Essays of Schopenhauer. Arthur Schopenhauer

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СКАЧАТЬ she had lost the power of one of her arms, that her whole system was entirely shaken, and demanding a monthly allowance as compensation. She won her case; the defendant had to pay three hundred thalers in costs and contribute sixty thalers a year to her maintenance while she lived. Schopenhauer on returning to Berlin did what he could to get the judgment reversed, but unsuccessfully. The woman lived for twenty years; he inscribed on her death certificate, "Obit anus, obit onus"

      The idea of marriage seems to have more or less possessed Schopenhauer about this time, but he could not finally determine to take the step. There is sufficient to show in the following essays in what light he regarded women. Marriage was a debt, he said, contracted in youth and paid off in old age. Married people have the whole burden of life to bear, while the unmarried have only half, was a characteristically selfish apothegm. Had not all the true philosophers been celibates—Descartes, Leibnitz, Malebranche, Spinoza, and Kant? The classic writers were of course not to be considered, because with them woman occupied a subordinate position. Had not all the great poets married, and with disastrous consequences? Plainly, Schopenhauer was not the person to sacrifice the individual to the will of the species.

      In August 1831 he made a fortuitous expedition to

      Frankfort-on-the-Main—an expedition partly prompted by the outbreak of

      cholera at Berlin at the time, and partly by the portent of a dream (he

      was credulous in such matters) which at the beginning of the year had

      intimated his death. Here, however, he practically remained until his

      death, leading a quiet, mechanically regular life and devoting his

      thoughts to the development of his philosophic ideas, isolated at first,

      but as time went on enjoying somewhat greedily the success which had

      been denied him in his earlier days. In February 1839 he had a moment of

      elation when he heard from the Scientific Society of Drontheim that he

      had won the prize for the best essay on the question, "Whether free will

      could be proved from the evidence of consciousness," and that he had

      been elected a member of the Society; and a corresponding moment of

      despondency when he was informed by the Royal Danish Academy of the

      Sciences at Copenhagen, in a similar competition, that his essay on

      "Whether the source and foundation of ethics was to be sought in an

      intuitive moral idea, and in the analysis of other derivative moral

      conceptions, or in some other principle of knowledge," had failed,

      partly on the ground of the want of respect which it showed to the

      opinions of the chief philosophers. He published these essays in 1841

      under the title of "The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics," and ten

      years later Parerga und Paralipomena the composition of which had engaged his attention for five or six years. The latter work, which proved to be his most popular, was refused by three publishers, and when eventually it was accepted by Hayn of Berlin, the author only received ten free copies of his work as payment. It is from this book that all except one of the following essays have been selected; the exception is "The Metaphysics of Love," which appears in the supplement of the third book of his principal work. The second edition of Die Welt als Willeund Vorstellung appeared in 1844, and was received with growing appreciation. Hitherto he had been chiefly known in Frankfort as the son of the celebrated Johanna Schopenhauer; now he came to have a following which, if at first small in numbers, were sufficiently enthusiastic, and proved, indeed, so far as his reputation was concerned, helpful. Artists painted his portrait; a bust of him was made by Elizabeth Ney. In the April number of the Westminster Review for 1853 John Oxenford, in an article entitled "Iconoclasm in German Philosophy," heralded in England his recognition as a writer and thinker; three years later Saint-Reni Taillandier, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, did a similar service for him in France. One of his most enthusiastic admirers was Richard Wagner, who in 1854 sent him a copy of his Der Ring der Nibelungen, with the inscription "In admiration and gratitude." The Philosophical Faculty of the University of Leipzic offered a prize for an exposition and criticism of his philosophical system. Two Frenchmen, M. Foucher de Careil and M. Challemel Lacour, who visited Schopenhauer during his last days, have given an account of their impressions of the interview, the latter in an article entitled, "Un Bouddhiste Contemporain en Allemagne," which appeared in the Revue des Deux Mondes for March 15th, 1870. M. Foucher de Careil gives a charming picture of him:— "Quand je le vis, pour la premihre fois, en 1859, ` la table de l'httel d'Angleterre, ` Francfort, c'itait dij` un vieillard, ` l'oeil d'un bleu vif et limpide, ` la lhvre mince et lighrement sarcastique, autour de laquelle errait un fin sourire, et dont le vaste front, estompi de deux touffes de cheveux blancs sur les cttis, relevait d'un cachet de noblesse et de distinction la physionomie petillante d'esprit et de malice. Les habits, son jabot de dentelle, sa cravate blanche rappelaient un vieillard de la fin du rhgne de Louis XV; ses manihres itaient celles d'un homme de bonne compagnie. Habituellement riservi et d'un naturel craintif jusqu'` la mifiance, il ne se livrait qu'avec ses intimes ou les itrangers de passage ` Francfort. Ses mouvements itaient vifs et devenaient d'une pitulance extraordinaire dans la conversation; il fuyait les discussions et les vains combats de paroles, mais c'itait pour mieux jouir du charme d'une causerie intime. Il possidait et parlait avec une igale perfection quatre langues: le frangais, l'anglais, l'allemand, l'italien et passablement l'espagnol. Quand il causait, la verve du vieillard brodait sur le canevas un peu lourd de l'allemand ses brilliantes arabesques latines, grecques, frangaises, anglaises, italiennes. C'itait un entrain, une pricision et des sailles, une richesse de citations, une exactitude de ditails qui faisait couler les heures; et quelquefois le petit cercle de ses intimes l'icoutait jusqu'` minuit, sans qu'un moment de fatigue se f{t peint sur ses traits ou que le feu de son regard se f{t un instant amorti. Sa parole nette et accentuie captivait l'auditoire: elle peignait et analysait tout ensemble; une sensibiliti dilicate en augmentait le feu; elle itait exacte et pricise sur toutes sortes de sujets."

      Schopenhauer died on the 20th September 1860, in his seventy-third year, peacefully, alone as he had lived, but not without warning. One day in April, taking his usual brisk walk after dinner, he suffered from palpitation of the heart, he could scarcely breathe. These symptoms developed during the next few months, and Dr. Gwinner advised him to discontinue his cold baths and to breakfast in bed; but Schopenhauer, notwithstanding his early medical training, was little inclined to follow medical advice. To Dr. Gwinner, on the evening of the 18th September, when he expressed a hope that he might be able to go to Italy, he said that it would be a pity if he died now, as he wished to make several important additions to his Parerga; he spoke about his works and of the warm recognition with which they had been welcomed in the most remote places. Dr. Gwinner had never before found him so eager and gentle, and left him reluctantly, without, however, the least premonition that he had seen him for the last time. On the second morning after this interview Schopenhauer got up as usual, and had his cold bath and breakfast. His servant had opened the window to let in the morning air and had then left him. A little later Dr. Gwinner arrived and found him reclining in a corner of the sofa; his face wore its customary expression; there was no sign of there having been any struggle with death. There had been no struggle with death; he had died, as he had hoped he would die, painlessly, easily.

      In preparing the above notice the writer has to acknowledge her indebtedness to Dr. Gwinner's Life and Professor Wallace's little work on the same subject, as well as to the few other authorities that have been available.—THE TRANSLATOR.

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