All that being said, here is my “chain” of reason.
Suffering, basic condition of life: hunger, want of clothing, need.
Rejection and negation of life, which may be disguised-- for as I pointed out, life itself is based on a rebellion against itself: against need, hunger, and suffering, which is its fundamental and enduring condition.
More suffering, but veiled in the Apollonian beauty of illusion and the sickness of reason.
We are commanded by desire, neither we or the beasts choose to live. The animal has no suspicion of death, all suffering is eternal for it, and it does not even have the option laid before it to die. The impetus which you see as driving all life is only an offshoot of a more fundamental impetus, and what you (and Schopenhauer) call the will to life is an illusion because it is supported on the basis of a much more powerful will possessed by the inorganic and non-living; life is driven rather by a desire NOT to be: not to be hungry, not to be cold, not to be unsatisfied-- for those are the fundamental conditions of life, far more enduring than any satisfaction. Life continues because it is based on a fundamental rebellion against itself which, strictly as a rebellion against itself, cannot ever result in either a victory or defeat, but only perpetual struggle, unending, unchecked, and without limit. We are born in a state of need, of suffering, and it is in this that we endure. Desire, in the case of man, strengthened by the sickness of reason, transforms this sorrow, this pain, this suffering (through the Apollonian beauty of illusion, as Nietzsche would say) into more desire, a desire more immense and more capable of happiness and misery than that of the brute: it returns this suffering which, again, may easily be deduced as the basic condition of the living organism, just as hunger is infinitely more enduring than satisfaction, to the primal will which governs organic as well as inorganic existence; the blind, striving, material force from which both of these orders descended. Desire is instilled within us, and everything it touches it transforms after its own image. Freedom permits man, unlike the beast, to stand defiant before this primal will and the suffering of the world, against nature itself, which has assailed him with the paroxysm and fever of desire in the first place; this freedom though requires the very suffering which he rebells against to indwell within it, for it is only from out of this suffering that desire persists-- desire must return this suffering again and again to the primal will or it ceases to be desire. For what we men has come to call happiness or satisfaction is totally unknown to the brute, whose small glories vanish in the moment. Happiness is the greatest danger of life, for as Goethe says, “Nature layeth a Golgotha upon those who rest.” The true will to death would be realized if man was bestowed with perpetual happiness. It is only in returning suffering to the primal will that desire is enkindled and does not cease to burn; that is its material.
Step two and beyond only concerns man, for the rejection of life (affirmation of it can only be illusory, concealing a basic rejection) requires freedom, the concept of which I elaborated in the longer passage.
When I speak of a rejection of life concealed by the illusion of affirmation, I am speaking of the idea of defiance which I connected strictly with my idea of human freedom, and the suffering which is required to indwell in it.
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502. The only ill in life that cannot be turned upon a better end, is bad taste in literature. Bad taste in wine will at least produce drunkenness, bad taste in women an enduring wife, and bad taste in morals, conviction. [/size]
[size=85]531. L amore potentissimo di noi stessi natural mente sa, che tutti di continuo aspiriamo ad effere felici; ma questo Amore e anch esso un cieco; e se non e guidato e ben regolato dall Sapienza. 1 – There is in us a fundament of joy, falsification, and moreover- simplicity. Let us hope that nothing solicits and disturbs this source; from whence cometh, indeed: joy, the ashen daughter of mortality and sole heir of the thousand likely abortions of our flesh. * For if this Cephissus ** does not keep its purity, if too much silt or loam falls into it, we feel its amenity and are refreshed by it only when it redounds and inundates upon us. In what complication and compensation, after all, does man live! And with good reason. To be too easily satisfied is a great harm to pleasure; for no obstacle stands to arrest and to thwart it, to oblige and contain it, nor to force the young Ganymede, that has just fallen into drunkeness upon life’s nectar, to contemplate his pantheon; a choice he is forced to make in circumstances that are still new to him and, without the delay that requires him to interpret his provocations and excitement, betray his youth. This thought, this thought is the last fruit I shall save from the cruel winter frost; it is the last stalk of my December’s harvest, and with it I resolve to myself for all my years to come, the whole contradiction of man, and breathe finally at liberty with my consilii tacitumque pondu. 2
La filosofia morale By Lodovico Antonio Muratori
Power is not by nature an apprehension of the mind in love, which continually vexes itself, and by its aspiration piles cloud upon cloud, vapor upon vapor; for such is the nature of love.
Matthiae Casimiri Sarbievii Carmina- Liber Epodon.
Silence can console a heavy thought.
Hope, love, ambition, etc.
