poet that we men are a kind of +globules in the blood of a Supreme Being, who possesses +his own personal collective consciousness, the consciousness +of the Universe.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the immense Milky Way which on clear +nights we behold stretching across the heavens, this vast +encircling ring in which our planetary system is itself +but a molecule, is in its turn but a cell in the Universe, +in the Body of God. All the cells of our body combine +and co-operate in maintaining and kindling by their +activity our consciousness, our soul; and if the consciousness +or the souls of all these cells entered completely +into our consciousness, into the composite whole, +if I possessed consciousness of all that happens in my +<a name="Page_149" id="Page_149" />bodily organism, I should feel the universe happening +within myself, and perhaps the painful sense of my +limitedness would disappear. And if all the consciousness +of all beings unite in their entirety in the universal +consciousness, this consciousness—that is to say, God—is +all.</p> + +<p>In every instant obscure consciousnesses, elementary +souls, are born and die within us, and their birth and +death constitute our life. And their sudden and violent +death constitutes our pain. And in like manner, in the +heart of God consciousnesses are born and die—but do +they die?—and their births and deaths constitute His life.</p> + +<p>If there is a Universal and Supreme Consciousness, I +am an idea in it; and is it possible for any idea in this +Supreme Consciousness to be completely blotted out? +After I have died, God will go on remembering me, and +to be remembered by God, to have my consciousness +sustained by the Supreme Consciousness, is not that, +perhaps, to be?</p> + +<p>And if anyone should say that God has made the +universe, it may be rejoined that so also our soul has +made our body as much as, if not more than, it has been +made by it—if, indeed, there be a soul.</p> + +<p>When pity, love, reveals to us the whole universe +striving to gain, to preserve, and to enlarge its consciousness, +striving more and more to saturate itself +with consciousness, feeling the pain of the discords +which are produced within it, pity reveals to us the likeness +of the whole universe with ourselves; it reveals to +us that it is human, and it leads us to discover our Father +in it, of whose flesh we are flesh; love leads us to personalize +the whole of which we form a part.</p> + +<p>To say that God is eternally producing things is +fundamentally the same as saying that things are +eternally producing God. And the belief in a personal +and spiritual God is based on the belief in our own personality +and spirituality. Because we feel ourselves to +<a name="Page_150" id="Page_150" />be consciousness, we feel God to be consciousness—that +is to say, a person; and because we desire ardently that +our consciousness shall live and be independently of the +body, we believe that the divine person lives and exists +independently of the universe, that his state of consciousness +is <i>ad extra</i>.</p> + +<p>No doubt logicians will come forward and confront us +with the evident rational difficulties which this involves; +but we have already stated that, although presented +under logical forms, the content of all this is not strictly +rational. Every rational conception of God is in itself +contradictory. Faith in God is born of love for God—we +believe that God exists by force of wishing that He +may exist, and it is born also, perhaps, of God's love for +us. Reason does not prove to us that God exists, but +neither does it prove that He cannot exist.</p> + +<p>But of this conception of faith in God as the personalization +of the universe we shall have more to say +presently.</p> + +<p>And recalling what has been said in another part of +this work, we may say that material things, in so far as +they are known to us, issue into knowledge through the +agency of hunger, and out of hunger issues the sensible +or material universe in which we conglomerate these +things; and that ideal things issue out of love, and out +of love issues God, in whom we conglomerate these ideal +things as in the Consciousness of the Universe. It is +social consciousness, the child of love, of the instinct of +perpetuation, that leads us to socialize everything, to see +society in everything, and that shows us at last that all +Nature is really an infinite Society. For my part, the +feeling that Nature is a society has taken hold of me +hundreds of times in walking through the woods +possessed with a sense of solidarity with the oaks, a +sense of their dim awareness of my presence.</p> + +<p>Imagination, which is the social sense, animates +the inanimate and anthropomorphizes everything; it +<a name="Page_151" id="Page_151" />humanizes everything and even makes everything +identical with man.<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36" /><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> And the work of man is to supernaturalize +Nature—that is to say, to make it divine by +making it human, to help it to become conscious of itself, +in short. The action of reason, on the other hand, is +to mechanize or materialize.</p> + +<p>And just as a fruitful union is consummated between +the individual—who is, in a certain sense, a society—and +society, which is also an individual—the two being +so inseparable from one another that it is impossible to +say where the one begins and the other ends, for they +are rather two aspects of a single essence—so also the +spirit, the social element, which by relating us to others +makes us conscious, unites with matter, the individual +and individualizing element; similarly, reason or intelligence +and imagination embrace in a mutually fruitful +union, and the Universe merges into one with God.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Is all this true? And what is truth? I in my turn +will ask, as Pilate asked—not, however, only to turn +away and wash my hands, without waiting for an answer.</p> + +<p>Is truth in reason, or above reason, or beneath reason, +or outside of reason, in some way or another? Is only +the rational true? May there not be a reality, by its very +nature, unattainable by reason, and perhaps, by its very +nature, opposed to reason? And how can we know this +reality if reason alone holds the key to knowledge?</p> + +<p>Our desire of living, our need of life, asks that that +may be true which urges us to self-preservation and self-perpetuation, +which sustains man and society; it asks +that the true water may be that which assuages our thirst, +and because it assuages it, that the true bread may be +that which satisfies our hunger, because it satisfies it.</p> + +<p>The senses are devoted to the service of the instinct of +preservation, and everything that satisfies this need of +preserving ourselves, even though it does not pass +<a name="Page_152" id="Page_152" />through the senses, is nevertheless a kind of intimate +penetration of reality in us. Is the process of assimilating +nutriment perhaps less real than the process of knowing +the nutritive substance? It may be said that to eat +a loaf of bread is not the same thing as seeing, touching, +or tasting it; that in the one case it enters into our body, +but not therefore into our consciousness. Is this true? +Does not the loaf of bread that I have converted into my +flesh and blood enter more into my consciousness than +the other loaf which I see and touch, and of which I say: +"This is mine"? And must I refuse objective reality +to the bread that I have thus converted into my flesh and +blood and made mine when I only touch it?</p> + +<p>There are some who live by air without knowing it. +In the same way, it may be, we live by God and in God—in +God the spirit and consciousness of society and of +the whole Universe, in so far as the Universe is also a +society.</p> + +<p>God is felt only in so far as He is lived; and man does +not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth +out of the mouth of God (Matt. iv. 4; Deut. viii. 3).</p> + +<p>And this personalization of the all, of the Universe, to +which we are led by love, by pity, is the personalization +of a person who embraces and comprehends within himself +the other persons of which he is composed.</p> + +<p>The only way to give finality to the world is to give it +consciousness. For where there is no consciousness there +is no finality, finality presupposing a purpose. And, as +we shall see, faith in God is based simply upon the vital +need of giving finality to existence, of making it answer +to a purpose. We need God, not in order to understand +the <i>why</i>, but in order to feel and sustain the ultimate +<i>wherefore</i>, to give a meaning to the Universe.</p> + +<p>And neither ought we to be surprised by the affirmation +that this consciousness of the Universe is composed +and integrated by the consciousnesses of the beings +which form the Universe, by the consciousnesses of all +<a name="Page_153" id="Page_153" />the beings that exist, and that nevertheless it remains a +personal consciousness distinct from those which compose +it. Only thus is it possible to understand how in +God we live, move, and have our being. That great +visionary, Emanuel Swedenborg, saw or caught a +glimpse of this in his book on Heaven and Hell <i>(De +Coelo et Inferno</i>, lii.), when he tells us: "An entire +angelic society appears sometimes in the form of a single +angel, which also it hath been granted me by the Lord +to see. When the Lord Himself appears in the midst of +the angels, He doth not appear as encompassed by a +multitude, but as a single being in angelic form. Hence +it is that the Lord in the Word is called an angel, and +likewise that on entire society is so called. Michael, +Gabriel, and Raphael are nothing but angelical societies, +which are so named from their functions."</p> + +<p>May we not perhaps live and love—that is, suffer and +pity—in this all-enveloping Supreme Person—we, all the +persons who suffer and pity and all the beings that strive to +achieve personality, to acquire consciousness of their suffering +and their limitation? And are we not, perhaps, ideas +of this total Grand Consciousness, which by thinking of +us as existing confers existence upon us? Does not our +existence consist in being perceived and felt by God? +And, further on, this same visionary tells us, under the +form of images, that each angel, each society of angels, +and the whole of heaven comprehensively surveyed, +appear in human form, and in virtue of this human form +the Lord rules them as one man.</p> + +<p>"God does not think, He creates; He does not exist, He +is eternal," wrote Kierkegaard (<i>Afslutende uvidens-kabelige +Efterskrift</i>); but perhaps it is more exact to say +with Mazzini, the mystic of the Italian city, that "God +is great because His thought is action" (<i>Ai giovani +d'ltalia</i>), because with Him to think is to create, and He +gives existence to that which exists in His thought by the +mere fact of thinking it, and the impossible is the un<a name="Page_154" id="Page_154" />thinkable +by God. Is it not written in the Scriptures +that God creates with His word—that is to say, with His +thought—and that by this, by His Word, He made +everything that exists? And what God has once made does +He ever forget? May it not be that all the thoughts that +have ever passed through the Supreme Consciousness +still subsist therein? In Him, who is eternal, is not all +existence eternalized?</p> + +<p>Our longing to save consciousness, to give personal +and human finality to the Universe and to existence, is +such that even in the midst of a supreme, an agonizing +and lacerating sacrifice, we should still hear the voice +that assured us that if our consciousness disappears, it is +that the infinite and eternal Consciousness may be enriched +thereby, that our souls may serve as nutriment to +the Universal Soul. Yes, I enrich God, because before +I existed He did not think of me as existing, because I +am one more—one more even though among an infinity +of others—who, having really lived, really suffered, and +really loved, abide in His bosom. It is the furious longing +to give finality to the Universe, to make it conscious +and personal, that has brought us to believe in God, to +wish that God may exist, to create God, in a word. To +create Him, yes! This saying ought not to scandalize +even the most devout theist. For to believe in God is, in +a certain sense, to create Him, although He first creates +us.<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37" /><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> It is He who in us is continually creating Himself.</p> + +<p>We have created God in order to save the Universe +from nothingness, for all that is not consciousness and +eternal consciousness, conscious of its eternity and +eternally conscious, is nothing more than appearance. +There is nothing truly real save that which feels, suffers, +pities, loves, and desires, save consciousness; there is +nothing substantial but consciousness. And we need +<a name="Page_155" id="Page_155" />God in order to save consciousness; not in order to think +existence, but in order to live it; not in order to know the +why and how of it, but in order to feel the wherefore +of it. Love is a contradiction if there is no God.</p> + +<p>Let us now consider this idea of God, of the logical +God or the Supreme Reason, and of the vital God or the +God of the heart—that is, Supreme Love.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36" /><a href="#FNanchor_36_36">[36]</a> <i>Todo lo humaniza, y aun lo humana</i>.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37" /><a href="#FNanchor_37_37">[37]</a> In the translation it is impossible to retain the play upon the verbs <i>crear</i>, +to create, and <i>creer</i>, to believe: <i>"Porque creer en Dios es en cierto modo +crearle, aunque El nos cree antes."</i>—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII" /><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156" />VIII</h2> + +<h2>FROM GOD TO GOD</h2> + +<p>To affirm that the religious sense is a sense of divinity +and that it is impossible without some abuse of the +ordinary usages of human language to speak of an +atheistic religion, is not, I think, to do violence to the +truth; although it is clear that everything will depend +upon the concept that we form of God, a concept which +in its turn depends upon the concept of divinity.</p> + +<p>Our proper procedure, in effect, will be to begin with +this sense of divinity, before prefixing to the concept of +this quality the definite article and the capital letter and +so converting it into "the Divinity"—that is, into +God. For man has not deduced the divine from God, +but rather he has reached God through the divine.</p> + +<p>In the course of these somewhat wandering but at the +same time urgent reflections upon the tragic sense of life, +I have already alluded to the <i>timor fecit deos</i> of Statius +with the object of limiting and correcting it. It is not +my intention to trace yet once again the historical processes +by which peoples have arrived at the consciousness +and concept of a personal God like the God of +Christianity. And I say peoples and not isolated individuals, +for if there is any feeling or concept that is truly +collective and social it is the feeling and concept of God, +although the individual subsequently individualizes it. +Philosophy may, and in fact does, possess an individual +origin; theology is necessarily collective.</p> + +<p>Schleiermacher's theory, which attributes the origin, +or rather the essence, of the religious sense to the +<a name="Page_157" id="Page_157" />immediate and simple feeling of dependency, appears to +be the most profound and exact explanation. Primitive +man, living in society, feels himself to be dependent +upon the mysterious forces invisibly environing him; he +feels himself to be in social communion, not only with +beings like himself, his fellow-men, but with the whole +of Nature, animate and inanimate, which simply means, +in other words, that he personalizes everything. Not +only does he possess a consciousness of the world, but +he imagines that the world, like himself, possesses consciousness +also. Just as a child talks to his doll or his +dog as if it understood what he was saying, so the +savage believes that his fetich hears him when he speaks +to it, and that the angry storm-cloud is aware of him and +deliberately pursues him. For the newly born mind of +the primitive natural man has not yet wholly severed +itself from the cords which still bind it to the womb of +Nature, neither has it clearly marked out the boundary +that separates dreaming from waking, imagination from +reality.</p> + +<p>The divine, therefore, was not originally something +objective, but was rather the subjectivity of consciousness +projected exteriorly, the personalization of the +world. The concept of divinity arose out of the feeling +of divinity, and the feeling of divinity is simply the dim +and nascent feeling of personality vented upon the outside +world. And strictly speaking it is not possible to +speak of outside and inside, objective and subjective, +when no such distinction was actually felt; indeed it is +precisely from this lack of distinction that the feeling and +concept of divinity proceed. The clearer our consciousness +of the distinction between the objective and the subjective, +the more obscure is the feeling of divinity in us.</p> + +<p>It has been said, and very justly so it would appear, +that Hellenic paganism was not so much polytheistic as +pantheistic. I do not know that the belief in a multitude +of gods, taking the concept of God in the sense in which +<a name="Page_158" id="Page_158" />we understand it to-day, has ever really existed in any +human mind. And if by pantheism is understood the +doctrine, not that everything and each individual thing +is God—a proposition which I find unthinkable—but +that everything is divine, then it may be said without +any great abuse of language that paganism was +pantheistic. Its gods not only mixed among men but +intermixed with them; they begat gods upon mortal +women and upon goddesses mortal men begat demi-gods. +And if demi-gods, that is, demi-men, were believed to +exist, it was because the divine and the human were +viewed as different aspects of the same reality. The +divinization of everything was simply its humanization. +To say that the sun was a god was equivalent to saying +that it was a man, a human consciousness, more or less, +aggrandized and sublimated. And this is true of all +beliefs from fetichism to Hellenic paganism.</p> + +<p>The real distinction between gods and men consisted +in the fact that the former were immortal. A god came +to be identical with an immortal man and a man was +deified, reputed as a god, when it was deemed that at +his death he had not really died. Of certain heroes it +was believed that they were alive in the kingdom of the +dead. And this is a point of great importance in estimating +the value of the concept of the divine.</p> + +<p>In those republics of gods there was always some predominating +god, some real monarch. It was through +the agency of this divine monarchy that primitive peoples +were led from monocultism to monotheism. Hence +monarchy and monotheism are twin brethren. Zeus, +Jupiter, was in process of being converted into an only +god, just as Jahwé originally one god among many +others, came to be converted into an only god, first the +god of the people of Israel, then the god of humanity, +and finally the god of the whole universe.</p> + +<p>Like monarchy, monotheism had a martial origin. +"It is only on the march and in time of war," says +<a name="Page_159" id="Page_159" />Robertson Smith in <i>The Prophets of Israel</i>,<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38" /><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> "that a +nomad people feels any urgent need of a central authority, +and so it came about that in the first beginnings of +national organization, centring in the sanctuary of the +ark, Israel was thought of mainly as the host of Jehovah. +The very name of Israel is martial, and means 'God (<i>El</i>) +fighteth,' and Jehovah in the Old Testament is Iahwè +Çebäôth—the Jehovah of the armies of Israel. It was on +the battlefield that Jehovah's presence was most clearly +realized; but in primitive nations the leader in time of +war is also the natural judge in time of peace."</p> + +<p>God, the only God, issued, therefore, from man's sense +of divinity as a warlike, monarchical and social God. He +revealed himself to the people as a whole, not to the +individual. He was the God of a people and he jealously +exacted that worship should be rendered to him alone. +The transition from this monocultism to monotheism +was effected largely by the individual action, more +philosophical perhaps than theological, of the prophets. +It was, in fact, the individual activity of the prophets +that individualized the divinity. And above all by +making the divinity ethical.</p> + +<p>Subsequently reason—that is, philosophy—took possession +of this God who had arisen in the human consciousness +as a consequence of the sense of divinity in man, and +tended to define him and convert him into an idea. For +to define a thing is to idealize it, a process which necessitates +the abstraction from it of its incommensurable or +irrational element, its vital essence. Thus the God of +feeling, the divinity felt as a unique person and consciousness +external to us, although at the same time +enveloping and sustaining us, was converted into the +idea of God.</p> + +<p>The logical, rational God, the <i>ens summum</i>, the +<i>primum movens</i>, the Supreme Being of theological +philosophy, the God who is reached by the three famous +<a name="Page_160" id="Page_160" />ways of negation, eminence and causality, <i>viæ negationis, +eminentiæ, causalitatis</i>, is nothing but an idea of +God, a dead thing. The traditional and much debated +proofs of his existence are, at bottom, merely a vain +attempt to determine his essence; for as Vinet has very +well observed, existence is deduced from essence; and to +say that God exists, without saying what God is and how +he is, is equivalent to saying nothing at all.</p> + +<p>And this God, arrived at by the methods of eminence +and negation or abstraction of finite qualities, ends by becoming +an unthinkable God, a pure idea, a God of whom, +by the very fact of his ideal excellence, we can say that +he is nothing, as indeed he has been defined by Scotus +Erigena: <i>Deus propter excellentiam non inmerito nihil +vocatur</i>. Or in the words of the pseudo-Dionysius the +Areopagite, in his fifth Epistle, "The divine darkness is +the inaccessible light in which God is said to dwell." +The anthropomorphic God, the God who is felt, in being +purified of human, and as such finite, relative and temporal, +attributes, evaporates into the God of deism or of +pantheism.</p> + +<p>The traditional so-called proofs of the existence of God +all refer to this God-Idea, to this logical God, the God +by abstraction, and hence they really prove nothing, or +rather, they prove nothing more than the existence of this +idea of God.</p> + +<p>In my early youth, when first I began to be puzzled +by these eternal problems, I read in a book, the author of +which I have no wish to recall,<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39" /><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> this sentence: "God is +the great X placed over the ultimate barrier of human +knowledge; in the measure in which science advances, +the barrier recedes." And I wrote in the margin, "On +this side of the barrier, everything is explained without +Him; on the further side, nothing is explained, either +<a name="Page_161" id="Page_161" />with Him or without Him; God therefore is superfluous." +And so far as concerns the God-Idea, the God of the +proofs, I continue to be of the same opinion. Laplace +is said to have stated that he had not found the hypothesis +of God necessary in order to construct his scheme of the +origin of the Universe, and it is very true. In no way +whatever does the idea of God help us to understand +better the existence, the essence and the finality of the +Universe.</p> + +<p>That there is a Supreme Being, infinite, absolute and +eternal, whose existence is unknown to us, and who has +created the Universe, is not more conceivable than that +the material basis of the Universe itself, its matter, is +eternal and infinite and absolute. We do not understand +the existence of the world one whit the better by telling +ourselves that God created it. It is a begging of the +question, or a merely verbal solution, intended to cover +up our ignorance. In strict truth, we deduce the existence +of the Creator from the fact that the thing created +exists, a process which does not justify rationally His +existence. You cannot deduce a necessity from a fact, +or else everything were necessary.</p> + +<p>And if from the nature of the Universe we pass to +what is called its order, which is supposed to necessitate +an Ordainer, we may say that order is what there is, and +we do not conceive of any other. This deduction of +God's existence from the order of the Universe implies a +transition from the ideal to the real order, an outward +projection of our mind, a supposition that the rational +explanation of a thing produces the thing itself. Human +art, instructed by Nature, possesses a conscious creative +faculty, by means of which it apprehends the process of +creation, and we proceed to transfer this conscious and +artistic creative faculty to the consciousness of an artist-creator, +but from what nature he in his turn learnt his +art we cannot tell.</p> + +<p>The traditional analogy of the watch and the watch<a name="Page_162" id="Page_162" />maker +is inapplicable to a Being absolute, infinite and +eternal. It is, moreover, only another way of explaining +nothing. For to say that the world is as it is and not +otherwise because God made it so, while at the same time +we do not know for what reason He made it so, is to say +nothing. And if we knew for what reason God made it +so, then God is superfluous and the reason itself suffices. +If everything were mathematics, if there were no +irrational element, we should not have had recourse to +this explanatory theory of a Supreme Ordainer, who is +nothing but the reason of the irrational, and so merely +another cloak for our ignorance. And let us not discuss +here that absurd proposition that, if all the type in a +printing-press were printed at random, the result could +not possibly be the composition of <i>Don Quixote</i>. Something +would be composed which would be as good as +<i>Don Quixote</i> for those who would have to be content +with it and would grow in it and would form part of it.</p> + +<p>In effect, this traditional supposed proof of God's +existence resolves itself fundamentally into hypostatizing +or substantivating the explanation or reason of a +phenomenon; it amounts to saying that Mechanics is the +cause of movement, Biology of life, Philology of language, +Chemistry of bodies, by simply adding the capital +letter to the science and converting it into a force distinct +from the phenomena from which we derive it and +distinct from our mind which effects the derivation. But +the God who is the result of this process, a God who is +nothing but reason hypostatized and projected towards +the infinite, cannot possibly be felt as something living +and real, nor yet be conceived of save as a mere idea +which will die with us.</p> + +<p>The question arises, on the other hand, whether a thing +the idea of which has been conceived but which has no +real existence, does not exist because God wills that it +should not exist, or whether God does not will it to exist +because, in fact, it does not exist; and, with regard to the +<a name="Page_163" id="Page_163" />impossible, whether a thing is impossible because God +wills it so, or whether God wills it so because, in itself +and by the very fact of its own inherent absurdity, it is +impossible. God has to submit to the logical law of contradiction, +and He cannot, according to the theologians, +cause two and two to make either more or less than four. +Either the law of necessity is above Him or He Himself +is the law of necessity. And in the moral order the question +arises whether falsehood, or homicide, or adultery, +are wrong because He has so decreed it, or whether He +has so decreed it because they are wrong. If the former, +then God is a capricious and unreasonable God, who +decrees one law when He might equally well have decreed +another, or, if the latter, He obeys an intrinsic nature +and essence which exists in things themselves independently +of Him—that is to say, independently of His +sovereign will; and if this is the case, if He obeys the +innate reason of things, this reason, if we could but know +it, would suffice us without any further need of God, and +since we do not know it, God explains nothing. This +reason would be above God. Neither is it of any avail +to say that this reason is God Himself, the supreme +reason of things. A reason of this kind, a necessary +reason, is not a personal something. It is will that +gives personality. And it is because of this problem of +the relations between God's reason, necessarily necessary, +and His will, necessarily free, that the logical and +Aristotelian God will always be a contradictory God.</p> + +<p>The scholastic theologians never succeeded in disentangling +themselves from the difficulties in which they +found themselves involved when they attempted to reconcile +human liberty with divine prescience and with the +knowledge that God possesses of the free and contingent +future; and that is strictly the reason why the rational +God is wholly inapplicable to the contingent, for the +notion of contingency is fundamentally the same as the +notion of irrationality. The rational God is necessarily +<a name="Page_164" id="Page_164" />necessary in His being and in His working; in every single +case He cannot do other than the best, and a number of +different things cannot all equally be the best, for among +infinite possibilities there is only one that is best accommodated +to its end, just as among the infinite number of +lines that can be drawn from one point to another, there +is only one straight line. And the rational God, the +God of reason, cannot but follow in each case the straight +line, the line that leads most directly to the end proposed, +a necessary end, just as the only straight line that +leads to it is a necessary line. And thus for the divinity +of God is substituted His necessity. And in the necessity +of God, His free will—that is to say, His conscious +personality—perishes. The God of our heart's desire, +the God who shall save our soul from nothingness, must +needs be an arbitrary God.</p> + +<p>Not because He thinks can God be God, but because He +works, because He creates; He is not a contemplative but +an active God. A God-Reason, a theoretical or contemplative +God, such as is this God of theological rationalism, +is a God that is diluted in His own contemplation. With +this God corresponds, as we shall see, the beatific vision, +understood as the supreme expression of human felicity. +A quietist God, in short, as reason, by its very essence, +is quietist.</p> + +<p>There remains the other famous proof of God's existence, +that of the supposed unanimous consent in a belief +in Him among all peoples. But this proof is not strictly +rational, neither is it an argument in favour of the rational +God who explains the Universe, but of the God of the +heart, who makes us live. We should be justified in +calling it a rational proof only on the supposition that +we believed that reason was identical with a more or less +unanimous agreement among all peoples, that it corresponded +with the verdict of a universal suffrage, only on +the supposition that we held that <i>vox populi</i>, which is +said to be <i>vox Dei</i>, was actually the voice of reason.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165" />Such was, indeed, the belief of Lamennais, that tragic +and ardent spirit, who affirmed that life and truth were +essentially one and the same thing—would that they +were!—and that reason was one, universal, everlasting +and holy (<i>Essai sur l'indifférence</i>, partie iv., chap, viii.). +He invoked the <i>aut omnibus credendum est aut nemini</i> +of Lactantius—we must believe all or none—and the saying +of Heraclitus that every individual opinion is fallible, +and that of Aristotle that the strongest proof consists in +the general agreement of mankind, and above all that +of Pliny (<i>Paneg. Trajani</i>, lxii.), to the effect that one man +cannot deceive all men or be deceived by all—<i>nemo +omnes, neminem omnes fefellerunt</i>. Would that it were +so! And so he concludes with the dictum of Cicero (<i>De +natura deorum</i>, lib. iii., cap. ii., 5 and 6), that we must +believe the tradition of our ancestors even though they +fail to render us a reason—<i>maioribus autem nostris, etiam +nulla ratione reddita credere</i>.</p> + +<p>Let us suppose that this belief of the ancients in the +divine interpenetration of the whole of Nature is universal +and constant, and that it is, as Aristotle calls it, an +ancestral dogma (<i>πατριος δοξα</i>) (<i>Metaphysica</i>, lib. vii., +cap. vii.); this would prove only that there is a motive +impelling peoples and individuals—that is to say, all or +almost all or a majority of them—to believe in a God. But +may it not be that there are illusions and fallacies rooted in +human nature itself? Do not all peoples begin by believing +that the sun turns round the earth? And do we not +all naturally incline to believe that which satisfies our +desires? Shall we say with Hermann<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40" /><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> that, "if there is +a God, He has not left us without some indication of +Himself, and if is His will that we should find Him."</p> + +<p>A pious desire, no doubt, but we cannot strictly call it +a reason, unless we apply to it the Augustinian sentence, +<a name="Page_166" id="Page_166" />but which again is not a reason, "Since thou seekest Me, +it must be that thou hast found Me," believing that God +is the cause of our seeking Him.</p> + +<p>This famous argument from the supposed unanimity +of mankind's belief in God, the argument which with a +sure instinct was seized upon by the ancients, is in its +essence identical with the so-called moral proof which +Kant employed in his <i>Critique of Practical Reason</i>, +transposing its application from mankind collectively to +the individual, the proof which he derives from our conscience, +or rather from our feeling of divinity. It is not +a proof strictly or specifically rational, but vital; it cannot +be applied to the logical God, the <i>ens summum</i>, the essentially +simple and abstract Being, the immobile and impassible +prime mover, the God-Reason, in a word, but +to the biotic God, to the Being essentially complex and +concrete, to the suffering God who suffers and desires in +us and with us, to the Father of Christ who is only to be +approached through Man, through His Son (John xiv. 6), +and whose revelation is historical, or if you like, +anecdotical, but not philosophical or categorical.</p> + +<p>The unanimous consent of mankind (let us suppose +the unanimity) or, in other words, this universal longing +of all human souls who have arrived at the consciousness +of their humanity, which desires to be the end and meaning +of the Universe, this longing, which is nothing but +that very essence of the soul which consists in its effort +to persist eternally and without a break in the continuity +of consciousness, leads us to the human, anthropomorphic +God, the projection of our consciousness to the Consciousness +of the Universe; it leads us to the God who confers +human meaning and finality upon the Universe and who +is not the <i>ens summum</i>, the <i>primum movens</i>, nor the +Creator of the Universe, nor merely the Idea-God. It +leads us to the living, subjective God, for He is simply +subjectivity objectified or personality universalized—He +is more than a mere idea, and He is will rather than +<a name="Page_167" id="Page_167" />reason. God is Love—that is, Will. Reason, the +Word, derives from Him, but He, the Father, is, above +all, Will.</p> + +<p>"There can be no doubt whatever," Ritschl says +(<i>Rechtfertigung und Versöhnung</i>, iii., chap. v.), "that a +very imperfect view was taken of God's spiritual personality +in the older theology, when the functions of knowing +and willing alone were employed to illustrate it. +Religious thought plainly ascribes to God affections of +feeling as well. The older theology, however, laboured +under the impression that feeling and emotion were +characteristic only of limited and created personality; it +transformed, <i>e.g.</i>, the religious idea of the Divine +blessedness into eternal self-knowledge, and that of the +Divine wrath into a fixed purpose to punish sin." Yes, +this logical God, arrived at by the <i>via negationis</i>, was a +God who, strictly speaking, neither loved nor hated, +because He neither enjoyed nor suffered, an inhuman +God, and His justice was a rational or mathematical +justice—that is, an injustice.</p> + +<p>The attributes of the living God, of the Father of +Christ, must be deduced from His historical revelation in +the Gospel and in the conscience of every Christian +believer, and not from metaphysical reasonings which +lead only to the Nothing-God of Scotus Erigena, to the +rational or pantheistic God, to the atheist God—in short, +to the de-personalized Divinity.</p> + +<p>Not by the way of reason, but only by the way of love +and of suffering, do we come to the living God, the human +God. Reason rather separates us from Him. We cannot +first know Him in order that afterwards we may love +Him; we must begin by loving Him, longing for Him, +hungering after Him, before knowing Him. The knowledge +of God proceeds from the love of God, and this +knowledge has little or nothing of the rational in it. For +God is indefinable. To seek to define Him is to seek to +confine Him within the limits of our mind—that is to say, +<a name="Page_168" id="Page_168" />to kill Him. In so far as we attempt to define Him, +there rises up before us—Nothingness.</p> + +<p>The idea of God, formulated by a theodicy that claims +to be rational, is simply an hypothesis, like the hypotheses +of ether, for example.</p> + +<p>Ether is, in effect, a merely hypothetical entity, valuable +only in so far as it explains that which by means of it we +endeavour to explain—light, electricity or universal +gravitation—and only in so far as these facts cannot be +explained in any other way. In like manner the idea +of God is also an hypothesis, valuable only in so far as +it enables us to explain that which by means of if we +endeavour to explain—the essence and existence of the +Universe—and only so long as these cannot be explained +in any other way. And since in reality we explain the +Universe neither better nor worse with this idea than +without it, the idea of God, the supreme <i>petitio principii</i>, +is valueless.</p> + +<p>But if ether is nothing but an hypothesis explanatory +of light, air, on the other hand, is a thing that is directly +felt; and even though it did not enable us to explain the +phenomenon of sound, we should nevertheless always be +directly aware of it, and, above all, of the lack of it in +moments of suffocation or air-hunger. And in the same +way God Himself, not the idea of God, may become a +reality that is immediately felt; and even though the idea +of Him does not enable us to explain either the existence +or the essence of the Universe, we have at times the direct +feeling of God, above all in moments of spiritual suffocation. +And this feeling—mark it well, for all that is tragic +in it and the whole tragic sense of life is founded upon +this—this feeling is a feeling of hunger for God, of the +lack of God. To believe in God is, in the first instance, +as we shall see, to wish that there may be a God, to be +unable to live without Him.</p> + +<p>So long as I pilgrimaged through the fields of reason +in search of God, I could not find Him, for I was not +<a name="Page_169" id="Page_169" />deluded by the idea of God, neither could I take an idea +for God, and it was then, as I wandered among the +wastes of rationalism, that I told myself that we ought +to seek no other consolation than the truth, meaning +thereby reason, and yet for all that I was not comforted. +But as I sank deeper and deeper into rational scepticism +on the one hand and into heart's despair on the other, +the hunger for God awoke within me, and the suffocation +of spirit made me feel the want of God, and with the want +of Him, His reality. And I wished that there might be +a God, that God might exist. And God does not exist, +but rather super-exists, and He is sustaining our existence, +existing us <i>(existiéndonos)</i>.</p> + +<p>God, who is Love, the Father of Love, is the son of +love in us. There are men of a facile and external habit +of mind, slaves of reason, that reason which externalizes +us, who think it a shrewd comment to say that so far +from God having made man in His image and likeness, +it is rather man who has made his gods or his God in his +own image and likeness,<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41" /><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a> and so superficial are they that +they do not pause to consider that if the second of these +propositions be true, as in fact it is, it is owing to the fact +that the first is not less true. God and man, in effect, +mutually create one another; God creates or reveals Himself +in man and man creates himself in God. God is +His own maker, <i>Deus ipse se facit</i>, said Lactantius +(<i>Divinarum Institutionum</i>, ii., 8), and we may say that +He is making Himself continually both in man and by +man. And if each of us, impelled by his love, by his +hunger for divinity, creates for himself an image of God +according to his own desire, and if according to His +desire God creates Himself for each of us, then there is +a collective, social, human God, the resultant of all the +human imaginations that imagine Him. For God is +<a name="Page_170" id="Page_170" />and reveals Himself in collectivity. And God is the +richest and most personal of human conceptions.</p> + +<p>The Master of divinity has bidden us be perfect as our +Father who is in heaven is perfect (Matt. v. 48), and in +the sphere of thought and feeling our perfection consists +in the zeal with which we endeavour to equate our imagination +with the total imagination of the humanity of which +in God we form a part.</p> + +<p>The logical theory of the opposition between the extension +and the comprehension of a concept, the one +increasing in the ratio in which the other diminishes, is +well known. The concept that is most extensive and at +the same time least comprehensive is that of being or of +thing, which embraces everything that exists and possesses +no other distinguishing quality than that of being; +while the concept that is most comprehensive and least +extensive is that of the Universe, which is only applicable +to itself and comprehends all existing qualities. And the +logical or rational God, the God obtained by way of +negation, the absolute entity, merges, like reality itself, +into nothingness; for, as Hegel pointed out, pure being +and pure nothingness are identical. And the God of the +heart, the God who is felt, the God of living men, is the +Universe itself conceived as personality, is the consciousness +of the Universe. A God universal and personal, +altogether different from the individual God of a rigid +metaphysical monotheism.</p> + +<p>I must advert here once again to my view of the opposition +that exists between individuality and personality, +notwithstanding the fact that the one demands the other. +Individuality is, if I may so express it, the continent +or thing which contains, personality the content or +thing contained, or I might say that my personality +is in a certain sense my comprehension, that which +I comprehend or embrace within myself—which is in a +certain way the whole Universe—and that my individuality +is my extension; the one my infinite, the other +<a name="Page_171" id="Page_171" />my finite. A hundred jars of hard earthenware are +strongly individualized, but it is possible for them to be +all equally empty or all equally full of the same homogeneous +liquid, whereas two bladders of so delicate a +membrane as to admit of the action of osmosis and +exosmosis may be strongly differentiated and contain +liquids of a very mixed composition. And thus a man, +in so far as he is an individual, may be very sharply +detached from others, a sort of spiritual crustacean, and +yet be very poor in differentiating content. And further, +it is true on the other hand that the more personality a +man has and the greater his interior richness and the +more he is a society within himself, the less brusquely +he is divided from his fellows. In the same way the +rigid God of deism, of Aristotelian monotheism, the +<i>ens summum</i>, is a being in whom individuality, or rather +simplicity, stifles personality. Definition kills him, for +to define is to impose boundaries, it is to limit, and it is +impossible to define the absolutely indefinable. This +God lacks interior richness; he is not a society in himself. +And this the vital revelation obviated by the +belief in the Trinity, which makes God a society and even +a family in himself and no longer a pure individual. The +God of faith is personal; He is a person because He +includes three persons, for personality is not sensible of +itself in isolation. An isolated person ceases to be a +person, for whom should he love? And if he does not +love, he is not a person. Nor can a simple being love +himself without his love expanding him into a compound +being.</p> + +<p>It was because God was felt as a Father that the belief +in the Trinity arose. For a God-Father cannot be a +single, that is, a solitary, God. A father is always the +father of a family. And the fact that God was felt as a +father acted as a continual incentive to conceive Him not +merely anthropomorphically—that is to say, as a man, +<i>ανθρωπος</i>—but andromorphically, as a male, <i>ανηρ</i>. In the +<a name="Page_172" id="Page_172" />popular Christian imagination, in effect, God the Father +is conceived of as a male. And the reason is that man, +<i>homo</i>, <i>ανθρωπος</i>, as we know him, is necessarily either a +male, <i>vir</i>, <i>ανηρ</i>, or a female, <i>mulier</i>, <i>γυνη</i>. And to these +may be added the child, who is neuter. And hence in +order to satisfy imaginatively this necessity of feeling +God as a perfect man—that is, as a family—arose the cult +of the God-Mother, the Virgin Mary, and the cult of the +Child Jesus.</p> + +<p>The cult of the Virgin, Mariolatry, which, by the +gradual elevation of the divine element in the Virgin has +led almost to her deification, answers merely to the +demand of the feeling that God should be a perfect man, +that God should include in His nature the feminine +element. The progressive exaltation of the Virgin Mary, +the work of Catholic piety, having its beginning in the +expression Mother of God, <i>θεοτοκος</i>, <i>deipara</i>, has culminated +in attributing to her the status of co-redeemer +and in the dogmatic declaration of her conception without +the stain of original sin. Hence she now occupies a +position between Humanity and Divinity and nearer +Divinity than Humanity. And it has been surmised that +in course of time she may perhaps even come to be +regarded as yet another personal manifestation of the +Godhead.</p> + +<p>And yet this might not necessarily involve the conversion +of the Trinity into a Quaternity. If <i>πνευμα</i>, in +Greek, spirit, instead of being neuter had been feminine, +who can say that the Virgin Mary might not already +have become an incarnation or humanization of the Holy +Spirit? That fervent piety which always knows how to +mould theological speculation in accordance with its own +desires would have found sufficient warranty for such a +doctrine in the text of the Gospel, in Luke's narrative +of the Annunciation where the angel Gabriel hails Mary +with the words, "The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee," +<i>πνευμα αγιον επε +λευσεται επι σε</i> (Luke i. 35). And thus +<a name="Page_173" id="Page_173" />a dogmatic evolution would have been effected parallel +to that of the divinization of Jesus, the Son, and his +identification with the Word.</p> + +<p>In any case the cult of the Virgin, of the eternal +feminine, or rather of the divine feminine, of the divine +maternity, helps to complete the personalization of God +by constituting Him a family.</p> + +<p>In one of my books (<i>Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho</i>, +part ii., chap. lxvii.) I have said that "God was and is, +in our mind, masculine. In His mode of judging and +condemning men, He acts as a male, not as a human +person above the limitation of sex; He acts as a father. +And to counterbalance this, the Mother element was +required, the Mother who always forgives, the Mother +whose arms are always open to the child when he flies +from the frowning brow or uplifted hand of the angry +father; the Mother in whose bosom we seek the dim, +comforting memory of that warmth and peace of our pre-natal +unconsciousness, of that milky sweetness that +soothed our dreams of innocence; the Mother who knows +no justice but that of forgiveness, no law but that of love. +Our weak and imperfect conception of God as a God +with a long beard and a voice of thunder, of a God who +promulgates laws and pronounces dooms, of a God who +is the Master of a household, a Roman Paterfamilias, +required counterpoise and complement, and since fundamentally +we are unable to conceive of the personal and +living God as exalted above human and even masculine +characteristics, and still less as a neutral or hermaphrodite +God, we have recourse to providing Him with a +feminine God, and by the side of the God-Father we +have placed the Goddess-Mother, she who always forgives, +because, since she sees with love-blind eyes, she +sees always the hidden cause of the fault and in that +hidden cause the only justice of forgiveness ..."</p> + +<p>And to this I must now add that not only are we unable +to conceive of the full and living God as masculine +<a name="Page_174" id="Page_174" />simply, but we are unable to conceive of Him as +individual simply, as the projection of a solitary I, an +unsocial I, an I that is in reality an abstract I. My living +I is an I that is really a We; my living personal I lives +only in other, of other, and by other I's; I am sprung, +from a multitude of ancestors, I carry them within me in +extract, and at the same time I carry within me, potentially, +a multitude of descendants, and God, the projection +of my I to the infinite—or rather I, the projection of +God to the finite—must also be multitude. Hence, in +order to save the personality of God—that is to say, in +order to save the living God—faith's need—the need of +the feeling and the imagination—of conceiving Him and; +feeling Him as possessed of a certain internal multiplicity.