CHAPTER I.

THE ESSAYS

OF

ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

TRANSLATED BY

T. BAILEY SAUNDERS, M.A.

THE WISDOM OF LIFE.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER

INTRODUCTION

I. DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT

II. PERSONALITY, OR WHAT A MAN IS

III. PROPERTY, OR WHAT A MAN HAS

IV. POSITION, OR A MAN'S PLACE IN THE ESTIMATION OF OTHERS--

Sect. 1. Reputation

" 2. Pride

" 3. Rank

" 4. Honor

" 5. Fame

INTRODUCTION.

In these pages I shall speak of _The Wisdom of Life_ in the common

meaning of the term, as the art, namely, of ordering our lives so as

to obtain the greatest possible amount of pleasure and success; an art

the theory of which may be called _Eudaemonology_, for it teaches us

how to lead a happy existence. Such an existence might perhaps be

defined as one which, looked at from a purely objective point of

view, or, rather, after cool and mature reflection--for the question

necessarily involves subjective considerations,--would be decidedly

preferable to non-existence; implying that we should cling to it for

its own sake, and not merely from the fear of death; and further, that

we should never like it to come to an end.

Now whether human life corresponds, or could possibly correspond,

to this conception of existence, is a question to which, as is

well-known, my philosophical system returns a negative answer. On the

eudaemonistic hypothesis, however, the question must be answered in

the affirmative; and I have shown, in the second volume of my chief

work (ch. 49), that this hypothesis is based upon a fundamental

mistake. Accordingly, in elaborating the scheme of a happy existence,

I have had to make a complete surrender of the higher metaphysical and

ethical standpoint to which my own theories lead; and everything I

shall say here will to some extent rest upon a compromise; in so far,

that is, as I take the common standpoint of every day, and embrace

the error which is at the bottom of it. My remarks, therefore, will

possess only a qualified value, for the very word _eudaemonology_ is a

euphemism. Further, I make no claims to completeness; partly because

the subject is inexhaustible, and partly because I should otherwise

have to say over again what has been already said by others.

The only book composed, as far as I remember, with a like purpose to

that which animates this collection of aphorisms, is Cardan's _De

utilitate ex adversis capienda_, which is well worth reading, and may

be used to supplement the present work. Aristotle, it is true, has a

few words on eudaemonology in the fifth chapter of the first book

of his _Rhetoric_; but what he says does not come to very much.

As compilation is not my business, I have made no use of these

predecessors; more especially because in the process of compiling,

individuality of view is lost, and individuality of view is the kernel

of works of this kind. In general, indeed, the wise in all ages have

always said the same thing, and the fools, who at all times form the

immense majority, have in their way too acted alike, and done just the

opposite; and so it will continue. For, as Voltaire says, _we shall

leave this world as foolish and as wicked as we found it on our

arrival_.

THE WISDOM OF LIFE.

CHAPTER I.

DIVISION OF THE SUBJECT.

Aristotle[1] divides the blessings of life into three classes--those

which come to us from without, those of the soul, and those of the

body. Keeping nothing of this division but the number, I observe that

the fundamental differences in human lot may be reduced to three

distinct classes:

[Footnote 1: _Eth. Nichom_., I. 8.]

(1) What a man is: that is to say, personality, in the widest sense

of the word; under which are included health, strength, beauty,

temperament, moral character, intelligence, and education.

(2) What a man has: that is, property and possessions of every kind.

(3) How a man stands in the estimation of others: by which is to be

understood, as everybody knows, what a man is in the eyes of his

fellowmen, or, more strictly, the light in which they regard him. This

is shown by their opinion of him; and their opinion is in its turn

manifested by the honor in which he is held, and by his rank and

reputation.

The differences which come under the first head are those which Nature

herself has set between man and man; and from this fact alone we may

at once infer that they influence the happiness or unhappiness of

mankind in a much more vital and radical way than those contained

under the two following heads, which are merely the effect of human

arrangements. Compared with _genuine personal advantages_, such as a

great mind or a great heart, all the privileges of rank or birth, even

of royal birth, are but as kings on the stage, to kings in real life.

