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Goethe's Secret Revelation
GA 57

24 October 1908, Berlin

Translator Unknown

II. Goethe's Secret Revelation: Esoteric

The objection might easily be raised to an address such as this to-day that symbolic and allegoric meanings are forced out of something which a poet has created in the free play of his imaginative fancy. The day before yesterday we set ourselves the task to explore the deeper meaning of Goethe's ‘Fairy Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily,’ as it was then presented to our eyes. It will always happen that such an analysis or explanation of a work of fantasy will be turned down with the remark: ‘Oh, all sorts of symbols and meanings with profound applications are looked for in the figures of the work.’ Therefore I want to say at once that what I shall say to-day has nothing whatever to do with the symbolic and allegoric interpretations often made by Theosophists about legends or poetic works. And because I know that again and again the objection has been made to similar explanations which I have given: ‘We are not going to be caught by such symbolic meanings of poetic figures,’ I cannot stress the fact sufficiently that what is to be said here must be taken in no other sense than the following. We have before us a poetic work, a work of comprehensive imaginative power or fantasy, that goes to the depths of things: ‘The Fairy Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily.’ We may well be allowed the question, whether we may approach the work from any particular point of view, and attempt to find the basic idea, the true content of this so poetic a product.

We see the plant before us. Man goes to it and examines the laws, the inner regularity, by which the plant grows and flourishes, by which it unfolds its nature bit by bit. Has the botanist, or even someone who is no botanist, but arranges the growth of the plant in his imagination, the right to do it? Can one object: the plant knows nothing of the laws you are discovering, the laws of its growth and development! This objection against the botanist or the lyric poet who expresses the sensations derived from the plant in his poetry would have the same weight as the objection one could bring against such an explanation of Goethe's story. I do not want things to be taken as if I were to say to you: There we have a Snake, which means this or that, there we have a Golden, a Silver, and a Brazen King, who stand for this or that. I do not intend to expound the story in this symbolic, allegoric sense, but more in such a way that as the plant grows according to laws of which it is itself unconscious, and as the botanist has the right to discover these laws of its growth, one must also say to oneself that it does not follow that the poet Goethe was consciously aware of the explanations which I shall give you. For it is as true that we must consider the inevitability, and the true ideal content of the story as it is that we discover the laws of the plant's growth; that the plant grows in accordance with the same inevitability which originated it, though it is itself unconscious of it.

So I ask you to take what I shall say as if it presented the sense and the spirit of Goethe's methods of thought and idea-conception and as if he who, as it were, feels himself called upon to put before you the ideal philosophy of Goethe, were justified—that you might find a way to it—in expounding the product of Goethe's invention, in emphasizing the figures, and in pointing out their correlation—just as the botanist demonstrates that the plant grows in accordance with laws he has discovered.

Goethe's psychology or soul-philosophy, namely, what he considers determinative for the nature of the soul, is illustrated in his beautiful Fairy Story of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily; and if we are to understand each other in what I have to say it will be a good thing if, in a preliminary study, we make the spirit of his soul-world clear. It has been already pointed out in the previous address that the world-conception represented here starts from the view that human knowledge is not to be looked upon as something stationary once for all. The view is widely held that man is as he is to-day, and being what he is he can give unequivocal judgment on all things; he observes the world with his sense-organs, takes in its phenomena, combines them with his reason, which is bound to his senses, and the result is an absolute knowledge of the world which must be valid for all. On the other side—but only in a certain way—stands the spiritual scientific world-conception which is represented here. This starts from the premise that what is to become our knowledge is continually dependent on our organs and our capacity for knowledge and that we ourselves are, as men, capable of development; that we can work on ourselves, and raise higher such capabilities as we have on a given level of existence. It holds that we can educate them, and they can be developed still further, even as man has developed himself from an imperfect state to his present position, and that we must come to a deeper penetration of things, and a more correct view of the world by rising to higher standards. To put it more clearly, if also more trivially: if we leave out altogether a development of humanity and look only at people as they are around us; and then turn our eyes on those men whom one reckons as belonging to primitive races in the history of civilization, and if we ask ourselves what they can know of the laws of the world around us and compare it with what an average European with some ideas of science can know of the world, we shall see there is a great difference between the two. Take, for instance, an African negro's picture of the world and that, let us say, of an European monist, who has a sense of reality through having absorbed a number of the scientific ideas of the present age: the two are entirely dissimilar.

But on the other hand Spiritual Science is far from depreciating the world-picture of the man who takes his stand on pure materialism, and from declaring it invalid. It is more true to say that in these things it is considered that in every case a man's world-picture corresponds to a stage in human evolution, and that man is able to increase the capabilities in him and to discover by means of the increase other new things.

It lies thus in the purview of Spiritual Science that man reaches ever higher knowledge by developing himself, and what he experiences in the process is objective world-content, which he did not see before because he was not capable of seeing it. Spiritual Science is therefore different from other one-sided world-conceptions, whether spiritualistic, or materialistic, because it does not recognize an absolute, unchangeable truth, but only a wisdom and truth belonging to a given stage of evolution. Thus it adheres to Goethe's saying: ‘Man has really always only his own truth, and it is always the same.’ It is always the same because what we instil into ourselves through our power of learning, viz., the objective, is the same.

Now how does man succeed in developing the capabilities and powers that lie in him? One may say that Spiritual Science is as old as human thought. It always took the view that man has before him the ideal of a certain knowledge-perfection, the object of his aspiration. The principle contained in this was always called the ‘principle of initiation.’ This initiation means nothing other than increasing the powers of man to ever higher stages of knowledge, and thereby attaining deeper insight into the nature of the world around him. Goethe stood completely and all his life long, one may say, on this principle of development towards knowledge, this principle of initiation; which is shown us most particularly in his Fairy Tale.

We shall understand each other most easily if we proceed from the view which is held most often and most widely to-day, and which is to a certain extent in opposition to the initiation-principle.

To-day one can hear in the widest circles those people who think about such things and believe themselves to have an opinion on them representing, more or less consciously, the point of view that in what concerns truth and objective reality only physical observation, or objects of physical observation can be decisive in formulating ideas. You will constantly hear it: that alone can be Science which is based on the objective foundation of observation, and by this one understands so frequently is meant only the observation of the senses and the application of the human reason and capacity to formulate thoughts to these sense-observations. Every one of you knows that the capacity to formulate ideas and concepts is a capacity of the human soul among other capacities and every one of you also knows that these other capacities of the soul are our feeling and our will. Thus, even with this comparative superficial review, we may say: man is not merely an ideating, but also a feeling and willing being. Now those who think they must put forward the purely scientific point of view will always repeat: in science, only the power of thought may enter, never human feeling, never what we know as will-impulses, for otherwise that which is objective would become clouded, and that which the power of thought might achieve by being kept impersonal, would only be prejudiced.

It is correct enough that when a man introduces his feeling, his sympathy or antipathy, into the object of a scientific enquiry, he finds it repulsive or attractive, sympathetic or antipathetic. And where should we be if he were to consider his desire as a source of knowledge, so that he could say about a thing, I want it or I do not want it? Whether it displeases or pleases you, whether you desire it or not, is entirely the same to the thing. As true as it is that he who believes himself able to stand on the firm ground of science can confine himself only to externals, so true it is that the thing itself compels you to say it is red, and that the impression you get concerning the nature of a stone is the correct one. But it does not lie in the nature of the thing that it appears to you ugly or beautiful, that you desire it or not. That it appears to you red has an objective reason; that you do not desire it has no objective reason.

In a certain respect modern psychology has got beyond the point of view just described. It is not my task here to speak for or against that tendency of modern psychology which says: ‘When we consider psychic phenomena and the soul-life, we must not confine ourselves only to intellectualism, we must regard man not merely in what concerns the power of conception, we must also consider the influences of the world of feeling and will.’ Perhaps some of you know that this belongs to Wundt's system of philosophy, which takes the will to be the origin of soul-activity. In a way that is in some respects fundamental, whether one agrees with it or not, the Russian psychologist Losski has pointed out the control of the will in human soul-life, in his last book called ‘Intuitivism.’ I could say much to you if I wanted to show how concerned the theory of the soul is to overcome the one-sidedness of intellectualism, and if further, I wanted to show you that the other powers also play a part in human soul-power.

If you carry the thought a step further, you will be able to say that this shows how impossible the demand is that the power of formulating ideas, limited as it is to observation, may lead to objective results in science. When science itself shows its impossibility, shows that everywhere Will plays a part, on what grounds would you then establish the purely objective observation of anything? Because you prefer to recognize only matter as objective, subject as you are to the tricks played by the will and your habits of thought, and because you have not the habit of thought and feeling to recognize also the spiritual element in things, therefore you omit the latter altogether in your theories. It is not a question, if we want to understand the world, of what kind of abstract ideals we set before us, but of what we can accomplish in our souls.

Goethe belongs to those people who reject the principle most categorically that knowledge is produced only through the thinking capacity, the one-sided capacity to form ideas. The prominent and significant principle expressed more or less clearly in Goethe's nature is that he considers that all the powers of the human soul must function if man is to unravel the riddles of the world.

Now we must not be one-sided and unjust. It is quite correct, when the objection is raised that feeling and will are qualities subjected to the personal characteristics of a man, and when it is asked where we should come to if not only what the eyes see and the microscope shows, but also what feeling and will dictate were considered as attributes of things! All the same that is just what we have to say in order to understand someone who, like Goethe, stands for the principle of initiation and development, namely, that, given the average feeling and will in man to-day, they cannot be applied to the acquirement of knowledge, that, in fact they would lead only to an absolute disharmony in their knowledge. One man wants this, the other that, according to the subjective needs of feeling and will. But the man who stands on the ground of initiation is also quite clear that of the powers of the human soul—thinking, representation, feeling, will—the capacity to construct thoughts and to think has advanced furthest, and is most inclined and adapted to exclude the personal element and to attain objectivity. For that soul-power which is expressed in intellectualism is now so advanced that when men rely upon it, they quarrel least, and agree most in what they say. Feeling and will have not had the chance of being developed to this point. We can also justifiably find differences when we examine the region of ideas and their representation. There are regions of the idea-life which give us completely objective truths, which men have recognized as such, quite apart from external experience, and these truths are the same if a million people differ in their opinions about them. If you have experienced in yourself the reasons for it, you are able to assert the truth even if a million people think otherwise. For instance, everyone can find such truths confirmed as those dealing with numbers and space dimension. Everyone can understand that 3 x 3 = 9, and it is so, even if a million people contradict it. Why is this the case? Because regarding such truths such as mathematical truths, most people have succeeded in suppressing their preference and their aversion, their sympathy and their antipathy, in short, the personal factor, and letting the matter speak for itself. This exclusion of the personal in the case of thought and the capacity to formulate ideas has always been called the ‘purification’ of the human soul, and considered the first stage on the way to initiation, or, as one might also say, on the way to higher knowledge.

The man who is versed in these things says to himself: It is not only with regard to feeling and the will that people are not yet so far that nothing personal enters into it, and that they can verify objectivity, but also with regard to thought the majority are not yet so far as to be able to give themselves up purely to what the things, the ideas of the things themselves say to him, as everyone can in mathematics. But there are methods of purifying thought to such a point that we no longer think personally, but let the thoughts in us think, as we let mathematical thought do. Thus, when we have cleansed thought from the influences of personality, we speak of purification or catharsis, as it was called in the old Eleusinian mysteries. Hence man must reach the point of purifying his thinking, which then enables him to comprehend things with objective thought.

Now, just as this is possible, so is it also possible to eliminate all the personal factor from feeling, so that the appeal of things to the feelings has no longer any say, to the Personal, or to Sympathy and Antipathy; nothing but the nature of the thing is evoked, in so far as it cannot speak to mere concept capacity. Experiences in our souls which have their roots or origin in our feelings, and which therefore lead to inner knowledge, and lead deeper into the nature of a thing, speaking however to other sides of the soul than mere intellectualism, can be purified of the personal element as well as thought, so that feeling can transmit the same objectivity as thought can. This cleansing or development of the feelings is called in all esoteric doctrine ‘enlightenment.’ Every man capable of development, and striving after it in no casual way, (that lies in intention of the personality) must take pains to be stirred only by what lies in the nature of the thing. When he has reached the point where the thing rouses in him neither sympathy nor antipathy, where he allows only the nature of things to speak, so that he says: whatever sympathies or antipathies I have are immaterial and are not to be taken into consideration, then it lies in the nature of the thing that the thought and action of the man assume this or that direction—then it is a declaration of the innermost nature of the thing. In esoteric doctrine this development of the will has been called ‘consummation.’

If a man takes his stand on the ground of spiritual science, he says to himself: ‘If I have a thing in front of me, there is in it a spiritual element, and I can so stimulate my mode of conception, that the essence of the thing is represented objectively through my concepts and ideas. Hence there is present in me the same thing that works externally, and I have recognized the essence of the thing through my mode of conception. But what I have recognized is only a part of the essence.’ There exists in things something which can speak not to thought at all, but only to feeling, and indeed only to purified feeling or to feeling which has become objective. The man who has not yet developed in himself by this cultivation of the feelings such a part of the essence, cannot recognize the essence along these lines. But for the man who says to himself that feeling as well as the capacity to think can provide a basis of knowledge (not the feeling as it is, but as it can become by means of well-founded methods of the teaching of cognition) for such a man it becomes gradually clear that there are things deeper than thought possibilities, things which speak to one's soul and the feelings. There are also things which reach even down to the will.

Now Goethe was particularly convinced that this really is the case, and that man really has in him these possibilities of development. He stood firmly on the ground of the principle of initiation, and he has shown us the initiation of man through the development of his soul and the development of the three powers of will, feeling and thought by representing them in his Fairy Tale.

The Golden King represents the initiation for the thought-capacity, the Silver King represents the initiation with knowledge capacity of objective feeling, and the Brazen King the initiation for knowledge capacity of the will. Goethe has emphasized that man must overcome certain things if he wishes to receive these three gifts. The Youth in the story represents man in his struggle for the highest. As Schiller in his Aesthetic Letters depicts man's aspiration towards complete humanity, so Goethe depicts in the Youth man's aspiration for the highest, wanting straight away to reach the Beautiful Lily, and attaining then inner human perfection, given him by the three Kings.

How that happens is pointed out in the course of the story. You remember that in the subterranean Temple, into which the Snake looks because of the earth's power of crystallization, one King was in each of the four corners. In the first was the Golden, in the second the Silver, in the third the Brazen King. In the fourth was the King who was a mixture of the other three metals, in whom, therefore, the three composite parts were so welded that one could not distinguish them. In this fourth King, Goethe depicts for us the representative of that stage of human development in which will, thought and feeling are mixed together. In other words he stands for that human soul which is governed by will, thought and feeling, because it is itself not master of these three capacities. On the other hand in the Youth, after he receives the three gifts from the three Kings separately, so that they are no longer chaotically mixed, that stage of knowledge is represented which does not allow itself to be ruled by thought, feeling and will, but which, on the contrary, rules over them. Man is ruled by them as long as they flow chaotically and intermingled in him, as long as they are not pure and independent in his soul. Until man has reached this separation, he is not capable of being effective through his three knowledge-capacities. When he has reached this point, however, he is no longer the subject of Chaos, but on the contrary himself controls his thought, his feeling and his will, when each is as pure and unalloyed as the metal of the respective Kings: his mode of Conception, pure as the Golden King (for nothing is mixed in him); his mode of Feeling, where nothing is added or mixed, but pure as the Silver King; and so too the Will, pure as the brass of the Brazen King; Concepts and Feelings no longer govern him, for he stands, in his nature, free; he is capable, in a word, of comprehension by means of thought, of feeling and will as required, making use of each separately. He can grasp according to necessity and the nature of things either by means of thinking, feeling or willing. Then he has advanced so far that the whole pure knowledge-capacity which we see in thought, feeling and will, leads him to a deeper insight, and he really steeps himself in the current of events, in the inner nature of things. Of course only experience can teach that this is possible.

Now it will not be difficult to agree, after what I said just now, that if Goethe makes the Youth represent striving mankind, we may see in the Beautiful Lily another soul-condition, namely, that soul-condition which man attains when the beings lying in things spring forth in the soul, and he thereby raises his existence by blending the things in himself with the nature of things in the external world. What man experiences in his soul by growing out of himself, by becoming master of the powers of the soul, victor over the chaos in his soul; what man then experiences, that inner blessedness, that unity with things; their awakening in him, is shown us by Goethe in his representation of the union with the Beautiful Lily. Beauty here is not merely aesthetic beauty, but a quality of man brought to a certain stage of perfection. So that we shall also now find it easy to understand why Goethe makes the Youth proceed in his effort to reach the Beautiful Lily, in such a way that all his powers at first disappear. Why is this?

We understand Goethe's presentation of such a scene if we hold fast to a thought he once expressed: ‘Everything which gives us mastery over ourselves without liberating us, leads us into error.’ Man must first be free, he must reach the point of being master of his inner soul-powers, and then he can attain union with the highest soul-condition, with the Beautiful Lily. But if he sets out to attain it unprepared, with still immature powers, they are lost and his soul is shrivelled. Hence Goethe points out that the Youth seeks this liberation which will make him captain of his soul. The moment his soul-powers are no longer chaotic, but are purified, cleansed and ordered, he is ready to reach that condition of soul which is symbolized by his union with the Beautiful Lily.

So we see that Goethe constructs these figures in free creative fantasy, and if we look upon them as representing soul-powers, we see that they permeate and work in his whole soul. If we look upon them like this, if we are as sensitive to these figures as in a way Goethe was—Goethe who unlike a second-rate didactic poet was not content to say what this or that soul-quality meant, but used it to express what he felt himself, then we shall realize what is expressed in these poetic figures. And therefore the various figures stand in the same personal relationship to each other as the soul-powers of a man stand to each other.

It cannot be clearly enough insisted upon that there is no question of the characters meaning this or that. That is certainly not the case. Rather is it that Goethe felt this or that in this or that soul-activity and transformed his feelings in connection with one or the other soul-activity into one or the other figures.

Thus he created the sequence of the story's events, which is still more important than the figures themselves. We see the Will-o'-the-Wisps and the Green Snake, and that the former cross over from the other side of the river and reveal quite peculiar qualities. They absorb the gold greedily, even lick it from the walls of the Old Man's room, and then throw it about prodigally. The same gold which in the Will-o'-the-Wisps is a sign of worthlessness, as we are also shown by the fact that the Ferryman has to refuse it—otherwise the river would surge up1and the waves rear up like horses—aufbäumen. Ed.—the Ferryman may take only fruits in payment—this gold—what effect does it have in the body of the Green Snake? The Snake, after taking it, becomes internally luminous! And the plants and other things round her are also lit up because she takes into herself what in the case of the Will-o'-the-Wisps is a symbol of worthlessness.

