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with the description of things a certain affective tone and an indica–
tion of how one ought to behave toward them. That this tangle can
be undone only with difficulty, is clearest perhaps from the linguistic
difficulties with which an objective sociology has to struggle. Our
everyday consciousness produces a total picture in which the value
characters appear to dwell indissolubly in things as "properties," a
picture which thus assures to the human being a strong feeling of
security. No words need be wasted in stressing the basic cultural sig–
nificance of this fact. But such an amalgamation of knowledge and
value is possible only so long as at least a relative stability prevails
in both areas. Once the world of values becomes fluid-especially in
connection with social tensions and conflicts-these total interpreta–
tions also break apart. An increase of social and ideological crises
arises, as for instance in Greece at the outbreak of the Peloponnesian
War.
In such periods of convulsion people often turn to philosophy
in order to win back their lost security, and they are then ready to
pay for it every price, even that of intellectual integrity. Thus it is
not surprising that many thinkers in such situations seize on all the
possibilities of security which the anthropomorphic-normative concep–
tual models seem to furnish; and that they gloss over with pseudo–
solutions (as the exampIes have shown) the difficulties which they
are bound to encounter in this process.
Finally, the secret of the historical success of these tautological
formulae and circular inferences lies precisely in their vacuity, which
made it possible to endow any and every ideological content with
the claim to universal validity. For more than 2000 years such
conceptual forms have served the most diverse values and ideals,
purposes and interests. The Greek sage and Roman jurist, the Catho–
lic schoolman and the man of letters of the Enlightenment, the liberal
free-trader and the socialist revolutionary were all able to use this
long-venerated world of concepts in order to establish their doctrines
as "truly natural" or "truly reasonable" and to give them in this
way the appearance of a higher legitimation. Add to this, that such
empty formulae are especially suitable for all kinds of institutional
rule. They awaken- especially in the governed- the impression of
the unshakeable security of ultimate principles, while they in no way
hinder the guiding authorities in their concrete decisions.
