This books seeks to address these questions. They arise naturally
once we ask whether there is such a thing as progress, and
whether we can construct a coherent and directional Universal
History of mankind. Totalitarianisms of the Right and Left have
kept us too busy to consider the latter question seriously for the
better part of this century. But the fading of these totalitarianisms,
as the century comes to an end, invites us to raise this old
question one more time.