Third Scientific Lecture-Course:
Astronomy
GA 323
8 January 1921, Stuttgart
Lecture VIII
To lead our present studies to a fruitful conclusion we must still pursue the rather subtle course I have been adopting, bringing together a great variety of ideas from different fields. For this reason we shall have to continue with this course also while the other course1Examples of the relation of Spiritual Science to the different branches of Science. Four lectures to students, Stuttgart, 11th to 15th January, 1921. Published (in the original German) in the Swiss periodical “Gegenwart”, Vol. 14, nos. 2 to 8, Berne, 1952. is going on—between the 11th and 15th January. We must arrange the times by agreement with the Waldorf School. There is so much to bring in that we shall need these days too. Now I am also well aware how many queries, doubts and problems may be arising in connection with this subject. Please prepare whatever questions you would like to put, if you need further elucidation. I will then try to incorporate the answers in one of next week's lectures, so as to make the picture more complete. Working in this way we shall be able to continue as heretofore, bringing in what I would call the subtler aspects of our theme.
Let us envisage once again the course we have been pursuing. Our aim is to gain a deeper understanding of Astronomy—the science of the Heavens—in connection with phenomena on Earth. To begin with, we pointed out that as a rule the Astronomy of our time only takes into account what is observed directly with the outer senses aided, no doubt, by optical instruments and the like. Such, in the main, were all the data hitherto adduced when seeking to explain and understand the phenomena of the Heavens. They took their start from the ‘apparent movements’, as they would now be called, or the celestial bodies. First they considered the apparent movement of the starry Heavens as a whole around the Earth and the apparent movement of the Sun. Then they observed the very strange paths described by the Planets. Such, in effect, is the immediate visual appearance; portions of the planetary paths look like loops (Fig. 1) the planet moves along here, reverses and goes back, and then forward again, here ... And now they reasoned; if the Earth itself is moving and we have no direct perception of this movement, the real movements of the heavenly bodies cannot but be different from the visual appearance. Interpreting along these lines—applying mathematical and geometrical laws—they arrived at an idea of what the ‘real’ movements might be like. So they arrived at the Copernican system and at its subsequent modifications. Such, in the main, were the methods of cognition used; first, what our senses when looking out into the Heavens, and then the intellectual assimilation, the reasoned interpretation of these sense-impression.

We then pointed out that this procedure can never lead to the adequate penetration of the celestial phenomena, if only for the reason that the mathematical method itself is insufficient. We begin our calculations along certain lines and are then brought to a stop. For as I was reminding you, the ratios between the periods of revolution of the several planets are incommensurable numbers,—incommensurable magnitudes. By calculation therefore, we do not reach the innermost structure of the celestial phenomena. Sooner or later we have to leave off.
It follows that we must adopt a different method. We have to take our start not only from what man observes when he looks out into the Universe with his senses; we must take man as a whole in his connection with the Universe, and perhaps not only man, but other creatures too,—the kingdoms of Nature upon Earth. All these things we pointed out, and I then showed how the whole organization of man can be seen in relation to certain phenomena in the evolution of the Earth, namely the Ice-Ages in their rhythmical recurrence. They also have to do with the inner evolution of man and of mankind. This too, I said, will give us indications of what the real movements in celestial space may be. These are the kind of things we must pursue.
Before continuing the rather more formal lines of thought with which we ended yesterday's lecture, let us consider once again this connection of man's evolution with the evolution of the Earth through the Ice-Ages. We saw that the special kind of knowledge or of cognitional life which the man of present time calls his own has only come into being since the last Ice-Age. Moreover all the civilization-epochs, of which I have so often told, have taken place since then—namely the Ancient Indian, the Persian, the Egypto—Chaldean, the Graeco-Latin and then the epoch in which we are now living. Before the last Ice-Age, we said, there must have been developing in human nature what in the man of today is more withdrawn, less at the surface of his nature, namely his power of ideation—the forming of mental pictures. The inner quality, we said, of this part of our inner life is truly to be understood only if we compare it with our dream-life. It is through sense-perception that our mental pictures receive clear and firm configuration and, as it were, a fully saturated content. The mental pictures are being formed in a more inward region of our bodily organic life—farther back, as it were behind the sense-perceptions,—and this activity is dim and hazy like our dream-life. Our forming of mental pictures would be as dim as it is in dreams, if the experiences of the senses did not strike in upon us every time we awaken. (We may allow the supposition, to help explain what is meant.)
More dim and hazy than our life in sense-perception, this inner life of ideation, mental imagery, is related to those earlier phases in the evolution of man's nature which preceded the last glacial epoch, or which—to speak in anthroposophical terms—belonged to old Atlantis.
What must it then have been like for man? In the first place he must have had a far more intimate inner connection with the surrounding world than he has today through sense-perception. We can control our sense-perception with our will. It is with our will at any rate that we direct the vision of our eyes, and by deliberate attention we can go even farther in governing our sense-perception by our own will. At all events, our will is very much at work in our sense—perceptions, making us to a large extent independent of the outer world. We orientate ourselves by our own arbitrary choice. Now this in only possible because as human beings we have in a way emancipated ourselves from the Universe. Before the last Ice-Age we cannot have been thus emancipated. (I say ‘cannot have been’ since I am wanting now to speak from the empirical aspect of external Science.) During that time, as we have seen, the power of ideation—the forming of mental images—was especially developed, and in his inner conditions man must have been far more dependent on all that was going on around him. Today we see the world around us shining in the sunlight, but the way we see it is considerably subject to the inner culture and control of our own life of will. In Atlantean time the way man was given up to the outer world must have been somehow dependent on the illumined Earth and its illumined objects, and then again—at night-time when the Sun was not shining—on the darkness, the gloaming. He must in other words have experienced periodic alternations in this respect. His inner life of mental imagery, which as we saw was then in process of development must alternately have been lighting up and ebbing down again. This inner periodicity, brought about by man's relation to the surrounding Universe, was indeed not unlike the peculiar periodicity of woman's organic functions of which we spoke before, which is related to the Lunar phases though only as regards length of time. This inner functioning of the woman's nature (I said, you will remember, it is there in man too but in a more inward way and therefore less easily perceived) was at one time actually linked with the corresponding events in the outer Universe. It then became emancipated—a property of human nature on its own,—so that what now goes on in the human being in this respect need not coincide with the outer events. yet the periodicity—the sequence of phases—remains the same as it was when the one coincided with the other.
Something quite similar is true of the rhythmic alternation in our inner life—in our ideation, our forming of mental images. The whole way we are organized in this respect, implanted in us in a far distant past, is to this day more or less independent of the life of the outer senses. Day by day we undergo an inner rhythm, our powers of mental imagery alternately lighting up and growing more dim; it is a daily ebb and flow. We only fail to notice it, since it is far less intense than that other periodicity which runs parallel to the Lunar phases. Nevertheless, in our head-organization to this day we have an alternation between a brighter and a dimmer kind of life. We carry in our head a rhythmic life. We are at one time more and at another less inclined to meet our sense-perceptions actively from within. It is a 24-hour rhythmic alteration. It would be interesting to observe—it might even be recorded in graphically—how human being vary as regards this inner period of the head, the forces of ideation and mental imagery alternating between brighter and more lively and then again dimmer and more sleepy times. The dim and sleepy times represent, so to speak, the inner night of the head, the brighter ones the inner day, but it does not coincide with the external alternation of day and night. It is an inner alternation of light and darkness, or relatively bright and dim conditions. And people vary in this respect. One human being has this inner alternation of light and dark in such a way that he tends rather to connect the lighter period of his mental image-forming power with his sense-perceptions. Another tends to it with the darker. Individuals are organized in one way or the other, and differ accordingly as to their power of observing the outer world. One human being will be inclined sharply to focus the phenomena of the outer world; another tends to do so less,—is more inclined to an inner brooding. All this is due to the alternating conditions I have been describing. Notably as educators, my dear Friends, we should cultivate the habit of observing things like this. They will be valuable signposts, indicating how we should treat the individual children both in our teaching and in education generally.
What interests us however here and now is the fact that man thus makes inward, as it were, what he once underwent in direct mutual relation with the outer world; so that it now works in him as an inner rhythm, the phases no longer coinciding with the outer yet still retaining the periodicity Before the Ice-Age, man's periods of brighter and more intimate participation in the surrounding Universe,. and then of dim withdrawal into himself, will have coincided regularly with the processes of the outer world. He still retains an echo of this rhythm, which in those long-ago times proceed from his living-together with the Universe around him, where at one moment his consciousness was lightened and filled with pictures while at another he withdrew into himself, brooding over the pictures. It is an echo of this latter state whenever we today are inclined to brood more or less melancholically in our own inner life. Once again therefore, what man experienced in and with the world in those older times has been driven farther back into his inner bodily nature, while at the outer periphery a new development has taken place in his faculties of sense-perception. He had these faculties, of course in earlier epochs too, but not developed in the way they now are.
While looking thus at what has taken place in man through his connection with the phenomena of the world around him, we are in fact looking into the Universe itself. Man then becomes the reagent for a true judgment of the phenomena of the Universe. But to complete this we need the other kingdoms of Nature too. Here I should like to draw your attention to something well-known and evident to everyone, the essential significance of which, however, remains unrecognized.
Consider the annual plant,—the characteristic cycle of its development. We see in it quite evidently what I was mentioning yesterday—the direct and indirect influences of the Sun. Where the Sun works directly, the flower comes into being; where the Sun works in such a way that the Earth comes in between, we get the root. The plant too makes manifest what we were speaking of yesterday as regards the animal and then applied in another way to man.
Yet we shall only see the full significance of this if we relate it to another fact. There are perennial plants too. What is the relation of the perennial plant to the annual, as regards the way in which plant-growth belongs to the Earth as a whole? The perennial retains its stem or trunk, and the truth is: Year by year a new world of plants springs, so to speak, from the trunk itself. Of course it is modified and metamorphosed, yet it is a vegetation growing on the trunk, which in its turn grows out of the Earth (Fig. 2). If you have morphological perception you will see it as clearly as can be,—it almost goes without saying. Here on the left I have the surface of the Earth, and the annual plant springing from it. Here on the right is the stem or trunk of the perennial, from which new vegetation, new plant-growth springs in each succeeding year. I must image something or other (to leave it vague, for the moment) continued from the Earth into the trunk. I must say to myself—what this plant here (Fig. 2 on the left) is growing on, must somehow be there in the trunk too (on the right). In other words there must be some element of the Earth—whatever it may be—entering into the trunk. I have no right to regard the trunk of the perennial as a thing apart, not belonging to the Earth; rather must I regard it as a modified portion of the Earth itself. Only then shall I be seeing it rightly; only then shall I discern the inner relationships, such as they really are. Something is there in the perennial plant, which otherwise is only in the Earth. It is through this that the plant becomes perennial. In effect, precisely by taking something of the Earth into itself it frees itself from dependence on the yearly course of the Sun. For we may truly say: The perennial wrests itself away from its dependence on the Sun's yearly course. it emancipates itself from the yearly course of the Sun, in that it forms the trunk, receiving into its own Nature—becoming able, as it were, to do for itself what otherwise could only come about through the working of the whole cosmic environment.

