Law and ethics spring up together from the same idea. Law is so much of the principle of respect for life as can be embodied in an external code; ethics are what cannot be so embodied. The foundation of law is humanity. It is [pg xviii] folly to wish to put out of action the links between law and world-view. In this way a world-view is the germ of all ideas and dispositions which are determinative for the conduct of individuals and of society. Flying machines carry men to-day through the air over a world in which hunger and brigandage have a place. It is not in China only that one recognizes the grotesque character of such progress: it is almost typical for mankind generally, and such grotesque progress cannot be changed to the normal till a general disposition prevails which is capable of bringing order again into the chaos of human life through ethics. In the last resort the practical can be realized only through the ethical What a remarkable circle! Rational thought which thinks itself out arrives at something non-rational and subjective which is a necessity of thought, viz. the ethical affirmation of world and life. On the other hand, what for the purpose of moulding the conditions of existence for individual men and mankind as a whole is rational, that is to say, what is objectively practical in this regard, can only be brought about by individuals perseveringly putting into action the above-mentioned non-rational and subjective. The non-rational principle underlying our activity, a principle which is provided for us by rational thought, is the sole rational and practical principle underlying all the happenings which are to be produced through human action. Thus the rational and the non-rational, the objective and the subjective proceed each from the other, and return each into the other again. Only when the play of this mutual interchange is in full activity do normal conditions of existence arise for men and mankind. Let it be disturbed and the abnormal develops. I have, then, in this book written the tragedy of the search for a world-view, and have myself trodden a new path to the same goal. Whereas Western thought has not arrived at any goal because it would not venture resolutely into the desert of scepticism about knowledge of the world, [pg xix] I make my way through this desert with calm confidence. It is, after all, only a narrow strip, and it lies in front of the ever-green oasis of an elemental world-view which grows out of thought about the will-to-live. In my attempt, however, to reach a world-view by this new method, I am conscious of having done no more than put together and think out to conclusions many gropings after this new method which were made by other seekers during the period covered.