The Rudolf Steiner Archive

My dear friends, many secrets of the spiritual world must first be explained symbolically or half symbolically, although the images are real and should be taken as realities. It is necessary to use an imaginative language, as I mean to do to-day, it is necessary to speak in the form of images which you can meditate in your soul, because long explanations would be needed if one were to speak: in the form of concepts and not symbolically. But those who bear in mind the things which I shall explain to you to day and who meditate upon them, will not fail to discover the deeper essence which they contain.

About this time of year we always pass over from one period into another. To be sure, this may at first appear to us a mere subdivision of time, but this is not the case. For a deeper instinct led the people, who had to fix the seasons of the year, to follow certain great laws governing the course of time. The festival which marks the transition from an old year to a new one is celebrated in our part of the world in the midst of winter, when the plants cease to grow, blossom and bear fruit. Only certain forest trees keep their so-called evergreen foliage throughout the winter. The sun unfolds its weakest power.

We know that spiritual processes are interwoven with all the processes which we perceive through our senses. We know that when we go through the woods we are not only surrounded by the trees with their green needles or leaves, but that a soul-spiritual essence weaves and works in the mysterious depths of life. We have already seen that things which in the eyes of our “clever” modern people appear as childish superstition, can be experienced as something which points to the real essence of the world.

We are therefore convinced that spiritual forces and influences lie at the foundation of everything physical, of the solid substances or of the physical phenomena which we can perceive through our senses. Let us now look upon the so-called lifeless an-organic earth, upon everything which constitutes the earth's mineral kingdom; let us look upon everything which is not endowed with life. To the materialist these lifeless substances appear devoid of life. But in every lifeless object we can see a soul-element, a spiritual element, so that we can also speak of a soul and spirit pertaining to our so-called lifeless, an-organic, purely mineral earth. When we speak of the consciousness of the earth, we cannot perceive in its geological-mineralogical substance even the trace of anything that can be compared with man's muscles and the blood; we can only see the earth's skeleton, or the earth's solid substance, so that when we speak of the earth's consciousness, we must think of it as being contained in the whole earth, which does not only consist of a skeleton, or of solid parts, but also of water, air, etc., which correspond to the muscles, the blood, etc. of man. The whole earth is endowed with consciousness, with a consciousness which forms part of the mineral kingdom. We shall not speak of the change in the earth's consciousness during the course of the year in a definite region, but shall instead enter more deeply into the idea that the whole earth is endowed with consciousness. Let us now turn away our gaze from the whole mineral earth and observe the plants which sprout and blossom out of the earth.

If we study the vegetable kingdom from the standpoint of spiritual science we must first look upon it as an independent being in respect to the earth. The fact that the vegetable kingdom as a whole is an independent being in respect to the earth, becomes clearly evident if we study the consciousness of these two beings. We can speak of a consciousness pertaining to the whole mineral earth, but we can also speak of a consciousness pertaining to the whole vegetable kingdom which develops upon the earth. The laws which govern this consciousness of course differ from the laws which govern human consciousness. When we speak of the consciousness of plants, we can only bear in mind a definite region of the earth, because the consciousness changes according to the various regions of the earth.

As human beings we do not notice that there is a certain parallelism between our consciousness and, for instance, the consciousness of the vegetable kingdom of the whole earth, because our daytime consciousness, not our night-consciousness, is a fully conscious state. In order to simplify matters, let us say that during our waning daytime consciousness our Ego and our astral body are within our physical body. I have already explained to you that in reality this only applies to our blood and nerve system, but not to the other systems. For when the Ego and the astral body are, as it were, outside the head, they permeate all the more the remaining parts of our organism.

Parallel to this we have the fact that when, for instance, there is winter on one side of the earth, there is summer on the other side. This too is only a transformation of consciousness. It is the same with us human beings. But we do not notice it, because these two states of consciousness are not equally clear. They have different degrees of strength. The night-consciousness is a dulled state of consciousness, practically no consciousness at all, and the daytime consciousness is a full state of consciousness pertaining to the other side of our being. Our lower nature is awake during the night, when our higher nature is asleep, and this is also the case with the earth, for when it is winter on one side, it is summer on the other side. When there is a waiting state of consciousness in one part of our being, there is a sleeping state in the other and vice-versa.

As explained just now (this has frequently been dealt with in other lectures) this only applies to the vegetable kingdom. In the height of summer the vegetable kingdom sleeps, because it sprouts and grows; it sleeps, while it unfolds its physical part to the utmost. And it is fully awake at that time of the year when it does not pass through any external physical development. The vegetable kingdom is then awake. We therefore speak of all the plants upon the earth as a whole; and this whole is endowed with consciousness.

When we speak of this consciousness, which therefore constitutes a second state of consciousness permeating the earth's mineral consciousness, when we speak of this plant-consciousness; we can really say that in our part of the world this plant-consciousness is asleep during the summer and awake during the dark winter season.

But at this time of the year something else takes place. You see, these two states of consciousness, viz. the whole earth-consciousness pertaining to the mineral kingdom and the whole plant-consciousness are distinct and separate: throughout the year they are two separate beings. Yet they are not ONLY two beings, for they permeate each other, so that one is filled by the other during that time of the year in which we are now living. When the old year passes over into the new year, the mineral objects and processes of the earth and the whole vegetable kingdom have ONE consciousness; that is to say, the two states of consciousness interpenetrate.

Of what kind is the MINERAL consciousness of the earth? To-day, however, we shall not consider its different stages in the same way in which we shall consider the consciousness of the plants, which is awake in the winter and asleep in the summer. What is the characteristic of the mineral consciousness, of the consciousness pertaining to the great being of the earth? Those who only rely upon their physical senses and upon the intellect which they think forms part of the physical senses, cannot know anything of this great consciousness of the earth. But spiritual science teaches us to observe the thoughts of the earth-consciousness, for the earth has thoughts, even as we have thoughts of minerals, plants and animals, of the air, the rivers and mountains. The earth has thoughts, in the same way in which we have thoughts concerning our environment, when we live in our ordinary daytime consciousness. What does the earth think? What thoughts live in its consciousness?

In the consciousness of the earth there are to begin with, thoughts connected with the whole heavenly space pertaining to the earth. Even as our eyes look upon the trees and stones, so the consciousness of the earth looks out into the heavenly spaces and harbours thoughts of all that goes on in the stars. The earth is a being that thinks about the stars and the events connected with them.

The mineral consciousness thus contains the secrets of the whole cosmos in the form of thought. Whereas we human beings walk over the surface of the earth and only think of the stones on our path or of many other things in our surroundings which we perceive through our senses, the earth thinks of the cosmos outside; these are the things which live in the consciousness of the earth, and as we walk through space we pass through the consciousness of the earth. The earth has a far wider consciousness and far greater thoughts than we. And it is really an uplifting thought to know: “As you walk along over the surface of the earth, you do not only pass through its atmosphere, but you pass through the thoughts of the earth.”

Let us now envisage something else—let us consider the consciousness of the plants. You see, plants cannot have great thoughts like those of the earth, for their consciousness, the thinking consciousness of the vegetable world (of the WHOLE vegetable kingdom, not of single plants) is far more limited; throughout the year it embraces a far smaller sphere pertaining to the earth—EXCEPT IN THESE DAYS, for at this time of the year (end of December/early January) the consciousness of the plants permeates the consciousness of the earth. The vegetable kingdom becomes aware of the secrets of the stars, it comprehends the mysteries of the stairs and uses them, so that in the springtime the plants may unfold again and bear blossoms and fruits in accordance with the mysteries of the cosmos. For the whole mystery of the cosmos is contained in the way in which the plants bear leaves, blossoms and fruits.

But while the plants develop their leaves, flowers and fruits they cannot develop thoughts about these processes. They can think of these processes only at this time of the year, when the consciousness of the vegetable world unites with the consciousness of the mineral world.

In spiritual science we therefore say; Two cycles interpenetrate at this time of the year, approximately around New Year's Eve.

The secret of existence consists in the fact that cycles INTERPENETRATE, continue their development separately and again interpenetrate. How wonderful is this secret of life! Two streams of development—the vegetable consciousness and the mineral consciousness, which take their course separately throughout the year, unite when one year passes over into the next. Then they develop separately until the end of the year when they unite once more. This constitutes the cyclic course of history.

Let us now pass over from this mystery, which can fill us with a deep, sacred feeling of reverence for the secret of the transition of one annual cycle into the next, let us now pass over to a still greater mystery. You know that we are living in the cycle which is connected with the development of the Consciousness-soul, which was preceded by the cycle connected with the development of the Understanding or Intellectual soul and by the cycle connected with the Sentient soul? If we go back still further, we come to the development of the Sentient Body. This leads us to the year 5000 B.C., when all human thinking developed under the influence of the sentient body, the so-called astral body.

In the course of human evolution we shall have to pass through the consciousness soul, the Spirit-Self, and still higher stages of development.

At the present time the consciousness-soul develops chiefly through the fact that the human being only uses his physical body as an instrument of perception. This brought us to the present; climax of materialism (we dealt with this in other lectures), for we use above all our physical body. But a time will come when we shall not only use the physical body, but also the etheric body, even as we once used our astral body, during the epoch of human development when the astral body supplied the chief foundation of consciousness.

We may therefore say: Once upon a time we lived upon the earth in such a way that our soul passed through a phase in which its consciousness contacted with the consciousness of our astral body. Even as at the end of the year the plants' consciousness passes through the. mineral consciousness, so thousands of years ago our soul passed through our astral body, through the consciousness pertaining to our astral body. At that time, the consciousness of our soul and the consciousness of our astral body were one. This leads us back thousands of years, to the year 6000 B.C. When this state of consciousness began, humanity on earth celebrated a new year, a great cosmic new year. Even as the new year now brings with it a union of the consciousness of the plants with the consciousness of the minerals, so 6000 years before our Christian ere marked the beginning of a new cosmic year upon the earth. It was a great cosmic new year! Our soul's consciousness then passed Through the astral consciousness. of our body.

What took place at that time? At that time, 6000 years B.C., when our inner soul-consciousness passed through the astral consciousness of our body, our limited human consciousness, such as we have it now, extended as far as the consciousness of the plants at New Year. Even as the plant looks out into the heavenly spaces, through the fact that its consciousness unites with the mineral consciousness, so 6000 years B.C. the human being saw and perceived an extensive field of wisdom, during that ancient cosmic NEW YEAR, when his soul united with the astral body.

