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The Tension Between East and West
GA 83

10 June 1922, Vienna

9. Prospects of its Solution (Europe-America)

If you are seeking, within the present social system, forces that inspire confidence, you will have to look in hidden places. Social distresses and deficiencies are only too evident; prospects, genuine ones at any rate, rather less so.

There are, of course, self-deceivers, on a greater or lesser scale, who even in face of the grave difficulties of the present seek salvation in this or that recipe; they devise all kinds of social institutions in which they claim that mankind, or at any rate a section of mankind, would prosper better than it ever has before. It seems to me, however, that nowadays we have become so clever, if I may so express it, that it is relatively easy to work out, on a would-be national basis, any kind of social system. It is possible today to be familiar with quite a lot of social systems advocated by the various shades of party opinion, wthout finding anything really bad about them; and yet, we do not expect anything very much from them, either. Certainly, anyone who considers the society of today, not simply as raw material for sociological theories, but from the standpoint of a knowledge of man, can only talk of the emergence of social prospects when man is able once again to come close to his real self.

The most important thing at this stage is not the excogitation of institutions, but the possibility of discovering man and including him in the social institutions we inhabit. And at this point it must even be admitted that, when it does become possible to discover man within the social order—or, at the present day, within the social chaos—then any given institution can serve the same purpose, more or less. The fact is that mankind can prosper socially in all kinds of different ways, within the most varied institutions.

What matters today is human beings, not just institutions. For this reason, I evoked a certain amount of satisfaction, particularly in circles where they feel the social problem more than they think about it, with my book The Threefold Commonwealth, by not merely showing how a given institution might be different. Instead, I argued that a great deal nowadays depends on whether the man who has to run a business, for instance, is able to bring his whole personality to bear, either directly or through assistants, on his work-people, so that he comes close to them by really discussing with them, as man to man, everything that goes on in the business, from the purchase of the raw material to the marketing of the finished product and the means by which it reaches the consumer. If you repeatedly discuss this chain of production with your employees, in a way that is attuned to human considerations, you establish a basis on which you can build the other things that are socially desirable and worth striving for today.

Yet it is still not enough to talk to people technically, in this way; something further is needed. What is needed, if we are to have hope in the prospects of society once more, is what I want to talk about today.

For a long time, the view has been widespread that the man who is a leader in the social sphere must first and foremost establish contact with the masses. Efforts in this direction were made throughout the nineteenth century. And as the social problem became more and more of a burning question, you could see people working in factories for months on end, in an attempt to get to know the life of the workers. There have been senior civil servants who, after reaching the retiring age and so completing their work in society, have gone among the working people and been astonished to discover what it is really like there. In short, there have long been efforts to get to know the common man, and in particular the proletariat. We may say, too, that the achievements of our literature and art in this respect have been considerable. The mode of existence of the workers and the masses in general, often impressively presented through works of art and literature, certainly deserves full recognition. With the major problems of the present, however, the most important point is not really that the leaders should know what goes on among the workers or the masses in general. Fundamentally, very little depends on our artistic depiction, from the inside, of the life of the masses: the miseries and cares that beset them, their struggles, their ideas and goals, and so on. I would say:

What we need today is not so much a way of understanding the masses, as a way of being understood by them; of going into the factory and business, whatever its kind, and being able to speak in such a way that we are not felt to be academic or “educated” or theoretical, but are taken as men who have something to say that appeals to men's souls.

For a long time now there have been laudable attempts to establish institutions for adult education, up to university level. What is made available to the people in this way does, it is true, interest them for a while by virtue of the piquancy of many scientific results; there is some excitement if the lecture is illustrated by lantern slides, or if we take people to zoos and the like. But we ought not to be under any illusion that this really appeals to their souls or touches their hearts. To do this, we must have something to say about man's relation to existence as a whole. On this point, it is true, leading personalities today still have rather odd opinions. They consider that the masses are not really interested in “philosophical questions,” as they call them. But they are! If you can only find the right language to express it, then eyes light up and hearts unfold. For example, if you start with quite simple scientific facts, and know how to handle them in such a way that, out of your reflections, human essence and human destiny ultimately emerge; and if you show people that what you say is well founded, and at the same time that it is not fragmentary knowledge that at best can occupy us in our moments of leisure, but something a man can absorb as nourishment for his soul—only if you succeed in doing this will you have made a start on the creation of confidence between the people, as they are called, and the leaders. It is possible today to speak from a party viewpoint, to provide the people with concepts such as “capitalism,” “labour,” “surplus value” and the like: the people will gradually assimilate these concepts, and then you can talk on party lines. But by doing so you will not provide men with systems in which they can participate with all their humanity, or enable them to co-operate in the creation of the society we must hope for if the forces of advancement, and not those of decline, are to prevail.

If you want to, you can soon see what the real situation is today, and where the real obstacles and restrictions occur. I was for some years a teacher at a workers' educational college, where I had to teach all kinds of subjects. I never kowtowed to any party dogma; at the same time, I never encountered any resistance on the part of a worker to understanding, when I presented history, for example, in such a way as to reveal at every point that it is not something that can be comprehended by a historical materialist interpretation, but something in which spiritual forces and spiritual impulses are operative. I was even able to evoke some understanding of why it was that Marx, whose ideas were thoroughly familiar to the members of my audiences, arrived at the view that is called “historical materialism,” the view that regards all spiritual phenomena as merely the effect of mechanistic and economic factors and the like. I was able to show them that this is because in fact, from about the sixteenth century onwards, there have increasingly come into play the forces that have made economic life dominant and decisive. In consequence, art and science and the rest really seem like—and in a sense even are—the results of economic life, mechanistic life. Marx made the mistake he did because he was only familiar with modern history.

It is not my wish to argue for one view or the other, however, but simply to observe that even this point was understood. It was not a lack of confidence on the part of the audiences that made my kind of popular instruction impossible, but the fact that one day the authorities noticed: the teaching here is not in accord with party dogma; instead, what is presented by way of illustration is drawn, to the best of the teacher's knowledge and judgment, from what appeals to human nature. And they grew anxious lest the audience should increase. One day, their emissary appeared at a meeting that was summoned for the purpose, to investigate whether I was fit to be a teacher at the workers' educational college. One of the workers' leaders appeared. And when I commented that, if the principle of progress was to be established in these circles, then the teacher must at least have freedom to teach as he wished, the representative replied: “Freedom is something we don't recognize! We recognize only a proper compulsion.”

This was the attitude that led to my expulsion from the teaching staff of that workers' educational college. From my point of view, however, it was really an illuminating experience. Not so much the expulsion itself, as the preceding acquaintance with the wide variety of people that make up the modern proletariat. An illuminating experience, because you could see that, if only you will speak out of your full humanity, so that your hearers

feel you are saying something to them that reaches into their hearts and affects their human and earthly being, they will regard thinking, when it springs from a philosophy of life, as the most important thing they can be offered. There exists today a feeling that enlightenment—not in any party sense, but in a general human sense—must spread among the masses. People long, more or less unconsciously, for something that springs from a really far-reaching philosophy of life.

And how should it be otherwise? For, after all, vast sections of mankind today are employed in such a way that their work cannot conceivably interest them. They perform it as if faced with something that has no relationship whatever with their humanity. Hence, although the clubs, guilds and unions that tend to be formed in these circles are indeed organized on the basis of the various trades—there are metal workers' unions, printers' unions, and so on—fundamentally they have surprisingly little to do with the business of production. They are primarily concerned with the element in the material sphere of life which is of general human interest—with consumption and the satisfaction of human needs. Mankind has had to become resigned about production, but not to anything like the same extent about consumption. And so large numbers of people are faced at present with work that turns them back upon themselves. Their environment cannot interest them, nor what they do from morning till night, unless it be so presented to them that they can find it interesting; what interests them first and foremost—and this is where we must begin—is what confronts a man when he is alone with himself after work and can simply concentrate his attention on his own humanity. We must also admit that, when we examine the social chaos of our time, we can see quite clearly that there are also many people in executive positions who are cut off from a direct interest in and relationship with what they are doing. It should be, not just an open secret, but something known to the widest possible circles, that even people whose work is intellectual often have so little interest in their profession that they too are reduced to waiting until after working hours in order to pursue their genuine and human interests. For that very reason it is obvious that we must provide human beings with things of human significance, if we wish to establish a basis for social optimism.

In the intellectual sector of civilization, we have accomplished an extraordinary amount. Today, we can point to all the things that human intelligence has achieved. And undoubtedly, people can learn an enormous amount when we acquaint them with the results of man's achievements in science and art. But that is not the point; the point is that we should be capable not only of disseminating intellectual culture, as a foundation for social structures, but also of exciting people, of inspiring them—not by producing grandiose utterances or well-rounded periods, but by having something to say, something that makes men feel: This touches my humanity.

If, on the other hand, we go to people with a philosophy of life derived from what is now popular and from what is recognized as true by our excellent natural sciences, you can see at once how impossible it is really to grip men's hearts with it and give them something that touches their humanity. Men will always regard the sort of thing they are usually given, as something superficial. In particular, what a man will say if he is willing to speak freely—because you have gained his confidence in other ways—is: “That's all very well: but in the first place we can't really understand what you say, because so much of it needs special preparation; and secondly it isn't straightforward enough for us; there is something that says to us: No thoroughfare!” I have heard many people talk like this about adult education colleges, public libraries and the like, as they are today. If now we seek to base on this experience an approach to society, we must look more deeply for the causes of the difficulty. And here once more I am compelled to introduce—in parenthesis, so to speak—part of a philosophy of life.

When, as we have often done during the last few days, we look at the Asiatic civilizations, so many legacies from which survive in our schools (even our secondary schools and universities), we find there, at any rate where the culture was at its height, something that must still be of inestimable value to us today. Its characteristic feature is that the knowledge of the world and philosophy of life discovered there were apprehended by the human spirit; and this in turn developed into the intellect, which I have described as the specific force of modern times. Our modern highly-developed intellect is, fundamentally, a late development of what, in the East, was dream-like clairvoyance. This dream-like clairvoyance has cast off its direct insight into the outside world and evolved into our inner logical order—into the great modern means of acquiring knowledge of nature.

And in the last analysis we must recognize, in the medium of philosophical communication in Europe today, yet another legacy from the Orient. It is not only the medieval schoolmen who still made use of words and concepts and ideas imbued with powers of the soul which derived from the East; we ourselves, however much we may deny it, speak, even in chemistry and physics, in language that we should not use if our education, right up to university level, were not conditioned by something derived from the Orient.

But in becoming intellect, this early clairvoyance has thrown off at the same time another shoot, which has affected the outlook on life of the masses in many ways. It has given rise to views which for the most part have already died out in Europe today, views which have been eradicated by modern elementary school education, and of which only vestiges survive among the most uneducated classes. While on the one hand the intellect has been developing to amazing heights, there has also developed deep down among the people (and far more than present-day psychology has yet revealed) something that projected certain subjective experiences, quite involuntarily, on to the outside world. These assumed the most varied forms, but they can all be covered by the single word “superstition.” Superstition, which signifies the projection of subjective experiences outwards into space and time, played a much greater rôle in mankind's development than is thought today. Even people who are only half-educated can now recognize the belief in ghosts as a superstition; yet there still persist in us, atavistically, many of the feelings that developed under the influence of this belief. In so far as we are the descendants of Oriental humanity in this respect too, we operate in our art and in other branches of life with at least the feelings that spring from this current in human development.

It is possible to examine what is emerging from the depths of social humanity, so to speak, at the present time; to look at the man who has developed out of the technical and mechanical world of modern times; to look into his heart and his quality of soul. And anyone who does so will see that this man—who has not gone through the process that makes the intellect supremely valuable to us today, the process of secondary and university education—has no genuine personal interest in all that can be achieved within the sphere of intelligence; what he has is something quite different. I would say: Something elemental reveals itself in such a man, welling up from depths that are rising to the surface in our social order—something elemental which, in Europe today, is quite inadequately understood, because fundamentally it is something new. But, when it is understood, it can show us the right way to bring a philosophy of life to the masses.

Anyone today who, growing up within mankind, has no contact with our inheritance from the Orient and is thus thrown back upon himself, as the working-man is and very many members of the upper classes too, is not interested first and foremost in the intellect. For him, it is above all the will that he is interested in—and will is something which rises up into the soul from deep below, something which emerges exclusively from man himself. Since this fact has, of course, been noticed in a superficial way, there exists today a certain longing to regard man as a being of will. Many people, indeed, believe that they can speak to the masses in terms of philosophy only if they deal primarily with the element of will in man. As a result of hankerings of this kind, it has come about—as frequently happens—that people have described to the masses “primitive culture,” in which man is still a creature of instinct. They describe to the working-man how these primitive people lived in simple circumstances, and then attempt to draw inferences about what the social order should be like today. In primary education today, a great deal of time is spent in describing the living conditions of these primitive, instinctive people. And there is a good deal of other evidence for the existence of a certain instinctive tendency to put forward the element of will, when people are called upon to expound a philosophy of life.