But a certain importance is ascribed even to them. You know that the Old Man at the critical moment calls upon the Will-o'-the-Wisps to open the Temple gates, so that the whole train can enter in. Precisely the same thing which happens here in the case of the Green Snake, is to be found in the human soul, a thing we came across particularly clearly two days ago in the conversation between Goethe and Schiller. We saw that Schiller, as he spoke with Goethe about the way in which nature should be regarded, was still of the opinion that the drawing with a few strokes by Goethe of the proto-plant was an idea, an abstraction, which one receives when one omits the differentiating features and puts together the common ones. And we saw that Goethe thereupon said that if that was an idea, then he saw his ideas with his eyes. At this moment there were two quite different realities in opposition. Schiller trained himself completely to take Goethe's way of looking at things; so that it shows no lack of honour to Schiller if he is taken as an example of that human soul which moves in abstractions, and preferably in those ideas of things which are comprehended by the mere reason. That is a particular inclination of the soul, which, if a man wishes to attain a higher development, can, in certain circumstances, play a very dangerous part.

There are people whose inclination lies in the direction of the abstract. Now when they combine this abstraction with something they come across as soul-power, this is, as a rule, the concept of unproductivity. These people are sometimes very acute, they can draw fine distinctions, and connect this or that concept wonderfully. But you also often find with such a soul-condition, that the spiritual influences, inspirations, are excluded. This soul-condition, characterized by unproductivity and abstraction, is represented to us in the Will-o'-the-Wisps. They take up the gold wherever they find it; they lack any inventive faculty, are unproductive and can grasp no ‘ideas.’ These ideas are alien to them. They have not the will unselfishly to yield themselves up to things, or to stick to facts or to use concepts only as far as they are interpreters of facts. All they care about is to stuff their reasons full of concepts, and then scatter them about prodigally. They are like a man who goes to libraries, collects wisdom there, and takes it in and then gives it out again correspondingly. These Will-o'-the-Wisps are typical of that soul-capacity which is never able to grasp a single literary thought, or feeling, but which can nevertheless grasp in beautiful forms what creative spirits have produced in literature. I do not mean to say anything against this kind of soul. If a man did not have it nor cultivated it when he was insufficiently endowed with it, he would lack something which must be present when it comes to the real capacity for knowledge. In his picture of the Will-o'-the-Wisps, in the whole circumstances in which they appear and act, Goethe shows the manner in which such a soul-type functions, in relation to other soul-types, how it harms and benefits. In truth, if someone wanted to climb to higher stages of knowledge and had not this faculty of soul, there would not be the means to open the Temple for him. Goethe shows the advantages equally with the drawbacks of this soul-condition. What he gives us in the Will-o'-the-Wisps represents a soul-element. The moment it wants to lead an independent life in one direction or another, it becomes harmful. This abstraction leads to a critical faculty which makes men learn everything indeed, but incapable of further development, because the productive element is missing in them. But Goethe also clearly shows how far there is value in what the Will-o'-the-Wisps represent. What they contain can become something valuable; in the Snake the Will-o'-the-Wisps' gold turns to something valuable in so far as she illumines the objects round about her.

What lives in the Will-o'-the-Wisps, when worked out in another way, will become extremely fruitful in the human soul. When man strives so to regard his experiences of concepts and ideas and ideal creations not as something abstract in themselves, but as capable of leading to and interpreting the realities round him, so that he thinks as selflessly and willingly of his observations as of the abstract quality of the concepts, then he is as regards this soul-power in the same position as the Green Snake: then he can produce light and wisdom out of the purely abstract concepts. Then he is not brought to be in the vertical line which loses all connection and relation to the horizontal plane. The Will-o'-the-Wisps are the Snake's relatives, but of the vertical line. The gold-pieces fall through the rocks, are absorbed by the Snake which thereby becomes inwardly luminous. He who approaches the things themselves with these concepts absorbs wisdom.

Goethe gives us also an example of how one is to work on the conceptions (Begriffe). He has the conception of the proto-plant. Primarily it is an abstract conception, which, were it worked out in the abstract, would become an empty picture, killing all life, as the gold, thrown down by the Will-o'-the-Wisps, killed the Pug-dog. But just think what Goethe does with the conception of the proto-plant. If we follow him on his Italian journey, we see that this conception is only the ‘leit-motif’ going from plant to plant, from being to being. He takes the conception, goes from it over to the plant, and sees how this is made in one or another shape, taking on quite different shapes, in lower or higher places, and so on. Now he follows from step to step how the spiritual reality or form creeps into every physical form. He himself creeps about like the Snake in the crevices of the earth. Thus for Goethe the conception-world is nothing else but that which can be spun into objective reality. The Snake for him is the representative of that soul-power which does not struggle upward selfishly to higher regions of existence in an attempt to raise itself above everything, but which continually and patiently lets the conception be verified by observation, patiently goes from experience to experience. When man not merely theorizes, not merely lives in the conceptions, but applies them to life and experience, then he is as far as this soul-power is concerned, in the position of the Snake. This is so in a very wide sense. He who takes philosophy not as a theory, but as what it is meant to be, he who regards the conceptions of spiritual science as exercises for life, knows that just such conceptions, even the highest, are meant to be applied in such a way that they merge into life and are verified by daily experience. The man who has learnt a few conceptions but is incapable of applying them to life is like a man who has learned a cooking-book by heart, but cannot cook. As the gold is a means to throw light on things, so Goethe illuminates the things round him by means of his ideas.

This is the instructive and grand thing about Goethe's attitude to Science, and his every effort, that his ideas and conceptions have reality and have the effect of lighting up all objects round him. The day before yesterday special importance was laid on the universality in Goethe which gives the reason why we never have the feeling: that is Goethe's ‘meaning.’ He stands there, and when we see him, we find only that we understand things better which before were not so clear. For this reason he was capable of becoming the point of agreement between two hostile brethren, as we saw the day before yesterday.

If we wanted to discuss every feature in this fairy tale and characterize every figure in it, I should have to speak not for three hours but for three weeks on it. So I can give you only the deeper principles contained in the story. But every feature shows us something of Goethe's method of thought and his opinion of the world.

Those soul-powers which are represented in the Will-o'-the-Wisps, in the Green Snake and in the Kings, are on one side of the River. On the other side lives the Beautiful Lily, the ideal of perfect knowledge and perfect life and work. We heard from the Ferryman that he can bring the people (gestalten, forms) from the other side to this, but can take no one back again. Let us apply this to our whole soul-mood or soul-condition and our improvement.

We find ourselves on earth as beings with souls. These or the other soul-capacities work upon us as talents, as more or less developed soul-powers. They are in us; but we have also something else in us. In us human beings if we take ourselves properly there is the feeling, the knowledge that the powers of our soul, which finally interpret the nature of things to us, are closely related to the elemental spirits (grundgeister) of the world, with the Creative, Spiritual forces. The longing for these creative forces is the longing for the Beautiful Lily. Thus we know that everything derived on one hand from the Beautiful Lily, strives on the other to return to her. Unknown forces unmastered by us have brought us from the world on the other side over the river-boundary to this side. But these forces, characterized by the Ferryman, and working in the depths of unconscious nature, cannot take us back again, for otherwise man would return, without his work and co-operation, to the kingdom of the divine, precisely as he came over. The forces which as unconscious nature-forces have brought us over into the kingdom of struggling humanity, may not lead us back again. For this other forces are required; and Goethe is aware of it. But he wants to show also how man must set about being able to re-unite with the Beautiful Lily. There are two ways. One leads over the Green Snake; we can cross by it and gradually find the kingdom of the spirit. The other way goes across the Giant's shadow. We are shown that the Giant, otherwise without strength, stretches out his hand at dusk, and its shadow falls across the River. The second road leads over this shadow. Whoever wishes therefore to cross by clear daylight to the kingdom of the spirit must use the way provided by the Snake; and whoever wishes to cross at dusk can use the way leading across the Giant's shadow. Those are the two ways to reach a spiritual picture of the world. The man who aspires to the spiritual world—not with human concepts and ideas, not with those forces which are symbolized by the worthless gold (as spirits of bare sophistry) and the Will-o'-the-Wisps—but by proceeding patiently and selflessly from experience to experience, succeeds in reaching the other bank in full sunlight.

Goethe knows that real research does not stop at material things, but must lead over beyond the boundary; beyond the river which separates us from the spiritual. But there is another way, a way for undeveloped people, who do not want to take the road of knowledge, but a way represented by the Giant. He himself is powerless, only his shadow has a certain strength. Now what is powerless in a true sense? Take all the conditions possible to man when his consciousness is reduced, as in hypnotism, somnambulism and even dream-conditions; everything by which the clear consciousness of day is subdued, whereby man is subject to lower soul-power than in clear consciousness, belongs to this second way. Here the soul, by surrendering its ordinary daily functional power of the soul, is led into the real kingdom of the spirit. The soul, however, does not itself become capable of crossing into the spiritual kingdom, but remains unconscious and is carried across like the Shadow into the kingdom of spirit. Goethe includes in the forces represented by the Giant's shadow everything which functions unconsciously and from habit, without the soul-powers which are active during clear consciousness taking part. Schiller, who was initiated into Goethe's meaning, once, at the time of the great upheavals in Western Europe, wrote to Goethe: ‘I rejoice that you have not been roughly caught in the shadow of the giant.’ What did he mean? He meant that had Goethe travelled further West, he would have been caught in the revolutionary forces of the West.

Then we see that the objects of man's quest, the height of knowledge, is represented in the ‘Temple.’ The Temple represents a higher stage of man's evolution. Goethe nowadays would say that if the Temple is something hidden, it is under the narrow crevices of the earth. Such an aspiring soul-force as is represented in the Snake can feel the shape of the Temple only dimly. By absorbing the ideal, the gold, she can illumine this shape, but fundamentally the Temple can be there to-day only as a subterranean secret. But though Goethe leaves the Temple as something subterranean for external culture, he points out that to a further-developed man this secret must be unlocked. In this he indicates the current of Spiritual Science which to-day has already caught up wide masses of people, which in a comprehensive sense seeks to make popular the content of Spiritual Science, of the principle of initiation, and of the Temple's secret. The Youth is therefore to be regarded in this truly free Goethean sense as the representative of aspiring mankind. Therefore the Temple is to rise beyond the River, so that not only a few individuals who seek illumination can cross and re-cross, but so that all people can cross the River by the bridge. Goethe, in the Temple of Initiation above the earth puts before us a future state, which will have arrived when man can go from the kingdom of the senses into the kingdom of the spiritual, and from the kingdom of the spiritual into the kingdom of the senses.

How is this attained in the Fairy Tale? Because the real secret of it is fulfilled. The solution of the story is to be found in the story itself, says Schiller, but he has also pointed out that the word that solves it is inserted in a very remarkable way. You remember the Old Man with the Lamp, which illuminates only where there is already light? Now, who is this Old Man, and what is the Lamp? What is its curious light? The Old Man stands above the situation. His lamp has the peculiar quality of changing things, wood into silver, stone into gold. It has also the quality of shining only where there is already a receptivity, a definite kind of light. As the Old Man enters the subterranean Temple he is asked how many secrets he knows. ‘Three,’ he replies. To the Silver King's question, ‘Which is the most important,’ he answers: ‘The open one.’ And when the Brazen King asks whether he would tell it them also, he says: ‘As soon as I know the fourth.’ Whereupon the Snake whispers something in his ear and he says at once:

‘The Time is at Hand.’

The solution of the riddle is what the Snake whispered in the Old Man's ear, and we have to find out what that is. It would lead us too far to say at length what the three secrets mean. I shall only hint at it. There are three Kingdoms which in evolution are so to speak stationary: the mineral, the vegetable and the animal Kingdoms, which are completed, as compared with progressive man, who is still developing. The inner development of man is so vehement and important that it cannot be confused with the development of the other three nature kingdoms. What the secret of the Old Man contains is the fact that one Kingdom of nature has arrived at the present point of a full-stop, and this is what explains the laws of the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms. But now comes the fourth kingdom, that of man, the secret which is to be revealed in the human soul. The secret which the Old Man must first discover, is of this kind. And how must he discover it? He knows of what it consists, but the Snake has to tell him first. This indicates to ns that man has still to go through something special, if he wants to attain the goal of evolution as the three other kingdoms have done. What this is the Snake whispers to the Old Man. She tells how a certain soul-power must be developed, if a higher stage is to be reached; she says that she has the will to sacrifice herself for this, and she does in fact sacrifice herself. Hitherto she has made a bridge when here and there someone wished to cross; but now she will become a permanent bridge, by falling in pieces, so that man will have a lasting connection between this side and that, between the spiritual and the physical. That the Snake has the will to sacrifice herself must be taken as the condition of revealing the fourth secret. The moment the Old Man hears that the Snake will sacrifice herself, he can even say: ‘The time is at hand!’ It is that soul-power which adheres to the external. And the way to be trodden is not to make this soul-force and inner science the ultimate end but self-surrender. That really is a secret, even if it is called an ‘open secret,’ that is, when any who will can know it. What is regarded in a wide circle as end in itself—everything we can learn in natural science, in political science of civilization, in history, in mathematics and all other sciences can never be an absolute end. We can never come to a true insight into the depths of the world, if we consider them as ends in themselves. Only if we are at all times ready to absorb them and regard them as means, which we offer as a bridge to let us cross over, do we come to real knowledge. We bar ourselves off from the higher, true knowledge unless we are also ready to sacrifice ourselves. Man will get an idea of what initiation is only when he ceases to carve for himself a world-conception out of external-physical concepts. He must be all feeling, with all-attuned soul, such a soul as Goethe describes in his ‘Westöstlichen Divan’ as the highest acquisition of man:

‘And so long thou hast not this, Death and Birth!
Thou art but a sorry guest, on this dark Earth.’

Death and Birth! Learn to know what life can offer, go through with it, but surpass, transcend yourself. Let it become a bridge for you, and you will wake up in a higher life and be one with the essence of things, when you no longer live in the illusion that, cut off from the higher ego, you can exhaust the essence of things. When Goethe speaks of the sacrifice of the idea and the soul-material, in order to acquire new life in higher spheres, and of the deepest inner love, he likes to think of the words of the mystic Jacob Böhme, who knows from experience this self-surrender of the Snake. Perhaps Jacob Böhme has pointed out just this to him and made it so clear to him that a man can live, even in the physical body, in a world which otherwise he would tread only after death, in the world of the eternal, the spiritual. Jacob Böhme knew also that it depends on the man, whether he can, in the higher sense, slide over into the spiritual world. He shows it in the saying: ‘Who dies not before he dies, is ruined when he dies.’ A significant saying! Man, who does not die before he dies, that is, who does not develop in himself the eternal, the inner kernel of being, will not be in a position, when he dies, to find again the spiritual kernel in himself. The eternal is in us. We must develop it in the body, so that we may find it outside the body. ‘Who dies not before he dies, is ruined when he dies.’ So it is also with the other sentence: ‘And so death is the root of all life.’

Thus we see that the things of the soul can only illumine a place where light already is: the Lamp of the Old Man can only shine where there is already light. Once more our attention is directed to those special soul-powers, of devotion and religious self-surrender, which for hundreds and thousands of years have brought the message of spiritual worlds to those who could not seek the light by way of Science or otherwise. The light of the different religious revelations is represented in the Old Man, who has this light. But to him who does not bring an inner light to meet the sense of religion, the Lamp of Religion gives no light. It can shine only where light already is and meets it. It is the Lamp which has transfigured man, which has led all mortality across to a life of soul.

And then we see that the two Kingdoms are united through the Snake's sacrifice. After it goes, so to say, through incidents symbolic of what man has to go through in his higher development in an esoteric sense, we see how the Temple of Knowledge is brought by means of all the three human soul-powers across the river, how it rises and each soul-power performs its service. This is meant to show that the soul-powers must be in harmony, since we are told: the single personality can achieve nothing; but when all work together at a favourable moment, when the strong and the weak co-operate in the right relationship, then the soul can acquire the ability to reach the highest state, the union with the Beautiful Lily. Then the Temple moves out of the hidden crevices up to the surface for all who strive in truth after knowledge and wisdom. The Youth is endowed with the knowledge-powers of thought by the Golden King: ‘Know and recognize the highest.’ He is endowed with the knowledge-powers of feeling by the Silver King, which Goethe expresses beautifully with the words: ‘Tend the sheep!’

In feeling are rooted art and religion, and for Goethe both were a unity—already at the time when he wrote on his Italian journey concerning Italy's works of art: ‘There is necessity, there is God!’

But there is also the doing—when man does not apply it to the struggle for existence, but when he makes it into a weapon for gaining beauty and wisdom. This is contained in the words spoken by the Brazen King to the Youth: ‘The Sword in the left hand, the right free!’ There is a whole world in these words. The right hand free to work the self out of human nature.

And what happens with the Fourth King, in whom all three elements are mingled together? This mixed King melts into a grotesque figure. The Will-o'-the-Wisps come and lick what gold there is off him: man's soul-powers here still want to examine what sort of stages of human development, now overcome, there once were.

Let us take yet another feature: namely, when the Giant comes staggering in and then stands there like a statue, pointing to the hours: when man has brought his life into harmony, then the subordinate has a meaning for what is intended to be methodical order. It ought to express itself like a habit. The unconscious itself will then receive a valuable meaning. Hence the Giant is depicted like a clock.

The Old Man with the Lamp is married to the Old Woman. This Old Woman represents to us nothing else but the healthy, understanding human soul-power, which does not penetrate into high regions of spiritual abstractions, but which handles everything healthily and practically, as, for instance, in religion, represented by the Old Man with the Lamp. She is the one to bring the Ferryman his pay: three heads of cabbage, three onions and three artichokes. Such a stage of development has not passed beyond the contemporary. That she is so treated by the Will-o'-the-Wisps is no doubt a reflected picture of how abstract minds look down with a certain amount of scorn on people who take things in directly by instinct or intuition.

Every point, every turn of this story is of deep significance, and if we enter into one more explanation, it must be of an esoteric kind, and you will find that one can really only give the method of explanation. Bury yourselves in the story, and you will discover that a whole world is to be found there, very much more than it has been possible to indicate to-day.

