for they are, one and all, movements of will—­desires, hopes, fears and ambitions, no matter to what directed:  they are always satisfied at the cost of pain, and in the case of ambition, generally with more or less of illusion.  With intellectual pleasure, on the other hand, truth becomes clearer and clearer.  In the realm of intelligence pain has no power.  Knowledge is all in all.  Further, intellectual pleasures are accessible entirely and only through the medium of the intelligence, and are limited by its capacity. For all the wit there is in the world is useless to him who has none.  Still this advantage is accompanied by a substantial disadvantage; for the whole of Nature shows that with the growth of intelligence comes increased capacity for pain, and it is only with the highest degree of intelligence that suffering reaches its supreme point.]

The normal, ordinary man takes a vivid interest in anything only in so far as it excites his will, that is to say, is a matter of personal interest to him.  But constant excitement of the will is never an unmixed good, to say the least; in other words, it involves pain.  Card-playing, that universal occupation of “good society” everywhere, is a device for providing this kind of excitement, and that, too, by means of interests so small as to produce slight and momentary, instead of real and permanent, pain.  Card-playing is, in fact, a mere tickling of the will.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Vulgarity is, at bottom, the kind of consciousness in which the will completely predominates over the intellect, where the latter does nothing more than perform the service of its master, the will.  Therefore, when the will makes no demands, supplies no motives, strong or weak, the intellect entirely loses its power, and the result is complete vacancy of mind.  Now will without intellect is the most vulgar and common thing in the world, possessed by every blockhead, who, in the gratification of his passions, shows the stuff of which he is made.  This is the condition of mind called vulgarity, in which the only active elements are the organs of sense, and that small amount of intellect which is necessary for apprehending the data of sense.  Accordingly, the vulgar man is constantly open to all sorts of impressions, and immediately perceives all the little trifling things that go on in his environment:  the lightest whisper, the most trivial circumstance, is sufficient to rouse his attention; he is just like an animal.  Such a man’s mental condition reveals itself in his face, in his whole exterior; and hence that vulgar, repulsive appearance, which is all the more offensive, if, as is usually the case, his will—­the only factor in his consciousness—­is a base, selfish and altogether bad one.]

On the other hand, a man of powerful intellect is capable of taking a vivid interest in things in the way of mere knowledge, with no admixture of will; nay, such an interest is a necessity to him.  It places him in a sphere where pain is an alien,—­a diviner air, where the gods live serene.