"Schopenhauer's Aesthetic Essays" selects 12 articles close to daily life from Volumes 2 and 5 of "The Complete Works of Schopenhauer". These articles are independent articles and discuss topics such as reading. , thinking, writing, criticism, language learning, style, music, the beauty of nature and death, etc.
Schopenhauer expounded his understanding of these issues with his accurate judgment, profound thinking, simple and unpretentious writing style, and his honest and natural style.
The articles in "Essays on Schopenhauer's Aesthetics" are selected from the famous German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)'s masterpieces "Appendices and Supplements" and "As Intention and Supplement" The World of Representations" Volume 2.
Schopenhauer published his epistemological masterpiece "On the Fourfold Roots of the Principle of Sufficient Reason" as early as 25 years old, and published his immortal masterpiece "The World as Intention and Representation" at the age of 30. Volume, the content covers various phenomena of the physical world of nature and human spiritual phenomena.
At the age of less than thirty, he completed this masterpiece of thought that thoroughly explains the world and life. Regardless of ancient or modern times, this can be regarded as a unique miracle.
Translator Wei Qichang (born in Guangzhou in 1962, now practicing medicine in Australia) said: There are two things that can be said to be the loves of my life. I am really lucky to have the chance to understand them deeply and benefit from them. Yes. These two things are Schopenhauer's works and ancient Chinese medicine.
It can be said that I fell in love with Schopenhauer at first sight, and then we became privately engaged with him. Now and in the future, we will definitely stay together and grow old together.
The admiration and admiration that Benhua’s thoughts arouse in me, and the spiritual pleasure it gives me, are only comparable to the theory and practice of traditional Chinese medicine. Both are so profound, simple and direct, and their fundamental views are surprisingly consistent in major aspects. If I have the opportunity in the future, I may
I "encountered" Schopenhauer in the 1980s and was "amazed" by him, although it was a copy of Schopenhauer's "Life" that I bought on the street. The Taiwanese version of "Wisdom" is not a good translation either.
Since then, I have aimed to enjoy reading the original texts of Schopenhauer and Zweig. The wonderful feeling of "lying on the sofa and reading Schopenhauer all day long" that Thomas Mann talked about must have come from this.
Highlights
In most cases, people do not have judgment, because judgment is as rare as the phoenix, and you have to wait five hundred years to see it.
Thinkers who are higher than their own century are already higher than other centuries and higher than mankind.
Nerds and academics are people who read books, but thinkers, geniuses, people who illuminate the world and promote human progress directly read the big book of worldly affairs and life.
People with first-class thinking ability always know clearly and clearly what they want to express, and the way of expression can be prose, poetry or music. People with mediocre ideas lack this decisiveness and clarity.
People always read the latest, not the best of all time.
No matter how little you read of bad things, it will be too much, and no matter how much you read of good works, it will be too little. Bad books are poison that damages our spiritual thoughts.
One of the prerequisites for reading good books is not to read bad books, because life is short and time and energy are extremely limited.
People can do without pictures and sculptures, and Muhammad's followers will not have the enjoyment of these arts, but no nation is without music and literature.
Whether the author's understanding of life and world affairs is profound or superficial determines the quality of their literary works. So, just as there are innumerable degrees of depth and clarity in the understanding of things, so there are innumerable degrees of literary men. But every writer must go all out to faithfully express what he sees.
The reason why a good writer recognizes himself as the best writer is that he sees how superficial other people's vision is. Behind what others see, there are so many hidden things that others cannot. The things that reappeared, because others could not see these things at all; he also saw that his own vision and images were much more profound.
Goethe said bluntly, "Only those who deceive the world and steal reputation are humble." People who have no value themselves, have never made any contributions, and are jealous of other people's achievements are the wholesale products of nature and ordinary people among all living beings. One member.
The pleasure that tragedy gives us is different from our feelings of beauty, but should belong to the pleasure of feeling the sublime and sublime. The pleasure brought by tragedy is indeed the highest level of sublimity and magnificence, because just like when we face the magnificent scenery of nature, we will no longer concentrate on the interests of the mind, but will adopt an intuitive attitude.
Likewise, when faced with suffering in tragedy, we lose focus on the will to survive. That is to say, in tragedy, the terrible side of life is before our eyes: human pain and misfortune, the accidents and mistakes that dominate this life, the defeats of the upright, and the victories of the despicable... Therefore , the essence of worldly affairs that directly conflicts with our wishes is revealed before us.
This situation forces our will to no longer yearn for and be attached to this existence. It is in this way that we realize that there is something in us that we cannot clearly and definitely recognize at all. All we know is: this is something that no longer wants to live.
Just as a seventh chord needs to have a chord in its original position, and red needs to have a green color, and even to produce this green color in the eyes, every tragedy also needs to have a completely different existence and appearance. world - although our understanding of this completely different world is always indirect, and we only gain this understanding indirectly by watching such tragedies.
As we witness tragic events unfold, we see more clearly than ever that life is a nightmare from which we must wake.
