[
  {
    "id": "GA060-1",
    "title": "The Answers of Spiritual Science to the Big Questions of Existence",
    "date": "20 Oct 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/eLib2015/19101020p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "Translator Unknown\nAlready for several years, I attempted to hold talks about spiritual science here from this place during the winter months. In this winter, I want also to give a picture of facts of the spiritual world from this viewpoint in the series of the talks announced to you. We shall consider the big questions of existence, the relation of life and death, of sleeping and wakening, of the human soul and animal soul, of the human spirit and animal spirit, and of the spirit in the realm of plants. Then we want to consider the development of the human being through the different ages, through childhood, youth, and the later years, the interest of education in the main character of the human being. We will light up the spiritual life turning our look to the great individualities of the human development, to Zarathustra, Moses, Galilei, and Goethe. Using single examples, I want to show in which way spiritual science relates to the natural sciences: at the example of astronomy and geology. Then I want to explain what spiritual science can say about the riddle of life. A kind of orienting, general consideration preceded the considerations every year. I follow this custom also this year speaking about the meaning of the spiritual science, its significance, its nature, and its task within the different spiritual needs of the present.\nOne may be allowed to say that spiritual science (German: Geisteswissenschaft ) is a rather unpopular thing even today in wide sections of the population. Indeed, one also speaks about “humanities” (German: Geisteswissenschaft ) outside our spiritual science. One understands, for example, something by history that one calls humanities, and probably also by other fields of knowledge of the present. In another sense than one normally speaks of humanities, I want to speak here. If one speaks of “humanities” today and applies the term possibly to history, one admits in the utmost that beside the human observation, the sensory experience, and intellectual experience still certain big trends come into consideration. These are effective like forces in the stream of the world evolution and cause as it were the talents of the single peoples and states. One probably speaks also of general ideas in history and in the human life. He who reflects what is meant in such a case soon remembers that one appeals to abstract ideas speaking of the forces, of that which guides the human destinies. These are general ideas in certain respect to which the human intellectual capability can attain a relation of knowledge.\nIn another sense, one speaks about humanities here assuming a spiritual world as a world that is essential as the human world is essential within the physical existence. I want to show: if one exceeds with the human cognitive faculties what presents itself to the external sensory observation, the intellectual experience, and goes to the guiding forces of human existence and world existence generally, one does not come to abstractions, to sapless and feeble concepts. However, one comes to something essential, to something that is living, full of contents, spiritually impregnated existence as the nature of the human being is. One speaks about an existing spiritual world here. That is why spiritual science is no popular thing for the widest circles of our present cultural striving. It is still the least if one calls those who devote themselves to such spiritual-scientific research blabbers, dreamers, or daydreamers. It is even today something ordinary to say that everything that wants to be or to appear as a strict method, as real scientificity on this ground is a quite dubious thing.\nBig, immense progress always exercised a suggestive effect on humanity also concerning thinking and feeling. The big progress of the general human life does not lie in the spiritual-scientific field, but rather in that field, of which humanity is rightly proud and on which it still sets big hopes for its further development. Until our days, this progress of the last centuries lies in the field that grows out of the natural sciences.\nImagine the immense theoretical progress of science which one has attained and will attain, and which big significance these scientific achievements have for the outer life, then one must say: the blessing of this scientific progress must exercise a suggestive power on the human beings. Thus, it has happened that this suggestive effect has expressed itself also to another side. If it had expressed itself only in such a way that above all the human mind felt something like a kind of worldly cult compared with this immense progress, who could even speak a single word against it? However, this suggestive power has also expressed itself in such a way that one does not only recognise the scientific research and the progress following from it for our time, but within wide sections of the population the faith originated that any knowledge of humanity can be gained only on scientific ground. Because one regards oneself as entitled to conclude from this faith that the spiritual-scientific method contradicts these scientific methods that it is impossible for that who is on scientific ground to speak generally of the investigation of a spiritual world, the prejudice is spread that spiritual science must be rejected compared to the entitled requirements of natural sciences. With this refusal, one hears very serious objections.\nThe scientific method, one says, is such a one whose research results, whose knowledge can be checked by every human being at any time, and that for the production of this knowledge, of these research results no subjective feeling, sympathy or antipathy, longing or desire are allowed to come into the picture. Nothing is allowed to interfere from the requirement that one would like to have this result so or so; the human element must exclude itself from the research and let the objectivity of the things speak if it concerns results of scientific research.\nSpiritual science cannot put up this demand just like that. To someone who regards this demand as generally valid it is a sufficient reason to reject spiritual science that it cannot satisfy this demand. Why is this the case? The natural sciences have the objects of their research round the human being. They start from that what can be put before every human being what every human being can think about it with the physical-scientific methods, if he is led before the thing. It is apparently completely irrelevant with which requirement the human being approaches what presents itself in his surroundings. It is just that what expresses itself in the general demand: physical-scientific knowledge must be able to be checked by any human being at any time. The true spiritual science cannot go forward at all, as the natural sciences obtain their results. It cannot say at first, it is necessary that any human being can check the results at any time. Since it must assume that these research results are obtained because the human being does not consider his inside as anything solid, anything concluded that he does not regard his subjective being as anything ready, but says to himself: my subjective being is nothing concluded, is nothing ready, it can be developed; the soul life can be deepened. The soul life can run so that that what one finds if one turns the senses to the outer world and applies the mind to what the senses say is only a base of other soul experiences. Other soul experiences arise if the soul becomes engrossed in itself, if it regards the immediate life experience only as a starting point and then struggles with forces slumbering in it at first. These forces can be got out, however, through the stages of existence that one cannot regard in such a way that one could check them with an outer eye.\nWhat the spiritual researcher must experience for the preparation of his studies is an inner struggle of the soul that is completely independent of that what the human being has in himself. If one demands from science generally that the human being should add nothing to the results that face him outside, then it could not be talk of spiritual science at all. However, he who reflects a little and asks himself: which is the most important part of the demands which are asserted there for spiritual science, could say to himself that its results are valid for any human being that they are not subject to the personal arbitrariness, and are significant for all human beings.\nThis is the characteristic of everything scientific that it does not only apply to somebody whom the objects of science face, but that — if the objects have been investigated — this can lead to knowledge that can be valid for all human beings.\nIf it were true that that what I have characterised in such a way as a development of the human being were only subjective, applied only to the one or the other person, and that only a personal faith were due to it, one could not speak of spiritual science really. It will still become apparent, however, in this winter that this inner life of the human being, the struggle of the soul can develop from the forces that slumber at first but can awake and guide him from experience to experience, and that this soul life can still ascend to a stage, where his experiences have a particular peculiarity.\nConsidering the human life as it happens inside of the human soul, it is a quite personal one at first, for the one this way, for the other that way. Someone who has a healthy self-reflection can realise with this or that what surges up in his soul as sympathy or antipathy what has as it were a personal touch only, that this and how this is the case. However, the inner experience leads to a certain point where just a methodically achieved, pure self-knowledge, uninfluenced by anything personal, must say to itself, the personal has just been cast off, forms a special area. However, then one comes to a certain point where for the inner experience, for the supersensible experience arbitrariness stops exactly the same way as it stops if one faces these or those sense-perceptible phenomena, and where one can also not think as one wants but must think according to the object. Thus, the human being also comes internally, emotionally to a certain sphere, to a certain area where he clearly realises that his personal subjectivity does no longer speak but that now not sense-perceptible but supersensible beings and forces speak for which his individuality has just as little significance as for that which the outer sensory objects say. However, one has to attain this knowledge if one wants to be entitled to call the statements of the spiritual world “science.” These winter talks shall be again a proof that we are permitted to call the considerations about the investigation of the spiritual world science.\nThus, one must say, spiritual science is founded on that what the human soul can investigate if it has come in its inner struggle and experience to a point where the personal does no longer have a say in the case of the considerations of the spiritual world, but where it lets the spiritual world say its peculiarities. If one compares spiritual science to the natural sciences, some people maybe say, then, however, spiritual science lacks the important characteristic that it can make a persuasive impression on all human beings, which the natural sciences have. Since one has the consciousness, wherever scientific results appear, even if you had not investigated and seen them yourself, you would be able to do it if you went to the observatory or to the laboratory and used the telescope and the microscope and you would recognise them in the same way as someone who imparted them to you. He could say: if in the way of spiritual science the proof is an inner one, and the soul struggles with itself, until it says: now you give nothing of your personality to that what the objects say to you, — nevertheless, it is a single struggle. One would have to say to someone who attains certain results this way, or whom the spiritual-scientific researcher informs of these results: these results remain an unknown land to me, until I myself ascend to the same point!\nAlso this — this will still appear to us — is a wrong objection. Indeed, this lonesome struggle of the human soul, this uncovering of forces slumbering in the human soul is necessary in order to reach the spiritual world where it speaks objectively to us. However, the spiritual world is in such a way: after the spiritual-scientific results have been informed, the results are effective.\nWhat someone, proved by spiritual-scientific research, communicates to his fellow men can be checked by everybody again, in a certain sense, however, not in such a way that one can see in the laboratory what the other has found, but in such a way that one can accept it. For in every soul a sense of impartial truth, a healthy logic, a healthy reasonableness lives. If the results of the spiritual research are dressed in healthy logic, in that what speaks as our healthy sense of truth, then in every soul or at least in every impartial soul a string can sound or resonate with the informing soul. One can say, any soul has the disposition — even if it has not still dedicated itself to the lonesome struggle — to take up by an impartial logic and by a healthy sense of truth what spiritual science informs. Even if one has to admit that also within the spiritual-scientific movement the communications of spiritual research are not always accepted with this healthy sense of truth and healthy logic, but this is a lack of every spiritual movement. However, in principle, this is right what I have said. In principle, one should even consider that it must lead to mistakes about mistakes if one accepts light-heartedly and with blind faith what is often brought as spiritual science to humanity today. Who really stands on the ground of spiritual science feels strictly obliged to inform logically and reasonably what he has to say, so that one can really check with a healthy sense of truth and with any logic. - Thus, we have explained the being of spiritual science showing how one has to find its results.\nOnly this science can prove that there is such an objective fact of the spirit. However, I want to call attention to the fact that this science just leads to the real contents of the spiritual world, to contents that are fulfilled vividly with such essentiality as for example a human being is fulfilled with essentiality. From this viewpoint, spiritual science gets clear about the fact that at last a spiritual world forms the basis of any physical-sensuous existence that the human being as well as all the other things is born and developed out of this spiritual world. It states also that behind the sense-perceptible world, behind the physical outer existence the region of the spiritual world extends. If now spiritual science goes over gradually to showing from its observations how it looks in this spiritual world how the spiritual world underlies our sense-perceptible world, then the aversion just arises in many circles as it was characterised at the beginning of this talk. In wide circles of the present, spiritual science is a quite unpopular thing. It is difficult by no means to understand that spiritual science still meets an immense opposition today. It is a matter of course because that what is incorporated as something new to the cultural life like spiritual science was always forced back in a certain respect like all small and big achievements of humanity. However, because there are many mental pictures, which the human being gets from the scientific observation, which cause just the necessity that someone who believes to stand completely on the ground of natural sciences is involved in nothing but contradictions if he hears what spiritual science says. Someone who stands on the ground of spiritual science does not doubt at all that with a certain right hundreds upon hundreds of disproofs of this spiritual science can be brought up.\nOnly as in brackets I would like to insert that I myself hold two talks in the next time at different places and also here once, so that clearness is brought in this question. The first of them reads: How Does One Disprove Theosophy? and the other: How Does One Found Theosophy? For a test, this should happen in order to show how that who stands on the ground of spiritual science can really gather everything that can be alleged as disproofs against spiritual science. Yes, I would like to say even more than that what has already been stated in this case that the disproofs of spiritual science, as one normally speaks today of disproofs, are not so particularly difficult in relation to its various results at all. It is easy to disprove the spiritual-scientific researches.\nI would not like to compare these disproofs directly, but to make clear what I want to say, and go back to something that often strikes one if one reads works of certain philosophers about Hegel's philosophy. — I do not want to speak here about the importance of Hegel's philosophy about what is true and what is wrong; we want to leave this undecided. — There will be few people among the experts of Hegel, who do not recognise that Hegel is a significant spirit. In Hegel's writings, one finds a strange sentence that can make, so to speak, a deep impression on those who want to disprove Hegel light-heartedly. This sentence reads, “Everything real is reasonable!” Imagine which inner laughter such a sentence must cause in someone who disproves with pleasure! A philosopher should be great who speaks such nonsense: “Everything real is reasonable!” One needs only to cast a single glance at the world and sees how unreasonable this sentence is! There is an easy method to disprove the correctness of this sentence, and it consists in the fact that someone himself gets up to mischief. Since one can state then that it is certainly not reasonable.\nShould the fact that a disproof becomes easy also lead to the fact that it is simply taken easy and is easily taken as important? This is another question, which answers itself maybe by the fact that one considers the following: should Hegel really have been so silly — one may relate to Hegel as one wants — that he would not have realised that this sentence is easily disproved? Should he have thought really that no one could get up to mischief? Should one not feel compelled to consider in which sense Hegel could have meant this sentence and that one does not meet what he meant with such a disproof at all?\nIn the same way, it may also be with many things of spiritual science. We go back to something concrete: spiritual science has to assume that the nervous system and the brain as the tools of thinking, imagination, feeling, and will-impulses are built by a spiritual. Brain and nervous system are tools of something essential that one cannot show in the sensory world, but that one has to investigate with the characterised methods of spiritual science. Spiritual science has to go back from that what science, resting on the sense-perceptible phenomena, knows to say about the brain and nervous system to something working in the human being mentally-spiritually that can no longer be investigated with the senses that can be investigated only on the inner ways of the soul. One can very easily now disprove what the spiritual research tells about something supersensible that forms the basis of the human brain.\nOne can say, all that you talk is only a product of the brain. If you do not realise this, consider once how the spiritual abilities rise in the evolution. With the lower animals, the spiritual abilities are still imperfect, with the higher animals and especially with the higher mammals they are quite significant and more perfect, and with the human being they are most complete because his brain has attained the biggest perfection. This shows that the spiritual life grows out of the brain. If you do not yet believe this, then turn once to someone who can show you how in certain cases of illness certain parts of the brain can become ineffective and the human being can no longer exercise certain abilities, so that, as it were, certain parts of the brain are demolished and the spiritual life is disabled. There you see how a sense-perceptible organ can demolish your spiritual life! Why do you still speak about the spiritual beings that should stand behind the sense-perceptible things?\nOne can make this objection very easily. The fact that it is done not from the scientific results, but from the suggestion which is formed for many people from certain scientific theories, must seem to us natural in the present. All that is connected with the fact that our time stands under the suggestive power of that opinion that one can only gain truth, knowledge if one directs the senses outwardly and ignites the reason by the gained observations. Even if — this must be said concerning spiritual science — these results deliver as many disproofs as possible, nevertheless, one can say that on the other side in our present a deep need, a deep longing exists for hearing something of those lands about which spiritual science knows to report something. A deep longing for it has developed at the same time and is alive with a group of human beings. With a big part of the human beings it slumbers, so to speak, under the surface of consciousness, however, it will appear more and more.\nThe need for spiritual-scientific results will become bigger and bigger. This longing, this need for spiritual-scientific results occurs as an outgrowth beside the admiration, the devotion of the scientific achievements. Just because the scientific achievements must necessarily face the human being outwardly, like a counter-pole the longing for spiritual-scientific results emerges. Concerning that, we have reached another viewpoint in the nineteenth and our centuries than humanity had hundred years ago. If one wants to speak of the worth of the spiritual-scientific researches of the present, it is important to realise that a century ago even greater spirits did not yet feel the need of speaking of spiritual-scientific results in the way as this should happen today in the sense of this course of lectures. Because the great individualities have the greatest say for humanity, in certain sense they only express what the need of the whole time is, also of the minor individualities, such a thing can present itself clearly, if we look at the greater individualities.\nThere one can say rightly, such a human being like Goethe felt the need to express himself about spiritual-scientific results by no means a century ago as this happens today on the ground of spiritual science. Where the question arose to speak about something that lies beyond the sense-perceptible, Goethe referred also like so many human beings often to the fact that this should be a thing of faith but not of strict science. He also often said that strictly speaking the communication of generally valid results on this ground could be hardly very fertile if one person communicates them to the other.\nWe are so advanced in the course of a century concerning the whole development of humanity not only that Goethe lived in an age which had no telegraphs, phones, railways and no such prospects as they come up to the aeronautics; we also face results of the spiritual development which are different from those at Goethe's lifetime. You can see this in a concrete case. There is a nice conversation that Goethe had with a certain Falk (Johannes Daniel F., 1768-1826, poet) at the occasion of Wieland's death (Christoph W., 1733-1813, poet and writer). There he expressed himself about the fields that deal with that which goes beyond birth and death of the human being that is not frail with his sensuous cover, which is immortal. The immediate occasion of the death of Wieland, very respected by him, urged Goethe to express himself in popular way towards a person like Falk who met him with understanding. What he said there is extremely typical if we go into the question of the significance of the spiritual science for the present.\n“You know for a long time that the ideas which are without a firm foundation in the sensory world do not convince me in spite of their remaining value because relating to nature I want to know and not to suppose and believe only. Concerning the personal continuation of our soul after death, it is like that: it does not at all contradict the long-term observations, which I have done of the state of our and all beings in nature; on the contrary, it arises from it with new strength of evidence. However, it is another issue how much of this personality deserves to continue, we must leave that to God. Provisionally, I want to note this only at first: I assume different classes and hierarchies of the primeval components of all beings, as it were, of the starting points of all phenomena in nature which I would like to call souls, because the ensoulment of the whole starts from these, or even monads — let us maintain this Leibniz expression! To express the simplicity of the simplest being, there would be no better one. Now some of these monads or starting points are — as experience shows — so small, so slight that they are suited at most only for a subordinated service and existence; others against it are strong and tremendous. Hence, the last capture everything into their circle that approaches them and transform it into a body, into a plant, into an animal, or even into something higher, into a star. They continue doing this, until the small or the big world whose intention lies spiritually in them also appears bodily. I would like to call the last only souls. It follows from this that there are world monads, world souls, like ant monads, ant souls, and that both in their origin even if they are not completely one, however, are related in their primeval being. Every sun, every planet carries a higher intention, a higher mission in itself, so that its developments must come about as regularly and according to the same law as the rosebush develops leaves, stalks and blossoms. You may call this an idea or a monad as you want, I also have nothing against it; it is enough that this intention exists invisibly and earlier than the visible development in nature...”\nIn certain sense, Goethe speaks at that time of that about which we shall often speak in these talks here: about the reincarnation of the human soul. He remarks: after all what he has formed as a view of the human world, animal world et cetera, and such a view would not contradict what he built up as science. One can now easily consider what Goethe's quotation means if one reflects that Goethe had made a discovery in 1784 which would be sufficient to keep his name until the most distant times, even if he had performed nothing else: the discovery of the so-called inter-maxillary in the upper jaw of the human being. There is in the upper jaw of the human being — as with the animals also — an intermediary bone. Just at that time, one denied this when Goethe entered the natural sciences. One looked only for externally discerning attributes where it concerned the differentiation of human being and animal, and had the opinion that the animals would have an intermediary bone in the upper jaw that would not exist with the human being. This differentiates the animal organisation from the human one. Goethe did not want to admit it, he could not believe that in this subordinated state the difference is to be given between human being and animal, and attempted with all available means to show that the human inter-maxillary grows together, indeed, already shortly after the birth, but exists as rudiment and is not absent with the human being. He succeeded in proving the fact that there is no outer difference between the human being and the animal.\nFrom this starting point Goethe looked around in all fields of the natural sciences and knew the scientific way of thinking of his time very well. Yes, he was so far ahead of his time that today Darwinists who want to reinterpret Goethe in the sense of Darwin can allege: Goethe is a precursor of Darwin. Although Goethe is rooted in the scientificity of his time this way and goes beyond it, he can say, nevertheless, what he has formed as a view of the immortal part of the human being what is reminiscent of reincarnation and is compatible with his scientific ideas. What Goethe could say at that time, every human being could say to himself. Other researchers who tried to gain knowledge for life scientifically were in the same position.\nIt is typical for it that one refers on Haeckel's ground to a great action of Kant, to the foundations of the mechanical worldview by Kant, and to the General Natural History and Theory of the Sky or Attempt of the Constitution and the Mechanical Origin of the Whole World Edifice that Kant wrote in 1775. You need only to take the Reclam booklet (cheap edition) and to examine the end. Then you ask, how do those who stand on the ground of mere Haeckelism face Kant if he speaks of the immortality of the human soul where he speaks about the great secrets of the human soul, about the prospect of the habitability of other heavenly bodies and of the human soul living on on other planets? How do such followers of Haeckel position themselves to the possibility of the reincarnation of the human being as it appears in this writing by Kant? Today one refers to things so that one is surprised, if those who refer to Kant would have really read these things!\nThe things are quite different in the present from those one or one and a half centuries ago. At that time, the tendency prevailed that one spoke about the matters of the spiritual life in a certain way, which wanted to have nothing to do with science. Since one felt that one speaks there of something that does not contradict what science can claim. Everybody who opens himself to the science of that time feels if he takes up anything scientific only by the popular portrayals that he can speak like Goethe: the convictions which I have formed of a spiritual life may they be like a personal faith, however, they contradict in no point what is science today. The things have changed and become very difficult compared with science. One must consider that after Goethe's death the big discoveries of the human and animal cells by Schleiden (Matthias Jacob Sch., 1804-1881, botanist) and Schwann (Robert Sch., 1810-1882, physiologist) happened, and that an elementary organism presented itself to the senses first. What does one need to talk of a “life on other heavenly bodies” et cetera, if one can see the bodies building themselves up with an animal or a plant by cooperation of the wholly material, sense-perceptible cells?\nThen there came the other immense achievements. We only need to consider the impact on the human thinking, when Kirchhoff (Gustav Robert K., 1827-1884, physicist) and Bunsen (Robert Wilhelm B., 1811-1899, chemist) brought the spectral analysis that extended the view of the human being to distant worlds. From this spectral analysis, one could conclude that the material existence, which we find on the earth, is the same also on the most distant heavenly bodies, so that one was allowed to speak of a unity of the material in the whole universe. Every day increases what can face us in this field. I could point to hundreds and hundreds of such things that worked revolutionary. That is why the conviction originated that one has to speak of the results of the scientific method in the following way, wait for what the scientific research has to say about the reasons of life, about the origin of the intellectual life from the brain activity, and do not talk of a spiritual world fantastically that should form the basis of all! -- One can understand this very easily.\nThus, the sight of the scientific has changed for the human power of persuasion. Goethe is in this respect really a predecessor of Darwin. Nevertheless, he rose according to the spirit of his time from his physical-scientific researches, from the development of the living beings from the imperfect to the perfect, to a wholly spiritual worldview that searches the supersensible, the spiritual behind everything sensuous. The human beings who go forward in the same way in our time believe that the scientific results urge to stop at that what these scientific results should be, and that every spiritual region originates from the sensuous background. The human being today cannot say in the same way as a century ago that that does not contradict the scientific results what he knows by his personal religious conviction or believes to know or has appropriated of the supersensible world, but it seems that it contradicts even very much. It seems not only to this or to that serious researcher of truth and striving human being in such a way.\nIf this is the case, we must say: for our present that persuasive power, the reasons of conviction which could be still presented a century ago or still later, without contradicting the external scientific results, are no longer immediately authoritative. Today it requires more serious impulses in order to maintain what is said about the supersensible world compared with the strict scientific results of science. We must be able to dress what we are authorised to believe about the spiritual world in the same way, to gain it in the same objective way, as the scientific results — only on other ground — can be attained. Only of a spiritual science which works with the same logic, with the same healthy sense of truth as the natural sciences one will feel that it can position itself beside the immensely advanced natural sciences. If one considers this, one understands in which sense spiritual science has become a necessity for our present. One also understands that this spiritual science can meet solely the longings of which I have spoken. And these longings exist because unconsciously works with many human souls what has just been characterised — just with the best seekers of truth and in a field where one does not anticipate it at all — if one quotes how the human thirst for knowledge strives out of that which one always said in the scientific field once.\nIndeed, the mathematical field, the field of geometry seems to be confirmed concerning its application to the sensuous world. Who would like to believe, so to speak, light-heartedly that anybody can allege that the statements of mathematics, of geometry could be shaken anyhow? Nevertheless, it is typical that there were spirits in the course of the nineteenth century who have soared to invent geometries, mathematics purely mathematically, by strict mathematical investigations that do not apply to the sensuous world, but to quite different worlds. That means there were mathematically thinking people who felt that they could exceed what there has been up to now as mathematics and geometry and could invent a geometry that applies to another sensuous world! There are not only one, but also several such geometries. Mathematically trained people know something about the names Riemann (Bernhard R., 1826-1866), Lobatschewski (Nikolaus L., 1793-1856), Bolyai (Johann B., 1802-1860). We do not want to go into that closer, because it matters only that such a thing can originate from the human recognising. — There are, for example, geometries, which do not acknowledge the sentence: the three corners of a triangle amount to 180 degrees but for which the triangles have another quality, so that, for example, the three corners of a triangle are always less than 180 degrees. Another case: in our Euclidean geometry, one can draw only one parallel through a point to a given line. Geometries have been invented where one can draw endlessly many parallels through a point to another line. That is, there were spirits who felt urged not only to be keen on other worlds but also to invent geometries for them! This is very indicative that even in mathematical heads a longing prevailed to exceed what is in the immediately surrounding world.\nI want still to state one thing only that our time needs something that one can obtain from spiritual science. It will turn out\n\nThat, indeed, the real spiritual-mental nature of the human being repeatedly appears in renewed lives on our earth,\nThat reincarnation is a similar fact in the spiritual-mental field as the theory of evolution on a subordinated stage for the animal realm,\nThat the human soul has developed through incarnations that it experienced during past lives, and experiences in future lives.\n\nIndeed, the art of disproving will very vehemently oppose such things in the present. However, one can already state that the present has a deep need for such results that are connected with that by which the human being can orientate himself about his determination, his position to the outer world.\nThe human being has only started for short time to position himself properly as a historical being in the world evolution. This has happened by the external educational means. Think of the limited scope of view of the humanity of the fourteenth, fifteenth centuries, before the art of printing spread the educational means. Questions did not yet arise to the human heart like that: how can our soul face with satisfaction what we recognise as the historical progress? Here is the origin of a question that has become a question of the heart for many human beings today. The historical progress shows that new achievements, which are also valuable for the inner development of the soul that new facts enter the stream of the progressive humanity. There the human being must ask himself, what is the innermost nature of the human being? Were the human beings of the past condemned to have experienced their lives in a vague existence and not to take interest in the products of a later progress? What is the share of the human being of the successive developments of the human race?\nAgainst this question, one may object many things. Here should be talk of the fact only that, indeed, from a deep feeling of the human soul the question, the riddle originates: is it possible that today a human soul lives which cannot integrate achievements which are stamped on the stream of the human evolution in future because its life is enclosed between birth and death?\nThis question gets a basic meaning for the confessors of Christianity. He, who stands on the ground of a purified Christianity, differentiates the pre-Christian epoch and the post-Christian epoch in the evolution of humanity and speaks of the fact that a stream of new spiritual life flowed from the Christ event, which was not there earlier for the earthly humanity. There the question must arise for such a human being: what about the souls, which have lived before the Christ event, before the announcement of that which streamed out of the Christ event?\nThe human being can put such a question. Spiritual science answers to it not only theoretically, but in such a way that it is also adequate to him. For it shows that the same human beings who took up achievements of the pre-Christian time, are reincarnated, after the stream of the Christian development had begun, so that nobody can lose what enters the culture. Thus, something grows out of history for spiritual science that is not only abstract ideas, but spiritual science speaks of history as of something in which the human being is involved with his innermost being everywhere. Because the human horizon has expanded by the modern educational means, now one puts this question in another sense than a century ago when the scope of view of the human beings was more limited. A desire for answer exists which spiritual science can only satisfy.\nIf we take into consideration this — and we could continue speaking for hours that way and could bring in many examples that are indicative that spiritual science has significance for the present because the present must ask very much for its results -, then we get an idea of the significance of spiritual science for the present. All talks of this winter shall serve only to collect material from the most different sides to show the spiritual-scientific results and their significance for the human life, as for the satisfaction of the highest need of the human being generally.\nI would only like to say at the end, today one of the most usual allegations against spiritual science is that one says, fortunately, the natural sciences have succeeded in getting a uniform principle to explain the world monistically. Spiritual science is almost a term that causes antipathies by itself in many people because it puts up a sort of dualism compared with this epistemologically beneficial monism!\nOne sins a lot with such catchwords. Is the principle explaining the universe uniformly broken because two currents co-operate in the universe, an outer one, and an inner one, which meet in the soul? Is it not allowed to assume that what approaches the soul from two sides — namely from the sensory experience on one side and from the spiritual-scientific research on the other side -, is still based on a uniform existence and appears only for the human view at first in two streams? Has one to take monism definitely superficially? If this were the case that the monistic principle would be thereby broken, then somebody may also state that the monistic principle is broken if he concedes that water consists of hydrogen and oxygen. Hydrogen and oxygen can still have a uniform origin even if they combine to water. The sensuous and the supersensible worlds can also have a uniform origin even if one is also forced by the facts of the natural sciences and spiritual science to say: in the human soul two streams unite, one of which from the sensory side, the other from the spiritual side. Then, indeed, one cannot show the uniform, the monon (the only), straight away, but it does not contradict the view of a monistic world. What appears from two sides that way attains the strength of the full reality only if we recognise it consisting of two currents. If we look at the outside world, we get a worldview by our senses and our reason that does not show its origin: the spirit. If we go the ways of the spiritual-scientific research and experience the impetus in our soul, we find the spirit. Matter and spirit meet in the soul. Joining spirit and matter within our soul delivers the true spiritual reality only!\nThus, you allow me to summarise the just said in the words, which give the same possibly in poetic form what all human beings felt at all times who impartially endeavoured to obtain a view of spirit and matter. Spiritual science relating to natural sciences teaches us to recognise that it is true:\nThe wealth of materials approaches the human sense Mysteriously from the depths of the universe. The spirit's word flows clarifying In the soul's grounds from cosmic heights full of contents. They meet in the human inside to reality full of wisdom."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-2",
    "title": "Life and Death",
    "date": "27 Oct 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/Singles/19101027p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "This is the 2nd of 15 lectures given by Rudolf Steiner at Berlin, that date from October, 1910 through March of 1911. There are also two “extra” lectures included in this lecture series, from December 14th 1911 and January 25th 1912. The title of these lectures is: Spiritual Science's Answer to the Large Questions of the Present Time , in German the title is: Antworten der Geisteswissenschaft auf den Grossen Fragen des Daseins .\nTranslator Unknown\nIf we take note of many an observation which is made on the relation of man to Life and Death to-day, we may be reminded of a sentence which Shakespeare gives to the gloomy Hamlet:\nImperious Caesar, dead, and turned to clay, Might stop a bold to keep the wind away; O, that the earth, which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw!\nSuch an utterance might be made by many an one who is subject to the suggestive effect of the many conceptions of the times which are acquired in the field of natural science, and who, might feel himself moved to follow up all the movements after death of the separate substances which compose the human body. He might feel himself justified in asking first of all: “What becomes of the oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, etc., which build up the human body after the death of man?” Quite apart from the fact that there are many people to-day who are influenced by the suggestive phrase: “the indestructibility of Matter,” there are, again, others who entirely lose the ability of imagining anything in the whole vast unending space other than matter and its operations.\nWe can see from many an observation on the nature of death, or one which establishes the idea of an antithesis between life and death, how much depends, in expositions of this kind, on establishing conceptions and ideas in the most exact manner possible. It happens again and again that no account is taken of the fact that “death” and “life” form an antithesis which depends on the nature of that to which it refers, and that, one who makes a closer observation dare not speak in the same way of the death of a plant or an animal as of a man. To what extent this is the case shall be explained in this lecture. How little we understand the expressions used in this sphere may be shown by the fact that in the physiology of the great naturalist, Huxley, for instance, the following is to be found. It is there said, that we must distinguish between the local death and the death of the tissue in an organism, and it is expressly stated that the life of man depends on the brain, lungs and heart, but that this is a threefold condition which we could really reduce into a twofold one; that, in fact, if we could maintain the breathing by artificial means, we might quite well remove the brain of a man and he would continue to live. That means that life would continue, even if the brain were taken away. That is to say, that when a man is no longer able to form a conception of what is around him or of what is taking place within him, and if life could be maintained merely as a life-process in the organism through artificial breathing, the organism would still continue to live in the sense of this definition of natural science, and we could not really speak of death, although no brain were there at all. That is an idea which ought to make clear to anyone who — though he might not care for a life without a brain, at least find such a definition plausible — that this explanation just shows that the definition of life given by natural science is not at all applicable to man in this form. For no one would be able to call the life of an organism — even a human one — the life of man himself, even if other respects the facts hinted at were quite correct.\nNow to-day we are, perhaps, somewhat further advanced even in the field of natural science than ten years ago, when one was almost embarrassed in speaking of life at all, and when all life was traced back to the life of the smallest living creatures. This life in the smallest organisms was looked upon as a complicated chemical process. According to this view, if this definition were extended to a conception of the universe, one could only speak of the smallest parts of life as living on, so that only a conservation of matter could then be spoken of. Now, to-day, on account of the investigations on radium, for instance, the idea of the indestructibility of matter has become a more uncertain one.\nI will now only draw your attention to the fact that natural science to-day is already attempting to speak of a sort of independence, at least of the smallest living creatures. It states that the smallest living creatures propagate themselves by fission; one divides itself into two, two into four, and so on. There we could not admit of a death, for the first lives on in the second and when these die they both live on in the next ones.\nNow those who wished to speak of the immortality of unicellular beings have sought for a definition of death, and just this definition of the nature of death is extremely characteristic. They have found the main characteristic of death is that it leaves a corpse behind, and as unicellular beings leave no corpse behind, they, therefore, cannot really die. Thus the characteristic of that which has to do with the deepest foundations of life is sought in what life leaves behind. Now it will be clear without further explanation, that what remains behind of life passes over gradually into lifeless matter. So lifeless matter now becomes in death the outer organism of the smallest, most complicated living creature. Yet if we wish to take into account the significance which death has for life, we must not look at what is left, at what becomes lifeless matter; but must seek the cause, the principles of life, in life itself, while it is there .\nI said that one cannot speak in the same sense of death in plants, as in animals and man, because an important phenomenon is not taken into consideration there. It is also found in certain of the lower animals, for example, in the ephemera; and consists in the fact that most plants and lower animals have the peculiarity that as soon as the process of fructification is established and the possibility of a new living being is created, the dying off of the old one then begins. In the plant the backward process, the process of dying off, begins the moment it has taken into itself the possibility of forming a new plant. One can therefore say quite certainly of those plants in which this can be observed, that the cause which has taken away life from them lies in the new living being or beings, which have left no life behind in the old being.\nThrough simple reflections one could convince oneself that this is so. There are certain plants which endure, which blossom again and again and bear fruit; and on which ever new plant-forms, like parasites, are, as it were, planted on to the old stem. But there you can convince yourself that they purchase the possibility of recreating themselves by thrusting certain parts of themselves into the realm of the lifeless, into death, — that is to say, they surround themselves with bark. We are quite justified in saying of a plant which can surround itself with bark, which can bear lifeless matter and yet continue to live, that it has a surplus of life; and because of this superfluity which it will not give up — only giving up what is necessary for the young organism — it must make itself secure by thrusting death outside. Thus it can also he said that every living being which possesses the possibility within itself beyond the bringing forth of a new creation, is confronted with the necessity of continually mastering life within itself, since it takes up inorganic lifeless matter. This can be adequately observed both in the animal and in man.\nThere we have a separation between life and death in the being itself. We have an exchange between a living member which develops in one direction, and a continual sinking-into itself of another member which is developing in the direction of death. If we now wish to draw near to the inmost being of man from this point of view, we must certainly bear in mind something of what has often been said before, but which is never superfluous, because it does not as yet belong to the ordinary recognised truth.\nIf we rest on quite ordinary conceptions — as we will to-day in the first half of the lecture — and then proceed to the question of life and death from the point of view of Spiritual Science, we must remember that what is taken into account here is certainly very little recognised to-day, for it has to do with a truth which is just as new to the man of to-day as another truth, which now belongs to the trivialities, was new, and even unknown, to the world of three centuries ago. I have often, pointed out that it is taken for granted to-day by the natural scientist, or by one who builds up his observations on natural-scientific conceptions, that it is an acknowledged fact that “everything living is born from the living.” (Of course, I am speaking here with the limitation which this sentence bears in the world of natural science. We need not embark on the question of primeval generation for instance, for it can be noticed right away that the analogous sentence which is mentioned there is also made use of in the world of Spiritual Science). Not long ago the great natural scientist, Francesco Redi, had to fight for this sentence, “Everything living is born from the living,” with all his energy. For before the appearance of this Naturalist of the 17th century, it. was considered quite possible, not only in lay circles. but even in scientific ones, for new organisms to generate from putrefying river-mud or from decaying organic matter. This was believed of worms and fishes. The idea, that the living can only develop from the living is not yet old, for only a few centuries ago Francesco Redi called forth such a storm of passion that he only just escaped the fate of Giordano Bruno. When we consider how the “fashions of the time” alter, we can judge of the fate of this truth that we must again proclaim here. For this truth, “Life can only originate from life”, called forth at that time a storm of anger. Those who feel themselves impelled to draw from the well of knowledge similar truths in other spheres, are no longer delivered to the flames of the funeral pile to-day. That is no longer the fashion. But they are made fun of; a man who communicates such things is turned into ridicule; those who are impelled to proclaim such things as relate to Spiritual, development, are condemned to suffer a Spiritual death. But the fate of the above-mentioned truth also consists in its having become a self-evident fact, a, triviality, for him who is capable of judging.\nThat error, then, was the cause of this truth, “Life can only originate from life”, not being recognised? A quite simple error in observation! The scientists looked at that which was immediately before than, but did not try to penetrate to the fact that the origin of a living creature lies in a seed left behind by another living creature; so that a new living organism of a certain kind can only originate because a former living organism leaves behind it a seed of a similar kind. That is to say, they looked at the environment of the developing organism, but should really have looked at that which was left behind by another living organism which was developing within this environment. This was done all through the centuries, up to the time of Francesco Redi. Quite interesting details might be gathered from books which had just as much weight in the 7th and 8th centuries as the authoritative writings of the most modern natural scientist of to-day, and in which was noted and classified quite exactly how, for instance, hornets develop from the decaying carcase of an ox; wasps from a donkey's carcase, etc. That was all nicely set out. Exactly in the same way in which mistakes were made in those times, mistakes are being made to-day in regard to the soul and spirit of man. How is this?\nA human being enters into existence and his individual development, begun at birth, is observed. on into later life. It is seen how the form, the different capacities and talents develop. (We will speak more exactly of this development in a later lecture). But if the scientists wish to know the nature of the human form, the nature of that with which we are dealing, they ask the question: “What are the hereditary relationships? From what sort of environment was the man born?” That is just the same method as when they look at the mud surrounding the worm which is coming forth from it, and not upon the egg. In what is formed as disposition, as different capacities in man, an exact distinction must. be made between what is characteristic, what is brought over from parents and grandparents and so on, and a certain kernel which he who observers truly will not fail to recognise. Only he who approaches the spirit and soul-element as did the naturalists before Francesco Redi will be able to deny that there is a kernel in man which presents itself clearly and which cannot be referred back to what is inherited from parents and grandparents, etc. In what is developing in a man we therefore have to distinguish that which comes from the environment from that which can never be produced from that environment.\nAs regards the exterior of a living plant or animal, we shall always find that the new being coming forth is in reality concerned with developing according to the species of its predecessors. Take the highest animals. How far do they carry that out? As far as is in accordance with the species, and for this they are planned. Certainly many will say: “Has, then, a horse, a dog or a cat no individuality?” And they will suppose that one might just as well describe the individuality of a cat, a horse and so on — perhaps even write their biography — as we could that of a human being. If anyone likes to do this, let him do so, but we should not take it as real, but only as symbolical, as when, for example, a school task is set for pupils, such as was set for myself and my school-fellows, for which we had to write the biography of our pens! One could, then, even speak of the biography of a pen: But where truth is concerned it is not a question of attending to analogies and comparisons, but of laying hold of the essentials. What is individual in man is not that which makes him one of the species, but that which makes of him the quite distinct individual that every man is. Every man is working towards the formation of what is individual in him, just as the plant works towards the formation of the species. Every development, every advance in education or in historical evolution, rests on the fact that man goes a stage further than the mere species, in the development of the individuality.\nIf there were in each man no individual spirit and soul kernel which develops in a Spiritual way, as the animal develops in his species, there would be no history. One could then only speak of an evolution of the human race, but not of a history or of a cultural development. Therefore, natural science speaks of the development of the species, of a kind of evolution in the horse, but not of a history.\nIn the development of every man we have to see a spirit and soul kernel which has the same significance as the species for an animal. The species in the animal kingdom corresponds to the individual in man. Now in the animal kingdom every creature which tends towards what is according to species, repeats the species of his ancestors and can only originate on the basis of the physical nature of the seed of his ancestors; so the individual part of each separate man cannot originate from anything which is here in the physical world, but solely from something which is of a Spiritual nature. That is to say that a Spiritual kernel, which enters into being at the birth of man, does not merely refer back to the species “man”, in so far as man goes back to a Spiritual ancestor, to a being who has progressed, who does not belong individually to the species “man”, not, indeed, to any “species”, but to this same human individuality. If then, a man be born, there is born with him an individual kernel which is not attached to anything else than to this individual human substance. As the animal seeks his species so does man seek his own individual human being. That is to say that this individual kernel when it appears at birth has been here before, just as the germ of the species was there for the animal. We must look in the past for the spirit and soul-substance, which is the Spiritual — not physical — kernel of this individuality which is developing Spiritually. Only a man who cannot see that the soul and spirit do not develop from within the general human organism, will deny that the conclusions just drawn are correct.\nEvery individual human life thus carries within itself the proof that it already existed before. We are, therefore, led back from an individual human life to an individual Spiritual seed and from this again to another Spiritual seed; that is, we are led from our own individual life back to a former individual life — and then, of course, to our next life. An unbiased observation of human life proves this to be just as much a necessity as the truth proclaimed in the sphere of natural science. Suppose anyone with an unprejudiced mind were to say: “Nothing can be known about that”, then if he draws this conclusion again and again he might end by saying: “I cannot do otherwise than accept this conclusion; if I do not I am sinning against all observation and logic.” In spite of this, however, this truth about the repeated earth-lives is still but little recognised; but this truth that the Spiritual can only originate from the Spiritual, will certainly make its mark in human cultural life and will be more quickly accepted than the other truth which has been characterised. The time will come when men will realise that beliefs have changed in this respect, just as we do not now believe that lower animals, fish, etc., could originate from river-mud.\nIf we follow, in the further course of its life, this individual kernel of the human being which one can see, as it were, come into being at birth, it appears to a certain extent in a. two-fold aspect; and this more especially in the growing human being, in youth. It appears there as something which requires a progressive development of the whole man. And he who can truly observe the intimate life of youth, who has learned to observe the child, not only from the outside but also from within, who remembers what he himself experienced in this respect, will admit that what is in him now was not there up to a certain age, but only showed itself later as a feeling of power, as a feeling of life, as a content of life which works in an extremely elevating way. What we carry within us as the individual core of our being works not only on the outer living form, but continues to work even into the most elementary formations and functions of life. When man arrives at a certain maturity and has the opportunity of taking up many things in the outside world, then this individual kernel of his being works so that he enriches himself, adapts himself to the outer world and gathers experiences. When, however, we observe this correlation between the individual core of man's being and what comes to pass in the course of his life — not only through what he learns and hears but also through experiences such as happiness and sorrow, pain and joy, we shall then see in this Spiritual life itself the same correlation on a higher plane, to that between the new embryo of the plant which develops in the blossom of the old one and the old plant whose life is taken away from it by the new seed.\nIf we extend this observation to the tree, we shall be able to say: “There, also, life is ever taken away, in that the tree turns into wood in the plant kingdom, but in its place certain things in the tree change into dead lifeless products: inorganic bark surrounds the tree.” In the same way we see, when we look at human life more closely, not only a progressive development but one which allows the Spiritual being of man to advance and grow, allows it to unite itself to the outer world; and as it grows ever more and more, we see it coming into conflict with the old condition; that is to say, it comes into conflict with its own self. That happens because it could in its youth build up and form organs according as it required them, while now in the further course of life this process is no longer possible; it must now go on living in a hardened life condition. So we see that when our life enriches itself by development in the course of time, when we take in what is new and thereby enrich the individual core of our being, we come into conflict with what envelops this kernel, with what we have built around it, and which is in process of growing. As long as we grow, and in so far as we thus grow, we do not take up into ourselves any Spiritual process of death. Only when we receive what is exterior to ourselves do we take in the Spiritual process of death. That is really the case throughout the whole of life, though it is less apparent in childhood than in later life. So we can say that in the realm of the spiritual, a Spiritual growing and dying takes place in the inner being of man. But in what does that process which takes place there consist? We can understand it well if we look at it for once in a lower form and take under observation anything from the realm of ordinary life, in order to form, as it were, conceptions and ideas concerning the higher realms of being. Let us take fatigue, for instance. We speak of fatigue both in the animal and human being. We must first gain an idea of the nature of fatigue. I cannot now go into all the ideas which have been collected on the subject, but we will observe the whole process of fatigue in relation to the life process. We can say that man becomes tired because he uses his muscles, and therefore fresh forces must be carried to the muscles. In this case we might say that man tires because he uses up his muses through work of some kind. Such a definition appears very plausible at first sight, only, it is not true. But it is the case to-day that we work with ideas which just merely touch the surface of things lightly, we do not wish to penetrate to the depths, For just think, if the muscles could really become fatigued, how would it be then with the muscles of the heart? They do not tire at all; they work day and night continuously, and the same is the case with other muscles in the human and animal bodies. This gives one the notion that it is not correct to say that in the relationship between work and muscle there is anything which can explain fatigue.\nWhen does an animal or a man become tired? When their work is not occasioned through the organism nor through the life-process, but by the outer world itself; that is to say, by the world with which a living being may come into relationship through its organs. Thus, when a living being carries out work by means of it consciousness, the organs concerned becomes fatigued:. In the life-process itself there is nothing which could occasion fatigue. So that the life-process, the whole of the life organs„ must be brought in contact with something which does not belong to them, if they are to become fatigued.\nI can only draw your attention to this important fact, in the development of which some extremely fruitful points of view can be found. Thus, only that which is brought to a living being by way of a conscious process, of an incitement to consciousness, can occasion fatigue. It would consequently be absurd to speak of the fatigue of plants. We can, therefore, say that in everything that can fatigue a living being something which is foreign to it must really be present, something which does not belong to its own nature must be introduced into it.\nWe, can therefore, say that every disturbance of the life-process which comes about though fatigue, points to the fact, even in a quite inferior realm, that that which we have in our soul-life is not born simply from our physical life, rather does it stand positively in contradiction to the laws of that life. The contradiction between the laws of the life of consciousness and those of life and the life-process alone explains what is present in fatigue — of this you can convince yourselves if you consider it more exactly. For this reason we can say that fatigue is an expression testifying that that which comes to a life-process must be foreign to it, if it is able to disturb it. Now, the life-process can really equalise what is used up through fatigue, by sleep and rest. What is used up is compensated for by something new, which enters in place of the life-processes.\nNow, an inner process of exhaustion appears in the individual human life, for the reason that man enters into relationship with the outside world. The old, which was present in the germ, enters into an exchange with the new. The result is expressed in that the individual life-kernel is transformed during individual life, but it must also for this reason throw off what has become wooden, as it were, what it has itself formed from its birth onwards. The cause of death is the calling to a new life within the human soul, just as in the animal organism the disposition to fatigue can only be caused by its entering into exchange-relationship with what is new and foreign to it. We might, therefore, say that the process of death, of gradually dying off, is one which is better understood if one takes its opposite into consideration, in which the soul stands in relationship with the organic, and which expresses itself in fatigue. Hence, we really have the seed of death in our innermost being during the whole of our individual life. We could not develop further, however, we could not possibly carry what we already are at birth a step further, if we did not in ourselves associate death with life. As fatigue is connected with the execution of exterior work, so is the thrusting off, the killing of the outer covering, with enrichment and higher development of the individual life-kernel. The psychic and Spiritual process of life and death — represents with great clarity what we might express thus; “We purchase the higher form, the further development of our life, by the beneficial act of thrusting off from us what we were before. No development would be possible if we could not thrust-off the old, for we advance through, and together with what we have worked into the new of our soul and spirit. What forces are in that? Such forces as are the fruits of our past life! We certainly can experience the seeds of these fruits, and can experience our observations of life, we can do much else in life, but we cannot organise these into ourselves nor really carry them over into our external covering. For we do not build our covering of what we learn in one life — or at most only to a limited extent — we build it according to what we have become in our last life. We can, therefore, only build up our life by making use of what we have acquired in our past life, and we can continue to develop by thrusting off the old from us — as the tree does its bark — and passing into death. With what we then take with us through death, we are able to build up our next life, for it contains in itself the same forces as have built up our Spiritual growth when we develop freshly and happily in our youth. It is of the same nature as these. We have absorbed it from our life experiences and with it build ourselves a future living organism, a future bodily covering, which will carry within it as the germ of a future blossom, what we have gained in one life. With regard to such things as these the question is always asked, over and over again: “What help is it, after all, to man, to hear about repeated earth-lives, if he is not able to remember his former lives, if the memory of his former lives is not present?”\nIt lies, indeed, in the nature of the Spiritual culture of to-day that we are not yet in a position to meditate and reflect upon questions of the soul and spirit life as freely as over the things of natural life. But we must make it clear to ourselves that it is possible to develop ideas and conceptions on these questions of the soul and spirit life, in exactly the same way. We can only do this if we really observe it more exactly, if we ask ourselves what must be the position of the human memory in general; what is the nature of the human memory? There is a point of time in the personal human life, which can lead very easily to the gaining of opinions on these questions. It is the following:\nWe all know that there is a time in the normal life of man to-day, of which there is no memory in later life. It is the time of his earliest childhood. In the normal life of to-day man remembers up to a certain point of his childhood, then memory disappears.\nAlthough it is quite clear to him that it is his own Spiritual I, or ego, which has built up his life, yet he lacks the power of stretching his memory beyond this point. He who examinee many children's lives, will be able to make one observation from them. It can of course only be substantiated in external life, but notwithstanding this, it is correct. From the observation of the soul of a child we discover that remembrance goes back just as far as to the point of time when the idea of “I,” the conception of his own Ego, arises within him. That is an external important fact At the moment when the child, of his own accord, no longer says: “Charles: wants this,” or, “May wants that,” but says “I want this,” from the point of time when the conscious conception of the Ego begins, remembrance also begins. Whence comes this remarkable fact? It comes because something else is necessary for remembrance, besides the coming into contact, as it were, once or always with an object. We can come into contact with an object ever so often without any recollection of it being necessarily called forth. Remembrance rests, namely, on a quite definite soul-process, a quite definite Spiritual inner life-process, of which we can become aware if we take the following into account.\nOne must distinguish between the perception of an object or experience, and the conception or idea of this object or experience. In the process of perception we have something that can always recur if we stand before the object again; but in the experience we have something else besides. When we come into contact with something, and have taken in an impression of it through the eye or ear, we have then taken into ourselves something more than an inner impression of it; what we take with us is that which remains in the conception or idea and which can embody itself in the memory. That, however, must first come into being. I know that what I have just said will be very much doubted by valiant followers of Schopenhauer, by those who assert that our conception of the universe is only our idea of it. But that lies in the confusion of perception with idea. Both must be emphatically differentiated. The idea is something which is reproduced. No matter how often the outer experience can arise, if it does not receive the inner impression of the idea, it cannot be incorporated in the memory; when, on the other hand, it is stated that the idea is nothing more than what presents itself to the perception, we need only bring to notice that the idea of a hot piece of steel, no matter how hot, will quite certainly not burn any one; but the sense-experience of it will. There we have the difference between idea and sense-perception. Therefore we an say that the idea is a sense-experience turned inwards. But with this turning inwards, with this outer rebound of the object, which is in reciprocal relationship with the inner being of man, and through which the inner impression is occasioned, something else comes into consideration. Whatever is experienced inwardly in our sense-life is embodied in our Ego by every sense-impression, and by everything that we can experience in the outer world. A sense-perception can even be there without being incorporated in the Ego. In the outer world it is impossible for an idea to be kept in the memory, if it be not received inwardly into the realm of the Ego. So that in every conception we form from a sense-experience and which can be retained in the memory, the Ego stands as the point of departure. An idea which comes into our soul-life from outside, can in no way be separated from the Ego. I know, indeed, that I am speaking figuratively; but all the same these things signify a reality, as we shall see in the course of the next lectures.\nWe can imagine that the experience of the Ego presents something like the inner surface of a sphere, seen from outside; then the sense-experiences come along and the self-mirroring of these experiences within the sphere give rise to the idea. For that, however, the Ego must be present in every single sense-perception. The Ego-experience is in everything which can be embodied in the memory; it is actually like a mirror which rays back the experiences to us within; but the Ego itself must be there. From this we learn that as long as the child does not receive the perceptions of ideas in such a way that they become conceptions, as long as they only approach the child from the outside as sense-perceptions, and are only experienced externally between the Ego and the outer world without being transformed into an Ego-experience, as long as the child has no conception of the Ego, then no Ego-mirror, as it were, veils from him what is round about him. Just as long as that lasts, one notices that the child imagines into the surroundings many things which adults do not understand. Only through the memory of what is past, can that emerge which the Ego has already taken up, so that it is thereby pressed into the memory. When the Ego-perception appears, the Ego places itself before the ideas as a mirror; but what lies before the time of the Ego-perception can not be called forth into the memory. Therefore man always comes into touch with the outer world in such a way that his Ego experiences all the events with him, his Ego is always there. This does not imply that everything must enter his consciousness, only that his experiences do not remain merely as sense-perceptions but are transformed into ideas.\nSo we can now say that the inmost kernel of man, from whose centre has developed that which has now been described as passing on from incarnation to incarnation, is veiled by the Ego-conception, as is usually found in man. Man places himself before his memory with his Ego-development of to-day. It is thus quite explicable that his memory only extends as far as the sense world.\nNow, can a proof be offered, through experience itself, that this can become other than it is? Can we speak of an “Extension of Memory” back into former incarnations? That is self-evident from the mere definition, if it is grasped, of what lies behind the individual Ego centre, which we ourselves cover over, as it were. If we begin to grasp it we met also perceive our inmost nature and being, we see what man does in human life; — not only what he does in common, but in his own individual life. Is there a possibility of looking behind the Ego, as it were? Yes, certainly there is. This lies in that inner soul-life of which I have already spoken, in the introductory lecture. If a man really undertakes to develop his Soul, by a severe and methodical training, in such a way that the slumbering forces within it begin to germinate, and the soul stretches out beyond itself, he can only do so by appropriating, with a certain inner renunciation, ideas which are not such as those in which the ego-experience is immediately present. The Ego-experience places everything in which it takes part before the kernel of one's being. For the training of the soul man must therefore appropriate ideas in which the Ego-experience is not present. For that, reason the inner soul exercises which a man undertake must be done in a quite definite way. What he embodies in his soul-life depends on the content of the meditation, and he must embody something that certainly in acceptable to the inner nature of the soul, but which does not, relate to anything external. What is there that is not related to anything external? Only meditation; but meditation is as a rule applied to the outer world, therefore it is not serviceable to him who wishes to rise to the higher worlds. A life of idea must therefore be developed which calls forth, in pictures and symbols which are continually placed before the soul, such an activity in the Ego that it would form ideas it never could have formed before when it wished to acquire the truth of the ordinary sense-world. The soul must therefore incorporate into itself pictures and symbols which do not appear when we survey the external through out Ego-experience.\nWhen we observe this, we have the following experience, about which we can only say something definite by pointing to that condition into which men enters again and again, namely, the condition of sleep. Through felling asleep, all ideas, all pain end sorrow, and so on, which man has experienced during the day, sink into indefinite obscurity, The whole conscious life of man goes down into indefinite obscurity and returns when the man wakes up again in the morning. Compare the life of consciousness in waking-up and in going to sleep. So long as man obtains only conscious impressions from the external life of the senses, he brings back with him in the morning, only what he had in his consciousness in the evening. He wakes up again with the same content in his consciousness; he remembers the same things, thinks the same thoughts, and so on. But when a man undertakes, in the specified manner, an inner training in which the Ego is not present, the position is different. He then notices, certainly, that his first step in progress consists in feeling on awaking, enriched through sleep; he feels that what he had taken up before going to sleep comes back to him with a richer content. So that he can now say: “Now I have looked behind the Spiritual world which the Ego does not cover up and, as a fruit of that, I embody into the life of my consciousness something that I had not gained from the sense-world, for I have brought it with me out or the world of sleep.”\nSuch are the first steps of progress in one who is leading a Spiritual life of the soul.\nNow, the further possibility steps in that he may now, even during the waking-day life, fill himself with a content not permeated by the Ego-experience, although the Ego is there. The Ego-experience must take its place beside this content, just as it does with the content of all physical experiences. If. we take this into account we must say that he alone who is able to look behind the Ego can gaze into the Spiritual content of a human being — he who treads such a path will often come near to developing certain feelings. The nature or these feelings will also show the nature of the way. Thus we must learn: — to be free from desire and especially to overcome fear and anxiety as regards coming events. We must learn to say in a calm and passionless way: “No matter what comer to me, I will accept it.” and we must not only put this to ourselves as a dry abstract conception, but must make it part of our innermost feeling. We need not become fatalists on this account (a fatalist thinks, that everything happens of itself), but we must use this means of intervening in life. If we are able to instil into the Ego this absolute balance as regards feeling and sensation, it drives with such force towards the Spiritual being of man that it separates the Ego from the perceptions which are already in our consciousness. So we remain standing within the Ego-world, yet receive a new world of inner soul-experiences. These make it alone possible for us to see, in its true individual form, the inmost kernel of man's being, which certainly develops from birth onwards as that which springs from a former life, but which could not be recognised before in its true reality. We must first see it as it is, as it really is in the present, and how it works. Now can we remember something towards which we had never turned our eyes? Just as the child has not that in his consciousness which took place before the development of his Ego-perception, so can man not keep in his memory those experiences of his former births which are not based on a knowledge of the inner kernel of man's being, on the feelings and sensations of the soul and spirit kernel, which is in every man.\nHe who really goes through this, who learns above all to purchase for himself a retrospect into former lives by looking towards the future with equanimity and resignation, will see that the former earth-lives are not merely a logical sequence, but that they prove to be a reality through a newly-born memory, which is really called forth. For that, however, one thing is necessary. The possibility of looking into the past can only be purchased by desirelessness, equanimity and passivity towards the future. To the extent to which we are prepared to experience the future in our feelings and sensations and are able to shut out our Ego with regard to the experience of the future, so far are we in a position to look into the past. The mere man develops this equanimity, the more nearly does he approach the point of time when the past earth-lives will become a reality for him. Thus we can give the reason to the objection often made, that for the ordinary human life no remembrance is there. This objection is just as if a child of four were brought to us, with the remark: “This child cannot count”, concluding from this that consequently a man could not, wither count! To this one could only reply: “Wait till the child is ten years old, he will then be able to count; therefore, man can count.” The recollection of former lives is a question of development ! Therefore is it necessary that one should learn to think over what, through the force of logical conclusion. has been taken as the point of the lecture to-day. It will then he found that a living spiritual soul-kernel may be present in man and that we carry it through death into a new life, as we have carried it through birth into this life.\nSo Spiritual Science points in no simple way, yet in a way that is substantially correct, to what, is eternal in man as regards “life” and “death.” And we may say that the logical conclusion about death and life in regard to the human being informs right away that in this human individuality the possibility is also present of gaining the memory of past lives. Then people need no longer say that unless we can remember our past lives they are of no use! Is only that which we can remember of use to us? We bear in us the fruits of past lives; we develop in ourselves in the present life without our knowledge, what we have brought over from former lives; and when we begin to look back into former earth-lives, the memory of them is certainly there. We can then say to ourselves what a good thing it was that in former times we were unable to remember back. This memory of the past can only be won in the way I have characterised as regards feelings and sensations towards the future life, but that is not all; it can only be made endurable by an attitude of soul such as has been described. Should it be aroused by artificial means and should man at the same time lead a life of desires and appetites permeated by egotism, then his soul and spirit-life must lose its balance and he must become unhinged. For certain things belong together, and others repel each other.\nWhat is eternal in man, what comes into life through birth, that goes over from life into the Spiritual worlds through death and reappears in new embodiments; and bound up with that is the fact, that we can only evolve higher in new embodiments if we make use of the fruits of the former life. To-day I wished to point out the relations to the kernel of man's being and these two ideas. When we have this in view we shell no longer give as our answer to the question as to the nature of life and death; “The nature of death is to be learnt from the corpse”. Rather shall we say: We sought in the innermost being of man that which must bring forth new life; but in order that new life may come into being, the old must gradually die off and finally be quite extinguished, just as the old plant when it is one year old dies off, so that the new plant may take life from it. He who observes the world of death in this manner will not consider that which remains behind as a corpse, but will look in every being for those characteristics of life which are carried over into a new life. Although Shakespeare may make the gloomy Danish Prince utter that which to many appears evident from the absolute facts of the science of to-day:\nImperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay Might stop a hole to keep the wind away; O, that the earth; which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw.\nIf such a remark applied to the process of dying, we will yet turn, while observing man from the point of view of Spiritual Science, to the Spiritual kernel of man's being which goes through birth and death and through ever new life. We then gain the assurance, if we do not follow the ways of Oxygen, Carbon, and Nitrogen, but seek the ways of life by considering what the real kernel of Man's being experiences, that we may place opposite the words of Shakespeare this other point of view.\nThe humblest man on Earth, Is a son of Eternity, And overcomes in ever new life The ancient death."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-3",
    "title": "The Human Soul and the Animal Soul",
    "date": "10 Nov 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/UNK1955/19101110p01.html",
    "book_title": "The Human Soul and the Animal Soul; The Human Spirit and the Animal Spirit",
    "content": "You may have noticed that the lecture today on “The Human Soul and the Animal Soul” is to be followed by another in a week's time on “The Human Spirit and the Animal Spirit.” The reason why spirit and soul must be dealt with in two separate lectures will not become completely clear until the next lecture has been given. In the meantime let it be emphasized that when life and existence are viewed in the light of spiritual science, the task is in one respect more difficult than it is in modern science as we know it today, where concepts and ideas which — if things are to be truly comprehended — must be kept separate, are thrown together. And it will be realized that the riddles connected with soul and spirit in animal and in man cannot be solved unless the distinction between soul and spirit is clear and unambiguous.\nWhen we speak of “soul” in the sense of spiritual science, the idea of inwardness, of inner experience, is always bound up with this concept. And when we talk of “spirit” with reference to the world around us, we are clear that in everything we can see or with which we can be confronted, there is a manifestation of spirit. Man would find himself involved in a strange self-contradiction were he not to take for granted the presence of spirit in all the phenomena of existence around him. Without falling into disastrous self-contradiction, nobody can have an intelligent grasp of the external world unless he admits that what he eventually finds in his own spirit concerning this external world — the concepts and ideas he acquires in order to understand outer phenomena — has something to do with the things themselves. If when a man believes he has learned anything from the concepts he has formed about the things of the outer world, he will not admit that there lives in these concepts something that is contained in the things themselves, he can never advance to knowledge — if he is to be true to himself and understand the nature of his own acts of cognition. He alone can speak of knowledge in the real sense who says to himself: “What I can ultimately discover and retain, what I can bring to realization in my spirit in acts of knowledge, must be contained, primarily, in the things themselves. And insofar as I take something into my spirit from the things of the world, no matter to which kingdom they belong, then in all kingdoms I must presuppose the existence of spirit.”\nThis acknowledgment, of course, will not always be forthcoming. But it can only fail to be made when a man has given way to the self-contradiction referred to above. Therefore in speaking of “spirit” we realize that it reveals itself in all worlds, and we try to understand how it pours into, becomes manifest, in these worlds. We speak differently of “soul.” We speak of “soul” when the spiritual — that which we assimilate with our intellect, our reason, and through which we cognize things — when a being experiences the spirit inwardly. We ascribe soul to a being which not only takes in but inwardly experiences spirit, creates out of the spirit. Thus we speak of the soul only when spirit is active in a being confronting us. In this sense we find spirit inwardly creative in man and in animal.\nIf one clings to current ideas it is easy to disavow many things and above all to disavow the results of spiritual investigation which make it clear that man is not a single-membered but a many-membered being. There are, of course, very many people today — one can well understand this, one can feel with them and discern what is in their minds — who, from their point of view, have reason to be skeptical when it is said as the outcome of spiritual investigation that man must be thought of as composed not only of the physical body that is perceived through the senses and investigated by science, but also of a higher body, the so-called “etheric body” or “life-body” — which is not to be associated with the hypothetical ether of physics. Equally, according to spiritual science, there is a third member of the human being; namely, the astral body; and also a fourth member, the “Ego,” the “I.”\nIf the existence of these members is not acknowledged, it is extremely easy, from the standpoint of modern scientific research, to deny the validity of what is stated by spiritual science; it is easy because before the validity of these things can be recognized the whole character and method of spiritual-scientific research must to some extent be understood.\nTo the spiritual investigator himself, these four members of the human being — physical body, etheric or life body, astral body and ego — that is to say, one visible and three invisible, super-sensible, members — are realities because he has developed the faculties slumbering in his soul in such a way that he can perceive the “higher” bodies of man just as ordinary eyes can perceive the physical body. These “higher” members of man are realities, and as invisible members underlie the visible member, the physical body. But although they are perceptible realities only to the spiritual investigator, it may nevertheless be said that thinking can apprehend what is meant when reference is made to these higher members of man's being. In the etheric body the spiritual investigator recognizes the bearer of all the phenomena of life, of the living, in man. Death ensues when the physical body is deserted by the etheric or life body. Therefore the spiritual investigator sees in this etheric or life body that which prevents the physical body from coming under the sway of the physical and chemical forces active in the physical body. The moment death occurs the physical body becomes a combination of purely chemical and physical forces and processes. That the human body during life is extricated from the sway of these chemical and physical processes which take possession of it immediately [after] death occurs, is due to the etheric or life body. During life the etheric body wrenches the chemical and physical substances and forces from their purely physical operations and surrenders them again to these physical activities only at the moment of death.\nIt is very easy to argue against this, but these arguments fall to the ground when the matter is more deeply understood. Quite apart from the fact that the etheric body is a reality to the spiritual investigator, logical thinking will itself disclose that a living organism is inconceivable without the existence of an etheric or life body. Therefore in spiritual science we ascribe an etheric body also to the plants. We say: Whereas man has still higher super-sensible members — the astral body and the “I” — the plant has only physical body and etheric body; and a mineral, as we see it in the outer world, consists of physical body only.\nOf the animal we say that an astral body is membered in the physical body and etheric body — associating with these terms for the time being nothing beyond what has just been said.\nIn the astral body, the spirit which, in the crystal, for example, produces the structure, becomes inward , inwardly and organically formative. In an animal the sense organs, the functions of the animal soul, arise out of the inner organization itself. Whereas in the mineral the spirit expends itself in elaborating the form, it remains inwardly alive in the animal. And we speak of this inner, living activity, this existence of the spirit within the animal organization itself, as an activity of the astral body. But of man we say that in him the astral body is also permeated by an “I,” an ego, and we shall presently see what significance this has for human life.\nWhat do we really mean when we speak of “spirit”? We ascribe to spirit that reality which we ourselves experience, as it were, in our intelligence . Through our intelligence we execute one thing or another; we bring the forces of different beings into an ensemble. This creative intelligence of ours has a particular characteristic. In that it enters into us in temporal existence, and is a creative force, we form a concept of intelligence, of reason, of creative intelligence, and then we look at the universe around us. — We should have to be very shortsighted before we could possibly ascribe intelligence, all that we call “spirit,” to ourselves alone. The incapacity to penetrate the riddles of existence is due, fundamentally, to the fact that man is nevertheless prone to ascribe intelligence to himself alone and can never answer the question: How comes it that I am able to apply intelligence to existence. But when we look around us and see that the things of space and time manifest in such a way that our intelligence can apprehend the existence of law, then we say: What lives within us as intelligence is also outspread in space and time, is actively at work in space and time. When we look at the lifeless realm of nature, we say that there the spirit is, as it were, frozen into matter, that our intelligence can apprehend, can lay hold of what comes to expression in the forms, in the law-determined workings of matter — and thereby we have in our intelligence a kind of reflection of the spirit weaving and working through the world. If we thus contemplate the spirit in the great universe, and then compare the way in which it is frozen, as it were, in the lifeless realm of existence with the way it confronts us in the animal, we say to ourselves: If we look at any particular animal, we see before us a self-enclosed existence, creative in the same way as the spirit outspread in space and time is creative. And a feeling will dawn in us of why those who knew what they were doing called this spirit working actively in the animal, the “astral body.” They turned their eyes to the great universe through which the stars move in their courses and which men apprehend through their intelligence, and they said: “The spirit lives in the ordering of the universe and in a single animal organism we see a certain conclusion, we see the spirit confined within the space bounded by the animal's skin.” That which is active in the animal and is identical with what is outspread in space and time, they designated as the “astral body” in the animal organism.\nNow between a dim feeling of the kinship of what comes to expression in the animal with what is spread out in space and time, and the knowledge resulting from strict investigation carried out by spiritual science, there is a long, long path. But this feeling is a trustworthy guide and it will enable many a man, before he himself is capable of this investigation, to perceive the truth of what the spiritual investigator says. When we observe how this spirit which with wonder and awe we see outspread in time and space, works in the animal, we can say: In the animal we see springing forth from its very organism the spiritual activity which is made manifest in all the laws of spatial and temporal existence. There is no need to study strange or rare phenomena, for those lying close at hand will suffice. A man of discernment need not go far field to perceive how, from the activity of animals, there go forth workings of the spiritual which are also to be discovered in the whole range of existence. — When he sees the wasp building its nest, he says to himself: There I can see intelligence springing forth as it were, from the animal organization itself; the intelligence which I perceive out yonder in the cosmos when I direct my own intelligence to the laws of existence, that same intelligence I perceive in the spirit that is working in the animal organization. Observing the activity of this spirit in the animal organization — no matter where — he will say with truth: This spirit that is active in the animal organization, this inwardness of the spirit in the animal, far surpasses what man is able to produce in the way of intelligence! An example lying near to hand has often been mentioned. — What a long time man has had to wait in the course of his existence before his own intelligence rendered him capable of producing paper! Think of the forces of intelligence which man was obliged to apply and master in his own soul life before he was able to produce paper. You can read in any simple textbook of history what a great event it was when men succeeded in making paper. But the wasps have been able to do it for thousands of years! For what is to be found in the wasps' nest is exactly the same as what man produces as “paper.”\nSo we see unmistakably that what flows out of man's intelligence in his struggle for existence, springs from the animal organism with full vigour of life. But as people generally go the wrong way to work, they have been indulging for a long time in strange speculation as to whether the animal is intelligent or not intelligent — never noticing that the essential point has been ignored. For the question cannot be whether the animal is or is not intelligent, but whether in all that it accomplishes, the animal unfolds what man can perform only through his intelligence. Then the answer can be given that in the animal there is an inwardly creative and powerful intelligence, operating directly out of animal life. And it will then be possible to have an inkling of what the spiritual investigator observes in the astral body and which he sees inwardly and outwardly active in the animal, in that the intelligence is creative in the organism itself , and creates from out of the organism. The spiritual investigator speaks of the astral body when there are present in the organism, organs which, through their activity, accomplish something that man can accomplish only through his intellect. And we see how this inner, spiritual activity is distributed as it were among the different animals, how it comes out in the faculties and skill of the various animal species. One species can do this, another that — and this is due to differentiation of the astral body in the various animal species.\nWe come now to consideration of the individual activity of the spirit in the animal organism. This inner working of the spirit in an organism, this experiencing of the spirit in its activity, is what we call soul experience. Now when we study this soul experience without bias or preconceptions, we find that it develops quite differently in man and in the animal. A great deal has been and is still being said on the subject of instinct in the animal and conscious activity in man. It would be well, in this connection, to cling less to words and to keep the real point more in mind — to try to understand the nature of instinct. Our study has already shown that instincts may far outstrip human intelligence, and that the qualities here brought into evidence are not to be connected with the word “instinct” in its ordinary sense. Man is so ready to ask in his infinite pride: “Am I not greatly superior to the animal?” But he would also do well to ask: “In what respect have I remained behind the animal?” Then he would find that he has remained behind the animal in respect of many faculties — faculties which are innate in the animal, but which man, if he is to develop them himself, has to acquire and master by dint of effort.\nMan comes into existence at birth as a helpless being, whereas when the animal is born, natural forces abound in its organism and it brings with it as inherited “capital,” as it were, what enables it to live as it has to live. We do not, of course, ignore the fact that, to begin with, the animal too has much to learn. — The chick is able to peck as soon as it is born but cannot at once distinguish between what is good or not good for it, between what it can or cannot digest. But that is only for a short time. The point is that certain faculties of the animal come into evidence in a way which makes it obvious that they lie in the line of heredity, they are truly innate, and they emerge at the proper time. The fact that some faculty does not begin to function until a particular time is no proof that it could have been acquired only after cultivation. The whole organization of animals and also of plants makes it obvious that something which lies in the line of heredity can emerge only when the organization of the being in question has already been in existence for a considerable time. Just as a human being gets his second teeth without having to wait until he himself acquires them by his own efforts, so it is with certain faculties and abilities of the animal. These faculties come into evidence only later, but for all that they belong to heredity. Take the hermit crab as an example. When it has lived for a time it has the urge to search for a snail shell, because the back of its body is too soft to be a firm support. This search for a snail shell in order to have protection for the back of its body is undertaken at a definite time out of the urge of self preservation, but then it occurs with certainty — that is to say, it is innate in the very organization of the hermit crab. Thus the moment the animal comes into existence we can perceive the whole circuit of its life in broad outline; the manner in which the animal is to develop is laid down at the moment of its birth and is then further elaborated. In this process of development and elaboration we recognize the activity of the spirit, and in the way in which the animal participates in the process we recognize its life of soul .\nIf the expression is not misunderstood, one could call the soul life of the animal an “enjoyment of the spirit within the organism,” and if we keep this idea in mind it will be a great help in characterizing this soul life. But then we shall see — for the time being we will confine ourselves to the higher animals — that this experiencing of spiritual activity by the animal is largely expended inwardly, that it lives itself out inwardly. Soul experience in the animal consists in the hankerings of its organs, in the cravings of its organs — and especially in the activity of those organs that are directed to the inner life. An inkling of how the animal as it were “enjoys” the work of the spirit within it can be gained — although full clarity can be reached only by spiritual investigation — by observing an animal engaged in the process of digestion. While an animal is digesting its food, that is to say, is experiencing the inner activity of the spirit, it has its greatest feelings of well being. In its soul, the animal experiences the inner, bodily reality in which the spirit is directly at work. Thus in the animal kingdom, soul experience is in a certain way bound up with the bodily nature. It is a delightful sight to see a herd of cattle lying down to digest immediately after grazing and to observe the soul life that is kindled in each animal. This experience is even more intense in animals which sink into a kind of digestive sleep. They are then experiencing the activity of the spirit in their organs.\nIn the animal, the activity of the spirit is closely knit to the organization. In that the spirit has built up a certain sum total of organs, the animal has to bring to expression the manner in which the spirit has worked in and is manifest in the organs; and it is not possible for the animal to go beyond the bounds of the spirit manifesting in the organs. When we observe the outer, psychic life functions, the outer life processes of the animal in this or that species, we see how closely the expressions of soul life are bound up with its inner organization, that is to say, with what has been wrought in the animal by the spirit. If we notice under what conditions an animal shows fear, we can say: When it shows fear, this is due to its particular organization. Again, when an animal shows a tendency to thieve, we can say the same.\nWhat has here been said from the standpoint of spiritual science has been well put in the essay entitled “Is the Animal a Being of Intelligence?” by Zell, a writer of great value in the realm of research into the animal soul. Although this short essay is written from a different standpoint, it gives most useful examples of how psychic experience in animals is bound up with their organization, and it can be taken as confirmation of what the spiritual investigator discovers from quite another side.\nSoul life in the animals is graduated in many variations in the different animals because, in creating the organs, the spirit has in each case given them a particular stamp. But we see that the spiritual activity of creation — which is anchored in the astral body — expends itself in organic formations, in what the animal actually brings with it into the world. In creating these specific formations, the spirit expends itself. The animal brings with it into the world what it is able to bring and what existence allows it to experience. It can go very little beyond this. This is evidence that the spirit has spent itself, has poured itself out, in the fashioning of the organs. In the formation of the organs, however, the species of animal is revealed to us. Therefore to the question: “What is it that the animal enjoys and experiences in its life of soul?” we can answer: From birth until death the animals' experiences are determined by its species. — It experiences in its soul life, and from out of its own organism, what it has been given by the spirit to accompany it into existence.\nGoethe was one who reflected deeply about the life of the animals and of man and he wrote these fine words: “The animals are instructed by their organs — so said the men of old. I add to that: men, too, but they have the advantage of being able to instruct their organs afresh.” (Letter to Wilhelm von Humboldt, 17th March, 1802.)\nThese are words of great profundity. Of what is an animal capable in life? What its organs make possible. And so an animal is nervous, courageous or cowardly, rapacious or gentle, according to how the spirit has poured itself into its organization. The creative activity of the spirit has poured itself into its organization. The creative activity of the spirit in its organs is mirrored in the soul life and soul experiences of the animal. This means that soul experience in the animal is confined within its species; it cannot go beyond the species, the genus; it experiences itself as species, as genus.\nContrast with this, man's life of soul. Man's life of soul as it comes to expression in his willing, his feeling, his thinking, in his cravings, his interests and in his intelligence, is something that when he enters existence at birth is not bestowed upon him by heredity and cannot be passed on by the man himself to his descendants. Far too little attention is paid to this latter fact. Yet it is of infinite importance, a fact upon which all observation of life should be based, and which may be put in somewhat the following way. — As soon as an animal or human being has acquired the power to reproduce his kind, the development of the etheric body is, to a certain point, complete. This etheric body has the power to bequeath what it contains within it to the descendants. But if a human being lives beyond this point he cannot bequeath to his descendants faculties which still remain to be developed. That is obvious. The moment a human being reaches puberty, he possesses all the faculties upon which hereditary transmission depends. Therefore faculties which remain capable of development after the time of puberty cannot be possessed by man in the same way as those which originated in the etheric body and can be transmitted by heredity. This is a cardinal truth of which sight must never be lost.\nAn important consideration in the study of human life is that from birth to death a man is capable of learning new languages, and what is equally significant is that if a man were to grow upon a distant, uninhabited island, he could not develop this faculty at all. The same applies to the faculty of forming concepts, and the development of the mental picture of the “I.” These are things which have nothing to do with heredity, and which cannot be transmitted by heredity, because they do not belong to the species or genus. In what does not belong to heredity, in faculties that remain capable of development beyond and apart form heredity, man has something that is not conditioned by the species or genus, but belongs to the individuality . And in the faculty of speech, in the possibility of forming ideas, and in the experience of the Ego concept, there lies what man himself so brings into the world that by means of it he instructs his organs afresh, teaching them what they have not yet received, but which they must acquire.