The Rudolf Steiner Archive

The Calendar of the Soul

Inner life changes along with the changing seasons of nature, as the two are intimately connected. The verses commence in the spring, at the time of the vernal equinox, the full moon, and Sunday, which by definition is Easter. This is when the sun’s path, the ecliptic, viewed from earth, crosses the heavenly extension of the Earth’s equator and so starts to leave Pisces and enter Ares. Similarly, summer begins when the sun starts to leave Gemini to enter Cancer, fall begins when the sun starts to leave Virgo to enter Libra, and winter begins when the sun starts to leave Sagittarius to enter Capricorn. The verses are paired 26 weeks apart, for spring in one hemisphere is autumn in the other. These verses are mantic, from the muse, with their own rhythm, beauty, and meaning. Although Christmas and Saint John’s Day are fixed by the solstices (Christmas being 4 days off since the correction of the Julian Calendar), both Easter and Michaelmas move, as they are connected not just with the earth-sun-stars axis, but also with moon rhythms and planetary human rhythms. Everything is in flux, moving always, and so each of us will have to fit the 52 verses of the year into the rhythms of the universe, which are actually our inner rhythms also. In some years, if Easter comes early after the equinox, verses will have to be doubled up. In other years, if Easter comes later after the equinox, verses will have to be held over for another week. And as always, the dating and significance of Easter and of Michaelmas create lots of discussion. “Human beings are able to develop the consciousness soul precisely through the exertion of energy required to penetrate such riddles”.¹ The celestial equator and the ecliptic:²

—Translation by John Riedel MD - 6 May 2023

[IMAGE REMOVED FROM PREVIEW]

• 1. Rudolf Steiner in Reading the Pictures of the Apocalypse, 5/23/09.
• 2. Tau’olunga https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Today we will try and get a clearer idea of the transition from the Logos to a new system, a new creation.

People usually ask first of all: How did it all come into existence? This is probably the hardest question, but one that is frequently asked. All one can do is to give an approximate idea. Above all we must be clear in our minds that it is our rational mind which asks how things came into existence, getting a more or less plausible notion of how one would have created the world if one had been the creator. The rational mind is, however, one of the things that originated in the Logos, and it is clear that the Logos has a far greater conscious awareness. We therefore cannot judge the Logos with our rational human minds and phrase the question like this: Why did the world have to arise out of the Logos? All we can ask is how the emergence of the world from the Logos proceeded, how things arose. We cannot ask why because why would imply compulsion. The process must be an act the Logos has done in freedom, not something done from necessity.

The creative principle of the Logos can only be given in image form.⁷⁸ We imagine an entity and its mirror image. We have to say to ourselves: The mirror image contains everything which is also to be found in this spirit. It looks exactly the same but is not alive; it does not include the principle of life. It will only be possible to understand how the mirror image can grow like the spirit if we consider that the spirit gives its life, its existence, to the mirror image. We have to consider, therefore, that a spirit gives its life to its mirror image. This is the idea of the first sacrifice. Giving up one’s own existence, transferring one’s own life to the mirror image—that is the original sacrifice.

This is exactly how it is with the Logos. The first Logos relates to the second as if we were standing in front of our mirror image and decided to give our own life to the mirror image. Giving one’s life is the original sacrifice made in freedom. It was the deed of the first Logos. The second Logos is exactly the same as the first Logos, except that it has been given existence through sacrifice. If we study the activity of the second Logos we find that its nature is such that it reflects the essential nature of the first Logos back to that first Logos. The second Logos is thus a reflection of the first Logos having been given the life that flowed from the first Logos.

The first Logos produces a reflection, and then gives its life to the mirror image. In the first Logos everything is directed towards the outside, with its existence an influence on the outside. The second Logos has 1) the existence it has received, and 2) the ability to let its content shine back on to the first Logos. We thus have duality in the second Logos. Its life and content are two things. The content is the same as for the first Logos, but its life is somewhat different from the first Logos (Fig. 17).

The line down the middle of the second circle indicates that in the second Logos life and content are two things, that they have been divided. Yet when it comes to content, image and mirror image are the same in either case, whilst life is two things.

This could not yet as such give a cosmic system, for all one would have, would be the relationship of one Logos to the other; there would be no multiplicity. This could only come with a further sacrifice. A further mirroring process had to come in which the relationship of the two was also reflected.

First, the first Logos was reflected once again, then the mirroring was mirrored. This created the third Logos as a reflection of the other two Logoi. The third Logos thus contains:

1. the mirror image of the first Logos
2. the mirror image of what the first Logos brought about in the second, which is its life
3. the mirror image of the content which the second Logos reflects back to the first.

Let us now visualize this (Fig. 18). The first Logos is reflected in a). If the first Logos is creative activity directed to the outside, its mirror image in the third Logos is the exact opposite of the action of the first Logos. In the first Logos, a) is the most sublime light of the world; in the third Logos it is the most extreme spiritual darkness.

b) in the second Logos is the life which the second Logos received from the first. It is not the life which gives itself in sacrifice but the life which has been accepted. The life which sacrifices itself in the first Logos is love. The opposite of this in the third Logos is absolute desire, longing, striving for Logos. In the third Logos, b) is thus absolute desire.

c) in the second Logos is the mirror image of the first Logos reflected by the second Logos.

In our own mirror image we distinguish

1. the image which shone out and comes back out of the darkness
2. what we have given returns as desire
3. the image itself, which we ourselves are

This corresponds to the three parts in the third Logos:

1. spiritual darkness = tamas
2. absolute desire = rajas
3. the simple mirror image of the first Logo = sattwa.

Tamas, rajas and sattwa are the three gunas, the three parts of the third Logos.⁷⁹

First there are a), b) and c). a) on its own is tamas. If a)—spiritual darkness or tamas—combines with b)—rajas, absolute desire—darkness combines with desire and we have a striving for the first Logos. If a) and c)—tamas and sattwa—are combined, we have the image of the first Logos, created out of the darkness. We can also combine b) and c). Each may occur on its own or be combined with one of the others. All three in combination are what the first Logos itself is. We have seven possible combinations of the three gunas (Fig. 19).

These are the seven different guna combinations. Think of these seven possible combinations as the next world-creative principle which may arise from the three gunas. These seven spirits do exist. They are the ‘seven creative spirits before the throne’, the seven creative powers that come after the three Logoi (Fig. 20).

These seven creative powers give rise to what we call the ‘prajapatis’. As each is able to repeat this exactly at subordinate levels of conscious awareness, life and form, we always have three: three times a, three times b, three times c, three times ab, three times ac, three times be, three times abc, making together three times seven = 21 prajapatis. Each of them acts like an original Logos. This gives us the 21 creators of a specific solar system.

The first concept we meet, therefore, is that of sacrifice made in perfect freedom. Once we have it, the question as to why ceases to have significance. Human progress consists in no longer asking this question but moving on to the concept of the creative Logos.

With a mechanical instrument, a watch, for instance, or a machine, we can predict how it will behave. This is somewhat less the case with natural processes, though to a degree it applies. Thus the time of a solar eclipse can be calculated. We may speak of ‘necessity’ in this case. With a plant it will also still be possible to say what it will do under specific conditions. However, the higher we go in the natural world, the more does it become impossible to say what an entity will do in a given situation. The higher a person is with regard to gifts and content, the less will it be possible to predict his actions, for we cannot grasp his reasons and motives. In that case all we can do is wait and see what he will do in a given situation.

In the same way we have to accept the creation of the world as an act done by the Logos in freedom. Progress consist in knowing that when it comes to the universe we do not ask as to the why, and that the question as to the ground or reason is not justifiable. All of those who understood this never spoke of a ground or reason. Jakob Boehme spoke of a ‘source and origin’ of the world.⁸⁰ To progress to insight into the world-creative power, we can only go to the point where we know that our own evolution must have been the goal, for that is where the creator must once have stood. The creator must have everything we possess, but in reverse. Atman is the lowest point within us. The creator has atman as numerous points in his periphery. When the solar system was in its inception, the world-creative Logos had the qualities we have found to be the goal of our evolution—atman, budhi, karana sharira or manas, kama, linga sharira, prana, sthula sharira—all as part of its essential nature.

We need to be clear in our minds as to where the activity of this creative Logos may lie. So we first of all investigate where the different metamorphoses take us. One form metamorphoses is physical, two are astral, two mental and two arupic, making a total of seven. When we have reached the height of the mental plane, we have become karana sharira from outside; we then become budhi and finally atman (Fig. 21, left). When the Earth has reached its goal we will be active on the higher mental plane. The transition then begins which takes us to the next planet. For this, we must have atman on the outside. This means that karana sharira and budhi must also vanish to the outside (Fig. 21, right).

The consequence is that we should not think that nothing happens in the transition to a new planet—pralaya is not inactivity and sleep—but karana sharira and budhi are shed. We must shed karana sharira on the budhi plane and budhi itself on the nirvana plane.

Evolution therefore becomes this (Fig. 22).

Pralaya is a very different kind of activity from that which occurs during a manvantara. To configure a new planetary chain, the spirit must have gone through the budhi and nirvana planes on the other side. The significance of these planes is that on them the spirits go through exactly the same process between planets as human beings do in devachan. There are also great pralayas—maha pralayas. If we follow the metamorphoses of conscious awareness from one planet to another, we get daytime conscious awareness on Earth, dream consciousness on Moon, and so on (Fig. 23).

It is necessary to go through the nirvana plane between one kind of conscious awareness and another. When the highest state of conscious awareness has been reached and atman has shed all vestments, having become truly all-embracing, it will be capable of creating a new solar system. For this, it must first go through two further planes of conscious awareness. By then it has gained a kind of all-vision, it will then be able to have a view of the whole cosmic system.

Our present daytime conscious awareness can have an overview of the mineral world, psychic consciousness can overview life, intellectual conscious awareness sentience, and spiritual conscious awareness of all that is. Atman has then reached its highest level. Atman is all-awareness.

If atman is to shine out, it must first develop the ability to give everything; it must be creative. It does so by vesting itself in budhi and manas. It can then start a new cosmic system on the arupa plane. When conscious awareness will have reached the final level, therefore, it will still have to go through two other planes. The first plane is the one where it does not peel off budhi but adds it; this is called the ‘para nirvana’ plane. The plane on which the entity descends again so that it may be active on the arupa plane, is called ‘mahapara nirvana plane’. Two planes that are in opposite positions correspond. The lowest is the physical, its opposite nirvana. (Fig. 24)

On the astral plane, desire rules, on the para nirvana plane love, budhi. On the mental plane, perception rules, taking in the thought; on the mahapara nirvana plane the creative thought rules. The budhi plane is absolute, loving dedication to the divine. Its opposite is a state of having completely turned away from all that is divine. Where the budhi plane is beatific, its opposite has absolute wretchedness. That is the eighth plane, the eighth sphere.

Imagine a particular entity has turned its back on evolution on some plane or other, going its own way. It would fall into the eighth sphere and would have to wait there until the whole of evolution has gone round. It could only be taken along again, as lowermost entity, in the next evolution. This cosmic ‘compass rose’ (Fig. 24) shows the opposites very well.

When we have arrived on the nirvana plane, the entity will have reached the point where its atman is completely on the outside. We are then dealing with the kind of Logos which we have called ‘the seven’. These are the seven creative spirits, which is also why we have seven different races [the ‘root races’, with seven sub-races each].

The seven different spirits belong to the nirvana plane. Going through the para nirvana plane and the manapara nirvana plane then, we come to the first and second Logos itself. The second arises on the para nirvana plane, the first on the mahapara nirvana plane. On the nirvana plane the cosmic system is brought to completion by the 7 times 3 = 21 prajapatis. The last of these is abc, the third Logos itself. Only the first Logos is able to take up again anything which has fallen into the eighth sphere. It takes it along with the cosmic dust. To be cast out from evolution is to link one’s life to something which inexorably remains behind, without fail, and to wait until evolution once again coincides with the state in question. A native of an uncilivilized wild place with the soul of such a native is relatively happy; but imagine a more highly developed spirit in the body of such a native or even a dog—that is banishment indeed. The higher soul has taken the road to a lower manifestation. To ‘go into the eighth sphere’ does indeed mean to be no longer progressing in accord with evolution, to be unable to participate in the evolution of the others, but to be cast back to a lower level.

Conscious awareness is perception up to the nirvana plane. From then on it is no longer mere perception but inner activity. On the para nirvana plane it is activity directed to the outside. On the mahapara nirvana plane it is the creative conscious mind of the Logos. This moves on from there through the eighth sphere and on to the physical plane, where it becomes the creative powers of nature. In reality these give expression to divine thoughts which appear to us as powers or forces because we do not have the overview.

• 78. See also part 2 in this volume. Also lecture given in Karlsruhe on 4 February 1907; The Structure of the Lord’s Prayer from GA 97; tr. A. H. Parker; London: Rudolf Steiner Press 1971; also in The Christian Mystery, Hudson: Anthroposophic Press 1998.
• 79. The teaching of the three gunas tamas, rajas and sattva is the foundation of the sankhya philosophy in the Vedanta system. See Rudolf Steiner’s lecture of 18 December 1912, in The Bhagavad Gita and the Epistles of Paul, GA 142; tr. L. D. Monges, D. M. Bugbey; New York: Anthroposophic Press 1971.
• 80. In ‘Aurora oder Morgenroete im Aufgang’, 23. Kapitel, Verse 1-6, in Sämtliche Werke, herausgegeben von K. W. Schibler, 6 Bde, Leipzig 1831–1846, Bd 2, S. 268.

I would like to say a few words in advance about the event “On the Essence of the Folk Song,” which is to take place here in the form of recitation. We can picture the scene that Goethe presented to friends and visitors at the Weimar court on December 18, 1818. There was a great masked procession, a great procession of living pictures. Among them were two that we would like to look at in particular. One depicted one of those old singers who, since time immemorial, have traveled from country to country singing to the people about the deeds of many a hero, but also about the feelings and emotions in the hearts of ordinary people. The other was a woman who was to represent the legend, the popular tale of good, noble deeds, of good, noble happenings. And these two figures were addressed by Goethe, the speaker who had to explain everything. Among other things, she said:

A noble man, eager to fathom
How man's purpose springs up everywhere,
Listens to the world for sound as a word,
That flows through the lands with a thousand springs;
He passes through the oldest, the newest regions
And listens in all zones.

And so from nation to nation he hears singing,
What stirred everyone in the mother's womb,
He hears tell of the good things
That the word of the forefather brought to the father.
All this was delight and teaching,
Feeling and action, as if it were one.

What suffering may bring and what is enough,
Bewilders confuses and unhoped unites,
That is what a thousand languages and idioms have meant,
From paradise to today.

So the bard sings, speaks legend and saga,
We feel it as if it were our own days.

When black the rock, surrounded by atmosphere
For dream images of dark lamentation forces,
There bright sunshine in the open sea
The high song of the delighted soul sounds;
They mean well and piously, they want
Only the human thing that everyone should want.

Where it is hidden, he would know how to find it,
Seriously veiled, disguised slightly as a game;
In the highest sense of the future to establish,
Humanity is our eternal goal.
Oh, why doesn't he look these days
Cured by humanity, the worst plagues!

This man had already been dead for fifteen years in 1813. Goethe had met him in Strasbourg in 1770. He describes in his “Poetry and Truth” how he entered a house in Strasbourg and encountered a man who, like himself, was about to go up the stairs and who immediately made a great impression on him. This man looked a little strange on the outside, like a poet, but at the same time like a clergyman; he was one, because it was Herder. He had a long silk coat, this coat he had hanging down, the tips tucked into his pocket. Herder was already sick at the time, but a person searching for greatness wherever it could be found. Goethe became friends with him and now the two of them collected folk songs and folk poems in Alsace. One may ask: why did they do that? Why did they go to the country roads, to the villages, to collect folk songs? And why, fifteen years after Herder's death, does Goethe praise the voices that come from the most diverse countries and peoples? Because even then, Goethe and Herder felt a certain urge within themselves to infuse poetry, which had strayed far from all that is genuine and true, with the sounds of the genuine popular heart. Herder went further in this than Goethe; it was he who rekindled the German people's love for the folk song. He collected folk songs wherever he could find them, from the northern Lapps to the southern peoples of the Orient. In 1778/79 he published the “Stimmen der Völker” (Voices of the Nations). It was a general surprise when people realized what poetry lives in the people, poetry that expresses the truest human feeling. Today we can discuss some of these matters in more detail than Herder was able to at the time. We have since learned a lot about the origin of these folk songs, but Herder already sensed all of this. That people originally accompanied everything, work and everything, with the sung word, in which there was rhythm and dance, that Herder already sensed, as did whooping and being sad in the folk song. He was the first to examine these things, then it went away; Uhland, Achim von Arnim continued to seek what people in the simplest of circumstances had written. And it was realized that what Goethe and Herder had written in their youth had an untruth in it; it was only customary in those days to write poetry. When Herder compares a Lappish poem with a poem by a distinguished poet, a poem by Ewald von Kleist, he has to say: What is it that Major von Kleist has written when you read the folk song in comparison? They were looking for what was genuine feeling, genuine poetry, in the folk song. Uhland, Mörike, Goethe himself would not have become such great poets if they had not first recognized the genuine. Today it is no longer possible to accompany work in this way with songs; work has lost all poetry, work has become a heavy burden. But one must see clearly that the folk song did not arise out of the fog.

So how did it come about? It is the human soul's moods that make people joyful or sad, that dismay them, that make them happy or unhappy; everything is in it. And it is always individual people who can feel with the people, who give poetic expression to what lives in the people; they are never numerous, they do not grow like cabbages in the field. Folk fantasy does not create as today's scholars would have it done off the cuff. That is simply nonsense. It is always individual people who have this ability. Even today there are still such people, even if they are very rare.

Depending on the time, folk songs took on different forms, for example in the 16th century. Who started a folk song then? It was wandering people who wandered around with views that had no rights; traveling people from country to country who didn't have much money in their pockets, so there were often cravings for the other pocket that was not with them: such feelings are also expressed, one can say honestly in a folk poem like “Schwartenhals – Schwartenhals” (literally: “The rind of the pork neck”), because others eat the pork neck and the meat, and he only gets the rind; “I came to a landlady's house – he had to leave me his pocket.”

Besides these there are also folk poems in which there is something sublime. All this was collected, and the poets learned an enormous amount from the truth and naturalness of feeling. The best of Goethe's poems, which so beautifully express human mood, human suffering and human desire, are inspired by folk songs. Everything that has ever been alive in the people, as long as the people have not yet grown tired, is expressed in their poetry. An example will be given of how a people in the 19th century still felt about those people whom they knew were their heroes. And Goethe felt this by translating the Neo-Greek-Epirotic heroic songs. They are the songs of the Albanian people; they are very significant and beautifully translated by Goethe. They sing of how the Albanian people feel about their enemy, the Turks, and how they long for freedom and want to summon all their strength against the Turkish occupation. One can say of such poems that they are timely, if not current. How people long to take up the sword to free themselves, something like the roaring of the wind lives in these heroic songs of the Epirotic Albanian people. And these feelings were already alive in Goethe's time. The rhythm and words resound with rushing and roaring feelings of freedom. The final poem is particularly beautiful: Charon, the guide of the dead; more than a guide, a charioteer. People who know modern Greek say that in this, Goethe has achieved something particularly beautiful in imitating what lives in these modern Greek poems.

Finally, a poem will be recited that best shows how folk poetry has been incorporated into art poetry. Genuine ballad tones are conjured up before us by Goethe's “Erlkönig”. This could only have been created by a person like Goethe, who, guided by Herder, then became a ballad poet himself. Goethe's “Etlkönig” is connected to the folk-style poem, as previously collected by Herder, through rhythm and tone.

The following poems by Goethe were recited: “Heidenröslein” (text see p. 28); also “Der König in Thule” and “Der Fischer”.

THE KING IN THULE

There was a king in Thule
Most true in life,
And dying, to his love
A golden cup he gave.

Nothing was better for him,
He emptied it at every feast;
His eyes overflowed
Every time he drank from it.

And when he came to die,
He counted his towns and his kingdom,
Gave everything to his heirs,
But not the cup at the same time.

He sat at the royal table,
The knights around him,
On high Father's Hall,
There at the castle by the sea.

There stood the old reveller,
Drank his last life's glow,
And threw the sacred cup
Down into the flood.

He saw him fall, drink
And sink deep into the sea.
His eyes would sink:
Never drank another drop.

THE FISHERMAN

The water rushed, the water swelled,
A fisherman sat there,
Looking at the fishing rod, peaceful,
Cool up to the heart.
And as he sits and listens,
The flood parts up:
From the moving water rushes
A wet woman.

She sang to him, she spoke to him:
What lures you, my brood
With human wit and human guile
Up into the heat of death?
If only you knew how it is for little fish
So comfortably on the ground,
You would descend as you are,
And would only be healthy.

Does not the dear sun delight,
Does not the moon delight in the sea?
Breathing in waves, does not her face
Return twice as beautiful?
Does not your own face beckon you
Back in eternal dew?

The water rushed, the water swelled,
Wetting his naked foot;
His heart swelled so full of yearning,
Like greeting from his sweetheart.
She spoke to him, she sang to him;
Then it happened to him:
Half drawn, half sank he,
And was no longer seen.

NEW GREEK EPIRUS HERO SONGS

I.

When fields have become Turkish,

II.

A black ship cleaves the waves
Near the coast of Kassandra,
With black sails above it,
And the blueness of the sky above them.
If a Turkish ship comes towards it,
Its scarlet pennants shine brightly,
“Strike your sails immediately,
Lower the sails dul'
No, I do not lower the sails,
Never do I let them down,
Do you threaten me as if I were a bride,
Bride, that is to be frightened.
I am Jannis, son of Stada,
Son-in-law of Bukovalas.
Come, my friends, to work! With his sword in his fist;
The beams drip with blood
And the waves are reddened.
Allah! Allah! Scream for mercy
The unbelievers on their knees.
Sadly, the winner calls, life! Stay now for the defeated!

III.

Bow, Liakos, to the Pasha,
Bow to the Vizier.
Before thou wast Armatole,
Lord of the land thou now shalt be.
“If Liakos only live,
He will never bow.
His sword is his Pasha,
His vizier is his gun."
Ali Pasha, hearing this,
is angry with the unwelcome guest,
writes the letters, the orders;
he decides what is to be done:
Veli Guekas, hurry vigorously,
through the cities, through the countryside,
Bring me Liakos at once, From the rampart's lofty stand:
Hearty, my children! to work,
Children of mine, to the fray!
Liakos appears nimbly,
Holding the sword in his teeth.
Day and night the fighting raged,
For three days and three nights.
Albanian women weep,
Dressed all in black in mourning;
Veli Guekas returns only to be
Strangled in his own blood.

IV.

What a noise? Where is it coming from?
What a mighty shaking?
Are they bulls before the slaughterhouse,
Wild beasts in fierce battle?
No! Bukovalas, leading fifteen hundred fighters to war,
Fights between Kerasovo
And the great city district.
Gunshots, like rain,
Bullets, like the lock's blow!
A blonde girl calls down
From the window of the gatehouse:
Stop the fighting, Janny,
This loading, this shooting!
Let the dust fall down,
Let the gun smoke blow away,
And then count your warriors,
So that you know who lost!
Three times the Turks were counted,
And four hundred dead lay,
And as the fighters were counted,
Only three faded away.

V.

The sun has set,
The crowd comes to the leader:
Up, companions, draw water
Share in the evening meal! Braid them into my bed;
Bring the confessor to the place,
That I may confess to him,
Reveal to him the deeds
I have done for my life.
Thirty years I am Armatole,
Twenty years a fighter already;
Now I will steal away to my death,
That I may be well satisfied.
Now prepare my grave,
That it may be high and spacious,
Upright, that I may be able to fight,
Able to load the pistols.
On the right I want an open window,
That the swallow may herald spring,
That the nightingale in May
May sing of the loveliest things.

It was followed by: Der Olympos, the Kissavos; Charon (see p. 30 for texts); Herder: Erlkönig's daughter (see p. 28/29 for text).

ERLKÖNIG

Who rides so late through night and wind?
It is the father with his child;
He has the boy well in his arms,
He holds him securely, he keeps him warm.

My son, why do you hide your face so anxiously?
Do you not see, Father, the Erl-King?
The Erl-King with crown and tail?
My son, it is a fog bank.

"You dear child, come, go with me!
I will play very beautiful games with you;
Many a colorful flower is on the beach,
My mother has many a golden robe.

My father, my father, and do you not hear
What the King of the Alders promises me softly? —
Be calm, stay calm, my child:
The wind whispers in dry leaves.

“Will you, dear boy, come with me?
My daughters shall wait on you well;
My daughters lead the nightly round,
And sway and dance and sing you to sleep.”

My father, my father, and do you not see there
Erlking's daughters in the gloomy place? —
My son, my son, I see it clearly:
The old willows seem so gray.

“I love you, I am attracted by your beautiful form;
and if you are not willing, I will use force.”
My father, my father, now he is touching me!
Erlking has harmed me!

The father is horrified, he rides away,
He holds the groaning child in his arms,
He barely reaches the farm;
The child is dead in his arms.

J. W. Goethe

Uhland and Goethe

[ 1 ] On September 3, 1786, Goethe set off on his Italian journey from Karlsbad. It brought him a rebirth of his intellectual life. Italy satisfied his thirst for knowledge and his artistic needs. He stood in awe before the works of art that gave him a deep insight into the imaginative life of the Greeks. He describes the feeling that these works of art awakened in his soul in his "Italian Journey". "At every moment" he felt called upon to contemplate them in order to "develop from the human form the circle of divine formation, which is perfectly complete, and in which no main character is missing as little as the transitions and mediations." He has "a conjecture that the Greeks proceeded according to the very laws by which nature proceeds, and which he is on the track of". He expresses how he perceives this realization as a spiritual rebirth with the words: "I have seen much and thought even more: the world opens up more and more; even everything that I have known for a long time only becomes my own. What an early knowing and late practicing creature is man!" - His feelings towards the creations of ancient art rise to the level of religious fervor: "These high works of art, as the highest works of nature, were produced by human beings according to true and natural laws. Everything arbitrary and imaginary collapses: there is necessity, there is God."

[ 2 ] Since Goethe had immersed himself in such an ideal of art, he saw everything in a new light. For him, this ideal becomes the yardstick for judging every phenomenon. One can observe this even in small things. When he was in Girgenti on April 26, 1787, he described his impressions with the words: "In the wide space between the walls and the sea, there are still the remains of a small temple, preserved as a Christian chapel. Here, too, half-columns are beautifully connected to the ashlar pieces of the wall, and both are worked into each other, most pleasing to the eye. You can feel exactly where the Doric order has reached its perfect measure."

[ 3 ] As chance would have it, on the same day that Goethe expressed his conviction of the high significance of ancient art by linking such words to a subordinate phenomenon, a man was born who summarized his almost opposite creed in the sentence:

Not in cold marble stones,
Not in temples, dull and dead,
In the fresh oak groves,
Weaves and rustles the German God.

Uhland's boyhood

[ 4 ] This man is Ludwig Uhland, who was born in Tübingen on April 26, 1787. When he concluded his poem "Freie Kunst" on May 24, 1812 with the above words, he was certainly not thinking of saying anything against Goethe's view of the world. Nor should they be cited in the sense of presenting a contrast between Goethe and Uhland. But they are indicative of Uhland's whole character. His path in life had to be different from Goethe's. Just as Goethe's whole inner being came to life before the "high works of art" of the ancients, so did Uhland's when he immersed himself in the depths of the German folk soul. Faced with this popular soul, he could have exclaimed: "There is necessity, there is God." He has this feeling when, wandering through the forest, he admires the native nature:

No better pleasure at this time,
Than to penetrate the forest,
Where thrush sings and hawk cries,
o deer and roe deer leap.

[ 5 ] He has the same feeling when he writes about Walther von der Vogelweide, reflecting on the art of German antiquity: "Among the old German singers, he deserves the name of the patriotic one. No one has, like him, recognized and felt the peculiarity of his people, how bitterly we hear him complain and reproach, with proud enthusiasm he sings elsewhere the praise of the German land, above all others, many of which he has wandered through: You shall speak: willekommen!"

[ 6 ] Uhland's ancestry and youthful development were highly conducive to the development of his folkloristic tendencies. His father's family was an old Württemberg family, rooted with all its attitudes and customs in the part of the country to which it belonged. His grandfather was an ornament to the University of Tübingen as a professor of theology, and his father worked as a secretary at this university. Her gentle, imaginative mother came from Eßlingen. These were favorable circumstances in which the quiet, introverted, outwardly awkward, even clumsy, but inwardly cheerful and enthusiastic for everything great and beautiful boy grew up. He was able to spend a lot of time in his grandfather's library and satisfy his thirst for knowledge in various fields. He enjoyed immersing himself in descriptions of important personalities and stories of great world-historical events as much as in descriptions of nature. Serious poems in which the life of the soul of deep people was expressed, such as those of Ossian and Hölty, made a great impression on him early on. This early Ernst Ludwig Uhland was far removed from all cowardice. If his high forehead indicated his sensible disposition, his beautiful blue eyes and cheerful disposition betrayed the deepest joy of life and the interest he could take in the smallest pleasures of existence. He was always there for all the fun games, jumping, climbing and skating. Not only could he spend hours sitting in a corner, engrossed in a book, but he could also wander through the woods and fields and devote himself entirely to the beauties of natural life. All learning was easy for him with such a disposition. Uhland's ability to master the external means of poetry became apparent early on. The occasional poems that he addressed to parents or relatives at parties show how easy verse and stanza form became for him.

Study and inclination. Uhland and Romanticism

[ 7 ] The outward course of study was forced upon Uhland by circumstances. He was only fourteen years old when his father was promised a family scholarship for his son if he studied law. Without having any inclination for this course of study, he took it up. The way he spent his apprenticeship is characteristic of his entire character. He literally split into two personalities. One personality was devoted to his poetic inclinations, his imaginative, cozy world view, his immersion in the history, legends and poetry of the Middle Ages; the other to the conscientious study of law. On the one hand, the Tübingen student lives in a stimulating devotion to everything that his "heart's desire" draws him towards, on the other hand, he appropriates the subjects of his professional studies so perfectly that he can conclude them with a doctoral thesis that has met with the approval of the most competent scholars. -

[ 8 ] The first poems that Uhland incorporated into his works date from 1804. The two ballads "The Dying Heroes" and "The Blind King" reveal a basic trait of his personality. Here he already lives in an imaginary world taken from Germanic prehistory. His love for this world has borne the most beautiful fruit for him. The sources of genuine folklore, the essence of the folk soul, were opened up to him through this love. As a poet and as a scholar, he drew the best strength from this love. And it was almost innate in him. He could say of himself that it was not only through study that German prehistory opened up to him, but that he sensed it when he gazed at the high cathedrals of the old cities. Scholarship only gave him clear, distinct ideas about what he had felt from his youth. - His immersion in the German Middle Ages was one of the characteristics of the literary movement known as Romanticism at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Ludwig Tieck, de la Motte Fouqúe, Clemens Brentano, Achim von Arnim and others were all promoters of this movement. They sought in piety and depth of mind a cure for the damage that the dry and often shallow "Enlightenment" of the eighteenth century had done to the spirit. As certain as it is that the pursuit of enlightenment, the recourse to one's own understanding and reason in matters of religion and outlook on life had a beneficial effect on the one hand, it is also certain that the critical stance towards all religious tradition and all old traditions brought about a certain sobriety on the other. The Romantics felt this. That is why they wanted to help the extreme, overly one-sided and understanding spirit of the times by delving into the prehistoric life of the soul. The view of art, which saw its ideal in the ancient Greek world and which had reached its zenith in Goethe and Schiller, also appeared to them to be a danger if it forgot its own people above the foreign antiquity. They therefore endeavored to revive interest in genuine German folklore.

[ 9 ] Such a current of the times must have found an echo in Uhland's heart. He must have felt happy during his university years to live in a circle of friends who shared his inclinations in this direction. Those who live in a pronounced world view easily see only the dark side of an opposing one. And so it was that Uhland and his childhood friends in Tübingen fought in their own way against the excesses of the Enlightenment and old-fashioned views that seemed to them to contradict German folklore. They expressed their resentment against this in a "Sonntagsblatt", which they could only publish by hand. Everything they had to say against the art movement, which was represented in the Stuttgart "Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände", they put down on paper. An essay in the Sonntagsblatt "Über das Romantische" (On Romanticism) provides clarity about Uhland's attitude. Certain traits of his soul, which can already be found here, remained with him throughout his life. "The infinite surrounds man, the mystery of the Godhead and the world. What he himself was, is and will be is veiled from him. These mysteries are sweet and terrible." He did not want to speak about the mysteries of existence with sober reason; he wanted to leave the primal reasons for existence as mysteries to which feeling can indulge in vague intuition, of which only the sensing imagination should form an idea in free images, not sharply outlined ideas through reason. He preferred to seek poetry in the unfathomable depths of the popular soul rather than in the high artistic laws of the Greeks. "Romanticism is not merely a fantastic delusion of the Middle Ages; it is high, eternal poetry that depicts in images what words can scarcely or never express, it is a book full of strange magical images that keep us in contact with the dark world of spirits." To express the secrets of the world through anything other than images of the imagination seemed to him like profaning these secrets. This is the attitude of the twenty-year-old Uhland. He retained it throughout his life. It is also clearly contained in the letter he sent to Justinus Kerner on June 29, 1829. June 1829, when the latter had presented him with his book on the "Seerin von Prevorst": "If you will allow me to express the impression that our last conversations left on me, it is this: what is yours in these works, what emerges pure and unclouded from your observation and view of nature, I am assured of the most beautiful benefit for all those who are aware that one will never penetrate the wonderful depths of human nature and worldly life without the living imagination..."

Circle of Friends

[ 10 ] The times that Uhland spent with his university friends were times that he himself described as "beautiful, joyful". Justinus Kerner, the rapturous Swabian poet, Karl Mayer, Heinrich Köstlin, a physician, Georg Jäger, a naturalist, and Karl Roser, Uhland's later brother-in-law, were all part of the circle. In 1808, Karl August Varnhagen von Ense, who was personally close to a number of Romantics and lived entirely according to their views, joined the circle. Uhland's poetry during this period bears the hallmark of the Romantic spirit in many respects. He sings of figures and circumstances from the world of medieval legends and history; he immerses himself in the emotional worlds of these prehistoric times and reproduces them characteristically. Even in the poems that do not refer to the Middle Ages, a romantic tone prevails as the basic mood. This tone sometimes takes on a rapturous, sentimental character. It is expressed, for example, in the song "Des Dichters Abendgang". The poet indulges in the delights of the sunset on a walk and then carries the impression of it home with him:

But when around the sanctuary,
The dark clouds roll down,
Then it is done, you turn back,
blessed by the miraculous.
In silent emotion you will go,
You carry the blessing of the song within you;
The light that you saw there,
Shines mildly around you on dark paths.

[ 11 ] Moods of a similarly romantic spirit are expressed in the songs: "An den Tod", "Der König auf dem Turme", "Maiklage", "Lied eines Armen", "Wunder", "Mein Gesang", "Lauf der Welt", "Hohe Liebe", and others from Uhland's student days. And the same romantic imagination prevails in the romances and ballads that Uhland wrote at the time: "Der Sänger", "Das Schloß am Meere", "Vom treuen Walter", "Der Pilger", "Die Lieder der Vorzeit" and others.

[ 12 ] And yet: for all the romantic mood in Uhland's character and for all the sympathy he had for the Romantic movement, there is a contrast between him and Romanticism proper. This grew out of a kind of contradictory spirit. Its main proponents wanted to oppose artistic poetry, as represented by Schiller, and the Enlightenment with something that was deeply rooted in popular life and the mind. Through study and scholarship, they came to the times in which, in their opinion, the spirit of the people and natural piety of the heart prevailed. In Uhland's case, the folkloristic and depth of feeling was present from the outset as a fundamental trait of his nature. If one therefore finds in many Romantics, for example in de la Motte Fouque and Clemens Brentano, that their striving for the Middle Ages, for the original folklore, has something sought after about it, that it often even appears only like an outer mask of their nature, then these traits are something quite natural in Uhland. He had never distanced himself in his thinking and feeling from the simplicity of the folk spirit; therefore he never needed to seek it. He felt comfortable and at home in the Middle Ages because the best aspects of it coincided with his inclinations and feelings. With such inclinations, it must have been quite an experience for him when Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano published "Des Knaben Wunderhorn" (1805) in Heidelberg, in which they collected the most beautiful flowers of folk poetry.

Journey to Paris. Diary

[ 13 ] In 1810, the poet had completed his studies, his state and doctoral examinations were behind him. He could think about looking around the world and searching for the nourishment for his spirit that he craved. Paris had to attract him. There were the manuscript treasures of old folk and heroic poetry, which could give him the deepest insight into the connections between the life and work of the past. The journey to the French capital and his stay there had a lasting effect on his entire life. He left Tübingen on May 6, i8io and arrived back home on February 14 of the following year. From i810 to 1820, Uhland kept a detailed diary, which was published by J. Hartmann. These notes are invaluable for understanding his personality, especially those relating to the Paris trip. Silent as Uhland generally is, he also proves to be in this diary. Feelings and thoughts are only sparsely interspersed between the purely factual details that are recorded. These are all the more significant. They give us a deep insight into his soul. He traveled via Karlsruhe, Heidelberg, Frankfurt, Mainz, Koblenz, Trier, Luxembourg, Metz, Verdun and Chalons. He writes: "My stay in Karlsruhe, which lasted from Monday to Sunday (May 7 to 3), will always be a precious memory for me." There he met the poet of the "Alemannic poems", Johann Peter Hebel. This genuinely folksy personality attracted Uhland immensely. He later wrote about his stay in Karlsruhe when he was in Koblenz: "Evening memories of Karlsruhe with tears." A diary entry that refers to the Rhine trip shows how Uhland liked to pursue mysterious connections in life and build his contemplative imagination on them: "Old view of Bacharach. The jolly, unknown journeyman with the post horn, which he blew badly, but whose notes were transfigured in the echo. The traveler from Breslau who suddenly emerged with his flute. Singing and music on the ship. Strange coincidence with my song: the little ship." Three months earlier, he had written the poem "Das Schifflein" ("The Little Ship"), in which he had described the experience, which now really came before his eyes, from his imagination. The diary shows us in many places that Uhland also pursued such things in later life, which cast a mysterious spell on the imagination, although they seem to defy rational contemplation. On April 3, 1813, for example, he wrote down a dream he had had. A girl was tempted by a reckless lover to enter the attic of a house and have herself played on a piano which, according to an old legend, must never be played because the player and the person who hears the notes will immediately age and die. Uhland sees himself in the company of his beloved. He feels the age within him; and the scene ends terribly. Uhland writes: "One could explain this dream as follows: the piano is the sin that lurks hidden somewhere in even the most pious home, waiting to be appealed to. The girl's lover is the devil, he knows how to handle the sin so that at first it sounds quite innocuous, ordinary. The sound becomes sweeter and sweeter, more and more enticing, holds fast with magical power, then it becomes terrible, and in wild storms the once pious and peaceful house perishes." Particularly characteristic in this respect, however, is a note from March i, 1810. "Night's idea for a ballad: the legend that those close to death believe they hear music could be used in such a way that a sick girl thought she heard a spiritual, supernatural serenade outside her window, as it were." This idea stuck so firmly in his mind that he expressed it on October 4 in Paris in a poem entitled "Serenade". This poem describes a dying girl who does not hear "earthly music", but who believes that "angels are calling me with music". Compare this with what Uhland wrote down on 8 June 1828 with reference to a dream, and you will recognize how such traits reveal something lasting in his character: "Among the surprising phenomena of a future world will also be that, just as we will have heavenly thoughts and feelings, so also for the expression of these a new organ will open up to us, a heavenly language will break out of the earthly one. The splendor and pomp of the present language cannot give us an idea of this, nor can the calm and (animated) silence of the language of the older German poets, just as in my song heaven wants to open up in the silence of Sunday morning, just as only when it is completely silent can the sounds of the aeolian harp or the harmonica be heard." At the same time, this shows how Uhland's whole way of imagining things had to lead him to the "silence and language of the older German poets", with whom he felt so closely related.

[ 14 ] In Paris, Uhland found what he was looking for. He immersed himself in old French and Spanish literature. The substantial essay "Das altfranzösische Epos", which appeared in the journal "Die Musen" in 1812, was the first result of these studies. He conceived the idea of a poem: "The King of France's Book of Fairy Tales", which, however, was never realized. He meets the poet Chamisso and spends pleasant days with him. He also meets Varnhagen again. A note dated November 17, 1981 shows what Uhland was pursuing with his studies in Paris: "Certain conception of the tendency of my collection of old French poetry: mainly saga, heroic saga, national saga, living voice, with the artistic, the bourgeois, etc." He is persistent in copying manuscripts. It is hard to say what fruit Uhland would have gained from his stay in Paris if it had not been curtailed from the outside. He needed the permission of the King of Württemberg to stay abroad. Unfortunately, his father had to inform him in December that royal permission for a further stay would not be granted. However, the poet not only became acquainted with the treasures of the Paris library, but also with the other treasures and beauties of the great cosmopolitan city. From his notes and letters we can see how he made it a point to study life and art, and how his view broadened. - What Paris meant to him is clear from the gloomy mood that initially afflicted him after his return. The prospect that he would now have to take up some kind of legal position added to this mood. One bright spot, however, was his acquaintance with Gustav Schwab, the poet of popular romances and songs and splendid writings on virtue, who was studying in Tübingen at the time. He became a loyal, devoted friend to Uhland. The level to which Uhland had worked his way up to in his poetic work is shown by his creations: "Roland's Shield Bearer", "St. George's Knight" and the magnificent "The White Stag", along with many others from this period. However, he had already achieved the high perfection of form that we encounter here earlier, as can be seen from one of his most popular ballads: "Es zogen drei Bursche wohl über den Rhein", which was written in 1809. On the other hand, the poems written after the Paris period clearly show how his imagination had been enriched by his immersion in the past. He is now not only capable of vividly depicting foreign material, but also of creating a complete harmony of content and manner of presentation in all external aspects of verse and rhythm.

Uhland as a civil servant

[ 15 ] After his return from Paris, Uhland had to look for a job. He had the opportunity to familiarize himself a little with the practical side of the profession by being entrusted with a number of defence cases in criminal matters and also the conduct of civil proceedings in the years i8i1 and 1812. The experience he gained from this did not exactly make the profession of a lawyer seem desirable to him. He was therefore satisfied when he was offered the opportunity to join the Ministry of Justice as an unsalaried secretary, but with the certain assurance that he would receive a salary before the end of the year. He took up his post in Stuttgart on December 22. - The life he now entered had many downsides for him. His official duties brought with them many difficulties. He had the task of dealing with the lectures that the minister gave to the king about the courts. The independent and straightforward manner in which Uhland drafted these lectures caused the minister some concern. After all, he was primarily concerned with creating as favorable an impression as possible with his reports. In addition, Uhland found it very difficult to connect with other people. It so happened that he was not accepted as a member of a circle of friends that met every Monday and Friday evening in a pub under the name "Schatten-Gesellschaft" until September 1813, although he had already attended one of the evenings on December 18, a few days after his arrival. Köstlin, Roser and others belonged to this circle. The strenuous work in the office and the unattractive life meant that Uhland did not feel very encouraged to be creative at the beginning of his stay in Stuttgart. How he nevertheless found his way inwardly and how his personality developed can be seen from statements such as the one in a letter to Mayer dated January 20, 1813: "Of course, I have not yet written any poetry, but in this outward isolation from it, poetry is becoming clearer and more alive to me inwardly, as is often the case with more distant friends."

[ 16 ] External events could only excite Uhland's poetic power to a limited extent. He was able to devote himself completely to them as a character, as a man of action. This is shown by his later self-sacrificing activity as a politician. Poetry was awakened in him, where it bore the most beautiful fruit, by an inner spiritual impulse. That is why the great struggle for freedom, in which his heart was fully involved, inspired him to write only a few songs. However, they show how his personality was interwoven with his people's striving for freedom. The "Lied eines deutschen Sängers", "Vorwärts", "Die Siegesbotschaft" and "An mein Vaterland" are songs with which he joined the chorus of freedom singers. - The salary that Uhland had been promised was not forthcoming for a long time. He grew tired of waiting and was otherwise not very satisfied with his position. For these reasons, he left the service of the state in May 1814. He now set up as a lawyer in Stuttgart. Although this profession also gave him little satisfaction, he felt happier with the external independence he now enjoyed. The source of his poetry also flowed more abundantly again. In 1814, he wrote the "Metzelsuppenlied" and the ballads "Graf Eberstein", "Schwäbische Kunde" and "Des Sängers Fluch".

