The individual must be consecrated to
something higher than himself--that is the
meaning of tragedy; he must be free of the
terrible anxiety which death and time evoke in the individual:
for at any moment, in the briefest atom
of his life's course, he may encounter something holy
that endlessly outweights all his struggle and his distress
--this is what it means to have a sense for the tragic
. And if the whole of humanity is destined to die out
--and who dares doubt that?--
so the goal is set for it that is its supreme task,
so to grow together in one and in common
that it sets out as a whole to meet its coming demise
with a sense for the tragic
. All the ennoblement of humanity is enclosed in this supreme task
; the definite rejection of this task
would be the saddest picture imaginable to a friend of humanity.
This is my view of things!
(Richard Wagner in Bayreuth, 1876)
I'm going to hurt you.
then kill you.
