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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/38283-8.txt b/38283-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..efb132f --- /dev/null +++ b/38283-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2333 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Schopenhauer, by Thomas Whittaker + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. 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: Schopenhauer + +Author: Thomas Whittaker + +Release Date: December 12, 2011 [EBook #38283] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCHOPENHAUER *** + + + + +Produced by Albert László and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + + +PHILOSOPHIES ANCIENT AND MODERN + +SCHOPENHAUER + + + + +NOTE + + +As a consequence of the success of the series of _Religions Ancient and +Modern_, Messrs. CONSTABLE have decided to issue a set of similar +primers, with brief introductions, lists of dates, and selected +authorities, presenting to the wider public the salient features of the +_Philosophies_ of Greece and Rome and of the Middle Ages, as well as of +modern Europe. They will appear in the same handy Shilling volumes, with +neat cloth bindings and paper envelopes, which have proved so attractive +in the case of the _Religions_. The writing in each case will be +confided to an eminent authority, and one who has already proved himself +capable of scholarly yet popular exposition within a small compass. + +Among the first volumes to appear will be:-- + + =Early Greek Philosophy.= By A. W. BENN, author of _The Philosophy + of Greece, Rationalism in the Nineteenth Century_. + + =Stoicism.= By Professor ST. GEORGE STOCK, author of _Deductive + Logic_, editor of the _Apology of Plato_, etc. + + =Plato.= By Professor A. E. TAYLOR, St. Andrews University, author + of _The Problem of Conduct_. + + =Scholasticism.= By Father RICKABY, S.J. + + =Hobbes.= By Professor A. E. TAYLOR. + + =Locke.= By Professor ALEXANDER, of Owens College. + + =Comte and Mill.= By T. WHITTAKER, author of _The Neoplatonists, + Apollonius of Tyana and other Essays_. + + =Herbert Spencer.= By W. H. HUDSON, author of _An Introduction to + Spencer's Philosophy_. + + =Schopenhauer.= By T. WHITTAKER. + + =Berkeley.= By Professor CAMPBELL FRASER, D.C.L., LL.D. + + =Bergsen.= By Father TYRRELL. + + + + +SCHOPENHAUER + + +By + +THOMAS WHITTAKER + +AUTHOR OF 'COMTE AND MILL,' ETC. + + +LONDON + +ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO LTD + +1909 + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAP. PAGE + + I. LIFE AND WRITINGS, 1 + II. THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE, 15 + III. METAPHYSICS OF THE WILL, 29 + IV. ĆSTHETICS, 49 + V. ETHICS, 65 + VI. HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE, 86 + SELECTED WORKS, 93 + + + + +SCHOPENHAUER + + + + +CHAPTER I + +LIFE AND WRITINGS + + +Arthur Schopenhauer may be distinctively described as the greatest +philosophic writer of his century. So evident is this that he has +sometimes been regarded as having more importance in literature than in +philosophy; but this is an error. As a metaphysician he is second to no +one since Kant. Others of his age have surpassed him in system and in +comprehensiveness; but no one has had a firmer grasp of the essential +and fundamental problems of philosophy. On the theory of knowledge, the +nature of reality, and the meaning of the beautiful and the good, he has +solutions to offer that are all results of a characteristic and original +way of thinking. + +In one respect, as critics have noted, his spirit is different from that +of European philosophy in general. What preoccupies him in a special way +is the question of evil in the world. Like the philosophies of the +East, emerging as they do without break from religion, Schopenhauer's +philosophy is in its outcome a doctrine of redemption from sin. The name +of pessimism commonly applied to it is in some respects misleading, +though it was his own term; but it is correct if understood as he +explained it. As he was accustomed to insist, his final ethical doctrine +coincides with that of all the religions that aim, for their adepts or +their elect, at deliverance from 'this evil world.' But, as the +'world-fleeing' religions have their mitigations and accommodations, so +also has the philosophy of Schopenhauer. At various points indeed it +seems as if a mere change of accent would turn it into optimism. + +This preoccupation does not mean indifference to the theoretical +problems of philosophy. No one has insisted more strongly that the end +of philosophy is pure truth, and that only the few who care about pure +truth have any concern with it. But for Schopenhauer the desire for +speculative truth does not by itself suffice to explain the impulse of +philosophical inquiries. On one side of his complex character, he had +more resemblance to the men who turn from the world to religion, like +St. Augustine, than to the normal type of European thinker, represented +pre-eminently by Aristotle. He was a temperamental pessimist, feeling +from the first the trouble of existence; and here he finds the deepest +motive for the desire to become clear about it. He saw in the world, +what he felt in himself, a vain effort after ever new objects of desire +which give no permanent satisfaction; and this view, becoming +predominant, determined, not indeed all the ideas of his philosophy, but +its general complexion as a 'philosophy of redemption.' + +With his pessimism, personal misfortunes had nothing to do. He was, and +always recognised that he was, among the most fortunately placed of +mankind. He does not hesitate to speak sometimes of his own happiness in +complete freedom from the need to apply himself to any compulsory +occupation. This freedom, as he has put gratefully on record, he owed to +his father, Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer, who was a rich merchant of +Danzig, where the philosopher was born on the 22nd of February 1788. +Both his parents were of Dutch ancestry. His mother, Johanna +Schopenhauer, won celebrity as a novelist; and his sister, Adele, also +displayed some literary talent. Generalising from his own case, +Schopenhauer holds that men of intelligence derive their character from +their father and their intellect from their mother. With his mother, +however, he was not on sympathetic terms, as may be read in the +biographies. His father intended him for a mercantile career, and with +this view began to prepare him from the first to be a cosmopolitan man +of the world. The name of Arthur was given to him because it is spelt +alike in the leading European languages. He was taken early to France, +where he resided from 1797 to 1799, learning French so well that on his +return he had almost forgotten his German. Portions of the years 1803 to +1804 were spent in England, France, Switzerland, and Austria. In England +he was three months at a Wimbledon boarding-school kept by a clergyman. +This experience he found extremely irksome. He afterwards became highly +proficient in English: was always pleased to be taken for an Englishman, +and regarded both the English character and intelligence as on the whole +the first in Europe; but all the more deplorable did he find the +oppressive pietism which was the special form taken in the England of +that period by the reaction against the French Revolution. He is never +tired of denouncing that phase of 'cold superstition,' the dominance of +which lasted during his lifetime; for the publication of Mill's +_Liberty_ and of Darwin's _Origin of Species_, which may be considered +as marking the close of it, came only the year before his death. + +The only real break in the conformity of Schopenhauer's circumstances to +his future career came in 1805, when he was placed in a merchant's +office at Hamburg, whither his father had migrated in disgust at the +annexation of his native Danzig, then under a republican constitution of +its own, by Prussia in 1793. Soon afterwards his father died; but out of +loyalty he tried for some time longer to reconcile himself to commercial +life. Finding this at length impossible, he gained permission from his +mother, in 1807, to leave the office for the gymnasium. At this time he +seems to have begun his classical studies, his education having hitherto +been exclusively modern. They were carried on first at Gotha and then at +Weimar. In 1809 he entered the university of Göttingen as a student of +medicine. This, however, was with a view only to scientific studies, not +to practice; and he transferred himself to the philosophical faculty in +1810. Generally he was little regardful of academical authority. His +father's deliberately adopted plan of letting him mix early with the +world had given him a certain independence of judgment. At Göttingen, +however, he received an important influence from his teacher, G. E. +Schulze (known by the revived scepticism of his _Ćnesidemus_), who +advised him to study Plato and Kant before Aristotle and Spinoza. From +1811 to 1813 he was at Berlin, where he heard Fichte, but was not +impressed. In 1813 the degree of Doctor of Philosophy was conferred on +him at Jena for the dissertation _On the Fourfold Root of the Principle +of Sufficient Reason_ (_Ueber die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom +zureichenden Grunde_, 2nd ed., 1847). This was the first result of his +Kantian studies. In the same year he began to be acquainted with Goethe +at Weimar, where his mother and sister had gone to reside in 1806. A +consequence of this acquaintance was that he took up and further +developed Goethe's theory of colours. His dissertation _Ueber das Sehen +und die Farben_ was published in 1816. A second edition did not appear +till 1854; but in the meantime he had published a restatement of his +doctrine in Latin, entitled _Theoria Colorum Physiologica_ (1830). This, +however, was an outlying part of his work. He had already been seized by +the impulse to set forth the system of philosophy that took shape in +him, as he says, by some formative process of which he could give no +conscious account. His great work, _Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung_, +was ready for publication before the end of 1818, and was published with +the date 1819. Thus he is one of the most precocious philosophers on +record. For in that single volume, written before he was thirty, the +outlines of his whole system are fixed. There is some development later, +and there are endless new applications and essays towards confirmation +from all sources. His mind never rested, and his literary power gained +by exercise. Still, it has been said with truth, that there never was a +greater illusion than when he thought that he seldom repeated himself. +In reality he did little but repeat his fundamental positions with +infinite variations in expression. + +After completing his chief work, Schopenhauer wrote some verses in which +he predicted that posterity would erect a monument to him. This +prediction was fulfilled in 1895; but, for the time, the work which he +never doubted would be his enduring title to fame seemed, like Hume's +_Treatise_, to have fallen 'deadborn from the press.' This he attributed +to the hostility of the academical philosophers; and, in his later +works, attacks on the university professors form a characteristic +feature. The official teachers of the Hegelian school, he declared, were +bent only on obtaining positions for themselves by an appearance of +supporting Christian dogma; and they resented openness on the part of +any one else. Yet on one side he maintained that his own pessimism was +more truly Christian than their optimism. The essential spirit of +Christianity is that of Brahmanism and Buddhism, the great religions +that sprang from India, the first home of our race. He is even inclined +to see in it traces of Indian influence. What vitiates it in his eyes is +the Jewish element, which finds its expression in the flat modern +'Protestant-rationalistic optimism.' As optimistic religions, he groups +together Judaism, Islam, and Grćco-Roman Polytheism. His antipathy, +however, only extends to the two former. He was himself in great part a +child of Humanism and of the eighteenth century, rejoicing over the +approaching downfall of all the faiths, and holding that a weak religion +(entirely different from those he admires) is favourable to +civilisation. Nothing can exceed his scorn for nearly everything that +characterised the Middle Ages. With Catholicism as a political system he +has no sympathy whatever; while on the religious side the Protestant +are as sympathetic to him as the Catholic mystics. What is common to all +priesthoods, he holds, is to exploit the metaphysical need of mankind +(in which he also believes) for the sake of their own power. +Clericalism, 'Pfaffenthum,' whether Catholic or Protestant, is the +object of his unvarying hatred and contempt. If he had cared to +appreciate Hegel, he would have found on this point much community of +spirit; but of course there was a real antithesis between the two as +philosophers. No 'conspiracy' need be invoked to explain the failure of +Schopenhauer to win early recognition. Belief in the State and in +progress was quite alien to him; and Germany was then full of political +hopes, which found nourishment in optimistic pantheism. What at length +gave his philosophy vogue was the collapse of this enthusiasm on the +failure of the revolutionary movement in 1848. Once known, it contained +enough of permanent value to secure it from again passing out of sight +with the next change of fashion. + +The rest of Schopenhauer's life in its external relations may be briefly +summed up. For a few years, it was diversified by travels in Italy and +elsewhere, and by an unsuccessful attempt at academical teaching in +Berlin. In 1831 he moved to Frankfort, where he finally settled in +1833. He lived unmarried there till his death on the 21st of September +1860. The monument, already spoken of, was unveiled at Frankfort on the +6th of June 1895. + +The almost unbroken silence with which his great work was received, +though it had a distempering effect on the man, did not discourage the +thinker. The whole series of Schopenhauer's works, indeed, was completed +before he attained anything that could be called fame. Constantly on the +alert as he was to seize upon confirmations of his system, he published +in 1836 his short work _On the Will in Nature_, pointing out +verifications of his metaphysics by recent science. In 1839 his prize +essay, _On the Freedom of the Human Will_ (finished in 1837), was +crowned by the Royal Scientific Society of Drontheim in Norway. This and +another essay, _On the Basis of Morality_, _not_ crowned by the Royal +Danish Society of Copenhagen in 1840, he published in 1841, with the +inclusive title, _Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik_. In 1844 appeared +the second edition of his principal work, to which there was added, in +the form of a second volume, a series of elucidations and extensions +larger in bulk than the first. This new volume contains much of his +best and most effective writing. His last work, _Parerga und +Paralipomena_, which appeared in 1851 (2 vols.), is from the literary +point of view the most brilliant. It was only from this time that he +began to be well known among the general public; though the philosophic +'apostolate' of Julius Frauenstädt, who afterwards edited his works, had +begun in 1840. His activity was henceforth confined to modifying and +extending his works for new editions; an employment in which he was +always assiduous. In consequence of this, all of them, as they stand, +contain references from one to another; but the development of his +thinking, so far as there was such a process after 1818, can be easily +traced without reference to the earlier editions. There is some growth; +but, as has been said, it does not affect many of the chief points. A +brief exposition of his philosophy can on the whole take it as something +fixed. The heads under which it must fall are those assigned to the +original four books of _Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung_. + +Although Schopenhauer discountenanced the attempt to connect a +philosophers biography with his work, something has to be said about his +character, since this has been dwelt on to his disadvantage by +opponents. There is abundant material for a personal estimate in the +correspondence and reminiscences published after his death by his +disciples Julius Frauenstädt and Wilhelm Gwinner. The apparent +contradiction is at once obvious between the ascetic consummation of his +ethics and his unascetic life, carefully occupied in its latter part +with rules for the preservation of his naturally robust health. He was +quite aware of this, but holds it absurd to require that a moralist +should commend only the virtues which he possesses. It is as if the +requirement were set up that a sculptor is to be himself a model of +beauty. A saint need not be a philosopher, nor a philosopher a saint. +The science of morals is as theoretical as any other branch of +philosophy. Fundamentally character is unmodifiable, though knowledge, +it is allowed, may change the mode of action within the limits of the +particular character. The passage to the state of asceticism cannot be +effected by moral philosophy, but depends on a kind of 'grace.' After +all, it might be replied, philosophers, whether they succeed or not, do +usually make at least an attempt to live in accordance with the moral +ideal they set up. The best apology in Schopenhauer's case is that the +fault may have been as much in his ideal as in his failure to conform +to it. The eloquent pages he has devoted to the subject of holiness only +make manifest the inconsequence (which he admits) in the passage to it. +For, as we shall see, this has nothing in common with the essentially +rational asceticism of the schools of later antiquity; which was a rule +of self-limitation in view of the philosophic life. He did in a way of +his own practise something of this; and, on occasion, he sets forth the +theory of it; but he quite clearly sees the difference. His own ideal, +which he never attempted to practise, is that of the self-torturing +ascetics of the Christian Middle Age. Within the range of properly human +virtue, he can in many respects hold his own, not only as a philosopher +but as a man. If his egoism and vanity are undeniable, he undoubtedly +possessed the virtues of rectitude and compassion. What he would have +especially laid stress on was the conscientious devotion to his work. +With complete singleness of purpose he used for a disinterested end the +leisure which he regarded as the most fortunate of endowments. As he +said near the close of his life, his intellectual conscience was clear. + +Of Schopenhauer's expositions of his pessimism it would be true to say, +as Spinoza says of the Book of Job, that the matter, like the style, is +not that of a man sitting among the ashes, but of one meditating in a +library. This of course does not prove that they are not a genuine, if +one-sided, rendering of human experience. All that can be said is that +they did not turn him away from appreciation of the apparent goods of +life. His own practical principle was furnished by what he regarded as a +lower point of view; and this gives its direction to the semi-popular +philosophy of the _Parerga_. From what he takes to be the higher point +of view, the belief that happiness is attainable by man on earth is an +illusion; but he holds that, by keeping steadily in view a kind of +tempered happiness as the end, many mistakes may be avoided in the +conduct of life, provided that each recognises at once the strength and +weakness of his own character, and does not attempt things that, with +the given limitations, are impossible. Of the highest truth, as he +conceived it, he could therefore make no use. Only by means of a truth +that he was bound to hold half-illusory could a working scheme be +constructed for himself and others. This result may give us guidance in +seeking to learn what we can from a thinker who is in reality no +representative of a decadence, but is fundamentally sane and rational, +even in spite of himself. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE + + +The title of Schopenhauer's chief work is rendered in the English +translation, _The World as Will and Idea_. Here the term 'idea' is used +in the sense it had for Locke and Berkeley; namely, any object of mental +activity. Thus it includes not merely imagery, but also perception. +Since Hume distinguished ideas' from 'impressions,' it has tended to be +specialised in the former sense. The German word, _Vorstellung_, which +it is used to render, conveys the generalised meaning of the Lockian +'idea,' now frequently expressed in English and French philosophical +works by the more technical term 'presentation' or 'representation.' By +Schopenhauer himself the word 'Idea' was used exclusively in the sense +of the Platonic Idea, which, as we shall see, plays an important part in +his philosophy. The distinction is preserved in the translation by the +use of a capital when Idea has the latter meaning; but in a brief +exposition it seems convenient to adopt a more technical rendering of +_Vorstellung_; and, from its common employment in psychological +text-books, I have selected 'presentation' as the most suitable. + +The first proposition of Schopenhauer's philosophical system is, 'The +world is my presentation.' By this he means that it presents itself as +appearance to the knowing subject. This appearance is in the forms of +time, space and causality. Under these forms every phenomenon +necessarily appears, because they are _a priori_ forms of the subject. +The world as it presents itself consists entirely of phenomena, that is, +appearances, related according to these forms. The most fundamental form +of all is the relation between object and subject, which is implied in +all of them. Without a subject there can be no presented object. + +Schopenhauer is therefore an idealist in the sense in which we call +Berkeley's theory of the external world idealism; though the expressions +used are to some extent different. The difference proceeds from his +following of Kant. His Kantianism consists in the recognition of _a +priori_ forms by which the subject constructs for itself an 'objective' +world of appearances. With Berkeley he agrees as against Kant in not +admitting any residue whatever, in the object as such, that is not +wholly appearance. But while he allows that Berkeley, as regards the +general formulation of idealism, was more consistent than Kant, he finds +him, in working out the principle, altogether inadequate. For the modern +mind there is henceforth no way in philosophy except through Kant, from +whom dates the revolution by which scholastic dualism was finally +overthrown. Kant's systematic construction, however, he in effect +reduces to very little. His is a much simplified 'Apriorism.' While +accepting the 'forms of sensible intuition,' that is, time and space, +just as Kant sets them forth, he clears away nearly all the superimposed +mechanism. Kant's 'Transcendental Ćsthetic,' he says, was a real +discovery in metaphysics; but on the basis of this he for the most part +only gave free play to his architectonic impulse. Of the twelve +'categories of the understanding,' which he professed to derive from the +logical forms of judgment, all except causality are mere 'blind +windows.' This alone, therefore, Schopenhauer adopts; placing it, +however, not at a higher level but side by side with time and space, +Kant's forms of intuition. These three forms, according to Schopenhauer, +make up the understanding of men and animals. 'All intuition is +intellectual.' It is not first mere appearance related in space and +time, and waiting for understanding to organise it; but, in animals as +in man, it is put in order at once under the three forms that suffice to +explain the knowledge all have of the phenomenal world. + +To Reason as distinguished from Understanding, Schopenhauer assigns no +such exalted function as was attributed to it in portions of his system +by Kant, and still more by some of his successors. The name of 'reason,' +he maintains, ought on etymological grounds to be restricted to the +faculty of abstract concepts. This, and not understanding, is what +distinguishes man from animals. It discovers and invents nothing, but it +puts in a generalised and available form what the understanding has +discovered in intuition. + +For the historical estimation of Schopenhauer, it is necessary to place +him in relation to Kant, as he himself always insisted. Much also in his +chief work is made clearer by knowledge of his dissertation _On the +Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason_, to which he is +constantly referring. Later, his manner of exposition became more +independent; so that he can be read by the general reader with profit +simply by himself, and without reference to antecedents. Still, it will +always be advisable for an expositor to follow his directions, at least +to the extent of giving some short account of the dissertation. This I +proceed to give approximately in the place to which he has assigned it +in his system. + +The name of the principle (_principium rationis sufficientis_) he took +over from Leibniz and his successor Wolff, but gave it a new amplitude. +With him, it stands as an inclusive term for four modes of connection by +which the thoroughgoing relativity of phenomena to one another is +constituted for our intelligence. The general statement adopted is, +'Nothing is without a reason why it should be rather than not be.' +Its four forms are the principles of becoming (_fiendi_), of knowing +(_cognoscendi_), of being (_essendi_), and of acting (_agendi_). +(1) Under the first head come 'causes.' These are divided into 'cause +proper,' for inorganic things; 'stimulus,' for the vegetative life both +of plants and animals, and 'motive,' for animals and men. The law of +causation is applicable only to changes; not to the forces of nature, to +matter, or to the world as a whole, which are perdurable. Cause precedes +effect in time. Not one thing, but one state of a thing, is the cause of +another. From the law of causation there results an infinite series _a +parte ante_ as well as _a parte post_. (2) The principle of sufficient +reason of knowing is applicable to concepts, which are all derived from +intuition, that is, from percepts. The laws of logic, which come under +this head, can yield nothing original, but can only render explicit what +was in the understanding. (3) Under the third head come arithmetical and +geometrical relations. These are peculiar relations of presentations, +distinct from all others, and only intelligible in virtue of a pure _a +priori_ intuition. For geometry this is space; for arithmetic time, in +which counting goes on. Scientifically, arithmetic is fundamental. (4) +As the third form of causality was enumerated 'motive' for the will; but +in that classification it was viewed from without, as belonging to the +world of objects. Through the direct knowledge we have of our own will, +we know also from within this determination by the presentation we call +a motive. Hence emerges the fourth form of the principle of sufficient +reason. This at a later stage makes possible the transition from physics +to metaphysics. + +All these forms alike are forms of necessary determination. Necessity +has no clear and true sense but certainty of the consequence when the +ground is posited. All necessity therefore is conditional. In accordance +with the four expressions of the principle of sufficient reason, it +takes the fourfold shape of physical, logical, mathematical, and moral +necessity. + +The sharp distinction between logical and mathematical truth, with the +assignment of the former to conceptual and of the latter to intuitive +relations, comes to Schopenhauer directly from Kant. So also does his +view that the necessary form of causation is sequence; though here his +points of contact with English thinkers, earlier and later, are very +marked. Only in his statement of the 'law of motivation' as 'causality +seen from within' does he hint at his own distinctive metaphysical +doctrine. Meanwhile, it is evident that he is to be numbered with the +group of modern thinkers who have arrived in one way or another at a +complete scientific phenomenism. Expositors have noted that in his +earlier statements of this he tends to lay more stress on the character +of the visible and tangible world as mere appearance. The impermanence, +the relativity, of all that exists in time and space, leads him to +describe it, in a favourite term borrowed from Indian philosophy, as +Maya, or illusion. Later, he dwells more on the relative reality of +things as they appear. His position, however, does not essentially +alter, but only finds varying expression as he turns more to the +scientific or to the metaphysical side. From Hume's view on causation he +differs not by opposing its pure phenomenism, but only by recognising, +as Kant does, an _a priori_ element in the form of its law. German +critics have seen in his own formulation an anticipation of Mill, and +this is certainly striking as regards the general conception of the +causal order, although there is no anticipation of Mill's inductive +logic. On the same side there is a close agreement with Malebranche and +the Occasionalists, pointed out by Schopenhauer himself. The causal +explanations of science, he is at one with them in insisting, give no +ultimate account of anything. All its causes are no more than +'occasional causes,'--merely instances, as Mill expressed it afterwards, +of 'invariable and unconditional sequence.' From Mill of course he +differs in holding its form to be necessary and _a priori_, not +ultimately derived from a summation of experiences; and, with the +Occasionalists, he goes on to metaphysics in its sense of ontology, as +Mill never did. The difference here is that he does not clothe his +metaphysics in a theological dress. + +In the later development of his thought, Schopenhauer dealt more +expressly with the question, how this kind of phenomenism is +reconcilable with a scientific cosmogony. On one side the proposition, +'No object without subject,' makes materialism for ever impossible; for +the materialist tries to explain from relations among presentations what +is the condition of all presentation. On the other side, we are all +compelled to agree with the materialists that knowledge of the object +comes late in a long series of material events. Inorganic things existed +in time before life; vegetative life before animal life; and only with +animal life does knowledge emerge. Reasoned knowledge of the whole +series comes only at the end of it in the human mind. This apparent +contradiction he solves by leaving a place for metaphysics. Our +representation of the world as it existed before the appearance of life +was indeed non-existent at the time to which we assign it; but the real +being of the world had a manifestation not imaginable by us. For this, +we substitute a picture of a world such as we should have been aware of +had our 'subject,' with its _a priori_ forms of time, space, and +causality, been then present. What the reality is, is the problem of the +thing-in-itself (to use the Kantian term). This problem remains over; +but we know that the metaphysical reality cannot be matter; for matter, +with all its qualities, is phenomenal. It exists only 'for +understanding, through understanding, in understanding.' These +discriminations made, Schopenhauer offers us a scientific cosmogony +beginning with the nebular hypothesis and ending with an outline of +organic evolution. This last differs from the Darwinian theory in +supposing a production of species by definite steps instead of by +accumulation of small individual variations. At a certain time, a form +that has all the characters of a new species appears among the progeny +of an existing species. Man is the last and highest form to be evolved. +From Schopenhauer's metaphysics, as we shall see, it follows that no +higher form of life will ever appear. + +A word may be said here on a materialistic-sounding phrase which is +very prominent in Schopenhauer's later expositions, and has been +remarked on as paradoxical for an idealist. The world as presentation, +he often says, is 'in the brain.' This, it must be allowed, is not fully +defensible from his own point of view, except with the aid of a later +distinction. The brain as we know it is of course only a part of the +phenomenon of the subject,--a grouping of possible perceptions. How +then, since it is itself only appearance, can it be the bearer of the +whole universe as appearance? The answer is that Schopenhauer meant in +reality 'the being of the brain,' and not the brain as phenomenon. He +had a growing sense of the importance of physiology for the +investigation of mind; and his predilection led him to adopt a not quite +satisfactory shorthand expression for the correspondence we know +scientifically to exist between our mental processes and changes capable +of objective investigation in the matter of the brain. + +In science his distinctive bent was to the borderland between psychology +and physiology. Hence came the attraction exercised on him by Goethe's +theory of colours. To his own theory, though, unlike his philosophical +system, it has always failed to gain the attention he predicted for it, +the merit must be allowed of treating the problem as essentially one of +psychophysics. What he does is to attempt to ascertain the conditions in +the sensibility of the retina that account for our actual +colour-sensations. This problem was untouched by the Newtonian theory; +but Schopenhauer followed Goethe in the error of trying to overthrow +this on its own ground. He had no aptitude for the special inquiries of +mathematics and physics, though he had gained a clear insight into their +general nature as sciences. On the psycho-physical side there is to-day +no fully authorised theory. The problem indeed has become ever more +complex. Schopenhauer's attempt, by combination of sensibilities to +'light' and 'darkness,' to explain the phenomena of complementary +colours, deserves at least a record in the long series of essays of +which the best known are the 'Young-Helmholtz theory' and that of +Hering. It marks an indubitable advance on Goethe in the clear +distinction drawn between the mixture, in the ordinary sense, that can +only result in dilution to different shades of grey, and the kinds of +mixture from which, in their view, true colours arise. + +A characteristic position in Schopenhauer's theory of knowledge, and one +that is constantly finding new expression in his writings, is the +distinction between abstract and intuitive knowledge already touched on. +Intuitive knowledge of the kind that is common to men and animals, as we +have seen, makes up, in his terminology, the 'understanding'; while +'reason' is the distinctively human faculty of concepts. When he +depreciates this, as he often does, in comparison with 'intuition,' it +must be remembered that he does not limit this term to perception of +particulars, but ascribes to what he calls the 'Platonic Idea' a certain +kind of union between reason and 'phantasy,' which gives it an intuitive +character of its own. Thus intuition can stand, though not in every case +for what is higher, yet always for that which is wider and greater and +more immediate. Whatever may be done with reflective reason and its +abstractions, every effectual process of thought must end, alike for +knowledge and art and virtue, in some intuitive presentation. The +importance of reason for practice is due to its generality. Its function +is subordinate. It does not furnish the ground of virtuous action any +more than ćsthetic precepts can enable any one to produce a work of art; +but it can help to preserve constancy to certain maxims, as also in art +a reasoned plan is necessary because the inspiration of genius is not +every moment at command. Virtue and artistic genius alike, however, +depend ultimately on intuition: and so also does every true discovery in +science. The nature of pedantry is to try to be guided everywhere by +concepts, and to trust nothing to perception in the particular case. +Philosophy also Schopenhauer regards as depending ultimately on a +certain intuitive view; but he allows that it has to translate this into +abstractions. Its problem is to express the _what_ of the world in +abstract form: science dealing only with the _why_ of phenomena related +within the world. This character of philosophy as a system of abstract +concepts deprives it of the immediate attractiveness of art; so that, as +he says in one place, it is more fortunate to be a poet than a +philosopher. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +METAPHYSICS OF THE WILL + + +We have seen that scientific explanation does not go beyond +presentations ordered in space and time. This is just as true of the +sciences of causation--the 'ćtiological' sciences--as it is of +mathematical science. All that we learn from Mechanics, Physics, +Chemistry and Physiology, is 'how, in accordance with an infallible +rule, one determinate state of matter necessarily follows another: how a +determinate change necessarily conditions and brings on another +determinate change.' This knowledge does not satisfy us. We wish to +learn the significance of phenomena; but we find that from outside, +while we view them as presentations, their inner meaning is for ever +inaccessible. + +The starting-point for the metaphysical knowledge we seek is given us in +our own body. The animal body is 'the immediate object of the subject': +in it as presentation the 'effects' of 'causes' in the order of +presentations external to it are first recognised. Now in virtue of his +body the investigator is not pure knowing subject standing apart from +that which he knows. In the case of the particular system of +presentations constituting his organism, he knows what these +presentations signify, and that is his _will_ in a certain modification. +The subject appears as individual through its identity with the body, +and this body is given to it in two different ways: on one side as +object among objects, and subjected to their laws; on the other side as +the will immediately known to each. The act of will and the movement of +the body are not two different states related as cause and effect; for +the relation of cause and effect belongs only to the object, the +phenomenon, the presentation. They are one and the same act given in +different manners: the will, immediately to the subject; the movement, +in sensible intuition for understanding. The action of the body is the +objectified act of will. Called at first the immediate object of +presentation, the body may now, from the other side, be called 'the +objectivity of the will.' + +Thus, as was said, the 'law of motivation' discloses the inner nature of +causality. In causality in general we know only relations of phenomena; +but in the case of our own body we know something else that those +relations express; namely, the act of will determined by motives. Now +there are in the world as presentation other systems like that which we +call our body. Unless all these are to be supposed mere phantoms without +inner reality, we must infer by analogy, in correspondence with like +phenomena, other individual wills similar to that which we know in +ourselves. This inference from analogy, universally admitted in the case +of human and animal bodies, must be extended to the whole corporeal +world. The failure to take this step is where the purely intellectual +forms of idealism have come short. Kant's 'thing-in-itself,' which is +not subject to the forms by which presentations become experience, but +which experience and its forms indicate as the reality, has been wrongly +condemned by his successors as alien to idealism. It is true that Kant +did in some respects fail to maintain the idealistic position with the +clearness of Berkeley; but his shortcoming was not in affirming a +thing-in-itself beyond phenomena. Here, in Schopenhauer's view, is the +metaphysical problem that he left a place for but did not solve. The +word of the riddle has now been pronounced. Beyond presentation, that +is, in itself and according to its innermost essence, the world is that +which we find in ourselves immediately as will. By this it is not meant +that a falling stone, for example, acts from a motive; knowledge and the +consequent action from motives belongs only to the determinate form that +the will has in animals and men; but the reality in the stone also is +the same in essence as that to which we apply the name of will in +ourselves. He who possesses this key to the knowledge of nature's +innermost being will interpret the forces of vegetation, of +crystallisation, of magnetism, of chemical affinity, even of weight +itself, as different only in phenomenal manifestation but in essence the +same; namely, that which is better known to each than all else, and +where it emerges most clearly is called will. Only the will is +thing-in-itself. It is wholly different from presentation, and is that +of which presentation is the phenomenon, the visibility, the +objectivity. Differences affect only the degree of the appearing, not +the essence of that which appears. + +While the reality everywhere present is not will as specifically known +in man, the mode of indicating its essence by reference to this, +Schopenhauer contends, is a gain in insight. The thing-in-itself ought +to receive its name from that among all its manifestations which is the +clearest, the most perfect, the most immediately illumined by knowledge; +and this is man's will. When we say that every force in nature is to be +thought of as Will, we are subsuming an unknown under a known. For the +conception of Force is abstracted from the realm of cause and effect, +and indicates the limit of scientific explanation. Having arrived at the +forces of nature on the one side and the forms of the subject on the +other, science can go no further. The conception of Will can make known +that which was so far concealed, because it proceeds from the most +intimate consciousness that each has of himself, where the knower and +the known coincide. + +By this consciousness, in which subject and object are not yet set +apart, we reach something universal. In itself the Will is not +individualised, but exists whole and undivided in every single thing in +nature, as the Subject of contemplation exists whole and undivided in +each cognitive being. It is entirely free from all forms of the +phenomenon. What makes plurality possible is subjection to the forms of +time and space, by which only the phenomenon is affected. Time and space +may therefore be called, in scholastic terminology, the 'principle of +individuation.' While each of its phenomena is subject to the law of +sufficient reason, which is the law of appearance in these forms, there +is for the Will as thing-in-itself no rational ground: it is 'grundlos.' +It is free from all plurality, although its phenomena in space and time +are innumerable. It is one, not with the unity of an object or of a +concept, but as that which lies outside of space and time, beyond the +_principium individuationis_, that is, the possibility of plurality. The +individual, the person, is not will as thing-in-itself, but phenomenon +of the will, and as such determined. The will is 'free' because there is +nothing beyond itself to determine it. Further, it is in itself mere +activity without end, a blind striving. Knowledge appears only as the +accompaniment of its ascending stages. + +Here we have arrived at the thought which, in its various expressions, +constitutes Schopenhauer's metaphysics. That this cannot be +scientifically deduced he admits; but he regards it as furnishing such +explanation as is possible of science itself. For science there is in +everything an inexplicable element to which it runs back, and which is +real, not merely phenomenal. From this reality we are most remote in +pure mathematics and in the pure _a priori_ science of nature as it was +formulated by Kant. These owe their transparent clearness precisely to +their absence of real content, or to the slightness of this. The attempt +to reduce organic life to chemistry, this again to mechanism, and at +last everything to arithmetic, could it succeed, would leave mere form +behind, from which all the content of phenomena would have vanished. And +the form would in the end be form of the subject. But the enterprise is +vain. 