Authors: Søren Kierkegaard
Once again let us speak of the wish, and hence of sufferings. A discussion of sufferings may always be profitable if it does not confine itself to the stubbornness of the affliction but is concerned whenever possible with the edification of the sufferer. It is both permissible and an act of sympathy to dwell upon suffering in order that the sufferer may not become impatient with our superficial discussion in which he does not recognize his own suffering and in order that in such impatience he may not thrust aside all consolation and be strengthened in double-mindedness.
It is indeed one thing to move out into life with the wish when that which is wished for, continued to be work and a task. It is another thing to move out into life away from that wish. Look at Abraham.
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He had to leave the home of his fathers and journey out among a strange people, where there was no reminder of that which he loved—yes, it is true that sometimes it may be a consolation, that nothing reminds one of what he wishes to forget, but it is a bitter consolation for one who is filled with longing. Hence a man can also have a wish that for him contains all, so that in the hour of separation, when the journeying is begun, it is as if he wandered out into a strange land where nothing but the contrast with what he has lost reminds him of that which he wished for. It can be to him as if he journeyed into a strange land, even if he remains in his home, perhaps on the same spot—through the loss of the wish, indeed, it may be as if he were among strangers, so that to suffer the loss of the wish seems to him heavier and more critical than the loss of his mind. Even if he does not leave the spot, his life moves along a laborious path away from that wish, perhaps into useless sufferings, for we are talking of the real sufferer, hence not of the ones who have the consolation that their sufferings are serving some good cause, are of benefit to others. It must have been like this: The journey to the strange country was not long; in a moment he was there, there in that strange country, where the sufferers were gathered, only not those that had stopped grieving; not those whose tears eternity cannot wipe away, for the reason that as an old religious writing so simply and so touchingly says, “how shall God be able in heaven to dry up your tears when you have not wept?”
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Another comes perhaps by another way but to the same place. Silently, the guiding necessity leads him onward.
Austere and earnest, not cruel, for it is never cruel, duty comes behind and brings up the rear of the company. But the path is not the path of the wish. Now he halts for a moment, even the two austere guides are touched by his suffering: look, there a side path branches off; “good-by, thou wish of my youth, thou friendly place, where I had hoped to be able to build and to dwell with my wish!” So they move on; the guiding necessity silently in advance, duty austere and silent comes behind, not cruel, for duty is never cruel. Alas, look, there a road runs off to the side that leads to the wish; “good-by, my place of work where by the full joy of work I had hoped to be able to forget the wishes I was denied in youth.” So the company moved on. Yet the manner in which it happens does not matter, whether it be the spot that is altered and the sufferer remains at that same spot, or whether the sufferer changes his whereabouts and journeys away; this does not matter, if the place is the same, if they are gathered at this one place, which human language may well be tempted to call: the useless suffering that is beyond the reach of any comfort. The sufferings themselves could have different names, but let us not multiply names. Let us consider what is essential; that the real sufferer does not benefit others by his suffering, but rather is a burden upon them. If this latter is not the case, the former must then be so if the suffering is to be regarded as useless, that is, if the sufferer is in the strictest sense to be called a sufferer. In the strictest sense, and let us really be strict with ourselves in order that we may not venture to call ourselves sufferers, the first time anything goes against us; but let us be all the more tender with those who are in the strictest sense sufferers. Oh, such a sufferer, whoever you may be; if a man is come to the point in the land of his birth where every way of
making a living is closed to him, then he thinks seriously of emigrating to a foreign country and there seeking his fortune. But perhaps you answer, “What does that mean, how shall I be able to emigrate, and what good would it do me to change my location? My lot is cast, everywhere on earth it would be just the same.” Of course, but let us understand one another; the journey of which we speak is not long, neither is the lot cast, unless you have already found the way out of your suffering: it is only a single step, a decisive step, and you, too, have emigrated, for the Eternal lies much nearer to you than any foreign country to the emigrant, and yet when you are there the change is infinitely greater. So then, go with God to God, continually take that one step more, that single step that even you, who cannot move a limb, are still able to take; that single step, that even the prisoner, who has lost his freedom, even the one in chains, whose feet are not free, is still able to take: and you are committed to the Good. Nobody, not even the greatest that has ever lived, can do more than you.
