The Rudolf Steiner Archive

My dear sisters and brothers,

Since the Christmas Conference an esoteric breath flows through the whole Anthroposophical Society. And those members of the Anthroposophical Society who have taken part in the general members' lectures will have noted how this esoteric breath flows through all the work within the anthroposophical movement now, and should do so in the future.

This was a necessity which, above all, flows from the spiritual world, from where the revelations come which should live in the anthroposophical movement.

Therefore, the necessity arose to create a certain nucleus for anthroposophical esoteric life, to create real esoteric life, and therewith the necessity arose to build a bridge to the spiritual world itself.

In a certain sense the spiritual world had to manifest the will for the creation of such a School. For an esoteric school cannot be created by human arbitrariness, nor from that human arbitrariness called “human ideals”; rather must this esoteric school be the body for something which flows out of spiritual life, so that everything that occurs in such a school presents the outer expression of an activity which in reality occurs in the spiritual world itself. Therefore, this esoteric school could not have been created without first asking the will of Michael, which since the last third of the nineteenth century has been guiding human affairs - something which I have often mentioned here in members' lectures.

In the course of time this will of Michael again and again cyclically intervenes in human affairs from the spiritual world. And when we look back in the evolution of time, we find that this same Michael-Will - which we can also call the Michael Reign - was active in the spiritual affairs of humanity, in the great questions of civilization before the Mystery of Golgotha, in the time of Alexander in Greece through the Chthonian and Celestial mysteries, and which was to spread to Asia and Africa. Where the Michael-Will reigns, there is always cosmopolitanism. What differentiates people on earth is overcome during the Michael age.

The most important influence, related to Aristotle and to Alexander, which was under the impulse of Michael, was followed by that of Oriphiel, and after Oriphiel came the Anael impulse, the Zachariel impulse, then the Raphael impulse, then the Samael impulse, then the Gabriel impulse, which extended into the 19^th century. And since the seventies of the nineteenth century we are again under the sign of Michael's reign. It is in its beginnings. But Michael's impulses must flow into all legitimate esoteric activities in a conscious manner - what can be clear to you, my sisters and brothers, through the general lectures for members.

And everything connected with the Christmas Conference leads to what is constituted as the basis of the anthroposophical movement's formation of this Esoteric School inspired and guided by Michael. It therefore rightfully exists in our times as a spiritual institution. All those who want to be rightful members of this School must accept this in their lives with the deepest sincerity. They must feel that they don't merely belong to an earthly community, but to a supersensible community, whose guide and leader is Michael himself. Therefore, everything communicated here is not to be understood as my words, insofar as they are the content of the lessons, but rather as what Michael communicates in an esoteric manner to those who feel they belong with him in this age. Therefore, what these lessons contain will be Michael's message for our age.

And it is because of this that the anthroposophical movement will receive its true spiritual strength. For this it is necessary that what membership in this School means be taken with the utmost earnestness. It is really necessary, my dear sisters and brothers, truly and deeply necessary, that it be indicated in the utmost earnest manner the sacred earnestness with which the School must be taken.

And here within the School it must be repeatedly said: in anthroposophical circles there is much too little earnestness for what really flows through the anthroposophical movement, and at least the esoteric members of the Esoteric School must be in the forefront of what humanity can gradually develop as the necessary earnestness. Therefore, it is necessary that the leadership of the School retain for itself the right to allow only those to enter as rightful, worthy members of the School who, in every aspect of their lives, want to be worthy representatives of anthroposophy; and the decision about whether this is the case or not must lie with the School's leadership.

Do not consider this, my sisters and brothers, as a limitation of freedom. The School's leadership must also have its freedom and be able to recognize who belongs to the School and who does not, just as each one is free to decide whether to belong to the School or not. So, a free, ideal-spiritual contract, so to speak, between each member of the School and the leadership must be agreed upon. In no other way could esoteric development be called healthy, especially not one which is worthy of the fact that this Esoteric School exists under the direct force of the Michael impulse itself.

Conscientious care of the mantric verses so that they do not fall into unauthorized hands is the first requisite; but also, to really be a worthy representative of the anthroposophical cause.

I only need to mention a few things to show how little the anthroposophical movement is still grasped with complete earnestness. It has happened that members of the School have reserved their seats by placing on them the blue membership certificates, which gives them the right to participate in the School. [1] It has happened in the Anthroposophical Society that whole piles of the News Sheets, only intended for members, have been found on the trolley cars that run from Dornach to Basel. And I could add many other examples to this list. And amazing things happen as a result of this lack of earnestness. Even with things that in everyday life are taken seriously, at the moment when those within the anthroposophical movement are expected to do so, they do not take them seriously.

These are things which must be considered in connection with the firm structure that this School must have. Therefore, these things must be said, because if they are not observed, one cannot worthily receive what is given here in the School as revelations from the spiritual world. At the end of each lesson, your attention is expressly drawn to the fact that the being of Michael is present while the revelations from the spiritual world are given, and are confirmed by Michael's sign and seal.

All these things must live in the members' hearts. And worthiness, profound worthiness must reign in all that is bound even in thought to the School. For only in this way what today is to be carried through the world as an esoteric stream can live. And that includes the duties incumbent on each individual.

The mantric verses written here on the blackboard can only be possessed, in the strictest sense of the word, by those who have the right to be present. And if a member of the School is unable to attend a lesson during which mantric verses are given, another member, who has the verses, may give them to him; but it must be for each individual case, that is, for each person to whom the verses are to be given, that permission must be requested, either from Dr. Wegman or from me. Once permission is granted in respect to a person, it remains valid. But permission must again be requested for each other individual. This is not an administrative rule, it is an occult rule that must be strictly adhered to. For every act of the School must be connected to the School's leadership: and that begins with having to request permission from the School's leadership for acts having to do with the School. Not the one who is to receive the mantras may ask, but only the one who is to give them, using the modality that I have just described. If someone takes notes on what is said here, except for the mantras, he is obliged to keep them for only one week, and then to burn them.

All these things are not arbitrary rules, but they relate to the occult fact that esoteric matters are only effective if they are embraced by the School members' attitude. The mantras lose their effectiveness if they fall into the wrong hands. And it is a rule so firmly inscribed in the cosmic order, that the following once happened and a whole group of mantras, which had been in effect within the anthroposophical movement, have been rendered ineffective.

I was able to give mantric verses to a number of people; I also gave them to a certain person, who had a friend. The friend was somewhat clairvoyant. And it happened that while the two friends were sleeping in the same room, the clairvoyant friend, when the other one merely repeated the mantra in thought, surreptitiously copied it and then did mischief with it by giving it to others as coming from himself. It was necessary to look into the matter, which revealed why the mantra became ineffective for all those who possessed it.

Therefore, my dear sisters and brothers, you must not take these things lightly, for esoteric rules are strict; and when someone has made such an error, he should not excuse himself by claiming that he was unable to avoid it. Of course, if someone runs through a mantra in his mind, and someone else copies it clairvoyantly, he certainly can do nothing about it. Nevertheless, the rules are applied with an iron necessity. [2]

I mention this so that you can see how little arbitrariness is involved, and how these things are being read from the spiritual world and that the practices of the spiritual world apply. Nothing is arbitrary in what occurs in a rightly existing esoteric school. And the earnestness from this esoteric school should stream out to the whole anthroposophical movement. For only then will this School be what it should be for the anthroposophical movement. But when something is done which only springs from personal motives and then it is pretended that it is because of devotion to the anthroposophical movement- well, I don't mean to say that it should not happen, because obviously, people today must be personal - but then it is also necessary that truth lives in what is personal, that for instance if someone comes here to Dornach for personal pleasure he should admit it and not pretend otherwise. There's nothing wrong with coming to Dornach for personal pleasure, in fact it is good. But one should admit it and not sidestep it by declaring pure dedication to spiritual life.

I mention this; I could just as well mention another example, which is more real, for it is really the case that when most of our friends come to Dornach, a will to sacrifice is involved, and that only in the least of cases is untruthfulness involved. But I've chosen this example because it is the least applicable and thus the least harmful. If I had mentioned other examples, what I would like to have as a calm prevailing mood in the hearts and souls of all who are sitting here now could not exist in the necessary degree.

After that introduction, I would like to start with the verse that is the beginning and end of Michael's proclamation to all unbiased human beings, and which contains what all entities in the world are saying, if one listens to them with the soul. For from all that lives in the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms, what sparkles down from the stars, what acts into our souls from the domains of the hierarchies, from all that crawls under and on the earth as worm-life, from what speaks in rocks and springs and fields and thunder and clouds and lightning; all these spoke to unbiased human beings in the past, speak at the present and will speak in the future:

O man, know thyself!
So resounds the Cosmic-Word.
You hear it strong in soul,
You feel it firm in spirit.

Who speaks with such cosmic might?
Who speaks with such depth of heart?

Does it work through distant radiant space
Into your senses' sense of being?
Does it ring through weaving waves of time
Into your life's evolving stream?

It's you yourself who,
In feeling space, in experiencing time,
The Word create, feeling foreign
In space's soulless void,
Because you lose the force of thought
In time's destroying flow.

The previous lesson ended, my dear sisters and brothers, with the Guardian of the Threshold giving the last admonitions before one passes over the yawning abyss of being; the Guardian of the Threshold spoke the weighty, moving words:

Come in,
The gate has opened;
You will become
A true human being.

Our souls and hearts have been exposed to the important, weighty, meaningful words spoken by the Guardian of the Threshold on behalf of Michael. And everything he said was to prepare us for the attitude we must have when we come over after the gate has been opened - over the yawning abyss of being, where one does not come walking with earthly feet, where one flies with the spiritual wings that grow when the soul is imbued with a spiritual attitude, with spiritual love, with spiritual feeling.

And now, now, my dear sisters and brothers, will be described what the human being experiences when he stands on the other side of the yawning abyss of being. The Guardian of the Threshold indicates to him: turn around and look back! Until now you have been looking at what appeared to you as black, night-cloaked gloom, about which you had to say that it will become inner light and will illumine your own Self. With the last admonitions—the Guardian of the Threshold says—I let it become lighter, at first most gently. You feel now the first light around you. But turn around, look back!

And now, when he who has crossed over the yawning abyss of being and turns around and looks back, he sees himself as an earthly human being, what he is during his physical incarnation, over there in the part of his being that he has left behind and which now lies in the earthly sphere. He observes his own human self there. He has embodied himself in spiritual being with his spirit-soul. The earthly environment is over there now. He stands there in the region, in which we first were with all our humanity, where we saw what crawls beneath and flies above, where we saw the sparkling stars, the warmth-giving sun, where we saw what lives in the wind and weather, and where, knowing that despite all its majesty, how the sun blazes and illumines, despite all the beauty and greatness accessible to the senses, we said to ourselves: our own humanity is not here; we must seek it on the other side of the yawning abyss of being, in what seems at first, to the senses, to be black, night-cloaked gloom.

The Guardian of the Threshold has shown, by the three beasts, what we actually are. Now will be described how in the gloom that is beginning to be light, we should begin to look back on what we as humans are in the sensory world, together with what was our only world in sensory earthly existence.

And now the Guardian of the Threshold points directly back there to the earthly man, which we ourselves also are during earthly existence, and to which we must continually return, into which we must always penetrate when we leave the spiritual world and return to our earthly duty. For we may not become dreamers and go into raptures, we must return completely to earth life. Therefore the Guardian of the Threshold directs us to look at the person who stands over there, who we ourselves are, in a way that at first draws our attention to what this person is. [An outline of a human being is drawn on the blackboard.]

He knows that he perceives the outer world through the senses, which are mostly situated in the head, and that he perceives his thinking through the impulse of the head.

But the Guardian of the Threshold now says: Look into this head. It is like looking into a dark cell, for you do not see the creative light within it. The truth is that what you had as thinking over there in the sensory world is mere seeming, mere images, not much more than mirror-images.

The Guardian of the Threshold admonishes us to be very aware of this, but also to be aware that what is only appearance in earthly thinking is the corpse - as we have heard in previous lessons - of a living thinking in which we were immersed in the soul-spiritual world before we descended to this earthly life. There thinking lived! Now thinking rests as dead thinking, as seeming thinking in the coffin of our bodies. And all the thinking we use in the sensory world is dead thinking. It was alive before we descended.

And what has this thinking accomplished? It has created everything that is within the head, within this dark cell - as it appears to the senses - that is light-creating essence. The brain, which rests within as thinking's support, has been created by living thinking. [The interior of the head, yellow, is drawn on the blackboard.] It is living thinking that creates the support for our earthly semblance of thinking.

Observe the brain's convolutions, observe what you carry within the dark cell that enables you to think, my sisters and brothers, observe the semblance of thinking in the dark cell, then you will find in what is felt above as thinking [drawing: red arrows] from out of which streams the force of will into thinking, so that each thought is streamed through with will. How the will streams into thinking can be sensed.

And now we look back from the other side of the threshold at how that other person, who we ourselves are, has waves of will streaming out of his body into the head, which create the will, and finally, when we follow them back to the turning points of time which lead to our previous incarnations, how they create the waves of thought from worlds past into our present incarnation and form our heads, all of which makes the semblance of thinking in this incarnation possible.

Therefore, we must be strong, the Guardian of the Threshold tells us, and imagine dead thinking being cast out into the cosmic nothingness, for it is only seeming. And the willing that then arises we should consider as what comes over from previous incarnations and interweaves and works, making us thinkers. Within [drawing: yellow] are the creating cosmic thoughts. These creating cosmic thoughts enable us to have human thoughts.

Therefore, the first words the Guardian of the Threshold speaks after he has let us cross the threshold, and after he has announced that the gate has opened, that we can become true human beings, the first words he speaks are:

See behind thinking's sensory light,
How in the gloomy spirit-cell
Willing arises from the body's depths;
Let be cast, through your strength of soul,
Dead thinking into the cosmic void;
And willing, it will arise
As cosmic thought's creation.

The first words we hear on the other side, as we look back at the figure, which we ourselves are:

[The first mantra is written on the blackboard, together with a heading. Blackboard writing is always in italics.]

The Guardian is heard in the brightening darkness:

I

See behind thinking's sensory light,
How in the gloomy spirit-cell
Willing arises from the body's depths;
Let be cast, through your strength of soul,
Dead thinking into the cosmic void;
And willing, it will arise
As cosmic thought's creation.

And then the Guardian of the Threshold adds - and one must strain to hear him: Now imagine that you are observing that figure on the other side who you yourself are; you turn around again and look into the darkness and try with all your inner imaginative force of remembrance - as one does when retaining a physical after-image in the eye. Try with all your strength to draw before you something like a gray outline of what you saw over there, but avoid drawing anything except the outline of the figure. [It is drawn.]

Then, if one succeeds in seeing this gray outline of a figure, behind it appears an image of the moon [a sickle moon, yellow, is drawn], the gray figure before it.

If one is able to keep inner calm, one sees the moon in the distance. The gray figure outline is also there, but it is active in us. And if we practice this over and over, we feel we have arrived at the spiritual figure of the head that we had over there, not the physical human figure, but at the spiritual figure of the head that we had over there, if we can feel what karma brings to us from previous earthly incarnations. [yellow arrow at the right of the sickle moon.]

Therefore, you should meditate on this picture that I have drawn here, the sickle moon with this arrow; let the mantra unfold, with this picture as the marker for the gradual familiarization with what forcefully comes over from previous earthly existences.

And secondly, the Guardian of the Threshold points with a stronger gesture to what feeling is to the person over there, who we ourselves are, and he admonishes that we are to see this feeling as a dim dream. In fact, we see feeling - which makes the person over there more real than thinking, for thinking is illusion, whereas feeling is half reality - we see the person's feeling enfold in numerous dream-pictures during the day. We learn by observing it that feeling, for the spirit and in the spirit, is dreaming.

But what kind of dreaming is feeling? In this feeling, not only the individual dreams, but within it the whole surrounding world dreams. Our thinking is our own. That's why it's illusion. The world lives in our feeling. The world's existence is within it.

Now we must achieve, to the extent possible, tranquility of heart, the Guardian warns, so that we can extinguish what lives and interweaves as feeling in the dream-pictures, just as dreams are extinguished in deep sleep. Then we can reach the truth of feeling, and we can see human feeling interwoven with the cosmic life that is present in spirit in all our surroundings. And then the real spiritual human being appears to us, who in his body lives at first in his half-existence. The human being appears to us from out of sleeping feeling. We feel ourselves to be on the other side of the threshold, on the other side of the yawning abyss of being, for feeling has fallen asleep and the cosmic creative powers, which live in feeling, have appeared around us.

See in feeling's weaving in the soul,
How in sleep's dim-like dawning
Life streams in from cosmic distance;
Let in sleep through tranquil heart
Human feeling waft away hushed;
And cosmic life spiritualizes
As the human being's power.

[This second part is written on the blackboard.]

II

See in

(Before it was “behind”, here it is “in”; all the words in a mantric verse are important.)

feeling's weaving in the soul,

(Before it was “thinking”, here “feeling”; there “sensory light”, here “weaving in the soul”; “weaving” is much more real than merely semblance of light.)

[In the first part “thinking” and “sensory light”, and in the second part “feeling's” are underlined.

How in sleep's dim-like dawning
Life streams in from cosmic distance;

(There it was “Willing arises from the body's depths;”, here “Life streams in from cosmic distance;”)

[In the third line of the first part “Willing” is underlined, and in the second part “Life”.]

Let in sleep through tranquil heart
Human feeling waft away hushed;

It is enhanced: Here [in the first part] it involved letting flow through the soul's force; here [in the second part] one must waft away human feeling. [the word “waft” is underlined.]

And cosmic life spiritualizes

—here [in the first part] it was the willing that is still in the human being; here it is cosmic

As the human being's power.

—the enhancement relative to cosmic thought's creation.—

[In the first part “cosmic thought's creation” and in the second part “human being's power” are underlined.]

The Guardian of the Threshold indicates to us that we should look back once again at the gray figure that stands over there, which we are ourselves in earthly life, but this time after having turned away, in our minds we turn it around in a circle. We will find, when we rotate the figure, that the sun appears behind it and rotates with it. [It is drawn - left, red]. And we will realize that at the moment we are brought into physical existence from the spiritual world, our etheric body has been compressed from the cosmic ether. Therefore, just as the first verse belongs to this [the drawing of the gray figure and the first verse are numbered “I”], this second verse belongs to this. [The drawing of the red rotating form and the second verse are numbered “II”.]

Then the Guardian of the Threshold refers us to our will, which is active in our limbs. And he strongly draws our attention to the fact that whatever relates to the will is in a sleeping state, even when we are awake. He explains how as the thought works downward - I explained it last time, so may say it now -, how as the thought carries warmth downward into our limbs' movement so that it becomes will: this becomes clear in spiritual cognition and spiritual seeing. Normal consciousness hides this when we are sleeping, as it hides life in general during sleep. Now we should observe the will in the limbs as though sunken in deep sleep. The will is asleep. The limbs are asleep. We should see this as a firm mental image. Then, when it is firm, we realize how thinking, the source of willing in earthly man, sinks down into the limbs. Then it becomes light in him. The will becomes bright. It wakes up. When we first see it in its sleeping state, we find that it wakes up when thinking sinks downward and light from below streams upward, which is the force of gravity. Feel the force of gravity in your legs and arms when you let them relax: that is what streams upward, and which meets with the downward streaming thinking. We observe human will transformed into its reality and thinking appearing as what ignites the will in man in an enchanting, magical way. That is the truly magical effect of thinking on the will. It is magic. Now we become aware of it. The Guardian of the Threshold says:

See above the bodily effects of will,
—in the aura—
How into sleeping fields of activity
Thinking sinks down from head forces;
Let through the soul's vision of light
human will transform itself;
And thinking, it appears
As the magical essence of will.

[This third verse, with underlining, is written on the blackboard.]

III

See above the bodily effects of will,

Now we imagine that the Guardian of the Threshold again points to the person over there, who we are ourselves, telling us to look and retain the picture, but not to turn around, but to let this picture sink below the surface of the earth beneath where the figure is standing. We look over there. There stands the one who we ourselves are. We make the picture and develop the strong force to look below, as though a lake were there and we were looking at this image as now being within the earth, but not as a mirror-image, but as an upright figure. [Draws.]

We imagine this picture: the earth [A white arc is drawn.] belonging to the third verse [This drawing and the third verse are given the number III.] We imagine: how the earth's gravitational forces rise, how the gravitational forces illuminate the limbs, feet and arms [white arrows]. In later observation, we acquire an idea of how gods and humans cooperate between death and a new birth to arrange karma.

That is what the Guardian of the Threshold admonishes us about when he speaks to us for the first time after we have crossed over the yawning abyss of being.

See behind thinking's sensory light,
How in the gloomy spirit-cell
Willing arises from the body's depths;
Let be cast, through your strength of soul,
Dead thinking into the cosmic void;
And willing, it will arise
As cosmic thought's creation.

See in feeling's weaving in the soul,
How in sleep's dim-like dawning
Life streams in from cosmic distance;
Let in sleep through tranquil heart
Human feeling waft away hushed;
And cosmic life spiritualizes
As the human being's power.

See above the bodily effects of will,
How into sleeping fields of activity
Thinking sinks down from head forces;
Let through the soul's vision of light
human will transform itself;
And thinking, it appears
As the magical essence of will.

The circle always closes. We are looking again at the starting point, listening to all the beings and all the processes of the world:

O man, know thyself!
So resounds the Cosmic-Word.
You hear it strong in soul,
You feel it firm in spirit.

Who speaks with such cosmic might?
Who speaks with such depth of heart?

Does it work through distant radiant space
Into your senses' sense of being?
Does it ring through weaving waves of time
Into your life's evolving stream?

It's you yourself who,
In feeling space, in experiencing time,
The Word create, feeling foreign
In space's soulless void,
Because you lose the force of thought
In time's destroying flow.

By this affirmation, Michael is present in this, his rightfully existing School. His presence is confirmed by his sign, which should loom over everything given in this School:

[Michael Sign - in red]

It is confirmed by his seal, that he has impressed on the esoteric striving of the Rosicrucian School, and which lives on symbolically in the threefold verse:

Ex deo nascimur

In Christo morimur

Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus

And as Michael impresses his seal, the first sentence is spoken with this gesture:

[draws: Image 1, the lower seal gesture, yellow]

The second sentence with this gesture:

[draws: Image 1, the middle seal gesture, yellow]

The third sentence with this gesture:

[draws: Image 1, the upper seal gesture]

The first gesture means:[3]

I esteem the Father

It lives mutely as we say: “Ex deo nascimur”.

[lower seal gesture]

The second gesture means:

I love the Son

It lives mutely as we say: “In Christo morimur”.

[middle seal gesture]

The third gesture means:

I unite with the Spirit

It lives mutely in the Sign, which is Michael's Seal, as we speak: “Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus”.

[upper seal gesture]

Thus, today's Michael affirmation is confirmed by means of his Sign and Seals:

[Michael's Sign]

[spoken with the seal gestures:]

Ex deo nascimur

In Christo morimur

Per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus.

Translator's notes:

[1] It is a fairly common practice in Germany and Switzerland for people who come early to a function to place a paper, notebook, or hat on a chair to reserve their places.

[2] It seems to me, although the editors of the German original say nothing about it, that Rudolf Steiner was being ironic here, that a School member gave the mantra to his unauthorized friend, who then passed it on to others, and that the member then used the “clairvoyant” story as an excuse.

[3] The Michael Sign and Seals: From the stenographic notes of the seven recapitulation lessons, it is not possible to determine when Rudolf Steiner only wrote the words on the blackboard or when he spoke the words and wrote them, or only spoke them.

---

This was the last Lesson for the Esoteric School. Rudolf Steiner was unable to continue because of illness. He died on March 30, 1925.

I.

Very early on, I was drawn to Kant. Between the ages of fifteen and sixteen, I studied Kant very intensively, and before I went to university in Vienna, I studied Kant's orthodox successors very intensively, from the beginning of the 19th century, who have been completely forgotten by the official history of science in Germany and are hardly ever mentioned anymore. Then I began to study Fichte and Schelling in depth. During this time—and this already is related to external occult influences—the idea of time became completely clear to me. This realization had no connection with my studies and was derived entirely from occult life. It was the realization that there is a backward-going evolution that interferes with the forward-going one—the occult-astral. This realization is the condition for spiritual vision.¹

Then came the acquaintance with the agent of the Masters.

Then an intensive study of Hegel.

Then the study of more recent philosophy as it developed in Germany from the 1850s, particularly of so-called epistemology in all its ramifications.

My childhood passed without anyone outwardly intending to do so, so that I never encountered a person with a superstition; and when someone around me spoke of things of superstition, it was never without a strongly emphasized rejection. I did get to know the church cultus, as I was drafted into the cultic acts as a so-called altar boy, but nowhere, not even with the priests did I get to know any true piety and religiosity. Instead, certain dark sides of the Catholic clergy kept coming to my attention.

I did not meet the Master immediately.², but first one of his emissaries,³ who was completely initiated into the secrets of the effectiveness of all plants and their connection with the cosmos and with human nature. For him, dealing with the spirits of nature was something natural, which he presented without enthusiasm, but which aroused all the more enthusiasm.

My official studies were directed towards mathematics, chemistry, physics, zoology, botany, mineralogy and geology. These studies offered a much more secure foundation for a spiritual world view than, for example, history or literature, which, in the absence of a specific method and also without significant prospects in the German scientific community at the time, were left without a secure footing.

During my first years at university in Vienna, I met Karl Julius Schröer. At first, I attended his lectures on the history of German literature since Goethe's first appearance, on Goethe and Schiller, on the history of German literature in the 19th century, on Goethe's “Faust”. I also took part in his “exercises in oral presentation and written presentation”. This was a unique college course based on the model of Uhland's institution at the University of Tübingen.⁴ Schröer came from German language research, had conducted significant studies on German dialects in Austria, he was a researcher in the style of the Brothers Grimm and in literary research, an admirer of Gervinus. He was previously director of the Viennese Protestant schools. He is the son of the poet and extraordinarily meritorious pedagogue Christian Oeser. At the time I got to know him, he was turning entirely to Goethe. He has written a widely read commentary o n Goethe's Faust and on Goethe's other dramas as well. He completed his studies at the German universities of Leipzig, Halle and Berlin before the decline of German idealism. He was a living embodiment of the noble German education. The person was attracted to him. I soon became friends with him and was then often in his house. With him it was like an idealistic oasis in the dry materialistic German educational desert. In the external life, this time was filled with the nationality struggles in Austria. Schröer himself was far removed from the natural sciences.

But I myself had been working on Goethe's scientific studies since the beginning of 1880.

Then Joseph Kürschner founded the comprehensive work Deutsche Nationalliteratur (German National Literature), for which Schröer edited the Goethean dramas with introductions and commentaries. Kürschner entrusted me with the edition of Goethe's scientific writings on Schröer's recommendation.

Schröer wrote a preface for it, through which he introduced me to the literary public.

Within this collection, I wrote introductions to Goethe's botany, zoology, geology and color theory.

Anyone reading these introductions will already be able to find the theosophical ideas in the guise of a philosophical idealism.

It also includes an examination of Haeckel.

My 1886 work is a philosophical supplement to this: Epistemologie.

Then I was introduced to the circles of Viennese theological professors through my acquaintance with the Austrian poetess M. E. delle Grazie, who had a paternal friend in Professor Laurenz Müllner. Marie Eugenie delle Grazie has written a great epic “Robespierre” and a drama “Shadow”.

At the end of the 1880s, I became an editor at the Deutsche Wochenschrift in Vienna for a short time. This gave me the opportunity to study the national psyche of the various Austrian nationalities in depth. The guiding thread for an intellectual cultural policy had to be found.

In all of this, there was no question of publicly promoting occult ideas. And the occult powers behind me gave me only one piece of advice: “All in the guise of idealistic philosophy”.

At the same time, I had more than fifteen years of experience as an educator and private teacher.

My first contact with Viennese theosophical circles at the end of the 1880s had no lasting external effect.

During my last months in Vienna, I wrote my little pamphlet Goethe as the Father of a New Aesthetic.

Then I was called to the then newly established Goethe and Schiller Archives in Weimar to edit Goethe's scientific writings. I did not have an official position at this archive; I was merely a contributor to the great “Sophie Edition” of Goethe's works.

My next goal was to provide the foundation of my world view, purely philosophically. This took place in the two works:

Truth and Science and Philosophy of Spiritual Activity.

The Goethe and Schiller Archives were visited by a large number of scholars and literary figures, as well as other personalities from Germany and abroad. I got to know some of these personalities better because I soon became friends with the director of the Goethe and Schiller Archives, Prof. Bernhard Suphan, and visited his house a lot. Suphan invited me to many private visits that he received from visitors to the archive. It was on one of these occasions that I met Treitschke.

I formed a deeper friendship with the German mythologist Ludwig Laistner, author of Riddle of the Sphinx, who died soon after.

I had repeated conversations with Herman Grimm, who told me a lot about his uncompleted work, a History of German Imagination.

Then came the Nietzsche period. Shortly before, I had even written about Nietzsche in a hostile sense.

My occult powers indicated to me that I should subtly allow the current of thought to flow in the direction of the truly spiritual. One does not arrive at knowledge by wanting to impose one's own point of view absolutely, but rather by immersing oneself in foreign currents of thought.

Thus I wrote my book on Nietzsche by placing myself entirely in Nietzsche's point of view. It is perhaps for this very reason the most objective book on Nietzsche in Germany. Nietzsche as an anti-Wagnerian and an anti-Christian is also fully represented.

For some time I was now considered the most unconditional “Nietzschean”.

At that time the “Society for Ethical Culture” was founded in Germany. This society wanted a morality with complete indifference to all world views—A complete construct and an educational hazard. I wrote a pointed article against this foundation in the weekly Die Zukunft.

The result was sharp replies. And my previous study of Nietzsche led to the publication of a pamphlet against me:

Nietzsche-Narren (Nietzsche Fool).

The occult point of view demands: “No unnecessary polemics” and “Avoid defending yourself where you can”.

I calmly wrote my book, Goethes Weltanschauung (Goethe's World View), which marked the end of my Weimar period.

Immediately after my article in Zukunft, Haeckel contacted me. Two weeks later, he wrote an article in Zukunft in which he publicly acknowledged my point of view that ethics can only arise on the basis of a worldview.

Not long after that was Haeckel's 60th birthday, which was celebrated as a great festivity in Jena. Haeckel's friends invited me. That was the first time I saw Haeckel. His personality is enchanting. In person, he is the complete opposite of the tone of his writings. If Haeckel had ever studied philosophy, in which he was not just a dilettante but a child, he would certainly have drawn the highest spiritualistic conclusions from his epoch-making phylogenetic studies.

Now, despite all of German philosophy and despite all of the other German education, Haeckel's phylogenetic thought is the most significant achievement of German intellectual life in the second half of the nineteenth century. And there is no better scientific foundation of occultism than Haeckel's teaching. Haeckel's teaching is great, but Haeckel is the worst commentator on his teaching. It is not by showing Haeckel's contemporaries his weaknesses that one benefits culture, but by presenting to them the greatness of Haeckel's phylogenetic ideas. I did this in the two volumes of my:

Welt- und Lebensanschauungen im 19. Jahrhundert (World and Life Views in the 19th Century), which are also dedicated to Haeckel, and in my small work: Haeckel and his opponents.

In Haeckel's phylogeny, only the time of the German intellectual life actually lives; philosophy is in a state of the most desolate infertility, theology is a hypocritical fabric that is not remotely aware of its untruthfulness, and the sciences, despite the great empirical upsurge, have fallen into the most barren philosophical ignorance.

From 1890 to 1897 I was in Weimar.

In 1897 I went to Berlin as editor of the Magazine for Literature. The writings Welt- und Lebensanschauungen im 19. Jahrhundert (World and Life Views in the 19th Century) and Haeckel und seine Gegner (Haeckel and his Opponents) already belong to the Berlin period.

My next task was to bring an intellectual current to bear in literature. I placed the Magazin für Literatur at the service of this task. It was a long-established organ that had existed since 1832 and had gone through the most diverse phases.

I led it gently and slowly into esoteric directions. Carefully but clearly: by writing an essay for the 150th anniversary of Goethe's birth:

Goethe's Secret Revelation.

which only reflected what I had already hinted at in a public lecture in Vienna about Goethe's fairy tale of the “green snake and the beautiful lily”.

It was only natural that a circle of readers should gradually gather around the trend I had inaugurated in the Magazin. They did gather, but not quickly enough for the publisher to see any financial prospects in the venture. I wanted to give a literary trend in young literature an intellectual foundation, and I was actually in the most lively contact with the most promising representatives of this trend. But on the one hand I was abandoned; on the other hand, this direction soon either sank into insignificance or into naturalism.

Meanwhile, contact with the working class had already been established. I had become a teacher at the Berlin Workers' Education School. I taught history and natural science. My thoroughly idealistic method of teaching history and my way of teaching soon became both appealing and understandable to the workers. My audience grew. I was called to give a lecture almost every evening.

Then the time came when I was able to say, in agreement with the occult forces behind me:

you have philosophically laid the foundation of the world view,
you have shown an understanding of the currents of time by treating them as only a complete adept could treat them;
no one will be able to say: this occultist speaks of the spiritual world because he does not know the philosophical and scientific achievements of the time.

I had now also reached my fortieth year, before the onset of which, in the sense of the masters, no one is allowed to publicly appear as a teacher of occultism.⁵ (Whenever someone teaches earlier, this is an error).

Now I was able to devote myself publicly to Theosophy. The next consequence was that, at the urging of certain leaders of German socialism, a general assembly of the Workers' Educational School was convened to decide between Marxism and me. But the ostracism did not decide against me. At the general assembly, it was decided with all of them against only four votes to keep me as a teacher.

But intimidation from the leaders caused me to resign after three months. In order not to compromise themselves, they wrapped the matter up in the pretext that I was too busy with the Theosophical movement to have enough time for the labor school in.

From the very beginning of my theosophical work, Miss v. Sivers was at my side. She also personally witnessed the last phases of my relationship with the Berlin working class.

II.

Christian Rosenkreutz went to the Orient in the first half of the fifteenth century to find the balance between the initiation of the East and that of the West.⁶ One consequence of this was the definitive establishment of the Rosicrucians in the West after his return. In this form, Rosicrucianism was to be the top secret school for the preparation of what esotericism would have to take on publicly as its task at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, when external natural science would have come to a preliminary solution to certain problems.

Christian Rosenkreutz described these problems as follows:

1) The discovery of spectral analysis, whereby the material constitution of the Cosmos was brought to light.
2) The introduction of material evolution into the science of the organic.
3) The realization of the fact of a state of consciousness other than the ordinary one through the recognition of hypnotism and suggestion.

Only when these material discoveries have been fully assimilated by science, should certain Rosicrucian principles be passed on from the realm of esoteric science to the public.

For the time being, the Christian-mystical initiation was given to the West in the form in which it was given by the initiator, the “Unknown from the Oberland”. ⁷ erfloss in St. Victor, Meister Eckhart, Tauler, etc.

The initiation of Manes is seen as a “higher degree” within this entire stream.⁸ In 1459, Christian Rosenkreutz also received his initiation: it consists in the true knowledge of the function of evil. This initiation, with its underlying reasons, must remain hidden from the masses for a long time to come. For wherever even the smallest ray of light from it has found its way into literature, it has wrought disaster, as through the noble Guyau, whose disciple was Friedrich Nietzsche.

III.

For information; it cannot yet be stated directly in this form.⁹

The Theosophical Society was founded in New York in 1875 by H. P. Blavatsky and H. S. Olcott. This first foundation had a distinctly Western character. And also the writing “Isis Unveiled”, in which Blavatsky published a great many occult truths, has a distinctly Western character. However, it must be said that the great truths communicated in this writing are often distorted and caricatured. It is as if a harmonious countenance were to appear completely distorted in a convex mirror. The things said in Isis are true, but the way in which they are said is an irregular reflection of the truth. This is due to the fact that the truths themselves are inspired by the great initiates of the West, who are also the initiators of Rosicrucian wisdom. The distortion stems from the inappropriate way in which these truths were absorbed by the soul of H. P. Blavatsky. For the educated world, this very fact should have been proof of the higher source of inspiration for these truths. For no one could have had these truths through themselves, and yet presented them in such a distorted way. Because the initiators of the West saw how little chance they had of the flow of spiritual wisdom into humanity in this way, they decided to drop the matter in this form for the time being. But once the gate was open, Blavatsky's soul was prepared to receive spiritual wisdom. The eastern initiators were able to take hold of it. These eastern initiators initially had the very best of intentions. They saw how humanity was heading towards the terrible danger of a complete materialization of the way of thinking through Anglo-Americanism. They, the Eastern Initiators, wanted to instill their form of anciently preserved spiritual knowledge into the Western world. Under the influence of this current, the Theosophical Society took on an Eastern character, and under the same influence, Sinnett's “Esoteric Buddhism” and Blavatsky's “Secret Doctrine” were inspired. But both became distortions of the truth again. Sinnett's work distorts the high revelations of the initiators through an inadequate philosophical intellectualism carried into it, and Blavatsky's “Secret Doctrine” through their own chaotic soul.

The result of this was that the initiators, including the Eastern ones, increasingly withdrew their influence from the official Theosophical Society, and that this became a playground for all kinds of occult powers that distorted the high cause. There was a brief episode in which Annie Besant, through her pure, lofty way of thinking and living, came into the initiators' current. But this little episode came to an end when Annie Besant surrendered to the influence of certain Indians who, under the influence of German philosophers in particular, developed a grotesque intellectualism, which they interpreted wrongly. That was the situation when I myself was faced with the necessity of joining the Theosophical Society. It had been founded by true initiates and therefore, although subsequent events have given it a certain imperfection, it is for the time being an instrument for the spiritual life of the present. Its beneficial further development in Western countries depends entirely on the extent to which it proves capable of incorporating the principle of Western initiation under its influence. For the Eastern initiations must necessarily leave untouched the Christ principle as the central cosmic factor of evolution. Without this principle, however, the theosophical movement would have to remain without a decisive influence on Western cultures, which have the Christ life at their starting point. The revelations of Oriental initiation would have to present themselves in the West as a sect alongside living culture. They could only hope to succeed in evolution if they eradicated the Christ principle from Western culture. But this would be identical with extinguishing the very purpose of the earth, which lies in the knowledge and realization of the intentions of the living Christ. To reveal this in its full wisdom, beauty and truth is the deepest goal of Rosicrucianism. Regarding the value of Eastern wisdom as a subject of study, only the opinion can exist that this study is of the highest value because the Western peoples have lost the sense of esotericism, but the Eastern peoples have retained it. But regarding the introduction of the right esotericism in the West, there should also only be the opinion that this can only be the Rosicrucian-Christian one, because it also gave birth to Western life, and because by losing it, humanity would deny the meaning and purpose of the Earth. Only in this esotericism can the harmony of science and religion flourish, while any fusion of Western knowledge with Eastern esotericism can only produce such barren bastards as Sinnett's “Esoteric Buddhism” is. One can schematically represent the correct path:

Original revelation -> Evolution through Indian Esotericism -> Christ -> split between Modern scientific materialism AND Esoteric Rosicrucianism -> Synthesis: productive modern Theosophy

the incorrect, of which Sinnett's “Esoteric Buddhism” and Blavatsky's “Secret Doctrine” are examples:

Original revelation -> Synthesis of Evolution through Indian Esotericism AND Modern scientific materialism of which the Eastern world has not participated = Blavatsky and Sinnett.

Appendix to Part I of Rudolf Steiner's Notes

From the introduction by Edouard Schuré to his French translation of Rudolf Steiner's work “Christianity as Mystical Fact” (1908) ¹

At the age of fifteen [eighteen], Rudolf Steiner made the acquaintance of a knowledgeable plant expert who was temporarily staying in his area. What was special about this person was that he not only knew the species, the families and the life of the plants down to the smallest details, but also their secret properties. It was as if he had spent his whole life in conversation with the unconscious and fleeting soul of plants and flowers. He had the gift of seeing the living principle of plants, the etheric body, and what is called in occultism the elemental beings of the plant kingdom. He spoke of it as if it were the most ordinary and natural thing. The calm and sober scientific tone of his conversation only increased the young man's curiosity and admiration. He later learned that this strange man was an emissary of the Master, whom he did not yet know, but who was to become his real initiator and who was already watching over him from afar.

What the whimsical botanist with the second sight had told him, young Steiner found to be entirely consistent with the logic of things. It only confirmed an inner feeling that he had had for a long time and that imposed itself more and more on his mind as the basic law and basis of the great universe: namely, the law of dual currents, which constitutes the movement of the world itself and which could be called the ebb and flow of the life of the universe.

We are all familiar with and aware of the outward current of evolution, which draws all beings of heaven and earth with it, stars, plants, animals, humans, and allows them to move forward into an infinite future, without our being aware of the original force that restlessly propels them forward. However, there is now a countercurrent in the universe that moves in the opposite direction and constantly intervenes in the first current. This is the current of involution, through which the principles, forces, entities and souls that come from the invisible world and the region of the eternal constantly penetrate into the visible reality. No evolution of the material would be comprehensible without this constant involution of the spirit, without this occult astral current, which, with its hierarchy of powerful entities, is the great inspirer of all life. Thus the spirit, which contains the future in its germ, involves itself in matter; matter, which receives the spirit, evolves towards the future. Thus, while we blindly walk towards an unknown future, this future consciously comes towards us, sinking into the course of the world and of man. Such is the dual movement of time, the exhalation and inhalation of the world soul, which comes from eternity and returns to eternity.

From the age of eighteen, the young Steiner had an intuitive sense of this dual current, which is the condition for all spiritual knowledge. The principle of the two currents had revealed itself to him through an involuntary and direct vision of things. From that moment on, he had an undeniable perception of secret powers at work behind and through him to guide him. He listened to what these powers said and followed their beckoning, for he felt himself in deep harmony with them.

However, these kinds of perceptions formed a world of their own in his spiritual life. They were truths for him, appearing as something so deep, mysterious and sacred that he could not imagine ever expressing them in words. He nourished his soul with them as from a divine source, but to let a drop of it flow out would have seemed like a desecration to him.

Alongside this inward, contemplative life, his intellectual and philosophical mind developed most vividly. From the age of 15 to 16, Rudolf Steiner had studied Kant, Fichte and Schelling in depth. When he came to Vienna a few years later, he was enthusiastic about Hegel, whose transcendental idealism leads to the limits of occultism. However, speculative philosophy could not satisfy him. His positive spirit demanded the solid basis that the observational sciences could provide. He therefore studied mathematics, chemistry, mineralogy, botany and zoology in depth. “These studies,” he says, “provide a much more secure basis for a spiritual world view than history and literature. The latter, lacking precise methods, were at that time unable to throw any significant light on the great field of German science.” Full of interest in everything he encountered, enthusiastic about art and poetry, Steiner nevertheless did not neglect the study of literary history. In this field, the literary historian Julius Schröer became an excellent guide for him. He was an outstanding scholar in the tradition of the Brothers Grimm who, above all, strove to cultivate in his students the art of free speech and written expression. The young student owed his extensive literary education to this important man. “In the wilderness of contemporary materialism,” Steiner says, “his house was an oasis of idealism for me.”

Nevertheless, this was not yet the master he was seeking. Amidst the most diverse studies and intensive meditations, he was only able to recognize fragments of the actual structure of the universe; but his innate intuition prevented him from doubting the divine source of things and a spiritual beyond. It is a characteristic sign of this extraordinary man that he never had to go through the crises of doubt and despair that mystics and thinkers on the threshold of a final conviction usually experience. However, he felt that the real light that illuminates and permeates everything had not yet come to him. The youth besieged him with their urgent problems. How should he arrange his life? The sphinx of fate lay before him. How would he solve the question she put to him?

At nineteen, the young neophyte met his guide - the master - an encounter he had long anticipated.

It is a fact confirmed by occult tradition and experience that those who are inspired by a disinterested yearning for the higher truth find a master who initiates them at the appropriate moment, that is, when they are ripe for it. “Knock and it will be opened to you,” says Jesus. This is true for all things, but especially for the truth. But the desire must be as ardent as a flame, as pure as crystal in a soul.

Rudolf Steiner's master was one of those powerful people who live unknown to the world under the mask of some bourgeois profession to fulfill a mission that only their peers in the Brotherhood of “Masters of Renunciation” know. They have no visible effect on human events. The incognito is the condition of their effectiveness, which thereby gains all the more strength. For they awaken, prepare and guide those who act in the open. For the Master, Rudolf Steiner did not have to do much to complete the first, spontaneous initiation of his disciple. He only had to show him how to make use of his own nature to provide him with everything he needed. In a luminous way, he showed him the connection between the external and the secret sciences, the religions and the spiritual forces that are currently contesting the leadership of humanity, as well as the age of the occult tradition that holds the threads of history in its hand, ties them, breaks them and ties them again over the centuries. He quickly led him through the various stages of the inner discipline in order to achieve conscious and rational clairvoyance. In just a few months, the student had been introduced to the incomparable depth and beauty of the esoteric synthesis through oral instruction. Rudolf Steiner had already outlined his spiritual mission: “To combine science with religion, to bring God into science and nature into religion, and thereby to fertilize art and life anew.” But how to approach this tremendous and audacious task? How could he conquer or rather tame and convert the great enemy, modern materialistic science, comparable to a huge armored dragon with a great treasure hoarded? How can we succeed in taming the dragon of modern science to harness it to the chariot of spiritual truth? Above all, how can we conquer the bull of public opinion?

Rudolf Steiner's master was hardly like this. He had none of this deep, almost feminine sensitivity, which, while not excluding energy, turns every touch into an emotional experience and immediately transforms the suffering of another into personal pain. He was a masculine spirit, a natural-born ruler who only looked at the species and for whom individuals hardly mattered. He spared neither himself nor others. His will was like a cannonball that, once it has left the barrel, shoots directly towards its target, sweeping away everything in its path. To his student's concerned questions, he replied something along the lines of:

"If you want to fight the enemy, you must first understand him. You can only conquer the dragon by putting on its skin. You have to take the bull by the horns. You will find your weapons and your comrades-in-arms in the greatest adversity. I have shown you who you are; now go – and be yourself!” ²

Rudolf Steiner knew the language of the masters well enough to sense the difficult path that this command imposed on him; however, he also understood that it was the only means to reach the goal. He obeyed and set out on his journey.