I should like to show you in two examples how much Goethe's spiritual world-view runs through his whole life, how in things of spiritual knowledge he stands in agreement in extreme old age with what he had written earlier.

While Goethe wrote ‘Faust’ he adopted a certain attitude which harks back to a symbol of a deeper evolution-path of nature. When Faust speaks of his father, who was an alchemist, and had taken over the old doctrines credulously, but had misunderstood them, he says that his father also made

‘... a Lion red, a wooer daring,
Within the Lily's tepid bath espoused.’
Faust I, Scene II, p. 32.

That is what Faust says, without knowing its significance. But such a saying can become a ladder leading to high stages of development. In the Fairy Tale Goethe shows in the Youth the human being striving for the highest bride, and that with which he is to be united he calls the Beautiful Lily. You notice this Lily is to be found already in the first parts of ‘Faust.’

And, again, the very nerve of Goethe's philosophy which found expression in his Fairy Tale, is to be found also in ‘Faust:’ in Part II, in the Mystic Chorus, where Faust confronts the entry into the spiritual world, where Goethe sets down his avowal of a spiritual world-conception in monumental words. He shows there how the ascent on the road of knowledge follows in three successive stages, namely, the purification of the thought, the illumination of feeling and the working out of will. What man attains through the purification of the thought leads him to recognize the spiritual behind everything. The physical becomes a symbol of the spiritual. He goes deeper still, in order to grasp what is unattainable to thought. He then reaches a state at which he no longer regards things by means of thought, but is directed into the thing itself, where the essence of it, and what one cannot describe become accomplished fact. And that which one cannot describe, that which, as you will hear in the course of the winter addresses, must be thought of in another way, that whereby one must advance to the secrets of the will, he labels simply ‘the indescribable.’ When man has completed the threefold road through thought, feeling and will, he is united with what is called ‘eternal womanhood’ in the Chorus Mysticus, the goal of the human soul's development, the ‘Beautiful Lily’ of the Fairy Tale.

Thus we see that Goethe utters his deepest conviction, his secret revelation there also, where he brings his great confessional poem to an end, after rising up through thought and feeling and will to union with the Beautiful Lily, up to that state which finds its expression in the passage of the Chorus Mysticus, which expresses the same thing as Goethe's philosophy and spiritual science, as well as the Fairy Tale:

‘All things transitory
But as symbols are sent:
Earth's insufficiency
Here grows to Event:
The Indescribable,
Here it is done:
The Woman-Soul leadeth us
Upward and on!’

Goethes Geheime Offenbarung Esoterisch

Einem Vortrage wie dem heutigen kann leicht der Vorwurf gemacht werden, daß in erzwungener Weise symbolische und allegorische Ausdeutungen gegeben werden von etwas, was ein Dichter im freien Spiel der Einbildungskraft geschaffen hat. Wir haben uns ja vorgestern die Aufgabe vorgezeichnet, das Goethesche «Märchen» von der grünen Schlange und der schönen Lilie, wie es uns da vor Augen getreten ist, in seinem tieferen Sinn zu erforschen. Immer wieder wird es geschehen, daß eine solche, wenn man so sagen will, Auslegung, Erklärung eines Phantasiewerks mit den Worten abgetan wird: Ach, da werden allerlei tiefsinnig sein sollende Symbole und Bedeutungen in den Gestalten des Werkes gesucht. — Deshalb möchte ich von vornherein bemerken, daß das, was heute von mir gesagt werden soll, nichts zu tun hat mit dem, was allerdings gerade von theosophischer Seite aus oft in bezug auf symbolische oder allegorische Ausdeutungen von Märchen oder dichterischen Werken gemacht worden ist. Und weil ich weiß, daß ähnlichen Auseinandersetzungen, die ich gegeben habe, immer wieder entgegengehalten wurde, auf solche symbolische Deutungen dichterischer Figuren lasse man sich nicht ein, so kann ich nicht scharf genug betonen, daß das, was hier zu sagen ist, einzig und allein in folgendem Sinne aufgefaßt werden muß.

Uns liegt heute ein dichterisches Werk vor, das Werk einer umfassenden und in die Tiefe der Dinge dringenden Einbildungskraft oder Phantasie: Das «Märchen» von der grünen Schlange und der schönen Lilie. Die Frage darf wohl aufgeworfen werden: Dürfen wir von irgendeinem Gesichtspunkte an das Werk herangehen und versuchen, den ideellen, den wirklichen Inhalt eines solchen dichterischen Produktes zu ergründen?

Wir sehen die Pflanze vor uns. Der Mensch tritt an die Pflanze heran; er untersucht die Gesetze, die innere Regelmäßigkeit, nach der die Pflanze wächst und gedeiht, nach der sie Stück für Stück ihres Wesens entwickelt. Hat der Botaniker oder hat jemand, der kein Botaniker ist, sich aber das Werden der Pflanze ideell zurechtlegt, das Recht dazu? Kann man ihm entgegenhalten: Von dem, was du da findest an Gesetzen, weiß die Pflanze nichts, sie kennt nicht die Gesetze ihres Wachstums und ihrer Entwickelung! — Genau den gleichen Wert, den dieser Einwand hätte, wenn man ihn gegen den Botaniker erheben würde oder gegen den Lyriker, der das, was er bei der Pflanze empfindet, in seinen lyrischen Leistungen zum Ausdruck bringt, genau denselben Sinn und Wert hätte derEinwand, den man gegen eine solche Erklärung des Goetheschen Märchens vorbringen könnte. Nicht möchte ich die Dinge so aufgefaßt wissen, als ob ich sagen würde: Da haben wir eine Schlange, die bedeutet dies oder jenes, da haben wir einen goldenen, einen silbernen, einen ehernen König, sie bedeuten dies oder jenes. Nicht in diesem symbolisch-allegorischen Sinne möchte ich das Märchen deuten, sondern mehr so, daß in gleicher Weise, wie die Pflanze nach Gesetzen wächst, von denen sie in ihrer Unbewußtheit nichts wissen kann, und wie der Botaniker das Recht hat, diese Gesetze des Pflanzenwachstums zu finden, man sich auch sagen muß: Das, was hier auseinandergesetzt wird, braucht der Dichter Goethe niemals so auseinandergesetzt, niemals so vor sein äußeres Tagesbewußtsein gebracht zu haben. Dennoch aber ist es ebenso wahr, daß die Gesetzmäßigkeit, der wirkliche, der ideelle Inhalt des Märchens im gleichen Sinne zu betrachten ist wie das, was wir als die Gesetze des Pflanzenwachstums finden, daß es dieselbe Gesetzmäßigkeit ist, nach der die Pflanze wächst, nach der sie entstanden ist, deren sie sich aber in ihrer Unbewußtheit nicht bewußt ist.

Daher bitte ich, das, was ich zu sagen mir erlauben werde, so aufzufassen, als ob es den Sinn und den Geist der Goetheschen Denkweise und Vorstellungsart darstellte, und als ob derjenige, welcher sich sozusagen berufen fühlt, die ideale Goethesche Weltanschauung vor Sie hinzustellen, eine Berechtigung hätte — damit Sie den Weg finden können zu einem Verständnis der Goetheschen Weltanschauung -, auseinanderzulegen das Erzeugnis Goethescher Phantasie, herauszuheben die Gestalten, und die Wechselbeziehungen zu zeigen, in welchen er sie verwendet hat, genau ebenso, wie der Botaniker zeigt, daß die Pflanze nach den Gesetzen wächst, die er gefunden hat.

Goethes Psychologie oder Seelenlehre, das heißt, was er für das Wesen der Seele maßgebend hält, das ist uns in seinem schönen Märchen von der grünen Schlange und der schönen Lilie veranschaulicht. Und wenn wir uns verständigen wollen über das, was darüber gesagt werden muß, so wird es gut sein, wenn wir in einer Vorbetrachtung den Geist seiner Seelenwelt anschaulich zur Sprache bringen. Schon in dem vorgestrigen Vortrage wurde darauf hingewiesen, daß die hier vertretene Weltanschauung davon ausgeht, daß die menschliche Erkenntnis nicht als etwas ein für allemal Feststehendes zu betrachten ist. Vielfach herrscht ja die Ansicht: So, wie der Mensch heute ist, so ist er eben, und so wie er ist, kann er über alle Dinge unbedingt entscheiden; er beobachtet mit seinen Sinnesorganen die Welt, erfaßt sie in ihren Erscheinungen, kombiniert diese mit seinem an die Sinne gefesselten Verstande, und was er da herausbringt mit dieser an die Beobachtung sich haltenden Verstandestätigkeit, das ist eine absolute Welterkenntnis, die für jeden gelten muß. — Im Gegensatze dazu, aber nur im Gegensatze in einer bestimmten Art, steht die geisteswissenschaftliche Weltanschauung, die hier vertreten wird. Sie geht davon aus, daß das, was unsere Erkenntnis wird, jederzeit abhängig ist von unseren Organen, von unseren Erkenntnisfähigkeiten, und daß wir selbst als Menschen entwicklungsfähig sind, daß wir an uns arbeiten können, daß wir diejenigen Erkenntnisfähigkeiten, die wir auf einer bestimmten Stufe unseres Daseins haben, höher emporheben können. Sie geht davon aus, daß wir sie ausbilden können, daß wir in ähnlicher Weise, wie sich der Mensch aus unvollkommenem Zustande hinaufentwickelt hat zu seinem gegenwärtigen Standpunkt, sie noch weiter entwickeln können, und daß wir durch die Erhebung zu höheren Gesichtspunkten auch zu tieferem Eindringen in die Dinge, zu einer richtigeren Anschauung der Welt kommen müssen.

Soll ich mich noch deutlicher, wenn auch etwas trivial ausdrücken, so möchte ich sagen: Wenn wir ganz absehen von einer Entwickelung der Menschheit und nur Rücksicht nehmen darauf, wie die Menschen sind, die so um uns herum leben, und dann auf jene Menschen blicken, die man in der Kulturgeschichte zu den primitiven Völkerstämmen rechnet, und wenn wir uns fragen, was sie imstande sind, von den Gesetzen der Welt um uns herum zu erkennen und zu wissen, und es vergleichen mit dem, was ein Durchschnitts-Europäer mit einigen wissenschaftlichen Begriffen von der Welt wissen kann, dann werden wir sehen, daß der Angehörige jenes primitiven Volksstammes sich von dem Durchschnitts-Europäer ganz wesentlich unterscheidet. Nehmen wir zum Beispiel das Weltbild eines AustralNegers und das eines, sagen wir, europäischen Monisten, welch letzteres dadurch Realität hat, daß man eine Summe wissenschaftlicher Begriffe der gegenwärtigen Zeit aufgenommen hat. Es unterscheiden sich diese zwei Weltbilder durchaus.

Aber andererseits ist die Geisteswissenschaft weit entfernt, das Weltbild des auf rein materiellem Standpunkte stehenden Menschen zu perhorreszieren oder es als ungültig zu erklären. Vielmehr werden diese Dinge so angesehen, daß in jedem Falle das Weltbild eines Menschen einer menschlichen Entwickelungsstufe entspricht, und daß der Mensch in der Lage ist, die in ihm enthaltenen Fähigkeiten zu steigern und durch die Steigerung der Fähigkeiten anderes, Neues zu erfahren.

Es liegt also in der Perspektive der Geisteswissenschaft, daß der Mensch zu immer höherer Erkenntnis dadurch kommt, daß er sich selber weiterentwickelt, und indem er sich weiterentwickelt, ist das, was er in sich erlebt, objektiver Welteninhalt, den er früher nur nicht gesehen hatte, als er eben noch nicht die Fähigkeit besaß, ihn zu sehen. Die Geisteswissenschaft unterscheidet sich daher wesentlich von anderen, einseitigen Weltanschauungen, seien sie spiritualistisch, seien sie materialistisch, weil sie im Grunde genommen eine ein für allemal abgeschlossene unfehlbare Wahrheit nicht kennt, sondern immer nur die Weisheit und Wahrheit einer bestimmten Entwickelungsstufe, und sich so an das Goethesche Wort hält: Der Mensch hat eigentlich immer nur seine eigene Wahrheit, und sie ist doch immer dieselbe. — Sie ist immer dieselbe, weil das, was wir durch unsere Erkenntniskraft in uns aufnehmen, das Objektive, dasselbe ist.

Wodurch nun gelangt der Mensch dazu, die in ihm liegenden Fähigkeiten und Kräfte zu entwickeln? Die Geisteswissenschaft ist sozusagen so alt wie die denkende Menschheit. Die Geisteswissenschaft stand immer auf dem Standpunkt, daß der Mensch das Ideal einer gewissen Erkenntnis-Vollkommenheit vor sich hat, der er zustrebt. Man nannte das Prinzip, das darin liegt, immer das Prinzip der Einweihung oder Initiation. Einweihung oder Initiation heißt also nichts anderes, als die Fähigkeiten des Menschen zu immer höheren Stufen der Erkenntnis zu steigern und dadurch zu tieferen Einsichten in das Wesen der Welt um uns herum zu gelangen. Goethe stand ganz und gar, man darf wohl sagen sein ganzes Leben hindurch, auf diesem Standpunkt der in der Entwickelung begriffenen Erkenntnis, auf dem Standpunkte der Einweihung, der Initiation. Gerade das zeigt uns im eminentesten Sinne sein Märchen.

Wir werden uns am leichtesten verstehen, wenn wir von der Anschauung ausgehen, die heute am meisten und im weitesten Umkreise vertreten ist und die in einem gewissen Gegensatz zu dem Einweihungs- oder Initiations-Prinzip steht.

Heute kann man im weitesten Umkreise diejenigen Menschen, die über solche Sachen nachdenken oder glauben, über solche Dinge ein Urteil zu haben, mehr oder weniger bewußt den Standpunkt vertreten hören, daß über die Wahrheit, über die objektive Wirklichkeit eigentlich nur Sinnesbeobachtung oder Gegenstände der Sinnesbeobachtung in der Vorstellung entscheiden können. Sie werden es immer wieder hören können: Wissenschaft kann nur sein, was auf der objektiven Grundlage der Beobachtung beruht. — Und man versteht so häufig darunter lediglich die Sinnesbeobachtung und die Anwendung des menschlichen Verstandes und Vorstellungsvermögens auf diese Sinnesbeobachtung. Ein jeder von Ihnen weiß, daß die Fähigkeit, sich Vorstellungen, Begriffe zu bilden, ein menschliches Seelenvermögen ist unter anderen Seelenvermögen, und ebenso weiß ein jeder von Ihnen, daß diese anderen Seelenvermögen unser Fühlen und unser Wollen sind. So kann man schon bei einer verhältnismäßig oberflächlichen Betrachtung sagen: Der Mensch ist nicht bloß ein vorstellendes, sondern auch ein fühlendes und wollendes Wesen. Nun werden diejenigen, die da glauben, den reinen Standpunkt der Wissenschaft vertreten zu müssen, immer wieder sagen: In das, was Wissenschaft ist, darf nur das Vorstellungsvermögen hineinreden, niemals das menschliche Gefühl, niemals das, was wir als Willensimpulse kennen, denn dadurch würde das, was objektiv ist, nur verunreinigt, dadurch würde das, was in unpersönlicher Art das Vorstellungsvermögen gewinnen könnte, nur beeinträchtigt. — Es ist richtig, daß, wenn der Mensch in das, was Gegenstand der Wissenschaft sein soll, sein Gefühl, seine Sympathie oder Antipathie hineinbringt, er die Dinge abstoßend oder ansprechend, sympathisch oder antipathisch findet. Und wohin kämen wir, wenn der Mensch sein Begehrungsvermögen als ein Erkenntnisvermögen betrachten würde, so daß er zu den Dingen sagen könnte: Ich will es, oder: ich will es nicht. — Ob es dir mißfällt oder gefällt, ob du es begehrst, das ist dem Ding höchst gleichgültig. So wahr es ist, daß derjenige, der glaubt, auf dem festen Boden der Wissenschaft stehen zu müssen, sich nur an die äußeren Dinge halten kann, so wahr ist es, daß das Ding selber es ist, das dir abnötigt zu sagen, es sei rot, daß das, was du als eine Vorstellung des Wesens des Steines gewinnst, richtig ist. Aber nicht liegt es im Wesen des Dinges, daß es dir häßlich oder schön erscheint, daß du es begehrst oder nicht begehrst. Daß es dir rot erscheint, hat einen objektiven Grund, daß du es nicht willst, das hat keinen objektiven Grund.

In einer gewissen Beziehung ist nun die heutige Psychologie eigentlich über den eben charakterisierten Standpunkt hinausgegangen. Es ist hier nicht meine Aufgabe, für oder gegen diejenige Richtung der heutigen Seelenwissenschaft oder Psychologie zu reden, die da sagt: Wenn wir die Seelenerscheinungen, das Seelenleben betrachten, dürfen wir uns nicht bloß auf den Intellektualismus beschränken, dürfen wir den Menschen nicht bloß in bezug auf die Vorstellungsfähigkeit betrachten, sondern müssen auch die Einflüsse der Gefühls- und Willenswelt berücksichtigen. — Vielleicht wissen einige von Ihnen, daß dies zum System der Wundtschen Philosophie gehört, welche den Willen als Ursprüngliches der Seelentätigkeit auffaßt. In einer in gewisser Beziehung grundlegenden Art, gleichgültig, ob man damit einverstanden ist oder nicht, hat der russische Psychologe Losskij in seinem Buche, das sich «Die Grundlegung des Intuitivismus» betitelt, auf die Willensrichtung des menschlichen Seelenlebens hingewiesen. Ich könnte Ihnen noch vieles sagen, wenn ich zeigen wollte, wie die Seelenlehre bestrebt ist, den einseitigen Intellektualismus zu überwinden, und wenn ich Ihnen ferner zeigen wollte, daß in das, was als menschliche Seelenkraft vorhanden ist, auch die andern Kräfte hineinspielen.

Wer weiter zu denken vermag, wird sich sagen: Daraus sehen wir, wie undurchführbar die Forderung ist, daß nur die auf die Beobachtung beschränkte Vorstellungsfähigkeit zu objektiven Resultaten der Wissenschaft führen dürfe. Wenn die Wissenschaft selbst zeigt, daß dies nicht möglich ist, daß überall Wille mitspielt, woraus wollt ihr dann feststellen, daß etwas rein objektive Beobachtung sei? Weil ihr dadurch, daß euer Wille euch den obenerwähnten Streich spielt und ihr wegen eurer Denkgewohnbheiten eine Vorliebe dafür habt, nur dasjenige, was materiell ist, als objektiv anzusehen, und weil ihr nicht die Denkgewohnheit und Gefühlsgewohnheit habt, auch das Geistige in den Dingen anzuerkennen, deshalb laßt ihr das Letztere in euren Theorien weg. Es kommt nicht darauf an, wenn wir die Welt begreifen wollen, was wir an abstrakten Idealen uns vorsetzen, sondern was wir in unserer Seele zuwege bringen, was wir können.

