All world-improvers are Socialists. And consequently there are no Classical world-improvers. Oswald Spengler More Quotes by Oswald Spengler More Quotes From Oswald Spengler We Germans will never produce another Goethe, but we may produce another Caesar. Oswald Spengler germanyproducemay The individual's life is of importance to none besides himself: the point is whether he wishes to escape from history or give his life for it. History recks nothing of human logic Oswald Spengler logicwishgiving The common man wants nothing of life but health, longevity, amusement, comfort-“happiness.” He who does not despise this should turn his eyes from world history, for it contains nothing of the sort. The best that history has created is great suffering. Oswald Spengler eyesufferingmen To-day a democrat of the old school would demand, not freedom for the press, but freedom from the press; but mean-time the leaders have changed themselves into parvenus who have to secure their position vis-a-vis the masses. Oswald Spengler leadermeanschool There is no proletarian, not even a Communist movement, that has not operated in the interests of money, and for the time being permitted by money - and that without the idealists among its leaders having the slightest suspicion of the fact. Oswald Spengler movementleaderfacts Philosophy, the love of Wisdom, is at the very bottom defence against the incomprehensible. Oswald Spengler bottomdefencephilosophy We have learned that history is something that takes no notice whatever of our expectations. Oswald Spengler expectations Critical (i.e., separating) methods apply only to the world-as-nature. It would be easier to break up a theme of Beethoven with dissecting knife or acid than to break up the soul by methods of abstract thought . Nature-knowledge and man-knowledge have neither ways nor aims in common. Oswald Spengler knivessoulmen In place of a world, there is a city, a point, in which the whole life of broad regions is collecting while the rest dries up. In place of a type-true people, born of and grown on the soil, there is a new sort of nomad, cohering unstably in fluid masses, the parasitical city dweller, traditionless, utterly matter-of-fact, religionless, clever, unfruitful, deeply contemptuous of the countryman and especially that highest form of countryman, the country gentleman. Oswald Spengler citiesclevercountry Those who talk too much about race no longer have it in them. Oswald Spengler too-muchrace Pacifism will remain an ideal, war a fact, and if the White race decides to wage it no longer, the dark ones will, and will become the masters of the world. Oswald Spengler racedarkwar Christian theology is the grandmother of Bolshevism. Oswald Spengler theologygrandmotherchristian You are caught in the current of unceasing change. Your life is a ripple in it. Every moment of your conscious life links the infinite past with the infinite future. Take part in both and you will not find the present empty. Oswald Spengler linkslife-ispast The mathematic, then, is an art. As such it has its styles and style periods. It is not, as the layman and the philosopher (who is in this matter a layman too) imagine, substantially unalterable, but subject like every art to unnoticed changes form epoch to epoch. The development of the great arts ought never to be treated without an (assuredly not unprofitable) side-glance at contemporary mathematics. Oswald Spengler imaginationmathart Long, long ago the country bore the country-town and nourished it with her best blood. Now the giant city sucks the country dry, insatiably and incessantly demanding and devouring fresh streams of men, till it wearies and dies in the midst of an almost uninhabited waste of country. Oswald Spengler long-agomencountry One day the last portrait of Rembrandt and the last bar of Mozart will have ceased to be — though possibly a colored canvas and a sheet of notes will remain — because the last eye and the last ear accessible to their message will have gone. Oswald Spengler portraitsone-dayeye If you are clever enough to figure out what men want, you are either too wise to marry them or too intimidating for them to marry you. Oswald Spengler wiseclevermen One does not reflect on a point of honor - that is already dishonor. To submit to insult, to forget a humiliation, to quail before an enemy - all these are signs of a life become worthless and superfluous. Oswald Spengler honordoeenemy I maintain that to-day many an inventor, many a diplomat, many a financier is a sounder philosopher than all those who practise the dull craft of experimental psychology. Oswald Spengler psychologycraftspractice The last man of the world-city no longer wants to live--he may cling to life as an individual, but as a type, as an aggregate, no, for it is a characteristic of this collective existence that it eliminates the terror of death. Oswald Spengler lastscitiesmen