Edition of the "Gedichtes" and the "Vaterländische Gedichte"

[ 17 ] In the fall of 1815, Uhland was able to publish the collection of his poems. Cotta, who had turned down an initial offer from the publisher in 1809 due to the "circumstances of the time", now agreed to take over the work. If this publication enabled the poet Uhland to become known in wider circles, it would soon provide an opportunity to do so with regard to his personal strength of character and soul. From now on, he actively intervened in the political affairs of his homeland. - In 1805, significant constitutional changes had been introduced in Württemberg. In the course of the turmoil caused by Napoleon in Germany, Duke Friedrich II had succeeded in making Württemberg an independent state and in 1806 he was granted the title of king. During this time, the state had also achieved significant territorial expansion. At the same time, however, the regent deprived the state of its old constitution, which was based on medieval institutions. Even though much of this constitution no longer corresponded to the new times, the Swabian people clung tenaciously to their inherited rights; at least they did not want to have new laws unilaterally imposed on them by the government. An antagonism developed between the king and the people, which lasted through the years of turmoil until the Congress of Vienna in 1815. After the negotiations of this congress, the people hoped for a reorganization of their political conditions in a liberal sense. As early as 1815, the king presented a draft constitution to a convened assembly. However, it met with the approval of neither the nobility nor the people. The latter demanded that completely new conditions should not be created arbitrarily, but that the old conditions should be transformed into new ones by negotiation, with full recognition of the rights of the estates that had been abolished in 1805. A second draft constitution presented by the king in 1816 also failed due to popular resistance. In that year the king died; his efforts to create new conditions in the country, disregarding the old rights, were initially continued by his successor, Wilhelm II. - Uhland's political convictions coincided with those of the people. Just as he clung with reverence to the products of the Middle Ages in intellectual life, so in public life the traditional institutions had something so deeply justified for him that his innermost feelings were outraged when they were arbitrarily and unilaterally shaken. He took the view that no one was authorized to give the people a new right, but that the owners of the "old, good law" must retain it until they themselves create innovations on the basis of it. It was in this sense that he expressed himself in 1816 in the poem: "The old, good right"; he wanted this "right", the "well-deserved fame of centuries proven, which everyone loves and honors from the heart like his Christianity". As in this poem, he expressed his conviction in a number of other poems. They were published from i815 to 1817 in small brochures as "Vaterländische Gedichte". They had a strong effect on his fellow countrymen. People appreciated this man, who was free-minded and democratic at heart, and increasingly revered him as one of the best guardians of Württemberg's national rights. As a result, people longed for the time when he would have reached the necessary age to become a member of the state parliament. Until then, namely until his thirtieth year, he could only work as a writer for the rights and freedom of his country.

"Duke Ernst". Dramatic attempts
"Ludwig the Bavarian". Dramatic plans

[ 18 ] Even before this time, the world also got to know Uhland as a playwright. In 1817, he completed his tragedy "Herzog Ernst", which he had begun in September of the previous year. It deals with the fate of the Swabian Duke Ernst, who repeatedly took up arms against his stepfather, Emperor Conrad II of Franconia (1024-1039), and who met his death in 1030 with his friend Werner of Kyburg while defending his supposed rights against the emperor. Uhland poured all his enthusiasm for the German Middle Ages and his Swabian homeland into this drama. Even if the dramatic liveliness of the work is rightly missed, the warmth of the portrayal and its lyrical power have always been admired. It was performed for the first time in May 1819 at the Stuttgart Court Theater and was a great success. - Uhland developed the greatest dramatic power in the first act, which presents a picture of harrowing entanglements. Gisela, the Emperor's wife, who has given him her sons Ernst and Hermann from her first marriage, asks her husband to release her son Ernst, who has been imprisoned on Gibichenstein for two years, on the day of his coronation as Roman king, where everyone is allowed to beg for favors. Her son had rebelled through youthful exuberance and because he believed he had a right to the Burgundian kingship, because the emperor had claimed this land for the empire. Gisela pleads for a pardon for the sorely tried man, who had a "semblance of right" for himself and whose young heart could easily be outraged. The Emperor is willing to grant the request if Ernst submits and relinquishes Burgundy. The scene in which Ernest appears, gaunt, pale and aged, is poignant. He is to be enfeoffed with Swabia if he renounces Burgundy and hands over his loyal friend Werner, who has always stood by him. He agrees to the first condition; he does not want to become a traitor to Werner under any circumstances. Like Ernst, the Emperor does not abandon the position he has once taken. Ernst and Werner remain loyal to each other. The imperial ban and the church ban hit them both. They are once again at the mercy of misfortune. Everything else now develops with iron consistency until Ernst and Werner's downfall, even if the dramatic life no longer rises to the heights reached in the first act.

[ 19 ] "Herzog Ernst" was not Uhland's first dramatic work, although it was the first that he completed. If you follow his dramatic drafts, you can see how persistently he worked on his perfection in this field of poetry and how he always made new approaches in this direction. One can therefore describe "Herzog Ernst" as the rich fruit of years of striving. At the time of his university studies, he tried his hand at a free adaptation of Seneca's play "Thyestes", which has been preserved. (Cf. Adalbert von Keller, Uhland als Dramatiker, p. r5 ff.) - The plan for an Achilles tragedy dates from the year i805. What Uhland wrote about it to Leo Freiherr von Seckendorf on March 6, 1807, shows how deeply he wanted to delve into the mysteries of life and fate with this drama: "About two years ago I began to draft a tragedy, Achilleus Tod. It was intended to portray the idea that even if fate prevents us from carrying out our decisions, if we have only fully and firmly grasped them within ourselves, they are nevertheless complete. What remains a fragment in reality can be a great whole in the idea. The idea remains untouched by fate. Various reasons, but especially my preference for the romantic, which the Greek ground was not up to, kept me from realizing it." It is a pity that nothing of the draft has survived, for one could gain insight from it into the way in which Uhland's Romantic spirit felt alien to the Greek cultural element. - After less significant dramatic attempts, Uhland became interested in the story of Francesca of Rimini in 1807. He was reading Dante's "Divine Comedy" at the time and thus became familiar with the material. The tragedy he wanted to work out from it occupied him for several years. He abandoned the plan in 1810 for a reason that we learn more about in a letter to Karl Mayer dated February 6, 18io: "I lack the leisure, inner peace and vitality to do anything bigger, for example Franceska; I can only do everything in fragments." The plan and individual scenes have survived (see Keller, Uhland als Dramatiker, p. 91 fl.) - Uhland received the inspiration for a drama "König Eginhard" from an old folk book. As an excerpt book shows, he made excerpts from this folk book in 1809. Justinus Kerner was also attracted to the Eginhard saga. He adapted it into a Chinese shadow play, which was published in Karlsruhe in 1811. The book from which Uhland took the legend is called: "Riesengeschichte oder kurzweilige und nützliche Historie von König Eginhard aus Böhmen, wie er des Kaisers Otto Tochter aus dem Kloster bringen lassen, usw. Item, how the great giants attacked the same kingdom etc. All described in a very useful and instructive way by Leopold Richtern, a native of Lambach in Upper Austria." Part of the Eginhard drama is the dramatic fairy tale "Schildeis", which Uhland published in 1812. - Uhland also attempted to write jocular plays during his student days. "The Uninhabited Island" and "The Bear" are two such plays. The latter is a farce set in Spain, which Uhland wrote together with Justinus Kerner in 1809. The year 1809 also saw the composition of a short comedy, "Die Serenade", which is also set in Spain. On ar. January i810, Uhland informs Kerner in a letter that he is working on a drama entitled "Tamlan and Jannet". It was to be a fairy tale dramatized from a Scottish ballad. A hint in the letter also reveals why this plan did not come to fruition. Uhland writes: "I have worked out the first act and another scene for Tamlan. It is to be three acts. You will receive a few scenes from it. Junker David is a changeling abandoned by the elves instead of the stolen Tamlan. As soon as Tamlan returns, he disappears. The discords dissolve into harmony, Absalon finds the desired music." Uhland drew inspiration for the two poems "Harald" and "Die Elfen" from this material. -

[ 20 ] It is understandable that Uhland had doubts about his dramatic talent after the failure of so many dramatic attempts. We learn of such doubts from a letter to J. Kerner dated 2i. January 1810: "With my inner restlessness, with my other, so varied occupations, nothing greater, more elaborate has been possible for me so far. And my talent for drama?" These words come after the mention of a tragedy sketch, "Benno", which Uhland wrote down in two days at the end of December 1809 (see Keller, Uhland als Dramatiker, p. 289 ff.) - Uhland wanted to deliver a truly romantic drama with his "Eifersüchtiger König" (Jealous King), the idea for which he communicated to his friend Kerner on 2i. January i810: "At last I have sketched a Scottish ballad (in Herder's folk songs) "The Jealous King" into a drama, albeit a slight one at first. The idea is to dissolve the hero and his story into poetry, into legend, precisely into the underlying ballad. Squire Waters leaves his father's house and goes to court; a minstrel joins him as the song that echoes the knightly life of action. Waters pleases the queen. The jealous king throws him into prison and has him executed; the flourishing life has come to an end. The minstrel leaves the court, the song goes out into the country. Water's parents and siblings sit at home by the fireside at night. They have a craving for scary fairy tales. The lost Minstrel enters and sings the ballad of Waters' death. The Queen's love for Waters is to be treated in such a way that she favors her dearest lady-in-waiting's inclination towards Waters, as it were in order to love him directly." Unfortunately, nothing has survived of the execution of this plan, which is rooted entirely in Uhland's romantic sensibility. - In 1814 and 1815, Uhland completed the short drama "Normännischer Brauch". He received the inspiration for it from old French poetry. The basic idea is given by the "Normännischer Brauch", that hospitality is rewarded. - A fragment: "Charlemagne in Jerusalem" was probably written in 1814. A letter from Uhland to J. Kerner dated March 28 reveals that the poet was working on a dramatic adaptation of the Hohenstaufen prince Konradin at the time. The diary shows that in July 1818 he read "Hahn's Reichsgeschichte über Otto von Wittelsbach und Konradin" in order to gain material for his drama. On July 14, he even wrote: "More vivid conception of Konradin". Nevertheless, only one scene was realized. He must have finally convinced himself that the material was not suitable for dramatic adaptation. This can be seen from a letter written on September 30, 1854 to Chief Justice Hein in Ulm, in which he states: "Because I myself, like many others, have once tried my hand at a Konradin, I know from experience that this historical subject seems to be more suitable for drama than it really is." - After so many futile attempts in the field of dramatic art, it must have filled Uhland with deep satisfaction when he wrote the last scene of his "Herzog Ernst" on July 14, 1817. On November 7, 1816, he had complained in a letter to Varnhagen von Ense: "Two poems occupy me, a narrative in stanzas, Fortunat und seine Söhne, on which, however, I have not completed more than two songs in two years, and a 'Trauerspiel', Herzog Ernst von Schwaben, which I cannot begin to complete unless I can hope to work it off in one piece. But my situation still won't allow me to do that." - The legend of the "Weiber von Weinsberg" preoccupied Uhland in 1816 and he wanted to work it into a dramatic farce, but this also remained a fragment. His planned Nibe-Jungen drama, the draft of which dates back to 1817, was also never realized. On the other hand, he was able to send the completed manuscript of the historical play "Ludwig der Bayer" to Munich on May 24, 1818. King Max Joseph had offered a prize for a drama based on Bavarian history, and Uhland had entered his work in the competition. The poet spoke about this drama in a letter to his parents on May 25th: "I have faithfully adhered to history in this and have faithfully used the documents still available. Also, since a play from Bavarian history was expressly requested, there are undoubtedly historians on the commission who are well qualified to judge it." Uhland wanted to express a "symbol of German tribal unity" in the play. It depicts the battle between Duke Ludwig of Bavaria and Frederick the Fair of Austria in 1322. The poet has portrayed a magnificent picture of German loyalty and strength of character in the personality of Frederick, who is captured and released by Louis for the purpose of working for peace in his homeland and who, true to his promise, voluntarily returns to captivity when he fails to mediate. The drama did not receive the prize. But that Uhland himself was satisfied by it is clear from the fact that he devoted himself to new dramatic plans after its completion. One of these is a short play: "Welf", of which only the beginning was written down in 1818, another: "Der arme Heinrich", of which only a small part was also written down in 1818. In 1819, the poet was occupied with "Otto von Wittelsbach" and "Bernardo del Carpio", for which he took the material from Spanish history. He wanted to deal with the heroic deeds of one of the most popular personalities in Spain. He only produced a prose sketch of "Otto von Wittelsbach", a draft of "Bernardo" and two fragments in verse. The last dramatic plan that occupied Uhland was in 1820, when he wanted to deal with the story of Johannes Parricida. From a suggestion he made to Gustav Schwab, we learn that Uhland wanted to put much of his own fate into this play. He said: "It was with him as it was with me. He was unlucky in everything." Nothing is known of an execution of this idea. It was the last to inspire Uhland to create in the dramatic field. The muse of this art never visited the poet again.

Marriage
Uhland as a representative of the people
Walther von der Vogelweide

[ 21 ] The above words about the plan for "Johannes Parricida" show how deeply upset Uhland's soul was at the failure of many a life plan. But just at the time when this disgruntlement seems to have taken hold of the poet's soul most strongly, a happy turnaround occurs in his life. On January 16, 1820, he became engaged to Emilie Vischer, the sister-in-law of his friend Karl Roser. The marriage took place on May 29 of the same year. This marked the beginning of a forty-two-year marriage that made Uhland happy in every respect. One need only read the magnificent work: "Ludwig Uhland's Leben. Compiled from his estate and from his own memory by his widow" to get an idea of the rarest union of souls based on intimate mutual understanding.

[ 22 ] If you want to judge Uhland's character, you need only familiarize yourself with his behaviour on the wedding day. The wedding ceremony was at three o'clock. The bridegroom spent the morning in the Ständehaus, where he also returned after the ceremony. The dutiful man did not want to allow himself a day off, which he would have had to take away from his work as a member of parliament. By this time, the poet was already fully involved in political life. In 1819, he was elected as a deputy from Eßlingen to the Assembly of the Estates, which had been convened to discuss the creation of a constitution. He was also appointed to the commission that had to work on the address of thanks to the king. This address is in fact essentially a work by Uhland. It bears the stamp of his character. It was written in a masculine manner, emphasizing freedom and justice, but sparing all prejudices of those in power. Uhland was a member of the deputation that had to present it. To celebrate the signing of the constitution on September 24, the "Herzog Ernst" was performed in Stuttgart on October 29. Uhland wrote a prologue to it, in which he characterized his relationship to political affairs in a striking and lively manner. In the performance, he brought the events of the present into a meaningful relationship with the facts of his drama. He characterized the time in which his hero lived: "This is the curse of the unhappy land, where freedom and law lie prostrate, that the best and the noblest must consume themselves in fruitless harm ..." "How different, if law and order, freedom and justice had risen up from stormy times and planted themselves firmly!" ... Uhland was also elected to the first state parliament, which convened in January 1820, as a representative of his home town of Tübingen. He held this office for six years with the conscientiousness that characterizes the course of his wedding day.

[ 23 ] In addition to his political work, Uhland devoted himself to the study of German prehistory. During these years, his interest was focused on the great medieval poet Walther von der Vogelweide. He felt a deep affinity with Walther's nature. Like Uhland himself, Walther was also a poetic and political personality. From the German conditions of his time, the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, he characterized the great singer. But Uhland himself was too pithy a character not to know and to see through everywhere how only a personality of a decidedly individual nature could be affected by the circumstances of the time in the way that Walther was. He knew what belonged to the times and also what belonged to man's own soul. And he took a deep look into the soul of his hero. He portrayed his character with a vividness that is difficult to achieve, how he suffered and what he wanted. How Walther cries out in poetry the cries of pain caused by his time, how he finds solace and healing in his art: Uhland has drawn this with delicate but decisive lines. These are soft outlines through which the image of the personality in Uhland's work presents itself to our souls, but they are outlines that reveal in every point the master of biographical art, who knows exactly how to find the boundary where overly sharp lines distort the character sketch into an arbitrary, if not caricature. And the figure of Walther in Uhland's drawing also becomes a symbol of the German nation. As peculiar as the soul of the individual personality is painted, everywhere we see the threads through which it is connected to the essence of the German national soul. - Uhland was only able to portray Walther von der Vogelweide because his studies were not limited to his narrow circle. He showed the same interest in the whole of German prehistory. During this time, he also worked on a "Representation of the Poetry of the Middle Ages". However, only the section on "Minnegesang" was completed, which was added to his collection "Schriften zur Geschichte und Dichtung" after Uhland's death. The work on "Walther von der Vogelweide" appeared in 1822. How little Uhland pursued these studies as a mere scholar is shown by his behavior on his travels, especially his honeymoon, which he was able to embark on after completing his work for the state parliament on July 8, 1820. The couple traveled throughout Switzerland. Everywhere we find Uhland eagerly endeavoring to get to know the customs, ideas and views of the people, everywhere he pursued the imagination of the country folk in their poetry and legends. What he hears from the mouths of the people themselves enlivens his eager studies, which he undertakes wherever he finds suitable material for his purpose in libraries. - Uhland's research was held in the highest esteem by his learned contemporaries. The explorer of German folklore, Joseph von Laßberg, visited him in 1820 and became his ardent admirer. This was important for Uhland, as Laßberg was in contact with the most important German classical scholars of the time and was also able to arrange written or personal contact with them for Uhland.

Politics and research. University professor

[ 24 ] In addition to the strictest understanding of his duties, Uhland was also characterized by wise moderation in all his actions. This makes his personality appear harmonious in the best sense of the word. Once he had taken on something, he gave himself to it with his whole soul. He put all his energy into it. But he never wanted one side of his profession to be compromised by the other. He lived in his research and at the same time achieved the most extraordinary things as a politician from 1819 to the end of 1826. In the latter year, however, he felt that the politician in him should not be allowed to push back the researcher any further. For this reason, he did not want to be re-elected to parliament in the following years. He wrote to his father in 1825: "It is my considered decision not to accept election this time. By enduring the seven troubled years, I believe I have fulfilled my civic duty in this respect.

[ 25 ] I cannot be expected to exclude myself from any other profession and purpose for another six years, apart from the fact that I would otherwise lack the desire and love that is required above all for such a sphere of activity." He did not allow himself to be re-elected for the time being. All the more reason for his desire to teach to grow ever greater and greater as a result of his research. For a long time, all his hopes in this direction remained unfulfilled. In 1829, the Württemberg government finally decided to appoint Uhland as an extraordinary professor of German language and literature in his home town at the suggestion of the academic senate of Tübingen University. He was now able to move to the latter. His lectures were among the most stimulating imaginable. All who heard them were full of praise and enthusiasm. Uhland was not a brilliant orator; he read his well-thought-out explanations, which were based on the most thorough research, from the manuscripts. Despite this unpretentious manner, he had the most profound effect. He presented his audience with the history of German poetry in the Middle Ages, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, as well as the history of legend and myth among the Germanic and Romance peoples. Particularly useful for his students were the "exercises in oral and written presentation" that he set up. Each participant in these could practise reciting speeches he had written himself or declaiming poems under Uhland's careful guidance, or could submit essays which were subjected to detailed criticism by the teacher. - Uhland's lectures were published after his death in his collected

[ 26 ] writings. They offer a complete picture of his academic work. Strangely enough, he did not deliver his inaugural lecture until the third year of his teaching career, on November 22, 1832. It can also be found in his writings. It deals with the saga of Duke Ernst, whom he was able to depict as clearly and vividly as a scholar at the time as he had previously portrayed him dramatically as a poet.

Death of the parents

[ 27 ] The joy that Uhland's parents felt when their son returned to them was great. But this joy was short-lived. In the spring of 1831, the mother fell ill and died on June 1 of the same year. Shortly afterwards, on August 29, the father followed. The warm relationship between the son and his parents is expressed in the poem "Nachruf" (Obituary), which he sent to their graves. It contained the simple but deeply painful lines: "They let the pious funeral song fade away, fade away; in my breast a gentle sound from you never dies away." And rarely has anyone expressed their grief in such haunting words as those in the obituary: "The death knell sounded so sad to me otherwise, so anxious; since you were rung by it, it has been the sound of home to me."

New political activity. Dismissal from the teaching profession.
"On the myth"

[ 28 ] It was not granted to Uhland for long to remain in a profession that would have met his innermost needs like no other. The people, whose advocate he had been in such a devoted manner for years, demanded his strength anew when the election for the Assembly of Estates to be convened the following year took place in 1832. He was elected deputy for the provincial capital and could not reconcile it with his conscience to deny himself the demands of his country. The French July Revolution had also deeply stirred emotions in Germany. For a man who, like Uhland, was prepared to give his life for justice and freedom at any time, important political tasks were once again at hand. He was one of the personalities in the Chamber who resolutely opposed the dangerous measure by which the government was to be granted special powers to maintain order. Since, in the opinion of Uhland and his friends, the way in which these powers were to be granted infringed on the rights of the people, they voted against them. The result was a dissolution of the chamber and new elections. Uhland was once again appointed to represent the people. The government soon found his work uncomfortable. They wanted to get rid of the deputy by saying that he was indispensable at the university and therefore could not be given leave to fulfill his duties as a deputy. Although he was truly devoted to his teaching position, there was no doubt in his mind that in such a case he would have to let his inclination take a back seat to his duties to the country and therefore take his leave as a professor. He was "very gladly" granted his resignation in May. He now devoted himself with all his strength to the office of representative of the people. A number of important bills were introduced at his suggestion. He only retired from this office again in 1838.

[ 29 ] His dismissal from his teaching post did not interrupt the pursuit of his research work. He was able to present his studies on the "Myth of Thor" to the world as early as 1836. In the following years he wanted to treat the "Myth of Odin" in the same way, but he left the manuscript lying around. It was only published after his death. Both works are as perceptive as they are soulful. Uhland pointed to the peculiarities of the creative popular imagination, which expresses a meaningful view of nature and a religiously deepened spiritual life in the form of myth. These works were complemented by the collection of German folk songs, which occupied him well into his forties. In 1844 and 1845 he was able to publish a large number of collected folk songs. He wrote a treatise explaining the essence of the folk song, which was only published from his estate.

The magic of Uhland's poetry

[ 30 ] In the period from 1816 to 1834, Uhland wrote very few poems. Unless there was a strong inner compulsion, he renounced all poetic activity. He is one of those personalities who are true to themselves in the strictest sense of the word. He probably never forced himself to write a poem. And since the muse only spoke to him at certain times, there are large gaps between the epochs of his poetic production. The year 1834 was another fruitful period. Magnificent ballads and romances belong to this period. "Die Geisterkelter", "Das Glück von Edenhall", "Das Singental", "Die versunkene Krone", "Die Glockenhöhle", "Das versunkene Kloster" were written at this time. He also wrote the songs: "Abendwolken", "Die Lerchen", "Dichtersegen", "Maientau", "Wein und Brot", "Sonnenwende", "Die Malve", "Reisen".

[ 31 ] The unique character of Uhland's poetry appears in these poems in a serene manner. The cozy tone of the songs, the meaningful vividness, the expression of a pure, loving feeling for nature appear in an outer form that has increased to the highest artistry. The ballads are imbued with the high ethical core of the poet's personality. It is part of the essence of Uhland's ballad and romance poetry that one always feels his heart beating, his soul rejoicing and suffering, when he tells facts in his simple, true way. Therein lies the magic of Uhland's poetry. He also puts his innermost feelings into his narrative poems; he always says what he feels about things and people. But by expressing his innermost feelings, he also knows how to let his personality recede behind the depiction. His creations reveal the complete unpretentiousness of a highly sensible man who is allowed to live his life to the full because his manner always appears modest and natural to the highest degree. When he talks about things, it seems as if the things alone speak. He feels so much with the nature and the heart of his fellow man that one always follows his sentiments, even when he speaks entirely from his personal point of view. It cannot be denied that the expression of the poet's feelings impairs the dramatic vividness of the narrative; but Uhland expresses himself in such a simple, truthful, thoroughly natural way that one does not feel the expression of his personality to be lacking in his ballads and romances. - And his feeling for nature is just as simple and great as his feeling for human destinies and actions. His eye looks at the creations of the world with serious joie de vivre. Only rarely does he strike a note of exuberance or exuberant cheerfulness. His outlook on life is always directed towards seeing the majesty and harmony in things. The moods of the times of day and seasons, the graceful and terrifying aspects of natural works and processes elicit the same vivid images and sounds that penetrate the soul. There is rarely anything sentimental in his feelings, although they are always characterized by softness and gentleness. Even in the poems in which he expresses his feeling for nature, the visual and emotional content flow into one another in an unforced manner.

Elected to the National Assembly. The year of the revolution.
The last years of his life. Letter to Alexander von Humboldt

[ 32 ] The satisfaction that the poet derived from his political activities diminished. And he may well have felt a sense of redemption when he made the firm decision not to accept another election as a deputy in 1838. He now lived a quiet, secluded life in his home town, completely devoted to his research. In 1836 he had bought his own house with a garden, from which he was granted a charming view of the wonderful Neckar valley. A number of trips to Austria, southern and northern Germany brought variety to his undemanding scholarly life. In 1846, he met Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm, the great German linguists and legend researchers, in person in Frankfurt am Main. -- Then came the turmoil of the revolutionary year 1848, and Uhland was one of the first to tremble with hope for a new era of freedom and national happiness. His fatherland was also gripped by the desire for freedom. Uhland's friend and fellow politician, Paul Pfitzer, with whom he had fought through many a storm in the Diet, was a member of the liberal ministry that was appointed. As a result, Uhland was asked to join the committee that was to prepare a new federal constitution in Frankfurt. Soon afterwards, he was elected to the German National Assembly from the districts of Tübingen and Rottenburg. Because he did not want to be both a representative of the people and a representative of the government, he resigned from the committee and devoted himself entirely to the negotiations of the People's Assembly. He belonged to the liberal center party. For a man like Uhland, who was able to see the situation more clearly than others, cherished expectations soon gave way to bitter disappointment. It did not take him long to realize that the various proposals made for the unification of Germany on a liberal basis had little chance of being realized. These proposals were a mixed bag: Prussian hereditary emperor, directorate, elective emperor, republican constitution. Uhland could draw little courage to intervene in the negotiations from all that was being said at the time. He was not a personality who indulged in hopeless radicalism. In addition to a resolute sense of independence and a noble enthusiasm for freedom, he also had the determined will to strive only for what was possible in the circumstances. Within the realm of the possible, however, he always advocated what was most in keeping with his sense of freedom. Thus, on June 29, 1848, he did not vote for Archduke Johann, but for Baron von Gagern for the office of Reichsverweser. Only rarely did he feel compelled to appear as an orator. When he did, he spoke weighty words. His entire feeling and thinking is expressed in the words he uttered on January 22, 1849 in the course of a speech against a hereditary emperor: "No head will shine over Germany that is not anointed with a drop of democratic ole." Following the King of Prussia's rejection of the German imperial dignity, those members of the parliament who were attached to this idea resigned. The rest of the representatives moved to Stuttgart. Uhland persevered in the rump parliament, despite his opposition to its relocation to Stuttgart. He felt it was his duty to remain among the men who wanted to continue fighting for their ideals. The situation in Stuttgart was the most difficult imaginable right from the start. The majority of the rump parliament was in favor of electing a regency of five people to lead the empire. Uhland was the leader of the opponents of this decision. He had only five like-minded people. He expected nothing from such a form of government. In the following days, the Württemberg government tried to prevent the meetings of the people's representatives by military force because they had decided to raise five million as a levy for the formation of a people's army. Uhland and his friends nevertheless wanted to go to the meeting on June 18. The military prevented them from doing so. They had to give way. So Uhland was one of those who fought the parliamentary battle to the last in those memorable days, and who could say to themselves that they had only given way to violence. - Only once more was Uhland called to the political scene, for a very short time. In 1850, he had to take part in the State Court, which had to pass judgment on the government's actions during the revolutionary period. Here, too, he once again stood up for the rights of the people in vain by advocating the condemnation of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Baron von Wächter, who had not submitted important political decisions to the Estates in accordance with the constitution.

[ 33 ] From then on, Uhland lived only for his scientific and literary work. He devoted himself to his research into the history of legends and began collecting folk songs. He also entered a new field. He wanted to work through the legends of his own homeland. He only managed to carry out a small part of this plan.

[ 34 ] Until the last days of his life, Uhland retained the full vigor that was always characteristic of him. His domestic happiness was always unclouded; he took great pleasure in bringing up two foster sons. One was Wilhelm Steudel, whom he took into his home as a fifteen-year-old boy. The father of the prematurely orphaned child was Uhland's friend, Dean Steudel in Tübingen. In 1848, the son of Uhland's sister, who had already died in 1836, lost his father. Uhland also devoted himself to the upbringing of this boy. - The poet was deeply saddened by the death of his old faithful friend Justinus Kerner in February 1862. It is not unlikely that a cold at the funeral was the cause of his fatal illness. He was unable to recover and died on November 13, 1862. The funeral services held in many places proved that Uhland's work had gradually come to be fully appreciated. The poet was loved in the widest circles of the people, the scholar of legends and myths was held in high esteem by his peers, the politician with his genuinely masculine sense of independence was revered as a role model. In the last period of his life, he proved this sense in a rare way. In December 1853, he was made a Knight of the Order pour le m£rite. He rejected the dignity with the significant words: "I would be in irreconcilable contradiction with literary and political principles, which I do not flaunt but have never denied, if I were to accept the honorary position that has been conferred on me and which is also associated with an elevation in rank. This contradiction would be all the more cutting as, after the shipwreck of national hopes, on whose planks I have floated, it would not suit me well to be adorned with decorations, while those with whom I have gone together in many and important things, because they went on in the last disruption, are doomed to the loss of homeland, freedom and civil honor, even to the death sentence." He addressed these proud words to Alexander von Humboldt, who informed him of the award. Humboldt did everything in his power to persuade the poet to accept. He remained unbending. He also rejected the order for science and art intended for him by the Bavarian king.

Dear attendees! For a number of years now, I have been privileged to give lectures here in this city in the field of spiritual science. Since the friends of our spiritual science movement have also requested such lectures here for these fateful times, I would like to present you with a reflection that takes more of an attitude of spiritual science as its starting point today; and tomorrow we will then delve deeper into questions of spiritual knowledge that move the heart and soul. It will be understandable that this introductory lecture is being held today, since everything that can move us today, especially when it is close to the heart and soul, must really be carried out after the fateful events in the midst of which we stand.

One could say that the nations of Central Europe are locked in a fortress, a large, mighty fortress. And in the east and west, the existence of this Central Europe is, so to speak, being called into question. And what a sum of courage, sacrifice and devotion have we seen in the months since the beginning of the war; and how much suffering and pain have we had to witness! How the days of suffering and pain, with their events, affect families, how fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters are connected with them!

Therefore, it must be important to us to introduce our reflections on the spiritual development and spiritual hopes of humanity with a few thoughts and feelings that are directed towards the difficult situation of our time. We hear this Central European culture vilified from all sides, reviled. We hear all sorts of things today from the east and west and from all sides about this Central European culture. We may undoubtedly, my dear attendees, see the significant deeds of our people and see them as related to the whole essence of our people's organism. I would like to say: what is happening today is happening through the arms of this organism. But it befits the very essence of the German people to consider the arms, the essence of the spirit, the essence of the soul of this organism. And what better way to do that than by remembering, at such a fateful and fateful moment, the significant and important deeds of the soul and spirit of the German people, and by drawing strength from them for our hopes and goals for the future.

And I would like to take the starting point of what we, as the essence of the German people, can envision from two outstanding geniuses of this people: Schiller and Fichte. Within the German essence, has it always been the custom, in difficult times, to draw strength from those who, as great ancestors, can provide this strength? And I would like to make this connection today, truly not to stir up emotional feelings in you, but because I believe that such a connection can be meaningful in our days, the connection to the days of the death of these two mentioned geniuses. It is possible for us – as I said, not to stir our emotions, but because I believe that this point of view is particularly close to our hearts and souls in these days – it is possible for us to look at the last days, yes, the hours of Schiller's and Fichte's death very intimately, very confidentially.

Schiller's death was described to us by his then young friend, the son of Johann Heinrich Voß, Heinrich Voß, the so-called younger Voß. And we can follow him, our Schiller in the last days of his life, as he is already dying, sustained solely by the powers of the spirit that prevail in him. Yes, with Schiller we can say that basically the body was long since doomed to die, while the strong, energetic spirit still prevailed and just dragged the body along. For, as this body was so completely decrepit, Heinrich Voß shows us, so to speak. He leads us into Schiller's death chamber, and we take part in the last hours of the great spiritual hero. We are told how Schiller, in these last hours, with his body already completely subject to death, with a yellowed face, with extinct eyes, still strong in spirit in these moments, how he had his last, his youngest child come to him in these last hours, how he looked the child long in the eye and then sent thoughts out of these eyes, one would like to say into the eyes. The younger Voss wanted to divine these thoughts, and we can say that, as he tells us, they will be correctly divined. It was as if Schiller wanted to say to the child – what he could only express in these rasping words: I should have been your father for much longer, I still have much to do for you. Then he handed the child back, turned away and looked at the wall again.

Do we not feel, my dear audience, as if the whole German nation, the soul of the whole German nation, could recognize itself in this child? Schiller, who died young, could also have said to our nation: I could have been much more to you, I have left much unsaid and undone for you. But he dies fully imbued with the inner energy of that which he felt to be the German spirit, that spirit which carried him through life, inspired him to his creations, sustained him as his body wasted away, that spirit whose world-historical mission he himself described in such moving words that we may well bring these words before our souls in these times. These words only became known long after Schiller's death, but they bear witness to how Schiller thought about the spirit of his people:

He who forms the mind, rules,
must ultimately become the ruler, because
finally at the goal of time, if the
life has any meaning at all,
must custom and reason triumph,
the brute force of form succumb
and the slowest people will catch up with all
the fast fleeting ones.
[...]
Him

– the German –

is destined for the highest,
and just as he is in the center of
Europe's peoples,
he is the core of humanity,
those are the flower and the leaf.

He has been chosen by the world spirit, during
the battle of the ages
to work on the eternal construction of human education,
to preserve what time brings,
Therefore, he has so far appropriated what is foreign
and preserved it within himself.
Everything that was valuable in other times
and peoples, that arose, developed and faded with the times, he has preserved;
he has not lost the treasures of
centuries;
Not to shine in the moment and
play a role, but to win the great
process of time. Every people
has its day in history, but
the day of the Germans is the harvest of
all time.

And today, in these fateful days, we may well remember the spirit that Schiller believed must be the harvest of all time, the harvest of the cultural development of mankind.

And if we turn our attention from Schiller, the great poet, to his friend, the philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte, we see no less of the German spirit in the soul of a human being when we look at Fichte's last hours on earth. Schiller was often able to tie in what he had to say to his people in a work, which will be discussed shortly, with Fichte's strong, forceful philosophy. Yes, Fichte's philosophy is energetic and powerful. It is as if, from the whole scope, the universality of the genius of the philosopher Fichte, he wanted to extract everything that this German mind has of load-bearing capacity, to draw out everything that can affirm the strongest will in the strongest thought. And so, as Fichte spoke the beautiful word: “What kind of philosophy you have depends on what kind of person you are,” it can be said that we see this word proven in truth in Fichte in particular; because he felt connected to the German spirit, which was so dear to him, Fichte felt at the same time connected with the rule and weaving of the whole world spirit, felt in every word he spoke, carried by the spirit that permeates and flows through the world. But this philosopher did not live only in the abstract spirit. When Germany was going through the difficult times at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Fichte, the philosopher, often considered whether he should not take part as a warrior in the fateful events of the time. But then he found that he could do more for his nation through his intellectual work. So it happened that at first only his wife took part in the military hospital service in Berlin. But she brought illness into his house by contagion. She recovered, but he himself, the philosopher, was carried off by the military hospital fever.

And now we see how Fichte, who presented the diamond-bright, crystal-clear thoughts of the most German philosophy to humanity, lay on his sickbed in the last days of his life, waiting for news of Blücher's crossing of the Rhine and everything that the people in the west had to undertake. We see how he, who had decided not to be physically among the fighting because he wanted to serve his people and humanity with his mind, we see how he took part in the warlike events of his time in his feverish dreams in his last hours. And we experience the wonderful interplay of a worldview with life even in illness and even in the death rattle when we see how Fichte allowed everything that he wanted to give to the German people through his powerful philosophy to flow into his feverish dreams. We see how he feels in his dreams in the midst of the struggling, and how he feels at the same time as resting securely with his soul in the spiritual world. The dying philosopher Fichte, without fear and full of hope for his people, said when they wanted to give him medicine: “I do not need medicine, because I know I will recover.” Shortly before, he had been given the news of Blücher's crossing of the Rhine. Thus, in the life of the man who is fully immersed in German intellectual life, this intellectual life and the immediate life of the surroundings interact. For this German intellectual life is not an idealistic, dreamy one, but one that always enters into all the individual achievements of its German people. And today, we can justifiably claim that everything achieved in the face of blood and death, pain and suffering, is sustained by the power that permeates our intellectual experience.

And so we see this Fichte, imbued with the best power of the German spirit! Today, we can only sketch out some of the characteristics of what lived in Fichte's mind. In one of Germany's darkest hours, when Germany had been brought to its knees by the western conqueror, Fichte spoke his “Speeches to the German Nation”. Certainly not everything that Fichte spoke at the time can be agreed with today, word for word. But the spirit that inspired him must also be ours. Just as Fichte assumed at the time that the German language is a primal language that developed like an organism from the starting point of German history in Europe, while the Romance languages of the West and South suffered a break in their development, while they originally started from something Germanic, but adopted something foreign that they put over the folk essence in the Romance essence.

If Fichte infers something from the character of this original language, which developed out of the essence of the German and grew like an organic force, then today this may be contestable from a linguistic point of view. But what inspired Fichte, what constitutes the fundamental character of his philosophy of will and thought, is that Fichte reflected on what is most original in man, what is connected in man with all the sources of life in the soul. Fichte sees flourishing and truly authentic destiny hopes only where the soul is able to bring forth from itself what lies in its depths. Fichte saw an emblem of the fact that the German spirit aspires to this in the German language. But even if we can no longer go into the details of Fichte's point of view today, we must still look at how what he then expressed in accordance with his time was formed in Fichte.

What did Fichte strive for in his philosophy? We need only recall what spiritual science actually wants to be. It wants to be a knowledge that does not passively surrender itself merely to the phenomena of the external world, that does not merely allow itself to be passively stimulated with reference to the mind that is bound to the brain, but spiritual science wants to be, if we want to use the expression in all humility, a brave science. It wants to be a science that comes about through the development of the higher human being in man, as Schiller said, the actual spiritual human being, through the development of that which is connected in man's own being with the great spiritual being of the world, which lives in man in such a way that when man recognizes it, he at the same time knows himself to be living and weaving in the divine-spiritual world being itself. But this is what Fichte was constantly seeking. And so he feels connected to the most spiritual part of the world through the knowledge that he sought to acquire from the human soul. Or how could one express the spiritual certainty that man can attain more forcefully than when Fichte uses the words:

There is no doubt about it, it is the most certain thing there is, indeed, the basis of all other certainties, the only absolutely valid objective, that there is a moral world order, that every rational individual is assigned his specific place in this order and counted on for his work.

Thus Fichte's most German philosophy brought about the realization that it was the most certain thing for Fichte to know that he was a single soul in the entire spiritual world, that there is such a world order into which the individual is woven.

Fichte merely renewed in a manner appropriate to modern times that which has always prevailed in the German spirit: the striving for knowledge that arises from the powers of the human soul, which cannot end with death. And when we hear such words as those just quoted from Fichte, we are reminded of the words of the great German mystic Angelus Silesius: “It is not I who live and die in me, but God Himself who lives and dies in me.”

This striving for knowledge not only gives the soul a sense of security in the world spirit, but at the same time certainty with regard to its immortality. For how could one, in the soul experiencing and knowing God in the soul, not be aware of this immortality? For if the God in the human soul dies, then death is precisely a new resurrection. The German spirit constantly strove for such knowledge, which conquers death, for knowledge of the soul, so that this soul recognizes itself not only through the instruments of its body, but through purely spiritual instruments, so that it faces its bodily experience, its own body, in a body-free state, in brave science, as it were, just as one faces external objects in the body. But from such knowledge there arose such a wonderful saying as that of Jakob Boehme, in which is summarized, as it were, all that the German spirit has to say about the great riddles of life in their connection with the destiny of the human soul: “He who does not die before he dies, will perish when he dies.”

But that means nothing other than Jakob Böhme wants to suggest that a knowledge of the nature of the soul can be gained in life, of the soul as it will be once it has passed through the gate of death and looks back at its body. Because the one who does not acquire such knowledge before he dies will, in Jakob Böhme's view, perish when he dies.

And so spiritual science today not only seeks knowledge of the spiritual, which is, so to speak, an increase of ordinary knowledge in the body, but spiritual science seeks knowledge in the soul, insofar as this soul, between birth and death, ing can forces that it will also have after death, when it will look back on the body and the bodily life, where the body and bodily life will again be not subject but object, as in everyday life. And if today a spiritual scientist wants to use, so to speak, what German spirit can bring us today to make a comparison for something that Fichte wanted to say in his time, then he could take this comparison for a particular case from this spiritual science. I will develop this particular case before you.

Fichte, when he was thinking about what he wanted to say to his people, about how they could realize their hopes and find their goals in these fateful times, pointed to a completely new education that goes to the source of the stirrings of life in the soul, to the higher human being in the human being. Fichte knew at the time that what he wanted to present to his nation with this education – we can no longer think in this way today, but we can look to Fichte's intentions, perceptions and feelings – was probably clear to Fichte's soul as the salutary for the future, but when he compared it with what had been regarded as the essence of education up to his time, it could appear to him as something completely new that must wriggle out of the old, so that this new has no longer any similarity with the old. Then the more recent spiritual researcher could say, precisely on the basis of spiritual science, which Fichte did not yet have: “Now, I compare this new, this completely new education with the soul that has wrestled itself free from the body at death and now looks back on it.

And the spiritual researcher today could describe how the soul looks back on the body and the life of the body after death. There is a passage in Fichte's “Addresses to the German Nation” that is particularly significant in this regard. It is a passage that one might easily overlook, but it is good to bring it to mind today. Fichte himself sought a symbol for the relationship between his new education and the old one. And he says: “What I am putting forward as a new educational plan appears different from everything that has been thought to be right, so that it will not be easy for anyone to understand me.” And when Fichte seeks a symbol for the relationship between this new education and the old one, he uses the following image:

Time appears to me as an empty shadow that stands over its corpses, from which an army of diseases has just driven it, and laments and cannot tear its gaze away from the once-so-beloved shell and desperately tries all means to get back into the dwelling of the plague. The invigorating breezes of the other world, into which the departed has entered, have already taken her in and are surrounding her with warm, loving whispers; the secret voices of the sisters are already greeting her and welcoming her; she is already stirring and expanding within all directions, in order to develop the more glorious form to which she is to awaken, but she still has no feeling for these airs or hearing for these voices, or if she had, she is absorbed in pain over her loss, with which she believes she has lost herself at the same time.

We see from this, my dear attendees, that Fichte himself uses the image that we use today from a spiritual scientific consciousness. Fichte uses it from what he feels as the depth of the German spirit weaving within him and what he wanted to present to his people at the time. How deeply this awareness of the interweaving of the soul with the All-Spirit is linked to German spiritual life, when we see that what is being sought today and achieved in spiritual science is working its way out of the great philosopher of the German people like an energetic presentiment.

And if we go back from him to Schiller, we can see how the search for the most spiritual part of the soul runs through one of his most intimate, most beautiful, most magnificent prose works, one of those prose works in which man perceives what he sees with his eyes and hears with his ears, not only in terms of external sensuality, but experiences the spiritual in it through the deepening of the soul within himself, and this is so full of life in him that he experiences it pictorially artistically or, as one would say today, spiritually scientifically as reality. There the human being is free, there the human being gives birth to his higher self.

Schiller's highest aspiration is to seek the higher human being within himself. And here, ladies and gentlemen, we can see how basically everything that the German mind has achieved at its highest levels is connected with its universal striving towards spirituality, towards the intimate coexistence of the soul with the spirit. With Schiller, with Fichte, with Goethe, the same striving is everywhere to be found. And for these minds, the most characteristic thing is that being German coincides with being human in the right sense, in the striving for the highest human ideal. And with a mind like Goethe's, in particular, we see this once again, and the most beautiful expression of this is his “Faust”.

It is precisely in these minds that we see how being German is something different from being Italian, French, British or Russian. Here we have to use the word: you can be Italian, you can be French, British or Russian, but you become German. You are constantly becoming German. Then one is best of all Germans, when Germanness floats before one like a higher ideal, or one could say like a living spiritual goal in the distance, which one has to approach more and more. Therefore, the word that Lagarde spoke in more recent times: “Being German lies not in the blood, but in the mind.” — is extremely true precisely for these minds.

Therefore, it is difficult to make those who live around this Germanness understand it, and on whom this Germanness of Central Europe has to send its rays of influence. And from Fichte's mouth we hear an important and significant word about being German, and again in the “Speeches to the German Nation”:

[...] whoever believes in spirituality and freedom of this spirituality, and wants the eternal development of this spirituality through freedom, that wherever it is born and in whatever language it speaks, it is of our kind, it belongs to us and will join us.

This is the universal position of the greatest Germans with regard to what they felt as Germanness, as Germanity. This is how Germany's great philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte spoke in his “Speeches to the German Nation”, which he, as he said in one of the first speeches, wanted to hold by Germans per se to the German per se.

I said: Everything that asserted itself as the striving for spirituality, as the essence of Germanness, is concentrated, as it were, in what Goethe was to his people. And now we might ask ourselves: Has anyone in the world tried to form a correct idea of this essence and this striving of the German people? There were times when one could hear one or another European nation praising the German essence and emphasizing it in one way or another. But in many cases one has to say: the experiences of today in particular show us how little reason, how little inner truth there was in what was felt about the German character in the world. Indeed, there are people like the French philosopher Bergson – one does not know whether he will still call himself Bergson now that St. Petersburg is no longer called St. Petersburg but Petrograd – this French philosopher Bergson, he found that the he had to give to philosophy in our time, basically borrowed it entirely from the philosophy of German idealism. In German idealism, it appears comprehensive and universal, but in Bergson's work, it appears meager and threadbare. But he, who should know the German character, pointed out in a chauvinistic speech he gave last Christmas how the Germans had forgotten everything they had achieved in the way of spirituality. How the Germans once had something like spirituality, but now they only show themselves to be purely mechanistic. One need only point to what the Germans are now producing: mechanistic cannons, rifles, machines, everything has been transformed into mechanism.