\nThis is a “transaction” between the human being and the spirit, lying beyond the horizon of what he is able to experience. Its results cannot be transmitted nor received into the qualities which lie within the line of heredity. Man unfolds something which cannot flow into the species, which is removed from the species. Insofar as man is a generic being, he has inherited all the faculties accruing to him as a generic being, just as the animal has inherited them; only he does not inherit as much skill, as much spirit, as does the animal. There is still something besides, which man can acquire as individuality. And the life of the spirit connected with these non-inherited qualities, constitutes his soul experiences — which transcend those of the animal. In that man enjoys the fruits of his work and activity insofar as they are acquired in life through qualities that are not inherited, he unfolds a life of soul transcending that of the animal.\nMan comes into existence with less skill than the animal. He is less skillful for the reason that the transaction with the spirit cannot be undertaken until some time after birth, whereas in the animal it has already been completed. Thus in its life of soul the animal enjoys what heredity can bequeath to it. That is to say, the soul life of the animal points to the past . And the moment we see the soul life of the animal passing into death, all that the animal can experience through its species also passes into death. Everything that is individual soul experience in the animal is something that has come to it from the past. In its existence the animal expends its life of soul and there is no basis for immortality. On the other hand, what is experienced in the animal soul lives on, ever and again, in the life of the species. Therefore in the sense of spiritual science we speak of a species — soul of the animal, which constantly arises anew, constantly lives on within the species. No one who desires clear concepts can deny the justification of this. The work of the spirit in the animal genus and species is experienced in the single animal individuality. But we see, too, that this experience points to the past, and that the very moment this past is exhausted, when the soul life must go towards death, towards its ending, the sunset glow begins.\nIt is different when, without preconceived ideas, we observe the soul life of man. There we see that when man is born, something comes with him that has not been expended in his organs; we see how he works further upon his organs, how he really teaches his organs. From this, however, we realize that in his individual life man is in direct interconnection with the spirit; he experiences in his life of soul not only what is transmitted to him by the past, but also what comes from outside to meet him in life, what is presented to him directly as spirit.\nThus man's life of soul is twofold: like the animal, his soul experiences the species to which he belongs as a human being; this he lives out as a being of the past, and it is this that goes forward to death when the spirit withdraws from the organs, when the organs begin to lignify, to wither away. But man's own dealings with the spirit do not belong to his organs; this is something that man has taken into his etheric body independently of the organs. Hence it is something that does not relegate him to the past that is inherited but is a seed for further life. In the measure in which we see that the inner man emancipates himself from his organs, that is to say, becomes individual, in that same measure we can say with logical truth that here we see the immortal part of man crystallize out of the bodily life.\nSo do we learn to feel that this grows in the human being, whereas in respect of what has been inherited he experiences the past in his life of soul. Thus there grows in man something that goes forward to the future that cannot be absorbed into the line of heredity. This is evident if we observe the life of soul in man and in animal. We see how closely the soul life of the animal is bound to its organism, how closely its faculties and skill, indeed all its experiences, are bound up with its organs and with its inherited characteristics. We can rightly observe the soul life of the animal only when we look for it in the self enjoyment of its bodily nature. That is the essential point. We see very little of the essential nature of an animal by watching the delight it takes in the outer world — but a great deal when we observe how it experiences its own digestion. The highest level of experience in the soul life of an animal lies within the boundaries of the organs. In its soul experiences the animal spends itself within its organization; and what remains to it for its outer life is significant for the animal only insofar as it can be experienced inwardly in its life of soul. It is of course the case — and this is also confirmed by the spiritual investigator — that the heights where the eagle passes its existence do give rise to experiences in its life of soul. But this experience lies in the activity of what lives in its organs and comes to expression within them. In man, soul experience emancipates itself from the inner enjoyment, the inner experiencing of the organs — and man has to pay the price for this. The animal has a certain security in its instincts; it knows which food is harmful and which is good for it. The animal injures itself very much less than it is injured by man. Animals are injured most of all when man keeps them in captivity. But in the freedom of nature, when the animal follows what is innate in its organism, its instincts are unerring, because it is so closely united with its organs. The human being, on the other hand, emancipates himself from his organs; and the consequence is that he can no longer directly adhere to what is good or bad for him. He becomes insecure. And whereas the animal displays passions that are in keeping with its organs, the human being unfolds passions which are possibly far more injurious and are not fitting for his organs. Whereas the spider spins its web with unerring certainty and it would be absurd to talk to it of reasoning, man is obliged to think a great deal before he can perfect any handiwork. For he can make great errors. Man's life of soul has emancipated itself from his bodily nature, but at a cost.\nBut man can unite with the spirit from the other side; he can receive into his soul what the spirit conveys to him. He is able to receive the spirit without the spirit having first to pour through the organs, through the bodily nature, whereas the animal is dependent upon how the spirit pours into its organs. The animal experiences within itself how the spirit flows into its organs. Man, on the other hand, wrests his organs away form the life of soul and thus experiences the direct inpouring of the spirit into his soul.\nOnce we have grasped what the spirit really is and how the spirit lives itself out within the soul, these things are of infinite significance. We shall, however, have to wait for the lecture on “Human Spirit and Animal Spirit” before they can be fully clarified. But when we think about the inner life of soul we get a feeling of the difference between man and animal if we contrast the inward bodily life of the animal soul with the outward bodily life of the human soul. Because of this outward bodily life, the human soul can become spiritually more inward. The fact that the human soul can delight in the things of the external world, can take in what the spirit in its external manifestations says to the soul, man owes to the circumstance that his soul has emancipated itself from the bodily nature, has separated from the inward bodily experience of the spirit and has gained the certainty of experiencing the spirit itself at the cost of uncertainty and lack of skill, of imperfectly developed instincts.\nIt is quite easy to say: How is it possible to speak of an animal “soul,” since “soul” implies the notion of inwardness and man cannot look into the inner life of another being. The people who base themselves on this glib objection are the very ones who refuse to listen to any talk of soul experience, because — so they contend — soul experience can only be “within ourselves” and can therefore be inferred in another being only by analogy. But if these things are taken as they really are and not talked about in the abstract, it is quite clear that the very way a being lives reveals what it actually experiences inwardly. Anyone who refuses to believe that a being lives according to what it experiences inwardly will be incapable of any real observation of the world. Admittedly, without demonstration, there is no absolute guarantee in direct observation that the animal experiences something in its life of soul when it shows pleasure in digesting. But a man who compares things in the world, and does not confine his observation to one phenomenon only, will soon recognize that there are many good reasons for speaking in this way. Once we have acquired a feeling of the difference of soul experience in the animal and in the human being, this feeling and perception will help us to understand the nature of soul life in the animal. Above all we shall feel with greater and greater clarity how man's life of soul is emancipated from spirit as a bodily experience. It is the spirit that creates the organs and works in the organism, building it into what it is, and when we speak of the building of the organs we are speaking of the spirit as it works in the etheric body. When the astral body inserts itself into the organization, this spirit can, under certain preconditions, be experienced in a particular way. If we take seriously what has been said above about physical body, etheric body and astral body, we can say: In human beings and animals the physical body is the lowest member of their being; the etheric body so fashions the chemical and physical substances that they become life processes. The etheric body lives within the physical body, comprises and embraces the chemical and physical processes. In all this lives the astral body, experiencing — as soul experience — everything that is going on in the etheric body. Thus the etheric body is the active, creative principle working on the physical body, and the astral body is that part of the animal or human being which experiences the deeds of the etheric body. Thus the physical body is united with the etheric body in the building up of the organs; and the etheric body is united with the astral body in the inner experiencing of this upbuilding and activity of the organs. Everything in the physical body, the etheric body, and the astral body is mutually related.\nNow what is it that evokes soul experience of a particular kind? That which pours, as it were, over the whole inner organization in man and animal. We can best understand this particular kind of experience by observing it in certain circumstances. Is there anyone who is not familiar with the characteristic form of soul experience which is present only while the animal is growing and the size of its organs is increasing and which stops when growth is completed? What expresses itself there in the experience of exuberant energy is connected with certain work that is being performed by the etheric body on the physical body and is an indication that the work is proceeding in the proper way. But what stands out prominently in this condition is always present as a certain feeling of well being in the soul, a feeling of life, of comfort or discomfort; and this depends upon whether the etheric body has or has not command over the physical organization, is able to master it or not. If the etheric body is unable to assert itself properly in the physical organs, this expresses itself in the astral body in a feeling of discomfort. But if the activity of the etheric body can everywhere find access to the physical organs, if that activity can take effect with the help of the physical organs, this engenders the feeling of general well being in men — either in a subtler or cruder form. If indigestion occurs, this can only mean that the etheric body cannot carry out an activity which it ought to carry out. This makes itself manifest in the accompanying discomfort. Or let us suppose someone has so exhausted himself by thinking that the organ of the brain “goes on strike.” In such a case the etheric body is still able to think, but the brain is no longer able to participate. Then the thinking begins to cause headaches; and from there the discomfort spreads into the general feeling of life. This is particularly intensified when the part of the organ that is built up by the etheric body is completely disorganized. We say then: “It is as though the skin cannot expand when outer heat makes it want to expand,” or, “I feel as if a burning brand is being held to my head.” In such a case the etheric body is meeting with resistance. Not being absorbed or seized by external impressions, it then comes up against a physical body to which it is not adjusted, and this expresses itself in the astral body as a feeling of pain .\nSo we understand “pain” in the astral body by conceiving it as the expression of weakness of the etheric body in relation to the physical body. An etheric body that is in harmony with its physical body works back upon the astral body in such a way that the feeling of well being is an inner experience of health. On the other hand, an etheric body that is at odds with its physical body works back upon the astral body in such a way that pain and discomfort are bound to arise in it. Now we shall be able to realize that because in the higher animals — it will be better to speak of the lower animals in the next lecture — the life of soul is so intimately bound up with the bodily nature, this soul experience will be much more deeply felt — as will also be the case in a disordered body — than it can be in a disordered human body. Because the soul life of man is emancipated from the inner, bodily experience, pain that is merely due to bodily circumstances is far less torturing, it gnaws much less deeply into the soul than in the higher animals. We can also observe that bodily pain in children is a much keener psychic pain than in later life, because in the measure in which the adult human being becomes independent of his bodily organization, he finds in the qualities which arise immediately out of his soul, the means to struggle against bodily pain; whereas the higher animal, being so closely bound up with its bodily nature, feels pain with infinitely greater intensity than man. Those who maintain that human pain can be more intense than pain felt by the animals, are talking without foundation. Pain in the animal is far, far more deep-seated than purely bodily pain in man can ever be.\nSo we see that in rising above this bodily nature, man draws out something from the innermost depths of his being; namely, his “I”, his ego. That which he does not inherit, which can sustain its existence above and apart from the species, which he must develop more and more through his individuality — that pertains to the ego. It is this that must enter human existence; it cannot be imparted by heredity, for it proceeds from the human individuality which comes from the spiritual realms into existence at birth and after death returns again to the spiritual realms. Therefore we speak of a core of being in man which passes on from life to life, because we can apprehend it in actual existence, provided only that we observe life with unprejudiced eyes.\nI have tried today to indicate how it can be established from direct experience that we may speak of a being in man who is not inherited but enters human existence from quite another side and when what man inherits is dissolved by death can pass into another spiritual existence. When further principles of spiritual science are understood, this needs no more explanation because spiritual investigation relies on direct vision and can bring from quite another side the proof and evidence for what was intended to be made clear today from experiences of everyday life. But it is also possible for spiritual science so to relate together these everyday experiences that they reveal to us that which can establish in man the hope — based upon observation of facts — of an enduring life of soul that transcends bodily existence.\nSo we see how observation of existence everywhere confirms the words of Goethe already quoted. Soul experience in the animal is enclosed within the circle of its organs. The organs are everywhere the masters, fashioned by the spirit in order that the animal can experience a soul life in keeping with its organs and is able to make use of them. Man, on the other hand, enters existence in such a way that his organs themselves give him no guidance upon what he must take from life and impress into his life of soul. But just here we find that which gives him his guarantee of immortality, that which is eternal because it cannot originate in heredity.\nThat is what Goethe meant by the words: “The animal is instructed by its organs, but man has the advantage of being able to instruct his organs afresh.” Anyone who understands this in the right way — that in the course of his existence man is capable of teaching his organs afresh — will say to himself: How a man teaches his organs becomes manifest in the life of soul and here his union with the spirit is revealed, a union that is indissoluble because it does not spend itself and does not come from the past but points the way to, and is the seed for, the future, the means whereby man can attain that which in his soul will engender the power to vanquish the old death in life that is ever and again renewed."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-4",
    "title": "The Human Spirit and the Animal Spirit",
    "date": "17 Nov 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/UNK1955/19101117p01.html",
    "book_title": "The Human Soul and the Animal Soul; The Human Spirit and the Animal Spirit",
    "content": "Let me in a few words recall some of the things dealt with in the last lecture. Particularly important for us were the views we were able to form, from immediate observation, concerning the difference between the human life of soul and that of the animals. We realized that the animal soul life may not be distinguished from that of man in such a way as to justify the assertion that man is superior to the animal in respect of certain spiritual attributes. To refute such a view we need only point to how certain achievements, obviously attained only by man struggling to a definite stage of intelligence, are brought about objectively within the animal world in the building of their dwellings and in the whole of their life. So that in what the animal does, in what it produces, in what it creates, we have exactly the same intelligent activity that is shown by man in the tools and products he makes. It might really be said: Into what the animal does there flows, and then congeals, the same intelligence that we find in man. Therefore we may not speak of animal soul and human soul by simply saying that the animal is to a definite extent behind man or man to a definite extent in advance of the animal.\nWhen speaking of the soul — and we describe the soul life as the inner life, in contradistinction to the spirit life seen pre-eminently in formation and development — we referred to the fact that we discover how intimately bound up is the soul life of the animal with its own organization; and what the animal can experience in its soul appears to us as predetermined by its whole structure and the whole arrangement of its organs. Thus it must be said: the animal's life of soul is determined by the fashion of its organization, and in its soul life the animal lives, as it were, within itself. But the essential feature of man's life of soul lies in the human soul being emancipated to a high degree from the immediate organism, and in the fact that — I beg you not to misunderstand me, I mean relatively only — independently of the bodily organization he experiences the spirit as such, in the way we have understood it; in other words, that the human soul is able to surrender itself directly to the spirit.\nIf we now rise to the consideration of the spirit in man and in animal we shall have to start from the concepts and ideas developed in our consideration of the soul in man and animal; we shall have to concern ourselves rather more deeply with a phenomenon arising out of what was said last time; namely, that in the animal all spiritual achievements immediately connected with its organs and experienced in its soul have been implanted into, and bound up with, what is hereditary in its species. We may also say that there lives itself out in the animal's soul that which belongs to the species, and because this is hereditary the animal comes into existence with the predisposition towards all the activities conditioned by the spirit which can be experienced through its soul nature. Thereby the animal enters existence fully equipped, and bequeaths to its racial descendants its inherited characteristics which we may call an outpouring of the animal spirit. It is different with man who in his life of soul emancipates himself from his bodily organism. But because in the course of nature this is transmitted through lineal descent, he enters existence helpless, to a certain extent, where the functions that should serve him in life are concerned. On the other hand, however, this helplessness is the one thing that enables man to develop in soul and spirit. Thus we find it to be the most important thing for man that, when he enters life through birth, everything determined from without should remain indeterminate. With this we have indicated how we have to consider the relation of the spirit to the bodily nature in animal and man — the soul lying between the spirit and bodily nature. In the way the animal appears to us as member of a species, gradually attaining its instinctive aims in life, we have a direct activity of the spirit in the organic bodily nature. The organic body in which the animal experiences its life of soul is, as it were, the spirit that has entered reality. An immediate relation exists in the animal between spirit and body. And if we look at the animal, study it — whether superficially as a layman, or more thoroughly with all the facilities comparative anatomy and physiology or any other science can offer — we see everywhere in the animal form, in the conditions of animal life, congealed spirit being lived out in this way in the individual animal species. And the external form — the external life in the same way — is for us the direct imprint of what we call the spirit lying behind the animal, so that in the animal we have to look for the closest relation between spirit and bodily nature.\nThis is quite different when we come to man. And when we have to draw attention to the most important differences between man and animal, it is essential not to look for them too far afield. In considering things in the right way, what is most important lies so near that there is no need for us to enter into all manner of intimate details in the investigation. Observing man, we find something standing between spirit and bodily nature which we need not take into consideration in the animal. This is important. In the animal form and organization the spirit works as it were directly. In man it does not work directly; an intermediate member thrusts itself in, which can be very easily observed in life. As man confronts us when we observe him, this intermediate member which brings about a looser connection between spirit and bodily nature is expressed in what we call the self-conscious ego. I do not want to refer now to the way in which this self-conscious ego takes shape in the body; I wish only to say: In the way man appears to us, in the way he confronts us as a phenomenon of soul, this self-conscious ego stands between his spirit and his bodily nature. Certainly from the point of view of those who believe they are standing on the firm ground of natural science, it is child's play to find objections to the expression “self-conscious ego.” But, at the moment, we are wanting to follow up the way in which this self-conscious ego is inserted between the spirit and the bodily nature.\nHere we find above all — we drew attention to this last time — that man is dependent on the life of his environment, of the world outside, in relation to his language, his way of thinking and also to the extent he has developed a consciousness of self. It is a generally recognized fact that man, if shut out from all contact with humanity, if obliged to grow up alone, would never arrive at speaking, nor definite thinking, nor consciousness of self; he would be forced to remain in the state of helplessness in which he was born. Thus we see that in the case of the animal all the activities necessary for animal life, for animal existence, come to it through heredity. And we see human activities arise in such a way that they may not be looked for in the line of heredity any more than, let us say, the original warmth necessary for hatching a hen's egg may be sought within the egg; it has to come to it from without. So we find that the things of which man has need for his development have to be acquired through something within him; whereas in the case of the animal it is imprinted into him by the spirit. Thus there remain open to man certain possibilities of development into which he takes up definite organizing forces through his self-conscious ego. For, naturally, no one will doubt that changes in the organization are bound up with man's gradual acquisition of speech, thinking, consciousness of self, and the activities connected with these; so that tendencies possessed by the animal from the beginning through hereditary activities, are taken up by man from the environment, just as warmth is taken up by the hen's egg that is being hatched; in other words, it is introduced from outside. Thus possibilities of development remain open to man as regards the inter-working of the environment. Naturally Spiritual Science does not adopt the view that man could achieve anything without organs. So we must be clear that everything working into man changes his organization. If we investigate the human organization closely, we see that this organization is actually changed by forces coming from without, which have to reach man by way of his ego. And then we see something else — if we consider man as he takes his place in the world, to become what he is able to become through speech, through his way of thinking and his consciousness of self, we grasp him as it were at one pole, at one end. We must, however, grasp him also at the other end. If we would penetrate him with thought, this is not so easy a matter. But it is in fact necessary to lay hold of man's other end.\nMan actually enters the world as a helpless being. It is perfectly easy to see what we are dealing with here, but not so easy to make it the subject of observation. In the course of his life the human being has to do something that the animal is spared. This is done by the human being when he learns to walk, or, rather, learns to stand. Connected with this learning to stand, a great deal in human life lies concealed; namely, the gaining control over what we may call our bodily equilibrium. If we carefully study the design for the animal's organization, the organization of its structure, we find that the animal is so organized that a certain balance is imprinted into it making it possible for it to carry on its life. It is so formed that his body is endowed with a firm balance. It constitutes man's helplessness, from one point of view, and, from another, his advantage over the animal, that he has to make the effort to acquire balance with the help of his ego. There is no question here of comparing man with the animals nearest to him. Where the comparative anatomy of all the individual organs is concerned, it would be childish were Spiritual Science to assume a gulf between man and the animals nearest him. But whereas in the design of the animal organization there lies a predetermined balance, to human beings the possibility is open to acquire this balance after birth; but still more possibilities are open to them. The direction of its movement is laid down for the animal through the predetermined organization imprinted into him — if one may use the word imprinted; whereas for man the possibility is open to develop, within limits, his own sense of movement. Other things too are open to the human being, and we shall come back to the various manifestations of this. It is open to man to be able to imprint life itself into his organization. It is certainly possible to speak of this imprinting of life into the living being. Who with any mind for these questions would fail to notice that the organization of a duck comes to expression in plastic form, or that this is also the case where the elephant is concerned? Who would fail to see how the skeleton, if one looks at it, as distinct from the single animal species, discloses riddle upon riddle; how life is as it were discharged into the form, is caught up into the form, appearing to us as if frozen there? Here, too, man has come in a certain way to pour life into his own form. We need therefore only make the preliminary remark that in studying an animal form with open mind, we are interested far more in the universal, the general, what has to do with species, bestowing little thought on the individual forms. What interests us in man's skeleton is the noblest organ, the structure of his skull, above all, its plastic art. And in every human being this structure is different, because it is open to what lies at the basis of the human ego — to what is individual; whereas in the animal it is what belongs to the species that comes to expression. Thus when we lay hold of man by his other end we find that during certain periods of life he has full scope for imprinting into himself his sense of balance, the sense of his own movement and his whole sense of life. The interesting point here is that at the beginning of human life we are able to watch this working of the spirit in man, this imprinting of the spirit into form and movement; how in the struggle for upright gait, in the struggle to acquire a sense of one's own movement, in the imprint of bodily form, these forces are really active and coming to expression. Then at a certain age, however, the possibility ceases for the further working of the forces which in childhood had free play. At a certain period of life, in regard to the activity we have been describing, these forces close down. But when they are really within the individual man, having finished their work in a particular sphere, they cannot at once vanish; they come to meet us at a later time in life, and at this later time we should be able to show that these forces are there in human life as realities.\nNow in fact we find these forces clearly arising in man again in a quite characteristic way for the progress of the spirit. What is accomplished by man in the development of his sense of balance, we find again in his later life, when he applies the same force to the development of his gestures. Gesture is something actually leading us into the deeper parts of the human organization, insofar as the spirit lives in man. And by bringing what is within him to expression in gesture, man has recourse to the same force he applied to the effort of gaining a sense of balance, for the setting up of a certain balanced poise. What man developed manifestly through learning to walk and stand, appears in later life in a finer, deeper, more intimate form when, instead of coming to physical expression, it is expressed more through the soul, in gesture. Hence we feel ourselves really intimately within man when we confront him and can let his gestures, the whole manner in which what is within him is expressed in outer movement, work upon us. In this respect every man is actually more or less of a gifted artist when confronting his fellows. For if we would penetrate to the finer psychological influences passing from man to man, we should see what an infinite amount depends — without it rising into consciousness — upon how gestures taken as a whole play upon a man. This need not enter into the broad light of external consciousness, yet it enters the soul and comes to expression when external consciousness sums up a host of intimate details, played out beneath the surface of consciousness, into everyday words such as “I like him,” “I don't like him”, or “I like her”, “I don't like her”.\nWe can also see how the forces organizing individual movement work on in later life. This we see when, passing from the gesture expressed in movement, we turn more to where the inner being of man may be found poured into the external form, but still in movement, in mimicry and in the physiognomy. There in fact what begins as individual sense of movement works on further, giving scope to the human being to go on developing out of helplessness, and then keeping this helplessness in check. When we notice how man, in his mien and in the play of his physiognomy, keeps his external self in continuous movement through his inner self, we find how what actually first appears in the organization more as a mere expression of bodily activity, then appears rather as poured into the soul-nature and intensified. What worked more directly in the earlier days of the human being is caught up more within him, in the self-conscious ego, to pour itself then from within outwards into the bodily regions; whereas to begin with self-conscious ego and spirit had, as it were, come to terms.\nIf we now see that what justifiably interests us in man is the particular form of his skull, we have to say: In this particular form of the skull of man something indeed is also expressed of his innermost being. Everyone knows that, broadly, this is the case, and that in the form of the brow, in the form of the skull, of each human being, we shall always find individual differences in men's inner nature. It goes without saying that we are not speaking here of those spheres of the spiritual life which are emancipated from the soul bound up with the body. There exists, however, as a certain ground work what may be described as an expression of the spirit that has become soul — what is wrongly developed in the sciences called phrenology, craniology, and things of that kind. It is above all essential for us to be clear that the forms coming to expression in the human skull are not general but individual to man, as he confronts us as a moral, intellectual being. When we begin to generalize, we fail to understand the whole connection. From this aspect, all phrenology practiced in this way is mischievous materialism. It should never be counted as science in its legitimate sense, for that it cannot be. What confronts us in the formation of the human skull is individual, different in each man. And the way in which we seek to form an opinion of each man in accordance with these characteristics must also be individual, just as our attitude is individual to each work of art. As there are no universal, fixed rules, as we have to take up our own attitude to each work of art, that is a work of art, if we consider according to universal rules what in an artistic sense lies hidden in man, we shall come to some kind of judgment but a judgment quite different from the ordinary one. And the following will make itself felt — that in observing the human skull we shall see how the spirit works in direct relation to the form, how forces of the spirit, of the ego, from within outwards push against the form of the skull which encases what works from without inwards. Only when we have a feeling for this working from without inwards and from within outwards, can we enter into what meets us in the form of the human skull that envelops the brain.\nThus, direct observation show us how in reality the spirit lives itself out in the animal forms. And since the animal's soul life is immediately bound up with its organization, the instinctive life being an expression of this organization, it will always be possible to see why some particular instinct or impulse must appear in the animal as part of its life of feeling. On the other hand, it may be said of man that in him we also see the spirit working on his organization, but from within; we see, too, however, that what lies at the basis of the self-conscious ego is in opposition to the organization and forces its way into it, at the same time forcing its way into the work of the spirit.\nNow let us consider man in a rather different way. In him we see the capacity for speech — which is quite obvious; then a definite way of thinking and a certain consciousness of self as the result of education. These capacities arise through man's contact with the external world. But it is not enough simply to take things on trust; we must realize that something far more profound lies at the basis of speech, of the way of thinking and of the consciousness of self brought about through the environment. What lies at their basis is the fact that man possesses three senses not found in the animal. The word sense has to be taken literally, but let us keep to fact and not to words. In the realm of speech-sound, of concept and of what we call ego being, the animal shows itself quite incapable of taking things in, in the way of human beings. Of all the senses, the animal gets as far as that of tone. For outer perception this is for the animal a kind of zenith. Its sense faculty rises to tone. But beyond that no possibility is offered by its general organization for an understanding of speech-sound, concept or ego being as in other beings. The animal recognizes its own species, the dog the dog, the elephant another elephant, and so on. But no spiritual investigator would ascribe to animals any perception of their own ego being. And materialistic investigation will never succeed in producing any proof of a perception of ego being in the animal organization; thus scientific investigation should not, and spiritual investigation will not, be in doubt about this. — So we see in man that the possibilities of development remain open where perception of the inner nature of sound, the inner nature of concept and idea, and the inner nature of the ego being are concerned. Were the possibility of development in these three activities closed to man, the other forces I named would have no nourishment pouring from within, and would be unable to find expression. Animals have no organs to make it possible for them to develop in these three ways. For all that man shows in life as superiority over the animal ears the imprint of what is within him as capacity for expression — his conception of sound, his conception of concepts, and his conception of the ego, of the ego consciousness. Meanwhile we find in the animal the expression of how the spirit is poured into form; we therefore see in the animal gestures and physiognomy determined by the nature of the species. This all expresses how the spirit can be active while becoming, as it were, congealed directly in the form. In man we find each individual has his characteristic gesture, his own particular physiognomy and facial expression; in this there comes to very clear expression what, on the other hand, he has in the way of capacity for developing speech-sound, concept or idea, and consciousness of self. In reality the capacity for this development pours itself into gesture, physiognomy, facial expression, into the whole way his consciousness of self is manifested. Here we see flowing from within outwards, expressing itself in the human being, what can be experienced only through the direct intercourse of the self-conscious ego with the spirit.\nIf we experience things in this way, we may say: If we do not approach man with abstract, dry, prosaic concepts but perceive him in a living way, we see how ego being, the being in idea and the being in speech-sound, work directly on external form and movement. It is indeed as if, as crystallographers, we were to study the forming forces of a crystal, then discover that we have in front of us a cube in the rock salt, an octahedron in the sulphur, and in the garnet a rhombododecahedron. Just as there we see how inner forces pour their activities into form, when perceiving man in a living way we see immediately living in his external form all that he actually is, what in his being makes a strong impression on us — what meets us as congealed ego idea, congealed concept or conception, and as congealed sense of sound. We should be able indeed to picture quite vividly this congealed sense of sound that meets us. For that intercourse with the spirit which man cherishes perhaps in the most intimate way, which every man, artist or not, is able to cherish, which works into this being as the finest weavings of his soul, this intercourse is experienced by man in a characteristic way, the whole importance of which for man's life should not be overlooked. We dare not indeed overlook it in its content, in its inner nature — I am not speaking here of word content — in the inner nature of the “how” in the word content, in the inner nature of the character of sound, or the soul in language. Language does not only have the spirit expressed in the content of words; language also possesses a soul. And much more than we think, a language works upon us in the character of its sound. A language with many “ah” sounds works upon us in one way; a language that in the character of its words is more prone to “ee” or “o” in quite another way. For in the timbre of the sound character there is poured out as if in the unconscious, the soul that flows over the whole of mankind. This builds us up, works upon us, and comes to expression in life as a special kind of gesture. For man's speech is a special kind of gesture — not as to the words but insofar as it has soul — in the way man lives in speech with his soul and expresses himself. In all that, indeed, we should be able to mention significant differences.\nEveryone knows that, apart from what is said, there belongs to what flashes from man to man in that queer indefinable way the inner quality of the way in which it is said. If we take this into consideration we shall say: We learn an infinite amount of what is deepest in human beings just from the way in which they speak. In ordinary life we have often to disregard this, for higher points of view may drive it into the background. Yet there is something in us that is very alive to the harshness or the pleasing tone of a voice. Those who really observe the soul know that harshness of voice is far more unpleasant in a man than in a woman, for the simple reason that this sphere is closely connected with our organization, and that the pitch of the voice in a man is more intimately related to, far more deeply bound up with, the life of soul than is the case in a woman. It is true but it cannot be proved. It can only be indicated, and if you are observant you will soon see it is so. Anyone able to understand such things, if wanting to give expression to something important, will therefore need to convey in his speech what has just been referred to, and not merely the word content. To give you an example of what I mean, really not from lack of modesty, I should like to refer to the Rosicrucian Mystery play I wrote — “The Portal of Initiation.” In all the most important passages in it, it is clear that what cannot be expressed in the content is brought out in the use of language, in the vowel sounds. You will find that where you get the sound “oo” after “ah,” “ee” cannot follow “ah.” It is of outstanding importance that we bear in mind that this realm is the “gesture” of speech, recognizing how the might of the spirit is working into the organization; and that we pay heed to this direct working of the spirit on the soul that contains the self-conscious ego. And then we look back on how the human soul pours itself into the bodily nature. I am coming now, it is true, to a language that obviously for many of you must be hypothetical; to talk of it may seem bold to some of you and to others even offensive. That, however, is beside the point.\nWe see how in man the ego being, what the sense of forming ideas can yield and undergo, and what the sense of sound can experience, pour themselves into gesture, physiognomy and facial expression, also, within the limits I have indicated, into the form. So that in man, in that period of his life between birth and death when the ego inserts itself between spirit and bodily nature, we see the direct activity of the spirit. Now let us just consider the following; and because the matter is more or less subtle, I shall speak figuratively. Let us imagine that what man accomplishes with his ego being, his power of conception and his sense of sound, in the way this flows more or less into his balance, individual movement and consciousness of self, and later into freedom of gesture, facial expression and the physiognomy revealing what is within him — let us imagine all this working together out of necessity, so that no conscious ego intervenes between these two, or three, aspects. Let us therefore imagine the ego to be eliminated, allowing the two sides of human nature to work on each other, so that through a sense of sound that does not enter consciousness but lives itself out in the innermost being, there is realized from the outset, in experience, the setting up of a balance that is not promoted by the ego; you would then have something which remains free for man, established without the intervention of the ego. This is what from the very beginning determines balance in the animal. And imagine the conception through which man grasps his laws and the animal species — in other words the whole organization so far as it is individual movement, physiognomy and facial expression, expressed in all animal movement, expressed also in animal instincts, passions and so on — and you have, bound up in the animal through the necessity of natural laws, what man has in his life through the intervention of the ego. We have, too, bound up from the outset with the animal, through the necessity of natural law, what in man is directly expressed only in life. In man the formative force of life works right into his form. But imagine it was no longer kept in reserve for individual life but from the beginning it acquired its form through Nature's activity, and then you have it in accordance with species, and in the way it confronts us plastically in the various animal species. — Thus we see in man a being with a sense world lying between two poles. He has his sense world, the world of perception, sound world, world of taste and world of smell and so on, lying between, on the one side, the way in which, conscious of himself, he finds a relation to his sense of balance in the different spatial directions, in the way he feels his existence in his own body; and on the other side, his sense of sound, his comprehension of concept, and his ego conception. As with inner necessity the inner life stands in relation to the intervening sense, so for the animal the inner life is related as something intervening, which, out of necessity, forms the whole organization. Let the two sides in man come together without the intervention of the ego and you have the direct working of the spiritual into the bodily without the intervention of the soul. In man we have what may be thus described — according to the spiritual and physical side he is an unfolding in space, gestures and so on, which on both sides stands open to the working of the spirit. And with this we must reconcile ourselves to the fact that through it in a certain way a foundation is laid for the whole understanding of man and the human spiritual life altogether, insofar as it plays its part in the history of the spirit. We see that we may not confound what man experiences conceptually with what he experiences when he realizes and develops the concept itself. In a certain relation man is in a quite different situation where the realization of a concept is concerned from his situation in respect of understanding it. The development of a concept is quite a different story from the means of understanding it. In this connection I should like to refer to an actual fact.\nIn the year 1894 Laurenz Müllner, a great admirer of Galileo, on being appointed Rector of the University of Vienna, gave his inaugural address, and in it he drew attention to a remarkable fact which indeed is very interesting. He pointed out that in Galileo we have a spirit able to grasp the physical laws of mechanics, the laws of oscillation, of the motion of projectiles, of the velocity of falling bodies, of equilibrium, which perhaps — said Professor Müllner — are expressed in the most grandiose way in Michelangelo's wonderful work — the lofty dome of St. Peter's in Rome. This is indeed true and must be admitted by anyone upon whom the work of art in question has made an impression. Thus it might be said — Laurenz Müllner went on: In Galileo's intellect these laws first arise in the form of concepts, which we then see in Rome rising to the heavens in the symmetry and equipoise of the gigantic cupola of St. Peter's. In Galileo man has learned to grasp in concepts what is presented in St. Peter's as the artistic creation of Michelangelo. Added to this we have the actual fact that the day of Galileo's birth and the day of Michelangelo's death fell in the same year. In 1564 Michelangelo died on 18th February and in the same year, almost on the same day — the 15th of February — Galileo was born, Galileo who discovered for mankind the physical laws of mechanics.\nThat is really an extraordinarily interesting fact. For it goes to prove that man brings about in a direct way the intercourse with the spirit through which he is able to imprint upon things the laws discovered afterwards; he does not accomplish this with his understanding, nor through concepts — not through the intelligence at all. But this points us to something else; namely, that in his organization man is in touch with the spirit before the intelligence has worked upon his soul inwardly. Hence in a certain way it can be said: Man is so constituted that he himself is able to incorporate into his substance what lives in him as outpouring of the spirit, what has worked upon him before he has been able to grasp it with his intelligence. This is so in the creation of any work of art. This fact is of interest because it enables us to see that man in physical life in regard to all that he lives, and all that comes to clear expression in an organ, before understanding the laws of that organ has something within him which carries out these laws plastically, gives them plastic form. So that if we follow up this thought it is quite clear that the sense for these laws of the spirit, expressed, for example, in a work of art, is there — must be there — in the soul before the laws are given bodily form. Hence, at the spiritual end of man, so to speak, we have also the reverse side — if we use the word in its better sense, raising it to the proper spiritual sphere. For then we are definitely shown that through an ennobled and purified instinct man creates what he discovers only later. As animals create instinctively, in the way bees, for example, organize their wonderful bee community, so man creates directly out of the spiritual world, before the spiritual world is reflected into this intelligence.\nThus we see that even in this direction everything points to the meeting of the self-conscious ego with the working of the spirit. Through instinct the animal arrives even in its feeling life at reflecting into its intelligence what it puts into its buildings, and so on. Take, for example, the beaver and what it builds. Among beavers Michelangelos will always be found, but never a Galileo who understood the same laws to which the beaver gives form in its constructions. In man there is something confronting his self-conscious ego, something created by the spirit when it enters the organization.\nSo in our study of human development, we have seen that between spirit and bodily organization the expression of the self-conscious ego intervenes, that the purified organization of the human being has immediate experience of the spirit, as it is seen in the imaginative creations of the artist; and that a self-conscious being lives in him which can oppose the ordering of the spirit in the body. Thus it is not a question of giving man preference over the animal or not; that would be the wrong way to approach the matter. We have, however, to realize that in the animal the spirit comes into direct contact with the bodily organization, and the soul passes its life in accordance with this bodily organization; whereas in man the living ego which is found in the soul pushes its way between spirit and bodily organization, establishing itself as mediator — thus working there between spirit and bodily organization. Through this the human ego has direct intercourse with what lives in the spiritual world. And it lives out this direct intercourse primarily by strenuous efforts to establish spiritual conditions in its environment which the animal is able to establish only instinctively. We see strongly marked a certain life of rights, a moral life among animals. But we understand the life of rights, the life of the State, and the whole course of world history, only when we see in man the emancipation of the spirit from the bodily nature by the intervention of the ego between spirit and bodily nature, through which the ego enters into immediate intercourse with the spiritual world.\nThe way in which this ego enters into direct intercourse with the spiritual world constitutes the normal condition of the human being. But as the intervention of a self-conscious ego between spiritual and bodily nature signifies progress beyond animal evolution, it is possible for man to go farther on this path by again developing within him the spirit which he set free from the bodily nature — developing it in the free intercourse experienced. The possibilities for this will be found in the lecture “The Nature of Sleep”, and its full significance appears in Knowledge of the Higher Worlds . There we see how in normal human beings the emancipation of the spirit from the bodily nature has arrived at a certain stage, but can be carried further by developing slumbering germinating forces in man, through the unfolding of which he can advance to direct vision into the spiritual world.\nWe had first to lay a foundation for what we are able to cultivate as actual contemplation of the spiritual world, by seeking the real significance of the human being in this intervention of the ego between spirit and bodily nature. But this again is given us also in an external bodily way, since the self-conscious ego as it confronts us in life does so in the inner being of man, entirely in his physiognomy and in accordance with his gestures. Some of you may remember that I have not only mentioned but have also substantiated that the old saying “Blood is a very special fluid” 1 A lecture called in English: “The Occult significance of Blood” is founded on deep truth. This is really so, and in what is thus expressed simply as a direct working of the soul on the blood circulation, we can divine something of that working of the self-conscious ego into the bodily nature, into the organization. That is, so to say, the nearest gate for the ego, fertilized by the spirit, to enter the bodily nature and work upon it. We see this on observing how the soul works upon the blood circulation. In the phenomena of blushing and turning pale I have often given you common examples for the direct working of what goes on in the soul and expresses itself physically; for fear and shame are actual processes of the soul. Anyone wanting to deny this would have to be an unconscious materialist, like, for example, William James: for although he wishes to be spiritual he is actually a materialist in wishing to defend the assertion: “Man does not weep because he is sad, he is sad because he weeps.” According to this we should have to imagine that man experiences sadness in his soul because some kind of material influence has an effect on the organism and squeezes out tears: and if man notices this — so says William James — he becomes sad. If we do not recognize how untenable this conclusion is, we shall not be able to understand that in affairs like laughing and weeping, and also in blushing, where a rush of blood takes place from the centre to the periphery, we have to do with material processes directly under the influence of soul and spirit.\nIf we think this over we shall be able to admit that in man what belongs to the soul does in very truth express itself in the circulation of the blood. What we say here about man; namely, that in the blood, and in the circulation, the self-conscious ego has its life, we cannot directly apply to the animal, because in it a self-conscious ego cannot work into the blood circulation, and — what is essential — because the animal does not open itself directly to the influence of the spiritual world which works into it; rather, from necessity. Whereas in the animal's blood circulation we have before us something in which the soul life of the animal finds immediate expression, in the blood circulation of the human being something is to be seen of the way in which the spirit works on the ego. If some day people will begin to give a little thought to what is here in question; namely, the importance for human life that man should not be organized from the outset to receive a definite imprint, of balance, of individual movement and of the sense of life, but must himself struggle to attain them — when they can discover how true it is that in spatial directions we have to do with realities, whether a spine is in a horizontal or vertical relation to space, or whether the blood circulates in this or that direction — then they will see how essential is the way in which such organizations are inserted into the whole cosmic connection. We should be obliged to see in reality, for example, in the spatial direction of a certain line, something of essential importance. When this is understood we may judge how great is the significance of the position and all the processes in the blood, in the human blood system. Today it is believed that the theory of the blood circulation is complete in itself. It is not so at all. We are only beginning to learn something of the secrets of the blood circulation. And not dogmatically to make bare assertions I will point to the following.\nNot more than twenty-five years ago, a scientific investigator in this sphere, the criminologist Moritz Benedict, celebrated for his mathematical qualifications in this direction, was first to draw attention to the important fact — generally ignored today — that the corresponding beats in the right artery and the left are different — an important fact for knowledge of the connections in the human being. And of special importance is something found in this sphere, not by anyone famous but by a very simple man, a Dr. Karl Schmidt. It was published by him in 1892 in the Vienna Medical Weekly in his article “Heartbeat and Pulsation,” in which quite important observations were indicated. Only when these things, still in their infancy, are studied to some degree, will a beginning have been made in knowledge of the connection between the self-conscious ego and the blood circulation, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the connection between the animal spirit working in the animal and the animal blood circulation. Last time, I pointed out that we, indeed, are able to go into details in the sciences of the organs and their individual functions, and are able to give evidence of the different ways the spirit shows itself in man and in animal. In this connection it is quite comprehensible that modern investigations into the relation of man's blood to that of apes say little, because they go only into externals — the purely physical substance, the chemical reactions, and so forth — not into the real question. Were it only a matter of physical substance it would necessarily be quite immaterial whether a wheel was used as a child's toy or for a watch. But it always depends on how a member or an organ is used in the whole of a being or of a thing. It has nothing to do with how man's blood is related to the blood of the ape, or the like, but with how the organs in question are placed in the service of the organization as a whole.\nHow the actual truth is treated by external investigation is best shown in Goethe's dealings with natural science. In Goethe's days, where the things of Nature are concerned, a rigid materialism was already prevailing, and even the most eminent scientists who wished to maintain the difference between man and animal founded their claims on something purely material. They were of the opinion that this difference was to be seen in the fact that in the upper jawbone of the animal there is an intermediate bone not found in man. They said: What distinguishes man from the animal is that the animal possesses an intermaxillary bone to accommodate the upper incisors, and this bone is not found in man! For Goethe this was inadmissible. His concern was not to find the difference between man and animal in anatomical details, but in the way the spirit in man and the spirit in the animal made use of the organs. (Incidentally I will just refer you to Goethe's “Theory of Metamorphosis” in which may be found information about all the individual human organs.) Thus from the outset Goethe could never reconcile himself to the idea that man's superiority to the animal was to be sought in a material detail. Therefore his one wish was to prove that this assertion was incorrect, that this chasm did not exist; and he set himself to work to find this intermaxillary bone in man. If Goethe had never accomplished anything but this one deed, if he had discovered nothing further than the presence in man of the intermaxillary bone, though no longer in a developed state and not apparent, through this alone for human evolution he would still remain a mighty genius. Said Goethe to himself — and I do not relate this because he did it but because it came to light through his experience: With Herder, and with others who are at pains to understand man spiritually, I have directed attention primarily to how man rises above the animal because the animal is bound up with its organization; but man is emancipated from it and enters into immediate intercourse with the spirit, thus being able to work back upon his organs. Goethe says this, as I have indicated, but in the following words: “Animals are taught by their organs, said the men of old. I add to this: man, too, is taught by his organs; however, he has the advantage of in turn teaching them.” Goethe could not but admit that the organs are the same but formed from different sides. Hence his great joy when at last he found the intermaxillary bone in man. At this point he writes to Herder: “... I have found — neither gold nor silver but something that gives me infinite joy — the ‘os intermaxillary’ in man! With Loder I compared man's skull with that of the animal and got on its track — when, lo! There it was. But I beg you to keep quiet about it, for this affair must be handled with caution. This should, however, make you too rejoice, for it is a kind of keystone to man; it is not lacking, it is there — actually there. I have imagined it in connection with your ‘whole’ — how splendidly it will fit in. ...” (Letter of 27th March, 1784.)\nThe difference between man and animal cannot be found in any particular detail. It has to be found entirely in the way the spirit makes use of things. For through this we behold man's relation to the spirit, how he has emancipated himself from what belongs to the body and is able to enter into direct intercourse with the spirit. Hence the difference in the sensation we experience on contemplating something spiritual from what we experience on contemplating anything physical and material. We seek to use words in quite different ways according to whether we look upon the spiritual or the physical.\nAmong Goethe's works two poems may be found together. Each contains three remarkable lines:\n“In all things the eternal's moving past, For everything must come to naught at last If in being it still would stay.”\n“Das Ewige regt sich fort in Allen: Denn Alles muss in Nichts zerfallen, Wenn es im Sein beharren will.”\nThus ends one poem, and the other begins:\n“No being can come to naught at last! In all the Eternal's moving past. In being know thyself, then, blessed.”\n“Kein Wesen kann zu Nichts zerfallen! Das Ewige regt sich fort in Allen, Am Sein erhalte dich beglückt!”\nA complete contradiction! How may we explain it? And Goethe has put it so blatantly in two poems next to one another. In truth if we contemplate the spirit in material existence, in our heart we may call forth the feeling: If the spirit would continue in material being, if it were not to break up all form, it would have to crumble into nothingness. The moment we see the spirit in the bodily nature we have to say: We have here to do with the eternal, immortal being, with the spirit with which we can unite in man's emancipated soul. Then we may say:\n“No being can come to naught at last, In all the Eternal's moving past. In being know thyself, then, blessed.”\nif we bear in mind the immortal, the eternal, in a being.\nIf we see the soul, if we see the spirit in the bodily nature, we have to say: If it lived itself out entirely in the body, if it would hold fast to the body, then it would have to fall into nothingness.\nThus the study of the animal's spirit and the human spirit leads us gradually upwards to a premonition of what in reality may be called the spirit. But before it is wished to find the way in which knowledge about the spirit can be acquired, it is necessary to know the way in which the spirit shines forth in the human soul which it frees from the body in order within it to live a life independent of the bodily organization, a life in its own sphere."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-5",
    "title": "The Nature of Sleep",
    "date": "24 Nov 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/eLib2015/19101124p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "In the present scientific considerations is little talk of such phenomena to which we want to dedicate this hour. Any human being should still feel that the sleep is something that positions itself in our life phenomena in such a way, as if it gives us the biggest riddles of life. One has probably always felt this mysterious and the important of the sleep when one spoke of the sleep as “the brother of death.” We have now to restrict ourselves at the discussion of the sleep as such, because the following talks still lead us to the consideration of death in certain respects.\nAll that the human being must count to his soul experience in the immediate sense, all mental pictures, all sensations and feelings that represent the soul drama of the human being, all pains, and sufferings, also the will-impulses sink down as it were in an uncertain darkness if the human being falls asleep. Some philosophers could doubt about themselves, so to speak, if they speak of the being of the soul and spirit, which reveals itself in the human nature, and from which they must admit that it seems to lose itself in nothing within every course of the day — even if it may be conceptualised and investigated ever so well. If we look at the phenomena of the soul life in such a way as one is used to look at them, actually, academically, as well as unprofessionally, we must say, they are extinguished during the sleeping state, they are away. For that who wants to look only at that of the soul, which expresses itself in the bodily, the human being is as it were a riddle if he thinks deeper. For the real bodily functions, bodily activities continue during sleep. Only the mental stops. Now one has to ask oneself only whether one speaks quite correctly about the bodily and the mental if one really encloses this mental in its entirety in that what appears as extinguished with falling asleep. Alternatively, whether already the usual observation of life — refraining now completely from spiritual-scientific or anthroposophic considerations — can show, nevertheless, that this mental is also active and effective when it is enveloped by the sleep. However, if one wanted to gain some clearness about these concepts, one could also say, if one wants to observe the phenomena of life in the right sense in this field, one must have precise concepts.\nI would like to mention from the start that also in relation to this issue spiritual science or anthroposophy is not able to speak as in general as one likes it today. If we speak of the nature of sleep, we speak only of the sleep of the human being. For spiritual science knows very well — this has been touched repeatedly in the last talks concerning other fields — that the same outer appearance of various beings can be based on quite different causes within the concerning beings. We have indicated this for the death, for the entire spiritual life and for the arrangement of the spiritual life with the animal and the human being. Today it would lead too far to speak still about the sleep of the animals. Therefore, we want to say in advance that I speak about the sleep of the human being only.\nWe human beings are able to speak of soul phenomena within ourselves by our consciousness, because we are aware of that what we imagine what we want what we feel. Now the question must arise — and it is exceptionally important just for our today's observations: are we allowed throwing together the concept of consciousness, as we know it as the normal human consciousness in the present, automatically with the concept of the human soul and mind? I would like to use a comparison at first in order to argue about these concepts clearer. A human being can walk around in a room and he is nowhere able to look at something of his face at the different places of the room. At one single place where he is able to look in a mirror, he can see something of his own face. There the figure of his face faces him in the picture. Is it not an immense difference for him whether he walks around only in the room and lives in himself or whether he sees what he lives in such a way also in the mirror? Perhaps, it could be with the human consciousness in a somewhat enlarged scale. The human being could live, so to speak, his soul life, and he would become aware of this soul life — as he lives it — only because it faces him in a kind of mirror. This could be very well. We could say, for example, it is conceivable that the human soul life continues, no matter whether the human being wakes or sleeps. However, in the awake state the human being perceives his soul life by a reflection — we say by a reflection within his physical nature at first — and he cannot perceive it in the sleeping state, because it is not reflected in his corporeality.\nIndeed, we would have proved nothing with it; however, we would have obtained two concepts at least. We could differentiate the soul life as such and the awareness of the soul life. We could imagine that for our consciousness, for our knowledge of the soul life, as we stand in the normal human life, everything depends on the fact that we get the soul life reflected by our corporeality because we could know nothing of it if we did not get it reflected. Then we would completely be in a state like in sleep. We try now, after we have obtained these concepts, to imagine the phenomenon of the awake life and sleep.\nSomeone who is able to observe life really can feel very clear, one would like to say, “behold” how the moment of falling asleep takes place really. He can perceive the mental pictures, the feelings becoming weaker, their brightness and intensity decreasing. However, these are not the very essentials. While the human being wakes, he lives in such a way that he creates order in his whole image life from his self-aware ego, summarises all mental pictures, as it were, with his ego. Since at the moment when we would not summarise our mental pictures with our ego in the awake life, we would not lead a normal soul life. We would have a group of mental pictures that we would call our mental pictures, and another group at which we would look as something strange, as an outside world. Only the human beings who experience a splitting of their ego what is a morbid state for the present human being could have such a splitting of their image life in different groups.\nWith the normal human being, it is essential that all mental pictures relate to a point in perspective: to the self-conscious ego. At the moment of falling asleep, we feel clearly how, so to speak, the ego is overpowered by the mental pictures at first, even though they become darker. They assert their independence, live an own way of life. Single clouds of mental pictures form, as it were, within the horizon of the consciousness, and the ego loses itself to the images. Then the human being feels the sense-perceptions becoming duller and duller and he feels finally how the will impulses are paralysed. Now we must point to something that few human beings observe quite clearly. In addition, the human being feels that at the moment of falling asleep something makes itself noticeable like an enclosed being in an uncertain fog which works cooling now and again, or becomes noticeable with other feelings at certain places of the body: in the hands, in the joints, in the temples, in the spine et cetera. Someone who falls asleep can observe these feelings. This are — one would like to say — such trivial experiences, as one can do them every evening while falling asleep if one wants.\nSuch human beings make better experiences already who more exactly observe the moment of falling asleep by a finer education of their soul life. Then they can feel something like waking up in spite of falling asleep. Everybody can observe these things really who gets into the habit of applying some methods because it is a generally human phenomenon. At the moment when the human beings feel something like waking up with falling asleep it is in such a way that one can really say, something wakes up like a spreading conscience, something like the morality of the soul wakes up. This is the case really. It becomes apparent in particular that such persons observe that experience of the preceding day life with which they are satisfied in their conscience. They feel this at this moment of the moral waking up in particular.\nAt the same time, this feeling is completely contrary to the feeling of the day. The human being falling asleep feels, as if his soul poured out itself about a world that awakes now and which primarily expresses itself as a feeling extending about what the soul can experience by itself like by a spreading out conscience in relation to its moral inwardness. Then there it is a moment of inner bliss, which, however, seems much longer for the falling asleep, when it extends about such things with which the soul can agree and it is often a feeling of deep strife if it has to reproach itself.\nBriefly, the moral human being who is pressed down during the day by the stronger sensory impressions expands and feels as something particular when he falls asleep. Everybody who has appropriated a certain method or maybe a sensation only concerning such observations knows that a certain longing awakes at this moment that we can describe possibly in this way: one wants that this moment, actually, may extend in the uncertain that it does not find an end. Then, however, something comes like a jolt, a kind of inner movement. Now this is quite exceptionally difficult to describe for the most human beings. Spiritual research can describe this inner movement to a hair's breadth, of course. It is as it were a demand that the soul makes to itself: you must extend still further; you must pour out yourself even further! However, while it puts this demand to itself, the soul loses itself for the moral life in the surroundings. It is, as if you distribute a droplet of colour in water: at first, you still see the colour if, however, the drop is distributed in the whole water, the colour grows weaker and weaker, and, finally, it disappears.\nIt is this way if the soul just starts swelling up, living in its moral reflection, there it still feels; but the feeling stops when the jolt, the inner movement occurs as the drop of colour loses itself in the water. This is no theory; one can observe this and it is accessible to everybody as a scientific observation. If we observe falling asleep this way, however, we are able to say, the human being intercepts with falling asleep as it were something that can no longer be in his consciousness afterwards. The human being has — if I may help myself now of the two ideas contrived before — as it were a moment of saying farewell to the mirror of the bodily in which the phenomena of life appeared reflected to him. Because he still has no possibility to let reflect what should be reflected in the body in something else, the possibility stops perceiving what he is.\nHowever, one is also able to perceive the phenomena of the day again in a certain way — if one is not arbitrary and does not want to be obstinate concerning the soul and the effect of that what goes there into an uncertain darkness. In another context, I have already drawn your attention to it that the human being who is forced to memorise this or that, to learn things by heart, manages this much easier if he sleeps on them, and that the biggest enemy of learning by heart is the avoidance of sleep. The possibility and the ability are there again to memorise easier if we have slept on the thing, than to learn something by heart in one go. However, it is this way also with other soul activities.\nHowever, we would be able to convince ourselves quite easily that it is impossible to learn something generally, to acquire something where the soul has to co-operate if we do not always insert the states of sleep in our states of life. One can conclude from such phenomena that our soul needs to withdraw from the body every now and then to get strength from a field that is not within the body because within the bodily the suitable forces are just worn out. We have to imagine if we wake up in the morning, we have brought recovering forces from the state in which we were to develop abilities which we could not develop if we were only always tied up to our body. The effect of sleep appears in our usual being this way if one wants to think straight and does not want to be obstinate.\nWhat appears in general and where one already needs some good will, if one stops in the usual life to hold together the single phenomena, appears in no uncertain manner if the human being goes through developments that can lead him to the real beholding in the spiritual life. I would like to explain here what happens if the human being has developed the forces slumbering in his soul to attain that state where he does not perceive by the senses and understand by the mind. — Further details of that follow in the talk How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Spiritual World? where the methods should be discussed quite comprehensively. — However, some of the experiences should be now emphasised which a human being can do who really goes through such exercises. They provide his soul as it were with spiritual eyes, with spiritual ears by which he is able to behold in the spiritual world that is not an object of speculation, but an object, as the human being perceives the colours and forms, warmth, cold and tones with his physical senses. Already in the former talks, I have explained how one attains true clairvoyance.\nThis spiritual development, these exercises consist really of the fact that the human being gets out something what he has in himself, attains other cognitive organs, and experiences as it were a jolt in the soul and thereby perceives a world that is always around him he cannot perceive, however, in the normal state. If the human being goes through such exercises, his sleep changes at first. Everybody knows this who has come to real own spiritual researches. Now I want to speak of the very first state of the change of the sleeping life with the actually clairvoyant, spiritual-scientific human being.\nThe first beginnings of this possibility of spiritual research let the human being appear not very different from the usual, normal state of consciousness. Since, if the human being carries out such exercises that we discuss later, he sleeps completely as well as another person at first and is unconscious exactly the same way as any other human being. Nevertheless, the moment of waking up shows something particular to someone who has gone through spiritual-mental exercises. I want to portray some quite concrete phenomena to you that are facts.\nAssuming that a human being who does such exercises thinks very sharply about something that also another human being could think, he tries — because he maybe faces a very hard problem — to tighten all his mental powers to come behind the matter.\nHe may fare exactly the same way as a pupil fares: his mental strength is not sufficient to solve the task. This can absolutely happen. If he already has more possibilities of experience about inner mental states in connection with bodily ones by his exercises, however, he feels something particular if he is not able to do anything. Then he feels other than it is usually the case that he has an opposition in his physical organs, for example, in his brain. He feels properly, as if the brain resists to him as we feel resistance, for example, if we want to hammer down a nail with a too heavy hammer. There the brain starts gaining reality. As the human being normally uses his brain, he does not feel it in such a way, as he uses an instrument, for example, a hammer. The spiritual researcher feels his brain, he feels independent compared to his thinking. This is an experience. However, where he cannot solve a task, there he feels that he can no longer carry out certain activities that he must carry out with thinking. He loses the power of the instrument and feels this quite clearly. This is a fact that one can experience certainly.\nIf now the spiritual researcher sleeps on the problem and wakes up, it can very often happen that he copes with the task. However, he feels quite exactly at the same time that he has done something before waking up that he has worked something. He feels that he was able to set something in motion, to make something active in himself during the sleep. He was forced to use his brain in the awake state. He knows this. However, he could no longer use it correctly because it resisted to him — as I have described. In the sleeping state — he feels this — he does not depend on the use of the brain. He could create a certain mobility without using the too strongly tired or claimed brain. Now he feels something quite peculiar: he perceives his activity that he has exercised in sleep, but not directly. The Lord does not give his friends their need in sleep (changed German saying referring to Psalms 127:2) . Nevertheless, he is not spared to solve the problem in the awake state. It can happen to him; but normally it is not in such a way, and in particular, not with such things which one has to solve with the brain.\nThen the human being feels something that he has not known before in the sensory world at all, he feels his own activity like in living pictures, in strange pictures which are in motion — as if the thoughts which he would need were living beings which strike up all kinds of interrelations. He feels his own activity of thought that he has exercised in sleep like a range of pictures. This feeling is hard to describe because one sticks to it in quite peculiar way and must say to himself, you are that! On the other side, he can distinguish this feeling again certainly from himself as he can distinguish an outer movement, which he does from himself. Thus, one has pictures, imaginations of an activity that has been carried out before waking up. Now one can notice if one has learnt to watch out for himself that these pictures of an activity, which was before waking up, combine with our brain and make it a more movable, more useful instrument. Therefore, one can accomplish something that one was not able to do before because a resistance was there to think, for example, certain thoughts. These are subtle things, but without them, one cannot come surely behind the secret of sleep. One feels that one has exercised no activity like in the awake state, but an activity that was used to the restoration of certain things in the brain, and that one has rebuilt the instrument, as one could not build up it before. One feels like a master builder of his own instruments.\nThe sensation that one has with such an activity is substantially different from that of an activity of the day. For the activity of the day, one has such a feeling that one can compare to it, as if one draws something after a model. There I am forced to comply with every line or colour spot of the picture that stands before me. With those things which appear as pictures at the moment of waking up and which visualise an activity during the sleep, one has the feeling, as if one invented the lines and created figures from oneself without being bound to a model. With such a phenomenon, one has intercepted as it were what the soul has done, before it has woken up: one has intercepted the activity of the regeneration of the brain. For one finds out gradually that that what one feels like a kind of covering the cerebral organs with that what one reminds there as figures is nothing else than a reconstruction of that what was destroyed during the day. One really feels like a master builder.\nNow the difference between a spiritual researcher who perceives such thing and a usual human being consists only of the fact that the spiritual researcher just perceives this, while the usual human being cannot pay attention to it and does not perceive it. Since the same activity, which the spiritual researcher carries out, every human being carries out, only the usual human being does not intercept the moment when the organs are built up anew from the activity during sleep.\nWe take such an experience and compare it with that what we have said before about the decreasing brightness of the everyday thought-life while falling asleep. One can look at this latter phenomenon really only in the right light if one either delivers oneself from the mental pictures of that worldview working very suggestively which believe to stand on the firm ground of natural sciences, or if one gets involved with the results of the present physical research. There the more exactly thinking human beings cannot help to admitting the independence of the mental from the bodily after the results of the physical research, for instance, of the brain research.\nIt is very interesting that recently a popular book appeared where everything of that what deals with the spiritual life and the origins of the spiritual life is shown wrongly, completely without any insight. Nevertheless, some very clever things are stated in this book Brain and Personality or the Physical Relations of the Brain to the Mind by William Hanna Thomson (1833-1918, American physician and author). Above all, he went into the brain research of the present and into some things, which present themselves, otherwise, for example as symptoms of fatigue that are very instructive. However, I have already explained that conscious activity only tires the muscles or nerves. As long our muscles serve the organic activity only, they cannot get tired, because it would be bad if, for example, the heart muscle and other muscles had to rest. We get tired only if we exercise an activity that is not innate to the organism if we exercise an activity that belongs to the conscious soul life. Therefore, one must say, if the soul life were born out like the heart activity, the immense difference between getting tired and not getting tired would not be explicable at all. Hence, the author of that book feels just forced to concede that the mental relates to the physical like the rider to the horse, that it is quite independent of the physical. This is an immense concession from a scientifically thinking person. One could receive quite peculiar feelings if a person, forced by the physical research of the present, has to concede that the mental life relates to the physical like the rider to the horse that is after the picture of the centaur that one has imagined in former times when one looked more at the spiritual.\nIt is evident by nothing that the author of this book has thought this, but this thought comes to the fore by the scientific idea again, and one gets feelings of such ideas, which are due to times, when many human beings still had a certain clairvoyance. Indeed, certain modern ideas about the centaur seem to comply better with that what a gentleman said to me once. The person concerned meant: the Greeks saw the Scythians or other horse peoples coming from the north, but they saw them maybe coming through a fog, they could not exactly distinguish those figures and thought that they would have grown out of the horses. The materialist may be content with such an explanation. Nevertheless, just the scientific researches of the present urge to concede the independence of the mental from the physical.\nThereby something strikes us most certainly, and we can pursue such things best of all if we imagine certain phenomena that are not everyday; however, such phenomena exist and cannot be denied. I know the story that a simple peasant started talking Latin suddenly at his hour of death, a language that he had never used, actually, and from which one could prove that he had heard it only as a little boy in the church once. This is no fable, but reality. Of course, he understood nothing of it when he had heard or recited it. Nevertheless, it is true. From that, any human being would have to form the idea, that the surroundings working on us still contain quite different things in themselves than what we take up in our usual consciousness. Since that often depends on our education what we understand and the like. Nevertheless, not only that what we understand unites with us, but also we have the possibility in ourselves to take up endlessly more things than those we take up consciously. We can even observe with any human being that at certain times images appear with him, which were not so intensive at that time when he got to know them, so that he can maybe remember nothing at all.\nHowever, because of certain things they appear again, position themselves maybe even in the centre of the soul life. We must absolutely admit that the extent of our soul life is endlessly larger than that what we can take up and enclose in our day consciousness. This is very important. Since thereby our look is directed to an inside which can impress our corporeality a little only because it was hardly kept in mind, and, nevertheless, it still lives on in us. We are thereby referred to the subsoil of our soul life that, actually, must exist for every reasonable human being. Since every reasonable human being has to say to himself, what he consciously perceives looking at the world is dependent on the equipment of his senses and on that what he can understand. Nobody is entitled to want to limit reality by that what he can perceive. It would be quite illogical to want to deny to the spiritual researcher that there is a spiritual world behind the physical world, because the human being can only say what he sees and hears about which he can think, and he can never judge about what he cannot perceive. Since the world of reality is not the world of the discernible. The world of the discernible is limited by the senses. Therefore, one should never speak — as in the Kantian sense — of limits of knowledge, or about what the human being can know or cannot know, but only about that what one faces with his sense-organs.\nIf anyone considers this, he must say to himself, behind the carpet of colours of the sensory world, behind that which the warmth sense perceives as warm or cold et cetera, there is an unlimited reality. Should influence us only what we perceive, or only that reality which we perceive? It is logical only if we imagine that a part of the whole reality is given by our perception that behind that an unlimited reality is which is real, however, also for us, because we are positioned in it, so that that lives on for us what lives outdoors and influences us. How does our conscious day life present itself then? Then we have to imagine the conscious day life in such a way — and there is no other possibility — that we open our senses, our cognitive faculties to an immeasurableness and oppose this immeasurableness. Because we have such eyes, such ears, such a warmth sense et cetera we face a certain part of reality; we reject, defend ourselves as it were against it, and exclude it from ourselves. In what does our conscious activity consist then? It is self-defending, excluding something. Exerting our sense organs is restraining something unperceived. What we perceive is the rest, that remains from that what spreads out around us, and which we push back for the most part. Thus, we feel actively positioned in the world, we feel connected with it. We defend ourselves as it were by our sensory activity against the plenty of impressions, while we cannot endure — figuratively spoken — the entire extensive infinity and take up a part of it only. If we think in such a way, we must still think relations between our whole organism, between our whole corporeality and the outside world quite different from those, which we can perceive or understand with our reason.\nThen it is no longer abstruse to remember that the relations that we have to the outside world live in us that also the invisible, supersensible is active in us that the supersensible, while it is active in us, uses the senses to produce a part of the whole reality. Then, however, our relation to reality is different from our sense-perception. Then there is something in our relations to the outside world that does not at all amount to nothing more than the sensory perception that escapes from the day consciousness. Then it is with us in such a way, as if we have to step with our being before a mirror and say to ourselves, you are something different; the mirror shows only the form, maybe also the colours. However, there you think inside, there you feel inside, the mirror cannot show all that to you, it shows only what is dependent on its laws. As you are, however, as a soul compared with your organism, you are something else than your senses show to you; they limit you to what is commensurate to their laws. So you face if you face a world — in similar way as you stand before a mirror — which becomes possible only by your senses!\nIf you think this picture to an end, you are no longer surprised that all life of our day consciousness depends very much on the organisation of our senses and our brain, just as that what we see of ourselves in the mirror depends on the state of the mirror. Someone who looks at a distorting mirror and sees the caricatured face gladly concedes that his picture does not depend on him, but on the mirror. Thus, it depends on the organisation of our reflection apparatus, and our mental activity is limited, is reflected in itself so to speak, while it is reflected in the bodily life. Then it is not miraculous that the part — what one can also prove physiologically — depends on the bodily, while this or that takes place in the consciousness one way or the other, because everything that the soul does depends on the organisation of our body if we shall become aware of it.\nObservation shows that the concepts which we have only constructed in the beginning absolutely correspond to the facts. The only difference is that our corporeality is a living mirror. We let the mirror, into which we look, as it is. Indeed, we can also impair the reflection. If we breathe on the mirror, it also does no longer reflect correctly. But the reflection in our physical nature which experiences the activity of our soul is connected with the fact that, while we reflect ourselves in our physical nature, the reflection itself is an activity, a process in our corporeality, and that we put that reflection as an activity before ourselves.\nThus, the bodily life presents itself really in such a way, as if we write what we think in a certain respect and have the letters then before ourselves. Thus, we write the activity of the soul in our bodily life. What the anatomist proves is only the letters, the outer apparatus, because we do not observe our soul life completely if we observe it only in the bodily life, we observe it only completely if we observe it independently from it. However, only the spiritual researcher is able to do this if he observes the soul life mirroring while it wakes up in the conscious day life. It becomes obvious that the soul life is like an architect who builds up something during the night, and destroys it in the day life.\nNow we face the soul life in the awake state and in the sleeping state. We have to imagine it as independent from the bodily life in the sleeping state, as the rider is independent from the horse. However, as the rider uses the horse and wears out its forces, the soul uses the activity of the body, so that chemical processes take place as the letters of the soul life. With it, we come to a point where we have worn out the bodily life, as it is limited in the senses, in the brain, so that we have exhausted it at first. Then we must start the other activity, initiate the reverse process, and rebuild the destroyed. This is the sleeping life, so that our soul exercises two contrary activities on our body. Indeed, while waking we have round ourselves our world of images surging up and down, of joy and grief, of feelings et cetera. However, while we have this before ourselves, we wear out our bodily life; we destroy it perpetually strictly speaking. While we are sleeping, we are the architects and rebuild what we have destroyed during the conscious life.\nWhat does the spiritual researcher perceive now? He perceives the architectural activity in peculiar pictures like in looping movements; this reconstruction is a real process that is contrary to the usual conscious day life. It is really no pipe dream if one speaks of the fact that one recognises in these intertwining movements that mysterious activity which the soul carries out in the sleep: we restore what we have destroyed in the day life. Hence, the recovering and the necessary of the sleep.\nWhy does now the sleeping life not become conscious? Why does the wake life become conscious? Because we have something like reflections with the processes which we carry out in the day life. However, while we perform the other activity, restoring the worn out, we have nothing at which it can be reflected. We lack the mirror for it. Only the spiritual researcher can show again what forms its basis. From a certain point the spiritual researchers does not only experience the mental activity, as I have described it, like a dream recollection of the sleep, but in such a way, as if he is not dependent at all on the instrument of the body, so that he can perceive an activity then which takes place only in the spiritual. There he can say to himself, you do not think with your brain now, but you think in quite different forms, you think pictures independently from your brain. However, the spiritual researcher can only get around to experiencing such a thing as I have described if he experiences that the whole that wraps around him as something nebulous does not disappear falling asleep. He perceives this fog at the temples, in the joints, in the spine. It becomes something from which that is reflected which he does — as that is reflected which we experience in the coarse bodily life — if he can limit and withdraw his activity in himself. The whole difference of the real clairvoyance from the usual wake day life consists of the fact that the wake day life needs another mirror to become conscious of the mental activity using the corporeality, whereas the activity of the clairvoyant is so strong if it radiates as soul activity that the emitted ray withdraws in itself. Thus, a reflection takes place as it were in the own inner experience, in a spiritual organism.\nIn this spiritual organism, our soul exists at night, even if we are no spiritual researchers. Therein it pours out. We do not manage with the whole life of sleep if we do not get clear that, indeed, our bodily processes — everything that anatomy, physiology can investigate — cause nothing else than the reflection of the soul processes, and that these soul processes always live on in a spiritual existence from falling asleep to waking up. If we think different, we cannot manage it at all. We have to speak as it were of a mysterious soul life that cannot enter at all the consciousness that the body gives. If one sees images appearing with a human being that he has not kept in his consciousness long since, one must say: there is something else in the human being than the images of the conscious soul life that have been taken up consciously.\nI have indicated already once that it is very easy to disprove the things that are real for the spiritual researcher. However, they are true. The spiritual research must speak of the fact that the human being has the physical body that we see with eyes, can touch with hands, and which anatomy and physiology know. In addition, we have an inner member of the human being: the astral body, the bearer of everything that the human being takes up consciously that he really experiences during the day life in such a way that he can receive it reflected by the body. Between the astral body and the physical body is the bearer of imaginations that remain unnoticed for years, which are brought up into the astral body then and become conscious life then. Briefly, between the astral body, the bearer of consciousness, and the physical body the etheric body of the human being is active. This etheric body is not only the bearer of such imaginations going unnoticed, but it also is generally the builder of the entire physical body.\nWhat happens now, actually, in the sleep? It happens that the astral body, the bearer of consciousness, leaves the physical and etheric bodies together with the ego, so that a splitting of the human nature takes place. If the human being is in the wake day life, the astral body and the ego are in the physical body and etheric body, and the processes of the physical body work like reflecting processes by which everything that goes forward in the astral body becomes conscious. Consciousness is the reflection of the experiences by the physical body, and, hence, we must not confuse consciousness with the experiences. If the astral body goes out in the sleep, it is not able to perceive anything in the world of the astral. The human being is unconscious there.\nWhich ability does now the spiritual researcher attain, while things also become conscious to him in sleep even if he does not rely on his brain? He attains the ability to perceive in something and to reflect his soul activity that lives for him between the things and that can be perceived in the wake day consciousness also as the own etheric body. The etheric body is woven of that by which the clairvoyant perceives; so that for him the external world becomes reflecting as for the soul life of the normal human being the physical corporeality becomes reflecting.\nNow there are interstates between waking and sleeping. Such an interstate is the dream. In relation to its origin the spiritual research shows that, indeed, the dreams are based on something similar as the clairvoyance is, only the latter is something trained, whereas the dreams are always fantastic. The human being loses the possibility that the physical body reflects his soul life if he leaves it with the astral body. However, under certain unusual conditions that happen for every human being, he can get the ability to receive the mental experiences reflected by the etheric body. Indeed, we must regard not only the physical body as an apparatus of reflection, but also the etheric body, because as long as the outer world makes impressions on us, the physical body works like an apparatus of reflection. However, if we become quiet in ourselves and process the impressions of the world, then we work in ourselves, however, our thoughts are real, nevertheless. We live our thoughts, and we feel that we are dependent on something subtler than our physical body is, namely on the etheric body. Then the etheric body reflects what is in the lonesome contemplation that is not based on outer impressions at first. Nevertheless, we are in our etheric body in the wake day consciousness; we perceive what is reflected, but we do not perceive the activity of the astral body directly. While we are not able in an interstate between waking and sleeping to receive outer sensory impressions but still something in certain way that is connected with our etheric body, the etheric body can reflect what we experience in our soul with our astral body. These are the irregular dreams, because the human being is in a quite unusual position.\nIf we consider this, we realise something of the dream world that is rather mysterious, otherwise. Hence, we have to imagine the subsoil of the soul life narrowly tied up with the dream life. While the physical body is the player of the soul life and our day interests affect it, we are connected by the etheric body often in the most remote kind with experiences which are long behind us and which we become aware of only weakly because the day life works strongly on us. Hence, they remain something very strange to us. However, if we consider dreams now, which are based on good observation, something strange can appear. For example, a good composer experiences the picture that a somewhat diabolical figure plays a sonata. He wakes — and can write down the sonata. There something has become active in him that worked like something strange in him. This was possible because something was in him for which the soul of the composer was ripe but could not appear in the wake day life because the bodily life is only an obstacle and not suitable to reflect. There we see that the bodily life is an obstacle and that this is its significance. In the day life we can only experience for which the bodily life — figuratively spoken — is lubricated as a machine. The bodily life is always an obstacle. However, we succeed to a certain degree in using the bodily life. One needs “inhibitions” everywhere. If a locomotive drives on the rails, there are also inhibitions, the frictions by which it can drive, because without friction the wheels could not rotate.\nOur bodily processes are the obstacles of our soul life in truth, and these inhibitory processes are the reflecting processes at the same time. If we are mature in our soul for something and if we have not yet succeeded in “smearing our machine,” the wake day life is a good hindrance. However, if we leave our physical body, our etheric body — that must appear to us as something completely strange because it is of subtler nature — can express what lives in the soul life. If then it is strong enough, it squeezes in the dream life like in this case of the composer. This is less connected with the daily interests than with concealed interests, which are remote in the fine subsoil. Thus, for example, also in the following. I note, I tell only something really observed. A woman dreams — although she has children, whom she loves very much, and a husband, who loves her exceptionally — that she is engaged for the second time and experiences all events with big joy. What does she dream? She dreams experiences that are very far from her current life, which she experienced once but which she does not recognise again, because the usual daily interest is connected only with the physical body. The etheric body reflects here what still lives on in her etheric body due to another event because any happy sensation has maybe released the dream.\nA man dreams that he goes through childhood experiences. These childhood experiences are reflected quite wonderfully. An especially important event grieving him deeply causes that he wakes up. At first, the dream is very dear to him; however, he soon falls asleep again and continues dreaming. Now a whole sum of disagreeable experiences goes through his soul, and an especially painful event wakes him. All that is extremely far from his present experiences. He gets up because he is shaken at the dream very much, walks around for a while in the room, then he lies down again, and experiences in the dream events that he has not experienced. All events that he has gone through are tangled, and now he experiences something quite new. The whole becomes a poem that he can even write down and set to music afterward. This is a real fact. Now it will not be difficult to imagine with the concepts that we have already attained what has happened there. For the spiritual researcher it presents itself this way: the man has suffered a break of his development as it were at a particular moment of his life. He had to give up something that lay in his soul. However, even if he had to give up it, his etheric body has not left it. The usual interests were only so strong to force back it. Where it was strong enough because of inner elasticity, it squeezed in the dream because the human being is delivered there from the inhibitions of the wake day life. That is the person concerned was on the brink to coming really to that what expressed itself in the poem; but then it has been drowned.\nThus, we clearly recognise the independence of the soul life from the outer bodily life in the dream. This must prove that the idea of the reflection of the soul life in the bodily life is very justified. Just the fact that the interests, in which we are involved, do not impress themselves straight in our immediate experience, shows that beside the life, as it runs in the everyday life, another life runs alongside which I have called a kind of waking up for the conscious finer observing. Everything lives in it that is for our spiritual life — as for example the conscience — independent of the bodily life. Everybody feels this. Nevertheless, in the daily life this other life turns out to be very much limited by our daily interests. In the sleep, our soul appears completely fulfilled with this moral quality. It really means immersing oneself in the spiritual what we can call a jolt, an inner movement. Spiritual-scientific research will arise as something by which we consciously settle in the world in which the normal human being settles unconsciously every time when falling asleep.\nThe human beings have to familiarise themselves gradually with the fact that the world comprises much more than what we can understand with the senses and pursue with the reason, and that the life of sleep is an area which we need because we just wear the noblest organs in the daily life which serve for the life of imagination. In the sleep, we restore them, so that they can face the world strongly and can reflect our soul life in the wake day life. Everything typical of the soul life could thereby become clear to us. Who would not know that he feels drawn, exhausted after a good, deep sleep? People often complain it; but this is no symptom, but comprehensible. Since strictly speaking the entire rest takes place only one or one and a half hours after sleep. Why? Because we have well worked on our organs, so that they do not only endure for some hours again, but for the whole day. There we are not yet trained immediately after waking, we can use them well only after some time. One would have to speak about a certain kind of weariness that one could be glad after one and a half hours that one can familiarise oneself with the recovered organs. Since from the sleep comes what we need: the architectural forces for the organs, which are worn during the day.\nThus, we can say, our soul life is a life in independence, a life from which we have something in the wake day life by our consciousness that is a reflection. Consciousness is a reflection of the relations of the soul to the surroundings. In the wake day life, we are given to our surroundings, to something strange, to something that we are not ourselves. During sleep, however — and this is the nature of sleep — we withdraw from all outer activity in order to work on ourselves. The comparison for it is suitable: in the ship that was on high sea, the sailors carpenter and mend when it drives in the harbour. Who believes that nothing happens with us during sleep could also believe that nothing needs to happen with the ship when it is in the harbour after a trip. However, it will drive out again, and there he will already see what happens if it is not repaired. Thus, it would be if the soul did not work on us during sleep. We are returned to ourselves in sleep, while we are given to the outside world in the day life. The normal human being is only unable to perceive what the soul does in sleep in such a way, as he perceives the outside world during the day.\nIn the talk How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Spiritual World? , we shall see that also in the spiritual a reflection can be attained as knowledge by which the human being can get perception in the higher worlds. All that shows that just the soul if it is not aware of itself knows nothing about its own activity, however, that it is occupied with itself, works in itself, and gets the forces independently from any corporeality that shall just serve the construction of the bodily.\nThus, I would like to summarise what I have said and characterise the nature of sleep with the words:\nThe soul returns itself. It withdraws embraced by sleep To spiritual regions, If sensory narrowness depresses it!"
