Stages on Life’s Way

by Søren Kierkegaard

In this sphere, grammar, dialectic, plan, design, consistency, train of thought, and everything that constrains are cast off together with the Roman yoke. The free spirit naturally has free speech, and free speech is thereby different from ordinary speech in that whereas one usually has a beginning, an [VI B 11 86] intention for the thought that is clear in the beginning and achieved in the conclusion (the speculative address perhaps has the defect of merely beginning), free speech is remarkable in the fact that it begins by virtue of an event so that the beginning comes upon the speaker just like Christmas Eve. But once begun, free speech is again remarkable in that there is no compelling reason for it to stop. Just as that worthy performer in the Dyrehave summer amusement park draws the rope out of himself, just so free speech rushes on, and to such an extent that two performers could be necessary: the speaker who produces the continuous web of free speech and the clerk who measures with an authorized yardstick and clips it off when the piece has come to be so long that it is a sermon. Remember what Pastor Grundtvig so rightly said in the preface to his sermons: “to preach is not to write with pen and ink,”131 from which it would also follow that every child who no longer writes on a slate but in a copy book (consequently with pen and ink) had been preaching. But even if this is so, even if—because of this* matchless discovery132—the staff is broken on all who write and everything written, it still does not follow that every ever so noisy sound issued by a Peder Ruus133 is therefore a sermon.

  Therefore, even though it is with pen and ink, let us make an attempt. Let the theme be: The Word of the Church. One goes back quite a few centuries, one gropes about in the darkness of the Middle Ages, the intolerable Roman yoke, the papal power with its nightmare pressed upon consciences until Martin Luther, the man of the word, made a visual demonstration of the thick darkness in which the papists groped and won the decisive battle on the church door in Wittenberg, where he shut the mouth of the excessively erudite tongue-thrashers and word-distorters. But then the darkness fell again for three centuries, until the matchless discovery [was made] here in the North, when the Living Word was set free and

  In margin: *marvelous, well-nigh

  [VI B 11 87] installed in its rightful place as the most beautiful field and meadow of Denmark’s mother tongue, in spite of German schoolmasters. And the folk-mouth and the folk-tongue shall not be bound, but all shall talk in the spirit when the golden age arrives, the matchless future of which the seer catches a glimpse with a hawk’s eye and proclaims on a mouth harp when the Living Word, the Church’s Word, God’s Word, which was from the beginning, sounds in Denmark. May this come to pass! Amen, yes, amen, in all eternity, amen.

  Such an address is no sermon, even in its best form, yes, even if a genius opened his purse-strings and scooped information out of the horn of plenty. Clarified by occasional glints of thought, at times stirred in mood, this is a historical lecture. In relation to the religious, it holds true that all historical knowledge is negative. In relation to the religious, all historical presentation is a diversion. The listener forgets himself over the papists and the twilight, over Luther and the sunrise, over the matchless discovery that was made in Copenhagen. But in relation to the religious it is precisely negative to forget oneself.* A religious speaker must not be different from his listeners as the teachers ex cathedra [from the chair] are different. The richer in spirit and the more knowledgeable the religious speaker is, the greater is the self-possession required in order to achieve unity with the listener. The religious speaker should be distinguished by his having existentially made sure of what the simplest of men also know. A hawk’s-eye view of world history does not replace a sober insight into oneself: the most matchless discoveries, even the discovery of gunpowder, do not compensate as a substitute for a lack of self-knowledge and of maieutic skill in relation to others.

  In margin: *and the positive is to be made self-active.

  —JP I 626 (Pap. VI B 11) n.d., 1844-45

  From sketch; see 465:25-471:19:

  Para. 5.

  Appendix.

  about self-inflicted sufferings.

  esthetically they are to be treated comically.

  A sly religiousness that says that

  God can certainly bring them upon one;

  therefore we are not to promote them ourselves.[*]

  This, however, is the principle of callousness,

  for if I block out receptivity, then let us see what

  God is able to do.

  The principle is to discover the terror, but

  to force one’s way through, if I do

  not force my way through, then the

  suffering is self-inflicted.

  [*]In margin: always being happy.

  —Pap. V B 149:4 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from draft; see 472:10:

  If a king, in order to disguise himself, walked around dressed as a butcher and resembled a certain butcher I knew and resembled him so that they could not be distinguished from each other, there would be a unity of the comic and the tragic in the relationship of the two. One would laugh at the butcher because he was not the king, and one would laugh at the other butcher because he was the king.—Pap. V B 150:23 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 474:30-481:19:

  About the principle:

  To repent of nothing is the highest wisdom an esthetic principle (dialectical in the direction of fate and decrees of providence) that has used an ethical expression. one sees that another person succumbs, how this sym

  pathetically affects one, and how one is to judge him, or whether one should leave it alone and keep to oneself.

  the dreadfulness of such views as in Börne, VIII, pp. 96 and 97,134 which he himself nevertheless believes to be wisdom, it is designed to blunt sympathy. [Penciled: the elder Fichte.]

  Imaginatively constructing, I have once again laid out everything here for the religious: the forgiveness of sins.

