3
On Method.—A certain naturalist made the following experiment: A glass jar was divided into two halves by a perfectly transparent glass partition. On the one side of the partition he placed a pike, on the other a number of small fishes such as form the prey of the pike. The pike did not notice the partition, and hurled itself on its prey, with, of course, the result only of a bruised nose. The same happened many times, and always the same result. At last, seeing all its efforts ended so painfully, the pike abandoned the hunt, so that in a few days, when the partition had been removed it continued to swim about among the small fry without daring to attack them.... Does not the same happen with us? Perhaps the limits between "this world" and "the other world" are also essentially of an experimental origin, neither rooted in the nature of things, as was thought before Kant, or in the nature of our reason, as was thought after Kant. Perhaps indeed a partition does exist, and make vain all attempts to cross over.. But perhaps there comes a moment when the partition is removed. In our minds, however, the conviction is firmly rooted that it is impossible to pass certain limits, and painful to try: a conviction founded on experience. But in this case we should recall the old scepticism of Hume, which idealist philosophy has regarded as mere subtle mind-play, valueless after Kant's critique. The most lasting and varied experience cannot lead to any binding and universal conclusion. Nay, all our a priori, which are so useful for a certain time, become sooner or later extremely harmful. A philosopher should not be afraid of scepticism, but should go on bruising his jaw. Perhaps the failure of metaphysics lies in the caution and timidity of metaphysicians, who seem ostensibly so brave. They have sought for rest—which they describe as the highest boon. Whereas they should have valued more than anything restlessness, aimlessness, even purposelessness. How can you tell when the partition will be removed? Perhaps at the very moment when man ceased his painful pursuit, settled all his questions and rested on his laurels, inert, he could with one strong push have swept through the pernicious fence which separated him from the unknowable. There is no need for man to move according to a carefully-considered plan. This is a purely aesthetic demand which need not bind us. Let man senselessly and deliriously knock his head against the wall—if the wall go down at last, will he value his triumph any the less? Unfortunately for us the illusion has been established in us that plan and purpose are the best guarantee of success. What a delusion it is! The opposite is true. The best of all that genius has revealed to us has been revealed as the result of fantastic, erratic, apparently ridiculous and useless, but relentlessly stubborn seeking. Columbus, tired of sitting on the same spot, sailed west to look for India. And genius, in spite of vulgar conception, is a condition of chaos and unutterable restlessness. Not for nothing has genius been counted kin to madness. Genius flings itself hither and thither because it has not the Sitzfleisch necessary for industrious success in mediocrity. We may be sure that earth has seen much more genius than history has recorded; since genius is acknowledged only when it has been serviceable. When the tossing-about has led to no useful issue—which is the case in the majority of instances—it arouses only a feeling of disgust and abomination in all witnesses. "He can't rest and he can't let others rest." If Lermontov and Dostoevsky had lived in times when there was no demand for books, nobody would have noticed them. Lermontov's early death would have passed unregretted. Perhaps some settled and virtuous citizen would have remarked, weary of the young man's eternal and dangerous freaks: "For a dog a dog's death." The same of Gogol, Tolstoy, Poushkin. Now they are praised because they left interesting books.... And so we need pay no attention to the cry about the futility and worthlessness of scepticism, even scepticism pure and unadulterated, scepticism which has no ulterior motive of clearing the way for a new creed. To knock one's head against the wall out of hatred for the wall: to beat against established and obstructive ideas, because one detests them: is it not an attractive proposition? And then, to see ahead uncertainly and limitless possibilities, instead of up-to-date "ideals," is not this too fascinating? The highest good is rest! I shall not argue: de gustibus aut nihil aut bene.... By the way, isn't it a superb principle? And this superb principle has been arrived at perfectly by chance, unfortunately not by me, but by one of the comical characters in Tchekhov's Seagull. He mixed up two Latin proverbs, and the result was a splendid maxim which, in order to become an a priori, awaits only universal acceptance.
4
Metaphysicians praise the transcendental, and carefully avoid it. Nietzsche hated metaphysics, he praised the earth—bleib nur der Erde treu, O meine Bruder—and always lived in the realm of the transcendental. Of course the metaphysicians behave better: this is indisputable. He who would be a teacher must proclaim the metaphysical point of view, and he may become a hero without ever smelling powder. In these anxious days, when positivism seems to fall short, one cannot do better than turn to metaphysics. Then the young man need not any more envy Alexander the Macedonian. With the assistance of a few books not only earthly states are conquered, but the whole mysterious universe. Metaphysics is the great art of swerving round dangerous experience. So metaphysicians should be called the positivists par excellence. They do not despise all experience, as they assert, but only the dangerous experiences. They adapt the safest of all methods of selfdefence, what the English call protective mimicry. Let us repeat to all students—professors know it already: he who would be a sincere metaphysician must avoid risky experience. Schiller once asked: How can tragedy give delight? The answer—to put it in our own words—was: If we are to obtain delight from tragedy, it must be seen only upon the stage.—In order to love the transcendental it also should be known only from the stage, or from books of the philosophers. This is called idealism, the nicest word ever invented by philosophising men.
