PYRRH~S
AND CYNEAS
335
So I must have with me men who
for me
are free, who can respond
to my appeal.
-
In every situation men are entirely free since the situation exists
to
be
superseded, and for that all have equal liberty. An ignoramus who
tries to educate himself is free, equally with a scientist who invents a new
hypothesis. We equally respect in every being the free effort to transcend
himself towards being; what is incomprehensible is the renunciation of
freedom. We cannot know how to establish any moral hierarchy among
human situations. Only, so far as I am concerned, there are certain of
these· transcendences which I can transcend and which crystallize for
me as objectives; there are others which I can but equal, or which
transcend me. Tess d'Urbeville loves Clare; the three farm girls who also
love Clare do not transcend the love of Tess; with Tess they transcend
themselves towards Clare. But if we discover Clare's weaknesses, if we
do not loveher while we recognize Tess's liberty we only see in her love
something foreign to us. The liberty of others only exists separately from
me in so far as it tends towards an alien end or one already transcended.
The ignoramus who uses his state of liberty to overcome his state of
ignorance can do nothing for the physician who has just invented a
complicated theory. The sick person who exhausts himself fighting against
his illness, or the slave against his slavery, care neither for poetry nor
for astronomy nor for the perfection of aviation; they first need health,
leisure, security, free disposal of themselves. The freedom of others has
only value for me if my aims can in their turn serve them for a point of
departure; it is by use of the tool which I made that others extend its
existence; the scientist can only talk with men who have reached a degree
of knowledge equal to his own; then he presents his theory to them as a
basis for new work. Another can only equal my transcendence if he is at
the same stage on the road as
I.
Lest our cries be lost in empty space I must have men near me who
are ready to hear me; and these men must be my peers. I cannot retreat
because the movement of my transcendence carries me unceasingly
forward, and I cannot move alone towards the future; I should lose –
myself in a waste where I should journey in vain. Then I must try to
create such circumstances for men that they can accompany me and
surpass my transcendence; I need them to
be
free to make use of me, and
in surpassing me to preserve me. I ask for mankind health, knowledge,
well-being and leisure, so that their liberty may not be employed in fight–
ing off sickness, ignorance and poverty.
Thus it is necessary that man should begin in two converging direc–
tions: he establishes objectives where he finds the concept of his trans–
cendency crystallized; and he transcends himself by a forward movement
which is his very liberty; at each step he tries to draw mankind
to
him.
He is like the commander of an expedition who plans a new route for
