I hadn't considered that, I guess what I've read lead to the Viennese angle rather than him. There's always an antecessor though, and trying to search for that leads to a quagmire or madness!
Liberty comes with responsibilities. Responsibilities to self, family, community, and state. It also comes with discipline, for without discipline, we are little better than animals.
When people are allowed to do "Whatever they want," they fall to self-destructive means. (Drug use, Sexual immorality, promiscuousness. lack of authority."
Modern man has lost that sense of place, of knowing where he belonged, what he had, and what he earned. When you get something for nothing, you treat it like trash.
You're right about modern man's problem. He's basically offered a dilemma now he no longer has those things - openness and "freedom" on one side and ascension on the other. Neither's a perfect answer, and both can easily leave a majority of people adrift.
Fantastic summation. This has deep roots going all the way back to the fall of Constantinople as the beginning of the end of Christendom and it's eventual replacement by nihilism and Blake's "dark Satanic mills."
Spengler was correct the late middle ages around the time of erecting giant cathedrals was the peak of "Faustian" western man. It will be interesting to see what comes next. Woke Imperium is obviously not sustainable, it is a liminal phase.
I'd agree with you about that, we're currently at an end and casting around for the next thing. I've never really been sure if we're Faustian men, perhaps because I hope we aren't.
If by Faustian men it is meant crusaders, I agree. If by Faustian men it is meant those with the moral and physical strength to raise something like beautiful cathedrals by hand, and the humility not to sign on off on them as "architected by,' then I hope we are.
I look at Faustian as meaning we've bargained with industry and technology for our power. I believe there's another way and we're not simply the caretakers of exploiters of what we gained through this pact with the devil.
"Ultimately, according to Spengler, Western or “Faustian” culture is characterized by its restless thrust toward the infinite and unattainable, or the “conception of mankind as an active, fighting, progressing whole” (165). The Faustian individual “strives to direct the world according to his will” (410). In architecture, the “infinity-seeking” Faustian tendency is most apparent in the endless vertical thrusts of Gothic cathedrals and the “depth-experience” of paintings, in which parallel lines meet in infinity (125). From its inception around 1000 with the Cluniac reforms, the Faustian civilization marked a radical break with its predecessors, the Apollonian (Classical) culture and the Magian (Judeo-Arabic) culture (98). According to Spengler, the differences between Faustian and Apollonian art are instructive: “The Apollonian form-language reveals only the become, the Faustian shows above all a becoming” (139)."
Pretty sure Spengler when referring to Faustian man was referring to the late medieval period before the dark Satanic mills, but I could be wrong, it's been a while since I read him.
It is hard not to detect the foul stench of Rousseau in this openness business.
Good stuff this piece.
I hadn't considered that, I guess what I've read lead to the Viennese angle rather than him. There's always an antecessor though, and trying to search for that leads to a quagmire or madness!
I enjoyed the Vienna angle.
I blame Plato in the end. All that philosophy stuff is seemingly designed to lead directly to quagmire and (of?) madness.
Liberty comes with responsibilities. Responsibilities to self, family, community, and state. It also comes with discipline, for without discipline, we are little better than animals.
When people are allowed to do "Whatever they want," they fall to self-destructive means. (Drug use, Sexual immorality, promiscuousness. lack of authority."
Modern man has lost that sense of place, of knowing where he belonged, what he had, and what he earned. When you get something for nothing, you treat it like trash.
You're right about modern man's problem. He's basically offered a dilemma now he no longer has those things - openness and "freedom" on one side and ascension on the other. Neither's a perfect answer, and both can easily leave a majority of people adrift.
Such interesting thoughts here. I think we are now seeing the ultimate end of unlimited "freedom". Very pertinent, thanks.
Fantastic summation. This has deep roots going all the way back to the fall of Constantinople as the beginning of the end of Christendom and it's eventual replacement by nihilism and Blake's "dark Satanic mills."
Spengler was correct the late middle ages around the time of erecting giant cathedrals was the peak of "Faustian" western man. It will be interesting to see what comes next. Woke Imperium is obviously not sustainable, it is a liminal phase.
I'd agree with you about that, we're currently at an end and casting around for the next thing. I've never really been sure if we're Faustian men, perhaps because I hope we aren't.
If by Faustian men it is meant crusaders, I agree. If by Faustian men it is meant those with the moral and physical strength to raise something like beautiful cathedrals by hand, and the humility not to sign on off on them as "architected by,' then I hope we are.
I look at Faustian as meaning we've bargained with industry and technology for our power. I believe there's another way and we're not simply the caretakers of exploiters of what we gained through this pact with the devil.
Hmmm seems we are both right, how convenient.
"Ultimately, according to Spengler, Western or “Faustian” culture is characterized by its restless thrust toward the infinite and unattainable, or the “conception of mankind as an active, fighting, progressing whole” (165). The Faustian individual “strives to direct the world according to his will” (410). In architecture, the “infinity-seeking” Faustian tendency is most apparent in the endless vertical thrusts of Gothic cathedrals and the “depth-experience” of paintings, in which parallel lines meet in infinity (125). From its inception around 1000 with the Cluniac reforms, the Faustian civilization marked a radical break with its predecessors, the Apollonian (Classical) culture and the Magian (Judeo-Arabic) culture (98). According to Spengler, the differences between Faustian and Apollonian art are instructive: “The Apollonian form-language reveals only the become, the Faustian shows above all a becoming” (139)."
https://campuspress.yale.edu/modernismlab/oswald-spengler/
Pretty sure Spengler when referring to Faustian man was referring to the late medieval period before the dark Satanic mills, but I could be wrong, it's been a while since I read him.
I take it as more in the sense of a deal for power. This is closer to my view
https://faustianeurope.wordpress.com/2007/07/24/oswald-spengler-and-faustian-culture/
https://asiatimes.com/2022/03/the-ignoble-descent-of-faustian-man/