The Rudolf Steiner Archive

H.S. Olcott, the President-Founder of the Theosophical Society, died on February 17, 1907. For nearly 32 years he was able to devote his extraordinary foresight, his great administrative gifts and his noble, dedicated spirit to this society, which he co-founded with H.P. Blavatsky in 1875. It was founded in November of that year in New York, but the headquarters of the society was soon moved to India.

If this society was to come into being at all, it was only thanks to the union of two such personalities as Olcott and Blavatsky. With the help of the latter's extraordinary talent for processing secret scientific truths, such teachings could be spread more widely at that time. Blavatsky was able to receive such teachings, which until then had only been the strictly guarded wisdom of a few learned men, from a source about which there is no reason to speak here. And through her effective nature, she was able to make these teachings accessible to a wider circle in word and writing. If this was to be done successfully, such a circle had to be organized accordingly. This was done by founding the Theosophical Society. Success could only be expected if the enormous amount of secret knowledge, as revealed in Blavatsky's books, magazine articles and oral teachings, was really taken in and digested spiritually by receptive people. This came about through the fact that in some localities people united in so-called lodges or branches who cultivated occult science in the way that the circumstances of the place in question allowed. In Olcott, Blavatsky found just the right man to help him undertake such a project. Thanks to his unique organizing ability, he succeeded in a very short time in inspiring the founding of such Theosophical branches, as they were called, in almost all the civilized countries. The branches in one language area were then combined into a section, and Adyar, near Madras in India, gradually became the common center for the administration of the sections combined in the “Theosophical Society”. From the time of its founding until his death, the administrative soul of this whole organization was Olcott. If one considers that there are at present twelve sections, one can readily understand what Olcott has accomplished, since his part in the founding and further administration of the Society is clear from the above words.

But for a position such as Olcott held, a number of virtues are still needed, and it can truly be said that he combined these virtues in the most beautiful way in his personality. Above all, the administrative head of such a society as the Theosophical Society must have a fine sense of tact, so as not to interfere in any way with the completely free spiritual work. One can administer the Society, but one cannot administer the work of spiritual science. What is taught or practised within the Society must be left entirely to the individual personalities. The moment any teaching or dogma is incorporated into the Society as such, its mission is at an end. All genuine spiritual achievements within the Society must originate with and be left to the individual persons qualified for them. All responsibility for what is achieved must also fall to them. Their work and standing in society can depend on nothing other than the trust that individual members place in them personally. The Society as such teaches itself; it may merely prepare the ground on which personalities called to do so work in complete freedom. It is obvious that in such a society the office of president requires the finest tact, and Olcott had it in the best way. The writer of these lines may of course only speak about this side of the late president with reference to the German section. However, since he has been active as Secretary General since the founding of this section, he is well placed to praise Olcott's high presidential virtues in this particular regard based on his relevant experience. Because of this, the work of the Theosophical Society was able to develop into the completely independent movement that it has become, without any interference. No one has ever interfered with the free development of original spiritual sources; no one has expected us to accept a paralyzing template. This must be said because it characterizes Olcott's wonderful broad-mindedness and his wonderful liberal spirit. If only a good many people would allow this attitude to be an example to them, then dogma-seeking and stereotyped “orthodoxy” would never play a role in society. Especially in what he did within his restless activity, Olcott was the model of a true Theosophist. Especially for this way, one cannot say of his work, no, one must say – and that means more – of his being, he must be infinitely grateful to him who strives to set the goals of the Theosophical movement as high as possible. One would like to say that the just-discussed nature of Olcott was his own, right down to his outward appearance. That is why he won the sympathy of those with whom he came into contact, and that was many, in the twinkling of an eye. In his person, the nature of the Theosophical Society was wonderfully incarnated. The love that was shown to him by the members, and which had something of the most natural naturalness about it, reflected something that was to become most widespread in the Theosophical Society. This was evident when he chaired the Theosophical Congresses in the presence of a large number of members. It was so obvious that this man was the president, if he was there at all. This was not the only way in which it showed what he was like, but also how the others naturally had to be with him when they gave themselves over to their feelings.

Olcott lived to be 75 years old. Until the end, he fulfilled his duties with undiminished strength. This strength was his own because he drew it from firm roots in the spiritual world and because he was able to renew it from these roots again and again. Even in the brief acquaintance with him that the writer of these lines was granted, this fact could not be overlooked. The calmness, certainty and effectiveness of his work were based on this.

Not a single characteristic of Olcott's life will be given this time. An attempt will be made to do so in the next issue of this journal. Here, only what made him the excellent mediator of Blavatsky's mission to the public and what earned him the greatest thanks of the members of the Theosophical Society should be said.

[ 1 ] In selecting such a theme as the one I propose for to-day, “Haeckel, The Riddle of the Universe, and Theosophy,” I am aware that to a student of spiritual life it is fraught with difficulties, and that the statements I am about to make may possibly give offence to so-called materialists and theosophists alike. And yet there seems to me a necessity that this matter should, once in a while, be approached from the theosophical point of view, since from one standpoint the “gospel” derived from Haeckel's researches has been made accessible to thousands upon thousands of mankind by means of his book, The Riddle of the Universe. Ten thousand copies of this work were sold within a very short time of its appearance, and it has been translated into many languages. Seldom, indeed, has a book of serious purpose found so wide a circulation.

[ 2 ] Now, if theosophy is to make clear its aims, it is but right that it should take into account so important a publication—one that concerns itself with the most profound questions of existence. Theosophy should deal with it comprehensively, and seek to express its attitude with regard to it. For after all, the theosophical conception of life is not combative but rather conciliatory, desirous of harmonising opposing views.

Furthermore, I myself am in a very peculiar position with respect to Ernst Haeckel's conception of the universe, for I know well those feelings and perceptions which, partly by reason of a scientific consciousness, and partly from the general conditions of the world and the usual conceptions thereof, draw men as though by the power of some fascination towards such great and simple paths of thought as those from which Haeckel has constructed his conception of the universe. And here I may say that I should hardly have dared to speak my mind thus openly were I in any sense an opponent of Haeckel, or were it not that I am intimately acquainted with all that can be experienced in the process of adapting oneself to the wonderful edifice of his ideas.

[ 3 ] The very first thing that anyone bringing his attention frankly to bear upon the development of spiritual life is bound to recognise, is the moral power displayed in Haeckel's labours. For years past this man, imbued with an enormous amount of courage, has fought for the acceptance and the recognition of his conception of the universe—fought strenuously, having again and again to defend himself against the manifold obstacles that impeded his progress. On the other hand, we must not be unmindful of the fact that Haeckel's great powers of comprehensive expression are balanced by equally comprehensive powers of thought: the very qualities in which many scientists are deficient happen to be those with which he is very highly endowed.

In gathering together the results of his researches and investigations under the one comprehensive title of a conception of the universe, he has boldly departed from those tendencies of scientific thought which have for several decades opposed any such undertaking; and this very departure must be recognised as an act of special significance.

Another fact to be noted is, that I am placed in a singular position with regard to the theosophical conception of the universe when I speak about Haeckel; for anyone acquainted with the process of development through which the theosophical movement has passed will be aware of what sharp words and what opposition, not only on the part of theosophists in general, but on the part of the founder of the theosophical movement, Madame H. P. Blavatsky, were directed against the deductions which Ernst Haeckel draws from his work of investigation. Few publications touching cosmogony have been so violently opposed in the Secret Doctrine as that of Haeckel.

You will understand that I speak here without prejudice, for I think that in parts of my book, Haeckel and his Opponents, as well as in my other work on Cosmogonies of the Nineteenth Century, I have to the fullest extent done justice to what I take to be the real truths contained in Haeckel's conception of the universe. I believe that I have sifted from his labours that which is fruitful, and that which is enduring. [ 4 ] Consider the general attitude towards the conception of the world in so far as it is based upon scientific reasons. During the first half of the nineteenth century a totally different spiritual attitude prevailed from that known in the second half. Haeckel's appearance on the scene coincided with a time in which it was an easy thing for the new growth of so-called Darwinism to be subjected to materialistic interpretations. If, therefore, we realise how insistent was this tendency, at the very time when Haeckel was a young and enthusiastic student entering upon the pursuit of natural science, to reduce all discoveries in that domain of learning to a materialistic issue, the consequent bent towards materialism may well be understood, and may therefore lead us into a path of peace rather than of conflict.

If you will consider those men who, about the middle of the nineteenth century, set themselves to confront the great riddle of humanity with calm, unprejudiced eyes, you will find two things: on the one hand, a state of absolute resignation in relation to the highest questions concerning a divine ordering of the world, such as immortality, freedom of will, origin of life—a resignation, in short, with regard to all the actual riddles of the universe. On the other hand you will discover, co-existing with this attitude of resignation, remnants of an ancient religious tradition, and this even among students of natural science. Bold adventuring towards investigation of such questions from the scientific point of view was, during the first half of the nineteenth century, to be met with only among German philosophers, such as Schelling and Fichte, as well as Oken, who, by the way, was a pioneer of freedom without equal, not alone upon this subject, but in many paths of life.

All attempts made by men in the present day towards the fundamentalising of world-theories are to be found in still bolder outline among the works of Oken. And yet all this was animated by a certain subtleness—a breath, as it were, of that old spiritualism which is clearly conscious that, behind and beyond all that our senses can perceive, all that can be investigated by means of instruments, there still lurks something spiritual to be sought for. [ 5 ] Haeckel has again and again told us how distinctly the mind of his great teacher—that deep student of natural science, Johannes Müller, of imperishable memory—was tinged with this subtle breath. You can read in Haeckel's own writings how he had been struck (it was at the time when he was busy at the Berlin University and studying the anatomy of men and animals under Johannes Müller) by the great resemblance apparent not alone in outward form, but also by that similarity which compels attention in the evolution of form. He tells us how he had remarked to his master that such resemblance as this must hint at some mysterious kinship between man and beast, and that the answer made by Johannes Müller, who had searched so deeply into Nature, had been: “Ah! he who lays bare the secret of species will indeed have reached the highest summit.”

What we have to do is to attune ourselves to the spirit, the motive, of such a seeker; of one who assuredly would never have halted had he beheld a prospect of entering into possession of that secret. On one other occasion, when teacher and pupil were travelling together on some journey of investigation, Haeckel again referred to the close relationship existing between animals; and Johannes Müller once more replied very much to the same effect. In alluding to this I only wish to draw your attention to a certain attitude of mind.

If you will look back among the writings of any well-known naturalist belonging to the first half of the nineteenth century—for instance, to those of Burdach—you will find that, in spite of all the careful and elaborate minutiae appertaining to natural science, whenever the kingdom of life comes to be considered, the suggestion is ever present that here no mere physical and chemical powers are in operation, but that something higher has to be taken into account.

[ 6 ] When, however, improvements in microscopes made it possible for man to observe, to a far greater extent than heretofore, all those curious formations which serve to distinguish living creatures, showing that we have to do with a fine web of the minutest animalcules, and that this actually composes the physical body—when, as I have said, so much was made visible, the attitude of the scientific mind underwent a change. This physical body, which serves plants and animals as their garment, now resolved itself, so far as the scientist was concerned, into a tissue of cells. This discovery as to the life of these cells was made by naturalists about the end of the third decade of the nineteenth century, and, seeing that it was possible to ascertain so much about the lives of such animalcules by the exercise of the senses, assisted by the aid of the microscope, it required but a step further for that which acts as the organising principle in these living creatures to be lost sight of, because no physical sense, nothing external, proclaimed its presence.

[ 7 ] At that time there was no Darwinism, yet it was owing to the impression made by this great advance in the domain of practical research that we find a natural science grounded in materialism coming into vogue during the 'forties and 'fifties. It was then thought that what could be perceived by the senses, and thus explained, could be understood by the whole world. Things that now seem puerile created then the most intense sensation, and became, so to speak, a gospel for humanity. Such words as “energy” and “matter” became popular by-words, while men like Büchner and Moleschott were recognised authorities. It was considered an evidence of childish fancy, belonging to earlier epochs of the human race, to suppose that anything that could be minutely examined with the eye was possessed of aught beyond what was actually visible.

[ 8 ] Now, you must bear in mind that, side by side with all discovery, feelings and sensations play a great part in the development of mental life. Anyone who may be inclined to think that cosmogonies are the result of bold calculations of reason makes a mistake: in all such matters the heart is active, and the secret sources of education also contribute their share. Humanity has, during its latest phase of development, been passing through a materialistic stage of education. The actual beginning of this stage is traceable far back, it is true; nevertheless, it reached its apex in the time of which we are speaking. We call this epoch of materialistic education the age of enlightenment.

Man had now—and this was the final result of the Christian conception of the universe—to find his foothold upon the firm ground of reality: the God whom he had so long sought beyond the clouds he was now bidden to seek within his inner consciousness. This had a far-reaching effect upon the entire development of the nineteenth century, and anyone interested in psychological changes and caring to study the development of humanity at that time will be enabled to understand how all the events and occurrences which then followed upon each other, such as the struggle for freedom in the 'thirties and 'forties, can but be classed as separate storms and convulsions of the feelings which were the result of that newly developed sense of physical reality, and which were bound to run their appointed course. We have to deal with a tendency in human education that sought in the first place forcibly to eradicate from the human heart every aspiration towards a spiritual life.

It is not from natural science that those deductions, pronouncing the world to consist of naught but what can be perceived by the senses, have been drawn; they are a consequence of the educational teaching obtaining at that time. Materialism had become interwoven with explanations relating to the facts of natural science. Anyone who will take the trouble to study these things as they really are, bringing to bear upon the subject a mind free from prejudice, will be in a position to see for himself that the case is as I am about to set forth, but it is impossible for me in the space of one short hour to deal with the matter exhaustively.

[ 9 ] The whole of the stupendous advance made in the realms of natural science, of astronomy, of physics and chemistry, due to spectrum analysis, to a greater theoretical knowledge of heat, and to that teaching concerning the development of living organisms known to us as the Darwinian theory—all these come within this period of materialism. Had these discoveries been made at a time when people still thought as they did about the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries, a time when a greater spiritual sensitiveness prevailed, then these discoveries would have been so construed as to furnish proofs positive of the working of the spirit in Nature—indeed, by very reason of the wonderful discoveries in natural science the supremacy of spirit would have been deemed incontestably established.

[ 10 ] It is clear, then, that scientific investigations with regard to Nature need not necessarily and under all circumstances lead to materialism. It was merely because so many leaders of civilisation at that time were materialistically inclined that these discoveries became interpreted in a materialistic way. Materialism was imported into natural science, and naturalists, such as Ernst Haeckel, accepted it unconsciously. Darwin's discovery per se need not have tended to materialism.

Materialism points to Darwin's book, The Origin of Species, as its chief support. Now, it is clear that if a thinker inclining to materialism approached these discoveries, he would be sure to invest Darwinism with a materialistic colouring, and it was due to Haeckel's boldly materialistic attitude of thought that Darwinism has received its present materialistic interpretation. It was an event of great moment when Haeckel, in the year 1864, announced the connection between man and the higher animals (apes). At that time this could but mean that man was descended from the higher animals. But since that day scientific thought has undergone a curious process of development. Haeckel has adhered to his opinion that man is the descendant of those higher animals, they being in their turn the developments of still lower types, reaching back finally to the very simplest forms of life. It is thus that Haeckel constructs man's entire genealogical tree—in fact, the lineal descent of all humanity. By this means everything of a spiritual nature became for him excluded from the world, except as a reflection of already-existing material things.

And yet Haeckel, having in the depths of his being a peculiar spiritual consciousness working side by side with his materialistic “thinking mind,” casts about for some means of help, since these two parts of his being have never been able to “come into line;” he has not succeeded in bringing about a working partnership between them. For this reason he comes to the conclusion that even the smallest living creature may be accredited with a sort of consciousness, but he does not explain to us how the complex human consciousness is developed out of that which is latent in the smallest living creature.

In the course of a conversation Haeckel once said: “People are always objecting to my materialism, but I don't deny the Spirit, nor do I deny Life: I only want people to observe that when you place matter in a retort everything in it soon begins to work and effervesce—to ferment.” That remark shows plainly enough that Haeckel possesses a spiritual as well as a scientific mind.

[ 11 ] Among those who, at the time of Darwin's supremacy, proclaimed their adherence to the theory of man's descent from the higher animals was the English scientist Huxley. He asserted the close similarity in external structure between man and the higher animals to be even greater than that existing between the higher and lower species of apes, and that we could but come to the conclusion that a line of descent existed leading from the higher animals to man. In more recent times scientists have discovered new facts, but even then those feelings which for centuries past have educated the human heart and soul were undergoing a change, a transformation. Hence it was that Huxley in the 'nineties, not long before his death, gave utterance to the following view—a strange one, coming from him:

“We see therefore,” he observed, “that in Nature life is conditioned by a series of steps, proceeding from the simplest and most incomplete up to the complicated and perfected. We cannot follow this continuity, yet why should not this continuous line proceed onwards in a region which we are unable to survey?”

In these words the way is indicated by which man may, by the pursuit of natural science, rise to the idea of a Divine being, standing high above man—a being farther removed from man than man himself is from the one-celled organism. Huxley had once said:

“I would rather have descended from such ancestors, ancestors similar to the brute, than from such as deny the human intelligence.”¹

[ 12 ] Thus do precepts and concepts, all the soul thinks and feels, alter in the course of time. Haeckel has continued his work of research along the lines he first adopted. In the year 1867 he had already published his popular work, The Natural History of Creation, and from this book much may be learnt. It teaches the laws by which the living kingdoms in Nature are linked one to the other. We can see through the veil shrouding the grey past and bring what is existent into relation with what is extinct, of which only the last remains may now be found upon the earth.

Haeckel has recognised this accurately. That world-history, here in a wider sense playing its part, I can only elucidate by making use of an illustration. You may find it no more accurate than are most comparative illustrations, yet it fairly bears out my meaning.

Let us suppose that a writer on art appeared upon the scene and produced a book in which he treated with consummate skill the whole period stretching from the days of Leonardo da Vinci to modern times. He presents to our minds all that has been achieved in the pursuit of art during that period, and we believe ourselves enabled to look within at the development of man's creative powers. Let us, then, go further, and imagine that another person came along and criticised the descriptive work, saying: “But, look here! Everything this art historian has put on record never happened at all! These are all descriptions of pictures that don't exist! What use have I for such imaginings? One has to investigate reality in order to arrive at the true method of adequately presenting art in its historical bearings. I will therefore investigate the remains of Leonardo da Vinci himself, and try to reconstruct the body, and then judge by the contours of his skull what brain he is likely to have had and how it may probably have functioned.” In the same way the events described by the art historian are depicted by the professor of anatomy. There may have been no mistake. All may have been correct. Well, then, in that case, says the anatomist, we must “fight to a finish” against this idealisation of our art historian; we must combat his phantasy, his imagination, for it amounts to credulity and superstition to allow anyone to attempt to make us believe that besides the form of Leonardo da Vinci there was some “gaseous vortex” to be apprehended as a soul.

[ 13 ] Now, this illustration, in spite of its manifest absurdity, really hits the mark. This is the position in which everyone finds himself who chooses to assert his belief in the Natural History of Creation as the only accurate one. Nor can this illustration be negatived by merely indicating its weak points. They are there, perhaps, but that is beside the point. What is of importance is that the obvious should for once be presented according to its inner relationship; and that is what Haeckel has done in a full and exhaustive way. It has been done in such a manner that anyone wishing to see, can see, how active is the Spirit in the moulding of the form, where, to all appearances, matter alone reigns supreme. Much may be learnt from that; we may learn how to acquire spiritually knowledge as to the world's material combination, how to acquire it with earnestness, dignity, and perseverance. Anyone going through Haeckel's Anthropogenesis sees how form builds itself up, as it were, from the simplest living creature to the most complicated, from the simplest organism to man. He who understands how to add the Spirit to what is already granted by the materialist may in this example of “Haeckelism” have the opportunity of studying the best elementary theosophy.

[ 14 ] The results of Haeckel's research constitute, so to speak, the first chapter of theosophy. Far better than by any other method, we can arrive at a comprehension of the growth and transformation of organic forms by a study of his works. We have every reason to call attention to the great things which have been achieved through the progress of this profound study of Nature.

