[609W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 304]
[P. 304] {FEUER} “ ‘Eternal’; -- in the true sense of the word – is that which negates finitude (or rather: the concept of finitude): the concept of finitude is unsuited to ‘reality’, for reality, i.e. something that is constantly changing, new and multifarious is precisely the negation of all that is merely imagined and conceived as finite: the infinitude of metaphysics is eternal unreality. {FEUER} The finite is merely an idea, albeit one that can cause us considerable disquiet; and yet it can do so only when we are unable to apprehend reality through the emotions: if, on the other hand, the reality of love draws upon us with the full force of its presence, it will negate the concept that disquiets us and destroy finitude by preventing all idea of it from entering our minds.” [609W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 304]
[610W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 304]
[P. 304] {FEUER] {Pre-SCHOP} “Egoism … ceases only when the ‘I’ is subsumedby the ‘you’: this ‘I’ and ‘you’, however, no longer show themselves as such the moment I align myself with the wholeness of the world: ‘I’ and ‘the world’ means nothing less than ‘I’ alone; the world will not become a complete reality for me until it becomes ‘you’, and this is something it can become only in the shape of the individual whom I love.” [610W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 304]
[611W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 304-305]
[P. 304] “I had reached the age of 36 before I divined the true reason for my creative impulse: until then I had regarded art as the end and life as a means to that end. But I made this discovery too late, with the result that my new instinct for life was bound to end in tragedy. {FEUER} {anti-FEUER} By taking a broader view of today’s world, we can further see that love has now become wholly impossible… . [P. 305] {FEUER} If it is a question, therefore, of seeking to save ourselves bymeans of some makeshift solution, I can find none better than a totally honest approach to the above-described state of affairs, and a frank admission of the truth, even if there be no other personal gain to be had from this than the pride of knowing the truth, and, ultimately, the will and the endeavour to pass on that knowledge to the rest of mankind and thus set them on the path that will lead to their redemption.” [611W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 304-305]
[612W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 306]
[P. 306] {FEUER} “ … I remain convinced that my lohengrin (according to my own conception of it) symbolizes the most profoundly tragic situation of the present day, namely man’s desire to descend from the most intellectual heights to the depths of love, the longing to be understood instinctively, a longing which modern reality cannot yet satisfy.”(…) This is where my art must come to the rescue: and the work of art that I had no choice but to conceive in this sense is none other than my Nibelung poem.” [612W-{1/25-26/54} Letter to August Roeckel: SLRW, p. 306]
