https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/ Recent content in The World As Will And Idea on Superphysics Hugo en Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/appendix/ Sat, 20 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/appendix/ <!-- C'est le privilège du vrai génie, et surtout du génie qui ouvre une carrière, de faire impunément de grandes fautes.—Voltaire. --> <p>It is much easier to point out the faults and errors in the work of a great mind than to give a distinct and full exposition of its value. For the faults are particular and finite, and can therefore be fully comprehended; while, on the contrary, the very stamp which genius impresses upon its works is that their excellence is unfathomable and inexhaustible. Therefore they do not grow old, but become the instructor of many succeeding centuries. The perfected masterpiece of a truly great mind will always produce a deep and powerful effect upon the whole human race, so much so that it is impossible to calculate to what distant centuries and lands its enlightening influence may extend. This is always the case; for however cultivated and rich the age may be in which such a masterpiece appears, genius always rises like a palm-tree above the soil in which it is rooted. But a deep-reaching and widespread effect of this kind cannot take place suddenly, because of the great difference between the genius and ordinary men. The knowledge which that one man in one lifetime drew directly from life and the world, won and presented to others as won and arranged, cannot yet at once become the possession of mankind; for mankind has not so much power to receive as the genius has power to give. But even after a successful battle with unworthy opponents, who at its very birth contest the life of what is immortal and desire to nip in the bud the salvation of man (like the serpents in the cradle of Hercules), that knowledge must then traverse the circuitous paths of innumerable false constructions and distorted applications, must overcome the attempts to unite it with old errors, and so live in conflict till a new and unprejudiced generation grows up to meet it.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-04/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-04/ <p>From the fact that we are able spontaneously to assign and determine the laws of relations in space without having recourse to experience, Plato concludes (Meno, p. 353, Bip.) that all learning is mere recollection. Kant, on the other hand, concludes that space is subjectively conditioned, and merely a form of the faculty of knowledge. How far, in this regard, does Kant stand above Plato!</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20/ <p>This chapter is connected with § 20 of the first volume.455</p> <p>Objectification is the self-exhibition in the real corporeal world. However, this world itself, as was fully shown in the first book and its supplements, is throughout conditioned by the knowing subject, thus by the intellect, and therefore as such is absolutely inconceivable outside the knowledge of this subject; for it primarily consists simply of ideas of perception, and as such is a phenomenon of the brain. After its removal the thing in itself would remain. That this is the will is the theme of the second book, and is there proved first of all in the human organism and in that of the brutes.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20b/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20b/ <p>My doctrine asserts that the whole body is the will itself, exhibiting itself in the perception of the brain.</p> <!-- Consequently, having entered into its forms of knowledge. --> <p>From this it follows that the will is everywhere equally present in the whole body, as is also demonstrably the case, for the organic functions are its work no less than the animal.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20c/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20c/ <p>We became acquainted above with the cerebral nervous system as an assistant organ of the will, in which it therefore objectifies itself in a secondary manner. As thus the cerebral system, although not directly coming within the sphere of the life- functions of the organism, but only governing its relations to the outer world, has yet the organism as its basis, and is nourished by it in return for its services; and as thus the cerebral or animal life is to be regarded as the production of the organic life, the brain and its function, knowledge, thus the intellect, belong indirectly and in a subordinate manner to the manifestation of the will. The will objectifies itself also in it, as will to apprehend the external world, thus as will to know. Therefore great and fundamental as is the difference in us between willing and knowing, the ultimate substratum of both is yet the same, the will, as the real inner nature of the whole phenomenon.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-11/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-11/ <p>Eloquence is the faculty of awakening in others our view of a thing, or our opinion about it, of kindling in them our feeling concerning it, and thus putting them in sympathy with us. And all this by conducting the stream of our thought into their minds, through the medium of words, with such force as to carry their thought from the direction it has already taken, and sweep it along with ours in its course. The more their previous course of thought differs from ours, the greater is this achievement. From this it is easily understood how personal conviction and passion make a man eloquent; and in general, eloquence is more the gift of nature than the work of art; yet here, also, art will support nature.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-16/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-16/ <p>Chapter XVI.26 On The Practical Use Of Reason And On Stoicism.</p> <p>In the seventh chapter I have shown that, in the theoretical sphere, procedure based upon conceptions suffices for mediocre achievements only, while great achievements, on the other hand, demand that we should draw from perception itself as the primary source of all knowledge. In the practical sphere, however, the converse is the case. Here determination by what is perceived is the way of the brutes, but is unworthy of man, who has conceptions to guide his conduct, and is thus emancipated from the power of what is actually perceptibly present, to which the brute is unconditionally given over. In proportion as a man makes good this prerogative his conduct may be called rational, and only in this sense can we speak of practical reason, not in the Kantian sense, the inadmissibility of which I have thoroughly exposed in my prize essay on the foundation of morals. It is not easy, however, to let oneself be determined by conceptions alone; for the directly present external world, with its perceptible reality, intrudes itself forcibly even on the strongest mind. But it is just in conquering this impression, in destroying its illusion, that the human spirit shows its worth and greatness. Thus if incitements to lust and pleasure leave it unaffected, if the threats and fury of enraged enemies do not shake it, if the entreaties of erring friends do not make its purpose waver, and the delusive forms with which preconcerted plots surround it leave it unmoved, if the scorn of fools and of the vulgar herd does not disturb it nor trouble it as to its own worth, then it seems to stand under the influence of a spirit-world, visible to it alone (and this is the world of conceptions), before which that perceptibly present world which lies open to all dissolves like a phantom. But, on the other hand, what gives to the external 26 This chapter is connected with § 16 of the first volume.337 world and visible reality their great power over the mind is their nearness and directness. As the magnetic needle, which is kept in its position by the combined action of widely distributed forces of nature embracing the whole earth, can yet be perturbed and set in violent oscillation by a small piece of iron, if only it comes quite close to it, so even a great mind can sometimes be disconcerted and perturbed by trifling events and insignificant men, if only they affect it very closely, and the deliberate purpose can be for the moment shaken by a trivial but immediately present counter motive. For the influence of the motives is subject to a law which is directly opposed to the law according to which weights act on a balance, and in consequence of it a very small motive, which, however, lies very near to us, can outweigh one which in itself is much stronger, but which only affects us from a distance. But it is this quality of the mind, by reason of which it allows itself to be determined in accordance with this law, and does not withdraw itself from it by the strength of actual practical reason, which the ancients denoted by animi impotentia, which really signifies ratio regendæ voluntatis impotens. Every emotion (animi perturbatio) simply arises from the fact that an idea which affects our will comes so excessively near to us that it conceals everything else from us, and we can no longer see anything but it, so that for the moment we become incapable of taking account of things of another kind. It would be a valuable safeguard against this if we were to bring ourselves to regard the present, by the assistance of imagination, as if it were past, and should thus accustom our apperception to the epistolary style of the Romans. Yet conversely we are very well able to regard what is long past as so vividly present that old emotions which have long been asleep are thereby reawakened in their full strength. Thus also no one would be irritated or disconcerted by a misfortune, a disappointment, if reason always kept present to him what man really is: the most needy of creatures, daily and hourly abandoned to innumerable misfortunes, great and [347]338 [348] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) small, Ä¿ ́μ1»¿Ä±Ä¿1⁄2 ¶É¿1⁄2, who has therefore to live in constant care and fear. Herodotus already says, “ ±1⁄2 μÃÄ1 ±1⁄2 ̧ÁÉÀ¿Â ÃÅ1⁄4Æ¿Á±” (homo totus est calamitas). The application of reason to practice primarily accomplishes this. It reconstructs what is one-sided and defective in knowledge of mere perception, and makes use of the contrasts or oppositions which it presents, to correct each other, so that thus the objectively true result is arrived at. For example, if we look simply at the bad action of a man we will condemn him; on the other hand, if we consider