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T is my task at this time to explain
certain matters directly related to practical life and to the outer
existence of mankind in general. This is to some extent an interlude
in our present studies, in order to bring out the quality which
Spiritual Science in our time must above all possess —
that of immediate relation to real life. We shall presently
come to those parts of our subject which deal more with the
inner life of man. All in all, this is the focus and aim of our
present studies: On the foundations of Spiritual Science, to
gain an idea of the individual man's position in
practical life, even in his calling or profession.
I would entitle the whole of this course of lectures (including
the last three or four) ‘The Karma of Vocation.’ But it is
necessary first to gain a broader basis; I must explain some
other things, connected with our question in a wider sense.
As
we have already seen, what man achieves for the world —
no matter in what profession — is connected,
intimately, even with the farthest cosmic future of
mankind; it cannot be set aside as mere prosaic toil. Man
enters into the social order of life in a certain way. His
Karma impels him to some particular calling. While we are
speaking of this question, no calling need be thought
inherently prosaic or poetic. For we now know that what
man does within the social order, is the first seed of
something, which is not only of significance for our Earth, but
will go on and on evolving when the Earth passes through the
Jupiter, Venus and Vulcan states. A living grasp of our several
callings, a recognition of simple and straightforward
human life in its significance, can be brought home to us most
intensely through these spiritual studies. For it is the task
of our spiritual-scientific movement not only to provide
euphonious theories, but to bring to our souls that which
will tend to place us rightly into life according to the Spirit
of our Time — each in his place. Therefore, our Truths
are always such as to be strong enough, for life itself really
to be judged and understood through them. We will not just
enthuse in a multitude of pleasing, comforting ideas; we will
receive ideas which can carry and sustain us throughout
life.
If
you will remember something I have often emphasised, you will
see how this spiritual-scientific movement tends to bring near
to our souls what is of real significance for life. I have
often pointed to an important fact of life; and if those whose
task lies in the sphere of learning are not too obtuse,
it may well be that this fact will play an important part in
Science comparatively soon. Nowadays there is much
emphasis on Heredity and all that is connected with it in man's
life. Repeating as they generally do, like parrots, the
scientific world-conception of to-day, educationists, when they
speak of the choice of callings, will also tell us of the
inherited qualities which the teacher must take into
account if he wishes to pass judgment on the questions
that so frequently arise as to the future calling of a young
person who is about to enter into life. But the question of
heredity is generally treated, nowadays, only in this
wise: — Children, they say, inherit certain
characteristics from their parents or earlier ancestors. And in
this connection they are generally thinking more or less
of physical heredity — that which is entirely contained
in the physical line. For the external scientists of
to-day cannot yet take the step of recognising the repeated
earthly lives of man — the carrying-over of human
qualities from former incarnations.
They talk of heredity; but they will only gain a right idea of
the question of heredity when they consider it in conjunction
with what you may already know, even if you only
understand the content of the booklet on
‘Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy’
Human life runs
its course in this way: There is a first section, approximately
to the seventh year — to the change of teeth; a second,
lasting until the fourteenth year; a third, until the
twenty-first; and so on. (For instance, there is another
period until the twenty-eighth year.) You will find some
further details in a booklet reproducing the
content of my recent lecture at Liestal, where I pointed
out once more, from another standpoint, these truths of human
evolution between birth and death and its division into
seven-year periods. Broadly speaking, as you know, the physical
body is to some extent inwardly perfected between birth and the
change of teeth, the etheric from then onward to the time of
puberty, and afterwards the astral body.
Let
us to-day consider this time of puberty, which takes its course
from about the fourteenth to the sixteenth year. (It varies, as
you know, with climate, nationality, etc.) At this time the
human being becomes ripe to bring descendants into life. The
study of this period is therefore immensely important
— especially for a natural-scientific theory of heredity.
For up to this time the human being must have developed all
those qualities which make him able — out of
himself — to convey such qualities to his
descendants. He cannot wait until a later time for the
development of these faculties. In a subordinate sense, no
doubt, characteristics subsequently acquired can also be
transmitted to the descendants; but speaking in the sense of
natural science, man is undoubtedly so organised that at the
age of fourteen to sixteen he becomes completely ripe for
inheritance. We cannot therefore say that the main qualities
which enter into his development after this time of life
are of any great significance for the question of heredity.
Natural Science will therefore have to find out the reasons why
man ceases, from this moment onward, to develop in himself
foundations of heredity. In the animal the thing is different.
Throughout its life, the animal does not essentially get beyond
this point of time. This is what we must really comprehend.
Without entering further into many things which would have to
be considered in this connection, I wish to say at once
what really underlies this matter from the point of view of
Spiritual Science. Take now the moment of birth. Before it, we
have a long period of time which man spends in the spiritual
life between death and a new birth. There, the processes take
place which I have so often described in outline in a certain
way. Naturally, all that takes place in that time between death
and a new birth influences the human being. But above all, that
which takes place in the spiritual between death and a new
birth contains much that is related to the development of the
bodily nature between birth and the age of fourteen to
sixteen. What man works out, on Earth, very largely in his
unconsciousness, this above all he works out between
death and a new birth from the standpoint of a higher
consciousness. Here upon Earth, man looks through his
eyes and other senses upon the mineral, plant and animal world.
