Fear, the inspiring principle of action in tyranny, is fundamentally connected to that anxiety which we experience in situations of complete loneliness. This anxiety reveals the other side of equality and corresponds to the joy of sharing the world with our equals.
The chief point with respect to the “scientific attitude” seems to be that it belongs to the very essence of science, which is primarily interested in facts, that our factual information is not only limited but that the answers to the most important factual questions concerning the human condition as well as the existence of Being in general are beyond factual knowledge and experience.
You will recall Kant’s opinion that the touchstone for determining whether the difficulty of a philosophical essay is genuine or mere “vapors of cleverness” may be found in its susceptibility to popularization. And Jaspers, who in this respect, as indeed in every other, is the only successor Kant has ever had, has like Kant more than once left the academic sphere and its conceptual language to address the general reading public.
Certainly, for Collingwood, human actions take place in contexts, and reference to context is often necessary to understand and get a feel for what is going on, but the relation between action and context is not like the relation between the instance and the law which governs it.
Shame is one of the “gifts reserved for age,” according to Eliot. He goes on to describe shame as
… the rending pain of re-enactment
Of all that you have done, and been; the shame
Of motives late revealed, and the awareness
Of things ill done and done to others’ harm
Which once you took for exercise of virtue.
[Eliot, Four Quartets, IV.2]