Out of a certain appetite for the sensational, the man of today does, it is true, accept these descriptions; to some extent, too, he feels in his own being, which has not advanced to a higher level of education, something akin to this instinctive element in human nature. But if you want to warm people, if you want to preserve their souls from desiccation, if you want to make contact with the whole man, then accounts of this kind will not help you.

Why is this? It is because, when you have scaled the peaks of science and acquired what science currently accepts as true, you develop, simply by doing so, something that really constitutes a modern superstition. Admittedly, it is not yet recognized as such; but just as the educated man of more recent times has learnt to regard the old belief in ghosts as a superstition, so to some extent the masses today—as it were prophetically, looking into the future—regard as a kind of superstition the ideas and concepts and notions that we assert about these primitive conditions of humanity.

What do we assert? We assert that mankind was originally governed by instinctive drives. These are something quite obscure, operating in unconscious regions that people are unwilling to define more precisely; they include the instincts, which are also found in animals, and all that is indefinite in man's feelings and expressions of will. People point to the element of natural creature active in man. Many thinkers today regard it as an ideal to depict man in such a way that what is inside him is presented as far as possible in terms of material processes, only elevated into those indefinite concepts that we call drives or instincts.

Let us, however, remember the view of man's inner make-up that I have developed in the last few days. I have shown how the exercises of spiritual science, by developing man, enable him to really see inside himself. He thereby reaches the stage of contemplating his inner organism, not as does the modern physiologist or anatomist from without, but in such a way that the parts of the organism can be inwardly experienced. When you have broken through the reflector of memory, you can look down upon the lungs, heart, etc., as something whose physical structure is merely the outward expression or manifestation of the spiritual—of that spiritual element which I have been able to represent as a world-memory linked with the great cosmos.

This can be sensed by the very man who today is thrown back by his work on to himself. Everywhere he longs to attain an understanding of it. But we achieve this understanding only when we clearly perceive what we are actually doing, when we perceive in its spiritual essence the element of spirit and soul which lies within us—which is not even our property and does not belong to our human personality, but which is the gulf, so to speak, that the cosmos sends into us as human beings. Man can come to know man only when, looking into himself, he finds as the basic substance of his physical being a spiritual element. Once we realize this, however, we also know that to speak of drives, instincts, and all the other things that people are always speaking of nowadays, is to interpose something in front of our real inner nature, just as superstition formerly interposed ghosts in front of external nature. When we speak of drives, instincts and the like in man, we mean only the psyche obscured, so to speak, by our own outlook. In speaking of our human make-up as it really is, we must ignore these spectres that we call instinctive drives, passions and the like, and see through them to reality. We must leave behind the spectres within us, represented by all these definitions of drives, lusts, passions, will and the like, in the same way as we have left behind the ghosts in the sphere of the external, natural order. With those ghosts, we interposed something from within us in front of external nature, and so projected what was subjective on to the objective sphere. Nowadays, we are setting up something that is, objectively, of a spiritual nature, as if it were something material; our drives and instincts, as usually defined, are materialized and internalized ghosts that obscure the true spiritual sphere. This is something which, as a matter of cognitive fact, is little understood nowadays, although it is felt when, with a true knowledge of man, we seek to approach anyone who, from the depths of his unconscious—and in the depths of this unconscious lies the spiritual sphere—instinctively feels: Don't talk to me about your materialized ghosts! You ought to be telling me something about the way in which man and the cosmos have grown up together.

If you have a feeling for society, you will rejoice over experiences like the one I had a few weeks ago, when I was lecturing to a group of working-men. I was originally supposed to speak about political economy. But I always arrange for the audience to choose the subject themselves; before the lecture begins, I let them hand it up to me or tell me, so that the knowledge imparted to them is of a kind that they themselves determine. On this occasion, a working-man took out a copy of our periodical The Three. He said he had read an article of mine in it, but couldn't quite understand what the planet was actually like which preceded the earth, subsequently went over into darkness, and eventually gave rise to the earth. I was able to lay before this man, in a straightforward and simple manner, an explanation in terms of spiritual science. And you could see that, whereas if you speak drily, in abstract concepts, they may feel: There's nothing much for us here! Yet when you speak of this kind of thing, their eyes light up, because they feel that here is something their souls can feed on, just as their bodies feed on what they eat. How their eyes light up when you give them something that grips their whole personality, their heart and soul—something that is not simply a concept of life, but an outlook, a philosophy of life in the sense that it really contains life and can excite enthusiasm, even when the worker comes straight from the machine.

And I certainly believe that social influence of this kind must be exerted first, before we can win men over in any other way—and they must be won over—to establish the appropriate social structures. How long this will take depends on men's determination. I know that many people say: “Oh, you are fobbing us off with something that will only be realized in four or five hundred years time.” To this I always reply: “Quite true, if not enough people want it; but in affairs of this kind, the important thing is not to calculate how long it may take for men to reach these social structures, but to forsake calculation and put our trust in the will.” If the will is present in a sufficiently large number of men, we may hope to attain, in not too great a length of time, what we might otherwise intellectually suppose would take centuries. Nothing is more of an obstacle to our reaching these social configurations than the hesitation that derives from such calculations. You should start, not by worrying about the results of intellectual calculation, but by attempting to come close to man. Then, you will see that, with a philosophy of life that does not interpose materialized ghosts before people's souls, but reveals to them man's link with the cosmos, you will soon meet with an appreciative reception.

Today, the usual reception you will get is as follows: If you take this kind of philosophy of life to those who are professionally qualified to judge it, they will compare it with what is already in existence, and will then take the view that it is amateurish, dilettante and so forth. Or the converse will happen: You wish to speak about these things, which so affect man's innermost self that drives, instincts and the like become spiritualized, and you feel obliged to adopt the scientific forms of expression customary today; otherwise what you have to say will be rejected before you start. But if you do adopt them, you are then told that you are speaking a language that is not for the people. You already knew this. That was why, when speaking to people who expect a great deal from those with scientific education, you set it in quite different contexts of ideas. What is said, however, is exactly the same. And that is how you come to realize that the man whose intellect has not been taught to run along a few particular lines by his specific intellectual training, will understand it. We shall, it is true, first have to leave behind an age in which, for doing this, a man can be thrown out of workers' educational colleges by those who regard themselves as the authentic leaders of the people.

I have had to demonstrate to you, then, that because of the very nature of the masses of humanity, there must exist today a philosophy of life in the form of an anthroposophically orientated spiritual science. For only out of such a philosophy, which can really talk about the spiritual sphere in speaking of man, can there arise any hope of attaining a social understanding. And then, from this social understanding, with people understanding one another, we can go forward to other things.

We can hope for this. This hope is native to us in Central Europe where, throughout the nineteenth century, the best minds sought a method of education by which it would be possible to lay hold of the child, so to speak, in the sphere of the will. They had perceived that a modern human being must be taken hold of in his will. They had not, of course, seen this as clearly as it can be seen with the aid of the philosophy of life I am propounding. But they had a notion of it. That is why they exerted themselves to find intellectual methods which would enable them to reach the child's will by way of his ideas, to lay hold of his will through his thought-forces. And an enormous amount of good was achieved in Central Europe, as a result of the German spirit—this is fully acknowledged in the West, or was at least until the Great War. Attention has always been drawn, in England, to the way in which, in Central Europe, people tried to take hold of the will indirectly, via a pedagogic method, and how this has been transplanted to England. This has always been recognized and described.

When we go still further West, to America, however, we find that, by the circumstances of spiritual geography, they have developed over there a distinct form of primitive philosophy of life—if I may so put it without offence—which yet carries within itself striking potentialities for the future. We find, for example, that in America, when educated people sum up what they think about human beings, they will say: What a man works out intellectually depends on the political party into which circumstances have led him, and on the church he belongs to. In reflecting the opinions of his church, his class, or his party, he does of course make use of his intellect; the real source, however, is not the intellect but the will. Again and again we can see American writers pointing to man's will as his primary substance. Present-day Americans like to quote writers who say: The intellect is nowadays nothing but a minister of state, and the will is the ruler—even though, as Carlyle said, the intellect may be an expensive minister.

This view, moreover, is not an invented abstraction, but something that is in the bones of educated Americans. Even the physiologists there talk in these terms. Anyone who has an ear for such things can perceive a marked difference between the language of physiologists in Europe and that of physiologists in America. Over there, people explicitly discuss how a man's brain is shaped by his situation in the world. They consider the brain to be a mechanism which is dependent, even down to its speech-centres, on the company a man keeps, the extent to which he gets on in life, and so forth. They therefore see the development of the will within the world as the primary aspect of man, and regard all the products of the brain as subordinate, as something which, fundamentally, has very little to do with a man's individuality. These people say: If you want to discover a man's individuality, you must examine his will and see how it developed in his childhood, in the context of his family, his church, his political allegiance, etc.; and then consider how he acquires an intellect which—as an American has said—has about as much to do with his essential being as the horse you ride has to do with the rider.

Although the legacy of the East has also extended as far as America, then, we have there, emerging directly from educated circles, something that in Europe lies in the subterranean depths of human existence. Our own America so to speak, the America that is within Europe, is the instinctive direction of humanity towards the will, and thus towards a very large class of people here. This also gives us the ground on which Europe must in fact reach an understanding with America, if a world-wide social rapprochement is to come about.

We do indeed find that a good deal of what the Americans have developed represents a primitive form of the exercises by which a spiritual vision is attained. Thus, we find Americans repeatedly commending self-control, self-discipline, self-education as all-important: what matters is not having learned something, but implanting it in your will by the constant repetition of a given exercise. We know the effect of rhythmically repeating concepts, and we know how the influence thus brought to bear on man's true centre in turn affects the will. It sometimes takes curious forms, this conscious direction to what, for modern man, must represent the innermost kernel of his being.

And precisely from a rapprochement of this kind we shall be able to develop the further recognition that we must pass through contemplation of the will to reach the spiritual element of man. There follows the prospect of a philosophy of life which (even though the working man cannot help being materialistic at present) can yet be such as I have expounded here—a power that can be developed from the social conditions themselves, so to speak, precisely through a rapprochement between Europe and America.

It was in Central Europe that the finest minds sought for intellectual topics that would be capable of taking hold of the temperament, the volitional side of children. Central European educators in the nineteenth century tried to discover the art of capturing the will by starting from the intellect. But they did not get beyond abstract thinking, which had not then advanced to the living thought. They were still caught up in the Oriental world and its legacy, and on the basis of this early Oriental heritage they sought to take hold of the will.

Then came a great mass of humanity who made will sovereign everywhere. And today we live in a period that contrasts with an earlier age when forces existed to uphold the social order. Even those of us whose outlook is not reactionary cannot help understanding that, in earlier times, a prince attended the same sermon as the lowest peasant in the district; and the man who spoke from within the spiritual life, on behalf of all, had something to say that affected everyone. A perfectly clear public image of the consolidation of the social orders by means of the spirit was definitely there in those earlier periods. It was a definite legacy from the Orient, this image which is apprehended by the head and only later sinks down into the heart. Now something else, something that springs from the will, has appeared. We must find once more a way of speaking philosophically out of a spirit that embraces us all, from the most uneducated to the most educated. Only in this way can we work together, think, feel and will together, so as to establish, in the present, social prospects for the future.

This will come about if we can create a rapprochement between the embryonic beginnings in Europe, as they have been described in the last few days, and what has emerged in America, at a higher level of civilization, so to speak, among educated people in general. A rapprochement aimed at moving westwards will create a basis for an understanding of the development of spirit in the West.

Only if we as Western men show that we are able, out of what we can apprehend within ourselves, to summon up something spiritual and to counter the Oriental spirit, which today is in a state of decadence, with a European-American spirit, will a world economy and a world commerce, such as exists only externally today, be possible, in a framework of genuine confidence between men. Today, even though the Asiatic trades in one form or another with us Western men, in his heart there is still the feeling: Your machines do not impress us! With them, you are turning yourselves into intellectualized machines; that is the kind of men you are, inside. Even X-rays do not impress them. The Oriental will say: With their aid, you can look inside man physically; but what is really important requires no apparatus, it arises from our clairvoyant inner self. Whether legitimate or not, this is the attitude of the Orient. They have a profound belief in the spirit in human nature, and look down with contempt on anything that accepts the constraint, as it seems to them, of technology and the machine, in such a way that man himself operates, in society, like a cog in a machine.

The gap between us and the Orient will be bridged only when we ourselves create a spiritual dimension in our philosophy of life, on foundations such as I have described, combining the spirit of Europe and America. This, however, will require the world to look more closely at Central Europe, which has gone furthest in the evolution of the intellect towards living thought. It is the men of the early part of the nineteenth century—Hegel, Fichte, Schelling—who have gone furthest in the evolution of thought towards life. At least they believed that in what they experienced as the substance of the world, albeit in thoughts that were still abstract, they had something vital and spiritual. What they had, of course, was only the germ of vital thought. That is why Central Europe itself forsook the paths it had been following. They need to be rediscovered by making thought genuinely vital. A rapprochement with Central Europe can bring this about.

