The Rudolf Steiner Archive

The Mysteries of Humanity in Philosophy and Spiritual Science (Anthroposophy)

[ 1 ] Dear attendees! I would like to take the liberty of adding a few perspectives to the ideas about Spiritual Science or anthroposophy that were developed here the day before yesterday. perspectives on the relationship of this Spiritual Science or anthroposophy to spiritual cultural currents within our time, within our wider present. By making a few remarks on the mystery of the human being, or the mysteries of the human being, as they are sought by human spiritual life, this perspective on the characterized circumstances will emerge.

[ 2 ] The necessity of speaking about a mystery of the human being, the assumption of a mystery of the human being, seems to be just as unnecessary for those souls who are not familiar with the Spiritual Science of anthroposophy. To speak of the necessity of a human mystery, of the assumption of a human mystery, seems just as unnecessary for those souls who have a feeling for the existence of this human mystery as it is necessary to prove that hunger intervenes in the physical life of human beings. For a consideration that is initially sufficient for life, it is clear that the same forces, the same life connections that in physical life cause our organism to be so constituted that it sustains itself through physical nourishment, that the same forces the same life circumstances that bring about what is necessarily connected with the natural circumstances of food intake: hunger. And the existence of the human mystery in the human soul is, in essence, nothing other than the existence of spiritual hunger, and is evoked in the same way as physical hunger for the body, as a spiritual, mental hunger caused by life itself, by the life contexts in which the soul is placed, so that every human being, insofar as they want to think their way into life, feels and knows the spiritual hunger or the mystery of life, the human mystery. One can deceive oneself in life about this human mystery, just as, say, poor students often deceive themselves about hunger by driving away this hunger through smoking. They do not drive away what lies at the root of hunger; they only deceive themselves about hunger. Its consequences still affect the organism. In the same way, one can deceive oneself about the existence of a human mystery for the soul through all kinds of prejudices, through all kinds of indifference to life, but one cannot work away this human mystery from the soul for the sake of spiritual life. If one wants to deceive oneself about it, the deception will succeed, and then all the more will come to pass what was already pointed out yesterday yesterday: instability of the soul in life, immaturity of the soul in life, weariness of the soul, and all the other things one can imagine.

[ 3 ] Animals are involved in the whole world process in such a way that they experience within themselves what they need through the world processes. But just as animals are predestined by their instinctive drives and the tools they acquire through these drives — if they need any — I would like to say their food within the animal culture, so too is their inner soul life predestined. Not so with humans. Through work that is not already predisposed in them by nature itself, humans place themselves within culture. He works beyond nature. Thus, he also questions beyond nature and must question beyond nature. He is not assigned by the world process that which he must necessarily experience according to the needs and living conditions of his soul. Therefore, we also see how indelibly, more than is commonly believed, the urge for knowledge that leads to a certain satisfaction about the mysteries of humanity is rooted in the human soul.

[ 4 ] Now, today we shall only draw attention in our context to what humanity has undertaken in recent decades for our immediate present, unlike in past centuries and millennia, in order to come closer to the great mysteries of humanity and their solutions. The work that people have done in such a magnificent, such a tremendous way in this line lies primarily in the external material realm, in the realm of sensory knowledge, the knowledge that not only works with the ordinary powers of the sense organs, but which attempts, through all that natural science can create to arm the sense activity, to increase sensory ability by penetrating the secrets of nature. And through this penetration into the secrets of nature, which, as I said, should not be belittled by Spiritual Science, but should be recognized in all its grandeur — fully recognized —, through this penetration into the processes of nature, the last few decades in particular hoped to come closer to what can be called an understanding of the great mysteries of humanity.

[ 5 ] One need only recall all that physics and chemistry have attempted to achieve in order to penetrate that which initially eludes the senses, that which human sensory observation can only attain when armed with the instruments of physics and chemistry, when it attempts to penetrate nature through the processes presented by physics and chemistry. And again, from what has been learned in this way, hope has been drawn that it will also be possible to penetrate into that which is not immediately given to human knowledge, but which is needed to solve the riddles of humanity.

[ 6 ] How, especially in the middle of the nineteenth century, and for much of the second half of the nineteenth century, did people place great hopes in not only researching the various modes of action of substances and forces through physics and chemistry, but also in gaining an understanding of what chemistry and physics call molecules and atoms, about the movement and processes in the smallest natural phenomena, and how did people believe that by learning to look into the essence of the smallest, into the essence of atoms, into the essence of molecules in a strictly exact manner—as they thought—by being able to look into this smallest world, one would gain insights into what might answer the question: What actually happens in human beings when they engage spiritually and mentally in the world? It was hoped that by getting to know the world of atoms and molecules out there in space, we would also get to know them well enough to be able to study their effects on the human organism and thus come much closer to solving the mystery of the human being.

[ 7 ] Now it is interesting to see what decades of research in this physical-chemical field, which has not received enough recognition, has achieved. It is not possible to go into the details, but we can point to what has emerged from conscientious research and conscientious research-oriented thinking. I need only draw attention to a statement by a conscientious researcher — [Augustus Rowland] — and this result can immediately come to mind. Decades of work researching the smallest parts of the world lie behind us, and a researcher who is intensively involved in this research says: Based on everything he has been able to learn, he must say, especially after his “spectral analytical investigations,” he must say — Augustus Rowland — “An iron atom must have a much more complicated mental image than a Steinway piano.”

[ 8 ] So, dear attendees, a beautiful, long path of research, which cannot be praised enough, has been taken and will undoubtedly be continued; but even now, those who understand these things must admit admit to themselves: that which always lies inexplicably before ordinary consciousness when we direct our senses toward nature is not explained when we proceed through all the processes of physics and chemistry down to the smallest structures, but what we find inexplicable in the external world immediately before us, such as the possibility of experiencing the movements of the strings of a Steinway grand piano, is just as present to us in the smallest things, in which we imagine all kinds of scientific mental images when we make our way into the smallest things. On this path into the smallest things, we find nothing different than in the large things. The world does not become more explainable by penetrating into the smallest things, if the smallest things prove to be just as complicated and inexplicable as the large things.

[ 9 ] And how, in another field, armed with the microscope, which has developed to such wonderful perfection, has research into living beings attempted to penetrate into the smallest things again! How did we hope, by advancing from what we see before us as animal and plant organisms, which Lamarck and Darwin thought of as connected to humans, how did we hope to bring understanding to these long rows of animal and plant forms by by researching the smallest parts, the cell structures, especially those cell structures from which the organism develops: the germ cells. And anyone who knows what has been achieved in recent times with regard to our understanding of the germ cell from which the organism arises can only be filled with the utmost admiration for this path that leads into the smallest areas of life. Great hopes were placed on this research in the nineteenth century. One need only think of such energetic and inquiring thinkers as Haeckel, who believed that by looking into the smallest living beings — but he was not the only radical who held these hopes; others did too — one could gain insight into what is before us.

[ 10 ] Now it is strange, again, what the result is to which a truly magnificent and tremendous path has led. I need only read to you a passage from the work of a great natural scientist of the nineteenth century, and you will see what the result is in this field, and whether the result is such that one can hope to gain insight into the mystery of man from the observation of the smallest life. Nägeli, the great natural scientist, but not he alone, for what is very significant, Haeckel's most important student, Oscar Hertwig, agrees completely with this statement by Nägeli and asserts for his part that it is precisely the microscopic research and other research on the origin of life of individual species, which has been developed in the very recent past, have confirmed what Nägeli said in the 1880s. This can therefore be characterized directly as a confession by a contemporary thinker at the height of natural science. It says:

[ 11 ] The egg cells contain all the essential characteristics of the species just as well as the developed organism, and as egg cells, the organisms differ no less from each other than in their developed state. The chicken egg contains the chicken species just as completely as the chicken itself, and the chicken egg is as different from the frog egg as the chicken is from the frog.