... When he is in the spiritual world with the Angeloi,
Archangeloi, Archai and Exusiai, ... and with those human
beings who have also passed through the gate of death and who
in some way can be near to his soul, then, looking downward,
his attention is directed above all to that which is
connected with the life of humanity during this time. And from
thence, as I have explained even in exoteric lectures, all that
which underlies heredity is likewise determined. And as
you know from an earlier lecture, the result of the past
vocational life also emerges like a relic of the processes
between death and a new birth — appearing
physiognomically as it were, in the gestures and in the whole
inherited tendencies too. In the human being at this time of
life — even in the way he walks and moves his hands and
in other respects deports himself — you can see the
result of his vocational life in the last incarnation. Then
comes the period from the fourteenth to the twenty-first year,
which is to some extent in opposition to the preceding
one. During this period, the hereditary impulses cannot work on
in the same way, for as we have seen, the point of time at
which man has these impulses fully developed is already passed.
External science takes no account of such questions; but
it will have to do so, unless it wishes to be void of all
reality.
Now
this is also the point of time when man is led by vague
unconscious impulses towards his new calling; and into this,
the processes which lie between death and a new birth do not
work nearly so much. For in this epoch the impulses of his
former incarnation are especially at work. When
circumstances work so as to drive him into this or that
calling, the human being believes — and others around him
too believe — that outer circumstances alone are in
reality bringing it about. But the outer
circumstances are subconsciously connected with what is
living in the human soul — living in it directly from the
conditions of the former incarnation. Observe the
difference: In the preceding period — from the seventh to
the fourteenth year — our former incarnation,
fertilised by what takes place between death and a new birth,
goes into our bodily organisation, making it the image of our
former calling. But in the following period the impulses no
longer work into us — no longer impress
their gestures on us — but lead us along the paths of
life to our new calling.
See
what an infinitely fruitful thought will arise from these
considerations, for the whole educational system of the
future. If only our outer worldly culture could make up its
mind to reckon with repeated lives on Earth instead of setting
up fanciful theories — theories which cannot but be
fanciful, because they do not reckon with the true
reality but with a fragment of it — with the realities
which are immediate and present between birth and death.
Here we can gain an outlook, of what untold importance it will
be for Spiritual Science to enter into those circles which have
to do with the human being's education and development,
and with the influences which are brought to bear upon the life
of man in the external social order. Of course we are here
looking out upon wide perspectives, — but they have very
much to do with the reality. For in the evolution of the world,
chaos does not prevail. Order prevails — or, if it be
disorder, even so it will always be explicable out of the
spiritual life. He, therefore, who knows the laws
connected with repeated lives on Earth, can meet life in
a very different way with his advice and active help. He can
say things and institute things, connected with the real course
of life.
You
must remember, in a certain sense everything in the world is
cyclic. We know the great cycles of post-Atlantean time: the
Indian, ancient Persian, Egypto-Chaldean, Graeco-Latin, our
own, and that which will follow it. The souls of men return in
each of these cycles — more than once, or in some cases
only once. But life on this Earth is not only cyclic in this
all-embracing sense. It is also cyclic in the sense that
certain conditions can be determined if we are able rightly to
understand those that preceded them. For instance, if someone
understands what was spiritually at work in the first centuries
of Christian evolution — say, from the third to the
seventh century A.D. — if he knows these spiritual
impulses, then he can also understand what social needs can be
at work in our time. There is a cyclic evolution, and if a man
is destined to place himself into this cyclic evolution
in a certain way, we make him unhappy if we advise him to
behave differently. Now in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch men
will have to place themselves into life more and more
consciously. Therefore a knowledge of these laws will
also have to emerge increasingly. It must be made possible for
a man to see himself in real connection with all that is going
on in his environment. It is not only that we should learn to
choose the right callings for our children; but that we
ourselves should be able to develop the right thoughts as to
our own relation to the world, no matter where in life we may
be placed. For as you know, thoughts are realities. In future
it will matter more and more what a man thinks about his
connection with all that is going on in the world around him
— in the evolution of the Spirit of the Time. In these
matters, more and more consciousness will have to take hold of
the human soul.
Remember how I tried to characterise the streams of life
that arose with the fifth post-Atlantean epoch. I showed how
there arose throughout the Western regions that stream which
rather tends to make the human being a Bourgeois. (For
so we called it, choosing a comprehensive and, as it were,
approximate term). Bourgeoisdom has come to
expression in Western Europe and in America. With this
ideal of the Bourgeois we then contrasted the Eastern goal. (It
is only a goal for the present: it is not so clearly expressed,
for the Western culture is comparatively more advanced
than the Eastern.) What is the Eastern goal? It is the ideal of
the Pilgrim. These two ideals —
Bourgeois and Pilgrim — stand over
against each other. Unless we realise how much this signifies
for life, we cannot possibly enter into that
understanding of life which is dawning more and more. The
people of former centuries and millennia — they could
confront life without conscious understanding. For they
were guided by the Divine-spiritual powers. We must approach
life with conscious understanding — increasingly,
the more we develop into the future which is now at hand.
Such things as I just now explained to you — the two
streams, one of which is based on heredity and the other
on salvation, liberation, — such things must be
thoroughly understood if we would claim any judgment upon the
life of present time. For these things force themselves upon
us. It is not merely my statement; it can be said out of the
realities of the time, for it has been felt and to some extent
even known for a long time past by those who have confronted
life not sleepily and obtusely but with full, wide-awake
attention. I have already spoken of this peculiarity of our
time: there are many human beings in our time who have a real
feeling for the things which are emerging, but are unable
(remember what I told you about Jaurès) —
unable to rise to an understanding of reincarnation and Karma.
