XIII. The Value of Life

One whose view more or less inclines in the direction of thinkers like Eduard von Hartmann may believe that in order to arrive at a correct valuation of life he must clear out of the way those factors which falsify our judgment about the balance of pleasure or displeasure. There are two ways in which he can do this. One way is by showing that our desires (urges, will) act disturbingly in our sober judgment of our feeling-values. While, for example, we should tell ourselves that sexual enjoyment is a source of evil, the fact that the sexual instinct is very strong in us misleads us into anticipating a pleasure far greater than in fact occurs. We want to enjoy, and therefore will not admit to ourselves that we suffer through the enjoyment. Another way is to subject feelings to criticism, and attempt to prove that the objects to which feelings attach themselves are revealed as illusions by the insight of reason, then are destroyed the moment our continually growing intelligence recognizes the illusion.