Stages on Life’s Way

by Søren Kierkegaard

  He [is] essentially* inclosingly reserved—she could not be that even if she wanted to (why not? A woman cannot express dialectical reduplication, just as she cannot express many consonants preceding one vowel but only the vowels).

  * The significance of the portions entered the fifth of each month.—JP V 5723 (Pap. V B 148:25) n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 427:39-429:12:

  What his inclosing reserve contains, he never says. Let us simply assume that his depression has no content at all. He who is depressed can name many cares that hold him in bondage, but the one that binds him he is unable to name. Or let it be guilt. Or mental derangement.

  —JP V 5724 (Pap. V B 148:29) n.d., 1844

  Deleted from draft; see 429:32-35:

  On the whole, the reader will perhaps pay heed to the respect with which he treats the girl, to whom he is greatly superior, but he does not know it and does not want to know it. —Pap. V B 150:12 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 430:15-18:

  . . . . . not until then can the original possibility of the religious that must be given in childhood’s impression break through.—Pap. V B 150:13 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 430:35:

  . . . . . and whereas one only rarely sees in actuality the deep respect for a girl that he has, one sees often enough that a girl does not understand herself.—Pap. V B 150:14 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from draft; see 431:7-435:8:

  He cannot at all understand that which essentially becomes her suffering, and she cannot at all understand that which essentially becomes his suffering (the responsibility).

  [Penciled: p. 11 bot. (Pap. V B 148:34)]

  He is essentially a thinker, she anything but.—

  He is religious—she is of the world (in the good sense)

  he is sympathetic (since he suffers sympathetically a second time)—she egoistic (but see p. 10 [Pap. V B 148:33])

  he suffers afterward—she at once.

  he remains the same—she despairs and then is comforted

  Impression for eternity

  He acting—she passive, and yet it is reversed.

  he guilty—she innocent, and yet they both are guilty.

  see p. 6 bot. [Pap. V B 148:28].

  —Pap. V B 148:24 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 433:6-21:

  When he says of her that she lacks feminine resignation, it is true, but not that she has no sympathy whatsoever for his sufferings, for at this point he forgets to bear in mind that by his deception he himself does indeed prevent her from seeing that he is suffering. Thus, the better his deception is, the less she discovers anything.

  Here I have him in a predicament.

  —Pap. V B 148:33 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 434:19-435:30:

  She believes that he has insulted her by breaking up, and yet he actually insulted her only by beginning, which she does not believe at all*

  *how did he come to begin?—Pap. V B 148:26 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 435:38-436:13:

  The expression for the misunderstandings pointed out is really that he cannot love, nor can she (see p. 11 bot. [Pap. V B 148:34]). He has chosen the ethical expression of love; she has chosen the self-loving expression.

  he lacks the immediacy, has the power of will; she has the immediate perseverance, cannot live without him, but this is not loving, for she lacks the resignation so that it can truly be said that she loves him.

  See p. 11 bot. [Pap. V B 148:34]

  —Pap. V B 148:28 n.d., 1844

  In margin of draft; see 436:11-13:

  If it had not come to a turning point, they could have become extremely happy in a certain sense, but unfortunately it cannot be thought away—Pap. V B 150:16 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 436:23-437:2:

  If he now becomes free and she becomes another’s, what then? —Will he then have a fling? No, it is a psychological impossibility; only then will he really begin to repent, not, however, that he gave her up (that is an esthetic observation he has already long ago put behind him) but that he began it and became a murderer. This thought he will now be able to hold fast in the ideality of his conception, undisturbed by actuality, which he was not when he had to worry about whether she actually would die etc. —He is once again inclosed within himself and has all his ideality.—Pap. V B 148:27 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 437:12-439:33:

  Hitherto, the defect in the tragic is that it had to be about great men and great events historically certain. —Disbelief in the idea—therefore hitherto the comic has had a higher ideality; we are more inclined to believe that a person is ridiculous than that he is great (see notes on esthetics [Pap. IV C 102-27, especially 121] in the tall cupboard next to the door).

