Another way might be proposed. The medium through which the idea becomes visible could be made the object of consideration. Having noted that one medium is richer and an- other less rich, one could base the division on this difference by finding a facilitation or an impediment in the varying richness or poverty of the medium. But the medium stands in an all too necessary relation to the whole production to keep a division based on it from becoming entangled in the above-mentioned difficulties after a few turns of thought.
I believe, however, that the following observations will open the prospect for a division that will have validity pre- cisely because it is completely accidental. The more abstract and thus the more impoverished the idea is, the more abstract and thus the more impoverished the medium is; hence the greater is the probability that no repetition can be imagined, and the greater is the probability that when the idea has ac- quired its expression it has acquired it once and for all. On the other hand, the more concrete and thus the richer the idea and likewise the medium, the greater is the probability of a repe- tition. As I now place the various classic works side by side and, without wishing to rank them, am amazed that all stand The Immediate Erotic Stages 55 equally high, it nevertheless will be readily apparent that one section has more works than another or, if it does not, that there is the possibility that it can have, whereas any possibility for the other is not so readily apparent.
I would like to develop this point in somewhat more detail. The more abstract the idea is, the less the probability. But how does the idea become concrete? By being permeated by the historical. The more concrete the idea, the greater the proba- bility. The more abstract the medium is, the less the probabil- ity; the more concrete, the more. But what does it mean that the medium is concrete except that it either is, or is seen in its approximation to, language, for language is the most concrete of all media. Hence, the idea that is disclosed in sculpture is to- tally abstract and has no relation to the historical; the medium through which it becomes manifest is likewise abstract. Con- sequently, it is very probable that the section of classic works that comprises sculpture will include only a few. The witness of time and the agreement of experience bear me out on this. But if I take a concrete idea and a concrete medium, the situa- tion is different. Homer certainly is a classic epic poet, but pre- cisely because the idea that becomes manifest in the epic is a concrete idea and because the medium is language, it is con- ceivable that the section of classic works that includes the epic has many works, which are all equally classic because history continually provides new epic subject matter. Here, too, the witness of history and the agreement of experience bear me out.
If I now base a division on the completely accidental, it really cannot be denied that it is accidental. But if reproached for it, | then reply that the reproach is a mistake, for it is sup- posed to be just that. It is accidental that one section has or can have more works than another. But since this is accidental, it is easy to see that the class that has or can have the most works may very well be placed uppermost. At this point, I could per- sist in what I said before and calmly reply that this would be perfectly legitimate but that I ought to be all the more praised for my consistency because I altogether accidentally placed the Opposite section uppermost. But I shall not do that.-On the 56 Either/Or, I other hand, I shall appeal to a circumstance that speaks in my favor—namely, the circumstance that the sections that include the concrete ideas are not closed and cannot be closed in this way. Therefore, it is more natural to place the others first and with regard to the latter group always to keep the double doors open. But if someone says that this is an imperfection, a defect in that first class, then he is plowing outside the furrows of my consideration, and I cannot pay any attention to what he says, however exhaustive it is, for it is indeed a fixed point that, viewed essentially, all are equally perfect.
But, then, which idea is the most abstract? Here, of course, the question concerns an idea that can become a theme for ar- tistic treatment, not ideas that are suitable for scholarly-scien- tific presentation. Which medium is the most abstract? I will answer this question first. It is the medium that is furthest re- moved from language.
Before answering that question, however, may I recall that there is a circumstance related to the final solution of my task. That is, the most abstract medium does not always have the most abstract idea as its theme. Thus the medium that archi- tecture uses is undoubtedly the most abstract, and yet the ideas that are manifest in architecture are not at all the most abstract. Architecture stands in a much closer relation to history than, for example, sculpture does. Here again appears the possibility of a new choice. For the first class in that order of precedence, I can choose either the works with the most abstract medium or those with the most abstract idea. In that respect, I prefer the idea, not the medium.