Do we not here see prefigured in the plant world, what I was just describing with regard to man in preglacial times? For in those times, as I was showing, the inner rhythm of the man's ideation—his life in mental pictures—developed by relation to the surrounding world. What then lived in the mutual relation between man and the surrounding world has since become a feature of his own inner life. There is an indication of the same kind of change in the plant kingdom, in that the annual is changed to a perennial. This is indeed a universal tendency in evolution; the living entities are on the way to emancipation from their original connections with the surrounding world.
Seeing the perennials arising, we have to say: It is as though the plant, when it becomes perennial, had learned something it you will allow the expression—learned from the time when it depended on cosmic environment, something which it can now do for itself. Now it is able of itself to bring forth fresh plant-shoots year by year. We do not reach an understanding of the phenomena of the world by merely staring at the things that happen to be side by side, or that are crowded into the field of view under the microscope. We have to see the larger whole and recognize the single phenomena in their connection with it.
Look at it all once more. The annual plant is given up to the cycle of the year, with all the changing relations to the Cosmos which this involves. This influence of the Cosmos beings to fade away in the perennial. In the perennial, what would otherwise vanish in the further course of the year is, as it were, preserved. In the trunk we see springing from the ground the working of the year, made permanent and lasting. This transition of what was first connected with the outer Universe into a more inward way of working we see it throughout the whole range of Nature's phenomena, in so far as they are cosmic. Hence too there are phenomena in which we can more quickly find the living connections between our Earth and the wider Cosmos, whilst there are others in which the cosmic influences are more concealed. We need to find out which of them are sensitive reagents, telling of the cosmic influences. The annual plant will tell us of the Earth's connection with Cosmos, the perennial will not be able to tell us much.
Again, the relation of the animal to man can give us an important clue. Look at the animal's development. (Though we might also include it, we will for the moment disregard the embryonic life.) The animal is born and grows up to a certain limit. It reaches puberty. Look at the animal's whole life, until puberty and beyond. Without any added hypotheses—taking the simple facts—you must admit that it is strange, what happens to the animal once puberty has been attained. For in a way the animal is finished then, so far as the earthly world is concerned. Any such statement is of course an approximation to the truth, needless to say; yet in the main we must admit that in the animal no further progression is to be seen, not after puberty. Puberty is the important goal of animal development. The immediate consequence of puberty—all that happens as an outcome of it—is there of course, but we cannot allege that anything takes place thence forward, deserving to be called a true progression.
With man it is different. Man remains capable of development far beyond puberty; but the development becomes more inward. Indeed it would be very sad for man if in his human nature he were to end his development at puberty in the way animals do. Man goes beyond this. He holds something in reserve by means of which he can go farther,—can undertake quite other journeys, unconnected with sexual maturity or puberty. This again is not unlike the “inwarding” of the cycle of the year in the perennial as against the annual plant. What is in evidence in the animal when puberty is reached, we see it transmuted into a more inward process in man, from puberty onward. Something therefore is at work in man, that is related to a cosmic process in his development from birth until puberty, and that then gets emancipated from the Cosmos—just as it does in the perennial plant—when puberty has been outgrown.
Here then you have a subtler way of estimating the phenomena among the kingdoms of Nature; so will you presently find signposts, indicating the connections between the creatures upon Earth and the Cosmos. We see how, when the cosmic influences cease as such, they are transplanted into the inner nature of the several creatures. We will take note of this and set it on one side for the moment; later we shall find the synthesis between this and quite another aspect.
Let us now take up again what I have frequently mentioned: The incommensurable ratios between the periods of revolution of the planets of the solar system. We may ask, what would the outcome be if they were commensurable? Cumulative disturbances would arise, whereby the planetary system would be brought to a standstill. This can be proved by calculation, though it would lead too far afield to do it now. Only the incommensurability between the periods of revolution enables the planetary system, so to speak, to stay alive. In other words, the solar system contains among other things a condition even tending to a standstill. It is precisely this condition which we are calculating. When in our calculations we get to the end of our tether, there is the incommensurable—and there, withal, is the very life of the planetary system! We are in a strange predicament when calculating the planetary system. If it were such that we could fully calculate it, it would die,—nay, as I said before, would have died long ago. It lives by virtue of the face that we can not calculate it fully. What is alive in the planetary system is precisely what we cannot calculate.
Now upon what do we base these calculations, from which once more, if we could pursue them to the end, we must deduce the inevitable death of the whole system? We base them on the force of gravitation—universal gravitation. Suppose we take our start from gravitation and nothing more, and think it out consistently. We get the picture of a planetary system subject to the force of gravitation. Then indeed we do arrive at commensurable ratios. But the planetary system would inevitably die. We calculate, in other words, to the extent that death prevails in the planetary system, basing our calculations on the force of gravity. In other words there must be something in the planetary system—different from gravitation—to which the incommensurability is due.
The planetary orbits can be brought into accord with the force of gravity very nicely, even as to their genesis, but their periods of revolution would then have to be commensurable. Now there is something which cannot be brought into accord with the force of gravitation, and which moreover does not so tidily fit into our planetary system. I mean what reveals itself in the cometary bodies. The comets play a very strange part in the system, and they have recently been leading scientists to some unusual ideas.
I leave aside the kind of explanations which often tend to arise, where anything most recently discovered is seized on to explain phenomena in other fields. In physiology for instance there was a time when they were fond of comparing the so-called sensory nerves to telegraph-wires leading in from the periphery. Through some central switch or commutator the impulse was supposed to be transmitted, leading to impulses and acts of will. From the centripetal nerves it was supposed to be switched over to the centrifugal; they compared it all to a telegraphic system. Maybe one day something quite different from telegraph-wires will be invented and by this way of thinking quite another picture will be applied to the same thing. So do the scientific fashions change. Whatever happens to have been discovered is quickly seized on as a handy way of explaining the phenomena in other fields. Much as they do in medicine! Scarcely has any new thing been found,—it is “discovered” to be a valuable remedy, though little thought is given to the inner reasons. Now that we have X-rays, X-rays are the remedy to use; we only use them because we happen to have found them. It is as though men let themselves be swept along chaotically, willy-nilly by whatever happens to turn up from time to time.
So for the comets: By spectroscopic investigation and by comparison with the corresponding results for the planets, the idea arose that the phenomena might be explained electromagnetically. Such ideas will at most lead to analogies, which may no doubt have some connection with the reality, but which will certainly not satisfy us if we are looking into it more deeply.
Yet as I said, leaving this aside, there was one thing which emerged quite inevitably when the phenomena of comets were studied in more detail. While for the rest of the planetary system they always speak of gravitational forces, the peculiar position of the comet's tail in relation to the Sun inevitably drove the scientists to speak of forces of repulsion from the Sun—forces, as it were of recoil. The terminology is not the main point; it will of course vary with the prevailing fashion. The point is that science was here obliged to look for something in addition to—and indeed opposite to gravity.
In effect, with the comets something different enters our planetary system,—something which in its nature is in a way opposite to the inner structure of the planetary system as such. Hence it is understandable that for long ages the riddle of the comets gave rise to manifold superstitions. Men had a feeling that in the courses of the planets laws of Nature, inherently belonging to our planetary system, find expression, while with the comets something contrary comes in. Here something disparate and diverse makes its way into our planetary system. Thus they inclined to see the planetary phenomena as an embodiment of normal laws of Nature, and to regard the cometary apparitions as something contrary to these normal laws. There were times—though not the most ancient times—when comets were associated, as it were, with moral forces flying through the Universe, scourges for sinful man.
Today we rightly look on that as superstition. Yet even Hegel could not quite escape associating the comets with something not quite explicable or only half explicable by ordinary means. The 19th century, of course, no longer believed the comets to appear like judges to chastise mankind. Yet in the early 19th century they had statistics purporting to connect them with good and bad vintage years. These too occur somewhat irregularly; their sequence does not seem to follow regular laws of Nature. And even Hegel did not quite escape this conclusion. He though it plausible that the appearance or non-appearance of comets should have to do with the good and bad vintage years.
The standpoint of the people of today—at least, of those who share the normal scientific outlook—is that our planetary system has nothing to fear from the comets. Yet the phenomena which they evoke within this planetary system somehow have little inner connection with it. Like cosmic vagrants they seem to come from very distant regions into the near neighborhood of our Sun. Here they call forth certain phenomena, indicating forces of repulsion from the Sun. The phenomena appear, was and wane, and vanish.
There was a man who still had a certain fund of wisdom where by he contemplated the Universe not only with his intellect but with the whole human being. He still had some intuitive perception of the phenomena of the Heavens. I refer to Kepler. He was the author of a strange saying about the comets—a saying which gives food for thought to anyone who is at all sensitive to Kepler; way of though and mood of soul. We spoke of his three Laws—a work of genius, when one considers the ideas and the data which were accessible in his time. Kepler arrived at his Laws out of a feeling for the inner harmony of the planetary system. For him it was no mere dry calculation; it was a feeling of harmony. He felt has three planetary Laws as a last quantitative expression of something qualitative—the harmony pervading the whole planetary system. And out of this same feeling he made a statement about the comets, the deep significance of which one feels if one is able to enter into such things at all. Kepler said: In the great Universe—even the Universe into which we look by night—there are as many comets as there are fishes in the ocean. We only see very, very few among them, while all the rest remain invisible, either because they are too small or for some other reason. Even external research has tended to confirm Kepler's saying. The comets seen were recorded even in olden time and it is possible to compare the number. Since the invention of the telescope ever so many more have been seen than before. Also when looking out into the starry Heavens under different conditions of illumination—that is to say, making provision for extreme darkness—a larger number of comets are recorded than otherwise. Even empirical research therefore comes near to what Kepler exclaimed, inspired as he was by a deep feeling for Nature.
Now if one speaks at all of a connection between the Cosmos and what happens on the Earth, it surely is not right to dwell one-sidedly on the relation to our Earth of the other planets of our system and to omit the heavenly bodies which come and go as the comets do. It is especially one-sided since we must now admit that the comets give rise to phenomena indicating the presence of quite other forces—forces opposite in kind to those to which we usually attribute the coherence of our planetary system. The comets do in fact bring something opposite into our system, and if we follow it up we must admit that this too is of great significance. Something in some way opposite in nature to the force which holds it together, comes with the comets into our planetary system.
In an earlier lecture-course about natural phenomena I drew attention to something of which I must here remind you. Those who were present—the course was mainly about Heat or Warmth2Stuttgart, 1st to 14th March 1920, generally known as the “Second Scientific Lecture-Course”. Issued (in the original German) by the Science Section of the Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland, 1925.—will no doubt recall it. I said that when we look at the phenomena of warmth in their relation to other phenomena of the Universe we are obliged to form a far more concrete idea of the Ether, of which the physicists generally speak in rather hypothetical terms. I said that in the formulae of Physics, wherever the force of pressure occurs as regards ponderable matter, we have to replace it by a force of suction as regards the ether. In other words, if we insert a plus sign for the intensity of a force in the realm of ponderable matter, we must give a minus sign to the corresponding intensity in the ether. I suggested that the well-known formulae should be looked through with this end in view; for one would see how remarkably, when this is done, they harmonize with the phenomena of Nature.
