Politeness is prudence and consequently rudeness is folly. To make enemies by being wantonly and unnecessarily rude is as crazy as setting one's house on fire. For politeness is admittedly false coin, like a counter; to be niggardly with it shows a want of intelligence, whereas to be generous with it is prudent. All nations end a letter with votre tres-humble serviteur, your most obedient servant, [67] suo devotissimo servo. Only the Germans refrain from using the word' servant', because, of course, it is not true! On the other hand, to carry politeness to the point of sacrificing one's interests is like giving gold coins instead of counters. Wax, by nature hard and brittle, becomes so pliable with a little warmth that it assumes any desired shape. In the same way, through some politeness and friendliness, even the peevish and malevolent can be made manageable and accommodating. Accordingly, politeness is to man what warmth is to wax.
Of course, politeness is difficult in so far as it requires us to show to everyone the greatest respect, whereas most people merit none. Again, we have to feign the liveliest interest in them, whereas we must be very glad not to have anything to do with them. To combine politeness with pride is a masterpiece.
We should be much less upset over insults, as being really always expressions of disrespect, if, on the one hand, we did not cherish a wholly exaggerated notion of our own value and dignity and thus an excessive haughtiness and, on the other, were quite clear as to what one man in his heart usually thinks of another. What a glaring contrast there is between the sensitiveness of most people over the slightest hint of any blame attaching to them, and what they would hear if the remarks of their friends about them came to their ears! On the contrary, we should bear in mind that ordinary politeness is only a grinning mask; we should then not raise an outcry when it is shifted a little or is removed for a moment. But when a man is positively rude, it is as if he had cast off all his clothes and stood before us in puris naturalibus. [68] Of course, like most people in this condition, he cuts a poor figure.
(37) For what we do or omit to do we should not take someone else as our model because position and circumstances are never the same and difference in character also gives to an action a different touch and tone. Hence duo cum faciunt idem, non est idem. [69] We must act in accordance with our own character after ripe reflection and clear thought. Therefore in practical affairs, originality is indispensable, otherwise what we do is not in keeping with what we are.
(38) We should not join issue with anyone's opinion, but must remember that, if we tried to talk him out of all the absurdities he believes, we might live to be as old as Methuselah without getting the better of him.
In conversation we should also refrain from correcting people, however well meant our remarks may be; for it is easy to offend but difficult, if not impossible, to make amends.
If the absurdities of a conversation we happen to hear begin to annoy us, we must imagine that it is a scene in a comedy between two fools. Probatum est.70 Whoever has come into the world seriously to instruct it in the most important things, can count himself lucky if he escapes with a whole skin.
(39) Whoever wants his judgement to be believed, should express it coolly and dispassionately; for all vehemence springs from the will. And so the judgement might be attributed to the will and not to knowledge, which by its nature is cold. Now since the radical element in man is the will, whereas knowledge is merely secondary and additional, people will sooner believe that the judgement has sprung from the excited will than that the excitation of the will has arisen from the judgement.
(40) Even when we are fully entitled to do so, we should not be tempted to praise ourselves. For vanity is something so ordinary, but merit so unusual that whenever we appear to praise ourselves, although only indirectly, everyone will wager a hundred to one that ours is the language of vanity and that we have not enough sense to see the absurdity of the thing. Yet in spite of everything, Bacon may not be entirely wrong when he says that the semper aliquid haeret applies not only to slander but also to self-praise, and therefore recommends the latter in moderate doses. (Cf. De augmentis scitntiarum, Leiden, 1645, lib. VIII, c. 2, pp. 644 seq.) [71]
(41) If we suspect that a man is lying, we should pretend to believe him; for then he becomes bold and assured, lies more vigorously, and is unmasked. If, on the other hand, we notice that he has let slip part of a truth he would like to conceal, we should look as though we did not believe him. Provoked by the contradiction, he may follow up with the rear-guard of the whole truth.
