Oriental origin of pessimism.—Pessimistic poets.—Byron.—Leopardi.—Poushkin.—Lermontoff.—Pessimism and suicide 233 II ANALYSIS OF PESSIMISM Attempts to assign reasons for the pessimistic conception of life.—Views of E. von Hartmann.—Analysis of Kowalevsky’s work on the psychology of pessimism 239 III PESSIMISM IN ITS RELATION TO HEALTH AND AGE Relation between pessimism and the state of the health.—History of a man of science who was pessimistic when young and who became an optimist in old age.—Optimism of Schopenhauer when old.—Development of the sense of life.—Development of the senses in blind people.—The sense of obstacles 247 PART VIII GOETHE AND FAUST I GOETHE’S YOUTH Goethe’s youth.—Pessimism of youth.—Werther.—Tendency to suicide.—Work and love.—Goethe’s conception of life in his maturity 261 II GOETHE AND OPTIMISM Goethe’s optimistic period.—His mode of life in that period.—Influence of love in artistic production.—Inclinations towards the arts must be regarded as secondary sexual characters.—Senile love of Goethe.—Relation between genius and the sexual activities 270 III GOETHE’S OLD AGE Old age of Goethe.—Physical and intellectual vigour of the old man.—Optimistic conception of life.—Happiness in life in his last period 279 IV GOETHE AND “FAUST” _Faust_ the biography of Goethe.—The three monologues in the first Part.—Faust’s pessimism.—The brain-fatigue which finds a remedy in love.—The romance with Marguerite and its unhappy ending 283 V THE OLD AGE OF FAUST The second Part of _Faust_ is in the main a description of senile love.—Amorous passion of the old man.—Humble attitude of the old Faust.—Platonic love for Helena.—The old Faust’s conception of life.—His optimism.—The general idea of the play 290 PART IX SCIENCE AND MORALITY I UTILITARIAN AND INTUITIVE MORALITY Difficulty of the problem of morality.—Vivisection and anti-vivisection.—Enquiry into the possibility of rational morality.—Utilitarian and intuitive theories of morality.—Insufficiency of these 301 II MORALITY AND HUMAN NATURE Attempts to found morality on the laws of human nature.—Kant’s theory of moral obligation.—Some criticisms of the Kantian theory.—Moral conduct must be guided by reason 309 III INDIVIDUALISM