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C
HAPTER ONE
1.0 PHILOSOPHERS’ VIEWS ON SUFFERING
Human suffering has been a re-occurring philosophical
issue that has in one way or the other moved even the
ancient philosophers into deep philosophical
reflection
In this first chapter, we are going to discuss the
ideas of ancient thoughts that moved Schopenhauer to
channel his philosophical thought on the world as
will and representation.
1.1 ANCIENT PERIOD
The philosophers of the ancient era served as
precursor to the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer.
Examining the concept of suffering in this era, the
beginning of the western philosophy and the Ionian
school of thought portrays Pythagoras and the
doctrine of Orphism which served as the foundation of
his philosophy of the human soul.
According to Orphism,
Man is a mixture of both divine and
human elements. The soul is the
divine element in man and is the
essential aspect of man. It formerly
lived in the other world and was
sent into this world the soul is
imprisoned in the body. The body in
other words is the prison of the
soul. After death, the soul will
transmigrate into another body, thus
leaving one prison for another. The
next prison may be worse because it
may be the body of an animal. For
the soul could transmigrate from a
human body to that of an animal.1
The Pythagoreans believed that by contemplating the
eternal truths, the soul gradually purifies itself.
Philosophy for the Pythagoras was a way of purifying
the soul and as such, a way of life and salvation. They
as well considered music highly therapeutic for certain
nervous disorders.2
Introspection into the Pythagoreans doctrine of the
soul portrays two different worlds; the world habited
by the soul formerly and the sinful world of suffering
1J. Omoregbe, A Simplified History of Western Philosophy. Vol.2. Ikeja: Joja Educational Research andPublishers, Reprinted, 2003. P. 72 S. E Stumpf, Philosophy, History and problems, New York: Mc Graw-Hill inc. Publication. 2003, p.12
which is a prison and a purgatory for purification is
what causes suffering. That is why they preach a strict
way of life that centered on purification and
asceticism.3
An intensive study on the Pythagorean doctrine of the
soul and Schopenhauer’s concept of human suffering
would see a great deal of similarities. Both Pythagoras
and Schopenhauer believed that the world is a
battlefield where each human being must struggle for
survival. For the Pythagoreans, the true self of every
person was the soul, the essential element in
partnership of the body4
The soul is therefore in continuous combat with the
body. Thus the human body is similar to Schopenhauer’s
3 Edward Craig, Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. New Fetter Lane, 1998, London Vol.7 p.860.4 J. Omoregbe, op. cit., p.8
concept of the will-to-live which manifest in the world
of representation. The human element with its bodily
needs like desires, fear, and thirst is some sort of a
burden and suffering to the true self of the human
person.
The Pythagoreans however believed that the way out of
this bondage of the soul is by contemplating the
external truths. And by doing so, the soul continues to
transmigrate from one body to another during which it
attains purification and immortality and is liberated5
this affirms what Hermmant said that so long as we
retain our body, there is absolutely no escape from
suffering, since our body is contaminated with
desires6.
5 V. Jadha, Hermmant, Why do we face problems in life.Copyright 1996, p.2.6 Ibid., p.32
We shall also consider another philosopher of the
ancient period known as Epicurus.
Epicurus was a practical philosopher who considered
philosophy as a medicine of the soul. Pleasure is for
him the standard of goodness and the chief aim of human
life. He was of the opinion that not every kind of
pleasure had the same value. Thus he distinguished
between various types of pleasures, namely, pleasures
that are intense but last only for a short while,
pleasures that are not so intense but last longer,
pleasures that have a painful aftermath and pleasures
that give a sense of calm and repose.
Epicurus emphasized these distinctions between various
kinds of pleasures “in order to guide people to the
happiest life”7 However, he decried the pleasures that
7S.E. Stumpf, philosophy History and problems. P. 105
have painful aftermath. S.E. Stumpf rightly quoted him
thus;
When….we maintain that pleasure is
the end, we do not mean the
pleasures of profligates and those
that consist of sensuality…, but
freedom from pain in the body and
from trouble in the mind. For it is
not continuous drinking and
revellings nor the satisfaction of
lusts, nor the enjoyment of fish and
other luxuries of the wealthy table,
which produce a pleasant life, but
sober reasoning, searching out the
motives for all choice and avoidance
and banishing mere opinions, to
which are due the greatest
disturbance of the spirit.8
Most importantly, the surest way of unhappiness and
pain for Epicurus is to emphasize too great a concern
for the above enumerated pleasure. In this manner,
Certain kinds of body pleasures
could never be fully satisfied…..
and if such pleasures require
continuous indulgence, it followed
that people pursuing such pleasures
would by definition always be
unsatisfied and would, therefore,
constantly suffer some pain. If for
example they wanted more money, or
more public acclaim or more exotic
8 S.E STUMPF, opp. cit., p.107
foods, or a higher position they
would always be dissatisfied with
their present situation and would
suffer some internal pain.9
Hence, even in pleasures, there are pains or suffering.
However, Epicurus suggests that humans have both the
power and the duty to regulate these unbridled desires
which Stumpf called ‘traffic of our desires’.
Nevertheless, one striking thing in the philosophy of
Epicurus is the view that “it does not follow that
every pleasure is worthy of being chosen; ``just as
every pain must not be avoided”10 Now the question is;
if some pains are not to be avoided does it mean that
there is something pleasurable or something good about
9 Ibid10 J. Omoregbe, opp. Cit., p.129
painful experiences? In other words, can one derive
happiness from suffering?
Perhaps, Epicurus’ attitude to life answered yes to
this question as he lived ascetic life, living on bread
and water. Thus for him, “once there is no peace of
mind there can be no happiness, but with peace of mind
one can be happy even in the midst of bodily torture”.11
It follows therefore that Epicurus was to some level
very optimistic about humanity and suffering unlike
Schopenhauer, even though there is some similarities in
their view about human suffering.
Hence it is now clear that the concept of human
suffering in Schopenhauer is not all that new. It
derived its origin from the history of philosophy.
11 S. E. Stumpf, opp. cit., p.138
1.2 MEDIEVAL PERIODD
The notion of human suffering in the medieval period
can be traced in the philosophy of Saint Augustine. He
considers evil and suffering as a consequence of man’s
misuse of free will. He maintained that God created man
to be free, responsible and to exercise his rights but
this freewill man misused and as such incurred evil on
himself. Hence the soul can never attain rest until it
rests in God12
For Plato, goodness is not matter of opinion but an
object of knowledge which implies that suffering is as
a result of ignorance13. Augustine however did not
accept Plato’s ideas on suffering thus maintaining his
stand that evil is a result of misuse of freewill. Our12 S. Borruso, The confessions of St. Augustine Nairo: Pauline Publishers, 2003, p.1113 William Benton, Great Ideas, A syntopicon of the great book vol.5, inc. Chicago, 1952, p.606
predicament is not that we are ignorant but that we
stand in the presence of alternatives. We must choose
to turn toward God or away from God14. So the wrong use
of God’s free will to man gave rise to human suffering
Augustine is of the idea that only in the metaphysical
sense can things be thought of as entirely good. That
is the reason why Augustine claimed that our load can
only be laid down by God15. The freewill given to man by
God is what Schopenhauer will call the Will-to-live,
which is the thing in itself. And according to
Augustine, the way out is contemplation of God and
turning back to him as the only source of happiness.
Schopenhauer did mention contemplation as a way to get
rid of human suffering on temporal basis but in a
different sense.
14 S. E. Stumpf, op. cit., p. 13815 William Benton, op. cit., p. 610
1.3 modern periods
The concept of human suffering in the modern era is
will illustrated in the political philosophy of Thomas
Hobbes and the state of nature, According to Hobbes:
The state of nature is a stat in which man
lives prior to the setting up of an organized
society, it is characterized by insecurity.