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-6",
    "title": "The Spirit in the Realm of Plants",
    "date": "8 Dec 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/Singles/19101208p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "These lectures were published under the title Spiritual Science's Answer to the Large Questions of the Present Time . In German: ‘Der Geist im Pflanzenreich,’ in Antworten der Geisteswissenschaft auf die Grossen Fragen des Daseins .\nTranslated by Gerald Karnow, with revisions by Alice Wulsin\nHow spiritual science must recognize the living and weaving spirit in all beings surrounding us by proceeding from the principle that the knowing human being should understand himself in his knowing has been touched upon in the lectures about The Human Soul and the Animal Soul and The Human Spirit and the Animal Spirit. 1 Berlin, November 10 and 17, 1910 It was said that the person knowing himself could never think of taking into his own spirit — as spiritual content — ideas, concepts, and mental images of things and beings if these concepts and ideas, this spiritual content through which the human being wants to make comprehensible what resides in the objects, were not first present in these objects, were not placed into them. All drawing forth of the spiritual from things and beings would be pure fantasy, would be a self-made fantasy, if we were not to presuppose that wherever we gaze and are able to discover the spirit, there this spirit is actually present.\nAlthough still only in small circles, this general presupposition of the spiritual content of the world is made rather frequently. Even those who speak of the spirit in objects, however, usually remain with speaking about the spirit in general, i.e., they speak about the existence of spiritual weaving, of spiritual life lying at the basis of the mineral, plant, and animal realms, etc. To enter into the means by which the spirit individualizes itself for us, how it manifests itself particularly in this or that form of existence, is not yet given much thought in the wider circles of our educated contemporaries. Offense is usually taken to those who speak not only of the spirit generally but of its particular forms, its particular ways, how it makes itself felt behind this or that phenomenon. Nevertheless, in our spiritual science, we should not speak about the spirit in the vague and general way indicated today; rather, we should speak in such a way that we recognize how the spirit weaves behind the mineral or plant existence, how it is active in the animal and human existence. Our task today is to say some thing about the nature of the spirit in the realm of plants.\nIt must be admitted that if we do not begin with abstract philosophy, or with abstract theosophy, but if we begin with unbiased observations of reality and at the same time — as it must be on the healthy ground of spiritual science — we stand firm on the ground of natural science and then want to speak about ‘the spirit in the realm of plants,’ we not only collide with unjustified prejudices of our scientists or other educated contemporaries but also come into conflict with more-or-less justified concepts that have, and must have, the power of strong suggestion.\nEspecially in this contemplation, which is to concern itself with the spirit that finds its expression, its physiognomy, as it were, in the realm confronting us in the gigantic trees of the primeval forest, or those growing on Teneriffa thousands of years ago, as well as in the small, unassuming violet hiding in the quiet woods or elsewhere — especially in such a contemplation a person may feel himself in a rather difficult position, if the natural scientific concepts of the nineteenth century have been absorbed. Yes, a person feels himself in a rather difficult position if he has worked through to what should be said about the spirit in this area, for how could it be denied that great and wonderful discoveries in the realm of material research — even in the realm of the nature of plants — were made in the nineteenth century, thoroughly illuminating the nature of plants from a certain standpoint.\nAgain and again we should be reminded that in the second third of the nineteenth century the great botanist, Schleiden, discovered the plant cell. He was the first to place before humanity the truth that every plant body is built up out of small — they are called ‘elementary organisms’ — independent entities, ‘cells,’ which appear like the building blocks of this plant body. While previously plants were able to be considered only in relation to their crude parts and organs, now attention was directed to how every leaf of the higher plants consisted of innumerable, tiny microscopic formations — the plant cells. No wonder such a discovery had a powerful influence on all thinking and feeling in relation to the plant world! It is entirely natural that the person who first discerned how the plant is built up out of these building blocks would arrive at the thought that by investigating these small formations, these building blocks, the secret of the nature of plants could be revealed.\nThe ingenious Gustav Theodor Fechner must already have experienced this idea when, around the middle of the nineteenth century, he actually tried to take into his thought sequences something like a ‘plant soul,’ although it could be said that his excessively fantastic elaboration of the nature of plants may have appeared somewhat too early. Fechner spoke comprehensively about a soul of plants (e.g., in his book Nanna ), and he spoke not only as one who merely fantasizes but as one thoroughly and deeply acquainted with the natural scientific advances of the nineteenth century. He was unable, however, to think that plants are merely built up out of cells; rather, when he looked at the forms, the structures, of individual plants, he was led to assume that sense reality is the expression of an underlying soul element.\nNow, you must admit that in contrast to what spiritual science has to say today about the life of the spirit in the realm of plants, Fechner's explanations appear rather fantastic, but his thoughts were actually an advance. In spite of this, Fechner had to experience the resistance that can come especially through the thinking into which the human spirit had penetrated by the discoveries of the nineteenth century. It must simply be understood that even the greatest individuals were fascinated by what they beheld when, under the microscope, the plant body revealed itself as a structure of small cells. They could in no way conceive how someone could still come up with the idea of a ‘plant soul’ after the material aspects had shown themselves in such a grandiose way to the searching human spirit. It is therefore easy to understand that even the discoverer of the plant cell became the greatest and most vehement opponent of what Fechner wished to say concerning the soul nature of plants. And it is rather interesting to see the fine and subtle mind of Fechner in battle with Schleiden, who became famous through his epoch-making discovery for botany but who did away, in a materialistically crude way, with everything that Fechner wanted to say about plants out of his intimate contemplations.\nIn a battle such as the one between Fechner and Schleiden in the nineteenth century, something basically took place that must be experienced by every soul who penetrates into the science of our time, working through the doubts and riddles that arise nevertheless, especially when one enters into the achievements of natural science. He will have grave doubts if he is able to work himself out of the frequently quite compelling concepts in such a realm. Whoever is not acquainted with this compelling quality of the materialistic natural scientific concepts of the nineteenth century may find trivial, possibly even narrow-minded, what is said out of the world view that wishes to place itself on the firm ground of natural science. One who approaches matters with a healthy sense for truth and a serious concern for solving life's riddles, however, and is at the same time armed with the botanical concepts of the nineteenth century, can have quite tragic inner soul experiences. Something about this need only be suggested here.\nThus we can learn, for example, what the botany of the nineteenth century has brought. There is much in this botany that is actually magnificent and truly astounding. A person who approaches the natural scientific concepts with a healthy sense for truth reaches the point where these concepts affect him like suggestion, with a tremendous power; they do not let him loose but whisper in his ears again and again, ‘You are doing something stupid if you leave the sure path on which one studies how cell relates to cell, how cell is nourished by cell,’ and so on. Finally it becomes necessary to tear oneself loose from the materialistic concepts in this realm. There is no other choice, no matter how firmly one wishes to be held by the suggestive power of the world views that are merely a consequence of outer materialistic concepts. After a certain point it no longer works. Not many people today experience that point. The suggestive power is experienced by most people who feel fascinated by the natural scientific results, and they do not dare take even a single step beyond what the microscope shows. The next step is taken only by very few. It is clear, however, to whoever maintains a healthy sense for truth, especially regarding the natural sciences — and this is necessary if one wishes to approach the spirit in the realm of plants — that first a person must occupy himself with a certain mental image, for otherwise he will always succumb to error, will always enter a labyrinth such as happened to Fechner despite his serious attempts to examine the symbolic, the physiognomic aspects of individual plant forms and structures.\nI would like to suggest to you what is significant here first by means of a comparison. Imagine that someone found a piece of matter, some kind of tissue, on a path. If he examines this piece of tissue, in certain cases it may happen that he doesn't get anywhere. Why not? If this piece of tissue is a piece of bone from a human arm, the examiner will not get anywhere if he wants to look merely at this piece of bone and to explain it out of itself, for it would be impossible for this piece of tissue to come into existence without the prior existence of a human arm.\nOne cannot speak about the tissue at all if it is not considered in connection with a complete human organism. It is impossible, therefore, to speak about such a formation other than in connection with an entire being. Consider the following comparison. We find an object somewhere, a human hair. If we wanted to explain how it may have originated there, we would be led completely astray, because we can explain this only by considering it in connection with an entire human organism. By itself it is nothing; by itself it cannot be explained.\nThis is something that the spiritual investigator must consider in relation to the whole scope of our observations, of our explanations. He must direct his attention to the question of whether any object confronting him can be considered by itself or whether it remains inexplicable by itself, whether it belongs to something else or can be examined better as an isolated entity.\nCuriously enough, the spiritual investigator becomes aware that it is generally impossible to consider the world of plants, this wonderful covering of the earth, as something existing by itself. When confronted with the plant he feels just as he does regarding a finger, which he can consider only as belonging to a complete human organism. The plant world cannot be considered in isolation, because to the view of the spiritual investigator the plant world at once relates itself to the entire planet earth and forms a whole with the earth, just as the finger or piece of bone or the brain forms a whole with our organism. And whoever merely looks at plants by themselves, remaining with the particular, does the same as one who wishes to explain a hand or a piece of human bone by itself. The common nature of plants simply cannot be considered in any other way than as a member of our common planet earth.\nHere, however, we come to a matter that may annoy many today, though it is valid nevertheless for the spiritual scientific view. We come to look differently at our whole planet earth than is done customarily by today's science, for our contemporary science — be it astronomy, geology, or mineralogy — basically speaks about the earth only in so far as this earthly sphere consists of rocks, of the mineral element, of lifeless matter. Spiritual science may not speak in this way. It can only speak in such a way that everything found on our earth — that which a being coming from outer space, as it were, would find in human beings, animals, plants, and stones — belongs to the whole of our earth, just as the stones themselves belong to our earth. This means that we may not look at the earth planet as a dead rock formation but rather as something that is in itself a living whole, bringing forth the nature of plants out of itself, just as the human being brings forth the structures of his skin, of his sense organs, and the like. In other words, we may not consider the earth without the plant covering that belongs to it.\nAn outer circumstance might already suggest to us that, just as every stone has a certain relationship to the earth, so also everything plant-like belongs to it. Just as every stone, every lifeless body, shows its relationship to the earth by being able to fall onto the earth, where it finds a resistance, so every plant shows its relationship to the earth by the direction of its stem, which is always such that it passes through the center of the earth. All stems of plants would cross at the earth's center if we extended them to that point. This means that the earth is able to draw out of its center all those force radiations that allow the plants to arise. If we look at the mineral realm without also adding the plant covering, we are looking only at an abstraction, at something thought out. We must also add that the natural science that proceeds purely out of the outer material likes to speak about how the origins of all life — including plant-life — must lie in the lifeless, the mineral element.\nThis issue does not exist at all for the spiritual investigator, because the lower is never a precondition for the higher; rather the higher, the living, is always the precondition for the lower, the nonliving. We will see later, in the lecture, What Has Geology to Say About the Origin of the World , 2 Berlin, February 9, 1911. that spiritual research shows how everything rock-like, mineral — from granite to the crumb of soil in the field — originated in a manner similar to what natural science says today about the origin of coal. Today coal is a mineral, we dig it out of the earth. What was it millions of years ago according to natural scientific concepts? Extensive, mighty forests — so says natural science — covered large portions of the earth's surface at that time; later they sank into the earth during shifts of the earth's crust and were then transformed chemically in regard to their material composition, and what we dig up today out of the depths of the earth are the plants that have become stone. If this is admitted today in relation to coal, it should not be considered too ridiculous if spiritual science, by its methods, comes to the conclusion that all rocks found on our earth have in the final analysis originated from the plant. The plant first had to become stone, as it were. Thus the mineral is not the precondition for the plant-like, but rather the reverse is the case, the plant-like is the precondition for the mineral. Everything of a mineral nature is first something plant-like that hardens and then turns to stone.\nThus in the earth planet we have something before us concerning which we must presuppose the following: it was once, with respect to its densest quality, of a plant nature, was a structure of plant-like being, and only developed the lifeless out of what was living, progressively hardening, turning to wood, turning to stone. Just as our skeleton first separates itself out of the organism, so we have to look at the earth's rock formations as the great skeleton of the earth being, of the earth organism.\nNow, if we are able to consider this earth organism from a spiritual scientific viewpoint, we can go still further. Today I can give only the first outlines of this, because this is a cycle of lectures in which one thing must lead to the next. We can ask ourselves, what is the situation with the earth organism as such?\nIn studying an organism we know that alternations of different conditions are revealed. The human and animal organ isms reveal a waking and a sleeping condition alternating in time. Can we, from a spiritual scientific viewpoint, find something similar regarding the body of the earth, the earth organism? To outer consideration, what follows may appear to be a mere comparison, but for spiritual research it is not a comparison but a fact. If we study the curious lawfulness of summer and winter, how it is summer on one half of the earth and winter on the other half, how this relationship alternates, and if we pay attention to how this lawfulness — as wintertime and summertime — is to be discerned in relation to all earthly life, then it will no longer appear absurd if spiritual science tells us that winter and summer in the earth organism correspond to waking and sleeping in the organisms around us. It is simply that the earth does not sleep in time in the same way as other organisms but is always awake somewhere and al ways asleep at some other portion of its being. Waking and sleeping move around spatially: the earth sleeps in the part where there is summer, and it is awake in the part of its being where there is winter. Thus the whole earth organism con fronts us spiritually with conditions like waking and sleeping in other organisms.\nThe summer condition of the earth organism consists of a very specific relationship of the earth to the sun, and because we are dealing with a living, spirit-filled organism we may say that it surrenders itself to an activity that proceeds spiritually from the sun. In the winter condition the earth organism closes itself off from this sun activity, drawing itself together into itself. Now let us compare this condition with human sleep. I will now speak of what appears to be a mere analogy; spiritual science, however, provides the evidence for these observations.\nIf we study the human being in the evening, when he is tired, as his consciousness is diminishing, we find that all thoughts and feelings that enter our soul during the day from the outside, all pleasure and suffering, joy and pain, sink into an indefinite darkness. During this time, the human spirit being — as we have shown in the lecture about the nature of sleep 3 Berlin, November 24, 1910. — passes out of the human physical body and enters the spiritual world, surrendering itself to the spiritual world. In this sleep condition it is a curious fact that the human being becomes unconscious. For the spiritual investigator (we will see how he comes to know this) it is revealed that the inner aspect of the human being, the astral body and ego, actually draw themselves out of the physical and etheric bodies, but they do not simply draw themselves out and float over him like a cloud formation; rather this whole inner aspect of the human being spreads itself out, pours itself out over the whole planetary world around us. As incredible as it may seem, it is nevertheless revealed that the human soul pours itself out in a unified way over the astral realm. The investigators who were acquainted with this realm knew well why they called what departs from the physical the ‘astral body.’ The reason was that this inner element draws out of heavenly space, with which it forms a unity, the forces it needs in order to replace what the day's efforts and work used up from the physical body. Thus the human being in sleep passes into the great world and in the morning draws himself back within the limits of his skin, into the small human world, into the microcosm. There, because his body offers him resistance, he again feels his ego, his self-consciousness.\nThis breathing out and breathing in of the soul is a wonderful alternation in human life. Of all those who have not spoken directly from an occult, spiritual scientific point of view, I have actually found only one individual who made so fitting a remark about the alternation of waking and sleeping that it can be taken directly over into spiritual science, be cause it corresponds with spiritual scientific facts. It was a thoroughly mathematical thinker, a deeply thoughtful man, who was able to encompass nature magnificently with his spirit: Novalis. He says in his Fragments :\nSleep is a mixed condition of body and soul. In sleep, body and soul are chemically united. In sleep the soul is evenly distributed throughout the body — the human being is neutralized. Waking is a divided, a polar condition; in waking the soul is pointed, localized. Sleep is soul-digestion; the body digests the soul (removal of the soul stimulus). Waking is the condition of the soul stimulus influence: the body partakes of the soul. In sleep the bonds of this system are loosened; in waking they are tightened.\nThus sleep for Novalis means the digestion of the soul by the body. Novalis is always conscious that in sleep the soul becomes one with the universe and is digested, so that the human being can be further helped in the physical world.\nWith respect to his inner being, then, the human being alternates in such a way that in the daytime he draws himself together into the small world, into the limits of his skin, and then expands into the great world during the night, drawing forth through surrender forces from that world in which he is then imbedded. We will not understand the human being unless we understand him as formed out of the entire macrocosm.\nFor that part of the earth where it is summer, there is something similar to what goes on in the human being in the condition of sleep. The earth gives itself to everything that comes down from the sun and forms itself as it should form itself under the influence of the sun activity. In that part of the earth where it is winter, it closes itself off from the influence of the sun, lives within itself. There it is the same as when the human being has drawn together into the small, inner world, living in himself, while for the part of the earth where it is summer it is the same as when the human being is surrendered to the whole outer world.\nThere is a law in the spiritual world: if we direct our attention to spiritual entities far removed from one another — such as, for example, the human being here on one side and the earth organism on the other — the states of consciousness must be pictured as reversed in a certain sense. With the human being, stepping out into the great world is the sleep condition. For the earth, the summer (which one would be inclined to consider a waking condition) is something that can only be compared with the human being falling asleep. The human being steps out into the great world when he falls asleep; in summer the earth with all its forces enters the realm of sun activity, only we must be able to think of the earth and the sun as spirit-filled organisms.\nIn wintertime, when the earth rests within itself, we must be able to think of its condition as corresponding to the waking condition of the human being, although it may be tempting to consider winter as the earth's sleep. When we consider entities as different from one another as the human being and the earth, however, the states of consciousness appear re versed in a certain way. Now, what does the earth accomplish when it is under the influence of surrender to the sun being, to the sun spirit? To have an easier comparison, we would do well to turn the concepts around now. The earth's surrender to the sun being is simply something that may be compared spiritually with the condition of the human being when he awakens in the morning and emerges out of the dark womb of existence, out of the night, into his joys and sorrows. When the earth enters the realm of sun activity — although this could be compared with the sleep condition of the human being — all the forces that sprout forth from the earth allow the resting winter condition of the earth to pass over into the active, the living, summer condition.\nWhat, then, are the plants in this whole web of existence? We could say that when spring approaches, the earth organ ism begins to think and to feel, because the sun with its being lures out the thoughts and feelings. The plants are nothing but a kind of sense organ for the earth organism, awakening anew every spring, so that the earth organism with its thinking and feeling can be in the realm of the sun activity. Just as in the human organism light creates the eye for itself in order to be able to manifest through the eye as ‘light,’ so every spring the sun organism creates for itself the plant covering in order to look at itself, to feel, to sense, to think by means of this plant covering. The plants cannot directly be considered the thoughts of the earth, but they are the organs through which the awakening organization of the earth in spring, together with the sun, develops its thoughts and feelings. Just as we can see our nerves emanating from the brain, developing our feeling and conceptual life through the eyes and ears together with the nerves, so the spiritual investigator sees in what transpires between earth and sun with the help of the plants the marvelous weaving of a cosmic world of thoughts, feelings, and sensations. The spiritual investigator finds that the earth is surrounded not merely by the mineral air of the earth, by the purely physical earth atmosphere, but by an aura of thoughts and feelings. For spiritual research the earth is a spiritual being whose thoughts and feelings awaken every spring, and throughout the summer they pass through the soul of our entire earth.\nThe plant world, however, which is a part of our entire earth organism, provides the organs through which our earth can think and feel. Woven into the spirit of the earth are the plants, just as our eyes and ears are woven into the activities of our spirit.\nIn spring a living, spirit-filled organism awakens, and in the plants we can see something that is pushed out of the countenance of our earth in some realm where it wants to begin to feel and think. Just as everything in the human being tends toward a self-conscious ego, so it is also in the realm of plants. The whole plant world belongs to the earth. I have already said that a person would be close to insanity if he did not think of how all feelings, sensations, and mental images are directed toward our ego. Similarly, everything the plants mediate during summertime is directed toward the earth's center, which is the earth ego. This should not be said merely symbolically! As the human being has his ego, so the earth has its self-conscious ego. That is why all plants strive toward the earth's center. That is why we may not consider plants by themselves but rather must consider them in interaction with the self-conscious ego of the earth. What unfolds itself as thoughts and sensations of the earth is similar to the thoughts and sensations that live in us, similar to whatever arises and disappears in us during our waking state, what lives in us astrally, if we speak from the viewpoint of spiritual science.\nThus we cannot picture the earth only as a physical structure, for the physical structure is for us something like our own physical body, which can be seen with the outer eyes and touched with the hands, and which is observed by outer science. This is the earth body that present-day astronomy or geology studies. Then we have to direct our attention to what in the human being we have come to know as the etheric body or life body. The earth also has such an etheric body, and it also has an astral body. This is what awakens every spring as the thoughts and feelings of the earth, which recede when winter approaches so that the earth rests in its own ego, closed off within itself, retaining only what it needs in order, through memory, to carry over the preceding into the following, retaining in the plant's seed forces what it has conquered for itself. Just as the human being, when he falls asleep, does not lose his thoughts and sensations but finds them again the next morning, so the earth, awakening again from sleep in the spring, finds the seed forces of the plants in order to permit what has been conquered in an earlier time to emerge again from the living memory of the seed forces.\nWhen regarded in this way, the plants can be compared with our eyes and ears. What our senses are for us, the plants are for the earth organism. But what perceives, what achieves consciousness, is the spiritual world streaming down from the sun to the earth. This spiritual world would not be able to achieve consciousness if it did not have its sense organs in the plants, mediating a self-consciousness just as our eyes and ears and nerves mediate our self-consciousness. This makes us aware that we speak correctly only if we say that those beings who stream from the sun down to the earth, unfolding their spiritual activity, encounter from spring through summertime the being that belongs to the earth itself. In this exchange the organs are formed through which the earth perceives those beings, for the plants do not perceive. It is a superstition, shared also by natural science, when it is said that the plant perceives. The spiritual entities that belong to the earth activity and the sun activity perceive through the plant organs, and these entities direct toward the center of the earth all organs they need in order to unite them with the center of the earth. Thus what we have to see behind the plant covering are the spiritual entities that weave around the earth and have their organs in the plants.\nIt is remarkable that in our time natural science is actually moving toward a recognition of such spiritual scientific findings, for it is nothing less than full recognition of the situation to say that our physical earth is only a part of the whole earth, that the gaseous sun ball is only a part of the whole sun, and that our sun, as it appears to us physically, is only a part of the soul-spiritual entities who interact with the soul-spiritual entities of the earth. Just as the human world is connected with its environment, and just as human beings have their organs in order to live and to develop themselves, so these entities, which are real, create for themselves in the plant covering an organ in order to perceive themselves. As I said, it is superstitious to believe that the plant as such perceives or that the single plant has a kind of soul. This is just as superstitious as speaking of the soul of an eye. Although a remark able linking of facts, self-evident to spiritual science, impelled outer science throughout the nineteenth century to recognize what has just been said, it is nevertheless a fact that outer science does not know its way around very well in this realm; this is still so today, for what science has brought together so far about the sense life of plants completely sup ports what I have just said about the spirit and its activity in the realm of plants, but in outer science it cannot be comprehended as such. We can see this in the following example. In 1804 Sydenham Edward discovered the unusual plant called the Venus fly-trap, which has bristles on its leaves. When an insect comes near this plant so that contact with the bristles occurs, the insect is trapped by the leaf and then seemingly devoured and digested. It was remarkable when man discovered that plants can eat, can even take in animals, are meat eaters! But it was not known quite what to do with this, and this is interesting, because this discovery has repeatedly been forgotten and then rediscovered, in 1818 by Nuttal, in 1834 by Curtis, in 1848 by Lindley, and in 1859 by Oudemans. Five people in succession discovered the same thing! And science could not do much more with this discovery than for Schleiden, who made such a contribution to research of the plant world, to say that one should be on guard and not succumb to all kinds of mystical speculations attributing a soul to plants! Today, however, science is again prepared to attribute a soul to the individual plant, for example the Venus fly trap. This would be as superstitious as attributing a soul to the eye, however. Especially people such as Raoul France, for example, have immediately interpreted these things in an outer sense, saying, ‘There the soul element is evident, manifesting in a way analogous to the soul element of the animal!’\nThis shows how necessary it is, especially in the realm of spiritual science, not to succumb to all kinds of fantasies, for here outer science has succumbed to the fantasy that by attributing a soul nature to the Venus fly-trap, it can be thrown together with the human or animal soul nature. If this is done, a soul should also be attributed to other entities that attract small animals and, when these animals have come near, surround them with their tentacles so that they remain caught within. If one speaks of a soul in the Venus fly-trap, a soul can also be attributed to a mouse trap! We should not speak like this, however. As soon as there is the wish to penetrate into the spirit, things must be understood accurately and exactly, and one must not conclude from apparently similar outer qualities that the inner qualities work in the same way.\nI have already directed attention to the fact that some animals exhibit something similar to memory. When an elephant is led to the drinking trough and on the way there someone irritates him, it can happen that when the elephant returns he has retained water in his trunk and sprays the person who irritated him earlier. It is said that here we can see that the elephant has a memory, that he remembered the person who irritated him and resolved: ‘On the way back I will spray him with water!’ But this is not the case. With the soul life it is important for us to follow the inner process exactly and not immediately to speak of memory when a later event occurs as an effect of an earlier cause. Only when a being truly looks back to something that took place at an earlier time do we have to do with memory; in every other case we are dealing only with cause and effect. This means that we would have to look exactly into the structure of the elephant's soul if we wished to see how the stimulus applied results in something that calls forth an effect after a certain time.\nTherefore we must not interpret things such as what we encounter in the Venus fly-trap by thinking that the entire arrangement of the plant is there in order to determine an inner soul nature of the plant, but rather that what goes on there is brought about from outside. The plant serves as organ of the entire earth organism even in such a case. How the plants on the one hand pertain to the ego of the earth and on the other hand to the aura of the earth — the astral body, the earth's world of sensations and feelings — was shown particularly by this research in the nineteenth century. One can actually be grateful to those natural scientists — such as Gottlieb Haberlandt — who simply presented the facts they discovered in their research, and did not — like Raoul France or others — draw from these results purely outer conclusions. If the natural scientist were to present things as they really are, then one could be grateful to him; if he draws from them conclusions regarding the soul life of a single plant, however, then he should also immediately conclude something about the soul life of the single hair or tooth.\nIf we now study grain-producing plants, we discover remarkable little organs present in all these plants. Small structures in the starch cells are discovered. These cells are constructed in quite a remarkable way, so that within them there is something like a loose kernel. These structures have the unique property that the cell wall remains insensitive to the kernel at only one spot. If the kernel slips to another spot, it touches the cell wall, leading the plant to return to its earlier position. Such starch cells are found in all plants whose main orientation is toward the center of the earth, so that the plant has an organ within that always makes it possible for it to direct itself in its main orientation toward the center of the earth. This discovery, made during the nineteenth century by various scientists, is certainly wonderful, and it is most remarkable if it is simply presented as it is. Even if Haberlandt, for example, believes that this is a matter of a kind of sense perception by plants, he nevertheless presents the facts so clearly that one must be especially grateful for his dry and sober presentation.\nBut now let us turn to something else. If the leaf of a plant is studied, it is discovered that the outer surface is actually always a composite of many small, lens-like structures, similar to the lens in our eye. These ‘lenses’ are arranged in such a way that the light is effective only if it falls onto the surface of the leaf from a very specific direction. If it falls from another direction, the leaf instinctively begins to turn in such a way that the light can fall into the center of the lens, because when it falls to the side it works in another way. Thus there are organs for light on the surface of the leaves of plants. These light organs, which actually can be compared with a kind of eye, are spread out over the plants, but the plant does not see by means of them; rather the sun being looks through them to the earth being. These light organs bring it about that the leaves of the plant always have the tendency to place themselves perpendicularly to the sunlight.\nIn this — in the way the plant surrenders itself to the sun's activity in spring and summertime — we have the plant's second main orientation. The first orientation is that of the stem, through which the plants reveal themselves as belonging to the earth's self-consciousness; the second orientation is the one through which the plants express the earth's surrender to the activity of the sun beings.\nIf we now wished to go still further, we would have to find, if the previous considerations are correct, that through this surrender of the earth to the sun, the plants somehow ex press how the earth, through what it brings forth, really lives in the great macrocosm. We would have to perceive some thing in the plants, so to speak, which would indicate to us that something works into the plant world that is brought about outside especially by the sun being. Linnaeus pointed out that certain plants open their blossoms at 5 a.m. and at no other time. This means that the earth surrenders itself to the sun, which is expressed in the fact that certain plants are able to open their blossoms only at very specific times of the day; for example, Hemerocallis fulva , the day lily, blossoms only at 5 a.m.; Nymphaea alba , the water lily, only at 7 a.m., and Calendula , the marigold, only at 9 a.m. In this way we see a marvelous expression of the earth's relationship to the sun, a relationship that Linnaeus termed the ‘sun clock.’ The plant's falling asleep, the folding together of the petals, is also limited to very specific times of the day. A wonderful lawfulness and regularity is evident in the life of plants.\nAll of this shows us how the earth is surrendered — like the human being in sleep — to the great world, living within it. Just as it allows the plants to bloom and wilt, it shows us the spiritual weaving between sun and earth. Looking at matters in this way, however, we would have to say that we gaze there into deep, deep mysteries of our environment. For the serious seeker after truth, this puts a stop to the possibility — regardless of how fascinating the results of purely material research are — to think of the sun merely as a ball of gas racing through space; it puts a stop to the possibility that the earth can be considered as it is by astronomy and geology today. There are compelling reasons that must lead the conscientious natural scientist to admit the following: ‘In what natural science reveals, you may no longer see anything but an expression of the spiritual life lying at the foundation of everything!’ Then we regard the plants as a physiognomic expression of the earth, as the expression of the features of our earth. Thus what we call our aesthetic feeling in relation to the plant world deepens especially through spiritual science. We stand before the gigantic trees in the primeval forest, before the quiet violet or lily of the valley, and we look at them as single individualities, yes, but in such a way that we say, there the spirit that lives throughout space expresses it self to us — sun spirit! earth spirit! Just as we recognize in a human being the piety or impiety of his soul, so we can come to an impression, from what looks at us out of the plants, of what lives as earth spirit, as sun spirit, of how they battle with one another or are in harmony. There we feel ourselves as living and weaving within the spirit.\nJust as an illustration of how spiritual science can be verified by the natural science of the nineteenth century, I will relate to you the following. Listeners who have heard lectures here in the past will recall how I have indicated that there are plants in the earthly world that are misplaced, that do not belong in our world. One such plant is mistletoe, which plays such a remarkable role in legends and myths, because it be longs to an earlier planetary condition of our earth and has remained behind as a remnant of a pre-earthly evolution. This is why it cannot grow on the earth but must take root in other plants. Natural science shows us that mistletoe does not have those curious starch cells that orient the plant toward the center of the earth. I could now begin briefly to take apart the entire botany of the nineteenth century bit by bit, and you will find little by little how the plant covering of our earth is the sense organ through which earth spirit and sun spirit behold each other.\nIf we pay heed to this, we receive a science — as seems appropriate for the plant world that we love and that gives us so much joy — a science that can at the same time raise our soul, bring it close to this plant world. With our soul and spirit we feel ourselves belonging to the earth and to the sun; we feel as if we had to look up to the plant world, as it were, we feel that it belongs to our great mother earth. We must do this. Everything that as animal or human being seems to be independent of the immediate effect of the sun is actually, through the plant world and its dependence on the plant world, indirectly dependent on the sun. The human being does not undergo the kinds of transformations that plants go through in winter and summer, but it is the plant that gives him the possibility of having such a constancy within himself. The substances that the plant develops can be developed only under the influence of the sun, through the interrelationship of sun spirit and earth spirit. The carbohydrates can arise only if the sun spirit and the earth spirit kiss through the plant being. The substances developed here yield what the higher organisms must take into themselves in order to develop warmth. The higher organisms can only thrive through the warmth developed by taking up the substances prepared by the sun via the plants.\nThus we must look to mother earth as to our great nourishing mother. We have seen, however, that in the plant covering we have the physiognomy of the plant spirit, and through this we feel as though standing in soul and spirit. We gaze, as it were — just as we gaze into the eyes of another person — into the soul of the earth, if we understand how it manifests its soul in the blossoms and leaves of the plant world.\nThis is what led Goethe to occupy himself with the plant world, which led him to an activity that consisted fundamentally of showing how the spirit is active in the plant world and how in the plant the leaf is formed out of the spirit in the most diverse forms. Goethe was delighted that the spirit in the plant forms the leaves, rounds them, and also leads them to wind around the stem. And it was remarkable when a man who truly recognized the spirit — Schiller, who met Goethe after a botanical lecture in Jena — when Schiller, who was not satisfied by the lecture, said, “That was just an observation of plants as they are in isolation!” whereupon Goethe took out a sheet of paper and sketched in his way, with a few lines, how for him the spirit is active in the plant. Schiller, who was un able to understand such a concrete presentation of the spirit of the plant, said in reply, “What you are drawing there is only an idea!” to which Goethe could only say, “Isn't it nice that I can have ideas without knowing it and can even see them with my own eyes!”\nEspecially in the way in which a man like Goethe studied the plant world on his journey over the Brenner — when he looked at the coltsfoot with completely different eyes — the way in which he saw in this how the spirit is active on the earth and forms the leaves, shows us how we can speak of a common spirit of the earth that brings itself to expression only in the manifold plant being as in his own special organ. What is physical is spirit; we simply have the task of pursuing the spirit always in the right way. Whoever pursues the plant as it grows out of the common spirit of the earth will find the earth spirit that Goethe already had in view when he let his Faust address the spirit active in the earth, who says of him self:\nIn Lebensfluten, in Tatensturm Wall' ich auf and ab, Webe hin and her! Geburt and Grab, Ein ewiges Meer, Ein wechselnd Weben, Ein gluhend Leben, So Schaff ich am sausenden Webstuhl der Zeit Und wirke der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid. In the tides of life, in action's storm, Up and down I wave, To and fro weave free, Birth and the grave, An infinite sea, A varied weaving, A radiant living, Thus at Time's humming loom it's my hand that prepares The robe ever-living the Deity wears.\nThe person who beholds in this way the spirit in the plant life of the earth feels himself strengthened by seeing what he must consider his inner being poured out over the whole environment he is allowed to inhabit. And he must say to himself, “If I study what encircles my space, I find it confirmed that the origin of all things is to be found in the domain of the spirit.” And an expression of the relationship of human spirit and human soul, and also the relationship of plant soul and plant spirit, we can encompass in these words:\nDie Dinge in den Raumesweiten, Sie wandeln sich im Zeitenlauf. Erkennend lebt die Menschenseele Durch Raumesweiten unbegrenzt Und unversehrt durch Zeitenlauf. Sie findet in dem Geistgebiet Des eignen Wesens tiefsten Grund. To the sense of man there speak The things in breadths of space Transforming themselves in course of time. Knowing lives the human soul Unbounded by the breadths of space, Unaltered by the course of time; It finds in the realm of spirit Its own being's deepest ground!"
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-7",
    "title": "How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Spiritual World?",
    "date": "15 Dec 1910",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/eLib2015/19101215p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "Translator Unknown\nBefore I start with the today's issue, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that these discussions are the beginning of a whole range of such discussions, and that all following issues could carry the same title as the today's issue in this winter. Referring to the most different phenomena of the human life and the scientific life, to the most different cultural personalities generally in the course of the next talks the way is discussed which the human being has to go if he wants to come to the knowledge of the spiritual world.\nAllow me — although this subject, this consideration, so to speak, shall lead to the region of the most impersonal, to the objective-spiritual-scientific — that I start, nevertheless, in the introduction from something personal, because the way into the spiritual world has to lead from the most personal to the impersonal. Hence, the personal will often be a symbolic sign of this way in spite of the impersonal, and one attains the possibility to point to various significant just because one starts as it were from the more intimate immediate experience. To the beholder of the spiritual worlds some allegorical things will be more important than it may appear at first. Something that may pass the human look maybe without being touched by attention may appear deeply significant to somebody who intensely wants to deal with such a consideration, as it should also form the basis of the today's discussions. I can say, the following belongs to the unforgettable things for me — what may appear as a trifle of life at first — which really showed the longing of the present human beings for the spiritual world. At the same time, it also showed the more or less admitted impossibility to get access to the spiritual world anyhow with the means which not only the present, even the last centuries give.\nI sat once in the cosy flat of Herman Grimm (1828-1901, German author). Those of you who are somewhat familiar with the German cultural life connect something with the name Herman Grimm. You maybe know the brilliant, significant biographer of Michelangelo and Raphael and know maybe that as it were the sum of the education of our time at least of Central Europe or of Germany was combined in the soul of Herman Grimm. In a conversation with Herman Grimm about Goethe, affiliated to him, and about Goethe's worldview it happened what is a trifle, what just belongs to the most unforgettable things of my life. To a remark which I did — we see afterward how just in relation to the rise of the human being to the spiritual world this remark can be significant -, Herman Grimm answered with a negative movement of his left hand. What lay in this movement of the hand is that which I count as it were to the unforgettable experiences of my life. It should concern of speaking about Goethe's specific way to the spiritual world — we still have to discuss Goethe's way to the spiritual world in the course of these talks. Herman Grimm gladly followed the ways of Goethe to the spiritual world — but in his way. It was completely abstruse to him to show an interest in such a way that one regards Goethe as the representative of a human being who really — also as an artist — gets down spiritual realities from the spiritual world to embody them in his pieces of art. It was more obvious to him to say, oh, we cannot get to this spiritual world with the means we have today as human beings; however, we can only get to it by imagination. Indeed, imagination offers things, which are great and can fulfil the human heart with warmth; but knowledge, well-grounded knowledge was something that Herman Grimm, such an intimate beholder of Goethe, did not want to find with Goethe. When I said that Goethe wanted to embody truth in beauty, in art, and when I tried to show that there are ways beyond imagination, ways into the spiritual world that lead on firmer ground than imagination, it was possibly not the refusal of someone who would not like to go with such a way. It was not the refusal of such a kind what Herman Grimm put in this movement of his hand, but in the kind, which only that knows who understood him more exactly, he laid the following: there may probably be such a way; nevertheless, we human beings cannot feel called to recognise something of it!\nAs I have said, I would not like to bring this forward as a personal affair in a pushy way, but it seems to me that such a gesture represents the position just of the best human beings of our age concerning the spiritual world. For I had a long conversation with Herman Grimm on the way from Weimar to Tiefurt (today a quarter of Weimar) where he explained that he had delivered himself completely from any only materialistic view of the world process, from the view that the human mind produces the real mental wealth out of itself in the successive epochs. In a big plan which — as those know who have dealt with Herman Grimm — was no longer carried out in a work, Herman Grimm told that he intended to write a History of German Imagination . He had in mind to represent the workings of imagination as a goddess in the spiritual worlds that produces what the human beings create to the welfare of the world progress. I would like to say: in that charming region between Weimar and Tiefurt I had a feeling with these words of a person whom I appreciate as one of the greatest spirits of our time, a feeling, which I want to express with the following words.\nToday many human beings say to themselves: one must be deeply dissatisfied with that what the outer science can say about the origins of life, about the secret of existence, about the world riddles; but there is no possibility to enter another world powerfully. There is no will-intensity of knowledge to recognise this world of the spiritual life as different from what the human being creates in his imagination. Many a person goes just with pleasure to this realm of imagination because it is the only spiritual realm for him. There I could just remember a passage in Grimm's Lectures on Goethe which he had held in the winter 1874/75 where he speaks of that impression which the wholly external, spiritless observation of nature must make on such a spirit like him.\nAlready thirty years before this encounter in Weimar, Herman Grimm appeared to me as the type of a human being whom all feelings and sensations push to the spiritual world. However, he cannot find the spiritual world as reality but only in the imagination, in its workings. On the other side, he did not want — just because he was such a person — to admit that Goethe sought the origins and riddles of existence in another realm than only in that of imagination, namely in the realm of spiritual reality.\nI would like to quote a passage at the starting point of our today's considerations where Herman Grimm speaks of something whose significance spiritual science does not deny. However, it is not only impossible for the sensations and feeling but also for a knowledge that wants to understand itself as it is regarded by the outer natural sciences or by that worldview which wants to stand on the firm ground of the natural sciences. I mean the Kant-Laplace theory that explains our solar system in such a way, as if it consisted only of lifeless, inorganic materials and forces and as if it formed from a gigantic gas ball. I allow myself to read out the passage from Herman Grimm's lectures on Goethe that shows what such an intriguing worldview making such deep impression meant to a spirit like Herman Grimm.\n“However, no matter how much Goethe forbids the reason here to take more for truth than one can take, indeed, with the five fingers of the hand, he gives the imagination of the poet the right to create pictures of that from unaware, dreaming strength what the reason longs for to see. However, he maintains the border of both activities sharply. The great Laplace-Kant imagination of the origin and future fall of the globe had already gained ground in his youth. From the rotating world nebula, the central gas drop forms from which the earth originates that experiences all phases, as a solidifying ball, for unfathomable periods, included the episode of the habitation by human beings, to fall, finally as a burnt-out slag into the sun. It is a long, but for the public comprehensible process for whose realisation no other outer intervention is required than the effort of any outer force to maintain the hot temperature of the sun.\nOne cannot imagine any more futile perspective for the future than that which should be forced upon us in this expectation as scientifically necessary today. A bone of a carrion around which a hungry dog creeps would be a refreshing appetising piece compared with this last excrement of creation as which our earth would become subject, in the end, to the sun again. It is the thirst for knowledge and a sign of ill imagination with which our generation takes up such things and believes it. Future scholars have to use a lot of astuteness to explain it as a historical phenomenon.”\nIt was necessary to me to point to such a passage because it happens seldom today. The mental pictures of the scientific worldviews work so intriguing, that one seldom points to spirits who are connected deeply with the cultural life of our time and still behave in such a way to it about which countless human beings say, it is a matter of course that the things are in such a way; everybody is, actually, a poor devil who will not concede that the things are in such a way! Yes, today we already see many people who have the deepest longing for building a connecting bridge between the human soul and the spiritual world. On the other side, we see beyond those circles which deeper deal with spiritual science, few people dealing with the means, which can lead the human soul to the land of its longing. Therefore, if we speak of the ways which should lead the human being into the spiritual world, and speak in such a way as it were that the spoken should apply to a narrow circle, but is directed to all those who are equipped with the today's education, then we encounter big resistance in a certain respect. It cannot only happen that one regards our views as daydreaming and fantasy. But they can also annoy many people because they deviate so much from that which applies to the widest circles today — as the suggestive and intriguing mental pictures of those who consider themselves as the most educated ones.\nI have already indicated in the first talk that the ascent to the spiritual world is an intimate affair of the soul, and that it contradicts certainly very much what in popular and in scientific circles is usual for the life of feeling and thinking. In particular the scientist demands: what shall apply scientifically must be verifiable any time and for any person and then he probably points to his external experiment which one can prove any time, before any person. It is a matter of course that spiritual science cannot satisfy this demand. — We shall see at once, why. — Hence, spiritual science already defies the methodical demand that science and the worldviews put up today so easily: to be verifiable for everybody everywhere and every time. In popular circles spiritual science very often encounters resistance because in our time — even where one longs for the ascent to the spiritual world — one intermingles the sensations and feelings with materialistic views. With the best will in the world, one cannot help thinking the spirit anyhow materialistically, even if one longs for the spiritual world, or at least imagining the ascent to the spiritual world connected with something material. Hence, most people prefer that one speaks to them about wholly outer means, for example, what they should eat and drink or should not eat and not drink, or what they should undertake usually purely externally in the material world. They prefer that much more than if one demands from them that they introduce intimate moments of development in their souls. Nevertheless, just that matters while ascending to the spiritual world.\nNow we want — completely in the sense as spiritual science considers this - to try once briefly to outline this rise of the human soul to the spiritual world. The starting point must be taken always from that in what the human being lives at first. The present human being lives firmly in the outer, sensuous world. Try once to make clear to him how much is still left in this human soul if one turns the look away from what the outer sensory impressions of the physical world have sparked as images in us. Consider what has come in with the outer, physical experiences, with the senses, which sufferings and joys, desires and pains, and what then our reason has combined from these impressions of the sensory world. Try once to eradicate all that from the soul, try to imagine it as not existing, and consider once what would remain then. The human beings who can take this simple self-introspection seriously realise that very little remains in the soul of the present human being. However, at first, the rise to the spiritual world cannot start from that what the outer sensory world gives us, but the human being has to develop soul forces that usually slumber in him. It is a requirement of any rise to the spiritual world that the human being realises that he is internally developable that something else is in him that he surveys with his consciousness at first.\nIt is an irritating idea for many people, for — taking a particular human being of the modern education — what does, for example, the modern philosopher if he wants to determine the entire significance and the being of knowledge? He says, I want to try once how far we can generally come with our thinking, with our soul forces, what can we understand of the world? There he looks in his way — depending on his present faculties — to grasp a worldview and put it before himself, and then he says as a rule, we cannot know the other things; they are beyond the limits of human knowledge! — It is generally the widespread expression that one can find in the modern literature: we cannot know this!\nHowever, there is another point of view, which goes beyond it quite different from the just mentioned one, while it says, truly, with my present soul forces, I can recognise this or that, but here in the soul is a developable being. This soul maybe has forces in itself that I must get out only from it. I have only to lead it certain ways beyond the current point of view, then I want to see whether I was not to blame when I said, this or that is beyond the limit of our knowledge. Perhaps I need to go on only a little bit in the development of my soul, then the limits extend, and I can deeper penetrate into the things.\nOne stretches the logic if one wants to judge about that, but one would say, what we recognise depends on our organs. Therefore, for example, the blind-born cannot judge about colours, he can judge only about that if he has got his eyesight by a happy operation. It could also be — I do not want to speak of the “sixth sense” but of something that one can receive from the soul wholly spiritually — that we get spirit eyes or spirit ears out of our souls. Then for us the big event could take place which takes place on a lower level if the blind-born experiences if he is so happy to be operated, so that then for us the supposition could become truth: there is a spiritual world around us, but to behold into it we must have woken the organs in ourselves. This would be the only logical. However, one stretches logic, because in our time the human beings have quite different needs if they hear of a spiritual world than to familiarise themselves with this spiritual world. I have told already once that in a South German city when I had to hold a talk a well-behaved journalist who writes feuilletons started his feuilleton with the words: “The incomprehensibility of theosophy strikes the eye above all.” We gladly believe that for this man theosophy is incomprehensible above all. However, is this a criterion anyhow? Transfer this example on mathematics that somebody may say of it: the incomprehensibility of mathematics mostly strikes the eyes. Then everybody says, indeed, this may be; then, however, he should learn something at first if he wants to write feuilletons! — It would often be better to transfer what applies to a special field on another appropriately. Thus, nothing else is left than that people deny — they can do this only by a decree — that there is a development of the soul — namely if they refuse to experience such a development of the soul — or they start such a development. Then the spiritual world becomes reality, truth for them. However, in order to get to the spiritual world, the soul must become able — not for the physical life, but for the knowledge of the spiritual world — to transform its figure completely in a certain respect, to become another being.\nThis can often warn us already, what I had often to emphasise here, that someone who feels the urge to ascend to the spiritual world must get clear about it above all repeatedly, whether he has got firm ground here in this world of physical reality whether he is able to be certain here. Since for all conditions which happen in the physical world we must have certainty, willpower and sentience, must not lose ground if we want to ascend from this world to the spiritual one. This is a preliminary stage: doing everything that strengthens our character in the physical world. Then it depends on bringing the soul to a feeling and a willing for the spiritual world different from the feeling and willing in the soul normally. Our soul has to become another organism of feeling and willing than it is in the normal life. There we get on what can bring spiritual science at first in contrast to that what is recognised today as “science” what puts spiritual science, however, on the other side, immediately beside this science with the same validity the outer science has.\nIf one says that everything that should be science must be verifiable any time and for any human being, one thinks that science must not depend on our subjectivity, on our subjective feelings, on that what we carry in ourselves as will decisions, will impulses, feelings and sensations only individually. Now, however, that who wants to ascend to the spiritual world must make the detour through the inside of his soul at first, must reorganise his soul, must look completely away from that what is outside in the physical world. In the normal life, the human being looks away from that what is within the physical world only if he sleeps; then he lets nothing in his soul through his eyes, ears and through the whole organisation of his senses, but then he becomes unaware of it and is not able to live consciously in a spiritual world.\nI have said that it belongs to the basic elements of spiritual knowledge for the human being to find the possibility in himself to exceed himself. That is, however, nothing else than making the spirit effective in himself at first. We all know that we only turn away from the physical world in the normal human life if we become unconscious in sleep. The talk about The Nature of Sleep has shown how the human being is there in a real spiritual world even if he knows nothing about it. Since it would be absurd to believe that the centre of soul and mind disappears in the evening and originates in the morning anew; no, it outlives the states of falling asleep to awakening really. However, the inner force to be aware is absent in the sleep, even if no stimulation of the consciousness arises from the impressions of the senses or by the work of the reason. The soul life is then reduced, so that the human being is not able to inspire and to rouse what the soul lets itself experience internally. If the human being wakes up again, the experiences come in from the outside, and because soul contents are given to him this way, he becomes aware of these soul contents. He cannot become conscious if he is not stimulated from the outside. The strength of the human being is otherwise too weak when he is left to his own resources in sleep.\nThe rise to the spiritual world is the stimulation of such soul forces that make the soul able to live in itself consciously if it becomes — compared with the external world — in such a way, as the human being is usually in the sleep. That is, the ascent to the spiritual worlds requires a stimulation of inner energy, a getting out of forces, which sleep, otherwise, which are paralysed in the soul, so that the human being cannot use them at all. All those intimate experiences, which the spiritual researcher has to go through in his soul aim at that which I have just characterised. Today I would like to tell something, to sum up something about the way to the spiritual world. In detail these things are shown in their elements — so to speak, in their ABC — in my book which appeared under the title How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds? However, today I do not want to recur exactly giving you an extract of this book, but I want to explain from another side what the soul has to do with itself in order to come into the spiritual world. He who is deeper interested in it can read up the details in the mentioned book. However, one must not believe that that what I have written there in detail can be shown here summarising it briefly that one can use the same words and sentences. Those who know the book will not think in such a way, that it is a summary of the book, but that it characterises the matter, nevertheless, from another side.\nIt is exceptionally important that for the spiritual researcher, who wants to ascend to the spiritual world, many things that lead the other human beings directly to knowledge become simply a means of the intimate education of the soul. Let me illustrate this with an example. Many years ago, I wrote a book, The Philosophy of Freedom . I wrote this book in such a way that it differs completely from other philosophical books of the present that have the intention more or less to give something about the world according to the mental pictures of the authors. This is not the next purpose of this book, but it should give a kind of thought training to that who gets himself into the thoughts there, so that the way of thinking, the special way of getting himself into these thoughts sets his sensations and feelings in motion. What is usually only a means of knowledge is at the same time a spiritual-mental means of education in this book. This is exceptionally important. Hence, it does not matter with this book so much whether one can argue about this and whether something has to be understood one way or the other but that the thoughts which are combined to an organism can teach our souls, can help them.\nThe same applies to my book Truth and Knowledge .\nThat also applies to many things that at first shall be basic elements to train the soul to come into the spiritual world. Mathematics, geometry teaches the human being the knowledge of the triangles, quadrangles and other figures. Nevertheless, why do they teach all that? Because the human being should thereby get knowledge how the things are in space to which principles they are subject et cetera. Spiritual science also works with similar figures as symbols. It presents, for example, the symbol of the triangle, the quadrangle, or other symbolic figures to the pupil. That is not why he shall attain immediate knowledge by them which he can attain also otherwise, but that he receives the possibility to train his spiritual abilities with them in such a way that his spirit arises to the higher world getting impressions from these symbols. One deals here with training of thoughts or — do not get me wrong — with gymnastics of thoughts. Therefore, a lot of that what is dry outer science, dry outer philosophy, mathematics, or geometry becomes the living symbol for the spiritual training that leads us in the spiritual world. If we have opened ourselves to this, then we learn to understand what no outer science understands that the old Pythagoreans spoke under the influence of their great teacher Pythagoras about the universe as consisting of figures because they considered the inner principles of the numbers. Now we consider how the numbers face us in the world everywhere. Nothing is easier than to disprove spiritual science or anthroposophy. For one will easily be able to say from a seemingly very serene point of view, these spiritual scientists come out from their mystic darkness with the number symbolism again and say that an inner lawfulness is contained in the numbers, and that one must consider, for example, the heptad as the true basis of the human being. — However, Pythagoras and his pupils also meant such a thing if they spoke of the inner lawfulness of the numbers. If we open ourselves to those miraculous connections which are in the relations of the numbers to the spirit, we can train it in such a way that it wakes up where it sleeps, otherwise, and develops stronger forces in itself to penetrate to the spiritual world.\nThus, it is a training by another science. It is also, actually, the study of that who wants to penetrate into the spiritual world. All that becomes an outer symbol for him that is crude reality more or less for the other human beings. If the human being is able to open himself to these symbols, he thereby does not only free his spirit from the external, physical world, but also penetrates it with strong forces, so that the soul can be aware of itself if no external stimulation is there. I have already mentioned that the human being if he opens himself to such a symbol, as it is the rose cross, can get an impulse to ascend to the spiritual world. We understand by the rose cross a simple black cross to which seven red roses are attached round the intersection of the beams.\nWhat should it say to us? Someone opens himself properly to it while imagining: I look, for example, at a plant; I say about this plant, it is an imperfect being, — and put a human being next to it who is in his way a more perfect being, but just only in his way. Since if I look at the plant, I must say, in it, I face a material being which is not filled with passions, desires, instincts, which lead it down from the height where it could otherwise be. The plant has its inner laws, it follows them from the leaf to the blossom, and to the fruit; thus it stands there chastely, without desire. On the other side, the human being lives, indeed, in his way a higher being but impregnated with desires, instincts, passions by which he can stray from his strict lawfulness. He must overcome something in himself first if he wants to follow his inner principles as the plant follows its inner principles.\nNow the human being can say to himself, the expression of the desires, instincts in me is the red blood. I can compare it in certain respect to the chaste plant juice, the chlorophyll, in the red rose. Then I can say, if the human being has become so strong in himself that the red blood is no longer an expression of that which presses down him beneath himself, but raises him above himself, — if the red colour of the rose expresses the pure inwardness, the purified nature of the human blood, I face the ideal of that which the human being can attain by overcoming the outer nature represented by the symbol of the black cross, the charred wood. The red colour of the rose symbolises the higher life that awakes if the red blood has become a chaste expression of the overcome nature of the human instincts.\nIf one does not let this representation be an abstract image, it becomes the vividly felt idea of development. Then a whole world of feelings and sensations revives in us; we feel a development from an imperfect to a more perfect state in ourselves. We feel the development as something quite different from that abstract thing which gives us the external science in the sense of a wholly external Darwinism. Development becomes something that deeply cuts in our hearts that penetrates us with warmth, with soul warmth, becomes a force in us that carries and holds us. Only by such inner experiences, the soul can develop strong forces in itself, so that it can penetrate its innermost being with consciousness.\nOne can easily say, of course, you recommend the idea of something quite imaginary, of something fictional. However, a mental picture is only valid if it is an effigy of an outer image, and, nevertheless, an image of the rose cross has no outer counter-image! — However, it does not matter that the image by which we train our soul is an effigy of an outer reality, but that the image wakes forces for our soul and elicits from the soul what slumbers covertly in it. If the human soul is given away to such a pictorial imagination if everything that is real, otherwise, becomes an occasion of pictures that are not got out of imagination arbitrarily, but are based on reality, as the rose cross, then we say: the human being takes care to ascend to the first level of knowledge of the spiritual world. — This is the level of Imaginative knowledge which leads us beyond what deals immediately only with the physical world.\nThus, the human being works on himself who wants to go up to the spiritual world in his soul with particular images, with a particular kind of opening himself to the otherwise outer reality. He works in this soul himself. If he has worked in this way for a while, the external scientist may say to him, this has for you only a subjective, only an individual value. However, the outer scientist does not know that there is a level of inner development with such a strict, lawful training of the soul where for the soul the possibility completely stops letting subjective feelings and sensations speak. The soul arrives at that stage where it must say to itself, now in me images rise which face me as really as trees and rocks, rivers and mountains, plants and animals of the outer world to which my subjectivity can add or subtract nothing.\nIndeed, there is an intermediary condition for everybody who wants to ascend to the spiritual world where he is subject to the risk that he can possibly bring in his subjectivity that applies only to him. Nevertheless, the human being has to go through this intermediary condition, and then he comes to a level where the soul experiences become objectively verifiable as all things of the outer, physical reality. Since, in the end, the principle applies to the outer science: what should be scientifically valid must be verifiable for everybody any time, but only for someone who prepares himself sufficiently. Alternatively, do you believe that you can teach the principle of the “corresponding boiling temperature” to an eight-year-old child? I doubt it. You will not even be able to teach the Pythagorean tenet to it. This shows clearly that the human soul is already tied to this principle that the human soul prepares itself suitably if one wants to prove something to it. Like one has to prepare oneself — although it is possible for every human being — to understand the Pythagorean tenet, one must be prepared by a certain practise of the soul if one wants to get to know or to recognise this or that in the spiritual world. Then, however, that what can be recognised is learnable and observable by everybody who prepares himself appropriately. Alternatively, if those who prepare their souls to be able to look back at repeated earth-lives, so that these are facts, inform observations of spiritual science then people come and probably say, there he brings dogmas and demands that we should believe! However, the spiritual researcher does not expect that they should believe his knowledge.\nIf people mean that this is dogmas what is said, then they should ask themselves: is the fact that there is a whale fish a dogma for that who has never seen one? Indeed, one can explain it with it: it is a dogma for him who has never seen a whale fish. However, the spiritual research does not approach the world with communications only. It does not do that if it understands itself; but it dresses what it gets down from the higher worlds in logical forms that are exactly the same logical forms with which also the other sciences are penetrated. Then everybody can check by healthy sense of truth and impartial logic whether this is right what the spiritual researcher has said. Always one has said: in order to find the spiritual facts a training of the soul is necessary, the soul must have gone through what is described now, but it is not necessary for the understanding of the informed; healthy sense of truth and logic without prejudice are sufficient.\nAfter the spiritual researcher has let such symbolic concepts and pictures work on his soul he notices that his sensory life and emotional life become quite different from that before. How are the sensory life and the emotional life in the usual world? It has become almost trivial today to use the term “egoistic” everywhere and to say, in the normal life, the human beings are egoistic. I would not like to express it in such a way, but I prefer to say, in the normal life, the human beings are tied up closely to the human personality, for example, if anything pleases us, like the most distinguished spiritual creations, the things of art and beauty. This expresses already itself in the proverb “there is no accounting for taste” that many things are bound to our personality and that it depends on it how we face the things subjectively. Examine how everything that can please you is connected with the fact how your education has been, to which place of the world, in which occupation your personality is put et cetera, in order to realise how the sensations and feelings are closely connected with our personality.\nHowever, if one does such soul exercises as the characterised ones, one notices that the sensations and feelings become quite impersonal. This is a big and tremendous experience if the moment occurs when our sensory life and emotional life become impersonal as it were. This moment comes certainly, if the human being is stimulated in the course of his spiritual way by those who take over his spiritual guidance to open him to the following things in particular. I want now to tell something that educates our complete sensory life and emotional life if the human being submits himself to it for weeks, for months.\nThere the following can come into consideration. If we turn our attention to the spiritual centre of the human being, to the ego which accompanies all our mental pictures, the mysterious centre of any experience, and if we go on with that respect, that esteem and devotion which can associate itself with the fact — for many, however, no fact, but a chimera -: there lives an ego inside! — If this becomes the most striking event that this ego is the most essential of the soul, then in the “I am” immense, strong feelings develop which are impersonal and aim just at recognising how in the ego-point everything is crowded together that hovers around us as world secrets and mysteries to understand the human being from the ego-point. The poet Jean Paul (born Johann Paul Friedrich Richter, 1763-1825, German author), for example, tells about this ego becoming conscious in his biography:\n“I never forget the phenomenon in myself still told to no one where I stood at the birth of my self-consciousness the place and time of which I can give. In a morning, I stood as a very young child under the front door and looked at the woodshed on the left when all at once the inner face “I am an ego” as a streak of lightning penetrated me and stood still luminously since then, my ego had seen itself for the first time and forever. Deceits of memory are hard to imagine, because no other information could intermingle something in an event that took place only in the veiled sanctum of the human being the novelty of which made everyday minor details permanent.”\nIt means very much to feel the devotion of this concentration of the world being in one point with all showers of reverence and with all sensations of the greatness of this fact. If the human being feels it over and over again and opens himself to it, it may be in such a way that it does not clarify all world riddles to him, but still gives him a direction leading to the impersonal and to the innermost nature of the human being.\nThus, we educate our emotional life and sensory life by egoity. If we have done it for a while, we can bring our feelings and sensations in another direction, can say to ourselves, this ego in us is connected with what we think, feel, and sense, with our soul life. There we can study the human nature with the ego as the centre of thinking, feeling, and willing without considering ourselves or without becoming personal. The human being becomes a mystery to us, not we to ourselves. There our feelings increase from the ego about the soul. Then we change over to another feeling, can acquire that nice feeling in particular without which we cannot continue leading our soul into the spiritual knowledge. It is the feeling that in everything that faces us the access to an infinite presents itself to us. This is the most wonderful feeling if one allows it to appear before the soul repeatedly.\nThis may happen where we go out and see a wonderful spectacle of nature: the mountains wrapped by clouds in thunder and flash. This works on our souls tremendously. But then we must learn to see the big and tremendous not only there, but we maybe take a single leaf, look at it exactly with all its veins and all the miraculous things which are in it, and we can perceive an infinite with the smallest leaf as with the biggest spectacle of nature. It may appear weird, but, nevertheless, it is some truth in it, and someone must express himself absurdly afterward: it may do a big impression if the human being sees the glowing lava mass coming out of the earth. Then, however, we imagine, anybody looks at warm milk or coffee, sees there something like small crater-shaped things and sees there a similar play happening in microcosm. Everywhere, in the smallest as in the biggest, you can find access to an infinite.\nIf we do research on and on, and even if many things have still revealed themselves to us: there are still more things under the cover which we have maybe investigated on top. Thus, we feel just that in every point of the universe something infinite may be revealed. This fills our soul with sensations and feelings that are necessary to us if we want to attain what Goethe calls “spirit eyes,” “spirit ears.” Briefly, we live out our emotional life, which is, otherwise, the most subjective, up to that point where we feel only as the scene on which something happens where we do not at all count our feelings among ourselves. Our personality is quietened. It is almost as if we stretch a canvas and a painter paints a picture on it, that we stretch our soul, if we train ourselves and let the spiritual world paint on the soul. One senses this from a certain time on. Then one must realise only that it is necessary for the recognition of the being of the world to regard a certain stage of the soul life solely as decisive.\nIndeed, what the human being attains with warm endeavour becomes the decisive factor of truth. In the soul must be decided whether something is true or not. Not anything external can decide, but while the human being goes beyond himself, he must find the authority in himself to look for truth. Yes, we can say strictly speaking, we cannot yet differ completely from the other human beings. The other human beings look for objective criteria, for something in the outside that confirms truth. However, the spiritual researcher searches the confirmation of truth from the inside. He makes the reverse. If it were that way, one could maybe say for the sake of appearance, it is bad if the spiritual scientists want to turn the world upside down with their craziness. Since in truth the naturalists and philosophers do nothing else than the spiritual researchers do, only they do not know that they do it. I want to give you a proof that is taken from the immediate present.\nOn the last naturalists' meeting Oswald Külpe (1862-1915, German psychologist and philosopher) held a talk about the relationship of the natural sciences to philosophy in which he goes into the relationship of the human being to the sensory world which he perceives as tone, colour, warmth et cetera, which are only subjective qualities. This is only somewhat different from that which Schopenhauer says: “The world is our (will and) representation (mental picture) .” But Oswald Külpe draws the attention to the fact that any sense-perception, briefly everything that appears as pictorial is subjective that, however, what physics and chemistry say has to be characterised as objective; so that we deal in our worldviews partly with something wholly subjective, partly with something objective like pressure, attractive and repulsive forces.\nI do not want to get involved with the criticism that was expressed, but go only into the way of thinking. This seems to be proved for the modern epistemologist very easily: because we cannot see without eyes, the light is only something that our eyes cause. However, what happens in the external world, one says, if a ball pushes the other what works there as forces, as resistance, pressure et cetera, one must move this, nevertheless, into the outside world, in the space. Why do people mean that? Oswald Külpe exposes himself at a certain passage very clearly speaking about the sense perceptions. Because he regards them as pictures, he says, they cannot attract each other, bang together, or warm up mutually, can also not have such-and-such big distance in space that they send the light in such-and-such velocity through the space, and cannot be arranged in such a way as the chemist arranges the elements. Why does he say that of the sense perceptions? Because he looks at them as pictures which are caused only by our senses.\nNow I would like to present a simple thought that shows that the pictorial nature changes nothing at all. The things bang together and attract each other. If Mr. Külpe looks, however, at the sensations, at this world that cannot bang together or attract, then it does not face Mr. Oswald Külpe as reality, but as a reflection. There he has pictures before himself certainly. However, hit, pressure, resistance and everything that is put there into the world as discerning from the sensations is explained in no other way objectively as by the pictorial nature of the sensations. Why is this that way? Because the human being if he feels pressure, a hit et cetera, changes that what lives in the things into the sensations of the things. He should study, if he says, for example, a billiard ball pushes the other that he puts what he experiences as an impact into the things!\nHe who stands on the ground of spiritual science does nothing else, too. He makes that which lives in the inside of the soul the expression criterion of the world. There is no other principle of knowledge than what can be found with the development of the soul. That means, the others do the same as the spiritual research does. However, the spiritual research is aware of it. The others do it unconsciously, have no idea of the fact that they do the same on an elementary level, they stop only at the very first step and deny what they themselves do. Therefore, we can say, spiritual science does not contrast the remaining research of truth; the other researchers do the same, only they do the first step and know nothing of it, while the spiritual research does the steps consciously as far as a certain human soul can do it according to its level of development.\nIf this is now attained that our feelings have become objective in certain way, this happens all the more what I have already indicated what is, however, a necessary condition of the progress in the spiritual worlds. That the human being learns to understand to live in the world so that one assumes, an all-embracing spiritual lawfulness weaves and lives in the spiritual world. In the usual life, the human being is far away from such a way of thinking. He gets angry if anything happens to him that does not suit him. This is quite comprehensible, because another point of view must be hard gained. This other point of view consists in saying: we come from a former life, have put ourselves in the situations, in which we are now, have led us to that what faces us from the future. What faces us there corresponds to a strictly objective spiritual lawfulness. We accept it, because it would be an absurdity not to accept it. What approaches us from the womb of the spiritual worlds whether the world reproves or praises us whether joy or pain appear to us: we accept it as the penetration of the world filled with wisdom. This is something that must become the basic principle of our being slowly and gradually. If it becomes this, our will starts to be trained. Whereas our feelings have to be reorganised before, our will is now reorganised, becomes independent of our personality and thereby an organ to perceive spiritual facts.\nThen after the level of Imaginative knowledge, the true Inspiration appears which one can call fulfilment with spiritual facts. However, we must get clear about that repeatedly that the human being can attain the training of the will only on a certain level if his feelings are already purified in a certain respect. Then his will can combine with the lawfulness of the world and he is there only as a human being, so that those facts and beings which want to appear to him, hold a wall before his will on which they can be reflected to him, so that they can be there for him.\nI could only describe something of that which the soul has to experience in quiet, patient devotion if it wants to ascend to the higher worlds. In the following talks, I have to describe many things of the world-historical development that the soul must experience to ascend to the spiritual worlds. Regard that which I have said today only as an introduction that by such a training our emotional life and willing life and our whole life of imagining develop in such a way that they become bearers of new worlds. Then we really enter a world, which we recognise as real, as we recognise the physical world in its kind as real.\nI have already mentioned on another occasion: someone who approaches reality with healthy thinking is able to distinguish a glowing piece of iron from one that exists only as a mental picture. Even if many Schopenhauerians may come, he will already be able to distinguish both from each other, — what is real and what is a mental picture. The human being can orientate himself towards reality. Therefore, he can only orientate himself towards reality about the spiritual world. Somebody said once that the human being if he only remembers of drinking lemonade also feels the taste of the lemonade on his tongue. I answered to him: as strong as the mental picture may be that somebody who has no lemonade before himself also feels the taste on the tongue by the lively mental picture of a lemonade, but I would like to see once whether anybody has extinguished his thirst with an only imagined lemonade. Then the criterion starts becoming more real. That also applies to an inner development of the human being that he gets to know not only a new soul life, new mental pictures, but collides in his soul with another world and knows: now you face a world that you can also describe as you can describe the outer world. This is not bare speculation, you can compare it only with a development of thought, but this is developing new senses and opening new worlds that stand really before us as our outer, physical world.\nI have indicated today that spiritual research is possible and is necessary because of the conditions of our time. However, I do not say that everybody must immediately become a spiritual researcher. For I have to stress the following. If a human being faces the communications of spiritual science with healthy sense of truth and unprejudiced logic, even if he is not able to behold in the spiritual worlds, everything that comes from such communications can become energy and feelings of strength for the soul, even if he believes in Haeckelism or Darwinism at first. What the spiritual researcher has to say is appropriate to speak more and more to the healthy sense of truth, all the more because it is connected with the deepest interests of every human being. There may be human beings who do not regard it as necessary for their soul welfare to know how amphibians and mammals relate to each other. However, what spiritual research resting on sure basis can say has to inspire all human beings: the fact that the soul belongs to the sphere of eternity — in so far as it belongs to the spiritual world descending by birth to the sensuous existence and again ascending through the gate of death to the spiritual world. This must be of the deepest interest for all human beings, what immerses itself in the soul as strength that is in such a way that the soul receives certainty to stand on its place in life. A soul that does not know about that strength can become hopeless, finally, can despair, and feel desolate and void. A soul, however, which fills itself with the achievements of spiritual science, cannot remain void and desolate if it absorbs the communications of spiritual research not as dogmas, but as life inspiring our soul. This gives consolation for all grief in life if we are led through all temporal sufferings to that what can comfort the soul. Briefly: spiritual science can give what the human being needs today because of the conditions of our time in the most lonesome and in the busiest hours of his life, — or if the strength was leaving him — what he needs in order to look into the future and to advance towards this future powerfully.\nThus, spiritual science is always able to confirm, as it starts from the spiritual research, from those who want to do the steps into the spiritual world, what we want to summarise in few words, which express the characteristic of the way into the spiritual world and its significance for the present human beings in a sensation. What we want to summarise in such a way shall not be a consideration of the theories of life but a consideration of remedies, of fortifiers for life:\nThe spiritual world — it remains closed to you, Unless you recognise in yourself The spirit that shines in the soul And can become light bearing you To the depths and heights of the universe."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-8",
    "title": "Predisposition, Talent and Education of the Human Being",
