The World As Will and Idea (Vol. 1 of 3)

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Title: The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 1 of 3)
Author: Arthur Schopenhauer
Release Date: December 27, 2011 [Ebook 38427]
Language: English
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK

THE WORLD AS WILL AND IDEA (VOL. 1 OF 3)***
The World As Will And Idea
By
Arthur Schopenhauer
Translated From The German By
R. B. Haldane, M.A.
And
J. Kemp, M.A.
Vol. I.
Containing Four Books.
“Ob nicht Natur zuletzt sich doch ergünde?”—GOETHE
Seventh Edition
London
Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co.
1909
Contents
Translators' Preface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Preface To The First Edition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Preface To The Second Edition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
First Book. The World As Idea. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
First Aspect. The Idea Subordinated To The Principle
Of Sufficient Reason: The Object Of Experience
And Science. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Second Book. The World As Will. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
First Aspect. The Objectification Of The Will. . . . . . 138
Third Book. The World As Idea. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Second Aspect. The Idea Independent Of The Principle
Of Sufficient Reason: The Platonic Idea: The
Object Of Art. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Fourth Book. The World As Will. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
Second Aspect. The Assertion And Denial Of The
Will To Live, When Self-Consciousness Has
Been Attained. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
Footnotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 527
[v]
Translators' Preface.
The style of “Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung” is sometimes
loose and involved, as is so often the case in German
philosophical treatises. The translation of the book has
consequently been a matter of no little difficulty. It was found
that extensive alteration of the long and occasionally involved
sentences, however likely to prove conducive to a satisfactory
English style, tended not only to obliterate the form of the
original but even to imperil the meaning. Where a choice has had
to be made, the alternative of a somewhat slavish adherence to
Schopenhauer's ipsissima verba has accordingly been preferred
to that of inaccuracy. The result is a piece of work which leaves
much to be desired, but which has yet consistently sought to
reproduce faithfully the spirit as well as the letter of the original.
As regards the rendering of the technical terms about which
there has been so much controversy, the equivalents used have
only been adopted after careful consideration of their meaning in
the theory of knowledge. For example, “Vorstellung” has been
rendered by “idea,” in preference to “representation,” which is
neither accurate, intelligible, nor elegant. “Idee,” is translated
[vi] by the same word, but spelled with a capital,—“Idea.” Again,
“Anschauung” has been rendered according to the context, either
by “perception” simply, or by “intuition or perception.”
Notwithstanding statements to the contrary in the text, the
book is probably quite intelligible in itself, apart from the treatise
“On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason.” It
has, however, been considered desirable to add an abstract of the
latter work in an appendix to the third volume of this translation.
R. B. H.
J. K.
Translators' Preface. 3
[vii]
Preface To The First Edition.
I propose to point out here how this book must be read in order
to be thoroughly understood. By means of it I only intend to
impart a single thought. Yet, notwithstanding all my endeavours,
I could find no shorter way of imparting it than this whole book.
I hold this thought to be that which has very long been sought
for under the name of philosophy, and the discovery of which
is therefore regarded by those who are familiar with history as
quite as impossible as the discovery of the philosopher's stone,
although it was already said by Pliny: Quam multa fieri non
posse, priusquam sint facta, judicantur? (Hist. nat. 7, 1.)
According as we consider the different aspects of this one
thought which I am about to impart, it exhibits itself as that
which we call metaphysics, that which we call ethics, and that
which we call æsthetics; and certainly it must be all this if it is
what I have already acknowledged I take it to be.
A system of thought must always have an architectonic
connection or coherence, that is, a connection in which one
part always supports the other, though the latter does not support
the former, in which ultimately the foundation supports all the
rest without being supported by it, and the apex is supported
without supporting. On the other hand, a single thought, however
[viii] comprehensive it may be, must preserve the most perfect
unity. If it admits of being broken up into parts to facilitate
its communication, the connection of these parts must yet be
organic, i.e., it must be a connection in which every part supports
the whole just as much as it is supported by it, a connection in
which there is no first and no last, in which the whole thought
gains distinctness through every part, and even the smallest part
cannot be completely understood unless the whole has already
Preface To The First Edition. 5
been grasped. A book, however, must always have a first and a

last line, and in this respect will always remain very unlike an
organism, however like one its content may be: thus form and
matter are here in contradiction.
It is self-evident that under these circumstances no other advice
can be given as to how one may enter into the thought explained
in this work than to read the book twice, and the first time with
great patience, a patience which is only to be derived from the
belief, voluntarily accorded, that the beginning presupposes the
end almost as much as the end presupposes the beginning, and
that all the earlier parts presuppose the later almost as much
as the later presuppose the earlier. I say “almost;” for this
is by no means absolutely the case, and I have honestly and
conscientiously done all that was possible to give priority to that
which stands least in need of explanation from what follows, as
indeed generally to everything that can help to make the thought
as easy to comprehend and as distinct as possible. This might
indeed to a certain extent be achieved if it were not that the
reader, as is very natural, thinks, as he reads, not merely of what
is actually said, but also of its possible consequences, and thus
besides the many contradictions actually given of the opinions [ix]
of the time, and presumably of the reader, there may be added
as many more which are anticipated and imaginary. That, then,
which is really only misunderstanding, must take the form of
active disapproval, and it is all the more difficult to recognise that
it is misunderstanding, because although the laboriously-attained
clearness of the explanation and distinctness of the expression
never leaves the immediate sense of what is said doubtful, it
cannot at the same time express its relations to all that remains
to be said. Therefore, as we have said, the first perusal demands
patience, founded on confidence that on a second perusal much,
or all, will appear in an entirely different light. Further, the
earnest endeavour to be more completely and even more easily
comprehended in the case of a very difficult subject, must justify
6 The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 1 of 3)
occasional repetition. Indeed the structure of the whole, which

is organic, not a mere chain, makes it necessary sometimes to
touch on the same point twice. Moreover this construction, and
the very close connection of all the parts, has not left open to
me the division into chapters and paragraphs which I should
otherwise have regarded as very important, but has obliged me to
rest satisfied with four principal divisions, as it were four aspects
of one thought. In each of these four books it is especially
important to guard against losing sight, in the details which must
necessarily be discussed, of the principal thought to which they
belong, and the progress of the whole exposition. I have thus
expressed the first, and like those which follow, unavoidable
demand upon the reader, who holds the philosopher in small
favour just because he himself is a philosopher.
[x] The second demand is this, that the introduction be read
before the book itself, although it is not contained in the
book, but appeared five years earlier under the title, “Ueber
die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom zureichenden Grunde:
eine philosophische Abhandlung” (On the fourfold root of the
principle of sufficient reason: a philosophical essay). Without
an acquaintance with this introduction and propadeutic it is
absolutely impossible to understand the present work properly,
and the content of that essay will always be presupposed in this
work just as if it were given with it. Besides, even if it had not
preceded this book by several years, it would not properly have
been placed before it as an introduction, but would have been
incorporated in the first book. As it is, the first book does not
contain what was said in the earlier essay, and it therefore exhibits
a certain incompleteness on account of these deficiencies, which
must always be supplied by reference to it. However, my
disinclination was so great either to quote myself or laboriously
to state again in other words what I had already said once in an
adequate manner, that I preferred this course, notwithstanding
the fact that I might now be able to give the content of that
essay a somewhat better expression, chiefly by freeing it from

several conceptions which resulted from the excessive influence
which the Kantian philosophy had over me at the time, such
as—categories, outer and inner sense, and the like. But even
there these conceptions only occur because as yet I had never
really entered deeply into them, therefore only by the way and
quite out of connection with the principal matter. The correction
of such passages in that essay will consequently take place of its
own accord in the mind of the reader through his acquaintance
with the present work. But only if we have fully recognised [xi]
by means of that essay what the principle of sufficient reason is
and signifies, what its validity extends to, and what it does not
extend to, and that that principle is not before all things, and the
whole world merely in consequence of it, and in conformity to
it, a corollary, as it were, of it; but rather that it is merely the
form in which the object, of whatever kind it may be, which is
always conditioned by the subject, is invariably known so far as
the subject is a knowing individual: only then will it be possible
to enter into the method of philosophy which is here attempted
for the first time, and which is completely different from all
previous methods.
But the same disinclination to repeat myself word for word,
or to say the same thing a second time in other and worse
words, after I have deprived myself of the better, has occasioned
another defect in the first book of this work. For I have omitted
all that is said in the first chapter of my essay “On Sight and
Colour,” which would otherwise have found its place here, word
for word. Therefore the knowledge of this short, earlier work is
also presupposed.
Finally, the third demand I have to make on the reader might
indeed be tacitly assumed, for it is nothing but an acquaintance
with the most important phenomenon that has appeared in
philosophy for two thousand years, and that lies so near us:
I mean the principal writings of Kant. It seems to me, in fact,
as indeed has already been said by others, that the effect these
writings produce in the mind to which they truly speak is very
like that of the operation for cataract on a blind man: and if we
wish to pursue the simile further, the aim of my own work may
be described by saying that I have sought to put into the hands of
[xii] those upon whom that operation has been successfully performed
a pair of spectacles suitable to eyes that have recovered their
sight—spectacles of whose use that operation is the absolutely
necessary condition. Starting then, as I do to a large extent, from
what has been accomplished by the great Kant, I have yet been
enabled, just on account of my earnest study of his writings, to
discover important errors in them. These I have been obliged
to separate from the rest and prove to be false, in order that I
might be able to presuppose and apply what is true and excellent
in his doctrine, pure and freed from error. But not to interrupt
and complicate my own exposition by a constant polemic against
Kant, I have relegated this to a special appendix. It follows then,
from what has been said, that my work presupposes a knowledge
of this appendix just as much as it presupposes a knowledge of
the philosophy of Kant; and in this respect it would therefore be
advisable to read the appendix first, all the more as its content
is specially related to the first book of the present work. On the
other hand, it could not be avoided, from the nature of the case,
that here and there the appendix also should refer to the text of
the work; and the only result of this is, that the appendix, as well
as the principal part of the work, must be read twice.
The philosophy of Kant, then, is the only philosophy with
which a thorough acquaintance is directly presupposed in what
we have to say here. But if, besides this, the reader has lingered
in the school of the divine Plato, he will be so much the better
prepared to hear me, and susceptible to what I say. And if,
indeed, in addition to this he is a partaker of the benefit conferred
by the Vedas, the access to which, opened to us through the
[xiii] Upanishads, is in my eyes the greatest advantage which this
still young century enjoys over previous ones, because I believe

that the influence of the Sanscrit literature will penetrate not less
deeply than did the revival of Greek literature in the fifteenth
century: if, I say, the reader has also already received and
assimilated the sacred, primitive Indian wisdom, then is he best
of all prepared to hear what I have to say to him. My work
will not speak to him, as to many others, in a strange and even
hostile tongue; for, if it does not sound too vain, I might express
the opinion that each one of the individual and disconnected
aphorisms which make up the Upanishads may be deduced as a
consequence from the thought I am going to impart, though the
converse, that my thought is to be found in the Upanishads, is by
no means the case.
But most readers have already grown angry with impatience,
and burst into reproaches with difficulty kept back so long. How
can I venture to present a book to the public under conditions and
demands the first two of which are presumptuous and altogether
immodest, and this at a time when there is such a general
wealth of special ideas, that in Germany alone they are made
common property through the press, in three thousand valuable,
original, and absolutely indispensable works every year, besides
innumerable periodicals, and even daily papers; at a time when
especially there is not the least deficiency of entirely original and
profound philosophers, but in Germany alone there are more of
them alive at the same time, than several centuries could formerly
boast of in succession to each other? How is one ever to come to
the end, asks the indignant reader, if one must set to work upon
a book in such a fashion? [xiv]
As I have absolutely nothing to advance against these

reproaches, I only hope for some small thanks from such readers
for having warned them in time, so that they may not lose an
hour over a book which it would be useless to read without
complying with the demands that have been made, and which
should therefore be left alone, particularly as apart from this we
might wager a great deal that it can say nothing to them, but
rather that it will always be only pancorum hominum, and must
therefore quietly and modestly wait for the few whose unusual
mode of thought may find it enjoyable. For apart from the
difficulties and the effort which it requires from the reader, what
cultured man of this age, whose knowledge has almost reached
the august point at which the paradoxical and the false are all
one to it, could bear to meet thoughts almost on every page
that directly contradict that which he has yet himself established
once for all as true and undeniable? And then, how disagreeably
disappointed will many a one be if he finds no mention here of
what he believes it is precisely here he ought to look for, because
his method of speculation agrees with that of a great living
philosopher,1 who has certainly written pathetic books, and who
only has the trifling weakness that he takes all he learned and
approved before his fifteenth year for inborn ideas of the human
mind. Who could stand all this? Therefore my advice is simply
to lay down the book.
But I fear I shall not escape even thus. The reader who has got
as far as the preface and been stopped by it, has bought the book
for cash, and asks how he is to be indemnified. My last refuge
is now to remind him that he knows how to make use of a book
[xv] in several ways, without exactly reading it. It may fill a gap in
his library as well as many another, where, neatly bound, it will
certainly look well. Or he can lay it on the toilet-table or the
tea-table of some learned lady friend. Or, finally, what certainly
is best of all, and I specially advise it, he can review it.
And now that I have allowed myself the jest to which in this
two-sided life hardly any page can be too serious to grant a
place, I part with the book with deep seriousness, in the sure
hope that sooner or later it will reach those to whom alone it
1
F. H. Jacobi.
can be addressed; and for the rest, patiently resigned that the
same fate should, in full measure, befall it, that in all ages
has, to some extent, befallen all knowledge, and especially the
weightiest knowledge of the truth, to which only a brief triumph
is allotted between the two long periods in which it is condemned
as paradoxical or disparaged as trivial. The former fate is also
wont to befall its author. But life is short, and truth works far and
lives long: let us speak the truth.
Written at Dresden in August 1818.
[xvii]
Preface To The Second Edition.
Not to my contemporaries, not to my compatriots—to mankind

I commit my now completed work in the confidence that it
will not be without value for them, even if this should be late
recognised, as is commonly the lot of what is good. For it
cannot have been for the passing generation, engrossed with the
delusion of the moment, that my mind, almost against my will,
has uninterruptedly stuck to its work through the course of a long
life. And while the lapse of time has not been able to make me
doubt the worth of my work, neither has the lack of sympathy;
for I constantly saw the false and the bad, and finally the absurd
and senseless,2 stand in universal admiration and honour, and
I bethought myself that if it were not the case those who are
capable of recognising the genuine and right are so rare that we
may look for them in vain for some twenty years, then those who
are capable of producing it could not be so few that their works
afterwards form an exception to the perishableness of earthly
things; and thus would be lost the reviving prospect of posterity
which every one who sets before himself a high aim requires to
strengthen him.
Whoever seriously takes up and pursues an object that does
[xviii] not lead to material advantages, must not count on the sympathy
of his contemporaries. For the most part he will see, however,
that in the meantime the superficial aspect of that object becomes
current in the world, and enjoys its day; and this is as it
should be. The object itself must be pursued for its own sake,
otherwise it cannot be attained; for any design or intention
is always dangerous to insight. Accordingly, as the whole
2
The Hegelian Philosophy.
Preface To The Second Edition. 13
history of literature proves, everything of real value required a

long time to gain acceptance, especially if it belonged to the
class of instructive, not entertaining, works; and meanwhile the
false flourished. For to combine the object with its superficial
appearance is difficult, when it is not impossible. Indeed that is
just the curse of this world of want and need, that everything must
serve and slave for these; and therefore it is not so constituted
that any noble and sublime effort, like the endeavour after light
and truth, can prosper unhindered and exist for its own sake.
But even if such an endeavour has once succeeded in asserting
itself, and the conception of it has thus been introduced, material
interests and personal aims will immediately take possession of
it, in order to make it their tool or their mask. Accordingly,
when Kant brought philosophy again into repute, it had soon to
become the tool of political aims from above, and personal aims
from below; although, strictly speaking, not philosophy itself,
but its ghost, that passes for it. This should not really astonish
us; for the incredibly large majority of men are by nature quite
incapable of any but material aims, indeed they can conceive
no others. Thus the pursuit of truth alone is far too lofty and
eccentric an endeavour for us to expect all or many, or indeed
even a few, faithfully to take part in. If yet we see, as for
example at present in Germany, a remarkable activity, a general [xix]
moving, writing, and talking with reference to philosophical
subjects, we may confidently assume that, in spite of solemn
looks and assurances, only real, not ideal aims, are the actual
primum mobile, the concealed motive of such a movement; that
it is personal, official, ecclesiastical, political, in short, material
ends that are really kept in view, and consequently that mere
party ends set the pens of so many pretended philosophers in
such rapid motion. Thus some design or intention, not the desire
of insight, is the guiding star of these disturbers of the peace, and
truth is certainly the last thing that is thought of in the matter. It
finds no partisans; rather, it may pursue its way as silently and
unheeded through such a philosophical riot as through the winter

night of the darkest century bound in the rigid faith of the church,
when it was communicated only to a few alchemists as esoteric
learning, or entrusted it may be only to the parchment. Indeed I
might say that no time can be more unfavourable to philosophy
than that in which it is shamefully misused, on the one hand to
further political objects, on the other as a means of livelihood. Or
is it believed that somehow, with such effort and such a turmoil,
the truth, at which it by no means aims, will also be brought
to light? Truth is no prostitute, that throws herself away upon
those who do not desire her; she is rather so coy a beauty that he
who sacrifices everything to her cannot even then be sure of her
favour.
If Governments make philosophy a means of furthering
political ends, learned men see in philosophical professorships a
trade that nourishes the outer man just like any other; therefore
they crowd after them in the assurance of their good intentions,
[xx] that is, the purpose of subserving these ends. And they keep
their word: not truth, not clearness, not Plato, not Aristotle,
but the ends they were appointed to serve are their guiding
star, and become at once the criterion of what is true, valuable,
and to be respected, and of the opposites of these. Whatever,
therefore, does not answer these ends, even if it were the most
important and extraordinary things in their department, is either
condemned, or, when this seems hazardous, suppressed by being
unanimously ignored. Look only at their zeal against pantheism;
will any simpleton believe that it proceeds from conviction? And,
in general, how is it possible that philosophy, degraded to the
position of a means of making one's bread, can fail to degenerate
into sophistry? Just because this is infallibly the case, and the
rule, “I sing the song of him whose bread I eat,” has always
held good, the making of money by philosophy was regarded
by the ancients as the characteristic of the sophists. But we
have still to add this, that since throughout this world nothing is
to be expected, can be demanded, or is to be had for gold but

mediocrity, we must be contented with it here also. Consequently
we see in all the German universities the cherished mediocrity
striving to produce the philosophy which as yet is not there to
produce, at its own expense and indeed in accordance with a
predetermined standard and aim, a spectacle at which it would
be almost cruel to mock.
While thus philosophy has long been obliged to serve entirely
as a means to public ends on the one side and private ends on
the other, I have pursued the course of my thought, undisturbed
by them, for more than thirty years, and simply because I was
obliged to do so and could not help myself, from an instinctive
impulse, which was, however, supported by the confidence that [xxi]
anything true one may have thought, and anything obscure one
may have thrown light upon, will appeal to any thinking mind,
no matter when it comprehends it, and will rejoice and comfort it.
To such an one we speak as those who are like us have spoken to
us, and have so become our comfort in the wilderness of this life.
Meanwhile the object is pursued on its own account and for its
own sake. Now it happens curiously enough with philosophical
meditations, that precisely that which one has thought out and
investigated for oneself, is afterwards of benefit to others; not
that, however, which was originally intended for others. The
former is confessedly nearest in character to perfect honesty;
for a man does not seek to deceive himself, nor does he offer
himself empty husks; so that all sophistication and all mere talk
is omitted, and consequently every sentence that is written at
once repays the trouble of reading it. Thus my writings bear
the stamp of honesty and openness so distinctly on the face
of them, that by this alone they are a glaring contrast to those
of three celebrated sophists of the post-Kantian period. I am
always to be found at the standpoint of reflection, i.e., rational
deliberation and honest statement, never at that of inspiration,
called intellectual intuition, or absolute thought; though, if it
received its proper name, it would be called empty bombast and

charlatanism. Working then in this spirit, and always seeing
the false and bad in universal acceptance, yea, bombast3 and
charlatanism4 in the highest honour, I have long renounced the
approbation of my contemporaries. It is impossible that an age
which for twenty years has applauded a Hegel, that intellectual
[xxii] Caliban, as the greatest of the philosophers, so loudly that it
echoes through the whole of Europe, could make him who has
looked on at that desirous of its approbation. It has no more
crowns of honour to bestow; its applause is prostituted, and its
censure has no significance. That I mean what I say is attested
by the fact that if I had in any way sought the approbation of
my contemporaries, I would have had to strike out a score of
passages which entirely contradict all their opinions, and indeed
must in part be offensive to them. But I would count it a crime
to sacrifice a single syllable to that approbation. My guiding
star has, in all seriousness, been truth. Following it, I could
first aspire only to my own approbation, entirely averted from
an age deeply degraded as regards all higher intellectual efforts,
and a national literature demoralised even to the exceptions, a
literature in which the art of combining lofty words with paltry
significance has reached its height. I can certainly never escape
from the errors and weaknesses which, in my case as in every
one else's, necessarily belong to my nature; but I will not increase
them by unworthy accommodations.
As regards this second edition, first of all I am glad to say
that after five and twenty years I find nothing to retract; so that
my fundamental convictions have only been confirmed, as far
as concerns myself at least. The alterations in the first volume
therefore, which contains the whole text of the first edition,
nowhere touch what is essential. Sometimes they concern things
of merely secondary importance, and more often consist of
3
Fichte and Schelling.
4
Hegel.
very short explanatory additions inserted here and there. Only

the criticism of the Kantian philosophy has received important
corrections and large additions, for these could not be put into
a supplementary book, such as those which are given in the [xxiii]
second volume, and which correspond to each of the four books
that contain the exposition of my own doctrine. In the case of
the latter, I have chosen this form of enlarging and improving
them, because the five and twenty years that have passed since
they were composed have produced so marked a change in my
method of exposition and in my style, that it would not have done
to combine the content of the second volume with that of the first,
as both must have suffered by the fusion. I therefore give both
works separately, and in the earlier exposition, even in many
places where I would now express myself quite differently, I have
changed nothing, because I desired to guard against spoiling the
work of my earlier years through the carping criticism of age.
What in this regard might need correction will correct itself in
the mind of the reader with the help of the second volume. Both
volumes have, in the full sense of the word, a supplementary
relation to each other, so far as this rests on the fact that one
age of human life is, intellectually, the supplement of another. It
will therefore be found, not only that each volume contains what
the other lacks, but that the merits of the one consist peculiarly
in that which is wanting in the other. Thus, if the first half of
my work surpasses the second in what can only be supplied by
the fire of youth and the energy of first conceptions, the second
will surpass the first by the ripeness and complete elaboration of
the thought which can only belong to the fruit of the labour of
a long life. For when I had the strength originally to grasp the
fundamental thought of my system, to follow it at once into its
four branches, to return from them to the unity of their origin,
and then to explain the whole distinctly, I could not yet be in
a position to work out all the branches of the system with the [xxiv]
fulness, thoroughness, and elaborateness which is only reached
by the meditation of many years—meditation which is required

to test and illustrate the system by innumerable facts, to support
it by the most different kinds of proof, to throw light on it from
all sides, and then to place the different points of view boldly in
contrast, to separate thoroughly the multifarious materials, and
present them in a well-arranged whole. Therefore, although it
would, no doubt, have been more agreeable to the reader to have
my whole work in one piece, instead of consisting, as it now does,
of two halves, which must be combined in using them, he must
reflect that this would have demanded that I should accomplish
at one period of life what it is only possible to accomplish in two,
for I would have had to possess the qualities at one period of life
that nature has divided between two quite different ones. Hence
the necessity of presenting my work in two halves supplementary
to each other may be compared to the necessity in consequence
of which a chromatic object-glass, which cannot be made out
of one piece, is produced by joining together a convex lens of
flint glass and a concave lens of crown glass, the combined
effect of which is what was sought. Yet, on the other hand,
the reader will find some compensation for the inconvenience of
using two volumes at once, in the variety and the relief which
is afforded by the handling of the same subject, by the same
mind, in the same spirit, but in very different years. However,
it is very advisable that those who are not yet acquainted with
my philosophy should first of all read the first volume without
using the supplementary books, and should make use of these
only on a second perusal; otherwise it would be too difficult for
[xxv] them to grasp the system in its connection. For it is only thus
explained in the first volume, while the second is devoted to a
more detailed investigation and a complete development of the
individual doctrines. Even those who should not make up their
minds to a second reading of the first volume had better not read
the second volume till after the first, and then for itself, in the
ordinary sequence of its chapters, which, at any rate, stand in
some kind of connection, though a somewhat looser one, the gaps

of which they will fully supply by the recollection of the first
volume, if they have thoroughly comprehended it. Besides, they
will find everywhere the reference to the corresponding passages
of the first volume, the paragraphs of which I have numbered
in the second edition for this purpose, though in the first edition
they were only divided by lines.
I have already explained in the preface to the first edition,
that my philosophy is founded on that of Kant, and therefore
presupposes a thorough knowledge of it. I repeat this here.
For Kant's teaching produces in the mind of every one who has
comprehended it a fundamental change which is so great that it
may be regarded as an intellectual new-birth. It alone is able
really to remove the inborn realism which proceeds from the
original character of the intellect, which neither Berkeley nor
Malebranche succeed in doing, for they remain too much in
the universal, while Kant goes into the particular, and indeed
in a way that is quite unexampled both before and after him,
and which has quite a peculiar, and, we might say, immediate
effect upon the mind in consequence of which it undergoes
a complete undeception, and forthwith looks at all things in
another light. Only in this way can any one become susceptible
to the more positive expositions which I have to give. On the [xxvi]
other hand, he who has not mastered the Kantian philosophy,
whatever else he may have studied, is, as it were, in a state
of innocence; that is to say, he remains in the grasp of that
natural and childish realism in which we are all born, and which
fits us for everything possible, with the single exception of
philosophy. Such a man then stands to the man who knows
the Kantian philosophy as a minor to a man of full age. That
this truth should nowadays sound paradoxical, which would not
have been the case in the first thirty years after the appearance
of the Critique of Reason, is due to the fact that a generation
has grown up that does not know Kant properly, because it has
never heard more of him than a hasty, impatient lecture, or an

account at second-hand; and this again is due to the fact that
in consequence of bad guidance, this generation has wasted its
time with the philosophemes of vulgar, uncalled men, or even
of bombastic sophists, which are unwarrantably commended
to it. Hence the confusion of fundamental conceptions, and in
general the unspeakable crudeness and awkwardness that appears
from under the covering of affectation and pretentiousness in
the philosophical attempts of the generation thus brought up.
But whoever thinks he can learn Kant's philosophy from the
exposition of others makes a terrible mistake. Nay, rather I
must earnestly warn against such accounts, especially the more
recent ones; and indeed in the years just past I have met with
expositions of the Kantian philosophy in the writings of the
Hegelians which actually reach the incredible. How should the
minds that in the freshness of youth have been strained and ruined
by the nonsense of Hegelism, be still capable of following Kant's
[xxvii] profound investigations? They are early accustomed to take the
hollowest jingle of words for philosophical thoughts, the most
miserable sophisms for acuteness, and silly conceits for dialectic,
and their minds are disorganised through the admission of mad
combinations of words to which the mind torments and exhausts
itself in vain to attach some thought. No Critique of Reason can
avail them, no philosophy, they need a medicina mentis, first
as a sort of purgative, un petit cours de senscommunologie, and
then one must further see whether, in their case, there can even
be any talk of philosophy. The Kantian doctrine then will be
sought for in vain anywhere else but in Kant's own works; but
these are throughout instructive, even where he errs, even where
he fails. In consequence of his originality, it holds good of him
in the highest degree, as indeed of all true philosophers, that one
can only come to know them from their own works, not from the
accounts of others. For the thoughts of any extraordinary intellect
cannot stand being filtered through the vulgar mind. Born behind
the broad, high, finely-arched brow, from under which shine

beaming eyes, they lose all power and life, and appear no longer
like themselves, when removed to the narrow lodging and low
roofing of the confined, contracted, thick-walled skull from
which dull glances steal directed to personal ends. Indeed we
may say that minds of this kind act like an uneven glass, in
which everything is twisted and distorted, loses the regularity of
its beauty, and becomes a caricature. Only from their authors
themselves can we receive philosophical thoughts; therefore
whoever feels himself drawn to philosophy must himself seek
out its immortal teachers in the still sanctuary of their works.
The principal chapters of any one of these true philosophers will
afford a thousand times more insight into their doctrines than [xxviii]
the heavy and distorted accounts of them that everyday men
produce, who are still for the most part deeply entangled in the
fashionable philosophy of the time, or in the sentiments of their
own minds. But it is astonishing how decidedly the public seizes
by preference on these expositions at second-hand. It seems
really as if elective affinities were at work here, by virtue of
which the common nature is drawn to its like, and therefore
will rather hear what a great man has said from one of its own
kind. Perhaps this rests on the same principle as that of mutual
instruction, according to which children learn best from children.
One word more for the professors of philosophy. I have

always been compelled to admire not merely the sagacity, the
true and fine tact with which, immediately on its appearance,
they recognised my philosophy as something altogether different
from and indeed dangerous to their own attempts, or, in popular
language, something that would not suit their turn; but also
the sure and astute policy by virtue of which they at once
discovered the proper procedure with regard to it, the complete
harmony with which they applied it, and the persistency with
which they have remained faithful to it. This procedure, which
further commended itself by the great ease of carrying it out,

consists, as is well known, in altogether ignoring and thus in
secreting—according to Goethe's malicious phrase, which just
means the appropriating of what is of weight and significance.
The efficiency of this quiet means is increased by the Corybantic
shouts with which those who are at one reciprocally greet the
[xxix] birth of their own spiritual children—shouts which compel the
public to look and note the air of importance with which they
congratulate themselves on the event. Who can mistake the
object of such proceedings? Is there then nothing to oppose
to the maxim, primum vivere, deinde philosophari? These
gentlemen desire to live, and indeed to live by philosophy. To
philosophy they are assigned with their wives and children, and
in spite of Petrarch's povera e nuda vai filosofia, they have
staked everything upon it. Now my philosophy is by no means
so constituted that any one can live by it. It lacks the first
indispensable requisite of a well-paid professional philosophy, a
speculative theology, which—in spite of the troublesome Kant
with his Critique of Reason—should and must, it is supposed,
be the chief theme of all philosophy, even if it thus takes on
itself the task of talking straight on of that of which it can know
absolutely nothing. Indeed my philosophy does not permit to the
professors the fiction they have so cunningly devised, and which
has become so indispensable to them, of a reason that knows,
perceives, or apprehends immediately and absolutely. This is a
doctrine which it is only necessary to impose upon the reader at
starting, in order to pass in the most comfortable manner in the
world, as it were in a chariot and four, into that region beyond the
possibility of all experience, which Kant has wholly and for ever
shut out from our knowledge, and in which are found immediately
revealed and most beautifully arranged the fundamental dogmas
of modern, Judaising, optimistic Christianity. Now what in
the world has my subtle philosophy, deficient as it is in these
essential requisites, with no intentional aim, and unable to afford
a means of subsistence, whose pole star is truth alone the [xxx]

naked, unrewarded, unbefriended, often persecuted truth, and
which steers straight for it without looking to the right hand or
the left,—what, I say, has this to do with that alma mater, the
good, well-to-do university philosophy which, burdened with
a hundred aims and a thousand motives, comes on its course
cautiously tacking, while it keeps before its eyes at all times
the fear of the Lord, the will of the ministry, the laws of the
established church, the wishes of the publisher, the attendance
of the students, the goodwill of colleagues, the course of current
politics, the momentary tendency of the public, and Heaven
knows what besides? Or what has my quiet, earnest search for
truth in common with the noisy scholastic disputations of the
chair and the benches, the inmost motives of which are always
personal aims. The two kinds of philosophy are, indeed, radically
different. Thus it is that with me there is no compromise and
no fellowship, that no one reaps any benefit from my works
but the man who seeks the truth alone, and therefore none of
the philosophical parties of the day; for they all follow their
own aims, while I have only insight into truth to offer, which
suits none of these aims, because it is not modelled after any of
them. If my philosophy is to become susceptible of professorial
exposition, the times must entirely change. What a pretty thing
it would be if a philosophy by which nobody could live were to
gain for itself light and air, not to speak of the general ear! This
must be guarded against, and all must oppose it as one man. But
it is not just such an easy game to controvert and refute; and,
moreover, these are mistaken means to employ, because they just
direct the attention of the public to the matter, and its taste for the
lucubrations of the professors of philosophy might be destroyed [xxxi]
by the perusal of my writings. For whoever has tasted of earnest
will not relish jest, especially when it is tiresome. Therefore the
silent system, so unanimously adopted, is the only right one, and
I can only advise them to stick to it and go on with it as long as it
will answer, that is, until to ignore is taken to imply ignorance;

then there will just be time to turn back. Meanwhile it remains
open to every one to pluck out a small feather here and there for
his own use, for the superfluity of thoughts at home should not be
very oppressive. Thus the ignoring and silent system may hold
out a good while, at least the span of time I may have yet to live,
whereby much is already won. And if, in the meantime, here and
there an indiscreet voice has let itself be heard, it is soon drowned
by the loud talking of the professors, who, with important airs,
know how to entertain the public with very different things.
I advise, however, that the unanimity of procedure should be
somewhat more strictly observed, and especially that the young
men should be looked after, for they are sometimes so fearfully
indiscreet. For even so I cannot guarantee that the commended
procedure will last for ever, and cannot answer for the final issue.
It is a nice question as to the steering of the public, which, on
the whole, is good and tractable. Although we nearly at all times
see the Gorgiases and the Hippiases uppermost, although the
absurd, as a rule, predominates, and it seems impossible that the
voice of the individual can ever penetrate through the chorus of
the befooling and the befooled, there yet remains to the genuine
works of every age a quite peculiar, silent, slow, and powerful
[xxxii] influence; and, as if by a miracle, we see them rise at last
out of the turmoil like a balloon that floats up out of the thick
atmosphere of this globe into purer regions, where, having once
arrived, it remains at rest, and no one can draw it down again.
Written at Frankfort-on-the-Maine in February 1844.
[001]
First Book. The World As Idea.
First Aspect. The Idea Subordinated To The

Principle Of Sufficient Reason: The Object
Of Experience And Science.
Sors de l'enfance, ami réveille toi!
—Jean Jacques Rousseau.

[003]
§ 1. “The world is my idea:”—this is a truth which holds good
for everything that lives and knows, though man alone can bring
it into reflective and abstract consciousness. If he really does
this, he has attained to philosophical wisdom. It then becomes
clear and certain to him that what he knows is not a sun and an
earth, but only an eye that sees a sun, a hand that feels an earth;
that the world which surrounds him is there only as idea, i.e.,
only in relation to something else, the consciousness, which is
himself. If any truth can be asserted a priori, it is this: for it is the
expression of the most general form of all possible and thinkable
experience: a form which is more general than time, or space, or
causality, for they all presuppose it; and each of these, which we
have seen to be just so many modes of the principle of sufficient
reason, is valid only for a particular class of ideas; whereas the
antithesis of object and subject is the common form of all these
classes, is that form under which alone any idea of whatever kind
it may be, abstract or intuitive, pure or empirical, is possible and

thinkable. No truth therefore is more certain, more independent
of all others, and less in need of proof than this, that all that exists
for knowledge, and therefore this whole world, is only object in
relation to subject, perception of a perceiver, in a word, idea.
This is obviously true of the past and the future, as well as of the
present, of what is farthest off, as of what is near; for it is true
of time and space themselves, in which alone these distinctions
[004] arise. All that in any way belongs or can belong to the world is
inevitably thus conditioned through the subject, and exists only
for the subject. The world is idea.
This truth is by no means new. It was implicitly involved in
the sceptical reflections from which Descartes started. Berkeley,
however, was the first who distinctly enunciated it, and by this he
has rendered a permanent service to philosophy, even though the
rest of his teaching should not endure. Kant's primary mistake
was the neglect of this principle, as is shown in the appendix.
How early again this truth was recognised by the wise men of
India, appearing indeed as the fundamental tenet of the Vedânta
philosophy ascribed to Vyasa, is pointed out by Sir William Jones
in the last of his essays: “On the philosophy of the Asiatics”
(Asiatic Researches, vol. iv. p. 164), where he says, “The
fundamental tenet of the Vedanta school consisted not in denying
the existence of matter, that is, of solidity, impenetrability,
and extended figure (to deny which would be lunacy), but in
correcting the popular notion of it, and in contending that it has
no essence independent of mental perception; that existence and
perceptibility are convertible terms.” These words adequately
express the compatibility of empirical reality and transcendental
ideality.
In this first book, then, we consider the world only from this
side, only so far as it is idea. The inward reluctance with which
any one accepts the world as merely his idea, warns him that
this view of it, however true it may be, is nevertheless one-sided,
27
adopted in consequence of some arbitrary abstraction. And yet

it is a conception from which he can never free himself. The
defectiveness of this view will be corrected in the next book by
means of a truth which is not so immediately certain as that from
which we start here; a truth at which we can arrive only by deeper
research and more severe abstraction, by the separation of what
is different and the union of what is identical. This truth, which [005]
must be very serious and impressive if not awful to every one, is
that a man can also say and must say, “the world is my will.”
In this book, however, we must consider separately that aspect
of the world from which we start, its aspect as knowable, and
therefore, in the meantime, we must, without reserve, regard all
presented objects, even our own bodies (as we shall presently
show more fully), merely as ideas, and call them merely ideas.
By so doing we always abstract from will (as we hope to make
clear to every one further on), which by itself constitutes the other
aspect of the world. For as the world is in one aspect entirely
idea, so in another it is entirely will. A reality which is neither
of these two, but an object in itself (into which the thing in itself
has unfortunately dwindled in the hands of Kant), is the phantom
of a dream, and its acceptance is an ignis fatuus in philosophy.
§ 2. That which knows all things and is known by none is
the subject. Thus it is the supporter of the world, that condition
of all phenomena, of all objects which is always pre-supposed
throughout experience; for all that exists, exists only for the
subject. Every one finds himself to be subject, yet only in so
far as he knows, not in so far as he is an object of knowledge.
But his body is object, and therefore from this point of view
we call it idea. For the body is an object among objects, and is
conditioned by the laws of objects, although it is an immediate
object. Like all objects of perception, it lies within the universal
forms of knowledge, time and space, which are the conditions of
multiplicity. The subject, on the contrary, which is always the
knower, never the known, does not come under these forms, but
is presupposed by them; it has therefore neither multiplicity nor

its opposite unity. We never know it, but it is always the knower
wherever there is knowledge.
[006] So then the world as idea, the only aspect in which we consider
it at present, has two fundamental, necessary, and inseparable
halves. The one half is the object, the forms of which are space
and time, and through these multiplicity. The other half is the
subject, which is not in space and time, for it is present, entire and
undivided, in every percipient being. So that any one percipient
being, with the object, constitutes the whole world as idea just
as fully as the existing millions could do; but if this one were
to disappear, then the whole world as idea would cease to be.
These halves are therefore inseparable even for thought, for each
of the two has meaning and existence only through and for the
other, each appears with the other and vanishes with it. They
limit each other immediately; where the object begins the subject
ends. The universality of this limitation is shown by the fact
that the essential and hence universal forms of all objects, space,
time, and causality, may, without knowledge of the object, be
discovered and fully known from a consideration of the subject,
i.e., in Kantian language, they lie a priori in our consciousness.
That he discovered this is one of Kant's principal merits, and
it is a great one. I however go beyond this, and maintain that
the principle of sufficient reason is the general expression for all
these forms of the object of which we are a priori conscious;
and that therefore all that we know purely a priori, is merely
the content of that principle and what follows from it; in it all
our certain a priori knowledge is expressed. In my essay on the
principle of sufficient reason I have shown in detail how every
possible object comes under it; that is, stands in a necessary
relation to other objects, on the one side as determined, on the
other side as determining: this is of such wide application, that
the whole existence of all objects, so far as they are objects,
ideas and nothing more, may be entirely traced to this their
29
necessary relation to each other, rests only in it, is in fact merely

relative; but of this more presently. I have further shown, that [007]
the necessary relation which the principle of sufficient reason
expresses generally, appears in other forms corresponding to
the classes into which objects are divided, according to their
possibility; and again that by these forms the proper division of
the classes is tested. I take it for granted that what I said in this
earlier essay is known and present to the reader, for if it had not
been already said it would necessarily find its place here.
§ 3. The chief distinction among our ideas is that between
ideas of perception and abstract ideas. The latter form just one
class of ideas, namely concepts, and these are the possession of
man alone of all creatures upon earth. The capacity for these,
which distinguishes him from all the lower animals, has always
been called reason.5 We shall consider these abstract ideas by
themselves later, but, in the first place, we shall speak exclusively
of the ideas of perception. These comprehend the whole visible
world, or the sum total of experience, with the conditions of
its possibility. We have already observed that it is a highly
important discovery of Kant's, that these very conditions, these
forms of the visible world, i.e., the absolutely universal element
in its perception, the common property of all its phenomena,
space and time, even when taken by themselves and apart from
their content, can, not only be thought in the abstract, but also
be directly perceived; and that this perception or intuition is
not some kind of phantasm arising from constant recurrence in
experience, but is so entirely independent of experience that we
must rather regard the latter as dependent on it, inasmuch as
the qualities of space and time, as they are known in a priori
perception or intuition, are valid for all possible experience,
as rules to which it must invariably conform. Accordingly, in
5
Kant is the only writer who has confused this idea of reason, and in this
connection I refer the reader to the Appendix, and also to my “Grundprobleme
der Ethik”: Grundl. dd. Moral. § 6, pp. 148-154, first and second editions.
[008] my essay on the principle of sufficient reason, I have treated

space and time, because they are perceived as pure and empty of
content, as a special and independent class of ideas. This quality
of the universal forms of intuition, which was discovered by
Kant, that they may be perceived in themselves and apart from
experience, and that they may be known as exhibiting those laws
on which is founded the infallible science of mathematics, is
certainly very important. Not less worthy of remark, however, is
this other quality of time and space, that the principle of sufficient
reason, which conditions experience as the law of causation and
of motive, and thought as the law of the basis of judgment,
appears here in quite a special form, to which I have given the
name of the ground of being. In time, this is the succession
of its moments, and in space the position of its parts, which
reciprocally determine each other ad infinitum.
Any one who has fully understood from the introductory essay
the complete identity of the content of the principle of sufficient
reason in all its different forms, must also be convinced of the
importance of the knowledge of the simplest of these forms, as
affording him insight into his own inmost nature. This simplest
form of the principle we have found to be time. In it each
instant is, only in so far as it has effaced the preceding one, its
generator, to be itself in turn as quickly effaced. The past and the
future (considered apart from the consequences of their content)
are empty as a dream, and the present is only the indivisible
and unenduring boundary between them. And in all the other
forms of the principle of sufficient reason, we shall find the same
emptiness, and shall see that not time only but also space, and the
whole content of both of them, i.e., all that proceeds from causes
and motives, has a merely relative existence, is only through and
for another like to itself, i.e., not more enduring. The substance
of this doctrine is old: it appears in Heraclitus when he laments
[009] the eternal flux of things; in Plato when he degrades the object
to that which is ever becoming, but never being; in Spinoza as
31
the doctrine of the mere accidents of the one substance which

is and endures. Kant opposes what is thus known as the mere
phenomenon to the thing in itself. Lastly, the ancient wisdom
of the Indian philosophers declares, “It is Mâyâ, the veil of
deception, which blinds the eyes of mortals, and makes them
behold a world of which they cannot say either that it is or that
it is not: for it is like a dream; it is like the sunshine on the sand
which the traveller takes from afar for water, or the stray piece
of rope he mistakes for a snake.” (These similes are repeated in
innumerable passages of the Vedas and the Puranas.) But what
all these mean, and that of which they all speak, is nothing more
than what we have just considered—the world as idea subject to
the principle of sufficient reason.
§ 4. Whoever has recognised the form of the principle
of sufficient reason, which appears in pure time as such, and
on which all counting and arithmetical calculation rests, has
completely mastered the nature of time. Time is nothing more
than that form of the principle of sufficient reason, and has no
further significance. Succession is the form of the principle of
sufficient reason in time, and succession is the whole nature
of time. Further, whoever has recognised the principle of
sufficient reason as it appears in the presentation of pure space,
has exhausted the whole nature of space, which is absolutely
nothing more than that possibility of the reciprocal determination
of its parts by each other, which is called position. The detailed
treatment of this, and the formulation in abstract conceptions
of the results which flow from it, so that they may be more
conveniently used, is the subject of the science of geometry.
Thus also, whoever has recognised the law of causation, the
aspect of the principle of sufficient reason which appears in what
fills these forms (space and time) as objects of perception, that [010]
is to say matter, has completely mastered the nature of matter as
such, for matter is nothing more than causation, as any one will
see at once if he reflects. Its true being is its action, nor can we
possibly conceive it as having any other meaning. Only as active

does it fill space and time; its action upon the immediate object
(which is itself matter) determines that perception in which alone
it exists. The consequence of the action of any material object
upon any other, is known only in so far as the latter acts upon the
immediate object in a different way from that in which it acted
before; it consists only of this. Cause and effect thus constitute
the whole nature of matter; its true being is its action. (A fuller
treatment of this will be found in the essay on the Principle of
Sufficient Reason, § 21, p. 77.) The nature of all material things
is therefore very appropriately called in German Wirklichkeit,6
a word which is far more expressive than Realität. Again, that
which is acted upon is always matter, and thus the whole being
and essence of matter consists in the orderly change, which one
part of it brings about in another part. The existence of matter is
therefore entirely relative, according to a relation which is valid
only within its limits, as in the case of time and space.
But time and space, each for itself, can be mentally presented
apart from matter, whereas matter cannot be so presented
apart from time and space. The form which is inseparable
from it presupposes space, and the action in which its very
existence consists, always imports some change, in other words
a determination in time. But space and time are not only, each for
itself, presupposed by matter, but a union of the two constitutes
its essence, for this, as we have seen, consists in action, i.e.,
in causation. All the innumerable conceivable phenomena and
[011] conditions of things, might be coexistent in boundless space,
without limiting each other, or might be successive in endless time
without interfering with each other: thus a necessary relation of
these phenomena to each other, and a law which should regulate
them according to such a relation, is by no means needful, would
not, indeed, be applicable: it therefore follows that in the case
6
Mira in quibusdam rebus verborum proprietas est, et consuetudo sermonis
antiqui quædam efficacissimis notis signat. Seneca, epist. 81.
33
of all co-existence in space and change in time, so long as each

of these forms preserves for itself its condition and its course
without any connection with the other, there can be no causation,
and since causation constitutes the essential nature of matter,
there can be no matter. But the law of causation receives its
meaning and necessity only from this, that the essence of change
does not consist simply in the mere variation of things, but
rather in the fact that at the same part of space there is now one
thing and then another, and at one and the same point of time
there is here one thing and there another: only this reciprocal
limitation of space and time by each other gives meaning, and
at the same time necessity, to a law, according to which change
must take place. What is determined by the law of causality
is therefore not merely a succession of things in time, but this
succession with reference to a definite space, and not merely
existence of things in a particular place, but in this place at a
different point of time. Change, i.e., variation which takes place
according to the law of causality, implies always a determined
part of space and a determined part of time together and in
union. Thus causality unites space with time. But we found
that the whole essence of matter consisted in action, i.e., in
causation, consequently space and time must also be united in
matter, that is to say, matter must take to itself at once the
distinguishing qualities both of space and time, however much
these may be opposed to each other, and must unite in itself
what is impossible for each of these independently, that is, the
fleeting course of time, with the rigid unchangeable perduration
of space: infinite divisibility it receives from both. It is for this [012]
reason that we find that co-existence, which could neither be in
time alone, for time has no contiguity, nor in space alone, for
space has no before, after, or now, is first established through
matter. But the co-existence of many things constitutes, in fact,
the essence of reality, for through it permanence first becomes
possible; for permanence is only knowable in the change of
something which is present along with what is permanent, while

on the other hand it is only because something permanent is
present along with what changes, that the latter gains the special
character of change, i.e., the mutation of quality and form in
the permanence of substance, that is to say, in matter.7 If the
world were in space alone, it would be rigid and immovable,
without succession, without change, without action; but we
know that with action, the idea of matter first appears. Again,
if the world were in time alone, all would be fleeting, without
persistence, without contiguity, hence without co-existence, and
consequently without permanence; so that in this case also there
would be no matter. Only through the union of space and time
do we reach matter, and matter is the possibility of co-existence,
and, through that, of permanence; through permanence again
matter is the possibility of the persistence of substance in the
change of its states.8 As matter consists in the union of space
and time, it bears throughout the stamp of both. It manifests
its origin in space, partly through the form which is inseparable
from it, but especially through its persistence (substance), the a
priori certainty of which is therefore wholly deducible from that
of space9 (for variation belongs to time alone, but in it alone
and for itself nothing is persistent). Matter shows that it springs
[013] from time by quality (accidents), without which it never exists,
and which is plainly always causality, action upon other matter,
and therefore change (a time concept). The law of this action,
however, always depends upon space and time together, and
only thus obtains meaning. The regulative function of causality
is confined entirely to the determination of what must occupy
7
It is shown in the Appendix that matter and substance are one.
8
This shows the ground of the Kantian explanation of matter, that it is “that
which is movable in space,” for motion consists simply in the union of space
and time.
9
Not, as Kant holds, from the knowledge of time, as will be explained in the
Appendix.
35
this time and this space. The fact that we know a priori the
unalterable characteristics of matter, depends upon this derivation
of its essential nature from the forms of our knowledge of which
we are conscious a priori. These unalterable characteristics
are space-occupation, i.e., impenetrability, i.e., causal action,
consequently, extension, infinite divisibility, persistence, i.e.,
indestructibility, and lastly mobility: weight, on the other hand,
notwithstanding its universality, must be attributed to a posteriori
knowledge, although Kant, in his “Metaphysical Introduction to
Natural Philosophy,” p. 71 (p. 372 of Rosenkranz's edition),
treats it as knowable a priori.
But as the object in general is only for the subject, as its idea,
so every special class of ideas is only for an equally special
quality in the subject, which is called a faculty of perception.
This subjective correlative of time and space in themselves as
empty forms, has been named by Kant pure sensibility; and we
may retain this expression, as Kant was the first to treat of the
subject, though it is not exact, for sensibility presupposes matter.
The subjective correlative of matter or of causation, for these
two are the same, is understanding, which is nothing more than
this. To know causality is its one function, its only power; and
it is a great one, embracing much, of manifold application, yet
of unmistakable identity in all its manifestations. Conversely all
causation, that is to say, all matter, or the whole of reality, is
only for the understanding, through the understanding, and in
the understanding. The first, simplest, and ever-present example
of understanding is the perception of the actual world. This is [014]
throughout knowledge of the cause from the effect, and therefore
all perception is intellectual. The understanding could never
arrive at this perception, however, if some effect did not become
known immediately, and thus serve as a starting-point. But this
is the affection of the animal body. So far, then, the animal
body is the immediate object of the subject; the perception of all
other objects becomes possible through it. The changes which
every animal body experiences, are immediately known, that is,

felt; and as these effects are at once referred to their causes,
the perception of the latter as objects arises. This relation is
no conclusion in abstract conceptions; it does not arise from
reflection, nor is it arbitrary, but immediate, necessary, and
certain. It is the method of knowing of the pure understanding,
without which there could be no perception; there would only
remain a dull plant-like consciousness of the changes of the
immediate object, which would succeed each other in an utterly
unmeaning way, except in so far as they might have a meaning
for the will either as pain or pleasure. But as with the rising
of the sun the visible world appears, so at one stroke, the
understanding, by means of its one simple function, changes the
dull, meaningless sensation into perception. What the eye, the
ear, or the hand feels, is not perception; it is merely its data.
By the understanding passing from the effect to the cause, the
world first appears as perception extended in space, varying in
respect of form, persistent through all time in respect of matter;
for the understanding unites space and time in the idea of matter,
that is, causal action. As the world as idea exists only through
the understanding, so also it exists only for the understanding.
In the first chapter of my essay on “Light and Colour,” I have
already explained how the understanding constructs perceptions
out of the data supplied by the senses; how by comparison of the
impressions which the various senses receive from the object, a
[015] child arrives at perceptions; how this alone affords the solution
of so many phenomena of the senses; the single vision of two
eyes, the double vision in the case of a squint, or when we try to
look at once at objects which lie at unequal distances behind each
other; and all illusion which is produced by a sudden alteration
in the organs of sense. But I have treated this important subject
much more fully and thoroughly in the second edition of the
essay on “The Principle of Sufficient Reason,” § 21. All that is
said there would find its proper place here, and would therefore
37
have to be said again; but as I have almost as much disinclination

to quote myself as to quote others, and as I am unable to explain
the subject better than it is explained there, I refer the reader to
it, instead of quoting it, and take for granted that it is known.
The process by which children, and persons born blind who
have been operated upon, learn to see, the single vision of the
double sensation of two eyes, the double vision and double touch
which occur when the organs of sense have been displaced from
their usual position, the upright appearance of objects while the
picture on the retina is upside down, the attributing of colour to
the outward objects, whereas it is merely an inner function, a
division through polarisation, of the activity of the eye, and lastly
the stereoscope,—all these are sure and incontrovertible evidence
that perception is not merely of the senses, but intellectual—that
is, pure knowledge through the understanding of the cause from
the effect, and that, consequently, it presupposes the law of
causality, in a knowledge of which all perception—that is to
say all experience, by virtue of its primary and only possibility,
depends. The contrary doctrine that the law of causality results
from experience, which was the scepticism of Hume, is first
refuted by this. For the independence of the knowledge of
causality of all experience,—that is, its a priori character—can [016]
only be deduced from the dependence of all experience upon it;
and this deduction can only be accomplished by proving, in the
manner here indicated, and explained in the passages referred to
above, that the knowledge of causality is included in perception
in general, to which all experience belongs, and therefore in
respect of experience is completely a priori, does not presuppose
it, but is presupposed by it as a condition. This, however, cannot
be deduced in the manner attempted by Kant, which I have
criticised in the essay on “The Principle of Sufficient Reason,” §
23.
§ 5. It is needful to guard against the grave error of supposing
that because perception arises through the knowledge of causality,
the relation of subject and object is that of cause and effect. For
this relation subsists only between the immediate object and
objects known indirectly, thus always between objects alone.
It is this false supposition that has given rise to the foolish
controversy about the reality of the outer world; a controversy
in which dogmatism and scepticism oppose each other, and the
former appears, now as realism, now as idealism. Realism treats
the object as cause, and the subject as its effect. The idealism
of Fichte reduces the object to the effect of the subject. Since
however, and this cannot be too much emphasised, there is
absolutely no relation according to the principle of sufficient
reason between subject and object, neither of these views could
be proved, and therefore scepticism attacked them both with
success. Now, just as the law of causality precedes perception
and experience as their condition, and therefore cannot (as Hume
thought) be derived from them, so object and subject precede
all knowledge, and hence the principle of sufficient reason in
general, as its first condition; for this principle is merely the form
of all objects, the whole nature and possibility of their existence
as phenomena: but the object always presupposes the subject; and
[017] therefore between these two there can be no relation of reason
and consequent. My essay on the principle of sufficient reason
accomplishes just this: it explains the content of that principle as
the essential form of every object—that is to say, as the universal
nature of all objective existence, as something which pertains to
the object as such; but the object as such always presupposes
the subject as its necessary correlative; and therefore the subject
remains always outside the province in which the principle of
sufficient reason is valid. The controversy as to the reality of
the outer world rests upon this false extension of the validity of
the principle of sufficient reason to the subject also, and starting
with this mistake it can never understand itself. On the one side
realistic dogmatism, looking upon the idea as the effect of the
object, desires to separate these two, idea and object, which are
39
really one, and to assume a cause quite different from the idea,
an object in itself, independent of the subject, a thing which is
quite inconceivable; for even as object it presupposes subject,
and so remains its idea. Opposed to this doctrine is scepticism,
which makes the same false presupposition that in the idea we
have only the effect, never the cause, therefore never real being;
that we always know merely the action of the object. But this
object, it supposes, may perhaps have no resemblance whatever
to its effect, may indeed have been quite erroneously received
as the cause, for the law of causality is first to be gathered from
experience, and the reality of experience is then made to rest
upon it. Thus both of these views are open to the correction,
firstly, that object and idea are the same; secondly, that the true
being of the object of perception is its action, that the reality of
the thing consists in this, and the demand for an existence of the
object outside the idea of the subject, and also for an essence
of the actual thing different from its action, has absolutely no
meaning, and is a contradiction: and that the knowledge of the
nature of the effect of any perceived object, exhausts such an [018]
object itself, so far as it is object, i.e., idea, for beyond this
there is nothing more to be known. So far then, the perceived
world in space and time, which makes itself known as causation
alone, is entirely real, and is throughout simply what it appears
to be, and it appears wholly and without reserve as idea, bound
together according to the law of causality. This is its empirical
reality. On the other hand, all causality is in the understanding
alone, and for the understanding. The whole actual, that is,
active world is determined as such through the understanding,
and apart from it is nothing. This, however, is not the only
reason for altogether denying such a reality of the outer world
as is taught by the dogmatist, who explains its reality as its
independence of the subject. We also deny it, because no object
apart from a subject can be conceived without contradiction.
The whole world of objects is and remains idea, and therefore
wholly and for ever determined by the subject; that is to say,

it has transcendental ideality. But it is not therefore illusion
or mere appearance; it presents itself as that which it is, idea,
and indeed as a series of ideas of which the common bond is
the principle of sufficient reason. It is according to its inmost
meaning quite comprehensible to the healthy understanding, and
speaks a language quite intelligible to it. To dispute about its
reality can only occur to a mind perverted by over-subtilty, and
such discussion always arises from a false application of the
principle of sufficient reason, which binds all ideas together of
whatever kind they may be, but by no means connects them with
the subject, nor yet with a something which is neither subject
nor object, but only the ground of the object; an absurdity, for
only objects can be and always are the ground of objects. If we
examine more closely the source of this question as to the reality
of the outer world, we find that besides the false application of
[019] the principle of sufficient reason generally to what lies beyond
its province, a special confusion of its forms is also involved; for
that form which it has only in reference to concepts or abstract
ideas, is applied to perceived ideas, real objects; and a ground of
knowing is demanded of objects, whereas they can have nothing
but a ground of being. Among the abstract ideas, the concepts
united in the judgment, the principle of sufficient reason appears
in such a way that each of these has its worth, its validity, and its
whole existence, here called truth, simply and solely through the
relation of the judgment to something outside of it, its ground of
knowledge, to which there must consequently always be a return.
Among real objects, ideas of perception, on the other hand, the
principle of sufficient reason appears not as the principle of the
ground of knowing, but of being, as the law of causality: every
real object has paid its debt to it, inasmuch as it has come to
be, i.e., has appeared as the effect of a cause. The demand for
a ground of knowing has therefore here no application and no
meaning, but belongs to quite another class of things. Thus the
41
world of perception raises in the observer no question or doubt

so long as he remains in contact with it: there is here neither
error nor truth, for these are confined to the province of the
abstract—the province of reflection. But here the world lies
open for sense and understanding; presents itself with naive truth
as that which it really is—ideas of perception which develop
themselves according to the law of causality.
So far as we have considered the question of the reality of the
outer world, it arises from a confusion which amounts even to
a misunderstanding of reason itself, and therefore thus far, the
question could be answered only by explaining its meaning. After
examination of the whole nature of the principle of sufficient
reason, of the relation of subject and object, and the special
conditions of sense perception, the question itself disappeared
because it had no longer any meaning. There is, however, one [020]
other possible origin of this question, quite different from the
purely speculative one which we have considered, a specially
empirical origin, though the question is always raised from a
speculative point of view, and in this form it has a much more
comprehensible meaning than it had in the first. We have dreams;
may not our whole life be a dream? or more exactly: is there
a sure criterion of the distinction between dreams and reality?
between phantasms and real objects? The assertion that what is
dreamt is less vivid and distinct than what we actually perceive is
not to the point, because no one has ever been able to make a fair
comparison of the two; for we can only compare the recollection
of a dream with the present reality. Kant answers the question
thus: “The connection of ideas among themselves, according to
the law of causality, constitutes the difference between real life
and dreams.” But in dreams, as well as in real life, everything
is connected individually at any rate, in accordance with the
principle of sufficient reason in all its forms, and this connection
is broken only between life and dreams, or between one dream
and another. Kant's answer therefore could only run thus:—the
long dream (life) has throughout complete connection according

to the principle of sufficient reason; it has not this connection,
however, with short dreams, although each of these has in itself
the same connection: the bridge is therefore broken between the
former and the latter, and on this account we distinguish them.
But to institute an inquiry according to this criterion, as to
whether something was dreamt or seen, would always be difficult
and often impossible. For we are by no means in a position to trace
link by link the causal connection between any experienced event
and the present moment, but we do not on that account explain it
as dreamt. Therefore in real life we do not commonly employ that
method of distinguishing between dreams and reality. The only
[021] sure criterion by which to distinguish them is in fact the entirely
empirical one of awaking, through which at any rate the causal
connection between dreamed events and those of waking life, is
distinctly and sensibly broken off. This is strongly supported by
the remark of Hobbes in the second chapter of Leviathan, that
we easily mistake dreams for reality if we have unintentionally
fallen asleep without taking off our clothes, and much more so
when it also happens that some undertaking or design fills all
our thoughts, and occupies our dreams as well as our waking
moments. We then observe the awaking just as little as the falling
asleep, dream and reality run together and become confounded.
In such a case there is nothing for it but the application of Kant's
criterion; but if, as often happens, we fail to establish by means
of this criterion, either the existence of causal connection with
the present, or the absence of such connection, then it must for
ever remain uncertain whether an event was dreamt or really
happened. Here, in fact, the intimate relationship between life
and dreams is brought out very clearly, and we need not be
ashamed to confess it, as it has been recognised and spoken of by
many great men. The Vedas and Puranas have no better simile
than a dream for the whole knowledge of the actual world, which
they call the web of Mâyâ, and they use none more frequently.
43
Plato often says that men live only in a dream; the philosopher
alone strives to awake himself. Pindar says (ii. ·. 135): Ãº¹±Â
¿½±Á ±½¸ÁÉÀ¿Â (umbræ somnium homo), and Sophocles:—
H½É ³Å½ !¼±Â ¿Å´µ½ ¿½Ä±Â ±»»¿, À»·½

£¹´É»½ AÃ¿¹ÀµÁ ¶É¼µ½, t º¿ÅÆ·½ Ãº¹±½.—Ajax, 125.
(Nos enim, quicunque vivimus, nihil aliud esse comperio

quam simulacra et levem umbram.) Beside which most worthily
stands Shakespeare:—
“We are such stuff

As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.”—Tempest, Act iv. Sc. 1.
[022]
Lastly, Calderon was so deeply impressed with this view
of life that he sought to embody it in a kind of metaphysical
drama—“Life a Dream.”
After these numerous quotations from the poets, perhaps I
also may be allowed to express myself by a metaphor. Life and
dreams are leaves of the same book. The systematic reading of
this book is real life, but when the reading hours (that is, the
day) are over, we often continue idly to turn over the leaves, and
read a page here and there without method or connection: often
one we have read before, sometimes one that is new to us, but
always in the same book. Such an isolated page is indeed out
of connection with the systematic study of the book, but it does
not seem so very different when we remember that the whole
continuous perusal begins and ends just as abruptly, and may
therefore be regarded as merely a larger single page.
Thus although individual dreams are distinguished from real
life by the fact that they do not fit into that continuity which runs
through the whole of experience, and the act of awaking brings
this into consciousness, yet that very continuity of experience
belongs to real life as its form, and the dream on its part can
point to a similar continuity in itself. If, therefore, we consider

the question from a point of view external to both, there is no
distinct difference in their nature, and we are forced to concede
to the poets that life is a long dream.
Let us turn back now from this quite independent empirical
origin of the question of the reality of the outer world, to its
speculative origin. We found that this consisted, first, in the false
application of the principle of sufficient reason to the relation of
subject and object; and secondly, in the confusion of its forms,
inasmuch as the principle of sufficient reason of knowing was
extended to a province in which the principle of sufficient reason
of being is valid. But the question could hardly have occupied
[023] philosophers so constantly if it were entirely devoid of all real
content, and if some true thought and meaning did not lie at
its heart as its real source. Accordingly, we must assume that
when the element of truth that lies at the bottom of the question
first came into reflection and sought its expression, it became
involved in these confused and meaningless forms and problems.
This at least is my opinion, and I think that the true expression
of that inmost meaning of the question, which it failed to find, is
this:—What is this world of perception besides being my idea?
Is that of which I am conscious only as idea, exactly like my own
body, of which I am doubly conscious, in one aspect as idea, in
another aspect as will? The fuller explanation of this question
and its answer in the affirmative, will form the content of the
second book, and its consequences will occupy the remaining
portion of this work.
§ 6. For the present, however, in this first book we consider
everything merely as idea, as object for the subject. And our own
body, which is the starting-point for each of us in our perception
of the world, we consider, like all other real objects, from the
side of its knowableness, and in this regard it is simply an idea.
Now the consciousness of every one is in general opposed to the
explanation of objects as mere ideas, and more especially to the
45
explanation of our bodies as such; for the thing in itself is known

to each of us immediately in so far as it appears as our own
body; but in so far as it objectifies itself in the other objects of
perception, it is known only indirectly. But this abstraction, this
one-sided treatment, this forcible separation of what is essentially
and necessarily united, is only adopted to meet the demands of
our argument; and therefore the disinclination to it must, in the
meantime, be suppressed and silenced by the expectation that
the subsequent treatment will correct the one-sidedness of the
present one, and complete our knowledge of the nature of the
world.
At present therefore the body is for us immediate object; [024]
that is to say, that idea which forms the starting-point of the
subject's knowledge; because the body, with its immediately
known changes, precedes the application of the law of causality,
and thus supplies it with its first data. The whole nature of matter
consists, as we have seen, in its causal action. But cause and
effect exist only for the understanding, which is nothing but their
subjective correlative. The understanding, however, could never
come into operation if there were not something else from which
it starts. This is simple sensation—the immediate consciousness
of the changes of the body, by virtue of which it is immediate
object. Thus the possibility of knowing the world of perception
depends upon two conditions; the first, objectively expressed, is
the power of material things to act upon each other, to produce
changes in each other, without which common quality of all
bodies no perception would be possible, even by means of the
sensibility of the animal body. And if we wish to express this
condition subjectively we say: The understanding first makes
perception possible; for the law of causality, the possibility of
effect and cause, springs only from the understanding, and is
valid only for it, and therefore the world of perception exists
only through and for it. The second condition is the sensibility
of animal bodies, or the quality of being immediate objects of
the subject which certain bodies possess. The mere modification

which the organs of sense sustain from without through their
specific affections, may here be called ideas, so far as these
affections produce neither pain nor pleasure, that is, have no
immediate significance for the will, and are yet perceived, exist
therefore only for knowledge. Thus far, then, I say that the body
is immediately known, is immediate object. But the conception
of object is not to be taken here in its fullest sense, for through
this immediate knowledge of the body, which precedes the
operation of the understanding, and is mere sensation, our own
[025] body does not exist specifically as object, but first the material
things which affect it: for all knowledge of an object proper,
of an idea perceived in space, exists only through and for the
understanding; therefore not before, but only subsequently to its
operation. Therefore the body as object proper, that is, as an
idea perceived in space, is first known indirectly, like all other
objects, through the application of the law of causality to the
action of one of its parts upon another, as, for example, when the
eye sees the body or the hand touches it. Consequently the form
of our body does not become known to us through mere feeling,
but only through knowledge, only in idea; that is to say, only in
the brain does our own body first come to appear as extended,
articulate, organic. A man born blind receives this idea only little
by little from the data afforded by touch. A blind man without
hands could never come to know his own form; or at the most
could infer and construct it little by little from the effects of other
bodies upon him. If, then, we call the body an immediate object,
we are to be understood with these reservations.
In other respects, then, according to what has been said, all
animal bodies are immediate objects; that is, starting-points for
the subject which always knows and therefore is never known
in its perception of the world. Thus the distinctive characteristic
of animal life is knowledge, with movement following on
motives, which are determined by knowledge, just as movement
47
following on stimuli is the distinctive characteristic of plant-life.

Unorganised matter, however, has no movement except such as
is produced by causes properly so called, using the term in its
narrowest sense. All this I have thoroughly discussed in my essay
on the principle of sufficient reason, § 20, in the “Ethics,” first
essay, iii., and in my work on Sight and Colour, § 1, to which I
therefore refer.
It follows from what has been said, that all animals, even the [026]
least developed, have understanding; for they all know objects,
and this knowledge determines their movements as motive.
Understanding is the same in all animals and in all men; it
has everywhere the same simple form; knowledge of causality,
transition from effect to cause, and from cause to effect, nothing
more; but the degree of its acuteness, and the extension of the
sphere of its knowledge varies enormously, with innumerable
gradations from the lowest form, which is only conscious of
the causal connection between the immediate object and objects
affecting it—that is to say, perceives a cause as an object in
space by passing to it from the affection which the body feels, to
the higher grades of knowledge of the causal connection among
objects known indirectly, which extends to the understanding
of the most complicated system of cause and effect in nature.
For even this high degree of knowledge is still the work of
the understanding, not of the reason. The abstract concepts of
the reason can only serve to take up the objective connections
which are immediately known by the understanding, to make
them permanent for thought, and to relate them to each other; but
reason never gives us immediate knowledge. Every force and law
of nature, every example of such forces and laws, must first be
immediately known by the understanding, must be apprehended
through perception before it can pass into abstract consciousness
for reason. Hooke's discovery of the law of gravitation, and the
reference of so many important phenomena to this one law, was
the work of immediate apprehension by the understanding; and
such also was the proof of Newton's calculations, and Lavoisier's

discovery of acids and their important function in nature, and also
Goethe's discovery of the origin of physical colours. All these
discoveries are nothing more than a correct immediate passage
from the effect to the cause, which is at once followed by the
recognition of the ideality of the force of nature which expresses
[027] itself in all causes of the same kind; and this complete insight
is just an example of that single function of the understanding,
by which an animal perceives as an object in space the cause
which affects its body, and differs from such a perception only
in degree. Every one of these great discoveries is therefore, just
like perception, an operation of the understanding, an immediate
intuition, and as such the work of an instant, an apperçu, a
flash of insight. They are not the result of a process of abstract
reasoning, which only serves to make the immediate knowledge
of the understanding permanent for thought by bringing it under
abstract concepts, i.e., it makes knowledge distinct, it puts us in
a position to impart it and explain it to others. The keenness of
the understanding in apprehending the causal relations of objects
which are known indirectly, does not find its only application in
the sphere of natural science (though all the discoveries in that
sphere are due to it), but it also appears in practical life. It is
then called good sense or prudence, as in its other application it
is better called acuteness, penetration, sagacity. More exactly,
good sense or prudence signifies exclusively understanding at
the command of the will. But the limits of these conceptions
must not be too sharply defined, for it is always that one function
of the understanding by means of which all animals perceive
objects in space, which, in its keenest form, appears now in the
phenomena of nature, correctly inferring the unknown causes
from the given effects, and providing the material from which
the reason frames general rules as laws of nature; now inventing
complicated and ingenious machines by adapting known causes
to desired effects; now in the sphere of motives, seeing through
49
and frustrating intrigues and machinations, or fitly disposing

the motives and the men who are susceptible to them, setting
them in motion, as machines are moved by levers and wheels,
and directing them at will to the accomplishment of its ends.
Deficiency of understanding is called stupidity. It is just dulness [028]
in applying the law of causality, incapacity for the immediate
apprehension of the concatenations of causes and effects, motives
and actions. A stupid person has no insight into the connection
of natural phenomena, either when they follow their own course,
or when they are intentionally combined, i.e., are applied to
machinery. Such a man readily believes in magic and miracles.
A stupid man does not observe that persons, who apparently
act independently of each other, are really in collusion; he is
therefore easily mystified, and outwitted; he does not discern the
hidden motives of proffered advice or expressions of opinion,
&c. But it is always just one thing that he lacks—keenness,
rapidity, ease in applying the law of causality, i.e., power of
understanding. The greatest, and, in this reference, the most
instructive example of stupidity I ever met with, was the case
of a totally imbecile boy of about eleven years of age, in an
asylum. He had reason, because he spoke and comprehended,
but in respect of understanding he was inferior to many of the
lower animals. Whenever I visited him he noticed an eye-glass
which I wore round my neck, and in which the window of the
room and the tops of the trees beyond were reflected: on every
occasion he was greatly surprised and delighted with this, and
was never tired of looking at it with astonishment, because he
did not understand the immediate causation of reflection.
While the difference in degree of the acuteness of the
understanding, is very great between man and man, it is even
greater between one species of animal and another. In all species
of animals, even those which are nearest to plants, there is at
least as much understanding as suffices for the inference from
the effect on the immediate object, to the indirectly known object
as its cause, i.e., sufficient for perception, for the apprehension

of an object. For it is this that constitutes them animals, as it
gives them the power of movement following on motives, and
[029] thereby the power of seeking for food, or at least of seizing
it; whereas plants have only movement following on stimuli,
whose direct influence they must await, or else decay, for they
cannot seek after them nor appropriate them. We marvel at the
great sagacity of the most developed species of animals, such as
the dog, the elephant, the monkey or the fox, whose cleverness
has been so admirably sketched by Buffon. From these most
sagacious animals, we can pretty accurately determine how far
understanding can go without reason, i.e., abstract knowledge
embodied in concepts. We could not find this out from ourselves,
for in us understanding and reason always reciprocally support
each other. We find that the manifestation of understanding
in animals is sometimes above our expectation, and sometimes
below it. On the one hand, we are surprised at the sagacity
of the elephant, who, after crossing many bridges during his
journey in Europe, once refused to go upon one, because he
thought it was not strong enough to bear his weight, though he
saw the rest of the party, consisting of men and horses, go upon
it as usual. On the other hand, we wonder that the intelligent
Orang-outangs, who warm themselves at a fire they have found,
do not keep it alight by throwing wood on it; a proof that this
requires a deliberation which is not possible without abstract
concepts. It is clear that the knowledge of cause and effect, as
the universal form of understanding, belongs to all animals a
priori, because to them as to us it is the prior condition of all
perception of the outer world. If any one desires additional proof
of this, let him observe, for example, how a young dog is afraid
to jump down from a table, however much he may wish to do so,
because he foresees the effect of the weight of his body, though
he has not been taught this by experience. In judging of the
understanding of animals, we must guard against ascribing to it
51
the manifestations of instinct, a faculty which is quite distinct

both from understanding and reason, but the action of which [030]
is often very analogous to the combined action of the two. We
cannot, however, discuss this here; it will find its proper place
in the second book, when we consider the harmony or so-called
teleology of nature: and the 27th chapter of the supplementary
volume is expressly devoted to it.
Deficiency of understanding we call stupidity: deficiency in
the application of reason to practice we shall recognise later
as foolishness: deficiency of judgment as silliness, and lastly,
partial or entire deficiency of memory as madness. But each of
these will be considered in its own place. That which is correctly
known by reason is truth, that is, an abstract judgment on
sufficient grounds (Essay on the Principle of Sufficient Reason,
§ 29 and following paragraphs); that which is correctly known
by understanding is reality, that is correct inference from effect
on the immediate object to its cause. Error is opposed to
truth, as deception of the reason: illusion is opposed to reality,
as deception of the understanding. The full discussion of all
this will be found in the first chapter of my essay on Light
and Colour. Illusion takes place when the same effect may be
attributed to two causes, of which one occurs very frequently, the
other very seldom; the understanding having no data to decide
which of these two causes operates in any particular case,—for
their effects are exactly alike,—always assumes the presence of
the commoner cause, and as the activity of the understanding
is not reflective and discursive, but direct and immediate, this
false cause appears before us as a perceived object, whereas it is
merely illusion. I have explained in the essay referred to, how in
this way double sight and double feeling take place if the organs
of sense are brought into an unusual position; and have thus given
an incontrovertible proof that perception exists only through and
for the understanding. As additional examples of such illusions
or deceptions of the understanding, we may mention the broken
[031] appearance of a stick dipped in water; the reflections in spherical

mirrors, which, when the surface is convex appear somewhat
behind it, and when the surface is concave appear a long way
in front of it. To this class also belongs the apparently greater
extension of the moon at the horizon than at the zenith. This
appearance is not optical, for as the micrometre proves, the eye
receives the image of the moon at the zenith, at an even greater
angle of vision than at the horizon. The mistake is due to the
understanding, which assumes that the cause of the feebler light
of the moon and of all stars at the horizon is that they are further
off, thus treating them as earthly objects, according to the laws
of atmospheric perspective, and therefore it takes the moon to be
much larger at the horizon than at the zenith, and also regards
the vault of heaven as more extended or flattened out at the
horizon. The same false application of the laws of atmospheric
perspective leads us to suppose that very high mountains, whose
summits alone are visible in pure transparent air, are much nearer
than they really are, and therefore not so high as they are; for
example, Mont Blanc seen from Salenche. All such illusions are
immediately present to us as perceptions, and cannot be dispelled
by any arguments of the reason. Reason can only prevent error,
that is, a judgment on insufficient grounds, by opposing to it a
truth; as for example, the abstract knowledge that the cause of
the weaker light of the moon and the stars at the horizon is not
greater distance, but the denser atmosphere; but in all the cases
we have referred to, the illusion remains in spite of every abstract
explanation. For the understanding is in itself, even in the case
of man, irrational, and is completely and sharply distinguished
from the reason, which is a faculty of knowledge that belongs to
man alone. The reason can only know; perception remains free
from its influence and belongs to the understanding alone.
[032] § 7. With reference to our exposition up to this point, it must be
observed that we did not start either from the object or the subject,
but from the idea, which contains and presupposes them both;
53
for the antithesis of object and subject is its primary, universal

and essential form. We have therefore first considered this form
as such; then (though in this respect reference has for the most
part been made to the introductory essay) the subordinate forms
of time, space and causality. The latter belong exclusively to the
object, and yet, as they are essential to the object as such, and as
the object again is essential to the subject as such, they may be
discovered from the subject, i.e., they may be known a priori,
and so far they are to be regarded as the common limits of both.
But all these forms may be referred to one general expression,
the principle of sufficient reason, as we have explained in the
introductory essay.
This procedure distinguishes our philosophical method from
that of all former systems. For they all start either from the
object or from the subject, and therefore seek to explain the one
from the other, and this according to the principle of sufficient
reason. We, on the contrary, deny the validity of this principle
with reference to the relation of subject and object, and confine
it to the object. It may be thought that the philosophy of identity,
which has appeared and become generally known in our own
day, does not come under either of the alternatives we have
named, for it does not start either from the subject or from
the object, but from the absolute, known through “intellectual
intuition,” which is neither object nor subject, but the identity of
the two. I will not venture to speak of this revered identity, and
this absolute, for I find myself entirely devoid of all “intellectual
intuition.” But as I take my stand merely on those manifestoes of
the “intellectual intuiter” which are open to all, even to profane
persons like myself, I must yet observe that this philosophy is
not to be excepted from the alternative errors mentioned above.
For it does not escape these two opposite errors in spite of its [033]
identity of subject and object, which is not thinkable, but only
“intellectually intuitable,” or to be experienced by a losing of
oneself in it. On the contrary, it combines them both in itself;
for it is divided into two parts, firstly, transcendental idealism,

which is just Fichte's doctrine of the ego, and therefore teaches
that the object is produced by the subject, or evolved out of it in
accordance with the principle of sufficient reason; secondly, the
philosophy of nature, which teaches that the subject is produced
little by little from the object, by means of a method called
construction, about which I understand very little, yet enough
to know that it is a process according to various forms of the
principle of sufficient reason. The deep wisdom itself which
that construction contains, I renounce; for as I entirely lack
“intellectual intuition,” all those expositions which presuppose it
must for me remain as a book sealed with seven seals. This is
so truly the case that, strange to say, I have always been unable
to find anything at all in this doctrine of profound wisdom but
atrocious and wearisome bombast.
The systems starting from the object had always the whole
world of perception and its constitution as their problem; yet the
object which they take as their starting-point is not always this
whole world of perception, nor its fundamental element, matter.
On the contrary, a division of these systems may be made, based
on the four classes of possible objects set forth in the introductory
essay. Thus Thales and the Ionic school, Democritus, Epicurus,
Giordano Bruno, and the French materialists, may be said to have
started from the first class of objects, the real world: Spinoza (on
account of his conception of substance, which is purely abstract,
and exists only in his definition) and, earlier, the Eleatics, from
the second class, the abstract conception: the Pythagoreans and
Chinese philosophy in Y-King, from the third class, time, and
[034] consequently number: and, lastly, the schoolmen, who teach a
creation out of nothing by the act of will of an extra-mundane
personal being, started from the fourth class of objects, the act of
will directed by knowledge.
Of all systems of philosophy which start from the object,
the most consistent, and that which may be carried furthest,
55
is simple materialism. It regards matter, and with it time and

space, as existing absolutely, and ignores the relation to the
subject in which alone all this really exists. It then lays hold
of the law of causality as a guiding principle or clue, regarding
it as a self-existent order (or arrangement) of things, veritas
aeterna, and so fails to take account of the understanding, in
which and for which alone causality is. It seeks the primary
and most simple state of matter, and then tries to develop all the
others from it; ascending from mere mechanism, to chemism,
to polarity, to the vegetable and to the animal kingdom. And
if we suppose this to have been done, the last link in the chain
would be animal sensibility—that is knowledge—which would
consequently now appear as a mere modification or state of matter
produced by causality. Now if we had followed materialism thus
far with clear ideas, when we reached its highest point we would
suddenly be seized with a fit of the inextinguishable laughter
of the Olympians. As if waking from a dream, we would all
at once become aware that its final result—knowledge, which
it reached so laboriously, was presupposed as the indispensable
condition of its very starting-point, mere matter; and when we
imagined that we thought matter, we really thought only the
subject that perceives matter; the eye that sees it, the hand that
feels it, the understanding that knows it. Thus the tremendous
petitio principii reveals itself unexpectedly; for suddenly the last
link is seen to be the starting-point, the chain a circle, and the
materialist is like Baron Münchausen who, when swimming in
water on horseback, drew the horse into the air with his legs,
and himself also by his cue. The fundamental absurdity of [035]
materialism is that it starts from the objective, and takes as the
ultimate ground of explanation something objective, whether it
be matter in the abstract, simply as it is thought, or after it has
taken form, is empirically given—that is to say, is substance, the
chemical element with its primary relations. Some such thing
it takes, as existing absolutely and in itself, in order that it may
evolve organic nature and finally the knowing subject from it,
and explain them adequately by means of it; whereas in truth
all that is objective is already determined as such in manifold
ways by the knowing subject through its forms of knowing, and
presupposes them; and consequently it entirely disappears if we
think the subject away. Thus materialism is the attempt to explain
what is immediately given us by what is given us indirectly. All
that is objective, extended, active—that is to say, all that is
material—is regarded by materialism as affording so solid a
basis for its explanation, that a reduction of everything to this
can leave nothing to be desired (especially if in ultimate analysis
this reduction should resolve itself into action and reaction).
But we have shown that all this is given indirectly and in the
highest degree determined, and is therefore merely a relatively
present object, for it has passed through the machinery and
manufactory of the brain, and has thus come under the forms of
space, time and causality, by means of which it is first presented
to us as extended in space and ever active in time. From such
an indirectly given object, materialism seeks to explain what
is immediately given, the idea (in which alone the object that
materialism starts with exists), and finally even the will from
which all those fundamental forces, that manifest themselves,
under the guidance of causes, and therefore according to law,
are in truth to be explained. To the assertion that thought is a
modification of matter we may always, with equal right, oppose
[036] the contrary assertion that all matter is merely the modification
of the knowing subject, as its idea. Yet the aim and ideal of
all natural science is at bottom a consistent materialism. The
recognition here of the obvious impossibility of such a system
establishes another truth which will appear in the course of our
exposition, the truth that all science properly so called, by which
I understand systematic knowledge under the guidance of the
principle of sufficient reason, can never reach its final goal, nor
give a complete and adequate explanation: for it is not concerned
57
with the inmost nature of the world, it cannot get beyond the
idea; indeed, it really teaches nothing more than the relation of
one idea to another.
Every science must start from two principal data. One of
these is always the principle of sufficient reason in some form or
another, as organon; the other is its special object as problem.
Thus, for example, geometry has space as problem, and the
ground of existence in space as organon. Arithmetic has time as
problem, and the ground of existence in time as organon. Logic
has the combination of concepts as such as problem, and the
ground of knowledge as organon. History has the past acts of
men treated as a whole as problem, and the law of human motives
as organon. Natural science has matter as problem, and the law of
causality as organon. Its end and aim is therefore, by the guidance
of causality, to refer all possible states of matter to other states,
and ultimately to one single state; and again to deduce these states
from each other, and ultimately from one single state. Thus two
states of matter stand over against each other in natural science
as extremes: that state in which matter is furthest from being the
immediate object of the subject, and that state in which it is most
completely such an immediate object, i.e., the most dead and
crude matter, the primary element, as the one extreme, and the
human organism as the other. Natural science as chemistry seeks
for the first, as physiology for the second. But as yet neither [037]
extreme has been reached, and it is only in the intermediate
ground that something has been won. The prospect is indeed
somewhat hopeless. The chemists, under the presupposition that
the qualitative division of matter is not, like quantitative division,
an endless process, are always trying to decrease the number of
the elements, of which there are still about sixty; and if they
were to succeed in reducing them to two, they would still try to
find the common root of these. For, on the one hand, the law of
homogeneity leads to the assumption of a primary chemical state
of matter, which alone belongs to matter as such, and precedes
all others which are not essentially matter as such, but merely
contingent forms and qualities. On the other hand, we cannot
understand how this one state could ever experience a chemical
change, if there did not exist a second state to affect it. Thus the
same difficulty appears in chemistry which Epicurus met with in
mechanics. For he had to show how the first atom departed from
the original direction of its motion. Indeed this contradiction,
which develops entirely of itself and can neither be escaped nor
solved, might quite properly be set up as a chemical antinomy.
Thus an antinomy appears in the one extreme of natural science,
and a corresponding one will appear in the other. There is just as
little hope of reaching this opposite extreme of natural science,
for we see ever more clearly that what is chemical can never be
referred to what is mechanical, nor what is organic to what is
chemical or electrical. Those who in our own day are entering
anew on this old, misleading path, will soon slink back silent and
ashamed, as all their predecessors have done before them. We
shall consider this more fully in the second book. Natural science
encounters the difficulties which we have cursorily mentioned,
in its own province. Regarded as philosophy, it would further
be materialism; but this, as we have seen, even at its birth, has
[038] death in its heart, because it ignores the subject and the forms of
knowledge, which are presupposed, just as much in the case of
the crudest matter, from which it desires to start, as in that of the
organism, at which it desires to arrive. For, “no object without a
subject,” is the principle which renders all materialism for ever
impossible. Suns and planets without an eye that sees them, and
an understanding that knows them, may indeed be spoken of in
words, but for the idea, these words are absolutely meaningless.
On the other hand, the law of causality and the treatment and
investigation of nature which is based upon it, lead us necessarily
to the conclusion that, in time, each more highly organised state
of matter has succeeded a cruder state: so that the lower animals
existed before men, fishes before land animals, plants before
59
fishes, and the unorganised before all that is organised; that,

consequently, the original mass had to pass through a long series
of changes before the first eye could be opened. And yet, the
existence of this whole world remains ever dependent upon the
first eye that opened, even if it were that of an insect. For such an
eye is a necessary condition of the possibility of knowledge, and
the whole world exists only in and for knowledge, and without
it is not even thinkable. The world is entirely idea, and as such
demands the knowing subject as the supporter of its existence.
This long course of time itself, filled with innumerable changes,
through which matter rose from form to form till at last the
first percipient creature appeared,—this whole time itself is only
thinkable in the identity of a consciousness whose succession
of ideas, whose form of knowing it is, and apart from which, it
loses all meaning and is nothing at all. Thus we see, on the one
hand, the existence of the whole world necessarily dependent
upon the first conscious being, however undeveloped it may
be; on the other hand, this conscious being just as necessarily
entirely dependent upon a long chain of causes and effects which
have preceded it, and in which it itself appears as a small link. [039]
These two contradictory points of view, to each of which we are
led with the same necessity, we might again call an antinomy
in our faculty of knowledge, and set it up as the counterpart
of that which we found in the first extreme of natural science.
The fourfold antinomy of Kant will be shown, in the criticism
of his philosophy appended to this volume, to be a groundless
delusion. But the necessary contradiction which at last presents
itself to us here, finds its solution in the fact that, to use Kant's
phraseology, time, space, and causality do not belong to the
thing-in-itself, but only to its phenomena, of which they are the
form; which in my language means this: The objective world,
the world as idea, is not the only side of the world, but merely
its outward side; and it has an entirely different side—the side of
its inmost nature—its kernel—the thing-in-itself. This we shall
consider in the second book, calling it after the most immediate

of its objective manifestations—will. But the world as idea,
with which alone we are here concerned, only appears with the
opening of the first eye. Without this medium of knowledge it
cannot be, and therefore it was not before it. But without that eye,
that is to say, outside of knowledge, there was also no before, no
time. Thus time has no beginning, but all beginning is in time.
Since, however, it is the most universal form of the knowable, in
which all phenomena are united together through causality, time,
with its infinity of past and future, is present in the beginning of
knowledge. The phenomenon which fills the first present must at
once be known as causally bound up with and dependent upon a
sequence of phenomena which stretches infinitely into the past,
and this past itself is just as truly conditioned by this first present,
as conversely the present is by the past. Accordingly the past
out of which the first present arises, is, like it, dependent upon
the knowing subject, without which it is nothing. It necessarily
[040] happens, however, that this first present does not manifest itself
as the first, that is, as having no past for its parent, but as
being the beginning of time. It manifests itself rather as the
consequence of the past, according to the principle of existence
in time. In the same way, the phenomena which fill this first
present appear as the effects of earlier phenomena which filled
the past, in accordance with the law of causality. Those who
like mythological interpretations may take the birth of Kronos
(ÇÁ¿½¿Â), the youngest of the Titans, as a symbol of the moment
here referred to at which time appears, though, indeed it has
no beginning; for with him, since he ate his father, the crude
productions of heaven and earth cease, and the races of gods and
men appear upon the scene.
This explanation at which we have arrived by following the
most consistent of the philosophical systems which start from the
object, materialism, has brought out clearly the inseparable and
reciprocal dependence of subject and object, and at the same time
61
the inevitable antithesis between them. And this knowledge leads

us to seek for the inner nature of the world, the thing-in-itself,
not in either of the two elements of the idea, but in something
quite distinct from it, and which is not encumbered with such a
fundamental and insoluble antithesis.
Opposed to the system we have explained, which starts from
the object in order to derive the subject from it, is the system
which starts from the subject and tries to derive the object from
it. The first of these has been of frequent and common occurrence
throughout the history of philosophy, but of the second we find
only one example, and that a very recent one; the “philosophy
of appearance” of J. G. Fichte. In this respect, therefore, it must
be considered; little real worth or inner meaning as the doctrine
itself had. It was indeed for the most part merely a delusion,
but it was delivered with an air of the deepest earnestness, with
sustained loftiness of tone and zealous ardour, and was defended [041]
with eloquent polemic against weak opponents, so that it was
able to present a brilliant exterior and seemed to be something.
But the genuine earnestness which keeps truth always steadfastly
before it as its goal, and is unaffected by any external influences,
was entirely wanting to Fichte, as it is to all philosophers who,
like him, concern themselves with questions of the day. In his
case, indeed, it could not have been otherwise. A man becomes
a philosopher by reason of a certain perplexity, from which he
seeks to free himself. This is Plato's ¸±Å¼±¾µ¹½, which he calls
a ¼±»± Æ¹»¿Ã¿Æ¹º¿½ À±¸¿Â. But what distinguishes the false
philosopher from the true is this: the perplexity of the latter
arises from the contemplation of the world itself, while that of
the former results from some book, some system of philosophy
which is before him. Now Fichte belongs to the class of the false
philosophers. He was made a philosopher by Kant's doctrine
of the thing-in-itself, and if it had not been for this he would
probably have pursued entirely different ends, with far better
results, for he certainly possessed remarkable rhetorical talent.
If he had only penetrated somewhat deeply into the meaning of

the book that made him a philosopher, “The Critique of Pure
Reason,” he would have understood that its principal teaching
about mind is this. The principle of sufficient reason is not,
as all scholastic philosophy maintains, a veritas aeterna—that
is to say, it does not possess an unconditioned validity before,
outside of, and above the world. It is relative and conditioned,
and valid only in the sphere of phenomena, and thus it may
appear as the necessary nexus of space and time, or as the law
of causality, or as the law of the ground of knowledge. The
inner nature of the world, the thing-in-itself can never be found
by the guidance of this principle, for all that it leads to will be
found to be dependent and relative and merely phenomenal, not
[042] the thing-in-itself. Further, it does not concern the subject, but
is only the form of objects, which are therefore not things-in-
themselves. The subject must exist along with the object, and
the object along with the subject, so that it is impossible that
subject and object can stand to each other in a relation of reason
and consequent. But Fichte did not take up the smallest fragment
of all this. All that interested him about the matter was that
the system started from the subject. Now Kant had chosen this
procedure in order to show the fallacy of the prevalent systems,
which started from the object, and through which the object had
come, to be regarded as a thing-in-itself. Fichte, however, took
this departure from the subject for the really important matter,
and like all imitators, he imagined that in going further than Kant
he was surpassing him. Thus he repeated the fallacy with regard
to the subject, which all the previous dogmatism had perpetrated
with regard to the object, and which had been the occasion of
Kant's “Critique”. Fichte then made no material change, and the
fundamental fallacy, the assumption of a relation of reason and
consequent between object and subject, remained after him as
it was before him. The principle of sufficient reason possessed
as before an unconditioned validity, and the only difference was
63
that the thing-in-itself was now placed in the subject instead of,
as formerly, in the object. The entire relativity of both subject
and object, which proves that the thing-in-itself, or the inner
nature of the world, is not to be sought in them at all, but
outside of them, and outside everything else that exists merely
relatively, still remained unknown. Just as if Kant had never
existed, the principle of sufficient reason is to Fichte precisely
what it was to all the schoolmen, a veritas aeterna. As an eternal
fate reigned over the gods of old, so these aeternæ veritates,
these metaphysical, mathematical and metalogical truths, and in
the case of some, the validity of the moral law also, reigned
over the God of the schoolmen. These veritates alone were
independent of everything, and through their necessity both God [043]
and the world existed. According to the principle of sufficient
reason, as such a veritas aeterna, the ego is for Fichte the ground
of the world, or of the non-ego, the object, which is just its
consequent, its creation. He has therefore taken good care to
avoid examining further or limiting the principle of sufficient
reason. If, however, it is thought I should specify the form of
the principle of sufficient reason under the guidance of which
Fichte derives the non-ego from the ego, as a spider spins its
web out of itself, I find that it is the principle of sufficient
reason of existence in space: for it is only as referred to this
that some kind of meaning and sense can be attached to the
laboured deductions of the way in which the ego produces and
fabricates the non-ego from itself, which form the content of the
most senseless, and consequently the most wearisome book that
was ever written. This philosophy of Fichte, otherwise not worth
mentioning, is interesting to us only as the tardy expression of
the converse of the old materialism. For materialism was the
most consistent system starting from the object, as this is the
most consistent system starting from the subject. Materialism
overlooked the fact that, with the simplest object, it assumed the
subject also; and Fichte overlooked the fact that with the subject
(whatever he may call it) he assumed the object also, for no

subject is thinkable without an object. Besides this he forgot that
all a priori deduction, indeed all demonstration in general, must
rest upon some necessity, and that all necessity is based on the
principle of sufficient reason, because to be necessary, and to
follow from given grounds are convertible conceptions.10 But
the principle of sufficient reason is just the universal form of the
[044] object as such. Thus it is in the object, but is not valid before
and outside of it; it first produces the object and makes it appear
in conformity with its regulative principle. We see then that the
system which starts from the subject contains the same fallacy
as the system, explained above, which starts from the object; it
begins by assuming what it proposes to deduce, the necessary
correlative of its starting-point.
The method of our own system is toto genere distinct from
these two opposite misconceptions, for we start neither from the
object nor from the subject, but from the idea, as the first fact
of consciousness. Its first essential, fundamental form is the
antithesis of subject and object. The form of the object again is
the principle of sufficient reason in its various forms. Each of
these reigns so absolutely in its own class of ideas that, as we
have seen, when the special form of the principle of sufficient
reason which governs any class of ideas is known, the nature of
the whole class is known also: for the whole class, as idea, is no
more than this form of the principle of sufficient reason itself;
so that time itself is nothing but the principle of existence in it,
i.e., succession; space is nothing but the principle of existence
in it, i.e., position; matter is nothing but causality; the concept
(as will appear immediately) is nothing but relation to a ground
of knowledge. This thorough and consistent relativity of the
world as idea, both according to its universal form (subject and
object), and according to the form which is subordinate to this
10
On this see “The Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason,” §
49.
65
(the principle of sufficient reason) warns us, as we said before,

to seek the inner nature of the world in an aspect of it which is
quite different and quite distinct from the idea; and in the next
book we shall find this in a fact which is just as immediate to
every living being as the idea.
But we must first consider that class of ideas which belongs to
man alone. The matter of these is the concept, and the subjective
correlative is reason, just as the subjective correlative of the ideas
we have already considered was understanding and sensibility, [045]
which are also to be attributed to all the lower animals.11
§ 8. As from the direct light of the sun to the borrowed light
of the moon, we pass from the immediate idea of perception,
which stands by itself and is its own warrant, to reflection, to the
abstract, discursive concepts of the reason, which obtain their
whole content from knowledge of perception, and in relation to
it. As long as we continue simply to perceive, all is clear, firm,
and certain. There are neither questions nor doubts nor errors;
we desire to go no further, can go no further; we find rest in
perceiving, and satisfaction in the present. Perception suffices
for itself, and therefore what springs purely from it, and remains
true to it, for example, a genuine work of art, can never be
false, nor can it be discredited through the lapse of time, for it
does not present an opinion but the thing itself. But with abstract
knowledge, with reason, doubt and error appear in the theoretical,
care and sorrow in the practical. In the idea of perception, illusion
may at moments take the place of the real; but in the sphere of
abstract thought, error may reign for a thousand years, impose
its yoke upon whole nations, extend to the noblest impulses of
humanity, and, by the help of its slaves and its dupes, may chain
and fetter those whom it cannot deceive. It is the enemy against
which the wisest men of all times have waged unequal war, and
only what they have won from it has become the possession of
11
The first four chapters of the first of the supplementary books belong to
these seven paragraphs.
mankind. Therefore it is well to draw attention to it at once, as

we already tread the ground to which its province belongs. It has
often been said that we ought to follow truth even although no
utility can be seen in it, because it may have indirect utility which
may appear when it is least expected; and I would add to this, that
we ought to be just as anxious to discover and to root out all error
[046] even when no harm is anticipated from it, because its mischief
may be very indirect, and may suddenly appear when we do not
expect it, for all error has poison at its heart. If it is mind, if it is
knowledge, that makes man the lord of creation, there can be no
such thing as harmless error, still less venerable and holy error.
And for the consolation of those who in any way and at any time
may have devoted strength and life to the noble and hard battle
against error, I cannot refrain from adding that, so long as truth
is absent, error will have free play, as owls and bats in the night;
but sooner would we expect to see the owls and the bats drive
back the sun in the eastern heavens, than that any truth which has
once been known and distinctly and fully expressed, can ever
again be so utterly vanquished and overcome that the old error
shall once more reign undisturbed over its wide kingdom. This
is the power of truth; its conquest is slow and laborious, but if
once the victory be gained it can never be wrested back again.
Besides the ideas we have as yet considered, which, according
to their construction, could be referred to time, space, and matter,
if we consider them with reference to the object, or to pure
sensibility and understanding (i.e., knowledge of causality), if
we consider them with reference to the subject, another faculty
of knowledge has appeared in man alone of all earthly creatures,
an entirely new consciousness, which, with very appropriate and
significant exactness, is called reflection. For it is in fact derived
from the knowledge of perception, and is a reflected appearance
of it. But it has assumed a nature fundamentally different. The
forms of perception do not affect it, and even the principle of
sufficient reason which reigns over all objects has an entirely
67
different aspect with regard to it. It is just this new, more highly
endowed, consciousness, this abstract reflex of all that belongs
to perception in that conception of the reason which has nothing
to do with perception, that gives to man that thoughtfulness [047]
which distinguishes his consciousness so entirely from that of
the lower animals, and through which his whole behaviour upon
earth is so different from that of his irrational fellow-creatures.
He far surpasses them in power and also in suffering. They live
in the present alone, he lives also in the future and the past.
They satisfy the needs of the moment, he provides by the most
ingenious preparations for the future, yea for days that he shall
never see. They are entirely dependent on the impression of the
moment, on the effect of the perceptible motive; he is determined
by abstract conceptions independent of the present. Therefore
he follows predetermined plans, he acts from maxims, without
reference to his surroundings or the accidental impression of
the moment. Thus, for example, he can make with composure
deliberate preparations for his own death, he can dissemble past
finding out, and can carry his secret with him to the grave; lastly,
he has an actual choice between several motives; for only in
the abstract can such motives, present together in consciousness,
afford the knowledge with regard to themselves, that the one
excludes the other, and can thus measure themselves against
each other with reference to their power over the will. The
motive that overcomes, in that it decides the question at issue,
is the deliberate determinant of the will, and is a sure indication
of its character. The brute, on the other hand, is determined by
the present impression; only the fear of present compulsion can
constrain its desires, until at last this fear has become custom, and
as such continues to determine it; this is called training. The brute
feels and perceives; man, in addition to this, thinks and knows:
both will. The brute expresses its feelings and dispositions by
gestures and sounds; man communicates his thought to others,
or, if he wishes, he conceals it, by means of speech. Speech
is the first production, and also the necessary organ of his

[048] reason. Therefore in Greek and Italian, speech and reason are
expressed by the same word; A »¿³¿Â, il discorso. Vernunft is
derived from vernehmen, which is not a synonym for the verb to
hear, but signifies the consciousness of the meaning of thoughts
communicated in words. It is by the help of language alone
that reason accomplishes its most important achievements,—the
united action of several individuals, the planned co-operation
of many thousands, civilisation, the state; also science, the
storing up of experience, the uniting of common properties in
one concept, the communication of truth, the spread of error,
thoughts and poems, dogmas and superstitions. The brute first
knows death when it dies, but man draws consciously nearer
to it every hour that he lives; and this makes life at times a
questionable good even to him who has not recognised this
character of constant annihilation in the whole of life. Principally
on this account man has philosophies and religions, though it is
uncertain whether the qualities we admire most in his conduct,
voluntary rectitude and nobility of feeling, were ever the fruit of
either of them. As results which certainly belong only to them,
and as productions of reason in this sphere, we may refer to the
marvellous and monstrous opinions of philosophers of various
schools, and the extraordinary and sometimes cruel customs of
the priests of different religions.
It is the universal opinion of all times and of all nations
that these manifold and far-reaching achievements spring from a
common principle, from that peculiar intellectual power which
belongs distinctively to man and which has been called reason,
A »¿³¿Â, Ä¿ »¿³¹ÃÄ¹º¿½, Ä¿ »¿³¹¼¿½, ratio. Besides this, no
one finds any difficulty in recognising the manifestations of this
faculty, and in saying what is rational and what is irrational,
where reason appears as distinguished from the other faculties
and qualities of man, or lastly, in pointing out what, on account
of the want of reason, we must never expect even from the most
69
sensible brute. The philosophers of all ages may be said to [049]

be on the whole at one about this general knowledge of reason,
and they have also given prominence to several very important
manifestations of it; such as, the control of the emotions and
passions, the capacity for drawing conclusions and formulating
general principles, even such as are true prior to all experience,
and so forth. Still all their explanations of the peculiar nature
of reason are wavering, not clearly defined, discursive, without
unity and concentration; now laying stress on one manifestation,
now on another, and therefore often at variance with each other.
Besides this, many start from the opposition between reason and
revelation, a distinction which is unknown to philosophy, and
which only increases confusion. It is very remarkable that up till
now no philosopher has referred these manifold expressions of
reason to one simple function which would be recognised in them
all, from which they would all be explained, and which would
therefore constitute the real inner nature of reason. It is true that
the excellent Locke in the “Essay on the Human Understanding”
(Book II., ch. xi., §§ 10 and 11), very rightly refers to general
concepts as the characteristic which distinguishes man from
the brutes, and Leibnitz quotes this with full approval in the
“Nouveaux Essais sur l'Entendement Humaine” (Book II., ch.
xi., §§ 10 and 11.) But when Locke (in Book IV., ch. xvii.,
§§ 2 and 3) comes to the special explanation of reason he
entirely loses sight of this simple, primary characteristic, and he
also falls into a wavering, undetermined, incomplete account of
mangled and derivative manifestations of it. Leibnitz also, in the
corresponding part of his work, behaves in a similar manner, only
with more confusion and indistinctness. In the Appendix, I have
fully considered how Kant confused and falsified the conception
of the nature of reason. But whoever will take the trouble to go
through in this reference the mass of philosophical writing which
has appeared since Kant, will find out, that just as the faults of [050]
princes must be expiated by whole nations, the errors of great
minds extend their influence over whole generations, and even

over centuries; they grow and propagate themselves, and finally
degenerate into monstrosities. All this arises from the fact that,
as Berkeley says, “Few men think; yet all will have opinions.”
The understanding has only one function—immediate
knowledge of the relation of cause and effect. Yet the
perception of the real world, and all common sense, sagacity, and
inventiveness, however multifarious their applications may be,
are quite clearly seen to be nothing more than manifestations of
that one function. So also the reason has one function; and from
it all the manifestations of reason we have mentioned, which
distinguish the life of man from that of the brutes, may easily be
explained. The application or the non-application of this function
is all that is meant by what men have everywhere and always
called rational and irrational.12
§ 9. Concepts form a distinct class of ideas, existing only in the
mind of man, and entirely different from the ideas of perception
which we have considered up till now. We can therefore never
attain to a sensuous and, properly speaking, evident knowledge
of their nature, but only to a knowledge which is abstract and
discursive. It would, therefore, be absurd to demand that they
should be verified in experience, if by experience is meant the real
external world, which consists of ideas of perception, or that they
should be brought before the eyes or the imagination like objects
of perception. They can only be thought, not perceived, and only
the effects which men accomplish through them are properly
objects of experience. Such effects are language, preconceived
and planned action and science, and all that results from these.
[051] Speech, as an object of outer experience, is obviously nothing
more than a very complete telegraph, which communicates
arbitrary signs with the greatest rapidity and the finest distinctions
of difference. But what do these signs mean? How are they
12
Compare with this paragraph §§ 26 and 27 of the third edition of the essay
on the principle of sufficient reason.
71
interpreted? When some one speaks, do we at once translate

his words into pictures of the fancy, which instantaneously flash
upon us, arrange and link themselves together, and assume form
and colour according to the words that are poured forth, and
their grammatical inflections? What a tumult there would be in
our brains while we listened to a speech, or to the reading of a
book? But what actually happens is not this at all. The meaning
of a speech is, as a rule, immediately grasped, accurately and
distinctly taken in, without the imagination being brought into
play. It is reason which speaks to reason, keeping within its own
province. It communicates and receives abstract conceptions,
ideas that cannot be presented in perceptions, which are framed
once for all, and are relatively few in number, but which yet
encompass, contain, and represent all the innumerable objects of
the actual world. This itself is sufficient to prove that the lower
animals can never learn to speak or comprehend, although they
have the organs of speech and ideas of perception in common
with us. But because words represent this perfectly distinct class
of ideas, whose subjective correlative is reason, they are without
sense and meaning for the brutes. Thus language, like every other
manifestation which we ascribe to reason, and like everything
which distinguishes man from the brutes, is to be explained
from this as its one simple source—conceptions, abstract ideas
which cannot be presented in perception, but are general, and
have no individual existence in space and time. Only in single
cases do we pass from the conception to the perception, do we
construct images as representatives of concepts in perception,
to which, however, they are never adequate. These cases are [052]
fully discussed in the essay on the principle of sufficient reason,
§ 28, and therefore I shall not repeat my explanation here. It
may be compared, however, with what is said by Hume in the
twelfth of his “Philosophical Essays,” p. 244, and by Herder in
the “Metacritik,” pt. i. p. 274 (an otherwise worthless book). The
Platonic idea, the possibility of which depends upon the union of
imagination and reason, is the principal subject of the third book

of this work.
Although concepts are fundamentally different from ideas of
perception, they stand in a necessary relation to them, without
which they would be nothing. This relation therefore constitutes
the whole nature and existence of concepts. Reflection is the
necessary copy or repetition of the originally presented world
of perception, but it is a special kind of copy in an entirely
different material. Thus concepts may quite properly be called
ideas of ideas. The principle of sufficient reason has here also a
special form. Now we have seen that the form under which the
principle of sufficient reason appears in a class of ideas always
constitutes and exhausts the whole nature of the class, so far as
it consists of ideas, so that time is throughout succession, and
nothing more; space is throughout position, and nothing more;
matter is throughout causation, and nothing more. In the same
way the whole nature of concepts, or the class of abstract ideas,
consists simply in the relation which the principle of sufficient
reason expresses in them; and as this is the relation to the ground
of knowledge, the whole nature of the abstract idea is simply
and solely its relation to another idea, which is its ground of
knowledge. This, indeed, may, in the first instance, be a concept,
an abstract idea, and this again may have only a similar abstract
ground of knowledge; but the chain of grounds of knowledge
does not extend ad infinitum; it must end at last in a concept
which has its ground in knowledge of perception; for the whole
[053] world of reflection rests on the world of perception as its ground
of knowledge. Hence the class of abstract ideas is in this respect
distinguished from other classes; in the latter the principle of
sufficient reason always demands merely a relation to another
idea of the same class, but in the case of abstract ideas, it at last
demands a relation to an idea of another class.
Those concepts which, as has just been pointed out, are not
immediately related to the world of perception, but only through
73
the medium of one, or it may be several other concepts, have

been called by preference abstracta, and those which have their
ground immediately in the world of perception have been called
concreta. But this last name is only loosely applicable to the
concepts denoted by it, for they are always merely abstracta,
and not ideas of perception. These names, which have originated
in a very dim consciousness of the distinctions they imply, may
yet, with this explanation, be retained. As examples of the first
kind of concepts, i.e., abstracta in the fullest sense, we may take
“relation,” “virtue,” “investigation,” “beginning,” and so on. As
examples of the second kind, loosely called concreta, we may
take such concepts as “man,” “stone,” “horse,” &c. If it were not
a somewhat too pictorial and therefore absurd simile, we might
very appropriately call the latter the ground floor, and the former
the upper stories of the building of reflection.13
It is not, as is commonly supposed, an essential characteristic
of a concept that it should contain much under it, that is to say,
that many ideas of perception, or it may be other abstract ideas,
should stand to it in the relation of its ground of knowledge, i.e.,
be thought through it. This is merely a derived and secondary
characteristic, and, as a matter of fact, does not always exist,
though it must always exist potentially. This characteristic arises
from the fact that a concept is an idea of an idea, i.e., its whole [054]
nature consists in its relation to another idea; but as it is not this
idea itself, which is generally an idea of perception and therefore
belongs to quite a different class, the latter may have temporal,
spacial, and other determinations, and in general many relations
which are not thought along with it in the concept. Thus we see
that several ideas which are different in unessential particulars
may be thought by means of one concept, i.e., may be brought
under it. Yet this power of embracing several things is not an
essential but merely an accidental characteristic of the concept.
13
Cf. Ch. 5 and 6 of the Supplement.
There may be concepts through which only one real object is

thought, but which are nevertheless abstract and general, by no
means capable of presentation individually and as perceptions.
Such, for example, is the conception which any one may have of
a particular town which he only knows from geography; although
only this one town is thought under it, it might yet be applied
to several towns differing in certain respects. We see then
that a concept is not general because of being abstracted from
several objects; but conversely, because generality, that is to say,
non-determination of the particular, belongs to the concept as an
abstract idea of the reason, different things can be thought by
means of the same one.
It follows from what has been said that every concept, just
because it is abstract and incapable of presentation in perception,
and is therefore not a completely determined idea, has what is
called extension or sphere, even in the case in which only one real
object exists that corresponds to it. Now we always find that the
sphere of one concept has something in common with the sphere
of other concepts. That is to say, part of what is thought under
one concept is the same as what is thought under other concepts;
and conversely, part of what is thought under these concepts is
the same as what is thought under the first; although, if they
[055] are really different concepts, each of them, or at least one of
them, contains something which the other does not contain; this
is the relation in which every subject stands to its predicate. The
recognition of this relation is called judgment. The representation
of these spheres by means of figures in space, is an exceedingly
happy idea. It first occurred to Gottfried Plouquet, who used
squares for the purpose. Lambert, although later than him, used
only lines, which he placed under each other. Euler carried
out the idea completely with circles. Upon what this complete
analogy between the relations of concepts, and those of figures in
space, ultimately rests, I am unable to say. It is, however, a very
fortunate circumstance for logic that all the relations of concepts,
75
according to their possibility, i.e., a priori, may be made plain in

perception by the use of such figures, in the following way:—
(1.) The spheres of two concepts coincide: for example the
concept of necessity and the concept of following from given
grounds, in the same way the concepts of Ruminantia and Bisulca
(ruminating and cloven-hoofed animals), also those of vertebrate
and red-blooded animals (although there might be some doubt
about this on account of the annelida): they are convertible
concepts. Such concepts are represented by a single circle which
stands for either of them.
(2.) The sphere of one concept includes that of the other.
[056]
(3.) A sphere includes two or more spheres which exclude

each other and fill it.
(4.) Two spheres include each a part of the other.

