Oswald Spengler

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Spengler in 1929

Suppress the dissenters Fascism

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“”Dr. Oswald Spengler has an unfortunate manner. He writes like an angry professor lecturing a class of idiot boys. And if a boy is so rash as to ask a question - even a quite intelligent question — the storm of sarcasm that follows is sure to silence him, though not so sure to convince. With a scream of italics and exclamation marks, Dr. Spengler falls upon the fool who hints that mankind might escape the gathering doom. As if driven to expiate some enormous guilt, he offers the whole Western world as a sacrifice to Fate, and there are no words too impolite for the victim who demurs. This is what has to be! History cannot be interfered with! Bare your throats and don't argue!

—Herbert Agar, 1932

“”Harry Kessler heard [Spengler] lecture at the Nietzsche-Archiv and came away feeling that he was "a half-educated charlatan… a fat pundit with a flabby chin and a brutal mouth who for an hour poured out the tritest and most trivial stuff… Not one original idea, not even false diamonds. Everything uniformly insipid, colourless, flat, boring. Yes, Spengler managed to make even Nietzsche boring!"

—Gordon Alexander Craig, recounting Harry Kessler's statements from Tagebücher

Oswald Arnold Gottfried Spengler (29 May 1880 in Blankenburg am Harz–8 May 1936 in Munich) was a German crank/polymath, who was active as a writer in the fields of history, culture, philosophy and politics… in a way that a ten year old edgelord Reddit keyboard warrior with a bad case of Dunning–Kruger syndrome is.

Spengler, who was an influential figure at the time of the Weimar Republic, was considered to be part of the nationalist and anti-democratic "Conservative Revolution". Philosophically, Spengler is associated with both the irrationalist and Lebensphilosophie movements; meaning that he espouses that science is fallible and therefore intuition and/or other ways of knowing are superior to rationalism.

While Spengler was primarily a Conservative Revolution ideologue, he is also the (unwitting) intellectual pioneer of Nazism as well. His irrationalist philosophies and very relativistic and deterministic view of history were assimilated by the Nazis, and his book Prussianism and Socialism may have even given them their name. Despite essentially enabling their existence, later in Spengler's life, he tried to denounce National Socialism and in particular its racial ideology, only to die before seeing the fruits of his own labour.

Because of his dour doomer, third-rate, Nietzsche-inspired jeremiads and dubious grasp of history, Spengler's esteemed work is not taken particularly seriously by actual academics. Not only that, he was so infamous that even various other renowned assholes, such as rival philosophers and reactionary dipshits like Martin Heidegger and Leo Strauss, thought that Spengler was a total jackass. Hell, even Nazis — his primary audience when he was still alive — turned on him.

Despite temporarily falling to obscurity following World War II, today Spengler's work is popular amongst right-wing audiences and especially with the far-right. His works experienced a resurgence following the 2007-2009 Great Recession and the emergence of right-wing populism and associated movements during the 2010s. His prophecies of doom and pseudohistorical woo has been consumed like candy by his audiences and has introduced various colorful words to the jargon of right-wing culture wars, being one of the (if not the) originators of "Faustian spirit", "Western civilization" (and all the "[bad thing] of west" snowclones), "Good old days", “The Great Replacement" theory and using incomprehensible terminology to title cultures.

And yes, he is the namesake of Egon Spengler from the Ghostbusters franchise.

Who?

Blankenburg, Harz (photo from 1900). Spengler's hometown.

Early life

Spengler was born to a conservative lower middle-class family in Blankenburg (a German town at the foot of the Harz mountains). He was the eldest of four children and the only son, with his father originally coming from a long line of miners before deciding to become a postal clerk.

Spengler was very reserved during his childhood; as he grew older, he became fond of reading and sought solace in great figures of culture. He was in poor health and suffered from migraines and anxiety disorders throughout his life.

At the age of ten, the family moved to the university town of Halle. Spengler completed his classical studies at the local gymnasium (academically oriented secondary school), where he studied Greek, Latin, mathematics and natural sciences. It was there that his passion for art developed— especially poetry, drama and music — and he came into contact with the ideas of Goethe and Nietzsche.

After his father's death in 1901, Spengler attended various universities (Munich, Berlin and Halle) as a private student, taking courses in many subjects: history, philosophy, mathematics, natural sciences, literature, the classics, music and the fine arts. In 1903, he failed his doctoral examination — for which he had submitted a thesis on Heraclitus— because he did not have sufficient references (this will be important), which made it impossible for him to begin an academic career. In 1904, he obtained his doctorate. He experienced a nervous breakdown in 1905, on a day he was supposed to have started as a school teacher. Presumably he saw the job as undignified, when he craved to be an respected academic-level intellectual.

His life at this stage was uneventful. He taught briefly in Saarbrücken and then in Düsseldorf. From 1908 to 1911 he taught science, German history and mathematics at a scientific-technical secondary school (Realgymnasium) in Hamburg. In 1911, following the death of his mother, he moved to Munich, where he lived until his own death in 1936.

He lived as a solitary scholar, with the means provided by his modest inheritance. He also supported himself financially by giving private lessons and/or by writing for newspapers.

When he began work on the first volume of what would become The Decline of the West, he intended to only focus on Germany, but he was deeply affected by the Agadir Crisis and expanded the scope of his work. Spengler was inspired by Otto Seeck's Geschichte des Untergangs der antiken Welt (History of the Decline of the Ancient World), so much so that Spengler seemingly gave a nod to it by naming his book in similar way.

The first volume was completed in 1914 but publication was delayed by the outbreak of the First World War. During the war, Spengler lived in extreme poverty, because his inheritance, invested outside Europe, was virtually unusable.

Fame

A 1922 caricature.

After its publication in 1918, The Decline of the West proved to a huge success, primarily due to circumstances in Germany at the time. Following the defeat of Germany in the First World War, there was despair over the national humiliation of the Treaty of Versailles and then the economic depression around 1923, fueled by the hyperinflation of the Weimar Republic.

The theses presented in The Decline of the West comforted the Germans (especially the nationalist-minded), because thanks to it, the collapse of Germany could be explained in a seemingly rational way, as part of larger world-historical processes. The book also proved unexpectedly popular outside Germany and was translated into many languages. While the contemporary reception to the work was positive, not everybody was completely stupid. The book was scrutinized by historians who knew their shit, who were dismayed by the amateurish attempts of an inexperienced author and his unscientific approach. Additionally, Spengler's obscure sources, intuitionism and national mysticism were subject of criticism.

