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The Social Question
GA 328

8 March 1919, Zürich

VI. What significance does work have for the modern Proletarian?

When the theme for today's lecture was announced, the question could have been asked: ‘From which angle is this going to be approached?’—From some or other research, it could be concluded that now again an understanding needs to be addressed, an understanding so strongly yearned for which has for a long time been imposed as today's capitalistic sea of confusion, and those in it notice that the water is up to their mouths and they are no longer able to swim in this sea. They search for a rescue boat; they would not be able to find such a rescue boat with conditions they usually insist upon. About such an interpretation I don't want to speak this evening. It appears to me that in the time in which we are living, quite other things are necessary. If we look at one another, at what has actually happened and what is going on at present, for those who are searching for such an understanding, it is so terrible.

What is called the ‘social question’ today has in no way only come about yesterday. In the way one speaks about it today, it is more than half a century old. However, what has actually led up to the social question is much, much older; it has come out of the entire development of modern times and out of the last centuries. When we observe where this development of the last centuries has led up to, then we can sum it up in the following way.

There were a number of people who we can best describe by saying they lived in a capitalistic economic order and felt comfortable living in this capitalist economic order. One hears often enough from these people how far civilization has progressed. One can hear how it has come about that humanity has reached such a stage in which not only distant single countries and continents but over world oceans they could quickly come to an understanding; how far humanity has come through a certain education and taken part in what they called spiritual life, imagining they had reached impressive heights in our time.

I don't need to mention all the praise declarations about this direction in our modern civilization. However, modern civilization has developed out of a foundation. Without this foundation, it is inconceivable; it thrives from this foundation. What was in this foundation? In this foundation there were increasingly more people who out of their deepest soul sensitivities had to let the call be heard: ‘Does modern life give us what our human existence is worth? Why have we been condemned by modern civilisation?’—So, modern humanity is ever more split into two divisions: in one in which they feel comfortable or at least feel satisfied in modern civilisation, but out of which they can only feel satisfied because of this foundation, while the other one must create the foundation as their labour, towards a social order in which they can basically have no share.

In the entire process, admittedly something else also developed. It developed in such a way that the carriers of the so-called civilization in the old patriarch conditions could not progress with its numerous illiterates. It meant that of the capitalistic supporters at least a part of the Proletarians, the part in their employ, had to be educated. As a result of this education, the Proletarians developed something which has come to such a frightening expression for those who understand the all too necessary facts. This development brought about the possibility to a large number of people, who had just created the foundation for this modern civilization, to be able to consider their situation; they didn't arrive at an instinctive insight any more but it enabled them to pose this question in the most intensive way: ‘Can we have a dignified human existence? How can we acquire a dignified human existence?’

Those who up to now had been the leaders of humanity have in the course of modern economic life brought the economic life as far as they could, into a connection with the modern state. The modern Proletariat could to a certain extent not be excluded from the modern state through the influences of recent times. So it came about that the Proletariat on the one hand within the economic life strived for a dignified existence and on the other hand with the help of the state, tried to win the right.

One can't deny this—the facts teach us—in both directions little has been accomplished. In the manner of the trade unions the modern working community within the economic circulation has tried to accomplish something: there were scraps of what human dignity within a healthy economic order should be. This has been achieved in a way, by state life. On the other hand, the economic and political power of the hitherto leading class of mankind was opposed. So one can say that despite various things having been accomplished in both these directions, today the modern Proletariat is not less challenged by the question: ‘What significance is there actually in my work in relation to what each person in the world must consider regarding dignity?’

In contrast to that, for long decades the Proletariat have, in the most varied forms, addressed the leading circles with the cry: ‘It can't go on like this!’—On the other hand, hardly an understandable word can be heard in response. The words which do become audible stand in an extraordinary relationship to what the minds of the time should have striven for. Don't we hear it from all possible sides—from the Christian-social side, from the bourgeois-socialist aspirants—some or other statement is being made which could help remedy the dangers which one is believed to be able to see? Was it more basically as ingratiating phrases which came out of various moral, religious deliverances, emerging from those, up to then, leading classes?

These leading circles didn't experience it but the other side of humanity did. The one who feels it from quite another angle than as from empty phrases, the one who experiences it out of the awareness of his or her class, brought into a particular social situation, should form the base for this modern civilisation. And so, some things were done through the trade union, cooperative and also political life, yet something else came about which was more important than the modern Proletarian's work, something which was full of seeds for the future and the facts of the present carried it into abundance. This was created in the following way.

While the ruling classes were amassing their luxuries, which could only be fed and empowered by capitalism, the Proletarian, in the time left over for him, in his meetings sought in the truest sense of the word an education towards a spiritual life. This was something which the earlier ruling classes didn't want to see, that among thousands, yes thousands of Proletarian souls a new culture, a new viewpoint was developing in the people.

Based on the nature of these things, the Proletarian development next proceeded to the viewpoint of considering economic life, because the modern life of the Proletarian was forged by the machine. Into the factory he was packed, harnessed in by capitalism. Here he found his concepts. However, these concepts—I only want to point out how intensely everything connected to Marxism penetrated with meaning into the Proletarian soul—this development was such that very little, really very little reaction was elicited from the leading, up to then ruling classes.

Isn't it typical that those who know about these things must say today: Among the ruling proletarian personalities, among those who really understand the Proletariat, not merely think about the Proletariat but among those individualities who have taken up what could really be considered a fruitful development offered by economic life, among them really live the basic, thorough knowledge of life into which the social organism plays even as the most elite of educators, even the most thoughtful professors of sociology, university professors. It is typical that this circle, whose calling it was so to speak, to concern itself with sociology, with national economics, that it resisted everything which presented itself as an understanding for the modern Proletariat, for as long as possible. Only when the facts threatened and no longer allowed anything else to be permitted, did they accommodate the bourgeois leaders, allowing many Marxist or similar terms to be taken into their national economic system.

That the work of the modern Proletariat was achieved, I would like to call it, achieved in total secrecy towards the leading ruling circles, this I report out of no grey theory; I maintain this because I could observe how this work was being executed. For years I was a teacher in the worker's education school in Berlin, where Wilhelm Liebknecht, the dear old servant, could be validated. Partly in this school, partly in what was happening, one had a good extract of every process in action, directed towards a new era developed out of the proletarian consciousness. This should have been considered long ago, but superficially regarded the modern proletarian movement only in terms of wages and daily bread and failed to understand its needs to be considered as a question of human dignity of all people.

On the other hand, it is not really important when people point to the frightening and sometimes cruel events out of the world of facts as originating from the social chaos. Those who understand these things correctly, how they have developed, don't question the connection between these cruelties or terrors to the modern proletarian movement but they clearly take it that the leading classes are at cause for what has come about today.

The world-historical moment only started when the Proletariat began taking responsibility for world historical events. Capitalism, the capitalistic world order particularly in the most recent times worked right into the terrible and in many respects insane catastrophe of the world war.

What can we now see as a central focus in the Proletarian movement and the Proletarian yearnings, which can be considered as the Proletarian progress? In the centre of this we see what the Proletarian experiences regarding that which basically is the cause and which can only be given from the modern economic order to the social organism, because the leading cultural circles are basically only interested in one thing which the Proletarian can give, and that one thing is Proletarian labour. One needs to realize how incisive Karl Marx's ideas were, which crossed the tracks of the modern Proletariat in such a way that they had the experience: Above all things clarity must be created in relation to the manner and way in which human labour may flow into the social organism.

Now, it has often been said and illuminated in the widest circles: through the modern economic order, labour has become goods among other commodities. It is typical of the economic life that it exists in the production, circulation and consumption of goods. However, it has happened that the labour of the modern Proletarian has been made into goods.

From this angle, basically everything can be said about the Proletarians. However, the question is usually drawn to one side so that it doesn't appear in the full light but through which one actually gains insights into the statement of the human labour in the healthy social organism. Here the question must be raised which in any case rises out of the Marxist question but it is raised in an even more precise, an even more intense manner. It must be asked: Can human labour ever really be considered as goods?

Through this the question leads to quite a different track. One will in fact ask: How can human labour legitimately be rewarded? How can human labour in any way come to its rights? One can add further: it must be in such a way that human labour earns its pay.

A wage is in some ways nothing other than purchase money for the goods called ‘labour power.’ However, the power of labour may never be goods! Where the power of labour in the economic process is made into goods, there is a falsehood in the economic process, because in reality something is added which could never be a true component of this reality. On this basis labour can be no goods because it can't have the character which goods is necessitated to have. In the economic process, each item of goods must have the possibility through its value, to be compared with other commodities. Comparability is the basic condition for the ‘being-of-goods’ (Ware-Sein) of something. The value of human labour can never be compared with the value of some or other commodities or products.

It would have been terribly easy if people had not forgotten how to simply think. Just think about it, for my sake, when ten people in a family work together, each one doing his or her work, how one can take a single contribution out of ten and compare it with the achievement which the ten has produced together? People just don't have the ability to compare the output of goods to the power of labour. Labour stands on quite another basis of social judgement than goods. This is what has perhaps in recent times not been clearly spoken about, but which lives in the experiences of the modern Proletariat.

What lives in the requirements of the modern Proletariat? What lives here in the feelings of the Proletarian is factual criticism, the world historic criticism which simply lies in the life of the modern Proletarians and, hurled into it, everything which the leading circles as a social order have promoted. The modern Proletariat is nothing other than a world historic criticism. Just the knowledge that labour can never be goods, owes its sensation, the basic experience of its existence, which is lived through in recent times as an enormous, an all-encompassing white lie, because labour is sold and according to their being this can never be sold.

That a remedy must be found, as everyone with insight must find obvious, of this the modern Proletariat is convinced. Yet he has been driven into something which not he, but the earlier ruling classes has made of the social organism. He has been pushed out of everything left over and is only drawn into the economic process. Does this not make it clear that he would want to bring about through this mere healing of this economic process and the circulation of the economic life itself, the entire social organism as well? Out of this the ideals have originated in the same way as the ideals the modern Proletariats have lived up to now.

It has been said that because private capitalism has made modern production into a goods production through private means of production, it has resulted in the modern Proletariat coming into the position which only he can experience. The only help can be offered by reverting back to the ancient idea of the cooperative, a cooperative which means that one's production goes over to the other and work towards self-production in which he can't misuse the other on the grounds that he would then be prejudicing himself. The following can also be asked: How would this great cooperative be set up? Here one must take refuge in the framework which has been created in recent times—that of the modern state. The modern state itself must make itself into a big cooperative through which the production of goods gradually is directed to the production of the self-employed.

Here we find the very point which needs to be grasped. One can now say that healing can be found in the modern Proletarians' spiritual life on the one hand, and at the same time discover that where there is a possibility for development in the modern Proletarian's spiritual life, there is a possibility from this step, to take yet another step towards progress.

People who do not agree with this should really not be resented if they are being sincere with honest feelings which they cherish, for they do not yet see results coming from the present Proletarian world view, but it is necessary to point out that this Proletarian world view have seeds of progress, and that this progress should really be striven for—and it can be striven for.

There are those who would admit they became enlightened by what I have already said—about eighteen years ago—in the Berlin trade union house, as a characteristic, and then often again had to emphasise it as a peculiarity of the modern labour movement, which I still maintain as absolute truth. At that time I said: For those who glance over the historic life of humanity with an inner understanding for what has emerged, for them it will be noticeable that this modern Proletarian Movement appears different to all other movements of humanity, basically because—and you might find this grotesque, a paradox even—it stands on a scientifically orientated foundation.

Profound, very profound it was then in this direction as a fundamental, basic requirement of the modern labour movement that the almost forgotten (Ferdinand) Lassalle's famous lecture was given entitled “Science and the Worker.” Things need to be looked at from another point of view than what is habitually done: one must look at it from the view of life. In doing so one could say: with reference to what has become available to the Proletariat as a result of what the ruling classes had to give him because they didn't want him to be left illiterate, through this the modern Proletarian had the desire to conquer, to take it as his inheritance what had been built up in the recent times out of the endeavours of the leading circles, what they had created as a scientific world view.

What it comes down to is this—now the modern Proletarian reacted in quite a different manner regarding this scientific world view than all the other circles, even though they were the ones who had created this world view. One could be quite an enlightened person in the leading and up to the-then ruling circles, a person whose innermost convictions welled up from the results of modern science, for my sake one could be a scientific researcher like Vogt, a popular scientific researcher like Büchner, and still your scientific orientation will be different to that of the modern Proletarian.

Those who, out of the leading circles with their prejudices, namely their anticipation and their presentiments, who theoretically confess to their modern education regarding human beings and nature, they remain stuck for this reason within a social order which cuts them off from the modern Proletariat. The structure of the Proletariat does not rest on scientific claims but is due to what came before modern science into human minds as religious, lawful and such imaginations towards the fulfilment of human dignity. Of this I once had a direct experience.

It happened in the moment when I stood in front of a worker gathering with the tragically passed away Rosa Luxemburg. We were addressing the gathering regarding the modern worker and modern science. There one could to see how, what modern science poured into the modern proletarian souls, worked quite differently even in the most convinced leading circles, when Rosa informed the people: ‘There is nothing which refers to the angelic creation of people, nothing which points to the lofty places of origin which the common people eagerly describe; there are even claims from the common people's world view how our origins developed from climbing animals. Whoever thinks this through’—thus she spoke enthusiastically about this issue, this leader of the workers—‘whoever thinks this through can't discriminate like the present leading circles are doing, persisting in their prejudices about the possibilities of grading ranks among people who all originate from the same origins.’—This was taken up differently by them compared with those in the leading circles. This supplemented the ideas which the modern Proletarians were taken to understand as science.

That which has been taken up by a soul has the possibility for further development and about this evolution I would like to relate something to you.

If you glance over everything which relates to the question of how it is possible that the force of labour of the modern Proletarian has been made into goods, you will gradually be coerced through your observations regarding the economic life to arrive at a point where you have to say to yourself: It has come about precisely because the modern worker has been harnessed to the mere economic life and through being within this economic life his labour has become goods. In this direction, we have the continuation of the slave question of olden times. Here the entire person was goods. Today what has remained is only the labour of the person. However, now this power of labour must be adhered to by all people.

Within the modern Proletarian soul was the feeling that the last remnants from Barbarian times must not be allowed to continue into the future, that it should be conquered. There was no other way to conquer it than with the same clear strength of mind with which the modern Proletariat grasped the essence of economic- and human nature, with which the science for a healthy social organism can be grasped. About this science I would like to say a few words to you.

One thing above all appears clearly. One need to ask oneself: within the circulation of the modern economic life, what makes the force of labour of the modern Proletarian into goods? It is the economic power of the capitalists.

In these words of the power of the capitalists there is already an indication for a healthy answer. So: when is power diametrically opposed? Power is diametrically opposed by law, by rights. This however points out that for the healing, the recovery, of human labour in the social organism it can only come about when labour is taken out, when above all the question regarding labour is taken out of the economic process and it becomes a pure and clear question of law.

Through this we come to consider things in broader terms, whether there is a more significant difference between the economic question and the question of law. This distinction exists: only we are not inclined today to examine this difference deeply enough. We are not inclined to goo deeply enough into, on the one hand, what the active forces in all of economic life has to be, and on the other hand, what the active powers need to be in the actual life of rights.

What works in the economic processes? Human needs are active in the economic process; here the possibility of satisfying human needs may come through production. Both are based on natural foundations, the human requirements are based on people and production is based on climatic, geographic and such natural foundations. The economic life of the modern division of labour has led towards what the exchange of commodities is, and has to be. Each exchange of commodity which benefits both the needs of people and value of goods according to their mutual estimation—I can't describe it in detail, it would take too long—appear on the markets and is drawn into the circulation of the economic process on the markets.

Within the circulation of the economic life, the life of the law can't develop simultaneously as a closed circuit. Human nature will as much admit that the social organism within the economic life develops the life of rights by itself, as it will admit that a single centralized system exists in the human organism. Tonight, I really don't want to play with various comparisons out of natural science but I believe here is the point which the natural scientist has also reached today, as we have done. In my last book “Riddles of the Soul” I have remarked that natural science can't properly acknowledge that there are three systems in the healthy human organism: the sense-nervous system is there as carrier of the soul life, the breathing and heart system as carrier of the rhythmic life and the metabolic system as carrier for metabolism and this comprises the entire human organism. However, each system is centralised in itself, each has its own approach to the outer world. In this human organism order and harmony is summoned in order for these three systems not to cause chaos among one another but that they unfold side by side, and as a result allow the power of one to flow into the other.

So in a healthy social organism such a three-foldness should take place. It must be realised that when a person in the economic organism becomes active, he must simply operate in the economic process. Then administration, the legislation of this economic process is expected to mutually evaluate the goods in the economic reality and bring it into movement towards a goal orientated circulation of goods, introducing the goods production, introducing the consumption of goods. What needs to be removed now from this economic process is not everything which includes the satisfaction of needs of one person to another, but is connected to the relationship of one person to every other person. Where all people should be equal is radically different from what can develop only in the economic life. That is why it is necessary for the healing of the social organism that the purely legal life element, the actual life of rights, be removed from the economic one. This development is just what has been striven against in recent times.

The ruling classes up to now—what have they done? In the regions where they felt comfortable, where their interests really lie, there you have the old merging which certainly had existed in many areas between the economic life and political state life, and now is taken further. So we see that in recent times, under the influence of the leading circles of mankind, so-called nationalisation came about in certain economic sectors. Post and telegraph and similar ones nationalised in a modern step which this modern progress wants.

In exactly the opposite direction it must be considered, not according to the interests of the leading circles up to now, but with the question: ‘What are the foundations of a healthy social organism?’—Efforts need to be made to gradually dissolve the purely economic life from the actual political state, a state which has to care for law and order, but above all to care for those things that out of these areas, out of the economic life the corresponding life of law flows in. Those who have no eyes, no spiritual eyes, can't really distinguish how radically different the economic life is to the actual political state.

Look at how these things have developed today. Some people speak out of the present social conditions in such a way that they say, within the social conditions we have as the first item: ‘Exchange goods for goods.’—Good, this happens in the economic life. It has just been spoken about. Now as to the second item: ‘Exchange of goods, alternatively the representative of goods, namely money, for labour.’ And as a third item: ‘Exchange of goods for laws.’

What about this last one? I've just spoken about the second one. Now, we need to look at the relationship of property ownership within the modern economic order and we will immediately become clear about what should be clarified in this area for the future. How one usually likes to think about the ownership relationship in relation to land—everything else in the actual foregoing regarding the social organism doesn't really have meaning, the only meaning it has is that the owner of the ground and land has the right to own a piece of land and can utilise the earth, and by doing so make his personal interests valid.

This doesn't have the slightest relevance in the origins of the economic processes as such. With the economic processes—against this only an erroneous national economy objects—it relates to what there is on the land as goods or the value of goods that can be generated. Use of the land depends on a right.

This right, however, is turned into power, transformed within the modern capitalistic economic order, through the amalgamation of capitalism with land rental. So on the one side we have the power, excluded from such rights; on the other side economic power, which is able to compel human labour to become goods. From both sides, nothing other than the actualized white lie is the result, when there is no striving—striving out of actual social insight—towards the dividing of the social organism into an economic organism and an organism in the narrower sense, as state-political.

The economic organism must be established on an associative foundation, out of the needs of consumption in its relationship to production. Out of the various interests of the most varied career circles the manifold cooperatives—one could name them with the old word of ‘brotherhood’—need to be developed, in which the needs and their fulfilment are managed.

What develops from this associative foundation of the economic organism will always relate to the fulfilment of one sphere of people with another sphere. In this area expert utilisation must be decisive, first in the natural foundations and then also in the design utilisation of the production, circulation and consumption of goods. What will be of relevance here would be human needs and human interests.

This is always regarded as contrary, as something radically different to how apparently equal people relate towards one another, where they should be equal; it is today already uttered in trivial words: ‘Where they must stand equal before those laws which they have created themselves, as equals.’

On the associative foundation, the circulation of the economic process will rest; on a purely democratic basis, on the principle of equality of all people and their relationship to one another will rest, in a narrower sense, the actual political organisation. Out of this political organisation something quite different will develop compared to the economic power, which makes labour into goods. Out of the economic life, separated from the political life, something will rise as a true law of employment, where here and only here, the labour which can be traded between one person and another, measure, work and so on can be agreed upon.

However, one might believe that things in recent times have already improved a bit—but fundamentally it comes down to not having improved. By the way the Proletarians' labour is positioned in the economic process, the price of labour as goods and the price of other products are dependent on the value of the goods. Everyone can see this if one looks deeper into the economic process. It will be different if, independent of the laws of the economic life and its administration, out of the political state, out of the purely democratic administration and making of laws for the political state, a labour law can come into existence. What will happen then?

What will then happen is that a person, through his own labour, will stand through his particular relationship towards the social organism in an ever so lively a way, as we can see today in the foundations of nature. Within certain boundaries, such things as the technical fertility of the ground, and so on, can be shifted a bit; the fixed boundaries of the foundations of nature be shifted a bit; yet these natural foundations determine the economic life nevertheless in the most extensive measure from one side. Likewise, as the economic life is determined from this side, so from the other side the economic life must be determined from outside, so that it doesn't make labour dependent on it but that the economic life can be presented by purely human foundations. Then labour determines the price of goods, then goods don't determine the price of labour any longer!

At most it can happen that from some or other basis the power of labour can't manage sufficiently and the economic life is impoverished. The remedy should be sought in the correct basis and not merely in the economic life.

The basic economic life is only based on supply and demand. With labour rights, which is situated on the basis of an independent political state, all the rest of the rights are also necessarily based on this same foundation. Briefly—I can only indicate it due to our limited time—it must necessarily be seen how there has to be a peeling apart on both sides: the life of rights and the economic life, the ideal of a healthy social organism in the future.

As a third element, the independent economic life must be integrated with the independent law of rights, with what one can call the spiritual life on mankind.

By speaking of true progress within the Proletarian world view, one will encounter the most resistance. The opinion has come from thinking-habits in this sphere, more than elsewhere, that salvation depends on the absorption of the entire spiritual life by the state. People were unable to see through the dependence of their spiritual life coming from the state right now in recent times, from what had happened before in the so-called interests of the ruling state circles, which had been able to satisfy these ruling circles. These ruling circles discovered their interests were satisfied by the state; they allowed the state to absorb ever more, what they called the spiritual life. Like the political state necessitated obligatory tax laws and established that all people are equal before the law, and how it is necessary by the state, through the obligatory tax to satisfy its needs, so, on the other side the spiritual life had to be freed from both the other spheres of the social organism.

The striving towards the amalgamation of the spiritual life with the economic life has brought disaster into our recent times. That which is to develop in the spiritual life can only do so if it takes place in the light of true freedom. Everything which can't develop in the light of true freedom stunts and paralyses the real spiritual life and besides that, leads to going astray, which can be recognised all too easily in the newer social order. Of necessity, here is to figure out which inner connections exist between the spiritual life in the narrowest sense, and the religious life, the economic life, the artistic life, a certain ethical life—what the relationship is between the life of all of them which originates in the first place out of the individuality's abilities and skills.