(5.) Two spheres lie in a third, but do not fill it.
This last case applies to all concepts whose spheres have

nothing immediately in common, for there is always a third
sphere, often a much wider one, which includes both.
To these cases all combinations of concepts may be referred,
and from them the entire doctrine of the judgment, its conversion,
contraposition, equipollence, disjunction (this according to the
[057] third figure) may be deduced. From these also may be derived the
properties of the judgment, upon which Kant based his pretended
categories of the understanding, with the exception however of
the hypothetical form, which is not a combination of concepts,
but of judgments. A full account is given in the Appendix of
“Modality,” and indeed of every property of judgments on which
the categories are founded.
With regard to the possible combinations of concepts which
we have given, it has only further to be remarked that they may
also be combined with each other in many ways. For example,
77
the fourth figure with the second. Only if one sphere, which
partly or wholly contains another, is itself contained in a third
sphere, do these together exemplify the syllogism in the first
figure, i.e., that combination of judgments, by means of which
it is known that a concept which is partly or wholly contained
in another concept, is also contained in a third concept, which
again contains the first: and also, conversely, the negation; the
pictorial representation of which can, of course, only be two
connected spheres which do not lie within a third sphere. If many
spheres are brought together in this way we get a long train of
syllogisms. This schematism of concepts, which has already been
fairly well explained in more than one textbook, may be used
as the foundation of the doctrine of the judgment, and indeed
of the whole syllogistic theory, and in this way the treatment
of both becomes very easy and simple. Because, through it, all
syllogistic rules may be seen in their origin, and may be deduced
and explained. It is not necessary, however, to load the memory
with these rules, as logic is never of practical use, but has only a
theoretical interest for philosophy. For although it may be said
that logic is related to rational thinking as thorough-bass is to
music, or less exactly, as ethics is to virtue, or æsthetics to art; we
must yet remember that no one ever became an artist by the study
of æsthetics; that a noble character was never formed by the study [058]
of ethics; that long before Rameau, men composed correctly and
beautifully, and that we do not need to know thorough-bass in
order to detect discords: and just as little do we need to know
logic in order to avoid being misled by fallacies. Yet it must be
conceded that thorough-bass is of the greatest use in the practice
of musical composition, although it may not be necessary for
the understanding of it; and indeed æsthetics and even ethics,
though in a much less degree, and for the most part negatively,
may be of some use in practice, so that we cannot deny them all
practical worth, but of logic even this much cannot be conceded.
It is nothing more than the knowledge in the abstract of what
every one knows in the concrete. Therefore we call in the aid

of logical rules, just as little to enable us to construct a correct
argument as to prevent us from consenting to a false one, and
the most learned logician lays aside the rules of logic altogether
in his actual thought. This may be explained in the following
way. Every science is a system of general and therefore abstract
truths, laws, and rules with reference to a special class of objects.
The individual case coming under these laws is determined in
accordance with this general knowledge, which is valid once
for all; because such application of the general principle is far
easier than the exhaustive investigation of the particular case; for
the general abstract knowledge which has once been obtained is
always more within our reach than the empirical investigation of
the particular case. With logic, however, it is just the other way. It
is the general knowledge of the mode of procedure of the reason
expressed in the form of rules. It is reached by the introspection
of reason, and by abstraction from all content. But this mode
of procedure is necessary and essential to reason, so that it will
never depart from it if left to itself. It is, therefore, easier and surer
to let it proceed itself according to its nature in each particular
[059] case, than to present to it the knowledge abstracted from this
procedure in the form of a foreign and externally given law. It
is easier, because, while in the case of all other sciences, the
general rule is more within our reach than the investigation of
the particular case taken by itself; with the use of reason, on the
contrary, its necessary procedure in a given case is always more
within our reach than the general rule abstracted from it; for that
which thinks in us is reason itself. It is surer, because a mistake
may more easily occur in such abstract knowledge, or in its
application, than that a process of reason should take place which
would run contrary to its essence and nature. Hence arises the
remarkable fact, that while in other sciences the particular case is
always proved by the rule, in logic, on the contrary, the rule must
always be proved from the particular case; and even the most
79
practised logician, if he remark that in some particular case he

concludes otherwise than the rule prescribes, will always expect
to find a mistake in the rule rather than in his own conclusion.
To desire to make practical use of logic means, therefore, to
desire to derive with unspeakable trouble, from general rules,
that which is immediately known with the greatest certainty
in the particular case. It is just as if a man were to consult
mechanics as to the motion of his body, and physiology as to his
digestion; and whoever has learnt logic for practical purposes is
like him who would teach a beaver to make its own dam. Logic
is, therefore, without practical utility; but it must nevertheless
be retained, because it has philosophical interest as the special
knowledge of the organisation and action of reason. It is rightly
regarded as a definite, self-subsisting, self-contained, complete,
and thoroughly safe discipline; to be treated scientifically for
itself alone and independently of everything else, and therefore
to be studied at the universities. But it has its real value, in
relation to philosophy as a whole, in the inquiry into the nature
of knowledge, and indeed of rational and abstract knowledge. [060]
Therefore the exposition of logic should not have so much the
form of a practical science, should not contain merely naked
arbitrary rules for the correct formation of the judgment, the
syllogism, &c., but should rather be directed to the knowledge
of the nature of reason and the concept, and to the detailed
investigation of the principle of sufficient reason of knowing.
For logic is only a paraphrase of this principle, and, more exactly,
only of that exemplification of it in which the ground that gives
truth to the judgment is neither empirical nor metaphysical, but
logical or metalogical. Besides the principle of sufficient reason
of knowing, it is necessary to take account of the three remaining
fundamental laws of thought, or judgments of metalogical truth,
so nearly related to it; and out of these the whole science of
reason grows. The nature of thought proper, that is to say,
of the judgment and the syllogism, must be exhibited in the
combination of the spheres of concepts, according to the analogy

of the special schema, in the way shown above; and from all this
the rules of the judgment and the syllogism are to be deduced by
construction. The only practical use we can make of logic is in
a debate, when we can convict our antagonist of his intentional
fallacies, rather than of his actual mistakes, by giving them their
technical names. By thus throwing into the background the
practical aim of logic, and bringing out its connection with the
whole scheme of philosophy as one of its chapters, we do not
think that we shall make the study of it less prevalent than it is
just now. For at the present day every one who does not wish
to remain uncultured, and to be numbered with the ignorant and
incompetent multitude, must study speculative philosophy. For
the nineteenth century is a philosophical age, though by this we
do not mean either that it has philosophy, or that philosophy
governs it, but rather that it is ripe for philosophy, and, therefore,
[061] stands in need of it. This is a sign of a high degree of civilisation,
and indeed, is a definite stage in the culture of the ages.14
Though logic is of so little practical use, it cannot be denied
that it was invented for practical purposes. It appears to me to
have originated in the following way:—As the love of debating
developed among the Eleatics, the Megarics, and the Sophists,
and by degrees became almost a passion, the confusion in which
nearly every debate ended must have made them feel the necessity
of a method of procedure as a guide; and for this a scientific
dialectic had to be sought. The first thing which would have to be
observed would be that both the disputing parties should always
be agreed on some one proposition, to which the disputed points
might be referred. The beginning of the methodical procedure
consisted in this, that the propositions admitted on both sides were
formally stated to be so, and placed at the head of the inquiry.
But these propositions were at first concerned only with the
14
Cf. Ch. 9 and 10 of the Supplement.
81
material of the inquiry. It was soon observed that in the process

of going back to the truth admitted on both sides, and of deducing
their assertions from it, each party followed certain forms and
laws about which, without any express agreement, there was
no difference of opinion. And from this it became evident
that these must constitute the peculiar and natural procedure of
reason itself, the form of investigation. Although this was not
exposed to any doubt or difference of opinion, some pedantically
systematic philosopher hit upon the idea that it would look
well, and be the completion of the method of dialectic, if this
formal part of all discussion, this regular procedure of reason
itself, were to be expressed in abstract propositions, just like
the substantial propositions admitted on both sides, and placed
at the beginning of every investigation, as the fixed canon of
debate to which reference and appeal must always be made.
In this way what had formerly been followed only by tacit [062]
agreement, and instinctively, would be consciously recognised
and formally expressed. By degrees, more or less perfect
expressions were found for the fundamental principles of logic,
such as the principles of contradiction, sufficient reason, excluded
middle, the dictum de omni et nullo, as well as the special rules
of the syllogism, as for example, ex meris particularibus aut
negativis nihil sequitur, a rationato ad rationem non valet
consequentia, and so on. That all this was only brought about
slowly, and with great pains, and up till the time of Aristotle
remained very incomplete, is evident from the awkward and
tedious way in which logical truths are brought out in many of
the Platonic dialogues, and still more from what Sextus Empiricus
tells us of the controversies of the Megarics, about the easiest
and simplest logical rules, and the laborious way in which they
were brought into a definite form (Sext. Emp. adv. Math. l.
8, p. 112). But Aristotle collected, arranged, and corrected all
that had been discovered before his time, and brought it to an
incomparably greater state of perfection. If we thus observe how
the course of Greek culture had prepared the way for, and led
up to the work of Aristotle, we shall be little inclined to believe
the assertion of the Persian author, quoted by Sir William Jones
with much approval, that Kallisthenes found a complete system
of logic among the Indians, and sent it to his uncle Aristotle
(Asiatic Researches, vol. iv. p. 163). It is easy to understand that
in the dreary middle ages the Aristotelian logic would be very
acceptable to the controversial spirit of the schoolmen, which, in
the absence of all real knowledge, spent its energy upon mere
formulas and words, and that it would be eagerly adopted even
in its mutilated Arabian form, and presently established as the
centre of all knowledge. Though its authority has since declined,
yet up to our own time logic has retained the credit of a self-
[063] contained, practical, and highly important science. Indeed, in
our own day, the Kantian philosophy, the foundation-stone of
which is taken from logic, has excited a new interest in it; which,
in this respect, at any rate, that is, as the means of the knowledge
of the nature of reason, it deserves.
Correct and accurate conclusions may be arrived at if we
carefully observe the relation of the spheres of concepts, and
only conclude that one sphere is contained in a third sphere,
when we have clearly seen that this first sphere is contained in
a second, which in its turn is contained in the third. On the
other hand, the art of sophistry lies in casting only a superficial
glance at the relations of the spheres of the concepts, and then
manipulating these relations to suit our purposes, generally in the
following way:—When the sphere of an observed concept lies
partly within that of another concept, and partly within a third
altogether different sphere, we treat it as if it lay entirely within
the one or the other, as may suit our purpose. For example, in
speaking of passion, we may subsume it under the concept of
the greatest force, the mightiest agency in the world, or under
the concept of the irrational, and this again under the concept of
impotency or weakness. We may then repeat the process, and
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start anew with each concept to which the argument leads us. A
concept has almost always several others, which partially come
under it, and each of these contains part of the sphere of the first,
but also includes in its own sphere something more, which is
not in the first. But we draw attention only to that one of these
latter concepts, under which we wish to subsume the first, and let
the others remain unobserved, or keep them concealed. On the
possession of this skill depends the whole art of sophistry and
all finer fallacies; for logical fallacies such as mentiens, velatus,
cornatus, &c., are clearly too clumsy for actual use. I am not
aware that hitherto any one has traced the nature of all sophistry
and persuasion back to this last possible ground of its existence, [064]
and referred it to the peculiar character of concepts, i.e., to the
procedure of reason itself. Therefore, as my exposition has led
me to it, though it is very easily understood, I will illustrate it in
the following table by means of a schema. This table is intended
to show how the spheres of concepts overlap each other at many
points, and so leave room for a passage from each concept to
whichever one we please of several other concepts. I hope,
however, that no one will be led by this table to attach more
importance to this little explanation, which I have merely given
in passing, than ought to belong to it, from the nature of the
subject. I have chosen as an illustration the concept of travelling.
Its sphere partially includes four others, to any of which the
sophist may pass at will; these again partly include other spheres,
several of them two or more at once, and through these the
sophist takes whichever way he chooses, always as if it were the
only way, till at last he reaches, in good or evil, whatever end he
may have in view. In passing from one sphere to another, it is
only necessary always to follow the direction from the centre (the
given chief concept) to the circumference, and never to reverse
this process. Such a piece of sophistry may be either an unbroken
speech, or it may assume the strict syllogistic form, according to
what is the weak side of the hearer. Most scientific arguments,
and especially philosophical demonstrations, are at bottom not

much more than this, for how else would it be possible, that so
much, in different ages, has not only been falsely apprehended
(for error itself has a different source), but demonstrated and
proved, and has yet afterwards been found to be fundamentally
wrong, for example, the Leibnitz-Wolfian Philosophy, Ptolemaic
Astronomy, Stahl's Chemistry, Newton's Theory of Colours, &c.
&c.15
§ 10. Through all this, the question presses ever more upon
[065] us, how certainty is to be attained, how judgments are to be
established, what constitutes rational knowledge, (wissen), and
science, which we rank with language and deliberate action as
the third great benefit conferred by reason.
Reason is feminine in nature; it can only give after it has
received. Of itself it has nothing but the empty forms of its
operation. There is no absolutely pure rational knowledge except
the four principles to which I have attributed metalogical truth;
the principles of identity, contradiction, excluded middle, and
sufficient reason of knowledge. For even the rest of logic is not
absolutely pure rational knowledge. It presupposes the relations
and the combinations of the spheres of concepts. But concepts
in general only exist after experience of ideas of perception,
and as their whole nature consists in their relation to these, it is
clear that they presuppose them. No special content, however,
is presupposed, but merely the existence of a content generally,
and so logic as a whole may fairly pass for pure rational science.
In all other sciences reason has received its content from ideas of
perception; in mathematics from the relations of space and time,
presented in intuition or perception prior to all experience; in pure
natural science, that is, in what we know of the course of nature
prior to any experience, the content of the science proceeds from
the pure understanding, i.e., from the a priori knowledge of the
15
Cf. Ch. 11 of Supplement.
85
law of causality and its connection with those pure intuitions or

perceptions of space and time. In all other sciences everything that
is not derived from the sources we have just referred to belongs
to experience. Speaking generally, to know rationally (wissen)
means to have in the power of the mind, and capable of being
reproduced at will, such judgments as have their sufficient ground
of knowledge in something outside themselves, i.e., are true. Thus
only abstract cognition is rational knowledge (wissen), which is
therefore the result of reason, so that we cannot accurately
say of the lower animals that they rationally know (wissen) [066]
anything, although they have apprehension of what is presented
in perception, and memory of this, and consequently imagination,
which is further proved by the circumstance that they dream.
We attribute consciousness to them, and therefore although the
word (bewusstsein) is derived from the verb to know rationally
(wissen), the conception of consciousness corresponds generally
with that of idea of whatever kind it may be. Thus we attribute life
to plants, but not consciousness. Rational knowledge (wissen)
is therefore abstract consciousness, the permanent possession in
concepts of the reason, of what has become known in another
way.
§ 11. In this regard the direct opposite of rational knowledge
is feeling, and therefore we must insert the explanation of feeling
here. The concept which the word feeling denotes has merely a
negative content, which is this, that something which is present
in consciousness, is not a concept, is not abstract rational
knowledge. Except this, whatever it may be, it comes under the
concept of feeling. Thus the immeasurably wide sphere of the
concept of feeling includes the most different kinds of objects,
and no one can ever understand how they come together until he
has recognised that they all agree in this negative respect, that
they are not abstract concepts. For the most diverse and even
antagonistic elements lie quietly side by side in this concept;
for example, religious feeling, feeling of sensual pleasure, moral
feeling, bodily feeling, as touch, pain, sense of colour, of sounds

and their harmonies and discords, feeling of hate, of disgust, of
self-satisfaction, of honour, of disgrace, of right, of wrong, sense
of truth, æsthetic feeling, feeling of power, weakness, health,
friendship, love, &c. &c. There is absolutely nothing in common
among them except the negative quality that they are not abstract
rational knowledge. But this diversity becomes more striking
when the apprehension of space relations presented a priori in
[067] perception, and also the knowledge of the pure understanding is
brought under this concept, and when we say of all knowledge
and all truth, of which we are first conscious only intuitively,
and have not yet formulated in abstract concepts, we feel it. I
should like, for the sake of illustration, to give some examples
of this taken from recent books, as they are striking proofs
of my theory. I remember reading in the introduction to a
German translation of Euclid, that we ought to make beginners
in geometry draw the figures before proceeding to demonstrate,
for in this way they would already feel geometrical truth before
the demonstration brought them complete knowledge. In the
same way Schleiermacher speaks in his “Critique of Ethics” of
logical and mathematical feeling (p. 339), and also of the feeling
of the sameness or difference of two formulas (p. 342). Again
Tennemann in his “History of Philosophy” (vol. I., p. 361) says,
“One felt that the fallacies were not right, but could not point out
the mistakes.” Now, so long as we do not regard this concept
“feeling” from the right point of view, and do not recognise that
one negative characteristic which alone is essential to it, it must
constantly give occasion for misunderstanding and controversy,
on account of the excessive wideness of its sphere, and its
entirely negative and very limited content which is determined
in a purely one-sided manner. Since then we have in German
the nearly synonymous word empfindung (sensation), it would
be convenient to make use of it for bodily feeling, as a sub-
species. This concept “feeling,” which is quite out of proportion
87
to all others, doubtless originated in the following manner. All

concepts, and concepts alone, are denoted by words; they exist
only for the reason, and proceed from it. With concepts, therefore,
we are already at a one-sided point of view; but from such a
point of view what is near appears distinct and is set down
as positive, what is farther off becomes mixed up and is soon
regarded as merely negative. Thus each nation calls all others [068]
foreign: to the Greek all others are barbarians; to the Englishman
all that is not England or English is continent or continental; to
the believer all others are heretics, or heathens; to the noble all
others are roturiers; to the student all others are Philistines, and
so forth. Now, reason itself, strange as it may seem, is guilty
of the same one-sidedness, indeed one might say of the same
crude ignorance arising from vanity, for it classes under the one
concept, “feeling,” every modification of consciousness which
does not immediately belong to its own mode of apprehension,
that is to say, which is not an abstract concept. It has had to pay
the penalty of this hitherto in misunderstanding and confusion
in its own province, because its own procedure had not become
clear to it through thorough self-knowledge, for a special faculty
of feeling has been set up, and new theories of it are constructed.
§ 12. Rational knowledge (wissen) is then all abstract
knowledge,—that is, the knowledge which is peculiar to the
reason as distinguished from the understanding. Its contradictory
opposite has just been explained to be the concept “feeling.”
Now, as reason only reproduces, for knowledge, what has
been received in another way, it does not actually extend our
knowledge, but only gives it another form. It enables us to
know in the abstract and generally, what first became known
in sense-perception, in the concrete. But this is much more
important than it appears at first sight when so expressed. For
it depends entirely upon the fact that knowledge has become
rational or abstract knowledge (wissen), that it can be safely
preserved, that it is communicable and susceptible of certain and
wide-reaching application to practice. Knowledge in the form

of sense-perception is valid only of the particular case, extends
only to what is nearest, and ends with it, for sensibility and
[069] understanding can only comprehend one object at a time. Every
enduring, arranged, and planned activity must therefore proceed
from principles,—that is, from abstract knowledge, and it must
be conducted in accordance with them. Thus, for example,
the knowledge of the relation of cause and effect arrived at by
the understanding, is in itself far completer, deeper and more
exhaustive than anything that can be thought about it in the
abstract; the understanding alone knows in perception directly
and completely the nature of the effect of a lever, of a pulley, or
a cog-wheel, the stability of an arch, and so forth. But on account
of the peculiarity of the knowledge of perception just referred
to, that it only extends to what is immediately present, the mere
understanding can never enable us to construct machines and
buildings. Here reason must come in; it must substitute abstract
concepts for ideas of perception, and take them as the guide of
action; and if they are right, the anticipated result will happen. In
the same way we have perfect knowledge in pure perception of
the nature and constitution of the parabola, hyperbola, and spiral;
but if we are to make trustworthy application of this knowledge
to the real, it must first become abstract knowledge, and by this
it certainly loses its character of intuition or perception, but on
the other hand it gains the certainty and preciseness of abstract
knowledge. The differential calculus does not really extend our
knowledge of the curve, it contains nothing that was not already
in the mere pure perception of the curve; but it alters the kind of
knowledge, it changes the intuitive into an abstract knowledge,
which is so valuable for application. But here we must refer
to another peculiarity of our faculty of knowledge, which could
not be observed until the distinction between the knowledge of
the senses and understanding and abstract knowledge had been
made quite clear. It is this, that relations of space cannot as
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such be directly translated into abstract knowledge, but only

temporal quantities,—that is, numbers, are suitable for this. [070]
Numbers alone can be expressed in abstract concepts which
accurately correspond to them, not spacial quantities. The
concept “thousand” is just as different from the concept “ten,” as
both these temporal quantities are in perception. We think of a
thousand as a distinct multiple of ten, into which we can resolve
it at pleasure for perception in time,—that is to say, we can count
it. But between the abstract concept of a mile and that of a foot,
apart from any concrete perception of either, and without the help
of number, there is no accurate distinction corresponding to the
quantities themselves. In both we only think of a spacial quantity
in general, and if they must be completely distinguished we are
compelled either to call in the assistance of intuition or perception
in space, which would be a departure from abstract knowledge,
or we must think the difference in numbers. If then we wish to
have abstract knowledge of space-relations we must first translate
them into time-relations,—that is, into numbers; therefore only
arithmetic, and not geometry, is the universal science of quantity,
and geometry must be translated into arithmetic if it is to be
communicable, accurately precise and applicable in practice. It
is true that a space-relation as such may also be thought in the
abstract; for example, “the sine increases as the angle,” but if
the quantity of this relation is to be given, it requires number for
its expression. This necessity, that if we wish to have abstract
knowledge of space-relations (i.e., rational knowledge, not mere
intuition or perception), space with its three dimensions must be
translated into time which has only one dimension, this necessity
it is, which makes mathematics so difficult. This becomes very
clear if we compare the perception of curves with their analytical
calculation, or the table of logarithms of the trigonometrical
functions with the perception of the changing relations of the
parts of a triangle, which are expressed by them. What vast
mazes of figures, what laborious calculations it would require [071]
to express in the abstract what perception here apprehends at

a glance completely and with perfect accuracy, namely, how
the co-sine diminishes as the sine increases, how the co-sine
of one angle is the sine of another, the inverse relation of the
increase and decrease of the two angles, and so forth. How time,
we might say, must complain, that with its one dimension it
should be compelled to express the three dimensions of space!
Yet this is necessary if we wish to possess, for application, an
expression, in abstract concepts, of space-relations. They could
not be translated directly into abstract concepts, but only through
the medium of the pure temporal quantity, number, which alone
is directly related to abstract knowledge. Yet it is worthy of
remark, that as space adapts itself so well to perception, and
by means of its three dimensions, even its complicated relations
are easily apprehended, while it eludes the grasp of abstract
knowledge; time, on the contrary, passes easily into abstract
knowledge, but gives very little to perception. Our perceptions
of numbers in their proper element, mere time, without the help
of space, scarcely extends as far as ten, and beyond that we have
only abstract concepts of numbers, no knowledge of them which
can be presented in perception. On the other hand, we connect
with every numeral, and with all algebraical symbols, accurately
defined abstract concepts.
We may further remark here that some minds only find full
satisfaction in what is known through perception. What they
seek is the reason and consequent of being in space, sensuously
expressed; a demonstration after the manner of Euclid, or an
arithmetical solution of spacial problems, does not please them.
Other minds, on the contrary, seek merely the abstract concepts
which are needful for applying and communicating knowledge.
They have patience and memory for abstract principles, formulas,
demonstrations in long trains of reasoning, and calculations, in
[072] which the symbols represent the most complicated abstractions.
The latter seek preciseness, the former sensible perception. The
91
difference is characteristic.
The greatest value of rational or abstract knowledge is that it
can be communicated and permanently retained. It is principally
on this account that it is so inestimably important for practice.
Any one may have a direct perceptive knowledge through the
understanding alone, of the causal connection, of the changes
and motions of natural bodies, and he may find entire satisfaction
in it; but he cannot communicate this knowledge to others until
it has been made permanent for thought in concepts. Knowledge
of the first kind is even sufficient for practice, if a man puts
his knowledge into practice himself, in an action which can
be accomplished while the perception is still vivid; but it is
not sufficient if the help of others is required, or even if the
action is his own but must be carried out at different times, and
therefore requires a pre-conceived plan. Thus, for example, a
practised billiard-player may have a perfect knowledge of the
laws of the impact of elastic bodies upon each other, merely in
the understanding, merely for direct perception; and for him it is
quite sufficient; but on the other hand it is only the man who has
studied the science of mechanics, who has, properly speaking,
a rational knowledge of these laws, that is, a knowledge of
them in the abstract. Such knowledge of the understanding in
perception is sufficient even for the construction of machines,
when the inventor of the machine executes the work himself;
as we often see in the case of talented workmen, who have no
scientific knowledge. But whenever a number of men, and their
united action taking place at different times, is required for the
completion of a mechanical work, of a machine, or a building,
then he who conducts it must have thought out the plan in the
abstract, and such co-operative activity is only possible through
the assistance of reason. It is, however, remarkable that in [073]
the first kind of activity, in which we have supposed that one
man alone, in an uninterrupted course of action, accomplishes
something, abstract knowledge, the application of reason or
reflection, may often be a hindrance to him; for example, in the

case of billiard-playing, of fighting, of tuning an instrument, or
in the case of singing. Here perceptive knowledge must directly
guide action; its passage through reflection makes it uncertain,
for it divides the attention and confuses the man. Thus savages
and untaught men, who are little accustomed to think, perform
certain physical exercises, fight with beasts, shoot with bows
and arrows and the like, with a certainty and rapidity which the
reflecting European never attains to, just because his deliberation
makes him hesitate and delay. For he tries, for example, to
hit the right position or the right point of time, by finding out
the mean between two false extremes; while the savage hits it
directly without thinking of the false courses open to him. In
the same way it is of no use to me to know in the abstract
the exact angle, in degrees and minutes, at which I must apply
a razor, if I do not know it intuitively, that is, if I have not
got it in my touch. The knowledge of physiognomy also, is
interfered with by the application of reason. This knowledge
must be gained directly through the understanding. We say that
the expression, the meaning of the features, can only be felt, that
is, it cannot be put into abstract concepts. Every man has his
direct intuitive method of physiognomy and pathognomy, yet
one man understands more clearly than another these signatura
rerum. But an abstract science of physiognomy to be taught
and learned is not possible; for the distinctions of difference are
here so fine that concepts cannot reach them; therefore abstract
knowledge is related to them as a mosaic is to a painting by a
Van der Werft or a Denner. In mosaics, however fine they may
be, the limits of the stones are always there, and therefore no
[074] continuous passage from one colour to another is possible, and
this is also the case with regard to concepts, with their rigidity
and sharp delineation; however finely we may divide them by
exact definition, they are still incapable of reaching the finer
modifications of the perceptible, and this is just what happens in
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the example we have taken, knowledge of physiognomy.16

This quality of concepts by which they resemble the stones of
a mosaic, and on account of which perception always remains
their asymptote, is also the reason why nothing good is produced
in art by their means. If the singer or the virtuoso attempts to
guide his execution by reflection he remains silent. And this
is equally true of the composer, the painter, and the poet. The
concept always remains unfruitful in art; it can only direct the
technical part of it, its sphere is science. We shall consider
more fully in the third book, why all true art proceeds from
sensuous knowledge, never from the concept. Indeed, with
regard to behaviour also, and personal agreeableness in society,
the concept has only a negative value in restraining the grosser
manifestations of egotism and brutality; so that a polished manner
is its commendable production. But all that is attractive, gracious,
charming in behaviour, all affectionateness and friendliness, must
not proceed from the concepts, for if it does, “we feel intention,
and are put out of tune.” All dissimulation is the work of
reflection; but it cannot be maintained constantly and without
interruption: “nemo potest personam diu ferre fictum,” says [075]
Seneca in his book de clementia; and so it is generally found
out and loses its effect. Reason is needed in the full stress
of life, where quick conclusions, bold action, rapid and sure
comprehension are required, but it may easily spoil all if it gains
16
I am therefore of opinion that a science of physiognomy cannot, with
certainty, go further than to lay down a few quite general rules. For example,
the intellectual qualities are to be read in the forehead and the eyes; the moral
qualities, the expression of will, in the mouth and lower part of the face. The
forehead and the eyes interpret each other; either of them seen alone can only
be half understood. Genius is never without a high, broad, finely-arched brow;
but such a brow often occurs where there is no genius. A clever-looking
person may the more certainly be judged to be so the uglier the face is; and a
stupid-looking person may the more certainly be judged to be stupid the more
beautiful the face is; for beauty, as the approximation to the type of humanity,
carries in and for itself the expression of mental clearness; the opposite is the
case with ugliness, and so forth.
the upper hand, and by perplexing hinders the intuitive, direct

discovery, and grasp of the right by simple understanding, and
thus induces irresolution.
Lastly, virtue and holiness do not proceed from reflection, but
from the inner depths of the will, and its relation to knowledge.
The exposition of this belongs to another part of our work;
this, however, I may remark here, that the dogmas relating to
ethics may be the same in the reason of whole nations, but the
action of every individual different; and the converse also holds
good; action, we say, is guided by feelings,—that is, simply not
by concepts, but as a matter of fact by the ethical character.
Dogmas occupy the idle reason; but action in the end pursues its
own course independently of them, generally not according to
abstract rules, but according to unspoken maxims, the expression
of which is the whole man himself. Therefore, however different
the religious dogmas of nations may be, yet in the case of all of
them, a good action is accompanied by unspeakable satisfaction,
and a bad action by endless remorse. No mockery can shake
the former; no priest's absolution can deliver from the latter.
Notwithstanding this, we must allow, that for the pursuit of a
virtuous life, the application of reason is needful; only it is not its
source, but has the subordinate function of preserving resolutions
which have been made, of providing maxims to withstand the
weakness of the moment, and give consistency to action. It plays
the same part ultimately in art also, where it has just as little to do
with the essential matter, but assists in carrying it out, for genius
is not always at call, and yet the work must be completed in all
[076] its parts and rounded off to a whole.17
§ 13. All these discussions of the advantages and disadvantages
of the application of reason are intended to show, that although
abstract rational knowledge is the reflex of ideas of perception,
and is founded on them, it is by no means in such entire congruity
17
Cf. Ch. 7 of the Supplement.
95
with them that it could everywhere take their place: indeed it

never corresponds to them quite accurately. And thus, as we
have seen, many human actions can only be performed by the
help of reason and deliberation, and yet there are some which are
better performed without its assistance. This very incongruity
of sensuous and abstract knowledge, on account of which the
latter always merely approximates to the former, as mosaic
approximates to painting, is the cause of a very remarkable
phenomenon which, like reason itself, is peculiar to human
nature, and of which the explanations that have ever anew been
attempted, are insufficient: I mean laughter. On account of
the source of this phenomenon, we cannot avoid giving the
explanation of it here, though it again interrupts the course of our
work to do so. The cause of laughter in every case is simply the
sudden perception of the incongruity between a concept and the
real objects which have been thought through it in some relation,
and laughter itself is just the expression of this incongruity. It
often occurs in this way: two or more real objects are thought
through one concept, and the identity of the concept is transferred
to the objects; it then becomes strikingly apparent from the entire
difference of the objects in other respects, that the concept was
only applicable to them from a one-sided point of view. It occurs
just as often, however, that the incongruity between a single real
object and the concept under which, from one point of view,
it has rightly been subsumed, is suddenly felt. Now the more
correct the subsumption of such objects under a concept may be
from one point of view, and the greater and more glaring their
incongruity with it, from another point of view, the greater is the [077]
ludicrous effect which is produced by this contrast. All laughter
then is occasioned by a paradox, and therefore by unexpected
subsumption, whether this is expressed in words or in actions.
This, briefly stated, is the true explanation of the ludicrous.
I shall not pause here to relate anecdotes as examples to
illustrate my theory; for it is so simple and comprehensible that
it does not require them, and everything ludicrous which the

reader may remember is equally valuable as a proof of it. But
the theory is confirmed and illustrated by distinguishing two
species into which the ludicrous is divided, and which result
from the theory. Either, we have previously known two or more
very different real objects, ideas of sense-perception, and have
intentionally identified them through the unity of a concept which
comprehends them both; this species of the ludicrous is called
wit. Or, conversely, the concept is first present in knowledge,
and we pass from it to reality, and to operation upon it, to action:
objects which in other respects are fundamentally different, but
which are all thought in that one concept, are now regarded and
treated in the same way, till, to the surprise and astonishment
of the person acting, the great difference of their other aspects
appears: this species of the ludicrous is called folly. Therefore
everything ludicrous is either a flash of wit or a foolish action,
according as the procedure has been from the discrepancy of the
objects to the identity of the concept, or the converse; the former
always intentional, the latter always unintentional, and from
without. To seem to reverse the starting-point, and to conceal wit
with the mask of folly, is the art of the jester and the clown. Being
quite aware of the diversity of the objects, the jester unites them,
with secret wit, under one concept, and then starting from this
concept he receives from the subsequently discovered diversity
of the objects the surprise which he himself prepared. It follows
[078] from this short but sufficient theory of the ludicrous, that, if we
set aside the last case, that of the jester, wit must always show
itself in words, folly generally in actions, though also in words,
when it only expresses an intention and does not actually carry it
out, or when it shows itself merely in judgments and opinions.
Pedantry is a form of folly. It arises in this way: a man
lacks confidence in his own understanding, and, therefore, does
not wish to trust to it, to recognise what is right directly in the
particular case. He, therefore, puts it entirely under the control of
97
the reason, and seeks to be guided by reason in everything; that

is to say, he tries always to proceed from general concepts, rules,
and maxims, and to confine himself strictly to them in life, in
art, and even in moral conduct. Hence that clinging to the form,
to the manner, to the expression and word which is characteristic
of pedantry, and which with it takes the place of the real nature
of the matter. The incongruity then between the concept and
reality soon shows itself here, and it becomes evident that the
former never condescends to the particular case, and that with its
generality and rigid definiteness it can never accurately apply to
the fine distinctions of difference and innumerable modifications
of the actual. Therefore, the pedant, with his general maxims,
almost always misses the mark in life, shows himself to be
foolish, awkward, useless. In art, in which the concept is
unfruitful, he produces lifeless, stiff, abortive mannerisms. Even
with regard to ethics, the purpose to act rightly or nobly cannot
always be carried out in accordance with abstract maxims; for
in many cases the excessively nice distinctions in the nature of
the circumstances necessitate a choice of the right proceeding
directly from the character; for the application of mere abstract
maxims sometimes gives false results, because the maxims only
half apply; and sometimes cannot be carried out, because they
are foreign to the individual character of the actor, and this never [079]
allows itself to be entirely discovered; therefore, inconsistencies
arise. Since then Kant makes it a condition of the moral worth
of an action, that it shall proceed from pure rational abstract
maxims, without any inclination or momentary emotion, we
cannot entirely absolve him from the reproach of encouraging
moral pedantry. This reproach is the significance of Schiller's
epigram, entitled “Scruples of Conscience.” When we speak,
especially in connection with politics, of doctrinaires, theorists,
savants, and so forth, we mean pedants, that is, persons who
know the things well in the abstract, but not in the concrete.
Abstraction consists in thinking away the less general predicates;
but it is precisely upon these that so much depends in practice.

To complete our theory it remains for us to mention a spurious
kind of wit, the play upon words, the calembourg, the pun, to
which may be added the equivocation, the double entendre, the
chief use of which is the expression of what is obscene. Just
as the witticism brings two very different real objects under one
concept, the pun brings two different concepts, by the assistance
of accident, under one word. The same contrast appears, only
familiar and more superficial, because it does not spring from the
nature of things, but merely from the accident of nomenclature.
In the case of the witticism the identity is in the concept, the
difference in the reality, but in the case of the pun the difference is
in the concepts and the identity in the reality, for the terminology
is here the reality. It would only be a somewhat far-fetched
comparison if we were to say that the pun is related to the
witticism as the parabola (sic) of the upper inverted cone to that
of the lower. The misunderstanding of the word or the quid pro
quo is the unintentional pun, and is related to it exactly as folly
is to wit. Thus the deaf man often affords occasion for laughter,
[080] just as much as the fool, and inferior writers of comedy often
use the former for the latter to raise a laugh.
I have treated laughter here only from the psychical side; with
regard to the physical side, I refer to what is said on the subject
in the “Parerga,” vol. II. ch. vi., § 98.18
§ 14. By means of these various discussions it is hoped
that both the difference and the relation between the process
of knowledge that belongs to the reason, rational knowledge,
the concept on the one hand, and the direct knowledge in purely
sensuous, mathematical intuition or perception, and apprehension
by the understanding on the other hand, has been clearly brought
out. This remarkable relation of our kinds of knowledge led us
almost inevitably to give, in passing, explanations of feeling and
18
99
of laughter, but from all this we now turn back to the further
consideration of science as the third great benefit which reason
confers on man, the other two being speech and deliberate action.
The general discussion of science which now devolves upon us,
will be concerned partly with its form, partly with the foundation
of its judgments, and lastly with its content.
We have seen that, with the exception of the basis of pure
logic, rational knowledge in general has not its source in the
reason itself; but having been otherwise obtained as knowledge
of perception, it is stored up in the reason, for through reason
it has entirely changed its character, and has become abstract
knowledge. All rational knowledge, that is, knowledge that has
been raised to consciousness in the abstract, is related to science
strictly so called, as a fragment to the whole. Every one has gained
a rational knowledge of many different things through experience,
through consideration of the individual objects presented to him,
but only he who sets himself the task of acquiring a complete
knowledge in the abstract of a particular class of objects, strives
after science. This class can only be marked off by means of a [081]
concept; therefore, at the beginning of every science there stands a
concept, and by means of it the class of objects concerning which
this science promises a complete knowledge in the abstract, is
separated in thought from the whole world of things. For example,
the concept of space-relations, or of the action of unorganised
bodies upon each other, or of the nature of plants, or of animals,
or of the successive changes of the surface of the globe, or of
the changes of the human race as a whole, or of the construction
of a language, and so forth. If science sought to obtain the
knowledge of its object, by investigating each individual thing
that is thought through the concept, till by degrees it had learned
the whole, no human memory would be equal to the task, and
no certainty of completeness would be obtainable. Therefore,
it makes use of that property of concept-spheres explained
above, that they include each other, and it concerns itself mainly
with the wider spheres which lie within the concept of its
object in general. When the relations of these spheres to each
other have been determined, all that is thought in them is also
generally determined, and can now be more and more accurately
determined by the separation of smaller and smaller concept-
spheres. In this way it is possible for a science to comprehend
its object completely. This path which it follows to knowledge,
the path from the general to the particular, distinguishes it from
ordinary rational knowledge; therefore, systematic form is an
essential and characteristic feature of science. The combination
of the most general concept-spheres of every science, that is, the
knowledge of its first principles, is the indispensable condition
of mastering it; how far we advance from these to the more
special propositions is a matter of choice, and does not increase
the thoroughness but only the extent of our knowledge of the
science. The number of the first principles to which all the rest are
[082] subordinated, varies greatly in the different sciences, so that in
some there is more subordination, in others more co-ordination;
and in this respect, the former make greater claims upon the
judgment, the latter upon the memory. It was known to the
schoolmen,19 that, as the syllogism requires two premises, no
science can proceed from a single first principle which cannot be
the subject of further deduction, but must have several, at least
two. The specially classifying sciences: Zoology, Botany, and
also Physics and Chemistry, inasmuch as they refer all inorganic
action to a few fundamental forces, have most subordination;
history, on the other hand, has really none at all; for the general
in it consists merely in the survey of the principal periods, from
which, however, the particular events cannot be deduced, and are
only subordinated to them according to time, but according to the
concept are co-ordinate with them. Therefore, history, strictly
speaking, is certainly rational knowledge, but is not science. In
19
Suarez, Disput. Metaphysicæ, disp. iii. sect. 3, tit. 3.
101
mathematics, according to Euclid's treatment, the axioms alone

are indemonstrable first principles, and all demonstrations are
in gradation strictly subordinated to them. But this method
of treatment is not essential to mathematics, and in fact each
proposition introduces quite a new space construction, which in
itself is independent of those which precede it, and indeed can
be completely comprehended from itself, quite independently
of them, in the pure intuition or perception of space, in which
the most complicated construction is just as directly evident as
the axiom; but of this more fully hereafter. Meanwhile every
mathematical proposition remains always a universal truth, which
is valid for innumerable particular cases; and a graduated process
from the simple to the complicated propositions which are to be
deduced from them, is also essential to mathematics; therefore,
in every respect mathematics is a science. The completeness of a
science as such, that is, in respect of form, consists in there being
as much subordination and as little co-ordination of the principles [083]
as possible. Scientific talent in general is, therefore, the faculty
of subordinating the concept-spheres according to their different
determinations, so that, as Plato repeatedly counsels, a science
shall not be constituted by a general concept and an indefinite
multiplicity immediately under it, but that knowledge shall
descend by degrees from the general to the particular, through
intermediate concepts and divisions, according to closer and
closer definitions. In Kantian language this is called satisfying
equally the law of homogeneity and that of specification. It
arises from this peculiar nature of scientific completeness, that
the aim of science is not greater certainty—for certainty may
be possessed in just as high a degree by the most disconnected
particular knowledge—but its aim is rather the facilitating of
rational knowledge by means of its form, and the possibility of
the completeness of rational knowledge which this form affords.
It is therefore a very prevalent but perverted opinion that the
scientific character of knowledge consists in its greater certainty,
and just as false is the conclusion following from this, that, strictly
speaking, the only sciences are mathematics and logic, because
only in them, on account of their purely a priori character, is
there unassailable certainty of knowledge. This advantage cannot
be denied them, but it gives them no special claim to be regarded
as sciences; for the special characteristic of science does not lie in
certainty but in the systematic form of knowledge, based on the
gradual descent from the general to the particular. The process of
knowledge from the general to the particular, which is peculiar
to the sciences, involves the necessity that in the sciences much
should be established by deduction from preceding propositions,
that is to say, by demonstration; and this has given rise to the old
mistake that only what has been demonstrated is absolutely true,
and that every truth requires a demonstration; whereas, on the
[084] contrary, every demonstration requires an undemonstrated truth,
which ultimately supports it, or it may be, its own demonstration.
Therefore a directly established truth is as much to be preferred
to a truth established by demonstration as water from the spring
is to water from the aqueduct. Perception, partly pure a priori, as
it forms the basis of mathematics, partly empirical a posteriori,
as it forms the basis of all the other sciences, is the source
of all truth and the foundation of all science. (Logic alone is
to be excepted, which is not founded upon perception but yet
upon direct knowledge by the reason of its own laws.) Not the
demonstrated judgments nor their demonstrations, but judgments
which are created directly out of perception, and founded upon
it rather than on any demonstrations, are to science what the sun
is to the world; for all light proceeds from them, and lighted
by their light the others give light also. To establish the truth
of such primary judgments directly from perception, to raise
such strongholds of science from the innumerable multitude of
real objects, that is the work of the faculty of judgment, which
consists in the power of rightly and accurately carrying over
into abstract consciousness what is known in perception, and
103
judgment is consequently the mediator between understanding

and reason. Only extraordinary and exceptional strength of
judgment in the individual can actually advance science; but
every one who is possessed of a healthy reason is able to
deduce propositions from propositions, to demonstrate, to draw
conclusions. To lay down and make permanent for reflection, in
suitable concepts, what is known through perception, so that, on
the one hand, what is common to many real objects is thought
through one concept, and, on the other hand, their points of
difference are each thought through one concept, so that the
different shall be known and thought as different in spite of a
partial agreement, and the identical shall be known and thought
as identical in spite of a partial difference, all in accordance with
the end and intention which in each case is in view; all this [085]
is done by the faculty of judgment. Deficiency in judgment is
silliness. The silly man fails to grasp, now the partial or relative
difference of concepts which in one aspect are identical, now the
identity of concepts which are relatively or partially different.
To this explanation of the faculty of judgment, moreover, Kant's
division of it into reflecting and subsuming judgment may be
applied, according as it passes from the perceived objects to the
concepts, or from the latter to the former; in both cases always
mediating between empirical knowledge of the understanding
and the reflective knowledge of the reason. There can be no
truth which could be brought out by means of syllogisms alone;
and the necessity of establishing truth by means of syllogisms
is merely relative, indeed subjective. Since all demonstration is
syllogistic, in the case of a new truth we must first seek, not for a
demonstration, but for direct evidence, and only in the absence of
such evidence is a demonstration to be temporarily made use of.
No science is susceptible of demonstration throughout any more
than a building can stand in the air; all its demonstrations must
ultimately rest upon what is perceived, and consequently cannot
be demonstrated, for the whole world of reflection rests upon and
is rooted in the world of perception. All primal, that is, original,

evidence is a perception, as the word itself indicates. Therefore
it is either empirical or founded upon the perception a priori of
the conditions of possible experience. In both cases it affords
only immanent, not transcendent knowledge. Every concept
has its worth and its existence only in its relation, sometimes
very indirect, to an idea of perception; what is true of the
concepts is also true of the judgments constructed out of them,
and of all science. Therefore it must in some way be possible
to know directly without demonstrations or syllogisms every
truth that is arrived at through syllogisms and communicated by
[086] demonstrations. This is most difficult in the case of certain
complicated mathematical propositions at which we only arrive
by chains of syllogisms; for example, the calculation of the
chords and tangents to all arcs by deduction from the proposition
of Pythagoras. But even such a truth as this cannot essentially and
solely rest upon abstract principles, and the space-relations which
lie at its foundation also must be capable of being so presented
a priori in pure intuition or perception that the truth of their
abstract expression is directly established. But of mathematical
demonstration we shall speak more fully shortly.
It is true we often hear men speak in a lofty strain of sciences
which rest entirely upon correct conclusions drawn from sure
premises, and which are consequently unassailable. But through
pure logical reasoning, however true the premises may be,
we shall never receive more than an articulate expression and
exposition of what lies already complete in the premises; thus
we shall only explicitly expound what was already implicitly
understood. The esteemed sciences referred to are, however,
specially the mathematical sciences, particularly astronomy. But
the certainty of astronomy arises from the fact that it has for its
basis the intuition or perception of space, which is given a priori,
and is therefore infallible. All space-relations, however, follow
from each other with a necessity (ground of being) which affords
105
a priori certainty, and they can therefore be safely deduced from

each other. To these mathematical properties we have only to
add one force of nature, gravity, which acts precisely in relation
to the masses and the square of the distance; and, lastly, the
law of inertia, which follows from the law of causality and
is therefore true a priori, and with it the empirical datum of
the motion impressed, once for all, upon each of these masses.
This is the whole material of astronomy, which both by its
simplicity and its certainty leads to definite results, which are
highly interesting on account of the vastness and importance [087]
of the objects. For example, if I know the mass of a planet
and the distance of its satellite from it, I can tell with certainty
the period of the revolution of the latter according to Kepler's
second law. But the ground of this law is, that with this distance
only this velocity will both chain the satellite to the planet and
prevent it from falling into it. Thus it is only upon such a
geometrical basis, that is, by means of an intuition or perception
a priori, and also under the application of a law of nature,
that much can be arrived at by means of syllogisms, for here
they are merely like bridges from one sensuous apprehension to
others; but it is not so with mere pure syllogistic reasoning in the
exclusively logical method. The source of the first fundamental
truths of astronomy is, however, properly induction, that is, the
comprehension of what is given in many perceptions in one
true and directly founded judgment. From this, hypotheses are
afterwards constructed, and their confirmation by experience,
as induction approaching to completeness, affords the proof
of the first judgment. For example, the apparent motion of
the planets is known empirically; after many false hypotheses
with regard to the spacial connection of this motion (planetary
course) the right one was at last found, then the laws which it
obeyed (the laws of Kepler), and, lastly, the cause of these laws
(universal gravitation), and the empirically known agreement of
all observed cases with the whole of the hypotheses, and with their
consequences, that is to say, induction, established them with

complete certainty. The invention of the hypotheses was the work
of the judgment, which rightly comprehended the given facts and
expressed them accordingly; but induction, that is, a multitude of
perceptions, confirmed their truth. But their truth could also be
known directly, and by a single empirical perception, if we could
pass freely through space and had telescopic eyes. Therefore,
[088] here also syllogisms are not the essential and only source of
knowledge, but really only a makeshift.
As a third example taken from a different sphere we may
mention that the so-called metaphysical truths, that is, such truths
as those to which Kant assigns the position of the metaphysical
first principles of natural science, do not owe their evidence to
demonstration. What is a priori certain we know directly; as the
form of all knowledge, it is known to us with the most complete
necessity. For example, that matter is permanent, that is, can
neither come into being nor pass away, we know directly as
negative truth; for our pure intuition or perception of space and
time gives the possibility of motion; in the law of causality the
understanding affords us the possibility of change of form and
quality, but we lack powers of the imagination for conceiving the
coming into being or passing away of matter. Therefore that truth
has at all times been evident to all men everywhere, nor has it ever
been seriously doubted; and this could not be the case if it had
no other ground of knowledge than the abstruse and exceedingly
subtle proof of Kant. But besides this, I have found Kant's proof
to be false (as is explained in the Appendix), and have shown
above that the permanence of matter is to be deduced, not from
the share which time has in the possibility of experience, but
from the share which belongs to space. The true foundation of all
truths which in this sense are called metaphysical, that is, abstract
expressions of the necessary and universal forms of knowledge,
cannot itself lie in abstract principles; but only in the immediate
consciousness of the forms of the idea communicating itself in
107
apodictic assertions a priori, and fearing no refutation. But if we

yet desire to give a proof of them, it can only consist in showing
that what is to be proved is contained in some truth about which
there is no doubt, either as a part of it or as a presupposition.
Thus, for example, I have shown that all empirical perception
implies the application of the law of causality, the knowledge [089]
of which is hence a condition of all experience, and therefore
cannot be first given and conditioned through experience as
Hume thought. Demonstrations in general are not so much for
those who wish to learn as for those who wish to dispute. Such
persons stubbornly deny directly established insight; now only
the truth can be consistent in all directions, and therefore we
must show such persons that they admit under one form and
indirectly, what they deny under another form and directly; that
is, the logically necessary connection between what is denied
and what is admitted.
It is also a consequence of the scientific form, the subordination
of everything particular under a general, and so on always to
what is more general, that the truth of many propositions is only
logically proved,—that is, through their dependence upon other
propositions, through syllogisms, which at the same time appear
as proofs. But we must never forget that this whole form of
science is merely a means of rendering knowledge more easy,
not a means to greater certainty. It is easier to discover the
nature of an animal, by means of the species to which it belongs,
and so on through the genus, family, order, and class, than
to examine on every occasion the animal presented to us: but
the truth of all propositions arrived at syllogistically is always
conditioned by and ultimately dependent upon some truth which
rests not upon reasoning but upon perception. If this perception
were always as much within our reach as a deduction through
syllogisms, then it would be in every respect preferable. For
every deduction from concepts is exposed to great danger of
error, on account of the fact we have considered above, that so
many spheres lie partly within each other, and that their content
is often vague or uncertain. This is illustrated by a multitude of
demonstrations of false doctrines and sophisms of every kind.
Syllogisms are indeed perfectly certain as regards form, but they
[090] are very uncertain on account of their matter, the concepts. For,
on the one hand, the spheres of these are not sufficiently sharply
defined, and, on the other hand, they intersect each other in so
many ways that one sphere is in part contained in many others,
and we may pass at will from it to one or another of these, and
from this sphere again to others, as we have already shown. Or,
in other words, the minor term and also the middle can always be
subordinated to different concepts, from which we may choose
at will the major and the middle, and the nature of the conclusion
depends on this choice. Consequently immediate evidence is
always much to be preferred to reasoned truth, and the latter is
only to be accepted when the former is too remote, and not when
it is as near or indeed nearer than the latter. Accordingly we saw
above that, as a matter of fact, in the case of logic, in which
the immediate knowledge in each individual case lies nearer to
hand than deduced scientific knowledge, we always conduct our
thought according to our immediate knowledge of the laws of
thought, and leave logic unused.20
§ 15. If now with our conviction that perception is the primary
source of all evidence, and that only direct or indirect connection
with it is absolute truth; and further, that the shortest way to this
is always the surest, as every interposition of concepts means
exposure to many deceptions; if, I say, we now turn with this
conviction to mathematics, as it was established as a science
by Euclid, and has remained as a whole to our own day, we
cannot help regarding the method it adopts, as strange and indeed
perverted. We ask that every logical proof shall be traced back
to an origin in perception; but mathematics, on the contrary,
20
109
is at great pains deliberately to throw away the evidence of

perception which is peculiar to it, and always at hand, that it
may substitute for it a logical demonstration. This must seem
to us like the action of a man who cuts off his legs in order to [091]
go on crutches, or like that of the prince in the “Triumph der
Empfindsamkeit” who flees from the beautiful reality of nature,
to delight in a stage scene that imitates it. I must here refer
to what I have said in the sixth chapter of the essay on the
principle of sufficient reason, and take for granted that it is fresh
and present in the memory of the reader; so that I may link
my observations on to it without explaining again the difference
between the mere ground of knowledge of a mathematical truth,
which can be given logically, and the ground of being, which is
the immediate connection of the parts of space and time, known
only in perception. It is only insight into the ground of being that
secures satisfaction and thorough knowledge. The mere ground
of knowledge must always remain superficial; it can afford us
indeed rational knowledge that a thing is as it is, but it cannot tell
why it is so. Euclid chose the latter way to the obvious detriment
of the science. For just at the beginning, for example, when
he ought to show once for all how in a triangle the angles and
sides reciprocally determine each other, and stand to each other
in the relation of reason and consequent, in accordance with the
form which the principle of sufficient reason has in pure space,
and which there, as in every other sphere, always affords the
necessity that a thing is as it is, because something quite different
from it, is as it is; instead of in this way giving a thorough insight
into the nature of the triangle, he sets up certain disconnected
arbitrarily chosen propositions concerning the triangle, and gives
a logical ground of knowledge of them, through a laborious
logical demonstration, based upon the principle of contradiction.
Instead of an exhaustive knowledge of these space-relations we
therefore receive merely certain results of them, imparted to us
at pleasure, and in fact we are very much in the position of a
[092] man to whom the different effects of an ingenious machine are

shown, but from whom its inner connection and construction are
withheld. We are compelled by the principle of contradiction
to admit that what Euclid demonstrates is true, but we do not
comprehend why it is so. We have therefore almost the same
uncomfortable feeling that we experience after a juggling trick,
and, in fact, most of Euclid's demonstrations are remarkably
like such feats. The truth almost always enters by the back
door, for it manifests itself per accidens through some contingent
circumstance. Often a reductio ad absurdum shuts all the
doors one after another, until only one is left through which we
are therefore compelled to enter. Often, as in the proposition of
Pythagoras, lines are drawn, we don't know why, and it afterwards
appears that they were traps which close unexpectedly and take
prisoner the assent of the astonished learner, who must now admit
what remains wholly inconceivable in its inner connection, so
much so, that he may study the whole of Euclid through and
through without gaining a real insight into the laws of space-
relations, but instead of them he only learns by heart certain
results which follow from them. This specially empirical and
unscientific knowledge is like that of the doctor who knows both
the disease and the cure for it, but does not know the connection
between them. But all this is the necessary consequence if we
capriciously reject the special kind of proof and evidence of
one species of knowledge, and forcibly introduce in its stead
a kind which is quite foreign to its nature. However, in other
respects the manner in which this has been accomplished by
Euclid deserves all the praise which has been bestowed on him
through so many centuries, and which has been carried so far
that his method of treating mathematics has been set up as the
pattern of all scientific exposition. Men tried indeed to model all
the sciences after it, but later they gave up the attempt without
quite knowing why. Yet in our eyes this method of Euclid
[093] in mathematics can appear only as a very brilliant piece of
111
perversity. But when a great error in life or in science has

been intentionally and methodically carried out with universal
applause, it is always possible to discover its source in the
philosophy which prevailed at the time. The Eleatics first brought
out the difference, and indeed often the conflict, that exists
between what is perceived, Æ±¹½¿¼µ½¿½,21 and what is thought,
½¿Å¼µ½¿½, and used it in many ways in their philosophical
epigrams, and also in sophisms. They were followed later by the
Megarics, the Dialecticians, the Sophists, the New-Academy, and
the Sceptics; these drew attention to the illusion, that is to say, to
the deception of the senses, or rather of the understanding which
transforms the data of the senses into perception, and which often
causes us to see things to which the reason unhesitatingly denies
reality; for example, a stick broken in water, and such like. It
came to be known that sense-perception was not to be trusted
unconditionally, and it was therefore hastily concluded that only
rational, logical thought could establish truth; although Plato (in
the Parmenides), the Megarics, Pyrrho, and the New-Academy,
showed by examples (in the manner which was afterwards
adopted by Sextus Empiricus) how syllogisms and concepts were
also sometimes misleading, and indeed produced paralogisms
and sophisms which arise much more easily and are far harder
to explain than the illusion of sense-perception. However, this
rationalism, which arose in opposition to empiricism, kept the
upper hand, and Euclid constructed the science of mathematics in
accordance with it. He was compelled by necessity to found the
axioms upon evidence of perception (Æ±¹½¿¼µ½¿½), but all the
rest he based upon reasoning (½¿Å¼µ½¿½). His method reigned
supreme through all the succeeding centuries, and it could not but
do so as long as pure intuition or perception, a priori, was not [094]
distinguished from empirical perception. Certain passages from
the works of Proclus, the commentator of Euclid, which Kepler
21
The reader must not think here of Kant's misuse of these Greek terms, which
is condemned in the Appendix.
translated into Latin in his book, “De Harmonia Mundi,” seem

to show that he fully recognised this distinction. But Proclus did
not attach enough importance to the matter; he merely mentioned
it by the way, so that he remained unnoticed and accomplished
nothing. Therefore, not till two thousand years later will the
doctrine of Kant, which is destined to make such great changes
in all the knowledge, thought, and action of European nations,
produce this change in mathematics also. For it is only after
we have learned from this great man that the intuitions or
perceptions of space and time are quite different from empirical
perceptions, entirely independent of any impression of the senses,
conditioning it, not conditioned by it, i.e., are a priori, and
therefore are not exposed to the illusions of sense; only after we
have learned this, I say, can we comprehend that Euclid's logical
method of treating mathematics is a useless precaution, a crutch
for sound legs, that it is like a wanderer who during the night
mistakes a bright, firm road for water, and carefully avoiding it,
toils over the broken ground beside it, content to keep from point
to point along the edge of the supposed water. Only now can we
affirm with certainty that what presents itself to us as necessary
in the perception of a figure, does not come from the figure on
the paper, which is perhaps very defectively drawn, nor from the
abstract concept under which we think it, but immediately from
the form of all knowledge of which we are conscious a priori.
This is always the principle of sufficient reason; here as the form
of perception, i.e., space, it is the principle of the ground of being,
the evidence and validity of which is, however, just as great and
as immediate as that of the principle of the ground of knowing,
i.e., logical certainty. Thus we need not and ought not to leave
[095] the peculiar province of mathematics in order to put our trust
only in logical proof, and seek to authenticate mathematics in a
sphere which is quite foreign to it, that of concepts. If we confine
ourselves to the ground peculiar to mathematics, we gain the
great advantage that in it the rational knowledge that something
113
is, is one with the knowledge why it is so, whereas the method
of Euclid entirely separates these two, and lets us know only the
first, not the second. Aristotle says admirably in the Analyt.,
post. i. 27: “‘ºÁ¹²µÃÄµÁ± ´½ µÀ¹ÃÄ·¼· µÀ¹ÃÄ·¼·Â º±¹ ÀÁ¿ÄµÁ±,
!Äµ Ä¿Å AÄ¹ º±¹ Ä¿Å ´¹¿Ä¹ ! ±ÅÄ·, ±»»± ¼· ÇÉÁ¹Â Ä¿Å AÄ¹,
Ä·Â Ä¿Å ´¹¿Ä¹” (Subtilior autem et praestantior ea est scientia,
quâ QUOD aliquid sit, et CUR sit una simulque intelligimus non
separatim QUOD, et CUR sit). In physics we are only satisfied
when the knowledge that a thing is as it is is combined with
the knowledge why it is so. To know that the mercury in the
Torricellian tube stands thirty inches high is not really rational
knowledge if we do not know that it is sustained at this height by
the counterbalancing weight of the atmosphere. Shall we then be
satisfied in mathematics with the qualitas occulta of the circle
that the segments of any two intersecting chords always contain
equal rectangles? That it is so Euclid certainly demonstrates
in the 35th Prop. of the Third Book; why it is so remains
doubtful. In the same way the proposition of Pythagoras teaches
us a qualitas occulta of the right-angled triangle; the stilted and
indeed fallacious demonstration of Euclid forsakes us at the why,
and a simple figure, which we already know, and which is present
to us, gives at a glance far more insight into the matter, and firm
inner conviction of that necessity, and of the dependence of that
quality upon the right angle:—
[096]
In the case of unequal catheti also, and indeed generally in the

case of every possible geometrical truth, it is quite possible to
obtain such a conviction based on perception, because these truths
were always discovered by such an empirically known necessity,
and their demonstration was only thought out afterwards in

addition. Thus we only require an analysis of the process of
thought in the first discovery of a geometrical truth in order to
know its necessity empirically. It is the analytical method in
general that I wish for the exposition of mathematics, instead of
the synthetical method which Euclid made use of. Yet this would
have very great, though not insuperable, difficulties in the case
of complicated mathematical truths. Here and there in Germany
men are beginning to alter the exposition of mathematics, and to
proceed more in this analytical way. The greatest effort in this
direction has been made by Herr Kosack, teacher of mathematics
and physics in the Gymnasium at Nordhausen, who added a
thorough attempt to teach geometry according to my principles
to the programme of the school examination on the 6th of April
1852.
In order to improve the method of mathematics, it is especially
necessary to overcome the prejudice that demonstrated truth has
any superiority over what is known through perception, or that
logical truth founded upon the principle of contradiction has
any superiority over metaphysical truth, which is immediately
evident, and to which belongs the pure intuition or perception of
space.
That which is most certain, and yet always inexplicable, is
what is involved in the principle of sufficient reason, for this
principle, in its different aspects, expresses the universal form
of all our ideas and knowledge. All explanation consists of
reduction to it, exemplification in the particular case of the
connection of ideas expressed generally through it. It is thus the
principle of all explanation, and therefore it is neither susceptible
[097] of an explanation itself, nor does it stand in need of it; for every
explanation presupposes it, and only obtains meaning through
it. Now, none of its forms are superior to the rest; it is equally
certain and incapable of demonstration as the principle of the
ground of being, or of change, or of action, or of knowing. The
115
relation of reason and consequent is a necessity in all its forms,

and indeed it is, in general, the source of the concept of necessity,
for necessity has no other meaning. If the reason is given there
is no other necessity than that of the consequent, and there is
no reason that does not involve the necessity of the consequent.
Just as surely then as the consequent expressed in the conclusion
follows from the ground of knowledge given in the premises,
does the ground of being in space determine its consequent in
space: if I know through perception the relation of these two,
this certainty is just as great as any logical certainty. But every
geometrical proposition is just as good an expression of such a
relation as one of the twelve axioms; it is a metaphysical truth,
and as such, just as certain as the principle of contradiction itself,
which is a metalogical truth, and the common foundation of all
logical demonstration. Whoever denies the necessity, exhibited
for intuition or perception, of the space-relations expressed in
any proposition, may just as well deny the axioms, or that
the conclusion follows from the premises, or, indeed, he may
as well deny the principle of contradiction itself, for all these
relations are equally undemonstrable, immediately evident and
known a priori. For any one to wish to derive the necessity
of space-relations, known in intuition or perception, from the
principle of contradiction by means of a logical demonstration
is just the same as for the feudal superior of an estate to wish
to hold it as the vassal of another. Yet this is what Euclid has
done. His axioms only, he is compelled to leave resting upon
immediate evidence; all the geometrical truths which follow are
demonstrated logically, that is to say, from the agreement of [098]
the assumptions made in the proposition with the axioms which
are presupposed, or with some earlier proposition; or from the
contradiction between the opposite of the proposition and the
assumptions made in it, or the axioms, or earlier propositions, or
even itself. But the axioms themselves have no more immediate
evidence than any other geometrical problem, but only more
simplicity on account of their smaller content.

When a criminal is examined, a procès-verbal is made of
his statement in order that we may judge of its truth from its
consistency. But this is only a makeshift, and we are not satisfied
with it if it is possible to investigate the truth of each of his
answers for itself; especially as he might lie consistently from
the beginning. But Euclid investigated space according to this
first method. He set about it, indeed, under the correct assumption
that nature must everywhere be consistent, and that therefore it
must also be so in space, its fundamental form. Since then the
parts of space stand to each other in a relation of reason and
consequent, no single property of space can be different from
what it is without being in contradiction with all the others.
But this is a very troublesome, unsatisfactory, and roundabout
way to follow. It prefers indirect knowledge to direct, which
is just as certain, and it separates the knowledge that a thing is
from the knowledge why it is, to the great disadvantage of the
science; and lastly, it entirely withholds from the beginner insight
into the laws of space, and indeed renders him unaccustomed
to the special investigation of the ground and inner connection
of things, inclining him to be satisfied with a mere historical
knowledge that a thing is as it is. The exercise of acuteness
which this method is unceasingly extolled as affording consists
merely in this, that the pupil practises drawing conclusions, i.e.,
he practises applying the principle of contradiction, but specially
he exerts his memory to retain all those data whose agreement
[099] is to be tested. Moreover, it is worth noticing that this method
of proof was applied only to geometry and not to arithmetic. In
arithmetic the truth is really allowed to come home to us through
perception alone, which in it consists simply in counting. As the
perception of numbers is in time alone, and therefore cannot be
represented by a sensuous schema like the geometrical figure,
the suspicion that perception is merely empirical, and possibly
illusive, disappeared in arithmetic, and the introduction of the
117
logical method of proof into geometry was entirely due to this

suspicion. As time has only one dimension, counting is the only
arithmetical operation, to which all others may be reduced; and
yet counting is just intuition or perception a priori, to which
there is no hesitation in appealing here, and through which alone
everything else, every sum and every equation, is ultimately
proved. We prove, for example, not that (7 + 9 × 8 - 2)/3 = 42;
but we refer to the pure perception in time, counting thus makes
each individual problem an axiom. Instead of the demonstrations
that fill geometry, the whole content of arithmetic and algebra is
thus simply a method of abbreviating counting. We mentioned
above that our immediate perception of numbers in time extends
only to about ten. Beyond this an abstract concept of the numbers,
fixed by a word, must take the place of the perception; which
does not therefore actually occur any longer, but is only indicated
in a thoroughly definite manner. Yet even so, by the important
assistance of the system of figures which enables us to represent
all larger numbers by the same small ones, intuitive or perceptive
evidence of every sum is made possible, even where we make
such use of abstraction that not only the numbers, but indefinite
quantities and whole operations are thought only in the abstract
and indicated as so thought, as [sqrt](r^b) so that we do not
perform them, but merely symbolise them.
We might establish truth in geometry also, through pure [100]
a priori perception, with the same right and certainty as in
arithmetic. It is in fact always this necessity, known through
perception in accordance with the principle of sufficient reason
of being, which gives to geometry its principal evidence, and
upon which in the consciousness of every one, the certainty of
its propositions rests. The stilted logical demonstration is always
foreign to the matter, and is generally soon forgotten, without
weakening our conviction. It might indeed be dispensed with
altogether without diminishing the evidence of geometry, for
this is always quite independent of such demonstration, which
never proves anything we are not convinced of already, through

another kind of knowledge. So far then it is like a cowardly
soldier, who adds a wound to an enemy slain by another, and
then boasts that he slew him himself.22
After all this we hope there will be no doubt that the evidence
of mathematics, which has become the pattern and symbol of
all evidence, rests essentially not upon demonstration, but upon
immediate perception, which is thus here, as everywhere else,
the ultimate ground and source of truth. Yet the perception which
lies at the basis of mathematics has a great advantage over all
other perception, and therefore over empirical perception. It
is a priori, and therefore independent of experience, which is
always given only in successive parts; therefore everything is
equally near to it, and we can start either from the reason or
from the consequent, as we please. Now this makes it absolutely
[101] reliable, for in it the consequent is known from the reason,
and this is the only kind of knowledge that has necessity; for
example, the equality of the sides is known as established by the
equality of the angles. All empirical perception, on the other
hand, and the greater part of experience, proceeds conversely
from the consequent to the reason, and this kind of knowledge
is not infallible, for necessity only attaches to the consequent on
account of the reason being given, and no necessity attaches to
the knowledge of the reason from the consequent, for the same
22
Spinoza, who always boasts that he proceeds more geometrico, has actually
done so more than he himself was aware. For what he knew with certainty
and decision from the immediate, perceptive apprehension of the nature of the
world, he seeks to demonstrate logically without reference to this knowledge.
He only arrives at the intended and predetermined result by starting from
arbitrary concepts framed by himself (substantia causa sui, &c.), and in the
demonstrations he allows himself all the freedom of choice for which the
nature of the wide concept-spheres afford such convenient opportunity. That
his doctrine is true and excellent is therefore in his case, as in that of geometry,
quite independent of the demonstrations of it. Cf. ch. 13 of supplementary
volume.
119
consequent may follow from different reasons. The latter kind

of knowledge is simply induction, i.e., from many consequents
which point to one reason, the reason is accepted as certain;
but as the cases can never be all before us, the truth here is
not unconditionally certain. But all knowledge through sense-
perception, and the great bulk of experience, has only this
kind of truth. The affection of one of the senses induces the
understanding to infer a cause of the effect, but, as a conclusion
from the consequent to the reason is never certain, illusion, which
is deception of the senses, is possible, and indeed often occurs,
as was pointed out above. Only when several of the senses, or
it may be all the five, receive impressions which point to the
same cause, the possibility of illusion is reduced to a minimum;
but yet it still exists, for there are cases, for example, the case
of counterfeit money, in which all the senses are deceived. All
empirical knowledge, and consequently the whole of natural
science, is in the same position, except only the pure, or as
Kant calls it, metaphysical part of it. Here also the causes are
known from the effects, consequently all natural philosophy rests
upon hypotheses, which are often false, and must then gradually
give place to more correct ones. Only in the case of purposely
arranged experiments, knowledge proceeds from the cause to the
effect, that is, it follows the method that affords certainty; but
these experiments themselves are undertaken in consequence [102]
of hypotheses. Therefore, no branch of natural science, such as
physics, or astronomy, or physiology could be discovered all at
once, as was the case with mathematics and logic, but required
and requires the collected and compared experiences of many
centuries. In the first place, repeated confirmation in experience
brings the induction, upon which the hypothesis rests, so near
completeness that in practice it takes the place of certainty, and
is regarded as diminishing the value of the hypothesis, its source,
just as little as the incommensurability of straight and curved
lines diminishes the value of the application of geometry, or
that perfect exactness of the logarithm, which is not attainable,

diminishes the value of arithmetic. For as the logarithm, or the
squaring of the circle, approaches infinitely near to correctness
through infinite fractions, so, through manifold experience, the
induction, i.e., the knowledge of the cause from the effects,
approaches, not infinitely indeed, but yet so near mathematical
evidence, i.e., knowledge of the effects from the cause, that the
possibility of mistake is small enough to be neglected, but yet the
possibility exists; for example, a conclusion from an indefinite
number of cases to all cases, i.e., to the unknown ground on
which all depend, is an induction. What conclusion of this kind
seems more certain than that all men have the heart on the left
side? Yet there are extremely rare and quite isolated exceptions
of men who have the heart upon the right side. Sense-perception
and empirical science have, therefore, the same kind of evidence.
The advantage which mathematics, pure natural science, and
logic have over them, as a priori knowledge, rests merely upon
this, that the formal element in knowledge upon which all that is
a priori is based, is given as a whole and at once, and therefore
in it we can always proceed from the cause to the effect, while
in the former kind of knowledge we are generally obliged to
[103] proceed from the effect to the cause. In other respects, the law of
causality, or the principle of sufficient reason of change, which
guides empirical knowledge, is in itself just as certain as the other
forms of the principle of sufficient reason which are followed by
the a priori sciences referred to above. Logical demonstrations
from concepts or syllogisms have the advantage of proceeding
from the reason to the consequent, just as much as knowledge
through perception a priori, and therefore in themselves, i.e.,
according to their form, they are infallible. This has greatly
assisted to bring demonstration in general into such esteem. But
this infallibility is merely relative; the demonstration merely
subsumes under the first principles of the science, and it is these
which contain the whole material truth of science, and they
121
must not themselves be demonstrated, but must be founded on

perception. In the few a priori sciences we have named above,
this perception is pure, but everywhere else it is empirical, and
is only raised to universality through induction. If, then, in
the empirical sciences also, the particular is proved from the
general, yet the general, on the other hand, has received its truth
from the particular; it is only a store of collected material, not a
self-constituted foundation.
So much for the foundation of truth. Of the source and
possibility of error many explanations have been tried since
Plato's metaphorical solution of the dove-cot where the wrong
pigeons are caught, &c. (Theætetus, p. 167, et seq.) Kant's
vague, indefinite explanation of the source of error by means of
the diagram of diagonal motion, will be found in the “Critique of
Pure Reason,” p. 294 of the first edition, and p. 350 of the fifth.
As truth is the relation of a judgment to its ground of knowledge,
it is always a problem how the person judging can believe that
he has such a ground of knowledge and yet not have it; that is to
say, how error, the deception of reason, is possible. I find this
possibility quite analogous to that of illusion, or the deception
of the understanding, which has been explained above. My [104]
opinion is (and this is what gives this explanation its proper
place here) that every error is an inference from the consequent
to the reason, which indeed is valid when we know that the
consequent has that reason and can have no other; but otherwise
is not valid. The person who falls into error, either attributes to
a consequent a reason which it cannot have, in which case he
shows actual deficiency of understanding, i.e., deficiency in the
capacity for immediate knowledge of the connection between
the cause and the effect, or, as more frequently happens, he
attributes to the effect a cause which is possible, but he adds to
the major proposition of the syllogism, in which he infers the
cause from the effect, that this effect always results only from
this cause. Now he could only be assured of this by a complete
induction, which, however, he assumes without having made it.

This “always” is therefore too wide a concept, and instead of it he
ought to have used “sometimes” or “generally.” The conclusion
would then be problematical, and therefore not erroneous. That
the man who errs should proceed in this way is due either to
haste, or to insufficient knowledge of what is possible, on account
of which he does not know the necessity of the induction that
ought to be made. Error then is quite analogous to illusion.
Both are inferences from the effect to the cause; the illusion
brought about always in accordance with the law of causality,
and by the understanding alone, thus directly, in perception
itself; the error in accordance with all the forms of the principle
of sufficient reason, and by the reason, thus in thought itself; yet
most commonly in accordance with the law of causality, as will
appear from the three following examples, which may be taken
as types or representatives of the three kinds of error. (1.) The
illusion of the senses (deception of the understanding) induces
error (deception of the reason); for example, if one mistakes a
[105] painting for an alto-relief, and actually takes it for such; the error
results from a conclusion from the following major premise: “If
dark grey passes regularly through all shades to white; the cause
is always the light, which strikes differently upon projections and
depressions, ergo—.” (2.) “If there is no money in my safe, the
cause is always that my servant has got a key for it: ergo—.” (3.)
“If a ray of sunlight, broken through a prism, i.e., bent up or down,
appears as a coloured band instead of round and white as before,
the cause must always be that light consists of homogeneous
rays, differently coloured and refrangible to different degrees,
which, when forced asunder on account of the difference of
their refrangibility, give an elongated and variously-coloured
spectrum: ergo—bibamus!”—It must be possible to trace every
error to such a conclusion, drawn from a major premise which
is often only falsely generalised, hypothetical, and founded on
the assumption that some particular cause is that of a certain
123
effect. Only certain mistakes in counting are to be excepted, and

they are not really errors, but merely mistakes. The operation
prescribed by the concepts of the numbers has not been carried
out in pure intuition or perception, in counting, but some other
operation instead of it.
As regards the content of the sciences generally, it is, in
fact, always the relation of the phenomena of the world to
each other, according to the principle of sufficient reason, under
the guidance of the why, which has validity and meaning only
through this principle. Explanation is the establishment of this
relation. Therefore explanation can never go further than to show
two ideas standing to each other in the relation peculiar to that
form of the principle of sufficient reason which reigns in the
class to which they belong. If this is done we cannot further
be asked the question, why: for the relation proved is that one
which absolutely cannot be imagined as other than it is, i.e., it is
the form of all knowledge. Therefore we do not ask why 2 + 2
= 4; or why the equality of the angles of a triangle determines [106]
the equality of the sides; or why its effect follows any given
cause; or why the truth of the conclusion is evident from the truth
of the premises. Every explanation which does not ultimately
lead to a relation of which no “why” can further be demanded,
stops at an accepted qualitas occulta; but this is the character
of every original force of nature. Every explanation in natural
science must ultimately end with such a qualitas occulta, and
thus with complete obscurity. It must leave the inner nature of a
stone just as much unexplained as that of a human being; it can
give as little account of the weight, the cohesion, the chemical
qualities, &c., of the former, as of the knowing and acting of
the latter. Thus, for example, weight is a qualitas occulta, for it
can be thought away, and does not proceed as a necessity from
the form of knowledge; which, on the contrary, is not the case
with the law of inertia, for it follows from the law of causality,
and is therefore sufficiently explained if it is referred to that law.
There are two things which are altogether inexplicable,—that is

to say, do not ultimately lead to the relation which the principle
of sufficient reason expresses. These are, first, the principle of
sufficient reason itself in all its four forms, because it is the
principle of all explanation, which has meaning only in relation
to it; secondly, that to which this principle does not extend, but
which is the original source of all phenomena; the thing-in-itself,
the knowledge of which is not subject to the principle of sufficient
reason. We must be content for the present not to understand this
thing-in-itself, for it can only be made intelligible by means of
the following book, in which we shall resume this consideration
of the possible achievements of the sciences. But at the point at
which natural science, and indeed every science, leaves things,
because not only its explanation of them, but even the principle
of this explanation, the principle of sufficient reason, does not
[107] extend beyond this point; there philosophy takes them up and
treats them after its own method, which is quite distinct from the
method of science. In my essay on the principle of sufficient
reason, § 51, I have shown how in the different sciences the chief
guiding clue is one or other form of that principle; and, in fact,
perhaps the most appropriate classification of the sciences might
be based upon this circumstance. Every explanation arrived at
by the help of this clue is, as we have said, merely relative; it
explains things in relation to each other, but something which
indeed is presupposed is always left unexplained. In mathematics,
for example, this is space and time; in mechanics, physics, and
chemistry it is matter, qualities, original forces and laws of
nature; in botany and zoology it is the difference of species, and
life itself; in history it is the human race with all its properties
of thought and will: in all it is that form of the principle of
sufficient reason which is respectively applicable. It is peculiar
to philosophy that it presupposes nothing as known, but treats
everything as equally external and a problem; not merely the
relations of phenomena, but also the phenomena themselves, and
125
even the principle of sufficient reason to which the other sciences

are content to refer everything. In philosophy nothing would
be gained by such a reference, as one member of the series is
just as external to it as another; and, moreover, that kind of
connection is just as much a problem for philosophy as what
is joined together by it, and the latter again is just as much a
problem after its combination has been explained as before it.
For, as we have said, just what the sciences presuppose and lay
down as the basis and the limits of their explanation, is precisely
and peculiarly the problem of philosophy, which may therefore
be said to begin where science ends. It cannot be founded upon
demonstrations, for they lead from known principles to unknown,
but everything is equally unknown and external to philosophy.
There can be no principle in consequence of which the world
with all its phenomena first came into existence, and therefore [108]
it is not possible to construct, as Spinoza wished, a philosophy
which demonstrates ex firmis principiis. Philosophy is the most
general rational knowledge, the first principles of which cannot
therefore be derived from another principle still more general.
The principle of contradiction establishes merely the agreement
of concepts, but does not itself produce concepts. The principle of
sufficient reason explains the connections of phenomena, but not
the phenomena themselves; therefore philosophy cannot proceed
upon these principles to seek a causa efficiens or a causa finalis
of the whole world. My philosophy, at least, does not by any
means seek to know whence or wherefore the world exists, but
merely what the world is. But the why is here subordinated to
the what, for it already belongs to the world, as it arises and has
meaning and validity only through the form of its phenomena,
the principle of sufficient reason. We might indeed say that every
one knows what the world is without help, for he is himself that
subject of knowledge of which the world is the idea; and so
far this would be true. But that knowledge is empirical, is in
the concrete; the task of philosophy is to reproduce this in the
abstract to raise to permanent rational knowledge the successive

changing perceptions, and in general, all that is contained under
the wide concept of feeling and merely negatively defined as not
abstract, distinct, rational knowledge. It must therefore consist
of a statement in the abstract, of the nature of the whole world,
of the whole, and of all the parts. In order then that it may not
lose itself in the endless multitude of particular judgments, it
must make use of abstraction and think everything individual in
the universal, and its differences also in the universal. It must
therefore partly separate and partly unite, in order to present to
rational knowledge the whole manifold of the world generally,
according to its nature, comprehended in a few abstract concepts.
[109] Through these concepts, in which it fixes the nature of the world,
the whole individual must be known as well as the universal,
the knowledge of both therefore must be bound together to the
minutest point. Therefore the capacity for philosophy consists
just in that in which Plato placed it, the knowledge of the one in
the many, and the many in the one. Philosophy will therefore be
a sum-total of general judgments, whose ground of knowledge
is immediately the world itself in its entirety, without excepting
anything; thus all that is to be found in human consciousness; it
will be a complete recapitulation, as it were, a reflection, of the
world in abstract concepts, which is only possible by the union
of the essentially identical in one concept and the relegation of
the different to another. This task was already prescribed to
philosophy by Bacon of Verulam when he said: ea demum vera
est philosophia, quae mundi ipsius voces fidelissime reddit, et
veluti dictante mundo conscripta est, et nihil aliud est, quam
ejusdem SIMULACRUM ET REFLECTIO, neque addit quidquam de
proprio, sed tantum iterat et resonat (De Augm. Scient., L. 2,
c. 13). But we take this in a wider sense than Bacon could then
conceive.
The agreement which all the sides and parts of the world have
with each other, just because they belong to a whole, must also be
127
found in this abstract copy of it. Therefore the judgments in this

sum-total could to a certain extent be deduced from each other,
and indeed always reciprocally so deduced. Yet to make the first
judgment possible, they must all be present, and thus implied
as prior to it in the knowledge of the world in the concrete,
especially as all direct proof is more certain than indirect proof;
their harmony with each other by virtue of which they come
together into the unity of one thought, and which arises from the
harmony and unity of the world of perception itself, which is
their common ground of knowledge, is not therefore to be made
use of to establish them, as that which is prior to them, but is [110]
only added as a confirmation of their truth. This problem itself
can only become quite clear in being solved.23
§ 16. After this full consideration of reason as a special
faculty of knowledge belonging to man alone, and the results
and phenomena peculiar to human nature brought about by it, it
still remains for me to speak of reason, so far as it is the guide
of human action, and in this respect may be called practical. But
what there is to say upon this point has found its place elsewhere
in the appendix to this work, where I controvert the existence of
the so-called practical reason of Kant, which he (certainly very
conveniently) explained as the immediate source of virtue, and
as the seat of an absolute (i.e., fallen from heaven) imperative.
The detailed and thorough refutation of this Kantian principle
of morality I have given later in the “Fundamental Problems of
Ethics.” There remains, therefore, but little for me to say here
about the actual influence of reason, in the true sense of the word,
upon action. At the commencement of our treatment of reason we
remarked, in general terms, how much the action and behaviour
of men differs from that of brutes, and that this difference is to be
regarded as entirely due to the presence of abstract concepts in
consciousness. The influence of these upon our whole existence
23
is so penetrating and significant that, on account of them, we are

related to the lower animals very much as those animals that see
are related to those that have no eyes (certain larvae, worms, and
zoophytes). Animals without eyes know only by touch what is
immediately present to them in space, what comes into contact
with them; those which see, on the contrary, know a wide circle
of near and distant objects. In the same way the absence of reason
confines the lower animals to the ideas of perception, i.e., the real
objects which are immediately present to them in time; we, on the
[111] contrary, on account of knowledge in the abstract, comprehend
not only the narrow actual present, but also the whole past and
future, and the wide sphere of the possible; we view life freely on
all its sides, and go far beyond the present and the actual. Thus
what the eye is in space and for sensuous knowledge, reason is,
to a certain extent, in time and for inner knowledge. But as the
visibility of objects has its worth and meaning only in the fact that
it informs us of their tangibility, so the whole worth of abstract
knowledge always consists in its relation to what is perceived.
Therefore men naturally attach far more worth to immediate and
perceived knowledge than to abstract concepts, to that which is
merely thought; they place empirical knowledge before logical.
But this is not the opinion of men who live more in words than
in deeds, who have seen more on paper and in books than in
actual life, and who in their greatest degeneracy become pedants
and lovers of the mere letter. Thus only is it conceivable that
Leibnitz and Wolf and all their successors could go so far astray
as to explain knowledge of perception, after the example of Duns
Scotus, as merely confused abstract knowledge! To the honour
of Spinoza, I must mention that his truer sense led him, on the
contrary, to explain all general concepts as having arisen from
the confusion of that which was known in perception (Eth. II.,
prop. 40, Schol. 1). It is also a result of perverted opinion that in
mathematics the evidence proper to it was rejected, and logical
evidence alone accepted; that everything in general which was
129
not abstract knowledge was comprehended under the wide name

of feeling, and consequently was little valued; and lastly that the
Kantian ethics regarded the good will which immediately asserts
itself upon knowledge of the circumstances, and guides to right
and good action as mere feeling and emotion, and consequently
as worthless and without merit, and would only recognise actions [112]
which proceed from abstract maxims as having moral worth.
The many-sided view of life as a whole which man, as
distinguished from the lower animals, possesses through reason,
may be compared to a geometrical, colourless, abstract, reduced
plan of his actual life. He, therefore, stands to the lower animals
as the navigator who, by means of chart, compass, and quadrant,
knows accurately his course and his position at any time upon the
sea, stands to the uneducated sailors who see only the waves and
the heavens. Thus it is worth noticing, and indeed wonderful,
how, besides his life in the concrete, man always lives another
life in the abstract. In the former he is given as a prey to all
the storms of actual life, and to the influence of the present; he
must struggle, suffer, and die like the brute. But his life in the
abstract, as it lies before his rational consciousness, is the still
reflection of the former, and of the world in which he lives; it is
just that reduced chart or plan to which we have referred. Here in
the sphere of quiet deliberation, what completely possessed him
and moved him intensely before, appears to him cold, colourless,
and for the moment external to him; he is merely the spectator,
the observer. In respect of this withdrawal into reflection he may
be compared to an actor who has played his part in one scene,
and who takes his place among the audience till it is time for
him to go upon the stage again, and quietly looks on at whatever
may happen, even though it be the preparation for his own death
(in the piece), but afterwards he again goes on the stage and
acts and suffers as he must. From this double life proceeds that
quietness peculiar to human beings, so very different from the
thoughtlessness of the brutes, and with which, in accordance with
previous reflection, or a formed determination, or a recognised

necessity, a man suffers or accomplishes in cold blood, what
is of the utmost and often terrible importance to him; suicide,
[113] execution, the duel, enterprises of every kind fraught with danger
to life, and, in general, things against which his whole animal
nature rebels. Under such circumstances we see to what an extent
reason has mastered the animal nature, and we say to the strong:
Ã¹´·Áµ¹¿½ ½Å Ä¿¹ !Ä¿Á! (ferreum certe tibi cor), Il. 24, 521.
Here we can say truly that reason manifests itself practically, and
thus wherever action is guided by reason, where the motives are
abstract concepts, wherever we are not determined by particular
ideas of perception, nor by the impression of the moment which
guides the brutes, there practical reason shows itself. But I have
fully explained in the Appendix, and illustrated by examples,
that this is entirely different from and unrelated to the ethical
worth of actions; that rational action and virtuous action are
two entirely different things; that reason may just as well find
itself in connection with great evil as with great good, and by
its assistance may give great power to the one as well as to the
other; that it is equally ready and valuable for the methodical
and consistent carrying out of the noble and of the bad intention,
of the wise as of the foolish maxim; which all results from the
constitution of its nature, which is feminine, receptive, retentive,
and not spontaneous; all this I have shown in detail in the
Appendix, and illustrated by examples. What is said there would
have been placed here, but on account of my polemic against
Kant's pretended practical reason I have been obliged to relegate
it to the Appendix, to which I therefore refer.
The ideal explained in the Stoical philosophy is the most
complete development of practical reason in the true and genuine
sense of the word; it is the highest summit to which man can
attain by the mere use of his reason, and in it his difference from
the brutes shows itself most distinctly. For the ethics of Stoicism
are originally and essentially, not a doctrine of virtue, but merely
131
a guide to a rational life, the end and aim of which is happiness

through peace of mind. Virtuous conduct appears in it as it [114]
were merely by accident, as the means, not as the end. Therefore
the ethical theory of Stoicism is in its whole nature and point of
view fundamentally different from the ethical systems which lay
stress directly upon virtue, such as the doctrines of the Vedas, of
Plato, of Christianity, and of Kant. The aim of Stoical ethics is
happiness: Äµ»¿Â Ä¿ µÅ´±¹ ¼¿½µ¹½ (virtutes omnes finem habere
beatitudinem) it is called in the account of the Stoa by Stobæus
(Ecl., L. ii. c. 7, p. 114, and also p. 138). Yet the ethics of
Stoicism teach that happiness can only be attained with certainty
through inward peace and quietness of spirit (±Ä±Á±¾¹±), and
that this again can only be reached through virtue; this is the
whole meaning of the saying that virtue is the highest good. But
if indeed by degrees the end is lost sight of in the means, and
virtue is inculcated in a way which discloses an interest entirely
different from that of one's own happiness, for it contradicts this
too distinctly; this is just one of those inconsistencies by means of
which, in every system, the immediately known, or, as it is called,
felt truth leads us back to the right way in defiance of syllogistic
reasoning; as, for example, we see clearly in the ethical teaching
of Spinoza, which deduces a pure doctrine of virtue from the
egoistical suum utile quærere by means of palpable sophisms.
According to this, as I conceive the spirit of the Stoical ethics,
their source lies in the question whether the great prerogative of
man, reason, which, by means of planned action and its results,
relieves life and its burdens so much, might not also be capable
of freeing him at once, directly, i.e., through mere knowledge,
completely, or nearly so, of the sorrows and miseries of every
kind of which his life is full. They held that it was not in keeping
with the prerogative of reason that the nature given with it, which
by means of it comprehends and contemplates an infinity of
things and circumstances, should yet, through the present, and
the accidents that can be contained in the few years of a life that
[115] is short, fleeting, and uncertain, be exposed to such intense pain,

to such great anxiety and suffering, as arise from the tempestuous
strain of the desires and the antipathies; and they believed that
the due application of reason must raise men above them, and
can make them invulnerable. Therefore Antisthenes says: ”µ¹
ºÄ±Ã¸±¹ ½¿Å½, · ²Á¿Ç¿½ (aut mentem parandam, aut laqueum.
Plut. de stoic. repugn., c. 14), i.e., life is so full of troubles
and vexations, that one must either rise above it by means of
corrected thoughts, or leave it. It was seen that want and suffering
did not directly and of necessity spring from not having, but from
desiring to have and not having; that therefore this desire to
have is the necessary condition under which alone it becomes a
privation not to have and begets pain. ŸÅ Àµ½¹± »ÅÀ·½ µÁ³±¶µÄ±¹,
±»»± µÀ¹¸Å¼¹± (non paupertas dolorem efficit, sed cupiditas),
Epict., fragm. 25. Men learned also from experience that it is
only the hope of what is claimed that begets and nourishes the
wish; therefore neither the many unavoidable evils which are
common to all, nor unattainable blessings, disquiet or trouble us,
but only the trifling more or less of those things which we can
avoid or attain; indeed, not only what is absolutely unavoidable
or unattainable, but also what is merely relatively so, leaves us
quite undisturbed; therefore the ills that have once become joined
to our individuality, or the good things that must of necessity
always be denied us, are treated with indifference, in accordance
with the peculiarity of human nature that every wish soon dies
and can no more beget pain if it is not nourished by hope. It
followed from all this that happiness always depends upon the
proportion between our claims and what we receive. It is all
one whether the quantities thus related be great or small, and
the proportion can be established just as well by diminishing the
amount of the first as by increasing the amount of the second; and
in the same way it also follows that all suffering proceeds from
[116] the want of proportion between what we demand and expect and
what we get. Now this want of proportion obviously lies only
133
in knowledge, and it could be entirely abolished through fuller

insight.24 Therefore Chrysippus says: ´µ¹ ¶Ã½ º±Ä½ µ¼Àµ¹Á¹±½ ÄÉ½
ÆÅÃµ¹ ÃÅ¼²±¹½¿½ÄÉ½ (Stob. Ecl., L. ii. c. 7, p. 134), that is, one
ought to live with a due knowledge of the transitory nature of the
things of the world. For as often as a man loses self-command,
or is struck down by a misfortune, or grows angry, or becomes
faint-hearted, he shows that he finds things different from what
he expected, consequently that he was caught in error, and did
not know the world and life, did not know that the will of the
individual is crossed at every step by the chance of inanimate
nature and the antagonism of aims and the wickedness of other
individuals: he has therefore either not made use of his reason
in order to arrive at a general knowledge of this characteristic of
life, or he lacks judgment, in that he does not recognise in the
particular what he knows in general, and is therefore surprised
by it and loses his self-command.25 Thus also every keen
pleasure is an error and an illusion, for no attained wish can give
lasting satisfaction; and, moreover, every possession and every
happiness is but lent by chance for an uncertain time, and may
therefore be demanded back the next hour. All pain rests on the
passing away of such an illusion; thus both arise from defective
knowledge; the wise man therefore holds himself equally aloof
from joy and sorrow, and no event disturbs his ±Ä±Á±¾¹±.
In accordance with this spirit and aim of the Stoa, Epictetus
began and ended with the doctrine as the kernel of his philosophy, [117]
that we should consider well and distinguish what depends upon
us and what does not, and therefore entirely avoid counting
24
Omnes perturbationes judicio censent fieri et opinione. Cic. Tusc., 4, 6.
¤±Á±ÃÃµ¹ Ä¿ÅÂ ±½¸ÁÉÀ¿ÅÂ ¿Å Ä± ÀÁ±³¼±Ä±, ±»»± Ä± ÀµÁ¹ ÄÉ½ ÀÁ±³¼±ÄÉ½
´¿³¼±Ä± (Perturbant homines non res ipsæ, sed de rebus opiniones). Epictet.,
c. v.
25
¤¿ÅÄ¿ ³±Á µÃÄ¹ Ä¿ ±¹Ä¹¿½ Ä¿¹Â ±½¸ÁÉÀ¿¹Â À±½ÄÉ½ ÄÉ½ º±ºÉ½, Ä¿ Ä±Â
ÀÁ¿»·Èµ¹Â Ä±Â º¿¹½±Â ¼· ´Å½±Ã¸±¹ µÆ±Á¼¿¾µ¹½ Ä±¹Â µÀ¹ ¼µÁ¿ÅÂ (Hæc est
causa mortalibus omnium malorum, non posse communes notiones aptare
singularibus). Epict. dissert., ii., 26.
upon the latter, whereby we shall certainly remain free from all
pain, sorrow, and anxiety. But that which alone is dependent
upon us is the will; and here a transition gradually takes place
to a doctrine of virtue, for it is observed that as the outer
world, which is independent of us, determines good and bad
fortune, so inner contentment with ourselves, or the absence of
it, proceeds from the will. But it was then asked whether we
ought to apply the words bonum and malum to the two former
or to the two latter? This was indeed arbitrary and a matter of
choice, and did not make any real difference, but yet the Stoics
disputed everlastingly with the Peripatetics and Epicureans about
it, and amused themselves with the inadmissible comparison of
two entirely incommensurable quantities, and the antithetical,
paradoxical judgments which proceeded from them, and which
they flung at each other. The Paradoxa of Cicero afford us an
interesting collection of these from the Stoical side.
Zeno, the founder, seems originally to have followed a
somewhat different path. The starting-point with him was that for
the attainment of the highest good, i.e., blessedness and spiritual
peace, one must live in harmony with oneself (A¼¿»¿³¿Å¼µ½¿ÅÂ
¾Ã½; ´½ µÃÄ¹ º±¸½ ½± »¿³¿½ º±¹ ÃÅ¼ÆÉ½¿½ ¾Ã½.—Consonanter
vivere: hoc est secundum unam rationem et concordem sibi
vivere. Stob. Ecl. eth. L. ii., c. 7, p. 132. Also: ‘ÁµÄ·½ ´¹±¸µÃ¹½
µ¹½±¹ ÈÅÇ·Â ÃÅ¼ÆÉ½¿½ ±ÅÄÃ ÀµÁ¹ A»¿½ Ä¿½ ²¹¿½. Virtutem esse
animi affectiomem secum per totam vitam consentientem, ibid.,
p. 104.) Now this was only possible for a man if he determined
himself entirely rationally, according to concepts, not according
to changing impressions and moods; since, however, only the
maxims of our conduct, not the consequences nor the outward
circumstances, are in our power, in order to be always consistent
[118] we must set before us as our aim only the maxims and not the
consequences and circumstances, and thus again a doctrine of
virtue is introduced.
But the ethical principle of Zeno—to live in harmony with
135
oneself—appeared even to his immediate successors to be too

formal and empty. They therefore gave it material content by the
addition—“to live in harmony with nature” (A¼¿»¿³¿Å¼µ½ÉÂ ÄÃ
ÆÅÃµ¹ ¶Ã½), which, as Stobæus mentions in another place, was
first added by Kleanthes, and extended the matter very much
on account of the wide sphere of the concept and the vagueness
of the expression. For Kleanthes meant the whole of nature
in general, while Chrysippus meant human nature in particular
(Diog. Laert., 7, 89). It followed that what alone was adapted
to the latter was virtue, just as the satisfaction of animal desires
was adapted to animal natures; and thus ethics had again to be
forcibly united to a doctrine of virtue, and in some way or other
established through physics. For the Stoics always aimed at unity
of principle, as for them God and the world were not dissevered.
The ethical system of Stoicism, regarded as a whole, is in fact
a very valuable and estimable attempt to use the great prerogative
of man, reason, for an important and salutary end; to raise him
above the suffering and pain to which all life is exposed, by
means of a maxim—
“Qua ratione queas traducere leniter œvum:

Ne te semper inops agitet vexetque cupido,
Ne pavor et rerum mediocriter utilium spes,”
and thus to make him partake, in the highest degree, of the

dignity which belongs to him as a rational being, as distinguished
from the brutes; a dignity of which, in this sense at any rate,
we can speak, though not in any other. It is a consequence
of my view of the ethical system of Stoicism that it must be
explained at the part of my work at which I consider what reason [119]
is and what it can do. But although it may to a certain extent
be possible to attain that end through the application of reason,
and through a purely rational system of ethics, and although
experience shows that the happiest men are those purely rational
characters commonly called practical philosophers,—and rightly

so, because just as the true, that is, the theoretical philosopher
carries life into the concept, they carry the concept into life,—yet
it is far from the case that perfection can be attained in this
way, and that the reason, rightly used, can really free us from
the burden and sorrow of life, and lead us to happiness. Rather,
there lies an absolute contradiction in wishing to live without
suffering, and this contradiction is also implied in the commonly
used expression, “blessed life.” This will become perfectly clear
to whoever comprehends the whole of the following exposition.
In this purely rational system of ethics the contradiction reveals
itself thus, the Stoic is obliged in his doctrine of the way to the
blessed life (for that is what his ethical system always remains)
to insert a recommendation of suicide (as among the magnificent
ornaments and apparel of Eastern despots there is always a
costly vial of poison) for the case in which the sufferings of the
body, which cannot be philosophised away by any principles or
syllogistic reasonings, are paramount and incurable; thus its one
aim, blessedness, is rendered vain, and nothing remains as a mode
of escape from suffering except death; in such a case then death
must be voluntarily accepted, just as we would take any other
medicine. Here then a marked antagonism is brought out between
the ethical system of Stoicism and all those systems referred to
above which make virtue in itself directly, and accompanied by
the most grievous sorrows, their aim, and will not allow a man to
end his life in order to escape from suffering. Not one of them,
however, was able to give the true reason for the rejection of
suicide, but they laboriously collected illusory explanations from
[120] all sides: the true reason will appear in the Fourth Book in the
course of the development of our system. But the antagonism
referred to reveals and establishes the essential difference in
fundamental principle between Stoicism, which is just a special
form of endæmonism, and those doctrines we have mentioned,
although both are often at one in their results, and are apparently
137
related. And the inner contradiction referred to above, with which

the ethical system of Stoicism is affected even in its fundamental
thought, shows itself further in the circumstance that its ideal,
the Stoic philosopher, as the system itself represents him, could
never obtain life or inner poetic truth, but remains a wooden,
stiff lay-figure of which nothing can be made. He cannot himself
make use of his wisdom, and his perfect peace, contentment, and
blessedness directly contradict the nature of man, and preclude
us from forming any concrete idea of him. When compared
with him, how entirely different appear the overcomers of the
world, and voluntary hermits that Indian philosophy presents
to us, and has actually produced; or indeed, the holy man of
Christianity, that excellent form full of deep life, of the greatest
poetic truth, and the highest significance, which stands before
us in perfect virtue, holiness, and sublimity, yet in a state of
supreme suffering.26
[121]
26
Second Book. The World As Will.
First Aspect. The Objectification Of The

