The Rudolf Steiner Archive

14. The Future of Humanity

[ 1 ] In the lecture on “The Great Initiates” two weeks ago, I took the liberty of point out that the great Initiates are essentially the bearers of humanity’s future ideals, and that their power and mode of action consist in the fact that they hold within themselves as their secret—and have taken into themselves as their mystery—that which will only become apparent to the rest of humanity in the future, and they incorporate it into humanity’s ideals in the manner they deem appropriate. So that in what we call the idealism of humanity, the future ideals of our race, we mostly find expressions of what emerges in the great Initiates from the depths of their knowledge of the great spiritual laws of the world. And I stated at the time that the theosophical ideals that emerge from the Masters differ from what one calls ideals in life, in that they arise from a genuine knowledge of the laws of nature and not from feelings such as: this is how it should be, this is right, and so on. I pointed out then that this is not prophecy in the negative sense of the word. It is a kind of indication of the future, as we also have in the natural sciences. Just as we know from our knowledge of the material laws of hydrogen and oxygen that they combine under certain conditions to form water, so it is with the spiritual laws, so that we can say what the ideals of the human future will be. The law of evolution leads humanity into the future. Consciously, the initiate must draw what he desires for the future from an understanding of the great laws of the universe. That was the first hint given two weeks ago regarding today’s lecture. The other hint was the one I gave eight days ago in the lecture on “Ibsen’s Spirit,” where it was shown how Ibsen points so sharply and magnificently to the shaping of the personality in our time, and how, precisely by meaningfully characterizing what has become so pronounced in our time, he points to something higher that transcends the personality—what we call individuality in the theosophical worldview.

[ 2 ] We truly stand at a turning point today. The great achievements of natural science have shown us, on the one hand, how the materialist worldview has borne the highest fruits, how Darwinism and materialism extend into our time, and how we owe them a great deal of cultural progress; but on the other hand, that currents are also making themselves felt that are preparing the future. New ideals are emerging precisely among the most outstanding minds. These minds, which point toward a distant future, are certainly not the so-called practical minds, but world history also unfolds differently than the practical minds imagine. I have previously pointed to one pillar of idealism, Tolstoy. Today, however, I would like to point to another Western mind, Keely, the great mechanic, who, even if he has not yet been able to bring us a practical application of his mechanical ideas, will nevertheless lead us forward. This raises questions that seem fantastical to the materialist. But let us at the same time become acquainted with an idealism that is of a different kind than that which is commonly known in everyday life. It is the same idealism that once lived in the mysteries. Until the founding of the Theosophical Society in 1875, what we now disseminate in popular lectures lived in the so-called secret schools. I have often referred to the Rosicrucians; I have also pointed out that one cannot discover the true secrets of the Rosicrucians through scholarly means. Goethe himself was connected to the Rosicrucians; he clearly expressed this in the poem “The Secrets.” We have gleaned all of this from the previous lectures.

[ 3 ] Today we want to examine those great laws of the world that have been proclaimed in the Mysteries as the laws of the future—the laws by which humanity must guide itself if it does not wish to grope blindly into the future, but rather—just as the natural scientist who enters the laboratory knows that by mixing and combining certain substances he will obtain certain results—is conscious of moving toward this or that event in the future. This, explained in popular terms, has only been available since 1875, since the founding of the Theosophical Society. Therefore, it should not surprise us that what constitutes scientific literature today contains nothing yet of these ideals of the future.

[ 4 ] Now the question might arise—and it has often been asked: Is it really the otherworldly idealists, who seem so removed from all practical matters, who first spin out in their minds the ideas of the future that sustain life? Could it be them? Mustn’t life be born out of practical experience? They are merely spinning out thoughts; they are dreamers—and yet they want to give birth to the future? Only those who know how to handle the affairs of daily life can intervene, and it falls to them to intervene in practical life. Let me, as a brief interlude, highlight examples of the practitioner and the idealist and show that it is not the practitioners who have brought about the great and true advances, but rather the theorists who, drawing from a wealth of ideas, have also brought the future into everyday life.