Life full of conflicts, struggles and men live
in perpetual danger and fear of death. A state
of war of all against all16
Hobbes attributed the cause of human suffering and pain
as a result of the selfish and self-seeking nature of
man. Human action is directed towards the satisfaction
of man’s self interests and will17. The picture we get
16 Edward Craig, Routledge Ency. Op. cit., p. 47017 Ibid, p. 470
of this state of nature is of people moving against
each other- bodies in motion or the anarchic condition
Hobbes called “the war of all against all”18. As the
sate of nature is that of equality and freedom of will
in which one is able to do whatever he likes. Life in
it becomes solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.
The only way to alleviate suffering in the state of
nature according to Hobbes is the way of peace which is
also the way of reason,. Reason brings about the
natural law that would enhance peace. Through reason,
an agreement is reached though which each person’s
right is delegated to the sovereign. By so doing, they
lend their wills by doing only what is permitted by the
sovereign’s law and refraining from what the law
prohibits19. The function of a civil society could be
18 S. E. Stumpf, op. cit., p. 21719 Edward Craig, Routledge Ency. Op. cit., p.471
achieved through reason which is also a way of bringing
human suffering to an end. It was through reason that
natural law came to existence, which helped in
organizing the civil society since it forbids man to do
anything that is destructive of his life or omit
anything that is necessary for its preservation20.
For Hobbes the first and most fundamental of the laws
of nature is that every man should endeavor as much as
it is in his power to ensure peace21. The way of reason
or knowledge mentioned by Hobbes must be similar to the
Aesthetic contemplation in Schopenhauer’s philosophy
whereby one is detached from material world and becomes
subjected to knowledge. It therefore means that in both
Hobbes and Schopenhauerian philosophy, the way out is
resorting once more to knowledge.
20 S. E. Stumpf, of. Cit., p. 21821 Ibid., p.218
1.4 COMTEMPORARY PERIOD
For proper investigation on the conception of human
suffering in this era, we should focus on the
existentialists who held that the individual man has an
infinite capacity to grow, develop, and overcome all
odds and shackles of nature. This group includes some
philosophers like Heidegger, Jaspers, Jean Paul Sartre,
Gabriel Marcel etc. for them, man is transcendent
because of his capacity to use his reason. They saw man
as an embodiment of potentialities.
Existentialists could be viewing the sufferings in the
world from the optimistic dimension because they are
already away of the inescapability of the troubles in
nature. As a result they try to develop a right
attitude and disposition to surmount and conquer them.
They only agreed with Schopenhauer on the fact of the
existence of suffering but difference comes on
disposition and attitude the two parties present. The
standpoint of the existentialist as concerning human
suffering is seen clearly in the words of Heidegger
when he said;
Man in his present life finds himself in a
precarious alienated decadent, unauthentic
situation full of deficiencies and miseries.
But there exists in man the tension to free
himself from the slavery of ignorance, error,
fear and passion22
22 B.Mondin, philosophical Anthropology, Rome, UrbanianaUniversity Press, 1985. P.198.
C
HAPTER TWO
2.0 SCHOPENHAUER’S PHILOSOPHICAL INSIGHT
Having abandoned medical studies in his early days,
Schopenhauer was advised by one of his lecturers to
study platonic and Kantian thoughts due to serious
influence of Kant on him, he accorded himself the
immediate successor of Kant instead of Hegel.
Schopenhauer no doubt drew his philosophical insight
from Kantian philosophy. Like Kant, Schopenhauer
distinguished between the noumina world and the
phenomenal world and between things in themselves and
things as they appear to us whereas Kant speaks of the
noumina world, the things in themselves as
transcendental and metaphysical, above the framework of
causality, space and time and therefore above human
knowledge23
Schopenhauer on the other maintained that there can be
no plurality in the noumina world. Plurality or
multiplicity is only found in the phenomenal world,
that is the world of appearance24 he claimed knowledge
of the noumina reality, the thing in itself. And for
him, it is “the will to live”25. Accordingly;
The act of will is indeed only the
nearest and clearest phenomenon of
the thing in itself; yet it follows
from this that if all other
phenomena could be known by us just23 A. Schopenhauer, World as Will and Representation, vol. 2, opp. Cit., p. 582.24 Omoregbe, opp. Cit., p. 14625 A. Schopenhauer, op. cit., vil.2, p. 197
as precisely as that which the will
is in us. Therefore, in this sense I
teach that the inner nature of
everything is the will and I call
the will the thing in itself26.
How does Schopenhauer arrive at the knowledge of the
thing in itself is a question that one may likely ask.
He claimed that one could arrive at this through self-
consciousness of one’s knowledge of his own willing.
Accordingly:
Infact our willing is the only
opportunity we have of understanding
simultaneously from within any event
that outwardly manifest itself.
Consequently, it is the one thing
26 Ibid., p. 197
known to us immediately and not
given to us merely in the
representation as all else is.27
According to him, this is the only narrow gateway to
the truth. Our whole body is nothing but objectified
will. Will as a representation of consciousness. He
argues that any person is opportuned to understand this
by entering into oneself by the help of intuition,
which he believed is the key to reality.28
2.1 THE NATURE OF WILL IN SCHOPONHAUER’S PHILOSOPHY
Arthur Schopenhauer developed a philosophy of pessimism
that focused on the nature of the “will”. This term
‘will’ was the central theme of his philosophy.
27 Ibid. p. 19628 Ibid., p.196
Ordinarily, the term “will” indicates “a conscious and
deliberate choice to behave in a certain way”,29 but
Schopenhauer used the term to mean both a person’s
individual desires as well as the overall essence of
being alive.30 He began his ‘magna carta’ with: “the
world is my representation… a truth valid with
reference to every living and knowing being… this
truth”, he said, “is nevertheless one-sided”. He
continued by saying that, “the separation of what is
different and the combination of what is identical can
lead us to this truth. This truth, which must be very
serious and gave if not terrible to everyone os that a
man can say and must say; “the world is my will”.31 In a
29 S. E. Stumpf, Philosophy History and Problems. P. 32730 Microsoft Encarta Premium 2006 Trans. And Ed. By Hollingale, K.J. Penguin Books.31 A. Schopenhauer, opp. cit., p. 162
nutshell, then, the world is for Schopenhauer “my
representation” as well as “my will”.
Meanwhile, according to Stumpf, “Schopenhauer’s concept
of the will represents his major disagreement with
Kant’s theory of the thing-in-itself.”32 Kant as we know
taught that the thing-in-itself (the noumena reality)
is and can only be one reality and it is the will-to-
live. The phenomenal world therefore is a reflection, a
self manifestation or self unfolding of the will.33
Elaborating on this his concept of the will, he said:
…this world in which we live and
have our being is, by its whole
nature, through and through will,
and at the same time through and
through representation…. Everyone32 S. E. Stumpf, opp. cit., p.32733 J. Omoregbe, opp. cit., p.143-144
finds himself to be this will, in
which the inner nature of the world
consists, and he also finds himself
to be the whole world…34
Therefore, Schopenhauer believes that, this “will” is
the ultimate reality. According to him “The will
considered purely in itself, is devoid of knowledge,
and is only a blind irresistible urge. The will is the
thing-in-itself, the inner content, the essence of the
world, but life, the visible world, the phenomenon, is
only the mirror of the will, this world will accompany
the will as inseparably as a body is accompanied by its
shadow.”35
Moreover, to say “the will” and to say “the will-to-
live are one and the same thing, for according to him,34 A. Schopenhauer opp. cit., p. 3-4.35 Ibid p.275
“it is immaterial and a mere pleonasm if instead of
simply saying ‘the will’ we say ‘the will-to-live”36
Again Schopenhauer believes that this will-to-live is
the cause to all struggles, suffering and evil in the
world. To buttress his point he said that “the striving
of matter can always be impeded only, never fulfilled
or satisfied. Every attained end is at the same time
the beginning of a new curse and so on ‘ad infinitum”37
This shall however be discussed and analysed later
after we must have looked into his biography briefly
and the influence he had from other philosophers.
