LECTURE TWO
On this
occasion I should like to be allowed to include certain
personal references among matters of objective history,
because what must be added to the subject dealt with in the
lecture yesterday is necessary for our study today and after
careful consideration I believe it is right to include more
details.
I want, first
of all, to speak of a particular experience connected with
our Movement. You know that outwardly we began by linking
ourselves — but outwardly only — with the
Theosophical Society and that we founded the so-called German
Section of that Society in the autumn of 1902, in Berlin. In
the course of the year 1904 we were visited in various towns
of Germany by prominent members of the Theosophical Society,
and the episode from which I want to start occurred during
one of these visits. The first edition of my book
Theosophy
had just been published — in the
spring of 1904 — and the periodical
Lucifer-Gnosis was appearing. In that periodical I
had published articles dealing with the problem of Atlantis
and the character of the Atlantean epoch. These articles were
afterwards published as a separate volume entitled
Unsere atlantischen Vorfahren
(Our Atlantean Forefathers).
[note 1]
The articles contained
a number of communications about the Atlantean world and the
earlier, so-called Lemurian epoch. Several articles of this
kind had therefore already appeared, and just at the time
when the members of the Theosophical Society were visiting us
a number of the periodical containing important
communications was ready, and had been sent to subscribers. A
member highly respected in the Theosophical Society had read
these articles dealing with Atlantis, and asked me a
question. And it is this question which I want to mention as
a noteworthy experience in connection with what was said in
the lecture yesterday.
This member
of the Theosophical Society, who at the time of its founding
by Blavatsky had taken part in most vital
proceedings, a member, therefore, who had shared to the full
in the activities of the Society, put the question: “By
what means was this information about the world of Atlantis
obtained?” — The question was very significant
because until then this member was acquainted only with the
methods by which such information was obtained in the
Theosophical Society, namely, by means of a certain kind of
mediumistic investigation. Information already published in
the Theosophical Society at that time was based upon
investigations connected in a certain respect with
mediumship. That is to say, someone was put into a kind of
mediumistic state—it could not be called a trance but
was a mediumistic state — and conditions were
established which made it possible for the person, although
not in the state of ordinary consciousness, to communicate
certain information; about matters beyond the reach of
ordinary consciousness. That is how the communications had
been made at that time and the member of the Theosophical
Society in question who thought that information about
prehistoric events could be gained only in this way, enquired
what personality we had among us whom we could use as a
medium for such investigations.
As I had
naturally refused to adopt this method of research and had
insisted from the outset upon strictly individual
investigation, and as what I had discovered at that time was
the result entirely of my own, personal research, the
questioner did not understand me at all, did not understand
that it was quite a different matter from anything that had
been done hitherto in the Theosophical Society. The path I
had appointed for myself, however, was this: To reject all
earlier ways of investigation and — admittedly by means
of super-sensible perception — to investigate by making
use only of what can be revealed to the one who is
himself the investigator.
In accordance
with the position I have to take in the spiritual Movement,
no other course is possible for me than to carry into strict
effect those methods of investigation which are suitable for
the modern world and for modern humanity. There is a very
significant difference, you see, between the methods of
investigation practised in Spiritual Science and those that
were practised in the Theosophical Society. All
communications received by that Society from the spiritual
world — including for example, those given in
Scott-Elliot's book on Atlantis — came
entirely in the way described, because that alone was
considered authoritative and objective. In this connection,
the introduction of our spiritual-scientific direction of
work was, from the very beginning something entirely new in
the Theosophical Society. It took thorough account of modern
scientific methods which needed to be elaborated and
developed to make ascent to the spiritual realms
possible.
This
discussion was significant. It took place in the year 1904,
and showed how great the difference was between what is
pursued in Spiritual Science and what was being pursued by
the rest of the Theosophical Society; it showed that what we
have in Spiritual Science was unknown in the Theosophical
Society at that time and that the Theosophical Society was
continuing the methods which had been adopted as a compromise
between the exotericists and the esotericists. Such was the
inevitable result of the developments I described in the
lecture yesterday. I said that seership gradually died away
and that there remained only a few isolated seers in whom
mediumistic states could be induced and from whom some
information might be obtained. In this way, “Occult
Orders”, as they were called, came into being, Orders
in which there were, it is true, many who had been initiated,
but no seers. Among the prevailing materialism these Orders
were faced with the necessity of having to cultivate and
elaborate methods which had long been in vogue, and
instruments for research had to be sought among persons in
whom mediumistic faculties — that is to say, atavistic
clairvoyance — could still be developed and produce
some result. In these circles there were far-reaching
teachings and, in addition, symbols. Those, however, who
wished to engage in actual research were obliged to rely on
the help of persons possessed of atavistic clairvoyance.
These methods were then continued in a certain way in the
Theosophical Society, and the compromise of which I spoke
yesterday really amounted to nothing else than that in the
Lodges and Orders experiments were made whereby spiritual
influences might be projected into the world. The desire was
to demonstrate that influences from the spiritual world
are exercised upon man.