From that time comes the lost wisdom (we spoke of this a few. days ago), the gnostic wisdom which disappeared. We must look for the origin of this wisdom in the cosmic New Year about 6000 years before our era. This, is the source from which Zarathustra drew his knowledge; it is the wisdom that illumined the Gnostics with its last rays, but as already explained, only a few traces of this gnostic wisdom have remained to us. It is the winter of the earth, but at the same time a cosmic new year of the earth, to which we go back.

Now add about 4000 years to the time which has passed since the founding of Christianity; this will bring us to a time when we shall again pass through our astral consciousness, but upon a higher stage. Our soul will again pass through our astral consciousness, through a cosmic star-consciousness. Let us prepare ourselves for this event, so that it may not find us unprepared.

Let us prepare ourselves for this Cosmic New Year! By preparing ourselves for the Christmas Festival, as explained during one of my last lectures, we prepare ourselves in the right way for the Cosmic New Year. If the birth of spiritual knowledge lives within us as a sacred Christmas feeling, we prepare ourselves in the right way for the new Cosmic New Year, which begins 12,000 years after the old cosmic year.

Twelve months of the year pass by from the union of the earth's vegetable consciousness with the mineral consciousness, to another union. Twelve thousands of years pass by from one Cosmic New Year to the other Cosmic New Year of the earth, from one passage of the human soul through the astral world to a new passage of the human soul through the astral world.

In this solemn hour, we thus look from the new year upon a small scale to the New Year upon a great cosmic scale, from the ordinary New Year's Eve to the cosmic New Year's Eve, for which we prepare ourselves if we try to perceive in the very midst of winter the light which only streams towards us, as inhabitants of the earth, during a cosmic New Year. Then it comes to us in a natural, elemental way.

We really see the world in its true light if we perceive the surrounding world not only in the way in which it appears to our senses, not only in accordance with a materialistic mentality, but if we look upon the external physical world as a symbol for the great mysteries of the cosmos.

The approach of New Year's Eve may therefore appear to us like the approach of a messenger from the spiritual world, revealing to us the mysteries connected with the end of the year and bringing us the following message:

“Behold, in the midst of the dark cold winter season the vegetable consciousness unites with the mineral consciousness of the earth. Let this be a sign to you that the earth too has its own cycle, namely the great cosmic year mentioned by Zarathustra, which goes from one Cosmic New Year's Eve to the other, and which we must understand if we wish to grasp the course of human development.”

Zarathustra speaks of twelve thousands of years, the twelve thousand years mentioned just now. He described the course of one Earthly Year, and divided it into four seasons representing the course of human evolution upon the earth. This is deeply rooted in the spiritual mysteries.

Let us fill our hearts and souls with a festive, earnest feeling, born out of a deeper comprehension of our spiritual science. Let us unfold within our heart that inner warmth which can be felt when in the midst of the cold winter night we hear the message of the Sun-Spirit's descent to the earth and then learn to know the mystery of the year's course.

The thirteen days from the 24th of December to the 6th of January are the days in which the plants' consciousness unites with the mineral consciousness. If the human being can transfer himself into the consciousness of the plants, he can see and dream of many mysteries which pass through his heart in many forms—he can have dreams such as that of Olaf Åsteson.

If we develop such feelings and moods, we obtain the right attitude towards the aims of our spiritual knowledge; these warm feelings which stream through our heart are a preparation for the New Cosmic Year, and they enable us to await it worthily, to look forward to that cosmic New Year's Eve which brings a new cosmic year. In future incarnations, when our souls will pass through the great Cosmic New Year, we shall experience it in the right way if the end of the year which closes the small cycle of twelve months becomes a symbol for the great end of the year which closes a cycle of twelve thousand years.

This is the secret of our existence. The things which take place upon a small scale always correspond to the things which take place upon a large scale, and upon a large scale the things are the same as upon a small scale. The small scale, the course of one year, can only be grasped if it becomes a symbol for the great cosmic course, for the cycle which encompasses thousands of years.

The year is an image for the Aeons. And Aeons are the reality of symbols which we encounter in the course of one year. If we really understand the year's course, our hearts will be deeply moved toy the mysteries of the cosmos, at this time of the year which marks the beginning of a new year. Let us try to attune our soul so that it can look into the new year conscious of the fact that it can bear within it the year's course as a symbol for the great COSMIC course, which encompasses all the mysteries pursued, by spiritual Beings who surge and weave through the universe from aeon to aeon, in the same way in which the Lesser Gods pursue the mysteries connected with the development of the vegetable and mineral Kingdoms during the course of one year.

On New Year's Eve it is always fitting to remember how past and future are linked together in life and in the existence of the world, how past and future are linked in the whole life of the Cosmos of which man is a part, how past and future are linked in every fraction of that life with which our own individual existence is connected, is interwoven through all that we were able to do and to think during the past year, and through all that we are able to plan for the coming year.

The thoughts which, almost in answer to an inward need, we call up before our souls in reviewing what we have done during the past year, and what we intend to do next year, should be pervaded with adequate earnestness and dignity, in accordance with the spirit of Anthroposophical Spiritual Science, so that we may illumine these thoughts with the Higher Light which we can receive from Spiritual Science, through contemplation of the great Cosmic events. How does this human life of ours stand with regard to past and future? It is like a mirror. Indeed, comparison with a mirror approaches reality far more than it may seem to do at first. Striving a little to attain self-knowledge is indeed like standing before a mirror. We stand, looking into a mirror and there in that mirror lies the past, of which we know its reflection is in the mirror. Behind the mirror lies that into which at first we cannot look, just as it is not possible to see in space, what lies behind a mirror. Perhaps the question should be raised here: What is it that corresponds in our world-mirror to the silver covering at the back which turns the transparent glass into a mirror? In the ordinary mirror the glass is coated behind so that we cannot see through it. What constitutes the coating of the world-mirror that reflects the past for us, and at first keeps the future hidden from our gaze? The world-mirror is coated with our own being, with our own human being. We have only to bear in mind that with the usual means of knowledge we are really unable to see ourselves, to see what we ourselves are. We cannot see through ourselves, we see through ourselves just as little as we see through a mirror. When we look into ourselves, many things are mirrored back to us, things which we have experienced, things which we have learnt; but our own being remains hidden from us, because we can see through ourselves at first just as little as we can see through an ordinary mirror. Looking at the matter generally, or I might say, in the abstract, we may consider this comparison with a mirror as I have just described it. But when we come to details modifications are needed. Trying to look back on our life through this mirroring process (for looking back on our life, on what our inner soul reflects, is a mirroring process), we must confess: What we see mirrored there, is only a part of our experiences. When you try to look back on your experiences, you will find that these experiences are continually subject to interruptions. You look back on what the day has brought you; but you do not look back on what the preceding night has brought you. The experiences of the night are an interruption. You look back on yesterday, you do not look back on the night before yesterday, and so on. Stretches of nighttime, not filled in by thoughts upon our experiences, are continually inserting themselves. It is an illusion to think that we survey our entire life when looking back upon it; we only piece together to some extent, what the days contain. In reality, the course of our life comes before us with continual interruptions.

We might now ask: Are these interruptions in the course of our life necessary? Yes, they are necessary. Were there no such interruptions in the course of our life, or, to speak more correctly, in the retrospection upon our life's course, then, as human beings, we should be quite unable to perceive our Ego. We should see the course of our life filled merely by the world outside, and in our life there would be no ego-consciousness at all. That we are able to experience, to feel our Ego, depends on the fact that our life's course is continually being broken up piece-wise. It is precisely with respect to this ego-perception, brought about by interruptions in the course of life, that present-day humanity faces a critical period. When a human being of today looks back on life and, as has just been explained, attains his Ego through this looking back, this Ego of present-day man is, in a certain respect, empty, we only know that we have an Ego. In earlier periods of earth evolution men knew more. Just as in ordinary daily life, the dreams of an individual dimly emerge out of his nightly experiences, so the clairvoyant-atavistic perceptions of the human beings of earlier periods emerged out of the Ego. These clairvoyant-atavistic perceptions were dreams only in their form; what they contained was reality. We may say: The Ego of present-day man has been emptied of the clairvoyant-atavistic content which was the support of men of past ages, permeating them with the conviction that they had something in common with a divine element, that they were connected with something divine. Out of these atavistic-clairvoyant visions, there arose in man's sentient life that which condensed into religious feeling and religious veneration towards those beings to whom religious cult and religious sacrifice were dedicated. How does the case stand today? Today the Ego is empty of these atavistic-clairvoyant visions, and when we look back on the Ego it is more or less only a point in our soul-life. The content of this Ego is a firm point of support, but it is nevertheless only a point. Now, however, we are living in an age in which the point must again become a circle, an age in which the Ego must again receive a content. Since the last third of the nineteenth century, the Spiritual World has made a mighty inroad into our Sense-world, in order that the Ego may again receive a content. This is why, ever since the seventies of the nineteenth century, the Spiritual World has willed to re-enter our physical existence through revelations in a new way. What we are striving for in Anthroposophical Spiritual Science is this: To receive with goodwill all that is seeking to enter through spiritual revelation from another world—from a world, however, which bears within it this world of ours—and to clothe these revelations in terms by which they can be communicated to man. These revelations are nothing less than that which definitely (in a certain respect) guarantees the future of mankind. It is not, indeed, a direct glance behind the mirror, but it is a guarantee for this, viz., that when we as human beings, hasten to meet the future i.e., hasten to step behind the mirror—which means facing the future—then that which we have to do in the future will be able to come to pass in full power, if we have first tested our forces, if we have first strengthened them through that, which, by means of Spiritual Science, reveals itself to us out of the Spiritual World.

Just as in the past, man's Ego was filled with an atavistic clairvoyant content, which guaranteed his connection with the divine, so today our Ego must be filled with a new spiritual content, received in full consciousness, a content which gives us again the link uniting our soul with the divine Soul-being. The men of the past possessed an atavistic clairvoyance. The last inheritance of this atavistic clairvoyance is abstract reflection, the abstract power of cognition possessed by modern men. It is a much diluted remnant of the early clairvoyance. The man of today can feel that this dilution, this logical dialectic dilution of a former atavistic clairvoyance, is no longer able to support his soul. Then the longing will arise within him to receive something new into his Ego. But that which has formed the end in the evolution of mankind from primeval times up to the present, must now be made the beginning. In olden times, man had clairvoyant revelations and did not understand them. Today man must first understand, must exert to the utmost his intellectual power, must exert to the utmost his reason. If he so exerts it through that which lies before him in Spiritual Science, then mankind will again develop the power of receiving the Spiritual clairvoyantly. This is certainly something that most people today wish to avoid, viz., to make use of their healthy human reason in order to understand Spiritual Science. Were it possible to avoid the use of man's reason, it would also be possible to avoid altogether the entrance of spiritual revelations into our earthly world.