One must be truly amazed at the logic that is going around the world today. After all, is it logical to speak as Bergson does? Even if one admits that the Germans once had Goethe, Schiller, Fichte, what, one might ask, did Bergson expect with his French logic? Did he expect that when the Central European peoples were threatened from all sides, threatened by a superior force two and a half times as strong, that they would then confront their enemies reciting Goethe and Schiller or declaiming Fichte's philosophy? Because they do not do this, the philosopher Bergson finds that the Germans have become a mechanistic people because they face their enemies with guns and cannons. Well, and from this French philosopher to that Monsieur Richepin, it is a straight line between what all the ranting and raving about the German people, the German essence can be heard. All the nuances of the ranting can be found. Richepin could not avoid saying that the Germans are wild, crazy, dirty beasts that must be strangled like wild pigs, all of them. There is a scale from the philosopher Bergson to such vilifications of the German people, which today vibrates throughout Europe. But then we may well ask ourselves: Has one always thought so about the German essence? About that German essence, which under today's conditions can naturally show nothing but its armies, but that German essence, which certainly only has to defend itself with its armies, but which has its foundation only in spirit and soul. It is interesting to contrast what is pulsating through the world today with this German essence in terms of its world position and its mission in the world. And here it is certainly no pleasant task to praise oneself, as it were, for that to which one is attached. So let us choose a different path, the path of looking around to see whether this German essence has always appeared “barbaric” to those who call it “barbaric” today, to those who have tried to understand it.

There is a thinker, a great thinker of the nineteenth century, an American thinker who spoke and wrote in English, Emerson. Since we do not want to judge German character ourselves, let us hear what a non-German, speaking English, Emerson in America, has to say about the nature of the German and his mission. Emerson ties in with Goethe, who is for him the representative of the German character, Goethe, in whom is summarized that which must also appear to us as the essential in Fichte and Schiller.

One phenomenon in particular, which Goethe shares with his entire nation, makes him stand out in the eyes of both the French and English public: that everything in his work is based solely on inner truth. In England and America, people respect talent, but they are only satisfied when it works for or against a party of its conviction. In France, people are delighted to see brilliant ideas going wherever they want. In all these countries, however, talented men write as far as their gifts reach. If what they present stimulates the discerning reader and contains nothing that offends against good manners, it is considered sufficient. So many columns, so many pleasantly and usefully spent hours. The German mind possesses neither the French vivacity nor the Englishman's understanding, honed to practicality, nor, finally, the American adventurousness. But what it does possess is a certain probity that never stops at the outward appearance of things, but always comes back to the main question: “Where is this going?” The German public demands of a writer that he stand above things and simply express himself about them. There is intellectual activity, well and good: what is it in favor of? What is the man's opinion? Where does he get [–where] all these thoughts?

The English [...] see only the individual, they do not know how to grasp humanity as a whole according to higher laws.

The Germans think for Europe.

The English do not appreciate the depth of the German genius.

It is true that one would be cautious if one had to coin such words oneself, but they were first uttered by an English American in English. Then he continues, looking at what the German mind has to give to world development:

For this reason, the terms of distinction used in higher conversation are all of German origin. While the English and French, who are praised for their acumen and erudition, approach their studies and points of view with a certain superficiality, and their personal character is not too deeply connected with what they have taken up and with the way they express themselves, is not too deeply connected, Goethe, the head and content of the German nation, speaks not because he has talent, but the truth concentrates its rays in his soul and shines out from it. He is wise in the highest degree, though his wisdom may often be obscured by his talent. However excellent what he says is, he has something even better in mind. [...] He has that awe-inspiring independence that arises from dealing with the truth.

Now, one could say that these are old stories. Emerson has been dead for a long time, and the Germans have changed according to those who judge them now in their lack of reflection caused by the passage of time. Perhaps we may look at something else that was said not decades ago, not a few months before the outbreak of the war, not by a German, not in Germany, but by an Englishman in Manchester. These words have also been translated into German and published under the title “Germany in the Nineteenth Century”.

In the preface, we are told that the lectures were given to provide journalists and other people with a little insight into the German character. You can judge for yourselves how well this has been received from what you now read in English newspapers about the German character and how it is viewed in England. But at that time the following was said, and not in German, but in English and in Manchester, in the British Isles themselves:

The highly favored elite among Descartes' and Newton's countrymen

- that is, the English [and French] —

the spirit of science was unquestionably known; but the passionate urge for knowledge was taught to modern Europe, if at all, mainly by thousands of German researchers.

Imagination, feeling, will asserted their right to be heard beside or above reason, and under their transforming pressure the universe became deeper, wider, and more wonderful.

It is strange what these Englishmen in Manchester know about the German character.

The irrational was recognized as a source of illumination; wisdom was sought from the child and the flower; science, philosophy and poetry drew near each other. With us in England this revival of the imagination created a noble poetry, but left the sciences and philosophy almost untouched. One of the keys to understanding the whole period

- please note that an Englishman is saying this –

is the fact that, while in England and France the poetic, philosophical and scientific movements flowed mostly in separate channels, in Germany they touched or merged completely. Wordsworth sang and Bentham calculated; but Hegel caught the genius of poetry in the net of his logic; and the thought that discovers and explains, and the imagination that creates, worked together in fruitful harmony in the genius of Goethe.

In Faust, at the end of his eventful life, we see a portrayal of present-day Germany, a Germany of restless, bold will and action, and we can understand all the better why the [great] cosmopolitan, in whose eyes state and nationality were subordinate and sometimes harmful ideals, nevertheless claims his unassailable place as the highest poet of the German Empire alongside Bismarck, his creator.

Yes, my dear attendees, one can only say: Yes, why do your fellow countrymen now call the people of Schiller and Goethe a “barbarian people”? This question will be asked by history about the development of these peoples for a long, long time, since they could know better. For I did not begin this consideration in order to answer the question: Why do they call the people of Fichte and Schiller a “barbarian people”?, but rather to show that this question will be asked for a long, long time [in the histories of Germany's enemies], and they, these other peoples, will have to answer it.

In these lectures, which these Englishmen gave to Englishmen, there is something that a German would truly not say in Germany; but it is not meant to be said here, only quoted: “No German words are more deeply imbued with the juice of national ethics than those that describe these things: true, thorough, faithful.”

Now, why then call the German people a “barbarian people”? And about the German Reich, the following was said in the same lectures:

On the whole, there is no question that the establishment of the German Reich has been beneficial to world peace. This explanation will seem strange to those who know nothing but the events of the present and for whom history is nothing more than an ever-changing, dazzling cinematograph. But history should be something more. It is fitting for it to let the light of the past shine on the confusion of the present, and in that higher light, things that seem hurtful will take on a natural appearance. For when we look to the past, we find that our ancestors

- he is, of course, referring to his English ancestors -

that our ancestors regarded France with far greater fear than the wildest noisemakers fear Germany today. And the fear of our ancestors had good reason. [...]

To sum up, the founding of the German Empire was a gain for Europe, and therefore also for Great Britain. For the events of the years 1866-1871 put an end once and for all to the possibility of waging predatory wars against the previously unprotected center of Europe, and thus removed a temptation to war that had so often often tempted into the wrong channels, they enabled the German people to develop their hitherto stunted political abilities, and they helped to establish on a firm basis a new European system that has preserved the peace for forty years. This blessing resulted from the fact that German unity achieved in one fell swoop what Great Britain, despite all its expenditure of blood and money, had never been able to achieve, namely to secure the balance of power in such a decisive way that a major war became the most dangerous of all ventures.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, if that is the case, why do they call the people of Central Europe a “barbarian people”? There is a strange preamble to the lectures from which I have quoted. You will have heard the name of Lord Haldane mentioned in an unpleasant way in the early weeks of the war. But it was this same Lord Haldane – who also spoke of the fact that the English, out of an overabundance of morality, could do nothing but join the other enemies of Germany to attack the Germans – well, this same Lord Haldane wrote a preface to the lectures, from which I would like to share a sample with you. In this preface, the Lord, who now claims that England could not help but punish Germany, says:

The source of the stream of its

- that is, Germany's -

intellectual and political life lies in the Reformation. But at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, a current unique in world history began to flow in a way that has been as continuous as it has been characteristic since that time. Since the days of ancient [Greece], the world has not seen such a spectacle of the closest fusion of the life of the statesman with that of the thinker. The spirit of Germany to-day is to a high degree concretely practical.

Yes, it is almost shameful to hear such a thing said. But I am not saying it, I am merely quoting it. Then Lord Haldane says:

Only the influence of true knowledge can dispel the clouds of mistrust and free us from the need to prepare for attacks that none of us really has in mind.

And a woman who spent eight years in Germany, an Englishwoman who visited hospitals and lecture halls and studied schools and everything she could get her hands on in Germany for eight years, she differs from the other Englishwomen in terms of her knowledge in that she really got to know the Germans and their institutions. She published a book called “Eight Years in Germany” by Miss Wylie. This book appeared very recently, just a few weeks before the outbreak of war. Miss Wylie has described some of the things she has learned about the German character here in Germany. I will share just a few words from her book with you, and you will see how the question that is the subject of our discussion today must be put.

Forty years ago, Germany was fighting for its existence. And it is still fighting for it today. It is completely wrong to believe that Germany is already at its peak. It is fighting a quiet but determined fight against powerful rivals whose power and experience was gained generations ago. [...]

On every border and across the water

- that is, over the Channel –

its opponents are sitting, both commercially and politically, and are waiting anxiously for the moment when Germany slackens up just a little, so that they can pounce on her and overwhelm her. Germany knows this [too] only too well.

We see that the German character was not entirely unknown to other nations. Therefore, we must consider the question of today's consideration as the question that will be asked of these nations by later history.

But at the same time, there is a complete lack of understanding of what is most deeply rooted in the German character, of what is most spiritual about it! Herman Grimm, the great art historian, was the one who uttered a wonderful word. He, this Herman Grimm – one can almost feel him as Goethe's governor in the second half of the nineteenth century – he, who was completely immersed in the German essence and was spiritually and emotionally connected to it, he spoke a very significant word about Goethe's biography, which the Englishman Lewes wrote. Lewes tried to weaken the old prejudices of the English with regard to Goethe. Because up until Lewes, every Englishman believed that the Germans revered a man, Goethe, who was actually a completely immoral fellow, despite having produced some beautiful things. With regard to Goethe's ethical nature, Mr. Lewes has achieved something. But Herman Grimm is right: when you read Lewes' biography, which is entitled “Goethe: His Life and Work”, you get the feeling that Lewes is writing about a person who was born in Frankfurt in 1749, a person to whom Goethe's life story is attributed, to whom Goethe's works are ascribed, and who died in March 1832. But what the German has in his Goethe is not even hinted at in Mr. Lewes' biography.

That is precisely what is so deeply ingrained in the German soul: universality, the desire to merge into that flowing spirituality and to transform the stream of spirituality into one's own being. That is what the peoples around Germany lack, and what they have basically still taken in very little to this day. And so one can say: What Herman Grimm once said with reference to the people of the East is true and right. There, he said, there was a Russian who had also written a biography, the biography of Beethoven. Nothing of what Beethoven really is lives in the biography.

Just compare the selfless, devoted way in which the German mind, always wanting to become, wants to delve into what is spread throughout the world, how it, disregarding its own character traits, knows how to find its way into those of others. How the German spirit has united Shakespeare's spirit with its own. When something like this is experienced in a nation, then a Herman Grimm is justified in saying this with reference to Mr. Lewes' alleged biography of Goethe. And when one sees how little heart and mind were actually present in those who have often called themselves the leaders of other nations, one understands a lot. One understands a lot when one really delves into what one can experience together with the German spirit. One can say: There really is something in this German spirit of that Faustian mood, which on the one hand has hidden life's great riddle in: “All that is transitory is only a parable,” but on the other hand says: “Whoever strives can be redeemed.” And in the German spirit lives something that must lead beyond all pessimism, something that establishes a true foundation for future security and future hope. But how little this has basically entered into the hearts and souls of those who, with some sincerity, seek in other nations what can liberate the spirit and bring harmony to the liberated human soul.

I would like to characterize for you how one of the most important Russians, Alexander Herzen, established a kind of spiritual entente with the Englishman Stuart Mill; how one of the best Russian minds, Herzen, immersed himself in the philosophy of the Englishman Stuart Mill, in that basically entirely materialistic world view, that he found, looking across Europe, that basically this culture of Europe can give no consolation, no hope for the future of humanity. It is the characteristic words of this Russian that really illuminate in a flash what has been confronting each other in Europe for a long time, and what now had to be expressed in these terrible flames of war. Herzen says of Stuart Mill:

[He was not exaggerating when he spoke of the narrowing of the mind, of energy, of the polished nature of personalities, of the constant flattening of life, of the constant exclusion of general human interests from life, of the reduction of the same to the interests of the commercial office and of bourgeois prosperity. Mill speaks openly about the fact that in this way England will become China – and we add: and not only England.

And we add: Not only England! For Stuart Mill believes that with England, the whole of Europe must become China. We only get the answer to the question: How could such an opinion arise even in the heart of an aspiring person? We get the answer when we see how he passes by that striving of which Goethe says in his Faust: “Whosoever strives, we can redeem him.” He also passes by what Fichte, Goethe and Schiller can mean for the whole of modern development. Those who speak thus do not know the German spirit, that German spirit of which we shall say in our fateful days: in it lives the power which, though not, as the Russian thinks, to the scaffold and the stake, yet to pressure and death, to infinite pain and suffering, goes to defend what the German soul and its mission in the world is.

However, if Emerson sees in Goethe the very representative of the German spirit, and one of the present-day intellectuals of Russia finds the following words about Goethe, Mereschkowski, who even claims to revere Goethe - one should not be deceived, one should not be deceived in his “Leading Spirits,” which have now been translated into German, for anyone who truly recognizes Goethe cannot utter such words about Goethe, the representative of modern intellectual life, as the Russian Mereschkowski has done. He says:

When Goethe speaks of the French Revolution, he suddenly bends to the earth, as a giant might be crushed by an evil spell and shrink to the size of a dwarf; from a Hellenic demigod he becomes a German bourgeois and – if the shadow of the Olympian will have mercy on me – a German philistine, a “Herr von Goethe”, a privy councillor of the Duke of Weimar and a respectable son of the respectable Frankfurt shopkeeper.

Let us assume that Goethe would appear to Mereschkowski in certain situations in his life; but anyone who recognizes Goethe and what he is to humanity would not say such a thing. For it does not merely depend on whether one considers something to be right, but whether one has enough spirituality to say it or not. There is something in these words that the world has yet to learn from the German spirit.

But when we now see how what is German spiritual life is to be trampled underfoot from the east, how this German spiritual life, in alliance with the western peoples, is to be trampled underfoot from the east, then we may ask: What about the understanding and the possibility of understanding on the part of what is there in the east, with regard to the German essence?

Now, esteemed attendees, once again it is not a German speaking, once again I do not want to speak myself, but I let a member of the Russian people speak for himself, the philosopher Solowjow, who is basically not just a philosopher, but a seer, who is regarded by the most excellent Russians themselves as a representative of Russia. Let us ask him. How does he, who has been vilified for decades by Russian intellectuals and other seducers of the Russian people, how does he judge this deification of the race principle to the exclusion of the education principle, how does he judge this brute force in relation to Europe? Let us hear him, not ourselves; let us hear the Russians about the Russians, not about the intimate forces of the Russian people, but about the forces that have come about through the conspiracies of mendacious Pan-Slavism and mendacious grand duchies. Let us hear the Russians talk about all that has been in preparation for a long time. He says: “Why does Europe not love us?” And he answers:

Europe [...] looks at us with apprehension and dislike, because the elemental power of the Russian people is dark and mysterious, its spiritual and cultural powers inferior, but its demands clear, determined and great.

The clamor of our rationalism, which seeks to destroy Turkey and Austria, to beat the Germans, to conquer Constantinople and, if possible, India, is loudly heard in Europe. But if we are asked what we will do for humanity after taking and destroying all of that, we can only remain silent or spout meaningless phrases. [...] Thus [...] the most essential, indeed the only important question that honest and reasonable patriotism should address is not Russia's power and mission, but its sins.

Because the subject that the Russians themselves must discuss has been introduced by the powers that I have just mentioned, for decades preparations have been made for what is now devastating Europe with such terrible storms, coming from the east. For if the question is raised from so many sides: “Who wanted the war?”, then the question needs only to be transformed into another: “Who could have prevented the war?” And there is a clear answer to this question, which history must also provide: only Russia could have prevented the war. Of course, the Western powers will also have to bear the consequences, because without them Russia would have avoided the war, at least for now. But only hints can be given about this. For the German who allows what I have been able to sketch with charcoal to take effect in his soul, what is now to be fought for in the East and West, at such unspeakable cost, must be something that opens our eyes, that shows us how much we need to reflect on ourselves, to reflect on that which allows us to find the strong forces of the German character. By the number of his enemies, the German can gauge the necessity of this search for his own strength, which depends on himself. In this respect, many things can be instructive for us.

We believed that an understanding would dawn, especially among the French, for the German way of being. Strangely enough, even shortly before the war, there were people who believed that an understanding could be found for the German way of being in youthful France. I must, in conclusion, shed some light on this matter. Some of our best Germans were amazed that a Frenchman, Romain Rolland, who was one of the first to join with Verhaeren and others in directing the bitterest invective against German “barbarism,” found in Romain Rolland a mind that understood the German essence, that understood Germany. Why did they find this? Yes, the question is difficult to answer, very difficult. This Romain Rolland has written a novel. In this novel, a German, Jean-Christophe, plays a role. I am well aware that I am passing judgment, and that my judgment can stand up to any aesthetic, and I am prepared for those who find the judgment I am passing “barbaric”.

So Romain Rolland wrote his novel “Jean-Christophe”. The hero is German, but he is concocted in such a way that a wild chaos results. This character is concocted from Beethoven's youth, the fates of Richard Wagner, Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler. All this is concocted in a jumble in this character. A character is shaped out of this, which in an artistic-aesthetic sense is basically repulsive to anyone who really has an appreciation for characterizations. And this Jean-Christophe – in German, this Johann Christof Kraft – is presented to us as he is placed in the terrible German circumstances. He spends his youth as a German among Germans, but he cannot stand these German circumstances. He has to get out of these German circumstances; he is not recognized in Germany. He does find some admirers, but he just can't stand the German way of doing things. He then goes to France. It is only in Paris that he finds what makes him a complete human being. This is described, along with other things, which are basically quite chaotic, just like Jean-Christophe himself.

And we have even been told by critics that this novel is one of the most significant achievements in the reconciliation of the German and French minds after 1870. And someone said the following about this novel:

I find myself at a loss as to how many times I should actually thank you. The human, the bon vivant, the artist, the German, the [worldly] side of me, each wants to come forward and say a word. But another time the artist should talk about this novel, another time the bon vivant, and the human wants to wait until he can shake your hand again. Today only the German should say thank you; for I have the feeling that French youth has become closer to us through this book, which has done more than all the diplomats, banquets and associations.

Someone printed this review as a letter to Romain Rolland.

In this book – forgive me for emphasizing this passage, but I can emphasize it without violating any artistic principle, simply because in Romain Rolland's work, which is a poor novel, you can hear Romain Rolland himself through his characters. When he gives his characters traits that are pleasing to him because he wants to talk about this German essence that he “knows so well”. It depends on what nuances are apparent to this young Frenchman, since he is supposed to understand the German essence so well. So we read the following, which comes about during a conversation with a visitor:

Since the German victories, the Germans did everything they could to compromise, to bring about a disgusting mishmash of new power and old principles. They did not want to abandon old idealism: That would have been an act of frankness that one was not capable of; in order to make it subservient to German interests, one had contented oneself with falsifying it. One followed the example of Hegel, the cheerfully duplicitous Swabian, who had waited for Leipzig and Waterloo to adapt the basic idea of his philosophy to the Prussian state

— In 1806, under the thunder of the guns at the Battle of Jena, Hegel wrote his fundamental work, which contains the basic outlines of all his later works. The Frenchman, who has not read Hegel either, or if he has, then without understanding, says that Hegel “waited for Leipzig and Waterloo”. And further.

and now, after interests had changed, it also changed its principles. When one was defeated, one said that Germany's ideal was humanity. Now that one was beating the others, it was said that Germany was humanity's ideal. As long as the other countries were the more powerful, one said with Lessing that love of one's country was a heroic weakness that one could very well do without, and one called oneself a citizen of the world. Now that victory had been achieved, there was no lack of contempt for “French” utopias: world peace, brotherhood, peaceful progress, human rights, natural equality; it was said that the strongest nation had an absolute right over the others, while the others, as the weaker ones, had no rights over it. It seemed as if the living God and the incarnate spirit, whose progress was achieved through war, violence and oppression.

That's how well the Frenchman understood the Germans!

Power, now that it was on his side, was canonized. Power had now become the epitome of all idealism and all reason.

To give honor to the truth, it must be said that Germany had suffered so much for centuries from having idealism without power that after so much trial she was well excused for now making the sad confession that she needed power above all, however it might be constituted. But how much hidden bitterness lay in such a confession of the people of a Herder and a Goethe! And what renunciation, what humiliation of the German ideal lay in this German victory! - And oh, this renunciation found only too much compliance in the lamentable tendency of all the best Germans to subordinate themselves.

“What characterizes the Germans,” said Möser more than a century ago, “is obedience.”

And Frau von Stael: “They obey properly. They use philosophical reasons to explain the most unphilosophical thing in the world: respect for power and the habituation to fear, which transforms respect into admiration.”

Christof found this feeling in the greatest and the smallest in Germany

- that is why he has to leave Germany -

from Wilhelm Tell onwards, the thoughtful, little bourgeois with the porter's muscles, who, as the free Jew Börne says: “to reconcile honor and fear, walks with his eyes downcast in front of the post of the tyrannical Mr. Gessler, so that he can invoke the fact that he did not disobey, who did not see the hat,” up to the honorable seventy-year-old Professor Weiße, one of the most respected scholars in the city, who, when a lieutenant passed him, quickly left the footpath to him and went down to the road.

Germany

— so says this good German-understander of France at another point,

Germany really bears the main burden of sin in Europe. If you have won the victory, you are responsible for it: you have incurred a debt against the vanquished; you have assumed the tacit responsibility of stepping forward and showing them the way. The victorious Louis XIV brought the world the splendor of French reason. What light did Germany of Sedan bring to the world?

Well, my dear audience, you may not find it wonderful when you have heard this that this Frenchman was among the first to weep with the others in the “Matin” over German “barbarism”. But you will find it wonderful that this book, this novel by Romain Rolland, was believed to be one of the most significant acts since 1870 in bringing about peace. It was quickly translated into German. The first three volumes were published shortly before the war. But this Frenchman wants to know the Germans, he also wants to describe them, where he finds characteristic moments in these Germans. As I said, he practices the technique of bad novelists, who are always audible when they let their characters speak. So this Frenchman, who is particularly surprising when he blows into the horn of the “Matin” et cetera, describes something that he really likes about the Germans. He describes how an admirer found Jean-Christophe a professor in Ulm. He visits him. Then the Frenchman describes what he calls a “German meal.” It was so good, the German meal, that even the cook Salomé peeks through the door to see how the gentlemen sitting with Jean-Christophe like it. That's when the Frenchman finds the “greatness” of Germany.

It was an exhibition of unforgettable, honest, unadulterated German cuisine with its aromas of all herbs, its thick sauces, its nutritious soups, its exemplary meat dishes, its monumental carp, its sauerkraut, its geese, its homemade cakes, its aniseed and caraway breads.

He describes something that he wants to depict as good about the Germans. But now, among those who came to see the German professor back then, there is one man who can sing well and who is truly not described in an outstandingly beautiful way by the Frenchman who understands Germans so well. And Romain Rolland loves music. His critics said that his novel was “the novel of modern music”. And he himself had grown to love Germany precisely because of music. So he describes someone who can sing. And he describes him in such a way that you can see that he, Jean-Christophe, wonders why a German can sing.

That is because the Germans do not know how to sing. They are seized by the power of song and the song works through them as if through an instrument. The spirit of the songs takes hold of them and they obey it. Because the soul of the German must do that. This soul obeys the song as the soldier obeys the general.

This is roughly how the Frenchman, who understands the Germans so well, describes the [German] art of singing.

And then he also gives us some insights into what the person who sings like this looked like. And so that you also have something good from the Frenchman's book in this area, I will also tell you that he describes this singer, who he admits sings excellently, for the reasons I have given, as a fat person who always sweats when he takes steps, but especially when he makes sounds. He describes his nature, his whole figure. Then he says: He looked like a Bavarian, a particular variety of German. He thinks that there are quite a few of these Bavarians, because they have the secret of preserving this human race, which “has come about through a system of noodles similar to that used to fatten poultry”.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, I could tell you many more things about the characteristics of what is behind what is now physically expressed. Particularly when one considers the contrast between Frenchness and Germanness, as expressed so clearly in the fact that, driven out of their minds by the eternal desire for revenge, the French have done something that they will only realize in the future: they have allowed themselves to be dragged eastwards, about which we have even heard a Russian speak. When one considers this antagonism between Central Europe and the immediate West, then words such as these might come to mind – truly, when one looks at everything that has been produced on the other side of the Rhine, when one summarizes it all – words like this might come to mind:

To the best of my knowledge, there is no natural law and no heavenly parliamentary act on the basis of which France alone, among all earthly beings, does not have to give back some of its plunder if the plundered owner can take it back. Nobody except France itself at this moment can believe that there is such a natural law. Alsace and Lorraine did not come to France in such a providential way that they could not be taken away from it. Richelieu's cunning, Louis XIV's grandiose saber; these are France's only legal titles to the German lands. Richelieu unscrewed them. And General Turenne happened to be unscrewed at the same time. Because Turenne was a real German by blood and nature. But Francis I had set his ancestor, the little Duke of Bouillon, on the path we saw above, and he gradually made him French.

And so on. And further:

For me, the saddest symptom in France at present is the figure its geniuses are now making, its highest literary voices, which should be its prophets and seers and which this figure has in fact been making for a generation. These voices apparently believe that new heavenly wisdom is radiating from France over all other peoples, who are sitting in deep shadow. France is the new Zion of the universe. And all the sad, dirty, half-crazed and in large part positively infernal stuff that French literature has preached to us in the last fifty years is a true gospel from heaven, full of blessings for all the children of men. Ah, one understands that France made its great revolution; that it raised its terrible voice of destiny against a world of human illusions, proclaiming with the trumpet of the Last Judgment: There shall be no more illusions!

These words were not coined by Germans! Rather, the words that I have just read were translated by the Würzburg professor of psychiatry, Rieger, from a letter that was indeed published in the Times on November 18, 1870 and that was written by Thomas Carlyle about France and the French way of life, French greed, and the claims to Alsace-Lorraine. It is a rather nice symptom that a psychiatrist found this letter and translated it, because there will be many a psychiatric chapter in world history when everything that is now being brought into the world from the east and the west about the German character has to be judged.

But if, on the other hand, we allow ourselves to be influenced by this German essence in the way that not pride but humble self-awareness has done, if we see what Germany's best minds have achieved in the German spirit, if we see how intuitions of spiritual science, spiritual insights have emerged in Schiller and Fichte, so that we have to say to ourselves: In this German essence lie seeds that oblige us to develop them further into blossoms and fruits, then we must fill our soul with the right future securities and future possibilities. And we will know that when our fateful and destiny-laden days are again replaced by such days in which history again speaks objectively, that then the question will hang over the enemy nations like one of the most terrible questions: Why do they call the people of Schiller and Fichte a “barbarian people”?

And in answering this question, one will feel how the German spirit has not completed its tasks in the world as a whole, in the development of humanity. One will feel how right Goethe was when he said to Luden, even in a fateful time:

The destiny of the Germans is not yet fulfilled. If they had had no other task than to break up the Roman Empire and create and organize a new world, they would have perished long ago. But since they have continued to exist, and in such strength and efficiency, I believe that they must still have a great destiny.

When one feels the German essence, one will feel how it has to defend itself today as if locked in a great fortress – even the enemies who do not understand it and want to trample it underfoot – and one will find that this German essence has not yet reached completion, that this German spirit must fight for its existence not only for its own good but also for the good of the development of the earth. And today we may summarize what this reflection could only contain in hints, we may summarize it in words that point out how, even if the German spirit has already achieved great things, what it has achieved must appear in the present as the germ of future blossoms and fruits. And one would like to call out to those over whom the question will hover as historical fate: Why do they call the people of Fichte and Schiller a “barbarian people”? In answer, one must call out to them what we want to conclude today's reflection with:

The German spirit has not completed
what it is to bring to the world.
It lives hopefully in future concerns,
It hopes for future deeds] full of life; -
In the depths of his being, he feels mightily
Hidden things that must have their effect as they mature.
How can a mindless enemy
Wish for his end to come:
As long as life reveals itself to him,
Which holds him in the roots of his being?

It is of great importance to Spiritual Science to follow the gradual development of man’s spirit, from epoch to epoch, as it slowly evolves, and pressing ever upward, emerges from the dark shadows of the past. Hence it is that the study of ancient Egyptian culture and spiritual life is of especial moment. This is found to be particularly the case when we endeavour to picture and live in the atmosphere and conditions associated with the latter.

The echoes which reach us from the dim grey vistas of by-gone times seem as full of mystery as is the countenance of the Sphinx itself, which stands so grimly forth as a monument to ancient Egyptian civilization. This mystery becomes intensified as modern external scientific research finds that it is constrained to delve ever deeper and deeper into the remote past, in order to throw light upon later Egyptian culture; regarding which most important documents are extant. Such investigations have found traces of certain things, clearly related to the active cultural life of Egypt, which date back to a period at least 7,000 years before the beginning of the Christian era. Here, then, is one reason why this particular civilization is of such paramount interest, but there is another, namely, present-day man, although living in times of broader and more general enlightenment has nevertheless a feeling, whether acceptable or not, that this ancient culture is in some singular and mysterious manner, connected with his very aims and ideals.

It is indeed significant that a man of such outstanding intellect as Kepler, should, at the very dawn of modern scientific development, have been moved to express the feelings which came over him, while engaged in astronomical research, in words somewhat as follows:—‘During my attempt to discover the manner of the passing of the planets around the sun, I have sought to peer into the deep secrets of the cosmos; the while it has oft-times seemed as if my fancy had led me into the mysterious sanctuaries of the old Egyptians—to touch their most holy vessels, and draw them forth that I might bestow them upon a new world. At such moments the thought has come to me, that only in the future will the true purport and intent of my message be disclosed.’

Here we find one of the greatest scientists of modern times overcome by a sense of such close relation to the ancient Egyptian culture, that he could find no better way of expressing the fundamental concepts underlying his work, than by representing them as a regeneration, naturally differing as to word and form, of the occult doctrines taught to the disciples and followers in the by-gone Egyptian Sanctuaries. It is therefore a matter of the greatest interest to us that we should realize the actual sentiments of these olden Egyptian peoples, in regard to the whole meaning and nature of their civilization.

There is an ancient legend that has been handed down through Greek tradition which is most suggestive, not only of what the Egyptians themselves felt regarding their culture, but also the way in which their civilization was looked upon by the ancients as a whole. We are told that an Egyptian sage once said to Solon:—‘You Greeks are still children, you have never grown up, and all your knowledge has been acquired through your own human observation and senses; you have neither traditions nor doctrines grey with age.’ We first learn what is implied by the expression, ‘doctrines grey with age‘, when the methods of Spiritual Science are employed in an endeavour to throw light upon the nature and significance of Egyptian thought and feeling. But, as has been before stated, when we approach this matter we must bear in mind that during successive periods of man’s development he gradually acquired different forms of consciousness, and that that order of conscious apprehension which is ours to-day, with its scientific method of thought, and through which we realize the outer world in virtue of our senses working in conjunction with reason and intellect, did not always exist. Deep down, underlying all human cognition, there is what we term ‘Evolution’, and evolution affects not only the outer world of form, but also the disposition of man’s soul. It follows, that we can only really understand the events which took place at the ancient centres of culture, when we accept that knowledge which Spiritual Science can alone obtain, from the sources of information at its disposal. We thus learn that in olden times instead of our present intellectual consciousness, there existed a clairvoyant state that differed from our customary normal conscious condition, of which we are cognizant from the moment we awake until we again fall asleep. On the other hand, the ancient clairvoyant state cannot be likened to the insensibility produced by slumber. Hence, the primeval consciousness of prehistoric man should be regarded as an intermediate condition now only faintly apparent, and retained, as one might say, atavistically in the form of an attenuated heritage in the picture world of our dreams.

Now, dreams are for the most part chaotic in character, and therefore meaningless in their relation to ordinary life. But the old clairvoyant consciousness, which also found expression in imagery although often of a somewhat subdued and visionary nature, was nevertheless a truly clairvoyant gift, and its symbolical manifestations had reference, not to our physical world, but to that realm which lies beyond all material things, in other words—the world of spirit. We can say that in reality all clairvoyant consciousness, including the dream-state of primitive man, as well as that acquired to-day through those methods to which we have previously referred, finds expression pictorially and not in concepts and ideas, as is the case with externalized physical consciousness. It is for the possessor of such faculty to interpret the symbols presented in terms of those spiritual realities, which underlie all physical perceptual phenomena.

We have reached a point where we can look back on the evolution of the ancient races, and of a surety say:—Those wondrous visions of by-gone times of which tradition tells us, were not born of childish fantasy and false conception of the works of Nature (this, as I have pointed out, is the wide-spread opinion in the materialistic circles of to-day), but were in truth veritable pictures of the Spirit-World, flashed before the souls of men in that now long distant past.

He who seriously studies the old mythologies and legends, not from the point of view of modern materialistic thought, but with an understanding of the creation and spiritual activities of mankind, will find in these strange stories a certain coherence which harmonizes wonderfully with those cosmic principles that dominate all physical, chemical and biological laws; while there rings throughout the ancient mythological and religious systems a tone of spiritual reality, from which they acquire a true significance.

We must clearly realize that the peoples of the various nations, each according to disposition, temperament and racial or folk-character, formed different conceptions of that vision world in which they conceived higher powers to be actively operating behind the accustomed forces of Nature. Further, that during the gradual course of evolution, mankind passed through many transitionary stages between that of the consciousness of the ancients, and our present-day objective conscious state. As time went on, the power necessary to the old clairvoyance dimmed and the visions faded; one might say—the doors leading to the higher realms were slowly closed, so that the pictures manifested to those whose souls could still peer into the Spirit-World, held ever less and less of spiritual force, until towards the end, only the lowest stages of supersensible activity could be apprehended. Finally, this primeval clairvoyant power died out, in so far as humanity in general was concerned, and man’s vision became limited to that which is of the material world, and to the apprehension of physical concepts and things; from that time on, the study of the interrelation of these factors led, step by step, to the birth of modern science. Thus it came about, that when the old clairvoyant state was past, our present intellectual consciousness gradually developed in diverse ways among the different nations.

The mission of the Egyptian peoples was of a very special nature. All that we know regarding ancient times, even that knowledge attained through modern Egyptian research, if rightly understood, tends but to verify the statements of Spiritual Science regarding the allotted task and true purpose of the Egyptian race. It was ordained that these olden peoples should still be imbued with a sufficiency of that primal power which would enable them to look back into the misty past; when their leaders in virtue of outstanding individualities and highly developed clairvoyant faculties, could gaze far into the mysteries of the Spirit-World. [Spiritual Science asserts that it was in accordance with ‘The Great Eternal Plan‘ that the Egyptians should gain wisdom and understanding from this source, to be a guide and a benefit in the development of mankind.] And we have learnt that it was to this end that this great nation was still permitted to retain a certain measure of that fast-fading clairvoyant power so closely associated with a specific disposition of soul. Although these qualities were, at that time, weak and ever waning in intensity, nevertheless they continued active until a comparatively late period in Egyptian history.

We can therefore make this statement:—The Egyptians, down to less than 1000 years before the Christian era, had actual experience of a mode of vision differing from that with which we are familiar in every-day life, when we merely open our eyes and make use of our intellect; and they knew that through this gift man was enabled to behold the spiritual realms. The later Egyptians, however, were unable to penetrate beyond the nethermost regions as portrayed in their pictorial visions, but they had power to recall those by-gone times in the Golden Age of Egyptian culture, when their priesthood could gaze both far and deeply into the world of spirit.

All knowledge obtained through visions was most carefully guarded and secretly preserved for thousands of years with the greatest piety, thankfulness and religious feeling, especially by the older Egyptians. At a later period, those among the people who still retained somewhat of clairvoyant power, expressed themselves after this fashion:—‘We can yet discern a lower spiritual realm—we know therefore that it is possible for mankind to look upon a Spirit-World; to question this truth would be as sensible as to doubt that we can really see external objects with our eyes.’ Although these later Egyptians were only able to apprehend weak echoes, as it were, of the inferior spiritual levels, nevertheless they felt and divined that in olden times man could indeed penetrate far into the mystic depths of that realm which lies beyond all physical sense perceptions. There is a doctrine grey with age, still preserved in wonderful inscriptions in Temples and upon columns. (It was this doctrine to which the sage referred when he spoke to Solon.) These inscriptions tell us of the broad deep penetration of clairvoyant power in the remote past.

That being to whom the Egyptians attributed all the profundity of their primordial clairvoyant enlightenment they called THE GREAT WISE ONE—THE OLD HERMES. When, at a later period, some other outstanding leader came to revive the ancient wisdom, he also called himself Hermes, according to an old custom prevalent among exalted Egyptian sages, and because his followers believed that in him the primeval wisdom of the old Hermes lived once again. They named the first Hermes,—‘Hermes Trismegistos‘—the Thrice-Great Hermes; but as a matter of fact it was only the Greeks who used the name of Hermes, for among the Egyptians he was known as ‘Thoth‘. In order to understand this being, it is necessary to realize what the Egyptians, under the influence of traditions concerning Thoth, regarded as true and characteristic cosmic mystics.

Such Egyptian beliefs as have come to us, one might say from outside sources, seem very strange indeed. Various Gods, of whom the most important are Osiris and Isis, are represented as not wholly human; oft-times having a human body and an animal head, or again formed of the most varied combinations of manlike and animal shapes. Remarkable religious legends have come down to us regarding this world of the Gods.

Again, the veneration and worship of cats and other animals by this ancient race was most singular, and went to such lengths that certain animals were considered as holy, and held in the greatest reverence, and in them the Egyptians saw something akin to higher beings. It has been said that this veneration for animals was such that when a cat, for instance, which had lived for a long time in one house, died, there was much weeping and lamentation. If an Egyptian observed a dead animal lying by the wayside, he did not dare to go near it, for fear that someone might accuse him of having slain it, in which case he would be liable to severe punishment. Even during the time that Egypt was actually under Roman rule, so it has been said, any Roman who killed a cat went in danger of his life, because such an act produced an uproar among the Egyptians. This veneration of animals appears to us as a most enigmatic part of Egyptian thought and feeling. Again, how extraordinary do the Pyramids, with their quadrilateral bases and triangular sides, seem to modern man; and how mysterious are the sphinxes and all that modern research drags forth from the depths of this ancient civilization and brings to the surface, to add to our knowledge an ever-increasing clarity. The question now arises:—What place did all these strange ideas occupy in the image world of the souls of those olden peoples? What had they to say regarding those things which the Thrice-Great Hermes had taught them, and how did they come by these curious concepts?

We must henceforth accustom ourselves to seek in all legends a deeper meaning, especially in those which are the more important. It is to be assumed that the purpose of some of these legends, is to convey to us in picture form, information regarding certain laws which govern spiritual life, and are set above external laws. As an example we have the fable of the god and goddess, Osiris and Isis. It was Hermes himself who called the Egyptian legends ‘The Wise Counsellors of Osiris‘. In all these fables, Osiris is a being who in the grey dawn of primeval times lived in the region where man now dwells. In the legend Osiris, who is represented as a benefactor of humanity, and under whose wise influence Hermes, or Thoth, gave to the Egyptians their ancient culture, even to the conduct of material life, was said to have an enemy whom the Greeks called Typhon. This enemy, Typhon, waylaid Osiris and slew him, then cut up his body, hid it in a coffin, and threw it into the sea. The goddess Isis, wife and sister of Osiris, sought long her husband who had been thus torn from her by Typhon, or Seth, and when she had at last found him, she gathered together the pieces into which he had been divided, and buried them here and there in various parts of the land, and in these places temples were erected. Later, Isis gave birth to Horos. Now, Horos was also a higher being, and his birth was brought about through spirit influence which descended upon Isis from Osiris, who had meanwhile passed into another world. The mission of Horos was to vanquish Typhon, and in a certain sense re-establish control of the life-current emanating from Osiris, which would continue to flow and influence mankind.

A legend such as this must not be regarded simply as an allegory, nor as a mere symbolism; in order to understand it rightly, we must enter into the whole world of Egyptian feeling and perception. It is far more important to do this than to form abstract concepts and ideas; for by thus opening the mind, we can alone give life to the sentiments and thoughts associated with the ideal forms of Osiris and Isis. Further, it is useless to attempt to explain these two outstanding figures by saying that Osiris represents the Sun, and Isis the Moon, and so forth—thus giving them an astronomical interpretation, as is the custom of the sciences of to-day outside of Spiritual Science—for such a theory leads to the belief that a legend of this nature is a mere symbolical portrayal of certain events connected with the heavens, and this is not true. We must go far back to the primeval feelings of the Egyptians, and from these as a starting-point try to realize the whole peculiar nature of their uplifted vision of the supersensible, and conception of those invisible forces beyond man’s apprehension which underlie the perceptual world. It is the spiritual interrelation of these factors that finds expression in the ideal forms of Osiris and Isis.

The old Egyptians associated these two figures with ideas similar to the following: There is a latent higher spiritual essence in all mankind which did not emanate from that material environment in which it now functions; at the beginning of earth-life it entered into physical bodily existence in condensed form, there slowly to unfold and grow throughout the ages. Man’s human state was preceded by another and more spiritual condition, and it is from this primordial condition from which the human being gradually developed. The Egyptian said:—‘When I look into my soul, I realize that there is within me a longing for spiritual things; a longing for that true spirituality from which I have descended, and I know that certain of the supersensible forces which operate in the region from which I come still live within me, and that the best of these are intimately related to the ultimate source of all superperceptual activity. Thus do I feel within me an Osiris power, which placed me here—a spirit embodied in external human form. In times past, before I came to this state, I lived wholly in a spiritual realm, where my life was confused, dim and instinctive in character. It was ordained that I be clothed with a material body, so that I should experience and behold a physical world, in order that I might develop therein. I know of a verity that in the beginning I have lived a life which compared to this physical perceptual existence, was indeed of the spirit.’

According to ancient Egyptian concepts the primordial forces underlying human evolution were regarded as dual, the one element being termed Osiris, while the other was known as Isis; hence we have an Osiris-Isis duality. When we give ourselves over to inner contemplation and are moved by the feelings and perceptions of the old Egyptians concerning this dualism, we at once find that we are involved in a process of active and suggestive thought, leading to certain conclusions. In order to follow this mental process we have only to consider the manner in which the mind operates when we think of some object, such for instance as a triangle. In this case, active thought must precede the actual conception of the figure. After the soul has been thus engaged in primary contemplation, we then turn our minds passively to the result of our thought concepts, and finally see the fruit of our mental activity pictured in the soul. The act of thinking has the same relation to final thought, as the act of conceiving to the final concept, or activity to the result of activity or its ultimate product. If we contemplate our mental process when we picture the Egyptian past, and are mindful of the mood of these ancient peoples, we realize that they looked upon the relation between Osiris and Isis in a somewhat similar manner to our conception of the order and outcome of thought activity. For instance, we might consider that activity should be regarded as a Male, or Father-Principle, and that therefore the Osiris-Principle must be looked upon as an active Male-Principle, a combative principle, which imbues the soul with thoughts and feelings of potency and vigour.

[We can form an idea of the old Egyptian concept concerning Osiris and Isis from the following considerations]:—In the physical body of man are certain components such as those that are active in the blood and those which are the basis of bone formation. The whole human system owes its being to the interaction of forces and matter, which combine to create and to enter the material form; these elements can be physically recognized, they were, however, at one time dispersed, and spread throughout the universe. A similar idea prevailed among the ancient Egyptians concerning their conception of Osiris-Force, which was conceived as actively pervading the entire cosmos, as Osiris. Even as the elements which form the physical body enter into it, there to combine and become operative, so did those olden peoples picture the Osiris-Force, as descending upon man to flow into his being and inspire within him the power of constructive thought and cognition—the veritable Osiris-Force. On the other hand, the expression Isis-Force was applied to that universal living cosmic influence which flows directly into the thoughts, concepts and ideas of mankind—it was this influence that was termed the Isis-Force. It is in the above manner that we must picture the uplifted vision in the souls of the old Egyptians, and it was thus that they regarded Osiris and Isis.

In that creation which surrounds us during our material existence, the ancient consciousness could find no words wherewith to express concepts such as these; for everything which is about us appeals alone to the senses, and has only meaning and value in a perceptual world, proffering no outer sign suggestive of a superphysical region. In order, therefore, to obtain something in the nature of a written language, which could express all such thoughts as moved the soul strongly, as for instance, when man exclaimed:—‘The Osiris-Isis-Force works within me,’ the ancients reached out to that script which is written in the firmament by the heavenly bodies, and said:—That supersensible power which man feels as Osiris, can be apprehended and expressed in perceptual terms if regarded as that active force emanating from the sun and spread abroad in the great cosmos. The Isis-Force may be pictured as the sun’s rays reflected from the moon which waits upon the sun, so that she may pass on the power of his radiance in the form of Isis-Influence. But until she receives his light the moon is dark—dark as a soul untouched by active uplifting thought. When the old Egyptian said:—‘The sun and the moon that are without reveal to me how I can best express, figuratively, my ideas concerning all that I feel within my soul,’ he knew that there was some hidden bond, in no way fortuitous, between these two heavenly bodies which appear so full of mystery in the vast universe—the light-giving sun and the dark moon every ready to reflect his splendour. And he realized that the light dispersed in space, and that reflected, must bear some unknown but definite relation to those supersensible powers of which he was conscious.

