THE GREAT QUIETUS.
It is related of Schopenhauer that he was in the habit of putting down
a gold piece on the _table d'hôte_ where he dined, and of taking it up
again when the dinner was ended. This gold piece, he explained to his
Boswell, was for the waiter the first time that any one of the
different officers, who frequented the dining-room, was heard
discussing a loftier topic than that which is circled in wine, woman,
and song. As the story runs, no occasion ever presented itself in which
he could in this manner express his pleasure and contentment; but had
he lived long enough to meet Lieutenant Von Hartmann there is little
doubt that the gold piece would have formed an immediate and rightful
part of the waiter's perquisites.
This gentleman, who is now no longer an officer, but simply a thinker
and a man of letters, may, in many respects, be regarded as
Schopenhauer's direct descendant. To the world at large very little
concerning him is known, and that little is contained in a modest
autobiography which appeared a few years ago, and to which his
publisher has since added a supplement.
The meagre details that are furnished therein amount, in brief, to
this: Eduard von Hartmann was born in 1842, in Berlin, in which city he
passed an uneventful boyhood. The school which he attended, and which
like most other schools forced the pupils to master a quantity of
subjects whose usefulness may be questioned, brought him into an almost
open revolt against a system of education which, in nine cases out of
ten, is nothing more than a pure waste of time. On leaving the
gymnasium he decided, for reasons which to the average German must seem
fantastic, to enter the military service at once instead of passing the
usual semesters at a university. To this budding pessimist student life
seemed to offer but dull variations between commonplaceness and
vulgarity: to listen or not to listen to sundry poorly expressed
lectures by day, to engulf at night a certain quantity of beer in stone
measures, and to diversify these occupations in receiving slashes on
the cheek-bone, or in affording amusement to the Hebes of Prussian
restaurants, was not to him the life that was called ideal. Very
wisely, then, and in accordance with the example which his father had
already given, he chose in a military career a profession most apt to
satisfy those inclinations of the scientist and of the artist which had
already begun to exert an influence upon him.
In the year 1858 Herr von Hartmann entered the crack artillery regiment
of Berlin as volunteer. He then passed three years at the artillery
school, intermingling the scientific studies of his profession with
artistic and philosophic researches, and frequenting meanwhile the
refined society to which his family belonged. About this time a
rheumatic affection, which had first declared itself toward the close
of his school-days, became complicated with a fracture of some of the
delicate machinery of the knee. The injury was both painful and
incurable, and in 1864 he was obliged to resign his position, and
thereupon left the army with the grade of first lieutenant. These
latter details are given by way of counterbalance to the calumnies of
his enemies, who, in explaining his pessimism by the state of his
health,--which they insinuate was brought about by excessive and
unusual debauchery,--have in one way and another managed to vituperate
his chief work into nine editions.
On leaving the army he sought a career first as painter and then as
musician; it did not take him long, however, to discover that his
vocation was not such as is found in purely artistic pursuits; "the
bankruptcy of all my ambitions," he says, "was complete; there remained
to me but one thing, and that was thought." It was from thought, then,
that he demanded a consolation and an employment, and turning to
metaphysics he began at once to plan his "Philosophy of the
Unconscious." Meanwhile, for his own distraction and instruction he had
written a few essays, of which but one was destined to see the light of
day. This monograph, "Die dialektische Methode," was so favorably
viewed at Rostock, that he received therefrom the degree and title of
Doctor of Philosophy.
"The Philosophy of the Unconscious," when completed, remained a year in
his closet, and was only published in 1868, owing to an accidental
meeting with an intelligent publisher. Before, as since, the appearance
and success of this work, which is very generally considered as the
chief philosophical event of the last two decades, Dr. von Hartmann has
lived at Berlin, where he endeavors in every-day life to prove the
practical value of evolutionary pessimism, which it is his wish to
substitute for the indifferentism and quietist doctrines of
Schopenhauer.
Personally, Dr. von Hartmann is a very attractive individual, and his
attractiveness is increased by the fact that there is nothing
commonplace, and at the same time nothing affected about him. When I
called at his house, I found him coiled up in a rug on one of those
long chairs that are familiar to every ocean traveler. My first
impression was that I was in the presence of a giant; and as the
Berlinese as a race are notoriously tall, I was only surprised at the
great size of his head, which differed singularly from that of the
ordinary Prussian. His hair was brushed back from his forehead in the
manner popularly termed _à la Russe_, but which is more noticeable in
Vienna than in St. Petersburg; his eyes, which were large and luminous,
possessed an expression of such indulgence as would put the most timid
visitor at ease. Owing partly to the arrangement of his hair, his
forehead seemed to me to be the most expansive that I had ever seen;
the lower part of his face was hidden in a beard which descended very
nearly to his waist, while as for his moustache, it is, I think, the
longest in metaphysics. In some way or another I had gotten to believe
that it was part of the professional philosopher to be both
self-contained and absent-minded; I always pictured him as a class as
wearing spectacles far down on the nose, as being somewhat snuffy, and
carelessly tired in loose and shabby dressing-gown. I can give no
reason for this fancy of mine other than that it is one of those
pictures which we all draw of people and places that we have not seen.
If I remember rightly, Mr. Sala said that he imagined Leipzig to be a
city of very squat houses, in which dwelt little girls in blue skirts,
and this until he got there and found that it was precisely like any
other of its kind.
As a child, and indeed until very lately, I invariably thought of
Hungary as having red roads, bordered by crimson houses and bluffs of
green, while all about I saw in fancy splendid horses prancing in rich
caparisons; but, as any traveler will admit, Hungary, in point of
natural effects, is as humdrum as Connecticut; for real color, I
suppose one must go to Japan, and yet there are many who have done so
and then returned utterly disillusioned. Dr. von Hartmann took away my
illusion about the philosopher; he had a rug, it is true, but no
dressing-gown, or at least not one which was visible, and there was
nothing of the careless mien and abstracted attitudes which I had
expected; to use a current phrase, he was very wide awake, and I may
add that to one who has lived among Germans he seemed refreshingly
hospitable and graciously courteous.