Thus past and future are linked together on this New Year's Eve, this Cosmic New Year's Day. For today, what is impending is indeed a kind of Cosmic New Year's Day. The future stands before us as a formidable question, not an indefinite abstract question, but as a concrete question. How can we approach that which, as a question put to mankind, in the form of a spiritual revelation, is striving more and more since the last third of the nineteenth century, to enter our earthly world? And how are we to place it in relation to revelations of the past? These questions should be livingly experienced. Then we should feel how important it is to direct our longings towards that which is presented here as Anthroposophical Spiritual Science. Then we should realize the earnestness and the dignity of the striving for Spiritual Science. It is especially needful to have this feeling at the present time. For we are not dealing with any kind of arbitrary human will (“Willkur”); we are dealing with something that as Cosmic knowledge wills to reveal itself to us from out of the world's evolution; we are dealing in very truth with what the gods will to make of man. But here we are faced with the fact that when we on the one hand turn towards the spirit, on the other hand those who wish only to worship the past, are drawn away by the Spirit of contradiction, by the Spirit of opposition. And the more we try with all our might to grasp the spirit of the future state of man, the more surely will the people of the past be possessed by the spirit of opposition. It is to be noticed among people of today that religious feeling is seeking to assume new life. Groping attempts are numerous. The attempts of Spiritual Science must not be groping. Through such attempts the real, concrete world of the Spirit ought to be grasped. Almost like a premonition of what it ought to be, we are faced by those who say: “Mere religious tradition is not enough for us; we want to have an inner religious experience, we do not only want to hear the message that, according to tradition, Christ lived and died in Palestine so many, or so many years ago—we want to experience in our souls the Christ-experience.” In many quarters we find such ideas arising among men, among people who believe that something of the Christ-experience has arisen in the depths of their souls.

These are groping attempts, often even questionable attempts, because at the same time people are content in the egoism of their soul, and then turn away from all inclination to the Spirit. These longings after inner spiritual experience are there nevertheless, and even groping attempts towards such inner spiritual experience, towards a new interest in the spiritual world, should be recognized. But the spirit of opposition will surely arise.

To judge by what he himself has printed, such a representative of the spirit of the past has recently uttered quite remarkable words at Stuttgart, contrasting attempts, groping attempts, to rouse a new religious interest, a new religious experience, with attempts to reach a really new concrete knowledge of the spiritual world, as in the case of Anthroposophical Spiritual Science. In the Shepherd-Play, performed at the Waldorf School, one of the shepherds, who has had a spiritual vision, says that he very nearly lost his power of speech. When I read the last page of Gogarten's Spiritual Science and Christianity, I must say that I very nearly lost my power of speech, for it is indeed surprising that anyone should say such things in the present age. It is things such as this that, on the Cosmic New Year's Eve, should stimulate contemplation of the comparison of the past with the inevitable future. What does this representative of religion really say? I do not know if the full import has been realized. He says: “Today—I ought to say at all times—the chief task is to safeguard the elementary feeling of piety of which I have spoken. It is almost wholly lacking today. We are occupied with religious ‘interests’ with religious ‘experiences’. Since Anthroposophy provides such good material for ‘interest’, and is such a good medium for ‘experiences’, people are helpless and without power of resistance when they meet it. People know even less of that fundamental, elementary bond, the bond brought into life by piety, which drives away every religious ‘interest’, and scatters every religious ‘experience’, the bond between God and creature. And because man knows little of this bond, he knows still less of that other bond, the unconditioned direct union between God and man.”

Here in the name of religion we see every religious interest repudiated, every religious experience scattered. A wholly undefined “bond” which cannot of course be differentiated, and which the speaker does not wish to differentiate, takes the place of religious interest, and of religious experience. We do indeed lose our power of speech when a teacher of religion says: “True piety must drive away every religious interest and scatter every religious experience.” We have gone so far that we are unable to realize what it means when an official representative of religion says: “Away with religious interest! Away with religious experience!” You see, apart from the fact that Gogarten does not know that he himself would be quite unable to speak of religion at all, if in the past there had never been atavistic religious interests and religious experience; apart from the fact that he as official representative of religion, could never have stood before an audience had not religion entered into the evolution of mankind, through religious interest and religious experience; apart from all this, everything I have told you just now proves what I told you before, that in the present day the very people who consider themselves the true representatives of religious life, work for the destruction of all that is essential in religion. Have these men lost every possibility of understanding what pertains to the human soul? Can these men no longer understand that when man turns his attention to anything, attention is guided by interest, and that everything entering the consciousness of man is based on experience? It seems as if human beings no longer speak from such consciousness at all, but only from a spirit of opposition. We should bear this in mind in all seriousness when we look into the mirror which so mysteriously unveils the past and conceals the future—though in a certain way the mirror unveils the future, too, in the way I have described.

It is the aim of Anthroposophical Spiritual Science to serve religious interest, and to give a content to religious experience. With what result? In the course of this year (1919) the question was brought forward before the Holy Roman Congregation whether the teaching that is termed theosophical is in keeping with the teaching of the Catholic Church, and whether it is permissible to belong to theosophical societies, to attend theosophical meetings, and to read theosophical papers and periodicals. The answer was: “No”, in every case, No, “in omnibus”. This is the spirit of opposition, of contradiction, and the Jesuit Zimmermann interprets it more particularly by applying this veto of the Holy Roman Congregation to Anthroposophy also. I need not set Zimmermann's writings before you in detail. You all know the wind that blows from a certain quarter against Anthroposophical Spiritual Science, and that it is the breath of the Spirit of contradiction. The Spirit carried in this wind can be felt in the following words, penned by that same Zimmermann, who for years spread abroad the lie that I was a renegade priest: “Through the defection of their General Secretary, Dr. Rudolf Steiner, who took along with him most of the members, the Theosophical Society picked up again to some extent in the course of years, and now owns about twenty-five lodges, one-fifth of which are certainly somewhat dormant, and publishes at Dusseldorf, as its official organ, Das Theosophische Streben (The Theosophic Endeavour). The followers of Steiner, who named his theosophy ‘Anthroposophy’ after his exit, complained recently that he was becoming unproductive, that he had no new ‘visions’, that he always lectures upon the same things, that he would soon have to throw himself into something new, etc.” This paves the way for another article dealing in the same intelligent fashion with the “Threefold Social Organism”. You see what Spirit of truth backs up this Jesuit? A Jesuit does not merely represent his personal opinion, but the opinion of the Catholic Church. He speaks only as a member of the Catholic Church. What he says represents the opinion of the Catholic Church. We must judge such things from a moral point of view. We must ask whether anyone who deals with truth as this man does—a man, moreover, held in high esteem by a particular religious community, can be held in high esteem by the true spirit of humanity.

As long as questions of this kind are not considered with due earnestness, we have not arrived at the right understanding of the Cosmic New Year's Eve. At the present moment, it is essential to reach this right understanding. It is essential for us to extend our sympathies—alas, our sympathies often arise from egoistic sources—to the great human relations, and to feel for the whole of mankind that human sympathy which impels us to make a spiritual movement like this effectively fruitful for the evolution of mankind. May you experience, my dear friends, at this very time, that it is the Spirit of the Cosmos itself, which for decades has been seeking entrance. May you experience during the coming night, that this Spirit which seeks to enter humanity, shall here so be served that the souls of those, who will to feel with and who will to think with Anthroposophical Spiritual Science, may feel their union with this new Spirit which wills to enter the world—the Spirit which alone can bring to the earthly world, the world that is destroying itself—the new upbuilding impulse out of Heaven. In this hour, a symbolic hour every year, demanding that we experience it as the decisive hour between past and future—in this hour may you unite your souls with the new Spirit; may you so experience in your souls the contact of the past year with the coming year, that the Cosmic Year which is passing away, may contact itself with the dawning Cosmic Year.

But the passing Cosmic Year will still send many an after-effect into the future; destructive forces into the spheres of Spirit, of Equity, of Economics. Therefore it is all the more needful, that as many men as possible shall be seized in the innermost depths of their souls by the New Year of the Spiritual Future, and shall develop a Will which may be the foundation of a new spiritual world, a world to be built into the future evolution of mankind. Those who care for the future of mankind are not those who would kill religious interest, who would do away with religious experience, but those only, those alone who can see how, through the intellectuality of our age, the old religious interest has faded away, the old religious life has been crippled. Those only care for the future, who see how a new interest must seize mankind, how new religious experience must spring up in mankind, so that man may bring into the Cosmos new germs for a future existence.

[ 1 ] Michael's intervention in the evolution of the world and of mankind, at the end of the nineteenth century, appears in a remarkable illumination, if we consider the history of spiritual life in the centuries that went before.

[ 2 ] In the early fifteenth century lies the moment from which the epoch of the spiritual Soul first begins.

[ 3 ] Previous to this moment, a great change may be seen taking place in the spiritual life of mankind. One can trace how everywhere, previously, Imaginations played through all men's outlook on the world. Particular persons, it is true, have, before this, already arrived in their soul's life so far as bare ‘concepts.’ But the general soul-life of the majority of mankind goes on in a mutual intermingling of Imaginations and of mental conceptions drawn from the purely physical world. It is so with their conceptions about processes of nature, and also with their conceptions of events in history.

[ 4 ] What spiritual observation can discover in this direction is in every way confirmed by external testimony. A few instances may be mentioned here.

[ 5 ] The tales of historical events, which had lived in the minds and mouths of men during the preceding centuries, began to be written down just before the Age of Consciousness.^t1 And thus we have preserved from that period ‘legends’ and such things, which give a faithful portrayal of the manner in which men pictured ‘history’ to themselves in the times before.

[ 6 ] A beautiful example is the Tale of the Good Gerard, preserved in a poem by Rudolf of Ems, who lived in the first half of the thirteenth century. ‘Good Gerard’ is a rich merchant of Cologne. He sets out on a trading expedition to Russia, Livonia and Prussia, to buy sables. Thence he goes on to Damascus and Nineveh, to procure silks and similar merchandise.