[ 12 ] It was hoped that by finding that the various species of animals are the same in the early stages of development, insight would be gained into the reasons why they are different in the world that is immediately apparent to our senses. And now the result, the result of the very latest research: no matter how far we go with the microscope into the smallest entities of life, we find the same inexplicable thing that we find in the chicken, in the frog, in the chicken egg, in the frog egg, just as inexplicable as the external world that is available to our senses, the world that can be recognized in this way by wonderful research. This can already be understood today as an effective confession in accordance with science, a confession to which future research cannot essentially change anything.

[ 13 ] Thus, there is no prospect of solving the mystery of the human being in this way. And again, if we look at the other path that external research has taken, it is no less admirable where, from what is before us, in our spheres of life, from which we are to proceed to a certain whole of the world, as when we want to draw conclusions from what is forming on earth today about what has been lived out geologically in the becoming of the earth; or when we want to draw conclusions from the observations of our senses or our senses armed with the telescope or through mathematics, and the senses armed with other, astronomical instruments, if we want to draw conclusions about the overall structure of the world. Here, too, the most admirable, the most powerful research is available. But what has come to light?

[ 14 ] One of the main advances in earth science or geology is precisely that the geologist can only extend the same causes that are currently effective to the entire area he wants to survey. Nothing else, than what is happening in our immediate surroundings, with earth being deposited from rivers or similar processes taking place, is what geologists find in other periods of the Earth's development, and they are proud of the fact that, since [Lyell] founded modern geology, they have used nothing other than what is also present in the immediate present.

[ 15 ] And again, we see how astrophysics—this wonderful science, equipped with all the physical and other means of research—has come to the conclusion that, wherever we may look in the great structure of the universe, the same processes, indeed the same substances that can be discovered on Earth, can also be found there. So when we leave our narrow circle of life on Earth and set out on the path of research that has become so important in recent times, we find nothing other than what we find in the smallest circle. Neither path, neither delving into the smallest things nor delving into the great connections of the universe, promotes what actually underlies the human mystery — the necessary spiritual hunger — in human beings. In contrast to this stands anthroposophy — anthroposophy or Spiritual Science — as I attempted to characterize it in yesterday's lecture. It is permeated by the realization that the paths indicated lead to nothing new beyond what is already immediately before the senses of humanity. It clearly recognizes: no matter how far one researches purely scientific paths, one finds nothing other than what one already has in the environment of the senses. But it is not only Spiritual Science — or anthroposophy, one might say — that senses this and sees it clearly; philosophers and philosophical research of all times have sensed this, and that is why philosophical research throughout the ages has included human attempts to penetrate deeper into the world in a way that does not go through the senses, in a way that is free from sensory observation. But what can philosophy use, and what does it use? Philosophy uses thought in order to penetrate more deeply than external research can penetrate. And one may say — one may also misunderstand some things, but if one has an understanding of the course of development of philosophical thinking, one will not misunderstand it — one can say: With regard to the development of thought, in order to gain something that provides answers to the mystery of humanity, something truly admirable has been achieved.

[ 16 ] And a system such as that which has emerged in recent times, such as Hegel's — one can object as much as one likes, for my part, and I will share most of the objections —, a system such as Hegel's leaves one unsatisfied, even though it has developed depth and sharpness of thought in an extraordinary way. In a sense, it has explored—or at least attempted to explore—everything that thought can come up with when it tries to develop within itself. It has brought all of this into the human soul in order to find something that can provide an answer to the question of the mystery of man. It leaves us unsatisfied; there is no complete answer. And those who engage with such a philosophical system, however astute, which is woven solely from thoughts, will find that this very philosophical system presents them with question after question, new riddles upon riddles, for which further answers must be sought.

[ 17 ] And if one investigates why a philosophical system based solely on concepts did not capture the souls in such a way that these souls could feel satisfaction in relation to their thirst for knowledge, one receives the answer that such philosophical systems operate with concepts and ideas that are derived from external sensory knowledge, that are abstracted from this external sensory knowledge. And even though one often believes that one has concepts other than those abstracted from the external sensory world or from the external, one does not. Consider Hegel's system: a wonderful structure, a wonderful coherence in bringing together all the concepts that humans use to grasp what lives in them as logic, to grasp what is spread out in nature, to grasp what historical development is, to grasp what enters the sensory world as art, what presents itself in the world of the soul as religion. A wonderful architectural structure, but only concepts that are suitable for grasping the external because they are abstracted from this external.

[ 18 ] But now the soul experiences that all the concepts gained in this way are not living concepts, that they are dead concepts, that they are unsuitable for leading us beyond the sensory world into reality. Anyone who is able to truly observe the nature of the world of concepts, as these concepts are abstracted from external reality, will find that our concepts have a far lower level of development than our sensory perceptions. If, to use the eye as an example again today, we were unable to enliven the eye from within and penetrate what is happening physically in the eye with our inner experience, thereby elevating it to a colorful, luminous mental image, but instead perceived directly what is happening in the eye as in a photographic camera, then the sensory perception of the eye would resemble what we have in our external concepts. The concepts as we have them in our external consciousness correspond only to something dead, they are not alive, and therefore they do not satisfy the soul.

[ 19 ] I can only point to this meaningful truth. You will find more details in the writings I quoted recently, namely in my book “How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds” and in my “Occult Science.” But it is clear to anyone who has a sense of self-observation and a sense of comparison within self-observation that, for ordinary perception, sensory perception is permeated and imbued with life in a completely different sense than the concept, which remains dead and is therefore, at best, capable of giving humans a sparse mental image of the formal conditions of life, but does not enable them to penetrate directly, as they are, into life itself, not even to penetrate as deeply into nature as sensory perceptions penetrate directly.

[ 20 ] In what I already hinted at the day before yesterday, in the completely different treatment of the conceptual world, the world of thought, the world of ideas, as all this treatment takes place in external philosophy, lies the path that Spiritual Science or anthroposophy takes. Through it, the concept is to be transformed from its dead existence into a living existence; through it, the concept is to be transformed in the same way that the mere physical process, which we can also perceive in the camera, is transformed into the lively development of the senses through the life of our organism in the eye. But this happens through the inner soul processes recently characterized and described in more detail in my books, those processes through which human beings work on themselves, just as chemists work in chemical laboratories and astronomers work in observatories, in order to penetrate the secrets of sensory existence with their instruments.

[ 21 ] When concepts are processed in this way, that they no longer serve to create a mental image of something external, to create a mental image of something external, but when these concepts are processed as they are processed in real, not mystically blurred meditation, so that the human being lives with the conceptual world, that the concept must be present in his soul, not in order to recognize something through this concept, but so that these concepts are active within him, have a life within him, then — in the course of experience — what we initially gain from the sensory external world through concepts is detached from the sensory external world. Just as we detach hydrogen from water in a chemical experiment, so we detach mental images from the external world of sensory perception through those energetic images — what is called meditation — we detach the concepts from the external sensory world of perception and process these concepts in purely inner, methodically regulated soul work; with the soul life, then they enter into a connection with the soul life, then they become alive within the soul life.