Unable to take hold either of individual Karma or of
World-Karma, they cannot penetrate what they so well
perceive.
In
many places in modern history, we find human beings who had an
open eye for what was happening, though they could never rise
to the point of explaining things from the standpoint of
repeated earthly lives; — nay more, though they
themselves, just because they could not accept repeated
earthly lives, largely contributed to bring about the very
things they criticised so sharply. That indeed is
characteristic of the men of to-day, even of those who see most
clearly. They criticise existing things, while they themselves
are working to bring about the very things they judge so truly.
So do unconscious impulses play into our human life.
Take for instance a man who saw many things with extreme
clarity; a man who clearly observed the life around him,
notably his own particular surroundings. I refer to John
Stuart Mill, the famous English philosopher, — born
in 1806 and died in 1873. Many people of our time regard him as
the renewer or essential continuer of Logic; but he also
developed social insight, far-reaching social ideas. He turned
his attention to the social evolution of that world
especially, with which he was familiar in his own
environment. And he wanted to find an answer to the
question, which for him assumed a tragic form: Into what
harbour are we steering? What is the tendency and ultimate goal
of that social character which has been stamped, to begin with,
upon the life of the nineteenth century? The type of humanity,
said Mill, which the nineteenth century developed, is
essentially the Bourgeois. Wherein does the Bourgeois
differ from the earlier types of humanity which evolved in the
course of ages? He asked himself this question, and he replied,
The Bourgeois differs in this respect: In former times
the individual was of far greater importance. (I am clothing it
now rather in our ideas; John Stuart Mill expressed practically
the same in other words.) Through the man of former time, a
stronger individuality was speaking; one felt the active rising
of the soul beyond the immediate and outward physical
realities. The Bourgeois type tends to reduce everything
to a dead level — tends to equalise all men in the social
order. And what is the upshot of this equalising process? Not
the equalising in greatness of the human soul, but in
nonentity, — so says John Stuart Mill. And he
outlines a human future for this fifth post-Atlantean age.
Human beings, in their social life together, will more and more
become the mincemeat of Bourgeois nonentity. He felt this as a
tragical conclusion.
Men
feel such things in different ways, however, according as they
are born out of the Western or the Eastern culture. The Russian
thinker Herzen made himself thoroughly familiar with
these observations by John Stuart Mill, but in his soul the
thing worked differently. While the Western thinker describes
this perspective of Bourgeoisdom with a certain nonchalance,
the Eastern suffers terribly to think that Europe — as
Mill and Herzen even said — should be steering towards a
kind of Chinese state. Both Mill and Herzen (as you may see
from Herzen's book, published in 1864) — the one with a
more Eastern, the other with a more Western colouring, —
regard what has arisen in China as a stage already attained,
compared to which Europe is only tending in the same direction
— tending to a new China, a senile civilisation
where men are the mere mincemeat of Bourgeois nonentity.
A narrowing of intellect will come, says John Stuart
Mill, — a narrowing of intellect and vigour, a
wearing down of individuality; in a word, all that will tend to
a dead level, — a constant flattening of life,
greater and greater superficiality, to the exclusion of the
all-embracing human interests. So says John Stuart Mill, and
Herzen only confirms it with a more tragic feeling:
reduction of all things to the interests of the ledger,
mercantile Bourgeois prosperity. Thus, in the 1860's, John
Stuart Mill and Herzen! Mill, speaking in the first place
of his own country, declares: England is on the way to become a
modern China! Herzen replies: Not only England but all Europe!
As you may see from Herzen's work of 1864, Herzen and Mill at
that time were more or less agreed as to what Herzen thus
expresses: If an un-awaited resurrection does not occur,
— leading to a re-birth of human personality, giving it
strength to overcome this Bourgeoisie, — Europe despite
its noble ancestry and Christianity will become a modern
China.
These words were spoken in 1864. But Herzen had no opportunity
to reckon with repeated earthly lives and Karma. Such a
perception, therefore, he could only receive in deepest
tragedy, and he expressed it thus: We are not the
doctors, we are the pains of our time. Conglomerated
mediocrity — that is the state we are
approaching. (It can perhaps better be expressed by the English
term which Herzen and Mill employed — ‘conglomerated
mediocrity’ — than by any German words.) And Herzen
says, out of deep tragical feeling: The time will come in
Europe, when modern scientific realism will have gone so far
that men will no longer seriously believe in anything belonging
to the other world — the super-sensible. People will say
that the only goal we have to follow is in the outer physical
realities. Men will be sacrificed for these realities,
nor will there be any other perspective than that the
human beings sacrificed are the mere bridge for those who
follow after them. Thus will the individual be sacrificed to
the polyp-state of the future.
Such words were really spoken at that time. Europe, says
Herzen, has only one difficulty in becoming very rapidly a
modern China, and that is Christianity. Christianity cannot so
easily be overcome. But he still sees no hopeful outlook, for
he finds even Christianity made flat and superficial —
superficial in the Revolution, and the Revolution, he says,
made still further superficial in the middle-class
Liberalism of the 19th century —
conglomerated mediocrity! ... Looking to what was said by
Mill, and mindful of the downfall of ancient Rome, Herzen
declares: I see the unavoidable breakdown of old Europe.
