The Rudolf Steiner Archive

6. The Tasks of Spiritual Research for the Future

[ 1 ] When people speak today of spiritual science in the sense intended here, one often finds that they not only express this or that conceptual objection, but turn against it in a downright passionate manner, as if it were something arising from the whim of this or that individual and brought into the world solely through that whim. Anyone who takes even a brief look at spiritual life—as it has developed up to the present day, as it has been [preparing] itself over long periods of time—will very soon realize that this spiritual science or spiritual research is not merely something that need only spring from the arbitrary intentions of some individual mind, but rather something that seeks to respond to the urge, the longing of the times. And anyone who is perhaps able to look a little more deeply into this urge, this longing of the times, will, with a little attention, also be able to perceive how those impulses that lead—vaguely and, even today, still almost instinctively—toward such spiritual research must, in the future, become ever more definite, ever more significant, and ever more intense; so that spiritual research, as understood here, corresponds to an urge of the times. This is what today’s and tomorrow’s lectures—which I have the honor of presenting to you—are intended to illustrate.

[ 2 ] It is, after all, quite easy to understand that people today cling to all sorts of popular notions and ideas that they have cobbled together to construct a worldview; but people object when spiritual research seeks to engage with contemporary spiritual life and asserts that, alongside what human senses can perceive—alongside what the ordinary intellect, which finds its fulfillment in understanding scientific research—that, alongside all of this, there is something within the human being that is described by terms so repulsive to many as “etheric body” , “astral body,” and “I-bearer”—so that human beings do not consist solely of the substances of the external world, but are said to possess within themselves supersensible elements as well, such as the supersensible etheric body, or the astral body, which is entirely supersensible and underlies the physical organization, and which is the bearer of the true “I,” the deepest essential being of the human being.

[ 3 ] It is just as easy to mock this insight, just as easy to cobble together apparent refutations of it using popular terms; and when, on top of that, humanities research seeks to explore—through its own methods—the conditions of life and existence of human nature, to show that it aims to extend beyond birth and death, beyond what the senses and conventional science can investigate, then such a claim seems to contradict everything one is accustomed to reading or hearing today.

[ 4 ] And yet, through this spiritual research, attention must be given to that which Lessing had already, more or less outwardly, introduced into our spiritual life; and this must be brought to life through spiritual research.

[ 5 ] This spiritual research must show human beings that there are forces within their supersensible faculties that extend beyond this earthly life; so that we must speak not only of one, but of repeated earthly lives, so that through spiritual science, a person can gain an overview of their being throughout their entire existence: forward beyond birth, first into their spiritual existence; then into past earthly lives, and again into the future, into future earthly lives.

[ 6 ] For spiritual science, a person’s entire existence is divided into successive earthly lives, which are separated from one another by what lies between death and a new birth: a purely spiritual existence in supersensible worlds.

[ 7 ] At first, this entry into the spiritual world seems to modern people in such a way that they have many objections to it; it appears entirely fantastical to them. And it is precisely those who are familiar with the conditions and foundations of spiritual science who will find it understandable that, at first, a great deal of resistance may arise in the modern soul against such assertions. And among the objections one finds, first and foremost, the claim: We overlook existence, and what initially presents itself to our senses shows us that we have, in sensory existence, a self-contained world that can be known through ourselves.

[ 8 ] That, after all, was the aspiration of a number of great, serious thinkers of the second half of the nineteenth century: to exert all the powers of thought in order to explain, from within themselves, that which unfolds before the human intellect! Much was done throughout the nineteenth century to establish such a worldview, to provide it with moral foundations and moral goals, and to offer comfort to the human soul through it. And it is not the worst of souls who have striven for a materialistic, positivist worldview.

[ 9 ] This is one type of resistance one encounters when discussing spiritual research or the spiritual sciences.

[ 10 ] The second is something found among people who hold a different belief, namely, that behind this sensory world lies a supersensible world—people who acknowledge the existence of such a supersensible world but cannot admit that human powers of cognition, that human capabilities for research, are capable of penetrating into supersensible existence.

