MONEY AND THE STYLE OF MODERN LIFE 245
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Rhythm, or at least its spatial equivalent, is also present
in many aspects of human relations. This spatial
equivalent is symmetry. Rhythm is symmetry in time,
just as symmetry is rhythm in space. The development of
symmetrical systems of relationships has gone hand in
hand with the development of rationalism. Where man
organizes relationships on a rational basis, he organizes
them in symmetrical forms, be it in the business world or in
his dealing with social and political systems.
But rhythm and its opposite do not occur only as alternative
forms in the life-series of man; they also appear at the
same time as two fundamentally opposed principles of life,
which may be indicated as the rhythmic-symmetrical and
the spontaneous-individualistic. And in their simultaneous
existence no reconciliation by alternation can be effected.
This fundamental opposition is most clearly manifest
in the relations between the individual and the social totality,
be it an economic, political, religious, or family group.
It is the fundamental principle of symmetry that each element
of a totality obtains its position, its rights and significance,
only through its relations to the other elements
and to the common center. If each element obeys only itself
and develops according to its own laws and desires, the
totality must inevitably be asymmetrical. The individual
desires to be a closed totality himself, a form with a center
of its own, from which all the elements of his existence and
activity receive their meaning and significance. But if the
superindividual totality is to be a closed whole, if it is to
objectify an idea with self-sufficient significance, it cannot
allow the full rounding out of its elements. The totality of
the whole is in eternal conflict with the totality of the individual.
Money seems at first to serve the realization of only
one of these forms. It is formless itself. It conquers all