</p> + +<p>This need the pagan feeling of a living divinity +obviated by polytheism. It is the agglomeration of its +gods, the republic of them, that really constitutes its +Divinity. The real God of Hellenic paganism is not so +much Father Zeus (<i>Jupiter</i>) as the whole society of gods +and demi-gods. Hence the solemnity of the invocation +of Demosthenes when he invoked all the gods and all the +goddesses: <i>τοις θεοις ευχομαι και πασαις</i>. And when +the rationalizers converted the term god, <i>θεος</i>, which is +properly an adjective, a quality predicated of each one +of the gods, into a substantive, and added the definite +article to it, they produced <i>the</i> god, <i>ο θεος</i>, the dead and +abstract god of philosophical rationalism, a substantivized +quality and therefore void of personality. For the masculine +concrete god (<i>el</i> dios) is nothing but the neuter +abstract divine quality (<i>lo</i> divino). Now the transition +from feeling the divinity in all things to substantivating +it and converting the Divinity into God, cannot be +achieved without feeling undergoing a certain risk. +And the Aristotelian God, the God of the logical proofs, +is nothing more than the Divinity, a concept and not a +living person who can be felt and with whom through +love man can communicate. This God is merely a sub<a name="Page_175" id="Page_175" />stantivized +adjective; He is a constitutional God who +reigns but does not govern, and Knowledge is His constitutional +charter.</p> + +<p>And even in Greco-Latin paganism itself the tendency +towards a living monotheism is apparent in the fact that +Zeus was conceived of and felt as a father, <i>Ζευς πατηρ</i>, as Homer calls him, the <i>Ju-piter</i> or <i>Ju-pater</i> of the Latins, +and as a father of a whole widely extended family of gods +and goddesses who together with him constituted the +Divinity.</p> + +<p>The conjunction of pagan polytheism with Judaic +monotheism, which had endeavoured by other means to +save the personality of God, gave birth to the feeling of +the Catholic God, a God who is a society, as the pagan +God of whom I have spoken was a society, and who at +the same time is one, as the God of Israel finally became +one. Such is the Christian Trinity, whose deepest sense +rationalistic deism has scarcely ever succeeded in understanding, +that deism, which though more or less impregnated +with Christianity, always remains Unitarian or +Socinian.</p> + +<p>And the truth is that we feel God less as a superhuman +consciousness than as the actual consciousness of the +whole human race, past, present, and future, as the collective +consciousness of the whole race, and still more, +as the total and infinite consciousness which embraces +and sustains all consciousnesses, infra-human, human, +and perhaps, super-human. The divinity that there is +in everything, from the lowest—that is to say, from the +least conscious—of living forms, to the highest, including +our own human consciousness, this divinity we feel to be +personalized, conscious of itself, in God. And this +gradation of consciousnesses, this sense of the gulf +between the human and the fully divine, the universal, +consciousness, finds its counterpart in the belief in angels +with their different hierarchies, as intermediaries between +our human consciousness and that of God. And these +<a name="Page_176" id="Page_176" />gradations a faith consistent with itself must believe to be +infinite, for only by an infinite number of degrees is it +possible to pass from the finite to the infinite.</p> + +<p>Deistic rationalism conceives God as the Reason of +the Universe, but its logic compels it to conceive Him as +an impersonal reason—that is to say, as an idea—while +deistic vitalism feels and imagines God as Consciousness, +and therefore as a person or rather as a society of persons. +The consciousness of each one of us, in effect, is a society +of persons; in me there are various I's and even the I's +of those among whom I live, live in me.</p> + +<p>The God of deistic rationalism, in effect, the God of the +logical proofs of His existence, the <i>ens realissimum</i> and +the immobile prime mover, is nothing more than a +Supreme Reason, but in the same sense in which we can +call the law of universal gravitation the reason of the +falling of bodies, this law being merely the explanation +of the phenomenon. But will anyone say that that which +we call the law of universal gravitation, or any other +law or mathematical principle, is a true and independent +reality, that it is an angel, that it is something which +possesses consciousness of itself and others, that it is a +person? No, it is nothing but an idea without any reality +outside of the mind of him who conceives it. And similarly +this God-Reason either possesses consciousness of +himself or he possesses no reality outside the mind that +conceives him. And if he possesses consciousness of +himself, he becomes a personal reason, and then all the +value of the traditional proofs disappears, for these proofs +only proved a reason, but not a supreme consciousness. +Mathematics prove an order, a constancy, a reason in the +series of mechanical phenomena, but they 'do not prove +that this reason is conscious of itself. This reason is a +logical necessity, but the logical necessity does not prove +the teleological or finalist necessity. And where there +is no finality there is no personality, there is no consciousness.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177" />The rational God, therefore—that is to say, the God +who is simply the Reason of the Universe and nothing +more—consummates his own destruction, is destroyed in +our mind in so far as he is such a God, and is only born +again in us when we feel him in our heart as a living +person, as Consciousness, and no longer merely as the +impersonal and objective Reason of the Universe. If +we wish for a rational explanation of the construction of +a machine, all that we require to know is the mechanical +science of its constructor; but if we would have a reason +for the existence of such a machine, then, since it is +the work not of Nature but of man, we must suppose a +conscious, constructive being. But the second part of +this reasoning is not applicable to God, even though it +be said that in Him the mechanical science and the +mechanician, by means of which the machine was constructed, +are one and the same thing. From the rational +point of view this identification is merely a begging of +the question. And thus it is that reason destroys this +Supreme Reason, in so far as the latter is a person.</p> + +<p>The human reason, in effect, is a reason that is based +upon the irrational, upon the total vital consciousness, +upon will and feeling; our human reason is not a reason +that can prove to us the existence of a Supreme Reason, +which in its turn would have to be based upon the +Supreme Irrational, upon the Universal Consciousness. +And the revelation of this Supreme Consciousness in our +feeling and imagination, by love, by faith, by the process +of personalization, is that which leads us to believe in the +living God.</p> + +<p>And this God, the living God, your God, our God, is +in me, is in you, lives in us, and we live and move and +have our being in Him. And He is in us by virtue of the +hunger, the longing, which we have for Him, He is Himself +creating the longing for Himself. And He is the +God of the humble, for in the words of the Apostle, God +chose the foolish things of the world to confound the +<a name="Page_178" id="Page_178" />wise, and the weak things of the world to confound the +things which are mighty (i Cor. i. 27). And God is in +each one of us in the measure in which each one feels +Him and loves Him. "If of two men," says Kierkegaard, +"one prays to the true God without sincerity of +heart, and the other prays to an idol with all the passion +of an infinite yearning, it is the first who really prays to +an idol, while the second really prays to God." It would +be better to say that the true God is He to whom man +truly prays and whom man truly desires. And there +may even be a truer revelation in superstition itself than +in theology. The venerable Father of the long beard +and white locks who appears among the clouds carrying +the globe of the world in his hand is more living and +more real than the <i>ens realissimum</i> of theodicy.</p> + +<p>Reason is an analytical, that is, a dissolving force, +whenever it transfers its activity from the form of +intuitions, whether those of the individual instinct of +preservation or those of the social instinct of perpetuation, +and applies it to the essence and matter of them. Reason +orders the sensible perceptions which give us the material +world; but when its analysis is exercised upon the reality +of the perceptions themselves, it dissolves them and +plunges us into a world of appearances, a world of +shadows without consistency, for outside the domain of +the formal, reason is nihilist and annihilating. And it +performs the same terrible office when we withdraw it +from its proper domain and apply it to the scrutiny of +the imaginative intuitions which give us the spiritual +world. For reason annihilates and imagination completes, +integrates or totalizes; reason by itself alone kills, +and it is imagination that gives life. If it is true that +imagination by itself alone, in giving us life without limit, +leads us to lose our identity in the All and also kills us +as individuals, it kills us by excess of life. Reason, the +head, speaks to us the word Nothing! imagination, the +heart, the word All! and between all and nothing, by +<a name="Page_179" id="Page_179" />the fusion of the all and the nothing within us, we live +in God, who is All, and God lives in us who, without +Him, are nothing. Reason reiterates, Vanity of vanities! +all is vanity! And imagination answers, Plenitude of +plenitudes! all is plenitude! And thus we live the +vanity of plenitude or the plenitude of vanity.</p> + +<p>And so deeply rooted in the depths of man's being is +this vital need of living a world<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42" /><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> illogical, irrational, +personal or divine, that those who do not believe in +God, or believe that they do not believe in Him, believe +nevertheless in some little pocket god or even +devil of their own, or in an omen, or in a horseshoe +picked up by chance on the roadside and carried about +with them to bring them good luck and defend them +from that very reason whose loyal and devoted henchmen +they imagine themselves to be.</p> + +<p>The God whom we hunger after is the God to whom +we pray, the God of the <i>Pater Noster</i>, of the Lord's +Prayer; the God whom we beseech, before all and above +all, and whether we are aware of it or not, to instil faith +into us, to make us believe in Him, to make Himself in +us, the God to whom we pray that His name may be +hallowed and that His will may be done—His will, not +His reason—on earth as it is in heaven; but feeling that +His will cannot be other than the essence of our will, the +desire to persist eternally.</p> + +<p>And such a God is the God of love—<i>how</i> He is it profits +us not to ask, but rather let each consult his own heart +and give his imagination leave to picture Him in the +remoteness of the Universe, gazing down upon him with +those myriad eyes of His that shine in the night-darkened +heavens. He in whom you believe, reader, He is your +God, He who has lived with you and within you, who +was born with you, who was a child when you were a +child, who became a man according as you became a +man, who will vanish when you yourself vanish, and who +<a name="Page_180" id="Page_180" />is your principle of continuity in the spiritual life, for +He is the principle of solidarity among all men and in +each man and between men and the Universe, and He +is, as you are, a person. And if you believe in God, +God believes in you, and believing in you He creates +you continually. For in your essence you are nothing +but the idea that God possesses of you—but a living idea, +because the idea of a God who is living and conscious of +Himself, of a God-Consciousness, and apart from what +you are in the society of God you are nothing.</p> + +<p>How to define God? Yes, that is our longing. That +was the longing of the man Jacob, when, after wrestling +all the night until the breaking of the day with that divine +visitant, he cried, "Tell me, I pray thee, thy name!" +(Gen. xxxii. 29). Listen to the words of that great +Christian preacher, Frederick William Robertson, in a +sermon preached in Trinity Chapel, Brighton, on the +10th of June, 1849: "And this is our struggle—<i>the</i> +struggle. Let any true man go down into the deeps of +his own being, and answer us—what is the cry that comes +from the most real part of his nature? Is it the cry for +daily bread? Jacob asked for that in his <i>first</i> communing +with God—preservation, safety. Is it even this—to be +forgiven our sins? Jacob had a sin to be forgiven, and +in that most solemn moment of his existence he did not +say a syllable about it. Or is it this—'Hallowed be +Thy name'? No, my brethren. Out of our frail and +yet sublime humanity, the demand that rises in the +earthlier hours of our religion may be this—'Save my +soul'; but in the most unearthly moments it is this—'Tell +me thy name.' We move through a world of mystery; +and the deepest question is, What is the being that is +ever near, sometimes felt, never seen; that which has +haunted us from childhood with a dream of something +surpassingly fair, which has never yet been realized; +that which sweeps through the soul at times as a desolation, +like the blast from the wings of the Angel of Death, +<a name="Page_181" id="Page_181" />leaving us stricken and silent in our loneliness; that +which has touched us in our tenderest point, and the +flesh has quivered with agony, and our mortal affections +have shrivelled up with pain; that which comes to us in +aspirations of nobleness and conceptions of superhuman +excellence? Shall we say It or He? What is It? Who +is He? Those anticipations of Immortality and God—what +are they? Are they the mere throbbings of my own +heart, heard and mistaken for a living something beside +me? Are they the sound of my own wishes, echoing +through the vast void of Nothingness? or shall I call +them God, Father, Spirit, Love? A living Being within +me or outside me? Tell me Thy name, thou awful +mystery of Loveliness! This is the struggle of all +earnest life."<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43" /><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a></p> + +<p>Thus Robertson. To which I must add this comment, +that Tell me thy name is essentially the same as Save +my soul! We ask Him His name in order that He may +save our soul, that He may save the human soul, that +He may save the human finality of the Universe. And +if they tell us that He is called He, that He is the <i>ens +realissimum</i> or the Supreme Being or any other metaphysical +name, we are not contented, for we know that +every metaphysical name is an X, and we go on asking +Him His name. And there is only one name that +satisfies our longing, and that is the name Saviour, Jesus. +God is the love that saves. As Browning said in his +<i>Christmas Eve and Easter Day</i>,</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>For the loving worm within its clod,</div> +<div>Were diviner than a loveless God</div> +<div>Amid his worlds, I will dare to say.</div></div> +</div> + +<p>The essence of the divine is Love, Will that personalizes +and eternalizes, that feels the hunger for eternity and +infinity.</p> + +<p>It is ourselves, it is our eternity that we seek in God, +<a name="Page_182" id="Page_182" />it is our divinization. It was Browning again who said, +in <i>Saul</i>,</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>'Tis the weakness in strength that I cry for! my flesh that I seek</div> +<div>In the Godhead!</div></div> +</div> + +<p>But this God who saves us, this personal God, the Consciousness +of the Universe who envelops and sustains our +consciousnesses, this God who gives human finality to +the whole creation—does He exist? Have we proofs of +His existence?</p> + +<p>This question leads in the first place to an enquiry into +the cleaning of this notion of existence. What is it to +exist and in what sense do we speak of things as not +existing?</p> + +<p>In its etymological signification to exist is to be outside +of ourselves, outside of our mind: <i>ex-sistere</i>. But +is there anything outside of our mind, outside of our +consciousness which embraces the sum of the known? +Undoubtedly there is. The matter of knowledge comes +to us from without. And what is the mode of this +matter? It is impossible for us to know, for to know is +to clothe matter with form, and hence we cannot know +the formless as formless. To do so would be tantamount +to investing chaos with order.</p> + +<p>This problem of the existence of God, a problem that +is rationally insoluble, is really identical with the problem +of consciousness, of the <i>ex-sistentia</i> and not of the +<i>in-sistentia</i> of consciousness, it is none other than the +problem of the substantial existence of the soul, the +problem of the perpetuity of the human soul, the problem +of the human finality of the Universe itself. To believe +in a living and personal God, in an eternal and universal +consciousness that knows and loves us, is to believe that +the Universe exists <i>for</i> man. For man, or for a consciousness +of the same order as the human consciousness, +of the same nature, although sublimated, a consciousness +that is capable of knowing us, in the depth of whose +being our memory may live for ever. +<a name="Page_183" id="Page_183" />Perhaps, as I have said before, by a supreme and +desperate effort of resignation we might succeed in +making the sacrifice of our personality provided that we +knew that at our death it would go to enrich a Supreme +Personality; provided that we knew that the Universal +Soul was nourished by our souls and had need of them. +We might perhaps meet death with a desperate resignation +or with a resigned despair, delivering up our soul to +the soul of humanity, bequeathing to it our work, the +work that bears the impress of our person, if it were certain +that this humanity were destined to bequeath its soul +in its turn to another soul, when at long last consciousness +shall have become extinct upon this desire-tormented +Earth. But is it certain?</p> + +<p>And if the soul of humanity is eternal, if the human +collective consciousness is eternal, if there is a Consciousness +of the Universe, and if this Consciousness is eternal, +why must our own individual consciousness—yours, +reader, mine—be not eternal?</p> + +<p>In the vast all of the Universe, must there be this unique +anomaly—a consciousness that knows itself, loves itself +and feels itself, joined to an organism which can only +live within such and such degrees of heat, a merely +transitory phenomenon? No, it is not mere curiosity +that inspires the wish to know whether or not the stars +are inhabited by living organisms, by consciousnesses +akin to our own, and a profound longing enters into that +dream that our souls shall pass from star to star through +the vast spaces of the heavens, in an infinite series of +transmigrations. The feeling of the divine makes us +wish and believe that everything is animated, that consciousness, +in a greater or less degree, extends through +everything. We wish not only to save ourselves, but +to save the world from nothingness. And therefore God. +Such is His finality as we feel it.</p> + +<p>What would a universe be without any consciousness +capable of reflecting it and knowing it? What would +<a name="Page_184" id="Page_184" />objectified reason be without will and feeling? For us +it would be equivalent to nothing—a thousand times +more dreadful than nothing.</p> + +<p>If such a supposition is reality, our life is deprived of +sense and value.</p> + +<p>It is not, therefore, rational necessity, but vital anguish +that impels us to believe in God. And to believe in +God—I must reiterate it yet again—is, before all and +above all, to feel a hunger for God, a hunger for divinity, +to be sensible of His lack and absence, to wish that God +may exist. And it is to wish to save the human finality +of the Universe. For one might even come to resign +oneself to being absorbed by God, if it be that our consciousness +is based upon a Consciousness, if consciousness +is the end of the Universe.</p> + +<p>"The wicked man hath said in his heart, There is no +God." And this is truth. For in his head the righteous +man may say to himself, God does not exist! But only +the wicked can say it in his heart. Not to believe that +there is a God or to believe that there is not a God, is +one thing; to resign oneself to there not being a God is +another thing, and it is a terrible and inhuman thing; +but not to wish that there be a God exceeds every other +moral monstrosity; although, as a matter of fact, those +who deny God deny Him because of their despair at not +finding Him.</p> + +<p>And now reason once again confronts us with the +Sphinx-like question—the Sphinx, in effect, is reason—Does +God exist? This eternal and eternalizing person +who gives meaning—and I will add, a human meaning, +for there is none other—to the Universe, is it a substantial +something, existing independently of our consciousness, +independently of our desire? Here we arrive at the +insoluble, and it is best that it should be so. Let it suffice +for reason that it cannot prove the impossibility of His +existence.</p> + +<p>To believe in God is to long for His existence and, +<a name="Page_185" id="Page_185" />further, it is to act as if He existed; it is to live by this +longing and to make it the inner spring of our action. +This longing or hunger for divinity begets hope, hope +begets faith, and faith and hope beget charity. Of this +divine longing is born our sense of beauty, of finality, of +goodness.</p> + +<p>Let us see how this may be.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38" /><a href="#FNanchor_38_38">[38]</a> Lecture I., p. 36. London, 1895, Black.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39" /><a href="#FNanchor_39_39">[39]</a> <i>No quiero acordarme</i>, a phrase that is always associated in Spanish +literature with the opening sentence of <i>Don Quijote: En an lugar de la +Mancha de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme</i>.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40" /><a href="#FNanchor_40_40">[40]</a> W. Hermann, <i>Christlich systematische Dogmatik</i>, in the volume entitled +<i>Systematische christliche Religion. Die Kultur der Gegenwart</i> series, +published by P. Hinneberg.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41" /><a href="#FNanchor_41_41">[41]</a> <i>Dieu a fait l'homme à son image, mais l'homme le lui a bien rendu</i>, +Voltaire.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42" /><a href="#FNanchor_42_42">[42]</a> <i>Vivir un mundo</i>.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43" /><a href="#FNanchor_43_43">[43]</a> <i>Sermons</i>, by the Rev. Frederick W. Robertson. First series, sermon iii., +"Jacob's Wrestling." Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübuer and Co., London, 1898.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX" /><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186" />IX</h2> + +<h2>FAITH, HOPE, AND CHARITY</h2> + +<blockquote><p>Sanctius ac reverentius visum de actis deorum credere quam scire.—TACITUS: +<i>Germania</i>, 34.</p></blockquote> + + +<p>The road that leads us to the living God, the God of the +heart, and that leads us back to Him when we have left +Him for the lifeless God of logic, is the road of faith, not +of rational or mathematical conviction.</p> + +<p>And what is faith?</p> + +<p>This is the question propounded in the Catechism of +Christian Doctrine that was taught us at school, and the +answer runs: Faith is believing what we have not seen.</p> + +<p>This, in an essay written some twelve years ago, I +amended as follows: "Believing what we have not seen, +no! but creating what we do not see." And I have +already told you that believing in God is, in the first +instance at least, wishing that God may be, longing for +the existence of God.</p> + +<p>The theological virtue of faith, according to the +Apostle Paul, whose definition serves as the basis of the +traditional Christian disquisitions upon it, is "the substance +of things hoped for, the evidence of things not +seen," <i>ελπιζομενων +υποστασις, πραγματων +ελεγχος ου βλεπομενων</i> + (Heb. xi. 1).</p> + +<p>The substance, or rather the support and basis, of +hope, the guarantee of it. That which connects, or, +rather than connects, subordinates, faith to hope. And +in fact we do not hope because we believe, but rather we +believe because we hope. It is hope in God, it is the +ardent longing that there may be a God who guarantees +the eternity of consciousness, that leads us to believe in +Him.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187" />But faith, which after all is something compound, +comprising a cognitive, logical, or rational element +together with an affective, biotic, sentimental, and strictly +irrational element, is presented to us under the form of +knowledge. And hence the insuperable difficulty of +separating it from some dogma or other. Pure faith, free +from dogmas, about which I wrote a great deal years ago, +is a phantasm. Neither is the difficulty overcome by +inventing the theory of faith in faith itself. Faith needs +a matter to work upon.</p> + +<p>Believing is a form of knowing, even if it be no more +than a knowing and even a formulating of our vital longing. +In ordinary language the term "believing," however, +is used in a double and even a contradictory sense. +It may express, on the one hand, the highest degree of +the mind's conviction of the truth of a thing, and, on the +other hand, it may imply merely a weak and hesitating +persuasion of its truth. For if in one sense believing +expresses the firmest kind of assent we are capable of +giving, the expression "I believe that it is so, although +I am not sure of it," is nevertheless common in ordinary +speech.</p> + +<p>And this agrees with what we have said above with +respect to uncertainty as the basis of faith. The most +robust faith, in so far as it is distinguished from all other +knowledge that is not <i>pistic</i> or of faith—faithful, as we +might say—is based on uncertainty. And this is because +faith, the guarantee of things hoped for, is not so much +rational adhesion to a theoretical principle as trust in a +person who assures us of something. Faith supposes an +objective, personal element. We do not so much believe +something as believe someone who promises us or assures +us of this or the other thing. We believe in a person and +in God in so far as He is a person and a personalization +of the Universe.</p> + +<p>This personal or religious element in faith is evident. +Faith, it is said, is in itself neither theoretical knowledge +<a name="Page_188" id="Page_188" />nor rational adhesion to a truth, nor yet is its essence +sufficiently explained by defining it as trust in God. +Seeberg says of faith that it is "the inward submission to +the spiritual authority of God, immediate obedience. +And in so far as this obedience is the means of attaining +a rational principle, faith is a personal conviction."<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44" /><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a></p> + +<p>The faith which St. Paul defined, <i>πιστις</i> in Greek, is +better translated as trust, confidence. The word <i>pistis</i> is +derived from the verb <i>πειθω</i>, which in its active voice +means to persuade and in its middle voice to trust in +someone, to esteem him as worthy of trust, to place confidence +in him, to obey. And <i>fidare se</i>, to trust, is +derived from the root <i>fid</i>—whence <i>fides</i>, faith, and also +confidence. The Greek root <i>πιθ</i> and the Latin <i>fid</i> are +twin brothers. In the root of the word "faith" itself, +therefore, there is implicit the idea of confidence, of surrender +to the will of another, to a person. Confidence is +placed only in persons. We trust in Providence, which +we conceive as something personal and conscious, not in +Fate, which is something impersonal. And thus it is in +the person who tells us the truth, in the person who gives +us hope, that we believe, not directly and immediately in +truth itself or in hope itself.</p> + +<p>And this personal or rather personifying element in +faith extends even to the lowest forms of it, for it is this +that produces faith in pseudo-revelation, in inspiration, +in miracle. There is a story of a Parisian doctor, who, +when he found that a quack-healer was drawing away his +clientèle, removed to a quarter of the city as distant as +possible from his former abode, where he was totally +unknown, and here he gave himself out as a quack-healer +and conducted himself as such. When he was denounced +as an illegal practitioner he produced his doctor's certificate, +and explained his action more or less as follows: +"I am indeed a doctor, but if I had announced myself as +<a name="Page_189" id="Page_189" />such I should not have had as large a clientèle as I have +as a quack-healer. Now that all my clients know that I +have studied medicine, however, and that I am a properly +qualified medical man, they will desert me in favour of +some quack who can assure them that he has never +studied, but cures simply by inspiration." And true it +is that a doctor is discredited when it is proved that he has +never studied medicine and possesses no qualifying +certificate, and that a quack is discredited when it is proved +that he has studied and is a qualified practitioner. For +some believe in science and in study, while others believe +in the person, in inspiration, and even in ignorance.</p> + +<p>"There is one distinction in the world's geography +which comes immediately to our minds when we thus +state the different thoughts and desires of men concerning +their religion. We remember how the whole +world is in general divided into two hemispheres +upon this matter. One half of the world—the great +dim East—is mystic. It insists upon not seeing anything +too clearly. Make any one of the great ideas of +life distinct and clear, and immediately it seems to the +Oriental to be untrue. He has an instinct which tells +him that the vastest thoughts are too vast for the human +mind, and that if they are made to present themselves in +forms of statement which the human mind can comprehend, +their nature is violated and their strength is lost.</p> + +<p>"On the other hand, the Occidental, the man of the +West, demands clearness and is impatient with mystery. +He loves a definite statement as much as his brother of +the East dislikes it. He insists on knowing what the +eternal and infinite forces mean to his personal life, how +they will make him personally happier and better, almost +how they will build the house over his head, and cook the +dinner on his hearth. This is the difference between the +East and the West, between man on the banks of the +Ganges and man on the banks of the Mississippi. Plenty +of exceptions, of course, there are—mystics in Boston and +<a name="Page_190" id="Page_190" />St. Louis, hard-headed men of facts in Bombay and Calcutta. +The two great dispositions cannot be shut off +from one another by an ocean or a range of mountains. +In some nations and places—as, for instance, among the +Jews and in our own New England—they notably commingle. +But in general they thus divide the world +between them. The East lives in the moonlight of +mystery, the West in the sunlight of scientific fact. +The East cries out to the Eternal for vague impulses. +The West seizes the present with light hands, and will +not let it go till it has furnished it with reasonable, +intelligible motives. Each misunderstands, distrusts, +and in large degree despises the other. But the two +hemispheres together, and not either one by itself, make +up the total world." Thus, in one of his sermons, +spoke the great Unitarian preacher Phillips Brooks, late +Bishop of Massachusetts (<i>The Mystery of Iniquity and +Other Sermons</i>, sermon xvi.).</p> + +<p>We might rather say that throughout the whole world, +in the East as well as in the West, rationalists seek +definition and believe in the concept, while vitalists +seek inspiration and believe in the person. The former +scrutinize the Universe in order that they may wrest its +secrets from it; the latter pray to the Consciousness of +the Universe, strive to place themselves in immediate +relationship with the Soul of the World, with God, in +order that they may find the guarantee or substance of +what they hope for, which is not to die, and the evidence +of what they do not see.</p> + +<p>And since a person is a will, and will always has +reference to the future, he who believes, believes in what +is to come—that is, in what he hopes for. We do not +believe, strictly speaking, in what is or in what was, +except as the guarantee, as the substance, of what will +be. For the Christian, to believe in the resurrection of +Christ—that is to say, in tradition and in the Gospel, +which assure him that Christ has risen, both of them +<a name="Page_191" id="Page_191" />personal forces—is to believe that he himself will one +day rise again by the grace of Christ. And even scientific +faith—for such there is—refers to the future and is +an act of trust. The man of science believes that at a +certain future date an eclipse of the sun will take place; +he believes that the laws which have governed the world +hitherto will continue to govern it.</p> + +<p>To believe, I repeat, is to place confidence in someone, +and it has reference to a person. I say that I know +that there is an animal called the horse, and that it has +such and such characteristics, because I have seen it; +and I say that I believe in the existence of the giraffe or +the ornithorhyncus, and that it possesses such and such +qualities, because I believe those who assure me that +they have seen it. And hence the element of uncertainty +attached to faith, for it is possible that a person +may be deceived or that he may deceive us.</p> + +<p>But, on the other hand, this personal element in belief +gives it an effective and loving character, and above all, in +religious faith, a reference to what is hoped for. Perhaps +there is nobody who would sacrifice his life for the sake of +maintaining that the three angles of a triangle are together +equal to two right angles, for such a truth does not +demand the sacrifice of our life; but, on the other hand, +there are many who have lost their lives for the sake of +maintaining their religious faith. Indeed it is truer to +say that martyrs make faith than that faith makes +martyrs. For faith is not the mere adherence of the +intellect to an abstract principle; it is not the recognition +of a theoretical truth, a process in which the will merely +sets in motion our faculty of comprehension; faith is an +act of the will—it is a movement of the soul towards a +practical truth, towards a person, towards something +that makes us not merely comprehend life, but that +makes us live.<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45" /><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a></p> + +<p>Faith makes us live by showing us that life, although +<a name="Page_192" id="Page_192" />it is dependent upon reason, has its well-spring and +source of power elsewhere, in something supernatural +and miraculous. Cournot the mathematician, a man of +singularly well-balanced and scientifically equipped +mind, has said that it is this tendency towards the supernatural +and miraculous that gives life, and that when it +is lacking, all the speculations of the reason lead to +nothing but affliction of spirit (<i>Traité de l'enchaînement +des idées fondamentales dans les sciences et dans +l'histoire</i>, § 329). And in truth we wish to live.</p> + +<p>But, although we have said that faith is a thing of the +will, it would perhaps be better to say that it is will +itself—the will not to die, or, rather, that it is some other +psychic force distinct from intelligence, will, and feeling. +We should thus have feeling, knowing, willing, +and believing or creating. For neither feeling, nor +intelligence, nor will creates; they operate upon a +material already given, upon the material given them +by faith. Faith is the creative power in man. But +since it has a more intimate relation with the will than +with any other of his faculties, we conceive it under the +form of volition. It should be borne in mind, however, +that wishing to believe—that is to say, wishing to create—is +not precisely the same as believing or creating, +although it is its starting-point.</p> + +<p>Faith, therefore, if not a creative force, is the fruit of +the will, and its function is to create. Faith, in a certain +sense, creates its object. And faith in God consists in +creating God; and since it is God who gives us faith in +Himself, it is God who is continually creating Himself +in us. Therefore St. Augustine said: "I will seek +Thee, Lord, by calling upon Thee, and I will call upon +Thee by believing in Thee. My faith calls upon Thee, +Lord, the faith which Thou hast given me, with which +Thou hast inspired me through the Humanity of Thy +Son, through the ministry of Thy preacher" (<i>Confessions</i>, +book i., chap. i.). The power of creating God in +<a name="Page_193" id="Page_193" />our own image and likeness, of personalizing the +Universe, simply means that we carry God within us, as +the substance of what we hope for, and that God is continually +creating us in His own image and likeness.</p> + +<p>And we create God—that is to say, God creates Himself +in us—by compassion, by love. To believe in God +is to love Him, and in our love to fear Him; and we +begin by loving Him even before knowing Him, and by +loving Him we come at last to see and discover Him in +all things.</p> + +<p>Those who say that they believe in God and yet +neither love nor fear Him, do not in fact believe in Him +but in those who have taught them that God exists, and +these in their turn often enough do not believe in Him +either. Those who believe that they believe in God, but +without any passion in their heart, without anguish of +mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, without an +element of despair even in their consolation, believe only +in the God-Idea, not in God Himself. And just as +belief in God is born of love, so also it may be born of +fear, and even of hate, and of such kind was the belief +of Vanni Fucci, the thief, whom Dante depicts insulting +God with obscene gestures in Hell (<i>Inf.</i>, xxv., 1-3). For +the devils also believe in God, and not a few atheists.</p> + +<p>Is it not perhaps a mode of believing in God, this +fury with which those deny and even insult Him, who, +because they cannot bring themselves to believe in Him, +wish that He may not exist? Like those who believe, +they, too, wish that God may exist; but being men of a +weak and passive or of an evil disposition, in whom +reason is stronger than will, they feel themselves caught +in the grip of reason and haled along in their own +despite, and they fall into despair, and because of their +despair they deny, and in their denial they affirm and +create the thing that they deny, and God reveals Himself +in them, affirming Himself by their very denial of Him.</p> + +<p>But it will be objected to all this that to demonstrate +<a name="Page_194" id="Page_194" />that faith creates its own object is to demonstrate that +this object is an object for faith alone, that outside faith +it has no objective reality; just as, on the other hand, to +maintain that faith is necessary because it affords consolation +to the masses of the people, or imposes a wholesome +restraint upon them, is to declare that the object +of faith is illusory. What is certain is that for thinking +believers to-day, faith is, before all and above all, wishing +that God may exist.</p> + +<p>Wishing that God may exist, and acting and feeling +as if He did exist. And desiring God's existence and acting +conformably with this desire, is the means whereby +we create God—that is, whereby God creates Himself +in us, manifests Himself to us, opens and reveals Himself +to us. For God goes out to meet him who seeks +Him with love and by love, and hides Himself from him +who searches for Him with the cold and loveless reason. +God wills that the heart should have rest, but not the +head, reversing the order of the physical life in which +the head sleeps and rests at times while the heart wakes +and works unceasingly. And thus knowledge without +love leads us away from God; and love, even without +knowledge, and perhaps better without it, leads us to +God, and through God to wisdom. Blessed are the +pure in heart, for they shall see God!</p> + +<p>And if you should ask me how I believe in God—that +is to say, how God creates Himself in me and reveals +Himself to me—my answer may, perhaps, provoke your +smiles or your laughter, or it may even scandalize you.</p> + +<p>I believe in God as I believe in my friends, because I +feel the breath of His affection, feel His invisible and +intangible hand, drawing me, leading me, grasping me; +because I possess an inner consciousness of a particular +providence and of a universal mind that marks out for +me the course of my own destiny. And the concept of +law—it is nothing but a concept after all!—tells me +nothing and teaches me nothing.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195" />Once and again in my life I have seen myself suspended +in a trance over the abyss; once and again I +have found myself at the cross-roads, confronted by a +choice of ways and aware that in choosing one I should +be renouncing all the others—for there is no turning +back upon these roads of life; and once and again in +such unique moments as these I have felt the impulse of +a mighty power, conscious, sovereign, and loving. +And then, before the feet of the wayfarer, opens out the +way of the Lord.</p> + +<p>It is possible for a man to feel the Universe calling to +him and guiding him as one person guides and calls to +another, to hear within him its voice speaking without +words and saying: "Go and preach to all peoples!" +How do you know that the man you see before you +possesses a consciousness like you, and that an animal +also possesses such a consciousness, more or less dimly, +but not a stone? Because the man acts towards you like a +man, like a being made in your likeness, and because the +stone does not act towards you at all, but suffers you to +act upon it. And in the same way I believe that the +Universe possesses a certain consciousness like myself, +because its action towards me is a human action, and I +feel that it is a personality that environs me.</p> + +<p>Here is a formless mass; it appears to be a kind of +animal; it is impossible to distinguish its members; I +only see two eyes, eyes which gaze at me with a human +gaze, the gaze of a fellow-being, a gaze which asks for +pity; and I hear it breathing. I conclude that in this +formless mass there is a consciousness. In just such a +way and none other, the starry-eyed heavens gaze down +upon the believer, with a superhuman, a divine, gaze, a +gaze that asks for supreme pity and supreme love, and in +the serenity of the night he hears the breathing of God, +and God touches him in his heart of hearts and reveals +Himself to him. It is the Universe, living, suffering, +loving, and asking for love.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196" />From loving little trifling material things, which +lightly come and lightly go, having no deep root in our +affections, we come to love the more lasting things, the +things which our hands cannot grasp; from loving goods +we come to love the Good; from loving beautiful things +we come to love Beauty; from loving the true we come to +love the Truth; from loving pleasures we come to love +Happiness; and, last of all, we come to love Love. We +emerge from ourselves in order to penetrate further into +our supreme I; individual consciousness emerges from +us in order to submerge itself in the total Consciousness +of which we form a part, but without being dissolved in +it. And God is simply the Love that springs from +universal suffering and becomes consciousness.</p> + +<p>But this, it will be said, is merely to revolve in an iron +ring, for such a God is not objective. And at this point +it may not be out of place to give reason its due and to +examine exactly what is meant by a thing existing, being +objective.</p> + +<p>What is it, in effect, to exist? and when do we say that +a thing exists? A thing exists when it is placed outside +us, and in such a way that it shall have preceded our +perception of it and be capable of continuing to subsist +outside us after we have disappeared. But have I any +certainty that anything has preceded me or that anything +must survive me? Can my consciousness know +that there is anything outside it? Everything that I +know or can know is within my consciousness. We will +not entangle ourselves, therefore, in the insoluble +problem of an objectivity outside our perceptions. +Things exist in so far as they act. To exist is +to act.</p> + +<p>But now it will be said that it is not God, but the idea +of God, that acts in us. To which we shall reply that it +is sometimes God acting by His idea, but still very often +it is rather God acting in us by Himself. And the retort +will be a demand for proofs of the objective truth of the +<a name="Page_197" id="Page_197" />existence of God, since we ask for signs. And we shall +have to answer with Pilate: What is truth?</p> + +<p>And having asked this question, Pilate turned away +without waiting for an answer and proceeded to wash his +hands in order that he might exculpate himself for +having allowed Christ to be condemned to death. And +there are many who ask this question, What is truth? +but without any intention of waiting for the answer, and +solely in order that they may turn away and wash their +hands of the crime of having helped to kill and eject God +from their own consciousness or from the consciousness +of others.</p> + +<p>What is truth? There are two kinds of truth—the +logical or objective, the opposite of which is error, and +the moral or subjective, the opposite of which is falsehood. +And in a previous essay I have endeavoured to +show that error is the fruit of falsehood.<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46" /><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a></p> + +<p>Moral truth, the road that leads to intellectual truth, +which also is moral, inculcates the study of science, +which is over and above all a school of sincerity and +humility. Science teaches us, in effect, to submit our +reason to the truth and to know and judge of things as +they are—that is to say, as they themselves choose to +be and not as we would have them be. In a religiously +scientific investigation, it is the data of reality themselves, +it is the perceptions which we receive from the +outside world, that formulate themselves in our mind as +laws—it is not we ourselves who thus formulate them. +It is the numbers themselves which in our mind create +mathematics. Science is the most intimate school of +resignation and humility, for it teaches us to bow before +the seemingly most insignificant of facts. And it is the +gateway of religion; but within the temple itself its function +ceases.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198" />And just as there is logical truth, opposed to error, +and moral truth, opposed to falsehood, so there is also +esthetic truth or verisimilitude, which is opposed to +extravagance, and religious truth or hope, which is +opposed to the inquietude of absolute despair. For +esthetic verisimilitude, the expression of which is +sensible, differs from logical truth, the demonstration of +which is rational; and religious truth, the truth of faith, +the substance of things hoped for, is not equivalent to +moral truth, but superimposes itself upon it. He who +affirms a faith built upon a basis of uncertainty does not +and cannot lie.</p> + +<p>And not only do we not believe with reason, nor yet +above reason nor below reason, but we believe against +reason. Religious faith, it must be repeated yet again, is +not only irrational, it is contra-rational. Kierkegaard +says: "Poetry is illusion before knowledge; religion illusion +after knowledge. Between poetry and religion the +worldly wisdom of living plays its comedy. Every +individual who does not live either poetically or religiously +is a fool" (<i>Afsluttende uvidenskabelig Efterskrift</i>, +chap. iv., sect. 2a, § 2). The same writer tells us +that Christianity is a desperate sortie (<i>salida</i>). Even so, +but it is only by the very desperateness of this sortie that +we can win through to hope, to that hope whose vitalizing +illusion is of more force than all rational knowledge, +and which assures us that there is always something that +cannot be reduced to reason. And of reason the same +may be said as was said of Christ: that he who is not +with it is against it. That which is not rational is contra-rational; +and such is hope.</p> + +<p>By this circuitous route we always arrive at hope in +the end.</p> + +<p>To the mystery of love, which is the mystery of suffering, +belongs a mysterious form, and this form is time. +We join yesterday to to-morrow with links of longing, +and the now is, strictly, nothing but the endeavour of +<a name="Page_199" id="Page_199" />the before to make itself the after; the present is simply +the determination of the past to become the future. The +now is a point which, if not sharply articulated, vanishes; +and, nevertheless, in this point is all eternity, the substance +of time.</p> + +<p>Everything that has been can be only as it was, and +everything that is can be only as it is; the possible is +always relegated to the future, the sole domain of liberty, +wherein imagination, the creative and liberating energy, +the incarnation of faith, has space to roam at large.