Editing Arthur Schopenhauer (section)

== Early life ==
[[File:Gdansk Schopenhauer House.jpg|thumb|upright|Schopenhauer's birthplace house, Świętego Ducha street]]
Arthur Schopenhauer was born on 22 February 1788 in [[Gdańsk]] (then part of the [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]]; later in the [[Kingdom of Prussia]] as Danzig) on Św. Ducha 47 (in Prussia Heiliggeistgasse), the son of {{ill|Heinrich Floris Schopenhauer|de}} and his wife [[Johanna Schopenhauer]] (née Trosiener),<ref name="Google Books">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fW5Dl-tUS_oC&q=Schopenhauer+%2222+February%22&pg=PR30|title=Chronology|last=Schopenhauer|first=Arthur|author2=Günter Zöller|author3=Eric F. J. Payne|year=1999|series=Prize Essay on the Freedom of the Will|publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]]|page=xxx |isbn=978-0-521-57766-3}}</ref> both descendants of wealthy German [[Patrician (post-Roman Europe)|patrician]] families. While they came from a [[Protestantism|Protestant]] background, neither of them was very religious;{{r|Cartwright|p=79}}<ref name="Bullock 1920 p. 53">{{cite book | last=Bullock | first=A.B. | title=The Supreme Human Tragedy: And Other Essays | publisher=C.W. Daniel | year=1920 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XipHAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA53 | access-date=2022-10-22 | page=53}}</ref> both supported the [[French Revolution]],{{r|Cartwright|p=13}} were [[Republicanism|republicans]], [[Cosmopolitanism|cosmopolitans]], and [[Anglophilia|Anglophiles]].{{r|Cartwright|p=9}} When Gdańsk became part of [[Kingdom of Prussia|Prussia]] in 1793, Heinrich moved to [[Hamburg]]—a free city with a republican constitution. His firm continued trading in Danzig, where most of their extended families remained. [[Adele Schopenhauer|Adele]], Arthur's only sibling, was born on 12 July 1797.{{Citation needed|date=September 2024}}

In 1797, Arthur was sent to [[Le Havre]] to live with the family of his father's business associate, Grégoire de Blésimaire. He seemed to enjoy his two-year stay there, learning to speak French and fostering a life-long friendship with Jean Anthime Grégoire de Blésimaire.{{r|Cartwright|p=18}} As early as 1799, Arthur started playing the flute.{{r|Cartwright|p=30}}

In 1803, he accompanied his parents on a European tour of [[Netherlands|Holland]], Britain, France, [[Switzerland]], [[Austria]], and [[Prussia]]. Viewed as primarily a pleasure tour, Heinrich used the opportunity to visit some of his business associates abroad.{{Citation needed|date=September 2024}}

Heinrich presented Arthur with a choice: he could either stay at home to begin preparations for university or travel with them to further his merchant education. Arthur chose to travel with them. He deeply regretted his choice later because the merchant training was very tedious. He spent twelve weeks of the tour attending school in [[Wimbledon, London|Wimbledon]], where he was confused by strict and intellectual [[Anglicanism|Anglicans]], whom he described as shallow. He continued to sharply criticize Anglican religiosity later in life despite his general Anglophilia.{{r|Cartwright|p=56}} He was also under pressure from his father, who became very critical of his educational results.{{Citation needed|date=September 2024}}

In 1805, Heinrich drowned in a canal near their home in Hamburg. Although it was possible that his death was accidental, his wife and son believed that it was suicide. He was prone to [[anxiety]] and [[Major depressive disorder|depression]], each becoming more pronounced later in his life.<ref>Safranski (1990), p. 12</ref> Heinrich had become so fussy that even his wife started to doubt his mental health.{{r|Cartwright|p=43}} "There was, in the father's life, some dark and vague source of fear which later made him hurl himself to his death from the attic of his house in Hamburg."{{r|Cartwright|p=88}}

Arthur showed similar moodiness during his youth and often acknowledged that he inherited it from his father. There were other instances of serious mental health problems on his father's side of the family.{{r|Cartwright|p=4}} Despite his hardship, Schopenhauer liked his father and later referred to him in a positive light.{{r|Cartwright|p=90}} Heinrich Schopenhauer left the family with a significant inheritance split in three among Johanna and the children. Arthur Schopenhauer was entitled to control of his part when he reached the age of majority. He invested it conservatively in government bonds and earned annual interest that was more than double the salary of a university professor.{{r|Cartwright|p=136}} After quitting his merchant apprenticeship, with encouragement from his mother, he dedicated himself to studies at the [[Ernestine Gymnasium, Gotha]], in [[Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg]]. While there, he also enjoyed a social life among the local nobility, spending large amounts of money, which deeply concerned his frugal mother.{{r|Cartwright|p=128}} He left the Gymnasium after writing a satirical poem about one of the schoolmasters. Although Arthur claimed he left voluntarily, his mother's letter indicates that he may have been expelled.{{r|Cartwright|p=129}}

[[File:ArthurSchopenhauer.jpg|thumb|left|Schopenhauer in his youth]]
Arthur spent two years as a merchant in honor of his dead father. During this time, he had doubts about being able to start a new life as a scholar.{{r|Cartwright|p=120}} Most of his prior education was as a practical merchant and he had trouble learning Latin; a prerequisite for an academic career.{{r|Cartwright|p=117}}

His mother moved away, with her daughter Adele, to [[Weimar]]—then the centre of [[German literature]]—to enjoy social life among writers and artists. Arthur and his mother did not part on good terms. In one letter, she wrote: "You are unbearable and burdensome, and very hard to live with; all your good qualities are overshadowed by your conceit, and made useless to the world simply because you cannot restrain your propensity to pick holes in other people."<ref>{{cite book |last= Wallace|first= W.|date= 2003|title= Life of Arthur Schopenhauer|location= Honolulu|publisher= University Press of the Pacific|page= 59|isbn=978-1-4102-0641-1}}</ref> His mother, Johanna, was generally described as vivacious and sociable.{{r|Cartwright|p=9}} She died 24 years later. Some of Arthur's negative opinions about women may be rooted in his troubled relationship with his mother.<ref>Durant, Will, ''The Story of Philosophy'', Garden City Publishing Co., Inc., New York, p. 350</ref>

Arthur moved to Hamburg to live with his friend Jean Anthime, who was also studying to become a merchant.