THE ESSAYS OF ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER
RELIGION: A DIALOGUE, ETC.
TRANSLATED BY T. BAILEY SAUNDERS, M.A.
CONTENTS.
PREFATORY NOTE
RELIGION: A DIALOGUE
A FEW WORDS ON PANTHEISM
ON BOOKS AND READING
ON PHYSIOGNOMY
PSYCHOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS
THE CHRISTIAN SYSTEM
PREFATORY NOTE
Schopenhauer is one of the few philosophers who can be generally
understood without a commentary. All his theories claim to be drawn
direct from the facts, to be suggested by observation, and to interpret
the world as it is; and whatever view he takes, he is constant in his
appeal to the experience of common life. This characteristic endows his
style with a freshness and vigor which would be difficult to match in
the philosophical writing of any country, and impossible in that of
Germany. If it were asked whether there were any circumstances apart
from heredity, to which he owed his mental habit, the answer might be
found in the abnormal character of his early education, his acquaintance
with the world rather than with books, the extensive travels of his
boyhood, his ardent pursuit of knowledge for its own sake and without
regard to the emoluments and endowments of learning. He was trained in
realities even more than in ideas; and hence he is original, forcible,
clear, an enemy of all philosophic indefiniteness and obscurity; so that
it may well be said of him, in the words of a writer in the _Revue
Contemporaine, ce n'est pas un philosophe comme les autres, c'est un
philosophe qui a vu le monde_.
It is not my purpose, nor would it be possible within the limits of a
prefatory note, to attempt an account of Schopenhauer's philosophy, to
indicate its sources, or to suggest or rebut the objections which may be
taken to it. M. Ribot, in his excellent little book, [Footnote: _La
Philosophie de Schopenhauer_, par Th. Ribot.] has done all that is
necessary in this direction. But the essays here presented need a word
of explanation. It should be observed, and Schopenhauer himself is at
pains to point out, that his system is like a citadel with a hundred
gates: at whatever point you take it up, wherever you make your
entrance, you are on the road to the center. In this respect his
writings resemble a series of essays composed in support of a single
thesis; a circumstance which led him to insist, more emphatically even
than most philosophers, that for a proper understanding of his system it
was necessary to read every line he had written. Perhaps it would be
more correct to describe _Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung_ as his
main thesis, and his other treatises as merely corollary to it. The
essays in this volume form part of the corollary; they are taken from a
collection published towards the close of Schopenhauer's life, and by
him entitled _Parerga und Paralipomena_, as being in the nature of
surplusage and illustrative of his main position. They are by far the
most popular of his works, and since their first publication in 1851,
they have done much to build up his fame. Written so as to be
intelligible enough in themselves, the tendency of many of them is
towards the fundamental idea on which his system is based. It may
therefore be convenient to summarize that idea in a couple of sentences;
more especially as Schopenhauer sometimes writes as if his advice had
been followed and his readers were acquainted with the whole of his
work.
All philosophy is in some sense the endeavor to find a unifying
principle, to discover the most general conception underlying the whole
field of nature and of knowledge. By one of those bold generalizations
which occasionally mark a real advance in Science, Schopenhauer
conceived this unifying principle, this underlying unity, to consist in
something analogous to that _will_ which self-consciousness reveals to
us. _Will_ is, according to him, the fundamental reality of the world,
the thing-in-itself; and its objectivation is what is presented in
phenomena. The struggle of the will to realize itself evolves the
organism, which in its turn evolves intelligence as the servant of the
will. And in practical life the antagonism between the will and the
intellect arises from the fact that the former is the metaphysical
substance, the latter something accidental and secondary. And further,
will is _desire_, that is to say, need of something; hence need and pain
are what is positive in the world, and the only possible happiness is a
negation, a renunciation of _the will to live_.
It is instructive to note, as M. Ribot points out, that in finding the
origin of all things, not in intelligence, as some of his predecessors
in philosophy had done, but in will, or the force of nature, from which
all phenomena have developed, Schopenhauer was anticipating something of
the scientific spirit of the nineteenth century. To this it may be added
that in combating the method of Fichte and Hegel, who spun a system out
of abstract ideas, and in discarding it for one based on observation and
experience, Schopenhauer can be said to have brought down philosophy
from heaven to earth.
