1001Philosophers

Arthur Schopenhauer vs Friedrich Nietzsche

Schopenhauer was Nietzsche's first and most decisive philosophical influence; Nietzsche read The World as Will and Representation in his early twenties, and his early work is unintelligible without Schopenhauer behind it. Nietzsche's mature philosophy is in important respects a sustained turning against everything Schopenhauer represented.

At a glance

Arthur SchopenhauerFriedrich Nietzsche
Dates1788 – 18601844 – 1900
NationalityGermanGerman
EraModernModern
Movements Continental Philosophy Existentialism, Continental Philosophy
Profile Arthur Schopenhauer → Friedrich Nietzsche →

Where they agree

Both held that the appearance of the world conceals an underlying drive that is not rational, both took aesthetic experience seriously as a mode of philosophical insight, and both wrote against the systematic optimism of Hegelian idealism. Both treated music as a special philosophical art with privileged access to the underlying reality.

Where they disagree

Schopenhauer held that the underlying will is the source of suffering, and that the highest human achievement is its denial through asceticism, contemplation, and aesthetic detachment. Nietzsche came to see this as the final symptom of the Christian morality he wanted to overcome — a no-saying disposition disguised as wisdom. Where Schopenhauer denies the will, Nietzsche affirms it; where Schopenhauer pities suffering, Nietzsche treats it as the discipline that produces depth and value. The contrast is the clearest case in modern philosophy of a thinker turning against his own first teacher.

Representative quotes

Arthur Schopenhauer

  • “Talent hits a target no one else can hit; genius hits a target no one else can see.”

    Das Talent gleicht dem Schützen, der ein Ziel trifft, welches die Uebrigen nicht erreichen können; das Genie dem, der eines trifft, bis zu welchem sie nicht ein Mal zu sehn vermögen... | Vol. II, Ch. III, para. 31 (On Genius), 1844 | As cited in The Little Book of Bathroom Philosophy: Daily Wisdom from the Greatest Thinkers‎ (2004) by Gregory Bergman, p. 137

  • “Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.”

    Psychological Observations

  • “We forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to be like other people.”

    As attributed in Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern English and Foreign Sources (1899) by James Wood, p. 624

Friedrich Nietzsche

  • “Postcard to Franz Overbeck , Sils-Maria (30 July 1881), tr. Walter Kaufmann , The Portable Nietzsche (1954)”

    I am utterly amazed, utterly enchanted! I have a precursor , and what a precursor! I hardly knew Spinoza : that I should have turned to him just now , was inspired by "instinct." Not only is his overtendency like mine—namely to make all knowledge the most powerful affect — but in five main points of his doctrine I recognize myself; this most unusual and loneliest thinker is closest to me precisely

  • “Here the ways of men part: if you wish to strive for peace of soul and pleasure, then believe; if you wish to be a devotee of truth, then inquire.”

    Letter to Elisabeth Nietzsche, Bonn, 1865-06-11, [ specific citation needed ] quoted as epigraph in Walter Kaufmann, The Faith of a Heretic (1961)

  • “Letter to Elisabeth Nietzsche, Bonn, 1865-06-11, [ specific citation needed ] quoted as epigraph in Walter Kaufmann, The Faith of a Heretic (1961)”

    Here the ways of men part: if you wish to strive for peace of soul and pleasure, then believe; if you wish to be a devotee of truth, then inquire.

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