Lecture Two
KOBERWITZ,
10th June, 1924.
MY DEAR FRIENDS,
We shall spend the
first lectures gathering various items of knowledge, so as to
recognise the conditions on which the prosperity of Agriculture
depends. Thereafter we shall draw the practical conclusions, which
can only be realised in the immediate application and are only
significant when put into practice. In these first lectures you must
observe how all agricultural products arise; how Agriculture lives in
the totality of the Universe.
A farm is true to its
essential nature, in the best sense of the word, if it is conceived
as a kind of individual entity in itself — a self-contained
individuality. Every farm should approximate to this condition. This
ideal cannot be absolutely attained, but it should be observed as far
as possible. Whatever you need for agricultural production, you
should try to posses it within the farm itself (including in the
“farm,” needless to say, the due amount of cattle).
Properly speaking, any manures or the like which you bring into the
farm from outside should be regarded rather as a remedy for a sick
farm. That is the ideal. A thoroughly healthy farm should be able to
produce within itself all that it needs.
We shall see
presently why this is the natural thing. So long as one does not
regard things in their true essence but only in their outer material
aspect, the question may justifiably arise: Is it not a matter of
indifference whether we get our cow-dung from the neighbourhood or
from our own farm? But it is not so. Although these things may not be
able to be strictly carried out, nevertheless, if we wish to do
things in a proper and natural way, we need to have this ideal
concept of the necessary self-containedness of any farm.
You will recognise
the justice of this statement if you consider the Earth on the one
hand, from which our farm springs forth, and on the other hand, that
which works down into our Earth from the Universe beyond. Nowadays,
people are wont to speak very abstractly of the influences which work
on to the Earth from the surrounding Universe. They are aware, no
doubt, that the Sun's light and warmth, and all the meteorological
processes connected with it, are in a way related to the form and
development of the vegetation that covers the soil. But present-day
ideas can give no real information as to the exact relationships,
because they do not penetrate to the realities involved. We shall
have to consider the matter from various standpoints. Let us to-day
choose this one: let us consider, to begin with, the soil of the
Earth which is the foundation of all Agriculture.
I will indicate the
surface of the Earth diagramatically by this line (Diagram 2). The surface of the Earth is generally
regarded as mere mineral matter — including some organic
elements, at most, inasmuch as there is formation of humus, or manure
is added. In reality, however, the earthly soil as such not
only contains a certain life — a vegetative nature of its own
— but an effective astral principle as well; a fact
which is not only not taken into account to-day but is not even
admitted nowadays. But we can go still further. We must observe that
this inner life of the earthly soil (I am speaking of fine and
intimate effects) is different in summer and in winter. Here we are
coming to a realm of knowledge, immensely significant for practical
life, which is not even thought of in our time.
Taking our start from
a study of the earthly soil, we must indeed observe that the surface
of the Earth is a kind of organ in that organism which reveals itself
throughout the growth of Nature. The Earth's surface is a real organ,
which — if you will — you may compare to the human
diaphragm. (Though it is not quite exact, it will suffice us for
purposes of illustration). We gain a right idea of these facts if we
say to ourselves: Above the human diaphragm there are certain organs
— notably the head and the processes of breathing and
circulation which work up into the head. Beneath it there are other
organs.
If from this point of
view we now compare the Earth's surface with the human diaphragm,
then we must say: In the individuality with which we are here
concerned, the head is beneath the surface of the Earth, while
we, with all the animals, are living in the creature's belly!
Whatever is above the Earth, belongs in truth to the
intestines of the “agricultural individuality,” if we may
coin the phrase. We, in our farm, are going about in the belly of the
farm, and the plants themselves grow upward in the belly of the farm.
Indeed, we have to do with an individuality standing on its head. We
only regard it rightly if we imagine it, compared to man, as standing
on its head. With respect to the animal, as we shall presently see,
it is a little different.