Sculpture, painting, and music have abstract media as does architecture, but this is not the place to go further into that ex- ploration. The most abstract idea conceivable is the sensuous! in its elemental originality [Genialitet].‘* But through which medium can it be presented? Only through music. It cannot be presented in sculpture because it has a qualification of a kind of inwardness; it cannot be painted, for it cannot be caught in def- inite contours. In its lyricism, it is a force, a wind, impatience, passion, etc., yet in such a way that it exists not in one instant but in a succession of instants, for if it existed in one instant, it The Immediate Erotic Stages 57 could be depicted or painted. That it exists in a succession of instants expresses its epic character, but still it is not epic in the stricter sense, for it has not reached the point of words; it con- tinually moves within immediacy. Consequently, it cannot be presented in poetry, either. The only medium that can present it is music. Music has an element of time in itself but neverthe- less does not take place in time except metaphorically. It can- not express the historical within time.
In Mozart’s Don Giovanni, we have the perfect unity of this idea and its corresponding form. But precisely because the idea is so very abstract and because the medium also is abstract, there is no probability that Mozart will ever have a competi- tor. Mozart’s good fortune is that he has found a subject matter that is intrinsically altogether musical, and if any other com- poser were to compete with Mozart, there would be nothing for him to do except to compose Don Giovanni all over again. Homer found a perfect epic subject matter, but because history offers more epic subject matter, many more epic poems are conceivable. Such is not the case with Don Giovanni. What I really mean will perhaps be seen best if I indicate the difference by reference to a related idea. Goethe’s Faust is really a classic work, but it is a historical idea, and therefore every extraor- dinary time in history will have its Faust. Faust has language as its medium, and since this is a much more concrete medium, for that reason, too, many works of the same kind are conceiv- able. But in the same sense as the classic works of Greek sculp- ture, Don Giovanni is and remains the only one of its kind. However, since the idea of Don Giovanni is even much more abstract than that which constitutes the basis of sculpture, it is readily seen that whereas in sculpture there are many works, in music there is only a single work. To be sure, many more classic works in music are conceivable, but there still is only one work of which it can be said that its idea is altogether mu- sical in such a way that the music does not help along as ac- companiment but discloses its own innermost nature as it dis- closes the idea. Therefore Mozart with his Don Giovanni stands highest among those immortals.
But I shall give up this whole exploration. It is written only 4 42 58 Either/Or, I for those who have fallen in love. And just as it does not take much to make children happy, so it is, as is well known, that the love-enraptured often rejoice in very odd things. It is like a vehement lovers’ quarrel over nothing, and yet it has its value—for the lovers.
Although the foregoing discussion has tried in every possi- ble way imaginable or unimaginable to gain recognition for Mozart’s Don Giovanni as supreme among all classic works, it nevertheless has made as good as no attempt to demonstrate that this work actually is classic, for the few scattered hints found here, by appearing merely as hints, simply show that the aim was not to demonstrate but occasionally to illuminate. This approach might seem more than odd. To demonstrate that Don Giovanni is a classic work in the strictest sense is a task for reflection, but the other endeavor is completely irrelevant to the proper domain of reflection. The movement of thought is calmed by having recognized that it is a classic work and that every classic production is equally perfect; to thinking, any- thing more one wants to do is suspect.
To that extent, the entire foregoing part is entangled in a self-contradiction and easily disintegrates into nothing. But this is quite proper, and such a self-contradiction is deeply rooted in human nature. The admiration, sympathy, and ven- eration in me, the child in me, the woman in me, demanded more than what thought could provide. Thought was calm, rested happy in its knowledge; then I went to it and begged it to bestir itself once more, to venture the ultimate. It knew very well that this was futile, but since 1 am usually on good terms with it, it did not refuse me. It labored in vain; egged on by me, it was continually going beyond itself and continually col- lapsing back into itself. It was continually looking for a foot- hold and finding none, continually trying to find bottom, but could neither swim nor wade. It was both a laughing and a crying matter. Therefore I did both and was very grateful that it had not denied me this service. And although I now know perfectly well that it is useless, it could still very well occur to me to ask thought to play once again the game that to me is inexhaustible material for enjoyment. Every reader who finds the game boring is, of course, not of my kind; it is meaningless The Immediate Erotic Stages 59 to him, and here as everywhere children who are alike play to- gether best. To him, the entire foregoing part is a superfluity; whereas to me it has such great importance that I say with Horace: Exilis domus est, ubi non et multa supersunt (Poor is the house where there’s not much to spare].'5 To him it is foolishness, to me wisdom; to him it is boring, to me a source of joy and merriment.