At the portals of the old world (meaning Europe) there stands
no Catilina, but only death.
There is another author, who learned very much from Mill and
Herzen, — I refer to the contemporary Russian writer
Merejkowsky. He, too, sees clearly many things that are there
around him in the present time. But he cannot make up his mind
to receive the sustaining ideas of Spiritual Science.
Merejkowsky says, not without justification, The sceptre
of former ages has been replaced by the yard-rule, the bible by
the ledger, and the altar by the counter.
But
the fault is, these things are merely criticized. For as you
know, it is inevitable for the yard-rule, the ledger and
the counter to play the part they actually play in this fifth
post-Atlantean age. It must be so. It is according to an
unavoidable World-Karma. The point is not to criticize or to
condemn, but to pour into this world of yard-rule, counter and
ledger the Spirit which alone can grapple with them, —
that is, the Spirit of Spiritual Science.
These things are very serious. I want to let you feel, as I
always do on such occasions: I am not setting forth what I
myself happen to want to say. What I express, is said in
agreement with those men who have observed life openly and
un-asleep. Views and opinions everyone can have, but the
question is: How do we stand in our time with our
opinions, how are they rooted in the soil of our time? Can we
confirm them by the facts? Our age is assuming a certain
character, — a character clearly perceived by those who
want to see. We cannot give to our age any character we like;
that is out of the question. We must see how the spiritual
evolution of mankind progresses, from cycle to cycle.
As
I have told you, there are occult societies who have knowledge
of these things out of old tradition — out of the ancient
atavistic secret doctrine. And as you also know from former
lectures, these societies, notably in the West — (but
Eastern people have become their followers) — have
assumed an impure character. That does not prevent them from
preserving certain secrets of existence. But they preserve them
in a way which is not allowable in our time. He above all, who,
obedient to the spiritual message of the time,
communicates that part of Spiritual Science which is now
being made public according to the true spirit of our age,
— he above all encounters opposition. Opposition
which undoubtedly often proceeds from unclean sources. For the
opposition is guided and directed everywhere by spiritual
powers; that we must not forget.
So
we can understand it, if opposition arises on all hands
precisely to that form of Spiritual Science which has to live
within our movement. These thing's are so easy to manipulate
nowadays. Time and again they declare: ‘It must not be; it is
not allowable for such a science to be created for wider
circles.’ And then they summon up all kinds of powers which
have the public ear to-day, so as to render Spiritual Science
harmless. University Professors go from country to country
proclaiming themselves in duty bound to stand up against my
Spiritual Science above all, because — as they say
— our time must concentrate on the Reality (meaning
that Reality which they alone can see) and not on these things
which divert men from it.
There is sometimes no little method in such attacks. Anyone who
is not blind, can see how they select the right places
according to the political constellations; the places
where they think their reputations as Professors will be most
effective, or where they think they will best be able to heave
us out of the saddle. They think they will make most headway by
choosing the right places and using the right words, (I mean
not inherently right, but according to the passions of
today).
These things, however, are all of them part of a larger whole.
Nothing is more feared, nothing is more anathematised in
certain quarters, than the possibility that a number of people
might discover something of the real character of life in our
time. For in those quarters especially, where the aforesaid
occult brotherhoods exist, they have the deepest interest in
keeping people in the dark, as to the things which are
connected with the real laws of life. If one keeps people in
the dark, one can work among them most effectively oneself. One
can no longer work effectively when they begin to know how they
are really standing in the present time. That is a danger for
those who want to fish in clouded waters, — who want to
keep their esoteric knowledge to themselves and apply it so as
to mould men in their social relationships in the way they want
to have them.
There are members of occult brotherhoods to-day, fully
convinced within their brotherhoods that spiritual powers
everywhere prevail in our surroundings, and that a bond
exists between the living and the dead. Within their
occult brotherhoods they speak in no other terms than of the
real laws of the Spiritual World, — those laws of which
we in our Spiritual Science possess a part which must be made
public to-day. They speak of all these things, inasmuch as they
have received them from old atavistic tradition.
Thereupon, they will write newspaper articles against the very
same things, branding them as medieval superstitions. Often
they are the very same people, who in the occult societies
cultivate Spiritual Science as a traditional doctrine, and in
the public journals write against it, characterising it as
‘medieval superstition,’ ‘outworn mysticism’
and the like. They think it right that they should keep this knowledge
to themselves, while other men remain stupid, ignorant of
the principles by which they are being led and guided. (Of
course there are also many very peculiar members of occult
brotherhoods, who know about as much of the world as they
can reach with the ends of their noses. They too join in the
chorus, saying how impossible it is to make public in our time
‘the content of the Mysteries.’)
But
there are many ways of keeping people befogged. Just as
Spiritual Science gives us certain ideas and concepts as
a true key to find our entry into the Spiritual World (I
mentioned this in the Liestal and in other public lectures) so
one can find certain concepts wherewith to ‘have on
toast’ that part of the population which cannot abide the
complete flattening of the intellect by the Natural Scientific
outlook, whereof Mill and Herzen speak. It is always
possible to form concepts in a certain manner. If only people
knew how concepts are formed in public life to-day, in order to
prepare the souls of men for what one wants! Many a man, if he
knew this, would presently bestir himself to approach true
spiritual science, which tells of these things in a honest and
upright way. To-day I will not refer to all manner of lofty
concepts which are being proclaimed to men as high ideals, not
with the object of their attaining what these ideals imply, but
with an altogether different purpose. I will not speak of that
to-day, but will make clear by a simple example how easy it is
to ‘have on toast’ people who feel a certain need to satisfy
their mystic longings.