merely the need that moved him to it, we will compassionate him: reason, by means of its conceptions, weighs the two, and leads to the conclusion that he must be restrained, restricted, and curbed by a proportionate punishment. I am again reminded here of Seneca&rsquo;s saying: “Si vis tibi omnia subjicere, te subjice rationi.” Since, however, as was shown in the fourth book, the nature of suffering is positive, and that of pleasure negative, he who takes abstract or rational knowledge as the rule of his conduct, and therefore constantly reflects on its consequences and on the future, will very frequently have to practise sustine et abstine, for in order to obtain the life that is most free from pain he generally sacrifices its keenest joys and pleasures, mindful of Aristotle&rsquo;s “A ÆÁ¿1⁄211⁄4¿Â Ä¿ ±»ÅÀ¿1⁄2 ́1Éoμ1, ¿Å Ä¿ ! ́Å” (quod dolore vacat, non quod suave est, persequitur vir prudens). Therefore with him the future constantly borrows from the present, instead of the present borrowing from the future, as is the case with a frivolous fool, who thus becomes impoverished and finally bankrupt. In the case of the former reason must, for the most part, assume the rôle of a churlish mentor, and unceasingly call for renunciations, without being able to promise anything in return, except a fairly painless existence. This rests on the fact that reason, by means of its conceptions, surveys the whole of life, whose outcome, in the happiest conceivable case, can be no other than what we have said.339 When this striving after a painless existence, so far as it might be attainable by the application of and strict adherence to rational reflection and acquired knowledge of the true nature of life, was carried out with the greatest consistency and to the utmost extreme, it produced cynicism, from which stoicism afterwards proceeded. I wish briefly here to bring this out more fully for the sake of establishing more firmly the concluding exposition of our first book. All ancient moral systems, with the single exception of that of Plato, were guides to a happy life. Accordingly in them the end of virtue was entirely in this life, not beyond death. For to them it is only the right path to a truly happy life; and on this account the wise choose it. Hence arise those lengthy debates chiefly preserved for us by Cicero, those keen and constantly renewed investigations, whether virtue quite alone and in itself is really sufficient for a happy life, or whether this further requires some external condition; whether the virtuous and wise may also be happy on the rack and the wheel, or in the bull of Phalaris; or whether it does not go as far as this. For certainly this would be the touchstone of an ethical system of this kind; the practice of it must give happiness directly and unconditionally. If it cannot do this it does not accomplish what it ought, and must be rejected. It is therefore with truth and in accordance with the Christian point of view that Augustine prefaces his exposition of the moral systems of the ancients (De Civ. Dei, Lib. xix. c. 1) with the explanation: “Exponenda sunt nobis argumenta mortalium, quibus sibi ipsi beatitudinem facere IN HUJUS VITÆ INFELICITATE moliti sunt; ut ab eorum rebus vanis spes nostra quid differat clarescat. De finibus bonorum et malorum multa inter se philosophi disputarunt; quam quæstionem maxima intentione versantes, invenire conati sunt, quid efficiat hominem beatum: illud enim est finis bonorum.” I wish to place beyond all doubt the eudæmonistic end which we have ascribed to all ancient ethics by several express statements of the ancients themselves. Aristotle says in the “Eth. Magna,” [349]340 [350] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) i. 4: “) μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄21± μ1⁄2 Äó μ1⁄2 ¶Ã1⁄2 μÃÄ1, Ä¿ ́μ μÅ ¶Ã1⁄2 μ1⁄2 Äó o±Ä± ı ±Áμı ¶Ã1⁄2.” (Felicitas in bene vivendo posita est: verum bene vivere est in eo positum, ut secundum virtutem vivamus), with which may be compared “Eth. Nicom.,” i. 5. “Cic. Tusc.,” v. 1: “Nam, quum ea causa impulerit eos, qui primi se ad philosophiæ studia contulerunt, ut, omnibus rebus posthabitis, totos se in optimo vitæ statu exquirendo collocarent; profecto spe beate vivendi tantam in eo studio curam operamque posuerunt”. According to Plutarch (De Repugn. Stoic., c. xviii.) Chrysippus said: “¤¿ o±Ä± o±o1±1⁄2 ¶Ã1⁄2 Äó o±o¿ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄2É ¶Ã1⁄2 ıÅÄ¿1⁄2 μÃÄ1.” (Vitiose vivere idem est guod vivere infeliciter.) Ibid., c. 26: “) ÆÁ¿1⁄2·Ã1 ¿ÅÇ ÄμÁ¿1⁄2 μÃÄ1 Ä·Â μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄21±Â o± ̧1⁄2 ±ÅÄ¿, ±»»1⁄2 μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄21±.” (Prudentia nihil differt a felicitate, estque ipsa adeo felicitas.) “Stob. Ecl.,” Lib. ii. c. 7: “¤μ»¿Â ́μ ƱÃ11⁄2 μ11⁄2±1 Ä¿ μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄2μ11⁄2, AÅ 1⁄2μo± À±1⁄2ı ÀÁ±ÄÄμı1.” (Finem esse dicunt felicitatem, cujus causa fiunt omnia.) “•Å ́±11⁄4¿1⁄21±1⁄2 ÃÅ1⁄2É1⁄2Å1⁄4μ11⁄2 Äó Äμ»μ1 »μ3¿ÅÃ1.” (Finem bonorum et felicitatem synonyma esse dicunt.) “Arrian Diss. Epict.,” i. 4: “) ±ÁμÄ· ıÅÄ·1⁄2 μÇμ1 Ä·1⁄2 μÀ±33μ»1±1⁄2, μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄21±1⁄2 À¿1·Ã±1.” (Virtus profitetur, se felicitatem præstare.) Sen., Ep. 90: “Ceterum (sapientia) ad beatum statum tendit, illo ducit, illo vias aperit.”—Id., Ep. 108: “Illud admoneo auditionem philosophorum, lectionemque, ad propositum beatæ vitæ trahendum.” The ethics of the Cynics also adopted this end of the happiest life, as the Emperor Julian expressly testifies (Orat. vi.): “¤·Â šÅ1⁄21o·Â ́μ Æ1»¿Ã¿Æ1±Â Ão¿À¿Â 1⁄4μ1⁄2 μÃÄ1 o±1 Äμ»¿Â, aÃÀμÁ ́· o±1 À±Ã·Â Æ1»¿Ã¿Æ1±Â, Ä¿ μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄2μ11⁄2; Ä¿ ́μ μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄2μ11⁄2 μ1⁄2 Äó ¶Ã1⁄2 o±Ä± ÆÅÃ11⁄2, ±»»± 1⁄4· ÀÁ¿Â ı ÄÉ1⁄2 À¿»»É1⁄2 ́¿3⁄4±Â.” (Cynicæ philosophiæ ut etiam omnis philosophiæ, scopus et finis est feliciter vivere: felicitas vitæ autem in eo posita est, ut secundum naturam vivatur, nec vero secundum opiniones multitudinis.) Only the Cynics followed quite a peculiar path to this end, a path directly opposed to the ordinary one—the path of extreme privation. They start from the insight that the341 motions of the will which are brought about by the objects which attract and excite it, and the wearisome, and for the most part vain, efforts to attain these, or, if they are attained, the fear of losing them, and finally the loss itself, produce far greater pain than the want of all these objects ever can. Therefore, in order to attain to the life that is most free from pain, they chose the path of the extremest destitution, and fled from all pleasures as snares through which one was afterwards handed over to pain. But after this they could boldly scorn happiness and its caprices. This is the spirit of cynicism. Seneca distinctly expresses it in the eighth chapter, “De Tranquilitate Animi:” “Cogitandum est, quanto levior dolor sit, non habere, quam perdere: et intelligemus paupertati eo minorem tormentorum, quo minorem damnorum esse materiam.” Then: “Tolerabilius est, faciliusque, non acquirere, quam amittere&hellip;. Diogenes effecit, ne quid sibi eripi posset, &hellip; qui se fortuitis omnibus exuit&hellip;. Videtur mihi dixisse; age tuum negotium, fortuna: nihil apud Diogenem jam tuum est.” The parallel passage to this last sentence is the quotation of Stobæus (Ecl. ii. 7): “”1¿3μ1⁄2·Â μÆ· 1⁄2¿1⁄41¶μ11⁄2 AÁ±1⁄2 Ä·1⁄2 ¤ÅÇ·1⁄2 μ1⁄2¿ÁÉñ1⁄2 ±ÅÄ¿1⁄2 o±1 »μ3¿Åñ1⁄2; Ä¿ÅÄ¿1⁄2 ́1⁄2 ¿Å ́Å1⁄2±1⁄4±1 2±»μμ11⁄2 oÅ1⁄2± »ÅÃ÷ķÁ±.” (Diogenes credere se dixit, videre Fortunam, ipsum intuentem, ac dicentem: aut hunc non potui tetigisse canem rabiosum.) The same spirit of cynicism is also shown in the epitaph on Diogenes, in Suidas, under the word ¦1»1Ão¿Â, and in “Diogenes Laertius,” vi. 2: ““·Á±Ãoμ1 1⁄4μ1⁄2 DZ»o¿Â QÀ¿ ÇÁ¿1⁄2¿Å; ±»»± ÿ1⁄2 ¿ÅÄ1 šÅ ́¿Â A À±Â ±1É1⁄2, ”1¿3μ1⁄2·Â, o± ̧μ»μ1; œ¿Å1⁄2¿Â μÀμ1 21¿Ä·Â ±ÅıÁoμ± ́¿3⁄4±1⁄2 μ ́μ13⁄4±Â ̃1⁄2·Ä¿1Â, o±1 ¶É·Â ¿11⁄4¿1⁄2 μ»±ÆÁ¿Ä±Ä·1⁄2.” (Æra quidem absumit tempus, sed tempore numquam Interitura tua est gloria, Diogenes: Quandoquidem ad vitam miseris mortalibus æquam Monstrata est facilis, te duce, et ampla via.) [351]342 [352] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) Accordingly the fundamental thought of cynicism is that life in its simplest and nakedest form, with the hardships that belong to it by nature, is the most endurable, and is therefore to be chosen; for every assistance, convenience, gratification, and pleasure by means of which men seek to make life more agreeable only brings with it new and greater ills than originally belonged to it. Therefore we may regard the following sentence as the expression of the kernel of the doctrine of cynicism: “”1¿3μ1⁄2·Â μ2¿3 À¿»»±o1 »μ3É1⁄2, Ä¿1⁄2 ÄÉ1⁄2 ±1⁄2 ̧ÉÀÉ1⁄2 21¿1⁄2 Á± ́1¿1⁄2 QÀ¿ ÄÉ1⁄2 ̧μÉ1⁄2 ́μ ́¿Ã ̧±1, ±À¿oμoÁÅÆ ̧±1 ́μ ±ÅÄ¿1⁄2 ¶·Ä¿Å1⁄2ÄÉ1⁄2 1⁄4μ»1À·oı o±1 1⁄4ÅÁ± o±1 ı À±Á±À»·Ã1±.” (Diogenes clamabat sæpius, hominum vitam facilem a diis dari, verum occultari illam quærentibus mellita cibaria, unguenta et his similia.) (Diog., Laert., vi. 2.) And further: “”μ¿1⁄2, ±1⁄2Ä1 ÄÉ1⁄2 ±ÇÁ·ÃÄÉ1⁄2 À¿1⁄2É1⁄2, Ä¿Å o±Ä± ÆÅÃ11⁄2 »¿1⁄4μ1⁄2¿ÅÂ, ¶Ã1⁄2 μÅ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄2ÉÂ; À±Á± Ä·1⁄2 ±1⁄2¿1±1⁄2 o±o¿ ́±11⁄4¿1⁄2¿ÅÃ1&hellip;. Ä¿1⁄2 ±ÅÄ¿1⁄2 DZÁ±oÄ·Á± Ä¿Å 21¿Å »μ3É1⁄2 ́1μ3⁄4±3μ11⁄2, A1⁄2ÀμÁ o±1 )Á±o»·Â, 1⁄4· ́μ1⁄2 μ»μÅ ̧·Á1±Â ÀÁ¿oÁ11⁄2É1⁄2.” (Quum igitur, repudiatis inutilibus laboribus, naturales insequi, ac vivere beate debeamus, per summam dementiam infelices sumus&hellip;. eandem vitæ formam, quam Hercules, se vivere affirmans, nihil libertati præferens. Ibid.) Therefore the old, genuine Cynics, Antisthenes, Diogenes, Krates, and their disciples had once for all renounced every possession, all conveniences and pleasures, in order to escape for ever from the troubles and cares, the dependence and the pains, which are inevitably bound up with them and are not counterbalanced by them. Through the bare satisfaction of the most pressing wants and the renunciation of everything superfluous they thought they would come off best. Accordingly they contented themselves with what in Athens or Corinth was to be had almost for nothing, such as lupines, water, an old threadbare cloak, a wallet, and a staff. They begged occasionally, as far as was necessary to supply such wants, but they never worked. Yet they accepted absolutely nothing that exceeded the wants referred to above. Independence343 in the widest sense was their aim. They occupied their time in resting, going about, talking with all men, and much mocking, laughing, and