That kind of reader would therefore be incapable of appre- ciating my lyrical thought, which is so ecstatic that it goes be- yond thought. But perhaps he would be kind enough to say, “We shall not quarrel about that; I skip that part. See now if you can come to the far more important matter of demonstrat- ing that Don Giovanni is a classic work, for I admit that this would be a really appropriate introduction to the exploration proper.”’ To what extent it would be an appropriate introduc- tion, I shall leave in abeyance, but the trouble here for me is that I in turn cannot appreciate him, for no matter how easy it may be for me to demonstrate it, it would still never occur to me to demonstrate it. But although I always assume the matter settled, the following will many times and in many ways'¢ il- luminate Don Giovanni in this respect, just as the foregoing discussion has already contained a few hints.
The immediate task of this exploration is to show the sig- nificance of the musical-erotic and to that end in turn to indi- cate the various stages, which, since they are all characterized by the immediate erotic, also harmonize in this, that essen- tially they are all musical. What I have to say about this I owe solely to Mozart. Therefore, if anyone should be courteous enough to admit that I am right in what I aim to set forth but has some doubts whether it is in Mozart’s music or whether, instead, I put it into the music, I can assure him that not only the little Iam able to set forth is in Mozart’s music, but infi- nitely much more. Yes, I can assure him that this very thought gives me the boldness to venture to try to explain a few things 43 60 Either/Or, I in Mozart’s music. What one has loved with youthful infatua- tion, what one has admired with youthful enthusiasm, that with which one has kept secret, enigmatic company in the in- wardness of the soul, that which one has hidden in the heart— one always approaches this with a certain shyness, with mixed feelings, when one knows that the purpose is to understand it. What one has come to know piece by piece, just as a bird gleans each little straw for itself, happier over each little bit than over all the rest of the world; what the loving ear, soli- tary, has absorbed, solitary in the great crowd, unnoticed in its secret hiding place; what the avid ear has picked up, never sat- isfied, what the avaricious ear has preserved, never secure, of which the faintest echo has never disappointed the sleepless at- tention of the reconnoitering ear; what one has lived in during the day and relived at night, what has driven away sleep and made it restless, what one has dreamed about in sleep, what one has awakened to in order awake to dream about it again, for the sake of which one has leaped out of bed in the middle of the night out of fear of forgetting it; what has made its ap- pearance to one in the most inspired moments, what one has always had at hand like a woman’s needlework, what has ac- companied one on bright moonlit nights, in lonely forests by the lake, on gloomy streets, in the middle of the night, at the break of day; what has sat with one on the same horse, what has been company in the carriage; what has permeated the home, what one’s room has witnessed, what has resonated in the ear, what has reverberated in the soul, what the soul has spun into its finest fabric—this now shows itself to thought. Just as in the old tales those enigmatic beings, draped in sea- weed, rise up from the bottom of the sea, so this rises up from the sea of recollection, intertwined with mementos. The soul becomes sad and the heart mellow, for it is as if one were tak- ing leave of it, as if one were parting never to meet again, nei- ther in time nor in eternity. One feels that one is being unfaith- ful, that one has betrayed one’s pact; one feels that one is no longer the same, not as young, not as childlike; one fears for oneself, that one will lose what made one happy, blissful, and rich; one fears for what one loves, that it will suffer in this The Immediate Erotic Stages 61 change, will perhaps appear less perfect, that it will possibly fail to answer the many questions, alas, and then all is lost, the magic is gone, and it can never again be evoked. As for Mo- zart’s music, my soul knows no fear, my confidence no limits. For one thing, what I have understood hitherto is only very lit- tle, and enough will always remain, hiding in the shadows of presentiment; for another, I am convinced that if Mozart ever became entirely comprehensible to me, he would then become completely incomprehensible to me.
