* * * * * _Viva muchos a�os!_ is the ordinary greeting in Spain, and it is usual throughout the whole world to wish people a long life. It is not a knowledge of what life is that explains the origin of such a wish, but rather knowledge of what man is in his real nature: namely, _the will to live_. The wish which every one has, that he may be _remembered_ after his death, and which those people with aspirations have for _posthumous_ fame, seems to me to arise from this tenacity to life. When they see themselves cut off from every possibility of real existence they struggle after a life which is still within their reach, even if it is only an ideal--that is to say, an unreal one. * * * * * We wish, more or less, to get to the end of everything we are interested in or occupied with; we are impatient to get to the end of it, and glad when it is finished. It is only the general end, the end of all ends, that we wish, as a rule, as far off as possible. * * * * * Every separation gives a foretaste of death, and every meeting a foretaste of the resurrection. This explains why even people who were indifferent to each other, rejoice so much when they meet again after the lapse of twenty or thirty years. * * * * * The deep sorrow we feel on the death of a friend springs from the feeling that in every individual there is a something which we cannot define, which is his alone and therefore _irreparable. Omne individuum ineffabile_. The same applies to individual animals. A man who has by accident fatally wounded a favourite animal feels the most acute sorrow, and the animal's dying look causes him infinite pain. * * * * * It is possible for us to grieve over the death of our enemies and adversaries, even after the lapse of a long time, almost as much as over the death of our friends--that is to say, if we miss them as witnesses of our brilliant success. * * * * *