Procedures
adopted in esoteric schools had therefore been brought into
action. This attempt was a fiasco, for whereas it had been
expected that through the mediums genuine spiritual laws
prevailing in the surrounding world would be brought to
light, the only result was that nearly all the mediums fell
into the error of supposing that everything emanated from the
dead, and they embellished it into communications alleged to
have been made to them by the dead. This led to a very
definite consequence. — If the older members among you
will think back to the earliest period of the Theosophical
Society and study the literature produced under its aegis,
you will find that the astral world — that is to say,
the life immediately after death — was described in
books by Mrs. Besant which merely reproduced what is
contained in Blavatsky's Secret Doctrine or was to be
read in books by Leadbeater. This was also the origin of
everything that was given out concerning man's life
between death and a new birth.
If you
compare what is said in my book
Theosophy
about the Soul-world and the Spirit-world — to begin with,
people were always trying to refute it but I think that today a
sufficient number are able to think objectively on the
subject — you will find very considerable differences,
precisely because in regard to these domains too the methods
of investigation were different. For all the methods of
research employed in the Theosophical Society, even including
those used for investigating the life of the dead, originated
from the procedures of which I have spoken.
So you see,
what the Theosophical Society had to offer the world to begin
with was in a certain respect a continuation of the attempt
made by the occultists previously. In what other respect this
was not the case we shall hear in a moment. Taken as a whole,
however, it was a continuation of the attempt which, since
the middle of the nineteenth century, had been the outcome of
the compromise made between the exotericists and the
esotericists, except that later on things were made rather
more esoteric by the Theosophical Society. Whereas the
previous attempt had been to present the mediums to the
world, the members of the Theosophical Society preferred to
work in their inner circle only and to give out merely the
results. That was an important difference, for there people
were going back to a method of investigation established as a
universal custom by the various Orders before the middle of
the nineteenth century. I bring this forward because I must
sharply emphasise the fact that with the advent of our
Spiritual Science an entirely new method, one which takes
full account of the work and attitude of modern science, was
introduced into the occult Movement.
Now as I told
you, the compromise reached between the exotericists and the
esotericists to convince the materialistic world through
mediums of all types that a spiritual world exists, had been
a fiasco, a fiasco inasmuch as the mediums always spoke of a
world which under the existing conditions simply could not be
accessible to them, namely, the world of the dead. The
mediums spoke of inspirations alleged to have been received
from a world in which the dead are living. The situation was
that the attempt made by the exotericists and the
esotericists had not achieved the result they had really
desired.
How had such
a state of affairs come about? What was the outcome of the
remarkable attempt that had been made as a result of the
compromise? The outcome was that initiates of a certain kind
had wrested the power from the hands of those who had made
the compromise. The initiates of the extreme left-wing had
taken possession of the proceedings which had been
countenanced in the way described. They acquired great
influence, because what was obtained through the mediums did
not spring from the realm of the dead at all, but from the
realm of the living—from initiates who had put
themselves either in distant or close rapport with the
mediums. Because everything was brought about through these
initiates and through the mediums, it was coloured by the
theories of those who wished to get the mediums under their
control. The desire of those among the exotericists and
esotericists who had made the compromise was to bring home to
men that there is indeed a spiritual world. That is what they
wanted to impress. But when those who thought themselves
capable of holding the guiding reins let them slip, the
occultists of the extreme left-wing took possession of them
and endeavoured by means of the mediums — if I may use
this tautology — to communicate their theories and
their views to the world.
For those who
had made the compromise for the good of humanity, the
position was disastrous, because they felt more and more
strongly that false teachings about the super-sensible were
being brought into the world. — Such was the position
in the development of occultism in the forties, fifties and
even in the sixties of the nineteenth century.
As long as
deliberation still continued in the circles of honest
occultists, the situation was sinister. For the further the
occultists inclined to the left, the less were they concerned
to promote that which alone is justifiable, namely, the
universal-human. In occultism a man belongs to the
“left” when he tries to achieve some ultimate
goal with the help of what he knows in the way of occult
teaching. A man belongs to the “right” in
occultism when he desires that goal purely for its own sake.
The middle party were in favour of making exoteric the
esoteric knowledge needed in our time to promote the
interests of humanity universal. But those who belong to the
extreme “left” are those who combine special aims
of their own with what they promulgate as occult teaching. A
man is on the “left” to the extent to which he
pursues special aims, leads people to the spiritual world,
gives them all kinds of demonstrations of it, and instils
into them in an illicit way, promptings that simply help to
bring these special aims to fulfilment. The leading circle of
modern initiates was faced with this situation. It was
realised that the control had fallen into the hands of people
who were pursuing their own special aims. — Such was
the state of affairs confronting the esotericists and the
exotericists who had made the compromise referred to.
Then it was
“heard”— the expression may not be quite
exact but absolutely exact words cannot be found because one
is dependent on external language and intercourse among
occultists is different from anything that external language
is capable of describing — it was “heard”
that an event of importance for the further continuation of
spiritual development on the Earth must be at hand. I can
describe this event only in the following way. — In the
research carried on by the individual Orders, they had
preferred for a long time to make less use of female mediums.
In the strict Orders, where it was desired to take the right
standpoint, no female mediums were ever used for obtaining
revelations from the spiritual worlds.
Now the
female organism is adapted by nature to preserve atavistic
clairvoyance longer than the male organism. Whereas male
mediums were becoming almost unknown, female mediums were
still to be found and a great number were used while the
compromise still held. But now there came into the
occultists' field of observation a personality who
possessed mediumistic faculties in the very highest degree.
