African Spir

Man pursues two goals: he seeks happiness and, being empty by essence, he seeks to fill his life; this latter motive plays a more considerable role than is usually thought. What we take for vanity, ambition, love of power and riches, is often, in reality, the need to mask this emptiness.

African Spir (10 November 1837 – 26 March 1890) was a Russian Neo-Kantian philosopher of German descent.

Quotes

The realization of justice is, in the actual state of things, a matter of life or death for society and for civilisation itself.

Words of a Sage : Selected thoughts of African Spir (1937)

Paroles d'un sage: Choix de pensées d'African Spir by Hélène Claparède-Spir (Words of a Sage : Selected thoughts of African Spir), Paris-Genève, Je Sers-Labor, 1937

• The doctrine expounded by me is the true one, but I am not its author. I have only been, so to speak, the soil in which it has germinated and has developed itself with an extreme slowness in the course of long years. Also there has never been such a disproportion between the man and his work than in my case, and what is the saddest, is that one has to suffer because of the incapacity and the weakness of the other. A man more capable than me, possessing this doctrine, would already have stirred the world.
  • Esquisse biographique, p. 18.

• Grâce à la connaissance des lois physiques, l’homme a pu au dehors asservir la nature, mais, intérieurement, il en est resté l’esclave.
  • Outwardly, thanks to the knowledge of physical laws, man can subjugate nature; but inwardly, he remains a slave.
  • Thanks to the knowledge of physical laws, man has been able to enslave nature on the outside, but on the inside, he has remained its slave.
    • p. 36.

• What is missing to our civilisation is the soul, the spiritual unity, the basis. That is why everything in it is pretence and contrivance; and why also, in spite of the progress and marvellous improvement they have accomplished in the external realm, men have, in general, become themselves neither better nor happier. They have neglected too much the essential; their own perfecting.
  • p. 36.

• If the abandonment of religious and moral principles was to become widespread, the consequences could be become such that we would finally see crop up in the very heart of civilisation, a new and apalling barbarism capable of engulfing all the acquisitions of the past.
  • p. 37.

• Nothing that rests on contradictions shall succeed or last in the long run; all that involves a contradiction is fatally destined, sooner or later, to disintegrate and disappear.
  • p. 37.

• Men who have sacrificed their well-being, and even their lives, for the cause of truth or the public good, are, from an empirical point of view (which scorns virtue and altruism) regarded as insane or as fools; but, from a moral standpoint, they are heroes who honour humanity.
  • p. 38.

• If we accomplish a good deed, a charity in the hope of future rewards, or with a more or less admitted ulterior motive to profit from personal advantages, we are probably doing a useful thing, but which is devoid of any truly moral character.
  • p. 39.

• The virtue preached by devout persons is the virtue of the slave who always believes themselves under the eye of the master. However, Jésus said: 'Serve God not as slaves, but as sons in the house'
  • p. 39, with a quote from Galatians 4:6-8.

• In reality, there is no contradiction between science and religion, whose domains are distinct, and which, far from fighting and persecuting each other, must, on the contrary, complement each other.
  • p. 39.

• If we recognize, following the materialist theories, that only the physical nature exists, and that man contains no higher essence, divine, which raises him above his animal nature, it would be a question neither of obligation, nor of moral responsibility; then the supreme good would consist for him, indeed, to satisfy his appetites and his natural inclinations, to look for pleasure and to flee from pain. In this case, there could be neither religion nor morality, since religion is precisely what raises man above vulgar reality, and morality is the very negation of selfishness.
  • p. 41.

• If the present civilisation does not acquire some stable moral fondations, its existence will hardly be more assured than that of the civilisations that have preceeded it, and which have fallen.
  • p. 41.

• The feeling of solidarity that is born amidst a community rests on the feeling of antagonism against those who are opposed to it. Most of the time we only adhere to a party or a group, in order to better differentiate ourselves from another.
  • p. 42.