Spengler was ultimately unharmed by his own ineptitude as a philosophical historian. On the contrary, as György Lukács pointed out, it was just what "gave rise to [Spengler's] unscrupulously cynical candour, his cheerful boldness in making uncritical generalizations" (read: refuge in audacity), and because of this, Spengler had more presence than his like-minded contemporaries (such as Leopold Ziegler and Hermann Graf Keyserling) of post-WWI German culture historian/philosophers.

Despite having essentially become a icon, Spengler refused the chair of philosophy at the University of Göttingen to concentrate on writing.

In 1919, he released a book called Prussianism and Socialism, in which he tried to explain socialism the way he thought what socialism is. This was part of the interwar-period Conservative Revolution politics — to which Spengler had aligned himself to — in which they tried to hijack the definition of socialism, just because they thought they could. Like The Decline of the West (Vol. 1), the book did have its fans. Anton Drexler and colleagues at the DAP (German Worker's Party), including this one Adolf Hitler fellow, really dug the book, especially the title of it. So circa February 1920, the group decided to rename, but found the "Prussian" was a tad nondescript, and thus decided to go with "National" Socialists instead.

Around 1923-1924, in the wake of political and social unrest and inflation, Spengler entered politics in an attempt to engineer Reichswehr General Hans von Seeckt's rise to power. At the time, General von Seeckt held lots of military power and certain level of charisma, which led to Germans to believe that there was a chance he could carry out a military coup and assume leadership of the country. Spengler being the smug snake he was, thought he could insert himself into von Seeckt's sphere of influence, so that if the General did carry out the coup, he would have been in position of power as well. It did not go well as Spengler turned out to be just as bad at politics as he was at interpreting history. After that disaster, von Seeckt denounced Spengler as a pompous opportunist. The von Seeckt coup never became reality (as von Seeckt was forced to resign from his position in 1926 by President von Hindenburg, among other higher-ups), while that one group that was dismissed by Spengler and colleagues of the Conservative Revolution, did so in 1933 with the Reichstag Fire Decree.

In 1931, Spengler published Man and Technics, which warned of the dangers of technology and industrialism to culture. In particular, he pointed out the tendency of Western technology to spread among enemy "colored races," who would then take up arms against the West.

Rise of Nazism and death

Spengler's grave in Munich

In 1932, Spengler did not vote for Paul von Hindenburg but rather for Adolf Hitler, even though he found the latter vulgar. After Hitler won, Spengler met with him in 1933, for the same reasons he did von Seeckt. As noted by Barbara Beßlich, Spengler likely thought he could establish control over Hitler, acting as sort of his Joan Quigley. However, as gigantic of an asshole as Spengler was, Hitler was still the bigger one (in that he now wielded the power to back it up). After a long discussion (that was likely unpleasant for both of them), Spengler proclaimed that Germany did not need a "heroic tenor", but a "real hero".

Subsequently, Spengler got into a public dispute with Alfred Rosenberg aka one of the main ideologues of the Nazi Party, and the writer of the infamous The Myth of the Twentieth Century. Rosenberg (whom Spengler ironically had paved the way for with his own writings) argued with Spengler, about the latter sufficiently onboard with Nazi ideology. Unlike Spengler with von Seeckt, Rosenberg did understand basic politics, which resulted in Spengler falling out of favor with the Nazis and getting marginalized.Despite Spengler's cred with the old guard of the lunatic fringe, this was not really a major loss to the ruling Nazis… since Rosenberg could write the same pseudo-historical gobshite that Spengler could, and be more Hitler friendly. Spengler also refused offers from Joseph Goebbels to give public speeches.

Trying to still assert dominance, Spengler wrote The Hour of Decision (Jahre der Entscheidung). Published in 1934, which became a bestseller. Spengler's criticism of liberalism was welcomed by the Nazis, even though Spengler disagreed with their biological ideology and anti-Semitism. While racial mysticism played an important role in his worldview, Spengler had always been openly critical of the pseudoscientific racial theories (ironic considering his own perchant for pseudohistory) professed by the Nazis and many others of his time. Although himself a German nationalist, Spengler considered the Nazis "too German" and "not Western enough" to lead the fight against other peoples. The book also warned of a future war in which Western civilization was in danger of being destroyed. The Hour of Decision was widely distributed abroad before being banned by the Nazis.

Afterwards Spengler was now a powerless pariah in the world he helped to build… tragic irony or poetic justice? Shortly before his death, he wrote in a letter to a friend, at a time when his thoughts were, as is known, turning toward Christianity: "the German Reich will probably no longer exist in ten years." In an staggering chance of irony, Spengler got something unambiguously right. Afterwards, he died of a heart attack on May 8, 1936.

Works

Spengler's big gist is that he saw history as a constant process of decay rather than as progressive evolution. In some of his political writings (Prussianism and Socialism, Reconstruction of the German State, etc.), Spengler was a supporter of a strongly authoritarian state.

Spengler supports the thesis that there are no universal cultures, philosophies, sciences, morals, valid always and everywhere, but that every discipline and every cultural aspect are indispensable in the context to which they belong. What Spengler fears, in addition to the crisis of spirituality and religiosity, are the new emerging political forms, such as democracy and socialism, which alter the "natural", or rather traditional, relationships of power.

Spengler's work, particularly The Decline of the West, tends to be lobbed alongside "other Interwar German classics" such as Mein Kampf, and Martin Heidegger's Being and Time.

The Decline of the West

1922 German copy of The Decline of the West. It’s contributed more to the West's decline than anything it criticizes.

The two volume doorstopper The Decline of the West is essentially Oswald Spengler's magnum opus and the work he is best known for. To put it nicely, at best it is right for the wrong reasons and at worst, it's an unremitting train-wreck that keeps on piling.

In the first volume, released 1918, Spengler attempts to summarize a morphology of universal history. While in the second volume, published in 1920 (following his 1919's Prussianism and Socialism), Spengler changed gears and argued that "German socialism was different from Marxism" and was in fact compatible with traditional German conservatism. As a bit of context, the book reflects the experiences of the time before and during the First World War and is inspired by the revolutionary circumstances of the era. As a philosopher, however, Spengler recommends "looking at the historical world of forms spanning thousands of years […] if one really wants to understand the great crisis of the present."

