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The Karma of the Individual and the Collective Life of Our Time
GA 172

5 November 1916, Dornach

Translator Unknown

From the indications already given [4th November 1916. See Anthroposophical Movement, Vol. IV. No. 37] you will have perceived that it is our intention in this lecture to lead to an understanding of the karma of the individual human being and (in a wider sense) of the whole karma of our time. But human life, particularly when we wish to study it as it concerns each individual one of us, is exceedingly complicated. If we desire to answer the question concerning a man's destiny, we have to follow many threads which connect him with the world, and with the more or less distant past. That will perhaps show you why, now that I wish to explain something that really concerns every one very closely, I am going a longer way round and connecting these studies, which are intended to throw light upon the narrower life of each individual, with the earthly life of one who was important in the world's history: with Goethe. Very many details of Goethe's earthly life have been made accessible to us, and although, of course, the destiny of an ordinary individual is very different from the path of destiny of such an exemplary, world-historic spirit, it is nevertheless possible, precisely from the study of such a life, to gain points of view applicable to each of us. For this reason we will not hesitate to extend these studies a little more, with respect to the special questions which we are considering, and gradually approaching.

If one follows Goethe's life as many of his would-be biographers have done hitherto, one does not notice how hastily man is inclined to establish causes and effects.

The scientists of to-day will point out again and again that man makes many mistakes if he hastily adopts the principle, ‘After a thing,—therefore because of it’—Post hoc, ergo propter hoc,—the principle that because one thing follows after another it must therefore proceed from it as effect from cause. In the domain of natural science this principle is condemned, and rightly so; but in the study of human life we are not yet so far advanced. Certain savage tribes belonging to the valleys of Kamchatka, believe that the water-wagtails or similar birds bring about the Spring, because Spring follows their arrival. Only too frequently, we draw the same conclusion: What follows something, must proceed from it. In Goethe's own descriptions of his life—descriptions of a human life that shines far and wide over humanity—we read that he had such and such a father, such and such a mother, and that in youth he underwent certain experiences which he himself narrates. Thereupon the biographers trace back what he did in later life, whereby he became so important for humanity, to these his youthful impressions—quite in accordance with the principle that because something follows on something else it must therefore proceed from it. That is no wiser than to believe that the Spring is brought by the water-wagtails. In natural science the superstition has been thoroughly condemned; but in the science of the mind, this stage of advancement has yet to be attained. True, it is explained quite plausibly how in his boyhood when the French were quartered in his parents' house during the occupation of Frankfort, Goethe was present when the celebrated Count Thorane, lieutenant to the King of France, arranged theatricals there. Goethe saw how he set the painters to work, and thus, while he was still almost a child, he came into touch with painting and with the art of the theatre. Thus lightly is Goethe's inclination towards art in later years traced back to these his youthful impressions! Nevertheless, in Goethe's case especially we can see his preordained karma working from earliest youth onward. Is it not a prominent feature in Goethe's whole life, how he unites his view of art and of the world with his view of Nature, how everywhere behind his artistic fantasy he has the impulse to strive after the knowledge of the truth in the phenomena of Nature? And do we not see how a strictly preordained karma causes him, even as a boy of six or seven years, to gather minerals and geological substances which he finds in his father's collection, and lay them on a music-stand and make an altar to the great God of Nature? On this altar, composed of many different objects of Nature, he fixes a fumigating candle and kindles the light, not in the ordinary mechanical way, but by catching with a lens the rays of the morning sun. He lets fall the very first rays through the lens on to the candle, thus kindling by the rays of the morning sun the fire which he offers to the great God of Nature. How sublimely beautiful is it to see the mind of this six or seven-year-old boy directed to what lives and moves as Spirit in the phenomena of Nature. Here we see how this trait, which must surely have come from an inborn tendency, could not have originated in his environment. In Goethe especially, what he brought with him into this incarnation worked with peculiar intensity.

If we study the time into which Goethe was born in that incarnation, we shall find a remarkable harmony between his nature and the events of his time. In accordance with the present world-outlook, one is no doubt inclined to say: What Goethe has created—Faust and other works that proceeded from him for the uplifting and spiritual permeation of humanity—all this came into being because Goethe created it out of his inner tendencies. For these creations which were given to humanity by Goethe, it is undoubtedly more difficult to prove that they do not belong to his personality in this simple way. But now consider something else for a moment. Think how futile, in face of certain phenomena of life, is many a mode of study whose authors believe that they are entering thoroughly into the truth. In my latest book, The Problem of Man (Vom Menschenrätsel), you will find de la Mettrie's statement quoted, to the effect that Erasmus of Rotterdam or Fontenelle would have become quite different beings if even only a tiny part of their brain had been different. According to such a way of thinking, we must presume that all that Erasmus and Fontenelle produced would not be in the world if, as de la Mettrie thinks, through a slightly different constitution of their brains, Erasmus and Fontenelle had become fools instead of wise men. Now in a certain respect this may perhaps apply to such works as Erasmus and Fontenelle produced; but consider the same question in another case. For example, can you imagine that the evolution of modern humanity would have run the same course if America had not been discovered? Just think of all that has flowed into the life of modern humanity through the discovery of America! Can the materialist assert that Columbus would have become a different being if his brain had been a little different, so that he would have become a fool instead of a Columbus, and that he would not then have discovered America? Certainly, this much could be said, just as one may say: Goethe would not have become Goethe, Fontenelle not Fontenelle, Erasmus not Erasmus if, for example, during their pre-natal period their mothers had met with an accident and they had been still-born. But we can never suppose that America would not have been discovered even if Columbus had been unable to discover it. You will admit, it is well-nigh self-evident that America would still have been discovered even if Columbus had had a defect in his brain! And so you cannot doubt that the course of the World's events is one thing and the share of the individual human being in these events is quite another; nor can you doubt that the World-events themselves summon those human individuals whose karma specially adapts them to carry out what the World-events require. In the case of America it can very easily be seen; but to one who looks more deeply the case is just the same with the origin of Faust. We should really have to believe in the utter lack of any sense in World-evolution if we were obliged to think that there was no inherent necessity for such a poem as Faust to be produced, even if what the materialists are so fond of reiterating had actually happened—if a slate had fallen on Goethe's head when he was five years old and he had become an imbecile. If you trace the development of spiritual life during the last decades before Goethe, you will see that Faust was an absolute requirement of the time. Lessing is a characteristic spirit; he too wished to write a Faust. He even wrote one scene, which is very beautiful. It was not Goethe's mere subjective needs which called for Faust; it was the Time itself. And one who looks more deeply into things can truly say: As to the course of events in the World's history, there is a similar connection between Goethe's works and Goethe himself, to what there is between Columbus and the discovery of America.

I said that if we study the time into which Goethe was born we notice a certain harmony between the individuality of Goethe and his age. Moreover, this applies to his age in the very widest sense. Remember that in spite of all their great differences (we shall return to this in a moment) there is nevertheless something very similar in the two spirits, Goethe and Schiller, not to mention others around them who were less great than they. You will remember, many things which shine out in Goethe, we also find appearing in Herder. We can, moreover, go much further. If we look at Goethe it does not perhaps at once appear; we will go into that in a moment. But if we look at Schiller, Herder, or Lessing we shall say: their lives certainly became different; but in their tendencies, in their impulses, there is in Goethe, in Schiller, in Herder, and in Lessing undoubtedly a tendency of soul through which, under other circumstances, any one of them could just as well have become a Mirabeau, or a Danton! They really harmonise with their age. In the case of Schiller it can be shewn without much difficulty, for no one can say that Schiller's frame of mind, as the author of The Robbers, or Fiesco, or Intrigue and Love, was very different from that of Mirabeau, Danton, or even Robespierre. It was only that Schiller allowed the same impulses to flow into Literature and Art which Danton, Robespierre, Mirabeau allowed to flow into their political tendencies. But with respect to the blood of the soul which pulses through World-history, there flows in The Robbers exactly the same as in the deeds of Danton, Mirabeau and Robespierre; and this same blood of the soul flowed also in Goethe. Although one might be prone at first to think of Goethe as a man far, far from being a revolutionary, he was not so—not by any means. Only in Goethe's complex nature there was also a special complication of karmic impulses, of impulses of destiny, which placed him in quite a special way into the world, even in his earliest youth.

When we follow Goethe's life with a vision sharpened by spiritual science, we find that, apart from everything else, it is divided into certain periods. The first period runs its course in such a way that we may say: An impulse which exists already in his childhood, flows on further. Then something comes from outside which apparently diverts the stream of his life, namely, his acquaintance with the Duke of Weimar in 1775. Again we see how his sojourn in Rome brings him into a different path of life. Through being able to take the Roman life into himself he becomes quite different. And if we wished to penetrate still more deeply we might say, that after this Roman transformation, a third impulse, coming apparently from without (though, as we shall see, this would not be quite correct in the sense of spiritual science) was the friendly intercourse with Schiller.

If we study the first part of Goethe's life up to the year 1775, we find—although to reach this result we must, of course, observe the various events more attentively than is usually done for such purposes—that in Goethe there lives a very strong revolutionary feeling, an opposition to what is around him. But Goethe's nature is spread over many different things, and as the spirit of revolt, being more spread out, does not manifest itself in him so strongly as it does when concentrated in Schiller's Robbers, the matter is not so noticeable. One who, with the aid of spiritual science, is able to enter into Goethe's boyhood and youth, finds that he possesses a spiritual life-force which he brings with him into his existence through the gate of birth, but which would not have been able to accompany him throughout his whole life if certain events had not taken place. What lived in Goethe as his individuality, was far greater than his organism could really receive and express.

In Schiller's case this can be seen very clearly. The cause of Schiller's early death was simply that his organism was consumed by the mighty life-force of his soul. That is as clear as day. It is well-known that when Schiller died it was found that his heart was, as it were, dried up within him. Only through his strong force of soul was he able to hold out as long as he did; but this great soul-force also consumed the life of his body.

In Goethe this force of soul became still greater, and yet he lived to a ripe old age. How was this possible? In the last lecture I mentioned a fact which played a very important part in Goethe's life. After he had lived a few years as a student in Leipzig, he fell ill, seriously ill, and almost died. We may say that he really looked death in the face. This illness was of course a natural phenomenon connected with his body; but we can never understand a man who works out of the elemental forces of the world, nor indeed can we understand any human being at all, unless we also take into consideration events such as these, which take place in the course of their Karma. What really happened to Goethe when he lay ill at Leipzig. There took place what we may call a complete loosening of the etheric body in which the life-force of the soul had until then been active; this was so loosened that after his illness Goethe no longer had the firm connection between the etheric body and the physical body which he had before. Now the etheric body is that part of our supersensible nature which really makes it possible for us to form concepts, to think. Abstract ideas such as we have in ordinary life, and which are alone appreciated by most materialistically minded people—these we have through the fact that the etheric body is bound up with the physical body very closely, as it were by a strong magnetic tie. This also gives us the strong impulse to carry our will into the physical world. Notably we have this impulse of the will when the astral body also is very strongly developed. If we consider Robespierre, Mirabeau or Danton, we find in them an etheric body firmly united with the physical, but they also have a strongly-developed astral body which in its turn acts strongly upon the etheric body and places these human individualities strongly into the physical world. Goethe was organised in this way too; but in him there was another force at work, and this produced a complication. It was this force which brought it about that through the illness which took him almost to death's door, his etheric body was loosened, and remained so. Now when the etheric body is no longer so intimately bound up with the physical body, it no longer thrusts its forces into the physical, but preserves them within itself. Hence the change which took place in Goethe when he then returned from Leipzig to Frankfort, where he became acquainted with Fräulein von Klettenberg the mystic, and with various medical friends who were devoting themselves to alchemical studies, and where he also studied the works of Swedenborg. At this time he really constructed for himself a spiritual system of the world. Chaotic as yet, it was nevertheless a spiritual system; for he possessed a very deep inclination to occupy himself with supersensible things. This, however, was essentially connected with his illness. And his soul, while carrying into this earth-life the foundations for this force which acts downward like gravity, also brought with it the impulse, through the above-mentioned illness, so to prepare the etheric body that it not merely manifested in the physical, but received the impulse—and not only the impulse but the capacity—to fill itself with supersensible ideas. So long as we consider merely the outer biographical facts in a person's life in a materialistic fashion, we never perceive the subtle connections which exist in the stream of his destiny; but as soon as we go into the connection of the natural events which occur in the body—such for instance as Goethe's illness—with what is manifested ethically, morally and spiritually, it becomes possible for us to have a presentiment of the profound working of karma.

In Goethe the revolutionary force would certainly have manifested in such a way as to have consumed him at an early age, for in his environment it would not have been possible for the revolutionary force to have expressed itself outwardly, and Goethe could not have written dramas like Schiller; so that he would simply have consumed himself. This was diverted through the loosening of the connection—the magnetic link—between his etheric and his physical body.

Here we see something that is apparently a natural event, playing a significant part in the life of a human being. Certainly, such a thing as this indicates a deeper connection than what the biographers mostly bring to the surface. The significance of an illness for the whole individual experience of a human being cannot be explained from hereditary tendencies, but it points to his connection with the universe—a connection which must be conceived as spiritual. You will also observe from this how complicated Goethe's life became; for the way in which we receive an experience makes us what we are.

Goethe now comes to Strassburg with an etheric body that is to a certain extent filled with occult knowledge; and in this condition he meets Herder. Herder's great ideas necessarily took a very different form in Goethe from what they were in Herder himself, who had not the same conditions in his finer constitution.

In Goethe's life, such an event had taken place as that above-described in Leipzig at the end of the 1760's, when he stood face to face with death. But the forces for this had already been preparing for a long time before. Anyone wishing to trace back such an illness to external or merely physical events, has not yet reached in spiritual spheres the point at which the scientists already stand, who say, that if one thing follows on another it must not therefore necessarily be looked upon as its direct result. In Goethe, therefore, this isolating of himself from the world was always there, owing to the peculiar connection between his physical body and his etheric body, which only reached its crisis through his illness.