(42) We have to regard all our personal affairs as secrets and must remain complete strangers, even to our good friends, in respect of everything about us which they cannot see with their own eyes. For in the course of time and with changed circumstances their knowledge of the most harmless things about us may be to our disadvantage. In general, it is more advisable to show our discernment by what we refrain from saying than by what we say. The former is a matter of prudence, the latter of vanity. The opportunities for both occur equally often; but we frequently prefer the fleeting satisfaction afforded by the latter to the permanent advantage secured by the former. Even the feeling of relief which occurs to lively people, when they speak aloud to themselves, should not be indulged lest it become a habit. For in this way, thought establishes such friendly terms with speech that even speaking to others gradually becomes like thinking aloud. Prudence, on the other hand, requires that we maintain a wide gulf between what we think and what we say.
Occasionally we imagine that others cannot possibly believe something concerning us, whereas it does not occur to them at all to doubt it. Yet if, through our action, this does occur to them, they are no longer able to believe it. But we often betray ourselves merely because we think it impossible for people not to notice this; just as we throw ourselves down from a height on account of giddiness, in other words, because we think it is impossible here to stand firm; the agony of standing here is so great that we think it better to cut it short. This vain imagining is called vertigo.
On the other hand, we should realize that even those who do not display any acuteness and acumen in other respects are experts in the algebra of other people's affairs. Here by means of a single given quantity, they solve the most complicated problems. If, for example, we tell them about a former event, without mentioning any names or giving any other descriptions of persons, we should be careful not to introduce any absolutely positive and particular circumstance, however insignificant, such as a place, a point of time, the name of someone of secondary importance, or anything else even only indirectly connected with it. For in this way they at once have a quantity positively given whereby their algebraical acumen discovers all the rest. The enthusiasm of curiosity is here so great that, by virtue thereof, the will spurs on the intellect and thus drives it to the attainment of the remotest results. For however insusceptible and indifferent men are to universal truths, they are keen on those that are individual and particular.
In accordance with all this, all the teachers of wordly wisdom have most urgently and with many different arguments recommended reticence and reserve; and so I can let the matter rest with what has already been said. I will, however, give one or two Arabian maxims that are particularly striking and little known. 'Do not tell your friend what your enemy ought not to know.' 'If I maintain silence about my secret, it is my prisoner; if I let it slip from my tongue, I am its prisoner.' 'On the tree of silence hangs the fruit of peace.'
(43) No money is spent to better advantage than that of which we have allowed ourselves to be defrauded; for with it we have directly purchased prudence.
(44) If possible, we should not feel animosity for anyone; yet we should note and remember everyone's procedes or actions in order to estimate his worth, at any rate in regard to ourselves, and accordingly to regulate our conduct and attitude towards him, always convinced that character is unalterable. To forget at any time the bad traits of a man's character is like throwing away hard-earned money. But in this way, we protect ourselves from foolish familiarity and foolish friendship.
'Neither love nor hate' contains a half of all wordly wisdom; 'say nothing and believe nothing' contains the other half. But, of course, we shall be only too glad to turn our back on a world where such rules and the following are necessary.
(45) Hatred or anger in what we say or in the way we look is futile, dangerous, imprudent, ridiculous, and common. Therefore we must never show anger or hatred except in our actions. We shall be able to do the latter more effectively in so far as we have avoided the former. It is only cold-blooded animals that are poisonous.
(46) Parler sans accent. [72] The object of this old rule of the worldly wise is that we should leave to the intelligence of others to discover what we have said. Their intelligence is slow and before it has arrived at our meaning we are off. On the other hand, parler avec accent is equivalent to addressing their feelings, and everything turns out the very opposite. If we are polite in manner and friendly in tone, we can without immediate risk be really rude to many a man.
D. Our Attitude to the Ways of the World and to Fate
(47) Whatever form human life assumes, there are always the same elements and therefore it is essentially the same everywhere, whether it is passed in the cottage or at court, in the cloister or the army. Its events, adventures, successes, and misfortunes may be ever so varied, yet it is with life as with confectionery; there is a great variety of things, odd in shape and diverse in colour, but all are made from the same paste; and what has happened to one man resembles much more what has befallen another than we think from hearing the different versions. The events of our life are like the pictures in a kaleidoscope wherein we see something different at every turn; yet in reality we have before us always the same thing.
