The Level of the Times

This is a phrase used by Ortega y Gasset, the man who discovered the Masses - an incredible discovery that should have been taken more seriously.

I have found this concept to be useful in describing the America that I grew up in, in the last half of the last Century. What was the ethical and intellectual level of those times? It was fairly low. Not very low, just fairly low. Below the water level.

These people could consider themselves virtuous, if they were not worse than their fellow-men. If they were only moderately stupid, or incompetent. This was the level of their times.

Ortega y Gasset was at home in the Spanish language, and was never interested in the English language, or in North America. But always lived, and taught in Latin America.

Living in North America would not have been easy for him (the culture clash would have been intense) - but he would have learned a lot.

He can be compared to another Spaniard - Federico García Lorca. Who was a Spanish poet and a New York poet, both.