To make the claim that Christianity brought sensuality into the world seems boldly venturesome. But as they say: Boldly ventured is half won. So it also holds here; it will become evi- dent upon reflection that in the positing of something, the other that is excluded is indirectly posited. Since sensuality generally is that which is to be negated, it really comes to light, is really posited, first by the act that excludes it through a pos- iting of the opposite positive. Sensuality is posited as a princi- ple, as a power, as an independent system first by Christianity, and to that extent Christianity brought sensuality into the world. But if the thesis that Christianity has brought sensual- ity into the world is to be understood properly, it must be comprehended as identical to its opposite, that it is Christian- ity that has driven sensuality out of the world, has excluded sensuality from the world. Sensuality was first posited as a principle, as a power, as an independent system by Christian- ity. I could add one more qualification that perhaps most em- phatically shows what I mean: sensuality was placed under the qualification of spirit first by Christianity. This is quite natu- ral, for Christianity is spirit, and spirit is the positive principle it has brought into the world. But when sensuality is viewed under the qualification of spirit, its significance is seen to be that it is to be excluded, but precisely because it is to be excluded it is defined as a principle, as a power, for that which spirit, which is itself a principle, is supposed to exclude must be something that manifests itself as a principle, even though it does not manifest itself as a principle until the moment when it is excluded. Of course, to protest against my thesis that sen- suality existed in the world prior to Christianity would be 45 62 Either/Or, I rather foolish, inasmuch as it goes without saying that what- ever is to be excluded always exists prior to that which ex- cludes it, even though, understood in another way, it comes into existence [bliver til] only when it is excluded. This in turn occurs because it comes into existence in another sense, and that is why I promptly said that boldly ventured is only half won.
Consequently, the sensual certainly did exist in the world before, but it was not qualified spiritually. How, then, did it exist? It was qualified psychically. This was its nature in pa- ganism, and if one wishes to look for its most perfect expres- sion, it was in Greece. But the sensual psychically qualified is not contrast or exclusion, but harmony and consonance. But precisely because the sensual is posited as harmoniously qual- ified, it is posited not as a principle but as a consonant encliti- con.!?
This view will be of importance in illuminating the various forms the erotic takes in various stages of the development of world consciousness and thereby guide us to the category of the immediate-erotic as identical with the musical-erotic. In Greek culture, the sensuous was controlled in the beautiful in- dividuality,'® or, to put it more accurately, it was not con- trolled, for it was not an enemy to be subdued, not a danger- ous insurgent to be held in check; it was liberated to life and joy in the beautiful individuality. Thus the sensuous was not posited as a principle. The psychical aspect constituting the beautiful individuality was inconceivable without the sen- suous; for this reason the erotic based on the sensuous was not posited as a principle either. Erotic love [Elskov] was every- where present as an element and present as an element in the beautiful individuality. The gods, no less than men, knew its power; the gods, no less than men, knew happy and unhappy love affairs. But in none of them was erotic love present as a principle; insofar as it was in them, in the single individual, it was there as an element of erotic love’s universal power, which, however, was present nowhere and therefore not even in the Greek conception or in the Greek consciousness.
It could be objected that Eros was indeed the god of erotic The Immediate Erotic Stages 63 love and that therefore erotic love must be considered present in him as a principle. But apart from the fact that here again erotic love does not rest upon the erotic in such a way that this is based solely upon the sensuous, but upon the psychical, there is also another circumstance to be noted, one that I shall now stress in somewhat more detail. Eros was the god of erotic love but was not himself in love. Insofar as the other gods or men detected the power of erotic love in themselves, they attributed it to Eros, traced it back to him, but Eros him- self did not fall in love, and if it did happen to him once,!? it was an exception; and although he was the god of erotic love, he was far behind the other gods, far behind men, in the num- ber of his affairs. That he fell in love is as good as to say that he, too, yielded to the universal power of erotic love, which thus in a way became a power outside himself, which in being spurned by him had no place at all now where it could be sought. His erotic love is not based on the sensuous, either, but upon the psychical. It is a genuinely Greek idea that the god of erotic love is not in love himself, whereas all the others are in- debted to him for their own falling in love. IfI were to imagine a god or a goddess of longing, it would be genuinely Greek that, whereas everyone who knew the sweet unrest or pain of longing would trace it to this being, this being would itself know nothing of longing.