Why do I say that the
agricultural individuality is standing on its head? For the following
reason. Take everything there is in the immediate neighbourhood of
the Earth by way of air and water vapours and even warmth. Consider,
once more, all that element in the neighbourhood of the Earth in
which we ourselves are living and breathing and from which the
plants, along with us, receive their outer warmth and air, and even
water. All this actually corresponds to that which would represent,
in man, the abdominal organs. On the other hand, that which takes
place in the interior of the Earth beneath the Earth's surface
— works upon plant-growth in the same way in which our head
works upon the rest of our organism, notably in childhood, but also
throughout our life. There is a constant and living mutual interplay
of the above-the-Earth and the below-the-Earth.
And now, to localise
these influences, I beg you to observe the following. The activities
above the Earth are immediately dependent on Moon, Mercury and Venus
supplementing and modifying the influences of the Sun. The so-called
“planets near the Earth” extend their influences to all
that is above the Earth's surface. On the other hand, the
distant planets — those that revolve outside the circuit of the
Sun — work upon all that is beneath the Earth's surface,
assisting those influences which the Sun exercises from below the
Earth. Thus, so far as plant-growth is concerned, we must look for
the influences of the distant Heavens beneath, and of the
Earth's immediate cosmic environment above the Earth's
surface.
Once more: all that
works inward from the far spaces of the Cosmos to influence the
growth of plants, works not directly — not by direct radiation
— but in this way: It is first received by the Earth, and the
Earth then rays it upward again. Thus, the influences that rise
upward from the earthly soil — beneficial or harmful for the
growth of plants — are in reality cosmic influences rayed back
again and working directly in the air and water over the Earth. The
direct radiation from the Cosmos is stored up beneath the Earth's
surface and works back from thence. Now these relationships determine
how the earthly soil, according to its constitution, works upon the
growth of plants. (We shall take plant-growth to begin with, and
afterwards extend it to the animals).
Consider the earthly
soil. To begin with, we have those influences that depend on the
farthest distances of the Cosmos — the farthest that come into
account for earthly processes. These effects are found in what is
commonly called sand and rock and stone. Sand and rock —
substances impermeable to water, which, in the common phrase,
“contain no foodstuffs” — are in reality no less
important than any other factors. They are most important for the
unfolding of the growth-processes, and they depend throughout on the
influences of the most distant cosmic forces. And above all —
improbable as it appears at first sight — it is through the
sand, with its silicious content, that there comes into the
Earth what we may call the life-ethereal and the
chemically influential elements of the soil. These influences
then take effect as they ray upward again from the Earth.
The way the soil
itself grows inwardly alive and develops its own chemical processes,
depends above all on the composition of the sandy portion of the
soil. What the plant-roots experience in the soil depends in no small
measure on the extent to which the cosmic life and cosmic chemistry
are seized and held by means of the stones and the rock, which may
well be at a considerable depth beneath the surface. Therefore,
wherever we are studying plant growth, we should be clear in the
first place as to the geological foundation out of which it arises.
For those plants in which the root-nature as such is important, we
should never forget that a silicious ground — even if it be
only present in the depths below — is indispensable. I would
say, thanks be to God that silica is very widespread on the Earth
— in the form of silicic acid, for instance, and in other
compounds. It constitutes 47-48% of the surface of the Earth, and for
the quantities we need we can reckon practically everywhere on the
presence of the silicic activity.
But that is not all.
All that is thus connected, by way of silicon, with the root-nature,
must also be able to be led upward through the plant. It must flow
upward. There must be constant interaction between what is drawn in
from the Cosmos by the silicon, and what takes place — forgive
me! —in the “belly” up above; for by the latter
process the “head” beneath must be supplied with what it
needs. The “head” is supplied out of the Cosmos, but it
must also be in mutual interaction with what is going on in the
“belly,” above the Earth's surface. In a word, that which
pours down from the Cosmos and is caught up beneath the surface must
be able to pour upward again. And for this purpose is the clayey
substance in the soil. Everything in the nature of clay is in
reality a means of transport, for the influences of cosmic entities
within the soil, to carry them upward again from below.