(48) An ancient writer very pertinently remarks that there are three forces in the world: [x, x, x,] prudence, strength, and luck. I believe the last to be the most powerful; for our life can be compared to the course of a ship. Fate, [x], secunda aut adversa fortuna, [73] plays the part of the wind in that it speeds us on our course or plunges us a long way back; against this our own efforts and exertions are of little avail. These play the part of the oars; if they have carried us forward some distance through long hours of toil, a sudden gust of wind can cast us back just as far. If, on the other hand, the wind is favourable, it can carry us so far forward that we do not need to use the oars. The power of luck is admirably expressed by a Spanish proverb: Da ventura a tu hijo, y echa la en el mar (give your son luck and cast him into the sea).
Chance is indeed a malignant power to which we should leave as little as possible. Yet which of all the givers is the only one who, in giving, at the same time most clearly shows us that we have no claim or title to his gifts; that for them we have certainly not to thank our merits and deserts but simply his goodness and grace; and that these alone permit us to cherish the joyful hope of receiving, in all humility, many another unmerited gift? Such a giver is chance. Chance understands the royal art of making clear to us that all merit is powerless and unavailing against his favour and grace.
When we look back at the course of our life; when we survey our 'labyrinthine way of error', [74] and now must see so many cases in which our luck failed, so many instances of misfortune, we can easily go too far in reproaching ourselves. For the course of our life is certainly not our own work, but the product of two factors, the series of events and that of our resolves, which are always acting on and modifying each other. Moreover, there is the fact that in both of these our horizon is always very limited, since we cannot state our resolves far in advance and still less are we able to foresee future events; but in reality only the resolves and events of the present are actually known to us. Therefore as long as our goal is still very remote, we cannot steer straight towards it, but must direct our course only approximately and by conjecture; and so we must often tack about and alter course. Thus all we can do is to make our decisions always in accordance with our present circumstances, hoping to be able to bring nearer to us the principal goal. Thus events and our chief aims can in most cases be compared to two forces that pull in different directions, their resultant diagonal being the course of our life. Terence has said: In vita est hominum quasi cum ludas tesseris: si illud, quod maxime opus est jactu, non cadit, illud quod cecidit forte, id arte ut corrigas. [75] Here he must have had in mind a kind of backgammon. More briefly we can say that fate shuffles the cards and we play. For the purpose of expressing my present remarks, the following simile would appear to be the most suitable. Life is like a game of chess; we draw up a plan, but this remains conditioned by what in the game the opponent, in life fate, will be inclined to do. The modifications that our plan thereby undergoes are often so great that when it is being carried out several of its fundamental features are scarcely recognizable.
Moreover, there is in the course of our lives something above and beyond all else, namely a trivial truth, only too frequently confirmed, that we are often more foolish than we think. On the other hand, we are often wiser than we ourselves imagine, a discovery made only by those who in the event have been so and even then have taken a long time to make it. There is in us something wiser than our head. Thus in the big moves of our life, in the important steps of its course, we act not so much from a clear knowledge of what is right as from an inner impulse, one might say instinct, that comes from the depths of our very being. If afterwards we criticize our actions in the light of clear conceptions that are inadequate, acquired, or even borrowed, in the light of general rules, of other people's examples, and so on, without sufficiently weighing the maxim 'what suits one need not suit all', then we shall easily do ourselves an injustice. But in the end, it is seen who was right and only the man who has luckily attained old age is capable of judging the matter both subjectively and objectively.
Perhaps that inner impulse is under the unconscious guidance of prophetic dreams that are forgotten when we are awake. In this way they give to our life an evenness of tone and dramatic unity such as could never be given to it by our conscious brain that is so often irresolute, unstable, rambling, and easily altered. In consequence of such dreams, for instance, the man who has a vocation for great achievements of a definite kind inwardly and secretly feels this from his youth up and works in this direction, just as do bees in the building of their hive. But for everyone it is this that Baltasar Gracian calls la gran sinderesis, the great instinctive protection of himself, without which he is lost. To act in accordance with abstract principles is difficult and succeeds only after much practice, and even then not invariably; moreover they are often inadequate. On the other hand, everyone has certain innate concrete principles that are in his very blood and marrow, since they are the result of all his thinking, feeling, and willing. Usually he does not know them in the abstract, but only when he looks back on his life does he become aware that he has always observed them and has been drawn by them as by an invisible thread. According as they are, so will they lead him to his good or adverse fortune.