[ 5 ] Take the discoveries of the 19th century. There is nothing we can find today that does not remind us at every turn of steam power, the telegraph, the telephone, the postal system, the railroad, and so on. But even the railroad was not invented by a practical engineer. And how did the practical engineers react to it? Here’s an example: When the first railroads were to be built in Germany, when the railroad was to run from Berlin to Potsdam, this caused the Prussian Postmaster General von Nagler a great deal of headache. He said: “I already send six to seven mail coaches to Potsdam every day, and they aren’t even fully occupied. Instead of building a railroad there, they should just throw the money out the window.” — And the opinion of the Bavarian Medical Association, which was consulted on the health effects of the railroad, went something like this: “One should not build railroads, for people could suffer serious harm as a result.” But if they were built anyway, one should at least erect wooden walls on both sides so that those passing by do not become dizzy at the sight of the fast trains. That was in the year 1830. Take, furthermore, the penny postage. Rowland Hill, a private citizen in England, was the first to have this idea—not a postal official. When this proposal was to be debated in Parliament in London, the chief postal official objected that the post offices would become too small with the increasing volume of mail, and one had to reply to the practitioner that the post offices must adapt to the volume of traffic, and not the other way around. The telephone is also not the invention of a practitioner. It was invented by the teacher Philipp Reis in Frankfurt am Main. It was then further developed by the teacher of the deaf and mute, Graham Bell. It was, so to speak, invented by theorists. The same was true of the telegraph. It was invented by two scholars, Gauss and Weber, in Göttingen.

[ 6 ] Using a few major examples, I have sought to show that it is never the practical people who bring about true progress for humanity. Practitioners have no judgment regarding what belongs to the future. They are the true conservatives, who oppose every thought that looks to the future with every possible obstacle. It is so easy to sense a certain emphasis on their exclusive expertise and their sense of authority among practitioners.

[ 7 ] This has been stated in advance to show that ideals do not arise from practical considerations, but are upheld by those who are imbued with a higher spiritual reality. However, this was merely an interlude.

[ 8 ] Now recall the lecture on the “Origin of Man,” in which we, as Theosophists, attributed a very early origin to humanity. We trace this origin much further back than the scientific records can take us. It may seem fantastical that this lineage has been traced back to the separation of the Earth from the Sun and the Moon: but whoever delves deeply into the method provided by Theosophy will find that these are not fantastical ideas, but tangible realities like the tables and chairs in this room. Whoever delves so deeply into the laws of the past and at the same time sharpens their gaze on spiritual development can, through the knowledge of the past, come to know the laws that belong neither to the past, nor to the present, nor to the future, but to all time. Once one has reached the point of attaining initiation to the degree I described in the lecture on the great initiates, the laws of the world lie open before the spiritual gaze—laws of the world according to which evolution unfolds, though they do require human beings to be realized. Just as the chemist must first mix the substances to allow the laws of nature to take effect, so too must humanity mix the elements to bring the great laws of the universe to fruition. Building upon the foundation of such world laws, two things should occupy us today: the distant future toward which we look, so that we do not remain stuck in the few millennia that we can historically survey—and a brief span of time, when we look into the future with our everyday gaze.

[ 9 ] Let us look into the distant future, just as we have looked into the distant past. Let us also understand our task in the future from a theosophical perspective. We have seen that our present humanity was preceded by another. We have looked back at the older races, who lived under different conditions and possessed different abilities. The task of our race is to develop the combining intellect. While we possess logical thinking, calculation, and counting—the faculties that enable us to understand the laws of external physical nature and apply them in the service of technology and industry—the situation was fundamentally different for the Atlantean race. The fundamental power of that race was memory. People today can hardly imagine the extent to which memory was developed among the Atlanteans. They could do very little arithmetic. Everything was based on the connections they formed from memory. For example, they knew three times seven by heart, but they could not calculate it. They knew no multiplication tables. Another power they had developed, though even more difficult to understand, was their ability to exert a certain influence on the life force itself. Through a special training of the will, they could exert a direct influence on living things, such as the growth of a plant. — If we go back even further, we come to a continent we call Lemuria. Natural science acknowledges this continent, which lay roughly where the Indian Ocean is today, although it assumes that its population consisted not of humans but of lower mammals.