When the West has brought forth spirit once again, and when the East not only sees its own spirit, but can also see, even in the trader and merchant, the representative of a spiritual philosophy of life, then the Oriental will no longer look down on us in arrogance; he will be able to reach an understanding. This is what we must seek if we are to have hopes for society. We cannot have them at all unless we realize what has to disappear.

There existed in Central Europe a spirit which proclaimed that everything ultimately collapses but that a new life springs up from the ruins. This is a hope we shall realize only when we look past the externals of society to its inner being. But then we must cease to try to maintain the old order at all costs, and instead have the courage to regard as expendable the things that must be overthrown. The old saying remains true: Nothing can come to fruition which has not first been cast into the earth as a seed, so that it may decay. Well, the word “decay” is not quite accurate here, but the image still holds. In discerning what we need to abandon as decayed, we must move forward to new impulses and to the new life that must blossom out of the ruins. Only in this way can we, in this age, have social hopes for the future.

Die Zeit und Ihre Sozialen Hoffnungen: Europa - Amerika

Meine sehr verehrten Anwesenden! Wer heute Kräfte innerhalb der sozialen Ordnung entdecken will, die zu Hoffnungen berechtigen, der muß schon im Verborgenen suchen. Soziale Nöte und Mängel sind ja offenbar. Hoffnungen, namentlich berechtigte Hoffnungen, weniger.

Allerdings gibt es mehr oder weniger große oder kleine Illusionäre, die auch gegenüber den heutigen großen Zeitschwierigkeiten in diesem oder jenem Rezept das Heil suchen, die allerlei soziale Einrichtungen ausdenken, innerhalb welcher die Menschheit oder wenigstens ein Teil der Menschheit besser gedeihen könne, als das bis jetzt der Fall war. Nun aber glaube ich, daß heute tatsächlich, wenn ich mich so ausdrücken darf, unsere Gescheitheit, unsere allgemeine Gescheitheit so vorgeschritten ist, daß es verhältnismäßig leicht ist, aus sogenannten Vernunftgründen heraus irgendein soziales System auszudenken. Und man kann heute schon recht viele soziale Systeme der verschiedensten Parteischattierungen kennen, ohne sie eigentlich irgendwie schlecht zu finden, und dennoch sich eigentlich nicht viel von ihnen versprechen. Jedenfalls kann derjenige, der die heutige soziale Ordnung nicht bloß wahrnimmt von seiten dessen, was man über sie ausdenken kann, sondern vom Gesichtspunkt der Menschenerkenntnis, eigentlich nur davon sprechen, daß soziale Hoffnungen aufkommen können, wenn der Mensch dem Menschen an sich, möchte ich sagen, wiederum näherkommen kann.

Es handelt sich vor allen Dingen wirklich nicht mehr um das Ersinnen von Einrichtungen, sondern um die Möglichkeit, den Menschen zu finden, so daß man mit ihm zuammen in den sozialen Einrichtungen drinnenstehen kann. Und da wird man sogar zugeben müssen, daß, wenn in dieser Weise der Mensch innerhalb der sozialen Ordnung oder auch des heutigen sozialen Chaos gefunden werden kann, daß dann mehr oder weniger auch diese oder jene äußere Einrichtung dem gleichen Ziel dienen könne. Denn es ist schon so, daß der Mensch in sozialer Beziehung doch auch auf die allermannigfaltigste Weise gedeihen kann, unter den mannigfaltigst gestalteten sozialen Einrichtungen.

Es kommt heute auf den Menschen an, nicht auf die Einrichtungen allein. Deshalb hat es auch gerade in denjenigen Kreisen, in denen man noch die soziale Frage mehr empfindet, als daß man über sie denkt, eine gewisse Befriedigung hervorgerufen, daß ich in meinen «Kernpunkten der sozialen Frage» nicht bloß darauf hingewiesen habe, wie das eine oder das andere beispielsweise anders eingerichtet werden könnte, sondern darauf, daß vieles heute darauf ankommt, daß derjenige, der zum Beispiel ein Unternehmen zu führen hat, in der Lage ist, mit seinem ganzen Menschen entweder selbst oder durch Helfer in die Menschenmasse einzugreifen, die in diesem Unternehmen arbeitet, so daß er ihr nahekommt erstens dadurch, daß er in seinem Unternehmen wirklich auf menschliche Art mit denen, die an dem Unternehmen beteiligt sind, alles das durchspricht, was da vorgeht vom Ankauf, von der Erwerbung des Rohprodukts bis zum Hinbringen des fertigen Produkts auf den Markt und bis zu der Art und Weise, wie es in den Konsum übergeht. Wenn man diesen ganzen Weg auf eine aufs Menschliche hinorientierte Weise immer wieder und wiederum durchspricht mit denjenigen, die am Unternehmen beteiligt sind, dann legt man einen Grund, um erst das andere auf diesem Grund erbauen zu können, was sonst in sozialer Beziehung heute wünschenswert und zu erstreben berechtigt ist.

Aber das genügt noch nicht, wenn man gerade in dieser Art fachmännisch zu den Menschen spricht, sondern es ist noch etwas anderes notwendig. Und was da notwendig ist, damit wir wieder soziale Hoffnungen haben können, davon möchte ich eben gerade heute sprechen.

Es ist seit langer Zeit eine verbreitete Anschauung, daß der Mensch, der in sozialer Beziehung führend ist, vor allen Dingen den Weg suchen müsse zu der großen breiten Masse. Nach dieser Richtung sind Bestrebungen gepflogen worden schon durch das ganze 19. Jahrhundert hindurch. Und als die soziale Frage immer brennender und brennender wurde, da konnte man es bemerken, wie der oder jener Monate hindurch sich selbst als Arbeiter in Fabriken betätigte, um das Arbeiterleben kennenzulernen. Es hat Hofräte gegeben, die, nachdem sie selbst schon pensoniert worden waren, also ihre soziale Arbeit eigentlich schon vollendet hatten, unter die Arbeiter sich begaben und dann erstaunt waren, wie es eigentlich in bezug auf das Volk in Wirklichkeit aussieht. Kurz, es bestehen seit langem Bestrebungen, den Menschen der breiten Masse, insbesondere auch den Proletarier kennenzulernen. Und, man kann schon sagen, ein Bedeutsames, ein Großes haben in dieser Beziehung unsere Literatur, unser Schrifttum, unsere Kunst geleistet. Was Malerei und andere Künste, was das Schrifttum geleistet haben in bezug auf die Darstellung, die zuweilen ergreifende Darstellung dessen, was unter Proletariern, was sonst unter den breiten Massen wächst, das muß selbstverständlich durchaus anerkannt werden. Allein bei den großen Fragen der Gegenwart kommt es eigentlich darauf doch nicht an, daß die führenden Menschen vor allen Dingen das kennenlernen, was unter Proletariern oder sonst in der breiten Masse lebt, wenig kommt im Grunde genommen heute eigentlich darauf an, daß man auch mit künstlerischem Sinn aus dem Innern heraus schildert, wie die breiten Massen leben, wie sie vom Elend geplagt werden etwa, von Sorgen geplagt werden, wie sie streben, was sie für Ideen, für Ziele haben und so weiter, Ich möchte sagen: Es kommt heute weniger darauf an, daß wir einen Weg finden, um die breiten Massen zu verstehen, sondern es kommt vielmehr darauf an, daß wir die Möglichkeit finden, von diesen breiten Massen verstanden zu werden, daß wir hineingehen in die Fabrik, in jegliche Unternehmung, und so sprechen können, daß wir nicht als akademisch, daß wir nicht als «gebildet», nicht als theoretisch empfunden werden, sondern daß wir als Menschen empfunden werden, empfunden werden so, daß wir etwas zu sagen haben, was tatsächlich in die Seelen hinein spricht.

Schöne Bestrebungen sind ja seit langem im Gang, allerlei Volkshochschulen, Volksbildungsanstalten und so weiter zu begründen. Was da an das Volk herangebracht wird, interessiert zwar eine Weile durch das Befremdende, das manche wissenschaftliche Resultate haben, es ruft Sensation hervor, wenn wir es etwa mit Lichtbildern begleitet sein lassen, oder wenn wir gar mit den Leuten in Menagerien gehen und dergleichen. Aber man sollte sich keiner Illusion darüber hingeben, daß das nicht wirklich hineinspricht in die Seelen, daß das die Herzen nicht ergreift. In die Seelen hineinsprechen, Herzen ergreifen, das können wir nur, wenn wir etwas zu sagen haben, was davon handelt, wie der Mensch in das ganze Dasein hineingestellt ist. Darüber haben allerdings heute führende Persönlichkeiten noch ganz merkwürdige Ansichten. Sie denken sich, daß der Angehörige der breiten Volksmassen sich ja doch nicht, wie sie das nennen, für «philosophische Fragen» zum Beispiel interessiere. O nein! Wenn man nur die richtige Sprache, in die das gegossen werden muß, findet, dann leuchten die Augen auf, dann schließen sich die Herzen auf. Wenn man zum Beispiel von ganz einfachen wissenschaftlichen Tatsachen ausgehrt, diese einfachen wissenschaftlichen Tatsachen dann so zu behandeln weiß, daß zuletzt aus der Betrachtung Menschenwesen und Menschenbestimmung herausspringt, und man dadurch, daß man den Leuten zeigt: die Dinge sind gut begründet, und auf der anderen Seite zeigt: das ist nicht ein zersplittertes Wissen, das einen höchstens interessieren kann in den Mußestunden, sondern etwas, was der Mensch in seine Seele aufnehmen kann, so daß er Seelennahrung hat - wenn einem das gelingt, dann erst hat man den Anfang damit gemacht, Vertrauen zu schaffen zwischen dem sogenannten Volk und den führenden Persönlichkeiten. Heute können Sie reden vom Parteistandpunkt aus, heute können Sie irgendwie an das Volk Begriffe heranbringen von «Kapitalismus», von «Arbeit», von «Mehrwert» und dergleichen: das Volk wird sich diese Begriffe nach und nach aneignen; dann können Sie parteimäßig sprechen. Aber Sie werden mit diesem parteimäßigen Sprechen die Menschen nicht dazu bringen, nun in solche soziale Gestaltungen einzugehen, in denen sie tatsächlich mit ihrer ganzen Menschlichkeit Anteil nehmen, mitzuarbeiten, auf daß das entsteht, was man erhoffen muß, wenn nicht die Niedergangs-, sondern die Aufgangskräfte siegen sollen.

Nun, wenn man nur den Willen zu solchen Sachen hat, dann kann man das wahrnehmen, was da eigentlich waltet, wo heute noch die Hindernisse und die Hemmungen liegen. Ich selbst war jahrelang Lehrer an einer Arbeiterbildungsschule. Ich habe die verschiedensten Unterrichtszweige dort zu vertreten gehabt. Ich habe mich niemals irgendeinem Parteidogma gefügt; aber ich habe auch niemals ein Hindernis gefunden im Verständnis, das mir entgegengebracht worden ist gerade von seiten des Proletariers, wenn ich die Geschichte zum Beispiel so vorgetragen habe, daß ich überall habe durchleuchten lassen, wie die Geschichte nicht etwas ist, was sich in geschichtsmaterialistische Anschauung fassen läßt, sondern etwas, in dem geistige Kräfte und geistige Impulse wirksam sind. Und ich konnte sogar ein gewisses Verständnis dafür hervorrufen, warum zum Beispiel Marx, den man dazumal in den Kreisen meiner Zuhörer sehr gut innehatte, zu der Anschauung gekommen ist, die man als «geschichtlichen Materialismus» bezeichnet, und die eben dahin geht, daß alles, was als Geistiges vorhanden ist, nur Äußerungen von mechanistischen, von wirtschaftlichen und so weiter Umständen seien. Ich konnte den Leuten begreiflich machen, daß das davon herkommt, daß in der Tat im geschichtlichen Leben seit etwa dem 16. Jahrhundert immer mehr und mehr die Kräfte hervorgetreten sind, durch die das wirtschaftliche Leben so tonangebend, so ausschlaggebend geworden ist, daß tatsächlich Kunst, Wissenschaft und so weiter wie Ergebnisse erscheinen, in gewisser Beziehung es sogar sind, des wirtschaftlichen Lebens, des mechanistischen Lebens. Und weil Marx nur die neuere Geschichte kannte, kam er zu seinem Irrtum.