• 1. Cf. Schuré's remarks on p.28; Rudolf Steiner's autobiographical lecture Berlin, February 4, 1913 in “Beiträge zur Rudolf Steiner Gesamtausgabe” No. 83/84; Lecture Dornach June 14, 1923 in “The History and the Conditions of the Anthroposophical Movement in Relation to the Anthroposophical Society” in GA 258; also Hella Wiesberger “The Biographical Moment of the Discovery of the Concept of Time” and “The Concept of Time as the ‘Basic Nerve’ of the Beginning of Anthroposophical Research” in “Beiträge zur Rudolf Steiner Gesamtausgabe” Nr. 49/50, S. 15-28. Then came the study of more recent philosophy as it had developed in Germany since the 1950s, especially so-called epistemology in all its ramifications.
• 2. Further details not known.
• 3. Felix Koguzki (Vienna 1833-1909 Trumau). Cf. the autobiographical lecture Berlin, February 4, 1913 in “Beiträge zur Rudolf Steiner Gesamtausgabe” No. 83, as well as “Mein Lebensgang”, GA 28. Furthermore, Emil Bock “Rudolf Steiner. Studies on his life and work, Stuttgart 1961.
• 4. Cf. Rudolf Steiner's biography of Ludwig Uhland (1787-1862, Tübingen). (section “Politics and Research. University Professor”) in GA 33.
• 5. Näheres in «Zur Geschichte und aus den Inhalten der ersten Abteilung der Esoterischen Schule 1904-1914», GA 264.
• 6. Cf. Rudolf Steiner, “The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosencreutz” in GA 35 “Philosophy and Anthroposophy 1904-1918”; also in “The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz anno 1459”, translated into modern German by Walter Weber, Stuttgart 1957 and Basel 1978. Cf. also “Esoteric Christianity and the Spiritual Guidance of Humanity”, GA 130.
• 7. Cf. Rudolf Steiner, “Mysticism at the Dawn of Modern Spiritual Life and Its Relationship to the Modern Worldview” (1901), GA 7; Basel, November 23, 1907 in “Aus den Inhalten der esoterischen Stunden” GA 266/1; “Zur Geschichte und aus den Inhalten der ersten Abteilung der Esoterischen Schule 1904-1914”, GA 264, p. 230.
• 8. Cf. Lecture Berlin, November 11, 1904 in “The Legend of the Temple and the Golden Legend” GA 93.
• 9. Regarding the whole of Section III cf. “The Occult Movement in the Nineteenth Century and its Relation to World Culture”, CW 254; lecture Helsingfors 11 April 1912 in “The Connection of the Human Being with the Elementary World. Kalewala - Olaf Åsteson - Russian folklore 9
• 1. The complete introduction by Schuré can be found in “Beiträge zur Rudolf Steiner Gesamtausgabe”, issue no. 42.
• 2. This statement is confirmed by Marie Steiner in the preface to the two lectures she published in 1947 under the title “The Christ Impulse in Historical Development” (Der Christusimpuls im historischen Werdegang): “Lugano, September 17, 1911 and Locarno, September 19, 1911,” now in CW 130. Her preface can be found in Marie Steiner, Collected Writings, Volume I, 'The Anthroposophy of Rudolf Steiner', Dornach 1967. In it he states that Rudolf Steiner deliberately set himself the task of 'making himself all the objections that the critical materialist brings to the revelations of the spirit, and to spare nothing that would in the slightest deviate from this line. He called this 'crawling into the dragon's skin'

It seems obvious to me today that what has been discussed here, from this point of view, during these days, the harmony of the subjective and the objective, is now emerging as an introduction to my lecture, also based, so to speak, on a feeling. Yesterday morning, the reflections concluded with the speech of Professor Römer, which gave me great satisfaction – that is the subjective aspect – for the reason that it showed how a specialist, who is thoroughly and fully immersed in his field, can feel the need for the spiritual science to shed light on such a specific subject. It will also have become clear to you from what Professor Römer has already been able to cite from his field of expertise today, that above all, for this interweaving, strong, vigorous work must be developed on the part of the relevant spiritual science itself. For what has been given so far - and this should be fully recognized - are initially individual guidelines that require verification with reference to external science.

In all that has been brought to me through this lecture to a certain subjective satisfaction, there was a consideration of the teeth. So yesterday we concluded with the teeth – now I come to the objective. And allow me to start with the teeth again today, though not with something that I want to tell you about the teeth on my own initiative, but with a saying that emerged from the scholarship of the 11th century, as it was in Central Europe at the time. This saying goes:

When thy tongue catcheth the wind

and draweth it into thy mouth,

and with thy teeth thou choosest

the word that thou shalt speak.

This means: just as the tongue catches the wind from its surroundings and draws it into the mouth, so it draws the word it speaks out of the teeth.

Now, that is a product of 11th-century Central European scholarship. It means that the tongue draws the word out of the teeth just as it draws air into the mouth from the outside world.

Now a sample of 19th-century scholarship, from the last third of the century, a word pronounced by the philologist Wilhelm Scherer, who was revered by a large number of students as a modern idol, and which you will find in his “Deutsche Sprachgeschichte” (History of the German Language), where he also uses this word that I have just read to you. The word he uses in contrast to this is this: “We laugh at such a word in the present”.

That is the scientific confession from the 19th century about this word from the 11th century; it expresses the scientific attitude that still prevails today in the broadest sense and that the representatives of the corresponding field are still likely to express today in further references.

If we first consider this contrast from the point of view that has been adopted here more often, that a complete change has taken place in relation to the state of mind of people since the first third of the 15th century, then we have in the time that lies between the first quoted saying and the saying of Wilhelm Scherer, we have contained approximately just what has elapsed in time since the dawning of that state of mind that existed until the beginning of the 15th century, and the direction that has emerged since then and has so far undergone a certain development.

Wilhelm Scherer now continues the sentences that he began by saying that he had to laugh at such a word from the 19th He says that all efforts in the present must be directed, with regard to linguistics, to bringing together what physiologists have to say about speaking and word formation based on the physiological organization of the human body with what philologists have to say about the development of language from ancient times to the present. In other words, physiology and philology should join hands in this field of science. And Wilhelm Scherer adds that unfortunately he has to admit that the philologists are very, very far behind and that it cannot be hoped that they will meet the physiologists halfway in terms of what they have to say about the physical organization for the formation of speech. So that physiology and philology are two branches of science whose lack of mutual understanding a man regarded as a man of his time acknowledges in no uncertain terms.

This points to a phenomenon that is a dominant one in our time: that the individual sciences with their methods do not understand each other at all, that they talk alongside each other without the person who is placed in the midst of this scientific activity and hears what the physiologists on the one hand and the philologists on the other have to say, and who hears what they say, is able to do something with it – forgive the perhaps somewhat daring comparison – other than to be skewered from two sides in relation to his soul by the formations of concepts.

In a sense, although I do not want to say much more with this than something analogous, a certain contrast is already expressed in the word designation, which, I would like to say, is unconsciously taken seriously by the newer currents of science. The word 'physiology' expresses the fact that it wants to be a logos about the physical in man, so to speak, that which grasps the physical in a logical, intellectual way; the word 'philology' expresses: love of wisdom, love of the Logos, love of the word; so the word designation is taken from an emotional experience. In one case the word designation is taken from a rational experience, in the other from an emotional experience. And what the physiologist wants to produce as a kind of intellectual Logos about the human body, that - namely the Logos - the philologist actually wants to love. As I said, I am only trying to make an analogy here, but if we pursue it further, if we follow it historically, it will take on a certain significance. I would advise us to follow it more closely historically.

But we can point out something else that comes to us from prehistory, from the forerunner of that which has emerged in human consciousness since the beginning of the 15th century. We know that what is called logic and which, in a certain respect, has its image in language, at least essentially, is a creation of Aristotle. And if one were to claim that, just as a person today who has not studied logic nevertheless lives logic in his soul activity, logic also lived in people's soul activity before Aristotle, one overlooks the fact that the transformation of the unconscious into the conscious nevertheless has a deeper significance in the course of human events. The elevation of the logical into consciousness is also a real process, albeit an inwardly real process, in the development of the soul of humanity: in older times there was an intimate relationship between the concept and the word. Just as there was such an intimate relationship between the concept or idea and the perception, as you will find explained in my “Riddles of Philosophy”, there was also an intimate connection, an interlocking, I would say, of words and ideas.

The distinction that we have to make today, psychologically, between the word and the content of the idea – particularly when considering mathematization, this emerges with all clarity – was not made in older times. And it was precisely this distinction that Aristotle first arrived at. He singled out, within the life of the soul, that which is conception or concept from the fabric of language and made it into something that exists separately for knowledge. But in doing so, he pushed that which lives in language further down into the unconscious than it was before. In a sense, a gulf was created for knowledge between the concept or the conception and the word.

The further back we go in the consideration of human language, the more we find that the word and the concept or idea are experienced as one and the same thing, that man, so to speak, hears inwardly what he thinks, that he has a word-picture, not so much a thought-picture. The thought is linked externally to the sense perceptions and internally to the word. But in this way, even in these early times, a certain intuitive perception was present, which can be characterized as follows: as people expressed themselves in words, they felt as if what resounded in their words had entered their speech directly from a hidden, subconscious, instinctive aspect of things. They felt, as it were, that a real process takes place between what lives in things, and especially in facts, and what inwardly forms the impulse for the sounding of the word. They felt such a real connection as a person today still feels a real connection between the substances that are outside, say egg, veal, lettuce, and what then happens inside with the content of these substances when they are digested. He will see a real process in this process, which unfolds from the outside of the substances to what happens inside in the digestion. He experiences this real process subconsciously. What one experienced in language was subconscious — even if much more clearly, already permeated by a certain dim awareness. One had the feeling that something living in the things is related to the sounds, to the words. Just as the substances of the materials one eats are connected with what happens internally in the metabolism of the human being, one felt an inner connection between what takes place in the things and facts, which is similar to words, and what sounds internally as a word. And in that Aristotle raised to consciousness what was felt to be a real process, where concepts come into play, the same was achieved for language as a person achieves when he reflects on what the substances of the materials in his organism do. Thinking about digestion is, of course, somewhat further removed from the actual process of digestion than thinking about language. But we can gain an idea of the relationship by clarifying this idea by moving from the more immediate to the more distant, and by becoming clearer in the distance.

Now, for us, if we replace today's abstract view of history with a more concrete one, the fact that things that happened in Greece in the pre-Christian era, also in the pre-Aristotelian era, happened later for the Central European population - who still perceived the Greeks as barbaric, that is, at a lower level of culture - is clear. And we will be right, and spiritual science gives us the guidance to raise this feeling to certainty, if we imagine that the mental state from which we speak is spoken emotionally, “the tongue draws the outer air into the mouth just as it draws the word out of the teeth,” that this way of looking at things , this remarkably pictorially expressed view was roughly the same as that which prevailed in pre-Aristotelian times within Greece, and in the place of which there arose what was bound to arise through the separation of logic, of the logos, through the separation of the conceptual from that which is expressed in language.

You are aware that in that erudition which developed first in the 15th century and from which the various branches of the individual specialized sciences have emerged, that in this erudition as education much has contributed what has asserted itself as late Greek culture. The philologists, in other words, those who are supposed to love the logos, were thoroughly influenced by what emerged from late Greek culture. And just imagine such a late Greek as a Germanic scholar, like Wilhelm Scherer, confronted with early Greek, and it tells him: the tongue pulls the language out of the teeth – then he naturally rejects it, then he wants nothing to do with it from his point of view. One must consider such facts in a light that tries to shine a little deeper into the historical context than what is often available in the ordinary popular science of history today, both in the field of external political or cultural history and in the field of language history.

Now the question is what paths must be sought in order to scientifically penetrate into the structure of the language organism itself, if I may express it in this way.

Even in external appearances, it is expressed how the soul, which has gradually been elevated into the realm of abstract concepts, has moved away from what was felt about language in the pre-Aristotelian period. What, for example, has been produced, as an opinion about the origin of language, by this research, which is in the sign of Aristotelism? Well, it was elevated into the abstract, and thus alienated from its direct connection with the external world, through which one could experience what really corresponds to the formed word in things. It was alienated from this, but still sought to understand what such a connection might look like, and it then also translated this connection into all kinds of abstractions. What she felt inwardly, she placed in the realm where concepts are formed externally, based on sensory or other external observations. Because it was impossible to delve into things to search for the process of how the word works from things into the human organization, an abstract concept was used in place of such an understanding, for example in the so-called Wauwau theory or in the Bimbam theory. The wauwau theory says nothing more than that what appears externally in the organic as sound is imitated. It is a completely external consideration of an external fact with the help of abstract concepts. The Bim-Bim theory differs from the Bow-Wow theory only in that it takes into account the inorganic way in which sound is released from itself. This sound is then imitated in an external way by the human being who is confronted with and influenced by external nature. And the transformation of that which children call — though not everywhere, but only in a very limited area of the earth — when they hear the dog bark: woof-woof, or that which comes into their sense of language when they hear the bell ring: ding-dong-dong, this transformation is then followed by a curious method. Thus, what has then formed into the organism of language can be seen in the indicated 'theories', which, it is true, have not been replaced by much better ones to this day.

We are therefore dealing with an inwardness of the observation of language. Above all, the aim of spiritual science, as it is meant here, is to make the study of language an inward one again, so that through what can be achieved in the ascent from sensory to supersensible knowledge, what was once thought about language through feeling and instinct can be found independently again, but now in a form appropriate to advanced humanity. And here I must point out (owing to the limited time I have only to indicate the directions in which the empirical facts can be followed) how spiritual science takes a strictly concrete path when it wants to understand how the human being develops from childhood to a certain age. You will find what I am trying to suggest here outlined, for example, in my booklet 'The Education of the Child from the Point of View of Spiritual Science'.

First of all, it must be pointed out how the entire soul-physical configuration of the human being in the period before the change of teeth is essentially different from what it becomes after the change of teeth. Anyone who has observed this fact knows how much is metamorphosed in the soul-physical life during the period when the second teeth replace the first. And anyone who does not seek the relationships between body, soul and spirit through abstractions such as the followers of psychophysical parallelism, but seeks them in concrete phenomena, seeks them according to a truly further developed scientific method, and is able to grasp the inner structure of the soul life in the concrete, will find just how what later, in a more soul-like way, in the peculiar configuration of conceptual life, in the implementation of that which is experienced conceptually, with will impulses, which then lead to the formation of the judgment, as something that has been working in the physical organization until the change of teeth. And he will not speculate about what can “work spiritually” in the physical organization from birth to the change of teeth. Rather, he will say to himself, what is then released during the change of teeth, released from a body in which it was previously latent, that has previously been active in a latent and bound state in the physical organization of the human being. And this particular type of physical organization, in which what can later be observed in the soul is active, comes to an end with the eruption of the second teeth, which you were also made aware of yesterday.

Now, the facts at hand must be considered not only from a physiological point of view, but also from the perspective of the human soul. Just as the physiologist, with his senses and the mind bound to them, penetrates into the physical processes of the human organism, so too does the soul, with its faculties of imagination and inspiration. If one really penetrates into these processes, then one must see in the real, which is first latent from birth to the change of teeth, and then becomes free, also in terms of imagination and knowledge. That is why my writing on “The Education of the Child from the Point of View of Spiritual Science”, in summarizing this process in a formulaic way, speaks of the fact that with the change of teeth, the etheric body of the human being, which previously worked in the physical body, is only born free to be active in the soul life. This “birth of the etheric body” is expressed in the change of teeth.

It is necessary to have such formulaic expressions at the starting point of anthroposophical spiritual scientific observation, such as “birth of the etheric body from the physical body”, which corresponds to an actual event. But when we seek to make the transition from spiritual science in the narrower sense — which is concerned with the observation of the human being's direct experience of the day — to the approach taken in the individual specialized sciences, then what is initially expressed in such a formulaic way becomes something similar to a mathematical formula: it becomes method, method for dealing with the facts. And that is why this spiritual science can have a fruitful effect on the individual sciences, without always merely continuing into the individual sciences that which, admittedly, must be clearly borne in mind at the starting point: that the human being is structured into a physical body, etheric body, and so on. At the beginning one can and must know such things; but if spiritual science is to bring about a fruitful influence, they must become active, they must become a method, a way of treating even the empirically given 'facts'. And in this respect spiritual science, because it rises from the inorganic, where it can do little, through the organic into the spiritual realm, I would like to say, not only in the way the individual sciences can fertilize can, but it will, as a result of its findings, have confirmations of facts to hand over to them, which will shed light on what is gained from the other side through sensory-physical observation and then seen through with the mind. Spiritual and sensory-physical research must meet. And it is one of the most important tasks for the future to ensure that this spiritual research and this sensory-physical research meet.

In the process that manifests itself externally during the change of teeth, it becomes clear that what is designated as the etheric body – but by taking a concrete view, not a word concept, into the eye of the soul – becomes freely active for the entire human organism, after previously having had an organizing effect in the physical body. Now it rises into the soul, becomes free and then consciously works back to the whole human being to a certain degree.

Something similar occurs again with what manifests externally as sexual maturity. There we see how, once again, something arises in human experience that expresses itself, on the one hand, in a certain metamorphosis of the physical organism and, on the other hand, in a metamorphosis of the spiritual. And an essential part of the spiritual researcher's work is to acquire a concrete way of looking at what occurs in the soul and spirit, just as someone who only wants to educate themselves through external observation acquires a concrete way of looking at what they can see with their eyes and combine with their mind. Soul cannot be looked at in this way, but can only be looked at in its reality through imagination. There is no true psychology that does not begin with imaginative observation, and there is no way to find the interrelationship of body and soul or physical body and spiritual soul other than to build a bridge between what is given to external physical sensory perception as the physical body, and what falls away from this perception, what can only be given as reality in the ascent to supersensible knowledge, the spiritual-soul.

If we now turn to what occurs during puberty, we must say: here we see, in a certain sense, the reverse process of what took place when the teeth changed. We see how what plays as the capacity for desire in man, what is the instinctive character of his will, takes hold of the organism in a way it did not take hold of it before. Summarizing the whole broad complex of facts that this involves in a formulaic way, it comes about that one says: the one in which the nature of desire slumbers, the astral body of the human being, becomes free when sexual maturity occurs. It is this body that now, if I may express it in this way, sinks freely into the physical organism, takes hold of it, permeates it, and thus materializes desire, which finds expression in sexual maturation.

Now, what does an appropriate comparison of these two processes show? We see, so to speak, when the change of teeth occurs, a liberation of the etheric body of the human being. How does what is happening actually express itself? It expresses itself in such a way that the human being becomes capable of further developing the formation of concepts, in general the movement in the life of ideas, which used to be more bound to his whole organism, bound to the organization of the head. To a certain extent we see, and spiritual science sees it not only to a certain extent but in its reality, that the etheric, which we ascribe to the human being as an etheric body, withdraws with the change of teeth to that which only lives in the rhythm of the human organism and in the metabolic limb-organism, and that it develops a free activity in the formation of the head, in the plastic formation of the head, in which the consciousness life of the human being participates in the imagination. In a sense, the organization of the head is uncovered during this time. And if I may express myself figuratively about a reality that certainly exists, I must say that what drives itself to the surface from the entire human organization in the second teeth is the soul-spiritual activity that previously permeates the entire bodily organization and then becomes free. Before, it permeated the whole human being right into the head. It gradually withdraws from the head; and it shows how it withdraws by revealing its no-longer-to-the-head activity in that it stops and produces the second teeth. You can visualize this almost schematically. If I indicate schematically what the human physical organization is with the white chalk, and what the etheric organization is with the red chalk, then the following would result schematically (see figure):

In the figure on the left, you see the human being in his spiritual, soul and physical activity as he stands before you until his teeth change. In the second figure, which is to your right, you see how the etheric element has withdrawn from the immediate effect of the head organization, how it has become free in a certain respect, so that from there it can freely affect the human head organism. And the last thing that happens in the physical organism as a result of this activity of the soul-spiritual is the eruption of the second teeth. I would say that you can observe in its image what is being communicated to you here as a spiritual view if you take the skulls that Professor Römer showed you yesterday, because you can compare the insertion of the first teeth with the insertion of the second teeth. If you want to follow this logically, then you have to take as a basis what has been gained here from spiritual science. Then you have to say to yourself, the first teeth, with all that is expressed in them, are taken out of the whole human organization, including the head organization. What is expressed in the second teeth is taken out after the inner soul organization, insofar as it concerns the etheric body, has slowly withdrawn into the rhythmic and metabolic organism and become free for the main head organization. In a similar way, we can say — as I said, I can only give guidelines — that something is happening with sexual maturity. What we call the astral body is sunk into the physical body, so that it finally takes hold of it and brings about what constitutes sexual maturity.

But now what happens in the human being takes place in the most manifold metamorphoses. Once one has truly understood a process such as that which is expressed through sexual maturity, which brings about a certain new relationship in human development, in the development of the human being to the outer world, once one truly understands such a process inwardly, one then also recognizes it when it occurs in a certain metamorphosis. What occurs at puberty, in that it takes hold of the whole person, in that it, so to speak, forms a relationship between the whole person and their environment, is, I would say, anticipated in a different metamorphosis at the moment when language develops in the child. Only what takes place with sexual maturation in the child takes place in a different metamorphosis in the formation of speech. What takes hold of the whole human being at sexual maturation and pours into his relationship with the outside world takes place between the rhythmic and limb human being and the human being's head organization. To a certain extent, the same forces that take hold of the whole person during puberty and direct their relationship to the outside world assert themselves between the lower and upper human beings. And as the lower human being learns to feel the upper human being in the way that the human being later learns to feel the outside world, he learns to speak. A process that can be observed externally in a person at a later age must be followed in its metamorphosis until it appears as an internal process in the human organism, in the learning to speak: the process that otherwise occurs in the whole person at puberty.

And once we have grasped this, we are able to comprehend how the interaction of the lower human being — the rhythmic and the limb-based human being — in its reciprocity develops an inner experience of something that is also present externally in the nature around us. This inward experiencing of what is outwardly present leads to the fact that what remains outwardly mute in things as their own language begins to resound as the human language in the human inner being. Please proceed from this sentence as from a regulative principle. Proceed from this sentence that what is in things, as they become external, material, falls silent, that in dematerialization it becomes audible in the human being and comes to speak. Then you will find the way in which you do not develop a yap-yap or a bim-bim theory, but on which you see that which is external to things – and cannot be perceived by external observation because it is silent and only exists in a supersensible way – as language in the human interior.

What I am saying here is like drawing a line to indicate the direction in which one would most like to paint a wide-ranging picture. I can only present this rather abstract proposition regarding the relationship between the things and facts of the external world and the origin of human language in the inner life. And you will see everything you can sense about language in a new light when you follow the path from this abstractly assumed sentence, which initially sounds formulaic, to what the facts connect for you in terms of meaning. And if you then want to apply what has been philologically obtained in this way to physiology, you will be able to learn about the connection between external sexual metamorphosis and linguistic metamorphosis by studying facts that are still present as a linguistic remnant of the sexual maturation metamorphosis in the change of the voice, that is, of the larynx in boys, and in some other phenomena that occur in women. If you have the will to engage with the facts and to draw the threads from one series of facts to another, not to encapsulate yourself in barren specialized sciences, but to really illuminate what is present in one science as fact , through the facts that come to light through other sciences, then the individual special sciences will be able to become what man must seek in them if he is to make progress on the path of his knowledge as well as on the path of his will.

In a context that might seem unrelated, we will see tomorrow in a very natural way how we can go from the change of teeth to the appearance of speech and then further back to what is the third on this retrogressive path: we see, so to speak, in what is expressed in the change of teeth, an interaction between the physical body and the etheric body. We see, in turn, in what is expressed in language, an interaction between the astral body and the etheric body. And thirdly, we must seek an interrelationship between the I and that which lives in man as an astral body, and we will be led to that which is the third in this retrospective consideration: to the embodiment of the spiritual-soul, to that which is born in the spiritual-soul. If one seeks the path from the change of teeth through the emergence of speech, the third stage is the stage of uniting the pre-existing human soul with the physical.

By walling up the way out of his consideration of the change of teeth to the consideration of language through his abstraction, Aristotle was forced to resort to the dogma that a new spiritual soul is born with each new human being. Due to a lack of will to continue on a path of knowledge, knowledge of human preexistence has been lost, and with it knowledge of all that truly leads to the knowledge of the human soul.

We see a historical connection, which, however, comes to expression in the treatment of certain problems, and we can say in conclusion: Today, according to the dictum of a philologist who is quite significant in the contemporary sense, philology and physiology are so opposed that they cannot understand each other. Why is this so? Because physiology studies the human body and does not come back to the mind in this study. If one pursues true physiology, then one finds the spiritual and psychological in man through the bodily in physiological observation. What happens when one pursues true philology? If one pursues true philology, then one does not reduce the logos to an abstraction, for which one then seeks to see through after-images, after-images in a scientific method, but one seeks to penetrate into that which one supposedly loves as a “philo”-logist, through imaginative and other forms of observation. But then, when one penetrates into that which has become shadowy and nebulous for today's philology, namely the genius of language, the creative genius of language, when one penetrates into it, then one penetrates through the spirit to the external corporeality.

Physiology finds the spirit by way of the inner body. Philology, when viewed correctly, finds what speaks and has fallen silent in things on the way out through the genius of language. It does not find bark and bim-bam, but rather finds the reason why words and language arise in us in the things that physically surround us. Physiology has lost its way because it stops at the body and does not penetrate inwardly through the body to the spirit. Philology has lost its way because it stops at the genius of language, which it then only grasps in the abstract, and does not penetrate into the inner being of the outer things from which what lives in the word resounds. If philology does not speak as if the wauwau and bimbam are imitated in an externally abstract way by man, but speaks about the external physicality in such a way that it becomes clear to it in imaginations, how the word arises from this external physicality, which echoes internally, so that when physiology has found spirit and philology has found physicality, they will find each other.

In this way I have traced the path that spiritual science in the anthroposophical sense wants to lead in conscientious work. I have only given a few hints in this particular field of introductory linguistics.

Now, these things are discussed among us, these things are striven for by us. While we strive for these things, so that they may bear witness to what is being striven for on a path of knowledge that arises entirely out of the spirit of our time. And while you can see from what is being striven for that there is probably a certain seriousness that can be measured against the seriousness that exists in other areas of life, Stuttgart, a meeting raged that trampled on most of our speakers, that had no intention of listening to anything, that did not want to engage with what we had to say, but that, through trampling and similar things, sought to crush what is being seriously pursued. And, addressing my fellow students, I may say: yesterday evening in Stuttgart, your colleagues were absent – not from the other faculty, but from the other attitude – they were not absent, they were present in the trampling.

Dear attendees, my dear fellow students! It will become ever clearer and clearer that there are those who, because they cannot be refuted – because they do not want to be refuted – because they do not want to engage with the new at all by inertly continuing with the old that has outlived itself, they will want to trample down on that with external force. Well, I would just like to appeal to you here in the sense that I do have faith in you, that you may say to yourself: We still have a say in this trampling down procedure! – But may this word become action.

Third evening of disputations

The questions did not relate to the theme of the day, “Linguistics”, but drew on problems dealt with earlier.

Dr. Steiner. Here is the question: It has been said that the three dimensions of space are not equal in structure – what is the difference?

In any case, the sentence was never formulated in this way: the three dimensions of space are “not equal in structure”, but what is probably meant here is the following. First of all, we have mathematical space, the space that we imagine – if we have an exact idea of it at all – as three mutually perpendicular dimensional directions, which we can thus define by the three mutually perpendicular coordinate axes.

In the usual mathematical treatment of space, the three dimensions are treated absolutely equally. We make so little distinction between the dimensions up-down, right-left, front-back that we can even think of these three dimensions as interchangeable. In the case of mere mathematical space, it does not matter whether, when we have the X-axis and the Z-axis perpendicular to each other, and the Y-axis perpendicular to them, we call the plane on which the Y-axis stands “horizontal” or “vertical” or the like. Likewise, we do not concern ourselves with the limitations of this space, so to speak. Not that we imagine it to be limitless. One does not usually ascend to this notion, but one imagines it in such a way that one does not concern oneself with its limits, but rather tacitly assumes that one can start from any point – let us say, for example, the X-direction and adding another piece to what you have already measured in the X-direction, to that again a piece and so on, and you would never be led to come to an end anywhere. In the course of the 19th century, much has been said against this Euclidean-geometric conception of space from the standpoint of meta-geometry. I will only remind you of how, for example, Riemann distinguished between the “unboundedness” of space and the “infiniteness” of space. And initially, there is no necessity for the purely conceptual imagination to assume the concept of “unboundedness” and that of “infiniteness” as identical. Take, for example, a spherical surface. If you draw on a spherical surface, you will find that nowhere do you come up against a spatial boundary that could, as it were, prevent you from continuing your drawing. You will certainly enter into your last drawing if you continue drawing; but you will never be forced to stop drawing because of a boundary if you remain on the spherical surface. So you can say to yourself: the spherical surface is unlimited in terms of my ability to draw on it. But no one will claim that the spherical surface is infinite. So you can distinguish, purely conceptually, between unlimitedness and infinity.

Under certain mathematical conditions, this can also be extended to space, can be extended to space in such a way that one imagines: if I add a distance in the X or Y axis, and then another and so on, and am never prevented from adding further distances, then this property of space could indeed speak for its unlimitedness, but not for the infinity of space. Despite the fact that I can always add new pieces, space does not need to be infinite at all; it could be unlimited. So these two concepts must be kept separate. So one could assume that if space were unbounded but not infinite, it would have an inward curvature in the same way as space does now, that is, in some way it would likewise recede into itself, like the surface of a sphere recedes into itself.

Certain ideas of newer metageometry are based on such assumptions. Actually, no one can say that there is much to be said against such assumptions; because, as I said, there is no way to derive the infinity of space from what we experience in space. It could very well be curved in on itself and then be finite.

Of course, I cannot go into this line of thought in detail, because it is almost the only one followed by the whole of modern metageometry. However, you will find sufficient evidence in the works of Riemann, Gauss and so on, which are readily available, to explore if you value such mathematical ideas.

From the purely mathematical point of view, therefore, this is what has been introduced into the, I would say rigid, neutral space of Euclidean geometry, which was only derived from 'unboundedness'. But what is indicated in the question is rooted in something else. Namely, that space, with which we initially calculate and which is available to us in analytical geometry, for example, when we deal with the three coordinate axes that are perpendicular to one another, that space is initially an abstraction. And an abstraction – from what? That is the question that must first be raised.

The question is whether we have to stop at this abstraction of “space” or whether that is not the case. Do we have to stop at this abstraction of space? Is this the only space that can be spoken of? Or rather, if this abstract concept of space is the only one that can legitimately be spoken of, then there is really only one objection that can be raised, and this is sufficiently addressed in Riemannian or any other metageometry. The fact of the matter is that, for example, Kant's definitions of space are based on the very abstract concept of space, in which one does not initially concern oneself with infinity or boundlessness, and that in the course of the 19th century, this concept of space was also shaken internally, in terms of its conceptual content, by mathematics. There can be no question of Kant's definitions still applying to a space that is not infinite but unlimited. In fact, much of the further development of the “Critique of Pure Reason” would be called into question, for example the doctrine of paralogisms, if one were obliged to move on to the concept of unlimited space curved in on itself.

I know that for the ordinary conception this concept of curved space causes difficulties. But from the purely mathematical-geometric point of view, nothing can be objected to what is assumed there, except that one is moving in a realm of pure abstraction that is initially quite far from reality. And if you look more closely, you will find that there is a strange circularity in the derivations of modern meta-geometry. It is this, that one starts out from the idea of Euclidean geometry, which is not concerned with the limitations of space. From this, one then gets certain derived ideas, let us say ideas that relate to something like a spherical surface. And then, in turn, by undertaking certain reconciliations or reinterpretations with the forms that arise, one can make interpretations of space from there. Actually, everything is said under the assumption of Euclidean coordinate geometry. Under this assumption, one arrives at a certain measure of curvature. One arrives at the derivations. All of this is done with the concepts of Euclidean geometry. But then one turns around, so to speak: one now uses these ideas, which can only arise with the help of Euclidean geometry, for example the measure of curvature, in order to arrive at a different idea that leads to a reorganization and can provide an interpretation for what has been gained from the curved forms. Basically, we are moving in an unrealistic area by extracting abstractions from abstractions. The matter would only be justified if empirical facts made it necessary to conform to the ideas of these facts according to what is obtained through such a thing.

The question, then, is: what is the experiential basis for the abstraction “space”? After all, space as such, as presented in Euclid, is an abstraction. What is the basis for what can be experienced, what can be perceived?

We must start from the human experience of space. Placed in the world, human beings, through their own activity of experience, actually perceive only one spatial dimension, and that is the dimension of depth. This perception, this acquired perception of the dimension of depth by the human being is based on a process of consciousness that is very often ignored. But this acquired perception is something quite different from the perception of the plane-like, the perception of extension in two dimensions. When we see with our two eyes, that is, with our total vision, we are never aware that these two dimensions come about through an activity of their own, through an activity of the soul. They are, so to speak, there as two dimensions. Whereas the third dimension comes about through a certain activity, even if this activity is not usually brought to consciousness. We actually have to first acquire the knowledge and understanding of how deep in space something lies, how far away from us any object is. We do not acquire the extent of the surface, it is given by observation. But we do acquire the sense of depth through our two eyes. The way in which we experience the sense of depth is indeed on the borderline between the conscious and the unconscious; but anyone who has learned to focus his attention on such things knows that the semi-unconscious or unconscious, never conscious, activity of judging the depth dimension is much more similar to an intellectual, or even a soul activity, an active soul activity than to everything that is only viewed on the plane.

Thus, the one dimension of three-dimensional space is already actively conquered for our objective consciousness. And we cannot say otherwise than: By observing the position of the upright human being, something is given in relation to this depth dimension — front-back — which is not interchangeable with any other dimension. Simply because a person stands in the world and experiences this dimension in a certain way, what he experiences there is not interchangeable with any other direction. For the individual, this depth dimension is something that cannot be exchanged for any other dimension. It is also the case that the grasping of two-dimensionality – that is, up-down, right-left, of course also when it is in front of us – is also tied to other parts of the brain, since it lies within the process of seeing, that is, within the sensory process of perception; while, with regard to localization in the brain, the emergence of the third dimension is quite close to those centers that are to be considered for intellectual activity. So here we can already see that in the realization of this third dimension, even in terms of experience, there is an essential difference compared to the other two dimensions.

But if we then move up to imagination, we get out of what we experience in the third dimension altogether: in imagination, we actually move on to two-dimensional representation. And now we have yet to work out the other imagination, the imagination of right and left, although this has been hinted at just as quietly as the development of the third dimension in objective imagining; so that there is again a specific experience in right and left. And finally, when we ascend to inspiration, the same applies to up and down.

For ordinary imagining, which is tied to our nervous sense system, we develop the third dimension. But when we turn directly to the rhythmic system by excluding the ordinary activity of the nervous sense system – which in a certain respect occurs when we ascend to the level of inspiration; it is not entirely precise to say this, but it does not matter for now – then we have the experience of the second dimension. And we have the experience of the first dimension when we ascend to inspiration, that is, when we advance to the third member of the human organization.

Thus that which we have before us in abstract space proves to be exact because everything we conquer in mathematics we extract from within ourselves. What arises in mathematics as three-dimensional space is actually something that we have within ourselves. But if we descend into ourselves through supersensible representations, it is not abstract space with its three equally valid dimensions that arises, but three different valences for the three different dimensions: front-back, right-left, up-down; they cannot be interchanged. From this follows yet another: if these three are not interchangeable, there is no need to imagine them with the same intensity. That is the essence of Euclidean space: that we imagine the X-, Y-, Z-axis with the same intensity – this is assumed for any geometric calculation.

If we hold the X-, Y-, Z-axis in front of us, then we must – if we want to stick with what our equations tell us in analytical geometry, but assume an inner intensity of the three axes – imagine this intensity as being of equal value. If we were to elastically enlarge the X-axis with a certain intensity, for example, the Y- and Z-axes would have to enlarge with the same intensity. That is to say, if I now grasp intensively that which I am expanding, the force of expansion, if I may say so, is the same for the X-, Y-, Z-axis, that is, for the three dimensions of Euclidean space. Therefore, applying the concept of space in this way, I would like to call this space rigid space.

Now, this is no longer the case when we take real space, of which this rigid space is an abstraction, when we take space as it is experienced by a human being. Then we can no longer speak of these three intensities of expansion being the same. Rather, the intensity is essentially dependent on what is found in the human being: the human proportions are entirely the result of the intensities of spatial expansion. And we must, for example, if we call the up-down the Y-axis, imagine this with a greater intensity of expansion than, for example, the X-axis, which would correspond to the right-left. If we were to look for a formulaic expression for this real space, if we were to express in formulaic terms what is meant by 'real' here, then again we would end up with a three-axis ellipsoid.

Now we also have the reason to imagine this three-axis space, in which supersensible thinking must live, in its three quite different possibilities of expansion, so that we can also recognize this space, through the real experience of the X-, Y- and Z-axis given to us with our physical body, as that which simultaneously expresses the relationship of the world bodies situated in this space.

When we imagine this, we must bear in mind that everything we think of out there in this three-dimensional cosmic space cannot be thought of as simply extending in different directions with the same intensity of expansion along the X-, Y- and Z-axes Z-axis, as is the case with Euclidean space, but we must think of space as having a configuration that could also be imagined by a triaxial ellipsoid. And the arrangement of certain stars certainly supports this. Our Milky Way system is usually called a lens and so on. It is not possible to imagine it as a spherical surface; we have to imagine it in a different way if we stick to a purely physical fact.

You can see from the treatment of space how little newer thinking is in line with nature. In ancient times, in older cultures, no one had such a conception as that of rigid space. One cannot even say that in Euclidean geometry there was already a clear conception of this rigid space with the three equal intensities of expansion, and also the three lines perpendicular to one another. It was only when people began to treat space in the manner of Euclidean geometry, in their calculations, that this abstract conception of space actually arose. In earlier times, quite similar insights had been gained, as I have now developed them again from the nature of supersensible knowledge. From this you can see that things on which people today rely so heavily, which are taken for granted, only have such significance because they operate in a sphere that is divorced from reality. The space that people use in their calculations today is an abstraction; it operates entirely in a sphere that is divorced from reality. It is abstracted from experiences that we can know through real experience. But today, people are often content with what abstractions are. In our time, when so much emphasis is placed on empiricism, abstractions are most often invoked. And people don't even notice it. They believe that they are dealing with things in reality. But you can see how much our ideas need to be rectified in this regard.

In every concept, the spiritual researcher does not merely ask whether it is logical. Although, in a certain sense, it is only a branch of Euclidean space, it is not really possible to grasp it conceptually, because one arrives at it through a completely abstract train of thought, in which one comes to a conclusion and, as it were, turns one's whole thinking upside down. When imagining, the spiritual researcher does not merely ask whether it is logical, but whether it is also in line with reality. That is the deciding factor for him in accepting or not accepting an idea. He only accepts an idea if this idea is in line with reality.

And this criterion of correspondence to reality will be given when one begins to deal with such ideas in an appropriate way, which is the justification for something like the theory of relativity, for example. It is logical in itself, I would like to say, because it only comprehends itself within the realm of logical abstraction, as logically as anything can be logical. Nothing can be more logical than the theory of relativity! But the other question is whether its ideas are realizable. And there you need only look at the ideas that are listed there as analogous, and you will find that they are actually quite unrealistic ideas that are just thrown around. It is only there for sensualization, they say beforehand. But it is not just there for symbolization. Otherwise the whole procedure would be in the air.

That is what I would like to say about the question. You see, it is not possible to answer questions that touch on such areas very easily. Now there is a question regarding the sentence: “The organism of an ancient Egyptian or Greek was quite different from that of modern man.

Dear attendees, I certainly did not say that! And at this point I must definitely draw attention to something that I often draw attention to, and really not out of immodesty: I am in the habit of expressing myself as precisely as I possibly can. And it is actually an extremely painful fact, not just for me personally, since it is tolerable, but from the point of view of the anthroposophical spiritual movement, that in the face of many things, for the formulation of which I have used all possible precautions to formulate the facts as adequately as possible, then everything possible is done, everything possible is said, and then these assertions are sent out into the world as “genuine anthroposophical teachings”. One of these assertions is that I am supposed to have said, “The organism of an ancient Egyptian or Greek was quite different from that of a modern man”.

It can be reduced to the following. I said: the modern way of thinking imagines too strongly that man, as a whole being, has basically always been as he is today, right down to a certain historical time. I usually only speak of “completely different,” of metamorphoses of man as such, where there are great differences, where man becomes “completely different” in a certain respect: in prehistoric times. But anyone who is able to penetrate to the subtleties of the structure and the innermost fabric – as a human being can in spiritual science – will find that a metamorphosis of the human being is constantly taking place, that, for example, the modern human being differs from the Egyptian or the Greek. Of course not in terms of external, striking characteristics, which are as striking as external physiognomy and the like. That is probably what is meant in the question, but that is not my opinion, because in terms of striking characteristics, modern man is of course not “completely different” from the Egyptian. But in terms of finer internal structural relationships, spiritual science comes to the following conclusion, for example. It has to be said that since the first third of the 15th century, humanity has become particularly adept at abstract thought, at moving more and more towards abstract trains of thought. This is also essentially based on a different structure of the brain. And through the method of spiritual science, the spiritual researcher can recognize the matter. Then it turns out that it is really the case that the brain has indeed changed in its finest structures since Egyptian times. The brain of the Egyptian was such that, to take one example, he also belonged to those of whom Dr. Husemann spoke, that the ancient Egyptian also had no sense for the blue color nuance and so on. In any case, we can see that the sense of abstraction occurs to the same extent as the nuances of blue emerge from mere darkness. What occurs in the life of the soul corresponds entirely to a physical metamorphosis. It is extremely important that we do not stop at the coarser aspects of human nature, as they are presented when we go back, for my sake, to the long periods of time that lie before history. Rather, if we want to consider human beings as humanity, we must also consider the finer structural changes during their historical existence.

Question: It would be interesting to hear, in a more intimate way, how this fact behaves.

Well, quite a lot has actually been said in these days, let us say, also through the things that Dr. Husemann has presented, about how this fact behaves. And if we were to go into other fields of fact, there would certainly be much that could be said about these other, very fine, intimate structural relationships of the human being.

Question: How do you explain the phenomenon of the well-known horse that solved all arithmetic and mathematical problems without difficulty, to the amazement of all scholars, and only then failed completely when the problems were written on pieces of paper in front of the examiner? If it is the case with the horse that none of those present in the room could see the problem, is this based on a strong suggestiveness on the part of the animal? And how does that come about?

I never want to talk about anything other than what I have investigated myself. And so, in answering this question, I would only like to share what I have experienced myself. For example, I don't know the famous Elberfeld horses. I also don't know the dog Rolf, I never had the honor of meeting him. Now, with regard to such things, I could always state that the story is all the more wonderful the less one is embarrassed by not really being able to see through it, to really get to know it. But I once saw Mr. von Osten's horse in Berlin. I can't say that the calculations that Mr. von Osten presented to the horse were extraordinarily complicated. But I was able to get an instant idea of what it was all about from what was going on there – although you had to look very closely.

I could only marvel at the strange theories that had been advanced about these things. There was a lecturer, I think his name was Fox or something like that, who was supposed to examine this whole story with the horse; and he now put forward the theory that every time the gentleman from the east gave some task, terribly small movements would occur in the eye or something like that. Another small movement would occur when Mr. von Osten says “three” like that, or when he says it like that; another movement would occur when he says “two”. So that a certain fine series of movements would come about if Mr. von Osten said, “three times two”; then the same sign of this movement would come again, six! And Mr. von Osten's horse should now be particularly predisposed to guess these fine movements, which the lecturer in question said he did not perceive in any way, but only assumed hypothetically. After all, the whole “theory” was based on the fact that Mr. von Osten's horse was much more perceptive, to a much greater extent in reality, than the lecturer who put forward this theory.

If you stick to the flashy blue thinking in hypothesizing, you can set up hypotheses in the most diverse ways. For those who have some insight into such matters, certain circumstances were of extraordinary value. During the entire time that Mr. von Osten presented his experiments to the amazed public with his horse, he gave the horse nothing but sweets – he had huge pockets in the back of his coat. And the horse just kept licking, and that's how it solved these tasks.

Now imagine that this has created a completely different relationship between the horse and Mr. von Osten himself. When Mr. von Osten continually gives the horse sugar, a very special relationship of love and intimacy develops between them. Now the animal nature is so extraordinarily variable due to the intimacy of the relationship that develops, both from 'animal to human and from human to animal'. And then effects come about that are actually wrongly described when they are called “mind reading” in the sense in which the word is often understood, but they are mediators for that which is not “subtle twitchings” that a private lecturer hypothetically posits, but which he himself says he does not see! No subtle twitches are needed to convey the solutions. It can be traced back to the following: imagine what went through the mind of Herr von Osten, who of course was vain enough to realize that the tension in the audience, made up of sensation-hungry people, was going through the most incredible twists and turns as he noticed it, and when he was then standing in front of the solution to the task, he gave the horse a piece of sugar. And add to that the effect on the horse of the mental relationship. It was truly not a command given by words or twitching, but an intimately given command that always went from Mr. von Osten to the horse when he gave him sweets to eat. Suggestion is probably not the right word. Relationships that take place between people cannot be transferred to every living being.

I have tried to show these things in concrete terms by highlighting a circumstance that many will consider trivial: the constant giving of sugar as something extraordinarily essential.

Question: Is there a possibility for pointing out a point of view that is just as stimulating for systematics in the field of mineralogy and crystallography as the idea of the primal plant is for botany or a new understanding of the periodic system of elements is for chemistry?