Goethe gehört zu denjenigen Menschen, die am schärfsten den Grundsatz ablehnen, daß die Erkenntnis nur durch das einseitige Vorstellungsvermögen, nur durch das Denkvermögen vermittelt werde. Das ist der hervorstechende, bedeutungsvolle Grundzug in Goethes Wesen, daß er, mehr oder weniger deutlich ausgesprochen, immer der Ansicht ist, daß die ganze menschliche Seele in allen ihren Kräften wirken müsse, wenn der Mensch die Weltenrätsel enträtseln will.

Nun dürfen wir aber auch nicht einseitig und nicht ungerecht sein. Es ist durchaus richtig, wenn in bezug auf die Erkenntnis eingewendet wird, daß Gefühl und Wille der Persönlichkeit den persönlichen Eigenschaften des Menschen unterworfene Fähigkeiten sind, und wenn gesagt wird: Wohin würden wir kommen, wenn man nicht bloß das, was die Augen sehen, was das Mikroskop zeigt, sondern was das Gefühl, der Wille dem Menschen sagt, als zu den Dingen gehörig betrachten wollte!

Das ist es aber gerade, was wir uns sagen müssen, um jemanden zu begreifen, der wie Goethe auf dem Prinzip der Einweihung und Entwickelung steht: daß so, wie durchschnittlich Gefühl und Wille heute im Menschen sind, sie in der Tat nicht zur Erkenntnis verwendet werden können, daß sie die Menschen nur zu einer absoluten Uneinigkeit in ihrer Erkenntnis führen würden. Der eine will das, der andere das, je nach den subjektiven Bedürfnissen des Gefühls und Willens. Der aber, welcher auf dem Boden der Initiation steht, ist sich auch darüber klar, daß von den menschlichen Seelenkräften — Denken, Vorstellen, Fühlen und Wollen - in der Entwickelung des gegenwärtigen Durchschnittsmenschen das Vermögen der Vorstellung, das Vermögen des Denkens eben am weitesten vorgeschritten ist, und am ehesten geneigt und geeignet ist, das Persönliche auszuschließen und zur Objektivität zu kommen. Denn dasjenige Seelenvermögen, das sich im Intellektualismus auslebt, ist heute schon so weit, daß die Menschen, wenn sie sich auf dieses Seelenvermögen verlassen, am wenigsten streiten, am meisten einig werden über das, was sie sagen. Das ist deshalb so, weil heute die Menschen in bezug auf das Vorstellungs- und Denkvermögen weit entwickelt sind, während Gefühl und Wille noch nicht zu solcher Objektivität entwickelt werden konnten.

Wir könnten auch, wenn wir auf dem Gebiete des Vorstellungslebens Umschau halten, mit Recht Unterschiede finden. Es gibt weite Gebiete des Vorstellungslebens, die uns vollständig objektive Wahrheiten liefern, Wahrheiten, die dieMenschen als solche erkannt haben, ganz unabhängig von der äußeren Erfahrung, wobei es ganz gleich ist, ob eine Million Menschen anders darüber urteilt. Wer die Gründe dafür in sich erlebt hat, der vermag die Wahrheit zu behaupten, auch wenn eine Million Menschen anderes meint. Jeder kann zum Beispiel bei solchen Wahrheiten, die sich auf Zahl- und Raumgrößen beziehen, das Gesagte bestätigt finden. Daß 3 mal 3 = 9 sind, kann jeder begreifen und erleben, und es ist richtig, selbst wenn eine Million Menschen dem widersprächen. Warum ist das so der Fall? Weil in bezug auf solche Wahrheiten, wie die mathematischen es sind, die meisten Menschen es dazu gebracht haben, ihre Vorliebe und Abneigung, ihre Sympathie und Antipathie, kurz, das Persönliche auszuschalten und nur die Sache für sich sprechen zu lassen. Man hat die Ausschaltung von allem Persönlichen in bezug auf das Denken und auf das Vorstellungsvermögen immer die Läuterung der menschlichen Seele genannt, und man betrachtete diese Läuterung als die erste Stufe auf dem Wege der Einweihung oder Initiation, oder, wie man auch sagen könnte, auf dem Wege zur höheren Erkenntnis.

Der Mensch, der in diesen Dingen bewandert ist, sagt sich: Nicht nur in bezug auf das Gefühl und auf den Willen sind die Menschen noch nicht so weit, daß da kein Persönliches mehr hineinspielt, daß sie Objektivität bewahren können, sondern auch in bezug auf das Denken sind die meisten noch nicht so weit, daß sie sich an das rein hingeben könnten, was ihnen die Dinge, die Ideen der Dinge selbst sagen, so wie es alle Menschen bei den mathematischen Dingen können. Aber es gibt Methoden, das Denken so weit zu läutern, daß wir nicht mehr persönlich denken, sondern die Gedanken in uns denken lassen, so wie wir die mathematischen Gedanken in uns denken lassen. Wenn wir also die Gedanken gereinigt haben von den Einflüssen der Persönlichkeit, dann sprechen wir von der Läuterung oder Katharsis, wie dies in den alten Eleusinischen Mysterien genannt wurde. Es muß also der Mensch dahin kommen, das Denken zu läutern, das ihm dann die Möglichkeit gibt, die Dinge gedanklich objektiv zu erfassen.

So, wie das möglich ist, ist es nun auch möglich, aus dem Gefühl alles Persönliche auszuschalten, so daß dann auch dasjenige, was von den Dingen das Gefühl anregt, nicht mehr zur Persönlichkeit spricht, nichts mehr zu tun hat mit Person, Sympathie und Antipathie, sondern einzig und allein das Wesen des Dinges aufruft, insofern es nicht zum bloßen Vorstellungsvermögen sprechen kann. Erlebnisse in unserer Seele, die in unserem Gefühlsleben wurzeln oder urständen, und die dadurch zu innerer Erkenntnis führen, daß sie tiefer in das Wesen eines Dinges hineinführen, die aber auch noch zu anderen Seiten der Seele als zum bloßen Intellektualismus sprechen, können ebenso vom Persönlichen gereinigt werden wie das Denken, so daß das Gefühl dann eben solche Objektivität vermittelt, wie sie das Denken oder das Vorstellungsvermögen vermitteln kann. Diese Reinigung oder Entwickelung des Gefühls nennt man in aller esoterischen Erkenntnislehre die Erleuchtung.

Jeder Mensch, der entwickelungsfähig ist und nicht in beliebiger Weise, wie es in den Intentionen der Persönlichkeit liegt, seine Entwickelung anstrebt, muß sich dahin bemühen, daß er sich nur durch das, was im Wesen des Dinges liegt, anregen läßt. Wenn er dahin gekommen ist, daß das Ding in ihm persönlich keine Sympathie oder Antipathie erweckt, daß er lediglich das Wesen der Dinge sprechen läßt, so daß er sagt: Was ich auch fürSympathien oder Antipathien habe, ist gleichgültig und darf nicht in Betracht kommen -, dann liegt es im Wesen des Dinges, daß das Denken und Handeln des Menschen diese oder jene Richtung annimmt, dann ist das eine Aussage des innersten Wesens des Dinges. In der esoterischen Erkenntnislehre hat man diese Entwickelung des Willens die Vollendung genannt.

Wenn der Mensch auf dem Boden der Geisteswissenschaft steht, so sagt er sich also: Wenn ich ein Ding vor mir habe, so lebt in diesem Ding ein Geistiges, und ich kann mein Vorstellungsvermögen so anregen, daß das Wesen der Dinge durch meine Begriffe und Vorstellungen objektiv repräsentiert wird. So ist gleichsam, was draußen arbeitet, in mir gegenwärtig geworden, und ich habe das Wesen des Dinges durch das Vorstellungsvermögen erkannt. Aber das, was ich erkannt habe, ist nur ein Teil des Wesens. Es gibt in den Dingen etwas, das überhaupt nicht zur Vorstellung, sondern nur zum Gefühl, und zwar zum geläuterten oder objektiv gewordenen Gefühl sprechen kann. — Der, welcher nicht schon in einer solchen Kultur des Gefühls einen derartigen Teil des Wesens in sich entwickelt hat, der kann das Wesen in dieser Richtung nicht erkennen. Für einen aber, der sich sagt, das Gefühl kann ebenso die Grundlage für die Erkenntnis geben wie das Vorstellungsvermögen - das Gefühl, nicht wie es ist, sondern wie es durch wohlbegründete Methoden der Erkenntnislehre werden kann für einen solchen wird es nach und nach klar, daß es Dinge gibt, die tiefer sind als das Vorstellungsvermögen, Dinge, die zu der seelischen Natur und zu dem Gefühl sprechen. Ebenso gibt es Dinge, die sogar bis zum Willen hinabreichen.

Nun war sich Goethe ganz besonders darüber klar, daß dies sich wirklich so verhält, daß der Mensch diese Entwickelungsmöglichkeiten hat. Er stand ganz auf dem Boden des Initiationsprinzips, und er hat uns die Einweihung des Menschen, die ihm durch die Entwickelung seiner Seele, durch die Entwickelung der drei Grundkräfte: Wille, Gefühl und Vorstellungsvermögen, werden kann, dadurch dargestellt, daß er in seinem Märchen die Repräsentanten dieser drei Einweihungen des Menschen auftreten läßt.

Der goldene König ist Repräsentant der Einweihung für das Vorstellungsvermögen, der silberne König ist der Repräsentant für die Einweihung mit dem Erkenntnisvermögen des objektiven Gefühls, der eherne König ist der Repräsentant der Einweihung für das Erkenntnisvermögen des Willens. Goethe hat uns zu gleicher Zeit nachdrücklich darauf aufmerksam gemacht, daß der Mensch erst gewisse Dinge überwinden muß, wenn er dazu kommen will, mit diesen drei Gaben begabt zu werden. Der Jüngling, den wir in der Erzählung des Märchens kennengelernt haben, ist nichts anderes als der Repräsentant des nach dem Höchsten strebenden Menschen. So wie Schiller des Menschen Streben nach vollkommener Menschlichkeit in seinen Ästhetischen Briefen hinstellt, stellt uns Goethe in dem Jüngling den nach dem Höchsten strebenden Menschen dar, der zunächst die schöne Lilie erreichen will, der aber dann die innere menschliche Vollkommenheit dadurch erlangt, daß ihn die drei Könige, der goldene, der silberne und der erzene König, damit begaben.

Wie das geschieht, wird in dem Gange des Märchens angedeutet. Erinnern Sie sich, daß in dem unterirdischen Tempel, in den die Schlange durch die Kristallisierungskraft der Erde blickt, in jeder der vier Ecken einer der Könige war. In der ersten war der goldene, in der zweiten der silberne, in der dritten der erzene König. In der vierten Ecke war ein König, der aus den drei Metallen gemischt war, in dem also diese drei Bestandteile so zusammengefügt sind, daß man sie nicht voneinander unterscheiden kann. In diesem vierten Könige stellt uns Goethe den Repräsentanten für diejenige menschliche Entwickelungsstufe hin, in welcher Wille, Vorstellungsvermögen und Empfindungsvermögen gemischt sind. Er ist mit andern Worten derjenige Repräsentant der menschlichen Seele, der von Wille, Vorstellung und Gefühl beherrscht wird, weil er selbst nicht Herr über diese drei Vermögen ist. Dagegen ist in dem Jüngling, nachdem er die Begabung von jedem der Könige im besonderen erlangt hat — die Begabung des Vorstellungsvermögens, die Begabung der Gefühlserkenntnis und die Begabung der Willenserkenntnis, so daß sie nicht mehr chaotisch gemischt sind -, diejenige Erkenntnisstufe dargestellt, die sich nicht mehr von Vorstellung, Gefühl und Wille beherrschen läßt, sondern über sie herrscht. Beherrscht wird der Mensch von ihnen so lange, wie sie in ihm chaotisch durcheinanderströmen, so lange sie sich in seiner Seele nicht rein, jede für sich selbst wirkend, finden. Solange der Mensch nicht zu dieser Sonderung gekommen ist, ist er auch nicht in der Lage, durch seine drei Erkenntnisvermögen zu wirken. Ist er aber dazu gelangt, beherrscht ihn nicht mehr das Chaotische, sondern beherrscht er umgekehrt selber sein Vorstellungsvermögen, ist es so rein wie der goldene König, so daß ihm nichts anderes beigemischt ist; ist sein Gefühlsvermögen so, daß ihm nichts anderes beigemischt ist, daß es rein und lauter dasteht wie der silberne König, und ist ebenso der Wille so rein wie das Erz des erzenen Königs, so daß ihn Vorstellungen und Gefühle nicht beherrschen und er sich frei in seiner Natur darstellen kann — mit andern Worten, ist er fähig, wenn es sich darum handelt, durch die Vorstellung zu erfassen, oder durch das Gefühl zu erfassen, oder durch den Willen zu erfassen, von Wille, Gefühl und Vorstellung einzeln Gebrauch zu machen, dann ist er so weit über sich hinausgeschritten, daß das gesamte reine Erkenntnisvermögen, das uns im Vorstellen, Fühlen und Wollen entgegentritt, ihn zu einer tieferen Einsicht führt, daß er wirklich untertaucht in den Strom des Geschehens, untertaucht in das, was die Dinge innerlich sind. Daß man so untertauchen kann, vermag natürlich nur die Erfahrung zu lehren.

Es wird nun nicht mehr schwer sein, nachdem dieses vorausgeschickt worden ist, zuzugeben, daß, wenn Goethe den strebenden Menschen durch den Jüngling repräsentiert sein läßt, wir in der schönen Lilie eine andere Seelenverfassung zu sehen haben, diejenige Seelenverfassung des Menschen, zu der er gelangt, wenn ihm die in den Dingen liegenden Wesenheiten in der Seele aufgehen und er sein Menschendasein dadurch erhöht, daß er die Dinge in sich verschmelzt mit dem Wesen der Dinge in der Außenwelt. Was da der Mensch in seiner Seele erlebt dadurch, daß er über sich hinauswächst, daß er Herr wird über die Seelenkräfte, Sieger ist über das Chaotische in seiner Seele, das, was der Mensch da erlebt, diese innere Seligkeit, dieses Verbundensein mit den Dingen, dieses Aufgegangensein in den Dingen, wird uns von Goethe repräsentativ dargestellt in der Vereinigung mit der schönen Lilie. Schönheit ist hier nicht bloß Kunstschönheit, sondern Eigenschaft des bis zu einem gewissen Grade vollendeten Menschen überhaupt. So daß wir jetzt auch begreiflich finden werden, warum uns Goethe darstellt, wie der Jüngling fortzieht, zur schönen Lilie hinstrebt, so daß alle Kräfte zunächst aus ihm verschwinden. Warum ist das so?

Wir verstehen Goethe in der Darstellung eines solchen Bildes, wenn wir an einen Gedanken, den er einst ausgesprochen hat, anknüpfen: «Alles, was unsern Geist befreit, ohne uns die Herrschaft über uns selbst zu geben, ist verderblich.» Erst muß der Mensch frei werden, dahin kommen, Herr über seine inneren Seelenkräfte zu sein, dann kann er mit wirklicher Erkenntnis zur Vereinigung mit dem höchsten Seelenzustande, mit der schönen Lilie gelangen. Wenn er es aber unvorbereitet, mit noch nicht reifen Kräften erlangen will, dann nimmt ihm das seine Kräfte und wirkt ausdorrend auf seine Seele. Daher wird von Goethe darauf aufmerksam gemacht, daß der Jüngling jene Befreiung sucht, die ihn zum Herrn über seine Seelenkräfte macht. In dem Augenblick, wo seine Seelenkräfte nicht mehr chaotisch in ihm wirken, sondern geläutert und gereinigt nebeneinanderstehen, in dem Augenblick ist er reif, jenen Seelenzustand zu erreichen, der durch die Verbindung mit der schönen Lilie charakterisiert oder repräsentiert ist.

So sehen wir, daß Goethe diese verschiedenen Gestalten in freischaffender Phantasie ausbildet, sehen, wenn wir sie als dargestellte Seelenkräfte betrachten, daß sie in seiner ganzen Seele walten und wirken. Wenn wir sie so betrachten, wenn wir so fühlen und empfinden, wie in gewisser Weise bezüglich dieser Gestalten Goethe gefühlt und empfunden hat, der sich nicht damit begnügt, wie ein schlechter didaktischer Dichter zu sagen, was diese oder jene Seelenkraft bedeutet, sondern der damit ausdrückt, was er selber empfand, dann werden wir erkennen, was sich ihm in solchen Dichtergestalten ausdrückt. Daher stehen die verschiedenen Gestalten in einem so persönlichen Verhältnis zueinander, wie die Seelenkräfte des Menschen zueinanderstehen.

Es kann nicht scharf genug betont werden, daß es sich nicht so verhält, daß die Gestalten dies oder jenes bedeuten. Das ist durchaus nicht der Fall. Es ist vielmehr so, daß Goethe bei dieser oder jener Seelenkraft dies oder jenes fühlt, und daß sich sein Fühlen dann zu dieser oder jener Gestalt wandelt. Damit schuf er den Vorgang desMärchens, der noch wichtiger ist als die Figuren selbst. So sehen wir die Irrlichter und die grüne Schlange. Wir sehen, daß die Irrlichter vom jenseitigen Ufer des Flusses herüberkommen und ganz merkwürdige Eigenschaften zeigen. Sie nehmen das Gold begierig in sich auf, lecken es sogar von den Wänden der Stube des Alten und werfen damit in verschwenderischer Weise um sich. Dasselbe Gold, das also in den Irrlichtern unter dem Zeichen einer Wertlosigkeit steht, die uns auch dadurch angedeutet wird, daß der Fährmann das Gold zurückweisen muß, weil der Fluß sich aufbäumen würde und nur Früchte in Zahlung nehmen darf, dieses Gold, was bewirkt es im Körper der grünen Schlange? Die Schlange wird, nachdem sie es aufnahm, innerlich leuchtend! Und das, was an Pflanzen und anderen Dingen um sie herum ist, wird auch dadurch erleuchtet, daß sie das, was bei den Irrlichtern im Zeichen der Wertlosigkeit steht, in sich aufnimmt. Aber auch den Irrlichtern wird eine gewisse Wichtigkeit zugeschrieben. Sie wissen, daß der Alte in entscheidender Stunde gerade die Irrlichter auffordert, die Pforte des Tempels zu öffnen, so daß der ganze Zug sich nun in den Tempel hineinbegeben kann.