[ 22 ] And then something transforms within us that is initially supersensible to ordinary consciousness; then something spiritual -soul, just as the eye is transformed in the organism by no longer remaining a physical apparatus but being permeated by life — something that is otherwise only capable of receiving concepts as dead — is transformed through the connection of conceptual thought life with soul life within us, so that we develop what Goethe “spiritual eye” or “spiritual ear.” Just as our physical organism organizes the physical eye through the natural forces within it, so the spiritual researcher organizes within his supersensible body those forces that arise through the intensive coexistence of the mental image and thought life, in a certain way with the soul life. He acquires other organs, but through this he achieves what an external mental image cannot achieve. Not by observing other things — what we obtain through the microscope or other physical or chemical apparatus and tools — not by observing other things than what is available to our ordinary senses in life, but by observing what is available to the ordinary sensory life in a different way, with newly formed organs, we move forward. So that we learn to recognize something that we could not recognize before. And just as blind is the one who does not have eyes and only sees before him — if the eye can develop in him — the colorful, luminous world, so a new world shines forth, a world of the spiritual, which is now really just as present as the sensory world, when the corresponding organ is formed.

[ 23 ] Now one might believe that what Spiritual Science or anthroposophy presents to the present world is something entirely subjective and personal, which is now being brought into the world by a few people. This is not the case, but precisely by pointing to what has just been characterized, Spiritual Science does not point to something fantastical -arbitrary, but rather to something that has become apparent in recent times as the deepest longing of people who are so advanced in their thinking and research. For it can be said that in human life, pretty much everything that later enters the stage of consciousness, that can be consciously strived for at a later time, appears beforehand in a certain instinctive way. p>

[ 24 ] And so it comes about that precisely out of the most thoughtful philosophical times, out of the times of philosophical development as it had emerged at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and in the first third of the nineteenth century, individual thinkers, individual philosophical researchers developed who, although they were not yet — the time was not yet ripe — were able to connect their thinking with the soul — that this soul, and with it thinking, was truly transformed into a new organ, a spiritual eye — but they instinctively felt that something lived within human beings that could become like a new organ. Therefore, when Spiritual Science or anthroposophy today speaks of our physical organism as we see it with our eyes, as we grasp it with our hands, as it can only be researched by physical science, and that this organism has a supersensible aspect, that our physical organism, as we see it with our eyes and touch with our hands, as it can only be researched by physical science, is based on a supersensible, if you will use the expression, etheric organism that cannot be perceived by any means of the sensory world, and when it is further claimed in this anthroposophy that it is precisely this etheric, supersensible, invisible organism that is transformed by thinking into a receptive organism for the spiritual, when reference is made to this etheric human body, into which the spiritual eye can integrate itself just as the physical body integrates the physical eye, when reference is made to this etheric body, it is not pointing to something that is, so to speak, shot out of a gun, but rather to something to which the thoughts of spiritual researchers were instinctively directed in the nineteenth century. Here are just a few examples that I have cited in my most recently published book, “Vom Menschenrätsel” (The Riddle of Man), beginning with an example chosen from the writings of Immanuel Hermann Fichte, the son of the great philosopher Fichte.

[ 25 ] Fichte, Immanuel Hermann Fichte, the son of Johann Gottlieb Fichte, the great Fichte, does not arrive at his insights through spiritual vision, not through what I called the day before yesterday “contemplative consciousness,” but through a certain instinctive feeling of an ethereal, supersensible body. Hence Immanuel Hermann Fichte says:

[ 26 ] In that it contains what is actually persistent in metabolism, it is the true, inner, invisible body, yet present in all visible materiality. The other, the outer appearance of the same, formed from incessant metabolism, may henceforth be called the “body,” which, truly impermanent and not one, is the mere effect or afterimage of that inner corporeality which throws it into the changing material world, just as, for example, the magnetic force from the particles of iron filings creates a seemingly dense body, which, however, disperses in all directions when the binding force is removed from it.

[ 27 ] In the first half of the nineteenth century, we see a brilliant thinker—Immanuel Hermann Fichte—referring to a force body, which we now call the etheric body in anthroposophy, which relates to everything we carry with us materially, as

[ 28 ] force from the particles of iron filings forms a seemingly dense body, which, however, disperses in all directions when the binding force is removed.

[ 29 ] For Immanuel Hermann Fichte, our entire physical organism in its composition is held together by the power of this invisible body. But Immanuel Hermann Fichte also knows that this supersensible body contains that which, together with the hereditary forces and substances that come from the physical world of our ancestors , which together with them forms our organism, our physical organism, which works from the spiritual world into the physical world and passes through the gate of death to continue working in the spiritual world. Immanuel Hermann Fichte immediately derives a scientific certainty from the view of this supersensible body — as he believes, of the immortality of man. And so Immanuel Hermann Fichte says very beautifully:

[ 30 ] For there is hardly any need to ask here how human beings relate to themselves in the process of death. Even after the last visible act of the life process, this body remains in its essence exactly the same in spirit and organizational power as it was before. Its integrity is preserved, for it has lost nothing of what was its substance during visible life. It only returns to the invisible world in death, or rather, since it never left it, since it is the actual persistent element in everything visible—it has only shed a certain form of visibility. “Being dead” simply means no longer being perceptible to the ordinary senses, in the same way that the actual reality, the ultimate causes of bodily phenomena, are imperceptible to the senses.

[ 31 ] And based on these assumptions, Immanuel Hermann Fichte then says that there must be — he does not elaborate further on this, the time was not yet ripe — that there must be, as opposed to anthropology, which deals with what the senses can know about human beings and what is based on sensory perception, another science; and Immanuel Hermann Fichte speaks about this other science in the first half of the nineteenth century in the following way:

[ 32 ] [...] anthropology ends with the conclusion, based on a wide variety of evidence, that human beings, according to the true nature of their being, as in the actual source of their consciousness, belong to a supersensible world. Sensory consciousness, on the other hand, and the world of phenomena arising from its starting point, with the entire sensory life, including that of human beings, have no other meaning than to be the place in which that supersensible life of the spirit takes place, introducing the otherworldly spiritual content of ideas into the sensory world through freely conscious action. [...] This thorough understanding of human nature now elevates “anthropology” to “anthroposophy” in its final result.

[ 33 ] This is Immanuel Hermann Fichte — expressing that in the first half of the nineteenth century he longed for what we today call “anthroposophy.” And anthroposophy wants to be nothing other than the real fulfillment of what has been longed for by people from the depths of the modern world of thought.

[ 34 ] And yet another example: a researcher who also did a great deal of work in Switzerland, but who, just like Immanuel Hermann Fichte — and like the many others who were on the path, on the path of longing that is to be satisfied by today's Spiritual Science — has been forgotten. This researcher is Troxler. And Troxler also speaks of what I have described above as the “supersensible body” , which can be experienced in human beings when they remove thoughts from the world of perception and allow them to live with the soul, so that thoughts and inner soul life ignite each other and bring the etheric body to perception, to inner perception, to experienced perception, and into this the possibility of integrating the spiritual eye or the spiritual organs of perception. Troxler — again in an instinctive intuition that such a thing exists — says beautifully:

[ 35 ] Philosophers in earlier times distinguished between a fine, noble soul body and the coarser physical body [...] a soul that had an image of the body itself, which they called a schema, and which was for them the inner, higher human being [...]. In more recent times, even Kant, in the dreams of a ghost writer, seriously dreams in jest of an entire inner, spiritual human being who carries all the limbs of the outer body on his spiritual body.

