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THE ESSAYS

OF

ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER


TRANSLATED BY

T. BAILEY SAUNDERS, M.A.




COUNSELS AND MAXIMS.

  _Le bonheur n'est pas chose aisee: il est
  tres difficile de le trouver en nous, et impossible
  de le trouver ailleurs_.

CHAMFORT.




CONTENTS.


CHAPTER

  INTRODUCTION
  I.   GENERAL RULES
  II.  OUR RELATION TO OURSELVES
  III. OUR RELATION TO OTHERS
  IV.  WORLDLY FORTUNE
  V.   THE AGES OF LIFE




INTRODUCTION.

If my object in these pages were to present a complete scheme of
counsels and maxims for the guidance of life, I should have to repeat
the numerous rules--some of them excellent--which have been drawn
up by thinkers of all ages, from Theognis and Solomon[1] down to La
Rochefoucauld; and, in so doing, I should inevitably entail upon the
reader a vast amount of well-worn commonplace. But the fact is that in
this work I make still less claim to exhaust my subject than in any
other of my writings.

[Footnote 1: I refer to the proverbs and maxims ascribed, in the Old
Testament, to the king of that name.]

An author who makes no claims to