'For in everything in nature there is something of which no ground +can ever be given, of which no explanation is possible, no cause further +is to be sought.' What for man is his inexplicable character, +presupposed in every explanation of his deeds from motives, that for +every inorganic body is its inexplicable quality, the manner of its +acting. + +The basis of this too is will, and 'groundless,' inexplicable will; but +evidently the conception here is not identical with that of the Will +that is one and all. How do we pass from the universal to that which has +a particular character or quality? For of the Will as thing-in-itself we +are told that there is not a greater portion in a man and a less in a +stone. The relation of part and whole belongs exclusively to space. The +more and less touches only the phenomenon, that is, the visibility, the +objectivation. A higher degree of this is in the plant than in the +stone, in the animal than in the plant, and so forth; but the Will that +is the essence of all is untouched by degree, as it is beyond plurality, +space and time, and the relation of cause and effect. + +The answer to the question here raised is given in Schopenhauer's +interpretation of the Platonic Ideas. These he regards as stages of +objectivation of the Will. They are, as Plato called them, eternal forms +related to particular things as models. The lowest stage of +objectivation of the Will is represented by the forces of inorganic +nature. Some of these, such as weight and impenetrability, appear in all +matter. Some are divided among its different kinds, as rigidity, +fluidity, elasticity, electricity, magnetism, chemical properties. They +are not subject to the relation of cause and effect, but are presupposed +by it. A force is neither cause of an effect nor effect of a cause. +Philosophically, it is immediate objectivity of the will; in ćtiology, +_qualitas occulta_. At the lowest stages of objectivation, there is no +individuality. This does not appear in inorganic things, nor even in +merely organic or vegetative life, but only as we ascend the scale of +animals. Even in the higher animals the specific enormously predominates +over the individual character. Only in man is the Idea objectified in +the individual character as such. 'The character of each individual man, +so far as it is thoroughly individual and not entirely comprehended in +that of the species, may be regarded as a particular Idea, corresponding +to a peculiar act of objectivation of the Will.' + +Schopenhauer warns us against substituting this philosophical +explanation for scientific ćtiology. The chain of causes and effects, he +points out, is not broken by the differences of the original, +irreducible forces. The ćtiology and the philosophy of nature go side by +side, regarding the same object from different points of view. Yet he +also gives us in relation to his philosophy much that is not +unsuggestive scientifically. His doctrine is not properly evolutionary, +since the Ideas are eternal; but he has guarded incidentally against our +supposing that all the natural kinds that manifest the Ideas +phenomenally must be always represented in every world. For our +particular world, comprising the sun and planets of the solar system, he +sets forth in the _Parerga_ an account of the process by which it +develops from the nebula to man. This was referred to in the preceding +chapter. In his fundamental work he describes a struggle, present +through the whole of nature, in which the phenomenal manifestations of +the higher Ideas conquer and subjugate those of the lower, though they +leave them still existent and ever striving to get loose. Here has been +seen an adumbration of natural selection: he himself admits the +difficulty he has in making it clear. We must remember that it is +pre-Darwinian. + +Knowledge or intelligence he seeks to explain as an aid to the +individual organism in its struggle to subsist and to propagate its +kind. It first appears in animal life. It is represented by the brain or +a large ganglion, as every endeavour of the Will in its +self-objectivation is represented by some organ; that is, displays +itself for presentation as such and such an appearance. Superinduced +along with this contrivance for aid in the struggle, the world as +presentation, with all its forms, subject and object, time, space, +plurality and causality, is all at once there. 'Hitherto only will, it +is now at the same time presentation, object of the knowing subject.' +Then in man, as a higher power beyond merely intuitive intelligence, +appears reason as the power of abstract conception. For the most part, +rational as well as intuitive knowledge, evolved originally as a mere +means to higher objectivation of the Will, remains wholly in its +service. How, in exceptional cases, intellect emancipates itself, will +be discussed under the heads of Ćsthetics and Ethics. + +That this view implies a teleology Schopenhauer expressly recognises. +Indeed he is a very decided teleologist on lines of his own, and, in +physiology, takes sides strongly with 'vitalism' as against pure +mechanicism. True, the Will is 'endless' blind striving, and is +essentially divided against itself. Everywhere in nature there is +strife, and this takes the most horrible forms. Yet somehow there is in +each individual manifestation of will a principle by which first the +organism with its vital processes, and then the portion of it called the +brain, in which is represented the intellect with its _a priori_ forms, +are evolved as aids in the strife. And, adapting all the manifestations +to one another, there is a teleology of the universe. The whole world, +with all its phenomena, is the objectivity of the one and indivisible +Will; the Idea which is related to all other Ideas as the harmony to the +single voices. The unity of the Will shows itself in the unison of all +its phenomena as related to one another. Man, its clearest and +completest objectivation, is the summit of a pyramid, and could not +exist without this. Inorganic and organic nature, then, were adapted to +the future appearance of man, as man is adapted to the development that +preceded him. But in thinking the reality, time is to be abstracted +from. The earlier, we are obliged to say, is fitted to the later, as the +later is fitted to the earlier; but the relation of means to end, under +which we cannot help figuring the adaptation, is only appearance for our +manner of knowledge. And the harmony described does not get rid of the +conflict inherent in all will. + +In this account of Schopenhauer's metaphysical doctrine, I have tried to +make the exposition as smooth as possible; but at two points the +discontinuity can scarcely be concealed. First, the relation of the +universal Will to the individual will is not made clear; and, secondly, +the emergence of the world of presentation, with the knowledge in which +it culminates, is left unintelligible because the will is conceived as +mere blind striving without an aim. As regards the first point, +disciples and expositors have been able to show that, by means of +distinctions in his later writings, apparent contradictions are to some +extent cleared away; and, moreover, that he came to recognise more +reality in the individual will. On the second point, I think it will be +necessary to admit that his system as such breaks down. But both points +must be considered in their connection. + +One of the most noteworthy features of Schopenhauer's philosophy is, as +he himself thought, the acceptance from first to last of Kant's +distinction between the 'empirical' and the 'intelligible' character of +the individual. Every act of will of every human being follows with +necessity as phenomenon from its phenomenal causes; so that all the +events of each person's life are determined in accordance with +scientific law. Nevertheless, the character empirically manifested in +the phenomenal world, while it is completely necessitated, is the +expression of something that is free from necessitation. This +'intelligible character' is out of time, and, itself undetermined, +manifests itself through that which develops in time as a chain of +necessary causes and effects. That this doctrine had been taken up, +without any ambiguity as regards the determinism, by Schelling as well +as by himself, he expressly acknowledges; and he finds it, as he also +finds modern idealism, anticipated in various passages by the +Neo-Platonists. His adaptation of it to his doctrine of the Ideas is +distinctly Neo-Platonic in so far as he recognises 'Ideas of +individuals'; but of course to make Will the essence belongs to his own +system. 'The intelligible character,' he says, 'coincides with the Idea, +or, yet more precisely, with the original act of will that manifests +itself in it: in so far, not only is the empirical character of each +man, but also of each animal species, nay, of each plant species, and +even of each original force of inorganic nature, to be regarded as +phenomenon of an intelligible character, that is, of an indivisible act +of will out of time.' This is what he called the '_aseitas_' of the +will; borrowing a scholastic term to indicate its derivation (if we may +speak of it as derived) from itself (_a se_), and not from a supposed +creative act. Only if we adopt this view are we entitled to regard +actions as worthy of moral approval or disapproval. They are such not +because they are not necessitated, but because they necessarily show +forth the nature of an essence the freedom of which consists in being +what it is. Yet he could not but find a difficulty in reconciling this +with his position that the one universal Will is identical in all +things, and in each is 'individuated' only by space and time. For the +Ideas, like the thing-in-itself, are eternal, that is, outside of time +as well as space; and all the things now enumerated, forces of nature, +plant and animal species, and individual characters of men, are declared +to be in themselves Ideas. + +He in part meets this difficulty by the subtlety that time and space do +not, strictly speaking, determine individuality, but arise along with +it. The diremption of individualities becomes explicit in those forms. +Yet he must have perceived that this is not a complete answer, and +various modifications can be seen going on. His first view clearly was +that the individual is wholly impermanent, and at death simply +disappears; nothing is left but the one Will and the universal Subject +of contemplation identical in all. Metempsychosis is the best +mythological rendering of what happens, but it is no more. Later, he +puts forward the not very clearly defined theory of a 'palingenesia' by +which a particular will, but not the intellect that formerly accompanied +it, may reappear in the phenomenal world. And the hospitality he showed +to stories of magic, clairvoyance, and ghost-seeing, is scarcely +compatible with the view that the individual will is no more than a +phenomenal differentiation of the universal will. A speculation (not put +forward as anything more) on the appearance of a special providence in +the destiny of the individual, points, as Professor Volkelt has noted, +to the idea of a guidance, not from without, but by a kind of good +daemon or genius that is the ultimate reality of the person. On all this +we must not lay too much stress; but there is certainly one passage that +can only be described as a definite concession that the individual is +real in a sense not at first allowed. Individuality, it is said in so +many words (_Parerga_, ii. § 117), does not rest only on the 'principle +of individuation' (time and space), and is therefore not through and +through phenomenon, but is rooted in the thing-in-itself. 'How deep its +roots go belongs to the questions which I do not undertake to +answer.'[1] + + [1] _Werke_, ed. Frauenstädt, vol. vi. p. 243. + +This tends to modify considerably, but does not overthrow, +Schopenhauer's original system. In very general terms, he is in the +number of the 'pantheistic' thinkers; and it is remarkable, on +examination, how these, in Europe at least, have nearly always +recognised in the end some permanent reality in the individual. This is +contrary to first impressions: but the great names may be cited of +Plotinus, John Scotus Erigena, Giordano Bruno, Spinoza (in Part v. of +the _Ethics_), and finally of Schopenhauer's special aversion, Hegel, +who has been supposed most unfavourable of all to any recognition of +individuality as real. It is more true, Hegel maintains, that the +individuality determines its world than that it is determined by it; and +there is no explanation why the determination should be such and such +except that the individuality was already what it is.[2] And, if +Schopenhauer's more imaginative speculations seek countenance from the +side of empiricism, there is nothing in them quite so audacious as a +speculation of J. S. Mill on disembodied mind, thrown out during the +time when he was writing his _Logic_.[3] + + [2] _Phänomenologie des Geistes_, Jubiläumsausgabe, ed. G. Lasson, pp. + 201-3. + + [3] Letter to Robert Barclay Fox, May 10, 1842. Printed in Appendix to + _Letters and Journals of Caroline Fox_, third ed., vol. ii. pp. 331-2. + 'To suppose that the eye is _necessary_ to sight,' says Mill, 'seems to + me the notion of one immersed in matter. What we call our bodily + sensations are all in the mind, and would not necessarily or probably + cease, because the body perishes.' + +The association with pantheism Schopenhauer accepts in principle, though +the name is not congenial to him. In his system the Will is one and all, +like the 'Deus' of Spinoza. The difference is that, instead of ascribing +perfection to the universe that is its manifestation, he regards the +production of a world as a lapse from which redemption is to be sought. +His doctrine has been rightly described, in common with the predominant +philosophical doctrines of his period, as a resultant of the deepened +subjective analysis brought by Kant into modern philosophy on the one +side, and of the return to Spinoza in the quest for unity of principle +on the other. Why, then, it may be asked, are Fichte, Schelling, and +Hegel the constant objects of his attack? The true explanation is not +the merely external one, that they were his successful rivals for public +favour, but is to be found in a real antithesis of thought. Within the +limits of the idealism they all hold in common, Schopenhauer is at the +opposite pole. In spite of his attempt to incorporate the Platonic +Ideas, and in spite of his following of Kant, whose 'intelligible world' +was in essence Platonic or neo-Platonic, he could find no place in his +system for a rational order at the summit. Now this order was precisely +what Fichte and Hegel aimed at demonstrating. If Schopenhauer is less +unsympathetic in his references to Schelling, that is because +Schelling's world-soul appeared to him to prefigure his own attempt to +discover in nature the manifestation of a blindly striving will or +feeling rather than reason. Suspicious as he shows himself of possible +plagiarisms by others, the charge cannot be retorted against himself. +The supreme principle of Fichte, it has been pointed out, has an +actively volitional character and was formulated before Schopenhauer's: +but then it is essentially rational. For Hegel, what is supreme is the +world-reason. Hence they are at one with Plato in holding that in some +sense 'mind is king.' For Schopenhauer, on the contrary, mind, or pure +intellect, is an emancipated slave. Having reached its highest point, +and seen through the work of the will, it does not turn back and +organise it, but abolishes it as far as its insight extends. + +Yet to say merely this is to give a wrong impression of Schopenhauer. +Starting though he does with blind will, and ending with the flight of +the ascetic from the suffering inherent in the world that is the +manifestation of such a will, he nevertheless, in the intermediate +stages, makes the world a cosmos and not a chaos. And the Platonists on +their side have to admit that 'the world of all of us' does not present +itself on the surface as a manifestation of pure reason, and that it +is a serious task to 'rationalise' it. Where he completely fails +is where the Platonic systems also fail, though from the opposite +starting-point. His attempt to derive presentation, intellect, +knowledge, from blind striving, is undoubtedly a failure. But so also +is the attempt of the Platonising thinkers to deduce a world of mixture +from a principle of pure reason without aid from anything else +empirically assumed. Not that in either case there is failure to give +explanations in detail; but in both cases much is taken from experience +without reduction to the principles of the system. What we may say by +way of comparison is this: that if Schopenhauer had in so many words +recognised an immanent Reason as well as Will in the reality of the +universe, he would have formally renounced his pessimism; while it +cannot be said that on the other side a more explicit empiricism in the +account of the self-manifestation of Reason would necessarily destroy +the optimism. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +ĆSTHETICS + + +A portion of Schopenhauer's system by which its pessimism is +considerably mitigated is his theory of the Beautiful and of Fine Art. +The characteristic of ćsthetic contemplation is, he finds, that +intellect throws off the yoke and subsists purely for itself as clear +mirror of the world, free from all subjection to practical purposes of +the will. In this state of freedom, temporary painlessness is attained. + +The theory starts from his adaptation of the Platonic Ideas. Regarded +purely as an ćsthetic theory, it departs from Plato, as he notes; for, +with the later Platonists, who took up the defence of poetic myths and +of the imitative arts as against their master, he holds that Art +penetrates to the general Idea through the particular, and hence that +the work of art is no mere 'copy of a copy.' The difference of the Idea +from the Concept is that it is not merely abstract and general, but +combines with generality the characters of an intuition. + +The Ideas, as we have seen, constitute the determinate stages of +objectivation of the Will. The innumerable individuals of which the +Ideas are the patterns are subject to the law of sufficient reason. They +appear, that is to say, under the forms of time, space, and causality. +The Idea is beyond these forms, and therefore is clear of plurality and +change. Since the law of sufficient reason is the common form under +which stands all the subject's knowledge so far as the subject knows as +individual, the Ideas lie outside the sphere of knowledge of the +individual as such. If, therefore, the Ideas are to be the object of +knowledge, this can only be by annulling individuality in the knowing +subject. + +As thing-in-itself, the Will is exempt even from the first of the forms +of knowledge, the form of being 'object for a subject.' The Platonic +Idea, on the other hand, is necessarily an object, something known, a +presentation. It has laid aside, or rather has not taken on, the +subordinate forms; but it has retained the first and most general form. +It is the immediate and most adequate possible objectivity of the Will; +whereas particular things are an objectivation troubled by the forms of +which the law of sufficient reason is the common expression. + +When intellect breaks loose from the service of the will, for which it +was originally destined in the teleology of nature, then the subject +ceases to be merely individual and becomes pure will-less subject of +knowledge. In this state the beholder no longer tracks out relations in +accordance with the principle of sufficient reason--which is the mode of +scientific as well as of common knowledge--but rests in fixed +contemplation of the given object apart from its connection with +anything else. The contemplator thus 'lost' in the object, it is not the +single thing as such that is known, but the Idea, the eternal form, the +immediate objectivity of the Will at this stage. The correlate of this +object--the pure Subject exempt from the principle of sufficient +reason--is eternal, like the Idea. + +The objectivation of the Will appears faintly in inorganic +things,--clouds, water, crystals,--more fully in the plant, yet more +fully in the animal, most completely in man. Only the essential in these +stages of objectivation constitutes the Idea. Its development into +manifold phenomena under the forms of the principle of sufficient +reason, is unessential, lies merely in the mode of knowledge for the +individual, and has reality only for this. It is not otherwise with the +unfolding of that Idea which is the completest objectivation of the +Will. To the Idea of Man, the occurrences of human history are as +unessential as the shapes they assume to the clouds, as the figures of +its whirlpools and foam-drift to the stream, as its frost-flowers to the +ice. The same underlying passions and dispositions everlastingly recur +in the same modes. It is idle to suppose that anything is gained. But +also nothing is lost: so the Earth-spirit might reply to one who +complained of high endeavours frustrated, faculties wasted, promises of +world-enlightenment brought to nought; for there is infinite time to +dispose of, and all possibilities are for ever renewed. + +The kind of knowledge for which the Ideas are the object of +contemplation finds its expression in Art, the work of genius. Art +repeats in its various media the Ideas grasped by pure contemplation. +Its only end is the communication of these. While Science, following the +stream of events according to their determinate relations, never reaches +an ultimate end, Art is always at the end. 'It stops the wheel of time; +relations vanish for it: only the essence, the Idea, is its object.' The +characteristic of genius is a predominant capacity for thus +contemplating things independently of the principle of sufficient +reason. Since this requires a forgetting of one's own person and the +relations between it and things, the attitude of genius is simply the +completest 'objectivity.' The 'subjectivity' opposed to this, in +Schopenhauer's phraseology, is preoccupation with the interests of one's +own will. It is, he says, as if there fell to the share of genius a +measure of intelligence far beyond the needs of the individual will: and +this makes possible the setting aside of individual interests, the +stripping off of the particular personality, so that the subject becomes +'pure knowing subject,' 'clear world-eye,' in a manner sufficiently +sustained for that which has been grasped to be repeated in the work of +art. A necessary element in genius is therefore Imagination. For without +imagination to represent, in a shape not merely abstract, things that +have not come within personal experience, genius would remain limited to +immediate intuition, and could not make its vision apprehensible by +others. Nor without imagination could the particular things that express +the Idea be cleared of the imperfections by which their limited +expression of it falls short of what nature was aiming at in their +production. 'Inspiration' is ascribed to genius because its +characteristic attitude is intermittent. The man of genius cannot always +remain on a height, but has to fall back to the level of the common man, +who can scarcely at all regard things except as they affect his +interests,--have a relation to his will, direct or indirect. + +This is the statement in its first outline of a theory that became one +of Schopenhauer's most fruitful topics. Many are the pages he has +devoted to the contrast between the man of genius and 'the wholesale +ware of nature, which she turns out daily by thousands.' The genius is +for him primarily the artist. Scientific genius as a distinctive thing +he does not fully recognise; and he regards men of action, and +especially statesmen, rather as men of highly competent ability +endowed with an exceptionally good physical constitution than as men of +genius in the proper sense. Philosophers like himself, who, as he +frankly says, appear about once in a hundred years, he classes in the +end with the artists; though this was left somewhat indeterminate in his +first exposition. The weakness of the man of genius in dealing with the +ordinary circumstances of life he allows, and even insists on. Genius, +grasping the Idea in its perfection, fails to understand individuals. A +poet may know man profoundly, and men very ill. He admits the proximity +of genius to madness on one side, and explains it in this way. What +marks the stage of actual madness, as distinguished from illusion or +hallucination, is complete disruption of the memory of past life, of the +history of the personality as something continuous; so that the +particular thing is viewed by itself, out of relation. This gives a kind +of resemblance to the attitude of genius, for which present intuition +excludes from view the relations of things to each other. Or, as we may +perhaps sum up his thought in its most general form, 'alienation' or +dissolution of personality has the resemblance often noted between +extremes to the impersonality, or, as he calls it, 'objectivity,' that +is super-personal. + +In spite of his contempt for the crowd, he has to admit, of course, that +the capacity of genius to recognise the Ideas of things and to become +momentarily impersonal must in some measure belong to all men; +otherwise, they could not even enjoy a work of art when produced. Genius +has the advantage only in the much higher degree and the greater +prolongation of the insight. Since, then, the actual achievement of the +artist is to make us look into the world through his eyes, the feelings +for the beautiful and the sublime may be treated irrespectively of the +question whether they are aroused by nature and human life directly or +by means of art. + +Ćsthetic pleasure in contemplation of the beautiful proceeds partly from +recognition of the individual object not as one particular thing but as +Platonic Idea, that is, as the enduring form of this whole kind of +things; partly from the consciousness the knower has of himself not as +individual, but as pure, will-less Subject of Knowledge. All volition +springs out of need, therefore out of want, therefore out of suffering. +No attained object of will can give permanent satisfaction. Thus, there +can be no durable happiness or rest for us as long as we are subjects of +will. 'The Subject of Will lies continually on the turning wheel of +Ixion, draws ever in the sieve of the Danaides, is the eternally +thirsting Tantalus. But in the moment of pure objective contemplation, +free from all interest of the particular subjectivity, we enter a +painless state: the wheel of Ixion stands still. The Flemish painters +produce this ćsthetic effect by the sense of disinterested contemplation +conveyed in their treatment of insignificant objects. There are certain +natural scenes that have power in themselves, apart from artistic +treatment, to put us in this state; but the slightest obtrusion of +individual interest destroys the magic. Past and distant objects, +through their apparent detachment, have the same power. The essential +thing ćsthetically, whether we contemplate the present or the past, the +near or the distant, is that only the world of presentation remains; the +world as will has vanished. + +The difference between the feelings of the Beautiful and of the Sublime +is this. In the feeling of the beautiful, pure intelligence gains the +victory without a struggle, leaving in consciousness only the pure +subject of knowledge, so that no reminiscence of the will remains. In +the feeling of the sublime, on the other hand, the state of pure +intelligence has to be won by a conscious breaking loose from relations +in the object that suggest something threatening to the will; though +there must not be actual danger; for in that case the individual will +itself would come into play, and ćsthetic detachment would cease. +Elevation above the sense of terror has not only to be consciously won +but consciously maintained, and involves a continuous reminiscence, not +indeed of any individual will, but of the will of man in general, so far +as it is expressed through its objectivity, the human body, confronted +by forces hostile to it. Pre-eminently this feeling arises from +contrast between the immensities of space and time and the apparent +insignificance of man. It means in the last resort that the beholder is +upheld by the consciousness that as pure subject of knowledge (not as +individual subject) he himself bears within him all the worlds and all +the ages, and is eternal as the forces that vainly seem to threaten him +with annihilation. + +On the objective side, and apart from the subjective distinction just +set forth, the sublime and the beautiful are not essentially different. +In both cases alike, the object of ćsthetic contemplation is not the +single thing, but the Idea that is striving towards manifestation in it. +Whatever is viewed ćsthetically is viewed out of relation to time and +space: 'along with the law of sufficient reason the single thing and the +knowing individual are taken away, and nothing remains over but the Idea +and the pure Subject of Knowledge, which together make up the adequate +objectivity of the Will at this stage.' There is thus a sense in which +everything is beautiful; since the Will appears in everything at some +stage of objectivity, and this means that it is the expression of some +Idea. But one thing can be more beautiful than another by facilitating +ćsthetic contemplation. This facilitation proceeds either from the +greater clearness and perfection with which the particular thing shows +forth the Idea of its kind, or from the higher stage of objectivation to +which that Idea corresponds. Man being the highest stage of +objectivation of the Will, the revelation of his essence is the highest +aim of art. In ćsthetic contemplation of inorganic nature and vegetative +life, whether in the reality or through the medium of art, and in +appreciation of architecture, the subjective aspect, that is to say, the +enjoyment of pure will-less knowledge, is predominant; the Ideas +themselves being here lower stages of objectivity. On the other hand, +when animals and men are the object of ćsthetic contemplation or +representation, the enjoyment consists more in the objective +apprehension of those Ideas in which the essence of the Will is most +clearly and fully manifested. + +Of all Schopenhauer's work, its ćsthetic part has met with the most +general appreciation. Here especially he abounds in observations drawn +directly, in his own phrase, from intuition. To make a selection of +these, however, is not appropriate to a brief sketch like the present. I +pass on, therefore, to those portions of his theory of Art by which he +makes the transition, in terms of his system, to Morality. + +From Architecture onward the arts are obliged to represent the Will as +divided. Here, at the first stage, its division subsists only in a +conflict of inorganic forces which have to be brought to equilibrium. +The conflict between weight and rigidity is in truth the only ćsthetic +material of architecture as a fine art. When we come to animal and +lastly to human life, which, in the Plastic Arts and in Poetry, as form, +individualised expression, and action, is the highest object of ćsthetic +representation, the vehemence of divided will is fully revealed; and +here too is revealed the essential identity of every will with our own. +In the words of the Indian wisdom, 'Tat twam asi'; 'that thou art.' +Under the head of Ethics it will be shown expressly that by this +insight, when it reacts on the will, the will can deny itself. For the +temporary release from its striving, given in ćsthetic contemplation, is +then substituted permanent release. To this 'resignation,' the innermost +essence of all virtue and holiness, and the final redemption from the +world, Art itself, at its highest stages, points the way. + +The summits of pictorial and poetic art Schopenhauer finds in the great +Italian painters so far as they represent the ethical spirit of +Christianity, and in the tragic poets, ancient and modern. It is true +that the poverty of their sacred history or mythology puts the Christian +artists at a disadvantage; but events are merely the accidents of their +art. Not in these, as related according to the law of sufficient reason, +is the essence, but in the spirit we divine through the forms portrayed. +In their representation of men full of that spirit, and especially in +the eyes, we see mirrored the knowledge that has seized the whole +essence of the world and of life, and that has reacted on the will, not +so as to give it motives, but as a 'quietive'; whence proceeds complete +resignation, and with it the annulling of the will and of the whole +essence of this world. Of tragedy, the subject-matter is the conflict of +the will with itself at its highest stage of objectivity. Here also the +end is the resignation brought on by complete knowledge of the essence +of the world. The hero, on whom at last this knowledge has acted as a +quietive, gives up, not merely life, but the whole will to live. 'The +true meaning of tragedy is the deeper insight, that what the hero +expiates is not his particular sins, but original sin, that is, the +guilt of existence itself.' To illustrate this position Schopenhauer is +fond of quoting a passage from Calderon which declares that the greatest +sin of man is to have been born. + +It seems strange that, after deriding as he does the popular notion of +'poetic justice' so detached a thinker should imagine an at least +equally one-sided view to receive its final confirmation from the +Spanish dramatist's poetic phrasing of a Christian dogma. The great +tragic poets, for Schopenhauer also, are Ćschylus, Sophocles and +Shakespeare. Now it is safe to say that by none of these was any such +general doctrine held either in conceptual or in intuitive form. The +whole effect of any kind of art, of course he would admit, cannot be +packed into a formula; but if we seek one as an aid to understanding, +some adaptation of his own theory of the sublime would probably serve +much better as applied to tragedy than his direct theory of the drama. +In the case of pictorial art, all that is proved by what he says about +the representation of ascetic saintliness, is that this, like many other +things, can be so brought within the scope of art as to make us +momentarily identify ourselves with its Idea in the impersonal manner he +has himself described. His purely ćsthetic theory is quite adequate to +the case, without any assumption that this is the representation of what +is best. Art, pictorial or poetic, can no more prove pessimism than +optimism. We pick out expressions of one or the other for quotation +according to our moods or subjective preferences; but, if we have the +feeling for art itself, our sense of actual ćsthetic value ought to be +independent of these. + +Schopenhauer's ćsthetic theory, however, does not end here. There +follows the part of it by which he has had an influence on artists +themselves. For him, a position separate from all the other arts is held +by music. While the rest objectify the Will mediately, that is to say, +by means of the Ideas, Music is as immediate an objectivation of the +whole Will as the world itself, or as the Ideas, of which the pluralised +phenomenon constitutes the sum of particular things. The other arts +speak of the shadow, music of the substance. There is indeed a +parallelism, an analogy, between Music and the Ideas; yet Music never +expresses the phenomenon in which these are manifested, but only the +inner essence behind the appearance, the Will itself. In a sense it +renders not feeling in its particularity, but feeling _in abstracto_; +joy, sorrow, not a joy, a sorrow. The phenomenal world and music are to +be regarded as two different expressions of the same thing. The world +might be called embodied Music as well as embodied Will. 'Melodies are +to a certain extent like general concepts, an abstract of reality.' A +complete explanation of music, that is, a detailed repetition of it in +concepts, were this possible, would be a complete explanation of the +world (since both express the same thing) and therefore a true and final +philosophy. As music only reaches its perfection in the full harmony, +'so the one Will out of time finds its perfect objectivation only in +complete union of all the stages which in innumerable degrees of +heightened distinctness reveal its essence.' But here, too, Schopenhauer +adds, the Will is felt, and can be proved, to be a divided will; and the +deliverance wrought by this supreme art, as by all the others, is only +temporary. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +ETHICS + + +Permanent redemption from the suffering of the world is to be found only +in the holiness of the ascetic; but to this there are many stages, +constituting the generally accepted human virtues. Of these Schopenhauer +has a rational account to give in terms of his philosophy; and if the +last stage does not seem to follow by logical sequence from the others, +this is only what is to be expected; for it is reached, in his view, by +a sort of miracle. To the highest kind of intuitive knowledge, from +which the ascetic denial of the will proceeds, artistic contemplation +ought to prepare the way; and so also, on his principles, ought the +practice of justice and goodness. Yet he is obliged to admit that few +thus reach the goal. Of those that do reach it, the most arrive through +personal suffering, which may be deserved. A true miracle is often +worked in the repentant criminal, by which final deliverance is +achieved. Though the 'intelligible character' is unalterable, and the +empirical character can only be the unfolding of this, as every great +dramatist intuitively recognises, yet the 'convertites,' like Duke +Frederick in _As You Like It_, are not to be regarded as hypocrites. The +'second voyage' to the harbour, that of the disappointed egoist, on +condition of this miracle, brings the passenger to it as surely as the +first, that of the true saints, which is only for the few. And in these +equally a miraculous conversion of the will has to be finally worked. + +At the entrance to his distinctive theory of ethics, Schopenhauer places +a restatement of his metaphysics as the possible basis of a mode of +contemplating life which, he admits, has some community with an +optimistic pantheism. The Will, through the presentation and the +accompanying intelligence developed in its service, becomes conscious +that that which it wills is precisely the world, life as it is. To call +it 'the will to live' is therefore a pleonasm. 'Will' and 'will to live' +are equivalent. For this will, life is everlastingly a certainty. +'Neither the will, the thing-in-itself in all phenomena, nor the subject +of knowledge, the spectator of all phenomena, is ever touched by birth +and death.' It is true that the individual appears and disappears; but +individuality is illusory. Past and future exist only in conceptual +thought. 'The form of life is a present without end, howsoever the +individuals, phenomena of the Idea, come into existence and vanish in +time, like fugitive dreams.' Only as phenomenon is each man different +from the other things of the world: as thing-in-itself he is the Will, +which appears in all, and death takes away the illusion that divides his +consciousness from the rest. 'Death is a sleep in which the +individuality is forgotten: everything else wakes again, or rather has +remained awake.' It is, in the expression adopted by Schopenhauer later, +an awakening from the dream of life: though this bears with it somewhat +different implications; and, as has been said, his theory of +individuality became modified. + +With the doctrine of the eternal life of the Will are connected +Schopenhauer's theories, developed later, of the immortality of the +species and of individualised sexual love. The latter is by itself a +remarkable achievement, and constitutes the one distinctly new +development brought to completion in his later years; for the +modifications in his theory of individuality are only tentative. His +theory of love has a determinate conclusion, of great value for +science, and not really compatible, it seems to me, with his pessimism. +In its relation to ethics, on which he insisted, it is rightly placed in +the position it occupies, between the generalised statement of his +metaphysics just now set forth on the one side, and his theory of human +virtue on the other. + +The teleology that manifests itself in individualised love is, in his +view, not related in reality to the interests of the individual life, +but to those of the species. That this is immortal follows from the +eternity of the Idea it unfolds.[4] The end sought is aimed at +unconsciously by the person. Fundamentally, for Schopenhauer, teleology +must of course be unconscious, since the will is blind, and will, not +intelligence, is primordial. Its typical case is the instinct of +animals; but the 'instinctive' character belongs also to the +accomplishment of the highest aims, as in art and virtue. What +characterises individualised love internally is the aim, attributed to +'nature' or 'the species,' at a certain typical beauty or perfection of +the offspring. The lover is therefore deluded in thinking that he is +seeking his own happiness. What looks through the eyes of lovers is the +genius of the race, meditating on the composition of the next +generation. It may, in the complexity of circumstances, be thwarted. +When it reaches its end, often personal happiness is sacrificed. +Marriages dictated by interest tend to be happier than love-matches. +Yet, though the sacrifice of the individual to the race is involuntary +in these, egoism is after all overcome; hence they are quite rightly the +object of a certain admiration and sympathy, while the prudential ones +are looked upon with a tinge of contempt. For here too that element +appears which alone gives nobility to the life either of intellect or of +art or of moral virtue, namely, the rising above a subjective interest +of the individual will. + + [4] The disappearance of species in time raises difficulties in more + than one way for his philosophy; but he formally escapes refutation by + the suggestion, already noted, that the Idea need not always be + manifested phenomenally in the same world. This, however, he did not + work out. + +No doubt there are touches of pessimism in this statement; but the +general theory does not seem reconcilable finally with pessimism as +Schopenhauer understands it. For it is a definitely stated position of +his that nature keeps up the process of the world by yielding just +enough to prevent discontinuance of the striving for an illusory end. +Yet he admits here in the result something beyond bare continuance of +life; for this is already secured without the particular modification of +feeling described. What the feeling is brought in to secure is a better +realisation of the type in actual individuals; and such realisation is +certainly more than bare subsistence with the least possible expenditure +of nature's resources. + +As the immediate preliminary to his ethics proper, Schopenhauer restates +his doctrine on the intelligible and the empirical character in man, and +lays down a generalised psychological position regarding the suffering +inherent in life. Everything as phenomenon, we have seen already, is +determined because it is subject to the law of sufficient reason. On the +other hand, everything as thing-in-itself is free; for 'freedom' means +only non-subjection to that law. The intelligible character of each man +is an indivisible, unalterable act of will out of time; the developed +and explicit phenomenon of this in time and space is the empirical +character. Man is his own work, not in the light of knowledge, but +before all knowledge; this is secondary and an instrument. Ultimately, +freedom is a mystery, and takes us beyond even will as the name for the +thing-in-itself. In reality, that which is 'will to live' need not have +been such (though we cannot see how this is so), but has become such +from itself and from nothing else. This is its '_aseitas_.' Hence it is +in its power to deny itself as will to live. When it does this, the +redemption (like the fall) comes from itself. This denial does not mean +annihilation, except relatively to all that we know under the forms of +our understanding. For the will, though the nearest we can get to the +thing-in-itself, is in truth a partially phenomenalised expression of +this. As the will to live expresses itself phenomenally, so also does +the denial of the will to live, when this, by special 'grace,' is +achieved. Only in man does the freedom thus attained find phenomenal +expression. That man can attain to it proves that in him the will has +reached its highest possible stage of objectivation; for, after it has +turned back and denied itself, there is evidently nothing more that we +can call existence, that is to say, phenomenal existence, beyond. What +there is beyond in the truth of being is something that the mystics +know--or rather, possess, for it is beyond knowledge--but cannot +communicate. + +The psychological reason that can be assigned for the ascetic flight +from the world is that all pleasure, happiness, satisfaction, is merely +negative. The will is a striving that has no ultimate aim. It is +sustained only by hindrances. Hindrance means suffering; and every +satisfaction attained is only temporary, a mere liberation from need, +want, pain, which is positive. Suffering increases with the degree of +consciousness. The life of civilised man is an alternation between pain +and _ennui_, which can itself become as intolerable a suffering as +anything. The problem of moral philosophy, then, is ultimately how +redemption from such a world is to be attained, but only so far as this +is a matter of conceptual knowledge. For philosophy, being from +beginning to end theoretical, cannot work the practical miracle by which +the will denies itself. + +The intuitive, as distinguished from merely conceptual, knowledge by +which the return is made, consists essentially in a clear insight into +the identity of the suffering will in all things and the necessity of +its suffering as long as it is will to live. This, then, is the true +foundation of morality. The universe as metaphysical thing-in-itself, as +noumenon, has an ethical meaning. All its stages of objectivation, +though in the process what seems to be aimed at is preservation of the +will as manifested, have in truth for their ultimate aim its redemption +by suppression of the phenomenal world in which it manifests itself. + +Affirmation of the will is affirmation of the body, which is the +objectivity of the will. The sexual impulse, since it affirms life +beyond the death of the individual, is the strongest of +self-affirmations. In it is found the meaning of the mythical +representation that has taken shape in the theological dogma of original +sin. For by this affirmation going beyond the individual body, suffering +and death, as the necessary accompaniment of the phenomenon of life, are +reaffirmed, and the possibility of redemption this time declared +fruitless. But through the whole process there runs eternal justice. The +justification of suffering is that the will affirms itself; and the +self-affirmation is justified by payment of the penalty. + +Before the final redemption--which is not for the world but for the +individual--there are many stages of ethical progress. These consist in +the gradual overcoming of egoism by sympathy. And here Schopenhauer +proceeds to set forth a practical scheme for the social life of man, +differing from ordinary utilitarianism only by reducing all sympathy to +pity, in accordance with his view that there can be no such thing as +positive happiness. + +He begins with a theory of justice, legal and moral, very much on the +lines of Hobbes, except that he regards it as up to a certain point _a +priori_. Here he is consistent throughout. As in his philosophical +account of mathematics and physics, so also in his aesthetics and +ethics, he retained, side by side with a strong empirical tendency, +belief in certain irreducible _a priori_ forms without which our +knowledge cannot be constituted. The pure ethical theory of justice, he +says, bears to the political theory the relation of pure to applied +mathematics. Injustice he holds to be the positive conception. It means +the breaking into the sphere of another person's will to live. The +self-affirmation of the will that appears in one individual body is +extended to denial of the will that appears in other bodies. Justice +consists in non-encroachment. There is a 'natural right,' or 'moral +right,' of resistance to injustice by infliction of what, apart from the +attempted encroachment, would be wrong. Either force or deception may be +used; as either may be the instrument of injustice. The purely ethical +doctrine of justice applies only to action; since only the not doing of +injustice depends on us. With the State and its laws, the relation is +reversed. The object of these is to prevent the suffering of injustice. +The State is not directed against egoism, but has sprung out of a +rationalised collective egoism. It has for its purpose only to avoid the +inconvenient consequences of individual aggressions on others. Outside +of the State, there is a right of self-defence against injustice, but no +right of punishment. The punishment threatened by the State is +essentially a motive against committing wrong, intended to supply the +place of ethical motives for those who are insufficiently accessible to +them. Actual infliction of it is the carrying out of the threat when it +has failed, so that in general the expectation of the penalty may be +certain. Revenge, which has a view to the past, cannot be justified +ethically: punishment is directed only to the future. There is no right +in any one to set himself up as a moral judge and inflict pain; but man +has a right to do what is needful for social security. The criminal's +acts are of course necessitated; but he cannot justly complain of being +punished for them, since it is ultimately from himself, from what he is, +that they sprang. + +With the doctrine of 'eternal justice,' touched on above, we pass into a +different region of thought. What is responsible for the guilt in the +world is the Will by which everything exists, and the suffering +everlastingly falls where the guilt is. Take the case of apparently +unpunished injustice (from the human point of view) expressing itself in +the extreme form of deliberate cruelty. Through this also, eternal +justice, from which there is no escape, is fulfilled. 