Even in its most pleasant season, Berlin is not a pleasant city; a
lounge of but half an hour on the Unter den Linden results through
unconscious imitation in an enforced quickstep; to begin with, there
are too many big houses, and then there are too many big soldiers; and
while the soldiers present to the stranger an appearance of arrogant
hostility, the houses, not to be outdone, try to look as much like the
soldiers as possible, and loom up in alert unbending aggressiveness;
indeed, I have now in my mind a certain street which, when I looked
down it, almost got up and threatened me. I experienced, therefore, a
subtle pleasure on discovering that out of the whole of rigid Berlin
Dr. von Hartmann had chosen his residence in the most unsoldierly, and
for that reason the most attractive part; and it was to this quarter of
the city that I went to visit the man who, in spite of certain vagaries
of thought, may be considered as Germany's first thinker. When he had
disentangled himself from the folds of his rug, the impression which
had been produced by the size of his head and the breadth of his
shoulders vanished entirely. I thought for the moment of the quaint
myths of the earlier Teutons, of the gnomes and kobolds, for Dr. von
Hartmann, while massive in head and shoulders, is yet short and
undersized, and the suggestion of the Rhine legends which his
appearance caused was heightened by the strange effect produced by the
luxuriance of his beard and moustache.
He had barely spoken, however, before I recognized in him not only the
man of the world, which goes without the telling, but the gentleman,
and, in a moment, the thinker. Stendhal says somewhere, in speaking of
German, that it took him "two whole years to forget the beastly
language." Stendhal was what is termed nowadays an impressionist, and
his expression may perhaps on that account be excused; in any event
German is decidedly an unpleasant tongue; it is very rich, rich even to
exuberance, and when it is well handled it is to the initiate
delightful in many respects; but to the Latin, and the average
Anglo-Saxon, it is terribly tortuous, and most easy to lose one's way
in. I had hoped, therefore, that I might be allowed to talk with Dr.
von Hartmann in some more flowing form of speech, but as he preferred
German, it was not, of course, my place to rebel, and I soon found that
I had nothing to regret. I have had in the Fatherland the privilege of
hearing some very accomplished actors, and I have also sat beneath some
very eloquent speakers, but the amplitude and resources of the German
language were first made clear to me by this gentleman. When he spoke,
I may say, without exaggeration, that his words seemed less like
figures of speech than evocations of pictures. I had puzzled for some
time over a particular point in his teaching, and when I told him of my
difficulty he drew down before me a series of illustrations and
examples, which were as well defined as though they formed a panorama
on the wall; and therewithal was such a fluency of verb, such a
precision of adjective, and such a nicety of accent, that for the first
and only time I loved the German language.
Dr. von Hartmann is in no sense a misanthrope. He leads a quiet and
easy life, demonstrating by his own example that pessimism is not a
gospel of desolation. Personally, he has had many grave misfortunes; he
has suffered in health, in name, and in purse, he has lost many who
were most dear to him, but his laugh is as prompt and as frank as a
boy's. At the head of his table sits a gracious and charming woman, his
children are rich in strength and spirits, and an observer lately said
of him and his family, "If you wish to see happy and contented faces,
go call on the Hartmanns."
Beyond writing a dozen or more monographs, and dissertations on
philosophical subjects, Dr. von Hartmann has also charmed the public
with two elaborate and well-conceived poems. His chief claim to
recognition, however, and the one which has placed him at the head of
contemporary metaphysics, is the work already mentioned, in which,
somewhat after the manner of his predecessor, and yet with a
diffuseness of argument which had no part in Schopenhauer's system, he
reduces the motor forces of the universe to a dual principle which he
terms the _Unbewussten_, or the Unconscious.
It is unnecessary to enter into any minute examination of this theory
of his, in which, with a juggle of fancies and facts, he tries to
reconcile the teaching of Hegel with that of Schopenhauer, for, however
it may be considered, it is in any event but loosely connected with
that part of his philosophy which treats of the matter in hand.
It will be sufficient for the understanding of what is to follow, to
note simply that after examining the forms of phenomenal existence,
matter, life organic and inorganic, humanity, and so on, he presents
the Unconscious as the One-in-all, the Universal soul, from which,
through determined laws, the multiplicity of individuals and characters
is derived. This one-in-all is sovereignly wise, and the world is
admirable in every respect; but while he argues in this way that the
world is the best one possible, he has no difficulty in showing that
life itself is irreclaimably miserable.
The originality of his system consists in a theory of optimistic
evolution as counterbalanced by a pessimistic analysis of life, and
also in the manner in which, with a glut of curious argument, he
concludes that as the world's _progressus_ does not tend to either
universal or even individual happiness, the great aim of science should
be to emancipate man from the love of life, and in this wise lead the
world back to chaos.
The main idea runs somewhat as follows. The interest of the Unconscious
is opposed to our own; it would be to our advantage not to live, it is
to the advantage of the Unconscious that we should do so, and that
others should be brought into existence through us. The Unconscious,
therefore, in the furtherment of its aims, has surrounded man with such
illusions as are capable of deluding him into the belief that life is a
pleasant thing, well worth the living. The instincts that are within us
are but the different forms beneath which this unreasoning desire to
live is at work, and with which the Unconscious inspires man and moulds
him to its profit. Hence the energy so foolishly expended for the
protection of an existence which is but the right to suffer, hence the
erroneous idea which is formed of the pain and pleasure derivable from
life, and hence the modification of past disenchantments through the
influence of fresh and newer hopes.
With regard to happiness, there are, according to Hartmann, three
periods or forms of illusion, from all of which the world must be
thoroughly freed before the great aim of science can be attained. The
first of these illusions consists in the idea that under certain
circumstances happiness is now obtainable on earth; the second, in the
belief that happiness is realizable in a future state; and the third,
in the opinion that happiness will be discovered in the march of
progress through the coming centuries.
Of these three ideas, the first has for some time past been recognized
by many as a chimera. In certain quarters the decomposition of the
second has already begun, but the belief in the reality of the third is
unquestionably the paramount conviction of the present century. When
each of these three illusions has been utterly routed and universally
done away with, then, Hartmann considers, the world will be ripe for
its great quietus.
The first of these three forms is, of course, the most tenacious;
indeed, it is an incontestible fact that man, even when miserable,
clings to life, and loves it not only when there is some vague hope of
a brighter future, but even under its most distressing conditions. It
is, therefore, against this illusion that pessimism, to be successful,
must rain the hardest blows.
The views of many eminent writers on this subject have already been
expressed in the course of these pages, but their views, while in a
measure important, should nevertheless be received with a certain
amount of caution, for they emanate from superior minds, in which
melancholy as the attribute of genius constantly presides.
Let us imagine, then, with Hartmann, a man who is not a genius, but
simply a man of ordinary culture, enjoying the advantages of an
enviable position; a man who is neither wearied by pleasure nor
oppressed by exceptional misfortunes; in brief, a man capable of
comparing the advantages which he enjoys with the disadvantages of
inferior members of society; let us suppose that Death comes to this
man and speaks somewhat as follows: "Your hour is at hand; it remains
with you, however, to live at once a new life, with the past entirely
effaced, or to accept the grave as it is."
