Pessimistic philosophy will be for the historical period that is now beginning, what the pessimistic religion of Christianity was for the one that has passed. The symbol of our flag is not the crucified redeemer but the angel of death with large, placid and clement eyes, supported by the dove of the idea of redemption; in essence, it is the same symbol.
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He who is not afraid of death, enters a house engulfed in flames; he who is not afraid of death, jumps without hesitation into a turbulent flood; he who is not afraid of death, charges into a dense hail of bullets; he who is not afraid of death, fights unarmed against thousands of armored titans; in summary, he who does not fear death is the only one who can do something for others, bleed for others, and has, at the same time, the only happiness, the only desirable good in this world: undisturbed peace of heart.
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Everything in the universe is unconsciously a will to death. This will to death is, above all in the human being, hidden in its entirety by the will to live, because life is a means to death, which presents itself clearly for even the most feeble-minded individual: we die unceasingly, our life is a slow agony, death daily overpowers every human being until, finally, it extinguishes with a breath the light of life in each one of us.
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The immanent philosophy does not recognize any miracle and does not know how to account for events in another unknown world, which would be a consequence of the actions of this world. Therefore, there is for it only a completely certain negation of the will to live, which is expressed by virginity. As we have seen in physics, the human being finds absolute annihilation in death; nevertheless, he is only apparently extinguished if he continues to live in his children, for in these children he has already risen from the dead: he has embraced life in them anew and affirmed it for an indeterminate time. This everyone feels instinctively. The insurmountable aversion of the genders after copulation in the animal kingdom manifests itself in the human being as a profound sadness.
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And this unhappiness - which corrodes and shakes the heart - is the driving force in the lives of the lower groups of the population, which whips them toward the path of redemption. The poor are consumed with the burning desire to possess the houses, the gardens, the goods, the saddle horses, the carriages, the champagne, the jewels and daughters of the wealthy. Well, then give them all these trifling possessions. Rise and descend from the luminous heights, from where you have seen with intoxicated gaze the promised land of eternal tranquility, where you had to recognize that life is essentially unfortunate, where the blindfold had to fall from your eyes; descend into the dark valley through which the turbid stream of the dispossessed creeps, and place your delicate, but loyal, pure and courageous hands in the calloused hands of your brothers. "They are brutes." Then give them motives that will ennoble them. "Their manners disgust." Then change them. "They believe that life has value. They consider the rich happier, for they eat and drink better, because they feast and make noise. They think the heart beats more peacefully under silk than under the coarse garb of toil." Then disillusion them, but not with sayings, but with deeds. Let them experience, let them prove for themselves that neither wealth, nor honor, nor fame, nor a pleasant life makes for happiness. Break down the barriers that separate those deceived by supposed happiness and they will be perplexed. Then they will complain: "We had thought we could be happy like this, and it turns out that, deep down, nothing has changed in us". All human beings must first of all be fed up with all the pleasures that the world can offer, before mankind can be ripe for redemption. Since their redemption is their destiny, they must be satiated, and such satisfaction is only brought about when the social question is resolved.
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Let us suppose that, in the future, the birth of a human being occurs without pain, and that science succeeds in protecting humans from every disease: in short, that the old age of these protected beings is fresh and vigorous, ending suddenly with a gentle and painless death (euthanasia). Death is the only thing we cannot take away and, consequently, we have before us a short and painless life. Is this a happy life? Let us examine it carefully. The citizens of our ideal state are human beings of gentle character and developed intelligence. They have, so to speak, been inculcated with a complete knowledge - free from absurdity and error - and however they reflect upon it, they will always consider it to be right. There are no more effects whose causes are enigmatic. Science has indeed reached its pinnacle and every citizen is satisfied with its achievements. The sense of beauty is powerfully displayed in everything. We cannot suppose that all are artists, yet everyone indeed possesses the capacity to enter easily into an aesthetic relation. They have been freed from all worries, for their work has been organized in an unprecedented manner and everyone is self-governing. Are they happy? They would be if they did not feel in themselves a terrible monotony and emptiness. Their needs have been taken away from them; they truly have neither worry nor suffering, but instead they have been seized by tedium. They have paradise on earth, but its atmosphere is stifling and suffocating. If they still had enough energy to endure such an existence until natural death, they would surely not have the heart to go through it again as rejuvenated beings.
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The animal basically follows its impulses, which are limited to hunger, thirst, the need to sleep and everything related to mating; it lives in a narrow sphere. To the human being, on the other hand, life comes to him through reason, in the form of wealth, women, honor, power, fame, etc., which fuels his will to live, his yearning to live. Reason makes satisfaction, artificially, a refined enjoyment. Thus death is detested with all one's soul and the mere mention of such a word tormentingly contracts the hearts of the majority, and the fear of death turns into anguish of death and despair, when human beings cast their eyes upon it. On the contrary, life is loved with passion. Accordingly, in the human being the will to death - the innermost impulse of his essence - is no longer concealed by the will to live as simply as in the animal, but disappears completely into the depths, from where it only manifests itself, from time to time, as a deep longing for tranquility.
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