"The present reflective age is one of understanding, of reflection, devoid of passion, an age which flies into enthusiasm for a moment only to decline back into indolence." - Kierkegaard, 1846



In Kierkegaard's social analysis, he distinguishes between two kinds of ages, a passionate age and a reflective age. In the latter, a passionate age "pushes forward, establishing new things and destroying others" while a reflective, passionless age "does the opposite, it stifles and hinders."



In a passionate age, strength, will, and excellence are lauded and valued. People admire, hate, love, feel, sorrow over each other and the world around them. Revolutions are born and people act by creating and destroying as they please.



In a reflective age, strength, will, and excellence are repressed and hindered. Men who act, dare, and risk are envied by those who don't. Revolutions and revolt are unthinkable acts because "such a display of strength would confuse the calculating cleverness of the times."



Kierkegaard analysis of the two ages leads him to conclude the passionate age, with its faults, is still better than the reflective age. One of the most important consequence is that the reflective age "nullifies the principle of contradiction": "The creative omnipotence implicit in the passion of absolute disjunction that leads the individual resolutely to make up his mind is transformed into the extensity of prudence and reflection - that is, by knowing and being everything possible to be in contradiction to oneself, that is, to be nothing at all". Knowing something is different from doing something.



Kierkegaard uses an example to describe the attitudes of the passionate and reflective ages towards a man who dares to act:



"If a precious jewel, which all desired, lay out on a frozen lake, where the ice was perilously thin, where death threatened one who went out too far while the ice near the shore was safe, in a passionate age the crowds would cheer the courage of the man who went out on the ice; they would fear for him and with him in his resolute action; they would sorrow over him if he went under; they would consider him divine if he returned with the jewel. In this passionless, reflective age, things would be different. People would think themselves very intelligent in figuring out the foolishness and worthlessness of going out on the ice, indeed, that it would be incomprehensible and laughable; and thereby they would transform passionate daring into a display of skill...."