The book introduces itself as a "Copernican overturning" of historical science and claims to reject the Eurocentric view of history. Which to him, basically means that he doesn't believe in the division of history into the classical linear periods, as in; "ancient - medieval - modern".

According to Spengler, the meaningful units are not eras, but cultures, which evolve as organisms. He distinguishes eight higher cultures: Babylonian, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, Meso-American (Maya/Aztec), classical (Greco-Roman), Arabic and finally the Western or "European-American" culture. He presents the bizarre idea of ​​Muslims, Jews and Christians, as well as their Persian and Semitic ancestors, as "Magi" (which is actually a term for Zoroastrian priests and not a specific culture); the Mediterranean cultures of classical antiquity, such as ancient Greece and ancient Rome, as "Apollonian"; and the modern Western world as "Faustian".

He states that cultures have a limited lifespan of a few thousand years. The last phase of each culture is, in Spengler's terminology, a 'civilization'. He then argues that civilizations go through a natural cycle of development, flowering and decay. Spengler then prophecised that the 20th Century Europe aka "Faustian Civilization", victim of narrow materialism and urban chaos, was in the last stage, "the winter season".

Historical development, according to Spengler, should not be seen in the Enlightenment perspective of progress, but on a par with the natural sciences, as the development of great civilizations (birth, apogee, decline); societies develop by carrying absolute values ​​within themselves, which instead take on a relative character outside. It is precisely the decay of these values ​​that is at the origin of Western decline. In Spengler's description, Western man is a proud but tragic figure, who, although he pursues and creates goals, is secretly convinced that the actual goal will never be achieved. Europe, unless it were able to purify itself and restore its spiritual values ​​and original lineage, would fall prey to "policies of barbaric savages" and "wars of annihilation". Here, Spengler exhibits one of the earliest forms of The Great Replacement theory.

Spengler sees the final state of civilization as having come for antiquity with the beginning of the Roman Empire, for the West with Napoleon, for the Orient with the Ottoman Empire, for China it was the imperial era (when there was less ups and downs), and for Egypt with the dawn of the New Kingdom. Spengler also calls the state of civilization (after overcoming the crisis of its emergence) the era of world peace. However, this was based only on the resignation of the broad masses, while the great "Caesars" and dictators had struggled for power and influence.

Spengler's idea of ​​the necessary transition of political constitutions into "Caesarism" (the imperial period) of the late-stage of civilization includes an anti-democratic and anti-liberal attitude. The philosopher, who was national-conservative in his own opinion, celebrated Prussia as the Western repetition of ancient Roman expansion. He dreamed of the future of the "Imperium Germanicum", which would once again completely summarize and organize the decaying Western culture.

The French revolution of 1789, the ideals of "Liberté, égalité, fraternité", in his opinion only led to the rule of money by capitalism. But capitalism undermines the social structure and ultimately turns against its own foundations of the liberal constitution. As a result, the rule of the Third Estate ultimately passes to that of the Fourth Estate, the formless mass of the world cities, or more precisely to those who can use these masses of civilization as tamers in the service of their own power intentions. The result is the decline of democracy and the advent of the rule of demagogues and dictators. Spengler believes this development is inevitable. He therefore distrusts the ideals of liberal democracy and the constitutional state.

Spengler declared imperialism, which he affirmed, to be a necessary phenomenon in the context of the decaying culture. Stating that "I am teaching imperialism here [...]. Imperialism is pure civilization. The fate of the West irrevocably lies in this manifestation." In the course of cultural development, the forces of the "cultural soul" bind all life energies into a strict form, even in the context of warlike actions.

In Spengler's eyes, the absolutist regimes of the 17th and 18th centuries, those of Louis XIV and Frederick the Great (and in ancient times; the time of Pericles) marked the heyday of the well-designed communities. Under the auspices of cultural decay, the energies of life would be released blindly again and chaos would break out. Taming this would always fall to the great individuals, "the Caesars". Consequently, their historical mission was unavoidable. The cult that later periods develop around their "leaders" therefore contains something inevitable in the history of every civilization.

At the end of the culture war, the winner would always be the one who knew how to best control the anarchic tendencies during the period of cultural decay and neutralize them for themselves. The example of the Romans in ancient times shows this. According to Spengler, the Prussian-Germans should take them as an example for the West. Spengler had argued that the last, in his words "Caesarism" phase of Western high culture would develop under German dominance and that Germany's defeat in war had prevented this transition.

Prussianism and Socialism

9 November 1918.

“”Prussiandom and socialism stand together against the inner England, against the world-view that infuses our entire life as a people, crippling it and stealing its soul…

—Oswald Spengler, Prussianism and Socialism

Prussianism and Socialism was Spengler's polemic that was published in 1919. In it, hammers the "German socialism was different from Marxism" thing, that he will touch upon in the second volume of The Decline of the West (which was released after this book). Here, he aims to connect the "Prussian character" with his idea of "socialism", which is the correct "socialism" compared to the "English socialism"; which Spengler may have assigned to being English, simply due to the Chartism movement. The book dabbles on following issues:

• Trauma of the November Revolution: Spengler considers the political upheaval of November 9, 1918, which brought an end to the Hohenzollern monarchy, in the larger context of a tragic history of Germany. The lack of a sense of fact that is characteristic of Germany shapes politics to a large extent, even in the style of revolutions. Thus, in 1918, as a result of the disintegration of the monarchy, elements "without the slightest statesmanlike talent of English parliamentarians" came to power. The uprising of the Marxist proletariat followed on the heels of "the liberal destruction of 1917." Spengler states that "The revolution of stupidity was followed by that of meanness. [...] It was the most senseless act in German history."
• Dawn of civilization: The revolution takes its course against the backdrop of the end of Western culture. Spengler's perspective corresponds to the historical-philosophical and morphological interpretation of culture as it develops with the decline of the West. Spengler sees "socialism" as the "last world mood" into which the tired Western European-North American cultural area takes refuge. The final battle for power in the emerging "Faustian empire" includes the fundamental question of whether the future state and economic constitution should be capitalist or socialist. Likewise, under what auspices the coming violent people of the Western end times will exert their power. For Spengler, this question decides nothing less than "the fate of the world". And this question, as the philosopher of history believes, must "be solved in Germany for the world".
• Liberalism, anarchism, socialism: According to Spengler, several “schools of thought” of political and economic style compete with each other on Western European soil. First one is English liberalism; “The English instinct decided: power belongs to the individual. Free struggle of one against the other; triumph of the stronger: liberalism, inequality. Second is French anarchism; “The French instinct: power belongs to no one. No subordination, therefore no order. No state, but nothing: equality for all, ideal anarchism, in practice repeatedly (1799, 1851, 1871, 1918) kept viable by the despotism of generals or presidents.” And the third being German/Prussian) socialism; “The German, or more precisely Prussian, instinct was: power belongs to the whole. The individual serves him. The whole is sovereign. The king is only the first servant of his state (Frederick the Great). Everyone gets his place. Orders are given and orders are obeyed.” Prussian socialism is essentially “illiberal and anti-democratic, as far as English liberalism and French democracy are concerned.” It is also anti-revolutionary.
• English capitalism: Spengler deems that the location of Isle of England made the strong state superfluous. British history has seen the lower classes grow into aristocratic forms - as with Whigs and Tories). Spengler therefore arrives to conclusion that "liberalism and capitalism are intrinsic to the English nation", and that democracy and universal suffrage are tried and tested English methods of capitalism. This does not mean that there are no hierarchies. Spengler comments on England's style of government, not without inner admiration: "The latest decisions of the party leaders are a secret even to the majority of members of parliament." The "fine English way" of governing from above and at the same time legitimizing oneself democratically from below commands unconditional respect for Spengler's aristocratic attitude (because of course it does).
• Socialism in Germany For Spengler, the liberal English (and the French anarchist) system remains tied to the psychological and historical conditions of the peoples concerned. Such principles cannot be successfully imitated by others without neglecting their own conditions and constraints. Spengler believes that parliamentarism is alien to Germany. In contrast: "Only socialism in some form can be of internal importance in Germany." Spengler does not mean Marxist socialism, as the following statement makes clear: The transition to socialism has already taken place in Germany, "this German socialist revolution took place in 1914. It took place in legitimate and military forms." German flirtation with English liberalisms, on the other hand, is not appropriate. It merely throws society out of shape and plays into the hands of English power. Spengler therefore calls for a fight against “inner England”, which “has secured the final victory for the outer England of the Entente powers by overthrowing the state”.
• Anti-Marxism: Spengler's criticism of Karl Marx ultimately aims at the fact that the mastermind of the Communist Manifesto mixed up psychological and economic problems and also judged the situation in England from the perspective of a German-Hegelian, and thus misunderstood it. Moreover, according to Spengler, Marx stands in the powerful tradition of theological thought. Marxism itself is essentially a religious, not a political movement. Just as Marxism is not true socialism, Russian Bolshevism, which refers to Marx, is not real socialism. (This guy doesn't know when to stop, does he?) To the extent that Russianness "does not feel internally Asian again", it is "culturally alien" and has been shaped by Western ideologies (pseudomorphosis). “This childish, dull and prescient Russianness has now been tormented, disturbed, wounded and poisoned by ‘Europe’ through the imposed forms of an already masculine, foreign and domineering culture.” And therefore the Russian events since the October Revolution of 1917, to which Western Europe has paid so much attention, are not even relevant to the question of genuine socialism.
• And finally, Spengler's appeal to Germany: Spengler appeals to the German working class and to the upper classes of the German people alike. The workers should free themselves from the ideology of Marxism, because "for the worker there is only Prussian socialism or nothing." But the conservative classes must also give up their bias in outdated thinking. They have to accept democracy in principle - Spengler expressly states - but a democracy that is far removed from the western English conditions. Spengler emphasizes the inner connection between his Prussian socialist idea and the idea of ​​power. If the Prussian aristocracy realizes socialism, the path to new global political heights for Germany will be clear.

Man and Technics

“”Optimism is cowardice.

—Oswald Spengler, Man and Technics

Man and Technics is a philosophical text by Oswald Spengler, that was published in 1931. Prerequisites Man and Technics is not a mere reflection on the position of technical processes in the modern world or their culturally conditioned criticism. Rather, Spengler tries to show that contemporary technology necessarily arises from a "Faustian impulse" to life that is deeply rooted in Western thought and will perish together with this very impulse.

Oswald Spengler states that man is a predator and transfers this to the institutions he develops. Struggle is the essence of existence. Technology is the tactic in that struggle and cannot be understood as a tool. Thinking developed with the improvement of the technique of the eye and the hand for hunting. At the end of the era of the armed hand, cattle breeding, agriculture, settlements, graves etc. appear and the era of entrepreneurship begins. Making and thinking separate. Two types of people arise. Thinker/leaders and makers/executors. Both experience the growing culture and the separation from nature as a painful lack of freedom.

He sees that it is not the usability of an invention but the personality of the inventor drives everything forward, his "being a predator". Leaders and guides no longer understand each other or the machine technology that has become esoteric. The entire earth is subjected to it, everything organic succumbs to its organization. Western civilization gives away its technical knowledge to the guided peoples. They will use it as a weapon to defeat the West but will never be able to develop it further themselves.

Analysis of Spengler and his ideas (and what's wrong with them)

György Lukács (pictured 1919) is tired of Spengler's bullshit.

Now, if you read the last section on Spengler's works, you likely went "hold the fuck up" a few times.

In general, due to Spengler's work being massive books with brick-walls of text, written in nonsensical dribble, with so many details wrong, coming at massive torrents and even relishing about "being heroically wrong", it has made detailed criticism and rebuttal of his work very difficult. Not to mention him vacillating between doomist cultural pessimism and triumphant national mysticism, making it even more difficult to figure out what he really believes in.

As such, most of his critics focus on deconstructing Spengler himself, using whatever tidbits that they managed to get out of Spengler's jumbled writing. And in doing so, they tend to arrive to the same, simple conclusion, that Spengler is a "amateur historian who doesn't know what he is talking about, doing second-rate Nietzche."

Spengler's how and why

The key to avoid being swept up by Spengler's crank magnetism - besides the obvious - is to outline the how and why. In terms of deconstructing Spengler, the works of H. Stuart Hughes (Oswald Spengler: Critical Estimate), György Lukács (The Destruction of Reason) and David Engels (Key Thinkers of the Radical Right: Behind the New Threat to Liberal Democracy) remain indispensable.

