in our fate, the low and vulgar in the human soul, the difficult complications of the social body: all unite in the question: Has our existence any real sense or value? Is it not torn asunder to an extent that we shall be denied truth and peace for ever?... Hence it is readily understood why a gloomy pessimism is spreading more and more, why the depressed feeling of littleness and weakness is pervading mankind in the midst of its triumphs.” Similar, and profoundly true, are the words spoken some years ago by a noted critic in the “Literarische Zentralblatt” (1900): “A painful lament and longing pervades our restless and peaceless time. The bulk of our knowledge is daily increasing, our technical ability hardly knows of difficulties it could not overcome ... and yet we are not satisfied. More and more frequently we meet with the tired, disheartened question: What’s the use? We lack the one thing which would give support and impetus to our existence, a firm and assured view of the world. Or, to be more exact, we have found that we cannot live with the view of the world which in this century of enlightenment has stamped its imprint more and more upon our entire mental life. Materialism, in coarser or finer form, has penetrated deeply our habits of thought, even in those who would indignantly protest against being called materialists; the name seemed to imply scientific earnestness and liberal views. However, there was still left a considerable fund of old, idealistic values, and as long as we could draw upon them we saw in materialism only the power to clear up rooted prejudices, and to open the road for progress in every field. To the newer generation, however, little or nothing is left of this old fund, hence, having nothing else but materialism to depend upon, they are confronted by an appalling dreariness and emptiness of existence. And ever since the man on the street has absorbed the easy materialistic principles, and looks down from the height of his ‘scientific’ view of life contemptuously upon all reactionaries, we have become aware of the danger that imperils everything implied by the collective word ‘humanism.’ This explains the plethora of literature which in these days deals with the questions of a world philosophy.” Who is not reminded after reading this mournful confession of the words of _St. Augustine_: “Restless is our heart, till it finds rest in Thee”?