That Schopenhauer is Freud's central philosophical reference is something that shows throughoutthe works of the founder of psychoanalysis, particulary in those regarding the displacement of the cogito from its central placing in human determination. From the necessary differentiation between the schopenhauerian unconscious, conceived as the Will's most primitive and original attribute, and the freudian unconscious, which opens a psychic dimension irreductible to consciousness –the subject being where its effects cake place, fundamentally ignoring their cause–, this article presents the essentials of Freud's debate with the philosopher, in regard to Civilization and its discontent: both emphasize the essentially negative character of happiness, on the explicit background of human desire as want.