[ 11 ] Whether these are doubts or objections arising from a philosophical perspective, ladies and gentlemen, the great philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte essentially addressed all these objections many years ago—a century ago— the great philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte said everything that needed to be said, when—in the manner in which one could express such things at that time—he delivered lectures in 1811 and 1813 at the newly founded University of Berlin and put into words what can be perceived about the spirit. Right at the beginning, Johann Gottlieb Fichte said to his listeners: Imagine a group of people who were born blind and remain blind, and among them there is one who, being sighted, speaks of light and colors. Then these people would say: He is speaking of something fantastical that does not exist at all.

[ 12 ] From their point of view, they are right, for what can be known about a world depends on whether a person possesses the faculty to perceive it. A supernatural world can only be acknowledged by those who—as Goethe called it—have the “eye of the spirit” to perceive this world as a reality before them.

[ 13 ] Now, the way this spiritual science or spiritual research is presented in recent literature, it does not merely present findings—not just what has just been briefly outlined—nor does the literature merely present the results of research; rather, you can find, for example, in my work *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?*, as well as in the second part of my *Outline of Esoteric Science*, how the human soul comes to truly develop within itself the organ needed to look into the spiritual world. And the nature of this organ is such that it is accessible to everyone, provided they follow the right path.

[ 14 ] If someone is born blind, one might say that they may be deprived of the ability to perceive light and colors for the rest of their life. As for the inner eye, it can be awakened in everyone; there are powers that lie dormant within each of us.

[ 15 ] Since today’s discussion is to focus on the “task of spiritual science for the future,” we can only briefly touch upon what the goals and the very nature of this spiritual science itself are. Something of what drives this spiritual science is, so to speak, inherent everywhere one looks—especially in the finest minds of the new age that is dawning, of the spiritual future that is taking shape.

[ 16 ] Among the many things one might recall, let us mention just this one, indeed well-known, statement by Goethe, in which Goethe—drawing, so to speak, on a lifetime of experience and through a profound contemplation of the reality of existence—says—you can find the passage in *Conversations with Eckermann*—he said: One may have gone through many things in life, may have approached existence in all sorts of ways—in old age, one becomes a mystic.

[ 17 ] And because Goethe held this view, he had his Faust end up as a mystic at the end of the second part of *Faust*, even though he also portrayed him as a practical soul.

[ 18 ] What exactly is Goethe trying to say when he speaks of people becoming mystics in old age? Essentially, anyone can experience this by faithfully observing the overall mood and state of their inner life in youth, and then, upon reaching a certain age: one has lived through life, formed certain views—certain inner perspectives—toward which one develops a very specific relationship, a particular state of mind and emotion.

[ 19 ] In youth, [goals and] ideals and worldviews can bubble up—views of the world can bubble up; one can have the feeling that they are there, emerging from within oneself. And when one looks back, especially to childhood, one can see how it was not yet possible to speak of how liveliness and expressiveness come from the soul and the rest from the body. How, from the indeterminate depths of the soul’s life, emerges what a person can observe in themselves during youth.

[ 20 ] Later on, one can see that what a person achieves wells up from the soul. But then comes the time when, more and more, what unfolds in the world around him is consciously reflected in the soul, when one knows: Now what you have experienced is coalescing inwardly in your soul in such a way that it can shed light on other things. One becomes inwardly richer.

[ 21 ] How fresh one feels inwardly in old age reveals what views one projected from within during one’s youth. In old age, one becomes much more independent of the physical. One has an inner experience that every person can have, even without spiritual science: the experience of becoming spiritually independent of oneself, of one’s physicality, one’s corporeality, and one’s personality. And Goethe sensed this inner reality when he said that one becomes a mystic in old age. He meant: One possesses a spiritual form from which one can shed light on the external world.

[ 22 ] And if one were to examine, I would say, the intention of Goethe’s soul at this very point, one could say: He sensed how, in youth—in the earlier stages of human life, so to speak—one lives in harmony with what one is externally, physically. The body grows, becoming stronger and stronger; all its individual functions become more vigorous. This happens in every life. Every human being experiences what might be called a high point in life, and every human being experiences a kind of—a decline. We all feel the decline of life. But precisely during the decline of physical life, we feel more and more this inner life that has become richer, as we are able to attribute more inner judgment about the world to ourselves; we feel our inner self becoming independent of the outward decline.

[ 23 ] If we have developed healthily, then we feel that we become more fulfilled and richer in inner content as we journey through life. This is why the question arises—regardless of all other matters—the question of: What comes after death, after we have passed through the gate of death—after we have stepped through the gate of death into the spiritual world?

