"it is not just the frequency with which "I" occurs, but the general spirit of a person's work that shows to what extent he is afflicted by the besetting sin of "egotism." And anyway, wasn't it something of a feat to keep a grip on one's own personality and a true sense of identity in our era of wholesale slaughter and death camps on such a vast scale? Times such as these breed only individualism based on the principle "every man for himself," not a true sense of one's own worth. The loss of this sense is not something our age can be proud of, but a sign of its sickness. I know the symptoms from observing myself and those around me."