LECTURE V.
Dornach, 1st April 1921.
If
we turn our attention to what we have often taken as the object
of esoteric study, to what is described in my books,
“Theosophy,”
“Occult Science,”
and others, as the principles of the human being, and if we
consider this somewhat generally and. externally, we can
look on the one hand towards all that can be called the forces,
the faculties, of the human intellect. To be sure, what we
comprise under the faculties of the intellect includes
something entirely different from what we have described
as the principles of man. But precisely through such studies as
call our attention to various concepts and ideas from other
points of view, we shall advance in our studies. Thus we see on
the one hand activities of a more intellectual order of the
human soul and spirit life, and we see on the other hand the
activities of the soul and spirit life which are more applied
to the appetitive faculties, to the will. Today we will turn
our attention to these faculties with reference to mankind in
general, that is, we will ask ourselves: what significance have
the more intellectual forces, and what significance have the
forces of a will nature in the life of humanity as a whole? If
such a method of study is undertaken, it can only be fruitful
if one does not dissociate man and mankind from the earth, but
when one regards man as a member of the whole earth planet. The
justification for this you will discover through statements
which you find, for instance, in
“Occult Science”
concerning the Saturn, Sun and Moon evolutions of our
Earth.
When you remember what has been said there about the Saturn,
Sun and Moon evolutions you will see that the views there
differ from those of the modern geologist and natural
scientist, who consider the earth on the one hand geologically,
as if man had no connection with it at all, and then again,
mankind by itself in a kind of self-enclosed anthropology, as
if this mankind walked about on a soil quite foreign to it.
This is quite impossible as a really fruitful method of study.
When you follow what was said about the Saturn, Sun and Moon
evolution, you will see that in these evolutions the forces
which worked in humanity itself and the forces which worked in
the rest of the planet were not at all to be thought of as
separate. The fact that humanity has reached a certain
independence on the earth and walks about free of the planet,
as it were upon its surface, is a phase of evolution, it must
not be considered as a final standard. We must consider mankind
in connection with the whole of earthly evolution. And,
therefore, in the first place we must say to ourselves: if we
turn our attention to the intellectual faculties and remember
what has been said about the earlier metamorphoses, about the
Saturn, Sun and Moon metamorphoses of the Earth's evolution
then we arrive at the fact that this inner development of the
intellect, which man has today, was not in existence in former
stages of the Earth's development. What is today localised to
some extent in our head as intellect was spread over the whole
Earth planet as a universal intelligence, as an intelligence
working according to law, penetrating everything. One
could say that intelligence worked in the facts of the whole
Earth evolution. The human being himself on the Moon, to say
nothing of Saturn and Sun, had not yet, as we know, a
reasoning consciousness, but instead a kind of dreamlike
consciousness. This dreamlike consciousness looked out into the
cosmic phenomena and man did not say to himself, “Out
there the cosmic phenomena take place and I grasp them with my
reason,” but man dreamed in pictures. What we find today
localised in our head as intellect he saw as something which
interpenetrated external facts and objects. We
differentiate between the laws of nature and that which in us
comprehends these laws of nature, and this latter we call our
intelligence. The human being of earlier times, and that
applies also to the earlier parts of our Earth evolution, lived
in a soul-consciousness of pictures and he did not distinguish
the laws of nature by his intelligence, but Nature herself had
intelligence, Nature herself gave herself laws. There outside
worked intelligence. It is an evolutionary phase of our
humanity, now become independent, that we bear intelligence
within us and there, outside, are the laws of nature. The sum
total of these natural laws was the intelligence for the man of
antiquity.
Now, as Earth humanity we have, as you know, already developed
consciousness to a certain degree, so that intelligence
is within us and outside exist natural laws which we only grasp
with our intelligence. In pointing to these facts, we are
touching upon an important evolutionary impulse of mankind. But
we must be aware that this evolutionary impulse must be more
and more laid hold of and perfected. Today indeed it is not yet
fully perfected. We certainly say to ourselves that we have
intellect within us, and there, without, the laws of nature
hold sway, but we have not yet fully made intelligence our own.
As humanity we have remained half-way as regards this receiving
of intelligence, reason, natural law, into ourselves. And these
facts which I have been touching upon are amongst those which
above all must be examined from the standpoint of Spiritual
Science precisely in our times. Nowadays we are still
extraordinarily proud when we possess something of an
intellectual nature, something pertaining to human
knowledge in common with other people. Something still holds
good today which is cutting very deeply into the whole
development of human nature, namely, that science should be
cultivated as something universal, hovering over
humanity, as it were, and that when men devote themselves to
science they should bring their individuality as a sacrifice,
that they should think — well, as “everyone”
thinks. It is an ideal, for instance, in our public educational
institutions, to cultivate a science which is quite impersonal,
quite un-individual, to make this science into something in
respect of which one says “I” as little as
possible, and says “one” as much as possible.