2.2 THE WORLD AS MANIFESTATION OF THE WILL-TO-LIVE
36 Ibid p.27537 Ibid p.164
Having come to the conclusion that the will is the
thing-in-itself, Schopenhauer went on to describe the
operation and manifestation of the will-to-live in
nature. He maintained that the whole world is willing,
Striving and mostly unconscious force with a
multiplicity of manifestation. Schopenhauer advances
this as a metaphysical account of the world as it is in
itself, but believes it is also supported by empirical
evidence. Humans as part of the world are fundamentally
willing beings. Their behavior shaped by an unchosen
will to life which manifests itself in organism38
Schopenhauer sees the manifestation of the will in
everything; he sees it in the impulse by which the
magnet turns to the North Pole, in the phenomena of
attraction and repulsion in gravitation, in normal
38 Edward Craig, Routledge Encyclo., opp. Cit., p. 545
instinct in human desire and likewise in organic and
inorganic spheres39
Describing once more the operation of the will to live,
Schopenhauer maintains that the will itself is without
knowledge and merely a rational blind impulse an
endless striving.
The will considered purely in itself
is devoid of knowledge and is only a
blind irresistible urge as we see it
appear in inorganic and vegetable
nature and in their laws and also in
vegetable past of our life40
Considering the fact that the will is blind, one may
ask why Schopenhauer gave it the name as will, since
39 Copleston, op. cit., p. 3740 A. Schopenhauer, opp. cit., vol. 1, p. 275
will imply rationality and seems not to be suitable for
describing a blind incessant impulse. Why not force?
However, Schopenhauer buttresses his reasons by saying
that we ought to take our descriptive term conscious
from our volition. It is also better to describe the
less well known in terms of the better known than the
other way round.41 So for him, the term will is well
situated
Furthermore, the will is in everything and makes use of
everything in varying degrees of intensity. It is
lesser in the inorganic maters than as in animals with
their instinct. In man, it is very complex and this
accounts for rationality but all still pointing to the
dame reality. Man thinks himself as being conscious of
what he does. He thinks that he is the one who takes
41 Copleston, op. cit., p.37
absolute charge over his actions, without knowing that
it is the will which serves as the brain behind this.
The will is never tired but remains in constant strife
until its end is achieved.
2.3 THE PHILOSOPHY OF PESSIMISM
From the epistemological point of view, Schopenhauer’s
ideas belong to the school of phenomenology. He
believes that the “phenomena world is therefore a
reflection, a self manifestation or self unfolding of
the will”.42 In other word the conflict we find in the
world is as a result of restless urge, struggles in
life in various ways and among various ways and among
various things.
42 C. Janaway, “Arthur Schopehauer” in Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Edward Craig (Gen. Ed.). Vol. 8 London : Routledge, 1998. P.548
Therefore, Schopenhauer’s views of life are “grim and
pessimistic.”43 it is on this vantage that he sees the
world of man as full of misery and suffering. In the
same way, the life of an individual is at constant
struggle and not merely the individual which is at
constant struggle and not merely a metamorphoric one
against want or boredom but also an actual struggle
against other people. He discovers adversaries
everywhere because life is in continual conflict and
dies with sword in hand. At most man’s restless quest
for happiness is also a manifestation of the will. In
which the will as a restless impulse manifests itself
in all conflicts in all struggles and in all evils in
the world. Hence, the will inevitably leads a person to
pain, suffering and death. In the same vein, to have
43 J.I, Omoregbe; A Simplified History of Western philosophy vol. 2. Lagos.
desires unsatisfied is to suffer; to have needs is
vulnerable to deprivation and to be without needs
usually invites a “state of empty boredom waiting to be
filed by a further cycle of desires”44 Since life in the
world is suffering by its very nature, hence life
itself is a crime and existence is an evil which bears
the penalty of suffering. Consequently, there can be no
true happiness because happiness is simply a temporary
cessation of human pain because pain is caused by
desire and human need can never be fulfilled.
44 R. H. Popkin “Schopenhauer, Arthur” in Essay and Aphorisms, p.43
CHAPT
ER THREE
3.0 SCHOPENHAUER’S PHILOSOPHY ON HUMAN SUFFERING
Schopenhauer having viewed the world in its fullness
and observing the pessimistic phase of the universe
declares that this world if full of conflict. He also
unleashed some solution to overcome this world of
pessimism. But one cannot arrive to the ultimate
solution to suffering without trying to x-ray the
nature of man and its feeling within his milieu. In
view of this, he characterized human action into two
perspectives which are individualism and collectivism,
however, he also under rate the evil in the world as
having its root in man because man is a microcosm on
which all that is fundamental to reality as a whole may
be plainly discerned. This is the main point of his
notion of the will as evil. Having witnessed in himself
of how the world looked like. He then wants to justify
it in religious sense pertaining the effect of worldly
evil as a contributor to human suffering. Moreover, he
lamented that this problem of evil has been central
concern of philosophers and of all the major religion.
Therefore, he mostly tailored his line of thought
chiefly to the religious views. His focus was not only
on Christianity and Hindu; he also extended his hand to
the Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism. In his
philosophical approach which has also gone far as in
moral attitude of human life. It is on this aspect that
he realized that moral evil is as a cause of man’s
misuse of the free will.
Furthermore, suffering is something pertinent to human
nature and man cannot avoid it as far as he still
exists. therefore, man is ever attached to suffering
because there is continuous cycle of life, following
the belief of the Buddha, hence, he holds that every
suffering has its particular characteristics either
morally hood or morally bad, and for this suffering to
end is as result of bringing rebirth to an end, this is
according to Buddha belief.
3.1THE WORLD AS WILL
It is a perennial philosophical reflection that if one
looks deeply enough into oneself, one will discover not
only one's own essence, but also the essence of the
universe. For as one is a part of the universe as is
everything else, the basic energies of the universe
flow through oneself, as they flow through everything
else. So it is thought that one can come into contact
with the nature of the universe if one comes into
substantial contact with one's ultimate inner being.45
Among the most frequently-identified principles that
are introspectively brought forth and one that was the
standard for German Idealist philosophers such as
Fichte, Schelling and Hegel who were philosophizing
45 R. Dircks, essays of Schopenhauer, A pan Series publication, 2005. P 28
within the Cartesian tradition is the principle of
self-consciousness46. With the belief that acts of self-
consciousness exemplify a self-creative process akin to
divine creation, and developing a logic that reflects
the structure of self-consciousness, namely, the
dialectical logic of position, opposition and
reconciliation (sometimes described as the logic of
thesis, antithesis and synthesis), the German Idealists
maintained that dialectical logic mirrors the structure
not only of human productions, both individual and
social, but the structure of reality as a whole,
conceived of as a thinking substance.
As much as he opposes the traditional German Idealists
in their metaphysical elevation of self-consciousness
(which he regards as too intellectualistic),
46 Copleston opp. cit., p.48
Schopenhauer stands within the spirit of this
tradition,
For he believes that
The supreme principle of the
universe is likewise apprehensible
through introspection, and that we
can philosophically understand the
world as various manifestations of
this general principle. For
Schopenhauer, this is not the
principle of self-consciousness and
rationally-infused will, but is
rather what he simply calls “Will” —
a mindless, aimless, non-rational
urge at the foundation of our
instinctual drives, and at the
foundational being of everything47.