When we pass on to
practical matters, this knowledge will give us the necessary
indications as to how we must deal with a clayey soil, or with a
silicious soil, according as we have to plant it with one form of
vegetation or another. First we must know what is really happening.
However else clay may be described, however, else we may have to
treat it so as to make it fertile — all that, no doubt, is most
important in the second place, but the fast thing is to know that
clay is the carrier of the cosmic upward stream.
But this up-streaming
of the cosmic influences is not all. There is also the other process
which I may call the terrestrial or earthly — that process
which is going on in the “belly” and which depends on a
kind of external “digestion.” For plant-growth, in
effect, all that goes on through summer and winter in the air above
the Earth is essentially a kind of digestion. All that is thus taking
place through a kind of digestive process, must in its turn be drawn
downward into the soil. Thus a true mutual interaction will arise
with all the forces and fine homeopathic substances which are
engendered by the water and air above the Earth. All this is drawn
down into the soil by the greater or lesser limestone content
of the soil. The limestone content of the soil itself, and the
distribution of limestone substances in homeopathic dilution
immediately above the soil — all this is there to carry into
the soil the immediate terrestrial process.
In due time there
will be a science of these things — not the mere scientific
jargon of to-day — and it will then be possible to give exact
indications. It will be known, for instance, that there is a very
great difference between the warmth that is above the Earth's surface
that is to say, the warmth that is in the domain of Sun, Venus,
Mercury and Moon — and that warmth which makes itself felt
within the Earth; which is under the influence of Mars, Jupiter and
Saturn. For the plant, we may describe the one kind as
leaf-and-flower warmth, and the other as root warmth. These two
warmths are essentially different, and in this sense, we may well
call the warmth above the Earth dead, and that beneath the
Earth's surface living.
The warmth beneath
the Earth decidedly contains some inner principle of life. It is
alive; moreover in winter it is most of all alive. If we human beings
had to experience the warmth which works within the Earth, we should
all grow dreadfully stupid, for to be clever we need to have
dead warmth brought to our body. But the moment the warmth is
drawn into the Earth by the limestone-content of the soil, or by
other substantialities within the Earth — the moment any outer
warmth passes over into inner warmth — it is changed into a
certain condition of vitality, however delicate.
People to-day are
well aware that there is a difference between the air above the soil
and the air within, but they do not observe that there is also this
difference between the warmth above and within. They know that the
air beneath the surface contains more carbonic acid, and the air
above, more oxygen, but again they do not know the reason. The reason
is that the air too is permeated by a delicate vitality the moment it
is absorbed and drawn into the Earth.
So it is both with
the warmth and with the air; they take on a slightly living quality
when they are received into the Earth. The opposite is true of the
water and of the solid earthy element itself. They become still more
dead inside the Earth than they are outside it. They lose something
of their external life. Yet in this very process they become open to
receive the most distant cosmic forces.
The mineral
substances must emancipate themselves from what is working
immediately above the surface of the Earth, if they wish to be
exposed to the most distant cosmic forces. And in our cosmic age they
can most easily do so — they can most easily emancipate
themselves from the Earth's immediate neighbourhood and come under
the influence of the most distant cosmic forces down inside the Earth
—in the time between the 15th January and the 15th February; in
this winter season. The time will come when such things are
recognised as exact indications. This is the season when the
strongest formative-forces of crystallisation, the strongest forces
of form, can be developed for the mineral substances within the
Earth. It is in the middle of the winter. The interior of the Earth
then has the property of being least dependent on itself — on
its own mineral masses; it comes under the influence of the
crystal-forming forces that are there in the wide spaces of the
Cosmos.