Out of this now, while we are speaking about these things in the most serious way, when in the first instance a healthy social organism is considered, we must speak about it in such a way that the following needs are to be counted under the heading of spiritual life: everything which involves the unfolding and development of individual abilities, from the start of the schooling system through to the university system, right into the artistic, right into the ethical life, yes, right into those branches of the spiritual life which form the foundation of practical and even economic systems. In all these areas, the emancipation of the spiritual life is to be striven for. Thus, the spiritual life is to be placed as a free initiative of individual human capabilities, so that this free spiritual life can only be there in a corresponding way in a healthy social organism, when its validity also depends on free recognition, on the free understanding of those who need the acceptance. That means that in future the management of the spiritual life will no longer be directed out of an addition of sums of what there is in the purse or strongbox, nor come out of state bureaucracy.

Not only as a result of the spiritual life being governed by the state, did it take on a certain characteristic corresponding to the personalities within it, in relation to the personalities who administered it, but the spiritual life as we find it today, rightly experienced as an ideology by the modern proletariat, this spiritual life has actually become a mirror image of the interests and desires which the leading circles have for the modern state because this they created according to their own comforts and needs. Is it basically right to say that the entire spiritual life has gradually become only a mirrored superstructure for the economic and governmental life? The modern spiritual life of the leading circles is exactly such a superstructure. Certainly chemistry or mathematics can't easily take on characteristics according to the interests of the leading circles. Already within the scope in which they are practiced, especially the light which falls on them from other spiritual areas, is determined through the fact that the leading circles have interests in the modern state life and for the modern spiritual life to grow together with the state.

Yes, modern spiritual life is exactly at the most important stage where it should penetrate the human soul and take its particular position in the social order, but instead it has become a sporting ball of the economic and political life. One can see in the way in which, right into the terrible war catastrophes, the carriers of the spiritual life were connected to the modern state life through capitalistic detours, basically taking the most important spiritual areas of life and inserting what could be applied, to the service of the state.

Not a hundred, not a thousand but thousands of proofs can be found. You only need to think of taking the German history professors and supporters of historic science. Try to make an image of everything they have produced in relation to the history of the Hohenzollern, and ask yourself whether, according to this world historic fact, the history of the Hohenzollern actually looks like it does, as it had appeared before? According to this, one can observe how relationships within the spiritual life have become a mere game for those who were not liberated from it.

The spiritual life must become free from both other spheres. Only then can the spiritual life continue with its own legislation and administration—as strange and surprising as this might sound, but it needs to be said—of what today can only, and completely, come out of capitalistic prejudices; then spiritual life will really become the winner over purely economic proletarian interests. The spiritual life is consistent. The spiritual life comes out of the highest branch of spiritual life right down into those branches which originate as a result of someone, out of their individual talents, taking the lead in some or other venture. Just as he directs them today, so he directs them out of the economic life through the process of power, economic power. Like he leads them from out of a healthy social organism, so it comes out of the spiritual life. Spiritual life has within a healthy social organism its own legislation and administration in relation to the higher branch of spiritual life, but also in relation to everything within the economic process which work towards the spiritual life being independent as such.

Then within this economic process the right way and influences of emancipation will rise towards an independent spiritual life. What had been achieved through capital can no longer be achieved according to the sense of modern capitalism. Now it will be achieved only through the impulses coming out of the spiritual life itself.

However, these impulses must be imagined in the correct way. How will an enterprise really look in line with these impulses?

Whoever knows the foundations of spiritual life—I have come across this quite often—will not contradict me when I give the following sketch of an enterprise which obtained its impulses not from an economic influence but from a spiritual power. Here would be those who are in the position, out of a free understanding with their colleagues and with a certain capital fund, to undertake nothing related to their own needs but directed to a social understanding which has been truly founded in spiritual life. In such an enterprise they would face, through a free understanding of all colleagues, right down to the last worker, the free understanding of their appointed posts, then a relationship of free understanding will arise between the leaders of the enterprise and the workers who are quite necessary for its execution. This results in, that beside the working hours there is included, within this enterprise and within the cooperatives of the enterprise, the possibility of a free expression about the entire way in which the overall social organism is placed within the economic process. Then those who live within the influences of a spiritual life would replace those in positions held by capitalist entrepreneurs today and reveal themselves in regard to all which places their wares in the entire social process of mankind. Each individual will then see the direction taken by the product to which they have contributed their work, where the product of their particular individual capabilities of manual work leads to. Everything can then also become included which would give the worker the possibilities to establish a real employment contract.

A real employment contract can't be determined when it is established on the basis of the condition that labour is goods. A true employment contract must not be based along these lines: the one and only real employment contract can only be based on the condition that work, which is necessary for the creation of products, is accomplished on the basis of laws, but that in relation to economics, that the proper cooperation is created between manual work and spiritual work, that in relation to economics, that a sharing operation between the manual and spiritual work must happen which can only take place out of the free understanding that manual work was the precursor, because then the manual worker knows that out of the spiritual coexistence with the leaders to what degree his work, through their leadership, flows for his own benefit into the social organism.

In such collaboration, the possibility ceases for capital based enterprises to develop according to egotistic benefits. Then only, when in this way the social organism is healed, then only can today's profit motives be replaced by purely factual interest. To a greater extent what had been the case in earlier times, would arise again as the interconnection between a person and his or her work.

Let us consider the connection between a person and their work today. On the one hand, there is the entrepreneur who wants to accomplish what he regards as work but he clears off as quickly as possible from this work. He expresses it in such a way that when he has cleared out from his work, he refers to it as “shoptalk.” He gets away from it and then searches through all kinds of other things to discover his striving as a human being. Through this relationship of human beings to their work is shown how little people grow together with their work.

This is an unhealthy relationship. This unhealthy relationship attracts others; by this tearing the modern Proletariat away from the foundation of their old craft, where they grew with their occupation, grew from their professions to their honour, to their human dignity, tear them away to where they are installed at machines, harnessed in a factory; here the unhealthy proof is produced in them that they can obtain no relationship with their jobs.

Whoever has come to know the true foundations of spiritual life knows that such an unhealthy relationship between a person and his occupation can only arise from unhealthy requirements. There is nothing in a healthy spiritual life which is free from political and free from the economic life which only have an effect on them; there is nothing in such a spiritual life which is not directly interesting and which, when it is correctly handled, a person can connect to his work, because he knows: this work he does, becomes a member of the circulation of the social organism. It is not something which can only be judged because it can't be any other way, that a person must also do something uninteresting. No, it must be judged in such a manner that precisely this foundation of spiritual life will be searched for, which is the one and only thing which can call forth interest: coherence of people with their work and interest in all spheres in any occupation.

This will show that, when the emancipated free spiritual life out of spiritual impulses enter right into the most individualised branches of governmental and economic life and its administrators, then only will it be possible that a real, factual interest is applied to all and not be based on a mere commercial, mere outer economic and benefit ratio relationship.

Admittedly the foundations for such a spiritual life need to be created. These foundations can only be created when everything regarding schooling is to be placed in the management of the spiritual life, when the lowest teacher no longer asks: what does the political state expect of me?—but when he or she can look at those in whom they have trust, when he or she can look at the spiritual life according to their own principles in their managed area of the social organism.

Thus, it works in many respects, I believe, when it proves itself naturally. From a true continuation of the proletarian world viewpoint it works against habits of thought. While people had absorbed the inheritance of the bourgeois science and amalgamated spiritual life, state and economic life into one another, it is important that for the healing of the social organism there needs to be a striving towards the independence of these three mentioned areas. Only through these areas—if I might use acceptable expressions—gradually having their own parliament and their own management, which relate to one another like a government of a sovereign state, only negotiating through delegation, only exchanging their communal needs through transport, then only will the social organism be healed. The question today is a fundamental one, arising out of all the facts: How can the social organism be healed? It needs to be taken in hand, it is sick, this social organism!

In order for those who, out of their class consciousness, want to make the correct claim towards healing the social organism, they actually need to research the Proletarian world viewpoint down to its fertile sprout and from there continue to build further.

I must admit that initially some could object to what is considered as correct today, when it is said: The direction must be taken according to this social three-foldness, this three-foldness of the social organism.—As much as these ideas contradict thought habits of some people at present, the reality must not be to steer towards our comforts, not towards what we believe has up to now been true for life practitioners. Reality needs to orientate us, reality founded on honesty and a healthy sense of judgment for the recognition of truth.

What I have explored here has no relevance to some or other cloud-cuckoo land. Oh, the time is here when some, who can only glance superficially at the simplest things and then create their own thought patterns, considering themselves practical in life, must admit that the very frowned-upon idealists who think from the basis of evolutionary necessities of mankind, are the real practical people. What I have given you is not clouds of cuckoo land; it originated exactly out of the most direct, daily needs in the life of mankind.

Admittedly I can't enter into all the single areas; in conclusion, I would like to touch on one area, an area which I can only mention fleetingly as something which I've apparently derived from the most ancient idea of the social life and how it comes across as the most ardent need. What in life is most humiliating? The most humiliating thing is that we must have what we call money, in our purse. We also know however, what is connected to this money. You know how this money intervenes into every part of life. If one considers the development of a healthy social organism, in which branch does the control of money belong?

The management of money has up to now been the concern of the state through certain forces of its development. Money is actually truly goods in a healthy organism, just as labour is not goods. Everything unhealthy which comes through how money enters the social organism results from money being stripped of its characteristic as goods, that it depends today more on the cancellation of some market through the political state, than on what it certainly should rest, while nothing else works in international traffic, which is on its merchandise value. National economists have an amusing battle today, a battle which really works in an amusing way to the insightful. They ask if money is goods, just a popular commodity, for which one can always swap other goods, whereas if for instance you had the misfortune of only manufacturing tables and chairs, you would have to go around dragging your tables and chairs and wait for someone who had vegetables. Instead you could swap your tables and chairs for the money they are worth and then find what's applicable according to your needs. While the one says money is a commodity or at least represents a commodity, even if it is paper money, for which there is a corresponding value, the other might say money is totally only that which comes about through the state law pigeon-holing a certain brand. Now these educated economists research the question: What is correct? Is money a commodity or something which arises from mere branding? Is it a mere payment for goods?

The answer is simply this: today money is neither the one nor the other, but both. The one is a result of the state simply approving of certain brands; the other is that in international transportation or in a certain relation also in national transportation, money purely as a commodity is the only form in which it can participate in the circulation.

A healthy social organism will strip money of its legal characteristics; its management and legislation will be assigned through a natural process within itself, in the adjustment of money, coinage, the value of money within the economic circulation, the same parliament, the same organisation which manages the rest of the economic organism.

Only then, when something like this steps in, which the modern Proletariat may be striving for, will it be placed on a healthy foundation. That strange relationship which exists between the working wages and the nature of goods, this relationship depends on a white lie. While the worker on the one hand believes that when his demand for an increased wage will suffice towards healthier living conditions, then on the other hand the price of commodities rises if it is not freed in the economic cycle from the legal cycle of the political state. These things are all placed on a healthy foundation only when the three-foldness steps in.

In the same way, if you have insight into the necessity of independence of the spiritual life, then you will see, will accept that there is no necessity to create capitalistic organisations as such, but that the manner and way how in the course of modern time capital is managed, how it has been used, that it only exists in the economic process, is how the capital process has caused damage which is linked to so much misery.

One will have to recognise this: as long as the employment contract does not relate to the collective output of what the crafter and the spiritual worker brings, but as long as the employment contract is related to the wages for the work, for so long would it be impossible to place these on a healthy basis.

The one and only way for the spiritual life to be recognised as a healthy reality becomes revealed in any case in its necessary relationship between worker and spiritual ruler, there where the worker is cheated, not cheated merely through the economy but cheated by the business man, who does not value his individual qualities, his spiritual traits in the right way, but in an incorrect way, in a inhuman manner. The worker is not exploited by the economic life, the worker is exploited through the white lies which come about in today's social organism in which individual abilities can just be used by cheating the workers because they are not seen from both sides in the economic process; within a healthy spiritual life they are seen from both sides and directed thus.

As I've said, what I've brought here towards the healing of the social organism can still be resisted by many Proletarian minds. I can see this. For years I have been involved with workers and spoken to them about these things. I haven't managed only single branches of teaching in the workers educational school; I have also offered exercises in speech. In these exercises which led on to speech exercises, several workers in this community truly showed what particular colouring, what special form their demands took as modern Proletariat. Here one could readily acquire the ability to think about the Proletariat not only in the manner of today's leading circles or the leading circles up to now. This is what I wanted to say to you today: think with the Proletariat, don't think about them!

For my sake think about it, it is like this—I would like to bring you to understand—that with reference to the contents of the one or the other meaning, one could perhaps renounce one but it is not important in today's world historic time whether one denies one or other meaning but that one agrees as to their honest claims which should be the claims of the modern Proletariat. Only through becoming comfortable with these agreements, with the consensus of honest Willing, then only through this could the seedling be discovered, which lies in the Proletarian world view, towards further growth and development. The time for mere discussion is over, the time is past for people who only want to serve their interests and speak about understanding. The time has come where for decades already, merely the undercurrents of outstanding claims of the modern Proletarians have now stepped up to the world historic plan, where they may really become the most important and most meaningful events in modern times.

What has come out of the chaos of the recent world war due to the economic war, which for a long time might in future continue to meet the future, this will become the social question. Today I will present no unreal, no theoretical solution or attempt to give one. I want to make you aware that the time has now come for the social question to present itself, where people in their social communal work need to be divided into governmental-, economic- and spiritual organs, that out of these healthy divisions a continued solution of the social question can come about.

This social question will not be solved from one day to the next once it is there; because it will always be there like life always generates new conflicts, so there needs to be this branching of members which strives in an honest way for solutions in the rising conflicts in social life. Whether people would try, in the widest circles, to become aware of such an evolution in the proletarian world view for the healing which would lie in the future, would depend on the direction taken from the starting point of the modern proletarian movement. Actually, it needs to lead to something which has not been able to come about yet. Out of all the eligible demands of the questions of wages, of bread, it needs to be lifted up to a mighty, radical world historic change, coming out of the consciousness of the modern worker and passing over into general human consciousness, out of the dignity, out of the sensitive dignity of the modern Proletarian, to be established as real dignity for all people.

In the attached discussion, various speakers were heard and the conclusion was given in the following words by Rudolf Steiner:

Rudolf Steiner: Yes, regarding the first honourable speaker I would like to make something like a fundamental remark. When one speaks one is often in the position to say that one can't quite grasp why things which the previous speaker uttered are not quite understandable, as if it had been said as a refutation of what one had just said. The first speaker spoke in such a way as if he found it necessary to assure me in every way—even though he has acknowledged many things, at least in relation to his whole attitude—that he actually has to fight. I'm not in a position to fight with him but I would like to say that actually those who have listened to me don't have so much against what the first speaker had said. I am in the position to acknowledge much more, also in relation to the content of his statements, than what he somehow seemed to focus on in relation to what I actually wanted.

Now, some details seem important. It is remarkable that the first speaker believes that according to my lecture I spoke to workers, but I did not work with them. Sure, naturally each one can only work in his area of expertise, but the manner and way in which I worked together with the workers is already such that one can't say: ‘the workers were merely spoken to.’ I also believe that those who perhaps enter more into what streams through the lecture, on its entire intention, will find it understandable that for so many years I have not been addressed in this way, even though I admit I have been thus addressed today. I have not always been addressed like this, only I believe, out of the simple reason that at that time workers already felt that what I had to say was not uttered from mere conversations with workers.

When it became possible for me to speak in such a way as I have had to do today, it is really not some learned skill. Let us pose the question: Who can actually implicate themselves as Proletarians? Whoever can speak with and to the Proletarian about his destiny which he has struggled through with his own forces, can speak in such a way as I have done today, only as a free speaker. In these circles I have been accused, shared community, I have perhaps even been treated nearly, perhaps even treated worse, than I've been handled here this evening. Surely it is something different when someone, like me, has struggled through in a similar way; I will continue thus in my short life which remains. I have struggled for years through conversations with the Proletarians, worked with the Proletarians, I have grown out of the Proletariat, grown hungry with the Proletarians. I didn't ask the Postman how much he earns to make him starve, but I had to become hungry myself. I didn't get to understand the Proletarians through thinking about them but I learnt to understand the Proletarians by living with them. I grew up out of the Proletariat, learned to starve because I had to starve. This is the foundation from which you can already sense that because I've been able to live for years with them, I don't speak as it it's a mere theory but from a position of an applicable practical position. I believe it can also give the basis whether one has a certain right to speak to the Proletarians or not.

This is what I wanted to say about this issue.

What the first speaker brought, for the greatest part, doesn't actually relate to me but to the intellectuals. Yes, the chairman has since said: ‘When someone or other can speak about being pelted with dirt, dirt thrown at him by the intellectuals, then I may do it too.’ Really, when you want to investigate the manner and way in which dirt has been thrown at me, and the way and manner this dirt looks like, then you will not envy the dealings I have entertained with the intellectuals.

Anyway, this is a personal remark. However, those who have replied to me, also come from a personal basis and therefore these remarks need to be made.

Now, the greatest part of course doesn't involve me but it has relevance to the student body. In relation to the latter: do you believe that I don't understand at all how the majority of today's student body is justified by the reproach that this ideal does not reach the lowest wage-labourer? Obviously here much can be argued regarding capital. Just as the modern worker, on the other hand, understands that after all, other classes of people have developed out of circumstances, so eventually the modern student has also had to develop out of their situation. Whoever can impartially compare the strivings within the modern student body with for instance what was found within the student body, when I also—it's been a while—had been within that student body, it was said, in reference to the profundity in just the phenomena of decline in the bourgeoisie, as contained in the modern professorial body—which obviously depends on the student body—that in relation to the example which illuminated the modern student body one can above all observe the blossoming which brings improvements to the students, which in itself has a certain satisfaction. It has become quite obvious—when today it looks as if the students would stick the workers in the back—that out of the colleagues of the student body, I believe there are quite large numbers already, it will rise towards social ideals. The student has to overcome various things. One must not forget how unshakable the clamps are which immobilises one. I have just recently had many an opportunity to also speak to young students, whose ideals appear unreachable to them yet they are closer to having developed a healthy spiritual life in general out of the sick spiritual life of today. I know what kind of receptivity the youth has for the renewal of the spiritual life. I know also, however, how great the temptation is, when inspired youth who have graduated, who find it necessary to search for a position in the modern community, how close the temptation lies to become dulled and fall back into the infidelity of philistinism.

Naturally we won't reach a final solution from one day to the next for what we most hope and wish to see. However, it must be acknowledged that everywhere where such a longing exists, this kind of sensible yearning which the modern Proletariat calls for, takes place, that it isn't suppressed and in some fanatic or dogmatic way mixed with one another. I still believe that this dogmatism at least up to a certain degree—even in modern struggles the funds can't be too easily chosen—would have to yield to the spirit which I've presented in my lectures: what is important is not so much the variety of thoughts but more on the equality of earnest will forces.

Just ask for once how many of those you blame for sticking one in the back are dependent on the circumstances established by the modern student, and ask yourself on the other hand, how much earnest will is valid in today's youth. Rather maintain that, than falling into dogmatism and becoming lamed.

Now, what I can say about the content brought by the second speaker is this: I agree to the call which has fallen to the left, which is basically not so very different from what I said myself: I don't claim things need to be as firmly said as I've expressed them. When something or other is said which can improve things, then I'm pleased about it. As a result, I don't judge as harshly as the second speaker has done; I would only like to put right what can always be referred to by this speaker who has not quite taken it in a right way. He has for instance referred with suspicion to the worker school where I taught for many years in Berlin by saying it could only be a liberal educational association. I have clearly stressed that it came from the old Liebknecht, the labour school was founded by Wilhelm Liebknecht! I don't believe you can push over the old Liebknecht with founding an arbitrary educational association for the working class as they would not have accepted him at the time. The audience wasn't made up out of the “ordinary bourgeois liberals” but were entirely comprised of workers who were none other than social democrats out of Proletarian circles organised through the bank!

So I believe that some of the words I have spoken have not been taken up in the right way by this speaker, as I would have liked them to be taken, and how they can be understood when not approached with a predetermined opinion when the other person arrives with a different meaning, but when he expresses what is meant only in a different form because he believes it is necessary that this world historic moment must be taken more comprehensively, and while he believes that today not every practical person can be called who would only judge in relation to the near future but a true practical person who overviews the bigger picture.

In relation to the question of the “call for proposals,” which corresponds nearly word-for-word to what I've said tonight—you need not wonder about it because you have heard that the “call” was created by me and that you need not expect that when I speak about something to the bourgeoisie, that it should sound different to when I speak here from this podium.

Interruption: Either everywhere the same or...

That's what I've just said. I said in the “call” are the same words as what I've said here. In every “call” there is nothing different to what I've said here.

For me it is important that the meaning of what I say is the truth and I will speak the truth in every instance where I am permitted to speak the truth. I only speak the truth; that is what it comes down to, for me. This is what I want to say in relation to this. I will exclude no one from anything if he can merge it with his conviction and can say yes to what I say myself. I believe this is the only way to arrive at an olive branch, that we speak the truth, unconcerned about the impression made on people, whether they support it or not. This is what I wanted to say about this.

In conclusion, I would like to make a remark which relates to what the next speaker said: I had not said anything about the manner of the struggle.—However, out of my words you can extract how I actually think about this struggle. I believe I've referred to it sufficiently; my view does not depend on a superficial understanding or how the nice things are all mentioned. Today we are enslaved in a facts-phase where our deeds are nothing but an empty observation of how things must be changed, however we need, through our observation, to find which new thoughts are really able to be brought into human souls. The ancient thoughts showed what kind of a social order they could bring about and these old thoughts are the proof that they are useless. For this reason, I believe that it first and foremost practically comes down to those who have an honest social will, to communicate before anything else about what can happen.

Today we stand here in Switzerland—I don't know if one could say “Thanks to God” or “unfortunately”—still in the circumstances which are not the same as in the central and eastern European circumstances. Central and eastern Europe is in circumstances only manageable through the connection to the ancient thinking of a social organism. When there is no effort made by the Proletariat themselves to utter the fundamental questions, which now out of this chaos through the simplest organisations, which all have to have the characteristics, according to my view, of this three-foldness of the social organism—if healing is not brought about by the Proletariat themselves, by organisations being newly recreated, according to new ideas, then I see absolutely no healing in the coming decades.

First of all, we need to begin with something you might regard as insignificant: we must realize we don't only face civil institutions, bourgeois conditions but that we face a bourgeois science.

This is what I've said in the Berlin union house for sixteen years and it was really understood among the Proletarians. The Proletariat still have the task of expelling thoughts of bourgeois science out of their thinking and not to meet some or other institutions with the bourgeois science but with new thoughts, which perhaps can only be brought by the Proletariat because the Proletariat are emancipated from all the remaining human relationship in which unfortunately the bourgeois people stand. Today the most important thing is something which probably appears as the least important to you, the emancipation of spiritual life; the accomplishment of the development of freedom of the spiritual life. If we accomplish in having a free spiritual life, if we manage to have a science which is not a mere capitalist tributary and thus indicate this tone into the Proletarian circles, then only can we approach healing. Not a restriction in the bourgeois sense, not a reduction but rather an amplification of proletarian activities.

I have the firm belief—if people were capable of arguing like the second speaker from a viewpoint which I well understand, and apply so many objections that one can't understand, sentence by sentence, what I've said—I have the firm belief, because I have spent much of life among the Proletariat, that what I have said is understood not from other classes but would be understood by the Proletariat. Unfortunately, we have to wait until the Proletariat understand it. I do believe however that it will be understood.