This was Madame H. P. Blavatsky, a personality very
specially adapted through certain subconscious parts of her
organism to draw a great deal, a very great deal, from the
spiritual world. And now think of what possibilities this
opened up for the world! At one of the most crucial points in
the development of occultism, a personality appeared who
through the peculiar nature of her organism was able to draw
many, many things from the spiritual world by means of her
subconscious faculties.
An occultist
who at that time was alert to the signs of the times could
not but say to himself: Now, at the right moment, a
personality has appeared who through her peculiar organic
constitution can produce the very strongest evidence of
ancient, traditional teaching existing among us in the form
of symbols only. It was emphatically the case that here was a
personality who simply because of her organic make-up
afforded the possibility of again demonstrating many things
which for a long time had been known only through tradition.
This was the fact confronting the occultists just after the
fiasco which had led to a veritable impasse. Let us
be quite clear on the point: Blavatsky was regarded as a
personality from whom, as out of an electrically-charged
Leyden jar, the electric sparks — occult truths —
could be produced.
It would lead
too far if I were to tell you of all the intermediate links,
but certain matters of importance must be mentioned. A really
crucial moment had arrived which I can indicate in the
following way; although expressed somewhat symbolically, it
is in strict accordance with the facts. — The
occultists of the right-wing, who in conjunction with the
middle party had agreed to the compromise, could say to
themselves: It may well be that something very significant
can be forthcoming from this personality. But those belonging
to the left-wing could also say with assurance: It is
possible to achieve something extremely effective in the
world with the help of this personality! — And now a
veritable battle was waged around her, on the one side with
the honest purpose of having much of what the initiates knew,
substantiated; on the other side, for the sake of
far-reaching, special aims.
I have often
referred to the early periods in the life of H. P. Blavatsky,
and have shown that, to begin with, attempts were made to get
a great deal of knowledge from her. But in a comparatively
short time the situation rapidly changed, owing to the fact
that she soon came into the sphere of those who belonged, as
it were, to the left. And although H. P. Blavatsky was very
well aware of what she herself was able to see — for
she was especially significant in that she was not simply a
passive medium, but had a colossal memory for everything that
revealed itself to her from the higher worlds —
nevertheless she was inevitably under the influence of
certain personalities when she wanted to evoke manifestations
from the spiritual world. And so she always made reference to
what ought really to have been left aside—she always
referred to the “Mahatmas”. They may be there in
the background but this is not a factor when it is a question
of furthering the interests of humanity.
And so it was
not long before H. P. Blavatsky was having to face a
decision. A hint came to her from a quarter belonging to the
side of the left that she was a personality of key
importance. She knew very well what it was that she saw, but
she was not aware of how significant she was as a
personality. This was first disclosed to her by the
left-wing. But she was fundamentally honest by nature and
after this hint had been given her from a quarter of which,
at the beginning, she could hardly have approved, because of
her fundamental honesty, she tried on her side to reach a
kind of compromise with an occult Brotherhood in Europe.
Something very fine might have resulted from this, because
through her great gift of mediumship she would have been able
to furnish confirmations of really phenomenal importance in
connection with what was known to the initiates from theories
and symbolism. But she was not only thoroughly honest, she
was also what is called in German a
“Frechdachs” — a “cheeky
creature”. And that she certainly was! She had in her
nature a certain trait that is particularly common in those
inclined to mediumship, namely, a lack of consistency in
external behaviour. Thus there were moments when she could be
very audacious and in one of these fits of audacity she
imposed on the occult Brotherhood which had decided to make
the experiment with her, terms which could not be fulfilled.
But as she knew that a great deal could be achieved through
her instrumentality, she decided to take up the matter with
other Brotherhoods. And so she approached an American
Brotherhood. This American Brotherhood was one where the
majority had always wavered between the right and the left,
but at all events had the prospect of discovering things of
tremendous significance concerning the spiritual worlds.
Now this was
the period when intense interest was being taken in H. P.
Blavatsky by other Brothers of the left. Already at that time
these left-wing Brothers had their own special interests. At
the moment I do not propose to speak about these interests.
If it were necessary, I could do so at some future time. For
the present it is enough to say that they were Brothers who
had their special interests, above all, interests of a
strongly political character; they envisaged the possibility
of achieving something of a political nature in America by
means of persons who had first been put through an occult
preparation. The consequence was that at a moment when H. P.
Blavatsky had already acquired an untold amount of occult
knowledge through having worked with the American Lodge, she
had to be expelled from it, because it was discovered that
there was something political in the background. So things
couldn't continue.
The situation
was now extremely difficult, tremendously difficult. For what
had been undertaken in order to call the world's
attention to the existence of a spiritual world, had in a
certain respect to be withdrawn by the serious occultists
because it had been a fiasco. It was necessary to show that
no reliance could be placed on what was being presented by
Spiritualism, in spite of the fact that it had many
adherents. It was only materialistic, it was sheer
dilettantism. The only scholarly persons who concerned
themselves with it were those who wanted to get information
in an external, materialistic way about a spiritual world. In
addition, H. P. Blavatsky had made it clear to the American
Lodge on her departure that she had no intention whatever of
withholding from the world what she knew. And she knew a
great deal, for she was able to remember afterwards what had
been conveyed through her. She had any amount of
audacity!
