<<<Solitude is inimical to power, shuns power, seeks its own progress. A progress that is an illusion, enhancing the few and fooling the masses, is for the solitary the opposite of progress, for it does not consult nature or quiet the mind in order to begin reconsturcting the self. But the theory of progress is an old device masking power, and concealing what the 20th century creative souls — and those brave 19th century figures like Kierkegaard and Nietzsche — unmasked as lies about human nature.

What is the alternative to progress for the grand institutions of today? It is a devolution to simplicity, to individuals and small social units, to natural industry and exchange, to a relationship to nature based on value and not exploitation or power. The alternative to progress is a devolution of artificial wealth, privilege, and legitimacy.

The "decline of the West" (to cite Spengler's title) means not only the decline of the theory of progress but the decline of the artificial social and economic conditions that have propped up institutions and circles of wealth and power based on belief in that theory. Here is a beginning point for anyone who has not connected the experience of the 20th century "Age of Anxiety" with the present devolution of global systems of power. Here is the beginning point for a philosophy of solitude based on a realization that progress is a chimera, a fog that suppresses mind, spirit, and body.>>> (both comments above from article).