Page:The World as Will and Idea - Schopenhauer, tr. Haldane and Kemp - Volume 3.djvu/163

Rh first question, if it attains great distinctness and continued presence, will make the philosopher, and the other, under the same conditions, the artist or the poet. Therefore, then, the high calling of both of these has its root in the reflectiveness which primarily springs from the distinctness with which they are conscious of the world and their own selves, and thereby come to reflect upon them. But the whole process springs from the fact that the intellect through its preponderance frees itself for a time from the will, to which it is originally subject.

The considerations concerning genius here set forth are connected by way of supplement with the exposition contained in chapter 21, of the ever wider separation of the will and the intellect, which can be traced in the whole series of existences. This reaches its highest grade in genius, where it extends to the entire liberation of the intellect from its root the will, so that here the intellect becomes perfectly free, whereby the world as idea first attains to complete objectification.

A few remarks now concerning the individuality of genius. Aristotle has already said, according to Cicero (Tusc., i. 33), "Omnes ingeniosos melancholicos esse;" which without doubt is connected with the passage of Aristotle's "Problemata," xxx. i. Goethe also says: "My poetic rapture was very small, so long as I only encountered good; but it burnt with a bright flame when I fled from threatening evil. The tender poem, like the rainbow, is only drawn on a dark ground; hence the genius of the poet loves the element of melancholy."

This is to be explained from the fact that since the will constantly re-establishes its original sway over the intellect, the latter more easily withdraws from this under unfavourable personal relations; because it gladly turns from adverse circumstances, in order to a certain extent to divert itself, and now directs itself with so much the greater energy to the foreign external world, thus more easily becomes purely objective. Favourable personal