Take for example that whole game of thought, if I may call it so, the Kinetic Theory of Gases, of of Heat itself,—the molecules impinging on each other and on the walls of the containing vessel. Take all this brutal play of mutual impact and recoil which is supposed to represent the thermal condition of gas. Instead of this phenomena will become clear and penetrable the moment we perceive that within warmth itself there are two conditions. akin to the conditions that prevail in ponderable matter; the other must be thought of as akin to the ether. Warmth is in this respect different from Air or Light. For light, if we are calculating truly we must use the negative sign throughout. Whatever in our formulae is to represent the effects of light, must bear a negative sign. For air or gas the sign must be positive. For warmth on the other hand, the positive and negative will have to alternate. What we are wont to distinguish as conducted heat, radiant heat and so on will only then become clear and transparent.
Within the realm of matter itself, these things reveal the need for a qualitative transition from the positive to the negative in characterizing the different kinds of force. And we now see, very significantly, how for the planetary system we also have to pass from the positive—that is, gravitation—to the corresponding negative, the repelling force.
One more thing I will say today, if only to formulate the problem. For the moment I will carry it no further, but only put the problem; we shall have time to go into these things in later lectures. Now that we have ascertained all this about the cometary bodies, let me compare the relation between our planetary system and the comets to what is there in the ovum, the female germ-cell, in its relation to the male element, the fertilizing sperm. Try to imagine, try to visualize the two processes, as you might actually see them. There is the planetary system; it receives something new into itself, namely the effects of a comet. There is the ovum; it receives into itself the fertilizing effect of the male cell, the spermatozoid.
Look at the two phenomena side by side without prejudice, as you might do in ordinary life when you see two things obviously comparable, side by side. Do you not find plenty of comparable features when you contemplate these two? I do not mean to set up any theory or hypothesis, I only want to indicate what you will see for yourselves if you once look at these things in their true connection.
Taking our start from this, tomorrow we may hope to enter into more concrete and more detailed aspects.
Achter Vortrag
[ 1 ] Es ist schon notwendig, daß wir, um diese Betrachtungen zu einem gewissen Ende zu führen, diesen subtilen Gang nehmen, den ich bisher eingehalten habe, das heißt möglichst viel von jenen Vorstellungen herbeizuschaffen, welche uns dann zu diesem Ziel, diesem Ende führen können. Dazu wird notwendig sein, daß ich auch während der Zeit, während welcher ich die anderen Vorträge halte, also vom 11. bis 15., diese Vorträge in einer Weise, wie wir es mit der Waldorfschule vereinigen können, fortsetze, sonst würde der Stoff nicht bewältigt werden können. Aber ich werde dann auch, weil ja gerade an diejenigen Dinge, die hier durchgeführt werden, sich wirklich sehr viele Bedenken, Zweifel und Fragen anknüpfen können, Sie bitten, daß für einen Tag der nächsten Woche jeder dasjenige vorbereitet, was er gerne in Anknüpfung an die Darstellungen fragen möchte zur Verdeutlichung und dergleichen. Ich werde das, was in dieser Weise gefragt wird, dann einmal in einem der Vorträge der nächsten Woche verarbeiten, das heißt, es vor Ihnen vorbringen, damit wir ein möglichst vollständiges Bild der Sache bekommen. Unter diesen Voraussetzungen werden wir auch die subtileren Dinge, möchte ich sagen, die ich eingefügt habe in diesen Gang der Darstellungen, beibehalten können.
[ 2 ] Machen wir uns noch einmal klar, wie wir eigentlich die ganze Betrachtung, die uns hineinführen soll in das Verständnis der Himmelskunde und des Zusammenhanges mit den irdischen Erscheinungen, wie wir den ganzen Gang dieser Betrachtungen eingerichtet haben. Wir sind davon ausgegangen, darauf hinzuweisen, wie gewöhnlich solche Betrachtungen nur darauf hinzielen, das zu berücksichtigen, was der Sinnesbeobachtung, auch der bewaffneten Sinnesbeobachtung, vorliegt. So war ja im wesentlichen alles dasjenige orientiert, was auch bis in unsere Tage für das Verständnis, für die Erklärung der Himmelserscheinungen beigebracht worden ist. Nicht wahr, man hat ja zunächst dasjenige in den Kreis der Beobachtung hereingezogen, was man heute die scheinbaren Bewegungen der Himmelskörper nennt. Man hat die scheinbare Bewegung des Sternenhimmels um die Erde herum, die scheinbare Bewegung der Sonne ins Auge gefaßt. Man hat dann gesehen, wie die Planeten merkwürdige Bahnen beschreiben. Teile dieser Planetenbahnen sind einfach für den Augenschein so etwas wie Schleifen (Fig. 1). Der Planet geht so, geht wieder zurück, geht so. Man hat sich gesagt: Wenn die Erde selber in Bewegung ist, so muß dadurch, daß ja diese Eigenbewegung der Erde zunächst nicht in die Wahrnehmung hineintritt, das vorliegen, daß die wirklichen Bewegungen der Himmelskörper andere sind, als sie dem unmittelbaren Augenschein gegeben sind.

[ 3 ] Und man hat dann durch Interpretationen sich eine Vorstellung darüber gemacht, wie eben unter Beobachtung der mathematischen Figuralität die wirklichen Bewegungen sein könnten. Da ist man zunächst zu dem kopernikanischen System gekommen, dann zu all den Modifikationen, die seither an diesem vollzogen worden sind. Man hat also im wesentlichen dasjenige ins Auge gefaßt, was sich dem Erkenntnisvermögen ergibt, insoferne dieses Erkenntnisvermögen sich den Sinnen und der Verarbeitung der Sinneseindrücke durch den Verstand, durch die Interpretation, überlassen will.
[ 4 ] Wir haben nun darauf aufmerksam gemacht, wie eine solche Betrachtungsweise nicht ausreichen kann, um in die Realität der Himmelserscheinungen hineinzudringen, aus dem einfachen Grunde, weil ja das mathematische Vorgehen nicht genügt; weil wir gewissermaßen, wenn wir Rechnungsansätze machen, aufhören müssen in einem gewissen Moment mit dem Ausrechnen. Ich habe Sie darauf aufmerksam gemacht, daß jene Verhältniszahlen, die bestehen zwischen den Umlaufzeiten der verschiedenen Planeten, inkommensutable Zahlen, inkommensurable Größen sind, daß dies uns zeigt: Wir kommen mit dem Rechnen nicht hinein in das eigentliche Gefüge der Himmelserscheinungen, wir müssen irgendwo stehen bleiben. Daraus folgt aber, daß wir eine andere Betrachtungsweise anwenden müssen, eine solche Betrachtungsweise, welche sich eben nicht darauf beschränkt, bloß das ins Auge zu fassen, sagen wir zunächst am Menschen, wozu die äußere Sinnesbeobachtung führt, sondern was zugrunde liegt dem ganzer Menschen, was vielleicht auch zugrunde liegt den anderen Wesen der Naturreiche auf der Erde. Auf alle diese Dinge haben wir schon hingewiesen, und ich habe dann gezeigt, wie mit der menschlichen Organisation in Zusammenhang gebracht werden können gewisse Erscheinungen, die im Laufe der Erdenentwickelung uns entgegentreten; wie also etwas, wie zum Beispiel die Eiszeiten, die in einer gewissen Weise rhythmisch im Gange der Erdenentwickelung eintreten, in Zusammenhang gebracht werden müssen mit der Menschheitsentwickelung, mit der Entwickelung des Menschen. Wenn dann das der Fall ist, dann geben uns solche Zusammenhänge einen Hinweis, wie es eigentlich beschaffen sein mag mit den Bewegungen im Himmelsraum. Und solche Dinge müssen wir weiter verfolgen.
[ 5 ] Bevor wir die mehr formale Betrachtungsweise, zu der wir gestern gekommen sind, fortsetzen, wollen wir noch einmal aufnehmen dasjenige, was sich uns ergeben hat für den Zusammenhang des Menschen in seiner Entwickelung mit der Entwickelung der Erde durch die Eiszeiten hindurch. Das haben wir ja schon sagen können, daß die besondere Art von Erkenntnis, die der Mensch in der Gegenwart sein eigen nennt, im Grunde genommen ihm nur wirklich eigen ist seit der letzten Eiszeit, daß seit der letzten Eiszeit ja auch jene Kulturperioden verflossen sind, von denen ich immer spreche als der urindischen Kulturperiode, der urpersischen Kulturperiode, der ägyptisch-chaldäischen, der griechisch-lateinischen bis herein zu unserer Kulturperiode. Wir haben auch darauf hingewiesen, daß vor dieser Eiszeit vorzugsweise sich entwickelt haben müsse in der menschlichen Natur dasjenige, was jetzt im gegenwärtigen Menschen mehr zurückliegt, weniger an der Oberfläche liegt: die Organisation seines Vorstellungsvermögens. Und wir haben gestern darauf aufmerksam gemacht, daß diese Organisation des Vorstellungslebens aus ihrer Qualität heraus dann begriffen wird, wenn man weiß, dieses Vorstellungsleben ist in seiner Qualität nur zu vergleichen eigentlich mit dem Traum. Nur dadurch bekommen unsere Vorstellungen, sagte ich, eine gewisse Konfiguration und einen gesättigten Inhalt, daß eben das Sinneserlebnis da ist. Dasjenige, was da gewissermaßen hinter den Sinneswahrnehmungen aus unserer Organisation heraus im Vorstellungsleben wirkt, das wirkt mit der Dumpfheit des Traumlebens. Wir würden nur mit der Dumpfheit des Traumlebens vorstellen können - wenn man überhaupt so etwas sagen darf -, wenn nicht hereinschlüge mit jedem Aufwachen in dieses Vorstellungsleben das Sinneserleben. Dieses Vorstellungsleben, das also ein dumpferes ist als das Sinnesleben, das führt uns zurück in jene Entwickelungsphasen der menschlichen Natur, die vor det letzten Vereisungszeit liegen — in unserer anthroposophischen Sprache: die im alten atlantischen Gebiet liegen.
