elle peignait et analysait tout ensemble; une sensibilité délicate
en augmentait le feu; elle était exacte et précise sur toutes sortes
de sujets."
Schopenhauer died on the 20th September 1860, in his seventy-third year,
peacefully, alone as he had lived, but not without warning. One day in
April, taking his usual brisk walk after dinner, he suffered from
palpitation of the heart, he could scarcely breathe. These symptoms
developed during the next few months, and Dr. Gwinner advised him to
discontinue his cold baths and to breakfast in bed; but Schopenhauer,
notwithstanding his early medical training, was little inclined to
follow medical advice. To Dr. Gwinner, on the evening of the 18th
September, when he expressed a hope that he might be able to go to
Italy, he said that it would be a pity if he died now, as he wished to
make several important additions to his _Parerga_; he spoke about his
works and of the warm recognition with which they had been welcomed in
the most remote places. Dr. Gwinner had never before found him so eager
and gentle, and left him reluctantly, without, however, the least
premonition that he had seen him for the last time. On the second
morning after this interview Schopenhauer got up as usual, and had his
cold bath and breakfast. His servant had opened the window to let in the
morning air and had then left him. A little later Dr. Gwinner arrived
and found him reclining in a corner of the sofa; his face wore its
customary expression; there was no sign of there having been any
struggle with death. There had been no struggle with death; he had died,
as he had hoped he would die, painlessly, easily.
In preparing the above notice the writer has to acknowledge her
indebtedness to Dr. Gwinner's _Life_ and Professor Wallace's little work
on the same subject, as well as to the few other authorities that have
been available.--THE TRANSLATOR.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Wallace's _Life_, pp. 95, 96.
[2] Wallace, p. 108.
[3] Haldane and Kemp's _The World as Will and Idea_.
[4] Wallace, p. 145.
ESSAYS OF SCHOPENHAUER.
ON AUTHORSHIP AND STYLE.
There are, first of all, two kinds of authors: those who write for the
subject's sake, and those who write for writing's sake. The first kind
have had thoughts or experiences which seem to them worth communicating,
while the second kind need money and consequently write for money. They
think in order to write, and they may be recognised by their spinning
out their thoughts to the greatest possible length, and also by the way
they work out their thoughts, which are half-true, perverse, forced, and
vacillating; then also by their love of evasion, so that they may seem
what they are not; and this is why their writing is lacking in
definiteness and clearness.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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