[ 15 ] At the time when Haeckel had constructed this wonderful edifice, the world was facing the deeper riddles of humanity as problems without solution. In the year 1872 Du Bois-Reymond, in a speech memorable for its brilliant rhetoric, alluded to the limits placed to natural science and to our knowledge of Nature. During the past decade the utterances of few men have been so much discussed as has this lecture with the celebrated “Ignorabimus.” It was a momentous event, and offered a complete contrast to Haeckel's own development and to his theory of the descent of man. In another lecture Du Bois-Reymond has tabulated seven great questions as to existence, questions which the naturalist can only answer in part, if at all. These seven “riddles of the universe” are:

1. The origin of energy and matter
2. How did the first movement arise in this quiescent matter?
3. How did life originate within this “matter set in motion?”
4. How is it that so many things in Nature bear the stamp of utility to a degree only met with in such human achievements as are the result of intelligent reasoning?
5. Assuming we were able to examine our brain, we should find it to be nothing but a jumble of little whirling spheres; how is it, then, that these same little balls, or spheres, enable me, let us say, to “see red,” to hear the tones of the organ, to feel pain, etc.? Think of a mass of whirling atoms, and it will be plain to you that it is not from them that you derive the sensations expressing themselves in such words as “I see red,” “I smell the scent of the rose,” etc.
6. How do understanding, reason, and speech develop in the living being?
7. How can “free will” originate in a being so circumscribed that his every act is the product of the whirling of these atoms?

[ 16 ] It was in connection with these riddles of the universe put forward by Du Bois-Reymond that Haeckel gave his book the title of The Riddle of the Universe. His desire was to give the answer to the questions raised by Du Bois-Reymond. There is a specially important passage in the lecture Du Bois-Reymond delivered on the “Limits of Inquiry into Nature,” which will enable us to step across into the field of theosophy.

[ 17 ] At the time when Du Bois-Reymond was lecturing at Leipsic before an assembly of natural scientists and medical men, the spirit of natural science was seeking after a purer, higher, and freer atmosphere—such an atmosphere as might lead to the theosophical cosmogony. On that occasion Du Bois-Reymond spoke as follows:—

“If we study man from the point of view of natural science, he presents himself to us as a working compound of unconscious atoms. To explain man in accordance with natural science means to ‘understand’ this atomic motion to its uttermost degree.”

He considered that if one were in a position to indicate the precise way in which the atoms moved at any given place in the brain, while saying, for instance, “I think,” or “Give me an apple”—if this could be done, then the problem would, according to natural science, have been solved. Du Bois-Reymond calls this the “astronomic” understanding of man. Even as a miniature firmament of stars would be the appearance of these active groups of human atoms. But what has not here been taken into consideration is the question as to how sensations, feelings, and thoughts arise in the consciousness of the man of whom, let us say, I perfectly well know that his atoms move in such and such a manner. That natural science can as little determine as it can the manner in which consciousness arises. Du Bois-Reymond concluded with the following words:—

“In the sleeping man, who is not conscious of the sensation expressed in the words ‘I see red,’ we have before us the physical group of the active members of the body. With regard to this sleeping body, we need not say, ‘We cannot know’—‘Ignorabimus!’ We are able to comprehend the sleeping man. Man awake, on the contrary, is incomprehensible to the scientist. In the sleeping man something is absent which is nevertheless present in the man awake: I allude to the consciousness through which he appears before us as a spiritual being.” [ 18 ] At that time, owing to a lack of courage in matters concerning natural science, further progress was impossible; there was no question as yet of theosophy, because natural science had, in concise terms, defined the boundary, had set a barrier at the precise spot up to which it wished to proceed in its own fashion. It was owing to this self-limitation of science that theosophical cosmogony had, about this time, its beginning. No one is going to maintain that man, when he goes to sleep “ceases to be,” and on re-awaking in the morning “resumes existence.” And yet Du Bois-Reymond says that something which is present in him by day is absent during the night. It is here that the theosophical conception of the universe is enabled to assert itself. Sense-consciousness is in abeyance in the sleeping man. As, however, the man of science uses as a prop for his argument that which brings about this sense-consciousness, he is unable to say anything concerning the spirituality that transcends it, because he lacks precisely the knowledge of that which makes of man a spiritual being.

By the use of such means as serve for natural science we are unable to investigate matters spiritual. Natural science depends upon what may be demonstrated to the senses. What can no longer be sensed when man falls asleep, cannot be the object of scientific investigation. It is in this something, no longer perceptible in the sleeping man, that we must seek for that entity by which man becomes a spiritual being. No mental representation can be made of what transcends the purely material and passes beyond the knowledge of the senses, until organs, of which the scientist can know nothing if he only depends on his sense-perceptions—spiritual eyes—are developed; eyes which are able to see beyond the confines of the senses.

For this reason we have no right to say, “Here are the limits of cognition;” but merely, “Here are the limits of sense-perception.”

The scientist perceives by means of his senses, but he is no spiritual observer; he must become one. become a “seer.” in order that he may see what is spiritual in man. This is the bourne towards which tends all profound wisdom in the world; not seeking the mere widening of its radius where actual material knowledge is concerned, but striving towards the raising of human faculty.

This also is the great difference between what is taught by present-day natural science and what is taught by theosophy. Natural science says: “Man has senses with which he perceives, and a mind whereby he is enabled to connect the evidences of his senses. What does not come within the scope of these lies beyond the ken of natural science.”

[ 19 ] Theosophy takes a different view of the case. It says: “You scientists are perfectly right, so long as you judge from your point of view, just as right as the blind man would be from his in saying that the world is devoid of light and colour. We make no objection to the standpoint of natural science, we would only place it in juxtaposition to the view taken by theosophy, which asserts that it is possible—nay, that it is certain—that man is not obliged to remain stationary at the point of view he occupies to-day; that it is possible for organs—spiritual eyes—to develop after a similar fashion to that in which those physical sense-organs of the body, the eyes and ears, have been developed; and once these new organs are developed, higher faculties will make themselves apparent.”

This must be taken on faith at first—nay, it need not even be believed; it may just be accepted as an assertion in an unprejudiced manner. Nevertheless, as true as it is that all believers in the Natural History of Creation have not beheld all that is therein presented to them as fact (how many of them have actually investigated these facts?), so true is it that these facts concerning a knowledge of the super-sensual can be explained to everyone.

The ordinary man, held in bondage by his senses, cannot possibly gain admittance to this realm. It is only by the aid of certain methods of investigation that the spiritual world opens to the seeker. Thus, man must transform himself into an instrument for those higher powers, one able to penetrate into worlds hidden from those still enthralled by their physical senses. To such as can accomplish this, visions of a quite distinctive nature will appear. The ordinary human being is not capable of seeing for himself, or of consciously recognising things about him, when his senses are wrapped in slumber; but when he applies occult methods of investigation this incapacity ceases, and he begins to receive quite consciously impressions of the astral world.

[ 20 ] There is at first a state of transition, familiar to all, between that exterior life of sense cognisance and that life which even in the most profound state of slumber is not quite extinguished. This state of transition is the chaos of dreams. To most people these will appear as mere reflections of what they have been experiencing during the previous day. Indeed, you will ask, how should a man be able to receive any new experiences during sleep, since the inner self has as yet no organs of cognition? But still, something is there—life is there. That which left the body when sleep wrapped it round has memory, and this remembrance rises before the sleeper in pictures more or less fantastic and confused. (Should anyone desire more information on this subject, it will be found in my books entitled The Way of Initiation and Initiation and its Results, Theosophical Publishing Society, 161, New Bond Street, W.)

[ 21 ] Now, in place of this chaos, order and harmony will, in the course of time, be brought about; an order and a harmony governing this region of dreams, and this will be a sign that the person in question is beginning to develop spiritually. Then he will cease to see the mere aftermath of reality, grotesquely portrayed; he will see things which have in ordinary life no existence.

Those who desire to remain within the boundary of the senses will, of course, say, “But they are only dreams!” Yet, if they, by such means, obtain an insight into the loftiest secrets of creation, it may surely be a matter of indifference to them whether they gain this through the medium of a dream or by means of the senses. Let us, for instance, suppose that Graham Bell had invented the telephone in a state of dream-consciousness. That would have been of no moment whatever to-day, for the telephone itself in any case is an important and useful invention. Clear and regular dreaming is therefore the beginning, and if in the stillness of the night hours you have come to “live in your dreams,” if, after a time, you have habituated yourself to a cognisance of worlds quite other than this, then will soon come a time when you will learn, by these new experiences, to step forth into actuality.

Then the whole world will assume a new aspect, and you will be as sensible of this change as you would be of threading your way through a row of solid chairs, through anything your senses may at this moment be aware of in their vicinity. Such is the condition of anyone who has acquired a new state of consciousness. Something new, a new kind of personality, has awakened within him. In the course of his further development a stage will at length be reached where not only the curious apparitions of the higher worlds pass before the spiritual eye as visions of light, but the tones also of those higher worlds become audible, telling their spiritual names, and able to convey to the seer a new meaning. In the language of the mysteries, this is expressed in the words, “Man sees the sun at midnight;” which is to say, that for him there are no longer any obstacles in space to prevent him from seeing the sun when on the other side of the world. Then, too, is the work of the sun, acting within the universe, made plain to him, and he becomes aware of that harmony of the spheres, that truth to which the Pythagoreans bore witness.

Tones and sounds, this music of the spheres, now become, for him, actual. Poets who were also seers have known of the existence of something approaching this music, and only those who can grasp Goethe's meaning from this point of view will be able to understand those passages, for instance, occurring in the “Prologue in Heaven” (see Faust, pt. I), which may be taken either as poetic phraseology or as a lofty truth. Where Faust is a second time introduced into the world of spirits, he speaks of these sounds: “Sounding loud to spirit-hearing, See the new-born Day appearing!” Faust, Part II.

[ 22 ] Here we have the connection between natural science and theosophy. Du Bois-Reymond has pointed to the fact that the sleeper only can be an object for the experiments of natural science. But if man should begin to open his inner senses, if he should come to see and hear that there is such a thing as spiritual actuality, then indeed will the whole edifice of elementary theosophy, so wonderfully, constructed by Haeckel—a structure none can admire more profoundly than I—then will this great work glow with a new glory, revealing, as it must, an entirely new meaning. According to this marvellous structure we see a simple living creature as the archetype, yet we may trace back that creature spiritually to an earlier condition of consciousness.

[ 23 ] I will now explain what theosophy holds as the doctrine of the descent of man. It is obvious that in a single lecture like the present no “proofs” can be advanced, and it is also natural that to all who are only acquainted with the theories commonly advanced on this subject everything I say will appear fantastic and highly improbable. All theories thus advanced originated, however, in the leading circles of materialistic thought, and many who would probably resent the suggestion of materialism as utterly foreign to their nature, are nevertheless (and indeed quite comprehensibly so) caught in a net of self-delusion.

The true theosophical teaching concerning evolution is, in our day, hardly known; and when our opponents speak of it, he who does know is at once able to recognise by the objections raised that he is dealing with a caricature of this doctrine of evolution.

For all such as merely acknowledge a soul, or spirit, to which expression is given within the human, or animal organism, the theosophical mode of representation must be utterly incomprehensible, and every discussion touching that subject is, with such persons, quite fruitless. They must first free themselves from the state of materialistic suggestion in which they live, and must make themselves acquainted with the fundamental attitude of theosophical thought.

[ 24 ] Just as the methods of research employed by physical science trace back the organism of the physical body into the dim distance of primeval times, so it is the mode of theosophical thought to delve into the past with regard to the soul and the spirit. Now, the latter method does not lead to any conclusions antagonistic or contradictory to the facts advanced by natural science; only with the materialistic interpretations of these facts it can have nothing to do.

Natural science traces the descent of the physical living being backwards, arriving by this course at organisms of a less and less complicated kind. Natural science declares: “The perfect living being is a development of these simpler and less complicated ones;” and, as far as physical structure is concerned, this is true, although the hypothetical forms of primeval ages of which materialistic science speaks do not entirely conform with those known to theosophical research. This, however, need not concern us at the present moment.

[ 25 ] From the physical standpoint theosophy also acknowledges the relationship of man with the higher mammals, with the man-like apes. But there can be no question of the descent of our humanity from a creature of the mind and soul calibre of the ape, as we know it. The facts are quite otherwise, and everything that materialism puts forward of this nature rests upon an error of thought. This error may be cleared up by means of a simple comparison sufficient for our purpose, though trite.

We will imagine two persons, one morally deficient and intellectually insignificant; the other endowed with a high standard of morality and of considerable intellectuality. We will assume that some fact or other confirms the relationship of these two. Now, I ask you, will the inference be drawn that the one in every way more highly endowed is descended from one who was of the standard described? Never! We may think it a surprising fact that they are brothers. We may find, however, that they had a father who was not of exactly the same standard as either of the brothers, and in that case one will be found to have worked his way up, the other to have degenerated.

[ 26 ] Materialistic science makes a similar mistake to that here indicated. Facts known to it induce the acceptance of a connection between ape and man, yet from this it should not draw the conclusion that man is descended from the ape-like animals. What should be accepted is a primeval creature, a common physical ancestor, from the stock of which the ape has degenerated, while man has been the ascending “brother.”

[ 27 ] Now, what was there in that primeval creature to cause this ascendance to the human on the one hand, the sinking into the ape kingdom on the other? Theosophy answers, “The soul of man himself did this.” Even then the soul of man was present, at a time when, on the face of this physical earth, the creatures possessing the highest sense of development were these common ancestors of man and ape. From amid the multitude of these ancestors the best types were capable of subjecting themselves to the soul's progress, the rest were not. Thus it happens that the present-day human soul has a “soul-ancestor” just as the body has its physical forebear.

It is true that, so far as the senses are concerned, those “soul-ancestors” could not, according to our present-day observations, have been perceptible within our bodies. They still belonged in a sense to “higher worlds,” and they were also possessed of other capabilities and powers than those of the present human soul. They lacked the mental activity and the moral sense now evident. Such souls could conceive no way of fashioning instruments from the things in the outer world; they could create no political states. The soul's activity still consisted to a great extent in transforming the archetype of those ancestral bodies themselves. It laboured at improving the incomplete brain, enabling it at a later period to become the seat of thought activities. As the soul of to-day, directed towards external things, constructs machines, etc., so did that ancestral soul labour at constructing the body of the human ancestor. The following objection can, of course, be raised: “Why, then, does not the soul at the present day work at its body to the same extent?” The reason for its not doing so is that the energy used at a former time for the transforming of the organs has since been directing its whole effort upon external things in the mastery and regulation of the forces of Nature.

[ 28 ] We may therefore ascribe a twofold descent to man in primeval times. His spiritual birth is not coeval with the perfecting of his organs of sense. On the contrary, the “soul” of man was already present at a time when those physical “ancestors” inhabited the earth. Figuratively speaking, we may say that the soul “selected” a certain number of such “ancestors” as seemed best fitted for receiving the external corporeal expression distinguishing the present-day man. Another branch of these ancestors deteriorated, and in its degenerate condition is now represented by the anthropoid apes. These, then, form, in the true sense of the word, branch lines of the human ancestry. Those ancestors are the physical forebears of man, but this is due only to the capacity for reconstruction which they had primarily received from the human soul within. Thus is man physically descended from the “archetype,” while spiritually he is the descendant of the “ancestral soul.”

But we can go even further back with regard to the genealogical tree of living creatures, and we shall then arrive at a physically still more imperfect ancestor. Yet, at the time of this physical ancestor, too, the “soul-ancestor” of man was existent. It was this latter which raised the physical ancestor to the level of the ape, again outstripping its less adaptable brother in the race for development, and leaving him behind on a lower stage of creation. To such as these belong those present-day mammals of a lower grade than that of the apes. Thus we may go further and further back into primeval times, even to a time when upon this earth, then bearing so different an aspect, existed those most elementary of creatures from which Haeckel claims the development of all higher beings. The soul-ancestor of man was also a contemporary of these primitive creatures; it was already living when the “archetype” transformed the serviceable types, leaving behind at different stages those incapable of further development.

In actual truth, therefore, the entire sum of earth's living creatures are the descendants of man, within whom that which in this day “thinks and acts” as soul originally brought about the development of living beings. When our earth came into existence, man was a purely spiritual being; he began his career by building for himself the simplest of bodies. The whole ladder of living creatures represents nothing but the outgrown stages through which he has developed his bodily structure to its present degree of perfection.

The creatures of the present day differ widely in appearance from that of their ancestors at those particular stages where they branched off from the human tree. Not that they have remained stationary, for they have deteriorated in accordance with an inevitable law, which, owing to the lengthy explanation it would involve, cannot be entered into here. But the greatest interest attaches to the fact that through theosophy we arrive, so far as man's outward form is concerned, at a genealogical tree not altogether unlike Haeckel's. Haeckel, however, presupposes as the physical ancestor of man nothing but a hypothetical animal. Yet the truth is that at all those points where Haeckel uses the names of animals, the still undeveloped forebears of man should be installed; for those animals, down to the meanest living creatures, are but deteriorated and degenerate forms occupying those lower stages through which the human soul has passed on its upward journey.

Externally, therefore, the resemblance between Haeckel's genealogical tree and that of theosophy is sufficiently striking, though internal evidences show them to be as wide apart as the poles.

[ 29 ] Hence the reasons why Haeckel's deductions are so eminently suited for the learning of sound elementary theosophy. One need do no more than master, from the theosophical point of view, the facts he has elucidated in so masterly a manner, and then raise his philosophy to a higher and nobler plane. If Haeckel seeks to criticise and belittle any such “higher” philosophy, he shows himself to be simply puerile—after the fashion, for instance, of a person who, not having got beyond the multiplication table, yet presumed to assert: “What I know is true, and all higher mathematics are only imaginary nonsense.” No theosophist desires to deny or contradict the elementary facts of natural science; but the crux of the matter is that the scientist, deluded by materialistic suggestions, does not even know what theosophy is talking about.

[ 30 ] It depends upon a man himself what kind of philosophy he adopts. Fichte has put this in so many words: “The unperceiving eye cannot detect colours; The non-perceptive Soul cannot perceive Spirit.” The same thought has been voiced by Goethe in a well-known phrase: “Were the eye not sun-like—how could we see the sun? Were God's own power not within us, the God-like vision—could it enrapture us?” and an expression of Feuerbach, if rightly conceived, proclaims that each one sees God's image after his own likeness. The slave to his senses sees God in accordance with those senses; the spiritual observer sees the Spirit deified. “Were lions, bulls, and oxen able to set up gods, their gods would resemble lions, bulls, and oxen,” was the remark of a Greek philosopher long ages ago.

The fetish-worshipper, too, has as his highest principle something we may call spiritual, but he has as yet not come to seek for this within himself, and this is why he has not got beyond beholding his god as anything more than a block of wood. The fetish-worshipper cannot raise his prayer above what he can inwardly feel, for he still regards himself as on the same level as the block of wood. And those who can see no more than a whirl of atoms, those to whom the highest resolves itself into tiny dots of matter, such as these, too, have missed recognition of the highest principle within themselves.

[ 31 ] It is true that Haeckel places before us in all his works the information he has honestly acquired, so that to him must be accorded “les defauts de ses qualites.” The sterling worth of his teaching will live, its negative qualities will vanish. Taken from the higher point of view, one might say that the fetish-worshipper worships in his fetish a lifeless object, while the materialistic adherent of the theory of atoms worships not alone one “little god” but a whole host of them, which he calls atoms!² The superstition of the one is about as great as that of the other; for the materialistic atom is no more than a fetish, and the wooden block is made up of atoms too. Haeckel says in one passage: “We see God in the stone, in the plant, in the brute, in man—God is everywhere,” yet he only sees God as he can comprehend Him. How enlightening here are Goethe's words, when he says: “Thou'rt like the Spirit which thou comprehendest, Not me!”) —Bayard Taylor's translation.

Thus does the materialist mark the whirling atoms in stone, in plant, in animal, and in man, possibly, too, in every work of art, and claim for himself a knowledge of a monistic cosmogony that has overcome the ancient superstitions. Yet theosophists have a monistic cosmogony too; and we can say, in the same words as Haeckel uses, that we see God in the stone, in the plant, in the brute, and in the man; but what we see are no whirling atoms, but the living God, the spiritual God, whom we seek outside in Nature, because we can also seek Him within ourselves.