[ 7 ] On the homeward journey he is driven out of his course by a tempest. He is thrown upon a strange shore, where he makes acquaintance with a man who is keeping prisoner certain English knights and also the bride of the English king. Gerard offers him everything that he has gained by trade upon his journey, and receives the prisoners in return. He takes them on board his ship and sets out on his journey home. When the ships come to where the ways part, one way to Gerard's country and the other to England, Gerard dismisses the men-prisoners and sends them on their way to their own country. The king's bride he keeps with him, in the hope that her betrothed, King William, will come and fetch her, as soon as he hears that she is free and where she is dwelling. The bride-queen and the ladies of her company are treated by Gerard with all conceivable kindness. She lives as a well-loved daughter in the house of him who has redeemed her from captivity. A long, long time goes by, without the king's appearing to fetch her. At last, in order to secure the future of his foster daughter, Gerard resolves to marry her to his own son; for it seem reasonable to believe that William is dead. The wedding feast is already in full train, when an unknown pilgrim appears amongst them. It is William. He had been long wandering about, seeking for his betrothed bride. She is restored to him, after Gerard's son has unselfishly resigned her. Both remain for a while still with Gerard; and then he fits out a ship to take them to England. Gerard is the first to be seen and welcomed in England by his former prisoners—all now attained to high dignities, and they at once want to choose him for their king. But he can tell them in reply that he is bringing them their own rightful king and queen. For they too had believed William to be dead, and were about to choose another king to rule the country, where everything had fallen to into confusion during the long time that William had been on his wanderings. The merchant of Cologne rejects everything they offer him in the way of honours and riches; and returns to Cologne, to live again as the simple merchant that he was before.

The story is couched in the form that the Saxon Emperor, Otto the First, journeys to Cologne to make the acquaintance of Good Gerard. For the powerful emperor in much that he has done, has not escaped the temptation of looking for an ‘earthly reward.’ Through acquaintance with Gerard, there is brought keenly home to him, by example, the untold good done by a plain man: The sacrifice of all the merchandise he had acquired, in order to set prisoners free; the restoration of his son's bride to William; and then all that he performs in order to bring William back to England, and so on—without coveting any earthly reward whatever in return, but looking for his reward from the hand of God alone. In the mouths of the people the man goes by the name of ‘the good Gerard.’ The Emperor feels that he has received a powerful spur, religiously and morally, through acquaintance with a man so minded as Gerard.

[ 8 ] This story—of which I have here given the bare outline, so as not merely to allude by name to something little known—shows from one aspect very distinctly what was the constitution of men's souls in the age that preceded the dawning of the Spiritual Soul in human evolution. [ 9 ] Anyone who lets the story, as told by Rudolf of Ems, work within him, can feel what a change has taken place in men's realization of the earthly world since the days when Emperor Otto lives (in the tenth century.)

[ 10 ] Looking thence to the age of the Spiritual Soul, we may see how the world has grown as it were ‘clear’ to the vision of men's souls, in respect of their grasp of physical entities and physical processes. Gerard sails with his ships, so to speak, through a mist. He only knows, each time, one little bit of the world with which he has to do. In Cologne, one learns nothing of what is happening in England; and one must go for years in search of a man who is in Cologne. The life and possessions of such a person as the man on whose shore Gerard is cast on his homeward voyage, first become known to one when Fate carries one directly to the spot. Compared to the perspicuity of the world's circumstances to-day, that of those days is like the difference between gazing over a broad, sunny landscape, and groping in a dense mist.

[ 11 ] With anything that to-day is accounted ‘historic’ the Tale of Good Gerard and the circumstances narrated in it have nothing whatever to do. But all the more do they shew the general tone of feeling and the whole state of mind of the age. And this, not the particular occurrences of the physical world, is depicted in Imaginations.

[ 12 ] The picture so drawn reflects Man's feeling that he is not merely a being who in all his life and actions is simply a link in the chain of events in the physical world, turned men's eyes to the beholding of the spiritual world. They did not see into the length and breadth of physical existence; but all the more they saw into the depths of spiritual existence.

[ 13 ] The tale of Good Gerard shews how the twilight haze which preceded the age of the Spiritual Soul as regards the perspective of the physical world, turned men's eyes to the beholding of the spiritual world. They did not see into the length and breadth of physical existence; but all the more they saw into the depths of spiritual existence.

[ 14 ] But as once it had been, when in their dim dreamlike clairvoyance men had looked into the spiritual world, it was now no more, in the age of which we are speaking. The Imaginations were there, but the apprehension they met with in the human soul was one already strongly tending towards the intellectual form of thought. The result was that people no longer knew how the world which reveals itself in Imaginations is related to the world of outer physical existence. And therefore, to people who adhered with more penetration to the intellectual form of thought, the Imaginations appeared to be free ‘fictions,’ with no actual reality.

[ 15 ] People no longer knew that through Imaginations men look into a world in which they dwell with quite another part of their being than in the physical world. And so, in the descriptions, both worlds are portrayed side by side; and both, from the style of the narration wear such a character, that one might well think that the spiritual events described had taken place alongside the physical ones, as visibly as the physical events themselves.

[ 16 ] Moreover, in many of these stories, the physical events themselves were confounded together. Persons whose lives lay hundreds of years apart appear on the scene as contemporaries. Actual events are transferred to wrong places or wrong times. [ 17 ] Facts of the physical world are looked at by the human soul in a way in which one can only look at things of the spirit, for which time and space have another meaning than they have for physical things. The physical world is described in Imaginations, instead of in thoughts. And, in return, the spiritual world is woven into the story as though one had to do, not with a quite other form of existence, but with a continuation of the physical facts.

[ 18 ] The history which holds solely to physical interpretations of everything, thinks that the old Imaginations from the East, from Greece, etc. were taken over, and woven poetically into the historical material which interested people at the time. In the writings of Isidore of Seville (7^th century A.D.) there was indeed a regular collection of old stories and legendary ‘motifs.’

[ 19 ] But this is a surface view of the matter. It can have a value only for one who has no sense of that other form of human soul-life, which knows itself and its own external existence to be in direct touch with the spiritual world, and feels impelled to express in Imaginations what thus it knows. And if then, instead of the narrator's own ‘Imagination,’ he uses one that has been handed down in history and which he has made his own by familiarity, this is not the essential feature; the essential feature is, that the soul's whole orientation is towards the spiritual world, so that the soul sees her own doings and all the proceedings of Nature interwoven with this spiritual world.

[ 20 ] There is, however, a certain confusion observable in the style of narrative in the period just before the dawn of the Spiritual Soul.

[ 21 ] In this confusion, when viewed with spiritual understandings, may be seen the actions of the Luciferic Powers. [ 22 ] The impulse which makes the soul adopt Imaginations into her personal store of life-experience, corresponds less with the faculties that she possessed in primeval times—through dream-like clairvoyance—and more with those already in existence in the eighth to the fourteenth centuries. These later faculties were already impelling the soul more towards a thinking interpretation of what was perceived through the senses. The soul is placed betwixt the two: betwixt the old orientation—where all turns upon the spiritual world, and the physical world is only seen as in a mist—and the new orientation, where all turns upon physical proceedings, and spiritual vision has grown dim.

[ 23 ] Into this unstable balance in the human soul is thrown the Luciferic influence. The Luciferic Powers want to prevent Man from coming to a complete orientation in the physical world. They want to keep him with his consciousness in spiritual regions that were suited to him in primeval times. They want to keep his dream-like, imaginative world-vision from the influence of that pure thinking which is trained to the understanding of physical existence. They are able indeed, in a wrong way, to keep back his powers of vision from the physical world; but they are not able, in a right way, to keep alive his power of realizing the old Imaginations. And so they leave him musing in Imaginations, without being able quite to transport him in soul into those worlds, where Imaginations have real validity. [ 24 ] The effect of Lucifer's influence, in the first beginning of the Age of the Spiritual Soul, is to transport Man out of the physical world into the supersensible one that lies just on its borders.

[ 25 ] This may be seen clearly illustrated in the Legend of Duke Earnest, which was one of the favourite stories of the Middle Ages, and circulated far and wide:

[ 26 ] Duke Earnest comes into conflict with the Emperor; and the emperor makes war unjustly upon him, to destroy him. To escape these impossible relations with the head of the empire, Duke Earnest sees himself obliged to join the crusade which is on its way to the East. In the various adventures that now befall him before his journey reaches its end, physical things and spiritual things are interwoven in the ‘legendary’ style above described. The duke, for instance, comes on his journey to a race of men with heads like cranes. He is cast with his vessels upon the ‘Magnetic Mountain,’ which attracts all ships by its magnetic power, so that people who come into the neighbourhood of the mountain cannot get away again, but are bound to perish miserably. Duke Earnest and his followers manage to escape by sewing themselves into skins and letting themselves be carried off by griffins, who are used to come down and prey upon the people who have been cast on the Magnetic Mountain. They are carried to a mountain top; and there, whilst the griffins are away, they cut themselves out of the skins and so escape. After further wanderings, they come to a people whose ears are so long that they can wrap them round their whole body like a coat; and then to another race of people with such big feet that when it rains they lie down on the ground and spread their feet over them like umbrellas. They come to a race of dwarfs, a race of giants, and so on. A great deal of this kind comes into the tale, as part of Duke Earnest's adventures upon his crusade. This ‘legend’ does not let one feel—in the way one should, wherever ‘Imaginations’ come in—that here the story is passing into a spiritual sphere, telling in pictures of things that are going on in the astral world and have a connection with the wills and the fate of the people upon earth.

[ 27 ] It is the same with the fine ‘Story of Roland,’ which celebrates Charlemagne's expedition against the heathens of Spain. Here it is even narrated, in analogy with the bible, that in order to enable Charlemagne to reach a desired place the sun stays its course, so that this one day is as long as an ordinary two.

[ 28 ] And, in the Saga of the Niebelung, one can see how the form of the story preserved in Northern countries has maintained the vision of the Spiritual in much greater purity; whereas in Middle Europe the Imaginations have been brought very close to physical life. The form of the Northern legends expresses clearly that the Imaginations have reference to an ‘astral world.’ In its Mid-European form, the ‘Niebelungen Lied,’ the Imaginations glide over into the views of the physical one.

[ 29 ] Those imaginations too, which come into the Legend of Duke Earnest, have in reality to do with experiences that are realised, between the adventures on the physical plane, in an ‘astral world’, to which Man as much belongs as to the physical one.