This then is the
situation. Towards the end of January the mineral substances of the
Earth have the greatest longing to become crystalline, and the deeper
we go into the Earth, the more they have this longing to become
purely crystalline within the “household of Nature.” In
relation to plant growth, what happens in the minerals at this time
is most of all indifferent, or neutral. That is to say, the plants at
this time are most left to themselves within the Earth; they are
least exposed to the mineral substances. On the other hand, for a
certain time before and after this period — and notably
before it, when the minerals are, so to speak, just on the
point of passing over into the crystalline element of form and shape
— then they are of the greatest importance; they ray out the
forces that are particularly important for plant-growth.
Thus we may say,
approximately in the month of November-December, there is a point of
time when that which is under the surface of the Earth becomes
especially effective for plant-growth. The practical question is:
“How can we really make use of this for the growth of
plants?” The time will come when it is recognised, how very
important it is to make use of these facts, so as to be able to
direct the growth of plants. I will observe at once, if we are
dealing with a soil which does not readily or of its own accord carry
upward the influences which should be working upward in this winter
season, then it is well to add a dose of clay to the soil. (I shall
indicate the proper dose later on). We thereby prepare the soil to
carry upward what, to begin with, is inside the Earth and make it
effective for the growth of plants. I mean, the crystalline forces
which we observe already when we look out over the crystallising
snow. (The force of crystallisation, however, grows stronger and more
intense the farther we go into the interior of the Earth). This
crystallising force must therefore be carried upward at a time when
it has not yet reached its culminating point — which it will
only attain in January or February.
Thus we derive the
most positive hints from knowledge which at first sight seems remote.
We get indications that will really help us, where we should
otherwise be experimenting in the dark.
Altogether, we should
be clear that the whole domain of Agriculture — including what
is beneath the surface of the Earth — represents an
individuality, a living organism, living even in time. The life of
the Earth is especially strong during the winter season, whereas in
summer-time it tends in a certain sense to die.
Now for the tilling
of the soil one important thing should above all be understood. I
have often mentioned it among anthroposophists. It is this. We must
know the conditions under which the cosmic spaces are able to pour
their forces down into the earthly realm. To recognise these
conditions, let us take our start from the seed-forming process. The
seed, out of which the embryo develops, is usually regarded as a very
complicated molecular structure, and scientists are especially
anxious to understand it in its complex molecular structure. In
simple molecules, they imagine, there is a simple structure; then it
grows ever more complicated, till at last we get to the infinitely
complex structure of the protein molecule.
With wonder and
astonishment they stand before what they imagine as the complicated
structure of the protein in the seed. For they conceive it as
follows. They think the protein molecule must be extremely
complicated; for after all, out of its complexity, the whole new
organism will grow. The new organism, infinitely complex as it is,
was already pre-figured in the embryonic condition of the seed.
Therefore this microscopic or ultra-microscopic substance must also
be infinitely complex in its structure.
To begin with, to a
certain extent this is quite true. When the earthly protein is built
up, the molecular structure is indeed raised to the highest
complexity. But a new organism could never arise out of this
complexity. The organism does not arise out of the seed in that way
at all. That which develops as the seed, out of the mother-plant or
mother-animal, does not by any means simply continue its existence in
that which afterwards arises as the descendant plant or animal. That
is not true. The truth is rather this:—
When the complexity
of structure has been enhanced to the highest degree, it all
disintegrates again, and eventually, where we first had the highest
complexity attained within the Earth-domain, we now have a tiny realm
of chaos. It all disintegrates, as we might say, into cosmic
dust. Then, when the seed — having been raised to the highest
complexity — has fallen asunder into cosmic dust and the tiny
realm of chaos is there, then the entire surrounding Universe begins
to work and stamps itself upon the seed, thus building up out of the
tiny chaos that which can only be built in it by forces pouring in
from the great Universe from all sides (Diagram
No. 4). So in the seed we get an image of the Universe.