'The torturer and +the tortured are one. The former errs in thinking he has no share in the +torture; the latter in thinking he has no share in the guilt.' For all +the pain of the world is the expiation of the sin involved in the +self-affirmation of will, and the Will as thing-in-itself is one and the +same in all. + +If this could satisfy any one, there would be no need to go further. The +whole being as it ought to be, why try to rectify details that are +absolutely indifferent? But of course the implication is that +individuality is simply illusory; and this, as has been said, was a +position that Schopenhauer neither could nor did consistently maintain. +Indeed, immediately after setting forth this theory of 'eternal +justice,' he goes on to a relative justification of those acts of +disinterested vengeance by which a person knowingly sacrifices his own +life for the sake of retribution on some extraordinary criminal. This, +he says, is a form of punishment, not mere revenge, although it involves +an error concerning the nature of eternal justice. Suicide involves a +similar error, in so far as it supposes that the real being of the +individual can be assailed through its phenomenal manifestation. It is +not a denial of the will to live, but a strong affirmation of it, only +not in the given circumstances: different circumstances are desired with +such intensity that the present cannot be borne. Therefore the +individual manifestation of the will is not suppressed. Yet, one might +reply, if individuality is an illusion attached to the appearance in +time and space of a particular organism, it would seem that, with the +disappearance of this, all that distinguishes the individual must +disappear also. + +Schopenhauer had no will thus to escape from life; nor did he afterwards +devote himself to expounding further his theory of eternal justice. What +he wrote later, either positively or as mere speculation, implies both +greater reality in the individual and more of cosmic equity to +correspond. His next step, even at his first stage, is to continue the +exposition of a practicable ethics for human life. His procedure +consists in adding beneficence to justice, with the proviso already +mentioned, which is required by his psychology, that all beneficence can +consist only in the relief of pain. For Schopenhauer, as for Comte, +what is to be overcome is 'egoism,' an excessive degree of which is the +mark of the character we call 'bad.' The 'good' is what Comte and +Spencer call the 'altruistic' character. This difference between +characters Schopenhauer goes on to explain in terms of his metaphysics. +The egoist is so deluded by the principle of individuation that he +supposes an absolute cleft between his own person and all others. The +remorse of conscience from which he suffers proceeds in part from an +obscure perception that the principle of individuation is illusory. +Genuine virtue springs out of the intuitive (not merely abstract) +knowledge that recognises in another individuality the same essence as +in one's own. The characteristic of the good man is that he makes less +difference than is customary between himself and others. Justice is an +intermediate stage between the encroaching egoism of the bad and +positive goodness. In the renunciation of rights of property, and +provision for all personal needs without aid from others, practised by +some religious and philosophical ascetics, it is passing over into +something more. There is, however, a certain misunderstanding involved +in so interpreting strict justice; for there are many ways in which the +rich and powerful can be positively beneficent. At the other extreme, +when they simply live on their inherited wealth, without doing anything +in return, their mode of life is morally, though not legally, unjust. +Rights of property Schopenhauer derived from labour spent on the things +appropriated. The injustice, in many ways, of the present social order +he quite recognises. If he has no sympathy with revolutions, it is +because he has no belief in the realisation of an ideal state. This +follows from his view of history. Human life, it is his conviction, +never has been and never will be different as a whole. Redemption from +evil can be attained only by the individual. All that the State can do +is to provide certain very general conditions of security under which +there will be no hindrance to those who desire to live in accordance +with a moral ideal. + +Yet there are qualifications to make. Many passages in Schopenhauer's +writings prove his firm belief in the future triumph of reason over +superstition. It is to the honour of humanity, he says, that so +detestable a form of evil as organised religious persecution has +appeared only in one section of history. And, in his own personal case, +he has the most complete confidence that the truths he has put forth +cannot fail sometime to gain a hearing. In all cases, error is only +temporary, and truth will prevail. His language on this subject, and +indeed often on others, is indistinguishable from that of an optimist. + +In the last resort, his pessimism entrenches itself behind the +psychological proposition that every satisfaction is negative, being +only the removal of a pain. If this is unsustainable, there is nothing +finally in his Metaphysics of Will to necessitate the pessimistic +conclusion drawn. The mode of deduction by which he proceeds is to argue +first to the position already noticed: that all that love of others on +which morality is based is fundamentally pity. True benevolence can only +be the desire to relieve others' pain, springing from the identification +of this with our own. For that reason, moral virtue must finally pass +over into asceticism--the denial of the will to live. In others, if we +are able to see through the principle of individuation, we recognise the +same essence as in ourselves, and we perceive that as long as this wills +it must necessarily suffer. The end then is to destroy the will to live. +This is to be done by _askesis_, self-mortification. The first step is +complete chastity. If, says Schopenhauer, the highest phenomenon of +will, that is, man, were to disappear through a general refusal to +affirm life beyond the individual body, man's weaker reflexion in the +animal world would disappear also, and the consciousness of the whole +would cease. Knowledge being taken away, the rest would vanish into +nothingness, since there is 'no object without subject.' That this will +come to pass, however, he certainly did not believe. He has no +cosmogony, like that of Hartmann, ending in a general redemption of the +universe by such a collective act. Nor did he hold, like his later +successor Mainländer, that through the conflict and gradual extinction +of individualities, 'this great world shall so wear out to nought.' The +world for him is without beginning and without end. But the exceptional +individual can redeem himself. What he does when he has reached the +height of holiness is by voluntary poverty and all other privations, +inflicted for their own sake, to break and kill the will, which he +recognises as the source of his own and of the world's suffering +existence. In his case not merely the phenomenon ends at death, as with +others, but the being is taken away. To be a 'world-overcomer' in this +sense (as opposed to a 'world-conqueror') is the essence of sanctity +when cleared of all the superstitious dogmas by which the saints try to +explain their mode of life to themselves. + +The absolutely pure expression of this truth is to be found only in +philosophy; but of the religions Buddhism comes nearest to expressing it +without admixture. For the Buddhist saint asks aid from no god. True +Christianity, however,--the Christianity of the New Testament and of the +Christian mystics,--agrees both with Buddhism and with Brahmanism in +ultimate aim. What spoils it for Schopenhauer is the Judaic element. +This, on one side, infects it with the optimism of the Biblical story of +creation, in which God 'saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it +was very good.' On the other side, it contaminates the myth of original +sin, which bears in itself a profound philosophical truth, by this same +doctrine of a creative God; from which follows all the injustice and +irrationality necessarily involved in the Augustinian theology, and not +to be expelled except with its theism. Nevertheless, the story of the +Fall of Man, of which that theology, in its fundamentally true part, is +a reasoned expression, is the one thing, Schopenhauer avows, that +reconciles him to the Old Testament. The truth that it clothes he finds +also among the Greeks; Empedocles, after the Orphics and Pythagoreans, +having taught that the soul had been doomed to wander because of some +antenatal sin. And the mysticism that accompanies all these more or less +pure expressions of one metaphysical truth he finds represented by the +Sufis even in optimistic Islam; so that he can claim for his philosophy +a world-wide consent. + +Religion, if we take this to include mysticism, at once rises above +philosophy and falls below it. As 'metaphysics of the people,' it is a +mythological expression of philosophical truth: as mysticism, it is a +kind of 'epi-philosophy.' Beyond pure philosophy Schopenhauer does not +profess to go; but he accepts what the mystics say as the description of +a positive experience which becomes accessible when supreme insight is +attained intuitively. For the philosopher as such, insight into that +which is beyond the forms of our knowledge and even beyond the will +itself, remains only conceptual; though it is within the province of +philosophy to mark out the place for this. The 'something else' that is +left when the will has been denied, is indicated by the 'ecstasy,' +'illumination,' 'union with God,' spoken of by the mystics. +Paradoxically, some of the mystics themselves even have identified it +with 'nothing'; but the result of the denial of the will to live is to +be called nothing only in relation to the world as we know it. 'On the +other hand, to those in whom the will has turned back and denied itself, +this so very real world of ours with all its suns and milky ways +is--nothing.' + +In this terminus of his philosophy, Schopenhauer recognised his kinship +with Indian thought, of which he was a lifelong student. To call his +doctrine a kind of Buddhism is, however, in some ways a misapprehension. +Undoubtedly he accepts as his ideal the ethical attitude that he finds +to be common to Buddhism and the Christianity of the New Testament; but +metaphysical differences mark him off from both. We have seen that he +rejects the extra-mundane God of Semitic derivation, adopted by +historical Christianity. Indeed he is one of the most pronounced +anti-Jehovists of all literature. But equally his belief in a positive +metaphysical doctrine marks him off from Buddhism, according to the +account given of it by its most recent students, who regard it either as +ultimately nihilistic or as having no metaphysics at all, but only a +psychology and ethics. Nor can he be precisely identified with the +Vedantists of orthodox Hinduism. Their ultimate reality, if we are to +find an analogue for it in European metaphysics, seems to resemble the +hypostasised _ego_ of Fichte, or the Kantian 'transcendental unity of +apperception', much more than it resembles Schopenhauer's blindly +striving will as thing-in-itself. Even in practical ethics, he does not +follow the Indian systems at all closely. Philosophical doctrines of +justice are of course purely European; and Schopenhauer himself points +out the sources of his own theory. In his extension of ethics to +animals, on which he lays much stress, he cites the teachings of Eastern +non-Semitic religions as superior to the rest; but he does not follow +the Indians, nor even the Pythagoreans, so far as to make abstinence +from flesh part of the ideal. He condemns vivisection on the ground that +animals have rights: certain ways of treating them are unjust, not +simply uncompassionate. The discussion here again is of course wholly +within European thought. Thus, in trying to determine his significance +for modern philosophy, we may consider his system in its immediate +environment, leaving it to more special students to determine how far it +received a peculiar colouring from the Oriental philosophies, of which, +in his time, the more exact knowledge was just beginning to penetrate to +the West. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE + + +Schopenhauer is not one of the philosophers who have founded a school, +though he has had many disciples and enthusiastic admirers. The +pessimism that was for a time a watchword with certain literary groups +has passed as a mode, and his true significance must be sought +elsewhere. Of the thinkers who have followed him in his pessimism, two +indeed stand out as the architects of distinct systems, Eduard von +Hartmann and Philipp Mainländer (both already incidentally referred to); +but while they are to be classed unquestionably as philosophers, their +systems contain an element that their master would have regarded as +mythological. Schopenhauer declared as clearly as any of the Greeks that +the phenomenal world is without beginning and without end. Kant's +positing of an 'antinomy' on this point he regarded as wholly without +rational justification. What Kant calls the 'antithesis,' namely, the +infinite series, can be logically proved for phenomena. The 'thesis,' +which asserts a beginning in time, is defended by mere fallacies. Now +Hartmann and Mainländer both hold, though in different fashions, that +there is a world-process from a beginning to an end, namely, the +extinction of consciousness. This is the redemption of the world. Their +affinity, therefore, seems to be with the Christian Gnostics rather than +with the pure philosophers of the Greek tradition, continued in modern +times by Bruno, Spinoza, and Schopenhauer. + +Whatever may be thought of the pessimism by which Schopenhauer's mood is +distinguished from that of his precursors, few will fail to recognise +that special doctrines of his system contain at least a large portion of +truth. His theories of Art, of Genius, and of Love are enough to found +an enduring reputation for any thinker, even if there were nothing else +of value in his writings. But there is much else, both in systematic +construction and in the illumination of detail. I have been inclined to +put forward first of all the translation into idealistic terms of the +universal sentiency held by the Ionian thinkers to be inherent in the +primordial elements of nature. While they viewed the world as an +objective thing having psychological qualities, Schopenhauer, after the +long intermediate process of thought, could treat it as phenomenal +object with a psychological or subjective essence. For both doctrines +alike, however, mind or soul is immanent. Still, it must be allowed that +a difference remains by which Schopenhauer was even more remote than +they were from the later Greek idealism. As they were not materialists, +so they did not exclude reason from the psychical properties of their +substances. Schopenhauer, while he rejected the materialism of their +ancient and modern successors alike, took the step of formally +derationalising the elements of mind. This, no doubt, is unsustainable +ultimately, if reason is ever to emerge from them. Yet the one-sidedness +of the position has had a peculiar value in combating an equally +one-sided rationalistic idealism. This is recognised by clear-sighted +opponents. And Schopenhauer's calling the non-rational or anti-rational +element in the world 'will' helps to make plainer the real problem of +evil. There is truth in the Hegelian paradox that 'pessimism is an +excellent basis for optimism.' An optimist like Plotinus saw that, even +if good comes of evil, the case of the optimist must fail unless evil +can be shown to be a necessary constituent of the world. The Platonic +and Neo-Platonic 'matter,' a principle of diremption or individuation, +like time and space for Schopenhauer, was an attempt to solve this +problem; but something more positive seemed to be needed as the source +of the stronger manifestations of evil. To the strength of these Plato +drew attention in a passage (_Republic_, x. 610[5]) where it is +acknowledged that injustice confers a character of vitality and +sleeplessness upon its possessor. In the notion of a blind and vehement +striving, Schopenhauer supplies something adequate; only, to maintain a +rational optimism, it must be regarded as a necessary element in a +mixture, not as the spring of the whole. + + [5] Cited in one of the introductory essays to Jowett and Campbell's + edition, vol. ii. + +Much might be said on the teleology by which he tries to educe +intelligence from the primordial strife. Against his view, that it is +evolved as a mere instrument for preserving races in a struggle, another +may be set that is ready to hand in a dialogue of Plutarch.[6] The +struggle among animals, it is there incidentally argued, has for its end +to sharpen their intelligence. Both these theories are on the surface +compatible with evolution. If, leaving aside the problem of mechanism, +we try to verify them by the test of results, the latter undoubtedly +seems the more plausible. For if the struggle was a means to the +improvement of intelligence, nature has succeeded more and more; +whereas, if her intention was to preserve races, she has continually +failed. This argument is at any rate perfectly valid against +Schopenhauer himself; for he holds in common with the optimistic +teleologists that 'nature does nothing in vain.' + + [6] _De Sollertia Animalium_, 27. + +I will conclude with a few detached criticisms on the ethical doctrine +which he regarded as the culmination of his system. The antithesis, it +may first be noted, between the temporary release from the vehemence of +the will that is gained through art, and the permanent release through +asceticism, is not consistently maintained. Schopenhauer admits that the +knowledge which for the ascetic is the 'quietive' of the will has to be +won anew in a perpetual conflict. 'No one can have enduring rest on +earth.' Again, revision of his doctrine concerning the reality of the +individual would, I think, necessitate revision also of the position +that not only asceticism but 'all true and pure love, nay, even freely +rendered justice, proceeds from seeing through the _principium +individuationis_.' If the individual is in some sense ultimately real, +then love must be to a certain extent literally altruism. We are brought +down to the elementary fact, in terms of the metaphysics of ethics, that +the object of love is a real being that is itself and not ourselves, +though having some resemblance to us and united in a larger whole. An +objection not merely verbal might indeed be taken to Schopenhauer's +metaphysics of ethics strictly on his own ground. If it is purely and +simply the essence of ourselves that we recognise in everything, does +not this reduce all love finally to a well-understood egoism? The +genuine fact of sympathy seems to escape his mode of formulation. And, +in the end, we shall perhaps not find the ascetic to be the supreme +ethical type. Of the self-tormenting kind of asceticism, it is not +enough to say with Schopenhauer that, since it is a world-wide +phenomenon of human nature, it calls for some account from philosophy. +The account may be sufficiently rendered by historical psychology; the +result being to class it as an aberration born of the illusions incident +to a certain type of mind at a certain stage. Indeed, that seems to be +the conclusion of the Buddhists, who claim to have transcended it by +finding it superfluous for the end it aims at. Let us then take, as our +example of the completed type, not the monks of the Thebaid, but the +mild ascetics of the Buddhist communities. Does not this type, even in +its most attractive form, represent a 'second best'? Is not the final +judgment that of Plato, that to save oneself is something, but that +there is no full achievement unless for the life of the State also the +ideal has been brought nearer realisation? When there is nothing in the +world but irredeemable tyranny or anarchy, flight from it may be the +greatest success possible as far as the individual life is concerned; +but this is not the normal condition of humanity. Finally, may not some +actual achievement, either practical or, like that of Schopenhauer, +speculative, even if accompanied by real imperfections of character, +possess a higher human value than the sanctity that rests always in +itself? + + + + +SELECTED WORKS + + +_English Translations_ + + _The World as Will and Idea._ Translated by R. B. HALDANE and J. KEMP. 3 + vols. 1883-6. + + _Two Essays_: I. _On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient + Reason_. II. _On the Will in Nature_. Bohn's Philosophical Library, + 1889. + + _Religion: A Dialogue, and other Essays._ Selected and translated by T. + BAILEY SAUNDERS. 3rd ed., 1891. [A series of other volumes of + selections excellently translated by Mr. Saunders has followed.] + + _Selected Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer._ With a Biographical + Introduction and Sketch of his Philosophy. By E. BELFORT BAX. 1891. + + _The Basis of Morality._ Translated with Introduction and Notes by A. B. + BULLOCK. 1903. + + +_Biographical and Expository_ + + _Arthur Schopenhauer: His Life and Philosophy._ By HELEN ZIMMERN. 1876. + + _Life of Arthur Schopenhauer._ By Professor W. WALLACE. 1890. + + _La Philosophie de Schopenhauer._ Par TH. RIBOT. 2nd ed., 1885. + + _Arthur Schopenhauer._ Seine Persönlichkeit, seine Lehre, sein Glaube. + Von JOHANNAES VOLKELT. 3rd ed., 1907. + + _Schopenhauer-Lexikon._ Von JULIUS FRADENSTÄDT. 2 vols., 1871. + + +Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty at the Edinburgh +University Press + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Schopenhauer, by Thomas Whittaker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCHOPENHAUER *** + +***** This file should be named 38283-8.txt or 38283-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/2/8/38283/ + +Produced by Albert László and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + +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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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: Schopenhauer + +Author: Thomas Whittaker + +Release Date: December 12, 2011 [EBook #38283] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCHOPENHAUER *** + + + + +Produced by Albert László and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<hr class="chap" /> + +<h3><span class="smcap">Philosophies Ancient and Modern</span></h3> + +<p> </p> + +<h1>SCHOPENHAUER</h1> + +<p> </p> + +<hr class="chap" /> + +<h2><a name="NOTE" id="NOTE"></a>NOTE</h2> + + +<p>As a consequence of the success of the series of <i>Religions +Ancient and Modern</i>, Messrs. <span class="smcap">Constable</span> have decided to issue +a set of similar primers, with brief introductions, lists of dates, +and selected authorities, presenting to the wider public the +salient features of the <i>Philosophies</i> of Greece and Rome and of +the Middle Ages, as well as of modern Europe. They will +appear in the same handy Shilling volumes, with neat cloth +bindings and paper envelopes, which have proved so attractive +in the case of the <i>Religions</i>. The writing in each case will be +confided to an eminent authority, and one who has already +proved himself capable of scholarly yet popular exposition +within a small compass.</p> + +<p>Among the first volumes to appear will be:—</p> + +<div class="hanging-indent"><p><b>Early Greek Philosophy.</b> By <span class="smcap">A. W. Benn</span>, author of <i>The Philosophy +of Greece, Rationalism in the Nineteenth Century</i>.</p> + +<p><b>Stoicism.</b> By Professor <span class="smcap">St. George Stock</span>, author of <i>Deductive Logic</i>, +editor of the <i>Apology of Plato</i>, etc.</p> + +<p><b>Plato.</b> By Professor <span class="smcap">A. E. Taylor</span>, St. Andrews University, +author of <i>The Problem of Conduct</i>.</p> + +<p><b>Scholasticism.</b> By Father <span class="smcap">Rickaby</span>, S.J.</p> + +<p><b>Hobbes.</b> By Professor <span class="smcap">A. E. Taylor</span>.</p> + +<p><b>Locke.</b> By Professor <span class="smcap">Alexander</span>, of Owens College.</p> + +<p><b>Comte and Mill.</b> By <span class="smcap">T. Whittaker</span>, author of <i>The +Neoplatonists, Apollonius of Tyana and other Essays</i>.</p> + +<p><b>Herbert Spencer.</b> By <span class="smcap">W. H. Hudson</span>, author of <i>An Introduction +to Spencer's Philosophy</i>.</p> + +<p><b>Schopenhauer.</b> By <span class="smcap">T. Whittaker</span>.</p> + +<p><b>Berkeley.</b> By Professor <span class="smcap">Campbell Fraser</span>, D.C.L., LL.D.</p> + +<p><b>Bergsen.</b> By Father <span class="smcap">Tyrrell</span>.</p></div> + + +<hr class="chap" /> + +<h1>SCHOPENHAUER</h1> + +<p> </p> + +<h3>By</h3> + +<h2>THOMAS WHITTAKER</h2> + +<h5>AUTHOR OF 'COMTE AND MILL,' ETC.</h5> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<h5>LONDON<br /> +<small>ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO LTD</small><br /> +1909</h5> + + +<hr class="chap" /> + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents"> + +<tr><td align='left'><small>CHAP.</small></td> +<td align='left'></td> +<td align='left'><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'><small>I.</small></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Life and Writings</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_1'>1</a></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'><small>II.</small></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Theory of Knowledge</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_15'>15</a></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'><small>III.</small></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Metaphysics of the Will</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_29'>29</a></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'><small>IV.</small></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Ćsthetics</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_49'>49</a></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'><small>V.</small></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Ethics</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_65'>65</a></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'><small>VI.</small></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Historical Significance</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_86'>86</a></td></tr> + +<tr><td align='right'></td> +<td align='left'><span class="smcap">Selected Works</span>,</td> +<td align='right'><a href='#Page_93'>93</a></td></tr> + +</table></div> + +<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h1><a name="SCHOPENHAUER" id="SCHOPENHAUER"></a>SCHOPENHAUER</h1> + + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2> + +<h3>LIFE AND WRITINGS</h3> + + +<p>Arthur Schopenhauer may be distinctively +described as the greatest philosophic writer of +his century. So evident is this that he has +sometimes been regarded as having more importance +in literature than in philosophy; but this +is an error. As a metaphysician he is second to +no one since Kant. Others of his age have surpassed +him in system and in comprehensiveness; +but no one has had a firmer grasp of the essential +and fundamental problems of philosophy. +On the theory of knowledge, the nature of reality, +and the meaning of the beautiful and the good, +he has solutions to offer that are all results of a +characteristic and original way of thinking.</p> + +<p>In one respect, as critics have noted, his spirit +is different from that of European philosophy in +general. What preoccupies him in a special way +is the question of evil in the world. Like the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> +philosophies of the East, emerging as they do +without break from religion, Schopenhauer's +philosophy is in its outcome a doctrine of redemption +from sin. The name of pessimism commonly +applied to it is in some respects misleading, +though it was his own term; but it is correct if +understood as he explained it. As he was accustomed +to insist, his final ethical doctrine coincides +with that of all the religions that aim, for their +adepts or their elect, at deliverance from 'this +evil world.' But, as the 'world-fleeing' religions +have their mitigations and accommodations, so +also has the philosophy of Schopenhauer. At +various points indeed it seems as if a mere +change of accent would turn it into optimism.</p> + +<p>This preoccupation does not mean indifference +to the theoretical problems of philosophy. No +one has insisted more strongly that the end of +philosophy is pure truth, and that only the few +who care about pure truth have any concern with +it. But for Schopenhauer the desire for speculative +truth does not by itself suffice to explain +the impulse of philosophical inquiries. On one +side of his complex character, he had more +resemblance to the men who turn from the world +to religion, like St. Augustine, than to the normal +type of European thinker, represented pre-emi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>nently +by Aristotle. He was a temperamental +pessimist, feeling from the first the trouble of +existence; and here he finds the deepest motive +for the desire to become clear about it. He saw +in the world, what he felt in himself, a vain effort +after ever new objects of desire which give no +permanent satisfaction; and this view, becoming +predominant, determined, not indeed all the ideas +of his philosophy, but its general complexion as +a 'philosophy of redemption.'</p> + +<p>With his pessimism, personal misfortunes had +nothing to do. He was, and always recognised +that he was, among the most fortunately placed +of mankind. He does not hesitate to speak +sometimes of his own happiness in complete +freedom from the need to apply himself to any +compulsory occupation. This freedom, as he has +put gratefully on record, he owed to his father, +Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer, who was a rich +merchant of Danzig, where the philosopher was +born on the 22nd of February 1788. Both his +parents were of Dutch ancestry. His mother, +Johanna Schopenhauer, won celebrity as a novelist; +and his sister, Adele, also displayed some +literary talent. Generalising from his own case, +Schopenhauer holds that men of intelligence +derive their character from their father and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> +their intellect from their mother. With his +mother, however, he was not on sympathetic +terms, as may be read in the biographies. His +father intended him for a mercantile career, and +with this view began to prepare him from the +first to be a cosmopolitan man of the world. The +name of Arthur was given to him because it is +spelt alike in the leading European languages. +He was taken early to France, where he resided +from 1797 to 1799, learning French so well that +on his return he had almost forgotten his German. +Portions of the years 1803 to 1804 were spent +in England, France, Switzerland, and Austria. In +England he was three months at a Wimbledon +boarding-school kept by a clergyman. This experience +he found extremely irksome. He afterwards +became highly proficient in English: was +always pleased to be taken for an Englishman, +and regarded both the English character and +intelligence as on the whole the first in Europe; +but all the more deplorable did he find the oppressive +pietism which was the special form taken in +the England of that period by the reaction against +the French Revolution. He is never tired of +denouncing that phase of 'cold superstition,' +the dominance of which lasted during his lifetime; +for the publication of Mill's <i>Liberty</i> and of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> +Darwin's <i>Origin of Species</i>, which may be considered +as marking the close of it, came only the +year before his death.</p> + +<p>The only real break in the conformity of +Schopenhauer's circumstances to his future career +came in 1805, when he was placed in a merchant's +office at Hamburg, whither his father had +migrated in disgust at the annexation of his +native Danzig, then under a republican constitution +of its own, by Prussia in 1793. Soon +afterwards his father died; but out of loyalty he +tried for some time longer to reconcile himself +to commercial life. Finding this at length impossible, +he gained permission from his mother, +in 1807, to leave the office for the gymnasium. +At this time he seems to have begun his classical +studies, his education having hitherto been exclusively +modern. They were carried on first at +Gotha and then at Weimar. In 1809 he entered +the university of Göttingen as a student of +medicine. This, however, was with a view only +to scientific studies, not to practice; and he transferred +himself to the philosophical faculty in +1810. Generally he was little regardful of +academical authority. His father's deliberately +adopted plan of letting him mix early with the +world had given him a certain independence of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> +judgment. At Göttingen, however, he received +an important influence from his teacher, G. E. +Schulze (known by the revived scepticism of +his <i>Ćnesidemus</i>), who advised him to study Plato +and Kant before Aristotle and Spinoza. From +1811 to 1813 he was at Berlin, where he heard +Fichte, but was not impressed. In 1813 the +degree of Doctor of Philosophy was conferred on +him at Jena for the dissertation <i>On the Fourfold +Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason</i> +(<i>Ueber die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom zureichenden +Grunde</i>, 2nd ed., 1847). This was the +first result of his Kantian studies. In the same +year he began to be acquainted with Goethe at +Weimar, where his mother and sister had gone +to reside in 1806. A consequence of this +acquaintance was that he took up and further +developed Goethe's theory of colours. His dissertation +<i>Ueber das Sehen und die Farben</i> was +published in 1816. A second edition did not +appear till 1854; but in the meantime he had +published a restatement of his doctrine in Latin, +entitled <i>Theoria Colorum Physiologica</i> (1830). +This, however, was an outlying part of his work. +He had already been seized by the impulse to +set forth the system of philosophy that took +shape in him, as he says, by some formative<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> +process of which he could give no conscious +account. His great work, <i>Die Welt als Wille +und Vorstellung</i>, was ready for publication +before the end of 1818, and was published with +the date 1819. Thus he is one of the most +precocious philosophers on record. For in that +single volume, written before he was thirty, the +outlines of his whole system are fixed. There +is some development later, and there are endless +new applications and essays towards confirmation +from all sources. His mind never rested, +and his literary power gained by exercise. Still, +it has been said with truth, that there never +was a greater illusion than when he thought that +he seldom repeated himself. In reality he did +little but repeat his fundamental positions with +infinite variations in expression.</p> + +<p>After completing his chief work, Schopenhauer +wrote some verses in which he predicted +that posterity would erect a monument to him. +This prediction was fulfilled in 1895; but, for the +time, the work which he never doubted would +be his enduring title to fame seemed, like Hume's +<i>Treatise</i>, to have fallen 'deadborn from the press.' +This he attributed to the hostility of the academical +philosophers; and, in his later works, attacks +on the university professors form a characteristic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> +feature. The official teachers of the Hegelian +school, he declared, were bent only on obtaining +positions for themselves by an appearance of +supporting Christian dogma; and they resented +openness on the part of any one else. +Yet on one side he maintained that his own +pessimism was more truly Christian than their +optimism. The essential spirit of Christianity is +that of Brahmanism and Buddhism, the great +religions that sprang from India, the first home +of our race. He is even inclined to see in it +traces of Indian influence. What vitiates it in +his eyes is the Jewish element, which finds its +expression in the flat modern 'Protestant-rationalistic +optimism.' As optimistic religions, he +groups together Judaism, Islam, and Grćco-Roman +Polytheism. His antipathy, however, +only extends to the two former. He was himself +in great part a child of Humanism and of the +eighteenth century, rejoicing over the approaching +downfall of all the faiths, and holding that +a weak religion (entirely different from those he +admires) is favourable to civilisation. Nothing +can exceed his scorn for nearly everything that +characterised the Middle Ages. With Catholicism +as a political system he has no sympathy +whatever; while on the religious side the Pro<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>testant +are as sympathetic to him as the Catholic +mystics. What is common to all priesthoods, +he holds, is to exploit the metaphysical need of +mankind (in which he also believes) for the sake +of their own power. Clericalism, 'Pfaffenthum,' +whether Catholic or Protestant, is the object of +his unvarying hatred and contempt. If he had +cared to appreciate Hegel, he would have found +on this point much community of spirit; but of +course there was a real antithesis between the +two as philosophers. No 'conspiracy' need be +invoked to explain the failure of Schopenhauer +to win early recognition. Belief in the State and +in progress was quite alien to him; and Germany +was then full of political hopes, which found +nourishment in optimistic pantheism. What at +length gave his philosophy vogue was the collapse +of this enthusiasm on the failure of the revolutionary +movement in 1848. Once known, it +contained enough of permanent value to secure +it from again passing out of sight with the next +change of fashion.</p> + +<p>The rest of Schopenhauer's life in its external +relations may be briefly summed up. For a few +years, it was diversified by travels in Italy and +elsewhere, and by an unsuccessful attempt at +academical teaching in Berlin. In 1831 he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> +moved to Frankfort, where he finally settled +in 1833. He lived unmarried there till his death +on the 21st of September 1860. The monument, +already spoken of, was unveiled at Frankfort on +the 6th of June 1895.</p> + +<p>The almost unbroken silence with which his +great work was received, though it had a distempering +effect on the man, did not discourage +the thinker. The whole series of Schopenhauer's +works, indeed, was completed before he attained +anything that could be called fame. Constantly +on the alert as he was to seize upon confirmations +of his system, he published in 1836 his short +work <i>On the Will in Nature</i>, pointing out verifications +of his metaphysics by recent science. In +1839 his prize essay, <i>On the Freedom of the Human +Will</i> (finished in 1837), was crowned by the Royal +Scientific Society of Drontheim in Norway. This +and another essay, <i>On the Basis of Morality</i>, <i>not</i> +crowned by the Royal Danish Society of Copenhagen +in 1840, he published in 1841, with the +inclusive title, <i>Die beiden Grundprobleme der +Ethik</i>. In 1844 appeared the second edition of +his principal work, to which there was added, +in the form of a second volume, a series of +elucidations and extensions larger in bulk than +the first. This new volume contains much of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +his best and most effective writing. His last +work, <i>Parerga und Paralipomena</i>, which appeared +in 1851 (2 vols.), is from the literary point +of view the most brilliant. It was only from this +time that he began to be well known among the +general public; though the philosophic 'apostolate' +of Julius Frauenstädt, who afterwards +edited his works, had begun in 1840. His activity +was henceforth confined to modifying and extending +his works for new editions; an employment +in which he was always assiduous. In +consequence of this, all of them, as they stand, +contain references from one to another; but the +development of his thinking, so far as there was +such a process after 1818, can be easily traced +without reference to the earlier editions. There +is some growth; but, as has been said, it does not +affect many of the chief points. A brief exposition +of his philosophy can on the whole take it as +something fixed. The heads under which it must +fall are those assigned to the original four books +of <i>Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung</i>.