[ 36 ] And again, Troxler speaks of how such a view, when it is felt, must lead to a continuation of external sensory “anthropology” working into the spiritual world. For Troxler says that the “super-spiritual sense” leads, in conjunction with the “super-sensory spirit,” to grasping the super-sensory essence of the human being in an anthroposophy.

[ 37 ] It is clear that, apart from the name, what is called “anthroposophy” today is by no means something new, but rather something has emerged in the necessary course of development of the newer spiritual life. We encounter what is so hostile today, this etheric body of the human being, which can contain the organs for spiritual vision, we encounter it, so to speak, already in thinking research, where it is instinctively pointed out; only that Spiritual Science or anthroposophy really wants to create the organs to bring it to view , this higher, inner human being.

[ 38 ] Just as the life of thought is bound to the outer sensory world for ordinary consciousness, so within the human being the will and everything connected with the will and the mind is bound to the instincts, affects, desires, and passions. And just as this life proceeds in ordinary life, so everything that is will life is bound to the life of the instincts, to the physical, to the external body. But just as the concept, the idea, the mental image can be detached from external perception, so too can the life of the will be detached from the life of the instincts, from everything connected with the physical, just as oxygen can be detached from water, so that it appears in the human being as purely spiritual.

[ 39 ] In this way — and again, the methods are described in detail in the books mentioned, because this can only be achieved through long systematic work that is just as difficult as the experimental work of physicists, chemists, or biologists — the spiritualized will can be extracted from the ordinary will life bound to physical life. But this does not merely manifest itself as will; it reveals itself in inner, fully grasped liveliness, as a complete inner human being who has a different consciousness than the ordinary consciousness. And just as we know how to use our physical eye with our ordinary consciousness, we can learn to use the eye that we have implanted in our etheric body with this consciousness, which is formed from the will that we detach from physicality. Here we gain a real inner human being who is within us and who spiritually contemplates the spiritual. Just as we can direct our ordinary physical consciousness toward the external environment, so we can direct this spiritual consciousness—by learning to use the super-spiritual organs that have been spoken of — to the spiritual world. And the spiritual world from which we, as spiritual beings, have emerged, presents itself before us.

[ 40 ] Now one might again believe: Yes, this is something that only occurs today and cannot really be proven in the deeper human need, the spiritual need. But that is not the case. For the peculiar thing is that, again out of a philosophical instinct, in the course of the nineteenth century — as if to counterbalance purely external research — spiritual researchers pointed out that this consciousness that human beings have for ordinary daily life is not the only consciousness, but that, hidden by ordinary daily life, as in a dream, by dream consciousness, human beings have hidden their daily consciousness, so that — hidden by daily consciousness — another, deeper consciousness lives. Only, this initially unclear and instinctively recognized or rather sensed phenomenon was also given an unclear name. It was referred to as the unconscious or subconscious. And you may know, dear audience, that, although certainly controversial in terms of his philosophy, since the 1860s the brilliant philosopher Eduard von Hartmann has spoken of the “unconscious” or “subconscious,” of a soul life that is within human beings, which is something completely different from the soul life of ordinary everyday consciousness, but from which forces rise up into ordinary consciousness from the deeper consciousness within human beings, so that ordinary consciousness is directed and filled by what rises up from a subconscious being, from an unconscious.

[ 41 ] And Eduard von Hartmann realized at the same time that what lives down there in human soul life like a second human being below the threshold of ordinary consciousness is more closely connected than ordinary daytime consciousness with the spiritual, that spreads in nature during ordinary daytime consciousness through my senses. And because the life of the instincts never rises to the level of pure will, separated from the external natural entity, as I explained the day before yesterday, Eduard von Hartmann also already senses that what is unconscious for him, but hypothetically assumed by him, lives in the soul, is connected, as it were, through subterranean connections, through sub-soul connections, with what spreads spiritually in nature.

[ 42 ] The unconscious or subconscious in the soul flows out and flows in, and this is connected with the unconscious spiritual, that is, the spiritual that does not appear to mere consciousness, which is spread throughout all beings. Thus, human beings are connected with their spiritual essence to everything else — including the world — even for this philosopher of modern times. Eduard von Hartmann believed that what is inside human beings as a higher human being, what is a higher consciousness, or rather an unconsciousness for them, can only be deduced hypothetically, and can only be arrived at by reflecting on and analyzing what ordinary consciousness provides. But through this analysis, through this conclusion, Hartmann arrives at certain mental images of the spiritual realm that is spread throughout the universe, from which we as spiritual beings have emerged and which we also carry within us.

[ 43 ] Hartmann first published — in a very flawed manner, as he later perfected his philosophy considerably — his “Philosophy of the Unconscious” in the 1860s, in which he really had to fight an uphill battle against what at that time one might say had emerged with the greatest hopes for human knowledge, with the result of materialistically colored Darwinism, which sought to solve the mystery of man by introducing materialistic mental images into the development of external nature alone. And while those who had embraced Darwinism with full enthusiasm, indeed with beautiful enthusiasm — it must also be said — hoped to solve the riddles of the world and the mysteries of humanity, Eduard von Hartmann argued in his “Philosophy of the Unconscious” that everything that can be understood in this way in the world available to ordinary consciousness must be traced back to spiritual effects that are supernaturally active in everything that lies before us.

[ 44 ] Today, we can understand that a philosophy that emerges in such a hopeful era of research will inevitably attract fierce opponents. And that is why the “philosophy of the unconscious,” which in turn sought to provide a worldview filled with the spiritual in place of the emerging materialism, encountered the fiercest opposition precisely from the Darwinian -materialistic worldview. And these fierce opponents did indeed appear. Legions of writings appeared that portrayed Hartmann's philosophy as something amateurish, as something that could only come from a person who understood nothing of the actual nerve and essence of newer knowledge. All these writings were written in a similar tone. Now look, here comes a philosopher who spins something out of his concepts that is supposed to shed light on the mystery of man and the world, without having any idea of the promising paths that the scientific method is taking, especially in recent times. And among the many writings—for something very strange happened—among the many writings that were supposed to be devastating for Hartmann's philosophy, there was also one by an author who did not name himself—a writing that thoroughly criticized everything Hartmann claimed to be the spiritual forces and contents of the world in his “Philosophy of the Unconscious,” and showed how amateurish one must proceed, as it were, toward hopeful Darwinism, toward external science, toward real natural science, if one has constructed such a web of ideas as Eduard von Hartmann, if one opposes this web of ideas to this promising research.

[ 45 ] And at that time, important researchers such as Oscar Schmidt, the great Darwinist, Ernst Haeckel himself, and many others could be named, read this writing, the sharpest, most astute writing against Eduard von Hartmann, and they said: Here is someone who has written something that is on a par with natural science; someone has written something that shows Hartmann how a true natural scientist speaks out against this dilettantish scribbling that Hartmann has produced. The writing had appeared anonymously. Oscar Schmidt and others said: Let this anonymous author reveal his name to us, and we will consider him one of our own, a true man who stands at the height of natural science. And a second edition, which was soon necessary, appeared. Then the anonymous author revealed his name: it was Eduard von Hartmann himself! Once upon a time, a perhaps strange but nevertheless proper lesson was taught to all those who believe that such things arise only from dilettantism or ignorance of the true essence and nature of natural science. Now those who had previously said that he was calling himself that began to remain silent. And since that time, the significant approval of the early days has been replaced by an energetic—to use the word—an energetic silence, a hushing up of Hartmann's view of life.

