Philosophy as a way of life

To observe human affairs from above means, at the same time, to see them from the point of view of death. It is only this perspective which brings about the necessary elevation and loosening of the spirit, which can provide the distance we need in order to see things as they really are. The Cynic never ceases denouncing mankind's delusions: forgetful of death, people passionately attach their hearts to some object - luxury or power, for example - which, in the course of time, they will inevitably be forced to give up. This is why the Cynics called upon mankind to rid themselves of superfluous desires, and to reject social conventions, and the whole of artificial civilization, as being nothing but a source of worries, care, and suffering. The Cynics would have us return to a simple, purely natural way of life.

To return to Lucian: we learn from his short essay How One Should Write History that the view from above is appropriate not only to the philosopher but also to the historian. More precisely, the historian's gaze must be the same as the philosopher's: courageous, free of party affiliations, not bound to any nation, but equally well disposed towards all, making no concessions either to friendship or to hate. This attitude must be expressed in the historian's presentation of his materials. The historian, says Lucian, must be like Homer's Zeus: gazing now at the land of the Thracians, now at the land of the Mysians.45

For the third time now, we encounter the Homeric topos of a god casting his gaze down at the earth. This time, however, the Homeric source is quoted so as to serve as a model of that impartiality which must characterize historical reporting, thanks to the elevated viewpoint the historian has elected as his own. This is what a modern writer might refer to as "the viewpoint of Sirius."

Thus we find Ernest Renan writing in 1 880: "Viewed from the solar system, our revolutions have scarcely the extent of the movements of atoms.

Considered from Sirius, they are even smaller still. " �6 To adopt the viewpoint of Sirius means, here again, to undertake the spiritual exercise of letting go and usin!( reserve, so as to achieve impartiality, objectivity, and critical judgmcnl .

248

Themes

I have only been able to bring up here a few aspects of an extraordinarily rich tradition. If - as I hope to do one day - one were to write the complete history of the theme of the view from above, many other texts would have to be taken into consideration. Here, by way of conclusion, I shall restrict myself to citing Baudelaire's poem "Elevation," in which the great Symbolist describes the experience of the poet. For him, the poet was a being not meant for this world (as he put it in "The Albatross," "His huge wings prevent him from walking"). Yet, thanks to his poetic gifts, which allow him to observe things from above, the poet is also a being capable of seizing the hidden correspondences in things. We thus return to the theme of Goethe's "true poetry," which is really a kind of physics in the sense in which we have defmed this term above: an intensive attempt to plunge into the secrets of nature.

[Elevation]

Above the ponds, above the valleys,

The mountains, woods, the clouds, and seas,

Beyond the sun, beyond the ether-,

Beyond the limits of the starry spheres,

My spirit, you move with swift agility.

Like a good swimmer at home in the sea,

You slice gay furrows through the measureless depths, With ineffable, masculine joy.

Fly far away from these pestilent fumes,

Go cleanse yourself in the upper air.

Go drink, like a pure, celestial liquor,

The bright fire that fills transparent space.

Left behind, all cares and endless sorrow

That weigh upon our foggy life like stones!

Oh happy man, who soars on sturdy wings

To calm and luminous fields!

In the morning, his thoughts, in their freedom,

soar up to the heavens like larks.

- He sails over life, understanding with ease

The language of flowers and voiceless things. •7

The View from Above

249

NOTES

I Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, I, 1074-9, 1088-95.

2 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Letter to Schiller, in Goelhes Brieftn, in Goethes Werke, Hamburger Ausgabe (hereafter HA), vol. 2, p. 344.

3 Homer, Iliad, bk S, 767-73.

4 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Dichtung und Wahrheit, bk 13, HA, vol. 9, p. 580.

S See above.

6 Homer, Odyssey, 1, 36.

7 Xenophon, Memorabilia, I, 4, 1 7 .

8 Philo Judaeus, Legum A/legoriae, I, 62; Qµod delerius, 86; De mutatione nominum, 178-80; De opijicio mundi, 69-7 1 .

9 Plato, P/1aedrus, 246c--8c.

lO Cicero, Tuswlan Disputations, I, 1 9, 43-5.

1 1 Seneca, Consolatio ad Marciam, 25, 2.