There can be little doubt, if this hypothetical individual has not
lived carelessly and thoughtlessly, and does not permit his judgment to
be biased by the desire for life at any price, that he would choose
death in preference to another existence, in which he would be assured
of none of the favorable conditions which he had hitherto enjoyed. He
will recommence his own life, perhaps, but no other of an inferior
grade.
This choice, however, would be that of an intelligent man, and might be
objected to on a ground not dissimilar to the one already advanced
against the judgments of genius. But let us follow Hartmann still
further, and in descending the spiral of humanity put the same question
to every one we meet; let us take, for instance, a woodcutter, a
Hottentot, or an orang-outang, and ask of each which he prefers, death,
or a new existence in the body of a hippopotamus or a flea. Each will
answer, "death," but none of them will hesitate between their own lives
and death; and if a like question be put to the hippopotamus and the
flea, their answers will be precisely similar.
The difference in the comparative judgment that each would bring to
bear on his own life, and on that of life in an inferior degree,
results evidently from the fact that on being questioned each enters
imaginatively into the existence of the lower creation, and at once
judges its condition to be insupportable. The difference between the
opinion which the flea holds on the value of its own existence and our
own private judgment on this insect is derived simply from the fact
that the flea has a quantity of absurd illusions which we do not share,
and these illusions cause it such an excess of imaginary happiness that
in consequence it prefers its own life to death. In this the flea is
not wrong; on the contrary, it is quite right, for the value of an
existence can only be measured in accordance with its natural
limitations. In this sense illusion is as serviceable as truth.
From this introduction it follows quite of itself that each and every
creature is capable of weighing the discomforts of an existence
inferior to that in which it dwells, and yet is unable to rightly judge
its own. Each can discern the illusions with which its inferior is
surrounded, but is always defenseless against its own, save under
exceptional circumstances, as in the case of genius. Hartmann
concludes, therefore, very logically that an intelligence which is
capable of embracing every form of life would condemn existence in its
totality in the same manner that an intelligence relatively restricted
condemns it in part.
In drawing up the balance-sheet of life, Hartmann differs from
Schopenhauer on the question of the purely negative character of
pleasure. That pleasure is at times a negative condition, as in the
cessation of pain, he willingly admits, but from his standpoint it is
something else besides; it may be either positive, although derived
from an illusion, as in love, or real, as in art and science.
Nevertheless, the predominance of pain over pleasure seems to be firmly
established, and his examination of this subject is not without a
repellant interest.
The four greatest blessings of life are admittedly health, youth,
liberty, and well-being; but from their nature, Hartmann points out,
these things are incapable of raising man out of indifference into
pleasure save only as they may help to diminish an anterior pain, or
guard him from a possible discomfort. Take the case of health, for
instance; no man thinks of his nerves until they are affected, nor yet
of his eyes until they ache; indeed, it may fairly be said that a man
who is in perfect condition only knows that he has a body because he
sees and touches it. Liberty may be regarded in much the same manner:
it is unnoticed until it is in some way interfered with; while youth,
which is the most propitious condition of life, is in itself but
capability and possibility, and not possession, nor yet delight.
Well-being, the certainty of shelter from need and privation, Hartmann
very rightly considers merely as the _sine qua non_ of life in its
baldest aspect, for, he argues, were it otherwise, the simple fact of
living would satisfy and content us; but we all know that an assured
existence is a torment if nothing fills the gap.
In the menagerie of beasts that torture life there is one, Baudelaire
says in his easy metre, that is more hideous than all the rest; it
is:--
... "l'ennui! L'oeil chargé d'un pleur involontaire
Il rêve d'échafauds en fumant son houka--
Tu le connais, lecteur, ce monstre délicat,
--Hypocrite lecteur,--mon semblable,--mon frère!"
This insupportable companion of inaction is usually banished by work;
but then, to him who is obliged to labor, is not work often
distasteful, and even a species of misfortune? Indeed, there are few,
if any, who ever work save under compulsion; and whether the compulsion
is caused by the attracting force of fame, the desire to escape from
want, or comes simply as a promise of relief from boredom, the
incentive and necessity are one and the same. It is true that man when
at work is consoled by the thought of rest, but then work and rest
merely serve to change his position, and they do so very much in the
same manner as that uneasiness which forces the invalid to turn in bed,
and then to turn back again, when it has shown him that the second
position is no better than the first.
The great blessings of life, therefore, reduce themselves, in brief, to
this: they represent but that affranchisement from pain which is
equivalent to a state of pure indifference; but as no one reaches this
condition save momentarily and by accident, it seems to follow that
life has less charm than non-existence, which represents indifference
in its most absolute and unquestioned form.
This state of beatitude is yet to be acquired; meanwhile, as Schiller
says, so long as philosophy does not govern the world, hunger and love
will suffice to keep it in motion. After the four causes of
contentment, Hartmann's views on the two incentives to activity remain
to be examined.
In regard to the first, it may be said without extravagance that the
sufferings of hunger rule the greater portion of the 1300 millions of
the earth's inhabitants. Europe not long since averaged a famine every
seven years; now, the facilities of communication have replaced famine
with an increased valuation of food. Death is the rarest and the least
important evil that hunger occasions; what is most to be regarded is
the physical and intellectual impoverishment, the mortality among
children, and the particular maladies which it engenders.
According to Hartmann, the analysis of hunger shows that in satisfying
its demands the individual does not raise his sensibility above a state
of pure indifference. He may, it is true, under favorable
circumstances, cause a certain pleasure to predominate over suffering
by means of taste and digestion; but in the animal kingdom, as in
humanity, taken as a whole, the tortures caused by hunger are greatly
in excess of any pleasures that may attach to it. In fact, from
Hartmann's standpoint, the necessity of eating is in itself a
misfortune.
After all that has been said through centuries of literature on the
subject of love, it is certainly difficult to be original; but Hartmann
has at least the merit of presenting it in a more abstract light, and
from a less alluring standpoint than any other writer who has handled
the subject. For love, according to his views, is either contrary to
the laws of society, and as such environed by perils and pains, vice
and degradation, or it is perfectly legal, and, in that case, quickly
extinguished. "In the majority of cases," he says, "insurmountable
obstacles arise between the two lovers and cause a consequent and
immense despair, while in the rarer and more fortunate instances the
expected happiness turns out to be purely illusory."
It is, however, as hard to love as it is not to love; but he (Hartmann)
says, "Who once recognizes that the happiness which it offers is but a
chimera, and that its pains are greater than its pleasures, will, while
unable perhaps to escape entirely from its allurements, be none the
less able to judge it differently from the novice, and therefore
capable of diminishing some of its suffering, and some of the
disproportion between its joys and its sorrows." According to this
savage moralist, then, love is either an illusory and quickly vanishing
happiness, or an actual suffering, and resembles hunger precisely in
that it is in itself and to the individual a veritable curse.