• Si nous possédions un flair moral plus développé, nous serions aussi écœurés moralement par la rapacité de ceux qui cherchent a profiter et à accaparer sans égards pour autrui, que nous le sommes par une odeur nauséabonde.
  • If we possessed a more developed moral sense, we'd be as disgusted by the rapacity of those who seek to profit and take without regard for others, as we are by a foul smell.
    • p. 43.

• Men generally are too inclined to let themselves be overawed by what is quantitatively great. It is thus that even thoughtful minds let themselves be impressed by the strength of Napoleon, so much so that they see in his person something august or majestic, when in fact he only had selfish ambitions. Half the earth was put to fire and sword to obtain for a man the pleasant sensation of his own absolute power.
  • p. 43.

• Injustice having always been predominant on earth, there are some who imagine that this existing social order will continue forever. That this order was able to last until now, has mainly been due to the conviction of people that it was of divine institution.
  • p. 45.

• Si dans un banquet quelqu’un s’avisait d’arracher aux convives les morceaux de la bouche, on serait unanime à trouver le procédé inique et brutal, mais quand par ailleurs la chose se pratique sous une forme moins apparente, on ne s’en montre guère offusqué.
  • If at a banquet someone were to rip the morsels from the mouths of the guests, we would be unanimous in finding their behaviour to be iniquitous and brutal, but when the same is done in a less conspicuous way, people are hardly offended.
    • p. 46.

• It is not on the ruins of liberty that we may in the future build justice.
  • p. 46.

• The social organization of work is the most complicated and difficult problem that humanity has ever had to solve. It being possible to realize this organization neither by violence, nor by merely external or legal measures, it requires the free participation of all to the common work, and, consequently, to a regeneration of men that brings them to overcome their selfishness and to understand their duty towards themselves and towards the community.
  • p. 47.

• The more gifted by nature is a man, the more is deplorable the abuse that he does by using them to shameful ends. A swindler or crook of higher condition is more blameworthy than a vulgar scoundrel; an intelligent evil-doer, having benefited from a higher education, represents a more saddening phenomenon than an unfortunate illiterate fellow having committed an offence.
  • p. 48.

• En s'adonnant trop exclusivement à la recherche d'un bonheur matériel, de biens éphémères, on méconnaît les vraies réalités dela vie et on laisse s'étioler et se dessécher l'esprit.
  • By devoting ourselves too exclusively to the pursuit of material happiness and ephemeral goods, we ignore the true realities of life and allow our spirit to wither and dry up.
    • p. 49.

• To succeed in brilliant businesses, to achieve great success, that is what the ambition and efforts of the majority of men aim for. But at the end of the day what do they get for it? Softer cushions, better meat, maybe decorations or medals - that is all. And to think that there are found serious men who consume their whole existence in the pursuit and the expectation of these trivialities.
  • p. 49.

• To spend for destruction ten times more than for instruction, such is the fashion in our time; and men seriously regard themsleves as rational beings!
  • p. 50.

• In the actual state of social relationships, the forms of politeness are necessary as a subsitute for benevolence.
  • p. 50.

• Nothing depicts better the poverty of human nature than to see men, placed as the leaders of nations, be preoccupied only with their own prestige and their own personal interest.
  • p. 51.

• The most sacred duty, the supreme and urgent work, is to deliver humanity from the malediction of Cain - fratricidal war.
  • p. 51.

• The well understood equity as well as interest of society demand that we work much more to prevent crimes and offenses than to punish them.
  • p. 52.

• Place a spider on top of a mountain and it will only try to catch flies; alas, they are many who, in the figurative meaning, have spider's eyes.
  • p. 52.

• In life we only try to produce, to win, and enjoy the more we can; in science, to discover and invent the more we can; in religion, to dominate on the greatest number of people we can; whereas the forming of the character, the further development of the faculties of the intelligence, the refinement of the consciousness and of the heart, are considered incidental things.
  • p. 52.

• La réalisation de la justice est, dans l’état actuel des choses, une question de vie ou de mort pour la société et pour la civilisation elle-même.
  • The realization of justice is, in the actual state of things, a matter of life or death for society and for civilisation itself.
    • p. 55.