When we speak of crystal forms, we are dealing with forms that are actually different in their overall relationship to the cosmos, in their entire position in the world, than the forms that one can imagine in the Primordial Plant and, again, in the plant forms derived from the Primordial Plant, that is to say, in the possibility of real existence. For example, the principle applied to the design of the primeval plant could not be applied to the field of mineralogy or crystallogy. For there one is dealing with something that must be approached from a completely different angle. And one must first approach it by actually approaching the field of polyhedral crystal forms. And this approach, I can only hint at now. I have explained it in more detail in its individual representations in a lecture course that I gave for a smaller group. This approach is taken when one starts from the consideration, an internal dynamic consideration of the state of aggregation, let us say first of all from the gaseous state downwards to the solid. I can only draw the lines now; it would take too long if I were to explain it in detail, but I will hint at it. If one descends – if I may express it this way – from the gaseous state to the liquid state, then one must say: the liquid state of aggregation shows itself in that, as the one in the whole coherence of nature, a level-limiting surface, which is a spherical surface, and the degree of curvature of which can be obtained from any point on the surface by means of the transition to the tangent at that point. What you get there includes the shape that has its outer circumference in the spherical surface, and a point in the interior that is the same distance from this spherical surface everywhere.

If we now imagine the drop in an unlimited way, I do not say in an infinite way, but enlarged in an unlimited way, we get a level surface approaching the horizontal, and we have certain relationships in mind that are perpendicular to this level surface.

But we arrive at the same idea by observing the connections that arise when we simply regard our earth as a force field that can attract surrounding objects that are not firmly attached to it. If we regard the earth not as a center of gravity but as a spherical surface of gravity, then we arrive at the same result for this, I would say, gravitational figure as we need in another respect for the material constitution of the drop. So for a pure force context, we get something that corresponds to a material context. And in this way we arrive at a possibility for studying the formal relationships in the inorganic.

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So that we can say that in this context of forces, which is present in the whole body of the earth, we are always dealing with the horizontal plane. If we now move from this state of forces to one in which, let us say, there is not a point in the center to which the level surface refers as in the 'drop to the one center point', but rather several points, we would find a strangely composed surface. These relationships of the line to these 'centers' I would have to draw in the diagram in something like the following way: But if we now proceed—and now I am taking a great leap, which is well-founded, but in the short time available I can only hint at the true content—if we now proceed to assume these points not inside, within the system we are dealing with, but outside, then perhaps we would get a diagram that can be made diagrammatically in the following way: If we transfer the points into immeasurable distances, not into infinite distances, but into very great distances, then these curved surfaces, which are indicated here by curved lines, by curves, pass over into planes, and we would get a polyhedral form, which approximates to what we have before us in the known crystal forms.

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And indeed, spiritual scientific observation leads us to look at the crystal in such a way that we do not merely derive it from certain inner figurative forces in some material substance, but we relate it to the exterior of the cosmos, and we seek in the cosmos the directions that then, through the distribution of their starting points, result in what the individual crystal form is. In the individual crystal form, we actually get, so to speak, impressions of large cosmic relationships. All of this needs to be studied in detail. I fear that what I have been able to hint at, albeit only in a few very sparse lines, may already seem to you to be something very daring. But it must be said that today people have encapsulated themselves in their world of ideas in a very narrow area, and that is why they feel so uncomfortable when one does not stick to the conceptual world that is usually taken as a basis today, I would say is taken as a basis in all sciences. Spiritual science demands an - as experience makes necessary - immeasurable expansion of concepts compared to the present situation. And that is precisely what makes some people uneasy. They cannot see the shore, so to speak, and believe they are losing their way. But they would realize that what is lost through the expanse is gained again as a certain inner firmness and security, so that there is no need to be so afraid of what appears to be an expansion into the boundless.

Of course, it is much easier to make up some model or other — as was also mentioned today in a certain question — than to advance to such ideas. It is easier to say: the truth must be simple! — The reason why one says that the truth must be simple is not, in fact, that the truth really must be simple, because the human organism, for example, is incredibly complicated. Rather, the reason why it is said that the true must be simple is that the simple is convenient in thinking. That is the whole point. And it is necessary, above all, to advance to the fuller content if one really wants to understand reality bit by bit.

The question that was raised here still required that one should present three hours of theory. One cannot speak about the sun through “a brief answer to the question,” because one would be completely misunderstood. And I do not want that. — So, first of all, the answerable questions are answered provisionally.

Question: Does spiritual science find a transformation of the material earth with the entry of the Christ-Spirit into the earth? Is the effect of the power of Christ perhaps particularly expressed in one of the elements found in modern times?

What is the question? — Not true, one must only consider from which point of view such a question can be asked. The question is posed: Is the effect of the power of Christ expressed in the material earth? — You must only bear in mind that spiritual science, based on its research, has a very definite idea about the earth that does not coincide with what one imagines about the earth when one speaks of the “material earth” in the sense of the word “material” in today's language. So the question is actually without real content. If one speaks of something like an “influence of the power of Christ on the earth”, then, since this idea is in turn borrowed from spiritual science, one must also have the idea of the earth that applies to anthroposophy, to spiritual science. And how the power of Christ stands in a certain relationship to the whole metamorphosis of the earth can only be presented in the overall context that I have given in Occult Science. And there one also finds what is necessary to answer the question, if it is formulated correctly.

In response to requests from many course participants, a gentleman from Stuttgart will give a brief report on the lecture given the previous evening by the Pan-German General v. Gleich at a mass meeting in Stuttgart on “Rudolf Steiner as the prophet of a questionable teaching” (see Rudolf Steiner's reference to this at the end of the morning lecture, $. 139/140).

I would just like to add that the aforementioned General v. Gleich, quite a long time before, for weeks before, he proceeded to his lecture and to the writing of his pamphlet, wrote a letter to our friend Mr. Molt, as a concerned father, concerned about the misfortune that he, as the owner of a forty-year-old nobility, not only “handed over” his son to anthroposophy, but also to a completely un-noble lady who is an anthroposophist! As a concerned father, he wrote to our friend Molt, asking him to visit him. Mr. Molt did so, but said that he did not know what to do with him. This was clear to him from the fact that Mr. v. Gleich demanded that we “of the threefold social order movement” should henceforth pay the son of General v. Gleich, who was employed by us, so little that the young man would not be able to marry, and that we should at least protect General v. Gleich from this marriage of his son by paying him so little. After these events, it was understandable that one could not expect the best from General von Gleich's lecture. We then actually saw even the worst expectations exceeded! It was the case with this lecture that Gleich essentially presented the content of a brochure – somewhat more fully developed, we might say – that appeared in Ludwigsburg at the same time. It had already been arranged that this brochure should appear at the same time as the lecture. In this brochure, he makes various accusations against anthroposophy in the most uninformed way, without providing any evidence for what he says – anyone who reads this brochure can see that for themselves – by actually only using the opponents of anthroposophy. This is clear from the brochure's table of contents: a few references to literature where one can find out about anthroposophy. One would think that these would be the anthroposophical books, but no, there are about twenty opponents, with the most shameless one right at the front: Max Seiling! Von Gleich essentially brings nothing new to the table that cannot be found in Seiling's brochure, only in the way General von Gleich used to give his lecture. And it was the case that this lecture was announced “without discussion”. There were numerous followers of the anthroposophical movement in the audience. After he had finished the lecture, which was full of the harshest expressions and included some of the most crude slander, he simply left the hall without entering into any discussion. And when someone tried to get a word in edgewise, and when Mr. Molt, who was there and was also personally attacked several times in the lecture, shouted: “He hereby publicly declares – he shouted this into the hall, in which there was a raging was a raging crowd of Mr. v. Gleich's supporters, he did not consider it worth replying to anything. He had already left the hall. On the other hand, the supporters, who were equipped with whistles and other noisy instruments, tried to shout down the anthroposophists who wanted to object. And it was quite close to a brawl. It was very difficult to protest against the most serious defamations, since the whole meeting immediately took on a threatening character, and it was clear that it would come to a brawl.

There followed some reports about the previous lecture by v. Gleich in Ludwigsburg. Finally, a letter from General v. Gleich to his son was read out.

I would just like to say a few words. Can I have this letter again? I would just like to make a formal comment, a comment that does not concern the matter itself. So, in the letter from Mr. v. Gleich to his son, it says: “[...] If only God had willed that you, a decent Christian nobleman, had fallen for your fatherland, then I could at least mourn you with pride [...] I pray to God to take the blindness from you again, so that you may awaken from it again [...].” (space in the postscript).

As you can see, a lot has been said about Mr. von Gleich's own Christianity; I would like to emphasize this: his own Christianity, in comparison with the unreasonable demand that we have been made to pay our son so badly that he cannot marry. That seems to me a very Christian act! And I do not want to be distracted by these “little piquant matters”, which are also on this program, and talk about the seriousness of the situation. Because I know very well that what happened yesterday in Stuttgart is not an end, but a beginning, that behind it stands a strong organization. And it is precisely out of this feeling that I may thank such a personality as the one who has just spoken - out of a real inner feeling for what Anthroposophy at least wants to be. But I would like to point out the seriousness of the situation and the necessity to act in the spirit of this serious situation.

What I want to say must, of course, be distinguished from a certain understanding that one can also have of such Christians as General von Gleich, for example, who is a Christian! I do not want to make a comparison, not even a formal one, but I just want to say something that I had to remember with this kind of Christianity. There are, in fact, very different kinds of Christianity, even of Orthodox Christianity. When the criminal anthropologist Moritz Benedikt started working and writing in criminal anthropology, he initially found little understanding in Vienna. He then found extraordinary understanding in a director of a home for dangerous criminals in Hungary. He was given the opportunity to examine the skulls of criminals, including the skulls of the most dangerous Hungarian criminals. Among them were the strangest people, including a very devout Orthodox Christian, who, of course, could not behave towards Professor Benedikt in accordance with his Christian intentions. He was very angry with him because he was allowed to examine his skull. And he was especially angry about it because he had heard that the prison director had agreed that Professor Benedikt would get to study particularly characteristic criminal skulls after death. And since he was not released to the professor Benedikt in this institution, he wanted to be at least presented to this Benedikt in chains. During this presentation, he said that he could not admit that, given his Christian beliefs, he should allow his skull to be sent to the professor Benedikt in Vienna after his death; he would then be buried here, and his skull would lie around in Vienna! And he wanted to know how his body and his skull would be brought together at the resurrection. He believed so much in his bodily resurrection – he was a real criminal, I think even a murderer.

For many years now, I have been giving the lectures on spiritual science during the winter season from this very place. I have always tried to begin these lectures with a consideration of the connection between the particular view of the spiritual world that is represented within this spiritual science, as it is meant here, and the general spiritual life. And already last winter, I tried — which must be particularly obvious in our present fateful time — to turn my attention to the feelings that are currently living within the German people, to that time of German spiritual development in which, out of the very core of the German being, a connection, a living together with the spiritual world, was sought in a truly idealistic form. In our time, in which the German nation must defend itself against a world of enemies in its existence, in its hopes for existence, it must be particularly obvious to look to the time of which one of the most popular historians of the German nation says: it is the time in which the idealistic spirits of this German nation have shown that even in times of extreme distress, in times of extreme hostility, the German character is able to salvage that greatness which can be saved by cultivating the spiritual life, as it appears to be inherent in the very deepest characteristics of this nation. We need not fall into the error of our opponents, who today believe, in such a strange and peculiar way, that they must particularly characterize the importance of their own nation by belittling the nature of the opponents. We need not fall into the error, for example, of those of whom we now hear that the German Weltanschauung itself must have seduced them into leading the German people into the most savage warfare. We can, without making the mistake of belittling our opponents, turn our attention to what the German people believe, must believe, according to their very nature: that their world-historical task is rooted in the deepest inwardness of their nature. And there is no need, as so many of Germany's enemies do today, to form an opinion about the popular, be it one's own or that of another people, out of direct hatred and antipathy in the present.

And so let us take as our starting-point for today's consideration an idea which an outstanding mind, relatively calm, was able to form in a time long before our own fateful time. This idea was formed by Wilhelm von Humboldt, Schiller's great friend, who was able to delve so wonderfully into the essence of the development of humanity, who knew how to depict the needs of man within the development of world history in such a subtle way, In 1830, when Wilhelm von Humboldt looked back on what Schiller's friendship meant to him, but also on what Schiller's significance for the development of the German people was, on what Schiller's entire intellectual development was, he expressed himself in the following way about the German essence:

Thus someone who has devoted much thought to the feelings that go with knowing this points to what he had to believe lies in the task and the immediate destiny of the German people.

And when we look at what has shaped the German character from the spiritual side in the great age when German idealism raised Germanness to the stage of thought; and when we point to the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century with all what had developed up to the immediate phase of development of our time, then we see something that cannot be grasped by the certainly significant but not very lofty concept, let us say, of the internationality of science and the like, which, insofar as it concerns science, is self-evident. But what emerged so powerfully in Germany's greatest periods in terms of intellectual development was that at that time, through those minds that felt so intimately connected to German nationality, such as Fichte, for example, the question of the whole significance of knowledge, of what man can achieve through the knowledge that he develops as science; the question of the relationship of this knowledge to the secret of the world, to the eternal-working, eternal-spiritual in the world itself. That knowledge has been called into question, that knowledge itself has become a mystery, and that it is precisely through this tendency towards the mysteriousness of knowledge that man has had to make the matter of this knowledge a personal and yet objective and factual human interest, that is the tremendously significant thing is how one can feel connected in every fiber of one's being to what man can achieve through an ideal in his striving, through the pursuit of knowledge; how one can strive for knowledge full of light and yet still raise the question: Can one go beyond this knowledge, or rather must one go beyond this knowledge if one wants to arrive at the deepest thing that connects man to the eternal sources of existence? And the reason why this riddle could present itself to the German soul in its best minds in a particularly intense way lies in the fact that during the period of German idealism, the striving asserted itself to have knowledge not only as something that something that teaches you about the world in terms of concepts, something you can stand coolly opposed to in your desire to dissect the phenomena of the world, but to have knowledge as something that lives in the whole soul and sustains the human being. It was precisely out of this yearning for the vitality of knowledge, out of this intimate feeling of connection with knowledge, that the great riddles of knowledge arose. It seems as if one only wants to have knowledge, only wants to cultivate a science, if this science can really live in such a way that one can also find the way to the sources of existence in the experiencing of knowledge.

It is appealing to see how German minds want to live in their knowledge, in their science, in a much higher sense than is usually meant when one speaks of the connection between life and science. Last winter, in a similar context, I tried to characterize Fichte's idiosyncrasy, this noble German spirit who, in one of the most difficult times in the development of the German people, placed his spiritual striving entirely at the service of his people, who, from the depth of his spirit, found the most wonderful words of power to inspire German enthusiasm. The way in which he felt connected with the pursuit of knowledge, and how he strove to rise to German idealism, is part of what Fichte was able to be to his people. A picture that has been preserved for us can illustrate this beautifully. Forberg, who heard Fichte speak when he tried to bring to life, from the depths of his striving for wisdom, what he saw as his connection with the weaving, ruling world spirit, said the following beautiful words about Fichte's way of speaking about spiritual matters:

And if one wants to characterize Fichte's German nature, one must point out how, by wanting to rule in the realm of concepts, he sought within this realm of concepts something that was more than what is often called concepts and ideas, something that was a revival of those forces of the human soul, which are one with the creative powers of all existence, those creative powers that live outside in nature, that have placed man himself in nature, that guide and direct historical life, that interweave and permeate all existence. But in order to gain such a view in full vitality, Fichte could not stop at the abstractness of the concepts, at concepts that are only views. For this he needed concepts that were directly experienced and imbued with soul by an element of activity that not only illuminates the human soul, but also strengthens it, so that this human soul, by first withdrawing from the external world, feels connected to the very innermost part of reality. And so Johann Gottlieb Fichte directed his contemplation to something living in the human soul, something that is being willed into existence. And what he sensed there, as flowing into his will, he experienced as if the divine spiritual forces that permeate and interweave the world were entering the soul, and the soul itself felt at rest within the divine experience. If one wishes to call this trait in Johann Gottlieb Fichte mystical, then one must remove from this expression everything that brings any kind of nebulousness into the world view; one must then bring this concept together with everything that is the highest energy of knowledge in Fichte's entire striving. Then German idealism appears as if compressed into a focal point, not only when Fichte talks about German nationality, but especially when he speaks of the highest matters to which his thinking and, one might say, his inner experience turns. In his attempt to visualize the ruling will in his own soul and to make it come alive before those to whom he speaks, he speaks about this will as if he were aware that the innermost essence of the whole world lives in this will. He speaks as if he himself felt the exalted will of the world pulsating in the human soul's own will, when this human soul, in its striving for knowledge, goes back to the innermost outflow and activity of the will itself. Fichte speaks wonderful words here:

Thus Fichte addresses what he senses as the will of the world by deepening his quest for knowledge, so that it may find what, in the innermost part of the soul, holds that soul together with the sources of existence; that from which the soul must create if it wants to feel that its creation in harmony with the historical and eternal powers that guide all existence itself. That science, through an idealistic consideration of life, must lead to such a grasp of human inwardness that in this inwardness, at the same time, the innermost of the world's existence in human striving is embraced, that is the basic feature of German idealism. And with this idealism, Fichte's philosophical comrades basically also face the great riddles of existence. |

From a certain point of view, I tried last winter to present this very arena of thought within German idealism and the world view of this German idealism. I undertook to show how Fichte tried to grasp the world through the experience of the innermost nature of the human will itself, by wanting to grasp the human soul where the will can delve into it. I wanted to show how Fichte, in his attempt to penetrate to the human ego in its essence, could not be satisfied with grasping this ego in being or in mere thinking, in the sense of Descartes with his “I think , therefore I am”, but how Fichte wanted to grasp the self, the innermost essence of the human soul, in such a way that there lies in it something that can never lose its existence because it can create this existence anew in every moment. Fichte wanted to show the living, ever creative will as the source of the human ego; not by a judgment of the kind: I think, that is something, therefore I am — not by that did Fichte want to find the essence of the ego, but by showing that even if this ego were not in any given moment, or if it could be said of it, on the basis of some evidence, that it were not, then this judgment would be invalid on the grounds that this ego is a creative one, because it can, in every moment, generate its existence anew out of the depths of this ego. In this perpetual re-creation, in this continuity of the creative, in this connection with the creative of the world, Fichte tried to recognize the essence of the ego in the will, to preserve it in the will, to shape the striving for knowledge in a living way.

And Schelling, Fichte's philosophical companion, who in many respects went so far beyond him, placed himself before nature in such a way that nature was not for him what it otherwise is in many respects for external science: a sum of phenomena that one dissects; rather, for Schelling, nature was to the human spirit in its nature, except that the human spirit stands in the present, experiences itself, but nature has lived through this spirit, so that it now rests enchanted in it, so that it hides behind its veil and reveals itself through its external appearances. Just as one regards a person in relation to his physiognomy, not only describing this physiognomy formally like a statue, but looking through the physiognomy to what is the living soul life, what looks through the physiognomic features, what spiritualizes and warms the outer form. Through the outer phenomena of nature, through the outer revelations as through the physiognomy of nature, Schelling wanted to go back to what is spiritual in nature, to unite the spirit in the soul with the spirit in nature. And from this arose in him that one-sided but bold way of striving for knowledge, which is expressed in Schelling's saying: “To comprehend nature is to create nature!” That in the human soul there could be something that only needs to be dragged into creative, living existence, and by so doing, not creating the outer phenomena of nature, but creating images that are the same as what lives behind nature, is expressed in the words: “To understand nature is to create nature!” Today, there is truly no need to take this philosophy of German idealism dogmatically; one need not be a follower of it, that is not the point. What is important is to get to know the power and inner soul from which such a direction of spiritual life arises. And so someone could be an opponent of the dogmas of German idealism in the fullest sense of the word, but find something resiliently alive, something that carries the future, in the way the human soul wanted to penetrate into the deepest secrets of existence back then.

And in this context, we may refer to Hegel, the third in this series, who was not afraid to ascend into the coldest realms of pure thought. For Hegel believed that when the soul withdraws from all the warmth of external observation, from all direct resting in natural existence, when it is all alone with the concepts that live in the soul in such a way that this soul is no longer present with its arbitrariness in the thinking of the concepts, but the soul abandons itself to the process of how one concept arises from the other, how concepts prevail within her, without her turning in any way to anything other than to these prevailing pure, crystal-clear and transparent concepts, which she lets prevail and weave within her as they themselves want, not as the soul wills, - then, Hegel believed, in this process, in this flowing of concepts, a union of the soul with the ruling world spirit itself, which lives out itself in concepts, which, through the millions of years, by sending its concepts commanding through infinity, allowed the outer world to emerge from the condensation of these concepts and then placed man into it so that man can awaken in his soul these concepts from which the world itself emerged. Is it really one-sided, the way Hegel delves into the world of existence by trying to penetrate to the sources of existence by squeezing out all other reality from the pure world of concepts? Is it one-sided in the sense that the World-Spirit, which flows and weaves through the world as if it were a mere logician, conjure up the world out of pure logic, this striving, which arises directly from the German essence and German nature, also shows how the German spirit, in its striving for knowledge, by its very nature seeks to connect with that which lives in the soul, that which can be directly beheld in the soul in its inwardness and which, by being thus beheld, simultaneously seizes the spirit flowing in the world. The fundamental principle of this striving is the seizing of the world-spirit by the spirit developed in the soul. And even if the right way of relating to world-life and its knowledge can only be solved by the human soul in a reasonably satisfactory way in the farthest, farthest future, the way in which it has been attempted within German idealism , this way of seeking the world spirit is so intimately connected with the German essence and at the same time it is the way in which, in our time, the eternal must be sought in the temporal human soul.

One can see how closely interwoven with German striving this kind of knowledge is when, at the dawn of the newer spiritual striving, one looks at how two phenomena confront each other at the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century; that is, the time when those forces first emerged that gave the newer world view the impulses for European development. It is interesting to see how the German soul relates to this dawn of intellectual life, for example, by juxtaposing two images from the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century. Regardless of one's own opinion of this remarkable spirit, let us consider him only in the context of the development of modern spiritual striving, if one places Jakob Böhme and compares him with a contemporary striving spirit in Western Europe, with a spirit who is also characteristic of his people, as Jakob Böhme is characteristic of his people, with Montaigne.

Montaigne is also a great and important figure, expressing one of the elements that arise at the dawn of the modern intellectual life. He is the great doubter. He is the one who, from within French culture, receives the following impulse: Let us look at the world. It reveals its secrets to us through our senses. We will try to reveal these secrets through our thinking. But who can say, in any way, that the senses do not deceive; that what is revealed to the senses from the depths of the world can somehow have a connection, which can be visualized, with the sources of existence. And who can deny, this great doubter asks, that if one does not rely on the senses, but on judgment, on thinking, if one seeks evidence and each piece of evidence in turn demands evidence, and the new proof in turn demands another proof, that one can then proceed along the chain of proofs and must also proceed, because everything that one believes to have proven appears fleeting when one looks at it more closely. Neither thinking nor sensual observation can provide any certainty. Therefore, a wise man, according to Montaigne, is one who does not seek such certainty at all; who has an inner irony about the phenomena of the world and about the knowledge of the sources of existence; who knows that although one can reflect on and observe all things , but that one thereby acquires only a knowledge that one can just as well admit as reject, without having any hope of attaining anything else through spiritual striving than precisely such a thing to which one can only relate doubtfully and ironically.

At the same time, within the German being stands Jakob Böhme, who undertakes the journey into the depths of the human soul by means of mere inner development of soul powers, by mere immersion in what the soul can draw up from its depths. And in the fact that he finds these depths of the human soul in the way he believes he is able to find them, he was clear about it, he was convinced that by descending into the depths of the human soul, he at the same time hears the sources of all existence, natural and spiritual, of all comprehensive existence, flowing into these depths. For Jakob Böhme, descending into the depths of the soul also means reaching out into the divine spiritual life that governs the world. And so Jakob Böhme sought this path; that in this path there can be no question of doubt or of an ironic mood in the Montaignean sense, because Jakob Böhme in his way is clear about the fact that he lives in the spirit, because one cannot doubt that in which one lives, in which one co-creates by immersing oneself in it. And one would like to say: Only a revival of this endeavor of Jakob Böhme's in a higher form lies in what lives on the scene of German idealism through the spirits just mentioned. And these just mentioned spirits basically all turn their gaze to a personality who – however much this has been doubted from a narrow-minded point of view – in her entire being, in her entire nature, emerged from the deepest popular German culture, to Goethe. And Fichte, the philosopher who was only struggling for clarity, who was never satisfied if he could not express what he had to say in concepts with sharp outlines, Fichte, who could be considered a dry, sober man of knowledge — that was not his way, but that is what characterizes his striving characterizes – who could be thought of as far, far removed from Goethe in the nature of his being, – Fichte addressed beautiful words to Goethe in which he wanted to express how he tried to align himself with the highest that he strove to bring forth, with what Goethe was by nature. When Fichte had brought the first, most abstract, one might say coldest, most historical, form of his “Wissenschaftslehre” to print, he presented the book to Goethe and wrote to him:

“I regard you and have always regarded you as the representative (of the purest spirituality of feeling) at the present level of humanity. It is to you that philosophy rightly turns. Your feeling is the same touchstone!”

Words that each of the others could have addressed to Goethe in the same way, and indeed each of them did address to Goethe in one way or another, as history shows.

And when Schiller, in his “Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man”, which, as I allowed myself to characterize here last winter, have been far too little appreciated, tried to answer the question from the depths of Kantian philosophy: How must the human soul strive in order to truly come to live together with the spirit of the world in freedom in the harmonious interaction of all its powers? And when Schiller turned his gaze to Goethe, he saw in him something like the German spirit in one of its centers, seeking to bring forth before the world, out of the deepest inwardness of his being, the highest that he had come to. Schiller admired the pure, free humanity of the ancient Greeks, that pure, free humanity that, on the one hand, is allowed to turn to external nature, but which does not allow this nature to have such an external hold on it as the more recent spiritual striving, in which man becomes unfree in his striving in the face of the coherence of nature. This Greek nature, which on the other hand became so aware of itself in the depths of its soul that it sensed itself as nature itself, also in its innermost being, this Greek element, which stood before Schiller's soul like a model of all human striving and living, Schiller saw it shine anew in Goethe's nature and life in the face of the newer spirit of the people. And Schiller characterized this at about the same time as Fichte wrote the words just quoted to Goethe, in a letter to Goethe with the following words:

"For a long time now, although from a considerable distance, I have been watching the course of your mind and have noted the path you have set out on with ever-renewed admiration. You seek what is necessary for nature, but you seek it by the most difficult route, which any weaker force would do well to avoid. You take all of nature to get light on the individual; in the totality of its manifestations, you seek the explanatory basis for the individual. Step by step, you ascend from the simple organization to the more complicated, in order to finally build the most complicated of all, the human being, genetically from the materials of the entire structure of nature. By recreating him in nature, as it were, you seek to penetrate his hidden technology. A great and truly heroic idea, which shows sufficiently how much your mind holds the rich totality of its conceptions together in a beautiful unity. You could never have hoped that your life would be enough for such a goal, but even just to embark on such a path is worth more than any other ending – and you have chosen, like Achilles in the Iliad, between Phthia and immortality. If you had been born a Greek, or even an Italian, and if from your cradle you had been surrounded by a refined nature and idealizing art, your path would have been infinitely shortened, perhaps made entirely superfluous. You would have absorbed the form of the necessary into the first view of things, and with your first experiences the great style would have developed in you. Now that you have been born a German, now that your Greek spirit has been thrown into this Nordic creation, you had no choice but to either become a Nordic artist yourself or to replace what reality withheld from your imagination by the application of your powers of thought, and thus to give birth to a Greece from within and in a rational way, so to speak.” The creative force that arises from the deepest inwardness, that not only creates the present, but that even gives birth to the past anew out of its own essence: the Goethean spirit. In this letter, Schiller selflessly characterizes it wonderfully, in which he truly laid the foundation for the friendship between these two minds, Goethe and Schiller; Schiller wonderfully characterizes this inwardness of the creation of the Goethean spirit. And truly, Goethe appears in the image of German idealism with all his striving.

Therefore, out of the striving of Goethe's personality, a poetic figure could arise that – I do not believe that one has to be prejudiced to say this – is uniquely placed in world literature and in the whole of world creation, the figure of Faust. How does he stand there, this Faust? As the highest representative of human striving, but still – after all, he is a university professor at heart – as a representative of the striving for knowledge, for knowledge! And right at the beginning of Faust, what becomes a riddle, what becomes a big question? Knowledge itself, the striving for knowledge becomes a question! Two elements come to life in this Faustian legend. And one must point out this living out of the two elements if one wants to understand the basic character of Goethe's Faustian creation on the one hand and, on the other hand, its connection with the innermost nature of German spiritual striving.

Of course, the term magic and everything connected with it is not exactly popular today. But Goethe was compelled to place his Faust before magic, after knowledge and insight had become a question, a riddle, for Faust. And the fact that today we are able to separate everything that is conventionally associated with the concept of magic from a deeper spiritual striving will be my particular task tomorrow in the lecture where I want to speak about the eternal powers of the human soul. But the way in which Goethe has Faust turn to magic can perhaps be thought of as quite separate from all the wild superstition and nebulous striving associated with the word magic and with magical striving in general. One can overlook secondary matters and look at the main thing, namely, the fundamental human striving as expressed in Faust. Why must Faust, who has really been involved in all human sciences, wanted to gain clarity in all human sciences about that which underlies existence as a source, why must Faust turn to magic, to a completely different way of interacting with nature than is the case with the ordinary pursuit of knowledge? Why? Because Faust has experienced everything that can be experienced in the pursuit of knowledge; because he has experienced everything that can be felt by a person who has a yearning for the depths of the nature of the world; everything that can be felt by a person when he feels alive in himself, which external science can comprehend. This science visualizes the laws of nature in concepts, in ideas. But do I exist with these concepts, or do I only have something in these concepts that weaves itself as a ghost in my own soul and that perhaps, with regard to this image, is clearly, but not with regard to its life, directly connected to the sources of existence? What forces itself into the soul as a question of this kind can be felt in different ways. It can be felt weakly, but it can also be felt strongly, so that the enigma that lives itself into the soul through these feelings becomes like a nightmare from which this human soul wants to free itself. For the soul can say to itself: All this knowledge is only something that one forms on the basis of existence. All this knowledge is something that has been subtracted from existence. But I must still descend into existence with what I experience in myself.

What one might say Schelling believed in his presumptuousness, Faust cannot believe: that by living in concepts, one creates in nature. Rather, he wants to descend into nature. He wants to seek out nature where it lives in creation. He wants to unfold an activity that is such that the human soul accomplishes it, but which, in that this activity is within the soul, is both creating nature and creating soul at the same time. Because Faust cannot do this in any other way, he tries to do it by seeking to invigorate within himself the path that ancient magicians have tried. Faust tries to have something in his soul that does not merely depict nature in terms within him, but that appears to him in what lives and creates behind appearances. He seeks to bring the spiritual in the creative power of nature, which flows and weaves through the world, which surges up and down in the tides of life and the storm of action, not only into knowledge, but seeks to connect with it in a living way. He seeks the path to it in such a way that the spiritual creation of nature stands beside him, as the soul of a human being stands embodied here in physical existence, so that one experiences existence, not just knows about it.

And in this way Faust stands before nature in the same way as—one need only point to a spirit like Jakob Böhme, in his own way, one need only look at that which underlies German philosophical striving in the idealistic period—Faust, yearning , yearning for knowledge, expecting certain achievements, to which he wants to rise, so in the face of nature, so next to nature, as befits the innermost life and weaving of the German spirit: to create nature in the soul and to let it become living science, living knowledge. That is why Goethe has to bring his Faust together with magic.

There is something else that Goethe brings together with his Faust, something that perhaps even more than the magical element that confronts us in the first scenes and then continues in what I would call a directly dramatic way, while it loses itself as a magical element – which seems perhaps even more wonderful than this magical element for this Goethean Faustian poem, which is now also intimately interwoven with the spiritual striving of the German people.

Let us try – as I said, without pronouncing dogmatically or in any way on the value – to place ourselves in the position of Jakob Böhme; let us try to bring to life before our soul one of the aspects of Jakob Böhme's striving. A great question confronts Jakob Böhme with regard to the riddle of existence, the question that arises from the contemplation of the world when one says: The world is governed by the World Spirit in its goodness, in its wisdom. He who is able to immerse himself in the spirit of the world senses the surging of the world's wisdom, the surging of the world's benevolence. But evil intrudes, evil in the form of suffering, evil in the form of human deeds. If we do not look at the abstraction of the thought, but at a striving for knowledge that is based on feeling and emotion, a striving for knowledge that takes hold of the whole person, we stand in awe at the way in which Jakob Böhme raises the question of the origin of evil. He cannot avoid saying to himself: the spirit of the world, the divine spirit of the world, must be thought of as connected with the sources of life; but one does not find the origin of evil by immersing oneself in the spirit of the world. And yet evil is there. — With tremendous intensity, the question of the origin of evil arises in the quest for knowledge of Jakob Böhme. He seeks to answer it by asking about evil, as one might ask about the origin of the deeds of light. What Jakob Böhme has developed in depth can only be illustrated here through this comparison, for the sake of brevity. For, just as one can never derive from the light that which appears as the deeds of light, but always needs darkness for this; just as one can never derive darkness, with which light must appear together, from the light itself, but rather one must go to this source of light if one wants to examine the deeds of light in external nature, Jakob Böhme attempts to find the essence, not merely the principle, of evil, not in the Divine either, but in that which takes its place beside the Divine, like the shadow, like the darkness beside the light, which one does not seek in the light, but for which one does not need reasons in the same way as for the light itself. He seeks to find it by undertaking the previously characterized journey into the depths of the soul and at the same time trying to grasp the existence of the world at its sources in the soul. Thus he does not confront evil as something that can be recognized in a concept, but as something that he tries to grasp in its reality. In his attitude towards evil as something that cannot be grasped conceptually but only in reality, Schelling is followed in his very significant treatise “Philosophical Investigations Concerning the Essence of Human Freedom and the Related Objects”, 1809. Schelling consciously follows Jakob Böhme in his search for evil.

Goethe, from the depths of the German soul, sensed this riddle of evil in a completely different way. Just think what a challenge it was to create a work of poetry in the way that Goethe did in his Faust. On the one hand, Goethe had to present a purely inward striving, which, after all, could only be expressed, one might think, by depicting a person who presents himself to the world lyrically. Goethe seeks to bring it to dramatic life as Faust stands before the world. He does this, however, by allowing what lives in the soul to shine through in such a way that it is inwardly alive in the soul and becomes external. The dramatic not only places the human being in the world as he stands in it lyrically, but also as he stands in it actively. This enables Goethe, as a dramatist must, to lead man out of subjectivity, out of the mere inwardness of the being into the outer world. But one should try to imagine what a challenge lay in what can be characterized in the following way. Now Faust is to strive, as man does when he lets the riddles of existence take effect on him, to go forward in the world, to become a fighter in the world. And yet such struggles, which arise from the riddles of knowledge, are inner struggles. As a rule, man stands alone in this, and as a rule nothing dramatic is connected with it. Dramas proceed differently, in that one simply lets the interior of the human soul unroll. What enabled Goethe to transform what is basically only an internal matter of the human soul into a vivid dramatic image? Simply by the fact that, just as he brings the human soul out into nature through magic on the one hand, on the other hand he brings this human soul out into the big wide world by trying to show that when one seeks out seeks out evil and wants to experience it in its reality, one cannot understand it merely as an inner principle and seek an inner explanation for it, but one must step out into life as it confronts one full of life. Therefore, Goethe cannot direct his attention to evil in such a way that he finds something in him that is mere philosophy, but he must direct his attention to the essence, to one who fights Faust, to one who is the embodiment of evil, who is as alive as the principle of evil as man is alive here in his physical body. And he must be able to feel and show that the fight against evil is not just an abstract, inward struggle, but that it is a struggle that is waged hourly, momentarily, in which man lives. In everything he does, he essentially encounters evil. Thus this obstacle was overcome. What is otherwise an abstract philosophical principle was brought into direct existence, into essential existence. Walking, changing, acting, fighting were brought about, which one otherwise speaks about. For these reasons, on the one hand, the magical element had to be revived in Faust, in that Faust tries to penetrate the shell of nature. On the other hand, evil had to be contrasted with Faust as something essential, something that is much more than what is usually called an idea or a concept; something that is usually conceived as living only within the soul had to be embodied, placed out into the world. And so in poetry, too, there was a need to resort to that deepening of the conception of evil which we find as such a wonderful fundamental trait of the German spiritual striving, from Jakob Böhme up through all the deeper German spirits who cannot satisfy themselves by seeking evil only in philosophical concepts, but who want to go out into the world. And in going out into the world, they encounter evil just as one encounters another human being in the physical world. In order to spiritually unlock the inner world, the striving had to connect with such a view of evil. That is to say, just as nature is to be sensed through magic to its sources, so spiritual life is to be placed in the context of human life by showing evil itself as a spiritually active being. Thus, as a poet, Goethe elevates man to the realm of the ideal, but of the living ideal.

And he was faced with a dilemma in yet another way: he, the great artist, of whom Schiller said that he could give birth to a Greece out of his own inwardness. He was faced with a dilemma in yet another way, one that we may only gradually come to see in its full significance. In Faust, we see the striving human being. Many commentators on Faust have emphasized the fact that Goethe did a great deed in having Faust redeemed, in not allowing Faust to perish, as was the case in earlier representations of Faust, but in having him redeemed, because, in accordance with the newer world view, one must assume that within man lie the forces that can achieve victory over evil. Yes, what this actually means for the overall view of the Faust epic is something that is not usually considered. One says, offhand: Goethe's Faust could only become what it is if Goethe had the idea from the very beginning to take into account the innermost nature of man in such a way that Faust could be redeemed. One imagines a drama, one imagines a work of art that takes place in time and that is supposed to be great, in such a way that one knows from the beginning what must come out in the end. And that is what it should actually be. For man, as one so often says, must bring with him his convictions from the highest riddles of life. Actually, nothing more and nothing less is expressed by this than that “Faust” should, by its very nature, be the most boring piece of writing in the world. After all, every pedant today knows, or at least believes he knows, that if man strives correctly, he should ultimately be redeemed. And now one of the greatest poets is to present a grandiose world poem in order to show this self-evident truth through all possible forms! And yet, Goethe has succeeded in embodying the thought just expressed, not in some abstract way, but in presenting living life before us through a long, long series of images. Why? Simply because he has shown how that which, when inwardly conceived in abstract thoughts, would be a mere truism, a matter of course, is set forth in life in a completely different way; because he attempts to extend life, on the one hand, in the direction of the magical , on the other hand, towards the spiritual side; because the striving for nature is not a striving for knowledge but a magical one; because the striving for evil or the recognition of evil is not just a philosophical matter but a matter of life. How does something become a matter of life that is otherwise only the soul's inner, abstract striving? It becomes a matter of life when the human being, when he stands before nature in the same way that Faust stands before nature in the sense of his striving, wants to go beyond abstract knowledge. He wants to go beyond that which can only live in concepts, which spins itself out as ideas, as concepts. He wants to enter into the sphere of nature, where there is creative life, with which the soul's own creative life connects, in order to go beyond nature's creation through mere abstract conceptual life.

But when you take hold of the matter in full life, you enter into that in man from which man in turn emerges by being able to acquire consciousness in his concepts. One need only go back to what, for example, the Greek Stoics strove for in their earnest quest for knowledge. They wanted a wisdom that would smooth the world, that would survey the world, and that would have nothing to do with human passion. Man should become dispassionate, dispassionate, in order to feel his soul absorbed in the calm conceptual grasping of the wisdom that pervades the world. Why did the Stoics want this? Because they felt that one comes out of a certain intoxication of life, out of a half-unconscious immersion in life, by coming to dispassionate understanding. Stoicism consists precisely in the search for a life free of intoxication.

Now, in the course of human evolution, the personality that is to be represented in Faust stands before nature in such a way that knowledge becomes a question for it, the very thing by which man tries to save himself from the intoxication of life. He can enter into the intoxication of life by immersing himself with the creative powers of the soul, but he does not absorb the same powers with which he has just risen, but rather he submerges himself seeking to connect the foundations of the soul with the foundations of nature. But from this arises what is now the error of Faust in the first part of the story, the submerging into sensuality, into sensual life, even into the outer trivial life, which he must undergo in his own personality because he is to connect what lives in his own personality, what lives in the depths of his soul, with what lives in the depths of world existence. The task of the first part of Faust and also of a large part of the second part is to present in a lively way the error by which man can be tested in his soul.

To what extent man, by wanting to grasp the world personally, the world in its power through knowledge, exposes himself to the danger of being submerged in the personal and being drawn into the whirlpool of life, is depicted in “Faust”. And that does not depend on some abstract doctrine, but on the will, on the character of this Faust. It is only through this that the poem becomes a poem. And on the other hand, since the human being strives for a real knowledge of evil and is not satisfied with a principal, conceptual understanding of evil, he must break through the ordinary life of the soul; for there he finds only concepts, ideas and feelings. He must go through this soul life, he must go to the place where man, without seeing the essential reality through the senses, perceives an essential reality through the pure soul experiences, from the spirit. This becomes the task of the one who wants to recognize evil in its reality through direct experience. This becomes the task of Faust in relation to Mephistopheles. But man cannot approach evil at all as he is at first. It is virtually impossible to approach evil as man is at first; for one must know the world, and one can only know it by knowing it in the soul. One must form concepts. One must have in one's soul that which can be experienced in one's soul. After all, as newer philosophers have so rightly and so wrongly asserted, one cannot transcend one's consciousness. But if one remains in consciousness, evil remains only an abstract concept, does not appear in essence.

Faust is faced with a great, so to speak, impossible task. But great, as it says in “Faust” itself, is “he who desires the impossible”. Faust is faced with the virtually impossible task of going beyond that which is the sole source of his consciousness, of going out of consciousness. This will be his further path, the path out of the ordinary consciousness of the soul. Tomorrow we will speak about the path of knowledge out of the ordinary consciousness to those realms where the spirit is grasped directly as spirit. This stands before Faust as a task. He cannot find evil in its essential nature in the field to which consciousness is initially directed. Therefore, he must again, and now not in a general, trivial, abstract way, come to find the reconciliation of man with existence, but in the way that he is able to do so as an individual human being. It must be shown how he finds his way out of ordinary consciousness to an understanding of life that now comes from deeper forces of the soul.

Thus we see Faust going, I might say, everywhere touching and feeling the existence of the world, feeling it inwardly, to see where he can find the gate through which he can penetrate into the inner being. Thus we see how he soars so high that, having transformed the soul and transformed it more and more, he really descends in experience to those depths towards which Jacob Boehme strove and which are then hinted at to us in the second part of “Faust” that Faust finds something widest, greatest, highest and at the same time deepest, which he had already striven for in his walk to the Mothers, in that his senses fail him, in that he goes blind and in his inner being inner bright light comes to life. Out of the ordinary consciousness, to a different consciousness, to a consciousness that slumbers in the depths of the soul, as the depths of the sources of nature slumber under the shell of nature that one sees with the outer senses, to a deeper consciousness that always accompanies man between birth and death, but that is not present in the ordinary field of consciousness. Faust must be guided in two ways through the strengthening of the spiritual life to the gates that lead from the abstractness of the idea to the livingness of spiritual existence itself: As a magician, Faust knocks at the gate of existence, which leads from mere observation of nature to co-creation with nature; in his dealings, in the living, dramatic dealings with Mephistopheles and with all that is structured by them, Faust knocks at the other gate, at that other gate that leads from the ordinary consciousness of the soul to a superconscious, supersensible consciousness, which opens up a spiritual world, from which evil also really originates, behind the ordinary existence of the soul, just as external natural revelation is only the expression of that which lives and moves entirely in nature.

Through the connection with what, one can say, is peculiar to the German national spirit, Goethe created a piece of writing that could only become a piece of writing in the most difficult sense. For the most non-sensuous, the most distant from the senses, the purely inward, was to be shaped dramatically. But this inwardness can only become dramatic if it is expanded in two directions. And Goethe sensed the necessity of this expansion in two directions. In doing so, he created the possibility of placing this unique poetry, which in a sense no one else in another nation would have conceived in the same way, into the world evolution.

If one has these thoughts, one can perhaps still raise the question: Yes, but did Goethe not actually create a work of art that requires a great deal of preparation to understand? It almost seems that way. For the commentaries that scholars, both German and non-German, have written about Goethe's “Faust” fill several libraries, not just one. But if one were to believe that a great deal of preparation is needed to understand the Faust epic, then the thought must arise: what did Goethe actually make this Faust epic out of? Was it the result of a philosophical quest? Was it speculation about the magical foundations of nature? Or was it speculation about the sources and origins of evil? No, truly not! He saw the puppet show, a pure folk performance, the folk play of Faust, which was presented to the simplest minds. He transformed what lives and breathes in it according to his own mind. The Faust legend, therefore, presents us with a work of art and a work of the spirit in the best sense of the words. If we look only at the most general aspect of its origin, it shows how this summit of German intellectual life has its source in the most direct folklore, that is, in the most elementary of the folk spirit, and how German idealistic intellectual striving is connected with the essence of the German folk spirit. It can also be proved historically from the origin of the highest poetry of mankind from the simplest folk drama. This is a significant world-historical drama, that a spirit that can delve so deeply into the folklore in its inner work, like Goethe, is able to create something supreme out of the most primitive folklore, something supreme that, as we have been able to show, is also connected to the most significant philosophical pursuit, to the philosophical idealistic pursuit in Germany's great intellectual period. In Faust — as I said, these things must not be taken dogmatically — we see the striving Fichte. How? Fichte does not seek to grasp being and the ego by bringing thought to consciousness, as Descartes and Cartesius did. Instead, Fichte seeks to grasp being and the ego by connecting with the world-creating powers that play into the inner soul, so that the ego creates itself in every moment. We see this, only translated into the dramatic will, into the directly living, flashing up again in Faust. Faust is not satisfied with the self that human striving for knowledge was able to convey to him, but he wants to experience his own self directly in the spiritual world. The whole progress of the dramatic action in 'Faust' consists in the fact that the ego, in its dealings with the world, creates itself anew, always elevating itself. Fichte lives in Goethe's Faust; Schelling also lives in Goethe's Faust, in that Faust, on the one hand, seeks to unite the truth of magic with his soul, but also seeks true striving in the depths of the soul seeks the true striving in the depths of the soul; in that which cannot be found in the ordinary life of the soul, in thinking, feeling and willing, he seeks it in his dealings with the representative of evil, as a direct spirit. Faust truly seeks out nature where it lives in creation. Schelling had, I might say, presumptuously explained it when he said: To understand nature is to create nature! Fichte stands on healthier ground when he says: To understand nature is to live with one's own creation in the creation of nature. But one can see how the power for a deeper striving for knowledge, for the sources of existence, also lives in Fichte. Hegel strove for the sober thought, and one cannot be more sober than Hegel. The world spirit with which the soul in Hegelian philosophy seeks to unite itself becomes a mere logical spirit. To think of the divine spirit of the world as a logical soul that only builds the world logically! It must not be taken dogmatically, but it must be taken as an expression of the striving that remains mystical even in the most extreme logic, that seeks a union of the deepest part of the soul with the summit of the whole existence of the world itself in nature and history. Hegel must also be taken in this way, that one cannot find one's own self in what the senses provide us, but only in what the human soul can achieve within itself when it comes out of the sensual world. This is also what Hegel's philosophy strives for. And Faust, after his eyesight has gone, is illuminated by a brighter light within. What Hegel seeks on the right path, only to fail to perceive as the right goal, is what Faust seeks: to let one's own self merge with the world-self, to unite with it, and thus to experience the world-self in one's own self.