[ 6 ] Was muß denn da eigentlich für den Menschen Tatsache gewesen sein? Erstens etwas, wodurch er einen innigeren Zusammenhang hatte mit der ihn umgebenden Welt, als das jetzt bei der Sinneswahrnehmung der Fall ist. Die Sinneswahrnehmung beherrschen wir mit dem Willen. Wenigstens richten wir unsere Augen durch den Willen und wir können ja vermöge der Aufmerksamkeit auch weitergehen in der Behertschung der Sinneswahrnehmung durch den Willen. Jedenfalls wirkt in unseren Sinneswahrnehmungen der Wille. Wir sind in einer gewissen Weise unabhängig von der Außenwelt, indem wir aus innerer Willkür uns selber orientieren können. Das ist aber nur dadurch der Fall, daß wir in einer gewissen Weise uns als Menschen vom Weltenall emanzipiert haben. So emanzipiert können wir nicht gewesen sein vor der letzten Eiszeit ich sage jetzt können, weil ich eben von seiten der äußeren empirischen Wissenschaft sprechen will. Da muß, während unser Vorstellungsvermögen sich ausgebildet hat, der Mensch in seinen Zuständen mehr abhängig gewesen sein von demjenigen, was sich in seiner Umgebung abspielte. Wie wir jetzt durch das Sonnenlicht um uns herum die Welt sehen, aber wie dieses Schen der Welt einer gewissen Willkür von innen unterworfen ist, so muß dazumal im Hingegebensein an die äußere Welt der Mensch abhängig gewesen sein von der beleuchteten Erde und ihren beleuchteten Gegenständen und wiederum von der Dunkelheit, der Finsternis, wenn die Sonne zur Nachtzeit nicht geschienen hat. Also der Mensch muß Wechselzustände erlebt haben zwischen dem Aufglimmen desjenigen, was das Vorstellungsvermögen, das sich ja damals entwickelt hat, ist, und wiederum dem Abfluten dieses Vorstellungslebens. Wir haben, mit anderen Worten, einen ähnlichen inneren Zustand, zubereitet durch des Menschen Wechselverhältnis mit dem Weltenall, wie er uns entgegengetreten ist in jenen eigentümlichen Zusammenhängen der weiblichen Funktionen mit den Mondenphasen in bezug auf ihre Zeitlänge. Dieses innere Funktionieren der weiblichen Natur ich sagte ja, bei der männlichen Natur ist es auch vorhanden, aber mehr nach innen, daher wird es weniger wahrgenommen - ist so, daß es einmal zusammengehangen hat mit den Vorgängen des äußeren Weltenalls, dann sich von ihnen emanzipiert hat und eine Eigentümlichkeit der menschlichen Natur selber geworden ist, so daß nicht mehr dasjenige, was jetzt im Menschen vor sich geht, zusammenzufallen braucht mit den äußeren Tatsachen, daß aber die Zeitfolge, die Phasenfolge noch dieselbe ist, wie sie war, als die Dinge äußerlich zusammenfielen.
[ 7 ] Etwas Ähnliches ist in der Tat der Fall für dasjenige, was ein innerer Wechsel ist in unserm, jetzt vom Sinnesleben mehr oder weniger unabhängigen, in der Zeit zurückliegenden Organisiertsein mit Bezug auf das Vorstellungsleben. Ein Ähnliches ist dafür vorhanden. Wir machen einen innerlichen Rhythmus durch von helleren Vorstellungskräften und dunkleren Vorstellungskräften, die in einem täglichen Wechsel auf und ab fluten. Und nur dadurch, daß das ein viel weniger intensiver Vorgang ist als der andere, welcher mit den Mondphasen parallel geht, bemerken wir ihn nicht. Wir tragen in der Tat in unserer Hauptesorganisation heute einen Wechsel zwischen einem dumpferen und einem helleren Leben. Wir tragen in unserer Hauptesorganisation ein rhythmisches Leben. Das eine Mal sind wir mehr geneigt, von innen heraus etwas entgegenzubringen den Sinneswahrnehmungen, das andere Mal sind wir weniger geneigt, etwas entgegenzubringen den Sinneswahrnehmungen, nur daß diese Wechselzustände eben den Zeitraum von 24 Stunden umfassen. Und es wäre interessant, etwa durch Kurven zu beobachten, wie die Menschen verschieden sind gerade in bezug auf diese innerliche Kopfperiode des Wechsels von helleren oder regeren Vorstellungskräften und dumpfen, schläfrigen Vorstellungskräften. Denn die dumpfen, schläfrigen Vorstellungskräfte, die sind dasjenige, was sozusagen eine innere Nacht des Hauptes ist; die helleren sind dasjenige, was ein innerer Tag des Hauptes ist. Das stimmt nicht überein mit dem äußeren Wechsel von Tag und Nacht. Wir haben einen inneren Wechsel von Helligkeit und Dunkelheit. Und je nachdem der eine Mensch dieses innere Wechseln von Hell und Dunkel so hat, daß eine größere Neigung vorhanden ist, sagen wir, den hellen Teil, den hellen Ablauf seiner Vorstellungskraft zusammenzubringen mit den Sinneswahrnehmungen, oder den dunklen Teil zusammenzubringen mit den Sinneswahrnehmungen, je nachdem der Mensch das eine oder andere in seiner Organisation hat, ist er verschieden in bezug auf die Möglichkeit, die Fähigkeit, die äußere Welt zu beobachten. Der eine hat eine starke Neigung, die äußeren Erscheinungen scharf ins Auge zu fassen; der andere hat eine weniger starke Neigung, die äußeren Erscheinungen scharf ins Auge zu fassen, er wendet sich mehr dem inneren Brüten zu. Das rührt eben von diesem Wechselverhältnis her, das ich eben geschildert habe. Solche Beobachtungen, meine lieben Freunde, die sollten wir ganz besonders als Erzieher uns angewöhnen zu machen. Denn sie werden uns wichtige Fingerzeige geben, um im Erziehen und Unterrichten in entsprechender Weise die Kinder zu behandeln.
[ 8 ] Dasjenige, was uns aber heute besonders interessiert, ist, daß der Mensch gewissermaßen verinnerlicht dasjenige, was er einmal durchgemacht hat im Wechselverhältnis mit der Außenwelt, daß das dann in ihm auftritt als ein innerer Rhythmus, der zwar noch den Zeitablauf bewahrt, der aber nicht mehr zusammenfällt in bezug auf seine Zeitgrenze mit dem Äußeren. So daß wir sagen müssen: Der Mensch vor der Eiszeit wird regelmäßig zusammenfallend gehabt haben mit den äußeren Vorgängen sein bald helleres, innigeres Miterleben des Weltenalls, sein bald dumpfes Zurückgezogensein in sich selber. Die Nachwirkungen dieses damaligen im Zusammenleben mit dem Weltall hervorgehenden Erhelltwerdens, Erfülltwerdens des Bewußtseins mit Bildern und des Zurücktretens, des Brütens über die Bilder, was seinen Nachklang hat in unserem innerlichen mehr oder weniger melancholischen Brüten, dasjenige also, was dazumal der Mensch erlebt hat, ist heute zurückgedrängt worden in die innere Organisation, und an der äußeren Peripherie ist dafür eine neue Entwickelung des Sinnesvermögens eingetreten, das ja schon in früheren Erdperioden da war, natürlich aber nicht so entwickelt wie jetzt.
[ 9 ] Wir sehen also hinein in das Weltenall, wenn wir auf dasjenige blicken, was im Menschen als die Folge seines Zusammenhanges mit den Weltenerscheinungen Platz gegriffen hat. Der Mensch muß uns erscheinen als ein Reagens für die Beurteilung der Himmelserscheinungen. Aber wir müssen zu Hilfe nehmen die anderen Naturwesen, wenn wir eine gewisse Vollständigkeit erzielen wollen. Und da möchte ich zunächst Ihren Blick lenken auf etwas, was ja jedem sich darbietet, was aber seiner Wichtigkeit nach gewöhnlich nicht betrachtet wird. Nehmen Sie die einjährige Pflanze in ihrer Entwickelung. Sie macht einen gewissen Kreislauf durch. Dieser Pflanze in ihrer einjährigen Entwickelung ist ja ganz offenbar auch dasjenige anzusehen, was ich gestern auseinandergesetzt habe: der Unterschied von direkter Sonnenwirkung und indirekter Sonnenwirkung. Das eine Mal ist die Sonnenwirkung direkt: Blütenentstehung; das andere Mal ist die Sonnenwirkung so, daß die Erde dazwischen ist: Wurzelentstehung. Wir haben also auch bei der Pflanze dasjenige, was wir gestern für das Tier ausführen konnten und was wir dann in einer gewissen Weise auf den Menschen angewendet haben.
[ 10 ] Nun aber werden wir eine solche Tatsache nur in der richtigen Weise würdigen, wenn wir sie auch zusammenbringen mit einer anderen. Das ist diese, daß es ja auch dauernde Pflanzen gibt. Wie steht die dauernde Pflanze zu der einjährigen Pflanze in bezug auf die Zusammengehörigkeit des Pflanzenwachstums zur Erde? Die dauernde Pflanze behält den Stamm, und eigentlich wächst jedes Jahr, man könnte sagen, an dem Stamm eine neue Pflanzenwelt. Es wächst an dem Stamm, natürlich modifiziert, metamorphosiert, eine Pflanzenwelt; an dem Stamm, der aus der Erde herauswächst. Und es ist einfach ganz selbstverständlich für den, der morphologischen Sinn hat, zu sagen: Da habe ich auf der einen Seite die Erdoberfläche, daraus wächst mir die Pflanze heraus; und dann habe ich den Stamm der Dauerpflanze, der jedes Jahr den Pflanzenansatz bekommt. Dann muß ich irgend etwas — zunächst will ich nur sagen: irgend etwas — mir fortgesetzt denken von der Erde in den Pflanzenstamm hinein. Dasjenige, worauf da (Fig.2, links) die Pflanze wächst, das muß sich hier (Fig.2, rechts) auch im Stamm finden.

[ 11 ] Das heißt, es muß gewissermaßen etwas aus der Erde in den Stamm hineingehen. Ich habe kein Recht, den Pflanzenstamm der Dauerpflanze nur als etwas anzusehen, was gar nicht zur Erde gehört, sondern ich habe ihn als einen modifizierten Teil der Erde selber anzusehen. Nur dann betrachte ich ihn in der richtigen Weise. Nur dann komme ich darauf, die Zusammenhänge, die da bestehen, wirklich ins Auge zu fassen. Es ist also da etwas in der Pflanze drinnen, was sonst nur in der Erde drinnen ist und wodurch die Pflanze gerade dauernd wird. Sie entreißt sich dadurch, daß sie etwas von dem Irdischen in sich selber aufnimmt, der Abhängigkeit vom jährlichen Sonnenlauf. Wir können also sagen: Die Dauer Fig. 2 Pe pflanze entreißt sich der Abhängigkeit vom jährlichen Sonnenlauf. Dadurch, daß sie sich emanzipiert von diesem jährlichen Sonnenlauf, insoferne sie Stamm ist, dadurch nimmt sie in ihre eigene Natur auf und kann jetzt gewissermaßen selber, was früher nur zustande gekommen ist durch die Einwirkung der kosmischen Umwelt.
[ 12 ] Haben wir da nicht schon bei der Pflanze vorgebildet dasjenige, was ich zum Beispiel jetzt am Menschen eben auseinandergesetzt habe für die Voreiszeit? Ich habe auseinandergesetzt, daß durch die Zusammenhänge mit der Umwelt sich gerade der Rhythmus des Vorstellungslebens entwickelt hat. Das, was zuerst sich bloß entwickelt hat im Wechselverhältnis des Menschen mit der Umgebung, das ist etwas in seinem Innern geworden. Bei der Pflanze haben wir dies angedeutet, indem aus der einjährigen Pflanze die Dauerpflanze wird. Wir haben also da einen ganz allgemeinen Prozeß im Weltenall: Die organischen Wesen sind auf dem Wege einer Emanzipation von den Zusammenhängen mit der Umwelt. Indem wir eine Dauerpflanze entstehen sehen, müssen wir sagen, es lernt gewissermaßen - verzeihen Sie, daß ich diesen Ausdruck gebrauche - die Dauerpflanze etwas aus der Zeit, in der sie in Abhängigkeit von der kosmischen Umwelt ist, und dann kann sie das selber. Sie bringt dann gewissermaßen jedes Jahr neue Pflanzensprößlinge hervor. Das ist eine für das Verständnis der Weltenzusammenhänge außerordentlich wichtige Tatsache. Man kommt nicht zu dem Verständnis der Welterscheinungen, wenn man nur immer die Dinge, die nebeneinander sind, oder diejenigen, die sich einem gerade in das Blickfeld des Mikroskops hineindrängen, betrachtet. Man kommt zum Verständnis der Welterscheinungen nur, wenn man die Einzelheiten aus dem großen Ganzen heraus wirklich zusammenhängend begreifen kann.