Genau dasselbe Ereignis, das sich hier mit der grünen Schlange vollzieht, findet sich als Erlebnis in der menschlichen Seele, ein Erlebnis, das uns besonders stark in einer solchen Denkweise hat entgegentreten können, wie wir sie vorgestern durch dasGespräch zwischen Goethe und Schiller konstatiert haben. Wir haben gesehen, daß Schiller in dem Augenblick, als er mit Goethe über die Art der Naturbetrachtung sprach, noch der Meinung war, daß das, was Goethe mit ein paar Strichen als Urpflanze hinzeichnete, eine Idee, etwas Abstraktes sei, das man erhalte, wenn man die unterscheidenden Merkmale wegläßt und das Gemeinsame zusammenfügt. Und wir haben gesehen, daß Goethe darauf sagte: Wenn das eine Idee ist, dann sehe ich meine Ideen mit Augen!In diesem Moment standen sich zwei ganz verschiedene Wirklichkeiten gegenüber. Schiller hat sich wirklich ganz zu Goethes Anschauungsweise hinaufgearbeitet, so daß man sich in der Schillerverehrung nichts vergibt, wenn man ihn als Beispiel anführt für jenes menschliche Seelenvermögen, das in Abstraktionen schwebt und vorzugsweise in den mit dem bloßen Verstande erfaßten Vorstellungen der Dinge lebt. Das ist eine besondere Seelenanlage, die, wenn der Mensch zu einer höheren Entwickelung gelangen will, unter Umständen eine recht böse Rolle spielen kann.

Es gibt Menschen, die vorzugsweise in der Richtung zum Abstrakten veranlagt sind. Wenn sie nun die Abstraktheit verbinden mit etwas, was ihnen da alsSeelenkraft entgegentritt, so ist das in derRegel der Begriff der Unproduktivität. Diese Menschen sind manchmal sehr scharfsinnig, können scharfe Unterscheidungen ausführen, diesen oder jenen Begriff wunderbar verbinden. Aber gerade eine solche Seelenstimmung ist oft auch damit verknüpft, daß die geistigen Einflüsse, die Inspirationen, keinen Eingang finden.

Diese Seelenverfassung, die durch Unproduktivität und Abstraktheit gekennzeichnet ist, wird uns in den Irrlichtern repräsentiert. Sie nehmen das Gold auf, wo sie es finden; sie sind frei von aller Erfindungsgabe, sind unproduktiv, können keine Ideen fassen. Diesen Ideen stehen sie fremd gegenüber. Sie haben nicht den Willen, sich selbstlos den Dingen hinzugeben, an die Tatsachen sich zu halten und Begriffe nur soweit zu benutzen, als sie Dolmetscher für die Tatsachen sind. Ihnen kommt es darauf an, ihren Verstand mit Begriffen vollzupfropfen und diese dann wieder in verschwenderischer Weise fortzugeben. Sie gleichen einem Menschen, der sich in Bibliotheken setzt, die Weisheit da sammelt, in sich aufnimmt und wieder in entsprechender Weise von sich gibt. Diese Irrlichter sind charakteristisch für dasjenige Seelenvermögen, das niemals imstande ist, einen einzigen literarischen Gedanken oder Empfindungsgehalt zu fassen, das aber sehr wohl das, was einmal da ist als Literaturgeschichte, das, was produktive Geister geleistet haben, in schöne Formen zu fassen vermag. Es soll hier nichts gegen dieses Seelenvermögen gesprochen werden. Hätte der Mensch dieses Seelenvermögen nicht oder pflegte er es nicht, wenn es ihm in zu geringem Maße zuteil geworden ist, so würde ihm etwas fehlen, was in bezug auf die wirkliche Erkenntnisfähigkeit notwendig vorhanden sein muß. Goethe stellt durch das Bild der Irrlichter, durch die ganzen Verhältnisse, in denen er sie auftreten und wirken läßt, die Art und Weise dar, wie ein solches Seelenvermögen im Verhältnis zu den anderen Seelenvermögen arbeitet, wie es schadet und nützt. Wahrhaftig, wenn jemand dieses Seelenvermögen nicht hätte und zu höheren Stufen der Erkenntnis aufsteigen wollte, dann würde nichts da sein, was ihm den Tempel aufschließen könnte. Goethe stellt ebenso die Vorzüge wie auf der anderen Seite die Nachteile dieses Seelenvermögens hin. Das, was in den Irrlichtern gegeben ist, stellt eben ein Seelenelement dar. In dem Augenblick, wo es nach der einen oder andern Seite hin ein selbständiges Leben führen will, wird es schädlich. Es wird aus dieser Abstraktheit ein kritisches Vermögen, das die Menschen so gestaltet, daß sie zwar alles lernen, sich aber nicht weiterentwickeln können, weil . ihnen das produktive Element fehlt. Goethe zeigt aber ganz klar, inwiefern auch ein Wertvolles in dem ist, was in den Irrlichtern dargestellt wird. Das, was sie in sich haben, kann auch etwas Wertvolles werden: in der Schlange wird das Gold der Irrlichter zu etwas Wertvollem, insofern es die Gegenstände, welche um die Schlange herum sind, beleuchtet.

Was in den Irrlichtern lebt, wird, wenn es in anderer Weise verarbeitet wird, in der menschlichen Seele äußerst fruchtbar werden. Wenn der Mensch sich bestrebt, das, was er in Begriffen, Ideen und idealen Gebilden erleben kann, nicht für sich als ein Abstraktes hinzustellen, sondern es so zu betrachten, daß es ihm Führer und Dolmetscher wird für das, was an Realitäten um ihn herum ist, so daß er sich ebensogern und hingebungsvoll an die Beobachtungen hält wie an die Abstraktheit der Begriffe, dann ist er mit dieser Seelenkraft in dem gleichen Falle wie die grüne Schlange. Dann kann er aus dem bloß Abstrakten, aus den bloßen Begriffen Licht und Weisheit gestalten. Dann führt sie ihn nicht dazu, daß er zur vertikalen Linie wird, die alle Verbindung und Beziehung zur Fläche verliert. Die Irrlichter sind die Verwandten der Schlange, sie sind aber von der vertikalen Linie. Die Goldstücke fallen zwischen die Felsen hinein, die Schlange nimmt sie auf und wird dadurch innerlich leuchtend. Die Weisheit nimmt der auf, der mit diesen Begriffen an die Dinge selbst herangeht.

Goethe gibt uns auch ein Beispiel, wie man an den Begriffen arbeiten soll. Goethe hat den Begriff der Urpflanze. Was ist er zunächst? Ein abstrakter Begriff. Würde er ihn abstrakt ausbilden, so würde er ein leeres Gebilde werden, das alles Lebendige tötet, wie das hingeworfene Gold der Irrlichter den Mops tötet. Denken Sie sich aber, was Goethe mit dem Begriffe der Urpflanze tut. Verfolgen wir ihn auf seiner italienischen Reise, dann sehen wir, wie dieser Begriff nur das Leitmotiv ist, um von Pflanze zu Pflanze, von Wesen zu Wesen zu gehen. Er nimmt den Begriff, geht von ihm aus zur Pflanze über und sieht, wie sie sich in dieser oder jener Form ausgestaltet, wie sie ganz andere Formen annimmt in niederer oder höherer Gegend und so weiter. Nun verfolgt er von Stufe zu Stufe, wie die geistige Realität oder Gestalt in jede sinnliche Gestalt hineinkriecht. Er selbst kriecht da herum wie die Schlange in den Klüften der Erde. So ist für Goethe die Begriffswelt nichts anderes als das, was sich in die objektive Wirklichkeit hineinspinnen läßt. Die Schlange ist ihm der Repräsentant der Seelenkraft, die nicht in egoistischer Weise hinaufstrebt zu den höheren Gebieten des Daseins und sich über alles zu erheben versucht, sondern die geduldig den Begriff durch die Beobachtung fortwährend bewahrheiten läßt, die geduldig von Erfahrung zu Erfahrung, von Erlebnis zu Erlebnis geht.

Wenn der Mensch nicht bloß theoretisiert, nicht bloß in den Begriffen lebt, sondern sie auf das Leben, auf die Erfahrung anwendet, dann ist er mit dieser Seelenkraft in der Lage der Schlange. Das ist in ganz umfassendem Sinne richtig. Wer die Philosophie nicht wie eine Theorie aufnimmt, sondern als das, was sie sein soll, wer die geisteswissenschaftlichen Begriffe als Aufgaben für das Leben betrachtet, der weiß, daß gerade Begriffe, und seien sie auch die höchsten, so verwendet werden sollen, daß sie in das Leben einfließen und an den täglichen Erlebnissen sich bewahrheiten können. Für den, der ein paar Begriffe gelernt hat, sie aber nicht ins Leben übertragen kann, liegt ein ähnliches Verhältnis vor wie für den, der ein Kochbuch auswendig gelernt hat, aber doch nicht kochen kann. So wie das Gold ein Mittel ist, die Dinge zu beleuchten, so beleuchtet Goethe durch seine Begriffe die Dinge, welche um ihn herum sind.

Das ist das Belehrende und Großartige an Goethes Wissenschaftlichkeit und allem Goetheschen Streben, daß das, was er an Begriffen und Ideen gibt, Realität hat, daß es wirkt wie ein Licht, leuchtend wird und die Gegenstände um ihn herum beleuchtet. Das vorgestern hervorgehobene Universale bei Goethe macht es, daß wir, wenn wir an ihn herantreten, nie das Gefühl haben, das ist Goethes «Meinung». Er steht da und wenn wir ihn sehen, finden wir nur, daß wir die Dinge besser begreifen, die uns vorher nicht so begreiflich waren. Dadurch eben konnte er zum Vereinigungspunkt feindlicher Brüder werden, wie wir vorgestern gesehen haben. Wollten wir jeden Zug in dem Märchen besprechen, jede Gestalt charakterisieren, dann müßte ich über dieses Märchen nicht drei Stunden, sondern drei Wochen sprechen. Ich kann also nur die tieferen Prinzipien in diesem Märchen angeben. Jeder Zug aber weist uns in Goethes Vorstellungsart und Goethes Weltgesinnung hinein.

Diejenigen Seelenkräfte, welche in den Irrlichtern, in der grünen Schlange und in den Königen dargestellt sind, befinden sich auf der einen Seite des Flusses. Drüben auf der andern Seite wohnt die schöne Lilie, das Ideal vollkommener Erkenntnis und vollkommenen Lebens und Schaffens. Von dem Fährmann haben wir gehört, daß er die Gestalten von dem jenseitigen Ufer herüberführen kann, aber niemand wieder zurückführen darf. Wenden wir das auf unsere ganze Seelenstimmung und Veredlung an.

Wir Menschen finden uns als seelische Wesenheiten hier auf der Erde. Diese oder jene Seelenkräfte arbeiten an uns als Anlagen, als mehr oder weniger ausgebildete Seelenkräfte. Sie sind in uns. Es lebt aber in uns auch noch etwas anderes. In uns Menschen, wenn wir uns selbst richtig erfassen, lebt das Gefühl, die Erkenntnis, daß die Seelenkräfte in uns, welche uns das Wesen der Dinge zuletzt vermitteln, mit den Grundgeistern der Welt, mit den schöpferischen, geistigen Mächten innig verwandt sind. Indem wir uns nach diesen schöpferischen Mächten sehnen, sehnen wir uns nach der schönen Lilie. So wissen wir, daß alles, was einerseits von der schönen Lilie herstammt, andererseits wieder zu ihr zurückzukehren strebt. Unbekannte Kräfte, die wir nicht meistern, haben uns herübergebracht. Wir wissen, daß gewisse Kräfte uns von der jenseitigen Welt über den Grenzfluß zur diesseitigen Welt herübergebracht haben. Diese durch den Fährmann charakterisierten, in den Tiefen der unbewußten Natur wirkenden Kräfte können aber uns nicht wieder zurückbringen, denn sonst würde der Mensch ohne seine Arbeit, ohne sein Zutun, genau ebenso wieder in das Reich des Göttlichen zurückkehren, wie er herübergekommen ist. Die Kräfte, die uns als unbewußte Naturkräfte herübergefahren haben in das Reich der strebenden Menschen, dürfen uns nicht wieder zurückführen. Dazu sind andere Kräfte nötig. Das weiß auch Goethe. Goethe will aber auch zeigen, wie der Mensch es anfangen muß, daß er sich mit der schönen Lilie wieder vereinigen kann.

Zwei Wege gibt es. Der eine geht über die grüne Schlange, über sie können wir hinübergehen, da finden wir nach und nach das Reich des Geistes. Der andere Weg geht über den Schatten des Riesen. Es wird uns dargestellt, daß der Riese, der sonst ganz kraftlos ist, in der Dämmerstunde seineHand ausstreckt, deren Schatten sich dann über den Fluß legt. Über diesen Schatten führt der zweite Weg. Wer also bei hellem Tageslicht hinüber will in das Reich des Geistes, muß sich des Weges bedienen, den die Schlange vermittelt, wer im Dämmerlichte hinüberkommen will, der kann sich des Weges bedienen, der über den Schatten des Riesen führt. Das sind die zwei Wege, um zu einem geistigen Weltenbilde zu kommen. Derjenige, der nicht mit menschlichen Begriffen, menschlichen Ideen, nicht mit denjenigen Mächten, die durch das wertlose Gold, bei bloß sophistischen Geistern, und durch die Irrlichter charakterisiert werden, die geistige Welt erstrebt, sondern in Geduld und Selbstlosigkeit von Erlebnis zu Erlebnis geht, gelangt beim hellen Sonnenschein zum jenseitigen Ufer.

Goethe weiß, daß wirkliche Forschung nicht am Materiellen kleben bleibt, sondern herüberführen muß über die Grenze, über den Fluß, der uns von dem Geistigen trennt. Es gibt aber noch einen andern Weg, einen Weg für unentwickeltere Menschen, die nicht den Weg des Erkennens, nicht den Erkenntnispfad gehen wollen, einen Weg, der repräsentiert wird durch den Riesen. Kraftlos ist dieser Riese, nur sein Schatten hat eine gewisse Kraft. Was ist nun im echten Sinne kraftlos? Nehmen Sie alle Zustände, in die der Mensch kommen kann bei herabgestimmtem Bewußtsein, wie beim Hypnotismus, Somnambulismus, ja selbst bei Traumzuständen: alles das, wodurch das helle Tagesbewußtsein herabgedämmert wird, wodurch der Mensch niedrigere Seelenkräfte als das helle Tagesbewußtsein in sich wirken läßt, gehört zu diesem zweiten Weg. Da wird die Seele beim Kraftloswerden der alltäglichen Seelenkraft ins wirkliche Reich des Geistes hinübergeführt. Die Seele wird aber nicht selbst fähig, in das geistige Reich hinüberzugehen, sondern sie bleibt bewußtlos und wird wie der Schatten in das Reich des Geistes hinübergeführt. Goethe nimmt noch alles das, was unbewußt, gewohnheitsmäßig wirkt, ohne daß die Seelenkräfte, die bei hellem Tagesbewußtsein wirksam werden, daran beteiligt sind, unter die Kräfte, welche in dem Schatten des Riesen vorzustellen sind. Schiller, der in das, was Goethe meinte, eingeweiht war, schrieb zur Zeit der großen Stürme im westlichen Europa einmal an Goethe: Froh bin ich, daß Sie von dem Schatten des Riesen nicht unsanft angefaßt worden sind. — Was meint Schiller damit? Er meinte, wenn Goethe weiter nach Westen gewandert wäre, so würde er von den revolutionären Mächten des Westens erfaßt worden sein.

Dann sehen wir, daß das, was der Mensch als Hochstand der Erkenntnisentwickelung erlangen soll, in dem Tempel dargestellt wird. Der Tempel bedeutet also einen höheren Entwicklungsstand des Menschen. In der jetzigen Zeit, würde Goethe sagen, ist der Tempel etwas Verborgenes, ist er unter den engen Klüften der Erde. Eine solche strebende Seelenkraft, wie sie durch die Schlange repräsentiert wird, kann nur undeutlich die Gestalt des Tempels fühlen. Dadurch, daß sie Ideale, das Gold in sich aufnimmt, kann sie diese Gestalt erleuchten, aber im Grunde genommen kann dieser Tempel in der jetzigen Zeit nur als ein unterirdisches Geheimnis da sein. Dadurch, daß Goethe diesen Tempel für die äußere Kultur etwas Unterirdisches sein läßt, weist er aber auch darauf hin, daß dieses Geheimnis einem weiterentwickelten Menschen erschlossen werden muß. Er weist damit auf die geisteswissenschaftliche Strömung hin, die heute schon breite Menschenmassen erfaßt hat, die in umfassendem Sinne populär zu machen sucht, was der Inhalt der Geisteswissenschaft, der Initiation oder desEinweihungsprinzips, der Inhalt der Tempelgeheimnisse ist.

In diesem echt freien Goetheschen Sinne ist daher der Jüngling als Repräsentant der strebenden Menschheit zu betrachten. Daher soll sich der Tempel über den Fluß erheben, damit nicht nur einzelne wenige, welche Erleuchtung suchen, herüber und hinüber gehen können, sondern damit dann alle Menschen auf der Brücke den Fluß passieren können. Einen Zukunftszustand stellte Goethe hin in dem Initiations-Tempel über der Erde, der da sein wird, wenn der Mensch aus dem Reiche des Sinnlichen in das Reich des Geistigen und aus dem Reiche des Geistigen in das Reich des Sinnlichen gehen kann.