Will.
Nos habitat, non tartara, sed nec sidera coeli:

Spiritus, in nobis qui viget, illa facit.
[123]
§ 17. In the first book we considered the idea merely as such,
that is, only according to its general form. It is true that as
far as the abstract idea, the concept, is concerned, we obtained
a knowledge of it in respect of its content also, because it has
content and meaning only in relation to the idea of perception,
without which it would be worthless and empty. Accordingly,
directing our attention exclusively to the idea of perception, we
shall now endeavour to arrive at a knowledge of its content, its
more exact definition, and the forms which it presents to us. And
it will specially interest us to find an explanation of its peculiar
significance, that significance which is otherwise merely felt, but
on account of which it is that these pictures do not pass by us
entirely strange and meaningless, as they must otherwise do, but
speak to us directly, are understood, and obtain an interest which
concerns our whole nature.
We direct our attention to mathematics, natural science, and
philosophy, for each of these holds out the hope that it will afford
us a part of the explanation we desire. Now, taking philosophy
First Aspect. The Objectification Of The Will. 139
first, we find that it is like a monster with many heads, each of

which speaks a different language. They are not, indeed, all at
variance on the point we are here considering, the significance
of the idea of perception. For, with the exception of the Sceptics
and the Idealists, the others, for the most part, speak very much in
the same way of an object which constitutes the basis of the idea,
and which is indeed different in its whole being and nature from
the idea, but yet is in all points as like it as one egg is to another. [124]
But this does not help us, for we are quite unable to distinguish
such an object from the idea; we find that they are one and the
same; for every object always and for ever presupposes a subject,
and therefore remains idea, so that we recognised objectivity
as belonging to the most universal form of the idea, which is
the division into subject and object. Further, the principle of
sufficient reason, which is referred to in support of this doctrine,
is for us merely the form of the idea, the orderly combination
of one idea with another, but not the combination of the whole
finite or infinite series of ideas with something which is not idea
at all, and which cannot therefore be presented in perception.
Of the Sceptics and Idealists we spoke above, in examining the
controversy about the reality of the outer world.
If we turn to mathematics to look for the fuller knowledge
we desire of the idea of perception, which we have, as yet,
only understood generally, merely in its form, we find that
mathematics only treats of these ideas so far as they fill time and
space, that is, so far as they are quantities. It will tell us with the
greatest accuracy the how-many and the how-much; but as this
is always merely relative, that is to say, merely a comparison of
one idea with others, and a comparison only in the one respect
of quantity, this also is not the information we are principally in
search of.
Lastly, if we turn to the wide province of natural science, which
is divided into many fields, we may, in the first place, make a
general division of it into two parts. It is either the description of
forms, which I call Morphology, or the explanation of changes,

which I call Etiology. The first treats of the permanent forms,
the second of the changing matter, according to the laws of
its transition from one form to another. The first is the whole
extent of what is generally called natural history. It teaches us,
[125] especially in the sciences of botany and zoology, the various
permanent, organised, and therefore definitely determined forms
in the constant change of individuals; and these forms constitute
a great part of the content of the idea of perception. In natural
history they are classified, separated, united, arranged according
to natural and artificial systems, and brought under concepts
which make a general view and knowledge of the whole of
them possible. Further, an infinitely fine analogy both in the
whole and in the parts of these forms, and running through
them all (unité de plan), is established, and thus they may be
compared to innumerable variations on a theme which is not
given. The passage of matter into these forms, that is to say,
the origin of individuals, is not a special part of natural science,
for every individual springs from its like by generation, which is
everywhere equally mysterious, and has as yet evaded definite
knowledge. The little that is known on the subject finds its place
in physiology, which belongs to that part of natural science I have
called etiology. Mineralogy also, especially where it becomes
geology, inclines towards etiology, though it principally belongs
to morphology. Etiology proper comprehends all those branches
of natural science in which the chief concern is the knowledge
of cause and effect. The sciences teach how, according to an
invariable rule, one condition of matter is necessarily followed by
a certain other condition; how one change necessarily conditions
and brings about a certain other change; this sort of teaching is
called explanation. The principal sciences in this department are
mechanics, physics, chemistry, and physiology.
If, however, we surrender ourselves to its teaching, we soon
become convinced that etiology cannot afford us the information
we chiefly desire, any more than morphology. The latter presents

to us innumerable and infinitely varied forms, which are yet
related by an unmistakable family likeness. These are for us
ideas, and when only treated in this way, they remain always
strange to us, and stand before us like hieroglyphics which [126]
we do not understand. Etiology, on the other hand, teaches us
that, according to the law of cause and effect, this particular
condition of matter brings about that other particular condition,
and thus it has explained it and performed its part. However, it
really does nothing more than indicate the orderly arrangement
according to which the states of matter appear in space and time,
and teach in all cases what phenomenon must necessarily appear
at a particular time in a particular place. It thus determines the
position of phenomena in time and space, according to a law
whose special content is derived from experience, but whose
universal form and necessity is yet known to us independently of
experience. But it affords us absolutely no information about the
inner nature of any one of these phenomena: this is called a force
of nature, and it lies outside the province of causal explanation,
which calls the constant uniformity with which manifestations of
such a force appear whenever their known conditions are present,
a law of nature. But this law of nature, these conditions, and this
appearance in a particular place at a particular time, are all that it
knows or ever can know. The force itself which manifests itself,
the inner nature of the phenomena which appear in accordance
with these laws, remains always a secret to it, something entirely
strange and unknown in the case of the simplest as well as of
the most complex phenomena. For although as yet etiology
has most completely achieved its aim in mechanics, and least
completely in physiology, still the force on account of which a
stone falls to the ground or one body repels another is, in its inner
nature, not less strange and mysterious than that which produces
the movements and the growth of an animal. The science
of mechanics presupposes matter, weight, impenetrability, the
possibility of communicating motion by impact, inertia and so

forth as ultimate facts, calls them forces of nature, and their
[127] necessary and orderly appearance under certain conditions a
law of nature. Only after this does its explanation begin, and
it consists in indicating truly and with mathematical exactness,
how, where and when each force manifests itself, and in referring
every phenomenon which presents itself to the operation of one
of these forces. Physics, chemistry, and physiology proceed in
the same way in their province, only they presuppose more and
accomplish less. Consequently the most complete etiological
explanation of the whole of nature can never be more than an
enumeration of forces which cannot be explained, and a reliable
statement of the rule according to which phenomena appear in
time and space, succeed, and make way for each other. But the
inner nature of the forces which thus appear remains unexplained
by such an explanation, which must confine itself to phenomena
and their arrangement, because the law which it follows does not
extend further. In this respect it may be compared to a section of
a piece of marble which shows many veins beside each other, but
does not allow us to trace the course of the veins from the interior
of the marble to its surface. Or, if I may use an absurd but more
striking comparison, the philosophical investigator must always
have the same feeling towards the complete etiology of the whole
of nature, as a man who, without knowing how, has been brought
into a company quite unknown to him, each member of which
in turn presents another to him as his friend and cousin, and
therefore as quite well known, and yet the man himself, while at
each introduction he expresses himself gratified, has always the
question on his lips: “But how the deuce do I stand to the whole
company?”
Thus we see that, with regard to those phenomena which we
know only as our ideas, etiology can never give us the desired
information that shall carry us beyond this point. For, after all its
explanations, they still remain quite strange to us, as mere ideas
whose significance we do not understand. The causal connection [128]

merely gives us the rule and the relative order of their appearance
in space and time, but affords us no further knowledge of that
which so appears. Moreover, the law of causality itself has
only validity for ideas, for objects of a definite class, and it has
meaning only in so far as it presupposes them. Thus, like these
objects themselves, it always exists only in relation to a subject,
that is, conditionally; and so it is known just as well if we start
from the subject, i.e., a priori, as if we start from the object, i.e.,
a posteriori. Kant indeed has taught us this.
But what now impels us to inquiry is just that we are not
satisfied with knowing that we have ideas, that they are such and
such, and that they are connected according to certain laws, the
general expression of which is the principle of sufficient reason.
We wish to know the significance of these ideas; we ask whether
this world is merely idea; in which case it would pass by us like
an empty dream or a baseless vision, not worth our notice; or
whether it is also something else, something more than idea, and
if so, what. Thus much is certain, that this something we seek
for must be completely and in its whole nature different from
the idea; that the forms and laws of the idea must therefore be
completely foreign to it; further, that we cannot arrive at it from
the idea under the guidance of the laws which merely combine
objects, ideas, among themselves, and which are the forms of the
principle of sufficient reason.
Thus we see already that we can never arrive at the real nature
of things from without. However much we investigate, we can
never reach anything but images and names. We are like a man
who goes round a castle seeking in vain for an entrance, and
sometimes sketching the façades. And yet this is the method that
has been followed by all philosophers before me.
§ 18. In fact, the meaning for which we seek of that world [129]
which is present to us only as our idea, or the transition from
the world as mere idea of the knowing subject to whatever it
may be besides this, would never be found if the investigator

himself were nothing more than the pure knowing subject (a
winged cherub without a body). But he is himself rooted in
that world; he finds himself in it as an individual, that is to say,
his knowledge, which is the necessary supporter of the whole
world as idea, is yet always given through the medium of a
body, whose affections are, as we have shown, the starting-point
for the understanding in the perception of that world. His body
is, for the pure knowing subject, an idea like every other idea,
an object among objects. Its movements and actions are so
far known to him in precisely the same way as the changes of
all other perceived objects, and would be just as strange and
incomprehensible to him if their meaning were not explained
for him in an entirely different way. Otherwise he would see
his actions follow upon given motives with the constancy of a
law of nature, just as the changes of other objects follow upon
causes, stimuli, or motives. But he would not understand the
influence of the motives any more than the connection between
every other effect which he sees and its cause. He would then call
the inner nature of these manifestations and actions of his body
which he did not understand a force, a quality, or a character,
as he pleased, but he would have no further insight into it. But
all this is not the case; indeed the answer to the riddle is given
to the subject of knowledge who appears as an individual, and
the answer is will. This and this alone gives him the key to his
own existence, reveals to him the significance, shows him the
inner mechanism of his being, of his action, of his movements.
The body is given in two entirely different ways to the subject of
knowledge, who becomes an individual only through his identity
with it. It is given as an idea in intelligent perception, as an
[130] object among objects and subject to the laws of objects. And it is
also given in quite a different way as that which is immediately
known to every one, and is signified by the word will. Every true
act of his will is also at once and without exception a movement
of his body. The act of will and the movement of the body
are not two different things objectively known, which the bond
of causality unites; they do not stand in the relation of cause
and effect; they are one and the same, but they are given in
entirely different ways,—immediately, and again in perception
for the understanding. The action of the body is nothing but the
act of the will objectified, i.e., passed into perception. It will
appear later that this is true of every movement of the body, not
merely those which follow upon motives, but also involuntary
movements which follow upon mere stimuli, and, indeed, that
the whole body is nothing but objectified will, i.e., will become
idea. All this will be proved and made quite clear in the course
of this work. In one respect, therefore, I shall call the body the
objectivity of will; as in the previous book, and in the essay on the
principle of sufficient reason, in accordance with the one-sided
point of view intentionally adopted there (that of the idea), I
called it the immediate object. Thus in a certain sense we may
also say that will is the knowledge a priori of the body, and the
body is the knowledge a posteriori of the will. Resolutions of
the will which relate to the future are merely deliberations of
the reason about what we shall will at a particular time, not real
acts of will. Only the carrying out of the resolve stamps it as
will, for till then it is never more than an intention that may be
changed, and that exists only in the reason in abstracto. It is only
in reflection that to will and to act are different; in reality they are
one. Every true, genuine, immediate act of will is also, at once
and immediately, a visible act of the body. And, corresponding
to this, every impression upon the body is also, on the other hand,
at once and immediately an impression upon the will. As such [131]
it is called pain when it is opposed to the will; gratification or
pleasure when it is in accordance with it. The degrees of both
are widely different. It is quite wrong, however, to call pain and
pleasure ideas, for they are by no means ideas, but immediate
affections of the will in its manifestation, the body; compulsory,
instantaneous willing or not-willing of the impression which the

body sustains. There are only a few impressions of the body
which do not touch the will, and it is through these alone that
the body is an immediate object of knowledge, for, as perceived
by the understanding, it is already an indirect object like all
others. These impressions are, therefore, to be treated directly
as mere ideas, and excepted from what has been said. The
impressions we refer to are the affections of the purely objective
senses of sight, hearing, and touch, though only so far as these
organs are affected in the way which is specially peculiar to
their specific nature. This affection of them is so excessively
weak an excitement of the heightened and specifically modified
sensibility of these parts that it does not affect the will, but
only furnishes the understanding with the data out of which the
perception arises, undisturbed by any excitement of the will. But
every stronger or different kind of affection of these organs of
sense is painful, that is to say, against the will, and thus they also
belong to its objectivity. Weakness of the nerves shows itself
in this, that the impressions which have only such a degree of
strength as would usually be sufficient to make them data for the
understanding reach the higher degree at which they influence the
will, that is to say, give pain or pleasure, though more often pain,
which is, however, to some extent deadened and inarticulate,
so that not only particular tones and strong light are painful to
us, but there ensues a generally unhealthy and hypochondriacal
disposition which is not distinctly understood. The identity of
[132] the body and the will shows itself further, among other ways, in
the circumstance that every vehement and excessive movement
of the will, i.e., every emotion, agitates the body and its inner
constitution directly, and disturbs the course of its vital functions.
This is shown in detail in “Will in Nature,” p. 27 of the second
edition and p. 28 of the third.
Lastly, the knowledge which I have of my will, though it
is immediate, cannot be separated from that which I have of
my body. I know my will, not as a whole, not as a unity, not

completely, according to its nature, but I know it only in its
particular acts, and therefore in time, which is the form of the
phenomenal aspect of my body, as of every object. Therefore the
body is a condition of the knowledge of my will. Thus, I cannot
really imagine this will apart from my body. In the essay on
the principle of sufficient reason, the will, or rather the subject
of willing, is treated as a special class of ideas or objects. But
even there we saw this object become one with the subject; that
is, we saw it cease to be an object. We there called this union
the miracle º±Ä½ µ¾¿Ç·½, and the whole of the present work is
to a certain extent an explanation of this. So far as I know
my will specially as object, I know it as body. But then I am
again at the first class of ideas laid down in that essay, i.e., real
objects. As we proceed we shall see always more clearly that
these ideas of the first class obtain their explanation and solution
from those of the fourth class given in the essay, which could
no longer be properly opposed to the subject as object, and that,
therefore, we must learn to understand the inner nature of the
law of causality which is valid in the first class, and of all that
happens in accordance with it from the law of motivation which
governs the fourth class.
The identity of the will and the body, of which we have
now given a cursory explanation, can only be proved in the
manner we have adopted here. We have proved this identity
for the first time, and shall do so more and more fully in the [133]
course of this work. By “proved” we mean raised from the
immediate consciousness, from knowledge in the concrete to
abstract knowledge of the reason, or carried over into abstract
knowledge. On the other hand, from its very nature it can never
be demonstrated, that is, deduced as indirect knowledge from
some other more direct knowledge, just because it is itself the
most direct knowledge; and if we do not apprehend it and stick
to it as such, we shall expect in vain to receive it again in some
indirect way as derivative knowledge. It is knowledge of quite

a special kind, whose truth cannot therefore properly be brought
under any of the four rubrics under which I have classified all
truth in the essay on the principle of sufficient reason, § 29,
the logical, the empirical, the metaphysical, and the metalogical,
for it is not, like all these, the relation of an abstract idea to
another idea, or to the necessary form of perceptive or of abstract
ideation, but it is the relation of a judgment to the connection
which an idea of perception, the body, has to that which is not
an idea at all, but something toto genere different, will. I should
like therefore to distinguish this from all other truth, and call it
º±Ä½ µ¾¿Ç·½ philosophical truth. We can turn the expression of
this truth in different ways and say: My body and my will are
one;—or, What as an idea of perception I call my body, I call
my will, so far as I am conscious of it in an entirely different
way which cannot be compared to any other;—or, My body is
the objectivity of my will;—or, My body considered apart from
the fact that it is my idea is still my will, and so forth.27
§ 19. In the first book we were reluctantly driven to explain
the human body as merely idea of the subject which knows it,
like all the other objects of this world of perception. But it has
now become clear that what enables us consciously to distinguish
our own body from all other objects which in other respects are
[134] precisely the same, is that our body appears in consciousness in
quite another way toto genere different from idea, and this we
denote by the word will; and that it is just this double knowledge
which we have of our own body that affords us information about
it, about its action and movement following on motives, and also
about what it experiences by means of external impressions; in
a word, about what it is, not as idea, but as more than idea; that
is to say, what it is in itself. None of this information have we
got directly with regard to the nature, action, and experience of
27
Cf. Ch. xviii. of the Supplement.
other real objects.

It is just because of this special relation to one body that the
knowing subject is an individual. For regarded apart from this
relation, his body is for him only an idea like all other ideas. But
the relation through which the knowing subject is an individual,
is just on that account a relation which subsists only between him
and one particular idea of all those which he has. Therefore he
is conscious of this one idea, not merely as an idea, but in quite
a different way as a will. If, however, he abstracts from that
special relation, from that twofold and completely heterogeneous
knowledge of what is one and the same, then that one, the body,
is an idea like all other ideas. Therefore, in order to understand
the matter, the individual who knows must either assume that
what distinguishes that one idea from others is merely the fact
that his knowledge stands in this double relation to it alone; that
insight in two ways at the same time is open to him only in
the case of this one object of perception, and that this is to be
explained not by the difference of this object from all others,
but only by the difference between the relation of his knowledge
to this one object, and its relation to all other objects. Or else
he must assume that this object is essentially different from all
others; that it alone of all objects is at once both will and idea,
while the rest are only ideas, i.e., only phantoms. Thus he must
assume that his body is the only real individual in the world, i.e., [135]
the only phenomenon of will and the only immediate object of
the subject. That other objects, considered merely as ideas, are
like his body, that is, like it, fill space (which itself can only be
present as idea), and also, like it, are causally active in space, is
indeed demonstrably certain from the law of causality which is
a priori valid for ideas, and which admits of no effect without a
cause; but apart from the fact that we can only reason from an
effect to a cause generally, and not to a similar cause, we are still
in the sphere of mere ideas, in which alone the law of causality
is valid, and beyond which it can never take us. But whether the
objects known to the individual only as ideas are yet, like his own
body, manifestations of a will, is, as was said in the First Book,
the proper meaning of the question as to the reality of the external
world. To deny this is theoretical egoism, which on that account
regards all phenomena that are outside its own will as phantoms,
just as in a practical reference exactly the same thing is done by
practical egoism. For in it a man regards and treats himself alone
as a person, and all other persons as mere phantoms. Theoretical
egoism can never be demonstrably refuted, yet in philosophy it
has never been used otherwise than as a sceptical sophism, i.e.,
a pretence. As a serious conviction, on the other hand, it could
only be found in a madhouse, and as such it stands in need of a
cure rather than a refutation. We do not therefore combat it any
further in this regard, but treat it as merely the last stronghold
of scepticism, which is always polemical. Thus our knowledge,
which is always bound to individuality and is limited by this
circumstance, brings with it the necessity that each of us can only
be one, while, on the other hand, each of us can know all; and it is
this limitation that creates the need for philosophy. We therefore
who, for this very reason, are striving to extend the limits of our
knowledge through philosophy, will treat this sceptical argument
[136] of theoretical egoism which meets us, as an army would treat a
small frontier fortress. The fortress cannot indeed be taken, but
the garrison can never sally forth from it, and therefore we pass
it by without danger, and are not afraid to have it in our rear.
The double knowledge which each of us has of the nature and
activity of his own body, and which is given in two completely
different ways, has now been clearly brought out. We shall
accordingly make further use of it as a key to the nature of
every phenomenon in nature, and shall judge of all objects which
are not our own bodies, and are consequently not given to our
consciousness in a double way but only as ideas, according to the
analogy of our own bodies, and shall therefore assume that as in
one aspect they are idea, just like our bodies, and in this respect
are analogous to them, so in another aspect, what remains of

objects when we set aside their existence as idea of the subject,
must in its inner nature be the same as that in us which we
call will. For what other kind of existence or reality should we
attribute to the rest of the material world? Whence should we take
the elements out of which we construct such a world? Besides
will and idea nothing is known to us or thinkable. If we wish to
attribute the greatest known reality to the material world which
exists immediately only in our idea, we give it the reality which
our own body has for each of us; for that is the most real thing
for every one. But if we now analyse the reality of this body and
its actions, beyond the fact that it is idea, we find nothing in it
except the will; with this its reality is exhausted. Therefore we
can nowhere find another kind of reality which we can attribute
to the material world. Thus if we hold that the material world is
something more than merely our idea, we must say that besides
being idea, that is, in itself and according to its inmost nature,
it is that which we find immediately in ourselves as will. I say
according to its inmost nature; but we must first come to know [137]
more accurately this real nature of the will, in order that we may
be able to distinguish from it what does not belong to itself, but
to its manifestation, which has many grades. Such, for example,
is the circumstance of its being accompanied by knowledge,
and the determination by motives which is conditioned by this
knowledge. As we shall see farther on, this does not belong to the
real nature of will, but merely to its distinct manifestation as an
animal or a human being. If, therefore, I say,—the force which
attracts a stone to the earth is according to its nature, in itself,
and apart from all idea, will, I shall not be supposed to express
in this proposition the insane opinion that the stone moves itself
in accordance with a known motive, merely because this is the
way in which will appears in man.28 We shall now proceed
28
We can thus by no means agree with Bacon if he (De Augm. Scient., L.
iv. in fine.) thinks that all mechanical and physical movement of bodies has
more clearly and in detail to prove, establish, and develop to its

full extent what as yet has only been provisionally and generally
explained.29
§ 20. As we have said, the will proclaims itself primarily in the
voluntary movements of our own body, as the inmost nature of
this body, as that which it is besides being object of perception,
idea. For these voluntary movements are nothing else than the
visible aspect of the individual acts of will, with which they are
directly coincident and identical, and only distinguished through
the form of knowledge into which they have passed, and in which
alone they can be known, the form of idea.
But these acts of will have always a ground or reason outside
themselves in motives. Yet these motives never determine more
[138] than what I will at this time, in this place, and under these
circumstances, not that I will in general, or what I will in general,
that is, the maxims which characterise my volition generally.
Therefore the inner nature of my volition cannot be explained
from these motives; but they merely determine its manifestation
at a given point of time: they are merely the occasion of my will
showing itself; but the will itself lies outside the province of the
law of motivation, which determines nothing but its appearance
at each point of time. It is only under the presupposition of
my empirical character that the motive is a sufficient ground of
explanation of my action. But if I abstract from my character,
and then ask, why, in general, I will this and not that, no answer
is possible, because it is only the manifestation of the will that is
subject to the principle of sufficient reason, and not the will itself,
always been preceded by perception in these bodies; though a glimmering of
truth lies at the bottom of this false proposition. This is also the case with
Kepler's opinion, expressed in his essay De Planeta Martis, that the planets
must have knowledge in order to keep their elliptical courses so correctly, and
to regulate the velocity of their motion so that the triangle of the plane of their
course always remains proportional to the time in which they pass through its
base.
29
Cf. Ch. xix. of the Supplement.
which in this respect is to be called groundless. At this point

I presuppose Kant's doctrine of the empirical and intelligible
character, and also my own treatment of the subject in “The
Fundamental Problems of Ethics,” pp. 48, 58, and 178, et seq.,
of first edition (p. 174, et seq., of second edition). I shall also
have to speak more fully on the question in the Fourth Book.
For the present, I have only to draw attention to this, that the
fact of one manifestation being established through another, as
here the deed through the motive, does not at all conflict with
the fact that its real nature is will, which itself has no ground; for
as the principle of sufficient reason in all its aspects is only the
form of knowledge, its validity extends only to the idea, to the
phenomena, to the visibility of the will, but not to the will itself,
which becomes visible.
If now every action of my body is the manifestation of an act
of will in which my will itself in general, and as a whole, thus my
character, expresses itself under given motives, manifestation of
the will must be the inevitable condition and presupposition of
every action. For the fact of its manifestation cannot depend upon
something which does not exist directly and only through it, [139]
which consequently is for it merely accidental, and through which
its manifestation itself would be merely accidental. Now that
condition is just the whole body itself. Thus the body itself must
be manifestation of the will, and it must be related to my will as
a whole, that is, to my intelligible character, whose phenomenal
appearance in time is my empirical character, as the particular
action of the body is related to the particular act of the will. The
whole body, then, must be simply my will become visible, must
be my will itself, so far as this is object of perception, an idea
of the first class. It has already been advanced in confirmation
of this that every impression upon my body also affects my
will at once and immediately, and in this respect is called pain
or pleasure, or, in its lower degrees, agreeable or disagreeable
sensation; and also, conversely, that every violent movement
of the will, every emotion or passion, convulses the body and

disturbs the course of its functions. Indeed we can also give an
etiological account, though a very incomplete one, of the origin
of my body, and a somewhat better account of its development
and conservation, and this is the substance of physiology. But
physiology merely explains its theme in precisely the same way as
motives explain action. Thus the physiological explanation of the
functions of the body detracts just as little from the philosophical
truth that the whole existence of this body and the sum total
of its functions are merely the objectification of that will which
appears in its outward actions in accordance with a motive, as
the establishment of the individual action through the motive and
the necessary sequence of the action from the motive conflicts
with the fact that action in general, and according to its nature,
is only the manifestation of a will which itself has no ground. If,
however, physiology tries to refer even these outward actions, the
immediate voluntary movements, to causes in the organism,—for
[140] example, if it explains the movement of the muscles as resulting
from the presence of fluids (“like the contraction of a cord when
it is wet,” says Reil in his “Archiv für Physiologie,” vol. vi. p.
153), even supposing it really could give a thorough explanation
of this kind, yet this would never invalidate the immediately
certain truth that every voluntary motion (functiones animales)
is the manifestation of an act of will. Now, just as little
can the physiological explanation of vegetative life (functiones
naturales vitales), however far it may advance, ever invalidate
the truth that the whole animal life which thus develops itself is
the manifestation of will. In general, then, as we have shown
above, no etiological explanation can ever give us more than the
necessarily determined position in time and space of a particular
manifestation, its necessary appearance there, according to a
fixed law; but the inner nature of everything that appears in this
way remains wholly inexplicable, and is presupposed by every
etiological explanation, and merely indicated by the names,
force, or law of nature, or, if we are speaking of action, character

or will. Thus, although every particular action, under the
presupposition of the definite character, necessarily follows
from the given motive, and although growth, the process of
nourishment, and all the changes of the animal body take place
according to necessarily acting causes (stimuli), yet the whole
series of actions, and consequently every individual act, and
also its condition, the whole body itself which accomplishes
it, and therefore also the process through which and in which it
exists, are nothing but the manifestation of the will, the becoming
visible, the objectification of the will. Upon this rests the perfect
suitableness of the human and animal body to the human and
animal will in general, resembling, though far surpassing, the
correspondence between an instrument made for a purpose and
the will of the maker, and on this account appearing as design,
i.e., the teleological explanation of the body. The parts of the [141]
body must, therefore, completely correspond to the principal
desires through which the will manifests itself; they must be the
visible expression of these desires. Teeth, throat, and bowels
are objectified hunger; the organs of generation are objectified
sexual desire; the grasping hand, the hurrying feet, correspond to
the more indirect desires of the will which they express. As the
human form generally corresponds to the human will generally,
so the individual bodily structure corresponds to the individually
modified will, the character of the individual, and therefore it is
throughout and in all its parts characteristic and full of expression.
It is very remarkable that Parmenides already gave expression
to this in the following verses, quoted by Aristotle (Metaph. iii.
5):—
IÂ ³±Á º±ÃÄ¿Â µÇµ¹ ºÁ±Ã¹½ ¼µ»µÉ½ À¿»Åº±¼ÀÄÉ½

¤ÉÂ ½¿¿Â ±½¸ÁÉÀ¿¹Ã¹ À±ÁµÃÄ·ºµ½; Ä¿ ³±Á ±ÅÄ¿
•ÃÄ¹½, AÀµÁ ÆÁ¿½µµ¹, ¼µ»µÉ½ ÆÅÃ¹Â ±½¸ÁÉÀ¿¹Ã¹
š±¹ À±Ã¹½ º±¹ À±½Ä¹; Ä¿ ³±Á À»µ¿½ µÃÄ¹ ½¿·¼±.
(Ut enim cuique complexio membrorum flexibilium se habet,

ita mens hominibus adest: idem namque est, quod sapit,
membrorum natura hominibus, et omnibus et omni: quod enim
plus est, intelligentia est.)30
§ 21. Whoever has now gained from all these expositions
a knowledge in abstracto, and therefore clear and certain, of
what every one knows directly in concreto, i.e., as feeling, a
knowledge that his will is the real inner nature of his phenomenal
being, which manifests itself to him as idea, both in his actions
and in their permanent substratum, his body, and that his will
is that which is most immediate in his consciousness, though it
has not as such completely passed into the form of idea in which
[142] object and subject stand over against each other, but makes
itself known to him in a direct manner, in which he does not
quite clearly distinguish subject and object, yet is not known
as a whole to the individual himself, but only in its particular
acts,—whoever, I say, has with me gained this conviction will
find that of itself it affords him the key to the knowledge of the
inmost being of the whole of nature; for he now transfers it to
all those phenomena which are not given to him, like his own
phenomenal existence, both in direct and indirect knowledge,
but only in the latter, thus merely one-sidedly as idea alone. He
will recognise this will of which we are speaking not only in
those phenomenal existences which exactly resemble his own,
in men and animals as their inmost nature, but the course of
reflection will lead him to recognise the force which germinates
and vegetates in the plant, and indeed the force through which the
crystal is formed, that by which the magnet turns to the north pole,
the force whose shock he experiences from the contact of two
different kinds of metals, the force which appears in the elective
affinities of matter as repulsion and attraction, decomposition
30
Cf. Ch. xx. of the Supplement, and also in my work, “Ueber den Willen in
der Natur,” the chapters on Physiology and Comparative Anatomy, where the
subject I have only touched upon here is fully discussed.
and combination, and, lastly, even gravitation, which acts so

powerfully throughout matter, draws the stone to the earth and
the earth to the sun,—all these, I say, he will recognise as
different only in their phenomenal existence, but in their inner
nature as identical, as that which is directly known to him so
intimately and so much better than anything else, and which in
its most distinct manifestation is called will. It is this application
of reflection alone that prevents us from remaining any longer at
the phenomenon, and leads us to the thing in itself. Phenomenal
existence is idea and nothing more. All idea, of whatever kind
it may be, all object, is phenomenal existence, but the will alone
is a thing in itself. As such, it is throughout not idea, but toto
genere different from it; it is that of which all idea, all object,
is the phenomenal appearance, the visibility, the objectification. [143]
It is the inmost nature, the kernel, of every particular thing, and
also of the whole. It appears in every blind force of nature and
also in the preconsidered action of man; and the great difference
between these two is merely in the degree of the manifestation,
not in the nature of what manifests itself.
§ 22. Now, if we are to think as an object this thing-in-itself
(we wish to retain the Kantian expression as a standing formula),
which, as such, is never object, because all object is its mere
manifestation, and therefore cannot be it itself, we must borrow
for it the name and concept of an object, of something in some way
objectively given, consequently of one of its own manifestations.
But in order to serve as a clue for the understanding, this can be
no other than the most complete of all its manifestations, i.e., the
most distinct, the most developed, and directly enlightened by
knowledge. Now this is the human will. It is, however, well to
observe that here, at any rate, we only make use of a denominatio
a potiori, through which, therefore, the concept of will receives
a greater extension than it has hitherto had. Knowledge of the
identical in different phenomena, and of difference in similar
phenomena, is, as Plato so often remarks, a sine qua non of
philosophy. But hitherto it was not recognised that every kind

of active and operating force in nature is essentially identical
with will, and therefore the multifarious kinds of phenomena
were not seen to be merely different species of the same genus,
but were treated as heterogeneous. Consequently there could
be no word to denote the concept of this genus. I therefore
name the genus after its most important species, the direct
knowledge of which lies nearer to us and guides us to the indirect
knowledge of all other species. But whoever is incapable of
carrying out the required extension of the concept will remain
involved in a permanent misunderstanding. For by the word will
he understands only that species of it which has hitherto been
[144] exclusively denoted by it, the will which is guided by knowledge,
and whose manifestation follows only upon motives, and indeed
merely abstract motives, and thus takes place under the guidance
of the reason. This, we have said, is only the most prominent
example of the manifestation of will. We must now distinctly
separate in thought the inmost essence of this manifestation
which is known to us directly, and then transfer it to all the
weaker, less distinct manifestations of the same nature, and thus
we shall accomplish the desired extension of the concept of will.
From another point of view I should be equally misunderstood by
any one who should think that it is all the same in the end whether
we denote this inner nature of all phenomena by the word will
or by any other. This would be the case if the thing-in-itself
were something whose existence we merely inferred, and thus
knew indirectly and only in the abstract. Then, indeed, we might
call it what we pleased; the name would stand merely as the
symbol of an unknown quantity. But the word will, which, like
a magic spell, discloses to us the inmost being of everything in
nature, is by no means an unknown quantity, something arrived
at only by inference, but is fully and immediately comprehended,
and is so familiar to us that we know and understand what will
is far better than anything else whatever. The concept of will
has hitherto commonly been subordinated to that of force, but I

reverse the matter entirely, and desire that every force in nature
should be thought as will. It must not be supposed that this is
mere verbal quibbling or of no consequence; rather, it is of the
greatest significance and importance. For at the foundation of
the concept of force, as of all other concepts, there ultimately
lies the knowledge in sense-perception of the objective world,
that is to say, the phenomenon, the idea; and the concept is
constructed out of this. It is an abstraction from the province
in which cause and effect reign, i.e., from ideas of perception,
and means just the causal nature of causes at the point at which [145]
this causal nature is no further etiologically explicable, but is
the necessary presupposition of all etiological explanation. The
concept will, on the other hand, is of all possible concepts the
only one which has its source not in the phenomenal, not in the
mere idea of perception, but comes from within, and proceeds
from the most immediate consciousness of each of us, in which
each of us knows his own individuality, according to its nature,
immediately, apart from all form, even that of subject and object,
and which at the same time is this individuality, for here the
subject and the object of knowledge are one. If, therefore, we
refer the concept of force to that of will, we have in fact referred
the less known to what is infinitely better known; indeed, to
the one thing that is really immediately and fully known to
us, and have very greatly extended our knowledge. If, on the
contrary, we subsume the concept of will under that of force, as
has hitherto always been done, we renounce the only immediate
knowledge which we have of the inner nature of the world, for
we allow it to disappear in a concept which is abstracted from the
phenomenal, and with which we can therefore never go beyond
the phenomenal.
§ 23. The will as a thing in itself is quite different from
its phenomenal appearance, and entirely free from all the forms
of the phenomenal, into which it first passes when it manifests
itself, and which therefore only concern its objectivity, and are
foreign to the will itself. Even the most universal form of all
idea, that of being object for a subject, does not concern it;
still less the forms which are subordinate to this and which
collectively have their common expression in the principle of
sufficient reason, to which we know that time and space belong,
and consequently multiplicity also, which exists and is possible
only through these. In this last regard I shall call time and space
the principium individuationis, borrowing an expression from
[146] the old schoolmen, and I beg to draw attention to this, once
for all. For it is only through the medium of time and space
that what is one and the same, both according to its nature and
to its concept, yet appears as different, as a multiplicity of co-
existent and successive phenomena. Thus time and space are the
principium individuationis, the subject of so many subtleties and
disputes among the schoolmen, which may be found collected
in Suarez (Disp. 5, Sect. 3). According to what has been
said, the will as a thing-in-itself lies outside the province of the
principle of sufficient reason in all its forms, and is consequently
completely groundless, although all its manifestations are entirely
subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason. Further, it is
free from all multiplicity, although its manifestations in time
and space are innumerable. It is itself one, though not in the
sense in which an object is one, for the unity of an object can
only be known in opposition to a possible multiplicity; nor
yet in the sense in which a concept is one, for the unity of a
concept originates only in abstraction from a multiplicity; but it
is one as that which lies outside time and space, the principium
individuationis, i.e., the possibility of multiplicity. Only when
all this has become quite clear to us through the subsequent
examination of the phenomena and different manifestations of
the will, shall we fully understand the meaning of the Kantian
doctrine that time, space and causality do not belong to the
thing-in-itself, but are only forms of knowing.
The uncaused nature of will has been actually recognised,

where it manifests itself most distinctly, as the will of man,
and this has been called free, independent. But on account of
the uncaused nature of the will itself, the necessity to which
its manifestation is everywhere subjected has been overlooked,
and actions are treated as free, which they are not. For every
individual action follows with strict necessity from the effect of
the motive upon the character. All necessity is, as we have already
said, the relation of the consequent to the reason, and nothing [147]
more. The principle of sufficient reason is the universal form of
all phenomena, and man in his action must be subordinated to it
like every other phenomenon. But because in self-consciousness
the will is known directly and in itself, in this consciousness
lies also the consciousness of freedom. The fact is, however,
overlooked that the individual, the person, is not will as a thing-
in-itself, but is a phenomenon of will, is already determined
as such, and has come under the form of the phenomenal, the
principle of sufficient reason. Hence arises the strange fact that
every one believes himself a priori to be perfectly free, even in
his individual actions, and thinks that at every moment he can
commence another manner of life, which just means that he can
become another person. But a posteriori, through experience,
he finds to his astonishment that he is not free, but subjected to
necessity; that in spite of all his resolutions and reflections he
does not change his conduct, and that from the beginning of his
life to the end of it, he must carry out the very character which he
himself condemns, and as it were play the part he has undertaken
to the end. I cannot pursue this subject further at present, for it
belongs, as ethical, to another part of this work. In the meantime,
I only wish to point out here that the phenomenon of the will
which in itself is uncaused, is yet as such subordinated to the law
of necessity, that is, the principle of sufficient reason, so that in
the necessity with which the phenomena of nature follow each
other, we may find nothing to hinder us from recognising in them
the manifestations of will.

Only those changes which have no other ground than a motive,
i.e., an idea, have hitherto been regarded as manifestations of
will. Therefore in nature a will has only been attributed to man,
or at the most to animals; for knowledge, the idea, is of course,
[148] as I have said elsewhere, the true and exclusive characteristic of
animal life. But that the will is also active where no knowledge
guides it, we see at once in the instinct and the mechanical skill
of animals.31 That they have ideas and knowledge is here not
to the point, for the end towards which they strive as definitely
as if it were a known motive, is yet entirely unknown to them.
Therefore in such cases their action takes place without motive,
is not guided by the idea, and shows us first and most distinctly
how the will may be active entirely without knowledge. The bird
of a year old has no idea of the eggs for which it builds a nest;
the young spider has no idea of the prey for which it spins a
web; nor has the ant-lion any idea of the ants for which he digs
a trench for the first time. The larva of the stag-beetle makes the
hole in the wood, in which it is to await its metamorphosis, twice
as big if it is going to be a male beetle as if it is going to be a
female, so that if it is a male there may be room for the horns, of
which, however, it has no idea. In such actions of these creatures
the will is clearly operative as in their other actions, but it is in
blind activity, which is indeed accompanied by knowledge but
not guided by it. If now we have once gained insight into the fact,
that idea as motive is not a necessary and essential condition of
the activity of the will, we shall more easily recognise the activity
of will where it is less apparent. For example, we shall see that
the house of the snail is no more made by a will which is foreign
to the snail itself, than the house which we build is produced
through another will than our own; but we shall recognise in
both houses the work of a will which objectifies itself in both the
31
This is specially treated in the 27th Ch. of the Supplement.
phenomena—a will which works in us according to motives, but

in the snail still blindly as formative impulse directed outwards.
In us also the same will is in many ways only blindly active: in
all the functions of our body which are not guided by knowledge,
in all its vital and vegetative processes, digestion, circulation, [149]
secretion, growth, reproduction. Not only the actions of the
body, but the whole body itself is, as we have shown above,
phenomenon of the will, objectified will, concrete will. All that
goes on in it must therefore proceed through will, although here
this will is not guided by knowledge, but acts blindly according
to causes, which in this case are called stimuli.
I call a cause, in the narrowest sense of the word, that state of
matter, which, while it introduces another state with necessity,
yet suffers just as great a change itself as that which it causes;
which is expressed in the rule, “action and reaction are equal.”
Further, in the case of what is properly speaking a cause, the
effect increases directly in proportion to the cause, and therefore
also the reaction. So that, if once the mode of operation be
known, the degree of the effect may be measured and calculated
from the degree of the intensity of the cause; and conversely the
degree of the intensity of the cause may be calculated from the
degree of the effect. Such causes, properly so called, operate
in all the phenomena of mechanics, chemistry, and so forth; in
short, in all the changes of unorganised bodies. On the other
hand, I call a stimulus, such a cause as sustains no reaction
proportional to its effect, and the intensity of which does not
vary directly in proportion to the intensity of its effect, so that the
effect cannot be measured by it. On the contrary, a small increase
of the stimulus may cause a very great increase of the effect,
or conversely, it may eliminate the previous effect altogether,
and so forth. All effects upon organised bodies as such are of
this kind. All properly organic and vegetative changes of the
animal body must therefore be referred to stimuli, not to mere
causes. But the stimulus, like every cause and motive generally,
[150] never determines more than the point of time and space at which
the manifestation of every force is to take place, and does not
determine the inner nature of the force itself which is manifested.
This inner nature we know, from our previous investigation,
is will, to which therefore we ascribe both the unconscious
and the conscious changes of the body. The stimulus holds
the mean, forms the transition between the motive, which is
causality accompanied throughout by knowledge, and the cause
in the narrowest sense. In particular cases it is sometimes nearer
a motive, sometimes nearer a cause, but yet it can always be
distinguished from both. Thus, for example, the rising of the sap
in a plant follows upon stimuli, and cannot be explained from
mere causes, according to the laws of hydraulics or capillary
attraction; yet it is certainly assisted by these, and altogether
approaches very near to a purely causal change. On the other
hand, the movements of the Hedysarum gyrans and the Mimosa
pudica, although still following upon mere stimuli, are yet very
like movements which follow upon motives, and seem almost to
wish to make the transition. The contraction of the pupils of the
eyes as the light is increased is due to stimuli, but it passes into
movement which is due to motive; for it takes place, because
too strong lights would affect the retina painfully, and to avoid
this we contract the pupils. The occasion of an erection is a
motive, because it is an idea, yet it operates with the necessity
of a stimulus, i.e., it cannot be resisted, but we must put the
idea away in order to make it cease to affect us. This is also
the case with disgusting things, which excite the desire to vomit.
Thus we have treated the instinct of animals as an actual link, of
quite a distinct kind, between movement following upon stimuli,
and action following upon a known motive. Now we might be
asked to regard breathing as another link of this kind. It has been
disputed whether it belongs to the voluntary or the involuntary
movements, that is to say, whether it follows upon motive or
[151] stimulus, and perhaps it may be explained as something which
is between the two. Marshall Hall (“On the Diseases of the

Nervous System,” § 293 sq.) explains it as a mixed function, for
it is partly under the influence of the cerebral (voluntary), and
partly under that of the spinal (non-voluntary) nerves. However,
we are finally obliged to number it with the expressions of will
which result from motives. For other motives, i.e., mere ideas,
can determine the will to check it or accelerate it, and, as is
the case with every other voluntary action, it seems to us that
we could give up breathing altogether and voluntarily suffocate.
And in fact we could do so if any other motive influenced the
will sufficiently strongly to overcome the pressing desire for air.
According to some accounts Diogenes actually put an end to his
life in this way (Diog. Laert. VI. 76). Certain negroes also are
said to have done this (F. B. Osiander “On Suicide” [1813] pp.
170-180). If this be true, it affords us a good example of the
influence of abstract motives, i.e., of the victory of distinctively
rational over merely animal will. For, that breathing is at least
partially conditioned by cerebral activity is shown by the fact that
the primary cause of death from prussic acid is that it paralyses
the brain, and so, indirectly, restricts the breathing; but if the
breathing be artificially maintained till the stupefaction of the
brain has passed away, death will not ensue. We may also
observe in passing that breathing affords us the most obvious
example of the fact that motives act with just as much necessity
as stimuli, or as causes in the narrowest sense of the word, and
their operation can only be neutralised by antagonistic motives,
as action is neutralised by re-action. For, in the case of breathing,
the illusion that we can stop when we like is much weaker than
in the case of other movements which follow upon motives;
because in breathing the motive is very powerful, very near
to us, and its satisfaction is very easy, for the muscles which
accomplish it are never tired, nothing, as a rule, obstructs it, and [152]
the whole process is supported by the most inveterate habit of the
individual. And yet all motives act with the same necessity. The
knowledge that necessity is common to movements following

upon motives, and those following upon stimuli, makes it easier
for us to understand that that also which takes place in our
bodily organism in accordance with stimuli and in obedience
to law, is yet, according to its inner nature—will, which in all
its manifestations, though never in itself, is subordinated to the
principle of sufficient reason, that is, to necessity.32 Accordingly,
we shall not rest contented with recognising that animals, both in
their actions and also in their whole existence, bodily structure
and organisation, are manifestations of will; but we shall extend
to plants also this immediate knowledge of the essential nature
of things which is given to us alone. Now all the movements
of plants follow upon stimuli; for the absence of knowledge,
and the movement following upon motives which is conditioned
by knowledge, constitutes the only essential difference between
animals and plants. Therefore, what appears for the idea as plant
life, as mere vegetation, as blindly impelling force, we shall
claim, according to its inner nature, for will, and recognise it
as just that which constitutes the basis of our own phenomenal
being, as it expresses itself in our actions, and also in the whole
existence of our body itself.
It only remains for us to take the final step, the extension
of our way of looking at things to all those forces which act
in nature in accordance with universal, unchangeable laws, in
conformity with which the movements of all those bodies take
place, which are wholly without organs, and have therefore no
susceptibility for stimuli, and have no knowledge, which is the
[153] necessary condition of motives. Thus we must also apply the
key to the understanding of the inner nature of things, which the
immediate knowledge of our own existence alone can give us,
to those phenomena of the unorganised world which are most
32
This subject is fully worked out in my prize essay on the freedom of the
will, in which therefore (pp. 29-44 of the “Grundprobleme der Ethik”) the
relation of cause, stimulus, and motive has also been fully explained.
remote from us. And if we consider them attentively, if we

observe the strong and unceasing impulse with which the waters
hurry to the ocean, the persistency with which the magnet turns
ever to the north pole, the readiness with which iron flies to
the magnet, the eagerness with which the electric poles seek to
be re-united, and which, just like human desire, is increased by
obstacles; if we see the crystal quickly and suddenly take form
with such wonderful regularity of construction, which is clearly
only a perfectly definite and accurately determined impulse in
different directions, seized and retained by crystallisation; if we
observe the choice with which bodies repel and attract each other,
combine and separate, when they are set free in a fluid state,
and emancipated from the bonds of rigidness; lastly, if we feel
directly how a burden which hampers our body by its gravitation
towards the earth, unceasingly presses and strains upon it in
pursuit of its one tendency; if we observe all this, I say, it will
require no great effort of the imagination to recognise, even at
so great a distance, our own nature. That which in us pursues its
ends by the light of knowledge; but here, in the weakest of its
manifestations, only strives blindly and dumbly in a one-sided
and unchangeable manner, must yet in both cases come under the
name of will, as it is everywhere one and the same—just as the
first dim light of dawn must share the name of sunlight with the
rays of the full mid-day. For the name will denotes that which is
the inner nature of everything in the world, and the one kernel of
every phenomenon.
Yet the remoteness, and indeed the appearance of absolute
difference between the phenomena of unorganised nature and
the will which we know as the inner reality of our own [154]
being, arises chiefly from the contrast between the completely
determined conformity to law of the one species of phenomena,
and the apparently unfettered freedom of the other. For in
man, individuality makes itself powerfully felt. Every one has
a character of his own; and therefore the same motive has not
the same influence over all, and a thousand circumstances which

exist in the wide sphere of the knowledge of the individual,
but are unknown to others, modify its effect. Therefore
action cannot be predetermined from the motive alone, for
the other factor is wanting, the accurate acquaintance with the
individual character, and with the knowledge which accompanies
it. On the other hand, the phenomena of the forces of nature
illustrate the opposite extreme. They act according to universal
laws, without variation, without individuality in accordance
with openly manifest circumstances, subject to the most exact
predetermination; and the same force of nature appears in its
million phenomena in precisely the same way. In order to
explain this point and prove the identity of the one indivisible
will in all its different phenomena, in the weakest as in the
strongest, we must first of all consider the relation of the will as
thing-in-itself to its phenomena, that is, the relation of the world
as will to the world as idea; for this will open to us the best way
to a more thorough investigation of the whole subject we are
considering in this second book.33
§ 24. We have learnt from the great Kant that time, space, and
causality, with their entire constitution, and the possibility of all
their forms, are present in our consciousness quite independently
of the objects which appear in them, and which constitute their
content; or, in other words, they can be arrived at just as well
[155] if we start from the subject as if we start from the object.
Therefore, with equal accuracy, we may call them either forms
of intuition or perception of the subject, or qualities of the
object as object (with Kant, phenomenon), i.e., idea. We may
also regard these forms as the irreducible boundary between
object and subject. All objects must therefore exist in them, yet
33
Cf. Ch. xxiii. of the Supplement, and also the Ch. on the physiology of
plants in my work “Ueber den Willen in der Natur,” and the Ch. on physical
astronomy, which is of great importance with regard to the kernel of my
metaphysic.
the subject, independently of the phenomenal object, possesses

and surveys them completely. But if the objects appearing in
these forms are not to be empty phantoms, but are to have a
meaning, they must refer to something, must be the expression of
something which is not, like themselves, object, idea, a merely
relative existence for a subject, but which exists without such
dependence upon something which stands over against it as a
condition of its being, and independent of the forms of such
a thing, i.e., is not idea, but a thing-in-itself. Consequently it
may at least be asked: Are these ideas, these objects, something
more than or apart from the fact that they are ideas, objects of
the subject? And what would they be in this sense? What is
that other side of them which is toto genere different from idea?
What is the thing-in-itself? The will, we have answered, but for
the present I set that answer aside.
Whatever the thing-in-itself may be, Kant is right in his
conclusion that time, space, and causality (which we afterwards
found to be forms of the principle of sufficient reason, the
general expression of the forms of the phenomenon) are not its
properties, but come to it only after, and so far as, it has become
idea. That is, they belong only to its phenomenal existence, not
to itself. For since the subject fully understands and constructs
them out of itself, independently of all object, they must be
dependent upon existence as idea as such, not upon that which
becomes idea. They must be the form of the idea as such; but
not qualities of that which has assumed this form. They must
be already given with the mere antithesis of subject and object [156]
(not as concepts but as facts), and consequently they must be
only the more exact determination of the form of knowledge in
general, whose most universal determination is that antithesis
itself. Now, that in the phenomenon, in the object, which is in
its turn conditioned by time, space and causality, inasmuch as
it can only become idea by means of them, namely multiplicity,
through co-existence and succession, change and permanence
through the law of causality, matter which can only become idea
under the presupposition of causality, and lastly, all that becomes
idea only by means of these,—all this, I say, as a whole, does
not in reality belong to that which appears, to that which has
passed into the form of idea, but belongs merely to this form
itself. And conversely, that in the phenomenon which is not
conditioned through time, space and causality, and which cannot
be referred to them, nor explained in accordance with them, is
precisely that in which the thing manifested, the thing-in-itself,
directly reveals itself. It follows from this that the most complete
capacity for being known, that is to say, the greatest clearness,
distinctness, and susceptibility of exhaustive explanation, will
necessarily belong to that which pertains to knowledge as such,
and thus to the form of knowledge; but not to that which in
itself is not idea, not object, but which has become knowledge
only through entering these forms; in other words, has become
idea, object. Thus only that which depends entirely upon being
an object of knowledge, upon existing as idea in general and
as such (not upon that which becomes known, and has only
become idea), which therefore belongs without distinction to
everything that is known, and which, on that account, is found
just as well if we start from the subject as if we start from the
object,—this alone can afford us without reserve a sufficient,
exhaustive knowledge, a knowledge which is clear to the very
foundation. But this consists of nothing but those forms of all
[157] phenomena of which we are conscious a priori, and which
may be generally expressed as the principle of sufficient reason.
Now, the forms of this principle which occur in knowledge of
perception (with which alone we are here concerned) are time,
space, and causality. The whole of pure mathematics and pure
natural science a priori is based entirely upon these. Therefore it
is only in these sciences that knowledge finds no obscurity, does
not rest upon what is incomprehensible (groundless, i.e., will),
upon what cannot be further deduced. It is on this account that
Kant wanted, as we have said, to apply the name science specially

and even exclusively to these branches of knowledge together
with logic. But, on the other hand, these branches of knowledge
show us nothing more than mere connections, relations of one
idea to another, form devoid of all content. All content which
they receive, every phenomenon which fills these forms, contains
something which is no longer completely knowable in its whole
nature, something which can no longer be entirely explained
through something else, something then which is groundless,
through which consequently the knowledge loses its evidence
and ceases to be completely lucid. This that withholds itself
from investigation, however, is the thing-in-itself, is that which
is essentially not idea, not object of knowledge, but has only
become knowable by entering that form. The form is originally
foreign to it, and the thing-in-itself can never become entirely
one with it, can never be referred to mere form, and, since this
form is the principle of sufficient reason, can never be completely
explained. If therefore all mathematics affords us an exhaustive
knowledge of that which in the phenomena is quantity, position,
number, in a word, spatial and temporal relations; if all etiology
gives us a complete account of the regular conditions under
which phenomena, with all their determinations, appear in time
and space, but, with it all, teaches us nothing more than why
in each case this particular phenomenon must appear just at [158]
this time here, and at this place now; it is clear that with
their assistance we can never penetrate to the inner nature of
things. There always remains something which no explanation
can venture to attack, but which it always presupposes; the forces
of nature, the definite mode of operation of things, the quality and
character of every phenomenon, that which is without ground,
that which does not depend upon the form of the phenomenal, the
principle of sufficient reason, but is something to which this form
in itself is foreign, something which has yet entered this form,
and now appears according to its law, a law, however, which
only determines the appearance, not that which appears, only the
how, not the what, only the form, not the content. Mechanics,
physics, and chemistry teach the rules and laws according to
which the forces of impenetrability, gravitation, rigidity, fluidity,
cohesion, elasticity, heat, light, affinity, magnetism, electricity,
&c., operate; that is to say, the law, the rule which these forces
observe whenever they enter time and space. But do what we
will, the forces themselves remain qualitates occultæ. For it is
just the thing-in-itself, which, because it is manifested, exhibits
these phenomena, which are entirely different from itself. In
its manifestation, indeed, it is completely subordinated to the
principle of sufficient reason as the form of the idea, but it can
never itself be referred to this form, and therefore cannot be fully
explained etiologically, can never be completely fathomed. It is
certainly perfectly comprehensible so far as it has assumed that
form, that is, so far as it is phenomenon, but its inner nature is not
in the least explained by the fact that it can thus be comprehended.
Therefore the more necessity any knowledge carries with it, the
more there is in it of that which cannot be otherwise thought or
presented in perception—as, for example, space-relations—the
clearer and more sufficing then it is, the less pure objective
[159] content it has, or the less reality, properly so called, is given
in it. And conversely, the more there is in it which must be
conceived as mere chance, and the more it impresses us as given
merely empirically, the more proper objectivity and true reality
is there in such knowledge, and at the same time, the more that is
inexplicable, that is, that cannot be deduced from anything else.
It is true that at all times an etiology, unmindful of its real aim,
has striven to reduce all organised life to chemism or electricity;
all chemism, that is to say quality, again to mechanism (action
determined by the shape of the atom), this again sometimes to
the object of phoronomy, i.e., the combination of time and space,
which makes motion possible, sometimes to the object of mere
geometry, i.e., position in space (much in the same way as we
rightly deduce the diminution of an effect from the square of

the distance, and the theory of the lever in a purely geometrical
manner): geometry may finally be reduced to arithmetic, which,
on account of its one dimension, is of all the forms of the principle
of sufficient reason, the most intelligible, comprehensible, and
completely susceptible of investigation. As instances of the
method generally indicated here, we may refer to the atoms of
Democritus, the vortex of Descartes, the mechanical physics of
Lesage, which towards the end of last century tried to explain
both chemical affinities and gravitation mechanically by impact
and pressure, as may be seen in detail in “Lucrèce Neutonien;”
Reil's form and combination as the cause of animal life, also
tends in this direction. Finally, the crude materialism which even
now in the middle of the nineteenth century has been served
up again under the ignorant delusion that it is original, belongs
distinctly to this class. It stupidly denies vital force, and first
of all tries to explain the phenomena of life from physical and
chemical forces, and those again from the mechanical effects
of the matter, position, form, and motion of imagined atoms,
and thus seeks to reduce all the forces of nature to action and [160]
reaction as its thing-in-itself. According to this teaching, light
is the mechanical vibration or undulation of an imaginary ether,
postulated for this end. This ether, if it reaches the eye, beats
rapidly upon the retina, and gives us the knowledge of colour.
Thus, for example, four hundred and eighty-three billion beats in
a second give red, and seven hundred and twenty-seven billion
beats in a second give violet. Upon this theory, persons who are
colour-blind must be those who are unable to count the beats,
must they not? Such crass, mechanical, clumsy, and certainly
knotty theories, which remind one of Democritus, are quite
worthy of those who, fifty years after the appearance of Goethe's
doctrine of colour, still believe in Newton's homogeneous light,
and are not ashamed to say so. They will find that what is
overlooked in the child (Democritus) will not be forgiven to the
man. They might indeed, some day, come to an ignominious

end; but then every one would slink away and pretend that he
never had anything to do with them. We shall soon have to
speak again of this false reduction of the forces of nature to
each other; so much for the present. Supposing this theory were
possible, all would certainly be explained and established and
finally reduced to an arithmetical problem, which would then be
the holiest thing in the temple of wisdom, to which the principle
of sufficient reason would at last have happily conducted us. But
all content of the phenomenon would have disappeared, and the
mere form would remain. The “what appears” would be referred
to the “how it appears,” and this “how” would be what is a priori
knowable, therefore entirely dependent on the subject, therefore
only for the subject, therefore, lastly, mere phantom, idea and
form of idea, through and through: no thing-in-itself could be
demanded. Supposing, then, that this were possible, the whole
world would be derived from the subject, and in fact, that would
[161] be accomplished which Fichte wanted to seem to accomplish by
his empty bombast. But it is not possible: phantasies, sophisms,
castles in the air, have been constructed in this way, but science
never. The many and multifarious phenomena in nature have
been successfully referred to particular original forces, and as
often as this has been done, a real advance has been made.
Several forces and qualities, which were at first regarded as
different, have been derived from each other, and thus their
number has been curtailed. (For example, magnetism from
electricity.) Etiology will have reached its goal when it has
recognised and exhibited as such all the original forces of nature,
and established their mode of operation, i.e., the law according to
which, under the guidance of causality, their phenomena appear
in time and space, and determine their position with regard to
each other. But certain original forces will always remain over;
there will always remain as an insoluble residuum a content of
phenomena which cannot be referred to their form, and thus
cannot be explained from something else in accordance with the

principle of sufficient reason. For in everything in nature there is
something of which no ground can ever be assigned, of which no
explanation is possible, and no ulterior cause is to be sought. This
is the specific nature of its action, i.e., the nature of its existence,
its being. Of each particular effect of the thing a cause may be
certainly indicated, from which it follows that it must act just at
this time and in this place; but no cause can ever be found from
which it follows that a thing acts in general, and precisely in the
way it does. If it has no other qualities, if it is merely a mote in a
sunbeam, it yet exhibits this unfathomable something, at least as
weight and impenetrability. But this, I say, is to the mote what
his will is to a man; and, like the human will, it is, according
to its inner nature, not subject to explanation; nay, more—it is
in itself identical with this will. It is true that a motive may be
given for every manifestation of will, for every act of will at [162]
a particular time and in a particular place, upon which it must
necessarily follow, under the presupposition of the character of
the man. But no reason can ever be given that the man has this
character; that he wills at all; that, of several motives, just this
one and no other, or indeed that any motive at all, moves his
will. That which in the case of man is the unfathomable character
which is presupposed in every explanation of his actions from
motives is, in the case of every unorganised body, its definitive
quality—the mode of its action, the manifestations of which are
occasioned by impressions from without, while it itself, on the
contrary, is determined by nothing outside itself, and thus is also
inexplicable. Its particular manifestations, through which alone
it becomes visible, are subordinated to the principle of sufficient
reason; it itself is groundless. This was in substance rightly
understood by the schoolmen, who called it forma substantialis.
(Cf. Suarez, Disput. Metaph., disp. xv. sect. 1.)
It is a greater and a commoner error that the phenomena
which we best understand are those which are of most frequent
occurrence, and which are most universal and simple; for, on

the contrary, these are just the phenomena that we are most
accustomed to see about us, and to be ignorant of. It is just as
inexplicable to us that a stone should fall to the earth as that an
animal should move itself. It has been supposed, as we have
remarked above, that, starting from the most universal forces of
nature (gravitation, cohesion, impenetrability), it was possible
to explain from them the rarer forces, which only operate under
a combination of circumstances (for example, chemical quality,
electricity, magnetism), and, lastly, from these to understand
the organism and the life of animals, and even the nature of
human knowing and willing. Men resigned themselves without
a word to starting from mere qualitates occultæ, the elucidation
[163] of which was entirely given up, for they intended to build upon
them, not to investigate them. Such an intention cannot, as we
have already said, be carried out. But apart from this, such
structures would always stand in the air. What is the use of
explanations which ultimately refer us to something which is
quite as unknown as the problem with which we started? Do we
in the end understand more of the inner nature of these universal
natural forces than of the inner nature of an animal? Is not the
one as much a sealed book to us as the other? Unfathomable
because it is without ground, because it is the content, that which
the phenomenon is, and which can never be referred to the form,
to the how, to the principle of sufficient reason. But we, who
have in view not etiology but philosophy, that is, not relative but
unconditioned knowledge of the real nature of the world, take
the opposite course, and start from that which is immediately
and most completely known to us, and fully and entirely trusted
by us—that which lies nearest to us, in order to understand
that which is known to us only at a distance, one-sidedly and
indirectly. From the most powerful, most significant, and most
distinct phenomenon we seek to arrive at an understanding of
those that are less complete and weaker. With the exception of
my own body, all things are known to me only on one side, that
of the idea. Their inner nature remains hidden from me and a
profound secret, even if I know all the causes from which their
changes follow. Only by comparison with that which goes on in
me if my body performs an action when I am influenced by a
motive—only by comparison, I say, with what is the inner nature
of my own changes determined by external reasons, can I obtain
insight into the way in which these lifeless bodies change under
the influence of causes, and so understand what is their inner
nature. For the knowledge of the causes of the manifestation of
this inner nature affords me merely the rule of its appearance in
time and space, and nothing more. I can make this comparison
because my body is the only object of which I know not merely [164]
the one side, that of the idea, but also the other side which
is called will. Thus, instead of believing that I would better
understand my own organisation, and then my own knowing and
willing, and my movements following upon motives, if I could
only refer them to movements due to electrical, chemical, and
mechanical causes, I must, seeing that I seek philosophy and not
etiology, learn to understand from my own movements following
upon motives the inner nature of the simplest and commonest
movements of an unorganised body which I see following upon
causes. I must recognise the inscrutable forces which manifest
themselves in all natural bodies as identical in kind with that
which in me is the will, and as differing from it only in degree.
That is to say, the fourth class of ideas given in the Essay on the
Principle of Sufficient Reason must be the key to the knowledge
of the inner nature of the first class, and by means of the law of
motivation I must come to understand the inner meaning of the
law of causation.
Spinoza (Epist. 62) says that if a stone which has been
projected through the air had consciousness, it would believe
that it was moving of its own will. I add to this only that the
stone would be right. The impulse given it is for the stone what
the motive is for me, and what in the case of the stone appears
as cohesion, gravitation, rigidity, is in its inner nature the same
as that which I recognise in myself as will, and what the stone
also, if knowledge were given to it, would recognise as will.
In the passage referred to, Spinoza had in view the necessity
with which the stone flies, and he rightly desires to transfer this
necessity to that of the particular act of will of a person. I, on
the other hand, consider the inner being, which alone imparts
meaning and validity to all real necessity (i.e., effect following
upon a cause) as its presupposition. In the case of men this is
called character; in the case of a stone it is called quality, but it is
[165] the same in both. When it is immediately known it is called will.
In the stone it has the weakest, and in man the strongest degree
of visibility, of objectivity. St. Augustine recognises, with a
true instinct, this identity of the tendencies of all things with our
own willing, and I cannot refrain from quoting his naïve account
of the matter:—“Si pecora essemus, carnalem vitam et quod
secundum sensum ejusdem est amaremus, idque esset sufficiens
bonum nostrum, et secundum hoc si esset nobis bene, nihil aliud
quæreremus. Item, si arbores essemus, nihil quidem sentientes
motu amare possemus: verumtamen id quasi appetere videremur,
quo feracius essemus, uberiusque fructuosæ. Si essemus lapides,
aut fluctus, aut ventus, aut flamma, vel quid ejusmodi, sine ullo
quidem sensu atque vita, non tamen nobis deesset quasi quidam
nostrorum locorum atque ordinis appetitus. Nam velut amores
corporum momenta sunt ponderum, sive deorsum gravitate, sive
sursum levitate nitantur: ita enim corpus pondere, sicut animus
amore fertur quocunque fertur” (De Civ. Dei, xi. 28).
It ought further to be mentioned that Euler saw that the inner
nature of gravitation must ultimately be referred to an “inclination
and desire” (thus will) peculiar to material bodies (in the 68th
letter to the Princess). Indeed, it is just this that makes him
averse to the conception of gravitation as it existed for Newton,
and he is inclined to try a modification of it in accordance with
the earlier Cartesian theory, and so to derive gravitation from

the impact of an ether upon the bodies, as being “more rational
and more suitable for persons who like clear and intelligible
principles.” He wishes to banish attraction from physics as a
qualitas occulta. This is only in keeping with the dead view of
nature which prevailed at Euler's time as the correlative of the
immaterial soul. It is only worth noticing because of its bearing
upon the fundamental truth established by me, which even at
that time this fine intellect saw glimmering in the distance. He
hastened to turn in time, and then, in his anxiety at seeing all the [166]
prevalent fundamental views endangered, he sought safety in the
old and already exploded absurdities.
We know that multiplicity in general is necessarily conditioned
by space and time, and is only thinkable in them. In this respect
they are called the principium individuationis. But we have
found that space and time are forms of the principle of sufficient
reason. In this principle all our knowledge a priori is expressed,
but, as we showed above, this a priori knowledge, as such,
only applies to the knowableness of things, not to the things
themselves, i.e., it is only our form of knowledge, it is not a
property of the thing-in-itself. The thing-in-itself is, as such,
free from all forms of knowledge, even the most universal,
that of being an object for the subject. In other words, the
thing-in-itself is something altogether different from the idea.
If, now, this thing-in-itself is the will, as I believe I have fully
and convincingly proved it to be, then, regarded as such and
apart from its manifestation, it lies outside time and space, and
therefore knows no multiplicity, and is consequently one. Yet,
as I have said, it is not one in the sense in which an individual
or a concept is one, but as something to which the condition
of the possibility of multiplicity, the principium individuationis,
is foreign. The multiplicity of things in space and time, which
collectively constitute the objectification of will, does not affect
the will itself, which remains indivisible notwithstanding it. It is
not the case that, in some way or other, a smaller part of will is
in the stone and a larger part in the man, for the relation of part
and whole belongs exclusively to space, and has no longer any
meaning when we go beyond this form of intuition or perception.
The more and the less have application only to the phenomenon
of will, that is, its visibility, its objectification. Of this there
is a higher grade in the plant than in the stone; in the animal
a higher grade than in the plant: indeed, the passage of will
[167] into visibility, its objectification, has grades as innumerable as
exist between the dimmest twilight and the brightest sunshine,
the loudest sound and the faintest echo. We shall return later
to the consideration of these grades of visibility which belong
to the objectification of the will, to the reflection of its nature.
But as the grades of its objectification do not directly concern
the will itself, still less is it concerned by the multiplicity of
the phenomena of these different grades, i.e., the multitude of
individuals of each form, or the particular manifestations of each
force. For this multiplicity is directly conditioned by time and
space, into which the will itself never enters. The will reveals
itself as completely and as much in one oak as in millions. Their
number and multiplication in space and time has no meaning with
regard to it, but only with regard to the multiplicity of individuals
who know in space and time, and who are themselves multiplied
and dispersed in these. The multiplicity of these individuals itself
belongs not to the will, but only to its manifestation. We may
therefore say that if, per impossibile, a single real existence, even
the most insignificant, were to be entirely annihilated, the whole
world would necessarily perish with it. The great mystic Angelus
Silesius feels this when he says—
“I know God cannot live an instant without me,

He must give up the ghost if I should cease to be.”
Men have tried in various ways to bring the immeasurable

greatness of the material universe nearer to the comprehension of
us all, and then they have seized the opportunity to make edifying
remarks. They have referred perhaps to the relative smallness
of the earth, and indeed of man; or, on the contrary, they have
pointed out the greatness of the mind of this man who is so
insignificant—the mind that can solve, comprehend, and even
measure the greatness of the universe, and so forth. Now, all this
is very well, but to me, when I consider the vastness of the world, [168]
the most important point is this, that the thing-in-itself, whose
manifestation is the world—whatever else it may be—cannot
have its true self spread out and dispersed after this fashion in
boundless space, but that this endless extension belongs only to
its manifestation. The thing-in-itself, on the contrary, is present
entire and undivided in every object of nature and in every living
being. Therefore we lose nothing by standing still beside any
single individual thing, and true wisdom is not to be gained by
measuring out the boundless world, or, what would be more to
the purpose, by actually traversing endless space. It is rather to
be attained by the thorough investigation of any individual thing,
for thus we seek to arrive at a full knowledge and understanding
of its true and peculiar nature.
The subject which will therefore be fully considered in the
next book, and which has, doubtless, already presented itself to
the mind of every student of Plato, is, that these different grades
of the objectification of will which are manifested in innumerable
individuals, and exist as their unattained types or as the eternal
forms of things, not entering themselves into time and space,
which are the medium of individual things, but remaining fixed,
subject to no change, always being, never becoming, while the
particular things arise and pass away, always become and never
are,—that these grades of the objectification of will are, I say,
simply Plato's Ideas. I make this passing reference to the matter
here in order that I may be able in future to use the word Idea in
this sense. In my writings, therefore, the word is always to be

understood in its true and original meaning given to it by Plato,
and has absolutely no reference to those abstract productions
of dogmatising scholastic reason, which Kant has inaptly and
illegitimately used this word to denote, though Plato had already
appropriated and used it most fitly. By Idea, then, I understand
[169] every definite and fixed grade of the objectification of will, so
far as it is thing-in-itself, and therefore has no multiplicity. These
grades are related to individual things as their eternal forms or
prototypes. The shortest and most concise statement of this
famous Platonic doctrine is given us by Diogenes Laertes (iii.
12): “A »±ÄÉ½ Æ·Ã¹, µ½ ÄÃ ÆÅÃµ¹ Ä±Â ¹´µ±Â ÃÄ±½±¹, º±¸±ÀµÁ
À±Á±´µ¹³¼±Ä±, Ä± ´½ ±»»± Ä±ÅÄ±¹Â µ¿¹ºµ½±¹, Ä¿ÅÄÉ½ A¼¿¹É¼±Ä±
º±¸µÃÄÉÄ±”—(“Plato ideas in natura velut exemplaria dixit
subsistere; cetera his esse similia, ad istarum similitudinem
consistentia”). Of Kant's misuse of the word I take no further
notice; what it is needful to say about it will be found in the
Appendix.
§ 26. The lowest grades of the objectification of will are
to be found in those most universal forces of nature which
partly appear in all matter without exception, as gravity and
impenetrability, and partly have shared the given matter among
them, so that certain of them reign in one species of matter
and others in another species, constituting its specific difference,
as rigidity, fluidity, elasticity, electricity, magnetism, chemical
properties and qualities of every kind. They are in themselves
immediate manifestations of will, just as much as human action;
and as such they are groundless, like human character. Only
their particular manifestations are subordinated to the principle
of sufficient reason, like the particular actions of men. They
themselves, on the other hand, can never be called either effect or
cause, but are the prior and presupposed conditions of all causes
and effects through which their real nature unfolds and reveals
itself. It is therefore senseless to demand a cause of gravity
or electricity, for they are original forces. Their expressions,

indeed, take place in accordance with the law of cause and effect,
so that every one of their particular manifestations has a cause,
which is itself again just a similar particular manifestation which
determines that this force must express itself here, must appear
in space and time; but the force itself is by no means the effect
of a cause, nor the cause of an effect. It is therefore a mistake [170]
to say “gravity is the cause of a stone falling;” for the cause in
this case is rather the nearness of the earth, because it attracts the
stone. Take the earth away and the stone will not fall, although
gravity remains. The force itself lies quite outside the chain of
causes and effects, which presupposes time, because it only has
meaning in relation to it; but the force lies outside time. The
individual change always has for its cause another change just as
individual as itself, and not the force of which it is the expression.
For that which always gives its efficiency to a cause, however
many times it may appear, is a force of nature. As such, it is
groundless, i.e., it lies outside the chain of causes and outside
the province of the principle of sufficient reason in general, and
is philosophically known as the immediate objectivity of will,
which is the “in-itself” of the whole of nature; but in etiology,
which in this reference is physics, it is set down as an original
force, i.e., a qualitas occulta.
In the higher grades of the objectivity of will we see
individuality occupy a prominent position, especially in the case
of man, where it appears as the great difference of individual
characters, i.e., as complete personality, outwardly expressed in
strongly marked individual physiognomy, which influences the
whole bodily form. None of the brutes have this individuality in
anything like so high a degree, though the higher species of them
have a trace of it; but the character of the species completely
predominates over it, and therefore they have little individual
physiognomy. The farther down we go, the more completely
is every trace of the individual character lost in the common
character of the species, and the physiognomy of the species

alone remains. We know the physiological character of the
species, and from that we know exactly what is to be expected
from the individual; while, on the contrary, in the human species
[171] every individual has to be studied and fathomed for himself,
which, if we wish to forecast his action with some degree of
certainty, is, on account of the possibility of concealment that
first appears with reason, a matter of the greatest difficulty. It
is probably connected with this difference of the human species
from all others, that the folds and convolutions of the brain,
which are entirely wanting in birds, and very weakly marked
in rodents, are even in the case of the higher animals far more
symmetrical on both sides, and more constantly the same in each
individual, than in the case of human beings.34 It is further to be
regarded as a phenomenon of this peculiar individual character
which distinguishes men from all the lower animals, that in
the case of the brutes the sexual instinct seeks its satisfaction
without observable choice of objects, while in the case of man
this choice is, in a purely instinctive manner and independent of
all reflection, carried so far that it rises into a powerful passion.
While then every man is to be regarded as a specially determined
and characterised phenomenon of will, and indeed to a certain
extent as a special Idea, in the case of the brutes this individual
character as a whole is wanting, because only the species has a
special significance. And the farther we go from man, the fainter
becomes the trace of this individual character, so that plants have
no individual qualities left, except such as may be fully explained
from the favourable or unfavourable external influences of soil,
climate, and other accidents. Finally, in the inorganic kingdom
of nature all individuality disappears. The crystal alone is to be
regarded as to a certain extent individual. It is a unity of the
34
Wenzel, De Structura Cerebri Hominis et Brutorum, 1812, ch. iii.; Cuvier,
Leçons d'Anat., comp. leçon 9, arts. 4 and 5; Vic. d'Azyr, Hist. de l'Acad. de
Sc. de Paris, 1783, pp. 470 and 483.
tendency in definite directions, fixed by crystallisation, which

makes the trace of this tendency permanent. It is at the same time
a cumulative repetition of its primitive form, bound into unity by
an idea, just as the tree is an aggregate of the single germinating [172]
fibre which shows itself in every rib of the leaves, in every leaf,
in every branch; which repeats itself, and to some extent makes
each of these appear as a separate growth, nourishing itself from
the greater as a parasite, so that the tree, resembling the crystal, is
a systematic aggregate of small plants, although only the whole
is the complete expression of an individual Idea, i.e., of this
particular grade of the objectification of will. But the individuals
of the same species of crystal can have no other difference than
such as is produced by external accidents; indeed we can make at
pleasure large or small crystals of every species. The individual,
however, as such, that is, with traces of an individual character,
does not exist further in unorganised nature. All its phenomena
are expressions of general forces of nature, i.e., of those grades of
the objectification of will which do not objectify themselves (as
is the case in organised nature), by means of the difference of the
individualities which collectively express the whole of the Idea,
but show themselves only in the species, and as a whole, without
any variation in each particular example of it. Time, space,
multiplicity, and existence conditioned by causes, do not belong
to the will or to the Idea (the grade of the objectification of will),
but only to their particular phenomena. Therefore such a force
of nature as, for example, gravity or electricity, must show itself
as such in precisely the same way in all its million phenomena,
and only external circumstances can modify these. This unity
of its being in all its phenomena, this unchangeable constancy
of the appearance of these, whenever, under the guidance of
causality, the necessary conditions are present, is called a law
of nature. If such a law is once learned from experience, then
the phenomenon of that force of nature, the character of which
is expressed and laid down in it, may be accurately forecast
and counted upon. But it is just this conformity to law of the

[173] phenomena of the lower grades of the objectification of will
which gives them such a different aspect from the phenomena of
the same will in the higher, i.e., the more distinct, grades of its
objectification, in animals, and in men and their actions, where
the stronger or weaker influence of the individual character and
the susceptibility to motives which often remain hidden from the
spectator, because they lie in knowledge, has had the result that
the identity of the inner nature of the two kinds of phenomena
has hitherto been entirely overlooked.
If we start from the knowledge of the particular, and not from
that of the Idea, there is something astonishing, and sometimes
even terrible, in the absolute uniformity of the laws of nature. It
might astonish us that nature never once forgets her laws; that
if, for example, it has once been according to a law of nature
that where certain materials are brought together under given
conditions, a chemical combination will take place, or gas will
be evolved, or they will go on fire; if these conditions are fulfilled,
whether by our interposition or entirely by chance (and in this
case the accuracy is the more astonishing because unexpected),
to-day just as well as a thousand years ago, the determined
phenomenon will take place at once and without delay. We are
most vividly impressed with the marvellousness of this fact in the
case of rare phenomena, which only occur under very complex
circumstances, but which we are previously informed will take
place if these conditions are fulfilled. For example, when we
are told that if certain metals, when arranged alternately in fluid
with which an acid has been mixed, are brought into contact,
silver leaf brought between the extremities of this combination
will suddenly be consumed in a green flame; or that under certain
conditions the hard diamond turns into carbonic acid. It is the
ghostly omnipresence of natural forces that astonishes us in such
[174] cases, and we remark here what in the case of phenomena
which happen daily no longer strikes us, how the connection
between cause and effect is really as mysterious as that which is

imagined between a magic formula and a spirit that must appear
when invoked by it. On the other hand, if we have attained to
the philosophical knowledge that a force of nature is a definite
grade of the objectification of will, that is to say, a definite
grade of that which we recognise as our own inmost nature, and
that this will, in itself, and distinguished from its phenomena
and their forms, lies outside time and space, and that, therefore,
the multiplicity, which is conditioned by time and space, does
not belong to it, nor directly to the grade of its objectification,
i.e., the Idea, but only to the phenomena of the Idea; and if
we remember that the law of causality has significance only in
relation to time and space, inasmuch as it determines the position
of the multitude of phenomena of the different Ideas in which
the will reveals itself, governing the order in which they must
appear; if, I say, in this knowledge the inner meaning of the
great doctrine of Kant has been fully grasped, the doctrine that
time, space, and causality do not belong to the thing-in-itself,
but merely to the phenomenon, that they are only the forms of
our knowledge, not qualities of things in themselves; then we
shall understand that this astonishment at the conformity to law
and accurate operation of a force of nature, this astonishment
at the complete sameness of all its million phenomena and the
infallibility of their occurrence, is really like that of a child or a
savage who looks for the first time through a glass with many
facets at a flower, and marvels at the complete similarity of the
innumerable flowers which he sees, and counts the leaves of each
of them separately.
Thus every universal, original force of nature is nothing but a
low grade of the objectification of will, and we call every such [175]
grade an eternal Idea in Plato's sense. But a law of nature is the
relation of the Idea to the form of its manifestation. This form is
time, space, and causality, which are necessarily and inseparably
connected and related to each other. Through time and space
the Idea multiplies itself in innumerable phenomena, but the

order according to which it enters these forms of multiplicity
is definitely determined by the law of causality; this law is as
it were the norm of the limit of these phenomena of different
Ideas, in accordance with which time, space, and matter are
assigned to them. This norm is therefore necessarily related to
the identity of the aggregate of existing matter, which is the
common substratum of all those different phenomena. If all
these were not directed to that common matter in the possession
of which they must be divided, there would be no need for
such a law to decide their claims. They might all at once
and together fill a boundless space throughout an endless time.
Therefore, because all these phenomena of the eternal Ideas are
directed to one and the same matter, must there be a rule for
their appearance and disappearance; for if there were not, they
would not make way for each other. Thus the law of causality is
essentially bound up with that of the permanence of substance;
they reciprocally derive significance from each other. Time and
space, again, are related to them in the same way. For time is
merely the possibility of conflicting states of the same matter,
and space is merely the possibility of the permanence of the same
matter under all sorts of conflicting states. Accordingly, in the
preceding book we explained matter as the union of space and
time, and this union shows itself as change of the accidents in the
permanence of the substance, of which causality or becoming is
the universal possibility. And accordingly, we said that matter is
through and through causality. We explained the understanding
as the subjective correlative of causality, and said matter (and
[176] thus the whole world as idea) exists only for the understanding;
the understanding is its condition, its supporter as its necessary
correlative. I repeat all this in passing, merely to call to mind
what was demonstrated in the First Book, for it is necessary for
the complete understanding of these two books that their inner
agreement should be observed, since what is inseparably united
in the actual world as its two sides, will and idea, has, in order
that we might understand each of them more clearly in isolation,
been dissevered in these two books.
It may not perhaps be superfluous to elucidate further by an
example how the law of causality has meaning only in relation
to time and space, and the matter which consists in the union of
the two. For it determines the limits in accordance with which
the phenomena of the forces of nature divide themselves in the
possession of matter, while the original forces of nature, as the
immediate objectification of will, which, as a thing in itself, is
not subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason, lie outside
these forms, within which alone all etiological explanation has
validity and meaning, and just on that account can never lead us
to the inner reality of nature. For this purpose let us think of some
kind of machine constructed according to the laws of mechanics.
Iron weights begin the motion by their gravity; copper wheels
resist by their rigidity, affect and raise each other and the lever
by their impenetrability, and so on. Here gravity, rigidity, and
impenetrability are original unexplained forces; mechanics only
gives us the condition under which, and the manner in which,
they manifest themselves, appear, and govern a definite matter,
time, and place. If, now, a strong magnet is made to attract
the iron of the weight, and overcome its gravity, the movement
of the machine stops, and the matter becomes forthwith the
scene of quite a different force of nature—magnetism, of which
etiology again gives no further explanation than the condition
under which it appears. Or let us suppose that the copper [177]
discs of such a machine are laid upon zinc plates, and an acid
solution introduced between them. At once the same matter
of the machine has become subject to another original force,
galvanism, which now governs it according to its own laws,
and reveals itself in it through its phenomena; and etiology can
again tell us nothing about this force except the conditions under
which, and the laws in accordance with which, it manifests itself.
Let us now raise the temperature and add pure acid; the whole
machine burns; that is to say, once more an entirely different
force of nature, chemical energy, asserts at this time and in this
place irresistible claims to this particular matter, and reveals
itself in it as Idea, as a definite grade of the objectification of
will. The calcined metal thus produced now unites with an acid,
and a salt is obtained which forms itself into crystals. These
are the phenomena of another Idea, which in itself is again
quite inexplicable, while the appearance of its phenomena is
dependent upon certain conditions which etiology can give us.
The crystals dissolve, mix with other materials, and vegetation
springs up from them—a new phenomenon of will: and so the
same permanent matter may be followed ad infinitum, to observe
how now this and now that natural force obtains a right to it and
temporarily takes possession of it, in order to appear and reveal
its own nature. The condition of this right, the point of time and
space at which it becomes valid, is given by causality, but the
explanation founded upon this law only extends thus far. The
force itself is a manifestation of will, and as such is not subject
to the forms of the principle of sufficient reason, that is, it is
groundless. It lies outside all time, is omnipresent, and seems
as it were to wait constantly till the circumstances occur under
which it can appear and take possession of a definite matter,
supplanting the forces which have reigned in it till then. All
[178] time exists only for the phenomena of such a force, and is
without significance for the force itself. Through thousands of
years chemical forces slumber in matter till the contact with the
reagents sets them free; then they appear; but time exists only
for the phenomena, not for the forces themselves. For thousands
of years galvanism slumbered in copper and zinc, and they lay
quietly beside silver, which must be consumed in flame as soon
as all three are brought together under the required conditions.
Even in the organic kingdom we see a dry seed preserve the
slumbering force through three thousand years, and when at last
the favourable circumstances occur, grow up as a plant.35

If by this exposition the difference between a force of nature
and all its phenomena has been made quite distinct; if we have
seen clearly that the former is the will itself at this particular grade
of its objectification, but that multiplicity comes to phenomena
only through time and space, and that the law of causality is
nothing but the determination of the position of these phenomena
in time and space; then we shall recognise the complete truth
and the deep meaning of Malebranche's doctrine of occasional
causes (causes occasionelles). It is well worth while comparing [179]
this doctrine of his, as he explains it in the “Recherches de la
Vérite,” both in the 3rd Chapter of the second part of the 6th
Book, and in the éclaircissements appended to this chapter, with
this exposition of mine, and observing the complete agreement
of the two doctrines in the case of such different systems of
thought. Indeed I cannot help admiring how Malebranche,
though thoroughly involved in the positive dogmas which his
35
On the 16th of September 1840, at a lecture upon Egyptian Archæology
delivered by Mr. Pettigrew at the Literary and Scientific Institute of London,
he showed some corns of wheat which Sir G. Wilkinson had found in a grave
at Thebes, in which they must have lain for three thousand years. They were
found in an hermetically sealed vase. Mr. Pettigrew had sowed twelve grains,
and obtained a plant which grew five feet high, and the seeds of which were
now quite ripe.—Times, 21st September 1840. In the same way in 1830 Mr.
Haulton produced in the Medical Botanical Society of London a bulbous root
which was found in the hand of an Egyptian mummy, in which it was probably
put in observance of some religious rite, and which must have been at least
two thousand years old. He had planted it in a flower-pot, in which it grew up
and flourished. This is quoted from the Medical Journal of 1830 in the Journal
of the Royal Institute of Great Britain, October 1830, p. 196.—“In the garden
of Mr. Grimstone of the Herbarium, Highgate, London, is a pea in full fruit,
which has sprung from a pea that Mr. Pettigrew and the officials of the British
Museum took out of a vase which had been found in an Egyptian sarcophagus,
where it must have lain 2844 years.”—Times, 16th August 1844. Indeed, the
living toads found in limestone lead to the conclusion that even animal life is
capable of such a suspension for thousands of years, if this is begun in the
dormant period and maintained by special circumstances.
age inevitably forced upon him, yet, in such bonds and under
such a burden, hit the truth so happily, so correctly, and even
knew how to combine it with these dogmas, at all events verbally.
For the power of truth is incredibly great and of unspeakable
endurance. We find constant traces of it in all, even the most
eccentric and absurd dogmas, of different times and different
lands,—often indeed in strange company, curiously mixed up
with other things, but still recognisable. It is like a plant that
germinates under a heap of great stones, but still struggles up
to the light, working itself through with many deviations and
windings, disfigured, worn out, stunted in its growth,—but yet,
to the light.
In any case Malebranche is right: every natural cause is only
an occasional cause. It only gives opportunity or occasion for the
manifestation of the one indivisible will which is the “in-itself”
of all things, and whose graduated objectification is the whole
visible world. Only the appearance, the becoming visible, in
this place, at this time, is brought about by the cause and is so
far dependent on it, but not the whole of the phenomenon, nor
its inner nature. This is the will itself, to which the principle
of sufficient reason has not application, and which is therefore
groundless. Nothing in the world has a sufficient cause of
its existence generally, but only a cause of existence just here
and just now. That a stone exhibits now gravity, now rigidity,
[180] now electricity, now chemical qualities, depends upon causes,
upon impressions upon it from without, and is to be explained
from these. But these qualities themselves, and thus the whole
inner nature of the stone which consists in them, and therefore
manifests itself in all the ways referred to; thus, in general, that
the stone is such as it is, that it exists generally—all this, I say, has
no ground, but is the visible appearance of the groundless will.
Every cause is thus an occasional cause. We have found it to be
so in nature, which is without knowledge, and it is also precisely
the same when motives and not causes or stimuli determine the
point at which the phenomena are to appear, that is to say, in

the actions of animals and human beings. For in both cases it
is one and the same will which appears; very different in the
grades of its manifestation, multiplied in the phenomena of these
grades, and, in respect of these, subordinated to the principle of
sufficient reason, but in itself free from all this. Motives do not
determine the character of man, but only the phenomena of his
character, that is, his actions; the outward fashion of his life, not
its inner meaning and content. These proceed from the character
which is the immediate manifestation of the will, and is therefore
groundless. That one man is bad and another good, does not
depend upon motives or outward influences, such as teaching and
preaching, and is in this sense quite inexplicable. But whether a
bad man shows his badness in petty acts of injustice, cowardly
tricks, and low knavery which he practises in the narrow sphere
of his circumstances, or whether as a conqueror he oppresses
nations, throws a world into lamentation, and sheds the blood
of millions; this is the outward form of his manifestation, that
which is unessential to it, and depends upon the circumstances in
which fate has placed him, upon his surroundings, upon external
influences, upon motives; but his decision upon these motives can
never be explained from them; it proceeds from the will, of which
this man is a manifestation. Of this we shall speak in the Fourth [181]
Book. The manner in which the character discloses its qualities is
quite analogous to the way in which those of every material body
in unconscious nature are disclosed. Water remains water with
its intrinsic qualities, whether as a still lake it reflects its banks,
or leaps in foam from the cliffs, or, artificially confined, spouts
in a long jet into the air. All that depends upon external causes;
the one form is as natural to it as the other, but it will always
show the same form in the same circumstances; it is equally
ready for any, but in every case true to its character, and at all
times revealing this alone. So will every human character under
all circumstances reveal itself, but the phenomena which proceed
from it will always be in accordance with the circumstances.