[ 30 ] All this, examined with the eye of the spirit, shows that the entrance into the Age of Consciousness means growing out of a phase of evolution in which the Luciferic Powers would be victorious over mankind, if the Spiritual Soul with its intellectual power did not bring a new strain of evolution into Mans being. That tendency to take their whole orientation from the spiritual world, by which men are confused and led astray, finds its check in the Spiritual Soul; men's gaze is drawn out into the physical world. All that takes place in this direction helps to withdraw mankind from the bewildering influence of Lucifer.

[ 31 ] In all this, Michael is already working from out of the spiritual world on Man's behalf. From the region above the senses he is preparing his work for later. He gives to mankind impulses which conserve the primeval relation to the divine-spiritual world, without this conservation assuming a Luciferic character.

[ 32 ] Then, in the last third of the nineteenth century, Michael pushes forward, and carries his action—which from the fourteenth to the nineteenth century has gone on preparatorily from the supersensible region—into the physical earth-world itself.

[ 33 ] It was necessary, for a while, that mankind should pursue their spiritual evolution in the direction of freeing themselves from a relation to the spiritual world which was threatening to become impossible. Subsequently, this evolution turned again, through Michael's mission, into paths which bring human progress upon earth once more into a relation with the spiritual world in which Man can find health and wholeness.

[ 34 ] So Michael stands, in his working, between the World-Picture of Lucifer, and the World-Understanding of Ahriman. The World-Picture turns, with Michael, to wisdom of itself as divine World-Working. And in this World-Working lives the care of Christ for mankind, which can thus disclose itself through Michael's World-Revelation to the human heart.

Leading Thoughts

[ 35 ] The dawn of the Age of Consciousness (age of the Spiritual Soul) in the 15^th century is preceded, in the evening of the age of the Intellectual or Mind-Soul, by an enhancement of Luciferic activity, which lasts on for a while into the new period.

[ 36 ] The aim of this Luciferic activity is unrightfully to preserve old forms of mentally picturing the world, and to keep Man back from using the intellect to comprehend the physical life of the world and make himself familiar with it.

[ 37 ] Michael unites himself with Man's activity, in order that the emancipated power of the intellect may abide by its divine, spiritual parentage, not in a Luciferic but in a rightful way.

• t1. Footnote by translator. In this and in several of the following Letters, the phrase ‘Age of Consciousness’ (Bewusstseins-Zeitalter) is often used synonymously with ‘Age of the Consciousness-Soul or spiritual Soul’ (Zeitalter der Bewusstseins-Seele)—compare what is said of this in the Preface.

In Lucifer's kingdom. A space which is not enclosed by artificial walls, but by fantastic forms which resemble plants, animals, etc. All in various brilliant shades of red. In the background are arranged three transparencies showing the top of Raphael's ‘Disputa,’ Leonardo's ‘Last Supper,’ and Raphael's ‘School of Athens.’ These are illuminated from the back of the stage whenever Maria or Benedictus challenges Lucifer. At other times they are invisible. On the right, Lucifer's throne. At first only the souls of Capesius and Maria are present. After a time Lucifer appears, and later on Benedictus and Thomasius, with his etheric counterpart or ‘double,’ and lastly, Theodora.

Maria:
Thou, who within the realm of sense art named
Capesius, ...
Art thou the being whom I meet the first
In Lucifer's domain: 'tis dangerous
To feel and breathe the spirit of this place.

Capesius (in astral garb):
O speak not to me of Capesius
Who in the kingdom of the Earth erewhile
Strove through a life which he hath long since known
Was but a dream. Whilst there he bent his mind
Upon such things as ever come to pass
As time streams on. And he had set himself
In that way to discover all the powers
Through which mankind fulfils its spirit-life.
What thus he came to know about those powers
He tried to keep deep fastened in his soul.
Now only in this realm one understands
To judge aright the knowledge he pursued.
He thought the pictures he possessed were true
And could reveal to him reality;
But, viewed from here, they clearly show themselves
As naught but empty dreams, which Spirit-hands
Have woven round about weak men of Earth.
They cannot bear the cold clear light of truth.
They would be utterly afraid and stunned
If they should learn how all the course of life
Is turned by spirits after their ideas.

Maria:
Thou speakest as I've only heard those speak
Who ne'er have been incarnate on the Earth.
They tell you Earth hath no significance,
That in the universe its work is small.
But he who hath belonged to realms of Earth
And owes to it the best powers that he hath,
Will have a different tale to tell thereof.
He finds important many threads of fate
Which bind Earth's life to that of all the worlds.
E'en Lucifer who works here with such power
Must keep his gaze fixed fast upon the Earth,
And seek to turn men's deeds in such a way
That their results may ripen his own soul.
He knows he'd fall a victim to the dark
If he could find no booty on the Earth,
And so his fate is bound up with that sphere.
So too, with those who dwell in other worlds.
And when the human soul can clearly see
The cosmic goal, which Lucifer desires,
And can compare with it what those powers wish
Who have him as opponent to their aims,
Then will it know that he can be destroyed
Through conquests which it gains o'er its own self.

Capesius:
The human being who here talks with thee
Thinks that fate dreadful, which compels him now
To wear a body round him; which hath yet
The breath of life and keeps its earthly form,
Although the spirit hath no more control.
At such a time this spirit feels indeed
That worlds, he values, fall at one fierce blow.
He feels himself within a prison-house
Narrow and horrible with naught all round.
Remembrance of the life that he passed through
Seems, as it were, extinguished from his soul.
At times he feels aware of human souls,
But what they say he cannot understand;
He only catches some especial words
Which lift themselves from out the general talk,
And bring remembrance of the loveliness
Which he can gaze on in the Spirit-realms.
He's in his body then, and yet is not;
He lives within that frame a life he fears
When he beholds it from this region here:
And he is longing for the time to come
When from the body he will be set free.

Maria:
The body which is proper to Earth-souls
Bears in itself the means to recreate
In lofty pictures loveliness sublime:
Which pictures, even if their substance now
Seems but a shadow in the human soul,
Are yet the buds which in the future worlds
Will open out to blossom and to fruit.
So through his body man may serve the gods.
And his soul's life doth show in its true light
Only when in his body he doth find
The power to give his “I” reality.

Capesius:
Ah, utter not that word in front of him
Who stands before thee now in Spirit-realms
And on the Earth is called Capesius.
He fain would flee away when that word sounds,
So fierce it burns him here.

Maria:
So thou dost hate
That which first gives true being unto men?
How canst thou come to live within this realm
If so appalling seems that word to thee?
For no one can arrive as far as this
Who hath not faced the nature of that word.

Capesius:
He who appears to thee hath often stood
Before great Lucifer who rules this realm.
And Lucifer hath made it clear to him
That only souls, who consciously make use
Of powers that from their earthly bodies come,
Can harm the realm which doth obey his will.
Those souls however who go through their life
Within the body, as it were in swoon,
And yet already have clairvoyant power,
These only learn in Lucifer's domain,
And cannot cause it harm in any way.

Maria:
I know that in these realms of Spirit-life
'Tis not by words, but sight, that one doth learn.
What in this moment I have come to see
Because of thine appearance to me here,
Will later show itself within my soul
As progress in my spirit-pupilship.

Capesius:
Here 'tis not only teaching that one gains;
Duties are also shown one in this place.
Thou hast here spoken with the soul of him
Who calls himself Capesius on earth.
The spirit-glances into former lives
That are accorded thee, will show to thee
Thou owest much through Karma unto him.
Therefore thou shouldst petition Lucifer
That he, great Light-Bearer, give thee the means
Capesius to shield, in life on Earth.
Thou knowest through thy wisdom well enough
What thou canst do for him, so that he may
Be led again to thee in later lives
So that through thee the debt may be wiped out.

Maria:
And so this duty which I hold so dear
Must be fulfilled through power from Lucifer?

Capesius:
Thou dost desire this duty to fulfil,
And that can only be through Lucifer.
Look! Here he comes, the Spirit of the Light.

(Lucifer appears and, in the course of his speech, Benedictus.)

Lucifer:
Maria, thou art asking at my throne
Self-knowledge for that very human soul
Who standeth near thee in the life on Earth.
It cannot learn to know itself aright
Except by gazing deep into myself;
And that it will achieve without thine aid.
How canst thou think that I would grant to thee
All that thou mayst desire for this thy friend?
Thou vainest Benedictus as thy guide,
Who is my strong opponent on the Earth,
Lending unto mine enemies his strength.
Already hath he stolen much from me.
Johannes cut himself adrift from him
And placed himself beneath my guiding hand.
He cannot yet indeed see my true self
Because he hath not yet the seer's full power.
He will attain it later through myself,
And then he will entirely be mine own.
But I command thee not to speak a word
That might apply to him in any way
So long as thou dost stand before my throne.
Any such word would burn me in this place.
Here words are deeds, and deeds must follow them;
But what might follow—from such words of thine—
It must not be—

Benedictus:
Thou must give ear to her.
For where words have an equal power with deeds
They come in consequence of former deeds.
The deed is done that conquers Lucifer:
Maria is my spirit-pupil true:
I could direct her to that point, whence she
Could recognize the highest spirit-task,
Which same she will most certainly fulfil.
And in fulfilling it she will for sure
Build in Johannes, power and balm to heal,
Which will release him from thy kingdom's grip.
Maria carries deep within her soul
A solemn holy vow which doth awake
Such healing powers in progress of the worlds.
Soon wilt thou hear all this put into words;
But if with powerful thought thou wouldst suppress
And veil the rays of light through which thou hast
The magic power to strive against, and win
The victory o'er all that selfhood means,
I think that then thou'lt glimpse the healing rays,
Which will in future shine with such a strength
That they will draw Johannes to their realm,
By their all-powerful love.

Maria:
Johannes soon
Will here appear; yet side by side
With his own wonted form, which on the earth
His soul would recognise, there will emerge
The being whom as his more potent double
Man carries hidden in his nature's depth.
And if Johannes could but recognize
Thee as thou seemest to his earthly form
It could not bring to him all he requires
To help him in the progress of his soul.
But to his double thou shalt now vouchsafe
What he requires upon those spirit paths,
O'er which I shall in future guide his steps.

Lucifer:
Johannes then must stand before me now.
I feel full well the power which comes from thee;
It hath opposed me since the Earth began.

(Enter Johannes Thomasius and his Etheric Counterpart from different sides of the stage at the same moment, and meet face to face.)