When we look at a clock we cannot see what it is that moves the hands so mysteriously, apparently with the aid of little demons, for all that can be seen is a piece of mechanism; but we know that underlying the whole mechanical structure, is the thought of the original designer, which thought had its origin in the soul of a man; so that in reality the mechanism owes its construction to something spiritual. Now, just as the movements of the hands of a clock are mutually related, and fundamentally dependent upon certain mechanical laws which exist in the universe, and finally upon those that are operative in the soul of a man (as when he speaks of experiencing the influence of the Osiris-Isis-Force), so are the movements of the Sun and Moon interrelated, and these bodies appear to us as indicators on the face of a mighty cosmic clock. The Egyptian did not merely say:—‘The Sun and Moon are to me a perceptual symbol of the relation between Osiris and Isis,’ but he felt and expressed himself thus:—‘That force which gives me life and is within, underlies the mysterious bond existing between the Sun and Moon, and it likewise endowed them with power to send forth light.’

In the same way as Osiris and Isis were regarded with reference to the Sun and Moon, so were other heavenly bodies looked upon as related to different gods. The ancient Egyptians considered that the positions of the various orbs in space were not merely symbolical of their own supersensible experiences, but likewise of those which tradition told them had been the experiences of seers belonging to the remote past. Further, they saw in the cosmic clock an expression of the activity of those forces, the workings of which they felt in the ultimate depths of the human soul. Thus it came about that this mighty clock, this grand creation of moving orbs, so wondrously interrelated with others that are fixed, was to the Egyptians a revelation of those mysterious spiritual powers which bring about the ever-changing positions of the heavenly bodies, and thus create an universal script, which man must learn to know and to recognize as a means whereby superperceptual power is given perceptual expression.

Such were the feelings and perceptions which had been handed down to the old Egyptians from their ancient seers, regarding a higher spiritual world of the existence of which they were wholly convinced, for they still retained a last remnant of primeval clairvoyant power. These olden peoples said:—‘We human beings had our true origin in an exalted spiritual realm, but we are now descended into a perceptual world, in which manifest material things and physical happenings, nevertheless, we are indeed come from the world of Osiris and of Isis. All that is best and which strives within us, and is fitted to attain to yet higher states of perfection, has of a verity flowed in upon us from Osiris and from Isis, and lives unseen within as active force. Physical man was born of those conditions which are of the external perceptual world, and his material form is but as a garment clothing the Osiris-Isis spirit within.’

Predominant in the souls of the old Egyptians was a profound sentiment concerning primeval wisdom, which filled their whole soul-life. The soul may indeed incline towards abstract notions, particularly the mathematical concepts of natural science, without in any way touching the moral and ethical factors of its life, nor affecting its fate or state of bliss. For instance, there may be discussion and debate relative to electrical and other forces, without the soul being moved to enter upon grave questions concerning man’s ultimate destiny.

On the other hand, we cannot ponder upon feelings and sentiments such as we have described regarding the Spirit-World and the inner relation of the soul’s character to Osiris and Isis, without arousing thoughts involving man’s happiness, his future, and his moral impulses. When the mind is thus occupied, man’s meditations are prone to take this form:—‘There dwells in me a better self, but because of what I am within my physical body, this “better self” is repressed and draws back, it is therefore not at first apparent. An Osiris and an Isis nature are fundamental to me; these, however, belong to a primordial world—to a by-gone golden age—to the holy past; now they are overcome by those forces that have fashioned the human form. But the Osiris-Isis power has entered and persists within that mortal covering which is ever subject to destruction through the external forces of Nature.’

The ‘Legend of Osiris and Isis‘ may be expressed in terms of feeling and sentiment in the following manner:—Osiris, the higher power in man, which is spread throughout cosmic space, is overcome by those forces which bring about utter degeneration in all human nature. Typhon confined the Osiris-Force within the body, as in a coffin formed to receive man’s spiritual counterpart; there the Osiris-Element lies concealed—invisible and unheeded by the outer world. (The name Typhon has linguistic connection with the words—‘Auflösen‘, to dissolve; and ‘Verwesen‘, to decompose.) The Isis-Nature, hidden within the confines of the soul, was always mysterious to the Egyptians. They considered that at some future period its influence would bring mankind back to that state which he enjoyed in the beginning; and that this return would ultimately be brought about through the penetrative force of intellectual power; for they fully recognized that in humanity there is a latent disposition which ever strives to re-endow Osiris with life.

The Isis-Force lies deep within the soul, and its profound purpose is to lead mankind, step by step, away from his present material state, and bring him back once more to Osiris.

It is this Isis-Force which—so long as man does not cling to his physical quality—makes it possible for him (even though he remain outwardly a physical man in a material world) to detach himself from his perceptual nature, and henceforth and for ever more to look upward from within his being to that more exalted Ego, which in the opinion of the most advanced thinkers, lies so mysteriously veiled at the very root of man’s powers of thought and action. This being, not the outer physical one, but the true inner man who has ever the stimulus to strive towards higher spiritual enlightenment, is as it were, the earth-born son of that Osiris who did not go forth into the material world, but remained as if concealed in the realms of the spirit. In their souls, the Egyptians regarded this invisible personality that struggles toward the attainment of a higher self, as Horos—the posthumous son of Osiris. It was thus that these old Egyptians visualized, with a certain feeling of sadness, the Osiris-origin of man; but at the same time they looked inward and said:—‘The soul has still retained something of the Isis-Force which gave birth to Horos, the possessor of that never-ceasing impulse to strive upward towards spiritual heights, and it is there, in that sublimity, that man shall once again find Osiris.’

It is possible for present-day humanity to bring about this mystic meeting in two ways. The Egyptian said:—‘I have come from Osiris, and to Osiris I shall return, and because of my spiritual origin, Horos lies deep within my being and Horos leads me on, back to Osiris—to his Father—who may alone be found in the world of spirit; for he can in no way enter into man’s physical nature; there he is overcome by the powers of Typhon, those external forces which underlie all destruction and decay.’

There are but two paths by which Osiris may be attained, the one is by way of the Portal of Death; the other passes not through the Gateway of Physical Dissolution, for Osiris may be reached through Initiation and the consecration of life to Sacred Service.

Under the title of Christianity as a Mystical Fact, I have gone more fully into this belief. The Egyptian conception was as follows:—When man has passed through the Portal of Death, and after certain necessary preparatory stages have been completed, he comes to Osiris, and being freed from his earthly envelope, there awakes in him a consciousness of actual relationship with that supreme deity; and he realizes that henceforth he will be greeted as Osiris, for this form of salutation is always bestowed upon those who have experienced death and entered into the World of Spirit.

The other pathway which likewise leads back to Osiris, that is to say, into the Spiritual Realms is, as we have already stated, by way of Initiation and Holy Devotion. Such was regarded by the Egyptians as a method through which knowledge might be gained of all that is supersensible and lies concealed in man’s nature, in other words of Isis, or the Isis-Power. We cannot penetrate into the depths of the soul, and thus reach the Isis-Force within, in virtue of mere earthly wisdom born of the experiences of daily life, but nevertheless, we have a means at hand whereby we may break through to this inner power and descend to the true Ego; there to find that this same Ego is ever enshrouded by all that is material in man’s physical disposition. If, indeed, we can but pierce this dark veil, then do we find ourselves at last in the Ego’s veritable spiritual home.

Hence it was that the old Egyptians said:—‘Thou shalt descend into thine own inner being—but first cometh thy physical quality, with all that it may express of that self that is thine, and through this human disposition must thou force a way. When thou regardest the stones, and the justness of their fashion—when thou considerest the plants, the inner life thereof and wonder of their form and when thou lookest upon the animals about thee—there of a verity, in these three Kingdoms of Nature, beholdest thou the outer world as begotten of spiritual and supersensible powers. But when thou standest before man, look not alone upon the outer form, but seek that which is within, where abideth the soul’s strength—even as the Isis-Forces.’ Therefore, in connection with the rites of initiation, there was included certain instruction as to what things should be observed during such time as the soul might remain incarnated.

The experiences of all who have in truth descended into their innermost being, have been fundamentally the same as those which come about at the time of passing, differing only in the manner of their occurrence. [One might say that if this method of approaching the spirit realms be followed, then]—Man must pass through the Portal of Death while he yet lives. He must learn to know that change from the physical to the superphysical outlook, from the material to the spiritual world—in other words, he must acquire knowledge of that metamorphosis which takes place at the time of actual death. And in order that he may obtain such enlightenment, he that would become initiated must take that way which leads him into the very depths of his being, for thus alone may true understanding and experience be attained. When this method is employed, the first real inner experience is connected with the blood, as formed by Nature, and the blood is the physical agent of the Ego, just as the nervous system forms the material medium in connection with [the three ultimate modes of consciousness], Feeling, Willing and Thinking. We have already referred to this matter in a previous lecture.

According to the ancient Egyptians, he who desires to descend into his being in order to realize profound association with the primary material media, must first pass down into his physical-etheric sheath and enter the etheric confines of his soul; he must learn to become independent of that force in his blood upon which he normally relies; he can then give himself up to the workings and the wonder of the blood’s action.

It is essential that man must first thoroughly understand his higher nature in regard to its physical aspect. To do this he must learn to view his material being as a detached and wholly separate object. Now, man can only recognize and be fully conscious of an object, as a specific thing, when external to it; hence he must learn to bring about this relation in respect to himself, if he would indeed comprehend the actuality of his being. It was for this reason that Initiation was directed towards the development of such powers as enabled the Soul-Forces to undergo certain experiences independently of the physical media, or agents. So that finally the aspirant could look down upon such media objectively, in the same way as man’s spiritual element looks down upon the material body after death.

The primary duty of one who would know the Isis-Mysteries was to acquire knowledge concerning his own blood; after which he underwent an experience that can be best described as—‘Drawing nigh unto the Threshold of Death.’ This was the first step in the Isis-Initiation; and he who would take it must have power to regard his blood and his being externally, and pass into that sheath which is the medium of the Isis-Nature. Further, the neophyte was led before two doors—within some Holy Sanctuary—the one was closed, the other open; and as he stood in that place there came before him visions depicting the most intimate experiences of his very life, and he heard a voice saying:—‘It is thus that thou art, so dost thou appear when thou beholdest thy true self pictured in the soul.’ How remarkable are these teachings the echoes of which are still heard after thousands of years have passed, and how wonderfully they harmonize with man’s present-day beliefs, even though they have since received materialistic interpretation.

According to the ancient Egyptian seer—when man takes the initial step and comes upon the world of his inner form he is there confronted by two doors—‘Through two doors shalt thou enter thy blood and thy innermost being.’ The anatomist would say:—‘Through two inlets situated in the valves on either side of the heart.’ [There are two pairs of valves in the heart, one pair on one side and one on the other; in each case when one of these valves is open, in order to let the blood-stream flow into a part of the system, that which is adjacent is closed (Ed.)]. Hence, he who desires to penetrate beneath his outer form must pass through the open door; for the gateway which is closed merely confines the blood to its proper course. We thus find that the results of anatomical investigation are certainly analogous to those born of clairvoyant vision in olden times; and although not so clear and accurate as are the conclusions of the modern anatomist, nevertheless they portray what the clairvoyant consciousness actually apprehended, when it regarded man’s inner form from an external stand-point.

The next step in the Isis-Initiation was what one might term the proving or profound study of Fire, Air and Water. During this period the Initiate gained complete knowledge of the Sheath-Quality of his Isis-Being, of the properties of Fire and how, in a certain form, it flows in the blood, using it as medium, and becomes fluid. He further received instruction concerning the manner in which Oxygen is infiltrated into the system from the air. All this wisdom descended upon him—the understanding of Fire, Air, Water, the warmth of his breath, and the true nature of the fluidity of his blood.

Thus it came about that the aspirant, in virtue of the knowledge he acquired of his Sheath-Quality through his newly-born comprehension of the elements of Fire, Air and Water, became so purified that when his vision at last penetrated beneath the enfolding envelope, he entered into his veritable Isis-Nature. We might say that at this point, the Initiate felt for the first time that he was in contact with his actual being, and that he was able to realize that he was indeed a spiritual entity, no longer limited by his external relation to humanity, and that he truly beheld the wonder of the spiritual realms.

It is a definite law that we can only look upon the sun in the daytime, for at night it lies concealed by matter; but the powers in the spiritual world are never thus veiled to those who have acquired the true gift of sight, for they are best discerned when the physical eyes are closed to all material things. Symbolically, in the sense of the Isis-Initiation, we would say:—‘He who is purified and initiated into the Isis-Mysteries, may discern that spiritual life and power to which the sun owes its origin, even though there be darkness as at midnight, for, metaphorically speaking, he may at all times behold the great orb of day and come face to face with the spirit beings of the superperceptual world.’

Such was the description of the method, or as one might say, the path leading to the Isis-Forces within, and we are told that it could be traversed by all who, during earthly life, would but earnestly seek the deepest forces of the soul. There were, however, yet higher mysteries, The Mysteries of Osiris, in which it was made clear that through the medium of the Isis-Forces, and in virtue of those supersensible primordial spiritual powers to which man owes his origin, he could exalt himself and thus attain to Osiris. In other words, he was initiated into those methods by which the human soul might be so uplifted, that it could at last enter upon the presence of that supreme deity.

When the Egyptians wished to portray the nature and character of the relation between Isis and Osiris, they had recourse to that special script which is written in the firmament by the passage of the Sun and Moon; while in the case of other spiritual powers, reference was made to the movements and interrelations existing between the various stars. Most prominent among the astronomical groups in such portrayals was the Zodiac, with its condition of comparative immobility, and the planets which move across its constellations. It was in the revelations of the Heavens, as manifested in spiritual symbols, that the old Egyptian found the true method of expressing those deep feelings which touched his soul. He knew that no earthly means were competent to indicate clearly the vital purpose of that urgent call to seek the Isis-Forces, that mankind might, through their aid, draw nearer to Osiris. He felt that in order to describe this purpose fittingly, he must reach out and make use of those bright groups of stars that ever shine in the firmament.

Hence we must regard Hermes, The Great Wise One, who according to Egyptian tradition, lived upon the Earth in the dawn of antiquity—and was endowed with the most profound clairvoyant insight concerning man’s relation to the Universe—as having possessed in high degree the power of apprehending and explaining the true nature of the connection between the constellations and the forces of the Spirit-World; and of interpreting the signs portraying events and happenings, as expressed in the language of the stars, in terms of their mysterious interrelations. Now, if in those olden days it was desired to enlighten the people with regard to the nature of the bond existing between Osiris and Isis, this matter was put forward in the form of an exoteric legend; but in the case of the Initiates the subject was treated more explicitly by means of symbolical reference to the light which emanates from the Sun and is reflected by the Moon, and the remarkable conditions governing its changes during the varying phases of the latter. In these phenomena the Egyptians found a practical and genuine analogy, expressive of the sacred link between the Isis-Force within the human soul and that supreme spiritual figure—Osiris.

From the movements of the heavenly bodies and the nature of their interrelations, there originated what we must regard as the very earliest form of written characters. Little as this fact is as yet recognized, we would nevertheless draw attention to the following statement:—If we consider the consonants of the alphabet, we note that they imitate the signs of the Zodiac, in their comparative repose; while the vowels and consonants are connected in a way which may be likened to that relation which the planets and the forces which move them bear to the constellations of the Zodiac as a whole. Hence it would appear that in the beginning, written characters were brought down to earth from the vault of heaven.

The sentiments which moved the ancient Egyptians when their thoughts turned to Hermes were such as we have described, and they realized that his great illumination came from those spiritual powers which called to him out of the heavens, prompting him with counsel concerning that activity which persisted in the souls of mankind. Ay! and more than that—he was instructed even in the deeds of everyday life, and in those directions in which such sciences were needed as Geometry and Surveying, both of which Pythagoras learnt from the Egyptians, who ascribed all this knowledge to the primordial wisdom of Hermes. One might say that ‘The Old Wise One’ saw in the interrelation of all things spread abroad upon the earth a counterpart of that which exists in the firmament, and finds expression in the mystic writings of the stars. It was Hermes—’The Thrice-Blessed‘—who first gave this Stellar Script to the world, and through its aid, and in the dawn of Egyptian life, he instilled into the minds of the people the elements of the science of mathematics, while he adjured them to look up to the heavens, there to seek guidance even regarding mundane matters.

The very life of the Egyptian nation in that olden time was dependent upon the overflowing of the Nile, and the deposits which it swept down from the mountainous country to the South. We can therefore readily understand how absolutely essential it was that there should be a certain pre-knowledge of the date of the coming of flood periods, so that they might anticipate the accompanying changes in natural conditions thus brought about in the course of any particular year. In those early days the Egyptians still reckoned time according to that Stellar Script which was written in the canopy of heaven. When Sirius, the Dog Star, was visible in the Sign of Cancer, they knew that the Sun would shortly enter that part of the Zodiac from whence its rays would shine down upon the earth and conjure forth, as if by magic, that life brought thereto by the deposits of the overflowing Nile. Hence, they looked upon Sirius as ‘The Watcher‘, who gave them warning of what they might expect; and the movements of Sirius formed part of their celestial clock. They gazed upward with thankful hearts, for the timely warnings of their ‘Watcher‘ enabled them to cultivate and to tend their land in such manner that it might best bring forth all things necessary to external life.

When questions of import arose such as the above, these old Egyptian peoples sought enlightenment and guidance from those writings which they saw spread across the firmament; the while they looked back into that dim grey past, when first they learnt that the passage of the stars was in truth an expression as of movements among the parts of some mighty cosmic clock. In Thoth, or Hermes, they recognized that Great Spirit who, according to their ancient traditions, set down the very earliest chronicles concerning cosmic wisdom. From that inspiration which came to him through the wondrous Stellar Script, Hermes conceived the forms underlying the physical alphabet, and through their aid taught mankind the principles of Agriculture, Geometry and Surveying; indeed, he instructed them in all things needful for the conduct of physical life. Now, physical life is nought but the embodiment of that spiritual life so deeply interwoven throughout the cosmos—and it was from the cosmos that the spirit of wisdom descended upon Hermes. It was evident to the Egyptians of that period to which we refer, that the influence of The Great Wise One was still active throughout their civilization, and they felt that this mystic bond was both profound and intimate in character.

The method adopted by the old Egyptians for the purpose of time calculations, and which continued in use for many centuries, was most convenient in operation and lent itself readily to all simple computations of this nature. They regarded the year as made up of exactly 365 days, which they divided into 12 months each of 30 days, thus leaving 5 days over, which were separately included. But modern Astronomy tells us that if this method be employed, then one quarter day every year is not taken into account [the actual difference is 6 hours, 9 min., 9 sec.]. Therefore, the Egyptian year came to an end one quarter day too soon. This difference gradually spread backward through the months until a coincidence was reached at the beginning of a certain year; and such coincidence took place every four times 365 years. Hence, after the lapse of each 1,460 years, the terrestrial time estimate would be for a moment in agreement with astronomical conditions, because at that particular moment the sum of the annual differences would be equivalent to one whole year.

Let us now suppose that at a certain time in 1322 B.C. an Egyptian looked up into the heavens, there, at that moment any visible constellation would occupy a definite position in the firmament [which position could be used as a basis of computation]. If we calculate backwards over a period of three times 1,460 years from 1322 B.C., we come to the year 5702 B.C., and it was some time prior to this date to which the Egyptians ascribed the dawn of that primordial Holy Wisdom which came to them in the beginning. They said:—‘In bygone times man’s power of clairvoyance was truly at its highest, but with the passing of each great Sun-Period‘ [of 1,46o years, which brought about the balance of terrestrial reckoning] ‘the divine gift of “clear seeing” gradually faded, until in this fourth stage in which we now live it is weak and ever-failing. Our civilization reaches far into the remoteness of antiquity, where the voice of tradition is all but stilled. In thought we hark back beyond three long Cosmic Periods, to that glorious and distant past when our greatest teacher, his disciples, and his successors, imparted to us the elements of the ancient wisdom which now finds expression—albeit in strangely altered form—in the character of our script, our Mathematics, Geometry, Surveying, our general conduct of life, and also in our study of the heavens. We regard the cosmic adjustment of our human computation, with its convenient factors of twelve times 30 days with five supplementary thereto, as a sign that we are ever subject to correction by the divine powers of the Spirit-World, because through error of thought and reason we have turned away from Osiris and from Isis. We cannot with exactitude measure the year’s length, but when our eyes are raised on high we can gaze into that hidden world from whence those spirit powers that ever guide the courses of the stars, remedy our faults and bring harmony where man has failed to find the truth.’

From the above it is clear that the old Egyptians realized the feebleness of man’s powers of intellect and understanding, so that, even in the case of their Chronology, they sought the aid of those higher spiritual forces and beings beyond the veil. Beings who correct, watch over, and protect mankind during the activities and experiences of earth life, bringing to bear upon these problems the mystic laws of the Great Cosmos. Hermes, or Thoth, was held in greatest veneration as One inspired by the ever vigilant heavenly powers, and in the souls of these ancient peoples this outstanding personality was looked upon, not merely as a great teacher, but as a being who was indeed exalted, and whom they regarded with the most profound feelings of reverence and thankfulness, so that they cried out:—‘All that I have cometh from Thee. Thou went on High in the dim grey dawn of antiquity and Thou hast sent down, by those who were the carriers of Thy traditions, all that flows throughout external civilization, and which is of greatest human service.’ Hence, with reference to the actual Creator of all supersensible forces, and those who watch over them, as well as Osiris and Hermes, or Thoth, the Egyptians felt in their souls not merely that they were imbued with knowledge begotten of wisdom, but they experienced a sentiment in deepest moral sense, of greatest veneration and gratitude.

The graphic descriptions of the past tell us that the wisdom of the ancient Egyptians was permeated throughout with a certain religious quality and mood, particularly noticeable in olden times, but by degrees these characteristics became less and less marked. In those days the people felt all knowledge to be closely associated with holiness, all wisdom with piety and all science with religion. As this attitude waned it gradually decreased in purity of form and expression. A similar change has taken place throughout the evolution of mankind among all those various civilizations whose mission has been to alter the trend of spiritual thought, and lead it in some wholly new direction. When each nation had reached the pinnacle of achievement, and its task was ended, there followed a period of decadence.

The greater part of our knowledge concerning ancient Egyptian culture is connected with an epoch of this nature, and the significance of all that lies beyond is merely a matter of conjecture and supposition. For instance, what is the true meaning of that extraordinary, and to us grotesque, worship of animals in that by-gone age, and of the curious feeling of awe we experience when our thoughts dwell upon the pyramids? The Egyptians themselves tell us that there was an era during which not only mankind, but also beings from the higher spiritual realms descended upon the earth. This was in the beginning before the knowledge and wisdom that was then vouchsafed had truly developed and become active.

If we would indeed know man’s innermost nature, we must not alone regard the outer form, but penetrate to the true self within. All external qualities with which we come in contact are but stages of manifestation which have remained ‘in situ‘, as one might say, and are seen as if representing in powerful, albeit diminutive imagery, ancient principles which are dominant in the three kingdoms of nature. Consider the world of minerals and of rocks—here we find those same relations of form which man has used in the architecture of the pyramids; while the inner forces of plant-life are expressed in the beauty of the Lotus-Flower; and lastly, distributed along that path which culminates in man himself, we find in the brute creation existences which have not attained to the higher level of humanity; they are, as it were, a crystallization of divine forces that have been embodied and scattered abroad in separate and distinct animal shapes.

We can well imagine that the feelings of the old Egyptians gave rise to thoughts of the above nature, when they recognized in animal life a manifestation of the unaltered primordial forces of the gods. For they looked back into the grey past when all earthly things were begotten of divine supersensible powers, and developed under their guidance. From this concept they conjectured that among the creations in Nature’s three kingdoms certain of these higher primal forces, which had lived on unchanged over a long period, had ultimately undergone some intimate modification which had raised them to that higher standard exhibited in the human form. When considering these ancient peoples we must ever have regard for their feelings, perceptions and the necessities of their life. It is from these factors that we can best realize how close was the moral bond between their wisdom and the soul, so that the latter might not swerve from the path of rectitude and morality.

The Egyptians believed, that because of the manner in which the Spirit-World was created and fashioned by the divine supersensible powers, there must be some definite moral relation which extends to the creatures of the animal kingdom. The grotesque and singular modes in which this concept ultimately found expression came about, only, after the final decline of the nation had commenced.

From the study of the later periods of Egyptian culture, it is clear that human frailty and imperfection were unknown in primordial times, for we learn from this source that in the early dawn of Egyptian life civilization was of a high standard, and it was then that man knew and experienced the most intimate divine spiritual revelations. We must not fall into that error, so common in our days, of assuming that all forms of human culture had their inception under the most simple and primitive conditions. In reality it was only after the impulse imparted by those first glorious blessings had waned, and a period of decline set in, that man’s life became crude and uncultured.

Hence, we should not look upon the barbaric tribes merely as peoples in whom intellection is expressed in its most elementary form, but, on the contrary, we must consider the aboriginal races as representative of civilizations which have fallen away from some exalted primordial state. This assertion is not at all to the liking of that branch of science which would have us believe that all culture had its inception under the most elementary conditions, such as those which are still found among the savages of our time. Nevertheless, Spiritual Science affirms, in virtue of knowledge obtained through the medium of its special methods, that the primitive states of mankind are in truth manifestations of long perished civilizations, and that all human life had its inception under cultural conditions directly inspired by divine beings—mentors from the Spirit-World—who descended upon the earth in the dim dawn of antiquity, and over whose deeds is cast a veil impenetrable to external history.

Man has long believed that if we trace life’s course backward through the ages we should in the end arrive at childish conditions, similar to those found among barbaric peoples. It was certainly not expected that in so doing we would find ourselves confronted with noble and exalted concepts and theories. Now, Spiritual Science definitely asserts that if we peer into the past, then, at the beginning of human life we shall not find rudimentary cultural states, but lofty and glorious civilizations, which at some later period fell away from their first high spiritual standard. At this point we might well ask:—‘Does this asservation, as advanced by Spiritual Science, bring it into conflict with the results of modern scientific research—the logical methods of which delve deeply and without prejudice, into all matters that come within the scope of its investigations?‘ Let us see how external science itself replies to this question.

With this object I will give a literal quotation from a recent work by Alfred Jeremias [Licentiate Doctor and Lecturer at the University of Leipzig], entitled The Old Testament in the Light of the Ancient East.¹ From the text we learn that external science while engaged in the gradual unfoldment of ancient history, has reached back into the remote past, and there found traces of a highly spiritual primeval civilization, whose culture was imbued with the most momentous and intellectual conceptions. It is further emphasized that those cultural states, which we are so accustomed to term barbaric, should in reality be regarded as typical of primordial civilizations that have fallen away from some higher level. The actual quotation to which I have referred is as follows:—²

‘The earliest records, as well as the whole ancient civilized life about the Euphrates valley, indicate the existence of a scientific and at the same time religious theoretical conception, which was not merely confined to the occult doctrines of the temple; but in accordance with its precepts, state organizations were regulated and conducted, justice declared and property administered and protected. The more ancient the period to which we can look back, the more absolute does the control exercised by this concept appear. It was only after the downfall of the primal Euphratean civilization that the influence of other powers began to make itself felt.’

From the above excerpt it is clear, that external science has truly made a beginning toward the opening up of new paths that tend to bring harmony and agreement into those matters [so often regarded as controversial] which it is the province of Spiritual Science to bring forward and impress upon our present civilization. In a previous lecture we have drawn attention to a similar progress in connection with the science of Geology. If in the future we continue to advance in like fashion, we shall gradually be compelled to recede ever further and further from that dull and lifeless conception which would have us regard all primordial civilization as primitive and childish in its nature. Then, indeed, shall we be led back to those great personalities of the remote past, who seem to us the more transcendent, because it was their divinely inspired mission to endow a yet clairvoyant people with those priceless blessings which are evident throughout all cultural activity in which we now play our part. Such noble spirits in human form as Zarathustra and Hermes at once claim and rivet our attention. They appear to us so exalted and so glorious, because it was THEY who in the dim dawn of human life gave to mankind those first most potent and uplifting impulses. The old Egyptian sage had this sublime concept in mind when he spoke to Solon concerning ‘doctrines grey with age‘. (Vide p. 86.)

Thus do we honour and revere Hermes, even as we venerate the great Zarathustra. To us he shines forth as one of those grand outstanding individualities—veritable leaders of mankind—the very thought of whom engenders a feeling of enhanced power within, and begets the indubitable conviction through which we know that the Spirit is not merely abroad in the world, but weaves beneath all earthly deeds, and is ever active throughout the evolution of humanity. Then are our lives strengthened, a fuller confidence is in our every action, hopes are assured and destiny stands out the more clearly before us. It is at such times that we exclaim:—‘Those yet to be born will of a surety lift up their hearts to the glorious spirit mentors who were in the beginning, and will seek the verity of their being in the gifts which are of the inner forces of the soul. They shall acknowledge and discern in the ever recurrent impulses which come as an upward urge to mankind the workings of a divine power, and the eternal manifestations of those Great Ones from the Spirit-World.’

ADDENDUM

The above lecture was delivered in Berlin on the 16th of February, 1911. In the interim, external science has probed further into the secrets of that highly advanced primal civilized life about the valley of the Euphrates, to which reference has been made on page 123. The following brief outline will indicate some of the results of Archæological research carried out in Mesopotamia at the site of the olden city known as ‘Ur of the Chaldees‘. At this place, most important discoveries have been made in connection with ancient Euphratean civilization, as the outcome of a Joint Expedition arranged by the British Museum and the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania in 1922, under the direction of C. Leonard Woolley, M.A., Litt. D. In a lecture given before ‘The Royal Society of Arts’ on the 8th of November, 1933, and which duly appeared in their Journal, Dr. Woolley said: ‘Certainly the discoveries that we made at Ur in the last ten years have tended to set scientists by the ears rather than satisfying them with the new information obtained ... few surprises in recent years have been so great as that occasioned by the excavation of the great cemetery lying beneath the ruins of Ur.’

In the tombs of Kings, in vaulted chambers of rubble masonry, dating as far back as 3500 B.C. were found treasures of gold, silver, mosaic, etc., wrought by the Sumerian workers and of a degree of technical excellence unsurpassed by the craftsmen of to-day. In one case, when referring to an especially fine specimen of polychrome art which had been discovered, and is now known as ‘The Ram Caught in a Thicket‘, Dr. Woolley drew attention to the fact, that this particular polychrome sculpture, while characteristic of the work of the ancients in 3400 B.. in the Near East, was actually suggestive of that of some rather late Italian Renaissance artist. As the investigations proceeded it became abundantly clear, that the ancient people who had so skilfully fashioned the strange and wonderful treasures brought to light, ‘were not tyros, they must have had behind them long traditions, long apprenticeship‘.

With the view of obtaining an insight into the history of this by-gone and highly developed civilization, excavations were commenced at a point which was actually the ground level of 3200 B.C., where through a depth of over sixty feet relics of the dim past were unearthed in clearly marked strata. Traces of eight superimposed cities were revealed, and deep down beneath the remains of an ancient pottery factory, so Dr. Woolley tells us, the excavators suddenly came upon a mass, eleven feet thick, of water-laid sand and clay, perfectly uniform and clean, which was undoubtedly the silt thrown up by “The Flood”.—‘We can,’ said Dr. Woolley, ‘actually connect it with the flood which we call Noah’s Flood‘. The verge of this deluge was found to be up ‘against the flank of the mound on which stood the earliest and most primitive city of Ur ‘. Below this deposit were ‘the remains of antediluvian houses ... the lowest human buildings rested upon black organic soil ... and that in turn went down below sea-level‘.

The excavations proved that the ancient Sumerian architects were familiar with concrete at the beginning of the fourth millennium B.C., and possibly earlier. They were acquainted with every basic form of modern architecture, and Dr. Woolley further states that there is no doubt that, ‘the arch, the vault, the apse, and the dome, used in Europe for the first time in the Roman period’, specimens of which were found among the ruins, ‘are a direct inheritance from the Sumerian peoples of the fourth millennium B.C. at least, and they may well go hack to a date still more remote’. (The italics are ours.) Further, it has been shown that continuity in Sumerian civilization undoubtedly extended from the fifth millennium B.C., up to the sixth century B.C. This fact has come to light as a result of discoveries made by digging beneath the foundations of the massive staged tower, known as the Ziggurat of Ur, the main religious building of the city; and by tracing the dates and character of cylinder seals of different periods, carried by these by-gone peoples for the purpose of signing written documents.

Toward the close of his most interesting lecture, Dr. Woolley stated that imports into Egypt before the First Dynasty, seemed to indicate that the Sumerians imparted to the then barbarous people of that country an impulse, which enabled them to develop their remarkable civilization. He further said: ‘Civilized as the Babylonians were, they made no new discoveries at all; they hardly advanced beyond what their predecessors had known and they preserved civilization rather than invented it. We know, too, that the Sumerians sent out the ancestors of the Hebrews with all the traditions of law, civilization, religion and art, which they had themselves enjoyed in their home country and which the Hebrews never entirely forgot, but by which they were profoundly influenced.’

Thus has this Joint Archæological Expedition, under the able leadership of Dr. Woolley, thrown the light of modern external science upon one of those glorious spiritual civilizations of the dim grey past, so often referred to by Rudolf Steiner, which endured just so long as its people opened their hearts to the guidance of the Spirit, but fell away and perished when they left the true path, and gave themselves up to material things. [Ed.]

Notes for this lecture:

1. Manual of Biblical Archaeology, 2 Vols. Translated from the second German Edition, by C. L. Beaumont. Edited by the Rev. Canon C. H. W. Johns, Litt.D. Published by Williams and Morgate, 1911.

2. Der Einfluss Babyloniens auf das Verständnis des Alten Testamentes, von Alfred Jeremias. ‘Die ältesten Urkunden sowie das gesamte euphratensische Kulturleben setzen eine wissenschaftliche und zugleich religiöse Theorie voraus, die nicht etwa nur in den Geheimlehren der Tempel ihr Dasein fristet, sondern nach der die staatlichen Organisationen geregelt sind, nach der Recht gesprochen, das Eigentum verwaltet und geschützt wird. Je höher das Altertum ist, in das wir blacken können, um so Ausschliesslicher herrscht die Theorie; erst mit dem Verfall der alten euphratensischen Kultur kommen andere Mächte zur Geltung.’

In these days there is much discussion concerning The Buddha and the Buddhist Creed; and this fact is the more interesting to all who follow the course of human evolution, because a knowledge of the true character of the Buddhist religion, or perhaps more correctly, the longing felt by many for its comprehension has only recently entered into the spiritual life of the Western nations. Let us consider for a moment that most prominent personality, Goethe, who exerted such a powerful influence on Occidental culture, at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, which influence continued so potently right on into our own period. When we examine his life, his works, and his intellectuality, we find no trace of the Buddhist doctrine; but a little later we note in the concepts of that genius, Schopenhauer (who was in a certain sense a disciple of Goethe), a clear and definite touch of Buddhistic thought; and since that period in which Schopenhauer lived, the interest taken in Eastern spiritual conceptions has steadily increased. Hence it is that there is now a widespread and inherent desire, to analyse and discuss all those matters connected with the name of the Great Buddha, which have found their way into the course of human evolution.

It is a remarkable fact that most people still persist in associating Buddhism, primarily, with the idea of recurrent earth lives, to which concept we have often referred in these lectures. Such an assumption is, however, found to be unwarranted when we have regard to the essential character of the Buddhist belief. We might say, that with the majority of those people who interest themselves in this subject, the notion of repeated earth lives, or as we term it, Reincarnation, forms a well-established and essential part of their preconceived ideas regarding Buddhism. But on the other hand it must be said, even though it sounds grotesque, that to those who probe more deeply into these matters, the association of Buddhism with the idea of reincarnation, appears almost equivalent to saying,—that the most complete knowledge of ancient works of art is to be sought among those peoples who have destroyed them at the commencement of universal development and progress in the Middle Ages. This certainly sounds grotesque, but it is nevertheless true, as we at once realize when we consider that the aim of Buddhism is directed towards the disparagement of our apparently inevitably recurring earth lives, and the reduction of their number as far as may be within our power. Hence, we must regard as the essential moving principle underlying the whole trend of Buddhist spiritual thought that principle which operates in the direction of freedom, that is, redemption from repeated rebirth, or liberation from reincarnation which it accepts as an established and unquestionable fact; in this concept is expressed the true and vital essence of Buddhism.

Even from a superficial glance at the history of Western spiritual life, we learn that the idea of repeated earthly existence is quite independent of an understanding of Buddhism, and vice versa; for during the course of our Occidental spiritual development we find ourselves confronted with a conception of reincarnation, presented in a manner both lofty and sublime, by a personality who most certainly had remained untouched by Buddhist views and trend of thought. This personality was Lessing, who in his treatise on The Education of Mankind, which is regarded as the most matured and mellow of his works, closes with the confession that he himself was a believer in the Doctrine of Reincarnation. With regard to this belief, he gives expression to those deeply significant words,—‘Is not all eternity mine?‘ Lessing was of opinion that the repetition of our earthly lives was proof that benefit would accrue from mundane endeavour, and that existence in this world is not in vain. For while we toil we look forward to ever widening and fuller recurring corporal states, in which we may bring to maturity the fruits of our by-gone earthly lives. The conception which Lessing really formed was of the prospect and anticipation of a rich and bountiful harvest, to be garnered in the fullness of time coupled with the knowledge that throughout human existence there is ever an inner voice, which in actual expectation of recurrent earth lives, calls to us, saying,—‘Thou shalt persist in thy labours.’ From what has been said, it is now apparent that it is in the very essence of Buddhism that man must ever strive to obtain such knowledge and wisdom as may serve to free him from those future reincarnations, the prevision of which lies in the spirit. Only when during one of our earth lives we have at last freed ourselves from the need of experiencing those which would otherwise follow, can we enter peacefully upon that condition which we may term Eternity.

I have persistently endeavoured to make it clear that the idea of reincarnation, both with regard to Spiritual Science and Theosophy, was not derived from any one of the ancient traditions, not even from Buddhism; it has in fact thrust itself upon us during our time, as a result of independent observation and reflection concerning life in connection with spiritual investigation. Hence, to associate Buddhism so directly with the idea of reincarnation indicates a superficial attitude. If we would indeed look into the true character and nature of Buddhism, then we must turn our spiritual eyes in quite another direction.

I must now once again draw your attention to that law in human evolution which we met with when we were considering the personality of the great Zarathustra. In accordance with this law, as was then stated, during the gradual passing of time the whole condition and character of man’s soul changed, while it went through varying transitional states. Those events regarding which we obtain information from external historical documents, represent as far as man is concerned, only a comparatively late phase in the evolution of humanity. If, however, we look back with the aid of Spiritual Science to prehistoric times, we gain much further knowledge; we then find that a certain condition of soul was common to primitive man, whereby the normal state of human consciousness was quite other than that of our day.

That pre-eminently intellectual order of consciousness, which leads to the manner in which, during the course of our normal human life, we now regard all things around us combining them by means of our mental powers acting through the brain, so that they shall be connected with and become a part of our wisdom, and our science—was first developed from another form of conscious state. I have emphasized this point before, but I must lay particular stress upon it once again. We have in the chaotic disorder of our dream-life, a last remnant—a species of atavistic heritage – of an old clairvoyance, which was at one time to a certain extent, an ordinary condition of the human soul, and in which mankind assumed a state between that of sleeping and that of being awake; he could then look upon those things hidden behind the perceptual world.

In these days in which our consciousness mainly alternates between the sleeping and the waking conditions, it is only in the latter that we seek to apprehend a state of intellectuality in the soul; but in olden times, clairvoyant visions were not so meaningless as are the dream forms of our period, for they could be quite definitely ascribed to specific superperceptual creations and events. Mankind had in connection with these ancient fluctuating visions a species of conscious state out of which our present intellectuality gradually evolved. Hence, we look back to a certain form of primeval clairvoyance which was followed by the long drawn out evolution of our consciousness as recognized to-day. Because of this by-gone dream-like clairvoyance, prehistoric man could gaze far into the superperceptual worlds, and through this connection with the supersensible, he gained not knowledge alone but a feeling of profound inner satisfaction and bliss from the full realization of the soul’s union with the Spirit-World.

Just as present-day man is now convinced through his sense perceptions and intellectuality that his blood is composed of substances which exist without in the physical universe, so was prehistoric man confident that his soul and spiritual nature emanated from that same hidden Spirit-World which he could discern in virtue of his clairvoyant consciousness. It has already been pointed out that there are phenomena connected with the history of mankind, and which are also apparent in certain external facts and happenings, that can only be fully understood when we pre-suppose some such primordial condition of man’s earthly existence. It has further been stated that modern science is coming more and more to the conclusion that it is erroneous to assume, as has been done by the materialistic Anthropology of the nineteenth century, that in primeval times the prevailing state common to man was similar to that found among the most primitive peoples of to-day. It is, in fact, becoming more and more clear that the prehistoric races had extremely exalted theoretical conceptions regarding the Spirit-World, and that these concepts were given to them in the form of visions. All those curious ideas which come to us through myths and legends can only be rightly understood, when they are first connected with and referred back to that ancient wisdom which came to man in a way wholly different from that by which our present intellectual science has been attained.

In these modern times there is not much sympathy expressed with the view that the position in which we find the primitive peoples of our day is not typical of the universal primordial condition of mankind, but is in reality an example of decadence from a primarily highly clairvoyant spiritual state common to all peoples. But facts will yet force a general acceptance of some such hypothesis as that put forward by Spiritual Science as a result of its investigations. Here, as in many other cases, it can be shown that fundamentally there is complete accord between spiritual and external science. Further, a time will come when the conclusions which Spiritual Science has formed regarding the probable future of man’s evolution, viewed from the scientific stand-point, will be entirely confirmed. We must look back, not merely to a form of primeval wisdom, but to a specific order of primordial feeling and apprehension, which we characterize as a clairvoyant bond, erstwhile existent between man and the divine regions of spirit.

We can easily understand that during the transition from the old or clairvoyant state of the human soul to our modern direct, unprejudiced and intellectual method of regarding the external perceptual world, there should arise two different currents of thought. As time went on the first of these made itself manifest more especially among those peoples who had clung to memories of the past, and to their fading psychic power, in such manner that they would say:—‘In by-gone days mankind was truly in contact with the spirit realms in virtue of the clairvoyant faculty, but since then he has descended into the material world of sense perception.’ This feeling spread throughout the whole soul’s outlook, until those ancient peoples would cry out:—‘We are indeed now come into a world of manifestations where all is illusion—all is Maya.’ Only at such time as man might commune with the spirit spheres could he truly comprehend, and be united with his very being. Thus it was that there came to those nations who still preserved a dim remembrance of the ancient primal clairvoyant state, a certain feeling of sadness at the thought of what they had lost, and an indifference to all material things which man might apprehend and understand through the medium of his intellect, and with which he is ever in direct and conscious contact.

On the other hand, the second of the two thought currents to which I have referred, may be expressed in the following manner:—‘We will observe and be active in this new world which has been given to us.’ Thought of this nature is especially noticeable throughout the Zarathustran doctrine. Those who experienced this call to action did not look back with sorrow and longing to the loss of the old clairvoyant power, but felt, ever more and more, that they must keep in close and constant touch with those forces by the aid of which they might penetrate into the secrets and nature of all material things, knowing full well that knowledge and guidance, born of the spirit, would flow in upon them if they would but give themselves up to earnest and profound meditation and piety. Such people felt impelled to link themselves closely with the world—there was no dreaming of the past, but an urge to gaze resolutely into the future and to battle with what might come. They expressed themselves after this fashion:—‘Interwoven throughout this world, which is now our portion, is the same divine essence that was spread about us and permeated our very beings in by-gone ages; and this spiritual component we must now seek amid our material surroundings. It is our task to unite ourselves with all that is good and of the spirit, and by so doing, to further the progress and evolution of creation.’ These words indicate the essential nature of that current of thought which was occupied with external physical perception, and went forth from those Asiatic countries where the Zarathustran doctrine prevailed, and which lay Northward of the region where mankind looked back in meditation, pondering over that great spiritual gift which had passed away, and was indeed lost.

Thus it came about that upon the soil of India there arose a spiritual life which is entirely comprehensible, when we regard it in the light of all this retrospection concerning a former union with the Spirit-World. If we consider the results in India of the teachings of the Sankhya and Yoga philosophies and the Yoga training, we find that these may be embodied in the following statement:—The Indian has ever striven to re-establish his connection with those Spirit-Worlds from whence he came, and it has been his constant endeavour to eliminate from his earthly life all that was spread around him in the external creation, and by thus freeing himself from material things, to regain his union with that spiritual region from whence humanity has emanated. The principle underlying Yoga philosophy is reunion with the divine realms, and abstraction from all that appertains to the perceptual world.

Only when we assume this fundamental mood of Indian spiritual life can we realize the significance of that mighty impulse brought about by the advent of the Buddha, which blazed up before our spiritual sight, as an after-glow across the evening sky of Indian soul-life, but a few centuries before the Christ-impulse began to dominate Western thought. It is only in the light of the Buddha-mood, when regarded as already characterized, that the outstanding figure of the Buddha can be truly comprehended. In view of that basic assumption to which we have above referred, we can readily conceive that in India there could exist an order of thought and conviction, such as caused mankind to regard the world as having fallen from a spiritual state into one of sense-illusion, or that ‘Great Deception‘, which is indeed Maya. It is also understandable that the Indian, because of his observations concerning this external world with which humanity is so closely connected, pictured to himself that this decline came about suddenly and unexpectedly from time to time, during the passing of the ages. So that Indian philosophy does not regard man’s fall as uniform and continuous, but as having taken place periodically from epoch to epoch. From this point of view we can now understand those contemplative moods, underlying a form of culture which we must regard as being in the departing radiance of its existence; for so must we characterize the Buddhist conception, if we would consider it as having a place in a philosophy such as we have outlined.

Indian thought ever harked back to that dim past when man was truly united with the Spirit-World. For there came a time when the Indian fell away from his exalted spiritual standard; this decline persisted until a certain level was reached, when he rose again, only to sink once more. He continued to alternate in this fashion throughout the ages, every descent taking him still further along the downward path, while each upward step was, as it were, a mitigation granted by some higher power, in order that man might not be compelled to work and live, all too suddenly, in that condition which he had already entered upon during his fall. According to ancient Indian philosophy, as each period of decline was ended there arose a certain outstanding figure whose personality was known as a ‘Buddha‘; the last of these was incarnated as the son of King Suddhodana, and called Gautama Buddha.