    "date": "12 Jan 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/eLib2015/19110112p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "Translator Unknown\nIf we look at the leitmotif of these winter talks if we look at the human nature, which we observe not only once between birth and death, but of which we assume as existing in repeated lives on earth, the question of the developmental basis of the human embodiment will appear to us quite essential in particular in our present. Since the human being of the present faces the peculiar appearance of predisposition, talent and education indeed questioning and researching. However, because he is little inclined to turn away his look from what appears in one life, and to look at the real builder, the real creator in the human being, the questions of this present human being easily get the character of half measure, of indefiniteness. If one assumes something in the human nature that penetrates many lives enlivening, then only the quite mysterious of this human being appears. One wants to consider the questions of predisposition, talent, and education in a new light, in another light than they can be considered if one only eyes what the present stresses so often: the inheritance, the qualities inherited by the ancestors. Spiritual science does not look away from such inherited predispositions, from the careful observations of the natural sciences. However, spiritual science knows that all that relates to the real nature of the human being like something that is used by it as the outer matter in the physical life is taken up by the small germ of a living being that determines its form from itself, but it takes the substantial, the material from his surroundings to live out its form in the outer life. Thus on the whole, we have to recognise in the way of someone's life a confluence of that what enters existence with its birth and of that in which the nature and the individuality of the human being are embedded and from which he takes his spiritual-mental food.\nIf we face, for example, as educators an adolescent human being like a holy riddle which we have to solve which has come from infinity to us, so that we give him the possibilities to develop, then a whole sum of new tasks, new views, new possibilities arises or all human relations generally. We see a human being entering existence at birth and assume that he/she brings in the core of his/her being in a certain way. The outer science also shows if we do not look at catchwords and theories, but at facts how this spiritual-mental essence of the human being still works on the child after birth, how the bodily organisation changes, is formed plastically under the influence of the spiritual-mental. The outer science can also show, for example, that the brain is still an uncertain, plastically malleable matter when the human being is born and that then he takes up something from the spiritual treasure of his surroundings and works like an artist on the malleable mass of the brain. Assuming that a human being is exposed helplessly on a lonesome island after birth and cannot attain the faculty of speech. Then we must say: the spiritual-mental contents that approaches us from the birth on is not anything that comes from the inside as anything that he receives without influence of his spiritual-mental surroundings, but speech is something that works on the human being. It is real like a sculptor who forms as it were the brain. We can also pursue this formation of the brain scientifically in the first times, even for years. If then it is proved anatomically or physiologically that the faculty of speech, the memory of certain linguistic images is bound to this or that organ, that every word is kept as it were like a book in a library, we are allowed to ask on the other side: what has formed the brain first? Then we can answer: what was there as a spiritual-mental in the vocabulary of the surroundings of the human being.\nThus, we must distinguish thoughts, mental pictures, sensations, will-impulses, and feelings — from something else that remains inner experience in such a way that it intervenes in the outer physical organisation, forms it plastically, and makes it a tool only for future spiritual abilities or the future spiritual-mental life. We can see this quite clearly if we pursue an ability through our life that shows quite different sides, although the outer psychology lumped these different sides together several times: if we pursue our memory.\nIf we appropriate something by memory if we memorise, we appropriate this by repetition above all. We have appropriated it then, and can give it from us. Everybody now knows oblivion, an awkward thing. Since the things are forgotten again, disappear from our memory, so that we cannot reproduce them in a later time. For instance, can you not remember how many things you must learn by heart and recite in your youth, and how much you can no longer recite by heart now? However, does everything disappear that we have taken up in our memory?\nNow we want to look only at oblivion. Is that what the human being has forgotten no longer there? It is there in a similar way as something that we have already mentioned that is always forgotten in the normal human life: the miraculous, first experiences of the childhood years are forgotten. We remember only back to a certain point in time. Before this time, however, we had numerous impressions. Who does not concede this if he follows the development of a child impartially in the first years?\nHowever, it is forgotten in the sense as we normally speak of oblivion. However, is it not there at all? Does it play no longer a role in the human soul? On the contrary, it plays a significant role in the human soul. For much more of the entire mood and condition of soul depends on the first childhood impressions than the human being is capable in the later life than one normally assumes. It is more important what one has forgotten in the first years what forms us in our soul being than one admits normally. Thus, the same applies to that what we learn later, we forget the text, the thoughts, but it remains in us as a certain soul mood. For example, a human being has learnt ballads or other poetries of great heroes with particular tasks, particular qualities at a certain age, He may forget the thoughts, the events et cetera, so that he cannot reproduce them again. However, it remains what he has learnt in the structure of his own character maybe as a soul force, as a kind to face life and to let approach joy and sorrow to himself. What we forget changes into moods, feelings, will-impulses, to that what does not rest more or less consciously in our soul life what creates, however, and forms in us. Only sometimes, it appears by particular processes in the later life that something forgotten is not completely forgotten, so that one can prove that only something like a cover was put on the subconscious layers of his soul life that it exists, however, in him. Thus, we realise positively how that what we forget what disappears from our memory works on our soul and appears then in our mood as joy and sorrow, as courage, as bravery or cowardice, or also as fear and fear of life. What we see sinking from the treasure of memory into subconsciousness becomes creative in our soul. We are what the things that we have forgotten have made of us. Since what is the human being concretely else than how he can be glad, courageous et cetera. If we consider the human being not in the abstract, but concretely, we must say, it is the harmonious interweaving and interrelation of his qualities, so that he himself is caused by what flows down in deeper layers of his consciousness. We see this during life.\nFrom everything that was regarded up to now and what should be still stated can arise that that what sinks spiritual-mentally into even deeper layers when the human being passes the gate of death. Since he finds a certain organisation every time if he wants to form his outer physical organisation by that what he takes up in this life. It is organised one way or the other, with these or those predispositions he comes into life. What is creative in our soul must attack that. Assuming that by that what we take up in ourselves, a quality of bravery could be developed in us. If we have, however, an organisation that is more suited to a coward than to a courageous human being, we must attack something more or less that we have from our organisation. When we go through the time between death and a new birth, the essentials of this human development lie in the fact that we develop the prototype, the original figure of our new physical body, our new physical organisation.\nThere we have no such limits and obstacles as they present themselves to our organisation in the life between birth and death, there we build plastically with that what we have acquired in life, the basis, the basic forces for a new corporeality within wider limits as it is the case between birth and death. Hence, we can say, what works on forgotten mental pictures during the life between birth and death only in our soul, this works if we walk through the gate of death, up to the time of reincarnation in the creation of our next organisation. It works on that which is connected with our new bodily organisation; so that we walk with such predispositions to the new existence that go down in even deeper layers of our being than the forgotten mental pictures in the life between birth and death.\nFrom all that it will be absolutely clear that the human being — because he has received the causes of the new corporeality from life, from the immediate surroundings — indeed, needs the same conditions again in a certain way. It is different with the animal whose organisation is determined by the line of heredity, as we have realised in the talks about Human Soul and Animal Soul and Human Spirit and Animal Spirit . The animal appears with particular formative trends that are not taken from the surroundings of the animal. We realise how little the animal gets by education, by training from the external world, how little it needs, hence, a scene which lies in the outer world to bring out again what is taken in as educational principles. However, the human being needs such a scene. Hence, he enters the world clumsily, so that we also have to give the finishing touch to the subtler arrangement of his organisation. Hence, the life and the interweaving of the individuality, his very basic nature, in the first years of his existence. Hence, his mind organ, the brain, enters existence as something malleable, and is provided only after birth with the ways, lines, and directions in which the predispositions should enjoy life.\nWith it, we realise that that which is important for the development is to be regarded as coming from former levels of existence. Hence, it is less important to have certain stubborn principles of education, than to consider every single human being, every individuality as a problem, as a holy riddle which is to be solved, and that it is down to us to create the opportunities so that this riddle can be solved in the possibly best way. An education is uncomfortable which can generally put up no firm principles, but must appeal a principle related to the artistic in the educator to observe what comes out there of the essentiality of the human being. It is more uncomfortable, as if one says according to regulations, these or those abilities are to be expressed one way or the other. However, we face the adolescent human being only with the right attitude if we consider him in every single case as an individuality, as something special in itself. However, if one wants to take the things trivially — some people have already the talent to take everything trivially -, one can say, individuality appears not only with the human being, but also with any animal. Indeed, so it seems. However, nobody will also deny this who speaks out the basic positions of spiritual science. I have often said, if one speaks in this sense of individuality, one must go into it more exactly, must be aware that if one wants to take the things trivially one can also speak of the biography and the individuality of a quill. I knew a man who could already distinguish quills — when one still cut goosequills. Because everybody trimmed his feather himself, it always got a personal relation to him, and because the person concerned had an excellent imagination, he could have very well written a biography of any single quill with all details. However, one must not apply the criterion of triviality, but that which is got out of the depths of knowledge.\nWe have realised that it is very important for the human being in the first years of his life that we maintain his abilities to intervene plastically in his physical or bodily-mental organisation, and that we do not obstruct this possibility. We obstruct this possibility mostly if we cram him with concepts and ideas too early which refer only to an outer sensuousness and which have the sharpest contours, or if we nail him down on an activity which is constricted theoretically in particular forms. There is no variability, no modification, also no possibility to develop the spiritual-mental abilities as the soul busies itself from day to day, from hour to hour. Assuming that a father would be a frightfully stubborn person who has as principle: my son must become in such a way as I was! I have made the shoes for my clientele for my whole life in such a way, and my son must make them in the same way! As I think, my son must think! — A spiritual-mental structure is there brought in the surroundings of the boy which works on his spiritual-mental organisation as it worked on the father, and the boy is thereby squeezed in particular forms, whereas one should investigate the individuality who enters existence to form the spiritual-mental organisation according to the knowledge one has obtained from it.\nThe educational instinct of humanity has already created a wonderful means by the general consciousness by which the human being becomes able in the first years to work on the variable, modifiable, versatile of the spiritual-mental, so that a free margin is left for the organisation of the human being. This is the play. This is also the way in which we occupy a child best of all that we do not give it concepts which are constricted in solid contours, but those which leave a margin to the thought, so that it can stray here or there. Only then, one finds the course of the thought that is predetermined by the inner predisposition. If I tell a fairy tale, so that it stimulates the spiritual activity of the child that the concepts do not develop in certain contours, but that it leaves the contours of the concepts versatile, then the child works in such a way as somebody works who tries and gets out the right by doing. The child works to get out how its spirituality must move, so that it forms its organisation in the best way as it is prefigured internally. That applies to the play. The play differs from the activity pressed in solid forms by the fact that, nevertheless, one can do to a certain degree what one wants if one plays that one does not have sharp contours in the thought and mobility of the organs from the start. Thereby it is reacted again in a free, determinable way on the spiritual-mental organisation of the human being. Play and the just characterised spiritual-mental activity of the child in the first years arise from a deep consciousness of the real nature of the human being. Someone who wants to become a real educator will also have the consciousness for the later years that, indeed, he has first to study, to recognise, to determine any single ability in the developing human being. Nevertheless, there is the possibility to observe certain great principles.\nSuch principles lead us then only to how the essence of the human being which goes from birth to birth, so to speak, uses the appearance which lies in the line of heredity. There it is of the highest interest to look in which way the spiritual-mental essence of the human being uses the features, the qualities, virtues et cetera of the father and mother, of the fatherly and motherly ancestors to build up something new. Indeed: the fatherly and motherly qualities are not used by the individual essence in the same way, but there a particular principle forms the basis. Just this principle is infinitely instructive. If we try to understand it in its completeness, we must understand how in the human soul two things make themselves noticeable.\nOne is intellectuality to which we want to count also the ability to think in mental pictures faster or slower, cleverer or more stupidly. The other is the general direction of will and feeling, of the affects, the interest that we take in our surroundings. The whole way of performing something depends on whether we have a versatile or a slow mind, a dull or a mind penetrating into the things whether we are astute or not. What the human being can perform for his fellow men and how we perform this depends on whether we know to connect our interests in the right sense with that what goes forward in our surroundings. Some human beings have good preconditions, but they have little interest in the fellow men and in the environment. Here the interest does not elicit the abilities. Hence, it is necessary that the interest is also considered in us like that whether the mobility of our intellectuality allows us to perform this or that for our social environment.\nFor the entire way of the soul life which is connected with our contact with the outside world, with our bigger or lower interests and with our skill for the outside world the human being takes the most important elements of heredity from the father. The soul takes the suitable elements from the father, so that it can develop those qualities in itself. However, our individuality entering existence takes what is intellectual mobility with which activity of imagination, pictorial imagination, ingenuity are also connected as heritage from the motherly qualities. You already find this exceptionally interesting chapter suggested by Schopenhauer in a certain way; he had a notion of it, however, was not able to point to the deeper things.\nHowever, an interesting difference now appears which can be only observed if one goes into the entire extent of life. Then you also find evidence of it everywhere. For an immense difference appears concerning the gender. The relation of a son to father and mother was described wonderfully in the Goethean words: “From the father I have the stature, the serious conduct of life.” That means everything that refers to the contact of the human being with the outer world. — “From mummy I have the glad nature, the desire of telling stories,” that is the entire way of the spiritual life. However, if we look now at the daughter, it becomes apparent quite strangely that the fatherly qualities appear with the daughter in such a way that they are raised a level from the realm of the will-impulses to the mental. Hence, one can find the fatherly qualities taken by the individuality of the daughter in such a way that they are raised to the mental whereby her soul life makes them more versatile, so that the most important qualities, which we see with the father more externally, are more internalised with the daughter.\nHence, we can say, the characteristics of the father live on in the soul of the daughter, the soul qualities of the mother, the activity of the mind as well as talents and abilities that one can develop live on in the son. Goethe's mother was a woman who could tell stories with whom the imagination functioned most wonderfully. This went down a level to the son, became predisposition, organisation, so that the son Goethe had the ability to give humanity what lived in his mother. Thus, we see how the motherly qualities are led down one level with the son, so that they become abilities of organs, while the daughter takes the fatherly qualities up one level, so that she internalises them, ensouls them. Perhaps, nothing is more typical for it than the nice contrast of Goethe to his sister Cornelia who was now completely the old Councillor (Goethe's father) who was a quiet, serious nature and, hence, could be to the poet already in his childhood what he needed: an exceptionally good companion. Take into consideration now that Goethe could gain no favourable relationship to his father after his biography. This was because the fatherly qualities were externalised with his father. Goethe needed these qualities, but he could not understand them as they were with his father. They were right there. They lived then in the soul of his sister who could be, therefore, such a good companion to him.\nYou find that confirmed in history. We have the nicest confirmation from the mother of the Maccabees in this respect who allows her sons to face death with heroic greatness for what she believes and what her fathers believed with the words, I have given you the body. However, He who created the world and the human beings has given you what I could not give you, and He will make sure that you receive it again if you lose it for your faith (according to 2 Maccabees 7:22-23). — How often just the motherly element is shown in history: from the mother of Alexander and the mother of the Gracchi brothers until our time we realise that qualities appear in a human being so that this person can work on the environment that she/he has the forces and talents and the bodily-mental organisation for it. There we could open any book about significant men: everywhere we find the motherly qualities translated so that they have descended one level that they have become abilities, which are put in life.\nWe take the example of Bürger's (Gottfried August B., 1743-1794, German poet) mother and father from whom he had inherited the will-quality. He had little in common with his father; the father was glad if he did not need to look after the development of the little boy; the mother, however, had a wonderfully versatile mind, she could correctly express herself grammatically and stylistically. This was necessary for the poet; he took over these qualities from his mother, and they arose just because he belonged to the next generation. Another example is Hebbel's (Friedrich H., 1813-1863, German author) relationship to his father. Somebody, who more exactly knows the poet Hebbel, feels an echo of the fatherly inheritance in everything peculiar and stubborn of his interests. The old master bricklayer Hebbel handed down a lot on his son in this respect. However, the son and the mother understood each other, and the mother prevented that the son became a master bricklayer instead of giving humanity his dramas. It is touching when Hebbel tells in his miraculous diaries what connected him with his mother.\nThese examples could be increased ad infinitum. However, we are not allowed at all — because we believe to observe in life that something else faces us here or there — to conclude that the things are wrong. This would be as if anybody said, the physicists prove the law of falling bodies; now I will prove that one can transgress the law applying all kinds of devices. — However, laws are not there that we take account of any fact, but have in mind what is possible. We have to do it in the natural sciences in such a way; we must do it in spiritual science in such a way. Only spiritual science is not far enough even today to proceed in the same way. If one regards this, one can find the law of the fatherly and motherly genotype confirmed everywhere.\nHowever, one has to realise if one considers the human being as a whole that the human soul that enjoys life in the entire, also bodily-mental organisation is not a simple one. One can want again wholeheartedly to be trivial and say, why do you anthroposophists have the strange habit to distinguish three soul members and even many members of the human nature? You talk there about a sentient soul, an intellectual soul, and a consciousness soul. Nevertheless, it would be much easier to speak of the soul as a uniform being which has thoughts, feelings and will-impulses. -- Certainly, it is easier, more comfortable — and more trivial, too. However, this is something at the same time that cannot promote the scientific consideration of the human being really. For it is not the longing for categorising and speaking many words. The arrangement of the human soul arises in the sentient soul, which is connected with the surroundings at first and receives the perception and sensations from the outside, in which the desires and instincts develop, and which is to be separated from the part in which already in a certain sense the received is processed. We activate our sentient soul, facing the outside world, perceiving its colours and sounds, but we also let appear what we, as normal human beings, cannot control at first: our desires and passions. However, if we withdraw and process what we have taken up by the perception et cetera in ourselves, so that the things of the outside world which are animated in us transform themselves into feelings, then we live in the second soul member, in the intellectual soul. As far as we control our thoughts and are not controlled by them, we live in the consciousness soul. In the Occult Science or in the Theosophy you see that three soul members have much more relations — in other way — to the outside world, not because we like to categorise, but the sentient soul is assigned in quite different way to the universe than the consciousness soul.\nThe consciousness soul isolates the human being and makes him feeling as an internally closed being. The intellectual soul relates him to the surroundings and to the whole universe; thereby he is a being that appears as an essence, as a confluence of the whole world. By the consciousness soul the human being lives in himself, isolates himself. The most principal what one experiences in the consciousness soul is that what one develops as the latest of his arrangements: the ability of logical thinking that we have opinions, thoughts et cetera. This rests in the consciousness soul. Concerning these qualities, the individual essence of the human being that enters existence at birth is indeed mostly subject to isolation. This innermost essence works its way at the latest. While his cover, his bodily organisation emerges at the earliest, his real individuality emerges at the latest. Nevertheless, as the human being is in the present — he was different in the past and will be different in the future -, indeed, he develops his opinions, concepts, mental pictures in the most isolated part of his nature. Hence, these exert the least influence on the entire construction and arrangement of his personality and appear only as predispositions when the whole personality is formed plastically.\nThere we realise how the talent of the human being develops in a certain order. We see appearing at first what lives in the least isolated, separated element, in the sentient soul. However, this has the biggest strength to intervene in the entire human organisation. Hence, we can understand that we can approach the child at least with opinions, theories, and ideas if this sentient soul wants to shape from the inside. We can approach the child only if we do not let theories and doctrines work on the sentient soul in the first years — as I have shown in my essay The Education of the Child from the Viewpoint of Spiritual Science . - However, one has to encourage the child to imitate what one sets an example of that what it should imitate. This is of infinite importance because this imitative instinct appears as one of the very first predispositions on which one can work. Admonitions and teachings are almost ineffective in this time. The child copies what it sees because it forms in such a way as it must form in accordance with its coherence with the outside world. We lay the first foundation of the entire personal being of the child if we give it examples during the first seven years what it can imitate if we guess how we have to behave in the surroundings of the child. However, this is an educational principle extremely strange for many people. Most people ask how the child should behave, and now there spiritual science comes with its requirements: the human being should learn from the child how one has to behave in the surroundings of the child — up to the words, attitudes, and thoughts! Since the child is much more receptive in its soul than one assumes usually, above all, more receptive than the adult human being. There are such human beings with a certain sensitivity who notice it immediately if, for example, a person comes in who dampens the good mood. This applies to the child in particular, even though one considers it little today. It depends much less on what one undertakes in detail, than on that one takes care which thoughts, which mental pictures one has. It is not enough that one keeps them secret and permits himself thoughts that should be not for the child, but our thoughts must be realised in such a way that we have the feeling: this can and should live on in the child. — This is uncomfortable, but it is right!\nWhen the second dentition has taken place, one has to consider the building on authority. This is the most important that the child can imitate in the first years what we speak, act and think, and that it feels us in the second epoch as a person on whom it can build, so that it can say: it is good what he does! — Not that we admonish the child from the seventh up to the fourteenth, sixteenth out of the principle to develop a moral theory: this must be done, this must be omitted. However, we should give the child the best treasure if it can have the sensation for the intellectual soul: it is good what the person beside me does; I must omit what he omits. — This is of infinite importance.\nThe possibility begins only with the fourteenth, sixteenth years that the human being builds on the most isolated part of his being, on the consciousness soul, that is on that what forms in the consciousness soul: on his opinions, concepts and ideas. However, they must have a firm ground first, and this must be created. If we do not create it, while we cause the opportunity by education as the individuality reveals it to us, if we do not give free rein to the development, then the human being is seized by another element: by the firmness of his cover nature. Then he externalises himself; then his individuality going from life to life does not intervene, but then he becomes the slave of his bodily organisation that subjugates him from the outside. Then the human being does not control his soul and mind, is completely dependent on his bodily-mental organisation, shows rigid qualities, which are unalterable.\nAgainst it, a human being with whom we have minded that his predispositions appear keeps a certain mobility for his whole life, can still find the way in new situations in the later life. However, with the other the organisation externalises itself, gets rigid forms, and he keeps them for his whole life. We live in an epoch where the individuality of the human being is little estimated and where, hence, little opportunity is given to convince oneself that the individuality is still versatile in the later life and active and can familiarise itself with new situations and truths. There we come to a chapter in which we can realise how some human beings must simply position themselves to life.\nSo many people take care if they have seen into a worldview so that they are convinced of it to convincing also other people. They believe that it is a very creditable endeavour if they say, because I understand it so clearly, nevertheless, I should be able to convince everybody. However, this is naive. Our opinions do not depend at all on whether to us something is proved logically. This is possible in the fewest cases. Since the opinions and convictions are formed from quite different subsoil of his soul — from his will nature, from his mood and feeling nature, so that someone can understand your logical discussions, your astute conclusions very well. Nevertheless, he does not at all accept them because that what a human being believes and what he confesses does not flow from his logic and his understanding, but from the whole personality, that is from those members, where the will where the mood arise. However, our thoughts are the latest of us that comes out from all our predispositions when the bodily organisation is finished long since. This is the most isolated field. There we find access to the other human beings at least. We can attain more if we seize them in those parts, which lie deeper: in the mood, in the will. There it is still intervened in the organisation.\nHowever, if a human being has grown up in a very materialistic sphere, a sum of will-impulses originate that shape his corporeality and his brain plastically. Then later he can appropriate a quite good logical thinking, however, this does no longer intervene in his brain plastically. Logical thoughts are the most powerless in the human soul. Hence, it depends especially on the fact that we find access to other human beings also in the soul, not only in the logic. If anybody has developed his brain already in a certain way, the brain that reflects the old mental pictures repeatedly does no longer transform any logic because it has become physical.\nHence, one cannot expect from such worldviews, which are built on the purest, sharpest logic as spiritual science that one can work in the way that one goes from one human being to the other to persuade him. If anybody who understands the spiritual-scientific impulse wanted to believe that he could convince the human beings by persuasion or by logic, if he possibly wanted to believe that the spiritual scientist abandons himself to this illusion, he is wrong very much! Since there is a big number of such human beings in our time who do not consider what spiritual science and spiritual research means because of their entire personality. From the big mass of those who live around us those will come who tend to spiritual science, to what they anticipate darkly what they already have in their souls. A selection, a choice only can take place concerning a worldview, which is built on this what the logic, the human consciousness can encompass. Hence, the spiritual scientist approaches the human beings and knows to differentiate: there is one to whom you may preach for years, he will not be able to go into your thoughts. You must make him aware of it; you can speak to his soul, but he himself cannot reflect it to himself from his soul tool, from the brain. The other is built in such a way that he can go into that what spiritual science is in its logical way, and, hence, he finds his way in what lives already in his soul.\nWe have to position ourselves in the big cultural tasks of the present or the future in this way. Only if we recognise how the whole human being relates to that what he can gradually take up of new truth in his development and education, one will also emphasise to develop the spiritual-mental of the human being, so that he can work powerfully on body and soul — especially during the years, where he is accessible to education. We must realise that one can sin a lot in this respect. We see from our considerations how human preference et cetera contributes even more to the views than pure logic. Pure logic could only speak if generally desires and instincts are completely quiet. One must be clear in one's mind before if we believe to have formed the predispositions of a human being one-sidedly somewhere in a special field, that then that appears in a strange way what we have left out of consideration.\nAssuming that we educate a human being in such a way that we express the abstract predispositions only as it is done frequently in the school. Then the pure concepts and abstract ideas cannot intervene in the entire mental and feeling life. This remains undeveloped, uneducated and appears to us later in all possible trivial ways of living. Then two kinds of people are visible often in life.\nEven with people of high standing — if they have not developed into that which is in the depths of personality — preference, inclination, and sympathy deeper sitting make themselves felt in other way. Which examinee would not have found out if he faces an ever so clever examiner who is able to survey a lot of his science that this one-sidedness is expressed by the fact that he has a preference for the way he wants just to hear the answers! Woes betide the examinee if he does not know to dress what he should say in the words as the examiner wants to have them!\nIn a book about psychology by Moriz Benedikt (1835-1920, Austrian neurologist) some right thing is said just about the mistakes of human education in this direction. He tells: once two examiners examined two examinees, and the mishap took place that the one examinee gave the answers to the examiner A in the way, as if the examiner B put the questions. If he had given the answers to this, he would have passed the exam brilliantly. The other of the candidates was in the reverse case. Hence, both fell!\nThis can show that one can dress what is unassailable quite well in logical forms. However, as soon as we are not able to immerse our concepts into the education of thought during education, no suitable field is to be found to form the human being from here. How must we behave then to the human being? We must behave in such a way that we give him abstract concepts and ideas as little as possible but give him very pictorial ideas in the time when he should still be formed mainly plastically and when abstractions and ideas are effective at least.\nTherefore, I have so emphasised, that the pictorial, the vivid in which the concepts are taken up and which shall diverge as little as possible from that what has picture, figure, and outline. Since what the imagination takes up as a picture, as a figure that way has a big power to intervene in our bodily organisation. The fact that the pictorial that faces us in the organisation intervenes in the bodily organisation, you can already recognise from the fact that you see how little it helps if you speak to a sick person who is in a certain situation: you should do this, you should leave this. — This helps very little. However, if you put an apparatus before him which is similar to an electrostatic generator, so that the sick person can get its picture, and you give him two handles, and let conduct no current, — if he has only the picture before himself, he feels the current, and then it helps! However where is so nicely declaimed that the imagination plays a big role, we have to recognise that it concerns not every imagination, but only the pictorial one.\nWe live in a time in which it has gradually become common practice that one little considers the following principle of spiritual science. Only between the fourteenth, sixteenth and 21-st, 22-nd years the human being becomes able to develop concepts and ideas, that one takes up concepts that should be developed only later; but today the human being is already mature before the end of this age to write newspaper articles, which are printed and then accepted by the people. Then it is difficult to keep away abstractions up to the characterised age and to bring the pictorial, the vivid home to the human being. Since the pictorial has the power to intervene in the bodily-mental organisation. You can find always confirmed what I say now, however, one does not always pay attention to it.\nMoriz Benedikt complains, for example, that many high school students (grammar pupils) are often so clumsy in the later life. Where from does this come? Because the whole education is not vivid, goes so little into the vivid and adheres only to abstractions, even with the teaching of languages. Against it, we are able to feel the pictorial well into the hands because the objects themselves face us in pictures. There one could say, if you want to imagine an object, you must move in such a way that you feel the circle or the ellipse growing together with the object in pictures. Not only the imitation with the manual skill, but the feeling and learning to love the things shows us how the pictorial, vivid imagination twitches in our limbs, makes them agile and versatile. We can find many people who cannot sew a button back on if it was torn off. This is a big disadvantage. The important is that we can intervene in the outside world with all that we have. We cannot learn everything of course. Nevertheless, we can learn that the spiritual-mental slides down from the spiritual in the bodily-mental and makes our limbs agile. Nobody whom we have instructed in his youth to understand what is outside him will be a clumsy person later in life. Since what already lies beneath the threshold of our consciousness can work most substantially on our organisation. This also applies to the language. One learns a language best of all in the time when one is not able at all to understand this language grammatically, because there one learns with that part of the soul, which belongs to the deeper layers.\nHumanity has developed that way — the single human being has to develop that way. I have already referred elsewhere to Laurenz Müllner (1848-1911, Austrian Catholic theologian) who called attention to the St. Peter's Basilica in Rome standing there splendidly that the principles of space are hidden in the mechanics of the domed building, so that one sees the spatial mechanics expressed most wonderfully. However, he suggested then that Galilei found the laws, which Michelangelo expressed in it, by his lofty mind and gave us the mechanical science only. I have also drawn your attention to the fact that Michelangelo's day of death almost coincides with Galilei's birthday, so that the abstract laws of the mechanics — what lives in the consciousness soul of the human being — appeared later than that what Michelangelo built out of his deeper soul members in space. As the higher soul members develop on basis of the lower ones as we must develop our members on basis of the predispositions in order to look back at them and to get a concept of them, it is also in the single life. In the single life the human being has also to be surrounded by the human society, has to place himself in what immerses him like in an atmosphere, in the spiritual-mental of our surroundings. Then that what he brings in in existence is formed. Nevertheless, he brings in not only what is given him from the line of heredity, but this is determined in the manifold way by his everlasting individuality. This individuality needs the inherited qualities; it must appropriate and develop them. This also outranks what enters existence with our individuality. We enter existence with birth: a creative, productive spirituality appropriates, where we cannot yet form concepts, the sculptural material from the line of heredity. Later only the consciousness soul is added. Thus, we realise an individual in the human nature, which shapes the abilities and talents plastically. If we become educators, it is our task, that that what we consider as a spiritual riddle, is solved with every human being anew. All that refers us to a mood. After the excavation of Schiller's bones, Goethe found his skull and saw there the forms on which the human individuality had worked. When he realised that in this form the fluid mind of Schiller had to incorporate itself, so that he could become what he became — Goethe could express this with the saying:\n\nWhat can the human being gain more in life Than that God's nature reveals itself to him, How she lets the solid melt away to spirit, How she firmly retains the spiritually created!\n\nOne must understand such a quotation out of the situation. Who takes it without regarding what expresses itself as spiritually created in the solid form, misunderstands it. However, someone does also not understand it who does not know which deep insight Goethe had into the everlasting weaving of an individuality that goes from birth to birth, embodies itself repeatedly, and is the real architect of the human being. As we have received the organs from the spirit, which are organs of the spirit again, one can easily say by a childish comparison, the clock shows the time, but we could not use it if the human mind had not invented it. — We use our brain for thinking in the physical world, but we could not use it for thinking if the world spirit had not created it. We would not have developed it with such an individuality if not our individuality had poured out itself as a spiritually created in our brain. There we deeper understand what we could express today. Goethe meant the same referring to that in the human being what is determining for all his talents and abilities, as if the stars were understood like any situation of the world, and as that, what affects the human being as an everlasting goes only for this reason through the gate of death to advance to new developmental forms. Briefly, we can summarise what we considered today in the mood of the Goethean thoughts, which he expressed in the Primal Words. Orphic. Daimon :\nAs on the day that lent you to the world, the sun stood to greet the planets, you instantly thrives and continued to do so in accordance with the law, by which you made your appearance. Thus you must be, you cannot escape from yourself, thus sibyls and prophets have already spoken; and no passage of time nor any power can break into bits a molded form that develops as it lives."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-9",
    "title": "Zarathustra",
    "date": "19 Jan 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/GC1987/19110119p02.html",
    "book_title": "Turning Points Spiritual History",
    "content": "Among the fundamental principles underlying Spiritual Science and to which your attention has been drawn in previous lectures, the most prominent is the idea of Reincarnation. According to this generally unpopular and little understood concept, it is maintained that human individuality is constrained to manifest again and again in a single personality, during its enfoldment in the course of repeated earth-lives. It has been previously pointed out that many and diverse questions are associated with this conception, and that such is the case will become more and more apparent as we proceed.\nWhat deep meaning, we might ask, underlies the fact that the span of man’s life on earth is destined to recur, not once only, but many times, and that during each successive period between rebirth and death human individuality persists. When we study the evolution of mankind in the light of Spiritual Science, we find therein a progressive purport, a design of such nature that each age and each epoch presents in some fashion a different content, and we realize that human evolution is ever destined to maintain a definite upward trend. Thus do we become aware of a profound latent significance, when we know that the varied influences which act upon mankind are indeed potent and become absorbed over and over again by the Ego during the course of human development. A condition which is only possible because man, with all that comprises his being, is brought into contact not once alone, but recurrently, with the great living stream of evolution.\nWhen we regard the whole evolutionary process as a rational progression, ever accompanied by fresh contents, there dawns a true comprehension of those Great Spiritual Beings who set the measure of progress. We are then able to realize the import and proper relation of these outstanding leaders, from whom have come new thoughts, experiences and impulses destined to further the advancement and progressive evolution of humanity.\nDuring this Cycle of Lectures I shall speak of many such Spiritual Beings who have acted as guides to mankind, and at the same time bring forward and elucidate various matters connected with this subject. The first human individuality to claim our attention from such a point of view is Zarathustra, about whom, although there is much discussion in these days, little is known; for as far as external investigation goes his history is especially problematical, as it is shrouded in mystery and unrecorded in ancient documents.\nWhen we consider the characteristics of such a personality as Zarathustra, whose gifts to mankind, as far as they are preserved for us, seem so strange to our present age, we at once realize how great is the dissimilarity in man’s whole being at different periods of earthly progress. Casual reflection might easily lead to the conclusion, that from the very beginning humanity has always had the same ideas concerning morality, the same general thoughts, feelings and conceptions as those which exist in our time. From previous lectures, however, and from others which will follow, you will know through the teachings of Spiritual Science that during man’s development great and important changes take place, especially as regards the life of the human soul, the nature of human apprehension, emotions and desires. Further, you will realize that man’s consciousness was very differently constituted in olden days; and that there is reason to believe that in the future yet other stages will be reached in which the conscious condition of mankind will vary considerably from its normal state to-day.\nWhen we turn our attention to Zarathustra we find that we must look back over an extremely long period. According to certain modern researches, he is considered to be a contemporary of Buddha; the approximate date of his life being fixed at some six to six and a half centuries before the birth of Christianity. It is, however, a remarkable and interesting fact that other investigators of late years, after carefully studying all existing traditions concerning Zarathustra, have been driven to the conclusion that the personality concealed beneath the name of the ancient founder of Persian religion must have lived a great many centuries before the time of Buddha. Greek historians have stated over and over again that the period ascribed to Zarathustra should be put back very many, possibly five to six thousand years before the Trojan War 1 the date of which has been placed at about 1200 B.C. From the above, and from what has been learned through research in many directions, we can now feel certain that historical investigators will in the end be unwillingly forced to acknowledge that the claims of Grecian scholarship regarding the great antiquity of the Zarathustran era, as indicated by ancient tradition, are justly founded and must be accepted as authentic. Spiritual Science, in its statements and theories, fully concurs with the old Greek writers who already in olden days had fixed the period of the founder of Persian religion so far back in time. We have, therefore, good reason for maintaining that Zarathustra, living as he did thousands of years before the birth of Christianity, was doubtless confronted with a very different class of human consciousness from that which exists in our present age. It has often been pointed out, and we will again refer to this matter, that in ancient times the development of human consciousness was such that the old ‘dream state’, or ‘clairvoyant condition’ (we will avoid misusing this term, as is so often done in these days), was in every way perfectly normal to man, so that his conceptions and ideas were such that he did not contemplate the world from that narrow perceptual point of view that is so prevalent to-day. We can best picture the impressions made by the world upon the consciousness of the ancients, if we turn our thoughts to that last enduring remnant of the old clairvoyant state, namely, dream consciousness. We all know those fluctuating dream pictures that come to us at times, the most of which carry no meaning, and are so often merely suggestive of the outer world, although there may now and then intrude some higher level of conscious thought; dream visions, which in these days we find so difficult to interpret and to understand. We might say that our sleep consciousness runs its course pictorially in ever-changing scenes, and which are at the same time symbolical. For instance, many of us have had the experience that events connected with some impressive happening — say, a conflagration — have been after a time once more figuratively manifested to us in a dream. Let us now consider for a moment this other horizon of our sleeping state, where clings in truth that last remnant of a conscious condition belonging to a by-gone age in the grey and distant past. The consciousness of the ancients was such that in reality they lived in a life of imagery. The visions which came to them were not merely indefinite unrelated creations, for they had reference to an actual outer world. In olden days primitive man was capable of intermediate conscious states, between those which prevail when we sleep and when we are awake; then it was that he lived in the presence of the Spirit-World, and the Spirit-World entered into his being. To-day this door is closed, but in those ancient times such was not the case. It was while in this intermediate condition that man became aware of visions which resembled to some extent dream pictures, but were definite in their manifestation of a spirit life and of spiritual achievement existing beyond the perceptual world. Although in the Zarathustran era, such visions had already become somewhat confused and vague, there was nevertheless still close contact with the world of spirit, therefore these ancients could say from direct observation and experience: ‘In the same way as I realize this outer physical world and this perceptual life, even so do I know that there exists another conscious condition belonging to a different region — a spiritual realm — related to that which is material, and where I do of a verity experience and observe the workings of the Divine Spirit.’ It is a fundamental principle underlying the evolution of the human race, that in no case can any one quality be developed except at the expense of some other attribute; hence it came about that from epoch to epoch, the faculty through which in olden times mankind obtained a clear inner vision of the spiritual realms became ever less and less pronounced. Our present day exact methods of thought, our power of expression, our logic, all that we regard as the most important driving forces of modern culture did not exist in the remote past. Such faculties have been acquired during later periods at the expense of the old clairvoyant consciousness, and it is now for mankind to regain and cultivate this long-lost power. Then in the future of human evolution a time will come when in addition to man’s purely physical consciousness, his intellectuality and his logic, he will again approach the condition of the ancient seer. We must differentiate between the upward and downward tendency of human consciousness. Evolution has a deeper meaning when we realize that in the beginning man was entirely of a spiritual realm, where he lived in the soul, and that when he descended into the physical world it was ordained that he should gradually relinquish his clairvoyant power in order that he might acquire qualities born of the existing purely physical conditions; such as intellectuality and logic. When this stage in his development has run its course he will again return to the world of spirit. Regarding the circumstances connected with these curious clairvoyant states and experiences of the ancients we have no historical record. Zarathustra lived in that same remote age, and was one of those great leading personalities who gave immense stimulus to the advancement of culture and civilization. Such guiding personalities must ever draw from the creative source that which we may term Illumination, whereby they are initiated into the higher mysteries of the world, irrespective of the standard of normal human consciousness existing in their time. Other such outstanding personalities of whom mention will be made during these lectures are: Hermes, Buddha and Moses. Zarathustra lived at least 8000 years before the present era, and those glorious gifts to civilization which emanated from his illumined spirit have been reflected in the great cultural progress of humanity. His influence has long ago been clearly recognized, and can be detected even to this day, by all who take note of the mysterious currents underlying the whole of human evolution. We now realize that Zarathustra belonged essentially to those Great Ones in whose souls lived a measure of the spiritual elements of truth, wisdom and perception, far surpassing the customary standard of human consciousness of their period. His mission was to proclaim to his fellow men, in that part of the world later known as the Persian Empire, those grand truths which emanated from the superperceptual regions — a world utterly beyond the apprehension of man’s normal consciousness in that dim and distant age. If we would understand the true significance of Zarathustra’s teachings, we must remember that it was his task to present to a certain section of humanity, in an intelligible manner, a particular world aspect; while on the other hand, various movements which had been in progress among the peoples of other regions, had given a different trend to the whole sphere of man’s culture. The personality of Zarathustra is of special interest because he lived in a territory, contiguous upon its South side to a country which was inhabited by Indian tribes, upon whom spiritual blessings flowed in quite a different manner. When we look forward from those by-gone times we find upon the selfsame soil where dwelt these ancient Indian tribes, the peoples among whom at a later period arose the poets of the Vedas. To the North, where spread the great Brahman Doctrine, is situated that region which was permeated throughout by the powerful and compelling teachings of Zarathustra. But that which he gave to the world was in many respects fundamentally different from the teachings of the great Ieaders among the Indians, whose words have lived on in the moving poetry of the Vedas, in their profound philosophy, and has reached yet an echo in that final glorious blaze of light — The Revelation of the Buddha. We can understand the difference between that which was born of the flow of thought from Zarathustra and the teachings of the ancient Indians, when we bear in mind that we may approach the region of the superperceptual world from two sides. Already in other lectures we have spoken of the path which man must traverse in order that he may enter into the spirit realms. There are two possible methods by which he may raise the energy of his soul, and the capacities latent in his inner being, so much above their normal level that he can pass out of this perceptual into the superperceptual world. The one method is that by which man enters or retires, more and more deeply into his soul, and thus merges himself in his very essence. The other leads behind the veil which is spread around us by our material state. Man can enter the superperceptual region by both these methods. When we experience within our very being a deepening of all values of our spiritual feelings, conceptions and ideas — in short, of our soul impulses; when in fact we creep more and more into ourselves, so that our spiritual powers become ever stronger and stronger; then can we, as it were, in some mystic way merge ourselves within and pass through all that we hold of the physical world to our actual spirit essence — the soul Ego — which Ego continues from incarnation to incarnation, and is not perishable but everlasting. When we have overcome our lusts and passions and all those experiences of the soul which are ours because we are of the body in a physical world, then can our true being pierce the surrounding veil and for ever enter the world of spirit. On the other hand, if we develop those powers which will enable us not merely to be sensible of the outer world with its colours, tone sensations, heat and cold; and if we so strengthen our spiritual forces that we shall be aware of that which lies beyond the colours, the sound, the heat and the cold, and all those other earthly sense-perceptions which hang as a mist about us — then will the enhanced powers of our soul take us behind the enshrouding cloud and into that boundless superperceptual region which is without confine and stretches ever into the infinite. There is one way leading to the Spirit-World which we may term the ‘Mystical Method’, and another which is properly called ‘The Method of \"Spiritual Science\"‘. All great spiritual personalities have followed these paths, in order to attain to those truths and revelations which it was their mission to impress upon humanity in the form of cultural progress. In primeval times man’s development was of such nature, that great revelations could only come to the people of any particular race, through one of these methods alone. But from that period on, in which the Greeks lived, that is, at the dawn of the Christian era, these two separate thought currents commingled, and became more and more one single cultural stream. When we now speak of entering the higher spheres, we understand, that he who would penetrate into the superperceptual region, develops both qualities of power in his soul. The forces necessary to the ‘Mystical Method’ are evolved within the inner being, and those essential to the course of ‘Spiritual Science’, are strengthened while man is yet conscious of the outer world. There is to-day no longer any definite separation of these two paths, as since about the time of that epoch marked by the life of the Grecian race, these two currents have run their course together — in the one, revelation comes about through a mystic merging of man’s consciousness within his very being — in the other, the veil is torn asunder by the enhanced power of his spiritual forces, and man’s awareness stretches outward into the great cosmos. In olden times before the Grecian or Christian era, these two possible methods were in operation separately among different peoples, and we find them working in close proximity, but in divers ways, in the Indian culture which found expression among the Vedas, on the one hand, and that of Zarathustra, further North, on the other. All that we look upon with such wonder in the ancient Indian culture, and which later found expression through Buddha, was achieved by inner contemplation, and turning away from the outer world — through causing the eyes to become less sensitive to physical colours, the ears to physical sounds, and bringing about a deadening of the sense organs in general to the perceptual veil — so that the inner soul forces might be strengthened: — Thus did man press on to Brahma, there to feel himself unified with that which ever works and weaves as the Inner Spirit of the Universe, — In this way originated the teachings of the Holy Rishis, which live on in the poetry of the Vedas, in the Vedantic philosophy, and in Buddhism. The Doctrine of Zarathustra was, however, entirely based upon the other method above-mentioned. He taught his disciples the secret of strengthening their powers of apprehension and cognition, in order that they might pass beyond the mists surrounding the outer perceptual world. He did not say to his followers, as did the Indian teachers: ‘Turn away from the colours, and from the sounds, and from all outer sense-impressions, and seek the path to the spiritual realms only through the merging of yourselves within your very souls’, — but he spoke thus: — ‘Strengthen your powers of perception, in order that you may look around upon all things, the plants, the animals, that which lives in the air and in the water, upon the mountains, and in the depths of the valleys, and cast your eyes upon the world.’ We know that the disciples of the Indian mystics regarded this earth upon which we live as merely maya (illusion), and turned from it in order to attain to Brahma. On the other hand, Zarathustra counselled his followers not to draw away from the material world, but to pass outward and beyond it, so that they might say: — ‘Whenever we experience perceptual manifestations in the outer physical world, we realize that therein lie concealed and beyond our sense perceptions the workings and achievements of the spirit.’ It is remarkable that the two paths should have been thus united in early Grecian times, and just because in that period true spiritual knowledge was more profound than in our day (which we are inclined to regard as so amazingly enlightened!) all things found expression in imagery, and the images gave rise to Mythology. Thus do we find these two thought currents commingled and fostered in the Grecian culture — The Mystical tending inward, and the Zarathustran outward into the great cosmos. That such was the case becomes evident from the fact, that one of these paths was named after Dionysos, that mysterious god who was reached when man merged himself ever deeper and deeper within his inner being, there to find a questionable sub-human element, as yet unknown, and from which he first developed into man. It was this unclean and half-animal residue to which was given the name of Dionysos. On the other hand, all that comes to us when we regard our physical sense perceptions from a purely spiritual standpoint, was termed Apollo. Thus we find in ancient Greece, in the Apollo current of thought, the teaching of Zarathustra; and in the Dionysos current, the doctrine of mystical contemplation, side by side in contrast. In Greece they united and operated conjointly — the Zarathustran and the Mystical Methods, those methods which had been at their highest level, working separately, in the days of the ancient Indians. Here we might say, that already in olden times these two thought currents were destined to commingle in the coming Grecian cults of Apollo and Dionysos, and thenceforward they would continue as one; so that in our present cultural period, when we raise ourselves to a certain spiritual understanding, we find them still unified and enduring. It is very remarkable, and one of the many riddles which present themselves to the thinking mind, that Nietzsche in his first work, The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music , gave evidence of a vague suspicion that in the Grecian creeds of Dionysos and Apollo, the Mystical current meets the stream of scientific spiritual thought. A further matter of interest lies in the fact, that Zarathustra actually taught his disciples to recognize in detail, the hidden workings of the Spirit in all material things, and from this starting-point the whole of his gifts to culture emanated. He emphasized that it was not sufficient for man merely to say: — ‘There before us spreads a material world, behind which ever works and weaves the Divine Spirit.’ Such a statement might appear at first sight full of significance, it leads, however, only to a general pantheistic outlook, and means nothing more, than that some vague nebulous spirit underlies all material phenomena. Zarathustra, like all other great personalities of the past who were exalted and had direct contact with the Spirit-World, did not present these matters to his followers and the people in any such indefinite and abstract manner; he pointed out, that in the same way as individual physical happenings vary in import, so is it with the latent spiritual factor, it being sometimes of greater and sometimes of less moment. He further stated that the sun, regarded purely from the physical point of view as a member of the stellar system, is the source of all earthly phenomena, life, and activity, while concealed within is the centre of spiritual existence in so far as we are immediately concerned. These things Zarathustra impressed earnestly and clearly upon his disciples, and, using simple words, we can picture him as addressing them somewhat as follows: — ‘When you regard man, you must realize that he does not only consist of a material body — such is but an outer expression of the spirit which is within. Even as the physical covering is a manifestation in condensed and crystallized form of the true spiritual man, so is the sun which appears to us as a light-giving mass when considered as such, merely the external manifestation of an inner spiritual sun.’ In the same way as we term the human spirit element as distinguished from the physical, The Aura, to use an ancient expression, so do we call the all-embracing hidden spiritual part of the sun, The Great Aura (Aura Mazda); in contradistinction to man’s spiritual component, which is sometimes called the Little Aura. Now, Zarathustra named all that lies hidden within and beyond man’s mere apprehension of the physical sun — ‘Aura Mazda’ or ‘Ahura Mazdao’ — and considered this element as important to our spiritual experiences and conditions, as is the physical sun to the wellbeing of plants and animals, and all that lives upon the face of the earth. There behind the physical sun lies the Spiritual Master — The Creator — ‘Ahura Mazdao’ or ‘Aura Mazda’, and from ‘Ahura Mazdao’ came the name, ‘Ormuzd’, or, ‘The Spirit of Light’. While the Indians mystically searched their inner being, in order to attain to Brahma — The Eternal — who shines outward as a point of light from within man’s essence, Zarathustra urged his disciples to turn their eyes upon the great periphery of existence, and pointed out that there within the body of the sun, dwells the great Solar Spirit — Ahura Mazdao — ‘The Spirit of Light’. He taught them that, just in the same way as when man strives to raise his spirit to perfection, so must he ever battle against his lower passions and desires, against the delusive images suggested by possible deception and falsehood, and all those antagonistic influences within, which continually oppose his spiritual impulses. Thus must ‘Ahura Mazdao’ face the opposition of ‘The Spirit of Darkness’ — ‘Angra Mainyus’ or ‘Ahriman’. We can now realize how the great Zarathustran conception could be evolved from experiences born of sensations and sense contents. Through these, Zarathustra could advance his disciples to a point where he could make clear to them that: — Within man there is a ‘Perfecting Principle’, which tells him that whatever may be his present condition this principle will work persistently within, and through it he may raise himself ever higher and higher; but at the same time there also operate impulses and inclinations, deceit and falsehood, all tending towards imperfection. This Perfecting Principle must therefore be developed and expanded, in order that the world may be destined to attain to wiser and more advanced states of perfection; it is the ‘Principle of Ahura Mazdao’, and is assailed throughout the whole world by Ahriman — ‘The Spirit of Darkness’ — who through imperfection and evil brings shadows into the light. By following the method above outlined, Zarathustra’s disciples were enabled to realize and to feel, that in truth each individual man is an image of the outer universe. We must not seek the true significance of such teaching in theories, concepts and ideas; but in active vivid consciousness and in the sensations impressed when through it man realizes that he is so related to the universe that he can say: — ‘As I stand here, I am a small world, and as such I am a replica of the Great Cosmos.’ Just as we have within us a principle of perfection, and another which is antagonistic, so throughout the universe is Ormuzd opposed by Ahriman. In these teachings the whole cosmos is represented as typical of a widespread human being; the forces of greatest virtue are termed Ahura Mazdao, while against these operate the powers of Angra Mainyus. When a man realizes that he is in direct contact with the workings of the universe and the attendant physical phenomena, but can only apprehend the perceptual, then as he begins to gain spiritual experience, a feeling of awe may come over him (especially if he is materialistic in thought) when he learns through Spectrum Analysis, that the same matter which exists upon the earth is found in the most distant stars. It is the same with Zarathustranism, when man feels that his spiritual part is merged in that of the whole cosmos, and that he has indeed emanated from its great spirit. Herein lies the true significance of such a doctrine, which was not merely abstract in character, but on the contrary wholly concrete. In this present age it is most difficult to make people understand (even when they have a certain sense for the spiritual that lies behind the perceptual) that it is necessary to a true and spiritually scientific view of the cosmos, that there be more than one central unity of spirit-power. But even as we distinguish between the separate forces in Nature, such as Heat, Light, and Chemical forces, so in the world of spirit must we recognize not merely one centralized power (whose existence is not denied) but we must differentiate between it and certain subservient uplifting forces, whose spheres of action are more circumscribed than are those of the all-embracing spirit. Thus it was that Zarathustra made a distinction between the omnipotent Ormuzd, and those spirit beings by whom he was served. Before we turn to a consideration of these subservient spirit entities, we must draw attention to the fact that the Zarathustran theory was not a mere Dualism — a simple doctrine of two worlds — the worlds of Ormuzd and of Ahriman; but that it maintained that underlying this double flux of cosmic influence, is a definite unity — a single power — which gave birth to both The Realm of Light (Ormuzd) and to The Realm of Darkness (Ahriman). It is not easy to gain a right understanding of Zarathustra’s conception concerning this ‘Unity’ underlying Ormuzd and Ahriman. With reference to this point the Greek authors state that the ancient Persians worshipped, and regarded as a ‘Living Unity’, that which lay beyond the light, and which Zarathustra termed ‘Zervane Akarene’. How can we gain a comprehension of what Zarathustra in his teachings meant by ‘Zervane Akarene’ or ‘Zaruana Akarana’? Let us consider for a moment the course of evolution; this we must regard as of such nature, that all beings tend towards greater and greater perfection. So that if we look into the future, we see more and more of the radiance from the Light-Realms of Ormuzd; but if we turn our eyes upon the past, we realize how the powers of Ahriman, which oppose Ormuzd, are circumstanced; and we then know that with the passing of time, these must be conquered and for ever ended. We will now picture to ourselves that the path into the future and that into the past each lead to the same point; a conception which present-day man finds most difficult to grasp. Let us take as an example a circle; if we pass along the circumference from the lowest point in one direction, we come to the opposite point above, if, however, we go along the other side, we come to the same point. When we consider a larger circle, then the circumference is flatter, and we must traverse a greater distance in each case. We will now suppose a circle to expand ever more and more, then ultimately the path on either side becomes a straight line, and is infinite. But just before the circle becomes infinite we would reach the same point whether we went by the one path or the other. Why, then, should not the same happen when the circumference is so flattened that the periphery becomes a straight line? In this case the point at infinity on the one must be identical with that on the other, and therefore we must be able to travel to it, from the lowest point in one sense (say, positive), and return as if coming from the opposite (negative) direction. This means that when our conception is infinite, we have a straight line extending without limit on either side, but which is in reality the circumference of an infinite circle. The abstraction given above lies at the basis of Zarathustra’s conception of what he termed Zaruana Akarana. Here, with regard to time, we look in one direction into the future, in the other into the past, and when we consider an infinite period time closes in upon itself as in a circle. This self-contained and infinite time circle is symbolically represented as a serpent eternally biting its own tail, and into it is woven upon the one side, The Power of Light, shedding upon us continually a greater and greater radiance; and upon the other, The Power of Darkness, becoming ever more and more profound. When we are midway, then is the light (Ormuzd) intermingled with the shadows (Ahriman); all is interwoven in the self-embracing infinite Flux of Time, ‘Zaruana Akarana’. There is something more about this ancient cosmic conception; its basic ideas were treated seriously, there were no mere vague statements such as: — ‘Without and remote from all that is material in this perceptual world, beyond those things which affect our eyes, our ears, and sense organs in general — abides The Spirit’. But it was definitely asserted, that in everything which could be seen and apprehended, therein could be discerned something of the nature of spirit signs, or a manifestation of the Spirit-World. If we take a sheet of paper upon which are inscribed alphabetical characters, these may be combined into words; but we must first have learnt how to read. Without this ability no one could read about Zarathustra; for they would merely perceive certain characters which could only be followed with the eyes. Actual reading can only take place after it is clearly understood how to connect such characters with that which is within the soul. Now, Zarathustra discerned a written sign underlying all that was in the perceptual world, particularly in the manner in which the stars are grouped in the universe. Just as we recognize written characters upon paper, so did Zarathustra descry in the starry firmament something similar to letters, conveying a message from the Spirit-World. Hence, arose an art of penetrating into the World of Spirit, and of deciphering the signs indicated by the arrangement of the stars, and of finding a method of reading and construing from their movements and order, in what manner and way those spiritual beings that are without, inscribe the facts concerning their activities in space. Zarathustra and his disciples had a paramount interest in these matters. To them it was a most important sign that Ahura Mazdao, in order to accomplish his creations and to reveal his message to the world, should (in the language of Modern Astronomy) ‘describe a circular path’. This fact was regarded as a sign traced in the heavens indicating in what manner Ahura Mazdao worked, and the relation which his activities bore to the universe as a whole. It is important that Zarathustra was able to point out that the constellations of the Zodiac, taken together as forming a closed curve in space, should symbolize a continuous and also retroactive time flux; and we can realize that there is indeed a most profound significance underlying the statement, that one branch of this time-curve stretches outward into the future, while the other leads backward into the remote past. Zaruana Akarana is that bright band of stars, later known as the Zodiac, that self-contained time-line ever traversed by Ormuzd, The Spirit of Light. In other words, the passage of the sun across the constellations of the Zodiac is an expression of the activity of Ormuzd; while the Zodiac itself is the symbol of Zaruana Akarana. In reality, Zaruana Akarana and The Zodiac are identical terms, just in the same way as are Ormuzd and Ahura Mazdao. There are two special circumstances to be considered in this connection. First, when the passage of the sun through the Zodiac takes place while it is light, as in the summer. At such time the solar radiance falls full upon the earth, bringing with it the power emanating from those spiritual forces ever flowing outward from the Light-Realms of Ormuzd. That part of the Zodiac traversed by Ahura Mazdao in the daytime, or during the summer, denotes the manner in which He works and weaves unhindered by Ahriman. On the other hand, those Zodiacal constellations which lie far beneath the horizon — dark regions through which we might picture the passage of Angra Mainyus — are symbolical of the Kingdom of The Shadows. We have stated that Zarathustra regarded Ormuzd as associated with the bright sections of the Zodiac (Zaruana Akarana), while he looked upon Ahriman as connected with the gloom. In what way do the activities of Ormuzd and Ahriman find expression in our material world? In order to understand this point we must realize that the effect of the solar rays is different in the morning from that at noon; varying as the sun ascends from Aries to Taurus, and again during its descent toward the horizon. The influence exerted is not the same in winter as in summer, and differs with every passing sign of the Zodiac. Zarathustra regarded the changing aspects of the sun in connection with the Zodiacal constellations as symbolical of the activities of Ormuzd proceeding from different directions, and from which came those spiritual beings that are both His servants and His sons, and who are ready at all times to execute His commands. These are the ‘Amschaspands’ or ‘Ameschas Pentas’, subservient entities, to each of whom is allotted some special duty. While Ormuzd controls all active functions in the Light-Realms, the Amschaspands undertake that specific work which finds expression in the transmission of the sun’s light when in Aries, Taurus, Cancer, etc. But the true vital activity of Ormuzd is manifested in the full radiance of the sun, shining throughout all bright signs of the Zodiac, from Aries to Libra or Scorpio. Following the Zarathustran line of thought, we might say: — ‘It is as though the evil powers of Ahriman came through the earth from those dark regions where abide his servants — his own Amschaspands — who are opposed to the good genii standing by the side of Ormuzd.’ Zarathustra actually distinguished between twelve different subservient spirit entities; six or seven on the side of Ormuzd, and five or six on that of Ahriman. These are regarded as typical of good or evil genii (Amaschas Pentas — lower spirits), according as to whether their influence comes with the sun’s rays from the bright Signs of the Zodiac, or emanates from those which are in gloom. Goethe had the subservient spirits of Ormuzd in mind when he wrote the following words at the beginning of Faust in the ‘Prologue of Heaven’ : ‘But ye, God’s sons in love and duty, Enjoy the rich, the ever-living Beauty! Creative Power, that works eternal schemes, Clasp you in bonds of love, relaxing never, And what in wavering apparition gleams Fix in its place with thoughts that stand for ever!’ 2 Doch ihr, die echten Göttersöhne, Erfreut euch der lebendig reichen Schöne! Das Werdende, das ewig wirkt und lebt, Umfass euch mit der Liebe holden Schranken, Und was in schwankender Erscheinung schwebt, Befestiget mit dauernden Gedanken. (Trans: BAYARD TAYLOR)\nFrom the above, and from what has been learned through research in many directions, we can now feel certain that historical investigators will in the end be unwillingly forced to acknowledge that the claims of Grecian scholarship regarding the great antiquity of the Zarathustran era, as indicated by ancient tradition, are justly founded and must be accepted as authentic. Spiritual Science, in its statements and theories, fully concurs with the old Greek writers who already in olden days had fixed the period of the founder of Persian religion so far back in time. We have, therefore, good reason for maintaining that Zarathustra, living as he did thousands of years before the birth of Christianity, was doubtless confronted with a very different class of human consciousness from that which exists in our present age.\nIt has often been pointed out, and we will again refer to this matter, that in ancient times the development of human consciousness was such that the old ‘dream state’, or ‘clairvoyant condition’ (we will avoid misusing this term, as is so often done in these days), was in every way perfectly normal to man, so that his conceptions and ideas were such that he did not contemplate the world from that narrow perceptual point of view that is so prevalent to-day.\nWe can best picture the impressions made by the world upon the consciousness of the ancients, if we turn our thoughts to that last enduring remnant of the old clairvoyant state, namely, dream consciousness. We all know those fluctuating dream pictures that come to us at times, the most of which carry no meaning, and are so often merely suggestive of the outer world, although there may now and then intrude some higher level of conscious thought; dream visions, which in these days we find so difficult to interpret and to understand. We might say that our sleep consciousness runs its course pictorially in ever-changing scenes, and which are at the same time symbolical. For instance, many of us have had the experience that events connected with some impressive happening — say, a conflagration — have been after a time once more figuratively manifested to us in a dream. Let us now consider for a moment this other horizon of our sleeping state, where clings in truth that last remnant of a conscious condition belonging to a by-gone age in the grey and distant past.\nThe consciousness of the ancients was such that in reality they lived in a life of imagery. The visions which came to them were not merely indefinite unrelated creations, for they had reference to an actual outer world. In olden days primitive man was capable of intermediate conscious states, between those which prevail when we sleep and when we are awake; then it was that he lived in the presence of the Spirit-World, and the Spirit-World entered into his being. To-day this door is closed, but in those ancient times such was not the case. It was while in this intermediate condition that man became aware of visions which resembled to some extent dream pictures, but were definite in their manifestation of a spirit life and of spiritual achievement existing beyond the perceptual world. Although in the Zarathustran era, such visions had already become somewhat confused and vague, there was nevertheless still close contact with the world of spirit, therefore these ancients could say from direct observation and experience: ‘In the same way as I realize this outer physical world and this perceptual life, even so do I know that there exists another conscious condition belonging to a different region — a spiritual realm — related to that which is material, and where I do of a verity experience and observe the workings of the Divine Spirit.’\nIt is a fundamental principle underlying the evolution of the human race, that in no case can any one quality be developed except at the expense of some other attribute; hence it came about that from epoch to epoch, the faculty through which in olden times mankind obtained a clear inner vision of the spiritual realms became ever less and less pronounced. Our present day exact methods of thought, our power of expression, our logic, all that we regard as the most important driving forces of modern culture did not exist in the remote past. Such faculties have been acquired during later periods at the expense of the old clairvoyant consciousness, and it is now for mankind to regain and cultivate this long-lost power. Then in the future of human evolution a time will come when in addition to man’s purely physical consciousness, his intellectuality and his logic, he will again approach the condition of the ancient seer.\nWe must differentiate between the upward and downward tendency of human consciousness. Evolution has a deeper meaning when we realize that in the beginning man was entirely of a spiritual realm, where he lived in the soul, and that when he descended into the physical world it was ordained that he should gradually relinquish his clairvoyant power in order that he might acquire qualities born of the existing purely physical conditions; such as intellectuality and logic. When this stage in his development has run its course he will again return to the world of spirit. Regarding the circumstances connected with these curious clairvoyant states and experiences of the ancients we have no historical record. Zarathustra lived in that same remote age, and was one of those great leading personalities who gave immense stimulus to the advancement of culture and civilization. Such guiding personalities must ever draw from the creative source that which we may term Illumination, whereby they are initiated into the higher mysteries of the world, irrespective of the standard of normal human consciousness existing in their time. Other such outstanding personalities of whom mention will be made during these lectures are: Hermes, Buddha and Moses.\nZarathustra lived at least 8000 years before the present era, and those glorious gifts to civilization which emanated from his illumined spirit have been reflected in the great cultural progress of humanity. His influence has long ago been clearly recognized, and can be detected even to this day, by all who take note of the mysterious currents underlying the whole of human evolution.\nWe now realize that Zarathustra belonged essentially to those Great Ones in whose souls lived a measure of the spiritual elements of truth, wisdom and perception, far surpassing the customary standard of human consciousness of their period. His mission was to proclaim to his fellow men, in that part of the world later known as the Persian Empire, those grand truths which emanated from the superperceptual regions — a world utterly beyond the apprehension of man’s normal consciousness in that dim and distant age.\nIf we would understand the true significance of Zarathustra’s teachings, we must remember that it was his task to present to a certain section of humanity, in an intelligible manner, a particular world aspect; while on the other hand, various movements which had been in progress among the peoples of other regions, had given a different trend to the whole sphere of man’s culture.\nThe personality of Zarathustra is of special interest because he lived in a territory, contiguous upon its South side to a country which was inhabited by Indian tribes, upon whom spiritual blessings flowed in quite a different manner. When we look forward from those by-gone times we find upon the selfsame soil where dwelt these ancient Indian tribes, the peoples among whom at a later period arose the poets of the Vedas. To the North, where spread the great Brahman Doctrine, is situated that region which was permeated throughout by the powerful and compelling teachings of Zarathustra. But that which he gave to the world was in many respects fundamentally different from the teachings of the great Ieaders among the Indians, whose words have lived on in the moving poetry of the Vedas, in their profound philosophy, and has reached yet an echo in that final glorious blaze of light — The Revelation of the Buddha.\nWe can understand the difference between that which was born of the flow of thought from Zarathustra and the teachings of the ancient Indians, when we bear in mind that we may approach the region of the superperceptual world from two sides. Already in other lectures we have spoken of the path which man must traverse in order that he may enter into the spirit realms. There are two possible methods by which he may raise the energy of his soul, and the capacities latent in his inner being, so much above their normal level that he can pass out of this perceptual into the superperceptual world. The one method is that by which man enters or retires, more and more deeply into his soul, and thus merges himself in his very essence. The other leads behind the veil which is spread around us by our material state. Man can enter the superperceptual region by both these methods.\nWhen we experience within our very being a deepening of all values of our spiritual feelings, conceptions and ideas — in short, of our soul impulses; when in fact we creep more and more into ourselves, so that our spiritual powers become ever stronger and stronger; then can we, as it were, in some mystic way merge ourselves within and pass through all that we hold of the physical world to our actual spirit essence — the soul Ego — which Ego continues from incarnation to incarnation, and is not perishable but everlasting. When we have overcome our lusts and passions and all those experiences of the soul which are ours because we are of the body in a physical world, then can our true being pierce the surrounding veil and for ever enter the world of spirit.\nOn the other hand, if we develop those powers which will enable us not merely to be sensible of the outer world with its colours, tone sensations, heat and cold; and if we so strengthen our spiritual forces that we shall be aware of that which lies beyond the colours, the sound, the heat and the cold, and all those other earthly sense-perceptions which hang as a mist about us — then will the enhanced powers of our soul take us behind the enshrouding cloud and into that boundless superperceptual region which is without confine and stretches ever into the infinite.\nThere is one way leading to the Spirit-World which we may term the ‘Mystical Method’, and another which is properly called ‘The Method of \"Spiritual Science\"‘. All great spiritual personalities have followed these paths, in order to attain to those truths and revelations which it was their mission to impress upon humanity in the form of cultural progress. In primeval times man’s development was of such nature, that great revelations could only come to the people of any particular race, through one of these methods alone. But from that period on, in which the Greeks lived, that is, at the dawn of the Christian era, these two separate thought currents commingled, and became more and more one single cultural stream. When we now speak of entering the higher spheres, we understand, that he who would penetrate into the superperceptual region, develops both qualities of power in his soul. The forces necessary to the ‘Mystical Method’ are evolved within the inner being, and those essential to the course of ‘Spiritual Science’, are strengthened while man is yet conscious of the outer world. There is to-day no longer any definite separation of these two paths, as since about the time of that epoch marked by the life of the Grecian race, these two currents have run their course together — in the one, revelation comes about through a mystic merging of man’s consciousness within his very being — in the other, the veil is torn asunder by the enhanced power of his spiritual forces, and man’s awareness stretches outward into the great cosmos.\nIn olden times before the Grecian or Christian era, these two possible methods were in operation separately among different peoples, and we find them working in close proximity, but in divers ways, in the Indian culture which found expression among the Vedas, on the one hand, and that of Zarathustra, further North, on the other. All that we look upon with such wonder in the ancient Indian culture, and which later found expression through Buddha, was achieved by inner contemplation, and turning away from the outer world — through causing the eyes to become less sensitive to physical colours, the ears to physical sounds, and bringing about a deadening of the sense organs in general to the perceptual veil — so that the inner soul forces might be strengthened: — Thus did man press on to Brahma, there to feel himself unified with that which ever works and weaves as the Inner Spirit of the Universe, — In this way originated the teachings of the Holy Rishis, which live on in the poetry of the Vedas, in the Vedantic philosophy, and in Buddhism.\nThe Doctrine of Zarathustra was, however, entirely based upon the other method above-mentioned. He taught his disciples the secret of strengthening their powers of apprehension and cognition, in order that they might pass beyond the mists surrounding the outer perceptual world. He did not say to his followers, as did the Indian teachers: ‘Turn away from the colours, and from the sounds, and from all outer sense-impressions, and seek the path to the spiritual realms only through the merging of yourselves within your very souls’, — but he spoke thus: — ‘Strengthen your powers of perception, in order that you may look around upon all things, the plants, the animals, that which lives in the air and in the water, upon the mountains, and in the depths of the valleys, and cast your eyes upon the world.’ We know that the disciples of the Indian mystics regarded this earth upon which we live as merely maya (illusion), and turned from it in order to attain to Brahma. On the other hand, Zarathustra counselled his followers not to draw away from the material world, but to pass outward and beyond it, so that they might say: — ‘Whenever we experience perceptual manifestations in the outer physical world, we realize that therein lie concealed and beyond our sense perceptions the workings and achievements of the spirit.’\nIt is remarkable that the two paths should have been thus united in early Grecian times, and just because in that period true spiritual knowledge was more profound than in our day (which we are inclined to regard as so amazingly enlightened!) all things found expression in imagery, and the images gave rise to Mythology. Thus do we find these two thought currents commingled and fostered in the Grecian culture — The Mystical tending inward, and the Zarathustran outward into the great cosmos.\nThat such was the case becomes evident from the fact, that one of these paths was named after Dionysos, that mysterious god who was reached when man merged himself ever deeper and deeper within his inner being, there to find a questionable sub-human element, as yet unknown, and from which he first developed into man. It was this unclean and half-animal residue to which was given the name of Dionysos. On the other hand, all that comes to us when we regard our physical sense perceptions from a purely spiritual standpoint, was termed Apollo. Thus we find in ancient Greece, in the Apollo current of thought, the teaching of Zarathustra; and in the Dionysos current, the doctrine of mystical contemplation, side by side in contrast. In Greece they united and operated conjointly — the Zarathustran and the Mystical Methods, those methods which had been at their highest level, working separately, in the days of the ancient Indians.\nHere we might say, that already in olden times these two thought currents were destined to commingle in the coming Grecian cults of Apollo and Dionysos, and thenceforward they would continue as one; so that in our present cultural period, when we raise ourselves to a certain spiritual understanding, we find them still unified and enduring.\nIt is very remarkable, and one of the many riddles which present themselves to the thinking mind, that Nietzsche in his first work, The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music , gave evidence of a vague suspicion that in the Grecian creeds of Dionysos and Apollo, the Mystical current meets the stream of scientific spiritual thought.\nA further matter of interest lies in the fact, that Zarathustra actually taught his disciples to recognize in detail, the hidden workings of the Spirit in all material things, and from this starting-point the whole of his gifts to culture emanated. He emphasized that it was not sufficient for man merely to say: — ‘There before us spreads a material world, behind which ever works and weaves the Divine Spirit.’ Such a statement might appear at first sight full of significance, it leads, however, only to a general pantheistic outlook, and means nothing more, than that some vague nebulous spirit underlies all material phenomena. Zarathustra, like all other great personalities of the past who were exalted and had direct contact with the Spirit-World, did not present these matters to his followers and the people in any such indefinite and abstract manner; he pointed out, that in the same way as individual physical happenings vary in import, so is it with the latent spiritual factor, it being sometimes of greater and sometimes of less moment. He further stated that the sun, regarded purely from the physical point of view as a member of the stellar system, is the source of all earthly phenomena, life, and activity, while concealed within is the centre of spiritual existence in so far as we are immediately concerned.\nThese things Zarathustra impressed earnestly and clearly upon his disciples, and, using simple words, we can picture him as addressing them somewhat as follows: — ‘When you regard man, you must realize that he does not only consist of a material body — such is but an outer expression of the spirit which is within. Even as the physical covering is a manifestation in condensed and crystallized form of the true spiritual man, so is the sun which appears to us as a light-giving mass when considered as such, merely the external manifestation of an inner spiritual sun.’ In the same way as we term the human spirit element as distinguished from the physical, The Aura, to use an ancient expression, so do we call the all-embracing hidden spiritual part of the sun, The Great Aura (Aura Mazda); in contradistinction to man’s spiritual component, which is sometimes called the Little Aura.\nNow, Zarathustra named all that lies hidden within and beyond man’s mere apprehension of the physical sun — ‘Aura Mazda’ or ‘Ahura Mazdao’ — and considered this element as important to our spiritual experiences and conditions, as is the physical sun to the wellbeing of plants and animals, and all that lives upon the face of the earth. There behind the physical sun lies the Spiritual Master — The Creator — ‘Ahura Mazdao’ or ‘Aura Mazda’, and from ‘Ahura Mazdao’ came the name, ‘Ormuzd’, or, ‘The Spirit of Light’.\nWhile the Indians mystically searched their inner being, in order to attain to Brahma — The Eternal — who shines outward as a point of light from within man’s essence, Zarathustra urged his disciples to turn their eyes upon the great periphery of existence, and pointed out that there within the body of the sun, dwells the great Solar Spirit — Ahura Mazdao — ‘The Spirit of Light’. He taught them that, just in the same way as when man strives to raise his spirit to perfection, so must he ever battle against his lower passions and desires, against the delusive images suggested by possible deception and falsehood, and all those antagonistic influences within, which continually oppose his spiritual impulses. Thus must ‘Ahura Mazdao’ face the opposition of ‘The Spirit of Darkness’ — ‘Angra Mainyus’ or ‘Ahriman’.\nWe can now realize how the great Zarathustran conception could be evolved from experiences born of sensations and sense contents. Through these, Zarathustra could advance his disciples to a point where he could make clear to them that: — Within man there is a ‘Perfecting Principle’, which tells him that whatever may be his present condition this principle will work persistently within, and through it he may raise himself ever higher and higher; but at the same time there also operate impulses and inclinations, deceit and falsehood, all tending towards imperfection. This Perfecting Principle must therefore be developed and expanded, in order that the world may be destined to attain to wiser and more advanced states of perfection; it is the ‘Principle of Ahura Mazdao’, and is assailed throughout the whole world by Ahriman — ‘The Spirit of Darkness’ — who through imperfection and evil brings shadows into the light. By following the method above outlined, Zarathustra’s disciples were enabled to realize and to feel, that in truth each individual man is an image of the outer universe.\nWe must not seek the true significance of such teaching in theories, concepts and ideas; but in active vivid consciousness and in the sensations impressed when through it man realizes that he is so related to the universe that he can say: — ‘As I stand here, I am a small world, and as such I am a replica of the Great Cosmos.’ Just as we have within us a principle of perfection, and another which is antagonistic, so throughout the universe is Ormuzd opposed by Ahriman. In these teachings the whole cosmos is represented as typical of a widespread human being; the forces of greatest virtue are termed Ahura Mazdao, while against these operate the powers of Angra Mainyus.\nWhen a man realizes that he is in direct contact with the workings of the universe and the attendant physical phenomena, but can only apprehend the perceptual, then as he begins to gain spiritual experience, a feeling of awe may come over him (especially if he is materialistic in thought) when he learns through Spectrum Analysis, that the same matter which exists upon the earth is found in the most distant stars. It is the same with Zarathustranism, when man feels that his spiritual part is merged in that of the whole cosmos, and that he has indeed emanated from its great spirit. Herein lies the true significance of such a doctrine, which was not merely abstract in character, but on the contrary wholly concrete.