I
will choose the silliest example I can. Someone might say:
Number, even by the Pythagoreans of old, was held to contain
the secrets of the World-order. Much is contained in the
relationships of number. Take for instance these two sets of
numbers. Nicholas II. of Russia — he was
|
born in the
year
|
1868
|
|
came to the
throne in
|
1894
|
|
has reigned
for
|
22 years
|
|
and is
now
|
48 years old
|
|
|
|
|
Add up the
numbers:
|
3832
|
|
Halve it and we
get:
|
1916,
—
|
the
most important year of the War. A very occult relationship of
numbers; for now take George V. of England:
|
He was born in
the year
|
1865,
|
|
his reign began
in
|
1910;
|
|
he has reigned
for
|
6
years
|
|
and he
is
|
51 years old
|
|
|
|
|
Add up the
numbers:
|
3832
|
|
Halve
it:
|
1916.
|
How
intimately the destinies of these two coincide! See how great a
part the Pythagorean laws of Number are playing in the world!
But that is not all, for there is Poincaré:
|
He was born in
|
1860,
|
|
he reigned since
|
1913.
|
|
That is,
|
3
years
|
|
and he is
|
56 years old
|
|
|
|
|
Add up the
numbers:
|
3832.
|
|
Halve
it:
|
1916.
|
See
how the Numbers correspond among the three Allies!
One
of the silliest examples, of course, for if I were now to step
down and ask one of the ladies — needless to say, I shall
not do so — when she was born, since when she has been a
member of the Anthroposophical Society, how old she is
(of course, I shall ask no such question), and how many years
she has been in the Society, and if I were then to add up the
numbers and halve the sum, I should get the very same number
— exactly the same. An ideal example! Assume, for
instance, some lady or gentleman, X. or Y,
|
was born
in
|
1870,
|
|
joined the A.S.
in
|
1912
|
|
has been in it
for
|
4
years,
|
|
and is
now
|
46 years
old.
|
|
|
|
|
Add
up:
|
3832,
|
|
Halve
it:
|
1916.
|
A
very silly example, no doubt. But I can assure you, many
things, in which such ‘Mysteries of Number’ are sought out,
depend upon no more than this. They are only a little less
obvious. And it is just as easy in other spheres to put
concepts together so as to throw sand in people's eyes. You
only need skilfully choose your paths and not let people know
what lies behind it. Even in the example I have just
given, many people fall into the trap. How deeply significant,
that destiny should choose the year 1916! But if we had
reckoned it for 1914 it would have come out just as well. The
fateful year for the three Allies would have coincided with the
outbreak of the War. Any number can be put together on
the same principle. Many a thing that is construed to-day
— only out of somewhat different foundations of thought
— is no more profound than this. Only, when it is a
little more hidden, people do not see through it. If plenty of
words are added — ‘profound,’ ‘cosmic,’ ‘abysmal
depths’ and so on, — and especially if all manner of
numerical relations are adduced, one can gain countless
followers and make it appear that one is speaking out of very
special depths of human knowledge.
Nevertheless, there is something more in the methods chosen by
certain people to throw sand in other people's eyes. Such and
such ideas are proclaimed in this quarter or that, and
certain statements are then added. The origin lies in some
occult association which wishes to attain a certain
purpose. One only need know the ways and means that are
adopted.
Such things should become impossible in future; and to
this end a number of people must develop, not the narrow,
limited intelligence and vigour to which Mill refers, but the
sustaining intelligence and vigour of life which come from
Spiritual Science. This Science will fertilise our human
intellect and energy of life. Then only shall we face the
facts of life, in such a way that we cannot be deceived.
You
see, it is not unconnected with these things: — There was
a certain fear and horror when from the European East to
the West there shone across the strange phenomenon of such an
individuality as Blavatsky, who appeared as it were from
the blue sky. (For her appearance made itself felt, long before
it was fulfilled.) I have often pointed out how important this
really was for the whole course of the nineteenth century. She
appeared at the very moment when the conflict raged most
furiously between the so-called ‘esotericists’ and the
so-called ‘progressive’ occultists. It was the reactionarists
who in this connection called themselves the esotericists.
Those who wanted to keep everything from the world —
those who wanted to keep all the occult secrets for
themselves — called themselves ‘esotericists.’ They
applied the word with this meaning. Into the midst of
this conflict, the life of Blavatsky fell; and through her
peculiar constitution — for immense forces were working
out of her subconsciousness — there was a danger
that the spiritual secrets might be revealed. People
might discover something in the true and real sense; such
was the danger. Beneath this danger they lived from 1840 onward
— practically since Blavatsky was born, since her
early childhood. And ever since that time, efforts were made so
to arrange things as to enlist Blavatsky in the service
of the Western Occult Brotherhoods. Had this succeeded, only
what the Western brotherhoods considered suitable and in their
interests would have emerged. But it all took a strange
turn. I have told you how the ‘Grand Orient’ first made efforts
to get hold of her. But she made conditions which could not be
fulfilled. The effort failed. Thereupon she made a great deal
of trouble for an American, Western brotherhood; for with her
temperament, she constantly boiled over and eluded them,
— escaped from what they wanted of her. Thereupon she was
expelled, and they knew of no other resource than to
condemn her to a kind of occult imprisonment and so
bring her into an Indian occult brotherhood whose pursuit of
occultism they considered harmless for the so-called Western
brotherhoods, because it went along their lines. For they said
to themselves: What if all manner of things are brought to
light from Indian sources, that will not greatly disturb our
circles. Most of the occultists who were working with serious
occultism in those quarters said: What, after all, will emerge,
now that we have surrounded Blavatsky with all the pictures
which shut her off from a real knowledge of the Spiritual
World! She will only absorb such things as may happily unite at
their tea-parties so many old maids of both sexes (I am really
quoting!) She will not greatly disturb our circles.
