SOURCE: "Karl Mannheim," in Katherine Mansfield and Other Literary Studies, Constable, 1959, pp. 152-62.

In the following essay, Murry evaluates Mannheim's contribution to modern social thought.

One thing was certain to those who had the privilege of direct contact with Karl Mannheim: that his was an eminent mind. It stood above others; it comprehended more; saw the great issues of our time in a wider perspective. More than this, he was pervaded with the sense of their urgency. The degree of his detachment was balanced by the degree of his identification. If he had stood aloof in order to understand, it was only in order that he might participate in the struggle with a full consciousness of what was, and was not possible: he was a master-strategist—the wisest I have known of the forces of light. And he was heroic. One felt that he was profoundly tired, his...