When the outer world affects a man in whom there is a close connection between the physical body and the etheric, the impressions made upon the physical body pass on at once into the etheric; they become one with it, and the etheric body simply experiences the impressions of the outer world simultaneously with the physical. In a nature such as Goethe's, impressions are of course made on the physical body, but the etheric body, being loosened, does not participate in them at once. The consequence is that such a man can be more isolated from his environment; a more complicated process takes place when ail impression is made on his physical body. Make a bridge for yourselves, from this peculiarity of Goethe's organic structure, to what you know from his biography, namely, that he allowed events—even historical events—to affect him without ever using force with them. Then you will understand the unique way in which Goethe's nature works. As I said: he takes the biography of Gottfried of Berlichingen. He allows himself to be influenced by Shakespeare's dramatic impulses, but he does not make very much alteration in the autobiography of Gottfried, although it is not specially well written; indeed he does not call his drama a Drama, but The Story of Gottfried of Berlichingen with the Iron Hand, dramatized. He only alters it a little. This shy and gentle touching of things, not grasping them with force, comes about through the peculiar connection between his etheric and his physical body.

This connection did not exist in Schiller. He therefore presents in Karl Moor thoughts which were truly not the result of any external impression on him, but which he formed quite forcefully—even with violence—out of his own nature. Goethe requires the action of life upon him, but he does not do violence to life; he only gently assists it, and raises what is already living, to a work of art. This is also the case when those conditions of life approach him which he then fashions in his Werther. His own experiences or those of his friend, Jerusalem, he does not bend or mould very much; he simply takes life as it is and helps it on a little, and through the gentle way in which he does so—precisely out of his etheric body—life itself becomes a work of art. But on account of this same organisation of his, he only comes into touch with life indirectly, I might say; and in this incarnation he prepares his karma through this merely indirect approach to life.

He goes to Strassburg. In addition to all that he experiences there, which brings him forward in his career as Goethe, he also experiences in Strassburg, as you know, the love affair with Frederica, the pastor's daughter at Sesenheim. His heart is very, very much engaged in this affair. Various moral objections can be raised, no doubt, to the course of this affair between Goethe and Frederica of Sesenheim—objections which may even be justified. That is not the point at this moment; the point is that we should understand. Goethe indeed goes through all that which in any other person—not a Goethe—not only must have led, but would as a matter of course have led to a lasting union. But Goethe does not experience directly. Through what I have just explained, a kind of cleft is created between his peculiar inner being and the outer world. Just as he does not do violence to what lives in the outer world, but only gently remodels it, so too, his feelings and sensations, inasmuch as he can experience them only in his etheric body:—he does not bring them through the physical body at once into a firm connection with the outer world so as to lead to a very definite event in life, as it would have done for others. Thus he withdraws again from Frederica of Sesenheim. But we should take such a thing as this in its relation to the soul. As he departs for the last time—(you may read of it in his biography)—he meets himself. Goethe actually encounters Goethe! Very much later in his life he tells how he met himself at that time. Goethe meets Goethe; he sees himself. He leaves Frederica; towards him comes Goethe, not in the clothing he is wearing, but in a different dress. And when years later he comes there again and visits his old friend, he recognises that, without premeditating it, he is wearing the suit in which he foresaw himself years ago, when he encountered himself. That is an event one must believe just as fully as one believes anything else that Goethe relates. It would be unseemly to criticise it, in face of the love of truth with which Goethe has presented his whole life.

How, then, did it come about that Goethe, who was so near and yet so far removed from the circumstances into which he had entered—so near that if it had been anyone else it would have led to something altogether different, and so far that he could still withdraw—how did it come about that on this occasion he actually met himself? In a human being who experiences something in the etheric body, this experience may very easily become objectified if the etheric body is thus loosened. He sees it as an external object, it is projected outward. This really took place with Goethe. On a specially favourable occasion, he actually saw the other Goethe—the etheric Goethe who lived within him, and who through his karma remained united with Frederica of Sesenheim. Hence he saw himself as a spectre coming towards him. This event in the deepest sense confirms what may already be seen from the very facts of Goethe's nature.

Here you see how a man may stand in the midst of external events and how we must nevertheless first understand the particular way, the individual way in which he is related to them. For the relation of man to the world is complicated—I mean his relation to the past and the inner connections of what he carries over from the past into the present. But through the fact that Goethe had in a sense torn his inner being from its connection with the body, it was possible for him, even in youth, to cultivate in his soul the profound truths which so surprise us in his Faust. I say ‘surprise’ intentionally, for the simple reason that they really must cause surprise; for I know scarcely anything more foolish than when biographers of Goethe continually repeat the sentence: ‘Goethe is Faust and Faust is Goethe.’ I have often read that remark in biographies of Goethe. It is simply nonsense; for what we really have in Faust, if we let it work upon us properly, actually affects us in such a way that sometimes we cannot suppose that Goethe himself experienced it or even knew of it in the same way; and yet, there it is in Faust. Faust always grows beyond Goethe. This can however be fully understood by one who knows the surprise which an author himself feels when he sees his poem in front of him. We have no right to suppose that the poet must always be as great as his work. This is no more necessarily the case, than that a father must be as great in soul-force and genius as his son. For true poetic creation is a living process, and it can never be affirmed that a spiritual creative genius cannot create something higher than himself, any more than it can be said that a living being cannot produce something greater than itself. Through the inner isolation I have described, those deep perceptions arise in Goethe's soul which we find in his Faust. For a work such as Faust is not merely a poem like other poems. Faust springs forth as it were out of the whole spirit of the fifth post-Atlantean age of civilisation; it grows far beyond Goethe himself. And much that we experience regarding the world and its development, rings out to us from Faust in a remarkable manner. Think of the words you have just heard:

‘My friend, the times gone by are but in sum
A book with seven seals protected;
What ‘Spirit of the Times' you call,
Good sirs, is but your spirit after all’

Latham's translation.

People pass too lightly over such a work. One who feels it in all its depths is reminded of many things which can only prove such words true in the very deepest sense. Think of what modern humanity possesses through the knowledge of the Greeks and of Greek culture, through Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides. People study this Greek life of culture. Take Sophocles: Is Sophocles a book with seven seals? It may not be easy for some to conceive that even Sophocles may be a book with seven seals. Yet Sophocles, who reached the age of 91, wrote over 80 dramas,—seven of which have been preserved. Do we know a man who wrote 81 dramas or more, when only seven have been handed down to us? Is it not literally true to say: a book with seven seals? How can anyone maintain, from what has been handed down, that he is acquainted with the whole culture of the Greeks, when he must simply admit that 74 dramas by Sophocles, which enraptured and uplifted the Greeks, no longer exist? A great number of the works of Aeschylus, too, have disappeared. Poets lived in Grecian times, whose names are even now unknown. Are not the times gone by ‘a book with seven seals?’ When we consider such an outward fact as this, we are obliged to answer ‘Yes.’ Or again:

‘The joy may well be courted,
Into the spirit of the times transported,
To see what thoughts of old the wise have entertained,
And then, how we at last such glorious heights have gained.’

Latham's translation.

‘Wagner’-natures think that they can easily transpose themselves into the spirit of a wise man—namely, when it is presented to them! It is a pity we cannot make trial of what the valiant critics would write about Hamlet if this play were to appear for the first time now and be put before them on some city stage,—or if a drama by Sophocles were to be performed before them. Perhaps in their case, even that would be of no avail, which Sophocles himself had to do in order to convince at least his relatives of his greatness when he was very old. For he reached the age of 91; and his relatives had to wait so long for their inheritance that they tried to get witnesses to prove that he had grown senile and could no longer control his own property. He could only save himself by writing Oedipus on Colonus. Thereby he could at least prove that he had not yet become senile. Whether that would help with present-day reviewers I do not know, but it helped with them. One who deeply studies such a fact as the tragedy of the 90-year-old Sophocles, will at the same time be able to measure how hard it is to find the way to a human individuality, and in what a complicated way the human individuality is connected with the events in the world. We might bring forward a very great deal to show into what deep layers one has to delve in order to understand the world. And yet, how much of the wisdom required to understand the world is contained in even the very first parts of Goethe's Faust! This is to be traced back to this destiny, which took such a remarkable form, showing in all reality how Nature and the activity of the Spirit are one in human evolution, and how an illness may have not only an outer physical significance but also a spiritual one.

Thus we see how the original karmic impulse which lived in Goethe was strictly continued. Then again, in 1775, there came, as it were from outside, his acquaintance with the Duke of Weimar. Goethe was called from Frankfort to Weimar. What did that signify in his life? We must first understand what an event like this signifies in the life of a human being. Otherwise we can get no further in the understanding of his life. I know how little the people of the present day are inclined really to awaken the soul-forces which are necessary, fully to feel what is contained even in the first parts of Goethe's Faust. In order to write the scenes represented here to-day (Faust, Part I., the Monologue in Faust's study, and the Easter Scene) a wealth of soul is required which, when one realises it, is apt to cause one to remain before it for a long, long time in an attitude of fervent adoration; and it often gives one the deepest pain to see how very dense the world really is; how little able to feel what is truly great. But if once one feels this fully, one will also realise what the human being who is thoroughly imbued with Spiritual Science arrives at in his feeling; for he comes to say: Something tremendous was living in this Goethe; ... it could not possibly go on in the same way.

One must indeed have some such thoughts. Just imagine: Goethe was born in 1749, in 1775 he was, therefore, only 26 years of age, when he carried with him to Weimar in his box the Scene we have seen performed today. A man who lived through such material to such a degree that he can write it, has something in his soul to bear; it weighs heavily upon his soul, for it is a force that wills to lead upward and would almost burst the soul to pieces.

We must be clear about two things, if we would appreciate in the right sense and in the true light the value of these first parts of Faust. One might think that if Goethe had gradually written these scenes from the age of 25 to 50, they would in that case not have strained his soul so much nor been such a heavy burden. Certainly, that would be so; but that is not possible, would not have been possible; for from 30 or 35 years of age the youthful force would have been lacking which was necessary to fashion these things so. He had to write them during those years, in accordance with his individual nature; but he could not go on living in that way. He needed something which was like a quenching, a kind of partial sleep of the soul, to weaken the fire that had burned in his soul when he wrote the first parts of Faust. The Duke of Weimar brought him to Weimar in order to make him Minister there; and he was a good Minister, as I said yesterday. When he was Minister and did a great deal of laborious work that which had burned in his soul could sleep partially and take a rest. There was really a very great difference in his mood before 1775 and after that year; it was like a kind of mighty awakeness followed by a life more dim and toned down. The word ‘torpor’—Dumpfheit—even comes into Goethe's mind when he describes his Weimar life, where he took part in the various events and entered into them far more than he had done before, when he had rather revolted against them. Then it is remarkable that after this duller state, which lasted for ten years, there followed a time in which events approached him more gently. And just as the ordinary life of sleep is not a direct result of the life of the previous day, so too, this sleeping life of Goethe was not an effect of what had gone before. Such connections are much deeper than is usually supposed. I have often pointed out that when the question is asked: Why does a person go to sleep? it is very superficial to answer: Because he is tired. It is an idle, nay, even a sleeping truth, for it is nonsense. Otherwise we should not have the fact that persons who cannot possibly be tired—ladies or gentlemen of private means, for example—doze off to sleep after a heavy meal when they are to listen to something in which they are not particularly interested. They are certainly not tired. It is not the case that we sleep because we are tired, for waking and sleeping are a rhythmic life-process. When the period of sleep, the necessity for sleep approaches, we then grow tired. We are tired because we ought to sleep, we do not sleep because we are tired. I will not go into this any further at the moment.

Think to what a great Order the rhythm of waking and sleeping belongs! It is the reflection in human nature of day and night in the Cosmos. It is, no doubt, more natural to material science to wish to explain sleep as resulting from the fatigue of the day; but the rhythm of sleeping and waking must be explained from the Cosmos, from great cosmic connections. And from great connections it must also be explained why in Goethe's case, after the period during which Faust stormed in the veins of his soul, there followed the ten years of his inwardly-dulled life at Weimar. This directs you at once to his Karma, regarding which, however, we cannot say any more at present.

The ordinary man wakes in the morning, as a rule, just in the same condition in which he goes to sleep at night; but that is only with respect to his own consciousness, in reality it is never so. We never waken exactly as we went to sleep; we are really a little richer; only we are not aware of this enrichment. But when a ‘wave-hollow’ has followed upon a ‘wave-mountain’ as in Goethe during his years at Weimar, there comes the awakening at a higher stage; it must come at a higher stage. The inmost forces strive towards this. And in Goethe also the inmost forces strove to awaken again—out of the Weimar stupor to full life,—in surroundings which could really bring him what he lacked. It was in Italy that he awakened. He could not, in accordance with his particular constitution, have awakened in Weimar itself. In just such a matter as this we can see the deep connection between the creative work of a true artist and his special experiences. One who is no artist can gradually write a drama, page after page, straight off the reel; he can do it quite well. A great poet cannot do this, for he needs to be deeply rooted in life. For this reason Goethe was able to express the very deepest truths in his Faust in comparatively early youth—truths which grew out far beyond his soul-capacities. But he had to express a rejuvenation in Faust. Think of it: Faust had to be brought to an entirely different frame of mind; notwithstanding the fact that he was moulded so deeply. For after all, in spite of all his depth, what he had hitherto taken into his soul had brought him to the verge of suicide. He had to be rejuvenated. A lesser poet may describe quite well, in verses which may, perhaps, be very beautiful, how a man can be rejuvenated. Goethe could not do this until something had taken place; he himself had first to be rejuvenated at Rome. The rejuvenation scene in the ‘Witch's Kitchen’ was therefore written at Rome, in the Villa Borghese. Goethe would not have ventured to write this scene before.