Since those olden times, when humanity was still directly united with the Spirit-World, there have arisen a number of such Buddhas, five having appeared subsequent to the last fall. The advent of the Buddhas was a sign that mankind shall not sink into illusion—into Maya—but that again and again there shall come into men’s lives something of the ancient primal wisdom, to succour and to aid humanity. This primordial knowledge, however, because of man’s constant downward trend, fades from time to time; but in order that it shall be renewed there arises periodically a new Buddha, and as we have stated, the last of these was Gautama Buddha.

Before such great teachers could advance, through repeated earth lives, to the dignity of Buddhahood, if we may so express it, they must have already been exalted and attained the lofty standing of a Bodhisattva.¹ According to the Indian philosophical outlook, Gautama Buddha, up to his twenty-ninth year, was not regarded as a Buddha, but as a Bodhisattva. It was therefore as a Bodhisattva that he was born into the royal house of Suddhodana; and because his life was ever devoted to toil and to striving, he was at last blessed with that inner illumination, symbolically portrayed in the words, ‘Sitting under the Bodhi tree‘; and that glorious enlightenment which flowed in upon him found expression in the ‘Sermon at Benares’.

Thus did Gautama Buddha rise to the full dignity of Buddahood in his twenty-ninth year, and from that time on, he was empowered to revive once again a last remnant of by-gone primeval wisdom; which, however, in the light of Indian conceptions, would be destined to fall into decadence during the centuries to come. But according to these same concepts, when man has sunk so low, that the wisdom and the knowledge which this last Buddha brought, shall have waned, then will yet another Bodhisattva rise to Buddhahood, the Buddha of the Future—the Maitreya Buddha; whose coming the Indian surely awaits, for it is foretold in his philosophy.

Let us now consider what took place at that time when the last Bodhisattva rose to Buddhahood; when, as we might say, his soul became filled with primordial wisdom. By so doing we can best realize and understand the true significance of that great change, wrought by struggle and toil through repeated earth lives.

There is a legend which tells us that until his twenty-ninth year he had seen nothing of the world outside the Royal Palace of Suddhodana; and that he was protected from that misery and suffering which are factors of existence ever antagonistic to human prosperity in life’s progress. It was under these conditions that the Bodhisattva grew up; but at the same time he was possessed of the Bodhisattva-consciousness, that consciousness so imbued with inner wisdom garnered from previous incarnations. Hence, as he developed, during life’s unfolding, he looked only upon those things which would bring forth true and goodly fruits. Since this legend is so well known, it is only necessary to refer to the main points. It states that when the Buddha at length came outside the Royal Palace he had an experience such as could not have occurred before—namely, he beheld a corpse—and he realized on seeing this body that life is dissolved by death; and that the death element breaks in upon life’s procreative and fruitful progress. He next came upon an ailing and feeble man; and knew that disease enters upon life. Again, he saw an aged person, tottering and weary; and he understood that old age creeps in upon the freshness of youth.

From the stand-point of Buddhism, Indian Philosophy presupposes that:—He who having been a Bodhisattva, and is exalted to Buddhahood, regards all experiences, such as the above, with the Bodhisattva-consciousness. This supposition must be clearly understood. Gautama realized that in the great wisdom which underlies development in all being, there is an element destructive to existence; and the legend states that when this truth first dawned upon him, his great soul was so affected that he cried out:—‘Life is full of misery.’

Let us now place ourselves in the position of those who look upon experiences of this nature, solely from the Buddhistic point of view, for instance, in the position of this Bodhisattva-Gautama. Gautama was possessed of a higher wisdom which lived within him, but was as yet not fully developed. He had, up to this period, seen only the fortunate and wealthy side of life, and now for the first time beheld the elements of decay and dissolution. If we consider the way in which he must have regarded these happenings, as viewed from the stand-point of assumptions forced upon him in virtue of his being, we can readily understand how it was that this great spiritual Buddha came to express himself in words somewhat as follows:—‘When we attain to knowledge and to wisdom, it comes about that in virtue of such wisdom we are led onwards toward development and progress; and because of this enlightenment, there enters into the soul the thought of an ever continuous and beneficial growth and advancement; but when we look upon the world about us we see there the elements of destruction as expressed in sickness, old age, and death. Verily, it cannot be wisdom that would thus mingle these destructive factors with life, but something quite apart and distinctive in character.’ At first the great Gautama did not fully grasp all that his Bodhisattva-consciousness implied, and we can well realize how it was that he became imbued with those thoughts which caused him to exclaim:—‘Man may indeed be possessed of much wisdom, and through his knowledge there may come to him the idea of plenteous benefits; but in life we behold about us not alone the factors of sickness and death, but many another baneful element which brings corruption and decay into our very existence.’

The Bodhisattva thus saw around him a condition which he could not as yet fully comprehend. He had passed through life after life, always applying the experiences gained through his previous incarnations to his soul’s benefit; the while his wisdom became ever greater and greater, till at last he could look down upon all earthly existence from a more exalted vantage-point. But when he came forth from the King’s Palace, and saw before him for the first time the realities of life, its true nature and significance did not at once penetrate his understanding. That knowledge which we gain from the repeated experiences of our earth lives, and which we store within us as wisdom, can never solve the ultimate secrets of our being, for the true origin of these mysteries must lie without—remote from that life which is ours as we pass from reincarnation to reincarnation.

Such thoughts matured in the great soul of Gautama and led him directly to that sublime enlightenment known as ‘The Illumination under the Bodhi Tree ‘.² There, while seated beneath this tree, it became clear to the Buddha that this world in which we have our being is Maya,—illusion; that here life follows upon life, and that we have come upon this earth from a spiritual realm. While we are yet here we may indeed be exalted, and even rise to noble heights in the divine sense, and we may pass through many reincarnations, becoming ever more and more possessed of wisdom; but because of that which is material and comes to us through contact with this earthly life, we can never solve the great ever-present mystery of existence which finds expression in old age, disease and death. It was at this time of enlightenment that the thought came to Gautama that the teachings born of suffering held for him a greater significance than all the wisdom of a Bodhisattva.

The Buddha expressed the fundamental concept underlying his great illumination as follows:—‘That which spreads itself abroad throughout this world of Maya is not veritable wisdom, indeed, so little of this quality is manifested in life that we can never hope to gain from external experiences a true understanding of affliction, nor acquire that knowledge which will show us the way by which we may be freed from suffering; for interwoven throughout all outer existence is a factor of quite another character, which differs from all wisdom and all knowledge.’

It is therefore obvious that what the Buddha sought was an element through the agency of which the destructive forces of old age, sickness and death become commingled with earthly life, and in which wisdom has no part. He held that freedom from these baneful factors can never come through mundane knowledge and learning for the path which leads to deliverance does not lie in that direction, and can only be found when man withdraws himself entirely from the external world, where life follows upon life and reincarnation upon reincarnation.

Thus it was the Buddha realized from the moment of his illumination that in the teachings and experience born of affliction, lay that basic element necessary to humanity for its future progress; and he conceived a factor (wherein was no wisdom) which he termed The Thirst for Existence to be the true source of all that misery and sorrow which so troubles the world. Upon the one side wisdom, upon the other a thirst for existence, where wisdom has no part. It was this thought which caused Gautama to exclaim:—‘Only liberation from recurrent earth life can lead humanity to the realization of perfect freedom; for earthly wisdom, even that of the highest learning, cannot save us from grief and anguish.’ He therefore gave himself up to meditation, and sought some means whereby mankind might be led away from all this restlessness in the world of his reincarnations, and guided into that transcendent state which Gautama Buddha has designated Nirvana.

What, then, is the nature of this state—this World of Nirvana—which man shall enter when he has so advanced in his earthly life that ‘The Thirst for Existence‘ has passed, and he no more desires to be reborn? We must understand this concept rightly, for then shall we avoid those grotesque and fantastic ideas, so frequently spread abroad. Nirvana is a condition that can only be characterized in the Buddhist sense. According to this conception, it is a world of redemption and of bliss that can never be expressed in terms of things which may be apprehended in the material state in which we have our being. There is nothing in this physical world, nor in the wide expanse of the cosmos, which can awaken in mankind a realization of the sublime truth underlying such redemption.

Hence, we should forbear from all pronouncements and assertions regarding that glorious region where humanity must seek salvation; and all earth-born predications and profitless statements—such as man is ever prone to make – must be stilled, for in them is nought pertaining to the spheres of eternal bliss. There is, indeed, no possibility of picturing that realm, where all may enter who have overcome the need for reincarnation, since it is not of those things of which we may have awareness on this earth life. When, therefore, we would speak of this condition we must use a negative, an indefinite, term and such a term is Nirvana. He who has conquered all mundane desires shall yet know the nature and the aspect of that other world which we can but indicate with the one vague and neutral word Nirvana. It is a region which, according to the Buddhist, no language can portray. It is not a ‘Nihility‘, it is indeed so far removed from such a concept that we can find no words wherewith to describe this state of being, so complete, so perfect, and all abounding in ecstasy and bliss.

We are now in a position to grasp and apprehend the very essence of Buddhism, its sentiments and its convictions. From the time of the Sermon at Benares, when first the Buddha gave expression to the ‘Doctrine of Suffering‘, Buddhism became permeated with thought and understanding concerning the inner nature of life’s misery and distress, and of that yearning, that Thirst for Existence which leads but to sorrow and affliction. There is, according to this doctrine, only one way in which humanity may truly progress, and that is through gaining freedom and redemption from further reincarnations. Mankind must find that path of knowledge which extends outward and beyond all earthly wisdom—that path which is the way and the means whereby slowly, step by step, man may become so fitted and conditioned that he can at last enter upon that ideal state—Nirvana. In other words, he must learn to utilize the experiences of his rebirths, in such manner that finally recurrent earth life is no longer essential to his development, and he is freed therefrom for evermore.

If we now turn from this brief summary of the conceptions which underlie Buddhism, to the root and essence of this religion, it at once strikes us as peculiar when viewed in the light of our ideas concerning humanity regarded as a whole—for Buddhism in point of fact isolates the individual. Questions are raised relative to man’s destiny, the purport and aim of his existence, his place and relation to the world—all from the stand-point of detached and separate personality. How, indeed, could any other trend of thought underlie a philosophy built upon a fundamental disposition of mind such as we have outlined? A philosophy evolved from a basic mood, which conceives man as being descended from spiritual heights and now finding himself in a world of illusion; from which material existence the wisdom of a Buddha may, from time to time, free him; but this very wisdom (as was seen in the case of the last Buddha) causes him to seek redemption from his earthly life. How could the goal of human existence, born as it was of convictions such as these, be characterized other than by representing man as isolated in his relation to the whole of his environment? According to this philosophy, the fundamental aspect of being is such as to represent decline, while development and evolution in earthly life implies degeneration.

The manner in which the Buddha sought enlightenment is both remarkable and significant, but unless we consider also the peculiar characteristics and circumstances connected with ‘The Illumination‘, neither the Buddha himself, nor Buddhism, can be properly understood. When Gautama craved enlightenment, he went forth into solitude; to a place where he could find entire and absolute isolation. For all that he had acquired from life to life, must be overcome in the utter detachment of his being, so that there could break in upon his soul that clear light whereby he might comprehend and solve the mystery of the world’s wretchedness. There in that place, as one in complete aloofness, dependent upon himself alone, the Buddha awaited the moment of illumination—that moment when there should come to him an understanding which would enable him to realize that the true cause of all human suffering lay in the intense longing manifested by individual man to be born again into this material world. And further, that this yearning for reincarnation, this thirst for existence, is the fundamental source of all that misery and distress which is everywhere about us, and of those pernicious factors which bring ruin and destruction into our very being.

We cannot rightly comprehend the unusual and singular nature of the Buddha-Illumination and of the Buddhistic Doctrine unless we compare them with the knowledge and experience we have gained through Christianity. Six hundred years after the advent of the Great Buddha, there arose in Christendom a wholly different conception, in which we also find man’s position relative to the world and all that is about him expressed in definite terms.

Now, regarding Buddhism, and speaking in an abstract and general manner, we can say:—The philosophic outlook concerning the cosmos, as set forth in Buddhistic teachings, is not treated historically, and this unhistoric method is thoroughly typical of all Eastern countries. These countries have seen one Buddha epoch follow upon another, only to gradually die out and eventually come to an end. Such descriptions as are concerned merely with man’s descent from higher to lower states, do not of themselves constitute what we term history, for the factors of true history would include the upward endeavour of humanity to reach some appointed goal, and the nature and possibilities of man’s association and union with the world as a whole, both in the past and in the future. We would then have veritable history. But the Buddhist stands isolated and alone, concerned only with the basic principles of his being, ever seeking to gain through the conduct of his personal life those powers which may lead him to freedom from ‘the thirst for existence‘, so that having attained to this freedom he may at last win redemption from rebirth.

In Christendom, six hundred years after the Buddha period, the attitude of individual man toward the evolution of humanity in general was of quite another kind. Putting aside all prejudice, which is so common a failing throughout the world, we can characterize one particular Christian trend of thought as follows:—From that part of the Christian concept which is founded upon the stories in the Old Testament it is realized that the ancients were related to the spiritual realms in a manner wholly different from that which was subsequently the case; as is seen in the grand and lofty imagery depicted in Genesis. Now, a curious fact comes to light, namely, in Christendom we find man’s relation to the world to be of a character entirely unlike that which obtains in Buddhism. The following may be considered as the Christian’s point of view:—‘Within my being is understanding begotten of that condition of soul which is now mine; and because of the way and the manner in which I observe and comprehend this outer perceptual world, there is born in me wisdom, intelligence and an aptitude for the practical conduct of life. But I can look back into the distant past when the human soul was differently conditioned, and there came about a circumstance, namely, “The Fall of Man”, which cannot be regarded simply from the Buddhistic stand-point.’ This event, which we so often find portrayed in a figurative form based upon misconception, the Buddhist believes to be a [natural result of man’s] descent from Divine spiritual heights into a world of Maya, or illusion. This great ‘Fall’ must, however, be looked upon in a quite different way, for truly characterized it is The Fall of Man [as caused wholly through his own transgression, and was not due as the Buddhist thinks, merely to his coming down from a higher spiritual state and entering a world of deception].

Although man may have his own opinion concerning this matter, nevertheless, there is one thing we must admit, and that will suffice for the present, namely, that in connection with the thought of ‘The Fall’ there is an inner sentiment which causes man to exclaim:—‘As I am now there work within me certain impulses and forces that have of a surety not developed in my being alone, for similar factors were active in a not so very distant past, when they played a part in happenings of such a nature that the human race, to which I belong, not only lapsed from its former higher spiritual standard, but is so far fallen that mankind has come into another relation with the world to the one which would have been, if the original conditions had but endured.’

When man fell away from his previous high spiritual state, he sank to a definitely lower level, and this change was brought about by what may be termed his own conscious sin. We are therefore not merely concerned with the fact of descent, as is the case when ‘The Fall’ is viewed from the Buddhist stand-point, for we must take into consideration varying mood during this period of decadence. If man’s first nature had but continued unchanged this decline would not have that character which it has now assumed, where the soul-state is such that he is ever prone to fall into temptation.

He who penetrates beneath the surface of Christianity and studies deeply, learns that while history ran its course man’s soul-quality altered. In other words, because of certain events which happened in ancient times, man’s soul (the working of which may be likened to a subconscious mind with his being) took to itself a quality quite other to that which was primarily intended. Now, the Buddhist’s position relative to the material world may be expressed as follows; he would say:—‘I have been taken out of a Divine spiritual realm and placed upon this earth; when I look around me I find nought but illusion—all is Maya.’ But the Christian, on the other hand, would exclaim:—‘When I came down into this material life, had I but conformed to the order and intent of that Divine plan in which I had my part, I could even now look beyond this perceptual pretence, behind all this deception, this Maya; and I would at all times have power to realize and discern that which is genuine and true. But because, when I descended upon this earth my deeds were not in harmony with those things which had been ordained, I have, through my own act, caused this world to become an illusion.’

To the question:—‘Why is this world one of Maya?’ the Buddhist answers:—‘It is the world itself that is Maya.’ But the Christian says:—‘It is I who am at fault, I alone; my limited capacity for discernment and my whole soul-state have placed me in such a position that I can no more apprehend that which was in the beginning; and my actions and conduct have ceased to be of such a nature that results follow smoothly, ever attended with beneficial and fruitful progress. I myself have enwrapped this material life in a veil of Maya.’ The Buddhist’s stand-point is: that the world is a great illusion, and must be overcome. The Christian exclaims:—‘I have been placed upon this earth and must here find the purpose and object of my being.’ When he once understands that through Spiritual Science knowledge may be acquired concerning recurrent earth lives, he then realizes that he may use this wisdom for the achievement of the true aim of his existence. He then becomes convinced that the reason why we now look upon a world of sorrow and deception, is because we have wandered from our allotted path. He considers that this change to Maya is the direct result of man’s deeds, and the manner in which he regards the world. The Christian, therefore, is of opinion that in order to attain to eternal bliss, we must not seek to withdraw ourselves from this earth-state but master that condition which we alone have brought about, and through which the aspect of all material things has been transformed into one of illusion, such that we no longer apprehend them in their truth and reality; we must turn back and overcome this deception, then may we follow the course of our first duly appointed destiny—for latent within each one of us abides a higher personality. If this more noble hidden-self were not hindered and could but look around upon the world, it would apprehend it in all its verity; man would then no longer continue an existence hampered by sickness and by death but lead an everlasting life in all the freshness of youth.

Such, then, is the true inner self that we have veiled. Veiled, because in the past we have been associated with a certain event in the world’s development, the effects of which have continued on, while the primary impulses still work within us, thus proving that we do not exist isolated and alone. We must not believe that we have been led to our present condition through a ‘thirst for existence’ common to individual man; but rather must we realize that each one of us is a definite unit in the sum total of humanity, and as such must take his share and suffer from the results of any original transgression committed by mankind.

It is in this way that the Christian feels that he is historically united with the whole human race, and while he looks into the future, he exclaims:—’Through travail and toil I must regain touch with that greater self which because of Man’s Fall, now lies enshrouded within my being. It is not Nirvana that I must seek, but my more noble Ego. Alone, must I find the way back to my true nature, then will the outer world be no longer an illusion, a vision of unreality, but a world wherein I shall overcome, of my own power and effort, all sorrow, sickness, and death. While the Buddhist would seek freedom from earthly conditions and from rebirth, through his struggle with ‘The Thirst for Existence’,—the Christian seeks liberation from his lower personality, and looks forward to the awakening of his higher self, that more exalted Ego, which he alone has veiled; so that through his awakening he may at last apprehend this perceptual world in the light of Divine truth.

When we compare those significant words of St. Paul:—‘Yet not I but Christ liveth in me’ (Galatians ii, 20) with the wisdom revealed by the Buddha, the contrast is as that between light and darkness. In St. Paul’s words, we find expressed that positive knowledge, that definite consciousness, which is ever active deep within us, and in virtue of which we take our place as human personalities in the world. According to the Buddhist, mankind has lapsed from spiritual heights, because this material world has pressed him down and implanted in him a ‘thirst for existence’; and this desire he must overcome—he must away! The Christian, on the other hand, says:—‘No! the world is not to blame because of my present state, the fault lies with me alone.’

We Christians dwell upon this earth equipped with our accustomed consciousness; but beneath all awareness and understanding there is a something ever active in each individual personality which in by-gone times found expression in the form of a clairvoyant visioned consciousness, now no more extant, for even while we possessed this faculty, we transgressed. If we would indeed reach the ultimate goal of our existence, then must we first atone for this human error. No man who is advanced in years may say:—‘In my early life I have sinned; it is unjust that I should now be called upon to make atonement for youthful faults, committed at a time when I had not yet attained to that fuller knowledge which is now mine.’ It would be equally wrong for him to assert that it is unfair that he be expected to use his present conscious power to such end that he may compensate for misdeeds enacted while in possession of a different conscious faculty, which faculty no longer exists, for it has been replaced by an intellectual cognition.

The only way in which man may truly atone, when indeed the will is there, is for him to raise himself upward from his present conscious-state and existing Ego, to a higher plane of personality—a more exalted ‘I’. Those words of St. Paul,—‘Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,’ could then be characterized as follows,—‘Yet not I, but a higher consciousness liveth in me.’ The Christian conception can be expressed in these words:—‘I have fallen from a higher spiritual state, and have entered upon a different condition from that which was previously ordained; but I must rise again; and this I must do, not through that quality of Ego which is mine, but in virtue of a power that can enter into my very being, uplifting me far above that “I”, which I now possess. Such a change can alone come to pass when the Christ-influence is once more active within, leading me onward until the world has lost all power of illusion, and I can apprehend it in its true reality. Ever upward until those baneful forces which have brought sickness and death upon the earth may be vanquished,—conquered by that higher spiritual power which Christ has quickened within my being.’

The innermost essence of Buddhism is best understood by comparing the Buddhist creed with that of Christianity. When we do this, we at once realize why it was that Lessing should have made use of the phrase,—‘Is not all Eternity mine?’—in his book entitled The Education of Mankind. These words imply that if we employ the experiences gained during our repeated reincarnations, in such manner as to suffer the Christ-force to abide ever more and more within us, we shall at last reach the eternal spheres which realms we cannot as yet hope to attain, because we have of our own act, enveloped the inner being as with a veil. The idea of reincarnation will present a wholly different aspect when illumined by the glory of Christianity; but it is not merely the actual belief in rebirth which matters for the present, for with the advance of Christian culture, humanity will gradually be driven to the acceptance of this concept as a truth brought forward by Spiritual Science. But it is important that we should realize that, whereas the deepest sentiments and convictions of the Buddhist’s faith cause him to blame the World for everything that is Maya—the Christian, on the other hand, looks upon himself, and mankind in general, as responsible for all earthly deception and illusion. The while he stores within his innermost being those qualities which are prerequisite and necessary to him, in order that he may rise to that state which we term Redemption. In the Christian sense, however, this does not only imply deliverance, but actual resurrection; for when man has attained to this state, his Ego is already raised to the level of that more exalted ‘I’ from which he has fallen. The Buddhist, when he looks around upon the world, finds himself concerned with an original sin, but feels that he has been placed upon this earth merely for a time, he therefore desires his freedom. The Christian likewise realizes his connection with an original sin, but seeks amendment and to atone for this first transgression. Such is an historical line of thought, for while the Christian feels that his present existence is associated with an incident which took place in olden times among the ancients, he also connects his life with an event that will surely come to pass when he is so advanced that his whole being will shine forth, filled with that radiance which we designate as the essence of the Christ-Being.

Hence it is that during the world’s development we find nothing in Christianity corresponding to successive Buddha-epochs coming one after another, as one might say, unhistorically, each Buddha proclaiming a like doctrine. Christianity brings forward but one single glorious event during the whole of man’s earthly progress. In the same way as the Buddhist pictures the Buddha, seated isolated and alone under the Bodhi tree, at the moment when he was exalted and the great illumination came to him; so does the Christian visualize Jesus of Nazareth at that time when there descended upon Him the all-inspiring Spirit of the cosmos. The baptism of Christ by John, as described in the Bible, is as vivid and clear a picture as is the Buddhist’s conception of the Illumination of the Buddha. Thus we have, in the first case, the Buddha seated under the Bodhi tree, concerned only with his own soul; in the second, Jesus of Nazareth, standing in the Jordan, while there descended upon Him that cosmic essence, that Spirit, symbolically represented as a dove, which entered into His innermost being.

To those who profess Buddhism, there is something about the Buddha and his works which is as a voice ever saying,—‘Thou shalt still this thirst for earthly existence, tear it out by the roots, and follow the Buddha—on to those realms which no earthly words can describe.’ The Christian has a similar feeling, with regard to the life and example of Christ, for there seems to come forth an influence, which makes it possible for him to atone for that primeval deed, committed by ancient humanity. He knows that when in his soul, the Divine cosmic influence (born of that great spiritual world which lies behind this perceptual earth) becomes as great a living force as in the Christ himself, then will he carry into his future reincarnations the increasing realization of the truth of St. Paul’s words:—‘Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me’; and he will be raised more and more, ever upwards, to that Divine state from which he is now fallen. When such a faith is ours, we cannot help but be deeply moved, when we hear the story of how the Buddha, as he addressed his intimate disciples, spoke to them as follows:—‘When I look back upon my former lives, as I might look into an open book, where I can read page after page, and review each life in turn that is passed, I find in every one of these earthly existences that I have built for myself a material body, in which my spirit has dwelt as in a temple; but I now know that this same body in which I have become Buddha will of a verity be the last.’ Speaking of that Nirvana, into which he would so soon enter, the Buddha said:—‘I already feel that the beams (“Balken”) are cracking and the supports giving way; that this physical body which has been raised up for the last time will soon be wholly and finally destroyed.’

Let us compare the above with the words of Christ, as recorded in the Gospel of St. John (ii. 19), when Jesus, intimating that He lived in a body which was external and apart, said:—‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ Here we have an exactly opposite point of view, which might be interpreted thus:—‘I will perform a deed which shall quicken and make fruitful, all that in this world is of God, and has come down to man from primeval times, and entered into his being.’ These words imply that the Christian, during his recurrent earth lives must exercise his every faculty, in order to give truth to the affirmation:—‘Yet not I, but Christ Iiveth in me.’ We must, however, clearly understand that Christ’s reference to the rebuilding of the temple has an eternal significance and means that the Christ-power ever enters into, and is absorbed by, all who truly realize that they themselves must play a constructive part in the collective evolution of humanity. It is entirely wrong to speak of that event which gave rise to what we term the Christ-impulse, as though we anticipated its recurrence in some form during the further development of mankind.

The Buddhist, when he ponders in accordance with the true concepts of his creed, pictures the advent of several Buddhas, appearing one after another throughout recurring Buddha-epochs, all of which during the course of their earth lives had a similar character and significance. The Christian looks back to a single past event which is described as—The Fall of Man through Sin—while he points to its converse in the Mystery of Golgotha. He who believes that the Christ-event will at some later period be repeated, merely shows that he has not grasped the true essence of the historical evolution of mankind. History tells us that this idea has been frequently put forward in the past and it is likely that it will again reappear in the future.

The course of true history must always be dependent upon some single basic event. Just as the arm of a balance must have one point of equilibrium and the beam from which the scales hang one point of support only; so in the case of a true record of the evolution of mankind there must be some single circumstance to which its historical development (taken either backwards or forwards) ever points. It is as absurd to speak of a repetition of the Christ-event as it would be to assert that the beam of a balance could be supported and swing upon two points. That Eastern wisdom should hold to the belief that a number of similar spiritual personalities succeed each other at intervals, as it does in the case of the Buddhas, is characteristic of the difference existing between the Oriental cosmic conception and that which has sprung up among the Occidental countries, as the result of so much painstaking observation and thought concerning the course of evolution. The Western concept first began to take definite form at the time of the manifestation of the Christ-impulse, which we must regard as a unique circumstance. If we oppose the oneness and singular character of the Christ-event, we argue against the possibility of the true historical evolution of mankind; and to argue against historical evolution betrays a misunderstanding of genuine history.

We can, in its deepest sense, term that consciousness possessed by individual man of indissoluble association with humanity as a whole, the Christian consciousness. Through it we become aware of a definite purpose, underlying the course of all human evolution, and realize that here indeed can be no mere repetition. Such consciousness is an attribute of Christianity, from which it cannot be separated. The real progress which mankind has made during its period of development is shown in the advance from the ancient Eastern cosmic conception to the philosophic concept of modern times—from the unhistoric to the historic—from a belief that the wheels of human chance roll on through a succession of similar events to a conviction that underlying the whole of man’s evolution is a definite purpose, a design of profound significance.

We realize that it is Christianity which has first revealed the true meaning of the doctrine of reincarnation. We can now state that the reason why man must experience recurrent earth lives is that he may be again and again instilled with the true import of material existence; with this object he is confronted with a different aspect of being during each of his incarnations. There is throughout humanity an upward tendency that is not merely confined to the isolated individual, but extends to the entire human race with which we feel ourselves so intimately connected. The Christ-impulse, the centre of all, causes us to realize that man can become conscious of the glory of this divine relation; then no more will he only acknowledge the creed of a Buddha, who cries out to him:—‘Free thyself!’—but will become aware of his union with The Christ, Whose deed has reclaimed him from the consequences of that decadence, symbolically represented as:—‘The Fall of Man through Sin.’

We cannot describe Buddhism better than by showing that it is the after-glow of a cosmic conception, the sun of which has nearly set; but with the advent of Gautama it shone forth with one last brilliant, powerful ray. We revere the Buddha none the less, we honour him as a Great Spirit—as one whose voice called into the past and brought back into this earthly life, once again that mood which brings with it so clear a consciousness of man’s connection with ancient primordial wisdom. On the other hand, we know that the Christ-impulse points resolutely towards the future, ever penetrating more and more deeply into the very soul of man; so that humanity may realize that it is not release and freedom that it should seek, but Resurrection that glorious transfiguration of our earthly being. It is in such a metamorphosis that we find the inner meaning of our material life. It is futile to search among dogmas, concepts and ideas for the active principle of existence; for the vital element of life lies in our impulses, emotions and feelings, and it is through these moods that we may apprehend the true significance of man’s evolution and development.

There may be some who feel themselves more drawn toward Buddhism than toward Christianity; and we must admit that even in our time there is something about Buddhism which inspires a certain sympathy in many minds, and which is to a certain extent in the nature of a Buddha-mood or disposition. Such a feeling, however, did not exist with Goethe, who sought to free himself from the pangs which he endured owing to the narrow-mindedness he found everywhere about him, at the time of his first sojourn in Weimar. His endeavour in this respect was wholly due to his love of life and conviction that interwoven throughout all external being is the same spiritual essence which is the true origin of the Divine element in man. Goethe strove to achieve this Iiberation from distress through observation of the outer world, going from plant to plant, from mineral to mineral, and from one work of art to another—ever seeking that underlying spirit from which the human soul emanates; the while he sought to unify himself with that Divine essence which manifests throughout all external things.

Goethe, when in converse with Schopenhauer regarding the influence of his thoughts and ideas upon his pupil, once said:—‘When your carefully considered and worthy conceptions come into contact with a wholly different trend of thought, they will be found at variance with one another.’ Schopenhauer had established a maxim which, expressed in his oft-repeated words, was as follows:—‘Life is ever precarious, and it is through deep meditation that I seek to alleviate its burdens.’ What he really sought was that illumination which would reveal and make clear the true origin [and intent] of existence. It was therefore only natural that Buddhist concepts should enter his mind and mingle with his ideas, thus causing him to ponder upon this olden creed.

During the progress of the nineteenth century the different branches of human culture have yielded such great and far-reaching results, that the mind of man seems incapable of adjusting itself in harmony with the flood of new ideas which continually pour in upon it, as a consequence of effort expended in scientific research; and it feels ever more and more helpless before the enormous mass of facts which is the unceasing product of such investigations. We have found this vast world of accepted truths to be wonderfully in accord with the concepts of Spiritual Science, but it is worthy of note that during the last century, although man’s reasoning powers increased greatly nevertheless they soon failed to keep pace with the immense inflow of scientific data. Thus it was that just toward the close of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, man realized that he could not hope to understand and to master all this new knowledge by means of the human intellect alone; for everything about us is connected with, and extends into the cosmos and the world of spirit—and this outer realm is still beyond the limits of man’s normal faculties of comprehension. He must, therefore, seek another way, some as yet untrodden path.

Hence it is that mankind has sought a cosmic philosophy, not wholly at variance with all those facts coming from the outer world which make inward appeal to the soul. Spiritual Science is based upon the most profound conceptions and experiences of divine wisdom, and is ever ready to deal with all fresh truths and data brought forward by external science, to assimilate them, and throw new light upon their significance, showing at the same time that in all which has actuality in external life, is embodied the divine essence—the spirit. There are some people, however, who find the concepts of Spiritual Science inconvenient and unsuitable. They turn away from the world of reality, which demands so much thought and effort for its unfoldment, and, according to their own knowledge and personal ideas, seek a higher plane merely through the development of their individual souls. Thus we have what may be termed an ‘Unconscious Buddhism’, which has long existed and been active in the philosophies of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. When an ‘Unconscious Buddhist’ comes into contact with true Buddhism then, because of indolence and inertia, he feels himself more ‘at home’ with this Eastern creed than with European Spiritual Science, which comes to grips with widespread facts, because it knows that throughout the entire range of reality the Divine spirit is ever manifest.

There is no doubt that the present sympathy and interest evinced with regard to Buddhism is due, in part, to feebleness of will and want of faith, faith, born of undeveloped spiritual knowledge. The whole essence of the Christian cosmic conception, which seems to have been in Goethe’s mind, demands that man shall not give way to his own weak spiritual understanding and talk of ‘the limitations of human knowledge’, but feel that there is within him a something which will carry him above all illusion and bring him to truth and reality, thus freeing him for evermore from terrestrial existence. A cosmic conception of this nature may call for much patient resignation, but such is of quite a different order to that which shrinks before the contemplation of the limits of human understanding. Resignation, in the Kantian sense, implies that mankind is altogether incapable of penetrating the deep secrets of the cosmos, and its chief feature lies in the special acknowledgment of the feebleness of man’s comprehension; but that of Goethe is of a different character, and is expressed in these words:—‘Thou hast not as yet come so far, that thou canst apprehend the Universe in all its glorious reality, but thou art capable of developing thyself.’ Resignation of this kind leads on to that stage of growth and progress when man will truly be in a position to call forth his Christ-nature from within his being; he yields, because he realizes that the highest point of his mundane development has not yet been attained. Such an attitude is noble and fully in accord with human understanding. It implies that we pass from life to life, with the consciousness of being, looking ever forward into the future in the knowledge that with regard to recurrent earthly existence all eternity is ours.

When we consider man’s evolution, we find ourselves confronted with two modern currents of thought, each leading to a different cosmic conception. One of which, due to Schopenhauer, pictures the world with all its misery and suffering, as of such nature that we can only realize and appreciate man’s true position when we gaze upon the works of the great artists. In these masterpieces we oft-times find portrayed the form and figure of a being, who through asceticism, has attained to something approaching to liberation from earthly existence, and already hovers, as it were, above this lower terrestrial life. Fundamentally, Schopenhauer was of opinion that in the case of a human being thus freed, retrospection concerning material conditions no longer exists and that herein lies the pre-eminent characteristic of such liberation. Hence, he who has thus won his way to freedom, can truly say:—‘I am still clothed in my bodily garment, but it has now lost all significance, and there is nought left about me which might in time to come recall my earthly life. I strive ever upward, in anticipation of that state with which I shall gain contact when I have at last wholly overcome the world, and all that appertains thereto.’ Of such nature was the sentiment of Schopenhauer, after he had become imbued with those ideas and convictions, which Buddhist teaching has spread abroad in the world.

Goethe, on the other hand, led on by his truly Christian impulse, regarded the world after the manner of his character—Faust. When we cease to look about us in trivial mood, when we truly realize that all material works must perish, and death at last overtake the body, then with Goethe we can say:—‘If we but take heed and ponder concerning our earthly activities there will come knowledge born of experience, teaching us that while all those things wrought and accomplished which are of this world must pass away, that which we have built up within ourselves through toil and striving during our contact with the ‘School of Earthly Life’, shall not perish, for such is indeed everlasting.’

So with Faust we think not of how our mundane works may endure, but look forward to the fruits which they shall bring forth in the course of the soul’s eternal life; thus are we carried far out and beyond the narrow confines of the Buddhist creed, into a world of thought which finds brief expression in those impressive words of Goethe:-

‘Eons cannot erase
The traces of my days on earth.’

Notes for this lecture:

1. Bodhisattva (Sanskrit). A Bodisat, one whose essence is enlightenment, that is, one destined to become a Buddha. A Buddha Elect (vide, A Concise Dictionary of Eastern Religion, by Winternitz).

2. Bodhi Tree—Fig-tree (Ficus religiosa); known also as the Bo Tree. [Ed.]

The theme of this lecture has been taken from the impulses arising in the times through which we are passing. Now that so many nations are fighting, we seem to be called upon to turn our inner vision upon such living forces and realities as are found among the nations. And in so far as it is possible to mention these forces and realities, these “folk-souls,” they shall be the subject of our talk to-night.

It is already hard enough nowadays to speak (as we intend to do) of the individual soul in a spiritual-scientific manner. It is no easy task in the face of the widespread materialism of our day to uphold the true inner and genuine existence of the individual soul; for this is nowadays doubted and denied on every hand. Materialistic thought, because of its determination to remain on the firm ground of natural science, often deems it its duty to reject the psycho-physical in its true meaning. And remote as is the conception of the life of the individual from this way of thinking, that which can be designated as “folk-soul” is still further removed from its grasp. For, says the naturalistic school, can the soul of a people be anything more than the manifestation of all its confluent individual souls, anything more than which binds together a given community of men and women while having no real existence except in separate human individuals? In the first lecture which I delivered this winter¹ I pointed out that the great events of our times, the sacrifice of so many lives obliged us to turn our eyes to the “folk-souls” as to something real. Whether he is fully conscious of it or not, the man who sacrifices himself in obedience to the destiny of the day, does believe the sacrifice which he makes to the folk-soul to be made to something real, something true, something that lives and has an inner being of its own. Even our modern philosophers, who are so averse to the spiritual attitude, cannot, when they come to enquire more deeply into the relations of history and human life in communities; dispense with the idea of a group soul, cannot, that is to say, do without the idea of a “folk-soul.” Thus Wundt, the Leipzig philosopher, who is so highly esteemed, and who certainly cannot be accused of any inclination towards the spiritual-scientific view of things, cannot avoid seeing in the group spirit something real, something to which he attributes an organism and even a personality.

Facts like these make one realise that the man who concerns himself with philosophical matters must at least draw near to what Spiritual Science has to give, and that it is simply for lack of familiarity with Spiritual Science that people hold the spiritual life and spiritual reality to be mere appendages of external reality. Wundt sees in the language, customs and religious views, as lived by a whole people, a certain organism; he even says that this life expresses a certain personality. But ordinary philosophy has not yet achieved a genuinely spiritual-scientific approach to the problem. To do this it would have to start from the fundamental principles to which attention was drawn in yesterday’s lecture. {i.e., The Human Soul in Life and Death, Berlin, 26th November, 1914, already available on your website; in the first paragraph of the lecture on 26th (note 1) is also reference to this lecture.}

It was pointed out that there exists a method of developing the human soul by the quickening of its inner powers and by the conquest of its inner conflicts. In this way the human soul is prepared for the vision of the spiritual world and is raised to the experience which can he expressed by saying that in the spiritual world one feels oneself to be living as a thought in the mind of a higher being. Just as our own thoughts live in us, so through soul development can we feel ourselves to be living as the thought of spiritual beings of a higher order. And it was also pointed out that that which is comprised by the psycho-spiritual element in man, that which throughout ordinary sleep lives outside the human body, is clarified and illumined by this soul development. Man can then know himself to be in that state wherein he generally lives in unconsciousness from the moment he goes to sleep till the moment when he wakes; he knows himself to be living in his own spiritual mode of being, and therefore in his own higher existence, just as he ordinarily knows himself to be living in his physical mode of being in external nature. But we also showed why in his heavy sleep life, the soul of man cannot be illumined with the consciousness of his spiritual mode of being. From the moment he drops asleep to when he awakes, man is filled with the desire to sink back into his physical body. And this desire has the effect of clouding over and obscuring that which the soul would experience if, freed from the body in sleep, it were at rest in the heart of the spiritual world. For Spiritual Science has grasped the fact that the soul is an independent entity which knows itself to be free of the body, that this soul cannot know anything of the condition in which it enters the state of sleep every day, cannot know why in this state its consciousness is obscure and dim. But in learning to know the peculiar character of the body-free human soul the Spiritual Investigator also learns to know what it is to sink back into the body at the moment of awaking. And at this point we must state a very important tenet of Spiritual Science, a very important result of Spiritual Investigation.

The Spiritual Investigator experiences consciously this act of sinking down into the physical body. He contrives to experience consciously what in sleep is unconscious, and, in the same way, he experiences the manner in which the soul, sunk again into the body, lives in this body. And he knows that while the soul’s consciousness is clouded in the state of sleep, yet when it sinks down into the body and lives in the body, it is then more “awake” than it could be through its own powers. Just as in sleep, owing to the desire of which we spoke, the soul is duller and less clearly conscious than it could be by its own powers, so during the day is it more awake, brighter, more illumined than it could be through its own strength. By sinking down into the body, the soul can participate in that which it experiences in the body. But through this process of sinking down, the soul’s life becomes a more awakened one than it would be with the help of only such forces as it could itself bring to the task.

And thus is shown to the Spiritual Investigator the truth of the saying that whatever appears in the external world as purely “physical” is in reality permeated with the spiritual, that fundamentally the spiritual inhabits everything physical. As man enters the inner light of his soul, so does he sink down into his body and know that he is not only body, but soul and spirit throughout. And the psychic element which he apprehends as he sinks down into his body, is something that leads not only a personal, but a supra-personal spiritual life, something that eludes us in the state we traverse between falling asleep and awaking, but which we actually live through when we sink down into the body. In our body we come in contact, amongst many other spiritual entities, with what may be called the “folk soul.” This “folk-soul” animates our body through and through. With our body we are not given only corporeal materiality. No, with the body which we use as our instrument between birth and death, we are also given that which animates our body and which is not one and the same thing as our own “personal soul.” That which unites itself with our personal soul when we sink down into the body is the “folk-spirit,” the “folk-soul.” When we fall asleep we abandon, in a sense, the habitation of the folk-soul to which we belong. The Spiritual Investigator is not afraid of the charge of Dualism (which would contradict Monism) which is brought against him when he points out that man is dual, that every time he goes to sleep he falls apart from unity into duality. He fears this charge of dualism as little as does the chemist when he says of water that it consists of hydrogen and oxygen. In men, regarded as external physical forms, there exists not only the individual soul that goes from one life to another, re-embodying itself in successive lives on earth; no, in the physical forms we see walking about there lives yet another psychic element—the folk-souls, actual and conscious through and through. But consciousness permeates the folk-soul in a different manner from what it does in the case of the individual human soul; and in order to show how different in kind is this folk-soul, we wish to draw attention to the following considerations.

Faced with external reality man’s response is determined by his whole character, by the particular colouring of his soul life, and is expressed in one of two ways. Either he will give himself up at once, in the observation of things, to the objectivity of the external world, or else, feeling but little inclination to cast his eye towards the horizon of the external world, he will live in increasing familiarity with the ebb and tide of his own soul. We meet this contrast in Goethe and Schiller. Goethe’s thought, which has rightly been named “concrete,” lights upon things and spreads itself over them. It lives in suchwise that Goethe shares the life of things and at the same time breathes in their spirit like a draught of spiritual air. Schiller’s gaze did not rest so much on the things around him, but was turned inwards on to his own soul with its secret pulsations, its own incessant rise and fall. Now, what lives in history as folk-soul is so constituted that the external world is not presented to it as it is to the individual human soul. As the objects around us in nature are present to us, so are we ourselves present to the folk-soul. Our souls, which re-enter our bodies when we awake from sleep, are at the same time “objects of observation” for the folk-souls that enter into us, just as the things in nature are our objects of observation. When we sink down into the body, I will not say that we are “seen” by the folk-soul, but its strength and activity pulsate as though voluntarily through our being. The folk-soul is focussed upon us.

But a distinction now arises, for the folk-soul may be directed more towards what enters the body than towards what enters the individual soul of man. The distinction was made clear by the example of Goethe in the case of the individual human soul in relation to nature. In the same way, the will impulse of tle folk-soul may, as it were, seize upon the individual soul, may give itself up to the individual soul; or it may live more within itself, as was illustrated by the case of Schiller; it may withdraw into what it regards as its own possession and give itself up to that with the help of human corporeality. Thus we can recognise in the folk-soul a consciousness of personality for which our souls are, as it were, what nature is for us. Much more could be said about folk-souls and their special characteristics in relation to certain peculiarities of the human soul. But this much is clear. Just as individual human souls vary amongst themselves and in their relation to the world according as their gaze is fixed outwards or inwards, so will the folk-souls be related in different ways to the human souls comprised in their several peoples. And the manner in which the folk-souls are related to the individual souls of men is what determines the course of history, of what actually happens in the world. In this way are the folk-souls differentiated from one another, in this way do they live their invisible lives within what we call human history. I should like to try and tell you what Spiritual Research has to say about the nature of folk-souls—at least in connection with a few genuine and real folk-souls. Those of my listeners who have attended the lectures designed for a smaller circle of students, will know that this interpretation has not been called forth by the great events of the present time, but that I have always presented these ideas in the same way, as the outcome of Spiritual Investigation into the folk-souls. I have done this for many years, before the impulse of the present caused the minds of men to look more closely into the inner life of nations.

In considering the life of folk-souls as they have been lived in history, we could go a long way back in the evolution of humanity, as this evolution is revealed by Spiritual Research. But we shall only go back to that point in the history of mankind which is more or less fitted to throw light on the topics that interest us most to-day. We come upon the track of a special kind of folk-soul if we go back to the life of Ancient Egypt, which was related to Chaldean, Babylonian and Assyrian life and was the forerunner of the life of Greece and Rome in the evolution of mankind. Now the Spiritual Investigator speaks of actual folk-souls which fulfilled themselves in the life of Egypt, Chaldea, Assyria and Babylon just as the individual soul fulfils itself in the human body. When we say that folk-souls have an organism and a personality, we are not speaking symbolically. For just as in the individual human body a personal and self-conscious soul lives out its life, so (equally surely) does a self-conscious folk-soul, supernaturally apprehensible, live out its life in the manner we have described. Moreover, in preparing one’s soul in the manner I have frequently explained how one can sink down into the folk-soul.