</p> + +<p>Although Schopenhauer discountenanced the +attempt to connect a philosophers biography +with his work, something has to be said about +his character, since this has been dwelt on to his +disadvantage by opponents. There is abundant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> +material for a personal estimate in the correspondence +and reminiscences published after his +death by his disciples Julius Frauenstädt and +Wilhelm Gwinner. The apparent contradiction +is at once obvious between the ascetic consummation +of his ethics and his unascetic life, +carefully occupied in its latter part with rules for +the preservation of his naturally robust health. +He was quite aware of this, but holds it absurd +to require that a moralist should commend only +the virtues which he possesses. It is as if the +requirement were set up that a sculptor is to be +himself a model of beauty. A saint need not be +a philosopher, nor a philosopher a saint. The +science of morals is as theoretical as any other +branch of philosophy. Fundamentally character +is unmodifiable, though knowledge, it is allowed, +may change the mode of action within the limits +of the particular character. The passage to the +state of asceticism cannot be effected by moral +philosophy, but depends on a kind of 'grace.' +After all, it might be replied, philosophers, +whether they succeed or not, do usually make +at least an attempt to live in accordance with +the moral ideal they set up. The best apology +in Schopenhauer's case is that the fault may +have been as much in his ideal as in his failure<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> +to conform to it. The eloquent pages he has +devoted to the subject of holiness only make +manifest the inconsequence (which he admits) +in the passage to it. For, as we shall see, this +has nothing in common with the essentially +rational asceticism of the schools of later antiquity; +which was a rule of self-limitation in view of the +philosophic life. He did in a way of his own +practise something of this; and, on occasion, he +sets forth the theory of it; but he quite clearly +sees the difference. His own ideal, which he +never attempted to practise, is that of the self-torturing +ascetics of the Christian Middle Age. +Within the range of properly human virtue, he +can in many respects hold his own, not only as +a philosopher but as a man. If his egoism and +vanity are undeniable, he undoubtedly possessed +the virtues of rectitude and compassion. What +he would have especially laid stress on was the +conscientious devotion to his work. With complete +singleness of purpose he used for a disinterested +end the leisure which he regarded as the most fortunate +of endowments. As he said near the close +of his life, his intellectual conscience was clear.</p> + +<p>Of Schopenhauer's expositions of his pessimism +it would be true to say, as Spinoza says of the +Book of Job, that the matter, like the style, is not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> +that of a man sitting among the ashes, but of one +meditating in a library. This of course does not +prove that they are not a genuine, if one-sided, +rendering of human experience. All that can be +said is that they did not turn him away from +appreciation of the apparent goods of life. His +own practical principle was furnished by what he +regarded as a lower point of view; and this gives +its direction to the semi-popular philosophy of +the <i>Parerga</i>. From what he takes to be the +higher point of view, the belief that happiness is +attainable by man on earth is an illusion; but he +holds that, by keeping steadily in view a kind of +tempered happiness as the end, many mistakes +may be avoided in the conduct of life, provided +that each recognises at once the strength and +weakness of his own character, and does not +attempt things that, with the given limitations, +are impossible. Of the highest truth, as he conceived +it, he could therefore make no use. Only +by means of a truth that he was bound to hold +half-illusory could a working scheme be constructed +for himself and others. This result may give us +guidance in seeking to learn what we can from +a thinker who is in reality no representative of a +decadence, but is fundamentally sane and rational, +even in spite of himself.</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2> + +<h3>THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE</h3> + +<p>The title of Schopenhauer's chief work is rendered +in the English translation, <i>The World as +Will and Idea</i>. Here the term 'idea' is used in +the sense it had for Locke and Berkeley; namely, +any object of mental activity. Thus it includes +not merely imagery, but also perception. Since +Hume distinguished ideas' from 'impressions,' +it has tended to be specialised in the former +sense. The German word, <i>Vorstellung</i>, which it +is used to render, conveys the generalised meaning +of the Lockian 'idea,' now frequently expressed +in English and French philosophical works by the +more technical term 'presentation' or 'representation.' +By Schopenhauer himself the word +'Idea' was used exclusively in the sense of the +Platonic Idea, which, as we shall see, plays an +important part in his philosophy. The distinction +is preserved in the translation by the use of +a capital when Idea has the latter meaning; but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> +in a brief exposition it seems convenient to adopt +a more technical rendering of <i>Vorstellung</i>; and, +from its common employment in psychological +text-books, I have selected 'presentation' as the +most suitable.</p> + +<p>The first proposition of Schopenhauer's philosophical +system is, 'The world is my presentation.' +By this he means that it presents itself as appearance +to the knowing subject. This appearance is +in the forms of time, space and causality. Under +these forms every phenomenon necessarily +appears, because they are <i>a priori</i> forms of the +subject. The world as it presents itself consists +entirely of phenomena, that is, appearances, +related according to these forms. The most fundamental +form of all is the relation between object +and subject, which is implied in all of them. +Without a subject there can be no presented +object.</p> + +<p>Schopenhauer is therefore an idealist in the +sense in which we call Berkeley's theory of the +external world idealism; though the expressions +used are to some extent different. The difference +proceeds from his following of Kant. His Kantianism +consists in the recognition of <i>a priori</i> +forms by which the subject constructs for itself an +'objective' world of appearances. With Berkeley<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> +he agrees as against Kant in not admitting +any residue whatever, in the object as such, that +is not wholly appearance. But while he allows +that Berkeley, as regards the general formulation +of idealism, was more consistent than Kant, he +finds him, in working out the principle, altogether +inadequate. For the modern mind there is henceforth +no way in philosophy except through Kant, +from whom dates the revolution by which scholastic +dualism was finally overthrown. Kant's +systematic construction, however, he in effect +reduces to very little. His is a much simplified +'Apriorism.' While accepting the 'forms of sensible +intuition,' that is, time and space, just as +Kant sets them forth, he clears away nearly all +the superimposed mechanism. Kant's 'Transcendental +Ćsthetic,' he says, was a real discovery in +metaphysics; but on the basis of this he for the +most part only gave free play to his architectonic +impulse. Of the twelve 'categories of the understanding,' +which he professed to derive from the +logical forms of judgment, all except causality are +mere 'blind windows.' This alone, therefore, +Schopenhauer adopts; placing it, however, not at +a higher level but side by side with time and +space, Kant's forms of intuition. These three +forms, according to Schopenhauer, make up the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> +understanding of men and animals. 'All intuition +is intellectual.' It is not first mere appearance +related in space and time, and waiting for understanding +to organise it; but, in animals as in +man, it is put in order at once under the three +forms that suffice to explain the knowledge all +have of the phenomenal world.</p> + +<p>To Reason as distinguished from Understanding, +Schopenhauer assigns no such exalted function as +was attributed to it in portions of his system by +Kant, and still more by some of his successors. +The name of 'reason,' he maintains, ought on +etymological grounds to be restricted to the faculty +of abstract concepts. This, and not understanding, +is what distinguishes man from animals. It +discovers and invents nothing, but it puts in a +generalised and available form what the understanding +has discovered in intuition.</p> + +<p>For the historical estimation of Schopenhauer, +it is necessary to place him in relation to Kant, +as he himself always insisted. Much also in his +chief work is made clearer by knowledge of his +dissertation <i>On the Fourfold Root of the Principle +of Sufficient Reason</i>, to which he is constantly +referring. Later, his manner of exposition became +more independent; so that he can be read by the +general reader with profit simply by himself, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> +without reference to antecedents. Still, it will +always be advisable for an expositor to follow his +directions, at least to the extent of giving some +short account of the dissertation. This I proceed +to give approximately in the place to which he +has assigned it in his system.</p> + +<p>The name of the principle (<i>principium rationis +sufficientis</i>) he took over from Leibniz and his +successor Wolff, but gave it a new amplitude. +With him, it stands as an inclusive term for four +modes of connection by which the thoroughgoing +relativity of phenomena to one another is constituted +for our intelligence. The general statement +adopted is, 'Nothing is without a reason +why it should be rather than not be.' Its four +forms are the principles of becoming (<i>fiendi</i>), of +knowing (<i>cognoscendi</i>), of being (<i>essendi</i>), and +of acting (<i>agendi</i>). (1) Under the first head +come 'causes.' These are divided into 'cause +proper,' for inorganic things; 'stimulus,' for the +vegetative life both of plants and animals, and +'motive,' for animals and men. The law of causation +is applicable only to changes; not to the +forces of nature, to matter, or to the world as a +whole, which are perdurable. Cause precedes +effect in time. Not one thing, but one state of a +thing, is the cause of another. From the law of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> +causation there results an infinite series <i>a parte +ante</i> as well as <i>a parte post</i>. (2) The principle of +sufficient reason of knowing is applicable to concepts, which +are all derived from intuition, that +is, from percepts. The laws of logic, which come +under this head, can yield nothing original, but +can only render explicit what was in the understanding. +(3) Under the third head come arithmetical +and geometrical relations. These are +peculiar relations of presentations, distinct from +all others, and only intelligible in virtue of a pure +<i>a priori</i> intuition. For geometry this is space; +for arithmetic time, in which counting goes on. +Scientifically, arithmetic is fundamental. (4) As +the third form of causality was enumerated +'motive' for the will; but in that classification it +was viewed from without, as belonging to the +world of objects. Through the direct knowledge +we have of our own will, we know also from +within this determination by the presentation we +call a motive. Hence emerges the fourth form of +the principle of sufficient reason. This at a later +stage makes possible the transition from physics +to metaphysics.</p> + +<p>All these forms alike are forms of necessary +determination. Necessity has no clear and true +sense but certainty of the consequence when the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> +ground is posited. All necessity therefore is conditional. +In accordance with the four expressions +of the principle of sufficient reason, it takes the +fourfold shape of physical, logical, mathematical, +and moral necessity.</p> + +<p>The sharp distinction between logical and +mathematical truth, with the assignment of the +former to conceptual and of the latter to intuitive +relations, comes to Schopenhauer directly from +Kant. So also does his view that the necessary +form of causation is sequence; though here his +points of contact with English thinkers, earlier +and later, are very marked. Only in his statement +of the 'law of motivation' as 'causality seen +from within' does he hint at his own distinctive +metaphysical doctrine. Meanwhile, it is evident +that he is to be numbered with the group of +modern thinkers who have arrived in one way or +another at a complete scientific phenomenism. +Expositors have noted that in his earlier statements +of this he tends to lay more stress on the +character of the visible and tangible world as +mere appearance. The impermanence, the +relativity, of all that exists in time and space, +leads him to describe it, in a favourite term +borrowed from Indian philosophy, as Maya, or +illusion. Later, he dwells more on the relative<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +reality of things as they appear. His position, +however, does not essentially alter, but only finds +varying expression as he turns more to the +scientific or to the metaphysical side. From +Hume's view on causation he differs not by +opposing its pure phenomenism, but only by +recognising, as Kant does, an <i>a priori</i> element in +the form of its law. German critics have seen in +his own formulation an anticipation of Mill, and +this is certainly striking as regards the general +conception of the causal order, although there is +no anticipation of Mill's inductive logic. On the +same side there is a close agreement with Malebranche +and the Occasionalists, pointed out by +Schopenhauer himself. The causal explanations +of science, he is at one with them in insisting, +give no ultimate account of anything. All its +causes are no more than 'occasional causes,'—merely +instances, as Mill expressed it afterwards, +of 'invariable and unconditional sequence.' From +Mill of course he differs in holding its form to be +necessary and <i>a priori</i>, not ultimately derived +from a summation of experiences; and, with the +Occasionalists, he goes on to metaphysics in its +sense of ontology, as Mill never did. The difference +here is that he does not clothe his metaphysics +in a theological dress.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the later development of his thought, +Schopenhauer dealt more expressly with the +question, how this kind of phenomenism is +reconcilable with a scientific cosmogony. On one +side the proposition, 'No object without subject,' +makes materialism for ever impossible; for the +materialist tries to explain from relations among +presentations what is the condition of all presentation. +On the other side, we are all compelled +to agree with the materialists that knowledge of +the object comes late in a long series of material +events. Inorganic things existed in time before +life; vegetative life before animal life; and only +with animal life does knowledge emerge. +Reasoned knowledge of the whole series comes +only at the end of it in the human mind. This +apparent contradiction he solves by leaving a +place for metaphysics. Our representation of the +world as it existed before the appearance of life +was indeed non-existent at the time to which we +assign it; but the real being of the world had +a manifestation not imaginable by us. For this, +we substitute a picture of a world such as we +should have been aware of had our 'subject,' with +its <i>a priori</i> forms of time, space, and causality, +been then present. What the reality is, is the +problem of the thing-in-itself (to use the Kantian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> +term). This problem remains over; but we know +that the metaphysical reality cannot be matter; +for matter, with all its qualities, is phenomenal. +It exists only 'for understanding, through understanding, +in understanding.' These discriminations +made, Schopenhauer offers us a scientific +cosmogony beginning with the nebular hypothesis +and ending with an outline of organic evolution. +This last differs from the Darwinian theory in +supposing a production of species by definite steps +instead of by accumulation of small individual +variations. At a certain time, a form that has all +the characters of a new species appears among +the progeny of an existing species. Man is the +last and highest form to be evolved. From +Schopenhauer's metaphysics, as we shall see, it +follows that no higher form of life will ever +appear.</p> + +<p>A word may be said here on a materialistic-sounding +phrase which is very prominent in +Schopenhauer's later expositions, and has been +remarked on as paradoxical for an idealist. The +world as presentation, he often says, is 'in the +brain.' This, it must be allowed, is not fully +defensible from his own point of view, except +with the aid of a later distinction. The brain as +we know it is of course only a part of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> +phenomenon of the subject,—a grouping of +possible perceptions. How then, since it is itself +only appearance, can it be the bearer of the whole +universe as appearance? The answer is that +Schopenhauer meant in reality 'the being of the +brain,' and not the brain as phenomenon. He +had a growing sense of the importance of +physiology for the investigation of mind; and +his predilection led him to adopt a not quite +satisfactory shorthand expression for the correspondence +we know scientifically to exist between +our mental processes and changes capable of +objective investigation in the matter of the +brain.</p> + +<p>In science his distinctive bent was to the +borderland between psychology and physiology. +Hence came the attraction exercised on him by +Goethe's theory of colours. To his own theory, +though, unlike his philosophical system, it has +always failed to gain the attention he predicted +for it, the merit must be allowed of treating the +problem as essentially one of psychophysics. +What he does is to attempt to ascertain the +conditions in the sensibility of the retina that +account for our actual colour-sensations. This +problem was untouched by the Newtonian +theory; but Schopenhauer followed Goethe in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> +the error of trying to overthrow this on its own +ground. He had no aptitude for the special +inquiries of mathematics and physics, though he +had gained a clear insight into their general +nature as sciences. On the psycho-physical side +there is to-day no fully authorised theory. The +problem indeed has become ever more complex. +Schopenhauer's attempt, by combination of sensibilities +to 'light' and 'darkness,' to explain the +phenomena of complementary colours, deserves +at least a record in the long series of essays of +which the best known are the 'Young-Helmholtz +theory' and that of Hering. It marks an indubitable +advance on Goethe in the clear distinction +drawn between the mixture, in the ordinary +sense, that can only result in dilution to different +shades of grey, and the kinds of mixture from +which, in their view, true colours arise.</p> + +<p>A characteristic position in Schopenhauer's +theory of knowledge, and one that is constantly +finding new expression in his writings, is the +distinction between abstract and intuitive knowledge already +touched on. Intuitive knowledge +of the kind that is common to men and animals, +as we have seen, makes up, in his terminology, +the 'understanding'; while 'reason' is the distinctively +human faculty of concepts. When he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> +depreciates this, as he often does, in comparison +with 'intuition,' it must be remembered that he +does not limit this term to perception of particulars, +but ascribes to what he calls the +'Platonic Idea' a certain kind of union between +reason and 'phantasy,' which gives it an intuitive +character of its own. Thus intuition can stand, +though not in every case for what is higher, yet +always for that which is wider and greater and +more immediate. Whatever may be done with +reflective reason and its abstractions, every +effectual process of thought must end, alike for +knowledge and art and virtue, in some intuitive +presentation. The importance of reason for +practice is due to its generality. Its function is +subordinate. It does not furnish the ground of +virtuous action any more than ćsthetic precepts +can enable any one to produce a work of art; +but it can help to preserve constancy to certain +maxims, as also in art a reasoned plan is necessary +because the inspiration of genius is not every +moment at command. Virtue and artistic genius +alike, however, depend ultimately on intuition: +and so also does every true discovery in science. +The nature of pedantry is to try to be guided +everywhere by concepts, and to trust nothing to +perception in the particular case. Philosophy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> +also Schopenhauer regards as depending ultimately +on a certain intuitive view; but he allows +that it has to translate this into abstractions. +Its problem is to express the <i>what</i> of the world +in abstract form: science dealing only with the +<i>why</i> of phenomena related within the world. +This character of philosophy as a system of +abstract concepts deprives it of the immediate +attractiveness of art; so that, as he says in one +place, it is more fortunate to be a poet than a +philosopher.</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2> + +<h3>METAPHYSICS OF THE WILL</h3> + + +<p>We have seen that scientific explanation does +not go beyond presentations ordered in space and +time. This is just as true of the sciences of +causation—the 'ćtiological' sciences—as it is of +mathematical science. All that we learn from +Mechanics, Physics, Chemistry and Physiology, +is 'how, in accordance with an infallible rule, +one determinate state of matter necessarily +follows another: how a determinate change +necessarily conditions and brings on another +determinate change.' This knowledge does not +satisfy us. We wish to learn the significance of +phenomena; but we find that from outside, while +we view them as presentations, their inner meaning +is for ever inaccessible.</p> + +<p>The starting-point for the metaphysical knowledge +we seek is given us in our own body. The +animal body is 'the immediate object of the +subject': in it as presentation the 'effects' of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> +'causes' in the order of presentations external +to it are first recognised. Now in virtue of his +body the investigator is not pure knowing +subject standing apart from that which he knows. +In the case of the particular system of presentations +constituting his organism, he knows what +these presentations signify, and that is his <i>will</i> +in a certain modification. The subject appears +as individual through its identity with the +body, and this body is given to it in two different +ways: on one side as object among objects, and +subjected to their laws; on the other side as the +will immediately known to each. The act of +will and the movement of the body are not two +different states related as cause and effect; for +the relation of cause and effect belongs only to +the object, the phenomenon, the presentation. +They are one and the same act given in different +manners: the will, immediately to the subject; +the movement, in sensible intuition for understanding. +The action of the body is the objectified +act of will. Called at first the immediate +object of presentation, the body may +now, from the other side, be called 'the objectivity +of the will.'</p> + +<p>Thus, as was said, the 'law of motivation' +discloses the inner nature of causality. In<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> +causality in general we know only relations of +phenomena; but in the case of our own body we +know something else that those relations express; +namely, the act of will determined by motives. +Now there are in the world as presentation other +systems like that which we call our body. Unless +all these are to be supposed mere phantoms without +inner reality, we must infer by analogy, in +correspondence with like phenomena, other individual +wills similar to that which we know in ourselves. +This inference from analogy, universally +admitted in the case of human and animal bodies, +must be extended to the whole corporeal world. +The failure to take this step is where the purely +intellectual forms of idealism have come short. +Kant's 'thing-in-itself,' which is not subject to +the forms by which presentations become experience, +but which experience and its forms indicate +as the reality, has been wrongly condemned by +his successors as alien to idealism. It is true +that Kant did in some respects fail to maintain +the idealistic position with the clearness of +Berkeley; but his shortcoming was not in affirming +a thing-in-itself beyond phenomena. Here, +in Schopenhauer's view, is the metaphysical +problem that he left a place for but did not solve. +The word of the riddle has now been pronounced.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> +Beyond presentation, that is, in itself and according +to its innermost essence, the world is that +which we find in ourselves immediately as will. +By this it is not meant that a falling stone, for +example, acts from a motive; knowledge and the +consequent action from motives belongs only to +the determinate form that the will has in animals +and men; but the reality in the stone also is the +same in essence as that to which we apply the +name of will in ourselves. He who possesses this +key to the knowledge of nature's innermost +being will interpret the forces of vegetation, of +crystallisation, of magnetism, of chemical affinity, +even of weight itself, as different only in phenomenal +manifestation but in essence the same; +namely, that which is better known to each than +all else, and where it emerges most clearly is +called will. Only the will is thing-in-itself. It is +wholly different from presentation, and is that of +which presentation is the phenomenon, the visibility, +the objectivity. Differences affect only the +degree of the appearing, not the essence of that +which appears.</p> + +<p>While the reality everywhere present is not +will as specifically known in man, the mode +of indicating its essence by reference to this, +Schopenhauer contends, is a gain in insight. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> +thing-in-itself ought to receive its name from +that among all its manifestations which is the +clearest, the most perfect, the most immediately +illumined by knowledge; and this is man's will. +When we say that every force in nature is to be +thought of as Will, we are subsuming an unknown +under a known. For the conception of Force is +abstracted from the realm of cause and effect, +and indicates the limit of scientific explanation. +Having arrived at the forces of nature on the one +side and the forms of the subject on the other, +science can go no further. The conception of +Will can make known that which was so far concealed, +because it proceeds from the most intimate +consciousness that each has of himself, where the +knower and the known coincide.</p> + +<p>By this consciousness, in which subject and +object are not yet set apart, we reach something +universal. In itself the Will is not individualised, +but exists whole and undivided in every single +thing in nature, as the Subject of contemplation +exists whole and undivided in each cognitive +being. It is entirely free from all forms of the +phenomenon. What makes plurality possible is +subjection to the forms of time and space, by +which only the phenomenon is affected. Time +and space may therefore be called, in scholastic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> +terminology, the 'principle of individuation.' +While each of its phenomena is subject to the +law of sufficient reason, which is the law of +appearance in these forms, there is for the Will as +thing-in-itself no rational ground: it is 'grundlos.' +It is free from all plurality, although its phenomena +in space and time are innumerable. It is +one, not with the unity of an object or of a concept, +but as that which lies outside of space and +time, beyond the <i>principium individuationis</i>, +that is, the possibility of plurality. The individual, +the person, is not will as thing-in-itself, +but phenomenon of the will, and as such determined. +The will is 'free' because there is +nothing beyond itself to determine it. Further, +it is in itself mere activity without end, a blind +striving. Knowledge appears only as the accompaniment +of its ascending stages.</p> + +<p>Here we have arrived at the thought which, in +its various expressions, constitutes Schopenhauer's +metaphysics. That this cannot be scientifically +deduced he admits; but he regards it as +furnishing such explanation as is possible of +science itself. For science there is in everything +an inexplicable element to which it runs back, +and which is real, not merely phenomenal. From +this reality we are most remote in pure mathe<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>matics +and in the pure <i>a priori</i> science of nature +as it was formulated by Kant. These owe their +transparent clearness precisely to their absence of +real content, or to the slightness of this. The +attempt to reduce organic life to chemistry, this +again to mechanism, and at last everything to +arithmetic, could it succeed, would leave mere +form behind, from which all the content of phenomena +would have vanished. And the form would +in the end be form of the subject. But the enterprise +is vain. 'For in everything in nature there +is something of which no ground can ever be +given, of which no explanation is possible, no +cause further is to be sought.' What for man is +his inexplicable character, presupposed in every +explanation of his deeds from motives, that for +every inorganic body is its inexplicable quality, +the manner of its acting.</p> + +<p>The basis of this too is will, and 'groundless,' +inexplicable will; but evidently the conception +here is not identical with that of the Will that is +one and all. How do we pass from the universal +to that which has a particular character or +quality? For of the Will as thing-in-itself we are +told that there is not a greater portion in a man +and a less in a stone. The relation of part and +whole belongs exclusively to space. The more<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> +and less touches only the phenomenon, that is, +the visibility, the objectivation. A higher degree +of this is in the plant than in the stone, in the +animal than in the plant, and so forth; but the +Will that is the essence of all is untouched by +degree, as it is beyond plurality, space and time, +and the relation of cause and effect.</p> + +<p>The answer to the question here raised is given +in Schopenhauer's interpretation of the Platonic +Ideas. These he regards as stages of objectivation +of the Will. They are, as Plato called them, +eternal forms related to particular things as +models. The lowest stage of objectivation of the +Will is represented by the forces of inorganic +nature. Some of these, such as weight and impenetrability, +appear in all matter. Some are +divided among its different kinds, as rigidity, +fluidity, elasticity, electricity, magnetism, chemical +properties. They are not subject to the +relation of cause and effect, but are presupposed +by it. A force is neither cause of an effect nor +effect of a cause. Philosophically, it is immediate +objectivity of the will; in ćtiology, <i>qualitas +occulta</i>. At the lowest stages of objectivation, +there is no individuality. This does not appear +in inorganic things, nor even in merely organic +or vegetative life, but only as we ascend the scale<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> +of animals. Even in the higher animals the +specific enormously predominates over the individual +character. Only in man is the Idea +objectified in the individual character as such. +'The character of each individual man, so far as +it is thoroughly individual and not entirely comprehended +in that of the species, may be regarded +as a particular Idea, corresponding to a peculiar +act of objectivation of the Will.'</p> + +<p>Schopenhauer warns us against substituting +this philosophical explanation for scientific ćtiology. +The chain of causes and effects, he points +out, is not broken by the differences of the +original, irreducible forces. The ćtiology and +the philosophy of nature go side by side, regarding +the same object from different points of view. +Yet he also gives us in relation to his philosophy +much that is not unsuggestive scientifically. +His doctrine is not properly evolutionary, since +the Ideas are eternal; but he has guarded incidentally +against our supposing that all the +natural kinds that manifest the Ideas phenomenally +must be always represented in every world. +For our particular world, comprising the sun and +planets of the solar system, he sets forth in the +<i>Parerga</i> an account of the process by which it +develops from the nebula to man. This was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> +referred to in the preceding chapter. In his +fundamental work he describes a struggle, +present through the whole of nature, in which +the phenomenal manifestations of the higher +Ideas conquer and subjugate those of the lower, +though they leave them still existent and ever +striving to get loose. Here has been seen an +adumbration of natural selection: he himself +admits the difficulty he has in making it clear. +We must remember that it is pre-Darwinian.</p> + +<p>Knowledge or intelligence he seeks to explain +as an aid to the individual organism in its +struggle to subsist and to propagate its kind. It +first appears in animal life. It is represented by +the brain or a large ganglion, as every endeavour +of the Will in its self-objectivation is represented +by some organ; that is, displays itself for presentation +as such and such an appearance. +Superinduced along with this contrivance for +aid in the struggle, the world as presentation, +with all its forms, subject and object, time, space, +plurality and causality, is all at once there. +'Hitherto only will, it is now at the same time +presentation, object of the knowing subject.' +Then in man, as a higher power beyond merely +intuitive intelligence, appears reason as the power +of abstract conception. For the most part,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> +rational as well as intuitive knowledge, evolved +originally as a mere means to higher objectivation +of the Will, remains wholly in its service. +How, in exceptional cases, intellect emancipates +itself, will be discussed under the heads of +Ćsthetics and Ethics.</p> + +<p>That this view implies a teleology Schopenhauer +expressly recognises. Indeed he is a very +decided teleologist on lines of his own, and, in +physiology, takes sides strongly with 'vitalism' +as against pure mechanicism. True, the Will is +'endless' blind striving, and is essentially divided +against itself. Everywhere in nature there is +strife, and this takes the most horrible forms. +Yet somehow there is in each individual manifestation +of will a principle by which first the +organism with its vital processes, and then the +portion of it called the brain, in which is represented +the intellect with its <i>a priori</i> forms, are +evolved as aids in the strife. And, adapting all +the manifestations to one another, there is a +teleology of the universe. The whole world, with +all its phenomena, is the objectivity of the one +and indivisible Will; the Idea which is related +to all other Ideas as the harmony to the single +voices. The unity of the Will shows itself in the +unison of all its phenomena as related to one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> +another. Man, its clearest and completest objectivation, +is the summit of a pyramid, and could +not exist without this. Inorganic and organic +nature, then, were adapted to the future appearance +of man, as man is adapted to the development +that preceded him. But in thinking the +reality, time is to be abstracted from. The +earlier, we are obliged to say, is fitted to the +later, as the later is fitted to the earlier; but the +relation of means to end, under which we cannot +help figuring the adaptation, is only appearance +for our manner of knowledge. And the harmony +described does not get rid of the conflict inherent +in all will.</p> + +<p>In this account of Schopenhauer's metaphysical +doctrine, I have tried to make the exposition as +smooth as possible; but at two points the discontinuity +can scarcely be concealed. First, the +relation of the universal Will to the individual +will is not made clear; and, secondly, the emergence +of the world of presentation, with the +knowledge in which it culminates, is left unintelligible +because the will is conceived as mere +blind striving without an aim. As regards the +first point, disciples and expositors have been able +to show that, by means of distinctions in his later +writings, apparent contradictions are to some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> +extent cleared away; and, moreover, that he +came to recognise more reality in the individual +will. On the second point, I think it will be +necessary to admit that his system as such breaks +down. But both points must be considered in +their connection.</p> + +<p>One of the most noteworthy features of +Schopenhauer's philosophy is, as he himself +thought, the acceptance from first to last of Kant's +distinction between the 'empirical' and the 'intelligible' +character of the individual. Every act +of will of every human being follows with necessity +as phenomenon from its phenomenal causes; +so that all the events of each person's life are +determined in accordance with scientific law. +Nevertheless, the character empirically manifested +in the phenomenal world, while it is completely +necessitated, is the expression of something that +is free from necessitation. This 'intelligible +character' is out of time, and, itself undetermined, +manifests itself through that which develops in +time as a chain of necessary causes and effects. +That this doctrine had been taken up, without +any ambiguity as regards the determinism, by +Schelling as well as by himself, he expressly +acknowledges; and he finds it, as he also finds +modern idealism, anticipated in various passages<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +by the Neo-Platonists. His adaptation of it to +his doctrine of the Ideas is distinctly Neo-Platonic +in so far as he recognises 'Ideas of individuals'; +but of course to make Will the essence belongs to +his own system. 'The intelligible character,' he +says, 'coincides with the Idea, or, yet more precisely, +with the original act of will that manifests +itself in it: in so far, not only is the empirical +character of each man, but also of each animal +species, nay, of each plant species, and even of +each original force of inorganic nature, to be regarded +as phenomenon of an intelligible character, +that is, of an indivisible act of will out of time.' +This is what he called the '<i>aseitas</i>' of the will; +borrowing a scholastic term to indicate its derivation +(if we may speak of it as derived) from +itself (<i>a se</i>), and not from a supposed creative act. +Only if we adopt this view are we entitled to +regard actions as worthy of moral approval or +disapproval. They are such not because they are +not necessitated, but because they necessarily +show forth the nature of an essence the freedom +of which consists in being what it is. Yet he +could not but find a difficulty in reconciling this +with his position that the one universal Will is +identical in all things, and in each is 'individuated' +only by space and time. For the Ideas, like the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> +thing-in-itself, are eternal, that is, outside of time +as well as space; and all the things now enumerated, +forces of nature, plant and animal species, +and individual characters of men, are declared to +be in themselves Ideas.</p> + +<p>He in part meets this difficulty by the subtlety +that time and space do not, strictly speaking, +determine individuality, but arise along with it. +The diremption of individualities becomes explicit +in those forms. Yet he must have perceived that +this is not a complete answer, and various modifications +can be seen going on. His first view +clearly was that the individual is wholly impermanent, +and at death simply disappears; nothing +is left but the one Will and the universal Subject +of contemplation identical in all. Metempsychosis +is the best mythological rendering of what happens, +but it is no more. Later, he puts forward the not +very clearly defined theory of a 'palingenesia' by +which a particular will, but not the intellect that +formerly accompanied it, may reappear in the +phenomenal world. And the hospitality he +showed to stories of magic, clairvoyance, and +ghost-seeing, is scarcely compatible with the view +that the individual will is no more than a +phenomenal differentiation of the universal will. +A speculation (not put forward as anything more)<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> +on the appearance of a special providence in the +destiny of the individual, points, as Professor +Volkelt has noted, to the idea of a guidance, not +from without, but by a kind of good daemon or +genius that is the ultimate reality of the person. +On all this we must not lay too much stress; but +there is certainly one passage that can only be +described as a definite concession that the individual +is real in a sense not at first allowed. +Individuality, it is said in so many words +(<i>Parerga</i>, ii. § 117), does not rest only on the +'principle of individuation' (time and space), and +is therefore not through and through phenomenon, +but is rooted in the thing-in-itself. 'How deep +its roots go belongs to the questions which I do +not undertake to answer.'<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<p>This tends to modify considerably, but does not +overthrow, Schopenhauer's original system. In +very general terms, he is in the number of the +'pantheistic' thinkers; and it is remarkable, on +examination, how these, in Europe at least, have +nearly always recognised in the end some permanent +reality in the individual. This is contrary +to first impressions: but the great names +may be cited of Plotinus, John Scotus Erigena, +Giordano Bruno, Spinoza (in Part v. of the <i>Ethics</i>),<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> +and finally of Schopenhauer's special aversion, +Hegel, who has been supposed most unfavourable +of all to any recognition of individuality as real. +It is more true, Hegel maintains, that the individuality +determines its world than that it is +determined by it; and there is no explanation +why the determination should be such and such +except that the individuality was already what it +is.<a name="FNanchor_1_2" id="FNanchor_1_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> And, if Schopenhauer's more imaginative +speculations seek countenance from the side of +empiricism, there is nothing in them quite so +audacious as a speculation of J. S. Mill on disembodied +mind, thrown out during the time when +he was writing his <i>Logic</i>.