Lecture III
Berlin, June 19, 1917
Today, my task
will be to contribute further to the fundamental theme in our
quest to understand the problems of our time. It is
justifiably required that man should be awake, and pay due
heed to the many spiritual influences that affect and
transform him over comparatively short periods of time, and
also that he acquaint himself with what must be done to
further the particular spiritual and cultural impulses at
work in our time.
I have tried
from various viewpoints to draw your attention to the greater
post-Atlantean period, by describing wider aspects as well as
details from it, because only our understanding of that
period makes our own comprehensible. To allow the whole of
mankind's post-Atlantean evolution to work upon us awakens
understanding for our own time.
I want today to
speak about that same period by bringing before you some
different characteristic aspects. However, in order to
understand what I want to describe I must ask you to bear in
mind what has been said about humanity as such becoming ever
younger and younger. I described how, immediately after the
Atlantean catastrophe, mankind's age was 56 and that by now
it has dropped to 27. This means that modern man develops
naturally up to that age. After the age of 27 he develops
further only if he cultivates impulses received directly from
the spirit out of his own inner initiative. So let us turn
our attention to how the 27 year old human being of today
came to be as he is.
Let us look
back once more to the time immediately after the great
Atlantean catastrophe. I have pointed out how very different,
compared with today, man's social feelings and in fact his
whole social structure then were. I would like to draw
special attention to the unique soul constitution of the
first post-Atlantean people, particularly of those in the
southern part of Asia, and also remind you of certain facts,
already known to you from my writings, about that ancient
Indian culture. There was at that time a complete absence of
what modern man can hardly imagine a social structure
without, namely the concepts of laws and rights. You will be
aware of the immense importance attached to these and related
concepts today. Things of this nature were never mentioned;
they were unknown in the first postAtlantean epoch. It would
have been impossible at that time to imagine what might be
meant by laws and rights, whereas we cannot visualize society
without them. When guidance was needed concerning what ought
to be done or left undone, or about arrangements to be made
either in public or private life, one turned to the
patriarchs, i.e., to those who had reached their fifties.
It was assumed,
because it was self-evident, that those who had reached their
fifties were able to recognize what ought to be done. They
had this ability because people remained capable of
development in the natural sense like children right into
their fifties, by which time they had also attained in the
same natural way a certain worldly maturity. No one disputed
the fact that people of that age were wise and knew how life
should be arranged and human affairs conducted. It would
never have occurred to anybody to doubt that people who had
developed normally into their fifties would know the right
answers to life's problems. When a human being today, in the
course of his natural development, reaches puberty, a change
takes place in his inner being. In that ancient time inner
revelations came to people in their mature years, simply
because natural development continued until late in life, the
consequence of which were the capabilities I have indicated.
Thus, when advice was needed, one consulted the natural
lawgivers, the elders, the wise ones.
Why exactly did
they have this extraordinary wisdom? The reason they were so
wise was that they experienced themselves at one with the
spirit, more particularly with the spirits that live in
light. Today we sense the warmth in our environment; we are
aware of the air as we breathe it in and out; we sense a
force in water as it evaporates to come down again as rain,
but we experience this only physically, through our senses.
The people of the first post-Atlantean epoch did not
experience things that way. When they were in their fifties,
they felt the spirit in warmth, in currents of air, in
circulating water. They did not just experience the wind
blowing but the spirits of wind; not just warmth but the
spirit of warmth; when they looked at water, they saw also
the water spirits. This caused them, when they had reached a
certain age, to listen to the revelations of these elemental
spirits, though only in certain states of wakefulness. What
the elemental spirits revealed to them formed the basis for
the wisdom they were able to impart to others. When people
who had reached that age had gone through normal development,
they were geniuses; in fact, they were much more than what we
understand by genius.
Today a child's
soul development reveals itself gradually up to a certain age
while the body's development takes place. In those days
something similar happened in old age when wisdom arose from
the bodily nature itself. It came about because many not only
developed naturally during the body's thriving growth, but
continued to do so during its decline when it became
sclerotic and mineralized. The body's forces of decline, its
calcification, caused the soul and spirit to develop, and
this was bound up with another aspect of evolution. If you
imagine vividly what I shall now describe, you will find it
easy to understand. People who had reached the age when the
body began to decline, clearly perceived the beings of the
elements. At night the normal senses enabled man to perceive
not only the stars but also imaginations. He saw the
spiritual aspect of the starry sky. I have often drawn
attention to old star maps with their curious figures. These
figures are not as modern science would have it —
creations of fantasy — but originate from direct
perception.