Good advice
is costly, as the saying goes. What was to be done? And now
something happened to which I have referred on various
occasions, for parts of what I am saying today in this
connection I have said in other places. Something that is
called in occultism “Occult imprisonment” was
brought about.
[note 2]
H. P. Blavatsky was
put into occult imprisonment. Through acts of a kind that can
be performed only by certain Brothers — and are
performed, moreover, only by Brotherhoods who allow
themselves to engage in illicit arts — through certain
acts and machinations they succeeded in compelling H. P.
Blavatsky to live for a time in a world in which all her
occult knowledge was driven inwards. Think of it in this way.
— The occult knowledge was in her aura; as the result
of certain processes that were set in operation, it came
about that for a long time everything in this aura was thrown
back into her soul. That is to say, all the occult knowledge
she possessed was to be imprisoned; she was to be isolated as
far as the outer world and her occultism were concerned.
This happened
at the time when H. P. Blavatsky might have become really
dangerous through the spreading of teachings which are among
the most interesting of all within the horizon of the Occult
Movement. Certain Indian occultists now came to know of the
affair, occultists who on their part tended strongly towards
the left, and whose prime interest it was to turn the
occultism which could be given to the world through H. P.
Blavatsky in a direction where it could influence the world
in line with their special aims. Through the efforts of these
Indian occultists who were versed in the appropriate
practices, she was released from this imprisonment within her
aura; she was free once again and could now use her spiritual
faculties in the right way.
From this you
can get an idea of what had taken place in this soul, and of
what combination of factors all that came into the world
through H. P. Blavatsky, was composed. But because certain
Indian occultists had gained the merit of freeing her from
her imprisonment, they had her in their power in a certain
respect. And there was simply no possibility of preventing
them from using her to send out into the world that part of
occultism which suited their purposes. And so something very
remarkable was “arranged”— if I may use a
clumsy word. What was arranged can be expressed approximately
as follows. — The Indian occultists wanted to assert
their own special aims in opposition to those of the others,
and for this purpose they made use of H. P. Blavatsky. She
was given instructions to place herself under a certain
influence, for in her case the mediumistic state had always
to be induced from outside — and this also made it
possible to bring all kinds of things into the world through
her.
About this
time she came to be associated with a person who from the
beginning had really no directly theosophical interests but a
splendid talent for organisation, namely, Colonel
Olcott. I cannot say for certain, but I surmise that
there had already been some kind of association at the time
when Blavatsky belonged to the American Lodge. Then, under
the mask, as it were, of an earlier individuality, there
appeared in the field of Blavatsky's spiritual vision a
personality who was essentially the vehicle of what it was
desired from India to launch into the world. Some of you may
know that in his book
People from the Other World,
Colonel Olcott has written a great deal about this
individuality who now appeared in H. P. B.'s field of
vision under the mask of an earlier individuality designated
as Mahatma Kut-Humi. You know, perhaps, that Colonel Olcott
has written a very great deal about this Mahatma Kut-Humi,
among other things that in the year 1874 this Mahatma
Kut-Humi had declared what individuality was living in him.
He had indicated that this individuality was John King by
name, a powerful sea-pirate of the seventeenth century. This
is to be read in Olcott's book
People from the Other World.
In the
Mahatma Kut-Humi, therefore, we have to do with the spirit of
a bold sea-pirate of the seventeenth century who then, in the
nineteenth century, was involved in significant
manifestations made with the help of H. P. Blavatsky and
others too. He brought tea-cups from some distance away, he
let all kinds of records be produced from the coffin of
H. P. B.'s father,
[note 3]
and so forth. From
Colonel Olcott's account, therefore, it must be assumed
that these were deeds of the bold pirate of the seventeenth
century.
Now Colonel
Olcott speaks in a remarkable way about this John King. He
says that perhaps here one had to do, not with the spirit of
this pirate but possibly with the creation of an Order which,
while depending for its results upon unseen agents, has its
existence among physical men. According to this account,
Kut-Humi might have been a member of an Order which engaged
in practices such as I have described and the results of
which were to be communicated to the world through H. P.
Blavatsky but bound up with all kinds of special interests.
These were that a specifically Indian teaching should be
spread in the world.
This was
approximately the situation in the seventies of the
nineteenth century. We therefore have evidence of very
significant happenings which must be seen in a single
framework when we are considering the whole course of events
in the Occult Movement. It was this same John King who, by
means of “precipitation”, produced
Sinnett's books, the first one,
Letters about the Occult World
and, especially,
Esoteric Buddhism.
This book
Esoteric Buddhism
came into my hands very shortly
after publication — a few weeks in fact — and I
could see from it that efforts were being made, especially
from a certain quarter, to give an entirely materialistic
form to the spiritual teachings. If you were to study
Esoteric Buddhism
with the insight you have acquired
in the course of time, you would be astonished at the
materialistic forms in which facts are there presented. It is
materialism in its very worst forms. The spiritual world is
presented in an entirely materialistic way. No one who gets
hold of this book can shake himself free from materialism.
