Single Idea 24088

[catalogued under 23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 8. Eternal Recurrence]

Full Idea

Let us press the image of eternity on our life! This thought contains more than all religions that despise this life as fleeting and taught us to look toward an unspecified different life.

Gist of Idea

See our present lives as eternal! Religions see it as fleeting, and aim at some different life

Source

Friedrich Nietzsche (Unpublished Notebooks 1881-82 [1882], 11[159])

Book Reference

Nietzsche,Friedrich: 'The Joyful Science, and 1881-82 fragments (v 6)', ed/tr. Del Caro,Adrian [Stanford 2023], p.358


A Reaction

This is the best statement of the idea of eternal recurrence I have so far found. His ideal is to design a life for ourselves which we would be happy to see endlessly repeated. A lot of thought would have to go into that!