Chapter 7
1. Failing to find an explanation in knowledge I began to search for it in life, hoping to find it among the people around me. I began to observe how these people like myself lived, and how they dealt with the question that had led me to despair.
2. And this is what I discovered among people whose position in life, as regards education and lifestyle, was similar to my own.
3. I found that these people of my circle had four methods of escape from the dreadful situation in which we all find ourselves.
4. The first method of escape is that of ignorance. It consists of failing to recognize, or understand, that life is evil and absurd. The majority of the people of this kind are either women, or very young, or very stupid and have not yet understood the problem of life that presented itself to Schopenhauer, Solomon and Buddha. They see neither the dragon that is waiting for them, nor the mice that are gnawing away at the bush from which they are clinging, and they lick the drops of honey. But they only lick them for a while: something will turn their attention to the dragon and the mice and their licking will come to an end. There was nothing I could learn from them, for we can never cease knowing what we know. 5. The second method of escape is that of epicureanism. It consists, while knowing the hopelessness of life, of enjoying the blessings we have without looking at the dragon or the mice, and of licking the honey in the best possible way, especially if a lot of it has fallen on the bush. Solomon describes this method thus:
6. 'Then I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun than to eat, to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God giveth him under the sun...
7. Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart... Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest all the days of the life of thy vanity, which he hath given thee under the sun, all the days of thy vanity: for that is thy portion in this life, and in thy labour which thou takest under the sun... Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is not work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest' (Ecclesiastes, Ⅷ.15, Ⅸ.7, 9-10).
8. This second method of escape sustains the majority of people of our circle. The conditions in which they find themselves dictate that they have a greater share of the good things in life than the bad; their moral torpor allows them to forget that all the privileges of their position are accidental and that not everyone can have a thousand wives and palaces as Solomon did; that for every man with a thousand wives there are a thousand men without wives, and that for every palace there are a thousand men who built it by the sweat of their brow, and that the same chance that has made you Solomon today might make you Solomon's slave tomorrow. The inertia of these people's imagination enables them to forget why it was Buddha was granted no peace: the inevitability of illness, old age and death, which can, if not today then tomorrow, destroy all these pleasures. The fact that a number of these people affirm that the dullness of their thought and imagination is something called 'positive philosophy' fails, in my opinion, to make them any different from the ranks of those who, failing to see the question, lick the honey. I could not imitate these people, for not sharing their dullness of imagination I could not create it artificially in myself. Like any man who sincerely lives I could not turn my eyes away from the mice and the dragon once I had seen them.
9. The third method of escape is through strength and energy. It consists of realizing that life is evil and senseless, and of destroying it. This is what a few strong and consistent people do. Having understood the utter stupidity of the joke that is being played on them, and realizing that the blessings of the dead are far greater than the blessings of the living, and that the best thing of all is not to live, they act accordingly and instantly bring an end to this stupid joke, using any available means: a noose around the neck, water, a stab in the heart, a train on a railway line. There are increasing numbers of people belonging to our circle who act in this way. On the whole those who behave like this do so during the prime of their life, when the strength of the soul is in full force and few of the habits that undermine human reason have yet been acquired. I saw that this was the most worthy mode of escape and wanted to follow it through.
10. The fourth road of escape is that of weakness. It consists of clinging to a life that is evil and futile, knowing in advance that nothing can come of it. People belonging to this category know that death is preferable to life but, lacking the strength to act rationally and bring a quick end to the deception by killing themselves, they seem to wait for something. This is the escape of weakness, for if I know of something better and it is within my reach, then why not yield to it? I myself belonged to this category.
11. Thus, people of my kind have four ways of saving themselves from a terrible contradiction. However hard I strained my mental faculties I could find no other than these four modes of escape. In the first method there is a failure to understand that life is meaningless, vain and evil and that it is better not to live. I could not help knowing this, and once I had realized it I could not close my eyes to it. The second method is to make use of life, such as it is, without thinking about the future. Neither could I do this. Like Saki-Muni, I could not ride out hunting when I knew that suffering, old age and death exist. My imagination was too fertile. Moreover I could not take pleasure in those fleeting occasions which momentarily threw pleasure on my existence. The third method is to have realized that life is evil and absurd and to bring it to an end by killing oneself. The fourth method of escape is to live like Solomon and Schopenhauer, knowing that life is a stupid joke being played on us, but nevertheless continuing to live, to wash, to dress, to eat, to talk, and even to write books. Although I found it offensive and painful I remained in this position.
12. I can now see that if I did not kill myself it was because of some vague awareness that my ideas were mistaken. No matter how convincing and irrefutable I felt my train of thoughts to be, as well as that of the wise ideas that had led us all to the conclusion that life is meaningless I still had some obscure doubts as to the validity of the final outcome of my deliberations.
13. It was expressed as follows: I, that is my reason, have acknowledged that life is irrational. If there is nothing higher than reason (and there is not, and nothing can prove that there is), then reason is the creator of life for me. Without reason I can have no life. How then can reason deny life when it is the creator of it? Or looking at it another way: if there were no life my reason would not exist, which must mean that reason is the offspring of life. Life is everything. Reason is the fruit of life and yet this reason rejects life itself. I felt that something was not quite right here.
14. Life is a senseless evil, that is certain, I said to myself. Yet I have lived and still live, and so too humanity has lived and still lives. How can this be? Why do men live when it is possible not to live? Can it be that only Schopenhauer and I have been intelligent enough to understand the senselessness and evil of life?
15. The argument about the vanity of life is not particularly subtle and all simple folk have known it for a long time; yet they have lived and still live. How is it they all live and never think of doubting the logic of life?
16. My knowledge, confirmed by the wisdom of the sages, had revealed to me that everything in the world, organic and inorganic, is arranged with the most unusual intelligence, and it is only my position that is absurd. But these fools, the vast masses of simple folk, while knowing nothing about the organic and inorganic arrangement of the world, continue to live and feel that life is very sensibly organized!
17. And it occurred to me that there might be something I did not yet know. After all, that is exactly how ignorance behaves. Ignorance always says what I am saying. When it does not know something it says that the thing it does not know is stupid. In any event it appears that there is a whole section of mankind that has lived and still lives, as if it knew the meaning of life, for without knowing this meaning it could not live. Yet I am saying that all life is meaningless and that I cannot live.
18. No one prevents Schopenhauer and me from denying life. Go ahead then, kill yourself and you won't have to think about it again. If you don't like life kill yourself. If you live and cannot understand the meaning of it, put an end to it, but don't turn around and start talking and writing about the fact that you don't understand life. You find yourself in cheerful company, where everyone is happy and know what they are doing, so if you find it boring and objectionable, leave!
19. For in the end what are we, who are convinced that suicide is obligatory and yet cannot resolve to commit it, other than the weakest, the most inconsistent and, speaking frankly, the most stupid of people, making such a song and dance with our banalities.
20. After all, our wisdom, however irrefutable it may be, has provided us with no understanding of the meaning of life. Yet all those millions who make up humanity manage to live without ever doubting its meaning.
21. Indeed, since those long ago days when life began and of which I know nothing, people who knew the argument about the vanity of life (which seems to me to prove its senselessness), have nevertheless lived and brought to life a meaning of their own. Ever since there has been some form of human life, people have had this understanding of life, and have pursued this life, and passed it down to me. Everything that is in me and around me is the fruit of their understanding of life. These very instruments of thought with which I judge life, and condemn it, were made by them and not by me. I myself was born, educated and grew up thanks to them. They dug up the iron, taught us how to fell wood, tamed the cattle and the horses, taught us how to sow the crops and how to live together; they created an order in life. They taught me how to think and speak. I am their offspring, provided by them with food and water, taught by them, able to think and speak using their thoughts and words, and now I have proved to them that it is all senseless! 'There is something wrong here,' I told myself, 'I have made a mistake somewhere.' But I could not discover where the mistake lay.
Chapter 8
1. None of these doubts, which I can now express more or less coherently, could I have formulated at the time. At the time I simply felt that despite the fact that my deductions about the vanity of life were logically unavoidable and were confirmed by the greatest thinkers, there was still something wrong with them. Whether it was in my reasoning, or whether it was in my formulation of the question, I did not know. I simply felt that the reasoning behind my conviction was complete, but that it was not enough. All these conclusions failed to persuade me to follow my argument to its end, that is to kill myself. I would not be speaking the truth if I said that it was through my reason that I arrived where I did and yet did not kill myself. My reason was working, but so too was something else that I can only call a consciousness of life. There was also another force at work which made me pay attention to the latter and not to the former. It was this force that led me out of my state of despair and guided my reason in an entirely different direction. It compelled me to pay attention to the fact that I, and the hundreds of others similar to myself, do not comprise the whole of humanity, and that I still did not know what this life of humanity was.
2. As I looked around at the narrow circle of my colleagues I saw nothing but people who had failed to understand the question, or who had understood it but drowned it in the intoxication of life, or who had understood it and had put an end to their lives, or who understood it but through weakness continued living in despair. And I saw no others. I thought that this narrow circle of scholars, and of rich and distinguished people, to which I belonged made up the whole of mankind and that the millions who had lived and still live were THEM, some sort of cattle, people.
3. It seems so strange to me now, so utterly incomprehensible, that in my reasoning of life I could have overlooked the life of humanity that surrounded me on all sides and that I could have been so ridiculously mistaken as to think that my life, and the life of Solomon and Schopenhauer, was the true, normal life, while the lives of millions was not worthy of attention. However strange it may seem now, I know it was so at the time. Amidst the wanderings of my conceited mind I felt certain that Solomon, Schopenhauer and myself had posed the question so honestly and exactly that there could be no two ways about it. I felt so certain that all these millions simply belonged to the category of those who had not yet penetrated the depths of the question, that as I searched for the meaning of my life it never once occurred to me to think: 'What sort of meaning do all the millions who have lived, and do live in the world give to their lives?'
4. I lived in this state of madness for a long time. It is a state which if not in deed then in words is very characteristic of more liberated and learned people. But whether it was thanks to my somewhat strange and instinctive love of the true working people that I was forced to understand them and to realize that they are not as stupid as we thought; or whether it was thanks to the sincerity of my conviction that I knew of nothing better to do than hang myself, I sensed anyway that if I wanted to live and to understand the meaning of life I must not seek it among those who have lost it and wish to kill themselves, but among the millions of people living and dead who have created life, and who carry the weight of our lives together with their own. And I looked around at the enormous masses of simple, uneducated people without wealth, who have lived and who still live, and I saw something quite different. I saw that with a few exceptions all those millions do not fit into my divisions, and that I could not categorize them as people who did not understand the question because they themselves posed, and answered, the question with unusual clarity. Neither could I categorize them as epicureans, since their lives rest more on deprivation and suffering than on pleasure. I could still less regard them as living out their meaningless lives irrationally, since they could explain every act of their lives, including death. They considered suicide the greatest evil. It appeared that mankind as a whole had some kind of comprehension of the meaning of life that I did not acknowledge and derided. It followed that rational knowledge does not provide the meaning of life, but excludes it; while the meaning given to life by the millions of people, by humanity as a whole, is founded on some sort of knowledge that is despised and considered false.
5. Rational knowledge, as presented by the learned and wise, negates the meaning of life, yet the vast masses-humanity as a whole-recognize that this meaning lies in irrational knowledge. And this irrational knowledge is faith, the very thing that I could not help rejecting. This God, one in three, the creation in six days, the devils and angels and all the rest that I could not accept without going mad.
6. My position was terrible. I knew that I could find nothing along the path of rational knowledge, other than negation of life. While in faith I found nothing other than a negation of reason, which was even more impossible than denial of life. According to rational knowledge life is an evil and people know it. They have the choice of ending their lives and yet they have always carried on living, just as I myself have done, despite having known for a long time that life is meaningless and evil. According to faith it follows that in order to comprehend the meaning of life I must renounce my reason, the very thing for which meaning was necessary.
Chapter 9
1. A contradiction arose from which there were only two ways out: either that which I called reasonable was not as reasonable as I thought, or that which I felt to be irrational was not as irrational as I thought. And I started to check the line of argument that stemmed from my rational knowledge.
2. As I checked this line of argument I found it to be entirely correct. The conclusion that life is nothing was inevitable, but I spotted a mistake. The mistake was that my thinking did not correspond to the question I had posed. The question was: why do I live? Or: is there anything that will remain and not be annihilated of my illusory and transitory life? Or: what meaning has my finite existence in an infinite universe? In order to answer this question I studied life.
3. Clearly the solution to all the possible questions of life could not satisfy me because my question, however simple it may seem at first, involves a demand for an explanation of the finite by means of the infinite and vice versa.
4. I had asked: what meaning has life beyond time, beyond space and beyond cause? And I was answering the question: 'What is the meaning of my life within time, space and cause?' The result was that after long and laboured thought I could only answer: none.
5. In my deliberations I was continually drawing comparisons between the finite and the finite, and the infinite and the infinite, and I could not have done otherwise. Thus I reached the only conclusion I could reach: force is force, matter is matter, will is will, the infinite is the infinite, nothing is nothing; and I could go no further than that.
6. It was somewhat similar to what happens in mathematics when, trying to resolve an equation, we get an identity. The method of deduction is correct, but the only answer obtained is that a equals a, and x equals x, or o equals o. Precisely the same thing was happening with my reasoning concerning the meaning of life. The only answers the sciences give to this question are identities.
7. And really, strictly rational knowledge, such as that of Descartes, begins with complete doubt in everything and throws aside any knowledge founded on faith, reconstructing everything along laws of reason and experiment. And it can provide no answer other than the one I reached: an indefinite one. It was only at first that I thought knowledge had given an affirmative answer, Schopenhauer's answer that life has no meaning and is evil. But when I went into the matter I realized that this answer is not affirmative and that it was only my senses that had taken it to be so. Strictly expressed, as it is by the Brahmins, Solomon, and Schopenhauer, the answer is but a vague one, an identity: o equals o, life presented to me as nothing is nothing. Thus, philosophical knowledge denies nothing but simply replies that it cannot solve the question, and that as far as it is concerned any resolution remains indefinite.
8. Having understood this, I realized that it was impossible to search for an answer to my questions in rational knowledge; that the answer given by rational knowledge simply suggests that the answer can only be obtained by stating the question in another way, by introducing the question of the relation of the finite to the infinite. I realized that no matter how irrational and distorted the answers given by faith might be, they had the advantage of introducing to every answer a relationship between the finite and the infinite, without which there can be no solution. Whichever way I put the question: how am I to live? the answer is always: according to God's law. Or to the question: is there anything real that will come of my life? the answer is: eternal torment or eternal bliss. Or, to the question: what meaning is there that is not destroyed by death? the answer is: unity with the infinite, God, heaven.
9. Thus in addition to rational knowledge, which I had hitherto thought to be the only knowledge, I was inevitably led to acknowledge that there does exist another kind of knowledge - an irrational one - possessed by humanity as a whole: faith, which affords the possibility of living. Faith remained as irrational to me as before, but I could not fail to recognize that it alone provides mankind with the answers to the question of life, and consequently with the possibility of life.
10. Rational knowledge had led me to recognize that life is meaningless. My life came to a halt and I wanted to kill myself. As I looked around at people, at humanity as a whole, I saw that they lived and affirmed that they knew the meaning of life. I looked at myself. I had lived as long as I knew the meaning of life. For me, as for others, faith provided the meaning of life and the possibility of living.
11. Having looked around further at people in other countries and at my contemporaries and predecessors, I saw the same thing. Where there is life there is faith. Since the day of creation faith has made it possible for mankind to live, and the essential aspects of that faith are always and everywhere the same.
12. Whatever answers faith gives, regardless of which faith, or to whom the answers are given, such answers always give an infinite meaning to the finite existence of man; a meaning that is not destroyed by suffering, deprivation or death. This means that only in faith can we find the meaning and possibility of life. I realized that the essential meaning of faith lies not only in the 'manifestations of things unseen', and so on, or in revelation (this is only a description of one of the signs of faith); nor is it simply the relationship between man and God (it is necessary to define faith, then God, and not God through faith); nor is it an agreement with what one has been told, although this is what faith is commonly understood to be. Faith is a knowledge of the meaning of human life, the consequence of which is that man does not kill himself but lives. Faith is the force of life. If a man lives, then he must believe in something. If he did not believe that there was something he must live for he would not live. If he does not see and comprehend the illusion of the finite he will believe in the finite. If he does understand the illusion of the finite, he is bound to believe in the infinite. Without faith it is impossible to live.
13. I recalled the whole course of my inner thinking and was horrified. It was now clear to me that in order for man to live he must either be unaware of the infinite, or he must have some explanation of the meaning of life by which the finite can be equated with the infinite. I had this explanation but it was no use to me while I believed in the finite; and I began to test it against my reason. And in the light of reason my former explanation vanished into thin air. But the time came when I no longer believed in the finite. And then I began, on a rational basis, to construct out of what I knew an explanation which might give a meaning to life; but nothing came of it. Together with the finest human intellects I reached the conclusion that o equals o and was most astonished at reaching this conclusion and that there could be no other.
14. What did I do when I searched for an answer in the experimental sciences? I wanted to find out why I lived and I therefore studied everything that exists outside myself. It became clear that I could discover a great deal, but nothing of what I needed.
15. What happened when I searched for the answer in the realms of philosophy? I studied the thoughts of those who found themselves in the same predicament as myself and who had no answer to the question of why we live. It was apparent that I could discover nothing here that I did not already know: namely that it is impossible to know anything.
16. What am I? A part of the infinite. It is indeed in these words that the whole problem lies. Can it be that this question has only occurred to man so recently? Can it be that no one before me has posed this question to himself, such a simple question, one that might spring to the lips of any intelligent child?
17. Surely this question has been raised ever since man has existed. Since the beginning it has been evident that solving the question by equating the finite with the finite is just as unsatisfactory as equating the infinite with the infinite. Since time immemorial man has striven to express the relationship between the finite and the infinite.
18. All the concepts we use to compare the finite to the infinite, and to arrive at an understanding of life, of the concepts of God, freedom and goodness, are put to the test of logic. But they fail to stand up to the critique of reason.
