Imminent seems the collapse of that which for millennium has constituted man's universe. The new world which has arisen as an apparatus for supply of… - Karl Jaspers

The individual who can help himself is precisely the one who wills that authority exist in the world.

Even the best institutions at the university are apt to deteriorate and to become distorted. Thus the very translation of thought into teachable form tends to impoverish its intellectual vitality. Once intellectual achievement is admitted into the body of accepted learning those achievements tend to assume an air of finality. Thus, it is merely a matter of convention at what point one subject ends and the other begins. It is possible, moreover, that an excellent scholar may not be able to find a place for himself within the established departmental divisions. A mediocre scholar may be preferred to him simply because his work fits into the traditional scheme. Any institution tends to consider itself an end in itself.

Ale morální a metafyzická vina, již chápe jen jedinec ve svém společenství jako svou vinu, se neodpykává (jak vyplývá z její podstaty). Nepřestává. Kdo ji má, vstupuje do procesu, který potrvá po celý jeho život.

Pro nás Němce tu platí alternativa: Bud se přijetí oné viny - kterou nemají ostatní na mysli, ale kterou stále znovu vyslovuje naše svědomí – stane základním rysem našeho německého sebeuvědomění, a pak půjde naše duše cestou proměny, nebo klesneme do lhostejné průměrnosti pouhého žití.