From the Man Without Qualities:
The ambitious moneyman finds himself in a difficult spot these days. To place himself on a level with the established powers, he must dress up his activities in great ideas. But great ideas that command instant allegiance no longer exist, because our skeptical contemporaries believe in neither God nor humanity, kings nor morality—unless they believe in them all indiscriminately, which amounts to the same thing. So the captain of industry, disinclined to forego greatness, which serves him as a compass, must resort to the democratic dodge of replacing the immeasurable influence of greatness with the measurable greatness of influence. So now whatever counts as great *is* great; but this means that eventually whatever is most loudly hawked as great is also great, and not all of us have the knack of swallowing this innermost truth of our times without gagging a little.