As Wilhelm von Humboldt said, can we not say that this German striving has not only tried in a beautiful way to establish harmony between philosophy – if one wants to call the pursuit of a worldview such – and poetry, and art in general, but that the German spirit has also brought this striving to external expression in a very unique way in Faust? Is not the very essence of Germanness characterized in this harmonious blending of the creations of the imagination with the quest of the sense of truth? Is it not otherwise in the world, where one finds that the imagination creates in freedom, but in unreality? The sense of truth creates according to the necessities of existence, but it does not come to a real life through this, only to an objectification, to a representation of experience. To bring fantasy out of its unreality and to animate that which it is able to create in such a way that the created lives together with the living spirit, so that harmony, harmonious harmony between poetry and philosophy can also exist in a work of art for once – that is what Goethe attempts, out of the whole originality and the truly not at all philosophical nature of his being. And when he has achieved this harmonizing of poetry and philosophy, of imagination and philosophy, by connecting with the most popular sources of the German spirit, then we may say: just as this Goethean work (we might also show it in other of his works, but it is most clearly and explicitly shown in his “Faust” — shows itself in connection with what the idealistic German world view has sought; there it is, as it now stands before us, seemingly the spiritual heritage of a few who prepare themselves especially for it. One can also see that, basically, supporters and opponents have tried to come to terms with the paths taken in the Goethe, Schiller, Schelling and Hegel era in the further course of German intellectual life up to our time. Infinite efforts have been made to understand the paths taken at that time along which one can find the sources of existence. But anyone who delves deeper into the ideas of those who lived in the arena of German idealism may come to the conclusion that what was developed there need not remain the property of only a few, of only a few individuals. Of course, if today we want to delve into the world view as presented by Fichte, Schelling and Hegel themselves, if we get involved in their books, it is understandable that we will soon close the books again if we do not want to make a special study of them. For it is understandable to say: All this is quite incomprehensible. Nor is there any criticism to be made of those who claim that it is incomprehensible and indigestible. But there is a possibility, and this possibility is actually offered by human development, that what appears to be an indigestible good for a few can become quite popular, can really find its way into the whole spiritual cultural life of humanity. In order to grasp the cosmic striving of man in the way it was grasped in German idealism, it was necessary that some people should devote themselves entirely to the particular formulation of concepts and ideas, that they should attempt this in a solitude of spiritual life that stands alone as such.

But it does not have to stay that way. It is possible to popularize that which lives in Fichte's thoughts, which are so abstract, so abstruse, and, as many might say from their point of view, so convoluted – I know that for many people I am saying something paradoxical, but time will teach that it is correct – if you live into the spirit and the way of thinking, to present it in such a way that it can be directly conveyed to the boy or girl in earliest youth; that it can be understood in the way one understands something that lies completely in the nature of human life if one wants to grasp this human life. And so with all the other spiritual heroes! It can be done just as it can with the Grimm fairy tales. It takes no more spiritual activity of the soul to recognize, feel and sense Goethe, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel in the depths of their creations than it does to grasp a fairy tale in the right imaginative way, as it is in the Grimm fairy tales. But the path will first have to lead people to live with something that belongs to the highest that humanity has gone through in terms of knowledge and poetry. And that is the significance of this idealistic striving of the German spirit. If one can show how one can grasp the essence of the soul in a simple way by appealing to the creative powers that lie within everyone, if one can show how these powers can be accessed in the right way, then one can bring this to people in a simple, elementary and direct way, whereas Fichte, to find it for the first time, needed a particularly high level of intellect. The same applies to everything else. But is what I am saying really so incredible? I do not think that anyone who remembers how he learned to understand the Pythagorean theorem at school will find it so incredible. But that does not mean that he is inclined to consider himself a Pythagoras, although the spiritual level and power of Pythagoras was necessary to first discover the Pythagorean theorem. An intense stream of spiritual world experience will flow from what the best German minds have sought in lonely, abstruse thoughts within German idealism, down to the most ordinary aspirations and lives of human beings.

And there is much, infinitely much, in this ordinary striving of man, if he is able to relate to the ever-creative and to feel that the human ego is creatively creative in the infinite. It is only by merging with the creative forces of nature that the human soul will be able to experience and feel the great beauties of nature as it reveals itself. And in a similar way, this applies to the other elements of this German intellectual life.

One must feel this, then the right feeling comes over one for the connection of the German striving with the entire world striving. And to revive this feeling in our days, it seems certainly appropriate to our destiny-bearing time. And it already belongs to that in which the German soul finds its strength. In conclusion, an example of this.

Even before the unity of the German people, the new German state, came about out of the context of the world, out of history, an unknown spirit writes beautiful words in his contemplation of Goethe's “Faust”. It was in 1865. I only quote these words of an otherwise quite unknown interpreter of Faust because they express what countless others have felt in exactly the same way. Since the emergence of the elevation in German idealism, which we have spoken of again today, countless of the best German minds have felt the connection between the paths that the idea takes in idealism into the spirit of nature and into the deeper foundations of the soul-spiritual itself. They felt that there is a connection between what the German spirit at its height has created for thought, what it has given to humanity as the sum of thoughts and artistic creations, and a connection between all this and what can also live in the German deed, in what the German people have to do when they have to carry out their world struggles on a different stage than that of thought. The connection between German intellectual life and German action was most deeply felt by those who knew how to place German thought and German idealistic work highest in their way of thinking. And from the contemplation of the past of German idealism, with its ascent to the heights where thought introduces to the life of the spirit—from the contemplation of this sphere of German idealism, there has always emerged the most beautiful hope that the German people will find the impulse for action from the same source when they need it.

What could be shown by many can be exemplified by one – and deliberately by one who is little known, Kreyssig, an explainer of Faust. Kreyssig, in 1865, wrote a paper about Goethe's “Faust” in which he tried to clarify, in his own way, what Goethe actually wanted with his “Faust.” He concludes with the words:

“And so we would then also know the overall impression that the contemplation of this giant monument of our great educational epoch, which after all remained unfinished and fragmentary, leaves behind, here we cannot summarize it better than in the simple memory of a passage from the famous legacy of the then 75-year-old poet to the younger world, which was preparing to take on new paths.”

Kreyssig cites Goethe's own thoughts, where he envisages the way in which Goethe sought a path into the spiritual world into old age. Kreyssig states how the power that leads into this spiritual world seems to him to be connected with the power that German action is to create in distant, distant times, which Goethe, as an old man, could only guess at:

The earnest style, the high art of the ancients,
The primeval secret of eternal forms,
It is familiar with men and with gods,
It will leaf through books as readily as through rocks.
For what Homer created and the Scipios
Will never live in the learned hothouse!
They wanted to transplant us into the hothouse;
But the German oak grew to the whole!
A storm of growth has overtaken it,
It has taken the glass of the hothouse with it.
Now grow, O oak, grow to the delight of the world.
I can already see new solar auras flying.
And when my gray eyelashes close,
a mild light will still pour forth,
from whose reflection of those stars
the late grandchildren will learn to see,
and in prophetically higher visions
to accomplish greater things for the world and humanity.

And the “Faust” interpreter adds - in 1865 -:

"Let us add the wish that the words of the master, who looks down on us with a mild light from better stars, may come true for his people, who are seeking their way to clarity in darkness, confusion and struggle, but, God willing, with indestructible strength, and that “in those higher accounts of God and humanity, which the poet of 'Faust' expects from the coming centuries, German action too, no longer as a symbolic shadow, but in beautiful, life-affirming reality, may one day find its place and its glorification alongside German thought and German feeling!"

Thus thought a German personality in 1865 of the German idea in connection with the hoped-for German deed. How the disembodied souls of such personalities may look upon the field in which the German deed is called upon for its realization today!

But precisely in connection with the faith, love and hope of such personalities, and especially of those personalities who, either through creation or understanding, have stood within the world view of German idealism, it may be said: the German need not, if he wants to recognize the impulses that are to inspire him, disparage any opponent. He has only to reflect on what he must believe, according to the innermost part of his being, to be his world-task. He must therefore reflect that he looks up to the way in which it has been handed down by his fathers, his ancestors, to his time; how it has become a force for the present, and how from this force, which is before his eyes, which lives in his soul, from the present hope may spring into the future.

Indeed, in the context of the present with German idealism, one can say from the innermost feeling: By looking to the past of thought or to what he has striven for outside of thought, the German feels feel his world task; he may feel it in this fateful time, he may feel it out of his love for his past and out of his faith in the power of the present, which becomes his when he has the right love for what the past has brought him. And from this love and from this faith, from this dual relationship between past and present, will spring in the right way that which, transcending blood and pain, allows us to glimpse a blessed present: German hope for the future. Thus, by delving into the idealism of the German essence, we can create a triad of love for the German past, faith in the German present, and hope for the German future.

My dear Friends,

today we will take first a reading from Goethe that will illustrate for you many of the things of which we have been speaking in the previous lectures. You will have seen from the readings you listened to a few days ago—taken first from the earlier, and then for comparison from the later Iphigenie—what sort of an ideal for drama was living in Goethe at the beginning of his work as a playwright. He brought this form of drama to a kind of perfection in Götz von Berlichingen, also in some of the scenes in Faust, Part I. Goethe was working here essentially out of a feeling for prose—not yet out of an artistic forming of speech.

The first Iphigenie, which may be described as the German Tasso, proclaims itself at once, in contradistinction to the Roman, as a striking example of well-formed prose, although a prose that has, under the influence of the poetic content, been allowed to run into rhythm.

It was on his visit to Italy that Goethe began to interest himself in the artistic forming of speech. Contemplation of Italian art awakened in him a perception of how man's formative powers work, how they shape and mould a material artistically. With the whole strength of his soul, Goethe set himself to work his way through to what he now saw to be art in its purity. And this led him to feel that wherever possible he must re-mould his earlier work, he must form it anew, letting its form arise now from the language, from the formative qualities of speech.

Goethe accomplished this in an eminent manner with the material he had at hand in his earlier Tasso and Tasso. And in Tasso he succeeded even in letting the speech shape the whole drama throughout. This was an achievement of remarkable originality. There is perhaps no other work of its kind where the conscious endeavour has been made to develop a drama entirely within the formative activity of speech itself.

Now, it will of course be evident from what I was saying yesterday that speech formation alone is not enough; drama must have in addition mime and gesture. The intellect of the spectator—for that too should undergo artistic development as he watches the play—needs to see the gesturing as well as to hear the words. This was not sufficiently clear to Goethe at the time when he was working at his Roman Tasso and Tasso; he had not yet realised the importance of mime and gesture as an integral part of drama. Hence it is that we have in Tasso so striking an example of a drama where it is all a matter of speech, where everything follows from the forming of the speech.

But now put yourself in the position of having to produce Goethe's Tasso. As you begin to develop your picture of the stage, scene by scene, you will find that many different possibilities are open to you for your stage settings. It will certainly not be easy to introduce modifications into the form of the speech, for speech has here been brought to a certain artistic perfection; but your picture of the stage you will find you can plan in the most varied ways. There is, however, a passage in Tasso where, as producer, you will come up against an insuperable difficulty. It is in the scene where Tasso makes himself intolerable to the Princess, acting in such a way as to give a most unfortunate turn to the whole drama. Here the producer is helpless. There is, in fact, no way out. Call on all the artistic means at your disposal, and see whether as producer you can make a success of this passage. You will not be able to do it. That such moments occur in plays must be known and recognised, if the art of the stage is to be cultivated in the right manner. You will of course finally manage to devise some way of meeting the situation, but you will not be able to give artistic form to your pis alle.

This instance from Tasso can serve to show that in his work as dramatist Goethe did not altogether find the way from the forming of speech to the development of full drama that lives and weaves on the stage. That, one must admit, is an important fact; and the importance of it can be clearly seen in the further development of Goethe's work. For what do we find?

In his Tasso and Tasso, Goethe may be said to live in the speech, to live in it as a supreme and perfect artist. In the sphere of speech, these two plays are unsurpassed. Goethe himself knew well of course that drama could not stop here, that it must develop further. While still in Italy, he composed also many scenes for his Faust. These, however, did not take on a Roman character. The ‘Witches' Kitchen’, for example, was composed in Italy, and is thoroughly northern, thoroughly Gothic in the old sense. Goethe knew that for these scenes he must wrest himself free of the Italian influence that surrounded him, must forget all about it and be a complete northerner. This comes out also in the letters he was writing at the time. What had been possible with Tasso and with Tasso was not possible with the material he was dealing with in Faust.

And now we can follow the development a step further. Goethe began to write Die natürliche Tochter. In this play he shows that he wants to come right out on to the stage. He is not going to continue working in speech alone, he means to concern himself with the whole picture presented to the audience. He planned here a trilogy, but it was never completed; we have no more than the first part. As a matter of fact, only fragments, mere torsos, remain to us of all the plays that Goethe began after this time. Even Pandora—a work that was grandly conceived, as can be seen from the rough sketch the author made of the whole—was never completed. Faust alone was finished, but finished in such a way that only in the speech was the poet happy and successful; for the rest, he drew on tradition. The last grand scene is derived from the traditional imaginative conceptions of Roman Catholicism. Goethe did not find in himself the sources for that scene.

Inherent of course in all this lies Goethe's profound honesty; Faust alone he finishes, and that, as can plainly be seen, out of a certain inability! The other plays he leaves unfinished, because he knew he could not complete them without entirely re-forming them. A dishonest artist would have finished them. Naturally, it is easy enough to polish off plenty of plays if one has no inclination or ability to delve down to the very deeps and make contact with the Archai of all creating. Oh yes, one can then complete many things to one's own satisfaction!

A number of different people have set out to complete Schiller's Demetrius, for example, but not one among them all has left us an artistic creation; no single ending proposed can be said to develop the play artistically. And it is art that we must really begin again to care about and expect to find. We must get to know art in its foundations, we must develop again a genuine artistic sensitiveness. For a long time this has been lacking. Traditions have survived, they have been handed down; but sensitiveness to true art—that is what our civilisation needs. The art of the stage has unique opportunity for helping this sensitiveness to develop: it can turn to good account the living relationship that subsists between stage and spectator. Unless we seize on this opportunity, we shall not get any farther.

In order to show you—or I should rather say, remind you, for I assume you are all of you familiar with the play—in order to remind you how far the forming of the speech dominated Goethe's dramatic work in the period of its highest attainment, we will ask you now to listen to the first scene from his Torquato Tasso. Frau Dr. Steiner will recite it for us.

(Frau Dr. Steiner): Let me first recall to you the setting of the scene. It takes place in a garden ornamented with columns carrying the busts of epic poets. In the foreground are Virgil on the right and Ariosto on the left.

(PRINZESSIN, LEONORE)

PRINZESSIN

Du siehst mich lächelnd an, Eleonore,
Und siehst dich selber an und lächelst wieder.
Was hast du? Lass es eine Freundin wissen!
Du scheinst bedenklich, doch du scheinst vergnügt.

LEONORE

Ja, meine Fürstin, mit Vergnügen seh' ich
Uns beide hier so ländlich ausgeschmückt.
Wir scheinen recht beglückte Schäferinnen,
Und sind auch wie die Glücklichen beschäftigt.
Wir winden Kränze. Dieser, bunt von Blumen,
Schwillt immer mehr und mehr in meiner Hand;
Du hast mit höherm Sinn und grösserm Herzen
Den zarten, schlanken Lorbeer dir gewählt.

PRINZESSIN

Die Zweige, die ich in Gedanken flocht,
Sie haben gleich ein würdig Haupt gefunden:
Ich setze sie Virgilen dankbar auf.
(Sie kränzt die Herme Virgils.)

LEONORE

So drück' ich meinen vollen frohen Kranz
Dem Meister Ludwig auf die hohe Stirne—
(Sie kränzt Ariostens Herme.)
Er, dessen Scherze nie verblühen, habe
Gleich von dem neuen Frühling seinen Teil.

PRINZESSIN

Mein Bruder ist gefällig, dass er uns
In diesen Tagen schon aufs Land gebracht:
Wir können unser sein und stundenlang
Uns in die goldne Zeit derDichter träumen.
Ich liebe Belriguardo, denn ich habe
Hier manchen Tag der Jugend froh durchlebt,
Und dieses neue Grün und diese Sonne
Bringt das Gefühl mir jener Zeit zurück.

LEONORE

Ja, es umgibt uns eine neue Welt!
Der Schatten dieser immer grünen Bäume
Wird schon erfreulich. Schon erquickt uns wieder
Das Rauschen dieser Brunnen. Schwankend wiegen
Im Morgenwinde sich die jungen Zweige.
Die Blumen von den Beeten schauen uns
Mit ihren Kinderaugen freundlich an.
Der Gärtner deckt getrost das Winterhaus
Schon der Zitronen und Orangen ab.
Der blaue Himmel ruhet über uns,
Und an dem Horizonte löst der Schnee
Der fernen Berge sich in leisen Duft.

PRINZESSIN

Es wäre mir der Frühling sehr willkommen,
Wenn er nicht meine Freundin mir entführte.

LEONORE

Erinnere mich in diesen holden Stunden,
O Fürstin, nicht, wie bald ich scheiden soll.

PRINZESSIN

Was du verlassen magst, das findest du
In jener grossen Stadt gedoppelt wieder.

LEONORE

Es ruft die Pflicht, es ruft die Liebe mich
Zu dem Gemahl, der mich so lang entbehrt.
Ich bring' ihm seinen Sohn, der dieses Jahr
So schnell gewachsen, schnell sich ausgebildet,
Und teile seine väterliche Freude.
Gross ist Florenz und herrlich, doch der Wert
Von allen seinen aufgehäuften Schätzen
Reicht an Ferraras Edelsteine nicht.
Das Volk hat jene Stadt zur Stadt gemacht,
Ferrara ward durch seine Fürsten gross.

PRINZESSIN

Mehr durch die guten Menschen, die sich hier
Durch Zufall trafen und zum Glück verbanden.

LEONORE

Sehr leicht zerstreut der Zufall, was er sammelt.
Ein edler Mensch zieht edle Menschen an
Und weiss sie festzuhalten, wie ihr tut.
Um deinen Bruder und um dich verbinden
Gemüter sich, die euer würdig sind,
Und ihr seid eurer grossen Väter wert.
Hier zündete sich froh das schöne Licht
Der Wissenschaft, des freien Denkens an,
Als noch die Barbarei mit schwerer Dämmrung
Die Welt umher verbarg. Mir klang als Kind
Der Name Herkules von Este schon,
Schon Hippolyt von Este voll ins Ohr.
Ferrara ward mit Rom und mit Florenz
Von meinem Vater viel gepriesen! Oft
Hab' ich mich hingesehnt; nun bin ich da.
Hier ward Petrarch bewirtet, hier gepflegt,
Und Ariost fand seine Muster hier.
Italien nennt keinen grossen Namen,
Den dieses Haus nicht seinen Gast genannt.
Und es ist vorteilhaft, den Genius
Bewirten: gibst du ihm ein Gastgeschenk,
So lässt er dir ein schöneres zurück.
Die Stätte, die ein guter Mensch betrat,
Ist eingeweiht; nach hundert Jahren klingt
Sein Wort und seine Tat dem Enkel wieder.

PRINZESSIN

Dem Enkel, wenn er lebhaft fühlt wie du.
Gar oft beneid' ich dich um dieses Glück.

LEONORE

Das du, wie wenig andre, still und rein
Geniessest. Drängt mich doch das volle Herz,
Sogleich zu sagen, was ich lebhaft fühle;
Du fühlst es besser, fühlst es tief und—schweigst.
Dich blendet nicht der Schein des Augenblicks.
Der Witz besticht dich nicht, die Schmeichelei
Schmiegt sich vergebens künstlich an dein Ohr:
Fest bleibt dein Sinn und richtig dein Geschmack,
Dein Urteil grad, stets ist dein Anteil gross
Am Grossen, das du wie dich selbst erkennst.

PRINZESSIN

Du solltest dieser höchsten Schmeichelei
Nicht das Gewand vertrauter Freundschaft leihen.

LEONORE

Die Freundschaft ist gerecht, sie kann allein
Den ganzen Umfang deines Werts erkennen.
Und lass mich der Gelegenheit, dem Glück
Auch ihren Teil an deiner Bildung geben;
Du hast sie doch, und bist's am Ende doch,
Und dich mit deiner Schwester ehrt die Welt
Vor allen grossen Frauen eurer Zeit.

PRINZESSIN

Mich kann das, Leonore, wenig rühren,
Wenn ich bedenke, wie man wenig ist,
Und was man ist, das blieb man andern schuldig.
Die Kenntnis alter Sprachen und des Besten,
Was uns die Vorwelt liess, dank' ich der Mutter;
Doch war an Wissenschaft, an rechtem Sinn
Ihr keine beider Töchter jemals gleich,
Und soll sich eine ja mit ihr vergleichen,
So hat Lucretia gewiss das Recht.
Auch, kann ich dir versichern, hab' ich nie
Als Rang und als Besitz betrachtet, was
Mir die Natur, was mir das Glück verlieh.
Ich freue mich, wenn kluge Männer sprechen,
Dass ich verstehen kann, wie sie es meinen.
Es sei ein Urteil über einen Mann
Der alten Zeit und seiner Taten Wert;
Es sei von einer Wissenschaft die Rede,
Die, durch Erfahrung weiter ausgebreitet,
Dem Menschen nutzt, indem sie ihn erhebt;
Wohin sich das Gespräch der Edlen lenkt,
Ich folge gern, denn mir wird leicht, zu folgen.
Ich höre gern dem Streit der Klugen zu,
Wenn um die Kräfte, die des Menschen Brust
So freundlich und so fürchterlich bewegen,
Mit Grazie die Rednerlippe spielt;
Gern, wenn die fürstliche Begier des Ruhms,
Des ausgebreiteten Besitzes, Stoff
Dem Denker wird, und wenn die feine Klugheit,
Von einem klugen Manne zart entwickelt,
Statt uns zu hintergehen, uns belehrt.

LEONORE

Und dann, nach dieser ernsten Unterhaltung,
Ruht unser Ohr und unser innrer Sinn
Gar freundlich auf des Dichters Reimen aus,
Der uns die letzten lieblichsten Gefühle
Mit holden Tönen in die Seele flösst.
Dein hoher Geist umfasst ein weites Reich,
Ich halte mich am liebsten auf der Insel
Der Poesie in Lorbeerhainen auf.

PRINZESSIN

In diesem schönen Lande hat man mir
Versichern wollen, wächst vor andern Bäumen
Die Myrte gern. Und wenn der Musen gleich
Gar viele sind, so sucht man unter ihnen
Sich seltner eine Freundin und Gespielin,
Als man dem Dichter gern begegnen mag,
Der uns zu meiden, ja, zu fliehen scheint,
Etwas zu suchen scheint, das wir nicht kennen
Und er vielleicht am Ende selbst nicht kennt.
Da wär' es denn ganz artig, wenn er uns
Zur guten Stunde träfe, schnell entzückt
Uns für den Schatz erkennte, den er lang'
Vergebens in der weiten Welt gesucht.

LEONORE

Ich muss mir deinen Scherz gefallen lassen,
Er trifft mich zwar, doch trifft er mich nicht tief.
Ich ehre jeden Mann und sein Verdienst,
Und ich bin gegen Tasso nur gerecht.
Sein Auge weilt auf dieser Erde kaum;
Sein Ohr vernimmt den Einklang der Natur;
Was die Geschichte reicht, das Leben gibt,
Sein Busen nimmt es gleich und willig auf:
Das weit Zerstreute sammelt sein Gemüt,
Und sein Gefühl belebt das Unbelebte.
Oft adelt er, was uns gemein erschien,
Und das Geschätzte wird vor ihm zu nichts.
In diesem eignen Zauberkreise wandelt
Der wunderbare Mann und zieht uns an,
Mit ihm zu wandeln, teil an ihm zu nehmen:
Er scheint sich uns zu nahn, und bleibt uns fern;
Er scheint uns anzusehn, und Geister mögen
An unsrer Stelle seltsam ihm erscheinen.

PRINZESSIN

Du hast den Dichter fein und zart geschildert,

Der in den Reichen süsser Träume schwebt.
Allein mir scheint auch ihn das Wirkliche
Gewaltsam anzuziehn und festzuhalten.
Die schönen Lieder, die an unsern Bäumen
Wir hin und wieder angeheftet finden,
Die, goldnen Aepfeln gleich, ein neu Hesperien
Uns duftend bilden, erkennst du sie nicht alle
Für holde Früchte einer wahren Liebe?

LEONORE

Ich freue mich der schönen Blätter auch.
Mit mannigfalt'gem Geist verherrlicht er
Ein einzig Bild in allen seinen Reimen.
Bald hebt er es in lichter Glorie
Zum Sternenhimmel auf, beugt sich verehrend
Wie Engel über Wolken vor dem Bilde;
Dann schleicht er ihm durch stille Fluren nach,
Und jede Blume windet er zum Kranz.
Entfernt sich die Verehrte, heiligt er
Den Pfad, den leis ihr schöner Fuss betrat.
Versteckt im Busche, gleich der Nachtigall,
Füllt er aus einem liebekranken Busen
Mit seiner Klagen Wohllaut Hain und Luft;
Sein reizend Leid, die sel'ge Schwermut lockt
Ein jedes Ohr, und jedes Herz muss nach—

PRINZESSIN

Und wenn er seinen Gegenstand benennt,
So gibt er ihm den Namen Leonore.

LEONORE

Es ist dein Name, wie es meiner ist.
Ich nähm' es übel, wenn's ein andrer wäre.
Mich freut es, dass er sein Gefühl für dich
In diesem Doppelsinn verbergen kann.
Ich bin zufrieden, dass er meiner auch
Bei dieses Namens holdem Klang gedenkt.
Hier ist die Frage nicht von einer Liebe,
Die sich des Gegenstands bemeistern will,
Ausschliessend ihn besitzen, eifersüchtig
Den Anblick jedem andern wehren möchte.
Wenn er in seliger Betrachtung sich
Mit deinem Wert beschäftigt, mag er-auch
An meinem leichtem Wesen sich erfreun.
Uns liebt er nicht—verzeih, dass ich es sage!—
Aus allen Sphären trägt er, was er liebt,
Auf einen Namen nieder, den wir führen,
Und sein Gefühl teilt er uns mit; wir scheinen
Den Mann zu lieben, und wir lieben nur
Mit ihm das Höchste, was wir lieben können.

PRINZESSIN

Du hast dich sehr in diese Wissenschaft
Vertieft, Eleonore, sagst mir Dinge,
Die mir beinahe nur das Ohr berühren
Und in die Seele kaum noch übergehn.

LEONORE

Du, Schülerin des Plato! nicht begreifen,
Was dir ein Neuling vorzuschwatzen wagt?
Es müsste sein, dass ich zu sehr mich irrte;
Doch irr' ich auch nicht ganz, ich weiss es wohl.
Die Liebe zeigt in dieser holden Schule
Sich nicht, wie sonst, als ein verwöhntes Kind:
Es ist der Jüngling, der mit Psychen sich
Vermählte, der im Rat der Götter Sitz
Und Stimme hat. Er tobt nicht frevelhaft
Von einer Brust zur andern hin und her;
Er heftet sich an Schönheit und Gestalt
Nicht gleich mit süssem Irrtum fest, und büsset
Nicht schnellen Rausch mit Ekel und Verdruss.

PRINZESSIN

Da kommt mein Bruder! Lass uns nicht verraten,
Wohin sich wieder das Gespräch gelenkt:
Wir würden seinen Scherz zu tragen haben,
Wie unsre Kleidung seinen Spott erfuhr.

---

TORQUATO TASSO
by Goethe
Act I. Scene 1.

(PRINCESS and LEONORA, habited as shepherdesses.)

PRINCESS

Smiling thou dost survey me, Leonora,
And with a smile thou dost survey thyself.
What is it? Let a friend partake thy thought!
Thou seemest pensive, yet thou seemest pleased.

LEONORA

Yes, I am pleased, my princess, to behold
Us twain in rural fashion thus attir'd.
Two happy shepherd-maidens we appear,
And like the happy we are both employed.
Garlands we wreathe, this one, so gay with flowers,
Beneath my hand in varied beauty grows;<
Thou hast with higher taste and larger heart
The slender pliant laurel made thy choice.

PRINCESS

The laurel wreath, which aimlessly I twin'd,
Hath found at once a not unworthy head;
I place it gratefully on Virgil's brow.
(She crowns the bust of Virgil.)

LEONORA

With my full joyous wreath the lofty brow
Of Master Ludovico, thus I crown—
(She crowns the bust of Ariosto.)
Let him whose sportive sallies never fade,
Receive his tribute from the early spring.

PRINCESS

My brother is most kind, to bring us here
In this sweet season to our rural haunts;
Here, by the hour, in freedom unrestrain'd,
We may dream back the poet's golden age.
I love this Belriguardo; in my youth
Full many a joyous day I linger'd here,
And this bright sunshine, and this verdant green,
Bring back the feelings of that bygone time.

LEONORA

Yes, a new world surrounds us! Grateful now
The cooling shelter of these evergreens.
The tuneful murmur of this gurgling spring
Once more revives us. In the morning wind
The tender branches waver to and fro.
The flowers look upwards from their lowly beds,
And smile upon us with their childlike eyes.
The gardener, fearless grown, removes the roof
That screened his citron and his orange-trees;
The azure dome of heaven above us rests;
And, in the far horizon, from the hills
The snow in balmy vapour melts away.

PRINCESS

Most welcome were to me the genial spring,
Did it not lead my friend away from me.

LEONORA

My princess, in these sweet and tranquil hours,
Remind me not how soon I must depart.

PRINCESS

Yon mighty city will restore to thee,
In double measure, what thou leavest here.

LEONORA

The voice of duty, and the voice of love,
Both call me to my lord, forsaken long,
I bring to him his son, who rapidly
Hath grown in stature, and matured in mind,
Since last they met—I share his father's joy.
Florence is great and noble, but the worth
Of all her treasur'd riches doth not reach
The prouder jewels that Ferrara boasts.
That city to her people owes her power;
Ferrara grew to greatness through her princes.

PRINCESS

More through the noble men whom chance led here,
And who in sweet communion here remain'd.

LEONORA

Chance doth again disperse what chance collects.
A noble nature can alone attract
The noble, and retain them as ye do.
Around thy brother, and around thyself,
Assemble spirits worthy of you both,
And ye are worthy of your noble sires.
Here the fair light of science and free thought
Was kindled first, while o'er the darkened world
Still hung barbarian gloom. E'en when a child,
The names resounded loudly in mine ear,
Of Hercules and Hippolyte of Este.
My father oft with Florence and with Rome
Extoll'd Ferrara! Oft in youthful dream
Hither I fondly turn'd, now am I here.
Here was Petrarca kindly entertain'd,
And Ariosto found his models here.
Italia boasts no great, no mighty name,
This princely mansion hath not call'd its guest.
In fostering genius we enrich ourselves;
Dost thou present her with a friendly gift,
One far more beautiful she leaves with thee.
The ground is hallow'd where the good man treads;
When centuries have roll'd his sons shall hear
The deathless echo of his words and deeds.

PRINCESS

Yes, if those sons have feelings quick as thine;
This happiness full oft I envy thee.

LEONORA

Which purely and serenely thou, my friend,
As few beside thee, dost thyself enjoy.
When my full heart impels me to express
Promptly and freely what I keenly feel,
Thou feel'st the while more deeply, and—art silent.
Delusive splendour doth not dazzle thee,
Nor wit beguile; and flattery strives in vain
With fawning artifice to win thine ear;
Firm is thy temper, and correct thy taste,
Thy judgment just, and, truly great thyself,
With greatness thou dost ever sympathise.

PRINCESS

Thou shouldst not to this highest flattery
The garment of confiding friendship lend.

LEONORA

Friendship is just; she only estimates
The full extent and measure of thy worth.
Let me ascribe to opportunity,
To fortune too, her portion in thy culture,
Still in the end thou hast it, it is thine,
And all extol thy sister and thyself
Before the noblest women of the age.

PRINCESS

That can but little move me, Leonora,
When I reflect how poor at best we are,
To others more indebted than ourselves.
My knowledge of the ancient languages,
And of the treasures by the past bequeath'd,
I owe my mother, who, in varied lore
And mental power, her daughters far excell'd.
Might either claim comparison with her,
'Tis undeniably Lucretia's right.
Besides, what nature and what chance bestow'd
As property or rank I ne'er esteem'd.
'Tis pleasure to me when the wise converse,
That I their scope and meaning comprehend;
Whether they judge a man of bygone times
And weigh his actions, or of science treat,
Which, when extended and applied to life,
At once exalts and benefits mankind.
Where'er the converse of such men may lead,
I follow gladly, for with ease I follow.
Well pleas'd the strife of argument I hear,
When, round the powers that sway the human breast,
Waking alternately delight and fear,
With grace the lip of eloquence doth play:
And listen gladly when the princely thirst
Of fame, of wide dominion, forms the theme,
When of an able man, the thought profound,
Develop'd skilfully with subtle tact,
Doth not perplex and dazzle, but instruct.

LEONORA

And then, this grave and serious converse o'er,
Our ear and inner mind with tranquil joy
Upon the poet's tuneful verse repose,
Who through the medium of harmonious sounds
Infuses sweet emotions in the soul.
Thy lofty spirit grasps a wide domain;
Content am I to linger in the isle
Of poesy, her laurel groves among.

PRINCESS

In this fair land, I'm told, the myrtle blooms
In richer beauty than all other trees;
Here, too, the Muses wander, yet we seek
A friend and playmate’mong their tuneful choir
Less often than we seek to meet the bard,
Who seems to shun us, nay, appears to flee,
In quest of something that we know not of,
And which perchance is to himself unknown.
How charming were it, if in happy hour
Encountering us, he should with ecstasy
In our fair selves the treasure recognise,
Which in the world he long had sought in vain!

LEONORA

To your light raillery I must submit,
So light its touch it passeth harmless by.
I honour all men after their desert,
And am in truth toward Tasso only just.
His eye scarce lingers on this earthly scene,
To Nature's harmony his ear is tuned.
What history offers, and what life presents,
His bosom promptly and with joy receives,
The widely scatter'd is by him combined,
And his quick feeling animates the dead.
Oft he ennobles what we count for naught;
What others treasure is by him despis'd.
Thus moving in his own enchanted sphere,
The wondrous man doth still allure us on
To wander with him and partake his joy;
Though seeming to approach us, he remains
Remote as ever, and perchance his eye,
Resting on us, sees spirits in our place.

PRINCESS

Thou hast with taste and truth portray'd the bard
Who hovers in the shadowy realm of dreams.
And yet reality, it seems to me,
Hath also power to lure him and enchain.
In the sweet sonnets, scattered here and there,
With which we sometimes find our trees adorn'd,
Creating like the golden fruit of old
A new Hesperia, perceiv'st thou
not The gentle tokens of a genuine love?

LEONORA

In these fair leaves I also take delight.
With all his rich diversity of thought
He glorifies one form in all his strains.
Now he exalts her to the starry heavens
In radiant glory, and before that form
Bows down, like angels in the realms above.
Then stealing after her through silent fields,
He garlands in his wreath each beauteous flower;
And should the form he worships disappear,
Hallows the path her gentle foot hath trod.
Thus like the nightingale, conceal'd in shade,
From his love-laden breast he fills the air
And neighbouring thickets with melodious plaints.
His blissful sadness and his tuneful grief
Charm every ear, enrapture every heart—

PRINCESS

And Leonora is the favour'd name
Selected for the object of his strains.

LEONORA

Thy name it is, my princess, as’tis mine.
It would displease me were it otherwise.
Now I rejoice that under this disguise
He can conceal his sentiment for thee,
And am no less contented with the thought
That this sweet name should also picture me.
Here is no question of an ardent love,
Seeking possession, and with jealous care
Screening its object from another's gaze.
While he enraptur'd contemplates thy worth
He in my lighter nature may rejoice.
He loves not us—forgive me what I say—
His lov'd ideal from the spheres he brings,
And doth invest it with the name we bear;
His feeling we participate; we seem
To love the man, yet only love in him
The highest object that can claim our love.

PRINCESS

In this deep science thou art deeply vers'd,
My Leonora, and thy words in truth
Play on my ear, yet scarcely reach my soul.

LEONORA

Thou Plato's pupil! and not comprehend
What a mere novice dares to prattle to thee?
It must be then that I have widely err'd;
Yet well I know I do not wholly err.
For love doth in this graceful school appear
No longer as the spoilt and wayward child;
He is the youth whom Psyche hath espous'd;
Who sits in council with the assembled gods.
He hath relinquish'd passion's fickle sway,
He clings no longer with delusion sweet
To outward form and beauty, to atone
For brief excitement by disgust and hate.

PRINCESS

Here comes my brother! let us not betray
Whither our converse hath conducted us;
Else we shall have his raillery to bear,
As in our dress he found a theme for jest.
(From the translation by Anna Swanwick.)

(Dr. Steiner): One fact has been entirely forgotten in the drama of recent years. When I tell you what it is, you will not very easily believe me; but I have been present at scarcely a single performance in recent years where the fact that we hear with our ears has not been forgotten. It seems such a simple obvious fact; and yet, from the point of view of art, it has been quite overlooked. The drama of our time has been working on the peculiar assumption that we hear- with our eyes ! It is accordingly considered necessary that whenever an actor is listening to another actor, he shall look straight towards him. In real life, it is certainly customary to turn to the person who is speaking, and it is perhaps justified there as a mark of politeness. Politeness is undoubtedly a praiseworthy virtue, it may even in certain circumstances be reckoned as one of the virtues that go to make up the moral code; and I am far from wanting to imply that there is no need for an actor to be polite; on the contrary! The actor on the stage, however, owes politeness first of all to the audience. (I do not mean some individual there; I shall have important things to say about the audience in the later lectures.) The only politeness that is due from the actor is in his relation to the audience, but in that he must not fail. It must never once be allowed to happen, for instance, that the audience see before them an actor speaking from the back of the stage, and four or five or more others standing in the foreground, turning their backs on the auditorium. That the stage should ever present such a picture is due to the intrusion there in recent years of the dilettantism that wants merely to imitate life. Blunders of this kind will disappear altogether as soon as we begin to take account again of style.

And where a true feeling for style is present, what difference will it make? We shall find we are perfectly able to arrange our positions on the stage so that only on the rarest occasion does an actor need to turn his back to the audience—only, that is, where a particular situation in the play absolutely requires it. As a matter of fact, nothing should ever happen on the stage for which there is not a compelling motive inherent in the play itself.

Take the case of smoking. In what I said yesterday I did not at all mean to convey the impression that I am against the smoking of cigarettes on the stage. But can there be any genuine motive behind it, when a number of persons, obviously merely to fill up dead moments with a bit of mime, are continually lighting cigarettes and smoking them in between their words, or even—as I have often seen—trying to cover their ignorance of rightly formed speech by standing there talking, holding cigarettes in their mouths as they speak? Yes, that does happen. All manner of detestable tricks of this sort have been finding their way on to the stage.

If, however, a boy of seventeen or eighteen years old comes on the stage and lights a cigarette, then there may well be a perfectly definite motive behind the action: we are to understand that the young fellow is anxious to pose as grown-up. He wants us to see that he is quite a man. In that case, the lighting of the cigarette has behind it a conscious motive that originates in the play itself, and I would thoroughly commend it—as I certainly do when in the plays of today I see boys and girls of seventeen or eighteen (the age of the part, of course, not of the actor) lighting their cigarettes. There, it is right and good; the action must, however, always be prompted directly by the situation in the play.

Do you see what is implied here—what demand we are making on behalf of art? We are asking that everything done on the stage shall be directly consequent on the inner texture of the play as an artistic creation. If our work is to have form and style, we must be able to see how every single detail in the acting springs straight from the fundamental intentions of the play. I have mentioned the matter of cigarettes merely as an example.

Suppose it happens in a play that one person is giving a command, and one, two or three others are receiving it. There you have a clear situation to be staged. As to the manner and bearing of the one who is giving the command, I need only refer you to what I said the other day, when we went through the several gestures for the variously spoken word—the incisive, hard, gentle, etc. What we have now to consider is the behaviour, in dumb show, of those who are receiving a command. Naturally, what they would find easiest would be to stand with their backs to the audience, for then there would be no need for them to act at all. But there is no occasion for them to take up such a position; in fact, it mustn't be done, it would be quite inartistic.

There are two things the audience must be able to see in one who is receiving a command. First, it must be evident that he is listening while the command is being given. And this, even when instead of facing the speaker he faces them, the audience will have no difficulty in seeing. If an actor who is receiving a command should ever turn his back to the audience, then we would have necessarily to conclude that he had some very particular reason for doing so. Imagine the speaker standing behind him, on his right; then the listener can still quite properly face the audience. He will be listening with his right ear and the audience will be able to see that he is doing so, by the way he turns just a little in that direction. No situation can possibly occur in a play where a listener is not perfectly well able to face the audience. And then, if the actor has his mime under proper control, the audience can see also in his countenance the impression that the command is making upon him. For that has to be seen too; it is the second of the two things that must be clearly visible to the spectator. The listener will therefore present to the audience a three-quarter profile more or less, his head inclined a little in the direction of the voice and slightly forwards. And if he has gone through beforehand the other exercises that I described yesterday, then as he assumes this position and enters into the feeling of it, his facial muscles will instinctively be set working in such a manner that the audience will see expressed in his countenance the nature of the command he is receiving. And if, in addition, he shows a tendency to move his arms and hands—not outwards, but more in the way of drawing them towards him—the gesture will be complete, will be exactly as it should be.

And now, my dear friends, you will probably be wanting to say: But if I were to arrange the stage with three or four actors all listening in the way you describe, it would look stereotyped, it would look as if it were according to some set plan.

Raphael would not have said so ! He would no doubt have introduced slight modifications into the gesture of the second listener, or of the third and so on, but the essential spirit and character of the gesture he would have maintained in them all. Raphael was not of course a producer; but he would, as onlooker, as critic, have demanded that gesture. He would, as I said, have modified it a little here and there, but the very similarity of gesture in the listeners would have impressed Raphael as aesthetically right. And should it ever be a case of some individual actor wanting his own way, then no question but that the stage picture as a whole must always receive the first consideration.

What I have been describing has reference to the receiving of a command. We can, however, also consider how it will be with mere listening. One actor is speaking and others are listening. The gesturing here will naturally be not unlike what we have found to belong to the receiving of a command. The speaker's gesture will of course again be from among those I indicated in connection with the different categories that I named for the word : incisive, gentle, etc.; the precise gesture of the listener will have to be carefully determined in the following way.

Let us suppose the content of what he has to say requires the speaker to speak quite slowly, so that his speaking falls into the category we named: slow, deliberate. We know then what his gesture will be. But what kind of a gesture will the listener have to make? The listener will have to adopt the gesture of a speaker who utters quick, decided words. Why is this?

When someone speaks in a quick, incisive tone of voice, he tends involuntarily to make sharply defined gestures; you will remember how we designated them as ‘pointing’ gestures. The narrator, who is speaking slowly, will not make these pointing gestures; he will make the movements with the fingers that I showed at the end of yesterday's lecture. The listener, however, will—silently, to himself– accentuate, as he listens, the important words. He will thus be in • the condition for incisive speaking—speaking, as it were, inaudibly, within; and he will accordingly be right in making the pointing gestures. Then you will have a perfect harmony of gesture: the one making those finger movements that belong to the telling, the other making the’ pointing’ finger movements that rightly accompany the listening. These are suggestions that you can study and work out in detail for yourselves.

Take another case. Again we have an actor relating something; but this time the content has the effect of making him speak his words out abruptly, as though they were cut short. This kind of speaking will always mean that the speaker particularly wants to drive home what he is telling; otherwise he would not tell it in that manner When the dramatist lets us see that a great deal depends on getting some information across to the listener, then the narrator will have to speak in this way, cutting his words short, and he will at the same time make the corresponding ‘flinging away’ gesture with his fingers—this gesture that you will remember I showed you before. The listener, on the other hand, will be true to his part and show the right response if he listens with all his ears—comes, that is, inwardly into the mood of a speaker who gives his words their full tone and value. Suppose someone wants to make sure of my taking in what he is telling me. Then I must stand before him in the manner of a full-toned speaker; for since I have to feel in full measure what he is saying, I must make the gesture that we saw to be right for the word that is spoken in full measure. These are ways to establish a right relationship between speaker and listener.

It must only not be forgotten that what I have now been recommending should never be noticeable on the stage; it should have been so thoroughly worked with that it has passed over entirely into an instinctive sensitiveness for what is true in art. If ever a movement gives the appearance of being studied or artificial, that movement is immediately false. For in art, everything is false unless it is the artistic itself that the spectator has before him—the artistic itself as style.

Consider in this connection what a difference there will be in their whole manner of speaking between some character in a drama who wants to convince, and one who wants to persuade. This difference must be brought out on the stage.

Situations occur where we want to persuade another person, we want to talk him round. One can have this desire in a good or in a bad sense—or somewhere between the two. You have a classic and grand instance of persuasion in the famous saying of Wallenstein: ‘Max, bleibe bei mir! ’ (Max, stay with me!).¹ There you have, not the will to convince, as will be evident from the context, but the will to persuade.