joking; their characteristic was carelessness and great cheerfulness. Since now in this manner of life they had no aims of their own, no purposes or ends to pursue, thus were lifted above the sphere of human action, and at the same time always enjoyed complete leisure, they were admirably fitted, as men of proved strength of mind, to be the advisers and admonishers of the rest. Therefore Apuleius says (Florid., iv.): “Crates, ut lar familiaris apud homines suæ ætatis cultus est. Nulla domus ei unquam clausa erat: nec erat patrisfamilias tam absconditum secretum, quin eo tempestive Crates interveniret, litium omnium et jurgiorum inter propinquos disceptator et arbiter.” Thus in this, as in so many other respects, they show a great likeness to the mendicant friars of modern times, that is, to the better and more genuine among them, whose ideal may be seen in the Capucine Christoforo in Manzoni&rsquo;s famous romance. Yet this resemblance lies only in the effects, not in the cause. They agree in the result, but the fundamental thought of the two is quite different. With the friars, as with the Sannyâsis, who are akin to them, it is an aim which transcends life; but with the Cynics it is only the conviction that it is easier to reduce their wishes and their wants to the minimum, than to attain to the maximum in their satisfaction, which indeed is impossible, for with their satisfaction the wishes and wants grow ad infinitum; therefore, in order to reach the goal of all ancient ethics, the greatest happiness possible in this life, they took the path of renunciation as the shortest and easiest: “A ̧μ1⁄2 o±1 Ä¿1⁄2 šÅ1⁄21Ã1⁄4¿1⁄2 μ1Á·o±Ã11⁄2 ÃÅ1⁄2Ä¿1⁄4¿1⁄2 μÀ1⁄2 ±ÁμÄ·1⁄2 A ́¿1⁄2.” (Unde Cynismum dixere compendiosam ad virtutem viam.) Diog. Laert., vi. 9. The fundamental difference between the spirit of cynicism and that of asceticism comes out very clearly in the humility which is essential to the ascetic, but is so foreign to the Cynic that, on the contrary, he is distinguished beyond everything else for pride [353]344 The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) and scorn:— “Sapiens uno minor est Jove, dives, Liber, honoratus, pulcher, rex denique regum.”—Hor. [354] On the other hand, the view of life held by the Cynics agrees in spirit with that of J. J. Rousseau as he expounds it in the “Discours sur l&rsquo;Origine de l&rsquo;Inégalité.” For he also would wish to lead us back to the crude state of nature, and regards the reduction of our wants to the minimum as the surest path to happiness. For the rest, the Cynics were exclusively practical philosophers: at least no account of their theoretical philosophy is known to me. Now the Stoics proceeded from them in this way—they changed the practical into the theoretical. They held that the actual dispensing with everything that can be done without is not demanded, but that it is sufficient that we should regard possessions and pleasures constantly as dispensable, and as held in the hand of chance; for then the actual deprivation of them, if it should chance to occur, would neither be unexpected nor fall heavily. One might always have and enjoy everything; only one must ever keep present the conviction of the worthlessness and dispensableness of these good things on the one hand, and of their uncertainty and perishableness on the other, and therefore prize them all very little, and be always ready to give them up. Nay more, he who must actually dispense with these things in order not to be moved by them, thereby shows that in his heart he holds them to be truly good things, which one must put quite out of sight if one is not to long after them. The wise man, on the other hand, knows that they are not good things at all, but rather perfectly indifferent things, ± ́1±Æ¿Á±, in any case ÀÁ¿·31⁄4μ1⁄2±. Therefore if they present themselves he will accept them, but yet is always ready to let them go again, if chance, to which they belong, should demand them back; for they are ÄÉ1⁄2 ¿Åo μÆ1⁄2345 !1⁄411⁄2. In this sense, Epictetus, chap. vii., says that the wise man, like one who has landed from a ship, &amp;c., will also let himself be comforted by a wife or a child, but yet will always be ready, whenever the captain calls, to let them go again. Thus the Stoics perfected the theory of equanimity and independence at the cost of the practice, for they reduced everything to a mental process, and by arguments, such as are presented in the first chapter of Epictetus, sophisticated themselves into all the amenities of life. But in doing so they left out of account that everything to which one is accustomed becomes a need, and therefore can only be given up with pain; that the will does not allow itself to be played with, cannot enjoy without loving the pleasures; that a dog does not remain indifferent if one draws a piece of meat through its mouth, and neither does a wise man if he is hungry; and that there is no middle path between desiring and renouncing. But they believed that they satisfied their principles if, sitting at a luxurious Roman table, they left no dish untasted, yet at the same time protested that they were each and all of them mere ÀÁ¿·31⁄4μ1⁄2±, not ±3± ̧±; or in plain English, if they eat, drank, and were merry, yet gave no thanks to God for it all, but rather made fastidious faces, and persisted in boldly asserting that they gained nothing whatever from the whole feast. This was the expedient of the Stoics; they were therefore mere braggarts, and stand to the Cynics in much the same relation as well-fed Benedictines and Augustines stand to Franciscans and Capucines. Now the more they neglected practice, the more they refined the theory. I shall here add a few proofs and supplementary details to the exposition of it given at the close of our first book. If we search in the writings of the Stoics which remain to us, all of which are unsystematically composed, for the ultimate ground of that irrefragible equanimity which is unceasingly demanded of us, we find no other than the knowledge that the course of the world is entirely independent of our will, and consequently, that the evil which befalls us is inevitable. If we [355]346 [356] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) have regulated our claims by a correct insight into this, then mourning, rejoicing, fearing, and hoping are follies of which we are no longer capable. Further, especially in the commentaries of Arrian, it is surreptitiously assumed that all that is ¿Åo μÆ1⁄2 !1⁄411⁄2 (i.e., does not depend upon us) is at once also ¿Å ÀÁ¿Â !1⁄4±Â (i.e., does not concern us). Yet it remains true that all the good things of life are in the power of chance, and therefore whenever it makes use of this power to deprive us of them, we are unhappy if we have placed our happiness in them. From this unworthy fate we are, in the opinion of the Stoics, delivered by the right use of reason, by virtue of which we regard all these things, never as ours, but only as lent to us for an indefinite time; only thus can we never really lose them. Therefore Seneca says (Ep. 98): “Si, quid humanarum rerum varietas possit, cogitaverit, ante quam senserit,” and Diogenes Laertius (vii. 1. 87): “TMÿ1⁄2 ́μ μÃÄ1 Ä¿ o±Ä1⁄2 ±ÁμÄ·1⁄2 ¶Ã1⁄2 Äó o±Ä1⁄2 μ1⁄4Àμ1Á1±1⁄2 ÄÉ1⁄2 ÆÅÃμ1 ÃÅ1⁄42±11⁄2¿1⁄2ÄÉ1⁄2 ¶Ã1⁄2.” (Secundum virtutem vivere idem est, quod secundum experientiam eorum, quæ secundum naturam accidunt, vivere.) The passage in Arrian&rsquo;s “Discourses of Epictetus,” B. iii., c. 24, 84-89, is particularly in point here; and especially, as a proof of what I have said in this reference in § 16 of the first volume, the passage: “¤¿ÅÄ¿ 3±Á μÃÄ1 Ä¿ ±1Ä1¿1⁄2 Ä¿1 ±1⁄2 ̧Á¿À¿1 À±1⁄2ÄÉ1⁄2 ÄÉ1⁄2 o±oÉ1⁄2 Ä¿ ı ÀÁ¿»·Èμ1 ı o¿11⁄2±Â 1⁄4· ́Å1⁄2±Ã ̧±1 μƱÁ1⁄4¿¶μ11⁄2 Ä¿1 μÀ1 1⁄4μÁ¿ÅÂ,” Ibid. iv.,</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-17/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-17/ <p>Chapter XVII.27 On Man&rsquo;s Need Of Metaphysics.</p> <p>With the exception of man, no being wonders at its own existence; but it is to them all so much a matter of course that they do not observe it. The wisdom of nature speaks out of the peaceful glance of the brutes; for in them the will and the intellect are not yet so widely separated that they can be astonished at each other when they meet again. Thus here the whole phenomenon is still firmly attached to the stem of nature from which it has come, and is partaker of the unconscious omniscience of the great mother. Only after the inner being of nature (the will to live in its objectification) has ascended, vigorous and cheerful, through the two series of unconscious existences, and then through the long and broad series of animals, does it attain at last to reflection for the first time on the entrance of reason, thus in man. Then it marvels at its own works, and asks itself what it itself is. Its wonder however is the more serious, as it here stands for the first time consciously in the presence of death, and besides the finiteness of all existence, the vanity of all effort forces itself more or less upon it. With this reflection and this wonder there arises therefore for man alone, the need for a metaphysic; he is accordingly an animal metaphysicum. At the beginning of his consciousness certainly he also accepts himself as a matter of course. This does not last long however, but very early, with the first dawn of reflection, that wonder already appears, which is some day to become the mother of metaphysics. In agreement with this Aristotle also says at the beginning of his metaphysics: “”1± 3±Á Ä¿ ̧±Å1⁄4±¶μ11⁄2 ¿1 ±1⁄2 ̧ÁÉÀ¿1 o±1 1⁄2Å1⁄2 o±1 Ä¿ ÀÁÉÄ¿1⁄2 ·Á3⁄4±1⁄2Ä¿ Æ1»¿Ã¿Æμ11⁄2.” (Propter admirationem enim et nunc et primo inceperunt homines philosophari.) Moreover, the special philosophical disposition consists primarily in this, that a man is capable of wonder beyond the ordinary and everyday degree, and is thus induced to make the universal of the phenomenon his 27 This chapter is connected with § 15 of the first volume.Chapter XVII. On Man&rsquo;s Need Of Metaphysics. 