Page:The World as Will and Idea - Schopenhauer, tr. Haldane and Kemp - Volume 3.djvu/392

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CHAPTER XLV.

ON THE ASSERTION OF THE WILL TO LIVE.

the will to live exhibited itself merely as an impulse to self-preservation, this would only be an assertion of the individual phenomenon for the span of time of its natural duration. The cares and troubles of such a life would not be great, and consequently existence would be easy and serene. Since, on the contrary, the will wills life absolutely and for all time, it exhibits itself also as sexual impulse, which has in view an endless series of generations. This impulse does away with that carelessness, serenity, and innocence which would accompany a merely individual existence, for it brings unrest and melancholy into the consciousness; misfortunes, cares, and misery into the course of life. If, on the other hand, it is voluntarily suppressed, as we see in rare exceptions, then this is the turning of the will, which changes its course. The will does not then transcend the individual, but is abolished in it. Yet this can only take place by means of the individual doing painful violence to itself. If, however, it does take place, then the freedom from care and the serenity of the purely individual existence is restored to the consciousness, and indeed in a higher degree. On the other hand, to the satisfaction of that most vehement of all impulses and desires is linked the origin of a new existence, thus the carrying out of life anew, with all its burdens, cares, wants, and pains; certainly in another individual; yet if the two who are different in the

1 This chapter is connected with § 60 of the first volume.