Hartmann judges marriage with an epigram borrowed from Lessing: "There
is, at most, but one disagreeable woman in the world; it is only a pity
that every man gets her for himself." In very much the same manner are
the ties of family and friendship weighed and judged. Scattered here
and there is some reflection of Schopenhauer's wit and wisdom, but
generally the discussion is defective, and lacks the grace of style and
purity of diction which characterized the latter writer. The sentiments
of honor, public esteem, ambition, and glory depend, he says, on the
opinion of others, and are therefore merely toys of the imagination,
"for my joys and troubles exist in my mind, and not in the minds of
other people. Their opinion concerning me has merely a conventional
value, and not one which is effective for me."
But to him who journeys through the desert called life, there is still
one suave and green oasis. Hartmann is not utterly relentless, and
though perhaps on all other subjects he may seem skeptical as a
ragpicker, he has yet a word or two of cheer for art and science. These
pleasant lands, however, are only traversable by rare and privileged
natures, for if from the pleasure which attaches to music, painting,
poetry, philosophy, and science, a deduction be made of all that which
is but sham, dilettanteism, and vanity, the more considerable part of
this supreme resource will be found to have disappeared. That which
remains over is the compensation which nature preserves as recompense
to the extreme sensibility of the artist and thinker, to whom the
miseries of life are far more poignant than to other men, whose
sensibilities are duller and less impressionable. Now, if the ubiquity
of suffering is admitted, the temperament of this latter class is, in
the long run, undoubtedly preferable to the more refined organization
of the artist; for, after all, a state of comparative insensibility is
evidently not too dearly bought, when the price is merely the lack of a
delight, whose absence is not a privation, and which, to those able to
appreciate it, is as rare as it is limited in duration. Moreover, even
the real and ineffaceable pleasures which the thinker and artist enjoy
are obtainable only after much trouble and discomfort.
Genius does not fall from the skies ready-made and complete in armor
and equipment; the study which is to develop it is a task painful and
tiresome, whose pleasures are rare, and, generally speaking, but those
of anticipation and vanquished obstacles. Each art has its mechanical
side, which demands a long apprenticeship; and even then, after the
preliminary preparation, the only pleasant moments are those of
conception, which, in turn, are directly succeeded by the long hours of
technical execution.
In the case of the amateur, the pleasure of listening to good music, of
seeing a fine actor, or of looking at works of art, is undoubtedly the
one that causes the least amount of inconvenience, and yet Hartmann is
not to be blamed for noting that even this pleasure is seldom
unalloyed. In the first place, there is the bother of going to the
picture-gallery; then there is the bad air and hubbub in the theatre;
after this come the dangers of catching cold, of being run into, or
annoyed in a dozen different ways, and especially the fatigue of
watching and listening.
In the case of the artist there are the inevitable deceptions; the
struggles with envy, the indifference and disdain of the public.
Chamfort was wont to exclaim, "The public indeed! how many idiots does
it take to make a public?" The public, nevertheless, has the ability to
make itself very disagreeable, and not every one courts its smile with
success. If, in addition to all these things, the nervous organization
of the thinker, more vibrant a thousandfold than that of other men, is
taken into consideration, it will be seen that Hartmann is not wrong in
stating that the pleasures to which this class is privileged are
expiated by a greater sensibility to pain.
But while art is not without its disadvantages, Hartmann declares that
life still holds one solace that is supreme and unalloyed. "Unconscious
sleep," he says, "is relatively the happiest condition, for it is the
only one from which pain is completely banished. With dreams, however,
all the miseries of life return; and happiness, when it then appears,
does so only in the vague form of an agreeable sensation, such as that
of being freed from the body, or flying through the air. The pleasures
of art and science, the only ones which could reconcile a sensible man
to life, are intangible herein, while suffering, on the other hand,
appears in its most positive form."
Among the different factors which are generally supposed to be more or
less productive of happiness, wealth or its symbol, money, usually
represents the enchanted wand that opens the gate to every joy of life.
It is true that we have seen that all these joys were illusions, and
that their pursuit was more painful than pleasing, but Hartmann here
makes an exception in favor of the delights which art and science
procure, and also, like a true Berlinois, of those which the table
affords.
"Wealth," he says, "makes me lord and master. With it I can purchase
the pleasures of the table, and even those of love." It is unnecessary
to contend with him on this point: our tastes all differ; still there
are few, it is to be imagined, who will envy him in an affection which
is purchasable with coin of the realm. Moreover, wealth does not make
one lord and master; there is a certain charm in original and brilliant
conversation which neither Hartmann nor any one else could buy, even
though all the wealth of Ormus and the Ind stood to his credit on the
ledgers of the Landesbank. Wealth, however, he hastens to explain,
should be valued not for the commodities which it can procure, but
rather because we are enabled therewith to shield ourselves from
inconveniences which would otherwise disturb that zero of the
sensibility which the pessimist holds to be the nearest approach to
reality in happiness.
It is said that the drowning man will clutch at a straw, and it is
possible that the reader who has seen his illusions dispersed and
slaughtered one by one has perhaps deluded himself with the fancy that
hope at least might yet survive; if he has done so, he may be sure that
he has reckoned without his host. Hartmann guillotines the blue goddess
in the most off-hand manner; she is the last on the list, and he does
the job with a hand which is, so to speak, well in. Of course hope is a
great delight; who thinks of denying it? Certainly not the headsman,
who even drops a sort of half tear over her mangled wings. But if we
come to look over the warrant which has legalized the execution, the
question naturally arises who and what is hope? It is of little use to
ask the poets, for they are all astray; what they see in hope is a fair
sky girt with laurels,--in other words, the rape of happiness; but has
it not been repeated even to satiety that happiness does not exist,
that pain outbalances pleasure? What is hope, then, but an illusion?
and an illusion, too, that plays all manner of tricks with us, and
amuses itself at our expense; one, in fact, which makes use of us until
our task is accomplished, and we understand that all things are
different from that which we desired. "He, then," Hartmann says, "who
is once convinced that hope is as vain and illusory as its object will
see its influence gradually wane beneath the power of the
understanding, and the one thing to which he will then look forward
will be, not the greatest amount of happiness, but the easiest burden
of pain."