In every
seed-formation, the earthly process of organisation is carried to the
very end — to the point of chaos. Time and again, in the chaos
of the seed the new organism is built up again out of the whole
Universe. The parent organism has to play this part: through its
affinity to a particular cosmic situation, it tends to bring the seed
into that situation whereby the forces work from the right cosmic
directions, so that a dandelion brings forth, not a barberry, but a
dandelion in its turn.
That which is imaged
in the single plant, is always the image of some cosmic
constellation. Ever and again, it is built out of the Cosmos.
Therefore, if ever we want to make the forces of the Cosmos effective
in our earthly realm, we must drive the earthly as far as possible
into a state of chaos. For plant-growth, Nature herself will see to
it to some extent, that this is done. However, since every new
organism is built out of the Cosmos, it is also necessary for us to
preserve the cosmic process in the organism long enough — that
is, until the seed-forming process occurs once more.
Say we plant the seed
of some plant in the Earth. Here in this seed we have the stamp or
impress of the whole Cosmos — from one cosmic aspect or
another. The constellation takes effect in the seed; thereby it
receives its special form. Now, the moment it is planted in the
Earth-realm, the external forces of the Earth influence it very
strongly, and it is permeated every moment with a longing to deny the
cosmic process — that is to say, to grow hypertrophied, to grow
out in all manner of directions. For that which is working above the
Earth does not really want to preserve this form.
The seed must be
driven to the state of chaos. On the other hand, when the first
beginnings of the plant are unfolding out of the seed, and at the
later stages also — over against the cosmic form which is
living as the plant-form in the seed we need to bring the earthly
element into the plant. We must bring the plant nearer to the Earth
in its growth. And this we can only do by bringing into the life of
the plant such life as is already present on the Earth. That is to
say, we must bring into it life that has not yet reached the utterly
chaotic state — life that has not yet gone forward to the stage
of seed-formation — life, that is to say, which came to an end
in the organisation of some plant before it reached the point of
seed-formation.
In effect, we must
bring into it such life as is already present on the Earth. In this
respect, in districts which are well-favoured by fortune, a rich
humus-formation comes very largely to man's assistance in
“Nature's household.” For in the last resort man can but
sparingly replace by artificial means the fertility the Earth itself
is able to achieve by natural humus-formation. To what is this
transformation due? It is due to the fact that that which comes from
the plant-life is absorbed by the whole Nature-process. To some
extent, all life that has not yet reached the state of chaos rejects
the cosmic influences. If such life is also made use of in the
plant's growth, the effect is to hold fast in the plant what is
essentially earthly. The cosmic process works only in the stream
which passes upward once more to the seed-formation; while on the
other hand the earthly process works in the unfolding of leaf,
blossom and so on, and the cosmic only radiates its influences into
all this.
We can trace the
process quite exactly. Assume you have a plant growing upward from
the root. At the end of the stem the little grain of seed is formed.
The leaves and flowers spread themselves out. Now the earthly element
in leaf and flower is the shape and form and the filling of earthly
matter. The reason why a leaf or grain develops thick and strong
— absorbs inner substantialities, and so on — the reason
for this lies in all that which we bring to the plant by way of
earthly life that has not yet reached the state of chaos. On
the other hand, the seed which evolves its force right up the steam
(in a vertical direction, not in the circling round) — the seed
irradiates the leaf and blossom of the plant with the force of the
Cosmos.
We can see this
directly. Look at the green plant-leaves. (Diagram
No. 3). The green leaves, in their form and thickness and in
their greeness too, carry an earthly element, but they would not be
green unless the cosmic force of the Sun were also living in them.
