" Thus Western man enacted an extraordinary dialectic in the course of the modern era - moving from a near boundless confidence in his own powers, his spiritual potential, his capacity for certain knowledge, his mastery over nature, and his progressive destiny, to what often appeared to be a sharply opposite condition: a debilitating sense of metaphysical insignificance and personal futility, spiritual loss of faith, uncertainty in knowledge, a mutually destructive relationship with nature, and an intens insecurity concerning the human future. In the four centuries of modern man’s existence, Bacon and Descartes had become Kafka and Beckett. "

― Richard Tarnas , The Passion of the Western Mind: Understanding the Ideas that Have Shaped Our World View