All Things Are Possible

PART I. _zu Fragmentarisch Ist Welt Und Leben_.

Zu fragmentarisch ist Welt und Leben.

H. HEINE.

The obscure streets of life do not offer the conveniences of the central thoroughfares: no electric light, no gas, not even a kerosene lamp-bracket. There are no pavements: the traveller has to fumble his way in the dark. If he needs a light, he must wait for a thunderbolt, or else, primitive-wise, knock a spark out of a stone. In a glimpse will appear unfamiliar outlines; and then, what he has taken in he must try to remember, no matter whether the impression was right or false. For he will not easily get another light, except he run his head against a wall, and see sparks that way. What can a wretched pedestrian gather under such circumstances? How can we expect a clear account from him whose curiosity (let us suppose his curiosity so strong) led him to grope his way among the outskirts of life? Why should we try to compare his records with those of the travellers through brilliant streets?

The law of sequence in natural phenomena seems so plausible, so obvious, that one is tempted to look for its origin, not in the realities of actual life, but in the promptings of the human mind. This law of sequence is the most mysterious of all the natural laws. Why so much order? Why not chaos and disorderliness? Really, if the hypothesis of sequence had not offered such blatant advantages to the human intelligence, man would never have thought of raising it to the rank of eternal and irrefutable truth. But he saw his opportunity. Thanks to the grand hypothesis, man is forewarned and forearmed. Thanks to this master-key, the future is at his mercy. He knows, in order that he may foreknow: savoir pour prévoir. Here, is man, by virtue of one supreme assumption, dictator henceforward of all nature. The philosophers have ever bowed the knee to success. So down they went before the newly-invented law of natural sequence, they hailed it with the title of eternal truth. But even this seemed insufficient. L'appétit vient en mangeant. Like the old woman in the fairy-tale about the golden fish, they had it in their minds that the fish should do their errands. But some few people at last could not stand this impudence. Some very few began to object....

The comfortable settled man says to himself: "How could, one live without being sure of the morrow; how could one sleep without a roof over one's head?" But misfortune turns him out of house and home. He must perforce sleep under a hedge. He cannot rest, he is full of terrors. There may be wild beasts, fellow-tramps. But in the long run he gets used to it. He will trust himself to chance, live like a tramp, and sleep his sleep in a ditch.

A writer, particularly a young and inexperienced writer, feels himself under an obligation to give his reader the fullest answers to all possible questions. Conscience will not let him shut his eyes to tormenting problems, and so he begins to speak of "first and ultimate things." As he cannot say anything profitable on such subjects--for it is not the business of the young to be profoundly philosophical--he grows excited, he shouts himself to hoarseness. In the end he is silent from exhaustion. And then, if his words have had any success with the public, he is astonished to find that he has become a prophet. Whereupon, if he be an average sort of person, he is filled with an insatiable desire to preserve his influence till the end of his days. But if he be more sensitive or gifted than usual, he begins to despise the crowd for its vulgar credulity, and himself for having posed in the stupid and disgraceful character of a clown of lofty ideas.

How painful it is to read Plato's account of the last conversations of Socrates! The days, even the hours of the old man are numbered, and yet he talks, talks, talks.... Crito comes to him in the early morning and tells him that the sacred ships will shortly return to Athens. And at once Socrates is ready to talk, to argue.... It is possible, of course, that Plato is not altogether to be trusted. It is said that Socrates observed, of the dialogues already written down by Plato. "How much that youth has belied me!" But then from all sources we have it, that Socrates spent the month following his verdict in incessant conversations with his pupils and friends. That is what it is to be a beloved master, and to have disciples. You can't even die quietly.... The best death is really the one which is considered the worst: to die alone, in a foreign land, in a poor-house, or, as they say, like a dog under a hedge. Then at least one may spend one's last moments honestly, without dissembling or ostentation, preparing oneself for the dreadful, or wonderful, event. Pascal, as his sister tells us, also talked a great deal before his death, and de Musset cried like a baby. Perhaps Socrates and Pascal talked so much, for fear they should start crying. It is a false shame!

The fact that some ideas, or some series of ideas, are materially unprofitable to mankind cannot serve as a justification for their rejection. Once an idea is there, the gates must be opened to it. For if you close the gates, the thought will force a way in, or, like the fly in the fable, will sneak through unawares. Ideas have no regard for our laws of honour or morality. Take for example realism in literature. At its appearance it aroused universal indignation. Why need we know the dirt of life? And honestly, there is no need. Realism could give no straightforward justification for itself. But, as it had to come through, it was ready with a lie; it compared itself to pathology, called itself useful, beneficial, and so obtained a place. We can all see now that realism is not beneficial, but harmful, very harmful, and that it has nothing in common with pathology. Nevertheless, it is no longer easy to drive it from its place. The prohibition evaded, there is now the justus titulus possessions.

Count Tolstoy preached inaction. It seems he had no need. We "inact" remarkably. Idleness, just that idleness Tolstoy dreamed of, a free, conscious idling that despises labour, this is one of the chief characteristics of our time. Of course I speak of the higher, cultured classes, the aristocracy of spirit--"We write books, paint pictures, compose symphonies"--But is that labour? It is only the amusement of idleness. SO that Tolstoy is much more to the point when, forgetting his preaching of inaction, he bids us trudge eight hours a day at the tail of the plough. In this there is some sense. Idleness spoils us. We were returning to the most primitive of all the states of our forefathers. Like paradisal Adam and Eve, having no need to sweat for our bread, we were trying to pilfer the fruit from the forbidden tree. Truly we received a similar punishment. Divine laws are inscrutable. In Paradise everything is permitted, except curiosity. Even labour is allowed, though it is not obligatory, as it is outside. Tolstoy realised the dangers of the paradisal state. He stooped to talk of inaction for a moment--and then he began to work. Since in regular, smooth, constant, rhythmical labour, whether it is efficient or whether it merely appears efficient, like Tolstoy's farming, there is peace of mind. Look at the industrious Germans, who begin and who end their day with a prayer. In Paradise, where there is no labour, and no need for long rest and heavy sleep, all temptations become dangerous. It is a peril to live there.... Perhaps present-day people eschew the paradisal state. They prefer work, for where there is no work there is no smoothness, no regularity, no peacefulness, no satisfaction. In Eden, even the well-informed individuals Cannot tell what will come next, savoir pour prévoir does not answer, and everlasting laws are exposed to ridicule. Amongst ourselves also a few of the work-abjurors, the idlers, are beginning to question our established knowledge. But the majority of men, and particularly Germans, still defend a priori judgments, on the ground that without these, perfect knowledge would be impossible, there could be no regulation of the course of natural phenomena, and no looking ahead.

To escape from the grasp of contemporary ruling ideas, one should study history. The lives of other men in other lands in other ages teach us to realise that our "eternal laws" and infallible ideas are just abortions. Take a step further, imagine mankind living elsewhere than on this earth, and all our terrestial eternalities lose their charm.

We know nothing of the ultimate realities of our existence, nor shall we ever know anything. Let that be agreed. But it does not follow that therefore we must accept some or other dogmatic theory as a modus vivendi, no, not even positivism, which has such a sceptical face on it. It only follows that man is free to change his conception of the universe as often as he changes his boots or his gloves, and that constancy of principle belongs only to one's relationships with other people, in order that they may know where and to what extent they may depend on us. Therefore, on principle man should respect order in the external world and complete chaos in the inner. And for those who find it difficult to bear such a duality, some internal order might also be provided. Only, they should not pride themselves on it, but always remember that it is a sign of their weakness, pettiness, dullness.

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