19. If it were not so frightening it would be amusing to observe the pride and complacency with which we, like children, take apart the watch, pull out the spring and make a toy of it, and are then surprised when the watch stops working.
20. It is both valuable and necessary to have a solution to the contradiction between the finite and the infinite, an answer to the question of life that makes it possible to live. The one solution we always find everywhere, among all peoples, is the solution that has been passed down to us from times we have lost all record of. It is such a difficult solution that we would be unable to devise anything like it. And it is a solution which we casually destroy so that we may yet again pose the question that confronts us all, and for which we do not have an answer.
21. The concepts of an infinite God, the sanctity of the soul, the relationship between God and the affairs of man, of moral good and evil, are all concepts that have been worked out in history, through the life of a humanity that is hidden to us. Without the existence of these concepts there would be neither life nor myself, and yet I, rejecting all the efforts of humanity, wanted to do it all over again, alone, in my own way.
22. I did not think so at the time but the germs of these thoughts were already within me. I realized that: (1) Despite our intelligence the contentions of Schopenhauer, Solomon and myself were foolish: we considered life to be evil and nevertheless continued to live. This was apparent stupidity because, if life is meaningless and I am so fond of reason, then I must destroy life so that no one can deny it. (2) All our arguments went round in a vicious circle, like a wheel that is not attached to the carriage. However much, and however well, we deliberated, we could find no answer to the question because o will always equal o, and therefore, our method must be mistaken. (3) I began to realize that the most profound wisdom of man is preserved in the answers given by faith, and that I did not have the right to negate them on grounds of reason and, above all, that it is these answers alone that can reply to the question of life.
Chapter 10
1. I could see this but it did not make matters any easier for me.
2. I was now prepared to accept any faith so long as it did not demand a direct denial of reason, which would have been a deceit. So I studied books on Buddhism and Mohammedanism and above all I studied Christianity, both through its writings and through people living around me.
3. Naturally I first turned to believers from my own circle, to learned people, Orthodox theologians, elder monks, theologians of the newest types of Orthodoxy, and even to the so-called New Christians who taught salvation through faith in redemption. I seized on these believers and questioned them on how they believed and what they understood to be the meaning of life.
4. Despite making all possible allowances and avoiding all arguments I could not accept the faith of these people. I saw that what they took to be faith gave no explanation to the meaning of life but obscured it, and that they themselves did not profess their faith in response to the question of life, that had led me to faith, but for some other reasons which were alien to me.
5. I recall the tormenting feeling of fear should I return to my former despair, after the hope I had experienced so many times in my relations with these people. The more precisely they expounded their teachings to me, the more clearly I saw their errors, until I lost all hope of finding an explanation to the meaning of life in their faith.
6. I was not so much alienated by the fact that in expounding their religious beliefs they confused Christian truths that had always been close to me with much that was unnecessary and irrational. It was more the fact that the lives of these people were just like my own, with the only difference that they did not live according to the principles expounded in their teachings. I felt strongly that they were deceiving themselves and that, like myself, they had no other concept of life than of living while they lived and of grabbing hold of everything they could. I saw this from the fact that if they had possessed a meaning that annihilated the fear of deprivation, suffering and death, they would not have been afraid of these things. But these believers of our class lived, just as I did, in excess, striving to maintain and increase it and fearing deprivation, suffering and death. Like myself and all non-believers, they lived only to satisfy their desires and they lived just as badly as, if not worse than, non-believers.
7. No arguments could convince me of the truth of their faith. Only actions showing me that they had an understanding of life that did not make them afraid, as I was, of poverty, sickness and death might have convinced me. But I witnessed no such behaviour among the believers of my circle. So that, while I witnessed this sort of behaviour among those of my circle who did not believe, I never witnessed it among the so-called believers.
8. I realized that the belief these men had was not the faith I was seeking and that their faith is not really faith but only one of the epicurean consolations in life. I understood that while this faith might perhaps serve, if not for consolation, then as some kind of distraction for a repentant Solomon on his deathbed, it is entirely unsuitable for the vast majority of mankind who do not seek amusement at the expense of other men's labour, but to make something of life. In order for mankind to live and to perpetuate life, instilling it with meaning, these millions must all have some different, more genuine concept of faith. Indeed it was not that neither I nor Solomon, nor Schopenhauer, had killed ourselves that convinced me of the existence of faith, but the fact that these millions have lived and still live, bearing those like Solomon and myself on the crest of their lives.
9. And I began to grow close to the believers among the poor, simple, uneducated folk: pilgrims, monks, sectarians and peasants. The belief held by these people was the same Christianity as that of the pseudo-believers of my circle. They too had mixed a great deal of superstition alongside Christian truths, but the difference was that while superstition was quite unnecessary to the believers of my circle, had nothing to do with their lives and simply provided some kind of epicurean distraction, the superstitions of the believers belonging to the labouring section of the population were so interconnected with their lives that they could not have conceived of life without them; they were a necessary condition of their lives. The whole way of life of the believers of my own circle stood in contradiction to their faith, whereas the whole way of life of the believers from the working population reaffirmed the meaning their faith gave to life. And I started to look more closely at the life and faith of these people, and the further I looked the more convinced I became that theirs was the true faith, that their faith was essential to them, and that it alone provides a sense of the meaning and possibility of life. In contrast to what I saw among the people of my class where it is possible to live without faith and where among the thousands there is barely one who can admit to being a believer, among them there is hardly one in a thousand who does not believe. In contrast to what I saw happening in my own circle, where the whole of life is spent in idleness, amusement and dissatisfaction with life, I saw that these people who laboured hard throughout their entire lives were less dissatisfied with life than the rich. In contrast to the people of our class who resist and curse the privations and sufferings of their lot, these people accept sickness and grief without question or protest, and with a calm and firm conviction that this is how it must be, that it cannot be otherwise and that it is all for the good. Contrary to us, who the more intelligent we are the less we understand the meaning of life and see some kind of malicious joke in the fact that we suffer and die, these people live, suffer and approach death peacefully and, more often than not, joyfully. In contrast to the fact that a peaceful death, a death without horror and despair, is a most rare exception in our circle, a tormented, rebellious and unhappy death is a most rare exception amongst these people. And there are millions and millions of these people who are deprived of all those things, which for the Solomons and I are the only blessings in life, and who nevertheless find tremendous happiness in life. I looked more widely around me. I looked at the lives of the multitudes who have lived in the past and who live today. And of those who understood the meaning of life I saw not two, or three, or ten, but hundreds, thousands and millions. And all of them, endlessly varied in their customs, minds, educations and positions, and in complete contrast to my ignorance, knew the meaning of life and death, endured suffering and hardship, lived and died and saw this not as vanity but good.
10. And I came to love these people. The further I penetrated into the lives of those living and dead about whom I had read and heard, the more I loved them and the easier it became for me to live. I lived like this for about two years and a great change took place within me, for which I had been preparing for a long time and the roots of which had always been in me. What happened was that the life of our class, the rich and learned, became not only distasteful to me, but lost all meaning. All our activities, our discussions, our science and our art struck me as sheer indulgence. I realized that there was no meaning to be found here. It was the activities of the labouring people, those who produce life, that presented itself to me as the only true way. I realized that the meaning provided by this life was truth and I accepted it.
Chapter 11
1. I remembered how these very beliefs repelled me and seemed devoid of any meaning when they were professed by people who lived in contradiction to them, and I remembered how these same beliefs attracted me and seemed sensible when I saw people living in accord with them; and I realized why I had rejected them and found them meaningless and why I now accepted them and found them full of meaning. I realized that I had been lost, and how I had become lost. I had strayed not so much because my ideas had been incorrect as because I had lived foolishly. I realized that I had been blinded from the truth not so much through my mistaken thoughts as through my life itself, which had been spent in satisfying desire and in exclusive conditions of epicureanism. I realized that my question as to what my life is, and the answer that it is an evil, was quite correct. The only mistake was that I had extended an answer that related only to myself to life as a whole. I had asked myself what my life was and had received the answer that it is evil and meaningless. And this was quite true, for my life of indulgent pursuits was meaningless and evil, but that answer applied only to my life and not to human life in general. I understood a truism that I subsequently found in the gospels: that people often preferred darkness to light because their deeds were evil. For he who acts maliciously hates light and avoids it so as not to throw light on his deeds. I understood that in order to understand life it is first of all necessary that life is not evil and meaningless, and then one may use reason in order to elucidate it. I realized why I had for so long been treading so close to such an obvious truth without seeing it, and that in order to think and speak about human life one must think and speak about human life and not about the lives of a few parasites. The truth has always been the truth, just as 2×2=4, but I had not admitted it, because in acknowledging that 2×2=4 I would have had to admit that I was a bad man. And it was more important and necessary for me to feel that I was good than to admit that 2×2=4. I came to love good people and to loathe myself, and I acknowledged the truth. And then it all became clear to me.
2. Imagine an executioner who has spent all his life torturing people and chopping off heads, or a hopeless drunkard, or a madman who has spent his entire life in a dark room which he detests but imagines that he would die if he left it - imagine if they should ask themselves, 'What is life?' Obviously the only answer they could come up with is that life is the greatest of evils. The madman's answer would be absolutely correct, but only with respect to himself. Suppose I am such a madman? Suppose all of us who are wealthy and learned are such madmen?
3. And I realized that we really are such madmen. I, at any rate, was one. Indeed, a bird is made in such a way that it can fly, gather food and build a nest, and when I see a bird doing these things I rejoice. Goats, hares and wolves are made in order to eat, multiply and feed their families, and when they do this I feel quite sure that they are happy and that their lives are meaningful. What should a man do? He too must work for his existence, just as the animals do, but with the difference that he will perish if he does it alone, for he must work for an existence, not just for himself, but for everyone. And when he does this I feel quite sure that he is happy and that his life has meaning. And what had I been doing for all those thirty years of conscious life? Far from working for an existence for everyone, I had not even done so for myself. I had lived as a parasite and when I asked myself why I lived, I received the answer: for nothing. If the meaning of human existence lies in working to procure it I had spent thirty years attempting, not to procure it, but to destroy it for myself and for others. How then could I get any answer other than that my life is evil and meaningless? Indeed it was evil and meaningless.
4. The life of the world runs according to someone's will; our lives and the lives of everything in existence are in someone else's hands. In order to have any chance of comprehending this will we must first fulfil it by doing what is asked of us. If I do not do what is asked of me I will never understand what it is that is asked of me, and still less what is asked of us all, of the whole world.
5. If a naked, hungry beggar were taken at a crossroads and led to an enclosed part of a splendid establishment where he is given food and drink, and then forced to move some kind of handle up and down, it is obvious that before deciding why it was he had been brought there to move the handle, and whether or not the establishment was reasonably arranged, the beggar must first move the handle. If he moves the handle he will see that it operates a pump, that the pump draws water and the water flows into the garden. Then he will be taken away from the enclosed place and given another job, and he will gather fruits and will enter into the joy of his Lord. As he progresses from lower to higher tasks he will continue to understand more and more about the structure of the establishment and participate in it, and he will never stop to ask why he is there, and he will never come to reproach his master.
6. Likewise the simple uneducated working people, whom we refer to as the herd, fulfil the will of their master without ever reproaching him. But we, the wise, eat the master's food without doing what he asks of us; instead of doing it we sit around in circles debating whether we should do something as stupid as moving a handle up and down. And then we think it over and decide that either the master is stupid, or that he does not exist and that we are the only intelligent ones. The only thing is, we feel that we are no good for anything and that we must somehow escape from ourselves.
Chapter 12
1. Having realized the errors in rational knowledge I found it easier to free myself from the temptation of futile theorizing. The conviction that knowledge of the truth can only be found in life stirred me to doubt the worth of my own way of life. The thing that saved me was that I managed to tear myself away from my exclusive existence and see the true life of the simple working people, and realize that this alone is genuine life. I realized that if I wanted to understand life and its meaning I had to live a genuine life and not that of a parasite; and having accepted the meaning that is given to life by that real section of humanity who have become part of that genuine life, I had to try it out.
2. At this time the following happened to me: over the course of a whole year, almost every minute I asked myself whether I had not better kill myself with a rope or a bullet. And at the same time as I was experiencing the thoughts and observations I have described, my heart was agonized by a tormenting feeling. I can only describe this feeling as a quest for God.
3. I say that this quest for God was not a debate but an emotion because it did not arise from my stream of thoughts - it was in fact quite contrary to them - but from my heart. It was a feeling of fear, abandonment, loneliness, amid all that was strange to me, and a sense of hope that someone would help me.
4. Despite the fact that I was utterly convinced of the impossibility of proving the existence of a God (Kant had shown me this and I had fully understood that it cannot be proven), I nevertheless searched for God in the hope that I might find Him, and reverting to an old habit of prayer, I prayed to Him whom I sought but could not find. In my mind I went over the arguments of Kant and Schopenhauer on the impossibility of proving the existence of God, and I began to refute them. Cause, I told myself, does not belong to the same category of thought as space and time. If I exist then there must be a cause, and a cause of the cause. And the cause of everything is that which we call God. I dwelled on this thought and tried with my whole being to recognize the presence of this cause. And as soon as I recognized that there is a force with power over me I immediately felt the possibility of life. But I asked myself: 'What is this cause, this force? How should I think about it? How should I relate to this thing I call God?' But only the familiar answers came into my head: 'He is the creator, He is omniscient.' The answers did not satisfy me and I felt that I still lacked something inside me that is necessary in order to live. I fell into a state of panic and started to pray to the one whom I sought, in order that He might help me. And the more I prayed the more apparent it became that He did not hear me and that there was really no one to whom I could turn. And with my heart full of grief that there was no one, no God, I cried: 'Lord have mercy on me. Save me! O Lord show me the way!' But no one had mercy on me and I felt that my life had come to an end.
5. Yet time and again, from different approaches, I kept coming to the same conclusion, that I could not have come into the world without any cause, reason, or meaning; that I could not be the fledgeling fallen from the nest that I felt myself to be. If I lie on my back crying in the tall grass, like a fledgeling, it is because I know that my mother brought me into the world, kept me warm, fed me and loved me. But where is she, that mother? If I am abandoned, then who has abandoned me? I cannot hide myself from the fact that someone who loved me gave birth to me. Who is this someone? Again, God.
6. 'He knows and He sees my search, my struggle and my grief. He does exist,' I told myself. And I had only to recognize this for an instant and life would rise up within me and I would feel the possibility and joy of living. But again, from the recognition of the existence of God, I moved on to search for my relationship to Him, and again I was presented with that God, our Creator, in three persons, who sent us His son, our Saviour. And again, that God, separated from me and the world, would melt like ice before my eyes, and once more there was nothing left and my flicker of life was extinguished. I fell into despair and felt that there was nothing else I could do except kill myself. And worst of all was that I did not even feel I could do that.
7. Not two or three, but tens of hundreds of times, my mood suddenly changed from joy and animation to despair and a consciousness of the impossibility of living.
8. I can remember once in early spring I found myself alone in the woods. I was listening and concentrating my thoughts on the one thing I had been continuously thinking about over the last three years. Again I was searching for God.
9. 'Fine then,' I said to myself, 'so there is no God, other than something I imagine and the only reality is my own life. There is no God and no miracle can prove that there is because it would only be part of my imagination, and would be irrational.'
10. 'But what about my concept of God, of He whom I seek?' I asked myself, 'Where does this concept come from?' Once again, confronted with these thoughts, joyous waves of life surged up within me. Everything around me came to life and took on meaning. But my joy did not last long. My mind continued its work. 'A concept of God is not God,' I told myself. 'A concept of God is something within me that I can either evoke or not evoke. It is not this that I am seeking. I am seeking that, without which there cannot be life.' Once again everything within and around me began to die, and again I wanted to kill myself.
11. But then I stopped and looked at myself and at what was going on inside me. I recalled the hundreds of occasions when life had died within me only to be reborn. I remembered that I only lived during those times when I believed in God. Then, as now, I said to myself: I have only to believe in God in order to live. I have only to disbelieve in Him, or to forget Him, in order to die. What are these deaths and rebirths? It is clear that I do not live when I lose belief in God's existence, and I should have killed myself long ago, were it not for a dim hope of finding Him. I live truly only when I am conscious of Him and seek Him. What then is it you are seeking? a voice exclaimed inside me. There He is! He, without whom it is impossible to live. To know God and to live are one and the same thing. God is life.
12. 'Live in search of God and there will be no life without God!' And more powerfully than ever before everything within and around me came to light, and the light has not deserted me since.
13. And I was saved from suicide. When and how this change occurred in me I could not say. Just as the life force within me was extinguished gradually and imperceptibly, and I came upon the impossibility of life, the cessation of life and the need for suicide, so too did this life force return to me, gradually and imperceptibly. And, strangely, the life force that returned to me was not a new one but the same old one that had attracted me during the early period of my life. I returned to all those things that had been part of my childhood and youth. I returned to a belief in that will that had given birth to me and which asked something of me. I returned to the idea that the single most important aim of my life is to improve myself, that is, to live according to this will. I returned to the conviction that I could find the manifestation of this will in something that had been hidden from me for a long time, in what humanity had worked out long ago for its own guidance. In other words I returned to a belief in God, in moral perfection, and to that tradition which had given life a meaning. Only the difference now was that whereas before I had accepted all this unconsciously, I now knew that I could not live without it.
14. Something like this happened to me: without remembering when I had been put into it, I found myself in a boat that had set off from some unknown shore. The direction to the opposite shore was shown to me, oars were put into my inexperienced hands, and I was left alone. I rowed as best I could and moved forwards, but the further I rowed towards the centre of the stream, the faster the current became that was carrying me directly away from my object, and I kept meeting more oarsmen like myself, who were being carried away by the current. There were lone oarsmen who continued to row; there were some who had discarded their oars; there were large rowing boats and enormous ships full of people, some struggling with the current, others abandoning themselves to it. And as I looked at the flow of those drifting downstream, I found that the more I rowed, the more I forgot the directions that had been given to me. In the very middle of the current, amid the crowd of boats and ships being pulled downstream, I lost my directions and abandoned my oars. From all directions people were being carried downstream by sail and oar, shouting for joy and assuring me and themselves that there could be no other direction. And I believed them and flowed with them. And I was carried a long way, so far that I could hear the noise of the rapids which were bound to shatter me, and I caught sight of boats that were already being smashed against them. Then I came to my senses. For a long time I could not understand what had happened to me. I saw nothing ahead of me except the destruction towards which I was rushing, but which I feared, and I could see no salvation anywhere, and I did not know what to do. But looking behind me I saw countless boats that could not stop but were defiantly pushing against the current, and I remembered the oars and the direction of the shore, and I began to struggle back against the current, towards the shore.