“One” has discovered this or that,
“one” must accept this or that as true. And
the ideal of the official representative of science today would
be just this — that one should not really be able to
distinguish the separate professors very well — least of
all as regards temperament — when one arrives at a
college from another college far distant. It would be an ideal,
if one — shall we say? — could listen to a lecture
on botany somewhere in the north, then fly with a balloon
towards the south and could there hear the continuation of this
lecture, and if the continuation should correspond with what
“one” really knows in Botany! Something quite
impersonal, unindividual, it is this which people consider to
be the right thing, and they have a horrible dread lest somehow
or other anything personal should enter into this knowledge,
into this working of the human intellect. It is just in this
sphere that the levelling down of the whole of human culture is
considered as of chief importance. It is a source of pride if
one does not deviate from what has been formulated once
and for all in a certain method. Thus, people would like to
sunder science from man. It is separated from man also in still
many other relations, as we know. Examples could be given of
this. Just think how most men today who are connected in an
official way with science write their dissertations, their
professorial candidature treatises and so on. They put
themselves into them as little as possible, and least of all
they reckon with the fact that these books will be quite
generally read. They are written; but they are scarcely read by
those who have to test them in the college in question;
at the most someone reads them who is obliged to do so, and
then he tells the others what is contained in them. For
science is something about which “one” thinks, not
oneself personally. And then they are stored away in libraries.
When someday someone or other writes a similar book he looks in
the library catalogue and sees where he can find anything he
must pay attention to and then that is stored away again, end
enters least of all into the individual-personal. All of that
is cut off. Yes, my dear friends, countless books abound in the
libraries which have no personal interest at all. This is after
all a dreadful situation. But what is worse, people have
not the least idea of it, and feel quite satisfied, believing
that they themselves do not need to know anything at all, for
in the libraries you can find everything, if you only get the
right catchword in the catalogue. There things rest. But men
are withering away beside a science which is so unindividual.
Science would have to be looked at differently if people wanted
to keep it in their heads instead of on the library
shelves.
This gives one through a few holes — so to say —
for one could bring forward many things along these lines, an
indication of how the ordinary intellectual culture in modern
men is still unindividual, impersonal, how they would like to
have it as something which carries on a sort of cloud existence
above them. But what is brought about by man belongs not only
to man, but to the cosmos. I have therefore said that in order
to come to fruitful reflections, we must regard man in
connection with the planet, and then again, the planet in
connection with the whole universe.
What man brings about, therefore, by using his intellect he can
deal with in two directions. He can exert it by developing
sciences which all end in “one” thinks,
“one” knows, “one” has attained these
or those improvements. Then one writes it down in books and
stores it away, then that is science, which the
generations outgrow, and men can wither away with such a
cultivation of the intellect. People can take the line of
looking to many other things for their real interests but
certainly not to what is an unreality, objective, with no
personal touch, preserved in libraries — this they do not
meddle with. One has known of learned assemblies who had a
phrase, “one who is fond of talking shop”
(Fachsimpeln). To gather in small circles and discuss
scientific matters when there was an official assembly was
considered as of far the least importance. Oh, no, one spoke
there of all sorts of trivialities, lying far removed from
anything that was really a matter of science. And those who had
the weakness of being somewhat enthusiastic about their science
and who then — shall we say? — when tea or black
coffee was being drunk, began perhaps to speak of this or that
philosophical subject, those were people who talked
“shop,” whom one couldn't take quite seriously
— who had not the mind of a man of the world.
I
once encountered this lack of the personal in science in a very
singular way. I attended an assembly where Helmholtz was giving
a. lecture. At this lecture, which was read aloud word for word
by Helmholtz and which had already been in print for some time,
the audience listened to its being read — well, as one
does listen to such a lecture. After the lecture, a
journalist came up to me and said — “Why exactly
that? One does not need that at all. Anyone can read such a
lecture, who wants to, when it has been printed, why should it
be read aloud to us as well? It would have been far more
sensible if Helmholtz had simply walked about in the auditorium
and given his hand to everyone. That would have done much more
good.” That is a very true example of how estranged
people are from what is flying about so impersonally as
science. Naturally people are being dried up by it. This, then,
is one way in which intellectual culture can be grasped.