In his book, György Lukács goes on detail how Spengler results to charlatan tactics to try assert false authority. Lukács proposes that Spengler's philosophy was formed by a purely vitalistic (i.e. German Vitalism / Lebensphilosophie) reading of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and the ever-popular Friedrich Nietzsche. He additionally points to there being "smattering of Henri Bergson", whom Spengler "simplified as vigorously as [Bergson] had Wilhelm Dilthey and Georg Simmel".

Basically, Spengler applied all the basic ideas the German Vitalism/Lebensphilosophe to the study of history (complete with the philosophy's rosy jargon and buzzwords); regarding life and death, intuition and reason, form (as in Gestalt) and law, simile and concept, symbol and formula etc. etc. Another key element Spengler utilized is something called Diltheyan method of "perception through men of genius" epistemology, a devolved form of historicism and epistemology based on Dilthey's philosophy, that had permeated in the German aristocratic circles. Lukács stating that;

With this epistemology Spengler intended to degrade all causal and law-controlled knowledge. The means of grasping dead forms is the mathematical law. The means of under­ standing live forms is the analogy. Spengler now extended analogy, as the central category of history, into the method of a universal morphology, into a 'symbol-system ', a 'physio­gnomy' of history. [...] Cause and effect, whose[sic] framework Spengler called the 'logic of space', were to be replaced in history by the framework of destiny, the 'logic of time '. Thus he achieved the identification of irrationalist life and history: 'life is the alpha and omega, and life has no system, no programme, no rationality; it exists for itself and through itself, and the profound order in which it realizes itself can only be intuited and felt - and then perhaps described..' Thus he declared history to be a universal science and, in the same breath, denied it any scientific character: 'The wish to treat of history scientifically is, in the last analysis, always a paradoxical thing... '

Thus, by resorting to totally arbitrary form of epistemology, in which every­ thing boiled down to "experience" and to "intuition", was according to Lukács; " Spengler's way of asserting the undisputed mastery of historical relativism."

Therefore; if everything is historical, then with Spengler, that meant that everything was historically relative, purely relative. This emboldened Spengler to get more creative, as this meant that he could also start "historicizing" even natural sciences. Per Lukács; "for [Spengler], it was not to do with the historical character of the real process in nature but with a pseudo-historical dissolving of the objectivity of all natural-scientific categories." And due to applying philosophical vitalism to everything, this opened doors for not only increasingly radical relativism, but also to outright mysticism as well.

Although the question of a historical treatment of nature (inits objective laws etc) had been in the air since Darwin and even with the Kant-Laplace theory, Spengler reversed all pre-established methods in purely subjectivist-vitalistic manner. Thus by ignoring accepted historical evolution of nature, Spengler too "histrocized" the knowledge of nature by making it a mere function of the character-type of a given "cultural cycle". Therefore, removing all the nature's independence and autonomy, thus causing the complete disappearance of the genuine problem, the historical being of nature itself within objective natural laws. This distorted proposition then giving new problems; namely how and to what extent the historical evolution of society affects the compass, character, etc., of our perception of nature.

But Spengler dismissed from consideration the necessary basis for the correct proposition, the objectivity of nature and evolution of the productive forces of a given society, and the stage in the growth of science and technology which they determine. By making an absolute principle of the element of historical relativity in our perceptions of nature, he likewise eliminated the fact of their progressive approximation to nature's objective reality. Not acknowledging the interaction between the evolution of productive forces and perceptions of nature, he intuitively derived the separate forms or results of natural science directly from the .. 'morphological form' of a 'cultural cycle'. And in so doing, he engendered a myth based on the radical and permanent relativity of all knowledge.

And as more popular Spengler got, the more audacious he got in stating completely incomprehensible nonsense and creating other insane paradoxes. To him, even numbers are a historical category. Spengler himself having stated that; "A number in itself does not and cannot exist. There are several worlds of numbers because there are several civilizations. We find an Indian, Arabic, ancient and occidental type of number each at bottom unique, each the expression of a different course of events..." And thusly, Spengler proclaims that there are "more than one kind of mathematics", to a point where even causality is just "an occidental and more precisely a Baroque phenomenon."

For Spengler, history took precedence over nature as a general rule: 'Thus history is the original world-form and nature a late one which only men of a mature culture may fulfil, not the reverse as a prejudice in urban scientific understanding tends to assume”. And so the whole science of physics along with its object was a myth of the late occidental 'Faustian' culture. The atom, speed of light and gravitation were just as much the mythical categories of 'Faustian man' as poltergeists and household demons were categories of the period that believed in magic. [Lukács points to Spengler drawing conclusions regarding historical relativity of knowledge from pre-WWI imperialist vitalist thinkers like Simmel and popularizing them in the process.] For those reasons, culture was for Spengler the 'primary phenomenon histories'. Of all past and future world-histories.

Regarding The Decline of the West, Lukács sees the book as a one big con, in which Spengler basically attempted to turn “all fields of human knowledge subservient to his philosophy of history, no matter whether he personally had truly mastered them or whether they, in themselves, had already yielded unequivocal, philosophically applicable results”. Further noting that the book sought the "intellectual redemption of German imperialist capitalism , with its aristocratic-militaristic features, by dubbing it the 'real' socialism. This, however, was already to anticipate the basic idea of Hitlerian social demagogy."

Sebastian Rosenberger calls Spengler's method of interpreting phenomena of different civilizations from very different eras as "simultaneous", that is, as equivalent within the rhythm of emergence, prosperity and decline being "not rational by scientific standards". Rosenberger points to The Decline of the West being almost perfectly devoid of scientific argument. Rosenberg concludes that Spengler saw rationality itself as a form of "decline" to be avoided.

Unoriginality

Karl Lamprecht (pictured 1909) is not too impressed about Spengler stealing his act.

Although Spengler seems like a trailblazer, he is not. Various topics he touches upon has been done by others before him, and often in better fashion.