And even more so when you come to the coloured flower; therein
are living not only the cosmic forces of the Sun, but also the
supplementary forces which the Sun-forces receive from the distant
planets — Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. In this way we must
look at all plant growth. Then, when we contemplate the rose, in its
red colour we shall see the forces of Mars. Or when we look at the
yellow sunflower — it is not quite rightly so called, it is
called so on account of its form; as to its yellowness it should
really be named the Jupiter-flower. For the force of Jupiter,
supplementing the cosmic force of the Sun, brings forth the white or
yellow colour in the flowers. And when we approach the chicory
(Cichoriuns Intybus), we shall divine in the bluish colour the
influence of Saturn, supplementing that of the Sun. Thus we can
recognise Mars in the red flower, Jupiter in the yellow or white,
Saturn in the blue, while in the green leaf we see essentially the
Sun itself. But that which thus shines out in the colouring of the
flower works as a force most strongly in the root. For the forces
that live and abound in the distant planets are working, as we have
seen, down there below within the earthly soil.
It is so indeed. We
must say to ourselves: Suppose we pull a plant out of the Earth. Down
below we have the root. In the root there is the cosmic nature,
whereas in the flower most of all there is the earthly, the cosmic
being only present in the delicate quality of the colouring and
shading. If on the other hand the earthly nature is to live strongly
in the root, then it must shoot into form. For the plant always has
its form from that which can arise within the earthly realm. That
which expands the form is earthly. Thus if the root is ramified and
much-divided, then, as in the flower's colouring the cosmic nature is
working upward, so here the earthly nature is working downward.
Therefore the cosmic roots are those that are more or less single in
form, whereas in highly ramified roots we have a working of the
earthly nature downward into the soil, just as in colour we have a
working-upward of the cosmic nature into the flower.
The Sun-quality is in
the midst between the two. The Sun-nature lives most of all in the
green leaf, in the mutual interplay between the flower and the root
and all that is between them. The Sun-quality is really that which is
related, as a “diaphragm” (for so we called it in this
picture) with the surface of the earth. The cosmic is associated with
the interior of the Earth and works upward into the upper parts of
the plant. The earthly, which is localised above the surface of the
earth, works downward, being carried down into the plant with the
help of the limestone element.
Observe those plants
in which the limestone strongly draws the earthly nature downward
into the roots. These are the plants whose roots shoot out in all
directions with many ramifications, such, for instance, as the food
fodder plants — I do not mean turnips or the like, but plants
like sainfoin. Such things must be recognised in the form of the
plant. To understand the plant, we must recognise the form of the
plant and from the colour of the flower, the extent to which the
cosmic and the earthly are working there.
Assume that by some
means we cause the cosmic to be strongly retained — held up
within the plant itself. Then it will not reveal itself to any great
extent. It will not shoot out into blossom but will express itself in
a stalk-like nature. Where, now, according to the indications we have
given, does the cosmic nature live in the plant? It lives in the
silicious element.
Look at the equisetum
plant. It has this peculiarity: it draws the cosmic nature to itself;
it permeates itself with the silicious nature. It contains no less
than 90% of silicic acid. In equisetum the cosmic is present, so to
speak, in very great excess, yet in such a way that it does not go
upward and reveal itself in the flower but betrays its presence in
the growth of the lower parts.
Or let us take
another case. Suppose that we wish to hold back in the root-nature of
a plant that which would otherwise tend upward through the stem and
leaf. No doubt this is not so important in our present earthly epoch,
for through various conditions we have already largely fixed the
different species of plants. In former epochs — notably in
primeval epochs — it was different. At that time it was still
possible quite easily to transform one plant into another; hence it
was very important to know these things. To-day too, it is important
if we wish to find what conditions are favourable to one plant or
another.
What do we then need
to consider? How must we look at a plant when we desire the cosmic
forces not to shoot upward into the blossoming and fruiting process
but to remain below? Suppose we want the stem and leaf-formation to
be held back in the root. What must we then do? We must put such a
plant into a sandy soil, for in silicious soil the cosmic is held
back; it is actually “caught:” Take the potato, for
example. With the potato this end must be attained. The blossoming
process must be kept below. For the potato is a stem and
leaf-formation down in the region of the root. The leaf and
stem-forming process is held back, retained in the potato itself. The
potato is not a root, it is a stem-formation held back. We must
therefore bring it into a sandy soil. Otherwise we shall not succeed
in having the cosmic force retained in the potato.