** River in Greece which was said to stain things white.
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A fine aphorism. Reads like something from Nietzsche’s Dawn or something. In applying it to myself, as you suggested, I do not wholly agree with the words “vanity” (why not pride?) and “slavish”. As I consider vanity and ‘pride’ (within quotations marks) as the two ‘poles’ of pride (without quotation marks), however, I can affirm that I am relatively vain and slavish. Then there’s the word “only” (“only he himself”). Though I think I may have the virtue of justice, the will to justice, I do not make any exclusive claims to it. I have realised for some time, however, that it is I who judges which men are ‘noble’ and thereby worthy of study, yes.
Yes I had composed that after a long study of the rhetoric in The Dawn.
It is called a double-antithesis, between self-renunciation and self-possession (vanity) and trying to learn virtues from others (slavish humility) and realizing these virtues in one’s self. The final part, the abrupt termination of the thought, is a ‘dissimulatio’ the purpose of which is to leave something unspoken, like the possibility of an error. Nietzsche uses a lot of “dissimulatio” and in the Dawn especially.
In his later books he moves away from rhetorical figures like this and begins using more of a rhetorical flourish, Roman, Latin, as opposed to Greek figures like you could find in Isocrates for example. You see the rise of things more along the lines of hyperbole and mixed metaphor, or word-playing, in his later books.
Desire, suffering, death… lol
Animals have no suspicion of death?
Elephants, snakes, birds, no suspicion… lol
Life is a desire, something uncontrolled … lol
Sorry to fuck you up, but I was told you exist. Where one socialists lies there are many… drones over drones.
“When I saw that someone posted in this thread, I was delighted that the conversation may have been open back up.
Instead I found a fucking moron named Cezar.
The end.”
What a beautiful book that was. Both funny and profound at the same time. It just grabbed hold of me and I couldn’t stop reading 'til the end. I loved the epilogue.
You are a coat of many colors, some muted some very, very bold.
HAHAHA! Doesn’t get any more profound than this, does it now? Here I come in to respond to two little remarks of yours and I am met with laughter. This is good. What was it that Freddie said…oh, here it is - "Not by wrath does one kill but by laughter. Come, Ascolo parodites, let us kill the spirit of gravity!
Now I am light, now I fly, now I see myself beneath myself, now a god dances through me. And one that I also like: “Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly”, well, Freddie didn’t say That one, but did I get that right-sounds about right).
In response to The Last Man’s …
You responded:
At that moment you had that thought or perspective, you may have had no choice. At the same time, psychological transformation or the way we come to think or to be…CAN be reversed. What you seem to be talking about here (insofar as I can even understand it) is BELIEF. You can change the way you believe if you truly want to. If you do not want to, then you must or ought to (but only if you want) ask yourself why it is that you have this belief and why you think it is unchangeable. What is it that it gives to you that perhaps you do not want to let go of? Suffering is a part of existence, but it is NOT existence and it does not have to be eternal. There is no such thing as eternal damnation except in the minds of some judgmental Christians – no matter what someone has done. Unless I am not understanding your meaning. Your words are very profound and I cannot dive that deeply into the depths with this mind of mine.
Are you so sure of this…seems like it could be emotional too. Nothing that we ever think and believe and decide is ever purely a this or a that, though subconsciously, we may not realize it at the time.
Anyway, your writings are quite beautiful. Sort of reminds me of someone’s. Hopefully you won’t be calling me a moron.
And of course, I can be wrong about some of the above, but of course, your writings are beautiful. And one must have time when they go through unchartered unwalked pathways for the first time (at least their first time). Remember to and to
No, I don’t think you’re a moron. I was laughing because you laughed at my joke to Cezar. But refrain from quoting Nietzsche to me, I write philosophy-- not self-help books. That is not to say I dislike Nietzsche, he is one of my favorite writers and philosophers. His aphorisms on psychology, aesthetics, etc. are all great. But in the final analysis the greater part of his philosophy approaches non-philosophy.
Yes, Nietzsche’s depth and insight are undeniable, he was without doubt one of the most profound writers and thinkers. But as to philosophy in the sense that you mean it here Ascolo? Perhaps, yes, he does leave something to be desired. In light of your comments here I have certainly given more thought as to whether Nietzsche’s solutions (explanations) regarding morality, will and suffering are truly philosophically tenable. Of course Nietzsche admitted he was more a psychologist (in the true sense of a genuine self-explorer) than a philosopher.
Then again it was, after all, Nietzsche who bid us to go beyond Nietzsche.
No he spoke of the relationship between master and student in more than Zarathustra.
And rather or not he admitted he was more of a psychologist than a philosopher does not matter, because he is. Which is not to say that he was not a philosopher.
Here I come in to respond to two little remarks of yours and I am met with laughter. 
- "Not by wrath does one kill but by laughter. Come, Ascolo parodites, let us kill the spirit of gravity!