[ 10 ] We are now coming to entirely different stages of development. Anyone who followed the lecture on the evolution of the Earth a few weeks ago will know that we are approaching a period when human beings were still hermaphroditic, when the individual being was both male and female at the same time. In myths and legends, this original hermaphroditism has been preserved in the consciousness of peoples. The Greeks originally attributed hermaphroditism to Zeus. It was said that he was a handsome man and at the same time a beautiful maiden. In the Greek mysteries, the hermaphroditic human still played a major role; it was presented as a unity of the human being. It was only from this, through the process I described at that time, that the unisex human being arose. Now let us follow the process further, as it presents itself to the seer in the worlds that grant insight into these things; that is, to the one who surrenders to the means of practical mysticism indicated here, which will be elaborated upon at another time.

[ 11 ] If we continue to observe human beings in this way, we see that they are now consciously going through again what they had already experienced unconsciously in earlier periods. We encounter the human beings of that time with a thin outer material shell. The Earth was still in a state of high temperature at that time; human beings still had a thin shell. Substances simply flowed in and out; it was like a kind of inhaling and exhaling. This is how human beings lived, without perceptions passing through the senses; the sensory impressions passed before them like a kind of undulating images, as in a dreamer. When such a person—who was essentially a soul-being—approached an object or being in a dreamlike, clairvoyant state, they could not perceive that object or being with their eyes, nor could they smell it with their sense of smell; rather, they approached the being, and it was through a force that I cannot describe further today that a dream-image arose within them. A world within his soul responded to what was happening outside. It was roughly like having a clock in front of you and not perceiving the clock itself, but hearing its ticking. Or like knocking over a chair in your sleep and dreaming of a duel. Today, of course, this is chaotic, so it has no meaning for us. But this must in turn be transformed into clairvoyance; then it regains its meaning. If, back then, you approached a person who harbored a malevolent feeling, an image would arise in your soul, rendered in dark shades of color, which was a reflection and not a perception of external reality. A sympathetic relationship was reflected through light shades. That is how people lived. It was only through the development of the senses that these soul-images were transformed into perceptions. They linked their ability to form color images with external reality. The physicist today says that nothing exists other than the vibration of matter, and that color is the soul’s response to these vibrations. Once the human eye had developed, human beings projected what had been surging up and down as images in the soul onto external objects. In essence, the entirety of what they perceived in their environment was nothing other than an extension of the soul-images into the external world.

[ 12 ] The further development of the human being consists in his once again—and this time consciously, not in twilight states—ascending into the higher worlds, where he perceives the world of souls around him. Initiation is nothing other than an ascent to this level. What the mystic can already cultivate within himself today through certain methods will be developed in all people in the future. This is the essence of the initiate: that he has already developed today what will become apparent in all people in the future, and that he can at least already indicate the direction of humanity’s future ideals. Through this, the ideals of the initiates possess a value that unconscious ideals can never have. Humanity will then move among spiritual realities just as it moves today among tables and chairs. Again and again I wish to emphasize that it is necessary for anyone who wishes to work their way up to this level today to be completely firm regarding the stage of development at which humanity now stands: they must be a person who can distinguish fantasy from reality. It is not the one who indulges in every fantasy who can be led into the higher world, but only the one who stands firmly on the stage of development that humanity has reached.

[ 13 ] Another state is that in which a person begins to see spiritually—or rather, to hear spiritually—that which constitutes the depth, the essence of things. This is the so-called inner word, through which things themselves tell us what they are. Just as today only human beings themselves can tell us what they are, so there is an inner essence to all things. We cannot perceive this inner essence of things with the intellect; we must crawl into things, become one with them. We can do this only with the spirit. We must therefore connect with things in the spirit. Through this, the world becomes that resounding world of which Goethe speaks and which I have often cited, so that the human being is lifted up into the higher regions, as it were into the spiritual world or into the Devachan; into the world in which the human being dwells in the time between death and a new birth. These are the worlds in which the human being participates between death and a new birth.

