A Death Like No Other

With the first volume published in 1918 and the second volume published in 1922, Oswald Spengler’s The Decline of the West stands as one of the most important works on the philosophy of history in the 20th century, particularly in how Spengler understood just how important World War I was in transforming the West permanently. Spengler was one of the first people to fully understand what the Great War had done, something that is all the more impressive considering that the war was still raging when he published the first volume. The origins of the book even date back to before the war, in 1911, yet Spengler understood just how important the time he was living in was for the West.

Remember, the West of 1914 was an optimistic place. The West ruled everywhere and was completely confident of its civilizing mission. Even the average man had reason to look forward to the future, after declining for decades, the wealth of the average person was now going up. The West’s economic system looked to be good for everyone, rather than just the wealthy few, and that seriously curtailed the appeal of the radical communists. Not being able to run on promises of improving people’s material lives, since that was already happening, they instead focused on attacking religion and family, driving the vast majority of people away from them. Even the intellectual class, infamous for its subversive tendencies, believed in the greatness of Western civilization. And with the horrors of the French Revolution and the subsequent Napoleonic Wars relegated to the past, most no longer feared a major, continent-wide European war, as had been common since the fall of Charlemagne’s empire.

Perhaps the West was a little too optimistic, as that was a major reason all the parties involved marched so willingly into World War I. And, that is why The Decline of the West is so important. Spengler understood that World War I was not simply a minor blip and things would soon be back to normal, but rather the breaking of the West. The West would never again be an optimistic civilization convinced of its own greatness. In the book, Spangler conceives civilizations as living organisms, entities with a lifespan that will rise and thrive but eventually go into decline and death. Rejecting the progressive and linear history common in his day, Spengler viewed history in terms of epochs. For Spengler, the world had eight great civilizations – Babylonian, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, Classical (Greco-Roman), Arabian, Mesoamerican, and Western. Each of these civilizations must be understood as a specific entity with a life cycle (specifically, one with a thousand years of progress followed by a thousand years of decline). Since the West began around 900 AD, it will begin its decline around 1900 AD. World War I was just the igniting event that set off the West’s inevitable decline.

Yes, eventually the West will decline just as Arabian civilization had and will eventually die just as the Babylonian, Egyptian, Mesoamerican, and Classical civilizations did. It is part of a natural lifecycle that cannot be stopped. Spengler has a level of fatalism that both intrigues me and horrifies me. It certainly is an interesting concept, even as some civilizations do not fit neatly in Spangler’s paradigm – both Indian and Chinese civilizations are older than the New Testament, for example. But, more importantly, just because the West is fated to decline and die, it gives us no reason to be indifferent toward our destiny. I understand that my mother will eventually die, as do all mothers, but that does not give me a good reason to resist that moment. Not that I think Spengler thought this, but there is a pessimism and fatalism in his theory that I believe can eventually lead to indifference.

More importantly, even if it is true that the West will eventually die, as did the once mighty Egyptian, Babylonian, and Classical civilizations, not all declines and deaths are created equal, and I would argue what the West faces is far starker than any other civilization in history. Though other civilizations have died, they were not replaced by people who hated them. Yes, Babylonian civilization would be replaced by the Persians, Egyptian civilization would be replaced by Classical civilization, and both would be replaced by Arabian civilization, but the civilizations that replaced them were in awe with what they had built. Perhaps the best way this phenomenon can be reviewed is in the decline of the Classical civilization. Eventually Classical civilization would decline, synthesizing itself with Christianity and Germanic influences, to form the West. But, these new influences did not hate Classical civilization. Far from it, they admired it and sought to imitate it. When Germanic chieftains viewed the Roman Empire, they were inspired to build their own empires in the image of Rome. The fact that Germany called its emperor “kaiser” and the Russians called their emperor “tsar” (“Caesar”) demonstrates just how powerful the legacy of Rome was, especially since neither nation was actually part of the Roman Empire.

Even more telling is how Christianity interacted with the Classical world. Despite the paganism of the Classical world and the persecution Christians faced during its first three centuries, Christians did not, by and large, declare Classical civilization to be evil and had to be dismantled piece-by-piece. Rather, they worked hard to distinguish what was right and good about the Classical world and what did need to be removed. Thus, the gladiatorial games were banned but the legacy of Plato and Aristotle were allowed to thrive, even to the point where many Christians considered the concept of the logos of Greek philosophy as essential in laying the foundations that would eventually allow Christianity to flourish.

However, this is not what is happening to the West. The West is dying and is being replaced by people who see no value in it. The West is the home of racism and that is really all they need to know. The situation is horrible throughout the West, but in some places, like Germany and Italy, their demographics are so far destroyed there is no realistic way to turn it around. Let that sink in for a bit. The nation that produced Mozart and Fredrick the Great and Bismarck and the nation that produced Michelangelo and Da Vinci and Machiavelli, nations that have produced some of the greatest philosophers, artists, musicians, politicians, and generals to ever live, will soon be gone just as the civilizations of ancient Babylon and Egypt are. And instead of being replaced by people inspired by that history, they stand to be replaced by people who see racism and nothing more.

To a large extent, I think Spengler was right. Just as civilizations rise, they will eventually decline and die. The West is no exception here, it is not meant to be eternal. Still, this should horrify us. As Dixians, we are part of the larger Western civilization framework. And just as we should not want our mothers to die, we should not want our civilization to die; even more horrific is what stands to replace the West. The West will not be replaced, as Classical civilization was, by people in awe of its glory, but by people who seek to destroy it because of its skin color.