Ich will aber gar nicht Partei nehmen für das eine oder das andere, sondern nur darauf hinweisen, daß selbst dieses verstanden worden ist. Nicht das mangelnde Vertrauen der Zuhörer hat diese Art der Volksunterweisung unmöglich gemacht, sondern das, daß eines Tages die gebräuchlichen Führer merkten: da wird nicht parteidogmatisch gelehrt, da wird so gelehrt, daß nach bestem Wissen und Ermessen das, was zur Veranschaulichung gebracht wird, aus dem Menschlichen hervorgebracht wird. Und sie bekamen Angst, diese gebräuchlichen Führer, daß sich die Zuhörerschaft immer mehr und mehr vermehre. Und eines Tages erschien ein Abgesandter dieser Führer in einer Versammlung, die zu dem Zwecke einberufen worden war, zu untersuchen, ob ich geeignet wäre zum Lehrer an der Arbeiterbildungsschule. Es erschien ein Arbeiterführer. Und als ich die Bemerkung machte: Ja, wenn ein Prinzip des Fortschritts innerhalb dieser Kreise geltend gemacht werden soll, so muß doch hier wenigstens eine völlige Lehrfreiheit herrschen —, da antwortete dieser Abgesandte: Freiheit, das anerkennen wir nicht! Wir anerkennen nur einen vernünftigen Zwang.

Nun, von dieser Anschauung ging dann mein Ausschließen aus dem Lehrerkollegium jener Arbeiterbildungsschule aus. Aber für mich selbst war das ein wirklich wichtiges Studium — nicht das Hinausgeworfenwerden zuletzt, sondern das Zusammensein mit den breiten Volksmassen vorher, die gerade im modernen Proletariat zu finden sind —, ein Studium aus dem Grunde, weil man sehen konnte: Redet man nur aus dem vollen Menschentum heraus, redet man so, daß die Zuhörer den Eindruck haben: da wird uns etwas gesagt, was uns bis ans Herz herandringt, was mit unserer Menschlichkeit zu tun hat, was mit unserer Menschheit als Erdenwesen zu tun hat, dann betrachten sie dieses aus einer Weltanschauung herauskommende Denken heute als das Wichtigste, was an sie herantreten kann. Ein Gefühl dafür ist vorhanden, daß vor allen Dingen Aufklärung, jetzt nicht im parteimäßigen Sinn, sondern im allgemein menschlichen Sinn, unter die Massen kommen müsse. Die Leute lechzen, mehr oder weniger unbewußt, nach dem, was aus einer wirklichen breiten Weltanschauung heraus kommt.

Und wie sollte es anders sein, meine sehr verehrten Anwesenden! Sehen wir doch, wie breite Menschenmassen heute so an ihre Arbeit hingestellt sind, daß diese Arbeit sie eigentlich unmöglich interessieren kann. Sie verrichten diese Arbeit, als ob sie etwas vor sich hätten, was zu ihrem Menschentum in gar keiner Beziehung stünde, Daher sind auch die Verbindungen, die Genossenschaften, die Gewerkschaften, für die in diesen Kreisen eine Neigung ist, so, daß sie sich zwar gliedern nach den Gewerben - es gibt Metallarbeitergewerkschaften, Buchdruckergewerkschaften und so weiter —, daß sie aber im Grunde genommen mit diesem Momente der Produktion außerordentlich wenig zu tun haben, sondern das meiste zu tun haben mit dem, was auf dem Gebiet des materiellen Lebens allgemein menschlich ist, das ist die Konsumtion, das ist die Geltendmachung der menschlichen Bedürfnisse. In bezug auf Produktion mußte die Menschheit zur Resignation schreiten, in bezug auf die Konsumtion aber durchaus nicht in demselben Grade. Und so steht heute ein großer Teil der modernen Menschheit vor einer Arbeit, die den Menschen ganz zurückweist auf sich selbst. Ihn kann nicht interessieren, was seine Umgebung ist; ihn kann nicht interessieren, was er vom Morgen bis zum Abend tut, wenn man es ihm nicht so beibringt, daß er Interesse haben kann; ihn interessiert vor allen Dingen, deshalb muß damit angefangen werden, was sich ihm darstellt, wenn er mit sich allein ist nach der Arbeit, wenn er einzig und allein ins Auge fassen kann, was er als Mensch ist. Und wir müssen sagen, wenn wir auf das soziale Chaos unserer Tage hinschauen, so finden wir schon deutlich genug, daß viele Menschen, auch der führenden Stände, herausgerissen sind aus dem, was unmittelbares Interesse, was unmittelbarer Zusammenhang mit dem ist, was man tut. Es dürfte ja auch nicht etwa bloß ein offenes Geheimnis sein, sondern etwas, was in weitesten Kreisen bekannt ist, daß heute selbst viele, die einen geistigen Beruf haben, eigentlich auch an diesem geistigen Beruf so wenig Interesse haben, daß sie auch darauf angewiesen sind, erst dann, wenn sie von ihrem Beruf hinweggehen, sich bloß für sich als Menschen zu interessieren. Aber schon daraus geht hervor, daß es nötig ist, daß man Menschliches an die Menschen heute heranbringt, wenn man soziale Hoffnungen begründen will.

In bezug auf Verstandeskultur haben wir ja außerordentlich vieles geleistet. Wir können heute darauf hinweisen, was menschliche Intelligenz alles geleistet hat. Und es kann gewiß außerordentlich viel gelernt werden, wenn man die Ergebnisse der menschlichen Leistungen in Wissenschaft und Kunst und so weiter an die Menschen heranbringt. Aber darum kann es sich doch nicht handeln, sondern es handelt sich darum, daß man in der Lage ist, nicht nur verstandesmäßige Bildung heute zu verbreiten, um soziale Gestaltungen zu begründen, sondern daß man in der Lage ist, den Menschen warm zu machen, den Menschen zu begeistern, zu begeistern nicht dadurch, daß man große und hohe Worte macht, daß man seine Reden schön formt, sondern dadurch, daß man etwas zu sagen hat, bei dem der Mensch erfühlt und empfindet: das rührt an mein Menschentum.

Wenn wir aber heute mit einer Weltanschauung an die Menschen herantreten, die wir herausnehmen aus dem, was heute populär ist, was heute auch schon aus unseren ausgezeichneten, großartigen Wissenschaften als anerkannt gewonnen werden kann, man wird sich alsbald überzeugen, wie es unmöglich ist, damit wirklich ins Herz der Menschen hineinzugreifen, etwas dem Menschen zu geben, was an sein Menschentum rührt. Der Mensch wird das immer als etwas Äußerliches empfinden, was man ihm auf die gewöhnliche Weise geben kann, und er wird es vor allen Dingen:so empfinden, daß er, wenn er sich dann vertrauensvoll ausspricht, weil man durch andere Eigenschaften sein Vertrauen gewinnt, daß er einem dann sagt: Ja, das wäre alles recht schön; aber erstens können wir das gar nicht verstehen, denn da sind so viele Dinge darinnen, zu denen man erst eine besondere Vorbildung haben muß, so daß wir das nicht verstehen können, und dann ist es uns nicht einfach genug; es ist etwas, was uns sagt: Du kannst da nicht hinüber. - Viele Menschen habe ich so reden hören über das, was heute Volkshochschulen, Volksbibliotheken und dergleichen sind. Wenn man aber gerade auf Grund einer solchen Erfahrung sucht, wie man in das soziale Leben hineinkommt, dann muß man eben tiefer suchen, woran das eigentlich liegt. Und da bin ich wieder genötigt, ich möchte sagen, als Episode etwas Weltanschauliches einfließen zu lassen.

Wenn wir hinüberblicken, wie wir das ja in diesen Tagen oftmals getan haben, in die asiatisch-orientalischen Kulturen, von denen so viele Erbstücke bis in unsere Schulen, sogar bis in unsere Mittel- und Hochschulen hinein vorhanden sind, so finden wir, daß da allerdings auf den Höhen der Bildung etwas ist, was uns auch heute noch von einem unsäglichen Wert sein muß. Das aber, was das Charakteristische ist, was einmal auf diesem Gebiet an Welterkenntnissen, Weltanschauungen gefunden worden ist, das ist doch erfaßt worden mit dem menschlichen Geist, der dann in weiterer Entwickelung der Intellekt geworden ist, von dem ich ja als der besonderen Kraft der neueren Zeit in diesen Tagen auch gesprochen habe. Unser neuzeitlicher besonders stark entwickelter Intellekt ist im Grunde genommen ein spätes Entwickelungsprodukt dessen, was im Orient drüben träumerisches Hellsehen war. Dieses träumerische Hellsehen hat abgeworfen, was unmittelbarer Einblick in die Außenwelt war, und hat sich heraufentwickelt zu unserer inneren logischen Ordnung, zu dem, was heute das große Mittel ist, um Naturerkenntnis zu erringen.

Und im Grunde genommen müssen wir auch in dem, was wir heute als das Mittel der Mitteilung für Weltanschauliches in Europa haben, ein Erbstück erkennen, das wir aus dem Orient haben. Nicht nur die mittelalterlichen Scholastiker haben noch so geredet, daß in ihren Wortformen und Begriffsformen und Ideenformen das enthalten war an Kräften der Seele, was herübergekommen ist aus dem Orient, sondern auch wir - wenn wir es auch ableugnen — reden bis in die Chemie und Physik hinein in Worten, in denen wir nicht reden würden, wenn nicht unsere Bildung bis in die höheren Schulen hinauf im Grunde genommen ein Ergebnis dessen wäre, was vom Orient herübergekommen ist.

Aber indem dasjenige, was altes Hellsehen war, Intellekt geworden ist, hat es gleichzeitig wie einen anderen Zweig aus sich das herausgetrieben, was vielfach maßgebend geworden ist für die Weltanschauung breiter Volksmassen, Anschauungen, die eigentlich heute in Europa zum großen Teil schon ausgestorben sind, die ausgemerzt worden sind von der neueren Volksschulbildung, die nur noch in Resten vorhanden sind in den ungebildetsten Klassen. Während sich auf der einen Seite der Intellekt bis zu wunderbaren Höhen entwickelt hat, entwickelte sich viel mehr, als das die heutige Seelengeschichte zeigt, auf dem Grund des Volkstums das, was gewisse subjektive Erlebnisse einfach unwillkürlich hinausprojizierte in den Raum, was zwar die mannigfaltigsten Formen annahm, was aber doch mit dem einheitlichen Wort Gespensteraberglaube benannt werden kann. Dieser Gespensteraberglaube, der darin besteht, daß subjektive Erlebnisse objektiv hinausversetzt werden in den Raum und in die Zeit, spielte im Laufe der geschichtlichen Entwickelung der Menschheit eine viel größere Rolle, als man heute denkt. Und wenn heute auch jeder halbwegs Gebildete diesen Gespensterglauben als Aberglauben erkennt, so leben doch vielfach noch atavistisch in uns die Gefühle, die sich unter dem Einfluß dieses Gespensterglaubens entwickelt haben. Und vielfach arbeiten wir, insofern wir auch in dieser Beziehung Nachkommen des orientalischen Wesens sind, auch in unserer Kunst und in anderen Lebenszweigen wenigstens mit den Gefühlen, die sich aus dieser Strömung der Menschheitsentwickelung ergeben haben.

Wer nun genauer hinsieht, was da heraufkommt, ich möchte sagen, aus den Tiefen des sozialen Menschentums in der heutigen Zeit, wer hinschauen kann auf den Menschen, der sich durch das technische, durch das maschinelle Wesen in der neueren Zeit herausgebildet hat, wer hineinschauen kann in dessen Herz, in dessen Seelenbeschaffenheit, der sieht, daß im Grunde genommen in diesem Menschen, der nicht durch das hindurchgegangen ist, was uns heute vor allen Dingen den IntelJlekt wertvoll macht, die Mittel- und Hochschulbildung, daß in diesem Menschen ein innerliches, wirkliches, nicht phrasenhaftes Interesse für all das, was innerhalb der Intelligenz werden kann, dennoch nicht vorhanden ist, sondern etwas ganz anderes. Ich möchte sagen: Hier offenbart sich Elementarisches, das heraufkommt aus den Tiefen, die sich nach oben bewegen in unserer Sozialen Ordnung, Elementarisches, das man im allergeringsten Maße heute in Europa noch versteht, weil es im Grunde genommen etwas Neues ist und, wenn es verstanden wird, zeigen kann, wie man vor die breite Masse hintreten muß mit Weltanschaulichem.

Wer heute, ohne verbunden zu sein mit dem, was Erbschaft ist aus dem Orient, in der Menschheit aufwächst und so auf sich zurückgewiesen ist, wie es der Proletarier ist und wie es auch viele, viele Menschen der höheren Stände sind, bei dem ist es nicht in erster Linie der Intellekt, der in den Umkreis seines Interesses tritt, bei dem ist es der Wille vor allen Dingen, dasjenige, was aus den Tiefen heraufdringt in die Seele, was durchaus aus dem Menschen selber kommt. Weil dies immerhin äußerlich gemerkt worden ist, ist heute auch eine gewisse Sehnsucht vorhanden, den Menschen als Willenswesen zu betrachten. Und viele glauben ja, daß sie gerade zu den breiten Massen weltanschaulich nur dann sprechen können, wenn sie vor allen Dingen auf das Willensmäßige im Menschen eingehen. Aus diesen Sehnsuchten ist erwachsen, was man so häufig findet, daß man den breiten Massen die «Urkultur» darstellt, wo der Mensch noch ein Triebwesen ist. Man stellt vor den Proletarier, wie der Mensch in solchen Urzeiten in einfachen Verhältnissen lebte, und will dann Schlüsse ziehen auf das, was heute soziale Ordnung sein soll. Viel Zeit wird gerade heute bei der Volksbildung damit zugebracht, daß man diese primitiven, triebmäßigen Menschenverhältnisse darstellt. Und vieles andere ist noch da, was darauf hinweist: es ist ein gewisser Instinkt dafür vorhanden, das Willensmäßige hinzustellen, wenn es sich darum handelt, Weltanschauung vor den Menschen zu vertreten.