[ 14 ] Our Earth is currently in its fourth cycle, or fourth round; it has already completed three rounds. The three rounds that are yet to come will bring about the development of higher abilities in human beings. What I have just described is now taking shape; and the root race that will follow ours will possess significantly different characteristics. In the middle of this cycle, it will give rise to a human race that will not descend as deeply into the physical world as ours, and which will have shed unisexuality and become bisexual. Then it will develop further, until it reaches the point where evolution comes to a close. This will be in the astral realm. Then it will go through another cycle, and yet another. Humanity must therefore still complete three such cycles. But today we can only touch upon the next one and the one after that.

[ 15 ] First, we must clarify what the task of the current human cycle is. The best way to proceed is to ask ourselves: What is humanity’s task on Earth with its combinative intellect? Clairvoyance and clairaudience are states that belong to earlier and later stages of development. Now humanity’s task is to be firmly grounded in physical life, and fundamentally, this is solely to guide humanity toward its goal. Theosophy is not meant to lead us away from the physical foundation; theosophy rises from the physical earth only because the physical world is also an expression of the soul and spiritual worlds. We do not wish to lead people into some vague, unclear realm; we do not wish to lead them away from physical reality, but rather we wish to bring this physical reality to a correct understanding, to a correct grasp. Then what lies behind physical reality will point to the task humanity has in the present cycle of development.

[ 16 ] Consider what is happening now. We call the current cycle the mineral cycle because, within it, human beings are dealing with the mineral world. The natural scientist says: We cannot yet comprehend the plant world—for he regards the plant as a sum of mineral processes—and he does the same with the animal. Even if this is a caricature of a worldview, there is nevertheless some truth to it. He combines with the intellect that which exists side by side in space and one after another in time. Everywhere it is the intellect that works on the dead, on the inanimate, that puts the parts together. Start with the machine and carry it through to the work of art: this is the task humanity has in the present cycle of development, and it will carry it through to the point where it transforms the entire Earth into its work of art. That is the task humanity has for the future. As long as there remains a single atom that humanity has not worked through with its powers, the human task on Earth is not yet complete. Anyone who follows the latest advances in electricity knows how the natural scientist can peer into the smallest parts of the mineral world, because he has mastered the electrical force that was still almost unknown fifty years ago. His task is to transform the inanimate into a great work of art. That is why there were works of art long before historical times, long before the Egyptians. Follow this line of thought, and you will understand that the present cycle signifies the spiritualization of the entire mineral world. Even the discerning natural scientist tells us that, based on what we know today, it is not inconceivable that a time will come when human beings will be able to delve even deeper into the essence of the material world. This is a certain perspective on the future.

[ 17 ] Those who have studied physics will recall a statement: a perspective on the future is gained from the fact that a large part of our technical work is accomplished through the application of heat, through the conversion of heat into work. The thermodynamicist shows us that only a certain portion of heat can ever be converted into work or into something technically useful. When you heat a steam engine, you cannot use all of the heat to generate propulsive force. Now imagine that heat is always consumed for work, but a portion of the heat cannot be converted into work and remains. This is the thermal state that the thermal engineer and the thermal theorist can portray as a kind of death state of our physical Earth. Then the one who deals with the phenomena of life objects that the time may have come when life itself intervenes: that living machinery which governs molecules and atoms in a completely different way, through which we move our arm and set the brain in motion. This force could then, when our transformative powers are no longer sufficient, work deeper into material nature than even the forces we can conceive of today are capable of doing.

[ 18 ] This presents you with a vision that, for the clairvoyant capable of following the spirit of evolution, is not merely an image but something concrete and real: he sees how the entire Earth will have been transformed into a work of art. Once this is achieved, however, humanity will have no further business in the mineral world; then it will be free on all sides, able to move freely, its soul no longer bumping against objects. This is the time when the Earth will enter the so-called astral state. Just as the mechanic today becomes master of the external world when he builds the machine imbued with his spirit, so it is with humanity. Everything that exists there will be the direct product of his deeds. What our deed is, what we ourselves have shaped, we need not perceive. The senses will then have transformed, and the astral state will set in. This is the perspective: the mineral world will come to an end with our Earth cycle. We therefore call the next cycle that humanity will undergo the cycle of plant existence. The entire Earth will have shed its mineral nature, and humanity will—just as it now intervenes in the mineral world with the intellect—intervene in the living world with the power of the soul. Humanity will then, on a higher level, be master of the plant world, just as it is now master of the mineral world. Then we will reach the stage where humanity will live on a fully living Earth. Yet let us regard this image only as an approximation; let us be content with having gained a glimpse into the next cycle.