Now, you could not imagine Wallenstein standing in front of Max Piccolomini, wringing his hands and saying: ‘Max, bleibe bei mir!’ But you can, and indeed you must, imagine him clapping Max on the shoulder, or showing at least an inclination to do so. That is the gesture that belongs properly to the words. Where, on the other hand, it is a question of trying to carry conviction by reasoning, the speaker must make some gesture upon his own person. He will have to clasp his hands, for example, or touch himself somewhere with his hands. He feels a need to discover within himself the power of conviction—as it were, to track it down. If, however, the speaker wants to persuade, he should make the gesture of touching the other person—or at least let it begin, making a movement, that is, which, if carried further, would be a complete gesture of touching.

Note carefully also the fine distinctions we have to make for different kinds of persuasion. We may, for example, be using persuasion with the intention of giving comfort. Much will then depend on our powers of persuasion in the good sense of the word, for the one who needs comfort has not time to be convinced; what he wants, as a rule, is to be persuaded, not to be convinced by reason. We shall find, however, it makes a great difference whether we are in this way using persuasion to bring comfort, or are, for instance, wanting something from the other person.

If we want to bring comfort, then we make this gesture of touching; it will work naturally and harmoniously, whether we only begin it, or carry it to completion. It need really only be begun. We can take the other's hand, or lay the palm of our hand on his forearm. The audience will then instinctively receive the right impression.

This gesture will, however, not be right if you are wanting something for yourself, as in the famous example I quoted just now, not even if your wish be inspired by the very best intentions. ‘Max, bleibe bei mir !’ The actor who says these words will not lay his hand on Max's arm; he will have to place his hand on Max's shoulder or on his head, or anyway make a gesture of beginning to do so. Things like this will have to be grasped in all their exact detail, if we are ever to have again a genuine art of production that concerns itself with the whole practical work of the stage.

And now let us go a little farther; for there are many more details of gesture and posture that require to be studied. We need, for example, to develop an artistic perception for the following. When a person is standing in front of you, you may be seeing him in profile, in part profile, or in full face; and there is a meaning for each of these three ways of being seen. Anyone who is an attentive observer of life will know how people sometimes place themselves instinctively so that others are seeing them in one or other of these ways. In real life a kind of affectation lies behind it, but in art it is done for artistic reasons. I once knew a professor (he was a German) who never lectured without presenting himself in profile to his audience—and not only before ladies, to whom he frequently gave lectures, but before his own men students too; and he knew very well what it meant.

Standing in profile always calls up instinctively in the onlooker a sense of being in the presence of intellectual superiority. You cannot look at a person in profile without being impressed with his intellectual superiority—or inferiority, as the case may be; for in real life inferiority also occurs. The front-face view can never, for unprejudiced observation, tell us whether the person is clever or stupid. Looking him full in the face, we can remark whether he is a good or a bad man, whether he is kindly disposed or selfish; but if we want to observe whether he is clever or dull, we must see him in profile. And since one who makes use of profile is sure to be a person who believes himself to be clever, we shall know he is wanting in this way to show us his cleverness.

The actor should also make here an additional gesture; he should at the same time hold his head back a little. Then the audience will be bound to feel that he is impressing his hearers with his intellectual superiority. If therefore you want the acting to be artistic, you must arrange that an actor who is to speak a passage wherein he has to appear superior to the one he is addressing shall turn his complete profile to the audience, holding his head back a little as he speaks. We must, you know, once and for all rid the stage of dilettantism. We must create again the possibility for students to learn the preliminaries for the art of the stage, just as painters have to learn how to use colour. For unless one has learned and studied these things, one is not an actor, one is not acting artistically, but at best merely performing à la Reinhardt or Bassermann!

But now, suppose you stand before the audience in part profile. That will express, not intellectual superiority but intellectual participation in what the other is saying, especially if at the same time the head be inclined forward a little, so. A listener can in this way show to the audience that he is following the speaker with his understanding. It may, however, be that you want rather more the listener's feelings to be apparent to the audience. In this case, whilst the other is speaking, the listener must as far as possible allow the audience to see him full face.

The situation on the stage can really come alive when the speaking is accompanied by these postures in the listener. Where the speaking is intended to make an impression on his intellect, you will choose for the listener the profile position; where it is rather his heart that is to be touched, you will let him stand full face to the audience. When details of this nature begin to be clearly envisaged and understood, then the art of the stage will be able to emerge from dilettantism and once again acquire content. We shall be able to see from the way an actor stands or walks, whether it is more with the intellect or with the feelings of the heart that he is participating in the situation.

Passing on now to consider the will, we find that for the expression of will there has always to be movement, and here you will have to pay particular regard to what I said about form in movement. The expression of will or resolve calls forth in another an answering impulse of will. We know how this happens in life. Someone gives expression to his will in a certain direction. We listen to him. We can fall in with his will, or we can ourselves ‘will’ to hinder it. There you have the two extreme situations, and there are naturally many intermediate possibilities.

A will that gives in to the will of the other must always be accompanied with a movement from left to right, either of the whole person or of the arms. Try it out for yourselves on the stage. Let one actor say something that has will in it, and another be standing there and making this gesture—that goes from left to right. You will feel at once that there is agreement on the part of the listener; the gesture expresses that he too wills the same thing Let him, however, make a right-to-left movement, and he is obviously on the defensive and may even be considering how he can put hindrances in the other's way. Still greater emphasis can be given to this’ will to oppose’ if the movement is made expressly with the head—naturally, the rest of the body also sharing in it.

These are among the things that will have to be taught in a school for production that sets out to be comprehensive and take the whole art of the stage for its province. You will remember I told you yesterday—it may have seemed as though I were making rather paradoxical statements—I told you that in practising running one learns instinctively the walking that is required for the stage, and that leaping helps to modify the walking in the right way, making it now quicker, now slower, and that wrestling develops hand and arm movements, and so on. How is all this to be put into practice?

The first thing the school will have to do is to arrange for the students to practise Running, Leaping, Wrestling, something in the nature of Discus-throwing, something like Spear-throwing; for that will help them to come easily and readily into all the bodily movements that are needed on the stage. Then we shall at any rate be saved from a feeling one has sometimes nowadays about an actor as soon as ever he comes on: that fellow, we feel, has no proper control of his body. How often we have the impression that all those people who are dancing and hopping about up there on the stage have not their bodies under control! They would have quite a different relation to their bodies if, right at the beginning of their training, they had practised these exercises.

The next thing will be to draw forth from each exercise the particular ability it can develop for the stage. Let the students practise running for a quarter to half an hour, and then for half to three-quarters of an hour stage-walking; and the same with leaping and wrestling. For they must be able to unite the two : the exercise, and the skill in movement that the exercise helps them to acquire. And in order that, when they come to the last exercise, they may really succeed in drawing forth from their body the forming of the word, the four preceding exercises should be practised in the following way.

For the practice of walking, and of modified walking, for the practice also of arm and hand movement and of play of countenance, you should have a reciter who does the speaking, while the student makes, in silence, the corresponding gesture or facial expression. And as far as these first four steps in the training are concerned, the same method should be continued even later on for one who is wanting presently to appear on the stage. He should practise his gestures, to begin with, without yet saying a word, while the speaker of the company does the speaking. This will give him the opportunity to make himself entirely familiar with the gestures in dumb play. When the students come to the fifth exercise, they can begin to speak; they can accompany the gesture with the speaking—which up to now they have been practising only separately, without gesture, in recitative. These two, gesture and the forming of the word, have then to be consciously combined, consciously fitted into one another. Only so will our acting have the necessary artistic style.

The men of ancient India had a theory of the origin of man which, while it resembled our modern one, bespoke more feeling for the spiritual. For they too looked upon a certain species of ape as akin to man; but they were more consistent than we in their adherence to the mistaken theory. These apes, they said, can speak; they only don't want to—partly out of obstinacy and partly because they are a little bashful about it. If they are in any way human, if they are on the way to becoming man, then it follows that they must be able to speak. That was the conclusion, the perfectly correct conclusion of the ancient Indians. And I am always reminded of it when I meet with lack of temperament in the very people who need it. For I know well that these people have temperament; they are only unwilling to show it. I mean that quite seriously; the people of today are far more temperamental than they seem. We think it improper to show temperament; but it is by no means always so, and especially not in the case of little children. And yet how annoyed we often are when children begin to show temperament! But there too, you know, we shall have to learn to be more understanding!

When we have a school of dramatic art, planned in the way I have indicated, we shall not need to have any misgivings about arranging for the students to practise leaping and wrestling and discus-throwing. If only the teacher has temperament, and does not go about with a long face, but is a person gifted with some humour, then that of itself will help to evoke in the students the necessary temperament. They will soon stop being shy of exhibiting it. We have the means at our disposal for evoking temperament, we only don't use them. And for art, in so far as its practice is concerned, temperament is an essential factor. My dear friends, we must know this; we must know how intrinsically temperament belongs to art.

To write books on mysticism may not require temperament. If the books please, well and good; the readers do not the the author. But in those arts where the human being presents himself in person, there has to be temperament; there has to be also enhanced temperament—that is to say, humour. And therewith the moment is reached where it can all begin to be esoteric. And that is what we are minded to achieve in these lectures—that our study shall take us right into the esoteric aspect of the whole matter.

• 1. Schiller's Wallenstein, Act III, Scene 18.
• 2. Heinrich Laube (1806–1884). In an article written in 1898, Rudolf Steiner referred to Laube as this master of all producers.' He worked mainly in Vienna.

Don't think that I want to take the floor here today to talk about that cheap understanding with regard to the social question that so many people would like to talk about today and who would like to be heard by name. I would like to speak of a completely different kind of understanding, the kind of understanding that seems to me to be called for by the loud, loudly speaking facts that are spreading across a large part of Europe today: understanding with the historical forces at work in the present and in the future, which call for a very specific, clear and energetic approach to what has been called the social question for more than half a century. How can we speak today of that other understanding mentioned at the beginning? Has not too much been lost for this understanding? Has not a certain part of modern humanity taken a long time to seek such an understanding? Today, a deep chasm is opening up between those who have been the leading classes of humanity up to now and those who are pressing forward with newer demands that have necessarily arisen from the times, i.e. between the leading classes of humanity up to now and the proletariat with its justified demands.

Let us take a look at recent life in order first of all to gain a judgment on the impossibility of easy understanding today. Much has been said for decades about this modern civilization, about this civilization which is supposed to have brought about such great and mighty things for mankind. How we have heard it again and again, the praise for modern technology, for modern transportation! Have we not heard them, all the phrases about how it is possible for people today - yes, which people are possible! - to traverse vast distances of land in a relatively short time, how it has become possible for thoughts to cover almost any distance, how it has become possible to expand so-called intellectual life? Well, I don't need to go into detail about the whole song of praise that has been heard so and so often. But what has all this, to which such a song of praise is sung, risen above? Without what would it not have been possible? It would not have been possible without the work of the greater part of mankind, that part which was not allowed to participate in all that has been so praised, that part which had to provide for these comforts of life under physical and mental privations, without being able to participate in any way in all the achievements of modern civilization.

Let's take a closer look at how, for more than half a century, we have come to the point where we still have to say that the abyss exists today. And if there is much talk of understanding today, it is precisely because people are afraid, because they are afraid of the facts that are looming so threateningly for some people. What, for example, has the moral world view of these leading classes been particularly preoccupied with - to start with a favorite subject of the leading classes since then? The world-view, the moral world-view of these leading classes has been particularly fond of dealing with, in endless speeches, in unctuous expositions, in words that seemed to overflow with feeling, with how men must develop love for one another, how men must see to it that brotherhood spreads, how men can only conquer the spiritual world by entering into such brotherhood. Such speeches, seemingly dripping with deep feeling, have indeed been made quite often by the leading spiritual circles of the hitherto leading class of mankind. Let us put ourselves in the place of such speeches in halls of mirrors or the like, and think how they preached about love of man, about charity, about religiosity, preached over a furnace heating provided by coal - I would like to draw attention to this in order to characterize a little the course of the present facts - which was extracted from those coal mines about which an English inquiry at the beginning of the newer labour movement brought quite strange things to light. Down there in the shafts of the earth, nine-, eleven-, thirteen-year-old children worked all day long in the shafts, children who never saw the sunlight except on Sunday, for the simple reason that they went down into the pits when it was still dark, and were only brought up again when it was no longer light. Men stood down there, completely naked, next to women who were pregnant and who also stood half-naked down there and had to work.

That was the first time that a government inquiry was held to draw attention to what was actually going on among the people, that such experiences were made, about which thoughtlessness had never wanted to enlighten itself, despite all the preaching of humanity, charity and religiosity. Admittedly, that was at the beginning of the modern proletarian movement. But it cannot be said that what has at least to some extent improved the situation of wide circles of people stems from the understanding that would have been gained in the hitherto leading classes of mankind. A large part of these leading classes of mankind are today just as uncomprehending of the true demands of the time, which follow from such facts, as they were fifty or more years ago.

There is no need to go as far as a hitherto leading, or at least seemingly leading, personality of humanity has gone: the former German Emperor, who called the socialist-minded people: Animals that gnaw at the foundations of the German empire and are worth exterminating. These are his own words. As I said, there is no need to go that far, but the judgments that are still made in certain circles today are not so very different from this particularly characteristic judgment just mentioned.

If we now look at what has taken place in the course of the last five to six decades, since what is now called the social question came into existence, we see on the one hand the thoughtless lack of understanding with regard to everything that has come up in the development of humanity, and on the other hand we see the onslaught, the justified onslaught of the broad proletarian masses, which has always been crowding into the words: It cannot go on like this. But today the facts speak a completely different language than they have in recent decades. And how do the judgments that some people make compare with the facts? The terrible catastrophe we have lived through in the last four to five years is a good lesson in this.

Please allow me to make the following personal comment. That which I have had to form for decades as a judgment on European political conditions, I had to summarize it in a lecture which I gave in the spring of 1914 in Vienna to a small circle - a larger one would probably have laughed at me at the time - I had to summarize that which was then woven among the people of Europe, among those people of whom one could say that they had something to do with the shaping of political destiny in Europe. At that time one had to say, if one looked at the times with an unbiased eye: With regard to the political and state relations of Europe, we are suffering from a creeping ulcer, a cancerous disease that will have to break out in a terrible way in the very near future. The time when this cancer broke out came very soon. But what did the “practitioners” say? What did the “statesmen” say? Today, when we talk about statesmen, we are always tempted to put quotation marks around the word. What did the “statesmen” say? What the leading foreign secretary of state in the German Reichstag said back then was the following. He said: “Thanks to the efforts of the cabinets, we can say that European peace will be secured for the foreseeable future. - That was said by a leading statesman in May 1914. This peace was so secure that since then twelve to fifteen million people have been shot dead, three times as many have been crippled. Just as in those days these statesmen spoke about what was in the political sky, so today many people speak about what is being said by the whole educated world through facts of the most significant and energetic kind. This is how people often speak about the social question. There is no idea in many circles of what must come and what will certainly come, and of what every reasonable person must be able to judge.

What I have to say on this matter is truly not based on any theoretical view. For many years I was a teacher at the workers' educational school founded in Berlin by Wilhelm Liebknecht, the old Liebknecht, I taught in the most diverse branches, and from there I also worked within the educational system of the modern proletariat in trade unions, in cooperatives and also within the political party. It is precisely when one has lived among and worked with those who have endeavored to carry the modern workers' movement forward from real thoughts, from real intellectual foundations, that one can perhaps say that one can form a judgment, not as one who thinks about the proletariat. Such judgment has no value today. Today, only a judgment formed with the proletariat, formed from the midst of the proletariat itself, can have any value.

In the hours that the workers spent after the hard work of the day, in which they went to the theater or played skat while other classes - I don't want to list all the nice things - in the hours in which the proletarian tried to enlighten himself about his situation, in those hours one could learn how the modern proletarian question has become and will become something quite different from a mere wage or bread question, as many still believe today, namely a question of human dignity. A question of a humane existence, that is what lies behind all proletarian demands, and has done for a long time.

Today's proletarian demands can be said to rest on three foundations. The one foundation is very often described by the proletarians themselves by referring to the great teacher of the proletariat, Karl Marx, as the existence of so-called surplus value. Surplus value, it was always a word that penetrated deep into the soul of the modern proletarian; it was a word that had an incendiary effect on the feelings of this modern proletarian. What word did the hitherto leading classes oppose to this surplus value? One will perhaps be surprised if I contrast the following two things.

The leading classes opposed this surplus value with the word of the great, important spiritual life which the civilization of mankind has brought forth. What did the proletarian know of this spiritual life? What was the great question of humanity for him? He knew that the surplus value he produced was used to make this spiritual life possible and to exclude him from this spiritual life. For him, surplus value was the very abstract basis of spiritual life. What kind of spiritual life was that? It was the intellectual life that arose in the dawn of the modern bourgeois economic order. It is often said, certainly not unjustly, that the modern proletariat was created by modern technology, by modern industrialism, by modern capitalism, and we shall speak of these things in a moment. But at the same time as this modern technology, with this capitalism, something else arose which we can call the modern scientific orientation. There it was - it was quite a long time ago - that the proletariat placed the last great trust in the bourgeoisie in the face of what the modern bourgeoisie brought up as the modern scientific orientation. And this last great trust, world-historical trust, has been disappointed.

What was the actual situation? Well, out of old worldviews, the justification of which we really don't want to examine today, what is today an enlightened, scientific worldview was formed. The proletarian, who has been called away from the medieval craft to the soul-killing machine, has been harnessed into modern capitalism, could not accept what the old classes had absorbed in their spiritual life. He could only accept, so to speak, the most modern product, the most modern outflow of this spiritual life. But for him this spiritual life became something quite, quite different from that of the leading classes. One need only visualize this with reference to all the depths of the proletarian soul. One must imagine how people from the hitherto leading classes, even if they were such enlightened people as the naturalist Vogt or the scientific popularizer Büchner, how they could be enlightened people with their heads, with their minds, in the sense of today's science; but they were such enlightened people only because they lived with their whole human being inside a social order that still came from the old religious and other world views in which the old still lived on. Their life was different from the one they professed, however honest they were in theory. The modern proletarian was compelled to take what remained to him as the legacy of the bourgeoisie in the fullest human seriousness. One need only have seen what it meant to the modern proletarian when he was told, as Lassalle once was, about science and the workers.

I stood - if I may also make this personal remark - more than eighteen years ago in Spandau, near Berlin, on the same speaker's platform with Rosa Luxemburg, who recently met her tragic end. We were both speaking to a proletarian assembly about science and the workers. At the time, Rosa Luxemburg said words that you could see had a powerful effect on the souls of these proletarian people who had come on a Sunday afternoon and had brought their wives and children with them; it was a heart-warming meeting. She said that, under the influence of modern science, people can no longer imagine that they have come up from conditions that were like angels, from which the modern differences of rank and class would be justified. No, she said almost literally: man, the physical man of today, was once highly indecent, climbing around on trees, and if one remembers this origin, then one really finds no reason to speak of today's class differences.

This was understood, but differently than by the leading circles. It was understood in such a way that the whole man wanted to be placed in this world view, which was to answer the question of the proletarian languishing in the barren machine: What am I as a human being? What is man in the world at all?

Now, however, the modern proletarian could gain nothing from this whole science other than what he could call a mirror image of what has emerged as the modern capitalist economic order. He felt that people speak as they must according to their economic circumstances, according to their economic situation. They had placed him in this economic situation; he could only judge from it. The leading circles said: the way people live now is a result of the divine world order, or a result of the moral world order, or a result of historical ideas and so on. The modern proletarian could only feel all this by saying to himself: “But you have put me into this economic life, and what have you made of me? Does that show what you have made of me, this divine world order, this moral world order, these historical ideas?

And so the concept of surplus value - the surplus value that he produced, that was extracted from him, that made this life of the leading classes possible - ignited in his emotional world and the opinion arose in him that everything that is produced by the leading circles in terms of spiritual life is only the reflection of their economic order.

Finally, for the last few centuries the proletarian theoretician was undoubtedly right in this view. The last few years have amply demonstrated this in the most diverse areas. Or can one believe that the people who taught history, for example, or wrote about history in the various schools - I don't want to say mathematics and physics, there's not much you can do in world views - can one say that they ultimately expressed anything other than a reflection of what the state-economic order was? Just look at the history of the states that entered the world war. The history of the Hohenzollerns will certainly look different in the future than the German professors have written in recent years and decades. It will, however, be made, this history, by people who have been told - yes, it is also a word of the German emperor - that they are not only enemies of the ruling class, but enemies of the divine world order.

So what was the spiritual life of the ruling classes became for the proletarian a dull ideology, a luxury of humanity, something for which he could muster no understanding. Nevertheless, his deepest longing was to find something that told him what human dignity, what human worth was. That is why the first proletarian demand is a spiritual demand. And one may say what one likes here or there, the first proletarian demand is a spiritual demand, the demand for such a spiritual life in which one can feel what one is as a human being, in which every human being can feel what human life on earth is worth. That is the first proletarian demand in the spiritual sphere.

The second proletarian demand arises in the field of legal life, of the actual political state. It is difficult to talk theoretically about what the law actually is. In any case, law is something that concerns all men, and one need only say the following about law: just as one cannot talk to a blind man about what a blue color is, but one does not need to theorize much about the blue color with one who sees, so one cannot talk about law with those who are blind to law. For the law rests on an original human awareness of the law. On the commandments of the political state, which the ruling classes have so finely carved out for themselves in recent centuries, the proletarian sought his right, his right above all in relation to his field of labor. What did he find? At first he did not find himself harnessed to the constitutional state, he found himself harnessed to the economic state. And there he saw that in contrast to all ideas of humanity, in contrast to all ideas of pure humanity, there remained for him a remnant of old inhumanity, a terrible remnant of old inhumanity. That, in turn, is something that Karl Marx so passionately impressed on the souls of the proletariat. There were slaves in ancient times. The whole human being was bought and sold like a commodity. Later there were serfs. There was less buying and selling of people than in the old days of slavery. Even now, people are still bought and sold like commodities. What Karl Marx and his successors have repeatedly and again so understandably expressed for the proletarian soul is that human labor power is sold. In the modern commodity market, where there should only be commodities, labor power itself is treated like a commodity. This rests in the depths, albeit often unconsciously, of the proletarian soul, so that it says to itself: the time has come when my labor power may no longer be a commodity.

This is the second proletarian demand. It springs from the legal ground. In drawing attention to this relationship, Karl Marx was once again speaking one of his most incendiary words. But we must be even more radical in this area than Karl Marx himself was in his approach. It must become clear: a world order, a social order must emerge in which man's labor power is no longer a commodity, in which it is completely stripped of the character of a commodity. For if I have to sell my labor power, I can also sell my entire human being. How can I retain my human being if I have to sell my labor power to someone else? He becomes master of my whole person. Thus the last remnant of the old slavery, but truly not in a lesser form, is still there today in this “humane” age.

So the proletarian, with his labor power and its sale, found himself thrust out of legal life into economic life. And when it is said, well, the labor contract exists, it must be countered that as long as a contract can be concluded between the employer and the worker about the labor relationship, the slave relationship with regard to labor power exists. Only then, when the relationship with regard to labor between labor manager and physical workers is transferred to the mere legal ground, only then is there that which the modern proletarian soul must demand.

However, this can only be the case when a relationship is no longer concluded only about wages, but only about what is produced jointly by the physical and the intellectual worker. There can only be contracts about goods, not about pieces of people. Instead of knowing that his labor relationship is protected on the basis of law, what did the modern proletarian find on this legal basis? Did he find rights? When he looked at himself, he really did not find any rights. Certain people had gradually become accustomed to perceiving this modern state as a kind of deity, as an idol. Almost as Faust spoke to Gretchen about God in the first part, so certain people spoke about the modern state. One could well imagine a modern labor entrepreneur instructing his workers about the divinity of the modern state and saying of this state: “The all-preserver, the all-embracer, does he not grasp and sustain you, me and himself?” He will probably always think: especially me. - Rights awaited the consciousness of humanity on the soil of the state. The modern proletarian found the privileges of those who had gained them from economic life, especially in recent times. Instead of that which must be demanded in regard to all rights - the equality of all men - what did the modern proletarian find? If one looks at what he found there on the ground of the constitutional state, one comes to his third demand; for he found on the ground on which he was to find the right, namely the right of his labor and the opposite right, the right of the so-called owner, he found the class struggle. For the modern proletarian, the modern state is nothing more than the class-struggle state.

Thus we designate the third proletarian demand as that which aims at overcoming the class state and replacing it with the constitutional state. Labor and labor management are objects of law. What, after all, is property? In the course of modern times it will have to become something that belongs to the old rusty things; for what is it in reality? In the social organism we need only the concept which says: possession is the right of any man to make use of any thing. Possession is always based on a right. Only when rights are regulated on the basis of a true democratic social order will workers' rights stand in opposition to so-called property rights. Only then, however, can that which is the legitimate demand of the modern proletarian be fulfilled.

If you look at the facts of today, which speak so loudly, then you come to the conclusion that what has gradually emerged as a social organism under the influence of modern technology, under the influence of modern capitalism, must be looked at more closely. - And one need only look at the three demands of the modern proletariat just characterized, then one will also see what is necessary for the recovery of the social organism. A spiritual, a legal and an economic aspect - these are the three aspects that must be looked at. But how have these three aspects been treated in the modern historical order, which is currently under the influence of technology and capitalism?

This is where we come from the critique of what has been formed by the ruling classes of the present, to what emerges today as a historical demand. I can imagine that some people will not fully agree with me in what I am about to say. But do not the facts that have developed show that people's thoughts have often lagged behind these facts? That is why it is perhaps justified to listen when someone says: “We not only need all kinds of talk about the transformation of conditions, no, today we need to move forward to completely new thoughts. New thoughts must enter the human brain, because the old thoughts have shown what they have made the human social order into. Rethinking and relearning, not just trying things out, is necessary today. And if what I have to say differs in some respects from the usual thoughts, I ask you to take it in such a way that it is taken from the observation of the facts of life and is just as honestly meant as many other things that are honestly put forward for the recovery of the newer social conditions.

I see, for example, how in recent times, precisely under the influence of the bourgeois social and economic order, economic life has increasingly grown together with legal life, how the political state and the economic state have become one. Let us take a very characteristic example of the present. Let us take the example of Austria, which has just succumbed to its fate. When, in the sixties of the 19th century, this Austria finally decided to establish a so-called constitutional life, how was the Imperial Council, this old blessed Imperial Council - because they wanted to have such a clear and short name, they called this Austrian state, apart from Hungary and the lands of the so-called Holy Crown of St. Stephen, “the kingdoms and lands represented in the Imperial Council”, - short name for Austria! - was elected? Elections were held for this Imperial Council according to four curiae, firstly the large landowners, secondly the chambers of commerce, thirdly the cities, markets and industrial towns, fourthly the rural communities. The latter were only allowed to vote indirectly. But what are all these curiae? They were economic curiae. They had to represent purely economic interests, and they elected their deputies to the Austrian Imperial Council. What was to be done there? Rights were to be established, political rights. What ideas did they have about political rights by basing the Austrian Imperial Council on these four curiae? Well, they had the idea that in the Imperial Council, where the law was to be decided, economic interests were merely transformed into rights. And so it was, and still is, that basically the state representations include, mostly openly or covertly, the mere economic interests. Look at the Farmers' Union in the German Reichstag; you can refrain from giving me closer examples. Everywhere we see how the tendency of modern times has been to merge economic life with the political life of the state proper. This was called progress. They began with those branches which were particularly convenient to the ruling classes, the postal, telegraph and railroad systems and the like, and extended them more and more. That is one thing that was welded together. The other thing that was merged, that was welded together, was intellectual life and the political state.

I know that I am to a certain extent treading on ice when I speak of this fusion of intellectual life with the political state, when I speak today of the fact that this fusion has led to the disadvantage, to the harm, to the illness of the social organism. Certainly, it was necessary for the ruling classes in the last centuries, and especially in the 19th century. But one must not merely believe that the administration, the operation of science and other branches of intellectual life has been corrupted, impaired by the state administration, but the content of science itself. Here, too, there is no need to go as far as the famous physiologist Du Bois-Reymond, who once called the members of the Berlin Academy of Sciences “the Hohenzollern's scientific protection force” in a beautiful speech - gentlemen always speak very, very beautifully when they talk about such things.

In an enlightened age, there was a lot of mockery about how in the Middle Ages external science and worldview, the handmaiden, was the servant of theology. Certainly, we will never want to return to those times. Anyone who looks at things today with unbiased judgment knows that a later time will judge ours in a similar way. In many cases, scholars no longer carry the train of theology, well, I don't want to say that they clean the boots of the states concerned, but in many respects the bearers of the train of the states concerned have already become the bearers of the train. That is what one must keep in mind again and again if one wants to talk about what it has actually brought about that in recent times, on the one hand, economic life has merged with political state life, and on the other hand, intellectual life has merged with precisely this political state life. Anyone who looks into these things does not now ask, as so many people ask: What should the League of Nations do, which is now to be founded from one point of view or the other? The other day in Berne I heard a gentleman who considers himself particularly clever say: The League of Nations must establish a supranational state, it must create a supra-parliament. Yes, you see, anyone who looks with an unbiased eye at what the previous states have achieved in these four terrible years really does not want to ask with regard to the League of Nations: How should the various measures and institutions of the previous states be transferred to this League of Nations? What should be done to make this League of Nations as similar as possible to the state? - He will probably ask differently. He will perhaps ask: What should this state refrain from doing? - After all, what it has done in the last four years has not really borne much fruit. Gradually, if you really look into the workings of modern social life with a healthy mind, you come to say what the historical powers and forces really demand in modern times.

While the world war was raging, I spoke to many people about what I am also saying here. I preached to deaf ears. I said to quite a few people: You still have time now; as long as the cannons are thundering, it is advisable that those states that want to end this war sensibly speak words into the thunder of the cannons, words that are demanded by the times, words that will definitely be realized in the next ten or twenty years. Today you have the choice of either accepting reason and realizing it through reason, or, if you don't want that, you will face cataclysms and revolutions. Like sound and smoke, that went past our ears.

What the times demand of us is that we really make up our minds to create independent social entities: a free, self-reliant intellectual life, a political state to which we leave only legal life, and an economic life that we place on its own foundation. - How dreadful it is for some who, in the sense of the old habits of thought, consider themselves practitioners, that one should now approach the complicated, three juxtaposed social organisms, a special spiritual organization, a special legal organization and a special economic organization! Just think what effect this will have on economic life, for example. On the one hand, economic life is limited by the natural basis, climate and soil conditions. On the one hand, nature can be dealt with by making all kinds of technical improvements, but there is a limit beyond which we cannot go. The natural basis forms one limit of economic life. One need only recall extreme examples. Think of a country where many people can feed themselves from bananas. It takes a hundred times less work to bring the banana from its place of origin to consumption than it does to bring our wheat in our regions from sowing to consumption. Well, such extreme examples clear things up. But even if things are not so extreme in a closed social territory, the natural basis is there. It is one limit of economic life. There must be another boundary. This is the one formed by the state, which stands independently alongside economic life. Within this state, which must stand on a purely democratic basis, because it deals with what applies equally to all men, what all men must agree upon, because it must emerge from the consciousness of right which is rooted in the soul of every man, in this constitutional state, measure, time and many other things relating to human labor will also be determined quite independently of economic life. Just as the seed is not already part of economic life in relation to the forces that grasp it under the earth, but just as these natural forces determine economic life itself, so labor law must also form the basis of economic life on the part of the independent state. The price of the commodity must be determined, as by the natural basis on the one hand, so on the other hand by the labor law independent of economic life. Commodity prices must be dependent on labor law, not, as is the case today, labor prices on commodity prices.

That is what every real worker secretly, in the depths of his soul, basically expects, that the regulation of labor power and also the regulation of so-called property, which will thus no longer be property at all, will be separated from economic life, so that in the economic field there can no longer be a compulsory relationship between employer and employee, but merely a legal relationship. Then there will be in economic life only that which belongs solely to economic life: the production of goods, the movement of goods, the consumption of goods. And what can be realized is precisely what socialist thought strives to realize, that from now on production will no longer be in order to profit, but that production will be in order to consume. This can only happen if the rules are made about labor and work performance just as independently as the rules themselves are made by nature for the economic order independently of this economic order. Only then will that come into its own in the field of economic life which is today developing as the cooperative system, the associative system; this must find a proper administration on the ground of economic life. Production life must be regulated in associations, in cooperatives, according to the needs of consumption. Above all, the entire regulation of currency must be taken away from the political state. Currency, money can no longer be something that is subject to the political state, but something that belongs to the economic body. What will then be that which is the representative of money? No longer some other commodity, which is really only a luxury good and whose value is based on human imagination, gold, but what will correspond to money - I can only hint at this, you will find it explained in my book on the social question, which will appear in a few days' time - what will correspond to money will be everything that is available in the way of useful means of production. And these useful means of production, they will be able to be treated as they should actually be treated in the sense of modern social thought, they will be able to be treated in the same way as today only that which is regarded in our time as the most abominable property is treated.

What is considered to be the worst property in our time? Well, of course the intellectual, the spiritual property. In our time we know that we have it from the social order. Yes, no matter how clever a person is, no matter how much he can achieve, no matter how beautiful things he produces, it certainly corresponds to his talents, and to some other things as well, but insofar as it is utilized in the social organism, insofar as one has it from the social organism. It is therefore just that this intellectual property should not remain with the heirs, but should, at least after a number of years, pass into the social organism, become common property, to be used by those who are suited to it by their individual abilities. This most precious property, intellectual property, is treated in this way today. This is how all so-called property will be treated in the future. Only it will have to be transformed much earlier into common property, so that those who have the abilities for it can in turn contribute these abilities to this property for the benefit and purpose of the social organism. Therefore, in the book that will be published in a few days, I have shown how it is necessary that the means of production remain under the management of one person only as long as the individual abilities of this person justify the management of these means of production, that everything that is profited on the basis of the means of production, if it is not again put into the production itself, must be transferred to the community. Through the spiritual organism, we can seek out those who, in terms of their individual abilities, can pass this on to the social community.

If one has really come to know this social organism from life, it is not so easy to fulfill this modern demand that the means of production no longer be transferred to private ownership so that they remain in this private ownership. But the means must be found by which this private property loses all meaning, so that the so-called private owner is then only the temporary leader, because he has the ability to manage the means of production best for the good of the community through his skills.

When, on the one hand, workers' rights are regulated in the political state, when, on the other hand, property thus becomes a property cycle in the true sense of the word, only then will a free contractual relationship between worker and labor leader concerning communal production be possible. There will be workers and labor leaders, entrepreneurs and employees no longer.

I can only briefly outline all these things. Therefore, please allow me to point out that, in addition to the independent economic area, which on the other side will have the independent political state, the constitutional state, which will stand independently and sovereignly next to the economic area, like nature itself, there will be spiritual life. This spiritual life can only develop according to its own, true, real forces when it is placed on its own ground in the future, when the lowest teacher up to the highest leader of any branch of teaching or education is no longer dependent on any capital group or on the political state, but when the lowest teacher and all those who are involved in spiritual life know: what I do is only dependent on the spiritual organization itself. Out of a good instinct, even if not exactly out of a special appreciation of religion, out of a good instinct, modern social democracy has coined the word with regard to religion: religion must be a private matter. In the same sense, as strange as it may still sound to people today, all spiritual life must be a private matter and must be based on the trust that those who wish to receive it have in those who are to provide it. Of course, I know that many people today fear that we will all, or rather our descendants, become illiterate if we can choose our own school. We won't become illiterate. It is perhaps precisely members of leading circles, hitherto leading circles, who today have quite a lot of cause to think this way about education; they remember how much trouble it has been for them to acquire the little bit of education that secures their social position. But that which the tripartite social organism demands of people will certainly not lead to illiteracy in a free intellectual life, especially under the influence of the modern proletariat.

I am completely convinced that if one is able to realize in this way the completely democratic constitutional state, which secures workers' rights, in which every person has a say in what is the same for all people, then the modern proletariat in particular will not be preoccupied with preaching illiteracy, then it will demand of its own accord, even in a free intellectual life, that people should not be led to the ballot box in the way that can now sometimes be heard from individual regions of a neighboring state, where the monks and country priests have cleared out the asylums for idiots and lunatics in order to lead those people who did not even know what their names were to the ballot box.

Whoever wants to believe in these things and hope for these things must, however, have faith in real human power and real human dignity. Anyone who, like me, has been independent of any kind of state order all his life, who has never submitted to any kind of state order, has also been able to preserve his impartiality for that which can be built up as a spiritual life that is independent of the state and stands on its own. This spiritual life will not cultivate the individual human faculties in the way that the luxury spiritual life, the ideology of the previous spiritual life, has done. The spiritual life that is built on itself will also not be a philistine, bourgeois spiritual life, it will be a humanity spiritual life, a spiritual life that will reach down from the highest, very highest members of spiritual creation into the individual details of human work and its management; the leaders of the individual economic areas will be pupils of the free spiritual life and will not develop out of this free spiritual life what has today become the entrepreneurial spirit, the spirit of capitalism.

There are labor contracts, but no real contract can actually be made about labor. What is today a labor contract is a lie, because in reality labor is not comparable to any commodity. Therefore one must say: if any contract is to be concluded in the future, it will be concluded about the jointly performed product, and then one will feel all the more: What was this previous employment contract actually about? What was it based on? - It was not based on any right, but on an abuse of personal, individual abilities. Basically, it was an overreaching. But overreaching, where does it come from? From the cleverness that today's intellectual life has often displayed. The spiritual life that I imagine, which is left to its own devices, will not produce this cleverness, it will not produce the lie of life, it will produce the truths of life. There will no longer be protective troops for any thrones and altars, but the spirit itself will administer the individual abilities of man right down to the individual branches of mankind. Capitalism is only possible if the spiritual life on the other side can be enslaved. If the spiritual life is liberated, then capitalism in its present form will disappear. I wanted to think about how capitalism can disappear. You can read in my book on the social question in a few days' time that this capitalism will disappear when spiritual life is truly emancipated and the truths of life are put in the place of the lies of life.

In essence, what I have outlined to you today in a brief sketch has been resounding through humanity for a long time. At the end of the 18th century, the words “liberty, equality, fraternity” rang out like a mighty motto in France. - In the course of the 19th century, very clever people repeatedly proved that these three ideas contradict each other in the social organism. Liberty, on the one hand, demands that individuality can move freely. Equality excludes this freedom. Fraternity, on the other hand, contradicts the other two.

As long as one was under the hypnosis of the dogma: The All-holder, All-embracer, does he not embrace you and me, himself? As long as one was under the hypnosis of this idol of the unitary state, these three ideas were contradictions. At the moment when mankind will find understanding for the threefold healthy social organism, these three ideas will no longer contradict each other, for then freedom will prevail in the field of the independent, sovereign spiritual organism, and equality of all in the field of the state organism, the legal organism, the equality of all men, and in the field of the economic organism, fraternity, that fraternity on a large scale which will be based on the cooperatives of production and consumption, which will be based on the associations of the individual professions, which will administer economic life in an appropriately fraternal manner. The three great ideas of liberty, equality and fraternity will no longer contradict each other when the three areas - spiritual, legal and economic - have come into their own in the world. Take this today as something that is still little thought of, but it is not a utopia, it is not something that has somehow been thought up, but something that has been gained from decades of observation of modern political, economic and spiritual conditions, something that can be believed to rest in the womb of human development itself like a seed that wants to be realized in the near future. And one can perceive in the loudly speaking facts of today, one can perceive in the demands of the proletariat, even if much is still expressed differently, that the longing for such realization is already present today.

Many people call what I am saying a utopia. It is taken from a reality-friendly, reality-appropriate way of thinking. This idea of a tripartite division is not a utopia. It can be tackled immediately everywhere from any social condition if one only has the good will, which is unfortunately so often lacking today. If you believe that what I am saying is a utopia, then I would like to remind you that what I am saying here about the healthy social organism is not what is usually said. People who otherwise speak of social ideas are setting up programs. I am not thinking of a program, I am not thinking of wanting to be cleverer than other people and to know the best about everything, how to do it and so on, but I am only thinking of structuring humanity, which should decide for itself what is true, what is good, what is expedient, in the right way. And it seems to me that if it is organized in such a way that people stand within it firstly in a free spiritual life, secondly in a free political legal life, thirdly in an economic life properly administered by economic forces, then people will find the best for themselves; I am not thinking of legislation about the best, but of the way in which people must be called upon to find through themselves that which is pious for them. Nor am I thinking, as some have believed, of a rebirth of the old estates and classes: The teaching class, the military class, the nurturing class - no, the opposite is what I am talking about here. People should not be divided into classes. Classes, estates, they are to disappear by dividing up life outside man, objective life. Man, however, is the unity that belongs in all three organisms. In the spiritual organism his talents and abilities are cultivated. In the state organism he finds his rights. In the economic organism he finds the satisfaction of his needs.

I believe, however, that the modern proletarian will develop a true consciousness of humanity out of his class consciousness, that he will find more and more understanding for what has been pointed out here: for the true liberation of humanity. And I hope that once the modern proletarian's soul will clearly realize how he is called to strive for the true goal of humanity, that he will then become, this modern proletarian, not only the liberator of the modern proletariat - he must certainly become that - but that he will become the liberator of everything human, everything that is truly worth liberating in human life. That is what we want to hope for, that is what we want to work towards. When it is said: Words are now spoken enough, let us see deeds - I wanted to speak today in such words that can really turn directly into deeds.

Discussion

1st speaker (Mr. Handschin): Spoke very spiritedly of the oppression of the worker by the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie imposes violence on the proletariat. The private property of the propertied classes has been created by the workers. Only communism would bring peace.

2nd speaker (Mr. Studer). Points to the ideas of free money and free land, which should enable the liberation of economic life.

3rd speaker (Mr. Mühlestein): Shows how in Germany the old powers are re-emerging and nothing has changed. Criticism of Social Democracy and the Center. Criticism of the threefold structure: it removes the law from economic and intellectual life; but justice must prevail in all three areas, not just in the constitutional state.

4th speaker: Wants to report on a “Swiss Federation for Transitional Reforms”; but is interrupted and the discussion is closed.

Rudolf Steiner: You will have noticed that the first two speakers in the discussion have basically not put forward anything against which I would need to argue, since, at least in my opinion, what has been put forward by the two gentlemen essentially shows - at least to me - how very necessary it is to take seriously what I have tried to do in a perhaps weak but honest way to contribute to the solution of the social question in the present serious times, as far as it is humanly possible. And that this is necessary, that today is the time to do so, you will at any rate have been able to gather from what the first speaker in the debate has just said to you from a soul that is certainly warmly felt.

Since the time is already well advanced, I would like to address just a few points here. The word “free land, free money” was used by the honorable second speaker. You see, this hints at something that is like a lot of things in the present day, if you want to approach the social question in precisely those ways, as I said, in real ways, as I tried to do in my presentation. On such occasions I have very often been in the situation of having to say: I am in complete agreement with you; the other person just usually, or at least very often, doesn't say it to me! The thing is, if I believed that my ideas were simply plucked out of the air from somewhere, then I wouldn't bore you with them, I would believe that they had long since not matured. That is precisely what I believe, that there is something essential about the ideas presented to you today. You will find the material, the building blocks everywhere. I gave a similar lecture in Bern the other day. A gentleman came to me then, not only in the discussion, but the next day for a conversation, and also spoke about “free land, free money”. After an hour, however, we were able to agree that what is actually wanted in the regulation of the currency question, in the creation of an absolute currency, will simply be achieved if this tripartite division that I have spoken of today is carried out properly - properly indeed - if the administration of values, the administration of money, is simply taken away from the political state and transferred to economic life. As I have said, I will show in my book “Die Kernpunkte der sozialen Frage in den Lebensnotwendigkeiten der Gegenwart und Zukunft” that the basis of the currency will then be quite different from what it is today, and that it will also become international. As long, of course, as the leading state, England, clings to the gold currency, the gold currency will have to apply in foreign policy; but internally, those who now really have the one true currency will no longer need gold in the social organism; for the only real true currency will consist in the means of production, which will then be there to be the currency for money. Money is completely misunderstood today. Money is only understood if it can be grasped as the complete opposite of the old natural economy.

What is money for today's social organism? It is the means of conducting a common economy. Just imagine the whole function of money. It consists simply in the fact that for what I work myself I have an instruction for something else that someone else works. And as soon as money is something other than this instruction, it is unauthorized in the social organism.

I could go on at length to confirm this, but I will only say briefly that this is what money must become! It will become so when all other machinations that play a part in the circulation of money cease. For only money is the common index which is there for the common comparison of the mutual values of commodities. That is what can also be achieved through the nature of this tripartite division, and what is partially, individually sought by the free-money movement; that is why I have said in such a case: I am in complete agreement with this movement - because I always try to see the individual movements in their justification, and I would like to lead them into a common great stream, precisely because I do not believe that one person, or even a group of people, can find what is right, but because I believe democratically that people together in reality, working together, properly organized alone, will only find what is right.

This is what I have described as a view of reality, not as some objective development. But I believe that the real human being will find what is right for the social organism out of his healthy human experience in association with other people.

We have one thing that everyone knows is only possible in social life - today's egoists would probably also like to have it for themselves - and that is language for a closed organism. Again and again it is preached in schools: If man had grown up on a lonely island, in solitude, he would not be able to speak; for speech can only be formed in social life. One must recognize [...] that all those things which are hidden behind private capital, property, which are hidden behind the mastery of some kind of work and the like, that all these things, including human talents, individual gifts, just like language, have social functions, that they belong to social life and are only possible within it. There must come a time when it becomes clear to people in schools what they are through the social organism and what they are therefore obliged to give back to the social organism. So what I am counting on is social understanding, which must come, just as the multiplication tables are taught in schools today. We will also have to relearn this. There were times when people learned something completely different in schools than they do today; just think of the Roman schools. There will come a time when children will be taught social understanding in schools. Because this has been neglected under the influence of modern technology and capitalism, we have ended up in today's conditions, in the pathological conditions of the social organism.

As far as Mr. Mühlestein is concerned, I must say that I am also in a position to have nothing against what he has put forward; I only believe that if his ideas continue to develop, they will then lead to what I have said.