For one, as Ernst Cassirer pointed out regarding the The Decline of the West, Spengler's work was essentially a retread of German historian Karl Lamprecht's. Much like Spengler, Lamprecht too was disregarded as a "dilettante historian" who employed questionable methods of presenting history, being scrutinized all the way from the release of Lamprecht's "Deutscher Geschichte" book series. Lamprecht insisted in the importance of "cultural and economic" history, being willfully negligent of important socio-political aspects and other natural science-related factors. Also having been influenced by Wilhelm Wundt's ethnopsychology, Lamprecht pushed concept of "universal history" and an theory of "psychogenesis" underlying it. Lamprecht thus formalized a theory that the historical development of national consciousness could be divided into "cultural ages"... which might sound familiar. And just like Spengler, Lamprecht also had his prophecies on how "the phenomena of decadence at the end of the 19th century" was result of overextended culture and overdeveloped technology, which will lead to the doom of the industrial nations... Not unlike what Spengler espouses in The Decline of the West and Man and Technics.

Another noted influence is Otto Seeck, who in 1895 began a book series titled History of the Decline of the Ancient World. Much like Spengler's Decline of the West, Seeck's work too contains woo, though here its a mix of late antiquity history with social Darwinism. Although at the time when it was made, Seeck's History of the Decline of the Ancient World series was considered to be the most comprehensive, source-based presentation of late antiquity in Germany. Though these days, it is grossly outdated, with Seeck's assessments of late antiquity having been debunked.

Also as noted by György Lukács, Spengler's idea of socialism appears to formed by writings of Max Scheler and Werner Sombart, which are known to have been formed by World War I propaganda/nationalism, coming from an pro-Germany/anti-England angle.

Also philosophically, Spengler didn't bring much new to the table - being mostly considered as a epigone of Friedrich Nietzsche's pessimistic proto-Lebensphilosophie, Wilhelm Dilthey's historicism and with touch of Goethe. György Lukács points out that Spengler is yet another in line of Nietzsche clones/German Vitalism/historicism thinkers, being a new low in "philosophical level" compared to his predecessors. Lukács remarks that Spengler is merely important in that he marks the point where German Vitalism movement starts to transmutate into outright fascist philosophy, effectively paving the way for the "Nazi ideologue trio" of Alfred Baeumler, Ernst Krieck and Alfred Rosenberg.

Spengler's definition of socialism

For more information, see: Hitler and socialism

Now, even a deaf, blind, and dumb person is able to determine that Spengler's interpretation “socialism” is a second-hand embarrassment inducing misread. However, there is a method to the madness, as the whole thing stems from the interwar-period Conservative Revolution, that Spengler was part of. Although they had various factions throwing ideas to the wall, with there being agreements and disagreements, one that all agreed on, was to "correct" the idea of socialism. The parameters of what socialism today is (and was back then), was to them merely Marxist "socialist revisionism." The conservative revolution instead crafted their own socialism, in which "socialism" instead invoked "Frontgemeinschaft" (sort of front-line camaraderie of German soldiers during the WWI) for the end goal of creating "Volksgemeinschaft" (national community / social cohesion). The conservative revolution thinkers had some concepts for this, with Spengler's being "Prussian Socialism" aka "Socialism of the blood".

Circa 1810s, the term socialism initially described the philosophy of Henri de Saint-Simon and his Saint-Simonians movement (whom Karl Marx would later refer to as "Utopian Socialists"). And by 1840s, the term socialism began to be appropriated by the working class movements, even though it encompassed various different meanings to them, from generic opposition against laissez-faire capitalism to the systematic communism of classical Marxism and anything in between. Indeed, even Marxism, despite Marx's book being the Communist Manifesto, was primarily referred to as socialism or social democratic, since "communism" at the time was primarily associated with militancy in France and Germany. It was not until Lenin and the Bolshevik Revolution, that there was a hard split between Communism and Socialism. By the last third of the 19th century, democratic socialist parties started to get foothold in politics. With it being 1899 when the Australian Labor Party became the first socialist party to get elected to form a government in the Colony of Queensland, even though it lasted merely a week.

Although Spengler had received his education in early 1900s, before the 1917 Russian Revolution and with Prussianism and Socialism released 1919, György Lukács points to this being another case where Spengler utilized German Vitalism's irrationalist relativism to just defy what had been well established by 1919.

Per Lukács; what Spengler expounds in his "Prussianism and Socialism", again using his 'morphology', that every civilization has had its form of socialism, such as beliefs of Zeno of Citium, Buddhism, etc.; and that present-day socialism should be the Faustian form of those manifestations. Spengler proclaims that in Prussianism, he has discovered "real" socialism; those of an military officer, civil servant and worker. And that the enemy was not capitalism, but England. These sort of ideas were explored already in Max Scheler's WWI pamphlets and Werner Sombart's 1915 book "Händler und Helden" (Traders and Heroes), meaning Spengler is essentially parroting WWI propaganda.

Prussians and Englishmen represent two major types in the development of civilization. There are 'two moral imperatives of a contrasting kind, slowly evolved from the Viking spirit and the code of the Knights of the Teutonic Order. The one group carried the Germanic idea within them, the others felt it over them : personal independence and supra-personal commonalty. Today they are called individualism and socialism. ' Karl Marx and working-class socialism have only complicated this question and are being thrust aside by the fateful logic of world-history. The victor will be 'Prussian socialism ', the 'socialism' founded by Friedrich Wilhelm I . The true Internationale will also be built on this basis : 'A genuine Internationale is possible only through the triumph of the idea of a single race above all others . The genuine Internationale is imperialism. ' The worker, in this 'socialism ', becomes an economic officer, and the entrepreneur a responsible administrative official. The German working class will be bound to realize that only this 'socialism' has real possibilities. No ideology is needed, only 'a brave skepticism, a class of socialistic master-natures'.

Lukács also draws comparisons with Spengler and Nietzsche's opposition to socialism. That; "[Nietzsche] had made a direct, frontal assault on socialism - of which he knew little. Of course it cannot be claimed that Spengler was any better acquainted with socialist literature, but his mode of attack was different, a dodging of the issue and a demagogic ruse: socialism, he conceded, would triumph - but the 'genuine article ' was Prussianism."

And no, Spengler was not a fan of the conventional socialism, or really anything left of reactionary politics. Historian Ishay Landa in his 2012 book "The Apprentice's Sorcerer: Liberal Tradition and Fascism", outlines that Spengler was strongly against egalitarianism, and labour rights, and instead championed very imperialist and elite-driven economy. Spengler essentially expected the working-class people to "work a whole lot, for the absolute minimum" and them "being happy about it."