§ 27. If, from the foregoing consideration of the forces of
nature and their phenomena, we have come to see clearly how
far an explanation from causes can go, and where it must stop if
it is not to degenerate into the vain attempt to reduce the content
of all phenomena to their mere form, in which case there would
ultimately remain nothing but form, we shall be able to settle in
general terms what is to be demanded of etiology as a whole.
It must seek out the causes of all phenomena in nature, i.e., the
circumstances under which they invariably appear. Then it must
refer the multitude of phenomena which have various forms in
various circumstances to what is active in every phenomenon, and
is presupposed in the cause,—original forces of nature. It must
correctly distinguish between a difference of the phenomenon
which arises from a difference of the force, and one which results
merely from a difference of the circumstances under which the
force expresses itself; and with equal care it must guard against
taking the expressions of one and the same force under different
circumstances for the manifestations of different forces, and
[182] conversely against taking for manifestations of one and the
same force what originally belongs to different forces. Now this
is the direct work of the faculty of judgment, and that is why
so few men are capable of increasing our insight in physics,
while all are able to enlarge experience. Indolence and ignorance
make us disposed to appeal too soon to original forces. This
is exemplified with an exaggeration that savours of irony in the
entities and quidities of the schoolmen. Nothing is further from
my desire than to favour their resuscitation. We have just as little
right to appeal to the objectification of will, instead of giving
a physical explanation, as we have to appeal to the creative
power of God. For physics demands causes, and the will is
never a cause. Its whole relation to the phenomenon is not in
accordance with the principle of sufficient reason. But that which
in itself is the will exists in another aspect as idea; that is to
say, is phenomenon. As such, it obeys the laws which constitute

the form of the phenomenon. Every movement, for example,
although it is always a manifestation of will, must yet have a
cause from which it is to be explained in relation to a particular
time and space; that is, not in general in its inner nature, but
as a particular phenomenon. In the case of the stone, this is
a mechanical cause; in that of the movement of a man, it is a
motive; but in no case can it be wanting. On the other hand, the
universal common nature of all phenomena of one particular kind,
that which must be presupposed if the explanation from causes
is to have any sense and meaning, is the general force of nature,
which, in physics, must remain a qualitas occulta, because with
it the etiological explanation ends and the metaphysical begins.
But the chain of causes and effects is never broken by an original
force to which it has been necessary to appeal. It does not run
back to such a force as if it were its first link, but the nearest link,
as well as the remotest, presupposes the original force, and could
otherwise explain nothing. A series of causes and effects may [183]
be the manifestation of the most different kinds of forces, whose
successive visible appearances are conducted through it, as I
have illustrated above by the example of a metal machine. But
the difference of these original forces, which cannot be referred
to each other, by no means breaks the unity of that chain of
causes, and the connection between all its links. The etiology and
the philosophy of nature never do violence to each other, but go
hand in hand, regarding the same object from different points of
view. Etiology gives an account of the causes which necessarily
produce the particular phenomenon to be explained. It exhibits, as
the foundation of all its explanations, the universal forces which
are active in all these causes and effects. It accurately defines,
enumerates, and distinguishes these forces, and then indicates all
the different effects in which each force appears, regulated by
the difference of the circumstances, always in accordance with
its own peculiar character, which it discloses in obedience to an
invariable rule, called a law of nature. When all this has been
thoroughly accomplished by physics in every particular, it will
be complete, and its work will be done. There will then remain
no unknown force in unorganised nature, nor any effect, which
has not been proved to be the manifestation of one of these forces
under definite circumstances, in accordance with a law of nature.
Yet a law of nature remains merely the observed rule according
to which nature invariably proceeds whenever certain definite
circumstances occur. Therefore a law of nature may be defined
as a fact expressed generally—un fait généralisé—and thus a
complete enumeration of all the laws of nature would only be a
complete register of facts. The consideration of nature as a whole
is thus completed in morphology, which enumerates, compares,
and arranges all the enduring forms of organised nature. Of the
causes of the appearance of the individual creature it has little
[184] to say, for in all cases this is procreation (the theory of which
is a separate matter), and in rare cases the generatio æquivoca.
But to this last belongs, strictly speaking, the manner in which
all the lower grades of the objectification of will, that is to say,
physical and chemical phenomena, appear as individual, and it is
precisely the task of etiology to point out the conditions of this
appearance. Philosophy, on the other hand, concerns itself only
with the universal, in nature as everywhere else. The original
forces themselves are here its object, and it recognises in them
the different grades of the objectivity of will, which is the inner
nature, the “in-itself” of this world; and when it regards the world
apart from will, it explains it as merely the idea of the subject.
But if etiology, instead of preparing the way for philosophy, and
supplying its doctrines with practical application by means of
instances, supposes that its aim is rather to deny the existence
of all original forces, except perhaps one, the most general,
for example, impenetrability, which it imagines it thoroughly
understands, and consequently seeks forcibly to refer all the
others to it—it forsakes its own province and can only give
us error instead of truth. The content of nature is supplanted

by its form, everything is ascribed to the circumstances which
work from without, and nothing to the inner nature of the thing.
Now if it were possible to succeed by this method, a problem in
arithmetic would ultimately, as we have already remarked, solve
the riddle of the universe. But this is the method adopted by those,
referred to above, who think that all physiological effects ought to
be reduced to form and combination, this, perhaps, to electricity,
and this again to chemism, and chemism to mechanism. The
mistake of Descartes, for example, and of all the Atomists, was
of this last description. They referred the movements of the
globe to the impact of a fluid, and the qualities of matter to the
connection and form of the atoms, and hence they laboured to
explain all the phenomena of nature as merely manifestations
of impenetrability and cohesion. Although this has been given [185]
up, precisely the same error is committed in our own day
by the electrical, chemical, and mechanical physiologists, who
obstinately attempt to explain the whole of life and all the
functions of the organism from “form and combination.” In
Meckel's “Archiv für Physiologie” (1820, vol. v. p. 185) we
still find it stated that the aim of physiological explanation is
the reduction of organic life to the universal forces with which
physics deals. Lamarck also, in his “Philosophie Zoologique,”
explains life as merely the effect of warmth and electricity: le
calorique et la matière électrique suffisent parfaitement pour
composer ensemble cette cause essentielle de la vie (p. 16).
According to this, warmth and electricity would be the “thing-
in-itself,” and the world of animals and plants its phenomenal
appearance. The absurdity of this opinion becomes glaringly
apparent at the 306th and following pages of that work. It is well
known that all these opinions, that have been so often refuted,
have reappeared quite recently with renewed confidence. If
we carefully examine the foundation of these views, we shall
find that they ultimately involve the presupposition that the
organism is merely an aggregate of phenomena of physical,

chemical, and mechanical forces, which have come together
here by chance, and produced the organism as a freak of nature
without further significance. The organism of an animal or of a
human being would therefore be, if considered philosophically,
not the exhibition of a special Idea, that is, not itself immediate
objectivity of the will at a definite higher grade, but in it would
appear only those Ideas which objectify the will in electricity,
in chemism, and in mechanism. Thus the organism would be
as fortuitously constructed by the concurrence of these forces as
the forms of men and beasts in clouds and stalactites, and would
therefore in itself be no more interesting than they are. However,
we shall see immediately how far the application of physical and
[186] chemical modes of explanation to the organism may yet, within
certain limits, be allowable and useful; for I shall explain that
the vital force certainly avails itself of and uses the forces of
unorganised nature; yet these forces no more constitute the vital
force than a hammer and anvil make a blacksmith. Therefore even
the most simple example of plant life can never be explained from
these forces by any theory of capillary attraction and endosmose,
much less animal life. The following observations will prepare
the way for this somewhat difficult discussion.
It follows from all that has been said that it is certainly an error
on the part of natural science to seek to refer the higher grades of
the objectification of will to the lower; for the failure to recognise,
or the denial of, original and self-existing forces of nature is just
as wrong as the groundless assumption of special forces when
what occurs is merely a peculiar kind of manifestation of what
is already known. Thus Kant rightly says that it would be
absurd to hope for a blade of grass from a Newton, that is,
from one who reduced the blade of grass to the manifestations of
physical and chemical forces, of which it was the chance product,
and therefore a mere freak of nature, in which no special Idea
appeared, i.e., the will did not directly reveal itself in it in a higher
and specific grade, but just as in the phenomena of unorganised

nature and by chance in this form. The schoolmen, who certainly
would not have allowed such a doctrine, would rightly have
said that it was a complete denial of the forma substantialis,
and a degradation of it to the forma accidentalis. For the forma
substantialis of Aristotle denotes exactly what I call the grade
of the objectification of will in a thing. On the other hand, it
is not to be overlooked that in all Ideas, that is, in all forces of
unorganised, and all forms of organised nature, it is one and the
same will that reveals itself, that is to say, which enters the form
of the idea and passes into objectivity. Its unity must therefore
be also recognisable through an inner relationship between all [187]
its phenomena. Now this reveals itself in the higher grades of
the objectification of will, where the whole phenomenon is more
distinct, thus in the vegetable and animal kingdoms, through
the universally prevailing analogy of all forms, the fundamental
type which recurs in all phenomena. This has, therefore, become
the guiding principle of the admirable zoological system which
was originated by the French in this century, and it is most
completely established in comparative anatomy as l'unité de
plan, l'uniformité de l'élément anatomique. To discover this
fundamental type has been the chief concern, or at any rate
the praiseworthy endeavour, of the natural philosophers of the
school of Schelling, who have in this respect considerable merit,
although in many cases their hunt after analogies in nature
degenerated into mere conceits. They have, however, rightly
shown that that general relationship and family likeness exists
also in the Ideas of unorganised nature; for example, between
electricity and magnetism, the identity of which was afterwards
established; between chemical attraction and gravitation, and so
forth. They specially called attention to the fact that polarity, that
is, the sundering of a force into two qualitatively different and
opposed activities striving after reunion, which also shows itself
for the most part in space as a dispersion in opposite directions, is
a fundamental type of almost all the phenomena of nature, from

the magnet and the crystal to man himself. Yet this knowledge
has been current in China from the earliest times, in the doctrine
of opposition of Yin and Yang. Indeed, since all things in
the world are the objectification of one and the same will, and
therefore in their inner nature identical, it must not only be the
case that there is that unmistakable analogy between them, and
that in every phenomenon the trace, intimation, and plan of the
[188] higher phenomenon that lies next to it in point of development
shows itself, but also because all these forms belong to the world
as idea, it is indeed conceivable that even in the most universal
forms of the idea, in that peculiar framework of the phenomenal
world space and time, it may be possible to discern and establish
the fundamental type, intimation, and plan of what fills the forms.
It seems to have been a dim notion of this that was the origin of the
Cabala and all the mathematical philosophy of the Pythagoreans,
and also of the Chinese in Y-king. In the school of Schelling also,
to which we have already referred, we find, among their efforts
to bring to light the similarity among the phenomena of nature,
several attempts (though rather unfortunate ones) to deduce laws
of nature from the laws of pure space and time. However, one
can never tell to what extent a man of genius will realise both
endeavours.
Now, although the difference between phenomenon and thing-
in-itself is never lost sight of, and therefore the identity of the
will which objectifies itself in all Ideas can never (because it
has different grades of its objectification) be distorted to mean
identity of the particular Ideas themselves in which it appears,
so that, for example, chemical or electrical attraction can never
be reduced to the attraction of gravitation, although this inner
analogy is known, and the former may be regarded as, so to
speak, higher powers of the latter, just as little does the similarity
of the construction of all animals warrant us in mixing and
identifying the species and explaining the more developed as
mere variations of the less developed; and although, finally,

the physiological functions are never to be reduced to chemical
or physical processes, yet, in justification of this procedure,
within certain limits, we may accept the following observations
as highly probable.
If several of the phenomena of will in the lower grades of
its objectification—that is, in unorganised nature—come into
conflict because each of them, under the guidance of causality, [189]
seeks to possess a given portion of matter, there arises from
the conflict the phenomenon of a higher Idea which prevails
over all the less developed phenomena previously there, yet in
such a way that it allows the essence of these to continue to
exist in a subordinate manner, in that it takes up into itself from
them something which is analogous to them. This process is
only intelligible from the identity of the will which manifests
itself in all the Ideas, and which is always striving after higher
objectification. We thus see, for example, in the hardening of
the bones, an unmistakable analogy to crystallisation, as the
force which originally had possession of the chalk, although
ossification is never to be reduced to crystallisation. The analogy
shows itself in a weaker degree in the flesh becoming firm. The
combination of humours in the animal body and secretion are
also analogous to chemical combination and separation. Indeed,
the laws of chemistry are still strongly operative in this case,
but subordinated, very much modified, and mastered by a higher
Idea; therefore mere chemical forces outside the organism will
never afford us such humours; but
“Encheiresin naturæ nennt es die Chemie,

Spottet ihrer selbst und weiss nicht wie.”
The more developed Idea resulting from this victory over

several lower Ideas or objectifications of will, gains an entirely
new character by taking up into itself from every Idea over which
it has prevailed a strengthened analogy. The will objectifies itself

in a new, more distinct way. It originally appears in generatio
æquivoca; afterwards in assimilation to the given germ, organic
moisture, plant, animal, man. Thus from the strife of lower
phenomena the higher arise, swallowing them all up, but yet
realising in the higher grade the tendency of all the lower. Here,
then, already the law applies—Serpens nisi serpentem comederit
[190] non fit draco.
I wish it had been possible for me to dispel by clearness of
explanation the obscurity which clings to the subject of these
thoughts; but I see very well that the reader's own consideration
of the matter must materially aid me if I am not to remain
uncomprehended or misunderstood. According to the view I
have expressed, the traces of chemical and physical modes of
operation will indeed be found in the organism, but it can never
be explained from them; because it is by no means a phenomenon
even accidentally brought about through the united actions of
such forces, but a higher Idea which has overcome these lower
ideas by subduing assimilation; for the one will which objectifies
itself in all Ideas always seeks the highest possible objectification,
and has therefore in this case given up the lower grades of its
manifestation after a conflict, in order to appear in a higher
grade, and one so much the more powerful. No victory without
conflict: since the higher Idea or objectification of will can
only appear through the conquest of the lower, it endures the
opposition of these lower Ideas, which, although brought into
subjection, still constantly strive to obtain an independent and
complete expression of their being. The magnet that has attracted
a piece of iron carries on a perpetual conflict with gravitation,
which, as the lower objectification of will, has a prior right to the
matter of the iron; and in this constant battle the magnet indeed
grows stronger, for the opposition excites it, as it were, to greater
effort. In the same way every manifestation of the will, including
that which expresses itself in the human organism, wages a
constant war against the many physical and chemical forces

which, as lower Ideas, have a prior right to that matter. Thus
the arm falls which for a while, overcoming gravity, we have
held stretched out; thus the pleasing sensation of health, which
proclaims the victory of the Idea of the self-conscious organism
over the physical and chemical laws, which originally governed
the humours of the body, is so often interrupted, and is indeed [191]
always accompanied by greater or less discomfort, which arises
from the resistance of these forces, and on account of which the
vegetative part of our life is constantly attended by slight pain.
Thus also digestion weakens all the animal functions, because it
requires the whole vital force to overcome the chemical forces
of nature by assimilation. Hence also in general the burden of
physical life, the necessity of sleep, and, finally, of death; for at
last these subdued forces of nature, assisted by circumstances,
win back from the organism, wearied even by the constant
victory, the matter it took from them, and attain to an unimpeded
expression of their being. We may therefore say that every
organism expresses the Idea of which it is the image, only after
we have subtracted the part of its force which is expended in
subduing the lower Ideas that strive with it for matter. This
seems to have been running in the mind of Jacob Böhm when he
says somewhere that all the bodies of men and animals, and even
all plants, are really half dead. According as the subjection in
the organism of these forces of nature, which express the lower
grades of the objectification of will, is more or less successful,
the more or the less completely does it attain to the expression of
its Idea; that is to say, the nearer it is to the ideal or the further
from it—the ideal of beauty in its species.
Thus everywhere in nature we see strife, conflict, and
alternation of victory, and in it we shall come to recognise more
distinctly that variance with itself which is essential to the will.
Every grade of the objectification of will fights for the matter,
the space, and the time of the others. The permanent matter must
constantly change its form; for under the guidance of causality,

mechanical, physical, chemical, and organic phenomena, eagerly
striving to appear, wrest the matter from each other, for each
desires to reveal its own Idea. This strife may be followed
through the whole of nature; indeed nature exists only through
[192] it: µ¹ ³±Á ¼· ·½ Ä¿ ½µ¹º¿Â µ½ Ä¿¹Â ÀÁ±³¼±Ã¹½, ½ ±½ ·½ À±½Ä±,
aÂ Æ·Ã¹½ •¼Àµ´¿º»·Â; (nam si non inesset in rebus contentio,
unum omnia essent, ut ait Empedocles. Aris. Metaph., B. 5). Yet
this strife itself is only the revelation of that variance with itself
which is essential to the will. This universal conflict becomes
most distinctly visible in the animal kingdom. For animals have
the whole of the vegetable kingdom for their food, and even
within the animal kingdom every beast is the prey and the food
of another; that is, the matter in which its Idea expresses itself
must yield itself to the expression of another Idea, for each animal
can only maintain its existence by the constant destruction of
some other. Thus the will to live everywhere preys upon itself,
and in different forms is its own nourishment, till finally the
human race, because it subdues all the others, regards nature as a
manufactory for its use. Yet even the human race, as we shall see
in the Fourth Book, reveals in itself with most terrible distinctness
this conflict, this variance with itself of the will, and we find
homo homini lupus. Meanwhile we can recognise this strife, this
subjugation, just as well in the lower grades of the objectification
of will. Many insects (especially ichneumon-flies) lay their eggs
on the skin, and even in the body of the larvæ of other insects,
whose slow destruction is the first work of the newly hatched
brood. The young hydra, which grows like a bud out of the
old one, and afterwards separates itself from it, fights while it
is still joined to the old one for the prey that offers itself, so
that the one snatches it out of the mouth of the other (Trembley,
Polypod., ii. p. 110, and iii. p. 165). But the bulldog-ant of
Australia affords us the most extraordinary example of this kind;
for if it is cut in two, a battle begins between the head and the
tail. The head seizes the tail with its teeth, and the tail defends
itself bravely by stinging the head: the battle may last for half
an hour, until they die or are dragged away by other ants. This
contest takes place every time the experiment is tried. (From [193]
a letter by Howitt in the W. Journal, reprinted in Galignani's
Messenger, 17th November 1855.) On the banks of the Missouri
one sometimes sees a mighty oak the stem and branches of which
are so encircled, fettered, and interlaced by a gigantic wild vine,
that it withers as if choked. The same thing shows itself in the
lowest grades; for example, when water and carbon are changed
into vegetable sap, or vegetables or bread into blood by organic
assimilation; and so also in every case in which animal secretion
takes place, along with the restriction of chemical forces to a
subordinate mode of activity. This also occurs in unorganised
nature, when, for example, crystals in process of formation meet,
cross, and mutually disturb each other to such an extent that they
are unable to assume the pure crystalline form, so that almost
every cluster of crystals is an image of such a conflict of will
at this low grade of its objectification; or again, when a magnet
forces its magnetism upon iron, in order to express its Idea in
it; or when galvanism overcomes chemical affinity, decomposes
the closest combinations, and so entirely suspends the laws of
chemistry that the acid of a decomposed salt at the negative
pole must pass to the positive pole without combining with the
alkalies through which it goes on its way, or turning red the
litmus paper that touches it. On a large scale it shows itself in the
relation between the central body and the planet, for although the
planet is in absolute dependence, yet it always resists, just like the
chemical forces in the organism; hence arises the constant tension
between centripetal and centrifugal force, which keeps the globe
in motion, and is itself an example of that universal essential
conflict of the manifestation of will which we are considering.
For as every body must be regarded as the manifestation of a
will, and as will necessarily expresses itself as a struggle, the
original condition of every world that is formed into a globe

cannot be rest, but motion, a striving forward in boundless space
[194] without rest and without end. Neither the law of inertia nor that
of causality is opposed to this: for as, according to the former,
matter as such is alike indifferent to rest and motion, its original
condition may just as well be the one as the other, therefore if we
first find it in motion, we have just as little right to assume that
this was preceded by a condition of rest, and to inquire into the
cause of the origin of the motion, as, conversely, if we found it
at rest, we would have to assume a previous motion and inquire
into the cause of its suspension. It is, therefore, not needful to
seek for a first impulse for centrifugal force, for, according to the
hypothesis of Kant and Laplace, it is, in the case of the planets,
the residue of the original rotation of the central body, from
which the planets have separated themselves as it contracted. But
to this central body itself motion is essential; it always continues
its rotation, and at the same time rushes forward in endless space,
or perhaps circulates round a greater central body invisible to us.
This view entirely agrees with the conjecture of astronomers that
there is a central sun, and also with the observed advance of our
whole solar system, and perhaps of the whole stellar system to
which our sun belongs. From this we are finally led to assume a
general advance of fixed stars, together with the central sun, and
this certainly loses all meaning in boundless space (for motion in
absolute space cannot be distinguished from rest), and becomes,
as is already the case from its striving and aimless flight, an
expression of that nothingness, that failure of all aim, which, at
the close of this book, we shall be obliged to recognise in the
striving of will in all its phenomena. Thus boundless space and
endless time must be the most universal and essential forms of
the collective phenomena of will, which exist for the expression
of its whole being. Lastly, we can recognise that conflict which
we are considering of all phenomena of will against each other
[195] in simple matter regarded as such; for the real characteristic of
matter is correctly expressed by Kant as repulsive and attractive

force; so that even crude matter has its existence only in the
strife of conflicting forces. If we abstract from all chemical
differences in matter, or go so far back in the chain of causes and
effects that as yet there is no chemical difference, there remains
mere matter,—the world rounded to a globe, whose life, i.e.,
objectification of will, is now constituted by the conflict between
attractive and repulsive forces, the former as gravitation pressing
from all sides towards the centre, the latter as impenetrability
always opposing the former either as rigidity or elasticity; and
this constant pressure and resistance may be regarded as the
objectivity of will in its very lowest grade, and even there it
expresses its character.
We should see the will express itself here in the lowest grade
as blind striving, an obscure, inarticulate impulse, far from
susceptible of being directly known. It is the simplest and the
weakest mode of its objectification. But it appears as this blind
and unconscious striving in the whole of unorganised nature, in
all those original forces of which it is the work of physics and
chemistry to discover and to study the laws, and each of which
manifests itself to us in millions of phenomena which are exactly
similar and regular, and show no trace of individual character,
but are mere multiplicity through space and time, i.e., through
the principium individuationis, as a picture is multiplied through
the facets of a glass.
From grade to grade objectifying itself more distinctly, yet
still completely without consciousness as an obscure striving
force, the will acts in the vegetable kingdom also, in which the
bond of its phenomena consists no longer properly of causes, but
of stimuli; and, finally, also in the vegetative part of the animal
phenomenon, in the production and maturing of the animal, and
in sustaining its inner economy, in which the manifestation of
will is still always necessarily determined by stimuli. The [196]
ever-ascending grades of the objectification of will bring us at
last to the point at which the individual that expresses the Idea
could no longer receive food for its assimilation through mere
movement following upon stimuli. For such a stimulus must be
waited for, but the food has now come to be of a more special
and definite kind, and with the ever-increasing multiplicity of
the individual phenomena, the crowd and confusion has become
so great that they interfere with each other, and the chance of the
individual that is moved merely by stimuli and must wait for its
food would be too unfavourable. From the point, therefore, at
which the animal has delivered itself from the egg or the womb
in which it vegetated without consciousness, its food must be
sought out and selected. For this purpose movement following
upon motives, and therefore consciousness, becomes necessary,
and consequently it appears as an agent, ¼·Ç±½·, called in at
this stage of the objectification of will for the conservation of
the individual and the propagation of the species. It appears
represented by the brain or a large ganglion, just as every
other effort or determination of the will which objectifies itself is
represented by an organ, that is to say, manifests itself for the idea
as an organ.36 But with this means of assistance, this ¼·Ç±½·, the
world as idea comes into existence at a stroke, with all its forms,
object and subject, time, space, multiplicity, and causality. The
world now shows its second side. Till now mere will, it becomes
also idea, object of the knowing subject. The will, which up to this
point followed its tendency in the dark with unerring certainty,
has at this grade kindled for itself a light as a means which
became necessary for getting rid of the disadvantage which arose
[197] from the throng and the complicated nature of its manifestations,
and which would have accrued precisely to the most perfect of
them. The hitherto infallible certainty and regularity with which
it worked in unorganised and merely vegetative nature, rested
36
Cf. Chap. xxii. of the Supplement, and also my work “Ueber den Willen in
der Natur,” p. 54 et seq., and pp. 70-79 of the first edition, or p. 46 et seq., and
pp. 63-72 of the second, or p. 48 et seq., and pp. 69-77 of the third edition.
upon the fact that it alone was active in its original nature, as blind
impulse, will, without assistance, and also without interruption,
from a second and entirely different world, the world as idea,
which is indeed only the image of its own inner being, but is yet
of quite another nature, and now encroaches on the connected
whole of its phenomena. Hence its infallible certainty comes to
an end. Animals are already exposed to illusion, to deception.
They have, however, merely ideas of perception, no conceptions,
no reflection, and they are therefore bound to the present; they
cannot have regard for the future. It seems as if this knowledge
without reason was not in all cases sufficient for its end, and
at times required, as it were, some assistance. For the very
remarkable phenomenon presents itself, that the blind working
of the will and the activity enlightened by knowledge encroach in
a most astonishing manner upon each other's spheres in two kinds
of phenomena. In the one case we find in the very midst of those
actions of animals which are guided by perceptive knowledge
and its motives one kind of action which is accomplished apart
from these, and thus through the necessity of the blindly acting
will. I refer to those mechanical instincts which are guided by
no motive or knowledge, and which yet have the appearance
of performing their work from abstract rational motives. The
other case, which is opposed to this, is that in which, on the
contrary, the light of knowledge penetrates into the workshop of
the blindly active will, and illuminates the vegetative functions
of the human organism. I mean clairvoyance. Finally, when
the will has attained to the highest grade of its objectification,
that knowledge of the understanding given to brutes to which the
senses supply the data, out of which there arises mere perception
confined to what is immediately present, does not suffice. That [198]
complicated, many-sided, imaginative being, man, with his many
needs, and exposed as he is to innumerable dangers, must, in
order to exist, be lighted by a double knowledge; a higher power,
as it were, of perceptive knowledge must be given him, and
also reason, as the faculty of framing abstract conceptions. With

this there has appeared reflection, surveying the future and the
past, and, as a consequence, deliberation, care, the power of
premeditated action independent of the present, and finally, the
full and distinct consciousness of one's own deliberate volition
as such. Now if with mere knowledge of perception there
arose the possibility of illusion and deception, by which the
previous infallibility of the blind striving of will was done away
with, so that mechanical and other instincts, as expressions of
unconscious will, had to lend their help in the midst of those that
were conscious, with the entrance of reason that certainty and
infallibility of the expressions of will (which at the other extreme
in unorganised nature appeared as strict conformity to law) is
almost entirely lost; instinct disappears altogether; deliberation,
which is supposed to take the place of everything else, begets (as
was shown in the First Book) irresolution and uncertainty; then
error becomes possible, and in many cases obstructs the adequate
objectification of the will in action. For although in the character
the will has already taken its definite and unchangeable bent or
direction, in accordance with which volition, when occasioned
by the presence of a motive, invariably takes place, yet error
can falsify its expressions, for it introduces illusive motives that
take the place of the real ones which they resemble;37 as, for
example, when superstition forces on a man imaginary motives
[199] which impel him to a course of action directly opposed to the
way in which the will would otherwise express itself in the
given circumstances. Agamemnon slays his daughter; a miser
dispenses alms, out of pure egotism, in the hope that he will
some day receive an hundred-fold; and so on.
Thus knowledge generally, rational as well as merely
sensuous, proceeds originally from the will itself, belongs to
37
The Scholastics therefore said very truly: Causa finalis movet non secundum
suum esse reale, sed secundum esse cognitum. Cf. Suarez, Disp. Metaph. disp.
xxiii., sec. 7 and 8.
the inner being of the higher grades of its objectification as

a mere ¼·Ç±½·, a means of supporting the individual and the
species, just like any organ of the body. Originally destined for
the service of the will for the accomplishment of its aims, it
remains almost throughout entirely subjected to its service: it is
so in all brutes and in almost all men. Yet we shall see in the
Third Book how in certain individual men knowledge can deliver
itself from this bondage, throw off its yoke, and, free from all
the aims of will, exist purely for itself, simply as a clear mirror
of the world, which is the source of art. Finally, in the Fourth
Book, we shall see how, if this kind of knowledge reacts on the
will, it can bring about self-surrender, i.e., resignation, which
is the final goal, and indeed the inmost nature of all virtue and
holiness, and is deliverance from the world.
§ 28. We have considered the great multiplicity and diversity
of the phenomena in which the will objectifies itself, and we have
seen their endless and implacable strife with each other. Yet,
according to the whole discussion up to this point, the will itself,
as thing-in-itself, is by no means included in that multiplicity
and change. The diversity of the (Platonic) Ideas, i.e., grades
of objectification, the multitude of individuals in which each of
these expresses itself, the struggle of forms for matter,—all this
does not concern it, but is only the manner of its objectification,
and only through this has an indirect relation to it, by virtue
of which it belongs to the expression of the nature of will for
the idea. As the magic-lantern shows many different pictures,
which are all made visible by one and the same light, so in [200]
all the multifarious phenomena which fill the world together
or throng after each other as events, only one will manifests
itself, of which everything is the visibility, the objectivity, and
which remains unmoved in the midst of this change; it alone
is thing-in-itself; all objects are manifestations, or, to speak the
language of Kant, phenomena. Although in man, as (Platonic)
Idea, the will finds its clearest and fullest objectification, yet man
alone could not express its being. In order to manifest the full
significance of the will, the Idea of man would need to appear,
not alone and sundered from everything else, but accompanied
by the whole series of grades, down through all the forms of
animals, through the vegetable kingdom to unorganised nature.
All these supplement each other in the complete objectification
of will; they are as much presupposed by the Idea of man as
the blossoms of a tree presuppose leaves, branches, stem, and
root; they form a pyramid, of which man is the apex. If fond of
similes, one might also say that their manifestations accompany
that of man as necessarily as the full daylight is accompanied by
all the gradations of twilight, through which, little by little, it
loses itself in darkness; or one might call them the echo of man,
and say: Animal and plant are the descending fifth and third of
man, the inorganic kingdom is the lower octave. The full truth
of this last comparison will only become clear to us when, in the
following book, we attempt to fathom the deep significance of
music, and see how a connected, progressive melody, made up of
high, quick notes, may be regarded as in some sense expressing
the life and efforts of man connected by reflection, while the
unconnected complemental notes and the slow bass, which make
up the harmony necessary to perfect the music, represent the rest
of the animal kingdom and the whole of nature that is without
knowledge. But of this in its own place, where it will not sound
[201] so paradoxical. We find, however, that the inner necessity of
the gradation of its manifestations, which is inseparable from
the adequate objectification of the will, is expressed by an outer
necessity in the whole of these manifestations themselves, by
reason of which man has need of the beasts for his support, the
beasts in their grades have need of each other as well as of plants,
which in their turn require the ground, water, chemical elements
and their combinations, the planet, the sun, rotation and motion
round the sun, the curve of the ellipse, &c., &c. At bottom this
results from the fact that the will must live on itself, for there
exists nothing beside it, and it is a hungry will. Hence arise eager
pursuit, anxiety, and suffering.
It is only the knowledge of the unity of will as thing-in-itself,
in the endless diversity and multiplicity of the phenomena,
that can afford us the true explanation of that wonderful,
unmistakable analogy of all the productions of nature, that
family likeness on account of which we may regard them as
variations on the same ungiven theme. So in like measure,
through the distinct and thoroughly comprehended knowledge
of that harmony, that essential connection of all the parts of the
world, that necessity of their gradation which we have just been
considering, we shall obtain a true and sufficient insight into
the inner nature and meaning of the undeniable teleology of all
organised productions of nature, which, indeed, we presupposed
a priori, when considering and investigating them.
This teleology is of a twofold description; sometimes an inner
teleology, that is, an agreement of all the parts of a particular
organism, so ordered that the sustenance of the individual and the
species results from it, and therefore presents itself as the end of
that disposition or arrangement. Sometimes, however, there is an
outward teleology, a relation of unorganised to organised nature
in general, or of particular parts of organised nature to each [202]
other, which makes the maintenance of the whole of organised
nature, or of the particular animal species, possible, and therefore
presents itself to our judgment as the means to this end.
Inner teleology is connected with the scheme of our work
in the following way. If, in accordance with what has been
said, all variations of form in nature, and all multiplicity of
individuals, belong not to the will itself, but merely to its
objectivity and the form of this objectivity, it necessarily follows
that the will is indivisible and is present as a whole in every
manifestation, although the grades of its objectification, the
(Platonic) Ideas, are very different from each other. We may,
for the sake of simplicity, regard these different Ideas as in
themselves individual and simple acts of the will, in which it

expresses its nature more or less. Individuals, however, are again
manifestations of the Ideas, thus of these acts, in time, space,
and multiplicity. Now, in the lowest grades of objectivity, such
an act (or an Idea) retains its unity in the manifestation; while,
in order to appear in higher grades, it requires a whole series
of conditions and developments in time, which only collectively
express its nature completely. Thus, for example the Idea that
reveals itself in any general force of nature has always one single
expression, although it presents itself differently according to the
external relations that are present: otherwise its identity could
not be proved, for this is done by abstracting the diversity that
arises merely from external relations. In the same way the
crystal has only one manifestation of life, crystallisation, which
afterwards has its fully adequate and exhaustive expression in
the rigid form, the corpse of that momentary life. The plant,
however, does not express the Idea, whose phenomenon it is,
at once and through a single manifestation, but in a succession
of developments of its organs in time. The animal not only
develops its organism in the same manner, in a succession of
[203] forms which are often very different (metamorphosis), but this
form itself, although it is already objectivity of will at this grade,
does not attain to a full expression of its Idea. This expression
must be completed through the actions of the animal, in which
its empirical character, common to the whole species, manifests
itself, and only then does it become the full revelation of the
Idea, a revelation which presupposes the particular organism as
its first condition. In the case of man, the empirical character is
peculiar to every individual (indeed, as we shall see in the Fourth
Book, even to the extent of supplanting entirely the character of
the species, through the self-surrender of the whole will). That
which is known as the empirical character, through the necessary
development in time, and the division into particular actions that
is conditioned by it, is, when we abstract from this temporal form
of the manifestation the intelligible character, according to the

expression of Kant, who shows his undying merit especially in
establishing this distinction and explaining the relation between
freedom and necessity, i.e., between the will as thing-in-itself
and its manifestations in time.38 Thus the intelligible character
coincides with the Idea, or, more accurately, with the original
act of will which reveals itself in it. So far then, not only the
empirical character of every man, but also that of every species of
animal and plant, and even of every original force of unorganised
nature, is to be regarded as the manifestation of an intelligible
character, that is, of a timeless, indivisible act of will. I should
like here to draw attention in passing to the naïveté with which
every plant expresses and lays open its whole character in its
mere form, reveals its whole being and will. This is why the [204]
physiognomy of plants is so interesting; while in order to know
an animal in its Idea, it is necessary to observe the course of its
action. As for man, he must be fully investigated and tested,
for reason makes him capable of a high degree of dissimulation.
The beast is as much more naïve than the man as the plant is
more naïve than the beast. In the beast we see the will to live
more naked, as it were, than in the man, in whom it is clothed
with so much knowledge, and is, moreover, so veiled through
the capacity for dissimulation, that it is almost only by chance,
and here and there, that its true nature becomes apparent. In the
plant it shows itself quite naked, but also much weaker, as mere
blind striving for existence without end or aim. For the plant
reveals its whole being at the first glance, and with complete
innocence, which does not suffer from the fact that it carries
its organs of generation exposed to view on its upper surface,
38
Cf. “Critique of Pure Reason. Solution of the Cosmological Ideas of
the Totality of the Deduction of the Events in the Universe,” pp. 560-586
of the fifth, and p. 532 and following of first edition; and “Critique of
Practical Reason,” fourth edition, pp. 169-179; Rosenkranz' edition, p. 224
and following. Cf. my Essay on the Principle of Sufficient Reason, § 43.
though in all animals they have been assigned to the most hidden
part. This innocence of the plant results from its complete want
of knowledge. Guilt does not lie in willing, but in willing with
knowledge. Every plant speaks to us first of all of its home, of
the climate, and the nature of the ground in which it has grown.
Therefore, even those who have had little practice easily tell
whether an exotic plant belongs to the tropical or the temperate
zone, and whether it grows in water, in marshes, on mountain,
or on moorland. Besides this, however, every plant expresses
the special will of its species, and says something that cannot
be uttered in any other tongue. But we must now apply what
has been said to the teleological consideration of the organism,
so far as it concerns its inner design. If in unorganised nature
the Idea, which is everywhere to be regarded as a single act of
will, reveals itself also in a single manifestation which is always
the same, and thus one may say that here the empirical character
[205] directly partakes of the unity of the intelligible, coincides, as it
were, with it, so that no inner design can show itself here; if, on
the contrary, all organisms express their Ideas through a series
of successive developments, conditioned by a multiplicity of
co-existing parts, and thus only the sum of the manifestations of
the empirical character collectively constitute the expression of
the intelligible character; this necessary co-existence of the parts
and succession of the stages of development does not destroy
the unity of the appearing Idea, the act of will which expresses
itself; nay, rather this unity finds its expression in the necessary
relation and connection of the parts and stages of development
with each other, in accordance with the law of causality. Since
it is the will which is one, indivisible, and therefore entirely
in harmony with itself, that reveals itself in the whole Idea as
in act, its manifestation, although broken up into a number of
different parts and conditions, must yet show this unity again
in the thorough agreement of all of these. This is effected by
a necessary relation and dependence of all the parts upon each
other, by means of which the unity of the Idea is re-established

in the manifestation. In accordance with this, we now recognise
these different parts and functions of the organism as related
to each other reciprocally as means and end, but the organism
itself as the final end of all. Consequently, neither the breaking
up of the Idea, which in itself is simple, into the multiplicity of
the parts and conditions of the organism, on the one hand, nor,
on the other hand, the re-establishment of its unity through the
necessary connection of the parts and functions which arises from
the fact that they are the cause and effect, the means and end, of
each other, is peculiar and essential to the appearing will as such,
to the thing-in-itself, but only to its manifestation in space, time,
and causality (mere modes of the principle of sufficient reason,
the form of the phenomenon). They belong to the world as idea, [206]
not to the world as will; they belong to the way in which the will
becomes object, i.e., idea at this grade of its objectivity. Every one
who has grasped the meaning of this discussion—a discussion
which is perhaps somewhat difficult—will now fully understand
the doctrine of Kant, which follows from it, that both the design
of organised and the conformity to law of unorganised nature are
only introduced by our understanding, and therefore both belong
only to the phenomenon, not to the thing-in-itself. The surprise,
which was referred to above, at the infallible constancy of the
conformity to law of unorganised nature, is essentially the same
as the surprise that is excited by design in organised nature; for
in both cases what we wonder at is only the sight of the original
unity of the Idea, which, for the phenomenon, has assumed the
form of multiplicity and diversity.39
As regards the second kind of teleology, according to the
division made above, the outer design, which shows itself, not
in the inner economy of the organisms, but in the support and
assistance they receive from without, both from unorganised
39
Cf. “Ueber den Willen in der Natur,” at the end of the section on
Comparative Anatomy.
nature and from each other; its general explanation is to be found

in the exposition we have just given. For the whole world,
with all its phenomena, is the objectivity of the one indivisible
will, the Idea, which is related to all other Ideas as harmony is
related to the single voice. Therefore that unity of the will must
show itself also in the agreement of all its manifestations. But
we can very much increase the clearness of this insight if we
go somewhat more closely into the manifestations of that outer
teleology and agreement of the different parts of nature with
each other, an inquiry which will also throw some light on the
foregoing exposition. We shall best attain this end by considering
the following analogy.
[207] The character of each individual man, so far as it is thoroughly
individual, and not entirely included in that of the species, may
be regarded as a special Idea, corresponding to a special act of the
objectification of will. This act itself would then be his intelligible
character, and his empirical character would be the manifestation
of it. The empirical character is entirely determined through the
intelligible, which is without ground, i.e., as thing-in-itself is not
subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason (the form of
the phenomenon). The empirical character must in the course
of life afford us the express image of the intelligible, and can
only become what the nature of the latter demands. But this
property extends only to the essential, not to the unessential in
the course of life to which it applies. To this unessential belong
the detailed events and actions which are the material in which
the empirical character shows itself. These are determined by
outward circumstances, which present the motives upon which
the character reacts according to its nature; and as they may
be very different, the outward form of the manifestation of the
empirical character, that is, the definite actual or historical form
of the course of life, will have to accommodate itself to their
influence. Now this form may be very different, although what
is essential to the manifestation, its content, remains the same.
Thus, for example it is immaterial whether a man plays for nuts

or for crowns; but whether a man cheats or plays fairly, that is the
real matter; the latter is determined by the intelligible character,
the former by outward circumstances. As the same theme may be
expressed in a hundred different variations, so the same character
may be expressed in a hundred very different lives. But various
as the outward influence may be, the empirical character which
expresses itself in the course of life must yet, whatever form
it takes, accurately objectify the intelligible character, for the
latter adapts its objectification to the given material of actual
circumstances. We have now to assume something analogous
to the influence of outward circumstances upon the life that is [208]
determined in essential matters by the character, if we desire to
understand how the will, in the original act of its objectification,
determines the various Ideas in which it objectifies itself, that
is, the different forms of natural existence of every kind, among
which it distributes its objectification, and which must therefore
necessarily have a relation to each other in the manifestation.
We must assume that between all these manifestations of the
one will there existed a universal and reciprocal adaptation and
accommodation of themselves to each other, by which, however,
as we shall soon see more clearly, all time-determination is
to be excluded, for the Idea lies outside time. In accordance
with this, every manifestation must have adapted itself to the
surroundings into which it entered, and these again must have
adapted themselves to it, although it occupied a much later
position in time; and we see this consensus naturæ everywhere.
Every plant is therefore adapted to its soil and climate, every
animal to its element and the prey that will be its food, and is
also in some way protected, to a certain extent, against its natural
enemy: the eye is adapted to the light and its refrangibility, the
lungs and the blood to the air, the air-bladder of fish to water,
the eye of the seal to the change of the medium in which it must
see, the water-pouch in the stomach of the camel to the drought
of the African deserts, the sail of the nautilus to the wind that is
to drive its little bark, and so on down to the most special and
astonishing outward adaptations.40 We must abstract however
here from all temporal relations, for these can only concern the
manifestation of the Idea, not the Idea itself. Accordingly this
kind of explanation must also be used retrospectively, and we
must not merely admit that every species accommodated itself
to the given environment, but also that this environment itself,
which preceded it in time, had just as much regard for the being
[209] that would some time come into it. For it is one and the
same will that objectifies itself in the whole world; it knows no
time, for this form of the principle of sufficient reason does not
belong to it, nor to its original objectivity, the Ideas, but only
to the way in which these are known by the individuals who
themselves are transitory, i.e., to the manifestation of the Ideas.
Thus, time has no significance for our present examination of the
manner in which the objectification of the will distributes itself
among the Ideas, and the Ideas whose manifestations entered
into the course of time earlier, according to the law of causality,
to which as phenomena they are subject, have no advantage
over those whose manifestation entered later; nay rather, these
last are the completest objectifications of the will, to which the
earlier manifestations must adapt themselves just as much as
they must adapt themselves to the earlier. Thus the course of the
planets, the tendency to the ellipse, the rotation of the earth, the
division of land and sea, the atmosphere, light, warmth, and all
such phenomena, which are in nature what bass is in harmony,
adapted themselves in anticipation of the coming species of
living creatures of which they were to become the supporter
and sustainer. In the same way the ground adapted itself to the
nutrition of plants, plants adapted themselves to the nutrition of
animals, animals to that of other animals, and conversely they
40
Cf. “Ueber den Willen in der Natur,” the section on Comparative Anatomy.
all adapted themselves to the nutrition of the ground. All the

parts of nature correspond to each other, for it is one will that
appears in them all, but the course of time is quite foreign to its
original and only adequate objectification (this expression will
be explained in the following book), the Ideas. Even now, when
the species have only to sustain themselves, no longer to come
into existence, we see here and there some such forethought of
nature extending to the future, and abstracting as it were from
the process of time, a self-adaptation of what is to what is yet [210]
to come. The bird builds the nest for the young which it does
not yet know; the beaver constructs a dam the object of which is
unknown to it; ants, marmots, and bees lay in provision for the
winter they have never experienced; the spider and the ant-lion
make snares, as if with deliberate cunning, for future unknown
prey; insects deposit their eggs where the coming brood finds
future nourishment. In the spring-time the female flower of the
diœcian valisneria unwinds the spirals of its stalk, by which till
now it was held at the bottom of the water, and thus rises to the
surface. Just then the male flower, which grows on a short stalk
from the bottom, breaks away, and so, at the sacrifice of its life,
reaches the surface, where it swims about in search of the female.
The latter is fructified, and then draws itself down again to the
bottom by contracting its spirals, and there the fruit grows.41 I
must again refer here to the larva of the male stag-beetle, which
makes the hole in the wood for its metamorphosis as big again
as the female does, in order to have room for its future horns.
The instinct of animals in general gives us the best illustration of
what remains of teleology in nature. For as instinct is an action,
like that which is guided by the conception of an end, and yet
is entirely without this; so all construction of nature resembles
that which is guided by the conception of an end, and yet is
entirely without it. For in the outer as in the inner teleology of
41
Chatin, Sur la Valisneria Spiralis, in the Comptes Rendus de l'Acad. de Sc.,
No. 13, 1855.
nature, what we are obliged to think as means and end is, in every
case, the manifestation of the unity of the one will so thoroughly
agreeing with itself, which has assumed multiplicity in space and
time for our manner of knowing.
The reciprocal adaptation and self-accommodation of
phenomena that springs from this unity cannot, however, annul
the inner contradiction which appears in the universal conflict of
[211] nature described above, and which is essential to the will. That
harmony goes only so far as to render possible the duration of the
world and the different kinds of existences in it, which without
it would long since have perished. Therefore it only extends
to the continuance of the species, and the general conditions of
life, but not to that of the individual. If, then, by reason of that
harmony and accommodation, the species in organised nature
and the universal forces in unorganised nature continue to exist
beside each other, and indeed support each other reciprocally,
on the other hand, the inner contradiction of the will which
objectifies itself in all these ideas shows itself in the ceaseless
internecine war of the individuals of these species, and in the
constant struggle of the manifestations of these natural forces
with each other, as we pointed out above. The scene and the
object of this conflict is matter, which they try to wrest from
each other, and also space and time, the combination of which
through the form of causality is, in fact, matter, as was explained
in the First Book.42
§ 29. I here conclude the second principal division of my
exposition, in the hope that, so far as is possible in the case of
an entirely new thought, which cannot be quite free from traces
of the individuality in which it originated, I have succeeded in
conveying to the reader the complete certainty that this world in
which we live and have our being is in its whole nature through
and through will, and at the same time through and through idea:
42
Cf. Chaps. xxvi. and xxvii. of the Supplement.
that this idea, as such, already presupposes a form, object and

subject, is therefore relative; and if we ask what remains if we
take away this form, and all those forms which are subordinate
to it, and which express the principle of sufficient reason, the
answer must be that as something toto genere different from
idea, this can be nothing but will, which is thus properly the
thing-in-itself. Every one finds that he himself is this will, in
which the real nature of the world consists, and he also finds [212]
that he is the knowing subject, whose idea the whole world is,
the world which exists only in relation to his consciousness, as
its necessary supporter. Every one is thus himself in a double
aspect the whole world, the microcosm; finds both sides whole
and complete in himself. And what he thus recognises as his
own real being also exhausts the being of the whole world—the
macrocosm; thus the world, like man, is through and through will,
and through and through idea, and nothing more than this. So we
see the philosophy of Thales, which concerned the macrocosm,
unite at this point with that of Socrates, which dealt with the
microcosm, for the object of both is found to be the same. But
all the knowledge that has been communicated in the two first
books will gain greater completeness, and consequently greater
certainty, from the two following books, in which I hope that
several questions that have more or less distinctly arisen in the
course of our work will also be sufficiently answered.
In the meantime one such question may be more particularly
considered, for it can only properly arise so long as one has not
fully penetrated the meaning of the foregoing exposition, and
may so far serve as an illustration of it. It is this: Every will is
a will towards something, has an object, an end of its willing;
what then is the final end, or towards what is that will striving
that is exhibited to us as the being-in-itself of the world? This
question rests, like so many others, upon the confusion of the
thing-in-itself with the manifestation. The principle of sufficient
reason, of which the law of motivation is also a form, extends
only to the latter, not to the former. It is only of phenomena,

of individual things, that a ground can be given, never of the
will itself, nor of the Idea in which it adequately objectifies
itself. So then of every particular movement or change of any
kind in nature, a cause is to be sought, that is, a condition that
[213] of necessity produced it, but never of the natural force itself
which is revealed in this and innumerable similar phenomena;
and it is therefore simple misunderstanding, arising from want of
consideration, to ask for a cause of gravity, electricity, and so on.
Only if one had somehow shown that gravity and electricity were
not original special forces of nature, but only the manifestations
of a more general force already known, would it be allowable to
ask for the cause which made this force produce the phenomena
of gravity or of electricity here. All this has been explained at
length above. In the same way every particular act of will of a
knowing individual (which is itself only a manifestation of will
as the thing-in-itself) has necessarily a motive without which
that act would never have occurred; but just as material causes
contain merely the determination that at this time, in this place,
and in this matter, a manifestation of this or that natural force
must take place, so the motive determines only the act of will
of a knowing being, at this time, in this place, and under these
circumstances, as a particular act, but by no means determines
that that being wills in general or wills in this manner; this is the
expression of his intelligible character, which, as will itself, the
thing-in-itself, is without ground, for it lies outside the province
of the principle of sufficient reason. Therefore every man has
permanent aims and motives by which he guides his conduct, and
he can always give an account of his particular actions; but if he
were asked why he wills at all, or why in general he wills to exist,
he would have no answer, and the question would indeed seem
to him meaningless; and this would be just the expression of his
consciousness that he himself is nothing but will, whose willing
stands by itself and requires more particular determination by
motives only in its individual acts at each point of time.

In fact, freedom from all aim, from all limits, belongs to the
nature of the will, which is an endless striving. This was already
touched on above in the reference to centrifugal force. It also [214]
discloses itself in its simplest form in the lowest grade of the
objectification of will, in gravitation, which we see constantly
exerting itself, though a final goal is obviously impossible for it.
For if, according to its will, all existing matter were collected in
one mass, yet within this mass gravity, ever striving towards the
centre, would still wage war with impenetrability as rigidity or
elasticity. The tendency of matter can therefore only be confined,
never completed or appeased. But this is precisely the case with
all tendencies of all phenomena of will. Every attained end is
also the beginning of a new course, and so on ad infinitum. The
plant raises its manifestation from the seed through the stem
and the leaf to the blossom and the fruit, which again is the
beginning of a new seed, a new individual, that runs through
the old course, and so on through endless time. Such also is
the life of the animal; procreation is its highest point, and after
attaining to it, the life of the first individual quickly or slowly
sinks, while a new life ensures to nature the endurance of the
species and repeats the same phenomena. Indeed, the constant
renewal of the matter of every organism is also to be regarded as
merely the manifestation of this continual pressure and change,
and physiologists are now ceasing to hold that it is the necessary
reparation of the matter wasted in motion, for the possible
wearing out of the machine can by no means be equivalent to the
support it is constantly receiving through nourishment. Eternal
becoming, endless flux, characterises the revelation of the inner
nature of will. Finally, the same thing shows itself in human
endeavours and desires, which always delude us by presenting
their satisfaction as the final end of will. As soon as we attain
to them they no longer appear the same, and therefore they soon
grow stale, are forgotten, and though not openly disowned, are
yet always thrown aside as vanished illusions. We are fortunate

[215] enough if there still remains something to wish for and to strive
after, that the game may be kept up of constant transition from
desire to satisfaction, and from satisfaction to a new desire, the
rapid course of which is called happiness, and the slow course
sorrow, and does not sink into that stagnation that shows itself in
fearful ennui that paralyses life, vain yearning without a definite
object, deadening languor. According to all this, when the will
is enlightened by knowledge, it always knows what it wills now
and here, never what it wills in general; every particular act of
will has its end, the whole will has none; just as every particular
phenomenon of nature is determined by a sufficient cause so
far as concerns its appearance in this place at this time, but the
force which manifests itself in it has no general cause, for it
belongs to the thing-in-itself, to the groundless will. The single
example of self-knowledge of the will as a whole is the idea as
a whole, the whole world of perception. It is the objectification,
the revelation, the mirror of the will. What the will expresses in
it will be the subject of our further consideration.43
[217]
43
Cf. Chap. xxviii. of the Supplement.
Third Book. The World As Idea.
Second Aspect. The Idea Independent Of

The Principle Of Sufficient Reason: The
Platonic Idea: The Object Of Art.
¤w Äx D½ ¼r½ µw, ³s½µÃ¹½ ´r ¿Pº Ç¿½; º±v Äw Äy ³¹³½y¼µ½¿½

¼r½ º±v À¿»»{¼µ½¿½, D½ÄÉÂ ´µ ¿P´sÀ¿Äµ D½.—— ›‘¤©•.
[219]
§ 30. In the First Book the world was explained as mere idea,
object for a subject. In the Second Book we considered it from
its other side, and found that in this aspect it is will, which
proved to be simply that which this world is besides being
idea. In accordance with this knowledge we called the world
as idea, both as a whole and in its parts, the objectification of
will, which therefore means the will become object, i.e., idea.
Further, we remember that this objectification of will was found
to have many definite grades, in which, with gradually increasing
distinctness and completeness, the nature of will appears in the
idea, that is to say, presents itself as object. In these grades
we already recognised the Platonic Ideas, for the grades are just
the determined species, or the original unchanging forms and
qualities of all natural bodies, both organised and unorganised,
and also the general forces which reveal themselves according to
natural laws. These Ideas, then, as a whole express themselves
in innumerable individuals and particulars, and are related to
these as archetypes to their copies. The multiplicity of such

individuals is only conceivable through time and space, their
appearing and passing away through causality, and in all these
forms we recognise merely the different modes of the principle
of sufficient reason, which is the ultimate principle of all that
is finite, of all individual existence, and the universal form of
the idea as it appears in the knowledge of the individual as
[220] such. The Platonic Idea, on the other hand, does not come
under this principle, and has therefore neither multiplicity nor
change. While the individuals in which it expresses itself are
innumerable, and unceasingly come into being and pass away,
it remains unchanged as one and the same, and the principle of
sufficient reason has for it no meaning. As, however, this is the
form under which all knowledge of the subject comes, so far as
the subject knows as an individual, the Ideas lie quite outside the
sphere of its knowledge. If, therefore, the Ideas are to become
objects of knowledge, this can only happen by transcending the
individuality of the knowing subject. The more exact and detailed
explanation of this is what will now occupy our attention.
§ 31. First, however, the following very essential remark. I
hope that in the preceding book I have succeeded in producing
the conviction that what is called in the Kantian philosophy the
thing-in-itself, and appears there as so significant, and yet so
obscure and paradoxical a doctrine, and especially on account
of the manner in which Kant introduced it as an inference from
the caused to the cause, was considered a stumbling-stone, and,
in fact, the weak side of his philosophy,—that this, I say, if it is
reached by the entirely different way by which we have arrived
at it, is nothing but the will when the sphere of that conception
is extended and defined in the way I have shown. I hope,
further, that after what has been said there will be no hesitation in
recognising the definite grades of the objectification of the will,
which is the inner reality of the world, to be what Plato called the
eternal Ideas or unchangeable forms (µ¹´Æ); a doctrine which is
229
regarded as the principal, but at the same time the most obscure
and paradoxical dogma of his system, and has been the subject
of reflection and controversy of ridicule and of reverence to so
many and such differently endowed minds in the course of many
centuries. [221]
If now the will is for us the thing-in-itself, and the Idea is

the immediate objectivity of that will at a definite grade, we
find that Kant's thing-in-itself, and Plato's Idea, which to him
is the only ¿½ÄÉÂ ¿½, these two great obscure paradoxes of the
two greatest philosophers of the West are not indeed identical,
but yet very closely related, and only distinguished by a single
circumstance. The purport of these two great paradoxes, with
all inner harmony and relationship, is yet so very different on
account of the remarkable diversity of the individuality of their
authors, that they are the best commentary on each other, for they
are like two entirely different roads that conduct us to the same
goal. This is easily made clear. What Kant says is in substance
this:—“Time, space, and causality are not determinations of the
thing-in-itself, but belong only to its phenomenal existence, for
they are nothing but the forms of our knowledge. Since, however,
all multiplicity, and all coming into being and passing away, are
only possible through time, space, and causality, it follows that
they also belong only to the phenomenon, not to the thing-in-
itself. But as our knowledge is conditioned by these forms, the
whole of experience is only knowledge of the phenomenon, not
of the thing-in-itself; therefore its laws cannot be made valid for
the thing-in-itself. This extends even to our own ego, and we
know it only as phenomenon, and not according to what it may be
in itself.” This is the meaning and content of the doctrine of Kant
in the important respect we are considering. What Plato says is
this:—“The things of this world which our senses perceive have
no true being; they always become, they never are: they have
only a relative being; they all exist merely in and through their
relations to each other; their whole being may, therefore, quite as
well be called a non-being. They are consequently not objects of

a true knowledge (µÀ¹ÃÄ·¼·), for such a knowledge can only be
[222] of what exists for itself, and always in the same way; they, on the
contrary, are only the objects of an opinion based on sensation
(´¿¾± ¼µÄ½ ±¹Ã¸·ÃµÉÂ ±»¿³¿Å). So long as we are confined to the
perception of these, we are like men who sit in a dark cave, bound
so fast that they cannot turn their heads, and who see nothing but
the shadows of real things which pass between them and a fire
burning behind them, the light of which casts the shadows on the
wall opposite them; and even of themselves and of each other
they see only the shadows on the wall. Their wisdom would
thus consist in predicting the order of the shadows learned from
experience. The real archetypes, on the other hand, to which
these shadows correspond, the eternal Ideas, the original forms
of all things, can alone be said to have true being (¿½ÄÉÂ ¿½),
because they always are, but never become nor pass away. To
them belongs no multiplicity; for each of them is according to
its nature only one, for it is the archetype itself, of which all
particular transitory things of the same kind which are named
after it are copies or shadows. They have also no coming into
being nor passing away, for they are truly being, never becoming
nor vanishing, like their fleeting shadows. (It is necessarily
presupposed, however, in these two negative definitions, that
time, space, and causality have no significance or validity for
these Ideas, and that they do not exist in them.) Of these only can
there be true knowledge, for the object of such knowledge can
only be that which always and in every respect (thus in-itself) is;
not that which is and again is not, according as we look at it.”
This is Plato's doctrine. It is clear, and requires no further proof
that the inner meaning of both doctrines is entirely the same;
that both explain the visible world as a manifestation, which in
itself is nothing, and which only has meaning and a borrowed
reality through that which expresses itself in it (in the one case
the thing-in-itself, in the other the Idea). To this last, which has
231
true being, all the forms of that phenomenal existence, even the [223]
most universal and essential, are, according to both doctrines,
entirely foreign. In order to disown these forms Kant has directly
expressed them even in abstract terms, and distinctly refused
time, space, and causality as mere forms of the phenomenon to
the thing-in-itself. Plato, on the other hand, did not attain to the
fullest expression, and has only distinctly refused these forms
to his Ideas in that he denies of the Ideas what is only possible
through these forms, multiplicity of similar things, coming into
being and passing away. Though it is perhaps superfluous, I
should like to illustrate this remarkable and important agreement
by an example. There stands before us, let us suppose, an animal
in the full activity of life. Plato would say, “This animal has
no true existence, but merely an apparent existence, a constant
becoming, a relative existence which may just as well be called
non-being as being. Only the Idea which expresses itself in
that animal is truly ‘being,’ or the animal in-itself (±ÅÄ¿ Ä¿
¸·Á¹¿½), which is dependent upon nothing, but is in and for
itself (º±¸½ ±ÅÄ¿, ±µ¹ aÂ ±ÅÄÉÂ); it has not become, it will not
end, but always is in the same way (±µ¹ ¿½, º±¹ ¼·´µÀ¿Äµ ¿ÅÄµ
³Å³½¿¼µ½¿½ ¿ÅÄµ ±À¿»»Å¼µ½¿½). If now we recognise its Idea
in this animal, it is all one and of no importance whether we
have this animal now before us or its progenitor of a thousand
years ago, whether it is here or in a distant land, whether it
presents itself in this or that manner, position, or action; whether,
lastly, it is this or any other individual of the same species; all
this is nothing, and only concerns the phenomenon; the Idea
of the animal alone has true being, and is the object of real
knowledge.” So Plato; Kant would say something of this kind,
“This animal is a phenomenon in time, space, and causality,
which are collectively the conditions a priori of the possibility of
experience, lying in our faculty of knowledge, not determinations
of the thing-in-itself. Therefore this animal as we perceive it
at this definite point of time, in this particular place, as an [224]
individual in the connection of experience (i.e., in the chain of

causes and effects), which has come into being, and will just as
necessarily pass away, is not a thing-in-itself, but a phenomenon
which only exists in relation to our knowledge. To know it as
what it may be in itself, that is to say, independent of all the
determinations which lie in time, space, and causality, would
demand another kind of knowledge than that which is possible
for us through the senses and the understanding.”
In order to bring Kant's mode of expression nearer the Platonic,
we might say: Time, space, and causality are that arrangement
of our intellect by virtue of which the one being of each kind
which alone really is, manifests itself to us as a multiplicity of
similar beings, constantly appearing and disappearing in endless
succession. The apprehension of things by means of and in
accordance with this arrangement is immanent knowledge; that,
on the other hand, which is conscious of the true state of the case,
is transcendental knowledge. The latter is obtained in abstracto
through the criticism of pure reason, but in exceptional cases it
may also appear intuitively. This last is an addition of my own,
which I am endeavouring in this Third Book to explain.
If the doctrine of Kant had ever been properly understood
and grasped, and since Kant's time that of Plato, if men had
truly and earnestly reflected on the inner meaning and content
of the teaching of these two great masters, instead of involving
themselves in the technicalities of the one and writing parodies
of the style of the other, they could not have failed to discern long
ago to what an extent these two great philosophers agree, and
that the true meaning, the aim of both systems, is the same. Not
only would they have refrained from constantly comparing Plato
to Leibnitz, on whom his spirit certainly did not rest, or indeed to
[225] a well-known gentleman who is still alive,44 as if they wanted to
mock the manes of the great thinker of the past; but they would
44
F. H. Jacobi.
233
have advanced much farther in general, or rather they would not

have fallen so disgracefully far behind as they have in the last
forty years. They would not have let themselves be led by the
nose, to-day by one vain boaster and to-morrow by another, nor
would they have opened the nineteenth century, which promised
so much in Germany, with the philosophical farces that were
performed over the grave of Kant (as the ancients sometimes
did at the funeral obsequies of their dead), and which deservedly
called forth the derision of other nations, for such things least
become the earnest and strait-laced German. But so small is
the chosen public of true philosophers, that even students who
understand are but scantily brought them by the centuries—•¹Ã¹
´· ½±Á¸·º¿Æ¿Á¿¹ ¼µ½ À¿»»¿¹, ²±ºÇ¿¹ ´µ ³µ À±ÅÁ¿¹ (Thyrsigeri
quidem multi, Baachi vero pauci). ) ±Ä¹¼¹± Æ¹»¿Ã¿Æ¹³ ´¹±
Ä±ÅÄ± ÀÁ¿ÃÀµÀÄÉºµ½, AÄ¹ ¿Å º±Ä ±¾¹±½ ±ÅÄ·Â ÀÄ¿½Ä±¹; ¿Å ³±Á
½¿¸¿ÅÂ µ´µ¹ ÀÄµÃ¸±¹, ±»»± ³½·Ã¹¿ÅÂ (Eam ob rem philosophia
in infamiam incidit, quad non pro dignitate ipsam attingunt:
neque enim a spuriis, sad a legitimis erat attrectanda).—Plato.
Men followed the words,—such words as “a priori ideas,”
“forms of perception and thought existing in consciousness
independently of experience,” “fundamental conceptions of the
pure understanding,” &c., &c.,—and asked whether Plato's Ideas,
which were also original conceptions, and besides this were
supposed to be reminiscences of a perception before life of the
truly real things, were in some way the same as Kant's forms of
perception and thought, which lie a priori in our consciousness.
On account of some slight resemblance in the expression of these
two entirely different doctrines, the Kantian doctrine of the forms
which limit the knowledge of the individual to the phenomenon,
and the Platonic doctrine of Ideas, the knowledge of which these [226]
very forms expressly deny, these so far diametrically opposed
doctrines were carefully compared, and men deliberated and
disputed as to whether they were identical, found at last that they
were not the same, and concluded that Plato's doctrine of Ideas
and Kant's “Critique of Reason” had nothing in common. But

enough of this.45
§ 32. It follows from our consideration of the subject, that,
for us, Idea and thing-in-itself are not entirely one and the same,
in spite of the inner agreement between Kant and Plato, and
the identity of the aim they had before them, or the conception
of the world which roused them and led them to philosophise.
The Idea is for us rather the direct, and therefore adequate,
objectivity of the thing-in-itself, which is, however, itself the
will—the will as not yet objectified, not yet become idea. For
the thing-in-itself must, even according to Kant, be free from
all the forms connected with knowing as such; and it is merely
an error on his part (as is shown in the Appendix) that he did
not count among these forms, before all others, that of being
object for a subject, for it is the first and most universal form
of all phenomena, i.e., of all idea; he should therefore have
distinctly denied objective existence to his thing-in-itself, which
would have saved him from a great inconsistency that was soon
discovered. The Platonic Idea, on the other hand, is necessarily
object, something known, an idea, and in that respect is different
from the thing-in-itself, but in that respect only. It has merely
laid aside the subordinate forms of the phenomenon, all of which
we include in the principle of sufficient reason, or rather it has
not yet assumed them; but it has retained the first and most
universal form, that of the idea in general, the form of being
[227] object for a subject. It is the forms which are subordinate
to this (whose general expression is the principle of sufficient
reason) that multiply the Idea in particular transitory individuals,
whose number is a matter of complete indifference to the Idea.
The principle of sufficient reason is thus again the form into
which the Idea enters when it appears in the knowledge of the
subject as individual. The particular thing that manifests itself in
45
See for example, “Immanuel Kant, a Reminiscence, by Fr. Bouterweck,”
pg. 49, and Buhle's “History of Philosophy,” vol. vi. pp. 802-815 and 823.
235
accordance with the principle of sufficient reason is thus only an

indirect objectification of the thing-in-itself (which is the will),
for between it and the thing-in-itself stands the Idea as the only
direct objectivity of the will, because it has assumed none of the
special forms of knowledge as such, except that of the idea in
general, i.e., the form of being object for a subject. Therefore
it alone is the most adequate objectivity of the will or thing-in-
itself which is possible; indeed it is the whole thing-in-itself, only
under the form of the idea; and here lies the ground of the great
agreement between Plato and Kant, although, in strict accuracy,
that of which they speak is not the same. But the particular things
are no really adequate objectivity of the will, for in them it is
obscured by those forms whose general expression is the principle
of sufficient reason, but which are conditions of the knowledge
which belongs to the individual as such. If it is allowable to
draw conclusions from an impossible presupposition, we would,
in fact, no longer know particular things, nor events, nor change,
nor multiplicity, but would comprehend only Ideas,—only the
grades of the objectification of that one will, of the thing-in-itself,
in pure unclouded knowledge. Consequently our world would be
a nunc stans, if it were not that, as knowing subjects, we are also
individuals, i.e., our perceptions come to us through the medium
of a body, from the affections of which they proceed, and which
is itself only concrete willing, objectivity of the will, and thus is
an object among objects, and as such comes into the knowing
consciousness in the only way in which an object can, through [228]
the forms of the principle of sufficient reason, and consequently
already presupposes, and therefore brings in, time, and all other
forms which that principle expresses. Time is only the broken
and piecemeal view which the individual being has of the Ideas,
which are outside time, and consequently eternal. Therefore
Plato says time is the moving picture of eternity: ±¹É½¿Â µ¹ºÉ½
º¹½·Ä· A ÇÁ¿½¿Â.46
§ 33. Since now, as individuals, we have no other knowledge
than that which is subject to the principle of sufficient reason,
and this form of knowledge excludes the Ideas, it is certain that
if it is possible for us to raise ourselves from the knowledge of
particular things to that of the Ideas, this can only happen by
an alteration taking place in the subject which is analogous and
corresponds to the great change of the whole nature of the object,
and by virtue of which the subject, so far as it knows an Idea, is
no more individual.
It will be remembered from the preceding book that knowledge
in general belongs to the objectification of will at its higher
grades, and sensibility, nerves, and brain, just like the other
parts of the organised being, are the expression of the will
at this stage of its objectivity, and therefore the idea which
appears through them is also in the same way bound to the
service of will as a means (¼·Ç±½·) for the attainment of its
now complicated (À¿»ÅÄµ»µÃÄµÁ±) aims for sustaining a being
of manifold requirements. Thus originally and according to its
nature, knowledge is completely subject to the will, and, like
the immediate object, which, by means of the application of
the law of causality, is its starting-point, all knowledge which
proceeds in accordance with the principle of sufficient reason
remains in a closer or more distant relation to the will. For
the individual finds his body as an object among objects, to all
of which it is related and connected according to the principle
[229] of sufficient reason. Thus all investigations of these relations
and connections lead back to his body, and consequently to his
will. Since it is the principle of sufficient reason which places
the objects in this relation to the body, and, through it, to the
will, the one endeavour of the knowledge which is subject to
this principle will be to find out the relations in which objects
46
Cf. Chap. xxix. of Supplement.
237
are placed to each other through this principle, and thus to trace
their innumerable connections in space, time, and causality. For
only through these is the object interesting to the individual, i.e.,
related to the will. Therefore the knowledge which is subject
to the will knows nothing further of objects than their relations,
knows the objects only so far as they exist at this time, in this
place, under these circumstances, from these causes, and with
these effects—in a word, as particular things; and if all these
relations were to be taken away, the objects would also have
disappeared for it, because it knew nothing more about them.
We must not disguise the fact that what the sciences consider in
things is also in reality nothing more than this; their relations,
the connections of time and space, the causes of natural changes,
the resemblance of forms, the motives of actions,—thus merely
relations. What distinguishes science from ordinary knowledge
is merely its systematic form, the facilitating of knowledge by the
comprehension of all particulars in the universal, by means of the
subordination of concepts, and the completeness of knowledge
which is thereby attained. All relation has itself only a relative
existence; for example, all being in time is also non-being; for
time is only that by means of which opposite determinations can
belong to the same thing; therefore every phenomenon which is
in time again is not, for what separates its beginning from its
end is only time, which is essentially a fleeting, inconstant, and
relative thing, here called duration. But time is the most universal
form of all objects of the knowledge which is subject to the will, [230]
and the prototype of its other forms.
Knowledge now, as a rule, remains always subordinate to the
service of the will, as indeed it originated for this service, and
grew, so to speak, to the will, as the head to the body. In the
case of the brutes this subjection of knowledge to the will can
never be abolished. In the case of men it can be abolished only
in exceptional cases, which we shall presently consider more
closely. This distinction between man and brute is outwardly
expressed by the difference of the relation of the head to the

body. In the case of the lower brutes both are deformed: in all
brutes the head is directed towards the earth, where the objects
of its will lie; even in the higher species the head and the body
are still far more one than in the case of man, whose head seems
freely set upon his body, as if only carried by and not serving it.
This human excellence is exhibited in the highest degree by the
Apollo of Belvedere; the head of the god of the Muses, with eyes
fixed on the far distance, stands so freely on his shoulders that it
seems wholly delivered from the body, and no more subject to
its cares.
§ 34. The transition which we have referred to as possible,
but yet to be regarded as only exceptional, from the common
knowledge of particular things to the knowledge of the Idea,
takes place suddenly; for knowledge breaks free from the service
of the will, by the subject ceasing to be merely individual, and
thus becoming the pure will-less subject of knowledge, which
no longer traces relations in accordance with the principle of
sufficient reason, but rests in fixed contemplation of the object
presented to it, out of its connection with all others, and rises into
it.
A full explanation is necessary to make this clear, and the
reader must suspend his surprise for a while, till he has grasped
the whole thought expressed in this work, and then it will vanish
[231] of itself.
If, raised by the power of the mind, a man relinquishes the
common way of looking at things, gives up tracing, under the
guidance of the forms of the principle of sufficient reason, their
relations to each other, the final goal of which is always a
relation to his own will; if he thus ceases to consider the where,
the when, the why, and the whither of things, and looks simply
and solely at the what; if, further, he does not allow abstract
thought, the concepts of the reason, to take possession of his
consciousness, but, instead of all this, gives the whole power of
239
his mind to perception, sinks himself entirely in this, and lets his
whole consciousness be filled with the quiet contemplation of
the natural object actually present, whether a landscape, a tree,
a mountain, a building, or whatever it may be; inasmuch as he
loses himself in this object (to use a pregnant German idiom),
i.e., forgets even his individuality, his will, and only continues
to exist as the pure subject, the clear mirror of the object, so
that it is as if the object alone were there, without any one to
perceive it, and he can no longer separate the perceiver from
the perception, but both have become one, because the whole
consciousness is filled and occupied with one single sensuous
picture; if thus the object has to such an extent passed out of
all relation to something outside it, and the subject out of all
relation to the will, then that which is so known is no longer the
particular thing as such; but it is the Idea, the eternal form, the
immediate objectivity of the will at this grade; and, therefore,
he who is sunk in this perception is no longer individual, for
in such perception the individual has lost himself; but he is
pure, will-less, painless, timeless subject of knowledge. This,
which in itself is so remarkable (which I well know confirms
the saying that originated with Thomas Paine, Du sublime au
ridicule il n'y a qu'un pas), will by degrees become clearer and
less surprising from what follows. It was this that was running
in Spinoza's mind when he wrote: Meus æterna est, quatenus res
sub æternitatis specie concipit (Eth. V. pr. 31, Schol.)47 In such [232]
contemplation the particular thing becomes at once the Idea of
its species, and the perceiving individual becomes pure subject
of knowledge. The individual, as such, knows only particular
things; the pure subject of knowledge knows only Ideas. For
47
I also recommend the perusal of what Spinoza says in his Ethics (Book
II., Prop. 40, Schol. 2, and Book V., Props. 25-38), concerning the cognitio
tertii generis, sive intuitiva, in illustration of the kind of knowledge we are
considering, and very specially Prop. 29, Schol.; prop. 36, Schol., and Prop.
38, Demonst. et Schol.
the individual is the subject of knowledge in its relation to a

definite particular manifestation of will, and in subjection to this.
This particular manifestation of will is, as such, subordinated to
the principle of sufficient reason in all its forms; therefore, all
knowledge which relates itself to it also follows the principle
of sufficient reason, and no other kind of knowledge is fitted
to be of use to the will but this, which always consists merely
of relations to the object. The knowing individual as such, and
the particular things known by him, are always in some place,
at some time, and are links in the chain of causes and effects.
The pure subject of knowledge and his correlative, the Idea, have
passed out of all these forms of the principle of sufficient reason:
time, place, the individual that knows, and the individual that is
known, have for them no meaning. When an individual knower
has raised himself in the manner described to be pure subject of
knowledge, and at the same time has raised the observed object
to the Platonic Idea, the world as idea appears complete and
pure, and the full objectification of the will takes place, for the
Platonic Idea alone is its adequate objectivity. The Idea includes
object and subject in like manner in itself, for they are its one
form; but in it they are absolutely of equal importance; for as
the object is here, as elsewhere, simply the idea of the subject,
the subject, which passes entirely into the perceived object has
thus become this object itself, for the whole consciousness is
[233] nothing but its perfectly distinct picture. Now this consciousness
constitutes the whole world as idea, for one imagines the whole
of the Platonic Ideas, or grades of the objectivity of will, in their
series passing through it. The particular things of all time and
space are nothing but Ideas multiplied through the principle of
sufficient reason (the form of the knowledge of the individual as
such), and thus obscured as regards their pure objectivity. When
the Platonic Idea appears, in it subject and object are no longer to
be distinguished, for the Platonic Idea, the adequate objectivity
of will, the true world as idea, arises only when the subject
241
and object reciprocally fill and penetrate each other completely;

and in the same way the knowing and the known individuals,
as things in themselves, are not to be distinguished. For if we
look entirely away from the true world as idea, there remains
nothing but the world as will. The will is the “in-itself” of the
Platonic Idea, which fully objectifies it; it is also the “in-itself”
of the particular thing and of the individual that knows it, which
objectify it incompletely. As will, outside the idea and all its
forms, it is one and the same in the object contemplated and in the
individual, who soars aloft in this contemplation, and becomes
conscious of himself as pure subject. These two are, therefore, in
themselves not different, for in themselves they are will, which
here knows itself; and multiplicity and difference exist only as
the way in which this knowledge comes to the will, i.e., only
in the phenomenon, on account of its form, the principle of
sufficient reason.
Now the known thing, without me as the subject of knowledge,
is just as little an object, and not mere will, blind effort, as without
the object, without the idea, I am a knowing subject and not mere
blind will. This will is in itself, i.e., outside the idea, one and
the same with mine: only in the world as idea, whose form is
always at least that of subject and object, we are separated as
the known and the knowing individual. As soon as knowledge, [234]
the world as idea, is abolished, there remains nothing but mere
will, blind effort. That it should receive objectivity, become
idea, supposes at once both subject and object; but that this
should be pure, complete, and adequate objectivity of the will,
supposes the object as Platonic Idea, free from the forms of the
principle of sufficient reason, and the subject as the pure subject
of knowledge, free from individuality and subjection to the will.
Whoever now, has, after the manner referred to, become
so absorbed and lost in the perception of nature that he only
continues to exist as the pure knowing subject, becomes in this
way directly conscious that, as such, he is the condition, that is,
the supporter, of the world and all objective existence; for this
now shows itself as dependent upon his existence. Thus he draws
nature into himself, so that he sees it to be merely an accident of
his own being. In this sense Byron says—
“Are not the mountains, waves, and skies, a part

Of me and of my soul, as I of them?”
But how shall he who feels this, regard himself as absolutely

transitory, in contrast to imperishable nature? Such a man will
rather be filled with the consciousness, which the Upanishad of
the Veda expresses: Hæ omnes creaturæ in totum ego sum, et
præter me aliud ens non est (Oupnek'hat, i. 122).48
§ 35. In order to gain a deeper insight into the nature
of the world, it is absolutely necessary that we should learn to
distinguish the will as thing-in-itself from its adequate objectivity,
and also the different grades in which this appears more and more
distinctly and fully, i.e., the Ideas themselves, from the merely
phenomenal existence of these Ideas in the forms of the principle
of sufficient reason, the restricted method of knowledge of the
[235] individual. We shall then agree with Plato when he attributes
actual being only to the Ideas, and allows only an illusive, dream-
like existence to things in space and time, the real world for the
individual. Then we shall understand how one and the same
Idea reveals itself in so many phenomena, and presents its nature
only bit by bit to the individual, one side after another. Then we
shall also distinguish the Idea itself from the way in which its
manifestation appears in the observation of the individual, and
recognise the former as essential and the latter as unessential.
Let us consider this with the help of examples taken from the
most insignificant things, and also from the greatest. When the
clouds move, the figures which they form are not essential, but
indifferent to them; but that as elastic vapour they are pressed
48
Cf. Chap. xxx. of the Supplement.
243
together, drifted along, spread out, or torn asunder by the force

of the wind: this is their nature, the essence of the forces which
objectify themselves in them, the Idea; their actual forms are
only for the individual observer. To the brook that flows over
stones, the eddies, the waves, the foam-flakes which it forms
are indifferent and unessential; but that it follows the attraction
of gravity, and behaves as inelastic, perfectly mobile, formless,
transparent fluid: this is its nature; this, if known through
perception, is its Idea; these accidental forms are only for us so
long as we know as individuals. The ice on the window-pane
forms itself into crystals according to the laws of crystallisation,
which reveal the essence of the force of nature that appears here,
exhibit the Idea; but the trees and flowers which it traces on the
pane are unessential, and are only there for us. What appears
in the clouds, the brook, and the crystal is the weakest echo of
that will which appears more fully in the plant, more fully still
in the beast, and most fully in man. But only the essential in
all these grades of its objectification constitutes the Idea; on the
other hand, its unfolding or development, because broken up in
the forms of the principle of sufficient reason into a multiplicity
of many-sided phenomena, is unessential to the Idea, lies merely [236]
in the kind of knowledge that belongs to the individual and has
reality only for this. The same thing necessarily holds good of
the unfolding of that Idea which is the completest objectivity of
will. Therefore, the history of the human race, the throng of
events, the change of times, the multifarious forms of human life
in different lands and countries, all this is only the accidental
form of the manifestation of the Idea, does not belong to the Idea
itself, in which alone lies the adequate objectivity of the will, but
only to the phenomenon which appears in the knowledge of the
individual, and is just as foreign, unessential, and indifferent to
the Idea itself as the figures which they assume are to the clouds,
the form of its eddies and foam-flakes to the brook, or its trees
and flowers to the ice.
To him who has thoroughly grasped this, and can distinguish

between the will and the Idea, and between the Idea and its
manifestation, the events of the world will have significance
only so far as they are the letters out of which we may read the
Idea of man, but not in and for themselves. He will not believe
with the vulgar that time may produce something actually new
and significant; that through it, or in it, something absolutely
real may attain to existence, or indeed that it itself as a whole
has beginning and end, plan and development, and in some way
has for its final aim the highest perfection (according to their
conception) of the last generation of man, whose life is a brief
thirty years. Therefore he will just as little, with Homer, people
a whole Olympus with gods to guide the events of time, as,
with Ossian, he will take the forms of the clouds for individual
beings; for, as we have said, both have just as much meaning
as regards the Idea which appears in them. In the manifold
forms of human life and in the unceasing change of events, he
will regard the Idea only as the abiding and essential, in which
[237] the will to live has its fullest objectivity, and which shows its
different sides in the capacities, the passions, the errors and the
excellences of the human race; in self-interest, hatred, love, fear,
boldness, frivolity, stupidity, slyness, wit, genius, and so forth,
all of which crowding together and combining in thousands of
forms (individuals), continually create the history of the great
and the little world, in which it is all the same whether they are
set in motion by nuts or by crowns. Finally, he will find that
in the world it is the same as in the dramas of Gozzi, in all of
which the same persons appear, with like intention, and with
a like fate; the motives and incidents are certainly different in
each piece, but the spirit of the incidents is the same; the actors
in one piece know nothing of the incidents of another, although
they performed in it themselves; therefore, after all experience of
former pieces, Pantaloon has become no more agile or generous,
Tartaglia no more conscientious, Brighella no more courageous,
245
and Columbine no more modest.

Suppose we were allowed for once a clearer glance into the
kingdom of the possible, and over the whole chain of causes and
effects; if the earth-spirit appeared and showed us in a picture
all the greatest men, enlighteners of the world, and heroes, that
chance destroyed before they were ripe for their work; then the
great events that would have changed the history of the world
and brought in periods of the highest culture and enlightenment,
but which the blindest chance, the most insignificant accident,
hindered at the outset; lastly, the splendid powers of great men,
that would have enriched whole ages of the world, but which,
either misled by error or passion, or compelled by necessity,
they squandered uselessly on unworthy or unfruitful objects, or
even wasted in play. If we saw all this, we would shudder
and lament at the thought of the lost treasures of whole periods
of the world. But the earth-spirit would smile and say, “The
source from which the individuals and their powers proceed is [238]
inexhaustible and unending as time and space; for, like these
forms of all phenomena, they also are only phenomena, visibility
of the will. No finite measure can exhaust that infinite source;
therefore an undiminished eternity is always open for the return
of any event or work that was nipped in the bud. In this world
of phenomena true loss is just as little possible as true gain. The
will alone is; it is the thing in-itself, and the source of all these
phenomena. Its self-knowledge and its assertion or denial, which
is then decided upon, is the only event in-itself.”49
§ 36. History follows the thread of events; it is pragmatic so
far as it deduces them in accordance with the law of motivation,
a law that determines the self-manifesting will wherever it is
enlightened by knowledge. At the lowest grades of its objectivity,
where it still acts without knowledge, natural science, in the form
of etiology, treats of the laws of the changes of its phenomena,
49
This last sentence cannot be understood without some acquaintance with
the next book.
and, in the form of morphology, of what is permanent in them.

This almost endless task is lightened by the aid of concepts, which
comprehend what is general in order that we may deduce what is
particular from it. Lastly, mathematics treats of the mere forms,
time and space, in which the Ideas, broken up into multiplicity,
appear for the knowledge of the subject as individual. All these,
of which the common name is science, proceed according to
the principle of sufficient reason in its different forms, and their
theme is always the phenomenon, its laws, connections, and the
relations which result from them. But what kind of knowledge
is concerned with that which is outside and independent of all
relations, that which alone is really essential to the world, the
true content of its phenomena, that which is subject to no change,
and therefore is known with equal truth for all time, in a word,
[239] the Ideas, which are the direct and adequate objectivity of the
thing in-itself, the will? We answer, Art, the work of genius.
It repeats or reproduces the eternal Ideas grasped through pure
contemplation, the essential and abiding in all the phenomena
of the world; and according to what the material is in which it
reproduces, it is sculpture or painting, poetry or music. Its one
source is the knowledge of Ideas; its one aim the communication
of this knowledge. While science, following the unresting and
inconstant stream of the fourfold forms of reason and consequent,
with each end attained sees further, and can never reach a final
goal nor attain full satisfaction, any more than by running we can
reach the place where the clouds touch the horizon; art, on the
contrary, is everywhere at its goal. For it plucks the object of its
contemplation out of the stream of the world's course, and has it
isolated before it. And this particular thing, which in that stream
was a small perishing part, becomes to art the representative of
the whole, an equivalent of the endless multitude in space and
time. It therefore pauses at this particular thing; the course of
time stops; the relations vanish for it; only the essential, the
Idea, is its object. We may, therefore, accurately define it as the
247
way of viewing things independent of the principle of sufficient

reason, in opposition to the way of viewing them which proceeds
in accordance with that principle, and which is the method of
experience and of science. This last method of considering things
may be compared to a line infinitely extended in a horizontal
direction, and the former to a vertical line which cuts it at
any point. The method of viewing things which proceeds in
accordance with the principle of sufficient reason is the rational
method, and it alone is valid and of use in practical life and in
science. The method which looks away from the content of this
principle is the method of genius, which is only valid and of use
in art. The first is the method of Aristotle; the second is, on the
whole, that of Plato. The first is like the mighty storm, that rushes [240]
along without beginning and without aim, bending, agitating, and
carrying away everything before it; the second is like the silent
sunbeam, that pierces through the storm quite unaffected by
it. The first is like the innumerable showering drops of the
waterfall, which, constantly changing, never rest for an instant;
the second is like the rainbow, quietly resting on this raging
torrent. Only through the pure contemplation described above,
which ends entirely in the object, can Ideas be comprehended;
and the nature of genius consists in pre-eminent capacity for such
contemplation. Now, as this requires that a man should entirely
forget himself and the relations in which he stands, genius is
simply the completest objectivity, i.e., the objective tendency of
the mind, as opposed to the subjective, which is directed to one's
own self—in other words, to the will. Thus genius is the faculty
of continuing in the state of pure perception, of losing oneself in
perception, and of enlisting in this service the knowledge which
originally existed only for the service of the will; that is to say,
genius is the power of leaving one's own interests, wishes, and
aims entirely out of sight, thus of entirely renouncing one's own
personality for a time, so as to remain pure knowing subject,
clear vision of the world; and this not merely at moments, but
for a sufficient length of time, and with sufficient consciousness,

to enable one to reproduce by deliberate art what has thus been
apprehended, and “to fix in lasting thoughts the wavering images
that float before the mind.” It is as if, when genius appears in
an individual, a far larger measure of the power of knowledge
falls to his lot than is necessary for the service of an individual
will; and this superfluity of knowledge, being free, now becomes
subject purified from will, a clear mirror of the inner nature
of the world. This explains the activity, amounting even to
disquietude, of men of genius, for the present can seldom satisfy
[241] them, because it does not fill their consciousness. This gives
them that restless aspiration, that unceasing desire for new things,
and for the contemplation of lofty things, and also that longing
that is hardly ever satisfied, for men of similar nature and of like
stature, to whom they might communicate themselves; whilst
the common mortal, entirely filled and satisfied by the common
present, ends in it, and finding everywhere his like, enjoys that
peculiar satisfaction in daily life that is denied to genius.
Imagination has rightly been recognised as an essential
element of genius; it has sometimes even been regarded as
identical with it; but this is a mistake. As the objects of genius
are the eternal Ideas, the permanent, essential forms of the
world and all its phenomena, and as the knowledge of the Idea
is necessarily knowledge through perception, is not abstract,
the knowledge of the genius would be limited to the Ideas of
the objects actually present to his person, and dependent upon
the chain of circumstances that brought these objects to him,
if his imagination did not extend his horizon far beyond the
limits of his actual personal existence, and thus enable him to
construct the whole out of the little that comes into his own
actual apperception, and so to let almost all possible scenes of
life pass before him in his own consciousness. Further, the
actual objects are almost always very imperfect copies of the
Ideas expressed in them; therefore the man of genius requires
249
imagination in order to see in things, not that which Nature has

actually made, but that which she endeavoured to make, yet
could not because of that conflict of her forms among themselves
which we referred to in the last book. We shall return to this
farther on in treating of sculpture. The imagination then extends
the intellectual horizon of the man of genius beyond the objects
which actually present themselves to him, both as regards quality
and quantity. Therefore extraordinary strength of imagination
accompanies, and is indeed a necessary condition of genius. But
the converse does not hold, for strength of imagination does not [242]
indicate genius; on the contrary, men who have no touch of genius
may have much imagination. For as it is possible to consider
a real object in two opposite ways, purely objectively, the way
of genius grasping its Idea, or in the common way, merely in
the relations in which it stands to other objects and to one's own
will, in accordance with the principle of sufficient reason, it is
also possible to perceive an imaginary object in both of these
ways. Regarded in the first way, it is a means to the knowledge
of the Idea, the communication of which is the work of art; in the
second case, the imaginary object is used to build castles in the
air congenial to egotism and the individual humour, and which
for the moment delude and gratify; thus only the relations of the
phantasies so linked together are known. The man who indulges
in such an amusement is a dreamer; he will easily mingle those
fancies that delight his solitude with reality, and so unfit himself
for real life: perhaps he will write them down, and then we shall
have the ordinary novel of every description, which entertains
those who are like him and the public at large, for the readers
imagine themselves in the place of the hero, and then find the
story very agreeable.
The common mortal, that manufacture of Nature which she
produces by the thousand every day, is, as we have said, not
capable, at least not continuously so, of observation that in every
sense is wholly disinterested, as sensuous contemplation, strictly
so called, is. He can turn his attention to things only so far

as they have some relation to his will, however indirect it may
be. Since in this respect, which never demands anything but
the knowledge of relations, the abstract conception of the thing
is sufficient, and for the most part even better adapted for use;
the ordinary man does not linger long over the mere perception,
does not fix his attention long on one object, but in all that is
presented to him hastily seeks merely the concept under which
[243] it is to be brought, as the lazy man seeks a chair, and then it
interests him no further. This is why he is so soon done with
everything, with works of art, objects of natural beauty, and
indeed everywhere with the truly significant contemplation of all
the scenes of life. He does not linger; only seeks to know his
own way in life, together with all that might at any time become
his way. Thus he makes topographical notes in the widest sense;
over the consideration of life itself as such he wastes no time.
The man of genius, on the other hand, whose excessive power
of knowledge frees it at times from the service of will, dwells
on the consideration of life itself, strives to comprehend the Idea
of each thing, not its relations to other things; and in doing this
he often forgets to consider his own path in life, and therefore
for the most part pursues it awkwardly enough. While to the
ordinary man his faculty of knowledge is a lamp to lighten his
path, to the man of genius it is the sun which reveals the world.
This great diversity in their way of looking at life soon becomes
visible in the outward appearance both of the man of genius and
of the ordinary mortal. The man in whom genius lives and works
is easily distinguished by his glance, which is both keen and
steady, and bears the stamp of perception, of contemplation. This
is easily seen from the likenesses of the few men of genius whom
Nature has produced here and there among countless millions.
On the other hand, in the case of an ordinary man, the true object
of his contemplation, what he is prying into, can be easily seen
from his glance, if indeed it is not quite stupid and vacant, as is
251
generally the case. Therefore the expression of genius in a face

consists in this, that in it a decided predominance of knowledge
over will is visible, and consequently there also shows itself in
it a knowledge that is entirely devoid of relation to will, i.e.,
pure knowing. On the contrary, in ordinary countenances there
is a predominant expression of will; and we see that knowledge
only comes into activity under the impulse of will, and thus is [244]
directed merely by motives.
Since the knowledge that pertains to genius, or the knowledge
of Ideas, is that knowledge which does not follow the principle
of sufficient reason, so, on the other hand, the knowledge
which does follow that principle is that which gives us prudence
and rationality in life, and which creates the sciences. Thus
men of genius are affected with the deficiencies entailed in
the neglect of this latter kind of knowledge. Yet what I say
in this regard is subject to the limitation that it only concerns
them in so far as and while they are actually engaged in that
kind of knowledge which is peculiar to genius; and this is by
no means at every moment of their lives, for the great though
spontaneous exertion which is demanded for the comprehension
of Ideas free from will must necessarily relax, and there are
long intervals during which men of genius are placed in very
much the same position as ordinary mortals, both as regards
advantages and deficiencies. On this account the action of
genius has always been regarded as an inspiration, as indeed
the name indicates, as the action of a superhuman being distinct
from the individual himself, and which takes possession of him
only periodically. The disinclination of men of genius to direct
their attention to the content of the principle of sufficient reason
will first show itself, with regard to the ground of being, as
dislike of mathematics; for its procedure is based upon the most
universal forms of the phenomenon space and time, which are
themselves merely modes of the principle of sufficient reason,
and is consequently precisely the opposite of that method of
thought which seeks merely the content of the phenomenon, the

Idea which expresses itself in it apart from all relations. The
logical method of mathematics is also antagonistic to genius, for
it does not satisfy but obstructs true insight, and presents merely
[245] a chain of conclusions in accordance with the principle of the
ground of knowing. The mental faculty upon which it makes
the greatest claim is memory, for it is necessary to recollect all
the earlier propositions which are referred to. Experience has
also proved that men of great artistic genius have no faculty
for mathematics; no man was ever very distinguished for both.
Alfieri relates that he was never able to understand the fourth
proposition of Euclid. Goethe was constantly reproached with his
want of mathematical knowledge by the ignorant opponents of
his theory of colours. Here certainly, where it was not a question
of calculation and measurement upon hypothetical data, but of
direct knowledge by the understanding of causes and effects, this
reproach was so utterly absurd and inappropriate, that by making
it they have exposed their entire want of judgment, just as much
as by the rest of their ridiculous arguments. The fact that up
to the present day, nearly half a century after the appearance
of Goethe's theory of colours, even in Germany the Newtonian
fallacies still have undisturbed possession of the professorial
chair, and men continue to speak quite seriously of the seven
homogeneous rays of light and their different refrangibility, will
some day be numbered among the great intellectual peculiarities
of men generally, and especially of Germans. From the same
cause as we have referred to above, may be explained the equally
well-known fact that, conversely, admirable mathematicians
have very little susceptibility for works of fine art. This is very
naïvely expressed in the well-known anecdote of the French
mathematician, who, after having read Racine's “Iphigenia,”
shrugged his shoulders and asked, “Qu'est ce que cela prouve?”
Further, as quick comprehension of relations in accordance with
the laws of causality and motivation is what specially constitutes
253
prudence or sagacity, a prudent man, so far as and while he is

so, will not be a genius, and a man of genius, so far as and
while he is so, will not be a prudent man. Lastly, perceptive
knowledge generally, in the province of which the Idea always [246]
lies, is directly opposed to rational or abstract knowledge, which
is guided by the principle of the ground of knowing. It is
also well known that we seldom find great genius united with
pre-eminent reasonableness; on the contrary, persons of genius
are often subject to violent emotions and irrational passions.
But the ground of this is not weakness of reason, but partly
unwonted energy of that whole phenomenon of will—the man of
genius—which expresses itself through the violence of all his acts
of will, and partly preponderance of the knowledge of perception
through the senses and understanding over abstract knowledge,
producing a decided tendency to the perceptible, the exceedingly
lively impressions of which so far outshine colourless concepts,
that they take their place in the guidance of action, which
consequently becomes irrational. Accordingly the impression
of the present moment is very strong with such persons, and
carries them away into unconsidered action, violent emotions
and passions. Moreover, since, in general, the knowledge of
persons of genius has to some extent freed itself from the service
of will, they will not in conversation think so much of the person
they are addressing as of the thing they are speaking about,
which is vividly present to them; and therefore they are likely
to judge or narrate things too objectively for their own interests;
they will not pass over in silence what would more prudently be
concealed, and so forth. Finally, they are given to soliloquising,
and in general may exhibit certain weaknesses which are actually
akin to madness. It has often been remarked that there is a
side at which genius and madness touch, and even pass over
into each other, and indeed poetical inspiration has been called
a kind of madness: amabilis insania, Horace calls it (Od. iii.
4), and Wieland in the introduction to “Oberon” speaks of it as
“amiable madness.” Even Aristotle, as quoted by Seneca (De

[247] Tranq. Animi, 15, 16), is reported to have said: Nullum magnum
ingenium sine mixtura dementiæ fuit. Plato expresses it in the
figure of the dark cave, referred to above (De Rep. 7), when he
says: “Those who, outside the cave, have seen the true sunlight
and the things that have true being (Ideas), cannot afterwards see
properly down in the cave, because their eyes are not accustomed
to the darkness; they cannot distinguish the shadows, and are
jeered at for their mistakes by those who have never left the cave
and its shadows.” In the “Phædrus” also (p. 317), he distinctly
says that there can be no true poet without a certain madness; in
fact, (p. 327), that every one appears mad who recognises the
eternal Ideas in fleeting things. Cicero also quotes: Negat enim
sine furore, Democritus, quemquam poetam magnum esse posse;
quod idem dicit Plato (De Divin., i. 37). And, lastly, Pope says—
“Great wits to madness sure are near allied,

And thin partitions do their bounds divide.”
Especially instructive in this respect is Goethe's “Torquato

Tasso,” in which he shows us not only the suffering, the
martyrdom of genius as such, but also how it constantly passes
into madness. Finally, the fact of the direct connection of
genius and madness is established by the biographies of great
men of genius, such as Rousseau, Byron, and Alfieri, and by
anecdotes from the lives of others. On the other hand, I must
mention that, by a diligent search in lunatic asylums, I have found
individual cases of patients who were unquestionably endowed
with great talents, and whose genius distinctly appeared through
their madness, which, however, had completely gained the upper
hand. Now this cannot be ascribed to chance, for on the one
hand the number of mad persons is relatively very small, and on
the other hand a person of genius is a phenomenon which is rare
beyond all ordinary estimation, and only appears in nature as the
255
greatest exception. It will be sufficient to convince us of this if we

compare the number of really great men of genius that the whole [248]
of civilised Europe has produced, both in ancient and modern
times, with the two hundred and fifty millions who are always
living in Europe, and who change entirely every thirty years. In
estimating the number of men of outstanding genius, we must of
course only count those who have produced works which have
retained through all time an enduring value for mankind. I shall
not refrain from mentioning, that I have known some persons
of decided, though not remarkable, mental superiority, who also
showed a slight trace of insanity. It might seem from this that
every advance of intellect beyond the ordinary measure, as an
abnormal development, disposes to madness. In the meantime,
however, I will explain as briefly as possible my view of the
purely intellectual ground of the relation between genius and
madness, for this will certainly assist the explanation of the real
nature of genius, that is to say, of that mental endowment which
alone can produce genuine works of art. But this necessitates a
brief explanation of madness itself.50
A clear and complete insight into the nature of madness, a
correct and distinct conception of what constitutes the difference
between the sane and the insane, has, as far as I know, not as
yet been found. Neither reason nor understanding can be denied
to madmen, for they talk and understand, and often draw very
accurate conclusions; they also, as a rule, perceive what is present
quite correctly, and apprehend the connection between cause and
effect. Visions, like the phantasies of delirium, are no ordinary
symptom of madness: delirium falsifies perception, madness the
thoughts. For the most part, madmen do not err in the knowledge
of what is immediately present; their raving always relates to
what is absent and past, and only through these to their connection
with what is present. Therefore it seems to me that their malady [249]
50
Cf. Chap. xxxi. of the Supplement.
specially concerns the memory; not indeed that memory fails

them entirely, for many of them know a great deal by heart,
and sometimes recognise persons whom they have not seen for
a long time; but rather that the thread of memory is broken,
the continuity of its connection destroyed, and no uniformly
connected recollection of the past is possible. Particular scenes
of the past are known correctly, just like the particular present; but
there are gaps in their recollection which they fill up with fictions,
and these are either always the same, in which case they become
fixed ideas, and the madness that results is called monomania
or melancholy; or they are always different, momentary fancies,
and then it is called folly, fatuitas. This is why it is so difficult
to find out their former life from lunatics when they enter an
asylum. The true and the false are always mixed up in their
memory. Although the immediate present is correctly known,
it becomes falsified through its fictitious connection with an
imaginary past; they therefore regard themselves and others as
identical with persons who exist only in their imaginary past;
they do not recognise some of their acquaintances at all, and
thus while they perceive correctly what is actually present, they
have only false conceptions of its relations to what is absent. If
the madness reaches a high degree, there is complete absence of
memory, so that the madman is quite incapable of any reference
to what is absent or past, and is only determined by the caprice of
the moment in connection with the fictions which, in his mind,
fill the past. In such a case, we are never for a moment safe
from violence or murder, unless we constantly make the madman
aware of the presence of superior force. The knowledge of the
madman has this in common with that of the brute, both are
confined to the present. What distinguishes them is that the brute
has really no idea of the past as such, though the past acts upon
it through the medium of custom, so that, for example, the dog
[250] recognises its former master even after years, that is to say, it
receives the wonted impression at the sight of him; but of the
257
time that has passed since it saw him it has no recollection. The
madman, on the other hand, always carries about in his reason
an abstract past, but it is a false past, which exists only for him,
and that either constantly, or only for the moment. The influence
of this false past prevents the use of the true knowledge of the
present which the brute is able to make. The fact that violent
mental suffering or unexpected and terrible calamities should
often produce madness, I explain in the following manner. All
such suffering is as an actual event confined to the present. It
is thus merely transitory, and is consequently never excessively
heavy; it only becomes unendurably great when it is lasting
pain; but as such it exists only in thought, and therefore lies in
the memory. If now such a sorrow, such painful knowledge or
reflection, is so bitter that it becomes altogether unbearable, and
the individual is prostrated under it, then, terrified Nature seizes
upon madness as the last resource of life; the mind so fearfully
tortured at once destroys the thread of its memory, fills up the
gaps with fictions, and thus seeks refuge in madness from the
mental suffering that exceeds its strength, just as we cut off a
mortified limb and replace it with a wooden one. The distracted
Ajax, King Lear, and Ophelia may be taken as examples; for
the creations of true genius, to which alone we can refer here,
as universally known, are equal in truth to real persons; besides,
in this case, frequent actual experience shows the same thing.
A faint analogy of this kind of transition from pain to madness
is to be found in the way in which all of us often seek, as it
were mechanically, to drive away a painful thought that suddenly
occurs to us by some loud exclamation or quick movement—to
turn ourselves from it, to distract our minds by force.
We see, from what has been said, that the madman has a [251]
true knowledge of what is actually present, and also of certain
particulars of the past, but that he mistakes the connection, the
relations, and therefore falls into error and talks nonsense. Now
this is exactly the point at which he comes into contact with the
man of genius; for he also leaves out of sight the knowledge of

the connection of things, since he neglects that knowledge of
relations which conforms to the principle of sufficient reason, in
order to see in things only their Ideas, and to seek to comprehend
their true nature, which manifests itself to perception, and in
regard to which one thing represents its whole species, in which
way, as Goethe says, one case is valid for a thousand. The
particular object of his contemplation, or the present which is
perceived by him with extraordinary vividness, appear in so
strong a light that the other links of the chain to which they
belong are at once thrown into the shade, and this gives rise
to phenomena which have long been recognised as resembling
those of madness. That which in particular given things exists
only incompletely and weakened by modifications, is raised by
the man of genius, through his way of contemplating it, to the
Idea of the thing, to completeness: he therefore sees everywhere
extremes, and therefore his own action tends to extremes; he
cannot hit the mean, he lacks soberness, and the result is what we
have said. He knows the Ideas completely but not the individuals.
Therefore it has been said that a poet may know mankind deeply
and thoroughly, and may yet have a very imperfect knowledge
of men. He is easily deceived, and is a tool in the hands of the
crafty.
§ 37. Genius, then, consists, according to our explanation,
in the capacity for knowing, independently of the principle
of sufficient reason, not individual things, which have their
existence only in their relations, but the Ideas of such things,
and of being oneself the correlative of the Idea, and thus no
longer an individual, but the pure subject of knowledge. Yet this
[252] faculty must exist in all men in a smaller and different degree;
for if not, they would be just as incapable of enjoying works
of art as of producing them; they would have no susceptibility
for the beautiful or the sublime; indeed, these words could have
no meaning for them. We must therefore assume that there
259
exists in all men this power of knowing the Ideas in things, and
consequently of transcending their personality for the moment,
unless indeed there are some men who are capable of no æsthetic
pleasure at all. The man of genius excels ordinary men only
by possessing this kind of knowledge in a far higher degree and
more continuously. Thus, while under its influence he retains
the presence of mind which is necessary to enable him to repeat
in a voluntary and intentional work what he has learned in this
manner; and this repetition is the work of art. Through this
he communicates to others the Idea he has grasped. This Idea
remains unchanged and the same, so that æsthetic pleasure is one
and the same whether it is called forth by a work of art or directly
by the contemplation of nature and life. The work of art is only
a means of facilitating the knowledge in which this pleasure
consists. That the Idea comes to us more easily from the work of
art than directly from nature and the real world, arises from the
fact that the artist, who knew only the Idea, no longer the actual,
has reproduced in his work the pure Idea, has abstracted it from
the actual, omitting all disturbing accidents. The artist lets us
see the world through his eyes. That he has these eyes, that he
knows the inner nature of things apart from all their relations, is
the gift of genius, is inborn; but that he is able to lend us this
gift, to let us see with his eyes, is acquired, and is the technical
side of art. Therefore, after the account which I have given in the
preceding pages of the inner nature of æsthetical knowledge in
its most general outlines, the following more exact philosophical
treatment of the beautiful and the sublime will explain them both,
in nature and in art, without separating them further. First of all [253]
we shall consider what takes place in a man when he is affected
by the beautiful and the sublime; whether he derives this emotion
directly from nature, from life, or partakes of it only through
the medium of art, does not make any essential, but merely an
external, difference.
§ 38. In the æsthetical mode of contemplation we have
found two inseparable constituent parts—the knowledge of the

object, not as individual thing but as Platonic Idea, that is, as
the enduring form of this whole species of things; and the self-
consciousness of the knowing person, not as individual, but as
pure will-less subject of knowledge. The condition under which
both these constituent parts appear always united was found to
be the abandonment of the method of knowing which is bound to
the principle of sufficient reason, and which, on the other hand,
is the only kind of knowledge that is of value for the service of
the will and also for science. Moreover, we shall see that the
pleasure which is produced by the contemplation of the beautiful
arises from these two constituent parts, sometimes more from
the one, sometimes more from the other, according to what the
object of the æsthetical contemplation may be.
All willing arises from want, therefore from deficiency, and
therefore from suffering. The satisfaction of a wish ends it; yet
for one wish that is satisfied there remain at least ten which are
denied. Further, the desire lasts long, the demands are infinite;
the satisfaction is short and scantily measured out. But even the
final satisfaction is itself only apparent; every satisfied wish at
once makes room for a new one; both are illusions; the one is
known to be so, the other not yet. No attained object of desire
can give lasting satisfaction, but merely a fleeting gratification; it
is like the alms thrown to the beggar, that keeps him alive to-day
that his misery may be prolonged till the morrow. Therefore, so
long as our consciousness is filled by our will, so long as we are
[254] given up to the throng of desires with their constant hopes and
fears, so long as we are the subject of willing, we can never have
lasting happiness nor peace. It is essentially all the same whether
we pursue or flee, fear injury or seek enjoyment; the care for
the constant demands of the will, in whatever form it may be,
continually occupies and sways the consciousness; but without
peace no true well-being is possible. The subject of willing is
thus constantly stretched on the revolving wheel of Ixion, pours
261
water into the sieve of the Danaids, is the ever-longing Tantalus.