Thus the
ancients, the wise ones, were able to give counsel and
regulate the social structure through what they directly
perceived. They had an intimate relationship with that part
of the earth they inhabited because they perceived its
spiritual content. They perceived spirituality in the water
that issued from it, in the air surrounding it, in the
climatic conditions of warmth and so on. But these
interrelationships differed from place to place. In Greece
they were different from those in India and different again
from those in Persia and so on. As a consequence the wise
ones, the sages, had perceptions that were related to the
particular section of the earth which they occupied. The
ancient Indian culture developed the way it did through the
relationships prevailing in that part of the earth. Likewise
there arose in Greece a culture specifically related to the
elements in that part. These differences were experienced
quite concretely.
Today something
similar is experienced only in regard to the human being. We
would regard it as grotesque were it suggested that the ear
could be situated where the nose is or vice versa. The whole
organism is so formed that the nose could only be where it is
and likewise the ear. However, the earth itself is an
organism, but for that there is no longer any feeling or
understanding. When a culture develops, it must of necessity
have a certain physiognomy through the influence of the
earth's elemental beings. What developed in ancient Greece
could not have been transferred to ancient India or vice
versa. What is so significant about ancient times is that
cultures developed which reflected the earth's spiritual
physiognomy. Nothing of this is known to man today because,
when he reaches the age when he could know, his natural
ability to develop ceases. People do not pause to wonder why
it is that, when the white man immigrated to North America,
the appearance of those who settled in the eastern part
became different from that of those who settled in
California. The expression in the eyes of the settlers in the
east changed completely, and their hands became larger than
they would have been in Europe; even the color of their skin
changed. This applies only to the eastern part of America.
The development of a civilization and its relationship to its
part of the earth's organism is no longer taken into account.
Man no longer knows what kind of spiritual entities, what
kind of spiritual beings live in the elements of the earth.
Man has become abstract; he no longer experiences things as
they truly are.
What I have
described applies to the first post-Atlantean epoch. Things
changed in the following epoch, in the course of which
mankind's age dropped to between 48 and 42. During this
second post-Atlantean epoch the natural ability of the human
being to develop lasted only into his forties. Therefore he
did not attain the kind of wisdom he had attained in the
first epoch. His soul-spirit being remained dependent on the
bodily nature only in his forties. The ability to sense his
relationship with the elements became weaker. However, the
ability was still there, only weakened. People now became
aware that when they were outside the body during sleep, they
were in the spiritual world. They became aware of this once
they had reached, their forties. They also became aware that
when they awoke and plunged into the body once more, the
spiritual world became dark. The teaching about Ormuzd and
Ahriman, about Light and Darkness, originated from this
experience. Man was aware that he was in the spiritual world
during sleep, and he experienced the descent into the body as
a descent into darkness. There was no longer the close
dependence on the piece of land one inhabited; instead, there
was an experience of participating in night and day. The
constellations of stars were still seen pictorially through
the faculty of imagination. This atavistic ability had
remained from the time of Atlantis and enabled man to know
that he had a living soul and that during sleep he was in a
spiritual world which he could experience through
imagination.
In the third,
the Egyptian-Chaldean epoch, the ability to experience
oneself so completely at one with the whole cosmos receded
still further. In Persia it had been taught by Zarathustra,
but had in general been known through tradition. During the
Egyptian-Chaldean cultural epoch, in the course of normal
evolution, man's sense perception became stronger while the
old spiritual perception became weaker. As a consequence the
main form of worship in the third epoch was a star cult.
Earlier, in Persia there had been no star cults; the
spiritual world had been experienced directly through
imagination and music of the spheres. In the third epoch
things were more interpreted rather than seen directly; the
pictorial aspect became fainter. A proper star cult developed
because the stars were clearly seen.
Then came the
fourth epoch when the surrounding spiritual world had faded
from man's consciousness. Only the physical aspect of the
stars was perceived; the world was seen more or less as we
see it. I have already described how man experienced the
world in ancient Greece. That the soul lives in the body and
expresses itself through the body — of this the Greeks
were aware, but they no longer felt to the same extent that
the cosmos was the soul's true home. I have often referred to
Aristotle who, because he was not initiated, could not
perceive the spiritual aspect of the stars; instead he
founded a philosophy of the world of stars. He interpreted
what he saw physically. His interpretation was based on his
awareness that man's soul resides in the body between birth
and death. He was also aware in a philosophical sense, that
the soul has its home in that outermost sphere in which, for
Aristotle, the highest God held sway, while lesser Gods held
sway in the nearer spheres. He also evolved a philosophy of
the elements, of earth, water, air, and fire or warmth; it
was, however, philosophy, not experience. No philosophy of
the elements had existed before when they were still directly
perceived and experienced. By the fourth epoch it had all
changed; mankind had been truly driven from the spiritual
world. The time had come when something had to intervene: the
Mystery of Golgotha.
