Books: Downfall

THE WORLD'S IRON AGE—William Henry Chamberlin—Macmillan ($3).

IDEAS FOR THE ICE AGE—Max Lerner —Viking ($3).

To the question that more & more people are asking in the deepening privacy of their own minds—What is really happening to western civilization?—these two books try to give answers. They both assume that civilization is collapsing, and they want to salvage something from the wreck.

For twelve years William Henry Chamberlin was the Christian Science Monitor's correspondent in Russia, "where," he says, "the revolt against European civilization began and where it has proceeded to the greatest lengths." He...