[ 46 ] This lesson, dear attendees, was necessary in the course of the nineteenth century in order to set an example, at least once, for all those who oppose legitimate worldview endeavors and who believe that the objections that can be pulled out of thin air could not be made by those to whom they are directed. Especially when it comes to anthroposophy or Spiritual Science, those who are so quick to mock and ridicule should learn something from the lesson that Eduard von Hartmann taught his so-called opponents at that time. For there is much to be learned from it! The objections raised against anthroposophy or Spiritual Science are, in most cases, not such that those who stand on the ground of anthroposophy or Spiritual Science could not fabricate them themselves at any moment.

[ 47 ] But at the same time, Eduard von Hartmann's behavior shows us that the idea of a consciousness beyond ordinary consciousness was born out of the spiritual movement in modern times. And when so many people today take offense — because they take offense at words — at that those who now speak of an astral body are saying something unfamiliar, it can be pointed out that, albeit in a hypothetical and only abstract way, nineteenth-century philosophy is working toward shaping what anthroposophy or Spiritual Science today achieves directly, inwardly, and spiritually by succeeding in separate the will from physicality through inner, intimate spiritual processes, thereby truly lifting consciousness out of the depths of the soul, [a consciousness] which is then able to look into the spiritual world with the help of what is called the spiritual eye.

[ 48 ] And Eduard von Hartmann is not alone in this. However, there has been little cooperation in this field, especially in the nineteenth century; therefore, researchers know so little about each other. But we need only look at various intellectual currents that belong here, especially towards the end of the nineteenth century, and we will see this concept of the “inner human being” reappearing again and again. We see how it appears in American research, how it appears in the research of Myers in England, who has published so many volumes of psychological studies /Three illegible characters follow in the stenogram.] We see how these researchers: James, Myers, and his colleagues point everywhere to a consciousness that is different from ordinary everyday consciousness, a consciousness that lies hidden in the depths of the soul but sends its rays of power up into ordinary consciousness. Myers, the English researcher, wrote in 1886 — initially without going into further detail about Eduard von Hartmann, as it is so uncommon today to work together — pointed to this other consciousness in such a compelling way that William James said: one of the greatest discoveries in the field of human soul life since 1886 is that of the subconscious.

[ 49 ] Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, in turn, sets itself the task of not only pointing to this subconscious, as these researchers also only pointed to it as something lies mystically and obscurely below, that cannot be reached, that only finds expression in religious attempts at conversion or in special abnormal moods of the soul. Spiritual Science seeks to point out that this is not just something unclear, but that it can be brought up from the depths of human soul life in full clarity, and that through this consciousness, human beings can see into the spiritual world just as they can see into the physical world through their everyday consciousness. Thus, there truly lives within us a human being who, as a spiritual human being, is able to see the eternal. As long as one points to such a fact as if in a picture, one will encounter less opposition; but when one contemplates the fact as such, so that it becomes, as it does through anthroposophy or Spiritual Science, an inwardly graspable fact and a sum of inner experiences just as the outer facts and outer experiences are, then one encounters more opposition. But the whole tendency of research, all the impulses of newer thinking, lead people to solve the riddle of the human being through such contemplation in a different way than external research does, and through contemplating a different human being than the human being of ordinary consciousness. This leads us not to seek anything else in the spiritual realm than what the microscope reveals to us, but to seek something deeper in what is available to the ordinary senses. We penetrate through the ceiling of the sensory world into the spiritual world. And those who are sincerely interested in solving the mystery of the human being in our time, with our present-day means, will find the path that anthroposophy or Spiritual Science takes. Then people are surprised when someone who takes this path begins to speak of a concrete spiritual world and of spiritual beings in this world. For spiritual research or anthroposophy does not lead to a vague pantheism, to a general spiritual chaos, as pantheism assumes, but to a concrete view of a concrete spiritual world. Just as we are not content externally merely emphasizing nature and nature and nature, but just as we look at individual plants, individual processes, individual animal beings, so we look at individual spiritual beings. It is the world into which we enter, in which we ourselves are when we have passed through the gate of death, in which we were before we entered physical existence through birth as spiritual human beings.

[ 50 ] And so we can say: it is not by desiring a spiritual world that we come to affirm a spiritual world — for certain reasons, it may even be the worst way, which cannot be explained here in detail, to develop direct desires to see as much as possible in the spiritual world — but rather, what first arises in the human soul is the soul-spiritual hunger characterized earlier, which is expressed in the question about human beings. And by honestly following the path with the means of recent human development, one enters a world that offers one spiritual things that one can only talk about if one speaks of spirits in the same way as one speaks of the physical world, by speaking of bodies. And this spiritual research not only provides immediate insight into our surroundings, but in a certain way it also provides insight — indeed, in a different way than external research can — into the entire structure of the world.

[ 51 ] And here I would like to insert a remark that is somewhat daring, because in the context of a single lecture I can only cite the research results of anthroposophy and cannot go into individual details of the evidence, but I would nevertheless like to share a few things, paradoxical as it may seem, so that you can see how different the paths of spiritual research are to the mysteries of humanity than the paths of external physical research. Once again, as I emphasized the day before yesterday, all spiritual research can be linked to the beautiful, healthy beginnings of Goethe's worldview. Goethe also wrote a beautiful treatise, following on from [Martius] and others, “On the Spiral Tendency of Plants.” . So he first turns his gaze back to the external world. He focuses on plants and how they attach leaf after leaf; but the fact that the leaf ascends in a spiral that is, [that] the arrangement of the individual leaf bases is ordered in a spiral, so to speak. This way in which the individual leaves are arranged, what kind of line this produces, the bases of the leaves that gradually form, when one considers this, and when one—Goethe remained at the beginning—when one continues some things, of which Goethe has provided sound beginnings, then one finds that this spiral arrangement of the leaves of plants cannot be explained by the plant itself, but rather the spiritual view that leads us beyond the sensual shows us that there are moving forces at work here from the universe itself, the same moving forces that are at work in the planets and that regulate the course of leaf growth. As I said, it sounds paradoxical at first, because I cannot explain it in detail; there is not enough time for that, but one can study the position and movement of the Earth in space from the arrangement of the leaves, and its relationship in motion to other planets. That is to say: what is outside in the great structure of the world is expressed in the plant. And a view, a wonderful perspective, opens up.

[ 52 ] The research that has been carried out in such a beautiful, powerful way into the movement of the heavenly bodies since Copernicus will be joined by a realization that leads us from the observation of what is immediately before us in space, in the heavenly space — if we explore it through Spiritual Science — leads to the form of celestial orbits. This research will unite with the research of Copernicus and Kepler, and a significant scientific future will emerge here. But as I said, as paradoxical as it sounds, I wanted to mention it briefly, but I can only mention it briefly. And just as — and again, this lies in the expansion of Goethe's worldview — just as something cosmic is expressed in the plant, so too is something cosmic expressed in the whole human being — but in this spiritual human being, whom we find when we detach the will from the instincts, from the physical. And one truly experiences the microcosm within — as it has been called — the macrocosm. One only has to learn, through the awakening of inner consciousness, of spiritual consciousness, to experience the macrocosmic human being, and in this way one will find the path from ordinary perception to something that can lead to the solution of the human riddle, as far as this is already possible for human beings.