In these
lectures I have pointed to the deep significance of the
Mystery of Golgotha. I explained that by the time it took
place mankind's age had dropped to 33; man's natural
development proceeded only up to that age, and Christ, in the
body of Jesus of Nazareth, experienced just that age. A truly
wondrous coincidence! As I have described, immediately after
the Atlantean catastrophe man remained capable of natural
development right up to the age of 56, then 55, later 54 and
so on. At the beginning of the second epoch this ability
lasted only up to the age of 48, then 47 and so on. At the
beginning of the third, the Egyptian-Chaldean epoch it lasted
only to the age of 42, receding to the age of 36. The
Graeco-Latin epoch began in the year of 747
B.C.
when man retained the ability of natural development only up to
the age of 35, then 34 and when it receded to the age of 33 then
—because this age is below 35 when the body begins to
decline — man could no longer experience the cosmic
spirit's union with the soul. Therefore, the spirit that is
the Christ Spirit approached man from outside. You see how
essential was the Christ Spirit's entry into mankind's
evolution.
Let us look
back once more to the patriarchs in ancient times who were,
one might say, super-geniuses. They were consulted on all
questions concerning the arrangement of human affairs because
their natural inner development enabled them to embody the
divine-spiritual element. The possibility of receiving higher
counsel from human beings diminished ever more. When
mankind's age receded to 33, Christ had to come from other
worlds and enter the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Man had to
receive from a different direction the impulse which through
his natural evolution he had lost.
This allows us
deep insight into the indispensable connection between
mankind's evolution and the Mystery of Golgotha. Science of
the spirit reveals Christ's entry into human evolution as an
inherent necessity. The need for new insight and deeper
understanding of the Christ Impulse can be seen at every
turn.
I recommend you
read the latest number of Die Tat (The Deed),
for it contains much of interest. You will find
an article by our revered friend Dr. Rittelmeyer
[ Note 1 ]
and also one of the last
articles written by our dear friend Deinhard before his
death.
[ Note 2 ]
In this
same number there is also an article by Arthur Drews which is
significant because here he again discusses the role of
Christ Jesus in the modern world.
[ Note 3 ]
I have often spoken about
Drews. He came to the fore in Berlin at the time when the
attempt was made, from the so-called monistic viewpoint to
prove, among other things, that Jesus of Nazareth could not
be a historical person. Two books appeared concerned with
what was called the “Christ Myth” to show that it
cannot be proved historically that a Jesus of Nazareth ever
lived.
This time Drews
discusses Christ Jesus from an odd point of view. In the June
number of Die Tat you will find an article entitled
“Jesus Christ and German Piety.” He builds up the
peculiar idea of a piety that is German; this is just about
as clever as to speak of a German sun or a German moon. To
bring national differences into these things is really as
nonsensical as it would be to speak of the sun or moon being
exclusively German; yet such absurdities attract large
audiences these days. It is interesting that Drews, who would
not dream of evoking Eckart,
[ Note 4 ]
Tauler
[ Note 5 ]
or Jacob Boehme,
[ Note 6 ]
here does evoke Fichte,
[ Note 7 ]
although normally he would not do so even if philosophical matters
were discussed. He takes the greatest trouble in his attempt to
justify his idea of German piety, and also to show that,
especially if one is German, the truth about Jesus Christ
cannot be arrived at through theology or historical study,
but only through what he calls German metaphysics. And says
Drews, no historical Christ Jesus can be found through
metaphysics.
Drews' whole
approach is closely connected with what I have drawn to your
attention in these lectures, that the only concept of God
modern man can reach is that of the Father God. The name of
Christ is interspersed in the writings of Harnack,
[ Note 8 ]
but what he describes is
the Father God. What is usually called the inner mystical
path can lead only to a general Godhead. Christ cannot be
found in either Tauler or Eckart. It is a different matter
when we come to Jacob Boehme, but the difference is not
understood by Drews. In Boehme the Christ can be found for it
is of Him that he speaks. Christ is to be found neither in
Arthur Drews' writings nor in Adolf Harnack's theology, but
Drews is, from the modern point of view, the more honest. He
seeks the Christ and does not find Him, because that is
impossible through abstract metaphysics held aloof from
historical facts. But the real facts of history can, as we
have seen, enable us to understand the significance even of
the age of Christ Jesus in relation to the Mystery of
Golgotha. Drews fails to find Christ because he remains at
abstract metaphysics, which is the only standpoint acceptable
today. Certainly, the healthy person can through metaphysics
find a general God but not Christ. It is an outlook that is
directly connected with what I explained, that atheism is
really an illness, the inability to find Christ a misfortune,
not to be able to find the spirit a soul blindness. Drews
cannot do otherwise than say, “What is discovered
through metaphysics cannot honestly be called Christ; we must
therefore leave Christ out of our considerations.”
Drews believes he is speaking out of the spirit of our time,
and so he is inasmuch as our time rejects spiritual science.