But when some external cause or inward disposition lifts us
suddenly out of the endless stream of willing, delivers knowledge
from the slavery of the will, the attention is no longer directed to
the motives of willing, but comprehends things free from their
relation to the will, and thus observes them without personal
interest, without subjectivity, purely objectively, gives itself
entirely up to them so far as they are ideas, but not in so far
as they are motives. Then all at once the peace which we were
always seeking, but which always fled from us on the former path
of the desires, comes to us of its own accord, and it is well with
us. It is the painless state which Epicurus prized as the highest
good and as the state of the gods; for we are for the moment set
free from the miserable striving of the will; we keep the Sabbath
of the penal servitude of willing; the wheel of Ixion stands still.
But this is just the state which I described above as necessary
for the knowledge of the Idea, as pure contemplation, as sinking
oneself in perception, losing oneself in the object, forgetting
all individuality, surrendering that kind of knowledge which
follows the principle of sufficient reason, and comprehends only
relations; the state by means of which at once and inseparably
the perceived particular thing is raised to the Idea of its whole
species, and the knowing individual to the pure subject of will-
less knowledge, and as such they are both taken out of the stream [255]
of time and all other relations. It is then all one whether we see
the sun set from the prison or from the palace.
Inward disposition, the predominance of knowing over willing,
can produce this state under any circumstances. This is shown by
those admirable Dutch artists who directed this purely objective
perception to the most insignificant objects, and established
a lasting monument of their objectivity and spiritual peace in
their pictures of still life, which the æsthetic beholder does not
look on without emotion; for they present to him the peaceful,
still, frame of mind of the artist, free from will, which was
needed to contemplate such insignificant things so objectively,

to observe them so attentively, and to repeat this perception
so intelligently; and as the picture enables the onlooker to
participate in this state, his emotion is often increased by the
contrast between it and the unquiet frame of mind, disturbed by
vehement willing, in which he finds himself. In the same spirit,
landscape-painters, and particularly Ruisdael, have often painted
very insignificant country scenes, which produce the same effect
even more agreeably.
All this is accomplished by the inner power of an artistic
nature alone; but that purely objective disposition is facilitated
and assisted from without by suitable objects, by the abundance
of natural beauty which invites contemplation, and even presses
itself upon us. Whenever it discloses itself suddenly to our view,
it almost always succeeds in delivering us, though it may be only
for a moment, from subjectivity, from the slavery of the will, and
in raising us to the state of pure knowing. This is why the man
who is tormented by passion, or want, or care, is so suddenly
revived, cheered, and restored by a single free glance into nature:
the storm of passion, the pressure of desire and fear, and all the
miseries of willing are then at once, and in a marvellous manner,
[256] calmed and appeased. For at the moment at which, freed from
the will, we give ourselves up to pure will-less knowing, we pass
into a world from which everything is absent that influenced
our will and moved us so violently through it. This freeing of
knowledge lifts us as wholly and entirely away from all that, as do
sleep and dreams; happiness and unhappiness have disappeared;
we are no longer individual; the individual is forgotten; we are
only pure subject of knowledge; we are only that one eye of the
world which looks out from all knowing creatures, but which
can become perfectly free from the service of will in man alone.
Thus all difference of individuality so entirely disappears, that it
is all the same whether the perceiving eye belongs to a mighty
king or to a wretched beggar; for neither joy nor complaining
263
can pass that boundary with us. So near us always lies a sphere
in which we escape from all our misery; but who has the strength
to continue long in it? As soon as any single relation to our will,
to our person, even of these objects of our pure contemplation,
comes again into consciousness, the magic is at an end; we fall
back into the knowledge which is governed by the principle of
sufficient reason; we know no longer the Idea, but the particular
thing, the link of a chain to which we also belong, and we
are again abandoned to all our woe. Most men remain almost
always at this standpoint because they entirely lack objectivity,
i.e., genius. Therefore they have no pleasure in being alone
with nature; they need company, or at least a book. For their
knowledge remains subject to their will; they seek, therefore, in
objects, only some relation to their will, and whenever they see
anything that has no such relation, there sounds within them, like
a ground bass in music, the constant inconsolable cry, “It is of
no use to me;” thus in solitude the most beautiful surroundings
have for them a desolate, dark, strange, and hostile appearance.
Lastly, it is this blessedness of will-less perception which casts [257]
an enchanting glamour over the past and distant, and presents
them to us in so fair a light by means of self-deception. For
as we think of days long gone by, days in which we lived in a
distant place, it is only the objects which our fancy recalls, not
the subject of will, which bore about with it then its incurable
sorrows just as it bears them now; but they are forgotten, because
since then they have often given place to others. Now, objective
perception acts with regard to what is remembered just as it
would in what is present, if we let it have influence over us, if
we surrendered ourselves to it free from will. Hence it arises
that, especially when we are more than ordinarily disturbed by
some want, the remembrance of past and distant scenes suddenly
flits across our minds like a lost paradise. The fancy recalls only
what was objective, not what was individually subjective, and we
imagine that that objective stood before us then just as pure and
undisturbed by any relation to the will as its image stands in our

fancy now; while in reality the relation of the objects to our will
gave us pain then just as it does now. We can deliver ourselves
from all suffering just as well through present objects as through
distant ones whenever we raise ourselves to a purely objective
contemplation of them, and so are able to bring about the illusion
that only the objects are present and not we ourselves. Then, as
the pure subject of knowledge, freed from the miserable self, we
become entirely one with these objects, and, for the moment, our
wants are as foreign to us as they are to them. The world as idea
alone remains, and the world as will has disappeared.
In all these reflections it has been my object to bring out
clearly the nature and the scope of the subjective element in
æsthetic pleasure; the deliverance of knowledge from the service
of the will, the forgetting of self as an individual, and the
raising of the consciousness to the pure will-less, timeless,
[258] subject of knowledge, independent of all relations. With this
subjective side of æsthetic contemplation, there must always
appear as its necessary correlative the objective side, the intuitive
comprehension of the Platonic Idea. But before we turn to the
closer consideration of this, and to the achievements of art in
relation to it, it is better that we should pause for a little at the
subjective side of æsthetic pleasure, in order to complete our
treatment of this by explaining the impression of the sublime
which depends altogether upon it, and arises from a modification
of it. After that we shall complete our investigation of æsthetic
pleasure by considering its objective side.
But we must first add the following remarks to what has been
said. Light is the pleasantest and most gladdening of things; it has
become the symbol of all that is good and salutary. In all religions
it symbolises salvation, while darkness symbolises damnation.
Ormuzd dwells in the purest light, Ahrimines in eternal night.
Dante's Paradise would look very much like Vauxhall in London,
for all the blessed spirits appear as points of light and arrange
265
themselves in regular figures. The very absence of light makes us

sad; its return cheers us. Colours excite directly a keen delight,
which reaches its highest degree when they are transparent. All
this depends entirely upon the fact that light is the correlative and
condition of the most perfect kind of knowledge of perception,
the only knowledge which does not in any way affect the will. For
sight, unlike the affections of the other senses, cannot, in itself,
directly and through its sensuous effect, make the sensation of
the special organ agreeable or disagreeable; that is, it has no
immediate connection with the will. Such a quality can only
belong to the perception which arises in the understanding, and
then it lies in the relation of the object to the will. In the case of
hearing this is to some extent otherwise; sounds can give pain
directly, and they may also be sensuously agreeable, directly
and without regard to harmony or melody. Touch, as one with [259]
the feeling of the whole body, is still more subordinated to this
direct influence upon the will; and yet there is such a thing as
a sensation of touch which is neither painful nor pleasant. But
smells are always either agreeable or disagreeable, and tastes
still more so. Thus the last two senses are most closely related
to the will, and therefore they are always the most ignoble, and
have been called by Kant the subjective senses. The pleasure
which we experience from light is in fact only the pleasure which
arises from the objective possibility of the purest and fullest
perceptive knowledge, and as such it may be traced to the fact
that pure knowledge, freed and delivered from all will, is in the
highest degree pleasant, and of itself constitutes a large part of
æsthetic enjoyment. Again, we must refer to this view of light
the incredible beauty which we associate with the reflection of
objects in water. That lightest, quickest, finest species of the
action of bodies upon each other, that to which we owe by far the
completest and purest of our perceptions, the action of reflected
rays of light, is here brought clearly before our eyes, distinct and
perfect, in cause and in effect, and indeed in its entirety, hence
the æsthetic delight it gives us, which, in the most important

aspect, is entirely based on the subjective ground of æsthetic
pleasure, and is delight in pure knowing and its method.
§ 39. All these reflections are intended to bring out the
subjective part of æsthetic pleasure; that is to say, that pleasure
so far as it consists simply of delight in perceptive knowledge
as such, in opposition to will. And as directly connected with
this, there naturally follows the explanation of that disposition or
frame of mind which has been called the sense of the sublime.
We have already remarked above that the transition to the
state of pure perception takes place most easily when the objects
bend themselves to it, that is, when by their manifold and yet
[260] definite and distinct form they easily become representatives
of their Ideas, in which beauty, in the objective sense, consists.
This quality belongs pre-eminently to natural beauty, which thus
affords even to the most insensible at least a fleeting æsthetic
satisfaction: indeed it is so remarkable how especially the
vegetable world invites æsthetic observation, and, as it were,
presses itself upon it, that one might say, that these advances are
connected with the fact that these organisms, unlike the bodies of
animals, are not themselves immediate objects of knowledge, and
therefore require the assistance of a foreign intelligent individual
in order to rise out of the world of blind will and enter the world
of idea, and that thus they long, as it were, for this entrance, that
they may attain at least indirectly what is denied them directly.
But I leave this suggestion which I have hazarded, and which
borders perhaps upon extravagance, entirely undecided, for only
a very intimate and devoted consideration of nature can raise or
justify it.51 velle videantur.—De civ. Dei, xi. 27.
51
I am all the more delighted and astonished, forty years after I so timidly
and hesitatingly advanced this thought, to discover that it has already been
expressed by St. Augustine: Arbusta formas suas varias, quibus mundi hujus
visibilis structura formosa est, sentiendas sensibus praebent; ut, pro eo quod
NOSSE{FNS non possunt, quasi INNOTESCERE{FNS
267
As long as that which raises us from the knowledge of mere

relations subject to the will, to æsthetic contemplation, and
thereby exalts us to the position of the subject of knowledge
free from will, is this fittingness of nature, this significance
and distinctness of its forms, on account of which the Ideas
individualised in them readily present themselves to us; so long
is it merely beauty that affects us and the sense of the beautiful that
is excited. But if these very objects whose significant forms invite
us to pure contemplation, have a hostile relation to the human will
in general, as it exhibits itself in its objectivity, the human body,
if they are opposed to it, so that it is menaced by the irresistible
predominance of their power, or sinks into insignificance before
their immeasurable greatness; if, nevertheless, the beholder [261]
does not direct his attention to this eminently hostile relation
to his will, but, although perceiving and recognising it, turns
consciously away from it, forcibly detaches himself from his will
and its relations, and, giving himself up entirely to knowledge,
quietly contemplates those very objects that are so terrible to
the will, comprehends only their Idea, which is foreign to all
relation, so that he lingers gladly over its contemplation, and
is thereby raised above himself, his person, his will, and all
will:—in that case he is filled with the sense of the sublime,
he is in the state of spiritual exaltation, and therefore the object
producing such a state is called sublime. Thus what distinguishes
the sense of the sublime from that of the beautiful is this: in the
case of the beautiful, pure knowledge has gained the upper hand
without a struggle, for the beauty of the object, i.e., that property
which facilitates the knowledge of its Idea, has removed from
consciousness without resistance, and therefore imperceptibly,
the will and the knowledge of relations which is subject to it,
so that what is left is the pure subject of knowledge without
even a remembrance of will. On the other hand, in the case of
the sublime that state of pure knowledge is only attained by a
conscious and forcible breaking away from the relations of the
same object to the will, which are recognised as unfavourable, by

a free and conscious transcending of the will and the knowledge
related to it.
This exaltation must not only be consciously won, but also
consciously retained, and it is therefore accompanied by a
constant remembrance of will; yet not of a single particular
volition, such as fear or desire, but of human volition in general,
so far as it is universally expressed in its objectivity the human
body. If a single real act of will were to come into consciousness,
through actual personal pressure and danger from the object,
[262] then the individual will thus actually influenced would at once
gain the upper hand, the peace of contemplation would become
impossible, the impression of the sublime would be lost, because
it yields to the anxiety, in which the effort of the individual to
right itself has sunk every other thought. A few examples will
help very much to elucidate this theory of the æsthetic sublime
and remove all doubt with regard to it; at the same time they will
bring out the different degrees of this sense of the sublime. It is
in the main identical with that of the beautiful, with pure will-
less knowing, and the knowledge, that necessarily accompanies
it of Ideas out of all relation determined by the principle of
sufficient reason, and it is distinguished from the sense of the
beautiful only by the additional quality that it rises above the
known hostile relation of the object contemplated to the will in
general. Thus there come to be various degrees of the sublime,
and transitions from the beautiful to the sublime, according as
this additional quality is strong, bold, urgent, near, or weak,
distant, and merely indicated. I think it is more in keeping with
the plan of my treatise, first to give examples of these transitions,
and of the weaker degrees of the impression of the sublime,
although persons whose æsthetical susceptibility in general is
not very great, and whose imagination is not very lively, will
only understand the examples given later of the higher and more
distinct grades of that impression; and they should therefore
269
confine themselves to these, and pass over the examples of the

very weak degrees of the sublime that are to be given first.
As man is at once impetuous and blind striving of will (whose
pole or focus lies in the genital organs), and eternal, free,
serene subject of pure knowing (whose pole is the brain); so,
corresponding to this antithesis, the sun is both the source of
light, the condition of the most perfect kind of knowledge, and
therefore of the most delightful of things—and the source of
warmth, the first condition of life, i.e., of all phenomena of will
in its higher grades. Therefore, what warmth is for the will, [263]
light is for knowledge. Light is the largest gem in the crown of
beauty, and has the most marked influence on the knowledge of
every beautiful object. Its presence is an indispensable condition
of beauty; its favourable disposition increases the beauty of
the most beautiful. Architectural beauty more than any other
object is enhanced by favourable light, though even the most
insignificant things become through its influence most beautiful.
If, in the dead of winter, when all nature is frozen and stiff,
we see the rays of the setting sun reflected by masses of stone,
illuminating without warming, and thus favourable only to the
purest kind of knowledge, not to the will; the contemplation of
the beautiful effect of the light upon these masses lifts us, as
does all beauty, into a state of pure knowing. But, in this case,
a certain transcending of the interests of the will is needed to
enable us to rise into the state of pure knowing, because there is
a faint recollection of the lack of warmth from these rays, that
is, an absence of the principle of life; there is a slight challenge
to persist in pure knowing, and to refrain from all willing, and
therefore it is an example of a transition from the sense of the
beautiful to that of the sublime. It is the faintest trace of the
sublime in the beautiful; and beauty itself is indeed present only
in a slight degree. The following is almost as weak an example.
Let us imagine ourselves transported to a very lonely place,
with unbroken horizon, under a cloudless sky, trees and plants
in the perfectly motionless air, no animals, no men, no running

water, the deepest silence. Such surroundings are, as it were,
a call to seriousness and contemplation, apart from all will and
its cravings; but this is just what imparts to such a scene of
desolate stillness a touch of the sublime. For, because it affords
no object, either favourable or unfavourable, for the will which is
[264] constantly in need of striving and attaining, there only remains
the state of pure contemplation, and whoever is incapable of this,
is ignominiously abandoned to the vacancy of unoccupied will,
and the misery of ennui. So far it is a test of our intellectual
worth, of which, generally speaking, the degree of our power
of enduring solitude, or our love of it, is a good criterion. The
scene we have sketched affords us, then, an example of the
sublime in a low degree, for in it, with the state of pure knowing
in its peace and all-sufficiency, there is mingled, by way of
contrast, the recollection of the dependence and poverty of the
will which stands in need of constant action. This is the species
of the sublime for which the sight of the boundless prairies of the
interior of North America is celebrated.
But let us suppose such a scene, stripped also of vegetation,
and showing only naked rocks; then from the entire absence of
that organic life which is necessary for existence, the will at once
becomes uneasy, the desert assumes a terrible aspect, our mood
becomes more tragic; the elevation to the sphere of pure knowing
takes place with a more decided tearing of ourselves away from
the interests of the will; and because we persist in continuing
in the state of pure knowing, the sense of the sublime distinctly
appears.
The following situation may occasion this feeling in a
still higher degree: Nature convulsed by a storm; the sky
darkened by black threatening thunder-clouds; stupendous,
naked, overhanging cliffs, completely shutting out the view;
rushing, foaming torrents; absolute desert; the wail of the wind
sweeping through the clefts of the rocks. Our dependence, our
271
strife with hostile nature, our will broken in the conflict, now
appears visibly before our eyes. Yet, so long as the personal
pressure does not gain the upper hand, but we continue in æsthetic
contemplation, the pure subject of knowing gazes unshaken and
unconcerned through that strife of nature, through that picture
of the broken will, and quietly comprehends the Ideas even of [265]
those objects which are threatening and terrible to the will. In
this contrast lies the sense of the sublime.
But the impression becomes still stronger, if, when we have
before our eyes, on a large scale, the battle of the raging elements,
in such a scene we are prevented from hearing the sound of our
own voice by the noise of a falling stream; or, if we are abroad
in the storm of tempestuous seas, where the mountainous waves
rise and fall, dash themselves furiously against steep cliffs, and
toss their spray high into the air; the storm howls, the sea boils,
the lightning flashes from black clouds, and the peals of thunder
drown the voice of storm and sea. Then, in the undismayed
beholder, the two-fold nature of his consciousness reaches the
highest degree of distinctness. He perceives himself, on the one
hand, as an individual, as the frail phenomenon of will, which the
slightest touch of these forces can utterly destroy, helpless against
powerful nature, dependent, the victim of chance, a vanishing
nothing in the presence of stupendous might; and, on the other
hand, as the eternal, peaceful, knowing subject, the condition of
the object, and, therefore, the supporter of this whole world; the
terrific strife of nature only his idea; the subject itself free and
apart from all desires and necessities, in the quiet comprehension
of the Ideas. This is the complete impression of the sublime.
Here he obtains a glimpse of a power beyond all comparison
superior to the individual, threatening it with annihilation.
The impression of the sublime may be produced in quite
another way, by presenting a mere immensity in space and time;
its immeasurable greatness dwindles the individual to nothing.
Adhering to Kant's nomenclature and his accurate division,
we may call the first kind the dynamical, and the second the
mathematical sublime, although we entirely dissent from his
explanation of the inner nature of the impression, and can allow
[266] no share in it either to moral reflections, or to hypostases from
scholastic philosophy.
If we lose ourselves in the contemplation of the infinite
greatness of the universe in space and time, meditate on the
thousands of years that are past or to come, or if the heavens
at night actually bring before our eyes innumerable worlds and
so force upon our consciousness the immensity of the universe,
we feel ourselves dwindle to nothing; as individuals, as living
bodies, as transient phenomena of will, we feel ourselves pass
away and vanish into nothing like drops in the ocean. But at once
there rises against this ghost of our own nothingness, against
such lying impossibility, the immediate consciousness that all
these worlds exist only as our idea, only as modifications of
the eternal subject of pure knowing, which we find ourselves
to be as soon as we forget our individuality, and which is the
necessary supporter of all worlds and all times the condition of
their possibility. The vastness of the world which disquieted us
before, rests now in us; our dependence upon it is annulled by its
dependence upon us. All this, however, does not come at once
into reflection, but shows itself merely as the felt consciousness
that in some sense or other (which philosophy alone can explain)
we are one with the world, and therefore not oppressed, but
exalted by its immensity. It is the felt consciousness of this
that the Upanishads of the Vedas repeatedly express in such a
multitude of different ways; very admirably in the saying already
quoted: Hæ omnes creaturæ in totum ego sum, et præter me aliud
ens non est (Oupnek'hat, vol. i. p. 122.) It is the transcending of
our own individuality, the sense of the sublime.
We receive this impression of the mathematical-sublime, quite
directly, by means of a space which is small indeed as compared
with the world, but which has become directly perceptible to us,
273
and affects us with its whole extent in all its three dimensions,
so as to make our own body seem almost infinitely small. An [267]
empty space can never be thus perceived, and therefore never
an open space, but only space that is directly perceptible in all
its dimensions by means of the limits which enclose it; thus for
example a very high, vast dome, like that of St. Peter's at Rome, or
St. Paul's in London. The sense of the sublime here arises through
the consciousness of the vanishing nothingness of our own body
in the presence of a vastness which, from another point of view,
itself exists only in our idea, and of which we are as knowing
subject, the supporter. Thus here as everywhere it arises from the
contrast between the insignificance and dependence of ourselves
as individuals, as phenomena of will, and the consciousness of
ourselves as pure subject of knowing. Even the vault of the starry
heaven produces this if it is contemplated without reflection; but
just in the same way as the vault of stone, and only by its apparent,
not its real extent. Some objects of our perception excite in us
the feeling of the sublime because, not only on account of their
spatial vastness, but also of their great age, that is, their temporal
duration, we feel ourselves dwarfed to insignificance in their
presence, and yet revel in the pleasure of contemplating them: of
this kind are very high mountains, the Egyptian pyramids, and
colossal ruins of great antiquity.
Our explanation of the sublime applies also to the ethical, to
what is called the sublime character. Such a character arises
from this, that the will is not excited by objects which are well
calculated to excite it, but that knowledge retains the upper hand
in their presence. A man of sublime character will accordingly
consider men in a purely objective way, and not with reference
to the relations which they might have to his will; he will, for
example, observe their faults, even their hatred and injustice
to himself, without being himself excited to hatred; he will
behold their happiness without envy; he will recognise their
good qualities without desiring any closer relations with them; [268]
he will perceive the beauty of women, but he will not desire

them. His personal happiness or unhappiness will not greatly
affect him, he will rather be as Hamlet describes Horatio:—
“... for thou hast been,

As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing;
A man that fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks,” &c. (A. 3. Sc. 2.)
For in the course of his own life and its misfortunes, he will
consider less his individual lot than that of humanity in general,
and will therefore conduct himself in its regard, rather as knowing
than as suffering.
§ 40. Opposites throw light upon each other, and therefore
the remark may be in place here, that the proper opposite of
the sublime is something which would not at the first glance be
recognised, as such: the charming or attractive. By this, however,
I understand, that which excites the will by presenting to it directly
its fulfilment, its satisfaction. We saw that the feeling of the
sublime arises from the fact, that something entirely unfavourable
to the will, becomes the object of pure contemplation, so that such
contemplation can only be maintained by persistently turning
away from the will, and transcending its interests; this constitutes
the sublimity of the character. The charming or attractive, on the
contrary, draws the beholder away from the pure contemplation
which is demanded by all apprehension of the beautiful, because
it necessarily excites this will, by objects which directly appeal
to it, and thus he no longer remains pure subject of knowing,
but becomes the needy and dependent subject of will. That
every beautiful thing which is bright or cheering should be called
charming, is the result of a too general concept, which arises
from a want of accurate discrimination, and which I must entirely
set aside, and indeed condemn. But in the sense of the word
[269] which has been given and explained, I find only two species of
275
the charming or attractive in the province of art, and both of them

are unworthy of it. The one species, a very low one, is found
in Dutch paintings of still life, when they err by representing
articles of food, which by their deceptive likeness necessarily
excite the appetite for the things they represent, and this is just
an excitement of the will, which puts an end to all æsthetic
contemplation of the object. Painted fruit is yet admissible,
because we may regard it as the further development of the
flower, and as a beautiful product of nature in form and colour,
without being obliged to think of it as eatable; but unfortunately
we often find, represented with deceptive naturalness, prepared
and served dishes, oysters, herrings, crabs, bread and butter,
beer, wine, and so forth, which is altogether to be condemned.
In historical painting and in sculpture the charming consists in
naked figures, whose position, drapery, and general treatment
are calculated to excite the passions of the beholder, and thus
pure æsthetical contemplation is at once annihilated, and the
aim of art is defeated. This mistake corresponds exactly to that
which we have just censured in the Dutch paintings. The ancients
are almost always free from this fault in their representations
of beauty and complete nakedness of form, because the artist
himself created them in a purely objective spirit, filled with ideal
beauty, not in the spirit of subjective, and base sensuality. The
charming is thus everywhere to be avoided in art.
There is also a negative species of the charming or exciting
which is even more reprehensible than the positive form which
has been discussed; this is the disgusting or the loathsome. It
arouses the will of the beholder, just as what is properly speaking
charming, and therefore disturbs pure æsthetic contemplation.
But it is an active aversion and opposition which is excited by
it; it arouses the will by presenting to it objects which it abhors.
Therefore it has always been recognised that it is altogether [270]
inadmissible in art, where even what is ugly, when it is not
disgusting, is allowable in its proper place, as we shall see later.
§ 41. The course of the discussion has made it necessary

to insert at this point the treatment of the sublime, though we
have only half done with the beautiful, as we have considered its
subjective side only. For it was merely a special modification
of this subjective side that distinguished the beautiful from the
sublime. This difference was found to depend upon whether
the state of pure will-less knowing, which is presupposed
and demanded by all æsthetic contemplation, was reached
without opposition, by the mere disappearance of the will from
consciousness, because the object invited and drew us towards
it; or whether it was only attained through the free, conscious
transcending of the will, to which the object contemplated had
an unfavourable and even hostile relation, which would destroy
contemplation altogether, if we were to give ourselves up to it.
This is the distinction between the beautiful and the sublime. In
the object they are not essentially different, for in every case the
object of æsthetical contemplation is not the individual thing,
but the Idea in it which is striving to reveal itself; that is to say,
adequate objectivity of will at a particular grade. Its necessary
correlative, independent, like itself of the principle of sufficient
reason, is the pure subject of knowing; just as the correlative of
the particular thing is the knowing individual, both of which lie
within the province of the principle of sufficient reason.
When we say that a thing is beautiful, we thereby assert that it
is an object of our æsthetic contemplation, and this has a double
meaning; on the one hand it means that the sight of the thing
makes us objective, that is to say, that in contemplating it we are
no longer conscious of ourselves as individuals, but as pure will-
less subjects of knowledge; and on the other hand it means that
[271] we recognise in the object, not the particular thing, but an Idea;
and this can only happen, so far as our contemplation of it is not
subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason, does not follow
the relation of the object to anything outside it (which is always
ultimately connected with relations to our own will), but rests in
277
the object itself. For the Idea and the pure subject of knowledge
always appear at once in consciousness as necessary correlatives,
and on their appearance all distinction of time vanishes, for they
are both entirely foreign to the principle of sufficient reason in
all its forms, and lie outside the relations which are imposed by
it; they may be compared to the rainbow and the sun, which
have no part in the constant movement and succession of the
falling drops. Therefore, if, for example, I contemplate a tree
æsthetically, i.e., with artistic eyes, and thus recognise, not it, but
its Idea, it becomes at once of no consequence whether it is this
tree or its predecessor which flourished a thousand years ago,
and whether the observer is this individual or any other that lived
anywhere and at any time; the particular thing and the knowing
individual are abolished with the principle of sufficient reason,
and there remains nothing but the Idea and the pure subject of
knowing, which together constitute the adequate objectivity of
will at this grade. And the Idea dispenses not only with time, but
also with space, for the Idea proper is not this special form which
appears before me but its expression, its pure significance, its
inner being, which discloses itself to me and appeals to me, and
which may be quite the same though the spatial relations of its
form be very different.
Since, on the one hand, every given thing may be observed in
a. purely objective manner and apart from all relations; and since,
on the other hand, the will manifests itself in everything at some
grade of its objectivity, so that everything is the expression of an
Idea; it follows that everything is also beautiful. That even the
most insignificant things admit of pure objective and will-less [272]
contemplation, and thus prove that they are beautiful, is shown
by what was said above in this reference about the Dutch pictures
of still-life (§ 38). But one thing is more beautiful than another,
because it makes this pure objective contemplation easier, it
lends itself to it, and, so to speak, even compels it, and then we
call it very beautiful. This is the case sometimes because, as an
individual thing, it expresses in its purity the Idea of its species

by the very distinct, clearly defined, and significant relation of its
parts, and also fully reveals that Idea through the completeness
of all the possible expressions of its species united in it, so that
it makes the transition from the individual thing to the Idea, and
therefore also the condition of pure contemplation, very easy
for the beholder. Sometimes this possession of special beauty
in an object lies in the fact that the Idea itself which appeals to
us in it is a high grade of the objectivity of will, and therefore
very significant and expressive. Therefore it is that man is more
beautiful than all other objects, and the revelation of his nature
is the highest aim of art. Human form and expression are the
most important objects of plastic art, and human action the most
important object of poetry. Yet each thing has its own peculiar
beauty, not only every organism which expresses itself in the
unity of an individual being, but also everything unorganised
and formless, and even every manufactured article. For all these
reveal the Ideas through which the will objectifies itself at its
lowest grades, they give, as it were, the deepest resounding bass-
notes of nature. Gravity, rigidity, fluidity, light, and so forth,
are the Ideas which express themselves in rocks, in buildings,
in waters. Landscape-gardening or architecture can do no more
than assist them to unfold their qualities distinctly, fully, and
variously; they can only give them the opportunity of expressing
themselves purely, so that they lend themselves to æsthetic
[273] contemplation and make it easier. Inferior buildings or ill-
favoured localities, on the contrary, which nature has neglected
or art has spoiled, perform this task in a very slight degree or not
at all; yet even from them these universal, fundamental Ideas of
nature cannot altogether disappear. To the careful observer they
present themselves here also, and even bad buildings and the like
are capable of being æsthetically considered; the Ideas of the
most universal properties of their materials are still recognisable
in them, only the artificial form which has been given them does
279
not assist but hinders æsthetic contemplation. Manufactured

articles also serve to express Ideas, only it is not the Idea of the
manufactured article which speaks in them, but the Idea of the
material to which this artificial form has been given. This may be
very conveniently expressed in two words, in the language of the
schoolmen, thus,—the manufactured article expresses the Idea of
its forma substantialis, but not that of its forma accidentalis; the
latter leads to no Idea, but only to a human conception of which
it is the result. It is needless to say that by manufactured article
no work of plastic art is meant. The schoolmen understand, in
fact, by forma substantialis that which I call the grade of the
objectification of will in a thing. We shall return immediately,
when we treat of architecture, to the Idea of the material. Our
view, then, cannot be reconciled with that of Plato if he is of
opinion that a table or a chair express the Idea of a table or a
chair (De Rep., x., pp. 284, 285, et Parmen., p. 79, ed. Bip.), but
we say that they express the Ideas which are already expressed
in their mere material as such. According to Aristotle (Metap.
xi., chap. 3), however, Plato himself only maintained Ideas of
natural objects: A »±ÄÉ½ µÆ·, AÄ¹ µ¹´· µÃÄ¹½ AÀ¿Ã± ÆÅÃµ¹
(Plato dixit, quod ideæ eorum sunt, quæ natura sunt), and in
chap. 5 he says that, according to the Platonists, there are no
Ideas of house and ring. In any case, Plato's earliest disciples, as
Alcinous informs us (Introductio in Platonicam Philosophiam, [274]
chap. 9), denied that there were any ideas of manufactured
articles. He says: IÁ¹¶¿½Ä±¹ ´µ Ä·½ ¹´µ±½, À±Á±´µ¹³¼± ÄÉ½ º±Ä±
ÆÅÃ¹½ ±¹É½¹¿½. ŸÅÄµ ³±Á Ä¿¹Â À»µ¹ÃÄ¿¹Â ÄÉ½ ±À¿ »±ÄÉ½¿Â
±ÁµÃºµ¹, ÄÉ½ ÄµÇ½¹ºÉ½ µ¹½±¹ ¹´µ±Â, ¿1¿½ ±ÃÀ¹´¿Â · »ÅÁ±Â, ¿ÅÄµ
¼·½ ÄÉ½ À±Á± ÆÅÃ¹½, ¿1¿½ ÀÅÁµÄ¿Å º±¹ Ç¿»µÁ±Â, ¿ÅÄµ ÄÉ½ º±Ä±
¼µÁ¿Â, ¿1¿½ £ÉºÁ±Ä¿ÅÂ º±¹ »±ÄÉ½¿Â, ±»»½ ¿ÅÄµ ÄÉ½ µÅÄµ»É½
Ä¹½¿Â, ¿1¿½ ÁÅÀ¿Å º±¹ º±ÁÆ¿ÅÂ, ¿ÅÄµ ÄÉ½ ÀÁ¿Â Ä¹, ¿1¿½ ¼µ¹¶¿½¿Â
º±¹ QÀµÁµÇ¿½Ä¿Â; µ¹½±¹ ³±Á Ä±Â ¹´µ±Â ½¿·Ãµ¹Â ¸µ¿Å ±¹É½¹¿ÅÂ
Äµ º±¹ ±ÅÄ¿Äµ»µ¹Â (Definiunt autem IDEAM exemplar æternum
eorum, quæ secundum naturam existunt. Nam plurimis ex iis,
qui Platonem secuti sunt, minime placuit, arte factorum ideas

esse, ut clypei atque lyræ; neque rursus eorum, quæ prætor
naturam, ut febris et choleræ, neque particularium, ceu Socratis
et Platonis; neque etiam rerum vilium, veluti sordium et festucæ;
neque relationum, ut majoris et excedentis: esse namque ideas
intellectiones dei æternas, ac seipsis perfectas). We may take this
opportunity of mentioning another point in which our doctrine
of Ideas differs very much from that of Plato. He teaches (De
Rep., x., p. 288) that the object which art tries to express, the
ideal of painting and poetry, is not the Idea but the particular
thing. Our whole exposition hitherto has maintained exactly the
opposite, and Plato's opinion is the less likely to lead us astray,
inasmuch as it is the source of one of the greatest and best known
errors of this great man, his depreciation and rejection of art,
and especially poetry; he directly connects his false judgment in
reference to this with the passage quoted.
§ 42. I return to the exposition of the æsthetic impression.
The knowledge of the beautiful always supposes at once and
inseparably the pure knowing subject and the known Idea as
object. Yet the source of æsthetic satisfaction will sometimes lie
more in the comprehension of the known Idea, sometimes more
in the blessedness and spiritual peace of the pure knowing subject
[275] freed from all willing, and therefore from all individuality, and
the pain that proceeds from it. And, indeed, this predominance
of one or the other constituent part of æsthetic feeling will
depend upon whether the intuitively grasped Idea is a higher
or a lower grade of the objectivity of will. Thus in æsthetic
contemplation (in the real, or through the medium of art) of
the beauty of nature in the inorganic and vegetable worlds, or
in works of architecture, the pleasure of pure will-less knowing
will predominate, because the Ideas which are here apprehended
are only low grades of the objectivity of will, and are therefore
not manifestations of deep significance and rich content. On
the other hand, if animals and man are the objects of æsthetic
281
contemplation or representation, the pleasure will consist rather

in the comprehension of these Ideas, which are the most distinct
revelation of will; for they exhibit the greatest multiplicity of
forms, the greatest richness and deep significance of phenomena,
and reveal to us most completely the nature of will, whether
in its violence, its terribleness, its satisfaction or its aberration
(the latter in tragic situations), or finally in its change and self-
surrender, which is the peculiar theme of christian painting; as
the Idea of the will enlightened by full knowledge is the object of
historical painting in general, and of the drama. We shall now go
through the fine arts one by one, and this will give completeness
and distinctness to the theory of the beautiful which we have
advanced.
§ 43. Matter as such cannot be the expression of an Idea.
For, as we found in the first book, it is throughout nothing but
causality: its being consists in its casual action. But causality
is a form of the principle of sufficient reason; knowledge of the
Idea, on the other hand, absolutely excludes the content of that
principle. We also found, in the second book, that matter is the
common substratum of all particular phenomena of the Ideas,
and consequently is the connecting link between the Idea and [276]
the phenomenon, or the particular thing. Accordingly for both of
these reasons it is impossible that matter can for itself express any
Idea. This is confirmed a posteriori by the fact that it is impossible
to have a perceptible idea of matter as such, but only an abstract
conception; in the former, i.e., in perceptible ideas are exhibited
only the forms and qualities of which matter is the supporter,
and in all of which Ideas reveal themselves. This corresponds
also with the fact, that causality (the whole essence of matter)
cannot for itself be presented perceptibly, but is merely a definite
casual connection. On the other hand, every phenomenon of an
Idea, because as such it has entered the form of the principle of
sufficient reason, or the principium individuationis, must exhibit
itself in matter, as one of its qualities. So far then matter is,
as we have said, the connecting link between the Idea and the
principium individuationis, which is the form of knowledge of
the individual, or the principle of sufficient reason. Plato is
therefore perfectly right in his enumeration, for after the Idea
and the phenomenon, which include all other things in the world,
he gives matter only, as a third thing which is different from
both (Timaus, p. 345). The individual, as a phenomenon of
the Idea, is always matter. Every quality of matter is also the
phenomenon of an Idea, and as such it may always be an object of
æsthetic contemplation, i.e., the Idea expressed in it may always
be recognised. This holds good of even the most universal
qualities of matter, without which it never appears, and which
are the weakest objectivity of will. Such are gravity, cohesion,
rigidity, fluidity, sensitiveness to light, and so forth.
If now we consider architecture simply as a fine art and apart
from its application to useful ends, in which it serves the will
and not pure knowledge, and therefore ceases to be art in our
sense; we can assign to it no other aim than that of bringing to
[277] greater distinctness some of those ideas, which are the lowest
grades of the objectivity of will; such as gravity, cohesion,
rigidity, hardness, those universal qualities of stone, those first,
simplest, most inarticulate manifestations of will; the bass notes
of nature; and after these light, which in many respects is their
opposite. Even at these low grades of the objectivity of will we
see its nature revealing itself in discord; for properly speaking the
conflict between gravity and rigidity is the sole æsthetic material
of architecture; its problem is to make this conflict appear with
perfect distinctness in a multitude of different ways. It solves
it by depriving these indestructible forces of the shortest way
to their satisfaction, and conducting them to it by a circuitous
route, so that the conflict is lengthened and the inexhaustible
efforts of both forces become visible in many different ways.
The whole mass of the building, if left to its original tendency,
would exhibit a mere heap or clump, bound as closely as possible
283
to the earth, to which gravity, the form in which the will appears
here, continually presses, while rigidity, also objectivity of will,
resists. But this very tendency, this effort, is hindered by
architecture from obtaining direct satisfaction, and only allowed
to reach it indirectly and by roundabout ways. The roof, for
example, can only press the earth through columns, the arch
must support itself, and can only satisfy its tendency towards the
earth through the medium of the pillars, and so forth. But just by
these enforced digressions, just by these restrictions, the forces
which reside in the crude mass of stone unfold themselves in
the most distinct and multifarious ways; and the purely æsthetic
aim of architecture can go no further than this. Therefore the
beauty, at any rate, of a building lies in the obvious adaptation
of every part, not to the outward arbitrary end of man (so far
the work belongs to practical architecture), but directly to the
stability of the whole, to which the position, dimensions, and
form of every part must have so necessary a relation that, where [278]
it is possible, if any one part were taken away, the whole would
fall to pieces. For just because each part bears just as much as it
conveniently can, and each is supported just where it requires to
be and just to the necessary extent, this opposition unfolds itself,
this conflict between rigidity and gravity, which constitutes the
life, the manifestation of will, in the stone, becomes completely
visible, and these lowest grades of the objectivity of will reveal
themselves distinctly. In the same way the form of each part
must not be determined arbitrarily, but by its end, and its relation
to the whole. The column is the simplest form of support,
determined simply by its end: the twisted column is tasteless; the
four-cornered pillar is in fact not so simple as the round column,
though it happens that it is easier to make it. The forms also
of frieze, rafter, roof, and dome are entirely determined by their
immediate end, and explain themselves from it. The decoration
of capitals, &c., belongs to sculpture, not to architecture, which
admits it merely as extraneous ornament, and could dispense with
it. According to what has been said, it is absolutely necessary, in

order to understand the æsthetic satisfaction afforded by a work
of architecture, to have immediate knowledge through perception
of its matter as regards its weight, rigidity, and cohesion, and our
pleasure in such a work would suddenly be very much diminished
by the discovery that the material used was pumice-stone; for
then it would appear to us as a kind of sham building. We
would be affected in almost the same way if we were told that
it was made of wood, when we had supposed it to be of stone,
just because this alters and destroys the relation between rigidity
and gravity, and consequently the significance and necessity of
all the parts, for these natural forces reveal themselves in a far
weaker degree in a wooden building. Therefore no real work
of architecture as a fine art can be made of wood, although it
[279] assumes all forms so easily; this can only be explained by our
theory. If we were distinctly told that a building, the sight of
which gave us pleasure, was made of different kinds of material
of very unequal weight and consistency, but not distinguishable
to the eye, the whole building would become as utterly incapable
of affording us pleasure as a poem in an unknown language. All
this proves that architecture does not affect us mathematically,
but also dynamically, and that what speaks to us through it,
is not mere form and symmetry, but rather those fundamental
forces of nature, those first Ideas, those lowest grades of the
objectivity of will. The regularity of the building and its parts is
partly produced by the direct adaptation of each member to the
stability of the whole, partly it serves to facilitate the survey and
comprehension of the whole, and finally, regular figures to some
extent enhance the beauty because they reveal the constitution of
space as such. But all this is of subordinate value and necessity,
and by no means the chief concern; indeed, symmetry is not
invariably demanded, as ruins are still beautiful.
Works of architecture have further quite a special relation to
light; they gain a double beauty in the full sunshine, with the blue
285
sky as a background, and again they have quite a different effect

by moonlight. Therefore, when a beautiful work of architecture
is to be erected, special attention is always paid to the effects
of the light and to the climate. The reason of all this is, indeed,
principally that all the parts and their relations are only made
clearly visible by a bright, strong light; but besides this I am of
opinion that it is the function of architecture to reveal the nature
of light just as it reveals that of things so opposite to it as gravity
and rigidity. For the light is intercepted, confined, and reflected
by the great opaque, sharply outlined, and variously formed
masses of stone, and thus it unfolds its nature and qualities in the
purest and clearest way, to the great pleasure of the beholders,
for light is the most joy-giving of things, as the condition and [280]
the objective correlative of the most perfect kind of knowledge
of perception.
Now, because the Ideas which architecture brings to clear
perception, are the lowest grades of the objectivity of will,
and consequently their objective significance, which architecture
reveals to us, is comparatively small; the æsthetic pleasure of
looking at a beautiful building in a good light will lie, not so much
in the comprehension of the Idea, as in the subjective correlative
which accompanies this comprehension; it will consist pre-
eminently in the fact that the beholder, set free from the kind
of knowledge that belongs to the individual, and which serves
the will and follows the principle of sufficient reason, is raised
to that of the pure subject of knowing free from will. It will
consist then principally in pure contemplation itself, free from
all the suffering of will and of individuality. In this respect the
opposite of architecture, and the other extreme of the series of
the fine arts, is the drama, which brings to knowledge the most
significant Ideas. Therefore in the æsthetic pleasure afforded by
the drama the objective side is throughout predominant.
Architecture has this distinction from plastic art and poetry: it
does not give us a copy but the thing itself. It does not repeat,
as they do, the known Idea, so that the artist lends his eyes to
the beholder, but in it the artist merely presents the object to
the beholder, and facilitates for him the comprehension of the
Idea by bringing the actual, individual object to a distinct and
complete expression of its nature.
Unlike the works of the other arts, those of architecture are very
seldom executed for purely æsthetic ends. These are generally
subordinated to other useful ends which are foreign to art itself.
Thus the great merit of the architect consists in achieving and
attaining the pure æsthetic ends, in spite of their subordination to
[281] other ends which are foreign to them. This he does by cleverly
adapting them in a variety of ways to the arbitrary ends in view,
and by rightly judging which form of æsthetical architectonic
beauty is compatible and may be associated with a temple, which
with a palace, which with a prison, and so forth. The more a
harsh climate increases these demands of necessity and utility,
determines them definitely, and prescribes them more inevitably,
the less free play has beauty in architecture. In the mild climate of
India, Egypt, Greece, and Rome, where the demands of necessity
were fewer and less definite, architecture could follow its æsthetic
ends with the greatest freedom. But under a northern sky this
was sorely hindered. Here, when caissons, pointed roofs and
towers were what was demanded, architecture could only unfold
its own beauty within very narrow limits, and therefore it was
obliged to make amends by resorting all the more to the borrowed
ornaments of sculpture, as is seen in Gothic architecture.
We thus see that architecture is greatly restricted by the
demands of necessity and utility; but on the other hand it has in
them a very powerful support, for, on account of the magnitude
and costliness of its works, and the narrow sphere of its æsthetic
effect, it could not continue to exist merely as a fine art, if
it had not also, as a useful and necessary profession, a firm
and honourable place among the occupations of men. It is
the want of this that prevents another art from taking its place
287
beside architecture as a sister art, although in an æsthetical point

of view it is quite properly to be classed along with it as its
counterpart; I mean artistic arrangements of water. For what
architecture accomplishes for the Idea of gravity when it appears
in connection with that of rigidity, hydraulics accomplishes
for the same Idea, when it is connected with fluidity, i.e.,
formlessness, the greatest mobility and transparency. Leaping
waterfalls foaming and tumbling over rocks, cataracts dispersed [282]
into floating spray, springs gushing up as high columns of water,
and clear reflecting lakes, reveal the Ideas of fluid and heavy
matter, in precisely the same way as the works of architecture
unfold the Ideas of rigid matter. Artistic hydraulics, however,
obtains no support from practical hydraulics, for, as a rule, their
ends cannot be combined; yet, in exceptional cases, this happens;
for example, in the Cascata di Trevi at Rome.52
§ 44. What the two arts we have spoken of accomplish for
these lowest grades of the objectivity of will, is performed for
the higher grades of vegetable nature by artistic horticulture. The
landscape beauty of a scene consists, for the most part, in the
multiplicity of natural objects which are present in it, and then in
the fact that they are clearly separated, appear distinctly, and yet
exhibit a fitting connection and alternation. These two conditions
are assisted and promoted by landscape-gardening, but it has
by no means such a mastery over its material as architecture,
and therefore its effect is limited. The beauty with which it is
concerned belongs almost exclusively to nature; it has done little
for it; and, on the other hand, it can do little against unfavourable
nature, and when nature works, not for it, but against it, its
achievements are small.
The vegetable world offers itself everywhere for æsthetic
enjoyment without the medium of art; but so far as it is an
object of art, it belongs principally to landscape-painting; to
52
Cf. Chap. 35 of Supplement.
the province of which all the rest of unconscious nature also

belongs. In paintings of still life, and of mere architecture, ruins,
interiors of churches, &c., the subjective side of æsthetic pleasure
is predominant, i.e., our satisfaction does not lie principally in
the direct comprehension of the represented Ideas, but rather in
the subjective correlative of this comprehension, pure, will-less
[283] knowing. For, because the painter lets us see these things
through his eyes, we at once receive a sympathetic and reflected
sense of the deep spiritual peace and absolute silence of the
will, which were necessary in order to enter with knowledge so
entirely into these lifeless objects, and comprehend them with
such love, i.e., in this case with such a degree of objectivity.
The effect of landscape-painting proper is indeed, as a whole,
of this kind; but because the Ideas expressed are more distinct
and significant, as higher grades of the objectivity of will, the
objective side of æsthetic pleasure already comes more to the
front and assumes as much importance as the subjective side.
Pure knowing as such is no longer the paramount consideration,
for we are equally affected by the known Platonic Idea, the world
as idea at an important grade of the objectification of will.
But a far higher grade is revealed by animal painting and
sculpture. Of the latter we have some important antique remains;
for example, horses at Venice, on Monte Cavallo, and on the
Elgin Marbles, also at Florence in bronze and marble; the ancient
boar, howling wolves, the lions in the arsenal at Venice, also
in the Vatican a whole room almost filled with ancient animals,
&c. In these representations the objective side of æsthetic
pleasure obtains a marked predominance over the subjective.
The peace of the subject which knows these Ideas, which has
silenced its own will, is indeed present, as it is in all æsthetic
contemplation; but its effect is not felt, for we are occupied
with the restlessness and impetuosity of the will represented. It
is that very will, which constitutes our own nature, that here
appears to us in forms, in which its manifestation is not, as
289
in us, controlled and tempered by intellect, but exhibits itself

in stronger traits, and with a distinctness that borders on the
grotesque and monstrous. For this very reason there is no
concealment; it is free, naïve, open as the day, and this is the
cause of our interest in animals. The characteristics of species
appeared already in the representation of plants, but showed [284]
itself only in the forms; here it becomes much more distinct, and
expresses itself not only in the form, but in the action, position,
and mien, yet always merely as the character of the species,
not of the individual. This knowledge of the Ideas of higher
grades, which in painting we receive through extraneous means,
we may gain directly by the pure contemplative perception of
plants, and observation of beasts, and indeed of the latter in their
free, natural, and unrestrained state. The objective contemplation
of their manifold and marvellous forms, and of their actions
and behaviour, is an instructive lesson from the great book of
nature, it is a deciphering of the true signatura rerum.53 We see
in them the manifold grades and modes of the manifestation of
will, which in all beings of one and the same grade, wills always
in the same way, which objectifies itself as life, as existence
in such endless variety, and such different forms, which are all
adaptations to the different external circumstances, and may be
compared to many variations on the same theme. But if we had
to communicate to the observer, for reflection, and in a word, the
explanation of their inner nature, it would be best to make use of
that Sanscrit formula which occurs so often in the sacred books
of the Hindoos, and is called Mahavakya, i.e., the great word:
“Tat twam asi,” which means, “this living thing art thou.”
53
Jakob Böhm in his book, “de Signatura Rerum,” ch. i., § 13-15, says, “There
is nothing in nature that does not manifest its internal form externally; for the
internal continually labours to manifest itself.... Everything has its language
by which to reveal itself.... And this is the language of nature when everything
speaks out of its own property, and continually manifests and declares itself, ...
for each thing reveals its mother, which thus gives the essence and the will to
the form.”
§ 45. The great problem of historical painting and sculpture

is to express directly and for perception the Idea in which
the will reaches the highest grade of its objectification. The
objective side of the pleasure afforded by the beautiful is here
[285] always predominant, and the subjective side has retired into
the background. It is further to be observed that at the next
grade below this, animal painting, the characteristic is entirely
one with the beautiful; the most characteristic lion, wolf, horse,
sheep, or ox, was always the most beautiful also. The reason of
this is that animals have only the character of their species, no
individual character. In the representation of men the character of
the species is separated from that of the individual; the former is
now called beauty (entirely in the objective sense), but the latter
retains the name, character, or expression, and the new difficulty
arises of representing both, at once and completely, in the same
individual.
Human beauty is an objective expression, which means the
fullest objectification of will at the highest grade at which it
is knowable, the Idea of man in general, completely expressed
in the sensible form. But however much the objective side
of the beautiful appears here, the subjective side still always
accompanies it. And just because no object transports us so
quickly into pure æsthetic contemplation, as the most beautiful
human countenance and form, at the sight of which we are
instantly filled with unspeakable satisfaction, and raised above
ourselves and all that troubles us; this is only possible because
this most distinct and purest knowledge of will raises us most
easily and quickly to the state of pure knowing, in which our
personality, our will with its constant pain, disappears, so long
as the pure æsthetic pleasure lasts. Therefore it is that Goethe
says: “No evil can touch him who looks on human beauty; he
feels himself at one with himself and with the world.” That a
beautiful human form is produced by nature must be explained
in this way. At this its highest grade the will objectifies itself
291
in an individual; and therefore through circumstances and its

own power it completely overcomes all the hindrances and
opposition which the phenomena of the lower grades present to
it. Such are the forces of nature, from which the will must [286]
always first extort and win back the matter that belongs to all
its manifestations. Further, the phenomenon of will at its higher
grades always has multiplicity in its form. Even the tree is
only a systematic aggregate of innumerably repeated sprouting
fibres. This combination assumes greater complexity in higher
forms, and the human body is an exceedingly complex system of
different parts, each of which has a peculiar life of its own, vita
propria, subordinate to the whole. Now that all these parts are
in the proper fashion subordinate to the whole, and co-ordinate
to each other, that they all work together harmoniously for the
expression of the whole, nothing superfluous, nothing restricted;
all these are the rare conditions, whose result is beauty, the
completely expressed character of the species. So is it in nature.
But how in art? One would suppose that art achieved the beautiful
by imitating nature. But how is the artist to recognise the perfect
work which is to be imitated, and distinguish it from the failures,
if he does not anticipate the beautiful before experience? And
besides this, has nature ever produced a human being perfectly
beautiful in all his parts? It has accordingly been thought that
the artist must seek out the beautiful parts, distributed among a
number of different human beings, and out of them construct a
beautiful whole; a perverse and foolish opinion. For it will be
asked, how is he to know that just these forms and not others
are beautiful? We also see what kind of success attended the
efforts of the old German painters to achieve the beautiful by
imitating nature. Observe their naked figures. No knowledge
of the beautiful is possible purely a posteriori, and from mere
experience; it is always, at least in part, a priori, although quite
different in kind, from the forms of the principle of sufficient
reason, of which we are conscious a priori. These concern
the universal form of phenomena as such, as it constitutes the

[287] possibility of knowledge in general, the universal how of all
phenomena, and from this knowledge proceed mathematics and
pure natural science. But this other kind of knowledge a priori,
which makes it possible to express the beautiful, concerns, not the
form but the content of phenomena, not the how but the what of
the phenomenon. That we all recognise human beauty when we
see it, but that in the true artist this takes place with such clearness
that he shows it as he has never seen it, and surpasses nature
in his representation; this is only possible because we ourselves
are the will whose adequate objectification at its highest grade
is here to be judged and discovered. Thus alone have we in fact
an anticipation of that which nature (which is just the will that
constitutes our own being) strives to express. And in the true
genius this anticipation is accompanied by so great a degree of
intelligence that he recognises the Idea in the particular thing,
and thus, as it were, understands the half-uttered speech of
nature, and articulates clearly what she only stammered forth.
He expresses in the hard marble that beauty of form which in a
thousand attempts she failed to produce, he presents it to nature,
saying, as it were, to her, “That is what you wanted to say!”
And whoever is able to judge replies, “Yes, that is it.” Only in
this way was it possible for the genius of the Greeks to find the
type of human beauty and establish it as a canon for the school
of sculpture; and only by virtue of such an anticipation is it
possible for all of us to recognise beauty, when it has actually
been achieved by nature in the particular case. This anticipation
is the Ideal. It is the Idea so far as it is known a priori, at least
half, and it becomes practical for art, because it corresponds to
and completes what is given a posteriori through nature. The
possibility of such an anticipation of the beautiful a priori in the
artist, and of its recognition a posteriori by the critic, lies in the
fact that the artist and the critic are themselves the “in-itself” of
[288] nature, the will which objectifies itself. For, as Empedocles said,
293
like can only be known by like: only nature can understand itself:
only nature can fathom itself: but only spirit also can understand
spirit.54
The opinion, which is absurd, although expressed by the
Socrates of Xenophon (Stobæi Floril, vol. ii. p. 384) that
the Greeks discovered the established ideal of human beauty
empirically, by collecting particular beautiful parts, uncovering
and noting here a knee, there an arm, has an exact parallel in
the art of poetry. The view is entertained, that Shakespeare, for
example, observed, and then gave forth from his own experience
of life, the innumerable variety of the characters in his dramas, so
true, so sustained, so profoundly worked out. The impossibility
and absurdity of such an assumption need not be dwelt upon. It
is obvious that the man of genius produces the works of poetic
art by means of an anticipation of what is characteristic, just
as he produces the works of plastic and pictorial art by means
of a prophetic anticipation of the beautiful; yet both require
experience as a pattern or model, for thus alone can that which is
dimly known a priori be called into clear consciousness, and an
intelligent representation of it becomes possible.
Human beauty was explained above as the fullest
objectification of will at the highest grade at which it is
knowable. It expresses itself through the form; and this lies
in space alone, and has no necessary connection with time, as,
for example, motion has. Thus far then we may say: the adequate
objectification of will through a merely spatial phenomenon is
beauty, in the objective sense. A plant is nothing but such a merely
spatial phenomenon of will; for no motion, and consequently no [289]
54
The last sentence is the German of the il n'y a que l'esprit qui sente l'esprit,
of Helvetius. In the first edition there was no occasion to point this out, but
since then the age has become so degraded and ignorant through the stupefying
influence of the Hegelian sophistry, that some might quite likely say that an
antithesis was intended here between “spirit and nature.” I am therefore obliged
to guard myself in express terms against the suspicion of such vulgar sophisms.
relation to time (regarded apart from its development), belongs

to the expression of its nature; its mere form expresses its whole
being and displays it openly. But brutes and men require, further,
for the full revelation of the will which is manifested in them,
a series of actions, and thus the manifestation in them takes on
a direct relation to time. All this has already been explained in
the preceding book; it is related to what we are considering at
present in the following way. As the merely spatial manifestation
of will can objectify it fully or defectively at each definite
grade,—and it is this which constitutes beauty or ugliness,—so
the temporal objectification of will, i.e., the action, and indeed
the direct action, the movement, may correspond to the will,
which objectifies itself in it, purely and fully without foreign
admixture, without superfluity, without defect, only expressing
exactly the act of will determined in each case;—or the converse
of all this may occur. In the first case the movement is made
with grace, in the second case without it. Thus as beauty is
the adequate representation of will generally, through its merely
spatial manifestation; grace is the adequate representation of will
through its temporal manifestation, that is to say, the perfectly
accurate and fitting expression of each act of will, through the
movement and position which objectify it. Since movement and
position presuppose the body, Winckelmann's expression is very
true and suitable, when he says, “Grace is the proper relation
of the acting person to the action” (Works, vol. i. p. 258). It
is thus evident that beauty may be attributed to a plant, but no
grace, unless in a figurative sense; but to brutes and men, both
beauty and grace. Grace consists, according to what has been
said, in every movement being performed, and every position
assumed, in the easiest, most appropriate and convenient way,
and therefore being the pure, adequate expression of its intention,
[290] or of the act of will, without any superfluity, which exhibits itself
as aimless, meaningless bustle, or as wooden stiffness. Grace
presupposes as its condition a true proportion of all the limbs,
295
and a symmetrical, harmonious figure; for complete ease and

evident appropriateness of all positions and movements are only
possible by means of these. Grace is therefore never without
a certain degree of beauty of person. The two, complete and
united, are the most distinct manifestation of will at the highest
grade of its objectification.
It was mentioned above that in order rightly to portray man, it
is necessary to separate the character of the species from that of
the individual, so that to a certain extent every man expresses an
Idea peculiar to himself, as was said in the last book. Therefore
the arts whose aim is the representation of the Idea of man, have
as their problem, not only beauty, the character of the species,
but also the character of the individual, which is called, par
excellence, character. But this is only the case in so far as this
character is to be regarded, not as something accidental and quite
peculiar to the man as a single individual, but as a side of the Idea
of humanity which is specially apparent in this individual, and
the representation of which is therefore of assistance in revealing
this Idea. Thus the character, although as such it is individual,
must yet be Ideal, that is, its significance in relation to the Idea
of humanity generally (the objectifying of which it assists in its
own way) must be comprehended and expressed with special
prominence. Apart from this the representation is a portrait, a
copy of the individual as such, with all his accidental qualities.
And even the portrait ought to be, as Winckelmann says, the
ideal of the individual.
That character which is to be ideally comprehended, as the
prominence of a special side of the Idea of humanity, expresses
itself visibly, partly through permanent physiognomy and bodily
form, partly through passing emotion and passion, the reciprocal [291]
modification of knowing and willing by each other, which is
all exhibited in the mien and movements. Since the individual
always belongs to humanity, and, on the other hand, humanity
always reveals itself in the individual with what is indeed peculiar
ideal significance, beauty must not be destroyed by character nor

character by beauty. For if the character of the species is
annulled by that of the individual, the result is caricature; and
if the character of the individual is annulled by that of the
species, the result is an absence of meaning. Therefore the
representation which aims at beauty, as sculpture principally
does, will yet always modify this (the character of the species),
in some respect, by the individual character, and will always
express the Idea of man in a definite individual manner, giving
prominence to a special side of it. For the human individual as
such has to a certain extent the dignity of a special Idea, and
it is essential to the Idea of man that it should express itself
in individuals of special significance. Therefore we find in the
works of the ancients, that the beauty distinctly comprehended by
them, is not expressed in one form, but in many forms of different
character. It is always apprehended, as it were, from a different
side, and expressed in one way in Apollo, in another way in
Bacchus, in another in Hercules, in another in Antinous; indeed
the characteristic may limit the beautiful, and finally extend even
to hideousness, in the drunken Silenus, in the Faun, &c. If the
characteristic goes so far as actually to annul the character of
the species, if it extends to the unnatural, it becomes caricature.
But we can far less afford to allow grace to be interfered with
by what is characteristic than even beauty, for graceful position
and movement are demanded for the expression of the character
also; but yet it must be achieved in the way which is most fitting,
appropriate, and easy for the person. This will be observed, not
[292] only by the sculptor and the painter, but also by every good
actor; otherwise caricature will appear here also as grimace or
distortion.
In sculpture, beauty and grace are the principal concern.
The special character of the mind, appearing in emotion,
passion, alternations of knowing and willing, which can only
be represented by the expression of the countenance and the
297
gestures, is the peculiar sphere of painting. For although

eyes and colour, which lie outside the province of sculpture,
contribute much to beauty, they are yet far more essential to
character. Further, beauty unfolds itself more completely when it
is contemplated from various points of view; but the expression,
the character, can only be completely comprehended from one
point of view.
Because beauty is obviously the chief aim of sculpture, Lessing
tried to explain the fact that the Laocoon does not cry out, by
saying that crying out is incompatible with beauty. The Laocoon
formed for Lessing the theme, or at least the text of a work of his
own, and both before and after him a great deal has been written
on the subject. I may therefore be allowed to express my views
about it in passing, although so special a discussion does not
properly belong to the scheme of this work, which is throughout
concerned with what is general.
§ 46. That Laocoon, in the celebrated group, does not cry out
is obvious, and the universal and ever-renewed surprise at this
must be occasioned by the fact that any of us would cry out if we
were in his place. And nature demands that it should be so; for in
the case of the acutest physical pain, and the sudden seizure by
the greatest bodily fear, all reflection, that might have inculcated
silent endurance, is entirely expelled from consciousness, and
nature relieves itself by crying out, thus expressing both the pain
and the fear, summoning the deliverer and terrifying the assailer.
Thus Winckelmann missed the expression of crying out; but as
he wished to justify the artist he turned Laocoon into a Stoic, who
considered it beneath his dignity to cry out secundum naturam, [293]
but added to his pain the useless constraint of suppressing all
utterance of it. Winckelmann therefore sees in him “the tried
spirit of a great man, who writhes in agony, and yet seeks to
suppress the utterance of his feeling, and to lock it up in himself.
He does not break forth into loud cries, as in Virgil, but only
anxious sighs escape him,” &c. (Works, vol. vii. p. 98, and at
greater length in vol. vi. p. 104). Now Lessing criticised this

opinion of Winckelmann's in his Laocoon, and improved it in the
way mentioned above. In place of the psychological he gave the
purely æsthetic reason that beauty, the principle of ancient art,
does not admit of the expression of crying out. Another argument
which he added to this, that a merely passing state incapable
of duration ought not to be represented in motionless works of
art, has a hundred examples of most excellent figures against
it, which are fixed in merely transitory movements, dancing,
wrestling, catching, &c. Indeed Goethe, in the essay on the
Laocoon, which opens the Propylaen (p. 8), holds that the choice
of such a merely fleeting movement is absolutely necessary. In
our own day Hirt (Horen, 1797, tenth St.) finally decided the
point, deducing everything from the highest truth of expression,
that Laocoon does not cry out, because he can no longer do so,
as he is at the point of death from choking. Lastly, Fernow
(“Römische Studien,” vol. i. p. 246) expounded and weighed all
these opinions; he added, however, no new one of his own, but
combined these three eclectically.
I cannot but wonder that such thoughtful and acute men
should laboriously bring far-fetched and insufficient reasons,
should resort to psychological and physiological arguments, to
explain a matter the reason of which lies so near at hand, and is
obvious at once to the unprejudiced; and especially I wonder that
Lessing, who came so near the true explanation, should yet have
[294] entirely missed the real point.
Before all psychological and physiological inquiries as to
whether Laocoon would cry out in his position or not (and I
certainly affirm that he would), it must be decided as regards
the group in question, that crying out ought not to be expressed
in it, for the simple reason that its expression lies quite outside
the province of sculpture. A shrieking Laocoon could not be
produced in marble, but only a figure with the mouth open
vainly endeavouring to shriek; a Laocoon whose voice has stuck
299
in his throat, vox faucibus haesit. The essence of shrieking,

and consequently its effect upon the onlooker, lies entirely in
sound; not in the distortion of the mouth. This phenomenon,
which necessarily accompanies shrieking, derives motive and
justification only from the sound produced by means of it; then
it is permissible and indeed necessary, as characteristic of the
action, even though it interferes with beauty. But in plastic
art, to which the representation of shrieking is quite foreign and
impossible, it would be actual folly to represent the medium of
violent shrieking, the distorted mouth, which would disturb all
the features and the remainder of the expression; for thus at the
sacrifice of many other things the means would be represented,
while its end, the shrieking itself, and its effect upon our feelings,
would be left out. Nay more, there would be produced the
spectacle of a continuous effort without effect, which is always
ridiculous, and may really be compared to what happened when
some one for a joke stopped the horn of a night watchman with
wax while he was asleep, and then awoke him with the cry of fire,
and amused himself by watching his vain endeavours to blow the
horn. When, on the other hand, the expression of shrieking lies
in the province of poetic or histrionic art, it is quite admissible,
because it helps to express the truth, i.e., the complete expression
of the Idea. Thus it is with poetry, which claims the assistance
of the imagination of the reader, in order to enable it to represent
things perceptibly. Therefore Virgil makes Laocoon cry out [295]
like the bellowing of an ox that has broken loose after being
struck by the axe; and Homer (Il. xx. 48-53) makes Mars and
Minerva shriek horribly, without derogating from their divine
dignity or beauty. The same with acting; Laocoon on the stage
would certainly have to shriek. Sophocles makes Philoctetus
cry out, and, on the ancient stage at any rate, he must actually
have done so. As a case in point, I remember having seen in
London the great actor Kemble play in a piece called Pizarro,
translated from the German. He took the part of the American, a
half-savage, but of very noble character. When he was wounded

he cried out loudly and wildly, which had a great and admirable
effect, for it was exceedingly characteristic and therefore assisted
the truth of the representation very much. On the other hand,
a painted or sculptured model of a man shrieking, would be
much more absurd than the painted music which is censured in
Goethe's Propylaen. For shrieking does far more injury to the
expression and beauty of the whole than music, which at the
most only occupies the hands and arms, and is to be looked upon
as an occupation characteristic of the person; indeed thus far it
may quite rightly be painted, as long as it demands no violent
movement of the body, or distortion of the mouth: for example,
St. Cecilia at the organ, Raphael's violin-player in the Sciarra
Gallery at Rome, and others. Since then, on account of the
limits of the art, the pain of Laocoon must not be expressed by
shrieking, the artist was obliged to employ every other expression
of pain; this he has done in the most perfect manner, as is ably
described by Winckelmann (Works, vol. vi. p. 104), whose
admirable account thus retains its full value and truth, as soon as
[296] we abstract from the stoical view which underlies it.55
§ 47. Because beauty accompanied with grace is the principal
object of sculpture, it loves nakedness, and allows clothing only
so far as it does not conceal the form. It makes use of drapery, not
as a covering, but as a means of exhibiting the form, a method
of exposition that gives much exercise to the understanding, for
it can only arrive at a perception of the cause, the form of the
body, through the only directly given effect, the drapery. Thus
to a certain extent drapery is in sculpture what fore-shortening is
in painting. Both are suggestions, yet not symbolical, but such
that, if they are successful, they force the understanding directly
to perceive what is suggested, just as if it were actually given.
I may be allowed, in passing, to insert here a comparison
55
This digression is worked out more fully in the 36th Chapter of the
Supplement.
301
that is very pertinent to the arts we are discussing. It is this:

as the beautiful bodily form is seen to the greatest advantage
when clothed in the lightest way, or indeed without any clothing
at all, and therefore a very handsome man, if he had also taste
and the courage to follow it, would go about almost naked,
clothed only after the manner of the ancients; so every one who
possesses a beautiful and rich mind will always express himself
in the most natural, direct, and simple way, concerned, if it
be possible, to communicate his thoughts to others, and thus
relieve the loneliness that he must feel in such a world as this.
And conversely, poverty of mind, confusion, and perversity of
thought, will clothe itself in the most far-fetched expressions and
the obscurest forms of speech, in order to wrap up in difficult and
pompous phraseology small, trifling, insipid, or commonplace
thoughts; like a man who has lost the majesty of beauty, and
trying to make up for the deficiency by means of clothing, seeks
to hide the insignificance or ugliness of his person under barbaric
finery, tinsel, feathers, ruffles, cuffs, and mantles. Many an
author, if compelled to translate his pompous and obscure book [297]
into its little clear content, would be as utterly spoilt as this man
if he had to go naked.
§ 48. Historical painting has for its principal object, besides
beauty and grace, character. By character we mean generally, the
representation of will at the highest grade of its objectification,
when the individual, as giving prominence to a particular side
of the Idea of humanity, has special significance, and shows this
not merely by his form, but makes it visible in his bearing and
occupation, by action of every kind, and the modifications of
knowing and willing that occasion and accompany it. The Idea of
man must be exhibited in these circumstances, and therefore the
unfolding of its many-sidedness must be brought before our eyes
by means of representative individuals, and these individuals
can only be made visible in their significance through various
scenes, events, and actions. This is the endless problem of the
historical painter, and he solves it by placing before us scenes of

life of every kind, of greater or less significance. No individual
and no action can be without significance; in all and through
all the Idea of man unfolds itself more and more. Therefore no
event of human life is excluded from the sphere of painting. It
is thus a great injustice to the excellent painters of the Dutch
school, to prize merely their technical skill, and to look down
upon them in other respects, because, for the most part, they
represent objects of common life, whereas it is assumed that only
the events of the history of the world, or the incidents of biblical
story, have significance. We ought first to bethink ourselves
that the inward significance of an action is quite different from
its outward significance, and that these are often separated from
each other. The outward significance is the importance of an
action in relation to its result for and in the actual world; thus
according to the principle of sufficient reason. The inward
significance is the depth of the insight into the Idea of man which
[298] it reveals, in that it brings to light sides of that Idea which
rarely appear, by making individuals who assert themselves
distinctly and decidedly, disclose their peculiar characteristics by
means of appropriately arranged circumstances. Only the inward
significance concerns art; the outward belongs to history. They
are both completely independent of each other; they may appear
together, but may each appear alone. An action which is of the
highest significance for history may in inward significance be
a very ordinary and common one; and conversely, a scene of
ordinary daily life may be of great inward significance, if human
individuals, and the inmost recesses of human action and will,
appear in it in a clear and distinct light. Further, the outward
and the inward significance of a scene may be equal and yet
very different. Thus, for example, it is all the same, as far as
inward significance is concerned, whether ministers discuss the
fate of countries and nations over a map, or boors wrangle in a
beer-house over cards and dice, just as it is all the same whether
303
we play chess with golden or wooden pieces. But apart from this,
the scenes and events that make up the life of so many millions of
men, their actions, their sorrows, their joys, are on that account
important enough to be the object of art, and by their rich variety
they must afford material enough for unfolding the many-sided
Idea of man. Indeed the very transitoriness of the moment
which art has fixed in such a picture (now called genre-painting)
excites a slight and peculiar sensation; for to fix the fleeting,
ever-changing world in the enduring picture of a single event,
which yet represents the whole, is an achievement of the art of
painting by which it seems to bring time itself to a standstill,
for it raises the individual to the Idea of its species. Finally,
the historical and outwardly significant subjects of painting have
often the disadvantage that just what is significant in them cannot
be presented to perception, but must be arrived at by thought.
In this respect the nominal significance of the picture must [299]
be distinguished from its real significance. The former is the
outward significance, which, however, can only be reached as
a conception; the latter is that side of the Idea of man which is
made visible to the onlooker in the picture. For example, Moses
found by the Egyptian princess is the nominal significance of a
painting; it represents a moment of the greatest importance in
history; the real significance, on the other hand, that which is
really given to the onlooker, is a foundling child rescued from
its floating cradle by a great lady, an incident which may have
happened more than once. The costume alone can here indicate
the particular historical case to the learned; but the costume is
only of importance to the nominal significance, and is a matter
of indifference to the real significance; for the latter knows only
the human being as such, not the arbitrary forms. Subjects
taken from history have no advantage over those which are taken
from mere possibility, and which are therefore to be called, not
individual, but merely general. For what is peculiarly significant
in the former is not the individual, not the particular event as
such, but the universal in it, the side of the Idea of humanity
which expresses itself through it. But, on the other hand, definite
historical subjects are not on this account to be rejected, only the
really artistic view of such subjects, both in the painter and in the
beholder, is never directed to the individual particulars in them,
which properly constitute the historical, but to the universal
which expresses itself in them, to the Idea. And only those
historical subjects are to be chosen the chief point of which can
actually be represented, and not merely arrived at by thought,
otherwise the nominal significance is too remote from the real;
what is merely thought in connection with the picture becomes
of most importance, and interferes with what is perceived. If
even on the stage it is not right that the chief incident of the plot
[300] should take place behind the scenes (as in French tragedies), it
is clearly a far greater fault in a picture. Historical subjects are
distinctly disadvantageous only when they confine the painter
to a field which has not been chosen for artistic but for other
reasons, and especially when this field is poor in picturesque and
significant objects—if, for example, it is the history of a small,
isolated, capricious, hierarchical (i.e., ruled by error), obscure
people, like the Jews, despised by the great contemporary nations
of the East and the West. Since the wandering of the tribes lies
between us and all ancient nations, as the change of the bed of
the ocean lies between the earth's surface as it is to-day and as
it was when those organisations existed which we only know
from fossil remains, it is to be regarded generally as a great
misfortune that the people whose culture was to be the principal
basis of our own were not the Indians or the Greeks, or even
the Romans, but these very Jews. But it was especially a great
misfortune for the Italian painters of genius in the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries that, in the narrow sphere to which they were
arbitrarily driven for the choice of subjects, they were obliged
to have recourse to miserable beings of every kind. For the
New Testament, as regards its historical part, is almost more
305
unsuitable for painting than the Old, and the subsequent history
of martyrs and doctors of the church is a very unfortunate subject.
Yet of the pictures, whose subject is the history or mythology
of Judaism and Christianity, we must carefully distinguish those
in which the peculiar, i.e., the ethical spirit of Christianity is
revealed for perception, by the representation of men who are
full of this spirit. These representations are in fact the highest and
most admirable achievements of the art of painting; and only the
greatest masters of this art succeeded in this, particularly Raphael
and Correggio, and especially in their earlier pictures. Pictures
of this kind are not properly to be classed as historical: for, as a
rule, they represent no event, no action; but are merely groups
of saints, with the Saviour himself, often still a child, with His [301]
mother, angels, &c. In their countenances, and especially in the
eyes, we see the expression, the reflection, of the completest
knowledge, that which is not directed to particular things, but
has fully grasped the Ideas, and thus the whole nature of the
world and life. And this knowledge in them, reacting upon the
will, does not, like other knowledge, convey motives to it, but
on the contrary has become a quieter of all will, from which
proceeded the complete resignation, which is the innermost spirit
of Christianity, as of the Indian philosophy; the surrender of
all volition, conversion, the suppression of will, and with it of
the whole inner being of this world, that is to say, salvation.
Thus these masters of art, worthy of eternal praise, expressed
perceptibly in their works the highest wisdom. And this is
the summit of all art. It has followed the will in its adequate
objectivity, the Ideas, through all its grades, in which it is affected
and its nature unfolded in so many ways, first by causes, then
by stimuli, and finally by motives. And now art ends with the
representation of the free self-suppression of will, by means of
the great peace which it gains from the perfect knowledge of its
own nature.56
56
In order to understand this passage it is necessary to have read the whole of
§ 49. The truth which lies at the foundation of all that we have
hitherto said about art, is that the object of art, the representation
of which is the aim of the artist, and the knowledge of which
must therefore precede his work as its germ and source, is an
Idea in Plato's sense, and never anything else; not the particular
thing, the object of common apprehension, and not the concept,
the object of rational thought and of science. Although the
Idea and the concept have something in common, because both
represent as unity a multiplicity of real things; yet the great
difference between them has no doubt been made clear and
[302] evident enough by what we have said about concepts in the
first book, and about Ideas in this book. I by no means wish
to assert, however, that Plato really distinctly comprehended
this difference; indeed many of his examples of Ideas, and his
discussions of them, are applicable only to concepts. Meanwhile
we leave this question alone and go on our own way, glad
when we come upon traces of any great and noble mind, yet not
following his footsteps but our own aim. The concept is abstract,
discursive, undetermined within its own sphere, only determined
by its limits, attainable and comprehensible by him who has only
reason, communicable by words without any other assistance,
entirely exhausted by its definition. The Idea on the contrary,
although defined as the adequate representative of the concept, is
always object of perception, and although representing an infinite
number of particular things, is yet thoroughly determined. It is
never known by the individual as such, but only by him who
has raised himself above all willing and all individuality to the
pure subject of knowing. Thus it is only attainable by the man of
genius, and by him who, for the most part through the assistance
of the works of genius, has reached an exalted frame of mind,
by increasing his power of pure knowing. It is therefore not
absolutely but only conditionally communicable, because the
Idea, comprehended and repeated in the work of art, appeals to
the next book.
307
every one only according to the measure of his own intellectual

worth. So that just the most excellent works of every art, the
noblest productions of genius, must always remain sealed books
to the dull majority of men, inaccessible to them, separated from
them by a wide gulf, just as the society of princes is inaccessible
to the common people. It is true that even the dullest of them
accept on authority recognisedly great works, lest otherwise they
should argue their own incompetence; but they wait in silence,
always ready to express their condemnation, as soon as they are
allowed to hope that they may do so without being left to stand [303]
alone; and then their long-restrained hatred against all that is
great and beautiful, and against the authors of it, gladly relieves
itself; for such things never appealed to them, and for that very
reason were humiliating to them. For as a rule a man must have
worth in himself in order to recognise it and believe in it willingly
and freely in others. On this rests the necessity of modesty in
all merit, and the disproportionately loud praise of this virtue,
which alone of all its sisters is always included in the eulogy
of every one who ventures to praise any distinguished man, in
order to appease and quiet the wrath of the unworthy. What then
is modesty but hypocritical humility, by means of which, in a
world swelling with base envy, a man seeks to obtain pardon for
excellences and merits from those who have none? For whoever
attributes to himself no merits, because he actually has none, is
not modest but merely honest.
The Idea is the unity that falls into multiplicity on account
of the temporal and spatial form of our intuitive apprehension;
the concept, on the contrary, is the unity reconstructed out of
multiplicity by the abstraction of our reason; the latter may be
defined as unitas post rem, the former as unitas ante rem. Finally,
we may express the distinction between the Idea and the concept,
by a comparison, thus: the concept is like a dead receptacle, in
which, whatever has been put, actually lies side by side, but out
of which no more can be taken (by analytical judgment) than was
put in (by synthetical reflection); the (Platonic) Idea, on the other

hand, develops, in him who has comprehended it, ideas which
are new as regards the concept of the same name; it resembles a
living organism, developing itself and possessed of the power of
reproduction, which brings forth what was not put into it.
It follows from all that has been said, that the concept, useful
as it is in life, and serviceable, necessary and productive as it
[304] is in science, is yet always barren and unfruitful in art. The
comprehended Idea, on the contrary, is the true and only source
of every work of art. In its powerful originality it is only derived
from life itself, from nature, from the world, and that only by
the true genius, or by him whose momentary inspiration reaches
the point of genius. Genuine and immortal works of art spring
only from such direct apprehension. Just because the Idea is
and remains object of perception, the artist is not conscious in
the abstract of the intention and aim of his work; not a concept,
but an Idea floats before his mind; therefore he can give no
justification of what he does. He works, as people say, from
pure feeling, and unconsciously, indeed instinctively. On the
contrary, imitators, mannerists, imitatores, servum pecus, start,
in art, from the concept; they observe what pleases and affects us
in true works of art; understand it clearly, fix it in a concept, and
thus abstractly, and then imitate it, openly or disguisedly, with
dexterity and intentionally. They suck their nourishment, like
parasite plants, from the works of others, and like polypi, they
become the colour of their food. We might carry comparison
further, and say that they are like machines which mince fine and
mingle together whatever is put into them, but can never digest it,
so that the different constituent parts may always be found again
if they are sought out and separated from the mixture; the man of
genius alone resembles the organised, assimilating, transforming
and reproducing body. For he is indeed educated and cultured
by his predecessors and their works; but he is really fructified
only by life and the world directly, through the impression of
309
what he perceives; therefore the highest culture never interferes

with his originality. All imitators, all mannerists, apprehend in
concepts the nature of representative works of art; but concepts
can never impart inner life to a work. The age, i.e., the dull
multitude of every time, knows only concepts, and sticks to them,
and therefore receives mannered works of art with ready and [305]
loud applause: but after a few years these works become insipid,
because the spirit of the age, i.e., the prevailing concepts, in
which alone they could take root, have changed. Only true works
of art, which are drawn directly from nature and life, have eternal
youth and enduring power, like nature and life themselves. For
they belong to no age, but to humanity, and as on that account
they are coldly received by their own age, to which they disdain
to link themselves closely, and because indirectly and negatively
they expose the existing errors, they are slowly and unwillingly
recognised; on the other hand, they cannot grow old, but appear
to us ever fresh and new down to the latest ages. Then they are no
longer exposed to neglect and ignorance, for they are crowned and
sanctioned by the praise of the few men capable of judging, who
appear singly and rarely in the course of ages,57 and give in their
votes, whose slowly growing number constitutes the authority,
which alone is the judgment-seat we mean when we appeal to
posterity. It is these successively appearing individuals, for the
mass of posterity will always be and remain just as perverse and
dull as the mass of contemporaries always was and always is.
We read the complaints of great men in every century about the
customs of their age. They always sound as if they referred to
our own age, for the race is always the same. At every time and
in every art, mannerisms have taken the place of the spirit, which
was always the possession of a few individuals, but mannerisms
are just the old cast-off garments of the last manifestation of the
spirit that existed and was recognised. From all this it appears
57
Apparent rari, nantes in gurgite vasto.
that, as a rule, the praise of posterity can only be gained at the

cost of the praise of one's contemporaries, and vice versa.58
§ 50. If the aim of all art is the communication of the
[306] comprehended Idea, which through the mind of the artist
appears in such a form that it is purged and isolated from all
that is foreign to it, and may now be grasped by the man of
weaker comprehension and no productive faculty; if further, it is
forbidden in art to start from the concept, we shall not be able
to consent to the intentional and avowed employment of a work
of art for the expression of a concept; this is the case in the
Allegory. An allegory is a work of art which means something
different from what it represents. But the object of perception,
and consequently also the Idea, expresses itself directly and
completely, and does not require the medium of something else
which implies or indicates it. Thus, that which in this way
is indicated and represented by something entirely different,
because it cannot itself be made object of perception, is always a
concept. Therefore through the allegory a conception has always
to be signified, and consequently the mind of the beholder has to
be drawn away from the expressed perceptible idea to one which
is entirely different, abstract and not perceptible, and which lies
quite outside the work of art. The picture or statue is intended
to accomplish here what is accomplished far more fully by a
book. Now, what we hold is the end of art, representation of
a perceivable, comprehensible Idea, is not here the end. No
great completeness in the work of art is demanded for what is
aimed at here. It is only necessary that we should see what the
thing is meant to be, for, as soon as this has been discovered,
the end is reached, and the mind is now led away to quite a
different kind of idea to an abstract conception, which is the
end that was in view. Allegories in plastic and pictorial art are,
therefore, nothing but hieroglyphics; the artistic value which
58
Cf. Ch. xxxiv. of Supplement.
311
they may have as perceptible representations, belongs to them

not as allegories, but otherwise. That the “Night” of Correggio,
the “Genius of Fame” of Hannibal Caracci, and the “Hours” of
Poussin, are very beautiful pictures, is to be separated altogether
from the fact that they are allegories. As allegories they do not [307]
accomplish more than a legend, indeed rather less. We are here
again reminded of the distinction drawn above between the real
and the nominal significance of a picture. The nominal is here the
allegorical as such, for example, the “Genius of Fame.” The real
is what is actually represented, in this case a beautiful winged
youth, surrounded by beautiful boys; this expresses an Idea. But
this real significance affects us only so long as we forget the
nominal, allegorical significance; if we think of the latter, we
forsake the perception, and the mind is occupied with an abstract
conception; but the transition from the Idea to the conception is
always a fall. Indeed, that nominal significance, that allegorical
intention, often injures the real significance, the perceptible truth.
For example, the unnatural light in the “Night” of Correggio,
which, though beautifully executed, has yet a merely allegorical
motive, and is really impossible. If then an allegorical picture
has artistic value, it is quite separate from and independent of
what it accomplishes as allegory. Such a work of art serves two
ends at once, the expression of a conception and the expression
of an Idea. Only the latter can be an end of art; the other is a
foreign end, the trifling amusement of making a picture also do
service as a legend, as a hieroglyphic, invented for the pleasure
of those to whom the true nature of art can never appeal. It is the
same thing as when a work of art is also a useful implement of
some kind, in which case it also serves two ends; for example,
a statue which is at the same time a candelabrum or a caryatide;
or a bas-relief, which is also the shield of Achilles. True lovers
of art will allow neither the one nor the other. It is true that an
allegorical picture may, because of this quality, produce a vivid
impression upon the feelings; but when this is the case, a legend
would under the same circumstances produce the same effect.

[308] For example, if the desire of fame were firmly and lastingly
rooted in the heart of a man, because he regarded it as his rightful
possession, which is only withheld from him so long as he has
not produced the charter of his ownership; and if the Genius of
Fame, with his laurel crown, were to appear to such a man, his
whole mind would be excited, and his powers called into activity;
but the same effect would be produced if he were suddenly to
see the word “fame,” in large distinct letters on the wall. Or if
a man has made known a truth, which is of importance either
as a maxim for practical life, or as insight for science, but it
has not been believed; an allegorical picture representing time
as it lifts the veil, and discloses the naked figure of Truth, will
affect him powerfully; but the same effect would be produced
by the legend: “Le temps découvre la vérité.” For what really
produces the effect here is the abstract thought, not the object of
perception.
If then, in accordance with what has been said, allegory in
plastic and pictorial art is a mistaken effort, serving an end
which is entirely foreign to art, it becomes quite unbearable
when it leads so far astray that the representation of forced and
violently introduced subtilties degenerates into absurdity. Such,
for example, is a tortoise, to represent feminine seclusion; the
downward glance of Nemesis into the drapery of her bosom,
signifying that she can see into what is hidden; the explanation of
Bellori that Hannibal Carracci represents voluptuousness clothed
in a yellow robe, because he wishes to indicate that her lovers
soon fade and become yellow as straw. If there is absolutely
no connection between the representation and the conception
signified by it, founded on subsumption under the concept,
or association of Ideas; but the signs and the things signified
are combined in a purely conventional manner, by positive,
accidentally introduced laws; then I call this degenerate kind of
allegory Symbolism. Thus the rose is the symbol of secrecy, the
313
laurel is the symbol of fame, the palm is the symbol of peace, [309]
the scallop-shell is the symbol of pilgrimage, the cross is the
symbol of the Christian religion. To this class also belongs all
significance of mere colour, as yellow is the colour of falseness,
and blue is the colour of fidelity. Such symbols may often be
of use in life, but their value is foreign to art. They are simply
to be regarded as hieroglyphics, or like Chinese word-writing,
and really belong to the same class as armorial bearings, the
bush that indicates a public-house, the key of the chamberlain,
or the leather of the mountaineer. If, finally, certain historical
or mythical persons, or personified conceptions, are represented
by certain fixed symbols, these are properly called emblems.
Such are the beasts of the Evangelist, the owl of Minerva, the
apple of Paris, the Anchor of Hope, &c. For the most part,
however, we understand by emblems those simple allegorical
representations explained by a motto, which are meant to express
a moral truth, and of which large collections have been made
by J. Camerarius, Alciatus, and others. They form the transition
to poetical allegory, of which we shall have more to say later.
Greek sculpture devotes itself to the perception, and therefore it
is æsthetical; Indian sculpture devotes itself to the conception,
and therefore it is merely symbolical.
This conclusion in regard to allegory, which is founded on our
consideration of the nature of art and quite consistent with it, is
directly opposed to the opinion of Winckelmann, who, far from
explaining allegory, as we do, as something quite foreign to the
end of art, and often interfering with it, always speaks in favour of
it, and indeed (Works, vol. i. p. 55) places the highest aim of art in
the “representation of universal conceptions, and non-sensuous
things.” We leave it to every one to adhere to whichever view
he pleases. Only the truth became very clear to me from these
and similar views of Winckelmann connected with his peculiar
metaphysic of the beautiful, that one may have the greatest
susceptibility for artistic beauty, and the soundest judgment in [310]
regard to it, without being able to give an abstract and strictly

philosophical justification of the nature of the beautiful; just as
one may be very noble and virtuous, and may have a tender
conscience, which decides with perfect accuracy in particular
cases, without on that account being in a position to investigate
and explain in the abstract the ethical significance of action.
Allegory has an entirely different relation to poetry from that
which it has to plastic and pictorial art, and although it is to
be rejected in the latter, it is not only permissible, but very
serviceable to the former. For in plastic and pictorial art it leads
away from what is perceptibly given, the proper object of all
art, to abstract thoughts; but in poetry the relation is reversed;
for here what is directly given in words is the concept, and the
first aim is to lead from this to the object of perception, the
representation of which must be undertaken by the imagination
of the hearer. If in plastic and pictorial art we are led from
what is immediately given to something else, this must always
be a conception, because here only the abstract cannot be given
directly; but a conception must never be the source, and its
communication must never be the end of a work of art. In poetry,
on the contrary, the conception is the material, the immediately
given, and therefore we may very well leave it, in order to
call up perceptions which are quite different, and in which the
end is reached. Many a conception or abstract thought may be
quite indispensable to the connection of a poem, which is yet, in
itself and directly, quite incapable of being perceived; and then
it is often made perceptible by means of some example which
is subsumed under it. This takes place in every trope, every
metaphor, simile, parable, and allegory, all of which differ only
in the length and completeness of their expression. Therefore,
in the arts which employ language as their medium, similes and
[311] allegories are of striking effect. How beautifully Cervantes
says of sleep in order to express the fact that it frees us from
all spiritual and bodily suffering, “It is a mantle that covers
315
all mankind.” How beautifully Kleist expresses allegorically the

thought that philosophers and men of science enlighten mankind,
in the line, “Those whose midnight lamp lights the world.” How
strongly and sensuously Homer describes the harmful Ate when
he says: “She has tender feet, for she walks not on the hard earth,
but treads on the heads of men” (Il. xix. 91.) How forcibly
we are struck by Menenius Agrippa's fable of the belly and the
limbs, addressed to the people of Rome when they seceded.
How beautifully Plato's figure of the Cave, at the beginning of
the seventh book of the “Republic” to which we have already
referred, expresses a very abstract philosophical dogma. The
fable of Persephone is also to be regarded as a deeply significant
allegory of philosophical tendency, for she became subject to the
nether world by tasting a pomegranate. This becomes peculiarly
enlightening from Goethe's treatment of the fable, as an episode
in the Triumph der Empfindsamkeit, which is beyond all praise.
Three detailed allegorical works are known to me, one, open and
avowed, is the incomparable “Criticon” of Balthasar Gracian. It
consists of a great rich web of connected and highly ingenious
allegories, that serve here as the fair clothing of moral truths, to
which he thus imparts the most perceptible form, and astonishes
us by the richness of his invention. The two others are concealed
allegories, “Don Quixote” and “Gulliver's Travels.” The first is
an allegory of the life of every man, who will not, like others, be
careful, merely for his own welfare, but follows some objective,
ideal end, which has taken possession of his thoughts and will;
and certainly, in this world, he has then a strange appearance. In
the case of Gulliver we have only to take everything physical as
spiritual or intellectual, in order to see what the “satirical rogue,”
as Hamlet would call him, meant by it. Such, then, in the poetical [312]
allegory, the conception is always the given, which it tries to
make perceptible by means of a picture; it may sometimes be
expressed or assisted by a painted picture. Such a picture will not
be regarded as a work of art, but only as a significant symbol, and
it makes no claim to pictorial, but only to poetical worth. Such is

that beautiful allegorical vignette of Lavater's, which must be so
heartening to every defender of truth: a hand holding a light is
stung by a wasp, while gnats are burning themselves in the flame
above; underneath is the motto:
“And although it singes the wings of the gnats,

Destroys their heads and all their little brains,
Light is still light;
And although I am stung by the angriest wasp,
I will not let it go.”
To this class also belongs the gravestone with the burnt-out,

smoking candle, and the inscription—
“When it is out, it becomes clear

Whether the candle was tallow or wax.”
Finally, of this kind is an old German genealogical tree,

in which the last representative of a very ancient family thus
expresses his determination to live his life to the end in abstinence
and perfect chastity, and therefore to let his race die out; he
represents himself at the root of the high-branching tree cutting it
over himself with shears. In general all those symbols referred to
above, commonly called emblems, which might also be defined
as short painted fables with obvious morals, belong to this class.
Allegories of this kind are always to be regarded as belonging
to poetry, not to painting, and as justified thereby; moreover,
the pictorial execution is here always a matter of secondary
importance, and no more is demanded of it than that it shall
represent the thing so that we can recognise it. But in poetry, as
in plastic art, the allegory passes into the symbol if there is merely
[313] an arbitrary connection between what it presented to perception
and the abstract significance of it. For as all symbolism rests,
at bottom, on an agreement, the symbol has this among other
317
disadvantages, that in time its meaning is forgotten, and then it is

dumb. Who would guess why the fish is a symbol of Christianity
if he did not know? Only a Champollion; for it is entirely
a phonetic hieroglyphic. Therefore, as a poetical allegory, the
Revelation of John stands much in the same position as the reliefs
with Magnus Deus sol Mithra, which are still constantly being
explained.
§ 51. If now, with the exposition which has been given of
art in general, we turn from plastic and pictorial art to poetry,
we shall have no doubt that its aim also is the revelation of
the Ideas, the grades of the objectification of will, and the
communication of them to the hearer with the distinctness and
vividness with which the poetical sense comprehends them. Ideas
are essentially perceptible; if, therefore, in poetry only abstract
conceptions are directly communicated through words, it is yet
clearly the intention to make the hearer perceive the Ideas of
life in the representatives of these conceptions, and this can only
take place through the assistance of his own imagination. But
in order to set the imagination to work for the accomplishment
of this end, the abstract conceptions, which are the immediate
material of poetry as of dry prose, must be so arranged that
their spheres intersect each other in such a way that none of
them can remain in its abstract universality; but, instead of it,
a perceptible representative appears to the imagination; and this
is always further modified by the words of the poet according
to what his intention may be. As the chemist obtains solid
precipitates by combining perfectly clear and transparent fluids;
the poet understands how to precipitate, as it were, the concrete,
the individual, the perceptible idea, out of the abstract and
transparent universality of the concepts by the manner in which
he combines them. For the Idea can only be known by perception; [314]
and knowledge of the Idea is the end of art. The skill of a master,
in poetry as in chemistry, enables us always to obtain the precise
precipitate we intended. This end is assisted by the numerous
epithets in poetry, by means of which the universality of every

concept is narrowed more and more till we reach the perceptible.
Homer attaches to almost every substantive an adjective, whose
concept intersects and considerably diminishes the sphere of the
concept of the substantive, which is thus brought so much the
nearer to perception: for example—
“•½ ´½ µÀµÃ½ ©ºµ±½ó »±¼ÀÁ¿½ Æ±¿Â !µ»¹¿¹¿,

»º¿½ ½ÅºÄ± ¼µ»±¹½±½ µÀ¹ ¶µ¹´ÉÁ¿½ ±Á¿ÅÁ±½.”
(“Occidit vero in Oceanum splendidum lumen solis,

Trahens noctem nigram super almam terram.”)
And—
“Where gentle winds from the blue heavens sigh,

There stand the myrtles still, the laurel high,”—
calls up before the imagination by means of a few concepts

the whole delight of a southern clime.
Rhythm and rhyme are quite peculiar aids to poetry. I can give
no other explanation of their incredibly powerful effect than that
our faculties of perception have received from time, to which
they are essentially bound, some quality on account of which
we inwardly follow, and, as it were, consent to each regularly
recurring sound. In this way rhythm and rhyme are partly a
means of holding our attention, because we willingly follow the
poem read, and partly they produce in us a blind consent to what
is read prior to any judgment, and this gives the poem a certain
emphatic power of convincing independent of all reasons.
From the general nature of the material, that is, the concepts,
which poetry uses to communicate the Ideas, the extent of its
[315] province is very great. The whole of nature, the Ideas of
all grades, can be represented by means of it, for it proceeds
according to the Idea it has to impart, so that its representations
319
are sometimes descriptive, sometimes narrative, and sometimes

directly dramatic. If, in the representation of the lower grades of
the objectivity of will, plastic and pictorial art generally surpass
it, because lifeless nature, and even brute nature, reveals almost
its whole being in a single well-chosen moment; man, on the
contrary, so far as he does not express himself by the mere form
and expression of his person, but through a series of actions and
the accompanying thoughts and emotions, is the principal object
of poetry, in which no other art can compete with it, for here the
progress or movement which cannot be represented in plastic or
pictorial art just suits its purpose.
The revelation of the Idea, which is the highest grade of the
objectivity of will, the representation of man in the connected
series of his efforts and actions, is thus the great problem of
poetry. It is true that both experience and history teach us to
know man; yet oftener men than man, i.e., they give us empirical
notes of the behaviour of men to each other, from which we
may frame rules for our own conduct, oftener than they afford
us deep glimpses of the inner nature of man. The latter function,
however, is by no means entirely denied them; but as often
as it is the nature of mankind itself that discloses itself to us
in history or in our own experience, we have comprehended
our experience, and the historian has comprehended history,
with artistic eyes, poetically, i.e., according to the Idea, not the
phenomenon, in its inner nature, not in its relations. Our own
experience is the indispensable condition of understanding poetry
as of understanding history; for it is, so to speak, the dictionary
of the language that both speak. But history is related to poetry
as portrait-painting is related to historical painting; the one gives
us the true in the individual, the other the true in the universal;
the one has the truth of the phenomenon, and can therefore [316]
verify it from the phenomenal, the other has the truth of the Idea,
which can be found in no particular phenomenon, but yet speaks
to us from them all. The poet from deliberate choice represents
significant characters in significant situations; the historian takes

both as they come. Indeed, he must regard and select the
circumstances and the persons, not with reference to their inward
and true significance, which expresses the Idea, but according to
the outward, apparent, and relatively important significance with
regard to the connection and the consequences. He must consider
nothing in and for itself in its essential character and expression,
but must look at everything in its relations, in its connection,
in its influence upon what follows, and especially upon its own
age. Therefore he will not overlook an action of a king, though
of little significance, and in itself quite common, because it has
results and influence. And, on the other hand, actions of the
highest significance of particular and very eminent individuals
are not to be recorded by him if they have no consequences.
For his treatment follows the principle of sufficient reason, and
apprehends the phenomenon, of which this principle is the form.
But the poet comprehends the Idea, the inner nature of man apart
from all relations, outside all time, the adequate objectivity of
the thing-in-itself, at its highest grade. Even in that method of
treatment which is necessary for the historian, the inner nature
and significance of the phenomena, the kernel of all these shells,
can never be entirely lost. He who seeks for it, at any rate, may
find it and recognise it. Yet that which is significant in itself,
not in its relations, the real unfolding of the Idea, will be found
far more accurately and distinctly in poetry than in history, and,
therefore, however paradoxical it may sound, far more really
genuine inner truth is to be attributed to poetry than to history.
For the historian must accurately follow the particular event
[317] according to life, as it develops itself in time in the manifold
tangled chains of causes and effects. It is, however, impossible
that he can have all the data for this; he cannot have seen all
and discovered all. He is forsaken at every moment by the
original of his picture, or a false one substitutes itself for it, and
this so constantly that I think I may assume that in all history
321
the false outweighs the true. The poet, on the contrary, has
comprehended the Idea of man from some definite side which
is to be represented; thus it is the nature of his own self that
objectifies itself in it for him. His knowledge, as we explained
above when speaking of sculpture, is half a priori; his ideal
stands before his mind firm, distinct, brightly illuminated, and
cannot forsake him; therefore he shows us, in the mirror of his
mind, the Idea pure and distinct, and his delineation of it down
to the minutest particular is true as life itself.59 The great ancient
historians are, therefore, in those particulars in which their data
fail them, for example, in the speeches of their heroes—poets;
indeed their whole manner of handling their material approaches
to the epic. But this gives their representations unity, and [318]
enables them to retain inner truth, even when outward truth was
not accessible, or indeed was falsified. And as we compared
history to portrait-painting, in contradistinction to poetry, which
59
It is scarcely necessary to say that wherever I speak of poets I refer
exclusively to that rare phenomenon the great true poet. I mean no one else;
least of all that dull insipid tribe, the mediocre poets, rhymsters, and inventors
of fables, that flourishes so luxuriantly at the present day in Germany. They
ought rather to have the words shouted in their ears unceasingly from all
sides—
Mediocribus esse poëtis
Non homines, non Dî, non concessere columnæ.
It is worthy of serious consideration what an amount of time—both their
own and other people's—and paper is lost by this swarm of mediocre poets,
and how injurious is their influence. For the public always seizes on what
is new, and has naturally a greater proneness to what is perverse and dull as
akin to itself. Therefore these works of the mediocre poets draw it away and
hold it back from the true masterpieces and the education they afford, and thus
working in direct antagonism to the benign influence of genius, they ruin taste
more and more, and retard the progress of the age. Such poets should therefore
be scourged with criticism and satire without indulgence or sympathy till they
are induced, for their own good, to apply their muse rather to reading what is
good than to writing what is bad. For if the bungling of the incompetent so
raised the wrath of the gentle Apollo that he could flay Marsyas, I do not see
on what the mediocre poets will base their claim to tolerance.
corresponds to historical painting, we find that Winckelmann's

maxim, that the portrait ought to be the ideal of the individual,
was followed by the ancient historians, for they represent the
individual in such a way as to bring out that side of the Idea of
man which is expressed in it. Modern historians, on the contrary,
with few exceptions, give us in general only “a dust-bin and a
lumber-room, and at the most a chronicle of the principal political
events.” Therefore, whoever desires to know man in his inner
nature, identical in all its phenomena and developments, to know
him according to the Idea, will find that the works of the great,
immortal poet present a far truer, more distinct picture, than the
historians can ever give. For even the best of the historians
are, as poets, far from the first; and moreover their hands are
tied. In this aspect the relation between the historian and the
poet may be illustrated by the following comparison. The mere,
pure historian, who works only according to data, is like a man,
who without any knowledge of mathematics, has investigated
the relations of certain figures, which he has accidentally found,
by measuring them; and the problem thus empirically solved is
affected of course by all the errors of the drawn figure. The poet,
on the other hand, is like the mathematician, who constructs
these relations a priori in pure perception, and expresses them
not as they actually are in the drawn figure, but as they are in
the Idea, which the drawing is intended to render for the senses.
Therefore Schiller says:—
“What has never anywhere come to pass,

That alone never grows old.”
[319]
Indeed I must attribute greater value to biographies, and
especially to autobiographies, in relation to the knowledge of the
nature of man, than to history proper, at least as it is commonly
handled. Partly because in the former the data can be collected
more accurately and completely than in the latter; partly, because
323
in history proper, it is not so much men as nations and heroes

that act, and the individuals who do appear, seem so far off,
surrounded with such pomp and circumstance, clothed in the
stiff robes of state, or heavy, inflexible armour, that it is really
hard through all this to recognise the human movements. On
the other hand, the life of the individual when described with
truth, in a narrow sphere, shows the conduct of men in all
its forms and subtilties, the excellence, the virtue, and even
holiness of a few, the perversity, meanness, and knavery of
most, the dissolute profligacy of some. Besides, in the only
aspect we are considering here, that of the inner significance of
the phenomenal, it is quite the same whether the objects with
which the action is concerned, are, relatively considered, trifling
or important, farm-houses or kingdoms: for all these things in
themselves are without significance, and obtain it only in so
far as the will is moved by them. The motive has significance
only through its relation to the will, while the relation which it
has as a thing to other things like itself, does not concern us
here. As a circle of one inch in diameter, and a circle of forty
million miles in diameter, have precisely the same geometrical
properties, so are the events and the history of a village and a
kingdom essentially the same; and we may study and learn to
know mankind as well in the one as in the other. It is also a
mistake to suppose that autobiographies are full of deceit and
dissimulation. On the contrary, lying (though always possible)
is perhaps more difficult there than elsewhere. Dissimulation
is easiest in mere conversation; indeed, though it may sound
paradoxical, it is really more difficult even in a letter. For in the [320]
case of a letter the writer is alone, and looks into himself, and
not out on the world, so that what is strange and distant does not
easily approach him; and he has not the test of the impression
made upon another before his eyes. But the receiver of the letter
peruses it quietly in a mood unknown to the writer, reads it
repeatedly and at different times, and thus easily finds out the
concealed intention. We also get to know an author as a man most

easily from his books, because all these circumstances act here
still more strongly and permanently. And in an autobiography it
is so difficult to dissimulate, that perhaps there does not exist a
single one that is not, as a whole, more true, than any history that
ever was written. The man who writes his own life surveys it as
a whole, the particular becomes small, the near becomes distant,
the distant becomes near again, the motives that influenced him
shrink; he seats himself at the confessional, and has done so
of his own free will; the spirit of lying does not so easily take
hold of him here, for there is also in every man an inclination
to truth which has first to be overcome whenever he lies, and
which here has taken up a specially strong position. The relation
between biography and the history of nations may be made clear
for perception by means of the following comparison: History
shows us mankind as a view from a high mountain shows us
nature; we see much at a time, wide stretches, great masses,
but nothing is distinct nor recognisable in all the details of its
own peculiar nature. On the other hand, the representation of
the life of the individual shows us the man, as we see nature if
we go about among her trees, plants, rocks, and waters. But in
landscape-painting, in which the artist lets us look at nature with
his eyes, the knowledge of the Ideas, and the condition of pure
will-less knowing, which is demanded by these, is made much
easier for us; and, in the same way, poetry is far superior both to
[321] history and biography, in the representation of the Ideas which
may be looked for in all three. For here also genius holds up to
us the magic glass, in which all that is essential and significant
appears before us collected and placed in the clearest light, and
what is accidental and foreign is left out.60
The representation of the Idea of man, which is the work of the
poet, may be performed, so that what is represented is also the
60
Cf. Ch. xxxviii. of Supplement.
325
representer. This is the case in lyrical poetry, in songs, properly

so called, in which the poet only perceives vividly his own state
and describes it. Thus a certain subjectivity is essential to this
kind of poetry from the nature of its object. Again, what is to be
represented may be entirely different from him who represents
it, as is the case in all other kinds of poetry, in which the poet
more or less conceals himself behind his representation, and at
last disappears altogether. In the ballad the poet still expresses
to some extent his own state through the tone and proportion
of the whole; therefore, though much more objective than the
lyric, it has yet something subjective. This becomes less in the
idyll, still less in the romantic poem, almost entirely disappears
in the true epic, and even to the last vestige in the drama,
which is the most objective and, in more than one respect, the
completest and most difficult form of poetry. The lyrical form of
poetry is consequently the easiest, and although art, as a whole,
belongs only to the true man of genius, who so rarely appears,
even a man who is not in general very remarkable may produce
a beautiful song if, by actual strong excitement from without,
some inspiration raises his mental powers; for all that is required
for this is a lively perception of his own state at a moment
of emotional excitement. This is proved by the existence of
many single songs by individuals who have otherwise remained
unknown; especially the German national songs, of which we
have an exquisite collection in the “Wunderhorn;” and also [322]
by innumerable love-songs and other songs of the people in all
languages;—for to seize the mood of a moment and embody
it in a song is the whole achievement of this kind of poetry.
Yet in the lyrics of true poets the inner nature of all mankind
is reflected, and all that millions of past, present, and future
men have found, or will find, in the same situations, which are
constantly recurring, finds its exact expression in them. And
because these situations, by constant recurrence, are permanent
as man himself and always call up the same sensations, the lyrical
productions of genuine poets remain through thousands of years

true, powerful, and fresh. But if the poet is always the universal
man, then all that has ever moved a human heart, all that human
nature in any situation has ever produced from itself, all that
dwells and broods in any human breast—is his theme and his
material, and also all the rest of nature. Therefore the poet may
just as well sing of voluptuousness as of mysticism, be Anacreon
or Angelus Silesius, write tragedies or comedies, represent the
sublime or the common mind—according to humour or vocation.
And no one has the right to prescribe to the poet what he ought
to be—noble and sublime, moral, pious, Christian, one thing
or another, still less to reproach him because he is one thing
and not another. He is the mirror of mankind, and brings to its
consciousness what it feels and does.
If we now consider more closely the nature of the lyric
proper, and select as examples exquisite and pure models, not
those that approach in any way to some other form of poetry,
such as the ballad, the elegy, the hymn, the epigram, &c., we
shall find that the peculiar nature of the lyric, in the narrowest
sense, is this: It is the subject of will, i.e., his own volition,
which the consciousness of the singer feels; often as a released
and satisfied desire (joy), but still oftener as a restricted desire
(grief), always as an emotion, a passion, a moved frame of
[323] mind. Besides this, however, and along with it, by the sight of
surrounding nature, the singer becomes conscious of himself as
the subject of pure, will-less knowing, whose unbroken blissful
peace now appears, in contrast to the stress of desire which
is always restricted and always needy. The feeling of this
contrast, this alternation, is really what the lyric as a whole
expresses, and what principally constitutes the lyrical state of
mind. In it pure knowing comes to us, as it were, to deliver
us from desire and its stain; we follow, but only for an instant;
desire, the remembrance of our own personal ends, tears us anew
from peaceful contemplation; yet ever again the next beautiful
327
surrounding in which the pure will-less knowledge presents itself

to us, allures us away from desire. Therefore, in the lyric and
the lyrical mood, desire (the personal interest of the ends), and
pure perception of the surrounding presented, are wonderfully
mingled with each other; connections between them are sought
for and imagined; the subjective disposition, the affection of
the will, imparts its own hue to the perceived surrounding, and
conversely, the surroundings communicate the reflex of their
colour to the will. The true lyric is the expression of the whole of
this mingled and divided state of mind. In order to make clear by
examples this abstract analysis of a frame of mind that is very far
from all abstraction, any of the immortal songs of Goethe may
be taken. As specially adapted for this end I shall recommend
only a few: “The Shepherd's Lament,” “Welcome and Farewell,”
“To the Moon,” “On the Lake,” “Autumn;” also the songs in
the “Wunderhorn” are excellent examples; particularly the one
which begins, “O Bremen, I must now leave thee.” As a comical
and happy parody of the lyrical character a song of Voss strikes
me as remarkable. It describes the feeling of a drunk plumber
falling from a tower, who observes in passing that the clock on
the tower is at half-past eleven, a remark which is quite foreign
to his condition, and thus belongs to knowledge free from will. [324]
Whoever accepts the view that has been expressed of the lyrical
frame of mind, will also allow, that it is the sensuous and poetical
knowledge of the principle which I established in my essay on
the Principle of Sufficient Reason, and have also referred to
in this work, that the identity of the subject of knowing with
that of willing may be called the miracle º±Ä½ µ¾¿Ç·½; so that
the poetical effect of the lyric rests finally on the truth of that
principle. In the course of life these two subjects, or, in popular
language, head and heart, are ever becoming further apart; men
are always separating more between their subjective feeling and
their objective knowledge. In the child the two are still entirely
blended together; it scarcely knows how to distinguish itself from
its surroundings, it is at one with them. In the young man all

perception chiefly affects feeling and mood, and even mingles
with it, as Byron very beautifully expresses—
“I live not in myself, but I become

Portion of that around me; and to me
High mountains are a feeling.”
This is why the youth clings so closely to the perceptible and

outward side of things; this is why he is only fit for lyrical poetry,
and only the full-grown man is capable of the drama. The old
man we can think of as at the most an epic poet, like Ossian, and
Homer, for narration is characteristic of old age.
In the more objective kinds of poetry, especially in the
romance, the epic, and the drama, the end, the revelation of
the Idea of man, is principally attained by two means, by
true and profound representation of significant characters, and
by the invention of pregnant situations in which they disclose
themselves. For as it is incumbent upon the chemist not only to
exhibit the simple elements, pure and genuine, and their principal
compounds, but also to expose them to the influence of such
[325] reagents as will clearly and strikingly bring out their peculiar
qualities, so is it incumbent on the poet not only to present
to us significant characters truly and faithfully as nature itself;
but, in order that we may get to know them, he must place
them in those situations in which their peculiar qualities will
fully unfold themselves, and appear distinctly in sharp outline;
situations which are therefore called significant. In real life, and
in history, situations of this kind are rarely brought about by
chance, and they stand alone, lost and concealed in the multitude
of those which are insignificant. The complete significance of
the situations ought to distinguish the romance, the epic, and
the drama from real life as completely as the arrangement and
selection of significant characters. In both, however, absolute
329
truth is a necessary condition of their effect, and want of unity in

the characters, contradiction either of themselves or of the nature
of humanity in general, as well as impossibility, or very great
improbability in the events, even in mere accessories, offend just
as much in poetry as badly drawn figures, false perspective, or
wrong lighting in painting. For both in poetry and painting we
demand the faithful mirror of life, of man, of the world, only
made more clear by the representation, and more significant by
the arrangement. For there is only one end of all the arts, the
representation of the Ideas; and their essential difference lies
simply in the different grades of the objectification of will to
which the Ideas that are to be represented belong. This also
determines the material of the representation. Thus the arts
which are most widely separated may yet throw light on each
other. For example, in order to comprehend fully the Ideas
of water it is not sufficient to see it in the quiet pond or in
the evenly-flowing stream; but these Ideas disclose themselves
fully only when the water appears under all circumstances and
exposed to all kinds of obstacles. The effects of the varied
circumstances and obstacles give it the opportunity of fully [326]
exhibiting all its qualities. This is why we find it beautiful when
it tumbles, rushes, and foams, or leaps into the air, or falls in
a cataract of spray; or, lastly, if artificially confined it springs
up in a fountain. Thus showing itself different under different
circumstances, it yet always faithfully asserts its character; it is
just as natural to it to spout up as to lie in glassy stillness; it is
as ready for the one as for the other as soon as the circumstances
appear. Now, what the engineer achieves with the fluid matter
of water, the architect achieves with the rigid matter of stone,
and just this the epic or dramatic poet achieves with the Idea of
man. Unfolding and rendering distinct the Idea expressing itself
in the object of every art, the Idea of the will which objectifies
itself at each grade, is the common end of all the arts. The life
of man, as it shows itself for the most part in the real world, is
like the water, as it is generally seen in the pond and the river;
but in the epic, the romance, the tragedy, selected characters are
placed in those circumstances in which all their special qualities
unfold themselves, the depths of the human heart are revealed,
and become visible in extraordinary and very significant actions.
Thus poetry objectifies the Idea of man, an Idea which has the
peculiarity of expressing itself in highly individual characters.
Tragedy is to be regarded, and is recognised as the summit
of poetical art, both on account of the greatness of its effect
and the difficulty of its achievement. It is very significant for
our whole system, and well worthy of observation, that the end
of this highest poetical achievement is the representation of the
terrible side of life. The unspeakable pain, the wail of humanity,
the triumph of evil, the scornful mastery of chance, and the
irretrievable fall of the just and innocent, is here presented to us;
and in this lies a significant hint of the nature of the world and of
existence. It is the strife of will with itself, which here, completely
[327] unfolded at the highest grade of its objectivity, comes into fearful
prominence. It becomes visible in the suffering of men, which is
now introduced, partly through chance and error, which appear
as the rulers of the world, personified as fate, on account of their
insidiousness, which even reaches the appearance of design;
partly it proceeds from man himself, through the self-mortifying
efforts of a few, through the wickedness and perversity of most.
It is one and the same will that lives and appears in them all,
but whose phenomena fight against each other and destroy each
other. In one individual it appears powerfully, in another more
weakly; in one more subject to reason, and softened by the light
of knowledge, in another less so, till at last, in some single
case, this knowledge, purified and heightened by suffering itself,
reaches the point at which the phenomenon, the veil of Mâya, no
longer deceives it. It sees through the form of the phenomenon,
the principium individuationis. The egoism which rests on this
perishes with it, so that now the motives that were so powerful
331
before have lost their might, and instead of them the complete
knowledge of the nature of the world, which has a quieting effect
on the will, produces resignation, the surrender not merely of life,
but of the very will to live. Thus we see in tragedies the noblest
men, after long conflict and suffering, at last renounce the ends
they have so keenly followed, and all the pleasures of life for
ever, or else freely and joyfully surrender life itself. So is it with
the steadfast prince of Calderon; with Gretchen in “Faust;” with
Hamlet, whom his friend Horatio would willingly follow, but is
bade remain a while, and in this harsh world draw his breath in
pain, to tell the story of Hamlet, and clear his memory; so also
is it with the Maid of Orleans, the Bride of Messina; they all
die purified by suffering, i.e., after the will to live which was
formerly in them is dead. In the “Mohammed” of Voltaire this
is actually expressed in the concluding words which the dying [328]
Palmira addresses to Mohammad: “The world is for tyrants:
live!” On the other hand, the demand for so-called poetical
justice rests on entire misconception of the nature of tragedy,
and, indeed, of the nature of the world itself. It boldly appears in
all its dulness in the criticisms which Dr. Samuel Johnson made
on particular plays of Shakespeare, for he very naïvely laments
its entire absence. And its absence is certainly obvious, for in
what has Ophelia, Desdemona, or Cordelia offended? But only
the dull, optimistic, Protestant-rationalistic, or peculiarly Jewish
view of life will make the demand for poetical justice, and find
satisfaction in it. The true sense of tragedy is the deeper insight,
that it is not his own individual sins that the hero atones for, but
original sin, i.e., the crime of existence itself:
“Pues el delito mayor

Del hombre es haber nacido;”
(“For the greatest crime of man

Is that he was born;”)
as Calderon exactly expresses it.

