A contradiction arose from which there were two exits. Either

that which I called reason was not so rational as I supposed, or

that which seemed to me irrational was not so irrational as I

supposed. And I began to verify the line of argument of my

rational knowledge.

Verifying the line of argument of rational knowledge I found

it quite correct. The conclusion that life is nothing was

inevitable; but I noticed a mistake. The mistake lay in this, that

my reasoning was not in accord with the question I had put. The

question was: “Why should I live, that is to say, what real,

permanent result will come out of my illusory transitory life —

what meaning has my finite existence in this infinite world?” And

to reply to that question I had studied life.

The solution of all the possible questions of life could

evidently not satisfy me, for my question, simple as it at first

appeared, included a demand for an explanation of the finite in

terms of the infinite, and vice versa.

I asked: “What is the meaning of my life, beyond time, cause,

and space?” And I replied to quite another question: “What is the

meaning of my life within time, cause, and space?” With the

result that, after long efforts of thought, the answer I reached

was: “None.”

In my reasonings I constantly compared (nor could I do

otherwise) the finite with the finite, and the infinite with the

infinite; but for that reason I reached the inevitable result:

force is force, matter is matter, will is will, the infinite is the

infinite, nothing is nothing — and that was all that could result.

It was something like what happens in mathematics, when

thinking to solve an equation, we find we are working on an

identity. the line of reasoning is correct, but results in the

answer that a equals a, or x equals x, or o equals o. the same

thing happened with my reasoning in relation to the question of the

meaning of my life. The replies given by all science to that

question only result in — identity.

And really, strictly scientific knowledge — that knowledge

which begins, as Descartes’s did, with complete doubt about

everything — rejects all knowledge admitted on faith and builds

everything afresh on the laws of reason and experience, and cannot

give any other reply to the question of life than that which I

obtained: an indefinite reply. Only at first had it seemed to me

that knowledge had given a positive reply — the reply of

Schopenhauer: that life has no meaning and is an evil. But on

examining the matter I understood that the reply is not positive,

it was only my feeling that so expressed it. Strictly expressed,

as it is by the Brahmins and by Solomon and Schopenhauer, the reply

is merely indefinite, or an identity: o equals o, life is nothing.

So that philosophic knowledge denies nothing, but only replies that

the question cannot be solved by it — that for it the solution

remains indefinite.

Having understood this, I understood that it was not possible

to seek in rational knowledge for a reply to my question, and that

the reply given by rational knowledge is a mere indication that a

reply can only be obtained by a different statement of the question

and only when the relation of the finite to the infinite is

included in the question. And I understood that, however

irrational and distorted might be the replies given by faith, they

have this advantage, that they introduce into every answer a

relation between the finite and the infinite, without which there

can be no solution.

In whatever way I stated the question, that relation appeared

in the answer. How am I to live? — According to the law of God.

What real result will come of my life? — Eternal torment or

eternal bliss. What meaning has life that death does not destroy?

— Union with the eternal God: heaven.

So that besides rational knowledge, which had seemed to me the

only knowledge, I was inevitably brought to acknowledge that all

live humanity has another irrational knowledge — faith which makes

it possible to live. Faith still remained to me as irrational as

it was before, but I could not but admit that it alone gives

mankind a reply to the questions of life, and that consequently it

makes life possible. Reasonable knowledge had brought me to

acknowledge that life is senseless — my life had come to a halt

and I wished to destroy myself. Looking around on the whole of

mankind I saw that people live and declare that they know the

meaning of life. I looked at myself — I had lived as long as I

knew a meaning of life and had made life possible.

Looking again at people of other lands, at my contemporaries

and at their predecessors, I saw the same thing. Where there is

life, there since man began faith has made life possible for him,

and the chief outline of that faith is everywhere and always

identical.

Whatever the faith may be, and whatever answers it may give,

and to whomsoever it gives them, every such answer gives to the

finite existence of man an infinite meaning, a meaning not

destroyed by sufferings, deprivations, or death. This means that

only in faith can we find for life a meaning and a possibility.