In
reality, things only became unpleasant when our stream
emerged, which took things in real earnest, giving access
to the sources of a real Spiritual World. Here you will see how
deep-seated were the foundations of the conflicts which
resulted. For in fact there was something in Blavatsky of those
impulses which must come from the Eastern World, and,
moreover, there was a certain necessity for a kind of
synthesis with the Western world. But the point was this:
— In recent times they had fallen more and more in the
pursuit of certain purposes and aims, which, as I indicated
once before, were not the purposes of truth alone, —
purposes which they pursued in the way I recently described to
you. Of a truth, these were sometimes quite other aims than
those of truth alone!
You
must consider this: — If one knows how the cycles of
humanity take their course, — if one knows what character
the world to-day must have according to its Archai, this or
that having prevailed in former times, each at its proper place
in evolution, — if one is cognisant of these things, then
one can work in a certain way. If on the one hand one
possesses traditional Occult Science, while on the other hand
in public journals and in public life one attacks the same
Occult Science as mere medieval superstition, then indeed one
can work in muddy waters and attain important objects, —
whatever it may be that one desires to attain. For things in
the world are connected, only people need not always know what
the connection is. For many human beings, the connection can
take place in the unconscious.
We
must be able to turn our gaze, as I said before, in the right
directions. Much depends on this. We must look to the right
places. Often something quite insignificant will appear there;
but the insignificant, seen in the right connection, often
explains far more than is explained by what would seem
important or significant. For in many things in the world it is
indeed as Hamlet says of good and evil: Nothing in itself
is good or evil, but man makes it so in thought. So it is with
many other things. A thing is important not by virtue of what
it appears to be, directly, in the outer Maya — in the
great illusion. Things are only recognised in their true
significance when we unite them with the right concepts. I will
give you an example from the most recent times in Europe,
without thereby wishing to encroach on any party or political
tendency.
People to-day are fond of thinking at short range, and so there
may be those who in their thought refer the outbreak of the
present War in Europe to the murder of the heir apparent, the
Archduke Franz Ferdinand. I do not say that that is wrong, I do
not say that there is not some truth in it. They can explain
certain events by referring them back to that assassination,
which took place in July, 1914. But there may also be those who
point out that it was printed in a Western journal in January,
1913, that the Archduke Franz Ferdinand would be murdered in
the near future for the good of European humanity.
We
can go back, that is to say, to the actual murder; but we can
also go back to what was printed in a Western paper already in
January, 1913, namely, the statement that he would be
murdered.
Or
again, we can go back to the murder of Jaurès on the eve
of the war, which, as I indicated recently, will in all
probability never be fully cleared up. But we can also go back
further, and point to the time to which I just referred. Almost
as far back as the other saying — that is to say, in the
year 1913, — we can find this statement: — If
the conditions in Europe should lead to war, Jaurès will
be the first to die. We can look up a certain so-called occult
almanac, which was sold for 40 francs. Here in this almanac,
which, destined for the year 1913, must have been printed in
1912, we can read the following: In Austria, the man of whom it
is commonly supposed that he will rule, will not come to
the throne, but in his stead a young man, of whom it is not yet
supposed that he will rule after the old Emperor. This was
printed in a so-called occult almanac for 1913, — printed
therefore already in the autumn of 1912. And in the same
almanac for 1914 (printed, therefore, in 1913), the same remark
was repeated. Evidently, in 1913, the attempted assassination
had failed. In all these things the connections will be
exposed, once people see things clearly. I mean the connection
between what is there in the external reality, and what is
brewed in unclean, hidden waves beneath. Some men will begin to
recognise the threads that run from public life into this or
that brotherhood. And they will recognise moreover,
how foolish it is of other brotherhoods still to declaim,
even to-day, that certain Truths of the Mysteries must be
preserved in silence. These people may be quite innocent; for
they are children, albeit they may be old members of this or
that Masonic order for example, claiming also to have occult
sources. They may be quite innocent. Nevertheless, they too
assist the gloom and darkness which are prevailing among
men.
I
recently chose the example of a very ‘enlightened’ pastor and
professor. I pointed out especially the discontinuity
prevailing in his thought. (I mentioned it quite briefly here,
and dealt with it further at St. Gall and Zurich.) He too, it
must be admitted belongs to an occult brotherhood. But he is
not one of those who work unfavourably, save by his
limitations. For in their occult brotherhood they do acquire a
certain limitation. They are purposely kept in a certain narrow
sphere. This too, some heads of occult brotherhoods make it
their task to bring about.
