The Myth Of Sisyphus
by
Albert Camus

(In Progress…)

There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. All the rest—whether or not the world has three dimensions, whether the mind has nine or twelve categories—comes afterwards. p. 3

If I ask myself how to judge that this question is more urgent than that, I reply that one judges by the actions it entails. I have never seen anyone die for the ontological argument. p. 3 [The rabbis teach that there are only two (perhaps three) of the 613 commandments (murder and rape, and perhaps denial of god) for which one may martyr oneself. JH]

[Suicide] is merely confessing that [living] “is not worth the trouble.” Living, naturally, is never easy. You continue making the gestures commanded by existence for many reasons, the first of which is habit. Dying voluntarily implies that you have recognized, even instinctively, the ridiculous character of that habit, the absence of any profound reason for living, the insane character of that daily agitation, and the uselessness of suffering. p. 5-6.

…[I]n a universe suddenly divested of illusions and lights, man feels an alien, a stranger. All healthy men having thought of their own suicide, it can be seen, without further explanation, that there is a direct connection between this feeling and the longing for death. p. 6

I have heard of an emulator of Peregrinos, a post-war writer who, after having finished his first book, committed suicide to attract attention to his work. Attention was in fact attracted, but the book was judged no good. Footnote No. 3, p. 7.