Thomasius:
O mine own Likeness, up till now thou hast
Shown thyself to me only that I might
Be frightened at the sight of mine own self.
I cannot understand thee much as yet;
I only know that thou dost guide my soul.
'Tis thou then who dost baulk me of free life
And dost prevent me from due cognizance
Of what I really am. Now must I hear
Thee speak in front of Lucifer, to see
What I in future years shall yet achieve.

Thomasius' Double:
'Tis true I often was allowed to come
And bring Johannes knowledge of himself.
But I could only work in those soul depths,
Which still are hidden from his consciousness.
My life within him hath for some long time
Been subject to considerable change.
Maria used to stand close to his side.
He thought her bound in spirit to himself;
I showed him that the true guides of his soul
Were only passion and impulsiveness.
He could but think of this as some reproach,
But thou couldst show, 0 Light-Bearer sublime,
To sensual tendencies the way by which
They best might serve the spirit-purposes.
Johannes from Maria had to part,
And give himself forthwith to earnest thought
Which hath the power to purify men's souls.
What from his purity of thought streamed forth
Flowed also unto me, and I was changed.
I feel his purity within myself.
Nought need he fear from me, if he should now
Feel once more drawn towards Maria's soul.
But he belongs, as yet, to thy domain,
And at this moment I demand him back.
For he shall now experience my being,
Without thy guidance and directing will.
He needs me now, that from me there may flow
Into his thought with mighty conscious strength
Both warmth of soul and also power of heart.
Then once more shall he find himself as man.

Lucifer:
I count thy striving good. Yet can I not
Grant to thee all that thou dost ask of me.
For should I give thee to Johannes now
In that same form wherein in former years
Thou didst appear before his mind and soul,
He would at present only give his love
To thinking and to knowledge cold and bare,
And all warm individuality
Would seem unfeeling, meaningless and dead.
It is not thus my power must fashion him.
Through me he must discover in himself
His living personality and self.
I must transform thee, if the thing that's right
Shall come forth for his health and progress now.
I have a long time since prepared for all
That now shall clearly show itself in thee.
Henceforth thou shalt appear in different guise:
Johannes will no more Maria love,
As he hath loved her in the days gone by.
Yet none the less he'll love, with all the strength
And all the passion he once gave to her.

Benedictus:
The glorious work in which we've gained success
Thou wouldst now turn unto thine own account.
Thou hast Johannes through his power of heart
Marked for thine own one day; and yet thou seest
That thou must make the fetters stronger still
If thou wouldst keep his being for thyself.
His heart will be beneath his spirit's rule—
If that is so then all the knowledge-work
Which he on Earth accomplished, must be giv'n
In future, for their own, to those great Powers
Which thou, since Time began, hast combated.
If thou succeed'st in capturing that love
Which now Johannes for Maria feels
And changing it by cunning to the lust
Which thou dost now require for thine own ends,
Then will he turn the good he did on Earth,
To evil ends from out the Spirit-worlds.

Maria:
Then he may yet be saved? 'Tis not decreed
That he must fall a victim to the Powers
That want to gain his work now for themselves?

Benedictus:
It would be so if all the Powers remained
Just as at present they have formed themselves;
But if at the right hour thou dost allow
Thy vow to take effect in thine own soul
Those Powers must change their course in future times.

Lucifer:
So work, compelling forces;
Ye elemental sprites,
Feel now your Master's power;
Smooth now for me the way,
That leads from realms of Earth
That so there may draw near
To Lucifer's domain
Whate'er my wish desires,
Whate'er obeys my will.

(Theodora appears.)

Theodora:
Who calleth me to realms so strange to me?
I like it not, unless the world of gods
Reveals itself in love unto my soul,
And glowing warmth entwining round my heart
Draws spirit-speech from out mine inmost soul.

Thomasius' Double:
Ah, how thou dost transform my very life!
Thou hast appeared, and here am I, a man
Who now can only work when filled by thee.
Johannes shall, through me, be now thine own,
And from henceforward thou shalt have the love
Which once so fearful and so radiant
Was wrested for Maria from his heart.
He saw thee years ago, but did not then
Feel all the warmth of love which was to grow
In secret in the depths of his own soul.
Now it will rise, and fill him full of power,
And turn his thoughts entirely to thyself.

Benedictus:
The crucial moment is arriving now,
His strongest power hath Lucifer let loose:
Maria, all the training of thy soul
Thou must put forth in strength to vanquish him.

Maria:
O Bearer of that Light, which would confine
Love only to the service of the self;
Thou hast from Earth's beginning granted men
Knowledge, when they, still guided by the gods,
Obeyed the spirit, knowing nought of self.
But since that time each soul of man hath been
The place in which thou fightest 'gainst the gods.
Yet now the times are coming, which must bring
Destruction on thyself and on thy realms.
A thinker bold was able to release
Science from all thy gifts in such a way
That unto mankind's gods it gave itself.
But thou dost try once more to get the powers,
Which for the gods are destined, for thyself.
Because Johannes through his work hath now
Deprived thee of that knowledge, with whose fruit
Thou from the first deceived'st all mankind,
So now thou would'st deceive him, through that love
Which, should he follow out his destined path
For Theodora he should never feel.
Thou fain wouldst conquer Wisdom now by Love,
As once 'gainst Love thou didst by Wisdom fight.
But know full well that in Maria's heart,
With which she now opposeth thy designs,
The spirit-pupilship hath planted powers
To keep far off, for ever, all self-love
From Knowledge. Never from this hour will I
Allow myself to be possessed by joy
Such as men feel when thoughts grow ripe within.
I'll steel my heart to serve as sacrifice
So that my mind can always only think
In such a way that through my thoughts I may
Offer the fruits of Knowledge to the gods.
My sacred service shall such Knowledge be,
And what I thus effect within myself
Shall o'er Johannes powerfully outstream,
And oft, in future, when within his heart
These words are whispered from thyself to him:
‘Man's human nature shall through love find out
What gives strength to his personality.’
Then shall my heart this powerful answer give:
‘Once thou wert listened to, when Earth began,
And there didst show forth signs of Wisdom's fruit;
The fruits of Love can only come to man
When they are brought to him from realms divine.’

Lucifer:
I mean to fight.

Benedictus:
And fighting, serve the gods.

Curtain

[ 1 ] The inner nature of man demands that he experience his relation with ultimate reality. Among thinkers who pursue this goal with untiring energy we find a large number discoursing on certain “boundaries” of knowledge. And, if we listen attentively, we cannot help noticing how collision with these boundaries, when it is experienced by a candid mind, tends in the direction of an inner psychic apprehension, a “purely noetic experience” such as was indicated in the first paragraph of this book. Consider how the profoundly able mind of Friedrich Theodor Vischer, in the packed essay he wrote on Johannes Volkelt’s book Dream-Phantasy (Traumphantasie), reports its own reaction to one such limit of cognition:

“No mind where no nerve-centre, where no brain”, say our opponents. No nerve-centre, we say, no brain unless it had been first prepared for by innumerable stages from below upwards. It is easy to babble, with a sneer, about Mind careering through granite and chalk—just as easy as it is for us to ask, with a sneer, how the albumen in the brain flies up aloft into ideas. Human knowledge is extinguished at any attempt to span the distance from one step to the other.

It will remain a secret how it comes about that nature—beneath which spirit must somehow or other be slumbering—presents itself as such a backlash of spirit that we bruise ourselves on it. The direction appears so absolute that Hegel’s formulation of it as “Being other” and “Being outside itself”, brilliant as it is, says almost nothing; it simply drapes the abruptness of the party wall. We may look to Fichte for a really adequate acknowledgment of the abruption and of the shock of the backlash, but we still find no explanation of it.

(Compare F. T. Vischer: Old and New (Altes und Neues), 1881, Part I, p. 229 f.)

Vischer lays his finger on the kind of issue with which anthroposophy too engages. But he fails to realise that, precisely at such a frontier of knowledge as this, another mode of knowledge can begin. He desires to go on living on these frontiers with the same brand of cognition that sufficed until he reached them. Anthroposophy seeks to demonstrate that the possibility of systematic knowledge (science) does not cease at the point where ordinary cognition “bruises” itself, at the point where this “abruption” and these “shocks” from the backlash make themselves felt; but that, on the contrary, the experiences that ensue from them lead naturally towards the development of another type of cognition, which transforms the backlash into perception of spirit—a perception which at the outset, in its initial stage, may be compared with tactile perception in the realm of the senses.

In Part III of Altes und Neues Vischer says: “Very well: there is no soul alongside of the body (he means, for the materialists); what we call matter simply becomes soul at the highest level of organisation known to us, in the brain, and soul evolves to mind or spirit. In other words, we are to be satisfied with a half-baked concept, which for the divisive understanding is a simple contradiction.” Anthroposophy echoes and supplements this with: Very well: for the divisive understanding there is a contradiction. But for the soul, the contradiction becomes the point of departure of a knowledge before which the divisive understanding is pulled up short, because it encounters the backlash of actual spirit.

[ 2 ] Again, Gideon Spicker, the author of a series of discerning publications, who also wrote Philosophical Confession of a Former Capuchin (Philosophische Bekenntnis eines ehemaligen Kapuziners, 1910) identifies incisively enough one of the confining limits of ordinary cognition:

Whatever philosophy a man confesses, whether it is dogmatic or sceptical, empirical or transcendental, critical or eclectic, every one, without exception, starts from an unproven and unprovable premise, namely the necessity of thinking. No investigation ever gets behind this necessity, however deep it may dig. It has to be simply, and groundlessly, accepted; every attempt to prove its validity already presupposes it. Beneath it yawns a bottomless abyss, a ghastly darkness, illuminated by no ray of light. We know not whence that necessity comes, nor whither it leads. As to whether a gracious God or whether an evil demon implanted it in the reason, we are equally uncertain. (p. 30.)

Reflection on the nature of thought, then, leads of itself to one of the frontiers of normal cognition. Anthroposophy occupies this frontier; it knows how necessity confronts and blocks discursive thought like an impenetrable wall. But when the act of thinking is experienced as such, the wall becomes penetrable. This experienced thinking finds a light of contemplation wherewith to illuminate the “darkness illuminated by no ray of light” of merely discursive thought. It is only for the dominion of the senses that the abyss is bottomless; if we do not halt before it, but make up our minds to risk going ahead with thought, beyond the point at which it has to jettison all that the senses have furnished to it, then in that “bottomless abyss” we find the realities of the spirit …*”

[ 3 ] One could continue almost indefinitely exemplifying the reaction of serious minds before the “frontiers of knowledge”. And it would serve to show that anthroposophy has its proper place as the inevitable product of mental evolution in the modern age. There are plenty of prophetic signs, if we know how to read them.