(49) We should constantly bear in mind the effect of time and the transient nature of things. Therefore in the case of everything now taking place, we should at once vividly picture to ourselves its opposite; thus in prosperity misfortune, in friendship enmity, in fine weather bad weather, in love hatred, in confidence and frankness betrayal and regret, and so also in the reverse case. This would give us a permanent source of true wordly wisdom, since we should always remain thoughtful and not be so easily deceived. In most cases we should thus have anticipated merely the effect of time. But possibly to no form of knowledge is experience so indispensable as to a correct appreciation of the instability and fluctuation of things. Just because every state or condition exists for the time of its duration necessarily and thus with absolute right, every year, every month, or every day looks as if it could now at last retain the right to exist to all eternity. But none retains it and change alone endures. The prudent man is he who is not deceived by the apparent stability of things and in addition sees in advance the direction that the change will first take.* On the other hand, men as a rule regard as permanent the state of things for the time being or the direction of their course. This is because they see the effects, but do not understand the causes; yet it is these that bear the seed of future changes, whereas the effect that exists solely for those men contains no such seed. They stick to the effects and assume that the causes unknown to them which were able to produce such effects will also be in a position to maintain them. Here they have the advantage that, if they err, they always do so in unison; and so the calamity that hits them as the result of their error is universal, whereas when the thinker has made a mistake, he stands alone. Here, incidentally, we have a confirmation of my principle that error is always the result of concluding from the consequent to the reason or ground. See World as Will and Representation, vol. i, § 15.
Nevertheless, we should anticipate time only theoretically and by foreseeing its effect, not practically and thus not so that we forestall it and demand prematurely what only time can bring. For whoever does this will discover that there is no worse and more exacting usurer than time; and if time is forced to make advances, it will demand heavier interest than would any Jew. For example, by means of unslaked lime and heat, we can so force a tree that within a few days it will bear leaves, blossom, and fruit; but it will then wither away and die. If a youth tries now to exercise the procreative power of a man, even if only for a few weeks, and wants to do at nineteen what he could very easily do at thirty, time will at any rate give him the advance, but a portion of the strength of his future years, in fact of his life itself, will be the interest. There are illnesses from which we completely recover only by our letting them run their natural course, after which they automatically disappear without leaving a trace. But if we demand to be well now and at once, so too must time here make an advance; the disease is cured, but the interest will be weakness and chronic complaint for the rest of our lives. When in time of war or civil disturbances we need money here and now, we are obliged to sell landed property or government stock for a third of their value, or even less, which we should have received in full had we given time its due and had, therefore, been willing to wait a few years; but we force time to grant an advance. Or we require a sum of money for a long journey; in a year to two we could have set it aside from our income. But we are unwilling to wait; the sum is, therefore, borrowed or sometimes taken from capital; in other words, time must advance the money. The interest will then be a disordered state of our accounts, a permanent and growing deficit from which we shall never be free. This, then, is time's usury; its victims are all those who cannot wait. To try to force the measured pace of time is a most costly undertaking. We should, therefore, guard against owing any interest to time.
(50) A characteristic difference, frequently appearing in everyday life, between ordinary and prudent men is that, when considering and estimating possible dangers, the former merely ask and take into account what of a similar nature has happened already; whereas the latter reflect on what might possibly happen and thus have in mind the words of a Spanish proverb: lo que no acaece en un ano, acaece en un rato (what does not happen within a year may happen within a few minutes). Of course, the difference in question is natural; for to survey what may happen requires discernment, but to see what has happened needs only our senses.
Our maxim, however, should be: sacrifice to evil spirits! In other words, we should not be afraid to spend time, trouble, and money, to put up with formalities and inconvenience, and to go without things, in order to shut the door on the possibility of misfortune. And the greater this may be, the smaller, more remote, and more improbable may be the possibility. The clearest example of this rule is the insurance premium; it is a sacrifice publicly made by all on the altar of evil spirits.
