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09 - A Confession - Leo Tolstory · Philosophy and Faith

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  Speaker 1: Chapter nine of a confession by will Tolstoy. A contradiction arose,
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  Speaker 1: from which there were two exits. Either that which I
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  Speaker 1: called reason was not so rational as I supposed, or
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  Speaker 1: that which seemed to me irrational was not so irrational
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  Speaker 1: as I suppose. And I began to verify the line
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  Speaker 1: of argument of my rational knowledge. Verifying the line of
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  Speaker 1: argument of rational knowledge, I found it quite correct. The
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  Speaker 1: conclusion that life is nothing was inevitable. But I noticed
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  Speaker 1: a mistake. The mistake lay in this that my reasoning
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  Speaker 1: was not in accord with the question I had put.
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  Speaker 1: The question was why should I live? That is to say,
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  Speaker 1: what real, permanent result will come out of my illusory,
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  Speaker 1: transitory life? What meaning has my finite existence in this
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  Speaker 1: infinite world? And to reply to that question, I had
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  Speaker 1: studied life. The solution of all the possible questions of
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  Speaker 1: life could evidently not satisfy me. For my question, simple
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  Speaker 1: as at first appeared, included a demand for an explanation
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  Speaker 1: of the finite in terms of the infinite, and vice versa.
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  Speaker 1: I asked, what is the meaning of my life beyond time, cause,
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  Speaker 1: and space? And to quite another question, what is the
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  Speaker 1: meaning of my life within time, cause, and space, with
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  Speaker 1: the result that, after a long effort of thought, the
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  Speaker 1: answer I reached was none. In my reasonings, I constantly compared,
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  Speaker 1: nor could I do otherwise, the finite with the finite,
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  Speaker 1: and the infinite with the infinite. But for that reason
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  Speaker 1: I reached the inevitable result. Forces, force matters matter, will
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  Speaker 1: is will, the infinite is the infinite. Nothing is nothing,
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  Speaker 1: and that was all that could result. It was something
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  Speaker 1: like what happens in mathematics. When thinking to solve an equation,
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  Speaker 1: we find we are working on an identity. The line
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  Speaker 1: of reasoning is correct, but the result is the answer
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  Speaker 1: that A equals A, or X equals x, or zero
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  Speaker 1: equals zero. The same thing happened with my reasoning and
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  Speaker 1: relation to the question of the meaning of my life.
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  Speaker 1: The reply given by all science to the question only
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  Speaker 1: result in identity, and really strictly scientific knowledge. That knowledge
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  Speaker 1: which begins, as Descart did, with complete doubt about everything,
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  Speaker 1: rejects all knowledge admitted on faith, and builds everything afresh
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  Speaker 1: on the laws of reason and experience, and cannot give
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  Speaker 1: any other reply to the question of life than that
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  Speaker 1: which I obtained, an indefinite reply only at first had
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  Speaker 1: it seemed to me that knowledge had given a positive
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  Speaker 1: reply the reply of Schopenhauer that life has no meaning,
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  Speaker 1: it is an evil. But on examining the matter, I
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  Speaker 1: understood that the reply is not positive. It was only
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  Speaker 1: my feeling that so expressed it strictly expressed as it
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  Speaker 1: is by Brahmins and by Solomon and Schopenhauer, the reply
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  Speaker 1: is merely indefinite or an identity null equals null. Life
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  Speaker 1: is nothing, so that philosophic knowledge denies nothing, but only
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  Speaker 1: replies that the question cannot be solved by it, that
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  Speaker 1: for it the solution remains indefinite. Having understood this, I
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  Speaker 1: understood that it was not possible to seek i rational
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  Speaker 1: knowledge for a reply to my question, and that the
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  Speaker 1: reply given by rational knowledge is a mere indication that
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  Speaker 1: a reply can only be obtained by a different statement
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  Speaker 1: of the question, and only when the relation of the
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  Speaker 1: finite to the infinite is included in that question. And
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  Speaker 1: I understood that, however irrational and distorted might be the
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  Speaker 1: replies given by faith, they have this advantage that they
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  Speaker 1: introduced into every answer or a relation between the finite
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  Speaker 1: and the infinite, without which there can be no solution
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  Speaker 1: in whatever way I stated the question, that relation appeared
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  Speaker 1: in the answer. How am I to live according to
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  Speaker 1: the law of God? What real result will come of
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  Speaker 1: my life? Eternal torment or eternal bliss? What meaning has life?
