Sexdoes not hesitate to
intrude with its trash,
and to interfere with the
negotiations of statesmen
and the investigations of
the learned. Every day it
destroys the most
valuable relationships.
Indeed it robs of all
conscience those who were
previously honorable and
upright.
_________________________
After his mother, the next most pervasive female presence in Arthur`s life was a
querulous seamstress named Caroline Marquet. Few biographical accounts of
Schopenhauer fail to spotlight their 1823 midday encounter, which took place on
a dimly lit Berlin stairway outside Arthur`s flat when he was thirty–five and
Caroline forty–five.
On that day Caroline Marquet, living in the adjoining flat, entertained three
friends. Irritated by the noisy chattering, Arthur flung open his door, accused the
four women of violating his privacy since the anteroom where they stood talking
was technically a part of his flat, and sternly ordered them to leave. When
Caroline refused, Arthur physically forced her, kicking and screaming, from the
anteroom and down the stairs. When she impertinently climbed back up the stairs
in defiance, he again removed her, this time more forcefully.
Caroline sued him, claiming that she was pushed down the stairs and
suffered grievous injury resulting in trembling and partial paralysis. Arthur was
highly threatened by the lawsuit: he knew that he was unlikely ever to earn money
from his scholarly pursuits and had always fiercely guarded the capital inherited
from his father. When his money was imperiled he became, in the words of his
publisher, «a chained dog.»
Certain that Caroline Marquet was an opportunistic malingerer, he fought
her lawsuit with all his might, employing every possible legal appeal. The bitter
court proceedings continued for the next six years before the court ruled against
him and ordered him to pay Caroline Marquet sixty talers a year for as long as her
injury persisted. (In that era a house servant or cook would have been paid twenty
talers annually plus food and board.) Arthur`s prediction that she was shrewd
enough to tremble as long as the money rolled in proved accurate; he continued to
pay for her support until she died twenty–six years later. When he was sent a copy
of her death certificate he scrawled across it: «Obit anus, abit onus» (the old
woman dies, the burden is lifted).
And other women in Arthur`s life? Arthur never married but was far from
chaste: for the first half of his life he was highly sexually active, perhaps even
sexually driven. When Anthime, his childhood friend from Le Havre, visited
Hamburg during Arthur`s apprenticeship, the two young men spent their evenings
searching for amorous adventures, always with women from lower social strata—
maids, actresses, chorus girls. If they were unsuccessful in their search, they
ended their evening by consoling themselves in the arms of an «industrious
whore.»
Arthur, lacking in tact, charm, and joie de vivre, was an inept seducer and
needed much advice from Anthime. His many rejections ultimately caused him to
link sexual desire with humiliation. He hated being dominated by the sexual drive
and in subsequent years had much to say about the degradation of sinking to
animalistic life. It was not that Arthur didn`t want women; he was clear about
that: «I was very fond of them—if only they would have had me.»
The saddest of love stories in the Schopenhauer chronicles took place when
he was forty–three and attempted to court Flora Weiss, a beautiful seventeen–year–old girl. One evening at a boating party he approached Flora with a bunch of
grapes and informed her of his attraction to her and his intention of speaking to
her parents about marriage. Later, Flora`s father was taken aback by
Schopenhauer`s proposal and responded, «But she is a mere child.» Ultimately, he
agreed to leave the decision to Flora. The business came to an end when Flora
made it clear to all concerned that she vehemently disliked Schopenhauer.
Decades later, Flora Weiss`s niece questioned her aunt about that encounter
with the famous philosopher and, in her diary, quoted her aunt as saying, «Oh,
leave me in peace about this old Schopenhauer.» When pressed for more
information, Flora Weiss described Arthur`s gift of the grapes and said, «But I
didn`t want them, you see. I felt revolted because old Schopenhauer had touched
them. And so I let them slide, quite gently, into the water behind me.»
There is no evidence that Arthur ever had a love affair with a woman whom
he respected. His sister, Adele, after receiving a letter in which Arthur reported
«two love affairs without love,” responded, in one of their few interchanges about
his personal life, «May you not totally lose the ability to esteem a woman while
dealing with the common and base ones of our sex and may Heaven one day lead
you to a woman to whom you can feel something deeper than these infatuations.»
At thirty–three Arthur entered into an intermittent ten–year liaison with a
young Berlin chorus girl named Caroline Richter–Medon, who often carried on
affairs with several men simultaneously. Arthur had no objections to that
arrangement and said, «For a woman, limitation to one man during the short time
of her flowering is an unnatural state. She is expected to save for one what he
cannot use and what many others desire from her.» He was opposed to monogamy
for men as well: «Man at one time has too much and in the long run too little....
half their lives men are whoremongers, half cuckolds.»
When Arthur moved from Berlin to Frankfurt, he offered to take Caroline
with him but not her illegitimate son, whom he insisted was not his. Caroline
refused to abandon her child, and after a short correspondence their relationship
ended for good. Even so, Arthur, almost thirty years later, at the age of seventy–one, added a codicil to his will leaving Caroline Richter–Medon five thousand
talers.
Though he often scorned women and the entire institution of matrimony,
Arthur vacillated about marriage. He cautioned himself by reflecting, «All great
poets were unhappily married and all great philosophers stayed unmarried:
Democritus, Descartes, Plato, Spinoza, Leibniz, and Kant. The only exception
was Socrates—and he had to pay for it, for his wife was the shrewish
Xanthippe.... most men are tempted by the outward appearance of women, that
hides their vices. They marry young and pay a high price when they get older for
their wives become hysterical and stubborn.»
As he aged he gradually relinquished the hope of marriage and gave up the
idea completely at the age of forty. To marry at a late age, he said, was
