Counterfeit Gods: The Empty Promises of Money, Sex, and Power, and the Only Hope that Matters

by Timothy J. Keller

There can also be intellectual idols, often called ideologies. For example, European intellectuals in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries became largely convinced of Rousseau’s view of the innate goodness of human nature, that all of our social problems were the result of poor education and socialization. World War II shattered this illusion. Beatrice Webb, whom many consider the architect of Britain’s modern welfare state, wrote: Somewhere in my diary—1890?—I wrote “I have staked all on the essential goodness of human nature. . . .” [Now thirty-five years later I realize] how permanent are the evil impulses and instincts in man—how little you can count on changing some of these—for instance the appeal of wealth and power—by any change in the [social] machinery. . . . No amount of knowledge or science will be of any avail unless we can curb the bad impulse.