With these thoughts, I would like to say, I can with a certain satisfaction look back at what I've wanted to achieve this evening. I really haven't wanted to convince you right into the details of every word. I am taking into consideration your free individualities; to each one of you I take care to allow for your understanding, out of freedom. I do believe that among you there are many who will still think differently about what I have said, as you already thought about it today. This belief is the very thing which needs to be applied to healing the social organism.

Welchen Sinn Hat Die Arbeit Des Modernen Proletariers?

Als der heutige Vortrag angekündigt worden ist, wird mancher vielleicht die Frage gestellt haben: Von welcher Seite kommt dasjenige, was da geredet werden soll? — Und nach der einen oder anderen Erkundung wird man vielleicht die Meinung haben, daß nun auch wieder geredet werden soll von derjenigen Verständigung, welche heute diejenigen so stark herbeisehnen, welche im Laufe längerer Zeiten herbeigeführt haben das heutige kapitalistische Meer der sozialen Verwirrung, indem sie bemerken, daß ihnen das Wasser bis an den Mund reicht und sie nicht mehr imstande sind, in diesem Meere zu schwimmen. Sie suchen nach dem einen oder anderen Rettungskahn; sie werden solche Rettungskähne aus den Voraussetzungen, die sie gewöhnlich machen, aber nicht finden. Denn von einer solchen Verständigung möchte ich Ihnen heute abend nicht sprechen. Mir scheint, daß in der Zeit, in der wir leben, ganz andere Dinge notwendig sind. Denn sehen wir uns an, was eigentlich geworden ist und was sich auslebt in den gegenwärtigen Zuständen, die für manchen, der gerade eine solche Verständigung sucht, so schreckhaft sind.

Dasjenige, was man heute «die soziale Frage» nennt, ist ja keineswegs gestern erst entstanden. Es ist in der Art, in der man heute davon spricht, mehr als ein halbes Jahrhundert alt. Aber was eigentlich geführt hat zu dieser sozialen Frage, das ist viel, viel älter; es ist dasjenige, was heraufgeführt hat die ganze Entwickelung der neueren Zeit, der letzten Jahrhunderte. Und wenn wir uns anschauen, wozu es die Entwickelung der letzten Jahrhunderte gebracht hat, so können wir das kurz etwa in die folgenden Worte zusammenfassen.

Da war eine Anzahl von Menschen, denjenigen Menschen, die man vielleicht am besten dadurch bezeichnet, daß man sagt, es sind diejenigen, die gelebt haben von der kapitalistischen Wirtschaftsordnung und die sich in der kapitalistischen Wirtschaftsordnung wohlgefühlt haben. Man konnte von diesen Leuten wahrhaftig oft genug hören, wie weit wir es in der Zivilisation gebracht haben. Man konnte hören, was hervorgebracht worden ist dadurch, daß die Menschheit in die Lage gekommen ist, nicht nur über weite Entfernungen einzelner Länder, einzelner Kontinente, sondern über Weltmeere hin sich schnell zu verständigen; wie weit man dadurch gekommen ist, daß sich eine gewisse Bildung ausgebreitet hat, daß die Menschen teilnehmen konnten an dem, was man das geistige Leben nannte und von dem man sich vorstellte, daß es zu einer ganz besonderen Höhe in unserer Zeit gekommen sei.

Nun, ich brauche Ihnen nicht zu schildern, was alles nach dieser Richtung hin geredet worden ist an Lobsprüchen über unsere moderne Zivilisation. Aber diese moderne Zivilisation, sie breitete sich aus über einem Untergrunde. Sie war ohne diesen Untergrund gar nicht denkbar; sie lebte von diesem Untergrund. Und was war in diesem Untergrunde? In diesem Untergrunde waren immer mehr und mehr Menschen von derjenigen Art, die aus ihrem tiefsten seelischen Empfinden den Ruf ertönen lassen mußten: Gibt uns das, was dieses moderne Leben gebracht hat, ein menschenwürdiges Dasein? Wozu hat uns diese moderne Zivilisation verurteilt? — Und so spaltete sich diese moderne Menschheit immer mehr und mehr in zwei Glieder: in die einen, welche sich in einer gewissen Weise wohlfühlten oder wenigstens befriedigt fühlten in dieser modernen Zivilisation, die sich aber nur befriedigt fühlen konnten aus dem Grunde, weil die anderen im Untergrunde ihre Arbeitskraft hingeben mußten für eine gesellschaftliche Ordnung, an welcher sie im Grunde genommen doch keinen Anteil haben konnten.

Mit diesem ganzen Hergang der Sache entwickelte sich allerdings noch etwas anderes. Es entwickelte sich das, daß gerade die Träger der sogenannten Zivilisation nicht mehr die alten patriarchalischen Zustände mit den zahlreichen Analphabeten fortsetzen konnten. Es entwickelte sich das, daß die von dem Kapitalismus getragenen Menschen wenigstens einen Teil des Proletariats, der ihnen diente, gebildet machen mußten. Und aus der Bildung des Proletariats entwickelte sich etwas, was sich jetzt in so schreckhaften, aber für den, der die Geschichte versteht, nur allzu notwendigen Tatsachen zum Ausdrucke bringt: Das entwickelte sich, daß vor allen Dingen eine ganz große Anzahl von Menschen, die eben die Unterlage bilden mußten für diese moderne Zivilisation, nunmehr nachdenken konnten über ihre Lage, daß sie sich nicht mehr instinktiv hinzugeben brauchten, daß sie die Frage in intensivster Art stellen konnten: Haben wir ein menschenwürdiges Dasein? Wie können wir zu einem menschenwürdigen Dasein kommen?

Diejenigen, die bisher die führende Klasse der Menschen waren, haben im Hergange des modernen Wirtschaftslebens dieses Wirtschaftsleben, soweit es ihnen genehm war, in Verbindung gebracht mit dem modernen Staate. Von diesem modernen Staate konnte, wenigstens in einem gewissen Maße, das moderne Proletariat nicht ausgeschlossen werden unter dem Einflusse der neueren Zeit. Und so kam es, daß das Proletariat auf der einen Seite innerhalb des Wirtschaftslebens aus seiner Lage herausstrebte, ein menschenwürdiges Dasein anstrebte, auf der anderen Seite aber mit Hilfe des modernen Staates sein Recht zu erkämpfen versuchte.

Man kann nicht sagen - die Tatsachen der Gegenwart lehren es-, daß auf beiden Wegen wenig noch erreicht worden ist. Auf dem Wege des gewerkschaftlichen Lebens hat die moderne Arbeitergesellschaft innerhalb des Wirtschaftskreislaufes manches zu erreichen versucht: es waren Brocken von dem, was eigentlich der Inhalt eines menschenwürdigen Daseins innerhalb einer gesunden Wirtschaftsordnung sein muß. Auf dem Wege des staatlichen Lebens ist das erreicht worden. Allein dem weiteren stand entgegen die wirtschaftliche und politische Gewalt der bisher führenden Klasse der Menschheit. Und so kann man sagen, trotzdem manches erreicht worden ist auf diesen beiden Wegen, steht heute das moderne Proletariat nicht weniger vor der Frage: Welchen Sinn hat denn eigentlich meine Arbeit mit Bezug auf dasjenige, was jeder Mensch in der Welt als seine Menschenwürde in Anspruch nehmen muß?

Demjenigen gegenüber, was durch lange Jahrzehnte das Proletariat in den verschiedensten Formen diesem führenden, leitenden Kreise zugerufen hat: So geht es nicht weiter! - demgegenüber wurde kaum irgendein verständnisvolles Wort hörbar. Und diejenigen Worte, die hörbar wurden, die standen eigentlich in einem merkwürdigen Verhältnisse zu dem, was eigentlich aus dem Geiste der Zeit heraus hätte angestrebt werden sollen. Hörten wir es nicht, wie von allen möglichen Seiten — von christlich-sozialer Seite, von bürgerlich-sozialistisch Strebenden — das oder jenes gesprochen wurde, was abhelfen könnte den Gefahren, die man glaubte heraufziehen zu sehen? War es mehr, im Grunde genommen, als salbungsvolle Phrase, die aus den verschiedenen, aus den Überlieferungen kommenden religiösen, sittlichen und so weiter Vorurteilen heraus erwuchsen dieser leitenden, bisher führenden Klasse?

Sie empfanden es nicht, diese führenden Kreise; aber eine andere Seite der Menschheit empfand es. Derjenige, der seine Richtung empfand von etwas ganz anderem als leeren Redensarten, derjenige, der seine Richtung empfand aus dem Bewußtsein der Klasse heraus, die in die besondere soziale Lage gebracht wurde, die Unterlage zu sein für diese moderne Zivilisation. Und so bildete sich, trotzdem ja auf der anderen Seite durch gewerkschaftliches, genossenschaftliches und auch politisches Leben manches geleistet wurde, noch etwas anderes heraus, etwas, was wichtiger noch ist, was eine Arbeit des modernen Proletariats ist, die voll von Keimen für die Zukunft ist, und von der auch die Tatsachen der Gegenwart in reichlichem Maße getragen werden: Das bildete sich heraus, daß, während die bisher führende Klasse ihrer Luxusbildung nachging, die einzig nur genährt und gekräftigt werden konnte von dem Kapitalismus, das Proletariat in den Zeiten, die ihm übrigblieben, in seinen Versammlungen nach einer im wahrsten Sinne des Wortes modernen Bildung ausging, ausging nach einem Geistesleben. Das war es, was die bisher führende Klasse der Menschheit nicht sehen wollte, daß durch Tausende und aber Tausende von Proletarierseelen hindurch eine ganz neue Bildung, eine ganz neue Anschauung über den Menschen sich entwickelte.

Es war in der Natur der Sache begründet, daß diese proletarische Bildung zunächst ausging von der Betrachtung des Wirtschaftslebens. Denn an die Maschine hatte das moderne Leben den Proletarier geschmiedet. In die Fabrik hatte sie ihn gedrängt, in den Kapitalismus hatte sie ihn eingespannt. Da heraus holte er seine Begriffe. Aber diese Begriffe -ich will nur darauf aufmerksam machen, wie intensiv alles dasjenige, was mit dem Marxismus zusammenhängt, verständnisvoll einschlug in die Proletarierseelen -, diese Bildung war eine solche, die wenig, wahrhaftig recht wenig Widerhall fand bei der leitenden, der bisher führenden Klasse der Menschheit.

Ist es nicht charakteristisch, daß derjenige, der die Dinge kennt, heute sagen muß: Unter den führenden proletarischen Persönlichkeiten, unter denjenigen, die wirklich verstehen mit dem Proletariat, nicht bloß über das Proletariat zu denken, unter denjenigen Persönlichkeiten, die aufgenommen haben, was an wirklich fruchtbarer Bildung über das Wirtschaftsleben heute aufgenommen werden konnte, unter denen lebt wahrhaftig heute eine ‚gründlichere, wenigstens lebensgründlichere Kenntnis desjenigen, was im sozialen Organismus spielt, als selbst unter den Gebildetsten der Gebildeten, selbst unter den über Soziologie nachdenkenden Professoren, Universitätsprofessoren. Denn es ist charakteristisch, daß sich diese Kreise, deren Beruf es sozusagen wat, sich mit Soziologie, mit der Nationalökonomie zu befassen, gesträubt haben so lange als möglich gegen alles dasjenige, was hervorging aus dem Verständnis für das moderne Proletariat. Und erst als die Tatsachen drängten, als die Tatsachen gar nichts anderes mehr zuließen, haben sich einige von diesen Bürgerlich-Führenden herbeigelassen, mancherlei marxistische oder ähnliche Begriffe in ihr nationalökonomisches System aufzunehmen.

Daß diese Arbeit von dem modernen Proletariat geleistet worden ist, ich möchte sagen, ganz im Verborgenen für die führenden, leitenden Kreise geleistet worden ist, das behaupte ich hier nicht aus einer grauen Theorie heraus; das behaupte ich, weil ich mitansehen konnte, wie diese Arbeit gezimmert worden ist. Ich konnte jahrelang in Berlin Lehter an jener Arbeiterbildungsschule sein, die Wilhelm Liebknecht, der alte Liebknecht noch begründet hatte. Und teilweise in dieser Schule, teilweise in dem, was sich daran schloß, hatte man einen guten Ausschnitt von alldem, was da gearbeitet worden ist, um eine neue Zeit heraufzuführen aus einem entwickelten proletarischen Menschheitsbewußtsein heraus. Das hätten längst alle diejenigen überlegen sollen, die in oberflächlicher Art diese moderne proletarische Bewegung nur wie eine bloße Lohn- und Brotfrage behandeln, die nicht verstehen, sie zu behandeln als eine Frage des menschenwürdigen Daseins aller Menschen.

Demgegenüber ist es wahrhaftig nicht sehr bedeutsam, wenn heute hingewiesen wird darauf, wie innerhalb der Tatsachenwelt, die sich aus dem sozialen Chaos heraus ergeben hat, Schreckhaftes, zuweilen Grausames geschieht. Derjenige, der die Dinge recht versteht, wie sie sich entwickelt haben, der frägt nicht nach dem Zusammenhange dieser Grausamkeiten oder des Schreckhaften mit der modernen proletarischen Bewegung, sondern der ist sich klar darüber, daß die bisher führenden Klassen es sind, welche das hervorgebracht haben, was heute geschieht.

Der weltgeschichtliche Augenblick, der ist erst eingetreten, indem das Proletariat beginnt, für die weltgeschichtlichen Ereignisse eine Verantwortung zu tragen. Bis in die furchtbare und in vieler Beziehung auch irrsinnige Katastrophe des sogenannten Weltkriegs hinein ist dasjenige verantwortlich, was aus dem Kapitalismus, aus der kapitalistischen Wirtschaftsordnung im Laufe der neueren Zeit und insbesondere der neuesten Zeit sich ergeben hat.

Was sehen wir aber nun im Mittelpunkte all desjenigen stehen, was proletarische Bewegung, was proletarische Sehnsucht, ja, was proletarische Forderung ist? Im Mittelpunkt dessen sehen wir stehen, was der Proletarier empfinden mußte gegenüber dem, was er im Grunde genommen herbeiführt und was durch die moderne Wirtschaftsordnung allein dem sozialen Organismus gegeben werden kann; denn die bisher leitenden Kulturkreise interessierten sich im Grunde genommen beim Proletarier nur für dieses einzige, und dieses einzige ist die Arbeitskraft des Proletariers. Man muß wissen, wie gerade eingeschlagen haben die Betrachtungen Karl Marx und derjenigen, die in seinen Bahnen gegangen sind, in das moderne Proletariat, aus dem Grunde, weil in diesem modernen Proletariat die Empfindung da war: Vor allen Dingen muß Klarheit geschaffen werden mit Bezug auf die Art und Weise, wie menschliche Arbeitskraft einfließen darf in den sozialen Organismus.

Nun, es ist oftmals gesagt worden und es hat in weitesten Kreisen eingeleuchtet: durch die moderne Wirtschaftsordnung ist die Arbeitskraft geworden zu einer Ware unter anderen Waren. Das ist ja das Eigentümliche des Wirtschaftslebens, daß es besteht in Warenproduktion, Warenzirkulation und Warenkonsumtion. Aber das ist eingetreten, daß zu einer Ware gemacht wurde die Arbeitskraft des modernen Proletariers.

Von dieser Seite her ist im Grunde genommen innerhalb des Proletariats alles gesagt worden. Nur wird die Frage gewöhnlich doch nur nach einer Seite hin gelenkt, so daß sie nicht völlig in dem Lichte erscheint, durch das man eigentlich Einblicke gewinnt in die Stellung der menschlichen Arbeitskraft im gesunden sozialen Organismus. Da muß eine Frage aufgeworfen werden, die sich allerdings aus der marxistischen Frage ergibt, die aber in einer noch präziseren, in einer noch intensiveren Weise aufgeworfen werden muß. Gefragt werden muß: Kann überhaupt menschliche Arbeitskraft jemals wirkliche Ware sein?

Dadurch wird die Frage auf ein ganz anderes Geleise noch geleitet. Man wird in der Tat fragen: Wie kann gerechtfertigterweise menschliche Arbeitskraft entlohnt werden? Wie kann menschliche Arbeitskraft überhaupt zu ihrem Rechte kommen? Und man kann dabei doch die Voraussetzung haben: es muß schon so sein, daß die menschliche Arbeitskraft Lohn empfängt.

Lohn ist aber in gewissen Zusammenhängen nichts anderes, als lediglich das Kaufgeld für die Ware «Arbeitskraft». Aber Arbeitskraft kann niemals eine Ware sein! Und wo im Wirtschaftsprozeß Arbeitskraft zur Ware gemacht wird, ist dieser Wirtschaftsprozeß Lüge. Denn es wird in die Wirklichkeit etwas hineingeworfen, was niemals ein wahrer Bestandteil dieser Wirklichkeit sein kann. Menschliche Arbeitskraft kann aus dem Grunde keine Ware sein, weil sie den Charakter, den notwendig jede Ware haben muß, nicht haben kann. Im Wirtschaftsprozeß3 muß jede Ware in die Möglichkeit versetzt sein, an Wert mit einer anderen Ware verglichen zu werden. Die Vergleichbarkeit ist die Grundbedingung für das Ware-Sein von etwas. Menschliche Arbeitskraft aber kann niemals mit irgendeinem Warenprodukte in bezug auf den Wert verglichen werden.

Es wäre eigentlich furchtbar einfach, wenn man nur nicht heute verlernt hätte, einfach zu denken. Man denke nur daran, wenn meinetwillen in einer Familie zehn Leute zusammenarbeiten, jeder seinen Teil arbeitet, wie man den Ärbeitsteil eines einzelnen aus diesen zehn vergleichen kann mit den Leistungen, die diese zehn hervorbtingen. Man hat gar nicht die Möglichkeit, mit den Warenleistungen die Arbeitskraft zu vergleichen. Die Arbeitskraft steht auf einem ganz anderen Boden des sozialen Beurteilens als die Ware. Das ist es, was vielleicht in der neueren Zeit nicht deutlich ausgesprochen worden ist, was aber lebt in den Empfindungen des modernen Proletariats.

Was lebt in den Forderungen des modernen Proletariats? Das, was lebt in den Empfindungen des modernen Proletariats, das ist tatsächliche Kritik, das ist die weltgeschichtliche Kritik, die einfach in dem Leben des modernen Proletariers liegt und die entgegengeschleudert wird allem, was von den bisher leitenden Kreisen als soziale Ordnung heraufgefördert worden ist. Dieses moderne Proletariat ist nichts anderes als eine weltgeschichtliche Kritik selber. Gerade der Erkenntnis, daß Arbeitskraft niemals Ware sein kann, verdankt die Empfindung, die Grundempfindung ihr Dasein, daß gelebt wird in der neueren Zeit in einer gewaltigen, in einer umfassenden Lebenslüge; denn gekauft wird Arbeitskraft, die ihrem Wesen nach niemals gekauft werden kann.

Daß dem Abhilfe geschaffen werden müsse, davon ist, wie es ja jedem Einsichtigen heute selbstverständlich sein muß, der moderne Proletarier überzeugt. Aber er ist hineingetrieben worden in dasjenige, was nicht er, was die bisher führenden Klassen aus dem sozialen Organismus gemacht haben. Er ist aus allem übrigen herausgestellt worden und nur hineingespannt worden in den Wirtschaftsprozeß. Sollte es da nicht erklärlich sein, daß er nun durch eine bloße Gesundung dieses Wirtschaftsprozesses, des Kreislaufes des Wirtschaftslebens selbst, auch die Gesundung des ganzen sozialen Organismus herbeiführen will? Daraus sind die Ideale entstanden, dergestalt, wie sie als Ideale des modernen Proletariats bisher leben.

Gesagt worden ist: Dadurch, daß der Kapitalismus als privater Kapitalismus durch den privaten Gebrauch der Produktionsmittel die moderne Produktion zu einer Warenproduktion gemacht hat, dadurch sei das moderne Proletariat in die Lage gekommen, die es nur selbst ganz empfinden kann. Dem kann nur abgeholfen werden dadurch, daß zurückgegriffen werde zu dem, was die uralte Idee der Genossenschaft ist, zu jener Genossenschaft, die gewissermaßen von dem Produzieren des einen für den anderen ausgeht und hinarbeitet zur Selbstproduktion, in welcher nicht mehr der eine den anderen übervorteilen kann, aus dem Grunde, weil er dann selbst übervorteilt würde. Und weiter ist gesagt worden: Wie soll diese Genossenschaft, diese große Genossenschaft begründet werden? Da müsse man seine Zuflucht nehmen eben zu dem Rahmen, der sich im Laufe der neueren Zeit herausgebildet hat: zu dem modernen Staate. Den modernen Staat selber müsse man zu einer groBen Genossenschaft machen, dutch welche gewissermaßen die Warenproduktion übergeführt wird in Produktionen für den Selbstbedarf.

Da ist es gerade, wo man den Punkt ergreifen muß, auf dem man sagen kann: Man findet das Gesunde gerade in dem Geistesleben des modernen Proletariats auf der einen Seite, und man findet zu gleicher Zeit dasjenige, wo dieses Geistesleben des modernen Proletariats entwickelungsfähig ist, wo es von der Stufe, die es bis jetzt beschritten hat, zu einer anderen Stufe noch fortschreiten kann.

Es sollte wahrhaftig von demjenigen, der anderer Meinung ist auf diesem Gebiete, nicht übelgenommen werden, wenn man aus ebenso aufrichtigen und ehrlichen Empfindungen heraus, wie er sie selber hegt, noch nicht gewissermaßen die Vollendung sieht in der gegenwärtigen proletarischen Weltanschauung, sondern wenn man gerade genötigt ist, darauf hinzuweisen, daß diese proletarische Weltanschauung in sich die Keime zu einem Fortschritt trägt, daß dieser Fortschritt aber auch wirklich angestrebt werden muß. Und er kann angestrebt werden.

Das wird derjenige zugeben, welcher einsieht, was ich bereits — es ist ungefähr achtzehn Jahre her - im Berliner Gewerkschaftshaus als eine Eigentümlichkeit, und dann oftmals wiederum als eine Eigentümlichkeit gerade der modernen Arbeiterbewegung hervorheben mußte und was ich heute noch für absolut richtig halten muß. Ich sagte damals: Für den, der das geschichtliche Leben der Menschheit überblickt und. aus diesem geschichtlichen Leben der Menschheit die moderne proletarische Bewegung mit Verständnis, mit innerem Verständnis hat hervorgehen sehen, für den ist es auffällig, daß diese moderne proletarische Bewegung anders als alle anderen Menschheitsbewegungen, die es je gegeben hat, im Grunde genommen auf einem - man mag das grotesk finden, man mag es paradox finden — auf einem geradezu wissenschaftlich orientierten Boden steht.

Tief, tief wahr ist es, was damals nach dieser Richtung hin als einen Grundton, als eine Grundforderung der modernen Arbeiterbewegung der schon fast vergessene Lassalle angeschlagen hat in seiner berühmten Rede über «Die Wissenschaft und die Arbeiter». Nur muß man die Sache noch von einem anderen Gesichtspunkte aus ansehen, als sie heute gewöhnlich angesehen wird: man muß sie ansehen von dem Gesichtspunkte des Lebens. Da kann man sagen: Mit Bezug auf dasjenige, was dem modernen Proletariat zugänglich geworden ist, durch das, was ihm die führenden Klassen geben mußten, wenn sie ihn nicht im Analphabetismus fortbelassen wollten, durch das hat der moderne Proletarier die Möglichkeit erlangt, zu übernehmen, wie ein Erbgut zu übernehmen, was sich in der neueren Zeit herausgebildet hat, aus dem Bestreben der leitenden Kreise zu übernehmen, was sich als wissenschaftliche Weltanschauung herausgebildet hat.

