The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer: the Wisdom of Life
As I am on the matter, let me be more frank still. The important
distinction, which is often insisted upon, between killing your enemy
in a fair fight with equal weapons, and lying in ambush for him, is
entirely a corollary of the fact that the power within the State, of
which I have spoken, recognizes no other right than might, that is,
the right of the stronger, and appeals to a _Judgment of God_ as the
basis of the whole code. For to kill a man in a fair fight, is to
prove that you are superior to him in strength or skill; and to
justify the deed, _you must assume that the right of the stronger is
really a right_.
But the truth is that, if my opponent is unable to defend himself, it
gives me the possibility, but not by any means the right, of killing
him. The _right_, the _moral justification_, must depend entirely upon
the _motives_ which I have for taking his life. Even supposing that I
have sufficient motive for taking a man's life, there is no reason
why I should make his death depend upon whether I can shoot or fence
better than he. In such a case, it is immaterial in what way I kill
him, whether I attack him from the front or the rear. From a moral
point of view, the right of the stronger is no more convincing than
the right of the more skillful; and it is skill which is employed if
you murder a a man treacherously. Might and skill are in this case
equally right; in a duel, for instance, both the one and the other
come into play; for a feint is only another name for treachery. If I
consider myself morally justified in taking a man's life, it is stupid
of me to try first of all whether he can shoot or fence better than
I; as, if he can, he will not only have wronged me, but have taken my
life into the bargain.
It is Rousseau's opinion that the proper way to avenge an insult is,
not to fight a duel with your aggressor, but to assassinate him,--an
opinion, however, which he is cautious enough only to barely indicate
in a mysterious note to one of the books of his _Emile_. This shows
the philosopher so completely under the influence of the mediaeval
superstition of knightly honor that he considers it justifiable to
murder a man who accuses you of lying: whilst he must have known that
every man, and himself especially, has deserved to have the lie given
him times without number.
The prejudice which justifies the killing of your adversary, so long
as it is done in an open contest and with equal weapons, obviously
looks upon might as really right, and a duel as the interference of
God. The Italian who, in a fit of rage, falls upon his aggressor
wherever he finds him, and despatches him without any ceremony, acts,
at any rate, consistently and naturally: he may be cleverer, but he is
not worse, than the duelist. If you say, I am justified in killing my
adversary in a duel, because he is at the moment doing his best to
kill me; I can reply that it is your challenge which has placed him
under the necessity of defending himself; and that by mutually putting
it on the ground of self-defence, the combatants are seeking a
plausible pretext for committing murder. I should rather justify the
deed by the legal maxim _Volenti non fit injuria_; because the parties
mutually agree to set their life upon the issue.
This argument may, however, be rebutted by showing that the injured
party is not injured _volens_; because it is this tyrannical principle
of knightly honor, with its absurd code, which forcibly drags one at
least of the combatants before a bloody inquisition.
I have been rather prolix on the subject of knightly honor, but I
had good reason for being so, because the Augean stable of moral and
intellectual enormity in this world can be cleaned out only with the
besom of philosophy. There are two things which more than all
else serve to make the social arrangements of modern life compare
unfavorably with those of antiquity, by giving our age a gloomy, dark
and sinister aspect, from which antiquity, fresh, natural and, as it
were, in the morning of life, is completely free; I mean modern honor
and modern disease,--_par nobile fratrum_!--which have combined to
poison all the relations of life, whether public or private. The
second of this noble pair extends its influence much farther than at
first appears to be the case, as being not merely a physical, but also
a moral disease. From the time that poisoned arrows have been found
in Cupid's quiver, an estranging, hostile, nay, devilish element has
entered into the relations of men and women, like a sinister thread
of fear and mistrust in the warp and woof of their intercourse;
indirectly shaking the foundations of human fellowship, and so more or
less affecting the whole tenor of existence. But it would be beside my
present purpose to pursue the subject further.
An influence analogous to this, though working on other lines, is
exerted by the principle of knightly honor,--that solemn farce,
unknown to the ancient world, which makes modern society stiff, gloomy
and timid, forcing us to keep the strictest watch on every word that
falls. Nor is this all. The principle is a universal Minotaur; and the
goodly company of the sons of noble houses which it demands in yearly
tribute, comes, not from one country alone, as of old, but from every
land in Europe. It is high time to make a regular attack upon this
foolish system; and this is what I am trying to do now. Would that
these two monsters of the modern world might disappear before the end
of the century!
Let us hope that medicine may be able to find some means of preventing
the one, and that, by clearing our ideals, philosophy may put an end
to the other: for it is only by clearing our ideas that the evil can
be eradicated. Governments have tried to do so by legislation, and
failed.