• Deep down, everything comes down to the following simple question: Do we really want justice and the realization in this world of higher principles? Or else do we want to serve selfish, short-sighted interests, which, when all is said and done, are also detrimental to those very same people that pursue them?
  • p. 55.

• The intellectual development of man, far from having gotten men away from war, has rather, on the contrary, brought them to a more perfected refinment in the art of killing.
  • p. 55.

• It is from our lack of proper content, from our inner emptiness, that we need occupations and distractions. Otherwise we experience boredom, which is nothing else than the feeling of unease that takes hold of us when our spirit is not asorbed in the mirages of life.
  • p. 56.

• There is only one thing in the world that is really valuable, it is to do good.
  • p. 56.

• L’homme poursuit deux buts : il recherche le bonheur et, étant vide par essence, il cherche à remplir sa vie ; ce dernier motif joue un rôle plus considérable qu’on ne le pense d’ordinaire. Ce que l’on prend pour vanité, ambition, amour du pouvoir et des richesses, est souvent, en réalité, le besoin de masquer ce vide.
  • Man is in pursuit of two goals: he is looking for happinesse and, being by essence empty, he is trying to fill his life; the latter reason plays a more considerable role than we ordinarily think. What we take for vainglory, ambition, love of power and riches, is often, indeed, a need to mask this emptiness.
    • p. 56.

• If pity was always equally alive and acting in all individuals and in all circumstances, we could do away with morality. Unfortunately, it is not compassion, but rather it's opposite - selfishness - that acts most strongly in us.
  • p. 57.

• Education has a tremendous power on man. Can't we see to which the astonishing discipline the people of Sparta have submitted for centuries? And this with a view to very petty purposes: purely outer greatness, the military predominace of Sparta. This example proves that men can do most anything they want; therefore it would only be a question of making them will the good.
  • p. 58.

• Up to now, in general, we have mainly stuffed the brains of young people with an indigestible multitude of various notions, without thinking enough about the prime necessity to form their character.
  • p. 58.

• Morality, to be effective, has to be well-reasoned. To want to repress evil only by coercion, and to obtain morality by a kind of education using constraint, without motivating it from within, is to make an artificial thing, devoid of lasting value.
  • p. 59.

• Only a moral education based on free inner discipline can bring to bear a salutary action and lead to a true morality.
  • p. 59.

• To reform society, and with it humanity, there is only one means; to transform the mentality of men, to direct them in a new spirit.
  • p. 60.

• As long as men will not be freed from their errors and delusions, humanity will not be able to progress towards the accomplishment of its true destiny.
  • p. 60.

• To sacrifice the moral to the physical, as is done in these days, is to sacrifice reality for a shadow.
  • p. 61.

• We can, following the example of Kant, consider the moral development and improvement of men, as the supreme goal of human evolution.
  • p. 61.

• De même que l'humanité a commencé par des outils en silex, et est arrivé peu à peu aux machines si puissantes et perfectionnées d'aujourd'hui, de même l'homme, en se façonnant de génération en génération, arrivera à un degré de perfection dont l'exemple ne nous a été donné, jusqu'à présent, que par de rares individus.
  • As humanity began with flint tools, and has arrived little by little to the powerful and perfected machines of today, so man, by shaping himself generation after generation, will arrive to a degree of perfection which, up to now, the example was given to us only by rare individuals.
    • p. 62.

Quotes about

• I do not know a philosopher so profound and at the same time so precise.
  • Leo Tolstoy, Hélène Claparède-Spir (1944) Evocation: Tolstoi, Nietzsche, Rilke, Spir, Genève, Georg et Cie.

• I am sure that his doctrine will be understood and appreciated as it deserves and that the destiny of his work will be similar to that of Schopenhauer.
  • Leo Tolstoy, Hélène Claparède-Spir (1944) Evocation: Tolstoi, Nietzsche, Rilke, Spir, Genève, Georg et Cie.