But as soon as intellect and self-consciousness had been
evolved, civilisation became possible. Nature has no history in the
sense of the origin of values; in the case of still uncivilised tribes
every new generation is a faithful reproduction of the preceding one.
Certainly there is modification caused by adaptation to the environment,
but there are no moral values, and consequently there is no history.
I have attempted to explain why tragedy is inseparable from love in its
highest intensity, to show the limits which check all deep emotion and
the yearning which would overstep them. The emotional life of man, which
is capable of infinite evolution, can only find satisfaction on its
lower, animal stages. Hunger, thirst, and sexual craving can be
satisfied without much difficulty, and therefore no tragic shadow falls
on the first stage. But the emotion which overwhelms the soul cannot be
appeased. Not only the great thinker's thirst for knowledge, the
mystic's religious yearning, the aesthetic will of the rare artist, but
also the love and longing of the passionate lover must reach beyond the
attainable to the infinite.
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