Schopenhauer's originality does not reside in his
characterization of the world as Will, or as act for we
encounter this position in Fichte's philosophy but in
the conception of Will as being devoid of rationality
or intellect.
Having rejected the Kantian position that our
sensations are caused by an unknowable object that
exists independently of us, Schopenhauer notes
importantly that our body which is just one among the
many objects in the world is given to us in two
different ways: we perceive our body as a physical
object among other physical objects, subject to the
natural laws that govern the movements of all physical
47 R. Dircks, opp cit. p.31
objects, and we are aware of our body through our
immediate awareness, as we each consciously inhabit our
body, intentionally move it, and feel directly our
pleasures, pains, and emotional states. We can
objectively perceive our hand as an external object, as
a surgeon might perceive it during a medical operation,
and we can also be subjectively aware of our hand as
something we inhabit, as something we willfully move,
and of which we can feel its inner muscular workings.
From this observation, Schopenhauer asserts that among
all the objects in the universe, there is only one
object, relative to each of us namely, our physical
body that is given in two entirely different ways. It
is given as representation (i.e., objectively;
externally) and as Will (i.e., subjectively;
internally)48. One of his intriguing conclusions is that
when we move our hand, this is not to be comprehended
as a motivational act that first happens, and then
causes the movement of our hand as an effect. He
maintains that the movement of our hand is but a single
act again, like the two sides of a coin that has a
subjective feeling of willing as one of its aspects,
and the movement of the hand as the other. More
generally, he adds that the action of the body is
nothing but the act of Will objectified, that is,
translated into perception.
At this point in his argumentation, Schopenhauer has
established only that among his many ideas, or
representations, only one of them (the representation
of his body) has this special double-aspected quality.
48A. Schopenhauer, opp. cit., vol.2, p.53
When he perceives the moon or a mountain, he does not
under ordinary circumstances have any direct access to
the metaphysical inside of such objects; they remain as
representations that reveal to him only their objective
side. Schopenhauer rejects Descartes’ causal
interactionism, where thinking substance is said to
cause changes in an independent material substance and
vice-versa.
This precipitates a position that characterizes the
inner aspect of things, as far as we can describe it,
as Will. Hence, Schopenhauer regards the world as a
whole as having two sides: the world is Will and the
world is representation. The world as Will (“for us”,
as he sometimes qualifies it) is the world as it is in
itself, and the world as representation is the world of
appearances, of our ideas, or of objects. An
alternative title for Schopenhauer's main book, The
World as Will and Representation, might well have been, The
World as Reality and Appearance. Similarly, his book might
have been entitled, The Inner and Outer Nature of Reality.
Despite its general precedents within the philosophical
family of double-aspect theories, Schopenhauer's
particular characterization of the world as will is
nonetheless novel and daring. It is also frightening
and pandemonic: he maintains that the world as it is in
itself (again, sometimes adding “for us”) is an endless
striving and blind impulse with no end in view, devoid
of knowledge, lawless, absolutely free, entirely self-
determining and almighty. Within Schopenhauer's vision
of the world as Will, there is no God to be
comprehended, and the world is conceived of as being
meaningless. When anthropomorphically considered, the
world is represented as being in a condition of eternal
frustration, as it endlessly strives for nothing in
particular, and as it goes essentially nowhere. It is a
world beyond any ascriptions of good and evil.
Schopenhauer's denial of meaning to the world differs
radically from the views of Fichte, Schelling and Hegel
all of whom fostered a distinct hope that everything is
moving towards a harmonious and just end. Like these
German Idealists, however, Schopenhauer also tries to
explain how the world that we experience daily is the
result of the activity of the central principle of
things. As the German Idealists tried to account for
the great chain of being — the rocks, trees, animals,
and human beings as the increasingly complicated and
detailed expressions of self-consciousness,
Schopenhauer attempts to do the same by explaining the
world as gradations of Will's manifestation.
According to Schopenhauer, corresponding to the level
of the universal subject-object distinction, Will is
immediately objectified into a set of universal objects
or Platonic Ideas. These constitute the timeless
patterns for each of the individual things that we
experience in space and time. There are different
Platonic Ideas, and although this multiplicity of Ideas
implies that some measure of individuation is present
within this realm, each Idea nonetheless contains no
plurality within itself and is said to be “one.” The
Platonic Ideas are in neither space nor time, and they
therefore lack the qualities of individuation that
would follow from the introduction of spatial and
temporal qualifications. In these respects, the
Platonic Ideas are independent of the specific fourfold
root of the principle of sufficient reason, even though
it would be misleading to say that there is no
individuation whatsoever at this universal level, for
there are many different Platonic Ideas that are
individuated from one another. Schopenhauer refers to
the Platonic Ideas as the direct objectifications of
Will, and as the immediate objectivity of Will.
Will's indirect objectifications appear when our minds
continue to apply the principle of sufficient reason
beyond its general root such as to introduce the forms
of time, space and causality, not to mention logic,
mathematics, geometry and moral reasoning. When Will is
objectified at this level of determination, the world
of everyday life emerges, whose objects are, in effect,
kaleidoscopically multiplied manifestations of the
Platonic forms, endlessly dispersed throughout space
and time.
Since the principle of sufficient reason is (given
Schopenhauer's inspiration from Kant) the
epistemological form of the human mind, the spatio-
temporal world is the world of our own reflection. To
that extent, Schopenhauer says that life is like a
dream. As a condition of our knowledge, Schopenhauer
believes that the laws of nature, along with the sets
of objects that we experience, we ourselves create in
way that is not unlike the way the constitution of our
tongues invokes the taste of sugar.
At this point, what Schopenhauer has developed
philosophically is surely interesting, but we have not
yet mentioned its more remarkable and memorable aspect.
If we combine his claim that the world is Will with his
Kantian view that we are responsible for the
individuated world of appearances, we arrive at a novel
outlook — an outlook that depends heavily upon
Schopenhauer's characterization of the thing-in-itself
as Will, understood to be an aimless, blind striving.
Before the human being comes onto the scene with its
principle of sufficient reason (or principle of
individuation) there are no individuals. It is the
human being that, in its very effort to know anything,
objectifies an appearance for itself that involves the
fragmentation of Will and its breakup into a
comprehensible set of individuals. The result of this
fragmentation, given the nature of Will, is terrible:
it is a world of constant struggle, where each
individual thing strives against every other individual
thing; the result is a permanent “war of all against
all” akin to what Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)
characterized as the state of nature.
Kant concludes in the Critique of Pure Reason that we create
the laws of nature. Adding to this, Schopenhauer
concludes in The World as Will and Representation that we
create the violent state of nature, for he maintains
that;
The individuation that we impose
upon things, is imposed upon a blind
striving energy that, once it
becomes individuated and
objectified, turns against itself,
consumes itself, and does violence
to itself. His paradigm image is of
the bulldog-ant of Australia, which
when cut in half, struggles in a
battle to the death between its head
and tail.49
Our very quest for scientific and practical knowledge
creates a world that feasts upon itself.
This marks the origin of Schopenhauer's renowned
pessimism: he claims that as individuals, we are the
unfortunate products of our own epistemological making,
and that within the world of appearances that we
structure, we are fated to fight with other
individuals, and to want more than we can ever have50.
On Schopenhauer's view, the world of daily life is
essentially violent and frustrating; it is a world
49 A. Schopenhauer, opp. cit., vol.2 p.5850 Ibid. p.53
that, as long as our consciousness remains at that
level where the principle of sufficient reason applies
in its fourfold root, will never resolve itself into a
condition of greater tranquility.
