The Greatest Fear. Unamuno, Life 3.7
What scares you most? Unamuno fears nothingness: the utter emptiness of non-existence.
Hay, entre los poéticos quejidos del pobre Cowper, unas líneas escritas bajo el peso del delirio, y en las cuales, creyéndose blanco de la divina venganza, exclama que el infierno podrá procurar un abrigo a sus miserias.
Hell might afford my miseries a shelter.
Este es el sentimiento puritano, la preocupación del pecado y de la predestinación; pero, leed estas otras mucho más terribles palabras de Sénancour, expresivas de la desesperación católica, no ya de la protestante, cuando hace decir a su Obermann (carta XC): «L’homme est périssable. Il se peut; mais périssons en résistant, et, si le néant nous est réservé, ne faisons pas que ce soit une justice». Y he de confesar, en efecto, por dolorosa que la confesión sea, que nunca, en los días de la fe ingenua de mi mocedad, me hicieron temblar las descripciones, por truculentas que fuesen, de las torturas del infierno, y sentí siempre ser la nada mucho más aterradora que él. El que sufre vive, y el que vive sufriendo ama y espera, aunque a la puerta de su mansión le pongan el «¡Dejad toda esperanza!», y es mejor vivir en dolor que no dejar de ser en paz. En el fondo era que no podía creer en esa atrocidad de un infierno, de una eternidad de pena, ni veía más verdadero infierno que la nada y su perspectiva. Y sigo creyendo que si creyésemos todos en nuestra salvación de la nada seríamos todos mejores.
Among the poetic laments of poor Cowper (†) are a few lines written under the weight of insanity, in which the author imagines himself condemned by divine vengeance, and exclaims that hell shall provide protection for his wretchedness:
Hell might afford my miseries a shelter.
This is a Puritan sentiment, showing typical preoccupation with sin and predestination (‡). But the words of Senancour, expressing Catholic desperation rather than Protestant in the mouth of his character Obermann, are even worse. Read them: "Man is perishable. Maybe so. But let us perish resisting this, and if nothingness is our lot, let not our actions make this just." I must confess here, painful as it is, that in the days of my naively faithful youth, I never trembled at descriptions of infernal torment, no matter how savage they might be. Always I felt that nothingness was more terrifying than hell. The man who suffers lives, and if he is alive while suffering, then he loves and hopes, for all that someone mark the gate of his mansion with the words, "Abandon all hope!" Better to live in pain than to relinquish existence in peace. As a youth, I could not seriously believe in the atrocity of hell, an eternity of woe, and I saw no truer hell than utter emptiness, and its outlook. I still believe that we would all be better people if we believed in our own salvation from nothingness.
What is the joy of living, la joie de vivre, that people tell us about today? Hunger for God. Thirst for eternity, for survival. Our poor little pleasure in a life that passes and does not remain will always drown us. An uninhibited love for life, a love that wants it to last forever, is the most common cause for anxiety about death. "If I am turned to nothing," we say to ourselves, "if I die utterly and finally, then the world is over for me, and it has ended. Why should it not end as soon as possible, before new consciences arise to suffer the grievous disappointment of an existence ephemeral and unreal? If the illusion of life is undone, if our life exists only for its own sake or for the sake of others who also must die, and this does nothing to fill our souls, then why live? Death is our remedy for this woe." Thus do we lament endless rest, out of fear, and come to call death our liberator.
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(†) William Cowper (1731-1800) was born into the family of an English clergyman, John Cowper, rector of the Church of St. Peter in Berkhamsted. He studied classics at Westminster School, and upon graduation trained as a lawyer. After two setbacks to his fledgling career—his proposal to marry his cousin Theodora was rebuffed by her father, and his strenuous preparation for exams required to secure a clerkship in the House of Lords precipitated a nervous breakdown—he attempted suicide and went into an insane asylum. After coming out, he lived with the family of a retired clergyman, and began to write poetry. He had at least one more episode of suicidal madness in 1773, when he believed that God condemned him to eternity in hell and ordered him to kill himself. So Unamuno is not being facetious here with his references to insanity. Cowper's poetry is not all mad or dreary, though; when not writing about eternal damnation, he liked to describe nature and the daily life of the English countryside.