[ 53 ] Again, it is through an expansion, a transformation, a metamorphosis of consciousness, not through the use of ordinary consciousness as it is, that one enters into the mystery of the human being. Thus, what was characterized the day before yesterday as the human being awakens from a dream and, through the intervention of his will in the outer world, connects what is otherwise a dream experience with the outer world and thereby elevates it to real mental images. Just as he thereby makes his ego real, or at least feels it to be real, so man awakens by awakening the inner human being who makes use of the spiritual eye and the spiritual ear in the etheric body — to use Goethe's expression.

[ 54 ] And if you take all this together, including what has been said about the philosophical treatment of the subconscious, you will find once again that nothing is presented arbitrarily in Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, but rather something toward which human development, human spiritual development, is heading. Longings that exist are satisfied by what Spiritual Science, unlike Hartmann, Myers, or James, does not present as a hypothesis, but makes a reality by truly detaching the inner human being from the human being who is aware of himself in ordinary consciousness, by truly awakening a higher consciousness within ordinary consciousness, in relation to which ordinary consciousness appears as alive as in the dream world, just as a person can live in a dream world while asleep in relation to ordinary consciousness. All of these are realities.

[ 55 ] But people of greater depth, people who have been able to combine self-observation with observation of the world, have always had a sense that this is the case, that human beings can truly acquire a higher consciousness, while their ordinary consciousness relates to this higher consciousness as the dream world the world of images in dreams, to the experiences of everyday life. Only one thing should be pointed out, which I have also pointed out in my book “Vom Menschenrätsel” (The Riddle of Man), which was recently published: how Johann Gottlieb Fichte, the father of Immanuel Hermann Fichte, was fully aware that there must be a higher consciousness in relation to ordinary consciousness. Therefore, he describes the world of ordinary consciousness in a strangely paradoxical way. But the paradox ceases when one considers the relationship between ordinary consciousness and contemplative consciousness from the point of view of anthroposophy. Fichte says: “Images are: they are the only thing” — images, indicating that our ego itself is only an image and knows images from images when we are in ordinary life — “images that float by without anything connecting them.”

[ 56 ] Just as waking consciousness becomes clear that dream consciousness is only something that accompanies physical processes and must be explained from waking consciousness — not the other way around, one cannot explain waking consciousness from dream consciousness — so those who delve into anthroposophy or Spiritual Science know that ordinary consciousness and its content must be explained from the realms of the spiritual world, into which awakened, observing consciousness penetrates. p>

[ 57 ] Thus we see how Spiritual Science or anthroposophy is by no means contrary to the genuine scientific approach of modern times. This is also one of the most essential and characteristic features of anthroposophy: that anthroposophy or Spiritual Science does not, like similar endeavors of earlier times or even of the present, connect directly with religious life, but rather connects with scientific life and seeks relationships with it. And this difference is usually not sufficiently taken into account. Time and again, anthroposophy or Spiritual Science, as it is meant here, is confused with older or contemporary mystical endeavors that take their starting point, their origin, from religious experience. Wherever anthroposophy may initially lead in religious terms, its origin is in scientific experience. Spiritual science or anthroposophy has produced what the scientific needs of modern times have given rise to Spiritual Science or anthroposophy. This is why Spiritual Science or anthroposophy differs in many respects from the mystical or other endeavors with which it is confused, which arise or have arisen from this or that religious creed. The latter always take on a subjective character and therefore lead to sectarianism. Anthroposophy or Spiritual Science can never lead to sectarianism or subjectivism, to closing oneself off in a certain subjective religious experience. Rather, because it has arisen out of scientific need, anthroposophy or Spiritual Science will take on the character that science bears, the character of being valid for all people, the character of being understandable to all people, just as science can be understood and comprehended by all people, only to a much higher degree, as I remarked the day before yesterday.

[ 58 ] But something else also follows from this premise. We have seen, we have experienced, how precisely the kind of scientific approach that was characterized at the beginning of this lecture has led people away from a real religious life. Have we not experienced how people who wanted to be enlightened by the newer materialistic scientific worldview, how they turned away from real religious life? How they believed they had to seek enlightenment precisely by giving up real religious life? In Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, we will experience the opposite, even though today many representatives of religious communities mistakenly believe that anthroposophy or Spiritual Science could interfere with their religious beliefs. It will not. It will bring about the opposite. Just as external science has in many ways distanced people from religious experience, Spiritual Science or anthroposophy will lead people back to religion, not merely to a religious view, but to the practical practice of religion, because Spiritual Science nevertheless ignites religious life and religious understanding from a completely different angle. Those who believe they are serving their religion by opposing Spiritual Science or anthroposophy are committing the greatest error. They would serve their religion much more by pointing out that this Spiritual Science, the path through this Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, is the most modern way to lead people to an understanding of religious experience. This is true in general, but also in detail.

[ 59 ] Spiritual Science or anthroposophy develops in a straight line, as has been shown historically today, out of scientific life. But by deepening the human being, by lifting the spiritual human being out of the ordinary human being, it also leads to a deeper understanding, let us say first of all, to a deeper understanding of Christianity.

[ 60 ] Dear attendees! I do not believe that anyone who sees Spiritual Science or anthroposophy as an enemy of Christianity truly understands and loves Christianity and truly recognizes its greatness! Anyone who does not want to acknowledge that Christianity, despite its greatness, has not yet revealed all its greatness. Or would one then, when pointing to what one experiences in the present time, claim that Christianity has already revealed all its greatness and regard everything that is happening now as a consequence of Christianity that one no longer understands? It is better to know that there is still much that is Christian to be brought into the development of human beings, for the improvement and salvation of the social and other aspects of human life!

[ 61 ] Spiritual Science or anthroposophy will be one of the ways — and new paths will always emerge — to lead people to what lies in the depths of Christianity. And again and again, as I say this, I am reminded not of a natural scientist, but of a Catholic clergyman, a Catholic priest who was rector of a university in the 1990s and who gave his rector's speech on Galileo, and, as a Catholic priest, pointed out the profound scientific significance of Galileo, who was once denounced as a heretic by the Church, and, as a member of a Catholic theological faculty, acknowledged his full greatness. But this same Catholic priest, this profound and significant theologian and philosopher, also said in the same speech how wrong it is to say, with regard to truly well-understood science, that it could prove truly hostile to Christianity. Only a misunderstood theory of natural science, not true natural science, can be hostile to Christianity. And this Catholic says—I have also quoted this in my book “The Mystery of Man”:

[ 62 ] Positive Christianity has no reason to reject the idea of evolution as such, if the natural process is not understood merely as a causal mechanism established from eternity, and if man is not presented as a product of it.

[ 63 ] And Laurenz Müllner himself expresses it explicitly:

[ 64 ] Thus came the new worldview

[ 65 ] — he means Galileo's scientific worldview —

[ 66 ] often appeared to be in opposition to opinions which, with very questionable justification, claimed to be derived from the teachings of Christianity. Rather, it was a contradiction between the expanded world consciousness of a new era and the more narrowly closed consciousness of antiquity, a contradiction with the Greek worldview, but not with the correctly understood Christian worldview, which was allowed to see only new wonders of divine wisdom in the newly discovered star worlds, whereby the miracles performed on earth divine love performed on earth could only gain greater significance.

[ 67 ] This is a truly Catholic priest, a man who thinks in a genuinely Christian sense, who knows that Christianity is not endangered when the miracles of divine creative power are sought in newly discovered worlds, and that what is found in the laws of nature does not work against the recognition of the miracles of divine love performed by Christ on earth, but that these only gain greater significance as a result. So one can also say — as I allowed myself to express in my book “The Mystery of Man”:

[ 68 ] Positive Christianity has no reason to reject the idea of a spiritual experience in the soul as such, if the spiritual experience does not lead to the death of religious devotion and edification, and if the soul is not deified.