Worauf es ankommt, das ist dieses, daß aber nun der moderne Proletarier in ganz anderer Weise reagieren mußte auf diese wissenschaftliche Weltanschauung als alle anderen Kreise, sogar diejenigen, welche unmittelbar diese Weltanschauung ausgebildet hatten. Man kann innerhalb der leitenden und bisher führenden Kreise ein sehr aufgeklärter Mensch sein, ein Mensch, dessen innerste Überzeugung hervorquillt aus den Resultaten, aus den Ergebnissen der modernen Wissenschaft, man kann meinetwillen ein Naturforscher wie Vogt, ein naturwissenschaftlich populärer Forscher wie Büchner sein, dennoch steht man der wissenschaftlich orientierten Weltanschauung anders gegenüber als der moderne Proletatrier.

Derjenige, der aus den leitenden Kreisen und ihren Vorurteilen, namentlich ihrem Vorgefühl und ihrer Vorempfindung heraus, sich theoretisch bekennt zu der modernen Bildung über den Menschen und über die Natur, der bleibt deshalb doch stecken innerhalb einer Gesellschaftsordnung, die sich streng abschließt von dem modernen Proletariat, und deren Struktur, deren ganze Organisation nicht herrührt von dem, was moderne Wissenschaft erzählt, sondern herrührt von demjenigen, was vor dieser modernen Wissenschaft die Menschengemüter an religiösen, an rechtlichen und sonstigen Vorstellungen über die Menschenwürde erfüllt hat. Das konnte ich einmal, ich möchte sagen, im unmittelbaren Erlebnis empfinden.

Es war indem Augenblicke, als ich, zusammen mit der jüngst tragisch untergegangenen Rosa Luxemburg in Spandau stand vor einer Arbeiterversammlung, vor der wir beide sprachen über den modernen Arbeiter und die moderne Wissenschaft. Da mußte man sehen, wie dasjenige, was diese moderne Wissenschaft in die moderne Proletarierseele hineingieBen kann, ganz anders wirkt auf den Proletarier als selbst auf den Überzeugtesten der bisher leitenden Menschenklasse, als Rosa Luxemburg den Leuten klarmachte: Da ist nichts, was hinweist auf einen engelgleichen Ursprung der Menschen, nichts, was hinweist auf die hohen Ausgangspunkte, von denen die bürgerliche Weltanschauung noch gern erzählen möchte; da ist von dieser modernen bürgerlichen Weltanschauung selbst behauptet, wie der Mensch als Klettertier einmal begonnen hat, wie er sich hinaufentwickelt hat aus diesen Zuständen. Wer das überdenkt - so sprach dazumal die für ihre Sache begeisterte Arbeiterführerin - wer das durchdenkt, der kann nicht in den Vorurteilen, die die heutigen führenden Kreise haben, verharren in den Vorurteilen von Rangunterschieden, von der Möglichkeit, so abzustufen zwischen den Menschen, die alle einen solchen gleichen Ursprung haben, wie man das innerhalb der führenden Kreise heute tut. - Das schlug anders ein, als bei den Leuten der führenden Kreise. Und das ergänzte dasjenige, was verständnisvoll als Wirtschaftswissenschaft der moderne Proletarier aufnahm.

Dasjenige, was da in die Seelen aufgenommen worden ist, das ist einer Fortentwickelung fähig, und von dieser Fortentwickelung möchte ich Ihnen heute einiges erzählen.

Derjenige, der alles das überblickt, was in Betracht kommt für die Frage gerade: Wie ist die Arbeitskraft des modernen Proletariers zu dem Sinn einer Ware gekommen? - der sieht sich nach und nach gedrängt, seine Beobachtungen über das Wirtschaftsleben zu dem Punkte zu führen, wo er sich sagen muß: Gerade dadurch, daß der moderne Arbeiter hineingespannt worden ist in dieses bloße Wirtschaftsleben, dadurch ist innerhalb des Wirtschaftslebens auch die Arbeitskraft des modernen Proletariers zur Ware geworden. In dieser Richtung haben wir nur die Fortsetzung dessen, was im Altertum die Sklavenfrage war. Da war der ganze Mensch Ware. Heute ist geblieben von diesem ganzen Menschen nur noch die Arbeitskraft. Aber dieser Arbeitskraft muß der ganze Mensch folgen.

In den Empfindungen der modernen Proletarierseele liegt es, daß das in Zukunft nicht so sein dürfe, daß das der letzte Rest der alten Barbarenzeit ist, der überwunden werden muß. Überwunden aber wird dies nicht anders werden können, als wenn man nun mit derselben klaren Geisteskraft, mit der das moderne Proletariat die Wirtschafts- und die Menschennatur ergriffen hat, damit auch die Wissenschaft von dem gesunden sozialen Organismus ergreift. Und von dieser Wissenschaft lassen Sie mich Ihnen einige Worte sagen.

Da tritt vor allen Dingen das deutlich auf: Man muß sich fragen: Was macht denn innerhalb des Kreislaufes des modernen Wirtschaftslebens die Arbeitskraft des modernen Proletariers zur Ware? Das macht die wirtschaftliche Gewalt des Kapitalistischen.

In diesem Worte von der Gewalt des Kapitalistischen liegt schon eine Hinweisung auf die gesunde Antwort. Denn: wem ist Gewalt diametral entgegengesetzt? Gewalt ist diametral entgegengesetzt dem Rechte. Das aber weist darauf hin, daß eine Gesundung mit Bezug auf die Verwertung der menschlichen Arbeitskraft im sozialen Organismus nur dann eintreten kann, wenn die Arbeitskraft herausgehoben wird, wenn überhaupt die Frage nach der Arbeitskraft herausgehoben wird aus dem Wirtschaftsprozeß und wenn sie wird zu einer reinen und lauteren Rechtsfrage.

Damit aber kommen wir dazu, des breiteren nachzudenken, ob denn ein tieferer Unterschied ist zwischen Wirtschaftsfrage und Rechtsfrage. Dieser Unterschied besteht; nur ist man heute noch nicht geneigt, diesen Unterschied tiefgehend genug zu nehmen. Man ist nicht geneigt, tiefgehend genug zu nehmen, was auf der einen Seite die wirksamen Kräfte in allem Wirtschaftsleben sein müssen und auf der anderen Seite die wirksamen Kräfte sein müssen in dem eigentlichen Rechtsleben.

Was wirkt im Wirtschaftsprozesse? Im Wirtschaftsprozesse wirkt das menschliche Bedürfnis, wirkt die Möglichkeit der Befriedigung dieses menschlichen Bedürfnisses durch die Produktion. Beides ist gegründet auf die Naturgrundlage; das menschliche Bedürfen auf die Naturgrundlage des Menschen, die Produktion auf die klimatischen, geographischen und sonstigen Naturgrundlagen. Dieses Wirtschaftsleben hat unter dem Einflusse der modernen Arbeitsteilung eben geführt zu dem, was der moderne Warenaustausch ist und sein muß, jener Warenaustausch, in dem sich nach dem Bedürfnisse der Menschen die Waren gegenseitig bewerten, und nach ihrer gegenseitigen Bewertung - ich kann das nicht im einzelnen beschreiben, es würde zu lange dauern —- auf dem Markte erscheinen und auf dem Markte in den Kreislauf des Wirtschaftsprozesses einziehen.

Innerhalb dieses Kreislaufes des Wirtschaftslebens kann sich als in einem abgeschlossenen Kreislauf nicht zu gleicher Zeit das Rechtsleben entwickeln. Die menschliche Natur läßt ebensowenig zu, daß sich im sozialen Organismus innerhalb des Wirtschaftslebens selbst das Rechtsleben entwickelt, wie sie zuläßt, daß im menschlichen, im natürlichen Menschenorganismus nur ein einziges, in sich zentralisiertes System da ist. Ich will wahrhaftig heute abend nicht spielen mit irgendwelchen Vergleichen aus der Naturwissenschaft; allein ich glaube, daß gerade da ein Punkt ist, wo auch die Naturwissenschaft über dasjenige hinausgehen muß, zu dem sie heute gekommen ist. Ich habe in meinem letzten Buche: «Von Seelenrätseln» hingewiesen, worauf es da ankommt, was Naturwissenschaft heute nicht ordentlich erkannt hat: daß im gesunden menschlichen Organismus drei Systeme vorhanden sind, daß das Sinnes-Nervensystem vorhanden ist, das als Träger des Seelenlebens da ist, das Atmungs- und Herzsystem als Träger des rhythmischen Lebens, das Stoffwechselsystem als Träger des Stoffwechsels, und daß das Ganze den menschlichen Organismus ausmacht. Aber jedes System ist für sich zentralisiert; jedes hat seinen eigenen Ausgang nach der Außenwelt. In diesem Menschenorganismus wird Ordnung und Harmonie dadurch hervorgerufen, daß diese drei Systeme nicht wüst durcheinanderwirken, sondern nebeneinander sich entfalten, und dadurch gerade recht die Kraft des einen in das andere hineinfließen kann.

So muß im gesunden sozialen Organismus eine solche Dreigliederung eintreten. Man muß einsehen, daß, wenn der Mensch im Wirtschaftsorganismus sich betätigt, er dann innerhalb dieses Wirtschaftsprozesses bloß wirtschaften muß. Dann handelt es sich datum, daß die Verwaltung, die Gesetzgebung dieses Wirtschaftsprozesses darauf ausgeht, die gegenseitige Bewertung der Ware in der wirtschaftlichen Wirklichkeit auf den Weg zu bringen, in der zweckmäßigsten Weise die Warenzirkulation einzuleiten, die Warenproduktion einzuleiten, die Warenkonsumtion einzuleiten. Aus diesem bloßen Wirtschaftsprozesse muß aber herausgeholt werden alles dasjenige, was sich nun bezieht nicht auf die Befriedigung des Bedürfnisses des einen Menschen mit dem anderen, sondern was sich bezieht auf das Verhältnis eines jeden Menschen zu jedem anderen Menschen. Dasjenige, worinnen alle Menschen gleich sein müssen, ist etwas radikal Verschiedenes von demjenigen, was sich im Wirtschaftsleben allein entwickeln kann. Daher ist notwendig zur Gesundung des sozialen Organismus, daß herausgeholt werde aus dem bloßen Wirtschaftsleben das Rechtsleben, das eigentliche Rechtsleben. Dieser Entwickelung hat eben gerade die neuere Zeit entgegengestrebt.

Die bisher führenden Klassen - was haben sie getan? Auf denjenigen Gebieten, auf denen es ihnen bequem war, auf denen es ihnen für ihre Interessen richtig erschien, da haben sie die alte Verschmelzung, die ja schon gewiß auf vielen Gebieten bestanden hat zwischen dem Wirtschaftsleben und dem politischen Staatsleben, weiter durchgeführt. Und so sehen wir, daß in dieser neueren Zeit, gerade unter dem Einflusse der leitenden Kreise der Menschheit, heraufkommt die sogenannte Verstaatlichung für gewisse Wirtschaftszweige. Post-, Telegraphenwesen und ähnliches zu verstaatlichen ist ja gefunden worden als im modernen Fortschritt gelegen und von diesem modernen Fortschritt verlangt.

In gerade entgegengesetzter Richtung muß derjenige denken, der nun nicht auf die Interessen der bisher führenden Kreise sieht, sondern der frägt: Welches sind die Grundlagen eines gesunden sozialen Organismus? -Der muß anstreben, daß immer mehr und mehr gelöst werde aus dem bloßen Wirtschaftsleben das Leben des eigentlich politischen Staates, desjenigen Staates, der zu sorgen hat für Recht und für Ordnung; der zu sorgen hat vor allen Dingen aber dafür, daß von diesem Gebiete aus in das Wirtschaftsleben das entsprechende Rechtsleben hineinfließt. Derjenige unterscheidet im menschlichen Leben nicht richtig, der kein Auge, kein geistiges Auge dafür hat, wie radikal verschieden Wirtschaftsleben und das Leben des eigentlichen politischen Staates ist.

Sehen wir einmal die Dinge an, wie sie sich heute entwickelt haben. Gewisse Menschen sprechen aus dem heutigen sozialen Zustand heraus so, sie sagen, innerhalb dieses sozialen Zustandes haben wir als erstes: Tausch von Waren gegen Waren. - Gut, das muß sein im Wirtschaftsleben. Davon ist ja gerade eben gesprochen worden. Dann haben wir als zweites, sagen sie und sie sehen das als berechtigt an: Tausch von Waren, beziehungsweise des Repräsentanten von Ware, des Geldes, gegen Arbeitskraft. Und als drittes: Tausch von Waren gegen Rechte.

Was ist das letztere? Über das zweite habe ich ja schon gesprochen. Nun, wir brauchen nur hinzusehen auf das Grundbesitzerverhältnis in der modernen Wirtschaftsordnung, und uns wird sogleich klar werden, was klar sein sollte auf diesem Gebiete für die Zukunft. Wie man sonst auch über das Besitzverhältnis in bezug auf Grund und Boden denken mag - alles andere hat für den realen Vorgang im sozialen Organismus nicht eigentlich eine Bedeutung; eine Bedeutung hat lediglich das, daß der Besitzer von Grund und Boden das Recht hat, ein Stück Grund und Boden allein zu benützen und bei dieser Benützung sein persönliches Interesse geltend zu machen.

Das hat nicht das geringste in seinem Ursprunge mit dem Wirtschaftsprozesse als solchem zu tun. Mit dem Wirtschaftsprozesse hat einzig und allein — dagegen kann nur eine verkehrte Nationalökonomie etwas einwenden - dasjenige zu tun, was auf dem Grund und Boden als Ware oder mit Warenwert erzeugt wird. Benützung des Grund und Bodens beruht auf einem Rechte.

Dieses Recht allerdings verwandelt sich innerhalb der modernen kapitalistischen Wirtschaftsordnung, namentlich durch die Verquickung des Kapitalismus mit den Grundrenten, wiederum in eine Gewalt. Und so haben wir auf der einen Seite die Gewalt, welche ausschließt von solchen Rechten; auf der anderen Seite jene wirtschaftliche Gewalt, welche die menschliche Arbeitskraft zwingen kann, zur Ware zu werden.

Von beiden Seiten her wird nichts anderes, als eine Lebenslüge verwirklicht, wenn nicht angestrebt wird - angestrebt wird aus wirklicher sozialer Einsicht heraus — die Gliederung des sozialen Organismus in einen Wirtschaftsorganismus und in einen Organismus des im engeren Sinne politischen Staates.

Der Wirtschaftsorganismus wird begründet werden müssen auf assoziativer Grundlage, aus den Bedürfnissen der Konsumtion in ihrem Verhältnisse zur Produktion. Aus den verschiedenen Interessen der mannigfaltigsten Berufskreise werden die mannigfaltigsten Genossenschaften - man könnte sie mit einem alten Wort auch Bruderschaften der Menschheit nennen — entwickelt werden müssen, in denen verwaltet werden die Bedürfnisse und ihre Befriedigung.

Was sich innerhalb dieser Assoziationsgrundlage des wirtschaftlichen Organismus herausbildet, das wird immer zu tun haben mit der Befriedigung des einen Kreises von Menschen durch einen anderen Kreis. Auf diesem Gebiete wird maßgebend sein müssen die sachverständige Verwertung erstens der Naturgrundlage, dann aber auch die sachverständige Ausgestaltung der Warenproduktion, -zirkulation und -konsumtion. Da wird geltend sein müssen das menschliche Bedürfnis, das menschliche Interesse.

Dem wird immer gegenüberstehen als etwas radikal Verschiedenes dasjenige, worinnen Mensch und Mensch wesentlich gleich sich gegenüberstehen, wo sie gleich sein müssen, wie man mit einem heute schon trivial gewordenen Worte sagt: Wo sie gleich sein müssen vor jenem Gesetze, das sie sich als gleiche Menschen selber geben.

Auf assoziativer Grundlage wird beruhen müssen der Kreislauf des Wirtschaftsprozesses; auf rein demokratischer Grundlage, auf dem Prinzip der Gleichheit aller Menschen in ihrem Verhältnis zueinander wird ruhen müssen im engeren Sinne die eigentliche politische Organisation. Aus dieser politischen Organisation wird entspringen etwas ganz anderes als die wirtschaftliche Gewalt, welche die Arbeitskraft zur Ware macht. Aus dem vom Wirtschaftsleben getrennten politischen Leben wird entspringen das wahre Arbeitsrecht, wo einzig und allein nach dem, was über Arbeitskraft zwischen Mensch und Mensch als Menschen verhandelt werden kann, Maß und Arbeit und anderes über die Arbeitskraft festgesetzt werden kann.

Wie man auch glauben mag, daß die Dinge in der neueren Zeit schon etwas besser geworden seien: dasjenige, worauf es fundamental ankommt, ist nicht besser geworden. Dutch die Art, wie die Arbeitskraft des Proletariersim Wirtschaftsprozesse drinnensteht, wird der Preis der zur Ware gemachten Arbeitskraft von den Preisen der anderen Wirtschaftsprodukte, von den Warenpreisen abhängen. Das sieht jeder, der wirklich tiefer hineinschaut in den Wirtschaftsprozeß. Anders wird die Sache sein, wenn unabhängig von dem Gesetze des Wirtschaftslebens und seiner Verwaltung, aus dem politischen Staate heraus, aus der rein demokratischen Verwaltung und Gesetzgebung des politischen Staates heraus ein Arbeitsrecht existieren wird. Was wird dann eintreten?

Dann wird eintreten, daß dasjenige, was der Mensch durch seine Arbeitskraft dem sozialen Organismus leistet, in einem ebenso lebendigen, durch sich bestimmten Verhältnis steht wie heute die Naturgrundlagen. Man kann innerhalb gewisser Grenzen die technische Fruchtbarmachung des Bodens und dergleichen etwas verschieben, die festen Grenzen der Naturgrundlage etwas verschieben; allein diese Naturgrundlagen bestimmen das Wirtschaftsleben dennoch in ausgiebigstem Maße von der einen Seite her. Ebenso wie von dieser Seite her das Wirtschaftsleben von außerhalb bestimmt wird, so muß von der anderen Seite her das Wirtschaftsleben von außen bestimmt werden, indem es nicht mehr die Arbeitskraft von sich abhängig macht, sondern die aus rein menschlichen Untergründen heraus bestimmte Arbeitskraft dem Wirtschaftsleben dargeboten werden kann. Dann macht die Arbeit den Preis der Ware, dann bestimmt nicht mehr die Ware den Preis der Arbeit!

Dann kann nur höchstens das eintreten, daß, wenn aus irgend welchem Grunde die Arbeitskraft nicht genügend geleistet werden kann, das Wirtschaftsleben verarmt. Dem muß aber abgeholfen werden dadurch, daß auf rechtlichem Boden die Abhilfe gesucht wird, und nicht aus dem bloßen Wirtschaftsleben.

Zugrunde liegt beim Wirtschaftsleben nur dasjenige, was nach Angebot und Nachfrage frägt. Mit dem Arbeitsrecht, das gestellt wird auf die Grundlage des selbständigen politischen Staates, werden aber notwendig auch alle übrigen Rechte auf diese selben Grundlagen gestellt werden. Kurz, man wird - ich kann das nur andeuten wegen der Kürze der Zeit - notwendigerweise sehen müssen gerade in der Auseinanderschälung der beiden Gebiete: des Rechtslebens und des Wirtschaftslebens, das Ideal eines gesunden sozialen Organismus in der Zukunft.

Und als drittes muß sich angliedern diesem selbständigen Wirtschaftsleben, diesem selbständigen Rechtsleben dasjenige, was man das geistige Leben der Menschheit nennen kann.

Darinnen wird man, indem man von dieser wahren Fortsetzung der proletarischen Weltanschauung spricht, am meisten auf Widerstand stoBen. Denn es ist in die menschlichen Denkgewohnheiten auf diesem Gebiete, mehr noch gerade als in anderes, eingegangen die Meinung, daß nur durch das Aufsaugen des gesamten geistigen Lebens vom Staate das Heil der Menschheit abhängen könne; und man durchschaut noch nicht, wie die Abhängigkeit, in die das geistige Leben vom Staate gekommen ist gerade in der neueren Zeit, aus dem hervorgegangen ist, was man nennen kann das Interesse der bisher führenden Kreise an dem Staate, der eben diese führenden Kreise so recht befriedigt hat. Diese führenden Kreise, sie haben ihre Interessen in diesem Staate befriedigt gefunden; sie haben dasjenige, was sie geistiges Leben nennen, immer mehr und mehr von diesem Staate aufsaugen lassen. Wie der politische Staat durch Zwangssteuergesetze genötigt ist, dasjenige herbeizuschaffen, was die Gleichheit aller Menschen vor dem Gesetze begründen kann, und wie der Staat genötigt ist, durch die Zwangssteuer seine Bedürfnisse zu befriedigen, so muß auf der anderen Seite das geistige Leben wirklich emanzipiert werden von den beiden anderen Gebieten des sozialen Organismus.

Gerade was man auf diesem Gebiete angestrebt hat: die Verquickung des Geisteslebens mit dem Staats- und Wirtschaftsleben, das ist es, was zum Unheil der neueren Zeit ausgeschlagen hat. Denn dasjenige, was im Geistigen leben soll, das kann sich nur entwickeln, wenn es im Lichte der wahren Freiheit sich entwickeln kann. Alles dasjenige, was nicht im Lichte der wahren Freiheit sich entwickeln kann, das verkümmert und lähmt das wirkliche Geistesleben und bringt es außerdem auch auf Abwege, die man in der neueren gesellschaftlichen Ordnung nur leider allzugut bemerken kann. Was aber notwendig ist auf diesem Gebiete, ist: zu durchschauen, welcher innere Zusammenhang besteht zwischen dem Geistesleben im engsten Sinne, und dem religiösen Leben, dem wissenschaftlichen Leben, dem künstlerischen Leben, dem Leben in einer gewissen Sittlichkeit, welcher Zusammenhang ist zwischen diesem Leben und alledem, was überhaupt hervorgeht aus den individuellen menschlichen Fähigkeiten und Geschicklichkeiten.

Daher muß jetzt, wo über diese Dinge hier in ernstem Sinne gesprochen wird, in ernstem Sinne eines gesunden sozialen Organismus gesprochen wird, gesprochen werden so, daß unter das geistige Leben gezählt wird alles dasjenige, was überhaupt mit der Entfaltung, der Entwickelung der individuellen Fähigkeiten etwas zu tun hat, alles dasjenige, was damit zu tun hat, vom Schulwesen angefangen bis hinauf zum Universitätswesen, bis hinein in das künstlerische, bis in das sittliche Leben, ja, bis auf diejenigen Geisteszweige, die die Grundlage des praktischen, auch des Wirtschaftslebens ausmachen. Auf allen diesen Gebieten muß angestrebt werden Emanzipation des geistigen Lebens. So daß dieses geistige Leben gestellt werden kann in die freie Initiative desjenigen, der die individuellen Fähigkeiten des Menschen hat, und daß dieses freie Geistesleben nur da sein kann dann in entsprechender Weise im gesunden sozialen Organismus, wenn es auch in seiner Geltung beruht auf der freien Anerkennung, auf dem freien Verständnisse derjenigen, die es entgegenzunehmen nötig haben. Das heißt, es darf in Zukunft nicht mehr irgendwie aus der Summe desjenigen, was man in der Tasche hat oder im Geldschrank, oder aus der Bürokratie des Staates heraus das Geistesleben verwaltet werden.