351 problem, while the investigators in the natural sciences wonder only at exquisite or rare phenomena, and their problem is merely to refer these to phenomena which are better known. The lower a man stands in an intellectual regard the less of a problem is existence itself for him; everything, how it is, and that it is, appears to him rather a matter of course. This rests upon the fact that his intellect still remains perfectly true to its original destiny of being serviceable to the will as the medium of motives, and therefore is closely bound up with the world and nature, as an integral part of them. Consequently it is very far from comprehending the world in a purely objective manner, freeing itself, so to speak, from the whole of things, opposing itself to this whole, and so for a while becoming as if self-existent. On the other hand, the philosophical wonder which springs from this is conditioned in the individual by higher development of the intellect, yet in general not by this alone; but without doubt it is the knowledge of death, and along with this the consideration of the suffering and misery of life, which gives the strongest impulse to philosophical reflection and metaphysical explanation of the world. If our life were endless and painless, it would perhaps occur to no one to ask why the world exists, and is just the kind of world it is; but everything would just be taken as a matter of course. In accordance with this we find that the interest which philosophical and also religious systems inspire has always its strongest hold in the dogma of some kind of existence after death; and although the most recent systems seem to make the existence of their gods the main point, and to defend this most zealously, yet in reality this is only because they have connected their special dogma of immortality with this, and regard the one as inseparable from the other: only on this account is it of importance to them. For if one could establish their doctrine of immortality for them in some other way, their lively zeal for their gods would at once cool, and it would give place almost to complete indifference if, conversely, the absolute impossibility [361]352 The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) of immortality were proved to them; for the interest in the existence of the gods would vanish with the hope of a closer acquaintance with them, to the residuum which might connect itself with their possible influence on the events of this present life. But if one could prove that continued existence after death is incompatible with the existence of gods, because, let us say, it pre-supposes originality of being, they would soon sacrifice the gods to their own immortality and become zealous for Atheism. The fact that the materialistic systems, properly so-called, and also absolute scepticism, have never been able to obtain a general or lasting influence, depends upon the same grounds. [362] Temples and churches, pagodas and mosques, in all lands and in all ages, in splendour and vastness, testify to the metaphysical need of man, which, strong and ineradicable, follows close upon his physical need. Certainly whoever is satirically inclined might add that this metaphysical need is a modest fellow who is content with poor fare. It sometimes allows itself to be satisfied with clumsy fables and insipid tales. If only imprinted early enough, they are for a man adequate explanations of his existence and supports of his morality. Consider, for example, the Koran. This wretched book was sufficient to found a religion of the world, to satisfy the metaphysical need of innumerable millions of men for twelve hundred years, to become the foundation of their morality, and of no small contempt for death, and also to inspire them to bloody wars and most extended conquests. We find in it the saddest and the poorest form of Theism. Much may be lost through the translations; but I have not been able to discover one single valuable thought in it. Such things show that metaphysical capacity does not go hand in hand with the metaphysical need. Yet it will appear that in the early ages of the present surface of the earth this was not the case, and that those who stood considerably nearer than we do to the beginning of the human race and the source of organic nature, had also both greater energy of the intuitive faculty of knowledge, and aChapter XVII. On Man&rsquo;s Need Of Metaphysics. 353 truer disposition of mind, so that they were capable of a purer, more direct comprehension of the inner being of nature, and were thus in a position to satisfy the metaphysical need in a more worthy manner. Thus originated in the primitive ancestors of the Brahmans, the Rishis, the almost super-human conceptions which were afterwards set down in the Upanishads of the Vedas. On the other hand, there have never been wanting persons who were interested in deriving their living from that metaphysical need, and in making the utmost they could out of it. Therefore among all nations there are monopolists and farmers-general of it—the priests. Yet their trade had everywhere to be assured to them in this way, that they received the right to impart their metaphysical dogmas to men at a very early age, before the judgment has awakened from its morning slumber, thus in early childhood; for then every well-impressed dogma, however senseless it may be, remains for ever. If they had to wait till the judgment is ripe, their privileges could not continue. A second, though not a numerous class of persons, who derive their support from the metaphysical need of man, is constituted by those who live by philosophy. By the Greeks they were called Sophists, by the moderns they are called Professors of Philosophy. Aristotle (Metaph., ii. 2) without hesitation numbers Aristippus among the Sophists. In Diogenes Laertius (ii. 65) we find that the reason of this is that he was the first of the Socratics who accepted payment for his philosophy; on account of which Socrates also returned him his present. Among the moderns also those who live by philosophy are not only, as a rule, and with the rarest exceptions, quite different from those who live for philosophy, but they are very often the opponents, the secret and irreconcilable enemies of the latter. For every true and important philosophical achievement will overshadow their own too much, and, moreover, cannot adapt itself to the views and limitations of their guild. Therefore it is always their endeavour to prevent such a work from making its way;</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-18/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-18/ <p>Chapter XVIII.29 On The Possibility Of Knowing The Thing In Itself.</p> <p>In 1836 I already published, under the title “Ueber den Willen in der Natur” (second ed., 1854; third ed., 1867), the most essential supplement to this book, which contains the most peculiar and important step in my philosophy, the transition from the phenomenon to the thing in itself, which Kant gave up as impossible. It would be a great mistake to regard the foreign conclusions with which I have there connected my expositions as the real material and subject of that work, which, though small as regards its extent, is of weighty import. These conclusions are rather the mere occasion starting from which I have there expounded that fundamental truth of my philosophy with so much greater clearness than anywhere else, and brought it down to the empirical knowledge of nature. And indeed this is done most exhaustively and stringently under the heading “Physische Astronomie;” so that I dare not hope ever to find a more correct or accurate expression of that core of my philosophy than is given there. Whoever desires to know my philosophy thoroughly and to test it seriously must therefore give attention before everything to that section. Thus, in general, all that is said in that little work would form the chief content of these supplements, if it had not to be excluded on account of having preceded them; but, on the other hand, I here take for granted that it is known, for otherwise the very best would be wanting. I wish now first of all to make a few preliminary observations from a general point of view as to the sense in which we can speak of a knowledge of the thing in itself and of its necessary limitation. What is knowledge? It is primarily and essentially idea. What is idea? A very complicated physiological process in the brain of</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-14/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-14/ <p>The presence of ideas and thoughts in our consciousness is as strictly subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason in its different forms as the movement of bodies to the law of causality.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20d/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-20d/ <p>A special authentication of the truth that the organism is merely the visibility of the will is also afforded us by the fact that if dogs, cats, domestic cocks, and indeed other animals, bite when violently angry, the wounds become mortal; nay, if they come from a dog, may cause hydrophobia in the man who is bitten, without the dog being mad or afterwards becoming so. For the extremest anger is only the most decided and vehement will to annihilate its object; this now appears in the assumption by the saliva of an injurious, and to a certain extent magically acting, power, and springs from the fact that the will and the organism are in truth one. This also appears from the fact that intense vexation may rapidly impart to the mother&rsquo;s milk such a pernicious quality that the sucking child dies forthwith in convulsions (Most, Ueber sympathetische Mittel, p. 16).</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-02/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-02/ <p>With all transcendental ideality the objective world retains empirical reality; the object is indeed not the thing in itself, but as an empirical object it is real. It is true that space is only in my head; but empirically my head is in space. The law of causality can certainly never enable us to get quit of idealism by building a bridge between things in themselves and our knowledge of them, and thus certifying the absolute reality of the world, which exhibits itself in consequence of its application; but this by no means does away with the causal relation of objects to each other, thus it does not abolish the causal relation which unquestionably exists between the body of each knowing person and all other material objects. But the law of causality binds together only phenomena, and does not lead beyond them. With that law we are and remain in the world of objects, i.e., the world of phenomena, or more properly the world of ideas. Yet the whole of such a world of experience is primarily conditioned by the knowledge of a subject in general as its necessary presupposition, and then by the special forms of our perception and apprehension, thus necessarily belongs to the merely phenomenal, and has no claim to pass for the world of things in themselves. Indeed the subject itself (so far as it is merely the knowing subject) belongs to the merely phenomenal, of which it constitutes the complementary half.