He believes he is speaking the truth when he says that
religion must be based on metaphysics, and therefore cannot,
if it is honest, entertain any concept of Christ.
Let us now turn
to the actual words with which Drews ends his extraordinary
article: “Every historical tradition”— he
means traditions depicting Christ historically —
“is an obstacle to religion; as soon as the great work
of reformation, only just begun by Luther, is completed, the
last remnant of any faith based on history will be swept away
from religious consciousness.”
I have often
mentioned that spiritual science seeks to establish a faith
based on history because it provides a concrete impetus
towards the spiritual aspect of evolution which leads as
directly to Christ as abstract metaphysics leads to an
undifferentiated God. Drews says, “German religion must
be either a religion without Christ or no religion at
all.” That expresses more or less what I have often
indicated, namely that the present-day consciousness is bound
to remove Christ unless it comes through spiritual science to
a concrete grasp of the spiritual world and thereby rekindles
understanding of Christ.
Drews
continues:
When one recognizes God and man to be
essentially the same,
[Imagine, to suggest, as is done here, that God and man are the same!]
when every person is seen to have a natural tendency to become a
“Christ”; i.e., to become a God-man, then there
will be no room for a Jesus Christ. One can certainly draw
attention to acts attributed to Christ in order to
elucidate and illustrate certain religious procedures, as
for example mystics have done. One can also refer to
sayings of Christ to make one's own opinions clear, just as
one can refer to words and doings of other outstanding
individuals.
Here we have
the peculiar situation that what is said never to have
existed is yet referred to as if it had. On the one hand
Drews sets out to prove that Christ never was, and on the
other he says that it is permissible to refer to His words
and deeds in order to elucidate one's own. He continues:
“German” religion of the
God-man has no use for a historical redeemer or even for an
exceptional human being who, like Jesus, haunts our liberal
theologians. It needs no symbolic representative who only
serves to confuse the issue. Such a symbol must be
recognized as superfluous and even dangerous because it
introduces into our “German” concept of
religion not only an alien element which, however sublime,
is nevertheless onesided, but also unacceptable Protestant
ethics. It is this which has caused modern man's alienation
from Christianity. Furthermore, such imposed ethics
contradict the duties, so deeply felt at the present time,
placed upon us by our own nature.
This is
certainly a passage of which I can make no proper sense. How
is one to come to terms with the way modern man thinks? That
is something difficult to understand when one's own thoughts
relate to reality. Drews continues:
All that is great and significant in the
Gospels is not lost to mankind even if there never was a
Jesus. The words attributed to him would then have come
from some other source. In any case, our salvation cannot
be dependent on whether there was a Jesus or not. Regarding
Jesus as principle of salvation draws in its wake not only
the whole dualistic metaphysics of Palestinian Judaism,
which is incompatible with the modern spirit, but also
makes religion inseparable from history. It introduces
vague opinions and brings forward doubtful historical
events as proof of external religious manifestations. The
“German” religion of the God-man is not only a
religion of freedom, but a religion of the most individual
and deepest inwardness. It will no sooner have entered life
than we shall be free both of external Church functions
with their subsidiary demands, but also of Jesus Christ. As
Fichte said: “It is through metaphysics, not history,
that salvation is obtained! And metaphysics knows of no
Jesus Christ.”
It would be
well if people become conscious of the fact that without
spiritual knowledge modern education leads logically to such
a conclusion. To present a different result would be a
compromise and therefore dishonest. If this were recognized
spiritual science would not be seen as something arbitrarily
introduced at the present time, but as the answer to the
deepest and truest needs of the human soul.
Since the year
1413 after the Mystery of Golgotha, man has lived in the
fifth post-Atlantean epoch during which through human
evolution he becomes ever more estranged from the spiritual
world. We can find our connection with spirituality only
through impulses that are no longer provided by man's bodily
nature but are innate in the soul itself. People today
succumb to the kind of abstractions I have described because
as yet they are not sufficiently permeated by Christianity to
sense the soul's necessity of union with the spiritual world.
That is why nowadays all concepts, all ideas are abstract.
Truly they go together — today's unchristian attitude
and the unreality and abstraction of ideas. Indeed our
concepts and ideas will remain unreal unless we learn to
permeate them once more with the spirit, the spirit in which
Christ lives. Through Him our concepts will again become as
living and real as those of the ancient Indian patriarchs who
through their personalities made concrete and effective what
was instituted as rights and laws. Our rights and laws are
themselves abstract. When a bridge is built and it collapses,
one soon realizes that its construction was based on wrong
concepts. In society such connections are not so easily
detected; all kinds of incompetence may be practiced. The
result reveals itself only in the unhappiness people suffer
in times such as ours. When a bridge collapses, one blames
the engineer who built it. When misfortune overtakes mankind
because the inadequate concepts of those in charge are
incapable of intervening in events, then one blames all kinds
of things. However, what ought to be blamed, or rather
recognized, is the circumstance that we are going through a
crisis in which people no longer have any true sense as to
whether a concept has any connection with reality or not.