Now, connected with a rejuvenation such as that experienced by Goethe, there is also a dull, dim consciousness (for in Goethe's time spiritual science did not yet exist); it could not be a clear consciousness but only a dim one. ... Special forces, too, are connected with such a rejuvenation—forces which play over into the next incarnation. Experiences belonging to this incarnation intermingle with many things that play over into the next incarnation. When we reflect upon this we are led to a specially deep and significant tendency in Goethe. Allow me at this point to make a personal remark: I have continually occupied myself for decades past—I may say since 1879 or 1880—with Goethe's conception of Nature, and intensely so since 1885-1886; during this time I have come to see that in the impulse given by Goethe to the conception of Nature—regarding which the present natural philosophers, scientists and thinkers really know nothing at all—there is contained something that can be developed further, but only in the course of centuries; so that Goethe, when he comes again, will probably be able in another incarnation to work upon what in this incarnation he could actually have completed, from his own views of Nature. People have as yet no notion of many things contained in Goethe's view of Nature. I have expressed my views on this point in my book Goethe's Weltanschauung(Goethe's Conception of the World) and in my introduction to Goethe's Works on Natural Science in Kürschner's Nationalliteratur. So that I can really say: In his conception of Nature, Goethe has within him something which points to very wide horizons—something inwardly connected with his rebirth, which indeed, in this connection, was not exactly connected with Rome, but with the period of his life which he lived through while he was at Rome. Read once more what I have said in connection with these things: how during his Italian journey he developed his Metamorphosis of plants and animals, the primal plant, the primal animal; and how, when he returned, he took in hand the Theory of Colour which people cannot yet understand to-day; and how he took still other things in hand. Then you will see that this development of his all-embracing conception of Nature is also connected with his rebirth. He did indeed bring all that had arisen within him in the course of his life into connection with Faust, not however in the way an insignificant poet would have done, but as a great one alone can do. Faust experiences the Gretchen tragedy. In the middle of this tragedy we suddenly meet with Faust's conception of Nature, which has many points of similarity with Goethe's great conception of Nature, and is expressed in Faust's words:—

‘Spirit sublime, didst freely give me all,
All that I prayed for. Truly not for nought
Thy countenance in fire didst turn upon me.
This glorious Nature thou didst for my kingdom give,
And power to feel it, to enjoy it. Not
A cold astonished visit didst alone
Permit, but deep within her breast to read
As in the bosom of a friend, didst grant me.
Thou leadest past mine eyes the long array
Of living things, mak'st known to me my brethren
Within the silent copse, the air, the water.‘ ...

Latham's translation.

A mighty conception of the world! Goethe ascribes it to Faust. Goethe only reached this permeation of the soul during his stay in Italy. The scene ‘Spirit sublime, didst freely give me all’ was also written in Rome; Goethe could not have written it earlier. Just these two scenes were written in Rome: the Rejuvenation Scene in the ‘Witch's Kitchen’ and the scene ‘Woodland and Cave:’ ‘Spirit sublime, didst freely give me all.’

You see from this an actual rhythm in Goethe's life—a rhythm which betrays an inner impulse, just as the rhythm of waking and sleeping in man betrays an inner impulse. In a life such as Goethe's we can study many laws with special clarity; moreover, we shall see how the laws we find in great men can also become of importance to the life of each individual. For, after all, the same laws which obtain in the case of a very great man, rule also in each single human being.

Zweiter Vortrag

Eigentlich ist ja die Absicht, wie Sie aus dem Angedeuteten schon vernommen haben, in diesem Vortrage jetzt zu einem Verständnis des einzelnen Karmas des Menschen zu führen und des Gesamtkarmas unserer Zeit im weiteren Sinne, Aber das menschliche Leben, gerade wenn man es so betrachten will, wie es jeden einzelnen angeht, ist außerordentlich kompliziert, und viele Fäden, die den Menschen an die Welt, an eine nähere oder fernere Vergangenheit knüpfen, muß man verfolgen, wenn man die Frage nach seinem Schicksal beantworten will. Das macht es vielleicht erklärlich, warum ich, während ich eigentlich etwas uns ganz Naheliegendes, jedem Menschen ganz Naheliegendes auseinandersetzen will, gerade jetzt weite Umwege mache und Betrachtungen, die gewissermaßen ihr Licht hereinwerfen sollen in das enge Daseinsstübchen jedes einzelnen, anknüpfe an ein weltgeschichtlich bedeutsames Erdenleben: an Goethes Erdenleben. Ist uns doch Goethes Erdenleben zugänglich in bezug auf sehr, sehr viele Einzelheiten. Liegt nun natürlich auch selbstverständlich jedes Menschenleben sehr weit ab mit Bezug auf sein Schicksal von dem Schicksalsgang eines so vorbildlichen, welthistorischen Geistes, so ist es doch möglich, gerade an der Betrachtung eines solchen Lebens Gesichtspunkte zu gewinnen für jeden einzelnen von uns, Daher wollen wir es uns nicht verdrießen lassen, diese Anknüpfungen, die wir gestern begonnen haben, gerade mit Bezug auf unsere speziellen Fragen, zu denen wir immer mehr und mehr kommen werden, noch ein wenig auszudehnen.

Wenn man so verfolgt Goethes Leben, wie es viele, die seine Biographen sein wollen, bis heute schon getan haben, so achtet man gar nicht darauf, wie der Mensch geneigt ist, in einer raschen Weise Wirkung mit Ursache zu verknüpfen. Sehen Sie, Naturwissenschafter werden schon heute immer wieder und wiederum darauf verweisen, daß der Mensch viele Irrtümer begeht, wenn er schnell-fertig das «Nach einem Ding und eben deshalb aus diesem Ding heraus» zu seinem Grundsatze macht, dieses «Post hoc, ergo propter hoc»: weil etwas aufeinanderfolgt, müsse es wie die Wirkung aus der Ursache hervorgehen. Man tadelt es auf naturwissenschaftlichem Gebiet. Auf dem Gebiete der Betrachtung des Menschenlebens ist man noch nicht so weitgekommen, diesen Grundsatz auch gründlich abzulehnen. Gewisse wilde Menschen, die zu den Kamtschadalen gehören, glauben, daß die Bachstelzen oder ähnliche Vögel den Frühling bringen, weil der Frühling auf deren Kommen folgt. So schließt der Mensch überhaupt sehr häufig: Das, was auf etwas anderes folgt, geht aus diesem andern hervor. — Man lernt kennen aus Goethes eigenen Beschreibungen, also aus den Beschreibungen eines besonders über die Menschheit hinleuchtenden Menschenlebens, daß Goethe diesen Vater, diese Mutter gehabt hat, die Dinge durchgemacht hat in seiner Jugend, die er uns ja selber mitteilt, und man leitet dann dasjenige, was er später im Leben getrieben hat, wodurch er der Menschheit so wichtig geworden ist, aus diesen Jugendeindrücken biographisch ab, ganz nach dem Grundsatze, daß, weil irgend etwas auf ein anderesfolegt, so müsse es auch aus diesem anderen hervorgehen. Es ist das nicht gescheiter, als wenn man glaubt, daß der Frühling von den Bachstelzen gebracht wird. Auf naturwissenschaftlichem Gebiete hat man einen solchen Aberglauben scharf getadelt, auf geisteswissenschaftlichem Gebiete muß man erst noch so weit kommen. Man erklärt allerdings sehr schön, daß Goethe in verhältnismäßig frühen Jahren, im Knabenalter noch, als in seinem Vaterhause französische Einquartierung war, während Frankfurt von den Franzosen besetzt war, erlebte, wie der berühmte Königsleutnant Thoranc Theateraufführungen dort veranstaltete, wie er Maler beschäftigte, und wie dadurch Goethe fast noch als Kind in Berührung kam mit der Malerei, in Berührung kam mit der theatralischen Kunst, und man leitet dann Goethes Hinneigung zur Kunst in der späteren Zeit au$ solchen Jugendeindrücken leichthin ab.

Allerdings, man sieht gerade bei Goethe von frühester Jugend an scharf sein vorgezeichnetes Karma wirken. Ist es nicht ein besonders hervorstechender Zug in Goethes ganzem Leben, wie er Kunstanschauung, Weltanschauung mit Naturanschauung verbindet, wie er gewissermaßen überall hinter der künstlerischen Phantasie das Streben hat nach der Erkenntnis der Wahrheit in den Naturerscheinungen? Und sehen wir nicht eben wie ein scharf vorgezeichnetes Karma den Knaben bereits, den sechs-, siebenjährigen Knaben, zusammentragen Mineralien, geologische Stufen, die er findet in der Mineralien- und Gesteinssammlung seines Vaters, um sie auf ein Notenpult zu legen und dem großen Gott der Natur einen Altar zu machen? Ja, wie er ein Räucherkerzchen auf diesem aus Naturprodukten zusammengestellten Altar befestigt und sich Licht nun nicht auf die gewöhnliche mechanische Weise macht, sondern mit einem Brennglas die Strahlen der ersten Morgensonne, gerade der ersten Morgensonne auffängt, um sie durch das Brennglas auf das Räucherkerzchen fallen zu lassen und so an den Strahlen der Morgensonne ein Feuer sich zu entzünden, das er dem großen Gotte der Natur darbringt. Wie großartig, und zu gleicher Zeit wie großartig schön sehen wir in dem sechs-, siebenjährigen Knaben den Sinn hingerichtet auf dasjenige, was als Geist in den Naturerscheinungen lebt und webt! Da sehen wir — da ja ganz gewiß dieser Zug, wenn man so sagen will, aus einer ursprünglichen Anlage gekommen sein muß, nicht aus der Umgebung herstammen kann -, wie dasjenige, was er hereingetragen hat in diese Inkarnation, bei diesem Menschen gerade mit besonders starker Kraft gewirkt hat.

Wenn man die Zeit betrachtet, in die Goethe in seiner damaligen Inkarnation hereingeboren worden ist, so wird man ein merk würdiges Zusammenstimmen seiner Natur mit den Zeitereignissen finden. Man ist ja gewiß nach heutiger Weltauffassung vielfach geneigt zu sagen: Nun ja, das was Goethe geschaffen hat, dieser «Faust», das andere, was zur Erhebung, zur geistigen Durchdringung der Menschheit von Goethe ausgegangen ist, das ist eben gekommen, weil es Goethe nach seinen Anlagen gemacht hat. - Es ist freilich schwieriger, bei solchen Dingen, wie sie durch Goethe der Menschheit gegeben worden sind, zu erhärten, daß seine Schöpfungen nicht in diesem einfachen Sinne an seine Person gebunden sein können. Aber überlegen Sie sich einmal etwas anderes. Überlegen Sie sich, wie kurzsinnig gegenüber gewissen Erscheinungen des Daseins manche Betrachtungsweise ist, die glaubt, sich gründlich auf die Wahrheit einzulassen. Sie können in meinem letzten Buche «Vom Menschenrätsel» de Lamettries Ausspruch finden, daß Erasmus von Rotterdam und Fontenelle zum Beispiel ganz andere Menschen geworden wären, wenn auch nur irgendeine kleine Partie in ihrem Gehirn anders gewesen wäre, Man muß nach einer solchen Denkweise annehmen, daß also alles dasjenige, was Erasmus, was Fontenelle geschaffen haben, nicht da wäre in der Welt, wenn, wie de Lamettrie meint, Erasmus und Fontenelle durch eine nur geringe andersartige Beschaffenheit ihres Gehirnes statt Weise Toren geworden wären. Nun, möchte ich sagen, langt es in einer gewissen Beziehung für solche Dinge, wie sie Erasmus, Fontenelle geschaffen haben. Aber überlegen Sie sich dasselbe mit Bezug auf einen anderen Fall. Können Sie sich zum Beispiel denken, daß die Entwickelung der neueren Menschheit hätte ablaufen können, ohne daß Amerika entdeckt worden wäre? Stellen Sie sich einmal vor, was alles eingeflossen ist in das Leben der modernen Menschheit durch die Entdeckung Amerikas! Könnte man nun als Materialist sagen, daß Kolumbus ein anderer geworden wäre, wenn sein Gehirn ein bißchen anders gewesen wäre und er ein Tor statt Kolumbus geworden wäre, und daß dann der Kolumbus nicht Amerika entdeckt hätte? Gewiß, das kann man sagen, geradeso wie man sagen kann, Goethe wäre nicht Goethe geworden, Fontenelle nicht Fontenelle, Erasmus nicht Erasmus, wenn zum Beispiel ihre Mütter während der Zeit, als die Betreffenden noch nicht geboren waren, ein Unglück gehabt hätten und sie tot zur Welt gekommen wären. Aber nimmermehr können wir denken, daß Amerika nicht entdeckt worden wäre, wenn Kolumbus es nicht hätte entdecken können. Sie werden es ziemlich selbstverständlich finden, daß Amerika auch entdeckt worden wäre, wenn Kolumbus einen Gehirndefekt gehabt hätte!

So werden Sie gar nicht zweifeln können, daß ein anderes der Gang der Weltenereignisse ist und ein anderes der Anteil des einzelnen an diesen Weltenereignissen, und Sie werden nicht zweifeln können, daß die Weltenereignisse selber sich aufrufen diejenigen menschlichen Individuen, die durch ihr Karma für dies oder jenes, was die Weltenereignisse fordern, besonders geeignet sind. Bei Amerika läßt es sich sehr leicht ausdenken. Aber für den Tieferblickenden ist es auch nicht anders, sagen wir zum Beispiel, mit Bezug auf die Entstehung des «Faust». Man müßte wirklich an den vollständigen Unsinn im Weltenwerden glauben, wenn man denken sollte, es hätte keine Notwendigkeit vorgelegen, daß solch eine Dichtung wie der «Faust» entstanden wäre, auch wenn das eingetreten wäre, was der Materialist so gerne betont: daß Goethe vielleicht als fünfjährigem Knaben ein Ziegel auf den Kopf gefallen wäre und er ein Blödling geworden wäre. Wer die Entwickelung des Geisteslebens in den Jahrzehnten bis zu Goethe hin verfolgt, der wird sehen, wie der «Faust» wirklich eine Forderung der Zeit war. Lessing ist ja der charakteristische Geist, der einen «Faust» schreiben wollte, sogar eine Szene, die sehr schön ist, schon geschrieben hatte. Nicht bloß Goethes subjektive Bedürfnisse forderten den «Faust», die Zeit forderte den «Faust»! Und für einen Tieferblickenden ist es eben wirklich so, daß man sagen kann, ein ähnlicher Zusammenhang wie zwischen KoJumbus und der Entdeckung Amerikas mit Bezug auf den welthistorischen Gang der Ereignisse, ist auch zwischen Goethes Schöpfungen und Goethe selber.