The peculiar characteristic of the folk-souls that formed the foundation of life in Egypt, Chaldea, Babylon and Assyria was this: these souls led their own lives to a very full extent—an extent only distantly approached by the lives of the peoples of Asia and Africa to-day—so that they gave themselves up but little to the individual, separate souls of men. The individual soul of man, living its own bodily life identified itself with the folk-soul by a certain extinction of its own individuality. The folk-soul fulfilled itself far more completely in what men accomplished than in the individual lives of these men. And this is what gives the Egyptian and the Chaldean-Babylonian-Assyrian culture its peculiar character.

Spiritual Science shows that the folk-souls, being invisible, are related to the spiritual element pervading all material things. Because man has of late withdrawn into his own soul, nature has come to stand at the opposite pole, and to appear to him as something inanimate, bereft throughout of soul and spirit. When the Ancient Egyptian or the Ancient Chaldean looked out upon the world, he saw with a clarity of vision that could never be equalled in later periods, that the material was everywhere the expression of the spiritual—he saw this in the progress of the stars, in the movements of the heavenly bodies, in the movements reflected in cloud and sea, and in the formation of dry land out of the watery element. just as one human being looking at another sees the movements and changes in the face before him as the expression of its possessor’s soul, so did the Egyptian or the Chaldean who was united with his folk-soul in the manner we have described, perceive what is nowadays called the “astrological” aspect of the world as the outcome of the fact that all outer, all material things do but reveal the physiognomy of what lies behind them and speak but of the spirit within. Thus heaven and earth became endowed with soul; or rather, since the folk-soul still found utterance in him, man saw in all the gestures of nature, in all her outer physiognomy a spiritual element at work.

After this, the inner progress of mankind consisted precisely in the fact that in the course of time the activity of the Egyptian and Chaldean folk-soul was replaced by that of the Greek and Roman folk-souls. The Greek and the Roman folk-souls are distinguished from the Egyptian and the Chaldean in that they are less absorbed in themselves and give themselves up lovingly to human individuality. Thus in Greek culture we see the first glimmerings of what may be called the valuation of the human individual, even if this individual sinks down into the bosom of the folk-soul; and as a result of this peculiar relation of the individual soul to the folk-soul we can point to the great things achieved by the Greek folk-soul in art, and poetry and philosophy. In order to make my views fully comprehensible I must now introduce a short survey of what can be said about the individual human soul.

Spiritual Science is hardly likely to regard this human soul with such primitive simplicity as is done by ordinary science. The Spiritual Investigator does indeed regard the human soul as a living unity that fulfils itself in the life of the Ego. But just as light passing through a prism breaks up, as it were, into different colours, from red and gold through green into blue and violet, so with equal truth can it be said that through contact with the outer world which is, as it were, the prism of the soul, man’s unified psychic life is divided into its three most important manifestations. In Spiritual Science these are designated as the “Sentient Soul,” the “Rational Soul”² and the “Consciousness Soul.”³ It is easy—a child can see how easy—for those who believe themselves to be safely entrenched in a genuinely scientific system to mock at such a “dismembering” [Gliederung] of the human soul. But just as it is impossible to acquire any knowledge of light without observing it in relation to the matter of the prism and seeing it broken up into the band of the rainbow of colours, so is it impossible to know the individual soul if we do not see its light broken up into separate rays by contact with the external world; into the ray of the Sentient Soul, the ray of the Rational Soul, and the ray of the Consciousness Soul. If we consider the Sentient Soul then we shall realise that the soul develops as Sentient Soul when it lives primarily within itself, when its own psychic forces, even when they reside in the body, strive, as it were, to break loose from the external world. Just as the light that has been decomposed by the prism is at its strongest in the yellow-red part of the spectrum, so does the soul live most intensely in the Sentient Soul. The Consciousness Soul, on the other hand, resembles that part of the light that is weakest, that is most like darkness—the blue-violet portion of the spectral band. The Consciousness Soul fulfils itself primarily in experiences where there is an effort to break loose from the inner life of the soul, where the body and the forces of the body play the outstanding part. The Sentient Soul, which embodies the actual life of the psyche, with its impulses, its instincts, and its passions, is thus quite untouched by the Consciousness Soul, whose sovereignty holds only within its subjection to the body. But between these two there lives the Rational or Mind Soul, which stands to the total life of the psyche in much the same relation as does the green in the spectrum to the red-yellow portion on one side of it and to the blue-violet on the other. Just as the physicist cannot know the nature of light without learning how it can be analysed into its separate colours, so the Spiritual Investigator cannot come to any knowledge of the human soul without first analysing it into the separate prismatic rays of the Sentient, the Rational and the Consciousness Souls.

This breaking-up of the psychic life into the separate rays does not occur everywhere in the same way. It must be remembered that man does not pass from one life to another in the same way all the world over. As we have often said, the souls that have appeared in our days have in their earlier lives known, say, the period of Egypt, Chaldea and Babylon, the period of Greece and Rome, and have thus had occasion to live through the various early civilisations. But even within the historical sequence, the human soul does not everywhere fulfil itself in the same way. On the contrary, how a soul fulfils itself depends upon how (when it sinks down into the body) it responds to the claims made upon it by the folk-soul. Such a folk-soul as was present, for instance, in Ancient Egypt or Chaldea is particularly favourable to the development of the Sentient Soul in man, and in point of fact we find the most powerful assertion of the Sentient Soul in the individual lives of the Ancient Egyptian and of the Ancient Chaldean and Babylonian period. These folk-souls preserved themselves and prepared the body of the individual in such a way that they permeated this body with their own mode of being. Owing, therefore, to the racial constitution of their bodies, these peoples could fulfil their souls in accordance with the particular colouring of the Sentient Soul. We see that the most powerful and intensive fulfilment of human individuality occurred in the Sentient Soul under the influence of the Egypto-Chaldean folk-soul.

If, now, we follow the path of historical development that leads to the Greek and then to the Roman civilisation (resembling each other in a way, though Roman law as something that is not dependent upon separate isolated individuals, but is brought about by the folk-soul living itself into the bodies of Greek and Roman citizens. We have thus in historical time three successive spheres of development, sharply divided from one another by the folk-souls whose province they are. First, the work of the Egypto-Chaldean folk-soul which gave the souls of men (which at this time were once again appearing clothed in bodies) special opportunities for developing their Sentient Souls. Then in the life of Greece and Rome, the folk-souls were so fashioned that men were able to fulfil their Rational or Mind Soul. And to-day we live in a period (Spiritual Investigation places its beginnings between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries) in which human development has the opportunity of fulfilling itself primarily in the Consciousness Soul. This fulfilment is particularly favoured by the folk-souls of the present day. Our own time must naturally be of special interest to us, and in general it would seem that our particular period had as its task the education of the Consciousness Soul. In other words, the folk-souls set themselves the task of so permeating the bodies of men and women that the soul is enabled to bind to its own service the body in which it lives. Our period is therefore one which lends itself to the development of external science, of external observation. And because in this period of the education of the Consciousness Soul, the bond uniting soul to body is stronger than it has ever been before, there has arisen in our times the urge to observe that external reality with which the body is so closely connected through the senses. The urge arose to promote scientific and cultural tendencies which should aim primarily at the co-operation of body and soul. A Spiritual Investigator can see as a legitimate outcome of the times this growth and development of the Consciousness Soul—the rise of materialism, the tendency to look more and more from the body to the things and facts of the senses. But here again the prevailing colour in the life of the modern world admits, as it were, of different “shades.” The shades are represented by the lives of the various folk-souls of modern times. And it is interesting, from the point of view of Spiritual Science, to bring some at least of these folk-souls before our mind’s eye for examination.

To take, as an example, the folk-souls of Southern peoples—the Italian and the Spanish folk-soul. When the Spiritual Investigator tries to sink himself into the essence of the Italian or the Spanish folk-soul, into these very real and living modes of being, he finds himself compelled to take account of a certain law of world-evolution, hardly known to ordinary science and held by it of little account. We referred to this law yesterday from another point of view. We said: When man has passed through the gates of death, when, therefore, he has entered the supra-sensible world and lives again in higher beings, he stands (with regard to what he has experienced in the body) in the same relation to those mighty super-beings as he stood on earth towards his memories. He looks back on his bodily state, and that gives him “consciousness of self,” just as the act of sinking into the physical body at the moment of waking gives consciousness of self. Thus when we are raised into the spiritual world we find a similar relation holding in the “progression of time,” as obtained in the world of space between soul and body. Through our body we are bound to space; our souls, however, enter a relationship that is temporal. When we have become spirit, when we have passed through the gates of death, we live with our memories, and this life we share with our memories in the spiritual world is like the life shared by body and soul in the physical world. This brings us to the law of periodicity in the spiritual world. What we go through when we raise ourselves to the spiritual world is law for the worlds of the spirit. The spiritual beings do not only experience the rhythmic alternation that we know as we pass from sleep to the waking state, but they go through a number of different states of consciousness in accordance with the periodicity of the times. Only when one has learnt adequately to reflect upon this law can one hope to understand the sway exercised by the folk-souls. Let the Spiritual Investigator study, for example, the Italian folk-soul (and the same thing applies to the Spanish), he will find in it something that consciously looks back to the Ancient Egyptian and Chaldean times. Man keeps his Self-consciousness kindled in his physical existence by the process of sinking down into the body; he preserves this Self-consciousness after death by looking back at his experiences on earth; and in the same way there is a sort of interchange between the folk-soul element that rises to the surface in the Italian people and the ,,Egypto-Chaldean folk-spirit. The Italian folk-spirit looks back on the experiences it had as the Egypto-Chaldean folk-spirit; it sinks down into the Egypto-Chaldean folk-spirit as we sink down into the body on awakening when we retain our consciousness of self. The law of periodicity, rhythmically graded, determines the sequence that extends from the folk-spirit’s activities in Egypto-Chaldean life, through its fulfilment in Italian civilisation, right down to the present times. And the results reached in this way by Spiritual Science from rhe data of Spiritual Investigation can be verified down to the smallest detail if we look at the way the folk-spirit, in which every separate human soul is embedded, fulfils itself.

But time has moved on. The folk-spirit has not retained all the characteristics it acquired in the life of Ancient Egypt and Chaldea. In the course of its development the soul, as we have already had occasion to point out, withdraws into itself. Nature therefore no longer appears to it as she did in the Egypto-Chaldean times, animated throughout with spirit. What the human soul experienced under the influence of the folk-soul in the civilisations of Ancient Egypt and Chaldea is experienced by the Italian folk-soul, only more inwardly in a renewed form of the same folk-spirit. And how can we realise this more clearly than by looking at one of the greatest creations of the Italian spirit ? May we not surmise that a creation such as is evinced by the Egyptian conception of the stars appears before us again in Italian culture, but in a deeper way, more interiorised, more self-contained? Spiritual Science obliges us to expect such a repetition, and the expectation is realised in Dante’s Divine Comedy. The Egyptian saw the whole world as animated with spirit. Dante recreates this conception but in an intenser, more inward form. The ancient folk-spirit lives again and remembers earlier times. In the co-operation of psychic beings in the Egypto-Chaldean and in the Italian folk-souls we can see the super-personal consciousness of the folk-soul at work. The Italian folk-soul is living again a kind of rhythmical recurrence of the Ancient Egyptian folk-spirit. And this living again, even in its more interiorised form, is particularly favourable to the development of the Sentient Soul in the separate human individual living at the heart of the folk-soul. Just as in the time of Egypt and Chaldea the Sentient Soul was given special opportunities for development by the folk-soul, so in modern Italy does the soul live anew as Sentient Soul in the Italian folk-soul, but in a deeper key, coloured as it were with a different shade. Thus does the folk-soul live on, and in those individuals on to whom it is directed (as the human soul is directed on to nature) it calls forth all the forces of the Sentient Soul. We shall understand all the great artistic creations of Italy, rooted as these are in the Sentient Soul, when we have learnt how the folk-soul works in the bodies of Italian men and women. We shall be able to understand the work of Raphael and Michelangelo down to its smallest detail, in so far as it arises from the activity of the folk-soul, when we have learnt the particular shade of colouring which the individual soul will take on under the influence of the folk-soul. Italian culture, under the influence of the folk-soul is a “Culture of the Sentient Soul.”

The culture of every folk-soul has its own peculiar mission. Upon each devolves the task of expressing with special force and intensity some particular aspect of the life of the soul. This has nothing to do with the development of the individual soul. But the national quality which at certain times is realised in the individual soul reveals itself in such a way that it must bring about the intensification of a particular colour in the life of the soul.

In the same way—and I beg my hearers to listen impartially, as to a purely scientific exposition, to the analysis I am putting before them—in the same way as the Ancient Egypto-Chaldean folk-soul lived anew in the Italian folk-soul and stamped its creations as of yore with the character of the Sentient Soul, so does the ancient civilisation of Greece, coloured with that of Rome, live on in the folk-soul of France. But here the spirit of Greek civilisation is expressed in such a way that the individual soul living at the heart of the French folk-soul, is freer from the body, seeks to permeate the body less than was the case in Greece. And just as the Greek folk-soul was particularly favourable to the fulfilment of the Rational or Mind Soul, so in the recrudescence of Greek culture in the French folk-soul we find that special care is taken of the Rational Soul. The inner state of consciousness of the French folk-soul, moreover, rests upon a kind of “remembering” that looks back to the achievements of the Greek and Roman folk-soul. It is difficult but of infinite importance for the understanding of the true course of history to examine the peculiar structure of the mind and consciousness of the folk-soul. The Rational Soul is what is peculiar to the French folk-soul. In Greek civilisation the Rational Soul, though it had torn itself free from the body, could still express the outward beauty of the body, the spiritual quality of what appears to us as corporeal. But as it became intensified and interiorised in French culture, the folk-soul took on another form. The national spirit is no longer translated straight into bodily form in space, as in the Greek statue; it fulfils itself in an “etherised” body that remains a thought-body and can only be “inwardly conceived” [vorgestellt]. This is at the foundation of the whole French character, of the French folk-soul. It absorbs the individual human souls into itself in such a way that these feel compelled so to develop their inner forces that they can imagine them strongly in the outer world. Now, how does one imagine oneself powerfully into the outer world? If the folk-spirit can no longer, as it could in Ancient Greece, realise plastically the spirit that animates the body, then all we have is the mere picture of this spirit in the body, as it has been shaped in man’s conception by his phantasy. And this is why the French folk-soul can only create an inner picture of man and why it tends to set most value on what one projects of oneself into the world, on what one imagines one wants to be in the world, on what is always called “la gloire,” on what one carries in one’s own phantasy.

This is the fundamental characteristic of French culture as it arises from its own folk-soul. And this is why it devolves upon French culture to impose upon the world this conception which the folk-soul has called forth in the phantasy of the individual French mii1. The Rational or Mind or Mood Soul [Gemütseele] works in pictures which it creates for itself in separate individualities. We may therefore surmise that the degree of greatness which the individual soul can achieve under the influence of the folk-soul will be manifested on the occasions when the folk-soul reaches an exceptional degree of development in the Rational Soul [Gemütseele]. The folk-soul comes most fully to life in the creations of those individual minds (its instruments) where feeling animated with understanding enquires searchingly into the appearances presented by the world. Feeling [Gemüt] animated by understanding tends in a peculiar way to work itself free and to command freely. This shows particularly in cases where complete control can be exercised over understanding and feeling; and French civilisation reaches its peak when this particular circumstance occurs—as in Moliere and Voltaire. In Voltaire we have dry understanding permeated with feeling, in Moliere, feeling that rests on understanding. A folk-soul exhibits its characteristic features in those of its utterances which correspond to it so closely that they can also supply the material in which the individual soul will express itself in its own particular colour. French culture is, then, something in the nature of a reminiscence of the Greek, as can be further ascertained by anyone who cares to study with a certain degree of penetration the inner history and development of French culture.

If we consider the French poets as giving individual colouring to the French folk-soul, we shall always find in this folk-soul (not in the individual Frenchman) a harking back to the civilisation of Greece. It finds expression in the deeds and thoughts and poems of individual Frenchmen. It appears in their question: How did the Greeks set about to write a proper tragedy? What did Aristotle say about it? Hence the discussions on the Unities of Time and Place in the Drama. This reacted even on Lessing. Drama was to be made to correspond to the Greek ideal. Moreover, the findings of Spiritual Science in this matter can be illustrated down to their smallest detail. A Greek spoke of himself as a Greek in the conscious conviction of being the represe1itative of mankind. All other nations were “Barbarians.” He had a special justification for this opinion because he expressed in an idealised way the promptings of the spirit. His attitude lives on and comes to the surface in the harking back of the French folk-soul. But because here it is a “remembering,” and because not every remembering is justified (there emerge many memories that are no longer fully justified) this claim of the French folk-soul to be the sole representative of humanity is now out of place. The very word “Barbarian” which is on everyone’s lips points to the recrudescence of this particular feature of Greek culture in the French folk-soul.

Now, just as French soul is particularly favourable to the culture of the Rational or Mind or Mood Soul [Gemütseele], so it is to the British folk-soul that there falls in modern times the task of cultivating the Consciousness Soul or Spirit Soul as such. The education of the Consciousness Soul appears in the history of mankind’s development as something that does not admit of repetition. The Italian folk-soul repeats in an altered form the life and experience of the Egypto-Chaldean folk-spirit, the French folk-soul those of the Graeco-Roman. But the British folk-soul enters the scene of modern evolution as something new. It is the most vivid expression of modern times in so far as these mark that phase of the soul in which it thoroughly permeates itself with the life of the body. The British folk-spirit is so constituted that it favours more than anything else a mode of co-existence with the body. It is therefore favourable also to what is effected through the body and especially what enters the soul through the body. Its mission is to care for the Consciousness Soul, and connected with this is the mission of materialism, which had at a certain point in history to enter into the development of mankind. It is, indeed, the special task of the British folk-soul to give expression to materialism. The individual soul is more or less independent of this, but it remains the characteristic of the folk-soul. We shall return in a moment to the peculiar character of the British folk-soul. But first, in order to throw light on the tasks belonging to the folk-souls, we must cast a glance on the folk-soul that dominates Central Europe and which is called the German folk-soul. And it may be useful to point out that these views of mine are not being brought forward now for the first time as the outcome, so it might seem, of the warlike events of the moment. No—what I say now is only what I have always said.

The German folk-soul is not especially fitted to call forth the particular shades of character of the Sentient Soul, nor of the Rational or Gemütseele, nor again of the Consciousness Soul. It is fitted, on the contrary, to give expression to the unity of the soul which may be said to live in all its three members. I am saying this, not in praise of any particular nation, but I say it in all objectivity, without love or hate, because it is the result of Spiritual Investigation, just as the appearance of light as red or green is the result of an experiment with the spectroscope. It is an objective fact. Just as the Italian, French and British folk-souls encourage the Sentient, the Rational and the Consciousness Souls respectively, so does the German folk-soul nurture man’s Ego, the individual seed within his soul that fulfils itself in his earthly life, the element that sinks lovingly into the body, with which it unites itself at the moment of waking up, but from which it detaches itself again on falling asleep; that which seeks to care for and befriend the manifestations that come to it from the external world but seeks also to befriend and care for everything that aspires to the Spirit. This is why I could say in my first lecture: The German folk-soul is that which more than anything else gives to the individual soul the possibility of sinking down into the depths of the Ego, where the secret is to be sought of what moves men’s hearts to anguish or to bliss. Here lies the reason why this German folk-soul can so easily be misunderstood, why, as is only too natural, this misunderstanding of what the German folk-soul really is is now being manifested on every side. For the German folk-soul, unlike the British folk-soul, does not fulfil itself in the external body, does not surrender itself immediately to the mission of materialism, because such a task does not in the least correspond with its nature. But it embarks on the one hand upon the contemplation of the external world of matter, from which it does not seek to withdraw itself, and on the other, gives itself up to the contemplation of the Spirit. And this it does in order to draw upon those deep spiritual sources upon which Meister Eckhardt, Jacob Boehme, Goethe and Fichte drew, communing alone as in a sort of duologue with the spiritual world, and turned aside from outer things. Thus if individual souls of other nations have to turn aside from the folk-souls in which they are embedded in order to sink down into what we call Spirit, the German, through the very nature of his folk-soul is always capable of being raised to spiritual regions. The souls of the other peoples must learn to grow out of their folk-souls before they can commune with the spiritual world. But the folk-soul that speaks to the individual souls of the Central European people, itself sounds a spiritual note, is itself a witness to the Spirit. And because folk-souls express themselves in characteristic features, because they appear to us when they work through men and women, using these as the instruments they select in order to create something characteristic of them, this gives us an opportunity for studying the essence of what a folk-soul really is. We shall find our results confirmed in this study when, on pursuing the progress of the various folk-souls, we discover what are the characteristic symptoms in which their forces come to be expressed. And these characteristic features can certainly best be studied by considering the individual folk-souls at their highest points of achievement.

Now there can be no doubt that Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” is to be regarded as a characteristic expression of the British folk-soul, and one of its mightiest manifestations, and that in the case of the German folk-soul we must look upon Goethe’s “Faust” as the outcome of the most intimate communion of a German with the German folk-spirit. How characteristic is the difference between “Hamlet” and “Faust.” I need hardly enlarge upon the greatness of Shakespeare and of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.” It will be granted by everyone, and there is no one who would rank Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” higher than I would. But in considering “Hamlet” as the outcome of the British folk-spirit, I would like to ask: What impression does “Hamlet” make on us?

As we have said, it is the mission of the British folk-spirit to introduce the Consciousness Soul, which is bond to the corporeal, into the outer development of historical events. My book, Rätsel der Philosophie (The Riddles of Philosophy) has recently been published as the second edition of my Welt -und Lebensanschauungen im Neunzehnten Jahrhundert (World and Life Conceptions in the Nineteenth Century), which appeared fourteen or fifteen years ago. It is now considerably enlarged and deals with the whole of Western philosophy. At the time of the first edition, in dealing with English philosophy, I tried to find an expression, a word that would be particularly well suited to render its character and the expression that occurred to me was that English Philosophy was the philosophy of an onlooker. An onlooker—and this can be shown particularly well in the work of John Stuart Mill—is one who sinks down into the body with his soul, and seeing the world from the body, lets the world go its own way. Compare with this the philosophy of Fichte. His was no “onlooker’s philosophy” but a “life philosophy,” one that does not “look on” at life but becomes one with it. This is the stupendous difference between the British and the German folk-souls. The British folk-soul tends in all its activities to turn man into an onlooker; it particularly encourages his powers of “looking on” by educating his Consciousness Soul. And in so far as he has cultivated the Consciousness Soul, man stands outside phenomena. He looks at them as it were from the body. Now Shakespeare’s greatness consists particularly in his capacity for standing at a distance and watching life objectively. His attitude to the phenomena of life and his descriptions of them show us that he paints things as an onlooker and describes what he experiences objectively from outside. An “onlooker’s world-concept” the outcome of the folk-soul . . . The truth is that when the individual human spirit, this spirit of the Consciousness Soul, armed with this peculiar characteristic which he gets from the folk-soul, when this individual spirit approaches the inner life of man, then he will see nothing but the play of externals—the inner side will always elude him. And this inability to reach the inner life must be particularly characteristic. In the pictures he draws of life’s external happenings, Shakespeare is a giant. But when it comes to perceiving the inner life through the external physiognomy then the “onlooker’s point of view” makes itself felt. And this onlooker’s point of view (expressed from the artistic greatness of the British folk-spirit) when it is faced with the inner world, shows itself to be that of the sceptic who doubts the very existence of the Spirit. We therefore intend no deprecation of Shakespeare when we say that he presents the Spirit as a ghost, a spook. Externally the spiritual appears as something ghostly. How does the spirit of Hamlet’s father appear? Not as a spirit but as a ghost. The man who believes in ghosts is in fact a spiritual materialist. He wants to perceive the spirit as a materialist would do, who asks that it should appear in some sort of rarefied matter. The spirit of Hamlet’s father appears, therefore, in ghost-like form. This is expressed in the confusion existing with regard to the way in which the spirit appears. As the materialistic mind can only get as far as a ghost, we see its whole teaching concerning the spiritual becoming confused. For example, whereas in the earlier part of the play everyone has seen the ghost, in the scene with his mother Hamlet is the only one to see it. At one moment it is an objective phenomena, at the next merely a subjective phantom. And now this great onlooker (for Hamlet is meant to be a character who looks on at the outer doings of the world), this great onlooker turns his gaze to the world within, and we get the famous speech in which he questions the spiritual world: To be or not to be? What follows after death? First awaking, then sleep, images, dreams; and then again doubt—“the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns.” All of it typical of the materialistic mind that tries to probe into the depths of the spiritual world and fails. This is why all those who, whether idealistically inclined or otherwise, cannot venture into the spirit, feel an inner kinship with Hamlet. Herman Grimm once said—and, for many, said truly—that when people probe too deeply into questions concerning their spiritual state, they stand as it were on the edge of an abyss and feel, like Hamlet, that they must throw themselves into it. Such, then, is the answer given us by one who, like Shakespeare, inspired by the folk-soul and yet transcending it, sets forth its spiritual essence. This answer shows us the bridge between Hamlet and the spiritual world to be broken and the gulf between filled only with uncertainty heaped upon uncertainty. Thus, even in this great artistic creation which of its kind remains unsurpassed and unsurpassable, the British folk-soul still reveals its own mission which is to contemplate the outer world and to be brought to a standstill before the abyss of the supernatural.

And now, to show by the description of a single figure how deep is the inwardness of the German folk-soul, so favourable to the life of the Ego and the unity of the soul, let us consider its most outstanding, its most profound manifestation in Goethe’s “Faust.” Does the soul stand here on the edge of an abyss into which it is impelled to cast itself? Far from it. Faust has no doubts about the spiritual world, his vision pierces beyond the material and historical facts that have gone to make up his life, and he stands face to face with the Spirit, he sees the Spirit before him, and he knows beyond the shadow of a doubt that he who probes deeply into the riddle of existence cannot be lost but will surely cross the abyss and be united with the Spirit.

And now let us turn to Hamlet again. He stands irresolute before the abyss with the question “To be or not to be” on his lips, asking of the spiritual world “to sleep, to dream?” And let us compare all this hesitation and uncertainty with the scene in the poem [First Part], where Faust stands face to face with the Spirit (Faust, Scene XIV):—

“Spirit sublime, thou gav’st me, gav’st me all
I ever asked thee. Not in vain didst thou
In flaming fire reveal thy countenance”
and further on
“Then to the cave secure thou leadest me,
Then show’st me mine own self, and in my breast
The deep, mysterious miracles unfold.”

This is union with the Spirit. In such union, in such vision the question whether we sleep, or dream, has no place. There is room only for Faust’s inspired advance into the spiritual world (as we find it described in the Second Part of the drama) and for the certainty which can be reached that the human spirit when it passes through the gates of death becomes united with the spiritual world. Here there is no longer any uncertain question about being or not being; there is the certainty that the soul is already in this world a citizen of the world of the Spirit, and that when it passes through the gates of death it stands face to face with the sublime Spirit who, if we but merge ourselves in it sufficiently during this life, will give us all we ask. But this Spirit is no ghostly apparition of the spirit world, for in the scene in the Witches’ kitchen spooks are treated with humour and with befitting irony. Mephistopheles, again, does not appear to Faust as a ghost, but is so conceived that one cannot imagine him otherwise than in human form. How meaningless it would be’ if, like Hamlet’s father, he were visible only to one person, or visible at one time and not at another. And the reason for this is that in “Faust” we are standing on solid ground.

Figures like Faust arise out of the folk-spirit, they are the fruit of the folk-soul. In Goethe’s Faust we have only a type and image of what has really taken place. For while Goethe was creating Faust, the whole of the folk-soul was active; it created itself in the book and created something that was alive, not only in Goethe, but in the spirit. Goethe’s Faust is but the copy of a creation of the German folk-soul, which moves in the spirit and which, as Goethe knew full well, is only at the beginning of its activity. Faust we know to be the symbol of an unconquerable force, of a reality that looks to the future. In Faust Goethe has planted a seed, and with equal truth it may be said that there is in the German folk-soul a power, a germinating force that will ever grow and ever spread in its activity. For Faust stands before us as one who must strive, and as one for whom all striving is only a beginning.

In order to bring out the characteristic feature of the German folk-spirit, we must mention another of its peculiarities. As I said, when we consider the French folk-spirit, we see that it is reminiscent of the culture of Ancient Greece. This reminiscence is visible in every department of French culture, but it works under the threshold of consciousness, it does not enter consciousness. The French folk-spirit shapes the individual in accordance with the influence exercised by this reminiscence, but this influence is not consciously felt. If the folk-spirit influences the individual soul in such a way as to bring out its ego-hood, then—since only in the Ego can Sentient, Rational and Consciousness Souls be united—the harmony of these united members of the soul will enter consciousness; whereas the essence of “reminiscence” is that it binds the folk-spirit to earlier cultural periods. Thus Greek culture enters into the German folk-spirit in quite a different manner from that in which it enters the French folk-soul. If Greek culture is introduced at a particularly characteristic point in the history of the German folk-soul and if in so doing it is to influence the isolated individual, then everything must happen consciously and not as it does in French culture, where the process is subliminal and only appears in the form of aesthetic debate. In the case of the German spirit, which is a mirror for the deeper events of history, the process must enter the consciousness of the man who allows himself to be specially guided by the folk-soul. Thus in the Second Part of “Faust” the union of Faust and Helena which takes place on the physical plane, in consciousness, quite clearly portrays the union with Greek culture. This is not merely entering into the Rational Soul, it is entering into the Ego. Faust stands, in all his completeness as a human being, face to face with Greek culture. In full consciousness of what he is doing, and in all solemnity he celebrates his union with an earlier period. I can naturally only give a few indications of what I mean. But light is thrown on the whole course of history when we consider the folk-souls in this way—dominating the destiny of man, beating, surging in endless interplay throughout the ages.

If now we set the German and the British folk-souls once again side by side, there is much we could point to showing that the Ego is what characterises the German folk-soul, while the Consciousness Soul is the special mark of the British folk-soul. Many of the peculiar features in the development of modern civilisation can be traced to this. It has been one of my tasks to show how Goethe gave birth (from the depths of his soul) to a Theory of Evolution in which he attempted from the depths of his Ego to reconstruct the whole sequence of organisms in their evolution from the simplest to the most perfected forms. This truly scientific theory, springing as it does from Goethe’s soul, is also the outcome of what one might call a “Communing between Goethe and the German folk-soul,” just as another theory is the outcome of a conversation with the British folk-soul. Goethe’s form of the Theory of Evolution, born as it is from the culture of the Ego, remains incomprehensible to many because Goethe delves so deeply into the nature of things in order to bring forth a Theory of Evolution out of the depths of the human soul. Such a theory could not spread rapidly. And then, in the nineteenth century, the British folk-soul seizes upon the Theory of Evolution; but while Goethe had started from the depths of the Ego, the British folk-soul starts from the Consciousness Soul and gives us the external “Struggle for existence” of the Darwinian theory. What Goethe established by means of inward development, Darwinism established outwardly. And as we live in the period of materialism, cultured humanity as a whole has neglected Goethe’s Theory of Evolution which comes from the depths of the Ego-culture, in favour of the form which Darwin has brought forth from the British folk-soul. Up to a certain point we still stand committed to this rejection of Ego-culture. I mean that theory which is scoffed at by all who believe themselves to be experts in this particular subject—I mean Goethe’s Theory of Colour which only those can understand who approach it from the standpoint of the human Ego-character. But humanity has rejected this theory of colour of Goethe’s (which comes from the depths of the Ego-culture) and has accepted Newton’s more materialistic colour theory inspired by the Consciousness Soul from out the British folk-spirit. But the time will come when men will learn to recognise that there is much in Goethe which they yet have to accept. And may I be allowed to say “in parenthesis”: Some of us may have succeeded in sending back to England our orders and marks of distinction; but true worth and dignity will not be achieved until, not only orders and distinctions, but also the materialistic form of the Theory of Evolution and the materialistic form of the Theory of Colour have been sent back to the British folk-soul whence they came.

The man whose thought is so inspired by the folk-soul that it is in the nature of a communing between the folk-soul and his own Ego, lives in such a way that in the most important moments of his life he is conscious of working for a content, of giving life to and realising a content in external life. Thus Goethe gave life to a content which had come to him in a moment of intuition when he founded his Theory of Evolution. But he who, ignoring the depths of his Ego, looks out onto the world from the Consciousness Soul, such an one will see nothing but the struggle for existence in the outward march of events. Every man sees his own inner nature in the external world. You can now all of you imagine what the events of to-day will mean for those who are inspired by the German folk-spirit, and what they will mean for those who are inspired by the British folk-spirit. The latter talks of the struggle for existence. Under the inspiration of the German folk-spirit, one sees in one’s opponent “the enemy,” whom one faces up to, man to man as in a duel. From the point of view of that folk-spirit which in science has inspired the Struggle for Existence, one sees the struggle in the field of battle in the following way: Everything becomes a struggle between “competing forces.”

In my first lecture, I tried in a few words to point to that which the Russian folk-soul stands for. There is no time to-day to enter more deeply into the subject, but a very peculiar characteristic of this folk-soul must be mentioned nevertheless. The curious thing about the Russian folk-soul what occurs to one at once, is that fundamentally it is less fitted than any other to the task it is engaged upon to-day—external struggle, external war. There is a very characteristic book by Mereschkowski, whom I have had occasion to mention before, called The March of the Mob. At the end of the book the author talks of the impression made upon him by the Hagia Sophia, the great basilica in Constantinople. The description he gives of this impression strikes the note which must come from the Russian folk-soul when it understands itself. And at the close of this passage the author tells how, surrendering himself completely to the spell of the great Mosque, he was moved to pray for his people:

“The Hagia Sophia, translucent and melancholy, flooded with the amber light of the ultimate mystery raised up my prostrate and affrighted soul. I gazed up at the dome, so like the vault of heaven, and thought: There it stands, created by the hand of man—man’s approach to the Triune Deity on earth. This approach has lasted, and what is more, will come again. How should those who love the Son not come to the Father who is the world? How should those not come to the Son who love the world, which the Father also loved since He gave His Son for it? For they are giving up their lives for Him and for their friends. They have the Son because they have love. Only His name they know not. And I was impelled to pray for them all, to pray in this heathen shrine that shall yet be the one and only temple of the future, that there be granted to my people the true power of victory, the conscious faith in the God who is Three in One.”

If we can regard the German folk-spirit, expressed in its representative “Faust” as one that is in the midst of the process of becoming, then we must look upon the Russian folk-soul as one that is still waiting for what is to happen. Its prevailing attitude is that of looking into the future, of not having found what it sought in the present. But when the Russian folk-soul becomes conscious of what lives in the depths of its nature, waiting to be brought out to the light, then it will realise that its mission lies in inner development, that this mission can fundamentally best be fulfilled by making its conquests within, by bringing forth that which lies hidden in its own depths and will some day be of great value to the cultural life of humanity. We cannot simply dismiss the Russian folk-soul as “barbaric”; we must think of it as one that will reach its full stature later on but has not yet passed beyond the age of childhood. I know how incomplete is this characterisation of the Russian folk-soul, but lack of time prevents me from describing it with more than a few words. This much, however, I will say. When the Russian folk-soul expresses itself as to-day, when it fails to express that attitude of expectation (which Mereschkowski represents as the spirit of prayer lying deep within the folk-soul) then it can be nothing but a wrecker of spiritual culture and of human culture in general. In turning outwards, the Russian folk-soul seems to be doing the opposite of what it really befits it to do.

This is why we feel, when we look towards the West, that however terrible the things that are at present going on there, they are the inevitable outcome of the impulses existing in the Western folk-souls. With the Russian folk-soul, on the contrary, we feel that it is quite unsuitable for this people to turn against those of the West, whom it ought, if it understood itself aright, to accept as its teachers. It is only because, of recent years, the question at issue has been so little understood that the importance of much that came from this quarter has been overestimated.

We could carry still further our study of the characteristics of folk-souls. Thus the human soul that realises itself in the Ego stands in the most intimate relation to the three members of the soul, the Sentient, the Rational or Mind, and the Consciousness Souls. Sometimes the individual soul rebels against the influences of the three members, sometimes they rebel against the individual soul. Just as the single individual soul shows the relationship of the three soul divisions to the human Ego, so can we see to-day the expressions and relationships of the several European souls to the soul of Europe as a whole. For external events are only a projection of the war waged by the members of the soul against the Ego. The Ego penetrates into the separate members, it establishes a relation with them; and here again we could discover in the outer events a confirmation of the findings of Spiritual Science reached by inner investigation.

The Ego is attracted to the Sentient Soul because it longs to be fertilised and quickened by the experiences of the Sentient Soul. Thus we see the German folk-soul plunging from the middle of Europe into the Italian folk-soul. We can trace this process right through history. If we go back to the time of Dürer and of other artists we see how they steeped themselves in the Italian folk-soul. Later we note that Goethe did not find happiness until he had satisfied his longing for Italy. This process consists on the one hand in the interplay between the Ego and the Sentient Soul, and on the other in that between the German folk-soul and the Italian folk-spirit. If we follow the course of history further we shall see how the individual Ego has to come to an understanding with the Rational and Consciousness Souls. Consider how often, right up till modern times, the German folk-soul has adjusted itself to the French, how Leibnitz, the most German of philosophers, wrote his works in French, and how Frederick the Great, the founder of Prussia’s greatness, lived almost exclusively in an atmosphere of French culture. This shows how strong is the inclination of the German spirit to be international, to fulfil itself in all the different nationalities. And this being its fundamental characteristic, to fulfil itself everywhere, we find the German folk-spirit also coming to an understanding with the British folk-soul, since nowadays it accepts, not Goethe’s Theory of Evolution and Theory of Colour, but Darwin’s and Newton’s. This shows how deep a bond there exists between the German folk-spirit and the British. And if to-day British voices are roused in anger against everything German, the German folk-soul cannot from the depths of its being return the hate which the British folk-spirit has shown towards it. The British folk-soul hates from sheer materialism. But the German folk-soul cannot maintain this position. It will have to come to an understanding with materialism. It is doing so now with force of arms in the fight that has been forced upon it, and in the future it will do so by liberating the spiritual within an epoch of materialism. Thus do we look through the external events of the moment into what is being revealed at the centre of Europe.

It is not, I think, a useless task to probe in this way into the fundamental nature of the folk-souls. For it seems to me that if the folk-souls are so illumined, the light may also be cast upon the fateful happenings of to-day and make their meaning clear. If we go deeply into the nature of these folk-souls then we shall feel the present-day events to be the inevitable outcome of their relations to each other. And this surely is the right way of coming to an understanding. And if it is true—as surely it is—that the events that are taking place east and west of us are of so mighty a nature that they must be the heralds of a new epoch, then from these events will develop a new phase in the history of the human spirit. For only a new phase of the human spirit can be fought for with such mighty sacrifices. And if this is so, then it is also true that much that up till now has been won only with petty sacrifices will in the future have to be achieved at a greater price. For the sacrifices made by Spiritual Science which I mentioned yesterday in connection with the development of the human soul are really far greater than all the sacrifices that are expended on external observations and experiments. Let us see to it that the great sacrifices made in the cause of another science be linked up to all the heroism and to all the suffering we see around us. I told you in my lecture yesterday how the forces of the unfinished lives now being sacrificed will unite with beings of the spiritual world and pours down their influence into the world of history here below. This picture, which corresponds nevertheless to a reality, I shall try to complete. Yes. We are entering upon a time when many will have to pay for the advent and development of a new world-phase of the human spirit with their blood and their lives, in suffering and in dangers. But those who have been called upon to do this will not know their sacrifice to have really been worth while till the future, when they will look down upon a humanity which will know how to live more worthily of the new era that has set in. If it is the folk-spirit that now demands the blood of our generation, it will be the folk-spirit that in the new era thus brought in will demand a new form of life. The folk-spirit will call upon those—and it will be for the humanity of the future to hear this call—who will liberate from their bodies the youthful forces of their souls for the quickening of the new humanity. Those, however, who preserve their lives and their health will feel that the child of humanity’s spiritual life, born of suffering and death, will need those who can tend it and who can receive the inspiration of the folk-soul aright. And no one will understand the German folk-soul who does not understand the German language, and this language shall not be the language of the external material life, but the language of the spirit. May the new spirit [Zeitenwesen], then, which is being born to-day of blood, of wounds and of death, find a humanity which, through the powerful unfolding of human spiritual power, will show itself worthy to be the guardian of the new age so hardly fought for, so hardly won.

• 1. “Goethe’s Mentality in our Fateful Days, and German Culture,” delivered on 29th October, in the “Architektenhaus” in Berlin.
• 2. The “Rational Soul” is also Called “Intellectual or Mind Soul.”
• 3. The “Consciousness Soul” is also called “Spirit Soul.”

When we seek the answer to the question to which we referred in the last lecture as to how human beings may establish a relationship with the Christ today, the objection is made by many that a number of human beings already have a relationship with Him. I have spoken frequently about this objection, and we know that it is invalid. On more careful consideration, it turns out to be a thoroughly egoistic objection that can be made only by a person who has the following view: “I have a faith that makes me happy; anything else is no concern of mine.” But in general, humanity's relation to the Christ-Being is not satisfactory; that is easily recognizable from the events of our times and little needs to be added. The necessary answer to this objection can be given by everyone by saying that a basic element in the confession of Christ must be the truth that He died and rose for all men—for all men alike—and that, when man turns against man for the sake of external possessions, it can never be done in His name. It is possible for a person to turn away from this general human destiny to apply himself solely in egoistic fashion to his own creed. Certainly, but then no attenion is paid to the fact that the occurrence of the Mystery of Golgotha is something that primarily concerns human society. We will now have to mention something that may draw our attention to what is essential in the path that leads to Christ, since it is obvious that each soul must find the way to Him for himself with those means that are suitable for the present time.

When we seek to understand in a more profound sense what the Christ Being signifies for the earth, we must first acquaint ourselves with the truth of an essential element in the Mystery of Golgotha; that is, it actually occurred only once at a definite point in space and time. When we fix this in our minds, we shall discover a contradiction of a view that is generally held, even by us; we should not simply seek to remove it by argumentation since it is justifiable and must first be recognized if we desire to remove it for our own souls. You see, provided the Mystery of Golgotha is an inner and genuine truth, it cannot represent anything but the meaning of the evolution of the earth. But, as we know, everything that occurs in time and space belongs to the realm of maya, the great illusion; that is, it does not belong to the real and eternal, the essential nature of things. Thus we face the highly significant contradiction that the Mystery of Golgotha belongs to maya, the great illusion, and we must place this contradiction before our souls in its full validity.

Now, since this Mystery of Golgotha occurred during the time of the earthly evolution of humanity, let us first consider this evolution. We know, of course, that what we have to deal with is that the human being has come over from earlier worlds and that at a definite point of time, as we have set forth in my book, An Outline of Occult Science, he was subjected to what may be called a luciferic temptation, a seduction. We have often considered this luciferic seduction in the sense in which spiritual scientific investigation shows it, and we know it was expressed in a magnificent image at the beginning of the Old Testament. In the so-called “Fall of Man,” the image of Lucifer as a serpent in Paradise is one of the mightiest representations of religious documents.

When we survey the time through which humanity passed from the luciferic temptation to the Mystery of Golgotha, we find it to be a time in which human beings gradually descended from a primeval, atavistic clairvoyant, revelation that was brought over from earlier planetary stages in which the spiritual worlds had a real existence before their souls. During the centuries preceding the Mystery of Golgotha, therefore, they were no longer able to look up to the spiritual world as they had done before, but they now possessed only echoes of the ancient knowledge of the spiritual world.

Taking now a relatively short period of earthly time since we cannot go all the way back to the luciferic temptation, let us review the successive descending stages of human evolution down to the Mystery of Golgotha. If we go back far enough, we discover that what men possessed at an earlier time as an atavistic wisdom, as a real perception of the spiritual world, now echoed in the world conceptions of the religions as reverence for a more or less significant, but highly regarded, ancestor. That is to say, in various regions of the earth we find religious cults that we may call ancestral cults. Such cults in which men look up with reverence to an ancestor still survive among those who have remained at a more or less early stage of evolution. What is the reason for this adoration? What is the reality behind this looking up to an ancestor in ancient times? In those most ancient times to which history can still look back, in that hoary antiquity, we have a certain epoch in which ancestral cults are customary (cf. chart on p. 194).

Such ancestral cults were not based on fact, as is supposed by superficial contemporary science, that those belonging to them imagined they had to look up to a certain ancestor, but the nature of the most ancient ancestral cults was such that men had a direct vision of their ancestors at a certain time in their lives. At these times, in a state of consciousness between waking and sleeping such as was universal in the earlier stages of human evolution, a person who looked up to an ancestral god really attained a condition of union with what he reverenced as his ancestor. The ancestor appeared to him not merely in a dream, but in a dream-like image that signified something real to him, and those individuals to whom the same ancestor appeared belonged together in a single ancestral cult. What these individuals beheld in spirit was, to be sure, a human form elevated to a lofty level, but something entirely different was concealed behind it. If we wish to know what was really concealed behind this spirit form, we must realize that the ancestor had once died and had left the earth as a highly regarded personality who had wrought much good for a human community. He had passed through the portal of death and when these individuals looked up to him, he was on the way between death and a new birth. As these human beings looked up to him, what was it they saw of him?

We know, of course, that when a human being passes through the portal of death, he remains for a short time in his etheric body before it is cast off. But the casting off of this body signifies that it passes over into the spiritual worlds, into the etheric world. The human being continues to develop in his ego and his astral body; the etheric body passes over into the etheric world. Since this man had performed something lasting on earth, the memory of his etheric body continued for a long time. It is this etheric body of the ancestor that was beheld in the ancient atavistic, dream-like clairvoyance and people revered what was revealed to them through it. But during the period between death and a new birth, this etheric body comes into contact with the spirits of the higher hierarchies; most particularly with those belonging to the hierarchy of the archai, the spirits of time. Since this particular ancestor was a significant personality for human evolution, he thus established a union with the time spirit who was bringing human evolution one step forward.