• 1. Readers who are unacquainted with Huxley's famous reply may be glad to have it in extenso, as given by Edward Clodd in Thomas Henry Huxley, published by William Blackwood and Sons:
  
  “At the meeting of the British Association at Oxford, on 28th June, 1860, Owen emphasised the statement that ‘the brain of the gorilla presented more differences, as compared with the brain of man, than it did when compared with the brains of the very lowest and most problematical of the Quadrumana.’ To this Huxley, in polite English, gave the lie direct, and pledged himself to ‘justify that unusual procedure elsewhere.’ Two days after, by mere chance, he was present at the reading of a paper by Dr. Draper ‘On the Intellectual Development of Europe considered with reference to the views of Mr. Darwin.’ In the discussion which followed, Bishop Wilberforce, throwing a glance at Huxley, ended a suave and superficial speech by asking him ‘as to his belief in being descended from an ape. Is it on his grandfather's or his grandmother's side that the ape ancestry comes in?’ Huxley did not rise till the meeting called for him. Then he let himself go. ‘The Lord hath delivered him into mine hands,’ he said in an undertone to Sir Benjamin Brodie. After showing how ill-equipped was the Bishop for controversy upon the general question of organic evolution, although it was an open secret that Owen had primed him for the contest, Huxley said: ‘You say that development drives out the Creator, but you assert that God made you; and yet you know that you yourself were originally a piece of matter no bigger than the end of this gold pencil-case?’ Then followed the famous retort:
  
  “‘I asserted, and I repeat, that a man has no reason to be ashamed of having an ape for his grandfather. If there were an ancestor whom I should feel shame in recalling it would rather be a man—a man of restless and versatile intellect—who, not content with success in his own sphere of activity, plunges into scientific questions with which he has no real acquaintance, only to obscure them by an aimless rhetoric, and distract the attention of his hearers from the real point at issue by eloquent digressions and skilled appeals to religious prejudice.’”
• 2. The word “worship” is, of course, not to be taken literally, for the materialistic thinker, though he has not yet been weaned from “fetishism,” has lost the habit of prayer.

Foreword

This booklet contains a lecture given by me, after a series of objections had been brought forward in a lecture from another quarter against the views summed up under the name “Anthroposophy” or “Spiritual Science.” I came to know of these objections through the circumstance that the lecturer himself had them printed in a newspaper. When the occasion of the observations contained in this booklet is borne in mind, it might seem as if their special publication were unjustified. With regard to this it may be said that even though the objections in question were, to begin with, only the subject of a single lecture, they are the ones with which it is intended from many quarters and in divers repetitions to refute the spiritual science (Anthroposophy) referred to in this booklet. They are to a certain extent typical “refutations.” They are typical, not only because of what is alleged, but because of the manner in which an attitude is taken towards that to which objections are raised. This manner is characteristic. It is often the case that people do not fix their attention upon what spiritual science says and direct their attack against this, but they fabricate an idea of what they think it says, and then attack this idea. A curious position results. The one attacked may quite agree with his opponent in his judgement of all that is attacked, and yet he is obliged to find that he is condemned, together with the distorted idea formed of him. The following example is particularly characteristic for this form of attack. A building is being erected for the purposes of Anthroposophy (Spiritual Science). This is to be a “College of Spiritual Science.” In the artistic form of the building it is sought to realise that for which this Spiritual Science can give the stimulus. The building is intended to bring to artistic expression that for which it is the frame, as it were. Certainly, the manner in which this is accomplished may be objected to from one or another artistic point of view. And the author of this pamphlet is far from thinking that what is being attempted in this building will be fully attained. But he is endeavouring to see that every sort of inartistic symbolism or allegorising is kept far removed from it. It is only necessary to open one's eyes in order to find that, when it is viewed, there is absolutely nothing symbolical or allegorical of the kind often met with where not Spiritual Science such as is to be pursued in this building, but unhealthy mysticism or such like is found. Yet in spite of this, one of the objections raised against this building is “One who enters this building will find all kinds of mysterious symbols which are Incomprehensible to the non-initiated, etc., etc.” In this way what we wish to attain in the building is successfully attacked, but only through the attack being directed against something which does not exist, and which, if it were really so, the one attacked would repudiate just as his opponent does. But by far the most of what is brought against the spiritual science we represent runs on this line. First a caricature of it is made, which sets all scientific thought at defiance, and then this caricature is attacked with the weapons of science. Another caricature is made, which is attacked from the point of view of religious feeling, whereas in truth no religious confession would have the slightest occasion to think anything but kindly of this spiritual science, if its true form were kept in view instead of a caricature of it.

In such a state of affairs it is almost impossible to do anything more than meet these attacks by stating the actual aims of spiritual science or Anthroposophy, and the lines it takes. I endeavoured to do this in the lecture upon which this pamphlet is based. Above all it is shown that the attacks are inapposite, because they are directed against self-made targets and not against Anthroposophy.

In this pamphlet, therefore, the true form of spiritual science is delineated in contradistinction to the imaginary one.

In the “Afterword,” a little more is said which amplifies the hints given in the lecture. The word “we” often occurs in the lecture; this is because I spoke to a certain extent as the representative of the movement in which Anthroposophy is cultivated.

Rudolf Steiner
April, 1916.

If I try to put forward this evening something about so-called spiritual science, about the way in which it is to be dealt with in the building at Dornach with which you are acquainted, and about that building itself, it is in no wise my intention to propagandise or arouse feeling either for Spiritual Science or for the Building.

I have especially in view the consideration of certain misunderstandings, which are known to exist with reference to the aims of the Anthroposophical Society. I will begin with the way in which a more or less unknown thing is judged when it makes its appearance anywhere. It is very easy to understand that anyone unfamiliar with a subject sees in its name something by means of which he thinks he can understand it. Anthroposophy and the Anthroposophical Society are names which have become more widely known than they formerly were, through the building at Dornach. “Anthroposophy” is by no means a new name. When some years ago there was a question of giving our cause a name, I thought of one which had become dear to me because a Professor of Philosophy, Robert Zimmermann, whose lectures I heard in my youth, called his chief work Anthroposophy. This was in the eighties of the nineteenth century. Moreover, the name Anthroposophy takes us still further back into literature. It was already used in the eighteenth century, indeed, still earlier. The name, therefore, is an old one; we are applying it to something new. For us it does not mean, “Knowledge of human beings.” That would be against the express intention of those who gave the name. Our science itself leads us to, the conviction that within the physical human being there lives a spiritual, inner one — as it were, a second human being.

Whereas that which man can learn about the universe through his senses and through the intellect which relies upon sense-observation may be called “Anthropology,” that which the inner, spiritual human being can know may be called “Anthroposophy.”

Anthroposophy is therefore the knowledge of the spiritual human being, or spirit-man, and that knowledge is not confined to man, but is a knowledge of everything which the spirit-man can perceive in the spiritual world, just as physical man observes physical things in the world. Because this second human being, the inner one, is the spiritual human being, the knowledge which he acquires may be called “Spiritual Science.” And this name is even less new than the name Anthroposophy. That is to say, it is not even unusual, and it would be a complete misunderstanding if anyone were to think that I, as has been said, or anyone closely connected with me, had coined the name “Spiritual Science.” The name is used everywhere where it is thought possible to attain knowledge which is not merely physical science, but knowledge of something spiritual. Numbers of our contemporaries call history a spiritual science, call sociology, political economy, aesthetics, and the philosophy of religion spiritual sciences. We use the name, only in a somewhat different sense, that is, in the sense that spirit is to us something real and actual, whereas most of those who nowadays speak of history, political economy, etc., as spiritual sciences, resolve the spirit into abstract ideas.

I will now also say something about the development of our Anthroposophical Society, because errors have been circulated on the subject. For instance, it is said that our Anthroposophical Society is only a kind of development out of what is called the “Theosophical Society.” Although it is true that what we aim at within our Anthroposophical Society placed itself for a time within the framework of the general Theosophical Society, yet our Anthroposophical Society must on no account be confused with the Theosophical Society. And in order to prevent this, I must bring forward something apparently personal, about the gradual rise of the Anthroposophical Society.

It was about fifteen years ago that I was invited by a small circle of people to give certain lectures on spiritual science. These lectures were afterwards published under the title, The Mystics of the Renaissance. Up till then I had, I may say, endeavoured as a solitary thinker to build up a view of the world which on the one hand fully reckons with the great, momentous achievements of the physical sciences, and on the other hand desires to rise to insight into spiritual worlds.

I must expressly lay stress on the fact that at the time when I was invited to speak to a small circle in Germany on the subject connected with spiritual science already mentioned, I did not depend in any way upon the works of the writer Blavatsky or of Annie Besant, nor did I take them particularly into consideration. These books, in their way of looking at things, were but little in keeping with my view of the world. I had at that time endeavoured, purely out of what I had discovered for myself, to give some points of view about spiritual worlds. The lectures we're printed; some of them were very soon translated into English, and that by a distinguished member of the Theosophical Society, which at that time was particularly flourishing in England; and from this quarter I was urged to enter the Theosophical Society. At no time had I any idea, if the occasion should have presented itself in the Theosophical Society, of bringing forward anything else but what was built up on the foundation of my own, independent method of research.

That which now forms the substance of our Anthroposophical view of the world, as studied in our circle of members, is not borrowed from the Theosophical Society, but was represented by me as something entirely independent, and represented within that Society in consequence of an invitation from it, until it was there found heretical and turned out; and what had thus always been an independent part of that Society was further developed and further built up in the now wholly independent Anthroposophical Society.

Thus it is an entirely erroneous conception to confuse in any way that which is living within the Anthroposophical Society with what is represented by Blavatsky and Besant. It is true that Blavatsky has in her books put forward important truths concerning spiritual worlds, but mixed with so much error that only one who has accurately investigated these matters can succeed in separating what is important from what is erroneous. Hence our Anthroposophical movement must claim to be considered wholly independent. This is not put forward from want of modesty, but merely in order to place a fact in its objectively right light.

Then came the time when it became necessary to represent in an artistic, dramatic form that which our spiritual science, our Anthroposophy, gave in its teachings. We began doing this in 1909 at Munich. From that time onward to the year 1913 we tried every year to give artistic expression in dramatic representations at Munich to that which our investigations lead us to acknowledge is living in the world as spiritual forces, as spiritual beings.

These dramatic performances were at first given in an ordinary theatre. But it soon became evident that an ordinary theatre cannot be the right framework for that which, in a certain way, was to enter the spiritual development of humanity as a new thing-. And thus the necessity arose for having a building of our own for such representations, and for the prosecution of our spiritual science generally and the art which belongs to it; a building which, moreover, in its form of architecture is an expression of what it is desired to accomplish. At first it was thought that it would be well to erect such a building in Munich. When this proved impossible, or, at any rate, extremely difficult, the possibility arose of our erecting the building at Dornach near Basle, on a very beautiful hill, where a large piece of land was offered us by a Swiss friend, who had this ground at his disposal, and who has our cause at heart. And thus, through easily comprehensible circumstances, it has come about that the building has been erected just in the north-western corner of Switzerland.

And now, before speaking further about the Dornach building, I should like to deal with the mission of spiritual science itself. It may be quite easy to understand that spiritual science or Anthroposophy, in the sense here intended, is misunderstood. One who has become conversant with this spiritual science finds it entirely comprehensible that many misunderstandings should be brought against it; and one who knows the course taken by the Spiritual development of mankind, will not be surprised at such misunderstandings. Opinions such as, “It is mere imagination; it is dreaming,” or perhaps worse, are comprehensible. In the same way as this spiritual science have, as a rule, those things been received which have entered the spiritual evolution of mankind for the first time. Moreover, it may very easily appear as if this spiritual science resembled certain older views of the universe which are not exactly popular at the present time. If the objects of spiritual science or Anthroposophy are looked at merely from the outside, it may be thought that they resemble those pursued by the Gnostics in the first Christian centuries. But one who really learns what our spiritual science is will find that it bears no more resemblance to the Gnosis than does the natural science of the present day to the natural science of the eighth or sixth century a.d. True, resemblances may be found between all possible things, if only a sufficient number of their distinguishing features be eliminated. It may, for instance, be said, “This spiritual science, this Anthroposophy, desires to know the world in a spiritual way. The Gnostics also desired to know the world in a spiritual way. Consequently spiritual science and the Gnosis are one and the same.”

In a similar manner may Anthroposophy be confused, let us say, with alchemy, with the magic of the Middle Ages. But this is all due to a complete misapprehension, a complete misunderstanding of the real aims of this spiritual science or Anthroposophy. In order to gain insight into this matter, it is necessary to look first at the modern method of thought in natural science, which for three or four centuries has been developing out of quite a different method of thought. It is necessary to realise what it meant for mankind when three or four centuries ago the revolution took place which may be expressed in the words: up to that time everyone, learned and ignorant alike, believed that the earth stood still in the midst of the universe, and that the sun and stars revolved round the earth. It may be said that in consequence of what Copernicus, Galileo, and others taught at that time, the ground under men's feet was made movable. Now, when the movement of the earth is looked upon as a matter of course, there is no feeling left of the surprising effect produced upon humanity at large by this and everything connected with it.

Now what natural science then sought to do for the interpretation and explanation of the mysteries of nature, spiritual science seeks to do for the spirit and soul at the present time. In its fundamental nature, spiritual science desires to be nothing else than something for the life of soul and spirit similar to what natural science then became for the life of external nature. One who believes, for instance, that our spiritual science has something to do with the ancient Gnosis quite ignores the fact that with the view of the world taken by natural science, something new entered the mental evolution of mankind, and that as a result of this new element, spiritual science is to be something similarly new for the investigation of spiritual worlds.

Now spiritual science, if it is to do the same for spirit that natural science has done for nature must investigate quite differently from the latter. It must find ways and means of penetrating into the sphere of the spiritual, a domain which cannot be perceived with outer physical senses, nor apprehended with the intellect which is limited to the brain.

It is still difficult to speak intelligibly about the ways and means found by spiritual science for penetrating into the spiritual sphere, because the spiritual world is generally considered, from the outset, as something unknown, indeed, as something which must necessarily remain unknown. Now spiritual science shows that the perceptive powers which man has in ordinary life, and which he also uses in ordinary science, are by no means able to penetrate into the spiritual world. In this respect spiritual science is in full accord with certain branches of natural science. Only natural science does not know certain faculties in man, which are latent within him, but capable of being developed.

It is again difficult to speak of these faculties at the present time, for the reason that they are, far and wide, confused with all manner of diseased phenomena in man. For instance, there is much talk nowadays of the possibility of man's acquiring certain abnormal faculties, and the natural scientist thereupon declares that it is true that they may be acquired, but they are only due to the fact that the otherwise normal nervous system and brain have become abnormal and diseased. In every case in which the investigator in natural science is correct in making such a statement, the spiritual investigator at once acknowledges it. But the aim of spiritual science should not be confused with what is often and widely called “clairvoyance,” in a superficial way. Neither should spiritual science be confused with that which appears under the name of spiritualism, etc., etc. The essential thing is this, that this spiritual science should be distinguished from everything that is in any way due to diseased human predispositions.

In order to make myself quite intelligible on this point, I must indicate, if only in a few words, the manner in which the spiritual investigator institutes his researches. The method of research in spiritual science is founded on something which has nothing to do with the soul-forces of man in so far as they are bound up with his bodily organism. If, for instance, it is said that spiritual science is founded on what is to be attained through some form of asceticism, or on something for which the nervous system is prepared and stimulated in a certain way, or that it results from the bringing of spirits into manifestation in an outer, physical way — all such assertions would be utterly inaccurate. That which the spiritual investigator has to do to gain the faculty of looking into the spiritual world, consists exclusively of processes of the spirit and soul; they have nothing to do with changes in the body, nor with visions arising from a morbid bodily life.

The spiritual investigator will be most careful not to let the body have any influence over that which he spiritually perceives. I mention by the way that if, for instance, a large number of the adherents of spiritual science are vegetarians, this is a matter of taste, which in principle has nothing to do with spiritual methods of research. It has only to do with a certain manner of making life easier — I would even say, with a more comfortable regulation of life, since it is easier to work in a spiritual way if no meat be eaten.

The main point is that spiritual science, with its methods of research, only begins where modern natural science leaves off. Humanity is indebted to the view of the world taken by natural science for what I would call a logic which educates itself by the facts of nature itself.

An important method of training has come in, among those who have studied natural science, with regard to the inner handling of thought. I will now try to make clear by a comparison the relation of spiritually scientific research to that of natural science. The mode of thought used by the investigator in natural science I would compare with the forms of a statue. The logic developed from the outer facts of nature has something lifeless in it. When we think logically, we have images in our conceptions and ideas. But these images are only inner thought-forms, just as the forms of a statue are forms.

Now the spiritual investigator sets out from this mode of thinking. In my books, The Way of Initiation, Initiation and its Results, and The Gates of Knowledge, directions are to be found as to what must be done with thinking in order that it may become something entirely different from what it is in ordinary life and ordinary science. The spiritual investigator develops his thinking; he makes it undergo a certain, special discipline. I cannot in this short sketch enter into details; these are described in the books I have named. When thinking, when the logic that bears sway in man, is treated in a certain way, the whole inner life of the soul becomes changed. Something happens which changes this soul-life into something else, which I will once more make dear by a comparison.

Imagine that the statue — this, of course, cannot happen, but let us assume that it could — imagine that the statue, which previously stood there with its lifeless form, were suddenly to begin to walk and to become living. This the statue cannot do; but human thinking, inner logical activity, can. By means of the soul-exercises undertaken and carried out by the spiritual investigator, he puts himself into such a state, that there is within him not only a thought-out logic, but a living logic; logic itself becomes a living being within him. Thereby he has grasped something living and bearing sway within him, instead of lifeless conceptions. He becomes permeated by this living, ruling element. And when spiritual research assumes the existence of an etheric body, besides the physical body which is visible to bodily eyes, by this is meant not something merely imagined, but it is meant that man, by bringing logical thinking to life within him, becomes conscious of a second human being within him. This is a matter of experience which may be arrived at. The experience must be made, in order that the science of the spiritual human being may arise, just as the outer experiments of natural science must be made, in order to learn nature's secrets.

Just as thinking is so transformed that it no longer leads merely to images, but becomes inwardly active and alive, so may the will also be developed in a certain way. The methods by which the will is so treated that we learn to know it as something different from what it is in ordinary life, are also to be found described in the above-named books. Through this development of the will, something of quite a different kind results from what comes through the development of thinking. If we desire to do something in ordinary life, if we work, the will, as it were, penetrates into the limbs. We say, “I will”; we move our hands; but the will only comes to expression in this movement. In its real essence it remains unknown. But by using certain exercises, the will may be released from its connection with the limbs. The will may be experienced in itself alone. Thinking may be made active, so as to become something inwardly alive, a kind of etheric body. The will may be isolated, separated from its connection with the bodily nature, and then we realise that we have within us a second human being in a far higher sense than is the case with thinking. Through the development of the will we become aware that we have a second human being within us, which has a consciousness of its own. If we work at our will in an adequate way, something takes place which I can only make clear by reminding you that in ordinary human life there are two alternating states, waking life and sleep. In waking life man lives, consciously; during sleep, consciousness ceases.

Now at first it is a mere assertion to say that the soul and spirit do not cease to be conscious between the time of falling asleep and awaking. But they are no longer directly in the body, they are outside it. The spiritual investigator succeeds in voluntarily giving his bodily life the same form that it takes involuntarily when he goes to sleep. He orders his senses and his ordinary intellect to be still; he achieves this by developing his will. And it then happens that the same condition is voluntarily brought about that is usually involuntarily present in sleep. Yet, on the other hand, what is now brought about is the complete opposite of the sleep-condition. Whereas during sleep we become unconscious and know nothing about ourselves and our surroundings, through developing the will in the manner described we consciously leave our bodies; we see the body outside ourselves, just as we usually perceive an external object outside ourselves. Then we notice that in man there lives a real spectator of his thoughts and actions. This is no mere image, no merely pictorial expression, but it is a reality. In our will there lives something which is perpetually observing us inwardly. It is easy to look upon this inner spectator as something intended to be taken pictorially; the spiritual investigator knows it to be a reality, just as the objects of sense are realities. And if we have these two, the living, moving thought-being, the etheric human being, and this inner spectator, then we have brought ourselves into a spiritual world, which is actually experienced, as the physical world is experienced with the senses. A second human being is found in man in this way, as oxygen is found in water by the methods of natural science.

That which is attained by developed thinking, is not visions, but spiritual sight of realities; what is attained by a developed will, is not ordinary soul-experiences, but the discovery of a different consciousness from the ordinary one. There now act one upon the other, the human being who is logic in motion, and the other human being who is a higher consciousness. If we learn to know these two within man, we know that part of man which exists even when his physical body falls into decay, when he goes through the gate of death. We learn to know the being in man which does not act through the outer body, which is of a soul and spirit nature, which will continue to exist after death, which existed also before birth, or, let us say, before conception. We learn to know the eternal essence of man in this way, through having separated it, as it were, out of the ordinary mortal human being, just as we can separate oxygen out of water by a chemical process.

