So those who do his will, the simple, unlearned working folk, whom we
regard as cattle, do not reproach the master; but we, the wise, eat the
master's food but do not do what the master wishes, and instead of doing it
sit in a circle and discuss: "Why should that handle be moved? Isn't it
stupid?" So we have decided. We have decided that the master is stupid, or
does not exist, and that we are wise, only we feel that we are quite useless
and that we must somehow do away with ourselves.
XII
The consciousness of the error in reasonable knowledge helped me to free
myself from the temptation of idle ratiocination. the conviction that
knowledge of truth can only be found by living led me to doubt the
rightness of my life; but I was saved only by the fact that I was able to tear
myself from my exclusiveness and to see the real life of the plain working
people, and to understand that it alone is real life. I understood that if I wish
to understand life and its meaning, I must not live the life of a parasite, but
must live a real life, and -- taking the meaning given to live by real
humanity and merging myself in that life -- verify it.
During that time this is what happened to me. During that whole year, when
I was asking myself almost every moment whether I should not end matters
with a noose or a bullet -- all that time, together with the course of thought
and observation about which I have spoken, my heart was oppressed with a
painful feeling, which I can only describe as a search for God.
I say that that search for God was not reasoning, but a feeling, because that
search proceeded not from the course of my thoughts -- it was even directly
contrary to them -- but proceeded from the heart. It was a feeling of fear,
orphanage, isolation in a strange land, and a hope of help from someone.
Though I was quite convinced of the impossibility of proving the existence
of a Deity (Kant had shown, and I quite understood him, that it could not be
proved), I yet sought for god, hoped that I should find Him, and from old
habit addressed prayers to that which I sought but had not found. I went
over in my mind the arguments of Kant and Schopenhauer showing the