The Rudolf Steiner Archive

10. The Worldview of German Idealism: A Reflection in Light of Our Fateful Times

[ 1 ] Ladies and gentlemen! For many years now, I have had the privilege of giving a lecture here almost every winter—as I have done in various cities throughout Germany—on topics within the field that I take the liberty of calling “spiritual science.” In these fateful times, however, it seems appropriate to turn our attention to the events of which we are all participants and witnesses at this moment. This seems all the more appropriate to me, distinguished guests, as it is my conviction—arising not from a vague feeling but from the very convictions of spiritual science itself—that precisely what constitutes spiritual-scientific understanding of the world is intimately connected with that which German folk culture and the German spirit have produced as the worldview of German Idealism, which revealed itself in a particularly grand and powerful way from this German essence at the end of the eighteenth and in the first half of the nineteenth century, but which has continued to exert its influence and continues to do so to this very day.

[ 2 ] Spiritual science, in the true and genuine sense, aims to be, in the study of spiritual life, a continuation of what the scientific worldview has brought about for external nature and the sensory world. However, to prepare the mind for such a conception of what underlies the world spiritually—and I say this, as I mentioned, based on spiritual insight itself—it seems to me that this very worldview of German Idealism is the true root and the true source. Therefore, please allow me this evening to offer a kind of reflection on this worldview of German Idealism and its influence on the present, its impact on the entire shaping of our times in general, and on the development of humanity throughout world history.

[ 3 ] Certainly, this worldview of German Idealism is born—entirely born, as we shall see—from the essence of German national character, and in this respect one might deny it a certain universal validity according to the phrase that is often uttered today, namely: All knowledge, all science, must in fact assume an international character and would be untrue to itself if it were in any way colored by a particular national character.

[ 4 ] As obvious as this may seem at first, I would say, and as self-evident as such a claim appears, one must nevertheless say that it is misleading from a deeper worldview perspective. It seems self-evident precisely because it is—I would say—the most ordinary thing one can say about science and the pursuit of knowledge about the world. When one speaks of the universality of knowledge and insight, one is really saying no more than that the sun or the moon are concepts shared by all people. They are; but the way in which what people have to say about the sun and the moon speaks from the souls and hearts of human beings—that way varies according to the talents, intellectual orientations, and dispositions of different peoples. The most diverse talents come into play to make this knowledge fruitful for human spiritual culture in one direction or another. What matters, precisely, is the extent to which what can be known can penetrate the entire course of human spiritual development in a healthy way. Yet it is in this that the talents and spiritual dispositions of the various peoples have their very distinct particularity. How else could one make sense of the fact that one of the most quintessentially German minds, Goethe, set out on his journey around the world to observe not only what presented itself to him through the contemplation of art, but also what nature had to offer him? How else would it be possible that he wrote to his German friends from Italy: “After all that I have seen of natural phenomena and facts of nature, I would now most like to undertake a journey to India”—so said Goethe—“not to discover it, but to view what has already been discovered in my own way.”

[ 5 ] This way of viewing what is given to each person is what matters when it comes to considering the actual impulses, the driving forces behind the progress of humanity as a whole.

[ 6 ] It is precisely spiritual science that makes it possible to view the souls of peoples in a truly epistemological way. However, one must immediately take as a starting point a spiritual-scientific insight that—like so many insights today—may be regarded by some as paradoxical, or perhaps even fantastical. Yet what I will initially have to say about the souls of different peoples from the perspective of spiritual science is something that may still seem fanciful and paradoxical to the present age, but which seeks to become part of human knowledge, just as certain findings in physics and the natural sciences have become part of it.

[ 7 ] When one considers the soul today in the context of conventional school psychology, one regards everything that swirls and lives within the soul—impulses of will, feelings, perceptions, thoughts, and ideas—as a single unit. Certainly, that is true; but this approach leads to no real understanding. Just as one cannot gain a real understanding of the soul itself, one cannot gain a real understanding of light unless one conceives of its interaction with material existence—with the physical objects that it encounters—in such a way that one believes the various shades of color emerge from the light: the red-yellow shade on one side, the green shade in the middle, the blue-violet shade on the other side—just as the physicist must view this single light, in its interaction with material existence, as structured into these shades of color, and just as he cannot arrive at an understanding of—as Goethe says— the deeds of light—one cannot come to an understanding of what the human soul actually is unless one divides it, I would say, into three shades of its nature as well. And so we call the first nuance of the soul’s nature—corresponding, as it were, to the red and yellow hues of light in the rainbow—[...] the human sentient soul. The human sentient soul contains everything that wells up from the dark depths of the soul, often unconsciously and subconsciously. What lives within a person without their intellect immediately comprehending it—their passions, their desires, and so on, as well as that which endows a person with this or that temperament—all of this wells up in the soul of feeling. But this feeling soul also contains, in a certain way—though, one might say, in a natural way—what can be called the eternal forces of the human soul, which endure through births and deaths and can reappear in ever-repeating earthly lives.

