The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Counsels and Maxims

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Артур Шопенгауэр. The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Counsels and Maxims

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV,

CHAPTER V

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GENERAL RULES. – SECTION 1.

The first and foremost rule for the wise conduct of life seems to me to be contained in a view to which Aristotle parenthetically refers in the Nichomachean Ethics:2 [Greek: o phronimoz to alupon dioke e ou to aedu] or, as it may be rendered, not pleasure, but freedom from pain, is what the wise man will aim at.

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In their search for gold, the alchemists discovered other things – gunpowder, china, medicines, the laws of nature. There is a sense in which we are all alchemists.

What offends a great intellect in society is the equality of rights, leading to equality of pretensions, which everyone enjoys; while at the same time, inequality of capacity means a corresponding disparity of social power. So-called good society recognizes every kind of claim but that of intellect, which is a contraband article; and people are expected to exhibit an unlimited amount of patience towards every form of folly and stupidity, perversity and dullness; whilst personal merit has to beg pardon, as it were, for being present, or else conceal itself altogether. Intellectual superiority offends by its very existence, without any desire to do so.

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