What, then, is this faith? And I understood that faith is not

merely “the evidence of things not seen”, etc., and is not a

revelation (that defines only one of the indications of faith, is

not the relation of man to God (one has first to define faith and

then God, and not define faith through God); it not only agreement

with what has been told one (as faith is most usually supposed to

be), but faith is a knowledge of the meaning of human life in

consequence of which man does not destroy himself but lives. Faith

is the strength of life. If a man lives he believes in something.

If he did not believe that one must live for something, he would

not live. If he does not see and recognize the illusory nature of

the finite, he believes in the finite; if he understands the

illusory nature of the finite, he must believe in the infinite.

Without faith he cannot live.

And I recalled the whole course of my mental labour and was

horrified. It was now clear to me that for man to be able to live

he must either not see the infinite, or have such an explanation of

the meaning of life as will connect the finite with the infinite.

Such an explanation I had had; but as long as I believed in the

finite I did not need the explanation, and I began to verify it by

reason. And in the light of reason the whole of my former

explanation flew to atoms. But a time came when I ceased to

believe in the finite. And then I began to build up on rational

foundations, out of what I knew, an explanation which would give a

meaning to life; but nothing could I build. Together with the best

human intellects I reached the result that o equals o, and was much

astonished at that conclusion, though nothing else could have

resulted.

What was I doing when I sought an answer in the experimental

sciences? I wished to know why I live, and for this purpose

studied all that is outside me. Evidently I might learn much, but

nothing of what I needed.

What was I doing when I sought an answer in philosophical

knowledge? I was studying the thoughts of those who had found

themselves in the same position as I, lacking a reply to the

question “why do I live?” Evidently I could learn nothing but what

I knew myself, namely that nothing can be known.

What am I? — A part of the infinite. In those few words lies

the whole problem.

Is it possible that humanity has only put that question to

itself since yesterday? And can no one before me have set himself

that question — a question so simple, and one that springs to the

tongue of every wise child?

Surely that question has been asked since man began; and

naturally for the solution of that question since man began it has

been equally insufficient to compare the finite with the finite and

the infinite with the infinite, and since man began the relation of

the finite to the infinite has been sought out and expressed.

All these conceptions in which the finite has been adjusted to

the infinite and a meaning found for life — the conception of God,

of will, of goodness — we submit to logical examination. And all

those conceptions fail to stand reason’s criticism.

Were it not so terrible it would be ludicrous with what pride

and self-satisfaction we, like children, pull the watch to pieces,

take out the spring, make a toy of it, and are then surprised that

the watch does not go.

A solution of the contradiction between the finite and the

infinite, and such a reply to the question of life as will make it

possible to live, is necessary and precious. And that is the only

solution which we find everywhere, always, and among all peoples:

a solution descending from times in which we lose sight of the life

of man, a solution so difficult that we can compose nothing like it

and this solution we light-heartedly destroy in order again to

set the same question, which is natural to everyone and to which we

have no answer.

The conception of an infinite god, the divinity of the soul,

the connexion of human affairs with God, the unity and existence of

the soul, man’s conception of moral goodness and evil — are

conceptions formulated in the hidden infinity of human thought,

they are those conceptions without which neither life nor I should

exist; yet rejecting all that labour of the whole of humanity, I

wished to remake it afresh myself and in my own manner.

I did not then think like that, but the germs of these

thoughts were already in me. I understood, in the first place,

that my position with Schopenhauer and Solomon, notwithstanding our

wisdom, was stupid: we see that life is an evil and yet continue

to live. That is evidently stupid, for if life is senseless and I

am so fond of what is reasonable, it should be destroyed, and then

there would be no one to challenge it. Secondly, I understood that

all one’s reasonings turned in a vicious circle like a wheel out of

gear with its pinion. However much and however well we may reason

we cannot obtain a reply to the question; and o will always equal

o, and therefore our path is probably erroneous. Thirdly, I began

to understand that in the replies given by faith is stored up the

deepest human wisdom and that I had no right to deny them on the

ground of reason, and that those answers are the only ones which

reply to life’s question.