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-15/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-15/ <p>Our self-consciousness has not space but only time as its form, and therefore we do not think in three dimensions, as we perceive, but only in one, thus in a line, without breadth or depth. This is the source of the greatest of the essential imperfections of our intellect. We can know all things only in succession, and can become conscious of only one at a time, indeed even of this one only under the condition that for the time we forget everything else, thus are absolutely unconscious of everything else, so that for the time it ceases to exist as far as we are concerned. In respect of this quality our intellect may be compared to a telescope with a very narrow field of vision; just because our consciousness is not stationary but fleeting. The intellect apprehends only successively, and in order to grasp one thing must let another go, retaining nothing but traces of it, which are ever becoming weaker. The thought which is vividly present to me now must after a little while have escaped me altogether; and if a good night&rsquo;s sleep intervene, it may be that I shall never find it again, unless it is connected with my personal interests, that is, with my will, which always commands the field.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-05/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-05/ <p>This chapter, along with the one which follows it, is connected with § 8 and 9 of the first book.</p> <p>It must be possible to arrive at a complete knowledge of the consciousness of the brutes, for we can construct it by abstracting certain properties of our own consciousness.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-06/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-06/ <p>The Doctrine of Abstract or Rational Knowledge.</p> <p>The outward impression upon the senses, together with the mood which it alone awakens in us, vanishes with the presence of the thing. Therefore these two cannot of themselves constitute experience proper, whose teaching is to guide our conduct for the future. The image of that impression which the imagination preserves is originally weaker than the impression itself, and becomes weaker and weaker daily, until in time it disappears altogether. There is only one thing which is not subject either to the instantaneous vanishing of the impression or to the gradual disappearance of its image, and is therefore free from the power of time. This is the conception. In it, then, the teaching of experience must be stored up, and it alone is suited to be a safe guide to our steps in life. Therefore Seneca says rightly, “Si vis tibi omnia subjicere, te subjice rationi” (Ep. 37). And I add to this that the essential condition of surpassing others in actual life is that we should reflect or deliberate. Such an important tool of the intellect as the concept evidently cannot be identical with the word, this mere sound, which as an impression of sense passes with the moment, or as a phantasm of hearing dies away with time. Yet the concept is an idea, the distinct consciousness and preservation of which are bound up with the word. Hence the Greeks called word, concept, relation, thought, and reason by the name of the first, A »¿3¿Â. Yet the concept is perfectly different both from the word, to which it is joined, and from the perceptions, from which it has originated. It is of an entirely different nature from these impressions of the senses. Yet it is able to take up into itself all the results of perception, and give them back again unchanged and undiminished after the longest period of time; thus alone does experience arise. But the concept preserves, not what is perceived nor what is then felt, but only what is essential in these, in an entirely altered form, and yet231 as an adequate representative of them. Just as flowers cannot be preserved, but their ethereal oil, their essence, with the same smell and the same virtues, can be. The action that has been guided by correct conceptions will, in the result, coincide with the real object aimed at. We may judge of the inestimable value of conceptions, and consequently of the reason, if we glance for a moment at the infinite multitude and variety of the things and conditions that coexist and succeed each other, and then consider that speech and writing (the signs of conceptions) are capable of affording us accurate information as to everything and every relation when and wherever it may have been; for comparatively few conceptions can contain and represent an infinite number of things and conditions. In our own reflection abstraction is a throwing off of useless baggage for the sake of more easily handling the knowledge which is to be compared, and has therefore to be turned about in all directions. We allow much that is unessential, and therefore only confusing, to fall away from the real things, and work with few but essential determinations thought in the abstract. But just because general conceptions are only formed by thinking away and leaving out existing qualities, and are therefore the emptier the more general they are, the use of this procedure is confined to the working up of knowledge which we have already acquired. This working up includes the drawing of conclusions from premisses contained in our knowledge. New insight, on the contrary, can only be obtained by the help of the faculty of judgment, from perception, which alone is complete and rich knowledge. Further, because the content and the extent of the concepts stand in inverse relation to each other, and thus the more is thought under a concept, the less is thought in it, concepts form a graduated series, a hierarchy, from the most special to the most general, at the lower end of which scholastic realism is almost right, and at the upper end nominalism. For the most special conception is almost the individual, thus almost real; and the most general conception, e.g., being (i.e., the infinitive [236]232 [237] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) of the copula), is scarcely anything but a word. Therefore philosophical systems which confine themselves to such very general conceptions, without going down to the real, are little more than mere juggling with words. For since all abstraction consists in thinking away, the further we push it the less we have left over. Therefore, if I read those modern philosophemes which move constantly in the widest abstractions, I am soon quite unable, in spite of all attention, to think almost anything more in connection with them; for I receive no material for thought, but am supposed to work with mere empty shells, which gives me a feeling like that which we experience when we try to throw very light bodies; the strength and also the exertion are there, but there is no object to receive them, so as to supply the other moment of motion. If any one wants to experience this let him read the writings of the disciples of Schelling, or still better of the Hegelians. Simple conceptions would necessarily be such as could not be broken up. Accordingly they could never be the subject of an analytical judgment. This I hold to be impossible, for if we think a conception we must also be able to give its content. What are commonly adduced as examples of simple conceptions are really not conceptions at all, but partly mere sensations—as, for instance, those of some special colour; partly the forms of perception which are known to us a priori, thus properly the ultimate elements of perceptive knowledge. But this itself is for the whole system of our thought what granite is for geology, the ultimate firm basis which supports all, and beyond which we cannot go. The distinctness of a conception demands not only that we should be able to separate its predicates, but also that we should be able to analyse these even if they are abstractions, and so on until we reach knowledge of perception, and thus refer to concrete things through the distinct perception of which the final abstractions are verified and reality guaranteed to them, as well as to all the higher abstractions which rest upon them. Therefore the ordinary explanation that the conception is233 distinct as soon as we can give its predicates is not sufficient. For the separating of these predicates may lead perhaps to more conceptions; and so on again without there being that ultimate basis of perceptions which imparts reality to all those conceptions. Take, for example, the conception “spirit,” and analyse it into its predicates: “A thinking, willing, immaterial, simple, indestructible being that does not occupy space.” Nothing is yet distinctly thought about it, because the elements of these conceptions cannot be verified by means of perceptions, for a thinking being without a brain is like a digesting being without a stomach. Only perceptions are, properly speaking, clear, not conceptions; these at the most can only be distinct. Hence also, absurd as it was, “clear and confused” were coupled together and used as synonymous when knowledge of perception was explained as merely a confused abstract knowledge, because the latter kind of knowledge alone was distinct. This was first done by Duns Scotus, but Leibnitz has substantially the same view, upon which his “Identitas Indiscernibilium” depends. (See Kant&rsquo;s refutation of this, p. 275 of the first edition of the Critique of Pure Reason.) The close connection of the conception with the word, thus of speech with reason, which was touched on above, rests ultimately upon the following ground. Time is throughout the form of our whole consciousness, with its inward and outward apprehension. Conceptions, on the other hand, which originate through abstraction and are perfectly general ideas, different from all particular things, have in this property indeed a certain measure of objective existence, which does not, however, belong to any series of events in time. Therefore in order to enter the immediate present of an individual consciousness, and thus to admit of being introduced into a series of events in time, they must to a certain extent be reduced again to the nature of individual things, individualised, and therefore linked to an idea of sense. Such an idea is the word. It is accordingly the sensible [238]234 The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) sign of the conception, and as such the necessary means of fixing it, that is, of presenting it to the consciousness, which is bound up