I would like to
give you an example taken from external nature to illustrate
once more the distinction between concepts that are connected
with reality and those that are not. If you take a crystal
and think of it as a hexagonal prism, closed above and below
by hexagonal pyramids, then you have a concept of a quartz
crystal that is connected with the reality, because that is
true of the crystal's form and existence. If on the other
hand you form a concept of a flower without roots, you have
an unreal concept, for without roots a flower cannot live,
cannot have an existence in reality. Someone who does not
strive to make his thoughts correspond to reality will regard
the flower torn off at the stem as just as real as the quartz
crystal, but that is untrue. It is not possible for someone
who thinks in accordance with reality to form a mental
picture of a flower without roots. People will have to learn
anew to form concepts that correspond to reality. A tree
which has been uprooted is no longer a reality to which the
concept tree corresponds. To feel the uprooted tree as a
reality is to feel an untruth, for it cannot live, but
withers and dies if not rooted in the earth. There you have
the difference.
No one whose
thinking corresponds to reality could suggest, as professor
Dewar does, that it is possible to calculate by means of
experiments how the world will end.
[ Note 9 ]
Such speculations are
always unreal. It must become habit to train one's thinking
to correspond to things as they truly are, otherwise one's
thoughts about the spiritual world will be mere fantasy. One
must be able to distinguish the concept of a living entity
from that of a lifeless one, otherwise one cannot have true
concepts of the spiritual world. One's thoughts remain unreal
if a tree without roots, or a geological stratum by itself
— for it can exist only if there are other strata lying
below as well as above — is regarded as true reality.
Those who think the way geologists or physicists and
especially biologists do are not formulating real thoughts.
Biologists think of a tooth, for example, as if it could
exist on its own. Today, spiritual science apart, it is only
in the realm of art — though not in pure realism
— that one finds any understanding for the fact that
the reality or unreality of something can depend on whether
that to which it belongs is present or not.
These examples
are taken from the external physical world, but today other
spheres, such as national economy and political science in
particular, suffer from unreal thoughts. I have pointed out
the impossibility of the political science outlined by
Kjellen in his book
The State as a Form of Life.
[ Note 10 ]
You know that I
have great respect for Kjellen. His book is both widely read
and highly praised, but if some aspect of natural science had
been written about in a similar way, the author would have
been laughed at. One may get away with writing in that way
about the state, but not about a crocodile. Not a single
concept in Kjellen's book is thought through
realistically.
It is essential
that man develop a sense for the kind of thoughts that do
relate to reality; only then will he be able to recognize the
kind of concepts and ideas capable of bringing order into
society. Just think how essential it is that we acquire
concepts enabling us to understand people living on Russian
soil. Remarkably little is done to reach such understanding.
What is thought about the Russian people, whether here or in
the West or in Central Europe, is very far from the truth. A
few days ago I read an article which suggested that Russians
still have to some extent the more mystical approach to life
of the Middle Ages, whereas since then in the West and in
Central Europe intellectuality has become widespread. The
article makes it clear that the Russian people should begin
to acquire the intellectuality which other European peoples
have had the good fortune to attain. The writer concerned has
not the slightest inkling that the character of the Russian
people is utterly different. People nowadays are not inclined
to study things as they truly are. The sense is lacking for
the reality, the truth, contained in things.
[ Note 11 ]
One of our
friends made the effort to bring together what I have written
about Goethe in my books with what I said in a lecture
concerning human and cosmic thoughts.
[ Note 12 ]
From this material he produced a book in Russian, a remarkable
book already published.
[ Note 13 ]
I am convinced it will be widely read in Russia by a certain
section of the public. Were it to be translated into German
or any other European language, people would find it deadly
boring. This is because they lack the sense for appreciating
the finely chiseled thoughts, the wonderful conceptual
filigree work that makes this book so striking.
What is so
remarkable about the Russian character is that as it evolves
something will emerge which is different from what has
emerged in the rest of Europe where mysticism and
intellectuality exist, as it were, apart. In Russia a
mysticism will appear which is intellectual in character and
an intellectuality which is based on mysticism. Thus it will
be something quite new, intellectual mysticism, mystical
intellectuality and, if I may put it so, quite equal to its
task. This is something that is not understood at all. It is
there nevertheless, though hidden within the chaos of Eastern
Europe, and will emerge expressing the characteristics I have
briefly indicated.
These things
can be understood only if one has a feeling for the reality
inherent in ideas. To acquire this sense, this feeling that
ideas are realities is one of the most urgent needs of the
present time. Without it abstract programs will continue to
be devised, beautiful political speeches held about all kinds
of measures to be taken which prove unproductive, though they
need not be. Nor can there be any feeling for events in
history which when followed up, can be an immense help when
it comes to understanding our own time.