The same thing was said long ago by Metrodorus, the earliest disciple

of Epicurus, who wrote as the title of one of his chapters, _The

happiness we receive from ourselves is greater than that which we

obtain from our surroundings_[1] And it is an obvious fact, which

cannot be called in question, that the principal element in a man's

well-being,--indeed, in the whole tenor of his existence,--is what he

is made of, his inner constitution. For this is the immediate source

of that inward satisfaction or dissatisfaction resulting from the

sum total of his sensations, desires and thoughts; whilst his

surroundings, on the other hand, exert only a mediate or indirect

influence upon him. This is why the same external events or

circumstances affect no two people alike; even with perfectly similar

surroundings every one lives in a world of his own. For a man has

immediate apprehension only of his own ideas, feelings and volitions;

the outer world can influence him only in so far as it brings these to

life. The world in which a man lives shapes itself chiefly by the way

in which he looks at it, and so it proves different to different

men; to one it is barren, dull, and superficial; to another rich,

interesting, and full of meaning. On hearing of the interesting events

which have happened in the course of a man's experience, many people

will wish that similar things had happened in their lives too,

completely forgetting that they should be envious rather of the mental

aptitude which lent those events the significance they possess when he

describes them; to a man of genius they were interesting adventures;

but to the dull perceptions of an ordinary individual they would have

been stale, everyday occurrences. This is in the highest degree the

case with many of Goethe's and Byron's poems, which are obviously

founded upon actual facts; where it is open to a foolish reader to

envy the poet because so many delightful things happened to him,

instead of envying that mighty power of phantasy which was capable

of turning a fairly common experience into something so great and

beautiful.

[Footnote 1: Cf. Clemens Alex. Strom. II., 21.]

In the same way, a person of melancholy temperament will make a scene

in a tragedy out of what appears to the sanguine man only in the light

of an interesting conflict, and to a phlegmatic soul as something

without any meaning;--all of which rests upon the fact that every

event, in order to be realized and appreciated, requires the

co-operation of two factors, namely, a subject and an object, although

these are as closely and necessarily connected as oxygen and hydrogen

in water. When therefore the objective or external factor in an

experience is actually the same, but the subjective or personal

appreciation of it varies, the event is just as much a different one

in the eyes of different persons as if the objective factors had not

been alike; for to a blunt intelligence the fairest and best object in

the world presents only a poor reality, and is therefore only poorly

appreciated,--like a fine landscape in dull weather, or in the

reflection of a bad _camera obscura_. In plain language, every man

is pent up within the limits of his own consciousness, and cannot

directly get beyond those limits any more than he can get beyond his

own skin; so external aid is not of much use to him. On the stage, one

man is a prince, another a minister, a third a servant or a soldier or

a general, and so on,--mere external differences: the inner reality,

the kernel of all these appearances is the same--a poor player, with

all the anxieties of his lot. In life it is just the same. Differences

of rank and wealth give every man his part to play, but this by no

means implies a difference of inward happiness and pleasure; here,

too, there is the same being in all--a poor mortal, with his hardships

and troubles. Though these may, indeed, in every case proceed from

dissimilar causes, they are in their essential nature much the same in

all their forms, with degrees of intensity which vary, no doubt, but

in no wise correspond to the part a man has to play, to the presence

or absence of position and wealth. Since everything which exists or

happens for a man exists only in his consciousness and happens for it

alone, the most essential thing for a man is the constitution of this

consciousness, which is in most cases far more important than the

circumstances which go to form its contents. All the pride and

pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull consciousness of a fool,

are poor indeed compared with the imagination of Cervantes writing his

_Don Quixote_ in a miserable prison. The objective half of life and

reality is in the hand of fate, and accordingly takes various forms in

different cases: the subjective half is ourself, and in essentials is

always remains the same.