[ 13 ] Aber fassen wir die Sache jetzt ins Auge, indem wir sie einfach anschauen. Wir haben die einjährige Pflanze unterworfen dem Wechselverhältnis gegenüber dem Kosmos im Laufe eines Jahres; wit haben dann verschwindend diesen Einfluß des Kosmos in der Dauerpflanze. Wir haben gewissermaßen in der Dauerpflanze bewahrt dasjenige, was sonst verschwindet im Laufe eines Jahres. Wir sehen gewissermaßen im Stamm heraussptossen aus der Erde dasjenige, was Wirkung des Jahres ist und aufbewahrt wird. Dieses Übergehen desjenigen, was sonst zusammenhängt mit der Außenwelt, in die innere Wirkungsweise, das können wir im ganzen Verlauf der Naturerscheinungen betrachten, sofern diese Naturetscheinungen kosmische sind. Wir müssen daher die Zusammenhänge unserer Erde mit dem Kosmos immer bei gewissen Erscheinungen suchen, und bei anderen Erscheinungen müssen wir sagen, daß sich diese kosmischen Wirkungen verbergen. Es kommt daher darauf an, daß wir gerade dasjenige herausfinden, was uns hinführt auf die kosmischen Einflüsse, was ein wirkliches Reagens dafür ist. Die einjährige Pflanze sagt uns etwas über den Zusammenhang der Erde mit dem Kosmos; die Dauerpflanze kann uns darüber nicht mehr viel sagen.
[ 14 ] Wiederum muß uns das Verhältnis vom Tier zum Menschen auf eine wichtige Fährte bringen. Betrachten Sie das Tier in seiner Entwickelung. Sehen wir zunächst vom Embryonalleben ab - wir könnten es auch einbeziehen. Das Tier wird geboren, es wächst bis zu einer gewissen Grenze heran, wird geschlechtsreif. Betrachten Sie dieses ganze tierische Leben bis zur Geschlechtsreife hin und dann über dieselbe hinaus. Sie können ganz hypothesenfrei die Tatsache betrachten und Sie werden sich sagen müssen, mit dem Tier geht doch etwas Eigentümliches vor, wenn es die Geschlechtsreife erlangt hat. Es ist dann in einer gewissen Weise eigentlich fertig für diese irdische Welt. Wir können eigentlich - natürlich, die Dinge sind ja alle approximativ, aber im wesentlichen sind sie so - Fortschrittsprozesse nach der Geschlechtsreife beim Tiere nicht mehr verfolgen. Es ist der wichtigste Zielpunkt in seiner Entwickelung diese Geschlechtsreife. Und dasjenige, was sie unmittelbar im Gefolge hat, was eben zutage tritt durch die Geschlechtsreife, das ist dann da, aber wir können nicht sagen, daß danach irgend etwas, was wir als Progression bezeichnen können, eintritt.
[ 15 ] Anders ist das beim Menschen. Der Mensch bleibt entwickelungsfähig bis über die Geschlechtsreife hinaus, nur verinnerlicht sich diese Entwickelung. Es wäre etwas höchst Trauriges um den Menschen in seiner Menschennatur, wenn er in derselben Weise fertig wäre mit seiner Entwickelung bei der Geschlechtsreife, wie das Tier fertig ist. Der Mensch geht darüber hinaus und hat dann noch einen Fonds in sich, der weiter hinausdringt, der besondere Wege einschlägt, der nichts zu tun hat mit der Geschlechtsreife. Wir können sagen, hier liegt etwas Ähnliches vor wie die Verinnerlichung des Jahresprozesses bei der Dauerpflanze gegenüber der einjährigen Pflanze. Dasjenige, was beim Tier vorliegt bei der Geschlechtsteife, sehen wir verinnerlicht beim Menschen von der Geschlechtsreife angefangen. Es muß uns also etwas auf Kosmisches hinweisen beim Menschen, insofern er in der Entwickelung von der Geburt bis zur Geschlechtsreife ist, was dann sich von diesem Kosmischen emanzipiert, wenn der Mensch über die Geschlechtsreife hinausgewachsen ist, gerade so wie bei der Dauerpflanze.
[ 16 ] Das, sehen Sie, ist ein Weg, um die Erscheinungen der Wesen zu taxieren und allmählich Wegweiser zu finden für die Zusammenhänge der irdischen Wesen mit dem Kosmos. Denn wir sehen dadurch, daß, wenn diese kosmischen Einflüsse aufhören, sie sich in das Innere der Natur der einzelnen Wesen selber verlegen. Dieses wollen wir nun auf die eine Seite legen und wollen dann später es im Zusammenhang betrachten, zu einer Synthese vereinigt mit etwas wesentlich anderem.
[ 17 ] Greifen wir jetzt auf, was ich wiederholt gesagt habe: Die Umlaufzeiten der Planeten im Sonnensystem stehen in Verhältnissen zueinander, die inkommensurabel sind. Wenn man von da ab nun sich überlegt, was geschehen würde, wenn die Verhältniszahlen der Umlaufzeiten der Planeten nicht inkommensurabel wären, so müßte man sich sagen: Es würden im Planetensystem Störungen entstehen, die sich immer wiederholen würden und die durch ihre Wiederholungen das Planetensystem zum Stillstand bringen würden. Es ist durch eine einfache Rechnung, die uns aber hier zu weit führen würde, nachzuweisen, daß nur durch die Inkommensurabilität der Verhältniszahlen bei den Umlaufzeiten der Planeten das Planetensystem gewissermaßen im Leben bleibt. Es muß also einen Zustand im Sonnensystem geben, der immer hindrängt eigentlich nach Stillstand. Und diesen Zustand, den rechnen wir eigentlich, wenn wir an ein Ende der Rechnung kommen. Kommen wir aber an das Inkommensurable, so kommen wir nicht an ein Ende der Rechnung. Da kommen wir gerade an das Leben des Planetensystems heran. Wir sind in einer merkwürdigen Lage, wenn wir das Planetensystem berechnen. Würde es so sein, daß wir es berechnen könnten, dann würde es sterben, würde längst gestorben sein, wie ich früher schon einmal sagte. Es lebt dadurch, daß wir es nicht berechnen können. Alles dasjenige, was wir nicht berechnen können im Planetensystem, ist das Lebendige. Was legen wir der Rechnung zugrunde, wenn wir ausrechnen bis zu dem Punkte, wo das Planetensystem sterben müßte? Wir legen zugrunde die Gravitationskraft, die Weltengravitation! In der Tat, wenn wir nur die Gravitationskraft zugrunde legen und von da aus dann konsequent denken, bis wir zu einem Bilde kommen des Planetensystems unter dem Einfluß der Gravitationskraft, dann kommen wir ja allerdings zur kommensurablen Verhältniszahl. Aber das Planetensystem müßte ersterben. Wir rechnen also gerade soweit, als im Planetensystem der Tod ist, und verwenden dazu die Gravitationskraft. Es muß im Planetensystem etwas sein, was etwas anderes ist als die Gravitationskraft und was gerade der Inkommensurabilität zugrunde liegt.
[ 18 ] Ganz gut lassen sich mit der Gravitationskraft vereinigen, auch der Genese nach, die Planetenbahnen, nur müßten die Umlaufzeiten dann kommensurabel sein. Was sich dann aber nicht vereinigen läßt mit der Gravitationskraft, was gar nicht hereinpaßt in unser Planetensystem, das ist dasjenige, was uns in den kometarischen Körpern zutage tritt. Diese kometarischen Körper, die eine merkwürdige Rolle in unserem Sonnensystem spielen, sie haben ja in der letzten Zeit die Wissenschaft zu ganz merkwürdigen Dingen gedrängt. Ich will dabei ganz absehen davon, daß man innerhalb der Wissenschaft ja gern alles dasjenige, was gerade erkannt wird, als Erklärungsprinzipien anwendet. Zum Beispiel auf dem physiologischen Gebiet redete man ja eine Zeitlang gern davon, daß sich unsere sogenannten sensitiven Nerven von der Peripherie nach dem Innern erstrecken wie Telegraphendrähte, die dann ankommen und gewissermaßen durch eine Art von Umschaltung weiterleiten dasjenige, was dann Willenshandlungen, Willensimpulse sind. Daß so dasjenige, was durch die zentripetalen Nerven geht, übertragen werde auf zentrifugale Nerven, das hat man immer verglichen mit Telegraphenleitungen. Nun, vielleicht, wenn einmal etwas gefunden wird, das sich in anderer Weise darstellt wie just der Telegraphendraht, wird man nach dieser Methode ein anderes Bild für diese Sache gebrauchen können. Und so wendet man, wie man in den Moden wechselt, alle diejenigen Dinge, die in irgendeinem Zeitalter gefunden werden, an, um der Erklärung gewisser Erscheinungen beizukommen. Man macht es da fast so wie auf gewissen Gebieten der Therapie, wo, kaum daß irgend etwas gefunden ist, es auch gleich als Heilmittel «entdeckt» wird, ohne daß man darüber nachdenkt, wie das im Grunde zusammenhängt. Nun man die Röntgenstrahlen hat, sind sie ein Heilmittel; hätte man sie nicht, so könnte man sie nicht anwenden. Es liegt darin etwas, wo man sich ganz der Willkür des Weltenganges in einer chaotischen Weise überläßt. So auch ist es gekommen, daß man durch die spektroskopischen Untersuchungen und durch den Vergleich mit den spektroskopischen Ergebnissen bei den Planeten auf gewisse elektromagnetische Wirkungen innerhalb der kometarischen Erscheinungen gekommen ist. Diese Dinge führen aber doch nicht weiter als höchstens zu Analogien, die ja zuweilen gewiß mit der Wirklichkeit zusammenhängen, die aber den ganz gewiß nicht befriedigen können, der tiefer hineinschauen will in die Realität.