<a name="FNanchor_2_3" id="FNanchor_2_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p> + +<p>The association with pantheism Schopenhauer +accepts in principle, though the name is not congenial +to him. In his system the Will is one and +all, like the 'Deus' of Spinoza. The difference is +that, instead of ascribing perfection to the universe +that is its manifestation, he regards the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> +production of a world as a lapse from which +redemption is to be sought. His doctrine has +been rightly described, in common with the predominant +philosophical doctrines of his period, +as a resultant of the deepened subjective analysis +brought by Kant into modern philosophy on the +one side, and of the return to Spinoza in the +quest for unity of principle on the other. Why, +then, it may be asked, are Fichte, Schelling, and +Hegel the constant objects of his attack? The +true explanation is not the merely external one, +that they were his successful rivals for public +favour, but is to be found in a real antithesis of +thought. Within the limits of the idealism they +all hold in common, Schopenhauer is at the +opposite pole. In spite of his attempt to incorporate +the Platonic Ideas, and in spite of his +following of Kant, whose 'intelligible world' was +in essence Platonic or neo-Platonic, he could find +no place in his system for a rational order at the +summit. Now this order was precisely what +Fichte and Hegel aimed at demonstrating. If +Schopenhauer is less unsympathetic in his +references to Schelling, that is because Schelling's +world-soul appeared to him to prefigure his own +attempt to discover in nature the manifestation +of a blindly striving will or feeling rather than<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> +reason. Suspicious as he shows himself of +possible plagiarisms by others, the charge cannot +be retorted against himself. The supreme principle +of Fichte, it has been pointed out, has an +actively volitional character and was formulated +before Schopenhauer's: but then it is essentially +rational. For Hegel, what is supreme is the +world-reason. Hence they are at one with Plato +in holding that in some sense 'mind is king.' +For Schopenhauer, on the contrary, mind, or +pure intellect, is an emancipated slave. Having +reached its highest point, and seen through the +work of the will, it does not turn back and +organise it, but abolishes it as far as its insight +extends.</p> + +<p>Yet to say merely this is to give a wrong impression +of Schopenhauer. Starting though he +does with blind will, and ending with the flight +of the ascetic from the suffering inherent in the +world that is the manifestation of such a will, he +nevertheless, in the intermediate stages, makes +the world a cosmos and not a chaos. And the +Platonists on their side have to admit that 'the +world of all of us' does not present itself on the +surface as a manifestation of pure reason, and +that it is a serious task to 'rationalise' it. Where +he completely fails is where the Platonic systems<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> +also fail, though from the opposite starting-point. +His attempt to derive presentation, intellect, +knowledge, from blind striving, is undoubtedly +a failure. But so also is the attempt of the +Platonising thinkers to deduce a world of mixture +from a principle of pure reason without aid from +anything else empirically assumed. Not that in +either case there is failure to give explanations +in detail; but in both cases much is taken from +experience without reduction to the principles of +the system. What we may say by way of comparison +is this: that if Schopenhauer had in so +many words recognised an immanent Reason as +well as Will in the reality of the universe, he +would have formally renounced his pessimism; +while it cannot be said that on the other side a +more explicit empiricism in the account of the +self-manifestation of Reason would necessarily +destroy the optimism.</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2> + +<h3>ĆSTHETICS</h3> + + +<p>A portion of Schopenhauer's system by which +its pessimism is considerably mitigated is his +theory of the Beautiful and of Fine Art. The +characteristic of ćsthetic contemplation is, he +finds, that intellect throws off the yoke and +subsists purely for itself as clear mirror of the +world, free from all subjection to practical purposes +of the will. In this state of freedom, +temporary painlessness is attained.</p> + +<p>The theory starts from his adaptation of the +Platonic Ideas. Regarded purely as an ćsthetic +theory, it departs from Plato, as he notes; for, +with the later Platonists, who took up the defence +of poetic myths and of the imitative arts as +against their master, he holds that Art penetrates +to the general Idea through the particular, and +hence that the work of art is no mere 'copy of a +copy.' The difference of the Idea from the +Concept is that it is not merely abstract and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> +general, but combines with generality the characters +of an intuition.</p> + +<p>The Ideas, as we have seen, constitute the +determinate stages of objectivation of the Will. +The innumerable individuals of which the Ideas +are the patterns are subject to the law of sufficient +reason. They appear, that is to say, under the +forms of time, space, and causality. The Idea is +beyond these forms, and therefore is clear of +plurality and change. Since the law of sufficient +reason is the common form under which stands +all the subject's knowledge so far as the subject +knows as individual, the Ideas lie outside the +sphere of knowledge of the individual as such. +If, therefore, the Ideas are to be the object of +knowledge, this can only be by annulling individuality +in the knowing subject.</p> + +<p>As thing-in-itself, the Will is exempt even +from the first of the forms of knowledge, the form +of being 'object for a subject.' The Platonic +Idea, on the other hand, is necessarily an object, +something known, a presentation. It has laid +aside, or rather has not taken on, the subordinate +forms; but it has retained the first and most +general form. It is the immediate and most +adequate possible objectivity of the Will; whereas +particular things are an objectivation troubled by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> +the forms of which the law of sufficient reason is +the common expression.</p> + +<p>When intellect breaks loose from the service of +the will, for which it was originally destined in +the teleology of nature, then the subject ceases +to be merely individual and becomes pure will-less +subject of knowledge. In this state the beholder +no longer tracks out relations in accordance with +the principle of sufficient reason—which is the +mode of scientific as well as of common knowledge—but +rests in fixed contemplation of the given +object apart from its connection with anything +else. The contemplator thus 'lost' in the object, +it is not the single thing as such that is known, +but the Idea, the eternal form, the immediate +objectivity of the Will at this stage. The correlate +of this object—the pure Subject exempt from the +principle of sufficient reason—is eternal, like the +Idea.</p> + +<p>The objectivation of the Will appears faintly in +inorganic things,—clouds, water, crystals,—more +fully in the plant, yet more fully in the animal, +most completely in man. Only the essential in +these stages of objectivation constitutes the Idea. +Its development into manifold phenomena under +the forms of the principle of sufficient reason, is +unessential, lies merely in the mode of knowledge<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> +for the individual, and has reality only for this. +It is not otherwise with the unfolding of that +Idea which is the completest objectivation of the +Will. To the Idea of Man, the occurrences of +human history are as unessential as the shapes +they assume to the clouds, as the figures of its +whirlpools and foam-drift to the stream, as its +frost-flowers to the ice. The same underlying +passions and dispositions everlastingly recur in +the same modes. It is idle to suppose that anything +is gained. But also nothing is lost: so the +Earth-spirit might reply to one who complained +of high endeavours frustrated, faculties wasted, +promises of world-enlightenment brought to +nought; for there is infinite time to dispose of, +and all possibilities are for ever renewed.</p> + +<p>The kind of knowledge for which the Ideas are +the object of contemplation finds its expression +in Art, the work of genius. Art repeats in its +various media the Ideas grasped by pure contemplation. +Its only end is the communication of +these. While Science, following the stream of +events according to their determinate relations, +never reaches an ultimate end, Art is always at +the end. 'It stops the wheel of time; relations +vanish for it: only the essence, the Idea, is its +object.' The characteristic of genius is a pre<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>dominant +capacity for thus contemplating things +independently of the principle of sufficient reason. +Since this requires a forgetting of one's own +person and the relations between it and things, +the attitude of genius is simply the completest +'objectivity.' The 'subjectivity' opposed to this, +in Schopenhauer's phraseology, is preoccupation +with the interests of one's own will. It is, he +says, as if there fell to the share of genius a +measure of intelligence far beyond the needs of +the individual will: and this makes possible the +setting aside of individual interests, the stripping +off of the particular personality, so that the subject +becomes 'pure knowing subject,' 'clear world-eye,' +in a manner sufficiently sustained for that which +has been grasped to be repeated in the work of +art. A necessary element in genius is therefore +Imagination. For without imagination to represent, +in a shape not merely abstract, things that +have not come within personal experience, genius +would remain limited to immediate intuition, and +could not make its vision apprehensible by others. +Nor without imagination could the particular +things that express the Idea be cleared of the +imperfections by which their limited expression +of it falls short of what nature was aiming at +in their production. 'Inspiration' is ascribed to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> +genius because its characteristic attitude is intermittent. +The man of genius cannot always remain +on a height, but has to fall back to the +level of the common man, who can scarcely at all +regard things except as they affect his interests,—have +a relation to his will, direct or indirect.</p> + +<p>This is the statement in its first outline of a +theory that became one of Schopenhauer's most +fruitful topics. Many are the pages he has devoted +to the contrast between the man of genius +and 'the wholesale ware of nature, which she +turns out daily by thousands.' The genius is for +him primarily the artist. Scientific genius as a +distinctive thing he does not fully recognise; and +he regards men of action, and especially statesmen, +rather as men of highly competent ability +endowed with an exceptionally good physical +constitution than as men of genius in the proper +sense. Philosophers like himself, who, as he +frankly says, appear about once in a hundred +years, he classes in the end with the artists; +though this was left somewhat indeterminate in +his first exposition. The weakness of the man of +genius in dealing with the ordinary circumstances +of life he allows, and even insists on. Genius, +grasping the Idea in its perfection, fails to understand +individuals. A poet may know man pro<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>foundly, +and men very ill. He admits the +proximity of genius to madness on one side, and +explains it in this way. What marks the stage +of actual madness, as distinguished from illusion +or hallucination, is complete disruption of the +memory of past life, of the history of the personality +as something continuous; so that the particular +thing is viewed by itself, out of relation. This +gives a kind of resemblance to the attitude of +genius, for which present intuition excludes from +view the relations of things to each other. Or, as +we may perhaps sum up his thought in its most +general form, 'alienation' or dissolution of personality +has the resemblance often noted between +extremes to the impersonality, or, as he calls it, +'objectivity,' that is super-personal.</p> + +<p>In spite of his contempt for the crowd, he has +to admit, of course, that the capacity of genius +to recognise the Ideas of things and to become +momentarily impersonal must in some measure +belong to all men; otherwise, they could not even +enjoy a work of art when produced. Genius has +the advantage only in the much higher degree +and the greater prolongation of the insight. +Since, then, the actual achievement of the artist +is to make us look into the world through his +eyes, the feelings for the beautiful and the sublime<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> +may be treated irrespectively of the question +whether they are aroused by nature and human +life directly or by means of art.</p> + +<p>Ćsthetic pleasure in contemplation of the +beautiful proceeds partly from recognition of the +individual object not as one particular thing but +as Platonic Idea, that is, as the enduring form of +this whole kind of things; partly from the consciousness +the knower has of himself not as +individual, but as pure, will-less Subject of Knowledge. +All volition springs out of need, therefore +out of want, therefore out of suffering. No attained +object of will can give permanent satisfaction. +Thus, there can be no durable happiness +or rest for us as long as we are subjects of will. +'The Subject of Will lies continually on the turning +wheel of Ixion, draws ever in the sieve of +the Danaides, is the eternally thirsting Tantalus. +But in the moment of pure objective contemplation, +free from all interest of the particular +subjectivity, we enter a painless state: the wheel +of Ixion stands still. The Flemish painters +produce this ćsthetic effect by the sense of +disinterested contemplation conveyed in their +treatment of insignificant objects. There are +certain natural scenes that have power in themselves, +apart from artistic treatment, to put us in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> +this state; but the slightest obtrusion of individual +interest destroys the magic. Past and distant +objects, through their apparent detachment, have +the same power. The essential thing ćsthetically, +whether we contemplate the present or the past, +the near or the distant, is that only the world +of presentation remains; the world as will has +vanished.</p> + +<p>The difference between the feelings of the +Beautiful and of the Sublime is this. In the feeling +of the beautiful, pure intelligence gains the +victory without a struggle, leaving in consciousness +only the pure subject of knowledge, so that +no reminiscence of the will remains. In the feeling +of the sublime, on the other hand, the state +of pure intelligence has to be won by a conscious +breaking loose from relations in the object that +suggest something threatening to the will; though +there must not be actual danger; for in that case +the individual will itself would come into play, +and ćsthetic detachment would cease. Elevation +above the sense of terror has not only to be consciously +won but consciously maintained, and +involves a continuous reminiscence, not indeed of +any individual will, but of the will of man in +general, so far as it is expressed through its objectivity, +the human body, confronted by forces<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> +hostile to it. Pre-eminently this feeling arises +from contrast between the immensities of space +and time and the apparent insignificance of man. +It means in the last resort that the beholder is +upheld by the consciousness that as pure subject +of knowledge (not as individual subject) he himself +bears within him all the worlds and all the +ages, and is eternal as the forces that vainly seem +to threaten him with annihilation.</p> + +<p>On the objective side, and apart from the subjective +distinction just set forth, the sublime and +the beautiful are not essentially different. In +both cases alike, the object of ćsthetic contemplation +is not the single thing, but the Idea that +is striving towards manifestation in it. Whatever +is viewed ćsthetically is viewed out of relation to +time and space: 'along with the law of sufficient +reason the single thing and the knowing individual +are taken away, and nothing remains over +but the Idea and the pure Subject of Knowledge, +which together make up the adequate objectivity +of the Will at this stage.' There is thus a sense +in which everything is beautiful; since the Will +appears in everything at some stage of objectivity, +and this means that it is the expression of some +Idea. But one thing can be more beautiful than +another by facilitating ćsthetic contemplation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> +This facilitation proceeds either from the greater +clearness and perfection with which the particular +thing shows forth the Idea of its kind, or from the +higher stage of objectivation to which that Idea +corresponds. Man being the highest stage of +objectivation of the Will, the revelation of his +essence is the highest aim of art. In ćsthetic +contemplation of inorganic nature and vegetative +life, whether in the reality or through the medium +of art, and in appreciation of architecture, the subjective +aspect, that is to say, the enjoyment of pure +will-less knowledge, is predominant; the Ideas +themselves being here lower stages of objectivity. +On the other hand, when animals and men are +the object of ćsthetic contemplation or representation, +the enjoyment consists more in the objective +apprehension of those Ideas in which the essence +of the Will is most clearly and fully manifested.</p> + +<p>Of all Schopenhauer's work, its ćsthetic part +has met with the most general appreciation. +Here especially he abounds in observations drawn +directly, in his own phrase, from intuition. To +make a selection of these, however, is not appropriate +to a brief sketch like the present. I pass +on, therefore, to those portions of his theory of +Art by which he makes the transition, in terms of +his system, to Morality.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> + +<p>From Architecture onward the arts are obliged +to represent the Will as divided. Here, at the +first stage, its division subsists only in a conflict +of inorganic forces which have to be brought to +equilibrium. The conflict between weight and +rigidity is in truth the only ćsthetic material of +architecture as a fine art. When we come to +animal and lastly to human life, which, in the +Plastic Arts and in Poetry, as form, individualised +expression, and action, is the highest object of +ćsthetic representation, the vehemence of divided +will is fully revealed; and here too is revealed +the essential identity of every will with our own. +In the words of the Indian wisdom, 'Tat twam +asi'; 'that thou art.' Under the head of Ethics +it will be shown expressly that by this insight, +when it reacts on the will, the will can deny itself. +For the temporary release from its striving, given +in ćsthetic contemplation, is then substituted +permanent release. To this 'resignation,' the +innermost essence of all virtue and holiness, and +the final redemption from the world, Art itself, at +its highest stages, points the way.</p> + +<p>The summits of pictorial and poetic art Schopenhauer +finds in the great Italian painters so far as +they represent the ethical spirit of Christianity, +and in the tragic poets, ancient and modern. It<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> +is true that the poverty of their sacred history or +mythology puts the Christian artists at a disadvantage; +but events are merely the accidents of +their art. Not in these, as related according to +the law of sufficient reason, is the essence, but in +the spirit we divine through the forms portrayed. +In their representation of men full of that spirit, +and especially in the eyes, we see mirrored the +knowledge that has seized the whole essence of +the world and of life, and that has reacted on +the will, not so as to give it motives, but as a +'quietive'; whence proceeds complete resignation, +and with it the annulling of the will and of the +whole essence of this world. Of tragedy, the +subject-matter is the conflict of the will with +itself at its highest stage of objectivity. Here +also the end is the resignation brought on by +complete knowledge of the essence of the world. +The hero, on whom at last this knowledge has +acted as a quietive, gives up, not merely life, but +the whole will to live. 'The true meaning of +tragedy is the deeper insight, that what the hero +expiates is not his particular sins, but original sin, +that is, the guilt of existence itself.' To illustrate +this position Schopenhauer is fond of quoting a +passage from Calderon which declares that the +greatest sin of man is to have been born.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></p> + +<p>It seems strange that, after deriding as he does +the popular notion of 'poetic justice' so detached +a thinker should imagine an at least equally one-sided +view to receive its final confirmation from +the Spanish dramatist's poetic phrasing of a +Christian dogma. The great tragic poets, for +Schopenhauer also, are Ćschylus, Sophocles and +Shakespeare. Now it is safe to say that by none +of these was any such general doctrine held either +in conceptual or in intuitive form. The whole +effect of any kind of art, of course he would +admit, cannot be packed into a formula; but if +we seek one as an aid to understanding, some +adaptation of his own theory of the sublime would +probably serve much better as applied to tragedy +than his direct theory of the drama. In the case +of pictorial art, all that is proved by what he says +about the representation of ascetic saintliness, is +that this, like many other things, can be so +brought within the scope of art as to make us +momentarily identify ourselves with its Idea in +the impersonal manner he has himself described. +His purely ćsthetic theory is quite adequate to +the case, without any assumption that this is the +representation of what is best. Art, pictorial or +poetic, can no more prove pessimism than optimism. +We pick out expressions of one or the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> +other for quotation according to our moods or +subjective preferences; but, if we have the feeling +for art itself, our sense of actual ćsthetic value +ought to be independent of these.</p> + +<p>Schopenhauer's ćsthetic theory, however, does +not end here. There follows the part of it by +which he has had an influence on artists themselves. +For him, a position separate from all the +other arts is held by music. While the rest +objectify the Will mediately, that is to say, by +means of the Ideas, Music is as immediate an +objectivation of the whole Will as the world itself, +or as the Ideas, of which the pluralised phenomenon +constitutes the sum of particular things. +The other arts speak of the shadow, music of the +substance. There is indeed a parallelism, an analogy, +between Music and the Ideas; yet Music +never expresses the phenomenon in which these are +manifested, but only the inner essence behind the +appearance, the Will itself. In a sense it renders +not feeling in its particularity, but feeling <i>in +abstracto</i>; joy, sorrow, not a joy, a sorrow. The +phenomenal world and music are to be regarded +as two different expressions of the same thing. +The world might be called embodied Music as +well as embodied Will. 'Melodies are to a certain +extent like general concepts, an abstract of reality.'<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> +A complete explanation of music, that is, a detailed +repetition of it in concepts, were this +possible, would be a complete explanation of the +world (since both express the same thing) and +therefore a true and final philosophy. As music +only reaches its perfection in the full harmony, +'so the one Will out of time finds its perfect objectivation +only in complete union of all the stages +which in innumerable degrees of heightened distinctness +reveal its essence.' But here, too, +Schopenhauer adds, the Will is felt, and can +be proved, to be a divided will; and the deliverance +wrought by this supreme art, as by all the others, +is only temporary.</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2> + +<h3>ETHICS</h3> + + +<p>Permanent redemption from the suffering of the +world is to be found only in the holiness of the +ascetic; but to this there are many stages, constituting +the generally accepted human virtues. +Of these Schopenhauer has a rational account +to give in terms of his philosophy; and if the +last stage does not seem to follow by logical +sequence from the others, this is only what is to +be expected; for it is reached, in his view, by a +sort of miracle. To the highest kind of intuitive +knowledge, from which the ascetic denial of the +will proceeds, artistic contemplation ought to +prepare the way; and so also, on his principles, +ought the practice of justice and goodness. Yet +he is obliged to admit that few thus reach the +goal. Of those that do reach it, the most arrive +through personal suffering, which may be deserved. +A true miracle is often worked in the repentant +criminal, by which final deliverance is achieved.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> +Though the 'intelligible character' is unalterable, +and the empirical character can only be the unfolding +of this, as every great dramatist intuitively +recognises, yet the 'convertites,' like Duke +Frederick in <i>As You Like It</i>, are not to be regarded +as hypocrites. The 'second voyage' to the harbour, +that of the disappointed egoist, on condition +of this miracle, brings the passenger to it as +surely as the first, that of the true saints, which is +only for the few. And in these equally a miraculous +conversion of the will has to be finally +worked.</p> + +<p>At the entrance to his distinctive theory of +ethics, Schopenhauer places a restatement of his +metaphysics as the possible basis of a mode of +contemplating life which, he admits, has some +community with an optimistic pantheism. The +Will, through the presentation and the accompanying +intelligence developed in its service, +becomes conscious that that which it wills is precisely +the world, life as it is. To call it 'the will +to live' is therefore a pleonasm. 'Will' and 'will +to live' are equivalent. For this will, life is everlastingly +a certainty. 'Neither the will, the thing-in-itself +in all phenomena, nor the subject of +knowledge, the spectator of all phenomena, is ever +touched by birth and death.' It is true that the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> +individual appears and disappears; but individuality +is illusory. Past and future exist only in +conceptual thought. 'The form of life is a present +without end, howsoever the individuals, phenomena +of the Idea, come into existence and vanish +in time, like fugitive dreams.' Only as phenomenon +is each man different from the other +things of the world: as thing-in-itself he is the +Will, which appears in all, and death takes away +the illusion that divides his consciousness from +the rest. 'Death is a sleep in which the individuality +is forgotten: everything else wakes again, +or rather has remained awake.' It is, in the expression +adopted by Schopenhauer later, an +awakening from the dream of life: though this +bears with it somewhat different implications; +and, as has been said, his theory of individuality +became modified.</p> + +<p>With the doctrine of the eternal life of the +Will are connected Schopenhauer's theories, developed +later, of the immortality of the species +and of individualised sexual love. The latter is +by itself a remarkable achievement, and constitutes +the one distinctly new development +brought to completion in his later years; for the +modifications in his theory of individuality are +only tentative. His theory of love has a deter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>minate +conclusion, of great value for science, and +not really compatible, it seems to me, with his +pessimism. In its relation to ethics, on which he +insisted, it is rightly placed in the position it +occupies, between the generalised statement of +his metaphysics just now set forth on the one +side, and his theory of human virtue on the +other.</p> + +<p>The teleology that manifests itself in individualised +love is, in his view, not related in reality to +the interests of the individual life, but to those of +the species. That this is immortal follows from +the eternity of the Idea it unfolds.<a name="FNanchor_1_4" id="FNanchor_1_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> The end +sought is aimed at unconsciously by the person. +Fundamentally, for Schopenhauer, teleology must +of course be unconscious, since the will is blind, +and will, not intelligence, is primordial. Its +typical case is the instinct of animals; but the +'instinctive' character belongs also to the accomplishment +of the highest aims, as in art and +virtue. What characterises individualised love +internally is the aim, attributed to 'nature' or +'the species,' at a certain typical beauty or per<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>fection +of the offspring. The lover is therefore +deluded in thinking that he is seeking his own +happiness. What looks through the eyes of +lovers is the genius of the race, meditating on the +composition of the next generation. It may, in the +complexity of circumstances, be thwarted. When +it reaches its end, often personal happiness is +sacrificed. Marriages dictated by interest tend +to be happier than love-matches. Yet, though +the sacrifice of the individual to the race is involuntary +in these, egoism is after all overcome; +hence they are quite rightly the object of a +certain admiration and sympathy, while the +prudential ones are looked upon with a tinge of +contempt. For here too that element appears +which alone gives nobility to the life either of +intellect or of art or of moral virtue, namely, the +rising above a subjective interest of the individual +will.</p> + +<p>No doubt there are touches of pessimism in +this statement; but the general theory does not +seem reconcilable finally with pessimism as +Schopenhauer understands it. For it is a definitely +stated position of his that nature keeps up the +process of the world by yielding just enough to +prevent discontinuance of the striving for an +illusory end. Yet he admits here in the result<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> +something beyond bare continuance of life; for +this is already secured without the particular +modification of feeling described. What the feeling +is brought in to secure is a better realisation +of the type in actual individuals; and such realisation +is certainly more than bare subsistence +with the least possible expenditure of nature's +resources.</p> + +<p>As the immediate preliminary to his ethics +proper, Schopenhauer restates his doctrine on the +intelligible and the empirical character in man, +and lays down a generalised psychological position +regarding the suffering inherent in life. +Everything as phenomenon, we have seen already, +is determined because it is subject to the law of +sufficient reason. On the other hand, everything +as thing-in-itself is free; for 'freedom' means +only non-subjection to that law. The intelligible +character of each man is an indivisible, unalterable +act of will out of time; the developed and +explicit phenomenon of this in time and space is +the empirical character. Man is his own work, +not in the light of knowledge, but before all +knowledge; this is secondary and an instrument. +Ultimately, freedom is a mystery, and takes us +beyond even will as the name for the thing-in-itself. +In reality, that which is 'will to live' need<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> +not have been such (though we cannot see how +this is so), but has become such from itself and +from nothing else. This is its '<i>aseitas</i>.' Hence +it is in its power to deny itself as will to live. +When it does this, the redemption (like the fall) +comes from itself. This denial does not mean +annihilation, except relatively to all that we know +under the forms of our understanding. For the +will, though the nearest we can get to the thing-in-itself, +is in truth a partially phenomenalised +expression of this. As the will to live expresses +itself phenomenally, so also does the denial of the +will to live, when this, by special 'grace,' is +achieved. Only in man does the freedom thus +attained find phenomenal expression. That man +can attain to it proves that in him the will has +reached its highest possible stage of objectivation; +for, after it has turned back and denied itself, +there is evidently nothing more that we can call +existence, that is to say, phenomenal existence, +beyond. What there is beyond in the truth of +being is something that the mystics know—or +rather, possess, for it is beyond knowledge—but +cannot communicate.</p> + +<p>The psychological reason that can be assigned +for the ascetic flight from the world is that all +pleasure, happiness, satisfaction, is merely nega<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>tive. +The will is a striving that has no ultimate +aim. It is sustained only by hindrances. Hindrance +means suffering; and every satisfaction +attained is only temporary, a mere liberation from +need, want, pain, which is positive. Suffering +increases with the degree of consciousness. The +life of civilised man is an alternation between +pain and <i>ennui</i>, which can itself become as intolerable +a suffering as anything. The problem +of moral philosophy, then, is ultimately how +redemption from such a world is to be attained, +but only so far as this is a matter of conceptual +knowledge. For philosophy, being from beginning +to end theoretical, cannot work the practical +miracle by which the will denies itself.</p> + +<p>The intuitive, as distinguished from merely +conceptual, knowledge by which the return is +made, consists essentially in a clear insight into +the identity of the suffering will in all things and +the necessity of its suffering as long as it is will +to live. This, then, is the true foundation of +morality. The universe as metaphysical thing-in-itself, +as noumenon, has an ethical meaning. All +its stages of objectivation, though in the process +what seems to be aimed at is preservation of the +will as manifested, have in truth for their ultimate +aim its redemption by suppression of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> +the phenomenal world in which it manifests +itself.</p> + +<p>Affirmation of the will is affirmation of the +body, which is the objectivity of the will. The +sexual impulse, since it affirms life beyond the +death of the individual, is the strongest of self-affirmations. +In it is found the meaning of the +mythical representation that has taken shape in +the theological dogma of original sin. For by this +affirmation going beyond the individual body, +suffering and death, as the necessary accompaniment +of the phenomenon of life, are reaffirmed, +and the possibility of redemption this time +declared fruitless. But through the whole process +there runs eternal justice. The justification of +suffering is that the will affirms itself; and the +self-affirmation is justified by payment of the +penalty.</p> + +<p>Before the final redemption—which is not for +the world but for the individual—there are many +stages of ethical progress. These consist in the +gradual overcoming of egoism by sympathy. And +here Schopenhauer proceeds to set forth a practical +scheme for the social life of man, differing from +ordinary utilitarianism only by reducing all sympathy +to pity, in accordance with his view that +there can be no such thing as positive happiness.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span></p> + +<p>He begins with a theory of justice, legal and +moral, very much on the lines of Hobbes, except +that he regards it as up to a certain point <i>a +priori</i>. Here he is consistent throughout. As +in his philosophical account of mathematics and +physics, so also in his aesthetics and ethics, he +retained, side by side with a strong empirical +tendency, belief in certain irreducible <i>a priori</i> +forms without which our knowledge cannot be +constituted. The pure ethical theory of justice, +he says, bears to the political theory the relation +of pure to applied mathematics. Injustice he +holds to be the positive conception. It means +the breaking into the sphere of another person's +will to live. The self-affirmation of the will that +appears in one individual body is extended to +denial of the will that appears in other bodies. +Justice consists in non-encroachment. There is +a 'natural right,' or 'moral right,' of resistance to +injustice by infliction of what, apart from the attempted +encroachment, would be wrong. Either +force or deception may be used; as either may be +the instrument of injustice. The purely ethical +doctrine of justice applies only to action; since +only the not doing of injustice depends on us. +With the State and its laws, the relation is reversed. +The object of these is to prevent the suffering of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> +injustice. The State is not directed against egoism, +but has sprung out of a rationalised collective +egoism. It has for its purpose only to avoid the +inconvenient consequences of individual aggressions +on others. Outside of the State, there is a +right of self-defence against injustice, but no right +of punishment. The punishment threatened by +the State is essentially a motive against committing +wrong, intended to supply the place of ethical +motives for those who are insufficiently accessible +to them. Actual infliction of it is the carrying +out of the threat when it has failed, so that in +general the expectation of the penalty may be +certain. Revenge, which has a view to the past, +cannot be justified ethically: punishment is +directed only to the future. There is no right +in any one to set himself up as a moral judge +and inflict pain; but man has a right to do what +is needful for social security. The criminal's acts +are of course necessitated; but he cannot justly +complain of being punished for them, since it is +ultimately from himself, from what he is, that +they sprang.</p> + +<p>With the doctrine of 'eternal justice,' touched +on above, we pass into a different region of +thought. What is responsible for the guilt in +the world is the Will by which everything exists,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> +and the suffering everlastingly falls where the +guilt is. Take the case of apparently unpunished +injustice (from the human point of view) expressing +itself in the extreme form of deliberate cruelty. +Through this also, eternal justice, from which +there is no escape, is fulfilled. 'The torturer and +the tortured are one. The former errs in thinking +he has no share in the torture; the latter in +thinking he has no share in the guilt.' For all +the pain of the world is the expiation of the sin +involved in the self-affirmation of will, and the +Will as thing-in-itself is one and the same in all.</p> + +<p>If this could satisfy any one, there would be no +need to go further. The whole being as it ought +to be, why try to rectify details that are absolutely +indifferent? But of course the implication is that +individuality is simply illusory; and this, as has +been said, was a position that Schopenhauer +neither could nor did consistently maintain. +Indeed, immediately after setting forth this theory +of 'eternal justice,' he goes on to a relative justification +of those acts of disinterested vengeance +by which a person knowingly sacrifices his own +life for the sake of retribution on some extraordinary +criminal. This, he says, is a form of +punishment, not mere revenge, although it involves +an error concerning the nature of eternal<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> +justice. Suicide involves a similar error, in so +far as it supposes that the real being of the individual +can be assailed through its phenomenal +manifestation. It is not a denial of the will to +live, but a strong affirmation of it, only not in the +given circumstances: different circumstances are +desired with such intensity that the present cannot +be borne. Therefore the individual manifestation +of the will is not suppressed. Yet, one might +reply, if individuality is an illusion attached to +the appearance in time and space of a particular +organism, it would seem that, with the disappearance +of this, all that distinguishes the +individual must disappear also.</p> + +<p>Schopenhauer had no will thus to escape from +life; nor did he afterwards devote himself to +expounding further his theory of eternal justice. +What he wrote later, either positively or as mere +speculation, implies both greater reality in the +individual and more of cosmic equity to correspond. +His next step, even at his first stage, is +to continue the exposition of a practicable ethics +for human life. His procedure consists in adding +beneficence to justice, with the proviso already +mentioned, which is required by his psychology, +that all beneficence can consist only in the relief +of pain. For Schopenhauer, as for Comte, what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> +is to be overcome is 'egoism,' an excessive degree +of which is the mark of the character we call +'bad.' The 'good' is what Comte and Spencer +call the 'altruistic' character. This difference +between characters Schopenhauer goes on to +explain in terms of his metaphysics. The egoist +is so deluded by the principle of individuation +that he supposes an absolute cleft between his +own person and all others. The remorse of +conscience from which he suffers proceeds in +part from an obscure perception that the principle +of individuation is illusory. Genuine virtue +springs out of the intuitive (not merely abstract) +knowledge that recognises in another individuality +the same essence as in one's own. The +characteristic of the good man is that he makes +less difference than is customary between himself +and others. Justice is an intermediate stage +between the encroaching egoism of the bad and +positive goodness. In the renunciation of rights +of property, and provision for all personal needs +without aid from others, practised by some +religious and philosophical ascetics, it is passing +over into something more. There is, however, +a certain misunderstanding involved in so interpreting +strict justice; for there are many ways +in which the rich and powerful can be positively<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> +beneficent. At the other extreme, when they +simply live on their inherited wealth, without +doing anything in return, their mode of life is +morally, though not legally, unjust. Rights of +property Schopenhauer derived from labour +spent on the things appropriated. The injustice, +in many ways, of the present social order he quite +recognises. If he has no sympathy with revolutions, +it is because he has no belief in the +realisation of an ideal state. This follows from +his view of history. Human life, it is his conviction, +never has been and never will be different +as a whole. Redemption from evil can be +attained only by the individual. All that the +State can do is to provide certain very general +conditions of security under which there will be +no hindrance to those who desire to live in +accordance with a moral ideal.</p> + +<p>Yet there are qualifications to make. Many +passages in Schopenhauer's writings prove his +firm belief in the future triumph of reason over +superstition. It is to the honour of humanity, +he says, that so detestable a form of evil +as organised religious persecution has appeared +only in one section of history. And, in his +own personal case, he has the most complete +confidence that the truths he has put forth<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +cannot fail sometime to gain a hearing. In all +cases, error is only temporary, and truth will +prevail. His language on this subject, and indeed +often on others, is indistinguishable from +that of an optimist.</p> + +<p>In the last resort, his pessimism entrenches +itself behind the psychological proposition that +every satisfaction is negative, being only the +removal of a pain. If this is unsustainable, there +is nothing finally in his Metaphysics of Will to +necessitate the pessimistic conclusion drawn. +The mode of deduction by which he proceeds is +to argue first to the position already noticed: +that all that love of others on which morality is +based is fundamentally pity. True benevolence +can only be the desire to relieve others' pain, +springing from the identification of this with +our own. For that reason, moral virtue must +finally pass over into asceticism—the denial of +the will to live. In others, if we are able to see +through the principle of individuation, we recognise +the same essence as in ourselves, and we +perceive that as long as this wills it must +necessarily suffer. The end then is to destroy the +will to live. This is to be done by <i>askesis</i>, self-mortification. +The first step is complete chastity. +If, says Schopenhauer, the highest phenomenon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> +of will, that is, man, were to disappear through +a general refusal to affirm life beyond the +individual body, man's weaker reflexion in the +animal world would disappear also, and the +consciousness of the whole would cease. Knowledge +being taken away, the rest would vanish +into nothingness, since there is 'no object without +subject.' That this will come to pass, however, +he certainly did not believe. He has no cosmogony, +like that of Hartmann, ending in a general +redemption of the universe by such a collective +act. Nor did he hold, like his later successor +Mainländer, that through the conflict and gradual +extinction of individualities, 'this great world +shall so wear out to nought.' The world for +him is without beginning and without end. But +the exceptional individual can redeem himself. +What he does when he has reached the height of +holiness is by voluntary poverty and all other +privations, inflicted for their own sake, to break +and kill the will, which he recognises as the +source of his own and of the world's suffering +existence. In his case not merely the phenomenon +ends at death, as with others, but the +being is taken away. To be a 'world-overcomer' +in this sense (as opposed to a 'world-conqueror') +is the essence of sanctity when cleared of all the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> +superstitious dogmas by which the saints try to +explain their mode of life to themselves.