Hence the life of every man is stamped with the same character

throughout, however much his external circumstances may alter; it is

like a series of variations on a single theme. No one can get beyond

his own individuality. An animal, under whatever circumstances it

is placed, remains within the narrow limits to which nature has

irrevocably consigned it; so that our endeavors to make a pet happy

must always keep within the compass of its nature, and be restricted

to what it can feel. So it is with man; the measure of the happiness

he can attain is determined beforehand by his individuality. More

especially is this the case with the mental powers, which fix once for

all his capacity for the higher kinds of pleasure. If these powers are

small, no efforts from without, nothing that his fellowmen or that

fortune can do for him, will suffice to raise him above the ordinary

degree of human happiness and pleasure, half animal though it be; his

only resources are his sensual appetite,--a cozy and cheerful family

life at the most,--low company and vulgar pastime; even education, on

the whole, can avail little, if anything, for the enlargement of his

horizon. For the highest, most varied and lasting pleasures are those

of the mind, however much our youth may deceive us on this point; and

the pleasures of the mind turn chiefly on the powers of the mind. It

is clear, then, that our happiness depends in a great degree upon what

we _are_, upon our individuality, whilst lot or destiny is generally

taken to mean only what we _have_, or our _reputation_. Our lot,

in this sense, may improve; but we do not ask much of it if we are

inwardly rich: on the other hand, a fool remains a fool, a dull

blockhead, to his last hour, even though he were surrounded by houris

in paradise. This is why Goethe, in the _West-östliclien Divan_, says

that every man, whether he occupies a low position in life, or emerges

as its victor, testifies to personality as the greatest factor in

happiness:--

_Volk und Knecht und Uberwinder

Sie gestehen, zu jeder Zeit,

Höchtes Glück der Erdenkinder

Sei nur die Persönlichkeit_.

Everything confirms the fact that the subjective element in life is

incomparably more important for our happiness and pleasure than the

objective, from such sayings as _Hunger is the best sauce_, and _Youth

and Age cannot live together_, up to the life of the Genius and the

Saint. Health outweighs all other blessings so much that one may

really say that a healthy beggar is happier than an ailing king. A

quiet and cheerful temperament, happy in the enjoyment of a perfectly

sound physique, an intellect clear, lively, penetrating and seeing

things as they are, a moderate and gentle will, and therefore a good

conscience--these are privileges which no rank or wealth can make up

for or replace. For what a man is in himself, what accompanies him

when he is alone, what no one can give or take away, is obviously more

essential to him than everything he has in the way of possessions, or

even what he may be in the eyes of the world. An intellectual man in

complete solitude has excellent entertainment in his own thoughts and

fancies, while no amount of diversity or social pleasure, theatres,

excursions and amusements, can ward off boredom from a dullard. A

good, temperate, gentle character can be happy in needy circumstances,

whilst a covetous, envious and malicious man, even if he be the

richest in the world, goes miserable. Nay more; to one who has the

constant delight of a special individuality, with a high degree of

intellect, most of the pleasures which are run after by mankind are

simply superfluous; they are even a trouble and a burden. And so

Horace says of himself, that, however many are deprived of the

fancy-goods of life, there is one at least who can live without

them:--

_Gemmas, marmor, ebur, Tyrrhena sigilla, tabellas,

Argentum, vestes, Gaetulo murice tinctas

Sunt qui non habeant, est qui non curat habere_;

and when Socrates saw various articles of luxury spread out for sale,

he exclaimed: _How much there is in the world I do not want_.

So the first and most essential element in our life's happiness is

what we are,--our personality, if for no other reason than that it is

a constant factor coming into play under all circumstances: besides,

unlike the blessings which are described under the other two heads, it

is not the sport of destiny and cannot be wrested from us;--and, so

far, it is endowed with an absolute value in contrast to the merely

relative worth of the other two. The consequence of this is that it is

much more difficult than people commonly suppose to get a hold on a

man from without. But here the all-powerful agent, Time, comes in

and claims its rights, and before its influence physical and mental

advantages gradually waste away. Moral character alone remains

inaccessible to it. In view of the destructive effect of time, it

seems, indeed, as if the blessings named under the other two heads,

of which time cannot directly rob us, were superior to those of the

first. Another advantage might be claimed for them, namely, that being

in their very nature objective and external, they are attainable, and

every one is presented with the possibility, at least, of coming into

possession of them; whilst what is subjective is not open to us to

acquire, but making its entry by a kind of _divine right_, it remains

for life, immutable, inalienable, an inexorable doom. Let me quote

those lines in which Goethe describes how an unalterable destiny is

assigned to every man at the hour of his birth, so that he can develop

only in the lines laid down for him, as it were, by the conjunctions

of the stars: and how the Sybil and the prophets declare that

_himself_ a man can never escape, nor any power of time avail to

change the path on which his life is cast:--

_Wie an dem Tag, der dich der Welt verliehen,

Dïe Sonne stand zum Grusse der Planeten,

Bist alsobald und fort und fort gediehen,

Nach dem Gesetz, wonach du angetreten.

So musst du sein, dir kannst du nicht entfliehen,

So tagten schon Sybillen und Propheten;

Und keine Zeit, und keine Macht zerstückelt

Geprägte Form, die lebend sich entwickelt_.

