The concept of death is a fundamental adjunct of Schopenhauer’s metaphysics of appearance and Will. Schopenhauer interprets death as the aim and purpose of life. He maintains that to live is to suffer, that the triumph of death is inevitable, and that existence is a constant dying.

In Chapter Xli.27 On Death And Its Relation To The Indestructibility Of Our True Nature, Schopenhauer opens with this sermon: Death is the true inspiring genius, or the muse of philosophy, wherefore Socrates has defined the latter as θανατου μελετη. Indeed without death men would scarcely philosophise. Therefore it will be quite in order that a special consideration of this should have its place here at the beginning of the last, most serious, and most important of our books.

He said the fear of death is innate, because in nature it’s just the opposite of survival: In fact, the fear of death is independent of all knowledge; for the brute has it, although it does not know death. Everything that is born brings it with it into the world. But this fear of death is a priori only the reverse side of the will to live, which indeed we all are. Therefore in every brute the fear of its destruction is inborn, like the care for its maintenance. Thus it is the fear of death, and not the mere avoidance of pain, which shows itself in the anxious carefulness with which the brute seeks to protect itself, and still more its brood, from everything that might become dangerous. 

Schopenhauer believes that it is also “nonexistent”, and there is no difference between life and death. He said that the reason why we look forward to a “better world” is that the world we live in is not good enough.