Aus einem gewissen Sensationsbedürfnis heraus nimmt zwar der Mensch heute solche Darstellungen hin, er fühlt gewissermaßen auch in seiner eigenen Wesenheit, die nicht bis zu einer höheren Bildung emporgedrungen ist, etwas Verwandtes mit diesem Triebhaften in der Menschennatur. Aber wenn man die Leute warm machen will, wenn man ihre Seelen nicht veröden lassen will, wenn man an den ganzen Menschen herankommen will, dann kommt man damit doch nicht zurecht.

Und man muß da doch etwas ein Vollmensch sein, wenn man sich die Frage beantworten will: Warum kommt man denn nicht zurecht? - Nun, deshalb nicht, weil man, wenn man heute auf der Höhe der Wissenschaft steht und sich das, was heute wissenschaftlich anerkannt ist, angeeignet hat, gerade dadurch etwas entwickelt, was zwar noch nicht als solcher erkannt ist, was aber dennoch ein moderner Aberglaube ist: Geradeso wie der gebildete Mensch einer späteren Zeit den alten Gespensteraberglauben als einen solchen empfinden gelernt hat, so empfindet gewissermaßen heute die breite Masse der Menschheit, wie prophetisch, wie in die Zukunft blickend, das als eine Art von Aberglauben, was wir gerade als Ideen und Begriffe und Vorstellungen über diese primitiven Verhältnisse in der Menschennatur vorbringen.

Was bringen wir denn da vor? Wir bringen vor, daß die Menschheit ursprünglich von einem Triebleben beherrscht wird. Das ist etwas recht Dunkles, was in den unbewußten Regionen waltet, das man nicht genauer definieren will: das Triebleben, in das die Instinkte, die man auch im Tiere findet, und alles Unbestimmte in den Willensäußerungen und Empfindungen des Menschen hereinscheinen. Man weist auf etwas hin, was wie ein Naturwesenhaftes innerhalb des Menschen waltet. Man betrachtet es vielfach heute als Ideal, den Menschen so darzustellen, daß man das, was im menschlichen Innern ist, möglichst als materielle Vorgänge, nur eben heraufgehoben in die unbestimmten Vorstellungen des Trieb-, des Instinktlebens und so weiter darstellt.

Aber erinnern wir uns an das, was in diesen Tagen hier von mir über das Innere der Menschennatur entwickelt worden ist. Ich habe dargestellt, wie die geisteswissenschaftlichen Übungen durch Entwickelung den Menschen dazu bringen, in Wirklichkeit in sein Innerliches hineinzuschauen. Er kommt dann darauf, seinen inneren Organismus nun nicht wie der moderne Physiologe oder Anatom von außen anzuschauen, sondern so anzuschauen, wie die Dinge in diesem Organismus innerlich erlebt werden können. Hat man den Gedächtnisspiegel durchstoßen, so sieht man hinunter auf Lunge, Herz und so weiter als auf das, was in seiner physischen Gestaltung nur der äußere Ausdruck, die äußere Offenbarung des Geistigen ist, und zwar eines Geistigen, das ich darstellen konnte wie ein Weltengedächtnis, das zusammenhängt mit dem großen Kosmos.

Ahnen kann das gerade der Mensch, der heute zurückgewiesen wird von seiner Arbeit auf sich selbst. Lechzen aber muß er überall, Verständnis dafür zu erlangen. Dann aber erlangen wir nur dies Verständnis, wenn wir durchschauen, was wir eigentlich tun, wenn wir das, was in uns als Geistiges, als Seelisches lebt, was nicht einmal unser Eigenes ist, nicht zu unserer menschlichen Persönlichkeit gehört, sondern was der Golf ist, möchte ich sagen, den der Kosmos in uns als Menschen hereinsendet, wenn wir das in seinem geistig-seelischen Wesen durchschauen. Der Mensch kann den Menschen nur erkennen, wenn er, hineinschauend in sich, auch auf die Grundwesenheit seines Leiblichen als eines GeistigSeelischen kommt. Dann aber, wenn wir das wissen, dann wissen wir auch, daß, wenn wir nun von «Trieben», «Instinkten», von all dem sprechen, wovon man heute so gerne spricht, es etwas ist, was wir vor die wahre innere Natur so hinstellen, wie einstmals der Aberglaube die Gespenster vor die äußere Natur hingestellt hat. Ja, wenn wir von «Trieben», von «Instinkten» und dergleichen im Menschen reden, so ist das nur, ich möchte sagen, das durch unsere Anschauung dunkelgemachte Seelische. Wenn wir von der Menschennatur in Wahrheit reden, dürfen wir nicht die Gespenster des Trieblebens, der Leidenschaften und dergleichen sehen, sondern wir müssen durch sie auf die Wahrheit hindurchschauen, wir müssen sozusagen das Realgespensterhafte in unserem Innern, das alle Definition von Trieben, Begierden, Leidenschaften, von Willen und dergleichen darstellt, ebenso überwinden, wie wir die Gespenster überwunden haben gegenüber der äußeren Naturordnung. Bei den Gespenstern haben wir das, was in uns entsteht, vor die äußere Natur hingesetzt, das Subjektive hinausprojiziert in das Objektive. Hier stellen wir etwas, was geistigseelischer Natur in seiner Objektivität ist, so hin, als wenn es ein Materielles wäre; unsere Triebe und Instinkte sind in den Definitionen, wie sie gegeben werden, die materialisierten, ins Innere des Menschen verlegten Gespenster, die vor der Wahrheit des GeistigSeelischen stehen. Das ist etwas, was als ein Erkenntnistatbestand heute wenig durchschaut wird, was aber gefühlt wird, wenn wir heute mit wirklicher Menschenerkenntnis an denjenigen Menschen herankommen wollen, der aus den Tiefen seines Unbewußten heraus, und in diesen Tiefen des Unbewußten ist ja gewissermaßen das Geistig-Seelische, ahnt: Ihr dürft mir nicht kommen mit den materiellen Gespenstern! Ihr sollt mir etwas sagen darüber, wie der Mensch mit dem Kosmos zusammengewachsen ist!

Meine sehr verehrten Anwesenden! Wenn man heute soziales Gefühl hat, dann jauchzt dieses innere Gefühl auf, wenn einem so etwas passiert, wie mir vor wenigen Wochen passiert ist, wo ich innerhalb einer Arbeiterschaft vorzutragen hatte. Zunächst war meine Aufgabe, über nationalökonomische Begriffe zu sprechen. Aber ich richte die Sache immer so ein, daß ich die Leute die Themen selber wählen lasse, daß ich mir vor Beginn des Vortrags das Thema überreichen oder sagen lasse, so daß eigentlich ganz aus dem Sinn der Leute heraus das geholt wird, was ihnen als Erkenntnis übergeben werden soll. Und siehe, da passierte es, daß einer der Arbeiter ein Heft unserer Zeitschrift «Die Drei» hervorholte und sagte, er hätte da einen Aufsatz von mir gelesen und hätte da nicht gut verstanden, wie der Planet eigentlich war, der der Erde vorangegangen ist, der dann in die Dunkelheit übergegangen ist und aus dem sich dann die Erde ergeben hat. Und ich konnte beginnen, nun wirklich geisteswissenschaftliche Erörterungen in gerader Linie, in einfacher Art vor diese Arbeiter hinzustellen. Und man konnte sehen: während sie, wenn man trocken, in abstrakten Begriffen spricht, etwa empfinden: Das gibt uns nichts Besonderes! —, ihre Augen aufleuchten, wenn man von solchen Dingen spricht, weil sie fühlen: da ist etwas, wovon ihre Seele zehren kann so, wie ihr Leib von der Nahrung zehrt, die er zu sich nimmt — wie ihre Augen aufleuchten, wenn man ihnen etwas gibt, was nun in den ganzen Menschen, in Herz und Seele eingreift, was nicht bloß Weltidee ist, sondern Weltanschauung in dem Sinn, daß in dieser Weltanschauung wirklich Leben vorhanden ist, daß sie Enthusiasmus erregen kann, selbst dann, wenn der Arbeiter unmittelbar von der Maschine kommt.

Und das glaube ich nun schon einmal, daß solches soziale Wirken vorangehen müsse allem anderen, bevor wir dazu kommen können, irgendwie sonst die Menschen dazu zu gewinnen - und sie müssen gewonnen werden —, die sozialen Gestaltungen dementsprechend zu haben. Wie lange das dauert, das hängt ab von dem guten Willen der Menschen. Ich weiß, wie viele Menschen sagen: Ja, da verweist du uns auf etwas, was erst in vier bis fünf Jahrhunderten Wirklichkeit werden kann. Ich sage dann immer: Ganz gewiß, wenn zu wenige Menschen das wollen. Aber bei all diesen Dingen handelt es sich nicht darum, daß man ausrechnet, wie lange das dauern kann, bis die Menschen zu solchen sozialen Gestaltungen kommen, sondern daß man dieses Rechnen sein läßt und die Sache in den Willen einfahren läßt. Wenn dieser Wille bei einer genügend großen Anzahl von Menschen vorhanden ist, dann können wir hoffen, daß das in einer gar nicht zu langen Zeit erreicht werden kann, wovon man sich sonst intellektualistisch vorstellt, daß es Jahrhunderte dauern könnte. Nichts hindert uns mehr, zu solchen sozialen Gestaltungen zu kommen, als jenes Zaudern, das aus solchem Berechnen hervorgeht. Man kümmere sich zunächst gar nicht darum, was die Rechnung im intellektualistischen Sinne ergibt, sondern man suche an die Menschen heranzukommen, und man wird sehen, wie man mit einer Weltanschauung, die ihnen nicht materialisierte Gespenster vor die Seele rückt, sondern die ihnen den Zusammenhang des Menschen mit dem Kosmos enthüllt, sehr rasches Verständnis finden wird.

Heute ist das Verständnis dieses: Wenn man mit solch einer Weltanschauung an diejenigen herantritt, die berufen sind, sie zu beurteilen, kommen diese und vergleichen sie mit dem, was man schon hat, und dann kommen sie darauf, daß das laienhaft, dilettantisch sei und so weiter. Oder aber es liegt das andere vor: Wenn man heute sprechen muß über diese Dinge, die nun wirklich das Innerste des Menschen so berühren, daß die Triebe und Instinkte und dergleichen vergeistigt werden, dann ist man genötigt, das in die heute gebräuchlichen wissenschaftlichen Formen zu kleiden; sonst wird man von vornherein mit diesen Dingen zurückgewiesen. Tut man dieses, dann wird gesagt: Du sprichst in einer Sprache, die nicht für das Volk ist. Das weiß man schon. Daher taucht man das auch, wenn man für diejenigen spricht, die Anforderungen der wissenschaftlichen Bildung stellen, in ganz andere Ideenzusammenhänge. Es wird aber durchaus dasselbe gegeben. Dann gerade sieht man, daß der Mensch, dessen Intellekt zunächst nicht durch diese und jene intellektuelle Vorbildung in bestimmte Bahnen gelenkt ist, es versteht. Allerdings, die Zeit muß erst überwunden werden, in der man, weil man dieses tut, gerade aus Arbeiterbildungsschulen hinausgeworfen wird durch diejenigen, die sich für die berufenen Führer derer halten, die als die breite Masse des Volkes dastehen.

Nun, ich mußte Sie also darauf hinweisen, daß schon durch die Beschaffenheit der breiten Masse der Menschen heute eine Weltanschauung als anthroposophisch orientierte Geisteswissenschaft da sein muß. Denn nur aus einer solchen Weltanschauung, die, wenn sie vom Menschen spricht, wirklich vom Geistigen reden kann, kann die Hoffnung quellen, daß man soziales Verständnis findet. Und dann kann man von diesem sozialen Verständnis mit den sich verstehenden Menschen zu weiterem schreiten. Das kann eine Hoffnung sein.