In Schopenhauer's view the various forms of Religion are no less a
product of human ingenuity than Art or Science. He holds, in effect,
that all religions take their rise in the desire to explain the world;
and that, in regard to truth and error, they differ, in the main, not by
preaching monotheism polytheism or pantheism, but in so far as they
recognize pessimism or optimism as the true description of life. Hence
any religion which looked upon the world as being radically evil
appealed to him as containing an indestructible element of truth. I have
endeavored to present his view of two of the great religions of the
world in the extract which concludes this volume, and to which I have
given the title of _The Christian System_. The tenor of it is to show
that, however little he may have been in sympathy with the supernatural
element, he owed much to the moral doctrines of Christianity and of
Buddhism, between which he traced great resemblance. In the following
_Dialogue_ he applies himself to a discussion of the practical efficacy
of religious forms; and though he was an enemy of clericalism, his
choice of a method which allows both the affirmation and the denial of
that efficacy to be presented with equal force may perhaps have been
directed by the consciousness that he could not side with either view to
the exclusion of the other. In any case his practical philosophy was
touched with the spirit of Christianity. It was more than artistic
enthusiasm which led him in profound admiration to the Madonna di San
Sisto:
Sie trägt zur Welt ihn, und er schaut entsetzt
In ihrer Gräu'l chaotische Verwirrung,
In ihres Tobens wilde Raserei,
In ihres Treibens nie geheilte Thorheit,
In ihrer Quaalen nie gestillten Schmerz;
Entsetzt: doch strahlet Rub' and Zuversicht
Und Siegesglanz sein Aug', verkündigend
Schon der Erlösung ewige gewissheit.
Pessimism is commonly and erroneously supposed to be the distinguishing
feature of Schopenhauer's system. It is right to remember that the same
fundamental view of the world is presented by Christianity, to say
nothing of Oriental religions.
That Schopenhauer conceives life as an evil is a deduction, and possibly
a mistaken deduction, from his metaphysical theory. Whether his scheme
of things is correct or not--and it shares the common fate of all
metaphysical systems in being unverifiable, and to that extent
unprofitable--he will in the last resort have made good his claim to be
read by his insight into the varied needs of human life. It may be that
a future age will consign his metaphysics to the philosophical
lumber-room; but he is a literary artist as well as a philosopher, and
he can make a bid for fame in either capacity. What is remarked with
much truth of many another writer, that he suggests more than he
achieves, is in the highest degree applicable to Schopenhauer; and his
_obiter dicta_, his sayings by the way, will always find an audience.
T.B. SAUNDERS.
RELIGION.
A DIALOGUE.
_Demopheles_. Between ourselves, my dear fellow, I don't care about the
way you sometimes have of exhibiting your talent for philosophy; you
make religion a subject for sarcastic remarks, and even for open
ridicule. Every one thinks his religion sacred, and therefore you ought
to respect it.
_Philalethes_. That doesn't follow! I don't see why, because other
people are simpletons, I should have any regard for a pack of lies. I
respect truth everywhere, and so I can't respect what is opposed to it.
My maxim is _Vigeat veritas et pereat mundus_, like the lawyers' _Fiat
justitia et pereat mundus_. Every profession ought to have an analogous
advice.
_Demopheles_. Then I suppose doctors should say _Fiant pilulae et pereat
mundus_,--there wouldn't be much difficulty about that!
_Philalethes_. Heaven forbid! You must take everything _cum grano
salis_.
_Demopheles_. Exactly; that's why I want you to take religion _cum grano
salis_. I want you to see that one must meet the requirements of the
people according to the measure of their comprehension. Where you have
masses of people of crude susceptibilities and clumsy intelligence,
sordid in their pursuits and sunk in drudgery, religion provides the
only means of proclaiming and making them feel the hight import of life.
For the average man takes an interest, primarily, in nothing but what
will satisfy his physical needs and hankerings, and beyond this, give
him a little amusement and pastime. Founders of religion and
philosophers come into the world to rouse him from his stupor and point
to the lofty meaning of existence; philosophers for the few, the
emancipated, founders of religion for the many, for humanity at large.
For, as your friend Plato has said, the multitude can't be philosophers,
and you shouldn't forget that. Religion is the metaphysics of the
masses; by all means let them keep it: let it therefore command external
respect, for to discredit it is to take it away. Just as they have
popular poetry, and the popular wisdom of proverbs, so they must have
popular metaphysics too: for mankind absolutely needs _an interpretation
of life_; and this, again, must be suited to popular comprehension.
Consequently, this interpretation is always an allegorical investiture
of the truth: and in practical life and in its effects on the feelings,
that is to say, as a rule of action and as a comfort and consolation in
suffering and death, it accomplishes perhaps just as much as the truth
itself could achieve if we possessed it. Don't take offense at its
unkempt, grotesque and apparently absurd form; for with your education
and learning, you have no idea of the roundabout ways by which people in
their crude state have to receive their knowledge of deep truths. The
various religions are only various forms in which the truth, which taken
by itself is above their comprehension, is grasped and realized by the
masses; and truth becomes inseparable from these forms. Therefore, my
dear sir, don't take it amiss if I say that to make a mockery of these
forms is both shallow and unjust.
_Philalethes_. But isn't it every bit as shallow and unjust to demand
that there shall be no other system of metaphysics but this one, cut out
as it is to suit the requirements and comprehension of the masses? that
its doctrine shall be the limit of human speculation, the standard of
all thought, so that the metaphysics of the few, the emancipated, as you
call them, must be devoted only to confirming, strengthening, and
explaining the metaphysics of the masses? that the highest powers of
human intelligence shall remain unused and undeveloped, even be nipped
in the bud, in order that their activity may not thwart the popular
metaphysics? And isn't this just the very claim which religion sets up?