Nicht allein dadurch, daß dieses Geistesleben verwaltet worden ist vom Staate, hat es einen gewissen Charakter angenommen in bezug auf die Persönlichkeiten, die drinnenstehen, in bezug auf die Persönlichkeiten, die es verwalten, sondern dieses geistige Leben, wie wir es heute haben, wie es mit Recht der moderne Proletarier als eine Ideologie empfindet, dieses geistige Leben, das ist doch zu einem Spiegelbilde desjenigen geworden, was sich an Interessen, an Bedürfnissen der führenden, leitenden Kreise für und durch den modernen Staat, den sie sich selbst ihrer eigenen Bequemlichkeit nach gebildet haben, nach diesem Bedürfnisse herausgestaltet hat. Ist es im letzten Grunde richtig, daß alles geistige Leben nur ein Spiegelbild gewissermaßen, nur ein Überbau des wirtschaftlichen oder des staatlichen Lebens ist? Das moderne geistige Leben der führenden Kreise ist nur ein solcher Überbau. Gewiß, Chemie, Mathematik, sie werden nicht leicht ihrem Inhalte nach den Charakter annehmen können, der sich aus den Interessen der führenden Kreise ergibt. Allein schon der Umfang, in dem sie betrieben werden, aber namentlich das Licht, das von den anderen Zweigen des Geisteslebens auf sie fällt, das ist bestimmt durch die Tatsache, daß mit den Interessen der leitenden, der bisher leitenden Kreise der Menschen die Interessen des modernen Staatslebens und damit die Interessen des modernen Geisteslebens im Staate zusammenwachsen.

Ja, dieses moderne Geistesleben, es ist gerade auf den wichtigsten Gebieten, da, wo es eingreifen soll in Menschenseelen, wenn es sich seinen Platz bestimmen soll in der sozialen Ordnung, ein Spielball des Wirtschaftslebens und des politischen Lebens geworden. Man kann es sehen an der Art, wie bis in diese furchtbare kriegerische Katastrophe herein diejenigen Träger des geistigen Lebens, die auf dem Umwege des Kapitalismus verbunden waren mit dem modernen Staatsleben, im Grunde genommen gerade auf den wichtigsten Lebensgebieten des Geistes dasjenige hervorgebracht haben, was in den Dienst des modernen Staates hat gestellt werden können.

Man könnte da nicht hundertfach, sondern tausend- und aber tausendfach die Beweise finden. Sie brauchen nur das eine zu bedenken: Nehmen Sie die deutschen Geschichtsprofessoren, die Träger der geschichtlichen Wissenschaft. Versuchen Sie sich ein Bild zu machen von alledem, was sie produziert haben mit Bezug auf die Geschichte der Hohenzollern, und fragen Sie sich, ob nun jetzt nach diesem weltgeschichtlichen Ereignisse die Geschichte der Hohenzollern ebenso aussehen wird, wie sie vorher ausgesehen hat? Daran kann man ersehen, wie das geistige Leben durch die Verhältnisse ein bloßes Spiel geworden ist desjenigen, von dem es eben nicht frei gewesen ist.

Frei werden muß das Geistesleben von den beiden anderen Gebieten. Dann aber kann das Geistesleben in seine ihm eigene Gesetzgebung und Verwaltung aufnehmen dasjenige - so sonderbar es klingt und so überraschend es für manchen sein wird, es muß gesagt werden —, was heute einzig und allein aus den kapitalistischen Vorurteilen hervorgehen kann: dann kann das Geistesleben der Überwinder des bloßen wirtschaftlichen proletarischen Interesses wirklich werden. Denn das geistige Leben ist ein einheitliches. Das geistige Leben geht von dem höchsten Zweige des Geisteslebens herunter bis in jene Verzweigungen, die dadurch entstehen, daß irgend jemand aus seinen individuellen Fähigkeiten heraus irgendeine Unternehmung zu leiten hat. So wie er sie heute leitete, so leitete er sie aus dem Wirtschaftsleben heraus unter der Wirkung der Gewalt, der wirtschaftlichen Gewalt. So wie er sie zu leiten hat im gesunden sozialen Organismus, so ist das aus dem Geistesleben heraus. Das Geistesleben hat im gesunden sozialen Organismus seine eigene Gesetzgebung und Verwaltung in bezug auf die höchsten Zweige dieses geistigen Lebens, aber auch mit Bezug auf alles dasjenige, was geistig in den Wirtschaftsprozeß gerade dann hineinwirken wird, wenn das geistige Leben als solches selbständig ist.

Dann wird auftreten in diesem Wirtschaftsprozeß in der richtigen Weise der Einfluß des emanzipierten, des selbständigen Geisteslebens. Dann wird dasjenige, was eben durch das Kapital geleistet werden wird, nicht mehr im Sinne des modernen Kapitalismus geleistet werden können. Dann wird es geleistet werden können allein nach den Impulsen, die das geistige Leben selber gibt.

Nur, man muß sich von diesen Impulsen die richtigen Vorstellungen machen. Wie wird zum Beispiel ein Betrieb unter diesen Impulsen eigentlich ausschauen?

Wer das Geistesleben in seinem Fundament kennt -ich weiß das ganz gut -, der wird mir nicht widersprechen, wenn ich die folgende Schilderung gebe von einem Betrieb, der seine Impulse nicht von der wirtschaftlichen Gewalt, sondern von der Gewalt des Geisteslebens erhält: Da wird derjenige durch das freie Verständnis der mit ihm Mitarbeitenden in die Lage versetzt werden, aus einem gewissen Kapitalfonds heraus dasjenige zu unternehmen, was nun nicht zu seinem Nutzen, sondern wegen des sozialen Verständnisses, das er sich im richtigen Geistesleben angeeignet haben wird, unternommen wird. Dann wird in einem solchen Betriebe gegenüberstehen derjenige, der durch das freie Verständnis seiner Mitarbeiter bis zum letzten Arbeiter herunter, durch das freie Verständnis an seinen Posten gestellt ist, dann wird, weil dann ein Verhältnis des freien Verständnisses eintreten wird zwischen diesem Leiter eines Betriebes und denjenigen, die arbeiten, sich ganz notwendig dasjenige herausbilden, was da macht, daß neben den Arbeitsstunden eingeführt wird innerhalb eines jeden Betriebes und innerhalb der Genossenschaften von Betrieben, die Möglichkeit eines freien Aussprechens über die ganze Art, wie der Wirtschaftsprozeß im sozialen Gesamtorganismus drinnensteht. Dann wird unter dem Einflusse eines solchen Geisteslebens derjenige, der an der Stellestehen wird, wo heute der kapitalistische Unternehmer steht, sich zu offenbaren haben in bezug auf alles dasjenige, was seine Ware hineinstellt in den gesamten Gesellschaftsprozeß der Menschheit. Dann wird jeder einzelne einsehen, welchen Weg das Produkt nimmt, zu dem er seine Arbeit beisteuert, das Produkt des handwerklichen Arbeiters und desjenigen, der diese handarbeitliche Arbeit durch seine besonderen individuellen Fähigkeiten zu leiten hat. Dann wird allein aber auch dasjenige eintreten können, was dem Arbeiter die Möglichkeit gibt, einen wirklichen Arbeitsvertrag zu schließen. Denn ein wirklicher Arbeitsvertrag kann nicht geschlossen werden, wenn er geschlossen wird auf Grundlage der Voraussetzung, daß Arbeitskraft Ware ist. Ein wahrer Arbeitsvertrag darf gar nicht auf diesen Grundlagen aufgebaut werden; sondern einzig und allein kann ein wirklicher Arbeitsvertrag nur aufgebaut werden auf der Grundlage, daß die Arbeit, die notwendig ist zur Herstellung eines Produktes, auf Grundlage des Rechtes geleistet wird, daß aber mit Bezug auf das Wirtschaftliche das gehörige Zusammenarbeiten zwischen handwerklichem und geistigem Arbeiter entsteht, daß mit Bezug auf das Wirtschaftliche jener Teilungsvorgang zwischen dem handwerklich und geistig Arbeitenden stattfinden muß, der allein aus der freien Einsicht auch des handwerklichen Arbeiters hervorgehen kann, weil dieser handwerklich Arbeitende dann wissen wird aus dem geistigen Zusammenleben mit dem Leitenden, in welchem Grade seine Arbeit dadurch, daß die Leitung da ist, zu seinem eigenen Vorteil einfließt in den sozialen Organismus.

Nur in einem solchen Zusammenarbeiten hört die Möglichkeit auf, daß die Unternehmungen, die auf Kapitalgrundlage gebaut werden müssen, auf den Vorteil, auf den egoistischen Vorteil aufgebaut werden. Dann allein, wenn in dieser Weise der soziale Organismus gesundet, dann allein kann das heutige Profitinteresse ersetzt werden durch das rein sachliche Interesse. Und heraufziehen wird in einem größeren Umfange, als das in früheren Zeiten der Fall war, wiederum der Zusammenhang zwischen dem Menschen und seiner Arbeit.

Sehen wir uns heute diesen Zusammenhang zwischen dem Menschen und seiner Arbeit an. Da ist auf der einen Seite der Unternehmer, der da leistet dasjenige, was er auch als Arbeit ansieht, aber er macht sich so schnell als möglich weg von dieser Arbeit. Er drückt das sogar dadurch aus, daß er, wenn er sich weggedrückt hat von seiner Arbeit, er das Reden über diese Arbeit als «Fachsimpelei» bezeichnet. Er macht sich weg, under sucht durch allerlei anderes dann zu dem zu kommen, was er als Mensch anstrebt. Gerade durch ein solches Verhältnis des Menschen zu seiner Arbeit drückt sich aus, wie wenig der Mensch mit seiner Arbeit verwachsen ist.

Das aber ist ein ungesundes Verhältnis. Das ist ein ungesundes Verhältnis, welches das andere nach sich ziehen mußte, daß, indem das moderne Proletariat hinweggerissen ist von dem Boden des alten Handwerkes, wo der Mensch mit seinem Beruf verwachsen war, aus seinem Berufe seine Ehre, seine Menschenwürde gezogen hat, und wo er hingestellt worden ist zu der Maschine, eingespannt worden ist in der Fabrik; da wird in ihm jenes Ungesunde erzeugt, daß er kein Verhältnis gewinnen kann zu seiner Arbeit.

Aber derjenige, der das Geistesleben in seiner wahren Grundlage erkennt, der weiß, daß solch ein ungesundes Verhältnis zwischen dem Menschen und seiner Arbeit nur eben unter ungesunden Voraussetzungen auch entstehen kann. Es gibt nichts in einem gesunden Geistesleben, das frei ist vom politischen und frei ist vom Wirtschaftsleben und auf diese nur zurückwirkt, es gibt nichts innerhalb eines solchen Geisteslebens, das nicht unmittelbar interessant ist, und was, wenn es nur richtig gehandhabt wird, den Menschen knüpft an seine Arbeit, weil er weiß: dasjenige, was er arbeitet, wird ein Glied in dem Kreislauf des sozialen Organismus. Das ist nicht etwas, was nur beurteilt werden darf als so, daß es nicht anders sein könne, daß der Mensch auch Uninteressantes tun müsse. Nein, das muß so beurteilt werden, daß gerade jene Grundlage des Geisteslebens aufgesucht wird, welche einzig und allein Interesse, Zusammenhang des Menschen mit seiner Arbeit und Interesse für diese Arbeit auf allen Gebieten, bei jeglicher Arbeit hervorrufen kann.

Da wird sich zeigen, daß, wenn das emanzipierte freie Geistesleben aus geistigen Impulsen heraus bis in die einzelnsten Verzweigungen hinein das staatliche und das Wirtschaftsleben in seinen Verwaltern versorgt, daß dann allein dasjenige eintreten kann, was ein wirkliches, sachliches Interesse an allem wird und nicht ein bloßes kaufmännisches, nicht ein bloß äußeres Wirtschafts- und Vorteilsverhältnis begründet.

Allerdings muß einem solchen Geistesleben die Grundlage geschaffen werden. Diese Grundlage kann nur geschaffen werden, wenn alles Schulwesen in die Verwaltung des geistigen Lebens selbst gestellt wird, wenn der unterste Lehrer nicht mehr zu fragen hat: Was verlangt der politische Staat von mir? -, sondern wenn er hinaufzuschauen hat zu denjenigen, zu denen er Vertrauen hat, wenn er hinschaut zu dem das Geistesleben nach ihren eigenen Grundsätzen verwaltenden Gebiete des sozialen Organismus.

So wirkt in vieler Beziehung dasjenige, wovon ich glaube, daß es sich naturgemäß ergibt. Gerade aus einer wahren Fortsetzung der proletarischen Weltanschauung wirkt es den Denkgewohnheiten entgegen. Denn während man es als Erbgut übernommen hat gerade von der bürgerlichen Wissenschaft: Geistesleben, Staat, Wirtschaftsleben miteinander zu verschmelzen, handelt es sich darum, daß zur Gesundung des sozialen Organismus angestrebt werden muß die Verselbständigung der angeführten drei Gebiete. Nur dadurch, daß gewissermaßen jedes dieser Gebiete - wenn ich mich jetzt gangbarer Ausdrücke bedienen darf— sein eigenes Parlament und seine eigene Verwaltung hat, die zueinander stehen wie die Regierungen souveräner Staaten, nur durch Delegationen miteinander verhandeln, nur ihre gemeinsamen Bedürfnisse im Verkehre austauschen, dann allein kann der soziale Organismus gesunden. Und die Frage ist heute die Grundfrage, die aus allen Tatsachen hervorgeht: Wie kann der soziale Organismus gesunden? Das ist mit Händen zu greifen: er ist krank, dieser soziale Organismus!

Diejenigen, die aus ihrem Klassenbewußtsein heraus die berechtigte Forderung aufstellen müssen, daß dieser soziale Organismus gesunde, die haben gerade nötig, die proletarische Weltanschauung zu verfolgen auf ihre fruchtbaren Keime hin und sie in entsprechender Weise weiterzubilden.

Ich gebe zu, daß es zunächst manchem gegen dasjenige sprechen kann, was er als das Richtige heute anschaut, wenn gesagt wird: Es muß die Richtung genommen werden nach dieser sozialen Dreigliederung, dieser Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus. — Aber so sehr dies den Denkgewohnheiten von manchem in der Gegenwart widerspricht, die Wirklichkeit darf sich nicht nach unserer Bequemlichkeit richten, nicht nach dem, was die glauben, die sich bisher für Lebenspraktiker gehalten haben. Die Wirklichkeit muß sich nach dem richten, was man aus einem ehrlichen, gesunden Wahrheitssinn heraus für das Richtige erkennen kann.

Das, was ich auseinandergesetzt habe, bezieht sich nicht auf irgendein Wolkenkuckucksheim. Oh, die Zeiten sind da, wo mancher, der sich, weil er nur das Einfache überschauen konnte und danach sich seine Denkgewohnheiten bildete, der sich dadurch für einen Lebenspraktiker hielt, wird zugeben müssen, daß die verpönten, so sehr verpönten Idealisten, die aus Entwickelungsnotwendigkeiten der Menschheit heraus denken, die wahren Lebenspraktiker sind. Dasjenige, was ich Ihnen angegeben habe, ist nicht ein Wolkenkuckucksheim; es ist entnommen gerade aus dem, was die unmittelbarsten, alltäglichsten Lebensbedürfnisse der Menschheit sind.

Ich kann natürlich nicht auf alle einzelnen Gebiete mich einlassen; ich will zum Schlusse ein einziges Gebiet berühren, ein Gebiet, an dem sich, wenn ich es auch nur flüchtig berühren kann, zeigen wird, wie dasjenige, was ich scheinbar von dem Urgedanken des sozialen Lebens hergeleitet habe, in das Allerärgste eingreift. Was ist im Leben das Allerärgste? Das Allerallerärgste ist, daß wir etwas, was wir Geld nennen, in unserer Tasche haben müssen. Aber Sie wissen auch, was an diesem Gelde hängt. Sie wissen, wie dieses Geld eingreift in alles Leben. Wenn man die Entwickelung des gesunden sozialen Organismus ins Auge faßt: welchem Gliede kommt denn die Verwaltung des Geldes zu ? Diese Verwaltung des Geldes hat bisher aus gewissen Entwickelungskräften, die sehr alt sind, der Staat besorgt. Das Geld aber ist ebenso wahr in einem gesunden Organismus Ware, wie die Arbeitskraft nicht Ware ist. Und alles Ungesunde, das von der Seite des Geldes aus eingreift in den sozialen Organismus, besteht darinnen, daß das Geld des Warencharakters dadurch entkleidet wird, daß es heute mehr beruht auf der Abstempelung von irgendeiner Marke durch den politischen Staat, als auf dem, worauf es ja noch, weil es da nicht anders geht im internationalen Verkehr, beruhen muß: auf seinem Warenwert. Die Nationalökonomen haben heute einen komischen Streit, einen Streit, der auf den Einsichtigen wirklich komisch wirkt. Sie fragen, ob das Geld eine Ware ist, nur eine beliebte Ware, für die man immer andere Waren eintauschen kann, während man sonst, wenn man zum Beispiel gerade das Unglück hat, nur Tische und Stühle zu fabrizieren, umherziehen müßte mit Tischen und Stühlen und warten, ob einer einem dafür Gemüse gibt, kann man, indem man zuerst Tische und Stühle für Geld eintauscht, für die Ware Geld Dinge bekommen, die einem gerade recht sind, nach denen man gerade Bedarf hat. Während die einen sagen: Dieses Geld ist eine Ware oder wenigstens der Repräsentant der Ware, für das da sein muß, auch wenn es Papiergeld ist, der entsprechende Gegenwert in Waren, sagen die anderen: Das Geld ist überhaupt nur dasjenige, was entsteht, indem der Staat durch ein Gesetz eine gewisse Marke abstempelt. Und nun forschen sie nach, diese nationalökonomischen Gelehrten, sie forschen nach: Was ist das Richtige? Ist das Geld Ware, oder etwas, was durch eine bloße Abstempelung entsteht? Ist es eine bloße Anweisung auf die Ware?

Die Antwort auf diese Fragen ist einfach diese: daß das Geld weder das eine noch das andere ist, sondern heute beides ist. Das eine ist es dadurch, daß der Staat eben gewisse Marken abstempelt; das andere ist, daß im internationalen Verkehre oder in gewisser Beziehung auch im nationalen Verkehre das Geld nur als Ware in der Warenzirkulation mitzirkulieren kann.

Der gesunde soziale Organismus wird das Geld jedes Rechtscharakters entkleiden; er wird es derjenigen Verwaltung und Gesetzgebung zuweisen, durch seinen eigenen, natürlichen Prozeß, auch die Hineinstellung des Geldes, Prägung des Geldes, Wertbestimmung des Geldes innerhalb des Wirtschaftskreislaufes, diesem selben Parlament, dieser selben Verwaltung, die den übrigen Wirtschaftsorganismus verwaltet.

Erst dann kann, wenn so etwas eintritt, dasjenige, was vom modernen Proletariat erstrebt werden muß, auf eine gesunde Basis gestellt werden. Jenes merkwürdige Verhältnis, das da besteht zwischen dem Arbeitslohn und der Warennatur, dieses Verhältnis, es beruht ebenfalls eigentlich auf einer Lebenslüge. Während auf der einen Seite der Arbeiter glaubt, durch seine Forderung nach höherem Lohn, wenn er diese befriedigt erhält, dann gesündere Lebensverhältnisse zu erlangen, steigt immer auf der anderen Seite der Preis der Waren, solange nicht emanzipiert wird der Wirtschaftskreislauf von dem Rechtskreislauf des politischen Staates. Diese Dinge werden alle erst auf eine gesunde Basis gestellt werden können, wenn diese Dreigliederung eintreten wird.

Ebenso wird man, wenn man die notwendige Selbständigkeit des Geisteslebens einsehen wird, einsehen, daß keine Notwendigkeit besteht, die kapitalistischen Betriebe als solche hervorzurufen, sondern die Art und Weise, wie im Laufe der neueren Zeit das Kapital verwaltet worden ist, wie es verwendet worden ist dadurch, daß es allein im Wirtschaftsprozeß drinnensteht, das ist es, was das Kapital in seiner Wirksamkeit zu den Schäden gebracht hat, mit denen soviel Elend verknüpft ist.

Man wird einsehen müssen: Solange nicht der Arbeitsvertrag auf die Teilung desjenigen sich bezieht, was gemeinsam der Handarbeiter mit dem Geistesarbeiter hervorbringt, sondern solange sich der Arbeitsvertrag auf die Entlohnung der Arbeit bezieht, so lange ist es unmöglich, daß dies auf eine gesunde Basis gestellt wird.

Einzig und allein dadurch, daß dem Geistesleben seine gesunde Wirklichkeit gegeben wird, wird aufgedeckt werden in jedem Falle, in dem es notwendig ist in dem Verhältnis zwischen Arbeiter und geistigem Lenker, daß da, wo der Arbeiter übervorteilt ist, er nicht durch die Wirtschaft bloß übervorteilt ist, sondern dadurch übervorteilt ist, daß derjenige, der der Unternehmer ist, seine individuellen Eigenschaften, seine geistigen Eigenschaften in einer nicht richtigen Weise, in einer nicht rechtlichen, in einer nicht menschenwürdigen Weise verwertet. Der Arbeiter wird nicht durch das Wirtschaftsleben ausgebeutet, der Arbeiter wird durch jene Lebenslüge ausgebeutet, die dadurch entsteht, daß im heutigen gesellschaftlichen Organismus die individuellen Fähigkeiten gerade verwendet werden können zur Übervorteilung des Arbeiters, weil sie innerhalb des Wirtschaftsprozesses nicht gesehen werden können von beiden Seiten; innerhalb des gesunden Geisteslebens werden sie von beiden Seiten gesehen und kontrolliert werden.

Wie gesagt, ich kann es gut einsehen, daß dasjenige, was ich hier angeführt habe gerade zur Gesundung des sozialen Organismus, heute auch noch manchem Proletariergemüte widerstreben kann. Ich kann es einsehen. Ich habe seit Jahren unter Arbeitern, mit Arbeitern über diese Dinge gesprochen. Ich habe ja nicht nur einzelne Zweige des Unterrichts innerhalb der Arbeiterbildungsschule verwaltet, ich habe mit den Arbeitern auch Redeübungen getrieben. In den Übungen, die zur Redeübung getrieben wurden, wurde mancherlei auch von seiten der Arbeiter vorgebracht in dieser Gemeinschaft, was so recht zeigte, welche besondere Färbung, welche besondere Artung die Forderungen des modernen Proletariats haben. Da bekommt man schon die Fähigkeit, nicht nur so, wie die Angehörigen der heutigen leitenden Kreise oder der bisher leitenden Kreise es tun, nur über den Proletarier denken — nein, man erlangt die Fähigkeit, mit dem Proletarier zu denken. Das ist es, was ich Ihnen heute sagen wollte: mit dem Proletarier zu denken, nicht nur über ihn zu denken!

