Everywhere there grows up an unethical conception of civilization. The masses reconcile themselves in an incomprehensible way to the theory of the relativity of all ethical standards and to thoughts of inhumanity. Freed from any obligation of ethical intention, the belief in progress suffers a process of externalization which increases from year to year, becoming finally nothing better than a wooden façade which conceals the pessimism behind it. That we have lapsed into pessimism is betrayed by the fact that the demand for the spiritual advance of society and mankind is no longer seriously made among us. We have now resigned ourselves, as if no explanation of it were needed, to the fate of being obliged to smile at the high-flying hopes of previous generations. There is no longer to be found among us the true world- and life-affirmation which reaches down to the depths of the spiritual nature of man. Unavowed pessimism has been consuming us for decades. Delivered over to events in a temper and disposition which is powerless because it is entirely without any true [pg 204] and ethical ideals of progress, we are experiencing the collapse of material and spiritual civilization alike. By its belief in an optimistic ethical world-view the modern age made itself capable of a mighty advance towards civilization. Its thought, however, has not been able to show this world-view to be founded in the nature of things, and we have therefore sunk, consciously and unconsciously, into a condition in which we have no world-view at all, a condition of pessimism, too, and of absence of all ethical conviction, so that we are on the point of complete shipwreck. The bankruptcy of the optimistic-ethical world-view was announced beforehand as little as was the financial bankruptcy of the ruined states of Europe. But just as the latter was gradually revealed as having actually come about by the constantly diminishing value of the paper-money that was issued, so is the former being gradually revealed by the constantly diminishing power among us of the true and profound ideals of civilization. [pg 205] CHAPTER XVII THE NEW WAY Why the optimistic-ethical world-view cannot be carried through to the logical conclusion THE greatness of European philosophy consists in its having chosen the optimistic-ethical world-view; its weakness in its having again and again imagined that it was putting that world-view on a firm foundation, instead of making clear to itself the difficulties of doing so. The task before our generation is to strive with deepened thought to reach a truer and more serviceable world-view, and thus to bring to an end our living on and on without any world-view at all.