Chapter XVI: Part 16

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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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 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 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 _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._, 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, 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 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 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 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 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 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 ηθος, and its expression, _i.e._, morals, ηθη. But this word comes from εθος, custom; they chose it in order to express metaphorically the constancy of character through the constancy of custom. Το γαρ ηθος απο του εθους εχει την επωνυμιαν. ηθικε γαρ καλειται δια το εθιζεσθαι (_a voce_ ηθος, _i.e._, _consuetudo_ ηθος _est appellatum: ethica ergo dicta est_ απο του εθιζεσθαι, _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: οἱ δε κατα Ζηνωνα τροπικως; ηθος εστι πηγη βιου αφ᾽ ἡς αἱ κατα μερος πραξεις ρεουσι (_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, 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 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 διδακτην ειναι την αρετην (_doceri posse virtutem_). From without the will can only be affected by motives. But these can never 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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: Ταρασσει τους ανθρωπους ου τα πραγματα, αλλα τα περι των πραγματων δογματα (_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 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 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.

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 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.