Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher of Pessimism Quotes

“Man, so puny in the quantitative order, is yet too great to be fully satisfied with anything less than the Infinite Good. Discontent with finite goods, ennui, boredom and weariness, disillusionment, represent, as it were, the constant invitation of God, whereby He would lead men to realize their true vocation and to seek complete happiness in Him. He has called us ut filii Dei nominemur et simus, and the Father does not will that His children should mistake the passing for the abiding, the partial for the complete, the wayside hut for the home. 'Thou hast made us for Thyself, O God, and our hearts can find no rest, until they rest in Thee.”
― Frederick Charles Copleston, Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher of Pessimism

“Lessing declared that, if God offered him the pursuit of truth with one hand and the final attainment of truth with the other, he would choose the former.”
― Frederick Charles Copleston, Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher of Pessimism

“The chief source of the serious evils which affect men is man himself: homo homini lupus. Whoever keeps this last fact clearly in view beholds the world as a hell, which surpasses that of Dante in this respect, that one man must be the devil of another. Apart from the arch-fiends, who appear in the guise of conquerors and set thousands of men to shoot each other, this fact appears in the general injustice, unfairness, hardness and even cruelty displayed in the conduct of men, one towards the other. How man deals with man is shown, for example, by negro slavery, the final end of which is sugar and coffee. The mechanical and monotonous labor in factories, which is the lot of millions, is another example. It is shown most distinctly when a mob of men is set free from all law and order, upon which follows the bellum omnium contra omnes, which Hobbes has so admirably described. Upon this depends the necessity of the State and legislation, and upon none of your false pretences. In other words, the State exists simply to keep human egoism, man's predatory instincts, within reasonable bounds: it has no ethical or educative end. It is directed against the unbridled egoism of one man or a few men; but it is not directed against egoism as such; on the contrary, it has sprung from egoism and exists only in its service, it is instituted on the supposition that pure morality is not to be expected.”
― Frederick Charles Copleston, Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher of Pessimism

“Now, the world, according to Schopenhauer, is phenomenon, is 'my idea', consists of my ideas of perception. On the other hand my intellect is a function of my brain, and my brain is a part of my body, the whole of which is objectified will. But objectified or manifested will is phenomenon; therefore I also am phenomenon. The world is accordingly both phenomenon of the will and also object for me, who am a phenomenon, and I am phenomenon of the will and also subject for the world. The total complex of subject-object is, then, phenomenal, the Will manifesting itself or objectifying itself in both subject and object, the plurality of subject and object being the 'outside' of the world, the noumenal unity of Will being the 'inside' of the world. If this be so, all my ideas, all my thoughts, are phenomenal; they are objects for 'me', i.e. the pure knower, just as much as the objects of the external world are objects for me. In this case not merely is the subject-object distinction phenomenal, but my assertion, my knowledge, my thought of the subject-object distinction is also phenomenal, it is my idea. More than that, the distinction I make between phenomenon and noumenon, between the subject-object distinction on the one hand and the metaphysical unity of Will, the 'inside' of the world, on the other hand is also phenomenal. (In fact, the whole philosophy of Schopenhauer is phenomenal!) But if phenomenal means illusionary, as it clearly does in Schopenhauer's doctrine concerning the external world as contained in the last book of the World, then any distinctions I draw, any thoughts I think, any philosophy I formulate, are also illusionary. In brief, La vida es sueño. In this way, the philosophy of Schopenhauer, in the opinion of the present writer, negates itself.”
― Frederick Charles Copleston, Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher of Pessimism

“But I am self-conscious, I can make myself an object of my knowledge: am I, then, my own idea? In so far as I really can turn myself into an object of self-reflection, know myself, I exist for my consciousness and am my own idea: but that is only one side of the matter, since to the self as known, as object of consciousness , there must correspond a self as knower, as subject. I reflect on myself: the 'myself' is object, the 'I' is subject. I then reflect on the 'I' : very well, the 'I' becomes object and 'another I', an I further back, as it were, becomes subject. In other words, there is always presupposed an I that is subject and subject only, that can never be object. It can never be apprehended or grasped in the sense of becoming object: but it is necessarily presupposed: it transcends the I as appearing to consciousness, as phenomenon. Consciousness, therefore, means the subject-object relation, and neither can the object be resolved into the subject (Fichte) or the subject into object (Schelling). The whole world (including e.g. my body) is object of my consciousness, is my idea; but the I does not exist without the object.”
― Frederick Charles Copleston, Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher of Pessimism