(51) We should not give way to great rejoicings or great lamentation over any incident partly because all things change and this alters its form; and partly because our judgement concerning what is favourable or unfavourable is deceptive. Consequently, almost everyone has at some time lamented over something that afterwards turned out for the best, or rejoiced over something that became the source of his greatest sufferings. The attitude of mind, here recommended to combat this, has been finely expressed by Shakespeare:
I have felt so many quirks of joy and grief
That the first face of neither, on the start,
Can woman me unto't.
-- All's Well that Ends Well, Act III, Sc. 2.)
But in general, whoever remains calm and unruffled in spite of every misfortune, shows that he knows how colossal and thousandfold are the possible evils of life; and therefore he regards what has now occurred as a very small part of what could happen. This is the temperament of the Stoic, in accordance with which we should never conditionis humanae oblitus, [76] but should always bear in mind what a woeful and wretched fate human existence is in general and how innumerable are the evils to which it is exposed. To be reminded of this insight into things, we need only cast a glance around us; wherever we are, we shall soon have before our eyes that struggling, tormenting, and floundering for a bare miserable existence that yields nothing. Accordingly we shall moderate our claims, learn to submit to the imperfection of circumstances and things, and always look out for misfortunes in order to avoid or endure them. For misfortunes, great and small, are the element of our lives and we should, therefore, always bear this in mind. Nevertheless, we should not, for this reason, lament and like a [x] [77] pull a long face with Beresford [78] over the hourly Miseries of Human Life, still less in pulicis morsu Deum invocare. [79] On the contrary, like a [x], [80] we should practise caution by forestalling and averting misfortunes, whether they come from people or things, and should become so refined in this that, like a clever fox, we neatly slip out of the way of every misfortune, great or small (which is in most cases only an awkwardness in disguise.)
A misfortune is for us less hard to bear if we have previously regarded it as possible and, as the saying is, have prepared ourselves to meet it. The main reason for this may be that, if we calmly think over the case as a mere possibility before it has occurred, we survey the extent of the misfortune clearly and in all directions and thus recognize it, at any rate, as finite and visible at a glance. Consequently, when it actually hits us, it cannot affect us with more than its true weight. On the other hand, if we have not thought over the matter and are caught unawares, our terrified mind is unable in the first instance to make a precise estimate of the magnitude of the misfortune. We cannot survey its extent and it easily appears to be incalculable, or at any rate much greater than it really is In the same way, obscurity and uncertainty make every danger appear to be greater than it is in reality. And, of course, there is also the fact that, while we have anticipated the misfortune as possible, we have at the same time thought of measures for obtaining help and consolation or at any rate have accustomed ourselves to a conception of it.
But nothing will better enable us to bear with composure the misfortunes that befall us than the conviction of the truth I have derived and established from its ultimate grounds in my prize-essay' On the Freedom of the Will'. There it says (Pt. Ill, at the end): 'Everything that happens, from the greatest to the smallest, happens with necessity.' For a man is soon able to reconcile himself to what is inevitably necessary; and that knowledge enables him to regard everything, even that which is brought about by the strangest chances, as just as necessary as that which ensues in accordance with the most familiar rules and in complete anticipation. I refer the reader to what I have said about the soothing effect of the knowledge that everything is inevitable and necessary (World as Will and Representation, vol. i, § 55). Whoever is imbued with this knowledge, will first of all willingly do what he can, but will then readily suffer what he must.
The petty misfortunes that vex us every hour may be regarded as intended to keep us in practice so that the strength to endure great misfortunes may not be wholly dissipated in prosperity. We must be a horny Siegfried [81] against the daily annoyances, the petty frictions and dissensions in human intercourse, trifling offences, the insolence of others, their gossip, scandal, and so on. In other words, we must not feel them at all, much less take them to heart and brood over them. On the contrary, we should not be touched by any of these things and should kick them away like stones that lie in our path. We should certainly not take them up and seriously reflect and ruminate on them.
(52) But what men usually call fate are often only their own stupid actions. Therefore we cannot too often take to heart the fine passage in Homer (Iliad, XXIII. 313ff.) where he recommends [x], i.e. prudent reflection. For if wicked actions are atoned for only in the next world, stupid ones are already atoned for in this, although now and then mercy may be shown.
Not ferocity but cunning has a terrible and dangerous look; so surely is man's brain a more terrible weapon than the lion's claw.
