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 SpenglerRead
When the Englishman speaks of national wealth he means the number of millionaires in the country.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote critiques how national wealth is often measured by the richness of a few rather than the wellbeing of all citizens.
Oswald Spengler's quote reflects a critical perspective on how society tends to define national wealth through the lens of financial success concentrated in the hands of millionaires. It suggests that measuring a nation's prosperity solely by the number of wealthy individuals does not provide an accurate or holistic view of the overall economic and social health of the population. This raises questions about equity and the true indicators of a thriving society.
Themes
WealthMillionairesNational WealthSocietyEconomics
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a discussion about economic inequality during a lecture on social justice.
More from Oswald Spengler
All quotes βIn 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 SpenglerRead
Man makes history; woman is history. The reproduction of the species is feminine: it runs steadily and quietly through all species, animal or human, through all short-lived cultures. It is primary, unchanging, everlasting, maternal, plantlike, and cultureless. If we look back we find that it is synonymous with life itself.
Oswald SpenglerRead
Every Socialist outbreak only blazes new paths for Capitalism.
Oswald SpenglerRead
If few can stand a long war without deterioration of soul, none can stand a long peace.
Oswald SpenglerRead
It is the Late city that first defies the land, contradicts Nature in the lines of its silhouette, denies all Nature. It wants to be something different from and higher than Nature. These high-pitched gables, these Baroque cupolas, spires, and pinnacles, neither are, nor desire to be, related with anything in Nature. And then begins the gigantic megalopolis, the city-as-world, which suffers nothing beside itself and sets about annihilating the country picture.
Oswald SpenglerRead
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