206 Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path
demonstrate that a cleverly calculated surplus of pleasure
or pain is actually felt.
For the moment, I shall not review the calculations of
the pessimists who support their opinions with a rational-
ist worldview; still, anyone deciding whether or not to
carry on with the business of life will first demand to be
shown where the calculated surplus of pain is to be
found.
Here we touch the point where reason by itself isnotin
a position to determine the surplus of pleasure or pain,
but must rather demonstrate that surplus as a percept in
life. For human beings cannot attain reality solely
through concepts, but only through the interpenetration,
mediated by thinking (cf. pp. 88 ff.), of concepts and per-
cepts (and feelings are percepts). A merchant, likewise,
will close his business only if the loss calculated by his
accountant is confirmed by the facts. If that does not hap-
pen, he will have the accountant calculate again. We con-
duct the business of life in just the same way. If a
philosopher wants to prove that pain is much more com-
mon than pleasure, and yet we do not feel this to be so,
then we say: you have made a mistake in your brooding;
think it through again! But, if, at a given moment, a busi-
ness really suffers such losses that its credit can no longer
satisfy the creditors, then bankruptcy results even if the
merchant’s bookkeeping obscures the state of his affairs.
In the same way, if, at a certain moment, the quantity of
a person’s pain is so great that no hope (credit) of future
pleasure can offer solace, then this must lead to bankrupt-
cy in the business of life.
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