In all that has gone before, Hartmann has endeavored to show that
suffering increases with the development of the intellect, or rather,
that happiness exists only in the mineral kingdom, which represents
that zero of the senses above which man struggles in vain. It has been
seen that they whose nervous systems are most impressionable have a
larger share of suffering than their less sensitive brethren;
furthermore, experience teaches that the lower classes are more
contented than the cultivated and the rich, for while they are more
exposed to want, yet they are thicker-skinned and more obtuse. In
descending the scale of life, therefore, it is easy to show that such
weight of pain as burdens animal existence is less than that which man
supports. The horse, whose sensibility is most delicate, leads a more
painful existence than the swine, or even the fish, whose happiness at
high tide is proverbial. The life of the fish is happier than that of
the horse, the oyster is happier than the fish, the life of the plant
is happier yet, and so on down to the last degrees of organic life,
where consciousness expires and suffering ends.
The balance sheet of human pleasure and pain may therefore be summed up
somewhat as follows: in the first column stand those conditions which
correspond to a state of pure indifference, and merely represent the
absence of certain sufferings; these are health, youth, liberty, and
well-being; in the second are those which stand as illusory incentives,
such as the desire for wealth, power, esteem, and general regard; in
the third are those which, as a rule, cause more pain than pleasure,
such as hunger and love; in the fourth are those which rest on
illusions, such as hope, etc.; in the fifth are those which, recognized
as misfortunes, are only accepted to escape still greater ones: these
are work and marriage; in the sixth are those which afford more
pleasure than pain, but whose joys must be paid for by suffering, and
in any event can be shared but by the few: this is the column of art
and science.
Let a line be drawn and the columns added up, the sum total amounts to
the inevitable conclusion that pain is greatly in excess of pleasure;
and this not alone in the average, but in the particular existence of
each individual, and even in the case of him who seems exceptionally
favored. Hartmann has taken great care to point out that experience
demonstrates the vanity of each of the opulent aspirations of youth,
and that on the subject of individual happiness intelligent old age
preserves but few illusions.
Such is the schedule of pleasure and pain which each one is free to
verify by his own experience, or, better still, to disregard
altogether; for, from what has gone before, it is easy to see that man
is most happy when he is the unconscious dupe of his own illusions. In
Koheleth it is written: "To add to knowledge is to add to pain." He,
then, whose judgment is obscured by illusions is less sensible to the
undeniable miseries of life; he is always prepared to welcome hope, and
each deception is forgotten in the expectation of better things. Mr.
Micawber, whose acquaintance we have all made, is not alone a type, but
a lesson, the moral of which is sometimes overlooked.
In brief, Hartmann's teaching resolves itself into the doctrine that
the idea that happiness is obtainable in this life is the first and
foremost of illusions. This conclusion, in spite of certain
eccentricities of statement, is none the less one which will be found
singularly difficult to refute. But every question has two different
sides, and this one is no exception. The devil, whom Schopenhauer
painted in a good grim gray, Hartmann has daubed all over with a depth
of black of which he is certainly undeserving; and not only that, but
he has taken an evident pleasure in so doing. It is not, therefore,
unfair to use his own weapon, and tell him that he, too, is the dupe of
an illusion, or, to borrow a simile from the prince of wits, to insist
that while he may not carry any unnecessary quantity of motes in his
eye, some dust has assuredly settled on his monocle.
As is the case with others who have treated the subject, Hartmann
confounds the value of the existence of the unit with the worth of
life in the aggregate. Taken as a whole, it is undeniably and without
doubt unfortunate, but that does not prevent many people from being
superlatively, and, to the pessimist, even insultingly happy; and
though the joy of a lifetime be circumscribed in a single second, yet
it is not rash to say that that second of joy may be so vividly intense
as to compensate its recipient for all miseries past and to come. It
may be noted, further, that the balance-sheet which has just been
reviewed is simply a resultant of Hartmann's individual opinion.
Sometimes, it is true, he deals with unquestioned facts, and sometimes
with unanswerable figures; but it has been wittily said that nothing is
so fallacious as facts except figures; and certain of these figures and
facts, which seem to bear out his statements, are found at times to be
merely assertions, and exaggerated at that.
The second great illusion from which Hartmann would deliver us is the
belief that happiness is realizable in a future life. As has been seen,
he has already contended that earthly felicity is unobtainable, and his
arguments against a higher state are, in a word, that unless the
condition which follows life is compared to the anterior state of
being, chaos, the successor of life, can bring to man neither happiness
nor unhappiness; but as the belief in the regeneration of the body is
no longer tenable, it follows that this contrast cannot be appreciated
by the non-existent, who are necessarily without thought or
consciousness.
This doctrine, which is very nearly akin to Buddhism, has, of course,
but little in common with Christianity. Christianity does not, it is
true, recognize in us any fee simple to happiness, but it recommends
the renunciation of such as may be held, that the value of the
transcendent felicity which it promises may be heightened to a still
greater extent. It was this regenerating hope, this association of a
disdain for life to a promise of eternal well-being, that saved
antiquity from the despair and distaste for life in which it was being
slowly consumed. But, according to the tendency of modern thought,
every effort to demonstrate the reality of ultramundane happiness only
results in a more or less disguised and fantastic representation of
Nirvâna, while the idea which each forms of such a condition varies
naturally with the degree of his culture. It is certainly not at all
astonishing that all those who are more or less attached to the
Christian conception of life should, as Hartmann says, indignantly
repulse any and every suggestion of this description. For such ideas to
be accepted, a long and worldly civilizing preparation is needed.
A period of this nature is found in his analysis of the third and last
great illusion, which holds that happiness will be realizable in the
progressing evolution of the world. The chapter in which this subject
is treated is one of the most masterly in his entire work, and as such
is well deserving of careful examination.
First, it may be explained that to the student of modern science the
history of the world is that of a continuous and immense development.
The union of photometry and spectral analysis enables him to follow the
evolution of other planets, while chemistry and mineralogy teach him
something of the earth's own story before it cooled its outer crust.
Biology discloses the evolution of the vegetable and animal kingdom;
archæology, with some assistance from other sources, throws an
intelligible light over the prehistoric development of man, while
history brings with it the reverberation of the ordered march of
civilization, and points at the same time to larger and grander
perspectives. It is not hard, then, to be convinced of the reality of
progress; the difficulty lies in the inability to present it to one's
self in a thoroughly unselfish manner. From an egoist point of view,
man--and by man is meant he who has succeeded in divesting himself of
the two illusions just considered--would condemn life not only as a
useless possession, but as an affliction. He has, however, Hartmann
tells him, a rôle to fill under the providential direction of the
Unconscious, which, in conformity with the plan of absolute wisdom,
draws the world on to a beneficent end, and this rôle exacts that he
shall take interest in, and joyously sacrifice himself to life. If he
does otherwise, his loss prevents no suffering to society, on the
contrary, it augments the general discomfort by the length of time
which is needed to replace a useful member. Man may not, then, as
Schopenhauer recommended, assist as a passive spectator of life; on the
contrary, he must ceaselessly act, work, and produce, and associate
himself without regret in the economic and intellectual development of
society; or, in other words, he must lend his aid to the attainment of
the supreme goal of the evolution of the universe, for that there is a
goal it is as impossible to doubt as it is unreasonable to suppose that
the world's one end and aim is to turn on its orbit and enjoy the
varied spectacle of pain. And yet, what is this goal to which all
nature tends? According to a theory which nowadays is very frequently
expressed, it is the attainment of universal happiness through gradual
advancement and progress.