  In margin: I have taken my gambler to the extreme; it is necessary when one pays attention to the dialectical in the direction of sympathy.—Pap. V B 148:39 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 479:22-24:

  . . . . . the impression.* He cites an example from his own practice. A fine lady in Paris had a maid who died in a pitiable way. The lady takes it hard, but what does B. do—with the aid of statistical surveys he convinces her that such things have occurred before, and she is consoled. Yet one can do that only in Paris, as B. correctly observes, where there is such a confluence of people.

  In margin: *and presumably contribute to—Börne’s having become a philanthropist.—Pap. V B 150:24 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 481:3-485:2:

  The Principal Result

  What he actually runs aground on is the issue of [deleted: the forgiveness of sins* and] the wedding. Between these fixed points, his reflection is continually at work to find a way to rescue her.

  *Penciled above: N.B.

  —Pap. V B 97:23 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 481:3-485:2:

  [V B 148.36 249] Actually the whole exposition tends toward the forgiveness of sin.

  But here the point is that repentance is dialectical, whether or not there ought to be action, whether there is not something to do, whether it is not to be done over again.

  It is easy enough when one assumes the guilt to be finished and fixed, and now repentance has only to consume it, but here the difficulty is whether repentance could not rather intervene in time and prevent the guilt from becoming established.

  Take David, for example (Uriah and Bathsheba), imagine it has happened (Uriah has fallen—Bathsheba his wife), now he repents; but suppose he has issued the order to place Uriah in a difficult spot and now begins to repent and now cannot find out whether it has happened, this situation in suspenso.

  The forgiveness of sin is a difficult issue in other respects. Earnest people have spoken well and competently to demonstrate that it exists, but how it now expresses itself, how human [V B 148 36 250] existence, not the whole world a
nd humanity, which are so superior, but how one single individual exists by virtue of it, what influence it has upon him, what it takes away and what it allows him to keep, whether the whole esthetic side of life returns again. —Here much existence-information is needed.—Pap. V B 148:36 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from draft; see 483:22:

  . . . . . (just as Hegel’s whole life is a rather miserable immediacy, in which the most extreme crisis is: which university is more suitable to him as assistant professor*)

  *something even his most zealous admirers have admitted, but without irony and humor, not even in company, much less in existing.—Pap. V B 150:25 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from draft; see 484:32-38 fn.:

  . . . . . to saunter from student to professor, then let such a thinker* go hang, and if this was his conviction, if he did this, if he manfully defied every temptation in this direction because it would not be respected, then truly his style would swell with pathos because it would have become a life issue for him.

  *who would be laughed to scorn in Greece.

  —Pap. V B 150:26 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from final copy; see 486:38-487:9:

  Sophist no. 3 is finished once and for all; I remain at every moment finished in the balance of the contradictions; but the religious person is continually striving because he is continually in passion.—Pap. VI B 8:20 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 489:3:

  For example, how much has been written about compassion for the needy, how many examples of it, how often the newspapers mention such examples, and yet the best part of it, the most endearing, the little psychological trait that gives the gift infinite worth and the lack of which changes the sum of money into jingling coins is not described. I knew a man who himself lived in poor circumstances and did not have much to give away and was never mentioned, indeed, was not even able to send his contribution pseudonymously, and yet I have learned more from him than from all publicity. He sometimes gave money to a poor person on the street, but when he gave, as secretly as possible, he always took off his hat to the poor person as respectfully as if he were a superior, and in as friendly a manner as if he were an equal. Four shillings or one mark is too little to be mentioned in the newspaper, but neither does the inwardness, the humanity get into the newspaper either.—Pap. V B 150:27 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from final copy; see 494:1:

  . . . . . who goes to church on Sunday, to Fredriksberg in the afternoon, and when there has been a fire at night outside the gate goes out the next afternoon to look at the site of the fire—Pap. VI B 8:21 n.d., 1844

  [V B 184 254] A Wish Occasioned by a Literary Blunder

  in Berlingske Tidende, no. 135

  In Berlingske T., no., under the rubric “Literature,” I find my name brought in such close association with various pseudonymous works that even the heading of the article has my name. The reviewer* of those books and the exhibitor of my person, after being introduced or pushed into literature this way, is ingenious enough to assume and to put this same assumption before a highly esteemed public that I have a divining rod [Ønskeqvist, wishing twig]—if I have indeed, as rumor says, written a good many books. Yes—if!

  * Note. What speedily found name is there for a person who writes something in a newspaper about a book.

  The world being as it is now, when a pseudonymous book comes out, as a matter of course someone or other also asks who the author presumably is. As a matter of course, for two weeks the guilty or innocent suspect is persecuted by many an ingenious question, many a little quip—and then, fortunately again as a matter of course, the matter is forgotten. If the matter is forgotten, then it would be inept to rake it up again, for if it might be momentarily interesting to learn to know it, since one was a little curious, it is boring to get to know something that one does not care about now. It is boring even if one did get to know the truth, for when the heat of curiosity has subsided, one perceives oneself that its object was a trifle.