15. The shore was God, the direction was tradition, and the oars were the freedom given to me to row towards the shore and unite with God. In this way the force of life rose up within me and I started to live once again.
Chapter 13
1. I renounced the life of our class, having recognized that it is not life but only a semblance of life, and that the conditions of luxury in which we live deprive us of the possibility of understanding life. I knew that in order to comprehend life I must understand the life not of the minority of those of us who are parasites, but of the simple working people, and of the meaning they give to life. The ordinary working people around me were the Russian people and it was to them that I turned, and to the meaning they give to life. This meaning, if it is possible to describe, is as follows. Every person comes into the world through the will of God. And God created man in such a way that each of us can either destroy his soul or save it. Man's purpose in life is to save his soul; in order to save his soul he must live according to God.
2. In order to live according to God one must renounce all the comforts of life, work, be humble, suffer and be merciful. This is the meaning the people have derived from all the religious teaching that has been handed down and communicated to them by the pastors, and by the traditions that form part of their lives and are expressed in their legends, sayings and tales, and it was clear to me and close to my heart. But, together with this meaning rooted in the faith of the people, there was much that was inextricably bound to the non-sectarian people among whom I lived, which revolted me and which I found incomprehensible: the sacraments, the church services, the fasts, the bowing before relics and icons. The people could not separate one thing from another, and neither could I. However strange I found much of what went on in the people's faith, I accepted all of it, attended services, prayed morning and evening, fasted, received communion, and for the first time my reason did not oppose anything. The very thing I had formerly found impossible now provoked no opposition.
3. My attitude to faith was now quite different from what it had been before. Formerly life had seemed full of meaning, and belief seemed to comprise an arbitrary confirmation of various completely unnecessary and irrational propositions that had nothing to do with life. At that time I asked myself what meaning these propositions could have and, convinced that they had none, I threw them aside. Now, on the contrary, I knew very well that my life has, and could have, no meaning. And not only did the tenets of faith cease to appear unnecessary to me, but I was led by indisputable experience to the conviction that it was only these tenets that can give meaning to life. I had formerly looked upon them as completely irrelevant double Dutch but now, even if I knew that I did not understand them, I knew there was meaning in them, and I told myself that I must learn to understand them. I made the following calculation. I told myself that, as with man and his faculty of reason, knowledge of faith arises from a mysterious source. This source is God, the origin of the human mind and body. Just as my body has succeeded to me from God, so too has my reason and my comprehension of life; therefore the stages in the development of this comprehension cannot be false. Those things in which people sincerely believe must be the truth. It may be expressed in various ways but it cannot be a lie. Therefore if I think it is a lie, it can only mean that I do not understand it. And I also said to myself: the essence of any faith consists in giving a meaning to life that will not perish with death. Faith must provide answers to the questions of a Tsar dying in the midst of luxury, an old serf worn out by work, an ignorant child, a wise old man, a half-witted old lady, a happy young woman, and a youth racked with passion. And so, if it is to answer to people living in the most differing circumstances of life and of different education, and if there is only one answer to the eternal questions of life-why do I live? what is the purpose of my life?-this answer, although essentially always the same, must be endlessly varied in its manifestation. The more unique, sincere and profound the answer, the more strange and peculiar it will appear in attempts to give it expression, depending on the education and circumstances of each individual. But these debates, while justifying much that was strange to me about the ritualistic aspects of religion, were nevertheless insufficient to enable me to perform acts I felt dubious about, particularly when it came to the faith that had become the sole concern of my life. With all the powers of my being I wished to be in a position whereby I could merge with the people in fulfilling the ritual aspects of their faith; but I could not do it. I felt that I would be lying to myself, and mocking what I considered sacred, if I were to do so. But at this point I was helped by some new Russian theological works.
4. According to the explanations of these theologians, the basic dogma of faith is the infallibility of the Church. The truth of everything the Church professes follows from this dogma as a necessary conclusion. The Church, as an assembly of believers, united in love and therefore possessing the truth, became the basis of my faith. I told myself that religious truth cannot be attained by one man alone, but only reveals itself to a union of all people, united through love. In order for the truth to be attained there must be no separation; and for there to be no separation we must love and make peace with those who are not in agreement with us. Truth manifests itself as love, and therefore if you do not respect the rituals of the Church you destroy love. And in destroying love you deprive yourself of the possibility of knowing the truth. At the time I did not see the sophistry of this argument. I did not see that unity in love can reveal the greatest love but never the divine truth as expressed in the definitive words of the Nicene Creed. I failed to see that love can never make a given expression of the truth a compulsory condition of unity. At the time I did not see the flaws in the argument, and thanks to it I was able to accept and fulfil all the rites of the Orthodox Church without understanding the majority of them. At the time I tried with my whole soul to avoid any arguments or contradictions, and attempted to explain those doctrines of the Church with which I was in conflict as reasonably as possible.
5. In fulfilling the church rituals I subdued my reason and submitted myself to a tradition shared by all mankind. I united myself with my ancestors and loved ones, with my father and mother, and grandfather and grandmother. They and all who came before them had believed and lived, and they had brought me into the world. And I joined those millions whom I so admired. Nor was there anything wrong in these acts in themselves (by wrong I mean the indulgence of desire). As I rose early in the morning to go to church I knew that I was doing something good, if only in that I was sacrificing my bodily comforts in order to subdue my proud mind, for the sake of unity with my ancestors and contemporaries, and of finding the meaning of life. It was the same when I prepared for communion and said my daily prayers, making the sign of the cross and genuflecting, as too when I fasted. However insignificant these sacrifices were, they were made for the sake of something good. I prepared for communion, I fasted and I observed the hours of prayer both at home and in church. While listening to the church services I paused at each word and whenever I could I gave it meaning. In the liturgy the most significant words for me were: 'Love one another in unity.' But further on I ignored the words: 'We believe in the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost', because I could not understand them.
Chapter 14
1. At the time it was so essential for me to believe in order to live that I subconsciously hid from myself the contradictions and obscurities in the religious dogma. But there was a limit to the amount of meaning that could be read into the rituals. If the most important words of the Ectene became increasingly clear to me, and even if I somehow managed to interpret the words: 'And remembering Our Sovereign Lady, Holy Mother of God, and all the saints, ourselves and one another, let us all devote our entire life to Christ, Our Lord'; and even if I interpreted the frequent repetition of prayers for the Tsar and his family by the fact that they are more exposed to temptation than others, and therefore in greater need of prayer, and the prayers for the subjugation of our enemies and adversaries by saying that they are evil, nevertheless these prayers and others, such as the Hymn of the Cherubim, the Chosen Warriors, as well as the whole sacrament of the Eucharist, in fact nearly two thirds of the service, if not all of it, had no meaning or made me feel that in giving it meaning I was lying and thereby destroying my relation to God and losing all possibility of faith.
2. I experienced the same thing over the celebration of the major feasts. I could understand the law of observing the Sabbath, in other words devoting one day to God. But the most important feast was in memory of the Resurrection, the reality of which I could neither imagine nor understand. And the name 'Resurrection' was also given to the weekly feast day. On this day the sacrament of the Eucharist was performed, which I found quite incomprehensible. All the other twelve feast days, except for Christmas, were in memory of miracles - things which I endeavoured not to think about, in order not to deny them: the Ascension, Pentecost, the Epiphany, the Intercession of the Virgin, and so on. At the celebration of these festivals, feeling that an importance had been ascribed to things I considered to be of little importance, I either invented something that would suffice as an explanation, or closed my eyes so that I would not see the things that tempted me.
3. This happened to me more powerfully than ever when I participated in what are the most usual, and regarded as the most important, sacraments: Baptism and Communion. Here I did not come into conflict with something incomprehensible but with fully comprehensible acts; it seemed to me that these acts were seductive and I found myself in a dilemma - either I rejected them, or I lied about them.
4. I shall never forget the tormenting feeling that I experienced on the day I received communion for the first time in many years. The service, the priest, the rules of prayer, were all something I could understand, and created in me a joyful realization that the meaning of life was being revealed. The communion itself I interpreted as an act performed in memory of Christ, signifying the purification of sin and the full acceptance of Christ's teachings. If this explanation was artificial I failed to notice its falsity. As I bowed down and humbled myself before the confessor, a simple, timid priest, I felt so happy to be shaking loose all the dirt in my soul, repenting all my sins, so happy to be united in thought with the aspirations of the Fathers who had written the prayers of the office, so happy to be united with all those who have and who do believe, that I failed to notice the artificiality of my interpretations. But when I approached the Royal Doors and the priest asked me to repeat what I believe, and that what I was about to receive was actually the body and blood, my heart contracted; it was more than a false note, it was a cruel demand made by someone who evidently had never known what faith is.
5. I can now permit myself to say that it was a cruel demand, but at the time I did not think so; it was just horribly painful to me. I was no longer in the position I had been in during my youth, when I thought that everything in life was lucid. I had come to faith because apart from it I had found nothing, absolutely nothing, other than destruction; it was therefore impossible to give up the faith, and so I submitted. I discovered in my soul a feeling that helped me to endure it. It was a sense of self-abasement and humility. I humbled myself and swallowed the body and blood without feeling any sense of blasphemy, and with the desire to believe; but the blow had already struck. Knowing in advance what awaited me I could not do it a second time.
6. I nevertheless continued to perform the church rituals, and I still believed that the truth lay in the dogma I was following. Then something happened to me which is clear to me now, but which struck me as strange at the time.
7. I was listening to the conversation of an illiterate peasant, a pilgrim, speaking about God, religion, life and salvation when a knowledge of faith was opened up to me. I drew closer to the people and, as I listened to their debates on life and religion, I found myself coming closer and closer to an understanding of the truth. The same thing happened to me when I read the Lives of the Martyrs and the Prologues, which became my favourite reading. Disregarding the miracles and thinking of them as fables expressing ideas, this reading revealed to me the meaning of life. There were the lives of Macarius the Great, Joseph the Prince (the story of Buddha), the writings of John Chrysostom, the story of the traveller in the well, of the monk who found gold, of Peter the Publican and the histories of the martyrs, all of whom proclaimed that death does not obliterate life; and there were the tales of illiterate and stupid men who found salvation, although they knew nothing about the teachings of the Church.
8. But I had only to mix in the company of learned believers, or to borrow their books, and vague feelings of doubt, dissatisfaction and exasperation with their arguments would rise up within me, and I felt that the further I penetrated their discourses, the further I distanced myself from the truth and headed for despair.
Chapter 15
1. I so often envied the peasants their illiteracy and lack of learning. They found nothing false in those doctrinal statements which seemed apparent rubbish to me. They could accept them and believe in the truth, in the same truth that I believed in. Only for me, wretched fellow, it was obvious that the truth was interwoven with fine threads of falsehood, and that I could not accept it as such.
2. Thus I lived for about three years and in the early days when, like one possessed, I was gradually acquiring the truth, scenting out the direction that seemed the clearest, these details struck me less. When I failed to understand something I told myself: 'I am guilty, I am a fool.' But the more I became infused with the truths I was studying, the more they became the basis of my life, the more burdensome and irritating these obstacles became, and the sharper the division between what I did not understand and what I could never understand except by lying to myself.
3. Despite the doubts and sufferings I still clung to the Orthodox Church. But questions of life that had to be resolved kept rising to the surface, and the Church's ruling on these issues - contrary to the very foundations of faith by which I lived - finally obliged me to renounce the possibility of communion with Orthodoxy. First and foremost these issues concerned the attitude of the Orthodox Church to other Churches, to the Catholics and the so-called Raskolniks. At the time, as a result of my interest in religion, I had come into contact with believers of various denominations: Catholics, Protestants, Old Believers, Molokans, and others. Among them I met many deeply moral men with sincere belief. I wished to be a brother to these people. And what happened? The teaching which had promised me unity of all through one faith and through love, that very teaching, speaking through its highest representatives, told me that all these people were living a lie, that the thing which gave them strength of life was a temptation of the devil, and that it is we alone who are in possession of the only possible truth. And I saw that the Orthodox Church regarded as heretics all those who did not profess an identical faith to theirs, just as the Catholics and the others consider the Orthodox followers to be heretics. And I saw that the Orthodox, although they may try to hide it, regard with hostility all those who do not practise their faith by using the same external symbols and words as themselves. And this could not be otherwise, first of all because the assertion that you live in falsehood and I in truth is the most cruel thing that one man can say to another and secondly, because a man who loves his children and his brothers cannot help feeling hostile towards those who want to convert his children and his brothers to a false belief. And this hostility increases in proportion to one's knowledge of theology. And assuming that truth lies in union by love, I was struck by the fact that theology was destroying the thing it should be advancing.
4. The temptation is obvious to educated men like ourselves who live in countries where a variety of different faiths are practised and who have seen the contemptuous, self-righteous, invincible manner of rejection with which the Catholics behave towards the Orthodox and the Protestants, and the Orthodox towards the Catholics and Protestants, and the Protestants towards them both. And there is such a similar attitude between the Old Believers, Russian Evangelists, Shakers and all the other religions, that the very obviousness of the temptation initially perplexed me. I told myself: no, it cannot be so simple. Surely if men fail to see that if their two convictions contradict each other, then neither of them possesses the sole truth that constitutes faith. There is something else here, there must be an explanation. I felt sure there was and I searched for the explanation, reading everything I could on the subject and consulting everyone I could. But I received no explanation other than the one according to which the Sumsky Hussars consider themselves to be the finest regiment in the world, while the Yellow Uhlans consider that they are the best regiment in the world. The ecclesiastics of all the different religious denominations, through their finest representatives, could tell me nothing except that they believed themselves to be in possession of the truth whilst others had strayed from it and that all they could do was to pray for them. I visited archimandrites, bishops, elder monks and monks of the strictest orders, yet none of them made any attempt to elucidate the matter for me. Only one explained it to me, but in such a way that I never asked anyone again.
5. I have already said that for every non-believer who returns to the faith (and this could include all of our younger generation), the question that first presents itself is: why is the truth not to be found in Lutheranism, or Catholicism, but only in the Orthodox faith? Someone who has been educated at secondary school cannot help knowing what the peasant does not know - namely, that the Protestants and Catholics are equally convinced of the singular truth of their faiths. Historical evidence, twisted by each religion to suit its own purpose, is insufficient. Is it not possible, as I have suggested, to understand the teachings in a superior way, so that from an elevated level the differences might disappear, as they do for people who genuinely believe? Is it not possible to go further along that path which we are following with the Old Believers? They stress the fact that their cross, their allelujahs, and their way of processing around the altar differ from ours. We say: you believe in the Nicene Creed and in the seven sacraments, and so do we. Let us keep to that and for the rest you may do as you please. Thus we have united with them by placing the essential aspects of faith above the non-essential. Is it not possible to say to the Catholics: you believe in such and such and so and so, which are the important things, as for the issue of the filoque and the Pope, you may do as you please. And can we not say the same to the Protestants and unite with them in the more important issues? My interlocutor agreed with my ideas, but told me that such concessions would provoke criticism from the spiritual authorities in that it suggests a departure from the faith of our ancestors and would lead to a schism, and that the vocation of the clergy is to safeguard, in all its purity, the Greek Orthodox faith that has been handed down by our forefathers.
6. Then I understood it all. While I am seeking faith, the force of life, they are seeking the best way of fulfilling, in the eyes of men, certain human obligations. And in fulfilling these human affairs they perform them in a human fashion. However much they might speak about their compassion for their lost brethren, or of their prayers for those who stand before the throne of the Almighty, it has always been necessary to use force in carrying out human duties. Just as it has always been applied, so it is now, and always will be. If two religions each consider that they hold the truth and the other a lie, then in order to convert their brothers to the truth they will each preach their own doctrines. And if a false doctrine is taught to the inexperienced sons of the Church which holds the truth, then that Church will have no choice other than to burn the books and banish the person who is leading his sons into temptation. What can be done with a sectarian who, in the eyes of the Orthodox Church, is ablaze with the fire of false doctrine, and who is misleading the sons of the Church in the most important matter of life, in faith? What can be done with him other than chop off his head or imprison him? Under the Tsar, Alexis Mikhailovitch, they were burned at the stake; in other words, the severest method of punishment of the time was enforced. In our day too the severest method of punishment is enforced: imprisonment in solitary confinement. As I turned my attention to what is done in the name of religion I was horrified and very nearly repudiated Orthodoxy. A further thing was the Church's attitude to life with regard to war and executions.
7. At the time Russia was at war. And, in the name of Christian love, Russians were killing their fellow men. It was impossible not to think about this. It was impossible to avoid the fact that killing is evil and contrary to the most basic principles of any faith. And yet prayers were said in the churches for the success of our armies, and our religious teachers acknowledged this killing as an outcome of faith. And this was not only applied to murder in time of war, but, during the troubled times that followed the war, I witnessed members of the Church, her teachers, monks, and ascetics condoning the killing of helpless, lost youths. As I turned my attention to all that is done by people who profess Christianity, I was horrified.
Chapter 16
1. I no longer had any doubts and was fully convinced that not all the teachings of the faith I had joined were true. Whereas before I used to say that all religious teaching is a lie, I no longer found it possible to say this. There could be no doubt that the people as a whole had a knowledge of the truth, otherwise they would not be here. Moreover, this knowledge of the truth was now accessible to me; I had already lived by it and felt its validity. But there was falsehood in it as well, of this I had no doubt. All that had hitherto repelled me now stood vividly before me. Although I could see that the mixture of lies I so loathed was less apparent among the peasants than among the representatives of the Church, I could nevertheless see that even in the people's faith there was falsehood mixed with the truth.