All that I have now brought before you must of course still be looked upon as fantastic at the present time; in relation to customary ideas, it is as fantastic as the words of Copernicus seemed, when he said, “It is not the sun which revolves round the earth, but the earth revolves round the sun.” Nevertheless, what appears so fantastic is really only something unaccustomed. It is not the case that something invented or dreamed has been related in what has just been set forth, but the point is that the spiritual is actually experienced as a fact by means of inward processes. The spiritual investigator is not speaking in a simple manner of man's nature when he enumerates, “Man consists of a physical body, etheric body, astral body, etc.,” but he is showing how that which is human nature, when it is contemplated as a whole, becomes split up into certain principles of which it is composed. And if the matter be regarded in accordance with its fundamental essence, nothing magical or mystical in a bad sense is meant by these principles of man's being. Spiritual science shows that man consists of different gradations, different shades of human nature. And this in a higher sphere is no different from the fact, in a lower one, that light may be so treated as to appear in seven colours. Just as light must be split up into seven colours in order that it may be studied, so must man be divided into his several parts in order that he may be really studied.

It should not be expected that what is spiritual can be brought before bodily eyes, before the senses. It must be experienced inwardly and spiritually. And to one who will not admit that inward experience, a spiritual experience, is in any way a fact, anything said by the spiritual investigator will be but empty skirmishing with words. To one who learns to know spiritual facts, these are realities in a far higher sense than are physical facts. If a plant grows, and develops blossom and fruit, a new plant again develops out of the seed; and when we have learnt to know the germ, we know that it has the full force of the plant within it, and that a new plant arises from the g-germ.

What is of the nature of spirit and soul must be learned from facts belonging to the spirit and soul; then we know that in the living thought, which is apprehended by the consciousness that is liberated out of the will, a life-germ has been discerned, which passes through the gate of death, goes through the spiritual world after death and afterwards returns again to earth-life. And just as truly as the plant-seed develops a new plant, does that which is the kernel of man's being develop a new earth-life. This new human being can be seen in the present one, for it becomes inwardly alive.

Natural science has methods of calculating certain events which will happen in the future. From the relative positions of the sun and moon it may be calculated when eclipses of these will occur. It is only necessary to know the corresponding factors in order to calculate when a certain conjunction of the stars will take place. In these cases it is necessary to use mathematics, because we are dealing with external space. The life-germ, which is inwardly experienced, also contains in a living way the indication of future earth-lives. Just as future eclipses of the sun and moon are indicated in the present relations of those bodies, so are future earth-lives indicated in that which is now alive within us. In this case we are not dealing with what, according to more ancient views, is called the transmigration of souls, but with something which modern spiritual research discovers from the facts of spiritual life, which are capable of being investigated.

Now certain things must be carefully kept in view, if we wish to understand the real foundations of spiritual research. We arrive at leaving the body with our soul and spirit through treating thought and will in the manner that has been indicated. We are then outside the body; and just as we usually have outer things before our eyes, so do we have our own physical body before us. But the essential thing is that we can always observe this body. And if it is a case of spiritual research in the true sense of the words, as it is here meant, that must never happen which does so in a diseased soul-life. For what is the characteristic feature of an abnormal or diseased soul-life? If some one is put into a hypnotic state or a so-called trance, as certain conditions are called, and speaks out of the subconscious, which is often denominated a kind of clairvoyance, the essential thing in the process is that the ordinary consciousness is not present whilst the changed consciousness is active. The former has been transformed into a dulled, abnormal consciousness. It will never be possible to say, when observing an abnormal and unhealthy condition of soul, “The healthy condition of soul is present at the same time as this,” for in that case the person would certainly not be unhealthy or abnormal.

In real spiritual research the fact is that man arrives at a changed consciousness, but that as a normal human being he is all the time standing by. The condition in which the spiritual investigator is, is not developed from out of ordinary normal soul-life, but by the side of it, if the condition is the right one. In the case of a genuine spiritual investigator, he lives, during his researches, outside his body; but his body continues to work on undisturbed together with all his normal soul-functions and his ordinary intellect, which remains completely normal. The man, if he is a true spiritual investigator, remains a normal human being, in spite of the fact that he has left his body, together with what he has developed within himself; and one who cannot himself investigate spiritually, really need not see that the other is living in a different world. The non-hypnotised person is not present beside the hypnotised one; the person with a normal soul-life is not present beside the one who is developing an abnormal soul-life. But the characteristic feature of spiritual research is that whilst it is being pursued, the person's normal condition is completely maintained. Just on this account the spiritual investigator is in a position accurately to distinguish true spiritual research from that which appears in any diseased conditions of soul.

Another mistake arises when it is thought that spiritual research has anything in common with ordinary spiritualism. By this it is not meant that all manner of facts may not be discovered through spiritualism, but these belong to natural science, not to spiritual science, for that which is discovered through spiritualism is presented to the outer senses, whether by means of materialisations, or knockings and the like. That which can be presented to the senses belongs to natural science. That which offers itself as an object to the spiritual investigator is of a soul and spirit nature, and cannot be presented externally, for instance, in space; it must be experienced inwardly.

Through the inner experience which has been described there is formed a comprehensive spiritual science, which not only throws light on the being of man and the passage through repeated earth-lives, but is also enlightening about the spiritual worlds and spiritual beings which lie behind nature. Spiritual research is able to enter the world through which man passes after death. Only it must not be thought that what appear in ordinary life in a certain sense as abnormal faculties have any special value in spiritual science. There is much talk nowadays of the possibility of telepathy. We will not now enter into all the pros and cons of this matter. People must grow accustomed to many things in the course of time. Just at the present time serious investigators are wrestling with the problem of the significance of the divining-rod, which is now so widely used, and about which one of the most matter-of-fact investigators is just now making important experiments, in order to ascertain what influence a person is under who is successful with the divining-rod. But all this belongs to the department of finer natural science. In the same way does the fact belong to this department that thoughts entertained by one person are able to influence another at a distance. True spiritual research cannot use such forces for gaining knowledge about the world of soul and spirit. It is a complete misunderstanding of spiritual science to think that it looks upon the teaching about telepathy as anything else but a part of a refined physiology, a refined form of natural science.

The way in which spiritual science investigates must not be confused with that which nowadays appears as spiritualism. When spiritual science remembers the human souls which are passing through a purely spiritual life in a spiritual world between death and re-birth, spiritual science knows that those souls are in the spiritual world in a soul-state pure and simple. Now it is possible for the spirit and soul that is in a human body to turn to the dead in such a way that a real connection is made with them. But this turning to the dead must itself be of a purely spiritual and soul character. Spiritual science shows this. And the direction of our own soul-life to our beloved dead may acquire deep significance, even whilst we ourselves are still in the physical world. It cannot be at variance with any religious belief if, through the view of the world taken by spiritual science, remembrance of the dead and active communion with them is cultivated in this way, if spiritual science stimulates this living together with the dead. In this connection it must always be borne in mind that the dead person can only be aware of what we are thinking and feeling for him in our souls if he desires such a connection with us. This also is shown by spiritual science. The exercise of any sort of power over the dead is entirely remote from the intentions of the spiritual investigator. He knows quite well that the dead are living in a sphere in which the relations of the will are different from those in the physical world; and if he were to wish to penetrate into the spiritual world, taking with him what he is able to develop here within the physical world, it would seem to him as though — to use a comparison — a company of people were sitting here and a lion suddenly appeared through the floor and committed ravages. So would harm result if an earthly human being were to force his way into the life of the dead in an unbefitting manner. Therefore there can be no question in spiritual science of summoning the dead, in the way in which this is attempted in spiritualism, just because the relations of the living to the dead are illuminated in a wonderful way by that which spiritual science arouses within our souls. And since amongst the numerous errors which have been urged against our spiritual science, one is that it has a connection with spiritualism with regard to the dead, it is very necessary to emphasise this misunderstanding sharply. Nothing less than the exact contrary of the truth is asserted with regard to spiritual science in this matter.

As already said, I do not wish to proselytise or arouse feeling for our cause, but only to mention misunderstandings which I know to be prevalent, and to indicate in the clearest way possible the relation of spiritual science to these matters.

Now the question is also asked — and it is even called an urgent one — what is the position of spiritual science or Anthroposophy towards the religious life of man? Its very nature, however, prevents it from interposing directly in any religious confession, in the sphere of any religious life. In this connection I can perhaps make myself clear in the following way. Let us assume that we have to do with natural science. Because we gain a knowledge of nature, we shall not imagine that we are able to create something in nature itself. Knowledge of nature does not create anything in nature. Nor, because we gain knowledge of spiritual conditions, shall we imagine that we are able to create something in spiritual facts. We observe spiritual conditions. Spiritual science endeavours to penetrate behind the mysteries of the spiritual conditions in the world. Religions are facts in the historical life of humanity. Spiritual science can of course go so far as to consider the spiritual phenomena which have appeared as religions in the course of the world's evolution. But spiritual science can never desire to create a religion, any more than natural science surrenders itself to the illusion of being able to create something in nature. Hence the most various religious confessions will be able to live together in the profoundest peace, and in complete harmony within the circle of the view of the world taken by spiritual science, and will be able to strive together after knowledge of the spiritual — so to strive that the religious convictions of the individual will not thereby be in any way injured. Neither need intensity in the exercise of a religious belief be in any way lessened by what is found in spiritual science. Rather must it be said that natural science, as it has appeared in modern times, has very often led people away from a religious conception of life, from the exercise of true, inner religion. It is an experience which we have in spiritual science that people who have been alienated from all religious life by the half-truths of natural science can be brought back again to that life through spiritual science. No one need be in any way estranged from his religious life through spiritual science. For this reason it cannot be said that spiritual science, as such, is a religious belief. It desires neither to create a religious belief, nor to change a man in any way with regard to the religious belief which he holds. Nevertheless it seems as though people were talking about the religion of the Anthroposophists! In reality such a thing cannot be said, for all religious beliefs are represented within the Anthroposophical Society; and no one is prevented by it from practically exercising his religious belief in the fullest, most comprehensive and most intense way. It is only that spiritual science desires to include the whole world in its survey; it desires to survey historical life, together with the highest spirituality which has entered historical life. That for this reason it also takes a survey of religions is absolutely no contradiction of what I have just said. And thus it comes to pass that the view of the world taken by spiritual science must in a certain respect deepen a man, even with regard to the objects of religious life.

But when, for instance, it happens that spiritual science is accused of not speaking of a personal God, when it is said that I prefer to speak of the Divinity, not of God, when it is asserted that what is called “the divine” in spiritual science is of a similar nature to that which is so designated in the pantheism of the Monists or Naturalists, this is all the opposite of the truth. Through the very circumstance that in spiritual science we are led to real spiritual beings, and to the real being that man is after death, just because we are led to concrete, real spiritual beings, we arrive at being able completely to understand how unreasonable it is to become a pantheist, how repugnant to common sense to deny personality in God. One arrives, on the contrary, at seeing that one may speak not only of the personality, but even of a super-personality of God. The most thorough refutation of pantheism may be found through spiritual science.

Can it be a subject of reproach that the spiritual investigator only speaks with deep reverence when, out of the feelings which his knowledge arouses in him, he points the way with awe to the divine? How often it is said in the circle of our friends, “In Him we live, and move, and have our being.” And one who wishes to comprehend God with one idea, does not know that all possible ideas cannot comprehend God, because all ideas are in God. But the recognition of God as a being who has personality in a much higher sense even than man, in a sense which even through spiritual science cannot be fully perceived, becomes quite, I would say, natural to people, specially through Anthroposophy. Religious conceptions are not made misty, in the pantheistic sense, through spiritual science, but, in accordance with their nature, become deepened. If we say that God is revealed in our own hearts and souls, this is surely the conviction of many religious people; and it is again and again said in spiritual science that there can be no question in this of wishing to deify man.

I have often used the simile that a drop taken out of the sea is water — do I therefore say that the drop is the sea? If I say that something divine speaks in the individual human soul, a drop out of the ocean of the infinite divine, do I therefore say anything which deifies the individual human soul? Do I say anything which unites nature with in a pantheistic way? Far from it. And finally, if from certain deeply-seated feelings which are aroused by spiritual science itself, the name “GOD” is, in reverential awe, not named but paraphrased, should this be a subject of blame from the religious point of view? I ask, is not one of the Ten Commandments, “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain?” May not spiritual science stimulate to a faithful fulfilment of this command, if the name of God is not perpetually on the lips of its followers?

And the name and being of Christ? It is just of spiritual science that it may be said that it makes every effort to understand the being of Christ, and that in doing so it is never at variance with that which is developed, from true foundations, by any religious denomination. Only, in this very domain, we meet with something most singular. Some one comes and says he has a certain conception or feeling about Christ, about Jesus, and we say to him, “Certainly, we recognise these feelings as wholly justified; only spiritual science leads to thinking many other things about Christ as well. It does not deny what you say, it accepts it. Only it must add much more to it.”

Just because spiritual science widens the spiritual sight, the eye of the soul, to extend over the spiritual world, is it necessary not only to recognise in the being to whom the Christian looks up as his Christ, the one who walked this earth, but to bring this being into connection with the entire cosmos. And then, again, much else is the consequence of so doing. But nothing which results from it takes anything away from the knowledge of Christ, only something is added to what the religious man, the really Christian religious man, has to say about the Christ. And when some one attacks the conception of Christ Jesus held by spiritual science, it always seems to the spiritual investigator as though some one comes and says, “I have this or that to say about the Christ; do you believe it?” “Yes!” we say. “Yes, but you not only believe that, but more besides!” This he will not allow. He is not satisfied with our admitting what he advocates, but he forbids us to declare something still greater and grander about the Christ than he himself declares.

For can it really be a heresy when spiritual science, out of its fundamental basis, out of the observation of that which, as spirit, holds sway through the whole progress of the earth with regard to human and other evolution, arrives at saying, “The whole existence of the earth would have no meaning in the universe if the Mystery of Golgotha had not taken place within the earthly sphere?” The spiritual investigator must say, “If any inhabitants of distant worlds could look down upon the earth and see what it is, they would see no meaning in the whole evolution of the earth unless Christ had lived, died, and risen again upon it.” The event of Golgotha gives meaning and purpose to earth-life for the whole world. If you were to study the results of spiritual research, you would see that reverence for Christ and devotion to Him cannot be diminished by such research, but on the contrary can only be enhanced.

Time presses, and I cannot enter into many other misunderstandings which have been spread abroad concerning certain thoughts about the Bible which are said to be prevalent in circles of Anthroposophists — as they are called, although the word would be better avoided, and only “Anthroposophy” used. The point in this case is that a person may be a very good spiritual investigator without in any way being able to accept what has, for definite reasons, been said for those members of our society who wish to know something about the Gospels or the Bible generally. But if what is said be read with the context, it will be found that, for instance, I never uttered such nonsense as that repeated earth-lives could be proved from the Bible by means of the passage in which Nathanael is spoken of. It has been asserted that I thought that when the Christ says, “When thou wast under the fig-tree, I saw thee,” he is referring to an earlier incarnation, in which he saw Nathanael sitting under the fig-tree. I can do but one thing when these misunderstandings fly about the world to-day, I can do but one thing — wonder how such things have been able to arise at all out of what was really said. They are just proofs of the manner in which what is really said becomes altered in the most diverse ways when it is repeated from one to another, and how the contrary — for in this case it is the contrary that came out — of what I had said was attributed to me.

I will not now discuss other misunderstandings, which could easily be refuted. I will only mention one thing, which may very easily be said, “What do you think of the fact that nothing about repeated earth-lives is found in the Bible?” It might be that some one would say that he could not believe in these repeated earth-lives, for the simple reason that, according to his convictions, there is a contradiction between the acceptation of these repeated earth-lives, which, certainly, minds such as Lessing's, for instance, admitted as true, and what is in the Bible.

Now repeated earth-lives will be accepted as a scientific, a spiritually-scientific fact, and people will learn to think in the following way about the relation to the Bible of such a fact of spiritual science, which had sooner or later to be discovered. Would it be thought possible for anyone to say he did not believe in the existence of America because the Bible does not mention such a place? Or would it be thought any injury to the Bible to say, “I think the existence of America is quite in harmony with my reverence for the Bible, in spite of America's not being mentioned within its pages”? Is there anything in the Bible about the truth of the Copernican view of the universe? There have been people who for this reason have looked upon the Copernican view of the world as something false and forbidden. Nowadays there is no one really versed in the culture of his time who could say that he found a contradiction between the teaching of Copernicus and the Bible — notwithstanding that the teaching of Copernicus is not in the Bible.

In the same way it may be said of the spiritually-scientific fact of repeated earth-lives that there is no injury done to the cardinal truths of the Bible, merely because nothing can be found therein about reincarnation, and because, indeed, much of its contents may be so interpreted as to seem to contradict this knowledge. These points must only be looked at from the right point of view. If they are so looked at, it may very well be remembered how such things change in the course of time. If some one says he will not admit the truth of repeated earth-lives for the reason that it contradicts the Bible, I am always reminded that there was a time when Galileo was treated in a very peculiar, well-known way, because he had something to say which apparently, but only apparently, contradicted the Bible. Or we may remember how Giordano Bruno was treated, because he too had something to say about which it was asserted that it could not be demonstrated out of the Bible.

I must, moreover, remember a priest who became the rector of a university some years ago, from the theological faculty, and who in his rectorial address, the subject of which was Galileo, spoke as a Catholic priest somewhat as follows. He said that times change and with them the way in which people accept recognised facts. Galileo was in his time treated as we all know; but now every true Christian sees that through the discovery of the grandeur of the cosmic system, as it became known through Galileo, the glory and majesty of God and devotion to Him can only be increased, not diminished. This was like a priest, it was like a Christian, indeed, it was perhaps said for the first time in a really Christian way. And the fine recognition of Galileo was Christian, which was gained for him from the whole address of this priest.

On the whole I would say, speaking from the convictions of spiritual science, that the spiritual scientist must, through his teachings, so think of what Christianity is, and of what Christ is to the world, as to say, “How fainthearted are those who think that in consequence of some discovery in the physical or spiritual domain the greatness which breathes towards us from the revelation of Christ can be diminished.” To the spiritual investigator he seems faint-hearted who thinks that through some fact, even such a weighty one as repeated earth-lives, some fact which is discovered in the physical or spiritual sphere, the splendour of the Christ-event and the influence of Christ can be lessened to the Christian; one who believes this might also believe that the sun loses power because it does not shine only for Europe, but for America too.

Whatever further physical or spiritual facts may be discovered, in any far-distant future, the great truths of Christianity will outshine them all. This is discerned by one who approaches the Christ-impulse and the entire Christian conception of the world with the attitude of spiritual research. Such a one has no fear. He is not so faint-hearted as to say that the splendour of Christianity can be diminished by any investigation. He knows that one who believes that Christianity can be imperilled by any physical or spiritual research, does not think much of Christianity.

It is really a question whether perhaps the numerous misunderstandings which exist with regard to that for which the Dornach building is an outward sign, an outer home, can be overcome. About the Dornach building itself I will only say to-day that it is intended to be nothing else but an artistic putting into form of that which is aroused in our perceptions and feelings when we have received into our souls the living essence of spiritual science or Anthroposophy. Therefore it should not be thought that the ideas of spiritual science are pictured by means of symbols or allegories in the forms of the building. Of that there is no question at all.

If you visit this building you will find that it has the peculiarity of having nothing at all mysterious in it, not a single symbol, nothing allegorical or the like. This has, from the very nature of the building, been kept entirely remote from it.

It may perhaps be said, “But it is necessary to know the thoughts belonging to spiritual science in order to understand what one sees!” This is true, but it is what the art of the Dornach building has in common with every other art. Take the Sistine Madonna, the wonderful picture of the Mother with the Child Jesus. I think that if a person who had never heard anything about Christianity were to stand before the Sistine Madonna, it would be necessary to explain to him what it is, for he too would not be able to understand the subject out of his own feelings. Thus it is a matter of course that it is necessary to live quite in the current of spiritual science in order to understand its art, just as it is necessary to be in the midst of Christianity in order to understand the Sistine Madonna.

The attempt is not made, in the Dornach building, to express the ideas of spiritual science symbolically, but there underlies it this fact of our view of the world, namely, that spiritual science is something — and this follows from what I have said here to-day — which takes hold of man's inner being in such a living, powerful way, that faculties otherwise dormant in him — artistic faculties as well as others — are awakened. And as spiritual science is something new — not a new name for something old, but something really new — just as present-day natural science is new as compared with the natural science of the Middle Ages, its art too must be something new and different from existing works of art. Gothic art came forward as new, compared with the antique; anyone who is of opinion that only antique art is of value may despise the Gothic; in the same way may a new style be abused, which arises out of a new way of feeling.

An accessory building is found especially bad. Near the building with two domes stands a heating-house. The attempt has been made to construct a useful building artistically out of the most modern of materials, concrete. The concrete was taken into account. And on the other hand everything that is in the building was taken into account. If anyone explains the form emblematically, if he sees all kinds of symbols in it, he is just a dreamer, a visionary, not one who sees what is there. Just as a nutshell is shaped so as to fit the nut-kernel, so does the artist try, in what he constructs, to form a shell for what is within it, a shell as it were in conformity with nature, so that the outer form is the appropriate covering of what it contains. That is what is attempted. And one who criticises this building and does not think it beautiful can be understood, for one must first grow used to these things. But he might perhaps try to imagine another chimney, as chimneys are now built, beside our heating-house, a correct, red chimney with its ordinary surroundings, and he might then compare the two.

