Cioran: Is Consciousness a Curse?

Speaking of plants and animals...

Jealous of their unconsciousness, basis of their salvation, we would be as they are, and furious at being unable to become so, we meditate their ruin, we strive to interest them in our misfortunes in order to revenge ourselves upon them. It is the animals we resent most of all: what would we not give to strip them of their silence, to convert them to language, to inflict upon them the abjection of speech! The charm of a life without reflexion, of existence as such being forbidden to us, we cannot bear that others should delight in it.

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