The only thing that stands in our power to achieve, is to make the

most advantageous use possible of the personal qualities we possess,

and accordingly to follow such pursuits only as will call them into

play, to strive after the kind of perfection of which they admit and

to avoid every other; consequently, to choose the position, occupation

and manner of life which are most suitable for their development.

Imagine a man endowed with herculean strength who is compelled by

circumstances to follow a sedentary occupation, some minute exquisite

work of the hands, for example, or to engage in study and mental

labor demanding quite other powers, and just those which he has not

got,--compelled, that is, to leave unused the powers in which he is

pre-eminently strong; a man placed like this will never feel happy all

his life through. Even more miserable will be the lot of the man

with intellectual powers of a very high order, who has to leave them

undeveloped and unemployed, in the pursuit of a calling which does not

require them, some bodily labor, perhaps, for which his strength is

insufficient. Still, in a case of this kind, it should be our care,

especially in youth, to avoid the precipice of presumption, and not

ascribe to ourselves a superfluity of power which is not there.

Since the blessings described under the first head decidedly outweigh

those contained under the other two, it is manifestly a wiser course

to aim at the maintenance of our health and the cultivation of our

faculties, than at the amassing of wealth; but this must not be

mistaken as meaning that we should neglect to acquire an adequate

supply of the necessaries of life. Wealth, in the strict sense of the

word, that is, great superfluity, can do little for our happiness; and

many rich people feel unhappy just because they are without any true

mental culture or knowledge, and consequently have no objective

interests which would qualify them for intellectual occupations. For

beyond the satisfaction of some real and natural necessities, all that

the possession of wealth can achieve has a very small influence upon

our happiness, in the proper sense of the word; indeed, wealth rather

disturbs it, because the preservation of property entails a great many

unavoidable anxieties. And still men are a thousand times more intent

on becoming rich than on acquiring culture, though it is quite certain

that what a man _is_ contributes much more to his happiness than

what he _has_. So you may see many a man, as industrious as an ant,

ceaselessly occupied from morning to night in the endeavor to increase

his heap of gold. Beyond the narrow horizon of means to this end, he

knows nothing; his mind is a blank, and consequently unsusceptible to

any other influence. The highest pleasures, those of the intellect,

are to him inaccessible, and he tries in vain to replace them by the

fleeting pleasures of sense in which he indulges, lasting but a brief

hour and at tremendous cost. And if he is lucky, his struggles result

in his having a really great pile of gold, which he leaves to

his heir, either to make it still larger, or to squander it in

extravagance. A life like this, though pursued with a sense of

earnestness and an air of importance, is just as silly as many another

which has a fool's cap for its symbol.

_What a man has in himself_ is, then, the chief element in his

happiness. Because this is, as a rule, so very little, most of those

who are placed beyond the struggle with penury feel at bottom quite as

unhappy as those who are still engaged in it. Their minds are vacant,

their imagination dull, their spirits poor, and so they are driven to

the company of those like them--for _similis simili gaudet_--where

they make common pursuit of pastime and entertainment, consisting

for the most part in sensual pleasure, amusement of every kind, and

finally, in excess and libertinism. A young man of rich family enters

upon life with a large patrimony, and often runs through it in an

incredibly short space of time, in vicious extravagance; and why?

Simply because, here too, the mind is empty and void, and so the man

is bored with existence. He was sent forth into the world outwardly

rich but inwardly poor, and his vain endeavor was to make his

external wealth compensate for his inner poverty, by trying to obtain

everything _from without_, like an old man who seeks to strengthen

himself as King David or Maréchal de Rex tried to do. And so in the

end one who is inwardly poor comes to be also poor outwardly.

I need not insist upon the importance of the other two kinds of

blessings which make up the happiness of human life; now-a-days the

value of possessing them is too well known to require advertisement.

The third class, it is true, may seem, compared with the second, of

a very ethereal character, as it consists only of other people's

opinions. Still every one has to strive for reputation, that is to

say, a good name. Rank, on the other hand, should be aspired to only

by those who serve the state, and fame by very few indeed. In any

case, reputation is looked upon as a priceless treasure, and fame as

the most precious of all the blessings a man can attain,--the Golden

Fleece, as it were, of the elect: whilst only fools will prefer rank

to property. The second and third classes, moreover, are reciprocally

cause and effect; so far, that is, as Petronius' maxim, _habes

habeberis_, is true; and conversely, the favor of others, in all its

forms, often puts us in the way of getting what we want.