\nIn this present age it is most difficult to make people understand (even when they have a certain sense for the spiritual that lies behind the perceptual) that it is necessary to a true and spiritually scientific view of the cosmos, that there be more than one central unity of spirit-power. But even as we distinguish between the separate forces in Nature, such as Heat, Light, and Chemical forces, so in the world of spirit must we recognize not merely one centralized power (whose existence is not denied) but we must differentiate between it and certain subservient uplifting forces, whose spheres of action are more circumscribed than are those of the all-embracing spirit. Thus it was that Zarathustra made a distinction between the omnipotent Ormuzd, and those spirit beings by whom he was served.\nBefore we turn to a consideration of these subservient spirit entities, we must draw attention to the fact that the Zarathustran theory was not a mere Dualism — a simple doctrine of two worlds — the worlds of Ormuzd and of Ahriman; but that it maintained that underlying this double flux of cosmic influence, is a definite unity — a single power — which gave birth to both The Realm of Light (Ormuzd) and to The Realm of Darkness (Ahriman). It is not easy to gain a right understanding of Zarathustra’s conception concerning this ‘Unity’ underlying Ormuzd and Ahriman. With reference to this point the Greek authors state that the ancient Persians worshipped, and regarded as a ‘Living Unity’, that which lay beyond the light, and which Zarathustra termed ‘Zervane Akarene’. How can we gain a comprehension of what Zarathustra in his teachings meant by ‘Zervane Akarene’ or ‘Zaruana Akarana’?\nLet us consider for a moment the course of evolution; this we must regard as of such nature, that all beings tend towards greater and greater perfection. So that if we look into the future, we see more and more of the radiance from the Light-Realms of Ormuzd; but if we turn our eyes upon the past, we realize how the powers of Ahriman, which oppose Ormuzd, are circumstanced; and we then know that with the passing of time, these must be conquered and for ever ended.\nWe will now picture to ourselves that the path into the future and that into the past each lead to the same point; a conception which present-day man finds most difficult to grasp. Let us take as an example a circle; if we pass along the circumference from the lowest point in one direction, we come to the opposite point above, if, however, we go along the other side, we come to the same point. When we consider a larger circle, then the circumference is flatter, and we must traverse a greater distance in each case. We will now suppose a circle to expand ever more and more, then ultimately the path on either side becomes a straight line, and is infinite. But just before the circle becomes infinite we would reach the same point whether we went by the one path or the other. Why, then, should not the same happen when the circumference is so flattened that the periphery becomes a straight line? In this case the point at infinity on the one must be identical with that on the other, and therefore we must be able to travel to it, from the lowest point in one sense (say, positive), and return as if coming from the opposite (negative) direction. This means that when our conception is infinite, we have a straight line extending without limit on either side, but which is in reality the circumference of an infinite circle.\nThe abstraction given above lies at the basis of Zarathustra’s conception of what he termed Zaruana Akarana. Here, with regard to time, we look in one direction into the future, in the other into the past, and when we consider an infinite period time closes in upon itself as in a circle. This self-contained and infinite time circle is symbolically represented as a serpent eternally biting its own tail, and into it is woven upon the one side, The Power of Light, shedding upon us continually a greater and greater radiance; and upon the other, The Power of Darkness, becoming ever more and more profound. When we are midway, then is the light (Ormuzd) intermingled with the shadows (Ahriman); all is interwoven in the self-embracing infinite Flux of Time, ‘Zaruana Akarana’.\nThere is something more about this ancient cosmic conception; its basic ideas were treated seriously, there were no mere vague statements such as: — ‘Without and remote from all that is material in this perceptual world, beyond those things which affect our eyes, our ears, and sense organs in general — abides The Spirit’. But it was definitely asserted, that in everything which could be seen and apprehended, therein could be discerned something of the nature of spirit signs, or a manifestation of the Spirit-World.\nIf we take a sheet of paper upon which are inscribed alphabetical characters, these may be combined into words; but we must first have learnt how to read. Without this ability no one could read about Zarathustra; for they would merely perceive certain characters which could only be followed with the eyes. Actual reading can only take place after it is clearly understood how to connect such characters with that which is within the soul. Now, Zarathustra discerned a written sign underlying all that was in the perceptual world, particularly in the manner in which the stars are grouped in the universe. Just as we recognize written characters upon paper, so did Zarathustra descry in the starry firmament something similar to letters, conveying a message from the Spirit-World. Hence, arose an art of penetrating into the World of Spirit, and of deciphering the signs indicated by the arrangement of the stars, and of finding a method of reading and construing from their movements and order, in what manner and way those spiritual beings that are without, inscribe the facts concerning their activities in space.\nZarathustra and his disciples had a paramount interest in these matters. To them it was a most important sign that Ahura Mazdao, in order to accomplish his creations and to reveal his message to the world, should (in the language of Modern Astronomy) ‘describe a circular path’. This fact was regarded as a sign traced in the heavens indicating in what manner Ahura Mazdao worked, and the relation which his activities bore to the universe as a whole. It is important that Zarathustra was able to point out that the constellations of the Zodiac, taken together as forming a closed curve in space, should symbolize a continuous and also retroactive time flux; and we can realize that there is indeed a most profound significance underlying the statement, that one branch of this time-curve stretches outward into the future, while the other leads backward into the remote past. Zaruana Akarana is that bright band of stars, later known as the Zodiac, that self-contained time-line ever traversed by Ormuzd, The Spirit of Light. In other words, the passage of the sun across the constellations of the Zodiac is an expression of the activity of Ormuzd; while the Zodiac itself is the symbol of Zaruana Akarana. In reality, Zaruana Akarana and The Zodiac are identical terms, just in the same way as are Ormuzd and Ahura Mazdao.\nThere are two special circumstances to be considered in this connection. First, when the passage of the sun through the Zodiac takes place while it is light, as in the summer. At such time the solar radiance falls full upon the earth, bringing with it the power emanating from those spiritual forces ever flowing outward from the Light-Realms of Ormuzd. That part of the Zodiac traversed by Ahura Mazdao in the daytime, or during the summer, denotes the manner in which He works and weaves unhindered by Ahriman. On the other hand, those Zodiacal constellations which lie far beneath the horizon — dark regions through which we might picture the passage of Angra Mainyus — are symbolical of the Kingdom of The Shadows.\nWe have stated that Zarathustra regarded Ormuzd as associated with the bright sections of the Zodiac (Zaruana Akarana), while he looked upon Ahriman as connected with the gloom. In what way do the activities of Ormuzd and Ahriman find expression in our material world? In order to understand this point we must realize that the effect of the solar rays is different in the morning from that at noon; varying as the sun ascends from Aries to Taurus, and again during its descent toward the horizon. The influence exerted is not the same in winter as in summer, and differs with every passing sign of the Zodiac. Zarathustra regarded the changing aspects of the sun in connection with the Zodiacal constellations as symbolical of the activities of Ormuzd proceeding from different directions, and from which came those spiritual beings that are both His servants and His sons, and who are ready at all times to execute His commands. These are the ‘Amschaspands’ or ‘Ameschas Pentas’, subservient entities, to each of whom is allotted some special duty.\nWhile Ormuzd controls all active functions in the Light-Realms, the Amschaspands undertake that specific work which finds expression in the transmission of the sun’s light when in Aries, Taurus, Cancer, etc. But the true vital activity of Ormuzd is manifested in the full radiance of the sun, shining throughout all bright signs of the Zodiac, from Aries to Libra or Scorpio. Following the Zarathustran line of thought, we might say: — ‘It is as though the evil powers of Ahriman came through the earth from those dark regions where abide his servants — his own Amschaspands — who are opposed to the good genii standing by the side of Ormuzd.’ Zarathustra actually distinguished between twelve different subservient spirit entities; six or seven on the side of Ormuzd, and five or six on that of Ahriman. These are regarded as typical of good or evil genii (Amaschas Pentas — lower spirits), according as to whether their influence comes with the sun’s rays from the bright Signs of the Zodiac, or emanates from those which are in gloom.\nGoethe had the subservient spirits of Ormuzd in mind when he wrote the following words at the beginning of Faust in the ‘Prologue of Heaven’ :\n‘But ye, God’s sons in love and duty, Enjoy the rich, the ever-living Beauty! Creative Power, that works eternal schemes, Clasp you in bonds of love, relaxing never, And what in wavering apparition gleams Fix in its place with thoughts that stand for ever!’ 2 Doch ihr, die echten Göttersöhne, Erfreut euch der lebendig reichen Schöne! Das Werdende, das ewig wirkt und lebt, Umfass euch mit der Liebe holden Schranken, Und was in schwankender Erscheinung schwebt, Befestiget mit dauernden Gedanken.\nFrom the above it is apparent that the conception which Goethe formed of ‘God’s sons’ as the servants of the Highest Divine Power, is similar to Zarathustra’s concept concerning the Amschaspands, of which, as already stated, he recognized twelve different kinds. Again, subservient to these Amschaspand entities, according to Zarathustranism, are yet lower orders of spiritual powers or forces, among which some twenty-eight separate types are usually distinguished. These are the so-called ‘Izarads’ or ‘Izeds’; the number of different classes into which they may be divided is, however, indeterminate, being variously estimated from twenty-four up to twenty-eight, and even as high as thirty-one. There is yet a third division of spiritual powers or forces, termed by Zarathustra ‘Ferruhars’ or ‘Frawaschars’. According to our conceptions, the Ferruhars have the least influence of any upon our tendencies and dispositions in the material world, and are regarded as that spiritual element which permeates the great macrocosm, and underlies all perceptual physical activity. They are the reality behind everything of which we are conscious and appears to us as merely external and material.\nWhile we picture the Amschaspands as controlling the twelve forces which are at work during all physical effects engendered by the action of light, and the Izeds, as governing those which influence the animal kingdom, so do we consider the Ferruhars, in addition to possessing the quality above-mentioned, as spiritual entities having under their guidance the ‘Group-Souls’ of animals.\nThus did Zarathustra discern a specialized realm beyond this perceptual universe — a perfectly organized superperceptual world — and his concept was absolutely definite, and in no sense of the nature of an abstraction. Behind Ormuzd and Ahriman he pictured Zaruana Akarana, further the good and bad Amschaspands, below these the Izeds, and lastly the Ferruhars.\nMan, as he is fashioned, is a replica in miniature of the great universe, and therefore all forces operative in the cosmos must be present in some manner within his being. Just as the benevolent powers of Ormuzd are expressed during that inner struggle to attain to perfection, and the unclean forces of Ahriman are in evidence while there is gloom and temptation, so do we find also the trace of other spiritual powers — those of the lower genii.\nI will now make a definite statement, which when viewed from the standpoint of modern cosmic ideas, is liable to awaken bitter feeling, namely: — I assert that before long it will be discovered and recognized by external science, that a superperceptual element underlies all physical phenomena, and that latent spirit exists in everything that comes within the limits of our sense perceptions. Further, that science will be driven to admit, that in the physical structure of man there is much that is a counterpart of those forces which permeate and spread life throughout the whole universe, and which flow into the body, there to become condensed.\nLet us go back to the Zarathustran Doctrine, which in many ways is similar to that of Spiritual Science. According to its concepts, Ormuzd and Ahriman are regarded as influencing mankind from without. Ormuzd being the source of inward impulses toward perfection, while Ahriman is ever in opposition. The Amschaspands also exert spiritual activity, if we consider their forces as being, so to speak, condensed in man, then it should be possible to trace and recognize their action to the point of physical expression.\nIn Zarathustra’s time, anatomy, as we understand it to-day, did not exist. Zarathustra and his disciples, by means of their spiritual insight, actually saw the cosmic streams to which reference has been made; they appeared to them in the form of twelve cosmic outpourings, flooding in upon man, there to maintain activity. Thus it came about that the human head was regarded by Zarathustra’s followers as a symbol of the inflowing of the seven good, and five evil, Amschaspands. Within man we have a continuance of the Amschaspand flux; how, then, is this flux to be recognized at this much later period? The anatomist has discovered that there are twelve principal pairs of brain nerves, which pass from the brain into the body. These are the physical counterparts, as it were, of the twelve condensed Amschaspand out-flowings, namely, twelve pairs of nerves of extreme potency in bringing about either the highest perfection, or the greatest evil. Here, then, we find reappearing in our present age, but transformed into material terms, that concept which had come to Zarathustra from the Spirit-World, and which he preached to his disciples.\nThere is, however, in all this a point of controversy. It is so easy for anyone in our day to maintain that the statements of Spiritual Science become wholly fantastical when it is alleged that Zarathustra, speaking of twelve Amschaspands, had in mind something connected with the twelve pairs of nerves which are in the human head! But the time will come when the world will gain yet another item of knowledge, for it will be discovered in what manner, and form the spirit, which permeates and lives throughout the universe, continues active in man.\nThe old Zarathustranism has arisen once again in our modern physiology. For in the same way as the twenty-eight to thirty-one Izeds are the servants of the Amschaspands, so are the twenty-eight spinal nerves subordinate to those of the brain. Again, the Izeds, who are present in the outer universe as a spirit flux, enter the human body, and their sphere of action is in those nerves which stimulate the lower soul-life of man; in these nerves they crystallize, as it were, and assume a condensed form. And where the Ized-flux, as such, entirely ceases, and the term ‘nerve’ can no longer be applied, is the actual centre where our personality receives its crowning touch. Further, those of our thoughts which rise slightly above mere cognition and simple brain action, are typical of the Frawaschars or Ferruhars.\nOur present period is connected in a remarkable manner with the Doctrine of Zarathustra. Through his teachings and by means of his spiritual archetypes, Zarathustra was enabled to enlighten his people regarding those regions which spread beyond the perceptual world, while his imagery was ever as a flowing contact with that which lies hidden behind the veil. With reference to this great doctrine it is most significant that after it had acted as an inspiration to humanity for a long period, always tending to promote greater and greater effort in various directions of cultural progress — only to lose its influence from time to time — there should arise once more, in our day, a marked tendency toward a mystical current of thought.\nIt was the same with the Greeks after the two methods of approach to the Spirit-World had commingled, for they also, at times, showed a preference for either the mystical or the Spiritual Scientific thought current. It is owing to the modern predominating interest in mysticism that many people find themselves drawn towards the Indian Spiritual Science, or Method of Contemplation. Hence it is, that the most essential and deeply significant aspects of Zarathustranism — in fact, its very essence — hardly appear in the spiritual life of our time, although there is abundant evidence of the nature of Zarathustra’s concepts and his methods of thought. But all that lies at the very base, and is absolutely vital to his doctrine, is in a sense lost to our age.\nWhen once we realize that in Zarathustranism is contained the spiritual prototype of so many things which we have rediscovered in the domain of physical research (numerous examples of which might be quoted), and of others that will be rediscovered later, then will a fundamental chord in our culture give place to one which will be founded upon the old Zarathustran teachings. It is remarkable that the profound attention which Zarathustranism paid to macrocosmic phenomena caused the world to recede, as it were, or appear of less moment; while in nearly all other beliefs with which a flood of mystical culture is associated, the outer world plays an important part, this is also the case in our materialism.\nThat great fundamental concept concerning two opposing basic qualities, and which recurs again and again throughout the religious doctrines of the world, we regard in the following manner; we consider it as symbolized by the antithesis of the sexes — the male and the female — so that in the old religious systems which were founded upon mysticism, the Gods and Goddesses were in reality, antithetical symbols of two opposing currents which flow throughout the universe. It is amazing that the teachings of Zarathustra should rise above these conceptions, and picture the origin of spiritual activity in so different a manner, portraying the good, as the resplendent, and the evil as the shadows.\nHence, the chaste beauty of Zarathustranism and its nobility, which transcends all those petty ideas which play so ugly a part in our time, when any endeavour is made to deepen man’s conception of spiritual life. Where the Greek writers state that the Supreme Deity in order to create Ormuzd, must also create Ahriman, so that He should obtain an antithesis; then, since Ahriman opposed Ormuzd, we have an example of how one primordial force is conceived as set against another. This same idea finds expression in the Hebrew, where evil comes upon the world through the woman — Eve — but we find nothing in Zarathustranism concerning ills that the world suffered through the antithesis of the sexes.\nAll those hateful ideas which are disseminated throughout our daily literature, pervading our very thoughts and feelings, distorting the true significance of the phenomena of disease and health, while failing to comprehend the intrinsic facts of life, will disappear, when that wholly different concept, the antithesis exhibited by Ormuzd and Ahriman — a conception so lofty and so powerful when compared with present-day paltry notions — is once more voiced in the words of Zarathustra, and enters to permeate and influence our modern culture. In this world, all things pursue their appointed course, and nothing can hinder the ultimate triumph of Zarathustran conceptions, which will, little by little, insinuate themselves into the life of the people.\nWhen we look upon Zarathustra in this way, we realize that he was indeed a Spirit, who in bygone times brought potent impulses to bear upon human culture. That such was the case becomes evident, if we but follow the course of subsequent events which took place in Asia Minor, and later among the people of Assyria and Babylonia, on down to the Egyptian period, and further even to the time of the spreading of Christianity. Everywhere we find in different lines of thought something which may be traced back, and shown to have its origin in that Great Light, which Zarathustra set blazing for humanity.\nWe can now understand how it was that a certain Greek writer (who wished to emphasize the fact that some among the Leaders had always given their people instruction in matters that they would only require at a later period in their culture) should have stated, that while Pythagoras had obtained all the knowledge that he could from the Egyptians concerning the methods of Geometry, from the Phænicians concerning Arithmetic, and from the Chaldeans concerning Astronomy — he was forced to turn to the successors of Zarathustra, in order to learn the secret teachings regarding the relation of humanity to the Spirit-World, and to obtain a true understanding of the proper conduct of life. The writer who made these statements regarding Pythagoras further asserts that the Zarathustran method for the conduct of life leads us beyond antitheses, and that all antitheses can be considered as culminating in the one great contrast of Good and Evil, which opposing condition can be finally absorbed, only by the purging away of all evil, falsehood and deceit. For instance, the worst enemy of Ormuzd is regarded as that one which bears the name of Calumny, and Calumny is one of the outstanding characteristics of Ahriman. The same writer states that Pythagoras failed to find the purest and most ideal ethical practice, namely, the one directed toward the moral purification of man, among either the Egyptians, the Phænicians, or the Chaldeans; and that he had again to turn to Zarathustra’s successors, in order to acquire that lofty conception of the universe which leads mankind to the earnest belief that through self-purification alone may evil be overcome. Thus did the great nobility and oneness of Zarathustra’s teachings become recognized among the ancients.\nWe would here mention that the statements made in this lecture are supported in every case by independent historical research; and we should carefully weigh all assertions coming from the representatives of other sciences, and judge for ourselves, whether or no they are in accord with our fundamental concepts. For instance, take the case of Plutarch, when he said that in the sense of Zarathustranism, the essence of Light as it affects the earth, is regarded as of supreme loveliness, and that its spiritual counterpart is Truth. Here is a definite statement made by an ancient historian, which is in complete agreement with all that has been said. We shall also find as we proceed that many historical events become clear and understandable when we take into consideration the various factors to which we have drawn attention.\nLet us now go back to the ancient Vedantic conception; this was based upon the mystical merging of man within his very being; but before he can attain to the inner Light of Brahma, he must meet with, and pass through, those passions and desires which are induced by wild semi-human impulses that are within him, and which are opposed to that mystical withdrawal within the spirit-soul, and into the eternal inner being. The Indian came to the conclusion that this could only be accomplished, if pending his mystic merging in Brahma, he could successfully eliminate all that we experience in the perceptual world which stimulates sensuous desires, and allures through colours and through sounds. Just so long as these play a part during our meditations, so long do we keep within us, an enemy opposed to our mystical attainment to perfection.\nThe Indian teacher said: — ‘Put away from yourselves all that can enter the soul through the powers that are external; merge yourselves solely within your very being — descend to the Devas — and when you have vanquished the lower Devas, then will you find yourselves within the kingdom of the Deva of Brahma; but shun the realm of the Asuras, whence come those malignant ones who would thrust themselves upon you from the outer world of Maya; from all such you must turn away, whatsoever may befall.’\nZarathustra, on the other hand, spoke to his disciples after this fashion: — ‘Those who follow the leaders among the people of the South can make no advance along the path which they have chosen, because of the different order of their search after those things which are of the Spirit; in such manner can no nation make headway. The call is not alone to mystic contemplation and to dreaming, but to live in a world which provides freely of all that is needful — man’s mission lies with the art of agriculture, and the promotion of civilization. You must not regard all things as merely Maya, but you must penetrate that veil of colours, and of sounds, which is spread around you; and avoid everything that may be of the nature of the Devas, and which because of your inner egoism, would hold you in its grasp. The region wherein abide the lower Asuras must be traversed, through this you must force your way, even up to the highest; but since your being has been especially organized and adapted to this intent, you must ever shun the dark realms of the Devas.’\nIn India, the teaching of the Rishis was otherwise, for they said to their followers: — ‘Your beings are not suitably organized to seek that which lies within the Kingdom of the Asuras — therefore avoid this region and descend to that of the Devas.’\nSuch was the difference between the Indian and Persian culture. The Indian peoples were taught that they must shun the Asuras and regard them as evil spirits; this was because through the method of their culture they were only aware of the lower Asuras; the Persians, on the other hand, who found only low types of Devas in the Devas regions were adjured by their leaders thus: — ‘Enter the Kingdom of the Asuras, for you are so constituted that you may attain even unto the highest of them.’\nThere lay within the impulse that Zarathustra gave to mankind a great fervour, which found expression when he said: — ‘I have a gift to bestow upon humanity which shall endure and live throughout the ages, and will smooth the upward path, overcoming all false doctrines, which are but obstacles diverting man from his struggle toward the attainment of perfection.’ Thus did Zarathustra feel himself to be the servant of Ahura Mazdao, and as such he experienced personally the opposition of Ahriman, over whose principles his teachings should enable mankind to achieve a sweeping victory. This conviction he expressed in impressive and beautiful words, to which reference is found in ancient documents. These, however, were necessarily inscribed at a later date; but what Spiritual Science tells us concerning Zarathustra and his pronouncements comes from other sources. Throughout all his telling adjurations there rings forth the inner impulse of his mission, and we feel the power of that great passion which overcame him, when, as the opponent of Ahriman and the Principle of Darkness, he said: — ‘I will speak! draw nigh and listen unto me, ye that come with longing from afar, and ye from near at hand — mark my words! — No more shall he, the Evil One, this false teacher, conquer the Spirit of Good. Too long hath his vile breath bemingled human voice and human speech. But now I will denounce him in the words which The Highest — The First One — has put into my mouth, the words which Ahura Mazdao has spoken. To him who will not harken unto my words, and who will not heed that which I say unto you — to him will come evil — and that, ere ever the world hath ended its cycles.’\nThus spoke Zarathustra, and we can but feel that he had something to impart to humanity, which would leave its impress throughout all later cultural periods. Those among us who have understanding and will but pay attention to that which persists in our time, even if only dimly apparent, who will note with spiritual discernment the tenor of our culture, can even yet, after thousands of years, recognize the echo of the Zarathustran teachings. Hence it is that we number Zarathustra among Great Leaders such as Hermes, Buddha, Moses, and others, about whom we shall have much to say in subsequent lectures. The spiritual gifts possessed by these Great Ones, and the position which they occupied among men, are indicated, and fitly expressed in the following words: —\n‘God sends us Spirits that shine as stars, From the spheres of eternal love. May we behold that glorious light, They reflect from the realms above.’ 3 Es leuchten gleich Sternen Am Himmel des ewigen Seins Die gottgesandten Geister. Gelingen möge es alien Menschenseelen, Im Reiche des Erdenseins Zu schauen ihrer Flammen Licht!"
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-10",
    "title": "Galileo, Giordano Bruno, and Goethe",
    "date": "26 Jan 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/Singles/19110126p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "The title of this lecture series is, Spiritual Science's Answer to the Large Questions of the Present Time , published in German as, Antworten der Geisteswissenschaft auf den Grossen Fragen des Daseins .\nIt is a far cry from the great Zarathustra or Zoroaster, who formed the subject of our last lecture in this series, to the three great personalities who provide the subject matter of our lecture to-day, and the gulf of time which, in our imagination, we are called upon to span is wide indeed. It is a gulf which stretches from a time thousands of years ago, long before our Christian Era. A time which we can only understand by attributing to the human beings existing then a mental outlook utterly foreign to our own. From this distant standpoint of time, we pass to the 16th and 17th centuries of our own era, to the time when that spirit was first kindled which, ever since, has been the source and inspiration of all vital and progressive culture from then to the present day. As we shall see, this spirit, which burnt so fiercely in the 16th and 17th centuries in individuals such as Galileo and Giordano Bruno, found a fresh medium in a personality so near our own times as that of Goethe.\nGalileo and Giordano Bruno are the two names we must mention when we review the beginnings of that epoch in our human evolution at which Natural Science had reached the same turning-point as Spiritual Science has reached to-day. The same great impulse which was then given to the thought of Natural Science will be, in a certain sense, given to this of Spiritual Science in the immediate future. Hence the importance of a comprehensive survey of the lines of thought and feeling of the men of that day, viz.: during the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 17th centuries — the time of Galileo and of Giordano Bruno — so that we may be able to understand their teaching in the full sense of the word.\nCasting a retrospective glance over the centuries immediately preceding theirs, viz: — from the 11th to the 15th centuries, we must try and realize what at first sight appears to be the peculiar conception of the Science current in those days, and how wide was the field which the term then embraced. We must realise that during these centuries, Scientific Knowledge was viewed from an entirely different standpoint from that from which it is viewed to-day. The popular conception of Scientific Knowledge was then very different from the ideas which prevailed in later times and from those which prevail to-day. For we are now speaking of the days before the printing-press, of those days when, for the majority of the people, their sole means of participating in Spiritual and intellectual life was through the Church or the school, etc. — That is to say they could only learn from oral instruction. Hence the necessity, if we would understand those times, of obtaining a correct picture of the scientific methods pursued by the educated men of that day.\nIn the times preceding those of Galileo and Giordano Bruno, there was an impulse towards Science, but it was an impulse which is very difficult for the modern mind to understand. We can only understand it by placing ourselves, in imagination, in an entirely different mental atmosphere from that by which we are surrounded to-day. In those days, whatever auditorium you might have entered where Science was being taught, you would always have noted one thing. Let us take, for example, a lecture on Natural Science. No matter what branch of Natural Science it might be, whether Medicine or another, the lecturer would base all his deductions solely upon the authority of ancient writings, especially upon those of Aristotle. To-day, the lecturer on Science bases his thesis upon the results of modern investigation, carried out in such or such an institute, where scientific methods of research are followed. But the lecturer of the days preceding those of Galileo and Giordano Bruno based his thesis upon the ancient writings, especially upon those of Aristotle, which were the foundation of all Science in those days.\nThe figure of Aristotle stands out pre-eminent as an intellectual giant in the history of human progress; and the service he rendered to his time is unspeakably important. But, for the moment, the interesting point for us is the fact that the books of Aristotle were seldom read in the sense in which they were originally given, but the traditional rendering gave the tone, and was everywhere considered determinant.\nNo matter whether it were a question of the definition of a principle or of an axiom, or the question of any truth whatever, it was always referred to Aristotle. “Such was Aristotle's opinion on this point,” “you will find it expressed thus by Aristotle”. Now the modern investigator or the lecturer on Science, or even the popular lecturer, always emphasizes the fact that this or that has been observed in some place or another. But the scientific teacher in the centuries preceding Galileo and Giordano Bruno laid stress upon the fact that a few centuries ago, the great authority, Aristotle, made such or such an assertion upon such or such a question. Just as to-day we refer, in Spiritual matters, to the authority of the revelations of religious documents and tradition and not to personal investigation, so, in those days, teachers of Science did not refer to nature the observation of nature, but referred back to written authority. They referred back to the writings of Aristotle.\nIt is extraordinarily interesting to study a University discourse and to note how doctors and their colleagues relied upon the theories of Aristotle.\nNow Aristotle was an intellectual giant; and though we must admit that even such an intellectual individuality should not be taken literally after the lapse of so many centuries, still, on the other hand, we must acknowledge that the works of Aristotle are so prodigious and so magnificent that even if they learnt nothing new, if men had studied Aristotle diligently, that is to say the original Aristotle, they would have accomplished a great deal. For the deeply illuminating teachings and theories of Aristotle could not have failed to have been of the greatest benefit to them.\nThis, however, was not the case. The lecturers of those days and the teachers who preached Aristotle in season and out of season, as a rule, understood nothing at all about him.\nThe doctrines taught in the time preceding that of Galileo and Giordano Bruno and claiming to be those of Aristotle were an almost incredibly mistaken version of his teaching. To-day, I will confine myself to showing you from the standpoint of Spiritual Science the place Galileo and Giordano Bruno took in the intellectual life of their time. I would call to mind in this connection an incident which is perfectly true and which I have often related before.\nOne of the most devoted adherents of Aristotle was at the same time a friend of Galileo's. Galileo, like Giordano Bruno, was an opponent of the followers of Aristotle, and with good reason, but not of Aristotle himself. Galileo maintained that men ought to go to the great book of Nature, which speaks so clearly to man, and learn from there the meaning of the Spirit in Nature. They should not rely entirely upon the books of Aristotle for their final authority. Now at that time, the School of Aristotle taught a marvelous doctrine concerning the seat of the nerves. Their theory was that the whole nervous system originated in the heart, that from the heart, the nerves spread to the brain and from thence spread over the entire body. “This”, said they, “is the teaching of Aristotle, therefore it must be true.” Galileo, who based his information upon the investigation of the human body, carried out by means of his physical eyes, and did not rely upon the teaching of ancient writings and ancient tradition, affirmed that the nerves had their seat in the brain and that the chief nerves originated in the brain. Galileo told this to one of his friends and wished him to see for himself and be convinced. “Yes, indeed, I will see it,” said the friend who took the opposite view, and he attended a demonstration on the human body. Then, indeed, this scholar, who was a devout follower of Aristotle, was greatly astonished and said to Galileo: — “It does indeed seem as if the nerves originated in the brain; yet Aristotle maintained that they originate in the heart. If there appears to be any contradiction here, I would believe in Aristotle rather than in Nature.” Such was the mental attitude which Galileo had to combat. Aristotle, or rather the distorted view of Aristotle, was dragged into all questions connected with Science.\nTo quote another instance: — A scholar of the Church wrote a treatise on immortality. Let us consider for a moment the method they employed in those days. They took their subject matter from the Church Doctrine, adding to that what they believed to be the teaching of Aristotle on the subject. Thus they used the words of Aristotle to support their own views, twisting his teaching so that they could claim its support, no matter from which side of the question, whether for or against, they wished to argue. To return to our scholar of Divinity. He had collected various passages from Aristotle in order to demonstrate the opinion of Aristotle upon the question of the immortality of the soul. Now this also is a perfectly true incident. The clergy had to submit their books to their superiors before publication. In this case, the superior objected to the book. “It is dangerous,” he said, “It would be better not to attempt it, for these extracts from Aristotle (in support of immortality) might also be used to support the opposite view.” The author of the book wrote back “If it is only a question of demonstrating more clearly the most acceptable meaning of Aristotle on this subject, then I will support it by another quotation, for one could quite well go on making quotations.” In short, from every point of view, Aristotle was used and abused.\nFrom these two incidents, we can see how greatly Aristotle was misunderstood at the time of Galileo and Giordano Bruno. We will take the example of the origin of the nerves in the heart. The meaning of this statement is hidden. We can only understand it when we realize that Aristotle lived at the end of the period of ancient Greek culture and, therefore, at the end of the period of the old clairvoyant consciousness. Because Aristotle looked back into the past, he transmitted a Science that arose out of a clairvoyant consciousness which was able to see behind the material world into the Spiritual. It was this clairvoyant consciousness which had produced the old Science. The essence of this primeval Science was transmitted by the Greek culture as ancient Science, and this it was which Aristotle possessed. He was one of the last who recorded it. But Aristotle was not himself capable of developing that clairvoyant consciousness, for he only possessed an intellectual consciousness.\nNote this well. Not without reason was Aristotle the first historian of Logic . This is because the intellectual argumentative thought was to become dominant. Thus, Aristotle assimilated the ancient teaching and reduced it into a logical system in his writings. Hence there is much in his writings which we cannot understand until we have learnt what it is he really meant. Thus, when he speaks of nerves, we must not ascribe to the word the meaning given to it to-day, nor the meaning it had even in the time of Galileo and Giordano Bruno, which was already related to our own. When Aristotle speaks of the nervous system, he means the Etheric Body of man. By which we mean the super-sensible part of human nature, which is closely connected with the human physical body. This Etheric body can now no longer be seen by man, the power of doing so having been lost during man's progressive evolution. Aristotle could no longer see it, but he knew about it, the knowledge having come to him from those times when the clairvoyant consciousness saw, not only the physical body, but also the Etheric Aura, the Etheric Body, which is really the builder and strength-giver of the physical body.\nAristotle drew his teaching from those times in which man perceived the Etheric Body as we now-a-days perceive colours. Thus, if you look at the Etheric Body instead of at the physical body, the former is truly the origin of certain currents. For Aristotle, this origin was not in the brain, but in the heart. The description given by Aristotle of these currents had usually been designated by the title of nerves. By those currents he did not mean nerves in our sense of the word, but he meant super-sensible currents, super-sensible forces. These proceed from the heart, flow to the brain and, from thence, are distributed to the various activities of the human body. These are matters which we cannot understand until we have learnt by means of Spiritual Science about the super-sensible parts and principles of human nature.\nMan had lost the power of seeing clairvoyantly even so long ago as the centuries preceding Galileo and Giordano Bruno. Hence people had no idea that Aristotle was speaking of the Etheric Current. They thought he meant the physical nerves, so they asserted that “Aristotle states that the physical nerves proceed from the heart.”\nSuch was the contention of the devout followers of Aristotle. Those, however, who had studied in the book of Nature could not allow this. Hence the great battle between Galileo and Giordano Bruno and the School of Aristotle.\nThe followers of Aristotle completely misunderstood him; no-one understood the real Aristotle; Galileo and Giordano Bruno naturally did not understand him either, for they did not take the trouble to penetrate to the real meaning of the works of Aristotle. Thus Galileo and Giordano Bruno were the two great Intellectuals of their time, who turned away from the pedantry of the Scholastics and of book-learning to the great book of Nature itself, which is available to each and all\nProfessor Laurenz Muellner, for whom, as philosopher, I have the greatest admiration, refers to this in a lecture which he gave in 1894 as Rector of the Vienna University. In this lecture, he drew attention to the fact that the great Galileo, with his wonderful knowledge and grasp of all the great laws of mechanics, had discovered the laws which govern the distribution of space. Now it is just these laws which govern the operation and, distribution of space which strike the eye and stir the emotions so very forcibly when we see them exemplified in St. Peter's at Rome. This mighty building influences us all. And each one experiences something tangible, which we can all understand. Let me illustrate this by the following example: — Speidel, the Viennese journalist, and the sculptor Natter were driving in the neighborhood of Rome. As they approached the city, Speidel suddenly heard a most extraordinary exclamation from Natter, who was a very genial spirit. Natter sprang suddenly to his feet. His friend could not think what was the matter with him, for he only heard the words “I am frightened”. As Natter would say no more then, it was only later that his friend heard that the exclamation had been called forth by the sight of the dome of St. Peter's in the distance.\nSomething akin to terrified wonder at the effect of the marvelous distribution of space, created by the genius of Michelangelo, overwhelms all who see this wonderful building. Laurenz Muellner draws attention to the fact that it is owing to Galileo, that great thinker, that it has become possible for mankind to conceive mathematically and mechanically such an effect of space-distribution as meets the eye in the wonderful building of the dome of St. Peter's, at Rome. At the same time, we must not forget that Galileo, who discovered the laws of Mechanics, was born when Michelangelo, the builder of St. Peter's, was almost on his deathbed. This means that it was from the Spiritual forces of Michelangelo that that skill in the distribution of the laws of space arose, which was not available to the intellect of man until later.\nFrom this, we must infer that what we may term intellectual knowledge, knowledge governed by reason, may come much later than the actual composition of matter in space.\nIf such matters are carefully and thoughtfully considered, it will be seen that human consciousness has undergone a change; that, earlier, men possessed a certain clairvoyance and that the manner of thinking with the intellect does not go back very far. This habit or manner of thinking with the intellect, owing to certain historical necessities, arose during the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Minds like those of Galileo and Giordano Bruno are the first harbingers of what was to come. Hence their fierce opposition to the school of Aristotle and especially to those who first completely misinterpreted Aristotle — who may be taken as the expression of the ancient wisdom — and then used their misinterpretation of him as an argument against Natural Science. We have now indicated Galileo's position in the world. He was, in the highest sense of the word, the man who first inaugurated the system of severe thought necessary for Natural Science, that system of the relation of Natural Science to Mathematics, which has continued on his lines from his day to our own.\nWhat is it that distinguishes Galileo from all other men up to his time? It is the doctrine which he was the first to realize and which he preached with such noble courage, thus proving himself a child of his age. The feelings which possessed Galileo can be to some extent rendered in the following words, which will help us to understand his whole soul and attitude of mind. “Here we stand as men upon the earth. Nature spreads herself out before us, with everything requisite for our senses and for our reason, which is connected with the instrument of the brain through nature”. Galileo says this many times, in various passages in his works, as may be verified, ”through Nature speaks the Divine Spiritual. We men approach Nature, view it with our eyes and study it with our other senses. What we perceive with our eyes, what we receive through our senses, is implanted in Nature by Divine Spiritual Beings. At first, the thoughts of the Divine Spiritual Beings exist yonder; then, as if springing forth from the thoughts of these Beings, come the visible things of Nature as the revelation of. Divine thought. Then come our powers of perception and, above all, our reason, which is inseparable from the brain. There we stand, ready to spell out, as from the letters of a book, and to arrive at the author's meaning, that which Divine thoughts have expressed in Nature.”\nGalileo took his stand firmly on the ground upon which all the great minds in the course of earthly evolution have taken their stand. He believed that the manifestations of Nature, the things of Nature, are as the letters of an alphabet, which express the mind of the Divine Spiritual beings. Thus the human mind exists that it may read what the Divine Spiritual Beings have written there, written in the form of minerals, in the course of natural phenomena, in the course of the movements of the stars. Human nature exists that it may read the thoughts of the Divine Mind. To Galileo, however, the Divine Mind is only distinguished from the human mind by the fact that everything that can be thought is thought by Divine Mind at once, in a single moment, unfettered by space or time. Let us apply this to any single field; to the field of Mathematics. We see at once how extra ordinary this conception is. If a student desires to learn all that has as yet been learnt by mankind about Mathematics, he will have or to toil at Mathematics for years. Then, as you know, man's conception of Mathematics depends greatly on time . Now, Galileo argued thus: — What humanity succeeds in grasping in the course of many years is conceived by the Divine thought in one second. Divine thought is unfettered by space or time. Above all, the human mind must not suppose that with its reason limited, as it is, by space and time, it can immediately understand the Divine Mind. Man must strive. He must observe each step. He must study each separate phenomenon carefully. He must not think that he can afford to ignore the phenomena, that he can leave out of account what God has planned as the foundation of the phenomena. Galileo affirmed that it was wrong not to wish to know the, true meaning of the wonderful manifestations which Nature unfolds, by means of human reason, that it was wrong not to strive to ascertain the truth by minute investigation. He affirmed that to endeavour to arrive at the truth by speculation, instead of studying carefully the details of the various phenomena, was an entirely false method of thought.\nBut the motive which prompted Galileo was quite other than those which give rise to similar language to-day. Galileo would not limit the human mind to observation because he denied the operation of the Divine Mind in Nature; on the contrary, just because the Divine Mind manifests itself in Nature and reveals itself as so great, so powerful and so wonderful; because (to the Divine Intelligence) all creative thought springs into being in a moment, while the human mind requires an eternity in which lovingly to decipher the letters of the Alphabet and can only arrive gradually at the detailed thoughts which they represent. It is humility at the thought of how far human reason is below the Divine Reason which prompts Galileo to warn his contemporaries. “you can no longer see behind the things of sense. Not because this was never possible to man, but because the time for doing so has gone by.”\nObservation, experience and individual thought; these composed the standard which Galileo placed before his contemporaries. This he was able to do because, in a certain sense, his mind was cast in a mathematical mould and because his method of thinking was so rigidly mathematical. In illustration of this we will take the matter of the telescope. Galileo heard that a discovery had been made in Holland, by means of which it was possible to perceive the most distant stars in the firmament. We must bear in mind that there were no newspapers in those days. He only heard from travelers that some thing had been discovered in Holland of the nature of a telescope. Galileo could not rest till he had found out for himself what this was and himself invented a telescope by means of which he made the great discoveries which confirmed the theories which had recently been promulgated in the Copernican-cosmo-conception. In order to understand these things aright, we must remember these two facts: — that nothing was then understood of the old super-sensible science, and that Galileo was a pathfinder for the new science. Secondly, that a short time before, Copernicus had given a new aspect to the conception of the world through external thought concerning the movements of the planets round the Sun. We must put ourselves in the position of the men of that time and try to enter into the mentality of those who believed, as men had done for thousands of years before them: — “Here we stand on the firm earth, immovable in space.” To men with views such as these, the idea was now presented for the first time, that the earth was spinning round the Sun with incalculable rapidity. Such a conception literally out the ground from under their feet. We cannot be surprised at the excitement such an idea created in all, whether partisans or opponents. To minds like that of Galileo, the way by which Copernicus had arrived at his conclusions was particularly convincing. Let us examine in the light of the present time the means by which Copernicus arrived at his conclusions.\nWhat made Copernicus arrive at the conception that the planets move round the Sun?\nUp to his time, a theory of the universe had prevailed, which was itself not understood because it was intended to be taken in a Spiritual sense. As then understood, it was indeed an impossible conception. Men had to suppose that the planets described the most complicated movements — circles — and then circles within circles. It was precisely this terrible complication of ideas which had to be got rid of. This it was which was so obnoxious to certain types of mind.\nIn reality, Copernicus made no new astronomical discoveries. Be said to himself “Let us proceed along the simplest lines of thought in order to arrive at an explanation of the movements of the planets.” He expressed his system of the universe in the simplest of terms. And with what a wonderful result! The Sun was placed in the centre while the planets revolved around it in circles or in ellipses, as Kepler proved later. The whole conception of the universe was reduced to a wonderful simplicity.\nIt was this simplicity which so greatly influenced the mind of Galileo. For he always emphatically affirmed that “the human mind is capable of recognizing truth in its simplicity.” Beauty is to be found in the simple, not in the complex. And truth is beauty.\nIt was because of its Beauty and because of the simplicity of its Beauty that the Copernican theory of the system of the Universe was accepted by so many minds at that time. Galileo in particular accepted it because he found in the teaching of Copernicus that Beauty in simplicity for which he was seeking.\nNow he could see the Moons of Jupiter, which hardly anyone would believe in. The eyes of Galileo were the first to see the Moons of Jupiter which encircle him as the planets do the Sun. It was a solar system in miniature. Jupiter with his Moons was as the Sun with his planets. This discovery confirmed the theories of a solar system constructed in accordance with a conception. It seemed so to Galileo, who applied the theory of Copernicus in miniature to a visible world. Hence Galileo was indeed a Pioneer of the New Science.\nThus it came about that he divided the presence of mountains in the Moons, that there were spots in the Sun and that the Nebulae extending across the stars were disintegrated worlds of stars. In short, all which may be expressed as the revelation of the Divine Wisdom expressed in the world of sense. All this made a tremendous effect upon Galileo. With his mathematical mind, the question of time, which was completely lost sight of in the material conception of the visible world, naturally influenced him greatly. Galileo first created the impulse in the human mind to admit that we cannot see behind the material veil with our normal consciousness: “The super-sensible is not to be understood by the human senses. It cannot be comprehended by human reason. Divine Reason grasps it outside time and space, while man's reason is limited to time and space. Let us confine ourselves to that which, in time and space, our human reason can understand.”\nNow, seeing that Galileo achieved such greatness in so many things, he is also, from the point of view of philosophy, one of the most important pioneers of the modern Spiritual development of humanity. Can we then wonder that we also see in him a mind who wished to make clear to himself and to others the relation of man to the world of sense and to his own soul-life.\nIt is a popular fallacy that Kant was the first to draw attention to the fact that the world around us is nothing but illusion and that it is not possible to arrive at “the thing in itself,” at things as they really are. Expressed rather differently, Galileo had already demonstrated this idea; only, behind the visible, he always saw the all-pervading thoughts of the Divine Spiritual, and it was only from humility and not from principle that he said that only after long aeons of time would mankind be fit to draw nearer to it.\nBut Galileo said: — “When we see a colour, it makes a certain impression on us. For example, red. Is the red colour in the things?” Galileo used a very remarkable illustration, which showed at once that the primary conception was incorrect. That, however, is immaterial to our purpose. The point we wish to emphasize is the conception itself as an idea of that time. Galileo said: — “If you take a feather and tickle a man on the soles of his feet or the palms of his hands, the man will experience a sensation of tickling. Now is the tickling in the feather? No. It is entirely subjective. What is in the feather is quite different. As the tickling is subjective, so too is the red colour subjective, which is visible in the world.” Thus he compared colours and even sounds with the tickling caused by the application of a feather to the soles of the feet.\nOnce we realize this, we can already trace in Galileo the beginnings of what came down to us as the philosophy of our modern times. For modern philosophy doubts the possibility of Man's ever being able to penetrate behind the veil of the world sense in any way whatsoever.\nThus we see in Galileo, who was born in 1664, the quiet, determined pioneer, while Giordano Bruno, who was somewhat older, being born in 1648, reflected in his mentality all the great truths which were fermenting in the minds of men such as Copernicus, Galileo himself and others at that period. The mind of Giordano Bruno mirrors for us all the great ideas of that time in a mighty, comprehensive system of philosophy.\nWhat was Giordano Bruno's own personal attitude to the world, quite apart from the mental attitude of the men of his day? Giordano Bruno (who only knew the corrupted version of Aristotle) argued thus: — “Aristotle maintains that a sphere exists which extends to the Moon, thence to the different spheres of the stars; then comes the sphere of the Divine Spiritual. Thus, according to Aristotle, the Living God must be sought for outside the spheres of the stars.”\nGiordano was viewing the Universe according to the conception of Aristotle. He saw first the earth, then the spheres of the Moon and of the Stars. Then, finally, beyond these again, beyond this world and beyond that inhabited by man, in the great periphery of this world, the Divine Spirit, which literally directs the revolutions and movements of the world of the planets.\nGiordano Bruno could not reconcile this conception with the actual human experience of his day. That which could now be perceived by means of the human senses, that which he himself perceived when he looked at plants, animals and man, that which he saw when he looked at mountains, seas, clouds and stars, all this appeared to him as a marvelous image of what lives in the Divine Spirit itself. In the moving stars, in the clouds sailing through the air, he saw not only a script written by the Divine Being, but something which might pertain to the Divine Being as a finger or a limb does to ourselves. The fundamental conception of Giordano Bruno was not that of a God who directs the visible world from outside, from the periphery, but a God who is incorporate in every single manifestation of the visible, whose bodily form is the visible world.\nIf we seek to understand how it was that he arrived at such a conclusion, we find that it was the result of the joy of the intoxication of delight in the spirit of the new age which had just begun. This new age had been preceded by a time during which man had been content to grope about amongst the old ideas of Aristotle. A time in which the leading Scholars, if they walked through woods and fields, had no eyes for Nature and all her beauties, but had their minds wholly set on Parchments and Writings which had originated with Aristotle.\nNow, however, the time had come when the voice of Nature began to make itself heard by men. Great discoveries revealed themselves one after another. Mighty minds like that of Galileo pressed on from point to point, recognizing the Divine in Nature herself at every step.\nThe theory of the God in Nature, in contradistinction to the mediaeval conception of Nature, from which God was eliminated, was accepted everywhere with an universal delirium of joy. To this spirit, every fibre of Giordano Bruno's being responded. “There is Spirit in all things,” he says, “This is proved by physical research. Wherever we see a visible creation, there we shall meet the Divine.” There is only one difference between the physical and the Divine. Because we are men and confined within narrow boundaries, the visible appears to us to be limited by time and space. To Giordano Bruno, the Spirit of God exists behind the sense-world. Not in the way in which (as he thought) it had existed for Aristotle or the men of the Middle Ages. He believed the Divine Spirit to be self-existing; and Nature only the body by means of which its Spirit manifested itself in all its beauty.\nNevertheless, man cannot perceive the whole of the Divine Spirit in Nature, he can only see a part. In all things, in all time and in space, the Divine Spirit is to be found. This was the creed of Giordano Bruno. Hence he says “Where is the Divine? In every stone, in every leaf, the Divine is everywhere. In all creation, specially in beings possessing a certain independent existence”. These beings, which recognise their own independence, he terms Monads. By a Monad, he means something which floats and flourishes in the ocean of divinity. All Monads are mirrors of the Universe. Thus Giordano conceived of the universal Spirit as divided into many Monads, and in each Monad that was an individual Spirit, there was something which was a reflection of the Universe.\nSuch a Monad is the human soul, and they are many. Indeed, the human body itself is composed of many Monads, not of one. If we understand the truth about the physical body according to the ideas of Giordano Bruno, we shall not see the fleshly human body, but a system of Monads; these Monads cannot be clearly seen, just as we cannot distinguish the separate midges in a swarm; the chief Monad is the human soul. When the human soul comes into existence at birth, so said Giordano Bruno, the other Monads which belong to the soul collect together and, by this, the existence of the Chief-Monad, of the Soul Monad, is made possible. When death approaches, the Chief-Monad discharges and disperses the other Monads.\nAccording to Giordano Bruno, birth is the assembling of many Monads round a Chief-Monad, while death is the separation of the inferior Monads from the Chief-Monad, so that the Chief-Monad may be able to take on another form. For each Monad is obliged to take on, not only the form by which we know it here, but every form which it is possible to take on in the Universe. Giordano Bruno conceives of a procession through every form. Thus he approaches as close as possible — in his enthusiasm — to the idea of the re-incarnation of the human soul.\nAnd with reference to the conception of our collective reality, he says: — Man, with his normal consciousness, stands confronted by this reality. What he first receives are the impressions of the senses. These are his first means of knowledge. Of these, there are four, says Giordano Bruno. The first means by which man acquires knowledge is by the impressions of the senses.\nThe second are the images we construct in our imagination when the things which have impressed the senses are no longer before us, when we only remember what we have experienced. Here we already penetrate further into the soul. This second channel of knowledge he terms “the power of imagination.” The word must not be taken to mean what it does to-day, but it must be understood in the sense in which it was used by Giordano Bruno. After a man has received what the impressions of sense have to give him, he enters (forming the picture within himself) into the impressions. The impression is made from without on the within. It then follows that man, while he penetrates the things with his reason and then proceeds further, draws nearer to the truth, instead of going further away from it. Hence Giordano Bruno recognises reason, the intellect, as the third means of acquiring knowledge, and in this he has in mind the moment when we leave the objects visible to our senses and ascend to the realm of thought. Then something higher and truer than any impression created by the senses flows towards us.\nAccording to Giordano Bruno, the fourth stage is Reason. Reason to him is a living and weaving in the regions of Pure Spirit.\nThus the system of Giordano Bruno comprises four stages of knowledge. He does not, however, classify them in the same way as they are classified, for example, in my books, “The Way of Initiation” and “Initiation and its Results”, under the headings of Present Knowledge, Imaginative Knowledge, Inspirational Knowledge and Intuitive Knowledge. His classifications are more in the abstract. We must, therefore, think of him in the following way: Giordano Bruno lived first at that point of time when the knowledge of visible phenomena was, advancing, therefore he used expressions which resemble those used now to express knowledge of the ordinary visible world, rather than those which relate to the higher worlds. But when Giordano Bruno looks up to the Spiritual World, we can have no doubt of his meaning from the tremendous emphasis with which he says “The Divine Spirit which exists in everything, which has its bodily form in all things, possesses that of which we have the representation, as the idea is the conception of the thing”.\n“In what way is the world in God? How is the Spirit in God?” he asks, and replies: “The Spirit is in God as Idea, as the Thought that precedes the Word.” In everything is the Spirit in Nature, as form, he replies, by which he means, that the idea which exists in the Divine Spirit is in the crystal, which has a form; it is in the plant, which has a form; in the animal, which has a form; it is in the human body, which has a form. Of all visible things which have form, a counterpart exists in the human soul as the concept of them.\nGiordano Bruno carries this still further. The things of Nature are shadows of the Divine Ideas. “Note well”, he says, “Our concepts are not the shadows of things, they are the shadows of the Divine Thoughts.” Thus, if we have the things of Nature around us and thus have the shadow of the Divine Idea, our concepts will be again fructified thereby. While we are forming our concepts, the Divine Spirit is weaving His Ideas into the original, so that we come in direct contact with the stream which connects us with the Divine Idea.\nWhen we study the theories of that Physical Science which is to-day called Monism, (unlike that of Giordano Bruno), what strikes us most is the fact that, if we would be consistent in speaking of these theories, we must say “they do not mention the Divine Thought”. But Giordano Bruno did not say that, he was a Spiritualist in the strictest sense of the word. What he has to gibe us out of the true inspiration of the Renaissance relates to the Monads. The assembling of the Monads at birth and their dissolution at death refers to the Divine Thoughts, which, in his conception of the world, flow into the world of ideas; and in his own words “The human thought is a reflection of the Divine.” If this is once thoroughly understood, we shall understand something of the spirituality of Giordano Bruno.\nBut for this, one thing is necessary: we must distinguish between the real and the unreal Giordano Bruno, between the Giordano Bruno who was so greatly misunderstood and the real man himself.\nGiordano Bruno was the master-mind, who, by his unbounded enthusiasm, spread broadcast among his contemporaries the more intellectual achievements of Galileo in the realms of Scientific Thought. This is why every utterance of Giordano Bruno carried such weight. All the joy and enthusIasm of the Spirit of the age, all its delight in the discovery of the working and weaving of Nature in the physical world, was concentrated in the personality of Giordano Bruno. This flood of rejoicing was itself crystallized into a system of philosophy, for the Divine Spirit which dwells in all visible things most certainly illuminated the soul of Giordano Bruno, and he was conscious of it. Hence we can understand those utterances of Giordano Bruno, which we do well to remember; they sound as if Nature herself had a direct message for men in those days. We can only quote a few words here.\nConsider how wonderful the following thought is, to which Giordano gives expression in contradistinction to the teaching of Aristotle on the same subject. “The Spirit of Divine intelligence is not beyond the visible world, it is not exterior to it, it is everywhere, wherever we may look. The Divine Intelligence does not dwell in any place exterior to the visible world. It does not dwell in that vague realm, of which we may say ‘something moves in circles wide’, it does mot dwell in a revolving, encircling realm, with which we can communicate only from a great distance. The Divine Spirit is the united principle of that vital force, which is in everything and in Nature herself.”\nSuch was the language which rang out at that time, such the convictions which sprang from the innermost depths of the soul of Giordano Bruno. The question now remains how best to reproduce this language to-day, so that it will speak directly to our hearts and minds. Hermann Brunnhofer, who called attention to this and had to submit to being called a too enthusiastic admirer of Giordano Bruno, put his words into fine verse:\nNon est Deus vel intelligentia exterior Cirounrotans et circumducens; Dignuis enim illi debet esse Internum prinzipuim Motus, Quod est Natura propria, species propria, anima propria, Quam habeat tot quot in illius Gremio et corpore vivent Noe generali Spiritu, corpore. Anima, Natura animantia Plantea, Lapides quae univena ut Disimus proportionaliter cumastro Euden composita ordine, etaedem Contemperata complexion um, symmetus, Secundum genus, quantumlebet secundum Specierum numeros singula deslingunlui.\nGiordano Bruno says philosophically: It is worthy of God to be the inner moving principle of things. See also: Herman Brunnhofer, The Influence of Giordano Bruno upon Goethe — Goethe's Journals — Vol. VII, 1886.\nGoethe translates this line for line in the poem beginning:\n“What Kind of God were He who from the World Remained aloof and the great Universe Around His finger twirled?” etc.\nThis is a poetical translation of the mind of Giordano Bruno through the instrumentality of the mind of Goethe. It was not merely that Goethe wrote these verses with Giordano Bruno's works lying beside him. Some other influence must have been at work than that which would have made Goethe merely recast the words of Giordano Bruno in a poetical form. We see in this how the spirit of Giordano Bruno becomes fully alive in Goethe. Nevertheless it is not only a couple of centuries which have to be bridged when we pass from the days of Galileo and Giordano Bruno to Goethe. We must realise that what in the case of Giordano Bruno had its origin in the first great enthusiastic mood from which arose the philosophic cult of Nature, became in Goethe a mood leading him with complete devotion from one thing to another and finally causing him to bring back into Nature the God whose existence man now learned to feel in Nature herself. In Goethe the mood of Giordano Bruno had become his own. It was born in him, as it were. It was already present in him when, at the age of seven, he took the music desk belonging to his father and arranged on it mineral ores from his father's collection, so as to have some products of Nature herself — for the same purpose he took plants from his father's herbarium. He then placed a little stick of incense on the top of the heap and waited, burning glass in hand, for the Sun to rise, so that he might enkindle the incense from its rays and thus consummate a sacrifice culled from the forces of Nature to the God who lives in the plants and minerals and to whom he had erected an altar.\nThus did Giordano Bruno live in Goethe at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, but in such a way that what lived as the innermost attitude of his soul, Goethe carried into every detail of Nature.\nIt was this mental attitude which made it impossible to Goethe to understand how the Scientific investigators of that day could attach such importance to the outward signs which differentiate men from animals. The physical Scientists of the eighteenth century maintained that man did not possess the same number of small bones in the upper part of the jaw bone as the animals — viz. the inter-maxillary bones — which contain the sheath of the upper teeth. Animals possess these and this is where men differ from animals. Goethe could not understand this highly materialistic idea. This indeed could not be the God who was the inner vital principle of Nature. The God of whom Giordano Bruno spoke as “circumroians et circumducens.” He must be a God who worked outside Nature, a God who, first of all, made the animals, then made man and then, in order to differentiate man from beast, arranged that animals should have the inter-maxillary bones, while these should be wanting in man.\nGoethe was the great investigator of Nature, who endeavoured to show that that which existed in Nature as form was capable of rising higher, and that it is not in anything external, such as the inter-maxillary bones, that the difference between the human and the animal world is to be found, but that something exists in man which, though it may be clothed with tones and muscles like those of the animals, constitutes the higher mind of humanity. This is only another proof of the magnitude of Goethe's genius. He not only discovered traces of the inter-maxillary bone and proved that it had only disappeared in man because it was a subordinate bone, but he also shows that the vertebrae may be distended if the activity of the mind contained in the brain finds this to be necessary. A long time ago, when I was studying the Scientific writings of Goethe, in order to understand his assertion that the bones of the skull are transposed vertebrae, the latter having been extended into the cavities of the skull, I came to the inevitable conclusion that Goethe must have conceived the idea that the brain itself was transposed spinal marrow and that this change had been wrought by the mind. That not only the covering tissue, but that the brain itself had been moved up from the vertebrae and spinal marrow to a higher level. It was a wonderful moment im my life when I discovered that, in the last decade of the eighteenth century, Goethe had written in pencil on a slip of paper “The brain is in reality only a piece of transposed spinal marrow.” Professor Bardeleben relates this in his article in the Weimar Year-Book on “Goethe as Scientific Investigator.”\nThus we see the mood which first appeared in Giordano Bruno applied by Goethe to the different parts of living beings. We see how Goethe applied the ideas of Giordano Bruno — to whom, as we have seen, he approaches so closely, even in his choice of words — in a practical way to everything in natural scientific thought.\nThis is why Goethe laid such stress upon finding in the whole plant world the metamorphosis of the primal archetypal plant (Urpflanze). Added to the great achievements of Goethe as artist were his noteworthy achievements as a scientific investigator of Nature. In a certain sense, the spirit which had come down from the clairvoyant stages of perception to a material form of vision was incorporated in Goethe, as a personality who saw the Divine in all his observations of Nature, even in the individual plants. The expression “Urpflanze”, Primal Archetypal plant. What did Goethe mean by that? He meant to indicate the Spiritual essence in the various species of Plants. With regard to this, the conversation between Schiller and Goethe at Jena, after a meeting of the Botanical Society, which they had both attended, is important. When they had left the assembly, Schiller said: — “What they said about plants was very unsatisfying.” Goethe replied: — “It might have been expressed differently. We ought to be able to see, not only those parts of the plant which we hold in our hands, but also their Spiritual relationship.” Then he took a piece of paper and drew the structure of a plant in a few strokes. He showed to Schiller that the type is not only present in the Lily, the Dandelion or the Ranunculus, but in all plants. Then Schiller, who could not understand the structure of the primal plant) said: — “That is no reality, it is nothing but an idea.” Goethe was very puzzled and said: — “It would gratify me very much to think that I could have ideas without knowing it and even see them with my physical eyes.” For Goethe could perceive the Spiritual element which permeates all plants. He saw it so clearly that he could even draw it. The same applies to the primal archetypal animal in all animals.\nThus Goethe pursued the God who does not work from without the material world, but who lives and operates within all visible things. Thus he followed the Divine Spirit which moves invisibly in everything, working in a concrete way from plant to plant, through leaf, blossom and fruit. It works in the same way from one animal to another, and also from one bone to another, from one animal form to another. It is interesting to note that Goethe was not understood by the men of his own time, not even by Schiller. But little by little the spirit of Goethe will take root even in the thought of the Natural Scientists. It will be acknowledged that Goethe's ideas were a stage higher than those of Giordano Bruno. Giordano Bruno spoke of a God, a pantheistic God, who is to be found everywhere, in plants and in animals. But Goethe, although he too sought the great spirit who does not operate from without, said further: — We must not only seek for Him in general; we must study the detailed phenomena and look for the Spirit in the separate things. For it lives in one way in plants, in another in mineral; one way in this bone and another way in that.\nThe Spirit is in perpetual action; it forms the various parts of matter, matter follows the moving spirit. This can be expressed as one universal spirit, as was done by Giordano Bruno. It can also be sought with deep devotion in every single detail, as Goethe did. In this way, man draws nearer and nearer to the Spirit at work in the outspread carpet of Nature, by degrees will that Spirit reveal itself.\nIf we study the successive stages of progress represented by Galileo, Giordano Bruno and Goethe, and search for the root principle which directed such great minds, we shall learn by degrees to adhere to the root principle which directed them, and not to be led away by the will-of-the-wisp of superficial criticism. For even the greatest minds do not escape criticism. Let us take Galileo with his great conception of the Divine, which embraced the whole of Creation in the span of one moment, and was unfettered by space or time. When we consider this, the question is bound to arise: — “What do the men of to-day know about the real significance of Galileo?” As a rule, they know little more about him than the one incident which is assuredly not true, that he said, as is supposed, “It moves, nevertheless.” A fine saying, truly, but, as can be seen from the investigations of the Italian scholar, Angells de Gubernatis, it cannot be true. And how often do we not hear that the last words of Goethe were: — “More light”, which is exactly what he never did say.\nHence we see that these great minds must be studied in the light which Spiritual Science is able to throw upon them, We cannot, as we are so fond of doing, judge of the past with our own, individual, unaided, modern mind.\nThese three master-minds form a wonderful, harmonious triad, which marks the beginning of our modern age; in Galileo and in Giordano Bruno we see the dawn, in Goethe we see the Sun itself, which show how the Spirit of the modern age already taught him to see that the smallest atom of matter cannot exist without Spirit behind it, which brings one atom in touch with another.\nI would call to your remembrance an incident which Goethe relates himself. Many years after the death of Schiller, it was decided to transfer his remains from their grave to the Princes Mausoleum. There was some difficulty in deciding which were really the bones of Schiller. Goethe was attracted by a skull, which he saw must have belonged to a man of the type of the genius of Schiller; on closer inspection, he decided that this must be Schiller's skull, as he recognised it from the strongly marked peculiarity in the shape of the skull. This skull was accordingly placed in the Princes Mausoleum. Here he recognised the principle, which was also recognised by Galileo, that the spirit (or genius) must be sought for humbly and mathematically.\nThe ancient church lamp still hangs in the cathedral at Pisa, swinging backwards and forwards before countless souls. But Galileo had only sat before it once, when he measured the beating of his pulse by the regular swinging of the lamp and thus discovered the laws of balance, which are of such vast importance to-day. This was a Divine Inspiration. There are many such cases. At the grave of Schiller, Goethe was inspired with the thought which lived in the philosophic inspiration of Giordano Bruno. “Spirit is inseparable from matter. It is everywhere. Not, however, tossing it wildly about and driving it round, but, as Spirit which exists in the minutest atom.” This conception of the Spiritual, which existed in Giordano Bruno, was re-born in Goethe's soul, as he held the skull of Schiller in his hand, and, as water congealed into ice, so was the Spirit of Schiller made manifest to him in the skull of Schiller.\nGoethe's entire spiritual standpoint lies before us when we study the poem which he wrote after having looked on Schiller's skull. Especially those lines, which are so often misinterpreted, and which we can only understand when we realise that in the situation which we have described above, Goethe saw the individuality of Schiller in plastic form before him, as if frozen.\nThen he cries, as he must do, forced thereto by the similarity of the Spirit which united Giordano Bruno and Goethe:\nWas kann der Mensch imleben mehr gewinnen, Als dass sich Gott-Natur ihm offenbare, Wie sie das Feste ladesst zu Geist verrinnen, Wie sie das Geisterzeugte fest bewahre.\nWhat can a man wrest more from life Than that Nature, all-divine, reveal to him How that she causeth the firm and formed to melt into Spirit, And how what is born of the Spirit she holdeth fast in form."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-11",
    "title": "What Has Geology to Say About the Origin of the World?",
    "date": "9 Feb 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/Singles/19110209p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "Translator Unknown\nIt could weigh like a nightmare on the world-conception based on spiritual science if in all earnestness and truthfulness it were obliged to come into opposition to the well-founded results of the investigations carried out by natural science — investigations which in the course of the last centuries, and especially during the nineteenth century, have accomplished such great things and brought such blessings on mankind, not only in the field of knowledge but in the whole field of human progress. But it would be particularly depressing if spiritual science were compelled to take a stand in opposition to a branch of natural science which is comparatively one of the youngest, but which by virtue of its nature and its special tasks is able not only to arouse human interest in the deepest sense of the word, but also to open perspectives into the very coming-into-being of our planet, as well as into the origin and evolving forms of the creatures inhabiting it. This young branch of natural science is Geology, the science which, especially since the second third of the nineteenth century — but also already prior to that — has made such tremendous strides and achieved results of real importance, even though the great questions about which we shall have to speak still remain open. Our main purpose today will be to envisage the relationship in which spiritual science must stand to geology — and to answer the question, how much from the point of view of spiritual science — that knowledge which has always formed the base of our considerations here — has geology to say about the question concerning the origin, the gradual emergence and evolution, of the earth and its living organisms?\nTo answer this question we must first think briefly of the way in which the methods employed in the specific study of geology really work. It is, of course, well known that geology draws the content of its knowledge from the solid ground of our earth itself, and that out of what it finds there — within the earth's strata — it forms its conclusions concerning the way in which our planet may have come into existence and the changes it has undergone in the course of time. We know, if, for instance during railway-construction or work in stone quarries or mining-operations, any breaking-up of the ground gives us the opportunity of studying deeper layers of the earth in regard to their rock formations or other contents, that these layers present a different appearance from that of the ground on which we tread — which is the outermost surface. But within this surface-layer, too, we discover very manifold variations when we investigate the ground as to the nature of its rock-formations and mineral character. And it is perhaps also known that some of the most interesting studies are concerned with layers of the earth's surface whose character is clearly such that we can say: the material which covers the ground must originally have been dissolved in water or have been subject to the force of water in some other way, must once have been washed up as it were by the waters in times long past. We still see today how rivers carry accumulations of shifting rocky material far away and deposit them in other parts. We see the ground covered by such alluvial deposits and we must conceive that in the same way, in far distant times, successive layers of deposits were formed. Over one layer which originated in that way we have to imagine another covering it which, on examination, proves to be different in character from the one below. Thus in its successive layers, the earth shows us how the character of their rock-material differs. It stands to reason that the upper strata must be the latest, superimposed by the most recent occurrences on the earth. As we have occasion to penetrate more and more deeply and to study the lower parts of the earth's crust, we come to strata which are the deposits from earlier and ever earlier times, successively overlaid by the later ones. Likewise it is common knowledge that within these strata of the earth all kinds of forms have been embedded, originating, according to present-day concepts, from organic beings of the animal kingdom, from plants which, carried away by the waters and the alluvial layers, have met with their death, as it were, and by this natural process have become thus entombed, and then, more or less changed or unchanged, are to be found there in the rock-material as the remains of prehistoric organic beings. Nor is it difficult to come to the conclusion that a certain relationship must be presumed between such a layer of rock-material and the fossil remains of animals and plants within it. But we must not imagine that the younger strata have overlaid the older ones so conveniently over the whole face of the earth; on the contrary, there is clear evidence that sometimes older strata — recognisable by their character — extend to the surface, that in the course of the earth's development manifold disturbances have occurred through sets of layers having become intermingled, overlaid, upturned, and so on. So that it is by no means an easy task for the geologist to determine how one layer has been deposited over the subjacent layer. These are matters which can only be mentioned briefly here. In any ease we need not concern ourselves with the irregularities just referred to; we may assume that the geologists have access to the earth's strata with their fossiliferous constituents, and that from this they draw their conclusions as to the appearance of the earth at the time when the present top layer had not yet been deposited or successive lower beds did not yet exist, and that in this way it is possible to form some idea of the appearance which our earth must have presented in times gone by.\nMoreover, it is an interesting and generally known fact that the upper layers — and therefore the youngest of our terrestrial material — contain fossils of more highly developed forms of animal- and plant-life, and that in the deeper layers we come to fossil remains of less developed forms of life, which today we are accustomed to count among the lower species and genera of the animal- and plant-kingdoms. We then come, as it were, to the lowest layers of the earth's crust, overlaid again and again by others; we come to the so-called “Cambrian” layer of our earth's development and find there only fossil remains of animals which did not yet possess a spinal column. We find other animals with a spinal column in the upper layers, which geology is therefore justified in regarding as the younger layers in earth-evolution:\nThus geology seems to be fully in conformity with what natural science knows today from other inferences, namely, that in the process of the earth's evolution the living creatures have developed by slow degrees from quite primitive to more perfect forms. When we now examine the Cambrian bed, namely, the lowest layer, and imagine that all the other layers had not yet come into existence, we shall have to assume that in the most ancient times there existed only the lowest animal forms, which as yet had no skeleton and were the first predecessors of the still undeveloped animals which were entombed in the deposits covering the lowest stratum of the rock-material. Then we must imagine that these beings have had descendants, that the latter may have underdone changes under the then prevailing, different conditions. In the next layer, which is again younger, we discover those animals in which there are already some indications of skeleton-like structures. And as we approach the younger layers we see evidence of more highly-developed animal species, until we come to the tertiary layers, where we already find the mammals, and then, in layers still younger than the tertiary layers, man.\nAs you know, there is a line of thought today which simply assumes that the lower animals of the Cambrian period have had descendants, some of which remained unchanged, while others developed towards vertebrate forms and so on; so that the appearance of more highly developed animals in the later, younger layers has to be explained by the assumption that the most primitive and simple forms of animal- and plant-life gradually evolved to higher forms. That would give a clearly outlined picture of the gradual development of life and also of the other occurrences on our earth — roughly as it might have presented itself to the eye of an observer who could have looked on during the billions and billions of years which geology has calculated for these happenings. Some idea of the methods applied and of the manner in which research is conducted may be gained from the following. — If, for instance, one observes how certain layers are still being formed today as alluvial deposits washed up by river-action or the like in the course of so and so many years, and if by measuring the thickness of such a layer a certain measurement is obtained by which it can be reckoned how many years it has taken for that layer to be deposited – then one can calculate how long the accumulation must have taken of all the layers we have had under review — provided that conditions were the same as they are today. As a result, the most divergent figures are obtained from the calculations made by the geologists. There is no need to enlarge upon contradictions which arise from this; for anyone who understands the contradictions will know that they have no essential significance, although they are really sometimes rather pronounced and amount to many billions of years according to the results obtained by different investigators.\nWhen we contemplate all this we have, after all, only a picture of the course which, according to the ideas of geology (conceived and expressed precisely in the tone applied in the present description), the events in the evolution of our earth have taken during the later billennia. Moreover, geology compels us to presume that all these happenings have been preceded by others. For all these layers which contain remains of animal life rest, as it were, on others, and such others, having pushed through the overlaid layers, then protrude over the surface, form mountains, and thus become visible. The tenets of geology, therefore, lead to the conclusion that all fossil-carrying layers of our earth are resting on some other layer — a conception which takes us back, so to speak, to an age of our earth which preceded all “life.” For the composition of this oldest and lowest stratum of the earth's crust shows us that, when it came into being, there could not — at least according to ideas prevailing at the present time — have been on the earth any “life” as it is today. For geology finds itself compelled to assume that the lowest stratum owes its origin to a fire-process within which any possibility of life is unthinkable. Geology, therefore, would take us back in the process of our earth-evolution to olden times when as it were out of a fire-process the oldest rock-formations and minerals originated, while only later the basic foundation of the lowest layer was overlaid by the younger, fossiliferous layers through other events, events which occurred when, through radiating its warmth into cosmic space, the earth had cooled down sufficiently to make life possible. One has to envisage all this as being accompanied by processes of a physical and chemical nature, which cannot be described in detail.\nIf in this way we look back into those oldest times of our earth when a certain degree of cooling down had already taken place (for geology conceives the earth before the time of the first rock-formation as still in a state of heat), we find our globe, evolving towards the surface, possessed of a basic layer, and we observe how over this basic layer have spread those layers which with their fossilised remains provide living witnesses of the fact that life has existed on the earth for a very long time. When we consider those oldest layers upon which the life-carrying layers are resting, and study their rock-material which consists mainly of what is called granite, 1 It must be pointed out that this lecture was given in the year 1911. Granite was formerly classified by geology as belonging to the archetypal rock-formations, as is also indicated in the descriptions given here by Rudolf Steiner. Today, the rocks included in the Archaean System are only old gneiss-formations and other crystalline schist-formations. It is held today that Granite is of eruptive origin and that there are various epochs of granite-formation. [The above statements refer in general to the actual archetypal rock-material, also when granite is spoken of. we envisage our globe in a form which, according to modern geology, still presents itself in a kind of lifeless condition. That is where the upper layers are open, and granite protrudes and forms mountains, so to speak, as a witness of the oldest times of our earth.\nWhen Goethe, who besides being a great poet was also a great student of Nature and of natural philosophy, found this oldest rock-formation of the earth — granite — it was borne in upon him that this granular rock-material is something on which, as on the bone-skeleton of the earth, everything else rests. Intuitively, Goethe experienced this as the echo of a primeval quiescence of our planet — and it was with reverence that he regarded this rock-formation. A man of his calibre was bound to contemplate the occurrences within earth-evolution not merely with his intellect but also with his heart, searching for what these remains can reveal of the earth-being. Profoundly moving and leading more deeply into the secrets than all abstract thinking are the words spoken by Goethe when face to face with this “oldest son of the earth” as he calls the granite:\n“... With such sentiments I approach you, you most ancient, most noble monument of the time. Sitting on a high, bare summit with a free view over a wide landscape, I can say to myself: There you are resting directly on ground which reaches down to the very lowest depths of the earth. No newer layer, no accumulations of alluvial deposits have interposed themselves between you and the firm basement of the primeval world; you do not walk, as you do in those fruitful, beautiful valleys, over a perpetual grave; these summits have produced nothing living, have devoured nothing living; they are prior to all life, above all life. – At this moment, as the inner attracting and moving forces of the earth are directly affecting me, as it were, while the influences of the heavens are weaving more closely about me, I become attuned to higher contemplations of nature; and as the human spirit vitalises everything, so too does a secret stir within me, a secret of a sublimity which I cannot resist. Such loveliness, I tell myself as I am looking down from this bare summit and hardly able to see some modestly growing moss far away on the river bank, such loveliness, I say, overcomes the man who wants to open his soul only to the oldest, the first and deepest sense of truth.”\nGoethe: Abhandlung über Granit.\nThat is the mood which came over Goethe when he contemplated this rock-formation, which by its whole nature showed that it could not contain anything living, and consequently could not, like the overlying layers, have engulfed anything living.