The life of a man, with its endless care, want, and suffering, is to be regarded as the explanation and paraphrase of the act of procreation, _i.e._, the decided assertion of the will to live; and further, it is also due to this that he owes to nature the debt of death, and thinks with anxiety of this debt. Is this not evidence of the fact that our existence involves guilt? At any rate, we always exist, subject to the periodical payment of the toll, birth and death, and successively partake of all the sorrows and joys of life, so that none can escape us: this is just the fruit of the assertion of the will to live. Thus the fear of death, which in spite of all the miseries of life holds us firmly to it, is really illusory; but just as illusory is the impulse which has enticed us into it. This enticement itself may be seen objectively in the reciprocal longing glances of two lovers; they are the purest expression of the will to live, in its assertion. How soft and tender it is here! It wills well‐ being, and quiet pleasure, and mild joys for itself, for others, for all. It is the theme of Anacreon. Thus by allurements and flattery it makes its way into life. But when once it is there, misery introduces crime, and crime misery; horror and desolation fill the scene. It is the theme of Æschylus. But now the act through which the will asserts itself and man arises is one of which all are, in their inmost being, ashamed, which they therefore carefully conceal; nay, if they are caught in it, are terrified as if they had been taken in a crime. It is an action of which in cold reflection one generally thinks with dislike, and in a lofty mood with loathing. Reflections which in this regard approach the matter more closely are offered by Montaigne in the fifth chapter of the third book, under the marginal heading: “_Ce que c’est que l’amour_.” A peculiar sadness and repentance follows close upon it, is yet most perceptible after the first performance of the act, and in general is the more distinct the nobler is the character. Hence even Pliny, the pagan, says: “_Homini tantum primi coitus pœnitentia, augurium scilicet vitæ, a pœnitenda origine_” (_Hist. Nat._, x. 83). And, on the other hand, in Goethe’s “Faust,” what do devil and witches practise and sing of on their Sabbath? Lewdness and obscenity. And in the same work (in the admirable “Paralipomena” to “Faust”) what does incarnate Satan preach before the assembled multitude? Lewdness and obscenity. But simply and solely by means of the continual practice of such an act as this does the human race subsist. If now optimism were right, if our existence were to be thankfully recognised as the gift of the highest goodness guided by wisdom, and accordingly in itself praiseworthy, commendable, and agreeable, then certainly the act which perpetuates it would necessarily have borne quite another physiognomy. If, on the other hand, this existence is a kind of false step or error; if it