[ 8 ] Let us distinguish—as it were, as a parallel phenomenon to the greenish hue of light—the so-called intellectual or emotional soul. This is the part of the soul through which a person gains an overview—a rationally considered, level-headed overview—of that which otherwise exists in the soul in an indeterminate and unconscious state as emotions and inner stirrings.

[ 9 ] And as the third nuance of life—blue-violet, so to speak, corresponding to the light—we speak of the consciousness soul. It is that through which the human being, from his soul life, is most closely connected to the surrounding physical world in which he finds himself; it is that which encompasses within itself the most temporal, the most transitory force of the human being; it is also that through which the human being appears individually as a personality, through which he makes the world serve his purposes, through which he brings into practical life that which he thoughtfully allows to well up from the subconscious life of the soul.

[ 10 ] And just as the one light—the one sunlight—lives within the various colors of the rainbow, so does the one self—the one, self-aware essence of the human being—live within the totality of the soul’s nuances. And just as light appears as the unity of red, green, and blue—as the unity of everything—so does the self, the personality, the individuality of the human being, the true “I.”

[ 11 ] That is all I can say today by way of introduction about this fact—the regularity of the life of the soul, which can certainly be scientifically substantiated—because it seems appropriate to me to apply this regularity of the life of the soul to the various national souls, insofar as they are spread throughout European intellectual life.

[ 12 ] Here we must say that [...] what might be called the “national soul” is, for spiritual science, just as much a reality—something living in and of itself, not merely an abstract concept that summarizes the characteristics of a people, but something living in and of itself. — You will also find the necessary references for this in our spiritual science literature, specifically in my book *Theosophy*.

[ 13 ] And here it must be said that the individual peoples differ in such a way that in one people the nuance of the feeling soul comes to the fore more, while in another people a different nuance of the soul life is more evident. As a result, the European peoples are structured according to their national souls—not the individual human beings, but insofar as these individual human beings belong to the national soul—and they bring to revelation and expression that which lives in the individual national souls precisely as the hues of the rainbow.

[ 14 ] Here, the perspective—which I would say is justified by spiritual science—shows us that when we look toward the south, toward the Italian people—and to some extent this also applies to the Spanish people—when we look toward the Italian people, we see that the national soul of the Italian people finds its full expression in the nuances of the feeling soul; and everything that can be observed in the most diverse expressions of this Italian national soul—in its good and bad aspects—is connected with the fact that in the Italian national soul the nuance of the feeling soul sets the tone, that everything, fundamentally speaking, simply wells up from the feeling soul.

[ 15 ] Today we want only—I would say—to emphasize the best qualities of the Italian people as they emerge from their emotional soul; but one will see that this Italian people, insofar as it appears as a national soul—as I said, not the individual human personality—must possess a certain one-sidedness, because its expressions, its manifestations, spring from the soul of feeling. Indeed, if we take the greatest figures—I will set aside artistic education and the visual arts proper, though they could very easily illustrate precisely what I have to say—if we take the greatest figures—Dante, Giordano Bruno— we discover, precisely when we delve deeply into them, that what they have achieved in a magnificently shaped worldview is created entirely from the soul of sensation. One need only read Giordano’s work, which is precisely why he was able to become such a great source of inspiration. When one delves deeply into what he has produced, it is like an expression of feeling for the worldview that a person can form from the abundance of the world’s phenomena. Feeling—it lives on in this one of the greatest [minds of] the Italians, in Giordano Bruno. I would just like to point that out.

[ 16 ] It is particularly important to examine the French national soul from the perspective we have gained. This French national soul reveals itself to the spiritual-scientific gaze in such a way that the stratification of the intellectual soul actually sets the tone for it. Everything in the French spirit that appears great, yet also one-sided, stems from the fact that the intellectual soul finds particular expression there. And let us mention today only that which influences the formation of a true worldview. The greatest Frenchman in this field, whose influence still shapes French philosophical thought today, is, of course, Descartes or Cartesius, who was born at the end of the sixteenth century and lived well into the seventeenth; but it is precisely in this Descartes or Cartesius—that thinker who emerged at the dawn of modern philosophical development—that one can see how everything that can lead to a worldview through reason alone is alive. His famous saying is: “I think, therefore I am.” Thinking is now grounded in the very being of the soul—that is, in that which lives within the rational soul.

