“DRY, CLEAR, WITHOUT ILLUSION”? PART II.

“Dry, clear, without illusion… A banker who has made a fortune…”

And that is a philosopher?!

What is Nietzsche doing here? Making fun of Stendhal? Of Himself? Of philosophy as such? Or maybe just having a good time at the expense and for the benefit of the reader? Well, perhaps, all of the above!

But, anyway, let us keep going with our entry…

The following is a sort of philosopher’s Manifesto, which I jotted down in one stream of consciousness, early on in this project. I do not intend it to survive later revisions in this particular form, but may this be the first draft of a something to take shape later, when I have the luxury to finish it…

It is the task of a philosopher, not only to be a skeptic, a critic, a sarcastic observer of other men’s follies, but to be productive in the most positive sense, to express one’s positive vision of the philosophical universe, to create definitions and clarify terms, to be a historical thinker, alongside one’s professed desire to go in pursuit of the Absolute, creating an anti-historical, and quasi-mathematical realm of ‘things-in-themselves,’ all perfect, standing on their own, unaffected by the corruption of time. No, this is not enough, and as far as I am concerned, one must also present himself as a more traditional type of philosophizer. But it is always “my” philosophy, “my” method, “my” “created fiction,” and it is always perfectly true, just because it is fiction, and it is all “mine,” because the unique world of basic concepts, considerations, connections, associations, syllogistic progressions, does not exist in anybody else’s “universe,” and, whatever we are, no matter to what depths of agonizing misery our lot may have brought us from our erstwhile glorious heights, we surely have not lost an absolute right to all our dreams and fictions, which do not die even after our last illusion is gone.

I want philosophy to be read like poetry, and maybe even be poetry. In this harboring of a little personal pleasure, I am very much akin to my dear friend Nietzsche, but not in the sense of being influenced by him, because I used to write poetry and wanted to express my instincts poetically from a very early age, before I even read a single line of his. Therefore, his Zarathustra can never say about me: “You had not yet sought yourselves; and you found me!”

I had been called an original thinker for as long as I can remember, but does that mean that I could also be like a Nietzschean “philosopher of the future,” determined to command and legislate? Whatever random thoughts might have passed through Nietzsche’s brain, as he was writing this about the higher man of tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, he made himself open to serious criticism and a suspicion of self-contradiction, but not in the sense where I agree with him now. For, in my created world today, I am commander and legislator, anything and everything, because there is nobody else in there to fill all those vacancies.

The only question remaining, perhaps, is what all these jobs and job descriptions ought to be? Do I need to command my thoughts and ideas within the absolute realm of my created fiction? Should I also write and introduce laws? And the answer to it is certainly yes, even if only to a point, as my kingdom must be well-organized and well-administered… maybe I should even seek some advice on how to run it from Hobbes? And then, this funny quasi-Hobbesian question: can I turn my kingdom into a Commonwealth of thoughts, ideas, impressions, all sorts of lawful citizens who together populate it, and all, by the majority vote residing in me by proxy, agree to my administration?

This is, by the way, not some silly word game, which I am playing, but an interesting and extremely useful examination of the ways, in which I am going to organize, and run, my enormous and motley collection of “mental” subjects, which, by my own admission, can easily get out of control.

So, what is a philosopher, if not the creator and administrator of his world of ideas, combining in himself the three branches of power: the ruler, the manager, the judge. This world is not entirely of his own origin, though. Great thinkers of the past are allowed… no, not just allowed, but even most welcome to have their residences in it, and the sovereign ought to discover a proper balance between being a gracious host and a tough administrator, whose job it is not to permit even the greatest of them to take over the government, not only the central government, but even the littlest local administration.

Until such an approach has been fully and consciously adopted, thoughts will be just those very important but underprivileged things, sitting in homeless shelters, like refugees from a great fire that has ravaged their original neighborhoods and sent them out naked into a most unsympathetic out-there.

Alas, poor Yorick! I am now holding the skull of me of the former life. Had I known better, and had devised then such a splendid world for myself, where I would be the commander and legislator of my thoughts--- and the deuce take all the intruders!--- I would then have earned the right to be called a philosopher, at least in my own eyes…

…Or is that mere vanity?...