Isn't it a little too much to have tolerance and delicate forbearance
preached by what is intolerance and cruelty itself? Think of the
heretical tribunals, inquisitions, religious wars, crusades, Socrates'
cup of poison, Bruno's and Vanini's death in the flames! Is all this
to-day quite a thing of the past? How can genuine philosophical effort,
sincere search after truth, the noblest calling of the noblest men, be
let and hindered more completely than by a conventional system of
metaphysics enjoying a State monopoly, the principles of which are
impressed into every head in earliest youth, so earnestly, so deeply,
and so firmly, that, unless the mind is miraculously elastic, they
remain indelible. In this way the groundwork of all healthy reason is
once for all deranged; that is to say, the capacity for original thought
and unbiased judgment, which is weak enough in itself, is, in regard to
those subjects to which it might be applied, for ever paralyzed and
ruined.
_Demopheles._ Which means, I suppose, that people have arrived at a
conviction which they won't give up in order to embrace yours instead.
_Philalethes_. Ah! if it were only a conviction based on insight. Then
one could bring arguments to bear, and the battle would be fought with
equal weapons. But religions admittedly appeal, not to conviction as the
result of argument, but to belief as demanded by revelation. And as the
capacity for believing is strongest in childhood, special care is taken
to make sure of this tender age. This has much more to do with the
doctrines of belief taking root than threats and reports of miracles.
If, in early childhood, certain fundamental views and doctrines are
paraded with unusual solemnity, and an air of the greatest earnestness
never before visible in anything else; if, at the same time, the
possibility of a doubt about them be completely passed over, or touched
upon only to indicate that doubt is the first step to eternal perdition,
the resulting impression will be so deep that, as a rule, that is, in
almost every case, doubt about them will be almost as impossible as
doubt about one's own existence. Hardly one in ten thousand will have
the strength of mind to ask himself seriously and earnestly--is that
true? To call such as can do it strong minds, _esprits forts_, is a
description more apt than is generally supposed. But for the ordinary
mind there is nothing so absurd or revolting but what, if inculcated in
that way, the strongest belief in it will strike root. If, for example,
the killing of a heretic or infidel were essential to the future
salvation of his soul, almost every one would make it the chief event of
his life, and in dying would draw consolation and strength from the
remembrance that he had succeeded. As a matter of fact, almost every
Spaniard in days gone by used to look upon an _auto da fe_ as the most
pious of all acts and one most agreeable to God. A parallel to this may
be found in the way in which the Thugs (a religious sect in India,
suppressed a short time ago by the English, who executed numbers of
them) express their sense of religion and their veneration for the
goddess Kali; they take every opportunity of murdering their friends and
traveling companions, with the object of getting possession of their
goods, and in the serious conviction that they are thereby doing a
praiseworthy action, conducive to their eternal welfare. [Footnote: Cf.
Illustrations of the history and practice of the Thugs, London, 1837;
also the _Edinburg Review_, Oct.-Jan., 1836-7.] The power of religious
dogma, when inculcated early, is such as to stifle conscience,
compassion, and finally every feeling of humanity. But if you want to
see with your own eyes and close at hand what timely inoculation will
accomplish, look at the English. Here is a nation favored before all
others by nature; endowed, more than all others, with discernment,
intelligence, power of judgment, strength of character; look at them,
abased and made ridiculous, beyond all others, by their stupid
ecclesiastical superstition, which appears amongst their other abilities
like a fixed idea or monomania. For this they have to thank the
circumstance that education is in the hands of the clergy, whose
endeavor it is to impress all the articles of belief, at the earliest
age, in a way that amounts to a kind of paralysis of the brain; this in
its turn expresses itself all their life in an idiotic bigotry, which
makes otherwise most sensible and intelligent people amongst them
degrade themselves so that one can't make head or tail of them. If you
consider how essential to such a masterpiece is inoculation in the
tender age of childhood, the missionary system appears no longer only as
the acme of human importunity, arrogance and impertinence, but also as
an absurdity, if it doesn't confine itself to nations which are still in
their infancy, like Caffirs, Hottentots, South Sea Islanders, etc.