[ 17 ] The human mind also has the peculiarity that, in a sense, it constructs the world as if it were an external, mechanical entity. This is indeed the peculiarity of the intellect: that it is unable to penetrate the inner vitality of the world, that it recoils, as it were, from this inner vitality, and that it seeks to construct everything. This is particularly evident in Descartes. And now let us draw attention to a detail: how this worldview of Cartesius, of Descartes, came about precisely because it is—I would say—the one-sided expression of intellectual life. Descartes contemplates the world; and after he has surrendered himself to all doubt—and this doubt, in turn, is also an expression of the intellectual view of the world—he comes to ask himself how he can form a picture of the world that possesses sensibility. Indeed, this picture of the world takes such a form that everything mechanical seems to fit into it. The world appears as one great mechanism. And it is characteristic of this—I would say—truly French worldview that Descartes explicitly asserts: we can perceive the soul only within ourselves, as human beings. Animals are moving machines. Descartes denies the existence of a soul in animals and, indeed, in all of [non-human] nature. Animals are automatons.

[ 18 ] Thus, in Descartes’ mind, the entire non-human natural world stands before him like a complex machine, with animals within this complex machine. Indeed, this reveals precisely the rationalist mindset that recoils from comprehending the living. And this rational aspect has remained one-sided, and it has ultimately led to the fact that, starting precisely in France and continuing into our own time, the impetus has been given to establish the actual materialism of the worldview—mechanism, one might say, as a worldview—

[ 19 ] Ladies and gentlemen, it would be very easy today to accuse someone who describes the relationships between national souls in this way of the following: “Yes, you are describing things from the perspective of today’s emotions, because the war has brought about a situation in which what we ourselves regard as our worldview—as the source of our national identity—is being reviled, even slandered, from all sides throughout Europe; and so we are now trying—I would say—in this era to either justify ourselves or seek revenge.”

[ 20 ] Well, distinguished guests, there are listeners here who know that what I am saying today about the various national souls in these difficult times of European events is something I have said time and again for many years, long before this war, and have expressed not only to Germans but also to members of other European nations; I regard this as a solid body of spiritual-scientific knowledge regarding European conditions

[ 21 ] French folklore has carried this mechanistic worldview into the present day, so that—let us say, for example, in Goethe’s time—what was a French, materialistic, or mechanistic worldview could come to the fore. And today we may recall how Goethe, even as a young man, confronted French mechanicism from his German consciousness—a German consciousness that seeks to focus on the living soul and the vitality of the worldview—by saying: “They bring us this mechanical play, nothing but a mechanism, a worldview as if the whole world were merely a game, a veritable automaton!” Yes, if only they could at least explain what one sees in the world of phenomena—if they could at least explain that much! They say these are moving atoms! But then, once they have explained how the atoms collide with one another, they withdraw and leave the entire world unexplained.

[ 22 ] This is precisely what Goethe, even as a young man, rejected: a one-sidedness that arose from the purely intellectual development of a worldview. And, essentially, one can see even to this day how this mechanistic worldview influences what we seek in a worldview—a popular worldview. For only a few individuals have attempted to work their way out of it; for example, the—well, I don’t know whether, today, after the outbreak of war and given the mood of the French, one may still call him Bergson—the famous philosopher—or whether the word “Bergson” as his name is now frowned upon in France; I don’t know—the famous Bergson; he did, after all, attempt in a certain way to break free from mechanism. It is Bergson, in fact, who, ever since the war broke out, has—one might even say—constantly lashed out in the most vicious manner against the German spirit, specifically against the German worldview, and has managed to talk his fellow Parisians into believing that it is precisely the Germans—who were, in a certain sense, great during the era of German Idealism—but who have now fallen so low in the present, [the Germans] have become a people who educate themselves only mechanically and in a machine-like manner. The Germans have become a people who themselves represent nothing more than a kind of machine!

[ 23 ] Bergson probably meant—Bergson, who formed this view of the German people because the Germans oppose the French with cannons and rifles— he probably formed this view because he believed that the Germans would counter the French cannons and rifles with the products of what he calls the “greatness, the golden age” of the German people—by reciting Novalis, Schiller, and Goethe, for example—since that would be all they had to rely on, wouldn’t it!