I know of no more precise way to designate what is distinc~ tive in this relation than to say that it is the opposite of a rep- resentative relation. In the representative relation, the total power is concentrated in a single individual, and the particular individuals participate therein to the extent that they partici- pate in the particular movements of that one. I could also say that this relation is the opposite of the one underlying incar- nation. In incarnation, the full plenitude of life is in the single individual, and this is for the others only through their behold- ing it in the incarnated individual.
Therefore, in the Greek relation it is the reverse. That which is the god’s power is not in the god but in all the other individ- uals, who trace it back to him; he himself is almost powerless, impotent, because he communicates his power to all the rest of 47 64 Either/Or, I the world. The incarnated individual imbibes, as it were, power from all the others, and thus the fullness is in that one, and in the others only insofar as they behold it in this individ- ual. This is important for what follows, just as in and by itself it is significant with regard to the categories the world con- sciousness uses at various times. Hence, we do not find the sensuous as a principle in Greek culture; neither do we find the erotic as a principle based upon the principle of the sensuous; and even if we had found it, we still perceive—something that is of the greatest importance in this exploration—that the Greek consciousness did not have the strength to concentrate all of it in a single individual but from a point that does not have it radiates it to all the others in such a way that this con- stituting point is almost recognizable by being the only one that does not have that which it gives to all the others.
So it was Christianity that posited sensuality as a principle, Just as it posited the sensuous-erotic as a principle. The idea of representation was introduced into the world by Christianity. If | now imagine the sensuous-erotic as a principle, as a power, as a domain, defined in relation to spirit—that is, defined in such a way that spirit excludes it—if I imagine this principle concentrated in a single individual, then I have the concept of the sensuous-erotic in its elemental originality [Genialitet]. This is an idea that Greek culture did not have, that Christi- anity first introduced into the world, although only indirectly.
If the elemental originality of the sensuous-erotic in all its immediacy insists on expression, then the question arises as to which medium is the most suitable for this. The point that par- ticularly must be kept in mind here is that it insists on being expressed and presented in its immediacy. In its mediacy and in being reflected in another medium, it falls within language and comes under ethical categories. In its immediacy, it can be expressed only in music. In this connection, I must ask the reader to recall something said about this in the insignificant introduction. The significance of music thereby appears in its full validity, and in a stricter sense it appears as a Christian art or, more correctly, as the art Christianity posits in excluding it from itself, as the medium for that which Christianity ex~- The Immediate Erotic Stages 65.
cludes from itself and thereby posits. In other words, music is the demonic. In elemental sensuous-erotic originality, music has its absolute theme. This, of course, does not mean that music cannot express anything else, but nevertheless this is its theme proper. Similarly, sculpture can depict something other than human beauty, and yet this is its absolute theme. Painting can depict something other than celestially transfigured beauty, and yet this is its absolute theme. In this regard, the point is to see the basic concept in each art and not to be con- fused by whatever else it can do. The basic concept of man is spirit, and one should not be confused by the fact that he is also able to walk on two feet. The basic concept of language is thought, and one should not be confused by the fact that a few emotional people are of the opinion that the greatest impor- tance of language is in the production of inarticulate sounds.
At this point, may I be permitted a little insignificant inter- lude;” praeterea censeo [furthermore I am of the opinion]?! that Mozart is the greatest of all the classic authors, that his Don Giovanni deserves the highest place among all the classic works.
As to music regarded as a medium, this, of course, is always a very interesting question. Whether I am capable of saying anything adequate about it is another question. I am well aware that I do not understand music; I readily admit that lam a layman. I do not hide the fact that I do not belong to the cho- sen tribe of music experts, that at most I stand in the doorway as a gentile convert drawn from afar to this place by a strange, irresistible impulse—but no further. Yet it is possible that the little I have to say, if received with kindness and indulgence, may have a single comment that will be found to contain something true, even if it is concealed under a peasant’s coat. I stand outside music, and from this position I observe it. That this position is very imperfect, I readily admit; that compared with the lucky ones standing inside I do not manage to see very much, I do not deny. But I go on hoping that from my posi- tion I, too, can communicate an illuminating detail, although the initiated could do it much better—indeed, to a certain de- gree even understand better what I say than I do myself.