It is true we very well know that what is attempted in the building at Dornach is but a beginning, and an imperfect beginning, but it is intended as the beginning of something which is arising out of a new view of the world, as a new style of architecture. There are also people who said, “Look, you have made seven columns, seven on each side of the principal hall. You are a very superstitious society; you believe in the mystical number seven.”

Well, one who sees seven colours in the rainbow might also be thought superstitious. In that case it is really nature, which causes the fact, which should be thought superstitious. But anyone who talks about these seven columns should not at first consider the number, but consider what has been newly attempted in the matter. Elsewhere, similar columns are placed near each other. The capitals of our columns are designed to be in continuous development; the second column is different from the first, the third again different; one capital arises out of another. This results in an organism, which has inner laws in the same way as have the seven tones, from the tonic to the leading note.

It will thus be found that nowhere have ideas, symbolism or the mysterious been elaborated, but the endeavour has everywhere been made to develop something artistic in forms, colours and so forth. We have striven to make the whole building the right framework for what is to be carried on within it. Buildings have walls. In walls as they have hitherto been built, people are accustomed to see something so framed as to shut off space. Our walls are so covered over with forms from inside that there is no feeling of space being shut off by the form, but one has the feeling that the wall is pervious and that one is looking out into the infinite. The walls are so constructed in their forms that they seem to efface themselves, and we remain in connection with nature and the whole world.

In this short account I have not wished to convince anyone. I wished to do only what I laid stress on at the beginning; I wish to interest, not to convince. But one thing I would fain emphasise once more — the way in which people become conversant with a particular view of the world depends on their habits of thought. And one who is acquainted with the course taken by the spiritual evolution of mankind knows that truth has always had to be developed through obstacles. Only consider how Giordano Bruno had to come forth before humanity, a humanity which had always believed that the blue vault of heaven was the limit of space. Giordano Bruno had to tell people, “There is nothing at all where you see the blue vault of the sky; you put something there yourselves when you look at it. Space stretches out into infinity, and infinite worlds are in the infinite space.” What Giordano Bruno then did for physical observation, spiritual science has to do for soul and spirit, and for what is temporal. In regard to soul and spirit there is also a kind of firmament, on one side birth, or let us say conception, on the other side, death. But that firmament is actually just as little a reality as the blue firmament above; merely because people can only see as far as birth or conception and as far as death with ordinary human faculties of perception, they think there is a boundary there, as people used to think the firmament was a boundary. But just as the blue firmament is no boundary, but infinite worlds exist in infinite space, so must we, with enlarged faculties, look out beyond the firmament of birth and death into an infinity of time, and behold in it the development of the eternal soul throughout successive earth-lives. In the spiritual sphere things are not different from what they are in the sphere of natural science. Therefore it may be asked: How is it then that so many misunderstandings arise from so many quarters about spiritual science? In this case I must say, if I may treat the matter more or less personally, that I think the reasons why spiritual science meets with so much hostility and misunderstanding are partly objective and partly subjective.

Amongst the objective reasons I would place this one first and foremost: Spiritual science is something upon which it is necessary to concentrate one's thoughts seriously. Long and earnest work is needful in order to understand it, work which is inseparable from many experiences and even from many disappointments. But this is in reality the case with every subject of knowledge. The paths of Anthroposophy cannot be found without such work. It seems to be the custom to say that for the understanding of a watch it is necessary to learn how the wheels work together. This demands some trouble. But it does not seem to be equally customary to make a similar admission with regard to the universe at large. In this case difficult, apparently complicated views are not allowed to have any value, and yet they are only difficult because the subject in hand is so. Instead of studying spiritual science themselves, people find fault with it because, judged from their own point of view, it is difficult.

Then there are subjective reasons. And these are to be found in what I have already said. It is difficult for people in general to reconcile ideas which they have once formed with ideas to which they are unaccustomed. Such unaccustomed ideas need not even contradict those already entertained, but need only add something to what has already been thought.

It has always been thus with truth. What is contradicted are people's habits of thought. And from this point of view, if the subjective reasons for misunderstandings about spiritual science are sought, we must say that the reasons are to be found on the same ground from which the teaching of Copernicus was rejected by the whole world, when it first appeared. It was just something new. But truth has to make its own way in the world, and does so in the end. This may well be felt by one who has at heart spiritual science, and all that to which it stimulates.

He relies on the experience that truth always works its way through the smallest crevices in the rocks of prejudices which have been set up. Perhaps spiritual science may still be hated now. But one who hates it will, at the most, only be able to make others hate it with him, people who are attached to him and swear by what he says. But never yet has a truth been effaced through having been hated. Truth may at any time be misunderstood and misinterpreted, but there will always be found those who know and rightly understand, in the face of those who misconstrue and misjudge. And even if that which spiritual science has to say in our time is not now recognised as true, if it is misunderstood and unappreciated, the time will come for this science also. Truth may be suppressed, but not destroyed. It must always be born again, however often it may be suppressed.

For truth is intimately, deeply and vitally bound up with the human soul, in such a way that one may be convinced that the human soul and truth belong to one another like sisters. And even if there are times and places in which dissension comes about between them, and some misunderstanding arises, recognition, and mutual love must always reappear between the soul and truth. For they are sisters, who have a common origin, and must always be lovingly mindful of their common origin — their origin in the spirituality which rules throughout the universe, and the discovery of which is the very task which Anthroposophy sets itself.

Afterword

By means of the details given in this booklet, it was to be shown how anthroposophical spiritual science receives its form at the present time as knowledge of the spiritual world, by going along lines which can hold their own by the side of the authorised lines of a scientific way of looking at things. In order to penetrate into the spiritual world in just as trustworthy a manner as natural science does into the world of matter, spiritual science must take paths which are different from those of natural science. In order to satisfy in a spiritual sphere the same demands which natural science satisfies in its sphere, it must work with faculties of perception and knowledge which are adapted to the spiritual, just as those of natural science are adapted to nature. A spiritual science with aims such as these cannot in any way be confused with more ancient tendencies of thought such as the Gnosis, etc. We can observe how in the course of modern times the effort to arrive at it appears quite clearly. Therefore it does not come forth as something which is voluntarily fabricated at the present time, but as the fulfilment of hopes which can be observed in the mental development of the West. Many things might be adduced to prove this; but we will only give two examples here, which show that “Anthroposophy” is something that has been thought about for a long time. Troxler, a thinker of the first half of the nineteenth century who is much under-estimated, published his Vorlesungen über Philosophie in 1835. In this work there is the sentence, “Although it is highly gratifying that the latest philosophy ... winds upwards in every Anthroposophy, i.e., it must be revealed in poetry as well as in history, we must not overlook the fact that this idea cannot be the fruit of speculation, and the true personality or individuality of man may not be confused either with what it sets up as subjective spirit or final ego, or with what it contrasts with this as absolute spirit or absolute personality.” What Troxler brings forward regarding his idea of Anthroposophy is confined to statements which clearly show how close he is to the acceptance of principles of human nature beyond the physical body. He says, “In earlier times philosophers differentiated a delicate, sublime soul-body from the grosser body. This they considered to be a sort of vehicle of the spirit, and it was an image of the body. They called it the pattern, and looked upon it as the inner, higher man.” The connection in which these words are found in Troxler's work, and the whole of his conception of the world, testify that we may see in his case aspirations which are fulfilled in the spiritual science indicated in this booklet. Only, as Troxler is not in the position to recognise that Anthroposophy is only possible through the development of soul-capacities in the direction indicated in this booklet, his own views relapse to points of view which, as compared with those attained by J. G. Fichte, Schelling and Hegel are not an advance, but retrogression. (See my book Die Rätsel der Philosophie.) In the work of J. H. Fichte, the son of the great philosopher, viz., in his Anthropologie, second edition 1860, page 608, we find the following sentences, “Anthropology ends in the result which is confirmed from various quarters, that the true nature of man's being and the real source of his consciousness belong to a super-sensible world. But sense-consciousness and the phenomenal world which appears before his eyes, together with the whole of the life of the senses, have no other importance than merely to be the place where that super-sensible life of the spirit is realised, by his bringing the spiritual contents of ideas into the sense-world through his own free, conscious act. ... The final result of this fundamental comprehension of human nature raises ‘Anthropology’ to ‘Anthroposophy.’“ In connection with the explanation of these sentences J. H. Fichte says (p. 609), “Thus, finally, Anthroposophy itself is only able to find its final conclusion in Theosophy.” The reasons why J. H. Fichte with his own view of the world did not arrive at Anthroposophy, but fell behind J. G. Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, are the same as in Troxler's case. For the present we will only give these two examples out of a multitude of facts contained in the history of the spiritual development of mankind, which could be adduced to prove that the anthroposophical spiritual science characterised in this booklet responds to a scientific tendency which has existed for a long time.

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In a lecture which I gave in 1902 before the Giordano Bruno Union, I referred to these statements by J. H. Fichte (which seemed to me to be the expression of a modern intellectual movement, not merely of an individual opinion); that was the time when a beginning was made with what now appears as the anthroposophical way of looking at things. From this it may be seen that we had in view the extension of the modern tendency of thought to the genuine observation of spiritual reality. We did not try to bring forth certain views out of the publications then called “theosophical” (and still so named at the present time), but we strove to continue the aspirations given birth to by modern philosophers, aspirations which, however, in their case remained in abstractions, and thus did not gain entrance to the true spiritual world. At the same time, this continuation seemed to me to be an extension of the view which Goethe, placing it at the foundation of his view of nature, which he described as being “in accordance with the spirit,” did not actually express, but felt. One who has followed my writings and lectures may gather all this from them; and I would not specially mention this matter if the misrepresentation of the truth were not brought up again and again, when it is said that I have changed from all that I wrote and said formerly and have turned to the views represented in the works of Blavatsky and Besant. One who carefully studies, for example, my Theosophy, will find that everything contained in it is developed in accordance with and as a continuation of the above-described direction of modern thought; he will find that the matters dealt with are presented in accordance with certain presuppositions contained in Goethe's conception of the world, and that only in certain places is it mentioned that ideas which I had arrived at (etheric body, sensation body, etc.), are also to be found in literature which is called theosophical. I know that by these explanations I shall not be able to do away with certain attacks made against me again and again, for in many cases these attacks are not made in order to arrive at the actual facts of the matter, but for something entirely different. But what can be done in the face of ever-recurring inexactitudes? Nothing can be done but to reiterate the truth!

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The searcher who works on the basis of the kind of knowledge indicated in this booklet sees that the method of his investigations is in complete accord with the endeavours of present-day natural science. But he knows that these endeavours of natural science must everywhere come to a stand-still or run into blind alleys if they do not meet what spiritual science can bring to light from opposite starting-points. A true view of the matter would look upon both directions of work as being like the boring of a tunnel, which commences from opposite directions, but, when the work is properly arranged, the two parties meet. The facts of contemporary work fully confirm this view. It is only misled opinions-regarding these facts which deny this and presume that spiritual science and natural science contradict each other. This contradiction, however, does not really exist. We have a brilliant example of the importance of the meeting of natural science and spiritual science in a book which has just been published, in, my opinion an epoch-making book. Vom Schaltwerk der Gedanken: Neue Einsichten und Betrachtungen über die Seele, by Karl Ludwig Schleich. If you read the important chapter on “Hysteria—a metaphysical problem,” you will see how a practical physician, who is at the same time a penetrating thinker, confronts facts which can only be fully elucidated by spiritual science, facts which compel him to say: “In the production of tissue through the impulse of hysteria we have the metaphysical problem of incarnation,” in “mediumistic vision, a kind of clairvoyance of possibilities of disease.” But a person would be under one of the very worst of illusions if he seriously thought that without the results of spiritual science he could explain all the actual experiences of man by the facts discovered by natural science. The scientist who refuses to consider spiritual science is like a man who has a piece of magnetic iron in his hand, but has no notion of magnetism and only uses the iron for an instrument in which magnetism plays no part. What would have come out of it if he had put the magnetism and not the material iron to some use? If you also read in Schleich's book the chapter on “The myth of the change of matter in the brain,” you will see for yourself how, by constraint of thought, the scientific physician comes to a formal description of what spiritual science—from a comprehensive presentation of spirit-life—appropriately describes as the etheric body of man. It is interesting to notice how this particular chapter in Schleich's book shows that at the present time natural science and spiritual science often talk in vain, because the co-operation of natural scientists and spiritual scientists in intellectual affairs is so difficult, on account of the dissipation of our intellectual life. Here we come to the painful thought: How different these things would be if scientists were really to become acquainted with spiritual science, instead of passing it by and leaving it to the foolish misrepresentations of those who act in accordance with the axiom: “Do not examine, but keep your irrelevant, prejudiced verdict!” At the close of the above-mentioned chapter Schleich says—and the case is important, because there is no question of ill-will, it is the statement of an upright, true investigator—“If Goethe, that seer and prophet, observed so many connections in nature and demonstrated that the skull with all its parts is nothing but an expanded cervical vertebra, because all the constituent parts of the latter can be traced in the bony covering of the brain, it would not surprise me if the thought I have just expressed, namely, of the heaping up of the brain out of the elements of the spinal marrow, did not also slip into the labyrinth of his thought. I should not be surprised if some day a slip of paper by Goethe on this subject was found.” Such is our intellectual co-operation at the present time! In 1916 an honest searcher expects that some time a scrap of paper of Goethe's will be found. But this was found by me as long ago as 1891. In the Goeian Annual for 1892, page 175, in the article Goethe as Anatomist, written by Professor K. v. Bardeleben, you will read, “The fact that Goethe occupied himself not only with Osteology, but also with the ligaments, the muscles, as well as the brain, is shown by various notes, most of them on loose leaves. In the Venetian Diary for 1790 R. Steiner found the following sentence, which may be closely connected with Goethe's thought on the vertebral nature of the skull-bones: ‘The brain itself is only a large principal ganglion. The organisation of the brain is repeated in each ganglion, so that each ganglion is to be looked upon as a small subordinate brain.’“ On the basis of this and similar things which I found, I was able to write in 1897 in my book, Goethe's Weltanschauung, out of purely scientific thought, “Each nerve-centre in the ganglia was to him (Goethe) a brain at a lower stage.” And this, in addition to many other things in connection with it, I have often mentioned since. This is only intended to be a small example of the manner in which investigators talk in vain in our pursuit of modern science. I shall certainly be the last to reproach Schleich for not knowing Goethe's Annual for 1892 and my book of 1897; the uncertainty in our pursuit of science comes not from people but from the conditions.

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In this booklet it has been pointed out how unfounded is all antagonism to spiritual science proceeding from religious points of view. We mentioned the excellent rectorial address given in 1894 by a catholic priest who was professor to the theological faculty at Vienna University. We are referring to Doctor Laurenz Müllner and his discourse on Galileo's Importance to Philosophy. In this address Doctor Milliner, who has remained a faithful son of his Church, says the following: “Thus a new conception of the world appeared (he is referring to the Galileo-Copernican view), which in many points was apparently at variance with opinions regarding which it was asserted, with very questionable right, that they proceeded from the doctrines of Christianity. It was much more a question of the contrast of the widened world-consciousness of the modern age to the more limited one of the antique, a contrast to the Greek, but not to the rightly understood Christian conception of the world, which could only see fresh marvels of divine power and wisdom in the newly discovered starry worlds, whereby the miracle of divine love accomplished on earth could only acquire greater importance.” In a similar manner with respect to the relation of spiritual science to religion it may be said that this spiritual science is often apparently at variance with opinions which are often represented as belonging to Christianity, but which with very questionable right assert their origin in the doctrines of Christianity. It is more a question of the contrast of the world-consciousness of our modern age which has extended into spiritual reality, to the narrowly limited natural-scientific consciousness of the last few centuries, but not to the rightly understood Christian conception of the world, which should only see in the spirit-worlds of Anthroposophy new marvels of divine power and wisdom, whereby the miracle of divine love accomplished in the world of sense can only acquire enhanced importance. As soon as in certain directions there is a fundamental insight into spiritual science such as was possessed by the above-mentioned noble priest and theologian, Laurenz Milliner, into modern natural science, all the attacks which are often made in such an unfounded manner upon spiritual science from the standpoint of religion will cease.

Those who describe the intellectual life of Germany from the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century usually see, alongside the high point of art in Lessing, Herder, Schiller, Goethe, Mozart, Beethoven and others, only an epoch of purely speculative thought in Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Schopenhauer and a few less important philosophers. It is widely believed that the latter personalities should be recognized merely as workers in the field of thought. It is admitted that they have done extraordinary work in the speculative field, but one is all too easily inclined to say that these thinkers were quite remote from actual occult research, from real spiritual experience. And so it happens that the theosophically striving person expects little profit from delving into their works.

Many who attempt to penetrate the thought-web of these philosophers give up the work after a time, because they find it unproductive. The scientific investigator says to himself: These thinkers have lost the solid ground of experience under their feet; they have built up in the nebulous heights the chimeras of systems, without any regard to positive reality. And for those interested in occultism, they lack the truly spiritual foundations. He comes to the conclusion: They knew nothing of spiritual experiences, of supersensible facts, and merely devised intellectual constructs.

As long as one stops at merely observing the outer aspects of the spiritual development, one will not easily come to a different opinion. But if one penetrates to the underlying currents, then the whole epoch presents itself in a different light. The apparent airy constructs of mere thought can be recognized as the expression of a deeper occult life. And Theosophy can then provide the key to understanding what these sixty to seventy years of spiritual life mean in the development of humanity.

In Germany at this time, there are two sets of facts, one of which represents the surface, but the other must be regarded as a deeper foundation. The whole thing gives the impression of a flowing stream, on the surface of which the waves ripple in the most diverse ways. And what is presented in the usual literary histories is only these rising and falling waves; but what lives in the depths and from which the waves actually draw their nourishment is ignored.

This depth contains a rich and fertile occult life. And this is none other than that which once pulsated in the works of the great German mystics, Paracelsus, Jakob Böhme and Angelus Silesius. Like a hidden power, this life was contained in the worlds of thought that Lessing, Herder, Schiller, Goethe, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel found there. The way in which, for example, Jakob Böhme had expressed his great spiritual experiences was no longer at the forefront of the prevailing literary discussion, but the spirit of these experiences continued to live on. One can see how, for example, this spirit lived on in Herder. Public discussion led Herder, like Goethe, to the study of Spinoza. In the work which he called “God,” Herder sought to deepen the conception of God in Spinozism. What he contributed to Spinozism was nothing other than the spirit of German mysticism. One could say that, unconsciously to himself, Jakob Böhme and Angelus Silesius were his guides. It is from such hidden sources that we can explain how, in the “Education of the Human Race”, a rationalist spirit such as Lessing was, could have incorporated ideas about reincarnation. The term “unconscious” is, however, only half accurate, because such ideas and intuitions may not have been on the surface of literary discussion in Germany, but they certainly lived a full life in the most diverse “occult societies” and “fraternities”. But of the above, only Goethe can be considered as having been initiated into the most intimate life of such “fraternities”; the others had only a more superficial connection with them. Much of it found its way into their lives and work as inspiration, without their being fully aware of the real sources.

In this respect, Schiller represents an interesting phenomenon of intellectual development. We cannot understand the real intellectual nerve of his life if we do not delve into his youthful works, which can be found in his writings as “Correspondence between Julius and Raphael”. Some of the material contained in it was written by Schiller while he was still at the Karls School in Stuttgart, while some of it was only written in 1785 and 1786. It contains what Schiller calls the “theosophy of Julius” and by which he refers to the sum of ideas to which he had risen at that time. It is only necessary to cite the most important thoughts from this “theosophy” to characterize the way in which this genius assembled his own edifice of ideas from the rudiments of German mysticism that were accessible to him. Such essential thoughts are, for example, the following: “The universe is a thought of God. After this ideal image of the spirit had passed over into reality and the born world fulfilled the design of its creator – allow me this human conception – so the vocation of all thinking beings is to seek out in this existing whole the first drawing, the rule in the machine, the unity in the composition, the law in the phenomenon, and to transfer the building backwards to its ground plan... The great composition that we call the world now remains strange to me only because it exists, symbolically describing to me the manifold expressions of that being. Everything in and outside of me is only a hieroglyph of a force that is similar to me. The laws of nature are the ciphers that the thinking being puts together to make itself understood to the thinking being – the alphabet by means of which all spirits negotiate with the most perfect spirit and with themselves... A new experience in this realm of truth, gravity, the discovery of blood circulation, the Linnaean system of nature, mean to me originally just what an antique, excavated in the Herculaneum - both only a reflection of a spirit, a new acquaintance with a similar being to me ... There is no longer any wilderness for me in all of nature. Where I discover a body, I sense a spirit. Where I perceive movement, I divine a thought... We have concepts of the wisdom of the supreme being, of his goodness, of his justice – but none of his omnipotence. To describe his omnipotence, we help ourselves with the piecemeal notion of three successions: Nothing, His Will, and Something. It is waste and dark – God calls: Light – and there is Light. If we had a real idea of His active omnipotence, then we would be creators, like He is...