Ich sagte, betrachtet man das Zeitalter, in das Goethe hineingeboren ist, so merkt man schon einen gewissen Zusammenklang zwischen der Individualität Goethes und diesem Zeitalter, und zwar diesem Zeitalter in weitestem Umkreise. Bedenken Sie, daß trotz aller großen Verschiedenheiten — wir werden gleich auf die Sache noch zurückkommen — doch etwas sehr Ähnliches in den beiden Geistern, in Goethe und Schiller ist, um andere, weniger Bedeutende um sie herum gar nicht zu erwähnen. Bedenken Sie, wie vieles von dem, was wir gerade bei Goethe aufleuchten sehen, wir auch in Herder aufleuchten sehen. Aber man kann viel weiter gehen. Wenn man Goethe ansieht, tritt es vielleicht nicht gleich hervor; darauf wollen wir eben gleich zurückkommen. Aber wenn man Schiller ansieht, wenn man Herder ansieht, Lessing ansieht, so wird man sagen: Zwar ist ihr Leben anders geworden, aber in den Tendenzen, in den Impulsen lebt bei Goethe, bei Schiller, bei Herder, bei Lessing durchaus ein Stück Seelenanlage, durch die sie hätten unter anderen Verhältnissen ebensogut ein Mirabean,ein Danton werden können. Sie stimmen wirklich mit ihrem Zeitalter zusammen. Bei Schiller wird es sich ja gar nicht so schwer nachweisen lassen, denn Schillers Gesinnung wird niemand, insofern Schiller der Dichter der «Räuber», des «Fiesko», der «Kabale und Liebe» war, sehr weit abstechend sehen von der Gesinnung eines Mirabeau oder Danton oder selbst Robespierre. Nur daß Schiller dieselben Impulse, die Danton, Robespierre, Mirabeau in ihre politischen Tendenzen haben hineinfließen lassen, ins Literarische, ins Künstlerische fließen ließ. Aber, man möchte sagen, in bezug auf das Seelenblut, das die Weltgeschichte durchpulst, fließt in den «Räubern» genau dasselbe Seelenblut wie in den Taten Dantons, Mirabeaus und Robespierres, und es floß dieses selbe Seelenblut aber auch in Goethe, wenn man auch zunächst sich vorstellen möchte, daß Goethe recht, recht weit von einem Revolutionär entfernt ist. Das ist er aber gar nicht, das ist er durchaus nicht. Nur kommt bei dieser komplizierten Natur, bei der Natur Goethes, eben auch eine besondere Komplikation von karmischen Impulsen, von Schicksalsimpulsen zustande, welche ihn schon in frühester Jugend in einer ganz besonderen Weise in die Welt hineinstellen.

Wenn man mit geisteswissenschaftlichem Blick das Leben Goethes verfolgt, so teilt es sich zunächst, wenn man von allem übrigen absieht, in gewisse Perioden ab. Die erste Periode verläuft so, daß man sagen kann, es fließt ein Impuls, den man schon in seiner Kindheit findet, weiter. Dann kommt etwas von außen, das seinen Lebensstrom scheinbar ablenkt: die Bekanntschaft mit dem Herzog von Weimar 1775. Und dann wiederum sehen wir, wie ihn in eine andere Lebensbahn bringt sein Aufenthalt in Rom, wie Goethe ein ganz anderer wird dadurch, daß er römisches Leben in sich aufnehmen kann. Wollte man noch genauer darauf eingehen, so könnte man sagen: ein dritter Impuls, der wie von außen kommt - aber das würde, wie wir sehen werden, nicht ganz richtig sein im geisteswissenschaftlichen Sinne -, wäre das freundschaftliche Zusammenleben mit Schiller, nachdem er seine römische Verwandlung durchgemacht hat.

Studiert man den ersten Teil von Goethes Leben bis zum Jahre 1775, dann findet man als Ergebnis, daß allerdings — wenn man auch die Ereignisse aufmerksamer betrachten muß, als man dies gewöhnlich tut — “ in diesem Goethe eine mächtige revolutionäre Stimmung lebt, eine Auflehnung gegen dasjenige, was in seiner Umgebung ist. Nur verteilt sich gewissermaßen seine Natur über vieles. Und dadurch, daß der Auflehne-Impuls nicht so stark hervortritt wie dann, wenn er sich konzentriert wie in Schillers «Räuber», sondern sich mehr verbreitet, tritt die Sache weniger stark hervor. Aber derjenige, der geisteswissenschaftlich auf Goethes Knaben- und Jugendleben einzugehen vermag, der findet, daß in ihm eine geistige Lebenskraft sitzt, die er sich durch seine Geburt in sein Dasein trägt, die, wenn nicht gewisse Ereignisse eingetreten wären, ihn nicht durch sein ganzes Leben hätte begleiten können. Dasjenige, was in ihm als Goethe-Individualität lebte, war weit größer als dasjenige, was sein Organismus wirklich aufnehmen und ausleben konnte.

Bei Schiller ist das handgreiflich. Wenn man solch Handgreifliches heute fühlen könnte, so würde man es schon finden. Schillers früher Tod rührte von nichts anderem her als davon, daß sein Organismus verbrannt wurde durch seine mächtige seelische Lebenskraft. Handgreiflich ist es. Ist es doch bekannt, daß, als Schiller gestorben war, man fand, daß sein Herz wie ausgedörrt in seinem Innern war. Nur durch seine mächtige Seelenkraft hielt er sich eben, solange es ging, aber diese mächtige Seelenkraft verzehrte zugleich das leibliche Leben. Bei Goethe war diese Seelenkraft noch stärker, und doch erreichte Goethe ein hohes Alter. Wodurch erreichte er ein so hohes Alter?

Sehen Sie, ich habe Ihnen gestern eine Tatsache erwähnt, welche in Goethes Leben ganz bedeutungsvoll eingreift. Als er einige Jahre in Leipzig Student gewesen war, da wird er krank, schwer krank und steht dem Tode gegenüber. Er schaut wirklich sozusagen dem Tode ins Angesicht. Diese Krankheit ist ja gewiß eine organische Naturerscheinung, aber man lernt nie einen Menschen, der aus dem Elementarischen der Welt heraus schafft, eigentlich überhaupt keinen Menschen kennen, wenn man solche Ereignisse nicht im Verlauf ihres Karmas in Erwägung zieht. Was geschah denn eigentlich mit Goethe, als er so in Leipzig krank war? Das geschah, was man nennen kann eine völlige Lockerung des ätherischen Leibes, in dem die seelische Lebenskraft wirksam gewesen war bis dahin. Der lockerte sich so, daß nach dieser Krankheit Goethe nicht mehr jenen strammen Zusammenhang hatte zwischen dem ätherischen Leib und dem physischen Leib, den er vorher gehabt hatte. Der ätherische Leib ist aber dasjenige Übersinnliche in uns, was uns eigentlich möglich macht, Vorstellungen zu haben, zu denken. Abstrakte Vorstellungen, wie wir sie im gewöhnlichen Leben haben, wie sie die meisten Menschen, die materialistisch gesinnt sind, allein lieben, hat man dadurch, daß der ätherische Leib eng verbunden ist mit dem physischen Leib, gewissermaßen durch ein starkes magnetisches Band mit dem physischen Leib verbunden ist. Dadurch aber, daß dies der Fall ist, hat man auch den starken Impuls, seinen Willen in die physische Welt hineinzutragen. Man hat diesen Impuls mit dem Willen, wenn außerdem der astralische Leib besonders stark entwickelt ist. Sehen wir hin nach Robespierre, nach Mirabeau, nach Danton, so haben wir einen mit dem physischen Leib stark verbundenen Ätherleib, aber auch einen stark entwickelten Astralleib, der seinerseits auf den Ätherleib wirkt und diese Menschenindividualitäten stark in die physische Welt hineinstellt.

So war auch Goethe organisiert. Aber nun wirkte in ihm eine andere Kraft, die eine Komplikation hervorbrachte. Die wirkte dahin, daß der ätherische Leib durch die Krankheit, die ihn dem Tode ganz nahe brachte, sich lockerte und gelockert blieb. Dadurch aber, daß der Ätherleib nicht mehr so innig mit dem physischen Leib verbunden ist, stößt er nicht mehr seine Kräfte in den physischen Leib hinein, sondern behält sie innerhalb des Ätherischen. Daher diese Umwandlung, die mit Goethe vorgegangen ist, als er nun zurückkehrte von Leipzig nach Frankfurt, wo er in der Bekanntschaft mit Fräulein von Klettenberg, der Mystikerin, in der Bekanntschaft mit allerlei ärztlichen Freunden, die sich alchimistischen Studien hingaben, in der Bekanntschaft mit den Schriften Swedenborgs sich wirklich ein geistiges Weltsystem, noch chaotisch, aber immerhin ein spirituelles Weltsystem aufbaut, wie er. auch eine innigste Neigung hat, sich mit übersinnlichen Dingen zu befassen. Das aber hängt zusammen mit seiner Krankheit. Und die Seele, die sich hereintrug in dieses Erdenleben die Anlage zu dieser Krankheit, die trug damit den Impuls herein, sich durch diese Krankheit den Ätherleib so zuzubereiten, daß dieser Ätherleib sich nicht bloß im Physischen auslebte, sondern den Drang, und nicht nur den Drang, sondern die Begabung erhielt, mit übersinnlichen Vorstellungen sich zu durchdringen. Solange man bloß die äußeren biographischen Tatsachen nach materialistischer Manier betrachtet für irgendeinen Menschen, kommt man nicht darauf, welch feine Zusammenhänge in der Schicksalsströmung eines Menschen sind. Erst wenn man sich einläßt auf den Zusammenklang von Naturereignissen, die unseren Organismus treffen, wie die Krankheit bei Goethe eines war, mit dem, was ethisch, moralisch, spirituell zum Vorschein kommt, dann erst bekommt man die Möglichkeit, die tiefe Wirkung des Karmas zu ahnen.

Die revolutionäre Kraft wäre bei Goethe sicherlich so zum Vorschein gekommen, daß sie ihn früh verzehrt hätte. Da ja in seinem Milieu ein Ausleben der revolutionären Kraft äußerlich nicht möglich gewesen wäre und Goethe nicht Dramen hätte schreiben können wie Schiller, so hätte er sich verzehren müssen. Sie wurde abgeleitet durch dieLockerung des Zusammenhanges, des magnetischen Bandes zwischen seinem ätherischen Leib und dem physischen Leib.

Da sehen Sie, wie ein Naturereignis in das Leben eines Menschen bedeutsam hereintritt. Gewiß, so etwas weist auf einen tieferen Zusammenhang hin, als derjenige ist, den oftmals die Biographen allein an die Oberfläche tragen wollen. Denn die Bedeutung einer Krankheit für das ganze individuelle Erleben eines Menschen läßt sich nicht aus Vererbungstendenzen heraus erklären, sondern die weist schon auf den Zusammenhang eines Menschen mit der Welt so hin, daß dieser Zusammenhang geistig gedacht werden muß. Sie merken daraus auch, wie Goethes Leben sich komplizierte. Denn davon hängt es ab, wie wir etwas aufnehmen, wie wir selber sind.

Jetzt kommt er gewissermaßen mit einem von okkulten Erkenntnissen erfüllten ätherischen Leib nach Straßburg. Und so tritt er Herder entgegen. Herders große Anschauungen mußten in Goethe etwas ganz anderes werden als in Herder selber, der nicht die gleichen Bedingungen in seiner feineren Konstitution hatte. Solch ein Ereignis, wie es dieses Gegenübertreten dem Tode war, tritt bei Goethe ein Ende der sechziger Jahre in Leipzig, aber es ist seiner Kraft nach vorbereitet schon lange. Und derjenige, der eine solche Krankheit aus äußeren Ereignissen herleiten will oder aus bloß physischen Ereignissen, der steht eben auf geistigem Gebiete noch nicht auf demselben Standpunkt, auf dem der Naturforscher steht: daß dasjenige, was nachfolgt, nicht unmittelbar als eine Wirkung angesehen werden darf desjenigen, auf das es folgt. Es war also in Goethe dieses gewissermaßen Sich-Isolieren von der Welt ‚durch diesen Zusammenhang zwischen physischem Leib und Ätherleib, der nur seine Krisis erreichte durch die Krankheit, immer da.

Auf jemanden, bei dem ein kompakter Zusammenhang ist zwischen physischem und Ätherleib, wirkt die Außenwelt ein, aber indem sie Eindrücke macht auf den physischen Leib, gehen die Eindrücke gleich in den. Ätherleib über, das ist eins; und der lebt dann mit den Eindrücken der Außenwelt einfach flott mit. Bei einer solchen Natur wie Goethe es war, werden die Eindrücke selbstverständlich auf den physischen Leib gemacht, aber der Ätherleib geht nicht gleich mit, weil er gelockert ist. Die Folge davon ist, daß gewissermaßen ein solcher Mensch isolierter sein kann gegenüber seiner Umgebung, daß ein komplizierterer Vorgang vorliegt, wenn ein Eindruck auf seinen physischen Leib gemacht wird. Rücken Sie sich hinüber von diesem organischen Bau Goethes zu dem, was Sie aus seiner Biographie kennen: daß er die Ereignisse, auch die historischen Ereignisse, gewissermaßen ohne sie zu vergewaltigen, auf sich wirken läßt, dann haben Sie sich Verständnis geschaffen für das eigentümliche Walten der Goethe-Natur. Ich sagte Ihnen: er nimmt die Biographie des Gottfried von Berlichingen, läßt sich nur beeinflussen von Shakespeares dramatischen Impulsen und veränderte gar nicht viel die nicht besonders gut geschriebene Selbstbiographie des Gottfried von Berlichingen, so daß er sein Drama auch nicht «Drama» nennt, sondern «Geschichte Gottfriedens von Berlichingen mit der eisernen Hand, dramatisiert»; er verändert nur etwas. Sehen Sie, dieses, ich möchte sagen, sanfte und zaghafte Anrühren der Dinge, so daß er nicht gewaltsam zufaßt, das ist bewirkt durch diesen ganz besonderen Zusammenhang zwischen Ätherleib und physischem Leib.