This, therefore, is
the ABC for our judgment of plant-growth. We must always be able to
say, what in the plant is cosmic, and what is terrestrial or earthly.
How can we adapt the soil of the earth, by its special consistency,
as it were to densify the cosmic and thereby hold it back more in the
root and leaf? Or again, how can we thin it out so that it is drawn
upward in a dilute condition, right up into the flowers, giving them
colour — or into the fruit-forming process, permeating the
fruit with a fine and delicate taste? For if you have apricots or
plums with a fine taste — this taste, just like the colour of
the flowers, is the cosmic quality which has been carried upward,
right into the fruit. In the apple you are eating Jupiter, in the
plum you are actually eating Saturn.
If mankind with their
present state of knowledge were suddenly obliged to create, from the
comparatively few plants of the primeval epoch of the Earth, the
manifold variety of our present fruits and fruit-trees, they would
not get very far. We should not get far if it were not for the fact
that the forms of our different fruits are inherited. They were
produced at a time when humanity had knowledge, out of primeval and
instinctive wisdom, how to create the different kinds of fruits from
the primitive varieties that then existed. If we did not already
possess the different kinds of fruit, handing them down by heredity
—if we had to do it all over again with our present cleverness
— we should not be very successful in creating the different
kinds of fruit. Nowadays it is all done by blind experiment, there is
no rational penetration into the process.
This must be
re-discovered if we wish to go on working on the Earth at all.
Extremely apt was the remark of our friend Stegemann to the effect
that a decrease in the value of the products is observable. This
decrease is indeed connected —like the transformation in the
human soul itself — with the ending of Kali Yuga in the
Universe during the last decades and in the decades that are now
about to come. You may take my remark amiss or not, as you will. We
stand face to face with a great change, even in the inner being of
Nature. What has come down to us from ancient times — whatever
it may be that we have handed down: natural talents, knowledge
derived from Nature, and the like, even the traditional medicaments
we still possess — all this is losing its value.
We must gain new
knowledge in order to enter again into the whole Nature-relationship
of these things. Mankind has no other choice. Either we must learn
once more, in all domains of life learn — from the whole nexus
of Nature and the Universe — or else we must see Nature and
withal the life of Man himself degenerate and die. As in ancient
times it was necessary for men to have knowledge entering into the
inwardness of Nature, so do we now stand in need of such knowledge
once again.
As I said just now,
the man of to-day may know — though this knowledge too is very
scanty — he may know how the air behaves in the interior of the
Earth. But he knows practically nothing of how the light
behaves in the interior of the Earth. He does not know that the
silicious — that is, the cosmic — stone or rock or sand
receives the light into the Earth and makes it effective there.
Whereas that which stands nearer to the earthly-living nature, namely
the humus, does not receive it; it does not make the light effective
in the Earth. It therefore gives rise to a “light-less”
working. Such things must be penetrated once more with clear
understanding.
Now the plant-growth
of the Earth is not all. To any given district of the Earth a
specific animal life also belongs. For reasons which will presently
be evident, we may for the moment leave man out, but we cannot
neglect animal life. For this is the peculiar fact; the best —
if I may call it so — cosmic qualitative analysis takes place
of its own accord, in the life of a certain district of the Earth,
overgrown as it is with plants, along with the animals in the same
region. This is the peculiar fact — and I should be glad if my
statements were tested, for if you subsequently test them you will
certainly find them confirmed. This is the peculiar relation. If in
any farm you have the right amount of horses, cows and other animals,
these animals taken together will give just the amount of manure
which you need for the farm itself, in order, as I said, to add
something more to what has already turned into chaos.
Nay more, if you have
the right number of cows, horses, pigs, etc., severally, the
proportion of admixture in the manure will also be correct. This is
due to the fact that the animals will eat the right measure of what
is provided for them by the growth of plants. They eat the right
quantity of what the Earth is able to provide. Hence in the course of
their organic processes they bring forth just the amount of manure
which needs to be given back again to the Earth.