  As it is related here, so it has also happened to me that now and then I have been tested in this distress, which, short and brief, is to have been regarded as an author. But I nevertheless ought to confess that even in private association people have shown much tact and I appreciate that no one has sought in print to draw me into an authorship into which I do not wish to be drawn.

  Now once again a pseudonymous book has come out, and since everyone long ago has become indifferent to the question of who the author is, suddenly a reviewer is so good as [VI B 184 255] to want to insinuate in the Berlingske Tidende that it is I. I think most people feel as I do the tactlessness of this. For if an author does not want to be named, let him be pseudonymous, unless a higher earnest consideration caused an authorized individuality to demand the name. But a little curiosity is no legitimate power in relation to pseudonymity, and to do it at a time when no one is interested in it anymore is inept.

  Consequently, if I, as rumor has it, am author of several pseudonymous books (a charge that is impossible to disclaim since not even all of them are named)—then I do have a divining rod or then one would almost have to believe that I have a divining rod.

  Alas! I am willingly satisfied with less, willingly satisfied to be regarded as the author of a smaller number of books, and of course it would indeed always be disagreeable if it went so far that I was not even regarded as the actual author of the books that bear my name. But it is I; I do assert it. These books I have actually written; I do wish to have them linked to my name. However, I have always regarded pseudonymity as a bill of divorcement between an author and his work and in any case curiosity, when it is disagreeable to an author and annoying to a reading public by chattering afterwards, is not justified in joining what wants to be separated.

  Upbuilding discourses I have written, it is true, and now I have written three discourses on imagined occasions. This authorship I cannot deny, even if I have not been much inclined to do something about acknowledging it or proving its authenticity, mainly because I do not have a particularly great notion of the solemn act and declaration of being reviewed in a newspaper. Therefore, until now I have successfully avoided having them reviewed, as it is called,* or described by a literary [VI B 184 256] endorser. This was achieved in a simple way, by not sending newspapers any free copies. It is always good that people understand one another in this way.

  In margin: * Note. This little innocent hint in Portefeuille136

  Meanwhile the inept anonymous author in B. T. has interjected the discourses in order to have an opportunity to mention my name in connection with the anonymous books. It is precisely this blunder that is unpleasant for me. Without exactly daring to flatter myself with many readers, perhaps not wishing it either, I found something satisfying, something charming, something inspiring in daring to believe that he did exist, “that single individual whom I with joy and gratitude call my reader,” that in his concealment he had enough sympathy for the modest undertaking to be just as unobtrusive on his part as I sought to be. Therefore, I am really pleased that fate so ordained it that when an installment of my discourses was published, there was also published some flashier pseudonymous book, and that many of the curious promptly hurried to it, while my reader secretly took the little book and let the others concern themselves about the bigger one. It was rather nice to think of being assured that that single individual grasped how one reads an upbuilding discourse, and above all, as remote from criticism as possible. Obeying the prompting in my inner being, I feel no need for prompting from without; inspired by the thought of “my reader,” I take pride in my requirement of him. I want to be, not the master, the teacher, the guide, but the servant, not to be loved by him but to love him, not that he will be proud of me but that I shall be proud of him. This, you see, is why I wished no review. What I did wish to know, whether my reader felt himself built up by the reading, I could never find out in the newspaper, for such things are not written about in the newspaper, and if they are written about there, it would not be by my re
ader. Of the other things one can come to know in the newspaper, of all the other things, I prefer to be ignorant, also out of sympathy for my reader, lest they disturb him. Criticism is always disturbing; the most flattering recognition is also disturbing.

  That the rather experienced but still beginning author perhaps could very well wish a word from an authority is true. I [VI B 184 257] was all the more cheered that that commanding firm Kts,137 who, when in his incognito he appears in literature, is recognized like Harun Al-Rashid138 by every functionary, that firm, which, when he appears, arouses the wonder of the less knowledgeable, just as when the crowd sees the ordinarily dressed person suddenly approached deferentially by the police because he is the chief, that firm to whom the young have learned from their fathers to show respect, and to whom I, who find it hard to comprehend how I would become any person’s teacher, have easily understood my relation as a learner and fear only that it might seem immoderate if in strong expressions I [han] were to say how much I think I have learned from him—that that firm in passing dropped a kind word, a little command for him who is all too pleased to obey. Just as that word cheered me, so “my reader” cannot have had anything but gain from it when he read it. For (yes, again I acknowledge what I owe to just that little article) it is no criticism (probably because the authority knows how dubious it is to place criticism in relation to the upbuilding), but the few words were also an upbuilding discourse, that is, it was more upbuilding than one whole discourse of mine.

  And now the wish (which perhaps is not needed, although it still could not very well fail to appear, since the inept reviewer in B. T., has made the attack), the wish that with the same tactfulness as before the journalists* will perceive the mistake of wanting in any way to reveal the identity of an author or to identify someone as author, i.e., to bore the readers and to annoy the innocent or guilty suspect, also that my upbuilding discourses will be left, as heretofore, unmentioned, and finally that a good beginning will be made by not discussing this article.

  In margin: * Note. Of course, I count wholesaler Nathanson139 among them, for the article, after all, is not by him but by an anonymous writer.