2. But where did the falsehood come from, and where did the truth come from? Both had been passed down by what is called the Church. But falsehood and truth are contained in tradition, in the so-called holy tradition and in the Scriptures.
3. Whether I liked it or not, I was led to study and examine these writings and traditions - an examination that until now I had been very fearful of.
4. I turned to a study of that very theology I had once so contemptuously rejected as unnecessary. It had previously struck me as a collection of useless nonsense, this at a time when I had been surrounded by manifestations of life that I thought clear and full of meaning. Now I would have been glad to discard all those things that did not enhance health of mind, but I did not know what to do with myself. The one meaning of life that had been revealed to me rests on this religious doctrine, or is at least inseparably connected. However far-fetched it might seem to my old, infirm mind, it was the only hope of salvation. It must be carefully and attentively examined in order to be understood, even if it is not understood in the way I understand the propositions of science. I do not seek that, nor can I, since I know the unusual nature of religious knowledge. I shall not seek the explanation of everything. I know that the explanation of all things, like the origin of all things, must remain a secret of eternity. But I want to understand in such a way as to be brought to the inevitably inexplicable. I want to realize that all that is inexplicable is so, not because the demands of my intellect are at fault (they are correct and apart from them I can understand nothing), but because I can recognize the limits of my intellect. I want to understand in such a way that everything inexplicable presents itself to me as being necessarily inexplicable and not as being something that I am under an obligation to believe.
5. I have no doubt that there is truth in the teachings, but I also have no doubt that there is falsehood in them too, and that I must discover what is true and what is false and separate one from the other. This is what I have set out to do. That which I found false in the teachings, and that which I found true, and the conclusions I came to comprise the following section of this essay, which, if someone should consider it worthwhile and useful to people, will probably be published some day, somewhere.
6. I wrote the above three years ago.
7. The other day, while I was re-reading this printed section and returning to the train of thoughts and feelings that were inside me when I was experiencing all this, I had a dream. This dream expressed for me, in condensed form, all that I had lived through and described, therefore I think that for those who have understood me a description of the dream will refresh, clarify and unify all that has been related at such length in these pages. Here is the dream: I see that I am lying on a bed. I am neither comfortable, nor uncomfortable. I am lying on my back. But I start to think about whether or not I am comfortable and it seems to me that my legs are a bit awkward; I do not know whether it is that they are too short or that they are uneven. I shift my legs and at the same time I begin to think about the way I am lying and what I am lying on, things which had not entered my head until now. And looking at my bed I see that I am lying on some plaited rope supports that are attached to the sides of the bed. My feet are resting on one of the supports, my calves on another and my legs are uncomfortable. I somehow know that these supports can be moved. Moving one of my legs I push away the furthest support beneath my feet. I presume that this will be better. But I have pushed it too far and want to rescue it with my legs, and this movement causes yet another support, beneath my calves, to fall off and my calves are left dangling. I move my whole body in order to adjust my position and am quite certain that this will settle the matter. But with this movement still more of the supports slip and move away beneath me and I can see that things are getting worse: the whole lower part of my body is slipping and hanging down, and my feet do not reach the ground. I am only supported on the upper half of my back and I start to feel not just uncomfortable but terrified of something. Only at this point do I ask myself the thing that has not yet entered my head. I ask myself: where am I and what am I lying on? I begin looking around and before anywhere else I look beneath me, where my body is dangling and in the direction where I feel I am bound to fall very soon. I look below, and I cannot believe my eyes. I am at a height not just of, say, an extremely tall tower or mountain, but I am at a height such as I could never have imagined.
8. I cannot even discern whether I can see anything there below, in the bottomless abyss over which I am hanging and into which I am being drawn. My heart contracts and I feel terrified. It is dreadful to look down there. I feel that if I look down I will immediately slip from the last support and perish. I do not look, but not looking is still worse because I am thinking about what is going to happen to me when I slip from the last support. And I feel that I am losing my last bit of strength through terror, and that my back is slowly slipping lower and lower. Another moment and I will fall off. And then I have a thought: perhaps it is not real. It is a dream. I will wake up. I try to wake up and cannot. 'What can I do, what can I do?' I ask myself, looking upwards. Above there is also an abyss. I look into this abyss of sky and try to forget about the abyss below, and I do in fact forget it. The infinity below repels and frightens me; the infinity above attracts and reassures me. Thus I am hanging over the abyss, held up by the last of the supports that has not yet slipped out from under me; I know that I am dangling but I only look upwards and my fear passes away. As happens in a dream, a voice says: 'Take note of this, this is it!' I look further and further into the infinity above me and feel myself growing calmer. I remember everything that has happened and how it happened: how I shifted the position of my legs, how I was dangling there, how terrified I felt, and how I was saved from my terror by looking upwards. And I asked myself: 'Am I not still dangling there?' And I do not look around so much as feel with my whole body the edge of the support by which I am held up. I see that I am no longer dangling or falling but am firmly supported. I ask myself how I am being supported: I grope about, look around and see that beneath me, under the middle of my body, there is a single support and when I look up I am lying on it in a position of secure balance, and that it alone gave me support before. And then, as happens in dreams, the mechanism by which I am supported seems to me to be a very natural, comprehensible and sure thing, although when awake it makes no sense at all. I am even surprised, in my sleep, that I had not understood this before. It appears that there is a pillar at my head and the solidity of this slender pillar is beyond doubt, although there is nothing for it to stand on. A rope is hanging very ingeniously, yet simply, from the pillar, and if one lies with the middle of one's body on the rope and looks up there can be no question of falling. This was all clear to me and I was glad and tranquil. It was as if someone were saying to me: 'See that you remember.' And I woke up.
目 录
企鹅口袋书系列·伟大的思想
与孤独为伍
(英汉双语)
[德]弗里德里希·尼采 著
马里昂·法博 斯蒂芬·莱曼
R. J. 霍林代尔 英译
孙若颖 汉译
中 国 出 版 集 团
中国对外翻译出版公司
目 录
一、与孤独为伍
1.真理之敌。信仰是比谎言更危险的真理之敌。
2.颠倒的世界。我们常会因为不喜欢某人的某个说法而严加苛责,其实我们更应该在相反的情况下这么做。
3.有个性的人。一个人看上去有个性,是因为他办事总是跟随自己的性情,而不是遵照原则。
4.必居其一。一个人如果生来不具有平易的性格,那么艺术与知识的陶冶必定可以使他变得性格平易。
5.对事业的激情。热爱事业(如科学、国家利益、文化、艺术)的人,往往对人比较冷漠(即便对其事业的代表,如政客、哲学家、艺术家也是如此)。
6.行动的冷静。瀑布在跌落时,变得舒缓飘逸;实干家在行动时,将强烈的渴望化为彻底的冷静。
7.浅显为妙。如果彻底了解,就很难忠诚。因为了解越深入,就越会接触到黑暗面。
8.理想主义者的误区。理想主义者们幻想自己投身的是天底下最伟大的事业,他们不愿相信,自己事业的壮大,也需要其他事业所必需的气味难闻的粪肥。
9.自我观察。人最善于防备自己,抵御自己的窥探和围攻;通常,他最多只能看清自己的外围城池。真正的堡垒他不但进不去,甚至看不见,除非朋友或敌人变成内应,带他从密道去那里。
10.合适的职业。男人们很少会忍受一项职业,除非他们相信或者说服自己相信,这项职业比其他的更重要。女人们在对待所爱的人时也是一样。
11.高尚的情操。高尚的情操大体上由善良和轻信构成,这正是贪婪和成功的人所不屑和鄙视的。
12.目的地和路。很多人会坚持走已经走上的路,对他们的目的地却很少这样坚持。
13.特立独行令人反感的地方。特立独行的人总是令人反感,因为他们与众不同的方式使周围的人感到自卑。
14.名人的特权。通过微不足道的礼物带给人无上的快乐,是名人的特权。
15.不经意的高尚。习惯给予而非索取的人,就具备了不经意的高尚。
16.成为英雄的条件。人如果想成为英雄,他的对手必须先从蛇变成龙,否则他就缺少一个合适的敌人。
17.朋友。分享喜悦而非同情,使人们成为朋友。
18.利用高潮与低潮。为了获得知识,要学会利用内在的潮汐,让自己顺势接近一件事物,一段时间以后,再顺势从那件事物上撤离。
19.爱自己。人们常说“爱事业”,实际上是爱自己,“爱事业”只是“爱自己”的表达方式。
20.谦逊之人。对人谦逊的人,往往对事物(城市、国家、社会、时代,或者人类)表现得格外傲慢。那是他的报复。
21.羡慕和嫉妒。羡慕和嫉妒是人类灵魂的私处。这个比方或许可以被推至更远。
22.最优雅的伪君子。完全不谈论自己是一种形式优雅的伪善。
23.烦恼。烦恼是一种生理疾病,不可能仅仅通过消灭其根源而消除它。
24.真理的代表。很难找到真理的拥趸,并非因为说出真理很危险,而是因为这件事本身很乏味。
25.比敌人还麻烦。当我们因为某些原因(比如感激)不得不和不投机的人维持热络的表象时,这些人对我们想象力的折磨比我们的敌人更甚。
26.走进大自然。我们喜欢走进大自然,因为它从不对我们评头论足。
27.寸有所长。在文明状态下,所有人都感到自己至少在某一方面比别人强,这是形成社会普遍亲善的基础:由于每个人在特定的情形下都可以向他人提供帮助,因而在接受他人的帮助时也就不会感到羞耻。
28.令人安慰的解释。某人故去时,我们通常需要令人安慰的解释,与其说是为了平复痛苦,不如说是为自己的痛苦轻易得到平复寻找借口。
29.忠实于信仰。事务繁忙的人,通常会保持基本理念和观点不变,这和为某种信念服务的人一样。他不再检验自己的信念,他没有时间这么做。事实上,连就此事进行考虑都与他的兴趣相违。
30.道德和数量。一个人比另一个更有道德,常常因为他的目标更多,后者因为在狭窄的圈子里忙于琐事而处于下风。
31.生命作为生命的作品。无论一个人在知识上多么广博,在他本人眼里多么客观,他最终只能收获自己的自传。
32.铁定的必然。透过历史的进程,人类了解到所谓“铁定的必然”,既非铁定也非必然。
33.经验之谈。不合理性不是一件事物消亡的理由,反而是其存在的条件。
34.真相。如今,没有人会因为某个致命的真相死去,因为解药太多。
35.基本观点。在真理的推广和人类的幸福之间,不存在预设的和谐。
36.人的宿命。进行过深入思考的人都知道,任何行为和判断都只能导致错误的结果。
37.真理如女巫。错误让动物变成人,真理是否会把人变回动物?
38.文化的危机。在我们的时代,文化面临被文化的手段摧毁的危险。
39.伟大意味着指出方向。没有哪条河流的伟大和充盈是单凭自身,能够吸纳众多的支流并带领它们前行才是其伟大之处。伟人也是一样。关键在于能指出一个众人追随的方向,至于他本人有没有足够的天赋,并不重要。
40.问心有愧。大谈自己对人类重要性的资本家,在信守约定或誓言方面会感到问心有愧。
41.要求被爱。要求别人爱自己是最大的傲慢。
42.蔑视他人。蔑视他人最明显的标志是只有在为了达成自己的目的时才会容忍他人。
43.政见相左的追随者。谁让别人对他暴跳如雷,谁就找到了追随自己的同伙。
44.忘记自己的经历。经常进行客观思考的人,容易忘记自己的经历,但不会忘记这些经历引发的思考。
45.固执己见。一个人固执己见,要么是因为他自己发现了这个观点而为之骄傲,要么是因为他经过努力理解了这个观点而为之骄傲,二者都出自于虚荣。
46.害怕曝光。善行同恶行一样害怕曝光。后者担心曝光会招致痛苦(作为惩罚);前者担心曝光会让快乐(纯粹的快乐一旦掺杂了虚荣心的满足就会终止)消失。
47.一天的长度。如果一个人有很多事要往一天里塞,一天就会变出一百个口袋来装。
48.暴君天才。如果灵魂翻腾起无法遏制的欲望,想确立自己的绝对权威,并且一直保持着这股狂热,那么即便不值一提的天分(在政治家或艺术家中),也能演变成几乎无法抗拒的自然力。
49.敌人的生命。如果一个人活着是为了同敌人战斗,那么敌人活着对他来说就非常重要。
50.更重要的事。无法解释、晦暗不明的事常被认为比可以解释、清晰明朗的事更重要。
51.评估服务。我们评估某项服务,依据的是这项服务的标价,而不是服务本身对于我们的价值。
52.不幸。不幸是如此的光荣(幸福反而像是一种浅薄、平庸和缺乏抱负的标志),如果有人说“你肯定非常幸福”时,我们通常都会表示抗议。
53.恐惧的幻象。恐惧的幻象是一个骨瘦如柴的邪恶小妖,专拣人的承受力达到极限时跳到他的背上。
54.令人生厌的反对者的价值。有时我们保持对某项事业的忠诚,只是因为反对它的人总是令我们生厌。
55.职业的价值。职业使我们变得没有思想,而这正是它最伟大的赐福。它仿佛一道防御工事,我们陷入疑虑和不安的围攻时,就可以撤退到它的后面。
56.本领。某些人的本领看起来比实际上小,是因为他们给自己安排的任务太庞大。
57.年轻。年轻时代是令人不快的,想在任何方面获得成就,在当时既不可能也不合理。
58.过于宏大的目标。当众夸下海口的人,在意识到无法兑现承诺时,通常不会有勇气重提旧事,最终无可避免地变成伪君子。
59.在溪流中。强劲的水流会带走石子和灌木,强大的思想也会吸引许多愚蠢和昏乱的头脑。
60.思想解放的危险。当一个人热切地试图解放思想时,他的激情和欲望也暗暗希望能从中得利。
61.精神的体现。如果一个人经常进行聪明的思考,他的脸和身体也会看起来很聪明。
62.视力不好和听力不好。视力不好的人,看到的东西往往比别人少一些;听力不好的人,听到的东西往往比别人多一些。
63.虚荣的自得其乐。虚荣的人不但想高人一等,而且希望感觉到高人一等,因此不惜自欺欺人。他关心的不是别人的意见,而是他对别人意见的看法。
64.格外虚荣。自大的人在生病时会变得格外虚荣,更加在乎名声和赞誉。他在多大程度上迷失了自己,就会从外界利用他人的观点重新赢回来。
65.“机智”的人。寻求机智的人没有机智。
66.给党派领袖的提示。如果能迫使人们公开宣誓效忠,就基本等于让他们在私下里宣誓效忠,因为人们总是希望显得表里如一。
67.轻蔑。通常,人们对来自别人的轻蔑比对来自自己的轻蔑更加敏感。
68.感激的绳索。某些有奴性思想的人,感恩戴德过了头,无异于用感激的绳索将自己活活勒死。
69.预言家的诀窍。要预言普通人的行为就必须明白,他们很少花费精力去摆脱糟糕的境遇。
70.唯一的人权。背离传统的人成为传统的祭品,坚守传统的人成为传统的奴隶。无论哪种情况,毁灭都随之而来。
71.比动物还不如。一个人纵声大笑时的粗俗超过了所有动物。
72.不求甚解。只会说一点外文的人比外文说得好的人更乐在其中,愉悦与不求甚解相得甚欢。
73.危险的帮助。有些人想加剧人们生活的苦难,只是为了向他们提供摆脱苦难的药方——比如基督教。
74.勤奋和负责。勤奋和负责往往是对头。勤奋想在果实青涩的时候就把它们从树上摘下,负责则让果实过久地挂在树上,直到它们掉下来,落得一场空。
75.怀疑。对于无法忍受的人,我们就把他们变得可疑。
76.缺乏机遇。很多人一辈子都在等待施展抱负的机会。
77.缺乏朋友。缺乏朋友通常是因为嫉妒或者傲慢。很多人有朋友只是幸运地因为没有可以嫉妒的理由。
78.多的危险。多一件本事不如少一件容易有稳固的立足,好比四条腿的桌子不如三条腿的站得稳。
79.他人的榜样。想成为榜样的人,必须给自己的德行添点愚蠢,这样别人就可以模仿并且超过模仿的对象——人们喜欢做这样的事。
80.当做靶子。通常别人的恶毒言论并非真的针对我们,而是发泄他们由于其他原因感到的烦恼和不悦。
81.轻易认输。如果人能说服自己憎恨过去,就不会再受到未了心愿的折磨。
82.身处危险。我们刚刚躲过一辆汽车的时候最容易被车撞倒。
83.声音对应的角色。不得不违背习惯大声说话的人(比如面对一大群人或者听力不好的人),通常会夸大他要表达的东西。
某些人之所以成为恶毒的诽谤者、阴谋家或者同谋,只是因为他们的声音最适合轻声细语。
84.爱与恨。爱与恨本身并不盲目,只是被它们怀里的火焰蒙蔽了双眼。
85.于己有利的树敌。无法获得世人认可的人,设法四处树敌。这样他就可以宽慰自己,是外界的敌意妨碍他的价值被承认,并且别人也有同感。这么做大大加强了他的自信。
86.忏悔。忏悔之后,我们将罪行忘却,听取忏悔的人却记住了。
87.自负。自负就像传说中的金羊毛,能保护你免受鞭笞,却抵御不住微小的刺痛。
88.火焰中的阴影。火焰在自己的眼里没有在被它照耀的人眼里那样明亮:智者也是如此。
89.自己的观点。我们突然被提问时第一个想到的观点,通常不是自己的,而是与我们的身份、地位或出身相符的习惯性答案;我们自己的观点很少浮出水面。
90.勇气的来源。普通人在看不到危险的时候,会像英雄那样英勇无畏、刀枪不入。相反的,英雄唯一容易受到伤害的地方在背部,因为那里他无法看到。
91.就医的危险。人要么因医生而生,要么因医生而死。
92.神奇的虚荣心。准确预言天气三次的人,多少会迷信自己拥有预言的天赋。一旦虚荣心得到满足,我们就不再争论那到底是天赋还是巧合。
93.职业。职业是生活的脊梁。
94.个人影响的危险性。感到自己对他人有巨大影响的人,必须给予对方充分的自由,对于对方偶尔的反抗应该表示支持甚至鼓励,否则他会不可避免地成为那个人的敌人。
95.让接班人得到他应得的。拥有无私胸襟、创立伟大事业的人,会用心培养接班人。在所有可能的接班人身上看到对手的影子并严加防范,是专制和卑鄙的标志。
96.一知半解。一知半解比彻底了解更受欢迎:事情在一知半解的人那里被简化,结果得到了更容易让人理解和信服的观点。
97.不适合做党派成员。经常思考的人不适合做党派成员,因为他的思想很快就洞穿并且超越了党派。
98.糟糕的记性。糟糕记性的好处,在于同一件美事,可以像头次经历一样享受好几次。
99.令自己感到痛苦。不替别人考虑往往标志着渴望麻木的不和谐的内心状况。
100.殉道者。殉道者的信徒所承受的痛苦甚于殉道者本人。
101.残留的虚荣心。一些没必要虚荣的人虚荣,是由某个残留的习惯发展而来,这一习惯源自于他们尚无自信、只能通过乞求从别人那里一点一点获得信仰的时期。
102.激情引爆点。对于即将陷入愤怒或热恋的人来说,此时此刻他的灵魂犹如注满水的容器。只差最后一滴,即引爆激情的善的意志(通常也被称为恶的意志)。只有这一小滴是必不可少的,之后容器里的水就开始溢出。
103.暴躁的想法。人或许可以被比做树林中堆积的炭木。年轻人只有在停止发红发热,并且化成炭后,才能变得有用。只要它们还在闷烧、冒烟,或许会更有趣,但一定毫无用处,并且经常带来麻烦。
人类无情地将每个人当做燃料,加热它庞大的机器。但是如果所有的人(也就是全人类)只是起到维持机器运转的作用,机器的意义何在?机器成为人类的最终目标——这就是人间喜剧吗?
