This selection of thoughts on religion, ethics, politics, women, suicide, books and many other themes is taken from Schopenhaur's last work, Parerga and Paralipomena, which he published in 1851. No German philosopher had written so well or so readably before him, and none had propounded the athiestic view that everything may not be all for the best. This articulate if despairing vision contributed to Schopenhaur's enormous popularity. In his introduction R.J. Hollingdale explains the metaphysical background to Schopenhauer's ideas and the psychological setting for the theory of the 'will', which anticipated Freud's notion of the unconcscious.