[ 24 ] What is objective—independent of the personal—is precisely this: You tell yourself that throughout your entire life, you accumulate a wealth that keeps growing. And when life has become ever richer, ever more meaningful, then it loses the body. Does what one has accumulated throughout one’s entire life simply vanish into nothingness? That is the question—not one born of fear of death or any subjective feeling, but rather, when such forces generate themselves ever more richly, the question arises: Are they to vanish into nothingness when a person passes through the gate of death? No, for we can perceive within ourselves how, fundamentally, something—which is the inner core of our soul—has been at work within us throughout our entire life, working upon our outer, physical existence. We can best recognize this when we—whatever comparison with death may have been made—observe the alternating states between waking and sleeping and ask ourselves what is happening there.

[ 25 ] An external, experimental science cannot answer this. But how does spiritual science provide an answer to this? We see a person falling asleep, and as this happens, the person feels increasingly estranged from the forces through which they move their limbs; they feel themselves slipping away from the earthly-physical. But at the very moment this happens, consciousness fades away. Spiritual science now says: Something very special happens here: The physical body and the etheric body remain lying in bed; but from the moment of falling asleep until waking, that which we call the astral body and the ego-bearer withdraws. However, the inner forces of these bodies are not yet awakened; therefore, the darkness of unconsciousness then spreads around the person.

[ 26 ] Spiritual research now shows—you can read more details about this in my writings—that the forces which are so weak in this astral body and this “I-bearer” of the human being in ordinary everyday life that the person cannot be aware of them during sleep, can nevertheless be stirred into action.

[ 27 ] This is achieved through genuine spiritual scientific methods. It is achieved through what is called meditation and concentration. If a person can bring themselves to make themselves an instrument for the truths of the spiritual world, they can do so through meditation and concentration.

[ 28 ] There is much to be said on this subject. Let us cite just one example here. Imagine that you have a glass that is empty and another that is one-quarter full of water, and that you pour water from the latter into the empty glass, and now imagine that, as this happens, what normally occurs—namely, that the glass from which he is pouring becomes emptier—does not happen, but rather that, by pouring into the other glass, the glass from which he is pouring actually becomes fuller. Because of the extra amount he pours over, the glass from which he is pouring would become fuller and fuller!

[ 29 ] One must form such symbolic concepts, which do not even claim to be real. For if a person always remains grounded in reason and is aware that their conception is a symbolic one, they can experience a certain feeling in the process. This can then express a higher truth—for example, regarding human love.

[ 30 ] Love is a concept that is virtually impossible to fully grasp. But one can express individual qualities of love through symbols.

[ 31 ] Whoever pours the gentle powers of his love into a heart in need of love will notice that he loses nothing of his power to love, but that through this giving, his power grows ever greater and greater. They will be able to use as a symbol of this love the glass that does not become emptier by pouring into another, but fuller.

[ 32 ] And when a person gathers all their thoughts together and focuses them on such a symbol, when a person has the patience to concentrate their spiritual powers again and again on such an inner life of thought, then they awaken the dormant powers within their soul and attain a state in which they become a true instrument for perceiving the world beyond the sensory realm.

[ 33 ] Human beings then come to truly experience, outside their physical bodies, the state and condition in which they are otherwise found only during sleep; and they can induce states that are not sleep, but are similar to sleep in that they are outside themselves, having stepped out of themselves with their astral body and their “I.” Then they are in the spiritual world. The spiritual world then opens up to them. This self-experiment also serves as proof that they live in a supersensible reality. And then the human being becomes aware that they are that which does not depend on the instrument of the body, but rather forms this bodily form themselves.

[ 34 ] And when this spiritual eye opens, he becomes aware—as the child enters the world through birth—of this supersensory work and shaping of the human being.

[ 35 ] Only then can the findings of external research be explained—when we are able to observe how, from the child’s indeterminate physiognomy, a more definite and increasingly defined one takes shape; how language develops; how the brain matures; and how upright posture is achieved.

[ 36 ] Here, the spiritual researcher reveals who is actually the true architect of the entire human form.

[ 37 ] The spiritual does not arise from the physical, [not from a single seed] at birth or conception; rather, the spiritual researcher can observe how the spiritual emerges from the spiritual world and how it first creates the physical body.