Feasibility of Caesarism

Mussolini (second from the left) busy being the ideal "Caesar" of the post-democratic Faustian Empire, as Spengler prophecized.

As stated prior, Spengler saw European absolutist regimes of Louis XIV and Frederick the Great (plus Pericles of ancient times) as ideal states. On that basis, he brainstormed "Imperium Germanicum", that would be ruled by a "Caesar"-like figure, who would take command of Euro-American "Faustian Culture" in order to rid it of decay and make it great again, thus ushering "world peace." Hindsight is 50/50, but this guy should not been as surprised that his rhetoric lead to rise of Nazis.

While he had belief that some form of Ceasarism was soon to appear, with Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini connected to his "visions", none of them really ended up living up to his hopes. Despite being under the Nazi sphere of influence - and the whole Nazi Germany losing World War II thing - Spengler considered Adolf Hitler to be the most unsuitable man to be "Caesar" of Germany. Though there is certain irony to this, as Nazis essentially took all the conservative revolution's ideas - that Spengler was part of - and turned them into something workable... As long as they worked.

Meanwhile, he saw the likes of Benito Mussolini and Cecil Rhodes (who had already died before Spengler made it big) as being more exemplary "Caesarism", and the Fascist Italy as a better "prototype of a coming era". As the outcome of World War II indicates (and having expressed "disappointment" with Mussolini's conquests), Spengler's delusions regarding Mussolini and Fascist Italy was a big wet rag -- left to dry out at the streets of Piazzale Loreto, Milan.

Even Spengler's idea of Julius Caesar-like figure being ruler the great epoch he envisioned leaned on wishful thinking. If a dictator like him tried to spearhead the giant empire of entire European-American sphere (sorry; FAUSTIAN CULTURE), especially in post-Enlightenment setting, he would not have had the ability to maintain that much power. While Julius Caesar appeared that have popular support and high degree of military success, he did not have the universal approval for it. If he did, he would never had been assassinated.

There is also one fundamental problem; history is written by winners. That is, there are academic studies on historiography that scrutinize Julius Caesar, regarding whatever he had said and/or written being actually true. Although Caesar's work being one of the oldest, most complete primary sources for historical reconstruction, it is believed that Caesar had written these from a political point, to build his image amongst Roman populous. Meaning Spengler had uncritically assumed that the exaggerated narrative of Julius Caesar was unquestionably true, and in his eagerness stuck with it, which may have contributed to Spengler constantly running afoul with reality.

Spengler's grasp of politics (or lack thereof)

Spengler was a anti-democratic nationalist who believed in a strongly authoritarian state. Although Spengler clearly has vile political beliefs, debunking them is easy, on the basis that Spengler's own actions spoke plenty loud about the unfeasibility of his own beliefs. While rich in fanciful ideas, Spengler's understanding of actual reality in politics was terrible. Indeed, him dabbling in politics in the 1920s and 1930s could be nicely described as a "series of self-owns." As stated prior, his politicking with Reichswehr General Hans von Seeckt went super bad, which lead to Spengler being labelled as a opportunistic pundit.

Per Barbara Beßlich - German literary scholar and (an actual) historian on German culture - Spengler had the intent to try direct "Caesarism", which he believed was coming, in the direction he wanted; to “instrumentalise it nationalistically”. However, like with a mad doctor in a cliché ridden horror flick, it went just as well. Not realizing his limitations, despite already having experienced setbacks with the whole General von Seeckt campaign, Spengler attempted to assert his dominance over the Nazis. But somehow not putting 1+1 together, that if you are in a dictatorship where might makes right, his talk of a big game ran into Hitler and co. having the freedom to whatever, and had their fanatical paramilitary units to stuff Spengler into the locker like a snooty twit he was.

Although Spengler was opposed to Hitler's brand of authoritarianism, it still needs to be underscored that Spengler was not against authoritarianism in general nor was his intent to safeguard democracy by any measure.

National mysticism and other culture-history nonsense

In Spengler's The Decline of the West, he identifies eight higher cultures, those being; Babylonian, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, Meso-American (Maya/Aztec), classical (Greco-Roman), Arabic and finally the Western/European-American/Faustian culture. He regards these "culture units" as more important than race or eugenics, as long as Germany's the one directing the Faustian one. Why Faust is selected - besides Spengler being a Goethe fan - can be inferred to be loaded language regarding counter-enlightenment.

As György Lukács noted, as Spengler considered that everything was relative due to his subjectivist-vitalistic view of history and all rest of the science, nothing he says really holds up to scrutiny.

In terms of racism, Spengler's xenophobia was not ipso facto derived from biological/eugenic factors, but due to hostility towards other cultures that presented a threat to Germany as a imperialist superpower. Per Sebastian Rosenberger analyzing the Decline of the West, he points to while Spengler rejecting biological racial theories as crude and mechanistic, he instead tried to establish a "geophysical-agrarian" concept of race, which displeased the Völkisch movement and the Nazis. Spengler's world of ideas is therefore not ethnic in the sense of being racist and exclusionary. His criticism of civilization, which labeled big city life, western democracy, socialism, rationalism and modern ways of life as indications of cultural decline, can only be described as racialist in a broader sense. In a way, he viewed technologically undeveloped peoples and cultures in a way, superior to ones that are developed, claiming that "colored races", who hate European imperialism, might one day conquer the "exhausted Faustian man". While sort of respectful to other races, he still emphasized that his own Germanic race needed to have superiority over others.

Although racial distinctions are critical to Spengler's schema of civilizations, this does not make him a racialist in the sense of believing in a hierarchy of the races. He dismissed notions of innate racial superiority, or of there being a master race. However, in his later work he did argue that the West was in the process of committing racial suicide through policies such as population control and the employment of medical science to sustain.

Current reputation

Despite the influence and international fame he enjoyed between the world wars, his work fell into obscurity after the Second World War. Being full of shit, having been instrumental in dissolving the democracy of Weimar Republic and having been rejected by Nazis, Spengler's audience was reduced to strictly niche level. Between 1945-c.2008, unless people were talking about Ghostbusters, nobody had the need to bring up Spengler.