[ 1 ] Thinkers who strive with all their strength to gain the kind of relation to true reality that is demanded by the inner nature of the human being discuss a great number of the limits to knowledge referred to on page 16ff.; and if one looks at the nature of these discussions, one can see quite clearly that the thrust experienced by genuine thinkers in their encounter with such "limits" is in the direction of that inner soul experience which is the subject of this first essay. Take a look, for example, at the way the gifted thinker Friedrich Theodore Vischer, in the important essay he wrote on Johannes Volkelt's book Dream Fantasy, describes the cognitive experience he had in the encounter with one such limit:

“No spirit where there is no nerve center, where there is no brain,” declare our opponents. “No nerve center, no brain,” we reply, “if not evolved from below upward, through innumerable levels.” It is easy to speak scornfully of mind (spirit) hovering about in granite and limestone, no more difficult than it would be for us to ask scornfully how protein in the brain can wing its way up to ideas. Measuring the different levels defies human knowledge. It will forever remain a secret how it happens that nature—beneath whose surface, after all, the spirit must be slumbering—stands there as so complete a counterstroke of the spirit that we bruise ourselves against it; this separation seems so absolute that Hegel's formulation, as brilliant as it is, of something “other than,” or “outside of,” oneself is as good as meaningless and only hides the extreme nature of this wall of seeming separation. One does find in Fichte's work a true recognition of the cutting edge and blows of this counterstroke, but no explanation for it.

(See Friedrich Theodore Vischer, Views Old and New, 1881.) Friedrich Theodore Vischer points vigorously to one of the places to which anthroposophy must also point. But the fact does not enter his consciousness that at such a borderland of knowledge a different form of knowing activity can enter. He wishes to live at these borderlands in the same kind of knowing activity which sufficed for him before he arrived at them. Anthroposophy attempts to show that science does not end where our ordinary knowing activity gets “bruised,” where these “cuts and blows” occur in the counterstroke of reality; anthroposophy tries to show that the experiences resulting from these “bruises, cuts, and blows” lead to the development of a different kind of knowing activity, which transforms the counterthrust of reality into a spiritual perception that, to begin with, on its first level, is comparable to tactile perception in the sense world.

In the third section of Views Old and New, Friedrich Theodore Vischer states: “Good, there is no soul alongside of the body (Vischer means for the materialist); thus, precisely what we make a point of calling ‘matter’—at the highest level of its formation known to us: in the brain—becomes soul, and the soul evolves into spirit. We are supposed to form a concept [of matter], which to the analyzing intellect is in complete contradiction with itself.” Again anthroposophy must reply to Vischer's presentation: Good, for the intellect that breaks things down into their component parts, there is a contradiction here; but for the soul, this contradiction becomes the point of departure for an activity of knowing at which the analyzing intellect halts because this intellect experiences the “counterstroke” of spiritual reality.

[ 2 ] Gideon Spicker, who, besides a number of other astute books, has also written Philosophical Confessions of a Former Capuchin Monk (1910), points to one of the borderlands of our ordinary knowing activity (using words that are certainly vivid enough):

No matter what one's philosophy is, whether dogmatic or skeptical, empirical or transcendental, critical or eclectic, they all, without exception, take their start from an unproven and improvable premise: the essentiality of thinking. No investigation will ever get behind this essentiality, no matter how deep it may dig. This essentiality must be accepted unconditionally and cannot be substantiated by anything; any attempt to prove its validity only presupposes this essentiality. Under it there gapes a bottomless abyss, a frightful darkness unlit by any ray of light. We do not know, therefore, where it comes from or where it is leading. Whether a merciful God or an evil demon has laid this essentiality into our reason is equally uncertain.

Thus, even the contemplation of thinking itself leads the thinker to the limits of ordinary knowledge. Anthroposophy sets in with its knowing activity at these Emits; it knows that essentiality confronts the abilities (art) of intellectual thinking like an impenetrable wall. For a thinking that the thinker experiences, however, the impenetrability of this wall disappears; this experienced thinking finds a light with which to illuminate and look into the “darkness unlit by any ray of light” of a merely intellectual thinking; and the “bottomless abyss” is so only for the realm of sense perception; anyone who does not halt at this abyss but dares to proceed with thinking even when this thinking must set aside what the sense world has inserted into it, such a person finds a spiritual reality in this “bottomless abyss.”

[ 3 ] We could continue indefinitely like this, presenting the experiences that serious thinkers have at the limits of knowledge.

Such examples would show that anthroposophy is the natural result of the evolution of present-day thought. Many things point to anthroposophy if these many things are seen in the right light.

Play in four acts by Hermann Bahr
Performance at the Lessing Theater, Berlin

Bonaparte is madly in love with the beautiful Josephine Beauharnais - so much so that he wants to do nothing all day but make out with the sweet woman. But she wants to cheat on him with Barras. So she sends him away from Paris to the army. While the storm of battle rages all around him, he thinks of nothing but his Josephine. If she writes to him too seldom or if her letters are too short, he gets angry, throws himself into the fray and wins one of his brilliant victories. Thus, through no fault of his own, he becomes a hero. The French make him consul. Now he thinks a little about what is right for a great man. It's not right for him to spend the whole day making love. So he neglects good Josephine, to whom he owes his fame. But it is also a good idea for him to acquire "decent manners". So he calls in the actor Talma to teach him. This is how the infatuated little Bonaparte became the great Napoleon. There are undoubtedly two people who represent this point of view; one is the soldier who accompanies Napoleon on his campaigns to shine his boots, the other is the Viennese poet Hermann Bahr. Both have the attitude that one usually wants to hit with the sentence: "There is no greatness for the valet de chambre." With the above few sentences we have reproduced the content of a "drama" by Hermann Bahr, which was performed at the Lessing Theater on 9 December. A long time ago, it had already been performed in Vienna on the stage that sometimes means the world. I suspect that the "poet" was laughed at at the time. For he felt compelled to write the following "salvation of honor" of his "drama": "It has been said that I wanted to mock Bonaparte in my "Josephine". Some have praised it, many have been annoyed by it; but no one has doubted that the purpose of the play was to make a hero ridiculous and small. It was strange for me to hear that, because I would never have thought of it, but I wanted to show what life is about an undoubtedly great person."

"Of course, this will only be expressed through the whole. Josephine is the first play of a trilogy..., the beginning man ... still believes that he is in the world for himself, to represent himself. He does not yet know that he can mean nothing for himself, but is only to take part in the great action of the eternal comedy. No, he wants to live his own life. The first act of our life is about how he is taught to do this and how he has to learn to move to the beat of fate. Here the young man wrestles with fate. He does not want to renounce himself, he resists, he wants to determine himself and his life. He does not want to serve. He has his own plans for himself, and he wants to follow them. But he must experience that fate is stronger. Whoever has reached this point, whoever has learned to obey fate, whoever no longer resists, enters the second act, the melancholy, cheerful play of the man. The man knows that it is not for man to determine his life. He knows that he is subject to a great power which he cannot resist. He knows that we are instruments with which inscrutable works are created according to inscrutable plans. No one can ever guess what his actions mean. We feel that a tremendous purpose rules our existence, but we are not allowed to see it. There is nothing for us but to obey.... At last, in the third act of life, man has become free from fate. He has played his part, now he steps down from the stage, the great director dismisses him... the essence of the old man is that he has become free and now, having cast off his part, he may finally live for himself... Fate needs a tyrant and takes a troubadour. How small are our wishes, how great is fate! This is what I wanted to portray: in "Josephine, how the unknown power captures him, sends the dreamer to war and lets the poet become a hero, even if he resists and wants nothing to do with his heroism; in the second part, his love for Walewska, how he has become a man who has surrendered to fate and knows that we must serve, and obediently performs his incomprehensible role. ... in the third part, on the island, how he has played out and become free of fate, how he is finally allowed to live according to himself, and how the emperor and hero falls from him and he becomes a Corsican enthusiast again, gazing out with wild dreams...".

It's funny how the world is reflected in this poet's head. The man who wants to be free to make love to Josephine, but whom fate makes unfree, a man who shakes up the peoples of Europe from West to East because he must "serve, obey", and who finally becomes "free" when he spends his last days imprisoned on a lonely little island!!!! The valet's attitude must turn grotesque somersaults if it is to become philosophy. It is a pity that Hermann Bahr did not become a natural historian. I imagine a natural history written by him according to the recipe of his Napoleon-Fate-Wisdom would be quite nice. It could read, for example: "The lion is the most good-natured animal. When he is ravenously hungry and encounters a wanderer in the desert, he lies down and begs the man to "eat me up so that I may be relieved of my hunger"... And in another passage you could read: "The odeur producers have long searched for a plant that is particularly fragrant - they finally found it in the devil's filth." - -

Prayer to the Spirit of Monday:

Great embracing Spirit,
Sensation shone in your life forms before my sensation existed.
You were.
I raise my soul to you.
I was in you.
I was part of your sensations.
You connected yourself with the earth's first beginnings and the shining of my sensation began in my body.
I felt myself in your feelings.
You were.
My sensations felt your being in them.
My soul began to be in itself.
Because you were in me.
You were.

Great embracing Spirit
May my I raise itself from below upward,
May it get an inkling of you in the all-embracing.
May the spirit of my being be illumined
By the light of your messengers.
May the soul of my being be enkindled by the fire flames of your servants.
May the will of my I grasp
Your creatorword's force.
You are.
May your being permeate my will
That my I be grasped by an understanding of your light's shining,
Your life's love-warmth
And your being's creator words.
You are.

We have helpful thoughts to support us in our meditations, which were given in all proper esoteric schools and are of great value if you place them before you in pictures, let them work on you, and immerse yourself in them meditatively. These thoughts aren't like our ordinary, everyday ones, for when we work with them they have germinating, awakening forces for us.

Thoughts that can lead to deeper insights into spiritual connections relatively quickly are the following:

The Gods sleep in the mineral kingdom.
They dream in the plant kingdom.
They wake and think in the animal kingdom.

Taking the animal kingdom first, we have to imagine that the spiritual beings were previously at our level and had thoughts that were just as confused as ours, whereas their thoughts have now become so regular and definite that they spread out before us as the animals we see. If we immerse ourselves in such ideas, then our thoughts will become consolidated, and we'll thereby become more closely connected with the beings who've placed their thoughts in the earth and also with that being who placed the force in the earth which in its totality is the Christ-force.