with the form of time, and thus establishing a connection between the reason, whose objects are merely general universals, knowing neither place nor time, and consciousness, which is bound up with time, is sensuous, and so far purely animal. Only by this means is the reproduction at pleasure, thus the recollection and preservation, of conceptions possible and open to us; and only by means of this, again, are the operations which are undertaken with conceptions possible—judgment, inference, comparison, limitation, &amp;c. It is true it sometimes happens that conceptions occupy consciousness without their signs, as when we run through a train of reasoning so rapidly that we could not think the words in the time. But such cases are exceptions, which presuppose great exercise of the reason, which it could only have obtained by means of language. How much the use of reason is bound up with speech we see in the case of the deaf and dumb, who, if they have learnt no kind of language, show scarcely more intelligence than the ourang-outang or the elephant. For their reason is almost entirely potential, not actual. [239] Words and speech are thus the indispensable means of distinct thought. But as every means, every machine, at once burdens and hinders, so also does language; for it forces the fluid and modifiable thoughts, with their infinitely fine distinctions of difference, into certain rigid, permanent forms, and thus in fixing also fetters them. This hindrance is to some extent got rid of by learning several languages. For in these the thought is poured from one mould into another, and somewhat alters its form in each, so that it becomes more and more freed from all form and clothing, and thus its own proper nature comes more distinctly into consciousness, and it recovers again its original capacity for modification. The ancient languages render this service very much better than the modern, because, on account of their great difference from the latter, the same thoughts are expressed in235 them in quite another way, and must thus assume a very different form; besides which the more perfect grammar of the ancient languages renders a more artistic and more perfect construction of the thoughts and their connection possible. Thus a Greek or a Roman might perhaps content himself with his own language, but he who understands nothing but some single modern patois will soon betray this poverty in writing and speaking; for his thoughts, firmly bound to such narrow stereotyped forms, must appear awkward and monotonous. Genius certainly makes up for this as for everything else, for example in Shakespeare. Burke, in his “Inquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful,” p. 5, § 4 and 5, has given a perfectly correct and very elaborate exposition of what I laid down in § 9 of the first volume, that the words of a speech are perfectly understood without calling up ideas of perception, pictures in our heads. But he draws from this the entirely false conclusion that we hear, apprehend, and make use of words without connecting with them any idea whatever; whereas he ought to have drawn the conclusion that all ideas are not perceptible images, but that precisely those ideas which must be expressed by means of words are abstract notions or conceptions, and these from their very nature are not perceptible. Just because words impart only general conceptions, which are perfectly different from ideas of perception, when, for example, an event is recounted all the hearers will receive the same conceptions; but if afterwards they wish to make the incident clear to themselves, each of them will call up in his imagination a different image of it, which differs considerably from the correct image that is possessed only by the eye-witness. This is the primary reason (which, however, is accompanied by others) why every fact is necessarily distorted by being repeatedly told. The second recounter communicates conceptions which he has abstracted from the image of his own imagination, and from these conceptions the third now forms another image differing still more widely from the truth, and this again he translates into [240]236 [241] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) conceptions, and so the process goes on. Whoever is sufficiently matter of fact to stick to the conceptions imparted to him, and repeat them, will prove the most truthful reporter. The best and most intelligent exposition of the essence and nature of conceptions which I have been able to find is in Thomas Reid&rsquo;s “Essays on the Powers of Human Mind,” vol. ii., Essay 5, ch. 6. This was afterwards condemned by Dugald Stewart in his “Philosophy of the Human Mind.” Not to waste paper I will only briefly remark with regard to the latter that he belongs to that large class who have obtained an undeserved reputation through favour and friends, and therefore I can only advise that not an hour should be wasted over the scribbling of this shallow writer. The princely scholastic Pico de Mirandula already saw that reason is the faculty of abstract ideas, and understanding the faculty of ideas of perception. For in his book, “De Imaginatione,” ch. 11, he carefully distinguishes understanding and reason, and explains the latter as the discursive faculty peculiar to man, and the former as the intuitive faculty, allied to the kind of knowledge which is proper to the angels, and indeed to God. Spinoza also characterises reason quite correctly as the faculty of framing general conceptions (Eth., ii. prop. 40, schol. 2). Such facts would not need to be mentioned if it were not for the tricks that have been played in the last fifty years by the whole of the philosophasters of Germany with the conception reason. For they have tried, with shameless audacity, to smuggle in under this name an entirely spurious faculty of immediate, metaphysical, so-called super-sensuous knowledge. The reason proper, on the other hand, they call understanding, and the understanding proper, as something quite strange to them, they overlook altogether, and ascribe its intuitive functions to sensibility. In the case of all things in this world new drawbacks or disadvantages cleave to every source of aid, to every gain, to every advantage; and thus reason also, which gives to man237 such great advantages over the brutes, carries with it its special disadvantages, and opens for him paths of error into which the brutes can never stray. Through it a new species of motives, to which the brute is not accessible, obtains power over his will. These are the abstract motives, the mere thoughts, which are by no means always drawn from his own experience, but often come to him only through the talk and example of others, through tradition and literature. Having become accessible to thought, he is at once exposed to error. But every error must sooner or later do harm, and the greater the error the greater the harm it will do. The individual error must be atoned for by him who cherishes it, and often he has to pay dearly for it. And the same thing holds good on a large scale of the common errors of whole nations. Therefore it cannot too often be repeated that every error wherever we meet it, is to be pursued and rooted out as an enemy of mankind, and that there can be no such thing as privileged or sanctioned error. The thinker ought to attack it, even if humanity should cry out with pain, like a sick man whose ulcer the physician touches. The brute can never stray far from the path of nature; for its motives lie only in the world of perception, where only the possible, indeed only the actual, finds room. On the other hand, all that is only imaginable, and therefore also the false, the impossible, the absurd, and senseless, enters into abstract conceptions, into thoughts and words. Since now all partake of reason, but few of judgment, the consequence is that man is exposed to delusion, for he is abandoned to every conceivable chimera which any one talks him into, and which, acting on his will as a motive, may influence him to perversities and follies of every kind, to the most unheard-of extravagances, and also to actions most contrary to his animal nature. True culture, in which knowledge and judgment go hand in hand, can only be brought to bear on a few; and still fewer are capable of receiving it. For the great mass of men a kind of training everywhere takes its place. It is effected by example, custom, [242]238 [243] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) and the very early and firm impression of certain conceptions, before any experience, understanding, or judgment were there to disturb the work. Thus thoughts are implanted, which afterward cling as firmly, and are as incapable of being shaken by any instruction as if they were inborn; and indeed they have often been regarded, even by philosophers, as such. In this way we can, with the same trouble, imbue men with what is right and rational, or with what is most absurd.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-07/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-07/ <p>The Relation of the Concrete Knowledge of Perception to Abstract Knowledge.</p> <p>Conceptions derive their material from knowledge of perception, and therefore the entire structure of our world of thought rests upon the world of perception. We must therefore be able to go back from every conception, even if only indirectly through intermediate conceptions, to the perceptions from which it is either itself directly derived or those conceptions are derived of which it is again an abstraction.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-09/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-09/ <p>Logic In General.