Meinem Wollen nach gedacht, ist es so — das möchte ich, daß Sie das verstanden haben -, daß man vielleicht mit Bezug auf den Inhalt der Meinungen da oder dort voneinander abweichen könne, daß es aber zunächst im heutigen weltgeschichtlichen Augenblicke nicht darauf ankommt, ob man in der einen oder in der anderen Meinung abweicht, sondern ob man zusammenstimmt in jener ehrlichen Forderung, die sein muß die Forderung des modernen Proletariats. Allein dadurch, daß man sich zu dieser Übereinstimmung bequemt, zu der Übereinstimmung in dem ehrlichen Wollen, einzig und allein dadurch können die Keime gefunden werden, die in der proletarischen Weltanschauung zur Weiterbildung liegen. Denn der Zeitpunkt ist vorüber, wo bloß diskutiert werden kann; der Zeitpunkt ist vorüber, wo Leute, die nur ihrem Interesse dienen wollen, von Verständigung sprechen durften. Der Zeitpunkt ist gekommen, wo die jahrzehntelangen, bloß aus den Unterströmungen hervorgehenden Forderungen des modernen Proletariers auf den weltgeschichtlichen Plan treten, wo sie wirklich zu dem allerwichtigsten, allerbedeutungsvollsten Ereignis der neueren Zeit werden.

Was aus dem Chaos des modernen Wirtschaftskrieges, des modernen Weltkrieges sich herausgebildet hat, was lange Zeit, ja was vielleicht für die Zukunft immer mehr die Zukunft erfüllen wird, das wird die soziale Frage sein. Nicht eine unwirkliche, nicht eine theoretische Lösung oder den Versuch einer solchen wollte ich Ihnen heute vorführen; auf das wollte ich aufmerksam machen, daß nun einmal die Zeit angebrochen ist, wo die soziale Frage da ist, wo die Menschen in ihrem sozialen Zusammenwirken so gegliedert werden müssen in Staats-, Wirtschafts- und geistige Organe, daß aus dieser gesunden Gliederung eine fortdauernde Lösung der sozialen Frage hervorgehen kann.

Diese soziale Frage wird nicht von heute auf morgen gelöst werden, nachdem sie einmal da ist; sondern weil sie immer da sein wird, wie das Leben seine Konflikte immer neu erzeugt, so wird immerzu auch jene Gliederung der Menschheit da sein müssen, welche nach der Lösung der im sozialen Leben aufgehenden Konflikte in ehrlicher Weise strebt. Ob man versuchen wird, in weitesten Kreisen darauf aufmerksam zu werden, daß in einer solchen Fortentwickelung der proletarischen Weltanschauung die Gesundung in die Zukunft hinein liegen wird, davon wird es abhängen, wohin der Ausgangspunkt der modernen proletarischen Bewegung führen wird. Under muß eigentlich dahin führen, aus all den berechtigten Forderungen der Lohnfrage, der Brotfrage heraus sich zu erheben zu jener mächtigen, weltgeschichtlichen Umwälzung, die aus dem Bewußtsein des modernen Arbeiters heraus übergehen wird in das allgemeine Menschheitsbewußtsein, die aus der Würde, aus der empfindungsgemäßen Würde des modernen Proletariers heraus begründen wird die wahre Menschenwürde für alle Menschen, die die anderen bisher nicht begründen konnten.

In der sich anschließenden Diskussion äußerten sich mehrere Redner. Den Abschluß bildete das folgende Schlußwort Rudolf Steiners:

Rudolf Steiner: Ja, ich muß zunächst einmal mit Bezug auf den verehrten ersten Einredner etwas wie eine prinzipielle Bemerkung machen. Man ist sehr häufig, wenn man redet, in der Lage, sagen zu müssen, daß man eigentlich nicht recht versteht, warum Dinge, wie sie von dem ersten Redner gesagt worden sind, just in der Form gesagt werden müssen, als wenn es eine Widerlegung dessen wäre, was man selbst gesagt hat. Der erste Redner hat so gesprochen, als wenn er in die Notwendigkeit versetzt wäre, mich gewissermaßen in allen Stücken - wenn er auch manches anerkannt hat, so wenigstens in bezug auf die ganze Haltung — eigentlich bekämpfen zu müssen. Ich bin nicht in der Lage, ihn bekämpfen zu müssen, sondern ich muß sagen, daß ich eigentlich meine, daß derjenige, der mir recht zugehört hat, gar nicht soviel haben wird gegen dasjenige, was der erste Redner gesagt hat. Ich bin in der Lage, in vielem mehr anerkennen zu können, auch in bezug auf das Inhaltliche, das, was er ausgesprochen hat, als er dasjenige irgendwie ins Auge zu fassen scheint, was ich eigentlich gewollt habe.

Nun, eines scheint mir wichtig zu sein in den Einzelheiten. Es ist merkwürdig, daß der erste Herr Redner glaubte, hervorheben zu müssen, daß dasjenige, was ich gesagt habe, entstanden sei dadurch, daß ich nur mit Arbeitern gesprochen habe, nicht mit Arbeitern mitgewirkt habe. Ja, nun, natürlich kann jeder nur auf seinem Gebiet wirken; aber die Art und Weise, wie ich mit Arbeitern zusammengewirkt habe, war schon so, daß man nicht sagen kann, daß es bloß mit Arbeitern gesprochen war. Ich glaube auch, daß derjenige, der vielleicht mehr eingeht auf das, was auch den heutigen Vortrag durchsetzte, auf das ganze Wollen es begreiflich finden wird, daß ich jahrelang nicht so angesprochen worden bin, obwohl ich es begreife, daß ich heute so angesprochen werde. Ich bin nicht immer so angesprochen worden, allein das glaube ich, aus dem einfachen Grunde, weil dazumal die Arbeiter schon gefühlt haben, daß dasjenige, was ich zu sagen habe, nicht heraus gesprochen ist aus dem bloßen Reden mit den Arbeitern.

Wenn es mir möglich geworden ist, in einer solchen Weise zu reden, wie ich auch heute wieder reden mußte, so ist das wahrhaftig nichts Angelerntes. Denn, werfen wir einmal die Frage auf: Wer darf sich denn eigentlich zu den Proletariern rechnen? Derjenige der mit den Proletariern, zu den Proletariern reden darf dadurch, daß er durch sein Schicksal und durch eigene Kraft sich dazu durchgerungen hat, so zu reden, wie ich es heute aber auch nur als freier Redner kann. Denn in den Kreisen, mit denen mir vorgeworfen worden ist, Gemeinschaft zu haben, ja, da bin ich vielleicht schon genau ebenso, vielleicht noch viel übler behandelt worden, als ich heute abend hier behandelt worden bin. Es ist doch etwas anderes, wenn man sich, wie ich, ja auch entsprechend durchgerungen hat; ich werde es auch weiter in dem kurzen Leben, das mir noch zur Verfügung steht. Ich habe mich aber jahrelang durchgerungen dadurch, daß ich mit den Proletariern gesprochen, mit den Proletariern gearbeitet, mit dem Proletariat mitgehungert habe. Ich habe nicht «Postbeamte gefragt, wieviel sie haben, um dabei verhungern zu können», sondern ich habe selbst mithungern müssen. Denn diejenige Familie, aus der ich herausgewachsen bin, war in einer viel übleren Lage, als vielleicht jene «Postbeamten» alle, die man heute fragen kann. Ich habe nicht allein gelernt, den Proletarier zu verstehen dadurch, daß ich über ihn denken lernte, sondern ich habe gelernt, den Proletarier dadurch zu verstehen, daß ich selber mit ihnen, mit den Proletariern gelebt habe, daß ich herausgewachsen bin aus dem Proletariat, mit dem Proletariat auch hungern lernte und mußte. Aus diesen Untergründen heraus spürte man schon dazumal, als ich jahrelang mit Arbeitern zusammenarbeiten konnte, daß ich nicht aus der Theorie, sondern aus einer ganz gehörigen Praxis heraus zu sprechen in der Lage bin. Ich glaube, das kann auch eine Grundlage dazu abgeben, ob man ein gewisses Recht hat, zu Proletariern zu sprechen oder nicht.

Das ist es, was ich zu der einen Sache sagen möchte.

Dann bezog sich ein großer Teil dessen, was der erste Redner vorgebracht hat, ja eigentlich gar nicht auf mich, es bezog sich auf die Intellektuellen. Ja, da hat bereits der Vorsitzende gesagt: Wenn irgendeiner davon reden kann, daß er mit Schmutz beworfen worden ist, von den Intellektuellen mit Schmutz beworfen worden ist, dann darf ich es. Denn wahrhaft, wenn Sie nachgehen würden der Art- und Weise, wie ich mit Schmutz beworfen worden bin, und namentlich der Art und Weise, wie dieser Schmutz ausschaut, dann würden Sie mich wahrscheinlich um den Umgang, wie ich ihn genossen habe mit den Intellektuellen, nicht beneiden.

Das ist eine persönliche Bemerkung; es sind überhaupt dies persönliche Bemerkungen. Aber dasjenige, was mir erwidert worden ist, geht ja auch im Grunde auf das Persönliche, und deshalb mußte schon diese Bemerkung gemacht werden.

Nun, ein großer Teil bezog sich selbstverständlich überhaupt nicht auf mich, bezog sich auf die Studentenschaft. In bezug auf das letztere: Glauben Sie, daß ich es durchaus nicht verkenne, daß ein großer Teil der heutigen Studentenschaft von dem Vorwurf mit Recht getroffen wird, daß nun sein Ideal das des untersten Lohnarbeiters nicht erreicht! Da könnte man selbstverständlich über dieses Kapitel sehr viel reden. Aber gerade der moderne Arbeiter sollte auf der anderen Seite verstehen, daß schließlich so, wie aus den Verhältnissen heraus die anderen Menschenklassen sich gebildet haben, so schließlich auch der moderne Student sich aus den Verhältnissen heraus gebildet hat. Wer unbefangen vergleichen kann das Streben innerhalb der modernen Studentenschaft, als Streben, mit demjenigen, was zum Beispiel innerhalb der Studentenschaft angetroffen worden ist, als ich selbst - es ist lange her - unter dieser Studentenschaft noch war, der wird sagen, daß allerdings mit Bezug auf die Gründlichkeit, in der gerade in den Niedergangserscheinungen des Bürgertums die moderne Professorenschaft drinnensteckte, von der die Studentenschaft selbstverständlich abhängig sein muß — mit Bezug auf dasjenige, was da als Beispiel voranleuchtete der modernen Studentenschaft, kann man doch für alle die Blüten, die immerhin gerade in der modernen Studentenschaft aufgehen nach dem Besseren hin, auch eine gewisse Befriedigung haben. Es werden ganz gewiß — wenn auch die Sache heute so ausschaut, als ob die Studentenschaft den Arbeitern in den Rücken fällt — gerade aus der Studentenschaft Mitarbeiter für die sozialen Ideale, ich glaube sogar in sehr reicher Zahl, hervorgehen. Der Student hat heute mancherlei zu überwinden. Man muß nicht vergessen, wie eisern die Klammern sind, mit denen man festgehalten ist. Ich habe gerade in letzter Zeit mannigfaltige Gelegenheit gehabt, auch mit jungen Studenten über Dinge zu sprechen, die vielleicht deren unmittelbaren Ideal ferner liegen, aber die naheliegen demjenigen, was sich als ein gesundes Geistesleben im allgemeinen aus dem kranken Geistesleben heute herausentwickeln muß. Ich weiß, welche Empfänglichkeit in der Jugend für eine Erneuerung des Geisteslebens ist. Ich weiß aber auch, wie groß die Versuchung ist, wenn man die Begeisterung der Jugend hinter sich hat, die das Diplom erreicht hat und notwendig hat, innerhalb der modernen bürgerlichen Gesellschaft eine Stelle zu suchen, wie nahe da die Versuchung liegt, dann wiederum hinein zu versumpfen in das Philistertum, in das Spießertum.

Wir kommen natürlich nicht von heute auf morgen zu einer endgültigen Lösung desjenigen, was wir erhoffen und ersehnen. Aber das müßte doch erkannt werden, daß überall dort, wo eine solche Sehnsucht, ein solches verständiges Ersehnen desjenigen, was mit Recht der moderne Proletarier fordert, Platz greift, man es nicht niederdrücken sollte dadurch, daß man in einer gewissen fanatischen, dogmatischen Weise das eine mit dem anderen zusammenwirft. Ich glaube doch, daß dieses Dogmatische wenigstens bis zu einem gewissen Grade — wenn auch im modernen Kampfe die Mittel nicht allzu glimpflich gewählt werden können — weichen müßte der Gesinnung, von der ich in meinem Vortrage gesprochen habe: daß es weniger ankommen sollte auf die Verschiedenheit der Gedanken, sondern auf die Gleichheit des ehrlichen Wollens.

Nun, fragen Sie einmal, wie viele von denjenigen, von denen Sie sagen, daß sie einem in den Rücken fallen, abhängig von den Verhältnissen sind, in die der moderne Student hineingestellt ist, und fragen Sie auf der anderen Seite aber auch, wieviel ehrliches Wollen gerade in der heutigen Jugend sich geltend macht. Pflegen Sie es lieber, statt daß Sie es dadurch, daß Sie ins Dogmatische fallen, geradezu lähmen.

Nun, was dann der zweite Redner zunächst vorgebracht hat, da kann ich ja sagen: Ich bin einverstanden mit dem Rufe, der da links gefallen ist, daß ja im Grunde genommen das nicht so sehr verschieden ist von demjenigen, was ich selber gesagt habe; und ich versteife mich nicht so sehr darauf, daß die Dinge gerade so gesagt werden, wie ich sie gesagt habe. Wenn irgend etwas, sagen wir, heute zur Besserung helfen kann, so bin ich erfreut darüber. Und ich will deshalb auch nicht mit etwas anderem so scharf ins Gericht gehen, was vom zweiten Redner gesagt worden ist; ich möchte nur aber etwas richtigstellen, was immerhin darauf hinweisen kann, daß dieser Redner doch die Sache nicht so ganz genau genommen hat. Er hat zum Beispiel meinen Hinweis darauf, daß ich jahrelang in der Arbeiterbildungsschule gelehrt habe in Berlin, dahin verdächtigt, daß er sagte: Das wird wohl nur ein liberaler Bildungsverein gewesen sein. - Ich habe ausdrücklich gesagt, es war die von dem alten Liebknecht, von Wilhelm Liebknecht begründete Arbeiterbildungsschule! Nun glaube ich nicht, daß Sie zuschieben dem alten Liebknecht, daß er einen x-beliebigen Bildungsverein für die Arbeiterschaft begründete, wie ihn die Arbeiterschaft in der damaligen Zeit auch gar nicht entgegengenommen hätte. Die Zuhörer waren nicht Menschen aus den «gewöhnlichen bürgerlichen Liberalen», sondern lediglich Arbeiter, lediglich aus den Kreisen der Proletarier und durch die Bank organisierte Sozialdemokraten!

So glaube ich, daß auch manche andere von mir gesprochenen Worte gerade von diesem Herrn Redner nicht in der richtigen Weise aufgefaßt worden sind, wie ich es eigentlich gewollt habe, und wie man es doch auch auffassen kann, wenn man nicht von vornherein mit einem Vorurteil nicht nur dann kommt, wenn der andere eine andere Meinung hat, sondern sogar, wenn er das, was man selber meint, nur in einer etwas anderen Form ausspricht, weil er glaubt, daß es eben notwendig ist, daß heute in diesem weltgeschichtlichen Augenblick die Dinge umfassender genommen werden müssen, und weiler glaubt, daß nicht jeder heute ein Praktiker genannt werden könnte, der nur nach dem Allernächsten urteilt, sondern derjenige der wahre Praktiker ist, der größere Verhältnisse überschaut.

Was die Auffassung der Frage des «Aufrufes» betrifft, wo darauf hingewiesen worden ist, daß das fast wörtlich übereinstimme mit dem, was ich Ihnen heute Abend gesagt habe - Sie werden sich nicht wundern darüber, da Sie ja gehört haben, daß der «Aufruf» von mir selber verfaßt worden ist, und Sie werden nicht von mir verlangen, daß ich, wenn ich da oder dort etwas spreche, wenn ich also etwa spreche zu Bürgerlichen, daß das anders lauten soll als das, was ich hier sage vom Podium aus.

Einwurf: Entweder überall gleich, oder...

Das sage ich ja gerade: Ich sage: in dem « Aufruf» steht dasselbe, was ich hier gesagt habe. In jenem « Aufruf» steht nirgendwo etwas anderes, als was ich hier gesagt habe.

Mir kommt es darauf an, daß dasjenige, was ich sage, in meinem Sinne die Wahrheit ist, und ich werde die Wahrheit an jedem Orte sagen, wo es mir gestattet ist, die Wahrheit zu sagen. Ich spreche nur die Wahrheit aus, darauf kommt es mir an. Das ist es, was ich in dieser Beziehung zu sagen habe. Ich werde niemanden ausschließen von irgend etwas, wenn er es mit seiner Überzeugung vereinen kann und zu dem Ja sagt, was ich selber sage. Denn ich glaube, dadurch kommen wir allein auf einen grünen Zweig, daß wir die Wahrheit aussprechen, unbekümmert darüber, welchen Eindruck sie auf die Menschen macht, ob sie unterschreiben oder nicht. Das ist es, was ich dazu sagen wollte.

Und dann möchte ich nur noch zum Schlusse das eine bemerken, das sich bezieht auf das, was der nächste Redner gesagt hat: Ich hätte nichts über die Kampfesweise gesagt. - Aber aus meinen Worten konnten Sie überall entnehmen, wie ich über diese Kampfesweise eigentlich denke. Ich glaube es genugsam angedeutet zu haben, daß es nicht meine Meinung ist, daß es heute auf eine oberflächliche Verständigung, oder wie die schönen Dinge alle heißen, ankommen kann. Heute sind wir eingerückt in ein Tatsachenstadium, wo in der Tat nichts anderes möglich ist, als daß wir nicht bloß zu leeren Anschauungen kommen, wie die Dinge gewandelt werden müssen, sondern dadurch, daß wir zur Anschauung kommen, welche neuen Gedanken wirklich möglich sind, in die Seelen der Menschen hineinzubringen. Denn die alten Gedanken haben eben gezeigt, was für eine soziale Ordnung sie zustande bringen können, und diesen alten Gedanken ist damit der Beweis geliefert, daß sie unbrauchbar sind. Deshalb glaube ich, daß es sich zunächst, zu allernächst, für das allernächst Praktische darauf ankommt, daß diejenigen, die ehrliches soziales Wollen haben, sich vor allen Dingen einmal verständigen über dasjenige, was geschehen kann.

Wir stehen heute in der Schweiz - ich weiß nicht, ob man da sagen soll «Gott sei Dank» oder «leider» - noch in Verhältnissen drinnen, die nicht so sind, wie in mittel- und osteuropäischen Verhältnissen es ist. Mittel- und Osteuropa steht ja in Verhältnissen drinnen, die wirklich nur bewältigt werden können durch Anknüpfen an die Urgedanken des sozialen Organismus. Und wenn da nicht der Versuch gemacht wird, daß zunächst unter dem Proletariat selber die fundamentalen Fragen besprochen werden, wie nun aus diesem Chaos heraus durch die einfachsten Organisationen, die aber alle den Charakter tragen müssen, meiner Ansicht nach, jener Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus — wenn nicht unter dem Proletariate selbst die Gesundung dadurch herbeigeführt wird, daß Organisationen neu geschaffen werden, nach neuen Gedanken, so sehe ich überhaupt zunächst für Jahrzehnte hinaus kein Heil.

Beginnen wird man müssen zunächst vor allen Dingen mit dem, was Ihnen vielleicht als unwesentlicher Punkt erscheint: Zuerst müssen wir einsehen, daß wir nicht nur gegenüberstehen bürgerlichen Einrichtungen, bürgerlichen Zuständen, sondern daß wir gegenüberstehen einer bürgerlichen Wissenschaft.

Das habe ich im Berliner Gewerkschaftshaus vor sechzehn Jahren gesagt, und das wurde selbst innerhalb des Proletariats richtig verstanden. Das Proletariat hat noch die Aufgabe, dasjenige, was in seinem Denken von bürgerlicher Wissenschaft ist, zunächst auszutreiben, und nicht im Sinne der bürgerlichen Wissenschaft irgendwelche Einrichtungen zu treffen, sondern im Sinne gerade jener Art neuer Gedanken, die vielleicht nur von dem Proletariat eben gefunden werden können, weil das Proletariat emanzipiert ist von allen übrigen menschlichen Zusammenhängen, in denen leider die bürgerlichen Menschen drinnenstehen.

Daher handelt es sich heute vor allen Dingen darum, daß das, was Ihnen vielleicht als das Unwesentlichste erscheint, die Emanzipation des geistigen Lebens, die Freiheitsentwickelung des geistigen Lebens, durchgeführt werde. Kommen wir dazu, ein wirklich freies Geistesleben zu haben, kommen wir dazu, daß nicht mehr eine Wissenschaft, die dem Kapitalismus tributpflichtig ist, den Ton angeben kann, bis in die Kreise des Proletariats hinein den Ton angeben kann, dann erst gehen wir einer Gesundung entgegen. Nicht eine Verengerung im bürgerlichen Sinne, nicht eine Verengerung will ich, sondern gerade eine Erweiterung der proletarischen Aufgaben.

Und ich habe den festen Glauben — mögen Menschen, die von dem Gesichtspunkte aus, den ich ganz gut verstehen kann, reden, wie der zweite Redner, noch soviel dagegen einwenden, daß man nicht versteht Satz für Satz, was ich gesagt habe -, ich habe den festen Glauben, den ich mir durch ein langes Leben unter dem Proletariat erworben habe, daß dasjenige, was ich gesagt habe, zunächst nicht von den anderen Klassen, sondern gerade vom Proletariat verstanden werden wird. Und es muß leider gewartet werden, bis es vom Proletariat verstanden werden wird. Ich glaube aber, da wird es verstanden werden können.

Und in diesem Gedanken, möchte ich sagen, kann ich auch mit einer gewissen Zufriedenheit zurückblicken auf dasjenige, was heute abend von mir erreicht werden wollte. Ich habe Sie wahrhaftig nicht bis ins Wort hinein in allen Einzelheiten überzeugen wollen. Dazu achte ich zu sehr Ihre freie Persönlichkeit; dazu achte ich zu sehr eines jeden freies Einverständnis. Aber ich habe den Glauben, daß unter Ihnen viele sind, die noch anders denken werden über dasjenige, was ich gesagt habe, als Sie schon heute gedacht haben. Und dieser Glaube ist es eben, wovon ich annehme, daß er dazugehört zur Gesundung des sozialen Organismus.

What is the meaning of the work of the modern proletarian?

When today's lecture was announced, some people may have asked themselves: Where does the topic to be discussed come from? And after some investigation, they may have come to the conclusion that we are once again going to talk about the kind of understanding that is so strongly desired today by those who, over a long period of time, have brought about the current capitalist sea of social confusion, only to find that the water is now up to their mouths and they are no longer able to swim in this sea. They are looking for one rescue boat or another; but they will not find such rescue boats from the assumptions they usually make. For I do not want to talk to you about such understanding this evening. It seems to me that in the times we live in, completely different things are necessary. For let us look at what has actually become and what is playing itself out in the current circumstances, which are so frightening for some who are seeking just such an understanding.