The perfect man of the world would be the one who was never irresolute and never in a hurry.
(53) Next to prudence, however, courage is a quality essential to our happiness. Of course, we cannot give ourselves either the one or the other, but inherit the former from our mother and the latter from our father. Yet whatever exists of these qualities may be helped by resolution and practice. In this world where 'the dice are loaded', we need a temper of iron, armour against fate, and weapons against mankind. For the whole of life is a struggle, every step is contested, and Voltaire rightly says: on ne reussit dans ce monde qu' a la pointe de l'epee, et on meurt les armes a la main. [82] It is, therefore, a cowardly soul who shrinks, laments, and loses heart, when clouds gather or even only appear on the horizon. On the contrary, our motto should be:
tu ne cede malis, sed contra audentior ito. [83]
So long as the issue of any dangerous affair is still in doubt and there is still a possibility that it may turn out successfully, we should not think of nervousness or hesitation, but only of resistance; just as we should not despair of the weather so long as there is still a blue patch in the sky. In fact we should be induced to say:
Si fractus illabatur orbis,
Impavidum ferient ruinae. [84]
The whole of life itself, not to mention its blessings, is still not worth such a cowardly trembling and shrinking of the heart:
Quocirca vivite fortes,
Fortiaque adversis opponite pectora rebus. [85]
And yet even here an excess is possible, for courage can degenerate into recklessness. Even a certain amount of timidity is necessary for our existence in the world and cowardice is merely the transgression of this measure. Bacon has admirably expressed this in his etymological explanation of the Terror panicus which is far superior to the older one that is preserved for us by Plutarch (On Isis and Osiris, c. 14). Thus he derives it from Pan, the personification of nature, and says: Natura enim rerum omnibus viventibus indidit metum, ac formidinem, vitae atque essentiae suae conservatricem, ac mala ingruentia vitantem et depellentem. Verumtamen eadem natura modum tenere nescia est: sed timoribus salutaribus semper vanos et inanes admiscet, adeo ut omnia (si intus conspici darentur) Panicis terroribus plenissima sint, praesertim humana. [86] (De sapientia veterum, lib. VI.) Moreover, the characteristic feature of the Terror panicus is that it is not clearly conscious of its reasons, but presupposes rather than knows them; in fact, if necessary, it urges fear itself as the reason of fear.
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Notes:
1 ['Happiness is only a dream and pain is real.']
2 ['To get through life, to overcome life'.]
3 [' If only we get over it!']
4 ['We must try to get along as well as we can.']
5 [' He will get through the world.']
6 [' Leave well alone!']
7 ['The chooser of the golden mean is certainly far removed from the squalor of the broken hovel and far enough from the envied splendours of the prince's palace. Caught by the storm, the crown of the mighty pine sways in the wind, the tallest towers crash heavily down, and the mountain tops are struck by thunderbolts.' (Horace, Odes, n. 10. 5-12.)]
8 [' No human affair is worth our troubling ourselves very much about it.']
9 ['Unceremoniously'.]
10 ['Society, circles, salons, what is called high society, is a miserable play, a bad opera, without interest, which is kept going for a while by the stage effects, the costumes, and the decorations.']
11 ['Why do you wear out your soul that is too weak for eternal plans?']
12 [i.e. Pamina.]
13 ['No other happiness than learning do I feel.']
14 ['Know thyself.']
15 ['But however much it mortified us, we will let bygones be bygones; and hard as it may be for us, we will subdue the peevishness in our hearts.' (Homer, Iliad, XVIII. 112f.)]
16 ['This lies in the lap of the gods.' (Homer, Iliad, XVII. 514.)]
17 ['Regard each particular day as a special life.' (Seneca, Epistulae, 101, 10.)]
18 ['On nothing have I set my hopes.']
19 ['It is difficult to keep quiet when one has nothing to do.']
* Just as our body is covered with clothes, so is our mind with lies. Our words, our actions, our whole nature are deceitful; and only through this veil can our true sentiments sometimes be guessed, just as the shape of the body is guessed through the clothes.
20 ['All my possessions I carry with me.']
21 ['Happiness belongs to those who are easily contented.']