Such were the ideas of Schiller's theosophy when he was in his early twenties. And from this basis he rises to the comprehension of human spiritual life itself, which he places in the context of cosmic forces: “Love, therefore, - the most beautiful phenomenon in the creation of the soul, the almighty magnet in the spiritual world, the source of devotion and the loftiest virtue – love is only the reflection of this one power, an attraction of excellence, based on an instantaneous exchange of personality, a confusion of beings. When I hate, I take something away; when I love, I become richer by what I love. Forgiveness is the recovery of a lost possession—hatred of men is prolonged suicide; selfishness is the greatest poverty of a created being.” From there, Schiller then seeks a God idea that corresponds to his feelings, which he presents in the following sentences: “All perfection in the universe is united in God. God and nature are two forces that are completely equal... It is a truth that, like a fixed axis, runs through all religions and systems - ‘Draw near to God, you who believe’.”

If we compare these statements of the young Schiller with the teachings of the German mystics, we will find that the latter have sharply defined thought contours that appear in his work as the exuberant expression of a more general world of feeling. Paracelsus, Jakob Böhme, Angelus Silesius have as a definite view of their intuitive mind what Schiller has in mind in the vague presentiment of feeling.

What comes to light in such a characteristic way in Schiller is also present in other of his contemporaries. Intellectual history only has to describe it in his case, because in his epoch-making works it has become a driving force for the nation. One can say that in Schiller's time, the spiritual world of facts of German mysticism as intuition, as direct experience of spiritual life, was hidden as if under a veil; but it lived on in the realm of feeling, in intuitive perceptions. People had retained devotion and enthusiasm for that which they no longer directly saw with the “spiritual senses.” We are dealing with an epoch in which spiritual vision was veiled, but in which feeling and intuitive sensing of this world were not.

All this process is now based on a certain lawful necessity. What entered into seclusion as spiritual vision emerged as artistic life in this period of German intellectual life. In occultism, one speaks of successive cycles of involution and evolution. Here we are dealing with such a cycle on a small scale. The art of Germany in the epoch of Schiller and Goethe is nothing more than the evolution of German mysticism in the realm of outer sensuous form. But in the creations of the German poets, the deeper insight recognizes the intuitions of the great mystical age of Germany. The mystical life of the past now takes on an entirely aesthetic, artistic character.

This is clearly expressed in the writing in which Schiller reached the full height of his world view, in his “Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man”. The occult dogmatist will perhaps find nothing in these Letters either but the brilliant speculations of a fine artistic mind. In reality, however, they are dominated by the endeavour to give a guide to a different state of consciousness from the ordinary one. They describe one stage on the way to the “higher self”. The state of consciousness that Schiller describes is indeed far removed from the astral or devachanic life of experience; but it does represent something higher than our everyday life. And if we approach it with an open mind, we can very well recognize in what can be called the 'aesthetic state', according to Schiller, a preliminary stage of those higher forms of intuition. Schiller wants to lead people beyond the standpoint of the 'lower self'. This lower self is characterized by two qualities. Firstly, it is necessarily dependent on the influences of the sensual world. Secondly, it is subject to the demands of logical and moral necessity. It is thus unfree in two directions. The sensual world prevails in its drives, instincts, perceptions, passions and so on. In his thinking and in his morality, the necessity of reason prevails. But only the person who has ennobled his feelings, drives, desires, wishes, and so on, so that only the spiritual is expressed in them, and who, on the other hand, has so completely absorbed the necessity of reason in himself that it is the expression of his own being, is free in Schiller's sense. A life led in this way can be characterized as one in which a harmonious balance has been achieved between the lower and higher selves. Man has ennobled his desire nature to such an extent that it is the embodiment of his “higher self”. Schiller sets this high ideal in these “Letters”, and he finds that in artistic creation and in pure aesthetic devotion to a work of art, there is an approach to this ideal. Thus, for him, life in art becomes a genuine means of educating the human being in the development of his “higher self”. For him, the true work of art is a perfect harmony of spirit and sensuality, of higher life and outer form. The sensual is only a means of expression; but the spiritual only becomes a work of art when it has found its expression entirely in the sensual. Thus the creative artist lives in spirit, but he lives in it in a completely sensual way; through him, everything spiritual becomes perceptible through the senses. And the person who immerses himself aesthetically perceives through his external senses; but what he perceives is completely spiritualized sensuality. So we are dealing with a harmony between spirit and sensuality; the sensual appears ennobled to the spirit, the spiritual comes to revelation to the point of sensual vividness. Schiller would also like to make this “aesthetic state” the model for social coexistence. He regards as unfree a social relationship in which people base their mutual relationships only on the desires of the lower self, of egoism. But a state in which mere legislation of reason is called upon to rein in the lower instincts and passions seems no less unfree to him. As an ideal, he posits a social constitution within which the individual feels the 'higher self' of the whole to be so strong as his own being that he acts 'selflessly' out of his innermost urge. The “individual ego” should come to the point where it becomes the expression of the “total ego”. Schiller perceives social action that is driven by such impulses as the action of “beautiful souls”; and such “beautiful souls”, which bring the spirit of the “higher self” to revelation in their everyday nature, are for Schiller also the truly “free souls”. He wants to lead humanity to “truth” through beauty and art. One of his core sayings is: Only through the dawn of the beautiful does man enter the land of knowledge.

Thus, from Schiller's world view, art is assigned a high educational mission in the evolutionary process of humanity. One could say that what Schiller presents here is the aesthetic-artistic mysticism of the earlier period of German intellectual life.

It might now appear that it is difficult to build a bridge from Schiller's aestheticism to another personality of the same period, but who is no less to be understood as coming from an occult undercurrent, namely Johann Gottlieb Fichte. On superficial examination, Fichte will be seen as a mere speculative thinker, as an intellectual. It is true that his domain is that of thought, and that those who want to seek out spiritual heights that lie above the world of thought will not find them with Fichte. Those who want a description of “higher worlds” will look for them in vain with him. Fichte has no experience of an astral or mental world. According to the content of his philosophy, he is concerned only with ideas that belong to the physical world. But the matter presents itself quite differently when one looks at his treatment of the world of thought. This treatment is by no means a merely speculative one. It is one that corresponds entirely to occult experience. Fichte only considers thoughts that relate to the physical world; but he considers these as an occultist would. Therefore, he himself is quite aware of leading a life in higher worlds. One need only see how he expresses himself in the lectures he gave in Berlin in 1813: “Imagine a world of the blind-born, to whom only those things and their relationships are known that exist through the sense of touch. Stand among them and speak to them of colors and the other qualities that are perceived only through the light of sight. Either you speak to them of nothing, and this is fortunate if they say so; for in this way you will soon notice the error and, if you are unable to open their eyes, you will stop talking to no avail... Or, for some reason, they want to give your teaching reason after all: so they can understand it only in terms of what they know through touch: they will want to feel light and colors and the other relationships of visibility, assume they feel it, contrive something within the feeling and lie to themselves about what they call color. Then they misunderstand, distort, and misinterpret.” At another time, Fichte says directly that for him his contemplation of the world is not merely a speculation about that which the ordinary senses give, but that a higher sense, reaching beyond these, is necessary for it: ”The new sense is is the sense for the spirit; for the one who is only spirit and absolutely nothing else, and to whom even the other, the given being, takes on the form of the spirit and is transformed into it, to whom therefore being in its own form has indeed disappeared... This sense has been seen in this way since the beginning of time, and everything great and excellent in the world, which alone makes humanity endure, comes from the visions of this sense. But that this sense should have seen itself in its difference and contrast to the other ordinary sense was not the case. The impressions of the two senses merged, and life disintegrated into these two halves without a unifying bond.” These last words are extremely characteristic of Fichte's place in the world of spiritual life. For the merely external (exoteric) philosophical striving of the West, it is indeed true that the sense of which Fichte speaks “did not see itself”. In all mystical currents of spiritual life that are based on occult experience and esoteric contemplation, it is clearly expressed; but, as already mentioned, the deeper basis for this was unknown in the prevailing literary and scholarly discussions of Fichte's time. In the terminology of contemporary German philosophy, Fichte was indeed the scout and discoverer of this higher meaning. That is why he started from something quite different than other philosophers. As a teacher he demanded of his students, and as a writer of his readers, that they should first of all perform an inner deed of the soul. He did not want to impart knowledge of anything outside of themselves, but he did make the demand that they perform an inner act. And through this inner act they were to ignite the true light of self-awareness within themselves. Like most philosophers of his time, he started from Kant's philosophy. Therefore, he expressed himself in the form of Kant's terminology, just as Schiller did in his mature years. But in terms of the height of inner, spiritual life, he surpassed Kantian philosophy very far, just as Schiller did. If one attempts to translate Fichte's demands on his listeners and readers from the difficult philosophical language into a more popular form, it might be expressed something like this: Every thing and every fact perceived by man imposes its existence on him. It is there without any action on the part of man, as far as his deepest inner being is concerned. The table, the flower, the dog, a light phenomenon and so on are there through something foreign to man; and it is only for man to determine the existence that has come about without him. For Fichte, the situation is different with the “I” of man. It is only there in so far as it attains being itself through its own activity. Therefore the sentence “I am” means something quite different from any other sentence. Fichte demanded that one should become conscious of this self-creative process as the starting point for any spiritual contemplation of the world. In every other realization, man can only be receptive; in the case of the “I” he must be creative. And he can perceive his “I” only by looking at himself as the creator of this “I. Thus Fichte demands a completely different way of looking at the ‘I’ than at all other things. And he is as strict as possible in this demand. He says, ”Most people would be more easily persuaded to consider themselves a piece of lava in the moon than an I...” He who is not yet at peace with himself on this point does not understand fundamental philosophy, and does not need it. Nature, of which he is a machine, will guide him without any effort of his own in all the business he has to carry out. To philosophize requires independence: and this one can only give oneself. - We should not want to see without the eye; but we should not claim that the eye sees either."

This very sharply delineates the boundary between ordinary experience and the occult. Ordinary perception and experience extend no further than the organs of perception that are objectively built into the human being. The occult begins where man begins to build higher organs of perception for himself through the dormant powers within him. Within ordinary experience, man can only feel himself to be a creature. When he begins to feel himself as the creator of his being, he enters the realm of the so-called occult life. The way Fichte characterizes the “I am” is entirely in line with occultism. Even though he remains in the realm of pure thought, his contemplation is not mere speculation, but true inner experience. But for this very reason it is also all too easy to mistake his world view for mere speculation. Those who are driven by curiosity into the higher worlds will not find what they are looking for by delving into Fichte's philosophy. But for those who want to work on themselves, to discover the abilities slumbering in their souls, Fichte can be a good guide. He will realize that what matters is not the content of his teachings or dogmas, but the power that grows in the soul when one devotedly follows Fichte's thought paths. One might compare this thinker to the prophet who did not enter the promised land himself, but led his people to a summit from which they could see its glories. Fichte leads thinking to the summit from which entry into the land of the occult can be made. And the preparation that one acquires through him is as pure as can be imagined. For it completely transcends the realm of sense perception and the realm of that which originates from the desire and covetousness of man (from his astral body). Through Fichte, one learns to live and move in the very pure element of thought. One retains nothing of the physical world in the soul except what has been implanted from higher regions, namely thoughts. And these form a better bridge to spiritual experiences than the training of other psychic abilities. For thought is the same everywhere, whether it occurs in the physical, astral or mental world. Only its content is different in each of these worlds. And the supersensible worlds remain hidden from man only as long as he cannot completely remove sensual content from his thoughts. When the thought becomes free of sensuality, then only one step remains to be taken, and the supersensible world can be entered.

The contemplation of one's own self in Fichte's sense is so significant because, with regard to this “self”, man remains without all thought content if he does not give himself such from within. For all the rest of the world, for all perception, feeling, will and so on, which make up the content of ordinary existence, the outer world fills the human being. He needs - in Fichte's words - basically to be nothing more than the “machine of nature”, which “manages its business without his intervention”. But the “I” remains empty, no outer world fills it with content if it does not come from within. Therefore, the realization “I am” can never be anything other than man's most intimate inner experience. Thus, there is something speaking in this sentence within the soul that can only speak from within. But the way this seemingly empty affirmation of one's own self occurs is how all higher occult experiences take place. They become richer in content and more vital, but they retain the same form. Through the experience of the I, as presented by Fichte, one can get to know the type of all occult experiences, at least in the purely mental sphere. It is therefore correct to say that with the “I am” God begins to speak in man. And it is only because this happens in a purely mental form that so many people do not want to recognize it.

But now, precisely with the keenest minds, which walked in such ways as Fichte, a limit of knowledge had to occur. Pure thinking is namely only an activity of the personality, not of the individuality, which passes through the various personalities in recurring reincarnations. The laws of even the highest logic never change, even if in the stages of re-embodiments the human individuality ascends to the stage of the highest sage. The spiritual perception increases, the perceptive faculty expands when an individuality that was highly developed in one incarnation is re-embodied, but the logic of thought remains the same even for a higher level of consciousness. Therefore, that which goes beyond the individual incarnation can never be grasped by any experience of thought, no matter how subtle, even if it rises to the highest levels. This is the reason why Fichte's way of looking at things, and also that of his contemporaries who followed in his footsteps, could not bring them to a realization of the laws of reincarnation and karma. Although various indications can be found in the works of the thinkers of this epoch, they arise more from a general feeling and are not necessarily and organically connected with their thought-structures. It may be said that the mission of these personalities in the history of thought was to present pure thought experiences as they can take place within an incarnation, excluding everything that reaches beyond this one embodiment of the human being.

The evolution of the human spirit proceeds in such a way that in certain epochs portions of the original esoteric wisdom are transferred into the consciousness of the people. And at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, it fell to the German national consciousness to shape the spiritual life of pure thought in its relationship to the individual personal existence. If we consider what has already been said in connection with Schiller's personality, that at this time art was to be placed at the center of intellectual life, then we will find the emphasis on the personal point of view all the more understandable. Art is, after all, the living out of the spirit in sensuous, physical forms. But the perception of these forms is conditioned by the organization of the individual personality living within the one incarnation. What projects beyond the personality into the supersensible realm will no longer be able to find expression in art directly. Art does reflect the supersensible, but this reflection is only carried over as the fruit of artistic creation and experience by the abiding essence of the soul from one reincarnation to another. That which enters into existence directly as art and aesthetic experience is bound to the personality. Therefore, in the case of a personality from the characterized epoch, a theosophical world view in the most eminent sense also has a thoroughly personal character. This is the case with Friedrich von Hardenberg, who as a poet bears the name Novalis. He was born in 1772 and died as early as 1801. What lived in this soul, which was entirely permeated by theosophical sentiment, is contained in a few poems and a series of poetic-philosophical fragments. From every page of his creations, this attitude flows towards the reader; but everything is such that the highest spirituality is coupled with an immediate sensual passion, with very personal drives and instincts. A truly Pythagorean way of thinking lives in this young nature, which was further nourished by the fact that Novalis worked his way up to become a mining engineer through a thorough mathematical and scientific education. The way in which the human mind develops the laws of pure mathematics out of itself, without the help of any sensory perception, became for him the model for all supersensible knowledge in general. Just as the world is harmoniously structured according to the mathematical laws that the soul finds within itself, so he thought this could be applied to all the ideas underlying the world. That is why man's relationship to mathematics took on an almost devotional, religious character for him. Sayings like the following reveal the peculiarly Pythagorean nature of his disposition: “True mathematics is the actual element of the magician. ... The highest life is mathematics... The true mathematician is an enthusiast per se. Without enthusiasm, there is no mathematics. The life of the gods is mathematics. All divine messengers must be mathematicians. Pure mathematics is religion. One can only attain to mathematics through a theophany. Mathematicians are the only happy people. The mathematician knows everything. He could do it even if he didn't know it... In the East, true mathematics is at home. In Europe, it has degenerated into mere technique. He who does not grasp a mathematical book with reverence and read it as the word of God does not understand it... Miracles as unnatural facts are amathematical – but there is no miracle in this sense, and what is called a miracle is precisely understandable through mathematics, because there is nothing miraculous about mathematics."

In such sayings, Novalis has in mind not merely a glorification of the science of numbers and spatial magnitudes, but the idea that all inner soul experiences should relate to the cosmos as the pure, sensuality-free, mathematical construction of the mind relates to the outer, numerically and spatially ordered harmony of the world. This is beautifully expressed when he says: “Humanity is, as it were, the higher meaning of our planet, the eye that it raises to heaven, the nerve that connects this limb to the upper world.” The identity of the human ego with the essence of the objective world is the leitmotif in all of Novalis's work. Among his “fragments” is the saying: “Among people, one must seek God. In human affairs, in human thoughts and feelings, the spirit of heaven reveals itself most brightly.” And he expresses the unity of the ‘higher self’ in all of humanity in the following way: ”In the I, in the point of freedom, we are all in fact completely identical - only from there does each individual separate. I is the absolute total place, the central point.” In Novalis, the position that the consciousness of the time assigned to art and artistic feeling is particularly evident. For him, art is something through which man grows beyond his narrowly defined “lower self” and through which he relates to the creative forces of the world. In the creative artistic imagination, he sees a reflection of the magical forces of action. Thus he can say: “The artist stands on man as the statue stands on the pedestal.” “Nature will be moral when, out of true love for art, it surrenders to art and does what art wills; art, when, out of true love for nature, it lives for nature and works for nature. Both must do it at the same time, of their own choosing, for their own sake, and of the other's choosing, for the sake of the other... When our intelligence and our world are in harmony, we are equal to God.” Novalis's lyric poems, especially his ‘Hymns to the Night,’ are imbued with such sentiments, as are his unfinished novel ‘Heinrich von Ofterdingen’ and the little work ‘The Apprentices at Sais,’ which is rooted entirely in mystical thinking and feeling.

These few personalities show how German poetry and thought in that period was based on a theosophical-mystical undercurrent. The examples could be multiplied by numerous others. Therefore, it is not even possible to attempt to give a complete picture here, but only to characterize the basic note of this spiritual epoch with a few lines.

It will not be difficult to see, however, that individual mystical and theosophical natures with a spiritual-intuitive mind found the theosophical basic ideas themselves in part in their own way from this whole life. Thus, theosophy shines out beautifully for us from the creations of some personalities of this epoch. Many could be cited where this is the case. Lorenz Oken could be mentioned, who founded a natural philosophy that, on the one hand, points back to Paracelsus and Jakob Böhme through its mystical spirit, and, on the other hand, is a forerunner of the justified parts of Darwinism through ingenious conceptions about evolution and the connection between living beings. Steffens could be cited, who sought in the processes of the development of the earth reflections of a cosmic spiritual life. One could refer to Eckartshausen (1752-1803), who sought to explain the abnormal phenomena of nature and soul life in a theosophical-mystical way. Ennemoser (1787-1854) with his “History of Magic”, Gotthilf Heinrich Schubert with his works on dream phenomena and the hidden facts in nature and the spirited explanations of Justinus Kerner, and Karl Gustav Carus are also rooted in the same school of thought. Schelling went from pure Fichteanism more and more to theosophy, and then in his “Philosophy of Mythology” and “Philosophy of Revelation,” which were not published until after his death, traced the developmental history of the human spirit and the connection between religions to their starting point in the mysteries. Hegel's philosophy should also be viewed in theosophical light, and then one would see how wrong it is in the history of philosophy to consider this profound spiritual experience of the soul to be mere speculation. All this requires, if it is to be treated exhaustively, a detailed work. Here, however, only a little-known personality is to be mentioned, who, in the focus of his mind, combined the rays of theosophical world-view and created a structure of ideas that in many respects completely coincides with the thoughts of theosophy that are being revived today. It is J. P. V. Troxler, who lived from 1780 to 1866 and whose works include, in particular, “Glimpses into the Essence of Man”, published in 1812. Troxler objects to the usual division of human nature into soul and body, which he finds misleading because it does not exhaust nature. He initially distinguishes between four elements of human nature: spirit, higher soul, soul (which he considers the lower soul) and body. One need only see this classification in the right light to recognize how close it is to the one commonly found in theosophical books today. The body as he understands it coincides completely with what is now called the physical body. The lower soul, or what he, in contrast to the body, calls the body, is nothing other than the so-called astral body. This is not something that has been inserted into his world of thought, but he himself says that what is subjectively the lower soul should be characterized objectively by resorting to the term astral body used by the ancient researchers. “There is therefore,” he explains, ”necessarily something in man which the sages of ancient times sensed and proclaimed as a σῶμα αστροειδες (Soma astroeides) and οὐρανόν σῶμα (Uranion soma), or as a σχῆμα πνευματικόν (schema pneumatikon), and what is the substrate of the middle sphere of life, the bond of the immortal and the mortal life?” Among the poets and philosophers who were Troxler's contemporaries, theosophy was alive as an undercurrent; but Troxler himself became keenly aware of this theosophy in the intellectual world around him and developed it in an original way. Thus, he comes to many of the ancient wisdom teachings through his own efforts. It is all the more appealing to delve into his thought processes, since he does not directly build on old traditions, but rather creates something like an original theosophy out of the thinking and attitudes of his time.