</p> <p>Logic, Dialectic, and Rhetoric go together, because they make up the whole of a technic of reason, and under this title they ought also to be taught—Logic as the technic of our own thinking, Dialectic of disputing with others, and Rhetoric of speaking to many (concionatio); thus corresponding to the singular, dual, and plural, and to the monologue, the dialogue, and the panegyric. Under Dialectic I understand, in agreement with Aristotle (Metaph., iii. 2, and Analyt. Post., i. 11), the art of conversation directed to the mutual investigation of truth, especially philosophical truth. But a conversation of this kind necessarily passes more or less into controversy; therefore dialectic may also be explained as the art of disputation. We have examples and patterns of dialectic in the Platonic dialogues; but for the special theory of it, thus for the technical rules of disputation, eristics, very little has hitherto been accomplished. I have worked out an attempt of the kind, and given an example of it, in the second volume of the “Parerga,” therefore I shall pass over the exposition of this science altogether here. In Rhetoric the rhetorical figures are very much what the syllogistic figures are in Logic; at all events they are worth considering. In Aristotle&rsquo;s time they seem to have not yet become the object of theoretical investigation, for he does not treat of them in any of his rhetorics, and in this reference we are referred to Rutilius Lupus, the epitomiser of a later Gorgias. All the three sciences have this in common, that without having learned them we follow their rules, which indeed are themselves first abstracted from this natural employment of them. Therefore, although they are of great theoretical interest, they are of little practical use; partly because, though they certainly give the rule, they do not give the case of its application; partly because in 21 This chapter and the one which follows it are connected with § 9 of the first volume. [286]280 The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) practice there is generally no time to recollect the rules. Thus they teach only what every one already knows and practises of his own accord; but yet the abstract knowledge of this is interesting and important. Logic will not easily have a practical value, at least for our own thinking. For the errors of our own reasoning scarcely ever lie in the inferences nor otherwise in the form, but in the judgments, thus in the matter of thought. In controversy, on the other hand, we can sometimes derive some practical use from logic, by taking the more or less intentionally deceptive argument of our opponent, which he advances under the garb and cover of continuous speech, and referring it to the strict form of regular syllogisms, and thus convicting it of logical errors; for example, simple conversion of universal affirmative judgments, syllogisms with four terms, inferences from the consequent to the reason, syllogisms in the second figure with merely affirmative premisses, and many such. [287] It seems to me that the doctrine of the laws of thought might be simplified if we were only to set up two, the law of excluded middle and that of sufficient reason. The former thus: “Every predicate can either be affirmed or denied of every subject.” Here it is already contained in the “either, or” that both cannot occur at once, and consequently just what is expressed by the laws of identity and contradiction. Thus these would be added as corollaries of that principle which really says that every two concept-spheres must be thought either as united or as separated, but never as both at once; and therefore, even although words are brought together which express the latter, these words assert a process of thought which cannot be carried out. The consciousness of this infeasibility is the feeling of contradiction. The second law of thought, the principle of sufficient reason, would affirm that the above attributing or denying must be determined by something different from the judgment itself, which may be a (pure or empirical) perception, or merely another judgment. This other and different thing is then called the groundChapter IX. On Logic In General. 281 or reason of the judgment. So far as a judgment satisfies the first law of thought, it is thinkable; so far as it satisfies the second, it is true, or at least in the case in which the ground of a judgment is only another judgment it is logically or formally true. But, finally, material or absolute truth is always the relation between a judgment and a perception, thus between the abstract and the concrete or perceptible idea. This is either an immediate relation or it is brought about by means of other judgments, i.e., through other abstract ideas. From this it is easy to see that one truth can never overthrow another, but all must ultimately agree; because in the concrete or perceptible, which is their common foundation, no contradiction is possible. Therefore no truth has anything to fear from other truths. Illusion and error have to fear every truth, because through the logical connection of all truths even the most distant must some time strike its blow at every error. This second law of thought is therefore the connecting link between logic and what is no longer logic, but the matter of thought. Consequently the agreement of the conceptions, thus of the abstract idea with what is given in the perceptible idea, is, on the side of the object truth, and on the side of the subject knowledge. To express the union or separation of two concept-spheres referred to above is the work of the copula, “is—is not.” Through this every verb can be expressed by means of its participle. Therefore all judging consists in the use of a verb, and vice versâ. Accordingly the significance of the copula is that the predicate is to be thought in the subject, nothing more. Now, consider what the content of the infinitive of the copula “to be” amounts to. But this is a principal theme of the professors of philosophy of the present time. However, we must not be too strict with them; most of them wish to express by it nothing but material things, the corporeal world, to which, as perfectly innocent realists at the bottom of their hearts, they attribute the highest reality. To speak, however, of the bodies so directly appears to them too vulgar; and therefore they say “being,” which they think sounds better, [288]282 [289] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) and think in connection with it the tables and chairs standing before them. “For, because, why, therefore, thus, since, although, indeed, yet, but, if, then, either, or,” and more like these, are properly logical particles, for their only end is to express the form of the thought processes. They are therefore a valuable possession of a language, and do not belong to all in equal numbers. Thus “zwar” (the contracted “es ist wahr”) seems to belong exclusively to the German language. It is always connected with an “aber” which follows or is added in thought, as “if” is connected with “then.” The logical rule that, as regards quantity, singular judgments, that is, judgments which have a singular conception (notio singularis) for their subject, are to be treated as universal judgments, depends upon the circumstance that they are in fact universal judgments, which have merely the peculiarity that their subject is a conception which can only be supported by a single real object, and therefore only contains a single real object under it; as when the conception is denoted by a proper name. This, however, has really only to be considered when we proceed from the abstract idea to the concrete or perceptible, thus seek to realise the conceptions. In thinking itself, in operating with judgments, this makes no difference, simply because between singular and universal conceptions there is no logical difference. “Immanuel Kant” signifies logically, “all Immanuel Kant.” Accordingly the quantity of judgments is really only of two kinds—universal and particular. An individual idea cannot be the subject of a judgment, because it is not an abstraction, it is not something thought, but something perceived. Every conception, on the other hand, is essentially universal, and every judgment must have a conception as its subject. The difference between particular judgments (propositiones particulares) and universal judgments often depends merely on the external and contingent circumstance that the language has no word to express by itself the part that is here to be separatedChapter IX. On Logic In General. 283 from the general conception which forms the subject of such a judgment. If there were such a word many a particular judgment would be universal. For example, the particular judgment, “Some trees bear gall-nuts,” becomes a universal judgment, because for this part of the conception, “tree,” we have a special word, “All oaks bear gall-nuts.” In the same way is the judgment, “Some men are black,” related to the judgment, “All negroes are black.” Or else this difference depends upon the fact that in the mind of him who judges the conception which he makes the subject of the particular judgment has not become clearly separated from the general conception as a part of which he defines it; otherwise he could have expressed a universal instead of a particular judgment. For example, instead of the judgment, “Some ruminants have upper incisors,” this, “All unhorned ruminants have upper incisors.” The hypothetical and disjunctive judgments are assertions as to the relation of two (in the case of the disjunctive judgment even several) categorical judgments to each other. The hypothetical judgment asserts that the truth of the second of the two categorical judgments here linked together depends upon the truth of the first, and the falseness of the first depends upon the falseness of the second; thus that these two propositions stand in direct community as regards truth and falseness. The disjunctive judgment, on the other hand, asserts that upon the truth of one of the categorical judgments here linked together depends the falseness of the others, and conversely; thus that these propositions are in conflict as regards truth and falseness. The question is a judgment, one of whose three parts is left open: thus either the copula, “Is Caius a Roman—or not?” or the predicate, “Is Caius a Roman—or something else?” or the subject, “Is Caius a Roman—or is it some one else who is a Roman?” The place of the conception which is left open may also remain quite empty; for example, “What is Caius?”—“Who is a Roman?” The μÀ±3É3·, inductio, is with Aristotle the opposite of the [290]284 [291] [292] The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) ±À±3É3·. The latter proves a proposition to be false by showing that what would follow from it is not true; thus by the instantia in contrarium. The μÀ±3É3·, on the other hand, proves the truth of a proposition by showing that what would follow from it is true. Thus it leads by means of examples to our accepting something while the ±À±3É3· leads to our rejecting it. Therefore the μÀ±3É3·, or induction, is an inference from the consequents to the reason, and indeed modo ponente; for from many cases it establishes the rule, from which these cases then in their turn follow. On this account it is never perfectly certain, but at the most arrives at very great probability. However, this formal uncertainty may yet leave room for material certainty through the number of the sequences observed; in the same way as in mathematics the irrational relations are brought infinitely near to rationality by means of decimal fractions. The ±À±3É3·, on the contrary, is primarily an inference from the reason to the consequents, though it is afterwards carried out modo tollente, in that it proves the non-existence of a necessary consequent, and thereby destroys the truth of the assumed reason. On this account it is always perfectly certain, and accomplishes more by a single example in contrarium than the induction does by innumerable examples in favour of the proposition propounded. So much easier is it to refute than to prove, to overthrow than to establish.