[ 24 ] Well, this Bergson—he has, in a certain sense, made a name for himself. However, I have shown in my book *The Riddles of Philosophy*—which was not written during the outbreak of the war, but was published right at the beginning of the war and had been completed long before—that those of Bergson’s ideas that are somewhat plausible can be found much more intensely and in a much more thorough manner in the minds of German thinkers from long before! But quite apart from that, Bergson always wants to be regarded as the one who brought the French a worldview that went far beyond what is considered a mechanistic or materialistic conception of things.

[ 25 ] Well, this worldview—how did Bergson himself hold it up to the Germans in his lectures, to these Germans who are said to have fallen so far since the days of their greatness? It’s just a shame that it has recently been proven that Bergson—for pages on end—did not merely paraphrase but actually copied the German philosopher Schelling, the German philosopher Schopenhauer, and so on and so forth!

[ 26 ] So whatever the Frenchman can hold up as a superior worldview to that of the Germans he slanders—my esteemed audience—he has written down himself! It is indeed necessary to reflect on these matters more often in the present day if one wishes to understand the mutual relationship among the peoples of Europe and what is now being said about this relationship by the opponents of this German essence.

[ 27 ] And, ladies and gentlemen, when we turn our attention to the British national soul, we find that this British national soul bears the imprint of the consciousness soul in its entirety. And in every detail of this British national soul, one can demonstrate how it gives expression to this soul of consciousness—how the Briton, the Englishman in particular, intends to place that which wells up from within him solely in the service of practical life.

[ 28 ] That is—and I will now set aside the development of the entire worldview—that is what is characteristic of English culture. Beginning with Milton and Bacon, it is evident everywhere that what was actually sought was a worldview intended solely to serve the immediate, tangible realities of life. But I will set that aside for now; I wish only to point out that, in very recent times, this English cultural tradition—insofar as it has truly emerged from the British cultural tradition—has led to a quite distinctive direction: truth is that which a person with a sense for truth regards as something intimately and deeply connected to the soul as a reality. Ladies and gentlemen: The English—and in this case in harmony with the Americans—have developed a worldview they call pragmatism. What is this pragmatism? Well, this pragmatism, ladies and gentlemen, is characterized above all by the fact that it treats truth—the concept, the very idea of truth itself—in a most peculiar way. Truth as something that connects the soul to a reality—to a spiritual reality—is something that this pragmatism, this quintessentially English product, does not recognize at all. Human beings perceive truth as a concept, as an idea—in the sense of pragmatism—purely for the purpose of dealing with the external sensory world, with external, tangible reality, and of intervening in it. Truth, in the sense of this pragmatism, is a concept that proves useful for external, practical life. Truth as a tool for utility in the most extreme sense—one might say that even scientific truth is understood in this way. Truth has no independent meaning; rather, truth [serves] only as a tool for finding one’s way in external life—that is what this pragmatism has brought about.

[ 29 ] Do we not see here the consciousness soul, which places everything that the human being produces spiritually solely in the service of external life? Do we not see it at work here in every detail—dear friends—as found among the three peoples mentioned, so that order and inner understanding will come into the matter when viewed according to the guiding principles that can only be briefly outlined here, but which can be fully substantiated by the findings of spiritual science?

[ 30 ] And let us now turn our gaze to the heart of Europe; let us turn our gaze to German intellectual life, insofar as it is rooted in its national character — let us turn our gaze to that spiritual striving within the German people that is meant to lead to a worldview, to a worldview that at least corresponds to the German essence, to German folk character—then we find, in the most comprehensive way, confirmation of what spiritual science also shows elsewhere: that this German soul is colored by this, that it, like light, appears in three different shades: red-yellow, greenish, and blue-violet. That this German soul manifests in such a way that the “I,” the self-consciousness, works through the three different soul nuances—the unity of the soul-life, active through all three soul nuances—this emerges, upon truly lively and intense contemplation, as the essence of the German national spirit, the German national soul.

[ 31 ] And this can be said in a completely objective sense; it does not require any kind of one-sided creation in the national sense, such as we see emerging from the Italian, French, and British national spirit.

[ 32 ] The German is able to truly rely on what a spiritual pursuit of knowledge about his nature provides him, and [he is able] to comprehend his nature based on this knowledge.

[ 33 ] And if one seeks historical evidence that this “I,” this “self”—the entire living personality—truly operates within German folklore through these three nuances of the soul, then one can point precisely to the three great thinkers who emerged so clearly within German intellectual life at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, and who sought to reveal German folk culture at the highest spiritual level. Kant, of course, preceded them; he sought to develop his ideas from within philosophy. However, we will not consider him here, even though he, so to speak, laid the foundation for the others.