</p> + +<p>Love ever looks and tends to the future, for its work +is the work of our perpetuation; the property of love is +to hope, and only upon hopes does it nourish itself. And +thus when love sees the fruition of its desire it becomes +sad, for it then discovers that what it desired was not its +true end, and that God gave it this desire merely as a +lure to spur it to action; it discovers that its end is further +on, and it sets out again upon its toilsome pilgrimage +through life, revolving through a constant cycle of illusions +and disillusions. And continually it transforms +its frustrated hopes into memories, and from these +memories it draws fresh hopes. From the subterranean +ore of memory we extract the jewelled visions of our +future; imagination shapes our remembrances into +hopes. And humanity is like a young girl full of longings, +hungering for life and thirsting for love, who +weaves her days with dreams, and hopes, hopes ever, +hopes without ceasing, for the eternal and predestined +lover, for him who, because he was destined for her from +the beginning, from before the dawn of her remotest +memory, from before her cradle-days, shall live with her +and for her into the illimitable future, beyond the +stretch of her furthest hopes, beyond the grave itself. +And for this poor lovelorn humanity, as for the girl ever +awaiting her lover, there is no kinder wish than that +when the winter of life shall come it may find the sweet +dreams of its spring changed into memories sweeter still, +<a name="Page_200" id="Page_200" />and memories that shall burgeon into new hopes. In +the days when our summer is over, what a flow of calm +felicity, of resignation to destiny, must come from remembering +hopes which have never been realized and +which, because they have never been realized, preserve +their pristine purity.</p> + +<p>Love hopes, hopes ever and never wearies of hoping; +and love of God, our faith in God, is, above all, hope in +Him. For God dies not, and he who hopes in God shall +live for ever. And our fundamental hope, the root and +stem of all our hopes, is the hope of eternal life.</p> + +<p>And if faith is the substance of hope, hope in its turn +is the form of faith. Until it gives us hope, our faith is +a formless faith, vague, chaotic, potential; it is but the +possibility of believing, the longing to believe. But we +must needs believe in something, and we believe in what +we hope for, we believe in hope. We remember the +past, we know the present, we only believe in the future. +To believe what we have not seen is to believe what we +shall see. Faith, then, I repeat once again, is faith in +hope; we believe what we hope for.</p> + +<p>Love makes us believe in God, in whom we hope and +from whom we hope to receive life to come; love makes +us believe in that which the dream of hope creates for us.</p> + +<p>Faith is our longing for the eternal, for God; and +hope is God's longing, the longing of the eternal, of the +divine in us, which advances to meet our faith and uplifts +us. Man aspires to God by faith and cries to Him: "I +believe—give me, Lord, wherein to believe!" And +God, the divinity in man, sends him hope in another life +in order that he may believe in it. Hope is the reward +of faith. Only he who believes truly hopes; and only +he who truly hopes believes. We only believe what we +hope, and we only hope what we believe.</p> + +<p>It was hope that called God by the name of Father; +and this name, so comforting yet so mysterious, is still +bestowed upon Him by hope. The father gave us life +<a name="Page_201" id="Page_201" />and gives bread wherewith to sustain it, and we ask +the father to preserve our life for us. And if Christ +was he who, with the fullest heart and purest mouth, +named with the name of Father his Father and ours, if +the noblest feeling of Christianity is the feeling of the +Fatherhood of God, it is because in Christ the human +race sublimated its hunger for eternity.</p> + +<p>It may perhaps be said that this longing of faith, that +this hope, is more than anything else an esthetic feeling. +Possibly the esthetic feeling enters into it, but without +completely satisfying it.</p> + +<p>We seek in art an image of eternalization. If for a +brief moment our spirit finds peace and rest and assuagement +in the contemplation of the beautiful, even though +it finds therein no real cure for its distress, it is because +the beautiful is the revelation of the eternal, of the +divine in things, and beauty but the perpetuation of +momentaneity. Just as truth is the goal of rational +knowledge, so beauty is the goal of hope, which is perhaps +in its essence irrational.</p> + +<p>Nothing is lost, nothing wholly passes away, for in +some way or another everything is perpetuated; and +everything, after passing through time, returns to +eternity. The temporal world has its roots in eternity, +and in eternity yesterday is united with to-day and to-morrow. +The scenes of life pass before us as in a cinematograph +show, but on the further side of time the film +is one and indivisible.</p> + +<p>Physicists affirm that not a single particle of matter +nor a single tremor of energy is lost, but that each is +transformed and transmitted and persists. And can it +be that any form, however fugitive it may be, is lost? +We must needs believe—believe and hope!—that it is +not, but that somewhere it remains archived and perpetuated, +and that there is some mirror of eternity in +which, without losing themselves in one another, all +the images that pass through time are received. Every +<a name="Page_202" id="Page_202" />impression that reaches me remains stored up in my +brain even though it may be so deep or so weak that it is +buried in the depths of my subconsciousness; but from +these depths it animates my life; and if the whole of my +spirit, the total content of my soul, were to awake to +full consciousness, all these dimly perceived and forgotten +fugitive impressions would come to life again, +including even those which I had never been aware of. +I carry within me everything that has passed before me, +and I perpetuate it with myself, and it may be that it all +goes into my germs, and that all my ancestors live undiminished +in me and will continue so to live, united +with me, in my descendants. And perhaps I, the whole +I, with all this universe of mine, enter into each one of +my actions, or, at all events, that which is essential in +me enters into them—that which makes me myself, my +individual essence.</p> + +<p>And how is this individual essence in each several +thing—that which makes it itself and not another—revealed +to us save as beauty? What is the beauty of +anything but its eternal essence, that which unites its +past with its future, that element of it that rests and +abides in the womb of eternity? or, rather, what is it but +the revelation of its divinity?</p> + +<p>And this beauty, which is the root of eternity, is revealed +to us by love; it is the supreme revelation of the +love of God and the token of our ultimate victory over +time. It is love that reveals to us the eternal in us and +in our neighbours.</p> + +<p>Is it the beautiful, the eternal, in things, that awakens +and kindles our love for them, or is it our love for things +that reveals to us the beautiful, the eternal, in them? +Is not beauty perhaps a creation of love, in the same way +and in the same sense that the sensible world is a creation +of the instinct of preservation and the supersensible world +of that of perpetuation? Is not beauty, and together with +beauty eternity, a creation of love? "Though our outward +<a name="Page_203" id="Page_203" />man perish," says the Apostle, "yet the inward man is +renewed day by day" (2 Cor. iv. 16). The man of +passing appearances perishes and passes away with +them; the man of reality remains and grows. "For our +light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for +us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory" +(ver. 17). Our suffering causes us anguish, and this +anguish, bursting because of its own fullness, seems to +us consolation. "While we look not at the things which +are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the +things which are seen are temporal; but the things which +are not seen are eternal" (ver. 18).</p> + +<p>This suffering gives hope, which is the beautiful in +life, the supreme beauty, or the supreme consolation. +And since love is full of suffering, since love is compassion +and pity, beauty springs from compassion and is +simply the temporal consolation that compassion seeks. +A tragic consolation! And the supreme beauty is that +of tragedy. The consciousness that everything passes +away, that we ourselves pass away, and that everything +that is ours and everything that environs us passes away, +fills us with anguish, and this anguish itself reveals to us +the consolation of that which does not pass away, of the +eternal, of the beautiful.</p> + +<p>And this beauty thus revealed, this perpetuation of +momentaneity, only realizes itself practically, only lives +through the work of charity. Hope in action is charity, +and beauty in action is goodness.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Charity, which eternalizes everything it loves, and in +giving us the goodness of it brings to light its hidden +beauty, has its root in the love of God, or, if you like, +in charity towards God, in pity for God. Love, pity, +personalizes everything, we have said; in discovering +the suffering in everything and in personalizing everything, +it personalizes the Universe itself as well—for the +Universe also suffers—and it discovers God to us. For +<a name="Page_204" id="Page_204" />God is revealed to us because He suffers and because we +suffer; because He suffers He demands our love, and +because we suffer He gives us His love, and He covers +our anguish with the eternal and infinite anguish.</p> + +<p>This was the scandal of Christianity among Jews and +Greeks, among Pharisees and Stoics, and this, which +was its scandal of old, the scandal of the Cross, is still +its scandal to-day, and will continue to be so, even +among Christians themselves—the scandal of a God who +becomes man in order that He may suffer and die and +rise again, because He has suffered and died, the scandal +of a God subject to suffering and death. And this truth +that God suffers—a truth that appals the mind of man—is +the revelation of the very heart of the Universe and of +its mystery, the revelation that God revealed to us when +He sent His Son in order that he might redeem us by +suffering and dying. It was the revelation of the divine +in suffering, for only that which suffers is divine.</p> + +<p>And men made a god of this Christ who suffered, and +through him they discovered the eternal essence of a +living, human God—that is, of a God who suffers—it +is only the dead, the inhuman, that does not suffer—a +God who loves and thirsts for love, for pity, a God who +is a person. Whosoever knows not the Son will never +know the Father, and the Father is only known through +the Son; whosoever knows not the Son of Man—he who +suffers bloody anguish and the pangs of a breaking heart, +whose soul is heavy within him even unto death, who +suffers the pain that kills and brings to life again—will +never know the Father, and can know nothing of the +suffering God.</p> + +<p>He who does not suffer, and who does not suffer +because he does not live, is that logical and frozen <i>ens +realissimum</i>, the <i>primum movens</i>, that impassive entity, +which because of its impassivity is nothing but a pure +idea. The category does not suffer, but neither does it +live or exist as a person. And how is the world to derive +<a name="Page_205" id="Page_205" />its origin and life from an impassive idea? Such a +world would be but the idea of the world. But the world +suffers, and suffering is the sense of the flesh of reality; +it is the spirit's sense of its mass and substance; it is the +self's sense of its own tangibility; it is immediate reality.</p> + +<p>Suffering is the substance of life and the root of personality, +for it is only suffering that makes us persons. +And suffering is universal, suffering is that which unites +all us living beings together; it is the universal or divine +blood that flows through us all. That which we call +will, what is it but suffering?</p> + +<p>And suffering has its degrees, according to the depth +of its penetration, from the suffering that floats upon the +sea of appearances to the eternal anguish, the source of +the tragic sense of life, which seeks a habitation in the +depths of the eternal and there awakens consolation; +from the physical suffering that contorts our bodies to +the religious anguish that flings us upon the bosom of +God, there to be watered by the divine tears.</p> + +<p>Anguish is something far deeper, more intimate, and +more spiritual than suffering. We are wont to feel the +touch of anguish even in the midst of that which we call +happiness, and even because of this happiness itself, to +which we cannot resign ourselves and before which we +tremble. The happy who resign themselves to their +apparent happiness, to a transitory happiness, seem to +be as men without substance, or, at any rate, men who +have not discovered this substance in themselves, who +have not touched it. Such men are usually incapable of +loving or of being loved, and they go through life without +really knowing either pain or bliss.</p> + +<p>There is no true love save in suffering, and in this +world we have to choose either love, which is suffering, +or happiness. And love leads us to no other happiness +than that of love itself and its tragic consolation of +uncertain hope. The moment love becomes happy and +satisfied, it no longer desires and it is no longer love. +<a name="Page_206" id="Page_206" />The satisfied, the happy, do not love; they fall asleep +in habit, near neighbour to annihilation. To fall into a +habit is to begin to cease to be. Man is the more man—that +is, the more divine—the greater his capacity for +suffering, or, rather, for anguish.</p> + +<p>At our coming into the world it is given to us to choose +between love and happiness, and we wish—poor fools!—for +both: the happiness of loving and the love of happiness. +But we ought to ask for the gift of love and not +of happiness, and to be preserved from dozing away into +habit, lest we should fall into a fast sleep, a sleep without +waking, and so lose our consciousness beyond power +of recovery. We ought to ask God to make us conscious +of ourselves in ourselves, in our suffering.</p> + +<p>What is Fate, what is Fatality, but the brotherhood of +love and suffering? What is it but that terrible mystery +in virtue of which love dies as soon as it touches the +happiness towards which it reaches out, and true happiness +dies with it? Love and suffering mutually engender +one another, and love is charity and compassion, and the +love that is not charitable and compassionate is not love. +Love, in a word, is resigned despair.</p> + +<p>That which the mathematicians call the problem of +maxima and minima, which is also called the law of +economy, is the formula for all existential—that is, +passional—activity. In material mechanics and in +social mechanics, in industry and in political economy, +every problem resolves itself into an attempt to obtain +the greatest possible resulting utility with the least +possible effort, the greatest income with the least expenditure, +the most pleasure with the least pain. And +the terrible and tragic formula of the inner, spiritual life +is either to obtain the most happiness with the least love, +or the most love with the least happiness. And it is +necessary to choose between the one and the other, and +to know that he who approaches the infinite of love, the +love that is infinite, approaches the zero of happiness, +<a name="Page_207" id="Page_207" />the supreme anguish. And in reaching this zero he is +beyond the reach of the misery that kills. "Be not, +and thou shalt be mightier than aught that is," said +Brother Juan de los Angeles in one of his <i>Diálogos de la +conquista del reino de Dios</i> (Dial. iii. 8).</p> + +<p>And there is something still more anguishing than +suffering. A man about to receive a much-dreaded blow +expects to have to suffer so severely that he may even +succumb to the suffering, and when the blow falls he +feels scarcely any pain; but afterwards, when he has +come to himself and is conscious of his insensibility, he +is seized with terror, a tragic terror, the most terrible of +all, and choking with anguish he cries out: "Can it be +that I no longer exist?" Which would you find most +appalling—to feel such a pain as would deprive you of +your senses on being pierced through with a white-hot +iron, or to see yourself thus pierced through without +feeling any pain? Have you never felt the horrible +terror of feeling yourself incapable of suffering and of +tears? Suffering tells us that we exist; suffering tells +us that those whom we love exist; suffering tells us that +the world in which we live exists; and suffering tells us +that God exists and suffers; but it is the suffering of +anguish, the anguish of surviving and being eternal. +Anguish discovers God to us and makes us love +Him.</p> + +<p>To believe in God is to love Him, and to love Him is +to feel Him suffering, to pity Him.</p> + +<p>It may perhaps appear blasphemous to say that God +suffers, for suffering implies limitation. Nevertheless, +God, the Consciousness of the Universe, is limited by the +brute matter in which He lives, by the unconscious, from +which He seeks to liberate Himself and to liberate us. +And we, in our turn, must seek to liberate Him. God +suffers in each and all of us, in each and all of the consciousnesses +imprisoned in transitory matter, and we all +suffer in Him. Religious anguish is but the divine +<a name="Page_208" id="Page_208" />suffering, the feeling that God suffers in me and that I +suffer in Him.</p> + +<p>The universal suffering is the anguish of all in seeking +to be all else but without power to achieve it, the anguish +of each in being he that he is, being at the same time all +that he is not, and being so for ever. The essence of a +being is not only its endeavour to persist for ever, as +Spinoza taught us, but also its endeavour to universalize +itself; it is the hunger and thirst for eternity and infinity. +Every created being tends not only to preserve itself in +itself, but to perpetuate itself, and, moreover, to invade +all other beings, to be others without ceasing to be itself, +to extend its limits to the infinite, but without breaking +them. It does not wish to throw down its walls and +leave everything laid flat, common and undefended, confounding +and losing its own individuality, but it wishes +to carry its walls to the extreme limits of creation and to +embrace everything within them. It seeks the maximum +of individuality with the maximum also of personality; +it aspires to the identification of the Universe +with itself; it aspires to God.</p> + +<p>And this vast I, within which each individual I seeks +to put the Universe—what is it but God? And because +I aspire to God, I love Him; and this aspiration of mine +towards God is my love for Him, and just as I suffer in +being He, He also suffers in being I, and in being each +one of us.</p> + +<p>I am well aware that in spite of my warning that I am +attempting here to give a logical form to a system of +a-logical feelings, I shall be scandalizing not a few of +my readers in speaking of a God who suffers, and in +applying to God Himself, as God, the passion of Christ. +The God of so-called rational theology excludes in effect +all suffering. And the reader will no doubt think that +this idea of suffering can have only a metaphorical value +when applied to God, similar to that which is supposed +to attach to those passages in the Old Testament which +<a name="Page_209" id="Page_209" />describe the human passions of the God of Israel. For +anger, wrath, and vengeance are impossible without +suffering. And as for saying that God suffers through +being bound by matter, I shall be told that, in the words +of Plotinus (<i>Second Ennead</i>, ix., 7), the Universal Soul +cannot be bound by the very thing—namely, bodies or +matter—which is bound by It.</p> + +<p>Herein is involved the whole problem of the origin of +evil, the evil of sin no less than the evil of pain, for if +God does not suffer, He causes suffering; and if His life, +since God lives, is not a process of realizing in Himself a +total consciousness which is continually becoming fuller—that +is to say, which is continually becoming more +and more God—it is a process of drawing all things +towards Himself, of imparting Himself to all, of constraining +the consciousness of each part to enter into the +consciousness of the All, which is He Himself, until at +last He comes to be all in all—<i>παντα εν πασι</i>, according +to the expression of St. Paul, the first Christian mystic. +We will discuss this more fully, however, in the next +chapter on the apocatastasis or beatific union.</p> + +<p>For the present let it suffice to say that there is a vast +current of suffering urging living beings towards one +another, constraining them to love one another and to +seek one another, and to endeavour to complete one +another, and to be each himself and others at the same +time. In God everything lives, and in His suffering +everything suffers, and in loving God we love His +creatures in Him, just as in loving and pitying His +creatures we love and pity God in them. No single soul +can be free so long as there is anything enslaved in God's +world, neither can God Himself, who lives in the soul of +each one of us, be free so long as our soul is not free.</p> + +<p>My most immediate sensation is the sense and love of +my own misery, my anguish, the compassion I feel for +myself, the love I bear for myself. And when this compassion +is vital and superabundant, it overflows from me +<a name="Page_210" id="Page_210" />upon others, and from the excess of my own compassion +I come to have compassion for my neighbours. My +own misery is so great that the compassion for myself +which it awakens within me soon overflows and reveals +to me the universal misery.</p> + +<p>And what is charity but the overflow of pity? What +is it but reflected pity that overflows and pours itself out +in a flood of pity for the woes of others and in the +exercise of charity?</p> + +<p>When the overplus of our pity leads us to the consciousness +of God within us, it fills us with so great +anguish for the misery shed abroad in all things, that we +have to pour our pity abroad, and this we do in the +form of charity. And in this pouring abroad of our pity +we experience relief and the painful sweetness of goodness. +This is what Teresa de Jesús, the mystical doctor, +called "sweet-tasting suffering" (<i>dolor sabroso</i>), and she +knew also the lore of suffering loves. It is as when one +looks upon some thing of beauty and feels the necessity +of making others sharers in it. For the creative impulse, +in which charity consists, is the work of suffering +love.</p> + +<p>We feel, in effect, a satisfaction in doing good when +good superabounds within us, when we are swollen with +pity; and we are swollen with pity when God, filling our +soul, gives us the suffering sensation of universal life, +of the universal longing for eternal divinization. For +we are not merely placed side by side with others in the +world, having no common root with them, neither is their +lot indifferent to us, but their pain hurts us, their +anguish fills us with anguish, and we feel our community +of origin and of suffering even without knowing +it. Suffering, and pity which is born of suffering, are +what reveal to us the brotherhood of every existing thing +that possesses life and more or less of consciousness. +"Brother Wolf" St. Francis of Assisi called the poor +wolf that feels a painful hunger for the sheep, and feels, +<a name="Page_211" id="Page_211" />too, perhaps, the pain of having to devour them; and +this brotherhood reveals to us the Fatherhood of God, +reveals to us that God is a Father and that He exists. +And as a Father He shelters our common misery.</p> + +<p>Charity, then, is the impulse to liberate myself and all +my fellows from suffering, and to liberate God, who +embraces us all.</p> + +<p>Suffering is a spiritual thing. It is the most immediate +revelation of consciousness, and it may be that our +body was given us simply in order that suffering might +be enabled to manifest itself. A man who had never +known suffering, either in greater or less degree, would +scarcely possess consciousness of himself. The child +first cries at birth when the air, entering into his lungs +and limiting him, seems to say to him: You have to +breathe me in order that you may live!</p> + +<p>We must needs believe with faith, whatever counsels +reason may give us, that the material or sensible world +which the senses create for us exists solely in order to +embody and sustain that other spiritual or imaginable +world which the imagination creates for us. Consciousness +tends to be ever more and more consciousness, to +intensify its consciousness, to acquire full consciousness +of its complete self, of the whole of its content. We +must needs believe with faith, whatever counsels reason +may give us, that in the depths of our own bodies, in +animals, in plants, in rocks, in everything that lives, in +all the Universe, there is a spirit that strives to know +itself, to acquire consciousness of itself, to be itself—for +to be oneself is to know oneself—to be pure spirit; and +since it can only achieve this by means of the body, by +means of matter, it creates and makes use of matter at +the same time that it remains the prisoner of it. The +face can only see itself when portrayed in the mirror, +but in order to see itself it must remain the prisoner of +the mirror in which it sees itself, and the image which +it sees therein is as the mirror distorts it; and if the +<a name="Page_212" id="Page_212" />mirror breaks, the image is broken; and if the mirror is +blurred, the image is blurred.</p> + +<p>Spirit finds itself limited by the matter in which it has +to live and acquire consciousness of itself, just as +thought is limited by the word in which as a social +medium it is incarnated. Without matter there is no +spirit, but matter makes spirit suffer by limiting it. And +suffering is simply the obstacle which matter opposes to +spirit; it is the clash of the conscious with the unconscious.</p> + +<p>Suffering is, in effect, the barrier which unconsciousness, +matter, sets up against consciousness, spirit; it is +the resistance to will, the limit which the visible universe +imposes upon God; it is the wall that consciousness runs +up against when it seeks to extend itself at the expense +of unconsciousness; it is the resistance which unconsciousness +opposes to its penetration by consciousness.</p> + +<p>Although in deference to authority we may believe, we +do not in fact know, that we possess heart, stomach, or +lungs so long as they do not cause us discomfort, suffering, +or anguish. Physical suffering, or even discomfort, +is what reveals to us our own internal core. And +the same is true of spiritual suffering and anguish, for +we do not take account of the fact that we possess a soul +until it hurts us.</p> + +<p>Anguish is that which makes consciousness return +upon itself. He who knows no anguish knows what he +does and what he thinks, but he does not truly know that +he does it and that he thinks it. He thinks, but he does +not think that he thinks, and his thoughts are as if they +were not his. Neither does he properly belong to himself. +For it is only anguish, it is only the passionate +longing never to die, that makes a human spirit master +of itself.</p> + +<p>Pain, which is a kind of dissolution, makes us discover +our internal core; and in the supreme dissolution, which +<a name="Page_213" id="Page_213" />is death, we shall, at last, through the pain of annihilation, +arrive at the core of our temporal core—at God, +whom in our spiritual anguish we breathe and learn to +love.</p> + +<p>Even so must we believe with faith, whatever counsels +reason may give us.</p> + +<p>The origin of evil, as many discovered of old, is +nothing other than what is called by another name the +inertia of matter, and, as applied to the things of the +spirit, sloth. And not without truth has it been said +that sloth is the mother of all vices, not forgetting that +the supreme sloth is that of not longing madly for +immortality.</p> + +<p>Consciousness, the craving for more, more, always +more, hunger of eternity and thirst of infinity, appetite +for God—these are never satisfied. Each consciousness +seeks to be itself and to be all other consciousnesses +without ceasing to be itself: it seeks to be God. And +matter, unconsciousness, tends to be less and less, tends +to be nothing, its thirst being a thirst for repose. Spirit +says: I wish to be! and matter answers: I wish not +to be!</p> + +<p>And in the order of human life, the individual would +tend, under the sole instigation of the instinct of +preservation, the creator of the material world, to +destruction, to annihilation, if it were not for society, +which, in implanting in him the instinct of perpetuation, +the creator of the spiritual world, lifts and impels him +towards the All, towards immortalization. And everything +that man does as a mere individual, opposed to +society, for the sake of his own preservation, and at the +expense of society, if need be, is bad; and everything +that he does as a social person, for the sake of the society +in which he himself is included, for the sake of its perpetuation +and of the perpetuation of himself in it, is +good. And many of those who seem to be the greatest +egoists, trampling everything under their feet in their +zeal to bring their work to a successful issue, are in +<a name="Page_214" id="Page_214" />reality men whose souls are aflame and overflowing with +charity, for they subject and subordinate their petty +personal I to the social I that has a mission to accomplish.</p> + +<p>He who would tie the working of love, of spiritualization, +of liberation, to transitory and individual forms, +crucifies God in matter; he crucifies God who makes the +ideal subservient to his own temporal interests or worldly +glory. And such a one is a deicide.</p> + +<p>The work of charity, of the love of God, is to endeavour +to liberate God from brute matter, to endeavour to give +consciousness to everything, to spiritualize or universalize +everything; it is to dream that the very rocks may +find a voice and work in accordance with the spirit of this +dream; it is to dream that everything that exists may +become conscious, that the Word may become life.</p> + +<p>We have but to look at the eucharistic symbol to see +an instance of it. The Word has been imprisoned in a +piece of material bread, and it has been imprisoned +therein to the end that we may eat it, and in eating it +make it our own, part and parcel of our body in which +the spirit dwells, and that it may beat in our heart and +think in our brain and be consciousness. It has been +imprisoned in this bread in order that, after being buried +in our body, it may come to life again in our spirit.</p> + +<p>And we must spiritualize everything. And this we +shall accomplish by giving our spirit, which grows the +more the more it is distributed, to all men and to all +things. And we give our spirit when we invade other +spirits and make ourselves the master of them.</p> + +<p>All this is to be believed with faith, whatever counsels +reason may give us.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And now we are about to see what practical consequences +all these more or less fantastical doctrines may +have in regard to logic, to esthetics, and, above all, to +ethics—their religious concretion, in a word. And +perhaps then they will gain more justification in the eyes +<a name="Page_215" id="Page_215" />of the reader who, in spite of my warnings, has hitherto +been looking for the scientific or even philosophic +development of an irrational system.</p> + +<p>I think it may not be superfluous to recall to the reader +once again what I said at the conclusion of the sixth +chapter, that entitled "In the Depths of the Abyss"; +but we now approach the practical or pragmatical part +of this treatise. First, however, we must see how the +religious sense may become concrete in the hopeful +vision of another life.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44" /><a href="#FNanchor_44_44">[44]</a> Reinold Seeberg, <i>Christliche-protestantische Ethik</i> in <i>Systematische +christliche Religion</i>, in <i>Die Kultur der Gegenwart</i> series.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45" /><a href="#FNanchor_45_45">[45]</a> <i>Cf.</i> St. Thomas Aquinas, <i>Summa</i>, secunda secundæ, quæstio iv., art. 2.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46" /><a href="#FNanchor_46_46">[46]</a> "<i>Qué es Verdad?</i>" ("What is truth?"), published in <i>La España +Moderna</i>, March, 1906, vol. 207 (reprinted in the edition of collected +<i>Ensayos</i>, vol. vi., Madrid, 1918).</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="X" id="X" /><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216" />X</h2> + +<h2>RELIGION, THE MYTHOLOGY OF THE BEYOND AND THE APOCATASTASIS</h2> + +<blockquote><p><i>Και γαρ ισως και + μαλιοτα πρεπει + μελλοντα εχεισε αποδημειν + διασκοπειν τε και + μυθολογειν περι της + αποδημιας της εχει, + ποιαν τινα αυτην οιομεθα ειναι +</i>.—PLATO: <i>Phædo</i>.</p></blockquote> + + +<p>Religion is founded upon faith, hope, and charity, which +in their turn are founded upon the feeling of divinity and +of God. Of faith in God is born our faith in men, of +hope in God hope in men, and of charity or piety +towards God—for as Cicero said,<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47" /><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> <i>est enim pietas iustitia +adversum deos</i>—charity towards men. In God is +resumed not only Humanity, but the whole Universe, +and the Universe spiritualized and penetrated with consciousness, +for as the Christian Faith teaches, God shall +at last be all in all. St. Teresa said, and Miguel de +Molinos repeated with a harsher and more despairing +inflection, that the soul must realize that nothing exists +but itself and God.</p> + +<p>And this relation with God, this more or less intimate +union with Him, is what we call religion.</p> + +<p>What is religion? In what does it differ from the +religious sense and how are the two related? Every +man's definition of religion is based upon his own inward +experience of it rather than upon his observation of it in +others, nor indeed is it possible to define it without in +some way or another experiencing it. Tacitus said +(<i>Hist.</i> v. 4), speaking of the Jews, that they regarded as +profane everything that the Romans held to be sacred, +<a name="Page_217" id="Page_217" />and that what was sacred to them was to the Romans +impure: <i>profana illic omnia quæ apud nos sacra, +rursum conversa apud illos quæ nobis incesta</i>. Therefore +he, the Roman, describes the Jews as a people +dominated by superstition and hostile to religion, <i>gens +superstitioni obnoxia, religionibus adversa</i>, while as +regards Christianity, with which he was very imperfectly +acquainted, scarcely distinguishing it from Judaism, he +deemed it to be a pernicious superstition, <i>existialis superstitio</i>, +inspired by a hatred of mankind, <i>odium generis +humani</i> (<i>Ab excessu Aug.</i>, xv., 44). And there have +been many others who have shared his opinion. But +where does religion end and superstition begin, or +perhaps rather we should say at what point does superstition +merge into religion? What is the criterion by +means of which we discriminate between them?</p> + +<p>It would be of little profit to recapitulate here, even +summarily, the principal definitions, each bearing the +impress of the personal feeling of its definer, which have +been given of religion. Religion is better described than +defined and better felt than described. But if there is +any one definition that latterly has obtained acceptance, +it is that of Schleiermacher, to the effect that religion +consists in the simple feeling of a relationship of dependence +upon something above us and a desire to establish +relations with this mysterious power. Nor is there much +amiss with the statement of W. Hermann<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48" /><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a> that the religious +longing of man is a desire for truth concerning his +human existence. And to cut short these extraneous +citations, I will end with one from the judicious and perspicacious +Cournot: "Religious manifestations are the +necessary consequence of man's predisposition to believe +in the existence of an invisible, supernatural and +miraculous world, a predisposition which it has been possible +to consider sometimes as a reminiscence of an +anterior state, sometimes as an intimation of a future +<a name="Page_218" id="Page_218" />destiny" (<i>Traité de l'enchaînement des idées fondamentales +dans les sciences et dans l'histoire</i>, § 396). And +it is this problem of human destiny, of eternal life, or of +the human finality of the Universe or of God, that we +have now reached. All the highways of religion lead up +to this, for it is the very essence of all religion.</p> + +<p>Beginning with the savage's personalization of the +whole Universe in his fetich, religion has its roots in the +vital necessity of giving human finality to the Universe, +to God, and this necessity obliges it, therefore, to attribute +to the Universe, to God, consciousness of self and of +purpose. And it may be said that religion is simply +union with God, each one interpreting God according to +his own sense of Him. God gives transcendent meaning +and finality to life; but He gives it relatively to each one +of us who believe in Him. And thus God is for man as +much as man is for God, for God in becoming man, in +becoming human, has given Himself to man because of +His love of him.</p> + +<p>And this religious longing for union with God is a +longing for a union that cannot be consummated in +science or in art, but only in life. "He who possesses +science and art, has religion; he who possesses neither +science nor art, let him get religion," said Goethe in one +of his frequent accesses of paganism. And yet in spite +of what he said, he himself, Goethe...?</p> + +<p>And to wish that we may be united with God is not to +wish that we may be lost and submerged in Him, for this +loss and submersion of self ends at last in the complete +dissolution of self in the dreamless sleep of Nirvana; it is +to wish to possess Him rather than to be possessed by +Him. When his disciples, amazed at his saying that it +was impossible for a rich man to enter into the kingdom +of heaven, asked Jesus who then could be saved, the +Master replied that with men it was impossible but not +with God; and then said Peter, "Behold, we have forsaken +all and followed thee; what shall we have there<a name="Page_219" id="Page_219" />fore?" +And the reply of Jesus was, not that they should +be absorbed in the Father, but that they should sit upon +twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel +(Matt. xix. 23-26).</p> + +<p>It was a Spaniard, and very emphatically a Spaniard, +Miguel de Molinos, who said in his <i>Guía Espiritual</i><a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49" /><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a> that +"he who would attain to the mystical science must +abandon and be detached from five things: first, from +creatures; second, from temporal things; third, from +the very gifts of the Holy Spirit; fourth, from himself; +and fifth, he must be detached even from God." And he +adds that "this last is the completest of all, because that +soul only that knows how to be so detached is that which +attains to being lost in God, and only the soul that attains +to being so lost succeeds in finding itself." Emphatically +a true Spaniard, Molinos, and truly Spanish is this +paradoxical expression of quietism or rather of nihilism—for +he himself elsewhere speaks of annihilation—and not +less Spanish, nay, perhaps even more Spanish, were the +Jesuits who attacked him, upholding the prerogatives of +the All against the claims of Nothingness. For religion +is not the longing for self-annihilation, but for self-completion, +it is the longing not for death but for life. "The +eternal religion of the inward essence of man ... the +individual dream of the heart, is the worship of his own +being, the adoration of life," as the tortured soul of +Flaubert was intimately aware (<i>Par les champs et par les +grèves</i>, vii.).</p> + +<p>When at the beginning of the so-called modern age, at +the Renaissance, the pagan sense of religion came to +life again, it took concrete form in the knightly ideal with +its codes of love and honour. But it was a paganism +Christianized, baptized. "Woman—<i>la donna</i>—was the +divinity enshrined within those savage breasts. Who<a name="Page_220" id="Page_220" />soever +will investigate the memorials of primitive times +will find this ideal of woman in its full force and purity; +the Universe is woman. And so it was in Germany, in +France, in Provence, in Spain, in Italy, at the beginning +of the modern age. History was cast in this mould; +Trojans and Romans were conceived as knights-errant, +and so too were Arabs, Saracens, Turks, the Sultan and +Saladin.... In this universal fraternity mingle +angels, saints, miracles and paradise, strangely blended +with the fantasy and voluptuousness of the Oriental +world, and all baptized in the name of Chivalry." Thus, +in his <i>Storia della Letteratura italiana</i>, ii., writes +Francesco de Sanctis, and in an earlier passage he informs +us that for that breed of men "in paradise itself the +lover's delight was to look upon his lady—<i>Madonna</i>—and +that he had no desire to go thither if he might not +go in his lady's company." What, in fact, was Chivalry—which +Cervantes, intending to kill it, afterwards purified +and Christianized in <i>Don Quixote</i>—but a real though +distorted religion, a hybrid between paganism and +Christianity, whose gospel perhaps was the legend of +Tristan and Iseult? And did not even the Christianity +of the mystics—those knights-errant of the spirit—possibly +reach its culminating-point in the worship of the +divine woman, the Virgin Mary? What else was the +Mariolatry of a St. Bonaventura, the troubadour of +Mary? And this sentiment found its inspiration in love +of the fountain of life, of that which saves us from death.</p> + +<p>But as the Renaissance advanced men turned from the +religion of woman to the religion of science; desire, the +foundation of which was curiosity, ended in curiosity, in +eagerness to taste of the fruit of the tree of good and evil. +Europe flocked to the University of Bologna in search of +learning. Chivalry was succeeded by Platonism. Men +sought to discover the mystery of the world and of life. +But it was really in order to save life, which they had also +sought to save in the worship of woman. Human con<a name="Page_221" id="Page_221" />sciousness +sought to penetrate the Universal Consciousness, +but its real object, whether it was aware of it or not, +was to save itself.</p> + +<p>For the truth is that we feel and imagine the Universal +Consciousness—and in this feeling and imagination religious +experience consists—simply in order that thereby +we may save our own individual consciousnesses. And +how?</p> + +<p>Once again I must repeat that the longing for the +immortality of the soul, for the permanence, in some form +or another, of our personal and individual consciousness, +is as much of the essence of religion as is the longing +that there may be a God. The one does not exist apart +from the other, the reason being that fundamentally they +are one and the same thing. But as soon as we attempt +to give a concrete and rational form to this longing for +immortality and permanence, to define it to ourselves, +we encounter even more difficulties than we encountered +in our attempt to rationalize God.</p> + +<p>The universal consent of mankind has again been +invoked as a means of justifying this immortal longing +for immortality to our own feeble reason. <i>Permanere +animos arbitratur consensu nationum omnium</i>, said +Cicero, echoing the opinion of the ancients (<i>Tuscul. +Quæst.</i>, xvi., 36). But this same recorder of his own +feelings confessed that, although when he read the arguments +in favour of the immortality of the soul in the +<i>Phædo</i> of Plato he was compelled to assent to them, as +soon as he put the book aside and began to revolve the +problem in his own mind, all his previous assent melted +away, <i>assentio omnis illa illabitur</i> (cap. xi., 25). And +what happened to Cicero happens to us all, and it +happened likewise to Swedenborg, the most daring +visionary of the other world. Swedenborg admitted that +he who discourses of life after death, putting aside all +erudite notions concerning the soul and its mode of union +with the body, believes that after death he shall live in a +<a name="Page_222" id="Page_222" />glorious joy and vision, as a man among angels; but +when he begins to reflect upon the doctrine of the union +of the soul with the body, or upon the hypothetical +opinion concerning the soul, doubts arise in him as to +whether the soul is thus or otherwise, and when these +doubts arise, his former idea is dissipated (<i>De cælo et +inferno</i>, § 183). Nevertheless, as Cournot says, "it is +the destiny that awaits me, <i>me</i> or my <i>person</i>, that moves, +perturbs and consoles me, that makes me capable of +abnegation and sacrifice, whatever be the origin, the +nature or the essence of this inexplicable bond of union, +in the absence of which the philosophers are pleased to +determine that my person must disappear" (<i>Traité</i>, etc., +§ 297).</p> + +<p>Must we then embrace the pure and naked faith in an +eternal life without trying to represent it to ourselves? +This is impossible; it is beyond our power to bring ourselves +or accustom ourselves to do so. And nevertheless +there are some who call themselves Christians +and yet leave almost altogether on one side this +question of representation. Take any work of theology +informed by the most enlightened—that is, the most +rationalistic and liberal—Protestantism; take, for +instance, the <i>Dogmatik</i> of Dr. Julius Kaftan, and of +the 668 pages of which the sixth edition, that of 1909, +consists, you will find only one, the last, that is devoted to +this problem. And in this page, after affirming that +Christ is not only the beginning and middle but also the +end and consummation of History, and that those who +are in Christ will attain to fullness of life, the eternal life +of those who are in Christ, not a single word as to what +that life may be. Half a dozen words at most about +eternal death, that is, hell, "for its existence is demanded +by the moral character of faith and of Christian hope." +Its moral character, eh? not its religious character, for I +am not aware that the latter knows any such exigency. +And all this inspired by a prudent agnostic parsimony.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223" />Yes, the prudent, the rational, and, some will say, the +pious, attitude, is not to seek to penetrate into mysteries +that are hidden from our knowledge, not to insist upon +shaping a plastic representation of eternal glory, such as +that of the <i>Divina Commedia</i>. True faith, true Christian +piety, we shall be told, consists in resting upon the confidence +that God, by the grace of Christ, will, in some way +or another, make us live in Him, in His Son; that, as our +destiny is in His almighty hands, we should surrender +ourselves to Him, in the full assurance that He will do +with us what is best for the ultimate end of life, of spirit +and of the universe. Such is the teaching that has +traversed many centuries, and was notably prominent in +the period between Luther and Kant.</p> + +<p>And nevertheless men have not ceased endeavouring to +imagine to themselves what this eternal life may be, nor +will they cease their endeavours so long as they are men +and not merely thinking machines. There are books of +theology—or of what passes for theology—full of disquisitions +upon the conditions under which the blessed +dead live in paradise, upon their mode of enjoyment, upon +the properties of the glorious body, for without some form +of body the soul cannot be conceived.</p> + +<p>And to this same necessity, the real necessity of forming +to ourselves a concrete representation of what this +other life may be, must in great part be referred the +indestructible vitality of doctrines such as those of +spiritualism, metempsychosis, the transmigration of souls +from star to star, and the like; doctrines which as often +as they are pronounced to be defeated and dead, are found +to have come to life again, clothed in some more or less +new form. And it is merely supine to be content to +ignore them and not to seek to discover their permanent +and living essence. Man will never willingly abandon +his attempt to form a concrete representation of the other +life.</p> + +<p>But is an eternal and endless life after death indeed +<a name="Page_224" id="Page_224" />thinkable? How can we conceive the life of a disembodied +spirit? How can we conceive such a spirit? +How can we conceive a pure consciousness, without a +corporal organism? Descartes divided the world into +thought and extension, a dualism which was imposed +upon him by the Christian dogma of the immortality of +the soul. But is extension, is matter, that which thinks +and is spiritualized, or is thought that which is extended +and materialized? The weightiest questions of metaphysics +arise practically out of our desire to arrive at an +understanding of the possibility of our immortality—from +this fact they derive their value and cease to be merely the +idle discussions of fruitless curiosity. For the truth is +that metaphysics has no value save in so far as it attempts +to explain in what way our vital longing can or cannot be +realized. And thus it is that there is and always will be +a rational metaphysic and a vital metaphysic, in perennial +conflict with one another, the one setting out from +the notion of cause, the other from the notion of +substance.</p> + +<p>And even if we were to succeed in imagining personal +immortality, might we not possibly feel it to be something +no less terrible than its negation? "Calypso was +inconsolable at the departure of Ulysses; in her sorrow +she was dismayed at being immortal," said the gentle, +the mystical Fénelon at the beginning of his <i>Télémaque</i>. +Was it not a kind of doom that the ancient gods, no less +than the demons, were subject to—the deprivation of the +power to commit suicide?