</p> + +<p>The absolutely pure expression of this truth is +to be found only in philosophy; but of the +religions Buddhism comes nearest to expressing +it without admixture. For the Buddhist saint +asks aid from no god. True Christianity, however,—the +Christianity of the New Testament +and of the Christian mystics,—agrees both with +Buddhism and with Brahmanism in ultimate aim. +What spoils it for Schopenhauer is the Judaic +element. This, on one side, infects it with the +optimism of the Biblical story of creation, in +which God 'saw everything that he had made, +and, behold, it was very good.' On the other +side, it contaminates the myth of original sin, +which bears in itself a profound philosophical +truth, by this same doctrine of a creative God; +from which follows all the injustice and irrationality +necessarily involved in the Augustinian +theology, and not to be expelled except with its +theism. Nevertheless, the story of the Fall of +Man, of which that theology, in its fundamentally +true part, is a reasoned expression, is the one +thing, Schopenhauer avows, that reconciles him +to the Old Testament. The truth that it clothes +he finds also among the Greeks; Empedocles,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> +after the Orphics and Pythagoreans, having +taught that the soul had been doomed to wander +because of some antenatal sin. And the mysticism +that accompanies all these more or less pure expressions +of one metaphysical truth he finds represented +by the Sufis even in optimistic Islam; so +that he can claim for his philosophy a world-wide +consent.</p> + +<p>Religion, if we take this to include mysticism, +at once rises above philosophy and falls below it. +As 'metaphysics of the people,' it is a mythological +expression of philosophical truth: as +mysticism, it is a kind of 'epi-philosophy.' +Beyond pure philosophy Schopenhauer does not +profess to go; but he accepts what the mystics +say as the description of a positive experience +which becomes accessible when supreme insight +is attained intuitively. For the philosopher as +such, insight into that which is beyond the forms +of our knowledge and even beyond the will itself, +remains only conceptual; though it is within the +province of philosophy to mark out the place for +this. The 'something else' that is left when the +will has been denied, is indicated by the 'ecstasy,' +'illumination,' 'union with God,' spoken of by +the mystics. Paradoxically, some of the mystics +themselves even have identified it with 'nothing';<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> +but the result of the denial of the will to live is to +be called nothing only in relation to the world as +we know it. 'On the other hand, to those in +whom the will has turned back and denied itself, +this so very real world of ours with all its suns +and milky ways is—nothing.'</p> + +<p>In this terminus of his philosophy, Schopenhauer +recognised his kinship with Indian thought, +of which he was a lifelong student. To call his +doctrine a kind of Buddhism is, however, in some +ways a misapprehension. Undoubtedly he accepts +as his ideal the ethical attitude that he finds to +be common to Buddhism and the Christianity of +the New Testament; but metaphysical differences +mark him off from both. We have seen that he +rejects the extra-mundane God of Semitic derivation, +adopted by historical Christianity. Indeed +he is one of the most pronounced anti-Jehovists +of all literature. But equally his belief in a positive +metaphysical doctrine marks him off from +Buddhism, according to the account given of it by +its most recent students, who regard it either as +ultimately nihilistic or as having no metaphysics +at all, but only a psychology and ethics. Nor can +he be precisely identified with the Vedantists of +orthodox Hinduism. Their ultimate reality, if +we are to find an analogue for it in European<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> +metaphysics, seems to resemble the hypostasised +<i>ego</i> of Fichte, or the Kantian 'transcendental +unity of apperception', much more than it +resembles Schopenhauer's blindly striving will as +thing-in-itself. Even in practical ethics, he does +not follow the Indian systems at all closely. +Philosophical doctrines of justice are of course +purely European; and Schopenhauer himself +points out the sources of his own theory. In his +extension of ethics to animals, on which he lays +much stress, he cites the teachings of Eastern +non-Semitic religions as superior to the rest; but +he does not follow the Indians, nor even the +Pythagoreans, so far as to make abstinence from +flesh part of the ideal. He condemns vivisection +on the ground that animals have rights: certain +ways of treating them are unjust, not simply uncompassionate. +The discussion here again is of +course wholly within European thought. Thus, +in trying to determine his significance for modern +philosophy, we may consider his system in its +immediate environment, leaving it to more special +students to determine how far it received a +peculiar colouring from the Oriental philosophies, +of which, in his time, the more exact knowledge +was just beginning to penetrate to the West.</p><hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2> + +<h3>HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE</h3> + + +<p>Schopenhauer is not one of the philosophers +who have founded a school, though he has had +many disciples and enthusiastic admirers. The +pessimism that was for a time a watchword with +certain literary groups has passed as a mode, and +his true significance must be sought elsewhere. +Of the thinkers who have followed him in his +pessimism, two indeed stand out as the architects +of distinct systems, Eduard von Hartmann and +Philipp Mainländer (both already incidentally +referred to); but while they are to be classed unquestionably +as philosophers, their systems contain +an element that their master would have regarded +as mythological. Schopenhauer declared as +clearly as any of the Greeks that the phenomenal +world is without beginning and without end. +Kant's positing of an 'antinomy' on this point he +regarded as wholly without rational justification. +What Kant calls the 'antithesis,' namely, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> +infinite series, can be logically proved for phenomena. +The 'thesis,' which asserts a beginning in +time, is defended by mere fallacies. Now Hartmann +and Mainländer both hold, though in +different fashions, that there is a world-process +from a beginning to an end, namely, the extinction +of consciousness. This is the redemption of +the world. Their affinity, therefore, seems to be +with the Christian Gnostics rather than with the +pure philosophers of the Greek tradition, continued +in modern times by Bruno, Spinoza, and +Schopenhauer.</p> + +<p>Whatever may be thought of the pessimism +by which Schopenhauer's mood is distinguished +from that of his precursors, few will fail to recognise +that special doctrines of his system contain +at least a large portion of truth. His theories of +Art, of Genius, and of Love are enough to found +an enduring reputation for any thinker, even if +there were nothing else of value in his writings. +But there is much else, both in systematic construction +and in the illumination of detail. I +have been inclined to put forward first of all the +translation into idealistic terms of the universal +sentiency held by the Ionian thinkers to be inherent +in the primordial elements of nature. +While they viewed the world as an objective<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> +thing having psychological qualities, Schopenhauer, +after the long intermediate process of +thought, could treat it as phenomenal object with +a psychological or subjective essence. For both +doctrines alike, however, mind or soul is immanent. +Still, it must be allowed that a difference +remains by which Schopenhauer was even more +remote than they were from the later Greek +idealism. As they were not materialists, so they +did not exclude reason from the psychical properties +of their substances. Schopenhauer, while +he rejected the materialism of their ancient and +modern successors alike, took the step of formally +derationalising the elements of mind. This, no +doubt, is unsustainable ultimately, if reason is +ever to emerge from them. Yet the one-sidedness +of the position has had a peculiar value in +combating an equally one-sided rationalistic +idealism. This is recognised by clear-sighted +opponents. And Schopenhauer's calling the non-rational +or anti-rational element in the world +'will' helps to make plainer the real problem of +evil. There is truth in the Hegelian paradox that +'pessimism is an excellent basis for optimism.' +An optimist like Plotinus saw that, even if good +comes of evil, the case of the optimist must fail +unless evil can be shown to be a necessary con<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span>stituent +of the world. The Platonic and Neo-Platonic +'matter,' a principle of diremption or +individuation, like time and space for Schopenhauer, +was an attempt to solve this problem; but +something more positive seemed to be needed +as the source of the stronger manifestations of +evil. To the strength of these Plato drew attention +in a passage (<i>Republic</i>, x. 610<a name="FNanchor_1_5" id="FNanchor_1_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a>) where it is +acknowledged that injustice confers a character of +vitality and sleeplessness upon its possessor. In +the notion of a blind and vehement striving, +Schopenhauer supplies something adequate; only, +to maintain a rational optimism, it must be regarded +as a necessary element in a mixture, not +as the spring of the whole.</p> + +<p>Much might be said on the teleology by which +he tries to educe intelligence from the primordial +strife. Against his view, that it is evolved as +a mere instrument for preserving races in a +struggle, another may be set that is ready to +hand in a dialogue of Plutarch.<a name="FNanchor_2_6" id="FNanchor_2_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> The struggle +among animals, it is there incidentally argued, +has for its end to sharpen their intelligence. +Both these theories are on the surface compatible<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> +with evolution. If, leaving aside the problem of +mechanism, we try to verify them by the test of +results, the latter undoubtedly seems the more +plausible. For if the struggle was a means to +the improvement of intelligence, nature has succeeded +more and more; whereas, if her intention +was to preserve races, she has continually failed. +This argument is at any rate perfectly valid +against Schopenhauer himself; for he holds in +common with the optimistic teleologists that +'nature does nothing in vain.'</p> + +<p>I will conclude with a few detached criticisms +on the ethical doctrine which he regarded as the +culmination of his system. The antithesis, it +may first be noted, between the temporary release +from the vehemence of the will that is gained +through art, and the permanent release through +asceticism, is not consistently maintained. Schopenhauer +admits that the knowledge which for +the ascetic is the 'quietive' of the will has to be +won anew in a perpetual conflict. 'No one can +have enduring rest on earth.' Again, revision of +his doctrine concerning the reality of the individual +would, I think, necessitate revision also of +the position that not only asceticism but 'all true +and pure love, nay, even freely rendered justice, +proceeds from seeing through the <i>principium<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> +individuationis</i>.' If the individual is in some +sense ultimately real, then love must be to a certain +extent literally altruism. We are brought +down to the elementary fact, in terms of the +metaphysics of ethics, that the object of love is a +real being that is itself and not ourselves, though +having some resemblance to us and united in +a larger whole. An objection not merely verbal +might indeed be taken to Schopenhauer's metaphysics +of ethics strictly on his own ground. If +it is purely and simply the essence of ourselves +that we recognise in everything, does not this reduce +all love finally to a well-understood egoism? +The genuine fact of sympathy seems to escape his +mode of formulation. And, in the end, we shall +perhaps not find the ascetic to be the supreme +ethical type. Of the self-tormenting kind of +asceticism, it is not enough to say with Schopenhauer +that, since it is a world-wide phenomenon +of human nature, it calls for some account from +philosophy. The account may be sufficiently +rendered by historical psychology; the result +being to class it as an aberration born of the illusions +incident to a certain type of mind at a certain +stage. Indeed, that seems to be the conclusion +of the Buddhists, who claim to have transcended +it by finding it superfluous for the end it aims at.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +Let us then take, as our example of the completed +type, not the monks of the Thebaid, but the +mild ascetics of the Buddhist communities. Does +not this type, even in its most attractive form, +represent a 'second best'? Is not the final +judgment that of Plato, that to save oneself is +something, but that there is no full achievement +unless for the life of the State also the ideal has +been brought nearer realisation? When there is +nothing in the world but irredeemable tyranny or +anarchy, flight from it may be the greatest success +possible as far as the individual life is concerned; +but this is not the normal condition of humanity. +Finally, may not some actual achievement, either +practical or, like that of Schopenhauer, speculative, +even if accompanied by real imperfections of +character, possess a higher human value than the +sanctity that rests always in itself?</p> + + + +<hr class="chap" /> + +<h3>FOOTNOTES</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <i>Werke</i>, ed. Frauenstädt, vol. vi. p. 243.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_2" id="Footnote_1_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <i>Phänomenologie des Geistes</i>, Jubiläumsausgabe, ed. G. Lasson, +pp. 201-3.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_3" id="Footnote_2_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Letter to Robert Barclay Fox, May 10, 1842. Printed in +Appendix to <i>Letters and Journals of Caroline Fox</i>, third ed., +vol. ii. pp. 331-2. 'To suppose that the eye is <i>necessary</i> to +sight,' says Mill, 'seems to me the notion of one immersed in +matter. What we call our bodily sensations are all in the +mind, and would not necessarily or probably cease, because the +body perishes.'</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_4" id="Footnote_1_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> The disappearance of species in time raises difficulties in +more than one way for his philosophy; but he formally escapes +refutation by the suggestion, already noted, that the Idea need +not always be manifested phenomenally in the same world. +This, however, he did not work out.</p></div> +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_5" id="Footnote_1_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Cited in one of the introductory essays to Jowett and +Campbell's edition, vol. ii.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_6" id="Footnote_2_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> <i>De Sollertia Animalium</i>, 27.</p></div> + + +<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p> + + + +<h2><a name="SELECTED_WORKS" id="SELECTED_WORKS"></a>SELECTED WORKS</h2> + + +<h4><i>English Translations</i></h4> + +<div class="hanging-indent-small"><p><i>The World as Will and Idea.</i> Translated by <span class="smcap">R. B. Haldane</span> +and <span class="smcap">J. Kemp</span>. 3 vols. 1883-6.</p> + +<p><i>Two Essays</i>: I. <i>On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of +Sufficient Reason</i>. II. <i>On the Will in Nature</i>. Bohn's +Philosophical Library, 1889.</p> + +<p><i>Religion: A Dialogue, and other Essays.</i> Selected and translated +by <span class="smcap">T. Bailey Saunders</span>. 3rd ed., 1891. [A series +of other volumes of selections excellently translated by Mr. +Saunders has followed.]</p> + +<p><i>Selected Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer.</i> With a Biographical +Introduction and Sketch of his Philosophy. By <span class="smcap">E. Belfort +Bax</span>. 1891.</p> + +<p><i>The Basis of Morality.</i> Translated with Introduction and +Notes by <span class="smcap">A. B. Bullock</span>. 1903.</p></div> + + +<h4><i>Biographical and Expository</i></h4> + +<div class="hanging-indent-small"><p><i>Arthur Schopenhauer: His Life and Philosophy.</i> By <span class="smcap">Helen +Zimmern</span>. 1876.</p> + +<p><i>Life of Arthur Schopenhauer.</i> By Professor <span class="smcap">W. Wallace</span>. +1890.</p><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p> + +<p><i>La Philosophie de Schopenhauer.</i> Par <span class="smcap">Th. Ribot</span>. 2nd ed., +1885.</p> + +<p><i>Arthur Schopenhauer.</i> Seine Persönlichkeit, seine Lehre, +sein Glaube. Von <span class="smcap">Johannaes Volkelt</span>. 3rd ed., 1907.</p> + +<p><i>Schopenhauer-Lexikon.</i> Von <span class="smcap">Julius Fradenstädt</span>. 2 vols., +1871.</p></div> + +<p> </p> + +<p class="center">Printed by T. and A. <span class="smcap">Constable</span>, Printers to His Majesty +at the Edinburgh University Press</p> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Schopenhauer, by Thomas Whittaker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCHOPENHAUER *** + +***** This file should be named 38283-h.htm or 38283-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/2/8/38283/ + +Produced by Albert László and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + +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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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: Schopenhauer + +Author: Thomas Whittaker + +Release Date: December 12, 2011 [EBook #38283] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCHOPENHAUER *** + + + + +Produced by Albert Laszlo and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + + +PHILOSOPHIES ANCIENT AND MODERN + +SCHOPENHAUER + + + + +NOTE + + +As a consequence of the success of the series of _Religions Ancient and +Modern_, Messrs. CONSTABLE have decided to issue a set of similar +primers, with brief introductions, lists of dates, and selected +authorities, presenting to the wider public the salient features of the +_Philosophies_ of Greece and Rome and of the Middle Ages, as well as of +modern Europe. They will appear in the same handy Shilling volumes, with +neat cloth bindings and paper envelopes, which have proved so attractive +in the case of the _Religions_. The writing in each case will be +confided to an eminent authority, and one who has already proved himself +capable of scholarly yet popular exposition within a small compass. + +Among the first volumes to appear will be:-- + + =Early Greek Philosophy.= By A. W. BENN, author of _The Philosophy + of Greece, Rationalism in the Nineteenth Century_. + + =Stoicism.= By Professor ST. GEORGE STOCK, author of _Deductive + Logic_, editor of the _Apology of Plato_, etc. + + =Plato.= By Professor A. E. TAYLOR, St. Andrews University, author + of _The Problem of Conduct_. + + =Scholasticism.= By Father RICKABY, S.J. + + =Hobbes.= By Professor A. E. TAYLOR. + + =Locke.= By Professor ALEXANDER, of Owens College. + + =Comte and Mill.= By T. WHITTAKER, author of _The Neoplatonists, + Apollonius of Tyana and other Essays_. + + =Herbert Spencer.= By W. H. HUDSON, author of _An Introduction to + Spencer's Philosophy_. + + =Schopenhauer.= By T. WHITTAKER. + + =Berkeley.= By Professor CAMPBELL FRASER, D.C.L., LL.D. + + =Bergsen.= By Father TYRRELL. + + + + +SCHOPENHAUER + + +By + +THOMAS WHITTAKER + +AUTHOR OF 'COMTE AND MILL,' ETC. + + +LONDON + +ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO LTD + +1909 + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAP. PAGE + + I. LIFE AND WRITINGS, 1 + II. THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE, 15 + III. METAPHYSICS OF THE WILL, 29 + IV. AESTHETICS, 49 + V. ETHICS, 65 + VI. HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE, 86 + SELECTED WORKS, 93 + + + + +SCHOPENHAUER + + + + +CHAPTER I + +LIFE AND WRITINGS + + +Arthur Schopenhauer may be distinctively described as the greatest +philosophic writer of his century. So evident is this that he has +sometimes been regarded as having more importance in literature than in +philosophy; but this is an error. As a metaphysician he is second to no +one since Kant. Others of his age have surpassed him in system and in +comprehensiveness; but no one has had a firmer grasp of the essential +and fundamental problems of philosophy. On the theory of knowledge, the +nature of reality, and the meaning of the beautiful and the good, he has +solutions to offer that are all results of a characteristic and original +way of thinking. + +In one respect, as critics have noted, his spirit is different from that +of European philosophy in general. What preoccupies him in a special way +is the question of evil in the world. Like the philosophies of the +East, emerging as they do without break from religion, Schopenhauer's +philosophy is in its outcome a doctrine of redemption from sin. The name +of pessimism commonly applied to it is in some respects misleading, +though it was his own term; but it is correct if understood as he +explained it. As he was accustomed to insist, his final ethical doctrine +coincides with that of all the religions that aim, for their adepts or +their elect, at deliverance from 'this evil world.' But, as the +'world-fleeing' religions have their mitigations and accommodations, so +also has the philosophy of Schopenhauer. At various points indeed it +seems as if a mere change of accent would turn it into optimism. + +This preoccupation does not mean indifference to the theoretical +problems of philosophy. No one has insisted more strongly that the end +of philosophy is pure truth, and that only the few who care about pure +truth have any concern with it. But for Schopenhauer the desire for +speculative truth does not by itself suffice to explain the impulse of +philosophical inquiries. On one side of his complex character, he had +more resemblance to the men who turn from the world to religion, like +St. Augustine, than to the normal type of European thinker, represented +pre-eminently by Aristotle. He was a temperamental pessimist, feeling +from the first the trouble of existence; and here he finds the deepest +motive for the desire to become clear about it. He saw in the world, +what he felt in himself, a vain effort after ever new objects of desire +which give no permanent satisfaction; and this view, becoming +predominant, determined, not indeed all the ideas of his philosophy, but +its general complexion as a 'philosophy of redemption.' + +With his pessimism, personal misfortunes had nothing to do. He was, and +always recognised that he was, among the most fortunately placed of +mankind. He does not hesitate to speak sometimes of his own happiness in +complete freedom from the need to apply himself to any compulsory +occupation. This freedom, as he has put gratefully on record, he owed to +his father, Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer, who was a rich merchant of +Danzig, where the philosopher was born on the 22nd of February 1788. +Both his parents were of Dutch ancestry. His mother, Johanna +Schopenhauer, won celebrity as a novelist; and his sister, Adele, also +displayed some literary talent. Generalising from his own case, +Schopenhauer holds that men of intelligence derive their character from +their father and their intellect from their mother. With his mother, +however, he was not on sympathetic terms, as may be read in the +biographies. His father intended him for a mercantile career, and with +this view began to prepare him from the first to be a cosmopolitan man +of the world. The name of Arthur was given to him because it is spelt +alike in the leading European languages. He was taken early to France, +where he resided from 1797 to 1799, learning French so well that on his +return he had almost forgotten his German. Portions of the years 1803 to +1804 were spent in England, France, Switzerland, and Austria. In England +he was three months at a Wimbledon boarding-school kept by a clergyman. +This experience he found extremely irksome. He afterwards became highly +proficient in English: was always pleased to be taken for an Englishman, +and regarded both the English character and intelligence as on the whole +the first in Europe; but all the more deplorable did he find the +oppressive pietism which was the special form taken in the England of +that period by the reaction against the French Revolution. He is never +tired of denouncing that phase of 'cold superstition,' the dominance of +which lasted during his lifetime; for the publication of Mill's +_Liberty_ and of Darwin's _Origin of Species_, which may be considered +as marking the close of it, came only the year before his death. + +The only real break in the conformity of Schopenhauer's circumstances to +his future career came in 1805, when he was placed in a merchant's +office at Hamburg, whither his father had migrated in disgust at the +annexation of his native Danzig, then under a republican constitution of +its own, by Prussia in 1793. Soon afterwards his father died; but out of +loyalty he tried for some time longer to reconcile himself to commercial +life. Finding this at length impossible, he gained permission from his +mother, in 1807, to leave the office for the gymnasium. At this time he +seems to have begun his classical studies, his education having hitherto +been exclusively modern. They were carried on first at Gotha and then at +Weimar. In 1809 he entered the university of Goettingen as a student of +medicine. This, however, was with a view only to scientific studies, not +to practice; and he transferred himself to the philosophical faculty in +1810. Generally he was little regardful of academical authority. His +father's deliberately adopted plan of letting him mix early with the +world had given him a certain independence of judgment. At Goettingen, +however, he received an important influence from his teacher, G. E. +Schulze (known by the revived scepticism of his _AEnesidemus_), who +advised him to study Plato and Kant before Aristotle and Spinoza. From +1811 to 1813 he was at Berlin, where he heard Fichte, but was not +impressed. In 1813 the degree of Doctor of Philosophy was conferred on +him at Jena for the dissertation _On the Fourfold Root of the Principle +of Sufficient Reason_ (_Ueber die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom +zureichenden Grunde_, 2nd ed., 1847). This was the first result of his +Kantian studies. In the same year he began to be acquainted with Goethe +at Weimar, where his mother and sister had gone to reside in 1806. A +consequence of this acquaintance was that he took up and further +developed Goethe's theory of colours. His dissertation _Ueber das Sehen +und die Farben_ was published in 1816. A second edition did not appear +till 1854; but in the meantime he had published a restatement of his +doctrine in Latin, entitled _Theoria Colorum Physiologica_ (1830). This, +however, was an outlying part of his work. He had already been seized by +the impulse to set forth the system of philosophy that took shape in +him, as he says, by some formative process of which he could give no +conscious account. His great work, _Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung_, +was ready for publication before the end of 1818, and was published with +the date 1819. Thus he is one of the most precocious philosophers on +record. For in that single volume, written before he was thirty, the +outlines of his whole system are fixed. There is some development later, +and there are endless new applications and essays towards confirmation +from all sources. His mind never rested, and his literary power gained +by exercise. Still, it has been said with truth, that there never was a +greater illusion than when he thought that he seldom repeated himself. +In reality he did little but repeat his fundamental positions with +infinite variations in expression. + +After completing his chief work, Schopenhauer wrote some verses in which +he predicted that posterity would erect a monument to him. This +prediction was fulfilled in 1895; but, for the time, the work which he +never doubted would be his enduring title to fame seemed, like Hume's +_Treatise_, to have fallen 'deadborn from the press.' This he attributed +to the hostility of the academical philosophers; and, in his later +works, attacks on the university professors form a characteristic +feature. The official teachers of the Hegelian school, he declared, were +bent only on obtaining positions for themselves by an appearance of +supporting Christian dogma; and they resented openness on the part of +any one else. Yet on one side he maintained that his own pessimism was +more truly Christian than their optimism. The essential spirit of +Christianity is that of Brahmanism and Buddhism, the great religions +that sprang from India, the first home of our race. He is even inclined +to see in it traces of Indian influence. What vitiates it in his eyes is +the Jewish element, which finds its expression in the flat modern +'Protestant-rationalistic optimism.' As optimistic religions, he groups +together Judaism, Islam, and Graeco-Roman Polytheism. His antipathy, +however, only extends to the two former. He was himself in great part a +child of Humanism and of the eighteenth century, rejoicing over the +approaching downfall of all the faiths, and holding that a weak religion +(entirely different from those he admires) is favourable to +civilisation. Nothing can exceed his scorn for nearly everything that +characterised the Middle Ages. With Catholicism as a political system he +has no sympathy whatever; while on the religious side the Protestant +are as sympathetic to him as the Catholic mystics. What is common to all +priesthoods, he holds, is to exploit the metaphysical need of mankind +(in which he also believes) for the sake of their own power. +Clericalism, 'Pfaffenthum,' whether Catholic or Protestant, is the +object of his unvarying hatred and contempt. If he had cared to +appreciate Hegel, he would have found on this point much community of +spirit; but of course there was a real antithesis between the two as +philosophers. No 'conspiracy' need be invoked to explain the failure of +Schopenhauer to win early recognition. Belief in the State and in +progress was quite alien to him; and Germany was then full of political +hopes, which found nourishment in optimistic pantheism. What at length +gave his philosophy vogue was the collapse of this enthusiasm on the +failure of the revolutionary movement in 1848. Once known, it contained +enough of permanent value to secure it from again passing out of sight +with the next change of fashion. + +The rest of Schopenhauer's life in its external relations may be briefly +summed up. For a few years, it was diversified by travels in Italy and +elsewhere, and by an unsuccessful attempt at academical teaching in +Berlin. In 1831 he moved to Frankfort, where he finally settled in +1833. He lived unmarried there till his death on the 21st of September +1860. The monument, already spoken of, was unveiled at Frankfort on the +6th of June 1895. + +The almost unbroken silence with which his great work was received, +though it had a distempering effect on the man, did not discourage the +thinker. The whole series of Schopenhauer's works, indeed, was completed +before he attained anything that could be called fame. Constantly on the +alert as he was to seize upon confirmations of his system, he published +in 1836 his short work _On the Will in Nature_, pointing out +verifications of his metaphysics by recent science. In 1839 his prize +essay, _On the Freedom of the Human Will_ (finished in 1837), was +crowned by the Royal Scientific Society of Drontheim in Norway. This and +another essay, _On the Basis of Morality_, _not_ crowned by the Royal +Danish Society of Copenhagen in 1840, he published in 1841, with the +inclusive title, _Die beiden Grundprobleme der Ethik_. In 1844 appeared +the second edition of his principal work, to which there was added, in +the form of a second volume, a series of elucidations and extensions +larger in bulk than the first. This new volume contains much of his +best and most effective writing. His last work, _Parerga und +Paralipomena_, which appeared in 1851 (2 vols.), is from the literary +point of view the most brilliant. It was only from this time that he +began to be well known among the general public; though the philosophic +'apostolate' of Julius Frauenstaedt, who afterwards edited his works, had +begun in 1840. His activity was henceforth confined to modifying and +extending his works for new editions; an employment in which he was +always assiduous. In consequence of this, all of them, as they stand, +contain references from one to another; but the development of his +thinking, so far as there was such a process after 1818, can be easily +traced without reference to the earlier editions. There is some growth; +but, as has been said, it does not affect many of the chief points. A +brief exposition of his philosophy can on the whole take it as something +fixed. The heads under which it must fall are those assigned to the +original four books of _Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung_. + +Although Schopenhauer discountenanced the attempt to connect a +philosophers biography with his work, something has to be said about his +character, since this has been dwelt on to his disadvantage by +opponents. There is abundant material for a personal estimate in the +correspondence and reminiscences published after his death by his +disciples Julius Frauenstaedt and Wilhelm Gwinner. The apparent +contradiction is at once obvious between the ascetic consummation of his +ethics and his unascetic life, carefully occupied in its latter part +with rules for the preservation of his naturally robust health. He was +quite aware of this, but holds it absurd to require that a moralist +should commend only the virtues which he possesses. It is as if the +requirement were set up that a sculptor is to be himself a model of +beauty. A saint need not be a philosopher, nor a philosopher a saint. +The science of morals is as theoretical as any other branch of +philosophy. Fundamentally character is unmodifiable, though knowledge, +it is allowed, may change the mode of action within the limits of the +particular character. The passage to the state of asceticism cannot be +effected by moral philosophy, but depends on a kind of 'grace.' After +all, it might be replied, philosophers, whether they succeed or not, do +usually make at least an attempt to live in accordance with the moral +ideal they set up. The best apology in Schopenhauer's case is that the +fault may have been as much in his ideal as in his failure to conform +to it. The eloquent pages he has devoted to the subject of holiness only +make manifest the inconsequence (which he admits) in the passage to it. +For, as we shall see, this has nothing in common with the essentially +rational asceticism of the schools of later antiquity; which was a rule +of self-limitation in view of the philosophic life. He did in a way of +his own practise something of this; and, on occasion, he sets forth the +theory of it; but he quite clearly sees the difference. His own ideal, +which he never attempted to practise, is that of the self-torturing +ascetics of the Christian Middle Age. Within the range of properly human +virtue, he can in many respects hold his own, not only as a philosopher +but as a man. If his egoism and vanity are undeniable, he undoubtedly +possessed the virtues of rectitude and compassion. What he would have +especially laid stress on was the conscientious devotion to his work. +With complete singleness of purpose he used for a disinterested end the +leisure which he regarded as the most fortunate of endowments. As he +said near the close of his life, his intellectual conscience was clear. + +Of Schopenhauer's expositions of his pessimism it would be true to say, +as Spinoza says of the Book of Job, that the matter, like the style, is +not that of a man sitting among the ashes, but of one meditating in a +library. This of course does not prove that they are not a genuine, if +one-sided, rendering of human experience. All that can be said is that +they did not turn him away from appreciation of the apparent goods of +life. His own practical principle was furnished by what he regarded as a +lower point of view; and this gives its direction to the semi-popular +philosophy of the _Parerga_. From what he takes to be the higher point +of view, the belief that happiness is attainable by man on earth is an +illusion; but he holds that, by keeping steadily in view a kind of +tempered happiness as the end, many mistakes may be avoided in the +conduct of life, provided that each recognises at once the strength and +weakness of his own character, and does not attempt things that, with +the given limitations, are impossible. Of the highest truth, as he +conceived it, he could therefore make no use. Only by means of a truth +that he was bound to hold half-illusory could a working scheme be +constructed for himself and others. This result may give us guidance in +seeking to learn what we can from a thinker who is in reality no +representative of a decadence, but is fundamentally sane and rational, +even in spite of himself. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE + + +The title of Schopenhauer's chief work is rendered in the English +translation, _The World as Will and Idea_. Here the term 'idea' is used +in the sense it had for Locke and Berkeley; namely, any object of mental +activity. Thus it includes not merely imagery, but also perception. +Since Hume distinguished ideas' from 'impressions,' it has tended to be +specialised in the former sense. The German word, _Vorstellung_, which +it is used to render, conveys the generalised meaning of the Lockian +'idea,' now frequently expressed in English and French philosophical +works by the more technical term 'presentation' or 'representation.' By +Schopenhauer himself the word 'Idea' was used exclusively in the sense +of the Platonic Idea, which, as we shall see, plays an important part in +his philosophy. The distinction is preserved in the translation by the +use of a capital when Idea has the latter meaning; but in a brief +exposition it seems convenient to adopt a more technical rendering of +_Vorstellung_; and, from its common employment in psychological +text-books, I have selected 'presentation' as the most suitable. + +The first proposition of Schopenhauer's philosophical system is, 'The +world is my presentation.' By this he means that it presents itself as +appearance to the knowing subject. This appearance is in the forms of +time, space and causality. Under these forms every phenomenon +necessarily appears, because they are _a priori_ forms of the subject. +The world as it presents itself consists entirely of phenomena, that is, +appearances, related according to these forms. The most fundamental form +of all is the relation between object and subject, which is implied in +all of them. Without a subject there can be no presented object. + +Schopenhauer is therefore an idealist in the sense in which we call +Berkeley's theory of the external world idealism; though the expressions +used are to some extent different. The difference proceeds from his +following of Kant. His Kantianism consists in the recognition of _a +priori_ forms by which the subject constructs for itself an 'objective' +world of appearances. With Berkeley he agrees as against Kant in not +admitting any residue whatever, in the object as such, that is not +wholly appearance. But while he allows that Berkeley, as regards the +general formulation of idealism, was more consistent than Kant, he finds +him, in working out the principle, altogether inadequate. For the modern +mind there is henceforth no way in philosophy except through Kant, from +whom dates the revolution by which scholastic dualism was finally +overthrown. Kant's systematic construction, however, he in effect +reduces to very little. His is a much simplified 'Apriorism.' While +accepting the 'forms of sensible intuition,' that is, time and space, +just as Kant sets them forth, he clears away nearly all the superimposed +mechanism. Kant's 'Transcendental AEsthetic,' he says, was a real +discovery in metaphysics; but on the basis of this he for the most part +only gave free play to his architectonic impulse. Of the twelve +'categories of the understanding,' which he professed to derive from the +logical forms of judgment, all except causality are mere 'blind +windows.' This alone, therefore, Schopenhauer adopts; placing it, +however, not at a higher level but side by side with time and space, +Kant's forms of intuition. These three forms, according to Schopenhauer, +make up the understanding of men and animals. 