CHAPTER I

THE CRISIS IN CIVILIZATION AND ITS SPIRITUAL CAUSE

The material and spiritual elements in civilization

OUR civilization is going through a severe crisis.

Most people think that the crisis was produced by the war, but that is wrong. The war, with everything connected with it, is only a phenomenon of the condition of un-civilization in which we find ourselves. Even in States which took no part in the war, and on which the war had no direct influence, civilization is shaken, only the fact is not so clearly evident in them as in those which were hard hit by the consequences of its peculiarly cruel spiritual and material happenings.

Yet is there any real, live thought going on among us about this collapse of civilization, and about possible ways of working ourselves up out of it? Scarcely! Clever men stumble about in seven-league boots in the history of civilization and try to make us understand that civilization is some kind of natural growth which blossoms out in definite peoples at definite times and then of necessity withers, so that new peoples with new civilizations must keep replacing the worn-out ones. When they are called upon, indeed, to complete their theory by telling us what peoples are destined to be our heirs, they are somewhat embarrassed. There are, in fact, no peoples to be seen whom one could imagine to be capable of even a portion of such a task. All the peoples of the earth have been in large measure under the influence both of our civilization [pg 002] and of our lack of it, so that they share more or less our fate. Among none of them are to be found thoughts which can lead to any considerable original movement of civilization.

Let us put on one side cleverness and interesting surveys of the history of civilization, and busy ourselves in a practical way with the problem of our endangered civilization. Of what character is this degeneration in our civilization, and why has it come about?

To begin with, there is one elementary fact which is quite obvious. The disastrous feature of our civilization is that it is far more developed materially than spiritually. Its balance is disturbed. Through the discoveries which now place the forces of Nature at our disposal in such an unprecedented way, the relations to each other of individuals, of social groups, and of States have undergone a revolutionary change. Our knowledge and our power have been enriched and increased to an extent that no one would have thought possible. We have thereby been enabled to make the conditions of human existence incomparably more favourable in numerous respects, but in our enthusiasm over our progress in knowledge and power, we have come to a defective conception of what civilization is. We value too highly its material achievements and no longer keep in mind as vividly as is desirable the importance of the spiritual. Now the results are upon us, and summon us to reflect. They tell us in terribly harsh language that a civilization which develops only on its material side but not in corresponding measure on its spiritual side, is like a ship which with defective steering gear gets at a constantly accelerating pace out of control, and thereby heads for a catastrophe.

The essential nature of civilization does not lie in its material achievements, but in the fact that individuals keep in mind the ideals of the perfecting of man, and the improvement of the social and political conditions of peoples, and of mankind as a whole, and that their habit [pg 003] of thought is determined in living and constant fashion by such ideals. Only when individuals work in this way as spiritual forces on themselves and on society is the possibility given of solving the problems which have been produced by the facts of life, and of attaining to a general progress which is valuable in every respect. Whether there is rather more or rather less of material achievement to record is not what is decisive for civilization. Its fate depends on whether or no thought keeps control over facts. The issue of a voyage does not depend on whether the vessel’s pace is somewhat quicker or somewhat slower, but on whether it steers a correct course, and its steering gear keeps in good condition.

Revolutions in the relations of life between individuals, society, and peoples, as they follow in the train of our great material achievements, make, if they are to show real progress in the sense of valuable civilization, higher demands on the habit of thought of civilized people, just as the increased speed of a ship presupposes greater reliability in rudder and steering gear. Advances in knowledge and power work out their effects on us almost as if they were natural occurrences. It is not within our power so to direct them that they influence favourably in every respect the relations in which we live, but they produce for individuals, for society, and for nations, difficult and still more difficult problems, and bring with them dangers which it is quite impossible to estimate beforehand. Paradoxical as it may seem, our advances in knowledge and power make true civilization not easier but more difficult. One can even say that, judging by the events of our own and the two preceding generations, we are almost entitled to doubt whether in view of the way in which these material achievements have been showered upon us, true civilization is still possible.

The most widespread danger which material achievements bring with them for civilization consists in the fact that through the revolutions in the conditions of life men [pg 004] become in greater numbers unfree, instead of free. The type of man who once cultivated his own bit of land becomes a worker who tends a machine in a factory; manual workers and independent trades-people become employees. They lose the elementary freedom of the man who lives in his own house and finds himself in immediate connexion with Mother Earth. Further, they no longer have the extensive and unbroken consciousness of responsibility of those who live by their own independent labour. The conditions of their existence are therefore unnatural. They no longer carry on the struggle for existence in comparatively normal relations in which each one can by his own ability make good his position whether against Nature or against the competition of his fellows, but they see themselves compelled to combine together and create a force which can extort for itself better living conditions. They acquire thereby the mentality of unfree men, in which ideals of civilization can no longer be contemplated in the needful purity, but become distorted to correspond with the surrounding atmosphere of struggle.

