If in the long run we are the makers of our own fate, in the short run we are the captives of the ideas we have created.

many who think themselves infinitely superior to the aberrations of naziism, and sincerely hate all its manifestations, work at the same time for ideals whose realization would lead straight to the abhorred tyranny.

fascism and naziism was not a reaction against the socialist trends of the preceding period but a necessary outcome of those tendencies.

We are ready to accept almost any explanation of the present crisis of our civilization except one: that the present state of the world may be the result of genuine error on our own part and that the pursuit of some of our most cherished ideals has apparently produced results utterly different from those which we expected.