[ 34 ] But let us place before our souls one of the most quintessentially German men, one of those men who knew—even as their thoughts soared toward the highest, toward a worldview—that within the German essence they could only attain this worldview in the true sense, in the living sense, if this worldview were the result of a dialogue with the German national spirit itself. And so it was with Fichte, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, who revealed the German essence most wonderfully in the worldview he created. How does he stand before us right now, when we first consider his personality merely from the outside?

[ 35 ] Allow me, esteemed audience, to present to you only a few essential aspects of his life, so that we may see how this whole person, Fichte, sought—from the unity of human life, from the “I” itself—to gain that which illuminates the world in its deepest life and can bring this insight to humanity.

[ 36 ] Even as a boy, Fichte—how does he appear to us? Two traits, truly wonderful in their poignant beauty—we can scarcely find them in any other mind: The six-year-old son of a simple farmer is, at first, a diligent student; and because he is such a good student, his father gives him the book *The Horned Siegfried* as a Christmas reward—he can already read. It soon becomes apparent that Johann Gottlieb Fichte is becoming somewhat inattentive in his studies; he is reprimanded for it. We see him standing one day by the stream that flows past his parents’ house, throwing *The Horned Siegfried*—which had become so dear to him, so very dear, and into which he had poured his whole soul—into the stream. And when his father arrives, the father realizes the reason for the boy’s strange behavior: Faced with the iron concept of duty that was already alive within him—a concept that went to the very root of his soul—he could not bear the thought that what was dear to him as a human being, as a person, should remain with him if it meant he might violate his duty. Thus, even the boy Fichte—the six-year-old boy—already feels himself standing within a world that is, I might say, entirely permeated by forces of duty.

[ 37 ] Some time later, when Johann Gottlieb Fichte was nine years old, the neighbor from the neighboring estate visited the little village where his parents lived. He had actually intended to hear the Sunday sermon; but he arrived too late. What happened? Since the pastor had already delivered the sermon, they brought the young boy—the nine-year-old in a blue peasant smock—before him. At first, the boy behaved awkwardly, but then, when he realized what was expected of him, he came to life, and who now recites the entire sermon he had heard as a nine-year-old boy word for word in front of the neighbor—so that everything he said flowed from the depths of his soul—for he had connected, with the innermost gaze of his soul, with what he had just heard, and thus he was able to let it flow forth again from the very depths of his being. Thus he lived a spiritual life in the immediacy of his own being. Thus was Fichte prepared to discover the worldview of German Idealism—that which could flow from him, I might say, albeit from a certain one-sided perspective, but nonetheless from a genuinely German perspective.

[ 38 ] How he was, in the depths of his being, fully aware that what lives within a human being—what lies within this “I”—harbors the source forces of the world itself—that which, in a divine-spiritual way, ripples through and permeates the world— and how this can be discovered if a person only delves deeply into the depths of their inner being—this is evident throughout Fichte’s entire body of work. He was, after all, appointed to a professorship in Jena relatively early on, which at that time was the center of German intellectual life. But the way in which Fichte, as a teacher, influenced his listeners is truly quite different from what one—I might say—usually imagines.

[ 39 ] People who have heard Fichte describe him in roughly the following way. They say: When Fichte spoke, it was as if his words rolled forth like thunder, discharging into flashes of lightning; and when he spoke, he did not merely seek to educate good individuals—he sought to educate great ones. And one of those who had listened to some of his closest associates said: What Fichte said revealed that, while his imagery was not practical, it was bold and energetic; that his imagination, though not graceful in the strict sense, had a compelling and powerful effect; and that in the realm of thought, in the realm of ideas, he spoke not like someone who merely uses grand words, but like someone capable of reigning in this invisible, this supernatural world.

[ 40 ] When Fichte spoke to his audience, he did not merely seek to convey to them the content of what he had to say. He never spoke the exact same words twice when lecturing on a subject; he never spoke in such a way—I would say that he did not merely have a certain content in his soul that he wanted to convey to his listeners—but rather, he had within himself an overall sense of what he wanted to say, an overall feeling, and sought above all to establish an inner bond between himself and each individual listener. He wanted what lived in his soul as a force—not merely as words—to become active in each individual listener, [but] to resound from within each listener themselves. He wanted a living energy to flow out over his entire audience. He wanted the listeners, after hearing his words, to leave with a different inner life than the one they had arrived with. He wanted to bring something to life within them. But this is how he worked, seizing the “I” with vitality.