Above all, it is necessary for people to open their eyes. But
our eyes must first learn to see. And we can only learn to see
if we allow the direction of our sight to be guided by the
understanding we have first received of the Spiritual
World. These people always reckon upon qualities on which one
seldom calculates in vain in human affairs. Thus, as I
mentioned once before, they tried to put me off the track on
one occasion. At the time when Alcyone was nominated, I also
could have been nominated in a certain way. Thereby, all that
pulses and flows through our movement could have been nicely
swept out of the world, — if I had let myself in for what
was suggested to me pretty strongly: I was to be nominated as
the reincarnated St. John! In certain quarters they would
then have undertaken to proclaim: Alcyone is so and so;
and he — he is the reincarnated St. John. Then the
whole movement would not have had to undergo what afterwards
ensued.
Vanity, needless to say, is one of many things that make men
stupid. Catch people's vanity, and you can attain much,
especially if you also know the ways and means of joining
certain concepts. As I said before, it was done in the
Theosophical Society, but in a too amateurish way. The others
do it more skilfully, — more in accordance with
realities. One cannot do much to the purpose if one has to
reckon with a personality like Annie Besant, who herself
is full of passions, and under whom those who were near her
heaved many a bitter sigh. One need only know the sighs of
those who were in Annie Besant's environment for years, their
sighs and their anxieties: what situation would she not bring
them into through the fact that she, too, had now been caught
in the aura of a certain Indian occultism. For in this
connection she had brought with her some strange
qualities, coming from strange foundations, — qualities
which proved highly inconvenient to a number of people in the
Theosophical Society. Many people (men especially) sighed
bitterly when they had tried again and again to bring Annie
Besant into a sensible line. And there were women too, who
sighed, but they subjected themselves time and again. They
wanted to cultivate Theosophy in the way that is customary in
those circles. But they pursued it in such a way, that it also
became — in the theosophical domain — rather like
‘conglomerated mediocrity.’ They tried to carry what John
Stuart Mill describes as conglomerated mediocrity, into
the pursuit of Spiritual Science. I myself
experienced it. A missionary of the Theosophical Society
was working in a town belonging to the Section of which I was
General Secretary. I went there to give lectures; indeed, I was
invited by the said missionary. But when I arrived there, she
said to me: We will gradually learn to do without the lectures.
After all, they are of no real use. We must arrange afternoon
tea-parties and invite the people. They will learn to know each
other at afternoon tea — and, she opined,
especially over the bread-and-butter. But the lectures (and she
said all this with a certain gesture of deprecation) —
the lectures will in time grow less and less important. She
too, one must say, was wrapped in a regular veil from certain
quarters; and indeed there are many such, who. work as
missionaries and often do not know what wires they are pulled
by. Sometimes not even wires are necessary; very thin cords or
even strings are sufficient. Truly, it is piteous, to see how
the most sacred and solemn affairs of mankind are sometimes
treated.
Now
they were especially afraid of this: What would happen if
Blavatsky remained sound and healthy, and yet brought to light
that which was there in the depths of her nature? Then, they
thought, the situation might become very dangerous even
politically, owing to her special constitution and her
peculiar connection with her own, Russian nationality. So they
made a very special effort to eliminate — to put out of
action — the object of their fears. And indeed, if what
was living in Blavatsky had been able to come forth
effectively already at that time (beginning in the 1860's and
70's) many things would have taken a different course
— things with respect to which people like Mill and
Herzen saw quite truly. But alas, Ahrimanic powers succeeded at
that time in eliminating or side-tracking many things. Well, we
shall presently see how our own Spiritual Science may yet be
treated under the present sorrowful conditions. Those who can
recognise its significance for the great tasks of the fifth
post-Atlantean epoch will think rightly about it. For it is
really true, this Spiritual Science reckons only with the
interests of pure humanity. You, by this time, should be in a
position to know that this is so, and to perceive the
true distinctions. Take for instance the way we have
frequently discussed Goethe's Faust, and even
presented it on the stage. One need have absolutely no national
motives in the background, to present Goethe's Faust to
mankind in its occult depths. On the other hand I leave it to
you to judge, whether or no one need have national motives in
the background, and very peculiar ones at that, — to do
as Maeterlinck did recently: to represent Goethe and Schiller
and Lessing as ‘mediocre minds’ and write long articles upon
their mediocrity, for which articles one gains the support of
the great newspapers in the world to-day. Whether or no
there are national motives behind such an action, I leave to
you to judge. (Nay, perhaps there are motives far deeper than
merely national ones.)
But
I will ask you now to place two things side by side. I have
told you in these lectures of a book recently written by the
Chinese author Ku Hung Ming — a work of genius in
some respects. In this book Ku Hung Ming explains that it is
the only salvation for the Europeans at the present time to
turn to Chinese culture. For, says Ku Hung Ming, the Europeans
will then be able to replace their worthless ‘charters of
liberty’ by the ‘charters of faithfulness’ which
can only come out of the Chinese spirit. Ku Hung Ming is a brilliant
and incisive thinker, and he confirms at this point what was long
ago foreboded by John Stuart Mill and Herzen; confirms it,
moreover, out of a deep knowledge of the Chinese culture.
Not only so; we find the same foreboding in a thinker who came
forward, not as a philologist or schoolmaster or
theologian, but as a man of practical affairs. I refer to Max
Eyth, of whom I spoke the other day, who was a business man to
begin with, passed through several other callings and had a
real knowledge of life.
Ku
Hung Ming describes the Chinese life and culture, and from his
graphic descriptions we can gain a vivid idea of what it is.