In this respect, tragedy plays a similar role to the spectacle, for, like the spectacle, tragedy takes us beyond our desires and their interests and makes us see We feel pleasure when something directly contradicts our desires.
To make tragic things - no matter what form they appear - have a unique tendency towards the sublime and sublime, is to make the viewer spontaneously have such an understanding: this The world and this life cannot give us true satisfaction, and it is not worth our reluctance to part with it. The spirit of tragedy is here. The tragic spirit therefore leads us into a state of mind that gives up hope and gives up hope.
The tragedy of the Christian period represented the abandonment of the entire will to live, the joyful abandonment of this world of nothingness while clearly aware of its worthlessness. I do think modern tragedy is superior to ancient tragedy.
Simple and unpretentious style belongs especially to thinkers who are superior to others, fully aware of their own advantages and therefore full of confidence.
In other words, those writers with mediocre ideas dare not make up their minds to write directly what they think, because they suspect that what they write will appear simple and naive.
But in fact, there is always a certain value in writing what you think directly. Therefore, if they write honestly and convey to readers in a simple and simple way the rather general things they have thought about, then what they write can still be read by us: within its specific scope Within, there are even some lessons.
But they did not do this. They strive to appear to think more and deeper than they actually do. Therefore, when they express their ideas, they like to use uncommon words, long complex sentences, fashionable and far-fetched phrases.
They really want to decorate their thoughts to appear knowledgeable and profound. In this way, readers will think that there is more in what they write that readers have not yet noticed.
Nothing is easier than writing something that no one can understand.
Every true thinker strives to express his thoughts as simply, clearly, accurately and concisely as possible. Accordingly, simplicity not only always leads to truth, but is also the mark of genius.
Style becomes beautiful because of thoughts, but those fake thinkers try to make their thoughts beautiful because of words. Language is just a silhouette of thought; vague or poor writing actually means slow or confused thinking.
Therefore, the first rule of good writing is that the writer must have something to say; in fact, this rule alone is almost enough. This rule has far-reaching implications.
The reason is very simple. Once a person has certain thoughts and opinions, he will go straight to achieve his goal, that is, to convey these thoughts and opinions.
In this way, he can neither be irrelevant, incoherent, nor talk without meaning. The result is that what is written cannot be boring or boring. In this way, his works always have a certain value. And objectively dull articles are always worthless for basically the same reason.
In contrast, the subjective feeling of dullness is only relative. This may be due to the reader's lack of interest in the matter discussed by the author, and the lack of interest may be due to the reader's own limited ability and knowledge.
Therefore, even excellent works may be boring and uninteresting to some readers. Similarly, some of the most clumsy and inferior works can be quite interesting and enjoyable from the subjective point of view of some readers.
If this kind of style appears in a book with pretentiousness and pretentiousness, it will be equivalent to the pretentious, arrogant and pretentious behavior in social life, which is equally disgusting. Those who lack ideological content like to dress themselves up in such words, just like in daily life, fools like to put on a serious look and stick to formalities.
Writing pretentious and artificial words is like dressing carefully so as not to be seen as a commoner, but a true gentleman will rarely be seen as wearing even the most inconspicuous clothes. Danger of mistaken identity. Therefore, just as one can identify a vulgar person by his gaudy, too-straight clothing, so one can identify a mediocre author by his pretentious, frivolous style.
The judgment of most people is so weak that we cannot place high hopes on it; it is only a semblance of judgment. Therefore, having something truly worthy of judgment can be regarded as receiving an extremely rare gift.
La Bruyere said, "The most rare things in this world, after the ability to discern, are diamonds and pearls."
Most people don't know how to distinguish. True and false, essence and dross, gold and brass, there is no discernible difference between the minds of ordinary people and the thoughts of rare geniuses. People will not receive an appropriate true evaluation, but will only be identified as what a third party thinks they are. This provides an opportunity for people to suppress extraordinary works of thought; so that mediocrity can take the opportunity to prevent and delay as long as possible those outstanding works from appearing.
Be sure to bring as little luggage as possible to avoid throwing away too many things along the way. Therefore, we should always remember the wise words of Balthazar Gracian: "A good thing becomes twice as good if it is concentrated."
I saw a wild flower and was attracted by it. Overwhelmed by the beauty of the flower and the perfection of its parts. I shouted loudly: "Is it possible that there are other beautiful flowers like you, which bloom and fall like this, and are not appreciated by others, and it is rare for a pair of eyes to even glance at you?" The wild flower answered me. : "Fool! Do you think I bloom for others to see? I bloom for myself, not for others. I bloom because I like to bloom. I live, I bloom, this is my happiness and The fun is there."
People who rise into the air in a balloon do not see themselves rising, but only see the earth sinking beneath their feet. What's going on? Only those who feel the same in this regard will understand this mystery.
To measure a person's greatness, different laws are used in the mental and physical aspects that are opposite to each other: physical size shrinks with increasing distance, and spiritual greatness increases with increasing distance.
If anyone has enough calories, he would rather stay away from social interaction, so as not to cause trouble to others and not suffer any annoyance from others.