</p> + +<p>When Jesus took Peter and James and John up into a +high mountain and was transfigured before them, his +raiment shining as white as snow, and Moses and Elias +appeared and talked with him, Peter said to the Master: +"Master, it is good for us to be here; and let us make +three tabernacles; one for thee and one for Moses and one +for Elias," for he wished to eternalize that moment. And +as they came down from the mountain, Jesus charged +<a name="Page_225" id="Page_225" />them that they should tell no man what they had seen +until the Son of Man should have risen from the dead. +And they, keeping this saying to themselves, questioned +one with another what this rising from the dead should +mean, as men not understanding the purport of it. And +it was after this that Jesus met the father whose son was +possessed with a dumb spirit and who cried out to him, +"Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief" (Mark ix.).</p> + +<p>Those three apostles did not understand what this +rising from the dead meant. Neither did those Sadducees +who asked the Master whose wife she should be in the +resurrection who in this life had had seven husbands +(Matt. xxii.); and it was then that Jesus said that God is +not the God of the dead, but of the living. And the +other life is not, in fact, thinkable to us except under the +same forms as those of this earthly and transitory life. +Nor is the mystery at all clarified by that metaphor of the +grain and the wheat that it bears, with which Paul +answers the question, "How are the dead raised up, +and with what body do they come?" (1 Cor. xv. 35).</p> + +<p>How can a human soul live and enjoy God eternally +without losing its individual personality—that is to say, +without losing itself? What is it to enjoy God? What +is eternity as opposed to time? Does the soul change or +does it not change in the other life? If it does not +change, how does it live? And if it changes, how does +it preserve its individuality through so vast a period of +time? For though the other life may exclude space, it +cannot exclude time, as Cournot observes in the work +quoted above.</p> + +<p>If there is life in heaven there is change. Swedenborg +remarked that the angels change, because the delight of +the celestial life would gradually lose its value if they +always enjoyed it in its fullness, and because angels, like +men, love themselves, and he who loves himself experiences +changes of state; and he adds further that at times +the angels are sad, and that he, Swedenborg, discoursed +<a name="Page_226" id="Page_226" />with some when they were sad (<i>De Cælo et Inferno</i>, +§§ 158, 160). In any case, it is impossible for us to conceive +life without change, change of growth or of diminution, +of sadness or of joy, of love or of hate.</p> + +<p>In effect, an eternal life is unthinkable and an eternal +life of absolute felicity, of beatific vision, is more unthinkable +still.</p> + +<p>And what precisely is this beatific vision? We +observe in the first place that it is called vision and not +action, something passive being therefore presupposed. +And does not this beatific vision suppose loss of personal +consciousness? A saint in heaven, says Bossuet, is a +being who is scarcely sensible of himself, so completely +is he possessed by God and immerged in His glory.... +Our attention cannot stay on the saint, because one finds +him outside of himself, and subject by an unchangeable +love to the source of his being and his happiness (<i>Du culte +qui est dû à Dieu</i>). And these are the words of Bossuet, +the antiquietist. This loving vision of God supposes an absorption +in Him. He who in a state of blessedness enjoys +God in His fullness must perforce neither think of himself, +nor remember himself, nor have any consciousness +of himself, but be in perpetual ecstasy (<i>εκστασις</i>) outside +of himself, in a condition of alienation. And the +ecstasy that the mystics describe is a prelude of this +vision.</p> + +<p>He who sees God shall die, say the Scriptures +(Judg. xiii. 22); and may it not be that the eternal vision +of God is an eternal death, a swooning away of the personality? +But St. Teresa, in her description of the last +state of prayer, the rapture, transport, flight, or ecstasy +of the soul, tells us that the soul is borne as upon a +cloud or a mighty eagle, "but you see yourself carried +away and know not whither," and it is "with +delight," and "if you do not resist, the senses are not +lost, at least I was so much myself as to be able to perceive +that I was being lifted up "—that is to say, without +<a name="Page_227" id="Page_227" />losing consciousness. And God "appears to be not content +with thus attracting the soul to Himself in so real a +way, but wishes to have the body also, though it be +mortal and of earth so foul." "Ofttimes the soul is +absorbed—or, to speak more correctly, the Lord absorbs +it in Himself; and when He has held it thus for a +moment, the will alone remains in union with Him"—not +the intelligence alone. We see, therefore, that it is +not so much vision as a union of the will, and meanwhile, +"the understanding and memory are distraught ... +like one who has slept long and dreamed and is hardly +yet awake." It is "a soft flight, a delicious flight, a +noiseless flight." And in this delicious flight the consciousness +of self is preserved, the awareness of distinction +from God with whom one is united. And one is +raised to this rapture, according to the Spanish mystic, +by the contemplation of the Humanity of Christ—that is +to say, of something concrete and human; it is the vision +of the living God, not of the idea of God. And in the +28th chapter she tells us that "though there were nothing +else to delight the sight in heaven but the great beauty +of the glorified bodies, that would be an excessive bliss, +particularly the vision of the Humanity of Jesus Christ +our Lord...." "This vision," she continues, +"though imaginary, I did never see with my bodily eyes, +nor, indeed, any other, but only with the eyes of the +soul." And thus it is that in heaven the soul does not +see God only, but everything in God, or rather it sees +that everything is God, for God embraces all things. +And this idea is further emphasized by Jacob Böhme. +The saint tells us in the <i>Moradas Setimas</i> (vii. 2) that +"this secret union takes place in the innermost centre of +the soul, where God Himself must dwell." And she +goes on to say that "the soul, I mean the spirit of the +soul, is made one with God ..."; and this union may +be likened to "two wax candles, the tips of which touch +each other so closely that there is but one light; or again, +<a name="Page_228" id="Page_228" />the wick, the wax, and the light become one, but the one +candle can again be separated from the other, and the two +candles remain distinct; or the wick may be withdrawn +from the wax." But there is another more intimate +union, and this is "like rain falling from heaven into a +river or stream, becoming one and the same liquid, so +that the river and the rain-water cannot be divided; or it +resembles a streamlet flowing into the sea, which cannot +afterwards be disunited from it; or it may be likened to +a room into which a bright light enters through two windows—though +divided when it enters, the light becomes +one and the same." And what difference is there +between this and the internal and mystical silence of +Miguel de Molinos, the third and most perfect degree of +which is the silence of thought? (<i>Guía Espiritual</i>, +book i., chap. xvii., § 128). Do we not here very +closely approach the view that "nothingness is the +way to attain to that high state of a mind reformed"? +(book iii., chap. xx., § 196). And what marvel is it +that Amiel in his <i>Journal Intime</i> should twice have +made use of the Spanish word <i>nada</i>, nothing, doubtless +because he found none more expressive in any other +language? And nevertheless, if we read our mystical +doctor, St. Teresa, with care, we shall see that the +sensitive element is never excluded, the element of +delight—that is to say, the element of personal consciousness. +The soul allows itself to be absorbed in +God in order that it may absorb Him, in order that it +may acquire consciousness of its own divinity.</p> + +<p>A beatific vision, a loving contemplation in which the +soul is absorbed in God and, as it were, lost in Him, +appears either as an annihilation of self or as a prolonged +tedium to our natural way of feeling. And hence +a certain feeling which we not infrequently observe and +which has more than once expressed itself in satires, not +altogether free from irreverence or perhaps impiety, with +reference to the heaven of eternal glory as a place of +<a name="Page_229" id="Page_229" />eternal boredom. And it is useless to despise feelings +such as these, so wholly natural and spontaneous.</p> + +<p>It is clear that those who feel thus have failed to take +note of the fact that man's highest pleasure consists in +acquiring and intensifying consciousness. Not the +pleasure of knowing, exactly, but rather that of learning. +In knowing a thing we tend to forget it, to convert it, if +the expression may be allowed, into unconscious knowledge. +Man's pleasure, his purest delight, is allied with +the act of learning, of getting at the truth of things, of +acquiring knowledge with differentiation. And hence +the famous saying of Lessing which I have already +quoted. There is a story told of an ancient Spaniard +who accompanied Vasco Núñez de Balboa when he +climbed that peak in Darien from which both the Atlantic +and the Pacific are visible. On beholding the two +oceans the old man fell on his knees and exclaimed, "I +thank Thee, God, that Thou didst not let me die without +having seen so great a wonder." But if this man had +stayed there, very soon the wonder would have ceased to +be wonderful, and with the wonder the pleasure, too, +would have vanished. His joy was the joy of discovery. +And perhaps the joy of the beatific vision may be not +exactly that of the contemplation of the supreme Truth, +whole and entire (for this the soul could not endure), +but rather that of a continual discovery of the Truth, of +a ceaseless act of learning involving an effort which keeps +the sense of personal consciousness continually active.</p> + +<p>It is difficult for us to conceive a beatific vision of +mental quiet, of full knowledge and not of gradual apprehension, +as in any way different from a kind of Nirvana, +a spiritual diffusion, a dissipation of energy in the essence +of God, a return to unconsciousness induced by the +absence of shock, of difference—in a word, of activity.</p> + +<p>May it not be that the very condition which makes our +eternal union with God thinkable destroys our longing? +What difference is there between being absorbed by God +<a name="Page_230" id="Page_230" />and absorbing Him in ourself? Is it the stream that is +lost in the sea or the sea that is lost in the stream? It is +all the same.</p> + +<p>Our fundamental feeling is our longing not to lose the +sense of the continuity of our consciousness, not to break +the concatenation of our memories, the feeling of our +own personal concrete identity, even though we may be +gradually being absorbed in God, enriching Him. Who +at eighty years of age remembers the child that he +was at eight, conscious though he may be of the +unbroken chain connecting the two? And it may be +said that the problem for feeling resolves itself into the +question as to whether there is a God, whether there is +a human finality to the Universe. But what is finality? +For just as it is always possible to ask the why of every +why, so it is also always possible to ask the wherefore +of every wherefore. Supposing that there is a God, +then wherefore God? For Himself, it will be said. +And someone is sure to reply: What is the difference +between this consciousness and no-consciousness? But +it will always be true, as Plotinus has said (<i>Enn</i>., ii., +ix., 8), that to ask why God made the world is the same +as to ask why there is a soul. Or rather, not why, but +wherefore (<i>δια τι</i>).</p> + +<p>For him who places himself outside himself, in an +objective hypothetical position—which is as much as to +say in an inhuman position—the ultimate wherefore is +as inaccessible—and strictly, as absurd—as the ultimate +why. What difference in effect does it make if there is +not any finality? What logical contradiction is involved +in the Universe not being destined to any finality, either +human or superhuman? What objection is there in +reason to there being no other purpose in the sum of +things save only to exist and happen as it does exist and +happen? For him who places himself outside himself, +none; but for him who lives and suffers and desires +within himself—for him it is a question of life or death. +<a name="Page_231" id="Page_231" />Seek, therefore, thyself! But in finding oneself, +does not one find one's own nothingness? "Having +become a sinner in seeking himself, man has become +wretched in finding himself," said Bossuet (<i>Traité de la +Concupiscence</i>, chap. xi.). "Seek thyself" begins +with "Know thyself." To which Carlyle answers +(<i>Past and Present</i>, book iii., chap. xi.): "The latest +Gospel in this world is, Know thy work and do it. +'Know thyself': long enough has that poor 'self' of +thine tormented thee; thou wilt never get to 'know' it, +I believe! Think it not thy business, this of knowing +thyself; thou art an unknowable individual: know what +thou canst work at; and work at it, like a Hercules. +That will be thy better plan."</p> + +<p>Yes, but what I work at, will not that too be lost +in the end? And if it be lost, wherefore should I +work at it? Yes, yes, it may be that to accomplish +my work—and what is my work?—without thinking +about myself, is to love God. And what is it to love +God?</p> + +<p>And on the other hand, in loving God in myself, am +I not loving myself more than God, am I not loving +myself in God?</p> + +<p>What we really long for after death is to go on living +this life, this same mortal life, but without its ills, without +its tedium, and without death. Seneca, the Spaniard, +gave expression to this in his <i>Consolatio ad Marciam</i> +(xxvi.); what he desired was to live this life again: +<i>ista moliri</i>. And what Job asked for (xix. 25-7) was to +see God in the flesh, not in the spirit. And what but +that is the meaning of that comic conception of <i>eternal +recurrence</i> which issued from the tragic soul of poor +Nietzsche, hungering for concrete and temporal immortality?</p> + +<p>And this beatific vision which is the primary Catholic +solution of the problem, how can it be realized, I ask +again, without obliteration of the consciousness of self? +<a name="Page_232" id="Page_232" />Will it not be like a sleep in which we dream without +knowing what we dream? Who would wish for an +eternal life like that? To think without knowing that +we think is not to be sensible of ourselves, it is not to +be ourselves. And is not eternal life perhaps eternal +consciousness, not only seeing God, but seeing that we +see Him, seeing ourselves at the same time and ourselves +as distinct from Him? He who sleeps lives, but +he has no consciousness of himself; and would anyone +wish for an eternal sleep? When Circe advised Ulysses +to descend to the abode of the dead in order to consult +the soothsayer Teiresias, she told him that Teiresias +alone among the shades of the dead was possessed of +understanding, for all the others flitted about like +shadows (<i>Odyssey</i>, x., 487-495). And can it be said +that the others, apart from Teiresias, had really overcome +death? Is it to overcome death to flit about like +shadows without understanding?</p> + +<p>And on the other hand, may we not imagine that +possibly this earthly life of ours is to the other life what +sleep is to waking? May not all our life be a dream +and death an awakening? But an awakening to what? +And supposing that everything is but the dream of God +and that God one day will awaken? Will He remember +His dream?</p> + +<p>Aristotle, the rationalist, tells in his <i>Ethics</i> of the +superior happiness of the contemplative life, <i>βιος θεωρητικος</i>; and all rationalists are wont to place happiness +in knowledge. And the conception of eternal +happiness, of the enjoyment of God, as a beatific vision, +as knowledge and comprehension of God, is a thing of +rationalist origin, it is the kind of happiness that corresponds +with the God-Idea of Aristotelianism. But the +truth is that, in addition to vision, happiness demands +delight, and this is a thing which has very little to do, +with rationalism and is only attainable when we feel +ourselves distinct from God.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233" />Our Aristotelian Catholic theologian, the author of +the endeavour to rationalize Catholic feeling, St. Thomas +Aquinas, tells us in his <i>Summa</i> (<i>prima secundæ partis, +quæstio</i> iv., <i>art</i>. i) that "delight is requisite for happiness. +For delight is caused by the fact of desire resting +in attained good. Hence, since happiness is nothing +but the attainment of the Sovereign Good, there cannot +be happiness without concomitant delight." But where +is the delight of him who rests? To rest, <i>requiescere</i>—is +not that to sleep and not to possess even the consciousness +that one is resting? "Delight is caused by +the vision of God itself," the theologian continues. But +does the soul feel itself distinct from God? "The +delight that accompanies the activity of the understanding +does not impede, but rather strengthens that +activity," he says later on. Obviously! for what +happiness were it else? And in order to save delectation, +delight, pleasure, which, like pain, has always +something material in it, and which we conceive of only +as existing in a soul incarnate in a body, it was necessary +to suppose that the soul in a state of blessedness +is united with its body. Apart from some kind of body, +how is delight possible? The immortality of the pure +soul, without some sort of body or spirit-covering, is +not true immortality. And at bottom, what we long for +is a prolongation of this life, this life and no other, this +life of flesh and suffering, this life which we imprecate +at times simply because it comes to an end. The +majority of suicides would not take their lives if they +had the assurance that they would never die on this +earth. The self-slayer kills himself because he will not +wait for death.</p> + +<p>When in the thirty-third canto of the <i>Paradiso</i>, Dante +relates how he attained to the vision of God, he tells us +that just as a man who beholds somewhat in his sleep +retains on awakening nothing but the impression of the +feeling in his mind, so it was with him, for when the +<a name="Page_234" id="Page_234" />vision had all but passed away the sweetness that sprang +from it still distilled itself in his heart.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Cotal son to, che quasi tutta cessa</i></div> +<div><i>mia visione ed ancor mi distilla</i></div> +<div><i>nel cuor lo dulce che nacque da essa</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p>like snow that melts in the sun—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>cosi la neve al sol si disigilla</i>.</div></div> +</div> + +<p>That is to say, that the vision, the intellectual content, +passes, and that which remains is the delight, the <i>passione +impressa</i>, the emotional, the irrational—in a word, +the corporeal.</p> + +<p>What we desire is not merely spiritual felicity, not +merely vision, but delight, bodily happiness. The +other happiness, the rationalist <i>beatitude</i>, the happiness +of being submerged in understanding, can only— +I will not say satisfy or deceive, for I do not believe that +it ever satisfied or deceived even a Spinoza. At the conclusion +of his <i>Ethic</i>, in propositions xxxv. and xxxvi. of +the fifth part, Spinoza, affirms that God loves Himself +with an infinite intellectual love; that the intellectual +love of the mind towards God is the selfsame love with +which God loves Himself, not in so far as He is infinite, +but in so far as He can be manifested through the +essence of the human mind, considered under the form +of eternity—that is to say, that the intellectual love of +the mind towards God is part of the infinite love with +which God loves Himself. And after these tragic, these +desolating propositions, we are told in the last proposition +of the whole book, that which closes and crowns +this tremendous tragedy of the <i>Ethic</i>, that happiness is +not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself, and that our +repression of our desires is not the cause of our enjoyment +of virtue, but rather because we find enjoyment in +virtue we are able to repress our desires. Intellectual +love! intellectual love! what is this intellectual love? +Something of the nature of a red flavour, or a bitter +<a name="Page_235" id="Page_235" />sound, or an aromatic colour, or rather something of +the same sort as a love-stricken triangle or an enraged +ellipse—a pure metaphor, but a tragic metaphor. And +a metaphor corresponding tragically with that saying +that the heart also has its reasons. Reasons of the +heart! loves of the head! intellectual delight! delicious +intellection!—tragedy, tragedy, tragedy!</p> + +<p>And nevertheless there is something which may be +called intellectual love, and that is the love of understanding, +that which Aristotle meant by the contemplative +life, for there is something of action and of love +in the act of understanding, and the beatific vision is the +vision of the total truth. Is there not perhaps at the +root of every passion something of curiosity? Did not +our first parents, according to the Biblical story, fall +because of their eagerness to taste of the fruit of the tree +of the knowledge of good and evil, and to be as gods, +knowers of this knowledge? The vision of God—that +is to say, the vision of the Universe itself, in its soul, in +its inmost essence—would not that appease all our longing? +And this vision can fail to satisfy only men of a +gross mind who do not perceive that the greatest joy of +man is to be more man—that is, more God—and that +man is more God the more consciousness he has.</p> + +<p>And this intellectual love, which is nothing but the +so-called platonic love, is a means to dominion and +possession. There is, in fact, no more perfect dominion +than knowledge; he who knows something, possesses +it. Knowledge unites the knower with the known. "I +contemplate thee and in contemplating thee I make thee +mine"—such is the formula. And to know God, what +can that be but to possess Him? He who knows God +is thereby himself God.</p> + +<p>In <i>La Dégradation de l'énergie</i> (iv<sup>e</sup> partie, +chap. xviii., 2) B. Brunhes relates a story concerning +the great Catholic mathematician Cauchy, communicated +to him by M. Sarrau, who had it from Père Gratry. +<a name="Page_236" id="Page_236" />While Cauchy and Père Gratry were walking in the +gardens of the Luxumbourg, their conversation turned +upon the happiness which those in heaven would have +in knowing at last, without any obscurity or limitation, +the truths which they had so long and so laboriously +sought to investigate on earth. In allusion to the study +which Cauchy had made of the mechanistic theory of +the reflection of light, Père Gratry threw out the suggestion +that one on the greatest intellectual joys of the +great geometrician in the future life would be to penetrate +into the secret of light. To which Cauchy replied +that it did not appear to him to be possible to know more +about this than he himself already knew, neither could +he conceive how the most perfect intelligence could +arrive at a clearer comprehension of the mystery of +reflection than that manifested in his own explanation +of it, seeing that he had furnished a mechanistic theory +of the phenomenon. "His piety," Brunhes adds, "did +not extend to a belief that God Himself could have +created anything different or anything better."</p> + +<p>From this narrative two points of interest emerge. +The first is the idea expressed in it as to what contemplation, +intellectual love, or beatific vision, may mean +for men of a superior order of intelligence, men whose +ruling passion is knowledge; and the second is the +implicit faith shown in the mechanistic explanation of +the world.</p> + +<p>This mechanistic tendency of the intellect coheres with +the well-known formula, "Nothing is created, nothing +is lost, everything is transformed"—a formula by +means of which it has been sought to interpret the +ambiguous principle of the conservation of energy, forgetting +that practically, for us, for men, energy is +utilizable energy, and that this is continually being lost, +dissipated by the diffusion of heat, and degraded, its +tendency being to arrive at a dead-level and homogeneity. +That which has value, and more than value, +<a name="Page_237" id="Page_237" />reality, for us, is the differential, which is the qualitative; +pure, undifferentiated quantity is for us as if it did +not exist, for it does not act. And the material +Universe, the body of the Universe, would appear to +be gradually proceeding—unaffected by the retarding +action of living organisms or even by the conscious +action of man—towards a state of perfect stability, of +homogeneity (<i>vide</i> Brunhes, <i>op. cit.</i>) For, while spirit +tends towards concentration, material energy tends +towards diffusion.</p> + +<p>And may not this have an intimate relation with our +problem? May there not be a connection between this +conclusion of scientific philosophy with respect to a +final state of stability and homogeneity and the mystical +dream of the apocatastasis? May not this death of the +body of the Universe be the final triumph of its spirit, +of God?</p> + +<p>It is manifest that there is an intimate relation between +the religious need of an eternal life after death and the +conclusions—always provisional—at which scientific +philosophy arrives with respect to the probable future of +the material or sensible Universe. And the fact is that +just as there are theologians of God and the immortality +of the soul, so there are also those whom Brunhes calls +(<i>op. cit.</i>, chap. xxvi., § 2) theologians of monism, and +whom it would perhaps be better to call atheologians, +people who pertinaciously adhere to the spirit of <i>a priori</i> +affirmation; and this becomes intolerable, Brunhes adds, +when they harbour the pretension of despising theology. +A notable type of these gentlemen may be found in +Haeckel, who has succeeded in solving the riddles of +Nature!</p> + +<p>These atheologians have seized upon the principle of +the conservation of energy, the "Nothing is created, +nothing is lost, everything is transformed" formula, +the theological origin of which is seen in Descartes, and +have made use of it as a means whereby we are able to +<a name="Page_238" id="Page_238" />dispense with God. "The world built to last," Brunhes +comments, "resisting all wear and tear, or rather automatically +repairing the rents that appear in it—what a +splendid theme for oratorical amplification! But these +same amplifications which served in the seventeenth +century to prove the wisdom of the Creator have been +used in our days as arguments for those who presume to +do without Him." It is the old story: so-called +scientific philosophy, the origin and inspiration of which +is fundamentally theological or religious, ending in an +atheology or irreligion, which is itself nothing else but +theology and religion. Let us call to mind the comments +of Ritschl upon this head, already quoted in this work.</p> + +<p>To-day the last word of science, or rather of scientific +philosophy, appears to be that, by virtue of the degradation +of energy, of the predominance of irreversible +phenomena, the material, sensible world is travelling +towards a condition of ultimate levelness, a kind of final +homogeneity. And this brings to our mind the +hypothesis, not only so much used but abused by +Spencer, of a primordial homogeneity, and his fantastic +theory of the instability of the homogeneous. An +instability that required the atheological agnosticism of +Spencer in order to explain the inexplicable transition +from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous. For how, +without any action from without, can any heterogeneity +emerge from perfect and absolute homogeneity? But +as it was necessary to get rid of every kind of creation, +"the unemployed engineer turned metaphysician," as +Papini called him, invented the theory of the instability +of the homogeneous, which is more ... what shall I +say? more mystical, and even more mythological if you +like, than the creative action of God.</p> + +<p>The Italian positivist, Roberto Ardigo, was nearer +the mark when, objecting to Spencer's theory, he said +that the most natural supposition was that things always +were as they are now, that always there have been +<a name="Page_239" id="Page_239" />worlds in process of formation, in the nebulous stage, +worlds completely formed and worlds in process of dissolution; +that heterogeneity, in short, is eternal. +Another way, it will be seen, of not solving the riddle.</p> + +<p>Is this perhaps the solution? But in that case the +Universe would be infinite, and in reality we are unable +to conceive a Universe that is both eternal and limited +such as that which served as the basis of Nietzsche's +theory of eternal recurrence. If the Universe must be +eternal, if within it and as regards each of its component +worlds, periods in which the movement is towards homogeneity, +towards the degradation of energy, must +alternate with other periods in which the movement +is towards heterogeneity, then it is necessary that +the Universe should be infinite, that there should be +scope, always and in each world, for some action coming +from without. And, in fact, the body of God cannot be +other than eternal and infinite.</p> + +<p>But as far as our own world is concerned, its gradual +levelling-down—or, we might say, its death—appears +to be proved. And how will this process affect the fate +of our spirit? Will it wane with the degradation of the +energy of our world and return to unconsciousness, or +will it rather grow according as the utilizable energy +diminishes and by virtue of the very efforts that it +makes to retard this degradation and to dominate +Nature?—for this it is that constitutes the life of the spirit. +May it be that consciousness and its extended support +are two powers in contraposition, the one growing at +the expense of the other?</p> + +<p>The fact is that the best of our scientific work, the best +of our industry (that part of it I mean—and it is a large +part—that does not tend to destruction), is directed +towards retarding this fatal process of the degradation +of energy. And organic life, the support of our consciousness, +is itself an effort to avoid, so far as it is +possible, this fatal period, to postpone it.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240" />It is useless to seek to deceive ourselves with pagan +pæans in praise of Nature, for as Leopardi, that +Christian atheist, said with profound truth in his stupendous +poem <i>La Ginestra</i>, Nature "gives us life like a +mother, but loves us like a step-mother." The origin +of human companionship was opposition to Nature; it +was horror of impious Nature that first linked men +together in the bonds of society. It is human society, +in effect, the source of reflective consciousness and of the +craving for immortality, that inaugurates the state of +grace upon the state of Nature; and it is man who, by +humanizing and spiritualizing Nature by his industry, +supernaturalizes her.</p> + +<p>In two amazing sonnets which he called <i>Redemption</i>, +the tragic Portuguese poet, Antero de Quental, +embodied his dream of a spirit imprisoned, not in atoms +or ions or crystals, but—as is natural in a poet—in the +sea, in trees, in the forest, in the mountains, in the wind, +in all material individualities and forms; and he +imagines that a day may come when all these captive +souls, as yet in the limbo of existence, will awaken to +consciousness, and, emerging as pure thought from +the forms that imprisoned them, they will see these +forms, the creatures of illusion, fall away and dissolve +like a baseless vision. It is a magnificent dream of the +penetration of everything by consciousness.</p> + +<p>May it not be that the Universe, our Universe—who +knows if there are others?—began with a zero of spirit—and +zero is not the same as nothing—and an infinite of +matter, and that its goal is to end with an infinite of +spirit and a zero of matter? Dreams!</p> + +<p>May it be that everything has a soul and that this +soul begs to be freed?</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Oh tierras de Alvargonzález,</i></div> +<div><i>en el corazón de España,</i></div> +<div><i>tierras pobres, tierras tristes,</i></div> +<div><i>tan tristes que tienen alma!</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241" />sings our poet Antonio Machado in his <i>Campos de +Castilla</i>.<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50" /><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a> Is the sadness of the field in the fields themselves +or in us who look upon them? Do they not +suffer? But what can an individual soul in a world of +matter actually be? Is it the rock or the mountain that +is the individual? Is it the tree?</p> + +<p>And nevertheless the fact always remains that spirit +and matter are at strife. This is the thought that +Espronceda expressed when he wrote:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Aquí, para vivir en santa calma,</i></div> +<div><i>o sobra la materia, o sobra el alma.</i><a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51" /><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>And is there not in the history of thought, or of +human imagination if you prefer it, something that +corresponds to this process of the reduction of matter, in +the sense of a reduction of everything to consciousness?</p> + +<p>Yes, there is, and its author is the first Christian mystic, +St. Paul of Tarsus, the Apostle of the Gentiles, he who +because he had never with his bodily eyes looked upon +the face of the fleshly and mortal Christ, the ethical Christ, +created within himself an immortal and religious Christ—he +who was caught up into the third heaven and there +beheld secret and unspeakable things (2 Cor. xii.). And +this first Christian mystic dreamed also of a final triumph +of spirit, of consciousness, and this is what in theology +is technically called the apocatastasis or restitution.</p> + +<p>In 1 Cor. xv. 26-28 he tells us that "the last enemy +that shall be destroyed is death, for he hath put all things +under his feet. But when he saith all things are put +under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did +put all things under him. And when all things shall be +subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be +<a name="Page_242" id="Page_242" />subject unto him that put all things under him, that God +may be all in all": <i>ινα η ο θεος παντα εν πασιν</i>—that is to +say, that the end is that God, Consciousness, will end by +being all in all.</p> + +<p>This doctrine is completed by Paul's teaching, in his +Epistle to the Ephesians, with regard to the end of the +whole history of the world. In this Epistle, as you +know, he represents Christ—by whom "were all things +created, that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible +and invisible" (Col. i. 16)—as the head over all things +(Eph. i. 22), and in him, in this head, we all shall be +raised up that we may live in the communion of saints +and that we "may be able to comprehend with all saints +what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, +and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge" +(Eph. iii. 18, 19). And this gathering of us +together in Christ, who is the head and, as it were, the +compendium, of Humanity, is what the Apostle calls the +gathering or collecting together or recapitulating of all +things in Christ, <i>ανακεφαλαιωσασθαι τα παντα εν Χριστω</i>. +And this recapitulation—<i>ανακεφαλαιωσις</i>, anacefaleosis—the +end of the world's history and of the human race, is +merely another aspect of the apocatastasis. The apocatastasis, +God's coming to be all in all, thus resolves itself +into the anacefaleosis, the gathering together of all things +in Christ, in Humanity—Humanity therefore being the +end of creation. And does not this apocatastasis, this +humanization or divinization of all things, do away with +matter? But if matter, which is the principle of individuation, +the scholastic <i>principium individuationis</i>, is +once done away with, does not everything return to pure +consciousness, which, in its pure purity, neither knows +itself nor is it anything that can be conceived or felt? +And if matter be abolished, what support is there left for +spirit?</p> + +<p>Thus a different train of thought leads us to the same +difficulties, the same unthinkabilities.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243" />It may be said, on the other hand, that the apocatastasis, +God's coming to be all in all, presupposes that there was +a time when He was not all in all. The supposition that +all beings shall attain to the enjoyment of God implies +the supposition that God shall attain to the enjoyment of +all beings, for the beatific vision is mutual, and God is +perfected in being better known, and His being is +nourished and enriched with souls.</p> + +<p>Following up the track of these wild dreams, we might +imagine an unconscious God, slumbering in matter, and +gradually wakening into consciousness of everything, +consciousness of His own divinity; we might imagine the +whole Universe becoming conscious of itself as a whole +and becoming conscious of each of its constituent consciousnesses, +becoming God. But in that case, how did +this unconscious God begin? Is He not matter itself? +God would thus be not the beginning but the end of the +Universe; but can that be the end which was not the +beginning? Or can it be that outside time, in eternity, +there is a difference between beginning and end? "The +soul of all things cannot be bound by that very thing—that +is, matter—which it itself has bound," says Plotinus +(<i>Enn.</i> ii., ix. 7). Or is it not rather the Consciousness of +the Whole that strives to become the consciousness of +each part and to make each partial consciousness conscious +of itself—that is, of the total consciousness? Is +not this universal soul a monotheist or solitary God who +is in process of becoming a pantheist God? And if it is +not so, if matter and pain are alien to God, wherefore, it +will be asked, did God create the world? For what purpose +did He make matter and introduce pain? Would +it not have been better if He had not made anything? +What added glory does He gain by the creation of angels +or of men whose fall He must punish with eternal torment? +Did He perhaps create evil for the sake of +remedying it? Or was redemption His design, redemption +complete and absolute, redemption of all things and +<a name="Page_244" id="Page_244" />of all men? For this hypothesis is neither more rational +nor more pious than the other.</p> + +<p>In so far as we attempt to represent eternal happiness +to ourselves, we are confronted by a series of questions to +which there is no satisfactory—that is, rational—answer, +and it matters not whether the supposition from which we +start be monotheist, or pantheist, or even panentheist.</p> + +<p>Let us return to the Pauline apocatastasis.</p> + +<p>Is it not possible that in becoming all in all God completes +Himself, becomes at last fully God, an infinite consciousness +embracing all consciousnesses? And what is +an infinite consciousness? Since consciousness supposes +limitation, or rather since consciousness is consciousness +of limitation, of distinction, does it not thereby +exclude infinitude? What value has the notion of infinitude +applied to consciousness? What is a consciousness +that is all consciousness, without anything outside it that +is not consciousness? In such a case, of what is consciousness +the consciousness? Of its content? Or may +it not rather be that, starting from chaos, from absolute +unconsciousness, in the eternity of the past, we continually +approach the apocatastasis or final apotheosis +without ever reaching it?</p> + +<p>May not this apocatastasis, this return of all things to +God, be rather an ideal term to which we unceasingly +approach—some of us with fleeter step than others—but +which we are destined never to reach? May not the +absolute and perfect eternal happiness be an eternal hope, +which would die if it were to be realized? Is it possible +to be happy without hope? And there is no place for +hope when once possession has been realized, for hope, +desire, is killed by possession. May it not be, I say, +that all souls grow without ceasing, some in a greater +measure than others, but all having to pass some time +through the same degree of growth, whatever that degree +may be, and yet without ever arriving at the infinite, at +God, to whom they continually approach? Is not eternal +<a name="Page_245" id="Page_245" />happiness an eternal hope, with its eternal nucleus of +sorrow in order that happiness shall not be swallowed up +in nothingness?</p> + +<p>Follow more questions to which there is no answer. +"He shall be all in all," says the Apostle. But will His +mode of being in each one be different or will it be the +same for all alike? Will not God be wholly in one of the +damned? Is He not in his soul? Is He not in what is +called hell? And in what sense is He in hell?</p> + +<p>Whence arise new problems, those relating to the +opposition between heaven and hell, between eternal +happiness and eternal unhappiness.</p> + +<p>May it not be that in the end all shall be saved, including +Cain and Judas and Satan himself, as Origen's development +of the Pauline apocatastasis led him to hope?</p> + +<p>When our Catholic theologians seek to justify rationally—or +in other words, ethically—the dogma of the +eternity of the pains of hell, they put forward reasons so +specious, ridiculous, and childish, that it would appear +impossible that they should ever have obtained currency. +For to assert that since God is infinite, an offence committed +against Him is infinite also and therefore demands +an eternal punishment, is, apart from the inconceivability +of an infinite offence, to be unaware that, in human ethics, +if not in the human police system, the gravity of the +offence is measured not by the dignity of the injured +person but by the intention of the injurer, and that to +speak of an infinite culpable intention is sheer nonsense, +and nothing else. In this connection those words which +Christ addressed to His Father are capable of application: +"Father, forgive them, for they know not what +they do," and no man who commits an offence against +God or his neighbour knows what he does. In human +ethics, or if you like in human police regulations—that +which is called penal law and is anything but law<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52" /><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> +eternal punishment is a meaningless phrase.</p> + +<p>"<a name="Page_246" id="Page_246" />God is just and punishes us; that is all we need to +know; as far as we are concerned the rest is merely +curiosity." Such was the conclusion of Lamennais +(<i>Essai</i>, etc., iv<sup>e</sup> partie, chap, vii.), an opinion shared by +many others. Calvin also held the same view. But is +there anyone who is content with this? Pure curiosity!—to +call this load that wellnigh crushes our heart pure +curiosity!</p> + +<p>May we not say, perhaps, that the evil man is +annihilated because he wished to be annihilated, or that +he did not wish strongly enough to eternalize himself +because he was evil? May we not say that it is not +believing in the other life that makes a man good, but +rather that being good makes him believe in it? And +what is being good and being evil? These states pertain +to the sphere of ethics, not of religion: or, rather, +does not the doing good though being evil pertain to +ethics, and the being good though doing evil to religion?</p> + +<p>Shall we not perhaps be told, on the other hand, that +if the sinner suffers an eternal punishment, it is because +he does not cease to sin?—for the damned sin without +ceasing. This, however, is no solution of the problem, +which derives all its absurdity from the fact that punishment +has been conceived as vindictiveness or vengeance, +not as correction, has been conceived after the fashion of +barbarous peoples. And in the same way hell has been +conceived as a sort of police institution, necessary in +order to put fear into the world. And the worst of it is +that it no longer intimidates, and therefore will have to +be shut up.</p> + +<p>But, on the other hand, as a religious conception and +veiled in mystery, why not—although the idea revolts our +feelings—an eternity of suffering? why not a God who is +nourished by our suffering? Is our happiness the end of +the Universe? or may we possibly sustain with our suffering +some alien happiness? Let us read again in the +<i>Eumenides</i> of that terrible tragedian, Æschylus, those +<a name="Page_247" id="Page_247" />choruses of the Furies in which they curse the new gods +for overturning the ancient laws and snatching Orestes +from their hands—impassioned invectives against the +Apollinian redemption. Does not redemption tear man, +their captive and plaything, from the hands of the gods, +who delight and amuse themselves in his sufferings, like +children, as the tragic poet says, torturing beetles? And +let us remember the cry, "My God, my God, why hast +thou forsaken me?"</p> + +<p>Yes, why not an eternity of suffering? Hell is an +eternalization of the soul, even though it be an eternity +of pain. Is not pain essential to life?</p> + +<p>Men go on inventing theories to explain what they call +the origin of evil. And why not the origin of good? Why +suppose that it is good that is positive and original, and +evil that is negative and derivatory? "Everything that +is, in so far as it is, is good," St. Augustine affirmed. +But why? What does "being good" mean? Good is +good for something, conducive to an end, and to say that +everything is good is equivalent to saying that everything +is making for its end. But what is its end? Our desire +is to eternalize ourselves, to persist, and we call good +everything that conspires to this end and bad everything +that tends to lessen or destroy our consciousness. We +suppose that human consciousness is an end and not a +means to something else which may not be consciousness, +whether human or superhuman.</p> + +<p>All metaphysical optimism, such as that of Leibnitz, +and all metaphysical pessimism, such as that of Schopenhauer, +have no other foundation than this. For Leibnitz +this world is the best because it conspires to perpetuate +consciousness, and, together with consciousness, will, +because intelligence increases will and perfects it, because +the end of man is the contemplation of God; while for +Schopenhauer this world is the worst of all possible +worlds, because it conspires to destroy will, because intelligence, +representation, nullifies the will that begot it.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248" />And similarly Franklin, who believed in another life, +asserted that he was willing to live this life over again, +the life that he had actually lived, "from its beginning +to the end"; while Leopardi, who did not believe in +another life, asserted that nobody would consent to live +his life over again. These two views of life are not +merely ethical, but religious; and the feeling of moral +good, in so far as it is a teleological value, is of religious +origin also.</p> + +<p>And to return to our interrogations: Shall not all be +saved, shall not all be made eternal, and eternal not in +suffering but in happiness, those whom we call good and +those whom we call bad alike?</p> + +<p>And as regards this question of good and evil, does +not the malice of him who judges enter in? Is the badness +in the intention of him who does the deed or is it +not rather in that of him who judges it to be bad? But +the terrible thing is that man judges himself, creates +himself his own judge.</p> + +<p>Who then shall be saved? And now the imagination +puts forth another possibility—neither more nor less +rational than all those which have just been put forward +interrogatively—and that is that only those are saved +who have longed to be saved, that only those are eternalized +who have lived in an agony of hunger for eternity +and for eternalization. He who desires never to die and +believes that he shall never die in the spirit, desires it +because he deserves it, or rather, only he desires personal +immortality who carries his immortality within him. +The man who does not long passionately, and with a +passion that triumphs over all the dictates of reason, +for his own immortality, is the man who does not deserve +it, and because he does not deserve it he does not long +for it. And it is no injustice not to give a man that +which he does not know how to desire, for "ask, and it +shall be given you." It may be that to each will be +given that which he desired. And perhaps the sin +<a name="Page_249" id="Page_249" />against the Holy Ghost—for which, according to the +Evangelist, there is no remission—is none other than that +of not desiring God, not longing to be made eternal.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>As is your sort of mind</div> +<div>So is your sort of search; you'll find</div> +<div>What you desire, and that's to be</div> +<div>A Christian,</div></div> +</div> + +<p>said Robert Browning in <i>Christmas Eve and Easter Day</i>.</p> + +<p>In his <i>Inferno</i> Dante condemned the Epicureans, those +who did not believe in another life, to something more +terrible than the not having it, and that is the consciousness +of not having it, and this he expressed in plastic +form by picturing them shut up in their tombs for all +eternity, without light, without air, without fire, without +movement, without life (<i>Inferno</i>, x., 10-15).</p> + +<p>What cruelty is there in denying to a man that which +he did not or could not desire? In the sixth book of his +<i>Æneid</i> (426-429) the gentle Virgil makes us hear the +plaintive voices and sobbing of the babes who weep upon +the threshold of Hades,</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Continuo àuditæ voces, vagitus et ingens,</i></div> +<div><i>Infantumque animæ flentes in limine primo,</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p>unhappy in that they had but entered upon life and never +known the sweetness of it, and whom, torn from their +mothers' breasts, a dark day had cut off and drowned in +bitter death—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Quos dulcis vitæ exsortes et at ubere raptos</i></div> +<div><i>Abstulit atra dies et funere mersit acerbo.