[ 38 ] Thus one traces a person’s life beyond death, just as one does in nature, just as one does with a plant, where one traces the seed from one year to the next; one traces the end and connects it to the beginning. One traces the seed as it does more than just sprout within the plant. The spiritual researcher does not merely trace the supersensory human aspect in its life between birth and death, but traces it beyond the gate of death. What Goethe calls the mystical is what the person who knows that it is the spiritual that reproduces itself pursues. And he sees how it becomes more and more independent as the body decays.

[ 39 ] Just as the seed remains when everything else withers away and then develops into a new plant, so it is with the spirit. And while, with age, more and more of our physical shell fades away, this spiritual aspect grows stronger and stronger—so much so that it has become enriched through all its experiences and is now capable of doing what it could not do at the beginning of life.

[ 40 ] At the beginning of life, one has built up a [specific] physical body. During one’s life, one comes to realize that this body can no longer be used in death. But within the inner soul lie the seeds for building a new life. And as we pass through the gate of death, we can see how the forces for building a new life have grown stronger.

[ 41 ] And so, through spiritual research, we can see how a person becomes ready to build a new body by gathering the forces between birth and death to build a new body for themselves.

[ 42 ] The spiritual researcher applies the very same methods by which we have become accustomed to observing nature from the outside; only he applies them in such a way that whoever wishes to use them must develop the faculties for supersensory perception. Then what he explains becomes comprehensible even to those who cannot yet look into the spiritual world—comprehensible on the basis of everything that is in harmony with the phenomena of external life.

[ 43 ] Thus, this doctrine—which may at first seem fantastical—of the return of the human being, of the creative soul that lives within him and is not limited by birth and death, becomes understandable. Then, starting today, humanity reaches a certain point in its view of the world—that point which is like the dawn in which Giordano Bruno stood.

[ 44 ] How did he—Giordano Bruno—stand there when he made his knowledge independent of natural science? If today natural science must rely on what is based on external phenomena, then one need only say: Even before Copernicus, before Kepler, before Galileo, people directed their senses out into outer space and discovered the laws of the universe precisely as they unfolded before their external senses; and he—Giordano Bruno—substitutes his inner vision for the external law. [Before Copernicus,] people remained at the level of sensory perception, observing the expansion of the vast celestial spheres and seeing the blue vault of the sky as if resting upon a disk.

[ 45 ] What did Giordano Bruno say against this view? He said: What you regard as the blue vault of the sky is merely a limitation of your eye. From every point, the eye looks out into an infinite world! He said this based on Copernicus. And Copernicus had not devised a system based on sensory experience; rather, what Copernicus presented in his system was derived through thought, through the inner power of the human soul.

[ 46 ] Thus, the soul must not rely on what natural science regards as knowledge. And drawing on his inner powers, Giordano Bruno was able to say: “What you perceive with your senses—this outer vault of the heavens—is nothing more than the limit of your vision!”

[ 47 ] In the same way, the spiritual researcher says: The boundaries of birth and death—and the belief that human beings are confined within these boundaries—can certainly be compared to the “boundaries” in the heavens that were assumed prior to the Copernican worldview on the basis of sensory perception. And just as Giordano Bruno did, spiritual science points outward into the infinite expanse of human soul life. And just as the blue vault of the heavens arises from the fact that sensory perception does not extend any further, so too does the belief that life is limited by death arise from the fact that limited perception sees no further than physical death.

[ 48 ] Many people today find themselves at the same point with the spiritual sciences as the natural sciences were three centuries ago; and the longing of the present age—our age—is pressing against these processes. Anyone who has followed the intellectual developments of recent times can see how the natural sciences and thought—that is, thought linked to the natural sciences and to external perception—have advanced from triumph to triumph. Anyone who follows this course will, when it comes to the development of science, certainly be an admirer of natural science, and nowhere does spiritual science involve a struggle against the marvelous achievements of natural science. But when natural science steps before your soul, then something else approaches this human being in relation to human life.

[ 49 ] I don’t want to theorize here; let’s consider a specific case. – It was in February 1901 when a star suddenly appeared in the sky and disappeared the very next day: After initially appearing to shine brightly, by the next day it had barely any perceptible light left.