The subject-matter is very subtle but in Sinnett's book
one cannot get away from materialism, however lofty the
heights to which it purports to carry one. And so those who
were now H. P. B.'s spiritual
“bread-givers” — forgive the materialistic
analogy — not only had special aims connected with
Indian interests, but they also made trenchant concessions to
the materialistic spirit of the age. And the influence which
Sinnett's book had upon very large numbers of people
shows how correctly they had speculated.
[note 4]
I have met scientists who were delighted with
this book because everything fitted in with their
stock-intrade and yet they were able to conceive of the
existence of a spiritual world. The book satisfied all the
demands of materialism and yet made it possible to meet the
need for a spiritual world and to acknowledge its
existence.
Now you know
that in the further development of these happenings, H. P.
Blavatsky wrote
The Secret Doctrine
in the eighties of the nineteenth century, and in 1891 she died.
The Secret Doctrine
is written in the same style as
Esoteric Buddhism,
except that it puts right certain
gross errors which any occultist could at once have
corrected. I have often spoken about the peculiar features of
Blavatsky's book and need not go into the matter again
now. Then, on the basis of what had come about in this way,
the Theosophical Society was founded and, fundamentally
speaking, retained its Indian trend. Although no longer with
the intensity that had prevailed under the influence of John
King, the Indian trend persisted. What I have now described
to you was, as it were, a new path which made great
concessions to the materialism of the age, but was
nevertheless intended to show humanity that a spiritual world
as well as the outer, material world must be taken into
account.
Many details
would have to be added to what I have now said, but time is
too short. I will go on at once to show you how our
spiritual-scientific Movement took its place in the Movement
which was already in existence.
You know that
we founded the German Section of the Theosophical Society in
October, 1902. In the winters of both 1900 and 1901 I had
already given lectures in Berlin which may be called
“theosophical” lectures, for they were held in
the circle and at the invitation of the Berlin Theosophists.
The first lectures were those which ultimately became the
book entitled,
Die Mystik im Aufgange des neuzeitlichen Geisteslebens
(translated into English with the title,
Mysticism and Modern Thought).
These lectures were
given to a circle of Members of the Theosophical Society, of
which I myself was not then a member. It must be borne in
mind at the outset that one had to do with teaching that was
already widespread and had led numbers of people to turn
their minds to the spiritual world. Thus all over the world
there were people who to a certain extent were prepared and
who wanted to know something about the spiritual world. Of
the things I have told you today they knew nothing, had not
the slightest inkling of them. But they had a genuine longing
for the spiritual world, and for that reason had attached
themselves to the Movement in which this longing could be
satisfied. And so in this Movement there were to be found
persons whose hearts were longing for knowledge of the
spiritual world.
You know that
in a grotesque and ludicrous way I was taxed with having made
a sudden turn-about from an entirely different world-view
which had been presented in my book
Welt- and Lebensanschauungen im neunzehnten Jahrhundert.
[note 5]
The first part had appeared in February 1900,
and the second part in the following October. I was taxed
with having suddenly changed sides and having gone over to
Theosophy. Now I have often told you that not only had
Sinnett's book, for example, come into my hands
immediately after its publication, but that I had also had
close associations with the young Theosophical Society in
Vienna. It is right that you should understand what the
circumstances were at the time, and I want also to give you a
very brief; objective view of the antecedents of the German
Section. There were people in the Theosophical Society who
longed to know of the spiritual world, and I had given
lectures in their circle. These were the lectures on
Mysticism and the Mystics which I gave in a small room in the
house of Count Brockdorff. At that time I was not
myself a member. The preface to the printed volume containing
these lectures is dated September 1901. In the summer of 1901
I had collected the lectures given the previous winter, into
the book published in September 1901 under the title
Die Mystik im Aufgange des neuzeitlichin Geistlebens.
[note 6]
I will read
the first lines of the preface to this book:
“What
is stated in this work formed the content of lectures given
by me last winter in the Theosophical Library in Berlin. I
was invited by Count and Countess Brockdorff to speak on
mysticism to an audience seriously interested in the
subject. Ten years earlier I should not have ventured to
comply with such a request. Not that the world of ideas
which I am now bringing to expression was not already
within me. This world of ideas is presented in my
The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity,
published by Emil Felber, Berlin, 1894. — But to express
this world of ideas as I am doing today and so to make it the
basis of study as in this present book, requires something
quite different from a mere firm conviction of its
intellectual truth. It requires intimate communion with
this world of ideas such as can be achieved only after many
years. Only now, after this intimate communion has been
vouchsafed to me, do I venture to speak in the way that
will be apparent in this book.”
Now you can
conceive why I had allowed the contents of lectures given in
very different circles to find a place in an occult movement.
In the first edition of the book
Welt-and Lebensanschauungen im neunzehnten Jahrhundert,
the following is contained in the chapter about Schelling
I quote from the first edition, which was dedicated to
Ernst Haeckel and was published in February, 1900. I
will read a few passages from the book of which people have
said that it sprang from a world-view quite different from
that presented in the book on Mysticism.—
“Now
there are two possible ways of describing a being which is
at the same time Spirit and Nature. The one is: I exhibit
the laws of nature which are active in Reality. Or, I show
how the spirit acts in order to come to these natural laws.