Wodurch ist das in dem Märchen erreicht worden? Dadurch, daß das eigentliche Geheimnis des Märchens erfüllt ist. Die Lösung des Märchens steht im Märchen selber, sagt Schiller. Er hat aber auch darauf hingewiesen, daß recht sonderbar das Wort der Lösung darinnen steht. Sie erinnern sich des Alten mit der Lampe, die nur leuchtet, wo schon Licht ist. Wer ist nun der Alte? Was ist diese Lampe? Was hat sie für ein eigenartiges Licht? Der Alte steht über der Situation. Seine Lampe hat die merkwürdige Eigenschaft, daß sie die Dinge verwandelt, Holz in Silber, Stein in Gold. Sie hat auch die Eigenschaft, daß sie nur da leuchtet, wo schon eine Empfänglichkeit, eine bestimmte Art des Lichtes vorhanden ist. Als der Alte in den unterirdischen 'Tempel hineintritt, wird gefragt, wieviel Geheimnisse er kenne. «Drei», versetzt der Alte. Auf die Frage des silbernen Königs: «Welches ist das wichtigste?», antwortet er: «Das offenbare.» Und auf die Frage des ehernen Königs: «Willst du es auch uns eröffnen?», sagt er: «Sobald ich das vierte weiß.» Darauf zischelt die Schlange dem Alten etwas ins Ohr, worauf er sagt: «Es ist an der Zeit!»

Das, was die Schlange dem Alten ins Ohr sagte, das ist die Lösung des Rätsels, und wir haben zu erforschen, was die Schlange dem Alten ins Ohr gesagt hat. Es würde zu weit führen, ausführlich zu sagen, was die drei Geheimnisse bedeuten. Nur andeuten will ich es.

Es gibt drei Reiche, die in der Entwickelung heute sozusagen stationär sind: das Mineral-, das Pflanzen- und das Tierreich, die dem Menschen gegenüber, der sich noch in weiterer Entwickelung befindet, abgeschlossen sind. Die innere Entwickelung, die der Mensch durchmacht, ist so vehement und bedeutsam, daß sie sich mit der Entwickelung der anderen drei Naturreiche nicht vergleichen läßt. Daß ein Naturreich dadurch zu dem gegenwärtigen Stande gekommen ist, daß es zu einem Abschluß gelangt ist, das ist es, was in dem Geheimnis des Alten liegt, das ist es, was die Gesetze des Mineral-, Pflanzen- und Tierreichs erklärt. Aber nun kommt das vierte Reich, das Reich des Menschen, das Geheimnis, das in der Seele des Menschen offenbar werden soll. Dieses Geheimnis ist ein solches, das der Alte erst erfahren muß. Und wie muß er es erfahren? Er weiß, worin es besteht, aber die Schlange muß es ihm erst sagen. Das deutet uns an, daß mit dem Menschen noch etwas Besonderes vorgehen muß, wenn er ebenso das Ziel der Entwickelung erreichen will, wie die anderen drei Reiche es erreicht haben. Was mit dem Menschen im Innersten seiner Seele geschehen ist, und was geschehen muß, wenn er das Ziel erreichen soll, das sagt die Schlange dem Alten ins Ohr. Sie sagt, wie eine bestimmte Seelenkraft sich entwickeln muß, wenn eine höhere Stufe erreicht werden soll, sie sagt, daß sie den Willen habe, sich dafür aufzuopfern, und sie opfert sich auf. Bisher hat sie nur eineBrücke gebildet, wenn hie und da ein einzelner Mensch hinübergehen wollte; nun aber wird sie zu einer dauernden Brücke werden, indem sie zerfällt, so daß der Mensch eine dauernde Verbindung haben wird zwischen dem Diesseits und Jenseits, zwischen Geistigem und Sinnlichem.

Daß die Schlange den Willen zur Aufopferung hat, das ist es, was als die Bedingung für die Eröffnung des vierten Geheimnisses angesehen werden muß. In dem Augenblick, wo der Alte hört, daß die Schlange sich opfern will, kann er dann auch sagen: «Es ist an der Zeit!» Es ist die Seelenkraft, die an das Äußere sich hält. Und der Weg muß dadurch betreten werden, daß diese Seelenkraft und innere Wissenschaft nicht Selbstzweck wird, sondern sich hinopfert. Das ist wirklich ein Geheimnis, wenn es auch als ein «offenbares» Geheimnis angesprochen wird, das heißt, wenn es auch jedem, der es will, offenbar werden kann.

Was in weitem Umkreis als Selbstzweck angesehen wird — alles, was wir lernen können in der Naturwissenschaft, in der Kulturwissenschaft, in der Geschichte, in der Mathematik und allen anderen Wissenschaften -—, es kann niemals Selbstzweck sein. Wir können niemals zur wahren Einsicht in die Tiefen der Welt kommen, wenn wir sie als etwas für sich betrachten. Erst wenn wir jederzeit bereit sind, sie in uns aufzunehmen und als Mittel zu betrachten, das wir hinopfern als Brücke, über die wir hinüberschreiten können, dann kommen wir zur wirklichen Erkenntnis. Wir sperren uns ab von der höheren, von der wirklichen Erkenntnis, wenn wir nicht auch bereit sind, uns hinzuopfern. Erst dann wird der Mensch einen Begriff bekommen vön dem, was Einweihung ist, wenn er aufhört, sich aus äußerlichsinnlichen Begriffen eine Weltanschauung zu zimmern. Er muß ganz Gefühl, ganz Seelenstimmung werden, eine solche Seelenstimmung, die dem entspricht, was Goethe als höchste Errungenschaft des Menschen in seinem «Westöstlichen Divan» charakterisiert:

Und so lang du das nicht hast,
Dieses: Stirb und Werde!
Bist du nur ein trüber Gast
Auf der dunklen Erde.

Stirb und Werde! Lerne kennen, was das Leben bieten kann, gehe hindurch, aber überwinde, gehe über dich hinaus. Laß es dir zur Brücke werden, und du wirst in einem höheren Leben aufleben, mit dem Wesen der Dinge eines sein, wenn du nicht mehr in dem Wahne lebst, daß du, getrennt von dem höheren Ich, das Wesen der Dinge erschöpfen kannst. Goethe erinnert sich gern, da, wo er von der Hinopferung des Begriffes und des Seelenmaterials spricht, um in höheren Sphären aufzuleben, wo er von der tiefsten innersten Liebe spricht, an die Worte des Mystikers Jakob Böhme, der dieses Erlebnis der Hinopferung der Schlange in sich kennt. Jakob Böhme hat ihn vielleicht gerade darauf hingewiesen und bewirkt, daß es ihm so klar war, daß der Mensch schon im physischen Leibe hinüberleben kann in eine Welt, die er sonst erst nach dem Tode betritt: in die Welt des Ewigen, des Geistigen. Jakob Böhme wußte auch, daß es von dem Menschen abhängt, ob er in höherem Sinne in die geistige Welt hinübergleiten kann. Er zeigt es in dem Spruche: Wer nicht stirbt, eh’ er stirbt, der verdirbt, wenn er stirbt. - Ein bedeutsames Wort! Der Mensch, der nicht stirbt, bevor er stirbt, das heißt, der nicht das Ewige, den inneren Wesenskern in sich entwickelt, der wird auch nicht in der Lage sein, wenn er stirbt, den geistigen Wesenskern in sich wiederzufinden. Das Ewige ist in uns. Wir müssen es im Leibe entwickeln, damit wir es außer dem Leibe finden können. «Wer nicht stirbt, eh’ er stirbt, der verdirbt, wenn er stirbt.» So ist es auch mit dem andern Satze: «Und so ist der Tod die Wurzel alles Lebens.»

Sodann sehen wir, daß das Seelische nur da erleuchten kann, wo schon Licht ist: die Lampe des Alten kann nur das erleuchten, was schon erleuchtet ist. Wieder werden wir auf Seelenkräfte des Menschen hingewiesen, auf jene Seelenkräfte, die als etwas Besonderes uns entgegentreten, die Seelenkräfte der Devotion, der religiösen Hingabe, die durch Jahrhunderte und Jahrtausende hindurch den Menschen die Botschaft von geistigen Welten gebracht haben, denen, die das Licht nicht auf dem Wege der Wissenschaft oder sonstwie suchen konnten. Das Licht der verschiedenen religiösen Offenbarungen wird dargestellt in dem Alten, der dieses Licht hat. Wer aber nicht von innen heraus dem religiösen Sinn ein Licht entgegenbringt, dem leuchtet nicht die Lampe der Religion. Nur da kann sie leuchten, wo ihr schon Licht entgegenkommt. Sie ist es gewesen, die die Menschen verwandelt hat, die alles Tote in das beseelte Lebendige hinübergeführt hat.

Und dann sehen wir, daß durch die Hinopferung der Schlange die beiden Reiche miteinander vereinigt werden. Nachdem sie sozusagen durch symbolische Vorgänge durchmacht, was der Mensch bei seiner Höherentwickelung im esoterischen Sinne durchzumachen hat, sehen wir, wie der Tempel der Erkenntnis durch alle drei menschlichen Seelenkräfte hinaufgeführt wird über den Fluß, wie er hinaufwandert und wie jede Seelenkraft ihren Dienst verrichtet. Es wird da angedeutet, daß die Seelenkräfte in Harmonie zusammenklingen müssen, indem uns gesagt wird: Die einzelne Persönlichkeit vermag nichts; wenn aber alle zur guten Stunde zusammenwirken, wenn die Gewaltigen und die Geringen im richtigen Verhältnis zueinander wirken, dann kann erstehen, was die Seele befähigt, den höchsten Zustand zu erreichen, die Vereinigung mit der schönen Lilie.

Dann wandert aber auch der Tempel aus den verborgenen Klüften hinauf an die Oberfläche für alle, die in Wahrheit nach Erkenntnis und Weisheit streben. Der Jüngling wird begabt mit den Erkenntniskräften des Denkens und Vorstellens durch den goldenen König: «Erkenne das Höchste.» Er wird begabt mit den Erkenntniskräften des Gefühls durch den silbernen König, was Goethe so schön andeutet mit den Worten: «Weide die Schafe!» Im Fühlen wurzeln Kunst und Religion, und für Goethe war beides eine Einheit, schon damals, als er von seiner italienischen Reise über die Kunstwerke Italiens schrieb: «Da ist Notwendigkeit, da ist Gott!»

Aber da ist auch die Tat — wenn der Mensch sie nicht zum Daseinskampf verwendet, wenn sie ihm zur Waffe wird, um Schönheit und Weisheit zu erkämpfen. Das ist in den Worten enthalten, die der eherne König zu dem Jüngling spricht: «Das Schwert an der Linken, die Rechte frei!» Darin liegt eine ganze Welt. Die Rechte frei zum Wirken aus der menschlichen Natur des Selbst heraus.

Und was geschieht mit dem vierten König, in dem alle drei Elemente durcheinandergemischt sind? Dieser gemischte König schmilzt zu einer grotesken Figur zusammen. Die Irrlichter kommen und lecken das noch vorhandene Gold aus ihm heraus. Die Seelenkräfte des Menschen wollen da noch studieren, was an menschlichen Entwicklungsstufen, die schon überwunden sind, einst vorhanden war.

Nehmen wir noch einen Zug, nämlich den, wie der Riese da taumelnd einherkommt und dann wie eine Bildsäule dasteht und die Stunden anzeigt: Wenn der Mensch sein Leben in Harmonie gebracht hat, dann hat auch das Untergeordnete Bedeutung für das, was methodische Ordnung sein soll. Das soll sich wie eine Gewohnheit ausprägen. Selbst das Unbewußte wird dann einen wertvollen Sinn erhalten. Deshalb wird der Riese gleichsam wie eine Uhr dargestellt.

Der Alte mit der Lampe ist vermählt mit der Alten. Diese Alte stellt uns nichts anderes dar als die gesunde verständige menschliche Seelenkraft, die nicht in hohe Regionen geistiger Abstraktion eindringt, die aber alles gesund und praktisch angreift, wie zum Beispiel in der Religion, die jain dem Alten mit der Lampe dargestellt wird. Gerade sie kann dann auch dem Fährmann die Löhnung bringen: drei Kohlhäupter, drei Zwiebeln und drei Artischocken. Eine solche Entwickelungsstufe ist noch nicht über die Zeitlichkeit hinweggekommen. Daß sie so behandelt wird, wie es von den Irrlichtern geschieht, ist wohl ein Abbild davon, wie abstrakte Geister meistens hochmütig auf Menschen herunterschauen, die aus unmittelbaren Instinkten oder Intuitionen heraus die Dinge erfassen.

Jeder Zug, jede Wendung in diesem Märchen ist von tiefgründiger Bedeutung, und tritt man noch in eine Erklärung ein, die esoterisch sein soll, dann findet man, daß man eigentlich nur die Methode der Erklärung anzugeben vermag. Vertiefen Sie sich in das Märchen selber, dann werden Sie finden, daß eine ganze Welt darinnen zu finden ist, weit mehr, als heute angedeutet werden konnte.

Wie sehr Goethes geistige Weltanschauung sein ganzes Leben durchzieht, wie in den Dingen der Geisteserkenntnis er noch im spätesten Alter in Einklang steht mit früher Geschaffenem, das möchte ich Ihnen noch an zwei Beispielen zeigen. Als Goethe den «Faust» schrieb, hatte er eine gewisse Vorstellung übernommen, die auf ein Symbolum eines tieferen Entwickelungsweges der Natur zurückgeht. Als Faust von seinem Vater spricht, der Alchimist war und die alten Lehren gläubig hingenommen, aber schon damals mißverstanden hatte, sagt er, daß sein Vater auch das ge macht habe, daß sich

... ein roter Leu, ein kühner Freier,
Im lauen Bad der Lilie vermählt.

Das sagt Faust, ohne daß er die Bedeutung davon kennt. Solch ein Wort aber kann zur Leiter werden, die auf hohe Entwickelungsstufen hinaufführt. Goethe zeigt in dem Märchen den nach der höchsten Braut strebenden Menschen in seinem Jüngling, und das, womit er vereinigt werden soll, nennt er die schöne Lilie. Sie sehen, diese Lilie finden Sie auch schon in den ersten Partien des «Faust». Und auch das, was als Grundnery der Goetheschen Anschauung seinen Ausdruck im Märchen gefunden hat, finden wir im «Faust», im zweiten Teile, im Chorus mysticus, da, wo Faust vor dem Eintritt in die geistige Welt steht, wo Goethe sein Bekenntnis zur geistigen Weltanschauung mit monumentalen Worten ablegt. Er zeigt da, wie in drei aufeinanderfolgenden Stufen, nämlich die Läuterung der Vorstellung, die Erleuchtung der Gefühle und die Herausarbeitung des Willens zur reinen Tat, der Aufstieg auf dem Erkenntnisweg erfolgt.

Was der Mensch durch die Läuterung der Vorstellung erlangt, führt ihn dazu, das Geistige hinter allem zu erkennen. Das Sinnliche wird ein Gleichnis für das Geistige. Er dringt tiefer ein, um das noch zu erfassen, was für die Vorstellung unzugänglich ist. Er erreicht dann eine Stufe, auf der er die Dinge nicht mehr durch die Vorstellung betrachtet, sondern in die Sache selbst hineingewiesen wird, da, wo das Wesen der Dinge und das, was man nicht beschreiben kann, Erreichnis wird. Und das, was man nicht beschreiben kann, was man, wie man im Laufe der Wintervorträge hören wird, in anderer Weise vorstellen muß, das, wobei man zu den Geheimnissen des Willens vorschreiten muß, bezeichnet er eben als das «Unbeschreibliche». Wenn der Mensch den dreifachen Weg durch die Vorstellung, das Gefühl und den Willen gemacht hat, dann vereinigt er sich mit dem, was im Chorus mysticus das «Ewig-Weibliche» genannt wird, das, was als menschliche Seele durchgemacht hat seine Entwickelung, das, was als die schöne Lilie dargestellt wird.

So sehen wir, daß Goethe geradezu sein tiefstes Bekenntnis, seine geheime Offenbarung auch noch da ausspricht, wo er sein großes Bekenntnisgedicht zum Abschluß bringt, nachdem er durch die Vorstellung, durch das Gefühl und den Willen emporgedrungen ist bis zur Vereinigung mit der schönen Lilie, bis zu dem Zustande, der seinen Ausdruck findet in der erwähnten Stelle des Chorus mysticus, ‚die dasselbe ausdrückt, was Goethes Philosophie und Geisteswissenschaft und was auch das «Märchen» sagt:

Alles Vergängliche
Ist nur ein Gleichnis!
Das Unzulängliche,
Hier wird’s Erreichnis;
Das Unbeschreibliche,
Hier ist’s getan;
Das Ewig-Weibliche
Zieht uns hinan!

Goethe's Secret Revelation Esoteric

A lecture such as today's can easily be criticized for forcing symbolic and allegorical interpretations of something that a poet created in the free play of his imagination. The day before yesterday, we set ourselves the task of exploring the deeper meaning of Goethe's “fairy tale” of the green snake and the beautiful lily, as it appeared before our eyes. Time and again, such an interpretation, or explanation, of a work of fantasy will be dismissed with the words: Oh, all kinds of symbols and meanings that are supposed to be profound are sought in the characters of the work. — Therefore, I would like to note from the outset that what I am going to say today has nothing to do with what has often been done, especially from a theosophical point of view, with regard to symbolic or allegorical interpretations of fairy tales or poetic works. And because I know that similar arguments I have made have repeatedly been countered with the objection that one should not engage in such symbolic interpretations of poetic figures, I cannot emphasize strongly enough that what is to be said here must be understood solely in the following sense.

Today we have before us a poetic work, the work of a comprehensive imagination or fantasy that penetrates to the depths of things: the “fairy tale” of the green snake and the beautiful lily. The question may well be raised: Can we approach the work from any point of view and attempt to fathom the ideal, the real content of such a poetic product?

We see the plant before us. Man approaches the plant; he examines the laws, the inner regularity according to which the plant grows and flourishes, according to which it develops piece by piece of its being. Does the botanist, or someone who is not a botanist but who has conceived of the plant's development in an ideal way, have the right to do so? Can one object to him: The plant knows nothing of the laws you have discovered; it does not know the laws of its growth and development! — The objection that could be raised against such an explanation of Goethe's fairy tale would have exactly the same value as if it were raised against the botanist or against the poet who expresses what he feels about the plant in his poetic works. I do not want things to be understood as if I were saying: here we have a snake, which means this or that; here we have a golden, a silver, a bronze king, who mean this or that. I do not want to interpret the fairy tale in this symbolic-allegorical sense, but rather in such a way that, just as the plant grows according to laws of which it cannot know anything in its unconsciousness, and just as the botanist has the right to discover these laws of plant growth, one must also say: The poet Goethe never needed to analyze what is being analyzed here, never needed to bring it to his outer consciousness. Nevertheless, it is equally true that the lawfulness, the real, the ideal content of the fairy tale must be regarded in the same sense as what we find to be the laws of plant growth, that it is the same lawfulness according to which the plant grows, according to which it came into being, but of which it is unaware in its unconsciousness.