22 ['Good form'.)
23 ['When good form appears, good common sense retires.']
24 ['It is impossible for anyone not to be perfectly happy who depends entirely on himself and possesses in himself alone all that he calls his.']
* It is well known that evils are alleviated by the fact that we bear them in common. People seem to regard boredom as one of these and therefore get together in order to be bored in common. Just as the love of life is at bottom only fear of death, so too the urge to be sociable is at bottom not direct. Thus it does not depend on love of society, but on the fear of loneliness, since it is not so much the pleasant company of others which is sought, as rather the dreariness and oppression of being alone, together with the monotony of one's own consciousness, that are avoided. Therefore to escape this, we put up with bad company and tolerate the burden and feeling of restriction that all society necessarily entails. If, on the other hand, a dislike of all this has triumphed and consequently a habit of solitude and an inurement to its immediate impression have arisen so that it no longer produces the effects previously described, then we can always be alone with the greatest ease and without hankering after society. For the need of society is not direct and, on the other hand, we are now accustomed to the wholesome virtues of solitude.
25 ['Stupidity suffers from its own weariness.' (Seneca, Epistulae, 9.)]
26 ['All our trouble comes from our not being able to be alone.']
27 ['Abstemiousness in food guarantees the health of our body, and that in association with men secures the peace of our soul.']
* In this sense, Sadi says in the Gulistan: 'Since this time, we have taken leave of society, and have resolved to follow the path of seclusion. For safety resides in solitude.'
28 ["The earth swarms with people who are not worth talking to.']
29 ['A lonely life have I always sought
(Stream, field, and wood can speak of this),
Fleeing from those dull and feeble spirits,
Through whom I cannot choose the path of light.'
-- Sonnet 221.)][/quote]
30 ['It is sometimes said of a man who lives alone that he does not like society. This is often as if one were to say of a man that he does not like going for a walk because he is not fond of walking at night in the forest of Bondy.']
31 ['Many who on earth wished to enjoy a divine life, have said with one voice: "Lo, then would I wander far off, and remain in the wilderness:" (Psalms 55: 7.)]
32 [Goethe's Faust, Bayard Taylor's translation.]
33 ['Bring yourself to be reasonable.']
34 ['For there is nothing perfect on earth.']
* People's envy shows how unhappy they feel. Their constant attention to the affairs of others shows how heavily time hangs on their hands.
35 ['The Cafe or the New Comedy'.]
36 ['We will find pleasure in what we have got without making comparisons. We shall never be happy if we are worried that someone else is luckier than we.... If you see many who are better off than you, think of how many who are worse off.']
37 ['Companions in misfortune'.]
38 ['Privileged minds have equal rank with sovereigns.']
39 ['Not to set in motion what is at rest.']
40 ['Harness the horse and send him off!']
41 ['Self-tormentor'.]
42 [' Whoever is not chastised is not properly brought up.' 'Spare the rod, spoil the child.']
43 [Schopenhauer uses the English expression 'blue devils' alongside the German die schwarzen Phantasien.]
44 ['Agitated', 'confused', 'dazed', 'bewildered'.]
45 ['To ruin the purpose of life in order to live.']
46 ['If you want to subject everything to yourself, then subject yourself to reason.']
47 ['Bear and forbear.']
48 ['Always read between the lines of what you are doing, and ask the wise men how you may pass your life with an easy mind, so that you may not be tormented by desire, fear, or the hope for things that are of little use.' (Epistles, I. 18. 95-9.)]
49 [' Life consists in movement.']
50 [' It is difficult to keep quiet when one has nothing to do.']
51 ['Every fool has his cap and bells.']
52 [' With a grain of salt.']
53 ['I see thee.']
* Sleep is a morsel of death which we borrow anticipando and for this we restore and renew the life that is exhausted by a day. Le sommeil est un emprunt fait a la mort. Sleep borrows from death for the maintenance of life; or it is the provisional interest of death, death itself being the paying off of the capital. The higher the rate of interest and the more regularly it is paid, the later is the paying off demanded.
54 [From Goethe's Faust, Pt. 1, Bayard Taylor's translation.]
55 ['Indeed this is impossible.']
56 ['Pudendum'.]