</i></div></div> +</div> + +<p>But what life did they lose, if they neither knew life nor +longed for it? And yet is it true that they never longed +for it?</p> + +<p>It may be said that others craved life on their behalf, +that their parents longed for them to be eternal to the end +that they might be gladdened by them in paradise. And +so a fresh field is opened up for the imagination—namely, +<a name="Page_250" id="Page_250" />the consideration of the solidarity and representivity of +eternal salvation.</p> + +<p>There are many, indeed, who imagine the human race +as one being, a collective and solidary individual, in +whom each member may represent or may come to represent +the total collectivity; and they imagine salvation as +something collective. As something collective also, +merit, and as something collective sin, and redemption. +According to this mode of feeling and imagining, either +all are saved or none is saved; redemption is total and +it is mutual; each man is his neighbour's Christ.</p> + +<p>And is there not perhaps a hint of this in the popular +Catholic belief with regard to souls in purgatory, the +belief that the living may devote suffrages and apply +merits to the souls of their dead? This sense of the transmission +of merits, both to the living and the dead, is +general in popular Catholic piety.</p> + +<p>Nor should it be forgotten that in the history of man's +religious thought there has often presented itself the idea +of an immortality restricted to a certain number of the +elect, spirits representative of the rest and in a certain +sense including them; an idea of pagan derivation—for +such were the heroes and demi-gods—which sometimes +shelters itself behind the pronouncement that there are +many that are called and few that are chosen.</p> + +<p>Recently, while I was engaged upon this essay, there +came into my hands the third edition of the <i>Dialogue sur +la vie et sur la mort</i>, by Charles Bonnefon, a book in +which imaginative conceptions similar to those that I +have been setting forth find succinct and suggestive expression. +The soul cannot live without the body, +Bonnefon says, nor the body without the soul, and thus +neither birth nor death has any real existence—strictly +speaking, there is no body, no soul, no birth, no death, +all of which are abstractions and appearances, but only a +thinking life, of which we form part and which can +neither be born nor die. Hence he is led to deny human +<a name="Page_251" id="Page_251" />individuality and to assert that no one can say "I am" +but only "we are," or, more correctly, "there is in us." +It is humanity, the species, that thinks and loves in us. +And souls are transmitted in the same way that bodies +are transmitted. "The living thought or the thinking +life which we are will find itself again immediately in a +form analogous to that which was our origin and corresponding +with our being in the womb of a pregnant +woman." Each of us, therefore, has lived before and +will live again, although he does not know it. "If +humanity is gradually raised above itself, when the last +man dies, the man who will contain all the rest of mankind +in himself, who shall say that he may not have +arrived at that higher order of humanity such as exists +elsewhere, in heaven?... As we are all bound +together in solidarity, we shall all, little by little, gather +the fruits of our travail." According to this mode of +imagining and thinking, since nobody is born, nobody +dies, no single soul has finished its struggle but many +times has been plunged into the midst of the human +struggle "ever since the type of embryo corresponding +with the same consciousness was represented in the succession +of human phenomena." It is obvious that since +Bonnefon begins by denying personal individuality, he +leaves out of account our real longing, which is to save +our individuality; but on the other hand, since he, +Bonnefon, is a personal individual and feels this longing, +he has recourse to the distinction between the called and +the chosen, and to the idea of representative spirits, and +he concedes to a certain number of men this representative +individual immortality. Of these elect he says that +"they will be somewhat more necessary to God than we +ourselves." And he closes this splendid dream by supposing +that "it is not impossible that we shall arrive by +a series of ascensions at the supreme happiness, and that +our life shall be merged in the perfect Life as a drop of +water in the sea. Then we shall understand," he con<a name="Page_252" id="Page_252" />tinues, +"that everything was necessary, that every +philosophy and every religion had its hour of truth, and +that in all our wanderings and errors and in the darkest +moments of our history we discerned the light of the +distant beacon, and that we were all predestined to participate +in the Eternal Light. And if the God whom we +shall find again possesses a body—and we cannot conceive +a living God without a body—we, together with +each of the myriads of races that the myriads of suns +have brought forth, shall be the conscious cells of his +body. If this dream should be fulfilled, an ocean of love +would beat upon our shores and the end of every life +would be to add a drop of water to this ocean's infinity." +And what is this cosmic dream of Bonnefon's but the +plastic representation of the Pauline apocatastasis?</p> + +<p>Yes, this dream, which has its origin far back in the +dawn of Christianity, is fundamentally the same as the +Pauline anacefaleosis, the fusion of all men in Man, in +the whole of Humanity embodied in a Person, who is +Christ, and the fusion not only of all men but of all +things, and the subsequent subjection of all things to +God, in order that God, Consciousness, may be all in all. +And this supposes a collective redemption and a society +beyond the grave.</p> + +<p>In the middle of the eighteenth century, two pietists of +Protestant origin, Johann Jakob Moser and Friedrich +Christoph Oetinger, gave a new force and value to the +Pauline anacefaleosis. Moser "declared that his +religion consisted not in holding certain doctrines to be +true and in living a virtuous life conformably therewith, +but in being reunited to God through Christ. But this +demands the thorough knowledge—a knowledge that +goes on increasing until the end of life—of one's own +sins and also of the mercy and patience of God, the +transformation of all natural feelings, the appropriation +of the atonement wrought by the death of Christ, the +enjoyment of peace with God in the permanent witness +<a name="Page_253" id="Page_253" />of the Holy Spirit to the remission of sins, the ordering +of life according to the pattern of Christ, which is the +fruit of faith alone, the drawing near to God and the +intercourse of the soul with Him, the disposition to die +in grace and the joyful expectation of the Judgement +which will bestow blessedness in the more intimate +enjoyment of God and in the <i>commerce with all the +saints</i>" (Ritschl, <i>Geschichte des Pietismus</i>, vol. iii., +§ 43). The commerce with all the saints—that is to say, +the eternal human society. And for his part, Oetinger +considers eternal happiness not as the contemplation of +God in His infinitude, but, taking the Epistle to the +Ephesians as his authority, as the contemplation of God +in the harmony of the creature with Christ. The commerce +with all the saints was, according to him, essential +to the content of eternal happiness. It was the realization +of the kingdom of God, which thus comes to be the +kingdom of Man. And in his exposition of these doctrines +of the two pietists, Ritschl confesses <i>(op. cit.</i>, iii., +§ 46) that both witnesses have with these doctrines contributed +something to Protestantism that is of like value +with the theological method of Spener, another pietist.</p> + +<p>We see, therefore, that the Christian, mystical, inward +longing ever since St. Paul, has been to give human +finality, or divine finality, to the Universe, to save +human consciousness, and to save it by converting all +humanity into a person. This longing is expressed in +the anacefaleosis, the gathering together of all things, all +things in earth and in heaven, the visible and the +invisible, in Christ, and also in the apocatastasis, the +return of all things to God, to consciousness, in order +that God may be all in all. And does not God's being +all in all mean that all things shall acquire consciousness +and that in this consciousness everything that has happened +will come to life again, and that everything that +has existed in time will be eternalized? And within the +all, all individual consciousnesses, those which have +<a name="Page_254" id="Page_254" />been, those that are, and those that will be, and as they +have been, as they are, and as they will be, will exist in +a condition of society and solidarity.</p> + +<p>But does not this awakening to consciousness of everything +that has been, necessarily involve a fusion of the +identical, an amalgamation of like things? In this conversion +of the human race into a true society in Christ, a +communion of saints, a kingdom of heaven, will not +individual differences, tainted as they are with deceit +and even with sin, be obliterated, and in the perfect +society will that alone remain of each man which was +the essential part of him? Would it not perhaps result, +according to Bonnefon's supposition, that this consciousness +that lived in the twentieth century in this corner of +this earth would feel itself to be the same with other such +consciousnesses as have lived in other centuries and +perhaps in other worlds?</p> + +<p>And how can we conceive of an effective and real +union, a substantial and intimate union, soul with soul, +of all those who have been?</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>If any two creatures grew into one</div> +<div>They would do more than the world has done,</div></div> +</div> + +<p>said Browning in <i>The Flight of the Duchess</i>; and Christ +has told us that where two or three are gathered together +in His name, there is He in the midst of them.</p> + +<p>Heaven, then, so it is believed by many, is society, a +more perfect society than that of this world; it is human +society fused into a person. And there are not wanting +some who believe that the tendency of all human progress +is the conversion of our species into one collective being +with real consciousness—is not perhaps an individual +human organism a kind of confederation of cells?—and +that when it shall have acquired full consciousness, all +those who have existed will come to life again in it.</p> + +<p>Heaven, so many think, is society. Just as no one +can live in isolation, so no one can survive in isolation. +<a name="Page_255" id="Page_255" />No one can enjoy God in heaven who sees his brother +suffering in hell, for the sin and the merit were common +to both. We think with the thoughts of others and we +feel with the feelings of others. To see God when God +shall be all in all is to see all things in God and to live +in God with all things.</p> + +<p>This splendid dream of the final solidarity of mankind +is the Pauline anacefaleosis and apocatastasis. We +Christians, said the Apostle (I Cor. xii. 27) are the body +of Christ, members of Him, flesh of His flesh and bone +of His bone (Eph. v. 30), branches of the vine.</p> + +<p>But in this final solidarization, in this true and supreme +<i>Christination</i> of all creatures, what becomes of each +individual consciousness? what becomes of Me, of this +poor fragile I, this I that is the slave of time and space, +this I which reason tells me is a mere passing accident, +but for the saving of which I live and suffer and hope +and believe? Granting that the human finality of the +Universe is saved, that consciousness is saved, would I +resign myself to make the sacrifice of this poor I, by +which and by which alone I know this finality and this +consciousness?</p> + +<p>And here, facing this supreme religious sacrifice, we +reach the summit of the tragedy, the very heart of it—the +sacrifice of our own individual consciousness upon +the altar of the perfected Human Consciousness, of the +Divine Consciousness.</p> + +<p>But is there really a tragedy? If we could attain to a +clear vision of this anacefaleosis, if we could succeed in +understanding and feeling that we were going to enrich +Christ, should we hesitate for a moment in surrendering +ourselves utterly to Him? Would the stream that flows +into the sea, and feels in the freshness of its waters the +bitterness of the salt of the ocean, wish to flow back to its +source? would it wish to return to the cloud which drew +its life from the sea? is not its joy to feel itself absorbed?</p> + +<p>And yet....</p> + +<p><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256" />Yes, in spite of everything, this is the climax of the +tragedy.</p> + +<p>And the soul, my soul at least, longs for something +else, not absorption, not quietude, not peace, not appeasement, +it longs ever to approach and never to arrive, it +longs for a never-ending longing, for an eternal hope +which is eternally renewed but never wholly fulfilled. +And together with all this, it longs for an eternal lack +of something and an eternal suffering. A suffering, a +pain, thanks to which it grows without ceasing in consciousness +and in longing. Do not write upon the gate +of heaven that sentence which Dante placed over the +threshold of hell, <i>Lasciate ogni speranza!</i> Do not +destroy time! Our life is a hope which is continually +converting itself into memory and memory in its turn +begets hope. Give us leave to live! The eternity that +is like an eternal present, without memory and without +hope, is death. Thus do ideas exist, but not thus do men +live. Thus do ideas exist in the God-Idea, but not thus +can men live in the living God, in the God-Man.</p> + +<p>An eternal purgatory, then, rather than a heaven of +glory; an eternal ascent. If there is an end of all suffering, +however pure and spiritualized we may suppose it to +be, if there is an end of all desire, what is it that makes +the blessed in paradise go on living? If in paradise +they do not suffer for want of God, how shall they love +Him? And if even there, in the heaven of glory, while +they behold God little by little and closer and closer, yet +without ever wholly attaining to Him, there does not +always remain something more for them to know and +desire, if there does not always remain a substratum of +doubt, how shall they not fall asleep?</p> + +<p>Or, to sum up, if in heaven there does not remain +something of this innermost tragedy of the soul, what +sort of a life is that? Is there perhaps any greater joy +than that of remembering misery—and to remember it is +to feel it—in time of felicity? Does not the prison +<a name="Page_257" id="Page_257" />haunt the freed prisoner? Does he not miss his former +dreams of liberty?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Mythological dreams! it will be said. And I have not +pretended that they are anything else. But has not the +mythological dream its content of truth? Are not dream +and myth perhaps revelations of an inexpressible truth, +of an irrational truth, of a truth that cannot be proven?</p> + +<p>Mythology! Perhaps; but, as in the days of Plato, +we must needs mythologize when we come to deal with +the other life. But we have just seen that whenever we +seek to give a form that is concrete, conceivable, or in +other words, rational, to our primary, primordial, and +fundamental longing for an eternal life conscious of itself +and of its personal individuality, esthetic, logical, and +ethical absurdities are multiplied and there is no way of +conceiving the beatific vision and the apocatastasis that +is free from contradictions and inconsistencies.</p> + +<p>And nevertheless!...</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, yes, we must needs long for it, however +absurd it may appear to us; nay, more, we must needs +believe in it, in some way or another, in order that we +may live. In order that we may live, eh? not in order +that we may understand the Universe. We must needs +believe in it, and to believe in it is to be religious. +Christianity, the only religion which we Europeans of +the twentieth century are really capable of feeling, is, as +Kierkegaard said, a desperate sortie (<i>Afsluttende +uvidenskabelig Efterskrift</i>, ii., i., cap. i.), a sortie which +can be successful only by means of the martyrdom of +faith, which is, according to this same tragic thinker, the +crucifixion of reason.</p> + +<p>Not without reason did he who had the right to do so +speak of the foolishness of the cross. Foolishness, without +doubt, foolishness. And the American humorist, +Oliver Wendell Holmes, was not altogether wide of the +mark in making one of the characters in his ingenious +<a name="Page_258" id="Page_258" />conversations say that he thought better of those who +were confined in a lunatic asylum on account of religious +mania than of those who, while professing the same +religious principles, kept their wits and appeared to enjoy +life very well outside of the asylums.<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53" /><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> But those who +are at large, are they not really, thanks to God, mad +too? Are there not mild madnesses, which not only +permit us to mix with our neighbours without danger to +society, but which rather enable us to do so, for by means +of them we are able to attribute a meaning and finality +to life and society themselves?</p> + +<p>And after all, what is madness and how can we +distinguish it from reason, unless we place ourselves +outside both the one and the other, which for us is +impossible?</p> + +<p>Madness perhaps it is, and great madness, to seek to +penetrate into the mystery of the Beyond; madness to +seek to superimpose the self-contradictory dreams of our +imagination upon the dictates of a sane reason. And a +sane reason tells us that nothing can be built up without +foundations, and that it is not merely an idle but a subversive +task to fill the void of the unknown with fantasies. +And nevertheless....</p> + +<p>We must needs believe in the other life, in the eternal +life beyond the grave, and in an individual and personal +life, in a life in which each one of us may feel his consciousness +and fed that it is united, without being confounded, +with all other consciousnesses in the Supreme +Consciousness, in God; we must needs believe in that +other life in order that we may live this life, and endure +it, and give it meaning and finality. And we must needs +believe in that other life, perhaps, in order that we may +deserve it, in order that we may obtain it, for it may be +that he neither deserves it nor will obtain it who does not +passionately desire it above reason and, if need be, +against reason.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259" />And above all, we must feel and act as if an endless +continuation of our earthly life awaited us after death; +and if it be that nothingness is the fate that awaits us we +must not, in the words of <i>Obermann</i>, so act that it shall +be a just fate.</p> + +<p>And this leads us directly to the examination of the +practical or ethical aspect of our sole problem.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47" /><a href="#FNanchor_47_47">[47]</a> <i>De natura deorum</i>, lib. i., cap. 41.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48" /><a href="#FNanchor_48_48">[48]</a> <i>Op. cit.</i></p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49" /><a href="#FNanchor_49_49">[49]</a> <i>Guía Espiritual que desembaraza al alma y la conduce por el interior +camino para alcanzar la perfecta contemplación y el rico tesoro de la paz interior</i>, +book iii., chap. xviii., § 185.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50" /><a href="#FNanchor_50_50">[50]</a></p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>O land of Alvargonzález,</div> +<div>In the heart of Spain,</div> +<div>Sad land, poor land,</div> +<div>So sad that it has a soul!</div></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51" /><a href="#FNanchor_51_51">[51]</a></p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>To living a life of blessed quiet here on earth,</div> +<div>Either matter or soul is a hindrance.</div></div> +</div> + +<p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52" /><a href="#FNanchor_52_52">[52]</a> Eso que llaman derecho penal, y que es todo menos derecho.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53" /><a href="#FNanchor_53_53">[53]</a> <i>The Autocrat of the Breakfast-table.</i></p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI" /><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260" />XI</h2> + +<h2>THE PRACTICAL PROBLEM</h2> + +<blockquote><p>L'homme est périssable. II se peut; mais périssons en résistant, et, si le +néant nous est reservé, ne faisons pas que ce soit une justice.—SÉNANCOUR: +<i>Obermann</i>, lettre xc.</p></blockquote> + +<p>Several times in the devious course of these essays I +have defined, in spite of my horror of definitions, my +own position with regard to the problem that I have been +examining; but I know there will always be some dissatisfied +reader, educated in some dogmatism or other, +who will say: "This man comes to no conclusion, he +vacillates—now he seems to affirm one thing and then its +contrary—he is full of contradictions—I can't label him. +What is he?" Just this—one who affirms contraries, a +man of contradiction and strife, as Jeremiah said of +himself; one who says one thing with his heart and the +contrary with his head, and for whom this conflict is the +very stuff of life. And that is as clear as the water that +flows from the melted snow upon the mountain tops.</p> + +<p>I shall be told that this is an untenable position, that a +foundation must be laid upon which to build our action +and our works, that it is impossible to live by contradictions, +that unity and clarity are essential conditions of +life and thought, and that it is necessary to unify thought. +And this leaves us as we were before. For it is precisely +this inner contradiction that unifies my life and gives it +its practical purpose.</p> + +<p>Or rather it is the conflict itself, it is this self-same +passionate uncertainty, that unifies my action and makes +me live and work.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261" />We think in order that we may live, I have said; but +perhaps it were more correct to say that we think because +we live, and the form of our thought corresponds with +that of our life. Once more I must repeat that our +ethical and philosophical doctrines in general are usually +merely the justification <i>a posteriori</i> of our conduct, of +our actions. Our doctrines are usually the means we +seek in order to explain and justify to others and to ourselves +our own mode of action. And this, be it observed, +not merely for others, but for ourselves. The man who +does not really know why he acts as he does and not +otherwise, feels the necessity of explaining to himself +the motive of his action and so he forges a motive. What +we believe to be the motives of our conduct are usually +but the pretexts for it. The very same reason which one +man may regard as a motive for taking care to prolong +his life may be regarded by another man as a motive for +shooting himself.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless it cannot be denied that reasons, ideas, +have an influence upon human actions, and sometimes +even determine them, by a process analogous to that of +suggestion upon a hypnotized person, and this is so +because of the tendency in every idea to resolve itself into +action—an idea being simply an inchoate or abortive act. +It was this notion that suggested to Fouillée his theory +of idea-forces. But ordinarily ideas are forces which we +accommodate to other forces, deeper and much less +conscious.</p> + +<p>But putting all this aside for the present, what I wish +to establish is that uncertainty, doubt, perpetual wrestling +with the mystery of our final destiny, mental despair, +and the lack of any solid and stable dogmatic foundation, +may be the basis of an ethic.</p> + +<p>He who bases or thinks that he bases his conduct—his +inward or his outward conduct, his feeling or his action—upon +a dogma or theoretical principle which he deems +incontrovertible, runs the risk of becoming a fanatic, +<a name="Page_262" id="Page_262" />and moreover, the moment that this dogma is weakened +or shattered, the morality based upon it gives way. If, +the earth that he thought firm begins to rock, he himself +trembles at the earthquake, for we do not all come up +to the standard of the ideal Stoic who remains undaunted +among the ruins of a world shattered into atoms. Happily +the stuff that is underneath a man's ideas will save him. +For if a man should tell you that he does not defraud or +cuckold his best friend only because he is afraid of hell, +you may depend upon it that neither would he do so even +if he were to cease to believe in hell, but that he would +invent some other excuse instead. And this is all to the +honour of the human race.</p> + +<p>But he who believes that he is sailing, perhaps without +a set course, on an unstable and sinkable raft, must not +be dismayed if the raft gives way beneath his feet and +threatens to sink. Such a one thinks that he acts, not +because he deems his principle of action to be true, but +in order to make it true, in order to prove its truth, in +order to create his own spiritual world.</p> + +<p>My conduct must be the best proof, the moral proof, +of my supreme desire; and if I do not end by convincing +myself, within the bounds of the ultimate and irremediable +uncertainty, of the truth of what I hope for, +it is because my conduct is not sufficiently pure. Virtue, +therefore, is not based upon dogma, but dogma upon +virtue, and it is not faith that creates martyrs but martyrs +who create faith. There is no security or repose—so far +as security and repose are obtainable in this life, so essentially +insecure and unreposeful—save in conduct that is +passionately good.</p> + +<p>Conduct, practice, is the proof of doctrine, theory. +"If any man will do His will—the will of Him that +sent me," said Jesus, "he shall know of the doctrine, +whether it be of God or whether I speak of myself" +(John vii. 17); and there is a well-known saying of +Pascal: "Begin by taking holy water and you will end +<a name="Page_263" id="Page_263" />by becoming a believer." And pursuing a similar train +of thought, Johann Jakob Moser, the pietist, was of the +opinion that no atheist or naturalist had the right to +regard the Christian religion as void of truth so long as +he had not put it to the proof by keeping its precepts +and commandments (Ritschl, <i>Geschichte des Pietismus</i>, +book vii., 43).</p> + +<p>What is our heart's truth, anti-rational though it be? +The immortality of the human soul, the truth of the +persistence of our consciousness without any termination +whatsoever, the truth of the human finality of the +Universe. And what is its moral proof? We may +formulate it thus: Act so that in your own judgement +and in the judgement of others you may merit eternity, +act so that you may become irreplaceable, act so that you +may not merit death. Or perhaps thus: Act as if you +were to die to-morrow, but to die in order to survive and +be eternalized. The end of morality is to give personal, +human finality to the Universe; to discover the finality +that belongs to it—if indeed it has any finality—and to +discover it by acting.</p> + +<p>More than a century ago, in 1804, in Letter XC of that +series that constitutes the immense monody of his <i>Obermann</i>, +Sénancour wrote the words which I have put at +the head of this chapter—and of all the spiritual +descendants of the patriarchal Rousseau, Sénancour +was the most profound and the most intense; of all the +men of heart and feeling that France has produced, not +excluding Pascal, he was the most tragic. "Man is +perishable. That may be; but let us perish resisting, +and if it is nothingness that awaits us, do not let us so +act that it shall be a just fate." Change this sentence +from its negative to the positive form—"And if it is +nothingness that awaits us, let us so act that it shall be +an unjust fate"—and you get the firmest basis of action +for the man who cannot or will not be a dogmatist.</p> + +<p>That which is irreligious and demoniacal, that which +<a name="Page_264" id="Page_264" />incapacitates us for action and leaves us without any ideal +defence against our evil tendencies, is the pessimism +that Goethe puts into the mouth of Mephistopheles when +he makes him say, "All that has achieved existence +deserves to be destroyed" (<i>denn alles was ensteht ist +wert doss es zugrunde geht</i>). This is the pessimism +which we men call evil, and not that other pessimism +that consists in lamenting what it fears to be true and +struggling against this fear—namely, that everything is +doomed to annihilation in the end. Mephistopheles +asserts that everything that exists deserves to be destroyed, +annihilated, but not that everything will be destroyed or +annihilated; and we assert that everything that exists +deserves to be exalted and eternalized, even though no +such fate is in store for it. The moral attitude is the +reverse of this.</p> + +<p>Yes, everything deserves to be eternalized, absolutely +everything, even evil itself, for that which we call evil +would lose its evilness in being eternalized, because it +would lose its temporal nature. For the essence of evil +consists in its temporal nature, in its not applying itself +to any ultimate and permanent end.</p> + +<p>And it might not be superfluous here to say something +about that distinction, more overlaid with confusion than +any other, between what we are accustomed to call +optimism and pessimism, a confusion not less than that +which exists with regard to the distinction between +individualism and socialism. Indeed, it is scarcely possible +to form a clear idea as to what pessimism really is.</p> + +<p>I have just this very day read in the <i>Nation</i> (July 6, +1912) an article, entitled "A Dramatic Inferno," that +deals with an English translation of the works of Strindberg, +and it opens with the following judicious observations: +"If there were in the world a sincere and total +pessimism, it would of necessity be silent. The despair +which finds a voice is a social mood, it is the cry of +misery which brother utters to brother when both are +<a name="Page_265" id="Page_265" />stumbling through a valley of shadows which is peopled +with—comrades. In its anguish it bears witness to +something that is good in life, for it presupposes sympathy ... The +real gloom, the sincere despair, is +dumb and blind; it writes no books, and feels no impulse +to burden an intolerable universe with a monument more +lasting than brass." Doubtless there is something of +sophistry in this criticism, for the man who is really in +pain weeps and even cries aloud, even if he is alone and +there is nobody to hear him, simply as a means of +alleviating his pain, although this perhaps may be a +result of social habits. But does not the lion, alone in +the desert, roar if he has an aching tooth? But apart +from this, it cannot be denied that there is a substance +of truth underlying these remarks. The pessimism that +protests and defends itself cannot be truly said to be +pessimism. And, in truth, still less is it pessimism to +hold that nothing ought to perish although all things +may be doomed to annihilation, while on the other hand +it is pessimism to affirm that all things ought to be +annihilated even though nothing may perish.</p> + +<p>Pessimism, moreover, may possess different values. +There is a eudemonistic or economic pessimism, that +which denies happiness; there is an ethical pessimism, +that which denies the triumph of moral good; and there +is a religious pessimism, that which despairs of the +human finality of the Universe, of the eternal salvation +of the individual soul.</p> + +<p>All men deserve to be saved, but, as I have said in the +previous chapter, he above all deserves immortality who +desires it passionately and even in the face of reason. +An English writer, H.G. Wells, who has taken upon +himself the rôle of the prophet (a thing not uncommon in +his country), tells us in <i>Anticipations</i> that "active and +capable men of all forms of religious profession tend in +practice to disregard the question of immortality +altogether." And this is because the religious professions +<a name="Page_266" id="Page_266" />of these active and capable men to whom Wells refers are +usually simply a lie, and their lives are a lie, too, if they +seek to base them upon religion. But it may be that at +bottom there is not so much truth in what Wells asserts as +he and others imagine. These active and capable men live +in the midst of a society imbued with Christian principles, +surrounded by institutions and social feelings +that are the product of Christianity, and faith in the +immortality of the soul exists deep down in their own +souls like a subterranean river, neither seen nor heard, +but watering the roots of their deeds and their motives.</p> + +<p>It must be admitted that there exists in truth no more +solid foundation for morality than the foundation of the +Catholic ethic. The end of man is eternal happiness, +which consists in the vision and enjoyment of God <i>in +sæcula sæculorum</i>. Where it errs, however, is in the +choice of the means conducive to this end; for to make +the attainment of eternal happiness dependent upon +believing or not believing in the Procession of the Holy +Ghost from the Father and the Son and not from the +Father alone, or in the Divinity of Jesus, or in the theory +of the Hypostatic Union, or even in the existence of +God, is, as a moment's reflection will show, nothing less +than monstrous. A human God—and that is the only +kind of God we are able to conceive—would never reject +him who was unable to believe in Him with his head, +and it is not in his head but in his heart that the wicked +man says that there is no God, which is equivalent to +saying that he wishes that there may not be a God. If +any belief could be bound up with the attainment of +eternal happiness it would be the belief in this happiness +itself and in the possibility of it.</p> + +<p>And what shall we say of that other proposition of the +king of pedants, to the effect that we have not come into +the world to be happy but to fulfil our duty (<i>Wir sind +nicht auf der Welt, um glücklich zu sein, sondern um +unsere Schuldigkeit zu tun</i>)? If we are in the world <i>for</i> +<a name="Page_267" id="Page_267" />something (<i>um etwas</i>), whence can this <i>for</i> be derived +but from the very essence of our own will, which asks for +happiness and not duty as the ultimate end? And if it +is sought to attribute some other value to this <i>for</i>, an +objective value, as some Sadducean pedant would say, +then it must be recognized that the objective reality, that +which would remain even though humanity should disappear, +is as indifferent to our duty as to our happiness, +is as little concerned with our morality as with our +felicity. I am not aware that Jupiter, Uranus, or Sirius +would allow their course to be affected by the fact that +we are or are not fulfilling our duty any more than by the +fact that we are or are not happy.</p> + +<p>Such considerations must appear to these pedants to +be characterized by a ridiculous vulgarity and a dilettante +superficiality. (The intellectual world is divided into +two classes—dilettanti on the one hand, and pedants on +the other.) What choice, then, have we? The modern +man is he who resigns himself to the truth and is content +to be ignorant of the synthesis of culture—witness what +Windelband says on this head in his study of the fate +of Hölderlin (<i>Praeludien</i>, i.). Yes, these men of culture +are resigned, but there remain a few poor savages like +ourselves for whom resignation is impossible. We do +not resign ourselves to the idea of having one day to +disappear, and the criticism of the great Pedant does not +console us.</p> + +<p>The quintessence of common sense was expressed by +Galileo Galilei when he said: "Some perhaps will say +that the bitterest pain is the loss of life, but I say that +there are others more bitter; for whosoever is deprived of +life is deprived at the same time of the power to lament, +not only this, but any other loss whatsoever." Whether +Galileo was conscious or not of the humour of this sentence +I do not know, but it is a tragic humour.</p> + +<p>But, to turn back, I repeat that if the attainment of +eternal happiness could be bound up with any particular +<a name="Page_268" id="Page_268" />belief, it would be with the belief in the possibility of its +realization. And yet, strictly speaking, not even with +this. The reasonable man says in his head, "There is +no other life after this," but only the wicked says it in +his heart. But since the wicked man is possibly only a +man who has been driven to despair, will a human God +condemn him because of his despair? His despair alone +is misfortune enough.</p> + +<p>But in any event let us adopt the Calderónian formula +in <i>La Vida es Sueño</i>:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Que estoy soñando y que quiero</i></div> +<div><i>obrar hacer bien, pues no se pierde</i></div> +<div><i>el hacer bien aun en sueños</i><a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54" /><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>But are good deeds really not lost? Did Calderón know? +And he added:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Acudamos a lo eterno</i></div> +<div><i>que es la fama vividora</i></div> +<div><i>donde ni duermen las dichas</i></div> +<div><i>no las grandezas reposan</i><a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55" /><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>Is it really so? Did Calderón know?</p> + +<p>Calderón had faith, robust Catholic faith; but for him +who lacks faith, for him who cannot believe in what +Don Pedro Calderón de la Barca believed, there always +remains the attitude of <i>Obermann</i>.</p> + +<p>If it is nothingness that awaits us, let us make an injustice +of it; let us fight against destiny, even though without +hope of victory; let us fight against it quixotically.</p> + +<p>And not only do we fight against destiny in longing +for what is irrational, but in acting in such a way that +we make ourselves irreplaceable, in impressing our seal +and mark upon others, in acting upon our neighbours in +order to dominate them, in giving ourselves to them in +order that we may eternalize ourselves so far as we can.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269" />Our greatest endeavour must be to make ourselves +irreplaceable; to make the theoretical fact—if this expression +does not involve a contradiction in terms—the +fact that each one of us is unique and irreplaceable, that +no one else can fill the gap that will be left when we die, +a practical truth.</p> + +<p>For in fact each man is unique and irreplaceable; there +cannot be any other I; each one of us—our soul, that is, +not our life—is worth the whole Universe. I say the +spirit and not the life, for the ridiculously exaggerated +value which those attach to human life who, not really +believing in the spirit—that is to say, in their personal +immortality—tirade against war and the death penalty, +for example, is a value which they attach to it precisely +because they do not really believe in the spirit of which +life is the servant. For life is of use only in so far as it +serves its lord and master, spirit, and if the master +perishes with the servant, neither the one nor the other +is of any great value.</p> + +<p>And to act in such a way as to make our annihilation +an injustice, in such a way as to make our brothers, our +sons, and our brothers' sons, and their sons' sons, feel +that we ought not to have died, is something that is +within the reach of all.</p> + +<p>The essence of the doctrine of the Christian redemption +is in the fact that he who suffered agony and death +was the unique man—that is, Man, the Son of Man, or +the Son of God; that he, because he was sinless, did not +deserve to have died; and that this propitiatory divine +victim died in order that he might rise again and that +he might raise us up from the dead, in order that he +might deliver us from death by applying his merits to +us and showing us the way of life. And the Christ who +gave himself for his brothers in humanity with an +absolute self-abnegation is the pattern for our action to +shape itself on.</p> + +<p>All of us, each one of us, can and ought to determine +<a name="Page_270" id="Page_270" />to give as much of himself as he possibly can—nay, to +give more than he can, to exceed himself, to go beyond +himself, to make himself irreplaceable, to give himself +to others in order that he may receive himself back again +from them. And each one in his own civil calling or +office. The word office, <i>officium</i>, means obligation, +debt, but in the concrete, and that is what it always +ought to mean in practice. We ought not so much to +try to seek that particular calling which we think most +fitting and suitable for ourselves, as to make a calling of +that employment in which chance, Providence, or our +own will has placed us.</p> + +<p>Perhaps Luther rendered no greater service to Christian +civilization than that of establishing the religious value +of the civil occupation, of shattering the monastic and +medieval idea of the religious calling, an idea involved in +the mist of human passions and imaginations and the +cause of terrible life tragedies. If we could but enter into +the cloister and examine the religious vocation of those +whom the self-interest of their parents had forced as +children into a novice's cell and who had suddenly +awakened to the life of the world—if indeed they ever do +awake!—or of those whom their own self-delusions had +led into it! Luther saw this life of the cloister at close +quarters and suffered it himself, and therefore he was +able to understand and feel the religious value of the +civil calling, to which no man is bound by perpetual vows.</p> + +<p>All that the Apostle said in the fourth chapter of his +Epistle to the Ephesians with regard to the respective +functions of Christians in the Church must be transferred +and applied to the civil or non-ecclesiastical life, for +to-day among ourselves the Christian—whether he know +it or not, and whether he like it or not—is the citizen, and +just as the Apostle exclaimed, "I am a Roman citizen!" +each one of us, even the atheist, might exclaim "I am a +Christian!" And this demands the <i>civilizing</i>, in the +sense of dis-ecclesiasticizing, of Christianity, which was +<a name="Page_271" id="Page_271" />Luther's task, although he himself eventually became the +founder of a Church.</p> + +<p>There is a common English phrase, "the right man in +the right place." To which we might rejoin, "Cobbler, +to thy last!" Who knows what is the post that suits +him best and for which he is most fitted? Does a man +himself know it better than others or do they know it +better than he? Who can measure capacities and +aptitudes? The religious attitude, undoubtedly, is to +endeavour to make the occupation in which we find ourselves +our vocation, and only in the last resort to change +it for another.</p> + +<p>This question of the proper vocation is possibly the +gravest and most deep-seated of social problems, that +which is at the root of all the others. That which is +known <i>par excellence</i> as the social question is perhaps +not so much a problem of the distribution of wealth, of +the products of labour, as a problem of the distribution of +avocations, of the modes of production. It is not aptitude—a +thing impossible to ascertain without first putting +it to the test and not always clearly indicated in a man, for +with regard to the majority of callings a man is not born +but made—it is not special aptitude, but rather social, +political, and customary reasons that determine a man's +occupation. At certain times and in certain countries it +is caste and heredity; at other times and in other places, +the guild or corporation; in later times machinery—in +almost all cases necessity; liberty scarcely ever. And +the tragedy of it culminates in those occupations, pandering +to evil, in which the soul is sacrificed for the sake of +the livelihood, in which the workman works with the +consciousness, not of the uselessness merely, but of the +social perversity, of his work, manufacturing the poison +that will kill him, the weapon, perchance, with which his +children will be murdered. This, and not the question +of wages, is the gravest problem.</p> + +<p>I shall never forget a scene of which I was a witness +<a name="Page_272" id="Page_272" />that took place on the banks of the river that flows through +Bilbao, my native town. A workman was hammering at +something in a shipwright's yard, working without putting +his heart into his work, as if he lacked energy or +worked merely for the sake of getting a wage, when +suddenly a woman's voice was heard crying, "Help! +help!" A child had fallen into the river. Instantly +the man was transformed. With an admirable energy, +promptitude, and sang-froid he threw off his clothes and +plunged into the water to rescue the drowning infant.</p> + +<p>Possibly the reason why there is less bitterness in the +agrarian socialist movement than in that of the towns is +that the field labourer, although his wages and his +standard of living are no better than those of the miner +or artisan, has a clearer consciousness of the social value +of his work. Sowing corn is a different thing from +extracting diamonds from the earth.</p> + +<p>And it may be that the greatest social progress consists +in a certain indifferentiation of labour, in the facility for +exchanging one kind of work for another, and that other +not perhaps a more lucrative, but a nobler one—for there +are degrees of nobility in labour. But unhappily it is +only too seldom that a man who keeps to one occupation +without changing is concerned with making a religious +vocation of it, or that the man who changes his occupation +for another does so from any religious motive.</p> + +<p>And do you not know cases in which a man, justifying +his action on the ground that the professional organism +to which he belongs and in which he works is badly +organized and does not function as it ought, will evade +the strict performance of his duty on the pretext that he +is thereby fulfilling a higher duty? Is not this insistence +upon the literal carrying out of orders called disciplinarianism, +and do not people speak disparagingly of +bureaucracy and the Pharisaism of public officials? And +cases occur not unlike that of an intelligent and studious +military officer who should discover the deficiencies of +<a name="Page_273" id="Page_273" />his country's military organization and denounce them to +his superiors and perhaps to the public—thereby fulfilling +his duty—and who, when on active service, should refuse +to carry out an operation which he was ordered to undertake, +believing that there was but scant probability of +success or rather certainty of failure, so long as these +deficiencies remained unremedied. He would deserve to +be shot. And as for this question of Pharisaism ...</p> + +<p>And there is always a way of obeying an order while +yet retaining the command, a way of carrying out what +one believes to be an absurd operation while correcting +its absurdity, even though it involve one's own death. +When in my bureaucratic capacity I have come across +some legislative ordinance that has fallen into desuetude +because of its manifest absurdity, I have always +endeavoured to apply it. There is nothing worse than a +loaded pistol which nobody uses left lying in some corner +of the house; a child finds it, begins to play with it, and +kills its own father. Laws that have fallen into desuetude +are the most terrible of all laws, when the cause of the +desuetude is the badness of the law.</p> + +<p>And these are not groundless suppositions, and least +of all in our country. For there are many who, while +they go about looking out for I know not what ideal—that +is to say, fictitious duties and responsibilities—neglect +the duty of putting their whole soul into the immediate +and concrete business which furnishes them with a +living; and the rest, the immense majority, perform their +task perfunctorily, merely for the sake of nominally complying +with their duty—<i>para cumplir</i>, a terribly immoral +phrase—in order to get themselves out of a difficulty, to +get the job done, to qualify for their wages without earning +them, whether these wages be pecuniary or otherwise.</p> + +<p>Here you have a shoemaker who lives by making shoes, +and makes them with just enough care and attention to +keep his clientèle together without losing custom. +Another shoemaker lives on a somewhat higher spiritual +<a name="Page_274" id="Page_274" />plane, for he has a proper love for his work, and out of +pride or a sense of honour strives for the reputation of +being the best shoemaker in the town or in the kingdom, +even though this reputation brings him no increase of +custom or profit, but only renown and prestige. But +there is a still higher degree of moral perfection in this +business of shoemaking, and that is for the shoemaker to +aspire to become for his fellow-townsmen the one and +only shoemaker, indispensable and irreplaceable, the +shoemaker who looks after their footgear so well that they +will feel a definite loss when he dies—when he is "dead +to them," not merely "dead"<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56" /><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a>—and they will feel that +he ought not to have died. And this will result from the +fact that in working for them he was anxious to spare +them any discomfort and to make sure that it should not +be any preoccupation with their feet that should prevent +them from being at leisure to contemplate the higher +truths; he shod them for the love of them and for the +love of God in them—he shod them religiously.</p> + +<p>I have chosen this example deliberately, although it +may perhaps appear to you somewhat pedestrian. For +the fact is that in this business of shoemaking, the +religious, as opposed to the ethical, sense is at a very +low ebb.</p> + +<p>Working men group themselves in associations, they +form co-operative societies and unions for defence, they +fight very justly and nobly for the betterment of their +class; but it is not clear that these associations have any +great influence on their moral attitude towards their work. +They have succeeded in compelling employers to employ +only such workmen, and no others, as the respective unions +shall designate in each particular case; but in the selection +of those designated they pay little heed to their technical +fitness. Often the employer finds it almost impossible to +dismiss an inefficient workman on account of his inefficiency, +for his fellow-workers take his part. Their work, +<a name="Page_275" id="Page_275" />moreover, is often perfunctory, performed merely as a +pretext for receiving a wage, and instances even occur +when they deliberately mishandle it in order to injure +their employer.