[ 41 ] And so Fichte—Johann Gottlieb Fichte—came to completely—I would say—reject that which had emerged from Descartes’ rational worldview. To strive for being in one’s own self and for the divine in the self—by proceeding from thought, and precisely because one thinks—would mean, as Fichte could not accept, that the self would have been something dead. For him, the self was to be something that can never die, for the reason that it is constantly creating itself. It cannot cease to be at all—since it constantly creates itself. That is to say: Fichte saw the essence of the “I” in the will. And by the fact that the “I” wills itself, it places itself into the world through its own power.

[ 42 ] Consequently, however, this also led Fichte to a worldview in which he saw the Will permeating the world as the truly active force in the world. And what is remarkable about Fichte is that he says: This external sensory world, as it appears to us, is not the true, real world. Why is it there? It is there so that human beings, within this sensory world, may themselves appear as sensory beings; so that within these human beings, the Will that permeates the world—which expresses itself as the divine duty that pervades the world—may serve as the material for fulfilling duty, for fulfilling the moral. Thus, for Fichte, the entire world is permeated by moral substance, by moral reality. For him, the entire world is a spiritual whole of duty, and whatever exists as an individual entity exists so that duty, so that the will, so that the divine—which lives within the will—may find its full expression.

[ 43 ] Fichte refers to the external sensory realm as a substance; he calls it the sensually perceived material of duty. Let us try, objectively, to reconcile this placement within a divine-moral world order in Fichte with the “chemism” that emerged from a uniform, rational worldview, as in the case of Descartes—Cartesius— try to recognize how Johann Gottlieb Fichte lived—I might say—in a certain inner connection of the soul with that which, as the divine, permeates and interweaves the world, and how he in turn sought to perceive this connection in the individual national spirits. But the ability of a national spirit to grasp this living connection with the universal spiritual in the “I”—this Fichte could attribute only to the German national spirit. And so it became quite clear to Fichte that, in the context of human development, the German national spirit was called upon to replace mechanistic, lifeless cognition with living cognition.

[ 44 ] But it is true that what pulses deeply through the magnificently effective “Addresses to the German Nation”—like an ethos itself, like a world-historical concept of duty—is what Johann Gottlieb Fichte delivered during one of Germany’s most difficult times, in Berlin, surrounded by the enemies who had invaded the city at that time, and while he was delivering these “Addresses to the German Nation”—in which he sought to demonstrate how the German national spirit is called upon to grasp, from the living “I,” the connection between humanity and the world spirit—as he delivered these addresses, which even today can still have a wonderfully inspiring effect on the German spirit, the passing French regiments were drumming outside. At any moment, he could have been captured by the enemies. Yet there he stood, unshakable, as the German man who was aware that he had to articulate the world-historical mission of the German national spirit.

[ 45 ] There is no need, my dear friends, to take the one-sided position today that one should accept philosophy—or a worldview—in terms of its content as if it were some kind of dogma. We can move beyond that today. There is no need to fully subscribe to what Fichte said here or there, or to what the others said—whom we will yet discuss; one can turn one’s attention to the way in which these people strive, and how, precisely in this striving, they demonstrate—as Fichte was also fully aware—that they sought to draw from the depths of the German national spirit.

[ 46 ] Thus Johann Gottlieb Fichte stands before us as one of those who sought a worldview rooted in German Idealism. We want to focus on this quest in his work—and in that of the others as well—rather than on what they actually said. One need not be a follower of anyone whom one considers a great, venerable, and significant personality; rather, one can still allow one’s individual striving to be kindled quite independently, even in those areas where one believes one cannot agree with him regarding the content of a doctrine. But the teaching is not what matters now; what matters is the personality, which, just as it stands, can serve to characterize the German people themselves, because it must lie in the very essence of the German people if—I would say—as with Fichte, something can emerge from this German essence with such self-awareness as Fichte brought forth from it.

[ 47 ] Then we see Fichte’s successor in another figure, Schelling. Schelling, too, is such a figure. I am convinced, distinguished guests, that it is precisely these three figures, of whom I am speaking here, who will once again be called upon when the time—which is certainly a time of great hopes and activity that we are experiencing, but which is also a time of severe trials—when this time bears its fruit.

[ 48 ] We see Fichte’s influence [in] Schelling. Here, too, we find a figure who seeks to create a worldview directly from the depths of the “I,” because he is fully aware that within what human beings experience in their innermost being, the divine-spiritual is at work—a force that flows through all of nature and all of existence and can be grasped through its activity [in] the world. If only human beings were able to experience their “I” strongly enough within themselves.