Amongst these races it is successful; but in India, the Brahmans treat
the discourses of the missionaries with contemptuous smiles of
approbation, or simply shrug their shoulders. And one may say generally
that the proselytizing efforts of the missionaries in India, in spite of
the most advantageous facilities, are, as a rule, a failure. An
authentic report in the Vol. XXI. of the Asiatic Journal (1826) states
that after so many years of missionary activity not more than three
hundred living converts were to be found in the whole of India, where
the population of the English possessions alone comes to one hundred and
fifteen millions; and at the same time it is admitted that the Christian
converts are distinguished for their extreme immorality. Three hundred
venal and bribed souls out of so many millions! There is no evidence
that things have gone better with Christianity in India since then, in
spite of the fact that the missionaries are now trying, contrary to
stipulation and in schools exclusively designed for secular English
instruction, to work upon the children's minds as they please, in order
to smuggle in Christianity; against which the Hindoos are most jealously
on their guard. As I have said, childhood is the time to sow the seeds
of belief, and not manhood; more especially where an earlier faith has
taken root. An acquired conviction such as is feigned by adults is, as a
rule, only the mask for some kind of personal interest. And it is the
feeling that this is almost bound to be the case which makes a man who
has changed his religion in mature years an object of contempt to most
people everywhere; who thus show that they look upon religion, not as a
matter of reasoned conviction, but merely as a belief inoculated in
childhood, before any test can be applied. And that they are right in
their view of religion is also obvious from the way in which not only
the masses, who are blindly credulous, but also the clergy of every
religion, who, as such, have faithfully and zealously studied its
sources, foundations, dogmas and disputed points, cleave as a body to
the religion of their particular country; consequently for a minister of
one religion or confession to go over to another is the rarest thing in
the world. The Catholic clergy, for example, are fully convinced of the
truth of all the tenets of their Church, and so are the Protestant
clergy of theirs, and both defend the principles of their creeds with
like zeal. And yet the conviction is governed merely by the country
native to each; to the South German ecclesiastic the truth of the
Catholic dogma is quite obvious, to the North German, the Protestant. If
then, these convictions are based on objective reasons, the reasons must
be climatic, and thrive, like plants, some only here, some only there.
The convictions of those who are thus locally convinced are taken on
trust and believed by the masses everywhere.
_Demopheles_. Well, no harm is done, and it doesn't make any real
difference. As a fact, Protestantism is more suited to the North,
Catholicism to the South.
_Philalethes_. So it seems. Still I take a higher standpoint, and keep
in view a more important object, the progress, namely, of the knowledge
of truth among mankind. And from this point of view, it is a terrible
thing that, wherever a man is born, certain propositions are inculcated
in him in earliest youth, and he is assured that he may never have any
doubts about them, under penalty of thereby forfeiting eternal
salvation; propositions, I mean, which affect the foundation of all our
other knowledge and accordingly determine for ever, and, if they are
false, distort for ever, the point of view from which our knowledge
starts; and as, further, the corollaries of these propositions touch the
entire system of our intellectual attainments at every point, the whole
of human knowledge is thoroughly adulterated by them. Evidence of this
is afforded by every literature; the most striking by that of the Middle
Age, but in a too considerable degree by that of the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries. Look at even the first minds of all those epochs;
how paralyzed they are by false fundamental positions like these; how,
more especially, all insight into the true constitution and working of
nature is, as it were, blocked up. During the whole of the Christian
period Theism lies like a mountain on all intellectual, and chiefly on
all philosophical efforts, and arrests or stunts all progress. For the
scientific men of these ages God, devil, angels, demons hid the whole of
nature; no inquiry was followed to the end, nothing ever thoroughly
examined; everything which went beyond the most obvious casual nexus was
immediately set down to those personalities. "_It was at once explained
by a reference to God, angels or demons_," as Pomponatius expressed
himself when the matter was being discussed, "_and philosophers at any
rate have nothing analogous_." There is, to be sure, a suspicion of
irony in this statement of Pomponatius, as his perfidy in other matters
is known; still, he is only giving expression to the general way of
thinking of his age. And if, on the other hand, any one possessed the
rare quality of an elastic mind, which alone could burst the bonds, his
writings and he himself with them were burnt; as happened to Bruno and
Vanini. How completely an ordinary mind is paralyzed by that early
preparation in metaphysics is seen in the most vivid way and on its most
ridiculous side, where such a one undertakes to criticise the doctrines
of an alien creed. The efforts of the ordinary man are generally found
to be directed to a careful exhibition of the incongruity of its dogmas
with those of his own belief: he is at great pains to show that not only
do they not say, but certainly do not mean, the same thing; and with
that he thinks, in his simplicity, that he has demonstrated the
falsehood of the alien creed. He really never dreams of putting the
question which of the two may be right; his own articles of belief he
looks upon as _à priori_ true and certain principles.
_Demopheles_. So that's your higher point of view? I assure you there is
a higher still. _First live, then philosophize_ is a maxim of more
comprehensive import than appears at first sight. The first thing to do
is to control the raw and evil dispositions of the masses, so as to keep
them from pushing injustice to extremes, and from committing cruel,
violent and disgraceful acts. If you were to wait until they had
recognized and grasped the truth, you would undoubtedly come too late;
and truth, supposing that it had been found, would surpass their powers
of comprehension. In any case an allegorical investiture of it, a
parable or myth, is all that would be of any service to them. As Kant
said, there must be a public standard of Right and Virtue; it must
always flutter high overhead. It is a matter of indifference what
heraldic figures are inscribed on it, so long as they signify what is
meant. Such an allegorical representation of truth is always and
everywhere, for humanity at large, a serviceable substitute for a truth
to which it can never attain,--for a philosophy which it can never
grasp; let alone the fact that it is daily changing its shape, and has
in no form as yet met with general acceptance. Practical aims, then, my
good Philalethes, are in every respect superior to theoretical.