The
other method is this; to interest oneself in every single
thing, so that one's mind catches fire and brings new life into
science and the details are recast into living concepts, so to
grasp everything that it is received from the first moment with
the inner life of feeling. Thus, one can really imbue with an
inner fire all that is given by science. By taking the various
sciences one can gradually penetrate into the whole world
existence, one can create something which becomes an innately
personal concern of every human being who pursues it. That is
the other method. On the one side impersonal, all that is
carried on being cut off from humanity — in fact people
would greatly prefer to find automatons for the pursuit
of science. Then they would have nothing more to reflect upon
with their own heads, for perhaps they would be
productive without them. But all that happens in this way, or
all that may happen from a fully heartfelt pursuit of science,
is indeed not merely the concern of mankind, it is the
concern of the whole planet and therewith of the whole
universe. For what a man does, inasmuch as he cultivates
something of an intellectual nature with his head, is just as
much an event as when the water of a spring flows under the
stream to the sea, or as when evaporation takes place, or it
rains. What happens when plants sprout and so on, those are
events of the one sort. What happens through the agency of man
is an event of another sort. It is not merely a human concern,
it is a concern of the whole planet. And this is precisely the
task of man in his evolution on the earth — for the
intelligence which formerly was poured out in common with the
whole planet, to be drawn within by man, to be united with
himself. Thus it is an evolutionary impulse of man to make
knowledge his own personal concern, so that he can imbue it
with enthusiasm, so that it can pass over into him and be
seized by the fire of his heart. And if he does not do the
latter, if he stores up knowledge in impersonal ways, then
something does not happen which ought to happen in the sense of
the Earth's evolution. The feeling nature of nan is not
seized by the culture of the intellect» The intellectual
culture only develops in the head, as it were, and hovers too
far away from the surface of the earth, merely in our heads. It
makes no difference if many people are short, and their heads
only reach about to the hearts of others, it develops only in
the heads, and it ought to sink down to the hearts. But lying
in wait for what is thus not taken in by the heart, what is not
seized by the feeling nature of man, are the Luciferic spirits.
And this for which the Luciferic spirits are thus waiting can
be received by them when it hovers thus impersonally
above the earth. For the only possibility of wresting the world
of intellect away from the Luciferic spirits is to imbue it
with feeling and make it a personal affair. And what is
happening in our age, and what has happened for a long time and
must become different, is that we are letting earthly existence
become the prey of the Luciferic world, by our cold, empty,
dried-up intellect. In this way the Earth is checked in her
evolution, and is held back at an earlier stage. She will not
arrive at her goal. And if man continues for a long time the
impersonality of so-called science, the consequence will be the
loss of the soul-nature altogether. This impersonal science is
the murderer of the human soul and spirit nature. It dries men
up, it withers them. Finally, it makes of the Earth something
that one can call a dead planet with automatic men on it, who
have lost their spirit and soul by these means. Here too one
must say: things must even now be taken in earnest; we must not
look on at this cosmic murder by the abstract impersonal
pursuit of knowledge on earth. That is one thing.
The
other is the human desire-nature, which is connected with the
will in man. What is connected with man's will-nature can again
take two directions. The one path is for this will-nature to
subordinate itself as much as possible to regulations or state
decrees, and to unite itself with what is a kind of general
law, so that this general law exists, and in addition there are
only man's purely instinctive desires.
The
other path is that what is reflected in man as desire, what is
present as will should gradually raise itself to pure thought,
expend itself in individual freedom so that it flows into the
social life as love. It is the method of transmuting the forces
of will and desire that I have described in the
“Philosophy of Spiritual Activity.”
There I have
shown how the common law of humanity must proceed from each
human individuality. I have described there how the social
order arises through the harmony of men's acts, when what
proceeds from the human individual is raised to pure thought.
Men are afraid of a social order which is formed by every
person giving himself his direction out of his own
individuality. People like to organise what men should want.
They like to establish categorical commands in the place of the
love working out of each human being. Through the
existence, however, of such abstract injunctions, whether
they are commands on the pattern of the Decalogue, or laws of
any individual State, then from out the individuality of man
only instinctive desires have a value, those desires which we
are seeing revive today especially, and which have become, as a
matter of fact, the sole social ingredient of the present time.
Again, that which happens in man when he does not make his will
individual, does not raise it to pure thinking, that is not
something affecting man alone, but it affects the whole planet
and therewith the cosmos. And what occurs when the human will
cannot become individual, this the Ahrimanic spirits are
greedily awaiting. They make it their own, these Ahrimanic
spirits, and they appropriate everything which lives in man of
a will-nature, by way of desires not unfolded to love, and
carry it over to individual demonic beings. Just as something
of a more universal nature arises through that which is
hovering over mankind as the intellectual faculty, so do
quite individually formed demonic beings arise out of the human
appetitive faculties not transformed into love.