[ 19 ] You have thus seen that humanity is on a path leading into a state entirely different from our own, one that is totally distinct; that there are forces within it of such a nature that they can take on entirely different forms in the future. But for those who can see through this, it is simultaneously linked to a feeling, a sensation that is fundamental to our entire life: What will humanity become if we view it as a wellspring of such future forces? We approach humanity quite differently when we know that the seed of this future humanity lies dormant within it. There our inner attitude toward them transforms into the feeling that in every human being we have before us something like an unsolved riddle. We wish to descend deeper and ever deeper into the layers of human nature, because we know that they hold such depths. It is not the theories that are important, nor is it imagining in our thoughts what the plant kingdom will one day look like, but rather that we develop a profound reverence for every human individuality. When we approach a human being in such a way that we stand before them as before a god seeking to emerge from his shell, then we have grasped something of theosophical life; and it is theosophical life, not theories, that matters. When we have certain ideas that show us what a human being can become and what they carry within themselves, then our hearts are filled with that genuine love for the divine human being that the theosophical worldview seeks to bring forth. And when we think this way, only then do we understand the first principle of the Theosophical Society: to form the core of a universal brotherhood of humanity, without distinction of sex, color, or creed. For what are these differences here?

[ 20 ] Now ask yourself: What significance do these conceptions of humanity hold for the future? How does this grand ideal relate to what is incumbent upon us? Is it not, after all, something that belongs to a pipe dream, because it pertains to a future in which we will practically never find ourselves? What a person develops within themselves, they must make use of within themselves. It is not a matter of indifference whether they carry on with the feelings I have just described, or whether they merely grope their way into the future in the dark. Just as a plant already carries within itself the seed of what it will become next year, so must human beings carry the future as their seed within themselves, and they cannot make this seed rich enough or great enough. And this also applies to the immediate present. Since you have largely occupied yourselves with what are conceived as social ideals, as plans for the future of humanity in the near term, you know that almost everyone who thinks about these matters has their own social ideal. Now, when one looks more deeply into these things, one asks: Why do these ideals have so little persuasive power? None of these things work out, and none of them fit together. Neither those who attempt to formulate future ideals in a utopian manner nor those who do so with a practical spirit can possibly arrive at truly grand and far-reaching perspectives. All of this—and one can assert this from a deeper perspective—any social ideas, even the beliefs of large, global parties, that are preached solely from an awareness of the sensory world can never have any practical value. Fifty years from now, people will be astonished at these fantasies. The social ideal cannot be devised. Neither our thoughts nor what we derive from our opinions and our intellect can form the basis for any social ideal; it must be stated plainly: No social theory, whatever it may be, is capable of serving the welfare of humanity.

[ 21 ] That is, however, difficult to prove. But consider the stage we are at: the present has brought personality to the fore. The personal is what is characteristic and significant about human beings. All other distinctions, even those between men and women, are overcome here. Today there is only personality, without any other differentiation. Let us bear in mind that humanity had to pass through this stage; and let us bear in mind that what we here call personality is called lower manas in the theosophical worldview: this is the power of thought that relates to the immediate world. Man is thus a personality insofar as he belongs to the sensory world, and the combining intellect also belongs to this sensory world. Everything that man can think out of the intellect, everything that elevates his personality, we must raise to a higher level if we wish to comprehend it in its true essence. That is why we also distinguish between personality and individuality, between lower and higher Manas. What, in fact, is this lower Manas?