Let me give you
a characteristic example. Concern about the problems facing
mankind at the present time causes one to turn repeatedly to
events that took place in the 18th century, particularly in
the '60s of that century. At that time remarkable impulses
were emerging in Europe. An attempt to understand them can be
most instructive. As you know that was when the Seven Years
War took place. England and France were deeply divided,
mainly through their colonial rivalry in North America. In
Europe, England and Prussia were allies; opposing them was
the alliance consisting of France and Austria. In Russia a
strong hostility prevailed against Prussia during the reign
of Czarina Elizabeth. Therefore one should really speak of an
alliance between Russia, France and Austria against Prussia
and England. One could say that on a smaller scale conditions
were similar to those of today; just as now there was then a
danger of complete chaos in Europe. In fact, when the
situation in the early 1760s is investigated, it is found to
be not unlike the present one in 1917. But the remarkable
incident I want to mention is the following.
I believe it
was on January the fifth, 1762, that Czarina Elizabeth died;
or to put it as the historians have done, her life, not very
often sober, had come to an end; she had spent most of it
inebriated. The Czarina Elizabeth was dead, and her nephew,
her sister's son, stood before those authorized to place the
crown upon his head. It was an extraordinary person who, on
January the fifth 1762, prepared himself to be elevated to
Czar. He was clad in his regiment's ceremonial uniform,
consisting of green jacket with red collar and cuffs, yellow
waistcoat and stockings, leggings to above the knee (he had
already as Grand Duke made a habit of never bending the knees
when walking as this, to him, seemed more dignified) long
pigtail, two powdered coils, a hat with upturned brim, and as
his symbol he carried a knobbed staff. As you know, his
consort was Catherine, later to become Catherine the Great.
History describes Czar Peter III as an immature young man.
[ Note 14 ]
It is extraordinarily difficult to ascertain what kind of person
he actually was. Very probably he was very immature, even
backward. He became Czar at a significant moment in the
history of Europe. At his side was a woman who already as a
seven year old girl had written in her diary that there was
nothing she desired more than to become the absolute ruler of
the Russian people. Her dream was to become ruler in her own
right. And she seemed to be proud that for the sake of direct
succession she need never bear a child that was necessarily
that of her husband, the Czar. When he became ruler, the war
had been going on for a long time; everybody longed for
peace. Peace would be a blessing if only it could be
attained.
What happened
next was that already in February — that is, soon after
the feeble-minded Peter III had ascended to the throne of the
Czars — all the European powers received a Russian
manifesto. This event was very remarkable, and I would like
to read to you a literal translation. The manifesto was sent
to the embassies in Austria, France, Sweden and Saxony.
Saxe-Coburg was at that time part of Poland. The document
reads as follows:
His Imperial Majesty, who through good
fortune ascended to the throne of his forebears, regards
his first duty to be promotion and increase of the welfare
of his subjects. It is therefore with great sorrow that he
Witnesses the present war which has already lasted six
years and is an immense burden to all the countries
involved. Far from showing any signs of coming to an end,
it is, to the misfortune of all the nations, spreading ever
further the longer it lasts. The suffering of humanity
through this calamity is all the greater because of the
uncertainty concerning the outcome, which shows no sign of
lessening. In these circumstances, out of humanitarian
feelings and compassion for the useless spilling of
innocent blood, his Imperial Majesty on his part wishes to
put an end to this evil. He therefore finds it necessary to
turn to Russia's allies reminding them that God's first
commandment to sovereigns, namely the preservation of the
people entrusted to them, must take precedence over all
other considerations. They on their part would wish to
secure the peace so necessary and valuable to them also,
and at the same time to contribute as much as is possible
to see peace established in the whole of Europe. To this
purpose His Majesty is prepared to sacrifice the conquests
made in this war by Russian forces. His Majesty hopes that
the allies on their part will consider the return of peace
a greater benefit than anything they could expect to obtain
through a prolonged war and further bloodshed. Out of the
best and deepest feelings his Imperial Majesty advises all
to devote their best forces to achieve so great and
beneficial an objective. St. Petersburg, February 23,
1762.