But, whatever progress humanity may realize, it will never be able,
Hartmann affirms, to do away with, nor yet diminish those most painful
of evils, illness, old age, poverty, and discontent. So, no matter to
how great an extent remedies may be multiplied, disorders, and
especially those which are light but chronic, will spread with a
progression far more rapid than the knowledge of therapeutics. The
gayety of youth, moreover, will never be but the privilege of a
fraction of mankind, while the greater part will continue to be
devoured by the melancholy of old age. The poverty of the masses, too,
as the world advances, becomes more and more formidable, for all the
while the masses are gaining a clearer perception of their misery. The
happiest races, it has been said over and over again, are those which
live nearest to nature, as do the savage tribes; and after them come
necessarily the civilized nations, which are the least cultivated.
Historically speaking, therefore, the progress of civilization
corresponds with the spread of general nausea.
May it not be, then, as Kant maintained, that the practice of universal
morality is the great aim of evolution? Hartmann considers the question
at great length, and decides in the negative; for, were it such, it
would necessarily expand with time, gain ground, so to speak, and take
a firm hold on the different classes of society. These feats, of
course, it has not performed, for immorality in descending the
centuries has changed only in form. Indeed, putting aside the
fluctuations of the character of every race, it will be found that
everywhere the same connection is maintained between egotism and
sympathy. If one is shocked at the cruelty and brutality of former
days, it should nevertheless be remembered that uprightness, sincerity,
and justice were the characteristics of earlier nations. Who shall say,
however, that to-day we do not live in a reign of falsehood, perfidy,
and the coarsest crimes; and that were it not for the assured execution
of the repressive enactments of the state and society, we should see
the naked brutality of the barbarians surge up again among us? For
that matter, it may be noted that at times it does reappear in all its
human bestiality, and invariably so the moment that law and order are
in any way weakened or destroyed. What happened in the draft riots in
New York, and in Paris under the Commune?
Since morality cannot be the great aim of evolution, perhaps it may be
art and science; but the further back one looks, the more does
scientific progress appear to be the exclusive work of certain rare and
gifted minds, while the nearer one approaches the present epoch, the
more collective does the work become. Hartmann points out that the
first thinkers were not unlike the magicians who made a monument rise
out of nothing, whereas the laborers who work at the intellectual
edifice of the present day are but corporations of intelligent builders
who each, according to their strength, aid in the construction of a
gigantic tower. "The work of science hereafter will," he says, "be
broader and less profound; it will become exclusively inductive, and
hence the demand for genius will grow gradually less. Similarity of
dress has already blended the different ranks of society; meanwhile we
are advancing to an analogous leveling of the intelligence, which will
result in a common but solid mediocrity. The delight in scientific
production will gradually wane, and the world will end in knowing only
the pleasures of passive understanding. But the pleasure of knowledge
is tasteless when truth is presented like a cake already prepared: to
be enjoyed it must cost an effort and a struggle."
Art will be handicapped in much the same manner. It is no longer now
what it was for the youth of humanity, a god august dispensing
happiness with open hands; it is simply a matter of amusement, a remedy
for ennui, and a distraction from the fatigues of the day. Hence the
increase of dilettantism and the neglect of serious study. The future
of art is to Hartmann self-evident. "Age has no ideal, or rather, it
has lost what it had, and art is condemned in the increasing years of
humanity to hold the same position as the nightly ballets and farces
now do to the bankers and brokers of large cities."
This consistent treatment of the subject Hartmann cleverly founds on
the analogy of the different ages of the life of the individual with
the development of humanity. It is, of course, merely a series of
affirmations, but not for that reason necessarily untrue. The great
thinkers have disappeared, as have also the great artists; and they
have done so, Hartmann would say, because we no longer need them.
Indeed, there can be little doubt that could the Greeks come back, they
would tell us our art was barbarous; even to the casual observer it has
retrograded, nor is it alone in painting and sculpture that symptoms of
decadence are noticeable; if we look at the tendencies in literature,
nothing very commendable is to be found, save in isolated instances,
where the technicalities of style have been raised very near to
perfection; but, apart from a few purists who can in no sense be called
popular, the majority of the manufacturers of fiction have nothing to
offer but froth and rubbish.
The modern stage, too, brings evidence that a palpitant tableau is more
appreciated than a polished comedy, and the concert-hall tells a story
which is not dissimilar. Music, which with Mozart changed its sex, has
been turned into a harlot by Offenbach and his successors; and there
are but few nowadays who would hesitate between Don Juan and the last
inanity of Strauss. One composer, however, of incontestable genius, has
been slowly fighting his way into the hearts of cultivated people, and,
curiously enough, has sought to translate with an orchestra some part
of the philosophy of pessimism. Schopenhauer, it is said, shook his
head at Wagner, and would have none of him; yet if Schopenhauer was
ever wrong, he was certainly wrong in that; for Wagner has expressed,
as no one will do again, the flooding rush of Will, and the unspiritual
but harmonious voice of Nature.
But whatever may become of art, science is not to be dismissed so
abruptly. Practically considered, the political, social, and industrial
advance of the world depends entirely on its progress; and yet, from
Hartmann's standpoint, all that has been accomplished hitherto, by the
aid of manufactories, steamships, railways and telegraphs, has merely
served to lessen the embarrassments which compressed the activity of
man; and the sole advantage which society has reaped by their aid is
that the force heretofore expended in actual labor is now free for the
play of the intellect, and serves to hasten the evolution of the world.
This result, Hartmann remarks, while of importance to general progress,
in no wise affects the happiness of the individual.
This last statement of his will perhaps be better understood if it be
taken into consideration that the increased production of food which
will necessarily follow on a more intelligent culture of the soil will
greatly augment the population. An increase of population will multiply
the number of those who are always on the verge of starvation, of which
there are already millions. But an advance of this kind, while a step
backward one way, must yet be a step forward in another; for the wealth
which it will bring in its train will necessarily aid in diminishing
suffering.