57 ['The degree of intellect necessary to please us is a fairly accurate measure of the degree of intellect that we possess.']
* If in men, as they are in most cases, the good outweighed the bad, it would be more advisable to rely on their justice, fairness, gratitude, fidelity, love, or compassion than on their fear. But since the bad outweighs the good, the opposite course is more advisable.
58 ['We can obtain proofs of the nature of a man's character even from trifles.']
59 ['The law is not concerned with trifles.']
60 [' In all wars it is only a question of stealing.']
61 ['Expel nature with a pitchfork, she still comes back.' (Epistles, I. 10. 24.)]
62 ['Everything that is not natural is imperfect.']
63 ['No one can wear a mask for long; sham and pretence rapidly return to their original nature.']
64 ['We beg this freedom for ourselves and likewise grant it to others.' (Horace, Ars poetiea, II.)]
65 ['In the misfortune of our best friends we always find something that does not displease us.']
* It can be said that man has given himself the will, for this is man himself. The intellect, however, is an endowment that he has obtained from heaven, in other words, from eternal and mysterious fate and its necessity whose mere instrument was his mother.
66 ['The only way to be popular is for us to be clad in the skin of the stupidest of animals.']
* For getting on in the world, friends and comrades are by far the most important means. Great abilities, however, make a man proud and thus little inclined to flatter those who have only limited ability and from whom indeed he should, therefore, conceal and never show his own. The consciousness of only limited ability has the opposite effect. It is admirably compatible with a humble, affable, and kindly nature and with a respectful attitude to what is bad, and therefore produces friends and supporters.
What has been said applies not only to the public service, but also to posts of honour and rank and indeed to fame in the learned world. Thus, for example, in the academies near mediocrity is always at the top, whereas men of merit enter at a late hour or never at all; and so it is with everything.
67 [Schopenhauer's own English.]
68 ['Naked'.]
69 ['When two people do the same thing, it is not the same.']
70 ['It is tested and proved.']
71 (Schopenhauer refers to the passage in Bacon's work where it says: 'Just as it is usually said of slander that something always sticks when people boldly slander, so it might be said of self-praise (if it is not entirely shameful and ridiculous) that if we praise ourselves fearlessly, something will always stick.']
72 ['To speak without emphasis'.]
73 ['Favourable or adverse fortune'.]
74 [Goethe's Faust, Pt. I.]
75 ['Human life is like a game of dice. If the dice does not turn up as you want it, then skill must improve what chance has offered.' (Adelphi, IV, 7; II. 739-41.)]
* Chance has so great a scope in all things human that when we try through present sacrifices to prevent a danger that threatens from afar, it often vanishes through an unforeseen state which things assume; and then not only are the sacrifices wasted, but the change brought about by them, with the altered state of things, is now a positive disadvantage. Thus in our precautionary measures, we must not look too far into the future, but must also reckon on chance and boldly face many a danger, hoping that it will pass like many a dark thunder cloud.
76 ['Forget the condition of man.']
77 ['Discontented person'.]
78 [The full title of the work is: 'The Miseries of Human Life; or the last groans of Timothy Testy and Samuel Sensitive, with a few supplementary sighs from Mrs Testy'.]
79 ['To invoke the Deity for every flea-bite'.]
80 [' Prudent and thoughtful person'.]
81 [A reference to Siegfried, the German mythical hero, who encountered many adventures in his youth. His cloak of invisibility gave him the strength of twelve men.]
82 ['In this world we succeed only at the point of the sword and we die with weapons in hand.']
83 ['Do not give way to the evil, but face it more boldly.' (Virgil, Aeneid, VI. 95.)]
84 ['Even if the world collapses over him, the ruins still leave him undismayed.' (Horace, Odes, III. 3. 7-8.)]
85 ['Therefore he lives bravely and presents a bold front to the blows of fate.' (Horace, Satires, II. 2. 135-6.)]
86 ['For the nature of things has infused all living beings with fear and terror as the preserver of their lives and for avoiding and warding off the evils that overtake them. However, this nature is here unable to exercise moderation, but always mixes vain and empty misgivings with those that are wholesome so that all beings, especially human, are full of this panic terror (if we could see into their hearts).']