For example, he has not at all considered that I am not - of course not! - want to take law out of economic life and intellectual life. No, on the contrary, I want to keep it in. And because I want it inside, I want to have developed an independent social science in which it can really be developed, created. When it has been generated, then it can have an effect on the other areas. Comprehensive thinking will show you this. If you consider the following, for example: Today, even scientific thinking does not yet really think logically and appropriately in relation to the natural human organism. People today think: the lungs - a piece of meat; the brain - also a piece of meat, and so on. Science says otherwise, but it does not say much else; for it regards these individual members of the human organism as parts of a great centralization. In truth, they see nothing else. The human being as a natural organism is a tripartite system: we have a nervous-sensory organism. The one is centralized and has its own outlets at the sensory organs. - We have a rhythmic organism, the lung-heart organism; it has its own outlets in the respiratory tract. - We have the metabolic organism, which in turn has its own outlet to the outside world. And we are this natural human being precisely because we have these three limbs, these three centralized limbs of the organism.

Can anyone now come along and say - if I say, as I have now done in my last book, “Of Riddles of the Soul”, that simply the proper scientific observation results in these three members of the human natural organism - can anyone come along and say that nature should not have developed these three members, because what matters is that all three members have air? - Of course all three limbs have air! - When the air is first inhaled through the lungs and processed accordingly, the metabolic members and the brain have their air, so that this air is drawn in and processed, and can therefore also be treated with all natural care in a specially separated member of the human natural organism. I do not want, like Schäffle, or like Meray or others, to play this analogy game between physiological and social concepts, that does not even occur to me; I only want to draw attention to the fact that a thoroughly formed thinking does not understand man as a natural organism if one only thinks: everything is centralized into one - but one understands man if one understands his three organ systems centralized in themselves.

It is precisely because man is perfect that he has these three centralized organ systems. This will be a great advance in natural science when we realize this! And the thinking that thinks so healthily about the human being also thinks healthily about the social organism, and feels healthily about the social organism. Spiritual life will be freest and best organized when it is emancipated. For in the field of emancipated spiritual life the people are already to be found who will provide for this free spiritual life. There will arise those who will actually bring the necessary dominion to this spiritual life. Those who do not bring it are those who are servilely dependent on capitalism or other things. Those who will be free as spiritual administrators will also be able to bring the blessings of spiritual life to the other two members.

And so, if justice is really produced in a state of law existing for itself, really centralized in itself, one will not have to worry that the other two members will not have justice, certainly in favorable distribution; in all the things that have been touched upon by Mr. Mühlestein, there must be justice; that will come in when it is first produced.

So it is not in order to have justice in one separate organ and not in the other that I take these three parts, but precisely in order to have justice in all three, I see the necessity that it should first be produced.

I would like to know if anyone can say: In a house, there are father, mother, children, the maidservants; but now you divide this house into father, mother, maidservants, and two cows that give milk, but all need the milk, so all must produce milk, not just the two cows? - No, I say: the cows must produce the milk so that everyone in the house can be properly supplied with milk. And so the constitutional state must have the law according to plan, produce the law, then the rights will be where they are needed. And that is precisely when they will be - forgive the somewhat trivial comparison - when they can be milked by the rule of law!

That is what I would like to emphasize; that what is important today is not to somehow pursue favourite ideas, but precisely to summarize that which pulsates in many hearts as a demand, that which is already present in many minds, even if more or less unconsciously, out of the forces of the times, and to really grasp that in the impulses that are there as the great forces of the times, which want to be realized, which we should now realize through reason. But if we do not want to realize them through reason, this will not prevent them from entering into reality.

Dear readers, we either have the choice to be reasonable or to wait in some other way for the realization of that which must be realized because it wants to realize itself out of the forces of history.

In this sense, however, I believe that proletarian consciousness is capable of grasping these demands, which lie in history itself, and thus of really striving for and achieving what I said at the end, insofar as it is possible for human beings: the liberation of everything in humanity that is worth liberating.

[ 1 ] Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel appear in their full significance quite especially to someone who considers the far-reaching impetus they gave to personalities possessed of far less spiritual vigor than they. Something is moving and working in the souls of this trio of thinkers that could not come fully to expression within themselves. And what is working as the basic undertone in the souls of these thinkers works on in a living way in their successors and brings them to world views—in accordance with the spirit—that even the three great original thinkers themselves could not achieve because they had to exhaust their soul vigor, so to speak in making the first beginnings.

[ 2 ] Thus, in Immanuel Hermann Fichte, the son of Johann Gottlieb Fichte, there appears a thinker who tries to penetrate more deeply into the spiritual than his father, Schelling, or Hegel. Whoever dares to make such an attempt will not only hear from outside the opposition of all those who are fearful about questions of world views; if he is a careful thinker, he will clearly perceive this opposition coming also from his own soul. Is there then actually a possibility of delivering the human soul of cognitive powers that lead into regions of which the senses give no view? What can guarantee the reality of such regions; what can determine the difference between such reality and the creations of fantasy and daydreaming? Whoever does not always have the spirit of this opposition at his side, so to speak, as the true companion of his prudence will easily blunder in his spiritual-scientific attempts; whoever has this spirit will recognize in it something extremely valuable for life.

Whoever enters into the arguments of Immanuel Hermann Fichte will find that a certain spiritual demeanor has passed over to him from his great predecessors that both strengthens his steps into the spiritual region and endows him with prudence in the sense just indicated.

[ 3 ] The standpoint of the Hegelian world view, which takes as its basic conviction the spiritual nature of the world of ideas, was also able to be the point of departure for Immanuel Hermann Fichte in the development of his thoughts. Nevertheless, he felt it to be a weakness in Hegel's world view that, from its supersensible vantage point, it still looks only at what is revealed in the sense world. Whoever lives into Immanuel Hermann Fichte's views can feel something like the following as its basic undertone. The soul experiences itself in a supersensible way when it lifts itself above sense perception to a weaving in the realm of ideas. Through this, the soul has not only enabled itself to see the sense world differently than the senses see it—which would correspond to the Hegelian world view—; but also, the soul has an experience of itself through this that it cannot have through anything to be found within the sense world. From now on the soul knows of something that itself is supersensible about the soul. This “something” cannot be merely the idea of the soul's sense-perceptible body. Rather, this something must be a living, essential beingness that underlies the sense-perceptible body in such a way that this body is formed according to the idea of this something. Thus Immanuel Hermann Fichte is led up above and beyond the sense-perceptible body to a supersensible body, which, out of its life, forms the first body. Hegel advances from sense observation to thinking about sense observation. Fichte seeks in man the being that can experience thinking as something supersensible, Hegel, if he wants to see in thinking something supersensible, would have to ascribe to this thinking itself the ability to think. Fichte cannot go along with this. He has to say to himself: If one is not to regard the sense-perceptible body itself as the creator of thoughts, then one is compelled to assume that there is something supersensible above and beyond this body. Moved by this kind of a view, Fichte regards the human sense-perceptible body in a natural-scientific way (physiologically), and finds that such a study, if only it is unbiased enough, is compelled to take a supersensible body as the basis of the sense-perceptible one. In paragraphs 118 and 119 of his Anthropology (second edition 1860), he says about this: “Within the material elements, therefore, one cannot find what is truly enduring, that unifying form principle of the body which proves to be operative our whole life long.” “Thus we are directed toward a second, essentially different cause within the body.” “Insofar as this [unifying form principle] contains what is actually enduring in metabolism, it is the true, inner body-invisible, yet present in all visible materiality. That other entity, the outer manifestation of this form principle, shaped by continuous metabolism: let us call it ‘corporality’ from now on; it is truly not enduring and not whole; it is the mere effect or copy of that inner bodily nature that throws it into the changing world of matter in somewhat the same way a magnetic force puts together, out of metal filing dust, a seemingly dense body that is then blown away in all directions when the uniting force is withdrawn.” This opens for Fichte the perspective of getting outside the sense world, in which man works between birth and death, into a supersensible world with which he is connected through Ws invisible body in the same way he is connected with the sense world through his visible body, For, his knowledge of this invisible body brings him to the view he expresses in these words: “For one hardly need ask here how the human being, in and for himself, conducts himself in this process of death. Man, in and for himself—even after the last, to us invisible, act of his life processes—remains, in his essential being, completely the same one he was before with respect to his spirit and power of organization. His integrity is preserved; for he has lost absolutely nothing of what was his and belonged to his substance during his visible life, He only returns in death into the invisible world; or rather, since he has never left the invisible world, since the invisible world is what actually endures within everything visible, he has only stripped off a particular form of visibility. ‘To be dead’ simply means to remain no longer perceptible to ordinary sense apprehension, in exactly the same way that what is actually real, the ultimate foundations of bodily phenomena, are also imperceptible to the senses.” And with such a thought Fichte feels himself to be standing so surely in the supersensible world that he can say: “With this concept of the continued existence of the soul, therefore, we not only transcend outer experience and reach into an unknown region of merely illusory existences; we also find ourselves, with this concept, right in the midst of the graspable reality accessible to thinking. To assert the opposite, that the soul ceases to exist, would be against nature, would contradict all analogy to outer experience. The soul that has ‘died,’ i.e., has become invisible to the senses, continues to exist no less than before, and is unremoved from its original life conditions. ... Another means of incarnation need only present itself to the soul's power of organization for the soul to stand there again in new bodily activity ...” (Paragraphs 133 Anthropology)

[ 4 ] Starting from such views there opens up for Immanuel Hermann Fichte the possibility of a self-knowledge that man attains when he observes himself from the point of view he gains through his experiences in his own supersensible entity. Man's sense-perceptible entity brings him to the point of thinking. But in thinking, after all, he grasps himself as a supersensible being, If he lifts mere thinking up into an inner experiencing—through which it is no longer mere thinking but rather a supersensible beholding,—he then gains a way of knowing through which he no longer looks only upon what is sense-perceptible, but also upon what is supersensible. If anthropology is the science of the human being by which he studies the part of himself to be found in the sense world, then, through his view of the supersensible, another science makes it appearance, about which Immanuel Hermann Fichte expresses himself in this way (paragraph 270): to “... anthropology ends up with the conclusion, established from the most varied sides, that man, in accordance with the true nature of his being, as though in the actual source of his consciousness, belongs to a supersensible world. Man's sense consciousness, on the other hand, and the phenomenal world (world of appearances) arising at the point of his eye, along with the whole life of the senses, including human senses: all this has no significance other than merely being the place in which that supersensible life of the human spirit occurs through the fact that the human spirit, by its own, free, conscious activity, leads the spiritual content of ideas from the beyond into the sense world ...” This fundamental apprehension of man's being now lifts “anthropology” in its final conclusions up to “anthroposophy.”

[ 5 ] Through Immanuel Hermann Fichte the cognitive impulse manifesting in the idealism of German world views is brought to the point of undertaking the first of those steps which can lead human insight to a science of the spiritual world. Many other thinkers strove like Immanuel Hermann Fichte to carry further the ideas of their predecessors: Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel. For, this German idealism points to the germinal power for a real development of those cognitive powers of man that behold the supersensible spiritual the way our senses behold the sense-perceptible material. Let us just look at several of these thinkers. One can see how fruitful the spiritual stream of German idealism proves to be in this direction if one does not refer merely to those thinkers who are discussed in the usual textbooks on the history of philosophy, but also to those whose spiritual work was enclosed within narrower boundaries. For example, there are the Little Writings (published 1869 in Leipzig) of Johann Heinrich Deinhardt, who died in Bromberg on August 16, 1867 as headmaster of a secondary school. His book contains essays on “the antithesis between pantheism and deism in pre-Christian religions,” on the “concept of religion,” on “Kepler, his life and character,” etc. The basic undertone of these treatises is altogether of a sort to show how the thought-life of their author is rooted in the idealism of German world views. One of these essays speaks about the “reasonable grounds for believing in the immortality of the human soul.” This essay defends immortality at first only with reasons that spring from our ordinary thinking. But at the end, the following significant note is added by the publisher: “According to a letter of August 14, 1866 to his publishers, the author intended to expand this essay for the complete edition of his collected ‘Little Writings’ with an observation about the new body that the soul is working to develop for itself already in this life. The author's death the following year prevented the carrying out of this plan.” How a remark like this spotlights the effect upon thinkers of the idealism of German world views, stimulating them to penetrate in a scientific way into the spiritual realm! How many such attempts a person would discover today, even by investigating only those thinkers still to be found in literature! How many there must be that bore no fruit in literature but a great deal in life! One is looking there really, in the scientific consciousness ruling in our day, at a more or less forgotten stream in German spiritual life.

[ 6 ] One of those thinkers, hardly ever heard of today, is Ignaz Paul Vitalis Troxler. Let us mention only one of his numerous books, Lectures on Philosophy, published in 1835. A personality is expressing himself in this book who is absolutely conscious of how a person using merely his senses and the intellect that deals with the observations of his senses can know only a part of the world. Like Immanuel Hermann Fichte, Troxler also feels himself in his thinking to be standing within a supersensible world. But he also senses how the human being, when he removes himself from the power that binds him to the senses, can do more than place himself before a world that in the Hegelian sense is thought by him; through this removal he can experience within his inner being the blossoming of a purely spiritual means of knowledge through which he spiritually beholds a spiritual world, like the senses behold the sense world in sense perception. Troxler speaks of a “supra-spiritual sense:” And one can form a picture of what he means by this in the following way. The human being observes the things of the world through his senses. He thereby receives sense-perceptible pictures of these things. He then thinks about these pictures. Thoughts reveal themselves to him thereby that no longer bear the sensible pictorial element in themselves. Through the power of his spirit, therefore, man adds supersensible thoughts to the sense-perceptible pictures. If he now experiences himself in the entity that is thinking in him, in such a way that he ascends above mere thinking to spiritual experiencing, then, from out of this experiencing, an inner, purely spiritual power of picture making takes hold of him. He then beholds a world in pictures that can serve as a form of revelation for a supersensibly experienced reality. These pictures are not received by the senses; but they are full of life, just as sense-perceptible pictures are; they are not dreamed up; they are experiences in the supersensible world held fast by the soul in picture form. In ordinary cognitive activity, the sense-perceptible picture is present first and then, in the process of knowledge, the thought comes to join it—the thought, which is not a picture for the senses. In the spiritual process of knowledge, the supersensible experience is present; this experience as such could not be beheld if it did not, through a power in accordance with the nature of the spirit, pour itself into the picture that brings this power to spiritually perceptible embodiment. For Troxler, the cognitive activity of the “supra-spiritual sense” is of just such a kind. And the pictures of this supra-spiritual sense are grasped by the “supersensible spirit” of man in the same way that sense-perceptible pictures are grasped by human reason in knowledge of the sense world. In the working together of the supersensible spirit with the supra-spiritual sense, there evolved, in Troxler's view, our knowing of the spirit (see the sixth of his Lectures on Philosophy).

Taking his start from such presuppositions, Troxler has an inkling of a “higher man” within the man that experiences himself in the sense world; this “higher man” underlies the sense-perceptible man and belongs to the supersensible world; and in this view Troxler feels himself to be in harmony with what Friedrich Schlegel expressed. And thus, as was already the case earlier with Friedrich Schlegel, the highest qualities and activities manifested by the human being in the sense world become for Troxler the expression of what the supersensible human being can do. Through the fact that man stands within the sense world, his soul is possessed of the power of belief. But this power after all is only the manifestation, through the sense-perceptible body, of the supersensible soul. In the supersensible realm a certain faculty of the soul underlies our power of belief; if one wants to express it in a supersensibly pictorial way, one must call this a faculty of the supersensible man to hear. And it is the same with our power of hope. A faculty of the supersensible man to see underlies this power; corresponding with our activity of love, there is the faculty of the “higher man” to feel, to “touch,” in spirit, just as the sense of touch in the sense-perceptible world is the faculty to feel something. Troxler expresses himself on this subject (page 107 of his Lectures on Philosophy, Bern, 1835) in the following way: “Our departed friend Friedrich Schlegel has brought to light in a very beautiful and true way the relationship of the sense-perceptible to the spiritual man. In his lectures on the philosophy of language and the word, Schlegel says: ‘If one wants—in that alphabet of consciousness which provides the individual elements for the individual syllables and whole words—to refind the first beginnings of our higher consciousness, after God Himself constitutes the keystone of highest consciousness, then the feeling for the spirit must be accepted as the living center of our whole consciousness and as the point of union with the higher consciousness ... One is often used to calling these fundamental feelings for the eternal: ‘belief, hope, and love.’ If one is to regard these three fundamental feelings or characteristics or states of consciousness as just so many organs of knowledge and perception of the divine—or, if you will, at least organs that give inklings of the divine,—then one can very well compare them to the outer senses and instruments of sense perception, both in the above respect and in the characteristic form of apprehension that each of them has, Then love corresponds in a striking way—in the first stimulating soul touch, in the continuous attraction, and in the final perfect union—to the outer sense of touch; belief is the inner hearing of the spirit, uniting the given word to its higher message, grasping it, and inwardly preserving it; and hope is the eye, whose light can glimpse already in the distance the objects it craves deeply and longingly.’” That Troxler himself now goes above and beyond the meaning Schlegel gave these words and thinks them absolutely in the sense indicated above is shown by the words Troxler now adds: “Far loftier than intellect and will, and their interaction, far loftier than reason and spiritual activity (Freiheit), and their unity, are these ideas of our deeper heart (Gerrütsideen) that unite in a consciousness of spirit and of heart; and just as intellect and will, reason and spiritual activity—and all the soul capacities and abilities of a lower sort than they—represent an earthward directed reflection, so these three are a heavenward directed consciousness that is illuminated by a truly divine light.” The same thing is shown by the fact that Troxler also expresses himself about the supersensible soul body in exactly the same way one encounters in Immanuel Hermann Fichte: “Earlier philosophers have already distinguished a fine and noble soul body from the coarser body ... a soul that had about itself a picture of the body that they called a schema and that was for them the inner, higher man. ... In modern times even Kant, in The Dreams of a Spirit Seer, dreams up seriously as a joke a completely inward soul man that bears all the members of its outer man upon his spiritual body; Lavater also writes and thinks in this way; and even when Jean Paul jokes about Bonet's slip and Platner's soul girdle, which are supposed to be hidden inside the coarser outside skirt and martyr's smock, we also hear him asking again, after all: ‘to what end and from where were these extraordinary potentials and wishes laid in us, which, bare as swallowed diamonds, slowly cut our earthly covering to pieces? ... Within the stony members (of man) there grow and mature his living members according to a way of living unknown to us.’ We could,” Troxler continues, “present innumerable further examples of similar ways of thinking and writing that ultimately are only various views and pictures in which ... the one true teaching is contained of the individuality and immortality of man.”

[ 7 ] Troxler too speaks of the fact that upon the path of knowledge sought by him a science of man is possible through which—to use his own expressions—the “supra-spiritual sense” together with the “supersensible spirit” apprehend the supersensible being of man in an “anthroposophy,” On page 101 of his Lectures there is the sentence: “While it is now highly encouraging that modern philosophy, which ... must reveal itself ... in any anthroposophy, is winding its way upward, still one must not overlook the fact that this idea cannot be the fruit of speculation, and that the true individuality of man must not be confused either with what philosophy sets up as subjective spirit or as finite ‘I,’ nor with what philosophy lets this ‘I’ be confronted by as absolute spirit or absolute personality.”

[ 8 ] There is no doubt that Troxler sought the way out of and beyond Hegel's thought-world more in dim feeling than in clear perception. One can nevertheless observe in his cognitive life how the stimulus of the idealism in the German world views of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel works in a personality who cannot make the views of this trio of thinkers into his own, but who finds his own way through the fact that he receives this stimulus.

[ 9 ] Karl Christian Planck belongs to those personalities in the evolution of German spiritual life who are forgotten now and were disregarded even during their own lifetimes. He was born in 1819 in Stuttgart and died in 1880; he was a professor in a secondary school in Ulm and later in a college in Blaubeuren. In 1877 he still hoped to be given the professorship in philosophy that became free then in Tübingen. This did not happen. In a series of writings he seeks to draw near to the world view that seems to him to express the spiritual approach of the German people. In his book Outline of a Science of Nature (1864) he states how he wants, in his own thoughts. to present the thoughts of the questing German folk soul: “The author is fully aware of the power of the deep-rooted preconceptions from past views that confront his book; nevertheless, just as the work itself has fought through to completion and into public view—in spite of all the adverse conditions confronting a work of this kind as a result of the whole situation and professional position of its author—so he is also certain that what must now fight for recognition will one day appear as the simplest and most obvious truth, and that through this, not merely its concerns but also the truly German view of things will triumph over any still unworthily external and un-German grasp of nature and spirit.—What, in unconscious profound inklings, has already been prefigured in our medieval literature will finally be fulfilled by our nation in the fullness of time. Impractical, afflicted by injury and scorn, the inwardness of the German spirit (as Wolfram von Eschenbach portrayed this inwardness in his Parzival), in the power of its ceaseless striving, finally attains the highest; this inwardness beholds the ultimate simple laws of the things of this world and of human existence itself, in their very foundations; and what literature has allegorized in a fanciful medieval way as the wonders of the grail, whose rulership its hero attains, receives, on the other hand, its purely natural fulfillment and reality in a lasting knowledge of nature and of the spirit itself.”

In the last period of his life Karl Christian Planck drew his thought-world together in a book published by the philosopher Karl Köstlin in 1881 under the title Testament of a German.

[ 10 ] One can absolutely perceive in Planck's soul a similar kind of feeling for the riddle of knowledge as that revealed in the other thinker personalities characterized in this book. This riddle in its original form becomes for Planck the point of departure for his investigations. Within the circumference of the human thought-world can the strength be found by which man can apprehend true reality, the reality that gives his existence sense and meaning within world existence? Man sees himself placed into and over against nature. He can certainly form thoughts about what rules in nature's depths as powers of true being; but where is his guarantee that his thoughts have any significance at all other than that they are creations of his own soul, without kinship to those depths? If his thoughts were like this, then it would in fact remain unknown to man what he himself is and how he is rooted in the true world. Planck was just as far as Hegel from wanting to approach the world depths through any soul force other than thinking. He could hold no other view than that genuine reality must yield itself somehow to thinking. But no matter how far one reaches out with thinking, no matter how one seeks to strengthen its inner power: one still remains always only in thinking; in all the widths and depths of thinking one does not encounter being (Sein). By virtue of its own nature, thinking seems to exclude itself from any communion with being. Nevertheless, this insight into thinking's alienation from being now becomes for Planck precisely the ray of light that falls upon the world riddle and solves it. If thinking makes absolutely no claim of bearing within itself anything at all in the way of reality, if it actually is true that thinking reveals itself to be something unreal, then precisely through this fact it proves itself to be an instrument for expressing reality. If it were itself something real, then the soul could weave only in its reality, and could not leave it again; if thinking itself is unreal, then it will not disturb the soul through any reality of its own; by thinking, man is absolutely not within any thought-reality; he is within a thought-unreality that precisely therefore does not force itself upon him with its own reality but rather expresses that reality of which it speaks. Whoever sees in thinking itself something real must, in Planck's view, give up hope of arriving at reality; since, for him, thinking must place itself between the soul and reality. If thinking itself is nothing, it can therefore also not conceal reality from our activity of knowing; then reality must be able to reveal itself in thinking.

[ 11 ] With this view Planck has, to begin with, attained only the starting point for his world view. For, in the thought-weaving immediately present in the soul during life, that thinking is by no means operative which is pure, self-renouncing, and even self-denying, There play into this ordinary thought weaving what lives in the mental picturing, feeling, willing, and wanting of the soul. Because this is so, the clouding of world views occurs. And Planck's striving is to attain a kind of world view in which everything it contains is the result of thinking, yet nothing stems from thinking itself, In everything that is made into a thought about the real world, one must look at what lives in thinking but without itself being thought by us, Planck paints his picture of the world with a thinking that gives itself up in order to allow the world to shine from it.

[ 12 ] As an example of the way Planck wants to arrive at a picture of the world through such striving, let us characterize with a few strokes how he thinks about the being of the earth.

If someone pictures the earth in the way advocated by purely physical geology, then, for Planck's world view, there is no truth in this picture. To picture the earth in this way would be the same as speaking of a tree and fixing one's gaze only upon the trunk, without its leaves, blossoms, and fruit. To the sight of our physical eyes, such a tree trunk can be called reality. But in a higher sense it is no reality. For, as a mere trunk, it cannot occur as such anywhere in our world. It can be what it is only in so far as those growth forces arise in it at the same time which unfold the leaves, blossoms, and fruits. In the reality of the trunk one must think these forces in addition and must be aware that the bare trunk gives a picture of reality deceiving to the beholder, The fact that something or other is present to the senses is not yet proof that in this form it is also a reality, The earth, pictured as the totality of what it manifests in mineral configurations and in the facts occurring within these configurations, is no reality, Whoever wants to picture something real about the earth must picture it in such a way that its mineral realm already contains within itself the plant realm, Just as the trunk configuration of the tree includes its leaves and blossoms; yes, that within the “true earth” the animal realm and man are already present along with it. But do not say that all this is obvious and that Planck, basically, is only deceiving himself in thinking that not everyone sees it this way. Planck would have to reply to this: Where is the person who sees it this way? Certainly, everyone pictures the earth as a planetary body with plants, animals, and man. But they in fact picture the mineral earth, constituted of geological layers, with plants growing out of its surface, and with animals and human beings moving around on it. But this earth as a sum, added up out of minerals, plants. animals, and human beings, does not exist at all. It is only a delusion of the senses. On the other hand there is a true earth; it is a completely supersensible configuration, an invisible being, which provides the mineral foundation from out of itself; but it is not limited to this, for it manifests itself further in the plant realm, then in the animal realm, then in the human realm. Only that person has the right eye for the mineral, plant, animal, and human realm who beholds the entirety of the earth in its supersensible nature, and who feels, for example, how the picture of the material mineral realm by itself, without the picture of the soul evolution of mankind, is a delusion. Certainly, one can picture a material mineral realm to oneself; but one is living in a world-lie and not in the world-truth if, in doing so, one does not have the feeling that with a mental picture like this, one is caught in the same madness as a person who wanted to think that a man whose head has been struck off would calmly go on with his life.

It might be said: If true knowledge necessitates what is indicated here, then such knowledge, after all, could never be achieved; for, whoever asserts that the mineral earth is no reality because it must be viewed within the entirety of the earth should say too that the entirety of the earth must be viewed in the plant system and so on. Whoever raises this objection, however, has not grasped the significance of what underlies a world view that is in accordance with the spirit. In all human activity of knowing, in fact, the issue is not merely that one think correctly, but also that one think in accordance with reality. In speaking of a painting one can certainly say that one is not thinking in accordance with reality if one looks only at one person when there are three in the painting; but this assertion, within its rightful scope, cannot be refuted by the statement: No one understands this painting who also does not know all the preceding paintings of the same artist. A thinking both correct and in accordance with reality is in fact necessary for knowing reality. To consider, on their own, a mineral as a mineral, a plant as a plant, etc., can be in accordance with reality; the mineral earth is not a real configuration, however; it is a configuration of our imagination, even when one is aware of the fact that the mineral earth is only a part of everything earthly.

That is what is significant about a personality like Planck: he attains an inner state in which he does not reflect upon but rather experiences the truth of a thought; he unfolds a special power in his own soul by which to experience when not to think a particular thought because, through its own nature, it kills itself. To grasp the existence of a reality that bears within itself its own life and its own death, this belongs to the kind of soul attitude that does not depend upon the sense world to tell it: this is or this is not.

[ 13 ] From this point of view Planck sought in thinking to grasp what lives in natural phenomena and in human existence in historical, artistic, and judicial life. In a brilliant book, he wrote on the Truth and Banality of Darwinism. He calls this work a “monument to the history of modern (1872) German science.” There are people who experience a personality like Planck as hovering in unworldly conceptual heights and lacking a sense for practical life. Practical life requires people who develop healthy judgment based on “real” life, as they call it. Now, with respect to this way of experiencing Planck, one can also hold the opinion: Many things would be different in real life if this easy-going view of life and of living life were less widespread in reality, and if on the other hand the opinion could grow somewhat that thinkers like Planck—because they acquire for themselves an attitude of soul through which they unite themselves with true reality—also have a truer judgment about the relationships of life than the people who call them “dreamers in concepts” (Begriffsschwärmer) and impractical philosophers. The opinion is also possible that those dullards who are averse to such supposed “dreaming in concepts” and who think themselves so very practical in life are losing their sense for the true relationships of life, whereas the impractical philosophers are developing it to the point that it can lead them right to their goal. One can arrive at such an opinion when one considers Planck and sees in him, combined with the acme of philosophical development of ideas, a far-sighted accurate judgment about the needs of a genuine conduct of life and about the events of outer life. Even if one holds a different view about much of what Planck has developed in the way of ideas about shaping outer life—which is also the case with the present writer,—still one can acknowledge that his views can provide, precisely in this area, a sound starting point in life for solving practical problems; even if in proceeding from there one arrives at something entirely different from one's starting point. And one should assert: People who are “dreamers in concepts” in this way and who, precisely because of this, can see what powers are at work in real life are more competent to meet the needs of this real life than many a person who believes himself to be imbued with practical skill precisely through the fact that, in his view, he has not let contact with any world of ideas “make him stupid.” (In his book, Nineteenth Century Views of the World and of Life, published in 1900, the present author has written about Karl Christian Planck's place in the evolution of modern world views. This book was published in a new edition in 1914 under the title Riddles of Philosophy.)

Someone might maintain that it is unjustified to regard Planck's thoughts as significant for the motive forces of the German people since these thoughts have not become widespread. Such an opinion misses the point when speaking about the influence of the being of a people upon the views of a thinker from that people. What is working there are the impersonal (of ten unconscious) powers of a people, living in their activities in the most varied realms of existence and shaping the ideas of a thinker like Planck. These powers were there before he appeared and will work on afterward; they live, even if they are not spoken of; they live, even if they are not recognized. And it can be the case that they work in a particularly strong way in an indigenous thinker like this, who is not spoken of, because less of what these powers contain streams into the opinions held about him than into his thoughts. A thinker like this can of ten stand there alone, and not only during his lifetime; even his thoughts can stand there alone in the opinion of posterity. But if one has apprehended the particular nature of his thoughts, then one has recognized an essential trait of the folk soul, a trait that has become a thought in him and will remain imperishably in his people, ready to reveal itself in ever new impulses. Independent of the question: What effectiveness was granted to his work? is the other question: What worked in him and will lead again and again to accomplishments in the same direction? The Testament of a German by Karl Christian Planck was republished in a second edition in 1912. It is a pity that many of those who were philosophically minded and fond of writing at that time mustered up more enthusiasm for the thoughts in Henri Bergson's world view—lightly woven and therefore more easily comprehensible to undemanding souls—than for the rigorously interrelated and far-reaching ideas of Planck. How much has indeed been written about the “new configurating” of world views by Bergson: written, particularly, by those who discover the newness of a world view so easily because they lack understanding, and of ten even knowledge, of what has already been there for a long time. Relative to the “newness” of one of Bergson's main ideas the present author has pointed in his book Riddles of Philosophy to the following significant situation. (And it should be mentioned, by the way, that this indication was written before the present war. See the foreword to the second volume of the above book.)

Bergson is led by his thoughts to a transformation of the widespread idea of the evolution of organic entities. He does not set at the beginning of this evolution the simplest organism and then think that, due to outer forces, more complicated organisms emerge from it all the way up to man; he pictures that, at the starting point of evolution, there stands a being that in some form or other already contains the impulse to become man. This being, however, can bring this impulse to realization only by first expelling from itself other impulses that also lie within it. By expelling the lower organisms, this being gains the strength to realize the higher ones. Thus man, in his actual being, is not what arose last, but rather what was at work first, before everything else. He first expels the other entities from his formative powers in order to gain by this preliminary work the strength to come forth himself into outer sense-perceptible reality. Of course many will object: But numbers of people have already thought that an inner evolutionary drive was working in the evolution of organisms. And one can refer to the long-present thought of purposefulness, or to views held by natural scientists like Nageli and others. But such objections do not pertain in a case like this one. For, with Bergson's thought it is not a matter of starting from the general idea of an inner evolutionary force, but rather from a specific mental picture of what man is in his full scope; and of seeing from this picture that this man, thought of as supersensible, has impulses within him to first set the other beings of nature into sense-perceptible reality and then also to place himself into this reality.

[ 14 ] Now this is the point. What can be read in Bergson in a scintillating lightly draped configuration of ideas had already been expressed before that by the German thinker Wilhelm Heinrich Preuss in a powerful and strongly thought-through way. Preuss is also one of those personalities belonging to the presentation here of a more or less forgotten stream in the development of German world views that are in accordance with the spirit. With a powerful sense for reality, Preuss brings together natural-scientific views and world views—in his book Spirit and Matter (1882), for example. One finds the Bergsonian thought we cited expressed by Preuss in the following way: “It should ... be time ... to present a teaching about the origins of organic species that is founded not only upon principles set up in a one-sided way by descriptive natural science, but that is also in full harmony with the rest of natural laws (which are also the laws of human thinking). This teaching should also be free of any hypothesizing and should rest only upon rigorous conclusions drawn from scientific observation in the broadest sense. This teaching should rescue the concept of species as much as Is factually possible, but at the same time should take Darwin's concept of evolution into its domain and seek to make It fruitful.—The center of this new teaching is man, the species that recurs only once on our planet: homo sapiens. Strange that older observers started with objects of nature and then erred to such an extent that they did not find the path to man, in which effort even Darwin Indeed succeeded only in a most pitiful and utterly unsatisfying way by seeking the ancestor of the lord of creation among the animals. Actually, the natural scientist would have to start with himself as a human being and then, continuing on through the whole realm of existence and of thinking return to mankind ... It was not by chance that human nature arose out of earthly nature; It was by necessity. Man is the goal of tellurian processes, and every other form arising besides him has borrowed its traits from his. Man is the first-born being of the whole cosmos. ... When the germs of his being had arisen, the remaining organic element no longer had the necessary strength to engender further human germs. What arose then was animal or plant. ...”

[ 15 ] The idea, as it lives in the philosophy of German idealism's picture of the being of man, also shines forth from the mental pictures of this little-known thinker of Elsfleth, Wilhelm Heinrich Preuss. Out of this view he knows how to make Darwinism—insofar as Darwinism looks only at the evolution occurring in the sense world—into a part of a world view that Is in accordance with the spirit and that wishes to know the being of man In Its development out of the depths of the world-all. As to how Bergson arrived at his thoughts—so glittering in his depletion, but so powerfully shining in Preuss's—let us emphasize that less here than the fact that in the writings of the little-known Preuss the most fruitful seeds can be found, able to give many a person a stronger impetus than that to be found in Bergson's glittering version of these same thoughts. To be sure, one must also meet Preuss with more ability to deepen one's thinking than was shown by those who waxed so enthusiastic about the “new life” instilled in our world view by Bergson. What is being said here about Bergson and Preuss has absolutely nothing to do with national sympathies and antipathies.

Recently, H. Bönke has investigated Bergson's “original new philosophical creation,” because Bergson has found it necessary in these fateful times to speak such hate-filled words and to shower such contempt upon German spiritual life (see Bönke's writing: Plagiarizer Bergson, Membre de l'Institut. Answer to the Disparagements of German Science by Edmond Perrier, President de l'Academie des Sciences. Charlottenburg, Huth, 1915). When one considers all that Bönke presents about the way Bergson reproduces what he has gotten from German thought-life, the statements will not seem exaggerated that the philosopher Wundt makes in the “Central Literary Paper of Germany,” number 46, of November 13, 1915: “... Bönke shows no lack ... of incriminating material. The greater part of his book consists of passages, taken from Bergson's and Schopenhauer's works, in which the younger author repeats the thoughts of the older, either verbatim or with slight variation. Even so, this alone is not the decisive point. Therefore, let us be a little bit clearer and more critical in ordering the examples advanced by Bönke. They then fall definitely into three categories. The first contains sentences from both authors that, except for minor differences, coincide exactly. ...” In the other categories the coincidence lies more in the way their thoughts are formed.

Now it is perhaps really not so important to show how much Bergson, who condemns German spiritual life so furiously, reveals himself to be a right willing proponent of this German spiritual life; more important is the fact that Bergson propounds this spiritual life in lightly woven, easily attainable reflections, and that many a critic would have done better to wait with his enthusiastic proclaiming of this “new enlivener” of world views until, through better understanding of those thinkers to whom Bergson owes his stimulus, the critic might have refrained from his proclamation.

That a person be stimulated by his predecessors is a natural thing in the evolution of mankind; what matters, however, is whether the stimulus leads to a process of further development or—and Bönke's presentation also makes this quite clear—leads to a process of regression as in Bergson's case.

A Side Glance

[ 16 ] In 1912 The Lofty Goal of Knowledge by Omar al Raschid Bey was published in Munich. (Please note: The author is not Turkish; he is German; and the view he advocates has nothing to do with Mohammedanism, but is an ancient Indian world view appearing in modern dress.) The book appeared after the author's death. If the author had had the wish to produce in his soul the requirements needed for understanding the series of thinkers depicted in this present book, a book like his would not have appeared in our age, and its author would not have believed he should show to himself and others, by what he said in his book, a path of knowledge appropriate to the present day. But because of the way things appear to him, the author of The Lofty Goal could have only a pitying smile for the assertion just made here. He would not see that everything he presents to our soul experience in his final chapter “Awakening out of Appearances” on the basis of what preceded this chapter and with this chapter, was, in fact, a correct path of knowledge for the ancient Indian. One can understand this path completely as one belonging to the past. The author would not see that this path of knowledge, however, leads into another path if one does not stop prematurely on the first, but rather travels on upon the path of reality in accordance with the spirit as modern idealism has done.

[ 17 ] The author would have to have recognized that his “Awakening out of Appearances” is only an apparent awakening; actually it is a drawing back of oneself—effected by one's own soul experiences—from the appearances, a kind of quaking when faced by the appearances, and therefore not an “awakening out of appearances,” but rather a falling asleep into delusion—a self-delusion that considers its world of delusion to be reality because it cannot get to the point of taking the path into a reality in accordance with the spirit. Planck's self-denying thinking is a soul experience into which al Raschid's deluded thinking cannot penetrate. In The Lofty Goal there is the statement: “Whoever seeks his salvation in this world has fallen prey to this world and remains so; for him there is no escape from unstilled desire; for him there is no escape from vain play; for him there is no escape from the tight fetters of the ‘I’. Whoever does not lift himself out of this world lives and dies with his world.” Before these sentences stand these: “Whoever seeks his salvation in the ‘I,’ for him egoism (Selbstsucht) is a commandment, for him egoism is God.” But whoever recognizes in a living way the motive soul forces that hold sway in the series of thinkers from Fichte up to Planck will see through the deception manifesting in these statements from The Lofty Goal. For he recognizes how the obsession (Sucht) with oneself—egoism—lies before the experience of the “I” in Fichte's sense, and how a fleeing from an acknowledgment of the “I”—in an ancient Indian sense—seemingly leads arrogant cognitive striving farther into the spiritual world, but actually throws one back into obsession with one's “I.” For only the finding of the “I” lets the “I” escape the fetters of obsession with the “I,” the fetters of egoism. The point, in fact, really is whether, in “awakening out of appearances,” one has experiences of The Lofty Goal that are produced by a falling back into an obsession with one's “I,” or whether one has the kind of experiences to which the following words can point. Whoever seeks his salvation in fleeing from the “I” falls prey to obsession with the “I”; whoever finds the “I” frees himself from obsession with the “I”; for, obsession with the “I” makes the “I” into its own idol; finding the “I” gives the “I” to the world. Whoever seeks his salvation in fleeing from the world will be thrown back from the world into his own delusions; he is deluded by an arrogant illusion of knowledge, which lets a vain playing with ideas appear to him as world truth; he looses the fetters of the “I” in front and does not notice how, from behind, the enemy of knowledge binds them all the faster. Whoever, scorning the phenomena of the world, wants to lift himself above the world leads himself into a delusion that holds him all the more securely because it reveals itself to him as wisdom; he leads himself into a delusion by which he holds himself and others back from the difficult awakening in the idealism of modern world views, and dreams into an “awakening out of appearances,” A supposed awakening, like that which The Lofty Goal wishes to indicate, is indeed a source of that experience which ever and again makes the “awakened person” speak of the sublimity of his knowledge; but it is also a hindrance for the experiencing of this idealism in world views. Please do not take these remarks as a wish on the author's part to disparage in any way al Raschid's kind of cognitive striving; what the present author is saying here is an objection that seems necessary for him to raise against a world view that seems to him to live in the worst possible self-delusion. Such an objection can certainly also be raised when one values, from a certain point of view, a manifestation of the spirit; it can seem most necessary precisely there, because that seriousness moves him to do so which must hold sway in dealing with questions of knowledge.

Translated by Gertrude Teutsch

The concepts concerning the super-sensible world and its relationship with the world of the senses have been discussed here in a long series of lectures. It is only natural that, again and again, the question should arise, “What is the origin of knowledge concerning the super-sensible world?” With this question or, in other words, with the question of the inner development of man, we wish to occupy ourselves today.

The phrase “inner development of man” here refers to the ascent of the human being to capacities which must be acquired if he wishes to make super-sensible insights his own. Now do not misunderstand the intent of this lecture. This lecture will by no means postulate rules or laws concerning general human morality, nor will it challenge the general religion of the age. I must stress this because when occultism is discussed the misunderstanding often arises that some sort of general demands or fundamental moral laws, valid without variation, are being established. This is not the case. This point requires particular clarification in our age of standardization, when differences between human beings are not at all acknowledged. Neither should today's lecture be mistaken for a lecture concerning the general fundamentals of the anthroposophic movement. Occultism is not the same as anthroposophy. The Anthroposophical Society is not alone in cultivating occultism, nor is this its only task. It could even be possible for a person to join the Anthroposophical Society and to avoid occultism altogether.

Among the inquiries which are pursued within the Anthroposophical Society, in addition to the field of general ethics, is also this field of occultism, which includes those laws of existence which are hidden from the usual sense observation in everyday human experience. By no means, however, are these laws unrelated to everyday experience. “Occult” means “hidden,” or “mysterious.” But it must be stressed over and over that occultism is a matter in which certain preconditions are truly necessary. Just as higher mathematics would be incomprehensible to the simple peasant who had never before encountered it, so is occultism incomprehensible to many people today. Occultism ceases to be “occult,” however, when one has mastered it. In this way, I have strictly defined the boundaries of today's lecture. Therefore, no one can object—this must be stressed in the light of the most manifold endeavors and of the experience of millennia—that the demands of occultism cannot be fulfilled, and that they contradict the general culture. No one is expected to fulfill these demands. But if someone requests that he be given convictions provided by occultism and yet refuses to occupy himself with it, he is like a schoolboy who wishes to create electricity in a glass rod, yet refuses to rub it. Without friction, it will not become charged. This is similar to the objection raised against the practice of occultism.

No one is exhorted to become an occultist; one must come to occultism of one's own volition. Whoever says that we do not need occultism will not need to occupy himself with it. At this time, occultism does not appeal to mankind in general. In fact, it is extremely difficult in the present culture to submit to those rules of conduct which will open the spiritual world.

Two prerequisites are totally lacking in our culture. One is isolation, what spiritual science calls “higher human solitude.” The other is overcoming the egotism which, though largely unconscious, has become a dominant characteristic of our time.

The absence of these two prerequisites renders the path of inner development simply unattainable. Isolation, or spiritual solitude, is very difficult to achieve because life conditions tend to distract and disperse, in brief to demand sense-involvement in the external. There has been no previous culture in which people have lived with such an involvement in the external. I beg you not to take what I am saying as criticism, but simply as an objective characterization.

Of course, he who speaks as I do knows that this situation cannot be different, and that it forms the basis for the greatest advantages and greatest achievements of our time. But this is the reason that our time is so devoid of super-sensible insight and that our culture is so devoid of super-sensible influence. In other cultures—and they do exist—the human being is in a position to cultivate the inner life more and to withdraw from the influences of external life. Such cultures offer a soil where inner life in the higher sense can thrive. In the Oriental culture there exists what is called Yoga. Those who live according to the rules of this teaching are called yogis. A yogi is one who strives for higher spiritual knowledge, but only after he has sought for himself a master of the super-sensible. No one is able to proceed without the guidance of a master, or guru. When the yogi has found such a guru, he must spend a considerable part of the day, regularly, not irregularly, living totally within his soul. All the forces that the yogi needs to develop are already within his soul. They exist there as truly as electricity exists in the glass rod before it is brought forth through friction. In order to call forth the forces of the soul, methods of spiritual science must be used which are the results of observations made over millennia. This is very difficult in our time, which demands a certain splintering of each individual struggling for existence. One cannot arrive at a total inward composure; one cannot even arrive at the concept of such composure. People are not sufficiently aware of the deep solitude the yogi must seek. One must repeat the same matter rhythmically with immense regularity, if only for a brief time each day, in total separation from all usual concerns. It is indispensable that all life usually surrounding the yogi cease to exist and that his senses become unreceptive to all impressions of the world around him. He must be able to make himself deaf and dumb to his surroundings during the time which he prescribes for himself. He must be able to concentrate to such a degree—and he must acquire practice in this concentration—that a cannon could be fired next to him without disturbing his attention to his inner life. He must also become free of all memory impressions, particularly those of everyday life.

Just think how exceedingly difficult it is to bring about these conditions in our culture, how even the concept of such isolation is lacking. This spiritual solitude must be reached in such a way that the harmony, the total equilibrium with the surrounding world, is never lost. But this harmony can be lost exceedingly easily during such deep immersion in one's inner life. Whoever goes more and more deeply inward must at the same time be able to establish harmony with the external world all the more clearly.

No hint of estrangement, of distancing from external practical life, may arise in him lest he stray from the right course. To a degree, then, it might be impossible to distinguish his higher life from insanity. It truly is a kind of insanity when the inner life loses its proper relationship to the outer. Just imagine, for example, that you were knowledgeable concerning our conditions on earth and that you had all the experience and wisdom which may be gathered here. You fall asleep in the evening, and in the morning you do not wake up on Earth but on Mars. The conditions on Mars are totally different from those on Earth; the knowledge that you have gathered on Earth is of no use to you whatsoever. There is no longer harmony between life within you and external life. You probably would find yourself in a Martian insane asylum within an hour. A similar situation might easily arise if the development of the internal life severs one's connection with the external world. One must take strict care that this does not happen. These are great difficulties in our culture.

