Sigmund Freud...on the fateful question



The fateful question of the human species seems, to me, to be whether, and to what extent, the cultural process developed in it will succeed in mastering the derangements of communal life caused by the human instinct of agression and self-destruction. In this connection, perhaps the phase through which we are at this moment passing deserves special interest. Men have brought their powers of subduing the forces of nature to such a pitch that, by using them, they could now, very easily, exterminate one another to the last man. They know this - hence arises a great part of their current unrest, their dejection, their mood of apprehension. And now it may be expected that the other of the two heavenly forces, eternal Eros, will put forth his strength so as to maintain himself alongside of his equally immortal adversary.

Civilization and its Discontents, 1930