</p> + +<p>In attempting to justify this state of things, it may be +said that the employers are a hundred times more blameworthy +than the workmen, for they are not concerned to +give a better wage to the man who does better work, or +to foster the general education and technical proficiency +of the workman, or to ensure the intrinsic goodness of +the article produced. The improvement of the product—which, +apart from reasons of industrial and mercantile +competition, ought to be in itself and for the good of the +consumers, for charity's sake, the chief end of the business—is +not so regarded either by employers or employed, +and this is because neither the one nor the other have any +religious sense of their social function. Neither of them +seek to make themselves irreplaceable. The evil is +aggravated when the business takes the unhappy form of +the impersonal limited company, for where there is no +longer any personal signature there is no longer any of +that pride which seeks to give the signature prestige, a +pride which in its way is a substitute for the craving for +eternalization. With the disappearance of the concrete +individuality, the basis of all religion, the religious sense +of the business calling disappears also.</p> + +<p>And what has been said of employers and workmen +applies still more to members of the liberal professions +and public functionaries. There is scarcely a single servant +of the State who feels the religious bearing of his +official and public duties. Nothing could be more unsatisfactory, +nothing more confused, than the feeling +among our people with regard to their duties towards the +State, and this sense of duty is still further obliterated by +the attitude of the Catholic Church, whose action so far +as the State is concerned is in strict truth anarchical. It +is no uncommon thing to find among its ministers +<a name="Page_276" id="Page_276" />upholders of the moral lawfulness of smuggling and contraband +as if in disobeying the legally constituted +authority the smuggler and contrabandist did not sin +against the Fourth Commandment of the law of God, +which in commanding us to honour our father and +mother commands us to obey all lawful authority in so +far as the ordinances of such authority are not contrary +(and the levying of these contributions is certainly not +contrary) to the law of God.</p> + +<p>There are many who, since it is written "In the sweat +of thy face shalt thou eat bread," regard work as a +punishment, and therefore they attribute merely an +economico-political, or at best an esthetic, value to the +work of everyday life. For those who take this view—and +it is the view principally held by the Jesuits—the +business of life is twofold: there is the inferior and +transitory business of winning a livelihood, of winning +bread for ourselves and our children in an honourable, +manner—and the elasticity of this honour is well known; +and there is the grand business of our salvation, of winning +eternal glory. This inferior or worldly business +is to be undertaken not only so as to permit us, without +deceiving or seriously injuring our neighbours, to live +decently in accordance with our social position, but also +so as to afford us the greatest possible amount of time +for attending to the other main business of our life. +And there are others who, rising somewhat above this +conception of the work of our civil occupation, a conception +which is economical rather than ethical, attain to +an esthetic conception and sense of it, and this involves +endeavouring to acquire distinction and renown in our +occupation, the converting of it into an art for art's sake, +for beauty's sake. But it is necessary to rise still higher +than this, to attain to an ethical sense of our civil calling, +to a sense which derives from our religious sense, from +our hunger of eternalization. To work at our ordinary +civil occupation, with eyes fixed on God, for the love of +<a name="Page_277" id="Page_277" />God, which is equivalent to saying for the love of our +eternalization, is to make of this work a work of +religion.</p> + +<p>That saying, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat +bread," does not mean that God condemned man to +work, but to the painfulness of it. It would have been +no condemnation to have condemned man to work itself, +for work is the only practical consolation for having +been born. And, for a Christian, the proof that God +did not condemn man to work itself consists in the saying +of the Scripture that, before the Fall, while he was +still in a state of innocence, God took man and put him +in the garden "to dress it and to keep it" (Gen. ii. 15). +And how, in fact, would man have passed his time in +Paradise if he had had no work to do in keeping it in +order? And may it not be that the beatific vision itself +is a kind of work?</p> + +<p>And even if work were our punishment, we ought to +strive to make it, the punishment itself, our consolation +and our redemption; and if we must needs embrace some +cross or other, there is for each one of us no better cross +than the cross of our own civil calling. For Christ did +not say, "Take up my cross and follow me," but "Take +up thy cross and follow me": every man his own cross, +for the Saviour's cross the Saviour alone can bear. And +the imitation of Christ, therefore, does not consist in +that monastic ideal so shiningly set forth in the book +that commonly bears the name of à Kempis, an ideal +only applicable to a very limited number of persons and +therefore anti-Christian; but to imitate Christ is to take +up each one his own cross, the cross of his own civil +occupation—civil and not merely religions—as Christ +took up his cross, the cross of his calling, and to embrace +it and carry it, looking towards God and striving to +make each act of this calling a true prayer. In making +shoes and because he makes them a man can gain +heaven, provided that the shoemaker strives to be per<a name="Page_278" id="Page_278" />fect, +as a shoemaker, as our Father in heaven is +perfect.</p> + +<p>Fourier, the socialist dreamer, dreamed of making +work attractive in his phalansteries by the free choice of +vocations and in other ways. There is no other way +than that of liberty. Wherein consists the charm of the +game of chance, which is a kind of work, if not in the +voluntary submission of the player to the liberty of +Nature—that is, to chance? But do not let us lose ourselves +in a comparison between work and play.</p> + +<p>And the sense of making ourselves irreplaceable, of +not meriting death, of making our annihilation, if it is +annihilation that awaits us, an injustice, ought to impel +us not only to perform our own occupation religiously, +from love of God and love of our eternity and eternalization, +but to perform it passionately, tragically if you +like. It ought to impel us to endeavour to stamp others +with our seal, to perpetuate ourselves in them and in +their children by dominating them, to leave on all things +the imperishable impress of our signature. The most +fruitful ethic is the ethic of mutual imposition.</p> + +<p>Above all, we must recast in a positive form the negative +commandments which we have inherited from the +Ancient Law. Thus where it is written, "Thou shalt +not lie!" let us understand, "Thou shalt always speak +the truth, in season and out of season!" although it is +we ourselves, and not others, who are judges in each +case of this seasonableness. And for "Thou shalt not +kill!" let us understand, "Thou shalt give life and +increase it!" And for "Thou shalt not steal!" let us +say, "Thou shalt increase the general wealth!" And +for "Thou shalt not commit adultery!" "Thou shalt +give children, healthy, strong, and good, to thy country +and to heaven!" And thus with all the other commandments.</p> + +<p>He who does not lose his life shall not find it. Give +yourself then to others, but in order to give yourself to +<a name="Page_279" id="Page_279" />them, first dominate them. For it is not possible to +dominate except by being dominated. Everyone +nourishes himself upon the flesh of that which he +devours. In order that you may dominate your neighbour +you must know and love him. It is by attempting +to impose my ideas upon him that I become the recipient +of his ideas. To love my neighbour is to wish that he +may be like me, that he may be another I—that is to say, +it is to wish that I may be he; it is to wish to obliterate +the division between him and me, to suppress the evil. +My endeavour to impose myself upon another, to be and +live in him and by him, to make him mine—which is the +same as making myself his—is that which gives religious +meaning to human collectivity, to human solidarity.</p> + +<p>The feeling of solidarity originates in myself; since I +am a society, I feel the need of making myself master of +human society; since I am a social product, I must +socialize myself, and from myself I proceed to God—who +is I projected to the All—and from God to each of +my neighbours.</p> + +<p>My immediate first impulse is to protest against the +inquisitor and to prefer the merchant who comes to offer +me his wares. But when my impressions are clarified +by reflection, I begin to see that the inquisitor, when he +acts from a right motive, treats me as a man, as an end +in myself, and if he molests me it is from a charitable +wish to save my soul; while the merchant, on the other +hand, regards me merely as a customer, as a means to an +end, and his indulgence and tolerance is at bottom +nothing but a supreme indifference to my destiny. +There is much more humanity in the inquisitor.</p> + +<p>Similarly there is much more humanity in war than +in peace. Non-resistance to evil implies resistance to +good, and to take the offensive, leaving the defensive +out of the question, is perhaps the divinest thing in +humanity. War is the school of fraternity and the bond +of love; it is war that has brought peoples into touch +<a name="Page_280" id="Page_280" />with one another, by mutual aggression and collision, +and has been the cause of their knowing and loving one +another. Human love knows no purer embrace, or one +more fruitful in its consequences, than that between +victor and vanquished on the battlefield. And even the +purified hate that springs from war is fruitful. War is, +in its strictest sense, the sanctification of homicide; Cain +is redeemed as a leader of armies. And if Cain had not +killed his brother Abel, perhaps he would have died by +the hand of Abel. God revealed Himself above all in +war; He began by being the God of battles; and one of +the greatest services of the Cross is that, in the form +of the sword-hilt, it protects the hand that wields the +sword.</p> + +<p>The enemies of the State say that Cain, the fratricide, +was the founder of the State. And we must accept the +fact and turn it to the glory of the State, the child of +war. Civilization began on the day on which one man, +by subjecting another to his will and compelling him to +do the work of two, was enabled to devote himself to the +contemplation of the world and to set his captive upon +works of luxury. It was slavery that enabled Plato to +speculate upon the ideal republic, and it was war that +brought slavery about. Not without reason was Athena +the goddess of war and of wisdom. But is there any +need to repeat once again these obvious truths, which, +though they have continually been forgotten, are continually +rediscovered?</p> + +<p>And the supreme commandment that arises out of love +towards God, and the foundation of all morality, is this: +Yield yourself up entirely, give your spirit to the end +that you may save it, that you may eternalize it. Such +is the sacrifice of life.</p> + +<p>The individual <i>quâ</i> individual, the wretched captive of +the instinct of preservation and of the senses, cares only +about preserving himself, and all his concern is that +others should not force their way into his sphere, should +<a name="Page_281" id="Page_281" />not disturb him, should not interrupt his idleness; and +in return for their abstention or for the sake of example +he refrains from forcing himself upon them, from interrupting +their idleness, from disturbing them, from +taking possession of them. "Do not do unto others +what you would not have them do unto you," he translates +thus: I do not interfere with others—let them not +interfere with me. And he shrinks and pines and +perishes in this spiritual avarice and this repellent ethic +of anarchic individualism: each one for himself. And +as each one is not himself, he can hardly live for +himself.</p> + +<p>But as soon as the individual feels himself in society, +he feels himself in God, and kindled by the instinct of +perpetuation he glows with love towards God, and with +a dominating charity he seeks to perpetuate himself in +others, to perennialize his spirit, to eternalize it, to +unnail God, and his sole desire is to seal his spirit upon +other spirits and to receive their impress in return. He +has shaken off the yoke of his spiritual sloth and avarice.</p> + +<p>Sloth, it is said, is the mother of all the vices; and in +fact sloth does engender two vices—avarice and envy—which +in their turn are the source of all the rest. Sloth +is the weight of matter, in itself inert, within us, and this +sloth, while it professes to preserve us by economizing +our forces, in reality attenuates us and reduces us to +nothing.</p> + +<p>In man there is either too much matter or too much +spirit, or to put it better, either he feels a hunger for +spirit—that is, for eternity—or he feels a hunger for +matter—that is, submission to annihilation. When +spirit is in excess and he feels a hunger for yet more of +it, he pours it forth and scatters it abroad, and in scattering +it abroad he amplifies it with that of others; and on +the contrary, when a man is avaricious of himself and +thinks that he will preserve himself better by withdrawing +within himself, he ends by losing all—he is like the +<a name="Page_282" id="Page_282" />man who received the single talent: he buried it in order +that he might not lose it, and in the end he was bereft +of it. For to him that hath shall be given, but from +him that hath but a little shall be taken away even the +little that he hath.</p> + +<p>Be ye perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect, +we are bidden, and this terrible precept—terrible +because for us the infinite perfection of the Father is +unattainable—must be our supreme rule of conduct. +Unless a man aspires to the impossible, the possible +that he achieves will be scarcely worth the trouble of +achieving. It behoves us to aspire to the impossible, to +the absolute and infinite perfection, and to say to the +Father, "Father, I cannot—help Thou my impotence." +And He acting in us will achieve it for us.</p> + +<p>And to be perfect is to be all, it is to be myself and +to be all else, it is to be humanity, it is to be the Universe. +And there is no other way of being all but to give oneself +to all, and when all shall be in all, all will be in each one +of us. The apocatastasis is more than a mystical dream: +it is a rule of action, it is a beacon beckoning us to high +exploits.</p> + +<p>And from it springs the ethic of invasion, of domination, +of aggression, of inquisition if you like. For true +charity is a kind of invasion—it consists in putting my +spirit into other spirits, in giving them my suffering as +the food and consolation for their sufferings, in awakening +their unrest with my unrest, in sharpening their hunger +for God with my hunger for God. It is not charity to +rock and lull our brothers to sleep in the inertia and +drowsiness of matter, but rather to awaken them to the +uneasiness and torment of spirit.</p> + +<p>To the fourteen works of mercy which we learnt in the +Catechism of Christian Doctrine there should sometimes +be added yet another, that of awakening the sleeper. +Sometimes, at any rate, and surely when the sleeper +sleeps on the brink of a precipice, it is much more merciful +<a name="Page_283" id="Page_283" />to awaken him than to bury him after he is dead—let us +leave the dead to bury their dead. It has been well said, +"Whosoever loves thee dearly will make thee weep," +and charity often causes weeping. "The love that does +not mortify does not deserve so divine a name," said that +ardent Portuguese apostle, Fr. Thomé de Jesús,<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57" /><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> who +was also the author of this ejaculation—"O infinite fire, +O eternal love, who weepest when thou hast naught to +embrace and feed upon and many hearts to burn!" He +who loves his neighbour burns his heart, and the heart, +like green wood, in burning groans and distils itself in +tears.</p> + +<p>And to do this is generosity, one of the two mother +virtues which are born when inertia, sloth, is overcome. +Most of our miseries come from spiritual avarice.</p> + +<p>The cure for suffering—which, as we have said, is the +collision of consciousness with unconsciousness—is not +to be submerged in unconsciousness, but to be raised to +consciousness and to suffer more. The evil of suffering +is cured by more suffering, by higher suffering. Do not +take opium, but put salt and vinegar in the soul's wound, +for when you sleep and no longer feel the suffering, you +are not. And to be, that is imperative. Do not then +close your eyes to the agonizing Sphinx, but look her in +the face and let her seize you in her mouth and crunch you +with her hundred thousand poisonous teeth and swallow +you. And when she has swallowed you, you will know +the sweetness of the taste of suffering.</p> + +<p>The way thereto in practice is by the ethic of mutual +imposition. Men should strive to impose themselves +upon one another, to give their spirits to one another, +to seal one another's souls.</p> + +<p>There is matter for thought in the fact that the +Christian ethic has been called an ethic of slaves. By +whom? By anarchists! It is anarchism that is an +ethic of slaves, for it is only the slave that chants the +<a name="Page_284" id="Page_284" />praises of anarchical liberty. Anarchism, no! but +<i>panarchism</i>; not the creed of "Nor God nor master!" +but that of "All gods and all masters!" all striving to +become gods, to become immortal, and achieving this +by dominating others.</p> + +<p>And there are so many ways of dominating. There is +even a passive way, or one at least that is apparently +passive, of fulfilling at times this law of life. Adaptation +to environment, imitation, putting oneself in +another's place, sympathy, in a word, besides being a +manifestation of the unity of the species, is a mode of +self-expansion, of being another. To be conquered, or +at least to seem to be conquered, is often to conquer; to +take what is another's is a way of living in him.</p> + +<p>And in speaking of domination, I do not mean the +domination of the tiger. The fox also dominates by +cunning, and the hare by flight, and the viper by poison, +and the mosquito by its smallness, and the squid by the +inky fluid with which it darkens the water and under +cover of which it escapes. And no one is scandalized at +this, for the same universal Father who gave its fierceness, +its talons, and its jaws to the tiger, gave cunning +to the fox, swift feet to the hare, poison to the viper, +diminutiveness to the mosquito, and its inky fluid to the +squid. And nobleness or ignobleness does not consist +in the weapons we use, for every species and even every +individual possesses its own, but rather in the way in +which we use them, and above all in the cause in which +we wield them.</p> + +<p>And among the weapons of conquest must be included +the weapon of patience and of resignation, but a +passionate patience and a passionate resignation, containing +within itself an active principle and antecedent +longings. You remember that famous sonnet of Milton—Milton, +the great fighter, the great Puritan disturber +of the spiritual peace, the singer of Satan—who, when +he considered how his light was spent and that one talent +<a name="Page_285" id="Page_285" />which it is death to hide lodged with him useless, heard +the voice of Patience saying to him,</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div class='i6'>God doth not need</div> +<div>Either man's work, or his own gifts; who best</div> +<div>Bear his mild yoke, they serve Him best: his state</div> +<div>Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed,</div> +<div>And post o'er land and ocean without rest;</div> +<div>They also serve who only stand and wait.</div></div> +</div> + +<p>They also serve who only stand and wait—yes, but it +is when they wait for Him passionately, hungeringly, +full of longing for immortality in Him.</p> + +<p>And we must impose ourselves, even though it be by +our patience. "My cup is small, but I drink out of my +cup," said the egoistical poet of an avaricious people.<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58" /><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> +No, out of my cup all drink, for I wish all to drink out +of it; I offer it to them, and my cup grows according to +the number of those who drink out of it, and all, in putting +it to their lips, leave in it something of their spirit. +And while they drink out of my cup, I also drink out of +theirs. For the more I belong to myself, and the more +I am myself, the more I belong to others; out of the fullness +of myself I overflow upon my brothers, and as I +overflow upon them they enter into me.</p> + +<p>"Be ye perfect, as your Father is perfect," we are +bidden, and our Father is perfect because He is Himself +and because He is in each one of His children who live +and move and have their being in Him. And the end +of perfection is that we all may be one (John xvii. 21), +all one body in Christ (Rom. xii. 5), and that, at the last, +when all things are subdued unto the Son, the Son himself +may be subject to Him that put all things under +him, that God may be all in all. And this is to make the +Universe consciousness, to make Nature a society, and +a human society. And then shall we be able confidently +to call God Father.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286" />I am aware that those who say that ethics is a science +will say that all this commentary of mine is nothing but +rhetoric; but each man has his own language and his +own passion—that is to say, each man who knows what +passion is—and as for the man who knows it not, nothing +will it avail him to know science.</p> + +<p>And the passion that finds its expression in this +rhetoric, the devotees of ethical science call egotism. +But this egotism is the only true remedy for egoism, +spiritual avarice, the vice of preserving and reserving +oneself and of not striving to perennialize oneself by +giving oneself.</p> + +<p>"Be not, and ye shall be mightier than all that is," +said Fr. Juan de los Angeles in one of his <i>Diálogos de la +Conquista del Reina de Dios</i> (<i>Dial.</i>, iii., 8); but what does +this "Be not" mean? May it not mean paradoxically—and +such a mode of expression is common with the +mystics—the contrary of that which, at a first and literal +reading, it would appear to mean? Is not the whole +ethic of submission and quietism an immense paradox, +or rather a great tragic contradiction? Is not the +monastic, the strictly monastic, ethic an absurdity? And +by the monastic ethic I mean that of the solitary Carthusian, +that of the hermit, who flees from the world—perhaps +carrying it with him nevertheless—in order that +he may live quite alone with a God who is lonely as +himself; not that of the Dominican inquisitor who +scoured Provence in search of Albigensian hearts to +burn.</p> + +<p>"Let God do it all," someone will say; but if man +folds his arms, God will go to sleep.</p> + +<p>This Carthusian ethic and that scientific ethic which is +derived from ethical science—oh, this science of ethics! +rational and rationalistic ethics! pedantry of pedantry, +all is pedantry!—yes, this perhaps is egoism and coldness +of heart.</p> + +<p>There are some who say that they isolate themselves +<a name="Page_287" id="Page_287" />with God in order that they may the better work out +their salvation, their redemption; but since sin is collective, +redemption must be collective also. "The +religious is the determination of the whole, and everything +outside this is an illusion of the senses, and that is +why the greatest criminal is at bottom innocent, a good-natured +man and a saint" (Kierkegaard, <i>Afsluttende</i>, +etc., ii., ii., cap. iv., sect. 2, <i>a</i>).</p> + +<p>Are we to understand, on the other hand, that men +seek to gain the other, the eternal life, by renouncing +this the temporal life? If the other life is anything, it +must be a continuation of this, and only as such a continuation, +more or less purified, is it mirrored in our +desire; and if this is so, such as is this life of time, so will +be the life of eternity.</p> + +<p>"This world and the other are like the two wives of +one husband—if he pleases one he makes the other +envious," said an Arab thinker, quoted by Windelband +(<i>Das Heilige</i>, in vol. ii. of <i>Präludien</i>); but such a +thought could only have arisen in the mind of one who +had failed to resolve the tragic conflict between his spirit +and the world in a fruitful warfare, a practical contradiction. +"Thy kingdom come" to us; so Christ taught +us to pray to the Father, not "May we come to Thy +kingdom"; and according to the primitive Christian +belief the eternal life was to be realized on this earth itself +and as a continuation of the earthly life. We were made +men and not angels in order that we might seek our +happiness through the medium of this life, and the Christ +of the Christian Faith became, not an angelic, but a +human, being, redeeming us by taking upon himself a +real and effective body and not an appearance of one +merely. And according to this same Faith, even the +highest of the angelical hierarchy adore the Virgin, the +supreme symbol of terrestrial Humanity. The angelical +ideal, therefore, is not the Christian ideal, and still less +is it the human ideal, nor can it be. An angel, more<a name="Page_288" id="Page_288" />over, +is a neutral being, without sex and without +country.</p> + +<p>It is impossible for us to feel the other life, the eternal +life, I have already repeated more than once, as a life of +angelical contemplation; it must be a life of action. +Goethe said that "man must believe in immortality, +since in his nature he has a right to it." And he added: +"The conviction of our persistence arises in me from +the concept of activity. If I work without ceasing to +the end, Nature is obliged (<i>so ist die Natur verpflichtet</i>) +to provide me with another form of existence, since my +actual spirit can bear no more." Change Nature to +God, and you have a thought that remains Christian in +character, for the first Fathers of the Church did not +believe that the immortality of the soul was a natural +gift—that is to say, something rational—but a divine +gift of grace. And that which is of grace is usually, in +its essence, of justice, since justice is divine and +gratuitous, not natural. And Goethe added: "I could +begin nothing with an eternal happiness before me, unless +new tasks and new difficulties were given me to overcome." +And true it is that there is no happiness in a +vacuity of contemplation.</p> + +<p>But may there not be some justification for the morality +of the hermit, of the Carthusian, the ethic of the +Thebaid? Might we not say, perhaps, that it is necessary +to preserve these exceptional types in order that +they may stand as everlasting patterns for mankind? Do +not men breed racehorses, which are useless for any practical +kind of work, but which preserve the purity of the +breed and become the sires of excellent hackneys and +hunters? Is there not a luxury of ethics, not less justifiable +than any other sort of luxury? But, on the other +hand, is not all this substantially esthetics, and not ethics, +still less religion? May not the contemplative, medieval, +monastic ideal be esthetical, and not religious nor even +ethical? And after all, those of the seekers after soli<a name="Page_289" id="Page_289" />tude +who have related to us their conversation when they +were alone with God have performed an eternalizing +work, they have concerned themselves with the souls of +others. And by this alone, that it has given us an +Eckhart, a Seuse, a Tauler, a Ruysbroek, a Juan de la +Cruz, a Catherine of Siena, an Angela of Foligno, a +Teresa de Jesús, is the cloister justified.</p> + +<p>But the chief of our Spanish Orders are the Predicadores, +founded by Domingo de Guzmán for the aggressive +work of extirpating heresy; the Company of Jesus, +a militia with the world as its field of operations (which +explains its history); the order of the Escuelas Pías, also +devoted to a work of an aggressive or invasive nature, +that of instruction. I shall certainly be reminded that +the reform of the contemplative Order of the Carmelites +which Teresa de Jesús undertook was a Spanish work. +Yes, Spanish it was, and in it men sought liberty.</p> + +<p>It was, in fact, the yearning for liberty, for inward liberty, +which, in the troubled days of the Inquisition, led many +choice spirits to the cloister. They imprisoned themselves +in order that they might be more free. "Is it not a fine +thing that a poor nun of San José can attain to sovereignty +over the whole earth and the elements?" said St. Teresa +in her <i>Life</i>. It was the Pauline yearning for liberty, +the longing to shake off the bondage of the external law, +which was then very severe, and, as Maestro Fray Luis +de León said, very stubborn.</p> + +<p>But did they actually find liberty in the cloister? It +is very doubtful if they did, and to-day it is impossible. +For true liberty is not to rid oneself of the external law; +liberty is consciousness of the law. Not he who has +shaken off the yoke of the law is free, but he who has +made himself master of the law. Liberty must be sought +in the midst of the world, which is the domain of the law, +and of sin, the offspring of the law. That which we +must be freed from is sin, which is collective.</p> + +<p>Instead of renouncing the world in order that we may +<a name="Page_290" id="Page_290" />dominate it—and who does not know the collective +instinct of domination of those religious Orders whose +members renounce the world?—what we ought to do is +to dominate the world in order that we may be able to +renounce it. Not to seek poverty and submission, but to +seek wealth in order that we may use it to increase human +consciousness, and to seek power for the same end.</p> + +<p>It is curious that monks and anarchists should be at +enmity with each other, when fundamentally they both +profess the same ethic and are related by close ties of +kinship. Anarchism tends to become a kind of atheistic +monachism and a religious, rather than an ethical or +economico-social, doctrine. The one party starts from +the assumption that man is naturally evil, born in original +sin, and that it is through grace that he becomes good, +if indeed he ever does become good; and the other from +the assumption that man is naturally good and is subsequently +perverted by society. And these two theories +really amount to the same thing, for in both the +individual is opposed to society, as if the individual had +preceded society and therefore were destined to survive +it. And both ethics are ethics of the cloister.</p> + +<p>And the fact that guilt is collective must not actuate +me to throw mine upon the shoulders of others, but +rather to take upon myself the burden of the guilt of +others, the guilt of all men; not to merge and sink my +guilt in the total mass of guilt, but to make this total +guilt my own; not to dismiss and banish my own guilt, +but to open the doors of my heart to the guilt of all men, +to centre it within myself and appropriate it to myself. +And each one of us ought to help to remedy the guilt, +and just because others do not do so. The fact that +society is guilty aggravates the guilt of each member +of it. "Someone ought to do it, but why should I? is +the ever re-echoed phrase of weak-kneed amiability. +Someone ought to do it, so why not I? is the +cry of some earnest servant of man, eagerly forward +<a name="Page_291" id="Page_291" />springing to face some perilous duty. Between these +two sentences lie whole centuries of moral evolution." +Thus spoke Mrs. Annie Besant in her autobiography. +Thus spoke theosophy.</p> + +<p>The fact that society is guilty aggravates the guilt of +each one, and he is most guilty who most is sensible of +the guilt. Christ, the innocent, since he best knew the +intensity of the guilt, was in a certain sense the most +guilty. In him the culpability, together with the divinity, +of humanity arrived at the consciousness of itself. Many +are wont to be amused when they read how, because of +the most trifling faults, faults at which a man of the +world would merely smile, the greatest saints counted +themselves the greatest sinners. But the intensity of +the fault is not measured by the external act, but by the +consciousness of it, and an act for which the conscience +of one man suffers acutely makes scarcely any impression +on the conscience of another. And in a saint, conscience +may be developed so fully and to such a degree +of sensitiveness that the slightest sin may cause him +more remorse than his crime causes the greatest criminal. +And sin rests upon our consciousness of it, it is in him +who judges and in so far as he judges. When a man +commits a vicious act believing in good faith that he +is doing a virtuous action, we cannot hold him morally +guilty, while on the other hand that man is guilty +who commits an act which he believes to be wrong, +even though in itself the act is indifferent or perhaps +beneficent. The act passes away, the intention remains, +and the evil of the evil act is that it corrupts the intention, +that in knowingly doing wrong a man is predisposed +to go on doing it, that it blurs the conscience. +And doing evil is not the same as being evil. Evil blurs +the conscience, and not only the moral conscience but +the general, psychical consciousness. And everything +that exalts and expands consciousness is good, while that +which depresses and diminishes it is evil.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292" />And here we might raise the question which, according +to Plato, was propounded by Socrates, as to whether +virtue is knowledge, which is equivalent to asking whether +virtue is rational.</p> + +<p>The ethicists—those who maintain that ethics is a +science, those whom the reading of these divagations will +provoke to exclaim, "Rhetoric, rhetoric, rhetoric!"—would +appear to think that virtue is the fruit of knowledge, +of rational study, and that even mathematics help +us to be better men. I do not know, but for my part I +feel that virtue, like religion, like the longing never to +die—and all these are fundamentally the same thing—is +the fruit of passion.</p> + +<p>But, I shall be asked, What then is passion? I do +not know, or rather, I know full well, because I feel it, +and since I feel it there is no need for me to define it to +myself. Nay, more; I fear that if I were to arrive at a +definition of it, I should cease to feel it and to possess +it. Passion is like suffering, and like suffering it creates +its object. It is easier for the fire to find something to +burn than for something combustible to find the fire.</p> + +<p>That this may appear empty and sophistical well I +know. And I shall also be told that there is the science +of passion and the passion of science, and that it is in the +moral sphere that reason and life unite together.</p> + +<p>I do not know, I do not know, I do not know.... +And perhaps I may be saying fundamentally the same +thing, although more confusedly, that my imaginary +adversaries say, only more clearly, more definitely, and +more rationally, those adversaries whom I imagine in +order that I may have someone to fight. I do not know, +I do not know.... But what they say freezes me and +sounds to me as though it proceeded from emptiness of +feeling.</p> + +<p>And, returning to our former question, Is virtue knowledge?—Is +knowledge virtue? For they are two distinct +questions. Virtue may be a science, the science of +<a name="Page_293" id="Page_293" />acting rightly, without every other science being therefore +virtue. The virtue of Machiavelli is a science, and +it cannot be said that his <i>virtu</i> is always moral virtue +It is well known, moreover, that the cleverest and the +most learned men are not the best.</p> + +<p>No, no, no! Physiology does not teach us how to +digest, nor logic how to discourse, nor esthetics how to +feel beauty or express it, nor ethics how to be good. And +indeed it is well if they do not teach us how to be hypocrites; +for pedantry, whether it be the pedantry of logic, +or of esthetics, or of ethics, is at bottom nothing but +hypocrisy.</p> + +<p>Reason perhaps teaches certain bourgeois virtues, but +it does not make either heroes or saints. Perhaps the +saint is he who does good not for good's sake, but for +God's sake, for the sake of eternalization.</p> + +<p>Perhaps, on the other hand, culture, or as I should say +Culture—oh, this culture!—which is primarily the work +of philosophers and men of science, is a thing which +neither heroes nor saints have had any share in the +making of. For saints have concerned themselves very +little with the progress of human culture; they have concerned +themselves rather with the salvation of the +individual souls of those amongst whom they lived. Of +what account in the history of human culture is our +San Juan de la Cruz, for example—that fiery little monk, +as culture, in perhaps somewhat uncultured phrase, has +called him—compared with Descartes?</p> + +<p>All those saints, burning with religious charity towards +their neighbours, hungering for their own and others' +eternalization, who went about burning hearts, inquisitors, +it may be—what have all those saints done for the +progress of the science of ethics? Did any of them discover +the categorical imperative, like the old bachelor of +Königsberg, who, if he was not a saint, deserved to +be one?</p> + +<p>The son of a famous professor of ethics, one who +<a name="Page_294" id="Page_294" />scarcely ever opened his lips without mentioning the +categorical imperative, was lamenting to me one day the +fact that he lived in a desolating dryness of spirit, in a +state of inward emptiness. And I was constrained to +answer him thus: "My friend, your father had a subterranean +river flowing through his spirit, a fresh current +fed by the beliefs of his early childhood, by hopes +in the beyond; and while he thought that he was nourishing +his soul with this categorical imperative or something +of that sort, he was in reality nourishing it with +those waters which had their spring in his childish days. +And it may be that to you he has given the flower of his +spirit, his rational doctrines of ethics, but not the root, +not the subterranean source, not the irrational substratum."</p> + +<p>How was it that Krausism took root here in Spain, +while Kantism and Hegelianism did not, although the +two latter systems are much more profound, morally and +philosophically, than the first? Because in transplanting +the first, its roots were transplanted with it. The +philosophical thought of a people or a period is, as it +were, the flower, the thing that is external and above +ground; but this flower, or fruit if you prefer it, draws +its sap from the root of the plant, and this root, which is +in and under the ground, is the religious sense. The +philosophical thought of Kant, the supreme flower of the +mental evolution of the Germanic people, has its roots in +the religious feeling of Luther, and it is not possible for +Kantism, especially the practical part of it, to take root +and bring forth flower and fruit in peoples who have not +undergone the experience of the Reformation and who +perhaps were incapable of experiencing it. Kantism +is Protestant, and we Spaniards are fundamentally +Catholic. And if Krause struck some roots here—more +numerous and more permanent than is commonly supposed—it +is because Krause had roots in pietism, and +pietism, as Ritschl has demonstrated in his <i>Geschichte +<a name="Page_295" id="Page_295" />des Pietismus</i>, has specifically Catholic roots and may +be described as the irruption, or rather the persistence, +of Catholic mysticism in the heart of Protestant +rationalism. And this explains why not a few Catholic +thinkers in Spain became followers of Krause.</p> + +<p>And since we Spaniards are Catholic—whether we +know it or not, and whether we like it or not—and +although some of us may claim to be rationalists or +atheists, perhaps the greatest service we can render to +the cause of culture, and of what is of more value than +culture, religiousness—if indeed they are not the same +thing—is in endeavouring to formulate clearly to ourselves +this subconscious, social, or popular Catholicism +of ours. And that is what I have attempted to do in this +work.</p> + +<p>What I call the tragic sense of life in men and peoples +is at any rate our tragic sense of life, that of Spaniards +and the Spanish people, as it is reflected in my consciousness, +which is a Spanish consciousness, made in Spain. +And this tragic sense of life is essentially the Catholic +sense of it, for Catholicism, and above all popular +Catholicism, is tragic. The people abhors comedy. +When Pilate—the type of the refined gentleman, the +superior person, the esthete, the rationalist if you like—proposes +to give the people comedy and mockingly presents +Christ to them, saying, "Behold the man!" the +people mutinies and shouts "Crucify him! Crucify +him!" The people does not want comedy but tragedy. +And that which Dante, the great Catholic, called the +Divine Comedy, is the most tragical tragedy that has +ever been written.</p> + +<p>And as I have endeavoured in these essays to exhibit +the soul of a Spaniard, and therewithal the Spanish soul, +I have curtailed the number of quotations from Spanish +writers, while scattering with perhaps too lavish a hand +those from the writers of other countries. For all human +souls are brother-souls.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296" />And there is one figure, a comically tragic figure, a +figure in which is revealed all that is profoundly tragic +in the human comedy, the figure of Our Lord Don +Quixote, the Spanish Christ, who resumes and includes +in himself the immortal soul of my people. Perhaps +the passion and death of the Knight of the Sorrowful +Countenance is the passion and death of the Spanish +people, its death and resurrection. And there is a +Quixotesque philosophy and even a Quixotesque metaphysic, +there is a Quixotesque logic, and also a +Quixotesque ethic and a Quixotesque religious sense—the +religious sense of Spanish Catholicism. This is the +philosophy, this is the logic, this is the ethic, this is the +religious sense, that I have endeavoured to outline, to +suggest rather than to develop, in this work. To develop +it rationally, no; the Quixotesque madness does not +submit to scientific logic.</p> + +<p>And now, before concluding and bidding my readers +farewell, it remains for me to speak of the rôle that is +reserved for Don Quixote in the modern European tragi-comedy.</p> + +<p>Let us see, in the next and last essay, what this may be.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54" /><a href="#FNanchor_54_54">[54]</a> Act II., Scene 4: "I am dreaming and I wish to act rightly, for good +deeds are not lost, though they be wrought in dreams."</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55" /><a href="#FNanchor_55_55">[55]</a> Act III., Scene 10: "Let us aim at the eternal, the glory that does not +wane, where bliss slumbers not and where greatness does not repose."</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56" /><a href="#FNanchor_56_56">[56]</a> "Se <i>les</i> muera," y no sólo "se muera."</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57" /><a href="#FNanchor_57_57">[57]</a> <i>Trabalhos de Jesus</i>, part i.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58" /><a href="#FNanchor_58_58">[58]</a> De Musset.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="CONCLUSION" id="CONCLUSION" /><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297" />CONCLUSION</h2> + +<h2>DON QUIXOTE IN THE CONTEMPORARY +EUROPEAN TRAGI-COMEDY</h2> + +<blockquote><p>"A voice crying in the wilderness!"—ISA. xl. 3.</p></blockquote> + + +<p>Need is that I bring to a conclusion, for the present at +any rate, these essays that threaten to become like a tale +that has no ending. They have gone straight from my +hands to the press in the form of a kind of improvization +upon notes collected during a number of years, and in +writing each essay I have not had before me any of those +that preceded it. And thus they will go forth full of +inward contradictions—apparent contradictions, at any +rate—like life and like me myself.</p> + +<p>My sin, if any, has been that I have embellished them +to excess with foreign quotations, many of which will +appear to have been dragged in with a certain degree of +violence. But I will explain this another time.</p> + +<p>A few years after Our Lord Don Quixote had journeyed +through Spain, Jacob Böhme declared in his +<i>Aurora</i> (chap xi., § 142) that he did not write a story or +history related to him by others, but that he himself had +had to stand in the battle, which he found to be full of +heavy strivings, and wherein he was often struck down +to the ground like all other men; and a little further on +(§ 152) he adds: "Although I must become a spectacle +of scorn to the world and the devil, yet my hope is in +God concerning the life to come; in Him will I venture +to hazard it and not resist or strive against the Spirit. +Amen." And like this Quixote of the German intellectual +world, neither will I resist the Spirit.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298" />And therefore I cry with the voice of one crying in the +wilderness, and I send forth my cry from this University +of Salamanca, a University that arrogantly styled itself +<i>omnium scientiarum princeps</i>, and which Carlyle called +a stronghold of ignorance and which a French man of +letters recently called a phantom University; I send it +forth from this Spain—"the land of dreams that become +realities, the rampart of Europe, the home of the +knightly ideal," to quote from a letter which the American +poet Archer M. Huntington sent me the other day—from +this Spain which was the head and front of the +Counter-Reformation in the sixteenth century. And +well they repay her for it!</p> + +<p>In the fourth of these essays I spoke of the essence +of Catholicism. And the chief factors in <i>de-essentializing</i> +it—that is, in de-Catholicizing Europe—have been +the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Revolution, +which for the ideal of an eternal, ultra-terrestrial life, +have substituted the ideal of progress, of reason, of +science, or, rather, of Science with the capital letter. +And last of all, the dominant ideal of to-day, comes +Culture.</p> + +<p>And in the second half of the nineteenth century, an +age essentially unphilosophical and technical, dominated +by a myopic specialism and by historical materialism, +this ideal took a practical form, not so much in the +popularization as in the vulgarization of science—or, +rather, of pseudo-science—venting itself in a flood of +cheap, popular, and propagandist literature. Science +sought to popularize itself as if it were its function to +come down to the people and subserve their passions, +and not the duty of the people to rise to science and +through science to rise to higher heights, to new and +profounder aspirations.</p> + +<p>All this led Brunetière to proclaim the bankruptcy of +science, and this science—if you like to call it science—did +in effect become bankrupt. And as it failed to +<a name="Page_299" id="Page_299" />satisfy, men continued their quest for happiness, but +without finding it, either in wealth, or in knowledge, or +in power, or in pleasure, or in resignation, or in a good +conscience, or in culture. And the result was pessimism.</p> + +<p>Neither did the gospel of progress satisfy. What end +did progress serve? Man would not accommodate himself +to rationalism; the <i>Kulturkampf</i> did not suffice him; +he sought to give a final finality to life, and what I call +the final finality is the real <i>οντως ον</i>. And the famous +<i>maladie du siècle</i>, which announced itself in Rousseau +and was exhibited more plainly in Sénancour's <i>Obermann</i> +than in any other character, neither was nor is +anything else but the loss of faith in the immortality of +the soul, in the human finality of the Universe.</p> + +<p>The truest symbol of it is to be found in a creation of +fiction, Dr. Faustus.</p> + +<p>This immortal Dr. Faustus, the product of the +Renaissance and the Reformation, first comes into our +ken at the beginning of the seventeenth century, when +in 1604 he is introduced to us by Christopher Marlowe. +This is the same character that Goethe was to rediscover +two centuries later, although in certain respects the +earlier Faust was the fresher and more spontaneous. +And side by side with him Mephistopheles appears, of +whom Faust asks: "What good will my soul do thy +lord?" "Enlarge his kingdom," Mephistopheles replies. +"Is that the reason why he tempts us thus?" +the Doctor asks again, and the evil spirit answers: +"<i>Solamen miseris socios habuisse doloris</i>," which, +mistranslated into Romance, is the equivalent of our +proverb—"The misfortune of many is the consolation +of fools." "Where we are is hell, and where hell +is there must we ever be," Mephistopheles continues, +to which Faust answers that he thinks hell's a fable +and asks him who made the world. And finally +this tragic Doctor, tortured with our torture, meets +Helen, who, although no doubt Marlowe never sus<a name="Page_300" id="Page_300" />pected +it, is none other than renascent Culture. And in +Marlowe's <i>Faust</i> there is a scene that is worth the whole +of the second part of the <i>Faust</i> of Goethe. Faust says +to Helen: "Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a +kiss"—and he kisses her—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div>Her lips suck forth my soul; see where it flies!