_Philalethes_. What you say is very like the ancient advice of Timaeus
of Locrus, the Pythagorean, _stop the mind with falsehood if you can't
speed it with truth_. I almost suspect that your plan is the one which
is so much in vogue just now, that you want to impress upon me that
The hour is nigh
When we may feast in quiet.
You recommend us, in fact, to take timely precautions, so that the waves
of the discontented raging masses mayn't disturb us at table. But the
whole point of view is as false as it is now-a-days popular and
commended; and so I make haste to enter a protest against it. It is
_false_, that state, justice, law cannot be upheld without the
assistance of religion and its dogmas; and that justice and public order
need religion as a necessary complement, if legislative enactments are
to be carried out. It is _false_, were it repeated a hundred times. An
effective and striking argument to the contrary is afforded by the
ancients, especially the Greeks. They had nothing at all of what we
understand by religion. They had no sacred documents, no dogma to be
learned and its acceptance furthered by every one, its principles to be
inculcated early on the young. Just as little was moral doctrine
preached by the ministers of religion, nor did the priests trouble
themselves about morality or about what the people did or left undone.
Not at all. The duty of the priests was confined to temple-ceremonial,
prayers, hymns, sacrifices, processions, lustrations and the like, the
object of which was anything but the moral improvement of the
individual. What was called religion consisted, more especially in the
cities, in giving temples here and there to some of the gods of the
greater tribes, in which the worship described was carried on as a state
matter, and was consequently, in fact, an affair of police. No one,
except the functionaries performing, was in any way compelled to attend,
or even to believe in it. In the whole of antiquity there is no trace of
any obligation to believe in any particular dogma. Merely in the case of
an open denial of the existence of the gods, or any other reviling of
them, a penalty was imposed, and that on account of the insult offered
to the state, which served those gods; beyond this it was free to
everyone to think of them what he pleased. If anyone wanted to gain the
favor of those gods privately, by prayer or sacrifice, it was open to
him to do so at his own expense and at his own risk; if he didn't do it,
no one made any objection, least of all the state. In the case of the
Romans, everyone had his own Lares and Penates at home; they were,
however, in reality, only the venerated busts of ancestors. Of the
immortality of the soul and a life beyond the grave, the ancients had no
firm, clear or, least of all, dogmatically fixed idea, but very loose,
fluctuating, indefinite and problematical notions, everyone in his own
way: and the ideas about the gods were just as varying, individual and
vague. There was, therefore, really no _religion_, in our sense of the
word, amongst the ancients. But did anarchy and lawlessness prevail
amongst them on that account? Is not law and civil order, rather, so
much their work, that it still forms the foundation of our own? Was
there not complete protection for property, even though it consisted for
the most part of slaves? And did not this state of things last for more
than a thousand years? So that I can't recognize, I must even protest
against the practical aims and the necessity of religion in the sense
indicated by you, and so popular now-a-days, that is, as an
indispensable foundation of all legislative arrangements. For, if you
take that point of view, the pure and sacred endeavor after truth would,
to say the least, appear quixotic, and even criminal, if it ventured, in
its feeling of justice, to denounce the authoritative creed as a usurper
who had taken possession of the throne of truth and maintained his
position by keeping up the deception.
_Demopheles_. But religion is not opposed to truth; it itself teaches
truth. And as the range of its activity is not a narrow lecture room,
but the world and humanity at large, religion must conform to the
requirements and comprehension of an audience so numerous and so mixed.
Religion must not let truth appear in its naked form; or, to use a
medical simile, it must not exhibit it pure, but must employ a mythical
vehicle, a medium, as it were. You can also compare truth in this
respect to certain chemical stuffs which in themselves are gaseous, but
which for medicinal uses, as also for preservation or transmission, must
be bound to a stable, solid base, because they would otherwise
volatilize. Chlorine gas, for example, is for all purposes applied only
in the form of chlorides. But if truth, pure, abstract and free from all
mythical alloy, is always to remain unattainable, even by philosophers,
it might be compared to fluorine, which cannot even be isolated, but
must always appear in combination with other elements. Or, to take a
less scientific simile, truth, which is inexpressible except by means of
myth and allegory, is like water, which can be carried about only in
vessels; a philosopher who insists on obtaining it pure is like a man
who breaks the jug in order to get the water by itself. This is,
perhaps, an exact analogy. At any rate, religion is truth allegorically
and mythically expressed, and so rendered attainable and digestible by
mankind in general. Mankind couldn't possibly take it pure and unmixed,
just as we can't breathe pure oxygen; we require an addition of four
times its bulk in nitrogen. In plain language, the profound meaning, the
high aim of life, can only be unfolded and presented to the masses
symbolically, because they are incapable of grasping it in its true
signification. Philosophy, on the other hand, should be like the
Eleusinian mysteries, for the few, the _élite_.