Of all the different points of view on the world, which were represented at the Fourth International Congress of Philosophy, many of our contemporaries consider the theosophical one to be the least scientific. One cannot be surprised at this fact. For much that at one point in time was considered fantastic and unfounded was in a later epoch a recognized, often even an obvious truth. Although theosophy is used as a term for schools of thought that have often appeared in the development of culture, as it was characterized in a short lecture at this congress, it represents an absolutely new school of thought. It aims to open the gates to a supersensible world. And it aims to find this world not through mere speculative thinking, but through real perception, which is as accessible to the human soul as the perception of the physical senses. It is usually thought that such spiritual perception only occurs in states of vision, of ecstasy in the soul, and that it is not subject to scientific control in those who are endowed with it. That is why it is not considered to have any value other than as a personal experience of individual human beings. Modern theosophy has nothing in common with this kind of spiritual experience. It shows that in the human soul there are dormant powers of knowledge that do not come to light in ordinary life or in external science. These powers can be awakened through meditation and through a vigorous concentration of the inner life of feeling and will. In order to achieve this, the soul must be able to shut itself off from all external impressions and also from everything that the memory retains of such external impressions. Meditation is the soul's intense devotion to ideas, sensations and feelings, in such a way that one does not develop any awareness of what these ideas or feelings mean for the physical world, but in such a way that they prove to be forces within the soul's life, which, as it were, radiate through the soul and thus draw out powers from its depths, of which the human being is not aware in ordinary life. The effect of this inner contemplation is such that through it the human being becomes aware of a spiritual reality of his own being, of which he is otherwise unaware. Before he engages in such exercises, he recognizes himself as an entity that knows something about itself and the world through bodily organs. After such exercises, he knows that he can unfold a life within himself, even without his bodily organs imparting such a life to him. He knows that he can separate himself spiritually from his physical body and that through this separation he does not have to sink into a state of unconsciousness. And he acquires such knowledge not only about himself, but also about a supersensible world, which for ordinary knowledge is hidden behind the physical-sensible world and in which lie the true causes of this latter world.

In this way man also learns to recognize that he, as a soul-spiritual being, is descended from soul-spiritual beings just as he, as a physical being, is descended from his physical ancestors. He must only feel that the soul-spiritual being from which he descends is himself, while he distinguishes his physical ancestors from himself. This opens up the prospect of repeated earthly lives. Through actual observation, he comes to understand that human life truly consists of the life of the soul in the physical body between birth and death, and that this is followed by a spiritual existence, which is usually considerably longer than the physical one. After this spiritual existence, a physical embodiment must follow again, and so on until the cycle of physical embodiments is fulfilled with the goal of the earth itself.

This idea of repeated lives on earth (reincarnation) must necessarily appear to most of our contemporaries as paradoxical, even grotesque. But it will be the same with it as with the idea of Francesco Redi, who, a few centuries ago, first proposed the idea, against the resistance of his contemporaries, that a germ of life cannot arise from the combination of inanimate substances, but only as the descendant of a similar living being. What seemed to be a fantastic idea of Francesco Redi's to people only a few centuries ago is now a generally accepted truth.

This is just one of the many results of modern theosophy. Most of the misunderstandings that arise in regard to it arise from the fact that people think it wants to be a renewal of Buddhism. It is not in the form it has taken in the West. For if there had never been a Buddhism, the characterized development would have to lead higher cognitive powers in the soul to the discovery of the theosophical truths.

In its modern form, Western Theosophy does not want to be or found a religion, but an extension of science into the supersensible realm. In doing so, it does not become a religion itself, but an instrument for deepening our understanding of religious life. It approaches Christianity as such an instrument; and it shows that in Christianity there are depths of life that can only be found by approaching it with a science of the supersensible. It shows how the foundation of Christianity can only be understood as an act that originates in a supersensible world and which has cast its rays into the physical historical development of humanity. It is precisely through the realization that man achieves his full life on earth in repeated embodiments that the superhuman, divine nature of Christ comes to the fore. The Christ Being was present in a physical body only once for true supersensible observation. And since the event at Golgotha, it has been connected with the development of humanity on earth. The highest peak of supersensible observation is that in the spiritual world, Christ is recognized as the directing force. The more the soul develops supersensible powers of recognition, the closer it comes to the Christ presence. Theosophy in no way disturbs the religious faith of the Christian, but rather strengthens it by elevating it to a supersensible-scientific truth. If for ordinary science the nature of Christianity can be doubted by many people, it becomes an unshakable truth for scientific spiritual observation. Through the instrument of Theosophy, the truths contained in the Gospels can only be seen in the right light.

For those who have followed the theosophical school of thought since it was founded in 1875 by the Theosophical Society, it may seem strange that Christianity is being discussed here from a theosophical point of view. This is because it is thought that the main teachings of Theosophy agree with oriental religious systems, especially with Brahmanism or Buddhism. And it is also true that at present many representatives of Theosophy still present it in a way that justifies such an opinion. But it must be said that the first founders of Theosophy did not understand the essence of Christianity, and that many important representatives of Theosophy still do not understand it at present. Theosophy itself must first reach a certain level to recognize that Christianity not only represents progress compared to all previous religious systems, but that it actually unites the true aspects of all other religions within itself, if it is properly understood.

Theosophy cannot be a religion as such; but it is a path to the full understanding of religion, just as it is a path to the true understanding of nature and the mind. Because this is misunderstood, opponents of Theosophy are currently still emerging, both from the religiously minded and from those opposed to religion. The former think that they might lose their religion through Theosophy. On properly immersing themselves in Theosophy, they will recognize that true religiosity is lost no more through Theosophy than the splendor of natural phenomena is lost through scientific observation.

The others believe that 'Theosophy must lead back to blind faith. They can convince themselves, through a real acquaintance with Theosophy, that the course of human history is not a succession of errors, but a development of truth. They will come to the realization that true science does not comprehend the most beautiful blossoms of human spiritual life – precisely the religious ones – by revealing the same as illusions, but by bringing their truth to light.

Anyone who observes the development of the soul in our time must find that there is a thirst for knowledge of the supersensible world. The ordinary sciences show a wonderful progress. They have completely transformed our culture in a relatively short time. They have provided solutions to questions for our outer life and will provide many more in the future. For the life of the soul, they have not provided any solutions, but instead, they continually raise new questions. No answer to such questions is given by traditional religious concepts. One cannot object that these answers are available, but that many of our contemporaries no longer feel them to be answers. The fact that they are no longer felt as such is the essential point that presents modern humanity with new tasks for the inner life. If humanity grasps these tasks through the science of the supersensible, harmony can be created between the longings of souls that arise from modern life. If this understanding does not come about, then the new questions would remain unsolved, leaving the souls burning with thirst. But questions that souls must ask themselves without being able to find answers mean soul-emptiness, soul-unhappiness; finding the answers to such questions means soul-peace, soul-strength, soul-happiness. And modern humanity needs this if its magnificent outer culture is not to remain without soul itself.

At the Section for the Philosophy of Religions, Dr. Rudolf Steiner of Germany spoke about the psychological foundations of Theosophy and their scientific justification. The speaker pointed out that he had to represent a subject that is not yet considered scientific in the broadest circles. This is quite understandable, however. For the school of thought in question has a completely different kind of knowledge in mind than the other current philosophical trends. These ask, what is the human soul like, and what can it know by virtue of the fact that it is constituted in a certain way? Theosophy, as expounded by the speaker, maintains that the soul can rise above its so-called normal state and thereby extend its powers of knowledge from the realm of the sensual and intellectual to that of the supersensible. However, by such a different state of the soul is not meant that which is referred to in ordinary psychology as the “subconscious” or “unconscious”, nor that of a vision, ecstasy or the like, but a state that can be achieved under the strictest self-control of the soul. To achieve this state, the soul must subject itself to strict and intimate exercises. It must imbue itself with ideas, thoughts and feelings that do not bear the usual character of images of an external reality, but rather have a more symbolic character. The soul must now exclude from its life all sensual, memory-based and intellectual impressions and contents, and through constant repetition become completely one with the characterized symbolic representations. The result is a very specific experience in which the soul perceives itself as an inner reality that rests within itself independently of the bodily organization. Through this experience, the human being knows that they can truly live independently of their body as a soul. The exercises must proceed from this point. The human being must remove the symbolic images from his soul life and direct the inner sense only to the activity through which he has experienced the symbols within himself. Through this practice, a condensation of the soul independent of the body is achieved; and into this inner life the content of a spiritual world now flows in the same way as sensual content flows into sensual perception when eyes and ears are directed towards the physical outer world. This opens up new levels of cognition; the first, in which the symbolic representations transform the soul life, can be called imaginative cognition, and the second, which only arises when the symbols have been removed from consciousness, can be called cognition through inspiration. The speaker then points out how the theory of science at present cannot agree with a development of the soul as described, because it transfers the “I” of the human being into the bodily inner world from the outset. But a future theory of knowledge will recognize that the I in truth already lies in the spiritual outer world and only reflects the ordinary I as its image in the bodily organization. Such a theory of knowledge will be able to fully reconcile itself with theosophy.

The speaker's brief remarks were followed by a lively debate. The well-known Platonist Dr. W. Lutoslawski asked the speaker a series of questions. These led to the further discussion that the soul exercises of modern man are not based, as those in ancient times were, on physical isolation from one's surroundings, on an extremely ascetic life and the like, but that they place the main emphasis on the development of those spiritual-mental powers which, within man, bring about his isolation of consciousness. In response to another question from Lutoslawski, the speaker remarks that the methods of soul training, as appropriate for the human being in modern cultures, have been developed by leading spiritual figures since the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

Another speaker, Dr. Stark, asks whether an objective criterion can be given for what a person, after the appropriate preparation, finds to be facts of the spiritual world. The speaker replies that research and experience in the supersensible worlds require a soul that has been prepared as described. If, however, the facts of these worlds are presented in a logical form, then the truly unbiased logic of ordinary consciousness can decide on them and recognize them as correct. In response to a question from the same speaker, Dr. Steiner adds that the epoch seems to be beginning in which the theosophy described above will flow into spiritual cultural life and develop into a recognized common good of human science.

Since the form of “spiritual science” to which the author of these pages professes has attracted some attention among contemporaries, especially since the idea of building a place for the cultivation of this science, a “University for Spiritual Science” (in Dornach in the canton of Solothurn), was conceived, attacks from its opponents have been coming from all sides. They try to attribute the insights of spiritual research to the musings and fantasies of its representatives, to its spread across a whole range of civilized countries to the blind faith of its adherents and to many other things that they endeavor to present in unflattering terms. The adherents of various religious denominations find something in spiritual science that they feel they have to fight against. They paint all kinds of dangers that supposedly threaten religious sentiment.

Those who really want to penetrate to the true meaning of spiritual research will find it easy to see the unfounded nature of the opponents' attacks. In almost every case, the fabric of objectively incorrect assertions on which these attacks are based could easily be uncovered. And in those cases where such attacks do speak of the findings of spiritual research, they are mostly based on the most inadequate and misleading conception of these findings. Distorted images of these findings are given, which the opponents themselves first work out; and it is easy to find a “refutation” of these.

The writer of these remarks does not intend to deal with this or that individual attack in the same way; on the other hand, he would like to say something in general about the meaning and significance of spiritual science in the face of the prejudices that are held against it.

First of all, it may be noted that such “attacks” can be particularly surprising when they are made on spiritual research by representatives of religious denominations. One needs only a little insight into this research to recognize that it does not want to oppose any religious confession on its own initiative. For it does not consider itself as a new religious confession; it is as far away as possible from any kind of founding of a religion or formation of a sect. It wants to be the genuine, true continuation of the scientific way of thinking, as this has become incorporated into the spiritual life of humanity at the dawn of modern culture through Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Giordano Bruno and others. Out of the same attitude of mind with which Galileo, Bruno and others regarded the realm of nature, spiritual science seeks to regard the realm of the spirit. And just as little as Copernicus's doctrine that the earth moves did any harm to true religiousness, so little can the law, correctly understood in terms of spiritual science, that the human soul undergoes repeated earthly lives, endanger true religiousness. After Copernicus' appearance, it was believed that his teaching was detrimental to religion; but one can think differently about this belief than a learned priest who, elected rector of a large university, gave a speech about Galileo spoke such convincing words that the contemporaries of Copernicus turned against him out of a misplaced religiousness, whereas in our time the truly religious person should recognize how every new insight into the workings of the world must add a new piece to the revelation of divine world governance. World history has progressed beyond the attitude that wanted to reject Copernicus, and those who grasp spiritual science in its true sense must admit that the opposition that arises against this science in our time will be overcome much more quickly. For even where this antagonism arises from good faith, it is inspired by no different attitude than that which was directed against the Copernican world view. One is tempted to ask why the supporters of such an attitude do not make use of the teachings that can be drawn from the fact that so many have not grown tired of saying that Copernicus's theory contradicts the Bible? If they did so, they could no more accuse spiritual science of being an opponent of the Bible than they certainly no longer do so with the theory of the earth's movement.

Spiritual science is the true successor of natural science research in that it strives to recognize the realm of the spirit with the means that are suitable for this realm. As a continuation of natural science, it cannot itself be mere natural science. For the methods that have brought this science such tremendous triumphs were able to do so precisely because they were highly adapted to the study of nature and because this research was not compromised by others that were not suitable for the natural field. In order to accomplish something similar in the realm of the spirit as natural science has accomplished in the realm of nature, spiritual science must develop other cognitive abilities than those applicable in natural science. In doing so, it must, of course, assert a point of view that, understandably, can meet with many doubts in the present day. Just look impartially at what is said about these “other cognitive abilities”. They are abilities that lie entirely within the developmental line of the ordinary human soul powers. How must spiritual science understand its difference from natural science? The study of nature can only be cultivated with the powers of cognition that man acquires in the natural course of his life and that are supported for the purpose of this research by regulated observation and scientific experimental tools. In order to penetrate into the spiritual world, man must develop it further through spiritual and soul exercises beyond the point to which it develops by itself, so to speak, without such exercises. In this way, something similar happens to the human being at a different level to what happens to the child, which develops the abilities of its later years from those of its early years. Just as the child learns to use its soul abilities in such a way that the body becomes a good tool for experiencing the world of the senses, so the human being can develop his powers of cognition further so that he can perceive and experience in a state free of the body – purely as a soul. This happens when the soul intensifies to an unlimited degree certain activities which it already employs to a small extent in ordinary life, and thus brings about a state in which it draws out of the body, as it were, everything that is soul and spiritual in it. She can then experience her body as being outside of her, but for short, limited periods of time. She can know herself to be transported into a world in which she lives with spiritual beings and spiritual processes, just as she is surrounded by sensual processes and beings in the sensual world. The kind of spiritual-mental exercises by which this is achieved is described in my books: “How to Know Higher Worlds?” and “Occult Science”. What the soul experiences as a change in itself through such exercises is described in my book: “The Threshold of the Spiritual World”. Anyone who does not want to engage with the description of such actual processes as described in these books will be able to deny the possibility of a soul life free of the physical body, just as someone could say: I do not believe that hydrogen, as something quite different from water, can be developed out of water. He can say this if he does not want to concern himself with the fact that water is broken down into hydrogen and oxygen by means of chemistry. But man can — through a kind of spiritual chemistry — break himself down into physical corporeality and into soul-spirituality. The mode of thinking in spiritual science is the same as that in natural science; only this mode of thinking must be further developed in order to go beyond nature. But the following must always be emphasized: to investigate the beings and processes in the spiritual world, the development of the characterized soul powers is necessary; but to understand and grasp what the spiritual researcher finds through these soul powers, all that is needed is an unbiased, unprejudiced consideration of the results of spiritual research with the ordinary soul abilities. And it may be said that the reason why so many people reject these results is not because they do not prove convincing to the ordinary understanding, but solely because these people allow their understanding to be clouded by prejudice and bias. Indeed, it takes a certain impartiality to admit: Man, as he is in ordinary life, is not yet so perfect; he can still develop slumbering soul powers within him, indeed, these powers must even be developed if the spiritual world is to reveal itself. But spiritual science shows that only the sensual world, subject to death, is perceptible to the senses and the ordinary powers of the soul, and that another world, not subject to death, can only reveal itself to the soul forces that have first been opened up to it.

Anyone who gains insight into these things can only feel the deepest satisfaction that in our time, in almost all civilized countries, people are showing an interest in spiritual science. For this interest, this spread of spiritual science, is a testimony to a healthy sense of truth, to the will to grasp life impartially. Those who do not want to gain this insight will be able to claim of the adherents of spiritual science that they are following their representatives out of blind faith. The truth of the matter is that the true adherents of spiritual science are such precisely because they can rise above blind faith. The opponents of spiritual research are fond of suspecting blind faith in those who adhere to anything but the often quite “blind faith” of these opponents themselves.

A much-loved and yet misleading way of speaking disparagingly about spiritual science is to give a distorted picture of the “composition of the human being” in the sense of this science, and then criticize this distorted picture. Anyone who takes the trouble to recognize from my Theosophy the way in which spiritual science arrives at this “composition” can find that the striving to recognize the nature of man, as it was an ideal of all worldviews, is to be brought into a form that meets the demands of contemporary science. What is fundamentally new about this “composition” is only what is gained through the spiritual abilities characterized above. The rest can be found in the works of a great number of insightful students of the soul. If the number seven is found to be a revealing number for the human constitutional elements, then it should also be found to be revealing that the light in the seven colors of the rainbow, the sound in a seven-part scale (where the octave is again the fundamental) must be conceived as coming to manifestation. For in the same sense, only on a higher level, the human being reveals himself in seven members, of which three, bound to the body, perish, three - as spiritual - are immortal, and one in the middle forms the connecting link between the mortal and the immortal part of the human being. There will come a time when it will be no more of a “superstition” to recognize that man has these “seven” members than it is considered “superstition” today that the rainbow consists of “seven” colors. Those who simply say that the Theosophists are not satisfied with body, soul and spirit, they want to have found out that man is composed of “seven” members, are misleading, because by withholding the true reasons for this “seven-number” from their listeners and readers by withholding the true reasons for this “number seven”, he gives rise to the idea that the seven limbs have been arbitrarily assumed, whereas they arise as a result of careful spiritual research.

And how often is it claimed that the law of “repeated lives on earth” is based on “mere belief”. In truth, it is based on the most careful and profound spiritual-scientific investigations. Through these, one finds that in the life of man between birth and death, a “soul core” is revealed in development, which is just as much the basis of a new human life as the plant germ developing in the plant is the basis of a new plant life, which is thus already found in the predecessor plant. Since the plant germ is of a physical nature, it can be found by means of the senses; since the 'soul core' is of a spiritual-soul nature, it can only be observed by the soul, which places itself in a body-free state in the sense described above. And so, in man, the immortal soul-core is found in a strictly scientific way; it is not merely imagined to be analogous to plant life. It reveals itself to spiritual observation as that which already exists in the present life between birth and death, but which contains the forces to lead the soul beyond death into a purely spiritual life between death and a new birth, and after the course of this life to guide it back to a new life on earth. That something similar to this is found at a higher level for human beings – only with the difference that it is spiritual-soul – as at a lower level for plant life, testifies that spiritual science is the true successor of natural science. The plant germ, as a physical being, can perish without bringing forth a new plant-being; the soul-germ proves to be imperishable; there is nothing that can prevent its continuing the life of the soul. And just as the “repeated earth-lives” are the result of research and not “mere belief”, so it is also the case with the law of the connection of these earth-lives. A following earth-existence shows itself to spiritual research in relation to the abilities, the character and also the fate of man as an effect of the earth-lives spent earlier.