[ 22 ] Consider the difference between us and a simple barbarian—who grinds grains between two stones to make flour, then bakes bread from it, and so on—and a modern person. With very little mental effort, the barbarian accomplishes what satisfies his physical needs. But civilization goes further, and what do we essentially do in our time? We send a telegram to America and have the same products sent to us that the barbarian ground himself. — All technical knowledge—what is it other than a roundabout way of satisfying animal needs? Just consider: does the intellect accomplish much more than satisfying ordinary physical needs? Does the intellect therefore rise to something higher by building ships, railroads, telephones, and so on, when it produces nothing other than the satisfaction of man’s ordinary needs?

[ 23 ] The intellect, then, is merely a detour and does not lead out of the sensory world. But wherever the spiritual world shines into this world—in great works of art, in original ideas that transcend everyday needs, or wherever something of what we call the theosophical worldview shines through—there something higher shines in; then the human spirit does not merely become a processor of what surrounds it, but rather a channel through which the spirit flows into the world. It brings something productive into this world. Every single human being is a channel through which a spiritual world pours forth. As long as a person seeks only the satisfaction of their needs, they are a personality. When they do what goes beyond that, they are an individuality. We can find this source only in the individual; the human being is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensory world; the human being mediates between the two. This is the twofold way in which we can approach the human being.

[ 24 ] As personalities, we are essentially all the same: one person’s intellect may be somewhat more developed, another’s somewhat less. But this is not the case with individuality. Here, a person becomes a unique character; here, each person brings something special to their mission. If I want to know what their purpose is in the world as a personality, if I want to know what they can be as an individual through their originality, then I must wait until something flows into this world from the spiritual world through this channel. If this influence is to take place, we must regard every human being as an unsolved mystery. The original spiritual power flows to us through every single individuality. As long as we regard the human being as a personality, we can regulate them: when we speak of general duties and rights, we are speaking of the personality. But when we speak of individuality, we cannot force the human being into a mold; they must be the bearer of their own originality. What will come upon humanity in ten years’ time will be known to those who live out their individuality. I must not determine the child I am raising on my own initiative; rather, I must draw out from his mysterious inner being what is entirely unknown to me. If we want a social order, then the individual personalities must work together; then everyone must be able to develop in their freedom. If we establish a social ideal, we tie this personality to this place, that personality to that place. The sum of what already exists is simply thrown together: but nothing new comes into the world as a result. That is why individualities must be brought in; the great individualities must make their mark. It is not laws or social programs based on intellectual ideals that must exist, but a social, brotherly spirit must arise. Only a social spirit can help us—the spirit of approaching every being as an individuality. Let us always be aware that every person has something to say to us. Every person has something to say to us. We need a social spirit, not social programs. This is entirely real and practical. It is something that can be expressed in the present moment, and it is what Theosophy presents as a great ideal for the future. In this way, Theosophy gains immediate practical significance. When theosophy flows into life, we will break the habit of constraining everything with rules and regulations; we will break the habit of judging by standards; we will regard people as human beings, free and individual. We will then be clear that we are fulfilling our task when we place the right person in the right place. We will no longer ask, “Is the best teacher the one who masters the subject matter best?” but rather, “What kind of person is this?” One must have a keen sense—perhaps a clairvoyant gift—to discern whether the person in question is in the right place in terms of their nature, whether they are in their rightful place as a human being. One can have a complete grasp of one’s subject matter, one can be a living, evolving scholar, and yet be unsuited to teach, because one does not know that which radiates from a person, that which draws out the individuality in another human being. Only when we set aside rules and regulations and ask, “What kind of person is this?” and place the best person where they are needed, do we fulfill within ourselves the ideals that Theosophy has brought. One can know a great deal as a doctor, but ultimately it comes down to how one relates to the patient, what kind of person the doctor is. When theosophy intervenes directly in life, then it is what it is meant to be.

Questions and Answers

Question: What do you think of Dr. Eugen Heinrich Schmitt?

[ 25 ] He is sympathetic to theosophy and, after publishing his work on the mystery of Hegelian dialectics, has himself written quite a bit about theosophy. However, his way of thinking is too mathematical; it is too constructively mathematical and relies on too little intuition. His way of thinking is also not tolerant enough of other viewpoints.