[ 19 ] Aber eines ist, möchte ich sagen, wie eine Notwendigkeit hervorgetreten bei der Betrachtung der Erscheinungen an den Kometen. Man ist, mag man nun nach der Mode die Dinge so oder so nennen, gedrängt worden, während man sonst überall im Planetensystem von Gravitationskräften spricht, bei der eigentümlichen Stellung des Kometenschweifes zur Sonne von Abstoßungskräften von der Sonne zu sprechen, von Rückstoßkräften. Man ist genötigt, zur Gravitation etwas hinzuzusuchen, was dieser Gravitation entgegengesetzt ist. Es tritt also mit den Kometen in unser Planetensystem fortwährend etwas herein, was dem inneren Gefüge des Planetensystems entgegengesetzt ist. So daß hier etwas liegt, was es begreiflich erscheinen läßt, daß man das Kometenrätsel durch lange Zeiten hindurch mit einem gewissen Aberglauben betrachtet hat. Man hat ein Gefühl davon gehabt: In dem Gang der Planeten drücken sich die Naturgesetze aus, da drückt sich dasjenige aus, was angemessen ist unserem Planetensystem; in den Erscheinungen der Kometen drückt sich etwas Entgegengesetztes aus, da kommt etwas herein in unser Planetensystem, das sich invers verhält zu unseren planetarischen Erscheinungen. Das führte dazu, auf der einen Seite zu sehen die planetarischen Erscheinungen und in ihnen gewissermaßen die Naturgesetze verkörpert, realisiert zu sehen; auf der anderen Seite in den kometarischen Erscheinungen das Entgegengesetzte von den Naturgesetzen zu sehen. So hat man zusammengebracht, nicht in den ältesten Zeiten, aber in gewissen Zeiten, die Kometen mit gewissermaßen fliegenden moralischen Kräften, welche Zuchtruten sein sollten für die sündigen Menschen. Wir sehen das heute mit Recht als einen Aberglauben an. Aber schon Hegel kann sich an so etwas nicht gut vorbeidrücken, was, ich möchte sagen, sich so halb wie etwas mit dem Natürlichen nicht zu Durchdringenden ausspricht. Man glaubte natürlich im 19. Jahrhundert nicht mehr, daß die Kometen irgendwie als moralische Richter auftreten, aber man brachte sie in der ersten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts durch eine gewisse Statistik in Zusammenhang mit guten und schlechten Weinjahren, die ja auch etwas scheinbar recht Unregelmäßiges haben, was auch in der Aufeinanderfolge den Naturgesetzen nicht ganz entspricht. Und Hegel konnte sich um das nicht herumdrücken. Das erscheint ihm sehr plausibel, daß mit guten und schlechten Weinjahren das Erscheinen oder Nichterscheinen von Kometen etwas zu tun habe.
[ 20 ] Jetzt steht der Mensch auf dem Standpunkt, insofern er ein Verhältnis zur zeitgenössischen Wissenschaft hat, daß er sagt: Unser Planetensystem hat von den Kometen nichts zu fürchten. Die Kometen rufen Erscheinungen hervor innerhalb unseres Planetensystems, die eigentlich mit diesem keinen rechten inneren Zusammenhang haben. Sie kommen als solche Sonderlinge des Weltenalls aus fernen Gegenden in unsere Sonnennähe, rufen da gewisse Erscheinungen hervor durch rückstoßende Kräfte von der Sonne, haben eine Zunahme ihrer Erscheinungen, eine Abnahme, und verschwinden dann wieder. Eine Persönlichkeit, die noch einen gewissen Fonds in sich hatte, die äußere Welt nicht bloß mit dem Intellekt aufzufassen, sondern mit dem ganzen menschlichen Wesen, die noch eine gewisse Intuition hatte für die Erscheinungen des Himmels, Kepler, er hat einen merkwürdigen Satz über die Kometen ausgesprochen, der ungeheuer viel dem zu denken gibt, der überhaupt die ganze Seelenverfassung dieses Kepler ein wenig auf sich wirken läßt. Wir haben die drei Keplerschen Gesetze besprochen, die etwas so außerordentlich Genialisches im Grunde darstellen, wenn man sie im Zusammenhang betrachtet mit dem, was dazumal als Vorstellungen über das Planetensystem da war. Die setzen aber voraus, daß Kepler ein tiefes Gefühl hatte von einer inneren Harmonie im planetarischen System, nicht bloß von irgend etwas, was sich einfach trocken errechnen läßt, sondern von einer inneren Harmonie. Und als den letzten Ausdruck, möchte ich sagen, dieser inneren Harmonie, als den letzten quantitativen Ausdruck für etwas Qualitatives, empfand er selbst seine drei Hauptgesetze des Planetensystems. Und aus dieser Empfindung heraus hat er einen Ausspruch getan über die Kometen, der außerordentlich bedeutsam ist und den man nachfühlen kann, wenn man sich auf solche Dinge einläßt. Er hat gesagt: Es gibt im Weltenall, also in dem uns überschaubaren Weltenall, so viele Kometen wie Fische im Meer, nur sehen wir die wenigsten von ihnen. Diejenigen, die wir sehen, sind nur ein kleiner Teil davon. Die anderen bleiben durch ihre Kleinheit oder durch sonstige Verhältnisse unsichtbar. - Im Grunde genommen hat auch die äußere Forschung diesen Ausspruch Keplers ja bestätigt, indem einfach seit der Erfindung des Teleskops viel mehr Kometen gesehen worden sind als früher, wo dieselben auch verzeichnet worden sind, so daß man vergleichen kann. Außerdem haben andere Mittel ergeben, daß, wenn man unter veränderten Beleuchtungsverhältnissen, also bei starker Dunkelheit, das Himmelsgewölbe betrachtet, man auch mehr Kometen verzeichnen muß als sonst. Also in einer gewissen Weise nähert sich selbst die empirische Forschung demjenigen, was Kepler aus tiefem Naturempfinden heraus geäußert hat.
[ 21 ] Wenn man aber überhaupt von einem Zusammenhang desjenigen, was auf der Erde geschieht, mit dem Kosmos spricht, dann erscheint es doch nicht so ohne weiteres tunlich, daß man wohl von dem Zusammenhang anderer Weltenkörper, anderer Körper unseres Planetensystems mit der Erde spricht, daß man aber nicht spricht von denjenigen, die in einer solchen Weise hereinkommen und wieder hinausgehen wie die Kometen; insbesondere dann, wenn wir heute zugeben müssen, daß der Komet Erscheinungen hervorruft, die gerade eben auf entgegengesetzte Kräfte hinweisen, als diejenigen sind, die gewöhnlich für unser Planetensystem als zusammenhaltende Kräfte genommen werden. In der Tat kommt durch den Kometen in unser System etwas herein, was diesem System entgegengesetzt ist. Verfolgt man das weiter, so muß man sich sagen, es bedeutet in der Tat die Tatsache etwas ganz Besonderes, daß die Kometen so hereinkommen als Entgegengesetztes zu dem, was dieses Planetensystem selbst zusammenhält.
[ 22 ] Nun habe ich in einem vorigen Kurs auf etwas hingewiesen im Zusammenhang der Naturerscheinungen, an das ich jetzt erinnern muß. Diejenigen, die bei diesem vorigen Kurs, dem Kurs über Wärmelehre, dabei waren, werden sich vielleicht erinnern, daß ich darauf hingewiesen habe, daß wir eigentlich, wenn wir die Wärmeerscheinungen verfolgen im Zusammenhang mit den anderen Erscheinungen des Weltenalls, genötigt sind den Äther, von dem man gewöhnlich hypothetisch spricht, in konkreter Weise zu fassen, indem wir einfach in unsere Formeln, die wir haben, dann, wenn wir für die ponderable Materie einsetzen den Druck, die Druckkraft, für den Äther die Saugkraft einsetzen müssen. Mit anderen Worten: Wenn wir die Intensität der Kraft in der ponderablen Materie mit plus einsetzen, müssen wir die Intensität im Äther mit minus einsetzen. Ich habe dazumal ja aufgefordert, die gebräuchlichen Formeln auf das hin durchzusehen, damit man sieht, wie sie dann anfangen, mit den Naturerscheinungen in einer merkwürdigen Weise übereinzustimmen. Wichtig ist noch, daß wir die ganze Spielerei, möchte ich sagen, der Clausiusschen Wärmetheorie mit dem gegenseitigen Sich-Stoßen der Moleküle und dem Stoßen an die Wand, diesem ganzen grausamen Spiel des Stoßens, des Aufeinanderprallens, an die Wand Prallens, wieder Zurückprallens, das eigentlich den Wärmezustand irgendeines Gases darstellen soll, daß wir das richtig sinnlich durchschaubar bekommen, wenn wir innerhalb der Wärme zwei Zustände ins Auge fassen, den einen, den wir verwandt mit den Zuständen der ponderablen Materie betrachten, und den anderen, den wir verwandt mit dem Äther betrachten. So daß wir bei der Wärme etwas anderes haben als bei der Luft oder beim Licht. Beim Licht müssen wir, wenn wir richtig rechnen wollen, alles mit negativen Vorzeichen einsetzen, was uns die Wirkung des Lichtes darstellen soll. Bei der Luft, bei dem Gas müssen wir alles dasjenige, was wirkt, mit positiven Vorzeichen einsetzen. Bei der Wärme haben wir nötig, Positives und Negatives wechseln zu lassen, und dadurch wird erst durchsichtig dasjenige, was wir gewöhnlich betrachten als leitende Wärme, strahlende Wärme und so weiter.
[ 23 ] Diese Dinge zeigen uns innerhalb der Materie selbst die Notwendigkeit, in der Charakteristik der Kräfte von dem Positiven ins Negative einzutreten. Jetzt sehen wir merkwürdigerweise, wie wir im Planetensystem selber von dem Positiven, von der Gravitation, ins Negative, in die Rückstoßkraft eintreten müssen.
[ 24 ] Nun will ich heute nur noch das sagen, um es gewissermaßen als die Formulierung eines Problems hinzustellen, nicht um mehr damit zu sagen - wir werden auf alle diese Sachen in weiteren Vorträgen näher eingehen: Ich will, nachdem wir das an den Kometen herausgefunden haben, was wir jetzt gesagt haben, den Vergleich hinstellen zwischen demjenigen, was Verhältnis ist unseres Planetensystems zu den kometarischen Körpern und dem, was vorhanden ist beim weiblichen Eikeim gegenüber dem befruchtenden männlichen Samenkern. Versuchen Sie sich nur einmal rein in der Anschauung das vorzulegen: Das Planetensystem, das etwas aufnimmt in sich, den Effekt eines Kometen; die Eizelle, welche aufnimmt in sich den Effekt der Befruchtung durch die Samenzelle. Sehen Sie sich diese
[ 25 ] beiden Erscheinungen nur einmal nebeneinander an, aber seien Sie dabei so vorurteilslos, daß Sie das so tun, wie Sie sonst irgend etwas, was im Leben nebeneinander ist und sich vergleichen läßt, ansehen. Sehen Sie sich das an, und ich frage Sie dann, ob Sie nicht, wenn Sie es ordentlich ansehen, Vergleichspunkte genug finden können. Ich will heute keine Theorie behaupten, keine Hypothese aufstellen, sondern ich will nur darauf hinweisen, sich diese Dinge einmal in dem richtigen Zusammenhang anzusehen.
[ 26 ] Von da ausgehend werden wir dann morgen versuchen, eben zu konkreteren Erscheinungen zu kommen.
Eighth Lecture
[ 1 ] In order to bring these considerations to a certain conclusion, it is necessary that we take the subtle approach I have followed so far, that is, to bring together as many of those mental images as possible that can then lead us to this goal, this conclusion. To this end, it will be necessary for me to continue these lectures in a way that can be combined with the Waldorf School during the time when I am giving the other lectures, that is, from the 11th to the 15th, otherwise the material would not be able to be covered. But because the things that are being done here can give rise to many concerns, doubts, and questions, I will also ask everyone to prepare for one day next week what they would like to ask in connection with the presentations for clarification and the like. I will then address the questions asked in this way in one of next week's lectures, that is, I will present them to you so that we can get as complete a picture of the matter as possible. Under these conditions, we will also be able to retain the more subtle things, I would say, that I have included in this course of presentations.