This therefore is the
case. We cannot carry it out absolutely, but in the ideal sense it is
correct. If we are obliged to import any manure from outside the
farm, properly speaking we should only use it as a remedy — as
a medicament for a farm that has already grown ill. The farm is only
healthy inasmuch as it provides its own manure from its own stock.
Naturally, this will necessitate our developing a proper science of
the number of animals of a given sort which we need for a given kind
of farm. This need not cause any alarm. Such a science will arise in
good time, as soon as we begin to have any knowledge again of the
inner forces concerned.
In effect, what was
said at the beginning of this lecture — describing that which
is above the Earth's surface as a kind of belly, and that which is
beneath as a kind of head-existence — is not complete unless we
also understand the animal organism in this way. The animal organism
lives in the whole complex of Nature's household. In form and colour
and configuration, and in the structure and consistency of its
substance from the front to the hinder parts, it is related to these
influences. From the snout towards the heart, the Saturn, Jupiter and
Mars influences are at work; in the heart itself the Sun, and behind
the heart, towards the tail, the Venus, Mercury and Moon influences
(Diagram No. 5). In this respect, those who
are interested in these matters should develop their knowledge above
all by learning to read the form. To be able to do this is of
very great importance.
Go to a museum and
look at the skeleton of any mammal, and go there with the
consciousness that in the form and configuration of the head there is
working above all the radiation of the Sun, the direct radiant
influence of the Sun as it pours into the mouth. For reasons we shall
yet discuss, the animal exposes itself to the Sun in a specific way.
A lion exposes itself to the Sun differently from a horse. The
forming of the head and that which immediately follows the head,
depends on the way the animal is exposed to the Sun. Thus in the fore
part of the animal we have the direct Sun-radiation, and as a
consequence the forming and development of the head.
Now you will
remember, the sunlight enters the sphere of the Earth in another way
also. It is thrown back by the Moon. We have not only to do with the
direct sunlight; we have also to do with the sunlight thrown back by
the Moon. This sunlight thrown back by the Moon is quite ineffective
when it shines on to the head of an animal. There it has no
influence. (What I am now saying applies especially, however, to the
embryo life). The light that is rayed back from the Moon develops its
highest influence when it falls on the hinder parts of the animal.
Look at the skeleton-formation of the hinder parts; observe its
peculiar relation to the head-formation. Cultivate a sense of form to
perceive this contrast — the attachment of the thighs, the
forming of the outgoing parts of the digestive tract, in contrast to
that which is formed as the opposite pole, from the head inward.
There, in the fore and hinder parts of the animal, you have the true
contrast of Sun and Moon.
Moreover you will
find that the Sun-influence goes as far as the heart and stops short
just before the heart. For the head and the blood-forming process,
Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are at work. Then, from the heart backward,
the Moon influence is supported by the Mercury and Venus forces. If
therefore you turn the animal in this way and stand it on its head,
with the head stuck into the Earth and the hinder parts upward
— you have the position which the “agricultural
individuality” has invisibly.
This will enable you
to discover, from the form and figure of the animal, a definite
relation between the manure, for example, which this animal provides,
and the needs of the particular portion of the Earth, the plants of
which the animal is eating. For you must know these things. You must
know, for instance, that the cosmic influences which are effective in
a plant rise upward from the interior of the Earth. They are led
upward. Suppose a plant is especially rich in such cosmic influences.
The animal which eats the plant will in its turn provide manure, out
of its whole organism, on the basis of this fodder. Thereby it will
provide the very manure which is most suited for the soil on which
the plant is growing. Thus if you can read Nature's language of
forms, you will perceive all that is needed by the
“self-contained individuality” which a true farm or
agricultural unit should be. Only the animal stock must also be
included in it.
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Figure 2
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