\nSketchy though it is, what I have been able to illustrate so far shows nevertheless — as if outlined in a rough charcoal drawing — the picture given us by geology today of the course of the evolution of the earth and its living creatures. It was not, however, always so conceived; this way of thinking has developed only very gradually. In the days of Goethe, for instance, when he occupied himself with geology, a certain dispute was raging about the origin of our earth — the dispute between the Plutonists and the Neptunists, as it was called. One of the principal supporters of the latter was the geologist Werner, who was also acquainted with Goethe. He held that, generally speaking, nothing that we are able to observe of the accumulated layers within the earth's crust can be traced back to any kind of action by fire, but that everything we can learn from investigations points to the earth having in effect consolidated out of nothing but a watery element, out of a watery form of the planet, that even the oldest strata are alluvial deposits from water and that, consequently, granite too owes its origin not to the action of seething fire, but to watery deposits — and only in the course of time, through later occurrences, underwent changes which make its watery origin less apparent today. Everything, so to speak, has originated from water — that was the basic conception of the Neptunists and especially of Werner. Contrary to this, the contention of the Plutonists was based on the assumption that the earth, together with the whole planetary system, had emerged out of a gaseous cosmic nebula in a state of high temperature, had detached itself through cooling down, that this process of cooling continued through radiating heat into cosmic apace, and that then the time came when heat-conditions made the formation of granite and perhaps of similar kinds of rock-material possible; but that through the radiation of heat only the surface-crust of the earth was cooled down, while the interior remained in a state of fiery fluid, and that volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are living witnesses that the interior of the earth beneath the crust remains in a fiery-fluid state. The adherents of the Neptunistic school, on the other hand, saw the cause of all volcanic phenomena in processes which, through pressure from within or through chemical conditions in the interior of the. Earth — by no means thought of as fiery — made it possible for mighty catastrophes to take place in the interior and erupt outwards. So that only at this juncture events occur which in their upward trend have the effect of pushing up whole mountain-massifs out of the interior of the earth. — In short, here we see a very interesting dispute being carried on as recently as the first half of the nineteenth century about the conception which, on the one hand, can be briefly put in the words used by Goethe in his “Faust:” “Everything has its origin in water,” as against the other contention that fundamentally all terrestrial formations are the result of fire-processes and that it must be imagined that on the surface of the outer crust — corresponding in its relationship to the interior to that between the egg-shell and the yolk of the egg — events have taken place through which quite a thin layer has remained in a cooled condition, forming, as it were, a covering sheet all round the mighty earth-volcano, which this planet under our feet was conceived to be.\nNow we must ask ourselves: What has this external investigation to tell us? And what, with the means elucidated, in the lectures given so far, has spiritual science to reveal about the origin of the earth? (Concerning the present and earlier evolutionary stages of the earth, more detailed information can be found in my book “Occult Science.”) How far, then, does geology lead us? We will now put into plain words what geology can tell us. It is this: —\nLook at the layer-formations to be found in the earth's upper crust. The order of their superpositions shows that alluvial deposits have formed — in any case, in most recent times — as a result of which animal beings have been entombed, whose descendants are still on the earth, but also those which have now become extinct and of whose existence as inhabitants of the earth we know only from the excavation of their remains. Then we are led to the lowest layer of the earth's crust; it still belongs to that part which is to the whole planet what the egg-shell is to the yolk of the egg, and shows signs that it might well owe its origin to fire-action. But those with deeper insight — Goethe, for example — are more cautious in their pronouncements — also when they are intent on thinking entirely in terms of geology. And it is interesting to hear what Goethe says about this lower layer:\n“... In the innermost bowels of the earth it (this layer) rests, firm and unshaken; its back rises on high, where its summit was never reached by the all-surrounding waters. So much, and so little more, do we know of this rock-material. Composed in a mysterious way of known constituents, it does not entitle us to trace its origin to fire anymore than to water.”\nThus Goethe already points out that in the last resort neither fire-action nor water can be thought responsible for the mysterious formation of this oldest son of our earth — granite. If against the investigations of geology, which anyhow have reached a point from which they cannot lead us any further, we quite simply set down what spiritual science has to say, what clairvoyant investigation has revealed, it presents itself somewhat in the following way.\nWhen with the eyes of Spirit — which can be sharpened by the methods repeatedly indicated in these lectures — we look at the prehistoric times of our planet, we observe what would have presented itself to our physical eyes approximately during the periods covered by geological research. We also see how in this research into the past, geological investigation had to resort to speculative phantasy. And looking backward from those beings which from our human point of view we call perfect today, we come to ever less and less perfect forms of life on the earth with a mixture, at times, of grotesque forms as, for instance, the various Saurian types such as Ichthyosaurus, Plesiosaurus, Dinosaurus, Archaeopteryx. We then find creatures without any vertebrate skeleton, and so, with clairvoyant vision, we do indeed come to a tellurian epoch in which we cannot find such beings as are now living on our earth. We must admit, therefore; that drawing from its own sources, spiritual-scientific research also reveals this gradual advance in degrees of perfection. When we now go back in time and clairvoyant research comes to the period connected by geology with granite, which according to the modern theory coagulated out of the tellurian mass already cooled but still subject to the effects of fire-action, we must ask: What has geology, what has spiritual science, to regard as prerequisites for conditions prevailing in an earlier time?\nIf in the field of geology we remain on really safe ground (and no student of natural science ought to doubt what I am now saying), geology has only suppositions in regard to what precedes the granite-age; likewise geology can have no more than suppositions about conditions in the interior of the earth. For the bores that have been driven into the earth by drilling-operations reach depths which must be regarded only as tiny pin-pricks. There are suppositions, hypotheses, and nothing else — at best some dim divination about conditions which preceded the weaving and surging processes in granite-formation and so forth.\nNow spiritual science — with the specific outlook often characterised here — follows earth-evolution backward into prehistoric times and finds in the domain which eyes can observe ever less and less perfect beings as the forerunners of all forms of life on the earth at the present time. But, tracing evolution backward in this way, spiritual science finds that there is a stupendous difference in the earth's appearance as compared with what it is at present. When we go back to pre-historic times, the earth does not present itself in the very least as we know it today, as the mineral base on which we walk surrounded by air with its fog and cloud-formations and so on. A great number of substances which are now in the interior of the earth were still in the surroundings of the earth in earlier times and settled only by degrees. This must also be admitted by geology. But we find, the further we go back, that our earth appears more and more as an utterly different planetary body, becomes something totally different; as we go further back, what is now the surrounding air does in effect take on the character of a living entity; in the environment of our earth we do not find only such mineralised air and cloud-formations as we have them now, but in the most ancient times we find within all that belongs to our earth something like live members of a great living being. And as we go back in this way we can see ourselves as if we were quite tiny beings today, standing within a human organism: if, standing within it on a firm, bony base, we looked out into outer space, we should there observe the blood-system, the nervous-system and so on, like an outer world. Thus one who stood on the earth in the remote past and looked out into space would not have seen a weaving, mineralised air but intense, pulsating life . And the further we go back the more this would be the case. So that we could go back to the epoch to which we assign granite-formation and reflect: There the earth is essentially a mighty, living body, containing multifarious and varied life within it, not yet inhabited by such living beings as move today on its surface or live in the water, and so on, but having their life within it — like parasites of the entire living earth-organism, swimming as it were in its blood, as today masses of rain float through the air. And then we come to a period of which we must say: It is true that on the earth's surface the heat is so great that life cannot develop; but in the environment life is developing which wants to, but cannot descend. Why is it that it cannot descend? Down in the depths, through the fire-process, under conditions of intense heat — it is there that what the living organism of our earth segregates out of its system as our living organism segregates the hard parts, the bones from the soft parts, is first absorbed. And now we look at the granite-formation and say: Originally the material which the granite contains — quartz, feldspar and mica – is in a state of dissolution within the great living being “Earth.” The 1atter needs for its development the capability to discard these substances: it segregates them and lets them fall to earth. What is below absorbs these segregations, builds up a basic massif, a bone-structure in the living being “Earth.” And when we go still further back we must investigate the causes as to why the whole living earth segregates from its organism the substances which today, as chemical-substances, form our earth and which at the same time are not those which appertain to the animal, plant, or human organism. These chemical substances were at that time segregated in a similar way through the effect of fire or water action, and were then transformed into the bone-structure of the earth.\nWhen we now reflect how it is that there are these substances which were eliminated from the living earth-being and form a solid foundation from which life has departed, and when we search for the causes which could have brought this about — then we come to something which, if spoken of as part of the development of our earth, is still apt to cause wide-spread annoyance today — not indeed among the thinkers in natural science (for they ought to acknowledge it) but especially among those who on the strength of a few preconceived ideas want to build up a world-conception. But a true picture must be given of the facts established by the investigations of spiritual science. They show that these processes — the segregation of the rock-materials — have been preceded, within the living being of the earth, by a process which in terms of anything occurring today can only be described as similar to our own internal-functioning, little known to external science, but already described to some extent in these lectures – as similar to that activity which functions all day in our own body when through work, through mental effort, we exert our muscles or the instrument of our brain — in short, our whole body. What is in operation here is the process we call “fatigue.” It is, in essence, a kind of destructive process of the organism. Therefore we can say: As we live our waking life today from morning till night, through thinking, feeling and willing, processes of destruction are working within us which we then feel us “fatigue.” A world-conception based on natural science would not readily admit that such processes of spirit-and-soul, working into matter as they do, underlie external effects in nature. But they functioned; they were at work in that mighty organism which the earth once was. And when the earth approached the time when granite and similar material segregated, it was laid hold of by all such destructive processes — which were the means whereby forces of spirit-and-soul worked upon matter. Into that organism into which formerly were worked not only the substances appertaining today to the plant, animal and human organisms, but also the substances which today constitute our earth-massif – into this organism flowed the effects of all these destructive processes that were due to the working of forces of spirit-and-soul. These destructive processes were introduced into the life of the great being “Earth” by forces which then brought about the ejection.- through a process of segregation, as it were — of those chemical substances which today are incorporated in the make-up of our earth, and which are not to be found in organic bodies.\nThus spiritual science leads us back to the earth as an organism — not to a primeval state in which the earth was, so to speak, dead matter; on the contrary, the earth was originally a mighty organism. From the point of view of spiritual science one must practically reverse the way of asking a question that is put quite wrongly today. No science which assumes that the earth was once a dead globe in which only chemical and physical processes were active will be able to explain how life could arise out of this dead globe. This is a highly controversial question; but as a rule it is put quite wrongly. For generally people ask: How could “life” have developed out of the lifeless? — But that is not how it is: the living is not preceded by the lifeless, but them reverse is the case; the lifeless is preceded by the living . The lifeless mineral is a product of segregation, as our bones are segregations of our organism. Similarly, all rock-material is a product of segregation in the earth-organism, and processes of spirit-and-soul forces — processes of destruction in the first place — are the means of producing such segregations in the organism of the earth. And were we to go further back we should see how this path would lead us much further still. We are led by what operates in the mineral domain to the earth as an organism, and indeed we already see, as we go still further back, that we are being led not only to an organism, but to a formation of our planet that is permeated with the working of forces of spirit-and-soul. No longer do we trace life back to the lifeless, but we trace the lifeless back to processes of segregation from the living, and we regard the living as a state emanating from the sphere of the spirit and of the soul . And the further we go back, the nearer we come to that sphere in which lies the real origin of the present minerals, the plant-forms and so on: we approach the Spiritual and we let spiritual science tell us that it was not merely out of a lifeless, fiery nebula that there came into existence all that we perceive in the manifold forms of earthly phenomena, but that all this has taken shape out of the Spiritual, that originally our earth was pure Spirit, and that the course of evolution was such that on the one side emerged those forms which tend more towards the mineral element, and that on the other side the possibility arose for certain new forms to develop, capable of responding to spiritual functions of a new order. For if we now proceed in the opposite direction and say: In the old rock-material we have something which segregated out of the original organism of the earth, and if we then go on to our present age, this segregation is going on all the time. Granite is merely the oldest segregation ; but the processes which bring about the segregation will be ever less and less living processes; for more and more they will tend to be mere chemical, mere mechanical processes; so that at last, in our time, we still have only those effects due to water-action, which can be observed when, for instance, a river carries rock-material from one place to another. But what we perceive there as the result of mechanical-chemical processes is only the final product; this has turned into the minerals in accordance with the laws of nature; it is a state resulting from what was originally at work in the realm of the life-forces.\nAnd so we see how actually in the course of the development of our earth something takes place in connection with the formation of the ground beneath us, which we find in a similar way in the individual human or animal organism. There we see, how a man lives to a certain age, how he then passes through the gate of death, leaving his body as a corpse, and we see the continuation of those processes which are purely mineral processes; during the body's lifetime, however, these chemical and physical processes were an integral part of those working through the forces of spirit-and-soul. Similarly we come back to a time of earth-existence when the processes which today are of a chemical and mechanical nature were caught up and perpetuated by organic — yes, by spiritual and soul-processes. But what is taking place on the ground formation of our earth is, so to speak, only the one stream, left from earlier — to begin with more living, organic processes — and then spiritual processes. This foundation had to come into existence, had to form itself, so that on its firm ground, life of a different order could function – that life which gradually became our life, in order that as time went on such cerebral instruments could develop in living beings which enabled them to become “inwardly” aware of the spirit, inwardly able to form thoughts and produce feelings which, as it were, repeat the outer processes in reflective and emotional awareness. Therefore the whole mass of our earth's substance had to be “sifted,” the present purely mineral substances had to be discarded — and those retained which today can form the organisms which are permeated by a part only of the substance of the old massif. These are the parts which only now can form themselves, for example, into what man is today. The spirit which lives in the human head, in the human heart, that is to say in a being whose organisation is as it were, more refined than that of the planetary being of the earth as a whole, this spirit could only originate in a being from which were eliminated those substances which today do not belong to organic 1ife. This “sifting” of the whole mass of our earth's substance had taken place, and the one part was given over as a foundation to the purely mineral life in order that on it can develop a new life, which we see entering its lowest form at the moment which in later times geology has marked as that of the emergence of the most primitive beings in Cambrian form.\nWhen, with the outlook of spiritual science, we thus observe life as it is today, we shall have to say: This life was originally in the outer atmosphere encircling the earth; then it descended as it were, but could not set foot on the surface of the earth until after it had sent down in advance all that it needed of mass-substance — as a basis on which to function. The process of decomposition, caused by processes in the domain of the spirit-and-soul forces, introduces two currents which have since been in operation: an ascending current, which unfolded a life of a finer, higher order – this needed only a part of the mass-substances — and another current which continued the process of decomposition and provides a foundation for the finer organisms, which then culminate in the human being. The development of these finer organisms is in the ascendancy. Why? Because (and again this would not be admitted today) through having segregated the coarsest material as in a mighty process of elimination, which then became the surface of the earth, they were in a position to isolate themselves more or less from the earth and its inner processes — and are now open to cosmic influences streaming towards the earth from outside. They are now exposed to the more spiritual effects of the cosmos and it is to this that they owe the ascent from primitive forms of life to that of man.\nLooking thus at the development of the earth, we regard the firm ground on which we walk – irrespective of the various processes — in such a way that we say to ourselves: On it we stand; it contains — in the granite and in the superimposed deposits — that which the kingdoms of the living beings could not use except as material ejected to form the ground on which to walk. And what exists as its continuation is a process of destruction and decomposition. That should logically lead to the following reflection – When the modern geologist gives us his explanation of the earth's crust with its valleys and mountains built up in successive layers, this would appear to be something like a decaying corpse, in which an old process of destruction and decomposition continues to work. From the standpoint of spiritual science, we move about on a ground in process of destruction which had to come about in order to give us the firm, solid ground we need when we consider the blossoming forces which point to the future and move in the opposite direction to those we encounter in the body of the earth; for these future-building forces are something which, independent of the solid ground of the earth penetrates into human souls, into human spirits, perhaps also into those beings which are outside the human element, and are only beginning their ascent on the foundation of the solid earth. In the latter itself we should, however, have something in a state of decomposition. From the point of view of spiritual science our earth would appear as a progressively disintegrating dead body, and the geological laws would at the same time be those governing the decomposition of the earth-corpse. And man on earth would be a being who lifts himself out of the dead earth body, just as the human soul, passing through the gate of death, rises from the corpse and abandons it to those forces which bring about its decomposition and destruction.\nThis may seem to be a gloomy picture. But it can only be so if one despairs of the spirit, regards the spirit as merely bound to matter, and believes that together with man's desertion of the living body of the earth, his end has come. But if we look at things as presented by a sound observation of nature, we shall say: In some way it must obviously come about that not only the individual human being but the whole of humanity gradually throws off the earth-body in order to be able to rise step by step to other realms of development. And so, from the standpoint of spiritual science, the mid-period of earth-evolution had already been passed ever since the time when “the oldest son of the earth” was segregated, and the beings which are beginnings in preparation for the future will unfold further on the foundation thus laid down.\nWhat does modern geology say to this conception of spiritual science?\nWhen dealing with words, theories, hypotheses, world-conceptions so light-heartedly and readily advanced by currents of thought on factional lines and the like, it is easy enough to demonstrate that spiritual science in itself is a contradiction of the way of thinking prevailing in natural science. But if spiritual science, which works as conscientiously and, methodically as any other science, is considered in relation to natural science, it is obviously necessary to pay attention to what natural science really has to say and, particularly in reference to what has been brought forward today, to raise the question: What has geology to say concerning the origin of the earth? — Nowadays, things of a very secondary nature are often presented to the general public in popular scientific publications and in the form of popular views of the world; and then it is said: “Science” has established this end that. If this is compared with what those half-crazy spiritual investigators say, it will strike a good many people as something which cannot be taken at all seriously. — For that is what will be said by many people who perhaps do not know much more about spiritual science than what has come to them indirectly through remote sources. But clearly there is need to turn to what real science and real spiritual science have to say. For spiritual science must not be regarded as being on a par with popular world-conceptions which are only seemingly derived from “science;” spiritua1 science must be examined with the sternness which should be applied to every true science and which its genuine investigators will always demand.\nAnd now we come to somethin6 which I cannot describe to you better than by drawing your attention to a work by one of the most eminent geologists of our time, and which a well-known contemporary geologist has called “the geological epic of the nineteenth century,” namely “The Face of the Earth” by Eduard Suess. It can truly be said that this work, on which Suess has been engaged not merely for years but for decades, gives a comprehensive survey — compiled with the greatest care imaginable — of the investigations which geology, this youngest branch of natural science, has carried out in the course of a few decades. And what does this book show us?\nSuess is a man who said: Let us for once set aside all the prejudices of the Neptunists, of the Plutonists, and all the theories amassed by the geologists of the nineteenth century; do not let us speculate, but let us observe the physiognomy, the picture presented by the earth's surface. Starting from a mental attitude based, it is true; on sense-perception but pure and unclouded by any theory or hypotheses. Eduard Suess arrived at results which differed from those that had been current for many decades. He came to the conclusion that the mountains which tower over us as seemingly mighty massifs, can after all only be likened to wrinkles on the peel of an apple, and can be explained in no other way than by assuming that certain forces of a purely physical-chemical nature are at work in the body of the earth-planet, as the result of which the unevenness, the valleys and mountains, the various layers and so on, have been formed; so that generally speaking, the distribution of water and land, the formation of continents and so forth, can be explained as the result of folds being formed, of certain forces piling up earth-massifs and thus forcing some particular masses of rock up into towering mountains. Other forces again have brought about the collapse of what has been piled on high; and in that way oceans are formed. In short, to such collapses, up-pilings, foldings and the like, he ascribes, for instance, the formation of the Alps. In an ingenious way we are thus shown that the face of the earth has emerged as the result of such aggregations, subsidences, foldings and so on. The formation of oceans and continents is explained asbeing brought about through certain subsidences causing the waters to be drained off in one direction, so that what had formerly been covered by sea becomes dry land. We are therefore concerned here with an earth-surface subject to processes due to a shaking up of earth-masses through mechanical forces, and to subsidences. And in trying to obtain a general picture of what is happening on the ground on which we walk, Suess arrives at an odd conclusion: that fundamentally the whole process that is taking place on the earth's surface is one of destruction, and that the ground where today we plough the fields and which yields to us the fruits of the earth, only came into existence through the occurrence elsewhere of foldings, subsidences — in short, through processes of destruction. I need quote only a short passage from this most important work of present-day geology and you wil1 see where Eduard Suess's purely sense-perceptive method of research has led this most conscientious natural scientist:\n“... The collapse of the globe is what we are witnessing. True, it had already begun a very long time ago, and so the brevity of the span of human life lets us be of good cheer. Not only are there traces of it in the high mountain ranges. Great blocks of earth have sunk hundreds, yes, in certain cases, many thousands of feet, and not the slightest sign of graded subsidences on the surface, but only the differences in the kinds of rock or deep mining betray the existence of a fracture. Time has levelled everything. In Bohemia, in the Palatinate, in Belgium, in Pennsylvania, in numerous places, the plough draws its furrows above the mightiest fractures.”\n(Eduard Suess, Das Antlitz der Erde, Vol. 1, page 778.)\nHere we have the results of conscientious scientific research concerning the ground on which we walk. And now think of what spiritual science has to say about the inauguration of this process through a process of destruction proceeding from forces of spirit-and-soul, a process which on the one side has its continuation in the physical-mechanical process of destruction taking place on the earth's surface, and which careful research impels geology to admit. So it is in all fields. When you take the results of real research and go by facts, you will always find: here stands spiritual science with all it has to say out of clairvoyant research, and there, provided only that it is free from monastic, materialistic or other prejudices, natural science stands firmly on the pure and sound basis of facts; and everywhere, as you will see, spiritual science links up with natural science in such a way that the latter on the pure basis of facts provides ample proof of what spiritual science as such has to offer. Never are there any grounds for contradictions between spiritual science and true natural science. Contradictions arise only between a sound spiritual science which deals with realities, and the theories of phantasts and of those who, while they claim to be standing on the firm ground of science, at once lose their foothold when their theories do not concur with what the facts proclaim, and adhere to what they themselves would like to say about the facts. Spiritual science lets the spiritual facts speak for themselves and tell what they have to reveal of the cosmic mysteries; natural science speaks of what it has established by its own methods: the two are in full concord. If you ignore those popular works which declare this or that to be a “scientific fact” and go to the sources, then you will find, especially in the field of geology, that the geologists everywhere get to a certain point — and then put a question-mark. Arriving at those question-marks, one can take them as a starting-point for spiritual research. Then spiritual science tells us: if it is true what clairvoyance reveals, the external factual material must appear in this or that form. — In the case of geology it was this: if what spiritual science has to describe is right, then, with the present process of decomposition continuing, our globe must now be in a state of collapse. Geology, adhering to facts, has shown that according to the laws it is so! The findings of true natural science everywhere are in line with the results of spiritual scientific investigation.\nWhen we consider the whole spirit and meaning of this exposition, we shall in no wise be taken aback by the thought that we are walking on ground which is a dead body in process of disintegration. For we realise that on this ground something has developed which again contains seeds for the future. The lectures to follow will show more and more clearly that just as man looks to his spirit, so the spiritual, which once created for its own purpose the ground on which we set our feet, is advancing towards future epochs when it will be revealed on ever and ever higher planes. And when such a man as the geologist Suess — because in his intercourse with nature he enters into all that is beautifu1, even in the destructive processes — expresses his admiration for the wonders of the Face of the Earth, he clothes it in his monumental work in these memorable words:\n“In the face of these open questions we rejoice in the sunshine, in the starry firmament and in all the manifold features on the face of our earth, which has been created by these very processes — recognising at the same time the extent to which life is governed by the character and destiny of the planet.”\nIf even a geologist, rising above all pessimism, experiences such a moment in his soul, how much more does the spiritual investigator who knows the truth of the words of Goethe: “Nature has invented death in order to have abundant life,” and who also knows through perceptive cognition that it is true to say, “Nature has invented death in order to have ever higher and ever more spiritual life;” how much more must the spiritual investigator, knowing this, say: Although we have to regard that which has produced out of itself a higher life as a corpse in process of destruction, nevertheless in all that moves on this ground we see, lighting up seeds of what can quicken hope and assurance in our hearts and tells us: We walk on the ground which a primeval world has given us, and which, through a process of disintegration, or destruction, has let the ground under our feet become what it is. We walk on this ground, divining – as in the spirit we rise to heavenly heights — that in the course of future development we shall have to leave this ground at the right time, in order that we may be received into the fold of the spiritual world with which, if we have the right understanding, our inmost being feels so firmly united."
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-12",
    "title": "Hermes and the Mysteries of Ancient Egypt",
    "date": "16 Feb 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/GC1987/19110216p02.html",
    "book_title": "Turning Points Spiritual History",
    "content": "It is of great importance to Spiritual Science to follow the gradual development of man’s spirit, from epoch to epoch, as it slowly evolves, and pressing ever upward, emerges from the dark shadows of the past. Hence it is that the study of ancient Egyptian culture and spiritual life is of especial moment. This is found to be particularly the case when we endeavour to picture and live in the atmosphere and conditions associated with the latter.\nThe echoes which reach us from the dim grey vistas of by-gone times seem as full of mystery as is the countenance of the Sphinx itself, which stands so grimly forth as a monument to ancient Egyptian civilization. This mystery becomes intensified as modern external scientific research finds that it is constrained to delve ever deeper and deeper into the remote past, in order to throw light upon later Egyptian culture; regarding which most important documents are extant. Such investigations have found traces of certain things, clearly related to the active cultural life of Egypt, which date back to a period at least 7,000 years before the beginning of the Christian era. Here, then, is one reason why this particular civilization is of such paramount interest, but there is another, namely, present-day man, although living in times of broader and more general enlightenment has nevertheless a feeling, whether acceptable or not, that this ancient culture is in some singular and mysterious manner, connected with his very aims and ideals.\nIt is indeed significant that a man of such outstanding intellect as Kepler , should, at the very dawn of modern scientific development, have been moved to express the feelings which came over him, while engaged in astronomical research, in words somewhat as follows: — ‘During my attempt to discover the manner of the passing of the planets around the sun, I have sought to peer into the deep secrets of the cosmos; the while it has oft-times seemed as if my fancy had led me into the mysterious sanctuaries of the old Egyptians — to touch their most holy vessels, and draw them forth that I might bestow them upon a new world. At such moments the thought has come to me, that only in the future will the true purport and intent of my message be disclosed.’\nHere we find one of the greatest scientists of modern times overcome by a sense of such close relation to the ancient Egyptian culture, that he could find no better way of expressing the fundamental concepts underlying his work, than by representing them as a regeneration, naturally differing as to word and form, of the occult doctrines taught to the disciples and followers in the by-gone Egyptian Sanctuaries. It is therefore a matter of the greatest interest to us that we should realize the actual sentiments of these olden Egyptian peoples, in regard to the whole meaning and nature of their civilization.\nThere is an ancient legend that has been handed down through Greek tradition which is most suggestive, not only of what the Egyptians themselves felt regarding their culture, but also the way in which their civilization was looked upon by the ancients as a whole. We are told that an Egyptian sage once said to Solon: — ‘You Greeks are still children, you have never grown up, and all your knowledge has been acquired through your own human observation and senses; you have neither traditions nor doctrines grey with age.’ We first learn what is implied by the expression, ‘doctrines grey with age‘, when the methods of Spiritual Science are employed in an endeavour to throw light upon the nature and significance of Egyptian thought and feeling. But, as has been before stated, when we approach this matter we must bear in mind that during successive periods of man’s development he gradually acquired different forms of consciousness, and that that order of conscious apprehension which is ours to-day, with its scientific method of thought, and through which we realize the outer world in virtue of our senses working in conjunction with reason and intellect, did not always exist. Deep down, underlying all human cognition, there is what we term ‘Evolution’, and evolution affects not only the outer world of form, but also the disposition of man’s soul. It follows, that we can only really understand the events which took place at the ancient centres of culture, when we accept that knowledge which Spiritual Science can alone obtain, from the sources of information at its disposal. We thus learn that in olden times instead of our present intellectual consciousness, there existed a clairvoyant state that differed from our customary normal conscious condition, of which we are cognizant from the moment we awake until we again fall asleep. On the other hand, the ancient clairvoyant state cannot be likened to the insensibility produced by slumber. Hence, the primeval consciousness of prehistoric man should be regarded as an intermediate condition now only faintly apparent, and retained, as one might say, atavistically in the form of an attenuated heritage in the picture world of our dreams.\nNow, dreams are for the most part chaotic in character, and therefore meaningless in their relation to ordinary life. But the old clairvoyant consciousness, which also found expression in imagery although often of a somewhat subdued and visionary nature, was nevertheless a truly clairvoyant gift, and its symbolical manifestations had reference, not to our physical world, but to that realm which lies beyond all material things, in other words — the world of spirit. We can say that in reality all clairvoyant consciousness, including the dream-state of primitive man, as well as that acquired to-day through those methods to which we have previously referred, finds expression pictorially and not in concepts and ideas, as is the case with externalized physical consciousness. It is for the possessor of such faculty to interpret the symbols presented in terms of those spiritual realities, which underlie all physical perceptual phenomena.\nWe have reached a point where we can look back on the evolution of the ancient races, and of a surety say: — Those wondrous visions of by-gone times of which tradition tells us, were not born of childish fantasy and false conception of the works of Nature (this, as I have pointed out, is the wide-spread opinion in the materialistic circles of to-day), but were in truth veritable pictures of the Spirit-World, flashed before the souls of men in that now long distant past.\nHe who seriously studies the old mythologies and legends, not from the point of view of modern materialistic thought, but with an understanding of the creation and spiritual activities of mankind, will find in these strange stories a certain coherence which harmonizes wonderfully with those cosmic principles that dominate all physical, chemical and biological laws; while there rings throughout the ancient mythological and religious systems a tone of spiritual reality, from which they acquire a true significance.\nWe must clearly realize that the peoples of the various nations, each according to disposition, temperament and racial or folk-character, formed different conceptions of that vision world in which they conceived higher powers to be actively operating behind the accustomed forces of Nature. Further, that during the gradual course of evolution, mankind passed through many transitionary stages between that of the consciousness of the ancients, and our present-day objective conscious state. As time went on, the power necessary to the old clairvoyance dimmed and the visions faded; one might say — the doors leading to the higher realms were slowly closed, so that the pictures manifested to those whose souls could still peer into the Spirit-World, held ever less and less of spiritual force, until towards the end, only the lowest stages of supersensible activity could be apprehended. Finally, this primeval clairvoyant power died out, in so far as humanity in general was concerned, and man’s vision became limited to that which is of the material world, and to the apprehension of physical concepts and things; from that time on, the study of the interrelation of these factors led, step by step, to the birth of modern science. Thus it came about, that when the old clairvoyant state was past, our present intellectual consciousness gradually developed in diverse ways among the different nations.\nThe mission of the Egyptian peoples was of a very special nature. All that we know regarding ancient times, even that knowledge attained through modern Egyptian research, if rightly understood, tends but to verify the statements of Spiritual Science regarding the allotted task and true purpose of the Egyptian race. It was ordained that these olden peoples should still be imbued with a sufficiency of that primal power which would enable them to look back into the misty past; when their leaders in virtue of outstanding individualities and highly developed clairvoyant faculties, could gaze far into the mysteries of the Spirit-World. [Spiritual Science asserts that it was in accordance with ‘The Great Eternal Plan‘ that the Egyptians should gain wisdom and understanding from this source, to be a guide and a benefit in the development of mankind.] And we have learnt that it was to this end that this great nation was still permitted to retain a certain measure of that fast-fading clairvoyant power so closely associated with a specific disposition of soul. Although these qualities were, at that time, weak and ever waning in intensity, nevertheless they continued active until a comparatively late period in Egyptian history.\nWe can therefore make this statement: — The Egyptians, down to less than 1000 years before the Christian era, had actual experience of a mode of vision differing from that with which we are familiar in every-day life, when we merely open our eyes and make use of our intellect; and they knew that through this gift man was enabled to behold the spiritual realms. The later Egyptians, however, were unable to penetrate beyond the nethermost regions as portrayed in their pictorial visions, but they had power to recall those by-gone times in the Golden Age of Egyptian culture, when their priesthood could gaze both far and deeply into the world of spirit.\nAll knowledge obtained through visions was most carefully guarded and secretly preserved for thousands of years with the greatest piety, thankfulness and religious feeling, especially by the older Egyptians. At a later period, those among the people who still retained somewhat of clairvoyant power, expressed themselves after this fashion: — ‘We can yet discern a lower spiritual realm — we know therefore that it is possible for mankind to look upon a Spirit-World; to question this truth would be as sensible as to doubt that we can really see external objects with our eyes.’ Although these later Egyptians were only able to apprehend weak echoes, as it were, of the inferior spiritual levels, nevertheless they felt and divined that in olden times man could indeed penetrate far into the mystic depths of that realm which lies beyond all physical sense perceptions. There is a doctrine grey with age, still preserved in wonderful inscriptions in Temples and upon columns. (It was this doctrine to which the sage referred when he spoke to Solon.) These inscriptions tell us of the broad deep penetration of clairvoyant power in the remote past.\nThat being to whom the Egyptians attributed all the profundity of their primordial clairvoyant enlightenment they called THE GREAT WISE ONE — THE OLD HERMES. When, at a later period, some other outstanding leader came to revive the ancient wisdom, he also called himself Hermes, according to an old custom prevalent among exalted Egyptian sages, and because his followers believed that in him the primeval wisdom of the old Hermes lived once again. They named the first Hermes, — ‘Hermes Trismegistos‘ — the Thrice-Great Hermes; but as a matter of fact it was only the Greeks who used the name of Hermes, for among the Egyptians he was known as ‘Thoth‘. In order to understand this being, it is necessary to realize what the Egyptians, under the influence of traditions concerning Thoth, regarded as true and characteristic cosmic mystics.\nSuch Egyptian beliefs as have come to us, one might say from outside sources, seem very strange indeed. Various Gods, of whom the most important are Osiris and Isis, are represented as not wholly human; oft-times having a human body and an animal head, or again formed of the most varied combinations of manlike and animal shapes. Remarkable religious legends have come down to us regarding this world of the Gods.\nAgain, the veneration and worship of cats and other animals by this ancient race was most singular, and went to such lengths that certain animals were considered as holy, and held in the greatest reverence, and in them the Egyptians saw something akin to higher beings. It has been said that this veneration for animals was such that when a cat, for instance, which had lived for a long time in one house, died, there was much weeping and lamentation. If an Egyptian observed a dead animal lying by the wayside, he did not dare to go near it, for fear that someone might accuse him of having slain it, in which case he would be liable to severe punishment. Even during the time that Egypt was actually under Roman rule, so it has been said, any Roman who killed a cat went in danger of his life, because such an act produced an uproar among the Egyptians. This veneration of animals appears to us as a most enigmatic part of Egyptian thought and feeling. Again, how extraordinary do the Pyramids, with their quadrilateral bases and triangular sides, seem to modern man; and how mysterious are the sphinxes and all that modern research drags forth from the depths of this ancient civilization and brings to the surface, to add to our knowledge an ever-increasing clarity. The question now arises: — What place did all these strange ideas occupy in the image world of the souls of those olden peoples? What had they to say regarding those things which the Thrice-Great Hermes had taught them, and how did they come by these curious concepts?\nWe must henceforth accustom ourselves to seek in all legends a deeper meaning, especially in those which are the more important. It is to be assumed that the purpose of some of these legends, is to convey to us in picture form, information regarding certain laws which govern spiritual life, and are set above external laws. As an example we have the fable of the god and goddess, Osiris and Isis. It was Hermes himself who called the Egyptian legends ‘The Wise Counsellors of Osiris‘. In all these fables, Osiris is a being who in the grey dawn of primeval times lived in the region where man now dwells. In the legend Osiris, who is represented as a benefactor of humanity, and under whose wise influence Hermes, or Thoth, gave to the Egyptians their ancient culture, even to the conduct of material life, was said to have an enemy whom the Greeks called Typhon. This enemy, Typhon, waylaid Osiris and slew him, then cut up his body, hid it in a coffin, and threw it into the sea. The goddess Isis, wife and sister of Osiris, sought long her husband who had been thus torn from her by Typhon, or Seth, and when she had at last found him, she gathered together the pieces into which he had been divided, and buried them here and there in various parts of the land, and in these places temples were erected. Later, Isis gave birth to Horos. Now, Horos was also a higher being, and his birth was brought about through spirit influence which descended upon Isis from Osiris, who had meanwhile passed into another world. The mission of Horos was to vanquish Typhon, and in a certain sense re-establish control of the life-current emanating from Osiris, which would continue to flow and influence mankind.\nA legend such as this must not be regarded simply as an allegory, nor as a mere symbolism; in order to understand it rightly, we must enter into the whole world of Egyptian feeling and perception. It is far more important to do this than to form abstract concepts and ideas; for by thus opening the mind, we can alone give life to the sentiments and thoughts associated with the ideal forms of Osiris and Isis. Further, it is useless to attempt to explain these two outstanding figures by saying that Osiris represents the Sun, and Isis the Moon, and so forth — thus giving them an astronomical interpretation, as is the custom of the sciences of to-day outside of Spiritual Science — for such a theory leads to the belief that a legend of this nature is a mere symbolical portrayal of certain events connected with the heavens, and this is not true. We must go far back to the primeval feelings of the Egyptians, and from these as a starting-point try to realize the whole peculiar nature of their uplifted vision of the supersensible, and conception of those invisible forces beyond man’s apprehension which underlie the perceptual world. It is the spiritual interrelation of these factors that finds expression in the ideal forms of Osiris and Isis.\nThe old Egyptians associated these two figures with ideas similar to the following: There is a latent higher spiritual essence in all mankind which did not emanate from that material environment in which it now functions; at the beginning of earth-life it entered into physical bodily existence in condensed form, there slowly to unfold and grow throughout the ages. Man’s human state was preceded by another and more spiritual condition, and it is from this primordial condition from which the human being gradually developed. The Egyptian said: — ‘When I look into my soul, I realize that there is within me a longing for spiritual things; a longing for that true spirituality from which I have descended, and I know that certain of the supersensible forces which operate in the region from which I come still live within me, and that the best of these are intimately related to the ultimate source of all superperceptual activity. Thus do I feel within me an Osiris power, which placed me here — a spirit embodied in external human form. In times past, before I came to this state, I lived wholly in a spiritual realm, where my life was confused, dim and instinctive in character. It was ordained that I be clothed with a material body, so that I should experience and behold a physical world, in order that I might develop therein. I know of a verity that in the beginning I have lived a life which compared to this physical perceptual existence, was indeed of the spirit.’\nAccording to ancient Egyptian concepts the primordial forces underlying human evolution were regarded as dual, the one element being termed Osiris, while the other was known as Isis; hence we have an Osiris-Isis duality. When we give ourselves over to inner contemplation and are moved by the feelings and perceptions of the old Egyptians concerning this dualism, we at once find that we are involved in a process of active and suggestive thought, leading to certain conclusions. In order to follow this mental process we have only to consider the manner in which the mind operates when we think of some object, such for instance as a triangle. In this case, active thought must precede the actual conception of the figure. After the soul has been thus engaged in primary contemplation, we then turn our minds passively to the result of our thought concepts, and finally see the fruit of our mental activity pictured in the soul. The act of thinking has the same relation to final thought, as the act of conceiving to the final concept, or activity to the result of activity or its ultimate product. If we contemplate our mental process when we picture the Egyptian past, and are mindful of the mood of these ancient peoples, we realize that they looked upon the relation between Osiris and Isis in a somewhat similar manner to our conception of the order and outcome of thought activity. For instance, we might consider that activity should be regarded as a Male, or Father-Principle, and that therefore the Osiris-Principle must be looked upon as an active Male-Principle, a combative principle, which imbues the soul with thoughts and feelings of potency and vigour.\n[We can form an idea of the old Egyptian concept concerning Osiris and Isis from the following considerations]: — In the physical body of man are certain components such as those that are active in the blood and those which are the basis of bone formation. The whole human system owes its being to the interaction of forces and matter, which combine to create and to enter the material form; these elements can be physically recognized, they were, however, at one time dispersed, and spread throughout the universe. A similar idea prevailed among the ancient Egyptians concerning their conception of Osiris-Force, which was conceived as actively pervading the entire cosmos, as Osiris. Even as the elements which form the physical body enter into it, there to combine and become operative, so did those olden peoples picture the Osiris-Force, as descending upon man to flow into his being and inspire within him the power of constructive thought and cognition — the veritable Osiris-Force. On the other hand, the expression Isis-Force was applied to that universal living cosmic influence which flows directly into the thoughts, concepts and ideas of mankind — it was this influence that was termed the Isis-Force. It is in the above manner that we must picture the uplifted vision in the souls of the old Egyptians, and it was thus that they regarded Osiris and Isis.\nIn that creation which surrounds us during our material existence, the ancient consciousness could find no words wherewith to express concepts such as these; for everything which is about us appeals alone to the senses, and has only meaning and value in a perceptual world, proffering no outer sign suggestive of a superphysical region. In order, therefore, to obtain something in the nature of a written language, which could express all such thoughts as moved the soul strongly, as for instance, when man exclaimed: — ‘The Osiris-Isis-Force works within me,’ the ancients reached out to that script which is written in the firmament by the heavenly bodies, and said: — That supersensible power which man feels as Osiris, can be apprehended and expressed in perceptual terms if regarded as that active force emanating from the sun and spread abroad in the great cosmos. The Isis-Force may be pictured as the sun’s rays reflected from the moon which waits upon the sun, so that she may pass on the power of his radiance in the form of Isis-Influence. But until she receives his light the moon is dark — dark as a soul untouched by active uplifting thought. When the old Egyptian said: — ‘The sun and the moon that are without reveal to me how I can best express, figuratively, my ideas concerning all that I feel within my soul,’ he knew that there was some hidden bond, in no way fortuitous, between these two heavenly bodies which appear so full of mystery in the vast universe — the light-giving sun and the dark moon every ready to reflect his splendour. And he realized that the light dispersed in space, and that reflected, must bear some unknown but definite relation to those supersensible powers of which he was conscious.\nWhen we look at a clock we cannot see what it is that moves the hands so mysteriously, apparently with the aid of little demons, for all that can be seen is a piece of mechanism; but we know that underlying the whole mechanical structure, is the thought of the original designer, which thought had its origin in the soul of a man; so that in reality the mechanism owes its construction to something spiritual. Now, just as the movements of the hands of a clock are mutually related, and fundamentally dependent upon certain mechanical laws which exist in the universe, and finally upon those that are operative in the soul of a man (as when he speaks of experiencing the influence of the Osiris-Isis-Force), so are the movements of the Sun and Moon interrelated, and these bodies appear to us as indicators on the face of a mighty cosmic clock. The Egyptian did not merely say: — ‘The Sun and Moon are to me a perceptual symbol of the relation between Osiris and Isis,’ but he felt and expressed himself thus: —‘That force which gives me life and is within, underlies the mysterious bond existing between the Sun and Moon, and it likewise endowed them with power to send forth light.’\nIn the same way as Osiris and Isis were regarded with reference to the Sun and Moon, so were other heavenly bodies looked upon as related to different gods. The ancient Egyptians considered that the positions of the various orbs in space were not merely symbolical of their own supersensible experiences, but likewise of those which tradition told them had been the experiences of seers belonging to the remote past. Further, they saw in the cosmic clock an expression of the activity of those forces, the workings of which they felt in the ultimate depths of the human soul. Thus it came about that this mighty clock, this grand creation of moving orbs, so wondrously interrelated with others that are fixed, was to the Egyptians a revelation of those mysterious spiritual powers which bring about the ever-changing positions of the heavenly bodies, and thus create an universal script, which man must learn to know and to recognize as a means whereby superperceptual power is given perceptual expression.\nSuch were the feelings and perceptions which had been handed down to the old Egyptians from their ancient seers, regarding a higher spiritual world of the existence of which they were wholly convinced, for they still retained a last remnant of primeval clairvoyant power. These olden peoples said: — ‘We human beings had our true origin in an exalted spiritual realm, but we are now descended into a perceptual world, in which manifest material things and physical happenings, nevertheless, we are indeed come from the world of Osiris and of Isis. All that is best and which strives within us, and is fitted to attain to yet higher states of perfection, has of a verity flowed in upon us from Osiris and from Isis, and lives unseen within as active force. Physical man was born of those conditions which are of the external perceptual world, and his material form is but as a garment clothing the Osiris-Isis spirit within.’\nPredominant in the souls of the old Egyptians was a profound sentiment concerning primeval wisdom, which filled their whole soul-life. The soul may indeed incline towards abstract notions, particularly the mathematical concepts of natural science, without in any way touching the moral and ethical factors of its life, nor affecting its fate or state of bliss. For instance, there may be discussion and debate relative to electrical and other forces, without the soul being moved to enter upon grave questions concerning man’s ultimate destiny.\nOn the other hand, we cannot ponder upon feelings and sentiments such as we have described regarding the Spirit-World and the inner relation of the soul’s character to Osiris and Isis, without arousing thoughts involving man’s happiness, his future, and his moral impulses. When the mind is thus occupied, man’s meditations are prone to take this form: — ‘There dwells in me a better self, but because of what I am within my physical body, this “better self” is repressed and draws back, it is therefore not at first apparent. An Osiris and an Isis nature are fundamental to me; these, however, belong to a primordial world — to a by-gone golden age — to the holy past; now they are overcome by those forces that have fashioned the human form. But the Osiris-Isis power has entered and persists within that mortal covering which is ever subject to destruction through the external forces of Nature.’\nThe ‘Legend of Osiris and Isis‘ may be expressed in terms of feeling and sentiment in the following manner: — Osiris, the higher power in man, which is spread throughout cosmic space, is overcome by those forces which bring about utter degeneration in all human nature. Typhon confined the Osiris-Force within the body, as in a coffin formed to receive man’s spiritual counterpart; there the Osiris-Element lies concealed — invisible and unheeded by the outer world. (The name Typhon has linguistic connection with the words — ‘Auflösen‘, to dissolve; and ‘Verwesen‘, to decompose.) The Isis-Nature, hidden within the confines of the soul, was always mysterious to the Egyptians. They considered that at some future period its influence would bring mankind back to that state which he enjoyed in the beginning; and that this return would ultimately be brought about through the penetrative force of intellectual power; for they fully recognized that in humanity there is a latent disposition which ever strives to re-endow Osiris with life.\nThe Isis-Force lies deep within the soul, and its profound purpose is to lead mankind, step by step, away from his present material state, and bring him back once more to Osiris.\nIt is this Isis-Force which — so long as man does not cling to his physical quality — makes it possible for him (even though he remain outwardly a physical man in a material world) to detach himself from his perceptual nature, and henceforth and for ever more to look upward from within his being to that more exalted Ego, which in the opinion of the most advanced thinkers, lies so mysteriously veiled at the very root of man’s powers of thought and action. This being, not the outer physical one, but the true inner man who has ever the stimulus to strive towards higher spiritual enlightenment, is as it were, the earth-born son of that Osiris who did not go forth into the material world, but remained as if concealed in the realms of the spirit. In their souls, the Egyptians regarded this invisible personality that struggles toward the attainment of a higher self, as Horos — the posthumous son of Osiris. It was thus that these old Egyptians visualized, with a certain feeling of sadness, the Osiris-origin of man; but at the same time they looked inward and said: — ‘The soul has still retained something of the Isis-Force which gave birth to Horos, the possessor of that never-ceasing impulse to strive upward towards spiritual heights, and it is there , in that sublimity, that man shall once again find Osiris.’\nIt is possible for present-day humanity to bring about this mystic meeting in two ways. The Egyptian said: — ‘I have come from Osiris, and to Osiris I shall return, and because of my spiritual origin, Horos lies deep within my being and Horos leads me on, back to Osiris — to his Father — who may alone be found in the world of spirit; for he can in no way enter into man’s physical nature; there he is overcome by the powers of Typhon, those external forces which underlie all destruction and decay.’\nThere are but two paths by which Osiris may be attained, the one is by way of the Portal of Death; the other passes not through the Gateway of Physical Dissolution, for Osiris may be reached through Initiation and the consecration of life to Sacred Service.\nUnder the title of Christianity as a Mystical Fact , I have gone more fully into this belief. The Egyptian conception was as follows: — When man has passed through the Portal of Death, and after certain necessary preparatory stages have been completed, he comes to Osiris, and being freed from his earthly envelope, there awakes in him a consciousness of actual relationship with that supreme deity; and he realizes that henceforth he will be greeted as Osiris, for this form of salutation is always bestowed upon those who have experienced death and entered into the World of Spirit.\nThe other pathway which likewise leads back to Osiris, that is to say, into the Spiritual Realms is, as we have already stated, by way of Initiation and Holy Devotion. Such was regarded by the Egyptians as a method through which knowledge might be gained of all that is supersensible and lies concealed in man’s nature, in other words of Isis, or the Isis-Power. We cannot penetrate into the depths of the soul, and thus reach the Isis-Force within, in virtue of mere earthly wisdom born of the experiences of daily life, but nevertheless, we have a means at hand whereby we may break through to this inner power and descend to the true Ego; there to find that this same Ego is ever enshrouded by all that is material in man’s physical disposition. If, indeed, we can but pierce this dark veil, then do we find ourselves at last in the Ego’s veritable spiritual home.\nHence it was that the old Egyptians said: — ‘Thou shalt descend into thine own inner being — but first cometh thy physical quality, with all that it may express of that self that is thine, and through this human disposition must thou force a way. When thou regardest the stones, and the justness of their fashion — when thou considerest the plants, the inner life thereof and wonder of their form and when thou lookest upon the animals about thee — there of a verity, in these three Kingdoms of Nature, beholdest thou the outer world as begotten of spiritual and supersensible powers. But when thou standest before man, look not alone upon the outer form, but seek that which is within, where abideth the soul’s strength — even as the Isis-Forces.’ Therefore, in connection with the rites of initiation, there was included certain instruction as to what things should be observed during such time as the soul might remain incarnated.\nThe experiences of all who have in truth descended into their innermost being, have been fundamentally the same as those which come about at the time of passing, differing only in the manner of their occurrence. [One might say that if this method of approaching the spirit realms be followed, then] — Man must pass through the Portal of Death while he yet lives. He must learn to know that change from the physical to the superphysical outlook, from the material to the spiritual world — in other words, he must acquire knowledge of that metamorphosis which takes place at the time of actual death. And in order that he may obtain such enlightenment, he that would become initiated must take that way which leads him into the very depths of his being, for thus alone may true understanding and experience be attained. When this method is employed, the first real inner experience is connected with the blood, as formed by Nature, and the blood is the physical agent of the Ego, just as the nervous system forms the material medium in connection with [the three ultimate modes of consciousness], Feeling, Willing and Thinking. We have already referred to this matter in a previous lecture.\nAccording to the ancient Egyptians, he who desires to descend into his being in order to realize profound association with the primary material media, must first pass down into his physical-etheric sheath and enter the etheric confines of his soul; he must learn to become independent of that force in his blood upon which he normally relies; he can then give himself up to the workings and the wonder of the blood’s action.\nIt is essential that man must first thoroughly understand his higher nature in regard to its physical aspect. To do this he must learn to view his material being as a detached and wholly separate object. Now, man can only recognize and be fully conscious of an object, as a specific thing, when external to it; hence he must learn to bring about this relation in respect to himself, if he would indeed comprehend the actuality of his being. It was for this reason that Initiation was directed towards the development of such powers as enabled the Soul-Forces to undergo certain experiences independently of the physical media, or agents. So that finally the aspirant could look down upon such media objectively, in the same way as man’s spiritual element looks down upon the material body after death.\nThe primary duty of one who would know the Isis-Mysteries was to acquire knowledge concerning his own blood; after which he underwent an experience that can be best described as — ‘Drawing nigh unto the Threshold of Death.’ This was the first step in the Isis-Initiation; and he who would take it must have power to regard his blood and his being externally, and pass into that sheath which is the medium of the Isis-Nature. Further, the neophyte was led before two doors — within some Holy Sanctuary — the one was closed, the other open; and as he stood in that place there came before him visions depicting the most intimate experiences of his very life, and he heard a voice saying: — ‘It is thus that thou art, so dost thou appear when thou beholdest thy true self pictured in the soul.’ How remarkable are these teachings the echoes of which are still heard after thousands of years have passed, and how wonderfully they harmonize with man’s present-day beliefs, even though they have since received materialistic interpretation.\nAccording to the ancient Egyptian seer — when man takes the initial step and comes upon the world of his inner form he is there confronted by two doors — ‘Through two doors shalt thou enter thy blood and thy innermost being.’ The anatomist would say: — ‘Through two inlets situated in the valves on either side of the heart.’ [There are two pairs of valves in the heart, one pair on one side and one on the other; in each case when one of these valves is open, in order to let the blood-stream flow into a part of the system, that which is adjacent is closed (Ed.)]. Hence, he who desires to penetrate beneath his outer form must pass through the open door; for the gateway which is closed merely confines the blood to its proper course. We thus find that the results of anatomical investigation are certainly analogous to those born of clairvoyant vision in olden times; and although not so clear and accurate as are the conclusions of the modern anatomist, nevertheless they portray what the clairvoyant consciousness actually apprehended, when it regarded man’s inner form from an external stand-point.\nThe next step in the Isis-Initiation was what one might term the proving or profound study of Fire, Air and Water. During this period the Initiate gained complete knowledge of the Sheath-Quality of his Isis-Being, of the properties of Fire and how, in a certain form, it flows in the blood, using it as medium, and becomes fluid. He further received instruction concerning the manner in which Oxygen is infiltrated into the system from the air. All this wisdom descended upon him — the understanding of Fire, Air, Water, the warmth of his breath, and the true nature of the fluidity of his blood.\nThus it came about that the aspirant, in virtue of the knowledge he acquired of his Sheath-Quality through his newly-born comprehension of the elements of Fire, Air and Water, became so purified that when his vision at last penetrated beneath the enfolding envelope, he entered into his veritable Isis-Nature. We might say that at this point, the Initiate felt for the first time that he was in contact with his actual being, and that he was able to realize that he was indeed a spiritual entity, no longer limited by his external relation to humanity, and that he truly beheld the wonder of the spiritual realms.\nIt is a definite law that we can only look upon the sun in the daytime, for at night it lies concealed by matter; but the powers in the spiritual world are never thus veiled to those who have acquired the true gift of sight, for they are best discerned when the physical eyes are closed to all material things. Symbolically, in the sense of the Isis-Initiation, we would say: — ‘He who is purified and initiated into the Isis-Mysteries, may discern that spiritual life and power to which the sun owes its origin, even though there be darkness as at midnight, for, metaphorically speaking, he may at all times behold the great orb of day and come face to face with the spirit beings of the superperceptual world.’\nSuch was the description of the method, or as one might say, the path leading to the Isis-Forces within, and we are told that it could be traversed by all who, during earthly life, would but earnestly seek the deepest forces of the soul. There were, however, yet higher mysteries, The Mysteries of Osiris, in which it was made clear that through the medium of the Isis-Forces, and in virtue of those supersensible primordial spiritual powers to which man owes his origin, he could exalt himself and thus attain to Osiris. In other words, he was initiated into those methods by which the human soul might be so uplifted, that it could at last enter upon the presence of that supreme deity.\nWhen the Egyptians wished to portray the nature and character of the relation between Isis and Osiris, they had recourse to that special script which is written in the firmament by the passage of the Sun and Moon; while in the case of other spiritual powers, reference was made to the movements and interrelations existing between the various stars. Most prominent among the astronomical groups in such portrayals was the Zodiac, with its condition of comparative immobility, and the planets which move across its constellations. It was in the revelations of the Heavens, as manifested in spiritual symbols, that the old Egyptian found the true method of expressing those deep feelings which touched his soul. He knew that no earthly means were competent to indicate clearly the vital purpose of that urgent call to seek the Isis-Forces, that mankind might, through their aid, draw nearer to Osiris. He felt that in order to describe this purpose fittingly, he must reach out and make use of those bright groups of stars that ever shine in the firmament.\nHence we must regard Hermes, The Great Wise One, who according to Egyptian tradition, lived upon the Earth in the dawn of antiquity — and was endowed with the most profound clairvoyant insight concerning man’s relation to the Universe — as having possessed in high degree the power of apprehending and explaining the true nature of the connection between the constellations and the forces of the Spirit-World; and of interpreting the signs portraying events and happenings, as expressed in the language of the stars, in terms of their mysterious interrelations. Now, if in those olden days it was desired to enlighten the people with regard to the nature of the bond existing between Osiris and Isis, this matter was put forward in the form of an exoteric legend; but in the case of the Initiates the subject was treated more explicitly by means of symbolical reference to the light which emanates from the Sun and is reflected by the Moon, and the remarkable conditions governing its changes during the varying phases of the latter. In these phenomena the Egyptians found a practical and genuine analogy, expressive of the sacred link between the Isis-Force within the human soul and that supreme spiritual figure — Osiris.\nFrom the movements of the heavenly bodies and the nature of their interrelations, there originated what we must regard as the very earliest form of written characters. Little as this fact is as yet recognized, we would nevertheless draw attention to the following statement: — If we consider the consonants of the alphabet, we note that they imitate the signs of the Zodiac, in their comparative repose; while the vowels and consonants are connected in a way which may be likened to that relation which the planets and the forces which move them bear to the constellations of the Zodiac as a whole. Hence it would appear that in the beginning, written characters were brought down to earth from the vault of heaven.\nThe sentiments which moved the ancient Egyptians when their thoughts turned to Hermes were such as we have described, and they realized that his great illumination came from those spiritual powers which called to him out of the heavens, prompting him with counsel concerning that activity which persisted in the souls of mankind. Ay! and more than that — he was instructed even in the deeds of everyday life, and in those directions in which such sciences were needed as Geometry and Surveying, both of which Pythagoras learnt from the Egyptians, who ascribed all this knowledge to the primordial wisdom of Hermes. One might say that ‘The Old Wise One’ saw in the interrelation of all things spread abroad upon the earth a counterpart of that which exists in the firmament, and finds expression in the mystic writings of the stars. It was Hermes — ’The Thrice-Blessed‘ — who first gave this Stellar Script to the world, and through its aid, and in the dawn of Egyptian life, he instilled into the minds of the people the elements of the science of mathematics, while he adjured them to look up to the heavens, there to seek guidance even regarding mundane matters.\nThe very life of the Egyptian nation in that olden time was dependent upon the overflowing of the Nile, and the deposits which it swept down from the mountainous country to the South. We can therefore readily understand how absolutely essential it was that there should be a certain pre-knowledge of the date of the coming of flood periods, so that they might anticipate the accompanying changes in natural conditions thus brought about in the course of any particular year. In those early days the Egyptians still reckoned time according to that Stellar Script which was written in the canopy of heaven. When Sirius, the Dog Star, was visible in the Sign of Cancer, they knew that the Sun would shortly enter that part of the Zodiac from whence its rays would shine down upon the earth and conjure forth, as if by magic, that life brought thereto by the deposits of the overflowing Nile. Hence, they looked upon Sirius as ‘The Watcher‘, who gave them warning of what they might expect; and the movements of Sirius formed part of their celestial clock. They gazed upward with thankful hearts, for the timely warnings of their ‘Watcher‘ enabled them to cultivate and to tend their land in such manner that it might best bring forth all things necessary to external life.\nWhen questions of import arose such as the above, these old Egyptian peoples sought enlightenment and guidance from those writings which they saw spread across the firmament; the while they looked back into that dim grey past, when first they learnt that the passage of the stars was in truth an expression as of movements among the parts of some mighty cosmic clock. In Thoth, or Hermes, they recognized that Great Spirit who, according to their ancient traditions, set down the very earliest chronicles concerning cosmic wisdom. From that inspiration which came to him through the wondrous Stellar Script, Hermes conceived the forms underlying the physical alphabet, and through their aid taught mankind the principles of Agriculture, Geometry and Surveying; indeed, he instructed them in all things needful for the conduct of physical life. Now, physical life is nought but the embodiment of that spiritual life so deeply interwoven throughout the cosmos — and it was from the cosmos that the spirit of wisdom descended upon Hermes. It was evident to the Egyptians of that period to which we refer, that the influence of The Great Wise One was still active throughout their civilization, and they felt that this mystic bond was both profound and intimate in character.\nThe method adopted by the old Egyptians for the purpose of time calculations, and which continued in use for many centuries, was most convenient in operation and lent itself readily to all simple computations of this nature. They regarded the year as made up of exactly 365 days, which they divided into 12 months each of 30 days, thus leaving 5 days over, which were separately included. But modern Astronomy tells us that if this method be employed, then one quarter day every year is not taken into account [the actual difference is 6 hours, 9 min., 9 sec.]. Therefore, the Egyptian year came to an end one quarter day too soon. This difference gradually spread backward through the months until a coincidence was reached at the beginning of a certain year; and such coincidence took place every four times 365 years. Hence, after the lapse of each 1,460 years, the terrestrial time estimate would be for a moment in agreement with astronomical conditions, because at that particular moment the sum of the annual differences would be equivalent to one whole year.\nLet us now suppose that at a certain time in 1322 B.C. an Egyptian looked up into the heavens, there, at that moment any visible constellation would occupy a definite position in the firmament [which position could be used as a basis of computation]. If we calculate backwards over a period of three times 1,460 years from 1322 B.C., we come to the year 5702 B.C., and it was some time prior to this date to which the Egyptians ascribed the dawn of that primordial Holy Wisdom which came to them in the beginning. They said: — ‘In bygone times man’s power of clairvoyance was truly at its highest, but with the passing of each great Sun-Period‘ [of 1,46o years, which brought about the balance of terrestrial reckoning] ‘the divine gift of “clear seeing” gradually faded, until in this fourth stage in which we now live it is weak and ever-failing. Our civilization reaches far into the remoteness of antiquity, where the voice of tradition is all but stilled. In thought we hark back beyond three long Cosmic Periods, to that glorious and distant past when our greatest teacher, his disciples, and his successors, imparted to us the elements of the ancient wisdom which now finds expression — albeit in strangely altered form — in the character of our script, our Mathematics, Geometry, Surveying, our general conduct of life, and also in our study of the heavens. We regard the cosmic adjustment of our human computation, with its convenient factors of twelve times 30 days with five supplementary thereto, as a sign that we are ever subject to correction by the divine powers of the Spirit-World, because through error of thought and reason we have turned away from Osiris and from Isis. We cannot with exactitude measure the year’s length, but when our eyes are raised on high we can gaze into that hidden world from whence those spirit powers that ever guide the courses of the stars, remedy our faults and bring harmony where man has failed to find the truth.’\nFrom the above it is clear that the old Egyptians realized the feebleness of man’s powers of intellect and understanding, so that, even in the case of their Chronology, they sought the aid of those higher spiritual forces and beings beyond the veil. Beings who correct, watch over, and protect mankind during the activities and experiences of earth life, bringing to bear upon these problems the mystic laws of the Great Cosmos. Hermes, or Thoth, was held in greatest veneration as One inspired by the ever vigilant heavenly powers, and in the souls of these ancient peoples this outstanding personality was looked upon, not merely as a great teacher, but as a being who was indeed exalted, and whom they regarded with the most profound feelings of reverence and thankfulness, so that they cried out: — ‘All that I have cometh from Thee. Thou went on High in the dim grey dawn of antiquity and Thou hast sent down, by those who were the carriers of Thy traditions, all that flows throughout external civilization, and which is of greatest human service.’ Hence, with reference to the actual Creator of all supersensible forces, and those who watch over them, as well as Osiris and Hermes, or Thoth, the Egyptians felt in their souls not merely that they were imbued with knowledge begotten of wisdom, but they experienced a sentiment in deepest moral sense, of greatest veneration and gratitude.\nThe graphic descriptions of the past tell us that the wisdom of the ancient Egyptians was permeated throughout with a certain religious quality and mood, particularly noticeable in olden times, but by degrees these characteristics became less and less marked. In those days the people felt all knowledge to be closely associated with holiness, all wisdom with piety and all science with religion. As this attitude waned it gradually decreased in purity of form and expression. A similar change has taken place throughout the evolution of mankind among all those various civilizations whose mission has been to alter the trend of spiritual thought, and lead it in some wholly new direction. When each nation had reached the pinnacle of achievement, and its task was ended, there followed a period of decadence.\nThe greater part of our knowledge concerning ancient Egyptian culture is connected with an epoch of this nature, and the significance of all that lies beyond is merely a matter of conjecture and supposition. For instance, what is the true meaning of that extraordinary, and to us grotesque, worship of animals in that by-gone age, and of the curious feeling of awe we experience when our thoughts dwell upon the pyramids? The Egyptians themselves tell us that there was an era during which not only mankind, but also beings from the higher spiritual realms descended upon the earth. This was in the beginning before the knowledge and wisdom that was then vouchsafed had truly developed and become active.\nIf we would indeed know man’s innermost nature, we must not alone regard the outer form, but penetrate to the true self within. All external qualities with which we come in contact are but stages of manifestation which have remained ‘in situ‘, as one might say, and are seen as if representing in powerful, albeit diminutive imagery, ancient principles which are dominant in the three kingdoms of nature. Consider the world of minerals and of rocks — here we find those same relations of form which man has used in the architecture of the pyramids; while the inner forces of plant-life are expressed in the beauty of the Lotus-Flower; and lastly, distributed along that path which culminates in man himself, we find in the brute creation existences which have not attained to the higher level of humanity; they are, as it were, a crystallization of divine forces that have been embodied and scattered abroad in separate and distinct animal shapes.\nWe can well imagine that the feelings of the old Egyptians gave rise to thoughts of the above nature, when they recognized in animal life a manifestation of the unaltered primordial forces of the gods. For they looked back into the grey past when all earthly things were begotten of divine supersensible powers, and developed under their guidance. From this concept they conjectured that among the creations in Nature’s three kingdoms certain of these higher primal forces, which had lived on unchanged over a long period, had ultimately undergone some intimate modification which had raised them to that higher standard exhibited in the human form. When considering these ancient peoples we must ever have regard for their feelings, perceptions and the necessities of their life. It is from these factors that we can best realize how close was the moral bond between their wisdom and the soul, so that the latter might not swerve from the path of rectitude and morality.\nThe Egyptians believed, that because of the manner in which the Spirit-World was created and fashioned by the divine supersensible powers, there must be some definite moral relation which extends to the creatures of the animal kingdom. The grotesque and singular modes in which this concept ultimately found expression came about, only, after the final decline of the nation had commenced.\nFrom the study of the later periods of Egyptian culture, it is clear that human frailty and imperfection were unknown in primordial times, for we learn from this source that in the early dawn of Egyptian life civilization was of a high standard, and it was then that man knew and experienced the most intimate divine spiritual revelations. We must not fall into that error, so common in our days, of assuming that all forms of human culture had their inception under the most simple and primitive conditions. In reality it was only after the impulse imparted by those first glorious blessings had waned, and a period of decline set in, that man’s life became crude and uncultured.\nHence, we should not look upon the barbaric tribes merely as peoples in whom intellection is expressed in its most elementary form, but, on the contrary, we must consider the aboriginal races as representative of civilizations which have fallen away from some exalted primordial state. This assertion is not at all to the liking of that branch of science which would have us believe that all culture had its inception under the most elementary conditions, such as those which are still found among the savages of our time. Nevertheless, Spiritual Science affirms, in virtue of knowledge obtained through the medium of its special methods, that the primitive states of mankind are in truth manifestations of long perished civilizations, and that all human life had its inception under cultural conditions directly inspired by divine beings — mentors from the Spirit-World — who descended upon the earth in the dim dawn of antiquity, and over whose deeds is cast a veil impenetrable to external history.\nMan has long believed that if we trace life’s course backward through the ages we should in the end arrive at childish conditions, similar to those found among barbaric peoples. It was certainly not expected that in so doing we would find ourselves confronted with noble and exalted concepts and theories. Now, Spiritual Science definitely asserts that if we peer into the past, then, at the beginning of human life we shall not find rudimentary cultural states, but lofty and glorious civilizations, which at some later period fell away from their first high spiritual standard. At this point we might well ask: — ‘Does this asservation, as advanced by Spiritual Science, bring it into conflict with the results of modern scientific research — the logical methods of which delve deeply and without prejudice, into all matters that come within the scope of its investigations?‘ Let us see how external science itself replies to this question.\nWith this object I will give a literal quotation from a recent work by Alfred Jeremias [Licentiate Doctor and Lecturer at the University of Leipzig], entitled The Old Testament in the Light of the Ancient East . 1 From the text we learn that external science while engaged in the gradual unfoldment of ancient history, has reached back into the remote past, and there found traces of a highly spiritual primeval civilization, whose culture was imbued with the most momentous and intellectual conceptions. It is further emphasized that those cultural states, which we are so accustomed to term barbaric, should in reality be regarded as typical of primordial civilizations that have fallen away from some higher level. The actual quotation to which I have referred is as follows: — 2\n‘The earliest records, as well as the whole ancient civilized life about the Euphrates valley, indicate the existence of a scientific and at the same time religious theoretical conception, which was not merely confined to the occult doctrines of the temple; but in accordance with its precepts, state organizations were regulated and conducted, justice declared and property administered and protected. The more ancient the period to which we can look back, the more absolute does the control exercised by this concept appear. It was only after the downfall of the primal Euphratean civilization that the influence of other powers began to make itself felt.’\nFrom the above excerpt it is clear, that external science has truly made a beginning toward the opening up of new paths that tend to bring harmony and agreement into those matters [so often regarded as controversial] which it is the province of Spiritual Science to bring forward and impress upon our present civilization. In a previous lecture we have drawn attention to a similar progress in connection with the science of Geology. If in the future we continue to advance in like fashion, we shall gradually be compelled to recede ever further and further from that dull and lifeless conception which would have us regard all primordial civilization as primitive and childish in its nature. Then, indeed, shall we be led back to those great personalities of the remote past, who seem to us the more transcendent, because it was their divinely inspired mission to endow a yet clairvoyant people with those priceless blessings which are evident throughout all cultural activity in which we now play our part. Such noble spirits in human form as Zarathustra and Hermes at once claim and rivet our attention. They appear to us so exalted and so glorious, because it was THEY who in the dim dawn of human life gave to mankind those first most potent and uplifting impulses. The old Egyptian sage had this sublime concept in mind when he spoke to Solon concerning ‘doctrines grey with age‘. (Vide p. 86.)\nThus do we honour and revere Hermes, even as we venerate the great Zarathustra. To us he shines forth as one of those grand outstanding individualities — veritable leaders of mankind — the very thought of whom engenders a feeling of enhanced power within, and begets the indubitable conviction through which we know that the Spirit is not merely abroad in the world, but weaves beneath all earthly deeds, and is ever active throughout the evolution of humanity. Then are our lives strengthened, a fuller confidence is in our every action, hopes are assured and destiny stands out the more clearly before us. It is at such times that we exclaim: — ‘Those yet to be born will of a surety lift up their hearts to the glorious spirit mentors who were in the beginning, and will seek the verity of their being in the gifts which are of the inner forces of the soul. They shall acknowledge and discern in the ever recurrent impulses which come as an upward urge to mankind the workings of a divine power, and the eternal manifestations of those Great Ones from the Spirit-World.’\n\n\nADDENDUM\nThe above lecture was delivered in Berlin on the 16th of February, 1911. In the interim, external science has probed further into the secrets of that highly advanced primal civilized life about the valley of the Euphrates, to which reference has been made on page 123 . The following brief outline will indicate some of the results of Archæological research carried out in Mesopotamia at the site of the olden city known as ‘Ur of the Chaldees‘. At this place, most important discoveries have been made in connection with ancient Euphratean civilization, as the outcome of a Joint Expedition arranged by the British Museum and the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania in 1922, under the direction of C. Leonard Woolley, M.A., Litt. D. In a lecture given before ‘The Royal Society of Arts’ on the 8th of November, 1933, and which duly appeared in their Journal , Dr. Woolley said: ‘Certainly the discoveries that we made at Ur in the last ten years have tended to set scientists by the ears rather than satisfying them with the new information obtained ... few surprises in recent years have been so great as that occasioned by the excavation of the great cemetery lying beneath the ruins of Ur.’\nIn the tombs of Kings, in vaulted chambers of rubble masonry, dating as far back as 3500 B.C. were found treasures of gold, silver, mosaic, etc., wrought by the Sumerian workers and of a degree of technical excellence unsurpassed by the craftsmen of to-day. In one case, when referring to an especially fine specimen of polychrome art which had been discovered, and is now known as ‘The Ram Caught in a Thicket‘, Dr. Woolley drew attention to the fact, that this particular polychrome sculpture, while characteristic of the work of the ancients in 3400 B.. in the Near East, was actually suggestive of that of some rather late Italian Renaissance artist. As the investigations proceeded it became abundantly clear, that the ancient people who had so skilfully fashioned the strange and wonderful treasures brought to light, ‘were not tyros, they must have had behind them long traditions, long apprenticeship‘.\nWith the view of obtaining an insight into the history of this by-gone and highly developed civilization, excavations were commenced at a point which was actually the ground level of 3200 B.C., where through a depth of over sixty feet relics of the dim past were unearthed in clearly marked strata. Traces of eight superimposed cities were revealed, and deep down beneath the remains of an ancient pottery factory, so Dr. Woolley tells us, the excavators suddenly came upon a mass, eleven feet thick, of water-laid sand and clay, perfectly uniform and clean, which was undoubtedly the silt thrown up by “The Flood”. — ‘We can,’ said Dr. Woolley, ‘actually connect it with the flood which we call Noah’s Flood‘. The verge of this deluge was found to be up ‘against the flank of the mound on which stood the earliest and most primitive city of Ur ‘. Below this deposit were ‘the remains of antediluvian houses ... the lowest human buildings rested upon black organic soil ... and that in turn went down below sea-level‘.\nThe excavations proved that the ancient Sumerian architects were familiar with concrete at the beginning of the fourth millennium B.C., and possibly earlier. They were acquainted with every basic form of modern architecture, and Dr. Woolley further states that there is no doubt that, ‘the arch, the vault, the apse, and the dome, used in Europe for the first time in the Roman period’, specimens of which were found among the ruins, ‘are a direct inheritance from the Sumerian peoples of the fourth millennium B.C. at least, and they may well go hack to a date still more remote ’. (The italics are ours.) Further, it has been shown that continuity in Sumerian civilization undoubtedly extended from the fifth millennium B.C., up to the sixth century B.C. This fact has come to light as a result of discoveries made by digging beneath the foundations of the massive staged tower, known as the Ziggurat of Ur, the main religious building of the city; and by tracing the dates and character of cylinder seals of different periods, carried by these by-gone peoples for the purpose of signing written documents.\nToward the close of his most interesting lecture, Dr. Woolley stated that imports into Egypt before the First Dynasty, seemed to indicate that the Sumerians imparted to the then barbarous people of that country an impulse, which enabled them to develop their remarkable civilization. He further said: ‘Civilized as the Babylonians were, they made no new discoveries at all; they hardly advanced beyond what their predecessors had known and they preserved civilization rather than invented it. We know, too, that the Sumerians sent out the ancestors of the Hebrews with all the traditions of law, civilization, religion and art, which they had themselves enjoyed in their home country and which the Hebrews never entirely forgot, but by which they were profoundly influenced.’\nThus has this Joint Archæological Expedition, under the able leadership of Dr. Woolley, thrown the light of modern external science upon one of those glorious spiritual civilizations of the dim grey past, so often referred to by Rudolf Steiner, which endured just so long as its people opened their hearts to the guidance of the Spirit, but fell away and perished when they left the true path, and gave themselves up to material things. [Ed.]\n\nNotes for this lecture:\n1. Manual of Biblical Archaeology , 2 Vols. Translated from the second German Edition, by C. L. Beaumont. Edited by the Rev. Canon C. H. W. Johns, Litt.D. Published by Williams and Morgate, 1911.\n2. Der Einfluss Babyloniens auf das Verständnis des Alten Testamentes , von Alfred Jeremias. ‘Die ältesten Urkunden sowie das gesamte euphratensische Kulturleben setzen eine wissenschaftliche und zugleich religiöse Theorie voraus, die nicht etwa nur in den Geheimlehren der Tempel ihr Dasein fristet, sondern nach der die staatlichen Organisationen geregelt sind, nach der Recht gesprochen, das Eigentum verwaltet und geschützt wird. Je höher das Altertum ist, in das wir blacken können, um so Ausschliesslicher herrscht die Theorie; erst mit dem Verfall der alten euphratensischen Kultur kommen andere Mächte zur Geltung.’"
