When one thinks of German pessimism, one usually thinks of Schopenhauer’s infamous metaphysics, which reduces all natural and human phenomena to manifestations of a blind, cosmic will, and its reception by Nietzsche. While initially inspired by Schopenhauer, Nietzsche is subsequently led to criticize his worldview. For what it amounts to is the claim that life is meaningless and, therefore, not worth living. Typically missing from this historical trajectory, however, are a series of original, intervening German philosophers—Julien Frauenstädt, Eugen Dühring, Eduard von Hartmann, Philip Mainländer, Julius Bahnsen, amongst others—who, due to a constellation of problems that pushed Schopenhauer to the forefront of late nineteenth century Germany, attempt to show that, despite the threat of pessimism, we should affirm life. The task of Beiser’s book is to trace this forgotten trajectory. It is the first English book to do so—indeed, one of the first books in any language—and, therefore, represents a scholarly contribution of immeasurable value.
What are the problems that made Schopenhauer into a pivotal figure in late nineteenth century Germany? It was, Beiser argues, the widespread phenomenon of pessimism itself. While we may expect this age to be one of happiness—the failed revolutions of 1830 and 1848 were behind it; Germany had attained national unity; there was profound social and technological progress (2)—a malaise infected it, one that made this age one of ‘Weltschmerz,’ a word that literally means ‘world-pain’ but, in fact, denotes a feeling of ‘world-weariness’ caused by a hypersensitivity to the insurmountable suffering of life. Something new marked this epoch: the theological framework that had made suffering bearable for over a millennia had collapsed, due to Kant’s critique of the proofs of God’s existence, biblical criticism, materialism, and, not but least, Darwin’s evolutionism (6). This led to a rediscovery of the problem of evil (5-7). For if evil is present all around us, and this evil can no longer be redeemed in the afterlife, the question arises of why we should bother living. In that Schopenhauer had already anticipated these concerns—both by giving metaphysical grounds for pessimism and outlining secular ways of redeeming life by denying it—in the 1860s, he became the fulcrum of four decades of thinking centred around the value of life.
The positions developed in these decades fall into two groups: the pessimists (best exemplified by Frauenstädt, Hartmann, Mainländer, and Bahnsen) and the optimists (best exemplified by Dühring). The former share three fundamental doctrines: (1) any theory of the value of life must include a metaphysical account of life; (2) when looked at metaphysically, life is not worth living due either to eudemonic reasons (there is more suffering than happiness) or idealistic reasons (we can never achieve the ideals that give meaning to our lives); and (3) despite this metaphysical pessimism, life still has value. The second try to push positivism and/or neo-Kantianism to combat the malaise of the day, arguing that philosophy must be more than a handmaiden of the empirical sciences.
The endorsements and criticisms of pessimism show a nation that, while cognizant of the difficulties of justifying life without God, is unwilling to fall into despair. While Frauenstädt, the figure responsible for re-introducing Schopenhauer (74-79), largely accepts Schopenhauer’s pessimistic metaphysics, he attacks its argument that life is essentially suffering. Because the will experiences both joy and pain, we have no ground to dismiss the (albeit ephemeral) experiences of happiness we do have (81-82). Dühring fights against the quietism advocated by Schopenhauer (85). While the optimist is insensible to the suffering of the world and the pessimist withdraws from it, the positivist demands us to change it realistically (89). A positivist account of the facts of life, instead of forcing us to accept life at face value, calls for political and economic reforms to make it more worth living (108-111). Hartmann, in his turn, re-conceptualizes Schopenhauer’s pessimistic metaphysics. Inducing from the empirical sciences, he argues the cosmic will is not blind, but purposive (126-129). While we must, when individual happiness is under consideration, be “eudemonic pessimists” (152-156), because the goal of history is the growth of the species through natural selection, we can be “evolutionary optimists” (156-161). Promoting this goal, realized in human culture, our lives assume greater meaning by participating in a cosmic plan for us.
The pessimistic metaphysics of the next two figures propose an even more radical approach than Schopenhauer himself ever dared. Mainländer contends that the universe exists because of the death of God, whereby its primordial unity fractures into self-standing individual wills, each of which, part of the dying corpse of God, suffers and has a death wish of its own (215-219). While suicide is the ultimate release (as Mainländer’s demonstrates) (206), our compassion for fellow sufferers entails we should, even if happiness is impossible, reduce suffering by revolutionizing the social order. This new order, he says, is one of communism, patriotism, and free love (225-228). Similarly, Bahnsen proclaims that there is no cosmic will, but only individual wills (244-246). While this spares individuality, he also maintains that each will is self-contradictory, leaving all hope for dialectic resolution foreclosed (271-276). We see this most acutely in our ideals: in actualizing one, we necessarily violate others (263-267). But, rather than giving up, we are called upon to make the best of it, to be tragic heroes—pessimism demands not quietism, but the courage to fight against all odds (282-283).
It must be noted just how influential these positions were in their times. A bibliography published in 1881 on Hartmann literature alone listed around 750 items (122). It is no surprise, then, that by 1938, Reclam Verlag noted that their popular edition of Schopenhauer’s The World as Will and Representation had sold almost 800,000 copies (14 note 5). It is, therefore, shocking that these figures have been forgotten in mainstream nineteenth century scholarship. Beiser must be lauded for bringing them to our attention.