104.生命的时针。生命中有一些罕见、孤立却意义非凡的时刻,还有不可胜数的间隔。最美好的间隔也不过是关于那些时刻的回味。爱情、春光、优美的旋律、山峦、月光、大海,所有这一切与心灵畅所欲言的机会只有一次,如果这样的机会确实存在的话,因为许多人根本没有经历过那样的时刻,他们本身就是生命这支交响曲中的间隔和幕间休息。
105.反对还是建设。我们通常犯的错误,是不顾一切地反对某个路线、党派或者时代,因为我们刚好撞见了它肤浅、不完善的一面,即所谓“美玉中的瑕疵”——或许是因为我们自己曾深入参与其中。于是我们背离它们,朝截然相反的方向走去。尽管去伪存真,取长补短才是更好的做法。当然,推进一项发展中的、不完善的事业,要比攻击它的不完善或抛弃它,需要更强的洞察力和意志力。
106.谦逊。真正的谦逊(即懂得我们不是自己的创造者)是有的,并且非常适合大人物,因为他最明白自己没有任何功劳(不管他作出过多么大的贡献)。大人物的自负之所以可憎,不是因为他在体验自己的力量,而是因为他在这样做时总是通过伤害和专横地对待他人或是试探对方承受力底线的方式。通常这只能证明他对自己的实力缺乏自信,反而令人质疑他的伟大。所以,明智的人要尽量避免自负。
107.一天的头一个想法。开始一天的最好方式,是在睡醒时思考我们能否在这一天给至少一个人带来欢乐。如果能用这种做法替代宗教祈祷,所有人都会从这项改变中受益。
108.傲慢作为最后的安慰。如果一个人将自身的不幸、智障或疾病,视为命中注定的劫难,或是对自己曾经做过的某件事的神秘惩罚,他等于是在拔高自己,幻想自己比别人优越。这种傲慢的罪人,在各种宗教派系中比比皆是。
109.幸福的生长。在人间的不幸经常光顾的火山带,人类建筑起小小的幸福花园。不论他以怎样的方式生活,是从存在中汲取知识,还是选择让步和屈从,抑或是以攻克难关为乐,他都会发现,幸福就在困境的边缘生长。越靠近危险的地方,越能收获巨大的幸福。不过,如果因此认为受苦是理所当然的,却很可笑。
110.祖辈之路。发展祖辈的技能而非另起炉灶是有道理的。否则就会失去在某一项技能上臻于完美的可能性。因此人们常说:该走哪条路?——走祖辈走过的路。
111.虚荣心和野心的教化。只要一个人尚未成为全人类正义事业的工具,野心就会折磨他;一旦他实现了这个野心,不得不像机器一样为大家服务,虚荣心又会来拜访。在野心完成了它那份艰苦的工作(让这个人变得有用)之后,虚荣心会在细小处感化他,让他变得更随和、宽容和周到。
112.哲学新手。刚刚从哲人那里分享了智慧的我们,走在大街上也能感觉到自己已经脱胎换骨,一变成为伟人。既然碰到的人对这份智慧一无所知,我们就必须发布关于一切的闻所未闻的新评判。因为对某部律法之书推崇备至,我们就认为自己也必须表现得像法官一样。
113.取悦于令人不悦。有些人想被关注,于是采取令人不悦的方式,这些人同那些不想被关注、只想取悦他人的人,需要的是同样的东西,只是程度上更强,方式上更间接,虽然这么做看似将他们带离了目标。由于想获得权力和影响力,他们表现得居高临下,尽管这会让人感到不悦。因为他们知道,最终得到权力的人,不论说或做什么,都会令人愉悦。即便他令人不悦,看上去也使人愉快。
自由精神的信奉者也想得到权力,为的是用来愉悦大众。如果他们由于自己的信仰而遭到威胁、迫害、监禁或者处决,他们会因为这有助于自己的信仰被铭刻在人类的丰碑上而欢喜。虽然那是推迟的奖赏,他们也欣然接受,并将其作为获取权力过程中痛苦而有效的途径。
114.宣战的借口以及诸如此类。为事先做好的决定寻找借口向邻国开战的君主,好比一个将继母作为既成事实强加给孩子的父亲。所有公开宣告的动机,不都是这类被强加于人的继母吗?
115.激情与权利。谈到权利,没有什么人比那个持怀疑态度的人更富于激情。他试图通过将激情拉到自己一边来削弱理智和疑虑。他因此无愧于良心并获得了人们的支持。
116.弃绝者的把戏。像天主教教士那样反对婚姻的人,会从最低级、庸俗的意义上理解婚姻。同样,拒绝同时代人尊敬的人,会从卑鄙的角度揣度人们的尊敬;唯有如此,他的弃绝和抗争才会变得相对容易。在大的方面克己的人,容易在小的方面纵容自己。可以想见,不为同时代人掌声所动的人,无法拒绝小的虚荣带来的满足。
117.傲慢年代。有才能的人的傲慢年代在二十六至三十岁之间到来。这是人的第一个成熟期,还带有很重的青涩味。这个时期的人往往根据自身的感受,要求那些对其才能不甚了解或一无所知的人,表现出尊敬和谦卑。由于这些表示并非总能如期而至,他有时会通过一个眼神,一个傲慢的手势或者某种声调来实施报复。观察细致的人能在他这段时期的所有作品,不论诗歌、哲学还是绘画和音乐中,辨认出这种痕迹。阅历丰富的长者往往对此会心一笑,同时满怀感触地回忆起这段美好时光。处于这个时期的人总感觉自己被大材小用了。或许他后来真的有所作为,但那种不可一世的自信已经一去不返,除非这个人一辈子都是虚荣心驱使下的不折不扣的小丑。
118.虚幻然而坚实。在深渊边缘行走或者跨越溪堑时,我们需要一个护栏,不是为了抓住它(因为它会立即同我们一起坠落),而是为了在视觉上感到安全。同样,我们年轻时,也需要那些能在无意中充当我们护栏的人;虽然如果我们真的碰到危险、需要依靠时,他们提供不了什么帮助,但是他们给了我们仿佛保护就在身边的那种安慰(比如父亲、老师、朋友,这三种人通常带给我们的感受)。
119.学会去爱。我们必须学会去爱,学会仁慈待人,而且要从小学起。如果教育和人生际遇没有提供给我们操练这些情感的机会,那么我们的灵魂就会变得干涸,甚至于无法理解关爱别人这样一件温柔的事。同样,仇恨也需要学习和培养,如果有人想精通此道的话。否则,仇恨的萌芽也会渐渐枯萎。
120.装饰性废墟。精神上历尽沧桑的人,早年留下的一些观点和习惯,会在他新的思考和行为中凸现出来,就像那些无法解释的古迹、灰色石雕,常常装点了整个地区。
121.爱与尊敬。爱使人渴望;害怕使人规避。这就是为什么我们不可能对同一个人既爱又尊敬。尊敬一个人、承认他的权威就等于畏惧他:这是一种敬畏之情。但是爱不承认权威,不接受任何区分,例如地位的高下。因为被爱意味着不被尊敬,所以野心家们或公开或私下里在爱的面前踌躇不前。
122.对冷漠者的偏爱。感情上热得快的人凉得也快,所以大体上不可靠。因此那些一直表现冷漠的人反而受到人们的偏爱,被认为靠得住和值得信赖。实际上,这是将他们同那些慢热并能长久保持热度的人搞混了。
123.自由见解的危险。自由见解那种娱乐性的随意,有如搔痒,如果你忍不住去挠它,最后就会赫然出现一个痛楚的伤口;换句话说,自由见解最终会搅扰我们对生活和人际关系的态度,造成我们在这方面的痛苦。
124.对强烈痛苦的渴望。猛烈的情感消逝之后,留下的是对她本身的隐秘渴望,消逝是她抛给我们的最后媚眼。受她的鞭笞,必定有令人感到快意的地方。与此相反,温和的情感令人感到索然无味。显然,在强烈的痛苦与微弱的愉悦之间,我们更倾向于选择前者。
125.对他人和世界的不满。我们经常迁怒于人,虽然我们烦恼的对象是自己。归根结底,我们是在努力混淆和欺骗自己的判断,用别人的疏忽和不足充当自己烦恼的根源,这样我们就可以不去追究自己。
宗教上自律甚严、经常苛责自己的人,最经常说人类的坏话。从来没有哪个圣人情愿将罪恶自己揽,美德全部让给别人。这样的人,只恐怕和那种谨遵菩萨教诲、于众人前隐匿起自己的长处而示人以不足的人,一样鲜见。
126.混淆因果。我们会不经意地找出符合自己脾胃的准则和信条,仿佛是那些准则和信条塑造了我们的性格,赋予它稳定性和确定性。真实的情形恰好相反。表面上,思考和判断塑造了我们的性格,事实上,正是性格决定了我们以何种方式思考和判断。
在这场无意识的喜剧中,是什么在操纵我们?除了懒惰和图省事的心理,还有在一切事情上维持前后一致、保持个性和思想上的统一的妄想:因为那会为我们赢得尊敬,带给我们信任和权力。
127.年纪与真相。年轻人喜欢有趣和古怪的东西,是真是假倒不关心。相对成熟的人喜欢真相中有趣和古怪的部分。完全成熟的人喜欢真相,即便真相显得平淡无奇、在普通人眼里枯燥而乏味。因为他们发现,真相倾向于透过朴素的伪装传递最高的智慧。
128.和蹩脚诗人一样的人们。正如蹩脚诗人在一句诗的后半段搜寻思想而迁就韵脚那样,人们在后半生,出于焦虑,也寻求起符合他们早年生活印记的活动、观点和朋友圈子,以便留下协调一致的外部印象。与此同时,他们不再拥有强大的思想来驾驭和重新定义他们的生命,取而代之的是搜寻韵脚的意向。
129.无聊与游戏。需求迫使我们从事能让需求得到满足的工作,我们习惯于在不断苏醒的新的需求下工作。但是在某些闲散的时刻,当我们的需求变得平静,仿佛睡去时,我们又开始受到无聊的侵扰。这是什么?这其实是工作的惯性,以一种新增的需求的形式表现出来。这种需求越大,工作的惯性也越大,需求带给我们的折磨也越大。为了摆脱无聊,人们要么在需求被满足的基础上继续工作,要么发明游戏,后者是一种为了满足工作的需要而设计的工作。厌烦了游戏,并且没有受新的需求烦恼的人,有时会充满了迈入第三种境界的渴望。这第三种境界同游戏的关系,就像飘浮同舞蹈,舞蹈同行走的关系,是一种喜悦、平和状态下的运动:这就是艺术家和哲学家眼中的幸福。
130.来自相片的启示。如果我们观察从孩童到成年的一系列相片,我们会欣喜地发现,成年后的我们更像童年时代而非青少年时代的我们。其可能的解释是,我们曾一度背离自己的本性,这种背离最终在意志力成熟的成年得到克服。青少年时代的我们,往往受到来自激情、导师或政治事件等强大影响的摆布,这些影响在成年后被压缩到一个有限的范围内。当然它们还会继续伴随并影响我们,但我们的内心感受和思考会占据主导。这些影响将被作为我们的力量源泉,但我们不会再像二十几岁时那样受其操控。就这样,我们在思想和情感上都与童年时代的我们更为接近——这一内在的回归,通过相片得到外化。
131.岁月的声音。少年人陈述、赞赏、谴责或撒谎的声音往往令上了年纪的人感到不悦,因为他们嗓门太大,同时又吐字不清,仿佛穹窿中的回音,因为空洞而引起共振。原来,少年人思考的东西,大部分不是个性丰盈的自然流露,而是在附和周围人的思想、言论和褒贬。由于情感(好恶)在他们内心引起的波澜,比伴随这些情感的理性思考来得更加猛烈,当他们表达自己时,就出现了这种含混、空洞的效果,暗示理性的缺席或匮乏。成年使人的声音变得铿锵有力、抑扬顿挫,声音虽不大,但像所有吐字清晰的发声一样,可以传递得很远。最后,老年通常会让声音带上一种温和与包容,闻之悦耳,当然某些时候也会变得乖戾。
132.逆行之人和先行之人。那些不讨人喜欢的人,对人充满了不信任,妒忌对手和邻居的成功,听到不同意见就光火。这一切表明他处于文化发展的早期阶段,像是个出土文物。他同别人打交道的方式,适用于霸权统治盛行的时代,所以他是个逆行之人。第二种人,豪爽地分享他人的喜悦,到哪里都能赢得伙伴,热爱所有蓬勃发展的事物,欣赏别人的荣誉和成功,不但不妄称只有自己掌握真理,反而充满了谦逊的怀疑主义——这样的人是先行之人,他在朝更高阶段的人类文化迈进。前者生活的时期,人类交流的基础尚未建立;而后者则生活在这栋大厦的最顶端,离那些被锁在文化地基以下、在地窖中发狂、咆哮的野蛮生物,要多远有多远。
133.疑病症患者的慰藉。当一个伟大的思想者暂时性地受到疑病症的折磨时,他可能会这样宽慰自己:“这只寄生虫滋生于你的伟大,倘若你没有那么伟大,你所受的苦就会少些。”一名政客,当他的妒忌和复仇之心(即他作为一国代表必然谙熟的“一切人反对一切人的战争”的情绪)侵入到他的私人关系中、令他举步维艰时,也会说出同样的话。
134.从现实中抽离。偶尔从现实中抽离有莫大的好处。从现实的岸边驶离,进入旧有世界观的海洋,从那里反观岸边,会使我们第一次有幸一睹它的全貌。再次回到岸边的我们,比起那些从没有离开过的人,获得了对现实更好的理解。
135.用个人的不足来播种和收获。像卢梭这样的人,懂得如何利用自身的弱点、不足和罪愆,仿佛这些是滋养天才的沃土。卢梭哀叹社会的腐败和堕落,视其为文化导致的恶果,皆基于其自身的经历,其中的苦涩使他的批判一针见血,入木三分。他从个人角度寻求救治,认为自己找寻的药方能直接医治社会,并通过社会间接地医治自身。
136.哲学上的思维定式。人们总是力求在多变的人生境遇和事件面前保持不变的情感立场和观点,我们称之为哲学上的思维定式。但是与其维持自身的统一,不如聆听来自不同生命境遇、观点各异的低语,以丰富我们的阅历。通过拒绝成为僵化、不变通和孤立的个人,我们承认并分享了芸芸众生的生命和特质。
137.轻蔑之火。一旦一个人敢于发表会使自己蒙羞的观点,他就朝独立迈进了一步。那时,甚至他的朋友和熟人也开始感到焦虑不安。有天分的人必须迈过这道火焰,那以后,他就是自己的主人了。
138.牺牲。如果有选择,人们更愿意选择大的牺牲而不是小的,因为对于大的牺牲,我们可以用自我崇拜来补偿自己,而对于小的牺牲这却是不可能的。
139.爱作为一种手段。无论谁想真正了解一件新事物(不管是一个人、一件事,还是一本书),都需要用全部可能的爱来接纳它,尽可能忽视、忘记它的所有不友好、令人反感或虚假的部分。比如,我们会给予某本书的作者最大的起跑优势,接下来就像观看赛跑一样,心情忐忑地盼望他能到达终点。通过这么做,我们得以深入新事物的内核,进入它的动力中心,而这正是了解一件事物的内涵所在。一旦到达那个阶段,理智就会设定它的限度。过高的评价和批判机制的偶尔失衡,都是将事物的灵魂引诱到开阔地的手段。
140.把世界想象得太好或太坏。不管我们把世界想象得太好还是太坏,我们都会收获巨大的喜悦:如果预想得太好,我们等于给世界(经历)注入了比实际更多的美好;如果预想得太糟,我们会得到一个令人愉快的失望:世界的美好,会因为我们的惊喜而加倍放大。
顺便一提,病态的脾性在这两种情形下的经历正好相反。
141.深刻的人。以印象深刻见长的人(他们通常被称为“深刻的人”),在遭遇突发性事件时,通常会表现得相对有控制力和决断性。这是因为反应时间太短,印象尚未形成。然而长久期待的人或事,最能刺激这种个性的人,会使他们几乎无法在等候结束时保持镇定自若。
142.同“高我”的交流。每个人在找到自己的“高我”时,都有过辉煌。真正的人道,要求我们仅在一个人的这种时刻,而非在他仍处于受束缚、受奴役的状态下时对他进行评判。比如说,我们应该就一名画家领会和呈现的最高妙的图景给予评价或荣誉。但是人们自己在对待“高我”时,却采取了非常不同的做法。他们经常装腔作势,以致后来不断模仿自己在辉煌时期的样子。有些人面对自己的理想时会感到羞惭,想要否定它:他们害怕自己的“高我”,因为当“高我”发言时,它的要求很高。此外,“高我”拥有影子般的自由,可以自主去留。为此,它经常被称为神灵的礼物,而实际上其他的一切也都是神灵(机遇)的礼物:那就是人自身。
143.喜欢独处的人。有些人如此喜欢独处,他们从不拿自己与他人比较,而是平静、愉快地吐露生命的独白,与自己进行美好的交谈,甚至还会大笑起来。但是如果被迫和他人比较,他们多半会忧郁地得出一个过低的自我评价,并因此不得不从旁人那里学习关于自己的积极、公正的评价。甚至从这习得的评价中,他们也总是想做些减损。
所以我们必须允许某些人保留他们独处的习惯,而不是像经常发生的那样,愚蠢地对他们施以怜悯。
144.没有旋律。有些人拥有一种持续、内在的宁静,他们所有的能力和谐地分布,任何目的性很强的活动都与他们格格不入。他们就像一首乐曲,完全由连续、悦耳的和弦组成,没有一丁点旋律经过编排的痕迹。他们的小船会随着外界的任何动向,立即在由和谐之音构筑的海洋上获得新的平衡。现代人碰到这种天性的人通常极端没有耐心,因为他们不会成就任何事,虽然不能说他们啥也不是。某些情形下,他们的存在让人不禁发问:为何一定要有旋律?为何我们不满足于生命在深潭上投下宁静的倒影?
