Meaning in History ¹ is actually a many faceted work concerned not only with the general problem of the meaning and significance of past events but also with the problem of the theological background of the philosophy of history, i.e. with the relationship between sacred and secular history, with Weltgeschichte und Heilsgeschehen. Yet the underlying motif uniting all of these concerns is the attempt to demonstrate the basic inadequacy of our modern historical consciousness, viz., historicism. However in order to demonstrate the inadequacy of a point of view, Löwith argues, one must first go to its actual base or source and then show that, seen in the light of this source, it does not do justice to a sober and unprejudiced view of reality. But since historicism has become so pervasive that it affects almost all of our intellectual activities, its actual base is not simply one specific intellectual movement (e.g. the young-Hegelians); rather, properly understood, it is the total enterprise of history itself. Thus in order to overcome historicism, "it does not suffice merely to reason correctly;" in addition "a historical reflection upon our historical thought itself is required." ²Such a reflection upon the actual sources of our contemporary understanding of the role and function of history is also all the more necessary since, according to Löwith, "we find ourselves more or less at the end of the modern rope. It has worn too thin to give hopeful support. We have learned to wait without hope "for hope would be hope for the wrong thing.' Hence the wholesomeness of remembering in these times of suspense what has been forgotten and of recovering the genuine sources of our sophisticated results." ³