I do wonder if
anywhere today there is a true feeling for the fact that this
manifesto is absolutely concrete, is based completely on
reality. One should be able to sense that it is a document
that carries the conviction of truth. However, the diplomatic
notes sent in answer to the manifesto are all declarations
written more or less in the same vein as are today's
declarations concerned with the entente, especially the ones
sent by Woodrow Wilson. Everything in these diplomatic notes
is utterly abstract with no relation to reality, whereas what
I just now read to you, written on the 23rd of February 1762,
is in a style of a different order, and contains something
quite remarkable, all the more so in view of the Czar's
condition, which I described to you. There must have been
someone with power behind the scenes, with a sense for the
reality of the situation, who could cause this action to be
taken. Later, when the abstract replies had reached Russia
— replies containing the same kind of abstractions as
those used today, like “peace, free from
annexation” or “freedom for the people”
— Peter, the feeble-minded, sent an answer delivered by
the Russian envoy, Count Gallitzin, to the Court in Vienna on
the 9th of April. Listen to what it contains:
The friendship which has existed between
the Russian Imperial Court and the Prussian Royal Court
ever since the time of Czar Peter I has lately suffered a
setback merely through accidental changes in the
constitution of Europe. The war which is a result of these
changes can neither last forever nor destroy the advantage
of a friendship which for many years proved to be a useful
confederation and could be so again. His Imperial Majesty
therefore proposes to the King of Prussia that they
conclude not only a lasting peace, but a treaty of alliance
in their mutual interest and to their mutual advantage.
Please note the stroke of genius in what
follows:
The reason for these deliberations on
the part of his Russian Imperial Majesty is obvious and
needs no lengthy explanation, as it is easy enough to
demonstrate that no good can come of a general peace such
as was concluded in Westphalia. Peace cannot be expected to
last when there is an unending shifting of arms and such
variety of intentions. Such a peace necessitates all
conquered territories to be protected, as is the case in
Westphalia. But now the matter hinges on pretentions which
have only arisen out of the war. These can hardly be
reconciled due to the eagerness early in the war to
mobilize as many powers as possible with little
consideration for possible consequences of hastily
concluded treaties and amalgamations.
One cannot
imagine a more ingenious diplomatic document. Think about it
— if only somebody could recognize now that the
pretentions made today have only arisen because of this war!
The document continues:
The Russian Imperial Court alone has
always insisted that, before a general congress is
arranged, it is necessary that conflicting interests and
demands are reconciled. It would appear that the Sovereign
Court in Vienna also recognizes this, and therefore never
directly answered the Russian Imperial communique. The
Sovereign Court made only brief reference to points that
were in its favor, passing over others in silence
preferring, it would seem, to await possible fortunes with
arms. ... The war that has since broken out between England
and Spain only increases the general misery. Although it
engages England at sea, it does nothing to lessen the war
in Germany. Sweden is without hope and is suffering losses;
her glory waning, she seems to have courage neither to
continue the war nor to withdraw from it. The Sovereign
Courts all appear to be waiting to see who will be the
first to make a decisive move towards establishing peace.
His Russian Imperial Majesty alone is ready to do so,
through compassion and also in view of the complaisance
shown by his majesty the King of Prussia. His Imperial
Majesty wishes to take the necessary steps at the earliest
possible moment, especially as this intention was
communicated to all the Sovereign Courts as early as the
23rd of February, soon after the start of his reign.
Peace was
established, and indeed as a result of what was initiated
with this concrete document based on reality. It is of the
greatest importance that a sense is developed for what
history conveys, a feeling for the difference between
concepts and ideas that are incapable of intervening in
reality, and those that are themselves rooted deeply in
reality and therefore have the power to affect it. One should
not imagine that words are always mere words; they can be as
effective as deeds if based on reality. It must be realized
that mankind is going through a crisis. It is all-important
that a new path, a new connection, be found to truth and
reality. People are so alienated from what is real that they
have lost the sense for truth and for the right way of
dealing with things. It is important to see that the crisis
we are in and the untruthfulness that abounds are related.
Let me give you one small example: a periodical has appeared,
calling itself
The Invisible Temple,
obviously a publication in which those inclined towards mysticism
expect to find something very deep.
“The Invisible Temple”
— Oh, the depth of it! Subtitle?
A Monthly Magazine for the Gathering of Spirits.
[ Note 15 ]
I will say no more
on that point, but in one issue monists and theosophists are
mentioned. Various foolish things are said, including a
passage I will read. The periodical is the mouthpiece for a
society which is at present led by Horneffer.
[ Note 16 ]
The society claims it is
going to renew the world.
This is the
passage:
Monists and theosophists may go in
different directions; they may vigorously fight and despise
one another; yet in one respect they are strangely alike.
Both lay claim to the word “science.” Both
insist that their pursuit is true science, and that
everybody else's science is pseudo-science. You will find
this stated in the writings of Haeckel as well as of Rudolf
Steiner.
I request you
to go through everything I have said or written and see if
you can find anything of what is here maintained. But who
today is prepared in a case like this to call something by
its right name, and say that it is an outright lie, and a
common one at that. That Horneffer should write such things
comes as no surprise. When he published Nietzsche's works, I
had to point out to him that he did not have the faintest
understanding of Nietzsche. What he had compiled and
published was rubbish. So what he writes now is no surprise.