[ 50 ] Whether the scientific hypothesis is more or less correct—how does the scientific mind view this star? It imagines that there is a binary star system there, that one star then collides with the other, explodes, and dissolves into a nebula. A bright flash from the collision, then a glow, followed by a fading as it disperses.

[ 51 ] And how, then, does scientific thought pursue this wondrous mystery? Let us think entirely within the current of thought that has woven its way through Giordano Bruno and Copernicus: there, two celestial bodies collide. Giordano Bruno describes the view out into the infinite expanses—the Sun with its planets, on which beings live. Worlds collide there. Perhaps millions of creatures perish in such a collision. In what is a flash and a burst, all this life is created and destroyed. What, if anything, can natural science tell us about what is happening up there in that external mechanical collision? There, celestial bodies disintegrate into nebulae, and from this nebula a new solar system will form; plants, and later animals and human forms, will emerge—until such a collision takes place again.

[ 52 ] This is what the mode of thinking associated with the natural sciences knows. — Let no one speak against the greatness of this mode of thinking. How could one not admire this mode of thinking—the one that achieved so much in the nineteenth century through spectral analysis and the advances in biology? But in addition to what we have just set before our souls, there is another force at work that can show us how powerless all thinking is that has been formed precisely by this flashing and shattering stellar event.

[ 53 ] When we see a mother caring for her child, we see her witnessing how the child’s soul works its way upward; we see this mother connected to the child’s first steps toward maturity—the attempts at speaking and walking—and we see her bound to the child in love; we then see this mother at the deathbed, watching the child pass away. We see the mother’s grief, and feel the question rising within us: Why was it born? And what has become of the soul that entered into this birth—in which I took such deep joy—and which has now vanished into nothingness?

[ 54 ] Here we have the question of life. And we know, my dear friends, that at every turn we encounter such questions—questions that cannot be answered through external sensory perception, but which we can see living in a corner of the soul.

[ 55 ] And now, as we look beyond what the natural sciences can offer about an entire world system, we feel the powerlessness of all that in the face of the questions that touch the human soul. Such things cannot be dismissed by staring at them impassively; life presents such things to our souls time and again.

[ 56 ] When millions of living beings die, perish in a collision—what natural science can tell us about all this passing away and coming into being of beings and beings does not come close to what the human heart asks when it sits at the deathbed of a loved one and ponders the fate of life!

[ 57 ] If we observe the thinking and activities of our time regarding these matters, a great change becomes apparent when compared to the past. We need only go back to Goethe’s time to see how even the most enlightened scholars—with the exception of the French moralists—affirmed something akin to the creation story and said: It was, in fact, the very essence of what we now regard as knowledge. What, then, was contained in the Mosaic creation story?

[ 58 ] Human beings exist in the spiritual world, and only then is the material added to it. This worldview gave human beings a picture of the world in which they were already present, and it did so in such a way that it told the human soul: What enters life so wonderfully belongs to the first substance of the earth—and you yourself are part of it.

[ 59 ] And increasingly, a worldview is emerging in its place that perceives only the mechanical processes of the universe. One sees a star system disintegrating and imagines that a new world is forming, just as one imagines a new solar system forming. I have often used the image of what happens when you take a certain substance—an oily substance—that forms droplets, cut a sheet of paper in half, and use it as an equatorial plane to penetrate the large droplet by inserting a needle into the paper, beginning to turn it, and then watching as small droplets indeed break off. And in this way, one actually sees something like a cosmic system unfolding on a small scale, just as it unfolds on a large scale out there. And: Who wouldn’t believe in it?

[ 60 ] There’s just one flaw: When you’re showing something, you mustn’t forget the most important things—you mustn’t forget that nothing would come of it if the teacher weren’t there, directing it! So you’re not presenting the full picture if you forget the main factor: the driving force! Thus, even theoretically, this “world system” has a flaw.

[ 61 ] But then it becomes completely inexplicable how this world soul can connect itself to what is developing there, so that it may one day emerge from its nothingness onto this stage.

[ 62 ] And the view that only mechanical principles can explain the world has become increasingly prevalent. From ancient times right up to the present day, a kind of belief has gradually taken shape that all phenomena can be explained solely by mechanical means. Human life itself has gradually become mechanical.