I shall allow myself only one remark, more closely concerning
the treatment of tragedy. The representation of a great misfortune
is alone essential to tragedy. But the many different ways in
which this is introduced by the poet may be brought under three
specific conceptions. It may happen by means of a character
of extraordinary wickedness, touching the utmost limits of
possibility, who becomes the author of the misfortune; examples
of this kind are Richard III., Iago in “Othello,” Shylock in “The
Merchant of Venice,” Franz Moor, Phædra of Euripides, Creon in
the “Antigone,” &c., &c. Secondly, it may happen through blind
fate, i.e., chance and error; a true pattern of this kind is the Œdipus
Rex of Sophocles, the “Trachiniæ” also; and in general most of
[329] the tragedies of the ancients belong to this class. Among modern
tragedies, “Romeo and Juliet,” “Tancred” by Voltaire, and “The
Bride of Messina,” are examples. Lastly, the misfortune may
be brought about by the mere position of the dramatis personæ
with regard to each other, through their relations; so that there is
no need either for a tremendous error or an unheard-of accident,
nor yet for a character whose wickedness reaches the limits of
human possibility; but characters of ordinary morality, under
circumstances such as often occur, are so situated with regard
to each other that their position compels them, knowingly and
with their eyes open, to do each other the greatest injury, without
any one of them being entirely in the wrong. This last kind of
tragedy seems to me far to surpass the other two, for it shows
us the greatest misfortune, not as an exception, not as something
occasioned by rare circumstances or monstrous characters, but
as arising easily and of itself out of the actions and characters
of men, indeed almost as essential to them, and thus brings it
terribly near to us. In the other two kinds we may look on the
prodigious fate and the horrible wickedness as terrible powers
which certainly threaten us, but only from afar, which we may
very well escape without taking refuge in renunciation. But in
333
the last kind of tragedy we see that those powers which destroy
happiness and life are such that their path to us also is open at
every moment; we see the greatest sufferings brought about by
entanglements that our fate might also partake of, and through
actions that perhaps we also are capable of performing, and
so could not complain of injustice; then shuddering we feel
ourselves already in the midst of hell. This last kind of tragedy
is also the most difficult of achievement; for the greatest effect
has to be produced in it with the least use of means and causes
of movement, merely through the position and distribution of
the characters; therefore even in many of the best tragedies this
difficulty is evaded. Yet one tragedy may be referred to as a [330]
perfect model of this kind, a tragedy which in other respects is far
surpassed by more than one work of the same great master; it is
“Clavigo.” “Hamlet” belongs to a certain extent to this class, as
far as the relation of Hamlet to Laertes and Ophelia is concerned.
“Wallenstein” has also this excellence. “Faust” belongs entirely
to this class, if we regard the events connected with Gretchen and
her brother as the principal action; also the “Cid” of Corneille,
only that it lacks the tragic conclusion, while on the contrary the
analogous relation of Max to Thecla has it.61
§ 52. Now that we have considered all the fine arts in the
general way that is suitable to our point of view, beginning
with architecture, the peculiar end of which is to elucidate the
objectification of will at the lowest grades of its visibility, in
which it shows itself as the dumb unconscious tendency of the
mass in accordance with laws, and yet already reveals a breach
of the unity of will with itself in a conflict between gravity
and rigidity—and ending with the consideration of tragedy,
which presents to us at the highest grades of the objectification
of will this very conflict with itself in terrible magnitude and
distinctness; we find that there is still another fine art which has
61
Cf. Ch. xxxvii. of the Supplement.
been excluded from our consideration, and had to be excluded,

for in the systematic connection of our exposition there was no
fitting place for it—I mean music. It stands alone, quite cut off
from all the other arts. In it we do not recognise the copy or
repetition of any Idea of existence in the world. Yet it is such a
great and exceedingly noble art, its effect on the inmost nature of
man is so powerful, and it is so entirely and deeply understood
by him in his inmost consciousness as a perfectly universal
language, the distinctness of which surpasses even that of the
[331] perceptible world itself, that we certainly have more to look
for in it than an exercitum arithmeticæ occultum nescientis se
numerare animi,62 which Leibnitz called it. Yet he was perfectly
right, as he considered only its immediate external significance,
its form. But if it were nothing more, the satisfaction which it
affords would be like that which we feel when a sum in arithmetic
comes out right, and could not be that intense pleasure with which
we see the deepest recesses of our nature find utterance. From
our standpoint, therefore, at which the æsthetic effect is the
criterion, we must attribute to music a far more serious and
deep significance, connected with the inmost nature of the world
and our own self, and in reference to which the arithmetical
proportions, to which it may be reduced, are related, not as the
thing signified, but merely as the sign. That in some sense music
must be related to the world as the representation to the thing
represented, as the copy to the original, we may conclude from
the analogy of the other arts, all of which possess this character,
and affect us on the whole in the same way as it does, only
that the effect of music is stronger, quicker, more necessary and
infallible. Further, its representative relation to the world must
be very deep, absolutely true, and strikingly accurate, because it
is instantly understood by every one, and has the appearance of a
certain infallibility, because its form may be reduced to perfectly
62
Leibnitii epistolæ, collectio Kortholti, ep. 154.
335
definite rules expressed in numbers, from which it cannot free

itself without entirely ceasing to be music. Yet the point of
comparison between music and the world, the respect in which
it stands to the world in the relation of a copy or repetition,
is very obscure. Men have practised music in all ages without
being able to account for this; content to understand it directly,
they renounce all claim to an abstract conception of this direct
understanding itself.
I gave my mind entirely up to the impression of music in all its [332]
forms, and then returned to reflection and the system of thought
expressed in the present work, and thus I arrived at an explanation
of the inner nature of music and of the nature of its imitative
relation to the world—which from analogy had necessarily to
be presupposed—an explanation which is quite sufficient for
myself, and satisfactory to my investigation, and which will
doubtless be equally evident to any one who has followed me
thus far and has agreed with my view of the world. Yet I
recognise the fact that it is essentially impossible to prove this
explanation, for it assumes and establishes a relation of music, as
idea, to that which from its nature can never be idea, and music
will have to be regarded as the copy of an original which can
never itself be directly presented as idea. I can therefore do no
more than state here, at the conclusion of this third book, which
has been principally devoted to the consideration of the arts,
the explanation of the marvellous art of music which satisfies
myself, and I must leave the acceptance or denial of my view
to the effect produced upon each of my readers both by music
itself and by the whole system of thought communicated in this
work. Moreover, I regard it as necessary, in order to be able to
assent with full conviction to the exposition of the significance
of music I am about to give, that one should often listen to music
with constant reflection upon my theory concerning it, and for
this again it is necessary to be very familiar with the whole of
my system of thought.
The (Platonic) Ideas are the adequate objectification of will.

To excite or suggest the knowledge of these by means of the
representation of particular things (for works of art themselves
are always representations of particular things) is the end of all
the other arts, which can only be attained by a corresponding
change in the knowing subject. Thus all these arts objectify the
will indirectly only by means of the Ideas; and since our world is
[333] nothing but the manifestation of the Ideas in multiplicity, though
their entrance into the principium individuationis (the form of
the knowledge possible for the individual as such), music also,
since it passes over the Ideas, is entirely independent of the
phenomenal world, ignores it altogether, could to a certain extent
exist if there was no world at all, which cannot be said of the other
arts. Music is as direct an objectification and copy of the whole
will as the world itself, nay, even as the Ideas, whose multiplied
manifestation constitutes the world of individual things. Music
is thus by no means like the other arts, the copy of the Ideas,
but the copy of the will itself, whose objectivity the Ideas are.
This is why the effect of music is so much more powerful and
penetrating than that of the other arts, for they speak only of
shadows, but it speaks of the thing itself. Since, however, it is the
same will which objectifies itself both in the Ideas and in music,
though in quite different ways, there must be, not indeed a direct
likeness, but yet a parallel, an analogy, between music and the
Ideas whose manifestation in multiplicity and incompleteness is
the visible world. The establishing of this analogy will facilitate,
as an illustration, the understanding of this exposition, which is
so difficult on account of the obscurity of the subject.
I recognise in the deepest tones of harmony, in the bass, the
lowest grades of the objectification of will, unorganised nature,
the mass of the planet. It is well known that all the high
notes which are easily sounded, and die away more quickly, are
produced by the vibration in their vicinity of the deep bass-notes.
When, also, the low notes sound, the high notes always sound
337
faintly, and it is a law of harmony that only those high notes

may accompany a bass-note which actually already sound along
with it of themselves (its sons harmoniques) on account of its
vibration. This is analogous to the fact that the whole of the
bodies and organisations of nature must be regarded as having
come into existence through gradual development out of the mass
of the planet; this is both their supporter and their source, and [334]
the same relation subsists between the high notes and the bass.
There is a limit of depth, below which no sound is audible. This
corresponds to the fact that no matter can be perceived without
form and quality, i.e., without the manifestation of a force which
cannot be further explained, in which an Idea expresses itself,
and, more generally, that no matter can be entirely without will.
Thus, as a certain pitch is inseparable from the note as such,
so a certain grade of the manifestation of will is inseparable
from matter. Bass is thus, for us, in harmony what unorganised
nature, the crudest mass, upon which all rests, and from which
everything originates and develops, is in the world. Now,
further, in the whole of the complemental parts which make up
the harmony between the bass and the leading voice singing
the melody, I recognise the whole gradation of the Ideas in
which the will objectifies itself. Those nearer to the bass are
the lower of these grades, the still unorganised, but yet manifold
phenomenal things; the higher represent to me the world of plants
and beasts. The definite intervals of the scale are parallel to the
definite grades of the objectification of will, the definite species
in nature. The departure from the arithmetical correctness of the
intervals, through some temperament, or produced by the key
selected, is analogous to the departure of the individual from the
type of the species. Indeed, even the impure discords, which
give no definite interval, may be compared to the monstrous
abortions produced by beasts of two species, or by man and
beast. But to all these bass and complemental parts which make
up the harmony there is wanting that connected progress which
belongs only to the high voice singing the melody, and it alone
moves quickly and lightly in modulations and runs, while all
these others have only a slower movement without a connection
in each part for itself. The deep bass moves most slowly, the
[335] representative of the crudest mass. Its rising and falling occurs
only by large intervals, in thirds, fourths, fifths, never by one
tone, unless it is a base inverted by double counterpoint. This
slow movement is also physically essential to it; a quick run or
shake in the low notes cannot even be imagined. The higher
complemental parts, which are parallel to animal life, move more
quickly, but yet without melodious connection and significant
progress. The disconnected course of all the complemental parts,
and their regulation by definite laws, is analogous to the fact
that in the whole irrational world, from the crystal to the most
perfect animal, no being has a connected consciousness of its
own which would make its life into a significant whole, and
none experiences a succession of mental developments, none
perfects itself by culture, but everything exists always in the
same way according to its kind, determined by fixed law. Lastly,
in the melody, in the high, singing, principal voice leading
the whole and progressing with unrestrained freedom, in the
unbroken significant connection of one thought from beginning
to end representing a whole, I recognise the highest grade of
the objectification of will, the intellectual life and effort of man.
As he alone, because endowed with reason, constantly looks
before and after on the path of his actual life and its innumerable
possibilities, and so achieves a course of life which is intellectual,
and therefore connected as a whole; corresponding to this, I say,
the melody has significant intentional connection from beginning
to end. It records, therefore, the history of the intellectually
enlightened will. This will expresses itself in the actual world
as the series of its deeds; but melody says more, it records the
most secret history of this intellectually-enlightened will, pictures
every excitement, every effort, every movement of it, all that
339
which the reason collects under the wide and negative concept
of feeling, and which it cannot apprehend further through its
abstract concepts. Therefore it has always been said that music
is the language of feeling and of passion, as words are the [336]
language of reason. Plato explains it as ! ÄÉ½ ¼µ»É½ º¹½·Ã¹Â
¼µ¼¹¼·¼µ½·, µ½ Ä¿¹Â À±¸·¼±Ã¹½ AÄ±½ ÈÅÇ· ³¹½·Ä±¹ (melodiarum
motus, animi affectus imitans), De Leg. vii.; and also Aristotle
says: ´¹± Ä¹ ¿1 ÁÅ¸¼¿¹ º±¹ Ä± ¼µ»·, ÆÉ½· ¿ÅÃ±, ·¸µÃ¹½ µ¿¹ºµ
(cur numeri musici et modi, qui voces sunt, moribus similes sese
exhibent?): Probl. c. 19.
Now the nature of man consists in this, that his will strives,
is satisfied and strives anew, and so on for ever. Indeed, his
happiness and well-being consist simply in the quick transition
from wish to satisfaction, and from satisfaction to a new wish.
For the absence of satisfaction is suffering, the empty longing
for a new wish, languor, ennui. And corresponding to this the
nature of melody is a constant digression and deviation from
the key-note in a thousand ways, not only to the harmonious
intervals to the third and dominant, but to every tone, to the
dissonant sevenths and to the superfluous degrees; yet there
always follows a constant return to the key-note. In all these
deviations melody expresses the multifarious efforts of will, but
always its satisfaction also by the final return to an harmonious
interval, and still more, to the key-note. The composition of
melody, the disclosure in it of all the deepest secrets of human
willing and feeling, is the work of genius, whose action, which is
more apparent here than anywhere else, lies far from all reflection
and conscious intention, and may be called an inspiration. The
conception is here, as everywhere in art, unfruitful. The composer
reveals the inner nature of the world, and expresses the deepest
wisdom in a language which his reason does not understand; as a
person under the influence of mesmerism tells things of which he
has no conception when he awakes. Therefore in the composer,
more than in any other artist, the man is entirely separated and
distinct from the artist. Even in the explanation of this wonderful

[337] art, the concept shows its poverty and limitation. I shall try,
however, to complete our analogy. As quick transition from wish
to satisfaction, and from satisfaction to a new wish, is happiness
and well-being, so quick melodies without great deviations are
cheerful; slow melodies, striking painful discords, and only
winding back through many bars to the keynote are, as analogous
to the delayed and hardly won satisfaction, sad. The delay of the
new excitement of will, languor, could have no other expression
than the sustained keynote, the effect of which would soon be
unbearable; very monotonous and unmeaning melodies approach
this effect. The short intelligible subjects of quick dance-music
seem to speak only of easily attained common pleasure. On the
other hand, the Allegro maestoso, in elaborate movements, long
passages, and wide deviations, signifies a greater, nobler effort
towards a more distant end, and its final attainment. The Adagio
speaks of the pain of a great and noble effort which despises
all trifling happiness. But how wonderful is the effect of the
minor and major! How astounding that the change of half a tone,
the entrance of a minor third instead of a major, at once and
inevitably forces upon us an anxious painful feeling, from which
again we are just as instantaneously delivered by the major. The
Adagio lengthens in the minor the expression of the keenest pain,
and becomes even a convulsive wail. Dance-music in the minor
seems to indicate the failure of that trifling happiness which
we ought rather to despise, seems to speak of the attainment
of a lower end with toil and trouble. The inexhaustibleness of
possible melodies corresponds to the inexhaustibleness of Nature
in difference of individuals, physiognomies, and courses of life.
The transition from one key to an entirely different one, since it
altogether breaks the connection with what went before, is like
death, for the individual ends in it; but the will which appeared in
this individual lives after him as before him, appearing in other
[338] individuals, whose consciousness, however, has no connection
341
with his.
But it must never be forgotten, in the investigation of all
these analogies I have pointed out, that music has no direct,
but merely an indirect relation to them, for it never expresses
the phenomenon, but only the inner nature, the in-itself of
all phenomena, the will itself. It does not therefore express
this or that particular and definite joy, this or that sorrow,
or pain, or horror, or delight, or merriment, or peace of
mind; but joy, sorrow, pain, horror, delight, merriment, peace
of mind themselves, to a certain extent in the abstract, their
essential nature, without accessories, and therefore without their
motives. Yet we completely understand them in this extracted
quintessence. Hence it arises that our imagination is so easily
excited by music, and now seeks to give form to that invisible
yet actively moved spirit-world which speaks to us directly, and
clothe it with flesh and blood, i.e., to embody it in an analogous
example. This is the origin of the song with words, and finally
of the opera, the text of which should therefore never forsake
that subordinate position in order to make itself the chief thing
and the music a mere means of expressing it, which is a great
misconception and a piece of utter perversity; for music always
expresses only the quintessence of life and its events, never these
themselves, and therefore their differences do not always affect
it. It is precisely this universality, which belongs exclusively to
it, together with the greatest determinateness, that gives music
the high worth which it has as the panacea for all our woes. Thus,
if music is too closely united to the words, and tries to form itself
according to the events, it is striving to speak a language which is
not its own. No one has kept so free from this mistake as Rossini;
therefore his music speaks its own language so distinctly and
purely that it requires no words, and produces its full effect when
rendered by instruments alone. [339]
According to all this, we may regard the phenomenal world,

or nature, and music as two different expressions of the same
thing, which is therefore itself the only medium of their analogy,

so that a knowledge of it is demanded in order to understand
that analogy. Music, therefore, if regarded as an expression of
the world, is in the highest degree a universal language, which
is related indeed to the universality of concepts, much as they
are related to the particular things. Its universality, however,
is by no means that empty universality of abstraction, but quite
of a different kind, and is united with thorough and distinct
definiteness. In this respect it resembles geometrical figures and
numbers, which are the universal forms of all possible objects of
experience and applicable to them all a priori, and yet are not
abstract but perceptible and thoroughly determined. All possible
efforts, excitements, and manifestations of will, all that goes on
in the heart of man and that reason includes in the wide, negative
concept of feeling, may be expressed by the infinite number of
possible melodies, but always in the universal, in the mere form,
without the material, always according to the thing-in-itself, not
the phenomenon, the inmost soul, as it were, of the phenomenon,
without the body. This deep relation which music has to the
true nature of all things also explains the fact that suitable music
played to any scene, action, event, or surrounding seems to
disclose to us its most secret meaning, and appears as the most
accurate and distinct commentary upon it. This is so truly the
case, that whoever gives himself up entirely to the impression
of a symphony, seems to see all the possible events of life and
the world take place in himself, yet if he reflects, he can find no
likeness between the music and the things that passed before his
mind. For, as we have said, music is distinguished from all the
other arts by the fact that it is not a copy of the phenomenon,
or, more accurately, the adequate objectivity of will, but is the
[340] direct copy of the will itself, and therefore exhibits itself as
the metaphysical to everything physical in the world, and as the
thing-in-itself to every phenomenon. We might, therefore, just
as well call the world embodied music as embodied will; and
343
this is the reason why music makes every picture, and indeed
every scene of real life and of the world, at once appear with
higher significance, certainly all the more in proportion as its
melody is analogous to the inner spirit of the given phenomenon.
It rests upon this that we are able to set a poem to music as a
song, or a perceptible representation as a pantomime, or both
as an opera. Such particular pictures of human life, set to the
universal language of music, are never bound to it or correspond
to it with stringent necessity; but they stand to it only in the
relation of an example chosen at will to a general concept. In
the determinateness of the real, they represent that which music
expresses in the universality of mere form. For melodies are to
a certain extent, like general concepts, an abstraction from the
actual. This actual world, then, the world of particular things,
affords the object of perception, the special and individual, the
particular case, both to the universality of the concepts and to the
universality of the melodies. But these two universalities are in
a certain respect opposed to each other; for the concepts contain
particulars only as the first forms abstracted from perception,
as it were, the separated shell of things; thus they are, strictly
speaking, abstracta; music, on the other hand, gives the inmost
kernel which precedes all forms, or the heart of things. This
relation may be very well expressed in the language of the
schoolmen by saying the concepts are the universalia post rem,
but music gives the universalia ante rem, and the real world the
universalia in re. To the universal significance of a melody to
which a poem has been set, it is quite possible to set other equally
arbitrarily selected examples of the universal expressed in this
poem corresponding to the significance of the melody in the [341]
same degree. This is why the same composition is suitable to
many verses; and this is also what makes the vaudeville possible.
But that in general a relation is possible between a composition
and a perceptible representation rests, as we have said, upon
the fact that both are simply different expressions of the same
inner being of the world. When now, in the particular case, such
a relation is actually given, that is to say, when the composer
has been able to express in the universal language of music the
emotions of will which constitute the heart of an event, then the
melody of the song, the music of the opera, is expressive. But the
analogy discovered by the composer between the two must have
proceeded from the direct knowledge of the nature of the world
unknown to his reason, and must not be an imitation produced
with conscious intention by means of conceptions, otherwise the
music does not express the inner nature of the will itself, but
merely gives an inadequate imitation of its phenomenon. All
specially imitative music does this; for example, “The Seasons,”
by Haydn; also many passages of his “Creation,” in which
phenomena of the external world are directly imitated; also all
battle-pieces. Such music is entirely to be rejected.
The unutterable depth of all music by virtue of which it floats
through our consciousness as the vision of a paradise firmly
believed in yet ever distant from us, and by which also it is so
fully understood and yet so inexplicable, rests on the fact that it
restores to us all the emotions of our inmost nature, but entirely
without reality and far removed from their pain. So also the
seriousness which is essential to it, which excludes the absurd
from its direct and peculiar province, is to be explained by the
fact that its object is not the idea, with reference to which alone
deception and absurdity are possible; but its object is directly the
will, and this is essentially the most serious of all things, for it
[342] is that on which all depends. How rich in content and full of
significance the language of music is, we see from the repetitions,
as well as the Da capo, the like of which would be unbearable in
works composed in a language of words, but in music are very
appropriate and beneficial, for, in order to comprehend it fully,
we must hear it twice.
In the whole of this exposition of music I have been trying
to bring out clearly that it expresses in a perfectly universal
345
language, in a homogeneous material, mere tones, and with the

greatest determinateness and truth, the inner nature, the in-itself
of the world, which we think under the concept of will, because
will is its most distinct manifestation. Further, according to my
view and contention, philosophy is nothing but a complete and
accurate repetition or expression of the nature of the world in
very general concepts, for only in such is it possible to get a view
of that whole nature which will everywhere be adequate and
applicable. Thus, whoever has followed me and entered into my
mode of thought, will not think it so very paradoxical if I say, that
supposing it were possible to give a perfectly accurate, complete
explanation of music, extending even to particulars, that is to
say, a detailed repetition in concepts of what it expresses, this
would also be a sufficient repetition and explanation of the world
in concepts, or at least entirely parallel to such an explanation,
and thus it would be the true philosophy. Consequently the
saying of Leibnitz quoted above, which is quite accurate from a
lower standpoint, may be parodied in the following way to suit
our higher view of music: Musica est exercitium metaphysices
occultum nescientis se philosophari animi; for scire, to know,
always means to have fixed in abstract concepts. But further, on
account of the truth of the saying of Leibnitz, which is confirmed
in various ways, music, regarded apart from its æsthetic or
inner significance, and looked at merely externally and purely
empirically, is simply the means of comprehending directly and
in the concrete large numbers and complex relations of numbers, [343]
which otherwise we could only know indirectly by fixing them
in concepts. Therefore by the union of these two very different
but correct views of music we may arrive at a conception of the
possibility of a philosophy of number, such as that of Pythagoras
and of the Chinese in Y-King, and then interpret in this sense
the saying of the Pythagoreans which Sextus Empiricus quotes
(adv. Math., L. vii.): Äó ±Á¹¸¼ó ´µ Ä± À±½Ä½ µÀµ¿¹ºµ½ (numero
cuncta assimilantur). And if, finally, we apply this view to
the interpretation of harmony and melody given above, we

shall find that a mere moral philosophy without an explanation
of Nature, such as Socrates wanted to introduce, is precisely
analogous to a mere melody without harmony, which Rousseau
exclusively desired; and, in opposition to this mere physics and
metaphysics without ethics, will correspond to mere harmony
without melody. Allow me to add to these cursory observations
a few more remarks concerning the analogy of music with the
phenomenal world. We found in the second book that the highest
grade of the objectification of will, man, could not appear alone
and isolated, but presupposed the grades below him, as these
again presupposed the grades lower still. In the same way music,
which directly objectifies the will, just as the world does, is
complete only in full harmony. In order to achieve its full effect,
the high leading voice of the melody requires the accompaniment
of all the other voices, even to the lowest bass, which is to be
regarded as the origin of all. The melody itself enters as an
integral part into the harmony, as the harmony enters into it, and
only thus, in the full harmonious whole, music expresses what it
aims at expressing. Thus also the one will outside of time finds
its full objectification only in the complete union of all the steps
which reveal its nature in the innumerable ascending grades of
distinctness. The following analogy is also very remarkable. We
[344] have seen in the preceding book that notwithstanding the self-
adaptation of all the phenomena of will to each other as regards
their species, which constitutes their teleological aspect, there
yet remains an unceasing conflict between those phenomena as
individuals, which is visible at every grade, and makes the world
a constant battle-field of all those manifestations of one and the
same will, whose inner contradiction with itself becomes visible
through it. In music also there is something corresponding to
this. A complete, pure, harmonious system of tones is not
only physically but arithmetically impossible. The numbers
themselves by which the tones are expressed have inextricable
347
irrationality. There is no scale in which, when it is counted, every

fifth will be related to the keynote as 2 to 3, every major third
as 4 to 5, every minor third as 5 to 6, and so on. For if they are
correctly related to the keynote, they can no longer be so to each
other; because, for example, the fifth must be the minor third to
the third, &c. For the notes of the scale may be compared to
actors who must play now one part, now another. Therefore a
perfectly accurate system of music cannot even be thought, far
less worked out; and on this account all possible music deviates
from perfect purity; it can only conceal the discords essential to
it by dividing them among all the notes, i.e., by temperament.
On this see Chladni's “Akustik,” § 30, and his “Kurze Uebersicht
der Schall- und Klanglehre.”63
I might still have something to say about the way in which
music is perceived, namely, in and through time alone, with
absolute exclusion of space, and also apart from the influence
of the knowledge of causality, thus without understanding; for
the tones make the æsthetic impression as effect, and without
obliging us to go back to their causes, as in the case of perception.
I do not wish, however, to lengthen this discussion, as I have
perhaps already gone too much into detail with regard to [345]
some things in this Third Book, or have dwelt too much on
particulars. But my aim made it necessary, and it will be the less
disapproved if the importance and high worth of art, which is
seldom sufficiently recognised, be kept in mind. For if, according
to our view, the whole visible world is just the objectification,
the mirror, of the will, conducting it to knowledge of itself, and,
indeed, as we shall soon see, to the possibility of its deliverance;
and if, at the same time, the world as idea, if we regard it in
isolation, and, freeing ourselves from all volition, allow it alone
to take possession of our consciousness, is the most joy-giving
and the only innocent side of life; we must regard art as the higher
63
Cf. Ch. xxxix. of Supplement.
ascent, the more complete development of all this, for it achieves

essentially just what is achieved by the visible world itself, only
with greater concentration, more perfectly, with intention and
intelligence, and therefore may be called, in the full significance
of the word, the flower of life. If the whole world as idea is only
the visibility of will, the work of art is to render this visibility
more distinct. It is the camera obscura which shows the objects
more purely, and enables us to survey them and comprehend
them better. It is the play within the play, the stage upon the
stage in “Hamlet.”
The pleasure we receive from all beauty, the consolation which
art affords, the enthusiasm of the artist, which enables him to
forget the cares of life,—the latter an advantage of the man of
genius over other men, which alone repays him for the suffering
that increases in proportion to the clearness of consciousness,
and for the desert loneliness among men of a different race,—all
this rests on the fact that the in-itself of life, the will, existence
itself, is, as we shall see farther on, a constant sorrow, partly
miserable, partly terrible; while, on the contrary, as idea alone,
purely contemplated, or copied by art, free from pain, it presents
to us a drama full of significance. This purely knowable side of
[346] the world, and the copy of it in any art, is the element of the artist.
He is chained to the contemplation of the play, the objectification
of will; he remains beside it, does not get tired of contemplating
it and representing it in copies; and meanwhile he bears himself
the cost of the production of that play, i.e., he himself is the will
which objectifies itself, and remains in constant suffering. That
pure, true, and deep knowledge of the inner nature of the world
becomes now for him an end in itself: he stops there. Therefore
it does not become to him a quieter of the will, as, we shall see in
the next book, it does in the case of the saint who has attained to
resignation; it does not deliver him for ever from life, but only at
moments, and is therefore not for him a path out of life, but only
an occasional consolation in it, till his power, increased by this
349
contemplation and at last tired of the play, lays hold on the real.
The St. Cecilia of Raphael may be regarded as a representation
of this transition. To the real, then, we now turn in the following
book.
[347]
Fourth Book. The World As Will.
Second Aspect. The Assertion And Denial

Of The Will To Live, When
Self-Consciousness Has Been Attained.
Tempore quo cognitio simul advenit, amor e medio

supersurrexit.—Oupnek'hat,
Studio Anquetil Duperron, vol. ii. p. 216.
[349]
§ 53. The last part of our work presents itself as the most serious,
for it relates to the action of men, the matter which concerns every
one directly and can be foreign or indifferent to none. It is indeed
so characteristic of the nature of man to relate everything else
to action, that in every systematic investigation he will always
treat the part that has to do with action as the result or outcome
of the whole work, so far, at least, as it interests him, and will
therefore give his most serious attention to this part, even if to
no other. In this respect the following part of our work would, in
ordinary language, be called practical philosophy, in opposition
to the theoretical, which has occupied us hitherto. But, in my
opinion, all philosophy is theoretical, because it is essential to it
that it should retain a purely contemplative attitude, and should
investigate, not prescribe. To become, on the contrary, practical,
to guide conduct, to transform character, are old claims, which
with fuller insight it ought finally to give up. For here, where
351
the worth or worthlessness of an existence, where salvation or

damnation are in question, the dead conceptions of philosophy
do not decide the matter, but the inmost nature of man himself,
the Dæmon that guides him and that has not chosen him, but been
chosen by him, as Plato would say; his intelligible character, as
Kant expresses himself. Virtue cannot be taught any more than
genius; indeed, for it the concept is just as unfruitful as it is in art,
and in both cases can only be used as an instrument. It would, [350]
therefore, be just as absurd to expect that our moral systems and
ethics will produce virtuous, noble, and holy men, as that our
æsthetics will produce poets, painters, and musicians.
Philosophy can never do more than interpret and explain what
is given. It can only bring to distinct abstract knowledge of the
reason the nature of the world which in the concrete, that is,
as feeling, expresses itself comprehensibly to every one. This,
however, it does in every possible reference and from every
point of view. Now, as this attempt has been made from other
points of view in the three preceding books with the generality
that is proper to philosophy, in this book the action of men
will be considered in the same way; and this side of the world
might, indeed, be considered the most important of all, not
only subjectively, as I remarked above, but also objectively.
In considering it I shall faithfully adhere to the method I have
hitherto followed, and shall support myself by presupposing all
that has already been advanced. There is, indeed, just one thought
which forms the content of this whole work. I have endeavoured
to work it out in all other spheres, and I shall now do so with
regard to human action. I shall then have done all that is in my
power to communicate it as fully as possible.
The given point of view, and the method of treatment
announced, are themselves sufficient to indicate that in this
ethical book no precepts, no doctrine of duty must be looked
for; still less will a general moral principle be given, an
universal receipt, as it were, for the production of all the virtues.
Neither shall we talk of an “absolute ought,” for this contains

a contradiction, as is explained in the Appendix; nor yet of a
“law of freedom,” which is in the same position. In general,
we shall not speak at all of “ought,” for this is how one speaks
to children and to nations still in their childhood, but not to
[351] those who have appropriated all the culture of a full-grown age.
It is a palpable contradiction to call the will free, and yet to
prescribe laws for it according to which it ought to will. “Ought
to will!”—wooden iron! But it follows from the point of view
of our system that the will is not only free, but almighty. From
it proceeds not only its action, but also its world; and as the will
is, so does its action and its world become. Both are the self-
knowledge of the will and nothing more. The will determines
itself, and at the same time both its action and its world; for
besides it there is nothing, and these are the will itself. Only
thus is the will truly autonomous, and from every other point
of view it is heteronomous. Our philosophical endeavours can
only extend to exhibiting and explaining the action of men in its
inner nature and content, the various and even opposite maxims,
whose living expression it is. This we shall do in connection with
the preceding portion of our work, and in precisely the same way
as we have hitherto explained the other phenomena of the world,
and have sought to bring their inmost nature to distinct abstract
knowledge. Our philosophy will maintain the same immanency
in the case of action, as in all that we have hitherto considered.
Notwithstanding Kant's great doctrine, it will not attempt to use
the forms of the phenomenon, the universal expression of which
is the principle of sufficient reason, as a leaping-pole to jump
over the phenomenon itself, which alone gives meaning to these
forms, and land in the boundless sphere of empty fictions. But
this actual world of experience, in which we are, and which is in
us, remains both the material and the limits of our consideration:
a world which is so rich in content that even the most searching
investigation of which the human mind is capable could not
353
exhaust it. Since then the real world of experience will never fail
to afford material and reality to our ethical investigations, any
more than to those we have already conducted, nothing will be
less needful than to take refuge in negative conceptions void of [352]
content, and then somehow or other make even ourselves believe
that we are saying something when we speak with lifted eyebrows
of “absolutes,” “infinites,” “supersensibles,” and whatever other
mere negations of this sort there may be (¿Å´µ½ µÃÄ¹, · Ä¿
Ä·Â ÃÄµÁ·ÃµÉÂ ¿½¿¼±, ¼µÄ± ±¼Å´Á±Â µÀ¹½¿¹±Â—nihil est, nisi
negationis nomen, cum obscura notione.—Jul. or. 5), instead
of which it would be shorter to say at once cloud-cuckoo-town
(½µÆµ»¿º¿ººÅ³¹±): we shall not require to serve up covered
empty dishes of this kind. Finally, we shall not in this book, any
more than in those which have preceded it, narrate histories and
give them out as philosophy. For we are of opinion that whoever
supposes that the inner nature of the world can in any way,
however plausibly disguised, be historically comprehended, is
infinitely far from a philosophical knowledge of the world. Yet
this is what is supposed whenever a “becoming,” or a “having
become,” or an “about to become” enters into a theory of the
nature of the world, whenever an earlier or a later has the least
place in it; and in this way a beginning and an end of the
world, and the path it pursues between them, is, either openly or
disguisedly, both sought for and found, and the individual who
philosophises even recognises his own position on that path. Such
historical philosophising in most cases produces a cosmogony
which admits of many varieties, or else a system of emanations,
a doctrine of successive disengagements from one being; or,
finally, driven in despair from fruitless efforts upon these paths
to the last path of all, it takes refuge in the converse doctrine of a
constant becoming, springing up, arising, coming to light out of
darkness, out of the hidden ground source or groundlessness, or
whatever other nonsense of this sort there may be, which is most
shortly disposed of with the remark that at the present moment
a whole eternity, i.e., an endless time, has already passed, so

that everything that can or ought to become must have already
[353] done so. For all such historical philosophy, whatever airs it
may give itself, regards time just as if Kant had never lived, as
a quality of the thing-in-itself, and thus stops at that which Kant
calls the phenomenon in opposition to the thing-in-itself; which
Plato calls the becoming and never being, in opposition to the
being and never becoming; and which, finally, is called in the
Indian philosophy the web of Mâya. It is just the knowledge
which belongs to the principle of sufficient reason, with which
no one can penetrate to the inner nature of things, but endlessly
pursues phenomena, moving without end or aim, like a squirrel
in its wheel, till, tired out at last, he stops at some point or
other arbitrarily chosen, and now desires to extort respect for
it from others also. The genuine philosophical consideration of
the world, i.e., the consideration that affords us a knowledge
of its inner nature, and so leads us beyond the phenomenon,
is precisely that method which does not concern itself with the
whence, the whither, and the why of the world, but always and
everywhere demands only the what; the method which considers
things not according to any relation, not as becoming and passing
away, in short, not according to one of the four forms of the
principle of sufficient reason; but, on the contrary, just that which
remains when all that belongs to the form of knowledge proper to
that principle has been abstracted, the inner nature of the world,
which always appears unchanged in all the relations, but is itself
never subject to them, and has the Ideas of the world as its object
or material. From such knowledge as this proceeds philosophy,
like art, and also, as we shall see in this book, that disposition of
mind which alone leads to true holiness and to deliverance from
the world.
§ 54. The first three books will, it is hoped, have conveyed
the distinct and certain knowledge that the world as idea is the
complete mirror of the will, in which it knows itself in ascending
355
grades of distinctness and completeness, the highest of which [354]

is man, whose nature, however, receives its complete expression
only through the whole connected series of his actions. The
self-conscious connection of these actions is made possible by
reason, which enables a man constantly to survey the whole in
the abstract.
The will, which, considered purely in itself, is without
knowledge, and is merely a blind incessant impulse, as we
see it appear in unorganised and vegetable nature and their
laws, and also in the vegetative part of our own life, receives
through the addition of the world as idea, which is developed in
subjection to it, the knowledge of its own willing and of what it
is that it wills. And this is nothing else than the world as idea,
life, precisely as it exists. Therefore we called the phenomenal
world the mirror of the will, its objectivity. And since what
the will wills is always life, just because life is nothing but the
representation of that willing for the idea, it is all one and a mere
pleonism if, instead of simply saying “the will,” we say “the will
to live.”
Will is the thing-in-itself, the inner content, the essence of
the world. Life, the visible world, the phenomenon, is only
the mirror of the will. Therefore life accompanies the will as
inseparably as the shadow accompanies the body; and if will
exists, so will life, the world, exist. Life is, therefore, assured
to the will to live; and so long as we are filled with the will
to live we need have no fear for our existence, even in the
presence of death. It is true we see the individual come into
being and pass away; but the individual is only phenomenal,
exists only for the knowledge which is bound to the principle
of sufficient reason, to the principio individuationis. Certainly,
for this kind of knowledge, the individual receives his life as a
gift, rises out of nothing, then suffers the loss of this gift through
death, and returns again to nothing. But we desire to consider
life philosophically, i.e., according to its Ideas, and in this [355]
sphere we shall find that neither the will, the thing-in-itself in

all phenomena, nor the subject of knowing, that which perceives
all phenomena, is affected at all by birth or by death. Birth and
death belong merely to the phenomenon of will, thus to life; and
it is essential to this to exhibit itself in individuals which come
into being and pass away, as fleeting phenomena appearing in
the form of time—phenomena of that which in itself knows no
time, but must exhibit itself precisely in the way we have said, in
order to objectify its peculiar nature. Birth and death belong in
like manner to life, and hold the balance as reciprocal conditions
of each other, or, if one likes the expression, as poles of the
whole phenomenon of life. The wisest of all mythologies, the
Indian, expresses this by giving to the very god that symbolises
destruction, death (as Brahma, the most sinful and the lowest god
of the Trimurti, symbolises generation, coming into being, and
Vishnu maintaining or preserving), by giving, I say, to Siva as
an attribute not only the necklace of skulls, but also the lingam,
the symbol of generation, which appears here as the counterpart
of death, thus signifying that generation and death are essentially
correlatives, which reciprocally neutralise and annul each other.
It was precisely the same sentiment that led the Greeks and
Romans to adorn their costly sarcophagi, just as we see them
now, with feasts, dances, marriages, the chase, fights of wild
beasts, bacchanalians, &c.; thus with representations of the full
ardour of life, which they place before us not only in such revels
and sports, but also in sensual groups, and even go so far as to
represent the sexual intercourse of satyrs and goats. Clearly the
aim was to point in the most impressive manner away from the
death of the mourned individual to the immortal life of nature,
and thus to indicate, though without abstract knowledge, that the
whole of nature is the phenomenon and also the fulfilment of the
[356] will to live. The form of this phenomenon is time, space, and
causality, and by means of these individuation, which carries with
it that the individual must come into being and pass away. But
357
this no more affects the will to live, of whose manifestation the

individual is, as it were, only a particular example or specimen,
than the death of an individual injures the whole of nature.
For it is not the individual, but only the species that Nature
cares for, and for the preservation of which she so earnestly
strives, providing for it with the utmost prodigality through the
vast surplus of the seed and the great strength of the fructifying
impulse. The individual, on the contrary, neither has nor can have
any value for Nature, for her kingdom is infinite time and infinite
space, and in these infinite multiplicity of possible individuals.
Therefore she is always ready to let the individual fall, and hence
it is not only exposed to destruction in a thousand ways by the
most insignificant accident, but originally destined for it, and
conducted towards it by Nature herself from the moment it has
served its end of maintaining the species. Thus Nature naïvely
expresses the great truth that only the Ideas, not the individuals,
have, properly speaking, reality, i.e., are complete objectivity of
the will. Now, since man is Nature itself, and indeed Nature at
the highest grade of its self-consciousness, but Nature is only
the objectified will to live, the man who has comprehended
and retained this point of view may well console himself, when
contemplating his own death and that of his friends, by turning
his eyes to the immortal life of Nature, which he himself is. This
is the significance of Siva with the lingam, and of those ancient
sarcophagi with their pictures of glowing life, which say to the
mourning beholder, Natura non contristatur.
That generation and death are to be regarded as something
belonging to life, and essential to this phenomenon of the will,
arises also from the fact that they both exhibit themselves merely
as higher powers of the expression of that in which all the rest [357]
of life consists. This is through and through nothing else than
the constant change of matter in the fixed permanence of form;
and this is what constitutes the transitoriness of the individual
and the permanence of the species. Constant nourishment and
renewal differ from generation only in degree, and constant

excretion differs only in degree from death. The first shows
itself most simply and distinctly in the plant. The plant is
throughout a constant recurrence of the same impulse of its
simplest fibre, which groups itself into leaf and branch. It is
a systematic aggregate of similar plants supporting each other,
whose constant reproduction is its single impulse. It ascends to
the full satisfaction of this tendency through the grades of its
metamorphosis, finally to the blossom and fruit, that compendium
of its existence and effort in which it now attains, by a short way,
to that which is its single aim, and at a stroke produces a thousand-
fold what, up till then, it effected only in the particular case—the
repetition of itself. Its earlier growth and development stands in
the same relation to its fruit as writing stands to printing. With
the animal it is clearly quite the same. The process of nourishing
is a constant reproduction; the process of reproduction is a higher
power of nourishing. The pleasure which accompanies the act of
procreation is a higher power of the agreeableness of the sense
of life. On the other hand, excretion, the constant exhalation and
throwing off of matter, is the same as that which, at a higher
power, death, is the contrary of generation. And if here we are
always content to retain the form without lamenting the discarded
matter, we ought to bear ourselves in the same way if in death
the same thing happens, in a higher degree and to the whole,
as takes place daily and hourly in a partial manner in excretion:
if we are indifferent to the one, we ought not to shrink from
the other. Therefore, from this point of view, it appears just as
[358] perverse to desire the continuance of an individuality which will
be replaced by other individuals as to desire the permanence of
matter which will be replaced by other matter. It appears just as
foolish to embalm the body as it would be carefully to preserve
its excrement. As to the individual consciousness which is bound
to the individual body, it is absolutely interrupted every day by
sleep. Deep sleep is, while it lasts, in no way different from
359
death, into which, in fact, it often passes continuously, as in the

case of freezing to death. It differs only with regard to the future,
the awaking. Death is a sleep in which individuality is forgotten;
everything else wakes again, or rather never slept.64
Above all things, we must distinctly recognise that the form
of the phenomenon of will, the form of life or reality, is really
only the present, not the future nor the past. The latter are only
in the conception, exist only in the connection of knowledge, so
far as it follows the principle of sufficient reason. No man has
ever lived in the past, and none will live in the future; the present
alone is the form of all life, and is its sure possession which
can never be taken from it. The present always exists, together
with its content. Both remain fixed without wavering, like the
rainbow on the waterfall. For life is firm and certain in the will,
and the present is firm and certain in life. Certainly, if we reflect
on the thousands of years that are past, of the millions of men [359]
who lived in them, we ask, What were they? what has become
of them? But, on the other hand, we need only recall our own
past life and renew its scenes vividly in our imagination, and
then ask again, What was all this? what has become of it? As it
is with it, so is it with the life of those millions. Or should we
suppose that the past could receive a new existence because it
64
The following remark may assist those for whom it is not too subtle to
understand clearly that the individual is only the phenomenon, not the thing
in itself. Every individual is, on the one hand, the subject of knowing, i.e.,
the complemental condition of the possibility of the whole objective world,
and, on the other hand, a particular phenomenon of will, the same will which
objectifies itself in everything. But this double nature of our being does not rest
upon a self-existing unity, otherwise it would be possible for us to be conscious
of ourselves in ourselves, and independent of the objects of knowledge and
will. Now this is by no means possible, for as soon as we turn into ourselves
to make the attempt, and seek for once to know ourselves fully by means of
introspective reflection, we are lost in a bottomless void; we find ourselves like
the hollow glass globe, from out of which a voice speaks whose cause is not to
be found in it, and whereas we desired to comprehend ourselves, we find, with
a shudder, nothing but a vanishing spectre.
has been sealed by death? Our own past, the most recent part of
it, and even yesterday, is now no more than an empty dream of
the fancy, and such is the past of all those millions. What was?
What is? The will, of which life is the mirror, and knowledge
free from will, which beholds it clearly in that mirror. Whoever
has not yet recognised this, or will not recognise it, must add
to the question asked above as to the fate of past generations of
men this question also: Why he, the questioner, is so fortunate
as to be conscious of this costly, fleeting, and only real present,
while those hundreds of generations of men, even the heroes and
philosophers of those ages, have sunk into the night of the past,
and have thus become nothing; but he, his insignificant ego,
actually exists? or more shortly, though somewhat strangely:
Why this now, his now, is just now and was not long ago? Since
he asks such strange questions, he regards his existence and his
time as independent of each other, and the former as projected
into the latter. He assumes indeed two nows—one which belongs
to the object, the other which belongs to the subject, and marvels
at the happy accident of their coincidence. But in truth, only
the point of contact of the object, the form of which is time,
with the subject, which has no mode of the principle of sufficient
reason as its form, constitutes the present, as is shown in the
essay on the principle of sufficient reason. Now all object is the
will so far as it has become idea, and the subject is the necessary
[360] correlative of the object. But real objects are only in the present;
the past and the future contain only conceptions and fancies,
therefore the present is the essential form of the phenomenon of
the will, and inseparable from it. The present alone is that which
always exists and remains immovable. That which, empirically
apprehended, is the most transitory of all, presents itself to the
metaphysical vision, which sees beyond the forms of empirical
perception, as that which alone endures, the nunc stans of the
schoolmen. The source and the supporter of its content is the
will to live or the thing-in-itself,—which we are. That which
361
constantly becomes and passes away, in that it has either already

been or is still to be, belongs to the phenomenon as such on
account of its forms, which make coming into being and passing
away possible. Accordingly, we must think:—Quid fuit?—Quod
est. Quid erit?—Quod fuit; and take it in the strict meaning of
the words; thus understand not simile but idem. For life is certain
to the will, and the present is certain to life. Thus it is that every
one can say, “I am once for all lord of the present, and through
all eternity it will accompany me as my shadow: therefore I
do not wonder where it has come from, and how it happens
that it is exactly now.” We might compare time to a constantly
revolving sphere; the half that was always sinking would be the
past, that which was always rising would be the future; but the
indivisible point at the top, where the tangent touches, would be
the extensionless present. As the tangent does not revolve with
the sphere, neither does the present, the point of contact of the
object, the form of which is time, with the subject, which has
no form, because it does not belong to the knowable, but is the
condition of all that is knowable. Or, time is like an unceasing
stream, and the present a rock on which the stream breaks itself,
but does not carry away with it. The will, as thing-in-itself, is just
as little subordinate to the principle of sufficient reason as the [361]
subject of knowledge, which, finally, in a certain regard is the
will itself or its expression. And as life, its own phenomenon, is
assured to the will, so is the present, the single form of real life.
Therefore we have not to investigate the past before life, nor the
future after death: we have rather to know the present, the one
form in which the will manifests itself.65 It will not escape from
the will, but neither will the will escape from it. If, therefore,
life as it is satisfies, whoever affirms it in every way may regard
65
“Scholastici docuerunt, quod æternitas non sit temporis sine fine aut
principio successio; sed Nunc stans, i.e., idem nobis Nunc esse, quod erat Nunc
Adamo, i.e., inter nunc et tunc nullam esse differentiam.”—Hobbes, Leviathan,
c. 46.
it with confidence as endless, and banish the fear of death as an

illusion that inspires him with the foolish dread that he can ever
be robbed of the present, and foreshadows a time in which there
is no present; an illusion with regard to time analogous to the
illusion with regard to space through which every one imagines
the position on the globe he happens to occupy as above, and
all other places as below. In the same way every one links the
present to his own individuality, and imagines that all present is
extinguished with it; that then past and future might be without a
present. But as on the surface of the globe every place is above,
so the form of all life is the present, and to fear death because it
robs us of the present, is just as foolish as to fear that we may
slip down from the round globe upon which we have now the
good fortune to occupy the upper surface. The present is the form
essential to the objectification of the will. It cuts time, which
extends infinitely in both directions, as a mathematical point,
and stands immovably fixed, like an everlasting mid-day with no
cool evening, as the actual sun burns without intermission, while
it only seems to sink into the bosom of night. Therefore, if a man
fears death as his annihilation, it is just as if he were to think that
[362] the sun cries out at evening, “Woe is me! for I go down into
eternal night.”66 And conversely, whoever is oppressed with the
burden of life, whoever desires life and affirms it, but abhors its
66
In Eckermann's “Conversations of Goethe” (vol. i. p. 161), Goethe says:
“Our spirit is a being of a nature quite indestructible, and its activity continues
from eternity to eternity. It is like the sun, which seems to set only to our
earthly eyes, but which, in reality, never sets, but shines on unceasingly.”
Goethe has taken the simile from me; not I from him. Without doubt he
used it in this conversation, which was held in 1824, in consequence of a
(possibly unconscious) reminiscence of the above passage, for it occurs in the
first edition, p. 401, in exactly the same words, and it is also repeated at p. 528
of that edition, as at the close of § 65 of the present work. The first edition was
sent to him in December 1818, and in March 1819, when I was at Naples, he
sent me his congratulations by letter, through my sister, and enclosed a piece
of paper upon which he had noted the places of certain passages which had
specially pleased him. Thus he had read my book.
363
torments, and especially can no longer endure the hard lot that
has fallen to himself, such a man has no deliverance to hope for
from death, and cannot right himself by suicide. The cool shades
of Orcus allure him only with the false appearance of a haven of
rest. The earth rolls from day into night, the individual dies, but
the sun itself shines without intermission, an eternal noon. Life is
assured to the will to live; the form of life is an endless present,
no matter how the individuals, the phenomena of the Idea, arise
and pass away in time, like fleeting dreams. Thus even already
suicide appears to us as a vain and therefore a foolish action;
when we have carried our investigation further it will appear to
us in a still less favourable light.
Dogmas change and our knowledge is deceptive; but Nature
never errs, her procedure is sure, and she never conceals
it. Everything is entirely in Nature, and Nature is entire in
everything. She has her centre in every brute. It has surely found
its way into existence, and it will surely find its way out of it. In
the meantime it lives, fearless and without care, in the presence
of annihilation, supported by the consciousness that it is Nature
herself, and imperishable as she is. Man alone carries about with
him, in abstract conceptions, the certainty of his death; yet this
can only trouble him very rarely, when for a single moment [363]
some occasion calls it up to his imagination. Against the mighty
voice of Nature reflection can do little. In man, as in the brute
which does not think, the certainty that springs from his inmost
consciousness that he himself is Nature, the world, predominates
as a lasting frame of mind; and on account of this no man is
observably disturbed by the thought of certain and never-distant
death, but lives as if he would live for ever. Indeed this is carried
so far that we may say that no one has really a lively conviction
of the certainty of his death, otherwise there would be no great
difference between his frame of mind and that of a condemned
criminal. Every one recognises that certainty in the abstract
and theoretically, but lays it aside like other theoretical truths
which are not applicable to practice, without really receiving it

into his living consciousness. Whoever carefully considers this
peculiarity of human character will see that the psychological
explanations of it, from habit and acquiescence in the inevitable,
are by no means sufficient, and that its true explanation lies in
the deeper ground we have given. The same fact explains the
circumstance that at all times and among all peoples dogmas
of some kind or other relating to the continued existence of the
individual after death arise, and are believed in, although the
evidence in support of them must always be very insufficient,
and the evidence against them forcible and varied. But, in truth,
this really requires no proof, but is recognised by the healthy
understanding as a fact, and confirmed by the confidence that
Nature never lies any more than she errs, but openly exhibits
and naïvely expresses her action and her nature, while only we
ourselves obscure it by our folly, in order to establish what is
agreeable to our limited point of view.
But this that we have brought to clearest consciousness, that
although the particular phenomenon of the will has a temporal
beginning and end, the will itself as thing-in-itself is not affected
[364] by it, nor yet the correlative of all object, the knowing but
never known subject, and that life is always assured to the
will to live—this is not to be numbered with the doctrines of
immortality. For permanence has no more to do with the will
or with the pure subject of knowing, the eternal eye of the
world, than transitoriness, for both are predicates that are only
valid in time, and the will and the pure subject of knowing
lie outside time. Therefore the egoism of the individual (this
particular phenomenon of will enlightened by the subject of
knowing) can extract as little nourishment and consolation for
his wish to endure through endless time from the view we have
expressed, as he could from the knowledge that after his death
the rest of the eternal world would continue to exist, which is
just the expression of the same view considered objectively, and
365
therefore temporally. For every individual is transitory only

as phenomenon, but as thing-in-itself is timeless, and therefore
endless. But it is also only as phenomenon that an individual
is distinguished from the other things of the world; as thing-
in-itself he is the will which appears in all, and death destroys
the illusion which separates his consciousness from that of the
rest: this is immortality. His exemption from death, which
belongs to him only as thing-in-itself, is for the phenomenon
one with the immortality of the rest of the external world.67
Hence also, it arises that although the inward and merely felt
consciousness of that which we have raised to distinct knowledge
is indeed, as we have said, sufficient to prevent the thought of
death from poisoning the life of the rational being, because this
consciousness is the basis of that love of life which maintains
everything living, and enables it to live on at ease as if there [365]
were no such thing as death, so long as it is face to face with
life, and turns its attention to it, yet it will not prevent the
individual from being seized with the fear of death, and trying
in every way to escape from it, when it presents itself to him
in some particular real case, or even only in his imagination,
and he is compelled to contemplate it. For just as, so long as
his knowledge was directed to life as such, he was obliged to
recognise immortality in it, so when death is brought before his
eyes, he is obliged to recognise it as that which it is, the temporal
end of the particular temporal phenomenon. What we fear in
death is by no means the pain, for it lies clearly on this side of
death, and, moreover, we often take refuge in death from pain,
just as, on the contrary, we sometimes endure the most fearful
67
This is expressed in the Veda by saying, that when a man dies his sight
becomes one with the sun, his smell with the earth, his taste with water, his
hearing with the air, his speech with fire, &c., &c. (Oupnek'hat, vol. i. p. 249
et seq.) And also by the fact that, in a special ceremony, the dying man gives
over his senses and all his faculties singly to his son, in whom they are now
supposed to live on (Oupnek'hat, vol. ii. p. 82 et seq.)
suffering merely to escape death for a while, although it would

be quick and easy. Thus we distinguish pain and death as two
entirely different evils. What we fear in death is the end of the
individual, which it openly professes itself to be, and since the
individual is a particular objectification of the will to live itself,
its whole nature struggles against death. Now when feeling thus
exposes us helpless, reason can yet step in and for the most part
overcome its adverse influence, for it places us upon a higher
standpoint, from which we no longer contemplate the particular
but the whole. Therefore a philosophical knowledge of the nature
of the world, which extended to the point we have now reached
in this work but went no farther, could even at this point of view
overcome the terror of death in the measure in which reflection
had power over direct feeling in the given individual. A man who
had thoroughly assimilated the truths we have already advanced,
but had not come to know, either from his own experience or
from a deeper insight, that constant suffering is essential to life,
who found satisfaction and all that he wished in life, and could
[366] calmly and deliberately desire that his life, as he had hitherto
known it, should endure for ever or repeat itself ever anew, and
whose love of life was so great that he willingly and gladly
accepted all the hardships and miseries to which it is exposed
for the sake of its pleasures,—such a man would stand “with
firm-knit bones on the well-rounded, enduring earth,” and would
have nothing to fear. Armed with the knowledge we have given
him, he would await with indifference the death that hastens
towards him on the wings of time. He would regard it as a false
illusion, an impotent spectre, which frightens the weak but has
no power over him who knows that he is himself the will of
which the whole world is the objectification or copy, and that
therefore he is always certain of life, and also of the present, the
peculiar and only form of the phenomenon of the will. He could
not be terrified by an endless past or future in which he would
not be, for this he would regard as the empty delusion of the web
367
of Mâya. Thus he would no more fear death than the sun fears
the night. In the “Bhagavad-Gita” Krishna thus raises the mind
of his young pupil Arjuna, when, seized with compunction at the
sight of the arrayed hosts (somewhat as Xerxes was), he loses
heart and desires to give up the battle in order to avert the death
of so many thousands. Krishna leads him to this point of view,
and the death of those thousands can no longer restrain him; he
gives the sign for battle. This point of view is also expressed by
Goethe's Prometheus, especially when he says—
“Here sit I, form mankind

In my own image,
A race like to myself,
To suffer and to weep,
Rejoice, enjoy,
And heed thee not,
As I.”
The philosophy of Bruno and that of Spinoza might also lead

any one to this point of view whose conviction was not shaken [367]
and weakened by their errors and imperfections. That of Bruno
has properly no ethical theory at all, and the theory contained in
the philosophy of Spinoza does not really proceed from the inner
nature of his doctrine, but is merely tacked on to it by means of
weak and palpable sophisms, though in itself it is praiseworthy
and beautiful. Finally, there are many men who would occupy
this point of view if their knowledge kept pace with their will,
i.e., if, free from all illusion, they were in a position to become
clearly and distinctly themselves. For this is, for knowledge, the
point of view of the complete assertion of the will to live.
That the will asserts itself means, that while in its objectivity,
i.e., in the world and life, its own nature is completely and
distinctly given it as idea, this knowledge does not by any means
check its volition; but this very life, so known, is willed as such
by the will with knowledge, consciously and deliberately, just
as up to this point it willed it as blind effort without knowledge.

The opposite of this, the denial of the will to live, shows itself
if, when that knowledge is attained, volition ends, because the
particular known phenomena no longer act as motives for willing,
but the whole knowledge of the nature of the world, the mirror
of the will, which has grown up through the comprehension of
the Ideas, becomes a quieter of the will; and thus free, the will
suppresses itself. These quite unfamiliar conceptions are difficult
to understand when expressed in this general way, but it is hoped
they will become clear through the exposition we shall give
presently, with special reference to action, of the phenomena
in which, on the one hand, the assertion in its different grades,
and, on the other hand, the denial, expresses itself. For both
proceed from knowledge, yet not from abstract knowledge,
which is expressed in words, but from living knowledge, which
is expressed in action and behaviour alone, and is independent
of the dogmas which at the same time occupy the reason as
[368] abstract knowledge. To exhibit them both, and bring them to
distinct knowledge of the reason, can alone be my aim, and not to
prescribe or recommend the one or the other, which would be as
foolish as it would be useless; for the will in itself is absolutely
free and entirely self-determining, and for it there is no law.
But before we go on to the exposition referred to, we must first
explain and more exactly define this freedom and its relation to
necessity. And also, with regard to the life, the assertion and
denial of which is our problem, we must insert a few general
remarks connected with the will and its objects. Through all
this we shall facilitate the apprehension of the inmost nature of
the knowledge we are aiming at, of the ethical significance of
methods of action.
Since, as has been said, this whole work is only the unfolding
of a single thought, it follows that all its parts have the most
intimate connection with each other. Not merely that each part
stands in a necessary relation to what immediately precedes it,
369
and only presupposes a recollection of that by the reader, as is

the case with all philosophies which consist merely of a series
of inferences, but that every part of the whole work is related to
every other part and presupposes it. It is, therefore, necessary
that the reader should remember not only what has just been
said, but all the earlier parts of the work, so that he may be able
to connect them with what he is reading, however much may
have intervened. Plato also makes this demand upon his readers
through the intricate digressions of his dialogues, in which he
only returns to the leading thought after long episodes, which
illustrate and explain it. In our case this demand is necessary; for
the breaking up of our one single thought into its many aspects
is indeed the only means of imparting it, though not essential
to the thought itself, but merely an artificial form. The division
of four principal points of view into four books, and the most
careful bringing together of all that is related and homogeneous,
assists the exposition and its comprehension; yet the material [369]
absolutely does not admit of an advance in a straight line, such
as the progress of history, but necessitates a more complicated
exposition. This again makes a repeated study of the book
necessary, for thus alone does the connection of all the parts with
each other become distinct, and only then do they all mutually
throw light upon each other and become quite clear.68
§ 55. That the will as such is free, follows from the fact that,
according to our view, it is the thing-in-itself, the content of all
phenomena. The phenomena, on the other hand, we recognise
as absolutely subordinate to the principle of sufficient reason in
its four forms. And since we know that necessity is throughout
identical with following from given grounds, and that these are
convertible conceptions, all that belongs to the phenomenon,
i.e., all that is object for the knowing subject as individual, is
in one aspect reason, and in another aspect consequent; and in
68
Cf. Chap. xli.-xliv. of Supplement.
this last capacity is determined with absolute necessity, and can,

therefore, in no respect be other than it is. The whole content of
Nature, the collective sum of its phenomena, is thus throughout
necessary, and the necessity of every part, of every phenomenon,
of every event, can always be proved, because it must be possible
to find the reason from which it follows as a consequent. This
admits of no exception: it follows from the unrestricted validity
of the principle of sufficient reason. In another aspect, however,
the same world is for us, in all its phenomena, objectivity of
will. And the will, since it is not phenomenon, is not idea or
object, but thing-in-itself, and is not subordinate to the principle
of sufficient reason, the form of all object; thus is not determined
as a consequent through any reason, knows no necessity, i.e., is
[370] free. The concept of freedom is thus properly a negative concept,
for its content is merely the denial of necessity, i.e., the relation of
consequent to its reason, according to the principle of sufficient
reason. Now here lies before us in its most distinct form the
solution of that great contradiction, the union of freedom with
necessity, which has so often been discussed in recent times, yet,
so far as I know, never clearly and adequately. Everything is
as phenomenon, as object, absolutely necessary: in itself it is
will, which is perfectly free to all eternity. The phenomenon, the
object, is necessarily and unalterably determined in that chain
of causes and effects which admits of no interruption. But the
existence in general of this object, and its specific nature, i.e., the
Idea which reveals itself in it, or, in other words, its character,
is a direct manifestation of will. Thus, in conformity with the
freedom of this will, the object might not be at all, or it might be
originally and essentially something quite different from what it
is, in which case, however, the whole chain of which it is a link,
and which is itself a manifestation of the same will, would be
quite different also. But once there and existing, it has entered
the chain of causes and effects, is always necessarily determined
in it, and can, therefore, neither become something else, i.e.,
371
change itself, nor yet escape from the chain, i.e., vanish. Man,
like every other part of Nature, is objectivity of the will; therefore
all that has been said holds good of him. As everything in Nature
has its forces and qualities, which react in a definite way when
definitely affected, and constitute its character, man also has his
character, from which the motives call forth his actions with
necessity. In this manner of conduct his empirical character
reveals itself, but in this again his intelligible character, the will
in itself, whose determined phenomenon he is. But man is the
most complete phenomenon of will, and, as we explained in the
Second Book, he had to be enlightened with so high a degree
of knowledge in order to maintain himself in existence, that in [371]
it a perfectly adequate copy or repetition of the nature of the
world under the form of the idea became possible: this is the
comprehension of the Ideas, the pure mirror of the world, as we
learnt in the Third Book. Thus in man the will can attain to
full self-consciousness, to distinct and exhaustive knowledge of
its own nature, as it mirrors itself in the whole world. We saw
in the preceding book that art springs from the actual presence
of this degree of knowledge; and at the end of our whole work
it will further appear that, through the same knowledge, in that
the will relates it to itself, a suppression and self-denial of the
will in its most perfect manifestation is possible. So that the
freedom which otherwise, as belonging to the thing-in-itself,
can never show itself in the phenomenon, in such a case does
also appear in it, and, by abolishing the nature which lies at
the foundation of the phenomenon, while the latter itself still
continues to exist in time, it brings about a contradiction of the
phenomenon with itself, and in this way exhibits the phenomena
of holiness and self-renunciation. But all this can only be
fully understood at the end of this book. What has just been said
merely affords a preliminary and general indication of how man is
distinguished from all the other phenomena of will by the fact that
freedom, i.e., independence of the principle of sufficient reason,
which only belongs to the will as thing-in-itself, and contradicts

the phenomenon, may yet possibly, in his case, appear in the
phenomenon also, where, however, it necessarily exhibits itself
as a contradiction of the phenomenon with itself. In this sense,
not only the will in itself, but man also may certainly be called
free, and thus distinguished from all other beings. But how this
is to be understood can only become clear through all that is to
follow, and for the present we must turn away from it altogether.
For, in the first place, we must beware of the error that the action
[372] of the individual definite man is subject to no necessity, i.e.,
that the power of the motive is less certain than the power of
the cause, or the following of the conclusion from the premises.
The freedom of the will as thing-in-itself, if, as has been said,
we abstract from the entirely exceptional case mentioned above,
by no means extends directly to its phenomenon, not even in
the case in which this reaches the highest made of its visibility,
and thus does not extend to the rational animal endowed with
individual character, i.e., the person. The person is never free
although he is the phenomenon of a free will; for he is already
the determined phenomenon of the free volition of this will,
and, because he enters the form of every object, the principle of
sufficient reason, he develops indeed the unity of that will in a
multiplicity of actions, but on account of the timeless unity of
that volition in itself, this multiplicity exhibits in itself the regular
conformity to law of a force of Nature. Since, however, it is that
free volition that becomes visible in the person and the whole of
his conduct, relating itself to him as the concept to the definition,
every individual action of the person is to be ascribed to the
free will, and directly proclaims itself as such in consciousness.
Therefore, as was said in the Second Book, every one regards
himself a priori (i.e., here in this original feeling) as free in his
individual actions, in the sense that in every given case every
action is possible for him, and he only recognises a posteriori
from experience and reflection upon experience that his actions
373
take place with absolute necessity from the coincidence of his

character with his motives. Hence it arises that every uncultured
man, following his feeling, ardently defends complete freedom
in particular actions, while the great thinkers of all ages, and
indeed the more profound systems of religion, have denied it. But
whoever has come to see clearly that the whole nature of man is
will, and he himself only a phenomenon of this will, and that such
a phenomenon has, even from the subject itself, the principle of
sufficient reason as its necessary form, which here appears as the [373]
law of motivation,—such a man will regard it as just as absurd
to doubt the inevitable nature of an action when the motive is
presented to a given character, as to doubt that the three angles of
any triangle are together equal to two right angles. Priestley has
very sufficiently proved the necessity of the individual action in
his “Doctrine of Philosophical Necessity;” but Kant, whose merit
in this respect is specially great, first proved the coexistence of
this necessity with the freedom of the will in itself, i.e., apart
from the phenomenon,69 by establishing the distinction between
the intelligible and the empirical character. I entirely adhere to
this distinction, for the former is the will as thing-in-itself so far
as it appears in a definite individual in a definite grade, and the
latter is this phenomenon itself as it exhibits itself in time in the
mode of action, and in space in the physical structure. In order to
make the relation of the two comprehensible, the best expression
is that which I have already used in the introductory essay, that
the intelligible character of every man is to be regarded as an act
of will outside time, and therefore indivisible and unchangeable,
and the manifestation of this act of will developed and broken up
in time and space and all the forms of the principle of sufficient
reason is the empirical character as it exhibits itself for experience
in the whole conduct and life of this man. As the whole tree is
69
“Critique of Pure Reason,” first edition, pp. 532-558; fifth edition, pp.
560-586; and “Critique of Practical Reason,” fourth edition, pp. 169-179;
Rosenkranz's edition, pp. 224-231.
only the constantly repeated manifestation of one and the same

tendency, which exhibits itself in its simplest form in the fibre,
and recurs and is easily recognised in the construction of the leaf,
shoot, branch, and trunk, so all a man's deeds are merely the
constantly repeated expression, somewhat varied in form, of his
intelligible character, and the induction based on the sum of all
[374] these expressions gives us his empirical character. For the rest,
I shall not at this point repeat in my own words Kant's masterly
exposition, but presuppose it as known.
In the year 1840 I dealt with the important chapter on the
freedom of the will, thoroughly and in detail, in my crowned
prize-essay upon the subject, and exposed the reason of the
delusion which led men to imagine that they found an empirically
given absolute freedom of the will, that is to say, a liberum
arbitrium indifferentiæ, as a fact in self-consciousness; for the
question propounded for the essay was with great insight directed
to this point. Therefore, as I refer the reader to that work, and also
to the tenth paragraph of the prize-essay on the basis of morals,
which was published along with it under the title “The Two
Fundamental Problems of Ethics,” I now omit the incomplete
exposition of the necessity of the act of will, which was given
at this place in the first edition. Instead of it I shall explain
the delusion mentioned above in a brief discussion which is
presupposed in the nineteenth chapter of the supplement to the
present work, and therefore could not be given in the prize-essay
referred to.
Apart from the fact that the will as the true thing-in-itself
is actually original and independent, and that the feeling of its
originality and absoluteness must accompany its acts in self-
consciousness, though here they are already determined, there
arises the illusion of an empirical freedom of the will (instead
of the transcendental freedom which alone is to be attributed to
it), and thus a freedom of its particular actions, from that attitude
of the intellect towards the will which is explained, separated,
375
and subordinated in the nineteenth chapter of the supplement,

especially under No. 3. The intellect knows the conclusions
of the will only a posteriori and empirically; therefore when
a choice is presented, it has no data as to how the will is to
decide. For the intelligible character, by virtue of which, when
motives are given, only one decision is possible and is therefore [375]
necessary, does not come within the knowledge of the intellect,
but merely the empirical character is known to it through the
succession of its particular acts. Therefore it seems to the intellect
that in a given case two opposite decisions are possible for the
will. But this is just the same thing as if we were to say of a
perpendicular beam that has lost its balance, and is hesitating
which way to fall, “It can fall either to the right hand or the left.”
This can has merely a subjective significance, and really means
“as far as the data known to us are concerned.” Objectively,
the direction of the fall is necessarily determined as soon as the
equilibrium is lost. Accordingly, the decision of one's own will is
undetermined only to the beholder, one's own intellect, and thus
merely relatively and subjectively for the subject of knowing.
In itself and objectively, on the other hand, in every choice
presented to it, its decision is at once determined and necessary.
But this determination only comes into consciousness through
the decision that follows upon it. Indeed, we receive an empirical
proof of this when any difficult and important choice lies before
us, but only under a condition which is not yet present, but merely
hoped for, so that in the meanwhile we can do nothing, but must
remain passive. Now we consider how we shall decide when the
circumstances occur that will give us a free activity and choice.
Generally the foresight of rational deliberation recommends one
decision, while direct inclination leans rather to the other. So
long as we are compelled to remain passive, the side of reason
seems to wish to keep the upper hand; but we see beforehand how
strongly the other side will influence us when the opportunity
for action arises. Till then we are eagerly concerned to place the
motives on both sides in the clearest light, by calm meditation on

the pro et contra, so that every motive may exert its full influence
upon the will when the time arrives, and it may not be misled by
[376] a mistake on the part of the intellect to decide otherwise than it
would have done if all the motives had their due influence upon
it. But this distinct unfolding of the motives on both sides is all
that the intellect can do to assist the choice. It awaits the real
decision just as passively and with the same intense curiosity as
if it were that of a foreign will. Therefore from its point of view
both decisions must seem to it equally possible; and this is just
the illusion of the empirical freedom of the will. Certainly the
decision enters the sphere of the intellect altogether empirically,
as the final conclusion of the matter; but yet it proceeded from
the inner nature, the intelligible character, of the individual will
in its conflict with given motives, and therefore with complete
necessity. The intellect can do nothing more than bring out
clearly and fully the nature of the motives; it cannot determine
the will itself; for the will is quite inaccessible to it, and, as we
have seen, cannot be investigated.
If, under the same circumstances, a man could act now one
way and now another, it would be necessary that his will itself
should have changed in the meantime, and thus that it should lie
in time, for change is only possible in time; but then either the
will would be a mere phenomenon, or time would be a condition
of the thing-in-itself. Accordingly the dispute as to the freedom of
the particular action, the liberum arbitrium indifferentiæ, really
turns on the question whether the will lies in time or not. If, as
both Kant's doctrine and the whole of my system necessitates,
the will is the thing-in-itself outside time and outside every form
of the principle of sufficient reason, not only must the individual
act in the same way in the same circumstances, and not only
must every bad action be the sure warrant of innumerable others,
which the individual must perform and cannot leave, but, as
Kant said, if only the empirical character and the motives were
377
completely given, it would be possible to calculate the future

conduct of a man just as we can calculate an eclipse of the sun or [377]
moon. As Nature is consistent, so is the character; every action
must take place in accordance with it, just as every phenomenon
takes place according to a law of Nature: the causes in the latter
case and the motives in the former are merely the occasional
causes, as was shown in the Second Book. The will, whose
phenomenon is the whole being and life of man, cannot deny
itself in the particular case, and what the man wills on the whole,
that will he also will in the particular case.
The assertion of an empirical freedom of the will, a liberum
arbitrium indifferentiæ, agrees precisely with the doctrine that
places the inner nature of man in a soul, which is originally a
knowing, and indeed really an abstract thinking nature, and only
in consequence of this a willing nature—a doctrine which thus
regards the will as of a secondary or derivative nature, instead
of knowledge which is really so. The will indeed came to be
regarded as an act of thought, and to be identified with the
judgment, especially by Descartes and Spinoza. According to
this doctrine every man must become what he is only through his
knowledge; he must enter the world as a moral cipher come to
know the things in it, and thereupon determine to be this or that,
to act thus or thus, and may also through new knowledge achieve
a new course of action, that is to say, become another person.
Further, he must first know a thing to be good, and in consequence
of this will it, instead of first willing it, and in consequence of
this calling it good. According to my fundamental point of view,
all this is a reversal of the true relation. Will is first and original;
knowledge is merely added to it as an instrument belonging to
the phenomenon of will. Therefore every man is what he is
through his will, and his character is original, for willing is the
basis of his nature. Through the knowledge which is added to it
he comes to know in the course of experience what he is, i.e., he
learns his character. Thus he knows himself in consequence of [378]
and in accordance with the nature of his will, instead of willing in

consequence of and in accordance with his knowing. According
to the latter view, he would only require to consider how he
would like best to be, and he would be it; that is its doctrine
of the freedom of the will. Thus it consists really in this, that
a man is his own work guided by the light of knowledge. I, on
the contrary, say that he is his own work before all knowledge,
and knowledge is merely added to it to enlighten it. Therefore
he cannot resolve to be this or that, nor can he become other
than he is; but he is once for all, and he knows in the course of
experience what he is. According to one doctrine he wills what
he knows, and according to the other he knows what he wills.
The Greeks called the character ·¸¿Â, and its expression, i.e.,
morals, ·¸·. But this word comes from µ¸¿Â, custom; they
chose it in order to express metaphorically the constancy of
character through the constancy of custom. ¤¿ ³±Á ·¸¿Â ±À¿
Ä¿Å µ¸¿ÅÂ µÇµ¹ Ä·½ µÀÉ½Å¼¹±½. ·¸¹ºµ ³±Á º±»µ¹Ä±¹ ´¹± Ä¿
µ¸¹¶µÃ¸±¹ (a voce ·¸¿Â, i.e., consuetudo ·¸¿Â est appellatum:
ethica ergo dicta est ±À¿ Ä¿Å µ¸¹¶µÃ¸±¹, sivi ab assuescendo)
says Aristotle (Eth. Magna, i. 6, p. 1186, and Eth. Eud., p.
1220, and Eth. Nic., p. 1103, ed. Ber.) Stobæus quotes: ¿1 ´µ
º±Ä± –·½É½± ÄÁ¿À¹ºÉÂ; ·¸¿Â µÃÄ¹ À·³· ²¹¿Å ±Æ½ !Â ±1 º±Ä±
¼µÁ¿Â ÀÁ±¾µ¹Â Áµ¿ÅÃ¹ (Stoici autem, Zenonis castra sequentes,
metaphorice ethos definiunt vitæ fontem, e quo singulæ manant
actiones), ii. ch. 7. In Christian theology we find the dogma
of predestination in consequence of election and non-election
(Rom. ix. 11-24), clearly originating from the knowledge that
man does not change himself, but his life and conduct, i.e.,
his empirical character, is only the unfolding of his intelligible
character, the development of decided and unchangeable natural
dispositions recognisable even in the child; therefore, as it were,
[379] even at his birth his conduct is firmly determined, and remains
essentially the same to the end. This we entirely agree with; but
certainly the consequences which followed from the union of this
379
perfectly correct insight with the dogmas that already existed in

Jewish theology, and which now gave rise to the great difficulty,
the Gordian knot upon which most of the controversies of the
Church turned, I do not undertake to defend, for even the Apostle
Paul scarcely succeeded in doing so by means of his simile of the
potter's vessels which he invented for the purpose, for the result
he finally arrived at was nothing else than this:—
“Let mankind
Fear the gods!
They hold the power
In everlasting hands:
And they can use it
As seems good to them.”
Such considerations, however, are really foreign to our subject.

Some explanation as to the relation between the character and
the knowledge in which all its motives lie, will now be more to
the point.
The motives which determine the manifestation of the
character or conduct influence it through the medium of
knowledge. But knowledge is changeable, and often vacillates
between truth and error, yet, as a rule, is rectified more and
more in the course of life, though certainly in very different
degrees. Therefore the conduct of a man may be observably
altered without justifying us in concluding that his character
has been changed. What the man really and in general wills,
the striving of his inmost nature, and the end he pursues in
accordance with it, this we can never change by influence upon
him from without by instruction, otherwise we could transform
him. Seneca says admirably, velle non discitur; whereby he
preferred truth to his Stoic philosophers, who taught ´¹´±ºÄ·½
µ¹½±¹ Ä·½ ±ÁµÄ·½ (doceri posse virtutem). From without the
will can only be affected by motives. But these can never [380]
change the will itself; for they have power over it only under
the presupposition that it is precisely such as it is. All that they

can do is thus to alter the direction of its effort, i.e., bring it
about that it shall seek in another way than it has hitherto done
that which it invariably seeks. Therefore instruction, improved
knowledge, in other words, influence from without, may indeed
teach the will that it erred in the means it employed, and can
therefore bring it about that the end after which it strives once for
all according to its inner nature shall be pursued on an entirely
different path and in an entirely different object from what has
hitherto been the case. But it can never bring about that the will
shall will something actually different from what it has hitherto
willed; this remains unchangeable, for the will is simply this
willing itself, which would have to be abolished. The former,
however, the possible modification of knowledge, and through
knowledge of conduct, extends so far that the will seeks to attain
its unalterable end, for example, Mohammed's paradise, at one
time in the real world, at another time in a world of imagination,
adapting the means to each, and thus in the first case applying
prudence, might, and fraud, and in the second case, abstinence,
justice, alms, and pilgrimages to Mecca. But its effort itself has
not therefore changed, still less the will itself. Thus, although its
action certainly shows itself very different at different times, its
willing has yet remained precisely the same. Velle non discitur.
For motives to act, it is necessary not only that they should
be present, but that they should be known; for, according to a
very good expression of the schoolmen, which we referred to
once before, causa finalis movet non secundum suum esse reale;
sed secundum esse cognitum. For example, in order that the
relation may appear that exists in a given man between egoism
and sympathy, it is not sufficient that he should possess wealth
[381] and see others in want, but he must also know what he can do
with his wealth, both for himself and for others: not only must
the suffering of others be presented to him, but he must know
both what suffering and also what pleasure is. Perhaps, on a first
381
occasion, he did not know all this so well as on a second; and if,
on a similar occasion, he acts differently, this arises simply from
the fact that the circumstances were really different, as regards
the part of them that depends on his knowing them, although
they seem to be the same. As ignorance of actually existing
circumstances robs them of their influence, so, on the other hand,
entirely imaginary circumstances may act as if they were real,
not only in the case of a particular deception, but also in general
and continuously. For example, if a man is firmly persuaded that
every good action will be repaid him a hundredfold in a future
life, such a conviction affects him in precisely the same way as a
good bill of exchange at a very long date, and he can give from
mere egoism, as from another point of view he would take from
egoism. He has not changed himself: velle non discitur. It is on
account of this great influence of knowledge upon action, while
the will remains unchangeable, that the character develops and its
different features appear only little by little. Therefore it shows
itself different at every period of life, and an impetuous, wild
youth may be succeeded by a staid, sober, manly age. Especially
what is bad in the character will always come out more strongly
with time, yet sometimes it occurs that passions which a man
gave way to in his youth are afterwards voluntarily restrained,
simply because the motives opposed to them have only then
come into knowledge. Hence, also, we are all innocent to begin
with, and this merely means that neither we nor others know the
evil of our own nature; it only appears with the motives, and
only in time do the motives appear in knowledge. Finally we [382]
come to know ourselves as quite different from what a priori
we supposed ourselves to be, and then we are often terrified at
ourselves.
Repentance never proceeds from a change of the will (which
is impossible), but from a change of knowledge. The essential
and peculiar in what I have always willed I must still continue to
will; for I myself am this will which lies outside time and change.
I can therefore never repent of what I have willed, though I can

repent of what I have done; because, led by false conceptions,
I did something that was not in conformity with my will. The
discovery of this through fuller knowledge is repentance. This
extends not merely to worldly wisdom, to the choice of the
means, and the judgment of the appropriateness of the end to my
own will, but also to what is properly ethical. For example, I
may have acted more egotistically than is in accordance with my
character, led astray by exaggerated ideas of the need in which I
myself stood, or of the craft, falseness, and wickedness of others,
or because I hurried too much, i.e., acted without deliberation,
determined not by motives distinctly known in abstracto, but by
merely perceived motives, by the present and the emotion which
it excited, and which was so strong that I had not properly the use
of my reason; but the return of reflection is thus here also merely
corrected knowledge, and from this repentance may proceed,
which always proclaims itself by making amends for the past, as
far as is possible. Yet it must be observed that, in order to deceive
themselves, men prearrange what seem to be hasty errors, but
are really secretly considered actions. For we deceive and flatter
no one through such fine devices as ourselves. The converse of
the case we have given may also occur. I may be misled by too
good an opinion of others, or want of knowledge of the relative
value of the good things of life, or some abstract dogma in which
I have since lost faith, and thus I may act less egotistically than is
[383] in keeping with my character, and lay up for myself repentance
of another kind. Thus repentance is always corrected knowledge
of the relation of an act to its special intention. When the will
reveals its Ideas in space alone, i.e., through mere form, the
matter in which other Ideas—in this case natural forces—already
reign, resists the will, and seldom allows the form that is striving
after visibility to appear in perfect purity and distinctness, i.e.,
in perfect beauty. And there is an analogous hindrance to the
will as it reveals itself in time alone, i.e., through actions, in
383
the knowledge which seldom gives it the data quite correctly, so

that the action which takes place does not accurately correspond
to the will, and leads to repentance. Repentance thus always
proceeds from corrected knowledge, not from the change of the
will, which is impossible. Anguish of conscience for past deeds is
anything but repentance. It is pain at the knowledge of oneself in
one's inmost nature, i.e., as will. It rests precisely on the certainty
that we have still the same will. If the will were changed, and
therefore the anguish of conscience mere repentance, it would
cease to exist. The past could then no longer give us pain, for it
exhibited the expressions of a will which is no longer that of him
who has repented. We shall explain the significance of anguish
of conscience in detail farther on.
The influence which knowledge, as the medium of motives,
exerts, not indeed upon the will itself, but upon its appearance in
actions, is also the source of the principal distinction between the
action of men and that of brutes, for their methods of knowledge
are different. The brute has only knowledge of perception, the
man, through reason, has also abstract ideas, conceptions. Now,
although man and brute are with equal necessity determined
by their motives, yet man, as distinguished from the brute,
has a complete choice, which has often been regarded as a
freedom of the will in particular actions, although it is nothing
but the possibility of a thoroughly-fought-out battle between [384]
several motives, the strongest of which then determines it with
necessity. For this the motives must have assumed the form of
abstract thoughts, because it is really only by means of these
that deliberation, i.e., a weighing of opposite reasons for action,
is possible. In the case of the brute there can only be a choice
between perceptible motives presented to it, so that the choice is
limited to the narrow sphere of its present sensuous perception.
Therefore the necessity of the determination of the will by the
motive, which is like that of the effect by the cause, can be
exhibited perceptibly and directly only in the case of the brutes,
because here the spectator has the motives just as directly before
his eyes as their effect; while in the case of man the motives are
almost always abstract ideas, which are not communicated to the
spectator, and even for the actor himself the necessity of their
effect is hidden behind their conflict. For only in abstracto can
several ideas, as judgments and chains of conclusions, lie beside
each other in consciousness, and then, free from all determination
of time, work against each other till the stronger overcomes the
rest and determines the will. This is the complete choice or power
of deliberation which man has as distinguished from the brutes,
and on account of which freedom of the will has been attributed to
him, in the belief that his willing is a mere result of the operations
of his intellect, without a definite tendency which serves as its
basis; while, in truth, the motives only work on the foundation
and under the presupposition of his definite tendency, which in
his case is individual, i.e., a character. A fuller exposition of this
power of deliberation, and the difference between human and
brute choice which is introduced by it, will be found in the “Two
Fundamental Problems of Ethics” (1st edition, p. 35, et seq.; 2d
edition, p. 34, et seq.), to which I therefore refer. For the rest,
this power of deliberation which man possesses is one of those
[385] things that makes his existence so much more miserable than
that of the brute. For in general our greatest sufferings do not
lie in the present as ideas of perception or as immediate feelings;
but in the reason, as abstract conceptions, painful thoughts, from
which the brute, which lives only in the present, and therefore in
enviable carelessness, is entirely free.
It seems to have been the dependence, which we have shown,
of the human power of deliberation upon the faculty of abstract
thinking, and thus also of judging and drawing conclusions also,
that led both Descartes and Spinoza to identify the decisions of
the will with the faculty of asserting and denying (the faculty of
judgment). From this Descartes deduced the doctrine that the
will, which, according to him, is indifferently free, is the source
385
of sin, and also of all theoretical error. And Spinoza, on the other
hand, concluded that the will is necessarily determined by the
motives, as the judgment is by the reasons.70 The latter doctrine
is in a sense true, but it appears as a true conclusion from false
premises.
The distinction we have established between the ways in
which the brutes and man are respectively moved by motives
exerts a very wide influence upon the nature of both, and has
most to do with the complete and obvious differences of their
existence. While an idea of perception is in every case the
motive which determines the brute, the man strives to exclude
this kind of motivation altogether, and to determine himself
entirely by abstract ideas. Thus he uses his prerogative of
reason to the greatest possible advantage. Independent of the
present, he neither chooses nor avoids the passing pleasure or
pain, but reflects on the consequences of both. In most cases,
setting aside quite insignificant actions, we are determined by
abstract, thought motives, not present impressions. Therefore
all particular privation for the moment is for us comparatively
light, but all renunciation is terribly hard; for the former only [386]
concerns the fleeting present, but the latter concerns the future,
and includes in itself innumerable privations, of which it is the
equivalent. The causes of our pain, as of our pleasure, lie for the
most part, not in the real present, but merely in abstract thoughts.
It is these which are often unbearable to us—inflict torments in
comparison with which all the sufferings of the animal world
are very small; for even our own physical pain is not felt at
all when they are present. Indeed, in the case of keen mental
suffering, we even inflict physical suffering on ourselves merely
to distract our attention from the former to the latter. This is why,
in great mental anguish, men tear their hair, beat their breasts,
lacerate their faces, or roll on the floor, for all these are in reality
70
Cart. Medit. 4.—Spin. Eth., pt. ii. prop. 48 et 49, cæt.
only violent means of diverting the mind from an unbearable

thought. Just because mental pain, being much greater, makes
us insensible to physical pain, suicide is very easy to the person
who is in despair, or who is consumed by morbid depression,
even though formerly, in comfortable circumstances, he recoiled
at the thought of it. In the same way care and passion (thus
the play of thought) wear out the body oftener and more than
physical hardships. And in accordance with this Epictetus rightly
says: ¤±Á±ÃÃµ¹ Ä¿ÅÂ ±½¸ÁÉÀ¿ÅÂ ¿Å Ä± ÀÁ±³¼±Ä±, ±»»± Ä± ÀµÁ¹
ÄÉ½ ÀÁ±³¼±ÄÉ½ ´¿³¼±Ä± (Perturbant homines non res ipsæ, sed
de rebus decreta) (V.); and Seneca: Plura sunt quæ nos terrent,
quam quæ premunt, et sæpius opinione quam re laboramus (Ep.
5). Eulenspiegel also admirably bantered human nature, for
going uphill he laughed, and going downhill he wept. Indeed,
children who have hurt themselves often cry, not at the pain, but
at the thought of the pain which is awakened when some one
condoles with them. Such great differences in conduct and in life
arise from the diversity between the methods of knowledge of
the brutes and man. Further, the appearance of the distinct and
[387] decided individual character, the principal distinction between
man and the brute, which has scarcely more than the character of
the species, is conditioned by the choice between several motives,
which is only possible through abstract conceptions. For only
after a choice has been made are the resolutions, which vary in
different individuals, an indication of the individual character
which is different in each; while the action of the brute depends
only upon the presence or absence of the impression, supposing
this impression to be in general a motive for its species. And,
finally, in the case of man, only the resolve, and not the mere
wish, is a valid indication of his character both for himself and
for others; but the resolve becomes for himself, as for others,
a certain fact only through the deed. The wish is merely the
necessary consequence of the present impression, whether of the
outward stimulus, or the inward passing mood; and is therefore
387
as immediately necessary and devoid of consideration as the

action of the brutes. Therefore, like the action of the brutes,
it merely expresses the character of the species, not that of the
individual, i.e., it indicates merely what man in general, not
what the individual who experiences the wish, is capable of
doing. The deed alone,—because as human action it always
requires a certain deliberation, and because as a rule a man has
command of his reason, is considerate, i.e., decides in accordance
with considered and abstract motives,—is the expression of the
intelligible maxims of his conduct, the result of his inmost
willing, and is related as a letter to the word that stands for his
empirical character, itself merely the temporal expression of his
intelligible character. In a healthy mind, therefore, only deeds
oppress the conscience, not wishes and thoughts; for it is only our
deeds that hold up to us the mirror of our will. The deed referred
to above, that is entirely unconsidered and is really committed in
blind passion, is to a certain extent an intermediate thing between
the mere wish and the resolve. [388]
Therefore, by true repentance, which, however, shows itself

as action also, it can be obliterated, as a falsely drawn line, from
that picture of our will which our course of life is. I may insert the
remark here, as a very good comparison, that the relation between
wish and deed has a purely accidental but accurate analogy with
that between the accumulation and discharge of electricity.
As the result of the whole of this discussion of the freedom
of the will and what relates to it, we find that although the will
may, in itself and apart from the phenomenon, be called free and
even omnipotent, yet in its particular phenomena enlightened by
knowledge, as in men and brutes, it is determined by motives to
which the special character regularly and necessarily responds,
and always in the same way. We see that because of the
possession on his part of abstract or rational knowledge, man, as
distinguished from the brutes, has a choice, which only makes
him the scene of the conflict of his motives, without withdrawing
him from their control. This choice is therefore certainly the

condition of the possibility of the complete expression of the
individual character, but is by no means to be regarded as
freedom of the particular volition, i.e., independence of the
law of causality, the necessity of which extends to man as to
every other phenomenon. Thus the difference between human
volition and that of the brutes, which is introduced by reason
or knowledge through concepts, extends to the point we have
indicated, and no farther. But, what is quite a different thing,
there may arise a phenomenon of the human will which is quite
impossible in the brute creation, if man altogether lays aside the
knowledge of particular things as such which is subordinate to
the principle of sufficient reason, and by means of his knowledge
of the Ideas sees through the principium individuationis. Then
an actual appearance of the real freedom of the will as a thing-
in-itself is possible, by which the phenomenon comes into a sort
[389] of contradiction with itself, as is indicated by the word self-
renunciation; and, finally, the “in-itself” of its nature suppresses
itself. But this, the one, real, and direct expression of the freedom
of the will in itself in the phenomenon, cannot be distinctly
explained here, but will form the subject of the concluding part
of our work.
Now that we have shown clearly in these pages the unalterable
nature of the empirical character, which is just the unfolding
of the intelligible character that lies outside time, together with
the necessity with which actions follow upon its contact with
motives, we hasten to anticipate an argument which may very
easily be drawn from this in the interest of bad dispositions. Our
character is to be regarded as the temporal unfolding of an extra-
temporal, and therefore indivisible and unalterable, act of will,
or an intelligible character. This necessarily determines all that is
essential in our conduct in life, i.e., its ethical content, which must
express itself in accordance with it in its phenomenal appearance,
the empirical character; while only what is unessential in this,
389
the outward form of our course of life, depends upon the forms
in which the motives present themselves. It might, therefore,
be inferred that it is a waste of trouble to endeavour to improve
one's character, and that it is wiser to submit to the inevitable,
and gratify every inclination at once, even if it is bad. But this
is precisely the same thing as the theory of an inevitable fate
which is called ±Á³¿Â »¿³¿Â, and in more recent times Turkish
faith. Its true refutation, as it is supposed to have been given by
Chrysippus, is explained by Cicero in his book De Fato, ch. 12,
13.
Though everything may be regarded as irrevocably
predetermined by fate, yet it is so only through the medium
of the chain of causes; therefore in no case can it be determined
that an effect shall appear without its cause. Thus it is not simply
the event that is predetermined, but the event as the consequence [390]
of preceding causes; so that fate does not decide the consequence
alone, but also the means as the consequence of which it is
destined to appear. Accordingly, if some means is not present, it
is certain that the consequence also will not be present: each is
always present in accordance with the determination of fate, but
this is never known to us till afterwards.
As events always take place according to fate, i.e., according
to the infinite concatenation of causes, so our actions always
take place according to our intelligible character. But just as we
do not know the former beforehand, so no a priori insight is
given us into the latter, but we only come to know ourselves as
we come to know other persons a posteriori through experience.
If the intelligible character involved that we could only form a
good resolution after a long conflict with a bad disposition, this
conflict would have to come first and be waited for. Reflection
on the unalterable nature of the character, on the unity of the
source from which all our actions flow, must not mislead us into
claiming the decision of the character in favour of one side or
the other; it is in the resolve that follows that we shall see what
manner of men we are, and mirror ourselves in our actions. This

is the explanation of the satisfaction or the anguish of soul with
which we look back on the course of our past life. Both are
experienced, not because these past deeds have still an existence;
they are past, they have been, and now are no more; but their
great importance for us lies in their significance, lies in the fact
that these deeds are the expression of the character, the mirror
of the will, in which we look and recognise our inmost self,
the kernel of our will. Because we experience this not before,
but only after, it behoves us to strive and fight in time, in order
that the picture we produce by our deeds may be such that the
contemplation of it may calm us as much as possible, instead of
[391] harassing us. The significance of this consolation or anguish of
soul will, as we have said, be inquired into farther on; but to this
place there belongs the inquiry which follows, and which stands
by itself.
Besides the intelligible and the empirical character, we must
mention a third which is different from them both, the acquired
character, which one only receives in life through contact with
the world, and which is referred to when one is praised as a man
of character or censured as being without character. Certainly
one might suppose that, since the empirical character, as the
phenomenon of the intelligible, is unalterable, and, like every
natural phenomenon, is consistent with itself, man would always
have to appear like himself and consistent, and would therefore
have no need to acquire a character artificially by experience
and reflection. But the case is otherwise, and although a man
is always the same, yet he does not always understand himself,
but often mistakes himself, till he has in some degree acquired
real self-knowledge. The empirical character, as a mere natural
tendency, is in itself irrational; nay, more, its expressions are
disturbed by reason, all the more so the more intellect and power
of thought the man has; for these always keep before him what
becomes man in general as the character of the species, and
391
what is possible for him both in will and in deed. This makes
it the more difficult for him to see how much his individuality
enables him to will and to accomplish. He finds in himself the
germs of all the various human pursuits and powers, but the
difference of degree in which they exist in his individuality is not
clear to him in the absence of experience; and if he now applies
himself to the pursuits which alone correspond to his character,
he yet feels, especially at particular moments and in particular
moods, the inclination to directly opposite pursuits which cannot
be combined with them, but must be entirely suppressed if he
desires to follow the former undisturbed. For as our physical
path upon earth is always merely a line, not an extended surface, [392]
so in life, if we desire to grasp and possess one thing, we must
renounce and leave innumerable others on the right hand and on
the left. If we cannot make up our minds to this, but, like children
at the fair, snatch at everything that attracts us in passing, we are
making the perverse endeavour to change the line of our path into
an extended surface; we run in a zigzag, skip about like a will o'
the wisp, and attain to nothing. Or, to use another comparison,
as, according to Hobbes' philosophy of law, every one has an
original right to everything but an exclusive right to nothing, yet
can obtain an exclusive right to particular things by renouncing
his right to all the rest, while others, on their part, do likewise
with regard to what he has chosen; so is it in life, in which
some definite pursuit, whether it be pleasure, honour, wealth,
science, art, or virtue, can only be followed with seriousness and
success when all claims that are foreign to it are given up, when
everything else is renounced. Accordingly, the mere will and the
mere ability are not sufficient, but a man must also know what he
wills, and know what he can do; only then will he show character,
and only then can he accomplish something right. Until he attains
to that, notwithstanding the natural consistency of the empirical
character, he is without character. And although, on the whole,
he must remain true to himself, and fulfil his course, led by his
dæmon, yet his path will not be a straight line, but wavering and
uneven. He will hesitate, deviate, turn back, lay up for himself
repentance and pain. And all this is because, in great and small,
he sees before him all that is possible and attainable for man in
general, but does not know what part of all this is alone suitable
for him, can be accomplished by him, and is alone enjoyable by
him. He will, therefore, envy many men on account of a position
and circumstances which are yet only suitable to their characters
and not to his, and in which he would feel unhappy, if indeed
[393] he found them endurable at all. For as a fish is only at home in
water, a bird in the air, a mole in the earth, so every man is only at
home in the atmosphere suitable to him. For example, not all men
can breathe the air of court life. From deficiency of proper insight
into all this, many a man will make all kinds of abortive attempts,
will do violence to his character in particulars, and yet, on the
whole, will have to yield to it again; and what he thus painfully
attains will give him no pleasure; what he thus learns will remain
dead; even in an ethical regard, a deed that is too noble for his
character, that has not sprung from pure, direct impulse, but from
a concept, a dogma, will lose all merit, even in his own eyes,
through subsequent egoistical repentance. Velle non discitur. We
only become conscious of the inflexibility of another person's
character through experience, and till then we childishly believe
that it is possible, by means of rational ideas, by prayers and
entreaties, by example and noble-mindedness, ever to persuade
any one to leave his own way, to change his course of conduct, to
depart from his mode of thinking, or even to extend his capacities:
so is it also with ourselves. We must first learn from experience
what we desire and what we can do. Till then we know it not, we
are without character, and must often be driven back to our own
way by hard blows from without. But if we have finally learnt
it, then we have attained to what in the world is called character,
the acquired character. This is accordingly nothing but the most
perfect knowledge possible of our own individuality. It is the
393
abstract, and consequently distinct, knowledge of the unalterable

qualities of our own empirical character, and of the measure and
direction of our mental and physical powers, and thus of the whole
strength and weakness of our own individuality. This places us
in a position to carry out deliberately and methodically the rôle
which belongs to our own person, and to fill up the gaps which
caprices or weaknesses produce in it, under the guidance of fixed [394]
conceptions. This rôle is in itself unchangeably determined once
for all, but hitherto we have allowed it to follow its natural course
without any rule. We have now brought to distinct conscious
maxims which are always present to us the form of conduct
which is necessarily determined by our own individual nature,
and now we conduct it in accordance with them as deliberately
as if we had learned it; without ever falling into error through the
passing influence of the mood or the impression of the present,
without being checked by the bitterness or sweetness of some
particular thing we meet with on our path, without delay, without
hesitation, without inconsistency. We shall now no longer, as
novices, wait, attempt, and grope about in order to see what we
really desire and are able to do, but we know this once for all,
and in every choice we have only to apply general principles
to particular cases, and arrive at once at a decision. We know
our will in general, and do not allow ourselves to be led by
the passing mood or by solicitations from without to resolve in
particular cases what is contrary to it as a whole. We know in
the same way the nature and the measure of our strength and
our weakness, and thereby are spared much suffering. For we
experience no real pleasure except in the use and feeling of our
own powers, and the greatest pain is the conscious deficiency of
our powers where we need them. If, now, we have discovered
where our strength and our weakness lie, we will endeavour to
cultivate, employ, and in every way make use of those talents
which are naturally prominent in us. We will always turn to
those occupations in which they are valuable and to the purpose,
and entirely avoid, even with self-renunciation, those pursuits

for which we have naturally little aptitude; we will beware of
attempting that in which we have no chance of succeeding.
[395] Only he who has attained to this will constantly and with full
consciousness be completely himself, and will never fail himself
at the critical moment, because he will always have known what
he could expect from himself. He will often enjoy the satisfaction
of feeling his strength, and seldom experience the pain of being
reminded of his weakness. The latter is mortification, which
causes perhaps the greatest of mental sufferings; therefore it
is far more endurable to have our misfortune brought clearly
before us than our incapacity. And, further, if we are thus fully
acquainted with our strength and our weakness, we will not
attempt to make a show of powers which we do not possess; we
will not play with base coin, for all such dissimulation misses
the mark in the end. For since the whole man is only the
phenomenon of his will, nothing can be more perverse than to
try, by means of reflection, to become something else than one
is, for this is a direct contradiction of the will with itself. The
imitation of the qualities and idiosyncrasies of others is much
more shameful than to dress in other people's clothes; for it is the
judgment of our own worthlessness pronounced by ourselves.
Knowledge of our own mind and its capacities of every kind, and
their unalterable limits, is in this respect the surest way to the
attainment of the greatest possible contentment with ourselves.
For it holds good of inward as of outward circumstances that there
is for us no consolation so effective as the complete certainty of
unalterable necessity. No evil that befalls us pains us so much
as the thought of the circumstances by which it might have been
warded off. Therefore nothing comforts us so effectually as
the consideration of what has happened from the standpoint of
necessity, from which all accidents appear as tools in the hand of
an overruling fate, and we therefore recognise the evil that has
come to us as inevitably produced by the conflict of inner and
395
outer circumstances; in other words, fatalism. We really only

complain and storm so long as we hope either to affect others [396]
or to excite ourselves to unheard-of efforts. But children and
grown-up people know very well to yield contentedly as soon as
they clearly see that it absolutely cannot be otherwise:—˜Å¼x½
½v ÃÄu¸µÃÃ¹ Æw»¿½ ´±¼qÃÃ±½ÄµÂ ½q³º· (Animo in pectoribus
nostro domito necessitate). We are like the entrapped elephants,
that rage and struggle for many days, till they see that it is
useless, and then suddenly offer their necks quietly to the yoke,
tamed for ever. We are like King David, who, as long as his
son still lived, unceasingly importuned Jehovah with prayers,
and behaved himself as if in despair; but as soon as his son was
dead, thought no longer about it. Hence it arises that innumerable
permanent ills, such as lameness, poverty, low estate, ugliness,
a disagreeable dwelling-place, are borne with indifference by
innumerable persons, and are no longer felt, like healed wounds,
just because these persons know that inward or outward necessity
renders it impossible that any change can take place in these
things; while those who are more fortunate cannot understand
how such misfortunes can be borne. Now as with outward
necessity, so also with inward; nothing reconciles so thoroughly
as a distinct knowledge of it. If we have once for all distinctly
recognised not only our good qualities and our strength, but
also our defects and weakness, established our aim accordingly,
and rest satisfied concerning what cannot be attained, we thus
escape in the surest way, as far as our individuality permits, the
bitterest of all sorrows, discontentment with ourselves, which is
the inevitable result of ignorance of our own individuality, of
false conceit and the audacity that proceeds from it. To the bitter
chapter of the self-knowledge here recommended the lines of
Ovid admit of excellent application—
“Optimus ille animi vindex lædentia pectus,