_Philalethes_. I understand. It comes, in short, to truth wearing the
garment of falsehood. But in doing so it enters on a fatal alliance.
What a dangerous weapon is put into the hands of those who are
authorized to employ falsehood as the vehicle of truth! If it is as you
say, I fear the damage caused by the falsehood will be greater than any
advantage the truth could ever produce. Of course, if the allegory were
admitted to be such, I should raise no objection; but with the admission
it would rob itself of all respect, and consequently, of all utility.
The allegory must, therefore, put in a claim to be true in the proper
sense of the word, and maintain the claim; while, at the most, it is
true only in an allegorical sense. Here lies the irreparable mischief,
the permanent evil; and this is why religion has always been and always
will be in conflict with the noble endeavor after pure truth.
_Demopheles_. Oh no! that danger is guarded against. If religion mayn't
exactly confess its allegorical nature, it gives sufficient indication
of it.
_Philalethes_. How so?
_Demopheles_. In its mysteries. "Mystery," is in reality only a
technical theological term for religious allegory. All religions have
their mysteries. Properly speaking, a mystery is a dogma which is
plainly absurd, but which, nevertheless, conceals in itself a lofty
truth, and one which by itself would be completely incomprehensible to
the ordinary understanding of the raw multitude. The multitude accepts
it in this disguise on trust, and believes it, without being led astray
by the absurdity of it, which even to its intelligence is obvious; and
in this way it participates in the kernel of the matter so far as it is
possible for it to do so. To explain what I mean, I may add that even in
philosophy an attempt has been made to make use of a mystery. Pascal,
for example, who was at once a pietist, a mathematician, and a
philosopher, says in this threefold capacity: _God is everywhere center
and nowhere periphery_. Malebranche has also the just remark: _Liberty
is a mystery_. One could go a step further and maintain that in
religions everything is mystery. For to impart truth, in the proper
sense of the word, to the multitude in its raw state is absolutely
impossible; all that can fall to its lot is to be enlightened by a
mythological reflection of it. Naked truth is out of place before the
eyes of the profane vulgar; it can only make its appearance thickly
veiled. Hence, it is unreasonable to require of a religion that it shall
be true in the proper sense of the word; and this, I may observe in
passing, is now-a-days the absurd contention of Rationalists and
Supernaturalists alike. Both start from the position that religion must
be the real truth; and while the former demonstrate that it is not the
truth, the latter obstinately maintain that it is; or rather, the former
dress up and arrange the allegorical element in such a way, that, in the
proper sense of the word, it could be true, but would be, in that case,
a platitude; while the latter wish to maintain that it is true in the
proper sense of the word, without any further dressing; a belief, which,
as we ought to know is only to be enforced by inquisitions and the
stake. As a fact, however, myth and allegory really form the proper
element of religion; and under this indispensable condition, which is
imposed by the intellectual limitation of the multitude, religion
provides a sufficient satisfaction for those metaphysical requirements
of mankind which are indestructible. It takes the place of that pure
philosophical truth which is infinitely difficult and perhaps never
attainable.
_Philalethes_. Ah! just as a wooden leg takes the place of a natural
one; it supplies what is lacking, barely does duty for it, claims to be
regarded as a natural leg, and is more or less artfully put together.
The only difference is that, whilst a natural leg as a rule preceded the
wooden one, religion has everywhere got the start of philosophy.
_Demopheles_. That may be, but still for a man who hasn't a natural leg,
a wooden one is of great service. You must bear in mind that the
metaphysical needs of mankind absolutely require satisfaction, because
the horizon of men's thoughts must have a background and not remain
unbounded. Man has, as a rule, no faculty for weighing reasons and
discriminating between what is false and what is true; and besides, the
labor which nature and the needs of nature impose upon him, leaves him
no time for such enquiries, or for the education which they presuppose.
In his case, therefore, it is no use talking of a reasoned conviction;
he has to fall back on belief and authority. If a really true philosophy
were to take the place of religion, nine-tenths at least of mankind
would have to receive it on authority; that is to say, it too would be a
matter of faith, for Plato's dictum, that the multitude can't be
philosophers, will always remain true. Authority, however, is an affair
of time and circumstance alone, and so it can't be bestowed on that
which has only reason in its favor, it must accordingly be allowed to
nothing but what has acquired it in the course of history, even if it is
only an allegorical representation of truth. Truth in this form,
supported by authority, appeals first of all to those elements in the
human constitution which are strictly metaphysical, that is to say, to
the need man feels of a theory in regard to the riddle of existence
which forces itself upon his notice, a need arising from the
consciousness that behind the physical in the world there is a
metaphysical, something permanent as the foundation of constant change.