Dieser Zusammenhang war beiSchiller nicht vorhanden. Daher stellt er solche Gestalten hin, die er wahrhaftig nicht auf einen äußeren Eindruck hin hingestellt hat, sondern die er ganz gewaltsam aus seiner Natur heraus formt: Karl Moor. Goethe braucht die Wirkung des Lebens. Aber das Leben vergewaltigt er nicht; er hilft nur leise nach, um das Leben zum Kunstwerk zu erheben. So ist es auch, als die Lebens- . verhältnisse an ihn herantreten, die er dann im «Werther» gestaltet hat. Eigene Lebensverhältnisse, Lebensverhältnisse seines Freundes Jerusalem, sie biegt er nicht, formt er nicht viel, sondern er nimmt das Leben und hilft nur nach. Und durch die sanfte Art, wie er nachhilft eben aus seinem Ätherleib heraus, wird aus dem Leben ein Kunstwerk. Aber er kommt durch dieselbe Organisation dem Leben auch, ich möchte sagen, nur mittelbar nahe und bereitet sich in dieser Inkarnation sein Karma durch dieses nur mittelbare Nahekommen dem Leben.

Er kommt nach Straßburg. Außer dem, was er erlebt hat, was ich Ihnen gestern erzählt habe, was ihn vorwärtsbrachte auf seiner GoetheLaufbahn, erlebte er ja, wie Sie wissen, in Straßburg auch die Herzensbeziehung zu der Pfarrtochter in Sesenheim, zu Friederike Brion. Er ist sehr, sehr mit seinem Herzen in diesem Verhältnisse drinnen, und gewiß, man kann mancherlei moralische Bedenken gegen den Verlauf dieses Verhältnisses zwischen Goethe und Friederike von Sesenheim geltend machen, die auch berechtigt sein mögen. Darauf kommt es jetzt nicht an, sondern auf das Verständnis kommt es an. Goethe macht schon wirklich alles dasjenige durch, was eben bei jemandem, der nicht Goethe gewesen wäre, nicht nur hätte führen müssen, sondern selbstverständlich geführt hätte zu einer dauernden Lebensgemeinschaft mit Friederike Brion. Aber Goethe erlebt nicht unmittelbar. Durch dasjenige, was ich Ihnen erzählt habe, ist zwischen seinem besonderen Innern und zwischen der Außenwelt eine Art Kluft geschaffen. So wie er das Lebendige der Außenwelt nicht vergewaltigt, sondern nur sanft umformt, so bringt er gewissermaßen auch sein Fühlen und Empfinden, wie er es nur in seinem Ätherleibe erleben kann, nicht durch den physischen Leib gleich zu einem solch festen Zusammenhang mit der Außenwelt, daß bei ihm dasjenige, was bei anderen zu ganz bestimmten Lebensereignissen geführt hätte, auch dazu hätte führen können. Und so zieht er sich wieder zurück von Friederike Brion. Aber man soll nur so etwas seelisch nehmen. Als er ein letztes Mal hinausreitet, begegnet er auf dem Rückwege-Sie können das in seiner Biographie nachlesen -sich selber. Goethe kommt Goethe entgegen. Goethe erzählt es ja noch viel, viel später, wie er sich dazumal selber begegnete. Goethe kommt Goethe entgegen. Er sieht sich selber. Er reitet hinaus, entgegen kommt ihm auf dem Rückwege Goethe, aber nicht in der Kleidung, die er anhat, sondern in einer anderen Kleidung. Und als er später, nach Jahren wiederum dahin kommt, die alten Bekannten aufsucht, da erkennt er, daß er wirklich in dem Kostüm, ohne daß er es gesucht hat, das er vor Jahren voraus an sich gesehen hat, als er sich begegnete, wieder hinausging. Das ist ein Ereignis, an das man mit derselben Kraft glauben muß, mit der man irgend etwas anderes glaubt, was Goethe erzählt. Daran zu mäkeln, das, möchte ich sagen, geziemt sich nicht gegenüber der Wahrheitsliebe, mit der Goethe sein Leben dargestellt hat.

Wie kommt es denn, daß Goethe, der also ferne-nahstand den Verhältnissen, in die er getreten war, so nahe, daß es bei jedem anderen zu etwas ganz anderem geführt hätte, und so ferne, daß er eben sich zurückziehen konnte, wie kommt es, daß er sich da selber begegnete? Nun, bei einem Menschen, der etwas im ätherischen Leib erlebt, verobjektiviert sich sehr leicht das Erlebnis, wenn dieser ätherische Leib gelockert ist. Er sieht es als ein Äußeres, es projiziert sich nach außen. Das ist bei Goethe wirklich eingetreten. Er hat in einem besonders dazu geeigneten Momente den anderen Goethe gesehen, den ätherischen Goethe, der in ihm lebte, der verbunden blieb durch sein Karma mit Friederike von Sesenheim. Daher kam er sich selbst als Gespenst entgegen. Aber es ist das gerade ein Ereignis, welches im tiefsten Sinne erhärtet, was über seine eigene Natur aus den Tatsachen zu ersehen ist.

Da sehen Sie, wie der Mensch drinnenstehen kann in den äußeren Ereignissen, und wie man doch erst erfassen muß die besondere Art und Weise, die individuelle Art und Weise, wie er drinnensteht. Denn kompliziert ist das Verhältnis des Menschen zur Welt, zur Vergangenheit, der Zusammenhang mit demjenigen, was wir aus der Vergangenheit herübertragen in unsere Gegenwart. Dadurch aber, daß Goethe gewissermaßen sein Inneres so herausgerissen hat aus dem körperlichen Zusammenhang, dadurch war ihm in früher Jugend schon möglich, die tiefen Wahrheiten in seiner Seele zu hegen, die uns in seinem «Faust» so überraschen. Ich sage absichtlich: überraschen, aus dem einfachen Grunde, weil sie wirklich überraschen müssen, denn ich kenne kaum irgend etwas Einfältigeres, als wenn Goethe-Biographen immerzu mit dem Satze hausieren gehen: «Goethe ist Faust und Faust ist Goethe». Ich habe das oftmals gelesen bei Goethe-Biographen. Es ist natürlich ein ganz gewöhnlicher Unsinn. Denn dasjenige, was wir im «Faust» wirklich haben, wenn wir es recht auf uns wirken lassen, kommt uns ja tatsächlich so vor, daß wir uns sagen müssen: Es ist zuweilen so, daß wir gar nicht vermuten, daß es in unmittelbar gleicher Art Goethe durchlebt hat oder sogar wissen kann - und dennoch steht es im «Faust» drinnen. Faust wächst immer über Goethe hinaus. Das kann allerdings nur der vollständig verstehen, der jene Überraschung kennt, die der ein Dichtwerk Schaffende selber erlebt, wenn er dann dieses Dichtwerk vor sich hat. Man darf nämlich nicht glauben, daß der Dichter immer ebenso groß sein muß wie sein Werk. Er braucht es ebensowenig zu sein, wie der Vater so groß zu sein braucht an Seelenkraft und Genie wie sein Sohn; denn das wirklich dichterische Schaffen ist ein Lebendiges. Und ebensowenig wie gesagt werden kann, daß ein Lebendiges nicht über sich hinaus schaffe, so kann auch nicht behauptet werden, daß nie ein Geistig-Schöpferisches über sich hinaus schaffe.

Aber durch dieses innerliche Isoliertsein, das ich beschrieben habe bei Goethe, treten jene tiefen Einsichten auf in seiner Seele, die uns aus seinem «Faust» entgegentreten. Denn solche Werke wie «Faust» sind nicht Dichtungen wie andere Dichtungen. Der «Faust» quillt gleichsam hervor aus dem ganzen Geiste der fünften nachatlantischen Kulturperiode; er wächst weit über Goethe hinaus. Und manches, was wir erleben mit der Welt und ihrem Werden, es tönt uns aus «Faust» in einer merkwürdigen Weise entgegen. Gedenken Sie des Wortes, das Sie eben vorhin gehört haben:

Mein Freund, die Zeiten der Vergangenheit
Sind uns ein Buch mit sieben Siegeln;
Was ihr den Geist der Zeiten heißt,
Das ist im Grund der Herren eigner Geist,
In dem die Zeiten sich bespiegeln.

Man geht zu leicht über ein solches Wort hinweg. Derjenige, der es in seiner vollen Tiefe spürt, wird an manches erinnert, was ein solches Wort nur im tiefsten Sinne wahr machen kann. Denken Sie, was die modernen Menschen haben durch die Kenntnis des Griechischen, des griechischen Geisteslebens, durch Äschylos, Sophokles, Euripides! Die Menschen vertiefen sich in dieses griechische Geistesleben, sagen wir in Sophokles. Ist Sophokles ein Buch mit sieben Siegeln? Man wird nicht leicht daran denken, daß Sophokles ein Buch mit sieben Siegeln sein könne! Sophokles, der einundneunzig Jahre alt geworden ist, hat mehr als achtzig Dramen geschrieben, sieben davon sind erhalten! Kennt man einen Menschen, der einundachtzig oder mehr Dramen geschrieben hat, von denen nur sieben erhalten sind? Ist das nicht wörtlich wahr: ein Buch mit sieben Siegeln? Wie kann jemand behaupten, nach dem, was überliefert ist, das Griechentum zu kennen, wenn er sich einfach vorhalten muß, vierundsiebzig Sophokleische Dramen, die die Griechen entzückt, erhoben haben, sind nicht da? Eine sehr große Anzahl auch von Äschylos sind nicht da. Dichter haben gelebt in der griechischen Zeit, deren Name nicht einmal bekannt ist. Sind nicht die Zeiten der Vergangenheit ein Buch mit sieben Siegeln? Wenn man solch eine äußerliche Tatsache nimmt, so muß man sich das sagen. Und —

...es ist ein groß Ergetzen,
Sich in den Geist der Zeiten zu versetzen,
Zu schauen, wie vor uns ein weiser Mann gedacht,
Und wie wir’s dann zuletzt so herrlich weit gebracht.

Wagner-Naturen glauben, sich leicht in den Geist eines weisen Mannes versetzen zu können — wenn es ihnen nämlich vorgemacht worden ist! Denn schade, daß man nicht die Probe machen kann, was die wackeren Rezensentelein über den «Hamlet» schreiben würden, wenn er jetzt eben erscheinen und auf irgendeiner großen städtischen Bühne vor den Herren aufgeführt würde, oder wenn ein Sophokleisches Drama vor diesen Herren heute aufgeführt würde! Vielleicht würde bei diesen Herren es selbst nicht helfen, was Sophokles selber tun mußte, um wenigstens seine Verwandten von seiner Größe noch im hohen Alter zu überzeugen. Denn einundneunzig Jahre alt ist er geworden, die Verwandten haben so lange auf die Erbschaft warten müssen; da haben sie gesucht, Zeugnisse zu bekommen, daß Sophokles schwachsinnig geworden sei und nicht mehr sein eigenes Vermögen verwalten könne. Da konnte er sich nicht anders retten, als daß er den «Odipus auf Kolonos» schrieb. Damit konnte er wenigstens beweisen, daß er noch nicht schwachsinnig geworden war. Ob es bei heutigen Rezensenten nützen würde, weiß ich nicht, damals hat es aber geholfen. Aber wer sich in eine solche Tatsache hinein vertieft, in die Tragik des neunzigjährigen Sophokles, der wird zu gleicher Zeit ermessen, wie schwer es ist, den Weg zu finden zu einer menschlichen Individualität; wie diese menschliche Individualität in komplizierter Weise mit den Weltenereignissen zusammenhängt. Und vieles, vieles könnte angeführt werden, das zeigen würde, wie man in tiefe Schächte hineingraben muß, um die Welt zu verstehen. Aber wie viel lebt von der Weisheit, die notwendig ist, um die Welt zu verstehen, schon in den allerersten Partien von Goethes «Faust»! Zurückzuführen ist das auf dieses eigentümlich verlaufende Schicksal, das wirklich zeigt, wie Natur und Geisteswirken eines ist in der menschlichen Entwickelung, wie eine Krankheit nicht nur eine äußere physische, wie eine Krankheit eine geistige Bedeutung haben kann.

So sehen wir, man möchte sagen, scharf fortgeführt den karmischen Anstoß, der in Goethe war. Dann aber wieder, 1775, tritt wie von außen herein die Bekanntschaft mit dem Herzog von Weimar. Goethe wird von Frankfurt nach Weimar berufen. Was bedeutet denn das in seinem Leben? Man muß erst verstehen, was solch ein Ereignis bedeutete für das Leben eines Menschen, wenn man nun weiteres ausfindig machen will, um das Leben zu verstehen. Ich weiß, wie wenig die heutige Welt geneigt ist, wirklich die Seelenkräfte wachzurufen, die notwendig sind, um so etwas voll zu empfinden, voll zu fühlen, was schon in den ersten Partien von Goethes «Faust» lebt. Um das zu schreiben, was nun hier aufgeführt worden ist — «Faust I», Monolog im Studierzimmer, Erdgeist —, dazu gehört ein Reichtum der Seele, der, wenn man ihn ansieht, einen dazu veranlassen möchte, in inbrünstiger Verehrung lange, lange davor zu verharren. Und man hat oftmals den tiefsten Seelenschmerz, wenn man sieht, wie die Welt eigentlich doch recht stumpf ist und gar nicht Größe, Größe fühlen kann. Fühlt man aber so etwas voll, dann wird man auch verstehen, wozu derjenige, der von Geisteswissenschaft wirklich durchdrungen ist, in seiner Empfindung kommt. Der kommt nämlich dazu, sich zu sagen: In diesem Goethe lebte etwas, das ihn verbrannte. So konnte es nicht weitergehen.

Diesen Gedanken muß man schon haben. Stellen Sie sich vor: 1749 ist Goethe geboren, 1775 ist er also sechsundzwanzig Jahre alt. Er trägt im Koffer das Manuskript der Szene, die wir heute aufgeführt haben nehmen wir nur dies, es war noch anderes dabei -, nach Weimar mit. Wer solches durchlebt hat, so, bis zu dem Grade, daß er es niederschreiben konnte, der hat daran in seiner Seele zu tragen; auf dessen Seele lastet es schwer, denn es ist eine Kraft, die aufwärtsführen will, die Seele zersprengen möchte.