[ 49 ] If, for Fichte, the divine essence is something that pervades the world—I might say—weaving and acting like a great moral force, then for Schelling the divine essence is, first and foremost, the great Artist who, out of the artistic weaving of his own essence, first sets nature before himself in order to behold his own truth, his own essence, and his own work in the mirror of nature. For Schelling, God’s work of art is nature. Not a natural science that is meant to operate abstractly and rationally—a natural science that operates in such a way that with every idea produced about nature, the human soul simultaneously feels a kinship with nature. But Schelling perceives nature in such a way that he says: Now man appeared; now other animated beings appeared in nature. But all of nature preceded this, as it were, as the unconscious and subconscious, which had to exist beforehand like a skeletal framework. Nature stands there as the entire worldview imbued with spirit; as the past and at the same time as the firm ground for the present; as the past in terms of matter upon which the spirit can stand, having prepared its existence within the existence of nature. And so, for Schelling, nature and spirit grow together—but in such a way that what truly emerges from Schelling as a worldview of German Idealism is once again connected to the entire personality, not merely one-sidedly with the emotional soul, one-sidedly with the conscious soul, or one-sidedly with the rational soul, but from the full richness of the spiritual being. One might say: Schelling in his entirety was present in this.

[ 50 ] Those who knew him personally described how, even in his old age, he spoke with sparkling eyes, as if he wanted to pour out onto his listeners—through the radiant gaze of his eyes—that which lived within him as a nature imbued with spirit and soul, through which he always felt the human soul interwoven with all of nature’s existence. Schelling felt himself soaring ever higher and higher—to the point where, in the end, he could be understood only to a limited extent—with this worldview of his that was, I might say, woven from the German spirit, from the soul of the spirit—just as, in Fichte’s case, it was woven from the soul of the will. God as the Artist, nature as a marvelous work of art, an emotional understanding of nature—which Schelling believed to be so intimately interwoven with the human self that he was later led to say: “To know nature is to create nature.”

[ 51 ] Certainly, these spirits were one-sided; but they were as one-sided as all people are who have the flaws of their virtues, not the flaws of their petty traits. — To recognize nature is to create nature! — He felt that what lives as a force in nature can be grasped by the soul, provided that this soul grasps itself within its own “I,” and that nature can thus be recreated.

[ 52 ] And the third is Hegel—the much-misunderstood philosopher who is, nevertheless, once again revered by some in the present day. If Fichte attempted to come alive in the will that can permeate everything—[he attempted] to come alive in the “I”—and if Schelling—I would say—attempted to create an idealistic worldview in the “world spirit” that comes alive in the “I” and imbues everything with spirit and soul, then Hegel attempts to create a worldview out of pure concepts, out of the Idea. And with Hegel in particular, it seems natural—precisely because he wanted to formulate a worldview in concepts, in ideas—to compare this Hegelian worldview with the mechanistic, rational one of Cartesius, of Descartes: there, everything is rational! But what did Hegel want? Hegel did not want the concept, the idea, to be such that his worldview would be, as it were, merely an instrument for recognizing an external reality. Hegel wanted this world to be such that the human soul, for its part, experiences the concepts itself, that it immerses itself with its “I” into the icy realms, but thereby also forms the experience of the pure concept. For Hegel had the inner experience—one may call it inner experience— that when a human being grasps the ideas of the world in their purity, he or she may then participate, with the innermost core of his or her self, in that which, as divine thought itself, creatively underlies the entire world—participate in the work of thought of the Deity—because, after all, a thought in the soul is, in a sense, merely an ideal representation of that which, as the thought of God, permeates the world—that is what Hegel wanted.

[ 53 ] This worldview is certainly one-sided as well, because it—I would say—reduces the divine-spiritual beings that underlie the world to mere logicians, since the entire world is reduced to a mere skeleton of their reality. But that is precisely why it is significant that—I would say—this inwardly living sense of and interweaving with a thought-life permeating the world has appeared as a stage in the development of the German spirit: I want to unite myself with the thought at work in the world, and I am convinced that in doing so I not only have something in my soul that outwardly reflects the world, but that when these thoughts flow through my soul, it is the divine activity itself that causes its thoughts to appear within my soul—those very thoughts according to which minerals, plants, animals, and human beings are created in the external world. Out there, God creates form and reality according to the Ideas; then, having stripped these Ideas of their material aspect, He allows them to flow through the human soul, and the human being participates by surrendering to this flow in a mysticism that is not vague, but entirely crystal-clear—a mysticism of Ideas, not of emotion: Human beings participate in the activity of the divine thoughts in the world!