And if there
were no striving on the part of the individuals towards a
community of freedom within the social order, the Earth would
have to fulfil her purpose with these beings, who would then be
individualised, but who would carry on an existence as
Ahrimanic spirits, and who would take away from the Earth the
possibility of evolving into the next planetary condition, the
Jupiter metamorphosis. Stated shortly, that would mean that the
abstract intellectuality of our planet would be perfected
towards the one side, would not let it come to completion, and
that which arises out of the will, not transmuted into love,
would create on the other side sheer individual beings. No less
than this is seen by one who sees into the beginnings of a
civilisation which is undermining the true progressive
development of the Earth. This is what such a seer sees being
formed today if no impediment is put in the way of the
impulses which on the one hand are now arising in the Western
world with such strength, and on the other hand developing so
forcibly in the Eastern world. What has proceeded purely out of
human subjectivity over there and is lying at the base of the
State culture, which has fallen into decadence, is something
which will actually mould the Earth's evolution in the
direction of individualised demons. And what is evolving in the
West is something which will sail along into a universal
standard of intellectuality and gradually make man into an
automaton. These things can plainly be seen in the construction
of these automatic machines, which are already here today
— partially. I say “partially” consciously,
for to be sure they are still to some extent very individual.
In many respects, one can see their automatic nature, but there
is something still left in these automatic machines which is at
the same time very individual. Something which is to be noticed
as an appendage to each of these separate automata, in which if
things aren't exactly in the form of banknotes, there's at any
rate a sound of gold and silver. But a. universal automatism
would also oblige the individual purse to become the general
communistic purse.
All
this is, however, something which must be regarded today not
with mere sympathy and antipathy alone, but with that sight
which looks through world events, which can observe what is
happening among men in connection with cosmic events. When one
sees things thus, one will say to oneself: it is given to man
to bring forward the planet wisely in its evolution. The
particular kind of existence which has been indicated today is
threatening humanity if men do not try to convert knowledge
into wisdom. And that can only come about if a man personally
applies himself to knowledge, if he takes it personally into
himself and binds it again to what, out of the desire nature
transmuted by love, becomes the common concern of humanity. One
can receive these things through Spiritual Science with a
strong impulse of inner understanding.
As
a matter of fact, it is shown in what has remained behind in
the Moon as a cosmic symbol. When we sec the Moon in its first
or last quarter, in what it shows us as its sickle form we have
a. picture of what the Earth could become. In the dark part, it
shows to one who can see the supersensible these little
demoniacal forms moving about in ghastly fashion, where the
curve of the sickle bends inwards. So that one is speaking
quite correctly in saying: man must preserve the Earth from the
Moon existence through all that I have now explained. The Moon
shows in a cosmic picture placed before us what the Earth could
become. And so we must accustom ourselves to penetrate in this
way with inner feeling into that too which we see outside in
the cosmos. We must so look upon the Moon that we can say: it
shows us something set up through cosmic evolution as a
caricature of the Earth existence, as what the Earth existence
can become if man does not learn to understand how to make
impersonal knowledge into his personal concern, if he does not
learn how, through warmth, to change individual desires into
love, through which they can develop into an associated social
life that is a common concern of the whole of mankind. One can
understand better what happens in the cosmos if one looks into
what is being accomplished in man, and conversely one can see
in the right way the tasks of mankind if one is able
consciously to look into the conditions of the cosmos. For they
are applicable also to that which should live in humanity
as morality, as ethics.
The
facts that are stated concerning Lucifer and Ahriman are not
meant to be taken in such a way that one should theorise about
them, that one should only say Ahriman is this, and
Lucifer is that. But one should so take up these ideas
into oneself that really one should see in all around the
activity of the Luciferic spirits who want to hold back the
Earth in earlier conditions. So too in all that is Ahriman one
should see something which would hold back the Earth so that it
does not advance to future stages. But one must penetrate
those things in detail. One must be able to value the moral in
relation to the laws of nature, and the laws of nature morally.
When that happens then the great bridge will be thrown
across between the moral world-concept and the theoretic
world-concept, of which bridge I have, as you know, often
spoken from this place.
Things which happen today must also he viewed from this
standpoint. For only when the free-will of man invades these
cosmic events can what has been indicated to you he turned to
good service. The further evolution of the world is in fact
entirely the task of man and of humanity. This must not be
overlooked. And one who only wants to theorise, who, for
instance, only wants to see and hears after so and so many
centuries or millennia this or that will happen — does
not consider that we are already living in a time when it is
given over to mankind to co-operate in the metamorphosis
of the earthly evolution; he does not consider that there must
be received into man's soul that which is the general
world-intelligence, nor that what lives individually in man as
the forces of desire must flow out from mankind in the form of
a universal love, which, however, is only attained through the
pure freedom of thought.
Herewith I have set before your mind's eye two streams of
culture, which are immensely important, and have sought in so
doing to show again from a certain aspect what is the task of
Spiritual Science when taken earnestly. The task lies in this
direction. It does not really lie in a few persons having
a feeling of well-being in the knowledge of this and that, but
it lies in so grasping human evolution that world events come
to pass in the true way out of humanity itself.
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