Then it appeals to the will, to the fears and hopes of mortal beings
living in constant struggle; for whom, accordingly, religion creates
gods and demons whom they can cry to, appease and win over. Finally, it
appeals to that moral consciousness which is undeniably present in man,
lends to it that corroboration and support without which it would not
easily maintain itself in the struggle against so many temptations. It
is just from this side that religion affords an inexhaustible source of
consolation and comfort in the innumerable trials of life, a comfort
which does not leave men in death, but rather then only unfolds its full
efficacy. So religion may be compared to one who takes a blind man by
the hand and leads him, because he is unable to see for himself, whose
concern it is to reach his destination, not to look at everything by the
way.
_Philalethes_. That is certainly the strong point of religion. If it is
a fraud, it is a pious fraud; that is undeniable. But this makes priests
something between deceivers and teachers of morality; they daren't teach
the real truth, as you have quite rightly explained, even if they knew
it, which is not the case. A true philosophy, then, can always exist,
but not a true religion; true, I mean, in the proper understanding of
the word, not merely in that flowery or allegorical sense which you have
described; a sense in which all religions would be true, only in various
degrees. It is quite in keeping with the inextricable mixture of weal
and woe, honesty and deceit, good and evil, nobility and baseness, which
is the average characteristic of the world everywhere, that the most
important, the most lofty, the most sacred truths can make their
appearance only in combination with a lie, can even borrow strength from
a lie as from something that works more powerfully on mankind; and, as
revelation, must be ushered in by a lie. This might, indeed, be regarded
as the _cachet_ of the moral world. However, we won't give up the hope
that mankind will eventually reach a point of maturity and education at
which it can on the one side produce, and on the other receive, the true
philosophy. _Simplex sigillum veri_: the naked truth must be so simple
and intelligible that it can be imparted to all in its true form,
without any admixture of myth and fable, without disguising it in the
form of _religion_.
_Demopheles_. You've no notion how stupid most people are.
_Philalethes_. I am only expressing a hope which I can't give up. If it
were fulfilled, truth in its simple and intelligible form would of
course drive religion from the place it has so long occupied as its
representative, and by that very means kept open for it. The time would
have come when religion would have carried out her object and completed
her course: the race she had brought to years of discretion she could
dismiss, and herself depart in peace: that would be the _euthanasia_ of
religion. But as long as she lives, she has two faces, one of truth, one
of fraud. According as you look at one or the other, you will bear her
favor or ill-will. Religion must be regarded as a necessary evil, its
necessity resting on the pitiful imbecility of the great majority of
mankind, incapable of grasping the truth, and therefore requiring, in
its pressing need, something to take its place.
_Demopheles_. Really, one would think that you philosophers had truth in
a cupboard, and that all you had to do was to go and get it!
_Philalethes_. Well, if we haven't got it, it is chiefly owing to the
pressure put upon philosophy by religion at all times and in all places.
People have tried to make the expression and communication of truth,
even the contemplation and discovery of it, impossible, by putting
children, in their earliest years, into the hands of priests to be
manipulated; to have the lines, in which their fundamental thoughts are
henceforth to run, laid down with such firmness as, in essential
matters, to be fixed and determined for this whole life. When I take up
the writings even of the best intellects of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, (more especially if I have been engaged in
Oriental studies), I am sometimes shocked to see how they are paralyzed
and hemmed in on all sides by Jewish ideas. How can anyone think out the
true philosophy when he is prepared like this?
_Demopheles_. Even if the true philosophy were to be discovered,
religion wouldn't disappear from the world, as you seem to think. There
can't be one system of metaphysics for everybody; that's rendered
impossible by the natural differences of intellectual power between man
and man, and the differences, too, which education makes. It is a
necessity for the great majority of mankind to engage in that severe
bodily labor which cannot be dispensed with if the ceaseless
requirements of the whole race are to be satisfied. Not only does this
leave the majority no time for education, for learning, for
contemplation; but by virtue of the hard and fast antagonism between
muscles and mind, the intelligence is blunted by so much exhausting
bodily labor, and becomes heavy, clumsy, awkward, and consequently
incapable of grasping any other than quite simple situations. At least
nine-tenths of the human race falls under this category. But still the
people require a system of metaphysics, that is, an account of the world
and our existence, because such an account belongs to the most natural
needs of mankind, they require a popular system; and to be popular it
must combine many rare qualities. It must be easily understood, and at
the same time possess, on the proper points, a certain amount of
obscurity, even of impenetrability; then a correct and satisfactory
system of morality must be bound up with its dogmas; above all, it must
afford inexhaustible consolation in suffering and death; the consequence
of all this is, that it can only be true in an allegorical and not in a
real sense. Further, it must have the support of an authority which is
impressive by its great age, by being universally recognized, by its
documents, their tone and utterances; qualities which are so extremely
difficult to combine that many a man wouldn't be so ready, if he
considered the matter, to help to undermine a religion, but would
