The Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University

Citation of Books Detail

Click here to return to the main list

Author QuotedKarl Jaspers
Title QuotedEuropean Spirit
Date (Year/Month/Day)1964/01/26
Imprint[S.l.] : [s.n.]. 1948
Quotation"What makes us afraid is our great freedom, in face of the emptiness that has still to be filled." Jaspers. And again these concluding words from the arresting little pamphlet on The European Spirit. "The philosophically serious European is faced today with the choice between opposed philosophical possibilities. Will he enter the limited field of fixed truth which in the end has only to be obeyed; or will he go into the limitless open truth?"¦Will he win this perilous independence in perilous openness as in existential philosophy, the philosophy of communication in which the individual becomes himself on condition that others become themselves, in which there is no solitary peace but constant dissatisfaction and in which a man exposes his soul to suffering."
Quotation SourceDancing in the Water of Life: Seeking Peace in the Hermitage. The Journals of Thomas Merton, Volume 5, 1963-1965.; Edited by Robert E. Daggy. / San Francisco : Harper Collins. 1997, p. 68
Letter to 
Notes 
Link to Merton's Copy  

(If there is a link above showing up as a number, click it to open another window with a full text version.)