To a certain extent we have all of us, under modern conditions, become unfree men. In every rank of life we have from decade to decade, if not from year to year, to carry on a harder struggle for existence. Overwork, physical or mental or both, is our lot. We can no longer find time to collect and order our thoughts. Our spiritual dependence increases at the same pace as our material dependence. In every direction we come to conditions of dependence which in former times were never known in such universality and such strength. Economic, social, and political organizations, which are steadily becoming more and more complete, are getting us more and more into their power. The State with its more and more rigid organization holds us under a control which is growing more and more decided and inclusive. In every respect, therefore, our individual being is depreciated. It is becoming more and more difficult to be a personality.

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Thus it is that the progress of our external civilization brings with it the result that individuals, in spite of all the advantages they get, are in many respects injured both materially and spiritually in their capacity for civilization through those very advantages.

It is our progress in material civilization, too, which intensifies in so disastrous a way our social and political problems. Through the social ones we are involved in a class struggle which shakes and throws into confusion economic and national relations. If we go down to rock-bottom, it was machinery and world commerce which brought about the world war, and the inventions which put into our hands such mighty power of destruction made the war of such a devastating character that conquered and conquerors alike are ruined for a period of which no one can see the end. It was also our technical achievements which put us in a position to kill at such a distance, and to wipe out the enemy in such masses, that we sank so low as to push aside any last impulse to humanity, and were mere blind wills which made use of perfected lethal weapons of such destructive capacity that we were unable to maintain the distinction between combatants and non-combatants.

Material achievements, then, are not civilisation, but become civilization only so far as the mental habit of civilized peoples is capable of allowing them to work towards the perfecting of the individual and the community. Fooled, however, by our advances in knowledge and power, we did not reflect on the danger to which we were exposing ourselves by the diminished value we put on the spiritual elements in civilization, and we surrendered completely to a naïve satisfaction at our magnificent material achievements, and went astray into an incredibly superficial conception of civilization. We believed in a progress which was a matter of course, because contained in the facts themselves. Instead of harbouring in our thought ideals approved by reason, and undertaking to mould reality into accordance with them, we were fooled [pg 006] by a vain feeling for reality, and wanted to come through with lowered ideals which were borrowed from it. By taking this course we lost all control over the facts.

Accordingly, just when the spiritual element in culture was necessary in extraordinary strength, we let it waste away.

Civilization and World-View

How could it come about that the spiritual element in civilization became so lost to us?

To understand that, we must go back to the time when it was at work among us in a direct and living way, and the path thereto leads us back into the eighteenth century. Among the Rationalists who approach everything through reason, and would regulate everything in life by rational considerations, we find expression given in elemental strength to the conviction that the essential element in civilization is a habit of thought. It is true that they are already impressed by modern achievements in discovery and invention, and do allow to the material side of civilization a corresponding importance. But they nevertheless regard it as self-evident that the essential and valuable element in civilization is the spiritual. That interest is focused first of all on the spiritual progress of men and humanity, and in that they believe with a mighty optimism.

The greatness of these men of the period of the “Aufklärung” lies in this, that they set up as ideals the perfecting of the individual, of society, and of mankind, and devote themselves to these ideals with enthusiasm. The force on which they count for the realizing of them is the general habit of thought; they demand of the human spirit that it shall transform men and the relations in which they live, and they trust to it to prove itself stronger than the facts of life.

But whence came the impulse to set up such high ideals of civilization, and their confidence of being able to realise [pg 007] them? It was from their view of the world (Weltanschauung).

The Rationalist world-view is optimistic and ethical, its optimism consisting in this, that it assumes as ruling in the world a general purposive adaptation which is directed to the perfecting of the world, and from this purposiveness the efforts of individual men and of mankind to secure material and spiritual progress derive meaning and importance and a guarantee of success.

This world-view is ethical because it regards the ethical as something in accordance with reason, and on that ground demands from man that, putting egoistic interests behind him, he shall devote himself to all ideals that are waiting for realization, taking the ethical as in everything the standard by which to judge. A habit of humane thought is for the Rationalists an ideal which they can be induced by no consideration to resign.

When at the close of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth the reaction against rationalism set in and criticism began to play upon it, its optimism was reproached as being superficial and its ethics as being sentimental. But the good it did, in spite of its manifold imperfections, by inspiring men with ideals of civilization grounded in reason, the spiritual movements which criticise it and take its place cannot develop in the same way. The energy of thought about civilization decreases imperceptibly but steadily. In proportion as the world-view of rationalism is left behind, the feeling for actuality makes its influence felt, until at last, from the middle of the nineteenth century onwards, ideals are borrowed no longer from reason but from actuality, and we therewith sink still further into a state of uncivilization and lack of humanity. This is the clearest and the most important of all the facts which can be established in the history of our civilization.