Diese Hoffnung liegt uns in Mitteleuropa außerordentlich nahe. In Mitteleuropa haben die besten Menschen durch das ganze 19. Jahrhundert hindurch nach einer Erziehungsmethode gesucht, durch die man das Kind sozusagen doch beim Willen fassen könne. Man hat schon geahnt, daß der moderne Mensch am Willen gefaßt sein muß. Man hat es allerdings nicht so eingesehen, wie es die Weltanschauung einsehen kann, die von hier aus vertreten wird. Aber man hat es geahnt. Daher bemühte man sich, diejenigen intellektualistischen Methoden zu finden, durch die man auf dem Wege der Vorstellung an den Willen der Kinder herankommen kann, das Kind mit seinen Denkkräften im Willen erfassen kann. Und eine Unsumme Gutes ist gerade in Mitteleuropa aus dem deutschen Geist heraus — das wird im Westen mit voller Anerkennung zugegeben, wurde wenigstens bis zum Kriege zugegeben — geleistet worden. Immer wurde in England hingewiesen darauf, wie man in Mitteleuropa den Willen auf dem Umwege durch die pädagogische Methode zu ergreifen suchte und wie dieses hinüberverpflanzt worden ist nach England. Das wurde immer anerkannt und dargestellt.

Aber wenn wir noch weiter nach Westen gehen, nach Amerika, dann finden wir, wie sich aus den geistig-geographischen Verhältnissen eine bestimmte Form einer primitiven, möchte ich sagen, ich will aber niemand verletzen, einer primitiven Weltanschauung herausentwickelt, die aber merkwürdige Keime für die Zukunft in sich trägt. Wir finden zum Beispiel, daß gerade in Amerika die gebildeten Menschen, wenn sie zusammenfassen, was sie über den Menschen denken, sagen: Was der Mensch intellektualistisch ausdenkt, das hängt davon ab, welcher Partei er durch die Umstände zugeführt worden ist, in welcher Sekte er drinnensteht; aber indem er so die Meinung seiner Sekte, seines Standes, seiner Partei wiedergibt, bedient er sich zwar seines Intellekts; das aber, woraus das hervorquillt, ist nicht der Intellekt, sondern ist der Wille. Und immer wieder sehen wir gerade innerhalb der amerikanischen Literatur auf den Willen des Menschen als auf die ursprüngliche Wesenheit hindeuten. Gerne zitieren gerade Amerikaner heute solche Schriftsteller, die sagen: Der Intellekt ist heute nichts anderes als der Minister eines Staates, und der Herrscher ist der Wille, wenn auch dieser Intellekt ein teurer Minister ist, wie Carlyle gesagt hat.

Das ist aber nicht eine Anschauung, die theoretisch konstruiert ist, das ist eine Anschauung, die gerade bei gebildeten Amerikanern in Fleisch und Blut übergegangen ist. So reden auch die Physiologen dort. Und derjenige, der für solche Dinge ein Ohr hat, empfindet einen sehr deutlichen Unterschied zwischen der Sprache der Physiologen in Europa und der Sprache der Physiologen in Amerika. Da reden die Leute ganz besonders deutlich davon, wie aus der Art und Weise, wie der Mensch in der Welt drinnensteht, sein Gehirn gebildet wird. Sie meinen, das Gehirn wäre ein Mechanismus, der selbst bis in seine Sprachzentren hinein abhängig sei von der Art und Weise, wie sich der Mensch bewege, wie er in der Welt vorwärtskomme und so weiter, so daß diese Leute die Entfaltung des Willens innerhalb der Welt als das Ursprüngliche im Menschen sehen und alles, was das Gehirn produziert, als das Dienende, als das, was im Grunde genommen nicht viel mit der Individualität des Menschen zu tun hat. Diese Leute sagen: Willst du die Individualität des Menschen kennenlernen, so schaue auf seinen Willen, schaue, wie sein Wille sich herausgebildet hat in seiner Kindheit aus seiner Familie, aus der Sekte, aus der Partei und so weiter; und dann sieh darauf hin, wie er sich einen Intellekt schafft, der - ein Amerikaner hat das gesagt - nicht viel mehr mit seiner Wesenheit zu tun hat als ein Pferd, dessen man sich zum Reiten bedient, mit dem Reiter.

Nun, da haben wir, trotzdem das östliche Element in seiner Erbschaft auch bis nach Amerika gekommen ist, unmittelbar aus der Bildung heraus das getrieben, was wir auf den Untergründen des menschlichen Daseins in Europa finden. Und, man möchte sagen, unser eigenes Amerika, das Amerika innerhalb von Europa, ist das instinktiv gegebene Hinweisen des Menschen auf den Willen, also auf eine zahlreiche Menschenklasse in Europa. Das gibt aber auch den Boden ab, wo Europa sich wirklich mit Amerika verständigen muß, wenn eine soziale Verständigung über die Erde hin kommen soll.

Und in der Tat finden wir, daß manches, was der Amerikaner entwickelt hat, die primitiven Anfänge von solchen Übungen sogar sind, durch die man zu einer geistigen Schau hinkommt. So findet man immer wieder und wiederum von den Amerikanern angepriesen, wie Selbstbeherrschung, Selbstzucht, Selbsterziehung das ist, worauf es ankommt; daß es nicht darauf ankommt, etwas gelernt zu haben, sondern darauf, etwas seinem Willen einzupflanzen durch immer wiederkehrende Wiederholung derselben Übung. Man weiß, was es für eine Bedeutung hat, die Vorstellungen zu wiederholen, rhythmisch zu wiederholen, wie dieses Wirken auf das eigentliche Zentrum des Menschen in den Willen eingreift. Merkwürdigen Formen begegnet man innerhalb dieses bewußten Hinweisens auf das, was für den modernen Menschen den innersten menschlichen Wesenskern eigentlich repräsentieren muß.

Und gerade aus solcher Verständigung heraus wird sich entwickeln lassen, was dazu führt, nun auch anzuerkennen, daß man durch die Betrachtung des Willens hindurch zu dem Geistig-Seelischen des Menschen kommen müsse. Es ergibt sich der Ausblick auf eine Weltanschauung, die, wenn auch heute der Proletatier noch materialistisch sein muß, dennoch so sein kann, wie sie hier vertreten wird, und wie sie, ich möchte sagen, aus den sozialen Verhältnissen heraus selbst als eine Kraft gefunden werden kann gerade durch eine Verständigung von Europa mit Amerika.

Gerade in Mitteleuropa waren die edelsten Geister bemüht, diejenigen intellektuellen Inhalte zu finden, die dann das Gemüt, die Willensnatur der Kinder ergreifen können. Die Pädagogen Mitteleuropas im 19. Jahrhundert wollten die Kunst erfinden, vom Intellekt aus den Willen zu erobern. Aber sie blieben beim abstrakten Denken, das eben noch nicht zum lebendigen Gedanken vorgeschritten ist. Man steckte noch in der orientalischen Welt, in der orientalischen Erbschaft drinnen, und aus der alten orientalischen Erbschaft wollte man dann den Willen ergreifen.

Dann kam eine große Menschenmasse, die machte den Willen überall geltend. Und wir leben heute in einer Zeit, die kontrastiert ist zu dem, was einmal da war zur Aufrechterhaltung der sozialen Ordnung. Wenn man auch nicht reaktionär gesinnt ist, so muß man doch wissen, wie in früheren Zeiten einer, wenn er auch Fürst war, doch in derselben Predigt saß mit dem letzten Bauern des Ortes, und derjenige, der aus dem geistigen Leben heraus sprach, für alle sprach, etwas zu sagen hatte,was alle ergriff. Das ganz offenbare Bild: wie man durch den Geist die sozialen Ordnungen zusammenhält, war eben für frühere Zeiten so gewiß da, wie es als Erbstück aus dem Orient gekommen ist, wie es erfaßt wird durch den Kopf und sich dann erst zum Herzen senkt. Jetzt hat sich etwas hineingestellt, was aus dem Willen heraus kommt. Wir müssen wiederum die Möglichkeit finden, aus einem Geiste heraus weltanschaulich zu sprechen, der alle ergreift, vom Ungebildetsten bis zum Gebildetsten: Nur so können wir zusammen arbeiten, zusammen denken, zusammen empfinden, zusammen wollen, soziale Hoffnungen in der Gegenwart für die Zukunft begründen.

Das aber wird sich ergeben, wenn man eine Verständigung herbeiführen kann zwischen den neuen Keimen in Europa, wie sie in diesen Tagen geschildert worden sind, und dem, was sich in Amerika, ich möchte sagen, sogar auf einer höheren Stufe der Kultur für die Gebildeten überhaupt ergibt. Eine Verständigung, die darauf abzielt, nach Westen hinüberzugehen, wird den Boden schaffen für das Verständnis einer inneren westlichen Geistentwickelung.

Und wenn wir als westliche Menschen zeigen, daß wir imstande sind, aus dem, was wir innerlich in uns selber ergreifen, ein Geistiges hervorzuzaubern, wenn wir den europäisch-amerikanischen Geist entgegensetzen können dem orientalischen Geist, der heute in der Dekadenz drinnen ist, dann erst wird Weltökonomie, wird Weltverkehr, wie er heute nur äußerlich besteht, im wahren Sinn des Wortes im Vertrauen unter den Menschen möglich sein. Denn mag heute der Asiate, in welcher Form auch immer, mit uns westlichen Menschen Wirtschaft treiben, er hat in seinem Herzen doch das Gefühl: Das, was ihr da habt an Maschinen, das imponiert uns nicht! Ihr macht damit euch selber zu intellektualistischen Maschinen! Das sind innerliche Menschen; nicht einmal die Röntgenstrahlen können ihnen imponieren. Der Orientale wird sagen: Nun ja, da könnt ihr räumlich ins menschliche Innere hineinschauen; dasjenige, was wirklich Bedeutung hat, dazu brauchen wir keine Apparate, das gibt uns unser hellsichtiges Innere selber. - Das mag berechtigt sein oder nicht, das ist aber Gesinnung, das ist Anschauung, die im Orient vorhanden ist. Man glaubt durchaus dort drüben, daß der Geist aus der Menschennatur des Orients entstanden ist, und man sicht mit einer gewissen Verachtung auf alles das herab, was sich, wie man meint, unter den Zwang der Technik, des Mechanistischen stellt, so daß der Mensch selber innerhalb der sozialen Ordnung wie ein Rad in einer Maschine arbeitet.

Erst dann aber, wenn man aus solchen Grundlagen, wie ich sie geschildert habe, aus europäischem und amerikanischem Geist zusammen, selber ein Geistiges in der Weltanschauung erzeugt, erst dann wird die Brücke auch zum Orient hinüber geschlagen werden. Dazu aber bedarf es dessen, daß die Welt nun doch auf dieses Mitteleuropa schaut, das es am weitesten gebracht hat in der Ausgestaltung des Intellekts nach dem lebendigen Gedanken hin. Die Geister aus dem Anfang des 19. Jahrhunderts: Hege/l, Fichte, Schelling sind am weitesten gegangen in der Ausgestaltung des Gedankens zum Leben. Sie glaubten wenigstens, daß sie in dem, was sie in zwar noch abstrakten Gedanken als substantiellen Inhalt der Welt empfanden, ein Lebendig-Geistiges hatten. Es war allerdings erst Keim zum lebendigen Gedanken. Daher verließ auch Mitteleuropa diese Wege, die sie eingeschlagen hatten. Sie müssen wiedergefunden werden, indem der Gedanke wirklich lebendig gemacht wird. Die mitteleuropäische Verständigung wird es zustande bringen können.

Dann aber, wenn der Westen wiederum den Geist aus sich geboren hat, wenn der Osten nicht nur seinen eigenen Geist sieht, wenn er auch in dem Händler und Wirtschaftenden den Repräsentanten einer geistigen Weltanschauung sehen kann, dann wird auch er nicht mehr in Hochmut herunterschauen, dann wird er sich verständigen können. Das aber ist, was wir suchen müssen, wenn wir soziale Hoffnungen haben sollen. Wir können keine haben, wenn wir nicht einsehen, was verschwinden muß.

Hier in Österreich war ein Geist, der es ausgesprochen hat, daß schließlich alles stürzt, aber daß neues Leben aus den Ruinen blühe. Nun wohl, erst wenn man in der Lage ist, von dem Äußerlich-Sozialen auf das Innerlich-Soziale hinzuschauen, dann kann diese Hoffnung erblühen. Dann muß man aber nicht durchaus die alten Ordnungen aufrecht erhalten wollen, sondern dann muß man den Mut haben, das als stürzenswert anzuschen, was stürzen muß. Denn wahr bleibt immer das Wort: Es kann nichts zur vollen Frucht sich entfalten, was nicht erst als Samenkorn in die Erde geworfen wird, damit es erst verfaule. Nun, das Wort «verfaulen» ist nicht richtig hier; aber das Bild gilt doch. Wir müssen, indem wir richtig erkennen, was wir als faul fallen lassen müssen, zu den neuen Trieben, zu dem schreiten, was als ein neues Leben aus den Ruinen blühen muß. Nur so werden wir in unserer Zeit soziale Hoffnungen für die Zukunft gewinnen können.

The Times and Your Social Hopes: Europe - America

Ladies and gentlemen! Anyone who wants to discover forces within the social order today that give rise to hopes must search in secret. Social hardships and deficiencies are obvious. Hopes, especially justified hopes, are less so.