One and the same thing guides me in both cases. The one
shows me conformity to law as it is active in nature; the
other shows me what the spirit does in order to represent
to itself this same conformity to law. In the one case I
pursue natural science, in the other spiritual science. How
these two are connected, Schelling describes in an
interesting way. He says: ‘The necessary tendency of
all natural science is to ascend from nature to
intelligence. This and nothing else underlies the endeavour
to bring theory into natural phenomena. The highest
perfection of natural science would be the complete
spiritualisation of all natural laws into laws of
observation and thought. Phenomena (the material) must
completely vanish, and laws alone (the formal )remain.
Hence it happens that the more conformity to law is brought
into nature herself the more the veils vanish, phenomena
themselves become more spiritual and finally disappear
altogether. Optical phenomena are nothing more than a
geometry whose lines are drawn by light, and the light
itself is already an ambiguous materiality. In the
phenomena of magnetism all traces of matter are lost, and
in those of gravity, which even the natural scientist is
only able to accept as a direct spiritual operation —
an effect at a distance — nothing remains but its
laws, whose transactions are in the vastness of the
mechanism of the celestial movements. The perfect theory of
nature would be that by virtue of which nature as a whole
is resolved into an intelligence. The lifeless and
unconscious products of nature are only nature's
abortive attempts to reflect herself; so-called lifeless
nature is, however, an unripe intelligence, hence in its
phenomena the intelligent character still peeps through,
but without consciousness. Nature only reaches her highest
aim — to become herself wholly object — in her
highest and final reflection, which is none other than Man,
or more generally, what we call Reason, through which
nature first completely returns into herself, and by which
it becomes manifest that she, nature, is originally
identical with what is known in us as intelligence and
consciousness.’ ”
And referring
further to Schelling, I say a little later:
“To
Schelling, with his progressive thought, the study of the
world was the study of God, or Theosophy. He already stood
completely on this ground when, in 1809, he brought out his
Philosophic Enquiries into the Nature of Human Freedom
and allied Matters.
All questions concerning
conceptions of the world now come to him in a new light. If
all things are divine, how comes it that there is evil in
the world, since God can only be perfect Goodness? If the
soul of man is in God, how comes it that she follows her
own self-seeking interests? And if it is God who acts in
me, how can I, who therefore in no wise act as an
independent being, yet be called free?”
This view of
the world is not put aside. — And I say further:
“With
such views, Schelling proved himself to be the boldest,
most courageous of those philosophers who allowed
themselves to be stimulated by Kant into adopting an
idealistic view of the world. Under the influence of this
stimulus, man has relinquished philosophising about things
lying beyond what the human senses alone and the thought
concerning such observations, utter. Men try to rest
content with what lies within the field of observation and
thought. But whereas Kant drew from this the inevitable
conclusion that man can know nothing of things
‘beyond’, his successors declared: As
observation and thought indicate nothing divine in that
‘beyond’, they are themselves the divine. Among
those who declared this, Schelling was the most forceful.
Fichte gathered everything into selfhood; Schelling
extended selfhood over everything. He did not, like Fichte,
wish to show that selfhood is everything, but, on the
contrary, that everything is selfhood. And Schelling had
the courage to declare not only the ego's content of
ideas to be divine, but the whole human spirit-personality.
He not only made the human Reason divine, but the content
of human life a divine, personal entity. One calls an
explanation of the world Anthropomorphism which,
starting from man, imagines that underlying the whole
course of the world there is a being who guides that course
as man guides his own actions. Those, too, who postulate a
general cosmic Intelligence as the basis of events, they
too explain the world in the anthropomorphic sense. For
this cosmic Intelligence is none other than the human
Reason which has been made general and universal. When
Goethe says: ‘Man never realises how anthropomorphic
he is’, his mind is engrossed with the thought that
concealed anthropomorphisms are contained in the simplest
utterances we make about nature. When we say, ‘a body
rolls further because another has struck it’, we form
such an idea from out of our ego. We strike a body and it
rolls on. If we see that a ball moves towards another and
this other rolls on further, we think of the striking of
the second by the first as analogous to the striking effect
which we ourselves exercise. Ernst Haeckel spoke the
anthropomorphic dogma: ‘divine world-creation and
divine world-government resemble the mechanical productions
of an ingenious technician or engineer and the
State-administration of a wise ruler. The Lord God as
Creator, Sustainer and Ruler of the Cosmos is here
conceived as thoroughly human in his thinking and
acting.’ Schelling had the courage to lead
anthropomorphism to its ultimate consequences. He declared
man and his whole life-content to be divine; and as not
only the rational belongs to this life-content, but also
the irrational, he was able also to explain the existence
of irrationality in the world. To this end he had to extend
the rational views of the reasoning mind by adding another,
whose origin does not lie in thinking. This — in his
opinion — higher view, he calls ‘Positive
Philosophy’. ‘This’, he says, ‘is
the really free philosophy; anyone who does not desire it
may leave it alone; I leave everyone free; I say only that
if anyone desires, for instance, to ascertain the actual
course of things, to have a free world-creation and so
forth, he can succeed only along the path of a philosophy
such as this. If rationalistic philosophy satisfies him and
he desires nothing further, let him content himself with
that, but he must give up trying to find in rationalistic
philosophy what unfortunately it cannot have within it,
namely, the real God and the reality underlying the course
of things, and a free relationship of God to the
world.’ Negative philosophy will ‘remain
pre-eminently the philosophy for the schools, Positive
philosophy, the philosophy for life. Only through
both together will there come the consecration that man may
expect from philosophy. It is well known that the
Eleusinian Initiates distinguished the Lesser and the
Greater Mysteries; the Lesser were a preparation for the
Greater. ... Positive philosophy is the necessary
consequence of Negative philosophy when this is rightly
understood. It may therefore be said: In Negative
philosophy the Lesser Mysteries are celebrated, in Positive
philosophy the Greater.’