48 66 Either/Or, I If I imagined two kingdoms bordering each other, one of which I knew rather well and the other not at all, and if how- ever much] desired it I were not allowed to enter the unknown kingdom, I would still be able to form some idea of it. I would go to the border of the kingdom known to me and follow it all the way, and in doing so I would by my movements describe the outline of that unknown land and thus have a general idea of it, although I had never set foot in it. And if this were a labor that occupied me very much, if I were unflaggingly scrupu- lous, it presumably would sometimes happen that as I stood with sadness at the border of my kingdom and gazed long- ingly into that unknown country that was so near and yet so far, I would be granted an occasional little disclosure. And even though I feel that music is an art that requires considera- ble experience if one is really to have an opinion on it, I com- fort myself again as so often before with the paradox that also in presentiment and ignorance one can have a kind of experi- ence. It is a comfort to me that Diana, who had not given birth herself, came to the aid of women in labor—indeed, that she had this ability from infancy as an inborn gift, so that when she was born she herself helped Latona in her labor pains.”
The kingdom that I know, to whose outermost boundary | shall go to discover music, is language. If the various media are ordered according to a specific process of development, lan- guage and music must be placed closest to each other, and that is also why it has been said that music is a language, which is more than a clever observation. If one is inclined to indulge in cleverness, one could say that sculpture and painting, too, are each a kind of language, inasmuch as every expression of an idea is always a language, since the essence of the idea is lan- guage. Clever folk therefore speak of the language of nature, and soft-headed clergy occasionally open the book of nature for us and read something that neither they nor their listeners understand. If the observation that music is a language did not amount to anything more than that, I would not bother with it but would let it go unchallenged and pass for what it is. But that is not the case. Not until spirit is posited is language in- stalled in its rights, but when spirit is posited, everything that The Immediate Erotic Stages 67 is not spirit is excluded. Yet this exclusion is a qualification of spirit, and consequently, insofar as that which is excluded is to affirm itself, it requires a medium that is qualified in relation to spirit, and this medium is music. But a medium that is quali- fied in relation to spirit is essentially language; now, since mu- sic is qualified in relation to spirit, it is legitimately called a lan- guage.
Language, regarded as medium, is the medium absolutely qualified by spirit, and it is therefore the authentic medium of the idea. To elaborate this more thoroughly is neither within my competence nor in the interest of this little inquiry. Just one specific comment, which again leads me into music, should find a place here. In language, the sensuous as medium is reduced to a mere instrument and is continually negated. That is not the case with the other media. Neither in sculpture nor in painting is the sensuous a mere instrument; it is rather a component. It is not to be negated continually, either, for it is continually to be seen conjointly. It would be a strangely back- ward consideration of a piece of sculpture or of a painting if I were to behold it in such a way that I took pains to see it in- dependently of the sensuous, whereby I would completely cancel its beauty. In sculpture, architecture, and painting, the idea is integral to the medium, but the fact that the idea does not reduce the medium to a mere instrument, does not contin- ually negate it, expresses, as it were, that this medium cannot speak. It is the same with nature. Therefore, it is properly said that nature is dumb, and architecture and sculpture and paint- ing; it is properly said despite all the fine, sensitive ears that can hear them speak. Therefore, it is foolish to say that nature is a language, certainly as foolish as to say that the mute speaks, since it is not even a language in the way sign language is. But that is not the case with language. The sensuous is reduced to a mere instrument and is thus annulled. If a person spoke in such a way that we heard the flapping of his tongue etc., he would be speaking poorly; if he heard in such a way that he heard the vibrations of the air instead of words, he would be hearing poorly; if he read a book in such a way that he contin- ually saw each individual letter, he would be reading poorly.