However, there are more or less grandiose or modest dreamers who seek salvation from today's great difficulties in this or that recipe, who devise all kinds of social institutions within which humanity, or at least part of humanity, could flourish better than has been the case until now. But now I believe that today, if I may express myself thus, our intelligence, our general intelligence, has advanced to such an extent that it is relatively easy to devise any social system based on so-called rational grounds. And today we can already be familiar with quite a few social systems of various political shades without actually finding them bad in any way, and yet without expecting much from them. In any case, those who perceive today's social order not only from the perspective of what can be conceived about it, but also from the point of view of human knowledge, can really only say that social hopes can arise when people can, I would say, come closer to each other again.

Above all, it is really no longer a matter of devising institutions, but of finding people so that we can stand together with them within social institutions. And here we must even admit that if human beings can be found in this way within the social order or even within today's social chaos, then more or less any external institution can serve the same purpose. For it is true that human beings can flourish in social relationships in the most diverse ways, under the most diverse social institutions.

Today, it is people who matter, not institutions alone. That is why, especially in those circles where the social question is still felt more than it is thought about, it has given rise to a certain satisfaction that in my “Key Points of the Social Question” I have not merely pointed out how one thing or another could be organized differently, but that much depends today on whether the person who, for example, has to run a business is able, either himself or through assistants, to intervene in the mass of people who work in that business, so that they can get close to them, firstly by really discussing everything that goes on in their company in a humane way with those involved in the company, from the purchase and acquisition of the raw product to the delivery of the finished product to the market and the way in which it is consumed. If you discuss this entire process in a human-oriented manner, again and again, with those involved in the company, then you lay a foundation on which you can build what is otherwise desirable and worth striving for in social relations today.

But it is not enough to speak to people in this professional manner; something else is also necessary. And what is necessary for us to have social hopes again is what I would like to talk about today.

It has long been a widespread view that people who are leaders in social relations must above all seek the path to the broad masses. Efforts in this direction were made throughout the 19th century. And as the social question became more and more pressing, it was noticeable how this or that person worked as a factory worker for months on end in order to get to know the life of a worker. There were court councillors who, after they themselves had already retired, i.e. had actually already completed their social work, went among the workers and were then astonished at what the reality of the people's situation actually looked like. In short, there have long been efforts to get to know the people of the broad masses, especially the proletariat. And it can certainly be said that our literature, our writings, and our art have achieved something significant and great in this regard. What painting and other arts, what literature have achieved in terms of depicting, sometimes movingly, what is growing among the proletariat and among the masses in general, must of course be fully recognized. But when it comes to the big issues of the present, it is not really important that the leading figures first and foremost get to know what is happening among the proletariat or among the masses in general. what really matters today is that we describe with artistic sensibility from within how the broad masses live, how they are plagued by misery, for example, by worries, how they strive, what ideas and goals they have, and so on. I would like to say: Today, it is less important that we find a way to understand the broad masses, but rather that we find a way to be understood by these broad masses, that we go into the factory, into any enterprise, and speak in such a way that we are not perceived as academic, as “educated,” not as theoretical, but that we are perceived as human beings, perceived in such a way that we have something to say that actually speaks to people's souls.

Beautiful endeavors have long been underway to establish all kinds of adult education centers, public education institutions, and so on. What is brought to the people there is interesting for a while because of the strangeness of some scientific results; it causes a sensation when we accompany it with photographs, for example, or when we even go with people to menageries and the like. But we should not delude ourselves that this does not really speak to people's souls, that it does not touch their hearts. We can only speak to people's souls and touch their hearts if we have something to say about how human beings are placed in the whole of existence. Today, however, leading figures still have very strange views on this. They think that the members of the broad masses are not interested in what they call “philosophical questions,” for example. Oh no! If you can just find the right language to express it in, then their eyes light up and their hearts open. If, for example, you start with very simple scientific facts and then know how to treat these simple scientific facts in such a way that ultimately human beings and human destiny emerge from the consideration, and if you show people that things are well-founded and, on the other hand, show them that that this is not fragmented knowledge that can at best be of interest in one's leisure hours, but something that people can take into their souls so that they have food for the soul—if you succeed in doing that, then you have made a start on creating trust between the so-called people and the leading personalities. Today you can speak from the party's point of view, today you can somehow introduce the people to concepts such as “capitalism,” “labor,” “surplus value,” and the like: the people will gradually acquire these concepts; then you can speak in party terms. But you will not, with this party-political talk, get people to enter into social structures in which they actually participate with their whole humanity, to work together so that what one must hope for may come about, if the forces of decline are not to prevail, but rather the forces of ascent.

Well, if one has the will to do such things, then one can perceive what is actually at work, where the obstacles and inhibitions still lie today. I myself was a teacher at a workers' educational school for many years. I had to teach a wide variety of subjects there. I never submitted to any party dogma; but I also never encountered any obstacles in the understanding shown to me, especially by the proletariat, when I presented history, for example, in such a way that I made it clear throughout that history is not something that can be grasped in a historical-materialistic view, but something in which spiritual forces and spiritual impulses are at work. And I was even able to elicit a certain understanding of why, for example, Marx, who was very well known in the circles of my listeners at the time, came to the view that is referred to as “historical materialism,” which holds that everything that exists as spiritual is merely an expression of mechanistic, economic, and so on circumstances. I was able to make people understand that this stems from the fact that, since about the 16th century, forces have increasingly come to the fore in historical life through which economic life has become so dominant, so decisive, that art, science, and so on actually appear to be, and in a certain sense even are, the results of economic life, of mechanistic life. And because Marx was only familiar with recent history, he came to his erroneous conclusion.

However, I do not want to take sides with one or the other, but only to point out that even this has been understood. It was not the lack of trust on the part of the audience that made this kind of public education impossible, but the fact that one day the usual leaders realized: this is not being taught in a dogmatic, partisan way, but in such a way that, to the best of their knowledge and judgment, what is being illustrated is brought forth from the human sphere. And these usual leaders became afraid that the audience would grow larger and larger. And one day, an emissary of these leaders appeared at a meeting that had been convened for the purpose of investigating whether I was suitable to be a teacher at the workers' educational school. A workers' leader appeared. And when I remarked: Yes, if a principle of progress is to be asserted within these circles, then at least complete freedom of teaching must prevail here — this emissary replied: Freedom, we do not recognize that! We only recognize reasonable coercion.

Well, this view led to my exclusion from the teaching staff of that workers' educational school. But for me personally, it was a really important learning experience—not the eventual expulsion, but the prior interaction with the broad masses of the people, who are to be found precisely in the modern proletariat—a learning experience because one could see: If you speak from your full humanity, if you speak in such a way that your listeners have the impression that you are telling them something that touches their hearts, something that has to do with their humanity, something that has to do with their humanity as earthly beings, then they will regard this thinking, which comes from a worldview, as the most important thing that can approach them today. There is a feeling that, above all, enlightenment—not in a partisan sense, but in a general human sense—must reach the masses. People are thirsting, more or less unconsciously, for what comes from a truly broad worldview.

And how could it be otherwise, my dear friends! Let us consider how broad masses of people today are assigned to work that cannot possibly interest them. They do this work as if they were doing something that has nothing to do with their humanity. That is why the associations, cooperatives, and unions that are popular in these circles are organized according to trade—there are metalworkers' unions, printing unions, and so on—but that they have very little to do with the actual production process and are mostly concerned with what is generally human in the realm of material life, namely consumption, the assertion of human needs. With regard to production, humanity had to resign itself to this, but with regard to consumption, this was by no means the case to the same degree. And so today, a large part of modern humanity is faced with work that completely rejects people back to themselves. They cannot be interested in their surroundings; they cannot be interested in what they do from morning to night unless they are taught to be interested; above all, they are interested in what presents itself to them when they are alone after work, when they can contemplate solely what they are as human beings. And we must say that when we look at the social chaos of our times, we find it clear enough that many people, even those in leading positions, are torn away from what is of immediate interest, what is directly related to what they do. It should not be just an open secret, but something that is widely known, that today even many who have an intellectual profession have so little interest in that intellectual profession that they are dependent on leaving their profession behind in order to be interested in themselves as human beings. But this alone shows that it is necessary to bring human values to people today if we want to establish social hopes.

We have achieved an extraordinary amount in terms of intellectual culture. Today we can point to all that human intelligence has achieved. And there is certainly a great deal to be learned by bringing the results of human achievements in science and art and so on to people. But that cannot be the point; the point is that we must be in a position not only to spread intellectual education today in order to establish social structures, but also to inspire people, to enthuse them, not by using grand and lofty words, not by crafting beautiful speeches, but by having something to say that people can feel and sense: this touches my humanity.

But if we approach people today with a worldview that we take from what is popular today, from what can already be gained as recognized from our excellent, magnificent sciences, we will soon be convinced how impossible it is to really touch people's hearts, to give people something that touches their humanity. People will always perceive this as something external, something that can be given to them in the usual way, and above all they will perceive it in such a way that when they speak confidently, because their trust has been gained through other qualities, they will then say: Yes, that would all be very nice; but first of all, we cannot understand it at all, because there are so many things in it that one must first have special training in order to understand, and then it is not simple enough for us; it is something that tells us: You cannot get there. I have heard many people talk like this about what adult education centers, public libraries, and the like are today. But if, precisely because of such an experience, one is looking for a way to enter into social life, then one must search more deeply to find out why this is so. And here I am again compelled to introduce something ideological as an aside.

When we look across, as we have often done these days, to the Asian-Oriental cultures, so many of whose legacies are present in our schools, even in our middle and high schools, we find that there is indeed something at the heights of education that must still be of inestimable value to us today. But what is characteristic, what was once found in this field of world knowledge and worldviews, has been grasped by the human spirit, which then developed further into the intellect, which I have also spoken of these days as the special power of modern times. Our modern, particularly highly developed intellect is, in essence, a late product of what was dreamlike clairvoyance in the Orient. This dreamlike clairvoyance shed what was immediate insight into the outside world and developed into our inner logical order, into what is today the great means of gaining knowledge of nature.

And basically, we must also recognize what we have today as the means of communication for worldviews in Europe as a legacy we have received from the Orient. Not only did the medieval scholastics still speak in such a way that their words, concepts, and ideas contained the forces of the soul that had come over from the Orient, but we too — even if we deny it — speak in chemistry and physics in words that we would not use if our education up to the higher schools were not, in essence, a result of what has come over from the Orient.

But as what was once clairvoyance became intellect, it simultaneously drove out, like another branch, what has in many ways become decisive for the worldview of broad masses of people, views that have actually largely died out in Europe today, that have been eradicated by modern elementary school education, and that now exist only in remnants among the most uneducated classes. While on the one hand the intellect has developed to wonderful heights, on the other hand, as the history of the soul today shows, something developed at the grassroots level of the people that simply projected certain subjective experiences involuntarily into space, something that took on the most diverse forms, but which can nevertheless be described with the single word “superstition.” This belief in ghosts, which consists of subjective experiences being objectively projected into space and time, played a much greater role in the course of human history than is thought today. And even though today every reasonably educated person recognizes this belief in ghosts as superstition, the feelings that developed under the influence of this belief still live on atavistically in many of us. And in many cases, insofar as we are also descendants of the Oriental being in this respect, we also work in our art and in other branches of life at least with the feelings that have arisen from this current of human development.

If we take a closer look at what is emerging, I would say, from the depths of social humanity in the present day, if we can look at the human being who has developed through the technical, mechanical nature of modern times, who can look into their hearts, into the nature of their souls, will see that, basically, in these people who have not gone through what we today value above all else in terms of intellect, namely secondary and higher education, there is nevertheless an inner, genuine, non-rhetorical interest in all that can become within the intellect. but something quite different. I would like to say: Here, something elementary is revealed, something that rises up from the depths, that moves upward in our social order, something elementary that is understood to the very least degree in Europe today, because it is, in essence, something new and, when understood, can show how one must step before the broad masses with a worldview.

Anyone today who grows up in humanity without being connected to what has been inherited from the Orient and is thus rejected, as is the proletarian and as are also many many people of the higher classes, it is not primarily the intellect that enters the sphere of his interest, but above all the will, that which rises from the depths into the soul, that which comes entirely from the human being himself. Because this has been noticed externally, there is also a certain longing today to regard human beings as beings of will. And many believe that they can only speak to the broad masses ideologically if they address above all the volitional aspect of human beings. These longings have given rise to what is so often found, namely the presentation of “primitive culture” to the broad masses, where human beings are still creatures of instinct. The proletariat is shown how people lived in simple circumstances in such primitive times, and conclusions are then drawn about what social order should be today. Much time is spent today in public education presenting these primitive, instinct-driven human relationships. And there is much else that points to this: there is a certain instinct to present the volitional when it comes to representing a worldview to people.

Out of a certain need for sensation, people today accept such representations; in a sense, they also feel something akin to this instinctive nature in their own being, which has not risen to a higher level of education. But if you want to warm people up, if you don't want to let their souls become desolate, if you want to reach the whole person, then you can't get along with that.