[ 69 ] And actually, one can say with Laurenz Müllner, the Catholic priest:

[ 70 ] The worldview of German idealism often appeared to be in opposition to opinions that claim, with very questionable justification, to be derived from the teachings of Christianity. Rather, it was a contradiction between a worldview that recognizes the spiritual nature of the soul and one that cannot access this spiritual nature, a contradiction to the misunderstood scientific way of thinking, but not to the correctly understood Christian worldview, which was only allowed to see revelations of divine power and wisdom in the true spiritual experiences of the human soul, whereby the experiences of religious devotion and edification, as well as the strength to carry out the duties of love.

[ 71 ] Just as no one needed to fear, when America was discovered, that because there must be people living in America who know nothing of Christ, the discovery of America could therefore be dangerous, because unbelief could come from there, just as no one could regard the discovery of America as a danger to Christianity, nor should the discovery of spiritual worlds be regarded as a danger to Christianity. For just as those who know Christianity in its inner significance know that what Christianity contains within itself has the ability to spread everywhere, even in all as yet unknown physical worlds, so those who understand Christianity on the one hand and spiritual research on the other know that Christianity has a content that does not lose in greatness, but only gains in greatness and superpower in comparison to all possible spiritual worlds that may yet be found through spiritual research or anthroposophy. And basically, those who think small about the power of Christianity, who do not think it so great that they say to themselves: Just as no physical research could ever be dangerous to Christianity, so no spiritual research can be dangerous to Christianity! For just as no one can claim that because there is nothing in the Gospels about the geography of America or the conditions in America, one should not speak of America, so too, if one understands Christianity correctly, one cannot claim that because the Gospels apparently say nothing about repeated earthly lives or about entering spiritual worlds, as anthroposophy or Spiritual Science says, one should not speak of it. Those who recognize and understand Christianity in its true magnitude, who love it in its effect on the world, will, precisely in order to be able to serve Christianity, be inspired by what is kindled in human beings by Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, will not be hostile to the latter. And it may even be that one could find it unchristian to oppose Spiritual Science or anthroposophy from the point of view of Christianity. But what is so deeply rooted in the newer spiritual striving, as has been shown, will certainly not be eradicated!

[ 72 ] That is all that needs to be said for now about the unjustified attacks on Spiritual Science from the religious side. These attacks on Spiritual Science come from all sides. Since spiritual research has its origins in science, it is naturally regarded as something amateurish by the prevailing scientific community. But if one considers what has happened in relation to external science in recent decades, I would say, the important self-knowledge of humanity that has taken place there, then one will be able to develop enough courage and inner determination to believe in the progress of anthroposophy or Spiritual Science in a properly founded way. I have already pointed out how much certain people had to retreat who, in Eduard von Hartmann, who was initially only a philosopher, saw only the spiritual world, who wanted to see only the dilettante in Eduard von Hartmann, when he showed them that he knew what they knew and was able to judge, and much more besides! But this course of scientific research is instructive insofar as this scientific research wanted to lead to a worldview. For nothing should be objected to scientific research if it stays within its limits, within which it has achieved such admirable successes. But let us remember: when Eduard von Hartmann appeared, his main opponents were among those — certainly, many today want to go beyond Haeckel, but in popular and lay circles, there is still enough Haeckelism — but Eduard von Hartmann experienced the worst challenges from those who believed they had found in the newly conquered Darwinism the true basis of a worldview, a worldview suitable only for modern times.

[ 73 ] And what do we have to experience? Something very, very peculiar! I would like to draw your attention to this one last point: one of the most distinguished students of Darwinism — Haeckel's — is Oscar Hertwig, the biologist, developmental theorist, and morphologist. Oscar Hertwig was one of Haeckel's favorite students, and he admits that he received his greatest inspiration from Haeckel. I myself have often heard Haeckel refer to Hertwig as one of his very best students, as one who has also chosen to be his most outstanding collaborator on the path of knowledge that Hertwig has chosen for himself. And let us look at what has become particularly apparent in Oscar Hertwig's recent publication! What has Hertwig achieved in the time since he was a student of the man who most radically established Darwinism as a worldview? What has Oscar Hertwig achieved? The real scientific refutation of Darwinism from a scientific point of view! For that is the life's work of Oscar Hertwig, Haeckel's comrade.

[ 74 ] One might say: this scientific development as self-knowledge is progressing rapidly; it does not take generations, but Haeckel's most immediate student, one of his oldest students, one of his earliest students, refutes everything that Haeckel considers and has considered to be the fundamental impulse the fundamental nature of the newer worldview. And with what sharp words Oscar Hertwig, Haeckel's student, speaks not only about the radical form of a Darwinian worldview as represented by Haeckel, but also about any materialistically colored Darwinism that refers only to pure descent theory through blood relationship of living beings, which refers to the principle of utility, to the struggle for existence, to adaptation, and so on. How does Hertwig express himself? He expresses himself by saying: All this has been overcome by recent research, it can no longer be discussed!

[ 75 ] It will continue to be discussed for a long time to come in popular lectures and in the worldviews propagated in lay circles. In this world, people will continue to talk for a long time about what has come about through the Darwinian worldview, because it will take some time for people to come to terms with the fact that even the most ardent Darwinists today are refuting materialistic Darwinism , and that Hertwig not only accuses Darwinism of having been mistaken in its research and of having used completely wrong concepts and ideas, but Oscar Hertwig also opposes materialistic Darwinism in a much more comprehensive way. He says: Why did this Darwinism arise in the nineteenth century? It arose for this reason — not because the facts of natural science build such a worldview — but because people in the nineteenth century came up with the idea of making the struggle among themselves, the mere mechanical action, the material view, their laws. That is why they also dreamed into nature: struggle for existence, selection of the fittest, and so on. Oscar Hertwig says something beautiful in his latest book, in which he writes about the refutation of materialistic Darwinism. Oscar Hertwig says:

[ 76 ] The principle of utility, the conviction of the necessity of unrestricted commercial and social competition, materialistic trends in philosophy are forces that have played a major role in the development of [modern] man even without Darwin. Those who were already under their influence gladly welcomed Darwinism as a scientific confirmation of ideas that were already familiar and dear to them. They could now see themselves, as it were, in the mirror of science.

[ 77 ] Because people wanted to think materialistically, they saw themselves and their materialism reflected in the mirror of science. This is said by one of the most enthusiastic Darwinists! And he goes on to say:

[ 78 ] He could now see himself, as it were, in the mirror of science.

The interpretation of Darwin's teachings, which are so ambiguous due to their vagueness, also allowed for a wide range of applications in other areas of economic, social [and] political life. From it, everyone could, as from a Delphic oracle, draw useful applications for social, political, hygienic, medical, and other issues, and to invoke the science of Darwinian biology with its immutable laws of nature to reinforce their assertions. But what if these supposed laws are not such?

[ 79 ] —and Hertwig has proven them to be “not such”—

[ 80 ] —shouldn't there also be potential social dangers in their versatile application to other areas? One should not believe

[ 81 ] — says Oscar Hertwig —,

[ 82 ] that human society has been able to use phrases such as relentless struggle for existence, selection of the [suitable], the useful, the expedient, perfection through selective breeding, etc., in their application to the [most diverse] areas, such as daily bread, without being deeply and lastingly influenced in the whole direction of their idea formation!

