Civilization is powerless to realize its dream of everlasting aggrandizement. The tower of Babylon will remain unfinished. As a reaction against his mediaeval ascetic ideal, man puts aside both resignation and contemplation, and attempts to dominate nature, organize life and increase its productive forces. This, however, does not help to bring him into closer communion with the inner life and soul of nature. On the contrary, by mastering it technically and organizing its forces man becomes further removed from it.
Organization proves to be the death of the organism.
Life becomes increasingly a matter of technique. The machine sets its stamp upon the human spirit and all its manifestations. Thus civilization has neither a natural nor a spiritual, but a mechanical foundation. It represents par excellence the triumph of technique over both the spirit and organism. Culture, having lost its soul, becomes civilization.