398
PAR'TISAN REVIEW
them, a project for dealing with them, for manipulating their forms,
which will produce a minimum transformation of his environment,
just enough so that things will oppress him a little less and in con–
sequence allow him more frequent and leisurely withdrawals into
himself . . . and so on, time after time.
There are, then, three different moments, which are repeated
cyclically throughout the course of human history, in forms each
time more complex and rich:
1.
Man feels himself lost, ship–
wrecked upon things; this is
alteraci6n.
2. Man, by an energetic
effort, retires into himself to form ideas about things and his pos–
sible dominance over them; this is taking a stand within the self,
ensimismamiento,
the
vita contemplativa
of the Romans, the
theore–
tikos bios
of the Greeks,
theory.
3. Man again submerges himself
in the world, to act in it according to a preconceived plan; this is
action,
vita activa, praxis.
Accordingly it is impossible to speak of action except in so far
as it will be governed by a previous contemplation; and v£ce versa,
the stand within the self is nothing but a projecting of future action.
Man's destiny, then, is primarily
action.
We do not live to
think, but, on the contrary, we think in order that we may succeed
in surviving. This is a point of capital importance, upon which, in
my judgment, we must set ourselves in radical opposition to the
entire philosophical tradition and make up our minds to deny that
thought,
in any sufficing sense of the word, was given to man once
and for all, so that without further ado he finds it at his disposal,
as a perfect faculty or power, ready to be employed and exercised,
as flight was given to the bird and swimming to the fish.
If
this pertinacious doctrine were valid, it would follow that
as the fish can-immediately-swim, man could-immediately and
without further ado-think. Such a notion deplorably blinds us to
the peculiar drama, the unique drama, which constitutes the very
condition of man. Because if for a moment, so that we may under–
stand one another here and now, we admit the traditional idea
that thought is the characteristic of man-remember
man, a ra–
tion-al animal-so
that to be a man would be, as our inspired fore–
father, Descartes, claimed, the same as to be
a thinking thing,
we
should find ourselves holding that man, by being endowed once
and for
all
with
thought,
by possessing it with the certainty with
