Academic thinkers: Sidgwick, Stephen, Alexander, Wundt, Paulsen, Höffding [181] The ethic of self-perfecting, Kant’s successors: Cohen, Herrmann [183] The ethic of self-perfecting: Martineau, Green, Bradley, Laurie, Seth, and Royce [185] Nature-philosophy and ethics. Fouillée, Guyau, Lange, Stern [186] Nature-philosophy and ethics in Eduard von Hartmann [194] Nature-philosophy and ethics in Bergson, Chamberlain, Keyserling, Haeckel [198] The death-agony of the optimistic-ethical world-view [202] XVII. THE NEW WAY [205] Why the optimistic-ethical world-view cannot be carried through to the logical conclusion [205] Life-view independent of world-view [208] XVIII. THE FOUNDATIONS OF OPTIMISM SECURED FROM THE WILL-TO-LIVE [212] The pessimistic result of knowledge [212] The world- and life-affirmation of the will-to-live [216] XIX. THE PROBLEM OF ETHICS, STARTING FROM THE HISTORY OF ETHICS [221] An ethic of self-devotion, or an ethic of self-perfecting? [221] Ethics and a theory of knowledge. Ethics and natural happenings. The enthusiastic element in ethics [224] The ethic of ethical personality, and the ethic of society [228] The problem of a complete ethic [230] XX. THE ETHIC OF DEVOTION AND THE ETHIC OF SELF-PERFECTING [232] The widening of the ethic of self-devotion into a cosmic ethic [232] The ethic of self-perfecting and mysticism [235] Abstract mysticism and the mysticism of reality. Supra-ethical and ethical mysticism [241] XXI. THE ETHIC OF REVERENCE FOR LIFE [244] The basic principle of the moral [244] The ethic of resignation. An ethic of veracity towards oneself, and an activist ethic [251] Ethics and thoughtlessness. Ethics and self-assertion [253] Man and other living creatures [256] The ethic of the relation of man to man [258] Personal and supra-personal responsibility. Ethics and humanity [262] XXII. The CIVILIZING POWER OF THE ETHIC OF REVERENCE FOR LIFE [269] Civilization as a product of reverence for life [269] The four ideals of civilization. The struggle for a civilized mankind in the machine age [271] Church and State as historical entities, and as ideals of civilization [278] The moralizing of the religious and political community [280] FOOTNOTES INDEX [287] CIVILIZATION AND ETHICS 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.