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-13/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-13/ <p>Euclid&rsquo;s method of demonstration has brought forth from its own womb its most striking parody and caricature in the famous controversy on the theory of parallels, and the attempts, which are repeated every year, to prove the eleventh axiom. This axiom asserts, and indeed supports its assertion by the indirect evidence of a third intersecting line, that two lines inclining towards each other (for that is just the meaning of “less than two right angles”) if produced far enough must meet—a truth which is supposed to be too complicated to pass as self-evident, and therefore requires a demonstration. Such a demonstration, however, cannot be produced, just because there is nothing that is not immediate.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19/ <p>This chapter is connected with § 19 of the first volume.</p> <p>The will, as the thing in itself, constitutes the inner, true, and indestructible nature of man.</p> <p>in itself, however, it is unconscious.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19c/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19c/ <ol start="3"> <li>If we run through the series of grades of animals downwards, we see the intellect always becoming weaker and less perfect, but we by no means observe a corresponding degradation of the will. Rather it retains everywhere its identical nature and shows itself in the form of great attachment to life, care for the individual and the species, egoism and regardlessness of all others, together with the emotions that spring from these. Even in the smallest insect the will is present, complete and entire; it wills what it wills as decidedly and completely as the man. The difference lies merely in what it wills, i.e., in the motives, which, however, are the affair of the intellect.</li> </ol> <p>It indeed, as the secondary part of consciousness, and bound to the bodily organism, has innumerable degrees of completeness, and is in general essentially limited and imperfect. The will, on the contrary, as original and the thing in itself, can never be imperfect, but every act of will is all that it can be. On account of the simplicity which belongs to the will as the thing in itself, the metaphysical in the phenomenon, its nature admits of no degrees, but is always completely itself. Only its excitement has degrees, from the weakest inclination to the passion, and also its susceptibility to excitement, thus its vehemence from the phlegmatic to the choleric temperament.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19d/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19d/ <ol start="4"> <li>The intellect becomes tired but the will is never tired.</li> </ol> <p>After sustained work with the head we feel the tiredness of the brain, just like that of the arm after sustained bodily work. All knowing is accompanied with effort; willing, on the contrary, is our very nature, whose manifestations take place without any weariness and entirely of their own accord. Therefore, if our will is strongly excited, as in all emotions, thus in anger, fear, desire, grief, &amp;c., and we are now called upon to know, perhaps with the view of correcting the motives of that emotion, the violence which we must do ourselves for this purpose is evidence of the transition from the original natural activity proper to ourselves to the derived, indirect, and forced activity. For the will alone is ±ÅÄ¿1⁄4±Ä¿Â, and therefore (lassitudinis et senii expers in sempiternum).</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-10/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-10/ <p>Although it is very hard to establish a new and correct view of a subject which for more than two thousand years has been handled by innumerable writers, and which, moreover, does not receive additions through the growth of experience, yet this must not deter me from presenting to the thinker for examination the following attempt of this kind.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-08/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-08/ <p>My theory of the ludicrous also depends upon the opposition explained in the preceding chapters between perceptible and abstract ideas, which I have brought into such marked prominence. Therefore what has still to be said in explanation of this theory finds its proper place here, although according to the order of the text it would have to come later.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19b/ Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-19b/ <ol start="2"> <li>What is common to all consciousness?</li> </ol> <p>What distinguishes one consciousness from another?</p> <p>This will lead to the secondary element.</p> <p>Consciousness is positively only known to us as a property of animal nature.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-12/ Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-12/ <p>This chapter is connected with § 14 of the first volume.Chapter XII. On The Doctrine Of Science.</p> <p>For a correct use of the intellect, the following are needed:</p> <ol> <li> <p>The correct apprehension through perception of the real things taken into consideration, and of all their essential properties and relations, thus of all data.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-03/ Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-03/ <p>The senses are merely the channels through which the brain receives from without (in the form of sensations) the materials which it works up into ideas of perception.</p> <p>Those sensations which principally serve for the objective comprehension of the external world must in themselves be neither agreeable nor disagreeable. This really means that they must leave the will entirely unaffected. Otherwise the sensation itself would attract our attention, and we would remain at the effect instead of passing to the cause, which is what is aimed at here.</p> https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-01/ Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000 https://www.superphysics.org/research/schopenhauer/world/vol-2/chapter-01/ <!-- Supplements to the First and Part of the Second Book of Vol. I. “Paucis natus est, qui populum ætatis suæ cogitat.”—SEN. Sixth Edition Appendix: Criticism of the Kantian Philosophy. . . . . . . 2 Supplements to the First Book. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 First Half. The Doctrine Of The Idea Of Perception. (To § 1-7 of the First Volume.) . . . . . . . . . . 155 Chapter I. The Standpoint of Idealism. . . . . . . 155 Chapter II. The Doctrine of Perception or Knowl- edge Of The Understanding. . . . . . . . 175 Chapter III. On The Senses. . . . . . . . . . . . . 184 Chapter IV. On Knowledge A Priori. . . . . . . . 191 Second Half. The Doctrine of the Abstract Idea, or Thinking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225 Chapter V. On The Irrational Intellect. . . . . . . 225 Chapter VI. On The Doctrine of Abstract or Rational Knowledge. . . . . . . . . . . . 230 Chapter VII. On The Relation of the Concrete Knowledge of Perception to Abstract Knowledge. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240 Chapter VIII. On The Theory Of The Ludicrous. 265 Chapter IX. On Logic In General. . . . . . . . . 279 Chapter X. On The Syllogism. . . . . . . . . . . 285 Chapter XI. On Rhetoric. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298 Chapter XII. On The Doctrine Of Science. . . . . 300 Chapter XIII. On The Methods Of Mathematics. . 313 Chapter XIV. On The Association Of Ideas. . . . 316 Chapter XV. On The Essential Imperfections Of The Intellect. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322 Chapter XVI. On The Practical Use Of Reason And On Stoicism. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336 Chapter XVII. On Man's Need Of Metaphysics. . 350iv The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 2 of 3) Supplements to the Second Book. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 386 Chapter XVIII. On The Possibility Of Knowing The Thing In Itself. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387 Chapter XIX. On The Primacy Of The Will In Self- Consciousness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399 Chapter XX. Objectification Of The Will In The Ani- mal Organism. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 454 Note On What Has Been Said About Bichat. . . . . . . 479 --> <p>In boundless space countless shining spheres, about each of which, and illuminated by its light, there revolve a dozen or so of smaller ones, hot at the core and covered with a hard, cold crust, upon whose surface there have been generated from a mouldy film beings which live and know—this is what presents itself to us in experience as the truth, the real, the world. Yet for a thinking being it is a precarious position to stand upon one of those numberless spheres moving freely in boundless space without knowing whence or whither, and to be only one of innumerable similar beings who throng and press and toil, ceaselessly and quickly arising and passing away in time, which has no beginning and no end; moreover, nothing permanent but matter alone and the recurrence of the same varied organised forms, by means of certain ways and channels which are there once for all. All that empirical science can teach is only the more exact nature and law of these events. But now at last modern philosophy especially through Berkeley and Kant, has called to mind that all this is first of all merely a phenomenon of the brain, and is affected with such great, so many, and such different subjective conditions that its supposed absolute reality vanishes away, and leaves room for an entirely different scheme of the world, which consists of what lies at the foundation of that phenomenon, i.e., what is related to it as the thing in itself is related to its mere manifestation.</p>