Please read the Glossary of My Terms to be able to follow this post.
Philosophers advance ideas they believe will alleviate forms of malcontent endemic to earthware. Heartseekers desire not alleviation, but to be l i f t e d c l e a r of dis-ease … and have innate certainty that ideas are as applicable in this regard as a garden hose to the mapping of the heavens.
Certain philosophers saw the limitations of earthscheme as insurmountable … “Strut, fret, and delude ourselves as we may, our lives are of no significance, and it is futile to seek or to affirm meaning where none can be found” (Schopenhauer) or “The life of a man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster” (David Hume). For heartseekers these are points of departure.
The case of Leo Tolstoy is instructive. A loving wife and family, considerable creative satisfaction, fame, money, left him craving something more. He turned to philosophy, but this fell short. At the age of 82 he fled his home in the middle of the night, seeking to live out his final days in simplicity and solitude. But the press and his followers tracked his movements, and he died at a railway station … of heart failure. His last words were reportedly “Run away! We must run away.” We have here a fine, powerful intellect finding sterility in philosophy.