  Likewise with the religious prototypes. The person who in this connection does not understand ab posse ad esse valet consequentia [a conclusion of actuality from possibility] does not understand ab esse ad posse valet consequentia [a conclusion of possibility from actuality] either but imagines that he does. Only ideality is the true norm; actuality and historical accuracy are nonsense as a norm.—-JP I 150 (Pap. V B 148:17) n.d., 1844

  Deleted from margin in final copy; see 437:20-32:

  . . . . . since the exception only proves the rule, and an exception like Lessing expressly demonstrates that his discovering eyes, his sharp understanding of what went before, were necessary in order that Emilia Galotti could see the light of day, and Lessing’s mastery in constructing a plot and writing dialogue [were necessary] in order to provide entrance for the piece.—Pap. VI B 8:18 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 437:37-438:9:

  I shall not decide this matter but rather give the explanation that the comic lies in metaphysical categories, the tragic in esthetic categories. The comic therefore leaves a total impression, for, since it points out the contradiction to the idea, existence is reconciled, inasmuch as the spectator laughs at it. The tragic does not reconcile with existence. I see the hero fall and the idea conquer, but the hero’s fall does indeed contain a sorrowful consideration for the spectator, who is not even a hero.—Pap. V B 150:17 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 439:34-440:22:

  The person who would ask me if my imaginary construction was a true story has not understood it at all, for the understanding lies precisely in its being infinitely unimportant; it is the spirit’s intrepid assurance that is needed. It is spirit to ask about two things: (1) Is it possible? (2) Am I able to do it? It is lack of spirit to ask about two things: (1) Is it true? (2) Has my neighbor Christophersen actually done it?—Pap. V B 148:20 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 441:4-444:23:

  If it had been an esthetic story, the result ought to have been given, but a religious exposition has no result, for it has its surest result safeguarded only in faith. (The negative higher than the positive praised by stupid people, including several geniuses.) To believe that one is finished is precisely perdition. The stupid pastors who have results and believe that to have faith is to roll around on dry land, when it is to swim, and consequently believe that to swim is to roll around on dry land. All tasks lie in the invisible (whether one actually has done it) and are indifferent to quantitative differences (the esthetic hero is supposed to be famous, esteemed, etc.—it revolves just as well around a dog as around kingdoms and lords).—Pap. V B 148:19 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 441:29-442:19:

  The ethical result see Æsthetica in tall cupboard p. 1, column 2 mid. [Pap. IV C 115].

  —Pap. V B 148:18 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 444:23:

  For example, if we take the two characters in the imaginary construction, it is clear that the heroine is a totally different positive character than the hero. She does not venture into the uncertain; she sticks to the positive.—Pap. V B 150:19 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 447:13-17:

  Latone could not give birth because a gadfly wa
s tormenting her—similarly this girl is a gadfly for him, and I have deliberately kept the contrast as strong as possible.—Pap. V B 148:9 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from draft; see 450:19-24:

  Precisely for that reason he will want to endure actuality and yet continually be in my service.—Pap. V B 150:20 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 453:6-30:

  Rötscher

  Börne who en passant [casually] calls Hamlet a “Christian tragedy.” The mistake in Shakespeare is precisely that Hamlet does not have religious doubts. If he does not have them, then it is sheer nonsense and indecision if he does not settle the matter straight a way.—JPII 1561 (Pap. V B 148:16) n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 453:27-30:

  Rötscher has quite rightly interpreted him as being morbidly reflective [deleted: and it is incredible that Goethe has taken such great pains to uphold Hamlet]. Rötscher’s development is excellent, and it also has something else of interest for one who wants[*] to check the systematicians a bit more closely; for R. is, as is known, a Hegelian, but in the psychical development of esthetic characters he is different and is constrained to use and does continually use existential categories such as the leap, for example, although he does not emphasize it as much as Vigilius Haufniensis does, and to me it is inconceivable that one can use them without noting the consequences for the system.