Egotism in relation to inward soul properties is the first obstacle. Present humanity usually takes no account of this. This egotism is closely connected with the spiritual development of man. An important prerequisite for spiritual development is not to seek it out of egotism. Whoever is motivated by egotism cannot get very far. But egotism in our time reaches deep into the innermost soul. Again and again the objection is heard, “What use are all the teachings of occultism, if I cannot experience them myself?” Whoever starts from this presumption and cannot change has little chance of arriving at higher development. One aspect of higher development is a most intimate awareness of human community, so that it is immaterial whether it is I or someone else having the experience. Hence I must meet one who has a higher development than I with unlimited love and trust. First, I must acquire this consciousness, the consciousness of infinite trust toward my fellow man when he says that he has experienced one thing or the other. Such trust is a precondition for working together. Wherever occult capacities are strongly brought into play, there exists unlimited trust; there exists the awareness that a human being is a personality in which a higher individuality lives. The first basis, therefore, is trust and faith, because we do not seek the higher self only in ourselves but also in our fellow men. Everyone living around one exists in undivided unity in the inner kernel of one's being.

On the basis of my lower self I am separated from other humans. But as far as my higher self is concerned—and that alone can ascend to the spiritual world—I am no longer separated from my fellow men; I am united with my fellow men; the one speaking to me out of higher truths is actually my own self. I must get away completely from the notion of difference between him and me. I must overcome totally the feeling that he has an advantage over me. Try to live your way into this feeling until it penetrates the most intimate fiber of your soul and causes every vestige of egotism to disappear. Do this so that the one further along the path than you truly stands before you like your own self; then you have attained one of the prerequisites for awakening higher spiritual life.

In situations where one receives guidance for the occult life, sometimes quite erroneously and confusedly, one may often hear that the higher self lives in the human being, that he need only allow his inner man to speak and the highest truth will thereby become manifest. Nothing is more correct and, at the same time, less productive than this assertion. Just try to let your inner self speak, and you will see that, as a rule, no matter how much you fancy that your higher self is making an appearance, it is the lower self that speaks. The higher self is not found within us for the time being. We must seek it outside of ourselves. We can learn a good deal from the person who is further along than we are, since there the higher self is visible. One's higher self can gain nothing from one's own egotistic “I.” There where he now stands who is further along than I am, there will I stand sometime in the future. I am truly constituted to carry within myself the seed for what he already is. But the paths to Olympus must first be illuminated before one can follow them.

A feeling which may seem unbelievable is the fundamental condition for all occult development. It is mentioned in the various religions, and every practical occultist with experience will confirm it. The Christian religion describes it with the well-known sentence, , which an occultist must understand completely, “Except ye become as little children, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.” This sentence can be understood only by he who has learned to revere in the highest sense. Suppose that in your earliest youth you had heard about a venerable person, an individual of whom you held the highest opinion, and now you are offered the opportunity to meet this person. A sense of awe prevails in you when the moment approaches that you will see this person for the first time. There, standing at the gateway of this personality, you might feel hesitant to touch the door handle and open it. When you look up in this way to such a venerable personality, then you have begun to grasp the feeling that Christianity intends by the statement that one should become like little children in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. Whether or not the subject of this veneration is truly worthy of it is not really important. What matters is the capacity to look up to something with a veneration that comes from the innermost heart.

This feeling of veneration is the elevating force, raising us to higher spheres of super-sensible life. Everyone seeking the higher life must write into his soul with golden letters this law of the occult world. Development must start from this basic soul-mood; without this feeling, nothing can be achieved. Next, a person seeking inner development must understand clearly that he is doing something of immense importance to the human being. What he seeks is no more nor less than a new birth, and that needs to be taken in a literal sense. The higher soul of man is to be born. Just as man in his first birth was born out of the deep inner foundations of existence, and as he emerged into the light of the sun, so does he who seeks inner development step forth from the physical light of the sun into a higher spiritual light. Something is being born in him which rests as deeply in most human beings as the unborn child rests in the mother.

Without being aware of the full significance of this fact, one cannot understand what occult development means. The higher soul, resting deep within human nature and interwoven with it, is brought forth. As man stands before us in everyday life, his higher and lower natures are intermingled, and that is fortunate for everyday life. Many persons among us would exhibit evil, negative qualities except that there lives along with the lower nature a higher one which exerts a balancing influence. This intermingling can be compared with mixing a yellow with a blue liquid in a glass. The result is a green liquid in which blue and yellow can no longer be distinguished. So also is the lower nature in man mingled with the higher, and the two cannot be distinguished. Just as you might extract the blue liquid from the green by a chemical process, so that only the yellow remains and the unified green is separated into a complete duality, so the lower and higher natures separate in occult development. One draws the lower nature out of the body like a sword from the scabbard, which then remains alone. The lower nature comes forth appearing almost gruesome. When it was still mingled with the higher nature, nothing was noticeable. But once separated, all evil, negative properties come into view. People who previously appeared benevolent often become argumentative and jealous. This characteristic had existed earlier in the lower nature, but was guided by the higher. You can observe this in many who have been guided along an abnormal path. A person may readily become a liar when he is introduced into the spiritual world, because the capacity to distinguish between the true and the false is lost especially easily. Therefore, strictest training of the personal character is a necessary parallel to occult training. What history tells us about the saints and their temptations is not legend but literal truth.

He who wants to develop towards the higher world on any path is readily prone to such temptations unless he can subdue everything that meets him with a powerful strength of character and the highest morality. Not only do lust and passions grow—that is not even the case so much—but opportunities also increase. This seems miraculous. As through a miracle, the person ascending into the higher worlds finds previously hidden opportunities for evil lurking around him. In every aspect of life a demon lies in wait for him, ready to lead him astray. He now sees what he has not seen before. As through a spell, the division within his own being charms forth such opportunities from the hidden areas of life. Therefore, a very determined shaping of the character is an indispensable foundation for the so-called white magic, the school of occult development which leads man into the higher worlds in a good, true, and genuine way. Every practical occultist will tell you that no one should dare to step through the narrow portal, as the entrance to occult development is called, without practicing these properties again and again. They build the necessary foundation for occult life.

First man must develop the ability to distinguish in every situation throughout his life what is unimportant from what is important, that is, what is perishable from the imperishable. This requirement is easy to indicate but difficult to carry out. As Goethe says, it is easy, but what is easy is hard. Look, for instance, at a plant or an object. You will learn to understand that everything has an important and an unimportant side, and that man usually takes interest in the unimportant, in the relationship of the matter to himself, or in some other subordinate aspect. He who wishes to become an occultist must gradually develop the habit of seeing and seeking in each thing its essence. For instance, when he sees a clock he must have an interest in its laws. He must be able to take it apart into its smallest detail and to develop a feeling for the laws of the clock. A mineralogist will arrive at considerable knowledge about a quartz-crystal simply by looking at it. The occultist, however, must be able to take the stone in his hand and to feel in a living way something akin to the following monologue: “In a certain sense you, the crystal, are beneath humanity, but in a certain sense you are far above humanity. You are beneath humanity because you cannot make for yourself a picture of man by means of concepts, and because you do not feel. You cannot explain or think, you do not live, but you have an advantage over mankind. You are pure within yourself, have no desire, no wishes, no lust. Every human, every living being has wishes, desires, lusts. You do not have them. You are complete and without wishes, satisfied with what has come to you, an example for man, with which he will have to unite his other qualities.”

If the occultist can feel this in all its depth, then he has grasped what the stone can tell him. In this way man can draw out of everything something full of meaning. When this has become a habit for him, when he separates the important from the unimportant, he has acquired another feeling essential to the occultist. Then he must connect his own life with that which is important. In this people err particularly easily in our time. They believe that their place in life is not proper for them. How often people are inclined to say, “My lot has put me in the wrong place. I am,” let us say, “a postal clerk. If I were put in a different place, I could give people high ideas, great teaching,” and so on. The mistake which these people make is that they do not enter into the significant aspect of their occupation. If you see in me something of importance because I can talk to the people here, then you do not see the importance of your own life and work. If the mail-carriers did not carry the mail, the whole postal traffic would stop, and much work already achieved by others would be in vain.

Hence everyone in his place is of exceeding importance for the whole, and none is higher than the other. Christ has attempted to demonstrate this most beautifully in the thirteenth chapter of the Gospel of John, with the words, “The servant is not greater than his lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him.” These words were spoken after the Master had washed the feet of the Apostles. He wanted to say, “What would I be without my Apostles? They must be there so that I can be there in the world, and I must pay them tribute by lowering myself before them and washing their feet.” This is one of the most significant allusions to the feeling that the occultist must have for what is important. What is important in the inward sense must not be confused with the externally important. This must be strictly observed.

In addition, we must develop a series of qualities.¹ To begin with, we must become masters over our thoughts, and particularly our train of thought. This is called control of thoughts. Just think how thoughts whirl about in the soul of man, how they flit about like will-o'-the wisps. Here one impression arises, there another, and each one changes one's thoughts. It is not true that we govern our thoughts; rather our thoughts govern us totally. We must advance to the ability of steeping ourselves in one specific thought at a certain time of the day and not allow any other thought to enter and disturb our soul. In this way we ourselves hold the reins of thought life for a time.

The second quality is to find a similar relationship to our actions, that is, to exercise control over our actions. Here it is necessary to undertake actions, at least occasionally, which are not initiated by anything external. That which is initiated by our station in life, our profession, or our situation does not lead us more deeply into higher life. Higher life depends on personal matters, such as resolving to do something springing totally from one's own initiative even if it is an absolutely insignificant matter. All other actions contribute nothing to the higher life.

The third quality to be striven for is even-temperedness. People fluctuate back and forth between joy and sorrow. One moment they are beside themselves with joy, the next they are unbearably sad. Thus, people allow themselves to be rocked on the waves of life, on joy or sorrow. But they must reach equanimity and steadiness. Neither the greatest sorrow nor the greatest joy must unsettle their composure. They must become steadfast and even-tempered.

Fourth is the understanding for every being. Nothing expresses more beautifully what it means to understand every being than the legend which is handed down to us, not by the Gospel, but by a Persian story. Jesus was walking across a field with his disciples, and on the way they found a decaying dog. The animal looked horrible. Jesus stopped and cast an admiring look upon it, saying, “What beautiful teeth the animal has!” Jesus found within the ugly the one beautiful aspect. Strive at all times to approach what is wonderful in every object of outer reality, and you will see that everything contains an aspect that can be affirmed. Do as Christ did when he admired the beautiful teeth on the dead dog. This course will lead you to the great ability to tolerate, and to an understanding of every thing and of every being.

The fifth quality is complete openness towards everything new that meets us. Most people judge new things which meet them by the old which they already know. If anyone comes to tell them something new, they immediately respond with an opposing opinion. But we must not confront a new communication immediately with our own opinion. We must rather be on the alert for possibilities of learning something new. And learn we can, even from a small child. Even if one were the wisest person, one must be willing to hold back one's own judgment, and to listen to others. We must develop this ability to listen, for it will enable us to meet matters with the greatest possible openness. In occultism, this is called faith. It is the power not to weaken through opposition the impression made by the new.

The sixth quality is that which everyone receives once he has developed the first five. It is inner harmony. The person who has the other qualities also has inner harmony. In addition, it is necessary for a person seeking occult development to develop his feeling for freedom to the highest degree. That feeling for freedom enables him to seek within himself the center of his own being, to stand on his own two feet, so that he will not have to ask everyone what he should do and so that he can stand upright and act freely. This also is a quality which one needs to acquire.

If man has developed these qualities within himself, then he stands above all the dangers arising from the division within his nature. Then the properties of his lower nature can no longer affect him; he can no longer stray from the path. Therefore, these qualities must be formed with the greatest precision. Then comes the occult life, whose expression depends on a steady rhythm being carried into life.

The phrase “carrying rhythm into life” expresses the unfolding of this faculty. If you observe nature, you will find in it a certain rhythm. You will, of course, expect that the violet blooms every year at the same time in spring, that the crops in the field and the grapes on the vine will ripen at the same time each year. This rhythmical sequence of phenomena exists everywhere in nature. Everywhere there is rhythm, everywhere repetition in regular sequence. As you ascend from the plant to beings with higher development, you see the rhythmic sequence decreasing. Yet even in the higher stages of animal development one sees how all functions are ordered rhythmically. At a certain time of the year, animals acquire certain functions and capabilities. The higher a being evolves, the more life is given over into the hands of the being itself, and the more these rhythms cease. You must know that the human body is only one member of man's being. There is also the etheric body, then the astral body, and, finally, the higher members which form the basis for the others.

The physical body is highly subject to the same rhythm that governs outer nature. Just as plant and animal life, in its external form, takes its course rhythmically, so does the life of the physical body. The heart beats rhythmically, the lungs breathe rhythmically, and so forth. All this proceeds so rhythmically because it is set in order by higher powers, by the wisdom of the world, by that which the scriptures call the Holy Spirit. The higher bodies, particularly the astral body, have been, I would like to say, abandoned by these higher spiritual forces, and have lost their rhythm. Can you deny that your activity relating to wishes, desires, and passions is irregular, that it can in no way compare with the regularity ruling the physical body? He who learns to know the rhythm inherent in physical nature increasingly finds in it an example for spirituality. If you consider the heart, this wonderful organ with the regular beat and innate wisdom, and you compare it with the desires and passions of the astral body which unleash all sorts of actions against the heart, you will recognize how its regular course is influenced detrimentally by passion. However, the functions of the astral body must become as rhythmical as those of the physical body.

I want to mention something here which will seem grotesque to most people. This is the matter of fasting. Awareness of the significance of fasting has been totally lost. Fasting is enormously significant, however, for creating rhythm in our astral body. What does it mean to fast? It means to restrain the desire to eat and to block the astral body in relation to this desire. He who fasts blocks the astral body and develops no desire to eat. This is like blocking a force in a machine. The astral body becomes inactive then, and the whole rhythm of the physical body with its innate wisdom works upward into the astral body to rhythmicize it. Like the imprint of a seal, the harmony of the physical body impresses itself upon the astral body. It would transfer much more permanently if the astral body were not continuously being made irregular by desires, passions, and wishes, including spiritual desires and wishes.

It is more necessary for the man of today to carry rhythm into all spheres of higher life than it was in earlier times. Just as rhythm is implanted in the physical body by God, so man must make his astral body rhythmical. Man must order his day for himself. He must arrange it for his astral body as the spirit of nature arranges it for the lower realms. In the morning, at a definite time, one must undertake one spiritual action; a different one must be undertaken at another time, again to be adhered to regularly, and yet another one in the evening. These spiritual exercises must not be chosen arbitrarily, but must be suitable for the development of the higher life. This is one method for taking life in hand and for keeping it in hand. So set a time for yourself in the morning when you concentrate. You must adhere to this hour. You must establish a kind of calm so that the occult master in you may awaken. You must meditate about a great thought content that has nothing to do with the external world, and let this thought content come to life completely. A short time is enough, perhaps a quarter of an hour. Even five minutes are sufficient if more time is not available. But it is worthless to do these exercises irregularly. Do them regularly so that the activity of the astral body becomes as regular as a clock. Only then do they have value. The astral body will appear completely different if you do these exercises regularly. Sit down in the morning and do these exercises, and the forces I described will develop. But, as I said, it must be done regularly, for the astral body expects that the same process will take place at the same time each day, and it falls into disorder if this does not happen. At least the intent towards order must exist. If you rhythmicize your life in this manner, you will see success in not too long a time; that is, the spiritual life hidden from man for the time being will become manifest to a certain degree.

As a rule, human life alternates among four states. The first state is the perception of the external world. You look around with your senses and perceive the external world. The second is what we may call imagination or the life of mental images which is related to, or even part of, dream life. There man does not have his roots in his surroundings, but is separated from them. There he has no realities within himself, but at the most reminiscences. The third state is dreamless sleep, in which man has no consciousness of his ego at all. In the fourth state he lives in memory. This is different from perception. It is already something remote, spiritual. If man had no memory, he could uphold no spiritual development.

The inner life begins to develop by means of inner contemplation and meditation. Thus, the human being sooner or later perceives that he no longer dreams in a chaotic manner; he begins to dream in the most significant way, and remarkable things reveal themselves in his dreams, which he gradually begins to recognize as manifestations of spiritual beings. Naturally the trivial objection might easily be raised that this is nothing but a dream and therefore of no consequence. However, should someone discover the dirigible in his dream and then proceed to build it, the dream would simply have shown the truth. Thus an idea can be grasped in an other-than-usual manner. Its truthfulness must then be judged by the fact that it can be realized. We must become convinced of its inner truth from outside.

The next step in spiritual life is to comprehend truth by means of our own qualities and of guiding our dreams consciously. When we begin to guide our dreams in a regular manner, then we are at the stage where truth becomes transparent for us. The first stage is called “material cognition.” For this, the object must lie before us. The next stage is “imaginative cognition.” It is developed through meditation, that is through shaping life rhythmically. Achieving this is laborious. But once it is achieved, the time arrives when there is no longer a difference between perception in the usual life and perception in the super-sensible. When we are among the things of our usual life, that is, in the sense world, and we change our spiritual state, then we experience continuously the spiritual, the super-sensible world, but only if we have sufficiently trained ourselves. This happens as soon as we are able to be deaf and dumb to the sense world, to remember nothing of the everyday world, and still to retain a spiritual life within us. Then our dream-life begins to take on a conscious form. If we are able to pour some of this into our everyday life, then the next capacity arises, rendering the soul-qualities of the beings around us perceptible. Then we see not only the external aspect of things, but also the inner, hidden essential kernel of things, of plants, of animals, and of man. I know that most people will say that these are actually different things. True, these are always different things from those a person sees who does not have such senses. The third stage is that in which a consciousness, which is as a rule completely empty, begins to be enlivened by continuity of consciousness. The continuity appears on its own. The person is then no longer unconscious during sleep. During the time in which he used to sleep, he now experiences the spiritual world.

Of what does sleep usually consist? The physical body lies in bed, and the astral body lives in the super-sensible world. In this super-sensible world, you are taking a walk. As a rule, a person with the type of disposition which is typical today cannot withdraw very far from his body. If one applies the rules of spiritual science, organs can be developed in the astral body as it wanders during sleep—just as the physical body has organs—which allow one to become conscious during sleep. The physical body would be blind and deaf if it had no eyes or ears, and the astral body walking at night is blind and deaf for the same reason, because it does not yet have eyes and ears. But these organs are developed through meditation which provides the means for training these organs. This meditation must then be guided in a regular way. It is being led so that the human body is the mother and the spirit of man is the father. The physical human body, as we see it before us, is a mystery in every one of its parts and, in fact, each member is related in a definite but mysterious way to a part of the astral body. These are matters which the occultist knows. For instance, the point in the physical body lying between the eyebrows belongs to a certain organ in the astral organism. When the occultist indicates how one must direct thoughts, feelings, and sensations to this point between the eyebrows through connecting something formed in the physical body with the corresponding part of the astral body, the result will be a certain sensation in the astral body. But this must be practiced regularly, and one must know how to do it. Then the astral body begins to form its members. From a lump, it grows to be an organism in which organs are formed. I have described the astral sense organs in the periodical, Lucifer Gnosis. They are also called Lotus flowers. By means of special word sequences, these Lotus flowers are cultivated. Once this has occurred, the human being is able to perceive the spiritual world. This is the same world he enters when passing through the portal of death, a final contradiction to Hamlet's “The undiscover'd country from whose bourn no traveler returns.”

So it is possible to go, or rather to slip, from the sense world into the super-sensible world and to live there as well as here. That does not mean life in never-never land, but life in a realm that clarifies and explains life in our realm. Just as the usual person who has not studied electricity would not understand all the wonderful workings in a factory powered by electricity, so the average person does not understand the occurrences in the spiritual world. The visitor at the factory will lack understanding as long as he remains ignorant of the laws of electricity. So also will man lack understanding in the realm of the spirit as long as he does not know the laws of the spiritual. There is nothing in our world that is not dependent on the spiritual world at every moment. Everything surrounding us is the external expression of the spiritual world. There is no materiality. Everything material is condensed spirit. For the person looking into the spiritual world, the whole material, sense-perceptible world, the world in general, becomes spiritualized. As ice melts into water through the effect of the sun, so everything sense-perceptible melts into something spiritual within the soul which looks into the spiritual world. Thus, the fundament of the world gradually manifests before the spiritual eye and the spiritual ear.

The life that man learns to know in this manner is actually the spiritual life he carries within himself all along. But he knows nothing of it because he does not know himself before developing organs for the higher world. Imagine possessing the characteristics you have at this time, yet being without sense-organs. You would know nothing of the world around you, would have no understanding of the physical body, and yet you would belong to the physical world. So the soul of man belongs to the spiritual world, but does not know it because it does not hear or see. Just as our body is drawn out of the forces and materials of the physical world, so is our soul drawn out of the forces and materials of the spiritual world. We do not recognize ourselves within ourselves, but only within our surroundings. As we cannot perceive a heart or a brain—even by means of X-ray—without seeing it in other people through our sense organs (it is only the eyes that can see the heart), so we truly cannot see or hear our own soul without perceiving it with spiritual organs in the surrounding world. You can recognize yourself only by means of your surroundings. In truth there exists no inner knowledge, no self-examination; there is only one knowledge, one revelation of the life around us through the organs of the physical as well as the spiritual. We are a part of the worlds around us, of the physical, the soul, and the spiritual worlds. We learn from the physical if we have physical organs, from the spiritual world and from all souls if we have spiritual and soul organs. There is no knowledge but knowledge of the world.

It is vain and empty idleness for man to “brood” within himself, believing that it is possible to progress simply by looking into himself. Man will find the God in himself if he awakens the divine organs within himself and finds his higher divine self in his surroundings, just as he finds his lower self solely by means of using his eyes and ears. We perceive ourselves clearly as physical beings by means of intercourse with the sense world, and we perceive ourselves clearly in relation to the spiritual world by developing spiritual senses. Development of the inner man means opening oneself to the divine life around us.

Now you will understand that it is essential that he who ascends to the higher world undergoes, to begin with, an immense strengthening of his character. Man can experience on his own the characteristics of the sense world because his senses are already opened. This is possible because a benevolent divine spirit, who has seen and heard in the physical world, stood by man in the most ancient times, before man could see and hear, and opened man's eyes and ears. It is from just such beings that man must learn at this time to see spiritually, from beings already able to do what he still has to learn. We must have a guru who can tell us how we should develop our organs, who will tell us what he has done in order to develop these organs. He who wishes to guide must have acquired one fundamental quality. This is unconditional truthfulness. This same quality is also a main requirement for the student. No one may train to become an occultist unless this fundamental quality of unconditional truthfulness has been previously cultivated.

When facing sense experience, one can test what is being said. When I tell you something about the spiritual world, however, you must have trust because you are not far enough to be able to confirm the information. He who wishes to be a guru must have become so truthful that it is impossible for him to take lightly such statements concerning the spiritual world or the spiritual life. The sense world corrects errors immediately by its own nature, but in the spiritual world we must have these guidelines within ourselves. We must be strictly trained, so that we are not forced to use the outer world for controls, but only our inner self. We are only able to gain this control by acquiring already in this world the strictest truthfulness. Therefore, when the Anthroposophical Society began to present some of the basic teachings of occultism to the world, it had to adopt the principle: there is no law higher than truth. Very few people understand this principle. Most are satisfied if they can say they have the conviction that something is true, and then if it is wrong, they will simply say that they were mistaken. The occultist cannot rely on his subjective honesty. There he is on the wrong track. He must always be in consonance with the facts of the external world, and any experience that contradicts these facts must be seen as an error or a mistake. The question of who is at fault for the error ceases to be important to the occultist. He must be in absolute harmony with the facts in life. He must begin to feel responsible in the strictest sense for every one of his assertions. Thus he trains himself in the unconditional certainty that he must have for himself and for others if he wishes to be a spiritual guide.

So you see that I needed to indicate to you today a series of qualities and methods. We will have to speak about these again in order to add the higher concepts. It may seem to you that these things are too intimate to discuss with others, that each soul has to come to grips with them on its own terms, and that they are possibly unsuitable for reaching the great destination which should be reached, namely the entrance into the spiritual world. This entrance will definitely be achieved by those who tread the path I have characterized.

When? One of the most outstanding participants in the theosophical movement, Subba Row, who died some time ago, has spoken fittingly about this. Replying to the question of how long it would take, he said, “Seven years, perhaps also seven times seven years, perhaps even seven incarnations, perhaps only seven hours.” It all depends on what the human being brings with himself into life. We may meet a person who seems to be very stupid, but who has brought with himself a concealed higher life that needs only to be brought out. Most human beings these days are much further than it seems, and more people would know about this if the materialism of our conditions and of our time would not drive them back into the inner life of the soul. A large percentage of today's human beings was previously much further advanced. Whether that which is within them will come forth depends on many factors. But it is possible to give some help. Suppose you have before you a person who was highly developed in his earlier incarnation, but now has an undeveloped brain. An undeveloped brain may at times conceal great spiritual faculties. But if he can be taught the usual everyday abilities, it may happen that the inner spirituality also comes forth.

Another important factor is the environment in which a person lives. The human being is a mirror-image of his surroundings in a most significant way. Suppose that a person is a highly developed personality, but lives in surroundings that awaken and develop certain prejudices with such a strong effect that the higher talents cannot come forth. Unless such a person finds someone who can draw out these abilities, they will remain hidden.

I have been able to give only a few indications to you about this matter. After Christmas, however, we will speak again about further and deeper things. I especially wanted to awaken in you this one understanding, that the higher life is not schooled in a tumultuous way, but rather quite intimately, in the deepest soul, and that the great day when the soul awakens and enters into the higher life actually arrives like the thief in the night. The development towards the higher life leads man into a new world, and when he has entered this new world, then he sees the other side of existence, so to speak; then what has previously been hidden for him reveals itself. Maybe not everyone can do this; maybe only a few can do it, one might say to oneself. But that must not keep one from at least starting on the way that is open to everyone, namely to hear about the higher worlds. The human being is called to live in community, and he who secludes himself cannot arrive at a spiritual life. But it is a seclusion in a stronger sense if he says, “I do not believe this, this does not relate to me; this may be valid for the after-life.” For the occultist this has no validity. It is an important principle for the occultist to consider other human beings as true manifestations of his own higher self, because he knows then that he must find the others in himself. There is a delicate distinction between these two sentences: “To find the others in oneself,” and “To find oneself in the others.” In the higher sense it means, “This is you.” And in the highest sense it means to recognize oneself in the world and to understand that saying of the poet which I cited some weeks ago in a different connection: “One was successful. He lifted the veil of the goddess at Sais. But what did he see? Miracle of miracles! He saw himself.” To find oneself—not in egotistical inwardness, but selflessly in the world without—that is true recognition of the self.

• 1. For another description of these exercises, see Occult Science, an Outline (Anthroposophic Press, Spring Valley, New York, 1972) Chapter 5, p. 283.

This year I shall again be giving a series of lectures on subjects related to Spiritual Science, as I have done now for several years past. Those of my audience who attended those previous lectures will know what is meant here by the term, Spiritual Science (Geisteswissenschaft). For others, let me say that it will not be my task to discuss some abstract branch of science, but a discipline which treats the spirit as something actual and real. It starts from the premise that human experience is not unavoidably restricted to sense-perceptible reality or to the findings of human reason and other cognitive faculties in so far as they are bound up with the sense-perceptible. Spiritual Science says that it is possible for human beings to penetrate behind the realm of the sense-perceptible and to make observations which are beyond the range of the ordinary intellect.

This introductory lecture will describe the role of Spiritual Science in present-day life, and will show how in the past this Spiritual Science—which is as old as humanity—appeared in a form very different from the form it must take today. In speaking of the present, I naturally do not mean the immediate here and now, but the relatively long period during which spiritual life has had the particular character which has come to full development in our own time.

Anyone who looks back over the spiritual life of mankind will see that “a time of transition” is a phrase to be used with care, for every period can be so described. Yet there are times when spiritual life takes a leap forward, so to speak. From the 16th century onwards, the relationship between the soul and spiritual life of human beings and the outer world has been different from what it was in earlier times. And the further back we go in human evolution, the more we find that men had different needs, different longings, and gave different answers from within themselves to questions concerning the great riddles of existence.

We can gain a clear impression of these transition periods through individuals who lived in those days and had retained certain qualities of feeling, knowing and willing from earlier periods, but were impelled to meet the demands of a new age.

Let us take an interesting personality and see what he makes of questions concerning the being of man and other such questions that must closely engage human minds—a personality who lived at the dawn of modern spiritual life and was endowed with the inner characteristics I have just described. I will not choose anyone familiar, but a sixteenth century thinker who was unknown outside a small circle. In his time there were many persons who retained, as he did, mediaeval habits of thinking and feeling and wished to gain knowledge in the way that had been followed for centuries, and yet were moving on towards the outlook of the coming age. I shall be naming an individual of whose external life almost nothing is historically known. From the point of view of Spiritual Science, this is thoroughly congenial. Anyone who has sojourned in the realm of Spiritual Science will know how distracting it is to find attached to a personality all the petty details of everyday life that are collected by modern biographers. On this account, we ought to be thankful that history has preserved so little about Shakespeare, for instance; the true picture is not spoilt—as it is with Goethe—by all the trivia the biographers are so fond of dragging in. I will therefore designate an individual of whom even less is known than is known about Shakespeare, a seventeenth century thinker who is of great significance for anyone who can see into the history of human thinking.

In Francis Joseph Philipp, Count von Hoditz and Wolframitz, who led the life of a solitary thinker during the second half of the seventeenth century in Bohemia, we have a personality of outstanding importance from this historical point of view. In a little work entitled Libellus de nominis convenientia¹—I have not inquired if it has since been published in full—he set down the questions which occupied his soul. If we immerse ourselves in his soul, these questions can lead us into the issues that a reflecting man would concern himself with in those days. This lonely thinker discusses the great central problem of the being of man. With a forcefulness that springs from a deep need for knowledge, he says that nothing so disfigures a man as not to know what his being really is.

Count von Hoditz turns to important figures in the history of thought, for instance to Aristotle in the fourth century B.C., and asks what Aristotle says in answer to this question—what the essential being of man really is.² He says: Aristotle's answer is that man is a rational animal. Then he turns to a later thinker, Descartes, and puts the same question, and here the answer is that man is a thinking being.³ But on reflection he comes to feel that these two representative thinkers can give no answer to his question; for—as he says—in the answers of Aristotle and Descartes he wanted to learn what man is and what he ought to do. When Aristotle says that man is a rational animal, that is no answer to the question of what man is, for it throws no light on the nature of rationality. Nor does Descartes in the seventeenth century tell us what man ought to do in accordance with his nature as a thinking being. For although we may know that man is a thinking being, we do not know what he must think in order to take hold of life in the right way, in order to relate his thought to life.

Thus our philosopher sought in vain for an answer to this vital question, a question that must be answered if a man is not to lose his bearings. At last he came upon something which will seem strange to a modern reader, especially if he is given to scientific ways of thought, but for our solitary thinker it was the only answer appropriate to the particular constitution of his soul. It was no help for him to know that man is a rational animal or a thinking being. At last he found his question answered by another thinker who had it from an old tradition. And he framed the answer he had thus discovered in the following words: Man in his essence is an image of the Divine.⁴ Today we should say that man in his essence is what his whole origin in the spiritual world makes him to be.

The remaining remarks by Count von Hoditz need not occupy us today. All that concerns us is that the needs of his soul drove him to an answer which went beyond anything man can see in his environment or comprehend by means of his reason. If we examine the book more closely, we find that its author had no knowledge gained direct from the spiritual world. Now if he had been troubled by the question of the relation between sun and earth, he could, even if he were not an observer himself, have found the answer somewhere among the observations collected by the new forms of scientific thought. With regard to external questions of the sense-world he could have used answers given by people who had themselves investigated the questions through their own observations and experiences. But the experiences available to him at that time gave no answer to the questions concerning man's spiritual life, his real being in so far as it is spiritual. Clearly, he had no means of finding persons who themselves had had experiences in the spiritual world and so could communicate to him the properties of the spiritual world in the same way as the scientists could impart to him their knowledge about the external world. So he turned to religious tradition and its records. He certainly assimilated his findings—this is characteristic of his quality of soul—but one can see from the way he worked that he was only able to use his intellect to give a new form to what he had found emerging from the course of history or from recorded tradition.

Many people will now be inclined to ask: Are there—can there be—any persons who from their own observation and experience are able to answer questions related to the riddles of spiritual life?

This is precisely what Spiritual Science will make people aware of once more: the fact that—just as research can be carried out in the sense-perceptible world—it is possible to carry out research in the spiritual world, where no physical eyes, no telescopes or microscopes are available, and that answers can thus be given from direct experience as to conditions in such a world beyond the range of the senses. We shall then recognise that there was an epoch, conditioned by the whole evolutionary progress of humanity, when other means were used to make known the findings of spiritual research, and that we now have an epoch when these findings can once more be spoken of and understanding for them can again be found.

In between lay the twilight time of our solitary thinker, when human evolution took a rest, so to speak, from ascending towards the spiritual world, and preferred to rely on traditions passed down through ancient records or by word of mouth. In certain circles it began to be doubted whether it was possible for human beings to enter a spiritual world through their own powers by developing the cognitive faculties that lie hidden or slumbering within them. Are there, then, any rational grounds for saying that it is nonsensical to speak of a spiritual world that lies beyond the sense-perceptible? A glance at the progress of ordinary science should be enough to justify this question. Precisely a consideration of the wonderful advances that have been made in unraveling the secrets of external nature should indicate to anyone that a higher, super-sensible knowledge must exist. How so?

If we study human evolution impartially, we cannot fail to be impressed by the exceptional progress made in recent times by the sciences concerned with the outer world. With what pride—and in a certain sense the pride is justified—do people remark that the vast, ever-increasing advance of modern science has brought to light many facts that were unknown a few centuries ago. For example, thousands of years ago the sun rose in the morning and passed across the heavens, just as it does today. That which could be seen in the surroundings of the earth and in connection with the course of the sun was the same then, for external observation, as it was in the days of Galileo, Newton, Kepler, Copernicus, and so on. But what could men say in those earlier ages about the external world? Can we suppose that the modern knowledge of which we are so justly proud has been gained by merely contemplating the external world? If the external world could itself, just as it is, give us this knowledge, there would be no need to look further: all the knowledge we have about the sense-perceptible world would have been acquired centuries ago. How is it that we know so much more and have a different view of the position of the sun and so on? It is because human understanding, human cognition concerning the external world, has developed and changed in the course of hundreds or thousands of years. Yes, these faculties were by no means the same in ancient Greece as they have come to be with us since the 16th century.

Anyone who studies these changes without prejudice must say to himself: Men have acquired something new. They have learnt to see the outer world differently because of something added to those faculties which apply to the external sense-world. Hence it became clear that the sun does not revolve round the earth; these new faculties compelled men to think of the earth as going round the sun.

No-one who is proud of the achievements of physical science can have any doubt that in his inner being man is capable of development, and that his powers have been remodeled from stage to stage until he has become what he is today. But he is called upon to develop more than outer powers; he has in his inner life something which enables him to recreate the world in the light of his inward capacity for knowledge. Among the finest words of Goethe are the following (in his book about Winckelmann)⁵ “if the healthy nature of man works as a unity, if he feels himself within the world as in a great, beautiful, noble and worthy whole, if harmonious ease offers him a pure and free delight: then the universe, if it could become conscious of itself, would rise in exultation at having reached its goal and would stand in wonder at the climax of its own being and becoming.” And again: “Man, placed at the summit of Nature, is again a whole new nature, which must in turn achieve a summit of its own. He ascends towards that height when he permeates himself with all perfections and virtues, summons forth order, selection, harmony and meaning, and attains in the end to the creation of a work of art.”

So man can feel that he has been born out of the forces he can see with his eyes and grasp with his reason. But if he applies the unbiased observation we have mentioned, he will see that not only external Nature has forces which develop until they are observed by the human eye, heard by the human ear, grasped by the human reason. In the same way a study of human evolution will show that something evolves within man; the faculties for gaining exact knowledge of nature were at first asleep within him, and have awakened by stages in the course of time. Now they are fully awake, and it is these faculties which have made possible the great progress of physical science.

Is it then inevitable that these inner faculties should remain as they are now, equipped only to reflect the outer world? Is it not perfectly reasonable to ask whether the human soul may not possess other hidden powers that can be awakened? May it not be that if he develops further the powers that lie hidden and slumbering within him, they will be spiritually illuminated, so that his spiritual eye and spiritual ear—as Goethe calls them⁶—will be opened and will enable him to perceive a spiritual world behind the sense-world?

To anyone who follows this thought through without prejudice, it will not seem nonsensical that hidden forces should be developed to open the way into the super-sensible world and to answer the questions: What is man in his real being? If he is an image of the spiritual world, what, then, is this spiritual world?

If we describe man in external terms and call to mind his gestures, instincts and so forth, we shall find all these characteristics represented imperfectly in lower beings. We shall see his external semblance as an integration of instincts, gestures and forces which are divided up among a number of lower creatures. We can comprehend this because we see around us the elements from which man has evolved into man. Might it not be possible then, to use these developed forces to penetrate similarly into a spiritual external world and to see there beings, forces and objects, just as we see stones, plants and animals in the physical world? Might it not be possible to observe spiritual processes which would throw light on man's inner life, just as it is possible to clarify his relationship to the outer world?

There has been, however, an interval between the old and the modern way of communicating Spiritual Science. This was a time of rest for the greater part of mankind. Nothing new was discovered; the old sources and traditions were worked over again and again. For the period in question this was quite right; every period has a characteristic way of meeting its fundamental needs. So this interlude occurred, and we must realise that while it lasted men were in a special situation, different both from what had been in the past and from what would be in the future. In a certain sense they became unaccustomed to looking for the soul's hidden faculties, which could have given insight into the spiritual world. So a time drew on when men could no longer believe or understand that the inner development of hidden faculties leads to super-sensible knowledge. Even then, one fact could hardly be denied: that in human beings there is something invisible. For how could it be thought that human reason, for example, is a visible entity? What sort of impartial thinking could fail to admit that human cognition is by its nature a super-sensible faculty?

Knowledge of this fact was never quite lost, even in the time when men had ceased to believe that super-sensible faculties within the soul could be developed so as to give access to the super-sensible. One particular thinker reduced this faculty to its smallest limit: it was impossible, he said, for men to penetrate by super-sensible vision into a world that comes objectively before us as a spiritual world, just as animals, plants and minerals and other people are encountered in the physical world. Yet even he had to recognise impartially that something super-sensible does exist and cannot be denied.

This thinker was Kant,⁷ who thus brought an earlier phase of human evolution to a certain conclusion. For what does he think about man's relationship to a super-sensible, spiritual world? He does not deny that a man observes something super-sensible when he looks into himself, and that for this purpose he employs faculties of knowledge which cannot be perceived by physical eyes, however far the refinement of our physical instruments may be carried. Kant, then, does point to something super-sensible; the faculties used by the soul to make for itself a picture of the outer world. But he goes on to say that this is all that can be known concerning a super-sensible world. His opinion is that wherever a man may turn his gaze, he sees only this one thing he can call super-sensible: the super-sensible element contained in his senses in order that he may perceive and grasp and understand the existence of the sense-world.

In the Kantian philosophy, accordingly, there is no path that can lead to observation or experience of the spiritual world. The one thing Kant admits is the possibility of recognising that knowledge of the external world cannot be attained by the senses, but only by super-sensible means. This is the sole experience of the super-sensible that man can have.

That is the historically important feature of Kant's philosophy. But in Kant's argument it cannot be denied that when man uses his thinking in connection with his actions and deeds, he has the means to affect the sense-perceptible world. Thus, Kant had to recognise that a human being does not follow only instinctive impulses, as lower animals do; he also follows impulses from within his soul, and these can raise him far above subservience to mere instinct. There are countless examples of people who are tempted by a seductive impulse to do something, but they resist the temptation and take as their guide to action something that cannot come from an external stimulus. We need only think of the great martyrs, who gave up everything the sense-world could offer for something that was to lead them beyond the sense-world. Or we need only point to the experience of conscience in the human soul, even in the Kantian sense. When a man encounters something ever so charming and tempting, conscience can tell him not to be lured away by it, but to follow the voice that speaks to him from spiritual depths, an indomitable voice within his soul. And so for Kant it was certain that in man's inner being there is such a voice, and that what it says cannot be compared with any message from the outer world. Kant called it the categorical imperatives significant phrase. But he goes on to say that man can get no further than this voice from the soul as a means of acting on the world from out of the super-sensible, for he cannot rise beyond the world of the senses. He feels that duty, the categorical imperative, conscience, speak from within him, but he cannot penetrate into the realm from which they come.

Kant's philosophy allows man to go no further than the boundary of the super-sensible world. Everything else that resides in the realm from which duty, conscience and the categorical imperative emanate is shut off from observation, although it is of the same super-sensible nature as the soul. Man cannot enter that realm; at most he can draw conclusions about it. He can say to himself: Duty speaks to me, but I am weak; in the ordinary world I cannot carry out fully the injunctions of duty and conscience. Therefore I must accept the fact that my being is not confined to the world of the senses, but has a significance beyond that world. I can hold this before me as a belief, but it is not possible for me to penetrate into the world beyond the senses; the world from which come the voices of moral consciousness, duty and conscience, the categorical imperative.

We will now turn to someone who in this context was the exact antithesis of Kant: I mean Goethe. Anyone who truly compares the souls of these two men will see that they are diametrically opposed in their attitudes towards the most important problems of knowledge. Goethe, after absorbing all that Kant had to say about these problems, maintained on the ground of his own inner experience that Kant was wrong. Kant, says Goethe, claims that man has the power to form intellectual, conceptual judgments, but is not endowed with any contemplative faculty which could give direct experience of the spiritual world. But—Goethe continues—anyone who has exercised himself with the whole force of his personality to wrest his way from the sense-world to the super-sensible, as I have done, will know that we are not limited to drawing conclusions, but through a contemplative power of judgement we are able actually to raise ourselves into the spiritual world. Such was Goethe's personal reply to Kant. He emphasises that anyone who asserts the existence of this contemplative judgement is embarking on an adventure of reason, but he adds that from his own experience he has courageously gone through this adventure!⁸

Yet in the recognition of what Goethe calls “contemplative judgement” lies the essence of Spiritual Science, for it leads, as Goethe knew, into a spiritual world; and it can be developed, raised to ever higher levels, so as to bring about direct vision, immediate experience, of that world, The fruits of this enhanced intuition are the content of true Spiritual Science. In coming lectures we shall be concerned with these fruits: with the results of a science which has its source in the development of hidden faculties in the human soul, for they enable man to gaze into a spiritual world, just as through the external instruments of the senses he is able to gaze into the realms of chemistry and physics.

It could now be asked: Does this possibility of developing hidden faculties that slumber in the soul belong only to our time, or has it always existed?

A study of the course of human history from a spiritual-scientific point of view teaches us that there existed ancient stores of wisdom, parts of which were condensed into those writings and traditions which survived during the intermediate period I described earlier. This same Spiritual Science also shows us that today it is again possible not merely to proclaim the old, but to speak of what the human soul can itself achieve by development of the forces and faculties slumbering within it; so that a healthy judgment, even where human beings cannot themselves see into the spiritual world, can understand the findings of the spiritual researcher. The contemplative judgment that Goethe had in mind when he spoke out against Kant, is in a certain sense the beginning of the upward path of knowledge which today is by no means unexplored. Spiritual Science is therefore able to show, as we shall see, that there are hidden faculties of knowledge which by ascending order penetrate ever further into the spiritual world.

When we speak of knowledge, we generally mean knowledge of the ordinary world, “material knowledge”; but we can also speak of “imaginative knowledge”, “inspired knowledge” and finally “intuitive knowledge”.⁹ These are stages of the soul's progress into the super-sensible world which are also experienced by the individual spiritual researcher in accord with the constitution of the soul today. Similar paths were followed by the spiritual researcher in times gone by. But spiritual research has no meaning if it is to remain the possession of a few; it cannot limit itself to a small circle. Certainly, anything an ordinary scientist has to say about the nature of plants or about processes in the animal world can be of service to all mankind, even though this knowledge is actually possessed by a small circle of botanists, zoologists and so on. But spiritual research is not like that. It has to do with the needs of every human soul; with questions related to the inmost joys and sorrows of the soul; with knowledge that enables the human being to endure his destiny, and in such a way that he experiences inner contentment and bliss even if destiny brings him sorrow and suffering. If certain questions remain unanswered, men are left desolate and empty, and precisely they are the concern of Spiritual Science. They are not questions that can be dealt with only in restricted circles; they concern us all, at whatever stage of development and culture we may be, for the answering of them is spiritual food for each and every Soul.

This has always been so, at all times. And if Spiritual Science is to speak to mankind in this way, it must find means of making itself understood by all who wish to understand it. This entails that it must direct itself to those powers which are most fully developed during a given period, so that they can respond to what the spiritual researcher has to impart. Since human nature changes from epoch to epoch and the soul is always acquiring new aptitudes, it is natural that in the past Spiritual Science should have spoken differently about the most burning questions that concern the soul. In remote antiquity it spoke to a humanity which would never have understood the way it speaks today, for the soul-forces which have now developed were non-existent then. If Spiritual Science had been presented in the way appropriate for the present day, it would have been as though one were talking to plants.

In ancient times, accordingly, the spiritual researcher had to use other means. And if we look back into remote antiquity, Spiritual Science itself tells us that in order to give answers in a form adapted to the soul-powers of mankind in those times, a different preparation was necessary for those who were training themselves to gaze into the spiritual world; they had to cultivate powers other than those needed for speaking to present-day mankind.

Men who develop the forces that slumber in the soul in order to gaze into the spiritual world and to see spiritual beings there, as we see stones, plants and animals in the physical world—these men are and always have been called by Spiritual Science, Initiates, and the experiences that the soul has to undergo in order to achieve this faculty is called Initiation. But in the past the way to it was different from what it is today, for the mission of Spiritual Science is always changing. The old Initiation, which had to be gone through by those who had to speak to the people in ancient times, led them to an immediate experience of the spiritual world. They could see into surrounding realms which are higher than those perceived through the senses. But they had to transform what they saw into symbolic pictures, so that people could understand it. Indeed, it was only in pictures that the old Initiates could express what they had seen, but these pictures embraced everything that could interest people in those days.