This chapter
of my book closed with the passage:
“If
the inner life is declared to be divine, it seems
inconsistent to confine ourselves to one part of it.
Schelling did not fall into this inconsistency. When he
said that to explain nature is to create nature, he
indicated the direction of his own view of life. If the
reflective study of nature is a repetition of her creation,
the basic character of his creation must correspond to that
of human action; it must be an act of free spiritual
activity, not one like a geometrical necessity. But we
cannot recognise a free creation through laws of Reason; it
must reveal itself through different means.”
I was writing
a history of world-views held in the nineteenth century. I
could not go any further than this, for what prevailed at the
time in advancing evolution were purely dilettante attempts
which had no influence upon the progress of philosophical
research. Such matters could not form part of this book. But
Theosophy, in so far as it is carried into earnest thinking
— that you find in the chapter on Schelling.
The second
part of the book, which deals, firstly, with Hegel, is dated
October, two. It was then that I had just begun to give the
lectures referred to, and in September, 1901, the book on
Mysticism had already been published. Truly it is not for the
sake of emphasising personal matters but in order to help you
to make an unprejudiced judgment that I should like to refer
you to a criticism of the book
Welt- und Lebensanschauungen im neunzehnten Jahrhundert
which appeared on 15th December, 1901 in the journal of the
German Freethinkers' Alliance, The Free-Thinker.
Here, after an introduction and a remark to the effect that
there had been no readable presentation of the development of
thought in the nineteenth century, it continues:
“Especially in the domain of philosophy in which
disputes can be carried on in appropriate words, many sins
are committed in popular writings. The ‘Watchers of
Zion’ and organisations of every kind, with their
learned cliques to which unfortunately so many university
tutors belong, are much to blame.”
Quotation of
the folllowing extract is made only in order to point out the
good-will with which the book was received at the time:
“So
much the more must we welcome the fact that Dr. Rudolf
Steiner, an author well known as a modern thinker and
protagonist, has undertaken the task of giving the German
public an objective presentation of the spiritual conflicts
waged in Germany in the nineteenth century concerning views
and conceptions of the world.”
Then, after
an extract from the book, a remarkable statement follows and
I must read it to you in full. The writer of this review
regrets the absence of something in the book, and expresses
this in the following words:
“Although the spiritualism of Du Prel and the
anchoretic original Christianity of Tolstoi are useless for
cultural activity based on the thought of evolution, yet
symptomatically they have a value not to be overlooked. The
same may be said of Neo-Buddhism (Theosophy), which has
developed a terminology of its own, a sort of mystic
jargon. A psychology of the modern belief in spirits by a
man of the mental calibre of Steiner would be decidedly
welcome. The language of his book is easy to comprehend.
None of the yard-long passages of the academic philosopher
disturbs the enjoyment of the reader.”
This was
written in November 1901, shortly after I had begun to give
the theosophical lectures in Berlin. It can truly be said
that there was then a demand, a public demand, that I should
speak about the aim and purpose of Theosophy. It was not a
matter of arbitrary choice but, as the saying goes, a clear
call of karma.
In the winter
of 1900-1901, I gave the lectures on Mysticism, and in that
of 1901-1902 those dealing with the Greek and Egyptian
Mysteries in rather greater detail. These lectures were
subsequently printed in the book
Christianity as Mystical Fact
[note 7]
(published in the summer of 1902).
The greater part of
Mysticism and Modern Thought
was at once translated into English, still before I was a member
of the Theosophical Society. I could tell you a great deal of
importance, but time does not permit of it now; it may be
told another time. One thing, however, I must add.
You see
clearly that nowhere in the course of things was there any
kind of sudden jump; one thing led to the other quite
naturally. At the beginning of the course of lectures on the
Greek and Egyptian Mysteries — again held in Count
Brockdorff's library — and indeed also at the
time of the second series I had some opportunity of hearing
about matters which were not so very serious at that time,
but which eventually led to things which have been spoken of
here as “mystical eccentricities”.
So in the
year 1901-1902, I spoke on the Greek and Egyptian Mysteries
and these lectures were attended by the present Frau Dr.
Steiner. She had also heard the lecture I had given in the
Theosophical Society during the winter of 1900 on
Gustav Theodor Fechner.
It was a special lecture, not forming
part of the other series. Frau Dr. Steiner had therefore
already been present at some of the lectures I gave during
that time. It would be interesting to relate a few details
here — but these may be omitted; they merely add a
little colour to the incident. If necessary, they can be told
on another occasion.
After having
been away for a time, Frau Dr. Steiner returned to Berlin
from Russia in the autumn, and with an acquaintance of
Countess Brockdorff was present at the second course of
lectures given in the winter of 1901–1902. After one of the
lectures on the Greek Mysteries, this acquaintance came to me
and said — well, something of the kind just alluded to!