3.1 The world as evil.
Schopenhauer sees the basic aim of existence as
suffering. This is obvious as the blind incessant
“Will” which never cease to objectify itself in nature.
Hence existence is a compliment of suffering. This was
why he said; if we wish to measure the degree of guilt
with which our existence itself is a burden, let us
look at the suffering commented with it51 thus,
existence exists for evil.
According to him:
This world is the battleground of
tormented and agonized being only by
each devouring the other. Therefore,
every beast of prey is the self
maintenance is a chain of torturing
deaths52
The fact that human life is evil is an implication of
the evilness of existence. Suffering is the reward that
existence obtains. Life Schopenhauer believes is evil
because pain and suffering are its stimulus and that
51 Schopenhauer, Vol. 2, op. cit., p. 58052 Ibid., p. 581
pleasure and desire are merely a negative cessation of
pain. Hence he said;
If life in itself were a precious
blessing decidedly preferable to non-
existence, the exit from it would not
need to be guarded by such fearful
watchmen as death and terrors. But who
would go on living as it is, if death
were less terrible? And who could bear
even the mere thought of death, if life
were a pleasure? But the former still
always has the good point of being the
end of life, and we console ourselves
with death in regard to sufferings of
life.53
53 A. Schopenhauer, vol. 2, op. cit., p. 578.
However, Schopenhauer could not assimilate the thought
of some philosophers like Leibniz for example who held
to the view that this is the best possible world ever
created. He buttressed this fact saying that God who is
the creator could not give the creature all without
allowing himself as God. Therefore there must be
limitation. The source of evil for him is not God
rather the very nature of things God creates for these
things are finite or limited in perfection.54 Hence he
further maintains that evil is not something
substantial but a mere absence of perfection. It is a
privation.55 In the same vein St. Augustine holds that;
Nothing is evil…… that which appears
evil from our finite perspective is
not evil at all but either good in
54 A. Schopenhauer, vol,2, op. cit., p.57855 Copleston, op. cit., p.84
itself or else part of some totality
in which its appearance evil is
subsumed by a greater good.56
This is the metaphysical optimism of Leibniz which
excited the ridicule of Schopenhauer, for whom this
world so far from being the best is rather the worst of
all possible worlds and standing objection to existence
of a beneficent creator. So far we have seen that
existence is suffering and the world is evil according
to Schopenhauer. The question still remains; is there
no way out to alleviate suffering? How can the question
of human suffering in the world be solved?
3.2 THE NATURE OF MAN IN EXISTING WORLD
56 Ibid., p.259
Man as a concrete being is so complicated and is
mystical that man as he is cannot give a clear answer
to himself. Man in the other hand is “the supreme
questions for man in the sense that man lacks a perfect
understanding of himself.57 For man to give a clear
account of what he is, what his origin is, what his
destiny is and what consistency his life and internal
dimension has. Naturally, “man is a physical substance
which has a unity of body and soul, without the soul,
the body would have no form”58 therefore, man functions
as a person only when the body and soul are unified
most importantly it is the soul that accounts for
sensation and power of intellect and will of which man
57 B. Mondin. Philosophical Anthropology. Rome: Urban University Press…58 H.J. Blacham, Reality, man and existence, Canada; Bantam Book, Inc. 1965 p.229
highest capacity is located at the intellect which
makes him a rational animal.
The nature of man can be seen in two different ways
that is individualism and collectivism. Individualism
sees man only in relation to himself and collectivism
sees only the society of man.”59 Both view of life
expresses the same human condition, but in different
reflection such that the human person feels himself to
be a man exposed by nature.
Schopenhauer sees man as an object of pity hence he
said How shall a man be proud when his conception is a
crime his birth a penalty, his life a labour and death
a necessity. He went further saying that when you come
in contact with a man, no matter whom, do not attempt
an objective appreciation of him according to his worth59 H.J. Blacham, Reality, man and existence, Canada; Bantam Book, Inc. 1965. p.229.
and dignity. Do not consider his bad will or his narrow
understanding and perverse ideas; as the former may
easily lead you to hate and the later to despise him
but fix your attention only upon his sufferings, his
needs, his anxieties, his pains. Then you will always
feel your kingship with him; you will sympathize with
him and instead of hatred or contempt you will
experience the commiseration that …… is the peace to
which the Gospel call us
Sequel to this, man’s nature in the community is to
relate with one another for natural understanding. To
achieve this goal, therefore, therefore, the science of
man entails a communal interaction in sharing
togetherness and unity in a society.
3.3HUMAN SUFFERING AND VANITY OF EXISTENCE
This vanity finds expression in the whole way in which
things exist in the infinite nature of time and space
as opposed to the finite nature of the individual in
both in the ever-passing present moment as the only
mode of actual existence in the interdependency and
relativity of all things, in continual becoming without
ever Being in constant wishing and never being
satisfied. In the long battle which forms the history
of life where every effort is checked by difficulties
and stopped until they are overcome. Time is that in
which all things pass away is merely the form under
which the will to live, the thing in itself and
therefore the imperishable has revealed to it that its
efforts are in vain. It is that agent by which at every
moment all things in our hands become as nothing and
lose any real value they possess. That which has been
exists no more it exists as little as that which has
never been. But of everything that exists, you must
say, in the nest moment that it has been hence
something of great importance now past is inferior to
something of little importance now present in that the
letter is a reality and related to the former as
something to nothing.
Furthermore, Schopenhauer lamented over mankind due to
the fact that despite the situation of our present
existence, man is still determine to pursue labour and
hope aimlessly60 for him, one can be happy but every
person strives his whole life long for some fancied
happiness which he seldom reaches and if he does, it is
60 A. Schopenhauer, vol.2 op. cit., p.575
only to find illusion.61 In expanding the extent of the
vanity of existence, Schopenhauer asserts that:
“of every event in our life, we can say only for one
moment that it is, forever after be how rapidly our
short span of time ebbs away; if it were not that in
the furthest depths of our being, we are secretly
conscious of our share in the exhaustible spring of
eternity so that we can always hope to find life in it
again”62 human suffering on the same mote is a fatal
reality which is global, nobody can escape or is
exempted from it unlike some philosophers like the
existentialists who were not comfortable with the
assertion that man’s labour in the world is in vain
since they believed that man is responsible for his
61 A.Schopenhauer, Pererrga, University Press, 1976, p.32362 A Schopenhauer, Studies in pessimism. P……
existence , Schopenhauer refused to accept their line
of thought less his metaphysical pessimism could not
have been part of his thoughts. Schopenhauer further
supported his stand with the story of Thracians myth
who were believed to be welcoming, the new born child
with lamentation during which they do recount all
evils, that inevitably face the child. On the other
hand, they buy the dead with mirth and merriment
because they have escaped from so many great
sufferings63
3.4 THE WILL AS THE AUTHOR OF HUMAN SUFFERING
As already noted the will is a blind and endless
striving urge or impulse and cannot find satisfaction
or reach a state of tranquility. It is always striving
63 A. Schopenhauer, Vol2. Op. cit.,p.575
and never attaining. This essential feature of the will
is reflected in itself objection of manifestat5ion
above all in human life (actions or activities). He
further writes;
The will is free; it is almighty,
the will appears in everything
precisely as it determines itself in
itself and outside time. The world
is the mirror of this willing and
all fitness, all suffering, all
miseries that it contains belong to
the expression in what the will
wills64
By this it implies that the will is the ruler of the
world and the ultimate core of suffering because
64 A. Schopenhauer, vol. 1 op. cit., p.351
according to Schopenhauer, willing and striving are the
whole essence of the world. Human beings are
perpetually in search of happiness or enjoyment or
pleasure but cannot find it. What we called happiness
is a temporary cessation of desire.65
That fact that human being can never escape suffering
is an implication of the capture of the will which is
the ultimate reality. Life or existence is even a
problem for Schopenhauer. As every particular thing or
each individual thing, is an objectification of the
will. Each strives to assert its own existence at the
expense of other things thereby introducing conflict in
the world. Thus the world is a field of conflicts which
manifests the nature of the will.66
65 Ibid., p.31266 Copleston, op. cit., p.39
Suffering however is a fact that cannot be denied.