But people take such things seriously, and thus it comes
about that the worst, most stupid foolishness is confused and
mixed up with the earnest striving of spiritual science, and
worse still, what is-truth is called lies, whereas lies are
accepted as truth.
It must be
learned that a new link to reality has to be found. In the
first post-Atlantean cultural epoch the patriarchs when they
reached their fifties, received the spirit into themselves as
part of their natural development. We may ask if this has in
any way remained through the Greek epoch up to our own? The
answer is that all that has remained is what we call genius.
When the faculty of genius appears today it is still to some
extent dependent on man's natural development. However, the
men of genius appearing during the fifth cultural epoch will
be the last in earth evolution. It is important to know that
no genius will appear in the future. We must face the fact
that as a natural gift the faculty of genius will disappear.
Instead, a new quality of originality will appear, a quality
that no longer appears as a gift of nature but must be
striven for. It will arise through man's intimate union with
the spirituality that reveals itself in the outer world.
A very
interesting man, a psychologist, died in March, 1917. I have
often spoken about Franz Brentano.
[ Note 17 ]
He was not only the most
significant expert on Aristotle, but a characteristic thinker
of our time. I have mentioned before that he began a work on
psychology. The first volume appeared in 1874; the second was
to appear that same fall and further volumes later. But
neither the one expected in the fall nor any later volumes
appeared. I became thoroughly familiar with Franz Brentano's
characteristic way of lecturing when I lived in Vienna. I
have read every published line of what he has written, so I
am well acquainted with the direction of his thoughts.
Because I know him so well I am convinced that Franz
Brentano's innate honesty prevented him from publishing
further volumes. There are clear indications already in the
first volume of his struggle to reach a clear conclusion
regarding immortality of the soul. However, without spiritual
science — with which he would have nothing to do
— he could not get beyond the first volume, let alone
the fifth, in which he planned to furnish proof of the soul's
immortality. There was no room for science of the spirit in
his outlook. He is, in fact, the originator of the saying so
much quoted by 19th-century philosophers: “Vera
philosophiae methodus nulla alia nisi scientiae naturalis
est” (”True science of the spirit can have no
other method of research than natural science.”)
[ Note 18 ]
He composed this
sentence for his inauguration thesis when in 1866, having
left the Dominican order, he became professor at the
university at Wurzburg. Philosophy was already then rather
scorned. The first time he entered the auditorium, where
formerly a follower of Baader
[ Note 19 ]
had lectured, he was met with slogans such as “sulfur
factory” written on the walls.
Franz Brentano
was a gifted man, and he worked out his chosen subject as far
as it was possible for him to do. The reason he came to a
standstill after the first volume of his intended work was
his refusal to enter into spiritual science. His later
writings are fragments. But one treatise, a rendering of one
of his lectures, is extremely interesting. It is entitled
Genius. Although he was a keen observer he was not
someone able to ascend from physical observations to
spiritual ones. The treatise is basically an attack on the
idea of genius. He opposes the idea that from some
unconscious strata of the soul could arise what is called
genius. He argues that what comes to expression is just a
quicker, more commanding grasp of things than is normally
attained by ordinary people. As I said, Brentano's treatise
is very interesting although he did not come to a
spiritual-scientific viewpoint. He was a keen observer and
for that very reason could not find, when observing life
today, anything to justify the claim of genius. And because
he was honest he opposed the idea.
The riddle of
genius, among other things, remains inexplicable till one
investigates the deeper aspects of mankind's evolution,
unless one knows that in the future, what has been known as
“genius” will be replaced in certain people by a
new way of communion with the spiritual world. When they
achieve this, they will receive impulses which will come to
expression in the external world in ways that will be
equivalent to what was created by geniuses in the past. To
recognize that things were different in the past and will be
different again in the future is to understand evolution
rightly.
I know full
well that one is ridiculed for saying such things, but they
are the result of direct observation of concrete facts. They
are also a contrast to the way people nowadays base their
actions not on facts but on some idea with which they have
become enamored. To give an example, a man concerned with
healing got the idea that movement is good for certain
illnesses, which is quite true. However, someone consulted
him who had a complaint which the practitioner thought would
benefit from movement. He recommended that the patient take
plenty of exercise, to which he got the reply: “Forgive
me, but you must have forgotten that I am a postman.”
One must recognize that concepts are only the tool, not the
reality, and also that one must never be dogmatic. I have
sometimes referred to another unreal concept, frequently
acted upon when it is said: “the best man in the right
place!”— whereupon it is immediately found that
one's nephew or son-in-law is the best man! What matters are
the facts as they truly are, not the idea one is in love
with. Unless a feeling for these things is acquired one will
fail to learn what is to be learned from history, and fail
also to recognize the real issues in things and events around
one. And the possibility to find the Christ again will elude
one.
We shall
continue these considerations next week.
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