  [*]In margin: to see how the systematicians are constrained to use existential categories such as the leap, for example.—JPIII 2344 (Pap. V B 150:21) n.d., 1844

  Deleted from final copy; see 454:30:

  The religious relation

  para. 1.

  —Pap. VI B 8:19 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 454:31-460:15:

  [Deleted: The religious]

  Para. 1 [changed to: 5]

  The concept of hero—suffering—“tragedy must arouse fear and cleanse the passions”—the spectator’s sympathy (different within the various views of the world)

  Para. 2 [changed to: 6]

  The principle: not to repent is the highest wisdom

  Para. 3 [changed to: 7]

  The forgiveness of sin

  —Pap. V B 149:3 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 454:31-460:15:

  [V B 148.37 250] What is it to be a hero?

  If he, my character, had been a hero in the ordinary sense, he would have had to become that demonically by saying: I see that my idea of existence requires that she must go, ergo, and this road over her leads me to my great goal. On the other hand, he must not say conversely that for him the main point was that he should suffer more than she. That is a religious hero. He is the greatest hero who wins the most. —He is the greatest hero who suffers the most.

  Feuerbach in Wesen des Christenthum is scandalized

  at Pascal’s life, that it is a story of suffering.

  Fr. Schlegel in Lucinde: that only health is

  lovable.[*]

  She also could have become a heroine, but only esthetically. I have not wished to keep her that way, for a new light should fall upon his sympathy; how it pains him that she breaks with the idea.

  If she had become a heroine, I would have bowed before her (although the esthetic interests me less) for there is nothing I would rather do than bow; would to God that there were someone to bow before; most people, however, believe that there is a great deal to stoop for in the world.

  I am poetice et eleganter [in a poetic and refined way] a street inspector; I think of the two chamberlains who opened the door for Napoleon and said: The Emperor.

  Anyone could be made a hero if he will confide in me. I shall bring him into mortal danger; then it will turn out all right.

  Baggesen’s lines fit most people (the majority): [V B 148 37 251]

  Our Lord took a bit of sausage meat

  And said: Become a man

  Become sausage-witted and sausage-happy.128

  —Pap. V B 148:37 n.d., 1844

  Addition to Pap. V B 148:37:

  [*]To make health the highest good is an animalistic principle; this is the way an animal is regarded—if it is not in good health, it is not worth anything. But man is spirit. To assert this principle is sin against the Holy Spirit, the most dreadful revolt against fellow-feeling.—JPI 913 (Pap. V B 148:38) n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 457:19-465:23:

  There is a lot of prating about the impossibility of using certain sufferings (illness etc.—Philoctetes) as the subject of poetic interpretation and poetic interest. My story of suffering is not poetry, either. But that statement is comparable to saying to a child asking a question: It is a stupid child, instead of saying that one is oneself unable to answer.

  Every suffering in which the suffering also becomes an occasion for something higher, a battle in which the nobler is developed, is eo ipso poetic. In the same way, poverty could become that.

  Moreover, genuine spectator compassion is not an unshaven immediacy but must be formed in dialectic.

  Aristotle: must arouse fear compassion and purify

  In margin: see Börne, S. S. II, p. 165 etc.

  —Pap. VB 148:35 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 464:12-465:16:

  [VI B 10 83] Note.[*] What is said in the text is not my own but the religious person’s position; here, however, I want to do what the religious person probably would not do—in order to illuminate a bit more the illusory positivity with regard to the religious,** to sketch a speculative and historicizing sermon in order to see what the positive is.

  [*]In margin: to p. 406 [SV VI 432].

  In margin: **and pertaining to the qualifications: fear and compassion.