</div> +<div>Come, Helen, come, give me my soul again.</div> +<div>Here will I dwell, for Helen is in these lips,</div> +<div>And all is dross that is not Helena.</div></div> +</div> + +<p>Give me my soul again!—the cry of Faust, the Doctor, +when, after having kissed Helen, he is about to be lost +eternally. For the primitive Faust has no ingenuous +Margaret to save him. This idea of his salvation was +the invention of Goethe. And is there not a Faust +whom we all know, our own Faust? This Faust has +studied Philosophy, Jurisprudence, Medicine, and even +Theology, only to find that we can know nothing, and +he has sought escape in the open country (<i>hinaus ins +weite Land</i>) and has encountered Mephistopheles, the +embodiment of that force which, ever willing evil, ever +achieves good in its own despite. This Faust has been +led by Mephistopheles to the arms of Margaret, child +of the simple-hearted people, she whom Faust, the overwise, +had lost. And thanks to her—for she gave herself +to him—this Faust is saved, redeemed by the people that +believes with a simple faith. But there was a second +part, for that Faust was the anecdotical Faust and not +the categorical Faust of Goethe, and he gave himself +again to Culture, to Helen, and begot Euphorion upon +her, and everything ends among mystical choruses with +the discovery of the eternal feminine. Poor Euphorion!</p> + +<p>And this Helen is the spouse of the fair Menelaus, the +Helen whom Paris bore away, who was the cause of the +war of Troy, and of whom the ancient Trojans said that +no one should be incensed because men fought for a +woman who bore so terrible a likeness to the immortal +<a name="Page_301" id="Page_301" />gods. But I rather think that Faust's Helen was that +other Helen who accompanied Simon Magus, and whom +he declared to be the divine wisdom. And Faust can +say to her: Give me my soul again!</p> + +<p>For Helen with her kisses takes away our soul. And +what we long for and have need of is soul—soul of bulk +and substance.</p> + +<p>But the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Revolution +came, bringing Helen to us, or, rather, urged on +by Helen, and now they talk to us about Culture and +Europe.</p> + +<p>Europe! This idea of Europe, primarily and immediately +of geographical significance, has been converted +for us by some magical process into a kind of metaphysical +category. Who can say to-day—in Spain, at +any rate—what Europe is? I only know that it is a +shibboleth (<i>vide</i> my <i>Tres Ensayos</i>). And when I proceed +to examine what it is that our Europeanizers call +Europe, it sometimes seems to me that much of its +periphery remains outside of it—Spain, of course, and +also England, Italy, Scandinavia, Russia—and hence +it is reduced to the central portion, Franco-Germany, +with its annexes and dependencies.</p> + +<p>All this is the consequence, I repeat, of the Renaissance +and the Reformation, which, although apparently +they lived in a state of internecine war, were twin-brothers. +The Italians of the Renaissance were all of +them Socinians; the humanists, with Erasmus at their +head, regarded Luther, the German monk, as a barbarian, +who derived his driving force from the cloister, +as did Bruno and Campanella. But this barbarian was +their twin-brother, and though their antagonist he was +also the antagonist of the common enemy. All this, I +say, is due to the Renaissance and the Reformation, and +to what was the offspring of these two, the Revolution, +and to them we owe also a new Inquisition, that of +science or culture, which turns against those who refuse +<a name="Page_302" id="Page_302" />to submit to its orthodoxy the weapons of ridicule and +contempt.</p> + +<p>When Galileo sent his treatise on the earth's motion +to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, he told him that it was +meet that that which the higher authorities had determined +should be believed and obeyed, and that he considered +his treatise "as poetry or as a dream, and as +such I desire your highness to receive it." And at +other times he calls it a "chimera" or a "mathematical +caprice." And in the same way in these essays, for +fear also—why not confess it?—of the Inquisition, of +the modern, the scientific, Inquisition, I offer as a +poetry, dream, chimera, mystical caprice, that which +springs from what is deepest in me. And I say with +Galileo, <i>Eppur si muove!</i> But is it only because of +this fear? Ah, no! for there is another, more tragic +Inquisition, and that is the Inquisition which the modern +man, the man of culture, the European—and such am I, +whether I will or not—carries within him. There is a +more terrible ridicule, and that is the ridicule with which +a man contemplates his own self. It is my reason that +laughs at my faith and despises it.</p> + +<p>And it is here that I must betake me to my Lord Don +Quixote in order that I may learn of him how to confront +ridicule and overcome it, and a ridicule which +perhaps—who knows?—he never knew.</p> + +<p>Yes, yes—how shall my reason not smile at these +dilettantesque, would-be mystical, pseudo-philosophical +interpretations, in which there is anything rather than +patient study and—shall I say scientific?—objectivity +and method? And nevertheless ... <i>eppur si muove!</i></p> + +<p><i>Eppur si muove!</i> And I take refuge in dilettantism, +in what a pedant would call <i>demi-mondaine</i> philosophy, +as a shelter against the pedantry of specialists, against +the philosophy of the professional philosophers. And +who knows?... Progress usually comes from the +barbarian, and there is nothing more stagnant than the +<a name="Page_303" id="Page_303" />philosophy of the philosophers and the theology of the +theologians.</p> + +<p>Let them talk to us of Europe! The civilization of +Thibet is parallel with ours, and men who disappear like +ourselves have lived and are living by it. And over all +civilizations there hovers the shadow of Ecclesiastes, +with his admonition, "How dieth the wise man?—as +the fool" (ii. 16).</p> + +<p>Among the people of my country there is an admirable +reply to the customary interrogation, "How are you?"<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59" /><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> +and it is "Living." And that is the truth—we are +living, and living as much as all the rest. What can a +man ask for more? And who does not recollect the +verse?—</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class='stanza'><div><i>Coda vez que considero</i></div> +<div><i>que me tengo de morir,</i></div> +<div><i>tiendo la capa en el suelo</i></div> +<div><i>y no me harto de dormir.</i><a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60" /><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a></div></div> +</div> + +<p>But no, not sleeping, but dreaming—dreaming life, +since life is a dream.</p> + +<p>Among us Spaniards another phrase has very rapidly +passed into current usage, the expression "It's a question +of passing the time," or "killing the time." And, +in fact, we make time in order to kill it. But there is +something that has always preoccupied us as much as +or more than passing the time—a formula which denotes +an esthetical attitude—and that is, gaining eternity, +which is the formula of the religious attitude. The +truth is, we leap from the esthetic and the economic to +the religious, passing over the logical and the ethical; +we jump from art to religion.</p> + +<p>One of our younger novelists, Ramón Pérez de +Ayala, in his recent novel, <i>La Pata de la Raposa</i>, has +told us that the idea of death is the trap, and spirit +<a name="Page_304" id="Page_304" />the fox or the wary virtue with which to circumvent the +ambushes set by fatality, and he continues: "Caught +in the trap, weak men and weak peoples lie prone on the +ground ...; to robust spirits and strong peoples the +rude shock of danger gives clear-sightedness; they +quickly penetrate into the heart of the immeasurable +beauty of life, and renouncing for ever their original +hastiness and folly, emerge from the trap with muscles +taut for action and with the soul's vigour, power, and +efficiency increased a hundredfold." But let us see; +weak men ... weak peoples ... robust spirits ... strong +peoples ... what does all this mean? I do not +know. What I think I know is that some individuals +and peoples have not yet really thought about death and +immortality, have not felt them, and that others have +ceased to think about them, or rather ceased to feel them. +And the fact that they have never passed through the +religious period is not, I think, a matter for either men +or peoples to boast about.</p> + +<p>The immeasurable beauty of life is a very fine thing to +write about, and there are, indeed, some who resign +themselves to it and accept it as it is, and even some who +would persuade us that there is no problem in the +"trap." But it has been said by Calderón that "to +seek to persuade a man that the misfortunes which he +suffers are not misfortunes, does not console him for +them, but is another misfortune in addition."<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61" /><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> And, +furthermore, "only the heart can speak to the heart," +as Fray Diego de Estella said (<i>Vanidad del Mundo</i>, +cap. xxi.).</p> + +<p>A short time ago a reply that I made to those who +reproached us Spaniards for our scientific incapacity +appeared to scandalize some people. After having remarked +<a name="Page_305" id="Page_305" />that the electric light and the steam engine function +here in Spain just as well as in the countries where +they were invented, and that we make use of logarithms +as much as they do in the country where the idea of them +was first conceived, I exclaimed, "Let others invent!"—a +paradoxical expression which I do not retract. We +Spaniards ought to appropriate to ourselves some of +those sage counsels which Count Joseph de Maistre gave +to the Russians, a people not unlike ourselves. In his +admirable letters to Count Rasoumowski on public +education in Russia, he said that a nation should not +think the worse of itself because it was not made for +science; that the Romans had no understanding of the +arts, neither did they possess a mathematician, which, +however, did not prevent them from playing their part +in the world; and in particular we should take to heart +everything that he said about that crowd of arrogant +sciolists who idolize the tastes, the fashions, and the +languages of foreign countries, and are ever ready to +pull down whatever they despise—and they despise +everything.</p> + +<p>We have not the scientific spirit? And what of that, +if we have some other spirit? And who can tell if the +spirit that we have is or is not compatible with the +scientific spirit?</p> + +<p>But in saying "Let others invent!" I did not mean to +imply that we must be content with playing a passive +rôle. No. For them their science, by which we shall +profit; for us, our own work. It is not enough to be on +the defensive, we must attack.</p> + +<p>But we must attack wisely and cautiously. Reason +must be our weapon. It is the weapon even of the fool. +Our sublime fool and our exemplar, Don Quixote, after +he had destroyed with two strokes of his sword that +pasteboard visor "which he had fitted to his head-piece, +made it anew, placing certain iron bars within it, in such +a manner that he rested satisfied with its solidity, and +without wishing to make a second trial of it, he deputed +<a name="Page_306" id="Page_306" />and held it in estimation of a most excellent visor."<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62" /><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a> And +with the pasteboard visor on his head he made himself +immortal—that is to say, he made himself ridiculous. +For it was by making himself ridiculous that Don +Quixote achieved his immortality.</p> + +<p>And there are so many ways of making ourselves +ridiculous I ... Cournot said <i>(Traité de l'enchaînement +des idées fondamentales</i>, etc., § 510): "It is best +not to speak to either princes or peoples of the probabilities +of death; princes will punish this temerity with disgrace; +the public will revenge itself with ridicule." True, +and therefore it is said that we must live as the age lives. +<i>Corrumpere et corrumpi sæculum vocatur</i> (Tacitus: +<i>Germania</i> 19).</p> + +<p>It is necessary to know how to make ourselves ridiculous, +and not only to others but to ourselves. And more +than ever to-day, when there is so much chatter about +our backwardness compared with other civilized peoples, +to-day when a parcel of shallow-brained critics say that +we have had no science, no art, no philosophy, no Renaissance, +(of this we had perhaps too much), no anything, +these same critics being ignorant of our real +history, a history that remains yet to be written, the first +task being to undo the web of calumniation and protest +that has been woven around it.</p> + +<p>Carducci, the author of the phrase about the <i>contorcimenti +dell'affannosa grandiositá spagnola</i>, has +written (in <i>Mosche Cochiere</i>) that "even Spain, which +never attained the hegemony of the world of thought, +had her Cervantes." But was Cervantes a solitary and +isolated phenomenon, without roots, without ancestry, +without a foundation? That an Italian rationalist, remembering +that it was Spain that reacted against the +Renaissance in his country, should say that Spain <i>non +ebbe egemonia mai di pensiero</i> is, however, readily comprehended. +Was there no importance, was there nothing +<a name="Page_307" id="Page_307" />akin to cultural hegemony, in the Counter-Reformation, +of which Spain was the champion, and which in point of +fact began with the sack of Rome by the Spaniards, a +providential chastisement of the city of the pagan popes +of the pagan Renaissance? Apart from the question as +to whether the Counter-Reformation was good or bad, +was there nothing akin to hegemony in Loyola or the +Council of Trent? Previous to this Council, Italy +witnessed a nefarious and unnatural union between +Christianity and Paganism, or rather, between immortalism +and mortalism, a union to which even some +of the Popes themselves consented in their souls; +theological error was philosophical truth, and all difficulties +were solved by the accommodating formula +<i>salva fide</i>. But it was otherwise after the Council; after +the Council came the open and avowed struggle between +reason and faith, science and religion. And does not the +fact that this change was brought about, thanks principally +to Spanish obstinacy, point to something akin to +hegemony?</p> + +<p>Without the Counter-Reformation, would the Reformation +have followed the course that it did actually follow? +Without the Counter-Reformation might not the Reformation, +deprived of the support of pietism, have perished in +the gross rationalism of the <i>Aufklärung</i>, of the age of +Enlightenment? Would nothing have been changed +had there been no Charles I., no Philip II., our great +Philip?</p> + +<p>A negative achievement, it will be said. But what is +that? What is negative? what is positive? At what +point in time—a line always continuing in the same +direction, from the past to the future—does the zero +occur which denotes the boundary between the positive +and the negative? Spain, which is said to be the land of +knights and rogues—and all of them rogues—has been +the country most slandered by history precisely because +it championed the Counter-Reformation. And because +<a name="Page_308" id="Page_308" />its arrogance has prevented it from stepping down into +the public forum, into the world's vanity fair, and publishing +its own justification.</p> + +<p>Let us leave on one side Spain's eight centuries of +warfare against the Moors, during which she defended +Europe from Mohammedanism, her work of internal +unification, her discovery of America and the Indies—for +this was the achievement of Spain and Portugal, and +not of Columbus and Vasco da Gama—let us leave all +this, and more than this, on one side, and it is not a little +thing. Is it not a cultural achievement to have created +a score of nations, reserving nothing for herself, and to +have begotten, as the Conquistadores did, free men on +poor Indian slaves? Apart from all this, does our +mysticism count for nothing in the world of thought? +Perhaps the peoples whose souls Helen will ravish away +with her kisses may some day have to return to this +mysticism to find their souls again.</p> + +<p>But, as everybody knows, Culture is composed of +ideas and only of ideas, and man is only Culture's instrument. +Man for the idea, and not the idea for man; the +substance for the shadow. The end of man is to create +science, to catalogue the Universe, so that it may be +handed back to God in order, as I wrote years ago in my +novel, <i>Amor y Pedagogia</i>. Man, apparently, is not +even an idea. And at the end of all, the human race will +fall exhausted at the foot of a pile of libraries—whole +woods rased to the ground to provide the paper that is +stored away in them—museums, machines, factories, +laboratories ... in order to bequeath them—to whom? +For God will surely not accept them.</p> + +<p>That horrible regenerationist literature, almost all of +it an imposture, which the loss of our last American +colonies provoked, led us into the pedantry of extolling +persevering and silent effort—and this with great +vociferation, vociferating silence—of extolling prudence, +exactitude, moderation, spiritual fortitude, synteresis, +<a name="Page_309" id="Page_309" />equanimity, the social virtues, and the chiefest advocates +of them were those of us who lacked them most. Almost +all of us Spaniards fell into this ridiculous mode of literature, +some more and some less. And so it befell that +that arch-Spaniard Joaquín Costa, one of the least +European spirits we ever had, invented his famous saying +that we must Europeanize Spain, and, while proclaiming +that we must lock up the sepulchre of the Cid +with a sevenfold lock, Cid-like urged us to—conquer +Africa! And I myself uttered the cry, "Down with +Don Quixote!" and from this blasphemy, which meant +the very opposite of what it said—such was the fashion +of the hour—sprang my <i>Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho</i> +and my cult of Quixotism as the national religion.</p> + +<p>I wrote that book in order to rethink <i>Don Quixote</i> in +opposition to the Cervantists and erudite persons, in +order to make a living work of what was and still is for +the majority a dead letter. What does it matter to me +what Cervantes intended or did not intend to put into it +and what he actually did put into it? What is living in +it is what I myself discover in it, whether Cervantes put +it there or not, what I myself put into and under and +over it, and what we all put into it. I wanted to hunt +down our philosophy in it.</p> + +<p>For the conviction continually grows upon me that +our philosophy, the Spanish philosophy, is liquescent +and diffused in our literature, in our life, in our action, +in our mysticism, above all, and not in philosophical +systems. It is concrete. And is there not perhaps as +much philosophy or more in Goethe, for example, as in +Hegel? The poetry of Jorge Manrique, the Romancero, +<i>Don Quijote</i>, <i>La Vida es Sueño</i>, the <i>Subida al Monte +Carmelo</i>, imply an intuition of the world and a concept +of life (<i>Weltanschauung und Lebensansicht</i>). And it +was difficult for this philosophy of ours to formulate itself +in the second half of the nineteenth century, a period that +was aphilosophical, positivist, technicist, devoted to +<a name="Page_310" id="Page_310" />pure history and the natural sciences, a period essentially +materialist and pessimist.</p> + +<p>Our language itself, like every cultured language, contains +within itself an implicit philosophy.</p> + +<p>A language, in effect, is a potential philosophy. +Platonism is the Greek language which discourses in +Plato, unfolding its secular metaphors; scholasticism is +the philosophy of the dead Latin of the Middle Ages +wrestling with the popular tongues; the French language +discourses in Descartes, the German in Kant and +in Hegel, and the English in Hume and in Stuart Mill. +For the truth is that the logical starting-point of all +philosophical speculation is not the I, neither is it representation +(<i>Vorstellung</i>), nor the world as it presents itself +immediately to the senses; but it is mediate or historical +representation, humanly elaborated and such as it is +given to us principally in the language by means of +which we know the world; it is not psychical but spiritual +representation. When we think, we are obliged to set +out, whether we know it not and whether we will or not, +from what has been thought by others who came before +us and who environ us. Thought is an inheritance. +Kant thought in German, and into German he translated +Hume and Rousseau, who thought in English and +French respectively. And did not Spinoza think in +Judeo-Portuguese, obstructed by and contending with +Dutch?</p> + +<p>Thought rests upon prejudgements, and prejudgements +pass into language. To language Bacon rightly +ascribed not a few of the errors of the <i>idola fori</i>. But is +it possible to philosophize in pure algebra or even in +Esperanto? In order to see the result of such an +attempt one has only to read the work of Avenarius on +the criticism of pure experience (<i>reine Erfahrung</i>), of this +prehuman or inhuman experience. And even Avenarius, +who was obliged to invent a language, invented one +that was based upon the Latin tradition, with roots which +<a name="Page_311" id="Page_311" />carry in their metaphorical implications a content of +impure experience, of human social experience.</p> + +<p>All philosophy is, therefore, at bottom philology. +And philology, with its great and fruitful law of +analogical formations, opens wide the door to chance, to +the irrational, to the absolutely incommensurable. History +is not mathematics, neither is philosophy. And +how many philosophical ideas are not strictly owing to +something akin to rhyme, to the necessity of rightly +placing a consonant! In Kant himself there is a great +deal of this, of esthetic symmetry, rhyme.</p> + +<p>Representation is, therefore, like language, like reason +itself—which is simply internal language—a social and +racial product, and race, the blood of the spirit, is language, +as Oliver Wendell Holmes has said, and as I +have often repeated.</p> + +<p>It was in Athens and with Socrates that our Western +philosophy first became mature, conscious of itself, and +it arrived at this consciousness by means of the dialogue, +of social conversation. And it is profoundly significant +that the doctrine of innate ideas, of the objective and +normative value of ideas, of what Scholasticism afterwards +knew as Realism, should have formulated itself in +dialogues. And these ideas, which constitute reality, +are names, as Nominalism showed. Not that they may +not be more than names (<i>flatus vocis</i>), but that they are +nothing less than names. Language is that which gives +us reality, and not as a mere vehicle of reality, but as +its true flesh, of which all the rest, dumb or inarticulate +representation, is merely the skeleton. And thus logic +operates upon esthetics, the concept upon the expression, +upon the word, and not upon the brute perception.</p> + +<p>And this is true even in the matter of love. Love +does not discover that it is love until it speaks, until it +says, I love thee! In Stendhal's novel, <i>La Chartreuse +de Parme</i>, it is with a very profound intuition that Count +Mosca, furious with jealousy because of the love which +<a name="Page_312" id="Page_312" />he believes unites the Duchess of Sanseverina with his +nephew Fabrice, is made to say, "I must be calm; if my +manner is violent the duchess, simply because her vanity +is piqued, is capable of following Belgirate, and then, +during the journey, chance may lead to a word which +will give a name to the feelings they bear towards each +other, and thereupon in a moment all the consequences +will follow."</p> + +<p>Even so—all things were made by the word, and the +word was in the beginning.</p> + +<p>Thought, reason—that is, living language—is an +inheritance, and the solitary thinker of Aben Tofail, the +Arab philosopher of Guadix, is as absurd as the ego +of Descartes. The real and concrete truth, not the +methodical and ideal, is: <i>homo sum, ergo cogito</i>. To +feel oneself a man is more immediate than to think. But, +on the other hand, History, the process of culture, finds +its perfection and complete effectivity only in the individual; +the end of History and Humanity is man, each +man, each individual. <i>Homo sum, ergo cogito; cogito +ut sim Michael de Unamuno</i>. The individual is the end +of the Universe.</p> + +<p>And we Spaniards feel this very strongly, that the +individual is the end of the Universe. The introspective +individuality of the Spaniard was pointed out by Martin +A.S. Hume in a passage in <i>The Spanish People</i>,<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63" /><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a> upon +which I commented in an essay published in <i>La España +Moderna</i>.<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64" /><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a></p> + +<p>And it is perhaps this same introspective individualism +which has not permitted the growth on Spanish soil +of strictly philosophical—or, rather, metaphysical—systems. +And this in spite of Suárez, whose formal +subtilties do not merit the name of philosophy.</p> + +<p>Our metaphysics, if we can be said to possess such a +thing, has been metanthropics, and our metaphysicians +<a name="Page_313" id="Page_313" />have been philologists—or, rather, humanists—in the +most comprehensive sense of the term.</p> + +<p>Menéndez de Pelayo, as Benedetto Croce very truly +said (<i>Estetica</i>, bibliographical appendix), was inclined +towards metaphysical idealism, but he appeared to +wish to take something from other systems, even from +empirical theories. For this reason Croce considers that +his work (referring to his <i>Historia de las ideas estéticas +de España</i>) suffers from a certain uncertainty, from the +theoretical point of view of its author, Menéndez de +Pelayo, which was that of a perfervid Spanish humanist, +who, not wishing to disown the Renaissance, invented +what he called Vivism, the philosophy of Luis Vives, +and perhaps for no other reason than because he himself, +like Vives, was an eclectic Spaniard of the Renaissance. +And it is true that Menéndez de Pelayo, whose +philosophy is certainly all uncertainty, educated in +Barcelona in the timidities of the Scottish philosophy as +it had been imported into the Catalan spirit—that creeping +philosophy of common sense, which was anxious not +to compromise itself and yet was all compromise, and +which is so well exemplified in Balmes—always shunned +all strenuous inward combat and formed his consciousness +upon compromises.</p> + +<p>Angel Ganivet, a man all divination and instinct, was +more happily inspired, in my opinion, when he proclaimed +that the Spanish philosophy was that of Seneca, +the pagan Stoic of Cordoba, whom not a few Christians +regarded as one of themselves, a philosophy lacking in +originality of thought but speaking with great dignity of +tone and accent. His accent was a Spanish, Latino-African +accent, not Hellenic, and there are echoes of him +in Tertullian—Spanish, too, at heart—who believed in +the corporal and substantial nature of God and the soul, +and who was a kind of Don Quixote in the world of +Christian thought in the second century.</p> + +<p>But perhaps we must look for the hero of Spanish +<a name="Page_314" id="Page_314" />thought, not in any actual flesh-and-bone philosopher, +but in a creation of fiction, a man of action, who is more +real than all the philosophers—Don Quixote. There is +undoubtedly a philosophical Quixotism, but there is also +a Quixotic philosophy. May it not perhaps be that the +philosophy of the Conquistadores, of the Counter-Reformers, +of Loyola, and above all, in the order of +abstract but deeply felt thought, that of our mystics, +was, in its essence, none other than this? What was +the mysticism of St. John of the Cross but a knight-errantry +of the heart in the divine warfare?</p> + +<p>And the philosophy of Don Quixote cannot strictly be +called idealism; he did not fight for ideas. It was of the +spiritual order; he fought for the spirit.</p> + +<p>Imagine Don Quixote turning his heart to religious +speculation—as he himself once dreamed of doing when +he met those images in bas-relief which certain peasants +were carrying to set up in the retablo of their village +church<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65" /><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a>—imagine Don Quixote given up to meditation +upon eternal truths, and see him ascending Mount +Carmel in the middle of the dark night of the soul, to +watch from its summit the rising of that sun which never +sets, and, like the eagle that was St. John's companion +in the isle of Patmos, to gaze upon it face to face and +scrutinize its spots. He leaves to Athena's owl—the +goddess with the glaucous, or owl-like, eyes, who sees +in the dark but who is dazzled by the light of noon—he +leaves to the owl that accompanied Athena in Olympus +the task of searching with keen eyes in the shadows for +the prey wherewith to feed its young.</p> + +<p>And the speculative or meditative Quixotism is, like +the practical Quixotism, madness, a daughter-madness +to the madness of the Cross. And therefore it is +despised by the reason. At bottom, philosophy abhors +<a name="Page_315" id="Page_315" />Christianity, and well did the gentle Marcus Aurelius +prove it.</p> + +<p>The tragedy of Christ, the divine tragedy, is the +tragedy of the Cross. Pilate, the sceptic, the man of +culture, by making a mockery of it, sought to convert +it into a comedy; he conceived the farcical idea of the +king with the reed sceptre and crown of thorns, and cried +"Behold the man!" But the people, more human than +he, the people that thirsts for tragedy, shouted, "Crucify +him! crucify him!" And the human, the intra-human, +tragedy is the tragedy of Don Quixote, whose face was +daubed with soap in order that he might make sport for +the servants of the dukes and for the dukes themselves, +as servile as their servants. "Behold the madman!" +they would have said. And the comic, the irrational, +tragedy is the tragedy of suffering caused by ridicule and +contempt.</p> + +<p>The greatest height of heroism to which an individual, +like a people, can attain is to know how to face ridicule; +better still, to know how to make oneself ridiculous and +not to shrink from the ridicule.</p> + +<p>I have already spoken of the forceful sonnets of that +tragic Portuguese, Antero de Quental, who died by his +own hand. Feeling acutely for the plight of his country +on the occasion of the British ultimatum in 1890, he +wrote as follows:<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66" /><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a> "An English statesman of the last +century, who was also undoubtedly a perspicacious +observer and a philosopher, Horace Walpole, said that +for those who feel, life is a tragedy, and a comedy for +those who think. Very well, then, if we are destined to +end tragically, we Portuguese, we who <i>feel</i>, we would +far rather prefer this terrible, but noble, destiny, to that +which is reserved, and perhaps at no very remote future +<a name="Page_316" id="Page_316" />date, for England, the country that <i>thinks</i> and <i>calculates</i>, +whose destiny it is to finish miserably and comically." +We may leave on one side the assertion that the English +are a thinking and calculating people, implying thereby +their lack of feeling, the injustice of which is explained +by the occasion which provoked it, and also the assertion +that the Portuguese feel, implying that they do not think +or calculate—for we twin-brothers of the Atlantic seaboard +have always been distinguished by a certain +pedantry of feeling; but there remains a basis of truth +underlying this terrible idea—namely, that some peoples, +those who put thought above feeling, I should say reason +above faith, die comically, while those die tragically who +put faith above reason. For the mockers are those who +die comically, and God laughs at their comic ending, +while the nobler part, the part of tragedy, is theirs who +endured the mockery.</p> + +<p>The mockery that underlies the career of Don Quixote +is what we must endeavour to discover.</p> + +<p>And shall we be told yet again that there has never +been any Spanish philosophy in the technical sense of +the word? I will answer by asking, What is this sense? +What does philosophy mean? Windelband, the historian +of philosophy, in his essay on the meaning of +philosophy (<i>Was ist Philosophie</i>? in the first volume of +his <i>Präludien</i>) tells us that "the history of the word +'philosophy' is the history of the cultural significance +of science." He continues: "When scientific thought +attains an independent existence as a desire for knowledge +for the sake of knowledge, it takes the name of +philosophy; when subsequently knowledge as a whole +divides into its various branches, philosophy is the +general knowledge of the world that embraces all other +knowledge. As soon as scientific thought stoops again +to becoming a means to ethics or religious contemplation, +philosophy is transformed into an art of life or into a +formulation of religious beliefs. And when afterwards +<a name="Page_317" id="Page_317" />the scientific life regains its liberty, philosophy acquires +once again its character as an independent knowledge of +the world, and in so far as it abandons the attempt to +solve this problem, it is changed into a theory of knowledge +itself." Here you have a brief recapitulation of +the history of philosophy from Thales to Kant, including +the medieval scholasticism upon which it endeavoured +to establish religious beliefs. But has philosophy no +other office to perform, and may not its office be to reflect +upon the tragic sense of life itself, such as we have been +studying it, to formulate this conflict between reason +and faith, between science and religion, and deliberately +to perpetuate this conflict?</p> + +<p>Later on Windelband says: "By philosophy in the +systematic, not in the historical, sense, I understand the +critical knowledge of values of universal validity +(<i>allgemeingiltigen Werten</i>)." But what values are there +of more universal validity than that of the human will +seeking before all else the personal, individual, and concrete +immortality of the soul—or, in other words, the +human finality of the Universe—and that of the human +reason denying the rationality and even the possibility +of this desire? What values are there of more universal +validity than the rational or mathematical value and the +volitional or teleological value of the Universe in conflict +with one another?</p> + +<p>For Windelband, as for Kantians and neo-Kantians +in general, there are only three normative categories, +three universal norms—those of the true or the false, the +beautiful or the ugly, and the morally good or evil. +Philosophy is reduced to logics, esthetics, and ethics, +accordingly as it studies science, art, or morality. +Another category remains excluded—namely, that of the +pleasing and the unpleasing, or the agreeable and the +disagreeable: in other words, the hedonic. The hedonic +cannot, according to them, pretend to universal validity, +it cannot be normative. "Whosoever throws upon +<a name="Page_318" id="Page_318" />philosophy," wrote Windelband, "the burden of +deciding the question of optimism and pessimism, whosoever +demands that philosophy should pronounce +judgement on the question as to whether the world is +more adapted to produce pain than pleasure, or <i>vice +versa</i>—such a one, if his attitude is not merely that of a +dilettante, sets himself the fantastic task of finding an +absolute determination in a region in which no reasonable +man has ever looked for one." It remains to be +seen, nevertheless, whether this is as clear as it seems, in +the case of a man like myself, who am at the same time +reasonable and yet nothing but a dilettante, which of +course would be the abomination of desolation.</p> + +<p>It was with a very profound insight that Benedetto +Croce, in his philosophy of the spirit in relation to +esthetics as the science of expression and to logic as the +science of pure concept, divided practical philosophy into +two branches—economics and ethics. He recognizes, in +effect, the existence of a practical grade of spirit, purely +economical, directed towards the singular and unconcerned +with the universal. Its types of perfection, of +economic genius, are Iago and Napoleon, and this grade +remains outside morality. And every man passes +through this grade, because before all else he must wish +to be himself, as an individual, and without this grade +morality would be inexplicable, just as without esthetics +logic would lack meaning. And the discovery of the +normative value of the economic grade, which seeks the +hedonic, was not unnaturally the work of an Italian, a +disciple of Machiavelli, who speculated so fearlessly with +regard to <i>virtù</i>, practical efficiency, which is not exactly +the same as moral virtue.</p> + +<p>But at bottom this economic grade is but the rudimentary +state of the religious grade. The religious is +the transcendental economic or hedonic. Religion is a +transcendental economy and hedonistic. That which man +seeks in religion, in religious faith, is to save his own +<a name="Page_319" id="Page_319" />individuality, to eternalize it, which he achieves neither +by science, nor by art, nor by ethics. God is a necessity +neither for science, nor art, nor ethics; what necessitates +God is religion. And with an insight that amounts to genius +our Jesuits speak of the grand business of our salvation. +Business—yes, business; something belonging to the +economic, hedonistic order, although transcendental. +We do not need God in order that He may teach us the +truth of things, or the beauty of them, or in order that He +may safeguard morality by means of a system of penalties +and punishments, but in order that He may save us, +in order that He may not let us die utterly. And because +this unique longing is the longing of each and every +normal man—those who are abnormal by reason of their +barbarism or their hyperculture may be left out of the +reckoning—it is universal and normative.</p> + +<p>Religion, therefore, is a transcendental economy, or, +if you like, metaphysic. Together with its logical, +esthetic, and ethical values, the Universe has for man an +economic value also, which, when thus made universal +and normative, is the religious value. We are not concerned +only with truth, beauty, and goodness: we are +concerned also and above all with the salvation of the +individual, with perpetuation, which those norms do not +secure for us. That science of economy which is called +political teaches us the most adequate, the most +economical way of satisfying our needs, whether these +needs are rational or irrational, beautiful or ugly, moral +or immoral—a business economically good may be a +swindle, something that in the long run kills the soul—and +the supreme human <i>need</i> is the need of not dying, +the need of enjoying for ever the plenitude of our own +individual limitation. And if the Catholic eucharistic +doctrine teaches that the substance of the body of Jesus +Christ is present whole and entire in the consecrated +Host, and in each part of it, this means that God is +wholly and entirely in the whole Universe and also in +<a name="Page_320" id="Page_320" />each one of the individuals that compose it. And this +is, fundamentally, not a logical, nor an esthetic, nor an +ethical principle, but a transcendental economic or religious +principle. And with this norm, philosophy is able +to judge of optimism and pessimism. <i>If the human soul +is immortal, the world is economically or hedonistically +good; if not, it is bad</i>. And the meaning which pessimism +and optimism give to the categories of good and evil is +not an ethical sense, but an economic or hedonistic sense. +Good is that which satisfies our vital longing and evil +is that which does not satisfy it.</p> + +<p>Philosophy, therefore, is also the science of the tragedy +of life, a reflection upon the tragic sense of it. An essay +in this philosophy, with its inevitable internal contradictions +and antinomies, is what I have attempted in these +essays. And the reader must not overlook the fact that +I have been operating upon myself; that this work partakes +of the nature of a piece of self-surgery, and without +any other anesthetic than that of the work itself. The +enjoyment of operating upon myself has ennobled the +pain of being operated upon.</p> + +<p>And as for my other claim—the claim that this is a +Spanish philosophy, perhaps <i>the</i> Spanish philosophy, +that if it was an Italian who discovered the normative +and universal value of the economic grade, it is a +Spaniard who announces that this grade is merely the +beginning of the religious grade, and that the essence +of our religion, of our Spanish Catholicism, consists precisely +in its being neither a science, nor an art, nor an +ethic, but an economy of things eternal—that is to say, of +things divine: as for this claim that all this is Spanish, +I must leave the task of substantiating it to another and +an historical work. But leaving aside the external and +written tradition, that which can be demonstrated by +reference to historical documents, is there not some +present justification of this claim in the fact that I am a +Spaniard—and a Spaniard who has scarcely ever been +<a name="Page_321" id="Page_321" />outside Spain; a product, therefore, of the Spanish tradition +of the living tradition, of the tradition which is +transmitted in feelings and ideas that dream, and not in +texts that sleep?</p> + +<p>The philosophy in the soul of my people appears to +me as the expression of an inward tragedy analogous to +the tragedy of the soul of Don Quixote, as the expression +of a conflict between what the world is as scientific reason +shows it to be, and what we wish that it might be, as our +religious faith affirms it to be. And in this philosophy +is to be found the explanation of what is usually said +about us—namely, that we are fundamentally irreducible +to <i>Kultur</i>—or, in other words, that we refuse to submit +to it. No, Don Quixote does not resign himself either +to the world, or to science or logic, or to art or esthetics, +or to morality or ethics.</p> + +<p>"And the upshot of all this," so I have been told more +than once and by more than one person, "will be simply +that all you will succeed in doing will be to drive people +to the wildest Catholicism." And I have been accused +of being a reactionary and even a Jesuit. Be it so! +And what then?</p> + +<p>Yes, I know, I know very well, that it is madness to +seek to turn the waters of the river back to their source, +and that it is only the ignorant who seek to find in the +past a remedy for their present ills; but I know too that +everyone who fights for any ideal whatever, although his +ideal may seem to lie in the past, is driving the world +on to the future, and that the only reactionaries are those +who find themselves at home in the present. Every supposed +restoration of the past is a creation of the future, +and if the past which it is sought to restore is a dream, +something imperfectly known, so much the better. The +march, as ever, is towards the future, and he who +marches is getting there, even though he march walking +backwards. And who knows if that is not the better +way!...</p> + +<p><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322" />I feel that I have within me a medieval soul, and I +believe that the soul of my country is medieval, that it +has perforce passed through the Renaissance, the +Reformation, and the Revolution—learning from them, +yes, but without allowing them to touch the soul, preserving +the spiritual inheritance which has come down +from what are called the Dark Ages. And Quixotism is +simply the most desperate phase of the struggle between +the Middle Ages and the Renaissance which was the offspring +of the Middle Ages.</p> + +<p>And if some accuse me of subserving the cause of +Catholic reaction, others perhaps, the official Catholics.... But +these, in Spain, trouble themselves little +about anything, and are interested only in their own +quarrels and dissensions. And besides, poor folk, they +have neither eyes nor ears!</p> + +<p>But the truth is that my work—I was going to say my +mission—is to shatter the faith of men here, there, and +everywhere, faith in affirmation, faith in negation, and +faith in abstention from faith, and this for the sake of +faith in faith itself; it is to war against all those who +submit, whether it be to Catholicism, or to rationalism, +or to agnosticism; it is to make all men live the life of +inquietude and passionate desire.</p> + +<p>Will this work be efficacious? But did Don Quixote +believe in the immediate apparential efficacy of his work? +It is very doubtful, and at any rate he did not by any +chance put his visor to the test by slashing it a second +time. And many passages in his history show that he +did not look with much confidence to the immediate +success of his design to restore knight-errantry. And +what did it matter to him so long as thus he lived and +immortalized himself? And he must have surmised, +and did in fact surmise, that his work would have another +and higher efficacy, and that was that it would ferment +in the minds of all those who in a pious spirit read of +his exploits.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323" />Don Quixote made himself ridiculous; but did he +know the most tragic ridicule of all, the inward ridicule, +the ridiculousness of a man's self to himself, in the eyes +of his own soul? Imagine Don Quixote's battlefield +to be his own soul; imagine him to be fighting in his +soul to save the Middle Ages from the Renaissance, to +preserve the treasure of his infancy; imagine him an +inward Don Quixote, with a Sancho, at his side, inward +and heroical too—and tell me if you find anything comic +in the tragedy.</p> + +<p>And what has Don Quixote left, do you ask? I +answer, he has left himself, and a man, a living and +eternal man, is worth all theories and all philosophies. +Other peoples have left chiefly institutions, books; we +have left souls; St. Teresa is worth any institution, any +<i>Critique of Pure Reason</i>.</p> + +<p>But Don Quixote was converted. Yes—and died, +poor soul. But the other, the real Don Quixote, he who +remained on earth and lives amongst us, animating us +with his spirit—this Don Quixote was not converted, +this Don Quixote continues to incite us to make ourselves +ridiculous, this Don Quixote must never die. And the +conversion of the other Don Quixote—he who was converted +only to die—was possible because he was mad, +and it was his madness, and not his death nor his conversion +that immortalized him, earning him forgiveness for +the crime of having been born.<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67" /><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a> <i>Felix culpa!</i> And +neither was his madness cured, but only transformed. +His death was his last knightly adventure; in dying he +stormed heaven, which suffereth violence.</p> + +<p>This mortal Don Quixote died and descended into hell, +which he entered lance on rest, and freed all the condemned, +as he had freed the galley slaves, and he shut +the gates of hell, and tore down the scroll that Dante saw +there and replaced it by one on which was written "Long +<a name="Page_324" id="Page_324" />live hope!" and escorted by those whom he had freed, +and they laughing at him, he went to heaven. And God +laughed paternally at him, and this divine laughter filled +his soul with eternal happiness.</p> + +<p>And the other Don Quixote remained here amongst us, +fighting with desperation. And does he not fight out of +despair? How is it that among the words that English +has borrowed from our language, such as <i>siesta, +camarilla, guerrilla</i>, there is to be found this word +<i>desperdo</i>? Is not this inward Don Quixote that I spoke +of, conscious of his own tragic comicness, a man of +despair (<i>desesperado</i>). A <i>desperado</i>—yes, like Pizarro +and like Loyola. But "despair is the master of impossibilities," +as we learn from Salazar y Torres (<i>Elegir al +enemigo</i>, Act I.), and it is despair and despair alone that +begets heroic hope, absurd hope, mad hope. <i>Spero +quia absurdum</i>, it ought to have been said, rather than +<i>credo</i>.</p> + +<p>And Don Quixote, who lived in solitude, sought more +solitude still; he sought the solitudes of the Peña Pobre, +in order that there, alone, without witnesses, he might +give himself up to greater follies with which to assuage +his soul. But he was not quite alone, for Sancho accompanied +him—Sancho the good, Sancho the believing, +Sancho the simple. If, as some say, in Spain Don +Quixote is dead and Sancho lives, then we are saved, for +Sancho, his master dead, will become a knight-errant +himself. And at any rate he is waiting for some other +mad knight to follow again.</p> + +<p>And there is also a tragedy of Sancho. The other +Sancho, the Sancho who journeyed with the mortal Don +Quixote—it is not certain that he died, although some +think that he died hopelessly mad, calling for his lance +and believing in the truth of all those things which +his dying and converted master had denounced and +abominated as lies. But neither is it certain that the +bachelor Sansón Carrasco, or the curate, or the barber, +<a name="Page_325" id="Page_325" />or the dukes and canons are dead, and it is with these +that the heroical Sancho has to contend.</p> + +<p>Don Quixote journeyed alone, alone with Sancho, +alone with his solitude. And shall we not also journey +alone, we his lovers, creating for ourselves a Quixotesque +Spain which only exists in our imagination?</p> + +<p>And again we shall be asked: What has Don Quixote +bequeathed to <i>Kultur</i>? I answer: Quixotism, and that +is no little thing! It is a whole method, a whole +epistemology, a whole esthetic, a whole logic, a whole +ethic—above all, a whole religion—that is to say, a +whole economy of things eternal and things divine, a +whole hope in what is rationally absurd.</p> + +<p>For what did Don Quixote fight? For Dulcinea, for +glory, for life, for survival. Not for Iseult, who is the +eternal flesh; not for Beatrice, who is theology; not for +Margaret, who is the people; not for Helen, who is culture. +He fought for Dulcinea, and he won her, for he +lives.