It is truly amazing how far modern psychiatry has come! It is almost as if a fresh start were necessary, a joint burning of all books and the complete abandonment of all classifications. A man exhibiting even the slightest inner conflict is already infallibly ill; there is no question about it. And there we are left wondering about the vexatious state in which science has placed itself. The only conclusion that can be drawn is that the less a man thinks, the less thought influences his life, the healthier he is; in other words, the science of mind has set as a model of mental health the man whose mind does not act. There is something wonderful and unbelievable about this; it is undoubtedly a major achievement, and it never ceases to amaze. Discharge for the jolly fool, and therapy for the antisocial, the melancholic, the misanthropic, the gloomy, the lonely, and the silent! Therapy for those who cannot come home from work and smile while scratching their bellies in front of a television set! Therapy, and may the sick forever exchange philosophical works for coloring books!
Category: Notes
One Cannot Help But Be Struck…
One cannot help but be struck by the nobility, by the beauty of an education led by a man of integrity and talent, since wonderful results can be derived from it. This is, however, of such rarity that those who come across a real example can only lose themselves in idealizations about how everything would be better if everyone had opportunities identical to those of a select few enlightened ones. And then confront it with the real world… but let the regrets remain for another day: those who honor this noble vocation deserve the highest recognition.
There Are Veiled Implications in the Personality…
There are veiled implications in the personality of the person who, through philosophy, reaches the rigidity of character of a Socrates, a Seneca, capable of facing their own death with serenity and indifference. The indifference of someone like this, in practice, cannot be understood by those who have not reached it, and this is why the discourse of such wise men tends to hurt. There is something unacceptably and frighteningly unnatural about this attitude, which only solidifies after the annihilation of a human dimension. May it be wisdom to shield oneself from the world, to be unaffected by any of its troubles; but this imperturbable marble, this materialization of passive pessimism, of not acting, not feeling, not wanting, and not suffering, although it achieves a victory of reason over instinct, simultaneously operates a human mutilation, and it is perhaps less painful, for those who cherish him and are around him, that he is never allowed to sing of such a victory.
There Is a Flagrant Injustice…
There is a flagrant injustice in the way Nietzsche is painted by both his opponents and his admirers. Everyone seems to strive to see, in every detail of his biography, the exaltations we find in his work. It is as if the man Nietzsche was deprived of discernment and contended daily in life as he did philosophically. They see in every trace of his personality an unhealthy imbalance, trying to make us believe that he was not lamentably assaulted by the disease, but it had progressed slowly since his birth. They deny his reason, and in the natural tendencies of any man whose vocation is serious study, in the natural manifestations of any man experiencing inner conflict, they see mental disorders. There are studies that defend it! Modern, modernly healthy men guarantee he was always sick! A man, therefore, unable to sit at a table and behave publicly: a mad. Words are lacking to address these imbeciles…