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Cats have no need of philosophy. Obeying their nature, they are content with the life it gives them. In humans, on the other hand, discontent with their nature seems to be natural. With predictably tragic and farcical results, the human animal never ceases striving to be something that it is not. Cats make no such effort. Much of human life is a struggle for happiness. Among cats, on the other hand, happiness is the state to which they default
Religions are attempts to make an inhuman universe humanly habitable. Philosophers have often dismissed these faiths as being far beneath their own metaphysical speculations, but religion and philosophy serve the same need.1 Both try to fend off the abiding disquiet that goes with being human.
Instead of being a sign of their inferiority, the lack of abstract thinking among cats is a mark of their freedom of mind. Thinking in generalities slides easily into a superstitious faith in language. Much of the history of philosophy consists of the worship of linguistic fictions. Relying on what they can touch, smell and see, cats are not ruled by words.
When turned in on itself, consciousness stands in the way of a good life. Self-consciousness has divided the human mind in an unceasing attempt to force painful experiences into a part that is sealed off from awareness. Suppressed pain festers in questions about the meaning of life. In contrast, the feline mind is one and undivided. Pain is suffered and forgotten, and the joy of life returns. Cats do not need to examine their lives, because they do not doubt that life is worth living. Human self-consciousness has produced the perpetual unrest that philosophy has vainly tried to cure.
As Montaigne put it, ‘There is a plague on Man: his opinion that he knows something.’9
Whereas cats live by following their nature, humans live by suppressing theirs. That, paradoxically, is their nature. It is also the perennial charm of barbarism. For many human beings, civilization is a state of confinement. Ruled by fear, sexually starved and filled with rage they dare not express, such people cannot help being maddened by a creature that lives by affirming itself.
Posing as a cure, philosophy is a symptom of the disorder it pretends to remedy. Other animals do not need to divert themselves from their condition. Whereas happiness in humans is an artificial state, for cats it is their natural condition. Unless they are confined within environments that are unnatural for them, cats are never bored. Boredom is fear of being alone with yourself. Cats are happy being themselves, while humans try to be happy by escaping themselves. It is here that cats are most different from humans.
Ailurophiles
But cat-lovers do not love cats because they recognize themselves in them. They love cats because cats are so different from them.
Not having formed an image of themselves, cats do not need to divert themselves from the fact that they will some day cease to exist. As a consequence, they live without the fear of time passing too quickly or too slowly. When cats are not hunting or mating, eating or playing, they sleep. There is no inner anguish that forces them into constant activity.
Diversion is a response to the defining feature of the human animal: the fear of death that comes with self-awareness.
As Pascal put it, human beings do not know how to sit quietly in a room.
Is there any other animal that cannot bear its own company? Certainly not any cat. Cats spend much of their lives in contented solitude. Yet they can grow fond of their human companions, and may treat the sick unease in them that humans themselves cannot remedy. Johnson appreciated this power in his cat, and described him as ‘a very fine cat, a very fine cat indeed’. Hodge gave him something human company could not supply: a glimpse of life before the Fall.
You can be in paradise only when you do not know what it is like to be in paradise. As soon as you know, paradise is gone. No effort of thought can take you back, for thought – the conscious awareness of yourself as a mortal being – is the Fall. In the Garden of Eden, the primordial human pair are clothed in ignorance of themselves. When they come to self-awareness, they find they are naked. Thinking of yourself is the gift of the serpent that cannot be returned.
Feline ethics is a kind of selfless egoism. Cats are egoists in that they care only for themselves and others they love. They are selfless in that they have no image of themselves they seek to preserve and augment. Cats live not by being selfish but by selflessly being themselves.
Humans are humans, cats are cats. The difference is that, while cats have nothing to learn from us, we can learn from them how to lighten the load that comes with being human. One burden we can give up is the idea that there could be a perfect life.
1 Never try to persuade human beings to be reasonable
Human beings use reason to bolster whatever they want to believe, seldom to find out if what they believe is true. This may be unfortunate, but there is nothing you or anyone else can do about it.
2 It is foolish to complain that you do not have enough time
If you think you do not have enough time, you do not know how to pass your time. Do what serves a purpose of yours and what you enjoy doing for its own sake. Live like this, and you will have plenty of time.
3 Do not look for meaning in your suffering
If you are unhappy, you may seek comfort in your misery, but you risk making it the meaning of your life. Do not become attached to your suffering, and avoid those who do.
4 It is better to be indifferent to others than to feel you have to love them
Few ideals have been more harmful than that of universal love. Better cultivate indifference, which may turn into kindness.
5 Forget about pursuing happiness, and you may find it
6 Life is not a story
The unwritten life is more worth living than any story you can invent.
7 Do not fear the dark, for much that is precious is found in the night
8 Sleep for the joy of sleeping
9 Beware anyone who offers to make you happy
Those who offer to make you happy do so in order that they themselves may be less unhappy. Your suffering is necessary to them, since without it they would have less reason for living. Mistrust people who say they live for others.
10 If you cannot learn to live a little more like a cat, return without regret to the human world of diversion
If you cannot find a faith that suits you, lose yourself in common life.
Instead of turning away from the world, turn back to it and embrace its folly.
When you see things without wanting to change them, they can give you a glimpse of eternity. Each moment is complete, and the shifting scene reveals itself to you as if it were out of time. Eternity is not another order of things but the world seen without anxiety.
For humans, contemplation is a break from living; for cats it is the sensation of life itself.