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-13",
    "title": "Buddha -or- Buddhism and Christianity",
    "date": "2 Mar 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/GC1987/19110302p02.html",
    "book_title": "Turning Points Spiritual History",
    "content": "In these days there is much discussion concerning The Buddha and the Buddhist Creed; and this fact is the more interesting to all who follow the course of human evolution, because a knowledge of the true character of the Buddhist religion, or perhaps more correctly, the longing felt by many for its comprehension has only recently entered into the spiritual life of the Western nations. Let us consider for a moment that most prominent personality, Goethe , who exerted such a powerful influence on Occidental culture, at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, which influence continued so potently right on into our own period. When we examine his life, his works, and his intellectuality, we find no trace of the Buddhist doctrine; but a little later we note in the concepts of that genius, Schopenhauer (who was in a certain sense a disciple of Goethe), a clear and definite touch of Buddhistic thought; and since that period in which Schopenhauer lived, the interest taken in Eastern spiritual conceptions has steadily increased. Hence it is that there is now a widespread and inherent desire, to analyse and discuss all those matters connected with the name of the Great Buddha, which have found their way into the course of human evolution.\nIt is a remarkable fact that most people still persist in associating Buddhism, primarily, with the idea of recurrent earth lives, to which concept we have often referred in these lectures. Such an assumption is, however, found to be unwarranted when we have regard to the essential character of the Buddhist belief. We might say, that with the majority of those people who interest themselves in this subject, the notion of repeated earth lives, or as we term it, Reincarnation, forms a well-established and essential part of their preconceived ideas regarding Buddhism. But on the other hand it must be said, even though it sounds grotesque, that to those who probe more deeply into these matters, the association of Buddhism with the idea of reincarnation, appears almost equivalent to saying, — that the most complete knowledge of ancient works of art is to be sought among those peoples who have destroyed them at the commencement of universal development and progress in the Middle Ages. This certainly sounds grotesque, but it is nevertheless true, as we at once realize when we consider that the aim of Buddhism is directed towards the disparagement of our apparently inevitably recurring earth lives, and the reduction of their number as far as may be within our power. Hence, we must regard as the essential moving principle underlying the whole trend of Buddhist spiritual thought that principle which operates in the direction of freedom, that is, redemption from repeated rebirth, or liberation from reincarnation which it accepts as an established and unquestionable fact; in this concept is expressed the true and vital essence of Buddhism.\nEven from a superficial glance at the history of Western spiritual life, we learn that the idea of repeated earthly existence is quite independent of an understanding of Buddhism, and vice versa; for during the course of our Occidental spiritual development we find ourselves confronted with a conception of reincarnation, presented in a manner both lofty and sublime, by a personality who most certainly had remained untouched by Buddhist views and trend of thought. This personality was Lessing , who in his treatise on The Education of Mankind , which is regarded as the most matured and mellow of his works, closes with the confession that he himself was a believer in the Doctrine of Reincarnation. With regard to this belief, he gives expression to those deeply significant words, — ‘Is not all eternity mine?‘ Lessing was of opinion that the repetition of our earthly lives was proof that benefit would accrue from mundane endeavour, and that existence in this world is not in vain. For while we toil we look forward to ever widening and fuller recurring corporal states, in which we may bring to maturity the fruits of our by-gone earthly lives. The conception which Lessing really formed was of the prospect and anticipation of a rich and bountiful harvest, to be garnered in the fullness of time coupled with the knowledge that throughout human existence there is ever an inner voice, which in actual expectation of recurrent earth lives, calls to us, saying, — ‘Thou shalt persist in thy labours.’ From what has been said, it is now apparent that it is in the very essence of Buddhism that man must ever strive to obtain such knowledge and wisdom as may serve to free him from those future reincarnations, the prevision of which lies in the spirit. Only when during one of our earth lives we have at last freed ourselves from the need of experiencing those which would otherwise follow, can we enter peacefully upon that condition which we may term Eternity.\nI have persistently endeavoured to make it clear that the idea of reincarnation, both with regard to Spiritual Science and Theosophy , was not derived from any one of the ancient traditions, not even from Buddhism; it has in fact thrust itself upon us during our time, as a result of independent observation and reflection concerning life in connection with spiritual investigation. Hence, to associate Buddhism so directly with the idea of reincarnation indicates a superficial attitude. If we would indeed look into the true character and nature of Buddhism, then we must turn our spiritual eyes in quite another direction.\nI must now once again draw your attention to that law in human evolution which we met with when we were considering the personality of the great Zarathustra. In accordance with this law, as was then stated, during the gradual passing of time the whole condition and character of man’s soul changed, while it went through varying transitional states. Those events regarding which we obtain information from external historical documents, represent as far as man is concerned, only a comparatively late phase in the evolution of humanity. If, however, we look back with the aid of Spiritual Science to prehistoric times, we gain much further knowledge; we then find that a certain condition of soul was common to primitive man, whereby the normal state of human consciousness was quite other than that of our day.\nThat pre-eminently intellectual order of consciousness, which leads to the manner in which, during the course of our normal human life, we now regard all things around us combining them by means of our mental powers acting through the brain, so that they shall be connected with and become a part of our wisdom, and our science — was first developed from another form of conscious state. I have emphasized this point before, but I must lay particular stress upon it once again. We have in the chaotic disorder of our dream-life, a last remnant — a species of atavistic heritage – of an old clairvoyance, which was at one time to a certain extent, an ordinary condition of the human soul, and in which mankind assumed a state between that of sleeping and that of being awake; he could then look upon those things hidden behind the perceptual world.\nIn these days in which our consciousness mainly alternates between the sleeping and the waking conditions, it is only in the latter that we seek to apprehend a state of intellectuality in the soul; but in olden times, clairvoyant visions were not so meaningless as are the dream forms of our period, for they could be quite definitely ascribed to specific superperceptual creations and events. Mankind had in connection with these ancient fluctuating visions a species of conscious state out of which our present intellectuality gradually evolved. Hence, we look back to a certain form of primeval clairvoyance which was followed by the long drawn out evolution of our consciousness as recognized to-day. Because of this by-gone dream-like clairvoyance, prehistoric man could gaze far into the superperceptual worlds, and through this connection with the supersensible, he gained not knowledge alone but a feeling of profound inner satisfaction and bliss from the full realization of the soul’s union with the Spirit-World.\nJust as present-day man is now convinced through his sense perceptions and intellectuality that his blood is composed of substances which exist without in the physical universe, so was prehistoric man confident that his soul and spiritual nature emanated from that same hidden Spirit-World which he could discern in virtue of his clairvoyant consciousness. It has already been pointed out that there are phenomena connected with the history of mankind, and which are also apparent in certain external facts and happenings, that can only be fully understood when we pre-suppose some such primordial condition of man’s earthly existence. It has further been stated that modern science is coming more and more to the conclusion that it is erroneous to assume, as has been done by the materialistic Anthropology of the nineteenth century, that in primeval times the prevailing state common to man was similar to that found among the most primitive peoples of to-day. It is, in fact, becoming more and more clear that the prehistoric races had extremely exalted theoretical conceptions regarding the Spirit-World, and that these concepts were given to them in the form of visions. All those curious ideas which come to us through myths and legends can only be rightly understood, when they are first connected with and referred back to that ancient wisdom which came to man in a way wholly different from that by which our present intellectual science has been attained.\nIn these modern times there is not much sympathy expressed with the view that the position in which we find the primitive peoples of our day is not typical of the universal primordial condition of mankind, but is in reality an example of decadence from a primarily highly clairvoyant spiritual state common to all peoples. But facts will yet force a general acceptance of some such hypothesis as that put forward by Spiritual Science as a result of its investigations. Here, as in many other cases, it can be shown that fundamentally there is complete accord between spiritual and external science. Further, a time will come when the conclusions which Spiritual Science has formed regarding the probable future of man’s evolution, viewed from the scientific stand-point, will be entirely confirmed. We must look back, not merely to a form of primeval wisdom, but to a specific order of primordial feeling and apprehension, which we characterize as a clairvoyant bond, erstwhile existent between man and the divine regions of spirit.\nWe can easily understand that during the transition from the old or clairvoyant state of the human soul to our modern direct, unprejudiced and intellectual method of regarding the external perceptual world, there should arise two different currents of thought. As time went on the first of these made itself manifest more especially among those peoples who had clung to memories of the past, and to their fading psychic power, in such manner that they would say: — ‘In by-gone days mankind was truly in contact with the spirit realms in virtue of the clairvoyant faculty, but since then he has descended into the material world of sense perception.’ This feeling spread throughout the whole soul’s outlook, until those ancient peoples would cry out: — ‘We are indeed now come into a world of manifestations where all is illusion — all is Maya.’ Only at such time as man might commune with the spirit spheres could he truly comprehend, and be united with his very being. Thus it was that there came to those nations who still preserved a dim remembrance of the ancient primal clairvoyant state, a certain feeling of sadness at the thought of what they had lost, and an indifference to all material things which man might apprehend and understand through the medium of his intellect, and with which he is ever in direct and conscious contact.\nOn the other hand, the second of the two thought currents to which I have referred, may be expressed in the following manner: — ‘We will observe and be active in this new world which has been given to us.’ Thought of this nature is especially noticeable throughout the Zarathustran doctrine. Those who experienced this call to action did not look back with sorrow and longing to the loss of the old clairvoyant power, but felt, ever more and more, that they must keep in close and constant touch with those forces by the aid of which they might penetrate into the secrets and nature of all material things, knowing full well that knowledge and guidance, born of the spirit, would flow in upon them if they would but give themselves up to earnest and profound meditation and piety. Such people felt impelled to link themselves closely with the world — there was no dreaming of the past, but an urge to gaze resolutely into the future and to battle with what might come. They expressed themselves after this fashion: — ‘Interwoven throughout this world, which is now our portion, is the same divine essence that was spread about us and permeated our very beings in by-gone ages; and this spiritual component we must now seek amid our material surroundings. It is our task to unite ourselves with all that is good and of the spirit, and by so doing, to further the progress and evolution of creation.’ These words indicate the essential nature of that current of thought which was occupied with external physical perception, and went forth from those Asiatic countries where the Zarathustran doctrine prevailed, and which lay Northward of the region where mankind looked back in meditation, pondering over that great spiritual gift which had passed away, and was indeed lost.\nThus it came about that upon the soil of India there arose a spiritual life which is entirely comprehensible, when we regard it in the light of all this retrospection concerning a former union with the Spirit-World. If we consider the results in India of the teachings of the Sankhya and Yoga philosophies and the Yoga training, we find that these may be embodied in the following statement: — The Indian has ever striven to re-establish his connection with those Spirit-Worlds from whence he came, and it has been his constant endeavour to eliminate from his earthly life all that was spread around him in the external creation, and by thus freeing himself from material things, to regain his union with that spiritual region from whence humanity has emanated. The principle underlying Yoga philosophy is reunion with the divine realms, and abstraction from all that appertains to the perceptual world.\nOnly when we assume this fundamental mood of Indian spiritual life can we realize the significance of that mighty impulse brought about by the advent of the Buddha, which blazed up before our spiritual sight, as an after-glow across the evening sky of Indian soul-life, but a few centuries before the Christ-impulse began to dominate Western thought. It is only in the light of the Buddha-mood, when regarded as already characterized, that the outstanding figure of the Buddha can be truly comprehended. In view of that basic assumption to which we have above referred, we can readily conceive that in India there could exist an order of thought and conviction, such as caused mankind to regard the world as having fallen from a spiritual state into one of sense-illusion, or that ‘Great Deception‘, which is indeed Maya. It is also understandable that the Indian, because of his observations concerning this external world with which humanity is so closely connected, pictured to himself that this decline came about suddenly and unexpectedly from time to time, during the passing of the ages. So that Indian philosophy does not regard man’s fall as uniform and continuous, but as having taken place periodically from epoch to epoch. From this point of view we can now understand those contemplative moods, underlying a form of culture which we must regard as being in the departing radiance of its existence; for so must we characterize the Buddhist conception, if we would consider it as having a place in a philosophy such as we have outlined.\nIndian thought ever harked back to that dim past when man was truly united with the Spirit-World. For there came a time when the Indian fell away from his exalted spiritual standard; this decline persisted until a certain level was reached, when he rose again, only to sink once more. He continued to alternate in this fashion throughout the ages, every descent taking him still further along the downward path, while each upward step was, as it were, a mitigation granted by some higher power, in order that man might not be compelled to work and live, all too suddenly, in that condition which he had already entered upon during his fall. According to ancient Indian philosophy, as each period of decline was ended there arose a certain outstanding figure whose personality was known as a ‘Buddha‘; the last of these was incarnated as the son of King Suddhodana, and called Gautama Buddha.\nSince those olden times, when humanity was still directly united with the Spirit-World, there have arisen a number of such Buddhas, five having appeared subsequent to the last fall. The advent of the Buddhas was a sign that mankind shall not sink into illusion — into Maya — but that again and again there shall come into men’s lives something of the ancient primal wisdom, to succour and to aid humanity. This primordial knowledge, however, because of man’s constant downward trend, fades from time to time; but in order that it shall be renewed there arises periodically a new Buddha, and as we have stated, the last of these was Gautama Buddha.\nBefore such great teachers could advance, through repeated earth lives, to the dignity of Buddhahood, if we may so express it, they must have already been exalted and attained the lofty standing of a Bodhisattva. 1 According to the Indian philosophical outlook, Gautama Buddha, up to his twenty-ninth year, was not regarded as a Buddha, but as a Bodhisattva. It was therefore as a Bodhisattva that he was born into the royal house of Suddhodana; and because his life was ever devoted to toil and to striving, he was at last blessed with that inner illumination, symbolically portrayed in the words, ‘Sitting under the Bodhi tree‘; and that glorious enlightenment which flowed in upon him found expression in the ‘Sermon at Benares’.\nThus did Gautama Buddha rise to the full dignity of Buddahood in his twenty-ninth year, and from that time on, he was empowered to revive once again a last remnant of by-gone primeval wisdom; which, however, in the light of Indian conceptions, would be destined to fall into decadence during the centuries to come. But according to these same concepts, when man has sunk so low, that the wisdom and the knowledge which this last Buddha brought, shall have waned, then will yet another Bodhisattva rise to Buddhahood, the Buddha of the Future — the Maitreya Buddha; whose coming the Indian surely awaits, for it is foretold in his philosophy.\nLet us now consider what took place at that time when the last Bodhisattva rose to Buddhahood; when, as we might say, his soul became filled with primordial wisdom. By so doing we can best realize and understand the true significance of that great change, wrought by struggle and toil through repeated earth lives.\nThere is a legend which tells us that until his twenty-ninth year he had seen nothing of the world outside the Royal Palace of Suddhodana; and that he was protected from that misery and suffering which are factors of existence ever antagonistic to human prosperity in life’s progress. It was under these conditions that the Bodhisattva grew up; but at the same time he was possessed of the Bodhisattva-consciousness, that consciousness so imbued with inner wisdom garnered from previous incarnations. Hence, as he developed, during life’s unfolding, he looked only upon those things which would bring forth true and goodly fruits. Since this legend is so well known, it is only necessary to refer to the main points. It states that when the Buddha at length came outside the Royal Palace he had an experience such as could not have occurred before — namely, he beheld a corpse — and he realized on seeing this body that life is dissolved by death; and that the death element breaks in upon life’s procreative and fruitful progress. He next came upon an ailing and feeble man; and knew that disease enters upon life. Again, he saw an aged person, tottering and weary; and he understood that old age creeps in upon the freshness of youth.\nFrom the stand-point of Buddhism, Indian Philosophy presupposes that: — He who having been a Bodhisattva, and is exalted to Buddhahood, regards all experiences, such as the above, with the Bodhisattva-consciousness. This supposition must be clearly understood. Gautama realized that in the great wisdom which underlies development in all being, there is an element destructive to existence; and the legend states that when this truth first dawned upon him, his great soul was so affected that he cried out: — ‘Life is full of misery.’\nLet us now place ourselves in the position of those who look upon experiences of this nature, solely from the Buddhistic point of view, for instance, in the position of this Bodhisattva-Gautama. Gautama was possessed of a higher wisdom which lived within him, but was as yet not fully developed. He had, up to this period, seen only the fortunate and wealthy side of life, and now for the first time beheld the elements of decay and dissolution. If we consider the way in which he must have regarded these happenings, as viewed from the stand-point of assumptions forced upon him in virtue of his being, we can readily understand how it was that this great spiritual Buddha came to express himself in words somewhat as follows: — ‘When we attain to knowledge and to wisdom, it comes about that in virtue of such wisdom we are led onwards toward development and progress; and because of this enlightenment, there enters into the soul the thought of an ever continuous and beneficial growth and advancement; but when we look upon the world about us we see there the elements of destruction as expressed in sickness, old age, and death. Verily, it cannot be wisdom that would thus mingle these destructive factors with life, but something quite apart and distinctive in character.’ At first the great Gautama did not fully grasp all that his Bodhisattva-consciousness implied, and we can well realize how it was that he became imbued with those thoughts which caused him to exclaim: — ‘Man may indeed be possessed of much wisdom, and through his knowledge there may come to him the idea of plenteous benefits; but in life we behold about us not alone the factors of sickness and death, but many another baneful element which brings corruption and decay into our very existence.’\nThe Bodhisattva thus saw around him a condition which he could not as yet fully comprehend. He had passed through life after life, always applying the experiences gained through his previous incarnations to his soul’s benefit; the while his wisdom became ever greater and greater, till at last he could look down upon all earthly existence from a more exalted vantage-point. But when he came forth from the King’s Palace, and saw before him for the first time the realities of life, its true nature and significance did not at once penetrate his understanding. That knowledge which we gain from the repeated experiences of our earth lives, and which we store within us as wisdom, can never solve the ultimate secrets of our being, for the true origin of these mysteries must lie without — remote from that life which is ours as we pass from reincarnation to reincarnation.\nSuch thoughts matured in the great soul of Gautama and led him directly to that sublime enlightenment known as ‘The Illumination under the Bodhi Tree ‘. 2 There, while seated beneath this tree, it became clear to the Buddha that this world in which we have our being is Maya, — illusion; that here life follows upon life, and that we have come upon this earth from a spiritual realm. While we are yet here we may indeed be exalted, and even rise to noble heights in the divine sense, and we may pass through many reincarnations, becoming ever more and more possessed of wisdom; but because of that which is material and comes to us through contact with this earthly life, we can never solve the great ever-present mystery of existence which finds expression in old age, disease and death. It was at this time of enlightenment that the thought came to Gautama that the teachings born of suffering held for him a greater significance than all the wisdom of a Bodhisattva.\nThe Buddha expressed the fundamental concept underlying his great illumination as follows: — ‘That which spreads itself abroad throughout this world of Maya is not veritable wisdom, indeed, so little of this quality is manifested in life that we can never hope to gain from external experiences a true understanding of affliction, nor acquire that knowledge which will show us the way by which we may be freed from suffering; for interwoven throughout all outer existence is a factor of quite another character, which differs from all wisdom and all knowledge.’\nIt is therefore obvious that what the Buddha sought was an element through the agency of which the destructive forces of old age, sickness and death become commingled with earthly life, and in which wisdom has no part. He held that freedom from these baneful factors can never come through mundane knowledge and learning for the path which leads to deliverance does not lie in that direction, and can only be found when man withdraws himself entirely from the external world, where life follows upon life and reincarnation upon reincarnation.\nThus it was the Buddha realized from the moment of his illumination that in the teachings and experience born of affliction, lay that basic element necessary to humanity for its future progress; and he conceived a factor (wherein was no wisdom) which he termed The Thirst for Existence to be the true source of all that misery and sorrow which so troubles the world. Upon the one side wisdom, upon the other a thirst for existence, where wisdom has no part. It was this thought which caused Gautama to exclaim: — ‘Only liberation from recurrent earth life can lead humanity to the realization of perfect freedom; for earthly wisdom, even that of the highest learning, cannot save us from grief and anguish.’ He therefore gave himself up to meditation, and sought some means whereby mankind might be led away from all this restlessness in the world of his reincarnations, and guided into that transcendent state which Gautama Buddha has designated Nirvana .\nWhat, then, is the nature of this state — this World of Nirvana — which man shall enter when he has so advanced in his earthly life that ‘The Thirst for Existence‘ has passed, and he no more desires to be reborn? We must understand this concept rightly, for then shall we avoid those grotesque and fantastic ideas, so frequently spread abroad. Nirvana is a condition that can only be characterized in the Buddhist sense. According to this conception, it is a world of redemption and of bliss that can never be expressed in terms of things which may be apprehended in the material state in which we have our being. There is nothing in this physical world, nor in the wide expanse of the cosmos, which can awaken in mankind a realization of the sublime truth underlying such redemption.\nHence, we should forbear from all pronouncements and assertions regarding that glorious region where humanity must seek salvation; and all earth-born predications and profitless statements — such as man is ever prone to make – must be stilled, for in them is nought pertaining to the spheres of eternal bliss. There is, indeed, no possibility of picturing that realm, where all may enter who have overcome the need for reincarnation, since it is not of those things of which we may have awareness on this earth life. When, therefore, we would speak of this condition we must use a negative, an indefinite, term and such a term is Nirvana. He who has conquered all mundane desires shall yet know the nature and the aspect of that other world which we can but indicate with the one vague and neutral word Nirvana. It is a region which, according to the Buddhist, no language can portray. It is not a ‘Nihility‘, it is indeed so far removed from such a concept that we can find no words wherewith to describe this state of being, so complete, so perfect, and all abounding in ecstasy and bliss.\nWe are now in a position to grasp and apprehend the very essence of Buddhism, its sentiments and its convictions. From the time of the Sermon at Benares, when first the Buddha gave expression to the ‘Doctrine of Suffering‘, Buddhism became permeated with thought and understanding concerning the inner nature of life’s misery and distress, and of that yearning, that Thirst for Existence which leads but to sorrow and affliction. There is, according to this doctrine, only one way in which humanity may truly progress, and that is through gaining freedom and redemption from further reincarnations. Mankind must find that path of knowledge which extends outward and beyond all earthly wisdom — that path which is the way and the means whereby slowly, step by step, man may become so fitted and conditioned that he can at last enter upon that ideal state — Nirvana. In other words, he must learn to utilize the experiences of his rebirths, in such manner that finally recurrent earth life is no longer essential to his development, and he is freed therefrom for evermore.\nIf we now turn from this brief summary of the conceptions which underlie Buddhism, to the root and essence of this religion, it at once strikes us as peculiar when viewed in the light of our ideas concerning humanity regarded as a whole — for Buddhism in point of fact isolates the individual. Questions are raised relative to man’s destiny, the purport and aim of his existence, his place and relation to the world — all from the stand-point of detached and separate personality. How, indeed, could any other trend of thought underlie a philosophy built upon a fundamental disposition of mind such as we have outlined? A philosophy evolved from a basic mood, which conceives man as being descended from spiritual heights and now finding himself in a world of illusion; from which material existence the wisdom of a Buddha may, from time to time, free him; but this very wisdom (as was seen in the case of the last Buddha) causes him to seek redemption from his earthly life. How could the goal of human existence, born as it was of convictions such as these, be characterized other than by representing man as isolated in his relation to the whole of his environment? According to this philosophy, the fundamental aspect of being is such as to represent decline, while development and evolution in earthly life implies degeneration.\nThe manner in which the Buddha sought enlightenment is both remarkable and significant, but unless we consider also the peculiar characteristics and circumstances connected with ‘The Illumination‘, neither the Buddha himself, nor Buddhism, can be properly understood. When Gautama craved enlightenment, he went forth into solitude; to a place where he could find entire and absolute isolation. For all that he had acquired from life to life, must be overcome in the utter detachment of his being, so that there could break in upon his soul that clear light whereby he might comprehend and solve the mystery of the world’s wretchedness. There in that place, as one in complete aloofness, dependent upon himself alone, the Buddha awaited the moment of illumination — that moment when there should come to him an understanding which would enable him to realize that the true cause of all human suffering lay in the intense longing manifested by individual man to be born again into this material world. And further, that this yearning for reincarnation, this thirst for existence, is the fundamental source of all that misery and distress which is everywhere about us, and of those pernicious factors which bring ruin and destruction into our very being.\nWe cannot rightly comprehend the unusual and singular nature of the Buddha-Illumination and of the Buddhistic Doctrine unless we compare them with the knowledge and experience we have gained through Christianity. Six hundred years after the advent of the Great Buddha, there arose in Christendom a wholly different conception, in which we also find man’s position relative to the world and all that is about him expressed in definite terms.\nNow, regarding Buddhism, and speaking in an abstract and general manner, we can say: — The philosophic outlook concerning the cosmos, as set forth in Buddhistic teachings, is not treated historically, and this unhistoric method is thoroughly typical of all Eastern countries. These countries have seen one Buddha epoch follow upon another, only to gradually die out and eventually come to an end. Such descriptions as are concerned merely with man’s descent from higher to lower states, do not of themselves constitute what we term history, for the factors of true history would include the upward endeavour of humanity to reach some appointed goal, and the nature and possibilities of man’s association and union with the world as a whole, both in the past and in the future. We would then have veritable history. But the Buddhist stands isolated and alone, concerned only with the basic principles of his being, ever seeking to gain through the conduct of his personal life those powers which may lead him to freedom from ‘the thirst for existence‘, so that having attained to this freedom he may at last win redemption from rebirth.\nIn Christendom, six hundred years after the Buddha period, the attitude of individual man toward the evolution of humanity in general was of quite another kind. Putting aside all prejudice, which is so common a failing throughout the world, we can characterize one particular Christian trend of thought as follows: — From that part of the Christian concept which is founded upon the stories in the Old Testament it is realized that the ancients were related to the spiritual realms in a manner wholly different from that which was subsequently the case; as is seen in the grand and lofty imagery depicted in Genesis. Now, a curious fact comes to light, namely, in Christendom we find man’s relation to the world to be of a character entirely unlike that which obtains in Buddhism. The following may be considered as the Christian’s point of view: — ‘Within my being is understanding begotten of that condition of soul which is now mine; and because of the way and the manner in which I observe and comprehend this outer perceptual world, there is born in me wisdom, intelligence and an aptitude for the practical conduct of life. But I can look back into the distant past when the human soul was differently conditioned, and there came about a circumstance, namely, “The Fall of Man”, which cannot be regarded simply from the Buddhistic stand-point.’ This event, which we so often find portrayed in a figurative form based upon misconception, the Buddhist believes to be a [natural result of man’s] descent from Divine spiritual heights into a world of Maya, or illusion. This great ‘Fall’ must, however, be looked upon in a quite different way, for truly characterized it is The Fall of Man [as caused wholly through his own transgression, and was not due as the Buddhist thinks, merely to his coming down from a higher spiritual state and entering a world of deception].\nAlthough man may have his own opinion concerning this matter, nevertheless, there is one thing we must admit, and that will suffice for the present, namely, that in connection with the thought of ‘The Fall’ there is an inner sentiment which causes man to exclaim: — ‘As I am now there work within me certain impulses and forces that have of a surety not developed in my being alone, for similar factors were active in a not so very distant past, when they played a part in happenings of such a nature that the human race, to which I belong, not only lapsed from its former higher spiritual standard, but is so far fallen that mankind has come into another relation with the world to the one which would have been, if the original conditions had but endured.’\nWhen man fell away from his previous high spiritual state, he sank to a definitely lower level, and this change was brought about by what may be termed his own conscious sin. We are therefore not merely concerned with the fact of descent, as is the case when ‘The Fall’ is viewed from the Buddhist stand-point, for we must take into consideration varying mood during this period of decadence. If man’s first nature had but continued unchanged this decline would not have that character which it has now assumed, where the soul-state is such that he is ever prone to fall into temptation.\nHe who penetrates beneath the surface of Christianity and studies deeply, learns that while history ran its course man’s soul-quality altered. In other words, because of certain events which happened in ancient times, man’s soul (the working of which may be likened to a subconscious mind with his being) took to itself a quality quite other to that which was primarily intended. Now, the Buddhist’s position relative to the material world may be expressed as follows; he would say: — ‘I have been taken out of a Divine spiritual realm and placed upon this earth; when I look around me I find nought but illusion — all is Maya.’ But the Christian, on the other hand, would exclaim: — ‘When I came down into this material life, had I but conformed to the order and intent of that Divine plan in which I had my part, I could even now look beyond this perceptual pretence, behind all this deception, this Maya; and I would at all times have power to realize and discern that which is genuine and true. But because, when I descended upon this earth my deeds were not in harmony with those things which had been ordained, I have, through my own act, caused this world to become an illusion.’\nTo the question: — ‘Why is this world one of Maya?’ the Buddhist answers: — ‘It is the world itself that is Maya.’ But the Christian says: — ‘It is I who am at fault, I alone; my limited capacity for discernment and my whole soul-state have placed me in such a position that I can no more apprehend that which was in the beginning; and my actions and conduct have ceased to be of such a nature that results follow smoothly, ever attended with beneficial and fruitful progress. I myself have enwrapped this material life in a veil of Maya.’ The Buddhist’s stand-point is: that the world is a great illusion, and must be overcome. The Christian exclaims: — ‘I have been placed upon this earth and must here find the purpose and object of my being.’ When he once understands that through Spiritual Science knowledge may be acquired concerning recurrent earth lives, he then realizes that he may use this wisdom for the achievement of the true aim of his existence. He then becomes convinced that the reason why we now look upon a world of sorrow and deception, is because we have wandered from our allotted path. He considers that this change to Maya is the direct result of man’s deeds, and the manner in which he regards the world. The Christian, therefore, is of opinion that in order to attain to eternal bliss, we must not seek to withdraw ourselves from this earth-state but master that condition which we alone have brought about, and through which the aspect of all material things has been transformed into one of illusion, such that we no longer apprehend them in their truth and reality; we must turn back and overcome this deception, then may we follow the course of our first duly appointed destiny — for latent within each one of us abides a higher personality. If this more noble hidden-self were not hindered and could but look around upon the world, it would apprehend it in all its verity; man would then no longer continue an existence hampered by sickness and by death but lead an everlasting life in all the freshness of youth.\nSuch, then, is the true inner self that we have veiled. Veiled, because in the past we have been associated with a certain event in the world’s development, the effects of which have continued on, while the primary impulses still work within us, thus proving that we do not exist isolated and alone. We must not believe that we have been led to our present condition through a ‘thirst for existence’ common to individual man; but rather must we realize that each one of us is a definite unit in the sum total of humanity, and as such must take his share and suffer from the results of any original transgression committed by mankind.\nIt is in this way that the Christian feels that he is historically united with the whole human race, and while he looks into the future, he exclaims: — ’Through travail and toil I must regain touch with that greater self which because of Man’s Fall, now lies enshrouded within my being. It is not Nirvana that I must seek, but my more noble Ego. Alone, must I find the way back to my true nature, then will the outer world be no longer an illusion, a vision of unreality, but a world wherein I shall overcome, of my own power and effort, all sorrow, sickness, and death. While the Buddhist would seek freedom from earthly conditions and from rebirth, through his struggle with ‘The Thirst for Existence’, — the Christian seeks liberation from his lower personality, and looks forward to the awakening of his higher self, that more exalted Ego, which he alone has veiled; so that through his awakening he may at last apprehend this perceptual world in the light of Divine truth.\nWhen we compare those significant words of St. Paul: — ‘Yet not I but Christ liveth in me’ (Galatians ii, 20) with the wisdom revealed by the Buddha, the contrast is as that between light and darkness. In St. Paul’s words, we find expressed that positive knowledge, that definite consciousness, which is ever active deep within us, and in virtue of which we take our place as human personalities in the world. According to the Buddhist, mankind has lapsed from spiritual heights, because this material world has pressed him down and implanted in him a ‘thirst for existence’; and this desire he must overcome — he must away! The Christian, on the other hand, says: — ‘No! the world is not to blame because of my present state, the fault lies with me alone.’\nWe Christians dwell upon this earth equipped with our accustomed consciousness; but beneath all awareness and understanding there is a something ever active in each individual personality which in by-gone times found expression in the form of a clairvoyant visioned consciousness, now no more extant, for even while we possessed this faculty, we transgressed. If we would indeed reach the ultimate goal of our existence, then must we first atone for this human error. No man who is advanced in years may say: — ‘In my early life I have sinned; it is unjust that I should now be called upon to make atonement for youthful faults, committed at a time when I had not yet attained to that fuller knowledge which is now mine.’ It would be equally wrong for him to assert that it is unfair that he be expected to use his present conscious power to such end that he may compensate for misdeeds enacted while in possession of a different conscious faculty, which faculty no longer exists, for it has been replaced by an intellectual cognition.\nThe only way in which man may truly atone, when indeed the will is there, is for him to raise himself upward from his present conscious-state and existing Ego, to a higher plane of personality — a more exalted ‘I’. Those words of St. Paul, — ‘Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,’ could then be characterized as follows, — ‘Yet not I, but a higher consciousness liveth in me.’ The Christian conception can be expressed in these words: — ‘I have fallen from a higher spiritual state, and have entered upon a different condition from that which was previously ordained; but I must rise again; and this I must do, not through that quality of Ego which is mine, but in virtue of a power that can enter into my very being, uplifting me far above that “I”, which I now possess. Such a change can alone come to pass when the Christ-influence is once more active within, leading me onward until the world has lost all power of illusion, and I can apprehend it in its true reality. Ever upward until those baneful forces which have brought sickness and death upon the earth may be vanquished, — conquered by that higher spiritual power which Christ has quickened within my being.’\nThe innermost essence of Buddhism is best understood by comparing the Buddhist creed with that of Christianity. When we do this, we at once realize why it was that Lessing should have made use of the phrase, — ‘Is not all Eternity mine?’ — in his book entitled The Education of Mankind . These words imply that if we employ the experiences gained during our repeated reincarnations, in such manner as to suffer the Christ-force to abide ever more and more within us, we shall at last reach the eternal spheres which realms we cannot as yet hope to attain, because we have of our own act, enveloped the inner being as with a veil. The idea of reincarnation will present a wholly different aspect when illumined by the glory of Christianity; but it is not merely the actual belief in rebirth which matters for the present, for with the advance of Christian culture, humanity will gradually be driven to the acceptance of this concept as a truth brought forward by Spiritual Science. But it is important that we should realize that, whereas the deepest sentiments and convictions of the Buddhist’s faith cause him to blame the World for everything that is Maya — the Christian, on the other hand, looks upon himself, and mankind in general, as responsible for all earthly deception and illusion. The while he stores within his innermost being those qualities which are prerequisite and necessary to him, in order that he may rise to that state which we term Redemption. In the Christian sense, however, this does not only imply deliverance, but actual resurrection; for when man has attained to this state, his Ego is already raised to the level of that more exalted ‘I’ from which he has fallen. The Buddhist, when he looks around upon the world, finds himself concerned with an original sin, but feels that he has been placed upon this earth merely for a time, he therefore desires his freedom. The Christian likewise realizes his connection with an original sin, but seeks amendment and to atone for this first transgression. Such is an historical line of thought, for while the Christian feels that his present existence is associated with an incident which took place in olden times among the ancients, he also connects his life with an event that will surely come to pass when he is so advanced that his whole being will shine forth, filled with that radiance which we designate as the essence of the Christ-Being.\nHence it is that during the world’s development we find nothing in Christianity corresponding to successive Buddha-epochs coming one after another, as one might say, unhistorically, each Buddha proclaiming a like doctrine. Christianity brings forward but one single glorious event during the whole of man’s earthly progress. In the same way as the Buddhist pictures the Buddha, seated isolated and alone under the Bodhi tree, at the moment when he was exalted and the great illumination came to him; so does the Christian visualize Jesus of Nazareth at that time when there descended upon Him the all-inspiring Spirit of the cosmos. The baptism of Christ by John, as described in the Bible, is as vivid and clear a picture as is the Buddhist’s conception of the Illumination of the Buddha. Thus we have, in the first case, the Buddha seated under the Bodhi tree, concerned only with his own soul; in the second, Jesus of Nazareth, standing in the Jordan, while there descended upon Him that cosmic essence, that Spirit, symbolically represented as a dove, which entered into His innermost being.\nTo those who profess Buddhism, there is something about the Buddha and his works which is as a voice ever saying, — ‘Thou shalt still this thirst for earthly existence, tear it out by the roots, and follow the Buddha — on to those realms which no earthly words can describe.’ The Christian has a similar feeling, with regard to the life and example of Christ, for there seems to come forth an influence, which makes it possible for him to atone for that primeval deed, committed by ancient humanity. He knows that when in his soul, the Divine cosmic influence (born of that great spiritual world which lies behind this perceptual earth) becomes as great a living force as in the Christ himself, then will he carry into his future reincarnations the increasing realization of the truth of St. Paul’s words: — ‘Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me’; and he will be raised more and more, ever upwards, to that Divine state from which he is now fallen. When such a faith is ours, we cannot help but be deeply moved, when we hear the story of how the Buddha, as he addressed his intimate disciples, spoke to them as follows: — ‘When I look back upon my former lives, as I might look into an open book, where I can read page after page, and review each life in turn that is passed, I find in every one of these earthly existences that I have built for myself a material body, in which my spirit has dwelt as in a temple; but I now know that this same body in which I have become Buddha will of a verity be the last.’ Speaking of that Nirvana, into which he would so soon enter, the Buddha said: — ‘I already feel that the beams (“Balken”) are cracking and the supports giving way; that this physical body which has been raised up for the last time will soon be wholly and finally destroyed.’\nLet us compare the above with the words of Christ, as recorded in the Gospel of St. John (ii. 19), when Jesus, intimating that He lived in a body which was external and apart, said: — ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ Here we have an exactly opposite point of view, which might be interpreted thus: — ‘I will perform a deed which shall quicken and make fruitful, all that in this world is of God, and has come down to man from primeval times, and entered into his being.’ These words imply that the Christian, during his recurrent earth lives must exercise his every faculty, in order to give truth to the affirmation: — ‘Yet not I, but Christ Iiveth in me.’ We must, however, clearly understand that Christ’s reference to the rebuilding of the temple has an eternal significance and means that the Christ-power ever enters into, and is absorbed by, all who truly realize that they themselves must play a constructive part in the collective evolution of humanity. It is entirely wrong to speak of that event which gave rise to what we term the Christ-impulse, as though we anticipated its recurrence in some form during the further development of mankind.\nThe Buddhist, when he ponders in accordance with the true concepts of his creed, pictures the advent of several Buddhas, appearing one after another throughout recurring Buddha-epochs, all of which during the course of their earth lives had a similar character and significance. The Christian looks back to a single past event which is described as — The Fall of Man through Sin — while he points to its converse in the Mystery of Golgotha. He who believes that the Christ-event will at some later period be repeated, merely shows that he has not grasped the true essence of the historical evolution of mankind. History tells us that this idea has been frequently put forward in the past and it is likely that it will again reappear in the future.\nThe course of true history must always be dependent upon some single basic event. Just as the arm of a balance must have one point of equilibrium and the beam from which the scales hang one point of support only; so in the case of a true record of the evolution of mankind there must be some single circumstance to which its historical development (taken either backwards or forwards) ever points. It is as absurd to speak of a repetition of the Christ-event as it would be to assert that the beam of a balance could be supported and swing upon two points. That Eastern wisdom should hold to the belief that a number of similar spiritual personalities succeed each other at intervals, as it does in the case of the Buddhas, is characteristic of the difference existing between the Oriental cosmic conception and that which has sprung up among the Occidental countries, as the result of so much painstaking observation and thought concerning the course of evolution. The Western concept first began to take definite form at the time of the manifestation of the Christ-impulse, which we must regard as a unique circumstance. If we oppose the oneness and singular character of the Christ-event, we argue against the possibility of the true historical evolution of mankind; and to argue against historical evolution betrays a misunderstanding of genuine history.\nWe can, in its deepest sense, term that consciousness possessed by individual man of indissoluble association with humanity as a whole, the Christian consciousness. Through it we become aware of a definite purpose, underlying the course of all human evolution, and realize that here indeed can be no mere repetition. Such consciousness is an attribute of Christianity, from which it cannot be separated. The real progress which mankind has made during its period of development is shown in the advance from the ancient Eastern cosmic conception to the philosophic concept of modern times — from the unhistoric to the historic — from a belief that the wheels of human chance roll on through a succession of similar events to a conviction that underlying the whole of man’s evolution is a definite purpose, a design of profound significance.\nWe realize that it is Christianity which has first revealed the true meaning of the doctrine of reincarnation. We can now state that the reason why man must experience recurrent earth lives is that he may be again and again instilled with the true import of material existence; with this object he is confronted with a different aspect of being during each of his incarnations. There is throughout humanity an upward tendency that is not merely confined to the isolated individual, but extends to the entire human race with which we feel ourselves so intimately connected. The Christ-impulse, the centre of all, causes us to realize that man can become conscious of the glory of this divine relation; then no more will he only acknowledge the creed of a Buddha, who cries out to him: — ‘Free thyself!’ — but will become aware of his union with The Christ, Whose deed has reclaimed him from the consequences of that decadence, symbolically represented as: — ‘The Fall of Man through Sin.’\nWe cannot describe Buddhism better than by showing that it is the after-glow of a cosmic conception, the sun of which has nearly set; but with the advent of Gautama it shone forth with one last brilliant, powerful ray. We revere the Buddha none the less, we honour him as a Great Spirit — as one whose voice called into the past and brought back into this earthly life, once again that mood which brings with it so clear a consciousness of man’s connection with ancient primordial wisdom. On the other hand, we know that the Christ-impulse points resolutely towards the future, ever penetrating more and more deeply into the very soul of man; so that humanity may realize that it is not release and freedom that it should seek, but Resurrection that glorious transfiguration of our earthly being. It is in such a metamorphosis that we find the inner meaning of our material life. It is futile to search among dogmas, concepts and ideas for the active principle of existence; for the vital element of life lies in our impulses, emotions and feelings, and it is through these moods that we may apprehend the true significance of man’s evolution and development.\nThere may be some who feel themselves more drawn toward Buddhism than toward Christianity; and we must admit that even in our time there is something about Buddhism which inspires a certain sympathy in many minds, and which is to a certain extent in the nature of a Buddha-mood or disposition. Such a feeling, however, did not exist with Goethe, who sought to free himself from the pangs which he endured owing to the narrow-mindedness he found everywhere about him, at the time of his first sojourn in Weimar. His endeavour in this respect was wholly due to his love of life and conviction that interwoven throughout all external being is the same spiritual essence which is the true origin of the Divine element in man. Goethe strove to achieve this Iiberation from distress through observation of the outer world, going from plant to plant, from mineral to mineral, and from one work of art to another — ever seeking that underlying spirit from which the human soul emanates; the while he sought to unify himself with that Divine essence which manifests throughout all external things.\nGoethe, when in converse with Schopenhauer regarding the influence of his thoughts and ideas upon his pupil, once said: — ‘When your carefully considered and worthy conceptions come into contact with a wholly different trend of thought, they will be found at variance with one another.’ Schopenhauer had established a maxim which, expressed in his oft-repeated words, was as follows: — ‘Life is ever precarious, and it is through deep meditation that I seek to alleviate its burdens.’ What he really sought was that illumination which would reveal and make clear the true origin [and intent] of existence. It was therefore only natural that Buddhist concepts should enter his mind and mingle with his ideas, thus causing him to ponder upon this olden creed.\nDuring the progress of the nineteenth century the different branches of human culture have yielded such great and far-reaching results, that the mind of man seems incapable of adjusting itself in harmony with the flood of new ideas which continually pour in upon it, as a consequence of effort expended in scientific research; and it feels ever more and more helpless before the enormous mass of facts which is the unceasing product of such investigations. We have found this vast world of accepted truths to be wonderfully in accord with the concepts of Spiritual Science, but it is worthy of note that during the last century, although man’s reasoning powers increased greatly nevertheless they soon failed to keep pace with the immense inflow of scientific data. Thus it was that just toward the close of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, man realized that he could not hope to understand and to master all this new knowledge by means of the human intellect alone; for everything about us is connected with, and extends into the cosmos and the world of spirit — and this outer realm is still beyond the limits of man’s normal faculties of comprehension. He must, therefore, seek another way, some as yet untrodden path.\nHence it is that mankind has sought a cosmic philosophy, not wholly at variance with all those facts coming from the outer world which make inward appeal to the soul. Spiritual Science is based upon the most profound conceptions and experiences of divine wisdom, and is ever ready to deal with all fresh truths and data brought forward by external science, to assimilate them, and throw new light upon their significance, showing at the same time that in all which has actuality in external life, is embodied the divine essence — the spirit. There are some people, however, who find the concepts of Spiritual Science inconvenient and unsuitable. They turn away from the world of reality, which demands so much thought and effort for its unfoldment, and, according to their own knowledge and personal ideas, seek a higher plane merely through the development of their individual souls. Thus we have what may be termed an ‘Unconscious Buddhism’, which has long existed and been active in the philosophies of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. When an ‘Unconscious Buddhist’ comes into contact with true Buddhism then, because of indolence and inertia, he feels himself more ‘at home’ with this Eastern creed than with European Spiritual Science, which comes to grips with widespread facts, because it knows that throughout the entire range of reality the Divine spirit is ever manifest.\nThere is no doubt that the present sympathy and interest evinced with regard to Buddhism is due, in part, to feebleness of will and want of faith, faith, born of undeveloped spiritual knowledge. The whole essence of the Christian cosmic conception, which seems to have been in Goethe’s mind, demands that man shall not give way to his own weak spiritual understanding and talk of ‘the limitations of human knowledge’, but feel that there is within him a something which will carry him above all illusion and bring him to truth and reality, thus freeing him for evermore from terrestrial existence. A cosmic conception of this nature may call for much patient resignation, but such is of quite a different order to that which shrinks before the contemplation of the limits of human understanding. Resignation, in the Kantian sense, implies that mankind is altogether incapable of penetrating the deep secrets of the cosmos, and its chief feature lies in the special acknowledgment of the feebleness of man’s comprehension; but that of Goethe is of a different character, and is expressed in these words: — ‘Thou hast not as yet come so far, that thou canst apprehend the Universe in all its glorious reality, but thou art capable of developing thyself.’ Resignation of this kind leads on to that stage of growth and progress when man will truly be in a position to call forth his Christ-nature from within his being; he yields, because he realizes that the highest point of his mundane development has not yet been attained. Such an attitude is noble and fully in accord with human understanding. It implies that we pass from life to life, with the consciousness of being, looking ever forward into the future in the knowledge that with regard to recurrent earthly existence all eternity is ours.\nWhen we consider man’s evolution, we find ourselves confronted with two modern currents of thought, each leading to a different cosmic conception. One of which, due to Schopenhauer, pictures the world with all its misery and suffering, as of such nature that we can only realize and appreciate man’s true position when we gaze upon the works of the great artists. In these masterpieces we oft-times find portrayed the form and figure of a being, who through asceticism, has attained to something approaching to liberation from earthly existence, and already hovers, as it were, above this lower terrestrial life. Fundamentally, Schopenhauer was of opinion that in the case of a human being thus freed, retrospection concerning material conditions no longer exists and that herein lies the pre-eminent characteristic of such liberation. Hence, he who has thus won his way to freedom, can truly say: — ‘I am still clothed in my bodily garment, but it has now lost all significance, and there is nought left about me which might in time to come recall my earthly life. I strive ever upward, in anticipation of that state with which I shall gain contact when I have at last wholly overcome the world, and all that appertains thereto.’ Of such nature was the sentiment of Schopenhauer, after he had become imbued with those ideas and convictions, which Buddhist teaching has spread abroad in the world.\nGoethe, on the other hand, led on by his truly Christian impulse, regarded the world after the manner of his character — Faust . When we cease to look about us in trivial mood, when we truly realize that all material works must perish, and death at last overtake the body, then with Goethe we can say: — ‘If we but take heed and ponder concerning our earthly activities there will come knowledge born of experience, teaching us that while all those things wrought and accomplished which are of this world must pass away, that which we have built up within ourselves through toil and striving during our contact with the ‘School of Earthly Life’, shall not perish, for such is indeed everlasting.’\nSo with Faust we think not of how our mundane works may endure, but look forward to the fruits which they shall bring forth in the course of the soul’s eternal life; thus are we carried far out and beyond the narrow confines of the Buddhist creed, into a world of thought which finds brief expression in those impressive words of Goethe:-\n‘Eons cannot erase The traces of my days on earth.’\n\nNotes for this lecture:\n1. Bodhisattva (Sanskrit). A Bodisat, one whose essence is enlightenment, that is, one destined to become a Buddha. A Buddha Elect ( vide, A Concise Dictionary of Eastern Religion , by Winternitz).\n2. Bodhi Tree — Fig-tree ( Ficus religiosa ); known also as the Bo Tree. [Ed.]"