Zwei Dinge müssen wir uns klarmachen, wenn wir in richtigem Sinne, in der richtigen Beleuchtung diese ersten Partien des «Faust», die Goethe geschrieben hat, würdigen wollen. Man könnte sich ja denken, daß Goethe, sagen wir von seinem fünfundzwanzigsten bis zu seinem fünfzigsten Jahre nach und nach diese Szenen geschrieben hätte. Dann würden sie die Seele nicht so gespannt haben, dann wären sie “ keine solche Last gewesen. Nun gewiß, aber das ist nicht möglich, wäre nicht möglich gewesen, denn vom dreißigsten, fünfunddreißigsten Jahre ab würde eben die Jugendkraft gemangelt haben, die dazu notwendig war, um diese Dinge gerade so zu gestalten. Er mußte sie in diesen Jahren schreiben nach seiner Individualität, aber er konnte so nicht weiterleben. Er brauchte etwas, was wie eine Dämpfung, wie eine Art partieller Seelenschlaf war, um abzuschwächen das Feuer, das in seiner Seele gebrannt hat, als er die ersten Partien des «Faust» schrieb. Der Herzog von Weimar holte ihn, um ihn in Weimar zum Minister zu machen. Und er war ein guter Minister, sagte ich schon. Da konnte er als Minister, indem er viel emsige Arbeit leistete, partiell verschlafen sich ausruhend — dasjenige, das gebrannt hat in seiner Seele. Und es ist wirklich ein gewaltiger Unterschied in der Stimmung vor 1775 und nach 1775, .die schon zu vergleichen ist mit einer Art gewaltigen Wachens und nachher abgedämpften Lebens. Da kommt sogar das Wort «Dumpfheit» Goethe in den Sinn, wenn er sein besonderes Leben in Weimar schildert, wo er so in die Ereignisse sich hineinlebt, aber mit ihnen mehr mitschwingt als früher, da er gegen sie revoltierte. Merkwürdig war es dann, daß auf die Abstumpfung für zehn Jahre ein sanfteres Heranbringen der Ereignisse an den Menschen folgte. Und so wenig das Schlafleben eine unmittelbare Wirkung des vorhergehenden Tageslebens ist, so wenig war dieses Schlafleben Goethes eine Wirkung desjenigen, was vorangegangen war. Die Zusammenhänge sind vie] größere, als man gewöhnlich denkt. Ich habe schon öfter darauf aufmerksam gemacht, daß es eine oberflächliche Anschauung ist, wenn man auf die Frage: Warum schläft der Mensch? antwortet: Weil er müde ist! — Es ist eine faule, selber schlafende Wahrheit, denn es ist ein Unsinn. Sonst müßte nicht eine Tatsache sein, daß diejenigen Menschen, die nicht müde sein können, zum Beispiel Rentiers nach einer vollen Mahlzeit, wenn sie etwas hören sollen, wofür sie sich nicht besonders interessieren, in Schlaf sich einlullen. Müde sind sie gewiß nicht. Die Sache ist nicht so, daß wir schlafen, weil wir müde sind, sondern das Wachen und Schlafen ist ein rhythmischer Lebensvorgang, und wenn die Zeit des Schlafens, die Notwendigkeit des Schlafens herankommt, so werden wir müde. Wir sind müde, weil wir schlafen sollen, nicht aber schlafen wir, weil wir müde sind. Das will ich in diesem Augenblicke nicht weiter ausführen.

Aber denken Sie sich einmal, in welchem großen Zusammenhang der Rhythmus von Schlafen und Wachen drinnensteht! Er ist ja die Nachbildung von Tag und Nacht im Kosmos innerhalb der menschlichen Natur. Den Schlaf erklären zu wollen aus der Ermüdung des Tages, ist allerdings der materialistischen Wissenschaft naheliegend, aber das Umgekehrte ist richtig. Der Rhythmus von Schlafen und Wachen muß aus dem Kosmos erklärt werden, aus großen Zusammenhängen heraus. Aus großen Zusammenhängen heraus muß aber auch erklärt werden, warum bei Goethe nach der Periode, in der «Faust» in seinen Seelenadern brauste, die Abdämpfung der zehn Jahre weimarischen Lebens folgte. Da werden Sie unmittelbar auf sein Karma gewiesen, über das nun nicht weiter gesprochen werden kann.

Der Mensch als alltäglicher Mensch wacht am Morgen auf, in der Regel so, wie er am Abend eingeschlafen ist, für sein eigenes Bewußtsein. In Wirklichkeit ist es ja niemals so. Wir wachen niemals gerade so auf, wie wir eingeschlafen sind, sondern wirklich etwas reicher; wir werden uns nur der Bereicherung nicht bewußt. Aber wenn nun auf einen Wellenberg ein Wellental gefolgt ist, wie bei Goethe in den weimarischen Jahren, dann erfolgt das Aufwachen auf einer höheren Stufe, muß auf einer höheren Stufe erfolgen. Aber die innersten Kräfte streben danach. Und die innersten Kräfte streben bei Goethe auch, aus der weimarischen Dumpfheit zum vollen Leben wieder zu erwachen in einer Umgebung, die ihm nun wirklich bringen konnte, was ihm fehlte. Das war in Italien, als er erwachte. In Weimar selber hätte er nach seiner besonderen Konstitution nicht aufwachen können. Gerade an einer solchen Sache aber kann man den tiefen Zusammenhang des Schaffens eines wirklichen Künstlers, eines großen Künstlers mit seinem besonderen Erleben sehen. Sehen Sie, einer, der kein großer Künstler ist, der kann ein Drama so glattweg nach und nach, Seite für Seite hinschreiben; er kann es ganz gut. Der große Dichter kann es nicht, denn der braucht: tief drinnenzuwurzeln im Leben. Goethe konnte daher tiefste, tiefste Wahrheiten in seinem «Faust» zum Ausdrucke bringen in verhältnismäßig früher Jugend, Wahrheiten, die weit über sein Seelenvermögen hinauswuchsen, Aber er mußte eine Verjüngung beim Faust zum Ausdruck bringen. Denken Sie sich: Faust mußte zu einer ganz anderen Stimmung kommen; trotzdem er so tief gestaltet ist, mußte er verjüngt werden. Schließlich, trotz aller Tiefe, hat ihn dasjenige, was er bis dahin in seiner Seele aufgenommen hat, dem Selbstmorde nahegebracht. Er mußte verjüngt werden. Ein kleiner Mensch kann recht gut schildern in vielleicht recht schönen Versen, wie ein Mensch verjüngt wird. Goethe konnte es nicht so ohne weiteres; er mußte selbst erst in Rom verjüngt werden. Daher ist die Verjüngungsszene der «Hexenküche» in Rom geschrieben, im Garten der Villa Borghese. Goethe würde es nicht gewagt haben, diese Szene früher zu schreiben.

Nun, verbunden mit einer solchen Verjüngung, wie sie Goethe erlebt hat, ist ein wenn auch noch dumpfes Bewußtsein. Zu Goethes Zeit gab es noch keine Geisteswissenschaft: es konnte kein helles Bewußtsein sein, sondern nur ein dumpfes Bewußtsein. Mit einer solchen Verjüngung sind besondere Kräfte wieder verbunden, die schon in die nächste Inkarnation hinüberspielen. Da gliedern sich ineinander Erlebnisse, die dieser Inkarnation angehören, und mancherlei, was in die nächste Inkarnation hinüberspielt. Wenn man dies bedenkt, wird man auf eine besonders tiefbedeutsame Tendenz bei Goethe geführt. Sehen Sie, wenn ich diese persönliche Bemerkung einschalten darf: Ich beschäftige mich seit einer Reihe von Jahrzehnten, ich kann sagen seit 1879/80 eigentlich immer, intensiv seit 1885/86, mit Goethes Naturanschauung. Und ich habe in dieser Zeit die Anschauung gewonnen: In dem Impuls, den Goethe der Naturanschauung gegeben hat - von dem die heutigen Naturgelehrten, Naturwissenschafter, Naturdenker eigentlich gar nichts verstehen -, liegt etwas, das ausgebildet werden kann, aber erst in Jahrhunderten. So daß Goethe wohl wahrscheinlich, wenn er wiederkommen wird in anderer Inkarnation, noch die Möglichkeit finden wird, an dem zu gestalten, was er in dieser Inkarnation gerade aus seinen Naturanschauungen noch nicht hat fertigmachen können. Manche Dinge ahnt man heute noch gar nicht, die in Goethes Naturanschauung liegen. Darüber habe ich mich ja ausgesprochen in meinem Buche «Goethes Weltanschauung» und in den Einleitungen zu «Goethes Naturwissenschaftlichen Schriften» in Kürschners Nationalliteratur. So daß man schon sagen kann: Goethe trägt mit seiner Naturanschauung etwas in sich, das in weite, weite Horizonte hinausweist, das aber innig zusammenhängt mit seiner Wiedergeburt, wie sie jetzt zwar nicht gerade in dieser Beziehung an Rom gebunden war, aber an das Lebensalter, das er in Rom durchlebte. Lesen Sie nach, wie ich die Dinge dargestellt habe, wie sich die Metamorphose der Pflanzen, der Tiere, Urpflanze, Urtier, während der italienischen Reise ausgestaltet, wie er, als er zurückkam, die Farbenlehre, die man heute noch gar nicht verstehen kann, in Angriff nahm, wie er ja noch andere Dinge in Angriff nahm; dann werden Sie sehen: Mit seiner Wiedergeburt hängt auch dieses Einleben in seine umfassende Naturanschauung zusammen. Dann hat er allerdings dasjenige, was sich in ihm selber im Laufe des Lebens ergeben hat, mit Faust in Beziehung gebracht, aber nicht so, wie es ein kleiner Dichter tut,sondern wie es ein großer Dichter tut. Faust erlebt die GretchenTragödie. Mitten in der Gretchen-Tragödie tritt uns plötzlich entgegen Faustens große Naturanschauung, die nun allerdings viel Verwandtes hat mit Goethes großer Naturanschauung, und die zum Ausdruck kommt in den Faust-Worten:

Erhabner Geist, du gabst mir, gabst mir alles,
Warum ich bat. Du hast mir nicht umsonst
Dein Angesicht im Feuer zugewendet.
Gabst mir die herrliche Natur zum Königreich,
Kraft, sie zu fühlen, zu genießen. Nicht
Kalt staunenden Besuch erlaubst du nur,
Vergönnest mir, in ihre tiefe Brust,
Wie in den Busen eines Freunds, zu schauen.
Du führst die Reihe der Lebendigen
Vor mir vorbei, und lehrst mich meine Brüder
Im stillen Busch, in Luft und Wasser kennen.
Und wenn der Sturm im Walde braust und knarrt,
Die Riesenfichte, stürzend, Nachbaräste
Und Nachbarstämme quetschend niederstreift,
Und ihrem Fall dumpf hohl der Hügel donnert,
Dann führst du mich zur sichern Höhle, zeigst
Mich dann mir selbst, und meiner eignen Brust
Geheime tiefe Wunder öffnen sich.

Eine große Weltanschauung! Goethe schreibt sie dem Faust zu. Goethe hat sie erst gewonnen bis zu dieser Durchdringung der Seele während seiner Italienreise. Die Szene «Erhabner Geist, du gabst mir, gabst mir alles», ist auch in Rom geschrieben; die hatte Goethe nicht früher geschrieben. Denn diese zwei Szenen, die Verjüngungsszene in der «Hexenküche» und die Szene «Wald und Höhle»: «Erhabner Geist, du gabst mir, gabst mir alles», sie sind es gerade, die in Rom geschrieben worden sind.

Da sehen Sie einen wirklichen Rhythmus in diesem Goethe-Leben, einen Rhythmus, der einen innerlichen Impuls verrät, so wie der Rhythmus von Wachen und Schlafen im Menschen einen inneren Impuls verrät. Wir können an einem solchen Leben, wie das Goethe-Leben es ist, besonders anschaulich manche Gesetze studieren, aber es wird sich uns zeigen, wie dasjenige, was bei großen Persönlichkeiten uns an Gesetzen entgegentritt, für das Leben jedes einzelnen wichtig werden kann. Denn schließlich walten doch die Gesetze, die bei einem Großen walten, bei jedem einzelnen Menschen. Über Lebenszusammenhänge nun, wie sie von diesem Gesichtspunkte aus gewonnen werden können, wollen wir morgen weiter sprechen.

Second Lecture

As you have already gathered from what I have said, the intention of this lecture is to lead you to an understanding of the individual karma of human beings and, in a broader sense, of the collective karma of our time. But human life, especially when viewed in this way, as it concerns each individual, is extremely complicated, and many threads that connect human beings to the world, to a closer or more distant past, must be traced if one wants to answer the question of their destiny. This perhaps explains why, while I actually want to deal with something that is very close to us, very close to every human being, I am now taking such a long detour and making observations that are intended to shed light, as it were, on the narrow existence of each individual, linking them to a life on earth that is significant in world history: to Goethe's life on earth. After all, Goethe's earthly life is accessible to us in great detail. Of course, every human life is very different from the fate of such an exemplary, world-historical mind, but it is nevertheless possible to gain insights for each of us from the contemplation of such a life. Therefore, let us not be discouraged from extending a little further the connections we began yesterday, particularly in relation to our specific questions, which we will continue to explore more and more.