'All intuition is +intellectual.' It is not first mere appearance related in space and +time, and waiting for understanding to organise it; but, in animals as +in man, it is put in order at once under the three forms that suffice to +explain the knowledge all have of the phenomenal world. + +To Reason as distinguished from Understanding, Schopenhauer assigns no +such exalted function as was attributed to it in portions of his system +by Kant, and still more by some of his successors. The name of 'reason,' +he maintains, ought on etymological grounds to be restricted to the +faculty of abstract concepts. This, and not understanding, is what +distinguishes man from animals. It discovers and invents nothing, but it +puts in a generalised and available form what the understanding has +discovered in intuition. + +For the historical estimation of Schopenhauer, it is necessary to place +him in relation to Kant, as he himself always insisted. Much also in his +chief work is made clearer by knowledge of his dissertation _On the +Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason_, to which he is +constantly referring. Later, his manner of exposition became more +independent; so that he can be read by the general reader with profit +simply by himself, and without reference to antecedents. Still, it will +always be advisable for an expositor to follow his directions, at least +to the extent of giving some short account of the dissertation. This I +proceed to give approximately in the place to which he has assigned it +in his system. + +The name of the principle (_principium rationis sufficientis_) he took +over from Leibniz and his successor Wolff, but gave it a new amplitude. +With him, it stands as an inclusive term for four modes of connection by +which the thoroughgoing relativity of phenomena to one another is +constituted for our intelligence. The general statement adopted is, +'Nothing is without a reason why it should be rather than not be.' +Its four forms are the principles of becoming (_fiendi_), of knowing +(_cognoscendi_), of being (_essendi_), and of acting (_agendi_). +(1) Under the first head come 'causes.' These are divided into 'cause +proper,' for inorganic things; 'stimulus,' for the vegetative life both +of plants and animals, and 'motive,' for animals and men. The law of +causation is applicable only to changes; not to the forces of nature, to +matter, or to the world as a whole, which are perdurable. Cause precedes +effect in time. Not one thing, but one state of a thing, is the cause of +another. From the law of causation there results an infinite series _a +parte ante_ as well as _a parte post_. (2) The principle of sufficient +reason of knowing is applicable to concepts, which are all derived from +intuition, that is, from percepts. The laws of logic, which come under +this head, can yield nothing original, but can only render explicit what +was in the understanding. (3) Under the third head come arithmetical and +geometrical relations. These are peculiar relations of presentations, +distinct from all others, and only intelligible in virtue of a pure _a +priori_ intuition. For geometry this is space; for arithmetic time, in +which counting goes on. Scientifically, arithmetic is fundamental. (4) +As the third form of causality was enumerated 'motive' for the will; but +in that classification it was viewed from without, as belonging to the +world of objects. Through the direct knowledge we have of our own will, +we know also from within this determination by the presentation we call +a motive. Hence emerges the fourth form of the principle of sufficient +reason. This at a later stage makes possible the transition from physics +to metaphysics. + +All these forms alike are forms of necessary determination. Necessity +has no clear and true sense but certainty of the consequence when the +ground is posited. All necessity therefore is conditional. In accordance +with the four expressions of the principle of sufficient reason, it +takes the fourfold shape of physical, logical, mathematical, and moral +necessity. + +The sharp distinction between logical and mathematical truth, with the +assignment of the former to conceptual and of the latter to intuitive +relations, comes to Schopenhauer directly from Kant. So also does his +view that the necessary form of causation is sequence; though here his +points of contact with English thinkers, earlier and later, are very +marked. Only in his statement of the 'law of motivation' as 'causality +seen from within' does he hint at his own distinctive metaphysical +doctrine. Meanwhile, it is evident that he is to be numbered with the +group of modern thinkers who have arrived in one way or another at a +complete scientific phenomenism. Expositors have noted that in his +earlier statements of this he tends to lay more stress on the character +of the visible and tangible world as mere appearance. The impermanence, +the relativity, of all that exists in time and space, leads him to +describe it, in a favourite term borrowed from Indian philosophy, as +Maya, or illusion. Later, he dwells more on the relative reality of +things as they appear. His position, however, does not essentially +alter, but only finds varying expression as he turns more to the +scientific or to the metaphysical side. From Hume's view on causation he +differs not by opposing its pure phenomenism, but only by recognising, +as Kant does, an _a priori_ element in the form of its law. German +critics have seen in his own formulation an anticipation of Mill, and +this is certainly striking as regards the general conception of the +causal order, although there is no anticipation of Mill's inductive +logic. On the same side there is a close agreement with Malebranche and +the Occasionalists, pointed out by Schopenhauer himself. The causal +explanations of science, he is at one with them in insisting, give no +ultimate account of anything. All its causes are no more than +'occasional causes,'--merely instances, as Mill expressed it afterwards, +of 'invariable and unconditional sequence.' From Mill of course he +differs in holding its form to be necessary and _a priori_, not +ultimately derived from a summation of experiences; and, with the +Occasionalists, he goes on to metaphysics in its sense of ontology, as +Mill never did. The difference here is that he does not clothe his +metaphysics in a theological dress. + +In the later development of his thought, Schopenhauer dealt more +expressly with the question, how this kind of phenomenism is +reconcilable with a scientific cosmogony. On one side the proposition, +'No object without subject,' makes materialism for ever impossible; for +the materialist tries to explain from relations among presentations what +is the condition of all presentation. On the other side, we are all +compelled to agree with the materialists that knowledge of the object +comes late in a long series of material events. Inorganic things existed +in time before life; vegetative life before animal life; and only with +animal life does knowledge emerge. Reasoned knowledge of the whole +series comes only at the end of it in the human mind. This apparent +contradiction he solves by leaving a place for metaphysics. Our +representation of the world as it existed before the appearance of life +was indeed non-existent at the time to which we assign it; but the real +being of the world had a manifestation not imaginable by us. For this, +we substitute a picture of a world such as we should have been aware of +had our 'subject,' with its _a priori_ forms of time, space, and +causality, been then present. What the reality is, is the problem of the +thing-in-itself (to use the Kantian term). This problem remains over; +but we know that the metaphysical reality cannot be matter; for matter, +with all its qualities, is phenomenal. It exists only 'for +understanding, through understanding, in understanding.' These +discriminations made, Schopenhauer offers us a scientific cosmogony +beginning with the nebular hypothesis and ending with an outline of +organic evolution. This last differs from the Darwinian theory in +supposing a production of species by definite steps instead of by +accumulation of small individual variations. At a certain time, a form +that has all the characters of a new species appears among the progeny +of an existing species. Man is the last and highest form to be evolved. +From Schopenhauer's metaphysics, as we shall see, it follows that no +higher form of life will ever appear. + +A word may be said here on a materialistic-sounding phrase which is +very prominent in Schopenhauer's later expositions, and has been +remarked on as paradoxical for an idealist. The world as presentation, +he often says, is 'in the brain.' This, it must be allowed, is not fully +defensible from his own point of view, except with the aid of a later +distinction. The brain as we know it is of course only a part of the +phenomenon of the subject,--a grouping of possible perceptions. How +then, since it is itself only appearance, can it be the bearer of the +whole universe as appearance? The answer is that Schopenhauer meant in +reality 'the being of the brain,' and not the brain as phenomenon. He +had a growing sense of the importance of physiology for the +investigation of mind; and his predilection led him to adopt a not quite +satisfactory shorthand expression for the correspondence we know +scientifically to exist between our mental processes and changes capable +of objective investigation in the matter of the brain. + +In science his distinctive bent was to the borderland between psychology +and physiology. Hence came the attraction exercised on him by Goethe's +theory of colours. To his own theory, though, unlike his philosophical +system, it has always failed to gain the attention he predicted for it, +the merit must be allowed of treating the problem as essentially one of +psychophysics. What he does is to attempt to ascertain the conditions in +the sensibility of the retina that account for our actual +colour-sensations. This problem was untouched by the Newtonian theory; +but Schopenhauer followed Goethe in the error of trying to overthrow +this on its own ground. He had no aptitude for the special inquiries of +mathematics and physics, though he had gained a clear insight into their +general nature as sciences. On the psycho-physical side there is to-day +no fully authorised theory. The problem indeed has become ever more +complex. Schopenhauer's attempt, by combination of sensibilities to +'light' and 'darkness,' to explain the phenomena of complementary +colours, deserves at least a record in the long series of essays of +which the best known are the 'Young-Helmholtz theory' and that of +Hering. It marks an indubitable advance on Goethe in the clear +distinction drawn between the mixture, in the ordinary sense, that can +only result in dilution to different shades of grey, and the kinds of +mixture from which, in their view, true colours arise. + +A characteristic position in Schopenhauer's theory of knowledge, and one +that is constantly finding new expression in his writings, is the +distinction between abstract and intuitive knowledge already touched on. +Intuitive knowledge of the kind that is common to men and animals, as we +have seen, makes up, in his terminology, the 'understanding'; while +'reason' is the distinctively human faculty of concepts. When he +depreciates this, as he often does, in comparison with 'intuition,' it +must be remembered that he does not limit this term to perception of +particulars, but ascribes to what he calls the 'Platonic Idea' a certain +kind of union between reason and 'phantasy,' which gives it an intuitive +character of its own. Thus intuition can stand, though not in every case +for what is higher, yet always for that which is wider and greater and +more immediate. Whatever may be done with reflective reason and its +abstractions, every effectual process of thought must end, alike for +knowledge and art and virtue, in some intuitive presentation. The +importance of reason for practice is due to its generality. Its function +is subordinate. It does not furnish the ground of virtuous action any +more than aesthetic precepts can enable any one to produce a work of art; +but it can help to preserve constancy to certain maxims, as also in art +a reasoned plan is necessary because the inspiration of genius is not +every moment at command. Virtue and artistic genius alike, however, +depend ultimately on intuition: and so also does every true discovery in +science. The nature of pedantry is to try to be guided everywhere by +concepts, and to trust nothing to perception in the particular case. +Philosophy also Schopenhauer regards as depending ultimately on a +certain intuitive view; but he allows that it has to translate this into +abstractions. Its problem is to express the _what_ of the world in +abstract form: science dealing only with the _why_ of phenomena related +within the world. This character of philosophy as a system of abstract +concepts deprives it of the immediate attractiveness of art; so that, as +he says in one place, it is more fortunate to be a poet than a +philosopher. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +METAPHYSICS OF THE WILL + + +We have seen that scientific explanation does not go beyond +presentations ordered in space and time. This is just as true of the +sciences of causation--the 'aetiological' sciences--as it is of +mathematical science. All that we learn from Mechanics, Physics, +Chemistry and Physiology, is 'how, in accordance with an infallible +rule, one determinate state of matter necessarily follows another: how a +determinate change necessarily conditions and brings on another +determinate change.' This knowledge does not satisfy us. We wish to +learn the significance of phenomena; but we find that from outside, +while we view them as presentations, their inner meaning is for ever +inaccessible. + +The starting-point for the metaphysical knowledge we seek is given us in +our own body. The animal body is 'the immediate object of the subject': +in it as presentation the 'effects' of 'causes' in the order of +presentations external to it are first recognised. Now in virtue of his +body the investigator is not pure knowing subject standing apart from +that which he knows. In the case of the particular system of +presentations constituting his organism, he knows what these +presentations signify, and that is his _will_ in a certain modification. +The subject appears as individual through its identity with the body, +and this body is given to it in two different ways: on one side as +object among objects, and subjected to their laws; on the other side as +the will immediately known to each. The act of will and the movement of +the body are not two different states related as cause and effect; for +the relation of cause and effect belongs only to the object, the +phenomenon, the presentation. They are one and the same act given in +different manners: the will, immediately to the subject; the movement, +in sensible intuition for understanding. The action of the body is the +objectified act of will. Called at first the immediate object of +presentation, the body may now, from the other side, be called 'the +objectivity of the will.' + +Thus, as was said, the 'law of motivation' discloses the inner nature of +causality. In causality in general we know only relations of phenomena; +but in the case of our own body we know something else that those +relations express; namely, the act of will determined by motives. Now +there are in the world as presentation other systems like that which we +call our body. Unless all these are to be supposed mere phantoms without +inner reality, we must infer by analogy, in correspondence with like +phenomena, other individual wills similar to that which we know in +ourselves. This inference from analogy, universally admitted in the case +of human and animal bodies, must be extended to the whole corporeal +world. The failure to take this step is where the purely intellectual +forms of idealism have come short. Kant's 'thing-in-itself,' which is +not subject to the forms by which presentations become experience, but +which experience and its forms indicate as the reality, has been wrongly +condemned by his successors as alien to idealism. It is true that Kant +did in some respects fail to maintain the idealistic position with the +clearness of Berkeley; but his shortcoming was not in affirming a +thing-in-itself beyond phenomena. Here, in Schopenhauer's view, is the +metaphysical problem that he left a place for but did not solve. The +word of the riddle has now been pronounced. Beyond presentation, that +is, in itself and according to its innermost essence, the world is that +which we find in ourselves immediately as will. By this it is not meant +that a falling stone, for example, acts from a motive; knowledge and the +consequent action from motives belongs only to the determinate form that +the will has in animals and men; but the reality in the stone also is +the same in essence as that to which we apply the name of will in +ourselves. He who possesses this key to the knowledge of nature's +innermost being will interpret the forces of vegetation, of +crystallisation, of magnetism, of chemical affinity, even of weight +itself, as different only in phenomenal manifestation but in essence the +same; namely, that which is better known to each than all else, and +where it emerges most clearly is called will. Only the will is +thing-in-itself. It is wholly different from presentation, and is that +of which presentation is the phenomenon, the visibility, the +objectivity. Differences affect only the degree of the appearing, not +the essence of that which appears. + +While the reality everywhere present is not will as specifically known +in man, the mode of indicating its essence by reference to this, +Schopenhauer contends, is a gain in insight. The thing-in-itself ought +to receive its name from that among all its manifestations which is the +clearest, the most perfect, the most immediately illumined by knowledge; +and this is man's will. When we say that every force in nature is to be +thought of as Will, we are subsuming an unknown under a known. For the +conception of Force is abstracted from the realm of cause and effect, +and indicates the limit of scientific explanation. Having arrived at the +forces of nature on the one side and the forms of the subject on the +other, science can go no further. The conception of Will can make known +that which was so far concealed, because it proceeds from the most +intimate consciousness that each has of himself, where the knower and +the known coincide. + +By this consciousness, in which subject and object are not yet set +apart, we reach something universal. In itself the Will is not +individualised, but exists whole and undivided in every single thing in +nature, as the Subject of contemplation exists whole and undivided in +each cognitive being. It is entirely free from all forms of the +phenomenon. What makes plurality possible is subjection to the forms of +time and space, by which only the phenomenon is affected. Time and space +may therefore be called, in scholastic terminology, the 'principle of +individuation.' While each of its phenomena is subject to the law of +sufficient reason, which is the law of appearance in these forms, there +is for the Will as thing-in-itself no rational ground: it is 'grundlos.' +It is free from all plurality, although its phenomena in space and time +are innumerable. It is one, not with the unity of an object or of a +concept, but as that which lies outside of space and time, beyond the +_principium individuationis_, that is, the possibility of plurality. The +individual, the person, is not will as thing-in-itself, but phenomenon +of the will, and as such determined. The will is 'free' because there is +nothing beyond itself to determine it. Further, it is in itself mere +activity without end, a blind striving. Knowledge appears only as the +accompaniment of its ascending stages. + +Here we have arrived at the thought which, in its various expressions, +constitutes Schopenhauer's metaphysics. That this cannot be +scientifically deduced he admits; but he regards it as furnishing such +explanation as is possible of science itself. For science there is in +everything an inexplicable element to which it runs back, and which is +real, not merely phenomenal. From this reality we are most remote in +pure mathematics and in the pure _a priori_ science of nature as it was +formulated by Kant. These owe their transparent clearness precisely to +their absence of real content, or to the slightness of this. The attempt +to reduce organic life to chemistry, this again to mechanism, and at +last everything to arithmetic, could it succeed, would leave mere form +behind, from which all the content of phenomena would have vanished. And +the form would in the end be form of the subject. But the enterprise is +vain. 'For in everything in nature there is something of which no ground +can ever be given, of which no explanation is possible, no cause further +is to be sought.' What for man is his inexplicable character, +presupposed in every explanation of his deeds from motives, that for +every inorganic body is its inexplicable quality, the manner of its +acting. + +The basis of this too is will, and 'groundless,' inexplicable will; but +evidently the conception here is not identical with that of the Will +that is one and all. How do we pass from the universal to that which has +a particular character or quality? For of the Will as thing-in-itself we +are told that there is not a greater portion in a man and a less in a +stone. The relation of part and whole belongs exclusively to space. The +more and less touches only the phenomenon, that is, the visibility, the +objectivation. A higher degree of this is in the plant than in the +stone, in the animal than in the plant, and so forth; but the Will that +is the essence of all is untouched by degree, as it is beyond plurality, +space and time, and the relation of cause and effect. + +The answer to the question here raised is given in Schopenhauer's +interpretation of the Platonic Ideas. These he regards as stages of +objectivation of the Will. They are, as Plato called them, eternal forms +related to particular things as models. The lowest stage of +objectivation of the Will is represented by the forces of inorganic +nature. Some of these, such as weight and impenetrability, appear in all +matter. Some are divided among its different kinds, as rigidity, +fluidity, elasticity, electricity, magnetism, chemical properties. They +are not subject to the relation of cause and effect, but are presupposed +by it. A force is neither cause of an effect nor effect of a cause. +Philosophically, it is immediate objectivity of the will; in aetiology, +_qualitas occulta_. At the lowest stages of objectivation, there is no +individuality. This does not appear in inorganic things, nor even in +merely organic or vegetative life, but only as we ascend the scale of +animals. Even in the higher animals the specific enormously predominates +over the individual character. Only in man is the Idea objectified in +the individual character as such. 'The character of each individual man, +so far as it is thoroughly individual and not entirely comprehended in +that of the species, may be regarded as a particular Idea, corresponding +to a peculiar act of objectivation of the Will.' + +Schopenhauer warns us against substituting this philosophical +explanation for scientific aetiology. The chain of causes and effects, he +points out, is not broken by the differences of the original, +irreducible forces. The aetiology and the philosophy of nature go side by +side, regarding the same object from different points of view. Yet he +also gives us in relation to his philosophy much that is not +unsuggestive scientifically. His doctrine is not properly evolutionary, +since the Ideas are eternal; but he has guarded incidentally against our +supposing that all the natural kinds that manifest the Ideas +phenomenally must be always represented in every world. For our +particular world, comprising the sun and planets of the solar system, he +sets forth in the _Parerga_ an account of the process by which it +develops from the nebula to man. This was referred to in the preceding +chapter. In his fundamental work he describes a struggle, present +through the whole of nature, in which the phenomenal manifestations of +the higher Ideas conquer and subjugate those of the lower, though they +leave them still existent and ever striving to get loose. Here has been +seen an adumbration of natural selection: he himself admits the +difficulty he has in making it clear. We must remember that it is +pre-Darwinian. + +Knowledge or intelligence he seeks to explain as an aid to the +individual organism in its struggle to subsist and to propagate its +kind. It first appears in animal life. It is represented by the brain or +a large ganglion, as every endeavour of the Will in its +self-objectivation is represented by some organ; that is, displays +itself for presentation as such and such an appearance. Superinduced +along with this contrivance for aid in the struggle, the world as +presentation, with all its forms, subject and object, time, space, +plurality and causality, is all at once there. 'Hitherto only will, it +is now at the same time presentation, object of the knowing subject.' +Then in man, as a higher power beyond merely intuitive intelligence, +appears reason as the power of abstract conception. For the most part, +rational as well as intuitive knowledge, evolved originally as a mere +means to higher objectivation of the Will, remains wholly in its +service. How, in exceptional cases, intellect emancipates itself, will +be discussed under the heads of AEsthetics and Ethics. + +That this view implies a teleology Schopenhauer expressly recognises. +Indeed he is a very decided teleologist on lines of his own, and, in +physiology, takes sides strongly with 'vitalism' as against pure +mechanicism. True, the Will is 'endless' blind striving, and is +essentially divided against itself. Everywhere in nature there is +strife, and this takes the most horrible forms. Yet somehow there is in +each individual manifestation of will a principle by which first the +organism with its vital processes, and then the portion of it called the +brain, in which is represented the intellect with its _a priori_ forms, +are evolved as aids in the strife. And, adapting all the manifestations +to one another, there is a teleology of the universe. The whole world, +with all its phenomena, is the objectivity of the one and indivisible +Will; the Idea which is related to all other Ideas as the harmony to the +single voices. The unity of the Will shows itself in the unison of all +its phenomena as related to one another. Man, its clearest and +completest objectivation, is the summit of a pyramid, and could not +exist without this. Inorganic and organic nature, then, were adapted to +the future appearance of man, as man is adapted to the development that +preceded him. But in thinking the reality, time is to be abstracted +from. The earlier, we are obliged to say, is fitted to the later, as the +later is fitted to the earlier; but the relation of means to end, under +which we cannot help figuring the adaptation, is only appearance for our +manner of knowledge. And the harmony described does not get rid of the +conflict inherent in all will. + +In this account of Schopenhauer's metaphysical doctrine, I have tried to +make the exposition as smooth as possible; but at two points the +discontinuity can scarcely be concealed. First, the relation of the +universal Will to the individual will is not made clear; and, secondly, +the emergence of the world of presentation, with the knowledge in which +it culminates, is left unintelligible because the will is conceived as +mere blind striving without an aim. As regards the first point, +disciples and expositors have been able to show that, by means of +distinctions in his later writings, apparent contradictions are to some +extent cleared away; and, moreover, that he came to recognise more +reality in the individual will. On the second point, I think it will be +necessary to admit that his system as such breaks down. But both points +must be considered in their connection. + +One of the most noteworthy features of Schopenhauer's philosophy is, as +he himself thought, the acceptance from first to last of Kant's +distinction between the 'empirical' and the 'intelligible' character of +the individual. Every act of will of every human being follows with +necessity as phenomenon from its phenomenal causes; so that all the +events of each person's life are determined in accordance with +scientific law. Nevertheless, the character empirically manifested in +the phenomenal world, while it is completely necessitated, is the +expression of something that is free from necessitation. This +'intelligible character' is out of time, and, itself undetermined, +manifests itself through that which develops in time as a chain of +necessary causes and effects. That this doctrine had been taken up, +without any ambiguity as regards the determinism, by Schelling as well +as by himself, he expressly acknowledges; and he finds it, as he also +finds modern idealism, anticipated in various passages by the +Neo-Platonists. His adaptation of it to his doctrine of the Ideas is +distinctly Neo-Platonic in so far as he recognises 'Ideas of +individuals'; but of course to make Will the essence belongs to his own +system. 'The intelligible character,' he says, 'coincides with the Idea, +or, yet more precisely, with the original act of will that manifests +itself in it: in so far, not only is the empirical character of each +man, but also of each animal species, nay, of each plant species, and +even of each original force of inorganic nature, to be regarded as +phenomenon of an intelligible character, that is, of an indivisible act +of will out of time.' This is what he called the '_aseitas_' of the +will; borrowing a scholastic term to indicate its derivation (if we may +speak of it as derived) from itself (_a se_), and not from a supposed +creative act. Only if we adopt this view are we entitled to regard +actions as worthy of moral approval or disapproval. They are such not +because they are not necessitated, but because they necessarily show +forth the nature of an essence the freedom of which consists in being +what it is. Yet he could not but find a difficulty in reconciling this +with his position that the one universal Will is identical in all +things, and in each is 'individuated' only by space and time. For the +Ideas, like the thing-in-itself, are eternal, that is, outside of time +as well as space; and all the things now enumerated, forces of nature, +plant and animal species, and individual characters of men, are declared +to be in themselves Ideas. + +He in part meets this difficulty by the subtlety that time and space do +not, strictly speaking, determine individuality, but arise along with +it. The diremption of individualities becomes explicit in those forms. +Yet he must have perceived that this is not a complete answer, and +various modifications can be seen going on. His first view clearly was +that the individual is wholly impermanent, and at death simply +disappears; nothing is left but the one Will and the universal Subject +of contemplation identical in all. Metempsychosis is the best +mythological rendering of what happens, but it is no more. Later, he +puts forward the not very clearly defined theory of a 'palingenesia' by +which a particular will, but not the intellect that formerly accompanied +it, may reappear in the phenomenal world. And the hospitality he showed +to stories of magic, clairvoyance, and ghost-seeing, is scarcely +compatible with the view that the individual will is no more than a +phenomenal differentiation of the universal will. A speculation (not put +forward as anything more) on the appearance of a special providence in +the destiny of the individual, points, as Professor Volkelt has noted, +to the idea of a guidance, not from without, but by a kind of good +daemon or genius that is the ultimate reality of the person. On all this +we must not lay too much stress; but there is certainly one passage that +can only be described as a definite concession that the individual is +real in a sense not at first allowed. Individuality, it is said in so +many words (_Parerga_, ii. Sec. 117), does not rest only on the 'principle +of individuation' (time and space), and is therefore not through and +through phenomenon, but is rooted in the thing-in-itself. 'How deep its +roots go belongs to the questions which I do not undertake to +answer.'[1] + + [1] _Werke_, ed. Frauenstaedt, vol. vi. p. 243. + +This tends to modify considerably, but does not overthrow, +Schopenhauer's original system. In very general terms, he is in the +number of the 'pantheistic' thinkers; and it is remarkable, on +examination, how these, in Europe at least, have nearly always +recognised in the end some permanent reality in the individual. This is +contrary to first impressions: but the great names may be cited of +Plotinus, John Scotus Erigena, Giordano Bruno, Spinoza (in Part v. of +the _Ethics_), and finally of Schopenhauer's special aversion, Hegel, +who has been supposed most unfavourable of all to any recognition of +individuality as real. It is more true, Hegel maintains, that the +individuality determines its world than that it is determined by it; and +there is no explanation why the determination should be such and such +except that the individuality was already what it is.[2] And, if +Schopenhauer's more imaginative speculations seek countenance from the +side of empiricism, there is nothing in them quite so audacious as a +speculation of J. S. Mill on disembodied mind, thrown out during the +time when he was writing his _Logic_.[3] + + [2] _Phaenomenologie des Geistes_, Jubilaeumsausgabe, ed. G. Lasson, pp. + 201-3. + + [3] Letter to Robert Barclay Fox, May 10, 1842. Printed in Appendix to + _Letters and Journals of Caroline Fox_, third ed., vol. ii. pp. 331-2. + 'To suppose that the eye is _necessary_ to sight,' says Mill, 'seems to + me the notion of one immersed in matter. What we call our bodily + sensations are all in the mind, and would not necessarily or probably + cease, because the body perishes.' + +The association with pantheism Schopenhauer accepts in principle, though +the name is not congenial to him. In his system the Will is one and all, +like the 'Deus' of Spinoza. The difference is that, instead of ascribing +perfection to the universe that is its manifestation, he regards the +production of a world as a lapse from which redemption is to be sought. +His doctrine has been rightly described, in common with the predominant +philosophical doctrines of his period, as a resultant of the deepened +subjective analysis brought by Kant into modern philosophy on the one +side, and of the return to Spinoza in the quest for unity of principle +on the other. Why, then, it may be asked, are Fichte, Schelling, and +Hegel the constant objects of his attack? The true explanation is not +the merely external one, that they were his successful rivals for public +favour, but is to be found in a real antithesis of thought. Within the +limits of the idealism they all hold in common, Schopenhauer is at the +opposite pole. In spite of his attempt to incorporate the Platonic +Ideas, and in spite of his following of Kant, whose 'intelligible world' +was in essence Platonic or neo-Platonic, he could find no place in his +system for a rational order at the summit. Now this order was precisely +what Fichte and Hegel aimed at demonstrating. If Schopenhauer is less +unsympathetic in his references to Schelling, that is because +Schelling's world-soul appeared to him to prefigure his own attempt to +discover in nature the manifestation of a blindly striving will or +feeling rather than reason. Suspicious as he shows himself of possible +plagiarisms by others, the charge cannot be retorted against himself. +The supreme principle of Fichte, it has been pointed out, has an +actively volitional character and was formulated before Schopenhauer's: +but then it is essentially rational. For Hegel, what is supreme is the +world-reason. Hence they are at one with Plato in holding that in some +sense 'mind is king.' For Schopenhauer, on the contrary, mind, or pure +intellect, is an emancipated slave. Having reached its highest point, +and seen through the work of the will, it does not turn back and +organise it, but abolishes it as far as its insight extends. + +Yet to say merely this is to give a wrong impression of Schopenhauer. +Starting though he does with blind will, and ending with the flight of +the ascetic from the suffering inherent in the world that is the +manifestation of such a will, he nevertheless, in the intermediate +stages, makes the world a cosmos and not a chaos. And the Platonists on +their side have to admit that 'the world of all of us' does not present +itself on the surface as a manifestation of pure reason, and that it +is a serious task to 'rationalise' it. Where he completely fails +is where the Platonic systems also fail, though from the opposite +starting-point. His attempt to derive presentation, intellect, +knowledge, from blind striving, is undoubtedly a failure. But so also +is the attempt of the Platonising thinkers to deduce a world of mixture +from a principle of pure reason without aid from anything else +empirically assumed. Not that in either case there is failure to give +explanations in detail; but in both cases much is taken from experience +without reduction to the principles of the system. What we may say by +way of comparison is this: that if Schopenhauer had in so many words +recognised an immanent Reason as well as Will in the reality of the +universe, he would have formally renounced his pessimism; while it +cannot be said that on the other side a more explicit empiricism in the +account of the self-manifestation of Reason would necessarily destroy +the optimism. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +AESTHETICS + + +A portion of Schopenhauer's system by which its pessimism is +considerably mitigated is his theory of the Beautiful and of Fine Art. +The characteristic of aesthetic contemplation is, he finds, that +intellect throws off the yoke and subsists purely for itself as clear +mirror of the world, free from all subjection to practical purposes of +the will. In this state of freedom, temporary painlessness is attained. + +The theory starts from his adaptation of the Platonic Ideas. Regarded +purely as an aesthetic theory, it departs from Plato, as he notes; for, +with the later Platonists, who took up the defence of poetic myths and +of the imitative arts as against their master, he holds that Art +penetrates to the general Idea through the particular, and hence that +the work of art is no mere 'copy of a copy.' The difference of the Idea +from the Concept is that it is not merely abstract and general, but +combines with generality the characters of an intuition. + +The Ideas, as we have seen, constitute the determinate stages of +objectivation of the Will. The innumerable individuals of which the +Ideas are the patterns are subject to the law of sufficient reason. They +appear, that is to say, under the forms of time, space, and causality. +The Idea is beyond these forms, and therefore is clear of plurality and +change. Since the law of sufficient reason is the common form under +which stands all the subject's knowledge so far as the subject knows as +individual, the Ideas lie outside the sphere of knowledge of the +individual as such. If, therefore, the Ideas are to be the object of +knowledge, this can only be by annulling individuality in the knowing +subject. + +As thing-in-itself, the Will is exempt even from the first of the forms +of knowledge, the form of being 'object for a subject.' The Platonic +Idea, on the other hand, is necessarily an object, something known, a +presentation. It has laid aside, or rather has not taken on, the +subordinate forms; but it has retained the first and most general form. +It is the immediate and most adequate possible objectivity of the Will; +whereas particular things are an objectivation troubled by the forms of +which the law of sufficient reason is the common expression. + +When intellect breaks loose from the service of the will, for which it +was originally destined in the teleology of nature, then the subject +ceases to be merely individual and becomes pure will-less subject of +knowledge. In this state the beholder no longer tracks out relations in +accordance with the principle of sufficient reason--which is the mode of +scientific as well as of common knowledge--but rests in fixed +contemplation of the given object apart from its connection with +anything else. The contemplator thus 'lost' in the object, it is not the +single thing as such that is known, but the Idea, the eternal form, the +immediate objectivity of the Will at this stage. The correlate of this +object--the pure Subject exempt from the principle of sufficient +reason--is eternal, like the Idea. + +The objectivation of the Will appears faintly in inorganic +things,--clouds, water, crystals,--more fully in the plant, yet more +fully in the animal, most completely in man. Only the essential in these +stages of objectivation constitutes the Idea. Its development into +manifold phenomena under the forms of the principle of sufficient +reason, is unessential, lies merely in the mode of knowledge for the +individual, and has reality only for this. It is not otherwise with the +unfolding of that Idea which is the completest objectivation of the +Will. To the Idea of Man, the occurrences of human history are as +unessential as the shapes they assume to the clouds, as the figures of +its whirlpools and foam-drift to the stream, as its frost-flowers to the +ice. The same underlying passions and dispositions everlastingly recur +in the same modes. It is idle to suppose that anything is gained. But +also nothing is lost: so the Earth-spirit might reply to one who +complained of high endeavours frustrated, faculties wasted, promises of +world-enlightenment brought to nought; for there is infinite time to +dispose of, and all possibilities are for ever renewed. + +The kind of knowledge for which the Ideas are the object of +contemplation finds its expression in Art, the work of genius. Art +repeats in its various media the Ideas grasped by pure contemplation. +Its only end is the communication of these. While Science, following the +stream of events according to their determinate relations, never reaches +an ultimate end, Art is always at the end. 'It stops the wheel of time; +relations vanish for it: only the essence, the Idea, is its object.' The +characteristic of genius is a predominant capacity for thus +contemplating things independently of the principle of sufficient +reason. Since this requires a forgetting of one's own person and the +relations between it and things, the attitude of genius is simply the +completest 'objectivity.' The 'subjectivity' opposed to this, in +Schopenhauer's phraseology, is preoccupation with the interests of one's +own will. It is, he says, as if there fell to the share of genius a +measure of intelligence far beyond the needs of the individual will: and +this makes possible the setting aside of individual interests, the +stripping off of the particular personality, so that the subject becomes +'pure knowing subject,' 'clear world-eye,' in a manner sufficiently +sustained for that which has been grasped to be repeated in the work of +art. A necessary element in genius is therefore Imagination. For without +imagination to represent, in a shape not merely abstract, things that +have not come within personal experience, genius would remain limited to +immediate intuition, and could not make its vision apprehensible by +others. Nor without imagination could the particular things that express +the Idea be cleared of the imperfections by which their limited +expression of it falls short of what nature was aiming at in their +production. 'Inspiration' is ascribed to genius because its +characteristic attitude is intermittent. The man of genius cannot always +remain on a height, but has to fall back to the level of the common man, +who can scarcely at all regard things except as they affect his +interests,--have a relation to his will, direct or indirect. + +This is the statement in its first outline of a theory that became one +of Schopenhauer's most fruitful topics. Many are the pages he has +devoted to the contrast between the man of genius and 'the wholesale +ware of nature, which she turns out daily by thousands.' The genius is +for him primarily the artist. Scientific genius as a distinctive thing +he does not fully recognise; and he regards men of action, and +especially statesmen, rather as men of highly competent ability +endowed with an exceptionally good physical constitution than as men of +genius in the proper sense. Philosophers like himself, who, as he +frankly says, appear about once in a hundred years, he classes in the +end with the artists; though this was left somewhat indeterminate in his +first exposition. The weakness of the man of genius in dealing with the +ordinary circumstances of life he allows, and even insists on. Genius, +grasping the Idea in its perfection, fails to understand individuals. A +poet may know man profoundly, and men very ill. He admits the proximity +of genius to madness on one side, and explains it in this way. What +marks the stage of actual madness, as distinguished from illusion or +hallucination, is complete disruption of the memory of past life, of the +history of the personality as something continuous; so that the +particular thing is viewed by itself, out of relation. This gives a kind +of resemblance to the attitude of genius, for which present intuition +excludes from view the relations of things to each other. Or, as we may +perhaps sum up his thought in its most general form, 'alienation' or +dissolution of personality has the resemblance often noted between +extremes to the impersonality, or, as he calls it, 'objectivity,' that +is super-personal. + +In spite of his contempt for the crowd, he has to admit, of course, that +the capacity of genius to recognise the Ideas of things and to become +momentarily impersonal must in some measure belong to all men; +otherwise, they could not even enjoy a work of art when produced. Genius +has the advantage only in the much higher degree and the greater +prolongation of the insight. Since, then, the actual achievement of the +artist is to make us look into the world through his eyes, the feelings +for the beautiful and the sublime may be treated irrespectively of the +question whether they are aroused by nature and human life directly or +by means of art. + +AEsthetic pleasure in contemplation of the beautiful proceeds partly from +recognition of the individual object not as one particular thing but as +Platonic Idea, that is, as the enduring form of this whole kind of +things; partly from the consciousness the knower has of himself not as +individual, but as pure, will-less Subject of Knowledge. All volition +springs out of need, therefore out of want, therefore out of suffering. +No attained object of will can give permanent satisfaction. Thus, there +can be no durable happiness or rest for us as long as we are subjects of +will. 