But as it turns out, eternal recurrence might be a thing; as Spengler experienced a revival in late 2000s/early 2010s. The 2007-2009 Great Recession plunged countries into economic woes, creating circumstances not unlike interwar Germany. As people started to point fingers at liberalism and modernity, along with the rise of right-wing populism, somewhere along the way, people rediscovered Oswald Spengler and his work.

Seeing the post-Great Recession world comparable to the "Winter of culture" that Spengler proposed, an ever increasing amount of right-wing loonies started to see this as a sign that Western civilization had started its last stage, despite this same shit essentially having happened during interwar period already. Either way, as did Nazis before them, the far-right (in particular the ethno-nationalists and "dissident right") took to Spengler's guidance regarding "purifying itself and restoring its spiritual values ​​and original lineage" to start combating the proverbial decline of the western culture. And by the looks of it, this "decline" is mostly associated with the great replacement, "cultural suicide" (multiculturalism), and "decadence" ("Liberal Elite") and other nebulous issues you can point the woke stick at.

In Spengler's Man and Technics, he proposed that technological development essentially keeps sapping human vitality the further it goes. And in the process, it will render generations and thus cultures into spiritless zombies. This too has been appropriated into the manosphere, with the book reading much like modern right-wingers' indictments of "tech-savvy millennials having been reduced into video game-playing soy boys" and calling return to good old days, "when men were men".

Not only that, Spengler's ideas, especially that of "Ceasarism", has likely contributed to the modern right's flirtations with authoritarianism. Spengler postulated that Ceasarism serves as a final phase of modernity that would succeed democracy, after its collapse. Right-wing "strongman" politicians such as of Vladimir Putin, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Donald Trump have been labelled as being "Ceasarist". In October 2023, the term "Red Caesarism", which calls for establishing a dictatorship to sort out America's problems, began to perpetuate amongst the fringes of American conservatives, especially those close to the Claremont Institute..

Curiously, Spengler is popular with some Islamists as well, who latch onto the book's culture critique of Continental Europe and feeding to anti-Western sentiment.

Relationships

People who ate Spengler's horseshit, have admitted it and liked it

• Oswald Mosley
• Carl Schmitt: One of the key ideologues of the Weimar Republic Conservative Revolution.
• Francis Parker Yockey: outright identifies himself as "neo-Spenglerian" and at the start of his book, "Imperium: The Philosophy of History and Politics", he states he made it as a sequel to Spengler's The Decline of the West.
• Julius Evola (who is famously cited by Steve Bannon)
• Joseph Campbell: Has outright stated so in "Myths to Live by".
• Gerhard Meisenberg
• Max Hermansen
• William S. Burroughs
• Pat Buchanan: apparently! He wrote a book titled "The Death of the West", and it is believed to be nod to Spengler's magnum opus. It very much reads like a post-Reagan counterpart of The Decline of the West.
• Henry Miller

Frenemies

• Adolf Hitler: Spengler and Hitler had a contentious relationship, with Spengler saying bad things about Hitler and then getting his books banned. Nevertheless, Hitler still "respected" Spengler enough to not have him killed.
• Theodor W. Adorno: Has bit of a love-hate relationship with Spengler, famously attempting to "turn (Spengler's) reactionary ideas toward progressive ends".
• Alfred Rosenberg: Owes his existence to Spengler, but threw him under the bus.
• Martin Heidegger: like Rosenberg, Heidegger tried to get Spengler aboard the Führer train, but when Spengler refused, Heidegger began talking behind Spengler's back.

Enemies and critics

Due to his pissy behavior and the fact some people ended up being tricked into reading his book through, Spengler has a fair share of people wanting a piece of him:

• Ernst Troeltsch: Pretty much the first person to state that The Decline of the West will be appropriated by evil assholes. Turns out he was better at "educated guesses" than Spengler was.
• Robert Musil: Along with Troeltsch, Musil was one of Spengler's early critics.
• Harry von Kessler: See the second of the top quotes.
• Thomas Mann: He was initially fan of Spengler's work, but got sick of him, calling Spengler "Nietzche's clever ape" and a "hyena".
• General Hans von Seeckt: Although Spengler tried engineer his political ascent around 1923-1924, his time with Spengler resulted him saying afterwards that Spengler "should have gone down with the west!"
• Karl Popper: although his book The Open Society and Its Enemies was primarily dedicated to tearing a new asshole on Plato and Karl Marx, he dedicated a few pages on explaining why Spengler was a goddamn idiot. Stating that in his opinion, Spengler's Decline of the West was to be "not taken seriously".
• György Lukács: Marxist theorist who included him in his book, The Destruction of Reason, which studied the philosophical irrationalism and how it lead to Nazism. He dedicated an entire chapter to him and debunking Spengler's methodology of bullshit.
• Max Horkheimer (of Frankfurt School): dismissed Spengler as a "Lebensphilosophie populist" and an affront to that philosophy.
• Franz Borkenau: Had published multiple essays that are critical of Spengler. Borkenau also placed Spengler along with Georges Sorel and Vilfredo Pareto as the major three philosophers of fascism.
• Leo Strauss: If you are too anti-democratic and reactionary for this guy, then you have done something real bad.

See also

• Julius Caesar
• Houston Stewart Chamberlain: racialist, pseudo-historical crank, whose writing bears similarity to Spengler's, as well as being an influence on Nazis.
• C.S. Lewis: if somebody brings up Spengler's "Man and Technics", then somebody else is bound to bring up Lewis' "Abolition of Man".

References

Sources

• Engels, David (2019). "Oswald Spengler and the Decline of the West". In Sedgwick, Mark (in en). Key Thinkers of the Radical Right: Behind the New Threat to Liberal Democracy. Oxford University Press. pp. 3–21. ISBN 978-0-19-087760-6. 
• Hughes, H. Stuart (1991). Oswald Spengler. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 978-1-4128-3034-8. 
• Lewis, Ben (2022). Oswald Spengler and the Politics of Decline. Berghahn Books. ISBN 9781800735750. 
• Lukács, György (1981). The Destruction of Reason. Humanities Press. ISBN 9780391022478. 
• Craig, Gordon Alexander (1978). Germany, 1866-1945. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198221135. 
• Pfeifer, Annie. "Oswald Spengler". Yale University. 
• Dreher, Carl. "Spengler and the Third Reich".