But bear in mind: your sufferings might well be called useless, and that we men can certainly be tempted to speak of useless suffering as beyond the reach of comfort. But this is only human speech. In the language of eternity, the suffering that helped you to reach the highest is far from useless. Alas, it is only useless and unused when you will not let yourself be helped by it up to the highest—for perhaps you killed the wish and became spiritually like dead flesh that feels no pain, otherwise it is just at the point of the wish that the sufferer winces and that the Eternal comforts.
Let us once again speak of the wish, and hence of sufferings. It is well not to turn away from the sight of suffering too soon.
Let us properly dwell upon it, being
convinced that for the deadly disease of “busyness” there is no medicine so specific as the pondering of the hard path of the true sufferer
and as a fellow human being sharing with him in the common lot of suffering. But alas, how often man’s sympathetic sharing in the suffering of others stands in inverse ratio to the length of the suffering! For if the suffering is drawn out in length, sympathy tends to pall: as the suffering increases, the sympathy decreases. At the first appearance of suffering, men’s sympathy rushes out to the victim. But when the suffering lingers on, then sympathy subsides, and, on the part of the busy individual when the first active stage of his sympathy has waned, this sympathy at times changes into a certain bitterness against the sufferer. Yes: wishes could be healed after a time, they could become a part of the past: but not
the wish.
There is a real distinction here, for there is a pain of the wish which sympathy can fix upon, but there is also a pain of the wish that eludes all scrutiny, that conceals itself and secretly follows through an entire life. Yes, it follows, but in the sense of privation. Yes, like a faithful companion this pain follows the sufferer throughout his whole life and keeps him company, but there is no sympathy in attendance. Now in what way ought we to speak of this wish that may possibly exist but that withdraws into concealment, and yet speak so that the sufferer will acknowledge the description, so that he will not take offense and impatiently turn away from our officious account of sufferings which we are either not capable or have not had the time to think ourselves into? Let us then, wherever possible in the description, speak with the sufferer’s own tongue and leave it to God to communicate to his heart any light that he may have for him.
Let us assume that dumb animals could have thoughts and could make themselves understood to one another even
though we could not make out what they said, let us take that for granted. It seems almost as if this were so. For when in summer the peasant’s horse stands in the meadow and throws up his head or shakes it, surely no one can know with certainty what that means; or when two of them who throughout their lives have walked side by side pulling in the same yoke are turned out at night, when they approach one another as if in intimacy, when they almost caress each other by movements of the head; or when the free horses neigh to one another so that the woods echo, when they are gathered on the plains in a big herd as if at a public meeting—assume then that they really could make themselves understood to one another.
But then there was one horse that was all alone. Now when this horse heard the call, when he saw that the herd was gathering in the evening, and he understood that they were about to hold a meeting, then he came running in the hope that he might learn something about life and its ways. He listened carefully to all that the elders had to say about how no horse should think himself fortunate until he is dead, how the horse of all creatures is most subject to the tragic changes of fate. And now the elder went over the many agonies: to suffer hunger and cold, to all but kill oneself through overwork, to be kicked by a cruel driver, to be abused by unskilled persons whom not a single step you take will satisfy, yet who blame and punish the horse for their own blunders, and then at last some winter, when old age has come on, to be driven out into the bare woods.
At this point the meeting broke up and that horse who had come with such eagerness went away dejected: “by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken” (Proverbs 15:13). He had understood perfectly all that had been said, but no one there had even as much as mentioned his sufferings.