[ 83 ] This is scientific self-knowledge! Anyone who is serious about the intellectual development of humanity must listen to it. And this same Oscar Hertwig, who was one of Haeckel's most loyal and best students and one of Darwin's most loyal and best successors, this same Oscar Hertwig now talks about it everywhere in his newer books: We must listen to thinkers such as Eduard von Hartmann! Here we see those coming out of natural science itself who initially point to the philosophical pioneers of the new worldview and who will gradually transform themselves into those who — after having practiced dilettantism long enough, as Eduard von Hartmann did at the time — will now show enough long enough dilettantism in Spiritual Science or anthroposophy — who, after finally coming to their senses, will find their way, just as Oscar Hertwig has now found his way to the once despised, so attacked, so dilettantishly presented Eduard von Hartmann.

[ 84 ] Spiritual Science itself may truly look at the way in which many natural scientists still live today in the belief that the solution to the mystery of human beings can come from natural science itself. The spiritual researcher does not underestimate natural science; he recognizes its tremendous progress, and he knows that without standing on the firm ground of natural science, he could not say anything authoritative in Spiritual Science either. But the researcher of Spiritual Science must nevertheless look in a strange way at those people who believe that that all spiritual research has already been completed by natural science, and who expect the solution to the mystery of the world, insofar as it is accessible to humans, to come solely from natural science.

[ 85 ] Not because I want to name someone I consider insignificant, but because I want to name someone I consider to be a very significant researcher of the present day, I would like to conclude by mentioning a researcher who has achieved tremendous things in the fields of physiology and chemistry, a researcher who has had a profound impact on contemporary scientific research. In a preface, this man concludes with an outlook he wishes to give on the significance of what natural science can be in our time. He concludes his preface with the following words—and these words are characteristic because they allow us to see, in a manner of speaking, how the purely scientific thinker reveals himself in the way he thinks—the man in question, whom, as I said, I hold in high esteem, says:

[ 86 ] Sometimes we hear it said that we live in the “best of all worlds”; it is difficult to say anything well-founded about this, but we — at least the natural scientists —

[ 87 ] — he says —

[ 88 ] can say with certainty that we live in the “best of times,” [...] that the future will only get better.

[ 89 ] Now listen and marvel at what this great man says about Goethe, the great connoisseur of nature and humanity! He says that one can

[ 90 ] with the great naturalist and humanist Goethe:
It is a great delight
To put oneself in the spirit of the times,
To see how a wise man thought before us,
And how we have ultimately come so wonderfully far.

[ 91 ] The eminent natural scientist takes these words as his confession, which he has gained from the significance of pure natural science for the time. He must have read his Goethe strangely! For what he claims here as his confession—the great natural scientist—is not Goethe's word, but Goethe puts it into the mouth of Wagner in his “Faust,” the pedantic little adversary of Faust; and it is probably closer to Goethe's opinion when we find these words of Wagner's in “Faust”:

[ 92 ] How all hope does not vanish from the head,
Which constantly clings to stale evidence,
Digging greedily for treasures with his hands,
And is happy when he finds earthworms!

[ 93 ] This is more of a Goethe quote than the one the great naturalist claims for himself, the true words: “How wonderfully far we have come!”

[ 94 ] As I pointed out the day before yesterday, one can remain on Goethe's ground and continue to develop his beginnings, as is necessary in human development, and then one enters into a healthy Spiritual Science, then one comes to a knowledge of the human being through his contemplative, awakened consciousness, and thus closer to a solution of the human riddle, albeit in such a way that new riddles then develop. But , but rather to point out that no one should believe that Spiritual Science leads to stagnation. One mystery follows another. Spiritual Science leads precisely to progress, not to the answer to all questions, but it shows the way to the solution of all human mysteries.

[ 95 ] Goethe, however, who in his time was already able to see how external, purely physical natural science leads away from the mystery of man rather than toward it, said these beautiful words:

[ 96 ] Man himself, insofar as he makes use of his healthy senses, is the greatest and most accurate physical apparatus that can exist, and that is precisely the greatest misfortune of modern physics, that experiments have been separated from man, as it were, and nature is recognized only in what artificial instruments show, indeed, what it can achieve, thereby limiting and proving it.

[ 97 ] Goethe does not want people to be excluded when it comes to understanding nature; and it is clear to him that humans themselves must undergo the development that can truly lead them to understanding the world.

For this,

[ 98 ] Goethe continues,

[ 99 ] but man stands so high that the otherwise unrepresentable is represented in him. What is a string and all its mechanical divisions compared to the ear of the musician? Yes, one can say: What are the elementary phenomena of nature itself compared to man, who must tame and modify them all in order to be able to assimilate them to some extent?

[ 100 ] Goethe points out from his point of view how it is not possible to solve the mystery of man by means of external research—which is accessible to ordinary consciousness and which one wants to separate from man. He points from research devoid of human beings to the sphere of research in which human beings place themselves in full liveliness and spirituality. Since Goethe's time, much of what belongs to the greatest external cultural achievements of modern times has emerged. These cultural achievements are, of course, fully recognized in their greatness and power by Spiritual Science. Spiritual Science does not desire regression, but only the everlasting progress of humanity, and therefore also recognizes every material advance, indeed, it values some of it precisely because it penetrates the real world and can thus also make the real world fruitful for human beings. But Spiritual Science can also be in harmony with such thinkers as Goethe, in whom modern times have found particularly characteristic expression, for it is capable of doing so.

[ 101 ] Modern culture, this mechanical machine culture, this culture that has developed in mercantile and social relations, has for too long viewed the development of humanity from the perspective of concepts that modern humanity has formed as materialistic concepts and that are never justified by nature itself. We have seen today how a natural scientist, as the brilliant Darwinian Hertwig expressly says, What people have dreamed up in terms of materialistic ideas is not a sum of laws that can be found in external nature. People have dreamed up falsehoods; nature does not confirm these falsehoods.

[ 102 ] Well then, Spiritual Science or anthroposophy wants to progress toward a different human content, one that does not need the buzzwords “survival of the fittest,” “struggle for existence,” and so on, but which will emerge from a real knowledge of the human soul and spirit. And then it will become clear whether Spiritual Science can withstand what the purely scientific Darwinist approach has not been able to withstand.

[ 103 ] If the latter approach has dreamed concepts into nature itself and into the world that are refuted by natural science, then Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, in its very essence, may much more hope that what it finds as reality in human beings, when applied to the observation of nature and the world, will not be refuted by the world, as was the case with Darwinism, the world refutes it, but that the world and its observers confirm precisely what the soul finds within itself and in the spirit. Despite all opposition, Spiritual Science looks calmly to the future and knows that it will not be like materialistic Darwinism, that nature refutes the theory, but that from the healthy foundations of the healthy human soul, such content of the soul will be found that the truths of culture and all world development will reflect back the foundation of this soul content. Has the world itself recently refuted a worldview that could be believed in with hope? — Spiritual Science or anthroposophy hopes that its worldview will not be refuted, but will be increasingly substantiated by what shines forth as spirit, as the soul of the human soul, the human spirit from the entire universe!

[ 104 ] For a well-founded knowledge of this will bring Spiritual Science or anthroposophy, for the future and already in the present, that the world is not based on mechanism, that the world is not based on matter and substance, but that the world is based on spirit, and that human beings fare well when they live in spirit and seeks his progress and salvation in the development of world history and in the realm of human coexistence through the spirit!