[ 63 ] And so it came to pass that the time drew near when the soul, with all its questions, found itself at a loss in the face of what it is able to perceive in the outside world according to modern thinking, and could find no bridge to what science says. And as the soul asks itself these questions—spiritual science has an answer!

[ 64 ] There was a time in the nineteenth century when people seriously believed that thoughts arose from the brain, and spoke of thoughts as if they were brain waves. How could it ever have come to be that movements in the brain were thought to be directly related to thoughts? Where could this entire mechanical science have come from in the first place?

[ 65 ] Consequently, in more recent times, due to the necessary conditions of the age, the ability of earlier times to look into the spiritual realm has been lost. People did not recognize the nature of thoughts; they did not know how to contemplate a thought. And so one could believe that the essence of the human being lay solely in that in which the soul is embedded—the physical body. But even if one argues the soul away, it is still there, and it inserts itself into the modern course of the world. —Hence, over time, the urge had asserted itself to call upon other active forces besides mere mechanical action.

[ 66 ] How did Herman Grimm, a prominent historian and art connoisseur of his time, approach life? He knew nothing yet of the spiritual sciences, but he had set himself a great task, which he shared with those who were willing to listen. He once explained this plan to me in detail; everything he provided us with in detail was intended to be only parts of a larger plan. He wanted to work on a major work in which he intended to demonstrate that what is at work in the entire existence of the world are not mechanical forces, but rather “creative imagination”! What is creative imagination within the human being is, in the outer world, the creative force—so he said.

[ 67 ] And there was a philosopher in the nineteenth century—Jakob Frohschammer, in Munich—who sought to present this human imagination as the most essential thing. When he demonstrates that not only do the forces in which today’s microscopists believe develop within the embryo, but that he also posits creative imagination as a formative force, this corresponds to the urge of that time to find something spiritual as well—amid the triumphs of natural science, to turn one’s gaze toward the active, creative spirit that reveals itself as transcending becoming and passing away. For coming into being and passing away are linked to the manifestation of nature, whereas the creative spirit is that which endures.

[ 68 ] And in our own time we see how serious-minded people feel that, even though one must rightly proceed in accordance with modern science whenever natural phenomena are discussed, the soul nevertheless cannot help but rise up into the spiritual realm that permeates and weaves through the world.

[ 69 ] An interesting phenomenon can be observed today. A curious book is now available at every train station bookstore: Although it contains some inaccuracies, this book is a significant work of our time; it is titled *Zur Kritik der Zeit* (*A Critique of the Times*), by Walter Rathenau. This book was written by a “practical man” who, with a clear eye, perceives this mechanistic aspect everywhere in scientific and intellectual life and who, particularly in the first chapters of this book, magnificently illustrates how human concepts have become mechanistic and how social life has become mechanistic.

[ 70 ] He depicts all of this with the pen of the thinking human being, the person who looks at reality. But it is precisely such a practical person, who is captivated by the living essence of the soul, who shows us the yearning for the spiritual in our time. There you will find, for example, meaningful passages. The soul cries out for what is spiritual:

She longs for a meaning that lies beyond what can be proven [...]. Time seeks [...] her soul.

[ 71 ] Time is searching for its soul—so he says—

and will find them; albeit against the will of mechanization. This era

[ 72 ] —ours—

had no interest in developing the spiritual aspect of human beings; its aim was to make the world usable—and thus rational—to push back the boundaries of the miraculous, and to conceal the beyond —

[ 73 ] to understand the truths.

Yet, as always, we are surrounded by mystery. It emerges from beneath every smooth surface of thought, and from every everyday experience, it takes just a single step,

[ 74 ] to penetrate

to the center of the world. Mechanization could not rob the individual life of the soul’s three emanations: love for fellow human beings, for nature, and for the Divine; yet for the life of the whole, they were reduced to insignificance. Love for humanity sank to cold compassion and a duty of care, and yet it represents the ethical pinnacle of the entire era; Love of nature became a sentimental Sunday pastime; love of God, obscured by the orchestrated performance of mythological-dogmatic rituals, was placed in the service of interests in this world and the next, and was thus not merely viewed with suspicion by ignoble natures.

There is probably not a single path along which it would be impossible for a person to find their soul [...]. But humanity will not take any detours. No prophets will come, nor any founders of religions, [...]. No single art form will bring the world its soul, for art is [already] a mirror [...] of the soul, not its creator.