What made itself known through this ghost, as we may call it, of the ancestor was, in reality, one of the time spirits; so worship within the most ancient religions was really directed to the time spirit. Wherever we go back into those times that we may look upon as the hoary antiquity of history, we find that human beings worshipped the etheric bodies of their forefathers to cause the time spirits to reveal themselves. That is to say, as we go back to the ancestral cults, what we find is the worship of the time spirits, the archai.

Men then descended further and began to worship those gods who are known to us from the various mythologies, and whom we call archangels; even Zeus in Greek mythology possessed archangelic manifestations. In the most ancient times people looked up to the time spirits; later, they looked up to those spirits who are not time spirits but are of equal value with the spirits who control the guidance of different peoples, the archangels. Thus we may say that polytheism, when human beings worshipped archangels, follows after ancestral worship.

Then human beings descend still further to the period in which the ego is gradually to be born in the individual. We now find that the most advanced nations pass over to monotheism at a relatively early period—the Egyptians, for example, even in the second millennium before Christ, the people of the Near East later. That is, they begin to worship angels, every person his or her own angel, rather than an archangel. They descend from the higher polytheism to the lower monotheism. After what has previously been presented to you, you will not consider what I am about to say as something strange. You will see that people must cure themselves of the pride that permeates the entire field of religious studies, which deems itself justified to consider monotheism as a religion superior to polytheism. By no means is it so, but the relationship of the two is just as has been described.

Why, then, could the ancient peoples still worship archai, archangels, and angels? They could do so because they still preserved a remnant or echo of the atavistic clairvoyant capacity. For this reason they were able to lift themselves up to what is superhuman; they could, in a certain sense, rise above the human and elevate themselves to the superhuman. In the ancient mysteries, this process of elevating oneself to the superhuman was especially cultivated. Human beings were developed so they could unfold within themselves what extended beyond the human, whereby the human soul lifted itself into the realm of spirituality. But then came the time when the human ego, as it lives here between birth and death, was born for human beings. This was the period coinciding with the occurrence of the Mystery of Golgotha. If the Mystery of Golgotha had not occurred, people would have degenerated; they would have descended from worshipping angels to worshipping the next subordinate hierarchy, man himself. When we recall how the Roman Caesars had themselves worshipped as gods, how they really were “gods” to the people, we shall know that at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha human beings had degenerated so far that they now no longer prayed to archai, archangels, or angels, but to man. In order to save men from praying to earthly human beings, it was necessary for the Divine Man to appear.

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The entrance of the Divine Man into history signified an important new way to relate oneself to religious life. Where had the worship of angels, archangels, archai, and even that of man in the form of the Roman Caesars, been found? In man himself; no one worshipped the Caesars through the Caesars, but through the worshipper himself, obviously; this had arisen from man; it came from the human soul. It was necessary that the Christ should appear as historic fact in the evolution of humanity; it was necessary that He should be seen, like the phenomena of nature, from without. He had to come into touch with human beings in an entirely different way from that of the gods of the ancient religions—in an entirely different way. “Where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I in the midst of them.” This is an important principle in Christianity because it signifies that, whereas it is possible through mere individual mysticism to find angels, archangels, even archai, it is not possible by this individual mysticism to find the Christ. Those who wish to practice individual mysticism, as this is often described even among theosophists, generally reach only the individual angel. They simply internalize this angel more, even making him often somewhat more egoistic than other persons make their gods. The Christ is found in different ways, not through the mere development of one's inner being, but when we are most of all aware that the Christ belongs to the community of human beings, to the whole of human community.

We now come to a most important differentiation, which can be taken into the human mind, we must admit, only with great difficulty. It is imperative, however, that we force ourselves to its level. When we face another human being in life, it is in maya that we, as human beings, face each other. Just as we have before us only the maya of natural phenomena, so are we likewise confronted only with the maya of the other human being. It is within maya that this human being stands before our external senses and all that is connected with the external world of the senses; then he stands before us as belonging to his family, his nation, his time. If we should survey him completely, we should see behind him the angel, the archangel, the archai, but they all express themselves in what the person is. It is because the archangel and the archai stand behind the observer and the human being observed, the latter is in a sense a member of certain human groups. In other words, the observed person in this way stands within heredity and hereditary relationships. Only our shortness of vision—understandable because we are human—prevents us from consciously judging a human being before us according to these essential connections; unconsciously we always do this. Unconsciously we face one another within this differentiation, which must inevitably be brought into humanity by these three hierarchies. But the Christ demands something more, something different. He demands in reality that when you face someone, you shall feel that what such a human being appears to you to be in the external world is not the entire and complete human being. When you face a human being, you should perceive his or her real being as coming not only from archai, archangels and angels, but from higher spirits no longer belonging to the earthly or even planetary evolution because this begins with the archai, the higher heavenly spirits, as you know from An Outline of Occult Science. You must see that with the human being something enters into maya that is supramundane.

To understand fully what I have just expressed, you must not allow it to remain a mere concept but carry it over completely into your feelings. It is necessary to understand clearly that in every human being something supramundane in his nature comes to meet us, something not to be understood by earthly human means. Then everyone will experience that sensitive reverence in the presence of all that is human. Before the Mystery of Golgotha, man had gradually lost this superhuman element and had descended all the way to being human. The superhuman element had been lost because—listen carefully—when a human being such as a Roman Caesar comes to be worshipped as a god, he loses his humanity and sinks to the level of the subhuman. He ceases to be a human being if he permits himself to be worshipped as something superhuman in social life. Man was threatened, therefore, with the loss of his humanity and it was restored to him through the appearance of Christ on earth. Read the cycle of lectures, From Jesus to Christ,¹¹⁸ in which I spoke on this question, telling you that something is really imparted to every individual human being through the fact that Christ was on earth.

Thus, the coming of the Christ has brought it about that we recognize in every earthly human being, even if he is a sinner or a publican, the Christ who is behind him. The Christ sat down with sinners so that we shall recognize in every earthly human being the truth of the statement, “What thou dost to the least of My brethren, thou has done unto Me.”¹¹⁹ As I have said, this concept must be transferred entirely into our feeling nature; only then shall we attain to its full truth. Then one also sees all concepts and ideas that separate men from one another fall away, and something belonging to all men in common spreads as an aura over the entire earth when we vow that we shall carry our search, not merely to the archai, but upward to what stands above them whenever we are in the presence of a human being.

If we look back again to the ancient mysteries, we find that in them the human being endeavored to transcend his own being in order to have his soul coalesce with the spiritual world. But through the occurrence of the luciferic temptation this is only partially possible. In this ascent the possibility is lost to ascend still further. It is not possible to bear anything more up into the higher world. Why is this so? The answer to this question will come to us if we fix our attention on the profounder meaning of the luciferic temptation. What does Lucifer truly purpose for humanity? We have often emphasized this. Humanity lives in maya, something that is not the real world but only a mirror of it. What, then, is Lucifer's intention? In this mirror the human being can lift himself up a few stages as far as to the archai, but he must then be taken over by Lucifer if he desires to rise still higher into the spiritual. In a certain sense, he must then take Lucifer as his guide; Lucifer, who constitutes the light that guides him further. If the luciferic evolution had continued, if Christ had not entered into human evolution, the following would have come about after the time in which the Mystery of Golgotha ought to have taken place: human beings within the mysteries would have developed to such an extent that the archai would have been openly visible to them. Then they would have entered into the luciferic world. In that case, however, all that the higher gods such as the exusiai implanted into earthly evolution in the form of the human element would have remained on earth. Man would have spiritualized himself in an entirely ascetic way and would have entered into the spiritual luciferic world in this ascetic spiritualization, leaving behind the corporeal. Human souls would have found their salvation, but the earth would have remained purposeless. The bodies of human beings would never have been able to render the service to the souls that they really ought to render. To prevent this constitutes the significance of the Mystery of Golgotha.

We must now look back once more to the evolution before the Mystery of Golgotha if we wish to understand this matter completely. From the very beginning of the evolution of the earth, it was Lucifer's intention to lead men away from the earth into his spiritual kingdom. He had no interest in the rest of earthly evolution but wanted only to possess what the higher gods had initiated in connection with man. He wished to lead this away in the form of the soul from the earthly evolution after it had remained for a time in the earthly form that comes from the exusiai, the spirits of form. In other words, he wished to lead the souls away and leave the earth to its fate. Why is it, then, that human beings did not follow this endeavor of Lucifer, before the Mystery of Golgotha, to lead them into a luminous world? Why didn't they? You may understand the reasons from many suggestions I have given here, even in these very lectures. They did not follow Lucifer because something was introduced into the evolution of the earth by the higher gods that prevented them from becoming light enough to do so.

As I have shown you, what is called the eighth sphere was introduced into earthly evolution in ancient times. As one of its aspects, the eighth sphere consists of man's acquiring such a preference for and attachment to his lower nature that Lucifer is not able to remove the higher nature from it. Every time Lucifer endeavored to spiritualize human beings, they were too strongly habituated to the flesh to follow him. If they had not been possessed by this cleaving to the flesh, to the physical nature, they would have followed Lucifer. This is one of the great mysteries of cosmic existence, that a divine element was actually implanted in human nature so that it might have, as it were, a greater heaviness than it would have possessed if this divine and necessary element had not been implanted in it. If it had not been implanted, human souls would have obeyed Lucifer. When we go back into ancient times, we find everywhere that the religions lay emphasis on the necessity of human beings reverencing what is earthly, what is an earthly connection living in flesh and blood so that they may be heavy enough not to be led out into the universe. Since all things having a relationship to both the human and the cosmic require not only an earthly, but also a cosmic arrangement, what you find described in my Occult Science occurred. At a certain time, as you know, not only was the earth formed, revolving in its orbit around the sun, but it was provided with the moon as its satellite.

What does it mean that the earth has a moon as its satellite? It means nothing more than that it acquired a force through which it can attract and hold the moon nearby. Should the earth not possess this power to hold the moon, then the spiritual correlative of this force would not be able to chain man to his lower nature because this force, from the spiritual point of view, is the same as that with which the earth attracts the moon. It may be said, then, that the moon is placed in the universe as an opponent of Lucifer in order to hinder him. I have already alluded to this mystery¹²⁰ and pointed out that in the period of materialism of the nineteenth century, this truth has been exactly reversed in Sinnet's book, Esoteric Buddhism.¹²¹ There the moon is described as something actually hostile to man. The truth is that it is not hostile to him but prevents him from falling victim to the temptation of Lucifer; it acts as the cosmic correlative of what constitutes the attachment of the human being to his lower nature. Rather than tearing the souls out of the lower nature and thereby preventing its concomitant spiritualization, a subconscious process was required. Had the arrangement been conscious, man would have followed the urges of his lower nature in full consciousness and would have sunk to the animal level. There had to be something in the lower nature of which man was not conscious and which he did not follow except as a human being on earth would follow what flowed into his lower nature as a divine element. Especially the God of the Old Testament, the Jahve God, was concerned that the human being should remain on earth. Jahve is connected in this mysterious way with the moon, as you will find explained also in Occult Science. From this statement you can estimate how materialistic it was to designate the moon as the eighth sphere, whereas it really is the force itself, the sphere, that attracts the moon. In her misguided ways, Blavatsky developed special malice in her Secret Doctrine by maligning the Jahve God as a mere moon god. She wanted to replace him with Lucifer whom she undertook to represent as the friend of the spirit. To be sure, Lucifer is just that, but only in the particular sense I have explained. Blavatsky tried to represent the Jahve God as the god of the mere lower nature, whereas what really constituted an opposition to Lucifer was implanted in the lower nature.

You see how dangerous it is to set up truths that may be perverted to their opposite. Blavatsky was misled by certain beings who had an interest in guiding her into putting Lucifer in the place of Christ, and this was to be achieved by introducing precisely the opposite of the truth of the eighth sphere and by maligning the Jahve God, representing him merely as the god of the lower nature. Thus did those cosmic powers who desired to advance materialism work even through what was called “theosophy.” Materialism would obviously have sunk to its worst abyss if men had come to believe that the moon was really the eighth sphere in the sense indicated by Sinnet or Blavatsky, and that Christianity must be fought in every way.

Now, placing the opponent of Lucifer in the lower nature of man was only possible so long as the human being had not developed his ego in the manner in which this took place at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha. The degree to which this ego was subdued in ancient times is greatly underestimated. It was subdued and appeared only during the centuries just prior to the Mystery of Golgotha. Then it no longer sufficed merely to place in the subconscious, or unconscious, nature what strove against Lucifer. Something had to come that the human being could take up into his consciousness; this is the Christ, who follows the Jahve God in evolution. It was necessary that the Christ should come so that through an avowal of Him the human being might consciously oppose mere spiritualization as this was striven for on the part of Lucifer. Christ descended for all human beings and only through our feeling related to everyone else do we belong to the earth. The deeper understanding of the Christ derives from our connection with all human beings and from our effort to attain a full and complete connection with them.

You see, as long as men lived without the fully developed ego before the Mystery of Golgotha, they passed through the portal of death into the spiritual world and entered into relationship with archai, archangels and angels. But since they had not yet developed the complete ego here on earth, even after they had passed through the portal of death they did not need to develop a connection with the higher spiritual beings consciously. This was regulated through the atavistic powers that lay within them. But since the Mystery of Golgotha—not by reason of it but since that time—everything has become quite different. Let us look at ourselves and see how things have changed.

A human being passes through the portal of death as do others or perhaps one person passes through the portal of death and others remain here on earth. By virtue of his or her passing through the portal of death, an individual continues to be a human being and if we desire to keep our connection with such an individual, our relationship to him or her cannot change. Let us now bear in mind, however, that at the present time, since we live after the Mystery of Golgotha, the human being in ascending into the spiritual worlds passes through the hierarchies of the angels, archangels, and archai. Since he is now within the period in which his ego has developed here on earth, he possesses a consciousness also for the other hierarchies that are above them. That is to say, he develops consciously the forces poured into him from beings that are even higher than the archai. What does this signify? Let us take a concrete case and assume that through death a person loses one who is dearly beloved. The one who has passed through the portal of death maintains for many years, of course, the connection with certain inclinations and tendencies that he had during his lifetime. However, since he developed his ego here in his lifetime as a human being, something in him begins consciously to work on the perspective of his next incarnation immediately after he has passed through the portal of death. This occurs in a decisive way in what I have called in the¹²² the midnight of existence; it appears to some extent in human consciousness immediately after death. When a person is in this state, however, there lives in him what already draws him away from what he was born into in his last life. Let us suppose that in his last life he belonged to a certain nation. The person who has remained behind continues to belong to this nation in his physical body, but a force belonging to an entirely different nation takes possession of the one who has died. How can the bond between the two continue beyond death undiminished in strength? Only when the one who remains here has an understanding for what extends above the angels, archangels and archai; that is, above what one may develop here through one's inclination toward relationships to human groups. If someone remains behind as a member of a certain nation and loses a friend through death who is already preparing to be a member of a different nation, the bond of love with the dead person cannot remain undisturbed. Only through the fact that both confess Christ, that they understand Christ in what extends above all differentiations of men can this bond be supramundane. What did John the Baptist say when Christ Jesus came to him to be baptized? “Behold, the Lamb of God, who beareth the sins of the world.” The full significance of these words might make us grow pale were we to take it in its full weight.

It may be asked why Christ has been victorious and not Mithras. During the time when Christianity was spreading from the East toward the West, the Mithraic cult expanded along the Danube all the way to France and Spain in Western Europe. The cult of Christ, however, has been victorious over the Mithraic cult. Why? Because the cult of Mithras had developed from extending above angels, archangels, and archai, and through this upward extention wished to attain to the Light-giver and Ruler of the World. What is the Christ in contrast to this? The Christ is He who took upon Himself for the evolution of the earth all that is bound up with angels, archangels, and archai; that is, all that chains man to the earth. He bears the sins of the world, those sins that have come into the world through human differentiation. He is a being in whose presence we must say, “I belong to a single human community, but because I belong to a single human community, to something connected with the earthly, I separate myself from the divine. From this I can be redeemed only by a Being who has nothing to do with human differentiation. The Christ in me leads me beyond earthly differentiations, teaches me to feel that what has been produced by earthly differentiation is suffering, that it brings death. Only through such an understanding of the Christ in me do I find my connection with the spiritual world.” All that entered humanity through the fact that differentiations have come about has been removed from it through the entrance of Christ into the world. Christ could not, therefore, be a divinity like Mithras, who guides the human being beyond himself. He is the one God who descended to earth and took away the sins of differentiation and cleansed man of them. Mithras rushes through the world with a sword in his hand that he thrusts into the lower nature to slay it; under him the lower nature dies. Christ offers Himself as the Lamb of God, who takes the lower nature into Himself in order to redeem it.

Much lies in this comparison, immeasurably much! It is for this reason that the idea of Christ is not to be separated from the idea of death and resurrection. Only when we realize that what leads man to the earth brings him death, that there is more in him than what brings him into the earthly atmosphere, and that something is in him that is the Christ Who leads him away again: In Christo morimur—only then do we understand the Christ and know that we are united with Him. Thus, the representations of the ancient gods could set triumphant beings before us, but the Christ could only be presented by the joining of human beings in suffering and death because Christ endured all that enters into the differentiations of man throughout the earth. It is thus that Christ becomes the One Who leads man through death and back into the spiritual world, but this also makes Him the Divinity Who may be approached here on earth as we pass beyond maya or illusion. As the Christ is born here from the womb of maya, so must we draw near to Him by advancing beyond maya and appealing to Him in all the higher reality that projects into maya, but isn't maya itself.

If it is to turn to this worship of Christ, mankind will still need a long time on earth. Nevertheless, we must begin again to take Christianity earnestly. It is taken least of all seriously by the theologians who are frequently in conflict over whether or not Christ performed miracles and, for example, drove out demons through them. Well, it is entirely superfluous to argue over whether or not Christ drove out demons. It is more important that we learn to reproduce His miracles and thereby cast the demons out now where we can. We still have little power to cast out demons in the higher sense as antiquity knew how to do through its atavism. That is the destiny, the karma, of our epoch. But we can begin to drive out those demons of whom I spoke yesterday; they are there and it is negative superstition to suppose that they are not. How do we drive them out? Humanity will be convinced that they are being driven out when what is unholy service today becomes holy; that is, permeated with the Christ consciousness. In other words, this means that we must change to a sacramentalism in which man's deeds are imbued by the consciousness that the Christ stands behind him everywhere. Thus, he ought to do nothing in the world except that in which the Christ can help him. If he does something else, the Christ must also help him but He is thus crucified again and again in human deeds. The crucifixion is not merely a single deed; it is a continuing deed. So long as we do not drive out the demons through what lives in our souls by changing external mechanical actions into holy actions, we will continue to crucify Christ. It is from this point that our education to a true Christianity must begin. What was symbolically practiced in the ancient cults of Christianity and was once performed only on the altar must take hold of the entire world. Humanity must learn to deal with nature as the gods have done; it should learn not to construct machines in an indifferent way but to fulfill a divine service and bring sacramentalism into everything that is produced.

It is already possible to make a beginning in many things. Most of all, human beings can begin to develop sacramentalism in two areas. The first is that of educating and teaching children. We will begin to spiritualize what the religions call “baptism” when we look upon every human being who enters the world through birth as bringing his/her Christ forces with him/herself. Thus we will have the right reverence before the growing human being and can then direct the entire education and especially the teaching of the child in this spirit so that we bring in this teaching a sacramentalism to fruition. We can achieve the same end when we not only look upon educating and teaching the child as a divine service, but also make it such a divine service. Finally, when we endeavor to bring what we call our knowledge into our consciousness in such a way that, as our souls are filled with ideas of the spiritual world, we are aware that the Spiritual world is entering into us and that we are being united with the spiritual; when we look upon that as a “communion;” when we can realize true knowledge in a sentence you find expressed before 1887: “Thinking is the true communion of humanity,”¹²³ when the symbolic sacrament of the altar will become the universal sacramental experience of knowledge. It is in this direction that the Christianizing of man must move forward. You will then come to the knowledge that, everywhere in life, reality enters into maya in everything that is related to the Christ, and that to look upon reality after the manner of modern science with its world conception is in the most eminent sense unchristian.

It is strange how people nowadays are so easily able to adjust to what is unchristian and how little they can find their way to everything in Christianity that is appropriate to our time. As yet, we can see very little that counteracts materialism from, as I might say, a darkling inclination. If there are some beginnings, people embracing them proceed on false paths in that they, in a confused way, turn to old relations rather than to spiritual science.

Forgive me if I mention in this connection something that concerns me personally, but I am doing this only to cite an example. I may already have pointed out in these lectures that Hermann Bahr,¹²⁴ a contemporary personality whom I knew very well in my youth, is again in the process of seeking spiritual things. He is not seeking them in spiritual science because his interest for it is very limited. Take his very fine and intelligent book on expressionism and you will discover that he has only a marginal interest in spiritual science. But you can also see from the book itself that up to its publication he has informed himself about spiritual science only to the extent of his having read Levy's book¹²⁵ on my world view and on the people who oppose it. He has not found the way yet to really engage himself more deeply. However, it is interesting that he wrote a novel whose hero becomes acquainted with everything: contemporary chemical laboratories and so on, attending Oswald's¹²⁶ lectures in Leipzig, busying himself a bit with the theosophers in London, and so forth. His hero becomes exposed to everything which the present day offers in spiritual sensations, and he even dabbles in spiritism. And then he asks someone—I don't remember who it was—to give him esoteric exercises, which he practices for a while. But he is impatient, continues them only for a short time, does not achieve results and then abandons them; in fact, he gives up on all his endeavors after a short while. Then he has some strange experiences—the most interesting thing for me has been that, in a curious way, much in this book is reminiscent of what I have mentioned most recently in lectures, even about actual events, although I haven't seen Hermann Bahr for the past twenty-eight years except once, but then we definitely did not discuss questions related to our views of the world. Recently, Hermann Bahr also had a play of his staged which is entitled The Voice. One need not defend this play for the simple reason that Hermann Bahr just is not trying to find his way into spiritual science, which he finds too difficult, but is relapsing into orthodox, or let's say, more recent Catholicism. At any rate, he is in search of spiritual life.

It is interesting how the hero of this play is in search of spiritual life. He is married to a lady, the daughter of a very orthodox mother and herself very orthodox in view. This lady is deeply serious about Christianity—more so than can be expected of a human being. However, her husband, the hero of the play, is a disciple of Oswald and Haeckel and is quite a materialist. Since his wife and mother-in-law are serious Christians, they are, of course, pained by the fact that the husband is a disciple of Oswald and Haeckel¹²⁷ and does not want to hear anything about the spiritual world. The wife grieves so much about this that she dies. After her death, the husband, from an unknown dark feeling, frequently thinks his deceased wife is calling out one thing or another to him. One day, in the sleeping compartment of a train, he hears the voice of his wife with special clarity. This almost makes him insane; when the train stops at a station he rushes out and behaves like a lunatic in what I believe was the waiting room of a station. The train went on without him, and later, it was demolished in a railroad accident. The injured people are carried into the station and then he realizes that he had been saved by the voice of his deceased wife; she had caused him to leave the train in which he would have otherwise perished. This was the first time that he associated the voice of his wife with the conditions of reality. I do not want to condemn this; I simply want to tell you what a contemporary human being commits to paper these days. The hero of the play, by experiencing this apparent miracle and the after-effect of this woman's being beyond her death, realizes that he has been saved by her and this causes him to reflect anew about the connection of human beings with the spiritual world. Later, his wife continues to communicate with him frequently and the ensuing intimate friendship between his soul and the soul of his deceased wife leads him back to Christianity in the truest sense, and he overcomes his materialistic world view.

Even though we do not need to defend this play as such, we see that there are human beings nowadays who strive to instill the view into life that a truth of the spiritual world can manifest itself in maya, the great deception. Only a clear understanding of Christianity will build the bridge between the life here on earth and the life that exists in the spiritual world. Quite a few people today have a need for this spiritual world but we must admit that their number is insignificant in relation to the large number of those people who are either mired in traditional religions—and thus have fallen prey to materialism even if they don't admit it—or whose lives are directly determined by materialism and who do not have a real connection with the spiritual world. As I said before, we need not defend Bahr's play but it can nevertheless direct us to this important realization: Whoever wants to understand Christianity in its deepest meaning must get beyond the problem of death. After all, the most interesting thing in this play is that it takes as its point of departure the relation between the human soul and the human body which transcends the portal of death. To be sure, there is a basic error in all these things: instead of being led to Christianity—for which process spiritual science, as we understand it, wants to make a real beginning—we are again led back to an individual religious denomination.

If human beings would only understand the Christ in the way I have indicated today—and if we may still continue to speak here, I will deal with this matter more thoroughly—if they could so understand the Christ as the matter has been explained today in only the most elementary suggestions, then the feeling and conceptions that are developed in regard to Him could be conveyed to all human beings. Christ did not die only for those who belong to some Christian sect, but He died and rose again for all mankind. We must not associate some specific religious confession with the Being of Christ, but every religious confession is to be brought into connection with Christianity. If all people would come to understand how to conceive the Christ as has been indicated, Christianity would spread over the entire earth because the revelation of Christ and the revelation of Jesus are two different things.

If we go as missionaries to foreign cultures, or even to people in our own lands, and wish to force upon them the worship of Jesus within a religious denomination, we will not be understood since the knowledge of these people extends far beyond what is brought to them by this or that missionary. I should like to know, for example, what a Turk would say if a modern Protestant pastor should try to convey to him his conception of Christ. This conception as it is dealt with by modern Protestant pastors holds that there was once a Socrates, and then one who was somewhat more than Socrates, the Christ, the human being, the special human being, but still the human being—or any of those confused things that are said today in modern Protestantism about Christ. The Turk would say to him, “What! You tell me such a thing and you wish to be called a Christian? Just read the nineteenth chapter of the Koran;¹²⁸ much more is contained in it about the Christ than what you are telling me!” In other words, the Turks know a great deal more concerning Christ Jesus than what the modern Protestant pastors are prone to present because the Koran contains more about Him and Christ is represented much more as the Divinity in the Turkish confession than in that of the modern Protestant. This is simply not realized because nowadays people do not often go so far as really to read the original religious documents; rather, they utter much superficial nonsense regarding all possible religions.

The Jesus revelation, too, will touch men in the proper way, but they themselves must attain its truth by their own power. They will be able to do this after having passed through a sufficient number of incarnations. Everyone today is to some degree prepared to receive the Christ revelation; this is a distinction that must be made. However, many forces are at work to suppress the real Christ revelation and genuine spiritual science. In this regard you need only to remember some of the things I previously mentioned regarding my characterization of various endeavors which lay claim to being occult.

And now I would like to conclude today's lecture, but not without offering a short supplement which, for definite reasons that will become apparent to you momentarily, should not be considered as part of the lecture itself. What I have stated thus far I have said without reservations whatsoever; but what I am about to add I shall have to formulate, at least for the time being, with certain qualifications. That is why I am presenting these additional remarks separately. If I mention them today, it is because I consider them somewhat important within the framework of the considerations at hand.

I had indicated earlier that materialism reached its zenith in the middle of the 19th century. During that time, the people who knew that spiritual life would always be necessary for humanity considered teaching mankind that our environment really contains spiritual beings and effects. But I had also indicated that the leading occultists in those days branched off into two groups. One of them maintained that mankind was not yet ready to accept spiritual things, while the second one was saying in the middle of the century that mankind was indeed ready to be exposed in an elementary way to the most important concepts of spiritual life.

This second group, which advocates the teaching and the dissemination of the doctrine, has been reduced to a tiny number of people. However, the anthroposophical movement subscribes to the belief that the dissemination of the doctrine, as it is practiced by us in today's activities, is important for the transmission of spiritual knowledge to mankind. This question was first raised in the fourth decade of the 19th century, but those who held this view were, in a way, outvoted. After that had happened, they agreed to chart a new course and adopt the practice of spiritism. These people attempted to show that spiritualistic media—individuals who can be considered psychics—are able to receive messages from the spiritual world and that it would be possible by these means to get in touch with the realms of the spirit.

I have characterized these things before, and I also indicated that this entire attempt was a failure. It was a failure because in contrast to what I explained in my recent speech in Bern, the people involved in the experiments were unable to pinpoint the various stages of our connection with the dead. Yet, the people in question did not want to deal with that phenomenon and, thus, the entire attempt was unsuccessful. All of the psychics indicated in the most primitive and elementary way that they were in direct communication with the deceased persons, and people always wanted to receive direct pronouncements from some deceased person through these media. Please note, this is not to say that what passes through a medium in an experiment cannot in some way lead to a contact with a dead person. But it is another matter to decide whether or not this is an unconscious, a genuine, and a proper mediation, and whether the mediation is possible at all. Some entirely different results were expected from the experiments. The psychic media were expected to make people understand that not only sensuous, but also spiritual forces flow continuously into human beings. Moreover, the experiments were supposed to teach people that spiritual things were preferably to be sought in the immediate environment, and not in the announcements of this or that dead person.

Since the whole attempt has proven to be a blunder, the serious occultists withdrew from this spiritistic experiment, and mankind now has to pay for this in that the psychic media have been usurped by all kinds of occultists. The latter do not pursue purely occult endeavors, but they chart a course that serves some specific human purpose. I have often mentioned this before: The person who wants to be a genuine occultist cannot merely serve a specific human purpose; rather, he must serve general human purposes, and above all, he or she must never employ improper and incorrect means in order to reach any goals whatsoever. But what isn't called occultism these days! You could get a notion of this if you read the report of the last Theosophical Convention, which contained the speeches of Mrs. Besant¹²⁹ and Mr. Leadbeater.¹³⁰ In these speeches, the present situation is depicted as the big struggle between Lords of Light, on whose side Mrs. Besant and Mr. Leadbeater are naturally to be found, and the Lords of Darkness. In these speeches the opinion is expressed that any neutral person not taking sides with any of these opposite parties, or more properly, with Mrs. Besant's and Mr. Leadbeater's Lords of Light, is a traitor. But still other things were discussed in these meetings. Mr. Leadbeater, for example, related from one of his profound occult insights that Bismarck¹³¹ was supposed to have gone to France before 1870 and established magnetic centers in the North, South, East, and West of France. During the 1870/71 war, these magnetic centers established by Bismarck had been at work, according to Mr. Leadbeater, because otherwise the war with France would have been lost. This is the kind of stuff people listen to in theosophical meetings! Yes, they do listen to it, and one can only marvel at this or do something more drastic when one learns such things are mentioned. But as I said, there are many kinds of occultism in our age.

Now that serious occultists have withdrawn from spiritism, it is important to keep in mind that the latter has been taken over by people pursuing specific purposes. And it is quite easy to do this. Please keep in mind what I want to say in this supplement: Spiritism originated from an honest attempt to find out whether mankind nowadays is ready to accept spiritual truths. Also, remember that the attempt was a failure and that all kinds of movements, occult brotherhoods, as well as individuals—especially from America—have attempted to manipulate the psychic media one by one for their own specific purposes.

Following all this, I now want to speak about a report that our dear friend, Mr. Heywood-Smith, gave to me yesterday concerning the book that deals with the experiences of Sir Oliver Lodge.¹³² I repeat, I am relating this with every possible reservation because I only have a report in front of me; it, however, is revealing enough. I reserve the right to make further comments when I am in possession of the book itself. However, since I do not consider the matter unimportant, I would like to deal with it today. Should the report prove to be incorrect, I would, of course, clarify the things mentioned today. That is why I speak with reservations.

It is an extraordinarily significant fact, isn't it, that one of the most renowned scientific personalities of England, the great naturalist Sir Oliver Lodge, has written a book¹³³ containing things which, when accepted as he presents them, should be counted among the most significant pronouncements of the present time. We know, of course, that Sir Oliver professed in some of his other books that he acknowledges the existence of the spiritual world. But let me come to the facts:

Sir Oliver Lodge had a son by the name of Raymond who was born in 1889 and who, when the war broke out, volunteered for military service while Sir Oliver and his wife were in Australia. In March 1915 Raymond came to a vicinity of Ypern—and you can imagine how worried his parents were. Soon thereafter, Sir Oliver received a message from an American medium, a Mrs. Piper, which was dated August 15. This message from America had a peculiar content which, according to the report that I have in front of me, reads as follows: “Myers will take an interest in whatever fate has ordained for you and will protect you.” However, this message was couched in the classical form of a poem by Horace. To repeat, Sir Oliver was notified by an American medium in August that Myers, formerly chairman of the Society for Psychical Research in London¹³⁴ but deceased fourteen years prior to the date of the letter, would protect and support Sir Oliver Lodge during a difficult event of which he, Sir Oliver, would be a part and thus work toward his protection. Please bear in mind that this message mentions only that Myers would help Sir Oliver during a difficult event.

Now, when Sir Oliver's son Raymond was killed in action in September 1915, Sir Oliver at first related the message which had indicated that Myers would help him, to the death of his son. Subsequently, however, Sir Oliver's family was the subject of all kinds of pronouncements by the psychic media; in fact, several psychic media appeared on the scene simultaneously and delivered quite a few messages. Little by little, it turned out that all these messages had the following basic content: “Myers is united with your son”—Sir Oliver's and Lady Lodge's son, because seances were conducted with her as well. “Myers is helping your son, whose primary concern is that you receive word from him and, especially, that Sir Oliver should thereby be placed into a relationship with the spiritual world.”—If one reads the various pronouncements of the individual psychics as presented in this report, one thing stands out everywhere. Throughout, the pronouncements exhibit interesting examples of psychic elevation; everything happens at a precise time; questions are being asked and so on, and they are then answered by the media. The whole process is extremely interesting. Even a picture of Raymond Lodge that was unknown to his family is found because the deceased son points to it and describes it, and it is then found in exactly the same place that he pinpointed. In short, in this book there seems to be compiled with extraordinary precision and exactitude all that can be experienced in many a spiritistic séance and which could lead to the events narrated. It is known that Sir Oliver had always been somewhat inclined toward these practices, much to the displeasure of his sons. However, after these happenings they became believers, too. Sir Oliver himself seems to have described in the most detailed manner how this bridge to his deceased son was constructed through the various psychic media.

What is important and what is presented is the fact that such a highly respected personality is induced to transcend into the spiritual world through the use of psychic media. I have to say this: From what I know about the various séances, they themselves do not reveal too many new features.—But something else is very important. We have here a modern scientific personality of the first rank who, when writing in this fashion, can have a tremendous influence on the minds of human beings and who feels compelled to write in this way. That is very important because such writing influences many people and causes them to turn to the “media enterprise,” which seeks to relate itself with the spiritual world in this fashion.

We are, of course, presented here with the same mistake of wanting to attain access to the spiritual world through spiritism which I previously described to you. But now let me ask you to look at the matter more closely. In the first message by the medium Piper which Sir Oliver Lodge received from America, a forecast is made of only one event against which Myers would protect Sir Oliver. To be sure, this event could have occurred in several ways. Suppose the son hadn't been killed in action. In that case, the statement that followed would have been quite compatible with the content of the message: “Well, you have been told that Myers protects your son in the spiritual world and keeps him from dying on the battlefield.”—You will probably not doubt that the people in America could have known that Raymond Lodge had been stationed in an endangered zone of the battlefield and that, therefore, one could have made pronouncements similar to those of the old oracles: “Myers will protect your son.” And had the son come out of the war unscathed, one could have said after the fact: “Myers did protect him by getting him out of the battle zone alive.” Suppose, however, the son was killed in action, one could then easily relate the prophecy to Myers' role as a mediator in bringing father and son together from the spiritual world. Thus we can see that the original pronouncement was shrewdly phrased. The whole affair was contrived in America. Since such fellowships extend, of course, over the whole world, the next medium was then put in touch with Lady Lodge. It is not necessary to know how such an anonymous session, as it is called in the report, comes into being. The procedures are as is customary in those sessions. But by now the sad news of the son's death had been received and Lady Lodge's psyche harbors all the after effects that such a message evokes. It is not difficult to demonstrate that what dwells in one soul migrated into another and communicates through the medium. Moreover, the son survived beyond death in the soul of his mother, in the manner that we are all acquainted with. Therefore, the accomplishment of the medium was nothing more than a rendering of what was already present in the souls of Lady Lodge or her family. This can be nicely substantiated from the protocol of the seances, which in each case is modulated to allow for the character of the major participants in these sessions. The name Myers is mentioned even by the media who were not acquainted with him. That, however, is not all that miraculous because Sir Oliver Lodge was a very good friend of Myers and had worked with him and so on. In short, everything would have been fine if only Sir Oliver, aside from the personal interest he took in his son's fate, had been content with carrying out an experiment whose sole purpose it was to show that there are spiritual effects in our environment. This was the original intention of the occultists, but then they abandoned this path.

I do not want to make judgments as I am sure the book itself will explain this matter, too. However, it seems we are confronted here with the obvious. Some people want to use Sir Oliver in order to attain definite special purposes. By using the constellations at hand, one very sorry occult brotherhood is likely to cite our case as characteristic when it makes its thrust to possibly, if you will, win over science to spiritism. Spiritism always likes to be considered as being “scientific,” and it can be easily used to attain special purposes.

To mention just one example, the attempt had been made in another place in America to cure mankind of the idea of reincarnation. What took place? During the time when the events I characterized had already happened, that is, when the serious occultists had already left spiritism, a certain Langsdorff,¹³⁵ if I am not mistaken, organized all kinds of séances in several localities. When media were put in touch with the dead, the latter everywhere gave testimony that they were not at all waiting for reincarnation. And so the doctrine of repeated lives on earth was especially attacked in America. One can accomplish a great deal if one allows people to be approached in this matter by the pronouncements of the dead.

I wanted to discuss this matter quickly with you in a few words because I had talked about these things recently and because the example cited seems to be an especially good one. For how will the world be informed about this? The world will learn that a renowned scientist has confessed his allegiance to spiritism. Then, people will read the book, and most likely—we see this from our example—they will think that the case for spiritism has never been made so convincingly as in this book. As I said, I am speaking in this supplement to our lecture with qualifications because I reserve the right to come back to the matter after I have read the book myself. We are probably confronted here with an attempt by the so-called brotherhood of the left wing to attain special things by these very means. This may not be clear at first blush, but it is well known that there are numerous brotherhoods who wish to attain their special purposes in this fashion, and more is attained in this way than people are accustomed to believe. We will talk about these things some more later on.

• 118. Von Jesus zu Christus (Karlsruhe, 1911), Bibl.-No. 131, CE (Dornach, 1974). From Jesus to Christ, (London, Rudolf Steiner Press, 1973).
• 119. Matthew 25:40.
• 120. Cf. the lectures in Die okkulte Bewegung im 19. Jahrhundert und ihre Beziehung zur Weltkultur, Bibl.-No. 257, CE (Dornach, 1969). The Occult Movement in the Nineteenth Century, (London, Rudolf Steiner Press, 1973).
• 121. Alfred Percy Sinnett, Esoteric Buddhism (1883).
• 122. Rudolf Steiner, Vier Mysteriendramen [Four Mystery Plays], Bibl.- No. 14, CE (Dornach, 1962). Four Mystery Plays, (Steiner Book Centre, Toronto, 1973).
• 123. Cf. Preface to: Goethe's Scientific Writings, II, Rudolf Steiner, ed. (1887) in Kürchner's Deutsche National-Litteratur. Photomechanic reprint, 5 vols., Bibl.-No. 1 a-e, CE (1975). Goethe the Scientist, (New York, Anthroposophic Press, 1950).
• 124. Hermann Bahr (1863–1934), a Viennese writer who was the author of the book Expressionismus, 3rd edition (Munich, 1919) and of the play Die Stimme [The Voice] (Berlin, 1916).
• 125. Eugene Levry, Rudolf Steiners Weltanschauung und ihre Gegner [Rudolf Steiner's World View and its Opponents] (Berlin, 1913).
• 126. Wilhelm Oswald (1853–1932) was a chemist.
• 127. Ernst Haeckel (1834–1919) was a renowned zoologist.
• 128. The nineteenth sura of the Koran is entitled “Mary.“
• 129. Cf. footnote 99.
• 130. Charles Webster Leadbeater (1847–1934) was a prominent personality in the Theosophical Society.
• 131. Otto Furst von Bismarck (1815–1898) was the Prussian Chancellor who founded the Second German Empire in 1871.
• 132. Oliver Lodge (1851–1940) was an English physicist and a member of the Royal Society.
• 133. Oliver Lodge, Raymond, or Life and Death (1916).
• 134. Frederic W. H. Meyers (1843–1901), a spiritist and friend of Sir Oliver Lodge, was a co-founder of the Society for Psychical Research in London.
• 135. Georg von Landsdorff was a physician who had previously lived and worked in Freiburg i.Br.

The decision to construct the first Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland was made in May, 1913, when Rudolf Steiner visited the future building site. Construction began within a few weeks and the exterior of the building was completed in April, 1914. Work on the interior proceeded at a slower pace and lasted through World War I (1914-1918). In 1914, Rudolf Steiner had begun a scaled-down model of the Christ sculpture that was later to be installed in the Goetheanum.. As the work on the sculpture itself began, he frequently explained its significance in his lectures.

One of Rudolf Steiner's lecture tours, May 6 through May 18, 1915, took him to Vienna, Prague and Linz. In all three cities he stressed that the Christ figure in the sculptured group would have to be portrayed as a being in equipoise between the polar forces of Lucifer and Ahriman and that this being was symbol of, and model for, man's own existence here on earth. The Linz lecture, which is here translated, presents the group in a world-historical context and relates the significance of the Lucifer-Christ-Ahriman configuration to the events surrounding World War I. Steiner sees a parallel between Christ's central, but equalizing position and Central Europe's mission in World War I. He implies that Germany's and Austria's militarism and political intransigence alone did not lead to war against the world powers in the East (Russia) and the West (France, England and, since 1917, the United States). According to Steiner, World War I was the earthly expression of a struggle between luciferic forces in the East and ahrimanic forces in the West, and it was Central Europe's destiny to mediate between these forces.

The fundamental polarization of East and West that Rudolf Steiner saw emerging more than six decades ago is now a political reality. While most historians today concede that World War II was in part caused by the circumstances surrounding World War I, few would accept Rudolf Steiner's statement from his Linz lecture that World War I was “destined by the European karma” or, to state it more concretely, that it was unavoidable. If the war could not have been avoided, then the question of who was to blame or who caused it is, as Steiner says, irrelevant. Based on this position, Steiner suggests that only one question has relevancy: “Who could have prevented the war?<” This question seems to contradict Steiner's statement that World War I was destined by the European karma. A quick glance at the historical record may help to clarify what Steiner meant.

In suggesting that the Russian government and possibly England, could have prevented the war, Steiner simply deals with possibilities outside the realm of what had to happen according to European karma. Russia's instigation of the two Peace Conferences in the Hague (1899 and 1907) was indeed self-serving and hypocritical, for it was Russia that, in 1914, mobilized its armed forces without considering British proposals for peace negotiations. Under these circumstances and considering the political immaturity of the German leadership, it was not surprising that the German Kaiser and his generals over-reacted to the Russian mobilization and interpreted it as a declaration of war. Kaiser Wilhelm II and Czar Nicholas II, who were cousins, frantically exchanged telegrams in which one beseeched the other to preserve the peace, but to no avail. The war machinery was already overheated by the forces of chauvinism and materialism so that even from this vantage point Steiner was correct in maintaining that war was unavoidable.

Regarding the possibility of preventing the war, a glance at the major Western powers involved in the controversy, and at Germany, reveals the following historical facts. France, for thirty years an ally of Russia, did nothing to prevent the war because she did not attempt to delay the hasty Russian mobilization. Her representatives said later that France regretted the Russian action, but there seems little doubt that France was more interested in presenting herself as the innocent victim of an attack. On the other hand, England's foreign secretary, Sir Edward Grey, could have prevented the war if he had taken earlier measures to discourage Germany's militarists from asserting themselves in their country, but in view of the English tradition and the English Constitution, this was probably not possible. Finally, the confusion in Germany itself was caused by a lack of understanding of who had legitimate authority to make decisions. Eventually, the political decisions were made by generals who managed to spread the belief that the fatherland was in peril and that Germany herself was not the attacker, but the attacked. Thus, theoretically, any one of these three powers could have prevented the war but that, as Rudolf Steiner points out in the lecture, is not the real issue.

Furthermore, the war did not emerge out of a French or Russian moral conviction that was responsive to German militarism. Rather, the goal of crushing German militarism emerged well after the war had begun. The war could be interpreted, in this sense, to be inevitable because it was not generated from a goal, but exploded and then developed its goals. In this war of attrition, materialism camouflaged itself with nationalistic sentiment and strove for absolute expression and triumph.

It is against such a background of perplexity and misguided fervor that Rudolf Steiner's message to Central Europeans must be read. In rejecting the question of who had caused the war, Steiner dismissed as equally irrelevant the question of who was to blame for materialism. Materialism was there, as was Ahriman. Steiner admonished the Central Europeans to counterbalance materialism by adopting a spiritual perception of life and by striving for an encounter with the Christ.

This profound spiritual responsibility that Steiner put on the Germans in 1915 was disregarded and the challenge passed by. After World War I it was not the Christ, but Adolf Hitler who, under the guise of “savior,” emerged as Germany's Nemesis and was thus catapulted into a central position. When Hitler was finally destroyed, Central Europe broke up into two parts, one of which disappeared behind the Iron Curtain, while the other aligned with the West.

As it stands today, Rudolf Steiner's call to instate the Christ in His central position has yet to be fully received and responded to not only by the people living in what is left of Central Europe, but also in the rest of the world.