Therefore, I ask you to understand what I am about to say as representing the meaning and spirit of Goethe's way of thinking and imagining, and as if the person who feels called, so to speak, to present Goethe's ideal worldview to you, had a right — so that you may find your way to an understanding of Goethe's worldview — to explain the product of Goethe's imagination, to highlight the characters, and to show the interrelationships in which he used them, just as the botanist shows that the plant grows according to the laws he has discovered.

Goethe's psychology or doctrine of the soul, that is, what he considers to be the essence of the soul, is illustrated for us in his beautiful fairy tale of the green snake and the beautiful lily. And if we want to agree on what needs to be said about this, it would be good to start by vividly describing the spirit of his soul world. In yesterday's lecture, it was already pointed out that the worldview represented here assumes that human knowledge is not to be regarded as something fixed once and for all. The prevailing view is often that human beings are what they are today, and that they can make unconditional decisions about all things; they observe the world with their sensory organs, grasp its phenomena, combine these with their intellect, which is bound to the senses, and what they produce with this intellectual activity, which is based on observation, is an absolute knowledge of the world that must apply to everyone. In contrast to this, but only in a certain way, is the spiritual-scientific worldview represented here. It proceeds from the assumption that what becomes our knowledge is always dependent on our organs, on our cognitive abilities, and that we ourselves as human beings are capable of development, that we can work on ourselves, that we can raise the cognitive abilities we have at a certain stage of our existence to a higher level. It assumes that we can train them, that in a similar way to how humans have developed from an imperfect state to their current position, we can develop them further, and that by raising ourselves to higher points of view, we must also gain a deeper insight into things and a more correct view of the world.

To express myself more clearly, albeit somewhat trivially, I would like to say: if we disregard the development of humanity altogether and only consider how the people who live around us are, and then look at those people who are considered primitive tribes in cultural history, and if we ask ourselves what they are capable of recognizing and knowing about the laws of the world around us, and compare this with what an average European with some scientific knowledge can know about the world, then we will see that the member of that primitive tribe differs significantly from the average European. Take, for example, the worldview of an Australian Negro and that of, say, a European monist, the latter of which is based on a collection of scientific concepts of the present day. These two worldviews are quite different.

But on the other hand, Spiritual Science is far from abhorring the worldview of people who take a purely materialistic standpoint or declaring it invalid. Rather, these things are viewed in such a way that in every case a person's worldview corresponds to a stage of human development, and that people are able to increase the abilities they possess and, by increasing these abilities, experience other, new things.

It is therefore the perspective of Spiritual Science that human beings attain ever higher levels of knowledge by developing themselves further, and as they develop further, what they experience within themselves is objective world content that they had not seen before, when they did not yet have the ability to see it. Spiritual Science therefore differs significantly from other one-sided worldviews, whether spiritualistic or materialistic, because it does not recognize a once-and-for-all infallible truth, but only the wisdom and truth of a particular stage of development, thus adhering to Goethe's words: “Human beings actually only ever have their own truth, and yet it is always the same.” It is always the same because what we take in through our power of cognition, the objective, is the same.

How does man come to develop the abilities and powers that lie within him? Spiritual Science is, so to speak, as old as thinking humanity. Spiritual Science has always taken the view that man has before him the ideal of a certain perfection of knowledge, which he strives for. The principle underlying this has always been called the principle of initiation. Initiation means nothing other than raising human abilities to ever higher levels of knowledge and thereby gaining deeper insights into the nature of the world around us. Goethe stood entirely, one might say throughout his entire life, on this standpoint of developing knowledge, on the standpoint of initiation. This is precisely what his fairy tale shows us in the most eminent sense.

We will understand each other most easily if we start from the view that is most widely held today and which stands in a certain contrast to the principle of initiation.

Today, in the widest circles, one can hear people who think about such things or believe they have a judgment on such matters more or less consciously take the position that only sensory observation or objects of sensory observation in the mental image can actually decide on truth, on objective reality. You will hear it said again and again: science can only be based on the objective foundation of observation. — And so often this is understood to mean merely sensory observation and the application of human intellect and imagination to this sensory observation. Each of you knows that the ability to form mental images and concepts is a human soul faculty among other soul faculties, and each of you also knows that these other soul faculties are our feelings and our will. So even from a relatively superficial observation, we can say that human beings are not merely thinking beings, but also feeling and willing beings. Now, those who believe they must represent the pure standpoint of science will say again and again: only the power of imagination may have a say in what science is, never human feeling, never what we know as impulses of the will, for this would only contaminate what is objective, it would only impair what the power of imagination could gain in an impersonal way. It is true that when people bring their feelings, their sympathy or antipathy into what is supposed to be the subject of science, they find things repulsive or appealing, sympathetic or unsympathetic. And where would we end up if people regarded their capacity for desire as a capacity for knowledge, so that they could say about things: I want it, or: I don't want it. — Whether you dislike or like it, whether you desire it, is of no consequence to the thing itself. As true as it is that those who believe they must stand on the firm ground of science can only hold on to external things, it is also true that it is the thing itself that compels you to say that it is red, that what you gain as a mental image of the essence of the stone is correct. But it is not in the nature of the thing that it appears ugly or beautiful to you, that you desire it or do not desire it. There is an objective reason why it appears red to you, but there is no objective reason why you do not want it.

In a certain respect, today's psychology has actually gone beyond the point of view just characterized. It is not my task here to speak for or against the direction of today's psychology, which says: When we consider the phenomena of the soul, the life of the soul, we must not limit ourselves to intellectualism alone; we must not consider the human being solely in relation to the power of imagination, but must also take into account the influences of the world of feelings and will. Perhaps some of you know that this belongs to the system of Wundt's philosophy, which regards the will as the origin of soul activity. In a way that is fundamental in a certain respect, regardless of whether one agrees with it or not, the Russian psychologist Lossky, in his book entitled “The Foundations of Intuitivism,” has pointed to the direction of the will in human soul life. I could tell you much more if I wanted to show how the doctrine of the soul strives to overcome one-sided intellectualism, and if I wanted to show you that other forces also play a role in what is present as human soul power.

Those who are able to think further will say to themselves: From this we see how impracticable it is to demand that only the power of imagination limited to observation should lead to objective results in science. If science itself shows that this is not possible, that will plays a part everywhere, how can you then determine that something is purely objective observation? Because your will plays the above-mentioned trick on you and, due to your habits of thinking, you have a preference for viewing only that which is material as objective, and because you do not have the habit of thinking and feeling that also recognizes the spiritual in things, you leave the latter out of your theories. When we want to understand the world, it is not important what abstract ideals we set ourselves, but what we can achieve in our souls, what we are capable of.

Goethe is one of those people who most strongly reject the principle that knowledge can only be conveyed through one-sided imagination, only through the power of thought. This is the striking, significant feature of Goethe's nature, that he always believes, more or less clearly expressed, that the whole human soul must be at work in all its powers if man wants to unravel the mysteries of the world.

However, we must not be one-sided and unfair. It is quite correct to object, with regard to knowledge, that the feelings and will of the personality are abilities subject to the personal characteristics of the individual, and to say: Where would we end up if we were to consider not only what the eyes see and what the microscope shows, but also what the feelings and will tell the individual as belonging to things!

But this is precisely what we must tell ourselves in order to understand someone like Goethe, who stands on the principle of initiation and development: that, as feelings and will are on average in human beings today, they cannot in fact be used for knowledge, that they would only lead people to absolute disagreement in their knowledge. One person wants one thing, another wants another, depending on the subjective needs of feeling and will. But those who stand on the ground of initiation are also clear about the fact that, of the human soul forces — thinking, mental image, feeling, and willing — in the development of the average human being today, it is the faculty of mental image, the faculty of thinking, that is most advanced and most inclined and suited to exclude the personal and arrive at objectivity. For the soul faculty that finds its expression in intellectualism is already so far advanced today that when people rely on this soul faculty, they argue the least and agree the most about what they say. This is because today people are highly developed in terms of their powers of mental image and thinking, while feeling and will have not yet been able to develop to such a degree of objectivity.

If we look around in the realm of the life of imagination, we could also rightly find differences. There are broad areas of the life of imagination that provide us with completely objective truths, truths that people have recognized as such, quite independently of external experience, regardless of whether a million people judge differently. Those who have experienced the reasons for this within themselves are able to assert the truth, even if a million people think otherwise. For example, everyone can find confirmation of what has been said in truths relating to numbers and spatial dimensions. Everyone can understand and experience that 3 times 3 equals 9, and it is true even if a million people contradict it. Why is this the case? Because when it comes to truths such as mathematical ones, most people have managed to switch off their likes and dislikes, their sympathies and antipathies, in short, their personal feelings, and let the facts speak for themselves. The elimination of everything personal in relation to thinking and imagination has always been called the purification of the human soul, and this purification was regarded as the first step on the path of initiation, or, as one might also say, on the path to higher knowledge.

Not only in relation to feeling and will are people not yet so far advanced that nothing personal plays a part, that they can maintain objectivity, but also in relation to thinking, most are not yet so far advanced that they can devote themselves purely to what things, the ideas of things themselves, tell them, as all people can do with mathematical things. But there are methods for purifying thinking to such an extent that we no longer think personally, but let the thoughts think within us, just as we let mathematical thoughts think within us. So when we have purified our thoughts of the influences of personality, we speak of purification or catharsis, as it was called in the ancient Eleusinian mysteries. Human beings must therefore purify their thinking, which then gives them the ability to grasp things objectively in their minds.

In the same way that this is possible, it is now also possible to eliminate everything personal from feeling, so that even that which stimulates feeling in things no longer speaks to the personality, no longer has anything to do with the person, sympathy, and antipathy, but solely evokes the essence of the thing, insofar as it cannot speak to the mere power of imagination. Experiences in our soul that are rooted or originated in our emotional life and that lead to inner knowledge by taking us deeper into the essence of a thing, but that also speak to other sides of the soul than mere intellectualism, can be purified of the personal just as much as thinking, so that feeling then conveys the same objectivity that thinking or the power of imagination can convey. This purification or development of feeling is called enlightenment in all esoteric epistemology.

Every person who is capable of development and does not strive for development in any arbitrary way, as is the intention of the personality, must endeavor to be inspired only by what lies in the essence of the thing. When they have reached the point where the thing does not arouse any sympathy or antipathy in them personally, where they simply let the essence of things speak, so that they say: Whatever sympathies or antipathies I may have are irrelevant and must not be taken into consideration — then it is in the nature of the thing that human thinking and acting takes this or that direction; then this is a statement of the innermost nature of the thing. In esoteric epistemology, this development of the will has been called perfection.

When a person stands on the ground of Spiritual Science, he says to himself: When I have a thing before me, a spiritual being lives in this thing, and I can stimulate my mental image so that the essence of things is objectively represented through my concepts and mental images. Thus, what is working outside has, as it were, become present within me, and I have recognized the essence of the thing through my mental image. But what I have recognized is only part of the essence. There is something in things that cannot be grasped by the mental image at all, but only by feeling, and indeed by feeling that has been purified or has become objective. Those who have not already developed such a part of their essence in themselves through such a cultivation of feeling cannot recognize the essence in this direction. But for someone who says to themselves that feeling can provide the basis for knowledge just as much as the power of imagination — feeling, not as it is, but as it can become through well-founded methods of epistemology — for such a person it gradually becomes clear that there are things that are deeper than the power of imagination, things that speak to the soul's nature and to feeling. Likewise, there are things that even reach down to the will.

Now Goethe was particularly clear that this is really the case, that human beings have these possibilities for development. He stood firmly on the ground of the principle of initiation, and he presented to us the initiation of the human being, which can be achieved through the development of the soul, through the development of the three fundamental forces: will, feeling, and imagination, by having the representatives of these three initiations of the human being appear in his fairy tale.

The golden king represents the initiation into the power of imagination, the silver king represents the initiation into the power of objective feeling, and the bronze king represents the initiation into the power of the will. At the same time, Goethe emphatically pointed out that human beings must first overcome certain things if they want to be endowed with these three gifts. The young man we meet in the fairy tale is none other than the representative of the human being striving for the highest. Just as Schiller presents man's striving for perfect humanity in his Aesthetic Letters, Goethe presents us with the young man who strives for the highest, who first wants to attain the beautiful lily, but who then attains inner human perfection through the three kings, the golden, silver, and bronze kings, who endow him with it.

How this happens is hinted at in the course of the fairy tale. Remember that in the underground temple, which the snake sees through the crystallizing power of the earth, there was one of the kings in each of the four corners. In the first was the golden king, in the second the silver king, and in the third the bronze king. In the fourth corner was a king who was a mixture of the three metals, in whom these three components are so combined that they cannot be distinguished from one another. In this fourth king, Goethe presents us with the representative of that stage of human development in which will, mental image, and sensitivity are mixed. In other words, he is the representative of the human soul that is ruled by will, mental image, and feeling because he himself is not master of these three faculties. In contrast, the young man, after acquiring the talents of each of the kings in particular — the talent of mental image, the talent of emotional awareness, and the talent of volitional awareness, so that they are no longer chaotically mixed — represents the stage of knowledge that is no longer dominated by mental image, emotion, and will, but rather rules over them. Human beings are dominated by them as long as they flow chaotically within them, as long as they are not found in their souls in a pure state, each acting for itself. As long as human beings have not achieved this separation, they are also unable to act through their three faculties of knowledge. But once they have achieved this, they are no longer dominated by chaos; on the contrary, they themselves dominate their faculty of imagination, which is as pure as the golden king, so that nothing else is mixed with it; their faculty of feeling is such that nothing else is mixed with it, so that it stands pure and clear like the silver king, and if his will is as pure as the ore of the ore king, so that ideas and feelings do not dominate him and he can freely express himself in his nature — in other words, if he is able, when it comes to grasping through mental image, or through feeling, or through will, to make use of will, feeling, and mental image individually, then he has gone so far beyond himself that the entire pure faculty of cognition that confronts us in mental image, feeling, and will leads him to a deeper insight, so that he truly submerges himself in the stream of events, submerges himself in what things are inwardly. Of course, only experience can teach us that it is possible to submerge ourselves in this way.

Now that this has been said, it will no longer be difficult to admit that when Goethe has the striving human being represented by the young man, we see in the beautiful lily a different state of soul, the state of soul that a person attains when the essences lying in things open up in the soul and he elevates his human existence by merging the things within himself with the essence of things in the outer world. What the human being experiences in his soul by rising above himself, by becoming master of the soul forces, by conquering the chaos in his soul, what the human being experiences there, this inner bliss, this connectedness with things, this merging with things, is represented to us by Goethe in the union with the beautiful lily. Beauty here is not merely artistic beauty, but a characteristic of the human being who has attained a certain degree of perfection. So now we will also understand why Goethe depicts the young man moving away, striving toward the beautiful lily, so that all his powers initially disappear from him. Why is that so?

We understand Goethe's depiction of such an image when we recall a thought he once expressed: “Everything that frees our spirit without giving us dominion over ourselves is pernicious.” First, man must become free, must come to be master of his inner soul forces, then he can attain, with true knowledge, union with the highest state of the soul, with the beautiful lily. But if he wants to attain this unprepared, with forces that are not yet mature, then it takes away his powers and has a withering effect on his soul. Goethe therefore points out that the young man seeks the liberation that will make him master of his soul forces. The moment his soul forces no longer work chaotically within him, but stand purified and cleansed side by side, he is ready to attain that state of soul characterized or represented by the connection with the beautiful lily.

Thus we see that Goethe develops these different figures in his free imagination; when we regard them as represented soul forces, we see that they reign and work throughout his entire soul. When we view them in this way, when we feel and sense them as Goethe himself felt and sensed them in a certain way, not content to say, like a poor didactic poet, what this or that soul force means, but expressing what he himself felt, then we will recognize what is expressed to him in such poetic figures. Therefore, the various characters stand in such a personal relationship to one another as the soul forces of human beings stand to one another.

It cannot be emphasized enough that it is not the case that the characters mean this or that. That is absolutely not the case. Rather, it is that Goethe feels this or that in relation to this or that soul force, and that his feeling then transforms into this or that character. In this way, he created the process of the fairy tale, which is even more important than the characters themselves. So we see the will-o'-the-wisps and the green snake. We see that the will-o'-the-wisps come over from the other side of the river and display very strange characteristics. They eagerly absorb the gold, even licking it off the walls of the old man's room and throwing it around lavishly. The same gold that is associated with worthlessness in the will-o'-the-wisps, which is also indicated by the fact that the ferryman has to reject the gold because the river would rise up and only accept fruit in payment, what effect does this gold have on the body of the green snake? After ingesting it, the snake becomes luminous inside! And the plants and other things around it are also illuminated by the fact that it absorbs what is symbolized by the will-o'-the-wisps as worthless. But the will-o'-the-wisps are also attributed a certain importance. They know that at the decisive hour, the old man will ask the will-o'-the-wisps to open the gate of the temple so that the whole procession can now enter the temple.

The very same event that takes place here with the green snake is found as an experience in the human soul, an experience that has been able to confront us particularly strongly in a way of thinking such as we noted the day before yesterday in the conversation between Goethe and Schiller. We have seen that at the moment when Schiller spoke with Goethe about the nature of nature observation, he still believed that what Goethe sketched with a few strokes as the primordial plant was an idea, something abstract that one obtains when one omits the distinguishing features and combines the common elements. And we saw that Goethe replied: If that is an idea, then I see my ideas with my eyes! At that moment, two very different realities stood opposite each other. Schiller really worked his way up to Goethe's way of seeing things, so that one does not betray one's admiration for Schiller when one cites him as an example of that human soul capacity which floats in abstractions and lives preferably in the mental images of things grasped by the mere intellect. This is a special disposition of the soul which, if a person wants to attain a higher level of development, can play a very negative role under certain circumstances.

There are people who are predisposed to the abstract. When they combine abstractness with something that confronts them as a soul force, it is usually the concept of unproductivity. These people are sometimes very astute, able to make sharp distinctions and combine this or that concept in a wonderful way. But precisely this kind of soul mood is often also linked to the fact that spiritual influences, inspirations, find no entry.