中世纪要比现在更盛产这种天性的人。现在我们很少有机会碰到这类人,他们即便身处乱世也能保持平和、愉悦的心态,像歌德对自己说的那样:最好的东西莫过于我在众人之中体验和养成的深深宁静,而我的收获则是他们无论用火还是剑都无法夺去的。
145.生活与经验。你是否注意到,有些人知道如何将自己的经历(他们微不足道的日常经历)变成一年收获三茬的富饶之地;而另一些人(他们的队伍如此壮大!),即便经历过最跌宕起伏的命运洗礼,见证过最变化莫测的时代或民族风云,却仍然轻飘飘地像木塞一样浮于表面。所以最终我们倾向于将人划分为两类:懂得如何变少为多的少数人和懂得如何变多为少的大多数。真的,那些变态的魔术师确有其人,他们非但不能无中生有,反而将有归于无。
146.游戏的严肃性。热那亚的日落时分,我听得一座高塔上钟声长鸣。它绵延不绝,盖过后街的嘈杂,仿佛总也听不够自己的声音。钟声在黄昏的天空和海边的空气中回荡,既可怕又孩子气,同时还很忧郁。我想起柏拉图的话,突然在心底里产生了共鸣:“说到底,人间之事没有一样值得当真;尽管如此……”
147.关于信仰与正义。冷静而清醒地兑现一个人在激情状态下做出的承诺和决定,是人类最可怕的重负之一。要人们永远为愤怒、狂热的复仇、炽烈的爱承担后果,会加剧对这类情感的抵触,特别是当这类情感已经广泛地成为人们尤其是艺术家崇拜的对象。艺术家们坚持不懈地播种着对激情的尊崇;当然他们没少为激情释放的可怕过程增添效果,诸如复仇导致的死亡、伤害,自我放逐和心碎后的弃绝。不管怎样,艺术家们维持着人们对激情的好奇,他们似乎想说:没有经历过激情,你就根本没有活过。
是否因为我们曾向某个纯粹想象的产物,比如上帝,宣誓效忠,或是曾在狂喜的盲目疯狂中将心交给某个君王、政党、女人、上帝,或是某个艺术家、思想家,认为他们配得上一切荣誉和牺牲,我们就永远负有义务?难道我们不是在自欺欺人?这样的承诺难道不应有个前提,即我们为之献身的对象真的如我们想象的一样?我们必须忠实于我们的过错吗,即便发现这种忠诚只能损害我们的“高我”?
不,不存在这样的约定、这样的义务。我们必须成为叛徒,采取不忠的做法,再三背弃我们的理想。我们从生命的一个阶段过渡到另一个,势必会带来背叛的痛楚,并为之受苦。我们是否必须严防情感的波澜以避免这类痛苦?世界难道不会因此变得过于黯淡和可怖?我们宁可自问,由信仰改变引发的痛苦是否必要,其依据是否是种错误的看法和判断?为什么我们钦佩坚守信仰的人而鄙视改变信仰的人?恐怕答案就在于,所有人都认为这种改变源自卑下的利益驱动或个人恐惧。也就是说,我们骨子里认为,如果一个人的信仰对其有利无害,没有人会改变信仰。但如果真是这样,就否定了一切信仰在精神层面的意义。让我们检视一下各种信仰产生的过程,看看它们是否被过分夸大,并借由这个办法揭示出,衡量信仰改变的标准的谬误,以及到目前为止,我们为这类改变所蒙受的不白之冤。
148.信仰就是相信某人在某项知识上拥有绝对真理。它假定:首先,绝对真理是存在的;此外,得出绝对真理的正确方法已经找到;最后,持有信仰的人运用的方法是正确的。此三项假定一出,即证明信仰之人不具备科学的思想方法;不管在别的方面有多成熟,他在理论上仍然处于幼稚阶段,还是个孩子。然而数千年来,人们一直生活在这种孩子气的假定中,它成为人类最强大的力量源泉。无数为信仰献身的人,认为自己是在为某种绝对真理服务。他们都错了:或许根本就没有人为真理做出过牺牲;其信仰武断的表述方式至少是不科学或不完全科学的。但实际上,人们不想出错是因为知道自己不可以出错。剥除他们的信仰,意味着动摇他们永恒的福祉。在意义如此重大的事情上,“意志”成为理智鲜明的指挥棒。每个教派的信徒都认为自己不可能被驳倒。如果反论据显得过于强大,他仍然可以从普遍意义上诋毁理智,甚至举起极端宗教狂热的大旗——“不合理故我信”。历史如此暴戾,不是因为理念之争,而是由于对理念的信仰之间的冲突,即信仰之争。如果那些将信仰视如珍宝、不惜牺牲荣誉、身体甚至生命为之服务的人,愿意花一半气力弄明白,他们凭什么恪守这样或那样的信仰,他们何以得出这样或那样的结论,人类历史就会变得平和许多!知识也会增进许多!所有对于异教徒的残酷迫害都可以被避免。原因有二:其一,宗教法官会首先扪心自问,从而不再傲慢地认为自己是在捍卫绝对真理;其二,异教徒们在研究过那些宗派主义者和所谓“正统派”漏洞百出的信条之后,不会再屑于去关注它们。
149.在人们以为他们掌握着绝对真理的时代,任何涉及到知识层面上的怀疑主义和相对主义立场都会招致深刻的不安。通常我们倾向于无条件地臣服于权威们(父亲、朋友、导师、君主)的信仰。如果我们不那么做,反而会感到良心不安。这种倾向情有可原,但我们不能因为它的影响就对人类理性的发展大加批判。最终人类的科学精神会引导出审慎的克制,这种中庸的美德在实践上比在理论上更为人所知。比如歌德笔下的安东尼奥,就是这种美德的典范,他成为代表愚昧、消极个性的塔索们共同憎恶的对象。信仰之人有权不去理解那个思维审慎、满腹经纶的安东尼奥;另一方面,讲求科学的人却没有权力因此斥责信仰之人;安东尼奥谅解塔索,并且知道这个人有可能信靠他,就像最终发生的那样。
150.如果一个人没有经历过不同的信仰,而是陷在第一个信仰的罗网里,那么无论如何,就因为这个不变性,他都是落后文化的代表。和此人在教育(总是以可教育性为前提)上的匮乏相一致的是,他刻薄、不明智、不可教、粗暴、生性多疑、无所顾忌,为了推行自己的观点而不择手段,因为他无法理解别的观点也有权存在。在这一方面,他可能成为力量的源泉,在变得过于自由和松散的文化中甚至是有益的,但这仅仅是因为他有效地激起了反抗:新兴文化的稚嫩结构正是在同他的对抗中变得强壮起来。
151.本质上,我们和宗教改革时代的人没什么两样——怎么会不一样呢?不过我们不再允许自己使用某些手段以证明自己是对的:这使得我们有别于那个时代,并表明我们属于一个更高的文化层面。现在,如果一个人仍然像宗教改革时代的人那样,通过怀疑和发怒来攻击和压制不同的意见,就表明如果他生活在别的时代,他可能会烧死他的反对者;如果他是一名宗教改革的反对者,他可能会动用宗教裁判所的全部手段。宗教裁判所在自己所处的时代是合理的,因为它不过是以整个教会领域为对象的普通军事管制,而且就像所有的军事管制一样,它为极端手段的采取做了辩护,即假定(如今我们已经不再苟同那些人的假定)教会拥有真理并且为了人类的救赎必须不惜一切代价捍卫它。不过现在,我们不再轻易地认为任何人拥有真理;宗教侦审的严酷做法已经播下了足够的不信任和警惕,任何通过激烈言行推行其观点的人,都让我们感到有可能是现有文化的敌人,或者至少是个逆行之人。事实上,拥有真理的热情,在今天同另一种热情比起来已经乏善可陈,这种热情更加柔和、安静,那就是孜孜不倦地学习、验证新知识的寻找真理的热情。
152.顺便一提,对于真理研究方法的追寻,是信仰自相残杀时代的产物。如果个人对于自己的“真理”,即他最终的正确性,不关心,就根本不会存在对方法的调查。但是,正因为存在不同个人关于绝对真理归属的永恒争夺,人类才一步步前行,试图找到那无可辩驳的方法来验证这些言论的公正性,以结束争端。起初,决定是由权威们做出的;后来,各种伪真理就彼此发现的方式和手段展开相互攻讦;中间有一个时期,人们总结出敌对教义的影响,证明它们有害无益;结果所有人都认为对手的信仰有错误。最终,思想家们的个人奋斗磨练了他们的方法,以至于真理真的可以被发现,于是早期方法的偏差也就大白于天下。
153.总而言之,科学的方法至少和任何调查的结果一样重要。因为科学精神建立在对方法的深入了解之上,如果那些方法丢失了,科学的全部结论也无法阻止迷信和谬论的新一轮胜利。聪明人可以尽情学习科学的结论,但我们仍然能从他们的对话,尤其是对话的假设中看出其科学精神的匮乏。他们不具备对错误思维方式本能的不信任,这种不信任,作为长期操练的结果,已经深深地扎根于每一个具有科学态度的人的灵魂。对前者来说,一件事物只要找到一种假设就足够了;他们会为之热血沸腾,认为大功告成。对他们而言,拥有观点意味着为它疯狂,并像对待信仰一样将其珍藏心中。如果一件事物没有解释,他们会为头一个进入脑海的类似于解释的概念兴奋不已;而这往往会导致最恶劣的后果,尤其是在政治领域。
因此,所有人都应该至少掌握一门科学的基础;然后他就会知道什么是方法,以及最极端的审慎有多么必要。这个忠告尤其应该给予女人,她们现在是各种臆测,尤其是那些貌似睿智、令人兴奋、激动、蛊惑人心的臆测的无助的牺牲品。事实上,如果仔细观察,我们会发现大部分受过教育的人仍然渴望信仰,但仅限于从思想家那里获得的信仰,只有极少数人想得到确定性。前者想获得当头棒喝,借以提升自身的力量;后者则带有就事论事的兴趣,无视私人利益,甚至上面提到的力量的提升。不论何处,只要思想家表现得像个天才,并自诩为天才,像个理应获得权威的更高存在那样俯视众人,他就在依靠那个占有压倒性多数的群体。这种天才维持着信仰的热度,引起了具有科学审慎和谦逊精神的人的不信任,在这个意义上,他是真理之敌,不管他如何认为自己是真理的追随者。
154.当然,还有另一种类型的天才,那就是公正的天才。没有任何理由认为这类天才不及哲学、政治或是艺术方面的天才。他回避任何有可能妨碍和混淆我们对事物的判断的东西,并从心底里感到憎恶。所以他是信仰的敌人。因为他希望公平对待一切事物,不管是活的还是死的,真实的还是虚构的。为了这么做,他必须洞察一切。因此他将每一样事物放置在最明亮的光线下,然后从各个角度用心观察。最后,他甚至会给他的敌人——那盲目或短视的“信仰”(这是男人的叫法;女人管它叫“忠诚”)一个公平的机会——为了真理的缘故。
155.主张从激情中产生;精神上的懒惰使这些主张僵化为信仰。
不过,谁要是感到自己拥有无拘无束、活力四射的精神,他可以通过不断的变化来避免这种僵化;谁要是在思维上是个不折不扣的滚雪球的人,那么他的头脑中就根本不会有任何观点,有的只是确定性和精确计算过的可能性。
但是像我们这样性质混合的人,有时激情似火,有时却又被理智冷却,我们想跪在公正的面前,尊奉她为我们唯一的女神。通常,内心的火焰会令我们不公正,在女神的眼里,也就是不纯洁;处于这种状态下的我们,永远无法触摸女神的手,她也永远不会愉悦地对我们露出庄严的微笑。我们敬拜她为我们生命中戴着面纱的伊希斯 ① 。当内心之火烧灼我们,试图吞噬我们时,羞愧的我们将自身的痛苦作为赎罪品和牺牲品祭献给她。是理智拯救了我们,使我们免于化为焦炭。它不断地将我们从公正的祭坛上拉走,或者将我们置于石棉的包裹之中。从火中得到拯救的我们,在理智的驱使下,在不同的主张之间大步前行,变换着阵营,我们是高尚的变节者,背叛所有可以背叛的一切,同时问心无愧。
156.流浪者。仅仅在一定程度上获得理性自由的人,只能感到自己是一名流浪者——而不是朝着某个终极目标行进的旅行者,因为这目标不存在。不过他确实想睁大眼睛观察在这个世界上真实发生的一切。因此他不可以将心太紧地束缚在某一件私人物品上,他的内心必有东西在游走,这种东西以变化和转瞬即逝为乐。当然,这样的人会经历糟糕的夜晚:精疲力竭之时,却发现原本应该为他提供休息的城市已经关上了大门。也许除此之外,就像在东方那样,沙漠一直延伸到城门脚下,掠食性动物的嚎叫时远时近,狂风肆虐,强盗牵走了他的驮畜。对他而言,可怕的夜晚犹如第二座沙漠降临在沙漠之上,而他的心已厌倦了漂泊。接着,早晨的太阳升起来,像愤怒的神灵一样发着光,城市敞开了大门,如果他在城市居民的脸上看到的沙漠、灰尘、欺骗、犹疑比城市外面还要多——那么白天几乎比夜晚还要糟糕。流浪者有时会碰到这样的情形,但是作为补偿,他在别的地方迎来了令人欣喜的早晨。就在附近,在黎明的曙光中,他看见一群群缪斯跳着舞在山岚中从他的身边经过。那之后,他在上午灵魂的平衡状态下安静地散步,从枝繁叶茂的树上撒下来的都是美好、明亮的东西,那是所有那些在山上、林间、在孤寂中甘之若饴的自由精灵的馈赠,他们和他一样,时而欢欣时而沉思,既是流浪者也是哲学家。在黎明的神秘中诞生的他们,思考着怎样才能让这一天在十点和十二点之间拥有纯净、清澈、美妙而欢欣的脸孔——他们在寻找上午的哲学。
注 释
① 伊希斯是埃及古代宗教里的女神,被认为是贤妻良母的典范、自然和魔法的保护者,受到统治阶级和劳苦大众的一致欢迎,被尊奉为生育、魔法和丰产女神。
二、在朋友们中间:结语
1
彼此沉默,很好
相视而笑,更好——
天空如丝的帐幔下
斜倚着书本和青苔
朋友们纵声大笑
大家都露出雪白的牙齿。
如果我做得好,让我们保持沉默,
如果我做得不好,让我们开怀大笑
一分为二,再次弄糟,
做得越糟糕,笑得越厉害,
直到我们钻进墓穴。
好啦,朋友们,你们觉得怎样?
阿门!来日再相逢!
2
不要找寻借口!不要宽恕!
你们这些开心的,不为爱所困的人
请给予我这本荒唐的书
你们的耳朵、心灵和庇护!
真的,朋友们,我自身的愚蠢
并没有全然白费!
我已经找到的和正在寻找的——
可曾在书里存在过?
向这个愚人阵营的来客致敬吧!
从这本愚人的书中了解
理性如何被教会——“推理”!
那么,朋友们,你们觉得怎样?