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  Speaker 1: That death does not destroy union with the eternal God Heaven.
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  Speaker 1: So that, besides rational knowledge, which it seemed to me
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  Speaker 1: the only knowledge, I was inevitably brought to acknowledge that
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  Speaker 1: all live humanity has another irrational knowledge, faith, which makes
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  Speaker 1: it possible to live. Faith still remained to me as
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  Speaker 1: irrational as it was before, but I could not but
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  Speaker 1: admit that it alone gives mankind or reply to the
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  Speaker 1: questions of life, and that consequently it makes life possible.
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  Speaker 1: Reasonable knowledge had brought me to acknowledge that life is senseless,
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  Speaker 1: and my life had come to a halt, and I
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  Speaker 1: wished to destroy myself. Looking around on the whole of mankind,
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  Speaker 1: I saw that people live and declare that they know
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  Speaker 1: the meaning of life. I looked at myself. I had
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  Speaker 1: lived as long as I knew a meaning of life,
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  Speaker 1: and in life possible. Looking again at people of other
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  Speaker 1: lands and my contemporaries in their predecessors, I saw the
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  Speaker 1: same thing. Where there is life there since man began.
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  Speaker 1: Faith has made life possible for him, and the chief
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  Speaker 1: outline of that faith is everywhere and always identical. Whatever
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  Speaker 1: that faith may be, and whatever answers it might give,
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  Speaker 1: to whomsoever it gives them, every such answer gives to
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  Speaker 1: the finite existence of man, an infinite meaning, a meaning
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  Speaker 1: not destroyed by sufferings, deprivations, or death. That means that
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  Speaker 1: only in faith can we find for life a meaning
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  Speaker 1: and a possibility. What then, is this faith? And I
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  Speaker 1: understood that faith is not merely the evidence of things
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  Speaker 1: not seen, et cetera, and it is not a revelation
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  Speaker 1: that defines only one of the indications of faith is
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  Speaker 1: not a relation of man to God. One has first
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  Speaker 1: to define faith and then God, and not faith through God.
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  Speaker 1: It is not only the agreement with what one has
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  Speaker 1: been told, but faith is a knowledge of the meaning
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  Speaker 1: of human life and consequence of which man does not
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  Speaker 1: destroy himself but lives. Faith is the strength of life.
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  Speaker 1: If a man lived, he believes in something. If he
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  Speaker 1: did not believe that one must live for something, he
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  Speaker 1: would not live. If he does not see and recognize
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  Speaker 1: the illusory nature of the finite, he believes in the finite.
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  Speaker 1: If he understands the illusory nature of the finite, he
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  Speaker 1: must believe in the infinite. Without faith, he cannot live.
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  Speaker 1: And I recalled the whole course of my mental labor
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  Speaker 1: and was horrified. It was now queer to me that
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  Speaker 1: for man to be able to live, he must either
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  Speaker 1: not see the infinite or have such an explanation of
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  Speaker 1: the meaning of life as will connect the finite with
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  Speaker 1: the infinite. Such an explanation I had had. But as
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  Speaker 1: long as I believed in the finite, I did not
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  Speaker 1: need the explanation, and I began to verify it by reason,
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  Speaker 1: And in the light of reason, the whole of my
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  Speaker 1: former explanation flew to Adams. But a time came when
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  Speaker 1: I ceased to believe in the finite, and then I
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  Speaker 1: began to build up rational foundations out of which I
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  Speaker 1: knew an explanation would bring me to the meaning of life.