We must keep in mind that we become different from other men through our occult development. Our interests change, and one often hears esoterics complain that they've lost interest in many things that used to interest them, and that they feel a inner boredom and emptiness. This is a quite normal state that soon passes And the emptiness of their soul will soon be filed with interests that'll replace the other ones a thousandfold. Nevertheless, we should not give up our connection with other men and the interests that filled us previously, and above all things we shouldn't demand that people must change their circle of interests. The difference between exoteric and esoteric men is that an exoteric man permeates his physical body firmly with his other bodies and as it were presses everything toward the outer surface. Thereby the average person who's born into a nation and family inherits certain concepts about good and evil, truth and other virtues that the creator Gods placed into them in the course of evolution. An esoteric will gradually live in accordance with these virtues out of his own knowledge. But he mustn't place himself above the concepts that are present in men about this, for then he would get into serious trouble with respect to his development. The inner man is gradually separated from the outer one in him. His higher parts leave the lower ones by themselves, and if he does not heed the ordinary laws of mankind, for instance about truthfulness, he can get into a dishonesty that of course hinders his development and that can do a lot of harm. All ill feelings and disputes, also among esoterics, are due to this.

We not only leave part of our etheric body and our sentient soul by themselves—we begin esoteric work in the sentient soul—but also, as it were, our physical body, and we experience all possible conditions, also diseases in the latter. We get into conditions that we didn't know before, but which we don't have to look upon as diseases for which we have to run to a doctor right away, for an exoteric doctor can of course not give us anything for these conditions, and in any case, they disappear by themselves. On the other hand, one shouldn't look upon every disease one gets as something that is caused by occult development or think that doctors can't treat one anymore That's spiritual arrogance. One can still get advice from a doctor for a long time. An esoteric should always pay attention to his health in the right way.

No one should let himself be kept from development by the difficulties that one can encounter and that arise through the loosening of the etheric body, or by cowardice and laziness. This loosening is something that must occur if one wants to press into higher worlds. And if we struggle towards it with serious striving, the master of wisdom and of the harmony of feelings will come to meet us with his strength and not fail to help us.

We'll reach the goal of seeing spiritually in the next life for sure, if not in this one.

[ 1 ] The sense for reality that lives in the idea of the threefold social organism will not be found by comparing it with that which traditional education and habits have taught people to think possible. The very reason for our present confusions in government and society is that these traditions have led to habits of thought and feeling that life itself has outgrown. Therefore anyone who objects that the idea of a threefold social order takes no account of the impulses that have formed until now the basis of all human institutions, are under the delusion that the overcoming of these old impulses is a sin against any possible social order. Rather, the threefold order is founded upon the recognition that a belief in the sustaining power of the old impulses is the worst obstacle to healthy and progressive steps which take into account our present stage of evolution.

[ 2 ] The impossibility of continuing to cultivate the old impulses should be clear from the fact that they have lost their power as an incentive to productive labor. The old econonomic motives of capital returns and wage earnings could maintain their power as incentives only as long as enough of the old treasured objects remained that could arouse people's inclination and love. These treasures have plainly become exhausted in the age that has just ended. Ever more numerous were the people who, as capitalists, no lon ger knew why they were amassing capital; ever more numerous, too, were wage earners who did not know why they were working.

[ 3 ] The exhaustion of the impulses that had kept together the nexus of the state was shown by the fact that in recent times many people have come almost as a matter of course to regard the state as an end in itself, and to forget that the state exists for the sake of human beings. To regard the state as an end in itself is possible only when one has so much lost the ability to assert one's inner, human individuality that one no longer expects from the state the kind of institutions this self-assertion would demand. Then one is indeed obliged to look for the essence of the state in all sorts of institutions that are quite contrary to its proper task. One will become determined to put more into the institutions of the state than is needed for the self-assertion of the human beings who compose it. However, every such more in the state evidences a less in the human beings who bear the burden of the state.

[ 4 ] In cultural life, the sterility of the old impulses is displayed in the mistrust with which people look on the spirit.What proceeds from life's unspiritual concerns arouses people's interest; they form views and concepts of it. What originates in spiritual productivity, people choose to regard as a private affair of the particular producer; they are inclined to hinder rather than help if it tries to find a place in public life. One of the most widespread characteristics of our contemporaries is that they remain closed to the individual spiritual achievements of their fellows.

[ 5 ] The present age needs to see clearly that it has exhausted its economic, political and cultural impulses. Such insight must kindle energetic will and social purpose. Until people recognize that our economic, political and cultural troubles are not due merely to external life circumstances, but also to the state of our souls, the necessary renewal has not yet been given its proper foundation.

[ 6 ] A split has come about in the constitution of the human soul. In the instinctive, unconscious impulses of human nature, something new is stirring. In conscious thought, the old ideas refuse to follow the instinctive stirrings. However, when the best instinctive promptings are not illuminated by corresponding thoughts, they became barbaric, animalistic. Modern humanity is rushing into a dangerous situation through this animalization of the instincts. Salvation can be found only in striving for new thoughts to meet a new world situation.

[ 7 ] Any cry for socialization that disregards this fact can lead to nothing salutary. Our disinclination to recognize ourselves as beings of soul and of spirit must be overcome. A one-sided transformation of the economic life, a one-sided reconstruction of political institutions without nurturing a socially healthy and productive state of soul, is more likely to lull humanity with deceptive dreams than to fill it with a sense for reality. It is because there are so few who can bring themselves to look on the problems of today and tomorrow as questions comprehending both external arrangements and inner renewal that we move so slowly along the road to a new social order. When many people say: Inner renewal takes a long time; it is a process that must not be hurried, behind such words lurks a fear of such renewal. For the right mood can only be this: to examine energetically everything that might lead to renewal, and then watch and see how slowly or quickly life's voyage proceeds.

[ 8 ] The events of recent years have cast a certain weariness about the souls of our contemporaries. For the sake of the coming generations, for the sake of the civilization of the near future, this weariness must be combatted. These are the feelings that have brought the idea of the threefold order before the public. Say that this idea is imperfect, say that it is all wrong; its supporters will understand if it is opposed from the standpoint of other new ideas. That it should so often be found to be “incomprehensible” because it contradicts the old and customary—this they cannot regard as a sign that such opponents can hear the present call of human evolution. One would think this call is sounding plainly enough for all to hear.

Berlin, undated transcript, 1904

During the Lemurian period something happened that has been among the most important events for many millions of years: the actual self of the human being took up residence in the human body. The human soul was further developed than the bodies that already existed at that time. Before the bodies were ready, the souls had a different development on other planets. Pitris: different degrees of development. Different level of consciousness. This consciousness, which we have now, has been gradually built up.

Through long periods of time, we have developed what is now on Earth on the Moon. Then it slept over. When man begins his Earth career, he is further than the Earth. He must build bodies in association with other high beings. “The Earth was desolate and confused.” The forms must be built from the material; this happens in the first three rounds. He builds forms as one builds a house. A kind of affinity with earthly matter brings this about. When he begins the fourth round, the bodies are so far ready that the entire physical system - bone, muscle, digestive, blood circulation system - is complete. The human brain is still in the design. The fourth round is for building this physical organ for consciousness.

Three main stages initially:

First: purely spiritual, arupa, formless; second: spiritual state of formation, rupa, astral state. At the end of the astral state, there is in the innermost part of the being:

1. an arupic being
2. enveloped by a thought body or rupa
3. by an astral body or sentient body.

He now begins the physical formation by first forming an impression of what he was astral in the finest matter, in ether. In earlier planetary development, man had a very different etheric body, which built up the one we now know, but in the fourth state of the fourth round, when the earth itself was etheric matter. It is the template of the physical body, roughly the color of peach blossom. During this time, the etheric body was the only human body. It was the first root race, subtle people floated in the etheric space and multiplied by one emerging from the other.

Becoming denser and denser, man goes through seven stages – racial – and now comes the second state, the air man. The ether attracts the air, permeates it, forms bodies. What we find in fairy tales is based on ancient memory. They are called Hyperboreans: “And the Lord made the winds his messengers.” Meaning: He formed a body of air for the spiritual beings. Hyperborea became more and more dense; air was very thick back then; yet the people were wonderfully beautiful. Etheric people were luminous fire figures. The astral earth would have been completely dark to a physical eye; during the etheric earth it would have begun to shine. The fiery figures are characterized as follows: “And God said, let there be light.

The Lemurians are so important because this important section was in the middle of it. Earlier catastrophes were not so violent because the earth was not yet so dense. Hyperboreans by rearranging the heat by moving the continent from the North Pole to the South.

Water-soaked, dense matter: the first Lemurians were formed from this; not as dense as lower jellyfish - they are called “egg-reproducing humans”, just like certain animals, amoebas, which first have indentations in which the nucleus is distributed, then it contracts. Thus man was materially immortal in those days, he divides but does not perish, so that man is materially immortal as such. In those days Pitri still hovered around the body; only in the middle of the Lemurian period could he take possession of it. He had everything, except the right brain. Now an approach to it was emerging. Fire mist had become protein-like, a brain approach was emerging and the soul could take possession. Only the very advanced Pitri could now form the body from within. So-called sons of the fire mist, Arhats, initiates, and indeed from the highest beings. Less strong Pitris would not yet have been able to form bodies. First representatives of wisdom. Other Pitris could have taken possession now, but then beings such as those that had emerged could not have come into being. Man would never have attained full freedom; he would have had a dull consciousness. Towards the end of the second Lemurian period, further Pitris began to incarnate.

Those bodies, however, that were not inhabited by Pitris at that time, developed into animality. If there were no brain in the body, no highly developed Pitri could work in it on our earthly plane. This development into animality is what all religions call the Fall of Man. At the expense of the brain, the rest of the human being has been pushed down into animality. By taking possession inwardly, the human being must develop senses in order to perceive. The Fall of Man creates the first karma.

Externally, physically, the first humans were much more perfect, but duller. At that time there were no apes; those bodies that were inhabited now developed into humans; the uninhabited ones decayed; they were soulless, amanasic ones. So during the second Lemurian period, a developed state of consciousness is achieved by sinking deeper into sensuality. The task of the eighth round, of all earthly development, is to achieve this state of consciousness.

On the moon he had a low one, and an even lower one earlier.

So through seven planets he develops seven states of consciousness. When they migrate from the moon, they had dream trance, before that plant trances, before that deep trances. Seven planets or states of consciousness. Seven kingdoms, seven races.