Still, if they are really concerned to stop the dueling system; and if
the small success that has attended their efforts is really due only
to their inability to cope with the evil, I do not mind proposing a
law the success of which I am prepared to guarantee. It will involve
no sanguinary measures, and can be put into operation without recourse
either to the scaffold or the gallows, or to imprisonment for life. It
is a small homeopathic pilule, with no serious after effects. If any
man send or accept a challenge, let the corporal take him before the
guard house, and there give him, in broad daylight, twelve strokes
with a stick _a la Chinoise_; a non-commissioned officer or a private
to receive six. If a duel has actually taken place, the usual criminal
proceedings should be instituted.
A person with knightly notions might, perhaps, object that, if such
a punishment were carried out, a man of honor would possibly shoot
himself; to which I should answer that it is better for a fool like
that to shoot himself rather than other people. However, I know very
well that governments are not really in earnest about putting down
dueling. Civil officials, and much more so, officers in the army,
(except those in the highest positions), are paid most inadequately
for the services they perform; and the deficiency is made up by honor,
which is represented by titles and orders, and, in general, by the
system of rank and distinction. The duel is, so to speak, a very
serviceable extra-horse for people of rank: so they are trained in the
knowledge of it at the universities. The accidents which happen to
those who use it make up in blood for the deficiency of the pay.
Just to complete the discussion, let me here mention the subject
of _national honor_. It is the honor of a nation as a unit in the
aggregate of nations. And as there is no court to appeal to but the
court of force; and as every nation must be prepared to defend its own
interests, the honor of a nation consists in establishing the opinion,
not only that it may be trusted (its credit), but also that it is to
be feared. An attack upon its rights must never be allowed to pass
unheeded. It is a combination of civic and knightly honor.
_Section 5.--Fame_.
Under the heading of place in the estimation of the world we have put
_Fame_; and this we must now proceed to consider.
Fame and honor are twins; and twins, too, like Castor and Pollux, of
whom the one was mortal and the other was not. Fame is the undying
brother of ephemeral honor. I speak, of course, of the highest kind of
fame, that is, of fame in the true and genuine sense of the word; for,
to be sure, there are many sorts of fame, some of which last but a
day. Honor is concerned merely with such qualities as everyone may be
expected to show under similar circumstances; fame only of those which
cannot be required of any man. Honor is of qualities which everyone
has a right to attribute to himself; fame only of those which should
be left to others to attribute. Whilst our honor extends as far as
people have knowledge of us; fame runs in advance, and makes us known
wherever it finds its way. Everyone can make a claim to honor; very
few to fame, as being attainable only in virtue of extraordinary
achievements.
These achievements may be of two kinds, either _actions_ or _works_;
and so to fame there are two paths open. On the path of actions, a
great heart is the chief recommendation; on that of works, a great
head. Each of the two paths has its own peculiar advantages and
detriments; and the chief difference between them is that actions are
fleeting, while works remain. The influence of an action, be it never
so noble, can last but a short time; but a work of genius is a living
influence, beneficial and ennobling throughout the ages. All that can
remain of actions is a memory, and that becomes weak and disfigured by
time--a matter of indifference to us, until at last it is extinguished
altogether; unless, indeed, history takes it up, and presents it,
fossilized, to posterity. Works are immortal in themselves, and once
committed to writing, may live for ever. Of Alexander the Great we
have but the name and the record; but Plato and Aristotle, Homer and
Horace are alive, and as directly at work to-day as they were in their
own lifetime. The _Vedas_, and their _Upanishads_, are still with us:
but of all contemporaneous actions not a trace has come down to us.[1]
[Footnote 1: Accordingly it is a poor compliment, though sometimes
a fashionable one, to try to pay honor to a work by calling it an
action. For a work is something essentially higher in its nature.
An action is always something based on motive, and, therefore,
fragmentary and fleeting--a part, in fact, of that Will which is the
universal and original element in the constitution of the world. But
a great and beautiful work has a permanent character, as being of
universal significance, and sprung from the Intellect, which rises,
like a perfume, above the faults and follies of the world of Will.
The fame of a great action has this advantage, that it generally
starts with a loud explosion; so loud, indeed, as to be heard all over
Europe: whereas the fame of a great work is slow and gradual in its
beginnings; the noise it makes is at first slight, but it goes on
growing greater, until at last, after a hundred years perhaps, it
attains its full force; but then it remains, because the works
remain, for thousands of years. But in the other case, when the first
explosion is over, the noise it makes grows less and less, and is
heard by fewer and fewer persons; until it ends by the action having
only a shadowy existence in the pages of history.]
Another disadvantage under which actions labor is that they depend
upon chance for the possibility of coming into existence; and hence,
the fame they win does not flow entirely from their intrinsic value,
but also from the circumstances which happened to lend them importance