If one follows Goethe's life as many who wish to be his biographers have done to this day, one does not pay any attention to how human beings are inclined to quickly link effect with cause. You see, natural scientists today repeatedly point out that people make many mistakes when they quickly adopt as their principle the idea that “after something happens, it must be because of something else,” this “post hoc, ergo propter hoc”: because something follows something else, it must be the effect of the cause. This is criticized in the field of natural science. In the field of human life, however, we have not yet progressed far enough to thoroughly reject this principle. Certain wild people belonging to the Kamchadal tribe believe that wagtails or similar birds bring spring because spring follows their arrival. Thus, humans very often conclude that what follows something else arises from that other thing. From Goethe's own descriptions, that is, from the descriptions of a human life that shines particularly brightly on humanity, we learn that Goethe had this father, this mother, that he went through these things in his youth, which he himself tells us about, and one then deduces biographically from these impressions of his youth what he did later in life that made him so important to humanity, entirely according to the principle that because something follows something else, it must also arise from that other thing. This is no more intelligent than believing that spring is brought by wagtails. In the natural sciences, such superstition has been sharply criticized; in the humanities, we have yet to reach that point. It is, however, very nicely explained that Goethe, at a relatively early age, while still a boy, when French troops were quartered in his father's house during the French occupation of Frankfurt, experienced how the famous royal lieutenant Thoranc organized theater performances there, how he employed painters, and how Goethe, still almost a child, came into contact with painting and the theatrical arts. From this, Goethe's inclination toward art in later life is easily deduced from such youthful impressions.

However, one can see Goethe's predestined karma at work from his earliest youth. Is it not a particularly striking feature of Goethe's entire life how he combines his view of art and his worldview with his view of nature, how he strives, behind his artistic imagination, to discover the truth in natural phenomena? And do we not see how a sharply defined karma already brings the boy, the six- or seven-year-old boy, to collect minerals and geological formations that he finds in his father's mineral and rock collection, to place them on a music stand and make an altar to the great God of nature? Yes, how he fastens a small incense burner to this altar made of natural products and, instead of lighting it in the usual mechanical way, uses a burning glass to catch the rays of the first morning sun, the very first rays of the morning sun, and lets them fall through the burning glass onto the incense burner, thus kindling a fire with the rays of the morning sun, which he offers to the great God of nature. How magnificent, and at the same time how magnificently beautiful, we see in this six- or seven-year-old boy the mind focused on that which lives and weaves as spirit in the phenomena of nature! We see here—since this trait must surely have come from an original disposition and cannot have originated from his environment—how what he brought with him into this incarnation has had a particularly strong effect on this person.

If we consider the time in which Goethe was born in his former incarnation, we find a remarkable harmony between his nature and the events of the time. According to today's worldview, one is certainly inclined to say: Well, what Goethe created, this “Faust,” and the other things that emanated from Goethe for the elevation and spiritual penetration of humanity, came about because Goethe did it according to his predispositions. It is, of course, more difficult to prove, in the case of things such as those given to humanity by Goethe, that his creations cannot be bound to his person in this simple sense. But consider something else. Consider how short-sighted certain views are toward certain phenomena of existence, views that believe they are thoroughly committed to the truth. In my last book, “Vom Menschenrätsel” (The Riddle of Man), you can find de Lamettrie's statement that Erasmus of Rotterdam and Fontenelle, for example, would have become completely different people if even the smallest part of their brains had been different. According to this way of thinking, one must assume that everything that Erasmus and Fontenelle created would not exist in the world if, as de Lamettrie believes, Erasmus and Fontenelle had become wise fools instead of fools due to a slight difference in the constitution of their brains. Well, I would say that in a certain respect this is sufficient for things such as those created by Erasmus and Fontenelle. But consider the same thing in relation to another case. Can you imagine, for example, that the development of modern humanity could have taken place without the discovery of America? Just imagine what has flowed into the life of modern humanity through the discovery of America! Could a materialist say that Columbus would have been a different person if his brain had been a little different and he had become a fool instead of Columbus, and that Columbus would not have discovered America? Certainly, one could say that, just as one could say that Goethe would not have become Goethe, Fontenelle would not have become Fontenelle, Erasmus would not have become Erasmus, if, for example, their mothers had had an accident before they were born and they had been stillborn. But we can never think that America would not have been discovered if Columbus had not been able to discover it. You will find it quite natural that America would have been discovered even if Columbus had had a brain defect!

Thus, you will not be able to doubt that the course of world events is one thing and the part of the individual in these world events is another, and you will not be able to doubt that world events themselves call upon those human individuals who, through their karma, are particularly suited to this or that which world events demand. In the case of America, it is very easy to imagine. But for those with deeper insight, it is no different, say, for example, with regard to the origin of “Faust.” One would really have to believe in complete nonsense in the becoming of the world if one were to think that there was no necessity for a work of fiction such as Faust to have come into being, even if what the materialist so gladly emphasizes had happened: that Goethe, as a five-year-old boy, had perhaps been hit on the head by a brick and had become a fool. Anyone who traces the development of intellectual life in the decades leading up to Goethe will see how Faust was truly a demand of the times. Lessing is, after all, the characteristic spirit who wanted to write a Faust and had even already written a scene that is very beautiful. It was not merely Goethe's subjective needs that demanded Faust; the times demanded Faust! And for those with a deeper insight, it is indeed true that one can say that there is a similar connection between KoJumbus and the discovery of America in relation to the course of world history as there is between Goethe's creations and Goethe himself.

I said that if one considers the age into which Goethe was born, one already notices a certain harmony between Goethe's individuality and this age, and indeed this age in its widest sense. Consider that despite all the great differences—we will come back to this point in a moment—there is something very similar in the two minds, in Goethe and Schiller, not to mention other, less significant similarities around them. Consider how much of what we see shining in Goethe we also see shining in Herder. But one can go much further. When one looks at Goethe, it may not be immediately apparent; we will come back to that in a moment. But when you look at Schiller, when you look at Herder, when you look at Lessing, you will say: although their lives turned out differently, there is definitely a piece of their soul in the tendencies, in the impulses of Goethe, Schiller, Herder, and Lessing, through which they could just as easily have become a Mirabeau or a Danton under different circumstances. They are truly in tune with their age. In Schiller's case, this is not so difficult to prove, for no one would consider Schiller's attitude, insofar as he was the poet of “The Robbers,” “Fiesco,” and “Intrigue and Love,” to be very different from that of Mirabeau, Danton, or even Robespierre. Except that Schiller allowed the same impulses that Danton, Robespierre, and Mirabeau allowed to flow into their political tendencies to flow into literature and art. But one might say that, in terms of the lifeblood that pulsates through world history, the same lifeblood flows in The Robbers as in the deeds of Danton, Mirabeau, and Robespierre, and this same lifeblood also flowed in Goethe, even if one might initially imagine that Goethe was very, very far removed from a revolutionary. But he is not that at all, he is definitely not that. It is just that in this complicated nature, in Goethe's nature, there is also a special complication of karmic impulses, of impulses of fate, which placed him in the world in a very special way from his earliest youth.

If one follows Goethe's life from a spiritual scientific perspective, it can initially be divided into certain periods, disregarding everything else. The first period can be described as the continuation of an impulse that can already be found in his childhood. Then something external appears that seems to divert the flow of his life: his acquaintance with the Duke of Weimar in 1775. And then we see how his stay in Rome sets him on a different course in life, how Goethe becomes a completely different person as a result of being able to absorb Roman life. If one wanted to go into this in more detail, one could say that a third impulse, which comes from outside – but this would not be entirely correct in the spiritual-scientific sense, as we shall see – was his friendly coexistence with Schiller after he had undergone his Roman transformation.

If one studies the first part of Goethe's life up to 1775, one finds that, although one must look at events more attentively than is usually done, “a powerful revolutionary mood lives in this Goethe, a rebellion against what is around him. It is only that his nature is, so to speak, spread over many things. And because the impulse to rebellion does not emerge as strongly as when it is concentrated, as in Schiller's “The Robbers,” but is more widespread, the matter does not stand out as strongly. But anyone who is able to examine Goethe's childhood and youth from a spiritual-scientific perspective will find that he possessed a spiritual vitality that he carried with him from birth and which, had certain events not occurred, would not have accompanied him throughout his entire life. What lived in him as Goethe's individuality was far greater than what his organism could actually absorb and live out.

In Schiller, this is obvious. If one could feel something so tangible today, one would find it. Schiller's early death was caused by nothing other than his organism being burned up by his powerful spiritual vitality. It is tangible. It is well known that when Schiller died, his heart was found to be dried up inside. Only his powerful spiritual energy kept him going as long as he could, but this powerful spiritual energy also consumed his physical life. Goethe's spiritual energy was even stronger, and yet Goethe reached a ripe old age. How did he achieve such a ripe old age?

You see, yesterday I mentioned a fact that had a very significant impact on Goethe's life. When he had been a student in Leipzig for several years, he fell ill, seriously ill, and faced death. He really looked death in the face, so to speak. This illness is certainly an organic natural phenomenon, but one never really gets to know a person who creates out of the elemental forces of the world if one does not take such events into consideration in the course of their karma. What actually happened to Goethe when he was ill in Leipzig? What happened was what can be called a complete loosening of the etheric body, in which the soul's life force had been active until then. It loosened to such an extent that after this illness Goethe no longer had the strong connection between the etheric body and the physical body that he had had before. But the etheric body is the supersensible part of us that actually enables us to have ideas and to think. Abstract ideas, such as we have in ordinary life, such as most people who are materialistic love, are possible because the etheric body is closely connected with the physical body, connected to it, as it were, by a strong magnetic bond. But because this is the case, we also have a strong impulse to carry our will into the physical world. One has this impulse with the will when, in addition, the astral body is particularly strongly developed. If we look at Robespierre, Mirabeau, and Danton, we see an etheric body strongly connected to the physical body, but also a strongly developed astral body, which in turn acts on the etheric body and places these human individuals strongly in the physical world.

Goethe was also organized in this way. But now another force was at work in him, which brought about a complication. This force caused the etheric body to loosen and remain loosened as a result of the illness that brought him very close to death. However, because the etheric body is no longer so intimately connected with the physical body, it no longer pushes its forces into the physical body, but retains them within the etheric. Hence this transformation that took place in Goethe when he returned from Leipzig to Frankfurt, where, through his acquaintance with Miss von Klettenberg, the mystic, in the acquaintance of all kinds of medical friends who devoted themselves to alchemical studies, in the acquaintance of the writings of Swedenborg, he really built up a spiritual world system, still chaotic, but nevertheless a spiritual world system, as he also had a deep inclination to concern himself with supersensible things. But this is connected with his illness. And the soul that brought the predisposition for this illness into this earthly life also brought with it the impulse to prepare the etheric body through this illness in such a way that this etheric body did not merely live out its life in the physical realm, but received the urge, and not only the urge, but also the ability to permeate itself with supernatural ideas. As long as one merely considers the external biographical facts of any human being in a materialistic manner, one cannot grasp the subtle connections in the flow of a person's destiny. Only when one allows oneself to be drawn into the harmony of natural events that affect our organism, such as Goethe's illness, with what emerges ethically, morally, and spiritually, does one gain the possibility of sensing the profound effect of karma.

The revolutionary force would certainly have come to the fore in Goethe in such a way that it would have consumed him early on. Since it would not have been possible for him to live out his revolutionary force outwardly in his milieu, and since Goethe could not have written dramas like Schiller, he would have had to consume himself. It was diverted by the loosening of the connection, the magnetic bond between his etheric body and his physical body.

Here you can see how a natural event can have a significant impact on a person's life. Certainly, something like this points to a deeper connection than the one that biographers often want to bring to the surface. For the significance of an illness for a person's entire individual experience cannot be explained by hereditary tendencies, but rather points to a person's connection with the world in such a way that this connection must be conceived spiritually. You can also see from this how Goethe's life became complicated. For it depends on this how we perceive something, how we ourselves are.

Now he arrives in Strasbourg, so to speak, with an etheric body filled with occult knowledge. And so he encounters Herder. Herder's great ideas had to become something completely different in Goethe than they were in Herder himself, who did not have the same conditions in his more delicate constitution. An event such as this encounter with death occurred in Goethe's life in Leipzig at the end of the 1860s, but it had been prepared for a long time by his inner strength. And anyone who wants to derive such an illness from external events or from purely physical events is not yet on the same level in the spiritual realm as the natural scientist, who understands that what follows cannot be regarded directly as an effect of what precedes it. So in Goethe, this kind of isolation from the world “through this connection between the physical body and the etheric body, which only reached its crisis through illness, was always there.”

In someone who has a compact connection between the physical body and the etheric body, the external world has an effect, but by making impressions on the physical body, the impressions immediately pass into the etheric body; that is one thing; and the etheric body then simply lives along with the impressions of the external world. In a nature such as Goethe's, impressions are naturally made on the physical body, but the etheric body does not immediately follow because it is loosened. The result is that such a person can be more isolated from their environment, in a sense, and that a more complicated process takes place when an impression is made on their physical body. Move away from Goethe's organic constitution to what you know from his biography: that he allowed events, including historical events, to affect him without violating them, so to speak, and then you will have gained an understanding of the peculiar workings of Goethe's nature. I told you: he takes the biography of Gottfried von Berlichingen, allows himself to be influenced only by Shakespeare's dramatic impulses, and does not change much of Gottfried von Berlichingen's not particularly well-written autobiography, so that he does not even call his drama a “drama,” but rather “The History of Gottfried von Berlichingen with the Iron Hand, Dramatized”; he only changes a few things. You see, this, I would say, gentle and tentative touching of things, so that he does not grasp them violently, is brought about by this very special connection between the etheric body and the physical body.

This connection did not exist in Schiller. That is why he creates characters whom he has not really based on external impressions, but whom he forms quite violently out of his own nature: Karl Moor. Goethe needs the effect of life. But he does not violate life; he only quietly helps to elevate life to a work of art. This is also the case when the circumstances of life approach him, which he then shaped in “Werther.” He does not bend his own circumstances or those of his friend Jerusalem; he does not shape them much, but rather takes life and only helps it along. And through the gentle way in which he helps, precisely from his etheric body, life becomes a work of art. But through the same organization, he also comes, I would say, only indirectly close to life and prepares his karma in this incarnation through this only indirect approach to life.