Politically considered, the outlook does not seem to be much more
assured. An ideal government can do nothing more than permit man to
live without fear of unjust aggressions, and enable him to prepare the
ground on which he may construct, if he can, the edifice of his own
happiness. Socially, the result will be about the same: through
solidarity, association, and other means, men will learn how to make
the struggle of the individual with want less severe; yet, in all this,
his burdens will be merely lightened, and positive happiness will
remain unobtained.
Such are the outlines of Hartmann's conception of what future progress
will amount to. If the ideal is realized, man will be gradually raised
out of the misery in which he is plunged, and little by little approach
a state of indifference in every sphere of his activity. But it should
be remembered that the ideal is ever intangible; man may approach, but
he can never reach it, and consequently will remain always in a state
of suffering.
In this manner, but with a profusion of argument, which, if not always
convincing, is yet highly instructive, Hartmann has shown in brief that
the people that dwell nearest to nature are happier than the civilized
nations, that the poor are more contented than the rich, the poor in
spirit more blessed than the intelligent, and that in general that man
is the happiest whose sensibilities are the most obtuse, because
pleasure is then less dominated by pain, and illusions are more
steadfast and complete; moreover, that the progress of humanity
develops not only wealth and its needs, and consequently discontent,
but also the aptitudes and culture of the intellect, which in turn
awaken man to the consciousness of the misery of life, and in so doing
heighten the sentiment of general misfortune.
The dream that another golden age is to visit the earth is, therefore,
puerile in the extreme. As the wayfarer's burden grows heavier with the
miles, so do humanity's suffering and the consciousness of its misery
continually increase. The child lives in the moment, the adolescent
dreams of a transcendent ideal; man aspires to glory, then to wealth or
practical wisdom; lastly, old age, recognizing the vanity of all
things, holds but to peace, and bends a tired head to rest. "And so it
is with civilization,--nations rise, strengthen, and disappear.
Humanity, by unmistakable signs, shows that it is on the wane, and that
having employed its strength in maturity, age is now overtaking it. In
time it will be content to live on the accumulated wisdom of the
centuries, and, inured to thought, it will review the collective
agitations of its past life, and recognize the vanity of the goal
hitherto pursued.... Humanity, in its decline, will leave no heir to
profit by its accumulated wealth. It will have neither children nor
grandchildren to trouble the rigor of its judgment through the
illusions of parental love. It will sink finally into that melancholy
which is the appanage of great minds; it will in a measure float above
its own body like a spirit freed from matter; or, as oedipus at
Colonna, it will in anticipation taste the calm of chaos, and assist
with compassionate self-pity at the spectacle of its own suffering.
Passions that have vanished into the depths of reason will be resolved
into ideas by the white light of thought. Illusions will have faded and
hope be done with, for what is there left to hope? Its highest aim can
be but the absence of pain, for it can no longer dream of happiness;
still weak and fragile, working to live, and yet not knowing why it
does so, it will ask but one gift, the rest of an endless sleep that
shall calm its weariness and immense ennui. It is then that humanity
will have passed through the three periods of illusion, and in
recognizing the nothingness of its former hopes will aspire only to
absolute insensibility and the chaos of Nirvâna."
It remains but to inquire what is to become of disillusionized
humanity, and to what goal evolution is tending. The foregoing account
of Hartmann's theory should have shown that this goal cannot be
happiness, for at no period has it ever been reached, and, moreover,
that with the progress of the world man is gaining a clearer perception
of his misery. On the other hand, it would be illogical to suppose that
evolution is to continue with no other aim than that of the discharge
of the successive moments that compose it; for if each of these moments
is valueless, evolution itself would be meaningless; but Hartmann, it
may be remembered, has recognized in the Unconscious a principle of
absolute wisdom, and the answer must be looked for elsewhere, but
preferably in that direction which most noticeably points to some
determined and progressive perfection. No such sign, however, is to be
met with anywhere save in the development of consciousness; here
progress has been clearly and uninterruptedly at work, from the
appearance of the first globule to contemporaneous humanity, and in all
probability will continue to advance so long as the world subsists.
All things aid in its production and development, while to its
assistance there come not only the perfecting of the nervous system,
but also such personal incentives as the desire for wealth, which in
increasing general welfare disfranchises the intellect; then, too,
there are the stimulants to intellectual activity, vanity and ambition,
and also sexual love, which heightens its aptitudes; in short, every
instinct which is valuable to the species, and which costs the
individual more pain than pleasure, is converted into an unalloyed and
increasing gain for consciousness.
In spite of all this, however, the development of consciousness is but
the means to an end, and cannot therefore be considered as an absolute
goal; "for consciousness," Hartmann says, "is born of pain, and exists
and expands with suffering, and yet what manner of consolation does it
offer? Merely a vain self-mirroring. Of course, if the world were good
and beautiful, this would not be without its advantage; but a world
which is absolutely miserable, a world which must curse its own
existence the moment it is able to judge it, can never regard its
apparent and purely ideal reflection as a reasonable goal and
termination of its existence. Is there not suffering enough in reality?
Is it necessary to reproduce it in a magic lantern? No; consciousness
cannot be the supreme goal of a world whose evolution is directed by
supreme wisdom.... Some other end must be sought for, then, to which
the development of consciousness shall be but the means."
But, however the question is regarded, from whatever standpoint the
matter is viewed, there seems to be but one possible goal, and that is
happiness. Everything that exists tends thereto, and it is the
principle on which rests each of the diverse forms of practical
philosophy; moreover, the pursuit of happiness is the essence of Will
seeking its own pacification. But happiness has been shown to be an
illusion; still there must be some key to the riddle. The solution is
at once simple and unexpected. There can be no positive happiness, and
yet happiness of some kind is necessary; the supreme aim of universal
progress, of which consciousness is but the instrument, is then the
realization of the highest possible felicity, which is nothing else
than the freedom from all pain, and, in consequence, the cessation of
all life; or, in other words, total annihilation.
This climax is the only one which Hartmann will consent to consider;
from any other point of view evolution would be a tireless _progressus_
which some day might be blindly arrested by chance, while life in the
mean time would remain in the utter desolation of an issueless
purgatory.
The path, however, through which the great deliverance is to be
effected is as tortuously perplexing as the irrational duality of the
Unconscious. Many generations of pessimists are needed before the world
will be fully ripe for its great leap into the night of time; even
then, though Hartmann does not appear to suspect it, there will
probably be quite a number of pantheists who, drunk on Nature, will
stupidly refuse the great bare bodkin, which will have thus been
carefully prepared for their viaticum.