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  Speaker 1: But nothing could I build. Together with the best of
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  Speaker 1: human intellect. I reached the conclusion that null equals null,
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  Speaker 1: and was much astonished at that conclusion, though nothing else
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  Speaker 1: could have resulted. What was I doing when I sought
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  Speaker 1: an answer in the experimental sciences? I wish to know
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  Speaker 1: why I lived? And for this purpose studied all that
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  Speaker 1: is outside me. Evidently I might learn much, but nothing
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  Speaker 1: of what I needed. What was I doing when I
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  Speaker 1: sought an answer in philosophical knowledge? I was studying the
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  Speaker 1: thoughts of those who had found themselves in the same
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  Speaker 1: position as I, lacking a reply to the question why
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  Speaker 1: do I live? Evidently I could learn nothing but what
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  Speaker 1: I knew myself, namely that nothing can be known. What
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  Speaker 1: am I? A part of the infinite? And those few
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  Speaker 1: words lie the whole problem. Is it possible that humanity
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  Speaker 1: has only put that question to itself since yesterday? And
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  Speaker 1: can no one before me have set himself that question,
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  Speaker 1: a question so simple and one that springs to the
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  Speaker 1: tongue of every wise child. Surely that question has been
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  Speaker 1: asked since man began, and naturally, for the solution of
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  Speaker 1: that question, since man began, it has been equally insufficient
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  Speaker 1: to compare the finite with the finite, and the infinite
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  Speaker 1: with the infinite. And since man began, the relation of
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  Speaker 1: the infinite to the finite has been sought out and expressed.
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  Speaker 1: All these conceptions in which the finite has been adjusted
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  Speaker 1: to the infinite, and a meaning found for life. The
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  Speaker 1: conception of God, of will, of goodness. We submit to
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  Speaker 1: logical examination, and all those conceptions fail to stand to
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  Speaker 1: reason's criticism. Were it not so terrible, it would be ludicrous.
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  Speaker 1: With what pride and self satisfaction we like children pull
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  Speaker 1: the watch to pieces, take out the spring, and make
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  Speaker 1: a toy of it, and are then surprised when the
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  Speaker 1: watch does not go. A solution of the contradiction between
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  Speaker 1: the finite and the infinite, and such a reply of
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  Speaker 1: the question of life, as will make it possible to live,
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  Speaker 1: is necessary and precious. And that is the only solution
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  Speaker 1: where we find, everywhere, always and among all people, a
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  Speaker 1: solution descending from times in which we lose sight of
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  Speaker 1: the life of man, a solution so difficult that we
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  Speaker 1: can compose nothing like it. And this solution we lightheartedly
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  Speaker 1: destroy in order it again to set the same question
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  Speaker 1: which is natural to everyone, into which we have no answer.
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  Speaker 1: The conception of an infinite God, the divinity of the soul,
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  Speaker 1: the connection of human affairs with God, the unity and
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  Speaker 1: existence of the soul. Man's conception of moral goodness and
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  Speaker 1: of evil are conceptions formulated in the hidden infinity of
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  Speaker 1: human thought. There those conceptions without which neither life, nor
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  Speaker 1: I should exist. Yet, rejecting all that labor of the
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  Speaker 1: whole of humanity, I wished to make it afresh myself,
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  Speaker 1: and in my own manner. I did not then think
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  Speaker 1: like that, But the germs of these thoughts were already
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  Speaker 1: in me. I understood in the first place that my
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  Speaker 1: position with Schopenhauer and Solomon, notwithstanding our wisdom, was stupid.
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  Speaker 1: We see that life is an evil, and yet continue
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  Speaker 1: to live. That is evidently stupid. For if life is senseless,
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  Speaker 1: and I am so fond of what is reasonable, it
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  Speaker 1: should be destroyed, and then there would be no one
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  Speaker 1: to challenge it. Secondly, I understood that all one's reasonings
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  Speaker 1: turned in a vicious cycle, like a wheel out of
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  Speaker 1: gear with its pinion. However much and however well we
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  Speaker 1: may reason, we cannot obtain a reply to the question,
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  Speaker 1: and gnaul will always equal null, and therefore our path
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  Speaker 1: is probably erroneous. Thirdly, I began to understand that and
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  Speaker 1: the replies given by faith is stored up the deepest
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  Speaker 1: of human wisdom, and that I had no right to
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  Speaker 1: deny them on the ground of reason, and that those
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  Speaker 1: answers are the only ones which reply to life's question.
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  Speaker 1: End of chapter nine,