He arrives in Strasbourg. In addition to what he experienced, what I told you yesterday, what brought him forward on his Goethe path, he also experienced, as you know, in Strasbourg the heartfelt relationship with the pastor's daughter in Sesenheim, with Friederike Brion. He is very, very much involved in this relationship with his heart, and certainly one can raise various moral objections to the course of this relationship between Goethe and Friederike von Sesenheim, which may well be justified. That is not what matters now, but rather understanding. Goethe really goes through everything that would not only have led, but would naturally have led someone who was not Goethe to a lasting relationship with Friederike Brion. But Goethe does not experience this directly. Through what I have told you, a kind of gap has been created between his special inner world and the outside world. Just as he does not violate the living world around him, but only gently transforms it, so too does he, in a sense, not bring his feelings and sensations, which he can only experience in his etheric body, into such a firm connection with the outside world through his physical body that what would have led to very specific life events for others could also have led to them for him. And so he withdraws again from Friederike Brion. But one should only take this as something spiritual. When he rides out for the last time, he encounters himself on the way back—you can read about this in his biography. Goethe comes toward Goethe. Goethe recounts much, much later how he encountered himself at that time. Goethe comes toward Goethe. He sees himself. He rides out, and on his way back Goethe comes toward him, but not in the clothes he is wearing, but in different clothes. And when he returns there years later to visit his old acquaintances, he realizes that he really did go out again in the costume he saw himself wearing years ago when he encountered himself, without having sought it out. This is an event that must be believed with the same force with which one believes anything else Goethe tells us. To find fault with this, I would say, is not befitting of the love of truth with which Goethe portrayed his life.

How is it that Goethe, who was so close to the circumstances he had entered into, so close that it would have led to something completely different for anyone else, and yet so distant that he was able to withdraw, how is it that he encountered himself there? Well, in a person who experiences something in the etheric body, the experience very easily becomes objectified when this etheric body is loosened. He sees it as something external; it projects itself outward. This is what really happened to Goethe. At a particularly suitable moment, he saw the other Goethe, the etheric Goethe who lived within him, who remained connected through his karma with Friederike von Sesenheim. That is why he encountered himself as a ghost. But it is precisely an event that confirms in the deepest sense what can be seen about his own nature from the facts.

You can see how people can be caught up in external events, and how you first have to grasp the particular way, the individual way, in which they are caught up in them. For the relationship of human beings to the world, to the past, the connection with what we carry over from the past into our present, is complicated. But because Goethe, in a sense, tore his inner self out of its physical context, he was able, even in his early youth, to cherish the profound truths in his soul that so surprise us in his Faust. I deliberately say “surprise” for the simple reason that they really must surprise us, for I can hardly think of anything more simplistic than Goethe biographers constantly peddling the phrase: “Goethe is Faust and Faust is Goethe.” I have read this many times in Goethe biographies. It is, of course, utter nonsense. For what we really have in Faust, when we allow it to sink in properly, actually strikes us as such that we have to say to ourselves: it is sometimes the case that we do not even suspect that Goethe experienced it in exactly the same way or could even have known it – and yet it is there in Faust. Faust always grows beyond Goethe. However, only those who know the surprise that a poet experiences when he has his work of poetry before him can fully understand this. For one must not believe that the poet must always be as great as his work. He needs it just as little as a father needs to be as great in soul and genius as his son; for true poetic creation is a living thing. And just as it cannot be said that a living thing cannot create beyond itself, so it cannot be claimed that something spiritual and creative can never create beyond itself.

But through this inner isolation that I have described in Goethe, those deep insights into his soul emerge that we encounter in his “Faust.” For works such as “Faust” are not poems like other poems. “Faust” springs forth, as it were, from the entire spirit of the fifth post-Atlantean cultural period; it grows far beyond Goethe. And much of what we experience with the world and its becoming resounds in a strange way in Faust. Remember the words you heard just now:

My friend, the times of the past
Are a book sealed with seven seals;
What you call the spirit of the times
Is in essence the spirit of the lords themselves,
In which the times are reflected.

It is too easy to overlook such words. Those who feel their full depth are reminded of many things that such words can only make true in the deepest sense. Think of what modern people have gained through their knowledge of Greek, of Greek intellectual life, through Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides! People immerse themselves in this Greek spiritual life, let us say in Sophocles. Is Sophocles a closed book? It is not easy to think that Sophocles could be a closed book! Sophocles, who lived to be ninety-one, wrote more than eighty dramas, seven of which have survived! Do you know anyone who has written eighty-one or more dramas, of which only seven have survived? Isn't that literally true: a book with seven seals? How can anyone claim to know Greek culture based on what has been handed down, when they simply have to admit that seventy-four Sophoclean dramas, which delighted and uplifted the Greeks, are no longer available? A very large number of Aeschylus' works are also missing. Poets lived in Greek times whose names are not even known. Are not the times of the past a book with seven seals? If one takes such an external fact, one must say so. And —

...it is a great delight,
To put oneself in the spirit of the times,
To see how a wise man thought before us,
And how we finally brought it so gloriously far.

Wagnerians believe they can easily put themselves in the mind of a wise man — if it has been shown to them! It is a pity that we cannot test what the brave little reviewers would write about “Hamlet” if it were to appear now and be performed on some large city stage before these gentlemen, or if a Sophoclean drama were to be performed before them today! Perhaps even what Sophocles himself had to do to convince at least his relatives of his greatness in his old age would not help these gentlemen. For he lived to be ninety-one years old, and his relatives had to wait so long for their inheritance that they sought evidence that Sophocles had become senile and was no longer capable of managing his own affairs. He had no way out except to write “Oedipus at Colonus.” With that, he could at least prove that he had not yet become senile. I don't know if it would work with today's critics, but it helped back then. But anyone who delves into such a fact, into the tragedy of the ninety-year-old Sophocles, will at the same time realize how difficult it is to find the path to human individuality; how this human individuality is intricately connected with world events. And much, much more could be cited to show how deep one must dig to understand the world. But how much of the wisdom necessary to understand the world is already present in the very first parts of Goethe's Faust! This can be traced back to this peculiar course of fate, which truly shows how nature and spiritual activity are one in human development, how an illness can have not only an external physical meaning, but also a spiritual meaning.

So we see, one might say, a sharp continuation of the karmic impulse that was in Goethe. But then again, in 1775, the acquaintance with the Duke of Weimar enters as if from outside. Goethe is summoned from Frankfurt to Weimar. What does this mean in his life? One must first understand what such an event meant for a person's life if one wants to find out more in order to understand that life. I know how little the world today is inclined to truly awaken the soul forces that are necessary to fully perceive and feel what already lives in the first parts of Goethe's Faust. To write what has now been presented here—Faust I, monologue in the study, Earth Spirit—requires a richness of soul which, when you look at it, makes you want to stand there for a long, long time in fervent adoration. And one often feels the deepest pain in one's soul when one sees how dull the world actually is and how incapable it is of feeling greatness. But if one feels something like this fully, then one will also understand what someone who is truly imbued with spiritual science comes to feel. For they come to say to themselves: there was something living in Goethe that consumed him. It couldn't go on like this."

You have to have this thought. Imagine: Goethe was born in 1749, so in 1775 he was twenty-six years old. He carried the manuscript of the scene we performed today in his suitcase—let's just take this, there was more in it—to Weimar. Anyone who has gone through something like that, to such an extent that he could write it down, carries it in his soul; it weighs heavily on his soul, because it is a force that wants to rise up, that wants to burst the soul apart.

We must be clear about two things if we want to appreciate the first parts of Faust that Goethe wrote in the right sense and in the right light. One might think that Goethe wrote these scenes gradually, say from the age of twenty-five to fifty. Then they would not have been so tense, they would not have been such a burden. Certainly, but that is not possible, it would not have been possible, because from the age of thirty to thirty-five, he would have lacked the youthful energy necessary to shape these things in this way. He had to write them during those years according to his individuality, but he could not continue living like that. He needed something like a dampening, a kind of partial slumber of the soul, to weaken the fire that burned in his soul when he wrote the first parts of Faust. The Duke of Weimar summoned him to make him a minister in Weimar. And he was a good minister, as I have already said. As a minister, he was able to rest and partially sleep away what was burning in his soul by working very diligently. And there really is a huge difference in the mood before 1775 and after 1775, which can be compared to a kind of tremendous awakening followed by a subdued life. The word “dullness” even comes to Goethe's mind when he describes his special life in Weimar, where he lives himself into events, but resonates with them more than before, when he rebelled against them. It was strange, then, that the ten years of dullness were followed by a gentler approach to events. And just as little as sleep is a direct effect of the previous day's life, Goethe's sleep was not an effect of what had gone before. The connections are much greater than one usually thinks. I have often pointed out that it is a superficial view to answer the question, “Why do people sleep?” with “Because they are tired!” It is a lazy, sleepy truth, because it is nonsense. Otherwise, it would not be a fact that people who cannot be tired, for example, rentiers after a full meal, when they have to listen to something that does not particularly interest them, lull themselves to sleep. They are certainly not tired. The fact is not that we sleep because we are tired, but that waking and sleeping are rhythmic processes of life, and when the time for sleeping, the necessity for sleeping, approaches, we become tired. We are tired because we have to sleep, but we do not sleep because we are tired. I do not wish to elaborate on this further at this moment.

But just think of the greater context in which the rhythm of sleeping and waking exists! It is, after all, the reproduction of day and night in the cosmos within human nature. To explain sleep as the result of fatigue during the day is, of course, obvious to materialistic science, but the opposite is true. The rhythm of sleeping and waking must be explained from the cosmos, from larger contexts. But larger contexts must also explain why, after the period when Faust raged in Goethe's soul, there followed the ten years of subdued life in Weimar. This points directly to his karma, which cannot be discussed further here.

As an everyday person, we wake up in the morning, usually in the same state of consciousness as when we fell asleep the night before. In reality, this is never the case. We never wake up exactly as we fell asleep, but always somewhat enriched; we are simply unaware of this enrichment. But when a wave crest is followed by a trough, as was the case with Goethe in his Weimar years, then the awakening takes place on a higher level, must take place on a higher level. But the innermost forces strive for this. And in Goethe's case, the innermost forces also strive to awaken from the dullness of Weimar to a full life in an environment that could now really give him what he lacked. That was in Italy, when he awoke. In Weimar itself, he could not have awakened because of his particular constitution. But it is precisely in such a thing that one can see the deep connection between the work of a real artist, a great artist, and his particular experience. You see, someone who is not a great artist can write a drama smoothly, page by page; he can do it quite well. The great poet cannot do this, because he needs to be deeply rooted in life. Goethe was therefore able to express the deepest, deepest truths in his “Faust” at a relatively early age, truths that far exceeded his soul's capacity. But he had to express a rejuvenation in Faust. Think about it: Faust had to arrive at a completely different mood; even though he is so deeply drawn, he had to be rejuvenated. After all, despite all his depth, what he had absorbed in his soul up to that point had brought him close to suicide. He had to be rejuvenated. A small person can describe quite well, perhaps in beautiful verses, how a person is rejuvenated. Goethe could not do this so easily; he first had to be rejuvenated himself in Rome. That is why the rejuvenation scene in “The Witch's Kitchen” was written in Rome, in the garden of the Villa Borghese. Goethe would not have dared to write this scene earlier.

Now, connected with such a rejuvenation as Goethe experienced is a consciousness, albeit still a dull one. In Goethe's time, there were no spiritual sciences: it could not be a clear consciousness, but only a dim one. Such rejuvenation is connected with special powers that already carry over into the next incarnation. Experiences belonging to this incarnation are intertwined with various things that carry over into the next incarnation. When one considers this, one is led to a particularly profound tendency in Goethe. Allow me to interject a personal remark: I have been studying Goethe's view of nature for a number of decades, I would say since 1879/80, and intensively since 1885/86. And during this time I have come to the conclusion that there is something in the impulse that Goethe gave to the view of nature – something that today's natural scientists, natural philosophers and natural thinkers actually understand nothing about – that can be developed, but only over centuries. So that Goethe will probably, when he returns in another incarnation, still find the opportunity to shape what he has not yet been able to complete in this incarnation from his view of nature. There are many things in Goethe's view of nature that we cannot even imagine today. I have expressed my thoughts on this in my book Goethe's World View and in the introductions to Goethe's Scientific Writings in Kürschner's National Literature. So that one can already say: Goethe carries within himself, with his view of nature, something that points to far, far-reaching horizons, but which is intimately connected with his rebirth, which was not exactly tied to Rome in this respect, but to the age he lived through in Rome. Read how I have described things, how the metamorphosis of plants, animals, the primordial plant, the primordial animal developed during his Italian journey, how, when he returned, he tackled the theory of colors, which even today is still incomprehensible, how he tackled other things as well; then you will see that this settling into his comprehensive view of nature is also connected with his rebirth. Then, of course, he related what had developed within himself in the course of his life to Faust, but not as a minor poet would do, but as a great poet does. Faust experiences the tragedy of Gretchen. In the midst of the Gretchen tragedy, we are suddenly confronted with Faust's great view of nature, which now, however, has much in common with Goethe's great view of nature, and which is expressed in Faust's words:

Sublime spirit, you gave me, gave me everything,
Why I asked. You did not turn your face toward me in vain in the fire.
You gave me the glorious nature as my kingdom,
the power to feel it, to enjoy it. Not
coldly allowing only a visit of wonder,
you grant me to look into its deep bosom,
As into the bosom of a friend.
You lead the ranks of the living
Before me, and teach me to know my brothers
In the silent bush, in air and water.
And when the storm roars and creaks in the forest,
The giant spruce, falling, crushing neighboring branches
And neighboring trunks,
And their fall thunders hollowly through the hills,
Then you lead me to a safe cave, show
Me then to myself, and to my own breast
Secret deep wonders open themselves.

A grand worldview! Goethe attributes it to Faust. Goethe only attained this insight into the soul during his trip to Italy. The scene “Sublime spirit, you gave me, gave me everything” was also written in Rome; Goethe had not written it earlier. For these two scenes, the rejuvenation scene in the “witches' kitchen” and the scene “Forest and Cave”: “Sublime spirit, you gave me, gave me everything,” are precisely those that were written in Rome.

Here you can see a real rhythm in Goethe's life, a rhythm that reveals an inner impulse, just as the rhythm of waking and sleeping in humans reveals an inner impulse. In a life such as Goethe's, we can study certain laws particularly clearly, but it will become apparent to us how what we encounter in the form of laws in great personalities can become important for the life of each individual. For ultimately, the laws that govern a great person also govern every single human being. Tomorrow we will continue to talk about the connections between life as they can be gained from this point of view.