Vincula qui rupit, dedoluitque semel.”
[397]
So much with regard to the acquired character, which, indeed,
is not of so much importance for ethics proper as for life in the
world. But its investigation was related as that of a third species
to the investigation of the intelligible and the empirical character,
in regard to which we were obliged to enter upon a somewhat
detailed inquiry in order to bring out clearly how in all its
phenomena the will is subject to necessity, while yet in itself it
may be called free and even omnipotent.
§ 56. This freedom, this omnipotence, as the expression
of which the whole visible world exists and progressively
develops in accordance with the laws which belong to the
form of knowledge, can now, at the point at which in its most
perfect manifestation it has attained to the completely adequate
knowledge of its own nature, express itself anew in two ways.
Either it wills here, at the summit of mental endowment and
self-consciousness, simply what it willed before blindly and
unconsciously, and if so, knowledge always remains its motive in
the whole as in the particular case. Or, conversely, this knowledge
becomes for it a quieter, which appeases and suppresses all
willing. This is that assertion and denial of the will to live
which was stated above in general terms. As, in the reference
of individual conduct, a general, not a particular manifestation
of will, it does not disturb and modify the development of the
character, nor does it find its expression in particular actions; but,
either by an ever more marked appearance of the whole method
of action it has followed hitherto, or conversely by the entire
suppression of it, it expresses in a living form the maxims which
the will has freely adopted in accordance with the knowledge it
has now attained to. By the explanations we have just given of
freedom, necessity, and character, we have somewhat facilitated
and prepared the way for the clearer development of all this,
which is the principal subject of this last book. But we shall have
[398] done so still more when we have turned our attention to life itself,
397
the willing or not willing of which is the great question, and have
endeavoured to find out generally what the will itself, which is
everywhere the inmost nature of this life, will really attain by its
assertion—in what way and to what extent this assertion satisfies
or can satisfy the will; in short, what is generally and mainly to
be regarded as its position in this its own world, which in every
relation belongs to it.
First of all, I wish the reader to recall the passage with
which we closed the Second Book,—a passage occasioned by
the question, which met us then, as to the end and aim of the will.
Instead of the answer to this question, it appeared clearly before
us how, in all the grades of its manifestation, from the lowest to
the highest, the will dispenses altogether with a final goal and
aim. It always strives, for striving is its sole nature, which no
attained goal can put an end to. Therefore it is not susceptible of
any final satisfaction, but can only be restrained by hindrances,
while in itself it goes on for ever. We see this in the simplest
of all natural phenomena, gravity, which does not cease to strive
and press towards a mathematical centre to reach which would
be the annihilation both of itself and matter, and would not cease
even if the whole universe were already rolled into one ball.
We see it in the other simple natural phenomena. A solid tends
towards fluidity either by melting or dissolving, for only so will
its chemical forces be free; rigidity is the imprisonment in which
it is held by cold. The fluid tends towards the gaseous state,
into which it passes at once as soon as all pressure is removed
from it. No body is without relationship, i.e., without tendency
or without desire and longing, as Jacob Böhme would say.
Electricity transmits its inner self-repulsion to infinity, though
the mass of the earth absorbs the effect. Galvanism is certainly,
so long as the pile is working, an aimless, unceasingly repeated
act of repulsion and attraction. The existence of the plant is just
such a restless, never satisfied striving, a ceaseless tendency [399]
through ever-ascending forms, till the end, the seed, becomes a
new starting-point; and this repeated ad infinitum—nowhere an

end, nowhere a final satisfaction, nowhere a resting-place. It will
also be remembered, from the Second Book, that the multitude
of natural forces and organised forms everywhere strive with
each other for the matter in which they desire to appear, for
each of them only possesses what it has wrested from the others;
and thus a constant internecine war is waged, from which, for
the most part, arises the resistance through which that striving,
which constitutes the inner nature of everything, is at all points
hindered; struggles in vain, yet, from its nature, cannot leave
off; toils on laboriously till this phenomenon dies, when others
eagerly seize its place and its matter.
We have long since recognised this striving, which constitutes
the kernel and in-itself of everything, as identical with that which
in us, where it manifests itself most distinctly in the light of
the fullest consciousness, is called will. Its hindrance through
an obstacle which places itself between it and its temporary aim
we call suffering, and, on the other hand, its attainment of the
end satisfaction, wellbeing, happiness. We may also transfer
this terminology to the phenomena of the unconscious world,
for though weaker in degree, they are identical in nature. Then
we see them involved in constant suffering, and without any
continuing happiness. For all effort springs from defect—from
discontent with one's estate—is thus suffering so long as it is
not satisfied; but no satisfaction is lasting, rather it is always
merely the starting-point of a new effort. The striving we see
everywhere hindered in many ways, everywhere in conflict, and
therefore always under the form of suffering. Thus, if there is no
final end of striving, there is no measure and end of suffering.
But what we only discover in unconscious Nature by sharpened
[400] observation, and with an effort, presents itself distinctly to us
in the intelligent world in the life of animals, whose constant
suffering is easily proved. But without lingering over these
intermediate grades, we shall turn to the life of man, in which
399
all this appears with the greatest distinctness, illuminated by the

clearest knowledge; for as the phenomenon of will becomes more
complete, the suffering also becomes more and more apparent.
In the plant there is as yet no sensibility, and therefore no pain.
A certain very small degree of suffering is experienced by the
lowest species of animal life—infusoria and radiata; even in
insects the capacity to feel and suffer is still limited. It first
appears in a high degree with the complete nervous system of
vertebrate animals, and always in a higher degree the more
intelligence develops. Thus, in proportion as knowledge attains
to distinctness, as consciousness ascends, pain also increases, and
therefore reaches its highest degree in man. And then, again, the
more distinctly a man knows, the more intelligent he is, the more
pain he has; the man who is gifted with genius suffers most of all.
In this sense, that is, with reference to the degree of knowledge in
general, not mere abstract rational knowledge, I understand and
use here that saying of the Preacher: Qui auget scientiam, auget
at dolorem. That philosophical painter or painting philosopher,
Tischbein, has very beautifully expressed the accurate relation
between the degree of consciousness and that of suffering by
exhibiting it in a visible and clear form in a drawing. The upper
half of his drawing represents women whose children have been
stolen, and who in different groups and attitudes, express in many
ways deep maternal pain, anguish, and despair. The lower half
of the drawing represents sheep whose lambs have been taken
away. They are arranged and grouped in precisely the same way;
so that every human head, every human attitude of the upper
half, has below a brute head and attitude corresponding to it.
Thus we see distinctly how the pain which is possible in the
dull brute consciousness is related to the violent grief, which [401]
only becomes possible through distinctness of knowledge and
clearness of consciousness.
We desire to consider in this way, in human existence, the inner
and essential destiny of will. Every one will easily recognise
that same destiny expressed in various degrees in the life of the

brutes, only more weakly, and may also convince himself to his
own satisfaction, from the suffering animal world, how essential
to all life is suffering.
§ 57. At every grade that is enlightened by knowledge, the will
appears as an individual. The human individual finds himself as
finite in infinite space and time, and consequently as a vanishing
quantity compared with them. He is projected into them, and, on
account of their unlimited nature, he has always a merely relative,
never absolute when and where of his existence; for his place and
duration are finite parts of what is infinite and boundless. His
real existence is only in the present, whose unchecked flight into
the past is a constant transition into death, a constant dying. For
his past life, apart from its possible consequences for the present,
and the testimony regarding the will that is expressed in it, is now
entirely done with, dead, and no longer anything; and, therefore,
it must be, as a matter of reason, indifferent to him whether the
content of that past was pain or pleasure. But the present is
always passing through his hands into the past; the future is quite
uncertain and always short. Thus his existence, even when we
consider only its formal side, is a constant hurrying of the present
into the dead past, a constant dying. But if we look at it from
the physical side; it is clear that, as our walking is admittedly
merely a constantly prevented falling, the life of our body is only
a constantly prevented dying, an ever-postponed death: finally,
in the same way, the activity of our mind is a constantly deferred
[402] ennui. Every breath we draw wards off the death that is
constantly intruding upon us. In this way we fight with it every
moment, and again, at longer intervals, through every meal we
eat, every sleep we take, every time we warm ourselves, &c.
In the end, death must conquer, for we became subject to him
through birth, and he only plays for a little while with his prey
before he swallows it up. We pursue our life, however, with great
interest and much solicitude as long as possible, as we blow out a
401
soap-bubble as long and as large as possible, although we know

perfectly well that it will burst.
We saw that the inner being of unconscious nature is a constant
striving without end and without rest. And this appears to us
much more distinctly when we consider the nature of brutes and
man. Willing and striving is its whole being, which may be
very well compared to an unquenchable thirst. But the basis
of all willing is need, deficiency, and thus pain. Consequently,
the nature of brutes and man is subject to pain originally and
through its very being. If, on the other hand, it lacks objects
of desire, because it is at once deprived of them by a too easy
satisfaction, a terrible void and ennui comes over it, i.e., its being
and existence itself becomes an unbearable burden to it. Thus
its life swings like a pendulum backwards and forwards between
pain and ennui. This has also had to express itself very oddly in
this way; after man had transferred all pain and torments to hell,
there then remained nothing over for heaven but ennui.
But the constant striving which constitutes the inner nature of
every manifestation of will obtains its primary and most general
foundation at the higher grades of objectification, from the fact
that here the will manifests itself as a living body, with the iron
command to nourish it; and what gives strength to this command
is just that this body is nothing but the objectified will to live
itself. Man, as the most complete objectification of that will, [403]
is in like measure also the most necessitous of all beings: he
is through and through concrete willing and needing; he is a
concretion of a thousand necessities. With these he stands upon
the earth, left to himself, uncertain about everything except his
own need and misery. Consequently the care for the maintenance
of that existence under exacting demands, which are renewed
every day, occupies, as a rule, the whole of human life. To this is
directly related the second claim, that of the propagation of the
species. At the same time he is threatened from all sides by the
most different kinds of dangers, from which it requires constant
watchfulness to escape. With cautious steps and casting anxious

glances round him he pursues his path, for a thousand accidents
and a thousand enemies lie in wait for him. Thus he went while
yet a savage, thus he goes in civilised life; there is no security
for him.
“Qualibus in tenebris vitæ, quantisque periclis

Degitur hocc' ævi, quodcunque est!”—LUCR. ii. 15.
The life of the great majority is only a constant struggle for

this existence itself, with the certainty of losing it at last. But
what enables them to endure this wearisome battle is not so
much the love of life as the fear of death, which yet stands in
the background as inevitable, and may come upon them at any
moment. Life itself is a sea, full of rocks and whirlpools, which
man avoids with the greatest care and solicitude, although he
knows that even if he succeeds in getting through with all his
efforts and skill, he yet by doing so comes nearer at every step
to the greatest, the total, inevitable, and irremediable shipwreck,
death; nay, even steers right upon it: this is the final goal of
the laborious voyage, and worse for him than all the rocks from
which he has escaped.
[404] Now it is well worth observing that, on the one hand,
the suffering and misery of life may easily increase to such
an extent that death itself, in the flight from which the whole
of life consists, becomes desirable, and we hasten towards it
voluntarily; and again, on the other hand, that as soon as want
and suffering permit rest to a man, ennui is at once so near that
he necessarily requires diversion. The striving after existence is
what occupies all living things and maintains them in motion.
But when existence is assured, then they know not what to do
with it; thus the second thing that sets them in motion is the
effort to get free from the burden of existence, to make it cease
to be felt, “to kill time,” i.e., to escape from ennui. Accordingly
403
we see that almost all men who are secure from want and care,
now that at last they have thrown off all other burdens, become
a burden to themselves, and regard as a gain every hour they
succeed in getting through; and thus every diminution of the
very life which, till then, they have employed all their powers
to maintain as long as possible. Ennui is by no means an evil
to be lightly esteemed; in the end it depicts on the countenance
real despair. It makes beings who love each other so little as
men do, seek each other eagerly, and thus becomes the source
of social intercourse. Moreover, even from motives of policy,
public precautions are everywhere taken against it, as against
other universal calamities. For this evil may drive men to the
greatest excesses, just as much as its opposite extreme, famine:
the people require panem et circenses. The strict penitentiary
system of Philadelphia makes use of ennui alone as a means of
punishment, through solitary confinement and idleness, and it is
found so terrible that it has even led prisoners to commit suicide.
As want is the constant scourge of the people, so ennui is that of
the fashionable world. In middle-class life ennui is represented
by the Sunday, and want by the six week-days.
Thus between desiring and attaining all human life flows on
throughout. The wish is, in its nature, pain; the attainment [405]
soon begets satiety: the end was only apparent; possession takes
away the charm; the wish, the need, presents itself under a new
form; when it does not, then follows desolateness, emptiness,
ennui, against which the conflict is just as painful as against
want. That wish and satisfaction should follow each other neither
too quickly nor too slowly reduces the suffering, which both
occasion to the smallest amount, and constitutes the happiest life.
For that which we might otherwise call the most beautiful part
of life, its purest joy, if it were only because it lifts us out of
real existence and transforms us into disinterested spectators of
it—that is, pure knowledge, which is foreign to all willing, the
pleasure of the beautiful, the true delight in art—this is granted
only to a very few, because it demands rare talents, and to these

few only as a passing dream. And then, even these few, on
account of their higher intellectual power, are made susceptible
of far greater suffering than duller minds can ever feel, and are
also placed in lonely isolation by a nature which is obviously
different from that of others; thus here also accounts are squared.
But to the great majority of men purely intellectual pleasures are
not accessible. They are almost quite incapable of the joys which
lie in pure knowledge. They are entirely given up to willing. If,
therefore, anything is to win their sympathy, to be interesting
to them, it must (as is implied in the meaning of the word) in
some way excite their will, even if it is only through a distant
and merely problematical relation to it; the will must not be left
altogether out of the question, for their existence lies far more
in willing than in knowing,—action and reaction is their one
element. We may find in trifles and everyday occurrences the
naïve expressions of this quality. Thus, for example, at any place
worth seeing they may visit, they write their names, in order thus
to react, to affect the place since it does not affect them. Again,
[406] when they see a strange rare animal, they cannot easily confine
themselves to merely observing it; they must rouse it, tease it,
play with it, merely to experience action and reaction; but this
need for excitement of the will manifests itself very specially
in the discovery and support of card-playing, which is quite
peculiarly the expression of the miserable side of humanity.
But whatever nature and fortune may have done, whoever a
man be and whatever he may possess, the pain which is essential
to life cannot be thrown off:— ·»µ¹´·Â ´½ ó¼É¾µ½, ¹´É½ µ¹Â
¿ÅÁ±½¿½ µÅÁÅ½ (Pelides autem ejulavit, intuitus in cælum latum).
And again:—–·½¿Â ¼µ½ À±¹Â ·± šÁ¿½¹¿½¿Â, ±ÅÄ±Á ¿¹¶Å½ µ¹Ç¿½
±Àµ¹ÁµÃ¹·½ (Jovis quidem filius eram Saturnii; verum ærumnam
habebam infinitam). The ceaseless efforts to banish suffering
accomplish no more than to make it change its form. It is
essentially deficiency, want, care for the maintenance of life. If
405
we succeed, which is very difficult, in removing pain in this form,

it immediately assumes a thousand others, varying according to
age and circumstances, such as lust, passionate love, jealousy,
envy, hatred, anxiety, ambition, covetousness, sickness, &c., &c.
If at last it can find entrance in no other form, it comes in the
sad, grey garments of tediousness and ennui, against which we
then strive in various ways. If finally we succeed in driving this
away, we shall hardly do so without letting pain enter in one of
its earlier forms, and the dance begin again from the beginning;
for all human life is tossed backwards and forwards between pain
and ennui. Depressing as this view of life is, I will draw attention,
by the way, to an aspect of it from which consolation may be
drawn, and perhaps even a stoical indifference to one's own
present ills may be attained. For our impatience at these arises
for the most part from the fact that we regard them as brought
about by a chain of causes which might easily be different. We
do not generally grieve over ills which are directly necessary and
quite universal; for example, the necessity of age and of death, [407]
and many daily inconveniences. It is rather the consideration
of the accidental nature of the circumstances that brought some
sorrow just to us, that gives it its sting. But if we have recognised
that pain, as such, is inevitable and essential to life, and that
nothing depends upon chance but its mere fashion, the form
under which it presents itself, that thus our present sorrow fills
a place that, without it, would at once be occupied by another
which now is excluded by it, and that therefore fate can affect us
little in what is essential; such a reflection, if it were to become a
living conviction, might produce a considerable degree of stoical
equanimity, and very much lessen the anxious care for our own
well-being. But, in fact, such a powerful control of reason over
directly felt suffering seldom or never occurs.
Besides, through this view of the inevitableness of pain, of
the supplanting of one pain by another, and the introduction of
a new pain through the passing away of that which preceded it,
one might be led to the paradoxical but not absurd hypothesis,

that in every individual the measure of the pain essential to him
was determined once for all by his nature, a measure which
could neither remain empty, nor be more than filled, however
much the form of the suffering might change. Thus his suffering
and well-being would by no means be determined from without,
but only through that measure, that natural disposition, which
indeed might experience certain additions and diminutions from
the physical condition at different times, but yet, on the whole,
would remain the same, and would just be what is called the
temperament, or, more accurately, the degree in which he might
be µÅº¿»¿Â or ´ÅÃº¿»¿Â, as Plato expresses it in the First Book
of the Republic, i.e., in an easy or difficult mood. This hypothesis
is supported not only by the well-known experience that great
suffering makes all lesser ills cease to be felt, and conversely
that freedom from great suffering makes even the most trifling
[408] inconveniences torment us and put us out of humour; but
experience also teaches that if a great misfortune, at the mere
thought of which we shuddered, actually befalls us, as soon as we
have overcome the first pain of it, our disposition remains for the
most part unchanged; and, conversely, that after the attainment
of some happiness we have long desired, we do not feel ourselves
on the whole and permanently very much better off and agreeably
situated than before. Only the moment at which these changes
occur affects us with unusual strength, as deep sorrow or exulting
joy, but both soon pass away, for they are based upon illusion.
For they do not spring from the immediately present pleasure
or pain, but only from the opening up of a new future which is
anticipated in them. Only by borrowing from the future could
pain or pleasure be heightened so abnormally, and consequently
not enduringly. It would follow, from the hypothesis advanced,
that a large part of the feeling of suffering and of well-being
would be subjective and determined a priori, as is the case with
knowing; and we may add the following remarks as evidence
407
in favour of it. Human cheerfulness or dejection are manifestly

not determined by external circumstances, such as wealth and
position, for we see at least as many glad faces among the poor
as among the rich. Further, the motives which induce suicide
are so very different, that we can assign no motive that is so
great as to bring it about, even with great probability, in every
character, and few that would be so small that the like of them
had never caused it. Now although the degree of our serenity
or sadness is not at all times the same, yet, in consequence of
this view, we shall not attribute it to the change of outward
circumstances, but to that of the inner condition, the physical
state. For when an actual, though only temporary, increase of
our serenity, even to the extent of joyfulness, takes place, it
usually appears without any external occasion. It is true that
we often see our pain arise only from some definite external [409]
relation, and are visibly oppressed and saddened by this only.
Then we believe that if only this were taken away, the greatest
contentment would necessarily ensue. But this is illusion. The
measure of our pain and our happiness is on the whole, according
to our hypothesis, subjectively determined for each point of time,
and the motive for sadness is related to that, just as a blister
which draws to a head all the bad humours otherwise distributed
is related to the body. The pain which is at that period of
time essential to our nature, and therefore cannot be shaken off,
would, without the definite external cause of our suffering, be
divided at a hundred points, and appear in the form of a hundred
little annoyances and cares about things which we now entirely
overlook, because our capacity for pain is already filled by that
chief evil which has concentrated in a point all the suffering
otherwise dispersed. This corresponds also to the observation
that if a great and pressing care is lifted from our breast by its
fortunate issue, another immediately takes its place, the whole
material of which was already there before, yet could not come
into consciousness as care because there was no capacity left
for it, and therefore this material of care remained indistinct

and unobserved in a cloudy form on the farthest horizon of
consciousness. But now that there is room, this prepared material
at once comes forward and occupies the throne of the reigning
care of the day (ÀÁÅÄ±½µÅ¿ÅÃ±). And if it is very much lighter
in its matter than the material of the care which has vanished, it
knows how to blow itself out so as apparently to equal it in size,
and thus, as the chief care of the day, completely fills the throne.
Excessive joy and very keen suffering always occur in the
same person, for they condition each other reciprocally, and are
also in common conditioned by great activity of the mind. Both
are produced, as we have just seen, not by what is really present,
[410] but by the anticipation of the future. But since pain is essential to
life, and its degree is also determined by the nature of the subject,
sudden changes, because they are always external, cannot really
alter its degree. Thus an error and delusion always lies at
the foundation of immoderate joy or grief, and consequently
both these excessive strainings of the mind can be avoided by
knowledge. Every immoderate joy (exultatio, insolens lætitia)
always rests on the delusion that one has found in life what can
never be found there—lasting satisfaction of the harassing desires
and cares, which are constantly breeding new ones. From every
particular delusion of this kind one must inevitably be brought
back later, and then when it vanishes must pay for it with pain
as bitter as the joy its entrance caused was keen. So far, then, it
is precisely like a height from which one can come down only
by a fall. Therefore one ought to avoid them; and every sudden
excessive grief is just a fall from some such height, the vanishing
of such a delusion, and so conditioned by it. Consequently we
might avoid them both if we had sufficient control over ourselves
to survey things always with perfect clearness as a whole and in
their connection, and steadfastly to guard against really lending
them the colours which we wish they had. The principal effort
of the Stoical ethics was to free the mind from all such delusion
409
and its consequences, and to give it instead an equanimity that

could not be disturbed. It is this insight that inspires Horace in
the well-known ode—
“Æquam memento rebus in arduiis

Servare mentem, non secus in bonis
Ab insolenti temperatam
Lætitia.”
For the most part, however, we close our minds against the
knowledge, which may be compared to a bitter medicine, that
suffering is essential to life, and therefore does not flow in upon
us from without, but that every one carries about with him its
perennial source in his own heart. We rather seek constantly [411]
for an external particular cause, as it were, a pretext for the pain
which never leaves us, just as the free man makes himself an
idol, in order to have a master. For we unweariedly strive from
wish to wish; and although every satisfaction, however much it
promised, when attained fails to satisfy us, but for the most part
comes presently to be an error of which we are ashamed, yet we
do not see that we draw water with the sieve of the Danaides, but
ever hasten to new desires.
“Sed, dum abest quod avemus, id exsuperare videtur

Cætera; post aliud, quum contigit illud, avemus;
Et sitis æqua tenet vitai semper hiantes.”—LUCR. iii. 1095.
Thus it either goes on for ever, or, what is more rare and
presupposes a certain strength of character, till we reach a wish
which is not satisfied and yet cannot be given up. In that case
we have, as it were, found what we sought, something that we
can always blame, instead of our own nature, as the source of
our suffering. And thus, although we are now at variance with
our fate, we are reconciled to our existence, for the knowledge is
again put far from us that suffering is essential to this existence
itself, and true satisfaction impossible. The result of this form of
development is a somewhat melancholy disposition, the constant
endurance of a single great pain, and the contempt for all lesser
sorrows or joys that proceeds from it; consequently an already
nobler phenomenon than that constant seizing upon ever-new
forms of illusion, which is much more common.
§ 58. All satisfaction, or what is commonly called happiness,
is always really and essentially only negative, and never positive.
It is not an original gratification coming to us of itself, but must
always be the satisfaction of a wish. The wish, i.e., some want,
is the condition which precedes every pleasure. But with the
satisfaction the wish and therefore the pleasure cease. Thus
[412] the satisfaction or the pleasing can never be more than the
deliverance from a pain, from a want; for such is not only
every actual, open sorrow, but every desire, the importunity
of which disturbs our peace, and, indeed, the deadening ennui
also that makes life a burden to us. It is, however, so hard
to attain or achieve anything; difficulties and troubles without
end are opposed to every purpose, and at every step hindrances
accumulate. But when finally everything is overcome and
attained, nothing can ever be gained but deliverance from some
sorrow or desire, so that we find ourselves just in the same
position as we occupied before this sorrow or desire appeared.
All that is even directly given us is merely the want, i.e., the pain.
The satisfaction and the pleasure we can only know indirectly
through the remembrance of the preceding suffering and want,
411
which ceases with its appearance. Hence it arises that we are not
properly conscious of the blessings and advantages we actually
possess, nor do we prize them, but think of them merely as a
matter of course, for they gratify us only negatively by restraining
suffering. Only when we have lost them do we become sensible
of their value; for the want, the privation, the sorrow, is the
positive, communicating itself directly to us. Thus also we are
pleased by the remembrance of past need, sickness, want, and
such like, because this is the only means of enjoying the present
blessings. And, further, it cannot be denied that in this respect,
and from this standpoint of egoism, which is the form of the
will to live, the sight or the description of the sufferings of
others affords us satisfaction and pleasure in precisely the way
Lucretius beautifully and frankly expresses it in the beginning of
the Second Book—
“Suave, mari magno, turbantibus æquora ventis,

E terra magnum alterius spectare laborem:
Non, quia vexari quemquam est jucunda voluptas;
Sed, quibus ipse malis careas, quia cernere suave est.”
Yet we shall see farther on that this kind of pleasure, through [413]
knowledge of our own well-being obtained in this way, lies very
near the source of real, positive wickedness.
That all happiness is only of a negative not a positive nature,
that just on this account it cannot be lasting satisfaction and
gratification, but merely delivers us from some pain or want
which must be followed either by a new pain, or by languor,
empty longing, and ennui; this finds support in art, that true
mirror of the world and life, and especially in poetry. Every
epic and dramatic poem can only represent a struggle, an effort,
and fight for happiness, never enduring and complete happiness
itself. It conducts its heroes through a thousand difficulties and
dangers to the goal; as soon as this is reached, it hastens to
let the curtain fall; for now there would remain nothing for it
to do but to show that the glittering goal in which the hero
expected to find happiness had only disappointed him, and that
after its attainment he was no better off than before. Because
a genuine enduring happiness is not possible, it cannot be the
subject of art. Certainly the aim of the idyll is the description of
such a happiness, but one also sees that the idyll as such cannot
continue. The poet always finds that it either becomes epical in
his hands, and in this case it is a very insignificant epic, made
up of trifling sorrows, trifling delights, and trifling efforts—this
is the commonest case—or else it becomes a merely descriptive
poem, describing the beauty of nature, i.e., pure knowing free
from will, which certainly, as a matter of fact, is the only
pure happiness, which is neither preceded by suffering or want,
nor necessarily followed by repentance, sorrow, emptiness, or
satiety; but this happiness cannot fill the whole life, but is only
possible at moments. What we see in poetry we find again in
music; in the melodies of which we have recognised the universal
expression of the inmost history of the self-conscious will, the
[414] most secret life, longing, suffering, and delight; the ebb and
flow of the human heart. Melody is always a deviation from
the keynote through a thousand capricious wanderings, even to
the most painful discord, and then a final return to the keynote
which expresses the satisfaction and appeasing of the will, but
with which nothing more can then be done, and the continuance
of which any longer would only be a wearisome and unmeaning
monotony corresponding to ennui.
All that we intend to bring out clearly through these
investigations, the impossibility of attaining lasting satisfaction
and the negative nature of all happiness, finds its explanation
in what is shown at the conclusion of the Second Book: that
the will, of which human life, like every phenomenon, is the
objectification, is a striving without aim or end. We find the
stamp of this endlessness imprinted upon all the parts of its
413
whole manifestation, from its most universal form, endless time

and space, up to the most perfect of all phenomena, the life and
efforts of man. We may theoretically assume three extremes
of human life, and treat them as elements of actual human life.
First, the powerful will, the strong passions (Radscha-Guna). It
appears in great historical characters; it is described in the epic
and the drama. But it can also show itself in the little world,
for the size of the objects is measured here by the degree in
which they influence the will, not according to their external
relations. Secondly, pure knowing, the comprehension of the
Ideas, conditioned by the freeing of knowledge from the service
of will: the life of genius (Satwa-Guna). Thirdly and lastly, the
greatest lethargy of the will, and also of the knowledge attaching
to it, empty longing, life-benumbing languor (Tama-Guna). The
life of the individual, far from becoming permanently fixed in
one of these extremes, seldom touches any of them, and is for the
most part only a weak and wavering approach to one or the other
side, a needy desiring of trifling objects, constantly recurring, and
so escaping ennui. It is really incredible how meaningless and [415]
void of significance when looked at from without, how dull and
unenlightened by intellect when felt from within, is the course of
the life of the great majority of men. It is a weary longing and
complaining, a dream-like staggering through the four ages of
life to death, accompanied by a series of trivial thoughts. Such
men are like clockwork, which is wound up, and goes it knows
not why; and every time a man is begotten and born, the clock of
human life is wound up anew, to repeat the same old piece it has
played innumerable times before, passage after passage, measure
after measure, with insignificant variations. Every individual,
every human being and his course of life, is but another short
dream of the endless spirit of nature, of the persistent will to
live; is only another fleeting form, which it carelessly sketches
on its infinite page, space and time; allows to remain for a time
so short that it vanishes into nothing in comparison with these,
and then obliterates to make new room. And yet, and here lies
the serious side of life, every one of these fleeting forms, these
empty fancies, must be paid for by the whole will to live, in all
its activity, with many and deep sufferings, and finally with a
bitter death, long feared and coming at last. This is why the sight
of a corpse makes us suddenly so serious.
The life of every individual, if we survey it as a whole and
in general, and only lay stress upon its most significant features,
is really always a tragedy, but gone through in detail, it has the
character of a comedy. For the deeds and vexations of the day,
the restless irritation of the moment, the desires and fears of the
week, the mishaps of every hour, are all through chance, which
is ever bent upon some jest, scenes of a comedy. But the never-
satisfied wishes, the frustrated efforts, the hopes unmercifully
crushed by fate, the unfortunate errors of the whole life, with
[416] increasing suffering and death at the end, are always a tragedy.
Thus, as if fate would add derision to the misery of our existence,
our life must contain all the woes of tragedy, and yet we cannot
even assert the dignity of tragic characters, but in the broad detail
of life must inevitably be the foolish characters of a comedy.
But however much great and small trials may fill human life,
they are not able to conceal its insufficiency to satisfy the spirit;
they cannot hide the emptiness and superficiality of existence,
nor exclude ennui, which is always ready to fill up every pause
that care may allow. Hence it arises that the human mind, not
content with the cares, anxieties, and occupations which the
actual world lays upon it, creates for itself an imaginary world
also in the form of a thousand different superstitions, then finds
all manner of employment with this, and wastes time and strength
upon it, as soon as the real world is willing to grant it the rest
which it is quite incapable of enjoying. This is accordingly most
markedly the case with nations for which life is made easy by
the congenial nature of the climate and the soil, most of all with
the Hindus, then with the Greeks, the Romans, and later with the
415
Italians, the Spaniards, &c. Demons, gods, and saints man creates
in his own image; and to them he must then unceasingly bring
offerings, prayers, temple decorations, vows and their fulfilment,
pilgrimages, salutations, ornaments for their images, &c. Their
service mingles everywhere with the real, and, indeed, obscures
it. Every event of life is regarded as the work of these beings; the
intercourse with them occupies half the time of life, constantly
sustains hope, and by the charm of illusion often becomes more
interesting than intercourse with real beings. It is the expression
and symptom of the actual need of mankind, partly for help and
support, partly for occupation and diversion; and if it often works
in direct opposition to the first need, because when accidents
and dangers arise valuable time and strength, instead of being [417]
directed to warding them off, are uselessly wasted on prayers and
offerings; it serves the second end all the better by this imaginary
converse with a visionary spirit world; and this is the by no
means contemptible gain of all superstitions.
§ 59. If we have so far convinced ourselves a priori, by
the most general consideration, by investigation of the primary
and elemental features of human life, that in its whole plan
it is capable of no true blessedness, but is in its very nature
suffering in various forms, and throughout a state of misery, we
might now awaken this conviction much more vividly within
us if, proceeding more a posteriori, we were to turn to more
definite instances, call up pictures to the fancy, and illustrate by
examples the unspeakable misery which experience and history
present, wherever one may look and in whatever direction one
may seek. But the chapter would have no end, and would carry
us far from the standpoint of the universal, which is essential to
philosophy; and, moreover, such a description might easily be
taken for a mere declamation on human misery, such as has often
been given, and, as such, might be charged with one-sidedness,
because it started from particular facts. From such a reproach and
suspicion our perfectly cold and philosophical investigation of
the inevitable suffering which is founded in the nature of life is

free, for it starts from the universal and is conducted a priori. But
confirmation a posteriori is everywhere easily obtained. Every
one who has awakened from the first dream of youth, who has
considered his own experience and that of others, who has studied
himself in life, in the history of the past and of his own time,
and finally in the works of the great poets, will, if his judgment
is not paralysed by some indelibly imprinted prejudice, certainly
arrive at the conclusion that this human world is the kingdom
of chance and error, which rule without mercy in great things
and in small, and along with which folly and wickedness also
[418] wield the scourge. Hence it arises that everything better only
struggles through with difficulty; what is noble and wise seldom
attains to expression, becomes effective and claims attention, but
the absurd and the perverse in the sphere of thought, the dull
and tasteless in the sphere of art, the wicked and deceitful in the
sphere of action, really assert a supremacy, only disturbed by
short interruptions. On the other hand, everything that is excellent
is always a mere exception, one case in millions, and therefore,
if it presents itself in a lasting work, this, when it has outlived the
enmity of its contemporaries, exists in isolation, is preserved like
a meteoric stone, sprung from an order of things different from
that which prevails here. But as far as the life of the individual is
concerned, every biography is the history of suffering, for every
life is, as a rule, a continual series of great and small misfortunes,
which each one conceals as much as possible, because he knows
that others can seldom feel sympathy or compassion, but almost
always satisfaction at the sight of the woes from which they are
themselves for the moment exempt. But perhaps at the end of
life, if a man is sincere and in full possession of his faculties,
he will never wish to have it to live over again, but rather than
this, he will much prefer absolute annihilation. The essential
content of the famous soliloquy in “Hamlet” is briefly this: Our
state is so wretched that absolute annihilation would be decidedly
417
preferable. If suicide really offered us this, so that the alternative

“to be or not to be,” in the full sense of the word, was placed
before us, then it would be unconditionally to be chosen as “a
consummation devoutly to be wished.” But there is something in
us which tells us that this is not the case: suicide is not the end;
death is not absolute annihilation. In like manner, what was said
by the father of history71 has not since him been contradicted,
that no man has ever lived who has not wished more than once
that he had not to live the following day. According to this, [419]
the brevity of life, which is so constantly lamented, may be the
best quality it possesses. If, finally, we should bring clearly
to a man's sight the terrible sufferings and miseries to which
his life is constantly exposed, he would be seized with horror;
and if we were to conduct the confirmed optimist through the
hospitals, infirmaries, and surgical operating-rooms, through the
prisons, torture-chambers, and slave-kennels, over battle-fields
and places of execution; if we were to open to him all the dark
abodes of misery, where it hides itself from the glance of cold
curiosity, and, finally, allow him to glance into the starving
dungeon of Ugolino, he, too, would understand at last the nature
of this “best of possible worlds.” For whence did Dante take the
materials for his hell but from this our actual world? And yet
he made a very proper hell of it. And when, on the other hand,
he came to the task of describing heaven and its delights, he had
an insurmountable difficulty before him, for our world affords
no materials at all for this. Therefore there remained nothing
for him to do but, instead of describing the joys of paradise, to
repeat to us the instruction given him there by his ancestor, by
Beatrice, and by various saints. But from this it is sufficiently
clear what manner of world it is. Certainly human life, like all
bad ware, is covered over with a false lustre: what suffers always
conceals itself; on the other hand, whatever pomp or splendour
71
Herodot. vii. 46.
any one can get, he makes a show of openly, and the more
inner contentment deserts him, the more he desires to exist as
fortunate in the opinion of others: to such an extent does folly
go, and the opinion of others is a chief aim of the efforts of
every one, although the utter nothingness of it is expressed in
the fact that in almost all languages vanity, vanitas, originally
signifies emptiness and nothingness. But under all this false
show, the miseries of life can so increase—and this happens
every day—that the death which hitherto has been feared above
[420] all things is eagerly seized upon. Indeed, if fate will show its
whole malice, even this refuge is denied to the sufferer, and,
in the hands of enraged enemies, he may remain exposed to
terrible and slow tortures without remedy. In vain the sufferer
then calls on his gods for help; he remains exposed to his fate
without grace. But this irremediableness is only the mirror of
the invincible nature of his will, of which his person is the
objectivity. As little as an external power can change or suppress
this will, so little can a foreign power deliver it from the miseries
which proceed from the life which is the phenomenal appearance
of that will. In the principal matter, as in everything else, a man
is always thrown back upon himself. In vain does he make to
himself gods in order to get from them by prayers and flattery
what can only be accomplished by his own will-power. The
Old Testament made the world and man the work of a god, but
the New Testament saw that, in order to teach that holiness and
salvation from the sorrows of this world can only come from the
world itself, it was necessary that this god should become man.
It is and remains the will of man upon which everything depends
for him. Fanatics, martyrs, saints of every faith and name, have
voluntarily and gladly endured every torture, because in them
the will to live had suppressed itself; and then even the slow
destruction of its phenomenon was welcome to them. But I do
not wish to anticipate the later exposition. For the rest, I cannot
here avoid the statement that, to me, optimism, when it is not
419
merely the thoughtless talk of such as harbour nothing but words

under their low foreheads, appears not merely as an absurd, but
also as a really wicked way of thinking, as a bitter mockery of
the unspeakable suffering of humanity. Let no one think that
Christianity is favourable to optimism; for, on the contrary, in
the Gospels world and evil are used as almost synonymous.72 [421]
§ 60. We have now completed the two expositions it was

necessary to insert; the exposition of the freedom of the will
in itself together with the necessity of its phenomenon, and the
exposition of its lot in the world which reflects its own nature,
and upon the knowledge of which it has to assert or deny itself.
Therefore we can now proceed to bring out more clearly the
nature of this assertion and denial itself, which was referred to
and explained in a merely general way above. This we shall do
by exhibiting the conduct in which alone it finds its expression,
and considering it in its inner significance.
The assertion of the will is the continuous willing itself,
undisturbed by any knowledge, as it fills the life of man in
general. For even the body of a man is the objectivity of the will,
as it appears at this grade and in this individual. And thus his
willing which develops itself in time is, as it were, a paraphrase
of his body, an elucidation of the significance of the whole and
its parts; it is another way of exhibiting the same thing-in-itself,
of which the body is already the phenomenon. Therefore, instead
of saying assertion of the will, we may say assertion of the body.
The fundamental theme or subject of all the multifarious acts
of will is the satisfaction of the wants which are inseparable
from the existence of the body in health, they already have their
expression in it, and may be referred to the maintenance of the
individual and the propagation of the species. But indirectly the
most different kinds of motives obtain in this way power over
the will, and bring about the most multifarious acts of will. Each
72
Cf. Ch. xlvi. of Supplement.
of these is only an example, an instance, of the will which here

manifests itself generally. Of what nature this example may be,
what form the motive may have and impart to it, is not essential;
the important point here is that something is willed in general
and the degree of intensity with which it is so willed. The will
can only become visible in the motives, as the eye only manifests
[422] its power of seeing in the light. The motive in general stands
before the will in protean forms. It constantly promises complete
satisfaction, the quenching of the thirst of will. But whenever it
is attained it at once appears in another form, and thus influences
the will anew, always according to the degree of the intensity
of this will, and its relation to knowledge which are revealed as
empirical character, in these very examples and instances.
From the first appearance of consciousness, a man finds
himself a willing being, and as a rule, his knowledge remains in
constant relation to his will. He first seeks to know thoroughly
the objects of his desire, and then the means of attaining them.
Now he knows what he has to do, and, as a rule, he does not strive
after other knowledge. He moves and acts; his consciousness
keeps him always working directly and actively towards the aims
of his will; his thought is concerned with the choice of motives.
Such is life for almost all men; they wish, they know what they
wish, and they strive after it, with sufficient success to keep them
from despair, and sufficient failure to keep them from ennui and
its consequences. From this proceeds a certain serenity, or at
least indifference, which cannot be affected by wealth or poverty;
for the rich and the poor do not enjoy what they have, for this,
as we have shown, acts in a purely negative way, but what they
hope to attain to by their efforts. They press forward with much
earnestness, and indeed with an air of importance; thus children
also pursue their play. It is always an exception if such a life
suffers interruption from the fact that either the æsthetic demand
for contemplation or the ethical demand for renunciation proceed
from a knowledge which is independent of the service of the will,
421
and directed to the nature of the world in general. Most men are
pursued by want all through life, without ever being allowed to
come to their senses. On the other hand, the will is often inflamed
to a degree that far transcends the assertion of the body, and [423]
then violent emotions and powerful passions show themselves,
in which the individual not only asserts his own existence, but
denies and seeks to suppress that of others when it stands in his
way.
The maintenance of the body through its own powers is so
small a degree of the assertion of will, that if it voluntarily
remains at this degree, we might assume that, with the death
of this body, the will also which appeared in it would be
extinguished. But even the satisfaction of the sexual passions
goes beyond the assertion of one's own existence, which fills
so short a time, and asserts life for an indefinite time after the
death of the individual. Nature, always true and consistent, here
even naïve, exhibits to us openly the inner significance of the
act of generation. Our own consciousness, the intensity of the
impulse, teaches us that in this act the most decided assertion of
the will to live expresses itself, pure and without further addition
(any denial of other individuals); and now, as the consequence
of this act, a new life appears in time and the causal series, i.e.,
in nature; the begotten appears before the begetter, different as
regards the phenomenon, but in himself, i.e., according to the
Idea, identical with him. Therefore it is this act through which
every species of living creature binds itself to a whole and is
perpetuated. Generation is, with reference to the begetter, only
the expression, the symptom, of his decided assertion of the will
to live: with reference to the begotten, it is not the cause of the
will which appears in him, for the will in itself knows neither
cause nor effect, but, like all causes, it is merely the occasional
cause of the phenomenal appearance of this will at this time in
this place. As thing-in-itself, the will of the begetter and that of
the begotten are not different, for only the phenomenon, not the
thing-in-itself, is subordinate to the principim individuationis.

With that assertion beyond our own body and extending to the
[424] production of a new body, suffering and death, as belonging to
the phenomenon of life, have also been asserted anew, and the
possibility of salvation, introduced by the completest capability
of knowledge, has for this time been shown to be fruitless. Here
lies the profound reason of the shame connected with the process
of generation. This view is mythically expressed in the dogma
of Christian theology that we are all partakers in Adam's first
transgression (which is clearly just the satisfaction of sexual
passion), and through it are guilty of suffering and death. In
this theology goes beyond the consideration of things according
to the principle of sufficient reason, and recognises the Idea of
man, the unity of which is re-established out of its dispersion into
innumerable individuals through the bond of generation which
holds them all together. Accordingly it regards every individual
as on one side identical with Adam, the representative of the
assertion of life, and, so far, as subject to sin (original sin),
suffering, and death; on the other side, the knowledge of the Idea
of man enables it to regard every individual as identical with the
saviour, the representative of the denial of the will to live, and,
so far as a partaker of his sacrifice of himself, saved through his
merits, and delivered from the bands of sin and death, i.e., the
world (Rom. v. 12-21).
Another mythical exposition of our view of sexual pleasure as
the assertion of the will to live beyond the individual life, as an
attainment to life which is brought about for the first time by this
means, or as it were a renewed assignment of life, is the Greek
myth of Proserpine, who might return from the lower world so
long as she had not tasted its fruit, but who became subject to it
altogether through eating the pomegranate. This meaning appears
very clearly in Goethe's incomparable presentation of this myth,
especially when, as soon as she has tasted the pomegranate, the
[425] invisible chorus of the Fates—
423
“Thou art ours!

Fasting shouldest thou return:
And the bite of the apple makes thee ours!”
It is worth noticing that Clement of Alexandria (Strom. iii.

c. 15) illustrates the matter with the same image and the same
expression: Ÿ1 ¼µ½ µÅ½¿ÅÇ¹Ã±½ÄµÂ ±ÅÄ¿ÅÂ ±À¿ À±Ã·Â ¼±ÁÄ¹±Â,
´¹± Ä·½ ²±Ã¹»µ¹±½, ÄÉ½ ¿ÅÁ±½É½, ¼±º±Á¹¿¹ ¿QÄ¿¹ µ¹Ã¹½, ¿1
Ä¿Å º¿Ã¼¿Å ½·ÃÄµÅ¿½ÄµÂ; (Qui se castrarunt ab omni peccato
propter regnum cœlorum, ii sunt beati, a mundo jejunantes).
The sexual impulse also proves itself the decided and strongest
assertion of life by the fact that to man in a state of nature, as
to the brutes, it is the final end, the highest goal of life. Self-
maintenance is his first effort, and as soon as he has made
provision for that, he only strives after the propagation of the
species: as a merely natural being he can attempt no more. Nature
also, the inner being of which is the will to live itself, impels
with all her power both man and the brute towards propagation.
Then it has attained its end with the individual, and is quite
indifferent to its death, for, as the will to live, it cares only
for the preservation of the species, the individual is nothing to
it. Because the will to live expresses itself most strongly in
the sexual impulse, the inner being of nature, the old poets and
philosophers—Hesiod and Parmenides—said very significantly
that Eros is the first, the creator, the principle from which all
things proceed. (Cf. Arist. Metaph., i. 4.) Pherecydes said: •¹Â
µÁÉÄ± ¼µÄ±²µ²»·Ã¸±¹ Ä¿½ ”¹±, ¼µ»»¿½Ä± ´·¼¹¿ÅÁ³µ¹½ (Jovem,
cum mundum fabricare vellet, in cupidinem sese transformasse).
Proclus ad Plat. Tim., l. iii. A complete treatment of this subject
we have recently received from G. F. Schœmann, “De Cupidine
Cosmogonico,” 1852. The Mâya of the Hindus, whose work and
web is the whole world of illusion, is also symbolised by love.
The genital organs are, far more than any other external
member of the body, subject merely to the will, and not at [426]
all to knowledge. Indeed, the will shows itself here almost as

independent of knowledge, as in those parts which, acting merely
in consequence of stimuli, are subservient to vegetative life and
reproduction, in which the will works blindly as in unconscious
nature. For generation is only reproduction passing over to a
new individual, as it were reproduction at the second power, as
death is only excretion at the second power. According to all
this, the genitals are properly the focus of will, and consequently
the opposite pole of the brain, the representative of knowledge,
i.e., the other side of the world, the world as idea. The former
are the life-sustaining principle ensuring endless life to time. In
this respect they were worshipped by the Greeks in the phallus,
and by the Hindus in the lingam, which are thus the symbol of
the assertion of the will. Knowledge, on the other hand, affords
the possibility of the suppression of willing, of salvation through
freedom, of conquest and annihilation of the world.
We already considered fully at the beginning of this Fourth
Book how the will to live in its assertion must regard its relation
to death. We saw that death does not trouble it, because it
exists as something included in life itself and belonging to it.
Its opposite, generation, completely counterbalances it; and, in
spite of the death of the individual, ensures and guarantees life
to the will to live through all time. To express this the Hindus
made the lingam an attribute of Siva, the god of death. We
also fully explained there how he who with full consciousness
occupies the standpoint of the decided assertion of life awaits
death without fear. We shall therefore say nothing more about
this here. Without clear consciousness most men occupy this
standpoint and continually assert life. The world exists as the
mirror of this assertion, with innumerable individuals in infinite
time and space, in infinite suffering, between generation and
[427] death without end. Yet from no side is a complaint to be further
raised about this; for the will conducts the great tragedy and
comedy at its own expense, and is also its own spectator. The
425
world is just what it is because the will, whose manifestation it

is, is what it is, because it so wills. The justification of suffering
is, that in this phenomenon also the will asserts itself; and this
assertion is justified and balanced by the fact that the will bears
the suffering. Here we get a glimpse of eternal justice in the
whole: we shall recognise it later more definitely and distinctly,
and also in the particular. But first we must consider temporal or
human justice.73
§ 61. It may be remembered from the Second Book that in
the whole of nature, at all the grades of the objectification of
will, there was a necessary and constant conflict between the
individuals of all species; and in this way was expressed the
inner contradiction of the will to live with itself. At the highest
grade of the objectification, this phenomenon, like all others,
will exhibit itself with greater distinctness, and will therefore be
more easily explained. With this aim we shall next attempt to
trace the source of egoism as the starting-point of all conflict.
We have called time and space the principium individuationis,
because only through them and in them is multiplicity of the
homogeneous possible. They are the essential forms of natural
knowledge, i.e., knowledge springing from the will. Therefore the
will everywhere manifests itself in the multiplicity of individuals.
But this multiplicity does not concern the will as thing-in-itself,
but only its phenomena. The will itself is present, whole and
undivided, in every one of these, and beholds around it the
innumerably repeated image of its own nature; but this nature
itself, the actually real, it finds directly only in its inner self.
Therefore every one desires everything for himself, desires to
possess, or at least to control, everything, and whatever opposes
it it would like to destroy. To this is added, in the case [428]
of such beings as have knowledge, that the individual is the
supporter of the knowing subject, and the knowing subject
73
Cf. Ch. xlv. of the Supplement.
is the supporter of the world, i.e., that the whole of Nature

outside the knowing subject, and thus also all other individuals,
exist only in its idea; it is only conscious of them as its idea,
thus merely indirectly as something which is dependent on its
own nature and existence; for with its consciousness the world
necessarily disappears for it, i.e., its being and non-being become
synonymous and indistinguishable. Every knowing individual is
thus in truth, and finds itself as the whole will to live, or the
inner being of the world itself, and also as the complemental
condition of the world as idea, consequently as a microcosm
which is of equal value with the macrocosm. Nature itself, which
is everywhere and always truthful, gives him this knowledge,
originally and independently of all reflection, with simple and
direct certainty. Now from these two necessary properties we
have given the fact may be explained that every individual,
though vanishing altogether and diminished to nothing in the
boundless world, yet makes itself the centre of the world, has
regard for its own existence and well-being before everything
else; indeed, from the natural standpoint, is ready to sacrifice
everything else for this—is ready to annihilate the world in order
to maintain its own self, this drop in the ocean, a little longer.
This disposition is egoism, which is essential to everything in
Nature. Yet it is just through egoism that the inner conflict of
the will with itself attains to such a terrible revelation; for this
egoism has its continuance and being in that opposition of the
microcosm and macrocosm, or in the fact that the objectification
of will has the principium individuationis for its form, through
which the will manifests itself in the same way in innumerable
individuals, and indeed entire and completely in both aspects
(will and idea) in each. Thus, while each individual is given to
[429] itself directly as the whole will and the whole subject of ideas,
other individuals are only given it as ideas. Therefore its own
being, and the maintenance of it, is of more importance to it than
that of all others together. Every one looks upon his own death
427
as upon the end of the world, while he accepts the death of his
acquaintances as a matter of comparative indifference, if he is not
in some way affected by it. In the consciousness that has reached
the highest grade, that of man, egoism, as well as knowledge,
pain and pleasure, must have reached its highest grade also, and
the conflict of individuals which is conditioned by it must appear
in its most terrible form. And indeed we see this everywhere
before our eyes, in small things as in great. Now we see its
terrible side in the lives of great tyrants and miscreants, and in
world-desolating wars; now its absurd side, in which it is the
theme of comedy, and very specially appears as self-conceit and
vanity. Rochefoucault understood this better than any one else,
and presented it in the abstract. We see it both in the history of the
world and in our own experience. But it appears most distinctly
of all when any mob of men is set free from all law and order;
then there shows itself at once in the distinctest form the bellum
omnium contra omnes, which Hobbes has so admirably described
in the first chapter De Cive. We see not only how every one tries
to seize from the other what he wants himself, but how often one
will destroy the whole happiness or life of another for the sake of
an insignificant addition to his own happiness. This is the highest
expression of egoism, the manifestations of which in this regard
are only surpassed by those of actual wickedness, which seeks,
quite disinterestedly, the hurt and suffering of others, without
any advantage to itself. Of this we shall speak soon. With this
exhibition of the source of egoism the reader should compare the
presentation of it in my prize-essay on the basis of morals, § 14.
A chief source of that suffering which we found above to [430]
be essential and inevitable to all life is, when it really appears
in a definite form, that Eris, the conflict of all individuals, the
expression of the contradiction, with which the will to live is
affected in its inner self, and which attains a visible form through
the principium individuationis. Wild-beast fights are the most
cruel means of showing this directly and vividly. In this original
discord lies an unquenchable source of suffering, in spite of the

precautions that have been taken against it, and which we shall
now consider more closely.
§ 62. It has already been explained that the first and simplest
assertion of the will to live is only the assertion of one's own
body, i.e., the exhibition of the will through acts in time, so far as
the body, in its form and design, exhibits the same will in space,
and no further. This assertion shows itself as maintenance of the
body, by means of the application of its own powers. To it is
directly related the satisfaction of the sexual impulse; indeed this
belongs to it, because the genitals belong to the body. Therefore
voluntary renunciation of the satisfaction of that impulse, based
upon no motive, is already a denial of the will to live, is a voluntary
self-suppression of it, upon the entrance of knowledge which acts
as a quieter. Accordingly such denial of one's own body exhibits
itself as a contradiction by the will of its own phenomenon. For
although here also the body objectifies in the genitals the will to
perpetuate the species, yet this is not willed. Just on this account,
because it is a denial or suppression of the will to live, such a
renunciation is a hard and painful self-conquest; but of this later.
But since the will exhibits that self-assertion of one's own body in
innumerable individuals beside each other, it very easily extends
in one individual, on account of the egoism peculiar to them all,
beyond this assertion to the denial of the same will appearing
in another individual. The will of the first breaks through the
limits of the assertion of will of another, because the individual
[431] either destroys or injures this other body itself, or else because
it compels the powers of the other body to serve its own will,
instead of the will which manifests itself in that other body. Thus
if, from the will manifesting itself as another body, it withdraws
the powers of this body, and so increases the power serving its
own will beyond that of its own body, it consequently asserts its
own will beyond its own body by means of the negation of the
will appearing in another body. This breaking through the limits
429
of the assertion of will of another has always been distinctly

recognised, and its concept denoted by the word wrong. For both
sides recognise the fact instantly, not, indeed, as we do here in
distinct abstraction, but as feeling. He who suffers wrong feels
the transgression into the sphere of the assertion of his own body,
through the denial of it by another individual, as a direct and
mental pain which is entirely separated and different from the
accompanying physical suffering experienced from the act or the
vexation at the loss. To the doer of wrong, on the other hand,
the knowledge presents itself that he is in himself the same will
which appears in that body also, and which asserts itself with
such vehemence; the one phenomenon that, transgressing the
limits of its own body and its powers, it extends to the denial of
this very will in another phenomenon, and so, regarded as will in
itself, it strives against itself by this vehemence and rends itself.
Moreover, this knowledge presents itself to him instantly, not in
abstracto, but as an obscure feeling; and this is called remorse,
or, more accurately in this case, the feeling of wrong committed.
Wrong, the conception of which we have thus analysed in its
most general and abstract form, expresses itself in the concrete
most completely, peculiarly, and palpably in cannibalism. This
is its most distinct and evident type, the terrible picture of the
greatest conflict of the will with itself at the highest grade of its
objectification, which is man. Next to this, it expresses itself
most distinctly in murder; and therefore the committal of murder [432]
is followed instantly and with fearful distinctness by remorse,
the abstract and dry significance of which we have just given,
which inflicts a wound on our peace of mind that a lifetime
cannot heal. For our horror at the murder committed, as also our
shrinking from the committal of it, corresponds to that infinite
clinging to life with which everything living, as phenomenon
of the will to live, is penetrated. (We shall analyse this feeling
which accompanies the doing of wrong and evil, in other words,
the pangs of conscience, more fully later on, and raise its concept
to distinctness.) Mutilation, or mere injury of another body,

indeed every blow, is to be regarded as in its nature the same
as murder, and differing from it only in degree. Further, wrong
shows itself in the subjugation of another individual, in forcing
him into slavery, and, finally, in the seizure of another's goods,
which, so far as these goods are regarded as the fruit of his labour,
is just the same thing as making him a slave, and is related to this
as mere injury is to murder.
For property, which is not taken from a man without wrong,
can, according to our explanation of wrong, only be that which
has been produced by his own powers. Therefore by taking this
we really take the powers of his body from the will objectified in
it, to make them subject to the will objectified in another body.
For only so does the wrong-doer, by seizing, not the body of
another, but a lifeless thing quite different from it, break into
the sphere of the assertion of will of another person, because the
powers, the work of this other body, are, as it were, incorporated
and identified with this thing. It follows from this that all true,
i.e., moral, right of property is based simply and solely on work,
as was pretty generally assumed before Kant, and is distinctly and
beautifully expressed in the oldest of all codes of law: “Wise men
who know the past explain that a cultured field is the property
[433] of him who cut down the wood and cleared and ploughed it,
as an antelope belongs to the first hunter who mortally wounds
it” (Laws of Manu, ix. 44). Kant's philosophy of law is an
extraordinary concatenation of errors all leading to each other,
and he bases the right of property upon first occupation. To me
this is only explicable on the supposition that his powers were
failing through old age. For how should the mere avowal of my
will to exclude others from the use of a thing at once give me a
right to it? Clearly such an avowal itself requires a foundation of
right, instead of being one, as Kant assumes. And how would he
act unjustly in se, i.e., morally, who does not respect that claim
to the sole possession of a thing which is based upon nothing but
431
its own avowal? How should his conscience trouble him about
it? For it is so clear and easy to understand that there can be
absolutely no such thing as a just seizure of anything, but only a
just conversion or acquired possession of it, by spending our own
original powers upon it. When, by any foreign labour, however
little, a thing has been cultivated, improved, kept from harm or
preserved, even if this labour were only the plucking or picking
up from the ground of fruit that has grown wild; the person who
forcibly seizes such a thing clearly deprives the other of the result
of his labour expended upon it, makes the body of this other
serve his will instead of its own, asserts his will beyond its own
phenomenon to the denial of that of the other, i.e., does injustice
or wrong.74 On the other hand, the mere enjoyment of a thing,
without any cultivation or preservation of it from destruction,
gives just as little right to it as the mere avowal of our desire for
its sole possession. Therefore, though one family has hunted a
district alone, even for a hundred years, but has done nothing for [434]
its improvement; if a stranger comes and desires to hunt there,
it cannot prevent him from doing so without moral injustice.
Thus the so-called right of preoccupation, according to which,
for the mere past enjoyment of a thing, there is demanded the
further recompense of the exclusive right to its future enjoyment,
is morally entirely without foundation. A new-comer might with
far better right reply to him who was depending upon such a
right, “Just because you have so long enjoyed, it is right that
others should now enjoy also.” No moral right can be established
to the sole possession of anything upon which labour cannot be
expended, either in improving it or in preserving it from harm,
unless it be through a voluntary surrender on the part of others, as
74
Thus the basis of natural right of property does not require the assumption
of two grounds of right beside each other, that based on detention and that
based on formation; but the latter is itself sufficient. Only the name formation
is not very suitable, for the spending of any labour upon a thing does not need
to be a forming or fashioning of it.
a reward for other services. This, however, already presupposes

a community regulated by agreement—the State. The morally
established right of property, as we have deduced it above, gives,
from its nature, to the owner of a thing, the same unlimited power
over it which he has over his own body; and hence it follows that
he can part with his possessions to others either in exchange or
as a gift, and they then possess them with the same moral right
as he did.
As regards the doing of wrong generally, it occurs either
through violence or through craft; it matters not which as far
as what is morally essential is concerned. First, in the case of
murder, it is a matter of indifference whether I make use of
a dagger or of poison; and the case of every bodily injury is
analogous. Other cases of wrong can all be reduced to the fact
that I, as the doer of wrong, compel another individual to serve
my will instead of his own, to act according to my will instead
of according to his own. On the path of violence I attain this end
through physical causality, but on the path of craft by means of
motivation, i.e., by means of causality through knowledge; for
[435] I present to his will illusive motives, on account of which he
follows my will, while he believes he is following his own. Since
the medium in which the motives lie is knowledge, I can only
accomplish this by falsifying his knowledge, and this is the lie.
The lie always aims at influencing another's will, not merely his
knowledge, for itself and as such, but only as a means, so far as it
determines his will. For my lying itself, inasmuch as it proceeds
from my will, requires a motive; and only the will of another
can be such a motive, not his knowledge in and for itself; for
as such it can never have an influence upon my will, therefore it
can never move it, can never be a motive of its aim. But only
the willing and doing of another can be this, and his knowledge
indirectly through it. This holds good not only of all lies that
have manifestly sprung from self-interest, but also of those which
proceed from pure wickedness, which seeks enjoyment in the
433
painful consequences of the error into which it has led another.

Indeed, mere empty boasting aims at influencing the will and
action of others more or less, by increasing their respect or
improving their opinion of the boaster. The mere refusal of a
truth, i.e., of an assertion generally, is in itself no wrong, but
every imposing of a lie is certainly a wrong. He who refuses to
show the strayed traveller the right road does him no wrong, but
he who directs him to a false road certainly does. It follows from
what has been said, that every lie, like every act of violence, is
as such wrong, because as such it has for its aim the extension of
the authority of my will to other individuals, and so the assertion
of my will through the denial of theirs, just as much as violence
has. But the most complete lie is the broken contract, because
here all the conditions mentioned are completely and distinctly
present together. For when I enter into a contract, the promised
performance of the other individual is directly and confessedly
the motive for my reciprocal performance. The promises were
deliberately and formally exchanged. The fulfilment of the [436]
declarations made is, it is assumed, in the power of each. If
the other breaks the covenant, he has deceived me, and by
introducing merely illusory motives into my knowledge, he has
bent my will according to his intention; he has extended the
control of his will to another individual, and thus has committed
a distinct wrong. On this is founded the moral lawfulness and
validity of the contract.
Wrong through violence is not so shameful to the doer of
it as wrong through craft; for the former arises from physical
power, which under all circumstances impresses mankind; while
the latter, by the use of subterfuge, betrays weakness, and lowers
man at once as a physical and moral being. This is further the
case because lying and deception can only succeed if he who
employs them expresses at the same time horror and contempt of
them in order to win confidence, and his victory rests on the fact
that men credit him with honesty which he does not possess. The
deep horror which is always excited by cunning, faithlessness,

and treachery rests on the fact that good faith and honesty are
the bond which externally binds into a unity the will which has
been broken up into the multiplicity of individuals, and thereby
limits the consequences of the egoism which results from that
dispersion. Faithlessness and treachery break this outward bond
asunder, and thus give boundless scope to the consequences of
egoism.
In the connection of our system we have found that the
content of the concept of wrong is that quality of the conduct
of an individual in which he extends the assertion of the will
appearing in his own body so far that it becomes the denial of
the will appearing in the bodies of others. We have also laid
down, by means of very general examples, the limits at which
the province of wrong begins; for we have at once defined its
gradations, from the highest degree to the lowest, by means of
[437] a few leading conceptions. According to this, the concept of
wrong is the original and positive, and the concept of right,
which is opposed to it, is the derivative and negative; for we
must keep to the concepts, and not to the words. As a matter
of fact, there would be no talk of right if there were no such
thing as wrong. The concept right contains merely the negation
of wrong, and every action is subsumed under it which does
not transgress the limit laid down above, i.e., is not a denial of
the will of another for the stronger assertion of our own. That
limit, therefore, divides, as regards a purely moral definition,
the whole province of possible actions into such as are wrong
or right. Whenever an action does not encroach, in the way
explained above, on the sphere of the assertion of will of another,
denying it, it is not wrong. Therefore, for example, the refusal
of help to another in great need, the quiet contemplation of the
death of another from starvation while we ourselves have more
than enough, is certainly cruel and fiendish, but it is not wrong;
only it can be affirmed with certainty that whoever is capable of
435
carrying unkindness and hardness to such a degree will certainly

also commit every wrong whenever his wishes demand it and no
compulsion prevents it.
But the conception of right as the negation of wrong finds its
principal application, and no doubt its origin, in cases in which
an attempted wrong by violence is warded off. This warding off
cannot itself be wrong, and consequently is right, although the
violence it requires, regarded in itself and in isolation, would be
wrong, and is here only justified by the motive, i.e., becomes
right. If an individual goes so far in the assertion of his own will
that he encroaches upon the assertion of will which is essential
to my person as such, and denies it, then my warding off of that
encroachment is only the denial of that denial, and thus from
my side is nothing more than the assertion of the will which
essentially and originally appears in my body, and is already
implicitly expressed by the mere appearance of this body; [438]
consequently is not wrong, but right. That is to say: I have then
a right to deny that denial of another with the force necessary to
overcome it, and it is easy to see that this may extend to the killing
of the other individual, whose encroachment as external violence
pressing upon me may be warded off by a somewhat stronger
counteraction, entirely without wrong, consequently with right.
For all that happens from my side lies always within the sphere of
the assertion of will essential to my person as such, and already
expressed by it (which is the scene of the conflict), and does not
encroach on that of the other, consequently is only negation of
the negation, and thus affirmation, not itself negation. Thus if
the will of another denies my will, as this appears in my body
and the use of its powers for its maintenance, without denial of
any foreign will which observes a like limitation, I can without
wrong compel it to desist from such denial, i.e., I have so far a
right of compulsion.
In all cases in which I have a right of compulsion, a complete
right to use violence against another, I may, according to the
circumstances, just as well oppose the violence of the other with

craft without doing any wrong, and accordingly I have an actual
right to lie precisely so far as I have a right of compulsion.
Therefore a man acts with perfect right who assures a highway
robber who is searching him that he has nothing more upon him;
or, if a burglar has broken into his house by night, induces him
by a lie to enter a cellar and then locks him in. A man who
has been captured and carried off by robbers, for example by
pirates, has the right to kill them not only by violence but also
by craft, in order to regain his freedom. Thus, also, a promise is
certainly not binding when it has been extorted by direct bodily
violence, because he who suffers such compulsion may with full
right free himself by killing, and, a fortiori, by deceiving his
oppressor. Whoever cannot recover through force the property
[439] which has been stolen from him, commits no wrong if he can
accomplish it through craft. Indeed, if some one plays with
me for money he has stolen from me, I have the right to use
false dice against him, because all that I win from him already
belongs to me. Whoever would deny this must still more deny
the justifiableness of stratagem in war, which is just an acted lie,
and is a proof of the saying of Queen Christina of Sweden, “The
words of men are to be esteemed as nothing; scarcely are their
deeds to be trusted.” So sharply does the limit of right border
upon that of wrong. For the rest, I regard it as superfluous to show
that all this completely agrees with what was said above about
the unlawfulness of the lie and of violence. It may also serve to
explain the peculiar theory of the lie told under pressure.75
In accordance with what has been said, wrong and right are
merely moral determinations, i.e., such as are valid with regard
to the consideration of human action as such, and in relation to
the inner significance of this action in itself. This asserts itself
75
The further exposition of the philosophy of law here laid down will be
found in my prize-essay, “Ueber das Fundament der Moral,” § 17, pp. 221-230
of 1st ed., pp. 216-226 of 2d ed.
437
directly in consciousness through the fact that the doing of wrong

is accompanied by an inward pain, which is the merely felt
consciousness of the wrong-doer of the excessive strength of the
assertion of will in itself, which extends even to the denial of the
manifestation of the will of another, and also the consciousness
that although he is different from the person suffering wrong as
far as the manifestation is concerned, yet in himself he is identical
with him. The further explanation of this inner significance of
all pain of conscience cannot be given till later. He who suffers
wrong is, on the other hand, painfully conscious of the denial
of his will, as it is expressed through the body and its natural
requirements, for the satisfaction of which nature refers him to
the powers of his body; and at the same time he is conscious [440]
that without doing wrong he might ward off that denial by every
means unless he lacks the power. This purely moral significance
is the only one which right and wrong have for men as men,
not as members of the State, and which consequently remains
even when man is in a state of nature without any positive law.
It constitutes the basis and the content of all that has on this
account been named natural law, though it is better called moral
law, for its validity does not extend to suffering, to the external
reality, but only to the action of man and the self-knowledge
of his individual will which grows up in him from his action,
and which is called conscience. It cannot, however, in a state
of nature, assert itself in all cases, and outwardly upon other
individuals, and prevent might from reigning instead of right. In
a state of nature it depends upon every one merely to see that
in every case he does no wrong, but by no means to see that in
every case he suffers no wrong, for this depends on the accident
of his outward power. Therefore the concepts right and wrong,
even in a state of nature, are certainly valid and by no means
conventional, but there they are valid merely as moral concepts,
for the self-knowledge of one's own will in each. They are a
fixed point in the scale of the very different degrees of strength
with which the will to live asserts itself in human individuals,

like the freezing-point on the thermometer; the point at which
the assertion of one's own will becomes the denial of the will
of another, i.e., specifies through wrong-doing the degree of
its intensity, combined with the degree in which knowledge is
involved in the principium individuationis (which is the form of
all knowledge that is subject to the will). But whoever wants
to set aside the purely moral consideration of human action, or
denies it, and wishes to regard conduct merely in its outward
effects and their consequences, may certainly, with Hobbes,
explain right and wrong as conventional definitions arbitrarily
[441] assumed, and therefore not existing outside positive law, and
we can never show him through external experience what does
not belong to such experience. Hobbes himself characterises his
completely empirical method of thought very remarkably by the
fact that in his book “De Principiis Geometrarum” he denies all
pure mathematics properly so called, and obstinately maintains
that the point has extension and the line has breadth, and we
can never show him a point without extension or a line without
breadth. Thus we can just as little impart to him the a priori
nature of mathematics as the a priori nature of right, because he
shuts himself out from all knowledge which is not empirical.
The pure doctrine of right is thus a chapter of ethics, and
is directly related only to action, not to suffering; for only the
former is the expression of will, and this alone is considered
by ethics. Suffering is mere occurrence. Ethics can only have
regard to suffering indirectly, merely to show that what takes
place merely to avoid suffering wrong is itself no infliction of
wrong. The working out of this chapter of ethics would contain
the precise definition of the limits to which an individual may go
in the assertion of the will already objectified in his body without
denying the same will as it appears in another individual; and also
the actions which transgress these limits, which consequently are
wrong, and therefore in their turn may be warded off without
439
wrong. Thus our own action always remains the point of view of
the investigation.
But the suffering of wrong appears as an event in outward
experience, and in it is manifested, as we have said, more
distinctly than anywhere else, the phenomenon of the conflict
of the will to live with itself, arising from the multiplicity of
individuals and from egoism, both of which are conditioned
through the principium individuationis, which is the form of the
world as idea for the knowledge of the individual. We also saw
above that a very large part of the suffering essential to human [442]
life has its perennial source in that conflict of individuals.
The reason, however, which is common to all these
individuals, and which enables them to know not merely the
particular case, as the brutes do, but also the whole abstractly in
its connection, has also taught them to discern the source of that
suffering, and induced them to consider the means of diminishing
it, or, when possible, of suppressing it by a common sacrifice,
which is, however, more than counterbalanced by the common
advantage that proceeds from it. However agreeable it is to
the egoism of the individual to inflict wrong in particular cases,
this has yet a necessary correlative in the suffering of wrong
of another individual, to whom it is a great pain. And because
the reason which surveys the whole left the one-sided point of
view of the individual to which it belongs, and freed itself for
the moment from its dependence upon it, it saw the pleasure
of an individual in inflicting wrong always outweighed by the
relatively greater pain of the other who suffered the wrong; and
it found further, that because here everything was left to chance,
every one had to fear that the pleasure of conveniently inflicting
wrong would far more rarely fall to his lot than the pain of
enduring it. From this reason recognised that both in order to
diminish the suffering which is everywhere disseminated, and
as far as possible to divide it equally, the best and only means
was to spare all the pain of suffering wrong by renouncing all
the pleasure to be obtained by inflicting it. This means is the

contract of the state or law. It is easily conceived, and little by
little carried out by the egoism, which, through the use of reason,
proceeds methodically and forsakes its one-sided point of view.
This origin of the state and of law I have indicated was already
exhibited as such by Plato in the “Republic.” In fact, it is the
essential and only origin, determined by the nature of the matter.
[443] Moreover, in no land can the state have ever had a different
origin, because it is just this mode of originating this aim that
makes it a state. But it is a matter of indifference whether, in each
particular nation, the condition which preceded it was that of a
horde of savages independent of each other (anarchy), or that of
a horde of slaves ruled at will by the stronger (despotism). In
both cases there existed as yet no state; it first arose through that
common agreement; and according as that agreement is more or
less free from anarchy or despotism, the state is more or less
perfect. Republics tend to anarchy, monarchies to despotism,
and the mean of constitutional monarchy, which was therefore
devised, tends to government by factions. In order to found a
perfect state, we must begin by providing beings whose nature
allows them always to sacrifice their own to the public good. Till
then, however, something may be attained through the existence
of one family whose good is quite inseparable from that of the
country; so that, at least in matters of importance, it can never
advance the one without the other. On this rests the power and
the advantage of the hereditary monarchy.
Now as ethics was concerned exclusively with right and
wrong doing, and could accurately point out the limits of his
action to whoever was resolved to do no wrong; politics, on
the contrary, the theory of legislation, is exclusively concerned
with the suffering of wrong, and would never trouble itself with
wrong-doing at all if it were not on account of its ever-necessary
correlative, the suffering of wrong, which it always keeps in view
as the enemy it opposes. Indeed, if it were possible to conceive
441
an infliction of wrong with which no suffering of wrong on the

part of another was connected, the state would, consistently,
by no means prohibit it. And because in ethics the will, the
disposition, is the object of consideration, and the only real thing,
the firm will to do wrong, which is only restrained and rendered [444]
ineffective by external might, and the actually committed wrong,
are to it quite the same, and it condemns him who so wills as
unjust at its tribunal. On the other hand, will and disposition,
merely as such, do not concern the state at all, but only the deed
(whether it is merely attempted or carried out), on account of
its correlative, the suffering on the part of another. Thus for the
state the deed, the event, is the only real; the disposition, the
intention, is only investigated so far as the significance of the
deed becomes known through it. Therefore the state will forbid
no one to carry about in his thought murder and poison against
another, so long as it knows certainly that the fear of the sword
and the wheel will always restrain the effects of that will. The
state has also by no means to eradicate the foolish purpose, the
inclination to wrong-doing, the wicked disposition; but merely
always to place beside every possible motive for doing a wrong
a more powerful motive for leaving it undone in the inevitable
punishment that will ensue. Therefore the criminal code is as
complete a register as possible of motives against every criminal
action that can possibly be imagined—both in abstracto, in order
to make any case that occurs an application in concreto. Politics
or legislation will therefore for this end borrow from that chapter
of ethics which is the doctrine of right, and which, besides the
inner significance of right and wrong, determines the exact limits
between them. Yet it will only do so for the purpose of making
use of its reverse side, and regarding all the limits which ethics
lays down as not to be transgressed, if we are to avoid doing
wrong, from the other side, as the limits which we must not
allow others to transgress if we do not wish to suffer wrong,
and from which we have therefore a right to drive others back.
Therefore these limits are, as much as possible, from the passive

side, barricaded by laws. It is evident that as an historian has very
[445] wittily been called an inverted prophet, the professor of law is an
inverted moralist, and therefore law itself, in its proper sense, i.e.,
the doctrine of the right, which we ought to maintain, is inverted
ethics in that chapter of it in which the rights are laid down which
we ought not to violate. The concept of wrong and its negation,
that of right, which is originally ethical, becomes juridical by the
transference of the starting-point from the active to the passive
side, and thus by inversion. This, as well as Kant's theory of
law, which very falsely deduces the institution of the state as
a moral duty from his categorical imperative, has, even in the
most recent times, repeatedly occasioned the very extraordinary
error that the state is an institution for furthering morality; that
it arises from the endeavour after this, and is, consequently,
directed against egoism. As if the inward disposition, to which
alone morality or immorality belongs, the externally free will,
would allow itself to be modified from without and changed by
influences exerted upon it! Still more perverse is the theory that
the state is the condition of freedom in the moral sense, and in
this way the condition of morality; for freedom lies beyond the
phenomenon, and indeed beyond human arrangements. The state
is, as we have said, so little directed against egoism in general
and as such, that, on the contrary, it has sprung from egoism
and exists only in its service—an egoism that well understands
itself, proceeds methodically and forsakes the one-sided for the
universal point of view, and so by addition is the common
egoism of all. The state is thus instituted under the correct
presupposition that pure morality, i.e., right action from moral
grounds, is not to be expected; if this were not the case, it
would itself be superfluous. Thus the state, which aims at
well-being, is by no means directed against egoism, but only
against the disadvantageous consequences which arise from the
multiplicity of egoistic individuals, and reciprocally affect them
443
all and disturb their well-being. Therefore it was already said

by Aristotle (De. Rep. iii.): ¤µ»¿Â ¼µ½ ¿Å½ À¿»µÉÂ Ä¿ µÅ ¶·½;
Ä¿ÅÄ¿ ´µ µÃÄ¹½ Ä¿ ¶Ã½ µÅ´±¹¼¿½ÉÂ º±¹ º±»ÉÂ (Finis civitatis [446]
est bene vivere, hoc autem est beate et pulchre vivere). Hobbes
also has accurately and excellently expounded this origin and
end of the state; and that old first principle of all state policy,
salus publica prima lex esto, indicates the same thing. If the
state completely attains its end, it will produce the same outward
result as if perfect justice of disposition prevailed everywhere.
But the inner nature and origin of both phenomena will be the
converse. Thus in the second case it would be that no one
wished to do wrong, and in the first that no one wished to suffer
wrong, and the means appropriate to this end had been fully
employed. Thus the same line may be drawn from opposite
directions, and a beast of prey with a muzzle is as harmless as
a graminivorous animal. But beyond this point the state cannot
go. It cannot exhibit a phenomenon such as would spring from
universal mutual well-wishing and love. For just as we found
that from its nature it would not forbid the doing of a wrong
which involved no corresponding suffering of wrong on the
part of another, and prohibits all wrong-doing only because this
is impossible; so conversely, in accordance with its tendency
towards the well-being of all, it would very gladly take care
that every benevolent action and work of human love should
be experienced, if it were not that these also have an inevitable
correlative in the performance of acts of benevolence and works
of love, and every member of the state would wish to assume the
passive and none the active rôle, and there would be no reason
for exacting the latter from one member of the state rather than
from another. Accordingly only the negative, which is just the
right, not the positive, which has been comprehended under the
name of obligations of love, or, less completely, duties, can be
exacted by force.
Legislation, as we have said, borrows the pure philosophy
of right, or the doctrine of the nature and limits of right and

[447] wrong, from ethics, in order to apply it from the reverse side
to its own ends, which are different from those of ethics, and
to institute positive legislation and the means of supporting it,
i.e., the state, in accordance with it. Positive legislation is thus
the inverted application of the purely moral doctrine of right.
This application may be made with reference to the peculiar
relations and circumstances of a particular people. But only
if the positive legislation is, in essential matters, throughout
determined in accordance with the guidance of the pure theory of
right, and for each of its propositions a ground can be established
in the pure theory of right, is the legislation which has arisen
a positive right and the state a community based upon right, a
state in the proper meaning of the word, a morally permissible,
not immoral institution. Otherwise the positive legislation is, on
the contrary, the establishment of a positive wrong; it is itself
an openly avowed enforced wrong. Such is every despotism,
the constitution of most Mohammedan kingdoms; and indeed
various parts of many constitutions are also of this kind; for
example, serfdom, vassalage, and many such institutions. The
pure theory of right or natural right—better, moral right—though
always reversed, lies at the foundation of every just positive
legislation, as pure mathematics lies at the foundation of every
branch of applied mathematics. The most important points of
the doctrine of right, as philosophy has to supply it for that end
to legislation, are the following: 1. The explanation of the inner
and real significance both of the origin of the conceptions of
wrong and right, and of their application and position in ethics.
2. The deduction of the law of property. 3. The deduction of
the moral validity of contracts; for this is the moral basis of the
contract of the state. 4. The explanation of the origin and the
aim of the state, of the relation of this aim to ethics, and of
the intentional transference of the ethical doctrine of right, by
reversing it, to legislation, in consequence of this relation. 5. The
445
deduction of the right of punishment. The remaining content of [448]

the doctrine of right is mere application of these principles, mere
accurate definition of the limits of right and wrong for all possible
relations of life, which are consequently united and distributed
under certain points of view and titles. In these special doctrines
the books which treat of pure law are fairly at one; it is only in the
principles that they differ much, for these are always connected
with some philosophical system. In connection with our system,
we have explained the first four of these principal points shortly
and generally, yet definitely and distinctly, and it remains for us
to speak in the same way of the right of punishment.
Kant makes the fundamentally false assertion that apart from
the state there would be no complete right of property. It follows
from our deduction, as given above, that even in a state of nature
there is property with complete natural, i.e., moral right, which
cannot be injured without wrong, but may without wrong be
defended to the uttermost. On the other hand, it is certain that
apart from the state there is no right of punishment. All right
to punish is based upon the positive law alone, which before
the offence has determined a punishment for it, the threat of
which, as a counter-motive, is intended to outweigh all possible
motives for the offence. This positive law is to be regarded
as sanctioned and recognised by all the members of the state.
It is thus based upon a common contract which the members
of the state are in duty bound to fulfil, and thus, on the one
hand, to inflict the punishment, and, on the other hand, to endure
it; thus the endurance of the punishment may with right be
enforced. Consequently the immediate end of punishment is,
in the particular case, the fulfilment of the law as a contract.
But the one end of the law is deterrence from the infringement
of the rights of others. For, in order that every one may be
protected from suffering wrong, men have combined to form [449]
a state, have renounced the doing of wrong, and assumed the
task of maintaining the state. Thus the law and the fulfilment of
it, the punishment, are essentially directed to the future, not to

the past. This distinguishes punishment from revenge; for the
motives which instigate the latter are solely concerned with what
has happened, and thus with the past as such. All requital of
wrong by the infliction of pain, without any aim for the future,
is revenge, and can have no other end than consolation for the
suffering one has borne by the sight of the suffering one has
inflicted upon another. This is wickedness and cruelty, and
cannot be morally justified. Wrong which some one has inflicted
upon me by no means entitles me to inflict wrong upon him.
The requital of evil with evil without further intention is neither
morally nor otherwise through any rational ground to be justified,
and the jus talionis set up as the absolute, final principle of the
right of punishment, is meaningless. Therefore Kant's theory of
punishment as mere requital for requital's sake is a completely
groundless and perverse view. Yet it is always appearing in
the writings of many jurists, under all kinds of lofty phrases,
which amount to nothing but empty words, as: Through the
punishment the crime is expiated or neutralised and abolished,
and many such. But no man has the right to set himself up
as a purely moral judge and requiter, and punish the misdeeds
of another with pains which he inflicts upon him, and so to
impose penance upon him for his sins. Nay, this would rather
be the most presumptuous arrogance; and therefore the Bible
says, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” But
man has the right to care for the safety of society; and this can
only be done by interdicting all actions which are denoted by the
word “criminal,” in order to prevent them by means of counter-
motives, which are the threatened punishments. And this threat
[450] can only be made effective by carrying it out when a case occurs
in spite of it. Accordingly that the end of punishment, or more
accurately of penal law, is the deterrence from crime, is a truth so
generally recognised and indeed self-evident, that in England it is
expressed in the very old form of indictment which is still served
447
by the counsel for the Crown in criminal actions, for it concludes

with the words, “If this be proved, you, the said N. N., ought
to be punished with pains of law, to deter others from the like
crimes in all time coming.” If a prince desires to extend mercy
to a criminal who has justly been condemned, his Ministers will
represent to him that, if he does, this crime will soon be repeated.
An end for the future distinguishes punishment from revenge,
and punishment only has this end when it is inflicted in fulfilment
of a law. It thus announces itself as inevitable in every future
case, and thus the law obtains the power to deter, in which its
end really consists. Now here a Kantian would inevitably reply
that certainly according to this view the punished criminal would
be used “merely as a means.” This proposition, so unweariedly
repeated by all the Kantians, “Man must always be treated as
an end, never as a means,” certainly sounds significant, and is
therefore a very suitable proposition for those who like to have
a formula which saves them all further thought; but looked at in
the light, it is an exceedingly vague, indefinite assertion, which
reaches its aim quite indirectly, requires to be explained, defined,
and modified in every case of its application, and, if taken
generally, is insufficient, meagre, and moreover problematical.
The murderer who has been condemned to the punishment of
death according to law must now, at any rate, and with complete
right, be used as a mere means. For public security, the chief end
of the state, is disturbed by him; indeed it is abolished if the law
is not carried out. The murderer, his life, his person, must now be
the means of fulfilling the law, and thereby of re-establishing the
public security. And he is made such a means with perfect right,
in fulfilment of the contract of the state, which was entered into [451]
by him because he was a citizen, and in accordance with which,
in order to enjoy security for his life, freedom, and property, he
has pledged his life, his freedom, and his property for the security
of all, which pledge has now been forfeited.
This theory of punishment which we have established, the
theory which is directly supported by sound reason, is certainly

in the main no new thought; but it is a thought which was
almost supplanted by new errors, and therefore it was necessary
to exhibit it as distinctly as possible. The same thing is in its
essence contained in what Puffendorf says on the subject, “De
Officio Hominis et Civis” (Bk. ii. chap. 12). Hobbes also agrees
with it, “Leviathan” (chaps. 15-28). In our own day Feurbach is
well known to have maintained it. Indeed, it occurs even in the
utterances of the ancient philosophers. Plato expresses it clearly
in the “Protagoras” (p. 114, edit. Bip.), also in the “Gorgias”
(p. 168), and lastly in the eleventh book of the “Laws” (p. 165).
Seneca expresses Plato's opinion and the theory of all punishment
in the short sentence, “Nemo prudens punit, quia peccatum est;
sed ne peccetur” (De Ira, i. 16).
Thus we have come to recognise in the state the means by
which egoism endowed with reason seeks to escape from its
own evil consequences which turn against itself, and now each
promotes the well-being of all because he sees that his own well-
being is involved in it. If the state attained its end completely,
then to a certain extent something approaching to an Utopia
might finally, by the removal of all kinds of evil, be brought
about. For by the human powers united in it, it is able to make the
rest of nature more and more serviceable. But as yet the state has
always remained very far from this goal. And even if it attained
to it, innumerable evils essential to all life would still keep it
in suffering; and finally, if they were all removed, ennui would
[452] at once occupy every place they left. And besides, the strife
of individuals is never completely abolished by the state, for it
vexes in trifles when it is prohibited in greater things. Finally,
Eris, happily expelled from within, turns to what is without; as
the conflict of individuals, she is banished by the institution of
the state; but she reappears from without as the war of nations,
and now demands in bulk and at once, as an accumulated debt,
the bloody sacrifice which by wise precautions has been denied
449
her in the particular. And even supposing that all this were finally
overcome and removed, by wisdom founded on the experience
of thousands of years, at the end the result would be the actual
over-population of the whole planet, the terrible evil of which
only a bold imagination can now realise.76
§ 63. We have recognised temporal justice, which has its
seat in the state, as requiting and punishing, and have seen that
this only becomes justice through a reference to the future. For
without this reference all punishing and requiting would be an
outrage without justification, and indeed merely the addition of
another evil to that which has already occurred, without meaning
or significance. But it is quite otherwise with eternal justice,
which was referred to before, and which rules not the state but the
world, is not dependent upon human institutions, is not subject
to chance and deception, is not uncertain, wavering, and erring,
but infallible, fixed, and sure. The conception of requital implies
that of time; therefore eternal justice cannot be requital. Thus
it cannot, like temporal justice, admit of respite and delay, and
require time in order to triumph, equalising the evil deed by the
evil consequences only by means of time. The punishment must
here be so bound up with the offence that both are one. [453]
”¿ºµ¹Äµ À·´³½ Ä½ ±´¹º·¼±Ä½ µ¹Â ¸µ¿ÅÂ

ÄµÁ¿¹Ã¹, º Àµ¹Ä½ µ½ ”¹¿Â ´µ»Ä¿Å ÀÄÅÇ±¹Â
“Á±Æµ¹½ Ä¹½½ ±ÅÄ±, –·½± ´½ µ¹Ã¿ÁÉ½Ä± ½¹½
˜½·Ä¿¹Â ´¹º±¶µ¹½? ŸÅ´½ A À±Á ¿ÅÁ±½¿Â,
”¹¿Â ³Á±Æ¿½Ä¿Â Ä±Á ²Á¿ÄÉ½ ¼±ÁÄ¹±Â,
•¾±ÁºµÃµ¹µ½, ¿Å´½ µºµ¹½¿Â ±½ Ãº¿ÀÉ½
µ¼Àµ¹½ º±ÃÄó ¶·¼¹±½; ±»»½ ! ”¹º·
•½Ä±Å¸± À¿Å µÃÄ¹½ µ³³ÅÂ, µ¹ ²¿Å»µÃ¸½ AÁ³½.
Eurip. ap. Stob. Ecl., i. c. 4.
76
Cf. Ch. xlvii. of Supplement.
(“Volare pennis scelera ad ætherias domus

Putatis, illic in Jovis tabularia
Scripto referri; tum Jovem lectis super
Sententiam proferre?—sed mortalium
Facinora cœli, quantaquanta est, regia
Nequit tenere: nec legendis Juppiter
Et puniendis par est. Est tamen ultio,
Et, si intuemur, illa nos habitat prope.”)
Now that such an eternal justice really lies in the nature of

the world will soon become completely evident to whoever has
grasped the whole of the thought which we have hitherto been
developing.
The world, in all the multiplicity of its parts and forms, is the
manifestation, the objectivity, of the one will to live. Existence
itself, and the kind of existence, both as a collective whole and
in every part, proceeds from the will alone. The will is free,
the will is almighty. The will appears in everything, just as it
determines itself in itself and outside time. The world is only the
mirror of this willing; and all finitude, all suffering, all miseries,
which it contains, belong to the expression of that which the will
wills, are as they are because the will so wills. Accordingly with
perfect right every being supports existence in general, and also
the existence of its species and its peculiar individuality, entirely
as it is and in circumstances as they are, in a world such as it is,
swayed by chance and error, transient, ephemeral, and constantly
suffering; and in all that it experiences, or indeed can experience,
[454] it always gets its due. For the will belongs to it; and as the will is,
so is the world. Only this world itself can bear the responsibility
of its own existence and nature—no other; for by what means
could another have assumed it? Do we desire to know what men,
morally considered, are worth as a whole and in general, we have
only to consider their fate as a whole and in general. This is
want, wretchedness, affliction, misery, and death. Eternal justice
451
reigns; if they were not, as a whole, worthless, their fate, as a

whole, would not be so sad. In this sense we may say, the world
itself is the judgment of the world. If we could lay all the misery
of the world in one scale of the balance, and all the guilt of the
world in the other, the needle would certainly point to the centre.
Certainly, however, the world does not exhibit itself to the
knowledge of the individual as such, developed for the service of
the will, as it finally reveals itself to the inquirer as the objectivity
of the one and only will to live, which he himself is. But the sight
of the uncultured individual is clouded, as the Hindus say, by the
veil of Mâyâ. He sees not the thing-in-itself but the phenomenon
in time and space, the principium individuationis, and in the
other forms of the principle of sufficient reason. And in this
form of his limited knowledge he sees not the inner nature of
things, which is one, but its phenomena as separated, disunited,
innumerable, very different, and indeed opposed. For to him
pleasure appears as one thing and pain as quite another thing:
one man as a tormentor and a murderer, another as a martyr
and a victim; wickedness as one thing and evil as another. He
sees one man live in joy, abundance, and pleasure, and even
at his door another die miserably of want and cold. Then he
asks, Where is the retribution? And he himself, in the vehement,
pressure of will which is his origin and his nature, seizes upon
the pleasures and enjoyments of life, firmly embraces them, and [455]
knows not that by this very act of his will he seizes and hugs
all those pains and sorrows at the sight of which he shudders.
He sees the ills and he sees the wickedness in the world, but far
from knowing that both of these are but different sides of the
manifestation of the one will to live, he regards them as very
different, and indeed quite opposed, and often seeks to escape by
wickedness, i.e., by causing the suffering of another, from ills,
from the suffering of his own individuality, for he is involved in
the principium individuationis, deluded by the veil of Mâyâ. Just
as a sailor sits in a boat trusting to his frail barque in a stormy sea,
unbounded in every direction, rising and falling with the howling

mountainous waves; so in the midst of a world of sorrows the
individual man sits quietly, supported by and trusting to the
principium individuationis, or the way in which the individual
knows things as phenomena. The boundless world, everywhere
full of suffering in the infinite past, in the infinite future, is
strange to him, indeed is to him but a fable; his ephemeral
person, his extensionless present, his momentary satisfaction,
this alone has reality for him; and he does all to maintain this, so
long as his eyes are not opened by a better knowledge. Till then,
there lives only in the inmost depths of his consciousness a very
obscure presentiment that all that is after all not really so strange
to him, but has a connection with him, from which the principium
individuationis cannot protect him. From this presentiment arises
that ineradicable awe common to all men (and indeed perhaps
even to the most sensible of the brutes) which suddenly seizes
them if by any chance they become puzzled about the principium
individuationis, because the principle of sufficient reason in some
one of its forms seems to admit of an exception. For example,
if it seems as if some change took place without a cause, or
[456] some one who is dead appears again, or if in any other way
the past or the future becomes present or the distant becomes
near. The fearful terror at anything of the kind is founded on
the fact that they suddenly become puzzled about the forms
of knowledge of the phenomenon, which alone separate their
own individuality from the rest of the world. But even this
separation lies only in the phenomenon, and not in the thing-
in-itself; and on this rests eternal justice. In fact, all temporal
happiness stands, and all prudence proceeds, upon ground that
is undermined. They defend the person from accidents and
supply its pleasures; but the person is merely phenomenon, and
its difference from other individuals, and exemption from the
sufferings which they endure, rests merely in the form of the
phenomenon, the principium individuationis. According to the
453
true nature of things, every one has all the suffering of the world
as his own, and indeed has to regard all merely possible suffering
as for him actual, so long as he is the fixed will to live, i.e., asserts
life with all his power. For the knowledge that sees through the
principium individuationis, a happy life in time, the gift of chance
or won by prudence, amid the sorrows of innumerable others, is
only the dream of a beggar in which he is a king, but from which
he must awake and learn from experience that only a fleeting
illusion had separated him from the suffering of his life.
Eternal justice withdraws itself from the vision that is involved
in the knowledge which follows the principle of sufficient reason
in the principium individuationis; such vision misses it altogether
unless it vindicates it in some way by fictions. It sees the bad,
after misdeeds and cruelties of every kind, live in happiness and
leave the world unpunished. It sees the oppressed drag out a
life full of suffering to the end without an avenger, a requiter
appearing. But that man only will grasp and comprehend eternal
justice who raises himself above the knowledge that proceeds
under the guidance of the principle of sufficient reason, bound [457]
to the particular thing, and recognises the Ideas, sees through
the principium individuationis, and becomes conscious that the
forms of the phenomenon do not apply to the thing-in-itself.
Moreover, he alone, by virtue of the same knowledge, can
understand the true nature of virtue, as it will soon disclose itself
to us in connection with the present inquiry, although for the
practice of virtue this knowledge in the abstract is by no means
demanded. Thus it becomes clear to whoever has attained to the
knowledge referred to, that because the will is the in-itself of all
phenomena, the misery which is awarded to others and that which
he experiences himself, the bad and the evil, always concerns
only that one inner being which is everywhere the same, although
the phenomena in which the one and the other exhibits itself exist
as quite different individuals, and are widely separated by time
and space. He sees that the difference between him who inflicts
the suffering and him who must bear it is only the phenomenon,
and does not concern the thing-in-itself, for this is the will living
in both, which here, deceived by the knowledge which is bound
to its service, does not recognise itself, and seeking an increased
happiness in one of its phenomena, produces great suffering in
another, and thus, in the pressure of excitement, buries its teeth
in its own flesh, not knowing that it always injures only itself,
revealing in this form, through the medium of individuality, the
conflict with itself which it bears in its inner nature. The inflicter
of suffering and the sufferer are one. The former errs in that he
believes he is not a partaker in the suffering; the latter, in that he
believes he is not a partaker in the guilt. If the eyes of both were
opened, the inflicter of suffering would see that he lives in all
that suffers pain in the wide world, and which, if endowed with
reason, in vain asks why it was called into existence for such great
suffering, its desert of which it does not understand. And the
[458] sufferer would see that all the wickedness which is or ever was
committed in the world proceeds from that will which constitutes
his own nature also, appears also in him, and that through this
phenomenon and its assertion he has taken upon himself all the
sufferings which proceed from such a will and bears them as his
due, so long as he is this will. From this knowledge speaks the
profound poet Calderon in “Life a Dream”—
“Pues el delito mayor

Del hombre es haber nacido.”
(“For the greatest crime of man

Is that he ever was born.”)
455
Why should it not be a crime, since, according to an eternal

law, death follows upon it? Calderon has merely expressed in
these lines the Christian dogma of original sin.
The living knowledge of eternal justice, of the balance that
inseparably binds together the malum culpæ with the malum
pœnæ, demands the complete transcending of individuality and
the principle of its possibility. Therefore it will always remain
unattainable to the majority of men, as will also be the case with
the pure and distinct knowledge of the nature of all virtue, which
is akin to it, and which we are about to explain. Accordingly the
wise ancestors of the Hindu people have directly expressed it in
the Vedas, which are only allowed to the three regenerate castes,
or in their esoteric teaching, so far at any rate as conception
and language comprehend it, and their method of exposition,
which always remains pictorial and even rhapsodical, admits;
but in the religion of the people, or exoteric teaching, they only
communicate it by means of myths. The direct exposition we
find in the Vedas, the fruit of the highest human knowledge
and wisdom, the kernel of which has at last reached us in the
Upanishads as the greatest gift of this century. It is expressed
in various ways, but especially by making all the beings in the [459]
world, living and lifeless, pass successively before the view of
the student, and pronouncing over every one of them that word
which has become a formula, and as such has been called the
Mahavakya: Tatoumes,—more correctly, Tat twam asi,—which
means, “This thou art.”77 But for the people, that great truth, so
far as in their limited condition they could comprehend it, was
translated into the form of knowledge which follows the principle
of sufficient reason. This form of knowledge is indeed, from its
nature, quite incapable of apprehending that truth pure and in
itself, and even stands in contradiction to it, yet in the form of a
myth it received a substitute for it which was sufficient as a guide
77
Oupnek'hat, vol. i. p. 60 et seq.
for conduct. For the myth enables the method of knowledge, in

accordance with the principle of sufficient reason, to comprehend
by figurative representation the ethical significance of conduct,
which itself is ever foreign to it. This is the aim of all systems
of religion, for as a whole they are the mythical clothing of the
truth which is unattainable to the uncultured human intellect.
In this sense this myth might, in Kant's language, be called a
postulate of the practical reason; but regarded as such, it has
the great advantage that it contains absolutely no elements but
such as lie before our eyes in the course of actual experience,
and can therefore support all its conceptions with perceptions.
What is here referred to is the myth of the transmigration of
souls. It teaches that all sufferings which in life one inflicts upon
other beings must be expiated in a subsequent life in this world,
through precisely the same sufferings; and this extends so far,
that he who only kills a brute must, some time in endless time,
be born as the same kind of brute and suffer the same death. It
teaches that wicked conduct involves a future life in this world
in suffering and despised creatures, and, accordingly, that one
[460] will then be born again in lower castes, or as a woman, or as a
brute, as Pariah or Tschandala, as a leper, or as a crocodile, and
so forth. All the pains which the myth threatens it supports with
perceptions from actual life, through suffering creatures which
do not know how they have merited their misery, and it does not
require to call in the assistance of any other hell. As a reward,
on the other hand, it promises re-birth in better, nobler forms,
as Brahmans, wise men, or saints. The highest reward, which
awaits the noblest deeds and the completest resignation, which
is also given to the woman who in seven successive lives has
voluntarily died on the funeral pile of her husband, and not less
to the man whose pure mouth has never uttered a single lie,—this
reward the myth can only express negatively in the language
of this world by the promise, which is so often repeated, that
they shall never be born again, Non adsumes iterum existentiam
457
apparentem; or, as the Buddhists, who recognise neither Vedas

nor castes, express it, “Thou shalt attain to Nirvâna,” i.e., to a
state in which four things no longer exist—birth, age, sickness,
and death.
Never has a myth entered, and never will one enter, more
closely into the philosophical truth which is attainable to so
few than this primitive doctrine of the noblest and most ancient
nation. Broken up as this nation now is into many parts, this
myth yet reigns as the universal belief of the people, and has the
most decided influence upon life to-day, as four thousand years
ago. Therefore Pythagoras and Plato have seized with admiration
on that ne plus ultra of mythical representation, received it from
India or Egypt, honoured it, made use of it, and, we know not
how far, even believed it. We, on the contrary, now send the
Brahmans English clergymen and evangelical linen-weavers to
set them right out of sympathy, and to show them that they are
created out of nothing, and ought thankfully to rejoice in the fact.
But it is just the same as if we fired a bullet against a cliff. In India
our religions will never take root. The ancient wisdom of the [461]
human race will not be displaced by what happened in Galilee.
On the contrary, Indian philosophy streams back to Europe,
and will produce a fundamental change in our knowledge and
thought.
§ 64. From our exposition of eternal justice, which is
not mythical but philosophical, we will now proceed to the
kindred investigation of the ethical significance of conduct and
of conscience, which is the merely felt knowledge of that
significance. But first I wish at this point to draw attention
to two peculiarities of human nature, that might help to make
clear how the nature of that eternal justice, and the unity and
identity of the will in all its phenomena upon which it rests, is
known to every one, at least as an obscure feeling.
When a bad deed has been done, it affords satisfaction not only
to the sufferer, who for the most part feels the desire of revenge,
but also to the perfectly indifferent spectator, to see that he who

caused another pain suffers himself a like measure of pain; and
this quite independently of the end which we have shown the state
has in view in punishment, and which is the foundation of penal
law. It seems to me that what expresses itself here is nothing but
the consciousness of that eternal justice, which is, nevertheless,
at once misunderstood and falsified by the unenlightened mind,
for, involved in the principium individuationis, it produces an
amphiboly of the concepts and demands from the phenomenon
what only belongs to the thing in itself. It does not see how
far in themselves the offender and the offended are one, and
that it is the same being which, not recognising itself in its
own manifestation, bears both the pain and the guilt, but it
desires rather to see the pain also in the particular individual to
whom the guilt belongs. Therefore, most persons would demand
that a man who had a very high degree of wickedness which
might yet occur in many others, only not matched with other
qualities such as are found in him, a man who also far surpassed
[462] others by extraordinary intellectual powers, and who inflicted
unspeakable sufferings upon millions of others—for example,
as a conqueror,—most persons, I say, would demand that such
a man should at some time and in some place expiate all these
sufferings by a like amount of pain; for they do not recognise
how in themselves the inflicter of suffering and the sufferers are
one, and that it is the same will through which the latter exist
and live which also appears in the former, and just through him
attains to a distinct revelation of its nature, and which likewise
suffers both in the oppressed and the oppressor; and indeed in
the latter in a greater measure, as the consciousness has attained
a higher degree of clearness and distinctness and the will has
greater vehemence. But that the deeper knowledge, which is no
longer involved in the principium individuationis, from which all
virtue and nobleness proceed, no longer retains the disposition
which demands requital, is shown by the Christian ethics, which
459
absolutely forbids all requital of evil with evil, and allows eternal
justice to proceed in the sphere of the thing-in-itself, which is
different from that of the phenomenon. (“Vengeance is mine; I
will repay, saith the Lord,”—Rom. xii. 19.)
A much more striking, but also a much rarer, characteristic
of human nature, which expresses that desire to draw eternal
justice into the province of experience, i.e., of individuality, and
at the same time indicates a felt consciousness that, as I have
expressed it above, the will to live conducts at its own cost the
great tragedy and comedy, and that the same one will lives in
all manifestations,—such a characteristic, I say, is the following.
We sometimes see a man so deeply moved by a great injury
which he has experienced, or, it may be, only witnessed, that he
deliberately and irretrievably stakes his own life in order to take
vengeance on the perpetrator of that wrong. We see him seek
for some mighty oppressor through long years, murder him at
last, and then himself die on the scaffold, as he had foreseen, [463]
and often, it may be, did not seek to avoid, for his life had value
for him only as a means of vengeance. We find examples of
this especially among the Spaniards.78 If, now, we consider the
spirit of that desire for retribution carefully, we find that it is
very different from common revenge, which seeks to mitigate
the suffering, endured by the sight of the suffering inflicted;
indeed, we find that what it aims at deserves to be called, not
so much revenge as punishment. For in it there really lies the
intention of an effect upon the future through the example, and
that without any selfish aim, either for the avenging person, for
it costs him his life, or for a society which secures its own safety
by laws. For that punishment is carried out by individuals, not
by the state, nor is it in fulfilment of a law, but, on the contrary,
78
That Spanish bishop who, in the last war, poisoned both himself and the
French generals at his own table, is an instance of this; and also various
incidents in that war. Examples are also to be found in Montaigne, Bk. ii. ch.
12.
always concerns a deed which the state either would not or

could not punish, and the punishment of which it condemns. It
seems to me that the indignation which carries such a man so
far beyond the limits of all self-love springs from the deepest
consciousness that he himself is the whole will to live, which
appears in all beings through all time, and that therefore the most
distant future belongs to him just as the present, and cannot be
indifferent to him. Asserting this will, he yet desires that in the
drama which represents its nature no such fearful wrong shall
ever appear again, and wishes to frighten ever future wrong-doer
by the example of a vengeance against which there is no means
of defence, since the avenger is not deterred by the fear of
death. The will to live, though still asserting itself, does not
here depend any longer upon the particular phenomenon, the
individual, but comprehends the Idea of man, and wishes to keep
its manifestation pure from such a fearful and shocking wrong.
[464] It is a rare, very significant, and even sublime trait of character
through which the individual sacrifices himself by striving to
make himself the arm of eternal justice, of the true nature of
which he is yet ignorant.
§ 65. In all the preceding investigations of human action, we
have been leading up to the final investigation, and have to a
considerable extent lightened the task of raising to abstract and
philosophical clearness, and exhibiting as a branch of our central
thought that special ethical significance of action which in life is
with perfect understanding denoted by the words good and bad.
First, however, I wish to trace back to their real meaning
those conceptions of good and bad which have been treated
by the philosophical writers of the day, very extraordinarily, as
simple conceptions, and thus incapable of analysis; so that the
reader may not remain involved in the senseless delusion that
they contain more than is actually the case, and express in and
for themselves all that is here necessary. I am in a position to
do this because in ethics I am no more disposed to take refuge
461
behind the word good than formerly behind the words beautiful
and true, in order that by the adding a “ness,” which at the
present day is supposed to have a special Ãµ¼½¿Ä·Â, and therefore
to be of assistance in various cases, and by assuming an air of
solemnity, I might induce the belief that by uttering three such
words I had done more than denote three very wide and abstract,
and consequently empty conceptions, of very different origin
and significance. Who is there, indeed, who has made himself
acquainted with the books of our own day to whom these three
words, admirable as are the things to which they originally refer,
have not become an aversion after he has seen for the thousandth
time how those who are least capable of thinking believe that
they have only to utter these three words with open mouth and
the air of an intelligent sheep, in order to have spoken the greatest
wisdom?
The explanation of the concept true has already been given [465]
in the essay on the principle of sufficient reason, chap. v. § 29 et
seq. The content of the concept beautiful found for the first time
its proper explanation through the whole of the Third Book of the
present work. We now wish to discover the significance of the
concept good, which can be done with very little trouble. This
concept is essentially relative, and signifies the conformity of an
object to any definite effort of the will. Accordingly everything
that corresponds to the will in any of its expressions and fulfils
its end is thought through the concept good, however different
such things may be in other respects. Thus we speak of good
eating, good roads, good weather, good weapons, good omens,
and so on; in short, we call everything good that is just as we
wish it to be; and therefore that may be good in the eyes of
one man which is just the reverse in those of another. The
conception of the good divides itself into two sub-species—that
of the direct and present satisfaction of any volition, and that of
its indirect satisfaction which has reference to the future, i.e., the
agreeable and the useful. The conception of the opposite, so long
as we are speaking of unconscious existence, is expressed by the

word bad, more rarely and abstractly by the word evil, which
thus denotes everything that does not correspond to any effort
of the will. Like all other things that can come into relation to
the will, men who are favourable to the ends which happen to
be desired, who further and befriend them, are called good, in
the same sense, and always with that relative limitation, which
shows itself, for example, in the expression, “I find this good,
but you don't.” Those, however, who are naturally disposed not
to hinder the endeavours of others, but rather to assist them,
and who are thus consistently helpful, benevolent, friendly, and
charitable, are called good men, on account of this relation of
their conduct to the will of others in general. In the case of
conscious beings (brutes and men) the contrary conception is
[466] denoted in German, and, within the last hundred years or so,
in French also, by a different word from that which is used in
speaking of unconscious existence; in German, böse; in French,
méchant; while in almost all other languages this distinction does
not exist; and º±º¿Â, malus, cattivo, bad, are used of men, as
of lifeless things, which are opposed to the ends of a definite
individual will. Thus, having started entirely from the passive
element in the good, the inquiry could only proceed later to the
active element, and investigate the conduct of the man who is
called good, no longer with reference to others, but to himself;
specially setting itself the task of explaining both the purely
objective respect which such conduct produces in others, and
the peculiar contentment with himself which it clearly produces
in the man himself, since he purchases it with sacrifices of
another kind; and also, on the other hand, the inner pain which
accompanies the bad disposition, whatever outward advantages
it brings to him who entertains it. It was from this source
that the ethical systems, both the philosophical and those which
are supported by systems of religion, took their rise. Both seek
constantly in some way or other to connect happiness with virtue,
463
the former either by means of the principle of contradiction or that

of sufficient reason, and thus to make happiness either identical
with or the consequence of virtue, always sophistically; the latter,
by asserting the existence of other worlds than that which alone
can be known to experience.79 In our system, on the contrary, [467]
virtue will show itself, not as a striving after happiness, that is,
well-being and life, but as an effort in quite an opposite direction.
It follows from what has been said above, that the good
is, according to its concept, ÄÉ½ ÀÁÉÂ Ä¹; thus every good
is essentially relative, for its being consists in its relation to
a desiring will. Absolute good is, therefore, a contradiction
in terms; highest good, summum bonum, really signifies the
same thing—a final satisfaction of the will, after which no new
desire could arise,—a last motive, the attainment of which would
afford enduring satisfaction of the will. But, according to the
investigations which have already been conducted in this Fourth
79
Observe, in passing, that what gives every positive system of religion its
great strength, the point of contact through which it takes possession of the
soul, is entirely its ethical side. Not, however, the ethical side directly as such,
but as it appears firmly united and interwoven with the element of mythical
dogma which is present in every system of religion, and as intelligible only by
means of this. So much is this the case, that although the ethical significance
of action cannot be explained in accordance with the principle of sufficient
reason, yet since every mythus follows this principle, believers regard the
ethical significance of action as quite inseparable, and indeed as absolutely
identical, and regard every attack upon the mythus as an attack upon right and
virtue. This goes so far that among monotheistic nations atheism or godlessness
has become synonymous with the absence of all morality. To the priests such
confusions of conceptions are welcome, and only in consequence of them
could that horrible monstrosity fanaticism arise and govern, not merely single
individuals who happen to be specially perverse and bad, but whole nations,
and finally embody itself in the Western world as the Inquisition (to the honour
of mankind be it said that this only happened once in their history), which,
according to the latest and most authentic accounts, in Madrid alone (in the rest
of Spain there were many more such ecclesiastical dens of murderers) in 300
years put 300,000 human beings to a painful death at the stake on theological
grounds—a fact of which every zealot ought to be reminded whenever he
Book, such a consummation is not even thinkable. The will can

just as little cease from willing altogether on account of some
particular satisfaction, as time can end or begin; for it there is
no such thing as a permanent fulfilment which shall completely
and for ever satisfy its craving. It is the vessel of the Danaides;
for it there is no highest good, no absolute good, but always
a merely temporary good. If, however, we wish to give an
honorary position, as it were emeritus, to an old expression,
which from custom we do not like to discard altogether, we
may, metaphorically and figuratively, call the complete self-
effacement and denial of the will, the true absence of will, which
alone for ever stills and silences its struggle, alone gives that
contentment which can never again be disturbed, alone redeems
the world, and which we shall now soon consider at the close
[468] of our whole investigation—the absolute good, the summum
bonum—and regard it as the only radical cure of the disease of
which all other means are only palliations or anodynes. In this
sense the Greek Äµ»¿Â and also finis bonorum correspond to the
thing still better. So much for the words good and bad; now for
the thing itself.
If a man is always disposed to do wrong whenever the
opportunity presents itself, and there is no external power to
restrain him, we call him bad. According to our doctrine of
wrong, this means that such a man does not merely assert the will
to live as it appears in his own body, but in this assertion goes
so far that he denies the will which appears in other individuals.
This is shown by the fact that he desires their powers for the
service of his own will, and seeks to destroy their existence
when they stand in the way of its efforts. The ultimate source
of this is a high degree of egoism, the nature of which has been
already explained. Two things are here apparent. In the first
place, that in such a man an excessively vehement will to live
begins to make himself heard.