What has it to tell us? It tells us that there is a close connexion between civilization and world-view. Civilization is the product of an optimistic-ethical view of the world. [pg 008] Only in proportion as the prevalent world-view is one which is world- and life-affirming and at the same time ethical, do we find ideals of civilization put forward and kept influential in the habits of thought of individuals, and of society.

That this inner relation between civilization and the world-view of civilized peoples has never received the attention that it deserves, is the result of there having been among us so little real meditation on the essential nature of civilization.

What is civilization? It is the sum total of all progress made by men and mankind in every sphere of action and from every point of view, so far as this progress helps towards the spiritual perfecting of individuals as the progress of all progress.

The impulse to strive for progress in all spheres of action and from every point of view comes to men out of an optimistic world-view which affirms the world and life to be something valuable in themselves, and consequently bears within itself a compulsion to raise to its highest possible value all that is, so far as it can be influenced by us. Hence come will and hope, and effort directed to the improvement of the condition of individuals and of society, of peoples and of mankind. This leads to a lordship of the spirit over the powers of Nature, to the completion of the religious, social, economic, and practical grouping of men, and to the spiritual perfecting of individuals and of the community.

Just as the world- and life-affirming, that is, the optimistic world-view is alone capable of stirring men to effort aimed at promoting civilization, so in an ethical world-view alone is there latent the power to make men, when putting aside and giving up altogether their selfish interests, persevere in such effort for civilization, and keep them always turned in the direction of the spiritual and moral perfecting of the individual as the essential object of civilization. Bound the one to the other, then, world- and [pg 009] life-affirming world-view and ethics think out in harmony the ideals of true, complete civilization and set to work at realizing them.

If civilization remains incomplete or its level falls, this rests in the last resort on the fact that either the world- and life-affirmation of the world-view, or its ethics, or both of them have remained undeveloped or have gone backwards. And that is the case with us. It is evident that the ethics required for civilization have gone out of use.

For decades we have been accustoming ourselves increasingly to measure with relative ethical standards, and no longer to allow ethics to have their say in all questions alike. This renunciation of consistent ethical judgment we feel as an advance in practicality.

But our world- and life-affirmation also have become shaky. The modern man no longer feels under any compulsion to think about ideals of progress and to will them. To a large extent he has come to terms with actuality. He is much more resigned than he admits to himself, and in one respect he is even outspokenly pessimistic. He does not really believe any more in the spiritual and ethical progress of men and of mankind, which is nevertheless the essential element in civilization.

This stunting of our world- and life-affirmation and of our ethics has its cause in the constitution of our world-view. In regard to this we have since the middle of the nineteenth century been going through a crisis. It is no longer possible for us to arrive at a conception of the universe in which the meaning of the existence of men and of mankind can be recognized, and in which, therefore, there are also contained the ideals which flow from thoughtful world- and life-affirmation and from ethical volition. We are falling more and more into a condition of having no world-view at all, and from our lack of that comes our lack of civilization.

The great question for us is, therefore, whether we have to renounce permanently the world-view which carries within it in all their strength the ideals of the perfecting of men and of mankind, and of ethical effort. If we succeed [pg 010] in establishing again a world-view in which world- and life-affirmation is given in convincing fashion, we shall become masters of the decay of civilization which is in progress, and shall reach again a true and living civilization. Otherwise we are condemned to see the wreck of all attempts to arrest the degeneration. Only when the truth that renewal of civilization can only come by a renewal of our world-view becomes a universal conviction, and a new longing for a world-view sets in, shall we find ourselves on the right path. But this is not yet in prospect. The modern man is still without any correct feeling of the full significance of the fact that he is living with an unsatisfactory world-view, or without any at all. The unnatural and dangerous character of this condition must first be brought home to his consciousness, just as those persons who exhibit disturbances of the stability of their nervous system have to be clearly told that their vitality is threatened, although they feel no pain. Similarly, we have to stir up the men of to-day to elementary meditation upon what man is in the world, and what he wants to make of his life. Only when they are impressed once more with the necessity of giving meaning and value to their existence, and thus come once more to hunger and thirst for a satisfying world-view, are the preliminaries given for a spiritual condition in which we become again capable of civilization.

But in order to learn the way to such a world-view we must see clearly why the struggle undertaken by the European spirit to secure it was for a time successful, but during the second half of the nineteenth century came to an unfortunate end.

Because our thinking is too little occupied with civilization it has been insufficiently noticed that the most important part of the history of philosophy is the history of man’s struggle for a satisfactory world-view. Regarded in this light, the history unrolls itself like a tragic drama.

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