Some day when the building in Dornach that is dedicated to the spiritual sciences is completed, it will contain, in a significant spot, a sculpture dominated by three figures. In the center of this group a figure will tower as if it were the manifestation of what I would call the most sublime human principle ever to unfold on earth. Hence, one will be able to experience this representation of the highest human principle in the evolution of the earth-the Christ, who in the course of this evolution lived three years in the body of Jesus of Nazareth. A special task in the portrayal of this Christ figure will be to make two ideas visible. Firstly, it will be important to show how the being that we are concerned with dwells in a human body. Secondly, it must also become apparent how this human body, in every facial expression and in every gesture reflects a magnificent degree of spiritual refinement, which descended with the Christ from cosmic and spiritual heights into this body in its thirtieth year. Then there will be the remaining two figures of the group, one to the left and the other to the right of the Christ figure, if that is the proper name for the figure that I have just sketched. This Christ figure is placed in such a way that it seems to be standing in front of a rock that towers noticeably at His left side, with its peak extending over His head. On top of the rock there will be another figure, winged but with his wings broken, who for this reason begins to fall into the abyss. One feature in the Christ figure that must be worked out with special artistic care is the manner in which he raises his left arm, for it is precisely this gesture that precipitates the breaking of the wings. It must not appear, however, as if the Christ Himself were breaking the wings of this being. Rather, the interaction of the two figures must be portrayed artistically to show how the Christ, by the very motion of raising his hand, is expressing his infinite compassion for this being. Yet this being cannot bear the energy flowing upward through arm and hand, an energy that is evidenced by indentations that the fingers of the extended hand seem to leave in the rock itself. When this being comes into proximity with the Christ being, he feels something that may be expressed in the words: I cannot bear the radiation of such purity upon me.

This feeling dominates so essentially as to break this upper beings wings and cause his imminent plunge into the abyss. To make this visible will be a particularly important artistic task and you will see how the meaning of this interaction could easily be misunderstood. Imagine, for example, an artistic portrayal of the Christ suggesting that merely by raising His hand He would radiate such power onto the being that his wings would be broken, forcing the plunge into the abyss. In that case it would be the Christ Himself who irradiated this being, as it were, with hatred, and thereby caused his descent. Such an impression must under no circumstances be conveyed. Rather, the being must be portrayed as having caused his own fall, for what is to be shown plunging downward, with broken wings, is Lucifer.

Now let us consider the other side of the group, toward the right of the Christ figure. There, the rock will have a ledge and, therefore, will be concave underneath. In this depression there will be another winged figure, who with his arm-like organs turns toward the ledge above. You have to visualize this as follows. To the right is the depression in the rock and in it stands this winged figure with wings entirely different from the figure on top of the rock. The wings of the figure on top of the rock resemble those of an eagle, whereas the figure in the depression has bat-like wings. This figure virtually buries himself in the cave, working in shackles, ever busy undermining the earthly realm.

The Christ figure in the middle has his right hand directed downward and the left one upward. Again, it will be an important artistic task not to show the Christ as wanting to shackle this figure; rather, he has infinite compassion for this being, which is Ahriman. Ahriman cannot bear this compassion and he writhes with pain from what the hand of the Christ exudes. This radiance from Christ's hand causes the golden veins down in the rock depression to wind around Ahriman's body like strong cords and shackle him. What is happening to Lucifer is his own doing; the same is true with Ahriman. This concept is going to take form as a sculpture that will be set up in a significant place in the new building. Above the sculptured group we will attempt to express the same motif through the medium of painting, but then the concept must be expressed differently. To summarize, the group of three figures: Christ, Lucifer and Ahriman will stand at the bottom as a sculpture, and above, the same motif will appear as a painting.

We are injecting this configuration of a relationship between Christ, Lucifer and Ahriman into our Dornach building because the science of the spirit reveals to us in a certain way that the next task regarding the comprehension of the Christ impulse will be to make man finally understand how the three forces of Christ, Lucifer and Ahriman are related in this world. To this day there has been much talk about Christianity and the Christ impulse, but man has not yet gained a clear understanding of what the Christ impulse has brought into the world as the result of the Mystery of Golgotha. Certainly, it is generally admitted that there is a Lucifer or an Ahriman, but in so doing, it is made to appear that from these two one must flee, as if one wished to say, “I want nothing to do with Lucifer and Ahriman!”—In yesterday's public lecture <¹ I described the way in which the divine-spiritual forces can be found. If these forces did not want to have anything to do with Lucifer and Ahriman, either, the world could not exist. One does not gain the proper relationship to Lucifer and Ahriman by saying, “Lucifer, I flee from you! Ahriman, I flee from you!” Rather, everything that man has to strive for as a result of the Christ impulse must be seen as similar to the equilibrious state of a pendulum. In the center, the pendulum is in perfect balance, but it must oscillate to one side or the other. The same applies to man's development here on earth. Man must oscillate to the one side according to the luciferic principle and to the other according to the principle of Ahriman, but he must maintain his equilibrium through the cultivation of Paul's declaration, “Not I, but Christ in me.”

To understand the Christ in His quintessential activity we must conceive of Him as a reality, as a working force. That is to say, we must realize that what wove itself into our evolution here on earth through the Mystery of Golgotha was present as a fact. It is not important how well or how inadequately this fact has been understood by mankind up to this time; what is important is that it has been present, influencing human development on earth. Much could be said to explain exactly what man has not understood about the Christ impulse up to this time; the science of the spirit will have to contribute its share to bring about a full comprehension of how the Christ impulse has come from spiritual heights and influenced man's development on earth through the Mystery of Golgotha. In order to realize how the Christ has become a working force, let us visualize—as has been done elsewhere—two events in the annals of man's evolution that have influenced the development of the entire Western world.

You will remember an important event from history when Constantine, son of Constantius Chlorus, defeated Maxentius and thus introduced Christianity externally into the mainstream of Western civilization. Constantine had to fight that important battle against Maxentius so that he could establish Christianity in his western empire as the official religion. Had this battle not taken place as it did, the entire map of Europe would have been different. But this battle really was not decided by military skill, that is, not by the intellectual prowess available to people in those days, but by something entirely different. Maxentius consulted the so-called Sibylline Books, the prophetic oracles of Rome, which guided him into leading his army out of the assured safety of Rome's walls into the open field, in order to confront Constantine's army. Constantine, on the other hand, had a dream before the battle in which he was told, “If you approach Maxentius under the banner of the Mystery of Golgotha you will reach a great objective!” Indeed, Constantine carried the symbol of the Mystery of Golgotha—the cross—when he led his forces into battle, even though his army was three-fourths smaller than that of Maxentius. Enthused by the power emanating from the Mystery of Golgotha, Constantine won that historical battle resulting in the external introduction of Christianity to Europe. When we realize the extent to which people in those days understood the Christ impulse purely by intellectual means, it is not surprising to find that there ensued an endless theological quarrel. People argued whether or not Christ was consubstantial with the Lord in all eternity, and so on. Let us say this, that the degree of knowledge of the Christ impulse available to human beings in those days is not important, but rather the fact that the Christ impulse was present and that through his dream it guided Constantine to bring about what had to happen. What is important is the actuality of the Christ and His real and visibly active power. Only in the science of the spirit do we begin to understand what the Christ impulse is.

Another historical event was the struggle between France and England. It changed the map of Europe in such a way that we can say that if France had not been victorious over England, all conditions and relationships would have become different. But how did this victory happen? It happened because the Christ impulse has worked itself into the subconscious of the soul up to the present time, when it is increasingly becoming a conscious force. So we can see in the evolution of the Western spirit how the Christ impulse seeks out in the souls of men those conditions by which it can become effective in some individuals. Legends have preserved for us the manner in which the Christ impulse can assert itself within the Western spiritual tradition. In part, these legends refer generally to ancient pagan ages, but they take us back to those heathen times in which an understanding of Christianity was beginning to germinate.

If the soul does not consciously seek initiation as delineated in Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment, but becomes saturated with the Christ impulse as if by way of natural initiation, then the most favorable period for this process is from December 25 to January 6. We can understand this clearly by realizing that for occult knowledge it is evident that the earth is not only what geologists describe. Geologists conceive the earth's components as being similar to the skeleton of man. Yet the spiritual also belongs to our earth whose aura has been permeated by Christ. During the day's twenty-four hours, this earth sleeps and is awake just as we are. We must familiarize ourselves with the fact that the state of wakefulness on earth occurs during the winter, and the state of sleep during the summer. The earth spirit is most awake in these twelve or thirteen days from Christmas to the Epiphany. In ancient ages when, as you know from the various presentations in my lecture series, human beings elevated themselves to a sort of dreamlike clairvoyance to reach a spiritual understanding of the world, in those ages the most favorable time for this process was summer. Thus, it is quite natural that whoever wants to elevate himself to spiritual heights by means of a more dreamlike clairvoyance will have an easier time of it during the summer, when the earth is asleep. Therefore, St. John's midsummer-day was in ancient ages the most propitious time to raise the soul to the spiritual level. The old way of spiritual interaction with the earth has been replaced by a more conscious elevation that can best be reached during the earth's wakefulness.

For this reason, legends inform us that unusually endowed people, who are particularly suited by their karmas, pass into an extraordinary state of consciousness that resembles sleep, but only on the surface. its inner quality is such that it can be inspired by those forces that elevate human beings to the domain we call the spirit world. A beautiful Norwegian legend² tells us that Olaf &Åsteson, in church on Christmas Eve, falls into a sleeplike state and when he awakens on January 6 is able to relate the experiences he had in this condition. This Norwegian legend does in fact describe the experiences that one perceives first as the soul world—and then as something that feels like the spirit world, but with everything being expressed as images, as imaginative forms.

This time of year has been most favorable in those epochs when human beings were not as advanced as they are in our time. Now it is no longer possible for the Christ impulse to penetrate the souls of men in this way, as if by natural initiation. Nowadays man must make a conscious effort and climb to initiation in a way similar to that achieved through the instructions given in my book Knowledge of the Higher Worlds. We are living in an age when natural initiations are becoming increasingly rare and will eventually disappear. Yet one initiation that could still essentially be called a natural initiation took place when the Christ impulse worked itself into the soul of the simple country girl, The Maid of Orleans. It was she who caused the victory of the French over the English. Again, not the human mind nor the talents of military leaders were decisive factors in changing the map of Europe so magnificently, but rather the Christ impulse working itself into the subconscious of the Maid of Orleans and inspiring her to radiate its presence in all of history.

We would now have to examine whether something similar could have occurred in the Maid of Orleans by way of natural initiation and ask whether her soul was inspired in the nights from the 25th day of December to the 6th of January. From her biography it seems difficult to demonstrate that she was even once in a sleep-like state during the twelve or thirteen special days when the Christ impulse could have entered her soul, inspiring her to act as its human shell on the battle grounds of France. Yet, that is precisely what happened. There is a time when the karma of a particular individual can facilitate such a sleep-like state in a human being. During the last few days prior to a person's birth he lives in the mother's womb in a dreaming, sleep-like state. He has not yet perceived with his senses what is happening in the world outside. If by virtue of his karma a person were especially suited to receive the Christ impulse during these last few days in the womb, then these days could also be days of natural initiation. Strengthened by and saturated with the Christ impulse, such a person would have to be born on the sixth day of January. Joan of Arc was born on that day. It is her special mystery that she was born on the 6th day of January and had spent the time from Christmas to the day of Epiphany in a peculiar sleep-like state in the womb of her mother where she received her natural initiation. Now consider the profound connections beyond the external developments that we are accustomed to call history. As a rule, the external events that are reconstructed from historical documents are of the least significance. What is of decisive historical significance is the plain date in our calendar indicating that Joan of Arc was sent into this world on the 6th day of January. Thus, supernatural forces become active in the sentient world and we must read the occult signs that present this fact to us. They tell us that the Christ impulse had already streamed into the Maid of Orleans before her physical birth, as if by way of natural initiation.

I want to explain these facts in order to instill in your souls a feeling for the fact that the external preception must take into account unknown forces and connections beyond what we ordinarily call history. European history has been guided by the Christ impulse since the Mystery of Golgotha, whereas Asia retained a world view that is not vet fully sensitive to the Christ impulse. To be sure, Europeans have been led into considering the wisdom of India as something especially profound. Not only is it characteristic of Hindu thought, if not of all Asian religious perception, however, that its entire attention is directed to the time preceding the appearance of the Christ impulse, but also that the state of religious perception is preserved as it was in those days. If something remains behind in the evolutionary process it can be interpreted to have absorbed something luciferic, and for this reason Asian religious evolution is the carrier of a luciferic element. A glance at the religious development of Asia will inform us that it contains much of what mankind as a whole once possessed but was later forced to abandon. We must in part cleanse Western culture of the luciferic remnants and in part we must elevate them in such a way that the Christ impulse can enter.

Moving from Asia to the East of Europe, we notice how Russian orthodox Christianity has remained stationary at an earlier stage of Christian development, refusing to advance and thereby keeping something of the luciferic element. In short, we can detect a luciferic remnant in the East, which, I would say, a wise guiding force left behind for the evolution of mankind in general.

Looking to the West and especially to American culture, a different characteristic quality stands out. The characteristic feature of American culture is to explain everything from external appearance. This kind of perception can certainly lead to great and significant achievements, but still, externals are usually expected to provide answers to all questions. Suppose we in Europe, and especially in Central Europe, notice a person who earlier in his life did not yet have an opportunity to dedicate himself to Christ and to the spiritual cosmic forces. If some event in this person's life brought about his conversion, we want to know what had gone on in his soul. We are not interested in learning that there was a leap forward in his development because such a phenomenon could certainly be found everywhere. The most incorrect pronouncement made by the empirical sciences is that nature does not make any leaps.³ Yet there is a tremendous leap from a green plant leaf to the red petal of a flower, and there is another significant leap from petal to the calyx. This pronouncement is therefore patently false; the truth of all development rests precisely on the fact that leaps occur everywhere. Hence, when a person who for some time was leading an external existence is suddenly induced by something to turn to spiritual things, we are not interested in the fact that it happened. What does interest us is the inner force and power that can bring about such a conversion. We will want to look into the soul of such a person and ascertain what has caused such a reversal. The inner workings of the soul will interest us.

How would the American proceed? He would do something quite peculiar. In America, conversions of this sort have been observed frequently. Well, the American would ask the people who have experienced conversions to write letters. He would then gather all these letters into a bundle and say, “I have received these letters from some two hundred people. Fourteen percent of all these souls experienced a conversion out of sudden fear of death or hell: five percent claimed altruistic motives; seventeen percent because they aspired to ethical ideals; fifteen percent had experienced pangs of conscience; ten percent acted in obedience to what they were taught; thirteen percent because they saw that others were converted and imitated them; nineteen percent because they were forced by a good whipping at the appropriate age, and so on.” In this fashion the most extreme souls are isolated, sorted and tallied and the result is claimed to be founded on “scientific data.” The findings are then compiled in books that are sent out and billed as “soul science.” For these people all other evidence is unsound, or as they claim, rests on subjective notions. There you have an example of the externalization of the innermost phenomena, and so it goes with many, many things in America. At a time that cries out for special spiritual deepening, the most external brand of spiritism is rampant in America! Everything there has to be tangible.

That is a materialistic interpretation of spiritual life. We could mention many other instances from which it would be possible to see how the culture of the West is seized by the ahrimanic principle, and what principle causes the pendulum to swing to the other side. In the East we are confronted by the luciferic and in the West by the ahrimanic principle. In Central Europe we have been assigned the immensely important task of finding the equilibrium between East and West. Therefore, the plastic group in our building in Dornach must represent what we consider the most significant spiritual task of our age, that is, finding the equilibrant relationship between Lucifer and Ahriman. Only then will it be recognized how the Christ impulse was meant to influence evolution on earth, when the Christ is not simply brought to preeminence, but is known in the proper way as exemplary force in balance with Lucifer and Ahriman.

The following may illustrate that no clear understanding has yet been reached concerning the relationship of man and of Christ to Lucifer and Ahriman. In a period, even the greatest phenomena are not always free from a one-sided attitude that may characterize the age. It is impossible to overestimate the significance of Michelangelo's magnificent painting The Last Judgment, which can be found in the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Christ is portrayed in triumph, directing the good people to the one side and the wicked to the other. Let us look at this Christ figure. It does not possess the features we would like to emphasize in the Christ of our building in Dornach. Even though Lucifer towers above, it must be shown that the Christ raises His hand in compassion. Lucifer is not supposed to be toppled by the power of Christ, but plunges down by his own power because he is unable to bear the radiance of the Christ nearby, and the Christ looks up and raises his brow toward Lucifer. Similarly, Ahriman is not conquered by any hatred from Christ, but because he feels he cannot stand the forces emanating from Him. The Christ, however, towers in the middle as the One who is carrying the Parcival principle into the new age and who, not through His power but through His very being, induces others to overcome themselves, rather than being overcome by Him. In Michelangelo's painting, we see a Christ who uses His very power to send some to heaven and others to hell. In future, such an image will no longer be seen as the genuine Christ, but rather as a Christ having luciferic qualities. Of course, this observation does not detract from the greatness of the painting, in fact, we acknowledge it. We simply must admit, however, that Michelangelo was not yet capable of painting the genuine Christ because the development of the world had not yet advanced to such a point when this could be done. There has to be a clear understanding that we cannot turn our attention just to the Christ, but must set our sight on the threefold configuration: Christ, Lucifer, Ahriman. I can only hint at this, but spiritual science will eventually bring to light the full content of the mystery, Christ in relation to Lucifer and Ahriman.

Now consider the following. Looking eastward we can make out luciferic forces even in the eastern regions nearest to us, while in the West we see ahrimanic forces. As a matter of fact, in spiritual scientific consideration we must adopt a mode of perception by which neither objects nor nations, nor the spirit of nations, are observed with sympathy or antipathy, but rather in accordance with their characteristics. What is called the national mentality of a person steeped in the heritage of his people depends to a large degree on the activity of the physical body and the ether body. From the time of our falling asleep to the moment of our awakening we live with our spiritual-intellectual being as astral body and ego, and during this period we also live outside our habitual national identity. Only during the time from our awakening to the time when we fall asleep do we partake in our nationality, because then we are immersed in our physical body. For this reason man overcomes his sense of national identity little by little during his stay in kamaloka. There he strives toward a union with humanity as a whole in order to live most of the time between death and rebirth in the sphere of humanity as such. Among the characteristics discarded in kamaloka is one that specializes us as members of a nationality.

In this connection the various nationalities differ considerably from one another. Let us, for instance, compare a Frenchman with a Russian. It is a Frenchman's particular trait that he is especially persistent in holding onto, and dwelling in, what the collective soul of his people carries into his physical body and ether body during his life between birth and death. This can be seen in his definitive idea—not as an individual but as a Frenchman—of what it is to be French. Above all, he stresses the importance of being French and what that means to him. But this notion held by Frenchmen or by anyone else from a Romance culture about their nationality affects the ether body by clearly imprinting the idea of nationality on it. A few days after the Frenchman has passed through the gate of death he loses his ether body; it is then a closed entity that has a prolonged existence in the etheric world. The ether body is unable to dissolve for a long time because it is impregnated with, and held together by, the Frenchman's idea of nationality. Thus, if we look to the West we see the field of death filled with firmly defined ether bodies.

Now, if we take a closer look to the East, at Russian man, we recognize his peculiar trait; his soul, upon passing through the gate of death, carries an ether body that dissolves in a relatively short period of time. That is the difference between the West and the East. When the ether bodies of Western Europeans are separated after death, they tend to maintain a certain rigidity. What the Frenchman calls “Gloire” is impregnated in his ether body as a national Gloire. He is condemned for a long time after his death to turn his spiritual sight onto this ether body, and to look at himself (The Russian, however, looks little at himself after his death.) Through all this, Western European man is exposed to the ahrimanic influence because his ether body has been infected by materialistic thinking.

The speedy separation and the diffusion of the ether body is accompanied by a feeling of sensual pleasure, which is also present as a most peculiar ingredient of national sentiment. How is this expressed in the East (Central Europeans do not understand this just as they do not empathize with the East.) Consider Dostoevsky and even Tolstoy or those leading writers who are constantly speaking of “Russian man”; their jargon is an expression of an undefined sensual pleasure surging from their national sentiment. Even in Solowjow's philosophy, we find a vague and stifling quality that the Central European man cannot reconcile with the clarity and purity he seeks. This search for clarity and purity is related to what is active in Europe as spiritual power.

In Central Europe there exists another condition, an intermediate state and something I can now dwell on in greater detail than was possible in yesterday's lecture. I mentioned that something exists in Central Europe that could be called the inner disposition toward striving. As a Central European, Goethe could have written his Faust no differently in the eighteen-forties: he was always striving! This striving is innermost nature. It was in Central Europe where the mystics made their appearance—those mystics who were not satisfied with the mere knowledge of the divine-spiritual principle but wanted to experience it in their own souls. To experience the Christ event internally was their very endeavor. Now take Solowjow who proceeds above all from a historical premise that the Christ died for mankind. That is correct, but Solowjow is a soul who, similar to a cloud, perceives spiritual life as something outside himself. Somehow he thinks that everything is viewed as a completed event, while Central European man demands that everyone experience the Christ event again in himself. Solowjow stresses time and again that Christ has to die so that man can be human. Meister Eckhart, in contrast, would have responded like this: “You are seeing Christ in the same way in which one looks at something external.” The point is that we should not look only at historical events, but that we should experience the Christ within ourselves. We must discover something within ourselves that passes through stages similar to those experienced by Christ, at least spiritually, so that we can rediscover the Christ event within ourselves.

Now it will certainly seem strange and fantastic when mankind nowadays is told that in Central Europe the close association of the “I” with the Christ principle had put a stamp on the entire development of the area, to the effect that even the linguistic spirit of a people took up this association and equated “I” (Ich) and “CH” (Christ): I-CH conjoined became “Ich.” In pronouncing “Ich” in Central Europe one utters the name of Jesus Christ. That is how close the “I” wants to be to the Christ, longing for the most intimate closeness with Him. This living together, as one, with the spiritual world, which we in Central Europe must strive to attain in all intellectual fields, is not known in the West or in the East. Therefore, something in the twentieth century is necessary so that the Christ principle can gradually spread over the entire European continent. I have frequently emphasized in several lecture series⁴ that in November 1879 the spiritual being we call the Archangel Michael had reached a special stage of development. Michael had become, so to speak, the leading spirit who is now preparing the event that has to take place in the twentieth century. This is alluded to in my first mystery play⁵ as the appearance of the etheric Christ on earth. It will come to pass that at first a few, and gradually more and more souls will know that the Christ is really here, is again on this earth, but as an ether body and not as a physical body.

Certain preparations are necessary. When some souls in the course of the twentieth century become clairvoyant to life in the etheric world—and that will happen—they would be disturbed by those ether bodies that are residual from Western Europe. The spiritual eye would perceive them first of all and would have a distorted vision of the Christ figure. For this reason Michael has to fight a battle in Europe. He has to contribute something to the diffusion of these rigid ether bodies from Western Europe. To accomplish this task, he must take the ether bodies from the East, which strive for diffusion, and join with them in a struggle against the West. The result of this is that since 1879 a violent struggle has been in preparation between Russian and Western European ether bodies and is now raging in the entire astral world. This furious battle between Russia and France is indeed going on in the astral world and is led by Michael; it corresponds to the war that is now being waged in Europe. We are often shaken by the knowledge that the events in the physical world take place as exact opposites to those occurring in the spiritual world, and that is precisely what is happening in this case. The alliance between France and Russia⁶ can be blamed on the seductive powers of Ahriman or, if you will, on the ahrimanic element, the twenty billion francs that France gave to Russia. This alliance is the physical expression of a struggle raging between French and Russian souls, a struggle that has an impact on Central Europe as it strives in its innermost soul for an encounter with the Christ. It is the karma of Europe that we in Central Europe must experience in an especially tragic way what the West and East must settle between themselves. The only possible interpretation of the external struggle between German and French elements is that the German element lies in the middle and serves as an anvil for both East and West. Germany, which is hammered by both sides in the conflict, is in reality the subject of their own controversy. That is the spiritual truth and quite different from what is happening in the physical world. Consider how different the spiritual truth is from what is happening in the physical world! This must strike contemporary man as grotesque, but it nevertheless is the truth, which must have a shocking effect on us.

There is yet another extraordinarily important matter worth mentioning. Surely history seems to be contradicted when we see that England, even though she has in the past always been allied with Turkey against Russia, now has to fight with Russia against Turkey. We can understand this contradiction only through occult observation. On the physical plane England and Russia are allies in the fight against the Turkish element, yet occult vision, perceiving this struggle from below through the physical plane and then onto the astral plane, sees that in the North it is Russia and in the Southeast it is Turkey that appear to be allied with England. This is due to the fact that the alliance between England and Russia is only of significance on the physical plane, but has no corresponding value in the spiritual world since it rests entirely on material interests. From below one sees that England and Russia are allied in the North only on the physical plane. In the Southeast, looking through the physical plane, one perceives on the astral plane a spiritual alliance between the English and the Turks while they are both fighting the Russians. Thus, on the physical plane, England is an ally to Russia and on the astral plane Russia is attacked by England. This is how we must see the events as they unfold in external reality inasmuch as they reveal themselves as external history. What is behind this history is something entirely different.

There will be a time when people will speak about the present events differently than they are doing now. You will have to admit, the entire war literature contains something rather unpleasant. True, some valid statements are made, but there are also many disagreeable ones. Above all, there is one thing that is disagreeable. There is much talk about how it is still too early to discuss the question of who has caused the war and so on. People delude themselves about the facts when they say that at a later date the documents in our archives will surely bring to light who is to blame for the war! In reference to the external events, however, the matter can be resolved fairly easily, provided one judges dispassionately. Chamberlain, in his War Essays⁷ is correct (even though he is in error about the details) when he says that it is possible to know the key issues of this war. All that is without a doubt accurate, but it leaves the proper question unasked. For example, there is but one question that can be answered unequivocally, if only it is properly posed, and this question is: Who could have prevented the war?—The constantly recurring question: Who is to blame for this war? and many other questions just are not appropriate. Who could have prevented the war? The answer to this question can be no other than that the Russian government could have prevented the war! Only in this fashion will it be possible to find the appropriate definition for the impulses that are at work in each situation. Of course, war had been desired by the East for decades, but had it not been for a certain relationship between England, Russia and France, it could not have broken out. Therefore, one might ascribe the greater blame to England. Yet all these conjectures do not take into consideration the underlying causes that made this World War a necessity. It is naive to believe that war could have been avoided. People these days talk as if it did not have to come about when it was, of course, destined by the European karma.

I wanted to allude to some of this by sketching the spiritual differences between East and West. It is not important that we look for external causes. All we have to know is that this war was a historic necessity. When that is understood the individual causes do not matter.

What is important is the proper attitude toward the various effects, for one effect can impress our souls in an especially significant way. It is remarkable and a characteristic phenomenon that a war like this one produces many unexpended ether bodies. Since this is the biggest war in man's conscious history, this phenomenon is present to a corresponding large degree. Ether bodies are produced that are not worn out. You see, the ether body that man carries with him can support him for a long period of time, until he reaches seventy, eighty or ninety years of age. But in a war human beings are sacrificed in the prime of their lives. You know that man, when he passes through the gate of death loses his ether body after a short period of time. A person dying in a war, however, loses his ether body when normally it could have supported his physical body for a long time, in many cases for decades. Those ether bodies entering the etheric world prematurely are preserved with all their powers. Consider now the countless number of unexpended ether bodies of those going through the gate of death at an early age. There is something distinctive about these ether bodies. I would like to illustrate this fact with an example that concerns our Movement, and after that I wish to explain how the ether bodies of the young soldiers who have gone through the gate of death will emerge in the etheric world in the near future.

This fall we witnessed in Dornach the death of little seven-year-old Theodor Faiss; his family belonged to the Anthroposophical Society and was employed not far from our building project. The father used to live in Stuttgart before moving to Dornach. He worked as a gardener in the vicinity of the building and lived there with his family. He himself had been drafted soon after the beginning of the war and at the time of the event I would like to relate, he was staying in a military hospital. Little seven-year-old Theodor was really a sunny child—a wonderful, lovely boy. Now, one day the following happened. We just had a lecture that I delivered in Dornach about the work that goes on in the building. After the lecture someone appeared and reported that little Theodor's mother had not seen him since late in the afternoon. It was ten o'clock at night and we could not help thinking that a terrible accident had happened. This afternoon a horse-driven furniture van had been in the vicinity of the so-called canteen; it was seen on a narrow street where it was forced to turn. To my knowledge, no van as huge had reached that spot in decades. Little Theodor had been in the canteen before the van had turned. He had been delayed there, otherwise he would have gone home earlier with the food that he had fetched from the canteen for supper. It so happened that he covered the short distance to his home in such a way that he reached the very spot where at that moment the van turned over and fell on him. Nobody had noticed the accident, not even the coachman because he was tending to his horses when the van turned over and did not know that the child was buried under it. When we were informed that the child was missing we tried to heave the vehicle up again. Friends fetched tools and alerted Swiss soldiers to help us with the task. Naturally the child had been dead since five-thirty in the afternoon. The van had crushed him immediately and he had died of suffocation.

This case can be used as an example of what I have often tried to explain by means of a comparison: causes are mistaken for effects, and vice versa. I have frequently used the following example. A person falls into the river and people hurry to the spot where it happened. When they find a rock, they conjecture that the victim had stumbled over it and this caused him to fall into the river and drown. Thus, they are sure that the man had died because he fell into the river. If one were to conduct an autopsy, however, it might turn out that he had suffered a heart attack and as a result, was already dead when he fell into the water, but he fell into the water because he had died. You will frequently encounter a similar confusion of cause and effect when life situations are assessed, and even more frequently in the general sciences.

The situation with little Theodor was that his karma had expired, so that it is actually possible to say, “He himself ordered the van to the place of the accident.” I have told you this externally tragic case in detail because we are here concerned with a child's ether body, which could have supported his life for decades. This ether body has passed into the spiritual world with all of its unexpended powers, but where is it? What is it doing? Since that day, anyone attuned to occult perception who is working artistically on the building in Dornach or is there simply to pursue his thoughts will know that the entire ether body of the child, with all its powers, is enlarged in the aura of the Dornach building. We must distinguish that the individuality is elsewhere; it goes its own way, but the ether body was separated after a few days and is now present in the building. I will never hesitate to assert that the powers needed for intuition are those of this ether body that was sacrificed for the building. The relationships behind ordinary life are often quite different from what we are able to suspect. This ether body has become one of the protective forces of the building. Something tremendously stupendous lies in such a relationship.

Now let us consider the vast amount of power that ascends to the spiritual world from the unexpended ether bodies of these who are now walling through the gate of death as a result of military events.

The way in which events are connected is different from what people can imagine; the karma in the world takes its course in a different way. It is the task of spiritual science to replace fantastic notions with spiritually true ideas. For example, we can hardly imagine something more fantastic and untrue, from a spiritual perspective, than what has taken place in the last few decades. Let us ask what has been accomplished by the (Hague) Peace Conference⁸ which aimed at replacing war with law, or international law, as it was called. Since the Peace Conferences were held, wars have never been more terrible. During the last few decades this Peace Movement counted among its special patrons the very monarch who has waged the bloodiest and most cruel wars ever known in history. The launching of the Peace Conferences by the Russian Czar must therefore be considered the biggest farce in world history; it is also the most abominable. This must be labeled a luciferic seduction of the East; the details can be easily traced. No matter how one may view the situation, the human soul is shocked by the fact that in the beginning, when the war impulses made their way into Central Europe, the people there made few comments about the situation, even in places where they gathered for the purpose of discussion, such as the German Parliament in Berlin. Little was said, but the events spoke for themselves. In contrast, there was much talk in the East and West. The most shocking impressions come from the debates among various political parties in the St. Petersburg Duma. Representatives of these parties uttered, with great fervor, endless variations of absolutely meaningless phrases. It was terrifying to see the luciferic seduction at work. The fires raging in this war, however, are intended to warn and admonish the human race to be on guard.

From what is now happening, a few souls must come to a realization that we cannot go on like this; human evolution must take up the spiritual! Materialism is confronting its karma in this, the most terrible of all wars. In a certain sense, this war is the karma of materialism. The more this fact is realized by human beings, the more they will abandon their arguments about who is to blame for the war, and then they will have to realize that this war has been sent into world history to admonish man to turn to a spiritual perception of human life in its entirety.

Not only does materialism cause human souls to embrace materialism, it also perverts man's logic and dulls his feelings. We in Central Europe are still lacking a full understanding of what I have stated before. We in Central Europe must be most intimately engaged in the continued development of the Christ impulse. To do this we must, among other things, try to understand the minds that have already sown the seeds. Just one example. Goethe wrote a theory of color, which physicists regard as something—well—something that deserves no more than an indulgent smile, as if they wanted to say, “What did the poet know about colors? He was nothing but a dilettante.” Since the 1880's I have tried to gain acceptance for Goethe's theory of color in spite of the findings of modern physics.⁹ Why does nobody understand that? The answer is that Central Europe has been imbued with the materialistic principle that has come to us from the British folk soul. Newton, whom Goethe had to oppose, has been victorious over everything emanating from Goethe's spirit. Goethe also established a theory of evolution that demonstrates how human beings, simply by grasping spiritual laws, can progress from the state of greatest imperfection to one of greatest perfection. People found this too difficult to understand. When Darwin published his theory of evolution in a more comprehensible fashion, it was readily accepted. Darwin, a materialistic thinker who was inspired by the British folk soul has conquered Goethe, a man whose perceptions resulted from a most intimate dialogue with the German folk soul.

Ernst Haeckel's experiences were tragic. During his entire life he nourished himself intellectually by leaning on the ideas of Huxley and Darwin; his materialism is basically an English product¹⁰ Yet when the war broke out, Haeckel was enraged about what emerged from the British Isles. He was one of the first to return British medals, diplomas and honors; instead, he should have returned his brand of Darwinism and physics, which is tinged with English thought. This is what we have to realize if we are to understand how Central Europe can strive for an intimate harmony with the laws of the world.

The greatest damage is done when what is poured into a child's soul induces the child to develop merely materialistically later in life. This trend has been on the increase for several centuries. Ahriman has even inspired one of the great British writers to compose a work that is calculated to impress the child's soul materialistically. The intent is hardly noticeable because ordinarily, one does not see all this as preparatory to a materialistic orientation. The work I am talking about is Robinson Crusoe. The description of Robinson is so shrewd that once the mind has accepted the ideas in the Robinson tale, it cannot avoid thinking materialistically thereafter. Mankind has not yet recovered from the ill effects perpetrated by the inventors of Robinson tales; they existed before and exist now. Much more could be said. These statements are not made to say something derogatory about the people of the West who have to be what they are. Rather, I wish to point out how the people in Central Europe must discover the connections to great values that are just now germinating but will grow to determine future developments. In this regard, the significance of Austria is especially noteworthy. During the past few decades several men there aspired to profound accomplishments, for example, Hamerling¹¹ in the area of literature, Carneri¹² who set out to deepen Darwinism, by extending it to the moral realm, as well as Bruckner¹³ and other artists from a variety of disciplines. What matters here is the concern of a people for these things.

Now let us consider the unexpended ether bodies that are still in existence. They were cast off by human beings who had learned, through a great event, how to sacrifice themselves for their people's spiritual commonalty, a commonalty no longer present for them, at least on the surface. If a spiritual scientist today asserts that there is a collective soul of people and that it exists as archangel and so forth, he will be ridiculed. What is called a people's collective soul by the materialists is nothing but the abstract sum of attributes that the people of a nation possess. The materialist considers the people as nothing but the sum of human beings who co-exist in the same geographic area and share a sense of commonalty with each other. We, on the other hand, speak of a people's spiritual commonalty in such a way that we know that the spirit of a people is present as a real being of the rank of an archangel. Even though somebody who sacrifices his life for his people is not fully conscious of the real spirit of his people, he nevertheless confirms by the manner in which he goes through death that he believes in a continuity of life alter this death. He believes that there is more to a people's spiritual commonalty than meets the eye, that is, it is related to, and co-exists with, the super-sensible world. All those going through death confirm in a more or less conscious way that there is a super-sensible world, and that realization is imprinted on their ether bodies. In a future time of peace, the unexpended ether bodies will be among people living on earth and will continually send the following sounds into the music of the spheres: there is more in the world than what mere physical eyes can perceive! This spiritual truth will ring forth as part of the music of the spheres through ether bodies that the dead have left behind. These are aside from what they are taking along as their individuality, which they retain during their lives between death and rebirth. We must listen to what lives and echoes from these ether bodies, because they were discarded by people who went through death and in so doing, affirmed the truth of the spiritual world. Mankind's greatest sin will be to ignore what the dead call out to us when their ether bodies speak. One's glance at the spiritual world will be infinitely enriched if one considers that those who have lost loved ones—fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters—may tell themselves that those who were sacrificed continue to live for humanity, as a reminder of what is yet to come!

If one were to rely only on what is taking place in the physical world, there would be little hope for the successful continuation of the spiritual movement through which a spiritual scientific world view is to be cultivated. Recently, a good and faithful colleague aged thirty or so died. My words to this soul that had gone through the gate of death requested that it should continue to work in our spiritual scientific field as faithfully and as courageously as it had done here on earth, utilizing all of its acquired knowledge. This colleague had worked diligently with us here on the physical plane; my message to him for his life between death and rebirth was that he should continue to work with us after death as he had done in life, for we are counting on these so-called dead as we are counting on the living. Our spiritual-scientific world view must be alive to such a degree that the gap between the so-called dead and the living can be overcome: we must feel the dead among us as if they were alive. We want not only theory, but life. Thus we wish to point out that when there is peace, there will be a living tie between those on earth and those who have gone through the gate of death. Man will be able to learn, and must learn, from the dead how they contribute to the great spiritual progress that must take hold on earth.

Sometimes life offers us an opportunity to see how human logic alone does not suffice. I would like to mention an example—not for personal reasons but because I want to characterize the way our Movement is viewed by the public. A few years ago an article was printed in a respected South German journal¹⁴ by a famous contemporary philosopher about our spiritual science. This treatment of spiritual science was intended to impress the public purely because the essay was authored by a famous philosopher. The editor took great pride in the fact that he was able to present an article about spiritual science by such a famous man. Of course, everything was skewed and the facts about spiritual science were distorted. But what did it take for the editor to realize that the account about spiritual science that he had sponsored in his monthly journal was distorted? The war broke out and the author of the article sent several letters to the editor. These letters contained some of the most disgusting remarks about Central European culture that one could imagine. The professor had railed and sneered at it. The editor then printed these letters in his journal as examples of the stupidity of this kind of thinking, commenting that anyone who writes this way belongs in an insane asylum. We are confronted by a curious fact. A good editor needed such an experience in order to see that the author, whose article on spiritual science had severely damaged the public image of the Movement, belonged in an insane asylum. If the man belongs in an insane asylum now, however, then the same was true before, when he wrote the article on spiritual science!

So it goes in the world! To be a judge of what is going on, man must garner other supports than those ordinarily available to him. The spiritual scientist who can clearly demonstrate that truth finds its own way, is on firm ground. Spiritual science, however, must be active in the evolution of mankind so that what is necessary, happens. Early in history Emperor Constantine had to accomplish his mission so that the Christ impulse could bear on the subconscious from the spiritual world. Later, the Christ impulse became active in the Maid of Orleans; what had to happen did indeed take place. Today, the Christ impulse must continue to bear on man, but more on his consciousness. In the future, there must be souls who will know that up there in the spiritual world there are those who sacrificed themselves as individuals and who admonish us to emulate their own belief in the active force of the spiritual, which they attained in death. The forces in the unexpended ether bodies beckon to the future, as well: to understand their message is to admit it into one's soul. Below, however, there must be souls who will perceive this truth and prepare for it through the proper and active understanding of our spiritual science. Our spiritual science must cultivate souls on this earth who will be capable of sensing what the ether bodies of the dead up there will say to us in the future. These souls will know that in the beyond there are forces to admonish human beings who had to be left on earth. When spirit-conscious souls down here harken to the hidden sounds of the spiritual world, then all bloodshed, all sacrifices and all suffering, past and future, will bear fruit. I do hope that quite a few souls come together through spiritual science and perceive the voices from the spiritual world that are resounding especially because of this war. Summarizing the final words of today's reflection, I wish to say a few words to you that are merely an expression of my feeling for what I want to instill in your souls.

From the warrior's valor,
From the blood of battles,
From the pain of the bereaved.
From a people's sacrifice
Will the spirit fruit arise—
Will the souls embrace the spirit
Consciously, with inner eyes.

With such feelings in our hearts we forever want to imbue ourselves with the meaning of the rose cross so that we can perceive it in the proper way as the motto for our doing, weaving and feeling. Not the black cross alone. He who tears the roses from the black cross and has nothing left but the black cross, would fall into the clutches of Ahriman. The black cross in itself represents life when it strives to embrace inanimate matter. Also, if one were to separate the cross from the roses, keeping only the latter, one would nor find the proper thing. For the roses, separate from the cross, tend to elevate us to a life of selfish striving toward the spiritual, but not to a life in which we reveal the spirit in a material world. Not the cross alone, not the roses alone, but the roses on the cross, the cross carrying the roses: That is our proper symbol.

• 1 . “Die übersinnliche Erkenntnis und ihre stärkende Seelenkraft in unserer schicksalstragenden Zeit” (“Supersensible Perception and Its Strengthening Soul-force in Our Time of Destiny”). Corresponding remarks can be found in the Berlin lectures of April 16 and 23, 1915, published as: “Aus schicksalstragenden Zeit”, (“From a Time of Destiny”) Bibl.-No. 64 in the Gesamtausgabe (Complete Works [of Rudolf Steiner]), Dornach, 1959.
• 2 . “Welten-Neujahr. Das Traumlied von Olaf &Åsteson” (“Cosmic New Year. The Legend of Olaf &Åsteson's Dream”), Hanover lecture of January 1, 1912. Published as a separate edition in Dornach, 1958; Gesamtausgabe (Complete works), Bibl.-No 158.
• 3 . In this form the pronouncement was first made by Karl von Linné in his Philosophia Botanica, Stockholm, 1751, no. 77.
• 4 . Cf. especially “Die spirituellen Hintergründe der äusseren Welt—Der Sturz der Geister der Finsternis” (“The Spiritual Background of the External World—The Fall of the Spirits of Darkness”), 14 lectures, Dornach, September 29 to October 28, 1917. Gesamtausgabe (Complete works), Bibl.-No. 177, Dornach, 1965.
• 5 . “Die Pforte der Einweihung” (“The Portal of Initiation”), first scene. Gesamtausgabe (Complete works), Bibl.-No 14, Dornach, 1962.
• 6 . The alliance was negotiated in 1897 by President Faure of France and Czar Nicolas II of Russia.
• 7 . Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Neue Kriegsaufsatze (New War Essays), Munich, 1915, p.36.
• 8 . “The reference is to the Hague Peace Conference of 1899 and 1907, which were both initiated by Czar Nicholas II.
• 9 . Rudolf Steiner was asked in 1882 to edit Goethe's scientific writings in Kürschner's Deutsche National-Literatur. Volume I was published in 1883; it contained writings on the formation and transformation of organisms. Rudolf Steiner's introductions and critical commentaries to the four volumes were published as a special edition, entitled: Rudolf Steiner, , Dornach, 1926. A German edition was published in Freiburg, 1949. Gesamtausgabe (Complete Works), Bibl.-No. 1. Cf. the correspondence between Karl Julius Schröer, Joseph Kürschner and Rudolf Steiner in Blätter für Anthroposophie,. 13 Jg. No. 2, February 1961.
• 10. Ernst Haeckel: “I have always readily acknowledged the magnificent contributions of the small insular British empire to the enrichment of human civilization. These were possible because of its advantageous insular position and its geographic alliances. In addition I worked on Darwinism for the past fifty years and had many personal dealings with Darwin, Huxley, Lyell, John Murray and many other famous natural scientists in England and Scotland; these were pleasant and fruitful personal relationships.” Haeckel, Ewigkeit. Weltkriegsgedanken über Leben und Tod, Religion und Entwicklungslehre (Eternity, World War Reflections on Life and Death, Religion, and the Theory of Evolution), Berlin, 1915, p.65 and 114.
• 11. Robert Hamerling, 1830-1889. Cf. Rudolf Steiner, Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Literatur 1886-1902 (Collected Essays on Literature, 1886-1902), Bibl.No. 20, Gesamtausgabe (Complete Works), Dornach, 1957; Mein Lebensgang (The Course of My Life), Bibl.-No. 28, Gesamtausgabe (Complete Works), Dornach, 1962; “Robert Hamerling, ein Dichter und ein Denker und ein Mensch” (“Robert Hamerling, the Poet, the Thinker and the Man”), Dornach, 1939.
• 12. Bartholomäus Ritter von Carneri, 1821-1909. Cf. Rudolf Steiner, “Carneri, der Ethiker des Darwinismus” in Methodische Grundlagen der Anthroposophie 1884-1901 (“Carneri, the Moral Philosopher of Darwinism” in Methodological Foundations of Anthroposophy, 1884-1901), Bibl.-No. 30, Gesamtausgabe (Complete Works), Dornach, 1961: also “Vom Menschenrätsel” (“On the Riddle of Man”) and Mein Lebensgang (The Course of My Life).
• 13. Anton Bruckner, 1824-1896.
• 14. Wincenty Lutoslawski, “Rudolf Steiner's sogenannte ‘Geheimwissenschaft’” in Hochland, 8.Jg., 1.Heft Oktober 1910, S.45-58. (“Rudolf Steiner's so-called ‘Occult Science’” in Hochland, VIII, 1, October 1910, p.45-58). Professor Karl Muth, editor of the journal, writes an editorial comment in No. 7 of the same year, in which he describes Lutoslawski as an “author who is eminent as a man and as a thinker.” Later, in Krisgshefte der Suddeutschen Monatshefte, Munich, February 1915, p.623-631, Muth refers to his correspondence with Lutoslawski and writes, among other things: “in addition to making several small contributions to Hochland, Lutoslawski also published in this journal three lead articles which aroused considerable attention among the readers: one article on the theosophy of Rudolf Steiner, another one on exercises to strengthen the will, and the third one on his conversion to the Catholic faith. His published notes contain peculiar biographical clues ... Where in Germany—except in an inane asylum—would there be a human being like this lector of philosophy from the University Geneva—a man who seems to be completely disoriented as he confronts the magnitude of our contemporary world-historical situation with complete blindness and a paucity of ideas! The relief which his overwrought brain received through his epistolary outpouring did not satisfy him; he now insists that his latest letter should come to the attention of the public as well.”