5
Poetae nascuntur.—Wonderful is man. Knowing nothing about it, he asserts the existence of an objective impossibility. Even a little while ago, before the invention of the telephone and telegraph, men would have declared it impossible for Europe to converse with America. Now it is possible. We cannot produce poets, therefore we say they are born. Certainly we cannot make a child a poet by forcing him to study literary models, from the most ancient to the most modern. Neither will anybody hear us in America no matter how loud we shout here. To make a poet of a man, he must not be developed along ordinary lines. Perhaps books should be kept from him. Perhaps it is necessary to perform some apparently dangerous operation on him: fracture his skull or throw him out of a fourth-storey window. I will refrain from recommending these methods as a substitute for paedagogy. But that is not the point. Look at the great men, and the poets. Except John Stuart Mill and a couple of other positivist thinkers, who had learned fathers and virtuous mothers, none of the great men can boast of, or better, complain of, a proper upbringing. In their lives nearly always the decisive part was played by accident, accident which reason would dub meaninglessness, if reason ever dared raise its voice against obvious success. Something like a broken skull or a fall from the fourth floor—not metaphorically, but often absolutely literally—has proved the commencement, usually concealed but occasionally avowed, of the activity of genius. But we repeat automatically: poetae nascuntur, and are deeply convinced that this extraordinary truth is so lofty it needs no verification.
6
"Until Apollo calls him to the sacrifice, ignobly the poet is plunged in the cares of this shoddy world; silent is his lyre, cold sleeps his soul, of all the petty children of earth most petty it seems is he." Pisaryev, the critic, was exasperated by these verses. Presumably, if they had not belonged to Poushkin, all the critics along with Pisaryev would have condemned them and their author to oblivion. Suspicious verse! Before Apollo calls to him—the poet is the most insignificant of mortals! In his free hours, the ordinary man finds some more or less distinguished distraction fox himself: he hunts, attends exhibitions of pictures, or the theatre, and finally rests in the bosom of his family. But the poet is incapable of normal existence. Immediately he has finished with Apollo, forgetting all about altars and sacrifices, he proceeds to occupy himself with unworthy objects. Or he abandons himself to the dolce far niente, the customary pastime of all favourites of the Muses. Let us here remark that not only all poets, but all writers and artists in general are inclined to lead bad lives. Think what Tolstoy tells us, in Confession and elsewhere, of the best representatives of literature in the fifties. On the whole it is just as Poushkin says in his verses. Whilst he is engaged in composition, an author is a creature of some consequence: apart from this, he is nothing. Why are Apollo and the Muses so remiss? Why do they draw to themselves wayward or vicious votaries, instead of rewarding virtue? We dare not suspect the gods, even the dethroned, of bad intentions. Apollo loved virtuous persons—and yet virtuous persons are evidently mediocre and unfit for the sacred offices. If any man is overcome with a great desire to serve the god of song, let him get rid of his virtues at once. Curious that this truth is so completely unknown to men. They think that through virtue they can truly deserve the favour and choice of Apollo. And since industry is the first virtue, they peg away, morning, noon, and night. Of course, the more they work the less they do. Which really puzzles and annoys them. They even fling aside the sacred arts, and all the labours of a devotee; they give themselves up to idleness and other bad habits. And sometimes it so happens, that just as a man decides that it is all no good, the Muses suddenly visit him. So it was with Dostoevsky and others; Schiller alone managed to get round Apollo. But perhaps it was only his biographers he got round. Germans are so trustful, so easy to deceive. The biographers saw nothing unusual in Schiller's habit of keeping his feet in cold water whilst he worked. No doubt they felt that if the divine poet had lived in the Sahara, where water is precious as gold, and the inspired cannot take a footbath every day, then the speeches of the Marquis of Pola would have lacked half their nobleness, at least. And apparently Schiller was not so wonderfully chaste, if he needed such artificial resources in the composition of his fine speeches. In a word, we must believe Poushkin. A poet is, on the one hand, among the elect; on the other hand, he is one of the most insignificant of mortals. Hence we can draw a very consoling conclusion: the most insignificant of men are not altogether so worthless as we imagine. They may not be fit to occupy government positions or professorial chairs, but they are often extremely at home on Parnassus and such high places. Apollo rewards vice, and virtue, as everybody knows, is so satisfied with herself she needs no reward. Then why do the pessimists lament? Leibnitz was quite right: we live in the best possible of worlds. I would even suggest that we leave out the modification "possible."