This state of mind, characterized by unproductivity and abstractness, is represented to us in the will-o'-the-wisps. They take gold wherever they find it; they are devoid of all inventiveness, are unproductive, and cannot grasp ideas. They are alien to these ideas. They do not have the will to devote themselves selflessly to things, to stick to the facts, and to use concepts only insofar as they are interpreters of the facts. What matters to them is to fill their minds with concepts and then lavishly give them away again. They resemble a person who sits in libraries, collects the wisdom there, absorbs it, and then gives it away again in an appropriate manner. These will-o'-the-wisps are characteristic of that soul faculty which is never able to grasp a single literary thought or feeling, but which is very well able to give beautiful form to what once existed as literary history, to what productive minds have achieved. Nothing is to be said here against this capacity of the soul. If man did not have this capacity of the soul, or if he did not cultivate it when it was given to him in too small a measure, he would be lacking something that is necessary for real cognitive ability. Through the image of will-o'-the-wisps, through the whole circumstances in which he lets them appear and work, Goethe depicts the way in which such a faculty of the soul works in relation to the other faculties of the soul, how it harms and benefits. Truly, if someone did not have this soul faculty and wanted to ascend to higher levels of knowledge, there would be nothing to open the temple to him. Goethe presents both the advantages and the disadvantages of this soul faculty. What is given in the will-o'-the-wisps represents an element of the soul. The moment it wants to lead an independent life in one direction or another, it becomes harmful. This abstractness becomes a critical faculty that shapes people in such a way that they can learn everything but cannot develop further because they lack the productive element. However, Goethe clearly shows the value of what is represented in the will-o'-the-wisps. What they have within them can also become something valuable: in the snake, the gold of the will-o'-the-wisps becomes something valuable insofar as it illuminates the objects around the snake.

What lives in the will-o'-the-wisps, when processed in a different way, becomes extremely fruitful in the human soul. If human beings strive not to regard what they can experience in concepts, ideas, and ideal constructs as something abstract, but to view it in such a way that it becomes a guide and interpreter for the realities around them, so that they adhere to their observations just as willingly and devotedly as to the abstractness of concepts, then they are in the same situation as the green snake with this soul power. Then they can create light and wisdom from the merely abstract, from mere concepts. Then it does not lead them to become a vertical line that loses all connection and relationship to the surface. Will-o'-the-wisps are related to the snake, but they are of the vertical line. The pieces of gold fall between the rocks, the snake picks them up and thereby becomes luminous within. Wisdom is taken up by those who approach things themselves with these concepts.

Goethe also gives us an example of how to work with concepts. Goethe has the concept of the primordial plant. What is it at first? An abstract concept. If he were to develop it abstractly, it would become an empty construct that kills all living things, just as the gold thrown down by the will-o'-the-wisps kills the pug. But think about what Goethe does with the concept of the primordial plant. If we follow him on his Italian journey, we see how this concept is only the leitmotif for moving from plant to plant, from being to being. He takes the concept, moves from it to the plant, and sees how it develops in this or that form, how it takes on completely different forms in lower or higher regions, and so on. Now he follows, step by step, how spiritual reality or form creeps into every sensual form. He himself creeps around like a snake in the crevices of the earth. Thus, for Goethe, the world of concepts is nothing other than what can be woven into objective reality. For him, the snake is the representative of the power of the soul, which does not strive in a selfish way to ascend to the higher realms of existence and try to rise above everything, but which patiently allows the concept to be continually verified through observation, patiently moving from experience to experience, from event to event.

When human beings do not merely theorize, do not merely live in concepts, but apply them to life, to experience, then they are in the same position as the serpent with this soul power. This is true in a very comprehensive sense. Those who do not take philosophy as a theory, but as what it should be, those who regard spiritual scientific concepts as tasks for life, know that concepts, even the highest ones, should be used in such a way that they flow into life and can be verified in daily experiences. For those who have learned a few concepts but cannot apply them to life, the situation is similar to that of someone who has memorized a cookbook but still cannot cook. Just as gold is a means of illuminating things, Goethe illuminates the things around him through his concepts.

This is the instructive and magnificent thing about Goethe's scientific approach and all of Goethe's endeavors: that what he provides in terms of concepts and ideas has reality, that it acts like a light, becomes luminous, and illuminates the objects around him. The universality in Goethe that was emphasized the day before yesterday means that when we approach him, we never have the feeling that this is Goethe's “opinion.” He stands there, and when we see him, we only find that we understand things better that were not so comprehensible to us before. This is precisely how he was able to become the unifying point between hostile brothers, as we saw the day before yesterday. If we wanted to discuss every feature of the fairy tale, characterize every character, then I would have to talk about this fairy tale not for three hours, but for three weeks. So I can only point out the deeper principles in this fairy tale. But every feature points us to Goethe's way of thinking and Goethe's worldview.

The soul forces represented by the will-o'-the-wisps, the green snake, and the kings are on one side of the river. On the other side lives the beautiful lily, the ideal of perfect knowledge and perfect life and creativity. We have heard from the ferryman that he can carry the figures from the other side of the river, but no one is allowed to return. Let us apply this to our entire soul mood and refinement.

We humans find ourselves here on earth as spiritual beings. These or those soul forces work on us as predispositions, as more or less developed soul forces. They are within us. But something else also lives within us. Within us humans, if we understand ourselves correctly, there lives the feeling, the knowledge that the soul forces within us, which ultimately convey the essence of things to us, are intimately related to the fundamental spirits of the world, to the creative, spiritual powers. By longing for these creative powers, we long for the beautiful lily. Thus we know that everything that originates from the beautiful lily strives to return to it. Unknown forces that we do not master have brought us over. We know that certain forces have brought us over from the other world across the border river to this world. However, these forces, characterized by the ferryman and working in the depths of unconscious nature, cannot bring us back again, for otherwise human beings would return to the realm of the divine without their work, without their intervention, just as they came over. The forces that have brought us over as unconscious forces of nature into the realm of striving human beings must not take us back again. Other forces are needed for this. Goethe knows this too. But Goethe also wants to show how human beings must begin in order to reunite with the beautiful lily.

There are two paths. One leads over the green snake; we can cross over it and gradually find the realm of the spirit. The other path leads over the shadow of the giant. We are shown that the giant, who is otherwise completely powerless, stretches out his hand at dusk, and his shadow then falls across the river. The second path leads over this shadow. So, those who want to cross over into the realm of the spirit in broad daylight must use the path provided by the snake, while those who want to cross over in the twilight can use the path that leads over the shadow of the giant. These are the two paths to a spiritual worldview. Those who do not strive for the spiritual world with human concepts, human ideas, or with those powers that are characterized by worthless gold, by merely sophistical minds, and by will-o'-the-wisps, but who go from experience to experience with patience and selflessness, will reach the other shore in bright sunshine.

Goethe knows that real research does not remain stuck in the material world, but must cross the border, the river that separates us from the spiritual. But there is another path, a path for less developed people who do not want to follow the path of knowledge, a path represented by the giant. This giant is powerless; only his shadow has a certain power. What is truly powerless? Take all the states that a person can enter into when their consciousness is lowered, such as in hypnosis, somnambulism, even in dream states: everything that dims the bright consciousness of the day, that allows lower soul forces than the bright consciousness of the day to work within a person, belongs to this second path. As the everyday soul power becomes powerless, the soul is led over into the real realm of the spirit. However, the soul does not become capable of crossing over into the spiritual realm itself, but remains unconscious and is led over into the realm of the spirit like a shadow. Goethe includes everything that acts unconsciously and habitually, without the participation of the soul forces that are effective in clear daytime consciousness, among the forces that can be imagined in the shadow of the giant. Schiller, who was initiated into what Goethe meant, wrote to Goethe at the time of the great storms in Western Europe: I am glad that you have not been harshly touched by the shadow of the giant. — What does Schiller mean by this? He meant that if Goethe had migrated further west, he would have been caught up in the revolutionary forces of the West.

Then we see that what man is to attain as the highest stage of cognitive development is represented in the temple. The temple thus signifies a higher stage of human development. In the present age, Goethe would say, the temple is something hidden, it is beneath the narrow crevices of the earth. Such a striving soul force, as represented by the serpent, can only vaguely sense the form of the temple. By absorbing ideals, the gold within it, it can illuminate this form, but basically, this temple can only exist as an underground mystery in the present age. By making this temple something underground for external culture, Goethe also points out that this mystery must be revealed to a more developed human being. He thus points to the spiritual scientific movement that has already captured broad masses of people today, which seeks to popularize in a comprehensive sense what is the content of Spiritual Science, of initiation or the principle of initiation, the content of the temple mysteries.

In this genuinely free Goethean sense, the young man is therefore to be regarded as a representative of striving humanity. For this reason, the temple should rise above the river, so that not only a few individuals seeking enlightenment can cross over, but so that all people can then cross the river on the bridge. Goethe presented a future state in the initiation temple above the earth, which will be there when man can pass from the realm of the sensual to the realm of the spiritual and from the realm of the spiritual to the realm of the sensual.

How was this achieved in the fairy tale? By fulfilling the actual secret of the fairy tale. The solution to the fairy tale is in the fairy tale itself, says Schiller. But he also pointed out that the word for the solution is strangely contained within it. You remember the old man with the lamp that only shines where there is already light. Who is the old man? What is this lamp? What kind of strange light does it have? The old man stands above the situation. His lamp has the remarkable property of transforming things, wood into silver, stone into gold. It also has the property of only shining where there is already a receptivity, a certain kind of light. When the old man enters the underground temple, he is asked how many secrets he knows. “Three,” replies the old man. When the silver king asks, “Which is the most important?” he replies, “The obvious one.” And when the bronze king asks, “Will you reveal it to us too?” he says, “As soon as I know the fourth.” Then the snake hisses something in the old man's ear, whereupon he says: “The time has come!”

What the snake whispered in the old man's ear is the solution to the riddle, and we must explore what the snake whispered in the old man's ear. It would take too long to explain in detail what the three secrets mean. I will only hint at it.

There are three kingdoms that are, so to speak, stationary in their development today: the mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms, which are closed to humans, who are still in the process of further development. The inner development that humans undergo is so vehement and significant that it cannot be compared to the development of the other three kingdoms of nature. That a natural kingdom has reached its present state by coming to a conclusion is what lies in the mystery of the ancient, which explains the laws of the mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms. But now comes the fourth kingdom, the kingdom of man, the mystery that is to be revealed in the soul of man. This mystery is one that the Old Man must first experience. And how must he experience it? He knows what it consists of, but the serpent must first tell him. This suggests to us that something special must still happen to man if he wants to reach the goal of development, just as the other three kingdoms have reached it. What has happened to man in the innermost part of his soul, and what must happen if he is to reach the goal, is whispered into the ear of the old man by the serpent. It tells him how a certain soul force must develop if a higher stage is to be reached; it says that it has the will to sacrifice itself for this, and it sacrifices itself. Until now, it has only formed a bridge when a single human being wanted to cross over here and there; but now it will become a permanent bridge by disintegrating, so that human beings will have a permanent connection between this world and the beyond, between the spiritual and the sensual.

The fact that the serpent has the will to sacrifice itself must be regarded as the condition for the opening of the fourth secret. The moment the old man hears that the serpent wants to sacrifice itself, he can say: “The time has come!” It is the soul force that adheres to the external. And the path must be entered by this soul force and inner science not becoming an end in itself, but sacrificing itself. This is truly a mystery, even if it is referred to as an “open” mystery, that is, even if it can be revealed to anyone who wants it.

What is widely regarded as an end in itself — everything we can learn in natural science, cultural studies, history, mathematics, and all other sciences — can never be an end in itself. We can never gain true insight into the depths of the world if we regard it as something in itself. Only when we are always ready to take it in and regard it as a means that we sacrifice as a bridge over which we can cross, only then do we come to real knowledge. We shut ourselves off from higher, real knowledge if we are not also prepared to sacrifice ourselves. Only then will human beings gain an understanding of what initiation is, when they stop constructing a worldview from external sensory concepts. They must become entirely feeling, entirely soul mood, a soul mood that corresponds to what Goethe characterizes as the highest achievement of human beings in his “West-Eastern Divan”:

And as long as you do not have this,
This: Die and become!
You are only a dull guest
On the dark earth.

Die and become! Get to know what life has to offer, go through it, but overcome it, go beyond yourself. Let it become a bridge for you, and you will revive in a higher life, be one with the essence of things, when you no longer live in the delusion that you, separated from the higher self, can exhaust the essence of things. Goethe likes to recall, when he speaks of the sacrifice of the concept and the material of the soul in order to live in higher spheres, when he speaks of the deepest inner love, the words of the mystic Jakob Böhme, who knows this experience of the sacrifice of the serpent within himself. Jakob Böhme may have pointed this out to him and made it so clear to him that human beings can already pass over in their physical bodies into a world that they would otherwise only enter after death: into the world of the eternal, the spiritual. Jakob Böhme also knew that it depends on the individual whether they can pass over into the spiritual world in a higher sense. He expresses this in the saying: “He who does not die before he dies will perish when he dies.” – A significant saying! The human being who does not die before he dies, that is, who does not develop the eternal, the inner core of his being, will also not be able to rediscover the spiritual core of his being when he dies. The eternal is within us. We must develop it in our bodies so that we can find it outside our bodies. “He who does not die before he dies will perish when he dies.” The same is true of the other sentence: “And so death is the root of all life.”

Then we see that the soul can only illuminate where there is already light: the lamp of the old can only illuminate what is already illuminated. Once again, we are reminded of the soul forces of human beings, those soul forces that appear to us as something special, the soul forces of devotion, of religious devotion, which throughout centuries and millennia have brought the message of spiritual worlds to those who could not seek the light through science or other means. The light of the various religious revelations is represented in the Old One, who has this light. But for those who do not bring light to the religious sense from within, the lamp of religion does not shine. It can only shine where light already meets it. It is this light that has transformed human beings, that has carried everything dead over into the animated living.

And then we see that through the sacrifice of the serpent, the two realms are united. After it has undergone, through symbolic processes, what human beings must undergo in their higher development in the esoteric sense, we see how the temple of knowledge is led up across the river by all three human soul forces, how it wanders upward, and how each soul force performs its service. It is implied that the soul forces must harmonize with each other, as we are told: The individual personality can do nothing; but when all work together at the right moment, when the mighty and the lowly work in the right relationship to each other, then what enables the soul to attain the highest state, union with the beautiful lily, can come into being.

Then the temple also emerges from the hidden crevices to the surface for all who truly strive for knowledge and wisdom. The young man is gifted with the powers of knowledge of thinking and mental image by the golden king: “Know the highest.” He is gifted with the powers of cognition of feeling by the silver king, which Goethe so beautifully suggests with the words: “Feed the sheep!” Art and religion are rooted in feeling, and for Goethe, both were one, even back when he wrote about the works of art in Italy during his Italian journey: “There is necessity, there is God!”

But there is also action — when man does not use it to fight for existence, when it becomes a weapon for him to fight for beauty and wisdom. This is contained in the words spoken by the bronze king to the young man: “The sword in your left hand, your right hand free!” Therein lies a whole world. The right hand free to act out of the human nature of the self.

And what happens to the fourth king, in whom all three elements are mixed together? This mixed king melts into a grotesque figure. The will-o'-the-wisps come and lick the remaining gold out of him. The soul forces of man still want to study what once existed in the stages of human development that have already been overcome.

Let us take another look, namely at how the giant comes staggering along and then stands there like a statue, showing the hours: when a person has brought their life into harmony, then even the subordinate has significance for what should be methodical order. This should become a habit. Even the unconscious will then take on a valuable meaning. That is why the giant is depicted as a clock, as it were.

The old man with the lamp is married to the old woman. This old woman represents nothing other than the healthy, sensible human soul power that does not penetrate into high regions of spiritual abstraction, but approaches everything in a healthy and practical way, as for example in religion, which is represented in the old man with the lamp. It is precisely this power that can then bring the ferryman his reward: three cabbages, three onions, and three artichokes. Such a stage of development has not yet transcended temporality. The fact that it is treated in the same way as the will-o'-the-wisps is probably a reflection of how abstract spirits usually look down haughtily on people who grasp things out of immediate instincts or intuitions.

Every move, every turn in this fairy tale has a profound meaning, and if one enters into an explanation that is supposed to be esoteric, one finds that one can actually only indicate the method of explanation. Immerse yourself in the fairy tale itself, and you will find that there is a whole world to be found in it, far more than could be hinted at today.

I would like to show you two examples of how Goethe's spiritual worldview permeates his entire life, how even in his later years he is still in harmony with his earlier work in matters of spiritual knowledge. When Goethe wrote “Faust,” he had adopted a certain mental image that goes back to a symbol of a deeper path of development in nature. When Faust speaks of his father, who was an alchemist and believed in the old teachings, but even then misunderstood them, he says that his father also did this, that he made himself

... a red lion, a bold suitor,
Married in the warm bath of the lily.

Faust says this without knowing its meaning. But such a word can become a ladder leading to high levels of development. In the fairy tale, Goethe shows the young man striving for the highest bride, and he calls that with which he is to be united the beautiful lily. You see, this lily can also be found in the first parts of “Faust” . And we also find what is expressed in the fairy tale as the basis of Goethe's view in Faust, in the second part, in the Chorus mysticus, where Faust stands before entering the spiritual world, where Goethe professes his belief in the spiritual worldview with monumental words. He shows how, in three successive stages, namely the purification of the mental image, the enlightenment of the feelings, and the development of the will to pure action, the ascent on the path of knowledge takes place.

What man attains through the purification of the mental image leads him to recognize the spiritual behind everything. The sensual becomes a parable for the spiritual. He penetrates deeper in order to grasp what is still inaccessible to the mental image. He then reaches a stage where he no longer views things through the mental image, but is led into the thing itself, where the essence of things and that which cannot be described becomes attainable. And that which cannot be described, which, as we shall hear in the course of the Winter Lectures, must be conceived in a different way as a mental image, that which requires us to advance to the mysteries of the will, he calls the “indescribable.” When human beings have traveled the threefold path through mental image, feeling, and will, they unite with what is called the “eternal feminine” in the Chorus mysticus, that which has undergone its development as the human soul, that which is represented as the beautiful lily.

Thus we see that Goethe expresses his deepest conviction, his secret revelation, even at the end of his great confessional poem, after he has ascended through mental image, feeling, and will to union with the beautiful lily, to the state that finds its expression in the aforementioned passage of the Chorus mysticus, 'which expresses the same thing that Goethe's philosophy and Spiritual Science and also the “fairy tale” say:

Everything transitory
Is only a parable!
The inadequate,
Here it becomes achievement;
The indescribable,
Here it is done;
The eternally feminine
Draws us upward!