[ 2 ] Let us once again clarify how we have actually structured the entire course of these considerations, which are intended to lead us into an understanding of astronomy and its connection with earthly phenomena. We started by pointing out how such observations usually aim only to take into account what is available to sensory observation, even armed sensory observation. Essentially, everything that has been taught to this day for the understanding and explanation of celestial phenomena has been oriented toward this. Indeed, what we now call the apparent movements of the heavenly bodies were initially included in the sphere of observation. The apparent movement of the starry sky around the Earth and the apparent movement of the Sun were taken into account. It was then observed how the planets describe strange orbits. Parts of these planetary orbits simply look like loops to the naked eye (Fig. 1). The planet moves like this, then back again, then like this. People said to themselves: if the Earth itself is in motion, then because this intrinsic motion of the Earth is not immediately apparent, it must be the case that the real movements of the celestial bodies are different from what they appear to be to the naked eye.

[ 3 ] And then, through interpretation, people formed a mental image of what the real movements might be, based on observation of the mathematical figures. This initially led to the Copernican system, then to all the modifications that have been made to it since then. In essence, therefore, we have considered what can be grasped by our cognitive faculties, insofar as these cognitive faculties are willing to rely on the senses and the processing of sensory impressions by the mind, through interpretation.
[ 4 ] We have now pointed out how such an approach cannot suffice to penetrate the reality of celestial phenomena, for the simple reason that the mathematical approach is not sufficient; because, in a sense, when we make calculations, we have to stop at a certain point. I have pointed out to you that the ratios that exist between the orbital periods of the various planets are incommensurable numbers, incommensurable quantities, and that this shows us that we cannot use calculations to penetrate the actual structure of celestial phenomena; we must stop somewhere. It follows, however, that we must apply a different approach, one that is not limited to merely considering, let us say, in the case of human beings, what external sensory observation leads to, but rather what underlies the whole human being, what perhaps also underlies the other beings of the natural kingdoms on earth. We have already pointed out all these things, and I have then shown how certain phenomena that we encounter in the course of Earth's development can be related to the human organization; how, for example, something like the ice ages, which occur in a certain rhythmic manner in the course of Earth's development, must be related to the development of humanity, to the development of the human being. If that is the case, then such connections give us an indication of what the movements in the heavens may actually be like. And we must pursue such things further.
[ 5 ] Before we continue with the more formal approach we arrived at yesterday, let us once again take up what we have learned about the connection between human development and the development of the Earth through the ice ages. We have already said that the special kind of knowledge that human beings possess in the present has really only been truly theirs since the last ice age, that since the last ice age those cultural periods have also passed of which I always speak as the ancient Indian cultural period, the ancient Persian cultural period, the Egyptian-Chaldean, the Greek-Latin, up to our own cultural period. We have also pointed out that before this ice age, what is now more hidden in the present human being, less on the surface, must have developed in human nature: the organization of his power of imagination. And yesterday we pointed out that this organization of the life of imagination is understood from its quality when one knows that this life of imagination can only be compared in its quality to dreaming. Only through the presence of sensory experience, I said, do our mental images acquire a certain configuration and a saturated content. That which, in a sense, works behind the sensory perceptions from our organization in the life of imagination, works with the dullness of dream life. We would only be able to imagine with the dullness of dream life — if one can say such a thing — if sensory experience did not strike into this mental image with every awakening. This life of imagination, which is thus duller than the life of the senses, takes us back to those phases of human nature's development that lie before the last ice age — in our anthroposophical language: those that lie in the ancient Atlantean region.
[ 6 ] What must actually have been a fact for human beings? First, something that gave them a more intimate connection with the world around them than is now the case with sensory perception. We control sensory perception with our will. At least we direct our eyes through our will, and we can also go further in controlling sensory perception through our will by means of our attention. In any case, the will is at work in our sensory perceptions. We are independent of the outside world in a certain way, in that we can orient ourselves from our inner will. But this is only the case because we, as human beings, have emancipated ourselves from the universe in a certain way. We cannot have been so emancipated before the last ice age – I say “can” because I want to speak from the perspective of external empirical science. While our powers of imagination were developing, human beings must have been more dependent in their states on what was happening in their environment. Just as we now see the world around us through the sunlight, but just as this light is subject to a certain arbitrariness from within, so at that time, in their devotion to the external world, humans must have been dependent on the illuminated earth and its illuminated objects, and in turn on the darkness, the gloom, when the sun did not shine at night. So humans must have experienced alternating states between the glimmering of what is the power of imagination, which was developing at that time, and the ebbing away of this imaginative life. In other words, we have a similar inner state, prepared by man's interaction with the universe, as we encountered it in those peculiar connections between female functions and the phases of the moon in relation to their duration. This inner functioning of female nature — I said that it is also present in male nature, but more inwardly, and is therefore less noticeable. It is such that it was once connected with the processes of the outer universe, then emancipated itself from them and became a peculiarity of human nature itself, so that what now takes place in human beings no longer needs to coincide with external facts, but the sequence of time the sequence of phases is still the same as it was when things coincided externally.
[ 7 ] Something similar is indeed the case for what is an inner change in our now more or less independent from sensory life, in the past organized being with regard to the life of imagination. Something similar is present for this. We experience an inner rhythm of brighter and darker powers of imagination, which ebb and flow in a daily alternation. And only because this is a much less intense process than the other, which parallels the phases of the moon, do we not notice it. In fact, we carry within our head organization today an alternation between a duller and a brighter life. We carry a rhythmic life within our head organization. At one time we are more inclined to respond to sensory perceptions from within, at another time we are less inclined to respond to sensory perceptions, except that these alternating states cover a period of 24 hours. And it would be interesting to observe, for example by means of curves, how people differ precisely in relation to this inner period of change in the head from brighter or more active powers of imagination to dull, sleepy powers of imagination. For the dull, sleepy powers of imagination are what we might call the inner night of the head; the brighter ones are what we might call the inner day of the head. This does not correspond to the outer alternation of day and night. We have an inner alternation of light and darkness. And depending on whether a person has this inner alternation of light and darkness in such a way that there is a greater tendency, let's say, to bring together the bright part, the bright course of his imagination, with the sensory perceptions, or to bring together the dark part with the sensory perceptions, depending on whether a person has one or the other in their constitution, they differ in terms of their ability to observe the external world. One has a strong tendency to focus sharply on external phenomena; the other has a less strong tendency to focus sharply on external phenomena and is more inclined to turn to inner brooding. This stems precisely from the interrelationship I have just described. My dear friends, as educators we should make a habit of making such observations. For they will give us important pointers on how to treat children appropriately in our education and teaching.
[ 8 ] What interests us particularly today, however, is that human beings internalize, as it were, what they have once experienced in interaction with the outside world, that this then appears in them as an inner rhythm which still preserves the passage of time, but no longer coincides with the outside world in terms of its temporal limits. So we must say: before the Ice Age, human beings will have regularly experienced their brighter, more intimate experience of the universe coinciding with external events, and their dull withdrawal into themselves. The after-effects of this illumination, this filling of consciousness with images, and this withdrawal, this brooding over images, which had its echo in our more or less melancholic brooding, that is, what humans experienced at that time, has now been pushed back into the inner organization, and on the outer periphery, a new development of the sensory faculty has taken place, which was already present in earlier Earth periods, but of course not as developed as it is now.
[ 9 ] We therefore look into the universe when we look at what has taken place in human beings as a result of their connection with world phenomena. Human beings must appear to us as a reagent for the assessment of celestial phenomena. But we must enlist the help of other natural beings if we want to achieve a certain completeness. And here I would first like to draw your attention to something that is obvious to everyone, but which is not usually considered in terms of its importance. Take the annual plant in its development. It goes through a certain cycle. In this plant's annual development, we can clearly see what I explained yesterday: the difference between direct and indirect solar influence. In one case, the effect of the sun is direct: the formation of flowers; in the other case, the effect of the sun is such that the earth is in between: the formation of roots. So in the plant we also have what we were able to explain yesterday for the animal and what we then applied in a certain way to the human being.
[ 10 ] But we will only appreciate this fact in the right way if we also bring it together with another. This is that there are also perennial plants. How does the perennial plant relate to the annual plant in terms of the connection between plant growth and the earth? The perennial plant retains its stem, and actually, every year, one could say that a new plant world grows on the stem. A plant world grows on the stem, naturally modified, metamorphosed; on the stem that grows out of the earth. And it is simply natural for those who have a morphological sense to say: on the one hand, I have the surface of the earth, from which the plant grows; and then I have the stem of the perennial plant, which receives the plant growth every year. Then I must think of something — for now, I will just say something — continuing from the earth into the plant stem. That on which the plant grows (Fig. 2, left) must also be found here (Fig. 2, right) in the stem.

[ 11 ] That means that something must, in a sense, enter the stem from the earth. I have no right to regard the stem of a perennial plant as something that does not belong to the earth at all, but must regard it as a modified part of the earth itself. Only then can I view it in the right way. Only then can I truly grasp the connections that exist. So there is something inside the plant that is otherwise only found in the earth and that makes the plant perennial. By absorbing something of the earth into itself, it frees itself from dependence on the annual cycle of the sun. We can therefore say: the plant breaks free from its dependence on the annual cycle of the sun. By emancipating itself from this annual cycle of the sun, insofar as it is a stem, it takes this into its own nature and can now, in a sense, do for itself what previously only came about through the influence of the cosmic environment.
[ 12 ] Have we not already seen in the plant what I have just explained, for example, in relation to the pre-ice age in humans? I have explained that it is precisely through connections with the environment that the rhythm of the life of imagination has developed. What first developed merely in the interaction of the human being with the environment has become something within him. We have indicated this in the case of the plant, in that the annual plant becomes the perennial plant. So we have a very general process in the universe: organic beings are on the way to emancipating themselves from their connections with the environment. When we see a perennial plant emerge, we must say that it learns, in a sense – forgive me for using this expression – the perennial plant learns something from the time when it is dependent on the cosmic environment, and then it can do it itself. It then produces new plant shoots every year, as it were. This is an extremely important fact for understanding the connections between the worlds. One cannot understand world phenomena by only looking at things that are next to each other or those that happen to come into view under the microscope. One can only understand world phenomena if one can truly comprehend the details in relation to the big picture.
[ 13 ] But let us now consider the matter by simply looking at it. We have subjected the annual plant to the interrelationship with the cosmos over the course of a year; we then have this influence of the cosmos disappearing in the perennial plant. In a sense, we have preserved in the perennial plant that which otherwise disappears in the course of a year. We see, as it were, in the trunk sprouting out of the earth that which is the effect of the year and is preserved. This transition of that which is otherwise connected with the outside world into the inner mode of action can be observed throughout the course of natural phenomena, insofar as these natural phenomena are cosmic. We must therefore always seek the connections between our earth and the cosmos in certain phenomena, and in other phenomena we must say that these cosmic effects are hidden. It is therefore important that we find out precisely what leads us to the cosmic influences, what is a real reagent for them. The annual plant tells us something about the connection between the earth and the cosmos; the perennial plant cannot tell us much more about this.