It is really not necessary to exert one's intellect particularly in order to find apparent refutations of the statements made by the spiritual researcher regarding special connections between the individual earthly lives of human beings. Indeed, it is not particularly difficult to ridicule many things in this field, since they belong to the “hidden depths of existence” and can easily appear strange to the field of ordinary thinking. If, for example, the spiritual researcher says that it may happen that a person was an idiot in one life on earth, but that it is precisely through his experiences as an idiot, which he looks back on after death, that he acquires the strength for a subsequent life on earth to become a philanthropic genius, then people of a certain disposition will naturally laugh and sneer at such a remark; but anyone who, through insight into true spiritual-scientific research and the mood of the researcher that is necessarily associated with it, gains an idea of the deep seriousness that must underlie such a statement, of the spiritual work through which such a statement is wrung from the soul, will no longer laugh and scoff. But he will also deepen his soul's contemplation of the depth, glory and inner dignity of all human and world existence.

Furthermore, how easy it is to say: yes, what becomes of human freedom if a person's actions are determined by his previous lives on earth? For if man acts according to a law of fate, then he does not act freely. The logic that is revealed in such an objection is somewhat flimsy. When I put my foot forward, I act according to the laws of life of my leg. Can anyone believe that freedom is endangered by this? Will someone say: yes, if I walk in accordance with the laws of life of the leg, then I am not free while walking? Nor should anyone be tempted to make the logical error of saying: if man acts in accordance with the law of fate, then one cannot speak of freedom. One can find that a truly thorough and serious logic is in harmony with the results of spiritual research everywhere; however, this cannot be said of a defective logic, which all too often considers itself infallible. One cannot demand or expect this of such a logic.

If there is at least an apparent reason for the adherents of various religions fearing a danger to religious life from the advances in the scientific way of thinking, then this should no longer apply to spiritual science itself after a little sober reflection.

What spiritual science has to say about the Christ-being is particularly offensive to many people. And yet this is also based only on a misunderstanding. If someone says, for example, that spiritual science claims that Jesus did not mature into the Christ from an early age under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but that during the first thirty years of his life he only prepared the physical shell in which the Christ took up residence at his baptism by John, then he is distorting the results of spiritual science on this point. Spiritual research investigates what actually happened through John's baptism, which, according to the Bible, undoubtedly has to be regarded as an important event in Jesus' life. (There are translators of the Gospel who render the important passage in Luke as: “This is my beloved Son; today I have begotten him.”) And this research finds that the Christ-spirit, which had guided Jesus of Nazareth as if from without until his thirtieth year, then, in that year, entered into the innermost part of his being. Future biblical research will surely recognize that on this point, too, the Gospel is proved not by the opponents of spiritual science, but by this one. Why do Christians attack the Christ teaching of spiritual science at all? It contains nothing, absolutely nothing that denies what Christianity has said about Christ up to now. It only broadens and elevates the concept of Christ. One would think that anyone who honestly has Christ at the bottom of his heart would rejoice at this. When spiritual science scientifically recognizes the event of Golgotha in its worldwide significance, nothing is taken away from the recognition that any Christian can claim for it. Where does one end up when one finds it unacceptable that someone believes something else about the Christ than one is willing to believe oneself? One ends up saying: I not only demand of you that you believe what I believe; but I disapprove of you wanting to know something that I do not want to know and do not want to believe.

These remarks were intended to give only a few points of view that may serve to point out some of the incorrect judgments about spiritual science. If one wanted to discuss each individual thing that is said about it here or there, one would have to write more than a few pages. But one would certainly not silence the false judgments that have been circulated, for example, in the wake of the construction of the Dornach “School of Spiritual Science”. This building will serve the Anthroposophical Society, which is dedicated solely to the cultivation of the spiritual science characterized here. This society did indeed emerge from the so-called “Theosophical Society”, but now has nothing whatsoever to do with it. For a number of years, the members of this Anthroposophical Society have been organizing spiritual and artistic presentations in Munich every summer. Members from all Western European countries gathered for these events. The growing number of participating members became so large that the construction of a separate building had to be considered. Western Switzerland is certainly the best location for such a building; in this area, the building is at the center of the part of Europe where most members of the Anthroposophical Society reside. And this location of the building enables them to visit the magnificent natural beauty spots of Switzerland after the events. It is in the nature of this science and its significance for the spiritual life of the present time that in the future the events will extend over longer periods of the year and thus a “School of Spiritual Science” will naturally arise. Anyone who has even a slight acquaintance with the spirit and work of the Anthroposophical Society need have no fear — as was feared in the wake of the Dornach building project — that this Society will engage in disruptive propaganda in the vicinity of the building site or anywhere else. However, anyone who objects that books on spiritual science are being published, that lectures are being given, and asks: Is that not propaganda?, needs no reply. For he might also object: You do talk about spiritual science, so you are doing propaganda. But it must be said that the entire way in which the Anthroposophical Society works is not based on propaganda, but rather on the fact that truth-seeking souls, out of the fullest inner freedom and only on the basis of their own judgment, find a place where truth is sought about the spiritual worlds.

Postscript

The immediate cause for these remarks was the publication in the appendix to the “Tagblatt für das Birseck, Birsig- und Leimental” of a lecture: “What do the Theosophists want?”, Which Pastor E. Riggenbach gave at the family evening of the Reformed Church in Arlesheim on February 14, 1914. The editorial staff of the above-named newspaper was kind enough to print a detailed response of mine in its columns, at the end of which I said that “I fully appreciate Pastor Riggenbach's calm, objective, and heartfelt discussion and am grateful to him for it.” In response to my response, the paper printed the following lines from Pastor Riggenbach:

A final word on the question: “What do the Theosophists want?” Dr. Steiner has provided a detailed response to my presentation at the Reformed Church's family evening, and it does not seem right to me to simply ignore it. Therefore, it is not my intention to continue the theoretical discussion, because despite all the common ground, the starting points are too different for us to reach an understanding, let alone unite. The readers have now had the opportunity to see the teachings of the theosophists in both lights, and we will leave it to them to decide for themselves on one or the other evaluation. I have no intention of continuing the discussion for the time being, and I will keep to myself what I might have to say in objection to Dr. Steiner's corrections and refutations. But I do feel the need to thank Dr. Steiner sincerely for his appreciation of my efforts to do justice to his cause. He has understood me correctly when he has read from my whole presentation that I can reject a doctrine as false and misleading without wanting to discredit the representatives of that doctrine in any way. Rather, I hope that we will continue to live in good understanding with the members of the Society who have now become our guests.

Arlesheim, March 2, 1914
E. Riggenbach, Pastor

This loyal comment by Pastor Riggenbach causes me to deviate from my original intention of publishing my reply as a printed document, as it appeared in the “Tagblatt für das Birseck, Birsigund Leimental”. I have written the arguments of this reply quite separately from their relation to Pastor Riggenbach and the necessary statements, and have expanded them with some additional remarks. When dealing with an opponent who presents his point of view in such a distinguished manner as Pastor Riggenbach does, I am reluctant to print what I have said a second time with reference to him.

What is the purpose of spiritual science?

A reply to “What do Theosophists want?”

The supplement of the “Tagblatt für das Birseck, Birsig- und Leimental” contains the reprint of a lecture: “What do the Theosophists want?”, which was held by Pastor E. Riggenbach at the family evening of the Reformed Church in Arlesheim on February 14. Since this lecture also aims to deal with the “spiritual science” that I represent, the honorable editorial team will grant me the request to be allowed to say the following about the speaker's remarks. I will only take into consideration what is said in relation to this “spiritual science”. For even in the time when I was a member of the so-called “Theosophical Society”, I never advocated anything other than this spiritual science; and I believe that if we look more closely at the world view I have expressed, even Pastor Rig genbach would not insist on his misleading statement: “that the whole system of thought with which Dr. Steiner appears is essentially the same as that invented by Ladies Blavatsky and Besant”.

First of all, the efforts of Pastor Riggenbach to do justice to the cause of “spiritual science” from his point of view should be unreservedly acknowledged. The noble tone of the arguments, the warm-hearted search for truth and the noble loyalty to conviction of the Reverend are most sympathetic; and I would ask him to accept what I have to say quite objectively and without expecting the slightest personal barb from me.

Every “attack” made by a representative of a religious community against “spiritual science” amazes me, to a certain extent, because I hardly ever miss an opportunity to emphasize again and again that this spiritual science does not want to oppose any kind of religious confession, since it does not see itself as a new religious confession, but as the genuine successor of the scientific mode of thinking, as this has been incorporated into the spiritual life of humanity at the dawn of modern culture by Copernicus, Kepler, Galilei and Giordano Bruno. From the same attitude of mind with which Galileo and Bruno regarded the realm of nature, spiritual science wants to observe the realm of the spirit. And just as little as Copernicus's teaching that the earth moves around the sun has detracted from true religiosity, so too can the law of “repeated earthly lives”, understood correctly in terms of spiritual science, do no harm to genuine religiosity. After the appearance of Copernicus, people believed that his teaching was detrimental to religion, just as Pastor Riggenbach currently believes this about spiritual science. World history has progressed beyond this belief, which felt compelled to reject Copernicus; and those who understand spiritual science in its true sense must admit that the opposition that this science is currently facing will be overcome much more quickly than that which was directed against Copernicus. Again and again I am reminded of the beautiful words spoken by a priest who, as a professor of theology, took up the post of rector of a university a little over ten years ago: He said that our contemporaries have turned against Copernicus out of a misguided religiosity; at present, the truly religious person will recognize that every new insight into the workings of the world adds a new piece to the revelation of the glory of divine world governance. Why not make use of the experiences of those who have not grown tired of emphasizing that the teaching of Copernicus contradicts the Bible? If Pastor Riggenbach did this, he would express some of his words differently, for example, by stating that spiritual science contradicts the Gospel.

When spiritual science speaks of “higher cognitive abilities,” it does so, however, from a point of view that is still doubted from many sides in the present day. But just take what is said about these abilities without prejudice! They are abilities that lie entirely within the developmental line of ordinary human soul forces. When a person voluntarily develops their thinking, feeling and willing from the point to which these have developed without their intervention, something similar happens as in the case of a child, which transitions from the abilities of its first years into those of its later years. Just as the child learns to use the faculties of his soul in such a way that his body becomes a good tool for him to experience the world of the senses, so can the human being develop his powers of knowledge further, so that he finds himself in a state of soul free of the body. In this state he then experiences the processes of a spiritual world and knows that he is surrounded by spiritual beings, just as he knows that he is surrounded by beings of sense in the world of the senses. That this is possible can be seen by anyone who opens himself to what is set forth in my book, “How to Know Higher Worlds.” He who does not want to open himself to it can deny the possibility of a soul-life free from the body, just as someone could say, “I do not believe in the existence of hydrogen,” when he is not interested in the fact that water consists of hydrogen and oxygen. Just as the chemist demonstrates hydrogen apart from water, so the spiritual researcher demonstrates the insights of the soul freed from the body. The mode of presentation of spiritual science is the same as that of natural science; only this mode of presentation is applied to the spiritual realm.

No one who takes into account what has just been said and considers it in the context of how spiritual science is disseminated by me, for example, can have the slightest doubt that Pastor Riggenbach is making a misleading when he says: “In this, too, the way of the Theosophists directly contradicts that of Jesus, in that they form a narrow, closed circle of initiates and carefully withhold their best for them. Jesus never wanted anything to do with such secrecy.” Who can uphold this claim, considering that in my writing ‘How to Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds’ it is said for everyone who opens up access to the knowledge of spiritual science? Who can raise the accusation of secretiveness when one considers that I say everything that can be understood from the present-day spirit of the age in numerous public lectures that are accessible to everyone? When spiritual science is practiced by certain circles in a way that goes beyond this, the reason for the seclusion of such circles is that one can only arrive at certain parts of spiritual science if one has previously acquired others. But this is no different in this science than in any other; and anyone who accuses spiritual science of secrecy should also do so with regard to university science, which does exactly the same in this respect; namely, only to talk about certain things to those who have acquired an understanding of them. In no other sense is spiritual science secretive like any other science.

I know that no one who has properly studied the insights of spiritual science will discuss the comments I have made on the Lord's Prayer, on the passage in the Gospel of John “He who eats my bread he tramples me underfoot” or about the words of St. Paul: ‘The whole of nature groans in labor pains, awaiting adoption as children’ in the way that Pastor Riggenbach has done. Anyone who wants to understand what I have said in relation to these things cannot, as Pastor Riggenbach does, take them out of context. If you do that, then you can't just say that “I'm always lively when interpreting; if I'm not interpreting, I'm subverting”; you can't just say, “In my opinion, such an interpretation of the Savior's words borders on blasphemy”; you could say much more: you could claim that such an interpretation is complete nonsense. But anyone who takes into account the type of lecture, the way of presenting and thinking, within which these supposed “interpretations” occur, will no longer use these things for criticism in the way that Pastor Riggenbach does. If well-meaning criticism, as is decidedly the case with Pastor Riggenbach, proceeds in this way, then one can imagine that on the part of the friends of spiritual science, some precautions are taken so that lecture cycles, for example, which are intended only for those listeners who know other, preparatory ones, do not fall into the hands of such persons, who must find them quite fantastic because they do not have the prerequisites for understanding. From such completely matter-of-fact and not at all fundamentally significant measures, the unfounded accusation of secretiveness has developed.

Pastor Riggenbach also practices a much-loved yet misleading way of providing information about the “composition of the human being” in the sense of spiritual science. Anyone who takes the trouble to compare my Theosophy with the way in which spiritual science arrives at this “composition” can find that the striving to recognize the nature of man, as it was an ideal of all world views, is to be brought to a form that satisfies the demands of current science. The only thing really new in this classification is that which is gained through the spiritual faculties characterized above. The rest can already be found in a whole series of insightful students of the soul. If the number seven is found to be a captious number for the expressions of the soul, then it should also be found captious that light must be conceived as coming to revelation in seven rainbow colors, and sound in the seven-membered scale (the octave is again the keynote). I will not argue with Pastor Riggenbach when he says: “From the Bible we are accustomed to distinguishing three parts in man: body, soul and spirit.” There were ‘divine scholars’ who were so little accustomed to this from the Bible that they accused all those who asserted this tripartite of heresy of the true Christian teaching. There will come a time when people ‘from spiritual science’ will be ‘accustomed’ to distinguishing seven members of the human being, just as they now distinguish seven colors of light. Anyone who simply says, “The Theosophists are not satisfied with this — with body, soul and spirit; they have found out that man is composed of seven parts...” is misleading because he gives his listeners and readers the idea that the seven parts of man have been arbitrarily assumed; while they arise from careful spiritual research.

Pastor Riggenbach follows a process similar to the one he applies to the seven-limbed nature of man for the laws of “repeated earthly lives” and “karma”. He first adapts these laws to his own way of thinking and then criticizes not what I, for example, present about these laws, but what he has first made out of them.

The law of “repeated earthly lives” is not based, as Pastor Riggenbach seems to assume, on “belief”, but on a spiritual-scientific investigation. Through such a study, one finds that in the life of a human being between birth and death, a “soul core” is revealed in development, which is just as much the basis of a new human life as the plant germ is the basis of a new plant life, which is already found in the predecessor plant. Since the plant germ is of a physical nature, it can be found by the means of sense science; since the soul core is of a spiritual-soul nature, it can only be found by observing the soul when it has become free of the body. And so it is found, not by analogy (a comparison) with plant life. The fact that something similar is found at a higher level for the human being – only with the difference that it is spiritual-soul – as at a lower level for plant life, testifies that spiritual science is the true successor of natural science. The plant germ, as a physical being, can perish without founding a new plant being. The soul germ proves to be the eternal part in man that passes through repeated earthly lives. It imprints the experiences of successive earthly lives, which the plant germ cannot do, or only to a limited extent. Only so much can be said here about the many-sided law of “karma”. When Pastor Riggenbach, again taken out of context, mentions “more as a curiosity” what I once said about the karma connection of an idiot, he proves by the way he presents it how little he realizes what the spiritual researcher has gone through in his soul before daring to communicate to his listeners such a specific case as having been investigated by him. He shows how little he realizes the profound seriousness that underlies such a statement. Pastor Riggenbach believes that the true Christian draws the “truth from the Bible” and then sees it confirmed by his “religious and moral experience.” I would ask him: Can he really not imagine that knowledge as difficult as that of the karma of an idiot, wrung from the soul, is later confirmed by experience? In this case, the pastor allows the non-pastor to freely confess that I find his treatment of me, especially in this karma case, to be less than Christian.

And I would like to say almost the same thing when Pastor Riggenbach makes the comment: “For those who take karma seriously, love, which believes everything and hopes everything, and endures everything and bears everything, must appear as an illusion.” Where can Pastor Riggenbach get the reasons for such an assertion? Certainly not from seriously meant spiritual science. For the latter never tires of pointing out the karmic connections of unloving actions and attitudes. But the fact that Pastor Riggenbach can achieve many things with his logic that are completely foreign to spiritual science is proved to me by a truly astonishing sentence in his remarks. He says: “It does sound very contrived and sophisticated when he — Steiner — writes at one point: ‘It is not fate that acts, but we act in accordance with the laws of our fate.’ Yes,” — so Pastor Riggenbach continues, “if we act in accordance with the laws of our fate, that means nothing other than that we act under the compulsion of our fate and with that freedom is gone.” With all due respect: if I should ever say, “It is not the laws of my leg that cause me to move when I put my foot forward, but rather I put my foot forward in accordance with the laws of my leg,” you, Pastor Riggenbach, will then find this ” and sophistical” and perhaps even say, ”Yes, when we walk in accordance with the laws of the leg, it means nothing more than that we walk under the compulsion of our leg laws, and that freedom is lost.” You would hardly say that, and realize that one should not be so unchristian as to accuse someone of “sophistry” when it is so easy to get muddled in terms of logic.

The criticism of the Christ impulse, of which spiritual science speaks, is probably the most unfounded part of Pastor Riggenbach's arguments. It would be going much too far to refute the assertion that “this whole way” of understanding the Christ comes from so-called Gnosticism. No, it comes from spiritual scientific research independent of all antecedents. It is quite wrong to say: “According to this, Jesus did not mature into the Christ under the guidance of the Holy Spirit from an early age, as the Bible shows us, but rather, during the first thirty years of his life, he only prepared the physical shell into which the Christ descended at his baptism by John.” One cannot distort what spiritual science has to say about this point more than it is distorted by this assertion. This science examines what actually happened through John's baptism, which, according to the Bible, undoubtedly has to be regarded as an important event in Jesus' life. (Weizsäcker even translates the corresponding important passage in the Gospel of Luke: “This is my beloved Son; today I have begotten him.”) And spiritual research finds that the Christ-spirit, which guided Jesus of Nazareth as if from without until he was thirty, then entered into the innermost part of his being in his thirtieth year. Future biblical research will surely find that precisely on this point the Bible is also right about Mr. Pastor Riggenbach, but gives credence to spiritual science. I can be brief about everything else that Pastor Riggenbach brings forward against the Christ-teaching of spiritual science. Why does one attack this Christ-teaching at all, since it contains nothing that negates the views of any Christian confession about Christ? Nothing, absolutely nothing of what Pastor Riggenbach believes about Christ is negated by spiritual science. Spiritual science only brings about a significant broadening and elevation of the concept of Christ. One would think that even in the mind of Pastor Riggenbach, those who accept what he accepts and something more besides may still be called good Christians. If the cosmic significance of the event of Golgotha is also recognized, then nothing is taken away from the recognition that Pastor Riggenbach claims for himself. It is wrong to say: “The gospel is too simple, too plebeian for them - the theosophists.” It is an assertion that is again - forgive me the word - not very Christian towards people who put all their efforts into understanding the Christ event. Where does it get you when you find it unacceptable that someone believes something else about Christ than you yourself want to believe? One comes to say: I not only demand of you that you believe what I believe; but I disapprove of you because you want to know something that I do not want to know. And yet this is the ultimate consequence of the criticism that Pastor Riggenbach exercises on the Christ-concept of spiritual science. He would certainly reject this consequence, since he is a thoroughly well-meaning critic. But I must hear it in his remarks, and I find that these remarks sound to me as if someone were saying: You must not believe in Copernicus, because he does not speak about the processes of the world in the way it is written in the Bible. More will be said about this in my next lecture on “Spiritual Science and its Relationship to Contemporary Religious and Social Movements,” which I will give in Basel on March 13, 1914.

In conclusion, I would like to reiterate that I fully appreciate the calm, objective and heartfelt manner in which the pastor has addressed the issue and am grateful to him for it. Indeed, I wholeheartedly agree with him: “I do not regret this discussion on my part, because it is always interesting to engage with the ideas of others in honest debate. But I have no more reason to regret it because, from the humbler ground of spiritual science, 'the simple glory of the gospel stands out all the more brightly.

Dr. Rudolf Steiner