Such queries may give us pause, but they may not stampede us. We may not forget that Professor Münsterberg, of Harvard, has written a great book bearing the impressive title, _The Eternal Values_. Nor may we be blind to the evidence that the thought so clearly and singularly espoused by the bearers of the better ideals of our new time is that of _the imminent and constant eternity in the human heart_, as unfolded by Spinoza and Schleiermacher and Nietzsche. Indeed, the question as to _what values are eternal values_, this eternity question, is central in our modern culture. Very superficial indeed would be our evaluation of modern life, most un-understood indeed would be the riddle of the soul of this life, did we ignore the ever clearer, ever mightier longing for eternity in this soul's abyss, and the unification of all deeper spirits upon the high task of giving an eternal content to our culture. By taking some illustrations, one can see the need to supply the latter profound view to the former superficial judgment, if one is to do justice to the new movements of life in the modern world. There is your modern poet. At first sight he seems to lack the illumination of that eternal light which never was on land or sea. You see the scorching sun beating upon the lone pilgrim as he plods through the burning sand to a goalless goal. You see faded, pale shadows. You do not meet with an idea that makes you feel that the poet yearns to interpret some eternal thought to this life of ours. Instead, life speaks only of itself and from itself. This is an abomination in the eyes of those who call themselves _Ewigkeitsmenschen_. They call it naturalistic, materialistic art. They upbraid an era in which a poet may dare to dissociate his poetry from the eternal ideal. Then you look again, you read more carefully, and you see the whole matter differently. The eternity that men claimed for their _thought_ is indeed gone. But eternity itself, the eternity of life, that is not gone, that abides. This realistic man of modern poetry, the more really he is apprehended, stands before us as the embodiment of a _necessity_, a necessity that transcends the individual, yet lives and weaves in him, a necessity that enunciates the law of life in the destiny of the individual--power of darkness or dawn of a new day! But necessity, law of life, this is but another name for eternity.