465
expresses itself, extending far beyond the assertion of his own

body; and, in the second place, that his knowledge, entirely
given up to the principle of sufficient reason and involved in
the principium individuationis, cannot get beyond the difference
which this latter principle establishes between his own person
and every one else. Therefore he seeks his own well-being alone,
completely indifferent to that of all others, whose existence is
to him altogether foreign and divided from his own by a wide
gulf, and who are indeed regarded by him as mere masks with no
reality behind them. And these two qualities are the constituent
elements of the bad character.
This great intensity of will is in itself and directly a constant
source of suffering. In the first place, because all volition as
such arises from want; that is, suffering. (Therefore, as will be
remembered, from the Third Book, the momentary cessation of [469]
all volition, which takes place whenever we give ourselves up to
æsthetic contemplation, as pure will-less subject of knowledge,
the correlative of the Idea, is one of the principal elements in our
pleasure in the beautiful.) Secondly, because, through the causal
connection of things, most of our desires must remain unfulfilled,
and the will is oftener crossed than satisfied, and therefore much
intense volition carries with it much intense suffering. For all
suffering is simply unfulfilled and crossed volition; and even
the pain of the body when it is injured or destroyed is as such
only possible through the fact that the body is nothing but the
will itself become object. Now on this account, because much
intense suffering is inseparable from much intense volition,
very bad men bear the stamp of inward suffering in the very
expression of the countenance; even when they have attained
every external happiness, they always look unhappy so long as
they are not transported by some momentary ecstasy and are
not dissembling. From this inward torment, which is absolutely
and directly essential to them, there finally proceeds that delight
in the suffering of others which does not spring from mere
egoism, but is disinterested, and which constitutes wickedness

proper, rising to the pitch of cruelty. For this the suffering of
others is not a means for the attainment of the ends of its own
will, but an end in itself. The more definite explanation of this
phenomenon is as follows:—Since man is a manifestation of will
illuminated by the clearest knowledge, he is always contrasting
the actual and felt satisfaction of his will with the merely possible
satisfaction of it which knowledge presents to him. Hence arises
envy: every privation is infinitely increased by the enjoyment
of others, and relieved by the knowledge that others also suffer
the same privation. Those ills which are common to all and
inseparable from human life trouble us little, just as those which
[470] belong to the climate, to the whole country. The recollection of
greater sufferings than our own stills our pain; the sight of the
sufferings of others soothes our own. If, now, a man is filled
with an exceptionally intense pressure of will,—if with burning
eagerness he seeks to accumulate everything to slake the thirst
of his egoism, and thus experiences, as he inevitably must, that
all satisfaction is merely apparent, that the attained end never
fulfils the promise of the desired object, the final appeasing of
the fierce pressure of will, but that when fulfilled the wish only
changes its form, and now torments him in a new one; and
indeed that if at last all wishes are exhausted, the pressure of
will itself remains without any conscious motive, and makes
itself known to him with fearful pain as a feeling of terrible
desolation and emptiness; if from all this, which in the case of
the ordinary degrees of volition is only felt in a small measure,
and only produces the ordinary degree of melancholy, in the
case of him who is a manifestation of will reaching the point of
extraordinary wickedness, there necessarily springs an excessive
inward misery, an eternal unrest, an incurable pain; he seeks
indirectly the alleviation which directly is denied him,—seeks to
mitigate his own suffering by the sight of the suffering of others,
which at the same time he recognises as an expression of his
467
power. The suffering of others now becomes for him an end in

itself, and is a spectacle in which he delights; and thus arises
the phenomenon of pure cruelty, blood-thirstiness, which history
exhibits so often in the Neros and Domitians, in the African Deis,
in Robespierre, and the like.
The desire of revenge is closely related to wickedness. It
recompenses evil with evil, not with reference to the future,
which is the character of punishment, but merely on account of
what has happened, what is past, as such, thus disinterestedly,
not as a means, but as an end, in order to revel in the torment
which the avenger himself has inflicted on the offender. What [471]
distinguishes revenge from pure wickedness, and to some extent
excuses it, is an appearance of justice. For if the same act, which
is now revenge, were to be done legally, that is, according to a
previously determined and known rule, and in a society which
had sanctioned this rule, it would be punishment, and thus justice.
Besides the suffering which has been described, and which is
inseparable from wickedness, because it springs from the same
root, excessive vehemence of will, another specific pain quite
different from this is connected with wickedness, which is felt
in the case of every bad action, whether it be merely injustice
proceeding from egoism or pure wickedness, and according to
the length of its duration is called the sting of conscience or
remorse. Now, whoever remembers and has present in his mind
the content of the preceding portion of this Fourth Book, and
especially the truth explained at the beginning of it, that life itself
is always assured to the will to live, as its mere copy or mirror,
and also the exposition of eternal justice, will find that the sting
of conscience can have no other meaning than the following, i.e.,
its content, abstractly expressed, is what follows, in which two
parts are distinguished, which again, however, entirely coincide,
and must be thought as completely united.
However closely the veil of Mâyâ may envelop the mind of
the bad man, i.e., however firmly he may be involved in the
principium individuationis, according to which he regards his

person as absolutely different and separated by a wide gulf from
all others, a knowledge to which he clings with all his might, as it
alone suits and supports his egoism, so that knowledge is almost
always corrupted by will, yet there arises in the inmost depths
of his consciousness the secret presentiment that such an order
of things is only phenomenal, and that their real constitution is
quite different. He has a dim foreboding that, however much
[472] time and space may separate him from other individuals and the
innumerable miseries which they suffer, and even suffer through
him, and may represent them as quite foreign to him, yet in
themselves, and apart from the idea and its forms, it is the one
will to live appearing in them all, which here failing to recognise
itself, turns its weapons against itself, and, by seeking increased
happiness in one of its phenomena, imposes the greatest suffering
upon another. He dimly sees that he, the bad man, is himself
this whole will; that consequently he is not only the inflicter of
pain but also the endurer of it, from whose suffering he is only
separated and exempted by an illusive dream, the form of which
is space and time, which, however, vanishes away; that he must
in reality pay for the pleasure with the pain, and that all suffering
which he only knows as possible really concerns him as the will to
live, inasmuch as the possible and actual, the near and the distant
in time and space, are only different for the knowledge of the
individual, only by means of the principium individuationis, not
in themselves. This is the truth which mythically, i.e., adapted to
the principle of sufficient reason, and so translated into the form
of the phenomenal, is expressed in the transmigration of souls.
Yet it has its purest expression, free from all foreign admixture,
in that obscurely felt yet inconsolable misery called remorse. But
this springs also from a second immediate knowledge, which is
closely bound to the first—the knowledge of the strength with
which the will to live asserts itself in the wicked individual,
which extends far beyond his own individual phenomenon, to the
469
absolute denial of the same will appearing in other individuals.

Consequently the inward horror of the wicked man at his own
deed, which he himself tries to conceal, contains, besides that
presentment of the nothingness, the mere illusiveness of the
principium individuationis, and of the distinction established by
it between him and others; also the knowledge of the vehemence [473]
of his own will, the intensity with which he has seized upon life
and attached himself closely to it, even that life whose terrible
side he sees before him in the misery of those who are oppressed
by him, and with which he is yet so firmly united, that just on
this account the greatest atrocity proceeds from him himself, as
a means for the fuller assertion of his own will. He recognises
himself as the concentrated manifestation of the will to live,
feels to what degree he is given up to life, and with it also to
innumerable sufferings which are essential to it, for it has infinite
time and infinite space to abolish the distinction between the
possible and the actual, and to change all the sufferings which as
yet are merely known to him into sufferings he has experienced.
The millions of years of constant rebirth certainly exist, like the
whole past and future, only in conception; occupied time, the
form of the phenomenon of the will, is only the present, and
for the individual time is ever new: it seems to him always as
if he had newly come into being. For life is inseparable from
the will to live, and the only form of life is the present. Death
(the repetition of the comparison must be excused) is like the
setting of the sun, which is only apparently swallowed up by the
night, but in reality, itself the source of all light, burns without
intermission, brings new days to new worlds, is always rising and
always setting. Beginning and end only concern the individual
through time, the form of the phenomenon for the idea. Outside
time lies only the will, Kant's thing-in-itself, and its adequate
objectification, the Idea of Plato. Therefore suicide affords no
escape; what every one in his inmost consciousness wills, that
must he be; and what every one is, that he wills. Thus, besides
the merely felt knowledge of the illusiveness and nothingness

of the forms of the idea which separate individuals, it is the
self-knowledge of one's own will and its degree that gives the
[474] sting to conscience. The course of life draws the image of the
empirical character, whose original is the intelligible character,
and horrifies the wicked man by this image. He is horrified all
the same whether the image is depicted in large characters, so
that the world shares his horror, or in such small ones that he
alone sees it, for it only concerns him directly. The past would
be a matter of indifference, and could not pain the conscience if
the character did not feel itself free from all time and unalterable
by it, so long as it does not deny itself. Therefore things which
are long past still weigh on the conscience. The prayer, “Lead
me not into temptation,” means, “Let me not see what manner
of person I am.” In the might with which the bad man asserts
life, and which exhibits itself to him in the sufferings which he
inflicts on others, he measures how far he is from the surrender
and denial of that will, the only possible deliverance from the
world and its miseries. He sees how far he belongs to it, and
how firmly he is bound to it; the known suffering of others has
no power to move him; he is given up to life and felt suffering.
It remains hidden whether this will ever break and overcome the
vehemence of his will.
This exposition of the significance and inner nature of the bad,
which as mere feeling, i.e., not as distinct, abstract knowledge, is
the content of remorse, will gain distinctness and completeness
by the similar consideration of the good as a quality of human
will, and finally of absolute resignation and holiness, which
proceeds from it when it has attained its highest grade. For
opposites always throw light upon each other, and the day at
once reveals both itself and the night, as Spinoza admirably
remarks.
§ 66. A theory of morals without proof, that is, mere
moralising, can effect nothing, because it does not act as a
471
motive. A theory of morals which does act as a motive can do so

only by working on self-love. But what springs from this source
has no moral worth. It follows from this that no genuine virtue
can be produced through moral theory or abstract knowledge [475]
in general, but that such virtue must spring from that intuitive
knowledge which recognises in the individuality of others the
same nature as in our own.
For virtue certainly proceeds from knowledge, but not from
the abstract knowledge that can be communicated through words.
If it were so, virtue could be taught, and by here expressing in
abstract language its nature and the knowledge which lies at its
foundation, we should make every one who comprehends this
even ethically better. But this is by no means the case. On
the contrary, ethical discourses and preaching will just as little
produce a virtuous man as all the systems of æsthetics from
Aristotle downwards have succeeded in producing a poet. For
the real inner nature of virtue the concept is unfruitful, just as it
is in art, and it is only in a completely subordinate position that it
can be of use as a tool in the elaboration and preserving of what
has been ascertained and inferred by other means. Velle non
discitur. Abstract dogmas are, in fact, without influence upon
virtue, i.e., upon the goodness of the disposition. False dogmas
do not disturb it; true ones will scarcely assist it. It would, in
fact, be a bad look-out if the cardinal fact in the life of man,
his ethical worth, that worth which counts for eternity, were
dependent upon anything the attainment of which is so much a
matter of chance as is the case with dogmas, religious doctrines,
and philosophical theories. For morality dogmas have this value
only: The man who has become virtuous from knowledge of
another kind, which is presently to be considered, possesses
in them a scheme or formula according to which he accounts
to his own reason, for the most part fictitiously, for his non-
egoistical action, the nature of which it, i.e., he himself, does not
comprehend, and with which account he has accustomed it to be
content.
Upon conduct, outward action, dogmas may certainly exercise
[476] a powerful influence, as also custom and example (the last
because the ordinary man does not trust his judgment, of the
weakness of which he is conscious, but only follows his own
or some one else's experience), but the disposition is not altered
in this way.80 All abstract knowledge gives only motives; but,
as was shown above, motives can only alter the direction of the
will, not the will itself. All communicable knowledge, however,
can only affect the will as a motive. Thus when dogmas lead it,
what the man really and in general wills remains still the same.
He has only received different thoughts as to the ways in which
it is to be attained, and imaginary motives guide him just like
real ones. Therefore, for example, it is all one, as regards his
ethical worth, whether he gives large gifts to the poor, firmly
persuaded that he will receive everything tenfold in a future life,
or expends the same sum on the improvement of an estate which
will yield interest, certainly late, but all the more surely and
largely. And he who for the sake of orthodoxy commits the
heretic to the flames is as much a murderer as the bandit who
does it for gain; and indeed, as regards inward circumstances, so
also was he who slaughtered the Turks in the Holy Land, if, like
the burner of heretics, he really did so because he thought that
he would thereby gain a place in heaven. For these are careful
only for themselves, for their own egoism, just like the bandit,
from whom they are only distinguished by the absurdity of their
means. From without, as has been said, the will can only be
reached through motives, and these only alter the way in which
it expresses itself, never the will itself. Velle non discitur.
In the case of good deeds, however, the doer of which appeals
to dogmas, we must always distinguish whether these dogmas
80
The Church would say that these are merely opera operata, which do not
avail unless grace gives the faith which leads to the new birth. But of this
farther on.
473
really are the motives which lead to the good deeds, or whether,
as was said above, they are merely the illusive account of them [477]
with which he seeks to satisfy his own reason with regard to
a good deed which really flows from quite a different source,
a deed which he does because he is good, though he does not
understand how to explain it rightly, and yet wishes to think
something with regard to it. But this distinction is very hard
to make, because it lies in the heart of a man. Therefore we
can scarcely ever pass a correct moral judgment on the action
of others, and very seldom on our own. The deeds and conduct
of an individual and of a nation may be very much modified
through dogmas, example, and custom. But in themselves all
deeds (opera operata) are merely empty forms, and only the
disposition which leads to them gives them moral significance.
This disposition, however, may be quite the same when its
outward manifestation is very different. With an equal degree of
wickedness, one man may die on the wheel, and another in the
bosom of his family. It may be the same grade of wickedness
which expresses itself in one nation in the coarse characteristics
of murder and cannibalism, and in another finely and softly in
miniature, in court intrigues, oppressions, and delicate plots of
every kind; the inner nature remains the same. It is conceivable
that a perfect state, or perhaps indeed a complete and firmly
believed doctrine of rewards and punishments after death, might
prevent every crime; politically much would be gained thereby;
morally, nothing; only the expression of the will in life would be
restricted.
Thus genuine goodness of disposition, disinterested virtue,
and pure nobility do not proceed from abstract knowledge. Yet
they do proceed from knowledge; but it is a direct intuitive
knowledge, which can neither be reasoned away, nor arrived at
by reasoning, a knowledge which, just because it is not abstract,
cannot be communicated, but must arise in each for himself,
which therefore finds its real and adequate expression not in [478]
words, but only in deeds, in conduct, in the course of the life

of man. We who here seek the theory of virtue, and have
therefore also to express abstractly the nature of the knowledge
which lies at its foundation, will yet be unable to convey that
knowledge itself in this expression. We can only give the concept
of this knowledge, and thus always start from action in which
alone it becomes visible, and refer to action as its only adequate
expression. We can only explain and interpret action, i.e., express
abstractly what really takes place in it.
Before we speak of the good proper, in opposition to the bad,
which has been explained, we must touch on an intermediate
grade, the mere negation of the bad: this is justice. The nature of
right and wrong has been fully explained above; therefore we may
briefly say here, that he who voluntarily recognises and observes
those merely moral limits between wrong and right, even where
this is not secured by the state or any other external power, thus
he who, according to our explanation, never carries the assertion
of his own will so far as to deny the will appearing in another
individual, is just. Thus, in order to increase his own well-being,
he will not inflict suffering upon others, i.e., he will commit no
crime, he will respect the rights and the property of others. We
see that for such a just man the principium individuationis is no
longer, as in the case of the bad man, an absolute wall of partition.
We see that he does not, like the bad man, merely assert his own
manifestation of will and deny all others; that other persons are
not for him mere masks, whose nature is quite different from
his own; but he shows in his conduct that he also recognises his
own nature—the will to live as a thing-in-itself, in the foreign
manifestation which is only given to him as idea. Thus he finds
himself again in that other manifestation, up to a certain point,
that of doing no wrong, i.e., abstaining from injury. To this
extent, therefore, he sees through the principium individuationis,
[479] the veil of Mâyâ; so far he sets the being external to him on a
level with his own—he does it no injury.
475
If we examine the inmost nature of this justice, there already

lies in it the resolution not to go so far in the assertion of one's
own will as to deny the manifestations of will of others, by
compelling them to serve one's own. One will therefore wish
to render to others as much as one receives from them. The
highest degree of this justice of disposition, which is, however,
always united with goodness proper, whose character is no longer
merely negative, extends so far that a man doubts his right to
inherited property, wishes to support his body only by his own
powers, mental and physical, feels every service of others and
every luxury a reproach, and finally embraces voluntary poverty.
Thus we see how Pascal, when he became an ascetic, would no
longer permit any services to be rendered him, although he had
servants enough; in spite of his constant bad health he made
his bed himself, brought his own food from the kitchen, &c.
(“Vie de Pascal, par sa Sœur,” p. 19). Quite in keeping with
this, it is reported that many Hindus, even Rajas with great
wealth, expend it merely on the maintenance of their position,
their court and attendants, and themselves observe with the
greatest scrupulousness the maxim that a man should eat nothing
that he has not himself both sowed and reaped. Yet a certain
misunderstanding lies at the bottom of this; for one man, just
because he is rich and powerful, can render such signal services
to the whole of human society that they counterbalance the
wealth he has inherited, for the secure possession of which he
is indebted to society. In reality that excessive justice of such
Hindus is already more than justice; it is actual renunciation,
denial of the will to live,—asceticism, of which we shall speak
last. On the other hand, pure idleness and living through the
exertions of others, in the case of inherited wealth, without
accomplishing anything, may be regarded as morally wrong, [480]
even if it must remain right according to positive laws.
We have found that voluntary justice has its inmost source in
a certain degree of penetration of the principium individuationis,
while the unjust remain entirely involved in this principle.

This penetration may exist not only in the degree which is
required for justice, but also in the higher degree which leads
to benevolence and well-doing, to love of mankind. And this
may take place however strong and energetic in itself the will
which appears in such an individual may be. Knowledge can
always counterbalance it in him, teach him to resist the tendency
to wrong, and even produce in him every degree of goodness,
and indeed of resignation. Thus the good man is by no means
to be regarded as originally a weaker manifestation of will than
the bad man, but it is knowledge which in him masters the blind
striving of will. There are certainly individuals who merely seem
to have a good disposition on account of the weakness of the
will appearing in them, but what they are soon appears from the
fact that they are not capable of any remarkable self-conquest in
order to perform a just or good deed.
If, however, as a rare exception, we meet a man who possesses
a considerable income, but uses very little of it for himself and
gives all the rest to the poor, while he denies himself many
pleasures and comforts, and we seek to explain the action of this
man, we shall find, apart altogether from the dogmas through
which he tries to make his action intelligible to his reason, that
the simplest general expression and the essential character of his
conduct is that he makes less distinction than is usually made
between himself and others. This distinction is so great in the
eyes of many that the suffering of others is a direct pleasure to
the wicked and a welcome means of happiness to the unjust.
The merely just man is content not to cause it; and, in general,
[481] most men know and are acquainted with innumerable sufferings
of others in their vicinity, but do not determine to mitigate
them, because to do so would involve some self-denial on their
part. Thus, in each of all these a strong distinction seems to
prevail between his own ego and that of others; on the other
hand, to the noble man we have imagined, this distinction is
477
not so significant. The principium individuationis, the form of

the phenomenon, no longer holds him so tightly in its grasp,
but the suffering which he sees in others touches him almost as
closely as his own. He therefore tries to strike a balance between
them, denies himself pleasures, practises renunciation, in order
to mitigate the sufferings of others. He sees that the distinction
between himself and others, which to the bad man is so great
a gulf, only belongs to a fleeting and illusive phenomenon. He
recognises directly and without reasoning that the in-itself of his
own manifestation is also that of others, the will to live, which
constitutes the inner nature of everything and lives in all; indeed,
that this applies also to the brutes and the whole of nature, and
therefore he will not cause suffering even to a brute.81
He is now just as little likely to allow others to starve, while
he himself has enough and to spare, as any one would be to
suffer hunger one day in order to have more the next day than
he could enjoy. For to him who does works of love the veil
of Mâyâ has become transparent, the illusion of the principium [482]
individuationis has left him. He recognises himself, his will,
in every being, and consequently also in the sufferer. He is
now free from the perversity with which the will to live, not
recognising itself, here in one individual enjoys a fleeting and
81
The right of man over the life and powers of the brutes rests on the fact that,
because with the growing clearness of consciousness suffering increases in like
measure; the pain which the brute suffers through death or work is not so great
as man would suffer by merely denying himself the flesh, or the powers of the
brutes. Therefore man may carry the assertion of his existence to the extent of
denying the existence of the brute, and the will to live as a whole endures less
suffering in this way than if the opposite course were adopted. This at once
determines the extent of the use man may make of the powers of the brutes
without wrong; a limit, however, which is often transgressed, especially in the
case of beasts of burden and dogs used in the chase; to which the activity of
societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals is principally devoted. In my
opinion, that right does not extend to vivisection, particularly of the higher
animals. On the other hand, the insect does not suffer so much through its
death as a man suffers from its sting. The Hindus do not understand this.
precarious pleasure, and there in another pays for it with suffering

and starvation, and thus both inflicts and endures misery, not
knowing that, like Thyestes, it eagerly devours its own flesh;
and then, on the one hand, laments its undeserved suffering, and
on the other hand transgresses without fear of Nemesis, always
merely because, involved in the principium individuationis, thus
generally in the kind of knowledge which is governed by the
principle of sufficient reason, it does not recognise itself in the
foreign phenomenon, and therefore does not perceive eternal
justice. To be cured of this illusion and deception of Mâyâ, and
to do works of love, are one and the same. But the latter is the
necessary and inevitable symptom of that knowledge.
The opposite of the sting of conscience, the origin and
significance of which is explained above, is the good conscience,
the satisfaction which we experience after every disinterested
deed. It arises from the fact that such a deed, as it proceeds from
the direct recognition of our own inner being in the phenomenon
of another, affords us also the verification of this knowledge, the
knowledge that our true self exists not only in our own person,
this particular manifestation, but in everything that lives. By
this the heart feels itself enlarged, as by egoism it is contracted.
For as the latter concentrates our interest upon the particular
manifestation of our own individuality, upon which knowledge
always presents to us the innumerable dangers which constantly
threaten this manifestation, and anxiety and care becomes the
key-note of our disposition; the knowledge that everything living
is just as much our own inner nature, as is our own person,
[483] extends our interest to everything living; and in this way the
heart is enlarged. Thus through the diminished interest in our
own self, the anxious care for the self is attacked at its very
root and limited; hence the peace, the unbroken serenity, which
a virtuous disposition and a good conscience affords, and the
more distinct appearance of this with every good deed, for it
proves to ourselves the depth of that disposition. The egoist feels
479
himself surrounded by strange and hostile individuals, and all

his hope is centred in his own good. The good man lives in a
world of friendly individuals, the well-being of any of whom
he regards as his own. Therefore, although the knowledge of
the lot of mankind generally does not make his disposition a
joyful one, yet the permanent knowledge of his own nature
in all living beings, gives him a certain evenness, and even
serenity of disposition. For the interest which is extended to
innumerable manifestations cannot cause such anxiety as that
which is concentrated upon one. The accidents which concern
individuals collectively, equalise themselves, while those which
happen to the particular individual constitute good or bad fortune.
Thus, though others have set up moral principles which they
give out as prescriptions for virtue, and laws which it was
necessary to follow, I, as has already been said, cannot do this
because I have no “ought” or law to prescribe to the eternally
free-will. Yet on the other hand, in the connection of my system,
what to a certain extent corresponds and is analogous to that
undertaking is the purely theoretical truth, of which my whole
exposition may be regarded as merely an elaboration, that the
will is the in-itself of every phenomenon but itself, as such, is
free from the forms of the phenomenal, and consequently from
multiplicity; a truth, which, with reference to action, I do not
know how to express better than by the formula of the Vedas
already quoted: “Tat twam asi!” (This thou art!) Whoever is able
to say this to himself, with regard to every being with whom
he comes in contact, with clear knowledge and firm inward [484]
conviction, is certain of all virtue and blessedness, and is on the
direct road to salvation.
But before I go further, and, as the conclusion of my exposition,
show how love, the origin and nature of which we recognised
as the penetration of the principium individuationis, leads to
salvation, to the entire surrender of the will to live, i.e., of all
volition, and also how another path, less soft but more frequented,
leads men to the same goal, a paradoxical proposition must first

be stated and explained; not because it is paradoxical, but because
it is true, and is necessary to the completeness of the thought I
have present. It is this: “All love (±³±À·, caritas) is sympathy.”
§ 67. We have seen how justice proceeds from the penetration
of the principium individuationis in a less degree, and how
from its penetration in a higher degree there arises goodness of
disposition proper, which shows itself as pure, i.e., disinterested
love towards others. When now the latter becomes perfect, it
places other individuals and their fate completely on a level
with itself and its own fate. Further than this it cannot go, for
there exists no reason for preferring the individuality of another
to its own. Yet the number of other individuals whose whole
happiness or life is in danger may outweigh the regard for one's
own particular well-being. In such a case, the character that has
attained to the highest goodness and perfect nobility will entirely
sacrifice its own well-being, and even its life, for the well-being
of many others. So died Codrus, and Leonidas, and Regulus, and
Decius Mus, and Arnold von Winkelried; so dies every one who
voluntarily and consciously faces certain death for his friends
or his country. And they also stand on the same level who
voluntarily submit to suffering and death for maintaining what
conduces and rightly belongs to the welfare of all mankind; that
[485] is, for maintaining universal and important truths and destroying
great errors. So died Socrates and Giordano Bruno, and so many
a hero of the truth suffered death at the stake at the hands of the
priests.
Now, however, I must remind the reader, with reference to
the paradox stated above, that we found before that suffering is
essential to life as a whole, and inseparable from it. And that
we saw that every wish proceeds from a need, from a want,
from suffering, and that therefore every satisfaction is only the
removal of a pain, and brings no positive happiness; that the
joys certainly lie to the wish, presenting themselves as a positive
481
good, but in truth they have only a negative nature, and are
only the end of an evil. Therefore what goodness, love, and
nobleness do for others, is always merely an alleviation of their
suffering, and consequently all that can influence them to good
deeds and works of love, is simply the knowledge of the suffering
of others, which is directly understood from their own suffering
and placed on a level with it. But it follows from this that
pure love (±³±À·, caritas) is in its nature sympathy; whether the
suffering it mitigates, to which every unsatisfied wish belongs,
be great or small. Therefore we shall have no hesitation, in
direct contradiction to Kant, who will only recognise all true
goodness and all virtue to be such, if it has proceeded from
abstract reflection, and indeed from the conception of duty and
of the categorical imperative, and explains felt sympathy as
weakness, and by no means virtue, we shall have no hesitation, I
say, in direct contradiction to Kant, in saying: the mere concept
is for genuine virtue just as unfruitful as it is for genuine art:
all true and pure love is sympathy, and all love which is not
sympathy is selfishness. •Á¿Â is selfishness, ±³±À· is sympathy.
Combinations of the two frequently occur. Indeed genuine
friendship is always a mixture of selfishness and sympathy; the
former lies in the pleasure experienced in the presence of the
friend, whose individuality corresponds to our own, and this [486]
almost always constitutes the greatest part; sympathy shows
itself in the sincere participation in his joy and grief, and the
disinterested sacrifices made in respect of the latter. Thus
Spinoza says: Benevolentia nihil aliud est, quam cupiditas ex
commiseratione orta (Eth. iii. pr. 27, cor. 3, schol.) As a
confirmation of our paradoxical proposition it may be observed
that the tone and words of the language and caresses of pure
love, entirely coincide with the tones of sympathy; and we may
also remark in passing that in Italian sympathy and true love are
denoted by the same word pietà.
This is also the place to explain one of the most striking
peculiarities of human nature, weeping, which, like laughter,

belongs to those qualities which distinguish man from the brutes.
Weeping is by no means a direct expression of pain, for it occurs
where there is very little pain. In my opinion, indeed, we never
weep directly on account of the pain we experience, but always
merely on account of its repetition in reflection. We pass from
the felt pain, even when it is physical, to a mere idea of it, and
then find our own state so deserving of sympathy that we are
firmly and sincerely convinced that if another were the sufferer,
we would be full of sympathy, and love to relieve him. But now
we ourselves are the object of our own sympathy; with the most
benevolent disposition we are ourselves most in need of help; we
feel that we suffer more than we could see another suffer; and
in this very complex frame of mind, in which the directly felt
suffering only comes to perception by a doubly circuitous route,
imagined as the suffering of another, sympathised with as such,
and then suddenly perceived again as directly our own,—in this
complex frame of mind, I say, Nature relieves itself through that
remarkable physical conflict. Weeping is accordingly sympathy
with our own selves, or sympathy directed back on its source. It
is therefore conditional upon the capacity for love and sympathy,
[487] and also upon imagination. Therefore men who are either
hard-hearted or unimaginative do not weep easily, and weeping
is even always regarded as a sign of a certain degree of goodness
of character, and disarms anger, because it is felt that whoever
can still weep, must necessarily always be capable of love, i.e.,
sympathy towards others, for this enters in the manner described
into the disposition that leads to weeping. The description which
Petrarch gives of the rising of his own tears, naïvely and truly
expressing his feeling, entirely agrees with the explanation we
have given—
“I vo pensando: e nel pensar m' assale

Una pietà si forte di me stesso,
483
Che mi conduce spesso,

Ad alto lagrimar, ch'i non soleva.”82
What has been said is also confirmed by the fact that

children who have been hurt generally do not cry till some
one commiserates them; thus not on account of the pain, but on
account of the idea of it. When we are moved to tears, not through
our own suffering but through that of another, this happens as
follows. Either we vividly put ourselves in the place of the
sufferer by imagination, or see in his fate the lot of humanity as
a whole, and consequently, first of all, our own lot; and thus,
in a very roundabout way, it is yet always about ourselves that
we weep, sympathy with ourselves which we feel. This seems
to be the principal reason of the universal, and thus natural,
weeping in the case of death. The mourner does not weep for
his loss; he would be ashamed of such egotistical tears, instead
of which he is sometimes ashamed of not weeping. First of all
he certainly weeps for the fate of the dead, but he also weeps
when, after long, heavy, and incurable suffering, death was to
this man a wished-for deliverance. Thus, principally, he is seized
with sympathy for the lot of all mankind, which is necessarily [488]
finite, so that every life, however aspiring, and often rich in
deeds, must be extinguished and become nothing. But in this lot
of mankind the mourner sees first of all his own, and this all the
more, the more closely he is related to him who has died, thus
most of all if it is his father. Although to his father his life was
misery through age and sickness, and though his helplessness
was a heavy burden to his son, yet that son weeps bitterly over
the death of his father for the reason which has been given.83
82
As I wander sunk in thought, so strong a sympathy with myself comes over
me that I must often weep aloud, which otherwise I am not wont to do.
83
Cf. Ch. xlvii. of Supplement. It is scarcely necessary to remind the reader
that the whole ethical doctrine given in outline in §§ 61-67 has been explained
fully and in detail in my prize-essay on the foundation of morals.
§ 68. After this digression about the identity of pure love and
sympathy, the final return of which upon our own individuality
has, as its symptom, the phenomenon of weeping, I now take
up the thread of our discussion of the ethical significance of
action, in order to show how, from the same source from which
all goodness, love, virtue, and nobility of character spring, there
finally arises that which I call the denial of the will to live.
We saw before that hatred and wickedness are conditioned by
egoism, and egoism rests on the entanglement of knowledge in the
principium individuationis. Thus we found that the penetration
of that principium individuationis is the source and the nature of
justice, and when it is carried further, even to its fullest extent, it
is the source and nature of love and nobility of character. For this
penetration alone, by abolishing the distinction between our own
individuality and that of others, renders possible and explains
perfect goodness of disposition, extending to disinterested love
and the most generous self-sacrifice for others.
If, however, this penetration of the principium individuationis,
this direct knowledge of the identity of will in all its
manifestations, is present in a high degree of distinctness, it
[489] will at once show an influence upon the will which extends
still further. If that veil of Mâyâ, the principium individuationis,
is lifted from the eyes of a man to such an extent that he
no longer makes the egotistical distinction between his person
and that of others, but takes as much interest in the sufferings
of other individuals as in his own, and therefore is not only
benevolent in the highest degree, but even ready to sacrifice his
own individuality whenever such a sacrifice will save a number
of other persons, then it clearly follows that such a man, who
recognises in all beings his own inmost and true self, must also
regard the infinite suffering of all suffering beings as his own,
and take on himself the pain of the whole world. No suffering
is any longer strange to him. All the miseries of others which
he sees and is so seldom able to alleviate, all the miseries he
485
knows directly, and even those which he only knows as possible,

work upon his mind like his own. It is no longer the changing
joy and sorrow of his own person that he has in view, as is
the case with him who is still involved in egoism; but, since
he sees through the principium individuationis, all lies equally
near him. He knows the whole, comprehends its nature, and
finds that it consists in a constant passing away, vain striving,
inward conflict, and continual suffering. He sees wherever he
looks suffering humanity, the suffering brute creation, and a
world that passes away. But all this now lies as near him as his
own person lies to the egoist. Why should he now, with such
knowledge of the world, assert this very life through constant acts
of will, and thereby bind himself ever more closely to it, press
it ever more firmly to himself? Thus he who is still involved in
the principium individuationis, in egoism, only knows particular
things and their relation to his own person, and these constantly
become new motives of his volition. But, on the other hand,
that knowledge of the whole, of the nature of the thing-in-itself
which has been described, becomes a quieter of all and every
volition. The will now turns away from life; it now shudders [490]
at the pleasures in which it recognises the assertion of life. Man
now attains to the state of voluntary renunciation, resignation,
true indifference, and perfect will-lessness. If at times, in the
hard experience of our own suffering, or in the vivid recognition
of that of others, the knowledge of the vanity and bitterness
of life draws nigh to us also who are still wrapt in the veil of
Mâyâ, and we would like to destroy the sting of the desires,
close the entrance against all suffering, and purify and sanctify
ourselves by complete and final renunciation; yet the illusion
of the phenomenon soon entangles us again, and its motives
influence the will anew; we cannot tear ourselves free. The
allurement of hope, the flattery of the present, the sweetness
of pleasure, the well-being which falls to our lot, amid the
lamentations of a suffering world governed by chance and error,
draws us back to it and rivets our bonds anew. Therefore Jesus

says: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,
than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.”
If we compare life to a course or path through which we must
unceasingly run—a path of red-hot coals, with a few cool places
here and there; then he who is entangled in delusion is consoled
by the cool places, on which he now stands, or which he sees
near him, and sets out to run through the course. But he who
sees through the principium individuationis, and recognises the
real nature of the thing-in-itself, and thus the whole, is no longer
susceptible of such consolation; he sees himself in all places at
once, and withdraws. His will turns round, no longer asserts its
own nature, which is reflected in the phenomenon, but denies it.
The phenomenon by which this change is marked, is the transition
from virtue to asceticism. That is to say, it no longer suffices
for such a man to love others as himself, and to do as much for
them as for himself; but there arises within him a horror of the
[491] nature of which his own phenomenal existence is an expression,
the will to live, the kernel and inner nature of that world which
is recognised as full of misery. He therefore disowns this nature
which appears in him, and is already expressed through his body,
and his action gives the lie to his phenomenal existence, and
appears in open contradiction to it. Essentially nothing else but a
manifestation of will, he ceases to will anything, guards against
attaching his will to anything, and seeks to confirm in himself
the greatest indifference to everything. His body, healthy and
strong, expresses through the genitals, the sexual impulse; but
he denies the will and gives the lie to the body; he desires
no sensual gratification under any condition. Voluntary and
complete chastity is the first step in asceticism or the denial of
the will to live. It thereby denies the assertion of the will which
extends beyond the individual life, and gives the assurance that
with the life of this body, the will, whose manifestation it is,
ceases. Nature, always true and naïve, declares that if this maxim
487
became universal, the human race would die out; and I think I
may assume, in accordance with what was said in the Second
Book about the connection of all manifestations of will, that with
its highest manifestation, the weaker reflection of it would also
pass away, as the twilight vanishes along with the full light. With
the entire abolition of knowledge, the rest of the world would
of itself vanish into nothing; for without a subject there is no
object. I should like here to refer to a passage in the Vedas,
where it is said: “As in this world hungry infants press round
their mother; so do all beings await the holy oblation.” (Asiatic
Researches, vol. viii.; Colebrooke, On the Vedas, Abstract of
the Sama-Veda; also in Colebrooke's Miscellaneous Essays, vol.
i. p. 79.) Sacrifice means resignation generally, and the rest
of nature must look for its salvation to man who is at once the
priest and the sacrifice. Indeed it deserves to be noticed as very
remarkable, that this thought has also been expressed by the [492]
admirable and unfathomably profound Angelus Silesius, in the
little poem entitled, “Man brings all to God;” it runs, “Man! all
loves thee; around thee great is the throng. All things flee to thee
that they may attain to God.” But a yet greater mystic, Meister
Eckhard, whose wonderful writings are at last accessible (1857)
through the edition of Franz Pfeiffer, says the same thing (p.
459) quite in the sense explained here: “I bear witness to the
saying of Christ. I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw
all things unto me (John xii. 32). So shall the good man draw
all things up to God, to the source whence they first came. The
Masters certify to us that all creatures are made for the sake of
man. This is proved in all created things, by the fact that the one
makes the use of the other; the ox makes use of the grass, the
fish of the water, the bird of the air, the wild beast of the forest.
Thus, all created things become of use to the good man. A good
man brings to God the one created thing in the other.” He means
to say, that man makes use of the brutes in this life because, in
and with himself, he saves them also. It also seems to me that
that difficult passage in the Bible, Rom. viii. 21-24, must be

interpreted in this sense.
In Buddhism also, there is no lack of expressions of this truth.
For example, when Buddha, still as Bodisatwa, has his horse
saddled for the last time, for his flight into the wilderness from
his father's house, he says these lines to the horse: “Long hast
thou existed in life and in death, but now thou shalt cease from
carrying and drawing. Bear me but this once more, O Kantakana,
away from here, and when I have attained to the Law (have
become Buddha) I will not forget thee” (Foe Koue Ki, trad. p.
Abel Rémusat, p. 233).
Asceticism then shows itself further in voluntary and
intentional poverty, which not only arises per accidens, because
the possessions are given away to mitigate the sufferings of
[493] others, but is here an end in itself, is meant to serve as a constant
mortification of will, so that the satisfaction of the wishes, the
sweet of life, shall not again arouse the will, against which
self-knowledge has conceived a horror. He who has attained
to this point, still always feels, as a living body, as concrete
manifestation of will, the natural disposition for every kind of
volition; but he intentionally suppresses it, for he compels himself
to refrain from doing all that he would like to do, and to do all that
he would like not to do, even if this has no further end than that
of serving as a mortification of will. Since he himself denies the
will which appears in his own person, he will not resist if another
does the same, i.e., inflicts wrongs upon him. Therefore every
suffering coming to him from without, through chance or the
wickedness of others, is welcome to him, every injury, ignominy,
and insult; he receives them gladly as the opportunity of learning
with certainty that he no longer asserts the will, but gladly sides
with every enemy of the manifestation of will which is his
own person. Therefore he bears such ignominy and suffering
with inexhaustible patience and meekness, returns good for evil
without ostentation, and allows the fire of anger to rise within
489
him just as little as that of the desires. And he mortifies not only
the will itself, but also its visible form, its objectivity, the body.
He nourishes it sparingly, lest its excessive vigour and prosperity
should animate and excite more strongly the will, of which it is
merely the expression and the mirror. So he practises fasting, and
even resorts to chastisement and self-inflicted torture, in order
that, by constant privation and suffering, he may more and more
break down and destroy the will, which he recognises and abhors
as the source of his own suffering existence and that of the world.
If at last death comes, which puts an end to this manifestation of
that will, whose existence here has long since perished through
free-denial of itself, with the exception of the weak residue of it
which appears as the life of this body; it is most welcome, and [494]
is gladly received as a longed-for deliverance. Here it is not, as
in the case of others, merely the manifestation which ends with
death; but the inner nature itself is abolished, which here existed
only in the manifestation, and that in a very weak degree;84 this
last slight bond is now broken. For him who thus ends, the world
has ended also.
And what I have here described with feeble tongue and only
in general terms, is no philosophical fable, invented by myself,
and only of to-day; no, it was the enviable life of so many saints
and beautiful souls among Christians, and still more among
Hindus and Buddhists, and also among the believers of other
religions. However different were the dogmas impressed on
their reason, the same inward, direct, intuitive knowledge, from
which alone all virtue and holiness proceed, expressed itself in
84
This thought is expressed by a beautiful simile in the ancient philosophical
Sanscrit writing, “Sankhya Karica:” “Yet the soul remains a while invested
with body; as the potter's wheel continues whirling after the pot has been
fashioned, by force of the impulse previously given to it. When separation of
the informed soul from its corporeal frame at length takes place and nature
in respect of it ceases, then is absolute and final deliverance accomplished.”
Colebrooke, “On the Philosophy of the Hindus: Miscellaneous Essays,” vol i.
p. 271. Also in the “Sankhya Karica by Horace Wilson,” § 67, p. 184.
precisely the same way in the conduct of life. For here also the
great distinction between intuitive and abstract knowledge shows
itself; a distinction which is of such importance and universal
application in our whole investigation, and which has hitherto
been too little attended to. There is a wide gulf between the
two, which can only be crossed by the aid of philosophy, as
regards the knowledge of the nature of the world. Intuitively or
in concreto, every man is really conscious of all philosophical
truths, but to bring them to abstract knowledge, to reflection, is
the work of philosophy, which neither ought nor is able to do
more than this.
Thus it may be that the inner nature of holiness, self-
[495] renunciation, mortification of our own will, asceticism, is
here for the first time expressed abstractly, and free from all
mythical elements, as denial of the will to live, appearing after
the complete knowledge of its own nature has become a quieter
of all volition. On the other hand, it has been known directly and
realised in practice by saints and ascetics, who had all the same
inward knowledge, though they used very different language
with regard to it, according to the dogmas which their reason had
accepted, and in consequence of which an Indian, a Christian,
or a Lama saint must each give a very different account of his
conduct, which is, however, of no importance as regards the
fact. A saint may be full of the absurdest superstition, or, on
the contrary, he may be a philosopher, it is all the same. His
conduct alone certifies that he is a saint, for, in a moral regard,
it proceeds from knowledge of the world and its nature, which
is not abstractly but intuitively and directly apprehended, and is
only expressed by him in any dogma for the satisfaction of his
reason. It is therefore just as little needful that a saint should
be a philosopher as that a philosopher should be a saint; just
as it is not necessary that a perfectly beautiful man should be
a great sculptor, or that a great sculptor should himself be a
beautiful man. In general, it is a strange demand upon a moralist
491
that he should teach no other virtue than that which he himself

possesses. To repeat the whole nature of the world abstractly,
universally, and distinctly in concepts, and thus to store up, as
it were, a reflected image of it in permanent concepts always at
the command of the reason; this and nothing else is philosophy.
I refer the reader to the passage quoted from Bacon in the First
Book.
But the description I have given above of the denial of the
will to live, of the conduct of a beautiful soul, of a resigned
and voluntarily expiating saint, is merely abstract and general,
and therefore cold. As the knowledge from which the denial of
the will proceeds is intuitive and not abstract, it finds its most
perfect expression, not in abstract conceptions, but in deeds [496]
and conduct. Therefore, in order to understand fully what we
philosophically express as denial of the will to live, one must
come to know examples of it in experience and actual life.
Certainly they are not to be met with in daily experience: Nam
omnia præclara tam difficilia quam rara sunt, Spinoza admirably
says. Therefore, unless by a specially happy fate we are made
eye-witnesses, we have to content ourselves with descriptions
of the lives of such men. Indian literature, as we see from the
little that we as yet know through translations, is very rich in
descriptions of the lives of saints, penitents, Samanas or ascetics,
Sannyâsis or mendicants, and whatever else they may be called.
Even the well-known “Mythologie des Indous, par Mad. de
Polier,” though by no means to be commended in every respect,
contains many excellent examples of this kind (especially in
ch. 13, vol. ii.) Among Christians also there is no lack of
examples which afford us the illustrations we desire. See the
biographies, for the most part badly written, of those persons who
are sometimes called saintly souls, sometimes pietists, quietists,
devout enthusiasts, and so forth. Collections of such biographies
have been made at various times, such as Tersteegen's “Leben
heiliger Seelen,” Reiz's “Geschichte der Wiedergeborennen,” in
our own day, a collection by Kanne, which, with much that

is bad, yet contains some good, and especially the “Leben der
Beata Sturmin.” To this category very properly belongs the life
of St. Francis of Assisi, that true personification of the ascetic,
and prototype of all mendicant friars. His life, described by
his younger contemporary, St. Bonaventura, also famous as a
scholastic, has recently been republished. “Vita S. Francisci a
S. Bonaventura concinnata” (Soest, 1847), though shortly before
a painstaking and detailed biography, making use of all sources
of information, appeared in France, “Histoire de S. François
d'Assise, par Chavin de Mallan” (1845). As an Oriental parallel
[497] of these monastic writings we have the very valuable work of
Spence Hardy, “Eastern Monachism; an Account of the Order
of Mendicants founded by Gotama Budha” (1850). It shows
us the same thing in another dress. We also see what a matter
of indifference it is whether it proceeds from a theistical or an
atheistical religion. But as a special and exceedingly full example
and practical illustration of the conceptions I have established, I
can thoroughly recommend the “Autobiography of Madame de
Guion.” To become acquainted with this great and beautiful soul,
the very thought of whom always fills me with reverence, and
to do justice to the excellence of her disposition while making
allowance for the superstition of her reason, must be just as
delightful to every man of the better sort as with vulgar thinkers,
i.e., the majority, that book will always stand in bad repute. For
it is the case with regard to everything, that each man can only
prize that which to a certain extent is analogous to him and for
which he has at least a slight inclination. This holds good of
ethical concerns as well as of intellectual. We might to a certain
extent regard the well-known French biography of Spinoza as a
case in point, if we used as a key to it that noble introduction
to his very insufficient essay, “De Emendatione Intellectus,” a
passage which I can also recommend as the most effectual means
I know of stilling the storm of the passions. Finally, even the
493
great Goethe, Greek as he is, did not think it below his dignity to
show us this most beautiful side of humanity in the magic mirror
of poetic art, for he represented the life of Fräulein Klettenberg
in an idealised form in his “Confessions of a Beautiful Soul,” and
later, in his own biography, gave us also an historical account
of it. Besides this, he twice told the story of the life of St.
Philippo Neri. The history of the world, will, and indeed must,
keep silence about the men whose conduct is the best and only
adequate illustration of this important point of our investigation,
for the material of the history of the world is quite different, [498]
and indeed opposed to this. It is not the denial of the will
to live, but its assertion and its manifestation in innumerable
individuals in which its conflict with itself at the highest grade
of its objectification appears with perfect distinctness, and brings
before our eyes, now the ascendancy of the individual through
prudence, now the might of the many through their mass, now
the might of chance personified as fate, always the vanity and
emptiness of the whole effort. We, however, do not follow here
the course of phenomena in time, but, as philosophers, we seek to
investigate the ethical significance of action, and take this as the
only criterion of what for us is significant and important. Thus
we will not be withheld by any fear of the constant numerical
superiority of vulgarity and dulness from acknowledging that the
greatest, most important, and most significant phenomenon that
the world can show is not the conqueror of the world, but the
subduer of it; is nothing but the quiet, unobserved life of a man
who has attained to the knowledge in consequence of which he
surrenders and denies that will to live which fills everything and
strives and strains in all, and which first gains freedom here in
him alone, so that his conduct becomes the exact opposite of that
of other men. In this respect, therefore, for the philosopher, these
accounts of the lives of holy, self-denying men, badly as they
are generally written, and mixed as they are with superstition
and nonsense, are, because of the significance of the material,
immeasurably more instructive and important than even Plutarch

and Livy.
It will further assist us much in obtaining a more definite
and full knowledge of what we have expressed abstractly and
generally, according to our method of exposition, as the denial of
the will to live, if we consider the moral teaching that has been
imparted with this intention, and by men who were full of this
[499] spirit; and this will also show how old our view is, though the pure
philosophical expression of it may be quite new. The teaching
of this kind which lies nearest to hand is Christianity, the ethics
of which are entirely in the spirit indicated, and lead not only
to the highest degrees of human love, but also to renunciation.
The germ of this last side of it is certainly distinctly present in
the writings of the Apostles, but it was only fully developed
and expressed later. We find the Apostles enjoining the love of
our neighbour as ourselves, benevolence, the requital of hatred
with love and well-doing, patience, meekness, the endurance
of all possible injuries without resistance, abstemiousness in
nourishment to keep down lust, resistance to sensual desire, if
possible, altogether. We already see here the first degrees of
asceticism, or denial of the will proper. This last expression
denotes that which in the Gospels is called denying ourselves
and taking up the cross (Matt. xvi. 24, 25; Mark viii. 34, 35;
Luke ix. 23, 24, xiv. 26, 27, 33). This tendency soon developed
itself more and more, and was the origin of hermits, anchorites,
and monasticism—an origin which in itself was pure and holy,
but for that very reason unsuitable for the great majority of men;
therefore what developed out of it could only be hypocrisy and
wickedness, for abusus optimi pessimus. In more developed
Christianity, we see that seed of asceticism unfold into the full
flower in the writings of the Christian saints and mystics. These
preach, besides the purest love, complete resignation, voluntary
and absolute poverty, genuine calmness, perfect indifference
to all worldly things, dying to our own will and being born
495
again in God, entire forgetting of our own person, and sinking

ourselves in the contemplation of God. A full exposition of
this will be found in Fénélon's “Explication des Maximes des
Saints sur la Vie Interieure.” But the spirit of this development
of Christianity is certainly nowhere so fully and powerfully [500]
expressed as in the writings of the German mystics, in the works
of Meister Eckhard, and in that justly famous book “Die Deutsche
Theologie,” of which Luther says in the introduction to it which
he wrote, that with the exception of the Bible and St. Augustine,
he had learnt more from it of what God, Christ, and man are than
from any other book. Yet we only got the genuine and correct
text of it in the year 1851, in the Stuttgart edition by Pfeiffer. The
precepts and doctrines which are laid down there are the most
perfect exposition, sprung from deep inward conviction of what
I have presented as the denial of the will. It should therefore
be studied more closely in that form before it is dogmatised
about with Jewish-Protestant assurance. Tauler's “Nachfolgung
des armen Leben Christi,” and also his “Medulla Animæ,” are
written in the same admirable spirit, though not quite equal in
value to that work. In my opinion the teaching of these genuine
Christian mystics, when compared with the teaching of the New
Testament, is as alcohol to wine, or what becomes visible in the
New Testament as through a veil and mist appears to us in the
works of the mystics without cloak or disguise, in full clearness
and distinctness. Finally, the New Testament might be regarded
as the first initiation, the mystics as the second,—Ã¼¹ºÁ± º±¹
¼µ³±»± ¼ÅÃÄ·Á¹±.
We find, however, that which we have called the denial of
the will to live more fully developed, more variously expressed,
and more vividly represented in the ancient Sanscrit writings
than could be the case in the Christian Church and the Western
world. That this important ethical view of life could here
attain to a fuller development and a more distinct expression
is perhaps principally to be ascribed to the fact that it was
not confined by an element quite foreign to it, as Christianity

is by the Jewish theology, to which its sublime author had
necessarily to adopt and accommodate it, partly consciously,
[501] partly, it may be, unconsciously. Thus Christianity is made
up of two very different constituent parts, and I should like to
call the purely ethical part especially and indeed exclusively
Christian, and distinguish it from the Jewish dogmatism with
which it is combined. If, as has often been feared, and especially
at the present time, that excellent and salutary religion should
altogether decline, I should look for the reason of this simply in
the fact that it does not consist of one single element, but of two
originally different elements, which have only been combined
through the accident of history. In such a case dissolution
had to follow through the separation of these elements, arising
from their different relationship to and reaction against the
progressive spirit of the age. But even after this dissolution
the purely ethical part must always remain uninjured, because
it is indestructible. Our knowledge of Hindu literature is still
very imperfect. Yet, as we find their ethical teaching variously
and powerfully expressed in the Vedas, Puranas, poems, myths,
legends of their saints, maxims and precepts,85 we see that it
inculcates love of our neighbour with complete renunciation of
self-love; love generally, not confined to mankind, but including
all living creatures; benevolence, even to the giving away of
the hard-won wages of daily toil; unlimited patience towards
85
See, for example, “Oupnek'hat, studio Anquetil du Perron,” vol. ii., Nos.
138, 144, 145, 146. “Mythologie des Indous,” par Mad. de Polier, vol.
ii., ch. 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. “Asiatisches Magazin,” by Klaproth: in the
first volume, “Ueber die Fo-Religion,” also “Baghnat Geeta” or “Gespräche
zwischen Krishna und Arjoon;” in the second volume, “Moha-Mudgava.” Also,
“Institutes of Hindu Law, or the Ordinances of Manu,” from the Sanscrit, by
Sir William Jones (German by Hüttner, 1797), especially the sixth and twelfth
chapters. Finally, many passages in the “Asiatic Researches.” (In the last forty
years Indian literature has grown so much in Europe, that if I were now to
complete this note to the first edition, it would occupy several pages.)
497
all who injure us; the requital of all wickedness, however base,
with goodness and love; voluntary and glad endurance of all
ignominy; abstinence from all animal food; perfect chastity and
renunciation of all sensual pleasure for him who strives after [502]
true holiness; the surrender of all possessions, the forsaking of
every dwelling-place and of all relatives; deep unbroken solitude,
spent in silent contemplation, with voluntary penance and terrible
slow self-torture for the absolute mortification of the will, torture
which extends to voluntary death by starvation, or by men giving
themselves up to crocodiles, or flinging themselves over the
sacred precipice in the Himalayas, or being buried alive, or,
finally, by flinging themselves under the wheels of the huge
car of an idol drawn along amid the singing, shouting, and
dancing of bayaderes. And even yet these precepts, whose origin
reaches back more than four thousand years, are carried out in
practice, in some cases even to the utmost extreme,86 and this
notwithstanding the fact that the Hindu nation has been broken
up into so many parts. A religion which demands the greatest
sacrifices, and which has yet remained so long in practice in
a nation that embraces so many millions of persons, cannot be
an arbitrarily invented superstition, but must have its foundation
in the nature of man. But besides this, if we read the life of
a Christian penitent or saint, and also that of a Hindu saint,
we cannot sufficiently wonder at the harmony we find between
them. In the case of such radically different dogmas, customs,
and circumstances, the inward life and effort of both is the
same. And the same harmony prevails in the maxims prescribed
for both of them. For example, Tauler speaks of the absolute
poverty which one ought to seek, and which consists in giving
away and divesting oneself completely of everything from which
one might draw comfort or worldly pleasure, clearly because
86
At the procession of Jagganath in June 1840, eleven Hindus threw
themselves under the wheels, and were instantly killed. (Letter of an East
Indian proprietor in the Times of 30th December 1840.)
all this constantly affords new nourishment to the will, which it

[503] is intended to destroy entirely. And as an Indian counterpart
of this, we find in the precepts of Fo that the Saniassi, who
ought to be without a dwelling and entirely without property,
is further finally enjoined not to lay himself down often under
the same tree, lest he should acquire a preference or inclination
for it above other trees. The Christian mystic and the teacher
of the Vedanta philosophy agree in this respect also, they both
regard all outward works and religious exercises as superfluous
for him who has attained to perfection. So much agreement in
the case of such different ages and nations is a practical proof
that what is expressed here is not, as optimistic dulness likes to
assert, an eccentricity and perversity of the mind, but an essential
side of human nature, which only appears so rarely because of
its excellence.
I have now indicated the sources from which there may
be obtained a direct knowledge, drawn from life itself, of the
phenomena in which the denial of the will to live exhibits itself.
In some respects this is the most important point of our whole
work; yet I have only explained it quite generally, for it is
better to refer to those who speak from direct experience, than to
increase the size of this book unduly by weak repetitions of what
is said by them.
I only wish to add a little to the general indication of the
nature of this state. We saw above that the wicked man, by the
vehemence of his volition, suffers constant, consuming, inward
pain, and finally, if all objects of volition are exhausted, quenches
the fiery thirst of his self-will by the sight of the suffering of
others. He, on the contrary, who has attained to the denial of
the will to live, however poor, joyless, and full of privation his
condition may appear when looked at externally, is yet filled
with inward joy and the true peace of heaven. It is not the restless
strain of life, the jubilant delight which has keen suffering as
its preceding or succeeding condition, in the experience of the
499
man who loves life; but it is a peace that cannot be shaken, a [504]
deep rest and inward serenity, a state which we cannot behold
without the greatest longing when it is brought before our eyes
or our imagination, because we at once recognise it as that which
alone is right, infinitely surpassing everything else, upon which
our better self cries within us the great sapere aude. Then we
feel that every gratification of our wishes won from the world is
merely like the alms which the beggar receives from life to-day
that he may hunger again on the morrow; resignation, on the
contrary, is like an inherited estate, it frees the owner for ever
from all care.
It will be remembered from the Third Book that the æsthetic
pleasure in the beautiful consists in great measure in the fact
that in entering the state of pure contemplation we are lifted
for the moment above all willing, i.e., all wishes and cares; we
become, as it were, freed from ourselves. We are no longer the
individual whose knowledge is subordinated to the service of its
constant willing, the correlative of the particular thing to which
objects are motives, but the eternal subject of knowing purified
from will, the correlative of the Platonic Idea. And we know
that these moments in which, delivered from the ardent strain of
will, we seem to rise out of the heavy atmosphere of earth, are
the happiest which we experience. From this we can understand
how blessed the life of a man must be whose will is silenced, not
merely for a moment, as in the enjoyment of the beautiful, but
for ever, indeed altogether extinguished, except as regards the
last glimmering spark that retains the body in life, and will be
extinguished with its death. Such a man, who, after many bitter
struggles with his own nature, has finally conquered entirely,
continues to exist only as a pure, knowing being, the undimmed
mirror of the world. Nothing can trouble him more, nothing can
move him, for he has cut all the thousand cords of will which
hold us bound to the world, and, as desire, fear, envy, anger, drag [505]
us hither and thither in constant pain. He now looks back smiling
and at rest on the delusions of this world, which once were able
to move and agonise his spirit also, but which now stand before
him as utterly indifferent to him, as the chess-men when the game
is ended, or as, in the morning, the cast-off masquerading dress
which worried and disquieted us in a night in Carnival. Life and
its forms now pass before him as a fleeting illusion, as a light
morning dream before half-waking eyes, the real world already
shining through it so that it can no longer deceive; and like
this morning dream, they finally vanish altogether without any
violent transition. From this we can understand the meaning of
Madame Guion when towards the end of her autobiography she
often expresses herself thus: “Everything is alike to me; I cannot
will anything more: often I know not whether I exist or not.” In
order to express how, after the extinction of the will, the death
of the body (which is indeed only the manifestation of the will,
and therefore loses all significance when the will is abolished)
can no longer have any bitterness, but is very welcome, I may be
allowed to quote the words of that holy penitent, although they
are not very elegantly turned: “Midi de la gloire; jour où il n'y a
plus de nuit; vie qui ne craint plus la mort, dans la mort même:
parceque la mort a vaincu la mort, et que celui qui a souffert la
première mort, ne goutera plus la seconde mort” (Vie de Mad.
de Guion, vol. ii. p. 13).
We must not, however, suppose that when, by means of the
knowledge which acts as a quieter of will, the denial of the will
to live has once appeared, it never wavers or vacillates, and that
we can rest upon it as on an assured possession. Rather, it must
ever anew be attained by a constant battle. For since the body is
the will itself only in the form of objectivity or as manifestation
[506] in the world as idea, so long as the body lives, the whole will to
live exists potentially, and constantly strives to become actual,
and to burn again with all its ardour. Therefore that peace and
blessedness in the life of holy men which we have described
is only found as the flower which proceeds from the constant
501
victory over the will, and the ground in which it grows is the
constant battle with the will to live, for no one can have lasting
peace upon earth. We therefore see the histories of the inner
life of saints full of spiritual conflicts, temptations, and absence
of grace, i.e., the kind of knowledge which makes all motives
ineffectual, and as an universal quieter silences all volition, gives
the deepest peace and opens the door of freedom. Therefore
also we see those who have once attained to the denial of the
will to live strive with all their might to keep upon this path,
by enforced renunciation of every kind, by penance and severity
of life, and by selecting whatever is disagreeable to them, all in
order to suppress the will, which is constantly springing up anew.
Hence, finally, because they already know the value of salvation,
their anxious carefulness to retain the hard-won blessing, their
scruples of conscience about every innocent pleasure, or about
every little excitement of their vanity, which here also dies last,
the most immovable, the most active, and the most foolish of
all the inclinations of man. By the term asceticism, which I
have used so often, I mean in its narrower sense this intentional
breaking of the will by the refusal of what is agreeable and the
selection of what is disagreeable, the voluntarily chosen life of
penance and self-chastisement for the continual mortification of
the will.
We see this practised by him who has attained to the denial
of the will in order to enable him to persist in it; but suffering
in general, as it is inflicted by fate, is a second way (´µÅÄµÁ¿Â
À»¿ÅÂ87 ) of attaining to that denial. Indeed, we may assume that
most men only attain to it in this way, and that it is the suffering
which is personally experienced, not that which is merely known, [507]
which most frequently produces complete resignation, often only
at the approach of death. For only in the case of a few is the mere
knowledge which, seeing through the principium individuationis,
87
On ´µÅÄµÁ¿Â À»¿ÅÂ cf. Stob. Floril., vol. ii. p. 374.
first produces perfect goodness of disposition and universal love

of humanity, and finally enables them to regard all the suffering
of the world as their own; only in the case of a few, I say, is
this knowledge sufficient to bring about the denial of the will.
Even with him who approaches this point, it is almost invariably
the case that the tolerable condition of his own body, the flattery
of the moment, the delusion of hope, and the satisfaction of the
will, which is ever presenting itself anew, i.e., lust, is a constant
hindrance to the denial of the will, and a constant temptation to
the renewed assertion of it. Therefore in this respect all these
illusions have been personified as the devil. Thus in most cases
the will must be broken by great personal suffering before its self-
conquest appears. Then we see the man who has passed through
all the increasing degrees of affliction with the most vehement
resistance, and is finally brought to the verge of despair, suddenly
retire into himself, know himself and the world, change his whole
nature, rise above himself and all suffering, as if purified and
sanctified by it, in inviolable peace, blessedness, and sublimity,
willingly renounce everything he previously desired with all his
might, and joyfully embrace death. It is the refined silver of
the denial of the will to live that suddenly comes forth from the
purifying flame of suffering. It is salvation. Sometimes we see
even those who were very wicked purified to this degree by great
grief; they have become new beings and are completely changed.
Therefore their former misdeeds trouble their consciences no
more, yet they willingly atone for them by death, and gladly see
the end of the manifestation of that will which is now foreign
[508] to them and abhorred by them. The great Goethe has given
us a distinct and visible representation of this denial of the will,
brought about by great misfortunes and despair of all deliverance,
in his immortal masterpiece “Faust,” in the story of the sufferings
of Gretchen. I know no parallel to this in poetry. It is a perfect
example of the second path that leads to the denial of the will,
not, as the first, through the mere knowledge of the sufferings of
503
a whole world which one has voluntarily acquired, but through

excessive suffering experienced in one's own person. Many
tragedies certainly end by conducting their strong-willed heroes
to the point of entire resignation, and then generally the will
to live and its manifestation end together, but no representation
that is known to me brings what is essential to that change so
distinctly before us, free from all that is extraneous, as the part
of “Faust” I have referred to.
In actual life we see that those unfortunate persons who have
to drink to the dregs the greatest cup of suffering, since when all
hope is taken from them they have to face with full consciousness
a shameful, violent, and often painful death on the scaffold, are
very frequently changed in this way. We must not indeed assume
that there is so great a difference between their character and
that of most men as their fate would seem to indicate, but must
attribute the latter for the most part to circumstances; yet they
are guilty and to a considerable degree bad. We see, however,
many of them, when they have entirely lost hope, changed in the
way referred to. They now show actual goodness and purity of
disposition, true abhorrence of doing any act in the least degree
bad or unkind. They forgive their enemies, even if it is through
them that they innocently suffer; and not with words merely and
a sort of hypocritical fear of the judges of the lower world, but
in reality and with inward earnestness and no desire for revenge.
Indeed, their sufferings and death at last becomes dear to them,
for the denial of the will to live has appeared; they often decline
the deliverance when it is offered, and die gladly, peacefully, and [509]
happily. To them the last secret of life has revealed itself in their
excessive pain; the secret that misery and wickedness, sorrow and
hate, the sufferer and the inflicter of suffering, however different
they may appear to the knowledge which follows the principle of
sufficient reason, are in themselves one, the manifestation of that
one will to live which objectifies its conflict with itself by means
of the principium individuationis. They have learned to know
both sides in full measure, the badness and the misery; and since
at last they see the identity of the two, they reject them both at
once; they deny the will to live. In what myths and dogmas they
account to their reason for this intuitive and direct knowledge
and for their own change is, as has been said, a matter of no
importance.
Matthias Claudius must without doubt have witnessed a
change of mind of this description when he wrote the remarkable
essay in the “Wandsbecker Boten” (pt. i. p. 115) with the title
“Bekehrungsgeschichte des ***” (“History of the Conversion of
***”), which concludes thus: “Man's way of thinking may pass
from one point of the periphery to the opposite point, and again
back to the former point, if circumstances mark out for him the
path. And these changes in a man are really nothing great or
interesting, but that remarkable, catholic, transcendental change
in which the whole circle is irreparably broken up and all the
laws of psychology become vain and empty when the coat is
stripped from the shoulders, or at least turned outside in, and as
it were scales fall from a man's eyes, is such that every one who
has breath in his nostrils forsakes father and mother if he can
hear or experience something certain about it.”
The approach of death and hopelessness are in other respects
not absolutely necessary for such a purification through suffering.
Even without them the knowledge of the contradiction of the will
[510] to live with itself can, through great misfortune and pain, force
an entrance, and the vanity of all striving become recognised.
Hence it has often happened that men who have led a very
restless life in the full strain of the passions, kings, heroes, and
adventurers, suddenly change, betake themselves to resignation
and penance, become hermits or monks. To this class belong
all true accounts of conversions; for example, that of Raymond
Lully, who had long wooed a fair lady, and was at last admitted to
her chamber, anticipating the fulfilment of all his wishes, when
she, opening her bodice, showed him her bosom frightfully eaten
505
with cancer. From that moment, as if he had looked into hell,

he was changed; he forsook the court of the king of Majorca,
and went into the desert to do penance.88 This conversion is
very like that of the Abbé Rancé, which I have briefly related in
the 48th chapter of the Supplement. If we consider how in both
cases the transition from the pleasure to the horror of life was the
occasion of it, this throws some light upon the remarkable fact
that it is among the French, the most cheerful, gay, sensuous, and
frivolous nation in Europe, that by far the strictest of all monastic
orders, the Trappists, arose, was re-established by Rancé after its
fall, and has maintained itself to the present day in all its purity
and strictness, in spite of revolutions, Church reformations, and
encroachments of infidelity.
But a knowledge such as that referred to above of the nature
of this existence may leave us again along with the occasion of
it and the will to live, and with it the previous character may
reappear. Thus we see that the passionate Benvenuto Cellini was
changed in this way, once when he was in prison, and again when
very ill; but when the suffering passed over, he fell back again
into his old state. In general, the denial of the will to live by
no means proceeds from suffering with the necessity of an effect
from its cause, but the will remains free; for this is indeed the one [511]
point at which its freedom appears directly in the phenomenon;
hence the astonishment which Asmus expresses so strongly at
the “transcendental change.” In the case of every suffering, it is
always possible to conceive a will which exceeds it in intensity
and is therefore unconquered by it. Thus Plato speaks in the
“Phædon” of men who up to the moment of their execution feast,
drink, and indulge in sensuous pleasure, asserting life even to
the death. Shakespeare shows us in Cardinal Beaufort the fearful
end of a profligate, who dies full of despair, for no suffering or
death can break his will, which is vehement to the extreme of
88
Bruckeri Hist. Philos., tomi iv. pars. i. p. 10.
wickedness.89
The more intense the will is, the more glaring is the conflict of
its manifestation, and thus the greater is the suffering. A world
which was the manifestation of a far more intense will to live
than this world manifests would produce so much the greater
suffering; would thus be a hell.
All suffering, since it is a mortification and a call to resignation,
has potentially a sanctifying power. This is the explanation of the
fact that every great misfortune or deep pain inspires a certain
awe. But the sufferer only really becomes an object of reverence
when, surveying the course of his life as a chain of sorrows,
or mourning some great and incurable misfortune, he does not
really look at the special combination of circumstances which has
plunged his own life into suffering, nor stops at the single great
misfortune that has befallen him; for in so doing his knowledge
still follows the principle of sufficient reason, and clings to the
particular phenomenon; he still wills life only not under the
conditions which have happened to him; but only then, I say,
he is truly worthy of reverence when he raises his glance from
the particular to the universal, when he regards his suffering as
[512] merely an example of the whole, and for him, since in a moral
regard he partakes of genius, one case stands for a thousand, so
that the whole of life conceived as essentially suffering brings
him to resignation. Therefore it inspires reverence when in
Goethe's “Torquato Tasso” the princess speaks of how her own
life and that of her relations has always been sad and joyless, and
yet regards the matter from an entirely universal point of view.
A very noble character we always imagine with a certain trace
of quiet sadness, which is anything but a constant fretfulness
at daily annoyances (this would be an ignoble trait, and lead
us to fear a bad disposition), but is a consciousness derived
from knowledge of the vanity of all possessions, of the suffering
89
Henry VI., Part ii. act 3, sc. 3.
507
of all life, not merely of his own. But such knowledge may
primarily be awakened by the personal experience of suffering,
especially some one great sorrow, as a single unfulfilled wish
brought Petrarch to that state of resigned sadness concerning the
whole of life which appeals to us so pathetically in his works;
for the Daphne he pursued had to flee from his hands in order to
leave him, instead of herself, the immortal laurel. When through
some such great and irrevocable denial of fate the will is to some
extent broken, almost nothing else is desired, and the character
shows itself mild, just, noble, and resigned. When, finally, grief
has no definite object, but extends itself over the whole of life,
then it is to a certain extent a going into itself, a withdrawal, a
gradual disappearance of the will, whose visible manifestation,
the body, it imperceptibly but surely undermines, so that a man
feels a certain loosening of his bonds, a mild foretaste of that
death which promises to be the abolition at once of the body and
of the will. Therefore a secret pleasure accompanies this grief,
and it is this, as I believe, which the most melancholy of all
nations has called “the joy of grief.” But here also lies the danger
of sentimentality, both in life itself and in the representation of
it in poetry; when a man is always mourning and lamenting [513]
without courageously rising to resignation. In this way we lose
both earth and heaven, and retain merely a watery sentimentality.
Only if suffering assumes the form of pure knowledge, and this,
acting as a quieter of the will, brings about resignation, is it
worthy of reverence. In this regard, however, we feel a certain
respect at the sight of every great sufferer which is akin to the
feeling excited by virtue and nobility of character, and also seems
like a reproach of our own happy condition. We cannot help
regarding every sorrow, both our own and those of others, as at
least a potential advance towards virtue and holiness, and, on the
contrary, pleasures and worldly satisfactions as a retrogression
from them. This goes so far, that every man who endures a
great bodily or mental suffering, indeed every one who merely
performs some physical labour which demands the greatest

exertion, in the sweat of his brow and with evident exhaustion,
yet with patience and without murmuring, every such man, I
say, if we consider him with close attention, appears to us like a
sick man who tries a painful cure, and who willingly, and even
with satisfaction, endures the suffering it causes him, because he
knows that the more he suffers the more the cause of his disease
is affected, and that therefore the present suffering is the measure
of his cure.
According to what has been said, the denial of the will to
live, which is just what is called absolute, entire resignation, or
holiness, always proceeds from that quieter of the will which the
knowledge of its inner conflict and essential vanity, expressing
themselves in the suffering of all living things, becomes. The
difference, which we have represented as two paths, consists
in whether that knowledge is called up by suffering which
is merely and purely known, and is freely appropriated by
means of the penetration of the principium individuationis, or by
suffering which is directly felt by a man himself. True salvation,
deliverance from life and suffering, cannot even be imagined
[514] without complete denial of the will. Till then, every one is
simply this will itself, whose manifestation is an ephemeral
existence, a constantly vain and empty striving, and the world
full of suffering we have represented, to which all irrevocably
and in like manner belong. For we found above that life is always
assured to the will to live, and its one real form is the present,
from which they can never escape, since birth and death reign
in the phenomenal world. The Indian mythus expresses this by
saying “they are born again.” The great ethical difference of
character means this, that the bad man is infinitely far from the
attainment of the knowledge from which the denial of the will
proceeds, and therefore he is in truth actually exposed to all the
miseries which appear in life as possible; for even the present
fortunate condition of his personality is merely a phenomenon
509
produced by the principium individuationis, and a delusion of

Mâyâ, the happy dream of a beggar. The sufferings which in
the vehemence and ardour of his will he inflicts upon others are
the measure of the suffering, the experience of which in his own
person cannot break his will, and plainly lead it to the denial
of itself. All true and pure love, on the other hand, and even
all free justice, proceed from the penetration of the principium
individuationis, which, if it appears with its full power, results
in perfect sanctification and salvation, the phenomenon of which
is the state of resignation described above, the unbroken peace
which accompanies it, and the greatest delight in death.90
§ 69. Suicide, the actual doing away with the individual
manifestation of will, differs most widely from the denial of
the will to live, which is the single outstanding act of free-will
in the manifestation, and is therefore, as Asmus calls it, the
transcendental change. This last has been fully considered in
the course of our work. Far from being denial of the will,
suicide is a phenomenon of strong assertion of will; for the
essence of negation lies in this, that the joys of life are shunned, [515]
not its sorrows. The suicide wills life, and is only dissatisfied
with the conditions under which it has presented itself to him.
He therefore by no means surrenders the will to live, but only
life, in that he destroys the individual manifestation. He wills
life—wills the unrestricted existence and assertion of the body;
but the complication of circumstances does not allow this, and
there results for him great suffering. The very will to live
finds itself so much hampered in this particular manifestation
that it cannot put forth its energies. It therefore comes to
such a determination as is in conformity with its own nature,
which lies outside the conditions of the principle of sufficient
reason, and to which, therefore, all particular manifestations are
alike indifferent, inasmuch as it itself remains unaffected by all
90
Cf. Ch. xlviii. of the Supplement.
appearing and passing away, and is the inner life of all things;
for that firm inward assurance by reason of which we all live free
from the constant dread of death, the assurance that a phenomenal
existence can never be wanting to the will, supports our action
even in the case of suicide. Thus the will to live appears just as
much in suicide (Siva) as in the satisfaction of self-preservation
(Vishnu) and in the sensual pleasure of procreation (Brahma).
This is the inner meaning of the unity of the Trimurtis, which is
embodied in its entirety in every human being, though in time it
raises now one, now another, of its three heads. Suicide stands in
the same relation to the denial of the will as the individual thing
does to the Idea. The suicide denies only the individual, not the
species. We have already seen that as life is always assured to
the will to live, and as sorrow is inseparable from life, suicide,
the wilful destruction of the single phenomenal existence, is a
vain and foolish act; for the thing-in-itself remains unaffected
by it, even as the rainbow endures however fast the drops which
support it for the moment may change. But, more than this, it
[516] is also the masterpiece of Mâyâ, as the most flagrant example
of the contradiction of the will to live with itself. As we found
this contradiction in the case of the lowest manifestations of will,
in the permanent struggle of all the forces of nature, and of all
organic individuals for matter and time and space; and as we
saw this antagonism come ever more to the front with terrible
distinctness in the ascending grades of the objectification of the
will, so at last in the highest grade, the Idea of man, it reaches the
point at which, not only the individuals which express the same
Idea extirpate each other, but even the same individual declares
war against itself. The vehemence with which it wills life, and
revolts against what hinders it, namely, suffering, brings it to the
point of destroying itself; so that the individual will, by its own
act, puts an end to that body which is merely its particular visible
expression, rather than permit suffering to break the will. Just
because the suicide cannot give up willing, he gives up living.
511
The will asserts itself here even in putting an end to its own
manifestation, because it can no longer assert itself otherwise.
As, however, it was just the suffering which it so shuns that was
able, as mortification of the will, to bring it to the denial of itself,
and hence to freedom, so in this respect the suicide is like a sick
man, who, after a painful operation which would entirely cure
him has been begun, will not allow it to be completed, but prefers
to retain his disease. Suffering approaches and reveals itself as
the possibility of the denial of will; but the will rejects it, in that
it destroys the body, the manifestation of itself, in order that it
may remain unbroken. This is the reason why almost all ethical
teachers, whether philosophical or religious, condemn suicide,
although they themselves can only give far-fetched sophistical
reasons for their opinion. But if a human being was ever
restrained from committing suicide by purely moral motives,
the inmost meaning of this self-conquest (in whatever ideas his
reason may have clothed it) was this: “I will not shun suffering, [517]
in order that it may help to put an end to the will to live, whose
manifestation is so wretched, by so strengthening the knowledge
of the real nature of the world which is already beginning to
dawn upon me, that it may become the final quieter of my will,
and may free me for ever.”
It is well known that from time to time cases occur in which
the act of suicide extends to the children. The father first kills
the children he loves, and then himself. Now, if we consider that
conscience, religion, and all influencing ideas teach him to look
upon murder as the greatest of crimes, and that, in spite of this,
he yet commits it, in the hour of his own death, and when he is
altogether uninfluenced by any egotistical motive, such a deed
can only be explained in the following manner: in this case, the
will of the individual, the father, recognises itself immediately
in the children, though involved in the delusion of mistaking the
appearance for the true nature; and as he is at the same time
deeply impressed with the knowledge of the misery of all life,
he now thinks to put an end to the inner nature itself, along with
the appearance, and thus seeks to deliver from existence and
its misery both himself and his children, in whom he discerns
himself as living again. It would be an error precisely analogous
to this to suppose that one may reach the same end as is attained
through voluntary chastity by frustrating the aim of nature in
fecundation; or indeed if, in consideration of the unendurable
suffering of life, parents were to use means for the destruction
of their new-born children, instead of doing everything possible
to ensure life to that which is struggling into it. For if the
will to live is there, as it is the only metaphysical reality, or
the thing-in-itself, no physical force can break it, but can only
destroy its manifestation at this place and time. It itself can never
[518] be transcended except through knowledge. Thus the only way
of salvation is, that the will shall manifest itself unrestrictedly,
in order that in this individual manifestation it may come to
apprehend its own nature. Only as the result of this knowledge
can the will transcend itself, and thereby end the suffering which
is inseparable from its manifestation. It is quite impossible to
accomplish this end by physical force, as by destroying the
germ, or by killing the new-born child, or by committing suicide.
Nature guides the will to the light, just because it is only in the
light that it can work out its salvation. Therefore the aims of
Nature are to be promoted in every way as soon as the will to
live, which is its inner being, has determined itself.
There is a species of suicide which seems to be quite distinct
from the common kind, though its occurrence has perhaps not yet
been fully established. It is starvation, voluntarily chosen on the
ground of extreme asceticism. All instances of it, however, have
been accompanied and obscured by much religious fanaticism,
and even superstition. Yet it seems that the absolute denial of
will may reach the point at which the will shall be wanting to
take the necessary nourishment for the support of the natural life.
This kind of suicide is so far from being the result of the will to
513
live, that such a completely resigned ascetic only ceases to live

because he has already altogether ceased to will. No other death
than that by starvation is in this case conceivable (unless it were
the result of some special superstition); for the intention to cut
short the torment would itself be a stage in the assertion of will.
The dogmas which satisfy the reason of such a penitent delude
him with the idea that a being of a higher nature has inculcated
the fasting to which his own inner tendency drives him. Old
examples of this may be found in the “Breslauer Sammlung
von Natur- und Medicin-Geschichten,” September 1799, p. 363;
in Bayle's “Nouvelles de la République des Lettres,” February [519]
1685, p. 189; in Zimmermann, “Ueber die Einsamkeit,” vol. i.
p. 182; in the “Histoire de l'Académie des Sciences” for 1764,
an account by Houttuyn, which is quoted in the “Sammlung für
praktische Aerzte,” vol. i. p. 69. More recent accounts may be
found in Hufeland's “Journal für praktische Heilkunde,” vol. x.
p. 181, and vol. xlviii. p. 95; also in Nasse's “Zeitschrift für
psychische Aerzte,” 1819, part iii. p. 460; and in the “Edinburgh
Medical and Surgical Journal,” 1809, vol. v. p. 319. In the year
1833 all the papers announced that the English historian, Dr.
Lingard, had died in January at Dover of voluntary starvation;
according to later accounts, it was not he himself, but a relation of
his who died. Still in these accounts the persons were generally
described as insane, and it is no longer possible to find out how
far this was the case. But I will give here a more recent case
of this kind, if it were only to ensure the preservation of one of
the rare instances of this striking and extraordinary phenomenon
of human nature, which, to all appearance at any rate, belongs
to the category to which I wish to assign it and could hardly
be explained in any other way. This case is reported in the
“Nürnberger Correspondenten” of the 29th July 1813, in these
words:—“We hear from Bern that in a thick wood near Thurnen
a hut has been discovered in which was lying the body of a man
who had been dead about a month. His clothes gave little or no
clue to his social position. Two very fine shirts lay beside him.
The most important article, however, was a Bible interleaved
with white paper, part of which had been written upon by the
deceased. In this writing he gives the date of his departure from
home (but does not mention where his home was). He then says
that he was driven by the Spirit of God into the wilderness to
pray and fast. During his journey he had fasted seven days and
then he had again taken food. After this he had begun again
[520] to fast, and continued to do so for the same number of days
as before. From this point we find each day marked with a
stroke, and of these there are five, at the expiration of which
the pilgrim presumably died. There was further found a letter
to a clergyman about a sermon which the deceased heard him
preach, but the letter was not addressed.” Between this voluntary
death arising from extreme asceticism and the common suicide
resulting from despair there may be various intermediate species
and combinations, though this is hard to find out. But human
nature has depths, obscurities, and perplexities, the analysis and
elucidation of which is a matter of the very greatest difficulty.
§ 70. It might be supposed that the entire exposition
(now terminated) of that which I call the denial of the will
is irreconcilable with the earlier explanation of necessity, which
belongs just as much to motivation as to every other form of the
principle of sufficient reason, and according to which, motives,
like all causes, are only occasional causes, upon which the
character unfolds its nature and reveals it with the necessity of a
natural law, on account of which we absolutely denied freedom
as liberum arbitrium indifferentiæ. But far from suppressing
this here, I would call it to mind. In truth, real freedom, i.e.,
independence of the principle of sufficient reason, belongs to
the will only as a thing-in-itself, not to its manifestation, whose
essential form is everywhere the principle of sufficient reason,
the element or sphere of necessity. But the one case in which
that freedom can become directly visible in the manifestation
515
is that in which it makes an end of what manifests itself, and

because the mere manifestation, as a link in the chain of causes,
the living body in time, which contains only phenomena, still
continues to exist, the will which manifests itself through this
phenomenon then stands in contradiction to it, for it denies
what the phenomenon expresses. In such a case the organs of
generation, for example, as the visible form of the sexual impulse,
are there and in health; but yet, in the inmost consciousness, [521]
no sensual gratification is desired; and although the whole
body is only the visible expression of the will to live, yet the
motives which correspond to this will no longer act; indeed, the
dissolution of the body, the end of the individual, and in this way
the greatest check to the natural will, is welcome and desired.
Now, the contradiction between our assertions of the necessity
of the determination of the will by motives, in accordance with
the character, on the one hand, and of the possibility of the entire
suppression of the will whereby the motives become powerless,
on the other hand, is only the repetition in the reflection of
philosophy of this real contradiction which arises from the direct
encroachment of the freedom of the will-in-itself, which knows
no necessity, into the sphere of the necessity of its manifestation.
But the key to the solution of these contradictions lies in the
fact that the state in which the character is withdrawn from the
power of motives does not proceed directly from the will, but
from a changed form of knowledge. So long as the knowledge is
merely that which is involved in the principium individuationis
and exclusively follows the principle of sufficient reason, the
strength of the motives is irresistible. But when the principium
individuationis is seen through, when the Ideas, and indeed
the inner nature of the thing-in-itself, as the same will in all,
are directly recognised, and from this knowledge an universal
quieter of volition arises, then the particular motives become
ineffective, because the kind of knowledge which corresponds
to them is obscured and thrown into the background by quite
another kind. Therefore the character can never partially change,

but must, with the consistency of a law of Nature, carry out in
the particular the will which it manifests as a whole. But this
whole, the character itself, may be completely suppressed or
abolished through the change of knowledge referred to above. It
[522] is this suppression or abolition which Asmus, as quoted above,
marvels at and denotes the “catholic, transcendental change;”
and in the Christian Church it has very aptly been called the
new birth, and the knowledge from which it springs, the work of
grace. Therefore it is not a question of a change, but of an entire
suppression of the character; and hence it arises that, however
different the characters which experience the suppression may
have been before it, after it they show a great similarity in their
conduct, though every one still speaks very differently according
to his conceptions and dogmas.
In this sense, then, the old philosophical doctrine of the
freedom of the will, which has constantly been contested and
constantly maintained, is not without ground, and the dogma
of the Church of the work of grace and the new birth is not
without meaning and significance. But we now unexpectedly
see both united in one, and we can also now understand in what
sense the excellent Malebranche could say, “La liberté est un
mystère,” and was right. For precisely what the Christian mystics
call the work of grace and the new birth, is for us the single
direct expression of the freedom of the will. It only appears if
the will, having attained to a knowledge of its own real nature,
receives from this a quieter, by means of which the motives are
deprived of their effect, which belongs to the province of another
kind of knowledge, the objects of which are merely phenomena.
The possibility of the freedom which thus expresses itself is the
greatest prerogative of man, which is for ever wanting to the
brute, because the condition of it is the deliberation of reason,
which enables him to survey the whole of life independent of
the impression of the present. The brute is entirely without the
517
possibility of freedom, as, indeed, it is without the possibility of a

proper or deliberate choice following upon a completed conflict
of motives, which for this purpose would have to be abstract
ideas. Therefore with the same necessity with which the stone [523]
falls to the earth, the hungry wolf buries its fangs in the flesh of
its prey, without the possibility of the knowledge that it is itself
the destroyed as well as the destroyer. Necessity is the kingdom
of nature; freedom is the kingdom of grace.
Now because, as we have seen, that self-suppression of the
will proceeds from knowledge, and all knowledge is involuntary,
that denial of will also, that entrance into freedom, cannot be
forcibly attained to by intention or design, but proceeds from the
inmost relation of knowing and volition in the man, and therefore
comes suddenly, as if spontaneously from without. This is why
the Church has called it the work of grace; and that it still regards
it as independent of the acceptance of grace corresponds to the
fact that the effect of the quieter is finally a free act of will.
And because, in consequence of such a work of grace, the whole
nature of man is changed and reversed from its foundation, so
that he no longer wills anything of all that he previously willed
so intensely, so that it is as if a new man actually took the place
of the old, the Church has called this consequence of the work of
grace the new birth. For what it calls the natural man, to which
it denies all capacity for good, is just the will to live, which must
be denied if deliverance from an existence such as ours is to be
attained. Behind our existence lies something else, which is only
accessible to us if we have shaken off this world.
Having regard, not to the individuals according to the principle
of sufficient reason, but to the Idea of man in its unity, Christian
theology symbolises nature, the assertion of the will to live in
Adam, whose sin, inherited by us, i.e., our unity with him in the
Idea, which is represented in time by the bond of procreation,
makes us all partakers of suffering and eternal death. On the
other hand, it symbolises grace, the denial of the will, salvation,
[524] in the incarnate God, who, as free from all sin, that is, from all
willing of life, cannot, like us, have proceeded from the most
pronounced assertion of the will, nor can he, like us, have a body
which is through and through simply concrete will, manifestation
of the will; but born of a pure virgin, he has only a phantom
body. This last is the doctrine of the Docetæ, i.e., certain Church
Fathers, who in this respect are very consistent. It is especially
taught by Apelles, against whom and his followers Tertullian
wrote. But even Augustine comments thus on the passage, Rom.
viii. 3, “God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh:”
“Non enim caro peccati erat, quæ non de carnali delectatione
nata erat: sed tamen inerat ei similitudo carnis peccati, quia
mortalis caro erat” (Liber 83, quæst. qu. 66). He also teaches
in his work entitled “Opus Imperfectum,” i. 47, that inherited
sin is both sin and punishment at once. It is already present
in new-born children, but only shows itself if they grow up.
Yet the origin of this sin is to be referred to the will of the
sinner. This sinner was Adam, but we all existed in him; Adam
became miserable, and in him we have all become miserable.
Certainly the doctrine of original sin (assertion of the will) and of
salvation (denial of the will) is the great truth which constitutes
the essence of Christianity, while most of what remains is only
the clothing of it, the husk or accessories. Therefore Jesus Christ
ought always to be conceived in the universal, as the symbol or
personification of the denial of the will to live, but never as an
individual, whether according to his mythical history given in the
Gospels, or according to the probably true history which lies at
the foundation of this. For neither the one nor the other will easily
satisfy us entirely. It is merely the vehicle of that conception
for the people, who always demand something actual. That in
recent times Christianity has forgotten its true significance, and
degenerated into dull optimism, does not concern us here.
[525] It is further an original and evangelical doctrine of
Christianity—which Augustine, with the consent of the leaders
519
of the Church, defended against the platitudes of the Pelagians,

and which it was the principal aim of Luther's endeavour to
purify from error and re-establish, as he expressly declares in
his book, “De Servo Arbitrio,”—the doctrine that the will is not
free, but originally subject to the inclination to evil. Therefore
according to this doctrine the deeds of the will are always sinful
and imperfect, and can never fully satisfy justice; and, finally,
these works can never save us, but faith alone, a faith which itself
does not spring from resolution and free will, but from the work
of grace, without our co-operation, comes to us as from without.
Not only the dogmas referred to before, but also this last
genuine evangelical dogma belongs to those which at the present
day an ignorant and dull opinion rejects as absurd or hides.
For, in spite of Augustine and Luther, it adheres to the vulgar
Pelagianism, which the rationalism of the day really is, and treats
as antiquated those deeply significant dogmas which are peculiar
and essential to Christianity in the strictest sense; while, on the
other hand, it holds fast and regards as the principal matter only
the dogma that originates in Judaism, and has been retained from
it, and is merely historically connected with Christianity.91 We,
91
How truly this is the case may be seen from the fact that all the contradictions
and inconceivabilities contained in the Christian dogmatics, consistently
systematised by Augustine, which have led to the Pelagian insipidity which is
opposed to them, vanish as soon as we abstract from the fundamental Jewish
dogma, and recognize that man is not the work of another, but of his own will.
Then all is at once clear and correct: then there is no need of freedom in the
operari, for it lies in the esse; and there also lies the sin as original sin. The
work of grace is, however, our own. To the rationalistic point of view of the
day, on the contrary, many doctrines of the Augustinian dogmatics, founded on
the New Testament, appear quite untenable, and indeed revolting; for example,
predestination. Accordingly Christianity proper is rejected, and a return is
made to crude Judaism. But the miscalculation or the original weakness of
Christian dogmatics lies—where it is never sought—precisely in that which is
withdrawn from all investigation as established and certain. Take this away
and the whole of dogmatics is rational; for this dogma destroys theology as
it does all other sciences. If any one studies the Augustinian theology in the
[526] however, recognise in the doctrine referred to above the truth

completely agreeing with the result of our own investigations.
We see that true virtue and holiness of disposition have their
origin not in deliberate choice (works), but in knowledge (faith);
just as we have in like manner developed it from our leading
thought. If it were works, which spring from motives and
deliberate intention, that led to salvation, then, however one may
turn it, virtue would always be a prudent, methodical, far-seeing
egoism. But the faith to which the Christian Church promises
salvation is this: that as through the fall of the first man we are all
partakers of sin and subject to death and perdition, through the
divine substitute, through grace and the taking upon himself of
our fearful guilt, we are all saved, without any merit of our own
(of the person); since that which can proceed from the intentional
(determined by motives) action of the person, works, can never
justify us, from its very nature, just because it is intentional,
action induced by motives, opus operatum. Thus in this faith
books “De Civitate Dei” (especially in the Fourteenth Book), he experiences

something analogous to the feeling of one who tries to make a body stand
whose centre of gravity falls outside it; however he may turn it and place it, it
always tumbles over again. So here, in spite of all the efforts and sophisms of
Augustine, the guilt and misery of the world always falls back on God, who
made everything and everything that is in everything, and also knew how all
things would go. That Augustine himself was conscious of the difficulty, and
puzzled by it, I have already shown in my prize-essay on the Freedom of the
Will (ch. iv. pp. 66-68 of the first and second editions). In the same way,
the contradiction between the goodness of God and the misery of the world,
and also between the freedom of the will and the foreknowledge of God, is
the inexhaustible theme of a controversy which lasted nearly a hundred years
between the Cartesians, Malebranche, Leibnitz, Bayle, Clarke, Arnauld, and
many others. The only dogma which was regarded as fixed by all parties was
the existence and attributes of God, and they all unceasingly move in a circle,
because they seek to bring these things into harmony, i.e., to solve a sum that
will not come right, but always shows a remainder at some new place whenever
we have concealed it elsewhere. But it does not occur to any one to seek for
the source of the difficulty in the fundamental assumption, although it palpably
obtrudes itself. Bayle alone shows that he saw this.
521
there is implied, first of all, that our condition is originally [527]

and essentially an incurable one, from which we need salvation;
then, that we ourselves essentially belong to evil, and are so
firmly bound to it that our works according to law and precept,
i.e., according to motives, can never satisfy justice nor save
us; but salvation is only obtained through faith, i.e., through a
changed mode of knowing, and this faith can only come through
grace, thus as from without. This means that the salvation is one
which is quite foreign to our person, and points to a denial and
surrender of this person necessary to salvation. Works, the result
of the law as such, can never justify, because they are always
action following upon motives. Luther demands (in his book “De
Libertate Christiana”) that after the entrance of faith the good
works shall proceed from it entirely of themselves, as symptoms,
as fruits of it; yet by no means as constituting in themselves a
claim to merit, justification, or reward, but taking place quite
voluntarily and gratuitously. So we also hold that from the ever-
clearer penetration of the principium individuationis proceeds,
first, merely free justice, then love, extending to the complete
abolition of egoism, and finally resignation or denial of the will.
I have here introduced these dogmas of Christian theology,
which in themselves are foreign to philosophy, merely for the
purpose of showing that the ethical doctrine which proceeds
from our whole investigation, and is in complete agreement and
connection with all its parts, although new and unprecedented
in its expression, is by no means so in its real nature, but fully
agrees with the Christian dogmas properly so called, and indeed,
as regards its essence, was contained and present in them. It
also agrees quite as accurately with the doctrines and ethical
teachings of the sacred books of India, which in their turn are
presented in quite different forms. At the same time the calling
to mind of the dogmas of the Christian Church serves to explain
and illustrate the apparent contradiction between the necessity [528]
of all expressions of character when motives are presented (the
kingdom of Nature) on the one hand, and the freedom of the

will in itself, to deny itself, and abolish the character with all the
necessity of the motives based upon it (the kingdom of grace) on
the other hand.
§ 71. I now end the general account of ethics, and with it
the whole development of that one thought which it has been
my object to impart; and I by no means desire to conceal here
an objection which concerns this last part of my exposition, but
rather to point out that it lies in the nature of the question, and
that it is quite impossible to remove it. It is this, that after our
investigation has brought us to the point at which we have before
our eyes perfect holiness, the denial and surrender of all volition,
and thus the deliverance from a world whose whole existence we
have found to be suffering, this appears to us as a passing away
into empty nothingness.
On this I must first remark, that the conception of nothing
is essentially relative, and always refers to a definite something
which it negatives. This quality has been attributed (by Kant)
merely to the nihil privativum, which is indicated by - as opposed
to +, which -, from an opposite point of view, might become
+, and in opposition to this nihil privativum the nihil negativum
has been set up, which would in every reference be nothing,
and as an example of this the logical contradiction which does
away with itself has been given. But more closely considered, no
absolute nothing, no proper nihil negativum is even thinkable;
but everything of this kind, when considered from a higher
standpoint or subsumed under a wider concept, is always merely
a nihil privativum. Every nothing is thought as such only in
relation to something, and presupposes this relation, and thus
also this something. Even a logical contradiction is only a
relative nothing. It is no thought of the reason, but it is not on that
[529] account an absolute nothing; for it is a combination of words;
it is an example of the unthinkable, which is necessary in logic
in order to prove the laws of thought. Therefore if for this end
523
such an example is sought, we will stick to the nonsense as the

positive which we are in search of, and pass over the sense as
the negative. Thus every nihil negativum, if subordinated to a
higher concept, will appear as a mere nihil privativum or relative
nothing, which can, moreover, always exchange signs with what
it negatives, so that that would then be thought as negation, and it
itself as assertion. This also agrees with the result of the difficult
dialectical investigation of the meaning of nothing which Plato
gives in the “Sophist” (pp. 277-287): ¤·½ Ä¿Å ÄµÁ¿Å ÆÅÃ¹½
±À¿´µ¹¾±½ÄµÂ ¿ÅÃ±½ Äµ, º±¹ º±Ä±ºµºµÁ¼±Ä¹Ã¼µ½·½ µÀ¹ À±½Ä±
Ä± ¿½Ä± ÀÁ¿Â ±»»·»±, Ä¿ ÀÁ¿Â Ä¿ ¿½ º±ÃÄ¿Å ¼¿Á¹¿Å ±ÅÄ·Â
±½Ä¹Ä¹¸µ¼µ½¿½, µÄ¿»¼·Ã±¼µ½ µ¹Àµ¹½, aÂ ±ÅÄ¿ Ä¿ÅÄ¿ µÃÄ¹½ ¿½ÄÉÂ
Ä¿ ¼· ¿½ (Cum enim ostenderemus, alterius ipsius naturam esse
perque omnia entia divisam atque dispersam in vicem; tunc
partem ejus oppositam ei, quod cujusque ens est, esse ipsum
revera non ens asseruimus).
That which is generally received as positive, which we call
the real, and the negation of which the concept nothing in its
most general significance expresses, is just the world as idea,
which I have shown to be the objectivity and mirror of the will.
Moreover, we ourselves are just this will and this world, and to
them belongs the idea in general, as one aspect of them. The
form of the idea is space and time, therefore for this point of view
all that is real must be in some place and at some time. Denial,
abolition, conversion of the will, is also the abolition and the
vanishing of the world, its mirror. If we no longer perceive it in
this mirror, we ask in vain where it has gone, and then, because it
has no longer any where and when, complain that it has vanished
into nothing.
A reversed point of view, if it were possible for us, would [530]
reverse the signs and show the real for us as nothing, and that
nothing as the real. But as long as we ourselves are the will to live,
this last—nothing as the real—can only be known and signified
by us negatively, because the old saying of Empedocles, that like
can only be known by like, deprives us here of all knowledge,

as, conversely, upon it finally rests the possibility of all our
actual knowledge, i.e., the world as idea; for the world is the
self-knowledge of the will.
If, however, it should be absolutely insisted upon that in some
way or other a positive knowledge should be attained of that
which philosophy can only express negatively as the denial of
the will, there would be nothing for it but to refer to that state
which all those who have attained to complete denial of the
will have experienced, and which has been variously denoted
by the names ecstasy, rapture, illumination, union with God,
and so forth; a state, however, which cannot properly be called
knowledge, because it has not the form of subject and object, and
is, moreover, only attainable in one's own experience and cannot
be further communicated.
We, however, who consistently occupy the standpoint of
philosophy, must be satisfied here with negative knowledge,
content to have reached the utmost limit of the positive. We
have recognised the inmost nature of the world as will, and all its
phenomena as only the objectivity of will; and we have followed
this objectivity from the unconscious working of obscure forces
of Nature up to the completely conscious action of man. Therefore
we shall by no means evade the consequence, that with the free
denial, the surrender of the will, all those phenomena are also
abolished; that constant strain and effort without end and without
rest at all the grades of objectivity, in which and through which
the world consists; the multifarious forms succeeding each other
in gradation; the whole manifestation of the will; and, finally,
also the universal forms of this manifestation, time and space,
[531] and also its last fundamental form, subject and object; all are
abolished. No will: no idea, no world.
Before us there is certainly only nothingness. But that which
resists this passing into nothing, our nature, is indeed just the
will to live, which we ourselves are as it is our world. That
525
we abhor annihilation so greatly, is simply another expression

of the fact that we so strenuously will life, and are nothing but
this will, and know nothing besides it. But if we turn our glance
from our own needy and embarrassed condition to those who
have overcome the world, in whom the will, having attained to
perfect self-knowledge, found itself again in all, and then freely
denied itself, and who then merely wait to see the last trace
of it vanish with the body which it animates; then, instead of
the restless striving and effort, instead of the constant transition
from wish to fruition, and from joy to sorrow, instead of the
never-satisfied and never-dying hope which constitutes the life
of the man who wills, we shall see that peace which is above
all reason, that perfect calm of the spirit, that deep rest, that
inviolable confidence and serenity, the mere reflection of which
in the countenance, as Raphael and Correggio have represented
it, is an entire and certain gospel; only knowledge remains, the
will has vanished. We look with deep and painful longing upon
this state, beside which the misery and wretchedness of our
own is brought out clearly by the contrast. Yet this is the only
consideration which can afford us lasting consolation, when, on
the one hand, we have recognised incurable suffering and endless
misery as essential to the manifestation of will, the world; and,
on the other hand, see the world pass away with the abolition of
will, and retain before us only empty nothingness. Thus, in this
way, by contemplation of the life and conduct of saints, whom it
is certainly rarely granted us to meet with in our own experience,
but who are brought before our eyes by their written history,
and, with the stamp of inner truth, by art, we must banish the [532]
dark impression of that nothingness which we discern behind
all virtue and holiness as their final goal, and which we fear as
children fear the dark; we must not even evade it like the Indians,
through myths and meaningless words, such as reabsorption in
Brahma or the Nirvana of the Buddhists. Rather do we freely
acknowledge that what remains after the entire abolition of will
is for all those who are still full of will certainly nothing; but,
conversely, to those in whom the will has turned and has denied
itself, this our world, which is so real, with all its suns and
milky-ways—is nothing.92
92
This is also just the Prajna—Paramita of the Buddhists, the “beyond all
knowledge,” i.e., the point at which subject and object are no more. (Cf. J. J.
Schmidt, “Ueber das Mahajana und Pratschna-Paramita.”)
Footnotes
***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
WORLD AS WILL AND IDEA (VOL. 1 OF 3)***
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The World As Will and Idea (Vol. 1 of 3)

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of The World As Will And Idea

(Vol. 1 of 3) by Arthur Schopenhauer

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost

Title: The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 1 of 3)

Author: Arthur Schopenhauer

Release Date: December 27, 2011 [Ebook 38427]

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK

been grasped. A book, however, must always have a first and a

occasional repetition. Indeed the structure of the whole, which

essay a somewhat better expression, chiefly by freeing it from

still young century enjoys over previous ones, because I believe

As I have absolutely nothing to advance against these

Not to my contemporaries, not to my compatriots—to mankind

history of literature proves, everything of real value required a

unheeded through such a philosophical riot as through the winter

to be expected, can be demanded, or is to be had for gold but

received its proper name, it would be called empty bombast and

very short explanatory additions inserted here and there. Only

by the meditation of many years—meditation which is required

some kind of connection, though a somewhat looser one, the gaps

never heard more of him than a hasty, impatient lecture, or an

the broad, high, finely-arched brow, from under which shine

One word more for the professors of philosophy. I have

further commended itself by the great ease of carrying it out,

a means of subsistence, whose pole star is truth alone the [xxx]

will answer, that is, until to ignore is taken to imply ignorance;

First Aspect. The Idea Subordinated To The

Sors de l'enfance, ami réveille toi!

—Jean Jacques Rousseau.

it may be, abstract or intuitive, pure or empirical, is possible and

adopted in consequence of some arbitrary abstraction. And yet

is presupposed by them; it has therefore neither multiplicity nor

necessary relation to each other, rests only in it, is in fact merely

[008] my essay on the principle of sufficient reason, I have treated

the doctrine of the mere accidents of the one substance which

possibly conceive it as having any other meaning. Only as active

of all co-existence in space and change in time, so long as each

something which is present along with what is permanent, while

every animal body experiences, are immediately known, that is,

have to be said again; but as I have almost as much disinclination

wholly and for ever determined by the subject; that is to say,

world of perception raises in the observer no question or doubt

long dream (life) has throughout complete connection according

H½É ³Å½ !¼±Â ¿Å´µ½ ¿½Ä±Â ±»»¿, À»·½

(Nos enim, quicunque vivimus, nihil aliud esse comperio

“We are such stuff

point to a similar continuity in itself. If, therefore, we consider

explanation of our bodies as such; for the thing in itself is known

the subject which certain bodies possess. The mere modification

following on stimuli is the distinctive characteristic of plant-life.

such also was the proof of Newton's calculations, and Lavoisier's

and frustrating intrigues and machinations, or fitly disposing

as its cause, i.e., sufficient for perception, for the apprehension

the manifestations of instinct, a faculty which is quite distinct

[031] appearance of a stick dipped in water; the reflections in spherical

for the antithesis of object and subject is its primary, universal

for it is divided into two parts, firstly, transcendental idealism,

is simple materialism. It regards matter, and with it time and

fishes, and the unorganised before all that is organised; that,