Heraclitus did notice that way back in the ancient
times when he said that in this world, war is the
father of all and the king of all.67 Though he did not
go into detail in order to determined the cause of
suffering, the fact remains that suffering is
indispensable to human life which is as a result of
human nature as willing being.
3.5 SUFFERING AS THE BASIC AIM OF HUMAN EXISTENCE
Suffering as the basic aim of human existence exposes
the fact that pleasure is not pleasant as we expect it.
The pleasure in life brings misfortune and pain because
human bodily frame would be relived of all need,
67 A. Schopenhauer, vol.1 op. cit., p.312
hardship and adversity; if everything man took in hand
were successful, they would so swollen with arrogance
or go mad.68
It has been free from suffering from positive evil. As
such human happiness cannot be measured because he
engage himself on thought with his power of reflection
on the past and the future and this occupies him out of
all proportion to its value, which is rooted in
physical pleasure and pain.
Then our world of happiness will be attained through
ascetic life as the Buddhist will have it. It is the
ascetic life that the Buddhist proposed to give man
necessary happiness in the sense that pain and
suffering should be accepted as something good where as
physical happiness becomes had and evil.68 S.M CAHN, Ethics History and Theory, New York; OxfordUni. Press, 1974. P.323
3.6 THE SOLUTION TO HUMAN SUFFERING
According to Schopenhauer’s view the world of daily
life as we have seen already is essentially violence
and frustration. It is a world that as long as our
consciousness remains at that level where the principle
of sufficient reason applies in its four fold root,
will never resolves itself into a condition of greater
tranquility, as he explicitly stated that life is
suffering.69
In cognizance of the above fact Schopenhauer still
presents us with true main ways by which one can
temporally get rid of suffering. The two ways are; the
69 A. Schopenhauer,vol.1 op. cit., p.313
way of aesthetic contemplation and the way of
asceticism and denial of the will to live.70
The way of Aesthetic contemplation
Accordingly, Encyclopedic dictionary has “Aesthetics”
as an experience of an escape from the horrors of this
world when the Will is kept in a condition of pure-
Willesness.71
This implies that our faculty of knowledge normally
only an instrument to the Will’s satisfaction gains
certain independence as pure Will-less contemplation
for its own sake, freeing us briefly from our misery,
while the veil which hides the true particularly rent.72
70 Copleston, op.cit., 4571 Honderish, the Oxford University Companion to Philosophy (ed.) Oxford University Press, 1995, p.80272 Ibid. p.803
Schopenhauer discovers more peaceful states of mind by
directing his everyday, practically oriented
consciousness towards more extra-ordinary universal and
less-individuated states of mind. He believes that with
less individuation and objectification, there is less
conflict, less pain and more peace. Hence he said;
We can withdraw from all suffering
just as well through present as
through distant objects whenever we
raise ourselves to put a pure
objective Contemplation of them and
are thus able to produce the
illusion that only those objects are
present not ourselves. Then as pure
object of knowing, delivered from
the miserable self, we became
entirely one with those objects and
foreign as our want is to them it is
at such moment just as foreign to
us. Then the world as representation
alone remains the world as will has
disappeared.73
In other words he is saying that in aesthetic
contemplation, we lose ourselves in the object we
forget about our individuality and become the clear
mirror of the object in this way, we become will-less
and painless.
Schopenhauer speaks of aesthetic contemplation as a
momentary cessation of the will and more to that only
few people have the capacity to remain for long in such
aesthetic state of mind and that most people are denied
73 A. Schopenhauer, Vol. 1 op. cit.,p.199
the tranquility of aesthetic genius has the capacity to
remain in the state of pure perception
ASCETICISM OR THE WAY OF SALVATION AND MORAL GOODNESS
Schopenhauer believes that a person who experiences the
truth of human nature from a moral perspective, who
appreciates how it’s spatial and temporal forms of
knowledge generates a constant passing away. Continual
suffering vain striving and inner tension will be
profoundly repulsed by the human scene in any of its
manifestation.
The result is an attitude of the denial of the Will-to-
live which Schopenhauer identifies with ascetic
attitude of renunciation, resignation and willesness
but also composure and tranquility. Hence:
Moral virtues are a means of advance
self-renunciation and accordingly of
denying the will-to-live. For true
righteousness, inviolable justice,
that form the bottom of his heart
has to make sacrifices which soon
deprive life of the sweetness
required to make it enjoyable,
thereby twin will from it and thus
lead to resignation.74
By this, Schopenhauer acknowledge that the devil of
one’s Will to live entails a terrible struggle with
one’s instinctual energies as one avoids the
temptations of bodily pleasures and resists the mere
animal force to endure and flourish.75 So before one can
74 A, Schopenhauer, vol.2, opp. Cit., p. 60675 Ibid. p. 606
enter transcendental consciousness of heavenly
tranquility, one must pass through the fires of hell
and experience a dark night of the soul as one’s
universal self fight against one’s individuated and
physical self, as pure knowledge struggles against
animalistic will and as freedom struggles against
nature76
CHAPTE
R FOUR
4.0 A CRITIQUE ON SCHOPENHAUER’S PHILOSOPHY
Schopenhauer’s philosophy could be said to have
subjected man to perpetual laxity as well as causing
defeat to man’s psychology. His deterministic approach
76 A. Schopenhauer essays on pessimism p. 68
to human existence abruptly denies the existentialists’
belief in man’s Essence. Kierkegaard who possessed most
of Schopenhauer’s writings including Die Welt als Wille und
Vorstellung, parenga and paralipomena and Die beiden Grund Probleme
der Ethik praises Schopenhauer as indisputably “a very
significant author.77 Happily remarking that his life
and career are a deep wound inflicted on professor
philosophy. What Kierkegaard finds must attractive in
Schopenhauer’s philosophy is his pessimism and his
critique of philosophy professors78 who do not live in
what they profess. But what attracts Schopenhauer here
is what in another sense repels him. Schopenhauer is at
once too pessimistic and yet not pessimistic enough.
Schopenhauer represents all of life as suffering
(rather than ethico-religious voluntary suffering, that77 S. Kierkegaard. Journals and papers. Hongs trans. Vol.4, p.23.78 Ibid. p.25
of the self-denying Christian paradox existence)79 and
proposed Indian ascetism as the proper response to this
pessimistic view of reality, an asceticism that amounts
to denial of will to live a kind of non-existence as it
were. But this universal pessimism easily becomes an
inverted optimism for “if to exist is to suffer, then
to exist in such a way that it is as if one did not
exist is clearly endaemonism if to exist is to suffer,
endaemonism of course cannot be sought in the direction
of existing it must be sought in the direction of not
existing.80
Kierkegaard leveled another criticism at Schopenhauer,
chiding him for his rejection of the deontological side
of the ethical. He wondered if it is actually possible
79 Ibid.80 Ibid
to be an ascetic without the divine or at least some
motif of eternity.