Yet each time he noticed the other horses hurrying off to a gathering he came running eagerly, hoping always that now it would be spoken of. And each time he listened he went away with a heavy heart. He came to understand better and better what the others were concerned about, but he came to understand himself less and less, just because it seemed as though the others excluded him, although he, too, was present.
Oh, you sufferer, whoever you may be, if your suffering was not hidden because you wished to hide it (for then you can manage;
your
action calls for a different comment) but if it is because of misunderstandings then you, too, have gone among men, listened carefully to their explanations, sought out their instruction, taken part in their meeting. But each time you finished the book, and each time the conversation was over, and each time the “Amen” was pronounced: then was your spirit broken because your heart grew troubled as you sighed: “Oh, that such a thing was all that I suffered from!” Oh, but you are not wholly wanting in being understood, for even if you yourself may have done nothing to deserve it, you shall be bidden to the highest thing of all, and to the Most High Himself. Nor are you wholly without human sympathy. There is a common human concern that is called edification. It is not so common as those undertakings about which the crowd shouts and clamors, for each participant is in reality alone with himself, but yet in the highest and most inclusive sense, edification is a common human concern. The edifying contemplation finds no rest until it has come to understand you. Is not one sinner who repents more important to Heaven than ninety-nine righteous men
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who have no need of repentance? So it is with you if you are one who truly suffers, your edifying contemplation is more important than the actions of
ninety-nine busy ones who have no need of edification. Yes, even if you did not exist, the edifying contemplation finds no rest before it has also plumbed this sorrow. For woe to the edifying talk that wishes only to chat between man and man about all the different inconveniences in life but does not dare risk touching upon the more terrible sufferings: such a talk is without frankness and can but have a bad conscience if it poses under the name of “edifying.” The busy ones that neither toil nor are oppressed
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but are just busy, think that they have escaped when they have contrived to avoid sufferings in this life; hence they do not wish to be disturbed either by hearing or thinking of that which is terrible. Yes, it is true that they have escaped. They have also escaped having any insight into life and have escaped into meaninglessness.
Oh, you sufferer, alone and abandoned as you are by the generation to which you belong, know that you are not abandoned by God, your creator. Everywhere you are surrounded by His understanding which offers itself to you at each moment. In it you unite your will with the Good. And the edifying contemplation is always ready to remind you of that presence; and its very existence is a source of security to the living.
As it is a comfort to seafarers to know that no matter on what strange water they may venture there are always pilots within call, so the edifying contemplation stands near the breakers and reefs of this life prepared by daily sight of terrible sufferings swiftly to render what little aid it can. Yet it cannot help in the way that a pilot helps the ship. The sufferer must help himself. But then neither shall he owe to this or to any other man what the seafarer owes to the pilot. Indeed if this sufferer like anyone else sincerely wills the Good, then he must be ready to suffer all. Then he is committed, not in that commitment by
which he is exempted from suffering, but in that by which he remains intimately bound to God, in which he wills only one thing: namely, to suffer all, to be and to remain loyally committed to the Good—under the pain of the wish.
My listener! Perhaps you are tired of so much talk about suffering—but an edifying talk never tires of it, no, a mother may sooner tire of nursing her sick child than the edifying talk of speaking of suffering. You are perhaps what is called a “happy one” whom talk of this kind tires. Yet surely you are not so happy as to wish to remain coldly ignorant of sufferings; on the contrary you aspire to this knowledge of suffering for your own sake in order that your education may be improved by its somber spectacle! Or perhaps you are a sufferer, who is wearied by talking of so many different kinds of suffering when yours is not even mentioned. Oh, to edify oneself in a living way with the sufferings of others is a comfort, and to dwell too exclusively on one’s own suffering may easily become that doubleness of mind which thinks that there is comfort for all others but none for itself. But this is not so. For with suffering each has his own, be it great or small. But with comfort it is certainly true that there is comfort for all, and in fact the same comfort for all.