reflect that what he is attacking is a people's most sacred treasure. If
you want to form an opinion on religion, you should always bear in mind
the character of the great multitude for which it is destined, and form
a picture to yourself of its complete inferiority, moral and
intellectual. It is incredible how far this inferiority goes, and how
perseveringly a spark of truth will glimmer on even under the crudest
covering of monstrous fable or grotesque ceremony, clinging
indestructibly, like the odor of musk, to everything that has once come
into contact with it. In illustration of this, consider the profound
wisdom of the Upanishads, and then look at the mad idolatry in the India
of to-day, with its pilgrimages, processions and festivities, or at the
insane and ridiculous goings-on of the Saniassi. Still one can't deny
that in all this insanity and nonsense there lies some obscure purpose
which accords with, or is a reflection of the profound wisdom I
mentioned. But for the brute multitude, it had to be dressed up in this
form. In such a contrast as this we have the two poles of humanity, the
wisdom of the individual and the bestiality of the many, both of which
find their point of contact in the moral sphere. That saying from the
Kurral must occur to everybody. _Base people look like men, but I have
never seen their exact counterpart_. The man of education may, all the
same, interpret religion to himself _cum grano salis_; the man of
learning, the contemplative spirit may secretly exchange it for a
philosophy. But here again one philosophy wouldn't suit everybody; by
the laws of affinity every system would draw to itself that public to
whose education and capacities it was most suited. So there is always an
inferior metaphysical system of the schools for the educated multitude,
and a higher one for the _élite_. Kant's lofty doctrine, for instance,
had to be degraded to the level of the schools and ruined by such men as
Fries, Krug and Salat. In short, here, if anywhere, Goethe's maxim is
true, _One does not suit all_. Pure faith in revelation and pure
metaphysics are for the two extremes, and for the intermediate steps
mutual modifications of both in innumerable combinations and gradations.
And this is rendered necessary by the immeasurable differences which
nature and education have placed between man and man.
_Philalethes_. The view you take reminds me seriously of the mysteries
of the ancients, which you mentioned just now. Their fundamental purpose
seems to have been to remedy the evil arising from the differences of
intellectual capacity and education. The plan was, out of the great
multitude utterly impervious to unveiled truth, to select certain
persons who might have it revealed to them up to a given point; out of
these, again, to choose others to whom more would be revealed, as being
able to grasp more; and so on up to the Epopts. These grades correspond
to the little, greater and greatest mysteries. The arrangement was
founded on a correct estimate of the intellectual inequality of mankind.
_Demopheles_. To some extent the education in our lower, middle and high
schools corresponds to the varying grades of initiation into the
mysteries.
_Philalethes_. In a very approximate way; and then only in so far as
subjects of higher knowledge are written about exclusively in Latin. But
since that has ceased to be the case, all the mysteries are profaned.
_Demopheles_. However that may be, I wanted to remind you that you
should look at religion more from the practical than from the
theoretical side. _Personified_ metaphysics may be the enemy of
religion, but all the same _personified_ morality will be its friend.
Perhaps the metaphysical element in all religions is false; but the
moral element in all is true. This might perhaps be presumed from the
fact that they all disagree in their metaphysics, but are in accord as
regards morality.
_Philalethes_. Which is an illustration of the rule of logic that false
premises may give a true conclusion.
_Demopheles_. Let me hold you to your conclusion: let me remind you that
religion has two sides. If it can't stand when looked at from its
theoretical, that is, its intellectual side; on the other hand, from the
moral side, it proves itself the only means of guiding, controlling and
mollifying those races of animals endowed with reason, whose kinship
with the ape does not exclude a kinship with the tiger. But at the same
time religion is, as a rule, a sufficient satisfaction for their dull
metaphysical necessities. You don't seem to me to possess a proper idea
of the difference, wide as the heavens asunder, the deep gulf between
your man of learning and enlightenment, accustomed to the process of
thinking, and the heavy, clumsy, dull and sluggish consciousness of
humanity's beasts of burden, whose thoughts have once and for all taken
the direction of anxiety about their livelihood, and cannot be put in
motion in any other; whose muscular strength is so exclusively brought
into play that the nervous power, which makes intelligence, sinks to a
very low ebb. People like that must have something tangible which they
can lay hold of on the slippery and thorny pathway of their life, some
sort of beautiful fable, by means of which things can be imparted to
them which their crude intelligence can entertain only in picture and
parable. Profound explanations and fine distinctions are thrown away
upon them. If you conceive religion in this light, and recollect that
its aims are above all practical, and only in a subordinate degree
theoretical, it will appear to you as something worthy of the highest
respect.
_Philalethes_. A respect which will finally rest upon the principle that
the end sanctifies the means. I don't feel in favor of a compromise on a
basis like that. Religion may be an excellent means of training the
perverse, obtuse and ill-disposed members of the biped race: in the eyes
of the friend of truth every fraud, even though it be a pious one, is to
be condemned. A system of deception, a pack of lies, would be a strange
means of inculcating virtue. The flag to which I have taken the oath is
truth; I shall remain faithful to it everywhere, and whether I succeed
or not, I shall fight for light and truth! If I see religion on the
wrong side--