7
It is Das Ewig Weibliche, with Russian writers. Poushkin and Lermontov loved women and were not afraid of them; Poushkin, who trusted his own nature, was often in love, and always sang his love of the moment. When infatuated with a bacchante, he glorified bacchantes. When he married, he warbled of a modest, nun-like beauty, his wife. A synthesising mind would probably not know what to do with all Poushkin's sorts of love. Nor is Lermontov any better. He abused women, but, as Byelinsky observed after meeting him, he loved women more than anything in the world. And again, not women of one mould only: any and all attractive females: the wild Bella, the lovely Mary, Thamar; one and all, no matter of what race or condition. Every time Lermontov is in love, he assures us his love is so deep and ardent and even moral, that we cannot judge him without conpunction. Vladimir Soloviov alone was not afraid to condemn him. He brought Poushkin as well as Lermontov to account for their moral irregularities, and he even went so far as to say that it was not he himself who judged them, but Fate, in whose service he acted as public denouncer. Lermontov and Poushkin, both dying young, had deserved death for their frivolities. But there was nobody else besides Vladimir Soloviov to darken the memories of the two poets. It is true Tolstoy cannot forgive Poushkin's dissolute life, but he does not apply to Fate for a verdict. According to Tolstoy morality can cope even with a Titan like Poushkin. In Tolstoy's view morality grows stronger the harder the job it has to tackle. It pardons the weak offenders without waste of words, but it never forgives pride and self-confidence. If Tolstoy's edicts had been executed, all memorials to Poushkin would have disappeared; chiefly because of the poet's addiction to the eternal female. In such a case Tolstoy is implacable. He admits the the kind of love whose object is the establishing of a family, but no more. Don Juan is a hateful transgressor. Think of Levin, and his attitude to prostitutes. He is exasperated, indignant, even forgets the need for compassion, and calls them "beasts." In the eternal female Tolstoy sees temptation, seduction, sin, great danger. Therefore it is necessary to keep quite away from the danger. But surely danger is the dragon which guards every treasure on earth. And again, no matter what his precautions, a man will meet his fate sooner or later, and come into conflict with the dragon. Surely this is an axiom. Poushkin and Lermontov loved danger, and therefore sought women. They paid a heavy price, but while they lived they lived freely and lightly. If they had cared to peep in the book of destinies, they might have averted or avoided their sad end. But they preferred to trust their star—lucky or unlucky. Tolstoy was the first among us—we cannot speak of Gogol—who began to fear life. He was the first to start open moralising. In so far as public opinion and personal dignity demand it, he did go to meet his dangers: but not a step further. So he avoided women, art, and philosophy. Love per se, that is, love which does not lead to a family, like wisdom per se, which is wisdom that has no utilitarian motive, and like art for art's sake, seemed to him the worst of temptations, leading to the destruction of the soul. When he plunged too deep in thinking, he was seized with panic. "It seemed to me I was going mad, so I went away to the Bashkirs for koumiss." Such confessions are common in his works. And surely there is no other way with temptations, than to cut short, at once, before it is too late. Tolstoy preserved himself on account of his inborn instinct for departing betimes from a dangerous situation. Save for this cautious prompting he would probably have ended like Lermontov or Poushkin. True, he might have gone deeper into nature, and revealed us rare secrets, instead of preaching at us abstinence, humility, simplicity and so on. But such luck fell to the fate of Dostoevsky. Dostoevsky had very muddled relations with morality. He was too racked by disease and circumstance to get much profit out of the rules of morality. The hygiene of the soul, like that of the body, is beneficial only to healthy men. To the sick it is simply harmful. The more Dostoevsky engaged himself with high morality, the more inextricably entangled he became. He wanted to respect the personality in a woman, and only the personality, and so he came to the point where he could not look on any woman, however ugly, with indifference. The elder Karamazov and his affair with Elizabeth Smerdyascha (Stinking Lizzie)—in what other imagination could such a union have been contemplated? Dostoevsky, of course, reprimands Karamazov, and thanks to the standards of modern criticism, such a reprimand is accounted sufficient to exonerate our author. But there are other standards. If a writer sets out to tell you that no drab could be so loathsome that her ugliness would make you forget she was woman; and if for illustration of this novel idea we are told the history of Fiodov Karamazov with the deformed, repulsive idiot, Stinking Lizzie; then, in face of such "imaginative art" it is surely out of place to preserve the usual confidence in that writer. We do not speak of the interest and appreciation of Dostoevsky's tastes and ideas. Not for one moment will I assert that those who with Poushkin and Lermontov can see the Eternal Female only in young and charming women, have any advantage over Dostoevsky. Of course, we are not forbidden to live according to our tastes, and we may, like Tolstoy, call certain women "beasts." But who has given us the right to assert that we are higher or better than Dostoevsky? Judging "objectively," all the points go to show that Dostoevsky is better—at any rate he saw further, deeper. He could find an original interest, he could discover das ewig Weibliche where we should see nothing of attraction at all, where Goethe would avert his face. Stinking Lizzie is not a beast, as Levin would say, but a woman who is able, if even for a moment, to arouse a feeling of love in a man. And we thought she was worse than nothing, since she roused in us only disgust. Dostoevsky made a discovery, we with our refined feelings missed it. His distorted, abnormal sense showed a greater sensitiveness, in which our high morality was deficient.... And the road to the great truth this time, as ever, is through deformity. Idealists will not agree. They are quite justly afraid that one may not reach the truth, but may get stuck in the mud. Idealists are careful men, and not nearly so stupid as their ideals would lead us to suppose.