What is now called “the social question” did not arise yesterday. In the way it is discussed today, it is more than half a century old. But what actually led to this social question is much, much older; it is what has brought about the entire development of modern times, of the last centuries. And if we look at what the developments of the last centuries have brought about, we can summarize it briefly in the following words.

There was a number of people, those people who are perhaps best described as those who lived from the capitalist economic order and who felt comfortable in the capitalist economic order. One could truly hear these people talk often enough about how far we had come in civilization. One could hear what had been achieved by humanity's ability to communicate quickly not only across the vast distances of individual countries and continents, but also across the oceans; how far we had come by spreading a certain level of education, enabling people to participate in what was called intellectual life, which was thought to have reached a very special height in our time.

Now, I don't need to describe to you all the praise that has been heaped upon our modern civilization in this regard. But this modern civilization spread over a foundation. It would have been inconceivable without this foundation; it lived off this foundation. And what was in this foundation? In this foundation there were more and more people of the kind who, from their deepest soul feelings, had to cry out: Does what this modern life has brought us give us a dignified existence? What has this modern civilization condemned us to? — And so this modern humanity split more and more into two groups: those who felt comfortable or at least satisfied in this modern civilization, but who could only feel satisfied because the others in the underground had to devote their labor to a social order in which they could not really participate.

However, this whole course of events led to something else developing. It led to the bearers of so-called civilization no longer being able to continue the old patriarchal conditions with their numerous illiterates. It developed that the people supported by capitalism had to educate at least part of the proletariat that served them. And from the education of the proletariat, something developed that is now expressed in facts that are so frightening, but for those who understand history, all too necessary: What developed was that, above all, a very large number of people, who had to form the foundation for this modern civilization, were now able to reflect on their situation, that they no longer had to surrender themselves instinctively, that they could ask the question in the most intense way: Do we have a dignified existence? How can we achieve a dignified existence?

Those who had previously been the leading class of people had, in the course of modern economic life, linked this economic life, insofar as it suited them, with the modern state. Under the influence of modern times, the modern proletariat could not be excluded from this modern state, at least to a certain extent. And so it came about that, on the one hand, the proletariat strove to improve its situation within economic life and achieve a dignified existence, while on the other hand it attempted to fight for its rights with the help of the modern state.

It cannot be said—as the facts of the present teach us—that little has been achieved in either direction. Through trade union activity, modern working-class society has attempted to achieve a great deal within the economic cycle: these were fragments of what must actually constitute a dignified existence within a healthy economic order. This has been achieved through state activity. However, further progress was hindered by the economic and political power of the class that had hitherto led humanity. And so, despite the fact that much has been achieved in both areas, the modern proletariat is still faced with the question: what is the meaning of my work in relation to what every human being in the world must claim as their human dignity?

In response to what the proletariat has been calling out to this leading, ruling circle in various forms for many decades: “Things cannot go on like this!” – hardly a word of understanding has been heard. And those words that have been heard were actually at odds with what should have been striven for in the spirit of the times. Did we not hear, from all possible sides—from Christian socialists, from bourgeois socialists—this or that being said that could remedy the dangers that people believed they saw looming? Was it, in essence, more than just unctuous phrases that arose from the various religious, moral, and other prejudices handed down by this ruling class, which had been in power until then?

These leading circles did not feel it, but another side of humanity did. Those who felt their direction from something quite different from empty rhetoric, those who felt their direction from the consciousness of the class that had been placed in the particular social position of being the foundation for this modern civilization. And so, despite the fact that much had been achieved on the other side through trade union, cooperative, and political life, something else emerged, something even more important, something that is the work of the modern proletariat, something that is full of seeds for the future, and something that is also richly supported by the facts of the present: It emerged that while the hitherto ruling class pursued its luxurious education, which could only be nourished and strengthened by capitalism, the proletariat, in the time it had left, sought a truly modern education in its assemblies, sought a spiritual life. This was what the hitherto ruling class of humanity did not want to see, that through thousands and thousands of proletarian souls a whole new education, a whole new view of humanity, was developing.

It was in the nature of things that this proletarian education initially arose from the observation of economic life. For modern life had forged the proletarian to the machine. It had pushed him into the factory, harnessed him to capitalism. That is where he got his ideas. But these ideas—I just want to point out how intensely everything connected with Marxism struck a chord of understanding in the souls of the proletariat—this education was one that found little, truly very little, resonance among the ruling class, the class that had hitherto led humanity.

Is it not characteristic that those who know the facts must say today: among the leading proletarian personalities, among those who really understand the proletariat, not just think about the proletariat, among those personalities who have absorbed what could be absorbed of truly fruitful education about economic life today, among them there truly lives today a 'more thorough, at least more fundamental knowledge of what is going on in the social organism than even among the most educated of the educated, even among professors who think about sociology, university professors. For it is characteristic that these circles, whose profession it is, so to speak, to deal with sociology and national economy, have resisted as long as possible everything that has emerged from an understanding of the modern proletariat. And only when the facts became urgent, when the facts allowed for nothing else, did some of these bourgeois leaders deign to incorporate various Marxist or similar concepts into their economic system.

I am not claiming here, on the basis of some vague theory, that this work was done by the modern proletariat, I would say, completely unbeknownst to the leading, ruling circles; I am claiming this because I was able to witness how this work was done. For years, I was able to be a lecturer in Berlin at the workers' educational school that Wilhelm Liebknecht, the old Liebknecht, had founded. And partly in this school, partly in what followed, one had a good cross-section of everything that had been worked on to bring about a new era based on a developed proletarian consciousness of humanity. All those who superficially treat this modern proletarian movement as a mere question of wages and bread, who do not understand how to treat it as a question of a dignified existence for all people, should have considered this long ago.

In contrast, it is truly not very significant when people point out today how, within the world of facts that has emerged from social chaos, terrible and sometimes cruel things are happening. Those who understand how things have developed do not ask about the connection between these cruel or terrifying events and the modern proletarian movement, but are clear that it is the classes that have been in power until now that have brought about what is happening today.

The moment in world history has only just arrived when the proletariat is beginning to bear responsibility for world historical events. What has resulted from capitalism, from the capitalist economic order in recent times and especially in the most recent times, is responsible for the terrible and in many respects insane catastrophe of the so-called world war.

But what do we now see at the center of all that is the proletarian movement, the proletarian aspiration, indeed, the proletarian demand? At the center of it all, we see what the proletarian must feel about what he basically brings about and what the modern economic system alone can give to the social organism; for the leading cultural circles to date have basically been interested in only one thing about the proletarian, and that one thing is the proletarian's labor power. It is important to understand how profoundly the ideas of Karl Marx and those who followed in his footsteps affected the modern proletariat, because this modern proletariat felt that, above all else, clarity was needed regarding the way in which human labor power could be incorporated into the social organism.

Well, it has often been said and has become clear in the widest circles: through the modern economic order, labor power has become a commodity among other commodities. That is the peculiarity of economic life, that it consists of commodity production, commodity circulation, and commodity consumption. But what has happened is that the labor power of the modern proletarian has been turned into a commodity.

From this point of view, everything has basically been said within the proletariat. However, the question is usually only addressed from one side, so that it does not appear completely in the light that actually provides insight into the position of human labor in a healthy social organism. A question must be raised which, admittedly, arises from the Marxist question, but which must be raised in an even more precise and intense manner. The question must be asked: Can human labor power ever be a real commodity?

This leads the question onto a completely different track. One will indeed ask: How can human labor be justifiably remunerated? How can human labor ever obtain its rights? And one can still assume that human labor must receive wages.

In certain contexts, however, wages are nothing more than the purchase price for the commodity “labor.” But labor can never be a commodity! And where labor is turned into a commodity in the economic process, that economic process is a lie. For something is being thrown into reality that can never be a true part of that reality. Human labor cannot be a commodity because it cannot have the character that every commodity must necessarily have. In the economic process, every commodity must be able to be compared in value with another commodity. Comparability is the basic condition for something to be a commodity. But human labor can never be compared in value with any commodity product.

It would actually be terribly simple, if only we had not forgotten how to think simply today. Just think, if, for my sake, ten people work together in a family, each doing their part, how can the work of one individual out of these ten be compared with the output produced by these ten? It is not possible to compare labor with the output of goods. Labor stands on a completely different basis of social evaluation than goods. This is something that has perhaps not been clearly articulated in recent times, but which lives on in the feelings of the modern proletariat.

What lives in the demands of the modern proletariat? What lives in the feelings of the modern proletariat is actual criticism, world-historical criticism, which simply lies in the life of the modern proletarian and is hurled against everything that has been promoted as social order by the ruling circles up to now. This modern proletariat is nothing other than a world-historical critique itself. It is precisely the realization that labor power can never be a commodity that gives rise to the feeling, the fundamental feeling, that in modern times we are living in a tremendous, comprehensive lie; for labor power is being bought that, by its very nature, can never be bought.

The modern proletarian is convinced that this situation must be remedied, as must be obvious to anyone with insight today. But he has been driven into what not he, but the hitherto ruling classes have made of the social organism. He has been excluded from everything else and has been forced into the economic process. Is it not understandable that he now wants to bring about the recovery of the entire social organism through a mere recovery of this economic process, the cycle of economic life itself? This has given rise to the ideals that have existed as the ideals of the modern proletariat up to now.

It has been said that because capitalism, as private capitalism, has turned modern production into commodity production through the private use of the means of production, the modern proletariat has found itself in a position that only it can fully appreciate. This can only be remedied by returning to the ancient idea of cooperation, to that cooperation which, in a sense, proceeds from the production of one for the other and works toward self-production, in which one can no longer take advantage of the other, because then he himself would be taken advantage of. And further it has been said: How is this cooperative, this great cooperative, to be established? Here one must resort to the framework that has developed in recent times: the modern state. The modern state itself must be turned into a large cooperative, through which, in a sense, the production of goods is transformed into production for self-sufficiency.

This is precisely where one must grasp the point at which one can say: on the one hand, one finds what is healthy in the intellectual life of the modern proletariat, and at the same time one finds where this intellectual life of the modern proletariat is capable of development, where it can progress from the stage it has reached so far to another stage.

Those who disagree in this area should truly not take offense if, based on feelings that are just as sincere and honest as their own, one does not yet see perfection in the current proletarian worldview, but is compelled to point out that this proletarian worldview carries within it the seeds of progress, but that this progress must also be actively pursued. And it can be pursued.

This will be admitted by anyone who understands what I already—about eighteen years ago—had to emphasize in the Berlin Trade Union House as a peculiarity, and then often again as a peculiarity of the modern labor movement in particular, and what I still consider to be absolutely correct today. I said at the time: For those who have an overview of the historical life of humanity and who have seen the modern proletarian movement emerge from this historical life of humanity with understanding, with inner understanding, it is striking that this modern proletarian movement, unlike any other human movement that has ever existed, is based on what may seem grotesque, one may find it paradoxical — on a downright scientific basis.“

It is deeply, deeply true what the almost forgotten Lassalle struck up in this direction as a basic tone, as a basic demand of the modern labor movement in his famous speech on ”Science and the Workers." But one must look at the matter from a different perspective than is usually done today: one must look at it from the perspective of life. One can say that with regard to what has become accessible to the modern proletariat through what the leading classes had to give it if they did not want to leave it in illiteracy, the modern proletarian has gained the opportunity to take over, as if it were a legacy, what has developed in recent times, to take over from the efforts of the leading circles what has developed as a scientific worldview.

What matters is that the modern proletarian had to react to this scientific worldview in a completely different way than all other circles, even those who had directly developed this worldview. One can be a very enlightened person within the leading and hitherto dominant circles, a person whose innermost convictions spring from the results of modern science; one can, for all I care, be a natural scientist like Vogt or a popular scientific researcher like Büchner, and yet one's attitude toward the scientifically oriented worldview is different from that of the modern proletarian.

Those who, out of the leading circles and their prejudices, namely their preconceptions and pre-sensations, theoretically profess modern education about man and nature, nevertheless remain stuck within a social order that is strictly closed off from the modern proletariat, whose structure and entire organization do not derive from what modern science tells us, but from what, before modern science, filled people's minds with religious, legal, and other ideas about human dignity. I was able to experience this once, I would say, in my own personal experience.

It was at a time when I stood together with Rosa Luxemburg, who recently died tragically, in Spandau before a workers' assembly, where we both spoke about the modern worker and modern science. One had to see how what this modern science can instill in the modern proletarian soul has a completely different effect on the proletarian than even on the most convinced members of the previously ruling class, as Rosa Luxemburg made clear to the people: There is nothing that points to an angelic origin of humankind, nothing that points to the lofty starting points that the bourgeois worldview still likes to talk about; this modern bourgeois worldview itself asserts how humans began as climbing animals and how they developed from these conditions. Anyone who thinks about this – as the enthusiastic labour leader said at the time – anyone who thinks this through cannot remain stuck in the prejudices held by today's leading circles, in the prejudices of class distinctions, of the possibility of ranking people who all have the same origins, as is done within the leading circles today. This had a different impact than it did on the people in the leading circles. And it complemented what the modern proletarian understood as economics.

What has been absorbed into people's souls is capable of further development, and I would like to tell you a little about this further development today.

Anyone who surveys everything that comes into consideration for the question: How did the labor power of the modern proletarian come to be regarded as a commodity? — will gradually find themselves compelled to take their observations of economic life to the point where they must say: It is precisely because the modern worker has been drawn into this purely economic life that the labor power of the modern proletarian has also become a commodity within economic life. In this respect, we are merely seeing a continuation of what was the slave question in ancient times. Back then, the whole person was a commodity. Today, all that remains of the whole person is their labor power. But the whole person must follow this labor power.

It is in the feelings of the modern proletarian soul that this should not be so in the future, that this is the last remnant of the old barbaric age that must be overcome. But this can only be overcome if the same clear intellectual power with which the modern proletariat has grasped economic and human nature is now used to grasp the science of a healthy social organism. And let me say a few words about this science.

First and foremost, it is clear that we must ask ourselves: what is it that makes the labor power of the modern proletarian a commodity within the cycle of modern economic life? It is the economic power of the capitalist.

These words about the power of the capitalist already point to the healthy answer. For who is diametrically opposed to power? Power is diametrically opposed to rights. This indicates that a recovery with regard to the utilization of human labor in the social organism can only occur if labor is removed, if the question of labor is removed from the economic process altogether and if it becomes a pure and fair question of rights.

This brings us to consider more broadly whether there is a deeper difference between economic issues and legal issues. This difference does exist; it is just that today we are not yet inclined to take this difference seriously enough. People are not inclined to take seriously enough what, on the one hand, must be the effective forces in all economic life and, on the other hand, must be the effective forces in legal life itself.

What influences economic processes? Economic processes are influenced by human needs and by the possibility of satisfying these human needs through production. Both are based on natural foundations: human needs on the natural foundations of human beings, and production on climatic, geographical, and other natural foundations. Under the influence of the modern division of labor, this economic life has led to what modern commodity exchange is and must be, namely commodity exchange in which commodities are mutually evaluated according to human needs and, after their mutual evaluation—I cannot describe this in detail, it would take too long—appear on the market and enter the cycle of the economic process on the market.

Within this cycle of economic life, legal life cannot develop at the same time as in a closed cycle. Human nature does not allow legal life to develop within the social organism within economic life itself, just as it does not allow there to be only one centralized system within the human, natural human organism. I truly do not want to play with any comparisons from natural science this evening; but I believe that this is precisely a point where natural science must go beyond what it has achieved today. In my last book, “Von Seelenrätseln” (On the Mysteries of the Soul), I pointed out what is important, what natural science has not yet properly recognized: that there are three systems in the healthy human organism: the sensory-nervous system, which is the bearer of soul life; the respiratory and cardiac system, which is the bearer of rhythmic life; and the metabolic system, which is the bearer of metabolism. Together, these three systems constitute the human organism. But each system is centralized in itself; each has its own outlet to the outside world. Order and harmony are brought about in this human organism by the fact that these three systems do not interact chaotically, but unfold alongside each other, allowing the power of one to flow into the other in just the right way.

Thus, such a threefold structure must occur in a healthy social organism. It must be understood that when human beings are active in the economic organism, they must then merely manage within this economic process. Then it is a matter of the administration and legislation of this economic process aiming to bring about the mutual evaluation of goods in economic reality, to initiate the circulation of goods in the most expedient way, to initiate the production of goods, and to initiate the consumption of goods. However, everything that does not relate to the satisfaction of the needs of one person by another, but rather to the relationship of each person to every other person, must be extracted from this mere economic process. That in which all people must be equal is something radically different from what can develop in economic life alone. Therefore, in order to restore the social organism to health, it is necessary to extract from mere economic life the life of law, the actual life of law. It is precisely this development that recent times have striven to oppose.

What have the leading classes done so far? In those areas where it was convenient for them, where it seemed right for their interests, they have continued the old fusion that already existed in many areas between economic life and political state life. And so we see that in recent times, precisely under the influence of the leading circles of humanity, the so-called nationalization of certain branches of the economy has emerged. Nationalizing the postal service, telegraphs, and the like has been found to be in line with modern progress and required by this modern progress.

Those who do not look to the interests of the hitherto leading circles, but who ask: What are the foundations of a healthy social organism? must think in the opposite direction. They must strive to ensure that the life of the actual political state, the state that has to ensure law and order, is increasingly separated from mere economic life. but above all, which must ensure that the corresponding legal life flows from this sphere into economic life. Those who do not have an eye, a spiritual eye, for how radically different economic life and the life of the actual political state are, do not correctly distinguish between the two in human life.

Let us look at how things have developed today. Certain people speak from today's social situation, saying that within this social situation we have, first of all, the exchange of goods for goods. Well, that is necessary in economic life. We have just spoken about that. Then, secondly, they say, and they consider this to be justified, we have the exchange of goods, or rather the representative of goods, money, for labor. And thirdly: the exchange of goods for rights.

What is the latter? I have already spoken about the second. Well, we only need to look at the relationship between landowners and the modern economic order, and it will immediately become clear to us what should be clear in this area for the future. Whatever one may think about the ownership of land, everything else is actually irrelevant to the real process in the social organism; the only thing that matters is that the owner of land has the right to use a piece of land exclusively and to assert his personal interest in this use.

This has nothing whatsoever to do with the economic process as such. The only thing that has anything to do with the economic process—and only a distorted economic theory can object to this—is what is produced on the land as a commodity or with commodity value. The use of land is based on a right.

However, within the modern capitalist economic order, this right is transformed into power, namely through the amalgamation of capitalism with ground rents. And so, on the one hand, we have the power that excludes such rights; on the other hand, we have the economic power that can force human labor to become a commodity.

From both sides, nothing other than a life lie is realized if the goal is not pursued—pursued out of genuine social insight—of structuring the social organism into an economic organism and an organism of the political state in the narrower sense.

The economic organism will have to be founded on an associative basis, on the needs of consumption in relation to production. From the diverse interests of the most varied professional circles, the most diverse cooperatives – one could also call them, using an old word, brotherhoods of humanity – will have to be developed, in which needs and their satisfaction are administered.

What develops within this associative basis of the economic organism will always have to do with the satisfaction of one circle of people by another circle. In this area, the expert utilization of natural resources will have to be decisive, but then also the expert organization of the production, circulation, and consumption of goods. Human needs and human interests will have to prevail.

This will always be contrasted by something radically different, namely that in which human beings are essentially equal to one another, where they must be equal, as is said with a phrase that has already become trivial today: where they must be equal before the law that they themselves give themselves as equal human beings.

The cycle of the economic process will have to be based on association; in the narrower sense, the actual political organization will have to be based on a purely democratic foundation, on the principle of the equality of all people in their relationship to one another. This political organization will give rise to something quite different from the economic power that turns labor into a commodity. True labor law will spring from political life, which is separate from economic life, where only what can be negotiated between people as human beings regarding labor power can be used to determine wages, working hours, and other aspects of labor power.

However much one may believe that things have already improved somewhat in recent times, what is fundamentally important has not improved. Because of the way in which the labor power of the proletariat is integrated into economic processes, the price of labor power turned into a commodity will depend on the prices of other economic products, on commodity prices. Anyone who really looks deeper into the economic process can see this. The situation will be different if, independently of the laws of economic life and its administration, a labor law exists within the political state, within the purely democratic administration and legislation of the political state. What will happen then?

Then what humans contribute to the social organism through their labor will be in a relationship that is just as alive and self-determined as the natural foundations are today. Within certain limits, it is possible to shift the technical fertilization of the soil and the like, to shift the fixed limits of the natural foundations somewhat; but these natural foundations nevertheless determine economic life to a very large extent from one side. Just as economic life is determined from outside by this factor, so too must economic life be determined from outside by the other factor, in that it no longer makes labor dependent on itself, but rather that labor, determined on purely human grounds, can be offered to economic life. Then labor determines the price of goods, and goods no longer determine the price of labor!

Then the only thing that can happen is that, if for some reason the labor force cannot perform sufficiently, economic life will become impoverished. However, this must be remedied by seeking a remedy on a legal basis, and not from economic life alone.

Economic life is based solely on supply and demand. With labor law, which is based on the independent political state, all other rights will necessarily also be based on the same foundations. In short, one will necessarily have to see – I can only hint at this due to the brevity of time – the ideal of a healthy social organism in the future precisely in the separation of the two areas: legal life and economic life.

And thirdly, what can be called the spiritual life of humanity must be attached to this independent economic life, this independent legal life.

It is here that one will encounter the most resistance when speaking of this true continuation of the proletarian worldview. For it has become ingrained in human thinking in this area, even more so than in others, that the salvation of humanity can only depend on the absorption of the entire spiritual life by the state; and people do not yet see how the dependence of spiritual life on the state, especially in recent times, has arisen from what can be called the interest of the hitherto leading circles in the state, which has so thoroughly satisfied these very leading circles. These leading circles have found their interests satisfied in this state; they have allowed what they call spiritual life to be absorbed more and more by this state. Just as the political state is compelled by compulsory tax laws to bring about what can establish the equality of all people before the law, and just as the state is compelled to satisfy its needs through compulsory taxation, so, on the other hand, intellectual life must be truly emancipated from the other two areas of the social organism.

It is precisely what has been striven for in this area—the amalgamation of spiritual life with state and economic life—that has led to the calamities of modern times. For that which is to live in the spiritual realm can only develop if it can develop in the light of true freedom. Everything that cannot develop in the light of true freedom withers and paralyzes real spiritual life and also leads it astray, which is unfortunately all too evident in the modern social order. But what is necessary in this area is to understand the inner connection between spiritual life in the narrowest sense and religious life, scientific life, artistic life, life in a certain morality, what connection there is between this life and everything that arises from individual human abilities and skills.

Therefore, now that these things are being discussed here in a serious sense, in the serious sense of a healthy social organism, it must be said that spiritual life includes everything that has anything to do with the unfolding and development of individual abilities, everything that has to do with it, from the school system up to the university system, into the artistic and moral life, and even into those branches of the mind that form the basis of practical and economic life. In all these areas, the aim must be to emancipate intellectual life. So that this intellectual life can be placed in the free initiative of those who have the individual abilities of human beings, and so that this free intellectual life can only exist in a healthy social organism if it is also based on the free recognition and understanding of those who need to receive it. This means that in the future, intellectual life must no longer be administered in any way from the sum of what one has in one's pocket or in one's safe, or from the bureaucracy of the state.