[ 14 ] Once again, the relationship between animals and humans must put us on an important trail. Consider the animal in its development. Let us first disregard embryonic life — we could also include it. The animal is born, it grows to a certain limit, it reaches sexual maturity. Consider this entire animal life up to sexual maturity and then beyond. You can look at the facts without any hypotheses and you will have to say to yourself that something peculiar happens to the animal when it reaches sexual maturity. In a certain sense, it is then actually finished for this earthly world. We can actually — of course, things are all approximate, but essentially they are so — no longer follow processes of progress after sexual maturity in animals. Sexual maturity is the most important goal in its development. And what immediately follows it, what comes to light through sexual maturity, is then there, but we cannot say that anything we can call progression occurs after that.
[ 15 ] It is different with humans. Humans remain capable of development beyond sexual maturity, only this development is internalized. It would be extremely sad for humans in their human nature if they were finished with their development at sexual maturity in the same way that animals are finished. Humans go beyond this and still have a reserve within themselves that reaches further, that takes special paths that have nothing to do with sexual maturity. We can say that this is similar to the internalization of the annual process in perennial plants as opposed to annual plants. What we see in animals at sexual maturity, we see internalized in humans from sexual maturity onwards. So there must be something in humans that points to the cosmic, insofar as they are in the process of development from birth to sexual maturity, which then emancipates itself from this cosmic when humans have outgrown sexual maturity, just as in perennial plants.
[ 16 ] This, you see, is one way of assessing the phenomena of beings and gradually finding signposts for the connections between earthly beings and the cosmos. For we see that when these cosmic influences cease, they are transferred into the inner nature of the individual beings themselves. Let us put this aside for now and consider it later in context, combined with something else essential to form a synthesis.
[ 17 ] Let us now take up what I have said repeatedly: the orbital periods of the planets in the solar system are incommensurable in relation to each other. If we now consider what would happen if the ratios of the orbital periods of the planets were not incommensurable, we would have to say that disturbances would arise in the planetary system that would repeat themselves over and over again and, through their repetitions, bring the planetary system to a standstill. A simple calculation, which would take us too far here, proves that it is only through the incommensurability of the ratios of the orbital periods of the planets that the planetary system remains, so to speak, alive. There must therefore be a state in the solar system that always pushes towards a standstill. And we actually calculate this state when we come to the end of the calculation. But when we reach the incommensurable, we do not reach the end of the calculation. We are approaching the life of the planetary system. We are in a strange situation when we calculate the planetary system. If we could calculate it, it would die, it would have died long ago, as I said earlier. It lives because we cannot calculate it. Everything in the planetary system that we cannot calculate is alive. What do we base our calculations on when we calculate up to the point where the planetary system would have to die? We base them on the force of gravity, the gravitational pull of the worlds! In fact, if we base our calculations solely on gravitational force and then think consistently from there until we arrive at a picture of the planetary system under the influence of gravitational force, then we do indeed arrive at a commensurable ratio. But the planetary system would have to die. So we calculate to the point where death is in the planetary system, and we use gravitational force to do so. There must be something in the planetary system that is different from gravitational force and that is the basis of incommensurability.
[ 18 ] The planetary orbits can be quite well reconciled with gravitational force, even in terms of their genesis, but then the orbital periods would have to be commensurable. But what cannot be reconciled with gravitational force, what does not fit into our planetary system at all, is what we see in cometary bodies. These cometary bodies, which play a strange role in our solar system, have recently prompted science to come up with some very strange ideas. I will completely disregard the fact that within science, people like to apply everything that is currently known as explanatory principles. For example, in the field of physiology, it was popular for a time to talk about our so-called sensitive nerves extending from the periphery to the interior like telegraph wires, which then arrive and, through a kind of switching, transmit what are then acts of will, impulses of will. The fact that what passes through the centripetal nerves is transmitted to the centrifugal nerves has always been compared to telegraph lines. Well, perhaps once something is found that presents itself in a different way than the telegraph wire, this method will allow us to use a different image for this thing. And so, as fashions change, we apply all those things that are found in a particular age to explain certain phenomena. It is almost like certain areas of therapy, where, as soon as something is found, it is immediately “discovered” as a remedy, without thinking about how it is actually connected. Now that we have X-rays, they are a remedy; if we did not have them, we could not use them. There is something in this that leaves one completely at the mercy of the chaos of the world. This is how it came about that, through spectroscopic investigations and comparison with the spectroscopic results for the planets, certain electromagnetic effects within cometary phenomena were discovered. However, these things lead at most to analogies, which are certainly sometimes related to reality, but which certainly cannot satisfy those who want to look deeper into reality.
[ 19 ] But one thing, I would say, has emerged as a necessity when considering the phenomena associated with comets. One is compelled, regardless of how one chooses to label things according to current fashion, to speak of repulsive forces from the sun, of recoil forces, in relation to the peculiar position of the comet's tail relative to the sun, while everywhere else in the planetary system one speaks of gravitational forces. One is compelled to seek something in addition to gravity that is opposed to this gravity. Thus, with the comets, something continually enters our planetary system that is opposed to the inner structure of the planetary system. So that there is something here that makes it understandable that the mystery of comets has been viewed with a certain superstition throughout long periods of time. People had a feeling that the laws of nature are expressed in the movement of the planets, that what is appropriate to our planetary system is expressed there; in the phenomena of comets, something opposite is expressed, something enters our planetary system that behaves inversely to our planetary phenomena. This led to seeing, on the one hand, the planetary phenomena and in them, in a sense, the laws of nature embodied and realized; on the other hand, seeing in the cometary phenomena the opposite of the laws of nature. Thus, not in the most ancient times, but in certain times, comets were associated with certain flying moral forces, which were supposed to be a rod of correction for sinful human beings. Today, we rightly regard this as superstition. But even Hegel cannot easily dismiss something that, I would say, expresses itself in a way that is only half permeable to the natural. Of course, in the 19th century, people no longer believed that comets somehow acted as moral judges, but in the first half of the 19th century, certain statistics linked them to good and bad wine years, which also seem to be quite irregular and do not entirely correspond to the laws of nature in their sequence. And Hegel could not avoid this. It seems very plausible to him that the appearance or non-appearance of comets has something to do with good and bad wine years.
[ 20 ] Now, insofar as he has a relationship with contemporary science, man takes the position that he says: Our planetary system has nothing to fear from comets. Comets cause phenomena within our planetary system that actually have no real internal connection with it. They come as such oddities of the universe from distant regions into our vicinity of the sun, cause certain phenomena there through repulsive forces from the sun, have an increase in their phenomena, a decrease, and then disappear again. Kepler, a personality who still had a certain capacity within himself to perceive the outer world not only with his intellect but with his whole human being, who still had a certain intuition for the phenomena of the heavens, uttered a remarkable sentence about comets that gives a great deal to think about to anyone who allows Kepler's whole state of mind to have a little effect on them. We have discussed Kepler's three laws, which are fundamentally something extraordinarily ingenious when viewed in the context of what was then understood as mental images of the planetary system. However, they presuppose that Kepler had a deep sense of an inner harmony in the planetary system, not just of something that can be calculated in a dry manner, but of an inner harmony. And as the ultimate expression, I would say, of this inner harmony, as the ultimate quantitative expression of something qualitative, he himself perceived his three main laws of the planetary system. And out of this feeling, he made a statement about comets that is extremely significant and that one can empathize with if one engages with such things. He said: There are as many comets in the universe, that is, in the universe that we can see, as there are fish in the sea, only we see very few of them. Those we see are only a small part of them. The others remain invisible due to their small size or other circumstances. - Basically, external research has also confirmed Kepler's statement, simply because since the invention of the telescope, many more comets have been seen than before, and these have also been recorded, so that comparisons can be made. In addition, other means have shown that when observing the sky under different lighting conditions, i.e., in complete darkness, more comets can be recorded than usual. So, in a certain way, even empirical research approaches what Kepler expressed from his deep understanding of nature.
[ 21 ] However, when speaking of a connection between what happens on Earth and the cosmos, it does not seem entirely feasible to speak of the connection between other celestial bodies, other bodies in our planetary system, and Earth, but not to speak of those that come in and go out in such a way as comets; especially when we must admit today that comets cause phenomena that point to forces that are precisely the opposite of those that are usually taken to be the cohesive forces of our planetary system. In fact, comets bring something into our system that is opposed to it. If we pursue this further, we must say that it is indeed something very special that comets come in as the opposite of what holds this planetary system together.
[ 22 ] Now, in a previous course, I pointed out something in connection with natural phenomena that I must now recall. Those who attended that previous course, the course on thermodynamics, may remember that I pointed out that when we follow the phenomena of heat in connection with the other phenomena of the universe, we are actually we are compelled to grasp the ether, which is usually spoken of hypothetically, in a concrete way, by simply inserting the suction force for the ether into our formulas when we insert the pressure, the pressure force, for ponderable matter. In other words, if we use plus for the intensity of the force in ponderable matter, we must use minus for the intensity in the ether. At that time, I asked that the usual formulas be reviewed in order to see how they then begin to correspond with natural phenomena in a remarkable way. It is also important that we see the whole game, I would say, of Clausius's heat theory with the mutual collision of molecules and the collision with the wall, this whole cruel game of collision, of colliding with each other, of colliding with the wall, of rebounding, which is actually supposed to represent the thermal state of some gas, that we can really understand it sensually if we consider two states within heat, one that we regard as related to the states of ponderable matter, and the other that we regard as related to ether. So that with heat we have something different than with air or light. With light, if we want to calculate correctly, we must use negative signs for everything that is supposed to represent the effect of light. With air, with gas, we must use positive signs for everything that has an effect. With heat, we need to alternate between positive and negative, and only then does what we usually consider to be conducting heat, radiant heat, and so on, become transparent.
[ 23 ] These things show us, within matter itself, the necessity of moving from positive to negative in the characteristics of forces. Now, strangely enough, we see how, in the planetary system itself, we must move from the positive, from gravity, to the negative, to the recoil force.
[ 24 ] Now I just want to say this today, to present it as a kind of formulation of a problem, not to say more about it — we will go into all these things in more detail in further lectures: Now that we have discovered what we have just said about comets, I want to draw a comparison between the relationship of our planetary system to cometary bodies and that which exists between the female egg cell and the fertilizing male sperm cell. Just try to imagine this: the planetary system, which absorbs something into itself, the effect of a comet; the egg cell, which absorbs into itself the effect of fertilization by the sperm cell. Take a look at these two phenomena side by side, but be as unbiased as possible, as you would be with anything else in life that exists side by side.
[ 25 ] two phenomena side by side, but be so unprejudiced that you do so as you would normally view anything in life that exists side by side and can be compared. Look at this, and I will then ask you whether, if you look at it properly, you cannot find enough points of comparison. I do not want to assert any theory today, nor do I want to put forward any hypothesis, but I just want to point out that these things should be viewed in the right context.
[ 26 ] Starting from there, we will then try tomorrow to arrive at more concrete phenomena.