It seems that in the 19th Century  “metaphysical need” for “metaphysical comfort” was more common than in the 20th Century, where the needs and comforts were anti-metaphysical.

This strikes me as an ontological analogue to the epistemological struggles (or were they actually also ontological struggles regarding the being of knowledge?), which concluded that if knowledge as we conceive it cannot exist, then knowledge itself is impossible, resulting in vulgar relativism.

If God as we conceived him and used him is no longer believable, then God is impossible: vulgar atheism.

objectivism : relativism :: idolatry : atheism

pragmatism :: religion

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So many colons.