Martinus: Livets Bog, vol. 5, sect. 1767

1767. Since the terrestrial human being thus has within itself two contrary processes, one that breaks down the nature of the animal, and one that builds up the opposite, namely the "real human nature", this being, as previously mentioned, is doomed in advance to being more or less in conflict with itself, quite apart from the conflict or discord with its fellow beings it continuously finds itself in, and which the remaining part of the animal psyche in its consciousness will continuously give rise to. This incipient new phenomenon in the terrestrial human being's consciousness is thus due to a growing capacity for sympathy or love and the pure unselfishness that arises from this, which the wild animal is completely devoid of. The completely wild animal can manifest only weak indications of sympathy for its mate and offspring for selfish purposes, or in cases that are a link in its drive for self-preservation, such as in the act of copulation or the process of procreation. It knows of no law commanding that it should love other beings as it loves itself. It knows only the law determining that "it has to look after itself". It cannot therefore regret or repent actions that it has committed, such as is the case with the human being. The ordinary civilised human being, on the contrary, spends every day more or less in regret, mortification and self-reproach for actions it committed because of its animal drive, but which, because of the growth of its unselfish or human psyche, it considers unworthy and therefore afterwards in fact wishes it had not committed. We call this dissatisfaction or conflict with itself "pangs of conscience". These pangs of conscience or the individual's dissatisfaction with itself, its war against the animal part of its psyche can be so overwhelming, so completely dominating that it can cause its originator to commit suicide. Here the human being thus differs from the animal. Animals do not commit suicide. They do not make any kind of a plan to kill themselves. They can of course inadvertently get into trouble or experience suffering, but they struggle on. They do not capitulate or make themselves traitors to their own physical existence by separating themselves from their physical bodies.