These pictures, drawn from real experience, are preserved for us in myths and legends which have come down from the most diverse periods and peoples. In academic circles these myths and legends are attributed to the popular imagination. Those who are cognisant of the facts know that myths and legends derive from super-sensible vision, and that in every genuine myth and legend we must see an externalised picture of something a spiritual researcher has experienced, or, in Goethe's words, what he has seen with the spiritual eye or heard with the spiritual ear. We come to understand legends and myths only when we take them as images expressing a real knowledge of the spiritual world. They are pictures through which the widest circles of people could be reached.

It is a mistake to assume—as it so often is nowadays—that the human soul has always been just as it is in our century. The soul has changed; its receptivity was quite different in the past. A person was satisfied then if he received the picture given in the myth, for he was inspired by the picture to bring an intuitive vision of the outer world much more directly before his soul. Today myths are regarded as fantasy; but when in former times the myth sank into a person's soul, secrets of human nature were shown to him. When he looked at the clouds or the sun and so forth, he understood as a matter of course what the myth had set before him. In this way something we could call higher knowledge was given to a minority in symbolic form. While today we talk and must talk in straightforward language, it would be impossible to express in our terms what the souls of the old sages or initiates received, for neither the initiates nor their hearers had the soul-forces we have now developed.

In those early times the only valid forms of expression were pictorial. These pictures are preserved in a literature which strikes a modern reader as very strange. Now and then, especially if one is prompted by curiosity as well as by a desire for knowledge, one comes across an old book containing remarkable pictures which show, for example, the interconnections between the planets, together with all sorts of geometrical figures, triangles, polygons and so on. Anyone who applies a modern intellect to these pictures, without having acquired a special taste for them, will say: What can one do with all this stuff, the so-called Key of Solomon¹⁰ as a traditional symbol, these triangles and polygons and such-like?

Certainly, the spiritual researcher will agree that from the standpoint of modern culture nothing can be made of all this. But when the pictures were first given to students, something in their souls really was aroused. Today the human soul is different. It has had to develop in such a way as to give modern answers to questions about nature and life, and so it cannot respond in the old way to such things as two interlocked triangles, one pointing upwards, the other downwards. In former times, this picture could kindle an active response; the soul gazed into it and something emerging from within it was perceived. Just as nowadays the eye can look through a microscope and see, for example, plant-cells that cannot be seen without it, so did these symbolic figures serve as instruments for the soul. A man who held the Key of Solomon as a picture before his soul could gain a glimpse of the spiritual world. With our modern souls this is not possible, and so the secrets of the spiritual world which are handed down in these old writings can no longer be knowledge in the original sense, and those who give them out as knowledge, or who did so in the 19th century, are doing something out of line with the facts. That is why one cannot do anything with writings such as those of Eliphas Levi,¹¹ for instance, for in our time it is antiquated to present these symbols as purporting to throw light on the spiritual world. In earlier times, however, it was proper for Spiritual Science to speak to the human soul through the powerful pictures of myth and legend, or alternatively through symbols of the kind I have just described.

Then came the intermediate period, when knowledge of the spiritual world was handed down from one generation to the next in writing or by oral tradition. Even if we study only external history, we can readily see how it was handed down. In the very early days of Christianity there was a sect in North Africa called the Therapeutae¹² a man who had been initiated into their knowledge said that they possessed the ancient writings of their founders, who could still see into the spiritual world. Their successors could receive only what these writings had to say, or at most what could be discerned in them by those who had achieved some degree of spiritual development.

If we pass on to the Middle Ages, we find certain outstanding persons saying: we have certain cognitive faculties, we have reason; then, beyond ordinary reason we have faculties which can rise to a comprehension of certain secrets of existence; but there are other secrets and mysteries of existence which are only accessible by revelation. They are beyond the range of faculties which can be developed, they can be searched for only in ancient writings.

Hence arose the great mediaeval split between those things that can be known by reason and those that must be believed because they are passed down by tradition, are revelation.¹³ And it was quite in keeping with the outlook of those times that the frontier between reason and faith should be clearly marked. This was justified for that period, for the time had passed when certain mathematical signs could be used to call forth faculties of cognition in the human soul. Right up to modern times, a person had only one means of grasping the super-sensible: looking into his own soul, as Augustine,¹⁴ for example, did to some extent.

It was no longer possible to see in the outer world anything that revealed deep inner secrets. Symbols had come to be regarded as mere fantasies. One thing only survived: a recognition that the super-sensible world corresponded to the super-sensible in man, so that a man could say to himself: You are able to think, but your thought is limited by space and time, while in the spiritual world there is a Being who is pure thought. You have a limited capacity for love, whereas in the spiritual world there is a Being who is perfect love. When the spiritual world was represented for a human being in terms of his own inner experience, his inner life could extend to a vision of nature permeated by the Divine; then he had consciousness of God. But for particular facts he could turn only to information given in ancient writings, for in himself he had nothing that could lead him into the spiritual world.

Then came the later times which brought the proud achievements of natural science. These are the times when faculties which could go beyond the sense-perceptible emerged not only in those who achieved scientific knowledge, but in all men. Something in the soul came to understand that the picture given to the senses is not the real thing, and to realise that truth and appearance are contraries. This new faculty, which is able to discern outward nature in a form not given to the senses, will be increasingly understood by those who today penetrate as researchers into the spiritual world and are then able to report that one can see a spiritual world and spiritual beings, just as down here in the sense-perceptible world one sees animals, plants and minerals.

Hence the spiritual researcher has to speak of realms which are not far removed from present-day understanding. And we shall see how the symbols which were once a means for gaining knowledge of the spiritual world have become an aid to spiritual development. The Key of Solomon, for instance, which once called forth in the soul a real spiritual perception, does so no longer. But if today the soul allows itself to be acted on by what the spiritual researcher can explain concerning this symbol, something in the soul is aroused, and this can lead a person on by stages into the spiritual world. Then, when he has gained vision of the spiritual world, he can express what he has seen in the same logical terms that apply to external science.

Spiritual Science or occultism must therefore speak in a way that can be grasped by anyone who has a broad enough understanding. Whatever the spiritual researcher has to impart must be clothed in the conceptual terms which are customary in other sciences, or due regard would not be paid to the needs of the times. Not everyone can see immediately into the spiritual world, but since the appropriate forces of reason and feeling are now existent in every soul, Spiritual Science, if rightly presented, can be grasped by every normal person with his ordinary reason. The spiritual researcher is now again in a position to present what our solitary thinker said to himself: Man in his essence is an image of the Godhead.

If we want to understand the physical nature of man, we look to the relevant findings of physical research. If we want to understand his inner spiritual being, we look to the realm which the spiritual researcher is able to investigate. Then we see that man does not come into existence at birth or at conception, only to pass out of existence at death, but that besides the physical part of his organism he has super-sensible members. If we understand the nature of these members, we penetrate into the realm where faith passes over into knowledge. And when Kant, in the evening of an older period, said that we can recognise the categorical imperative, but that no-one can penetrate with conscious vision into the realm of freedom, of divine being and immortality, he was expressing only the experience natural to his time. Spiritual Science will show that we can penetrate into a spiritual world; that just as the eye equipped with a microscope can penetrate into realms beyond the range of the naked eye, so can the soul equipped with the means of Spiritual Science penetrate into an otherwise inaccessible spiritual world, where love, conscience, freedom and immortality can be known, even as we know animals, plants and minerals in the physical world. In subsequent lectures we will go further into this.

If once more we look now at the relationship between the spiritual researcher and his public, and at the difference between the past and present of Spiritual Science, we can say: The symbolic pictures used by spiritual researchers in the past acted directly on the human soul, because what today we call the faculties of reason and understanding were not yet present. The pictures gave direct vision of the spiritual world, and the ordinary man could not test with his reason what the spiritual researcher communicated to him through them. The pictures acted with the force of suggestion, of inspiration; a man subjected to them was carried away and could not resist them. Anyone who was given a false picture was thus delivered over to those who gave it to him. Therefore, in those early times it was of the utmost importance that those who rose into the spiritual world should be able to inspire absolute confidence and firm belief in their trustworthiness; for if they misused their power they had in their hands an instrument which they could exploit in the worst possible way.

Hence in the history of Spiritual Science there are periods of degeneration as well as times of brilliance; times in which the power of untrustworthy initiates was misused. How the initiate in those early times behaved towards his public depended to the utmost degree on himself alone. At the present time—and one might say, thank God for it!—all this is somewhat different. Since the change does not come about all at once, it is still necessary that the initiate should be a trustworthy person, and it will then be justified to feel every confidence in him. But people are already in a different relationship to the spiritual researcher; if he is to speak in accordance with the demands of his time he must speak in such a way that every unbiased mind can understand him, if the willingness to understand him is there. This is, of course, far removed from saying that everyone who could understand must now understand. But reason can now be the judge of what an individual can understand, and therefore everyone who devotes himself to Spiritual Science should bring his unbiased judgment to bear on it.

From now onwards this will be the mission of Spiritual Science: to rise into a spiritual world, through the development of hidden powers, just as the physiologist penetrates through the microscope into a realm of the smallest entities, invisible to the naked eye. And ordinary intelligence will be able to test the findings of spiritual research, as it can test the findings of the physiologist, the botanist, and so on. A healthy intelligence will be able to say of the spiritual researcher's findings: they are all consistent with one another. Modern man will come to the point of saying to himself: My reason tells me that it can be so, and by using my reason I can grasp clearly what the spiritual researcher has to tell. And that is how the spiritual researcher, for his part, should speak if he feels himself to be truly at one with the mission of Spiritual Science at the present time. But there will be a time of transition also today. For since the means to achieve spiritual development are available and can be used wrongly, many people whose purpose is not pure, whose sense of duty is not sacred and whose conscience is not infallible, will find their way into a spiritual world. But then, instead of behaving like a spiritual researcher who can know from his own experience whether the things he sees are in accord with the facts, these pretended researchers will impart information that goes against the facts. Moreover, since people can come only by slow degrees to apply their reasoning powers to understanding what the spiritual researcher says, we must expect that charlatanry, humbug and superstition will flourish preeminently in this realm. But the situation is changing. Man now has himself to blame if, without wishing to use his intellect, he is led by a certain curiosity to believe blindly in those who pass themselves off as spiritual investigators, so-called. Because men are too comfort-loving to apply their reason, and prefer a blind faith to thinking for themselves, it is possible that nowadays we may have, instead of the old initiate who misused his power, the modern charlatan who imposes on people not the truth, but something he perhaps takes for truth. This is possible because today we are at the beginning of an evolutionary phase.

There is nothing to which a man should apply his reason more rigorously than the communications that can come to him from Spiritual Science. People can lay part of the blame on themselves if they fall victim to charlatanry and humbug; for these falsities will bear abundant fruit, as indeed they have done already in our time. This is something that must not go unnoticed when we are speaking of the mission of Spiritual science today.

Anyone who listens now to a spiritual researcher—not in a willful, negative way that casts immediate doubt on everything, but with a readiness to test everything in the light of healthy reason—will soon feel how Spiritual Science can bring hope and consolation in difficult hours, and can throw light on the great riddles of existence. He will come to feel that these riddles and the great questions of destiny can be resolved through Spiritual Science; he will come to know what part of him is subject to birth and death, and what is the eternal core of his being. In brief, it will be possible—as we shall show in later lectures—that, given good will and the wish to strengthen himself by taking in and working over inwardly the communications of Spiritual Science, he will be able to say with deepest feeling: What Goethe divined and said in his youth is true, and so are the lines he wrote in his maturity and gave to Faust to speak:

The spirit world is ever open,
Dead is thy heart, thy sense-veil closely drawn!
Up, scholar, let thy breast unwearied
Bathe in the roseate hues of dawn!¹⁵

In the dawn-lines of the Spirit!

• 1. The “Libellus de hominis convenienta” by Francis Joseph Philipp Count von Hoditz and Wolframitz is a manuscript which was discovered in the Fürstenberg Library in Prague and which was written approximately between 1696 and 1700.
• 2. Aristotle, 384–322 B.C. Cf. the Parva Naturalia.
• 3. René Descartes, 1596–1650. Cf. for example the work “Meditationes de prima Philosophia”, 1641/42.
• 4. With this answer Hoditz goes back to the Neo-Platonist Philo of Alexandria (see Rudolf Steiner's comments on him in Christianity as Mystical Fact, Rudolf Steiner Press, London 1972) who in turn revives the Old Testament tradition; I Moses 1, 26/27
• 5. Goethe: Winkelmann, “Antikes” and “Schönheit”; in: Goethe, Werke, Weimar Edition, vol.46 (Weimar, 1891).
• 6. Cf. for example Goethe's essay “Wenige Bemerkungen” in Goethes Naturwissenschaftliche Schriften, edited by Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, 1975, vol. 1, p.107 or in “Entwurf einer Einleitung in die vergleichende Anatomie”, op. cit., p.262: “We learn to see with the eyes of the spirit, without which we grope around blindly as everywhere so also in natural science”. Also Faust II, sc. 1, 1 1.4667.
• 7. Immanuel Kant, 1724–1804. Cf. the chapter “The time of Kant and Goethe” in Rudolf Steiner's The Riddles of Philosophy, Anthroposophic Press, New York 1973.
• 8. Goethe, “Anschauende Urteilskraft” in: Goethes Naturwissenschaftliche Schriften, edited by Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, 1975, vol. 1, p.1 15/116.
• 9. Cf. fundamental account of the stages of knowledge in Rudolf Steiner, Occult Science, An Outline, Rudolf Steiner Press, London 1979, in the chapter “Knowledge of the Higher Worlds”.
• 10. The symbol of two intertwined triangles, the one pointing upwards, the other downwards.
• 11. Eliphas Levi, 1810–1875, occultist. Pseudonym for the originally catholic deacon Alphonse Louis Constant from Paris. Dogme et Rituel de la haute Magie, 2 vols, 1854 and 1856.
• 12. Philo of Alexandria (25 B.C.–50 A.D.) describes the life and thought of the Therapeutae in his work “De vital contemplative”. Cf. also Rudolf Steiner, Christianity as Mystical Fact, Rudolf Steiner Press, London 1972, p.137.
• 13. Decisive in this respect are the writings of Thomas Aquinas, especially the four books of the Summa philosophica. Cf. also Rudolf Steiner, The Riddles of Philosophy and The Redemption of Thinking.
• 14. St. Augustine, 354–430 A.D.. Had the greatest influence of the Church Fathers on theology and philosophy.
• 15. Faust I, sc.1,11.443–446.

It is of some interest to observe from the point of view of spiritual science in the sense that the word is used here, the various ways by which the human being expresses himself.¹ For in approaching human life from different sides, as it were, and observing its different aspects as we have done in these lectures, a comprehensive view of it can be gained. Today let us deal with that universal expression of the human spirit which is manifest in language; and next time, under the heading “Laughing and Weeping”, we will then look at a variation, as it were, of human expression which is connected with language but is fundamentally different from it all the same.

When we speak of human language, we feel sufficiently how all the significance, dignity and the whole of the human being are connected with that which we call language. Our innermost existence, all our thoughts, feelings and impulses of the will flow outward to our fellow human beings and unite us with them through language. Thus we feel the possibility of expanding our being infinitely, the ability to make our being extend into our environment through language. On the other hand, anyone who can enter into the inner life of significant personalities will be able to feel particularly how language can also become a tyrant, a force which exercises power over our inner life. We can feel how our feelings and thoughts, those things of a special and intimate nature which pass through our soul, can be expressed only poorly and inadequately in the word, in language. And we can also feel how even the language within which we are placed forces us into specific modes of thinking. Everyone must be aware how the human being is dependent on language as far as his thinking is concerned. It is words to which our concepts are generally attached; and in an imperfect stage of development the human being will readily confuse the word or that which the word inculcates in him with the concept. Here lies the cause for the inability of some people to construct for themselves a conceptual framework which reaches beyond what is contained in the words commonly used in their environment. And we are aware how the character of a whole people who speak a common language is in a certain way dependent on that language. The person who observes national character more closely, the character of languages in their context, must realise that the way in which the human being is able to transform the content of his soul into sounds in turn acts back on the strengths and weaknesses of his character, on the way his temperament is expressed, even on his conception of existence as a whole. The configuration of a language can tell much about the character of a people. And since a language is common to a people, the individual is dependent on a common element, an average quantity, as it were, which prevails among that people. He is thus subject to a certain tyranny, to the rule of commonality. But if one realises that language contains on the one hand our individual spiritual life and on the other the spiritual life of the community, then one comes to see what might be called the “secret of language” as something of special significance. A considerable amount can be learnt about the soul-life of the human being if one observes how this being expresses itself in language.

The secret of language, its origin and development at different periods, has always been the subject of investigation by certain specialist scientific disciplines. But it cannot be said that these disciplines have been particularly successful in our century in uncovering the secret of language. That is why today we will try to illuminate aphoristically so to speak, in broad outline, language, its development and its connection with the human being from a spiritual-scientific point of view as we have been applying it to man and his development.

It is this connection which in the first instance seems so mysterious when we use a word to describe an object, an event, a process. What is the link between a particular combination of sounds which form a word or sentence and that which is within us which the object, expressed as word, means? In this respect outward science has tried to unite a wide range of observations in all kinds of ways. But the unsatisfactory nature of such a method has also been felt. The question is quite simple, and yet it is so difficult to answer: why did the human being, when faced with some object or event in the outside world, produce this or that particular sound from within himself as an echo of that object or event?

From a certain point of view the matter was thought to be quite simple. It was thought, for example, that language was originally formed by an inner ability of our speech organs. This imitated those things which were heard outwardly as sound—the sounds of certain animals for example, or something knocking against something else; rather like when the child hears the dog bark “bow-wow” it calls the dog a “bow-wow”. Such word formation is called onomatopoeic, an imitation of the sound. This was held by certain directions of thought to be the original foundation of sound and word formation. Of course the question how the human being came to name beings which did not emit a sound remains unanswered. The great linguistic researcher Max Müller,² realising the unsatisfactory nature of such a theory, ridiculed it by calling it the “bow-wow” theory. He set up another theory which his opponents in turn called “mystical” (giving the word a sense in which it should not be used). For Max Müller holds the view that each object contains within itself, as it were, something which is like a sound; everything in a certain sense has a sound, not only the glass which is dropped, not only the bell which is struck, but everything. And the ability of the human being to establish a relationship between his soul and this expressive element, which is like the essential nature of the object, calls forth the ability in the soul to express this inner sound-being of the object. Thus the essence of a bell can be experienced in the sounding of the “bim-bam”. And Max Müller's opponents returned his ridicule and called his theory the “bim-bam” theory. A more detailed examination would show that something unsatisfactory always remains in trying to characterise outwardly in this way the things which the human being experiences of the nature of things like an echo in his soul. A deeper penetration of the inner being of man is required.

From the point of view of spiritual science the human being is fundamentally a very complex being. He has his physical body, which is governed by the same laws and has the same constitution as the mineral world. Then, from a spiritual-scientific aspect, the human being has a second, higher member of his being, the ether body or life body. Then there is the astral body, the bearer of pleasure and pain, joy and sorrow, of instincts, desires and passions; this is just as real a member of the human being for spiritual science, if not more real, than the one which one can see with the eyes and touch with the hands. And the fourth member of the human being we called the bearer of the ego. We further saw that at his present stage the development of the human being consists of the ego working on the transformation of the other three members of his being. We also pointed out that at a future time the ego will have transformed these three members in such a way that nothing will remain of what nature, or the spiritual forces which are active in nature, has made of these three human members.

For the astral body, the bearer of pain and pleasure, of joy and sorrow, of all the surging power of the imagination, feelings and perceptions, was created initially without our participation, that is, without any contribution by our ego. But now the ego has become active and it works in such a manner that it purifies and cleanses and subordinates all the qualities and activities of the astral body. If the ego has worked only a small amount on the astral body, the human being is dominated by his instincts and desires; but if it purifies the instincts and desires into virtues, if it orders muddled thinking by the thread of logic, then a part of the astral body has become transformed. It has become transformed from a product in which the ego takes no part into a product of the ego. If the ego fulfils this work consciously, of which today only a start has been made in human evolution, we call this part of the astral body which has been consciously transformed by the ego the “spirit-self”, or, using a term from Oriental philosophy, “Manas”. When the ego works not only on the astral body, but in a different and more intensive way on the ether body, we call this part of the ether body transformed by the ego the “life-spirit”, or, with a term from Oriental philosophy, “Budhi”. And when finally the ego has become so strong—and this will happen only in the far distant future—that it transforms the physical body and regulates its laws and permeates it so that it rules over everything which lives in the physical body, we call this part of the physical body “spirit-man”, or also, because this work begins with controlling the breathing processes, with a term from Oriental philosophy, “Atman”. (Cf. German “atmen”—to breathe.)

Thus we see the human being initially as a four membered being, consisting of a physical body, an ether body, an astral body and an ego. And similarly to the three members of our being which derive from the past, we are able to speak of three members of the human being developing into the future, created by the work of our ego. We can therefore speak of the seven-membered human being by adding to the physical body, ether body, astral body and ego the spirit-self, life-body and spirit-man. But when we consider these last three members as something distant, belonging to the future evolution of mankind, it must be added that the human being is prepared for such a development in a certain way already in the present. Consciously the human being will work with his ego on the physical, ether and astral bodies only in the far distant future; but in the subconscious, that is, without full consciousness, the ego is already transforming these three members of its being on the basis of a still dulled activity. The results are already in existence. What we described in previous lectures as inner members of the human being were only able to come about because of this work by the ego. From the astral body it fashioned the sentient soul as inner mirror-image, as it were, of the sentient body. Whilst the sentient body transmits gratification (sentient body and astral body are synonymous as regards man; without the sentient body we would have no gratification), this is mirrored internally in the soul as desire—and it is desire which we then ascribe to the soul. Thus the two things belong together: the astral body and the transformed astral body or sentient soul, as gratification and desire belong together. In a similar way the ego was working in the past already on the ether body. This created internally in the soul of the human being the intellectual or mind soul. Thus the intellectual soul, which is also the bearer of memory, is linked with the subconscious transformation of the ether body by the ego. And finally, the ego has been working in the past also on the transformation of the physical body in order to enable the existence of the human being in his present form. The result of that transformation is the consciousness soul, which permits the human being to gain knowledge about the things of the outside world. The seven-membered human being can therefore be characterised as follows: through the preparative, subconscious activity of the ego the three soul members have been created; the sentient soul, the intellectual soul and the consciousness soul.

The question may now be asked: are not the physical body, ether body and astral body complex entities? What a miracle of construction is the physical human body! And if we examined it more closely, we would find that this physical body is much more complex than that part alone which the ego has transformed into the consciousness soul and which can be called the physical form of the consciousness soul. Similarly the ether body is much more complex than that which might be called the form of the intellectual or mind soul. And the astral body too is much more complex than the form of the sentient soul. These parts are poor in comparison to what was in existence before the human being had an ego. That is why in spiritual science we speak of the human being as having developed in the distant past from spiritual beings the first predisposition for a physical body. To this was added the ether body, then still later the astral body, and finally the ego. The physical body of the human being has thus passed through four stages of development. First there was a direct correspondence with the spiritual world; then it developed and was interwoven and transfused with the ether body. It therefore became more complex. Then it became interwoven with the astral body which made it more complex again. Then the ego was added. And only the work of the latter on the physical body transformed part of the physical body and made it into the bearer of human consciousness: the ability to gain knowledge of the outer world. But this physical body has more functions than providing us with a knowledge of the outside world by means of our senses and our brain. It has to fulfil a number of activities which form the basis of our consciousness but which take place completely outside the sphere of the brain. The same applies to the ether body and the astral body.

If the fact is now quite clear that everything which surrounds us in the outside world is spirit, that there is a spiritual foundation to everything material, etheric and astral, as we have emphasised so often, then we have to say: the ego works as a spiritual being from the inside outwards, as the human being develops the three members of his being; in a similar manner—whether we call them spiritual beings or spiritual actions is not important—must have been working on our physical, ether and astral bodies before the ego emerged, which then took over this development. We are looking back at a time in which the same action on our astral body, ether body and physical body occurred as today is done by the ego outwards into these three members. That is to say, before the ego was ready to establish itself within them, spiritual creation, spiritual actions, worked on our sheaths and gave them form, movement, shape. There are spiritual actions in the human being which occur before the activities of the ego, if we exclude for a moment all that which our ego has transformed in the three members of our being as sentient soul, intellectual soul and consciousness soul, and regard the construction, the inner movement and action of these three sheaths of the human being.

That is why in spiritual science we talk of the human being as he is today as being an individual soul, a soul transfused with an ego, which makes every human being into a self-contained individuality. Before the human being became such a self-contained ego-being, he was part of a “group-soul”, part of a quality of soul which we still refer to today in the animal world as group-soul.³ What occurs in the human being as individual soul in each person, that occurs in the animal world as the basis of the whole species or family. A whole species of animal has a common group-soul. The individual human soul is equivalent to the soul of the species in the animal. Thus before man became an individual soul another soul was working in the three members of his being of which we have knowledge today only through spiritual science, a soul which was the precursor of our individual ego. And this precursor of our ego, which then passed on to the ego the physical body, ether body and astral body in order that the ego might continue to transform them, this group-soul also transformed from within itself the physical body, ether body and astral body and ordered them according to itself. And the final activity of the human being before he was endowed with an ego, the final influence which lies before the birth of the ego, is present today in what we call human language. When we therefore consider what preceded the life of our consciousness soul, our intellectual or mind soul and our sentient soul, we come across an activity of the soul which is not yet transfused by the ego and its result is present today in the expression of language.

What is the outward appearance of the four members of the human being? How are they expressed purely outwardly in the physical body? The physical body of a plant looks different from the physical body of a human being. Why? Because in the plant only the physical body and the ether body are present, whereas in the human physical body the astral body and the ego are present as well. This inward activity forms and refashions the physical body correspondingly. How is the physical body affected when it is permeated by an ether or life body?

The glandular system is the outward physical expression in man and animal of the ether or life body; that is to say, the ether body is the architect of the glandular system. The astral body formed the nervous system. That is why it is correct to talk of a nervous system only in those beings where an astral body is present. What, now, is the expression in the human being of his ego? It is the circulatory system and specifically what might be called the blood under the special influence of the inner life warmth. All the work which the ego does on the human being when it transforms the physical body is channelled via the blood. That is why the blood is of such special nature. When the ego transforms the sentient soul, the intellectual soul and the consciousness soul, then all the work that the ego achieves only penetrates into the physical body because the ego has the ability to affect the physical body via the blood. Our blood is the mediator for the astral body and the ego and all their activity.

There can be no doubt if we look at human life, even on a superficial level only, that the human being transforms the physical body with the ego in the same way as he transforms the consciousness soul, the intellectual soul and the sentient soul. Who would deny that the physiognomy expresses what lives and works inwardly. And who would deny that inward thinking, if it takes hold completely of the soul, transforms the brain even in the course of one life. Our brain is a tool which adapts to the requirements of our thinking. But if we consider the amount which the human being can transform, artistically fashion as it were, his outer being through the ego, it is very small. It is very little which we can do with our blood by setting the blood in motion with what we call our inner warmth. Those spiritual beings which preceded our ego managed to achieve more, for they were able to make use of a more effective means; thus the human form took shape under their influence in such a way that it is an overall expression of what those forces made of the human being. These beings used the substance of air. In the same way that we use the inner warmth to make our blood pulse—thus making the blood active in our own form—the beings working on us previous to our ego made the air serve their purpose. And the work of these beings on us through air created what gives us our form as human beings.

It might seem strange that we speak of spiritual forces working on the human being in the far distant past through air. But it is not the first time I have said that it is a misjudgement to think of the soul and spirit life of our inner being only as product of the imagination, and not to realise that it has been taken from the outside world as a whole. Whoever states that concepts and ideas could arise in us without ideas existing in the outside world might just as well say that he can take water from a glass in which there is none. Our concepts would be nothing more than froth if they were anything other than what lives in outside things and what is present in those things as their laws. We fetch that which we allow to develop in our souls from our environment. That is why we can say: everything material which surrounds us is interwoven with spiritual beings.

Strange as it may sound, what surrounds us as air is not merely the substance as shown by chemistry, but spiritual beings and spiritual forces are active in it. And in the same way that we can transform our physical body a small amount by the warmth which streams forth from our ego—that is the essential element—in the blood, the beings which preceded the ego formed in a powerful way the outer form of our physical being by means of the air. We are human beings because of our larynx and everything connected with that. The larynx, sculpted from outside into us as this wonderful artistic organ and connected with the other vocal and speech organs, was created from the spiritual element in the air. Goethe said very aptly with reference to the eye: “The eye is fashioned by the light for the light!”⁴ If, in the sense of Schopenhauer,⁵ it is now stressed that without an eye sensitive to light there would be no impression of light for us, then this is only half the truth. The other half is that we would have no eye if the light had not sculpted, as it were, our eyes from undefined organs in the far distant past. Light must therefore be seen not only as the abstract entity which is described today as physical light; but in light we have to search for that hidden being which is capable of creating the eye for itself.

Similarly we can say in another respect that the air is full of beings which were able at certain times to create in the human being the intricate organ of the larynx and all that is connected with it. And the rest of the human form to the smallest detail has been formed and sculpted in such a manner that man in his present stage is a further development of his speech organs, as it were. The speech organs are something decisive for the human form in the first instance. That is why it is speech that transcends man above the animals. For the spiritual being which we call the spirit of the air also fashioned the animals, but not to such a level where they could develop the facility of speech such as the human being has it. We see that the human being had internally already developed his speech organs by the time that he developed his present thinking, his feelings and his will, that is to say, everything connected with his ego. Now it can be understood why these spiritual forces could only work on the physical body in such a manner that the human being finally became like an appendix to his speech organs, because they developed the astral body, ether body and physical body through the influence, the configuration of the air. After the human being had become capable of having within him an organ which corresponded to what we have called the spiritual beings of the air, in the same way that the eye corresponds to the spiritual beings of the light, he could fashion into this what the ego developed in itself as reason, as consciousness, feeling, emotion. Thus there is a threefold activity in the subconscious; activity on the physical body, the ether body and the astral body which existed previous to the ego. We can recognise this if we know that it was the group-soul and that the group-soul worked in an imperfect manner in the animal.

This has to be taken into consideration if we regard the work of the spiritual forces occurring before the ego in the astral body. We have to exclude everything concerning the self and observe the work done by the group-self from dark foundations. Desire and gratification face each other in the astral body on a level of imperfection. Desire was able to become a soul quality, an inner faculty, because it already had a precursor in the astral body of the human being.

Similar to desire and gratification in the astral body, imagery, symbolism, and outer stimulus face each other in the ether body. It is most important to distinguish the activity of our ether body preceding the ego from the activity of the ego in the ether body. When the ego is active as intellectual or mind soul, then, at the present stage of development of the human being, it seeks a truth which is as nearly as possible a true picture of the outer world. Those things which do not exactly correspond to outward things are not called “true”. The spiritual activities which lie before the advent of our ego do not work in this manner; they work more symbolically, in the image, rather like a dream works. A dream works in the following manner, for example, that someone dreams of a shot being fired; and when he wakes up he sees that the chair next to the bed has fallen over. What is outer happening and outer impression—the falling over of the chair—is transformed into an image in the dream, into the shot. In this way the spiritual beings preceding the ego work symbolically in the same way that we will work again when we achieve a higher spiritual activity by initiation; here we try—but this time with full consciousness—to work towards a symbolic view, an imaginative conception, away from the purely abstract outside world.

Then the spiritual beings working in the human physical body transformed it into what might be called a correspondence of outer events, outer facts, and imitation. Imitation is something which we find in the child, for example, when the other soul members are still hardly developed. Imitation is something that belongs to the subconscious human nature. That is why education should start with imitation, because before the ego begins to create order in the human being, the drive to imitate is present as a natural drive.

The drive to imitate in the physical body in contrast to outer activities, symbolising in the ether body in contrast to outer stimulus, and the correspondence of desire and gratification in the astral body all have to be considered as having been created with the aid of the tool of air—and having been created in such a manner that a sculpted, an artistic impression as it were, has been created in our larynx and in the whole of the speech apparatus. It can then be said: these beings preceding the ego worked on the human being in such a manner that they formed and ordered him such that the air could come to expression in him in this threefold direction.

For when we look at language capability in the true sense of the word, we have to ask: does it consist of the sound which we utter? No, it is not the sound. Our ego sets in motion what has been created into us by the air. In the same way that we move the eye to take in the outward light, whilst the eye itself exists to take light in, our ego within us sets in motion those organs which have been formed by the spiritual beings in the air. We set the organs in motion by the ego; we activate the organs which correspond to the spirit of the air and we have to wait until the spirit of the air who formed the organs sounds back at us the tone as an echo of our action on the air. We do not produce the tone, just as the individual parts of a pipe do not produce the tone. Our ego develops activity by the use of those organs which have been created from the spirit of the air. Then we have to wait for the latter to set the air in motion again such that the word sounds by the original activity which produced the organs.

Thus we can indeed see that human language must rest on the threefold correspondence which was mentioned. How does this correspondence work?

Imitation in the physical body rests on the speech organs imitating those things which are outward activities, outward objects which make an impression on us, and producing them as sound in the same way that a painter imitates a scene which consists of quite different constituents than paint, canvas, light and dark. Similar to the painter who imitates with light and dark we imitate the environment with our organs which were formed from elements of the air. That is why what we produce in sound is a true imitation of the essence of an object; and our vowels and consonants are nothing but images and imitations of those things which make an impression on us from the outside.

The next thing is the image in the ether body, what we might call symbolism. The first elements of our language were created by imitation, but then this developed further by tearing itself away, as it were, from outward impressions. The ether body assimilates—such as in the dream—those things which no longer correspond to outer experiences; that is the developing element in sound. Initially the ether body assimilates the pure imitation; then the imitation is transformed in the ether body so that it becomes something independent and, because it has been through an internal process, corresponds to outward impressions only symbolically as image: we are no longer merely imitators.

And thirdly, desire, emotion, everything which lives internally is expressed in the astral body. This works in such a manner that it continues to transform the sound. The internal experiences flow from the inside into the sound: pain and pleasure, joy and sorrow, desires, wishes; all these things stream into the sound and bring the subjective element into it. What started as pure imitation was then transformed into the language symbol in the independent sound or word image and is now transformed further by the infusion of the human being's internal experiences. It always has to be an outward correspondence which provokes the sound in the soul; when the soul expresses its inward experiences, pleasure and pain, joy and sorrow and all the others, in sound it has to search for a corresponding outer form. At the first stage the outer impression is imitated. The inner sound image or the creation of the symbol is the next step. But the inner experiences, such as joy and sorrow, by their nature have no outer equivalent. This correspondence between outer being and inner experience can be observed with children as they learn to speak. One can see how the child begins to transform a feeling into a sound. When the child initially calls “ma” or “pa” then this is only the inner transformation of an emotion into sound. It is only the expression of something inward. But when the child expresses itself in this way and the mother, for example, comes, the child notices how its inward feeling of pleasure, which is transformed into the sound “ma”, corresponds to an outer event. Of course the child does not enquire how it happens that in this case there is a correspondence with the coming of the mother. The inner experience of pleasure or pain is allied with an outward impression and thus what streams out from the inside is united with the outer impression. That is the third way in which language acts. It is therefore true to say that language originated equally by internal imitation of the outside and by outward reality being linked to our inner experience. The process which happens in innumerable cases, and which is completed when the inner expression “ma” or “pa” is formed into the words “mama” or “papa”, and is satisfied when the father or mother responds. Every time that the human being realises that something happens as a result of an inner expression, the expression of that inner event unites for him with something outward.

All this takes place without any participation by the ego. It is only at a later stage that the ego takes over this activity. Thus the forces in existence previous to the ego were at work in the configuration which lies at the base of the human language ability. And because the ego took over when the basis for human language had already been created, language then ordered itself according to the ego. Therefore the expression connected with the sentient body is transfused by the sentient soul; the images and symbols connected with the ether body are transfused by the intellectual soul: the human being fills the sound with the experiences of the intellectual soul, and similarly he fills it with the experiences of the consciousness soul, which were initially only imitation. By this process gradually those areas of our language came into existence which represents inner experiences of the soul.

That is why, regarding the nature of language, it must be quite clearly understood that there is something in us which was there before the ego, which was then developed by the ego. But then, also, it cannot be claimed that language directly represents the ego, that it represents the spiritual aspect in us, everything which is intimate to our personality; but it must be understood that we can never see in language an immediate expression of the ego. The spirit of language works symbolically in the ether body, imitatively in the physical body; and this is linked with its creative activity in the sentient soul, forcing the inward experiences from it in such a manner that the sound is an expression of the inner life. In sum, language did not develop according to the conscious ego as it is today, but, if the development of language is to be compared to anything at all, its development can only be compared to artistic creation. Just as we cannot demand that the imitation of the artist corresponds to reality, we cannot demand that language copies those things which it is meant to represent. Language only imitates the outside world in a way similar to the picture, to the way that the artist as such imitates outside reality. Before the human being was a self-conscious being in the way that he is today, an artist was at work in him, active as the spirit of language, and our ego is embedded in a place where previously an artist was at work. This in itself is put rather in the form of an image, but it expresses the truth in this field. We observe an unconscious activity and feel that here there is something which created the human being as a work of art. In this respect we must not forget that we can only examine each work of art as permitted by the methods of that art. If this were born in mind, it would preclude from the beginning such pedantic works as Fritz Mauthner's “Kritik der Sprache”.⁶ Here the critique of language is based on quite wrong premises; namely, that if we regard human languages they do not in any way represent objective reality. But is that their function in the first place? There is just as little possibility for language to represent reality as there is of the picture representing outward reality in the colours on the canvas and the use of light and shadow. The spirit of language which lies at the foundation of human activity has to be grasped with artistic feeling.

Only a brief outline of these things has been given. But if one knows that an artist who formed language was active in mankind then one can understand—as different as the various languages may be—that even in the individual human languages the artistic element was at work in all sorts of differing ways. Then it can be understood how the spirit of language—let us call this being working in the air the spirit of language—when it reveals itself on a relatively low level in the human being works in an atomistic way by wanting to construct everything from the single parts. That is how it comes about that the individual sounds combine to form a whole sentence.

If, for example, we take the sounds “shi” and “pian” in Chinese, we have two atoms of language formation; the one syllable “shi” means song, poem, and “pian” means book. If we combine the two sounds, “shi-pian”, then this would be the same as creating the combination “poem-book” in English; something results from the particles which, seen as a whole, produces poetry book. This is only one example of how the Chinese language forms its concepts and ideas.

If we reflect on the things which we have considered today, we can also now understand how a wonderfully formed language such as a Semitic one must be considered in its essence. In Semitic languages we have certain sounds as a foundation which are really only constituted of consonants. And then the human being inserts vowels in between these consonants. If we thus take the consonants q, t, l, just as an example, and insert an a and then another a, then, whilst the word formed purely from the consonants is only an imitation of an outward sound, the word “qatal”, to kill, is created by the addition of the vowels.

We thus have a noteworthy development in that “to kill” as a complex of sounds comes about initially by the speech organs simply imitating the outward process. Then the soul continues the process and the inward experience is added with the vowels: the complex of sounds is further developed so that “to kill” is referred back to a subject. This is basically the constitution of the Semitic languages and in it is expressed the combination of the various elements in language formation within the framework of language. Symbolism (i.e. that which is found at work in the ether body as the spirit of language), which is the primary agent in Semitic languages, demonstrates the particular aspect of the Semitic languages which takes the individual imitative sounds one step further and transforms them into symbols by the insertion of vowels.

That is why fundamentally all words in Semitic languages are formed in such a way that they relate to the surroundings of the outside world as symbols. In contrast, everything which appears in the Indo-Germanic languages is prompted more by what we have called the inner expression of the astral body, the inner being. For the astral body is something which is already connected with the consciousness. When one faces the outside world one contrasts oneself with it. If one faces the outside world from the point of view of the ether body one fuses with it, is one with it. Only when things are reflected in the consciousness does a difference exist between oneself and things. This working of the astral body with all its inner experiences can be seen in the Indo-Germanic languages in contrast to the Semitic languages in that they have the verb “to be”: a reflection of independent existence. That is possible because we are able to separate ourselves from outward impressions with our consciousness. If, therefore, we want to say for example “God is good” in Semitic, then this is not immediately possible because there is no way of producing the word “is” as an expression of being, for this originates in the contrast of astral body and outside world. The ether body simply states. That is why in the Semitic languages one would have to say “God the good”. The contrast of subject and object is not a characteristic element. The languages which are in contrast with the outside world, which contain as an essential element the perception of an outside world, are particularly the Indo-Germanic languages. They in turn affect the human being in such a way that they support inwardness, i.e. all those things which provide the foundations for developing a strong personality, a strong ego. This is already evident in the language.

All the things which I have spoken about might be considered by some to be only unsatisfactory indications for the simple reason that one would have to speak for two weeks if one wanted to describe everything in this field in detail. Nevertheless, those who have attended these lectures more regularly and who have penetrated into the essential nature of the matter will see that such indications are not unjustified. They are only intended to show how a spiritual-scientific view of language can be provoked which fundamentally shows that language cannot be understood in any other way than in an artistic sense, which must be developed. That is why all scholarship must fail if it is not willing to participate in the creative act which was undertaken by the forces creating language in the human being before the ego became active in us. Only a creative faculty can grasp the secret of language, because only a creative faculty as such can recreate. No learned abstraction can ever bring about comprehension of a work of art. Only those ideas illuminate a work of art which are able to recreate in a fruitful way as ideas the things which the artist expresses by other means paint, sound, etc. Creative feeling alone can comprehend the artist, and a creative feeling for language alone can understand the spiritual creativity in the origin of language. That is one of the tasks which spiritual science is called upon to do in respect of language.

The other task is something which is of significance on a practical level. If we understand how language originated from an inner pre-human artist, then we can also elevate ourselves to make this creative feeling become active where we want to express something of validity in language. But there is little feeling for that in our present time, where not much progress has been achieved in fostering a living feeling for language.⁷ Today everyone who opens his mouth feels that he is able to express all things. But it must be understood quite clearly that we have to create again in our soul an immediate connection between what we want to express and how we want to express it. We have to re-awaken the linguistic artist in us in all areas. Today human beings are satisfied if what they want to say comes out in any way, no matter what form it takes. How many people realise—which is absolutely necessary in the field of spiritual science—that an artistic feeling for language is necessary to express anything? If true presentations of spiritual-scientific material, for example, are examined,⁸ it will be found that the true spiritual scientists who have written these things also seriously worked on them to form each sentence creatively, that the position of the verb is not an arbitrary decision. Each sentence will be seen as a birth, because it must be experienced inwardly in the soul as immediate form, not simply as a thought. And the sentences are connected not only consecutively, but the third one has to be formed in essence at the same time as the first one because they are interconnected in their effect. In spiritual science it is impossible to work without a creatively active sense of language. Everything else is inadequate. It is important to free oneself of being slavishly tied to words. But we cannot do that if we think that any word is suitable to express a given thought; that already is an error in our linguistic creativity. The expression of super-sensible facts cannot be gained from words which are coined only with a view to the sense world. If the question is asked “How is one to express the ether body or the astral body in a concrete manner in reality by means of a word?” nothing of this has been understood. Only the person has understood something of this who says: I will understand what the ether body is if in the first instance I investigate from one particular aspect and it is quite clear that I am dealing with artistically formed reflected images; and then I investigate three more aspects. The matter has then been presented from four different sides. When it is thereafter expressed in language, in walking round the topic as it were, we are presenting an artistic image of the matter. If one is not aware of this, nothing will be achieved but abstractions and a sclerotic reproduction of what is previously known. That is why development in spiritual science will always be connected with what might be called “development of the inward sense and the inward creative power of language”. In this sense spiritual science will have a fruitful effect on style in language, will transform the terrible linguistic style of today which is ignorant of the creativity of language, and fewer people, who can hardly speak and write, will embark on literary careers. The awareness has been lost today, for example, that to write prose is something much more elevated than writing in verse; only the prose which is written today is on a much lower level. But it is the purpose of spiritual science to act as a stimulus in those fields which are connected with the deepest secrets of mankind. For spiritual science will be active in those areas in such a way that it fulfils the visions of the greatest personalities. Spiritual science will conquer the super-sensible worlds through the thinking, will become capable of decanting the thought in such a way into the sound structure that our language too can again become a means of communication of the experiences of the soul in the super-sensible.⁹ Then spiritual science will have become the agent which makes real what is expressed about an important realm of the inner human being in the words:

Unmeasurably deep is the thought;
And its winged agent is the word.¹⁰

• 1 . Cf. the lecture “Sprachwissenschaft”, Dornach, 7th April 1921, in: Die Befruchtende Wirkung der Anthroposophie auf die Fachwissenschaften, Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach, Switzerland. (GA 76)
• 2 . Max Müller, 1823–1900. Noted Orientalist, religious and linguistic researcher.
• 3 . Cf. the lecture “Die Seele der Tiere im Lichte der Geisteswissenschaft”, Berlin, 23rd January 1908, in: Die Erkenntnis der Seele und, des Geistes, Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach, Switzerland. (GA 56)
• 4 . Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “Entwurf einer Farbenlehre”, des ersten Bandes erster, didaktischer Teil, in: Goethes Naturwissenschaftliche Schriften, ed. Rudolf Steiner, reprint Dornach 1975, vol. 111, P.88.
• 5 . Arthur Schopenhauer, 1788–1860, German philosopher.
• 6 . Fritz Mauthner, 1849–1923. A new edition of this work, Die Kritik der Sprache, was just being published in 1910.
• 7 . In 1898 already Rudolf Steiner wrote in his essay “Noch ein Wort über die Vortragskunst”: “Artistic speech is often considered today to be failed idealism”. In: Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Dramaturgie 1889–1900, Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach, Switzerland. (GA 29)
• 8 . Cf. also chapter 33 of Rudolf Steiner, An Autobiography, Steiner Books, New York, 1980.
• 9 . Rudolf Steiner repeatedly noted in his later work that for example the 7th scene of his mystery drama “The Portal of Initiation” (in: Rudolf Steiner, Four Mystery Plays, Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1983) showed in the most direct sense this transformation of spiritual experience into sound.
• 10. Friedrich von Schiller, Poetry in Homage to the Arts (Die Huldigung der Künste).