A closer look at Schopenhauer’s philosophy one will
observe that he gave up Christianity and always praises
Indian Brahminism (the traditional social and religious
system of verdict Hinduism).81 He has to admit himself
that those ascetics are after all determined by a
consideration of eternity are qualified religiously not
by (philosophical) genius and the eternal confronts
them as a religious duty
On another note, Schopenhauer’s intermittently
encountered claim that Will is the thing-in-itself only
to us provides philosophical space for him to assert
consistently that mystical experience provides a
positive insight. It also relativizes to the human
81 Encarta dictionary
condition, Schopenhauer’s famous position that the
world is Will. This entails that his outlook on daily
life is as a cruel and violence- filled world- a world
generated by the application of the principle of
sufficient reason is based on a human-conditioned
intuition, namely, the direct double knowledge of one’s
body as both subject and object. So along these lines,
Schopenhauer’s pessimistic vision of the world can
itself be seen to be grounded upon the subject-object
distinction that is the general root of the principle
of sufficient reason
On the other hand, Schopenhauer’s philosophy serves a
pointer to our mission on earth when considered
theologically though he went to the extreme end. From
his philosophy, one can deduce that man’s primary motif
in life is to reach an end where happiness rules,
there, man strive to gain this bounteous gift of nature
by putting of all that gives bodily pleasure to the
mere mortal body.
4.1 APPRECIATIOON OF SCHOPENHAUER’S GROUND OF PESSIMISM
Here we come upon the reason for Schopenhauer’s
pessimism. His concept of the will portrays the whole
system of nature as moving in response to the driving
force in all things. All things are like puppets “set
in motion by internal clockwork.”82 The lowliest being
for example the amoeba, or the highest that is, a human
being is driven by the same force, the will. The blind
will which produces human behavior is the same which
makes the plants grow. Every individual bears the stamp
of a forced condition. Schopenhauer thus rejects the
82 S. E. Stumpf opp. cit., p. 328
assumption that human beings are superior to animals
because animals are controlled only by instincts
whereas humans are rational beings. The intellect, he
says is itself fashioned by the universal will so that
the human intellect is on the same level as the
instincts of animals. Moreover intellect and will in
human beings are not to be thought of as to separate
faculties. Instead the intellect is for Schopenhauer an
attribute of the will; it is secondary or in a
philosophical sense, accidental. He can sustain
intellectual effort only for short periods of time; it
declines in strength and requires rest, and is finally
a function of the body. By contrast, the will continues
without interruption to sustain and support life.
During dreamless sleep the intellect does not function,
whereas all the organic functions of the body continue.
These organic functions are manifestations of the will,
while other thinkers spoke of the freedom of he will.
Schopenhauer says “I prove its omnipotence.”
The omnipotence of the will in all of nature has
pessimistic implications for human beings. As
Schopenhauer says, “men are only apparently drawn from
in front; really they are pushed from behind; it is not
life that tempts them on, but necessity that drives
them forward”83 the primal drive in all of nature is to
produce life. The will to live has no other purpose
than to continue the cycle of life Schopenhauer
portrays the realm of nature as a fierce struggle where
the will to live inevitably produces constant conflict
and destruction of other elements. No purpose of aim is
violated during this conflict; the underlying drive of
83 I9bid. P.329
the will leaves no alternative outcome. Schopenhauer
tells of a report of a place in Java where, for as far
as the eye can see, the land is covered with skeletons,
which gives the impression of a battlefield. These are
skeletons or large turtles. Five feet long, ten feet
wide and twelve feet high. They come out of the sea to
lay their eggs and are then attacked by wild long that
lay them on their back step off their armor and eat
them alive. Now Schopenhauer says; this misery repeats
itself thousands and thousands of times year in year
in. for this those turtles were born …it is thus the
will to live objectify itself”84
If we move from the animal world to the human race,
Schopenhauer admits that the mater becomes more
complicated, but the fundamental character remains
84 Ibid. p.329
unaltered. It is not the individual but only the
species that nature cares for. Human life turns out to
be by no means a gift for enjoyment but as a task, a
drudgery to be performed. Millions of people are united
into nations striving for the common good, but
thousands fall as a sacrifice for it “now senseless
delusions, not intriguing politics, incite them to wars
with each other….in peace industries, and trse are
active, inventions work miracles, sins are navigated,
delicacies are collected from all ends of the world”
but asks Schopenhauer, what is the aim of all these
striving? His answer is “to sustain ephemeral; and
tormented individuals though a short span of time.”85
Life, Schopenhauer says is a bad bargain. The
disproportion between human trouble, on the one hand
85 Ibid p.329
and reward on the other means that life involves the
exertion of all our strength for something that is of
no value there is nothing to look forward to except
the satisfaction of hunger and the sexual instinct or
in any case a little momentary comfort. His conclusion
is that “life is a business , the process of which are
very far from covering the cost of it.”86
There can be no true happiness because happiness is
simply a temporary cessation of need or want, most of
which can never be fulfilled. Finally, human life is a
striving without aim. And the life of every individual
is always a tragedy but gone thought in detail it has
the character of a comedy.
4.1 THE ODD AND GAINS IN HUMAN SUFFERING
86 Ibid. p.329
Schopenhauer made it clear that a life without trial
and tribulations is not worth living. The essence of
suffering in human existence determines his necessity
towards the life of happiness. Suffering has chiefly
both positive and negative effects on human existence.
Schopenhauer rejects Hedonist idea of pleasure as
something that brings happiness to the soul. He sees it
as something evil in the sight of men. Such he
considers as insatiable desire in man that brings pain
to man. For Schopenhauer, it is only through trial and
suffering that a positive end is made. In technological
aspect, many inventories in this world are produced at
the cause of human suffering to give justification to
their intellectual ability
On the negative aspect of it, suffering sometimes put
man in a state of chaos with respect to moral and
physical evil. Man can also inflict suffering on the
other because man is wolf to man (homo lupus homini)
according to Schopenhauer, in the physical evil,
diseases and natural disasters man encounters
discomforts him and even anxiety makes man to lose his
happiness in the world. Not to talk of the political
instability that tramples on the poor masses and denies
him his freedom of happiness. Some are sitting in the
streets begging for their daily bread but it seems that
there is no hope for survival. Why then is such
suffering and ascetic life not enough to provide
happiness for them.
From this perspective, Schopenhauer’s does not render
any help to humanity rather it continues to put the
world in a chaotic state, in other words good is quite
distinct from evil.
4.2 KINDS OF SUFFERING
Traditionally, suffering is classified as: moral,
mental, psychological, physical, social and so on.
According to Nnajike, c., this classification has only
descriptive values to enable caregivers attend more
effectively to the afflicted. We shall look into some
of them.
PHYSICAL SUFFERING
Physical suffering can be attributed as suffering men
undergoes as a result of the laws of nature which
affects man in his material physical stuff – the
corporeal aspect of man.87 A manifestation of some
suffering appears to be physical when the body is
87 Nnajike, C., Making sense of Human suffering p. 9
hurting. Instances of such physical suffering includes
those resulting from a hurt in the body, bodily
sickness, a congenital and accidental disfigure of
parts of the body etc. it can also be experienced in
such other forms as a breakdown of the bodily organ and
also in hunger and thirst even though they are linked
to economic poverty.
Psychological suffering
Psychological suffering could also be described as
mental suffering. It refers to and explains “the
general affliction caused by sickness, poverty,
misfortune and any kind of suffering”88 this shows that
human being also suffers at the level of psyche.
However, this psychical level of suffering is also
connected to the physical level already considered88 Ibid., p.10
above. In order not to dichotomize human being into
two- body and soul as in the philosophy of Rene
Descartes, we wish to state that suffering involves the
whole being of the sufferer.89 The suffering of one part
involves the others. Hence, “what we designate as
physical suffering can also affect the human
psychological make-up mental and emotional and vice
versa
Though there are still other forms of economic
suffering and so on, we are not going to treat them in
details because the generally accepted forms are only
physical and mental suffering.