Not only has this spiritual life been administered by the state, giving it a certain character in relation to the personalities involved in it, in relation to the personalities who administer it, but this spiritual life as we have it today, which the modern proletarian rightly perceives as an ideology, this spiritual life has become a mirror image of the interests and needs of the leading, ruling circles for and through the modern state, which they have formed for their own convenience, shaped according to these needs. Is it ultimately correct that all spiritual life is only a reflection, so to speak, only a superstructure of economic or state life? The modern spiritual life of the leading circles is only such a superstructure. Certainly, chemistry and mathematics will not easily be able to take on the character that results from the interests of the leading circles. The very extent to which they are pursued, but especially the light that falls on them from other branches of intellectual life, is determined by the fact that the interests of the leading circles of humanity, or at least those that have been leading until now, are merging with the interests of modern state life and thus with the interests of modern intellectual life in the state.

Yes, this modern spiritual life has become a plaything of economic and political life, especially in the most important areas, where it is supposed to intervene in human souls if it is to determine its place in the social order. This can be seen in the way in which, up until this terrible war catastrophe, those bearers of spiritual life who were connected to modern state life through the detour of capitalism have, in essence, produced precisely in the most important areas of spiritual life that which could be placed at the service of the modern state.

One could find not a hundred, but a thousand and a thousand times the evidence for this. You need only consider one thing: take the German history professors, the bearers of historical science. Try to get an idea of everything they have produced with regard to the history of the Hohenzollerns, and ask yourself whether, after this world-historical event, the history of the Hohenzollerns will now look the same as it did before. From this, one can see how intellectual life has become a mere plaything of those from whom it has not been free.

Intellectual life must become free from the other two areas. But then spiritual life can incorporate into its own legislation and administration that which — strange as it may sound and surprising as it may be for some, it must be said — can today arise solely from capitalist prejudices: then spiritual life can truly become the conqueror of mere economic proletarian interests. For spiritual life is a unified whole. Spiritual life descends from the highest branches of spiritual life to those branches that arise when someone has to manage some undertaking based on their individual abilities. Just as they managed it today, they managed it from economic life under the influence of force, economic force. Just as they have to manage it in a healthy social organism, so it is from spiritual life. In a healthy social organism, spiritual life has its own legislation and administration with regard to the highest branches of this spiritual life, but also with regard to everything that will have a spiritual effect on the economic process precisely when spiritual life as such is independent.

Then the influence of emancipated, independent spiritual life will appear in this economic process in the right way. Then what will be achieved through capital will no longer be achieved in the sense of modern capitalism. Then it will be achieved solely according to the impulses given by spiritual life itself.

However, we must form the right ideas about these impulses. For example, what will a business actually look like under these impulses?

Anyone who knows the fundamentals of spiritual life—and I know this very well—will not disagree with me when I give the following description of a business that receives its impulses not from economic power, but from the power of spiritual life: Through the free understanding of his co-workers, he will be enabled to use a certain capital fund to undertake something that is not for his own benefit, but because of the social understanding he will have acquired in the right spiritual life. Then, in such a business, the person who is appointed to his position through the free understanding of his co-workers, right down to the last worker, will be confronted with then, because a relationship of free understanding will then arise between this manager of an enterprise and those who work, it will quite necessarily develop what makes it possible, in addition to working hours, within every enterprise and within the cooperatives of enterprises, to speak freely about the whole way in which the economic process is integrated into the social organism as a whole. Then, under the influence of such a spiritual life, those who will stand in the place where capitalist entrepreneurs stand today will have to reveal themselves in relation to everything that their goods bring into the overall social process of humanity. Then each individual will understand the path taken by the product to which he contributes his labor, the product of the craft worker and of the one who has to direct this manual labor through his special individual abilities. Only then will it be possible for workers to conclude a genuine employment contract. For a genuine employment contract cannot be concluded if it is based on the premise that labor power is a commodity. A true employment contract cannot be based on these principles; rather, a real employment contract can only be based on the premise that the work necessary for the manufacture of a product is performed on the basis of the law, but that, with regard to economic considerations, there is proper cooperation between manual and intellectual workers, that, with regard to economic matters, there must be a division of labor between manual and intellectual workers that can only arise from the free insight of the manual worker as well, because this manual worker will then know, from his intellectual coexistence with the manager, to what extent his work, thanks to the existence of management, flows into the social organism to his own advantage.

Only in such cooperation does the possibility cease that enterprises, which must be built on a capital basis, are built on advantage, on selfish advantage. Only then, when the social organism is healed in this way, can today's profit interest be replaced by purely objective interest. And the connection between man and his work will emerge again to a greater extent than was the case in earlier times.

Let us look today at this connection between man and his work. On the one hand, there is the entrepreneur, who does what he considers to be work, but who distances himself from this work as quickly as possible. He even expresses this by referring to talking about his work as “shop talk” once he has distanced himself from it. He distances himself and then seeks to achieve what he strives for as a human being through all sorts of other things. It is precisely this relationship between people and their work that expresses how little people are connected to their work.

But this is an unhealthy relationship. It is an unhealthy relationship that inevitably leads to another, namely that the modern proletariat has been torn away from the soil of the old craft, where people were deeply attached to their profession, drew their honor and human dignity from their profession, and where they were placed at the machine, harnessed in the factory; this creates an unhealthy situation in which he cannot establish a relationship with his work.

But those who recognize the true basis of intellectual life know that such an unhealthy relationship between man and his work can only arise under unhealthy conditions. There is nothing in a healthy spiritual life that is free from politics and economics and only has an effect on them; there is nothing within such a spiritual life that is not immediately interesting and which, if handled correctly, connects people to their work because they know that what they do becomes a link in the cycle of the social organism. This is not something that can only be judged as something that cannot be otherwise, that people must also do uninteresting things. No, it must be judged in such a way that precisely that basis of spiritual life is sought which alone can evoke interest, connection between people and their work, and interest in this work in all areas, in all work.

It will become apparent that when emancipated, free spiritual life, based on spiritual impulses, extends into the most minute branches of state and economic life in its administrators, then and only then can something arise that becomes a real, objective interest in everything and does not merely establish a commercial, merely external economic and advantageous relationship.

However, the foundation for such a spiritual life must be laid. This foundation can only be laid if the entire school system is placed under the administration of spiritual life itself, if the lowest teacher no longer has to ask: What does the political state require of me? — but when he has to look up to those in whom he has confidence, when he looks to the areas of the social organism that administer spiritual life according to their own principles.

In many respects, what I believe to be a natural outcome has an effect. Precisely as a true continuation of the proletarian worldview, it counteracts habitual ways of thinking. For while it has been inherited from bourgeois science to merge spiritual life, the state, and economic life, the goal of healing the social organism must be to make the three areas mentioned independent. Only if each of these areas—if I may use common terms—has its own parliament and its own administration, which relate to each other like the governments of sovereign states, only if they negotiate with each other through delegations, only if they exchange their common needs in trade, only then can the social organism be restored to health. And the question today is the fundamental question that arises from all the facts: How can the social organism be healed? It is obvious: this social organism is sick!

Those who, out of their class consciousness, must make the justified demand that this social organism be healed, need to pursue the proletarian worldview in its fruitful seeds and develop it further in an appropriate manner.

I admit that at first glance, some may disagree with what they consider to be right today when it is said that we must move in the direction of this social threefold division, this threefold division of the social organism. But as much as this contradicts the thinking habits of many people today, reality must not be guided by our convenience, nor by the beliefs of those who have hitherto considered themselves practitioners of life. Reality must be guided by what can be recognized as right from an honest, healthy sense of truth.

What I have discussed does not refer to some kind of cloud cuckoo land. Oh, the time has come when many who, because they could only grasp the simple things and formed their habits of thought accordingly, considered themselves to be practical people, will have to admit that the despised, so very despised idealists, who think out of the necessities of human development, are the true practical people. What I have indicated to you is not a pipe dream; it is taken directly from what are the most immediate, everyday needs of humanity.

Of course, I cannot go into every single area; I will conclude by touching on a single area, an area which, even if I can only touch on it briefly, will show how what I have apparently derived from the original idea of social life interferes with the worst thing of all. What is the worst thing in life? The very worst thing is that we must have something we call money in our pockets. But you also know what is attached to this money. You know how this money interferes with all of life. If we consider the development of a healthy social organism, which member is responsible for the administration of money? Until now, the state has been responsible for the administration of money due to certain developmental forces that are very old. But money is just as much a commodity in a healthy organism as labor is not a commodity. And everything unhealthy that interferes with the social organism from the side of money consists in the fact that money is stripped of its commodity character by the fact that today it is based more on the stamping of some mark by the political state than on what it must still be based on, because there is no other way in international trade: on its commodity value. Economists today are engaged in a strange dispute, a dispute that seems truly strange to those who understand. They ask whether money is a commodity, just a popular commodity that can always be exchanged for other commodities, whereas otherwise, if one has the misfortune, for example, only tables and chairs, one would have to go around with tables and chairs and wait to see if someone would give one vegetables in exchange for them, one can, by first exchanging tables and chairs for money, obtain things that are just right for one, that one needs at that moment, for the commodity money. While some say that money is a commodity, or at least the representative of the commodity that must be there, even if it is paper money, the corresponding equivalent in goods, others say that money is only what is created when the state stamps a certain mark on it by law. And now these national economic scholars are researching: What is the correct answer? Is money a commodity, or something that is created by a mere stamp? Is it merely an instruction for the commodity?

The answer to these questions is simply this: money is neither one nor the other, but today it is both. It is one because the state stamps certain marks on it; it is the other because in international trade, and to a certain extent also in national trade, money can only circulate as a commodity in the circulation of commodities.

A healthy social organism will strip money of any legal character; it will assign it to the administration and legislation, through its own natural process, including the introduction of money, the minting of money, the determination of the value of money within the economic cycle, to this same parliament, this same administration that manages the rest of the economic organism.

Only when this happens can what the modern proletariat must strive for be placed on a healthy basis. That strange relationship that exists between wages and the nature of goods, that relationship, is also based on a lie of life. While on the one hand the worker believes that by demanding higher wages, if he gets them, he will achieve healthier living conditions, on the other hand the price of goods will always rise the price of goods continues to rise on the other side, as long as the economic cycle is not emancipated from the legal cycle of the political state. All these things will only be able to be placed on a healthy basis when this threefold division comes into being.

Similarly, when the necessary independence of spiritual life is recognized, it will be understood that there is no need to create capitalist enterprises as such, but that the way in which capital has been managed in recent times, the way in which it has been used by being solely involved in the economic process, that is what has caused capital to have such a damaging effect, with which so much misery is associated.

It must be understood that as long as the employment contract does not refer to the division of what the manual laborer and the intellectual worker produce together, but as long as the employment contract refers to the remuneration of labor, it will be impossible to place this on a healthy basis.

Only by giving intellectual life its healthy reality will it be revealed in every case where it is necessary in the relationship between worker and intellectual leader that where the worker is taken advantage of, he is not merely taken advantage of by the economy, but is taken advantage of by the fact that the entrepreneur exploits his individual qualities, his intellectual qualities, in an improper, unlawful, and inhumane manner. The worker is not exploited by economic life; the worker is exploited by the lie of life that arises from the fact that in today's social organism, individual abilities can be used precisely to take advantage of the worker because they cannot be seen by both sides within the economic process; within a healthy spiritual life, they are seen and controlled by both sides.

As I said, I can well understand that what I have mentioned here, precisely for the recovery of the social organism, may still be repugnant to many a proletarian mind today. I can understand that. I have been talking about these things among workers and with workers for years. I have not only administered individual branches of teaching within the workers' educational school, I have also conducted speech exercises with the workers. In the exercises that were conducted for speech practice, many things were also brought up by the workers in this community, which really showed the special coloring, the special nature of the demands of the modern proletariat. This gives you the ability not only to think about the proletariat, as the members of today's ruling circles or the previous ruling circles do, but also to think with the proletariat. That is what I wanted to tell you today: to think with the proletariat, not just about it!

According to my will, it is this — I would like you to understand this — that we may differ here and there in terms of the content of our opinions, but that at this moment in world history, what matters is not whether we differ in one opinion or another, but whether we agree on that honest demand which must be the demand of the modern proletariat. Only by agreeing to this, by agreeing in honest desire, only then can the seeds be found that lie in the proletarian worldview for further development. For the time is past when one can merely discuss; the time is past when people who only want to serve their own interests could speak of understanding. The time has come when the demands of the modern proletarian, which have been emerging for decades from the undercurrents, are entering the world historical stage, where they are truly becoming the most important, most significant event of modern times.

What has emerged from the chaos of modern economic warfare, of modern world war, what has long been, and what will perhaps increasingly fill the future, will be the social question. I did not want to present you with an unrealistic, theoretical solution or attempt at one today; I wanted to draw your attention to the fact that the time has come when the social question is there, when people in their social interaction must be structured into state, economic, and intellectual organs in such a way that a lasting solution to the social question can emerge from this healthy structure.

This social question will not be solved overnight once it has arisen; but because it will always be there, just as life constantly generates new conflicts, there will always have to be that structure of humanity which honestly strives to resolve the conflicts that arise in social life. Whether attempts will be made to draw attention in the widest possible circles to the fact that the future lies in the further development of the proletarian worldview will determine where the starting point of the modern proletarian movement will lead. And it must actually lead from all the justified demands of the wage question, the bread question, to that powerful, world-historical upheaval which will pass from the consciousness of the modern worker into the general consciousness of humanity, which will establish, out of the dignity, out of the emotional dignity of the modern proletarian, the true human dignity for all people, which others have not yet been able to establish.

Several speakers expressed their views in the ensuing discussion. Rudolf Steiner concluded with the following closing remarks:

Rudolf Steiner: Yes, first of all, with reference to the esteemed first speaker, I must make something of a fundamental remark. Very often, when one speaks, one is in a position of having to say that one does not really understand why things, as they were said by the first speaker, have to be said in precisely this form, as if it were a refutation of what one has said oneself. The first speaker spoke as if he felt compelled to oppose me on all points — even though he acknowledged some things, at least in relation to my overall position. I am not in a position to have to fight him, but I must say that I actually believe that anyone who has listened to me carefully will not have much to object to in what the first speaker said. I am in a position to acknowledge much more, also with regard to the content of what he said, as he seems to have somehow grasped what I actually wanted to say.

Now, one thing seems important to me in the details. It is strange that the first speaker felt he had to emphasize that what I said arose from the fact that I only spoke with workers, not worked with workers. Yes, well, of course everyone can only work in their own field; but the way I worked with workers was such that one cannot say that I only spoke with workers. I also believe that those who perhaps understand more of what permeated today's lecture, the whole desire, will find it understandable that I have not been addressed in this way for years, although I understand that I am being addressed in this way today. I have not always been addressed in this way, but I believe that this is simply because at that time the workers already felt that what I had to say was not expressed in mere conversation with the workers.

If it has become possible for me to speak in such a way as I had to speak again today, it is truly not something I learned. For let us ask ourselves the question: Who can actually count themselves among the proletariat? Those who, through their fate and their own strength, have brought themselves to speak to the proletariat and among the proletariat in the way that I, too, can speak today, but only as a free speaker. For in the circles with which I have been accused of associating, I have perhaps been treated just as badly, perhaps even worse, than I have been treated here this evening. It is something else entirely when, like me, one has fought one's way through; I will continue to do so in the short life that remains to me. But I have struggled for years by talking to the proletariat, working with the proletariat, starving with the proletariat. I did not ask “post office clerks how much they had so that they could starve,” but I had to starve myself. For the family I grew up in was in a much worse situation than perhaps all those “post office clerks” you can ask today. I did not learn to understand the proletariat simply by thinking about them, but I learned to understand the proletariat by living with them myself, by growing up in the proletariat, by learning and having to go hungry with the proletariat. From this background, even back then, when I was able to work with workers for years, it was clear that I was able to speak not from theory, but from a great deal of practical experience. I believe that this can also serve as a basis for determining whether one has a certain right to speak to proletarians or not.

That is what I would like to say on this matter.

Then a large part of what the first speaker said did not actually refer to me at all, it referred to the intellectuals. Yes, the chairman has already said: If anyone can talk about being pelted with mud, being pelted with mud by the intellectuals, then I can. For truly, if you were to examine the manner in which I have been besmirched, and in particular the nature of this besmirching, you would probably not envy me the association I have enjoyed with intellectuals.

This is a personal remark; these are personal remarks in general. But what has been said in response to me is also basically personal, and that is why this remark had to be made.

Now, of course, a large part of it did not refer to me at all, but to the student body. With regard to the latter: believe me, I am well aware that a large part of today's student body is rightly accused of not living up to the ideal of the lowest wage earner! Of course, there is a lot to be said about this chapter. But modern workers, in particular, should understand that, just as other social classes have been shaped by their circumstances, so too have modern students been shaped by their circumstances. Anyone who can impartially compare the aspirations of modern students with those encountered, for example, among the student body when I myself was still a student—a long time ago—will say that, with regard to the thoroughness with which the modern professoriate was involved in the decline of the bourgeoisie, on which the student body must of course depend — with regard to what served as an example for the modern student body — one can nevertheless feel a certain satisfaction for all the blossoms that are blooming for the better, especially in the modern student body. Even if things look today as if the student body is stabbing the workers in the back, I am quite certain that it is precisely from the student body that collaborators for social ideals will emerge, and I believe in very large numbers. Students today have many things to overcome. We must not forget how ironclad the constraints are that hold them back. Recently, I have had many opportunities to talk with young students about things that may be far removed from their immediate ideals, but which are close to what must develop as a healthy intellectual life in general out of today's sick intellectual life. I know how receptive young people are to a renewal of intellectual life. But I also know how great the temptation is, once you have left behind the enthusiasm of youth, obtained your diploma, and need to find a job in modern bourgeois society, how close the temptation is to sink back into philistinism and narrow-mindedness.

Of course, we will not arrive at a definitive solution to what we hope and long for overnight. But it should be recognized that wherever such a longing, such an intelligent yearning for what the modern proletarian rightly demands takes hold, it should not be suppressed by conflating the one with the other in a certain fanatical, dogmatic way. I believe that this dogmatism should give way, at least to a certain extent—even if the means cannot be chosen too leniently in the modern struggle—to the attitude I spoke of in my lecture: that it should matter less what the differences in thought are, but rather the equality of honest will.

Now, ask yourself how many of those whom you say are stabbing you in the back are dependent on the circumstances in which modern students find themselves, and ask yourself, on the other hand, how much honest will is asserting itself among today's youth. Cultivate it rather than paralyzing it by falling into dogmatism.

Now, as for what the second speaker said at the beginning, I can say that I agree with the comment made on the left, that it is not so different from what I myself said; and I am not so insistent that things be said exactly as I said them. If anything can help improve the situation today, I am delighted. And so I do not want to judge too harshly anything else that was said by the second speaker; I would just like to correct something that may indicate that this speaker did not take the matter quite so seriously. For example, he questioned my reference to having taught for many years at the Workers' Educational School in Berlin, suggesting that it was probably just a liberal educational association. I explicitly stated that it was the Workers' Educational School founded by the late Wilhelm Liebknecht! Now, I don't believe that you would attribute to old Liebknecht the founding of just any educational association for the working class, as the working class at that time would not have accepted it anyway. The audience was not made up of “ordinary bourgeois liberals,” but solely of workers, solely from proletarian circles and organized Social Democrats across the board!

So I believe that some of my other words were not understood correctly by this gentleman, as I had intended, and as they could be understood if one did not come with a prejudice not only when the other person has a different opinion, but even when he expresses what one himself thinks only in a slightly different form, because he believes that it is necessary, at this moment in world history, to take a more comprehensive view of things, and because he believes that not everyone who judges only by the immediate circumstances can be called a practical person today, but that the true practical person is the one who sees the bigger picture.

As for the interpretation of the “appeal,” where it has been pointed out that it corresponds almost word for word with what I have said to you this evening — you will not be surprised, since you have heard that the “appeal” was written by me myself, and you will not demand that when I speak here or there, for example when I speak to citizens, that it should sound different from what I am saying here from the podium.

Interjection: Either the same everywhere, or...

That is precisely what I am saying: I am saying that the “appeal” contains the same thing that I have said here. Nowhere in that “appeal” is there anything other than what I have said here.

What matters to me is that what I say is the truth in my mind, and I will speak the truth wherever I am allowed to speak the truth. I only speak the truth; that is what matters to me. That is what I have to say in this regard. I will not exclude anyone from anything if they can reconcile it with their convictions and say yes to what I myself say. For I believe that the only way we can succeed is by speaking the truth, regardless of the impression it makes on people, whether they agree with it or not. That is what I wanted to say on this matter.

And then, in conclusion, I would just like to comment on what the next speaker said: that I had not said anything about the way of fighting. But from my words, you could gather everywhere what I actually think about this way of fighting. I believe I have made it sufficiently clear that it is not my opinion that superficial understanding, or whatever all the nice things are called, can be what matters today. Today, we have entered a stage of reality where, in fact, there is no other option than to not only come up with empty ideas about how things need to be changed, but also to come up with ideas about what new thoughts are truly possible to bring into people's souls. For the old ideas have shown what kind of social order they can bring about, and this has proven that these old ideas are useless. That is why I believe that, first and foremost, for the most immediate practical purposes, it is important that those who have honest social intentions first of all agree on what can be done.

Today in Switzerland – I don't know whether to say “thank God” or “unfortunately” – we still find ourselves in circumstances that are not like those in Central and Eastern Europe. Central and Eastern Europe are in circumstances that can really only be overcome by returning to the original ideas of the social organism. And if no attempt is made to first discuss the fundamental questions among the proletariat itself, such as how to emerge from this chaos through the simplest organizations, which in my opinion must all bear the character of the threefold social organism — if recovery is not brought about among the proletariat itself by creating new organizations based on new ideas, I see no salvation at all for decades to come.

First of all, we will have to start with what may seem to you to be an insignificant point: we must first realize that we are not only confronted with bourgeois institutions and bourgeois conditions, but that we are confronted with bourgeois science.

I said this in the Berlin Trade Union House sixteen years ago, and it was correctly understood even within the proletariat. The proletariat still has the task of first expelling what is bourgeois science from its thinking, and not of establishing any institutions in the spirit of bourgeois science, but in the spirit of precisely those new ideas that can perhaps only be found by the proletariat, because the proletariat is emancipated from all other human contexts in which, unfortunately, bourgeois people are involved.

Therefore, the most important thing today is to carry out what may seem to you to be the most insignificant thing: the emancipation of intellectual life, the development of freedom in intellectual life. If we succeed in achieving a truly free intellectual life, if we succeed in ensuring that science, which is beholden to capitalism, no longer sets the tone, even in proletarian circles, only then will we be on the road to recovery. I do not want a narrowing in the bourgeois sense, I do not want a narrowing at all, but rather an expansion of proletarian tasks.

And I firmly believe—no matter how much people who speak from the point of view that I can understand very well, such as the second speaker, object that what I have said is not understood sentence by sentence— I firmly believe, based on my long life among the proletariat, that what I have said will not be understood by the other classes at first, but precisely by the proletariat. And unfortunately, we will have to wait until it is understood by the proletariat. But I believe that it will be understood there.

And with this in mind, I would like to say that I can also look back with a certain satisfaction on what I wanted to achieve this evening. I truly did not want to convince you in every detail. I respect your free personality too much for that; I respect everyone's free consent too much for that. But I believe that many of you will think differently about what I have said than you did today. And it is this belief that I assume is part of the recovery of the social organism.