Page:Selections from the writings of Kierkegaard.djvu/80

 78 University of Texas Bulletin

for so inflammable a material as woman is most likely to arouse the suspicions of an insurance agent. Just consider for a moment what he has done in thus identifying himself with her! If, some fine New Year's night she goes off like some fireworks he will promptly follow suit; and even if this should not happen he will have many a close call. And what may he not lose! He may lose his all ; for there is but one absolute antithesis to the absolute, and that is nonsense. Therefore, let him not seek refuge in some so- ciety for morally tainted individuals, for he is not morally tainted â€” far from it ; only, he has been reduced in absurdum and beatified in nonsense ; that is, has been made a fool of. This will never happen among men. If a man should sputter off in this fashion I would scorn him. If he should fool me by his cleverness I need but apply the ethical cate- gory to him, and the danger is trifling. If things go too far I shall put a bullet through his brain ; but to challenge a woman â€” what is that, if you please? Who does not see that it is a joke, just as when Xerxes had the sea whipped? When Othello murders Desdemona, granting she really had been guilty, he has gained nothing, for he has been duped, and a dupe he remains; for even by his murdering her he only makes a concession with regard to a consequence which originally made him ridiculous; whereas Elvira''*' may be an altogether pathetic figure when arming herself with a dagger to obtain revenge. The fact that Shakespeare has conceived Othello as a tragic figure (even disregarding the calamity that Desdemona is innocent) is to be explained and, indeed, to perfect satisfaction, by the hero being a colored person. For a colored person, dear fellow-banquet- ers, who cannot be assumed to represent spiritual qualities â€” a colored person, I say, who therefore becomes green in his face when his ire is aroused (which is a physiological fact), a colored man may, indeed, become tragic if he is deceived by a woman; just as a woman has all the pathos of tragedy on her side when she is betrayed by a man. A man who flies into a rage may perhaps become tragic ; but

3<'Heroine of Mozart's "Don Juan."