And one must be a complete human being if one wants to answer the question: Why can't one cope? - Well, it is because, when one is at the height of science today and has acquired what is scientifically recognized today, one develops something that is not yet recognized as such, but which is nevertheless a modern superstition: Just as educated people of a later age have learned to perceive the old superstitions about ghosts as such, so today the broad masses of humanity perceive, as if prophetically, as if looking into the future, as a kind of superstition what we present as ideas and concepts and notions about these primitive conditions in human nature.

What are we putting forward here? We are putting forward that humanity is originally ruled by a life of instincts. This is something quite obscure that reigns in the unconscious regions, which one does not want to define more precisely: the life of instincts, in which the instincts that are also found in animals and everything indefinite in the expressions of will and feelings of human beings shine through. One points to something that reigns within human beings like a natural being. Today, it is often considered ideal to portray human beings in such a way that what is inside them is represented as much as possible as material processes, only elevated to the vague ideas of the life of drives, instincts, and so on.

But let us remember what I have been saying here in recent days about the inner nature of human beings. I have described how spiritual scientific exercises, through development, lead people to look into their inner being in reality. They then come to see their inner organism not as the modern physiologist or anatomist sees it from the outside, but as things can be experienced internally in this organism. Once one has penetrated the mirror of memory, one looks down on the lungs, heart, and so on as merely the external expression, the external manifestation of the spiritual in its physical form, and indeed of a spirituality that I could describe as a world memory connected with the great cosmos.

This can be sensed especially by those who today are rejected by their work on themselves. But they must yearn everywhere to gain understanding for this. But we can only gain this understanding if we see through what we are actually doing, if we see through what lives in us as spiritual, as soul, what is not even our own, does not belong to our human personality, but is, I would say, the gulf that the cosmos sends into us as human beings, if we see through this in its spiritual-soul nature. Human beings can only recognize other human beings when, looking within themselves, they also come to the fundamental nature of their physical being as spiritual and soulful. But then, when we know this, we also know that when we speak of “drives,” “instincts,” and all the things that people like to talk about today, it is something that we place before our true inner nature, just as superstition once placed ghosts before our outer nature. Yes, when we speak of “drives,” “instincts,” and the like in human beings, it is only, I would say, the soul obscured by our perception. When we speak of human nature in truth, we must not see the ghosts of the life of drives, passions, and the like, but we must see through them to the truth. we must, so to speak, overcome the real ghostly nature within us, which represents all definitions of drives, desires, passions, will, and the like, just as we have overcome the ghosts in relation to the external natural order. With ghosts, we have placed what arises within us before external nature, projecting the subjective out into the objective. Here we place something that is spiritual-soul in nature in its objectivity as if it were material; our drives and instincts are, in the definitions given, the materialized ghosts transferred into the inner being of man, which stand before the truth of the spiritual-soul. This is something that is little understood today as a fact of knowledge, but which is felt when we want to approach people today with real human insight, people who, from the depths of their unconscious, and in these depths of the unconscious is, in a sense, the spiritual-soul, sense: You must not come to me with material ghosts! You should tell me something about how human beings have grown together with the cosmos!

My dear friends! If you have social awareness today, then this inner feeling rejoices when something happens to you, as happened to me a few weeks ago, when I had to give a lecture to a group of workers. My task was initially to talk about economic concepts. But I always arrange things so that I let the people choose the topics themselves, so that before I begin my lecture, I have them hand me the topic or tell me what it is, so that what is to be conveyed to them as knowledge is actually drawn from their own minds. And lo and behold, one of the workers took out a copy of our magazine “Die Drei” and said that he had read an essay of mine and had not understood very well what the planet that preceded the Earth was actually like, which then passed into darkness and from which the Earth emerged. And I was able to begin presenting truly spiritual scientific discussions in a straightforward, simple manner to these workers. And one could see that while they might feel indifferent when speaking in dry, abstract terms, That doesn't give us anything special! — their eyes light up when you talk about such things, because they feel that there is something their soul can feed on, just as their body feeds on the food it consumes — how their eyes light up when you give them something that now touches the whole human being, heart, and soul, something that is not merely an idea of the world, but a worldview in the sense that there is real life in this worldview, that it can arouse enthusiasm, even when the worker comes directly from the machine.

And I believe that such social action must precede everything else before we can somehow win people over — and they must be won over — to have the social structures that correspond to it. How long that will take depends on the goodwill of the people. I know how many people say: Yes, you are pointing us to something that can only become reality in four or five centuries. I always say: Certainly, if too few people want it. But with all these things, it is not a matter of calculating how long it may take for people to arrive at such social structures, but of abandoning such calculations and allowing the matter to take root in the will. If this will exists in a sufficiently large number of people, then we can hope that what one otherwise intellectually imagines could take centuries can be achieved in a not too long time. Nothing prevents us from achieving such social structures more than the hesitation that arises from such calculations. Let us not concern ourselves at first with what the calculation yields in an intellectual sense, but let us seek to reach out to people, and we will see how, with a worldview that does not present them with materialized ghosts, but rather reveals to them the connection between humans and the cosmos, we will find very rapid understanding.

Today, the understanding is this: when you approach those who are called upon to judge with such a worldview, they come and compare it with what they already have, and then they conclude that it is amateurish, dilettantish, and so on. Or the opposite is true: if one has to speak today about these things that really touch the innermost being of human beings in such a way that the drives and instincts and the like are spiritualized, then one is compelled to clothe this in the scientific forms commonly used today; otherwise, one will be rejected from the outset with these things. If one does this, then one is told: You are speaking in a language that is not for the people. That is already known. Therefore, when speaking for those who demand scientific education, one immerses oneself in completely different contexts of ideas. But it is definitely the same thing that is being presented. Then you see that people whose intellect has not been guided in certain directions by this or that intellectual training understand it. Of course, you first have to get through the period when, because you do this, you are thrown out of workers' training schools by those who consider themselves the appointed leaders of the broad masses of the people.

Well, I had to point out to you that, given the nature of the broad masses of people today, there must be a worldview based on anthroposophically oriented spiritual science. For only from such a worldview, which, when it speaks of human beings, can really speak of the spiritual, can the hope spring forth that social understanding will be found. And then, with people who understand each other, we can move forward from this social understanding. That can be a hope.

This hope is extremely close to us in Central Europe. Throughout the 19th century, the best people in Central Europe searched for a method of education that would enable them to grasp the child's will, so to speak. They already sensed that modern human beings must be grasped by the will. However, they did not understand this in the same way as the worldview represented here. But they sensed it. Therefore, efforts were made to find intellectual methods by which one could approach the will of children through imagination, to grasp the child with its powers of thought in the will. And a great deal of good has been achieved in Central Europe from the German spirit — this is fully acknowledged in the West, or at least was acknowledged until the war. In England, attention was always drawn to how Central Europe sought to grasp the will indirectly through pedagogical methods and how this was transplanted to England. This was always recognized and presented.

But if we go even further west, to America, we find that the spiritual-geographical conditions have given rise to a certain form of primitive, I would say, but I don't want to offend anyone, a primitive worldview, which, however, carries within it remarkable seeds for the future. We find, for example, that in America in particular, educated people, when they summarize what they think about human beings, say: What a person thinks out intellectually depends on which party circumstances have led them to, which sect they belong to; but in expressing the opinion of their sect, their class, their party, they do indeed make use of their intellect; but what springs from it is not the intellect, but the will. And again and again, especially in American literature, we see references to the will of man as the original essence. Americans today like to quote writers who say that the intellect is nothing more than the minister of a state, and the ruler is the will, even if this intellect is an expensive minister, as Carlyle said.

However, this is not a view that is theoretically constructed; it is a view that has become second nature, especially among educated Americans. Physiologists there also speak in this way. And those who have an ear for such things perceive a very clear difference between the language of physiologists in Europe and the language of physiologists in America. People there talk very clearly about how the way in which humans stand in the world shapes their brains. They believe that the brain is a mechanism that, even in its language centers, is dependent on the way in which humans move, how they progress in the world, and so on, so that these people see the development of the will within the world as the original in man and everything that the brain produces as the servant, as something that basically has little to do with the individuality of man. These people say: if you want to know a person's individuality, look at their will, look at how their will was formed in their childhood from their family, from their sect, from their party, and so on; and then look at how they create an intellect that—as an American once said—has no more to do with their essence than a horse used for riding has to do with its rider.

Now, even though the Eastern element in his heritage has also come to America, we have driven directly from education what we find in the foundations of human existence in Europe. And, one might say, our own America, the America within Europe, is the instinctive indication of man's will, that is, of a numerous class of people in Europe. But this also provides the basis on which Europe must really communicate with America if social understanding is to come about across the globe.

And indeed, we find that some of what Americans have developed are actually the primitive beginnings of such exercises, through which one can arrive at spiritual insight. Thus, we find Americans repeatedly praising self-control, self-discipline, and self-education as what is important; that it is not important to have learned something, but to implant something in one's will through the repeated repetition of the same exercise. We know the significance of repeating ideas, repeating them rhythmically, how this activity affects the very center of the human being, the will. We encounter strange forms within this conscious reference to what must actually represent the innermost core of human nature for modern man.

And it is precisely from such understanding that it will be possible to develop what leads to the recognition that one must arrive at the spiritual-soul aspect of the human being through the contemplation of the will. This opens up the prospect of a worldview which, even if the proletariat must still be materialistic today, can nevertheless be as it is represented here, and as it can, I would say, be found as a force arising from social conditions, precisely through an understanding between Europe and America.

In Central Europe in particular, the noblest minds were endeavoring to find intellectual content that could then capture the minds and wills of children. The educators of Central Europe in the 19th century wanted to invent the art of conquering the will through the intellect. But they remained stuck in abstract thinking, which had not yet progressed to living thought. They were still stuck in the Oriental world, in the Oriental heritage, and they wanted to seize the will from the old Oriental heritage.

Then came a large crowd of people who asserted their will everywhere. And today we live in a time that contrasts with what once existed to maintain social order. Even if one is not reactionary, one must nevertheless know how in earlier times, even if one was a prince, one sat in the same sermon with the last farmer of the village, and the one who spoke from spiritual life spoke for everyone and had something to say that moved everyone. The very obvious picture of how the spirit holds social orders together was just as certain in earlier times as it came as a legacy from the Orient, as it is grasped by the head and only then sinks into the heart. Now something has come in that comes from the will. We must once again find the possibility of speaking from a spirit that touches everyone, from the most uneducated to the most educated: only in this way can we work together, think together, feel together, want together, and establish social hopes in the present for the future.

But this will happen if we can bring about an understanding between the new seeds in Europe, as they have been described in recent days, and what is happening in America, I would say, even at a higher level of culture for the educated in general. An understanding that aims to spread westward will lay the groundwork for an understanding of an inner Western spiritual development.

And if we as Westerners show that we are capable of conjuring up something spiritual from what we grasp within ourselves to conjure up something spiritual, if we can contrast the European-American spirit with the Oriental spirit, which is in decline today, only then will world economy and world traffic, which today exist only externally, be possible in the true sense of the word in trust among people. For even though Asians may do business with us Westerners in whatever form today, they still feel in their hearts: What you have there in terms of machines does not impress us! You are turning yourselves into intellectual machines! These are inner people; not even X-rays can impress them. The Oriental will say: Well, you can look spatially into the human interior; for what really matters, we do not need any apparatus, our clairvoyant interior gives us that itself. Whether this is justified or not, it is an attitude, a view that exists in the Orient. Over there, people firmly believe that the spirit arose from the human nature of the Orient, and they look down with a certain contempt on everything that, in their opinion, is subject to the constraints of technology and mechanization, so that human beings themselves work within the social order like cogs in a machine.

But only when, on the basis of what I have described, a spiritual worldview is created from the European and American spirit, only then will the bridge to the Orient be built. But for this to happen, the world must now look to Central Europe, which has made the greatest progress in shaping the intellect according to living thought. The minds of the early 19th century: Hegel, Fichte, Schelling have gone furthest in shaping the idea of life. They at least believed that what they perceived in their still abstract thoughts as the substantial content of the world was a living spirit. However, it was only the seed of living thought. That is why Central Europe abandoned the paths they had taken. They must be rediscovered by making thought truly alive. Central European understanding will be able to bring this about.

But then, when the West has once again given birth to the spirit, when the East sees not only its own spirit, but can also see in the merchant and the economist the representatives of a spiritual worldview, then it too will no longer look down in arrogance, then it will be able to communicate. But that is what we must seek if we are to have social hopes. We cannot have any if we do not realize what must disappear.

Here in Austria, there was a spirit that said that everything would eventually collapse, but that new life would blossom from the ruins. Well, only when one is able to look from the external social to the internal social can this hope blossom. But then one must not necessarily want to maintain the old order, but must have the courage to recognize as worthy of collapse that which must collapse. For the saying remains true: nothing can develop into full fruit unless it is first thrown into the earth as a seed, so that it may first rot. Well, the word “rot” is not quite right here, but the image is still valid. By correctly recognizing what we must let fall away as rotten, we must move toward the new shoots, toward what must blossom as a new life from the ruins. Only in this way will we be able to gain social hope for the future in our time.