And we get this impression: How right were John Stuart
Mill and Herzen (you need only read Herzen's work of 1864)
— how right were they when they described the doctrines
of Confucius and Laotze as the final and logical consequence
which must result if Europe is taken hold of by the so-called
positive realism, born of the conglomerated mediocrity of
Bourgeois nonentity. For the logical conclusion of
what is pursued in our Universities to-day and passes thence
into the people as the modern World-conception, is the Chinese
spirit; with the sole difference that the latter found its way
to this conclusion, out of an earlier history and civilisation,
600 years before the Christian Era. Ku Hung Ming clearly
outlines what the Chinese spirit is. Mill and Herzen described
the path which is being trodden by that civilisation of Europe
which will only take its stand on external, positivist
realism. There you have it from both sides at once: from the
one side, the prophecy that the Chinese spirit will take hold
of Europe, and from the other side the dictum that the Chinese
spirit is Europe's only salvation.
Maybe there is yet a third side! I may perhaps raise this very
question now at the conclusion of this lecture: What if there
be yet a third side, where they may find it very convenient and
in their interest that a Chinaman of all people should now be
giving the Europeans good advice, to choose the only
possible salvation? What if it were no mere matter of chance
that the teaching of Ku Hung Ming, of all people, should now be
thrown into Europe? — a teaching, however brilliant from
the Chinese standpoint, well enough adapted to confuse those
who do not receive it with clear and open minds — minds
awakened by Spiritual Science. A teaching, I repeat, only too
well adapted to confuse men, and, maybe, to lead them in the
very direction in which one wants them to go, —
into a Chinese state. John Stuart Mill and Herzen recognised
quite truly how the sails are set, by certain occult
brotherhoods, in this direction. They really want a Chinese
system. For the intentions of certain brotherhoods can most
readily be instilled into a Chinese Europe. Why should it not
be according to the will of such a brotherhood that a
Chinaman of all people should now be advising Europe to lend an
ear to all the good that might come to them out of the Chinese
spirit? May they not well expect that even the most
‘enlightened’ will be carried away by the good advices which a
Chinaman can give, now that in Europe herself they no longer
know which way to turn?
I
have told you how important is this Chinese book. But I also
feel obliged (from the standpoint which must always be
maintained in our Spiritual Science) to draw your attention to
this fact: Such publications as the book — or rather,
books — of Ku Hung Ming (for two have already appeared)
should be followed with attention, but one should also know
that there are definite purposes behind them —
far-reaching purposes. We do wrong not to make ourselves
acquainted with them, but we do equally wrong to be ‘taken in’
by them. And it is especially important to observe with
care and attention all that sets itself up to-day as
mysticism or occultism, arising frequently from very
cloudy sources. Those who will bear in mind what I have
frequently set forth, will certainly endeavour to see truly in
these matters. For the modern world stands in the midst of many
other streams. And the question is whether individuals have the
goodwill to see clearly and openly.
For
instance we must be able to appreciate the difference between
the stream we have already mentioned and a certain other
stream, which to this day possesses far more power than is
commonly imagined. I mean the stream proceeding from certain
Roman Catholic sources, behind which there are often real
principles of Initiation, though, needless to say, those who
are brought out into the world from this quarter are led by the
leading-strings. Let us now contrast what may well be
contrasted: On the one hand the Roman Church, and on the other
hand those Occult Brotherhoods of which I spoke — the
Roman Church which works in the way that is well known to you,
and on the other hand the Brotherhoods, which, needless to say,
attack the Roman Church to the knife. Yet they themselves go to
such lengths as I described: While they possess the occult
knowledge and make use of it, in public they stigmatise it as
‘medieval superstition,’ in order to keep men in the
stream which they desire, — in order to make use of them.
Contrast with this the Roman Church. You need only take such an
event as the Encyclica of the 8th December, 1864, where
the standpoint of the Roman Church concerning freedom of
conscience and of religious ceremonies is proclaimed
ex cathedra. The principles of freedom which are
commonly believed are quoted and condemned somewhat in this
fashion: — Some people say, Freedom of conscience and
religious ceremony is the right of every man. That is delirium
— madness, in other words. It is madness, delirium, for
an orthodox Catholic — following the Roman see — to
claim freedom of conscience and religious ceremony!
That is the one stream. The other finds it preferable not to
say such things, but to do things whereby the freedom of
conscience — and, above all, the freedom of individual
conviction, the placing of individual convictions, into the
general life of mankind, — shall be effectively annulled.
There you have two contrasting movements — movements
which are very important in the present time, and on which much
depends.
Considerations such as these at the close of the present
lecture, are given with a definite purpose, so that those who
stand within our spiritual-scientific movement may resolve
within their souls not to be among the sleepy ones, but to be
among those who try to see life as it is. You are not a
spiritual scientist by merely receiving the knowledge of
Spiritual Science and believing in it. You are only a true
spiritual scientist when the spiritual-scientific truths
transform you into a man who sees clearly and has the will to
observe with attention what is going on around him, — to
observe it in the right way and at the right points in life, so
as to gain a true judgment of the position into which he
himself is placed in the world. This, too, is necessary, if we
would speak in a fruitful way about the ‘Karma of
Vocation.’
These studies we shall presently continue. Then will the
necessary light be thrown on what belongs more to the every-day
life — the immediate human life of the individual —
the Karma of Vocation.
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