Skip to content

Philosopher

Last reviewed:

Arthur Schopenhauer

1788–1860 · Philosophical pessimism · Modern

Arthur Schopenhauer argued that the world as we know it is representation, and that the inner nature of that world is will, a blind striving with no final goal. The World as Will and Representation begins from a Kantian claim about appearance and then leaves Kant behind. Aesthetic contemplation, for him, is one of the few pauses in the striving.

Read more

Compassion is the basis of morality, because it is the crack in the usual wall between self and other. He is darker than the Stoics and more systematic than a book of aphorisms, and he is ruder about Hegel than a fair history would be. The prize essays on freedom and on morality are the short way into the ethics.

The big book is the way into the metaphysics. English readers should name a translation, E. F. J. Payne's for the major work, because 'idea' in older versions makes Vorstellung sound like a thought you could correct. He influenced Nietzsche and, less officially, a strain in Wittgenstein. He is not a self-help pessimist. The pessimism is a conclusion he thinks the metaphysics forces.

Two essays and the book's first sentence are secured. A fourth motto was not added. The system does not naturally shed one-line quotations that stay accurate.

Start here

The opening section of The World as Will and Representation in Payne, then the 1840 essay on morality.

The first sentence is famous and incomplete. The morality essay is where the system becomes an ethics you can accept or refuse without swallowing every page of the will.

Quotations

Key ideas

  • Representation

    The world as object is always the world for a subject. That is the opening, not yet the gloom.

  • Will

    Striving, not a rational plan, is what he thinks representation is a veil for.

  • Compassion

    The only genuine moral incentive, against Kant's empty form of duty.

  • Denial

    Aesthetic quiet and ascetic denial are the exits he offers from the will. They are rare.

Major works

  • The World as Will and Representation (1818)

    Volume 1 states the system. Volume 2 expands it.

  • On the Freedom of the Will (1839)

    You can do what you will, but you cannot will what you will.

  • On the Basis of Morality (1840)

    The prize essay against Kant, with compassion as the moral incentive.

Influences

Influenced

Common misreadings

  • 'The world is my representation' is not solipsism. The 'my' is any subject.
  • Compassion is not pity from above. It is a crack in egoism, and it is the whole of his moral incentive.
  • The determinism about the will is hard. Softening it into 'habits are sticky' writes a different essay.

Famous lines Arthur Schopenhauer never said

None of the lines this library files for Arthur Schopenhauer is marked Questionable or Misattributed. That is only a fact about these cards. It is not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.

FAQ

What is the best book to start with?

The opening section of The World as Will and Representation in Payne, then the 1840 essay on morality. The first sentence is famous and incomplete. The morality essay is where the system becomes an ethics you can accept or refuse without swallowing every page of the will.

What is the most famous quote?

This library does not measure fame, and it does not rank lines by how often they are shared. The first line it files for Arthur Schopenhauer that is not marked Questionable or Misattributed is “A person can do what they will, but they cannot will what they will.” (On the Freedom of the Will (1839), a standard English of his formulation, Paraphrase or translation).

What is the most misquoted line?

None of the lines this library files for Arthur Schopenhauer is marked Misattributed or Questionable. That is a fact about these cards, not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.

What is one key idea, in a sentence?

Representation: The world as object is always the world for a subject. That is the opening, not yet the gloom.