4.3 Necessity of suffering as a means to an end.
89 Ibid., p.3
Schopenhauer held that suffering is the basic aim of
our existence on earth. He believes that unless
suffering is the direct and immediate object of life,
our existence must entirely fail of its aim.90
He disagrees with the view that pleasure in the world
outweighs the pain, buttressing this point, he brought
in the quotation in the letter of St. Peter (1pet. 5:3-
9). Your brothers all over the world are suffering the
same thing.91
Again, could it be that St. Paul understood in some
manner the necessity of the suffering in the world
hence, declaring the saving power of suffering he said;
in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s
afflictions for the sake of his body that is the church
90 A. Schopenhauer, op, cit,. p. 61691 A. Schopenhauer’s Parerga and Paralipomena
In the like manner, Cecil Mcgary, in his text ‘ the
Christian meaning of human suffering’ sees suffering as
a phenomenon that unavoidably co-habits with man in the
existence and this he believes must always be in man’s
awareness;
The theme of suffering is a
universal theme that accompanies man
at every point of earth; in a
certain sense, it co-exists with him
in the world and thus demands to be
constantly reconsidered
nevertheless, in whatever form,
suffering seems to be and is almost
inseparable from man’s earthly
existence92
92 C. Mcgarry, the Christian meaning of Human suffering. Nairobi; Pauline publ., 2000, p.8
There is need for human suffering just as a ship
without ballast is unstable and will not go straight so
also man cannot be focused in the absence of suffering.
It is that work, worry, labour and trouble that are the
chief source of living for all men. The happiness of
any given life is to be measured not by its joys or
pleasures but by the extent to which it has been free
from suffering from positive evil.
4.4 THE FINAL END OF MAN
The concept of the final end of man has generated a lot
of philosophical thought. Man as a supreme being takes
cognizance of his being and his final end. As such
without this aim in life, human life would have been
barbaric. But Aristotle intervened by saying that all
action aims towards an end, but the question is what
the end of man is? And in what state of nature does it
manifest itself?
Schopenhauer in the light of this had it that the end
of man is happiness within the universe with special
attitude to aesthetic contemplation, moral and
asceticism such that man is availed to happy life only
if he is able to escape from the will to live. This
“Will” that always ignite the human desire also meets
suffering and pain on the way. In other words,
Aristotle also maintained that ‘happiness is the final
end of man. Therefore, he said:
Pleasure, wealth and honour cannot
occupy the lace of the chief good
for which people should aim. To be
an ultimate end an act must be self
sufficient and final, that which is
always desirable in it and never for
the sake of something else and it
must be attainable by people.93
However, Aristotle was on the ground of what will give
tranquility of the soul. He, found his happiness not in
worldly pleasure, wealth and honour, but rather in the
working of the soul in the way of excellence of
virtue.94
Moreover, Aristotle held his philosophical proposal
within the ambiance of rationality. He rightly stated:
“the general rule of morality is to act in accordance
with “Right Reason” what this means is that the
93 S. E. Stumpf, op. cit., p.10094 Ibid., p.92
rational part of the soul should control the irrational
part”95
It is obvious that the irrational part requires
guidance when we consider what it consists of and what
its mechanism is. When looking at our appetites, we
discover first that they are affected or influenced by
things outside of the self, such as objects and people.
For Aristotle, there are two basic ways on which the
appetitive part of the soul reacts to these external
factors. These ways being love (or concupiscent
passions) and hate (or the irascible passion).96 Love
leads us to desire things and persons, whereas hate
leads us to avoid or destroy them. It becomes quickly
apparent that these passions for love and hate could
easily “go wild” when taken by themselves.
95 Ibid., p.9296 Ibid., p.93
The philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer made some
positive impacts despite his pessimistic attitude
especially after the death of Hegel and the failure of
the revolution of 1848. The climate of opinion was more
prepared for a favorable reconsideration of
Schopenhauer’s anti-rationalist and pessimistic system.
It became more widely known and as such, won some
adherents.97
Hence, “Schopenhauer’s writing helped to stimulate in
German as interest in oriental thought and religion.”98
Moreover, his view that an irrational force lies at the
center of life subsequently influenced voluntalistic
psychology, a school of psychology that emphasized the
causes for our choices, sociological studies that
examine nominational factors affecting people; and
97 Copleston, A history of philosophy,vol.7, p.288.98 Ibid
cultural attitudes that play down the value of reason
in life.99 Meanwhile, Schopenhauer did not only engage
on drawing the attention of people to the empirical
fact that there is much evil and suffering in the world
he also indicated what he believed to be the cause of
this empirical fact.100 This is attributed to the thing
in itself - the will.
Though he was one sided, his one-sidedness and
exaggeration as copleston pointed out, serve as an
effective counter-balance or anti-thesis to a system
such as that of Hegel in which attention is so focused
on the triumphant match of reason through history that
the evil and suffering in the world are obscured from
view by high-sounding phrases.101
99 Ibid100 Ibid101 Ibid
On the negative perspective, one fact remains
outstanding in the philosophy of Schopenhauer, which s
earlier on pointed out, is his total pessimism. He
extolled the dark side of human existence and landed
himself in fatalism and nihilism.102 In an instance, he
opposed procreation. For him, to procreate is to create
more suffering in the world. This implies that man is
faced to suffer, and to stop this suffering, humanity
must stop generating off-spring which leads to total
extinction of all living things. What an agony!
Philosophically, Schopenhauer’s pessimistic vision of
the world did not create any hope for man, if it does,
he would have agreed with the existentialists that
suffering is part of existence which man must surmount.
102 A. Schopenhauer opp. Cit., p.412
Although Schopenhauer is regarded as the prince of
pessimism, his philosophy also gave hope to humanity.
His greatest contributions on the moral goodness and
salvation, especially when he highlighted the means of
aesthetic contemplation and asceticism is magnificent
with this way of denial of the will, he taught us how
to escape the horrors of this world.
5.1 CONCLUSION
Among 19th century philosophers, Arthur Schopenhauer was
among the first to contend that at its core, the
universe is not a rational place. Inspired by Plato and
Kant, both of whom regarded the world as being more
amenable to reason, Schopenhauer developed their
philosophies into an instinct-recognizing and
ultimately ascetic outlook, emphasizing that in the
face of a world filled with endless strife, we ought to
minimize our natural desires for the sake of achieving
a more tranquil frame of mind and a disposition towards
universal beneficence. Often considered to be a
thoroughgoing pessimist, Schopenhauer in fact advocated
ways — via artistic, moral and ascetic forms of
awareness — to overcome a frustration-filled and
fundamentally painful human condition. Since his death
in 1860, his philosophy has had a special attraction
for those who wonder about life's meaning, along with
those engaged in music, literature, and the visual
arts.
Nevertheless, if Schopenhauer’s philosophy of suffering
in the world is given a right attitude and disposition,
his outlook about the world would be the guide for the
children of men. Really, he understood the world and it
scourges but the problem is actually on his attitude
and disposition toward suffering. He forgot that even
the scripture is not pessimistic or scandalized about
the suffering on the world. Instead like
existentialists, it opted for a way to live above it.
Nevertheless, despite Schopenhauer’s attitude and
disposition, his concept suffering teaches us to
distinguish between real and apparent promotions of
human happiness. How neither riches nor honors nor
scholarship can raise the individual … of the
discouragement over the worthlessness of his existence.
If humanity could appreciate and dispose themselves to
Schopenhauer’s methods of asceticism, self-renunciation
and resignation, the human predicament would take a new