</p> + +<p>And the greatest thing about him was his having been +mocked and vanquished, for it was in being overcome +that he overcame; he overcame the world by giving the +world cause to laugh at him.</p> + +<p>And to-day? To-day he feels his own comicness and +the vanity of his endeavours so far as their temporal +results are concerned; he sees himself from without—culture +has taught him to objectify himself, to alienate +himself from himself instead of entering into himself—and +in seeing himself from without he laughs at himself, +but with a bitter laughter. Perhaps the most tragic +character would be that of a Margutte of the inner man, +who, like the Margutte of Pulci, should die of laughter, +but of laughter at himself. <i>E riderá in eterno</i>, he will +laugh for all eternity, said the Angel Gabriel of Margutte. +Do you not hear the laughter of God?</p> + +<p>The mortal Don Quixote, in dying, realized his own +comicness and bewept his sins; but the immortal Quixote, +<a name="Page_326" id="Page_326" />realizing his own comicness, superimposes himself upon +it and triumphs over it without renouncing it.</p> + +<p>And Don Quixote does not surrender, because he is +not a pessimist, and he fights on. He is not a pessimist, +because pessimism is begotten by vanity, it is a matter of +fashion, pure intellectual snobbism, and Don Quixote is +neither vain nor modern with any sort of modernity (still +less is he a modernist), and he does not understand the +meaning of the word "snob" unless it be explained to +him in old Christian Spanish. Don Quixote is not a +pessimist, for since he does not understand what is meant +by the <i>joie de vivre</i> he does not understand its opposite. +Neither does he understand futurist fooleries. In spite +of Clavileño,<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68" /><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a> he has not got as far as the aeroplane, +which seems to tend to put not a few fools at a still +greater distance from heaven. Don Quixote has not +arrived at the age of the tedium of life, a condition that +not infrequently takes the form of that topophobia so +characteristic of many modern spirits, who pass their +lives running at top speed from one place to another, +not from any love of the place to which they are going, +but from hatred of the place they are leaving behind, and +so flying from all places: which is one of the forms of +despair.</p> + +<p>But Don Quixote hears his own laughter, he hears the +divine laughter, and since he is not a pessimist, since +he believes in life eternal, he has to fight, attacking the +modern, scientific, inquisitorial orthodoxy in order to +bring in a new and impossible Middle Age, dualistic, +contradictory, passionate. Like a new Savonarola, an +Italian Quixote of the end of the fifteenth century, he +fights against this Modern Age that began with +Machiavelli and that will end comically. He fights +against the rationalism inherited from the eighteenth +<a name="Page_327" id="Page_327" />century. Peace of mind, reconciliation between reason +and faith—this, thanks to the providence of God, is no +longer possible. The world must be as Don Quixote +wishes it to be, and inns must be castles, and he will +fight with it and will, to all appearances, be vanquished, +but he will triumph by making himself ridiculous. +And he will triumph by laughing at himself and +making himself the object of his own laughter.</p> + +<p>"Reason speaks and feeling bites" said Petrarch; but +reason also bites and bites in the inmost heart. And +more light does not make more warmth. "Light, light, +more light!" they tell us that the dying Goethe cried. +No, warmth, warmth, more warmth! for we die of cold +and not of darkness. It is not the night kills, but the +frost. We must liberate the enchanted princess and +destroy the stage of Master Peter.<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69" /><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a></p> + +<p>But God! may there not be pedantry too in thinking +ourselves the objects of mockery and in making Don +Quixotes of ourselves? Kierkegaard said that the +regenerate (<i>Opvakte</i>) desire that the wicked world should +mock at them for the better assurance of their own +regeneracy, for the enjoyment of being able to bemoan +the wickedness of the world (<i>Afsluttende uvidenskabelig +Efterskrift</i>, ii., Afsnit ii., cap. 4, sect. 2, b).</p> + +<p>The question is, how to avoid the one or the other +pedantry, or the one or the other affectation, if the +natural man is only a myth and we are all artificial.</p> + +<p>Romanticism! Yes, perhaps that is partly the word. +And there is an advantage in its very lack of precision. +Against romanticism the forces of rationalist and +classicist pedantry, especially in France, have latterly +been unchained. Romanticism itself is merely another +form of pedantry, the pedantry of sentiment? Perhaps. +In this world a man of culture is either a dilettante or a +pedant: you have to take your choice. Yes, René and +Adolphe and Obermann and Lara, perhaps they were all +<a name="Page_328" id="Page_328" />pedants.... The question is to seek consolation in +disconsolation.</p> + +<p>The philosophy of Bergson, which is a spiritualist +restoration, essentially mystical, medieval, Quixotesque, +has been called a <i>demi-mondaine</i> philosophy. Leave +out the <i>demi</i>; call it <i>mondaine</i>, mundane. Mundane—yes, +a philosophy for the world and not for philosophers, +just as chemistry ought to be not for chemists alone. The +world desires illusion (<i>mundus vult decipi</i>)—either the +illusion antecedent to reason, which is poetry, or the +illusion subsequent to reason, which is religion. And +Machiavelli has said that whosoever wishes to delude +will always find someone willing to be deluded. Blessed +are they who are easily befooled! A Frenchman, Jules +de Gaultier, said that it was the privilege of his countrymen +<i>n'être pas dupe</i>—not to be taken in. A sorry +privilege!</p> + +<p>Science does not give Don Quixote what he demands +of it. "Then let him not make the demand," it will be +said, "let him resign himself, let him accept life and +truth as they are." But he does not accept them as they +are, and he asks for signs, urged thereto by Sancho, who +stands by his side. And it is not that Don Quixote does +not understand what those understand who talk thus to +him, those who succeed in resigning themselves and +accepting rational life and rational truth. No, it is that +the needs of his heart are greater. Pedantry? Who +knows!...</p> + +<p>And in this critical century, Don Quixote, who has +also contaminated himself with criticism, has to attack +his own self, the victim of intellectualism and of sentimentalism, +and when he wishes to be most spontaneous +he appears to be most affected. And he wishes, unhappy +man, to rationalize the irrational and irrationalize the +rational. And he sinks into the despair of the critical +century whose two greatest victims were Nietzsche and +Tolstoi. And through this despair he reaches the heroic +<a name="Page_329" id="Page_329" />fury of which Giordano Bruno spoke—that intellectual +Don Quixote who escaped from the cloister—and +becomes an awakener of sleeping souls (<i>dormitantium +animorum excubitor</i>), as the ex-Dominican said of himself—he +who wrote: "Heroic love is the property of +those superior natures who are called insane (<i>insano</i>) not +because they do not know (<i>no sanno</i>), but because they +over-know (<i>soprasanno</i>)."</p> + +<p>But Bruno believed in the triumph of his doctrines; at +any rate the inscription at the foot of his statue in the +Campo dei Fiori, opposite the Vatican, states that it has +been dedicated to him by the age which he had foretold +(<i>il secolo da lui divinato</i>). But our Don Quixote, the +inward, the immortal Don Quixote, conscious of his own +comicness, does not believe that his doctrines will +triumph in this world, because they are not of it. And +it is better that they should not triumph. And if the +world wished to make Don Quixote king, he would +retire alone to the mountain, fleeing from the king-making +and king-killing crowds, as Christ retired alone +to the mountain when, after the miracle of the loaves and +fishes, they sought to proclaim him king. He left the +title of king for the inscription written over the Cross.</p> + +<p>What, then, is the new mission of Don Quixote, +to-day, in this world? To cry aloud, to cry aloud in the +wilderness. But though men hear not, the wilderness +hears, and one day it will be transformed into a resounding +forest, and this solitary voice that goes scattering +over the wilderness like seed, will fructify into a gigantic +cedar, which with its hundred thousand tongues will sing +an eternal hosanna to the Lord of life and of death.</p> + +<p>And now to you, the younger generation, bachelor +Carrascos of a Europeanizing regenerationism, you who +are working after the best European fashion, with scientific +method and criticism, to you I say: Create wealth, +create nationality, create art, create science, create ethics, +above all create—or rather, translate—<i>Kultur</i>, and thus +<a name="Page_330" id="Page_330" />kill in yourselves both life and death. Little will it all +last you!...</p> + +<p>And with this I conclude—high time that I did!—for +the present at any rate, these essays on the tragic sense +of life in men and in peoples, or at least in myself—who +am a man—and in the soul of my people as it is reflected +in mine.</p> + +<p>I hope, reader, that some time while our tragedy is still +playing, in some interval between the acts, we shall +meet again. And we shall recognize one another. And +forgive me if I have troubled you more than was needful +and inevitable, more than I intended to do when I took +up my pen proposing to distract you for a while from +your distractions. And may God deny you peace, but +give you glory!</p> + +<p>SALAMANCA,<br /> +<i>In the year of grace</i> 1912.</p> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59" /><a href="#FNanchor_59_59">[59]</a> "Que tal?" o "como va?" y es aquella que responde: "se vive!"</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60" /><a href="#FNanchor_60_60">[60]</a> Whenever I consider that I needs must die, I stretch my cloak upon the +ground and am not surfeited with sleeping.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61" /><a href="#FNanchor_61_61">[61]></a> No es consuelo de desdichas—es otra desdicha aparte—querer a quien las +padece—persuadir que no son tales (<i>Gustos y diogustos no son niés que imaginatión</i>, +Act I., Scene 4).</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62" /><a href="#FNanchor_62_62">[62]</a> <i>Don Quijote</i>, part i., chap, i.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63" /><a href="#FNanchor_63_63">[63]</a> Preface.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64" /><a href="#FNanchor_64_64">[64]></a> <i>El individualismo español</i>, in vol. clxxi., March 1, 1903.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65" /><a href="#FNanchor_65_65">[65]</a> See <i>El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha</i>, part ii., +chap. lviii., and the corresponding chapter in my <i>Vida de Don Quijote y Sancho</i>.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66" /><a href="#FNanchor_66_66">[66]</a> In an article which was to have been published on the occasion of the +ultimatum, and of which the original is in the possession of the Conde do +Ameal. This fragment appeared in the Portuguese review, <i>A Aguía</i> (No. 3), March, 1912.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67" /><a href="#FNanchor_67_67">[67]</a> An allusion to the phrase in Calderón's <i>La Vida es Sueño</i>, "Que delito +cometí contra vosotros naciendo?"—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68" /><a href="#FNanchor_68_68">[68]</a> The wooden horse upon which Don Quixote imagined that he and Sancho +had been carried in the air. See <i>Don Quijote</i>, part ii., chaps. 40 and 41.—J.E.C.F.</p> + +<p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69" /><a href="#FNanchor_69_69">[69]</a> <i>Don Quijote</i>, part ii., chap. 26.</p> + +<hr /> +<h2><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331" /><a name="INDEX" id="INDEX" />INDEX</h2> + +<ul> + <li> + <ul> + + <li>Æschylus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_246'>246</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Alexander of Aphrodisias, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_88'>88</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Amiel, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_18'>18,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_68'>68,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_228'>228</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Anaxagoras, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Angelo of Foligno, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Antero de Quintal, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_240'>240,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_315'>315</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Ardigo, Roberto, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_238'>238</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Aristotle, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_1'>1,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_21'>21,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_80'>80,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_144'>144,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_171'>171,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_232'>232,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_235'>235</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Arnold, Matthew, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_103'>103</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Athanasius, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_63'>63-65</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Avenarius, Richard, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_144'>144,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Athanasius, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_63'>63-65</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>de Ayala, Ramón Pérez, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_303'>303</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Bacon, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Balfour, A.J., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_27'>27</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Balmes, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_84'>84,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_85'>85</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Bergson, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_144'>144,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_328'>328</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Berkeley, Bishop, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_87'>87,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_146'>146</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Besant, Mrs. A., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_291'>291</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Boccaccio, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_52'>52</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Böhme, Jacob, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_227'>227,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_297'>297</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Bonnefon, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_250'>250,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_254'>254</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Bossuet, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_226'>226,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_231'>231</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Brooks, Phillips, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_76'>76,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_190'>190</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Browning, Robert, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_112'>112,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_181'>181,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_249'>249,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_254'>254</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Brunetière, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_103'>103,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_298'>298</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Brunhes, B., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_235'>235,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_237'>237,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_238'>238</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Bruno, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_301'>301,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_329'>329</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Büchner, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_95'>95</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Butler, Joseph, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_5'>5,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_6'>6,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_87'>87</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Byron, Lord, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_94'>94,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_102'>102,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_103'>103,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_132'>132</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Calderón, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_39'>39,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_268'>268,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_323'>323</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Calvin, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_121'>121,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_246'>246</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Campanella, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_301'>301</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Carducci, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_102'>102,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_306'>306</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Carlyle, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_231'>231,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_298'>298</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Catherine of Sienna, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Cauchy, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_236'>236</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Cervantes, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_220'>220,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_306'>306</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Channing, W.E., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_78'>78</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Cicero, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_216'>216,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_221'>221</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Clement of Alexandria, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_32'>32</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Cortés, Donoso, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Costa, Joaquin, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_309'>309</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Cournot, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_192'>192,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_217'>217,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_222'>222,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_306'>306</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Cowper, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_43'>43</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Croce, Benedetto, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_313'>313,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_318'>318</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Dante, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_42'>42,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_51'>51,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_140'>140,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_223'>223,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_233'>233,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_256'>256,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_295'>295</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Darwin, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_72'>72,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_147'>147</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Descartes, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_34'>34,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_86'>86,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_107'>107,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_224'>224,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_237'>237,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_293'>293,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_312'>312</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Diderot, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_99'>99</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Diego de Estella, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_304'>304</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Dionysius the Areopagite, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_160'>160</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Domingo de Guzmán, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Duns Scotus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_76'>76</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Eckhart, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Empedocles, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_61'>61</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Erasmus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_112'>112,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_301'>301</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Erigena, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_160'>160,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_167'>167</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Fénelon, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_224'>224</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Fichte, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_8'>8,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_29'>29</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Flaubert, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_94'>94,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_219'>219</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Fouillée, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_261'>261</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Fourier, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_278'>278</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Francesco de Sanctis, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_220'>220</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Francke, August, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_120'>120</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Franklin, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_248'>248</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Galileo, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_72'>72,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_267'>267,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_302'>302</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Ganivet, Angel, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_313'>313</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>de Gaultier, Jules, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_328'>328</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Goethe, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_218'>218,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_264'>264,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_288'>288,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_299'>299,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_309'>309</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Gounod, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_56'>56</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Gratry, Père, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_236'>236</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Haeckel, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_95'>95</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Harnack, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_59'>59,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_64'>64,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_65'>65,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_69'>69,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_75'>75</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hartmann, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_146'>146</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hegel, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_5'>5,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_111'>111,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_170'>170,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_294'>294,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_309'>309,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Heraclitus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hermann, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_69'>69,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_70'>70,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_77'>77,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_217'>217</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Herodotus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_140'>140</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hippocrates, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hodgson, S.H., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_30'>30</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Holberg, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_109'>109</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Holmes, Oliver Wendell, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_257'>257,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_311'>311</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hume, David, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_79'>79,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_86'>86,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_104'>104,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Hume, Martin A.S., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_312'>312</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Huntingdon, A.M., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_298'>298</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>James, William, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_5'>5,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_81'>81,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_86'>86</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Jansen, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_121'>121</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Juan de los Angeles, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_1'>1,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_207'>207,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_286'>286</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Juan de la Cruz, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_67'>67,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_293'>293</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Justin Martyr, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_63'>63</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Kaftan, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_68'>68,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_222'>222</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Kant, Immanuel, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_3'>3,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_4'>4,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_11'>11,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_13'>13,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_67'>67,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_68'>68,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_73'>73,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_79'>79,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_114'>114,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_166'>166,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_294'>294,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_311'>311,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_317'>317</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>à Kempis, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_51'>51,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_99'>99,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_277'>277</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Kierkegaard, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_3'>3,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_109'>109,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_115'>115,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_123'>123,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_153'>153,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_178'>178,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_198'>198,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_257'>257,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_287'>287,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_327'>327</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Krause, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_294'>294</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Lactantius, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_59'>59,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_169'>169</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Lamarck, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_147'>147</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Lamennais, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_117'>117,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_246'>246</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Laplace, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_161'>161</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Leibnitz, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_247'>247</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Leo XIII., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_75'>75</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Leopardi, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_44'>44,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_47'>47,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_123'>123,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_132'>132,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_240'>240,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_248'>248</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Le Roy, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_73'>73</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Lessing, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_229'>229</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Linnæus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_1'>1</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Loisy, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Loyola, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_122'>122,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_307'>307,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_314'>314,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_324'>324</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Loyson, Hyacinthe, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_116'>116</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Lucretius, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_94'>94,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_102'>102</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Luis de León, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Luther, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_3'>3,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_121'>121,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_270'>270,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_294'>294,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_301'>301</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Mach, Dr. E., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Machado, Antonio, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_241'>241</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Machiavelli, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_296'>296,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_326'>326,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_328'>328</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>de Maistre, Count Joseph, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_305'>305</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Malebranche, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_63'>63</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Malón de Chaide, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_66'>66</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Manrique, Jorge + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_309'>309</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Marcus Aurelius, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_315'>315</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Marlowe, Christopher, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_299'>299</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Martins, Oliveira, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_68'>68</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Mazzini, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_153'>153</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Melanchthon, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_69'>69</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Menéndez de Pelayo, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_313'>313</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Michelet, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_45'>45</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Miguel de Molinos, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_216'>216,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_219'>219,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_228'>228</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Mill, Stuart, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_104'>104,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Milton, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_284'>284</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Moser, Johann Jacob, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_252'>252,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_263'>263</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Myers, W.H., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_88'>88</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Nietzsche, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_50'>50,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_61'>61,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_100'>100,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_231'>231,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_239'>239,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_328'>328</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Nimesius, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_59'>59</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Obermann, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_11'>11,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_47'>47,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_259'>259,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_263'>263,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_268'>268</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Oetinger, Friedrich Christoph, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_252'>252,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_253'>253</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Ordóñez de Lara, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_56'>56</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Origen, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_245'>245</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Papini, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_238'>238</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pascal, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_40'>40,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_45'>45,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_262'>262,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_263'>263</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Petrarch, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_327'>327</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pfleiderer, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_61'>61</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pius IX., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pizarro, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_324'>324</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Plato, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_38'>38,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_45'>45,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_48'>48,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_61'>61,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_90'>90,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_125'>125,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_216'>216,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_217'>217,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_221'>221,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_292'>292,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pliny, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_165'>165</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Plotinus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_209'>209,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_230'>230,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_243'>243</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pohle, Joseph, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_77'>77</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Pomponazzi, Pietro, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_88'>88</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Renan, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_51'>51,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_68'>68</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Ritschl, Albrecht, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_68'>68,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_114'>114,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_121'>121,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_167'>167,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_238'>238,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_253'>253,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_263'>263,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_294'>294</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Robertson, F.W., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_180'>180</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Robespierre, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_41'>41</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Rohde, Erwin, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_60'>60,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_61'>61</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Rousseau, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_53'>53,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_263'>263,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_299'>299,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Ruysbroek, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Saint Augustine, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_192'>192,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_247'>247</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Saint Bonaventura, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_220'>220</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Saint Francis of Assissi, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_52'>52,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_210'>210</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Saint Paul, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_48'>48,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_49'>49,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_62'>62,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_94'>94,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_112'>112,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_188'>188,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_209'>209,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_225'>225,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_241'>241,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_253'>253,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_255'>255,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_270'>270</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Saint Teresa, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_67'>67,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_75'>75,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_210'>210,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_226'>226,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_228'>228,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_323'>323</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Saint Thomas Aquinas, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_83'>83,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_92'>92,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_233'>233</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Salazar y Torres, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_324'>324</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Schleiermacher, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_89'>89,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_156'>156,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_217'>217</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Schopenhauer, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_146'>146,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_147'>147,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_247'>247</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Seeberg, Reinold, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_188'>188</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Sénancour, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_43'>43,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_47'>47,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_260'>260,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_263'>263,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_299'>299</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Seneca, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_231'>231,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_313'>313</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Seuse, Heinrich, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_75'>75,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Shakespeare, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_39'>39</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Socrates, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_29'>29,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_145'>145</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Solon, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_17'>17</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Soloviev, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_95'>95</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Spencer, Herbert, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_89'>89,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_124'>124,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_238'>238,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_253'>253</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Spener, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_253'>253</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Spinoza, Benedict, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_6'>6,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_7'>7,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_22'>22,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_24'>24,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_31'>31,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_38'>38,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_40'>40,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_89'>89,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_97'>97-99,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_101'>101,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_208'>208,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_234'>234,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_310'>310</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Stanley, Dean, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_91'>91</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Stendhal, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_311'>311</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Stirmer, Max, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_29'>29</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Suárez, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_312'>312</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Swedenborg, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_153'>153,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_221'>221,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_225'>225</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Tacitus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_56'>56,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_94'>94,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_142'>142,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_216'>216,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_306'>306</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Tauler, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Tennyson, Lord, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_33'>33,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_103'>103</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Tertullian, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_74'>74,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_94'>94,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_104'>104</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Thales of Miletus, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_317'>317</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Thomé de Jesús, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_283'>283</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Tolstoi, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_328'>328</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Troeltsch, Ernst, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_70'>70,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_112'>112</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Velasquez, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_70'>70</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Vico, Giovanni Baptista, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_142'>142,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Vinet, A., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_93'>93,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_113'>113,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_160'>160</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Virchow, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_95'>95</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Virgil, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_249'>249</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Vives, Luis, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_313'>313</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Vogt, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_95'>95</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Walpole, Horace, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_315'>315</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Weizsäcker, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_62'>62,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_77'>77</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Wells, H.G., + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_265'>265</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Whitman, Walt, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_125'>125</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + <li>Windelband, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_267'>267,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_316'>316,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_317'>317</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> + <li> + <ul> + <li>Xenophon, + <ul> + <li><a href='#Page_29'>29,</a></li> + <li><a href='#Page_143'>143</a></li> + </ul> + </li> + </ul> + </li> +</ul> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Tragic Sense Of Life, by Miguel de Unamuno + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRAGIC SENSE OF LIFE *** + +***** This file should be named 14636-h.htm or 14636-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/4/6/3/14636/ + +Produced by David Starner, Martin Pettit and the PG Online Distributed +Proofreading Team + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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