ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to show that existentialism, far from being a dead philosophy, is in fact the only modern philosophy with a long and clear road of development ahead of it. The first practical necessity for the existential philosopher is to learn to become constantly aware of the intentionality of all his conscious acts. The true ‘founder’ of the new existentialism is Friedrich Nietzsche, for it was he who announced the advent of a new optimism. But even Nietzsche did not clearly recognise the character of inevitability of this optimism. The basic impulse behind existentialism is optimistic, very much like the impulse behind all science. Existentialism is romanticism, and romanticism is the feeling that man is not the mere creature he has always taken himself for. Romanticism began as a tremendous surge of optimism about the stature of man. Its aim was to raise man above the muddled feelings and impulses of his everyday humanity.