It should not be supposed that in all this there is any question of the
suicide of the individual: Hartmann is far too dramatic to suggest a
final tableau so tame and humdrum as that; besides, it has been seen
that the death of the individual does not drag with it the
disappearance of the species, and in no wise disturbs the heedless calm
of Nature. It is not the momentary and ephemeral existence that is to
be destroyed, for, after its destruction, the repairing and reproducing
force would still survive; it is the principle of existence itself
which must be extinguished; the suicide, to be effectual, must be that
of the cosmos. This proceeding, which will shortly be explained, "will
be the act of the last moment, after which there will be neither will
nor activity; after which, to quote Saint John, 'time will have ceased
to be.'"
But here it may be pertinently asked whether humanity, such as it now
is, will be capable of this grandiose development of consciousness
which is to prepare the absolute renunciation of the will to live, or
whether some superior race is to appear on earth which will continue
the work and attain the goal. May it not be that the globe will be but
the theatre of an abortive effort of this description, and long after
it has gone to increase the number of frozen spheres, some other
planet, which is to us invisible, may, under more favorable
circumstances, realize the self-same aim and end? To this the answer is
made that if humanity is ever destined to conduct the world's evolution
to its coronation, it will assuredly not complete its task until the
culminating point of its progress has been reached, nor yet until it
has united the most favorable conditions of existence. We need not,
however, bother about the perspective which science has disclosed, and
which points to a future period of congelation and complete inertia;
long before that time, Hartmann says, evolution will have ended, and
this world of ours, with its continents and archipelagoes, will have
vanished.
The manner in which this great and final annihilation is to be
accomplished is of a threefold nature; the first condition necessary to
success is that humanity at some future time shall concentrate such a
mass of Will that the balance, spread about elsewhere over the world,
will be insignificant in proportion. This, Hartmann explains, is in no
wise impossible, "for the manifestation of Will in atomic forces is
greatly inferior to that which is exercised in the vegetable and animal
kingdom, and hence much less than that which irrupts in man. The
supposition, therefore, that the greater part may be capitalized in man
is not necessarily an idle dream. When that day arrives, it will
suffice for humanity to no longer will to live to annihilate the entire
fabric; for humanity will at that time represent more Will than all
the rest of Nature collectively considered."
The second condition necessary to success is that mankind shall be so
thoroughly alive to the folly of life, so imperiously in need of peace,
and shall have so completely disentangled every effort from its
aimlessness, that the yearning for an end to existence will be the
prime motive of every act. A condition such as this, Hartmann thinks,
will probably be realized in the old age of humanity. The theory that
life is an evil is already admitted by thinkers; the supposition,
therefore, that it may some day triumph over the prejudices of the
multitude is neither absurd nor preposterous. As is shown in the
history of other creeds, an idea may penetrate so deeply into the minds
of its adherents as to breed an entire race of fanatics; and it is the
opinion, not of Hartmann alone, but of many serious and cultivated
scholars, that if ever an idea was destined to triumph without recourse
to either passion or violence, and to exercise at the same time an
action purely pacific, yet so profound and durable as to assure its
success beforehand, that idea, or rather that sentiment, is the
compassion which the pessimist feels not only for himself, but for
everything that is. Its gradual adoption these gentlemen consider not
as problematical, but merely as a question of time. Indeed, the
difficulty is not so great as might be supposed; every day the will of
the individual suffices to triumph over the instinctive love of life,
and, Hartmann logically argues, may not the mass of humanity do the
same thing? The denial of the will to live on the part of the
individual is, it is true, barren of any benefit to the species, but,
on the other hand, a universal denial would result in complete
deliverance.
Mankind, however, has yet a long journey before it, and many
generations are needed to overcome, and to dissipate little by little,
through the influence of heredity, those passions which are opposed to
the desire for eternal peace. In time, Hartmann thinks, all this will
be brought about; and he holds, moreover, that the development of
consciousness will correspond with the weakening of passion, which is
to be one of the characteristics of the decline of humanity, as it is
now one of the signs of the day.
The third condition necessary for the perfect consummation of this
gigantic suicide is that communication between the inhabitants of the
world be so facilitated that they may simultaneously execute a common
resolution. Full play is allowed the imagination in picturing the
manner in which all this is to be accomplished. Hartmann has a contempt
for details, and contents himself with asserting that it is necessary
and possible, and that in the abdication of humanity every form of
existence will cease.
Such, in brief, is this vehement conception of the ordering of the
world, and the plan for its precipitate destruction. With a soldierly
disregard of objection, but with a prodigality of argument and
digression which, if not always substantial, is unusually vivid,
Hartmann explains the Unconscious and its reacting dualism of Will and
Idea. One principle is, as has been seen, constantly irrupting into
life, and it is through the revolt of the second that the first is to
be thwarted and extinguished. Nothing, indeed, could be more simple;
and it would be a graceless and pedantic task to laboriously clamber to
the same vague altitudes to which Hartmann has so lightly soared, and
there contradict his description of the perspective.
To any one who has cared to follow the writer thus far, the outlines
given of Hartmann's conspiracy against pain must have seemed
aggressively novel. Schopenhauer's ideas on the same subject were
seemingly more practical, if less lurid, but then Schopenhauer hugged a
fact and flouted chimeras. It may be that Schopenhauer was a little
behind the age, for Hartmann has criticised him very much as a
collegian on a holiday might jeer at the old-world manners of his
grandfather. As they cannot both be right, each may be wrong; and it
may be that the key to the whole great puzzle is contained in that one
word, resignation, which the poet-philosopher pronounced so long ago.
As a remedy this certainly has the advantage of being a more immediate
and serviceable palliative to the sufferer than either of those
suggested in the foregoing systems. It is admitted that--
"Man cannot feed and be fed on the faith of to-morrow's baked meat;"
and it is in the same manner difficult for any one to hypnotize himself
and his suffering with the assurance that in the decline of humanity
all pain will cease; on the other hand, whether we have in regard to
future generations an after-me-the-deluge feeling, and practically care
very little whether or no they annihilate themselves and pain too,
still the more intelligent will readily recognize the ubiquity of
sorrow, and consider resignation at present as its most available
salve.
But in spite of its vagaries, pessimism, as expounded by Schopenhauer
and Hartmann, possesses a real and enduring value which it is difficult
to talk away; it is naturally most easy to laugh, in the heyday of
youth and health, at its fantastic misanthropy; indeed, it is in no
sense perfect; it has halted and tripped many times; it has points that
even to the haphazard and indifferent spectator are weak and faulty,
and yet what creed is logically perfect, and what creed is impregnable
to criticism? That there is none such can be truly admitted. The
reader, then, may well afford to be a little patient with pessimism;
theoretically, it is still in its infancy, but with increasing years
its blunders will give way to strength; and though many of the theories
that it now holds may alter, the cardinal, uncontrovertible tenet that
life is a burden will remain firm and changeless to the end of time.