阿门!来日再相逢。
三、自由精神
1.噢,神圣的单纯!人类生活在怎样的天真和虚妄中啊!一旦我们认识到这一点,就会对此连连称奇。我们是怎样将周遭的一切变得简单明了、自由随意!我们是如何让感觉对一切肤浅之物敞开大门,让思想耽溺于天马行空的联想和错误的推断!——我们是如何设法从一开始就保留无知,以享受生命那难以想象的磅礴恣肆、酣畅淋漓,亦即享受生命本身!而只有在无知那如花岗岩般坚实的地基上,知识才能巍然屹立;求知的意志是以更为强大的求无知、求不确定性、求不真实的意志为基础!不是作为后者的对立面,而是作为其升华!即便语言在此处就像在别处一样无法克服自身的粗鄙,将程度的不同和细微的差别说成对立,即便人类根深蒂固的伪善,扭曲了我们之中智者的话语,我们也能不时心领神会,然后抚掌大笑:正是最高妙的知识试图将我们束缚在这个被简化的,不自然的,伪造的和被扭曲的世界。它义无反顾地热爱错误,因为作为一个生命体,它热爱生活。
2.欢快的绪言之后是庄严的敬告:这是说给最严肃的人听的。要小心,哲学家和热爱知识的朋友们,警惕殉道者的做法!警惕“为真理之故”受苦,警惕为自己辩驳!它会损毁你良心全部的纯真和公正,使你无法容忍任何不同和反对的意见;它会使你在同危险、诽谤、猜忌、驱逐甚至更大的敌意作斗争时变得愚蠢、野蛮和无情,你不得不摆出人间真理守护人的姿态——仿佛“真理”如此幼稚、无能,以至于需要人守护!而你,我亲爱的无所事事的朋友和精神上的阴谋家,就成了众人中那个面露愁苦的骑士!毕竟你心里清楚,众人之中你自己正确与否根本不重要;你知道迄今为止没有哲学家能够被证明是正确的,而你在钟爱的词句和学说(有时是你自己)后面打上的每个问号,或许比你在控诉人和法庭面前做出的所有肃穆的手势和狡黠的答辩,都更为诚实和令人钦佩。不如避开!逃走,躲起来!运用你的面具和手腕,让自己受到误解或是别人的敬畏!别忘了花园,那个有着金色棚架的花园!接近那些像花园一样的人,或是那些让你想起黄昏时分水面上飘过的音乐的人。选择有益的独处,自由、随意、惬意的独处会让你在某种程度上保持美好!每一场漫长而隐秘的战争都会让人变得无比恶毒、狡猾和卑鄙!在时刻警惕敌人和可能的敌人中被拉伸的恐惧,让人变得富于攻击性!这些被社会驱逐的人,受到长期迫害和大力追捕的人,还有像斯宾诺莎 ① 和乔尔丹诺·布鲁诺 ② 那样被迫遁世的人,最终都会变成精明的复仇者和恶念的传播者,即便他们顶着最超凡脱俗的伪装,甚至于自己也蒙在鼓中(让我们揭示斯宾诺莎的伦理学和神学基础吧!)——更不用说道德义愤的愚蠢性,它准确无误地表明一个哲学家已经丧失其哲学式幽默。一个哲学家的殉道,他的“为真理之故牺牲”,暴露出他人格中潜藏的煽动者和演员的一面。如果到目前为止,我们只是出于艺术的好奇在审视他,结合众多哲学家的案例,很容易理解那种想偶尔瞥见堕落状态下的他(堕落成“殉道者”,堕落成在舞台和讲坛上豪言壮语的人)的危险欲望。只是有必要澄清我们将要看到的是什么:不过是一场“羊人剧” ③ ,一出放在正剧结尾的闹剧,不过是再次证明那个真正的绵长的悲剧已经结束:假定每部哲学起初都是一部长长的悲剧的话。
3.每个优秀的人都会本能地寻求一座秘密堡垒,在那里他可以摆脱人群、民众和大多数;在那里,置身事外的他可以忘记人类的规则——除非,作为一名卓尔不群的博学之士,他会在更强大的本能驱使下,径直奔向这一规则。任何在和人打交道时没有流露出沮丧,表现出嫌恶、厌腻、怜悯、阴郁和孤单情绪的人,必定不具备精致的品位;但是如果他不去主动承担这份不快而是不断地规避它,坚持安静而骄傲地躲在自己的堡垒里,那么可以肯定:知识不适合他。否则总有一天,他会不得不对自己说:让我的品位见鬼去吧!规则比例外——比我这个例外本身,更有趣!他会选择走“下来”和走“进去”。哲学家对普通人的研究漫长而严肃,其中充斥着的掩饰、自我征服、亲昵和不良结交——和不相称的人结交都可以算做不良结交——构成了他人生经历中不可或缺的部分,并且可能是最令人不快、发狂和失望的部分。如果哲学家像知识最钟爱的孩子那样足够幸运,他就会遇见帮助他完成任务的捷径——即所谓的玩世不恭者,这些人早已看穿了自身的蒙昧、平庸和驯顺,却仍能保持在人前谈论自己的冲动——有时他们甚至在书中打滚,就像在自己的排泄物中一样。玩世不恭是普通人接近真诚的唯一形式;杰出的人必须在玩世不恭面前竖起耳朵,不论它是粗俗还是高雅;而在某个丑角或者科学“羊人”不知羞耻地夸夸其谈时,暗自感到庆幸。当然有时厌恶中会混合着着迷:因为某些不可知的原因,这些不知天高地厚的山羊和猴子有时颇具天分。比如加利亚尼神父 ④ ,这个思想无比深刻、目光无比犀利的人,同时也可能是他那个世纪最肮脏的人——他远比伏尔泰更深刻,因此也更沉默。科学的头颅经常被安到猴子身上,超凡的领悟力常被装配到平庸的灵魂上——这在物理学家和伦理生理学家中比比皆是。不论何时,如果有人以不含私怨、无伤大雅的方式将人类比喻成有两种需求的肚子和一种需求的头脑;不论何处,如果有人看到、寻求和想看到的只有食、色和虚荣,仿佛这些是人类行为真实和唯一的动机;总之,任何时候,如果有人对人类大加嘲讽但并非中伤诽谤时,热爱知识的人就应该认真倾听;只要有人不带情绪地说话,他就应该关注。那些处于激愤状态,不停地用牙齿撕扯自己(或者世界、上帝、社会)的人,从道德上讲,也许确实比那些哈哈大笑、洋洋自得的“羊人”站得更高,但在任何别的意义上,他都更加平庸、乏味和无益,而且愤怒的人比任何人说的谎都更多。
4.人们很难理解我们:尤其当你像急逝的恒河之水一样思考和生活,而周围的人却采取截然不同的方式:他们像乌龟一样缓慢,或者至多是“像青蛙那样蹦跳”——当然我这是在努力让自己难于被理解!——我们应该对旁人委婉善意的诠释表示由衷的感激。至于我们的“好友”,他们总是太懒惰,认为作为好友,他们有权好逸恶劳:如果我们从一开始就给他们一些误解的空间和自由会好得多——这样我们就可以对他们大加嘲笑;——或者索性摆脱掉这些好友,而仍然保持欢笑!
5.从一种语言翻译成另一种语言,最难传递的莫过于风格的节奏感,它源自于种族的个性,用生理学上的话说,就是“新陈代谢”的平均速度。有一些以忠实于原文为初衷的翻译,结果不自觉地将原文庸俗化,几乎成为歪曲,就是因为要同时翻译出勇敢而欢快的节奏(它跳跃着将一切事物和词语中暗含的危险抛在身后)是不可能的。德国人几乎无法用自己的语言快速说话,由此可以推断,他们对于表达自由、无拘无束的思想中那些最大胆、愉悦的情绪也大多无能为力。例如歌剧中的滑稽男低音和戏剧中的“羊人”,无论是在形体还是道德上都会令德国人感到陌生,所以阿里斯托芬 ⑤ 和佩特罗尼乌斯 ⑥ 对他们来说是不可翻译的。一切以静止、慵懒、肃穆、冗长和乏味为特征的风格,在德国蓬勃发展——请原谅我指出,即便是歌德的散文,融合了优雅与生硬,也不例外。它是其所属的那个“辉煌年代”的映像,是对“德国趣味”尚存的年代的一种德国式的表达:即道德和艺术上的洛可可式风格。莱辛是个例外,这要归功于他的历史性,他博古通今并且在很多方面造诣很高:他成为贝尔的译者并非偶然,他喜欢狄德罗和伏尔泰,更喜爱罗马喜剧家——在节奏感方面,莱辛崇尚无拘无束,竭力摆脱德国式的拘谨。但即便在他的散文中,德语也无法模仿马基雅维里的节奏感,后者的《君主论》让我们呼吸到佛罗伦萨的干爽空气,并且忍不住要将最严肃的事用最活泼、最轻快的方式表达。其中或许不无居心叵测的艺术家对反差效果的追求——一边是冗长、艰深、危险的思想,一边是飞驰的节奏和恣意的欢娱。谁会冒险用德文翻译佩特罗尼乌斯呢,他在创作、理念、词汇方面比迄今的任何一位音乐家都更深谙快板的精髓——如果我们能拥有他那风一样的轻盈步履,那样的气流和呼吸,那种风的解放性的藐视,以及风的那种让一切奔跑起来而获得健康的力量,所有那些邪恶病态世界中的沼泽,甚至“古代世界”中的沼泽又算得了什么?至于阿里斯托芬,由于他的贡献和补充,我们可以原谅希腊的存在(假定我们非常清楚需要原谅和改观的是什么)。临终前的柏拉图,枕下放的既不是《圣经》,也不是任何一本埃及的书,更不是毕达哥拉斯或柏拉图自己的著作,而是一本阿里斯托芬喜剧。没有什么比这个流传的轶事更能激发我对柏拉图那讳莫如深的行为方式和他那斯芬克斯式个性的思考。如果没有阿里斯托芬,即便是柏拉图,也无法忍受他的人生——那被他否定的希腊式人生!
6.适合独立的人寥寥无几——那是强者的特权。任何人,即便有充分的理由,只要不是迫于无奈而主动尝试独立,就证明他不但是个强者,而且大胆到近乎莽撞的地步。他会从此踏进一座迷宫,在这里,生活本身的危险被放大了一千倍,没有人清楚他是怎样和在哪里迷了路,变得孑然一身,最后被良心的牛头怪 ⑦ 撕成碎片。假使这样的人被摧毁,人们将难以理解、无法感受也不会寄予同情——而他则再也回不去!甚至连人们的怜悯也得不到!
7.当我们最了不起的见解,未经允许就出现在不喜欢它们和不适合听到它们的人的耳朵里时,听上去肯定会像是疯话,甚至是罪恶。哲学家们曾在希腊人、波斯人和穆斯林中分别进行“显白教诲”和“隐微教诲”,发现只要人们信仰等级秩序而非权利平等,二者的区分并不在于“显白教诲”是从外部而非内部观察、评价、估量和判断。其根本区别在于,“显白教诲”是从下面看事物,而“隐微教诲”是从上面看事物!在灵魂的某些高度上,连悲剧看起来也不可悲;即便集合世上所有的惨状,谁又敢确定它们一定会令我们心生怜悯,从而分外悲伤?……在高层次的人看来是营养品的东西,对于低层次和全然不同的人来说可能是毒药。普通人的美德在哲学家身上可能恰恰意味着恶习和缺陷;一个高层次的人可能只有在堕落和毁灭时,才会获得某些令俗世尊奉他为圣人的属性。同样的书,对于不同层次人的灵魂和健康,作用可能正好相反,要看读者究竟是低层次、生命力暗弱的人,还是高层次、生命力强悍的人。在前一种情形下,这些书是危险的,有可能导致人的崩溃和毁灭;在后一种情形下,它们会成为先驱的号角,激励勇者鼓起他们的勇气。给所有人读的书总是令人掩鼻:因为有渺小者的气味吸附在上面。凡是众人吃喝乃至敬拜的地方,都有臭味。谁要想呼吸纯净的空气,就不要去教堂。
8.人年轻时,无论是崇拜还是鄙视,都缺乏分寸,善于掌握分寸是生命最大的奖赏。我们必须为自己用简单的对错来评判人和事付出高昂的代价,也只有这样才算公平。在这段时期,最差的品味,即对于绝对的偏好,总是被残忍地滥用,出尽洋相,直到我们学会在感情中加入一点艺术,甚至冒险尝试一些刻意的东西:就像真正的生活艺术家做的那样。年轻人高涨的愤怒和虔敬,似乎一定要把人和事伪造成他们情感的宣泄对象方才罢休——在这一点上,年轻意味着伪造和欺骗。待年轻的灵魂被失望磨折,最终将怀疑的矛头指向自己,那处于自我怀疑和良心拷问中的自己,依然血性而野蛮。现在它是多么地痛恨自己,它是那么不耐烦地撕扯自己,它要为长期以来的自我欺骗狠狠地报复自己,仿佛这是有预谋的自我蒙蔽!在这一转变中,我们通过不信任自己的感情来惩罚自己;我们用怀疑来折磨自己的热情;事实上,连问心无愧也会被感到是种危险,仿佛这也是一种自我蒙蔽,是正义感开始变得倦怠的标志。最重要的是,我们开始划分阵营,并从原则上与年轻为敌。——十年以后,我们才知道,所有这些仍然是年轻的举动。
9.在人类历史中最漫长的一段时期——即所谓的史前时期——一件行为是否有价值,由它的结果来决定。行为本身及其动机并不在人们的考虑范围之内,就像在中国,儿女的荣辱直接反映到父母身上,人们通过追溯成败的根源来对行为做出肯定或否定的评价。让我们把这个时期叫做人类的道德前期:那时“了解你自己!”这句训诫尚不为人知。另一方面,地球上的某些地方在过去一万年中逐步改变认识,认为决定行为价值的不再是结果而是动机。总体上,这是一件大事,是视野和标准上精进的结果,体现了处于统治地位的贵族价值观和血统迷信所带来的影响,它标志着狭义上的道德时期的到来:这是人们自我认知的初步尝试。人们不再考虑结果而是动机:多么伟大的视角转换!这是在经历了长期挣扎和游移之后才取得的!当然,一种灾难性的新迷信,即狭隘的诠释从此成为主导:一件行为的动机被明确地诠释为意图的动机。人们达成共识,认为行为的价值即存在于其背后的意图的价值。意图被看做是行为的全部动机和背景——正是在这种偏见的左右下,人们进行道德上的褒贬、裁夺和哲学式推究直至今日。可是,伴随着人类新一轮自省和见解的深化,我们今天难道不是有必要再次做出价值颠覆和翻转的决定?我们难道不是应该站在一个被称为超道德时期(这个叫法起初有点贬义)的起点?今天,至少在我们这些“非道德者”中间,出现了一种猜测,即决定性的行为价值恰恰存在于它的非意图部分;而所有意图部分,所有可以被看见、了解和“感知”的部分,仍然停留于它的表层和皮毛——像所有的皮毛那样,它泄露出一些秘密,但隐藏的更多。简言之,我们认为意图只是一种有待诠释的符号,由于表征的对象太过丰富而致使本意丧失。传统意义上的道德,即意图的道德,是一种偏见,一种仓促、苟且之举,类似天文学、炼金术,无论如何都必须被征服。征服道德,某种意义上也是道德的自我征服,就让它作为灵魂的试金石,成为最敏锐、最诚挚和最恶毒的良心长期秘密劳作的代名词。
10.全心奉献、为他人牺牲自己,整套关于无私的伦理都缺乏确凿的论据支持,必须受到严厉的诘问和审判;同样还有宣扬“视角公正”的美学,它被今日的艺术解放运动用来装点门面,以令其心安理得。在“舍己为人”这类情感中存有太多的糖分和妖术,让人不得不起双倍的戒心,自问:“这些会不会是诱饵?”确实,这类情感能够取悦拥有这类情感的人、从中获益的人以及观众,但这并不能提供于其有利的论据,反而提醒我们要戒备。所以还是让我们小心些吧!
11.无论今日我们在哲学上采取何种立场,从任何角度看,这个世界的错误性是我们能见到的最确定无疑的东西——层出不穷的解释诱使我们认为“事物本质”就具有欺骗性。而自觉或不自觉的“上帝代言人”,认为我们的思考本身,即“理性”,要为世界的虚假性负责,这是他们在这个问题上选择的体面出路。他们认为这个世界,包括空间、时间、结构、运动在内的一切,都是一种错误的推断。这样的人有充分的理由对思考产生怀疑:不正是思考本身让我们蒙受更大的欺骗吗?谁能保证思考不会再犯同样的错误?说实在的,思想者们的天真令人感动并心生敬意,今天他们依然会走上前去请求意识给予他们诚实的回答,比如它是否是“真的”,比如为什么它坚决拒外部世界于千里之外,等等诸如此类的问题。对于“直接的确定性”的信仰是一种道德上的天真,是我们哲学家的光荣:但是,我们不应成为“仅仅是道德的”人!除去道德的层面,这种信仰是一种蠢行,没有给我们带来任何荣耀!在日常生活中,如果有人总是抱着怀疑的态度,会被看做是“不良个性”的表现,因此是不明智的。而我们这些人,既然超越了世俗世界及其是非评判,为什么不可以冒昧地说:哲学家,作为目前为止世上受骗最多的生物,有权拥有这个“不良个性”——他有义务抱持怀疑态度,从每个怀疑的深渊狞笑着向外窥探。——请大家务必原谅我用这副幽默的嘴脸来进行表述:长期以来,在对待欺骗和被欺骗的问题上,我学会采取与以往不同的方式进行思考和评判;对于某些盲目抗拒被欺骗的哲学家,我也准备了几句友善的提醒。为什么不呢?认为“真相比表象更有价值”,不过是道德上的偏见,甚至是世界上论证得最差的假定。让我们至少承认:如果没有全面的评估和表象作为基础,根本不会有生命;如果我们像某些哲学家那样,仅凭一腔热情就笨拙地想要废止整个“表象世界”,好吧,假设你可以这么做——但你的“真相”也会化为乌有!说实在的,是什么让我们认为在“真”与“假”之间存在着实质性的不同?难道承认存在清晰程度上的不同还不够吗,就好比外观上不同程度的深浅和色调,用画家的术语来说就是不同的值?为什么我们的世界不能是虚构的?有人反对道:可是所有虚构的东西都有作者。对此,我们何不简单地反问:为什么?这种“都有”不也是一种虚构吗?现在我们不可以对主语,也像对谓语和宾语那样感到一丝讽刺吗?难道哲学家不应当凌驾于对语法的信仰之上吗?家庭教师们请恕我冒昧,可是现在,不正是哲学同家庭教师们的信仰,决裂的时候了吗?
12.噢,伏尔泰!噢,人性!噢,愚钝!“真相”和关于真相的寻求需要注意。如果一个人以太人性的方式来寻求——“他找寻真相只是为了行善”——我敢打赌,他什么也找不到!