'The Subject of Will lies continually on the turning wheel of +Ixion, draws ever in the sieve of the Danaides, is the eternally +thirsting Tantalus. But in the moment of pure objective contemplation, +free from all interest of the particular subjectivity, we enter a +painless state: the wheel of Ixion stands still. The Flemish painters +produce this aesthetic effect by the sense of disinterested contemplation +conveyed in their treatment of insignificant objects. There are certain +natural scenes that have power in themselves, apart from artistic +treatment, to put us in this state; but the slightest obtrusion of +individual interest destroys the magic. Past and distant objects, +through their apparent detachment, have the same power. The essential +thing aesthetically, whether we contemplate the present or the past, the +near or the distant, is that only the world of presentation remains; the +world as will has vanished. + +The difference between the feelings of the Beautiful and of the Sublime +is this. In the feeling of the beautiful, pure intelligence gains the +victory without a struggle, leaving in consciousness only the pure +subject of knowledge, so that no reminiscence of the will remains. In +the feeling of the sublime, on the other hand, the state of pure +intelligence has to be won by a conscious breaking loose from relations +in the object that suggest something threatening to the will; though +there must not be actual danger; for in that case the individual will +itself would come into play, and aesthetic detachment would cease. +Elevation above the sense of terror has not only to be consciously won +but consciously maintained, and involves a continuous reminiscence, not +indeed of any individual will, but of the will of man in general, so far +as it is expressed through its objectivity, the human body, confronted +by forces hostile to it. Pre-eminently this feeling arises from +contrast between the immensities of space and time and the apparent +insignificance of man. It means in the last resort that the beholder is +upheld by the consciousness that as pure subject of knowledge (not as +individual subject) he himself bears within him all the worlds and all +the ages, and is eternal as the forces that vainly seem to threaten him +with annihilation. + +On the objective side, and apart from the subjective distinction just +set forth, the sublime and the beautiful are not essentially different. +In both cases alike, the object of aesthetic contemplation is not the +single thing, but the Idea that is striving towards manifestation in it. +Whatever is viewed aesthetically is viewed out of relation to time and +space: 'along with the law of sufficient reason the single thing and the +knowing individual are taken away, and nothing remains over but the Idea +and the pure Subject of Knowledge, which together make up the adequate +objectivity of the Will at this stage.' There is thus a sense in which +everything is beautiful; since the Will appears in everything at some +stage of objectivity, and this means that it is the expression of some +Idea. But one thing can be more beautiful than another by facilitating +aesthetic contemplation. This facilitation proceeds either from the +greater clearness and perfection with which the particular thing shows +forth the Idea of its kind, or from the higher stage of objectivation to +which that Idea corresponds. Man being the highest stage of +objectivation of the Will, the revelation of his essence is the highest +aim of art. In aesthetic contemplation of inorganic nature and vegetative +life, whether in the reality or through the medium of art, and in +appreciation of architecture, the subjective aspect, that is to say, the +enjoyment of pure will-less knowledge, is predominant; the Ideas +themselves being here lower stages of objectivity. On the other hand, +when animals and men are the object of aesthetic contemplation or +representation, the enjoyment consists more in the objective +apprehension of those Ideas in which the essence of the Will is most +clearly and fully manifested. + +Of all Schopenhauer's work, its aesthetic part has met with the most +general appreciation. Here especially he abounds in observations drawn +directly, in his own phrase, from intuition. To make a selection of +these, however, is not appropriate to a brief sketch like the present. I +pass on, therefore, to those portions of his theory of Art by which he +makes the transition, in terms of his system, to Morality. + +From Architecture onward the arts are obliged to represent the Will as +divided. Here, at the first stage, its division subsists only in a +conflict of inorganic forces which have to be brought to equilibrium. +The conflict between weight and rigidity is in truth the only aesthetic +material of architecture as a fine art. When we come to animal and +lastly to human life, which, in the Plastic Arts and in Poetry, as form, +individualised expression, and action, is the highest object of aesthetic +representation, the vehemence of divided will is fully revealed; and +here too is revealed the essential identity of every will with our own. +In the words of the Indian wisdom, 'Tat twam asi'; 'that thou art.' +Under the head of Ethics it will be shown expressly that by this +insight, when it reacts on the will, the will can deny itself. For the +temporary release from its striving, given in aesthetic contemplation, is +then substituted permanent release. To this 'resignation,' the innermost +essence of all virtue and holiness, and the final redemption from the +world, Art itself, at its highest stages, points the way. + +The summits of pictorial and poetic art Schopenhauer finds in the great +Italian painters so far as they represent the ethical spirit of +Christianity, and in the tragic poets, ancient and modern. It is true +that the poverty of their sacred history or mythology puts the Christian +artists at a disadvantage; but events are merely the accidents of their +art. Not in these, as related according to the law of sufficient reason, +is the essence, but in the spirit we divine through the forms portrayed. +In their representation of men full of that spirit, and especially in +the eyes, we see mirrored the knowledge that has seized the whole +essence of the world and of life, and that has reacted on the will, not +so as to give it motives, but as a 'quietive'; whence proceeds complete +resignation, and with it the annulling of the will and of the whole +essence of this world. Of tragedy, the subject-matter is the conflict of +the will with itself at its highest stage of objectivity. Here also the +end is the resignation brought on by complete knowledge of the essence +of the world. The hero, on whom at last this knowledge has acted as a +quietive, gives up, not merely life, but the whole will to live. 'The +true meaning of tragedy is the deeper insight, that what the hero +expiates is not his particular sins, but original sin, that is, the +guilt of existence itself.' To illustrate this position Schopenhauer is +fond of quoting a passage from Calderon which declares that the greatest +sin of man is to have been born. + +It seems strange that, after deriding as he does the popular notion of +'poetic justice' so detached a thinker should imagine an at least +equally one-sided view to receive its final confirmation from the +Spanish dramatist's poetic phrasing of a Christian dogma. The great +tragic poets, for Schopenhauer also, are AEschylus, Sophocles and +Shakespeare. Now it is safe to say that by none of these was any such +general doctrine held either in conceptual or in intuitive form. The +whole effect of any kind of art, of course he would admit, cannot be +packed into a formula; but if we seek one as an aid to understanding, +some adaptation of his own theory of the sublime would probably serve +much better as applied to tragedy than his direct theory of the drama. +In the case of pictorial art, all that is proved by what he says about +the representation of ascetic saintliness, is that this, like many other +things, can be so brought within the scope of art as to make us +momentarily identify ourselves with its Idea in the impersonal manner he +has himself described. His purely aesthetic theory is quite adequate to +the case, without any assumption that this is the representation of what +is best. Art, pictorial or poetic, can no more prove pessimism than +optimism. We pick out expressions of one or the other for quotation +according to our moods or subjective preferences; but, if we have the +feeling for art itself, our sense of actual aesthetic value ought to be +independent of these. + +Schopenhauer's aesthetic theory, however, does not end here. There +follows the part of it by which he has had an influence on artists +themselves. For him, a position separate from all the other arts is held +by music. While the rest objectify the Will mediately, that is to say, +by means of the Ideas, Music is as immediate an objectivation of the +whole Will as the world itself, or as the Ideas, of which the pluralised +phenomenon constitutes the sum of particular things. The other arts +speak of the shadow, music of the substance. There is indeed a +parallelism, an analogy, between Music and the Ideas; yet Music never +expresses the phenomenon in which these are manifested, but only the +inner essence behind the appearance, the Will itself. In a sense it +renders not feeling in its particularity, but feeling _in abstracto_; +joy, sorrow, not a joy, a sorrow. The phenomenal world and music are to +be regarded as two different expressions of the same thing. The world +might be called embodied Music as well as embodied Will. 'Melodies are +to a certain extent like general concepts, an abstract of reality.' A +complete explanation of music, that is, a detailed repetition of it in +concepts, were this possible, would be a complete explanation of the +world (since both express the same thing) and therefore a true and final +philosophy. As music only reaches its perfection in the full harmony, +'so the one Will out of time finds its perfect objectivation only in +complete union of all the stages which in innumerable degrees of +heightened distinctness reveal its essence.' But here, too, Schopenhauer +adds, the Will is felt, and can be proved, to be a divided will; and the +deliverance wrought by this supreme art, as by all the others, is only +temporary. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +ETHICS + + +Permanent redemption from the suffering of the world is to be found only +in the holiness of the ascetic; but to this there are many stages, +constituting the generally accepted human virtues. Of these Schopenhauer +has a rational account to give in terms of his philosophy; and if the +last stage does not seem to follow by logical sequence from the others, +this is only what is to be expected; for it is reached, in his view, by +a sort of miracle. To the highest kind of intuitive knowledge, from +which the ascetic denial of the will proceeds, artistic contemplation +ought to prepare the way; and so also, on his principles, ought the +practice of justice and goodness. Yet he is obliged to admit that few +thus reach the goal. Of those that do reach it, the most arrive through +personal suffering, which may be deserved. A true miracle is often +worked in the repentant criminal, by which final deliverance is +achieved. Though the 'intelligible character' is unalterable, and the +empirical character can only be the unfolding of this, as every great +dramatist intuitively recognises, yet the 'convertites,' like Duke +Frederick in _As You Like It_, are not to be regarded as hypocrites. The +'second voyage' to the harbour, that of the disappointed egoist, on +condition of this miracle, brings the passenger to it as surely as the +first, that of the true saints, which is only for the few. And in these +equally a miraculous conversion of the will has to be finally worked. + +At the entrance to his distinctive theory of ethics, Schopenhauer places +a restatement of his metaphysics as the possible basis of a mode of +contemplating life which, he admits, has some community with an +optimistic pantheism. The Will, through the presentation and the +accompanying intelligence developed in its service, becomes conscious +that that which it wills is precisely the world, life as it is. To call +it 'the will to live' is therefore a pleonasm. 'Will' and 'will to live' +are equivalent. For this will, life is everlastingly a certainty. +'Neither the will, the thing-in-itself in all phenomena, nor the subject +of knowledge, the spectator of all phenomena, is ever touched by birth +and death.' It is true that the individual appears and disappears; but +individuality is illusory. Past and future exist only in conceptual +thought. 'The form of life is a present without end, howsoever the +individuals, phenomena of the Idea, come into existence and vanish in +time, like fugitive dreams.' Only as phenomenon is each man different +from the other things of the world: as thing-in-itself he is the Will, +which appears in all, and death takes away the illusion that divides his +consciousness from the rest. 'Death is a sleep in which the +individuality is forgotten: everything else wakes again, or rather has +remained awake.' It is, in the expression adopted by Schopenhauer later, +an awakening from the dream of life: though this bears with it somewhat +different implications; and, as has been said, his theory of +individuality became modified. + +With the doctrine of the eternal life of the Will are connected +Schopenhauer's theories, developed later, of the immortality of the +species and of individualised sexual love. The latter is by itself a +remarkable achievement, and constitutes the one distinctly new +development brought to completion in his later years; for the +modifications in his theory of individuality are only tentative. His +theory of love has a determinate conclusion, of great value for +science, and not really compatible, it seems to me, with his pessimism. +In its relation to ethics, on which he insisted, it is rightly placed in +the position it occupies, between the generalised statement of his +metaphysics just now set forth on the one side, and his theory of human +virtue on the other. + +The teleology that manifests itself in individualised love is, in his +view, not related in reality to the interests of the individual life, +but to those of the species. That this is immortal follows from the +eternity of the Idea it unfolds.[4] The end sought is aimed at +unconsciously by the person. Fundamentally, for Schopenhauer, teleology +must of course be unconscious, since the will is blind, and will, not +intelligence, is primordial. Its typical case is the instinct of +animals; but the 'instinctive' character belongs also to the +accomplishment of the highest aims, as in art and virtue. What +characterises individualised love internally is the aim, attributed to +'nature' or 'the species,' at a certain typical beauty or perfection of +the offspring. The lover is therefore deluded in thinking that he is +seeking his own happiness. What looks through the eyes of lovers is the +genius of the race, meditating on the composition of the next +generation. It may, in the complexity of circumstances, be thwarted. +When it reaches its end, often personal happiness is sacrificed. +Marriages dictated by interest tend to be happier than love-matches. +Yet, though the sacrifice of the individual to the race is involuntary +in these, egoism is after all overcome; hence they are quite rightly the +object of a certain admiration and sympathy, while the prudential ones +are looked upon with a tinge of contempt. For here too that element +appears which alone gives nobility to the life either of intellect or of +art or of moral virtue, namely, the rising above a subjective interest +of the individual will. + + [4] The disappearance of species in time raises difficulties in more + than one way for his philosophy; but he formally escapes refutation by + the suggestion, already noted, that the Idea need not always be + manifested phenomenally in the same world. This, however, he did not + work out. + +No doubt there are touches of pessimism in this statement; but the +general theory does not seem reconcilable finally with pessimism as +Schopenhauer understands it. For it is a definitely stated position of +his that nature keeps up the process of the world by yielding just +enough to prevent discontinuance of the striving for an illusory end. +Yet he admits here in the result something beyond bare continuance of +life; for this is already secured without the particular modification of +feeling described. What the feeling is brought in to secure is a better +realisation of the type in actual individuals; and such realisation is +certainly more than bare subsistence with the least possible expenditure +of nature's resources. + +As the immediate preliminary to his ethics proper, Schopenhauer restates +his doctrine on the intelligible and the empirical character in man, and +lays down a generalised psychological position regarding the suffering +inherent in life. Everything as phenomenon, we have seen already, is +determined because it is subject to the law of sufficient reason. On the +other hand, everything as thing-in-itself is free; for 'freedom' means +only non-subjection to that law. The intelligible character of each man +is an indivisible, unalterable act of will out of time; the developed +and explicit phenomenon of this in time and space is the empirical +character. Man is his own work, not in the light of knowledge, but +before all knowledge; this is secondary and an instrument. Ultimately, +freedom is a mystery, and takes us beyond even will as the name for the +thing-in-itself. In reality, that which is 'will to live' need not have +been such (though we cannot see how this is so), but has become such +from itself and from nothing else. This is its '_aseitas_.' Hence it is +in its power to deny itself as will to live. When it does this, the +redemption (like the fall) comes from itself. This denial does not mean +annihilation, except relatively to all that we know under the forms of +our understanding. For the will, though the nearest we can get to the +thing-in-itself, is in truth a partially phenomenalised expression of +this. As the will to live expresses itself phenomenally, so also does +the denial of the will to live, when this, by special 'grace,' is +achieved. Only in man does the freedom thus attained find phenomenal +expression. That man can attain to it proves that in him the will has +reached its highest possible stage of objectivation; for, after it has +turned back and denied itself, there is evidently nothing more that we +can call existence, that is to say, phenomenal existence, beyond. What +there is beyond in the truth of being is something that the mystics +know--or rather, possess, for it is beyond knowledge--but cannot +communicate. + +The psychological reason that can be assigned for the ascetic flight +from the world is that all pleasure, happiness, satisfaction, is merely +negative. The will is a striving that has no ultimate aim. It is +sustained only by hindrances. Hindrance means suffering; and every +satisfaction attained is only temporary, a mere liberation from need, +want, pain, which is positive. Suffering increases with the degree of +consciousness. The life of civilised man is an alternation between pain +and _ennui_, which can itself become as intolerable a suffering as +anything. The problem of moral philosophy, then, is ultimately how +redemption from such a world is to be attained, but only so far as this +is a matter of conceptual knowledge. For philosophy, being from +beginning to end theoretical, cannot work the practical miracle by which +the will denies itself. + +The intuitive, as distinguished from merely conceptual, knowledge by +which the return is made, consists essentially in a clear insight into +the identity of the suffering will in all things and the necessity of +its suffering as long as it is will to live. This, then, is the true +foundation of morality. The universe as metaphysical thing-in-itself, as +noumenon, has an ethical meaning. All its stages of objectivation, +though in the process what seems to be aimed at is preservation of the +will as manifested, have in truth for their ultimate aim its redemption +by suppression of the phenomenal world in which it manifests itself. + +Affirmation of the will is affirmation of the body, which is the +objectivity of the will. The sexual impulse, since it affirms life +beyond the death of the individual, is the strongest of +self-affirmations. In it is found the meaning of the mythical +representation that has taken shape in the theological dogma of original +sin. For by this affirmation going beyond the individual body, suffering +and death, as the necessary accompaniment of the phenomenon of life, are +reaffirmed, and the possibility of redemption this time declared +fruitless. But through the whole process there runs eternal justice. The +justification of suffering is that the will affirms itself; and the +self-affirmation is justified by payment of the penalty. + +Before the final redemption--which is not for the world but for the +individual--there are many stages of ethical progress. These consist in +the gradual overcoming of egoism by sympathy. And here Schopenhauer +proceeds to set forth a practical scheme for the social life of man, +differing from ordinary utilitarianism only by reducing all sympathy to +pity, in accordance with his view that there can be no such thing as +positive happiness. + +He begins with a theory of justice, legal and moral, very much on the +lines of Hobbes, except that he regards it as up to a certain point _a +priori_. Here he is consistent throughout. As in his philosophical +account of mathematics and physics, so also in his aesthetics and +ethics, he retained, side by side with a strong empirical tendency, +belief in certain irreducible _a priori_ forms without which our +knowledge cannot be constituted. The pure ethical theory of justice, he +says, bears to the political theory the relation of pure to applied +mathematics. Injustice he holds to be the positive conception. It means +the breaking into the sphere of another person's will to live. The +self-affirmation of the will that appears in one individual body is +extended to denial of the will that appears in other bodies. Justice +consists in non-encroachment. There is a 'natural right,' or 'moral +right,' of resistance to injustice by infliction of what, apart from the +attempted encroachment, would be wrong. Either force or deception may be +used; as either may be the instrument of injustice. The purely ethical +doctrine of justice applies only to action; since only the not doing of +injustice depends on us. With the State and its laws, the relation is +reversed. The object of these is to prevent the suffering of injustice. +The State is not directed against egoism, but has sprung out of a +rationalised collective egoism. It has for its purpose only to avoid the +inconvenient consequences of individual aggressions on others. Outside +of the State, there is a right of self-defence against injustice, but no +right of punishment. The punishment threatened by the State is +essentially a motive against committing wrong, intended to supply the +place of ethical motives for those who are insufficiently accessible to +them. Actual infliction of it is the carrying out of the threat when it +has failed, so that in general the expectation of the penalty may be +certain. Revenge, which has a view to the past, cannot be justified +ethically: punishment is directed only to the future. There is no right +in any one to set himself up as a moral judge and inflict pain; but man +has a right to do what is needful for social security. The criminal's +acts are of course necessitated; but he cannot justly complain of being +punished for them, since it is ultimately from himself, from what he is, +that they sprang. + +With the doctrine of 'eternal justice,' touched on above, we pass into a +different region of thought. What is responsible for the guilt in the +world is the Will by which everything exists, and the suffering +everlastingly falls where the guilt is. Take the case of apparently +unpunished injustice (from the human point of view) expressing itself in +the extreme form of deliberate cruelty. Through this also, eternal +justice, from which there is no escape, is fulfilled. 'The torturer and +the tortured are one. The former errs in thinking he has no share in the +torture; the latter in thinking he has no share in the guilt.' For all +the pain of the world is the expiation of the sin involved in the +self-affirmation of will, and the Will as thing-in-itself is one and the +same in all. + +If this could satisfy any one, there would be no need to go further. The +whole being as it ought to be, why try to rectify details that are +absolutely indifferent? But of course the implication is that +individuality is simply illusory; and this, as has been said, was a +position that Schopenhauer neither could nor did consistently maintain. +Indeed, immediately after setting forth this theory of 'eternal +justice,' he goes on to a relative justification of those acts of +disinterested vengeance by which a person knowingly sacrifices his own +life for the sake of retribution on some extraordinary criminal. This, +he says, is a form of punishment, not mere revenge, although it involves +an error concerning the nature of eternal justice. Suicide involves a +similar error, in so far as it supposes that the real being of the +individual can be assailed through its phenomenal manifestation. It is +not a denial of the will to live, but a strong affirmation of it, only +not in the given circumstances: different circumstances are desired with +such intensity that the present cannot be borne. Therefore the +individual manifestation of the will is not suppressed. Yet, one might +reply, if individuality is an illusion attached to the appearance in +time and space of a particular organism, it would seem that, with the +disappearance of this, all that distinguishes the individual must +disappear also. + +Schopenhauer had no will thus to escape from life; nor did he afterwards +devote himself to expounding further his theory of eternal justice. What +he wrote later, either positively or as mere speculation, implies both +greater reality in the individual and more of cosmic equity to +correspond. His next step, even at his first stage, is to continue the +exposition of a practicable ethics for human life. His procedure +consists in adding beneficence to justice, with the proviso already +mentioned, which is required by his psychology, that all beneficence can +consist only in the relief of pain. For Schopenhauer, as for Comte, +what is to be overcome is 'egoism,' an excessive degree of which is the +mark of the character we call 'bad.' The 'good' is what Comte and +Spencer call the 'altruistic' character. This difference between +characters Schopenhauer goes on to explain in terms of his metaphysics. +The egoist is so deluded by the principle of individuation that he +supposes an absolute cleft between his own person and all others. The +remorse of conscience from which he suffers proceeds in part from an +obscure perception that the principle of individuation is illusory. +Genuine virtue springs out of the intuitive (not merely abstract) +knowledge that recognises in another individuality the same essence as +in one's own. The characteristic of the good man is that he makes less +difference than is customary between himself and others. Justice is an +intermediate stage between the encroaching egoism of the bad and +positive goodness. In the renunciation of rights of property, and +provision for all personal needs without aid from others, practised by +some religious and philosophical ascetics, it is passing over into +something more. There is, however, a certain misunderstanding involved +in so interpreting strict justice; for there are many ways in which the +rich and powerful can be positively beneficent. At the other extreme, +when they simply live on their inherited wealth, without doing anything +in return, their mode of life is morally, though not legally, unjust. +Rights of property Schopenhauer derived from labour spent on the things +appropriated. The injustice, in many ways, of the present social order +he quite recognises. If he has no sympathy with revolutions, it is +because he has no belief in the realisation of an ideal state. This +follows from his view of history. Human life, it is his conviction, +never has been and never will be different as a whole. Redemption from +evil can be attained only by the individual. All that the State can do +is to provide certain very general conditions of security under which +there will be no hindrance to those who desire to live in accordance +with a moral ideal. + +Yet there are qualifications to make. Many passages in Schopenhauer's +writings prove his firm belief in the future triumph of reason over +superstition. It is to the honour of humanity, he says, that so +detestable a form of evil as organised religious persecution has +appeared only in one section of history. And, in his own personal case, +he has the most complete confidence that the truths he has put forth +cannot fail sometime to gain a hearing. In all cases, error is only +temporary, and truth will prevail. His language on this subject, and +indeed often on others, is indistinguishable from that of an optimist. + +In the last resort, his pessimism entrenches itself behind the +psychological proposition that every satisfaction is negative, being +only the removal of a pain. If this is unsustainable, there is nothing +finally in his Metaphysics of Will to necessitate the pessimistic +conclusion drawn. The mode of deduction by which he proceeds is to argue +first to the position already noticed: that all that love of others on +which morality is based is fundamentally pity. True benevolence can only +be the desire to relieve others' pain, springing from the identification +of this with our own. For that reason, moral virtue must finally pass +over into asceticism--the denial of the will to live. In others, if we +are able to see through the principle of individuation, we recognise the +same essence as in ourselves, and we perceive that as long as this wills +it must necessarily suffer. The end then is to destroy the will to live. +This is to be done by _askesis_, self-mortification. The first step is +complete chastity. If, says Schopenhauer, the highest phenomenon of +will, that is, man, were to disappear through a general refusal to +affirm life beyond the individual body, man's weaker reflexion in the +animal world would disappear also, and the consciousness of the whole +would cease. Knowledge being taken away, the rest would vanish into +nothingness, since there is 'no object without subject.' That this will +come to pass, however, he certainly did not believe. He has no +cosmogony, like that of Hartmann, ending in a general redemption of the +universe by such a collective act. Nor did he hold, like his later +successor Mainlaender, that through the conflict and gradual extinction +of individualities, 'this great world shall so wear out to nought.' The +world for him is without beginning and without end. But the exceptional +individual can redeem himself. What he does when he has reached the +height of holiness is by voluntary poverty and all other privations, +inflicted for their own sake, to break and kill the will, which he +recognises as the source of his own and of the world's suffering +existence. In his case not merely the phenomenon ends at death, as with +others, but the being is taken away. To be a 'world-overcomer' in this +sense (as opposed to a 'world-conqueror') is the essence of sanctity +when cleared of all the superstitious dogmas by which the saints try to +explain their mode of life to themselves. + +The absolutely pure expression of this truth is to be found only in +philosophy; but of the religions Buddhism comes nearest to expressing it +without admixture. For the Buddhist saint asks aid from no god. True +Christianity, however,--the Christianity of the New Testament and of the +Christian mystics,--agrees both with Buddhism and with Brahmanism in +ultimate aim. What spoils it for Schopenhauer is the Judaic element. +This, on one side, infects it with the optimism of the Biblical story of +creation, in which God 'saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it +was very good.' On the other side, it contaminates the myth of original +sin, which bears in itself a profound philosophical truth, by this same +doctrine of a creative God; from which follows all the injustice and +irrationality necessarily involved in the Augustinian theology, and not +to be expelled except with its theism. Nevertheless, the story of the +Fall of Man, of which that theology, in its fundamentally true part, is +a reasoned expression, is the one thing, Schopenhauer avows, that +reconciles him to the Old Testament. The truth that it clothes he finds +also among the Greeks; Empedocles, after the Orphics and Pythagoreans, +having taught that the soul had been doomed to wander because of some +antenatal sin. And the mysticism that accompanies all these more or less +pure expressions of one metaphysical truth he finds represented by the +Sufis even in optimistic Islam; so that he can claim for his philosophy +a world-wide consent. + +Religion, if we take this to include mysticism, at once rises above +philosophy and falls below it. As 'metaphysics of the people,' it is a +mythological expression of philosophical truth: as mysticism, it is a +kind of 'epi-philosophy.' Beyond pure philosophy Schopenhauer does not +profess to go; but he accepts what the mystics say as the description of +a positive experience which becomes accessible when supreme insight is +attained intuitively. For the philosopher as such, insight into that +which is beyond the forms of our knowledge and even beyond the will +itself, remains only conceptual; though it is within the province of +philosophy to mark out the place for this. The 'something else' that is +left when the will has been denied, is indicated by the 'ecstasy,' +'illumination,' 'union with God,' spoken of by the mystics. +Paradoxically, some of the mystics themselves even have identified it +with 'nothing'; but the result of the denial of the will to live is to +be called nothing only in relation to the world as we know it. 'On the +other hand, to those in whom the will has turned back and denied itself, +this so very real world of ours with all its suns and milky ways +is--nothing.' + +In this terminus of his philosophy, Schopenhauer recognised his kinship +with Indian thought, of which he was a lifelong student. To call his +doctrine a kind of Buddhism is, however, in some ways a misapprehension. +Undoubtedly he accepts as his ideal the ethical attitude that he finds +to be common to Buddhism and the Christianity of the New Testament; but +metaphysical differences mark him off from both. We have seen that he +rejects the extra-mundane God of Semitic derivation, adopted by +historical Christianity. Indeed he is one of the most pronounced +anti-Jehovists of all literature. But equally his belief in a positive +metaphysical doctrine marks him off from Buddhism, according to the +account given of it by its most recent students, who regard it either as +ultimately nihilistic or as having no metaphysics at all, but only a +psychology and ethics. Nor can he be precisely identified with the +Vedantists of orthodox Hinduism. Their ultimate reality, if we are to +find an analogue for it in European metaphysics, seems to resemble the +hypostasised _ego_ of Fichte, or the Kantian 'transcendental unity of +apperception', much more than it resembles Schopenhauer's blindly +striving will as thing-in-itself. Even in practical ethics, he does not +follow the Indian systems at all closely. Philosophical doctrines of +justice are of course purely European; and Schopenhauer himself points +out the sources of his own theory. In his extension of ethics to +animals, on which he lays much stress, he cites the teachings of Eastern +non-Semitic religions as superior to the rest; but he does not follow +the Indians, nor even the Pythagoreans, so far as to make abstinence +from flesh part of the ideal. He condemns vivisection on the ground that +animals have rights: certain ways of treating them are unjust, not +simply uncompassionate. The discussion here again is of course wholly +within European thought. Thus, in trying to determine his significance +for modern philosophy, we may consider his system in its immediate +environment, leaving it to more special students to determine how far it +received a peculiar colouring from the Oriental philosophies, of which, +in his time, the more exact knowledge was just beginning to penetrate to +the West. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE + + +Schopenhauer is not one of the philosophers who have founded a school, +though he has had many disciples and enthusiastic admirers. The +pessimism that was for a time a watchword with certain literary groups +has passed as a mode, and his true significance must be sought +elsewhere. Of the thinkers who have followed him in his pessimism, two +indeed stand out as the architects of distinct systems, Eduard von +Hartmann and Philipp Mainlaender (both already incidentally referred to); +but while they are to be classed unquestionably as philosophers, their +systems contain an element that their master would have regarded as +mythological. Schopenhauer declared as clearly as any of the Greeks that +the phenomenal world is without beginning and without end. Kant's +positing of an 'antinomy' on this point he regarded as wholly without +rational justification. What Kant calls the 'antithesis,' namely, the +infinite series, can be logically proved for phenomena. The 'thesis,' +which asserts a beginning in time, is defended by mere fallacies. Now +Hartmann and Mainlaender both hold, though in different fashions, that +there is a world-process from a beginning to an end, namely, the +extinction of consciousness. This is the redemption of the world. Their +affinity, therefore, seems to be with the Christian Gnostics rather than +with the pure philosophers of the Greek tradition, continued in modern +times by Bruno, Spinoza, and Schopenhauer. + +Whatever may be thought of the pessimism by which Schopenhauer's mood is +distinguished from that of his precursors, few will fail to recognise +that special doctrines of his system contain at least a large portion of +truth. His theories of Art, of Genius, and of Love are enough to found +an enduring reputation for any thinker, even if there were nothing else +of value in his writings. But there is much else, both in systematic +construction and in the illumination of detail. I have been inclined to +put forward first of all the translation into idealistic terms of the +universal sentiency held by the Ionian thinkers to be inherent in the +primordial elements of nature. While they viewed the world as an +objective thing having psychological qualities, Schopenhauer, after the +long intermediate process of thought, could treat it as phenomenal +object with a psychological or subjective essence. For both doctrines +alike, however, mind or soul is immanent. Still, it must be allowed that +a difference remains by which Schopenhauer was even more remote than +they were from the later Greek idealism. As they were not materialists, +so they did not exclude reason from the psychical properties of their +substances. Schopenhauer, while he rejected the materialism of their +ancient and modern successors alike, took the step of formally +derationalising the elements of mind. This, no doubt, is unsustainable +ultimately, if reason is ever to emerge from them. Yet the one-sidedness +of the position has had a peculiar value in combating an equally +one-sided rationalistic idealism. This is recognised by clear-sighted +opponents. And Schopenhauer's calling the non-rational or anti-rational +element in the world 'will' helps to make plainer the real problem of +evil. There is truth in the Hegelian paradox that 'pessimism is an +excellent basis for optimism.' An optimist like Plotinus saw that, even +if good comes of evil, the case of the optimist must fail unless evil +can be shown to be a necessary constituent of the world. The Platonic +and Neo-Platonic 'matter,' a principle of diremption or individuation, +like time and space for Schopenhauer, was an attempt to solve this +problem; but something more positive seemed to be needed as the source +of the stronger manifestations of evil. To the strength of these Plato +drew attention in a passage (_Republic_, x. 610[5]) where it is +acknowledged that injustice confers a character of vitality and +sleeplessness upon its possessor. In the notion of a blind and vehement +striving, Schopenhauer supplies something adequate; only, to maintain a +rational optimism, it must be regarded as a necessary element in a +mixture, not as the spring of the whole. + + [5] Cited in one of the introductory essays to Jowett and Campbell's + edition, vol. ii. + +Much might be said on the teleology by which he tries to educe +intelligence from the primordial strife. Against his view, that it is +evolved as a mere instrument for preserving races in a struggle, another +may be set that is ready to hand in a dialogue of Plutarch.[6] The +struggle among animals, it is there incidentally argued, has for its end +to sharpen their intelligence. Both these theories are on the surface +compatible with evolution. If, leaving aside the problem of mechanism, +we try to verify them by the test of results, the latter undoubtedly +seems the more plausible. For if the struggle was a means to the +improvement of intelligence, nature has succeeded more and more; +whereas, if her intention was to preserve races, she has continually +failed. This argument is at any rate perfectly valid against +Schopenhauer himself; for he holds in common with the optimistic +teleologists that 'nature does nothing in vain.' + + [6] _De Sollertia Animalium_, 27. + +I will conclude with a few detached criticisms on the ethical doctrine +which he regarded as the culmination of his system. The antithesis, it +may first be noted, between the temporary release from the vehemence of +the will that is gained through art, and the permanent release through +asceticism, is not consistently maintained. Schopenhauer admits that the +knowledge which for the ascetic is the 'quietive' of the will has to be +won anew in a perpetual conflict. 'No one can have enduring rest on +earth.' Again, revision of his doctrine concerning the reality of the +individual would, I think, necessitate revision also of the position +that not only asceticism but 'all true and pure love, nay, even freely +rendered justice, proceeds from seeing through the _principium +individuationis_.' If the individual is in some sense ultimately real, +then love must be to a certain extent literally altruism. We are brought +down to the elementary fact, in terms of the metaphysics of ethics, that +the object of love is a real being that is itself and not ourselves, +though having some resemblance to us and united in a larger whole. An +objection not merely verbal might indeed be taken to Schopenhauer's +metaphysics of ethics strictly on his own ground. If it is purely and +simply the essence of ourselves that we recognise in everything, does +not this reduce all love finally to a well-understood egoism? The +genuine fact of sympathy seems to escape his mode of formulation. And, +in the end, we shall perhaps not find the ascetic to be the supreme +ethical type. Of the self-tormenting kind of asceticism, it is not +enough to say with Schopenhauer that, since it is a world-wide +phenomenon of human nature, it calls for some account from philosophy. +The account may be sufficiently rendered by historical psychology; the +result being to class it as an aberration born of the illusions incident +to a certain type of mind at a certain stage. Indeed, that seems to be +the conclusion of the Buddhists, who claim to have transcended it by +finding it superfluous for the end it aims at. Let us then take, as our +example of the completed type, not the monks of the Thebaid, but the +mild ascetics of the Buddhist communities. Does not this type, even in +its most attractive form, represent a 'second best'? Is not the final +judgment that of Plato, that to save oneself is something, but that +there is no full achievement unless for the life of the State also the +ideal has been brought nearer realisation? When there is nothing in the +world but irredeemable tyranny or anarchy, flight from it may be the +greatest success possible as far as the individual life is concerned; +but this is not the normal condition of humanity. Finally, may not some +actual achievement, either practical or, like that of Schopenhauer, +speculative, even if accompanied by real imperfections of character, +possess a higher human value than the sanctity that rests always in +itself? + + + + +SELECTED WORKS + + +_English Translations_ + + _The World as Will and Idea._ Translated by R. B. HALDANE and J. KEMP. 3 + vols. 1883-6. + + _Two Essays_: I. _On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient + Reason_. II. _On the Will in Nature_. Bohn's Philosophical Library, + 1889. + + _Religion: A Dialogue, and other Essays._ Selected and translated by T. + BAILEY SAUNDERS. 3rd ed., 1891. [A series of other volumes of + selections excellently translated by Mr. Saunders has followed.] + + _Selected Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer._ With a Biographical + Introduction and Sketch of his Philosophy. By E. BELFORT BAX. 1891. + + _The Basis of Morality._ Translated with Introduction and Notes by A. B. + BULLOCK. 1903. + + +_Biographical and Expository_ + + _Arthur Schopenhauer: His Life and Philosophy._ By HELEN ZIMMERN. 1876. + + _Life of Arthur Schopenhauer._ By Professor W. WALLACE. 1890. + + _La Philosophie de Schopenhauer._ Par TH. RIBOT. 2nd ed., 1885. + + _Arthur Schopenhauer._ Seine Persoenlichkeit, seine Lehre, sein Glaube. + Von JOHANNAES VOLKELT. 3rd ed., 1907. + + _Schopenhauer-Lexikon._ Von JULIUS FRADENSTAeDT. 2 vols., 1871. + + +Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty at the Edinburgh +University Press + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Schopenhauer, by Thomas Whittaker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCHOPENHAUER *** + +***** This file should be named 38283.txt or 38283.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/2/8/38283/ + +Produced by Albert Laszlo and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + +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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