What such people voluntarily give up is the existence we know. What they achieved for this, in our view, is nothing, and the Buddhist faith calls this "Nirvana".
From this point of view, every truly independent thinker who thinks for himself is no different from a prince in this respect: his expression is straight to the point, never evasive or timid; his judgment is Like an order issued by a king, it also comes from his own sufficient strength and is also expressed straightforwardly.
This is because such a thinker does not obediently adopt authoritative opinions, just like a king does not accept orders; on the contrary, he only recognizes what he has confirmed; in contrast, thinking The minds of ordinary people are controlled by various popular ideas, authoritative statements and secular prejudices; they are no different from the general public who silently obey the legal order.
The virtue of modesty is simply a weapon invented to protect against envy.
Ignorance is only disgraceful when paired with wealth.
The social need arising from man's inner emptiness and monotony drives people together. But each person's many disgusting qualities and intolerable shortcomings separate people again. The right distance that people finally found to allow everyone to be together and tolerate each other is politeness, thoughtfulness and elegance.
Although we can arrange ourselves to read and study at will, it is indeed beyond our power to arrange ourselves to think at will. That is, just as the burning of fire requires ventilation to begin and continue, so our thinking activity must be stimulated and sustained by our interest in the object of thought. And this interest can be purely objective, or it can only arise from the interests of the subject.
Only when it comes to personal matters will people feel the interest arising from the subject; to take an objective interest in things, only those who essentially like to think will do so, because nature has given them For such a mind, thinking is as natural to them as breathing air. But such people are quite rare. Therefore, most academics rarely take an objective interest in things.
In the kingdom of reality, although it is sometimes so beautiful, charming and comfortable, we always only operate under a heavy atmosphere that needs to be constantly overcome, but in the kingdom of thoughts, But we have become disembodied spirits, without burdens or hardships. Therefore, the happiness that a sophisticated and rich thinking mind finds within itself at one magical moment is incomparable to any happiness on earth.
In other words, an independent, self-thinking person only later learns that authorities agree with his views, and those authoritative statements only confirm his opinions and enhance his confidence. In contrast, those book philosophers start from an authoritative view and put together the opinions and views of others they have read into a whole.
Such a patchwork of thoughts is like a robot made up of strange and strange parts, while an independent and self-contained thought is like a living person.
This is because independent, self-contained thoughts come into being in a similar way to living people: the external world fertilizes the thinking mind, and the fruits of thought are subsequently produced.
The truths taught to us by others are only prostheses, dentures, and wax noses that adhere to our bodies. At most, they are prosthetic noses installed through surgical skin grafting. But the truth obtained through thinking is like our own natural limbs - only such things truly belong to us.
This is the difference between a thinker and a pedant. Therefore, the intellectual gain that can be gained by a person who thinks independently is like a vivid and beautiful picture: the light and shadow are accurate, the tone is just right, and the colors are harmonious and unified.
But the old-fashioned pedants have made their heads look like a large palette filled with colorful and mottled paints: even if the various paints are placed in an orderly manner, the colors are mixed on the entire block. The board still lacks harmony, coherence and meaning.
The thoughts in our heads are just like our lovers: we think we will never forget this thought, and our lovers will never change their hearts; but out of sight, out of mind! The most exquisite thoughts, if not written down, may be irrevocably forgotten, and our lovers, unless they marry us, may follow someone else.
Thinking for yourself and reading books have an incredibly different effect on our mental thoughts. Therefore, this different effect continues to widen the distance between different people who already have different mental abilities - because according to the strength of their thinking abilities, people tend to think independently or read other people's thoughts. .
A person can generate many thoughts that are of great value to him, but only a few of them have the ability to be effective through resonance or reflection. That is to say, only a few ideas can still attract the interest of readers after they are written down.
Pure experience, like reading, cannot replace thinking. The relationship between pure experience and thinking is the relationship between eating, digestion and absorption. When experience boasts that it is only through the discovery of experience that it has promoted the development of human knowledge, it is tantamount to the mouth boasting that the survival of the entire body is only the work of the mouth.
Modest style is always the dress for genius, just as nudity is the privilege of the beautiful body.
A pedant is a person who reads books, but a thinker, a genius, a person who illuminates the world and promotes human progress directly reads the big book of practical life.
In the final analysis, only our own fundamental thoughts will have truth and vitality: because only our own thoughts are what we truly and completely understand. The thoughts of others that we read are only scraps left behind by others, used clothes worn by strangers.
Thoughts that belong to others, acquired through reading, are compared to thoughts that originate within oneself, just as fossilized traces of plants from prehistoric times are compared to plants blooming in the spring.
Those who spend their lives reading and absorbing wisdom from books are like poring over various travel notes to understand a place in detail. A person who is familiar with the travel notes of a certain place can provide us with a lot of information about this place, but in the final analysis, he does not have a coherent, clear and thorough understanding of the actual conditions of this place.
In contrast, those who spend time thinking are like tourists who have been to this place in person: only they truly understand what they are talking about; for that place They have a coherent understanding of things, and when they talk about these things, they really know each other.