13.假设除我们的欲望和情感世界以外,没有东西“生来”是真的,假设我们不可能上升或下降到除了冲动以外的任何其他“现实”——因为思维只是这些冲动之间的相互联系。是不是可以尝试着这样提问:这种“生来”的东西是否足以提供对所谓客观(或者“物质”)世界的理解?我不是指贝克莱 ⑧ 、叔本华 ⑨ 口中的假象、“表象”或者“观念”,而是和我们的情感拥有相同真实程度的——一种形式更为原始的情感世界,这个世界中的一切仍然处于高度的统一中,然后在有机过程中实现分化和发展(自然也变得更脆弱和敏感),作为一种本能的生命,它的全部有机功能诸如自我调节、同化、吸收、排泄和新陈代谢,仍然被综合绑定在一起——犹如生命的早期形式?——最终,这个实验不仅被允许,而且受到方法的道义的驱策。不要设想有几种因果律,只要拿一种因果律进行尝试的实验还没有被推至极端(到荒唐的地步,如果可以这么说的话)。那是一种我们现在无法驳斥的方法的道义——它由“定义”而来,像数学家说的那样。最后,问题变成我们是否真的认为意志是有效的,我们是否相信意志的因果律。如果我们相信——从根本上说,对这一点的相信正是对因果律本身的相信——那么我们就必须试着假设意志的因果律为唯一的因果律。“意志”当然只能作用于“意志”——而不能作用于“物质”(不能作用于“神经”,比如说)。总而言之,我们必须冒险试一下那个假设,即只要发现“效果”的地方,意志就正在作用于意志——而一切机械现象,只要有力活跃于其中,都是意志的力量,意志的效果。——假设最终我们成功地将我们整个本能的生命解释为意志一种基本形式的发展和衍生——即我所提出的强力意志;——假设我们可以从一切有机过程中追溯到这个强力意志,并且能够在其中找到繁殖和营养问题——它们其实是同一个问题——的解决办法,我们就有权将一切有效力量毫不含糊地定义为:强力意志。从内部观察到的世界,根据其“悟性”描述和定义的世界——只能是“强力意志”而非任何别的东西。
14.“什么?说难听点不就是:上帝被驳倒了,而魔鬼没有?”正相反!正相反,我的朋友!见鬼,谁让你说得那么难听!
15.在我们这个时代发生的法国大革命是一场可怕的闹剧,从近处审视则会发现完全是多余的。然而全欧洲高尚而热情的观众,却远隔千里,长久而富于激情地用自己的义愤和狂喜诠释着这场革命,以至于文本在诠释之下消失了。这样,高尚的后代就可以再次误读整个过去,或许只有这样,历史的样貌才可以被忍受。还是说:这一切已经发生?我们自己是否就是那“高尚的后代”?根据我们的理解,这个过程岂不是在此刻已经完成?
16.没有人会因为一个学说仅仅有助于改善人的心情和品德,就认为它是真理。或许可爱的“理想主义者们”除外,这些人为一切真善美的事物激动不已,让各种五颜六色的一厢情愿在他们的池塘里游来游去。快乐和美德并不能令人信服。不过即便思维缜密的人也倾向于忘记,不快和邪恶同样是站不住脚的抗辩。有些事尽管极为有害和危险,却可能蕴含着真相。事实上,这或许是存在的基本特性,即获得关于它的全部真相,会毁掉一个人——因此,一个人精神力量的大小可以通过他所能接受的“真相”的多少来衡量,或者说,他需要“真相”在多大程度上被稀释、遮掩、粉饰、钝化和篡改。无疑,对于某些真相的发现,邪恶而不快乐的人处于更为有利的位置,成功的可能性更大。更不用说那些邪恶并快乐的人——对于这类人,道德学家们只能保持缄默。也许严酷和狡猾的个性在造就坚强、独立的人格和哲学家方面更有优势,而温和亲切、谦恭礼让、举重若轻这些品质在学者身上更受珍视,也更有意义。假设“哲学家”这个概念并不局限于写书的哲学家——或者更糟,就自己的哲学写书的哲学家!——司汤达为具有自由精神的哲学家的形象添上了这最后一笔,鉴于德国趣味,我不得不进行强调——因为它同德国趣味背道而驰。这位最后的伟大的心理学家说:要成为好的哲学家,必须眼光犀利透彻,不受幻象所左右。一个发迹的银行家,具有进行哲学发现的一个必备特质,那就是甄别事物本质的能力。
17.所有深刻的东西都喜欢面具。最深刻的东西甚至憎恶映像和比喻。难道上帝掩饰其羞耻的伪装不正应是某种同羞耻截然相反的东西吗?这是一个可疑的疑问,如果某些神秘主义者没有思考过这些事,反而是奇怪的。有些事情表述起来如此微妙,我们宁可粗鲁地进行掩饰,使其面目全非。有时在富于爱和慷慨的举动后,最明智的做法莫过于拿起棍棒,把目击者一顿好揍,以混淆其记忆。有些人懂得如何混淆和虐待自己的记忆,这样至少可以报复这个唯一的知情者——羞辱感是富于创造力的。令我们最感羞耻的并非是最糟糕的事:面具背后不只有欺瞒——狡猾中有诸多良善。我能想象有珍贵、脆弱之物需要守护的人,在生活中可能表现得粗枝大叶,好像一只陈旧、发绿,上着厚厚铁箍的酒桶——他精致的羞耻感使他不得不如此。一个有着深刻羞耻感的人,他与命运狭路相逢的地方人迹罕至,这种地方连他的至交和邻人也一无所知。他不让他们看到自己的致命之处,以及他重新获得的对生命的把握。这样一个深藏不露的人,本能地用言语掩饰沉默和隐瞒,想方设法规避交流,他需要一个面具代替他进入朋友的大脑和内心游荡,并确保它切实有效。假设有一天他不想再要这个面具,但他会发现面具已经在那儿了——而这是一件好事。每个深刻的人都需要一个面具:不但如此,在深刻思想的周围,面具会不断扩大,这要感谢那不停编织着的谎言,即对于他所说的每个词,走过的每一步,给出的每一个生命迹象的肤浅诠释。
18.我们必须考验自己是否适合独立和掌控;而且必须在合适的时间这样做。我们不应该规避这项考验,虽然它是一个人可能碰到的最危险的游戏,并且我们自己才是最终唯一的裁判。不要成为他人的附庸,即便是你最心爱的人——每个人都是监狱,也是庇护所;不要成为祖国的附庸,即便它正在遭受苦难,亟待援助——既然胜利的祖国很少令人牵挂;不要成为怜悯的附庸,即便怜悯的对象是大人物,我们只是碰巧撞见了他少有的磨难和无助;不要成为一门科学的附庸,即便它用最珍贵的发现作为诱饵,并且看似专为我们而预备;不要成为超脱的附庸,那种鸟类的超然绝尘,为了视野更开阔而越飞越高——这是飞行者的危险;不要变成自身美德的附庸,成为我们某个部分的牺牲品,比如“好客”的牺牲品,这是富有而高尚的人面临的危险中的危险,他们出手阔绰,几乎无动于衷,将慷慨这一美德推至不道德的境地。我们必须知道如何保重自己:这就是独立人格最严苛的考验。
19.一类新的哲学家正在出现:我冒昧地给这类哲学家起个不无危险的名字。根据我对他们的猜测,以及他们允许别人对他们的猜测——他们在本性上希望保留某些方面的神秘——这些未来的哲学家可以被正确地,但也许是错误地,描述为尝试者。这个名字本身也仅仅是个尝试,或者是个引诱,如果你愿意的话。
20.这些未来的哲学家是“真理”的新朋友吗?很可能是:因为迄今为止所有的哲学家都爱他们的真理。不过当然,他们不会成为独断论者。如果他们的真理成为所有人的真理,这对他们的骄傲和品味来说是个侮辱,而这恰恰是迄今为止所有独断论者的隐秘欲望和潜台词。“我的判断是我个人的判断:别人不能轻易拥有它”——一位未来的哲学家可能会这样说。我们必须改掉希望和多数人意见一致的坏毛病。当“善”从你邻居的口中说出时,“善”将不再是善。怎么可能存在一种“共同的善”?这个表述本身就是自相矛盾的,共同的东西从来就少有价值。最终还是和现在以及过去一直以来的情形一样:伟大的人收获伟大,深刻的人窥见深刻,讲究的人得到战栗和精致。总而言之,罕见的人得到罕见的东西。
21.说了上述这些话后,我觉得没必要再说明,这些未来的哲学家也会成为自由、非常自由的精灵——同样可以肯定,他们将超越自由精灵本身,变得更加高贵、伟大、卓尔不群,根本不会被误认为是任何别的东西。不过这么说了以后,我感到自己有责任——不仅对他们也对作为他们的前驱和先行者的我们,我们这些自由的精灵——从我们所有人身上消除一种古老而愚蠢的偏见和误解,长久以来它像雾霭一样遮蔽了“自由精神”这个概念。在现今的欧洲各国和美国,这个名词遭到一类非常狭隘、封闭和奴性的人滥用,他们想要的东西和我们的意图乃至本能截然相反——更不用说对于初露头角的新型哲学家们,他们就好比关上的窗、插上的门。简言之,他们令人遗憾地属于平均主义者,这些被错误地定名为“自由精灵”的人——是民主趣味及其“现代理念”伶牙俐齿、笔耕不辍的奴隶,这些人都没有孤独,没有属于自己的孤独,他们好心而笨拙,既不缺乏勇气也不缺乏令人尊敬的体面,只是他们不自由,肤浅得可笑,尤其是他们试图在现存的社会形态中找到所有人类失败和不幸的症结的固有倾向:而这正好颠倒了事实真相!他们努力奋斗的目标是绿色牧场上羊群的普遍幸福,即每个人都拥有稳定、放心、舒适和安逸的生活。他们最经常挂在嘴边的两句口号是“权利平等”和“同情一切受苦受难的人”——他们认为受苦本身是需要被废止的。我们,作为这一观点的反对者,在“人”这种植物究竟在哪里和怎样才能生长得最茁壮这个问题上,已经茅塞顿开。我们认为个人的成长总是发生在相反的情形下,他所处的境遇必须变得异常艰险,他的创造力和掩饰力(也就是他的“精神”)必须在长期的压力和约束下演化成精明和大胆,他的生命意志必须被强化为无条件的强力意志——我们认为街道上和内心里都存在的严酷、力量、奴性、危险,以及各色伪装、禁欲主义,实验艺术,各种恶行,人身上所有的邪恶、可怕、暴戾、凶残和恶毒的东西,都能像它们的反面一样,起到提升人类的作用——即便说了这么多,我们也没有说得完全。不管怎样,在我们就这一点发表和未发表的言论中,我们都站在所有现代意识形态和羊群急需品的另一端:或许与之截然对立?难怪我们这些“自由精灵”并不一定是最健谈的人,我们不想透露一丁点儿关于自由精灵享受的自由和受到的制约。至于那句危险的惯用语“超越善恶”,我们用它来避免自己的意思被曲解:我们是和这些可敬的“现代理念”代言人自称的“自由思想者”,或者诸如此类的称谓,不同的人。我们以自由精神的国度为家,或至少曾在那里做客;我们一次次逃离那些散发着霉味的舒适的庇护所;我们曾因偏好、偏见、年轻、出身、邂逅的人、读过的书,甚至流浪的疲惫而羁留于此。对于荣誉、金钱、地位、感官享受中的奴性诱惑,我们充满憎恶;对于悲苦和变化无常的疾病,我们心存感激,因为它们总能将我们从某些规则及其“偏见”中解放出来;我们对身体里的上帝、魔鬼、绵羊和蛀虫同样感念,我们好奇到堕落的地步,穷根究底到残忍的地步,拥有捉住难以捉摸事物的大胆手指,消化不易消化事物的牙齿和肠胃;多亏了“自由意志”的丰盈,我们做好准备从事一切要求敏锐洞察力的工作,以及参与一切冒险。我们拥有正、反两面灵魂,没有人能够轻易参透我们的最终意图,我们拥有前、后双重背景,没有人能穷尽它的边缘;藏在灯罩背后的我们是征服者,尽管我们一天到晚看上去像是继承人、浪荡子、收藏家和经办人,是自家财宝和橱柜的守财奴,在学习与遗忘之间精打细算,在设想上敢于创新,有时为各类数据洋洋自得,有时显得迂腐,有时甚至勤勉得像大白天里的夜猫子。是的,如果有必要,我们还是稻草人——而现在就有这个必要:我们生来就是自身最深沉、最黑暗、最明亮的孤独那宣了誓的、富于妒忌心的朋友——我们这些自由精灵,就是这样一类人!也许你们这些后来者,你们这些新型哲学家,也会有些类似之处?
注 释
① 巴鲁赫·斯宾诺莎,十七世纪荷兰哲学家。因怀有异端思想被犹太教会革除教籍、逐出社团,以磨镜片为生,在隐居中进行哲学研究。
② 乔尔丹诺·布鲁诺,意大利文艺复兴时期的思想家和哲学家,因反对地心说、坚持日心说,被宗教裁判所囚禁八年,后被烧死在罗马鲜花广场。
③ “羊人剧”,古希腊悲剧的雏形,由装扮成半人半兽的演员演出而得名。一般是轻松的短剧,在一个悲剧三联剧后上演,作为调剂和对悲剧的讽刺。
④ 费迪南多·加利亚尼,意大利经济学家。尼采曾称他为十八世纪“最精致、最挑剔的头脑”。
⑤ 阿里斯托芬,古希腊早期喜剧代表作家,相传写有四十四部喜剧,有“喜剧之父”之称。
⑥ 佩特罗尼乌斯,古罗马作家,暴君尼禄的廷臣,主管宫中娱乐,著有长篇讽刺小说《萨蒂利孔》。
⑦ 牛头怪(弥诺陶洛斯),古希腊神话中的人身牛头怪物,被禁闭在弥诺斯的迷宫中,吞食雅典进贡的童男童女。
⑧ 乔治·贝克莱,英国主观唯心主义哲学家、主教。他认为世界上只存在能进行思考的心灵,和不能进行思考、只存在于心灵之中的观念。
⑨ 亚瑟·叔本华,德国哲学家。他认为世界分为两部分:一方面是表象,一方面是控制表象世界的意志。
四、来自高山:古抒情诗
噢,生命的正午!噢,节日!噢,夏日的花园!我在不安的狂喜中等待,我站立着,观望着,等候着——朋友们,你们在哪儿?我日夜殷勤等候的就是你们。现在来吧!是你们出现的时候了!
难道不是因为你,冰川在今日将它的灰白换成了玫瑰红?溪流追随着你,风和云朵不断爬上蓝天更高处,满怀热望地寻找你。
为了你,我在最高的高处摆好了筵席——和我一样,你生活的地方和星星相隔咫尺,或者说和深渊的深处相隔咫尺?我的帝国——可曾有帝国如此幅员辽阔?我的蜜汁——可曾有人尝到过它的甜蜜?
——朋友们,你们来了!——但是,哎呀,我不就是你们要拜访的那个人吗?你们踌躇着,瞪大眼睛——不,还是愤怒好了!我不再是——我了吗?我的手、步伐和面孔改变了吗?在你们眼里,我不是——我了吗?
我是另一个人吗?一个我自己的陌生人?从我自身里冒出来?一个经常打败自己的摔跤运动员?经常自己和自己过不去,被自己的胜利制约和伤害?
我曾寻找风刮得最猛烈的地方,学会在不毛之地生存,忘记祈祷和诅咒,忘记人和神,变成冰川之上飞掠而过的幽灵?
——老朋友们!你们看上去多么苍白,充满爱与惊恐!不——走吧!不要生气!在这里——你们不会感觉宾至如归:在这片坚冰与岩石的遥远国度,你必须成为一名猎手,并且喜欢阿尔卑斯山的山羊。
我变成了一名邪恶的猎手!——瞧瞧我的弓有多满,拉满这张弓的必定是男人中最强有力的那一个——可是那支箭,哎呀——啊,没有哪支箭比那一支更危险——闪开!快走!为了你们自己的性命!……
你转过脸来?——噢,心脏,你表现得很坚强,你的希望仍然强大:现在让你的心扉向新朋友敞开吧!不要抓住过去不放!不要抓住回忆不放!如果你曾经年轻,那么现在——你更加年轻!
曾经联结我们的东西,那由一个希望构成的纽带——谁还能读懂曾镌刻其上、如今业已模糊的爱的符号?它就像一张羊皮纸——褪色,枯黄——伸过去的手也会缩回来。
不再是朋友,可是——我该如何称呼他们?——他们是朋友的幽灵,暗夜里叩响我的心扉,注视着我说:“我们曾经是朋友吗?”——噢,褪色的词句,曾经如玫瑰一般芬芳!
噢,青春的憧憬,往往并不自知!那些我曾经仰慕和崇敬的人,变成了我的亲人——他们的老去成为他们被放逐的理由:只有那不断变化的人才保持着和我的相似。
噢,生命的正午!噢,第二次青春!噢,夏日的花园!我在不安的狂喜中等待,我站立着,观望着,等候着——我在等候朋友,新的朋友,不分日夜殷勤守候。现在来吧!是你们出现的时候了!
这首歌已经完成——欲望的甜蜜喊叫死在了嘴唇上:这是一个男巫干的,一个适时的朋友,正午之友——不!不要问他是谁——它在正午时发生,在正午时,一个人变成了两个……
现在,对胜利成竹在胸的我们,庆祝盛事中的盛事:我们的朋友查拉图斯特拉 ① 来了,他是贵宾中的贵宾!既然全世界都在大笑,可怖的幕布被租来,婚礼之日迎来光明与黑暗……
注 释
① 查拉图斯特拉,公元前七到六世纪的古代波斯宗教改革者。尼采在其作品《查拉图斯特拉如是说》中假借他的名义说出自己的哲学思想。
Friedrich Nietzsche
Man Alone with Himself
TRANSLATED BY MARION FABER, STEPHEN LEHMANN AND R. J. HOLLINGDALE
PENGUIN BOOKS - GREAT IDEAS
CONTENTS
The numbering system, starting at one, used for the individual sections is specific to this edition, as it was too cumbersome to begin the book with, for example, Enemies of Truth as number 483 as in the original work.