The World as Will and Idea (Vol. 3 of 3) — Schopenhauer — John Shaqi
The World as Will and Idea (Vol. 3 of 3)
Schopenhauer · en
intellect, an intensifying of all the _emotions_ appears, and indeed the
possibility of the _passions_, which, properly speaking, are unknown to
the brute. For the vehemence of the will keeps pace with the advance of
intelligence, because this advance really always springs from the
increased needs and pressing demands of the will: besides this, however,
the two reciprocally support each other. Thus the vehemence of the
character corresponds to the greater energy of the beating of the heart
and the circulation of the blood, which physically heighten the activity
of the brain. On the other hand, the clearness of the intelligence
intensifies the emotions, which are called forth by the outward
circumstances, by means of the more vivid apprehension of the latter.
Hence, for example, young calves quietly allow themselves to be packed in
a cart and carried off; but young lions, if they are only separated from
their mother, remain permanently restless, and roar unceasingly from
morning to night; children in such a position would cry and vex themselves
almost to death. The vivaciousness and impetuosity of the ape is in exact
proportion to its greatly developed intellect. It depends just on this
reciprocal relationship that man is, in general, capable of far greater
sorrows than the brute, but also of greater joy in satisfied and pleasing
emotions. In the same way his higher intelligence makes him more sensible
to _ennui_ than the brute; but it also becomes, if he is individually very
complete, an inexhaustible source of entertainment. Thus, as a whole, the
manifestation of the will in man is related to that in the brute of the
higher species, as a note that has been struck to its fifth pitched two or
three octaves lower. But between the different kinds of brutes also the
differences of intellect, and thereby of consciousness, are great and
endlessly graduated. The mere analogy of consciousness which we must yet
attribute to plants will be related to the still far deader subjective
nature of an unorganised body, very much as the consciousness of the
lowest species of animals is related to the _quasi_ consciousness of
plants. We may present to our imagination the innumerable gradations in
the degree of consciousness under the figure of the different velocity of
points which are unequally distant from the centre of a revolving sphere.
But the most correct, and indeed, as our third book teaches, the natural
figure of that gradation is afforded us by the scale in its whole compass
from the lowest audible note to the highest. It is, however, the grade of
consciousness which determines the grade of existence of a being. For
every immediate existence is subjective: the objective existence is in the
consciousness of another, thus only for this other, consequently quite
indirect. Through the grade of consciousness beings are as different as
through the will they are alike, for the will is what is common to them
all.