  (A) The Speculative Sermon

  Let the theme be: Christian joy. The text is read, the theme is off to a proper start by means of, for example, a contrasting movement, but this is unimportant—now the discourse begins. In the first place, Christian joy is not (1) the world’s joy. This is developed rhetorically in proportion to the speaker’s talents, yet not very rigorously, for he is not talking to criminals and adulterers but to cultured people. And the distinguished sins, the demonic passions—one does not dare to touch on these. At the conclusion of this point one is in a pleasant, almost complacent, mood. (2) Christian joy is not the satisfaction that poetry and art confer. Here is something for the cultured; they do not have time themselves to read the system, so they get it in church, and it is always something in [VI B 10 84] return for the preacher’s annual gratuity. But the clergyman does not have a splendid leisure either, and what he knows here is soon used up. That he does not have leisure is nothing to sneer at, is even praiseworthy, but the one who knows what scholarship is never dabbles in the subject in the pulpit. The satisfaction of poetry and art is appearance. The point here is to get this word introduced—it is so speculative. If one wishes to talk still more speculatively, one says: the external appearance. This is found even in children’s reading books. In a long series of such books there has been a story called: Appearances are Deceiving129—an English crime story. In a more recent speculative reading book, probably published under the direction of such a clergyman, the title is External Appearances are Deceiving. (3) Christian joy is not the spirit’s repose in itself that scholarship bestows upon its cultivators. One has a little stock of sayings and one could, if the clergyman had time, point out to him especially many passages in Aristotle where there is discussion of the blessedness of the gods—these lend themselves excellently for use in a pagan address, and in our time also in a sermon. —But let us see what time it is. Good gracious, it is eleven o’clock! So there are only a few moments left. Gebet Acht [Attention, please], ladies and gentlemen—now comes the positive: the Christian joy is higher than all this. Amen. This is positive speculation in the pulpit. The theme has not even been talked about.* If anyone [VI B 10 85] says that the Christian joy is unutterable—well, then this is what is to be discussed, and the theme becomes the unutterable joy. It is even a beautiful theme, but then there must be discussion of the unu
tterable, why it is unutterable, etc. On the other hand, one does not discuss the unutterable by talking about something else which is so easy to utter that one can even say it by rote. To talk about the unutterable in this manner is similar to the language in Behrend’s advertisement: when he had lost a silk umbrella and out of fear that someone would keep it if he came to know that it was made of silk, he advertised that a linen umbrella had been lost.130 This kind of positive talk is an outright waste of the listener’s time. He who has anything to do with scholarship does not wish to hear such a one-shilling course, and he who does not have anything to do with scholarship does not understand it anyway, and a good listener wishes first and last for the simple biblical teaching. If the clergyman still ventures the incredible, he says the following in the pulpit: the innermost center—but this is not particularly gripping for the person who is accustomed to move about in such scholarly phrases, and a respectable citizen who sits in a church is disturbed because he only knows these words from target-practice in the national guard.

  In margin: *In order quite perfectly and genuinely speculatively to conceal this irregularity, the speaker would need only to say: Yet this is not the place to talk about it (but, to be sure, about art, poetry, and scholarship). This category, this is not the place, must be regarded as the system’s main cornerstone, which holds up the enormous construction, which one can never storm—because this is not the place—-just as the man who obtained the royal dispensation to choose the manner of his death was never executed because he very kindly explained regarding each particular manner of death that this was not the place or this was not the way he would choose

  That which really should be accentuated in religious joy is suffering and the idea that is the hinge of the category, namely, that the joy of poetry, art, and scholarship stands in an accidental relationship to suffering, because one person becomes a poet without suffering, another by suffering, a thinker without suffering (as a genius), another by suffering, but religious joy is in the danger. From here on it is easy to show why it is unutterable. JP I 625 (Pap. VI B 10) n.d., 1844

  Continuation of Pap. VI B 10:

  B. A Historicizing Sermon