Question: How do we know anything about the Atlanteans and Lemurians?

[ 26 ] From the Akashic Records. These are traces left behind by every action, which can be read back over long periods of time. The Akashic Records are very much a reality for those who can read them. However, they are difficult to read, and one is easily prone to error in the process. To give a rough idea of this, let the following be said. When I speak here, the words fill the air. The vibrations correspond to the words. Anyone who could not hear my words but were able to study the vibrations of the air would be able to reconstruct my words from those vibrations. These vibrations remain in the air only for a short time. In the astral substance, however, they persist longer. If a person lives as a dreamer in the same way as a person does in outer reality, then they can also see the spiritual in outer reality; then they can also trace the origin of the Earth back to the astral formation of the Earth, But when a person has attained the continuity of consciousness, and when they possess this continuous consciousness during the night in their dreams, they can see the chains of worlds, their formation, and their passing.

Question: What do you think of Karl Marx and his work?

[ 27 ] Karl Marx’s achievements apply to the period from the 16th century to the present day. They encompass the era of the emergence of modern economic life and the development of industrialism. Insofar as production, consumption, and related matters are concerned, Theosophy can align with Marx. The mistake the Marxist makes, however, is that he reduces everything to class struggle. This is a misinterpretation of the facts. It is the human being who shapes things, not the environment, nor the relations of production. Can anyone perhaps claim that the invention of differential calculus depended on the relations of production? Certainly not. But what has been achieved with the help of differential calculus?

Question: Can a Theosophist be a Social Democrat?

[ 28 ] Yes, provided he remains a theosophist at every turn. Whether the Social Democratic Party is what is desirable for the foreseeable future is something each person must decide for themselves.

Question: What role does art play in the intellectual development of humanity?

[ 29 ] It is the same as other activities. It helps transform the entire world into a work of art, even though the individual work of art itself is transient. We may ask, however, whether these individual works of art have no significance, and from a theosophical point of view we must then say that two things come into consideration with such a work of art: first, the work of art in space, and second, the human power that created it. Human power is what endures. Art signifies something that has an even higher significance.

Question: What is the Theosophical view on the Last Judgment and eternal punishment in hell?

[ 30 ] In the Theosophical view, there are no eternal punishments in hell. There are only stages of development, the effects of karma. The Last Judgment, however, has a completely different meaning. It refers to a specific point in time within that cycle I spoke of in my lecture. In this cycle, human beings will reach a certain stage where they no longer have any external impulses, where they will have completely overcome the sensory realm, and where they will have spiritualized the mineral-physical realm. What they have achieved in the spiritual life will manifest itself just as their inner mood manifests in the spirit. Therefore, their inner mood will be expressed in their outer form. Human beings will bear the outer form they have shaped through their karma. The Last Judgment means nothing other than that what each person has imprinted in their soul will be imprinted upon them. Today, human beings can conceal what lives in their souls, but that will no longer be the case.

Question: How does patriotism fit in with universal brotherhood?

[ 31 ] Patriotism is justified at a certain stage of development. But what we hold up as the ideal of human brotherhood is something that transcends it. The two are compatible with one another. Intellectual activity can indeed have individual aspects, and by reflecting on individuality, a certain element is introduced. Not every person has their own logic, for logic is something universal, not individual; yet these intellectual activities take on an individual character. The intellect, however, is not the individual.

Question: Why can't a madman control himself?

[ 32 ] The madman is, first and foremost, physically ill. The opposite of madness is sanity, which means being able to bring one’s inner life into harmony with one’s surroundings. Anyone who cannot achieve this harmony appears insane. If you wanted to behave on Mars the same way you do on Earth, you would be a Martian madman.

Question: What should one make of the American books on hypnotism and magnetism?

[ 33 ] What is truly meaningful cannot be found in these books. Moreover, these things are often harmful to one’s health and in other respects as well. From the standpoint of the theosophical worldview, I can only strongly advise against such things.

Question: Did Christ really live a hundred years before the year one?

[ 34 ] I take the orthodox position on this matter. In my opinion, others have erred in this regard.