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-14",
    "title": "Moses",
    "date": "9 Mar 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/GC1987/19110309p02.html",
    "book_title": "Turning Points Spiritual History",
    "content": "When we study the great historical individualities of the past, such as those who have already claimed our attention during these lectures, namely, Zarathustra, Hermes and Buddha, we are brought face to face with incidents and facts which are of interest to us as human beings, because we feel that our whole soul life plays a part in the collective evolution of humanity. It is only when we look back to those great spiritual characters of by-gone times, who have helped to bring about the conditions in which we now live, that we can truly comprehend our present circumstances.\nWith regard to Moses, however, whose personality we are about to consider, the matter presents a wholly different aspect; for here we have the feeling that there is no limit to that direct influence exerted by all those events connected with his name, which yet continue to affect the spiritual content of our souls. We still feel, in our very bones, as it were, the workings of those impulses which emanated from this great outstanding patriarch. It seems to us that Moses is even now a living force in our thoughts and feelings, and as if when we analyse our ideas and motives according to his doctrine and sentiments, that we are in truth arraigning and searching our very souls. It is for this reason that all that persistent tradition which is directly associated with Moses, seems to us more vivid, more actually present, than that which is connected with those other great personalities to whom I have referred. It is therefore in a certain sense, less difficult to deal with this outstanding individuality, for through the Bible we are all familiar with this mighty figure, whose influence has endured even to the present time.\nAlthough the conscientious researches which have been conducted by science during the past ten years and more, have to a certain extent touched upon the surface and here and there thrown new light upon the history of Moses — in so far as it can be gleaned from the Bible — nevertheless, when we look more deeply into the matter, we must admit that very little indeed has been altered with regard to the general impression which we have received from our own personal study of the Scriptures.\nWhenever we refer to any matter connected with Moses, or to the great patriarch himself, we speak as if we were mentioning some subject well known throughout the widest circles; this fact somewhat simplifies the contemplation of the historical features. But on the other hand there are certain difficulties which arise, because of the manner in which the Bible tradition concerning Moses is expressed. This we at once realize when we call to mind the vicissitudes which accompanied the Biblical researches of the nineteenth century.\nThere is scarcely a single branch of human knowledge, or sincere scientific endeavour, even when we include the natural sciences, which claims in so high a degree our deep admiration and reverence, as do these investigations; and I feel that this point should be repeatedly emphasized. The industry, the discrimination, the devoted and unselfish scientific application, expended upon separate sections of the Bible, in order to educe from their character and style a definite knowledge of their alleged origin, is considered by those who have followed these researches closely as a work which has had no parallel during the nineteenth century.\nAll this investigation of the past hundred years has, however, a tragic side, for the further the researches were carried, the more did they tend to place the Bible beyond the reach of the people. Anyone who will consult the current literature concerning the results of these exhaustive studies can convince himself of this fact. The difficulty arose because the Bible was dissected and split up, particularly in the case of the Old Testament, in an attempt to show, for instance, that a certain passage occurring in one part of the Bible owed its origin to a different current of tradition to that of a passage in another part. Also, that during the course of time the whole subject matter had gradually become welded together, in a form which made it necessary for it to be first separated out in this scholarly manner, in order that it might be understood. Hence, in a certain sense, the outcome of these investigations must be looked upon as tragic, since they were fundamentally wholly negative in character and contributed nothing toward the continuance of that vivifying influence which the Bible is capable of exerting, and which has lived in the hearts and souls of mankind for thousands of years.\nThat movement towards true spiritual development, which we have termed Spiritual Science, is chiefly concerned with constructive activities and is not interested in mere criticism, as is so often the case with other sciences. In our time its most important task is to bring about once again an accurate and proper understanding of the Bible, and in this relation it puts forward the following question: — ‘Is it not essential that we should first penetrate into the very depths of the import and significance which underlies the whole character of the ancient Biblical traditions, and then, only after these are fully and clearly understood, inquire as to their origin?’ Such a procedure is however, not easy, especially with reference to the Old Testament, and is particularly difficult in regard to those sections which deal with the great outstanding figure and personality of Moses.\nWe would now ask: — ‘What is it that Spiritual Science has to say regarding the peculiar nature of those ancient Biblical descriptions?’ It tells us that those external events which are associated with this or that personality or nation, have been chronicled in the order and manner in which they actually occurred, as viewed from the stand-point of external history. Following this method, the personality of Moses is so depicted that his experiences in the physical world are represented just as they took place in relation to space and time.\nIt is only when we have made a profound study of the Bible through the medium of Spiritual Science, that we realize that a Biblical description concerned with external happenings and experiences may become merged in one of quite another nature; and it is often with difficulty that we can distinguish this change in fundamental character. We are told, for instance, of journeys and other worldly events which we accept as such; then, all unnoticed, as the account continues, we find ourselves confronted with a graphic narrative of a wholly different order. It seems to us that a certain journey is represented as continuing from one definite place to another, and as if we were expected to look upon the account of events depicted in the latter part of the narrative in the same light as the external physical happenings described at the beginning. In reality, however, the latter part of such an account may be actually a figurative portrayal of the soul-life of the particular personality to whom the story has reference. It then has no connection whatever with external worldly events, but depicts the soul experiences, struggles and conquests, through which this especial being is raised to a higher degree of soul development, greater enlightenment, a more advanced stage of activity, or to a mission concerned with the world’s evolution. In such case, descriptions of outside events pass over without any noticeable change directly into pictorial representations, which although remaining similar in style and character, have absolutely no significance with regard to external physical happenings — but refer only to the inner experiences of the soul.\nThe above assertion will always remain ‘a mere assertion’ to those who are unable to utilize the methods of Spiritual Science and thus enter gradually and understandingly into the strange and unusual features associated with many of the graphic narratives found in the Bible; more particularly will this be the case with regard to those sections which deal with the patriarch Moses. When, however, we study this strange method of representation deeply, we notice that when at some certain point in a story the description of external physical events changes into one of soul-experiences, the whole style and fundamental character of the account alters, while a new element suddenly makes its appearance. If we ask ourselves: — ‘How does it come about that we are able to perceive this change?’ we can only answer that we realize it because of a conviction that comes to us from the soul. This curious descriptive method, which we have just characterized, lies at the base of ancient religious historical narratives, more especially when they are concerned with personalities who have reached a high standard of discernment and understanding of the soul’s action and inner workings.\nThe further we advance, and the more deeply we become immersed in the study of Spiritual Science, the greater is our faith in this singular style of representation; but just because of the strangeness of this method it is, in some ways, far from easy to gain a clear comprehension of the true meaning of certain passages which occur in the graphic delineation of Moses. On the one hand, we have the Bible with its apparently straightforward narrative, but on the other, there are difficulties due to the curious way in which the account is presented, when the subject matter is of an especially profound character. This fact has resulted in the customary interpretations being much too liberal in many cases.\nWhen, for instance, we consider the conception of ancient Hebrew history, as advanced by the philosopher Philo, who lived at the time of the founding of Christianity, we realize at once that he endeavoured to portray the whole record of the old Jewish nation as if it were an allegory. Philo aimed at a figurative representation in which the entire history of this ancient race becomes a sort of symbolical account of the soul-experiences of a people. In so doing, Philo went too far, and for this reason: he did not possess that judgment and insight, born of Spiritual Science, which would have enabled him to discern and to know when the descriptions concerning external events glided into portrayals relative to soul-life.\nAs we proceed it will be realized that in Moses we have a personality who influenced directly the active course of human evolution, and whose mission it was to enlighten mankind concerning matters of the utmost import and significance. When we experience that deep sense, so pregnant with meaning, through which we become aware that his deeds even yet touch a chord within our souls, then do we feel that a full and clear comprehension of the Moses-Impulse is to us a necessity. We will, therefore, without further preamble, enter at once upon the question of his great Mission. The true object of his life’s work cannot, however, be fully understood unless we presuppose that the Bible narrative was based upon actual and specific knowledge of a certain fundamental change in man’s psychic condition, to which we have already referred when considering the individualities of Zarathustra, Hermes and Buddha. We then drew attention to the fact that during the course of evolution the soul-life of man has gradually undergone a definite modification, from a divine primordial clairvoyant state to that of our present-day intellectual consciousness.\nI must once again bring back to your minds a statement made in previous lectures, namely, that in primeval times the soul of man was so constituted that during certain intermediary conditions between that of sleeping and being awake, he could gaze upon the Spirit-World, and that things thus observed, and which were truly of the spiritual realms, manifested as pictures or visions; and it is these visions that in many cases have been perpetuated in the form of mythological legends of by-gone times.\nIn reply to the question: — ‘How can the reality of this ancient clairvoyant consciousness be proved externally, and without the aid of Spiritual Science?’ we would say that the answer is to be found in the results of certain precise and painstaking investigations which have been carried on even in our time, but which have not as yet received general recognition. We would point out that comparatively recently some of our mythologists during their researches into the origin of ancient mythical visions, legends, etc., which have arisen among certain separate and distinctive peoples, have been forced to assume the existence of an altogether different conscious state in order to account for these ancient myths and concepts.\nI have often referred to an interesting book, entitled The Riddle of the Sphinx , by Ludwig Laistner, a mythologist who must be ranked as the most prominent among the modern investigators in this field of research. The Riddle of the Sphinx is regarded as one of the most important works of its kind. Laistner draws attention to the fact that certain myths appear to form a sequel to events typical of experiences in a dream world. He did not advance so far as the study of Spiritual Science, and he was quite unaware that he had in reality laid the foundation stone of a true knowledge and understanding of the Ancient Mythologies. We ( annot, however, regard Myths and Legends merely in the light of transfigured typical dreams, as Laistner has done, but we must recognize in them the products of a by-gone condition of human consciousness in which man could apprehend the Spirit-World in pictorial visions, that later found expression in mythical imagery.\nIt is impossible to comprehend the old fables and legends, unless we start with the hypothesis that they were evolved from a different form of conscious state; and it is just because this basic assumption has been lacking that they are so little understood. This prehistoric soul-state has now given way to our present intellectual consciousness, which latter may be briefly characterized as follows: — We alternate between a condition of sleeping and of being awake. In our wakeful state we seize upon those impressions which come to us from the external world, through the medium of our senses; these ideas we group together, combining them by means of our intellect. This material form of intellectual consciousness, which acts through our power of understanding and intelligence, has now superseded the ancient clairvoyant soul-state. We have thus characterized a particular episode of history, and presented it in the aspect which it assumes when we make a profound study of the evolution of mankind.\nThere is yet another factor which underlies the manner in which Bible narratives are expressed. It appears that a special mission was assigned to each nation, race and tribe in connection with the evolution and development of man; and that the ancient clairvoyant forms of consciousness manifested in different ways according to the capacity and temperament of the various peoples. It is for this reason that we find fundamentally among the mythologies and pagan religions of divers nations such uniformity of tradition concerning this old clairvoyant state.\nWe thus realize that we are not dealing with just one abstract idea, or unit, in this ancient conception of the world; for the most varied missions were assigned to Nations and to Peoples who differed very greatly from one another; and thus it came about that the universal consciousness found expression in many and varying forms. If we would indeed understand all that the evolution of mankind implies, then we must take into consideration the fact that it does not merely consist of a meaningless succession of civilizations, but that throughout the whole course of man’s progress and development there is found interwoven both significance and purport. Hence we find that a certain order of conscious-state may reappear and be found active in some later civilization because, like a fresh page, or a new-born flower, it has something to add to that which has gone before; for the whole meaning and purpose of human evolution implies ever recurrent and successive forms of manifestation.\nWe can best understand the people of a nation from the stand-point of Spiritual Science when we realize that all races, be they Ancient Indians, Persians, Babylonians, Greeks, or Romans, had a definite mission to fulfil, and that each nation gave expression in some special and distinctive manner to that which was active and could live in man’s consciousness. We cannot rightly comprehend these different peoples unless we are in a position to apprehend and to realize the nature of their mission from their individual characteristics. The whole evolution of mankind proceeds in such manner that to each nation a certain time is apportioned and when this period draws to a close, the nation’s work is done. It is as if the hour had struck, the seeds had brought forth their fruit, and the task was ended. It may, however, happen that with this or that race certain peculiarities of temperament, or natural disposition, corresponding to a former period may persist. In such a case this particular nation has, as it were, overpassed the appointed time when a new mission should be entered upon, and take the place of that which was before. Thus it is that certain singular and distinctive national traits may endure and become active at a later period, the while the objective course of human evolution substitutes some fresh purpose for that which was previously determined.\nA course of events of this nature is especially noticeable with the Egyptians, and we have already become acquainted with their peculiar characteristics during the lecture devoted to Hermes. The Egyptians had been assigned a lofty mission in connection with the collective progress and development of humanity; and all that was embodied therein was perfected and fulfilled, while the seeds of that which was to follow had been laid in the Egyptian civilization. The people of this great nation, however, retained their original temperament and singular characteristics and were therefore not of themselves capable of formulating and undertaking a new mission. Hence it came about that the control and government of the succeeding community passed into other hands. The source out of which the fresh movement evolved was fundamentally Egyptian, but the mission itself was destined to assume a different character.\nHere we note something akin to a change of tendency in the whole purport of man’s evolution, and in order that we may understand the circumstances, it is necessary that we immerse ourselves deeply in the study of all that pertained to the growth and development of the Egyptian mission. When Moses had acquired all the knowledge and information possible concerning this matter, he pondered deeply and the souls of his people were stirred. It was, however, not his task to carry on the ancient Egyptian mission; he must evolve therefrom some entirely new plan which he might instil into the course of human evolution. It is because his concept was so mighty, so comprehensive and so penetrating in its nature, that the personality of Moses exerted so powerful an Influence upon the whole history of mankind. The way in which the Moses Mission was evolved out of the past evolution of the Egyptian people is even in our day of the greatest interest, while its example and study yet bear abundant fruit. That knowledge and understanding which came to Moses from the Egyptians, and which was enhanced through his contact with the lofty and eternal course of spiritual development has ever reached outward, until it has now become active in our soul-life.\nHence, the impression we have gained of Moses is that of a personality not directly dependent upon any particular period, or upon any special mission, for that wisdom which was his to impart to humanity. We regard him as one whose soul must have been stirred by those eternally surging waves of Divine influence, that ever find new channels through which to reach deep down into the evolution of mankind, so that man may be productive and bring forth goodly fruits. It is as if the ever-lasting germ of wisdom implanted in the soul of Moses, found its fitting soil, and ripened, in the light of that knowledge which came to him from the Egyptian civilization.\nThe Bible account of the finding of Moses enclosed in an Ark, shortly after his birth (Ex. ii. 5), is a symbolical description according to the ancient mode, from which we are to understand that in Moses we are concerned with a soul that drew upon eternal sources for the most lofty of those concepts which it proffered to humanity. Anyone who understands the singular form in which such religious narratives are developed, knows that this particular style is always indicative of some matter of deep significance. During former lectures of this series, we have learnt that when man desires to raise his capacity of apprehension to the higher level of the spiritual spheres he must pass through certain stages of soul development, during which he completely shuts himself off from the external world, and also from that ever wakeful call emanating from the lowest forces of the soul.\nLet us suppose that we wished to express figuratively, that at birth some personality entering upon earth life came upon the world endowed with certain Divine gifts which would later raise him to great heights in his relation to mankind. We might well indicate this concept by developing a narrative telling us that it was essential that this being should, shortly after birth, pass through some material experience of such nature as to cause all his sense perceptions and powers of external apprehension to be for a time entirely shut off from the physical world. 1 Viewed in this light the Bible story concerning the discovery of Moses becomes quite intelligible.\nWe read that the daughter of the Egyptian King Pharaoh [sent her maid to the river to fetch the Ark, in which was the child] and that she herself named him Moses — ‘Because,’ she said, ‘I drew him out of the water.’ (Ex. ii, 10.) Those who are aware of the true meaning of the name ‘Moses’, know that it signifies this act, as is indicated in the Bible. From this graphic narrative we are to understand that the daughter of Pharaoh, who is here symbolical of Egyptian culture, guided the influx of external life into a soul touched with the attributes of eternity. At the same time we find intimated in a wonderful manner that the imperishable message which Moses was destined to bring to humanity was as one might say, enfolded and lay within an outer shell encompassed and enveloped by the old Egyptian culture and mission.\nNext follow descriptions of external events which occurred during the life-development of Moses; and we realize once again from the form in which they are presented, that they have reference to actual outer happenings. All that we read concerning the vicissitudes of Moses, especially where mention is made of his grief and distress over the bondage of his people in Egypt, may be regarded as an actual account of mundane events. As the story continues, it merges almost imperceptibly into a graphic portrayal of his inner soul-life and soul-experiences. This occurs at that place where it is stated that he fled away and was finally guided to a priest of Midian whose name was Jethro or Ruel. (Ex. ii, 15 to 20.)\nAnyone having the knowledge and discernment necessary in order to discover the existence of a story of this nature underlying what, at first sight, would appear to be an ordinary spiritual narrative, would at once realize from the very names alone that the account changes its whole character at this point and passes over to a description of soul-events. We do not mean to suggest that Moses did not actually set out upon a journey to some temple sanctuary or abode of priestly learning; but rather that the whole narrative has been most ingeniously developed and told in such manner that external happenings are deliberately intermingled with the soul-experiences of the great patriarch. Thus do we find that all outer life-experiences mentioned at this point are suggestive of the trials and tribulations against which Moses struggled in order to attain to a more exalted soul-state.\nWhat, then, is the actual significance of Jethro? From the Bible we learn that he was one of those mysterious individualities whom we meet again and again when we study the evolution and development of the human race. Beings who stand supreme in having won their way through toil and effort to that lofty standard of knowledge and discernment which can only be acquired, slowly and gradually, through veritable experience of the soul’s inner conflicts. It is in this wise alone that man may gain true understanding of those grand spiritual heights where lie the paths ever traversed by such exalted ones. Moses became, to a certain extent, a disciple of Jethro, and through this association his mission was destined to receive a direct impulse. Now, Jethro was one of those incomprehensible beings who withhold their innermost nature from the apprehension of mankind, though acting on occasion as teachers and leaders of men. In these days there is much doubt and incredulity regarding the reality of such mystic personalities, but that they have indeed existed becomes evident to every earnest student of the historical development of humanity.\nThe account of the experiences of Moses while a disciple of this great wise priest, opens with a description of his meeting with Jethro’s seven daughters [in the land of Midian. Ex. ii, 15, 16] near-by to a well (a symbol betokening: — source of wisdom). Anyone who would comprehend the deeper significance underlying a graphic narrative of this nature must above all remember that mystical descriptions of every period have symbolically portrayed all such knowledge and power as the soul itself may display in the form of female figures — even down to Goethe , who in the closing words of Faust , alludes to the ‘eternal feminine’. Thus in the seven daughters of Jethro, we recognize the seven human soul-forces, over which that priestly character ever exercised control. 2\nWe must bear in mind that in those ancient times when man’s consciousness was still quickened by the old clairvoyance, other views prevailed regarding the nature of the human soul and its various powers. The only way in which we can form any conception of this primordial consciousness is by starting with our current ideas as a basis. We speak in these days of man’s soul and its powers of thinking, feeling and willing, as if these forces were within us, contained, as one might say, in the very soul itself; and this concept is essentially correct, as viewed from the stand-point of intellectual consciousness. Primeval man, however, under the influence of his gift for clairvoyant vision, regarded the soul and its workings from a different aspect. He was not aware of any centralized system in this connection and did not look upon his powers of thought, feeling and will, as forces whose mid-point of activity is situated in the Ego and which determine the oneness and individuality of the soul, but regarded himself as wholly subservient to the Macrocosm and its several forces; while each separate source of energy within his soul seemed linked with specific and divine spiritual beings. This concept may be compared to one in which we might conceive our thought activities as prompted and maintained by some spiritual soul-power other than that which stimulates and influences the faculties of feeling and will. We would thus picture separate currents of spiritual energy as flowing inward from the Macrocosm, and activating our powers of thought, feeling and willing. Although in these days we form no such conception, it was thus that primeval man regarded his soul, not as a centralized unit in itself, but rather as a theatre in which the divine spiritual powers of the cosmos might unceasingly play their several parts. In connection with Moses, reference is made to seven such forces, which are conceived as ever active upon the stage of soul-life.\nWe have only to turn to Plato in order to realize that man's outlook upon the evolution of human consciousness changed and became in general ever more and more abstract and intellectual. Plato conceived ‘Ideas’ to be living entities, leading an existence such as in our time could only be thought of in connection with matter; while each separate soul-force is pictured as possessing an attribute which plays its part in the theatre of the soul’s totality. Gradually the conceptions formed regarding the capacity of the soul became increasingly abstract while the Unity of the Ego assumed more and more its rightful place in man’s concepts.\nStrange as it may appear, in the medieval conception of the seven liberal arts, 3 we can still recognize in abstract form characteristics typical of the symbolic representation of the seven active spiritual forces of soul-life in the seven daughters of the Midianite priest, Jethro. The manner in which the seven liberal arts were evolved and brought to light was as a last dim echo (touched with a modern trend of thought) of that consciousness which recognized that seven distinct faculties persist, and are ever active in the scenes staged in the theatre of man’s soul.\nWhen we consider the above concepts, we begin to realize that while, from the spiritual standpoint, Moses was confronted with the collective aspect of these seven human soul-forces, nevertheless, his chief mission was to implant one particular soul-influence in the form of an impulse deeply and fully in the course of human evolution. This it was possible for him to do, because it lay in the blood and in the temperament of his people to manifest an especial interest in that outstanding soul-power, the activities of which have been felt right on down to our own time, and which it was his task to instil. We refer to that dominant soul-energy which unites all those forces, previously regarded as separate and detached, in one centralized and homogeneous bond of inner soul-life — the life of the true self — the Ego. We are next told that one of the daughters of Jethro married Moses; this means that within his soul one of these forces became especially active, so much so indeed, that owing to its influence it became for a long period a dominating power in human evolution, reducing all other soul-forces to a unified Soul-Ego.\nStatements such as the above must be made with the greatest reserve, for in our present age mankind has no adequate faculty, or organ, wherewith he may realize that many Biblical descriptions which apparently represent external happenings are presented solely for the purpose of drawing attention to the fact that at the time at which the events portrayed took place, a particular soul was undergoing some experience of inner development; in other words, was especially concerned with, and attracted to, its individual mission. It is also apparent that one special attribute which the old Egyptians did not possess, namely, that inspiration which Moses drew from the human Ego-force at the mid-point of man’s soul-powers was for him the criterion [to which he referred his judgment].\nWe can therefore with reason assert that the true mission of the ancient Egyptian nation was to found a culture based upon the practise and methods of primeval clairvoyance. All that is best of those things which have been handed down to us from the Egyptian civilization, has sprung from the singular nature of those peculiar psychic powers, once possessed by the Egyptian priests and the leaders of the people. But the time came when with regard to the old Egyptian mission, one might say, that the cosmic clock had run down, and the call must go forth to mankind to unfold and develop those soul-forces which it was ordained should, for a long period, supersede that ancient passive clairvoyant condition in the future evolution of humanity.\nEgo-consciousness, intellectuality, rationalism, reason and understanding, with their spheres of action in the external perceptual world were destined to replace the old clairvoyant consciousness in the human race yet to come. I have already stated how, in the future of mankind, the clairvoyant power, and the intellectual consciousness, will be found united. Even now, humanity is advancing toward a time when these two conscious states will be universally interwoven and co-active throughout the human race.\nThe most important element in human culture, regarded from our modern stand-point, received its first impulse through Moses; hence, that sense of persistency in connection with the Moses-impulse which still exists in our soul-life and power. To Moses was granted a certain capacity for intellectual thought and action, controlled by reason and understanding ; and this ability [and his wisdom] were instilled into him in a singular and unusual manner; because all those concepts and ideas which came to him and were destined to manifest and bear fruit in some particular way at a later period, must first be implanted in a fashion conforming with the peculiar methods in vogue in those ancient times. Here we come upon a remarkable fact, namely, that later generations of mankind were directly indebted to Moses for their power of expanding and developing their understanding and intellect through the medium of their Ego-consciousness; so that they might reason and ponder upon the world, and gain enlightenment through inner intellectual contemplation while yet fully awake.\nThe manner in which a consciousness of intellectuality came to Moses must have been through flashes of intellectual awareness, similar in nature to the old clairvoyant manifestations. He was indeed the recipient of that first initial impulse toward the new order of reasoned judgment and understanding, while at the same time he possessed the old clairvoyant power, being in fact, under the influence of the last of its promptings. All that knowledge and enlightenment which was acquired by later generations independently of clairvoyance was accessible to Moses through its aid. His understanding, his discernment and intuition in the sphere of pure reason came to him when his soul passed into that same clairvoyant condition which he had experienced when under the influence of the old Midianite priest. We have the incident of the burning bush, which glowed with fire of such nature that it was not consumed. In this case, the spirit of the cosmos manifested before Moses in an entirely new manner, which was beyond the clairvoyant knowledge of the Egyptians to explain.\nEveryone who is acquainted with the essential facts knows that, during the course of development, man’s soul reaches a point when the aspect of external objects gradually undergoes a change, so that they appear interwoven with that mysterious background of archetypes from which they emanate. The spectacle of the ‘burning bush’, so magnificently portrayed in the Bible, is recognized by all who are advanced in spiritual discernment as an instance of man’s apprehension of the Spirit-World.\nWe now realize that the enlightenment which Moses received in clairvoyant form must have been of the nature of a new consciousness proceeding from the great spirit of the cosmos, that spirit which is ever active and weaves throughout the whole material world. Ancient peoples believed in a plurality of cosmic forces, these they conceived as operating in man’s soul in such manner that the soul’s power did not represent a unit, for the forces were manifold in nature, while the soul was regarded merely as the scene of their active expression. It was for Moses to recognize a cosmic spirit of a very different order — one that did not manifest as a soul-power owing its origin to divers spirit influences which, although exhibiting a certain similitude, find ultimate expression in varied form. That spirit of the cosmos, which it was ordained that Moses should apprehend, was of wholly other character, for its revelation can alone take place in the innermost and holiest mid-point of soul-life, the Ego. There works the spirit of the universe — in the place where man’s soul is conscious of its very centre.\nWhen the human soul feels that the Ego is linked with the weaving and the life of the spirit, in the same way as the people of old realized that their being was truly related to the cosmic forces, then can it apprehend those things which were first revealed to Moses through his clairvoyant powers. And these revelations must be regarded as forming the cosmic basis from which came the great impulse he gave to mankind. That primal impulse enabling humanity through its reasoning faculties and understanding alone [unaided by the old clairvoyance], to associate and compare physical phenomena, and to recognize in them factors underlying all continuity in the material world.\nIn these days, if we consider the centre of our soul-life, it appears to be of extremely poor content, in spite of the fact that this content represents our most intense life experiences. Certain people, especially those of a highly gifted and talented character, as for instance, Jean Paul, have felt, sometime during the course of earthly existence, that they were actually confronted with their true centre of being. Jean Paul, in his autobiography, tells this story: — ‘Never shall I forget an inner vision which I once experienced and which I have not as yet described to anyone. In this vision I was present at the birth of my true conscious self, and I clearly recollect both the time and the place of this occurrence. It was one morning when I was a very young child; I was standing in the doorway of our house, and as I looked toward the left, in the direction of the wood-shed, there suddenly came to me an inner vision flashed down as lightning from Heaven, of the words: — “I AM AN I” (Ich bin ein Ich) — and these words remained for a space shining brightly. In that moment, and in that place, my Ego had looked upon itself for the first time, and the gaze would endure forever. Illusion due to defect of memory is hardly conceivable in this case, since no outside incidents on topics could mingle extraneous matter with an event which could only take place in the secret and most holy seclusion of man’s innermost being, and the very novelty of which caused minor details to be deeply impressed upon my memory.’\nThis ‘secret and most holy seclusion’ appears to be the most intense and powerful condition of our soul-life, but mankind cannot be so aware of this particular soul-state as of many another, for it is lacking in [conscious] plentitude. When man withdraws himself to this central point, then does he indeed realize that through those wondrous words — ‘I AM’ — so earnest and so forceful, but withal so meagre in actual word content, there ever resounds the dominant tone of his innermost soul-being.\nThat spirit from the cosmos, which Moses clearly apprehended as an homogeneous unity, is unceasingly active in that abode of ‘secret and most holy seclusion’. No wonder, when this cosmic essence was first revealed to Moses that he cried out: — ‘If I am appointed to the task of standing before the people in order to inaugurate a new civilization based upon the consciousness of self — who will believe me? — In whose name shall I proclaim my mission?’ And the answer came: — ‘Thou shalt say “I AM THAT I AM.”’ This profound asseveration signifies that the name of the Divinity Who reveals Himself in the ‘secret and most holy seclusion’ of man’s nature, cannot be otherwise proclaimed than with words which designate the consciousness of self-being. In the phenomenon of the burning bush, Moses discerned the Jahveh, or Jehovah-nature, and we can well understand that from the moment when the name — Jahveh — broke in upon his consciousness as ‘I AM’, there came a new current, a new element into the course of human evolution, and which was destined from that time on to supplant the old Egyptian civilization. The ancient culture had merely served to develop the soul of Moses, in order that he might be in a position to truly appreciate and to cope with those most exalted personalities and difficult situations which it would be his lot to encounter during the course of his life experiences.\nWe next come to the conference between Moses and Pharaoh. It is easy to see that when these two came together, they could not understand one another. The account is intended to convey the idea that all those things regarding which Moses spoke proceeded from an entirely changed order of human consciousness, and must, therefore, have been quite unintelligible to Pharaoh, in whom the old clairvoyant Egyptian culture alone continued active. That such was the case, is evident from the way in which the records are expressed — for Moses spoke a new language. He clothed his speech in words which emanated from the Ego-consciousness of the human soul, and were, therefore, incomprehensible to Pharaoh, who could only follow the old train of thought.\nUp to that cosmic hour, the Egyptians had had a mission to fulfil, based upon the powers of a by-gone clairvoyant conscious state — but the time allotted to that mission had passed. Henceforth, the race, if it should continue to live on, would still remain endowed with the same temperament and national characteristics which it had heretofore possessed. It had found no means whereby it might raise itself and cross the sheer boundary which separated the old epoch from the new. But at this very time it was ordained that the Hebrew people would arise, and that Moses should point out a way. In remembrance of the events connected with the ‘passing over’ by Moses and his people from that period which was ended to that which was to come, there has ever since been celebrated The Feast of the Passover, and this festival should constantly remind us that it was Moses who was blessed with the understanding and the wisdom that made possible the transition from the old order of consciousness to the new. The Egyptians could not span this gulf, and while as the nation tarried, the waves of time swept onward. It is in the manner outlined above, that we must regard the relation of Moses to the Egyptians, and to his people.\nThe Hebrew race was by nature thoroughly adapted to receive that great enlightenment which it was the Mission of Moses to impart. What was its actual character? It was ordained that the old clairvoyant state should give place to an intellectual reasoning consciousness. It has been pointed out in previous lectures that clairvoyant consciousness is in no way connected with our external corporeal nature, and that it unfolds freely just at those times when man, through his soul training, has released himself from his external bodily instrument in order that he may be active and untrammelled in his soul-life. The intellectual consciousness is associated with the brain and the blood, and its means of expression lies in the human organism.\nThe continued spiritual development of that conscious state which had previously hovered, as it were, over the physical structure had, up to the time of Moses, been brought about solely through the relation existing between master and pupil; but it must now accommodate itself to a new condition in which it would be directly connected with, and confined to, the physical organism, and to the blood which would flow in the veins of the people from generation to generation. It was for this reason that the enlightenment which Moses was destined to give to humanity, so as to bring about an impulse toward an intellectual culture, could only be instilled into a nation in which the blood of the race would continue to flow vigorously throughout future generations, and therefore of such nature was the instrument chosen to receive the basal principles of the new cognitive faculty.\nThe new reasoning consciousness, the seeds of which were implanted by Moses, was not destined to live on merely in the spirit, for it had been ordained that the people thus chosen should be taken away from the Egyptian nation, in the midst of which they had been made ready, and that henceforth isolated and as a separate race they must develop through centuries to come those external methods and means which would in future form the basis of an intellectual culture, that should continue on throughout all coming ages.\nWe thus realize that the world’s history is full of significance and purport, and that the spiritual element is closely related to all external physical agents. It is clear that the author of the Bible narrative is at great pains to present the account of the transition of the ancient Egyptian culture to that of Moses in its true light and meaning as an episode in the history of the world. We have, for instance, the story of the passing of the Children of Israel through the Red Sea. Concealed beneath this narrative lies a wonderful truth relative to the evolution of mankind, but which is only to be understood by those who clearly comprehend the whole nature of this incident.\nIn connection with the Egyptians, we find proof of that link which necessarily exists between the soul-powers and that which is termed the clairvoyant faculty. We obtain the clearest insight into this matter when we take the animal organism as our starting-point, but I am sure you will not assume that by so doing, I would suggest that man’s nature resembles that of the animal kingdom. We must first imagine that the whole outlook and soul-life of the brute creation is dreamy and torpid, compared with the intellectual soul-state of man. Now, although primeval human clairvoyance most certainly cannot be directly compared with the soul-life of animals, from which it differs radically, nevertheless, we can clearly trace a definite relation between the instinctive existence and soul-life of the brute creation and that of the ancient soul-life of man. Although often exaggerated, there is a certain amount of truth underlying those stories which tell of animals leaving districts subject to earthquakes and volcanic disturbances, days before an eruption takes place. It has certainly happened, in some cases, that while human beings who regard and apprehend all things through the medium of their intellect have remained unmoved, the animals in the neighbourhood have been aroused. Anyone who has a knowledge of Spiritual Science knows that brute nature is so closely interwoven with all life in its immediate environment, that we can, in a sense, assert that animals possess a measure of instinctive understanding, which through its rudimentary powers controls and regulates their existence. This faculty is no longer found in man, because he has developed a higher intellectual quality, through which he is able to form reasoned concepts and ideas concerning all things which come within his cognizance; but this very logical capacity has, in effect, torn asunder that close tie with Nature herself, which he once enjoyed.\nWe must picture that in primeval times man was the possessor of a similar instinctive cognition to that above mentioned, in connection with the old clairvoyant state and also in conjunction with his relation to the external phenomena of Nature — a kind of intuition — whereby the ancients were enabled to say: — ‘Such and such events are about to occur, hence we must take certain steps to prepare ourselves in advance.’ Just in the same way as some people, who are suitably constituted, raise themselves through striving of soul to a higher power of discernment and attain to an order of apprehension concerning matters connected with Nature for which no cause or reason can be assigned.\nHe who uses the forces of his soul and through its attributes and its virtues wins power to utter statements which are beyond the scope of his intellectual consciousness, feels uncomfortable when people come to him and say: — ‘Why is that so? Give us proof of your assertions.’ Such persons never realize that knowledge of this nature comes by quite a different path from that which is born of logical reasoning. It is a striking and pertinent fact that Goethe, when he looked out of a window could often predict, hours in advance, what kind of weather was in store. If we conceive faculties of this nature as existing among the ancients and manifesting in such a way that through direct contact with the Spirit-World, the people of old were enabled to be closely associated with creation and the Phenomena of Nature (but in a manner entirely different from that which is the case to-day), then, we can realize and picture at least one fundamental feature of the old clairvoyance relative to the practical conduct of life. In olden times mankind did not possess meteorological observatories, there were no weather-forecasts published in newspapers or in other ways, as there are to-day; but the ancients were endowed with a sense of perception which clearly foretold what would occur, and they governed their actions in accordance with the impressions received.\nThis was especially the case with the old Egyptians, among whom the faculty of sense-perception was developed to a very high degree. They had no knowledge of our modern science or of our analytical methods, but nevertheless they knew how to comport themselves so as to be in living harmony with the whole surrounding world. But because the cosmic hour had struck for the Egyptian culture, this faculty, once so prominent, fell into decadence, and the Egyptian people became ever less and less capable of understanding and dealing with the facts and realities of Nature, and could no longer foretell from the grouping and interaction of external elements and factors, what should be their attitude and mode of conduct. But humanity was now destined to learn how to investigate and to study the arrangement and interrelations of these external elements, and it was Moses who would impart the impulse, but the impulse that he gave came even then from his old clairvoyant consciousness.\nWhile Moses and his people stood upon the shore of the Red Sea, he realized, through an understanding somewhat similar to our own, but which still unfolded clairvoyantly, that exceptional natural circumstances, namely, an unusual combination of an East Wind and ebbtide together with a channel-like passage, made it possible at the right moment, for him to lead the Israelites across shallow waters. This historical fact has been graphically portrayed in order that we may realize that Moses was indeed the founder of a new and universal mode of intellectual apprehension that is still active in our day, and through which mankind will once more learn to bring the practical affairs of life into harmony with the existing order of Nature, even as was done by that great patriarch.\nThe Egyptians were a nation whose hour was spent; they could no longer foretell what would come to pass. The power of the old instinctive faculties which were theirs in by-gone times had waned, and they found themselves once more in a position as in the past when a decision must be made. In by-gone times they would have cried out: — ‘It is too late! We cannot now make the passage.’ But that innate gift of discernment which they had so long enjoyed had all but vanished, and they knew not how to live in the new intellectual conscious state. Therefore they stood before the Red Sea helpless and bewildered, the old clairvoyant consciousness could no longer be their guide [they followed] and disaster overtook them. Here we find the new Moses-element in direct contrast with the old, and we see that the ancient clairvoyant faculty had so far declined that it could no longer be relied upon; and because it was unsuited to the new age it was the forerunner of calamity.\nWhen we look beneath the surface of such apparently external graphic narratives as the above, and come upon the matter which the narrator really has in mind, we find that the stories oft-times characterize great turning-points in the evolution of mankind; and we realize that it is no light task to deduce from the peculiar descriptions found in the ancient writings, the true significance of the various personalities mentioned, such for instance, as Moses in the circumstances we have just quoted.\nIt is clear from what follows later in the account that at that time when it had to be decided whether Moses should, or should not, lead his people to Palestine, he still relied entirely upon the old clairvoyance, and that in his case, his intellectual enlightenment was fundamentally dependent upon this faculty. It was because the blood that flowed in the veins of the Jewish people made them by nature especially suitable to the task of laying the foundation of the impending movement toward intellectuality, that it was ordained that they should be led forth and guided to the Promised Land. The knowledge and wisdom which Moses acquired through his clairvoyant powers sufficed to impart the necessary impulse — but could not be of itself of the new culture; for this new cultural faculty was destined to manifest in ways which would be the antithesis of the old order of clairvoyant consciousness.\nFrom the Bible account it is evident that Moses felt that his call was merely to lead his people to a certain place; he was not to take them into the Promised Land; the last stage of the journey must be left to those who were destined to embrace the new order of intellectual development.\nAlthough Moses was the prophet of the Lord, who manifests in our very Ego-being, we are nevertheless given to understand that it was only in virtue of his clairvoyant faculty that he could become conscious of the Mighty Word of the Great Spirit of the cosmos. When at last he was left to himself with the task of succouring his people, he fled to his tent in order that through his clairvoyant powers he might once more be in the actual presence of his God. Then it was that a Voice said: — ‘Because thou canst not carry out all that is betokened by those thoughts which come to thee with visions, henceforth must another be the leader of thy people.’ The words of this decree shed a radiance around the great patriarch, for they implied that Moses with his clairvoyant faculty, was a prophet the like of whom would no more be seen in Israel. We are to understand that Moses was the last among the ancients to be endowed with the old order of psychic discernment. Henceforth would a form of intellection wholly independent of this gift spread its influence among all fitting peoples, and man’s actions and cognition be based on power to reason and tradition alone. Thus might the Ego, the verity of which had already become recognized by those who had understanding of the fundamental factors of the new culture, be made ready that it might absorb a new principle.\nIt was through the Mission of Moses that mankind was first led to realize that the most positive feeling which man can experience of the absolute reality of the all-pervading cosmic Spirit, that Divine Principle which is ever active and interwoven throughout the whole earth, is centred in the ‘I AM’ — the very mid-point of the human soul. But in order that these two simple words may be fraught with the uttermost import, the ‘I AM’ must first store within itself full measure of a content that shall once again embrace the world. To compass this end necessitated yet another mission, which mission is expressed in those deeply significant words of St. Paul: — ‘Yet not I, but Christ liveth in Me’ (Gal. ii, 20). Now, Moses had brought humanity up to the point of establishing a true culture of man’s Ego. This new-born intellection was destined to live on throughout the ages yet to be, a gift from above, a form of civilization, a ‘receptacle’, so to speak, for the coming content. It was essential that the centre of our being should first unfold in the bosoms of the ancient Hebrew people. Henceforth, would this divine ‘receptacle’ be filled with all that springs from a true understanding of The Mystery of Golgotha, and the events which took place in Palestine. Thus would the Ego receive its new content, which itself would be a creation of the Spirit-World. We can most easily recognize all that came of that fresh in-pouring, and that owed its origin to the preparation and development of the Hebrew people, when we refer to the book of Job. We cannot, however, rightly understand the wonderful tragedy therein portrayed, unless we take into account the peculiar characteristics of the Jewish race.\nWe are told that Job, albeit he was a righteous man who believed in his God was, nevertheless, convinced that the Almighty was actually the true source of all his afflictions. He experienced disaster after disaster to his property, his family, and his own person. So that the Lord appeared to manifest in such a manner that Job might well have doubted whether indeed the Great Spirit of the cosmos was really active in man’s Ego. Matters went to such a length that Job’s wife could not understand why her husband, in spite of all that had befallen him, should continue to trust in the Almighty. She therefore spoke to him in words of paramount import, thus: — ‘[Dost thou still retain thine integrity?) curse God, and die.’ (Job ii, 9.) What is the underlying meaning of this significant allegorical tragedy, and of the words: — ‘Curse God, and die’? It is here implied that, — If the God Whom you regard as being the very source of your existence visits you with sorrow and adversity, you may turn from Him; but of a verity death will be the lot of the one who would do this thing, for he who turns away from his God, places himself without the pale of the living course of evolution. The friends of Job could not believe that he had committed no transgression, for surely in the case of a righteous person should equity prevail. Even the narrator himself cannot make clear to us the justness of the circumstances, for he can only say that Job, who was thus stricken with misery and distress, nevertheless received compensation in the physical world for all that he had lost and suffered.\nThroughout this deeply significant allegory as depicted in the book of Job there is, as it were, an echo of the Moses-consciousness; and in the story it is made clear that the Spirit brings to us enlightenment and ever manifests in man’s innermost being. But during the course of earthly existence, the Ego must live in contact with physical things. Hence it is that there are moments of transgression in which man may weaken, and lose his feeling of unity with the vital source of life. From the Christ-Impulse, humanity has learnt that compensation for suffering and affliction is not to be sought in the physical world alone. We now know that in every case when man is overcome by bodily distress — in sorrow and in pain — then, if he but remain steadfast, he may indeed triumph over that which is material. For his Ego is not merely illumined by the ultimate source of all that is spread throughout space and time, but is of a verity so conditioned that it may yet absorb the mighty power of the eternal.\nWe find the same uplifting thoughts underlying St. Paul’s words: — ‘Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me’ (Gal. ii, 20). Moses had brought humanity so far that it could realize that all things that live and weave throughout the cosmos, manifest in deepest and most characteristic form in the Ego. Man may comprehend the world, if it be pictured as a simple unit proceeding from some great universal Ego centre. If we would indeed receive the eternal spirit within our being, then must we not regard temporal things; nor take heed only of the Jehovah-Unit hidden and beyond all that is of space and time; but look also to that spontaneous and glorious benefaction — The Christ-Source — which underlies and is concentric with all unity.\nThus do we recognize in Moses the personality of one who paved the way for Christianity; and we have learnt in what manner he instilled into humanity a consciousness of self, a consciousness which throughout the development of all future generations would be as a store-house to be filled with the substance of eternity; which means that it was yet to become a fitting receptacle replete with the essence of the Christ-Being. It is in this way that we picture the patriarch Moses in his relation to the progress and evolution of mankind. History ever reveals its deepest truths when subject to thought and reflection of the above nature.\nIn a previous lecture devoted to Buddha, we drew attention to the fact that from time to time some outstanding personality arises, through whose agency the eternal fount of wisdom springs once more into life, thus causing humanity to advance yet another step in its growth and development; and when we ponder upon the circumstances connected with this or that great figure, there comes to us a sense of his true relation to the collective evolution of mankind.\nWhen we regard the development of the human race from this stand-point, we find that we are involved in its progress in a vital sense, and it is at once apparent that the Spirits of the cosmos have some fixed and definite purpose associated with our existence, the object of which becomes more and more discernible as life proceeds. It is through the earnest consideration of the example and works of lofty spiritual individualities, together with profound meditation concerning outstanding events in the world’s evolution and the history of mankind, that we may gain that sense of power, confidence of soul and unswerving hope, through which alone we may take our proper place in the totality of human evolution. If we regard the history of the world in this manner, we feel anew the beauty of Goethe’s words, and we realize that the greatest benefit which can accrue to us through the study of universal history is the awakening of our enthusiasm. But it must be an enthusiasm which is not mere blind admiration and wonder, for it should prompt us to implant in our souls the seeds which are borne to us from the past, so that they may bring forth goodly fruits in the time yet to come.\nThe words of the great poet live again, in somewhat modified form, when, through the contemplation of those grand outstanding personalities and events of olden times we realize this glorious truth: —\n‘The age is as a field in flower, Where wondrous growth and life proceed; Fresh buds unfold with every hour — Lo! all is fruit and all is seed.’4\n\nNotes for this lecture:\n1. The underlying suggestion here involved is, that the fact that it is necessary that the perceptual faculties be held in abeyance for the time being, indicates that this particular personality, already possessed other faculties of a spiritual order, which being thus freed would become operative. [Ed.]\n2. The seven human soul-forces to which reference is here made, are those cosmic-influences which act through the soul in connection with the seven principles of man’s organism. These ‘seven principles’ are as follows: — (1) The Physical body. (2) The Etheric or Life Body. (3) ‘The Astral Body. (4) The Ego or Body of Consciousness, which sets about transforming the first three by acting upon the psychic principles. Within the Ego is: (5) Atma. Spirit-man as transmuted Physical Body. (6) Buddi. Life-spirit as transmuted Etheric or Life Body. (7) Manas. Spirit-self as transmuted Astral Body. The latter, Manas, is partly developed; but of Atma and Buddi there is merely a seed. Vide, Investigations in Occultism by Rudolf Steiner. Published by G. P. Putnam’s Sons, London and New York. [Ed.]\n3. In the Middle Ages, the Liberal Arts (artes liberales) were considered to be seven in number, namely, music, grammar, rhetoric,logic, arithmetic, geometry and astronomy. Plato and Aristotle , distinguished between the practical arts, and the so-called liberal arts, which latter were concerned with progress of an ethical or literary character. [Ed.] 4. Die Zeit, sie ist eine blühende Flur, Ein grosses Lebendiges ist der Menschheit Werdegang, Und alles ist Frucht und alles ist Same!\n"
  },
  {
    "id": "GA060-15",
    "title": "What Has Astronomy to Say about the Origin of the World?",
    "date": "16 Mar 1911",
    "city": "Berlin",
    "source": "https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA060/English/eLib2015/19110316p01.html",
    "book_title": "",
    "content": "Translator Unknown\nWho could doubt that one can look at astronomy hopefully if the talk is of the world origin? For astronomy is rightly a science for which we not only have high respect because it leads us with weighty knowledge in the vastnesses of the universe. It is also something that speaks in spite of any abstractness and roughness most intensely to our souls and minds. So one can say: one can understand that the human soul hopes to get explanation of the deepest secrets of existence looking up at the starry heaven, which speaks so deeply to our mind if we open ourselves to it at night.\nWe want to ask ourselves from the viewpoint of spiritual science, what has astronomy to say about the origin of the universe? Perhaps, that what results from these considerations appears to somebody in such a way, as if a flower of hope is picked to pieces in a certain way. Someone who gets this impression, nevertheless, consoles himself with the fact that astronomy has just brought such miraculous results to us in the last decades that we have enough reason to be very glad about these results as such — also intellectually. However, we are led by this deeper knowledge of the newer time in this field to the fact that just this deepening of astronomy makes us less hopeful if we try to get explanation about the big questions of origin and development of the universe directly. There we can point to the fact that just to that what the physical research experienced as an immense deepening since Copernicus by observations or by courageous speculations in the course of the nineteenth century something was added that introduces us in a before unexpected way in the material character of the universe. Whereas one had once to confine oneself to state out of the boldness of the human thinking that if we look at the stars worlds face us at which we should look similarly as at our own world, the spectral analysis by Kirchhoff and Bunsen enabled us to investigate the material nature of the stars directly by the physical instrument. Hence, one can venture an assertion reasonably based on immediate observation that we detect the same materials with the same qualities in the different suns, in the nebulae and in the other things that face us in space as we find them on our earth.\nThat is why one can say that since the middle of the nineteenth century our science was seized by the knowledge: we rest here as human beings within a material world with its laws, with its forces. From the effect which these material laws of the earth show in the so-called spectroscope, and because the same effects are sent from the most distant space to the spectroscope, one can conclude that in the whole space, as far as the material world is considered, the same materiality and the same laws of materiality have poured forth. While it was once in certain respect only a kind of geometrical calculation to investigate the movements of the stars, the brilliant connection of spectral analysis with the so-called Doppler effect enabled us to observe not only those movements which happen before us in such a way that we recognise them as on a surface drawn as the movements of the stars. But since that time we can also include the Doppler effect, a little shift of the spectral lines, in those movements of the stars because the stars come closer or go away from us; while it was only possible once to calculate really what happened in a plane which stands vertically to our line of sight. Such a principle, as it is the connection of the Doppler effect with spectral analysis, is the basis of tremendous achievements of astronomy. What now the human being could invent as a kind of worldview as it turns out if we consider the space filled with suns, planets, minor planets, with nebulae and other things and their intertwined movements and their lawful affecting each other — about this worldview we say: we can understand that such a picture appeared to the human mind that strove for knowledge as a model of clearness, of inner substantiality, if one pursues to encompass reality with the thinking.\nIf we visualise what it means to calculate a thing that fulfils the space: the big and the small things move in such a way, the one has an effect on the other. If we visualise, what it means to be able to think such a clear thought in the space, we visualise it comparing it to any other physical effect that we see in our surroundings, for example, with the turning green of the trees in the spring or with the blossoming of a plant. Some people who stand or stood vividly in science know how bitter it is if they are compelled at first on the ground of completely outer consideration repeatedly to reach for concepts that can be thought by no means to an end if it concerns, for example, imagining a growing, developing plant, apart from more complex phenomena like animal organisms. Even already in the phenomena of chemistry and physics of our earth evolution some rest remains to us in the effects of heat et cetera even if we want to understand things, which our eyes see, and our ears hear, with clear concepts. If we look at space and can comprise it in such a picture that expresses itself in clear changes of location, in mutual relations of movement, then it is comprehensible that this has a beatific effect on our inside. Then we say to ourselves: such explanations that we can give of the movement of the stars in space and their mutual effect are very clear in themselves so that we can generally consider them as an example of explanations. Small wonder, hence, that this thought of the fascinating clarity of the astronomical worldview seized numerous human beings. It was very instructive for someone who pursued the theoretical science of the nineteenth century that the excellent spirits of the nineteenth century used approaches that were predetermined by the just characterised fascinating sensation.\nExcellent spirits of the nineteenth century thought possibly in that way, we see out in space, see the mutual relations and movements of the stars, if we transform them into thoughts, a picture of miraculous clearness originates. Now we try to see into that little world into which, however, only the speculating thought can see which one built up as hypotheses in the nineteenth century more and more: the world of atoms and molecules. One imagined that every material consists of smallest parts which no eye and no microscope can see which one has to assume, however, hypothetically. Thus, one assumed that — as one has many stars in space — here are as it were smallest stars, the atoms. Then from the mutual arrangement of the atoms, as they are grouped together, arises — indeed, only hypothetically — that what can wake the picture in us in microcosm: here you have a number of atoms, they relate to each other in a certain respect and move around each other. If the atoms relate to each other and move, this means that the material, which composes these atoms, for example, is hydrogen or oxygen. All materials can be referred to small atoms of which they consist. These small atoms are grouped again, and then certain groups form the molecules. However, if one could look into these atoms and molecules, one would have in microcosm an effigy of the clearness, which we have outdoors, where the space is filled with stars. It was attractive for some thinkers of the nineteenth century if they could say to themselves, all outer phenomena, light, sound, elasticity, electricity and so on lead back to such effects that are caused by the movements and forces of atoms that happen as the forces and movements on the large scale if we see out into space. A strange picture originated in some spirits: if we look into the human brain, it also consists of materials and forces, which we find in the world outdoors. If one were able to look into the smallest things of the human brain, in the circulating blood, one would recognise something like smallest atomic and molecular worlds that are effigies of the big universe in microcosm. One believed if one could pursue mathematically what arises from the atoms and their movements, then one would be able to recognise that a certain kind of atomic movements — working on our eye — cause the impression of light, another kind the impression of warmth. Briefly, one imagined to be able to reduce all phenomena of nature to a small, tiny astronomy, to the astronomy of the atoms and molecules. Almost the word had been stamped which played a big role in the sensational talks that during the seventies Emil Du Bois-Reymond (1815-1896, German naturalist) held about the “limits of the knowledge of nature,” the word of the “spirit of Laplace.” This had become a kind of catchword and meant nothing else than that it would have to be the ideal of a physical explanation to reduce everything that we see round us to astronomical knowledge of the movements of atoms and molecules. Laplace was that spirit who surveyed the celestial mechanics. That spirit who could bring in this overview of the stars in space in smallest molecular and atomic things would approach, so to speak, more and more the ideal to recognise our nature astronomically.\nHence, we can say that there were people who believed: if I have the impression, I hear a tone, or I see red, a movement goes forward in truth in my brain. If I could describe these movements as the astronomers describe the movements of the stars, then I would understand what it concerned understanding the natural phenomena and the human organism. Then we would have the fact in our consciousness: I hear the tone C sharp, I see red. However, in truth it would be in such a way: if we perceive red, a little atomic and molecular universe takes place in us, and if we knew how the movements are, we would have understood, why we perceive red and not yellow, because with another movement yellow would happen.\nThus, astronomical knowledge became an ideal in the course of the nineteenth century, penetrating any physical knowledge with the same clear concepts, which apply to astronomy. One can say, it is interesting largely to pursue how under the influence of such a thought the theoretical natural sciences developed. I would like to point to something that faced me many years ago. I knew a headmaster who was an excellent man, also as a headmaster. However, he occupied himself during his remaining school activity to invent such a physical system along which one can also get without the attractive or repulsive forces valid since Newton's time. Thus,, that headmaster — Heinrich Schramm — whose works are rather significant, tried in his book The General Movement of Matter as a Basic Cause of All Natural Phenomena to get rid of the gravitational force except that what already the astronomical knowledge had removed.\nIt was very interesting what this man tried in a certain ingenious way at first. For if we believe that light, sound and heat are nothing else than movements of the smallest mass particles, if astronomical knowledge is able to shine everywhere, why should we still assume those weird, mystic forces reaching from the sun to the earth through the empty space? Why should one not also be able to assume instead of this mystic gravitational attraction in which one had believed up to now such a force between the atoms and molecules? Why should one not be able to shake this too? Indeed, this man succeeded — without considering a special attractive force — in understanding the attraction of the heavenly bodies and the atoms. He showed: if two bodies are confronted in space, nevertheless, one does not need to suppose that they attract each other, because someone does not assume such an attraction — so Schramm meant — who does not believe in such a thing like hands shaking in space. The only thing that one is allowed to assume is that small moved mass particles which push from all sides like small balls, so that from all sides small balls push the two big balls. If one exactly calculates now and does no mistake, one finds that simply because the hits between both balls and those that are caused from without result in a difference. The forces, which one assumed, otherwise, as attractive forces from without can be substituted by hits from without, so that one would have to replace the attractive forces by pushing forces, which attract the matter.\nWith tremendous astuteness, you find this thought carried out in the cited writing. I could bring in later writings of the same character; however, Schramm treated the thing first. Thus, Schramm could show how completely according to the same law two molecules exercise attraction just like the biggest heavenly bodies. Thus, astronomical knowledge became something that gained ground in the biggest space and worked into the smallest, assumed particles of matter and ether. This stood as a great ideal before the thinkers of the nineteenth century. Who did his studies in this time knows that one applied this ideal to the most different phenomena that astronomical knowledge was just a radical ideal. One is allowed to say that everything was suitable — at first during the seventies — to promote this ideal, because to that all the results of the more precise investigation of the conditions of heat were added. In the sixties, one recognised more and more what Julius Robert Mayer had shown already during the forties of the nineteenth century ingeniously: the fact that heat can be transformed into other natural forces according to particular numerical ratios. The fact that this is the case, we realise if we touch a surface with the fingers intensely, for example, the pressure changes into heat. If we heat a steam engine, the heat changes into the locomotive forces of the machine. As heat changes into motion or compressive force into heat, the other natural forces, electricity et cetera change likewise into natural forces of which one thought that they are transformable. If one connected this thought with the laws of astronomical knowledge, one could say, what faces us there differs in relation to reality only because a certain form of movement within the world of the atoms and molecules changes into another. We have a certain form of movement in the molecules, a little, complex astronomical system, and the movements change into other movements, one system into another system. Heat is transformed into locomotive force et cetra that way.\nOne believed to be able to figure everything out this way. So big and tremendous was the impression of astronomical knowledge that it provided such an aim. We have now to say that at first still a little was gained concerning a theory of world evolution with all these thoughts. Why? There we have to look around at the ideas of those people who were in the immediate cultural life and ideals of their time. For I do not want to start immediately from that which spiritual science has to say and what can be easily contested by its opponents. We can convince ourselves the easiest how these things happened if we look a little closer at that speech About the Limits of the Knowledge of Nature that Du Bois-Reymond held on the Conference of German Naturalists and Physicians in Leipzig on 14 August 1872.\nThere Du Bois-Reymond spoke highly of this ideal of an astronomical knowledge and said that true natural sciences exist only where we can lead back the single natural phenomena to an astronomy of atoms and molecules, anything else is not valid as an explanation of nature. Thus, somebody would have explained the human soul life scientifically if he had succeeded in showing how after the model of astronomical movements the atoms and molecules must form a group in the human being to let appear a human brain. At the same time, however, Du Bois-Reymond drew attention to the fact that we have done still nothing for the explanation of the soul and its facts by such an astronomical explanation. For he said, assuming that the ideal is fulfilled that we can really say, the movements of the atoms happen within the brain after the model of astronomical movements: by the perception of the tone C sharp this movement complex arises, by the perception of the colour red another — then we have satisfied our need of causality scientifically. However, no one, Du Bois-Reymond emphasised, could realise, why a certain kind of movements just changes into the experience of our soul: I perceive red, I hear organ tone, and I smell rose smell or such.\nFor Du Bois-Reymond drew attention to something that already Leibniz had stressed and that nothing can be objected. If we imagine — if it depends only on movement — a gigantic human brain, so that we could walk in it like in a factory where we can observe all movements of the wheels and belts and could show: there is a certain movement — we draw it nicely and calculate it as we can calculate the movements of the planets around the sun. However, nobody would know if he did not know it from other things that this movement, which I observe there, corresponds in the soul to the experience: I see red. He would not be able to figure this out, but he would be able to find out only laws of movement and can say to themselves, the movement runs this or that way, this and that happens in space. However, he would not be able to find the connection between these movements thought according to the model of astronomy and the peculiar experience: I see red, I hear organ tone, and I smell rose smell. If he did not know from anywhere else where from these experiences are, he would never be able to conclude them from the movements of the atoms. Du Bois-Reymond even said rather crassly: “Which conceivable connection exists between certain movements of certain atoms in my brain on the one hand, and, on the other hand, with the original, not further definable, undeniable facts: I feel pain, I feel desire, I taste sweet, smell rose smell, hear organ tone, see red, and the immediately flowing certainty from that: so I am? It is absolutely and forever incomprehensible that it should not be irrelevant to a number of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen etc. atoms in which way they lie and move in which way they lay and moved in which way they will lie and move.”\nWhat Du Bois-Reymond said there did not completely comply with natural logic; for just in this crass expression we can see that it is not irrelevant to a number of molecules — to material parts — in which way they lie and move. For you know that it is not irrelevant to sulfur, saltpetre and coal in which way they lie side by side. If they lie side by side under certain conditions, they yield gunpowder. It is also not irrelevant in which relation one has brought the carbon to the hydrogen; but it concerns whether the material is led with the movement to another material with which it is used and can maybe form an explosive force. This quotation was overshot if it also had a shade of correctness. However, already Leibniz had recognised the correct thing: the fact that there no kind of transition exists between the astronomical movement of the molecules and atoms and between the qualities of our experience and our inner soul life. It is not possible to bridge this abyss with the bare astronomical science as a “movement.”\nWe have to get out this clearly from the various mistakes in the speech of Du Bois-Reymond. Nevertheless, this is the valuable of this speech: it was something like a reaction, like a feeling against the omnipotence and the infinite wisdom of the astronomical knowledge. If we take into consideration what we are able to make evident so clearly, we find the possibility to transfer it to the big astronomical knowledge. If we assume what is certainly justified that one cannot find the bridge to the experiences of soul and mind from the astronomical knowledge of the movement of the smallest mass particles anyhow, then, however, one cannot bridge from that what the big astronomy offers to any effects of soul and mind which fill the space! If it is true and we imagine the human brain so increased that we could walk in it and look at the movements in it like at the movements of the heavenly bodies, and if we could perceive nothing of mental counter-images in these movements of our brain, we do not need to be surprised if we stand in such an enlarged brain — namely in the universe — and cannot find the bridge between the movements of the stars in space and the possible mental-spiritual activities which cover the cosmic space. They would also relate to movements of the stars like our thoughts, sensations and soul experiences relate to movements of our own cerebral mass. When Du Bois-Reymond spoke this, everybody who could think could conclude what was never done up to now: if that is right which Du Bois-Reymond showed with some certainty, one must also say, if anything mental or spiritual fills the space, no astronomy, no astronomical knowledge can say anything against or for that spiritual or mental filling the space, because one cannot conclude anything spiritual from movements.\nWith it, it was necessary to say, the astronomer must restrict himself at the description of that what goes forward in the universe. He cannot at all judge about the fact that on a large scale soul experiences of cosmic kind belong to the movements of the stars as our soul experiences belong to the movements of mass particles in the brain. With it, already in the seventies of the nineteenth century astronomy was limited. However, one would have had to ask quite different from Du Bois-Reymond asked, namely, is there any possibility to penetrate in another way to find the mental and spiritual beings filling the cosmic space? — Therefore, spiritual science points in contrast to astronomy to something that we discussed repeatedly in these talks: the fact that the human being is able to develop his cognitive forces to higher levels than he has them in the normal life. If these cognitive forces have been lifted to a higher level, it is possible to find other things in space and time than that at what one looked as the ideal fulfilment of space and time in the nineteenth century: the astronomic movements of forces and atoms in space.\nHowever, we must not think too poorly about what the external natural sciences have to say concerning the evolution of the world. For the scientific facts, which have led, indeed, to a certain radical ideal of an astronomical molecular and atomic knowledge, developed something that we have to regard almost as a model of a scientific, deeply in the secrets of existence shining fact. Even if it has a limited significance, nevertheless, it is a fact of very first rank. Today it can be indicated only because what it concerns is the answer of the question: “What has astronomy to say about the origin of the world?”\nIn order to answer this question, one has to point to the fact that within the scientific thinking, research and experimentation it is clearly proved that it is right, indeed, in general that we can transform natural forces into each other that we can transform, for example, heat into work or if we have done any work this into heat. However, that is right with a quite weighty restriction. While on one side it is valid: heat can be transformed into mechanical work, into kinetic energy and kinetic energy again into heat — we must say on the other side that if one wants to transform heat back into work, in kinetic energy, this cannot happen unlimitedly. We realise this the clearest with the steam engine. We produce the movement by heat, but we cannot at all transform all heat into kinetic energy. Some heat gets always lost, so that we always have to calculate with all processes in nature where heat is transformed into movement with a loss of heat, as it is sure with a steam engine. For even with the best steam engines we can only transform about one quarter of the heat into movement, the other is emitted into the cooler, into the surroundings et cetera. We are able to do it only in such a way that we must realise that a part of the heat — as heat — is emitted in the cosmic space.\nThe knowledge that, indeed, kinetic energy can be completely transformed into heat but heat cannot completely retransformed into kinetic energy has also become in exterior relation one of the most fruitful knowledge for the science of the nineteenth century. Since thermodynamics is based merely on this knowledge, so that a big part of our present physics is built on it what has been characterised just here as the knowledge that heat cannot be retransformed completely into kinetic energy, but that always a rest of heat remains which is emitted. This has been shown apodictically by such investigations as for example those of the famous physicist Clausius (Rudolf C., 1822-1888, German physicist) who generalised this sentence that with all processes in the universe this sentence must be applied. Hence, we deal with all conversion processes where heat plays a role, with a transmission of heat in that work which is just considered with the facts of our nature. However, because always by the transformation a rest of heat remains, one can easily understand that the final state of our material development will be the transformation of all kinetic energy, of all other work in nature into heat. This is the last that must result: every physical process must convert itself into heat because always a rest of heat is left. Thus, all world processes run in such a way that heat will become bigger and bigger which results as a rest and at last the result must be that all movement processes will have been transformed into heat. Then we would be concerned with a big world chaos that exists only of heat, which can no longer be retransformed. Every life process that the sun causes on earth leaves rests of heat; at last, everything that shines from the sun to us tends to pass over to a general heat death.\nThis is the famous “Clausius's heat death” into which any material development of the universe must discharge. Here physics delivered a knowledge for that who generally understands something of knowledge that is quite apodictic against which one cannot argue. Our material universe heads the heat death in which all physical processes will once be buried.\nThere we have something from physics that we can transfer immediately on the entire astronomy. If we were only able to see movement changing into heat, we could say, the universe could be infinite forwards and backward, does not need to end. However, physics shows in the second law of the mechanical theory of heat that the material processes of the universe head the heat death. One can be convinced: if it were not so difficult, if one must not have such a lot of mathematical prior knowledge and go into difficult physical processes, much more people would know something of Clausius's heat death than it is really the case.\nThere we have brought something in our astronomical worldview that signifies development as it were. Imagine how fatal it must be for a materialistic knowledge to open itself to this apodictic result! Someone who only considers the spiritual and mental as concomitants of the material movements must suppose immediately that everything mental and spiritual is buried in the heat chaos, which our material world heads. Thus, all culture for which the human beings strives, all beauty and effectiveness of the earth would once meet their death with the general heat death at the same time. — One can now say that in particular this general heat death has become somewhat fatal for the astronomical knowledge. Not all astronomers take the easy way out like Ernst Haeckel in his Riddle of the Universe . He means, the second law of the mechanical heat theory contradicts, actually, the first one that all heat is convertible. Indeed, one cannot deny — Haeckel also knows this — that our solar system hastens to such a heat death, but he consoles himself saying: if the whole solar system is doomed to die the heat death, it will once collide with another world system, then heat originates from the collision again — and then a new world system originates! — However, he does not consider that a clash of the slags and rests is already considered in the general heat death, so that one cannot hope for consolation from that.\nThere are also serious people who feel urged to get the possibility from the physical-astronomical knowledge to understand the world development almost try to come beyond the general heat death. There the attempt of the Swedish researcher Arrhenius (Svante A., 1859-1927) may be mentioned who refers in his book The Becoming of the Worlds (1908) in manifold way just to such questions from the viewpoint of physical chemistry, physics, astronomy, and geology. One can say, here the attempt is already done in somewhat wittier way than Haeckel did to overcome the theory of the general heat death. However, if one regards everything that Arrhenius tries to adduce, one must say, it is persuasive in no way. Only briefly, I would like to characterise what is taught from this side about the overcoming of the general heat death. Of course, one cannot deny that our solar system heads the general heat death. However, besides it Arrhenius represents another idea that is based on certain assumptions of Maxwell (James Clerk M., 1831-1879, Scottish physicist) and his so-called pressure of radiation. This is something that is opposite to the former attraction of the world masses that perpetually radiates from the single heavenly bodies into space to the other heavenly bodies generating pressure caused by various natural forces.\nThis pressure which as it were the heavenly bodies send into space is able — because it is a force radiating in the cosmic space — to carry the smallest particles of matter which are pushed off by a heavenly body. Arrhenius now tries to show by all kinds of considerations that it is natural that, as long as special conditions do not take place, these phenomena caused by the radiation pressure prevent the general heat death by no means. But Arrhenius believes that such special conditions are caused by the fact that as it were this cosmic dust becomes nebulae which are in particular material states — for example, by the fact that in such nebula any star drives from anywhere, would have compressed the matter that it has taken away, and increased the temperature that way. If it were possible that such a star that meets the matter drives in such a nebula, attracts the matter and compresses it, increases the temperature, we would have something that causes an increase of temperature in the cosmic space again, and we would have something that could be transformed again into work. Arrhenius shows wittily that the cosmic dust that approaches to such a nebula is in another position — as it were, it is carried away in such a position in which it escapes from the general trend of the heat death.\nI could indicate only briefly, what is also indicated too briefly in Arrhenius's writing. However, someone who goes into that which has led to the assumption of the general heat death cannot help admitting that the possibility is only virtual, that in a nebula, even if the temperature rises, the heat death could be detained. Since, nevertheless, these are only fallacies, and the law of the general heat death is such a general one that we must admit if we properly proceed: according to the physical laws the stars, which collide with a nebula, have only to bring the rest of their former existence with them. Thus, these processes, which happen in the nebula, must also be included in the trend of the universe to the general heat death.\nNow it is typical that Arrhenius still goes on and includes the possibility in his idea of the radiation pressure that a heavenly body could push seeds of living beings to the other by the radiation pressure. Indeed, one can prove — with a big appearance of correctness — that the cold through which certain plant seeds and animal gametes would be carried would work preserving on them, so that one could suppose by calculation only that life was carried from one heavenly body to the other heavenly body by the radiation pressure. One could work out this, for example, for the distance from the earth to Mars. Then one spares the earth — instead of saddling the earth with it — the possibility, as one wants it, otherwise, in physics, geology et cetera, to have produced life because then one can say: the earth does not need to have produced life, because it can have flown to it from other heavenly bodies. — Besides, it does not issue a lot. For, will one attain anything special with it that one moves the question of the origin of life to other heavenly bodies? There we have the same difficulties, only that on the earth the conditions hinder us to accept the origin of life on other heavenly bodies. Generally, these matters can show how apparently materialistic prejudices influence well-intentioned enterprises of the present, which start from the eternity of life. Since the whole line of thought is materialistic, so that one does not take into account that life could have its origin here as well as in that what could be thought as radiation from one heavenly body to the other. This shows that in the present even well-intentioned thoughts suffer from placing themselves on the ground of materialism.\nThus, the same faces us everywhere: the study of physical laws, material laws, material forces is used, so that as it were everything that physics finds is transferred to the big world edifice, and one tries to imagine the origin of the universe with these forces. We have realised that such thoughts exceed the limits of the astronomical knowledge everywhere. Since the astronomer cannot at all conclude anything that deals with the forces, which cause the becoming of the world from that what he has before himself. We can realise again that our thinking and feeling are mental processes which cause material processes quite certainly, for example, in our brain, even in our blood. Someone who feels sense of shame to whom the blush rises in his face can convince himself of the fact that mental processes entail material processes. However, someone who admits that the mental-spiritual causes material processes in us has to say to himself, if I stood in the human brain and studied the outside movements, I would only see movements in the movements; there I would not at all anticipate that I include the movements that are caused by the spiritual-mental processes. I ignore the spiritual-mental causes. — May it not seem comprehensible that the astronomer studying the heavenly bodies is urged to develop the causes one or the other way that any star moves one or the other way? Are we allowed to conclude from the bare movements or from the dynamic laws: the sun must be positioned in a certain way to the earth, the moon must be positioned in a certain way to the earth, must orbit the earth in a certain way, and thereby these movements can result? Astronomy can generally decide nothing in what way they are caused in the mental-spiritual. Therefore, we can come just from the field of astronomy to the necessity to point by quite different means to the true causes also of the universe. There I can point — today just only with a few words — to the connection of earth, sun and moon.\nTheir mutual life and their relations of motion have developed, as these three heavenly bodies relate to each other. If we want to recognise why the sun, earth and moon relate to each other just as they relate today, we must not only move up from those forces on earth which we recognise as the physical-mechanical to the space, but we must still move up from other processes which happen on earth. Most certainly we have if we look at the human being something before us that belongs to the whole earth and its connection with the sun and moon as the blossoming of flowers or any other process — or as an electric process in the air. Certainly, the human being belongs with all that he is to the earth, and it is an abstraction if one only thinks the earth as the geologists do, as an only inorganic, inanimate thing, but one has to include the human beings in the whole processes of the earth.\nAt first, we have the difficulty that we must distinguish two things if we want to understand the difference between human being and animal in the right way. With the animal, the type predominates, so that an individual ego is not effective in its whole development between birth and death in so determining way, as this is the case with the human being with his individual ego, which expresses itself in education and the cultural life. This distinguishes the human being from the animal with which the type predominates. Now it is in such a way that such things go over by transitions into each other. With the animal, the type predominates, but the type goes into the human nature.\nThe further we to go back in time, the more we find that the human being is also a generic being, and we see the individual more and more originating from the type. On the ground of the type, the individual emerges. We have the ideal of a human future before ourselves, which says to us, the individual, the ego-nature of every human being will be victorious over the type in the course of the earth development. Nevertheless, going back we just realise the type on the ground of human development. Going back, we have also approached another condition of consciousness more and more in which the human being was connected dream-like, vividly with a spiritual world. That is why we must regard these two things as related: the type and the pictorial, dreamlike consciousness of the ancient times on the one hand and, on the other hand, the development of the individuality and our individual consciousness by that what the human being has to obtain in the course of the times. Such an emergence of the individuality from the type, the intellectual from the clairvoyant-dreamlike must be searched in its origins within the whole world development. Since, so to speak, as the stone which falls to the earth is controlled by the general world laws, this emergence of the human individuality and intellectuality from the human type and clairvoyance is also connected with the big cosmic laws which work everywhere in space. We have already done a step in this direction when we characterised the significance of geology for spiritual science.\nWe could show there that we can trace back the earth to a condition in which such processes are earthly, telluric, which only happen today if our thoughts and sensations work like decomposing in our organism, so that we find — if we go back to the earth origin — such epochs in which the earth was in a process of decomposition. That knowledge shows — what is shown more exactly in the Occult Science — which has been characterised in these talks that as it were the whole earth has sheltered from too extensive a decomposition process by the fact that it has separated the moon. The moon had to be separated from our earth so that that condition could be overcome which can be described as a decomposition process within the earth evolution.\nWe do not only have a mechanical-physical process, but we have to regard the extrusion of the moon as such a process that became necessary because the earth sheltered, while she expelled the moon, from too extensive a process of decomposition. The earth could thereby get a new relation to the sun directly. Since while it had the moon in itself, this decomposition process was so that the effect of the sun could not penetrate the terrestrial atmosphere — if we imagine the terrestrial atmosphere at that time. Therefore, only a new condition had to be caused, so that earth and sun could catch sight of each other. With it, with the cleaning of the terrestrial atmosphere — what became only possible with the extrusion of the moon — the condition of forces came into being which gradually transformed the old generic consciousness into the self-consciousness, into the intellectual consciousness. Thus, the extrusion of the moon, the cleaning of the terrestrial atmosphere and the direct relation of earth and sun are connected with the entire human development. We could now go back even further and would find such a condition of our earth development in which the earth was still connected with the sun.\nWe would also find that the separation of sun and earth happened in order to make the existence of conscious beings generally possible on earth. Only by the repulsion of the earth from the sun that force system came about which made it possible that beings could become conscious. Thus, the ancient clairvoyant consciousness became possible by the repulsion of the earth from the sun — and the advance to a higher consciousness, an intellectual consciousness by the extrusion of the moon from the earth. If we ascend clairvoyantly to that what external astronomy cannot give, we have to regard the cosmic forces as the reasons of the separation of the sun and the remaining planets from the earth — that is we come to spiritual causes.\nI could only indicate the principle. Of course, everybody could ask, did the human being already exist, when earth and sun separated? Indeed, he existed, only under other conditions. It is a matter of course that the human being, as he lives under the current conditions, would not be possible if the sun were together with the earth. However, this would be no objection. We receive spiritual causes for the movements of the heavenly bodies. Now we do no longer stop at that to which astronomy pointed more than one century ago at the mere utilisation of physical laws saying: the earth was once connected with the sun in a big gas ball, that started rotating, and thereby the planets and also the earth were separated and later also the moon from the earth. - Now, we do no longer get around to asserting that such a thing happens only due to mechanical-physical laws, but inner, spiritual reasons must be there why the earth separated from the sun.\nThe earth was separated from the sun, so that the human being was raised to the conscious experience, and the moon was separated from the earth, so that he can advance to his higher consciousness. Briefly, we start bringing that in the astronomical worldview what we must bring in — namely into the astronomical worldview of the small brain that what we must bring in if we want to go over from the mere movement of the cerebral atoms to the conclusion: I see red, hear organ tone, I smell rose smell et cetera. — Thus, we must go forward if we want to find the transition from that what the popular astronomy can give us, to that what the causes of the events are in space. Hence, those who want to stop at the ground of external physics should confine themselves to investigate this only what movements or what forces are what is to be recognised astronomically. They should confess that another progress of knowledge is necessary if astronomy wants to come to an explanation of the becoming of the universe, should confess that they would have to stop as representatives of a rationalistic and empiric astronomy at the explanation of the becoming of the universe.\nConsidering this, it turns out that the great and significant results of modern astronomy fit in our spiritual-scientific world edifice quite wonderfully. Take the Occult Science. There is shown how our earth has gradually developed, how it goes — just like the single human being in the successive earth-lives — through developmental stages how, so to speak, a planet goes through developmental stages. There our earth is led back to a former planetary stage, this stage to an earlier one, so far, as one can trace back it, up to a stage, which is called “Old Saturn” with which, however, not our today's Saturn is meant, but a planetary predecessor of our earth.\nThe same cognition that is quite independent of any outer physics and any speculation, shows that a planetary predecessor of our earth, just this Old Saturn, was mere heat and that spiritual forces intervened in this condition of heat, so that spiritual forces took possession of the heat chaos. All development is thereby caused up to our earth. In addition, spiritual science shows that really the material under our feet is dying off. In the talk What Has Geology to Say About the World Origin?, we have shown that geology has advanced so far to agree with us that the earth crust is dying off. We understand everything that we know of the earth crust only well if we understand it as dying off. However, in this fact is contained that the spiritual becomes free from the material. If among us the planetary material dies off, the spirit gets free from it.\nWe have another possibility now! We can point to the nebula — there we have no speculations after the model of the physicists, nevertheless, do not stop at the heat death — and can say, indeed, there we have the things in which all remaining processes are transformed into heat. However, as with the beginning of the earth spiritual powers seized the heat state, spiritual powers lead the nebulae into which by the heat death the solar systems discharge from the heat death to new solar systems. There is, actually, nothing more astonishing than the accordance of one of the most admirable laws of the nineteenth century in its application to astronomy — like the application of the second law of the mechanical heat theory — with the positive, actual results of astronomical observations.\nIf you do not take the speculative inventions of all kinds of radiation, but if you start from that what one can obtain from the spectroscope or from the photography of the astronomical phenomena, you realise that everything complies down to the last detail with that what one can obtain as evolution of the worlds from spiritual science. For it shows how that what one sees as an astronomical spatial picture is the result - the spiritual result — of spiritual beings. We can say different from the modern astronomical physicists: the human being has no reason to fight against the heat death or to be afraid of it, because he knows that from it new life will blossom as from the old heat chaos life blossomed which we have now before ourselves. Because a real repetition and increase of life is possible this way — not only from that what Arrhenius assumes that life is winded up like in a clockwork anew and takes place in the nebula anew, but development is only possible if a spiritual element works from one heat state to the other. If our world substance is buried in the grave of heat, the spirit has advanced a step and conjures up higher things, higher life from the heat chaos. Hence, the final state of the earth embodiment — the Vulcan stage — is in the Occult Science that which points to this what looks out as a new life from the grave of the heat death. Therefore, the name “Vulcan” is used. If we challenge astronomy, we can just realise that the external science complies deeply with that what spiritual science has to give.\nIndeed, people will say repeatedly, you spiritual scientists are daydreamers, because the right result of exact science absolutely contradicts what you believe to get from spiritual science. — Anybody could then say, you have seriously spoken even of Moses, but we know that all that is overtaken. Since the glorious natural sciences have taught us long since, we are way beyond the world development of Moses — natural sciences have shown this. — Those speak that way who only are present from without. However, let us ask the others who were present not from without, but more from within. There I know a very significant physicist who has considerable share of the development of optics, Biot (Jean-Baptiste B., 1774-1862), who said, either Moses was as deeply experienced in sciences as our century, or he was inspired.\nA leading physicist of the nineteenth century said this. Now those who write popular books about worldviews maybe mean, indeed, a physicist thinks that way who deals only with the outside of the phenomena. Nevertheless, those who go deeper into the being of the organic show that one was chased away from the spirit in the course of the nineteenth century where one searched the natural causes. -- How did Liebig (Justus von L., 1803-1873, chemist) think, who deeply penetrated into the being of the organic, about the relations of the world, to which he had dedicated his research efforts, to the spiritual world? He says that these are the opinions of dilettantes who derive the authorisation of their walks on the border of the fields of physical research to explain to the unknowing and gullible audience how world and life originated, actually, and how far, nevertheless, the human being has come concerning the investigation of the highest things. — People may say: have you never heard that Lyell (Charles L., 1797-1875) founded a geology? Have you never heard about the big progress, which came with him, that he overcame those worldviews, which still count on spiritual forces? — I could bring writings by Lyell forward to you that make deep impression today. However, just Lyell said once, in which direction we pursue our investigations, everywhere we discover the clearest proofs of a creative intelligence, of its providence, power and wisdom.\nThe founder of the newer geology says this. Now the people could come and say, nevertheless, Darwin (Charles D., 1809-1882, English naturalist) has overcome the influence of any spiritual forces. Darwin showed how by purely natural processes the evolution of the organisms happens. — However, Darwin himself wrote: “I opine that all living beings that ever have been on earth are descended from a prototype into which the creator breathed life.” — So people can also not quote Darwin who says there, we are daydreamers if we speak of spiritual beings and spiritual forces. Then still people maybe come and say, do you not know the basic nerve of any scientific development of the nineteenth century, which has deeply influenced any development? Do you know nothing about the basic law of the transformation of the natural forces? — We have just spoken of it today, have realised that the transformation of the natural forces does not contradict what spiritual science has to say.\nHowever, the people could want to refer to Julius Robert Mayer (1814-1878, German physician and physicist), to the founder of the law of the mechanical heat equivalent as well as of the transformation of the natural forces. However, Julius Robert Mayer did the strange dictum: I exclaim wholeheartedly, a right philosophy can be nothing else than propaedeutics for the Christian religion! — The things are different everywhere if one goes back to the origins and to those who created these origins who are the great pathfinders on the way of human knowledge, and not to their followers, nor to those who want to find lightweight ideas — like the newer astrophysicists — and want to encompass the whole world with it. If one goes not to the latter but to the former, one can say, spiritual science completely agrees with the great pathfinders.\nHence, spiritual science knows that it can position itself in the development of the human mind, and that it advances harmoniously with the development of humanity with everything that has promoted the human development. If a merely external, physical astronomy wants to devise the evolution of the universe, one may remind those who act in such a way of a general quotation in the Xenien by Goethe and Schiller:\n\nTo infinite heights the firmament extends, However, the little mind also found the way to them.\n\nWe must shelter from the fact that the little mind finds its way to the firmament. For we can show that just as little as the consideration of the brain leads us to a spiritual-mental life, but that this is separated from the mere movements and this can go beyond them, just as little the consideration of the external movements and laws is able to penetrate in the spirit of the universe. Hence, there it remains true in a certain way what Schiller means speaking to the astronomers:\n\nDo not chat to me so much about nebulae and suns! Is nature only great, because she gives you to count them? Your object is the most elated, admittedly, in space; But, friends, the elated does not live in space!\n\nSchiller means that. It is right if one regards the movable appearance in space only. It is not right if one goes into what — as a spiritual — emits the laws of space. — Thus, the words remain true: ascending with the mind to the stars always causes the notion of the spiritual-divine in every mind. If we want to ascend, however, with our cognition, our cognition has to go the way: per aspera ad astra — through severity to the stars, through the thorns to the roses\nHowever, this is the way of spiritual knowledge. Just the spiritual-scientific way to the stars shows that it brings along the human being to say to himself: as my materials and those which are in my surroundings are spread out in the whole universe — as the spectroscope shows--, the spiritual that lives in me is spread out in the whole universe and belongs to it. My corporeality is born out of the universe — my soul and mind are born out of the universe. It remains true what should be characterised here once again with some words which I already stated on another occasion: it remains true that the human being can only come to the entire world consciousness if he gets clear about the question which astronomy cannot answer: the question of his share of the world and his destination in the world. It is true that the answer to this question can give him security of life, optimism, hope of life if he knows from the spiritual-scientific knowledge what the words mean:\nThe wealth of materials approaches the human sense Mysteriously from the depths of the universe. The spirit's word flows clarifying In the soul's grounds from cosmic heights full of contents. They meet in the human inside to reality full of wisdom."
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