[ 75 ] This, then, is how a “practitioner of life” speaks of the soul’s longing and yearning. — Much in the book is off the mark; but this much is true: Anyone who feels this way senses how the truth of the soul is no longer spoken of in our time. Religious founders are rejected. He feels that even an exoteric teaching is no longer willing to be accepted.

[ 76 ] But the very essence of time is to reconnect the soul with the spiritual.

[ 77 ] And what spiritual science has to offer corresponds to this longing; spiritual research shows that human beings can find within themselves such an unfolding of the powers slumbering in their souls that they can immerse themselves directly in what surrounds us on the supersensible plane. And then, within these vast expanses, the gaze conquers the material world.

[ 78 ] We look out and feel not only the human body embedded in physical existence, but—through it—the soul embedded in spiritual existence; [we] expand our gaze beyond birth and death.

[ 79 ] Just as the natural sciences have broadened our view beyond the blue vault of the sky—just as the natural sciences say: “This boundary that humanity has set for itself must be expanded”—so the spiritual sciences say: What mechanical science and the mechanical worldview believe about the boundary set for human life—a boundary that stems solely from limited human cognition itself—expanded human cognition will go beyond it, will transcend this boundary, just as natural science went beyond the boundary of the blue vault of the sky.

[ 80 ] Just as the humanities are seen in our time as embodying the yearning and longing for their soul—just as “the age seeks its soul”—so they will continue to develop the life of this soul and strive for its further development.

[ 81 ] A worldview built on imagination cannot endure; this problem of Herman Grimm’s could never have been solved. But we see how, in those who have preserved the freshness of this longing of the soul, the desire stirs to look out into the spiritual-soul realm that lies outside in the world. And we know that we are a part of it, just as our body is a part of the material world.

[ 82 ] Spiritual science seeks to give people what the soul longs for. And when we ask: What will spiritual science have to do in the future? When all those people who feel a longing within themselves for the origin and destination of the soul begin to ask, then we will point not to abstract concepts, but to the hungry souls, and seek to give these hungry souls what they clearly show they desire.

[ 83 ] Spiritual science does not seek to speak of an indefinite brotherly love, but rather to relate to people in such a way that it gives them what the human soul longs for. Then one may hear this or that objection, mockery, and worse—but as a spiritual scientist, one will find this understandable and will be able to understand those people who, from their point of view today, cannot yet do anything other than what the opponents of natural science did centuries ago: hold trials for heresy. Admittedly, they no longer erect pyres, but they do it in a manner befitting the fashion of the times: treating people who strive for the truth as fantasists and seeking to denigrate them through mockery and blasphemy.

[ 84 ] But that does not matter to those people; for as far as the truth is concerned, all that matters to them is that it—the truth—reveals itself to the soul as justified by its very nature, and that it in fact promotes, enriches, and elevates this life, and can stand the test of life.

[ 85 ] The task of tomorrow’s lecture—which, in a sense, will serve as a continuation of today’s—will be to show that the latter can indeed happen.

[ 86 ] With regard to the truth, it can be said: Anyone who views truth in the manner just discussed can say to himself: Certainly, all human endeavor is always and forever subject to error, and much can easily creep into what the spiritual researcher seeks as error. He is well aware that error can creep in even more easily than in the external sensory world. But regardless—if only the intention to seek the truth is present, then even the smallest thing that happens in this field may be compared to the great things that have been accomplished in the service of science. Whether the truth is mocked or not is irrelevant. For only two possibilities exist: Either what is being disseminated is error—in which case it will already be eradicated by the striving, truth-seeking human mind, for the human soul that seeks the truth does not tolerate error—or else it is the truth; in that case, no mockery, no unfounded personal objections, and absolutely nothing will be able to stop the triumphant power inherent in this truth!

[ 87 ] In world history, it is indeed the case that [it sometimes happens that] things [and] beings can be revealed. But with regard to the truth, it may be said: No matter where people have turned their backs on it, no matter where people may resist it here or there, and no matter how deeply the truth may be buried in the deepest pits—all of this will be overcome! For everywhere, the truth has still found ways to break through once more into humanity, to be useful and beneficial, and to continue its triumphant march through the development of the human spirit.