"In this book, a bold attempt is made for the first time to predetermine the course of history. Its design is to follow the destiny of a culture — indeed the only culture of our time that is fully in the bloom of accomplishment — the West-European-American — through its still unaccomplished stages.
Hitherto the possibility of solving so important a problem has received very little attention.
…
The decline of the West, which at first sight may appear, like the decline of the Classical, to be a phenomenon of limited and permanent character, is in reality a philosophical theme that, properly considered, contains within itself every great question of existence.
If we are to discover in what form the destiny of Western culture will be accomplished, we must first ask what a culture is, what are its relations to visible history, to life, to soul, to nature, to spirit; what are the forms it takes and how these forms — peoples, tongues and epochs, battles and ideas, states and gods, arts and craft-works, sciences, laws, economic types and world-ideas, great men and great events — are the symbols to be interpreted and how they are to be interpreted as such."
"The Decline of the West", Oswald Spengler