This lady subsequently became a more and more fanatical
adherent of the Theosophical Society and was later given a
high position in the Order founded to wait for the Second
Coming of Christ. At the time of which I am speaking, she
came to me after the lecture on the Greek Mysteries and,
adopting the air of a really profound initiate of the
Theosophical Society about to give evidence of her
initiation, said: “You have spoken of Mysteries; but
they are still in existence. There are still secret
societies. Are you aware of that?”
After a
subsequent lecture on the same subject, she came to me again
and said: “One sees that you still remember quite well
what you were taught when you were in the Greek
Mysteries!” That is something which, carried a little
farther, borders on the chapter deserving the title of
“mystical eccentricities”.
In the autumn
of 1901, this lady organised a tea-party. Frau Dr. Steiner
always speaks of it as the “chrysanthemum tea”
because there were so many of these flowers in the room. The
invitation came from this acquaintance of Countess Brockdorff
and I often thought that she wanted — well, I
don't quite know what it was! The day chosen for the
founding of the Theosophical Society was one of special
importance for this lady. She may have wanted to enlist me as
a co-worker on her own lines, for she put out feelers and was
often very persistent — but nothing of any account came
of it. I should like, however, just to relate a conversation
that took place in the autumn of 1901 between the present
Frau Dr. Steiner and myself on the occasion of that
“chrysanthemum tea”, when she asked whether it
was not urgently necessary to call to life a
spiritual-scientific Movement in Europe. In the course of the
conversation I said in unambiguous terms: “Certainly it
is necessary to call such a Movement to life. But I will ally
myself only with a Movement that is connected exclusively
with Western occultism and cultivates its
development.” And I also said that such a Movement must
link on to Plato, to Goethe, and so forth. I indicated the
whole programme which was then actually carried out.
In this
programme there was no place for unhealthy activities, but
naturally a few people with such tendencies came; they were
people who were influenced by the Movement of which I have
spoken. But from the conversation quoted at the beginning of
this lecture, which I had with a member of the English
Theosophical Society, you will see that a complete rejection
of everything in the nature of mediumship and atavism was
implicit in this programme.
The path we
have been following for long years was adopted with full
consciousness. Although elements of mediumistic and atavistic
clairvoyance have not been absent, there has been no
deviation from this path, and it has led to our present
position.
I had, of
course, to rely on finding within the Theosophical Movement
people who desired and were able to recognise thoroughly
healthy methods of work. The invariable procedure of those
who did not desire a Movement in which a healthy and strict
sense of scientific responsibility prevails, has been to
misrepresent the aim we have been pursuing, in order to suit
their own ends. The very history of our Movement affords
abundant evidence that there has been no drawing back from
penetrating into the highest spiritual worlds, to the extent
to which they can now, by grace, be revealed to mankind; but
that on the other hand, whatever cannot be attained along a
healthy path, through the right methods for entering the
spiritual worlds, has been strictly rejected. Those who
recognise this and who follow the history of the Movement do
not need to take it as a mere assurance, for it is evident
from the whole nature of the work that has been going on for
years. We have been able to go very, very much further in
genuine investigation of the spiritual world than has ever
been possible to the Theosophical Society. But we take the
sure, not the unsure, paths. This may be said candidly and
freely.
I have always
refused to have anything to do with forms of antiquated
occultism, with any Brotherhoods or Communities of that kind
in the domain of esotericism. And it was only under the
guarantee of complete independence that I worked for a time
in a certain connection with the Theosophical Society and its
esoteric procedures, but never in the direction towards which
it was heading. Already by the year 1907 everything really
esoteric had completely vanished from the Theosophical
Society, and later happenings are sufficiently well known to
you. It has also happened that Occult Brotherhoods made
proposals to me of one kind or another. A certain
highly-respected Occult Brotherhood suggested to me that I
should participate in the spreading of a kind of occultism
calling itself ‘Rosicrucian’, but I left the
proposal unanswered, although it came from a much-respected
Occult Movement. I say this in order to show that we
ourselves are following an independent path, suited to the
needs of the present age, and that unhealthy elements are
inevitably regarded by us as being undesirable in the
extreme.
Notes:
Note 1.
Dr. Steiner's articles in Lucifer-Gnosis are
collected in the book entitled
Aus der Akasha-Kronik.
The book was published in English
translation by Rudolf Steiner Publications Inc., New
York, 1959, with the title
Cosmic Memory.
Note 2.
See inter alia:
Man in the Light of Occultism, Theosophy and Philosophy,
lecture 7
and
lecture 10;
Earthly and Cosmic Man, lecture 1;
Earthly and Cosmic Man,
lecture 1;
The Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge
of Good and Evil, lecture 4;
Things of the present and past in the Spirit of Man, lecture 5.
(The last two lecture-courses are not yet printed but are
available in translation as typescripts.) See also Notes
at end of Lecture Five.
Note 3.
Note by translator. Presumably by means of the
process known in spiritualism as
“precipitation”.
Note 4.
See notes at the end of Lecture Five.
Note 5.
The content of this book is included in
Die Rätsel der Philosophie.
Note 6.
Translated with the title,
Mysticism and Modern Thought.
(Anthroposophical Publishing Co., London
and Anthroposophic Press, New York, 1925.)
Note 7.
Second English edition (revised) 1972. (Rudolf Steiner
Press, London)
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