[ 54 ] Yes, ladies and gentlemen, in these three figures—who, far more than one might think, continue to live on in the German spirit even during the period when they were rarely mentioned, in the second half of the nineteenth century and right up to the present day—in these three figures, we encounter the worldview of German Idealism, that German Idealism which was called upon—and we can [see this] directly and objectively in these spirits, the spirits of this German Idealism—which was called upon—I would say—in terms of knowledge, I expressly emphasize, not religiously, but epistemologically—although the epistemological is a pillar of the religious, the religious arises from another part—and also as a pillar of the religious, to conjure forth from the depths of human nature the second great tidal wave with regard to a human worldview.

[ 55 ] Let’s turn our attention to Asia. Asia, after all, preserves in its worldview—and India in particular still preserves, I would say, an ancient worldview—in which human beings have sought to arrive at—to arrive at from within their very being—that which, as the divine-spiritual, permeates, interweaves with, and lives through the world. But how do Asians—and the modern-day Indians, who are the successors of those ancient Asians—attempt to make the divine-spiritual activity and flow in the world present within their own soul? By dampening and numbing the soul, by numbing the “I”; the “I” must be extinguished, so that the human being can surrender to the universal flow of Brahman. — This is the ancient striving toward a worldview—I might say—the primordial Aryan striving for a worldview. A characteristic feature of this is that the ego is subdued and numbed to the point of extinction, so that what a person experiences in their ego does not stand in their way when they wish to awaken within their soul that which, in a divine-spiritual way, floods and permeates the world. To extinguish oneself—so that the divine may work within—that is the ideal of this Pan-Asian worldview.

[ 56 ] This worldview was no longer a possibility once the greatest event in the history of human development had taken place. This worldview was no longer a possibility once the Christ impulse had entered humanity. From a religious standpoint, humanity was given a deepening of such magnitude that the Asian element may never again emerge in its former strength, for it could never again be commensurate with this event, in which the Christ Impulse lives as the supreme event. It was the destiny of the German national spirit to create for earthly existence a form of knowledge that is commensurate with the Christ impulse.

[ 57 ] And these three spirits are like the three symptoms through which one strives toward such a worldview. As I said: How can one seek such a worldview without extinguishing the “I”! We have seen how precisely these three thinkers—Fichte, Schelling, Hegel—seek to live out the “I” to the fullest, how they place it at the center of the three soul nuances, not by extinguishing the “I,” but precisely through its full experience, through the elevation of the “I”; how the divine-spiritual flows into this “I”—that is what fell to the German national spirit. And it was able to do so because it could let the “I” shine through the three shades of the soul, just as the unified light shines through the three shades of the rainbow.

[ 58 ] It was precisely the task of the greatest German thinkers—who saw themselves as one with what the truly German national spirit desires in the further development of humanity—to engage with the more recent development of the world in the same way as those who now place everything that can be recognized about the existence of nature and the soul in the service of such an idealistic worldview.

[ 59 ] It seems appropriate to me, distinguished guests, to point this out today. What will come to pass as a result of major external events will be decided by arms and other circumstances. However, in light of such considerations, it seems particularly fitting at this very moment to immerse our souls in the very essence of the German national spirit itself, which is now, from all sides, is not only, I might say, reviled, but also slandered—and which, precisely because it must act in the manner I have indicated, is so misunderstood by those who, driven by their hatred, not only misunderstand the German worldview—one cannot say they merely misunderstand it, but they also willfully misunderstand it. But they cannot understand it because they act in a one-sided manner, with the one-sidedness of a particular shade of the soul; whereas the German, by his very nature, must act toward wholeness, out of his moderation.

[ 60 ] This is what is poured out over what the German spirit is meant to accomplish in the world—I would say something like a devotional mood. The German national soul is particularly predisposed to acquiring knowledge through the nature and essence of the soul, and then enriching this knowledge within the soul itself, so that this knowledge is like the soul’s reaching out toward the divine essence.

[ 61 ] Don’t we see—and I would like to read these words to you verbatim—don’t we see the beauty in this when we look specifically at those who have always sought to bring to mind, from the depths of the German essence, that which is the German national spirit? Do we not always see this striving—which the German knows how to transform into a spiritual impulse even for the divine and spiritual—to cultivate a devout mood even in science? How beautiful, how wonderful it is, for example, when a German—and that is precisely why he may perhaps be mentioned today—who appears in Austria as one of the greatest German-Austrians, immersing himself in the German essence, even if he may not have arrived at the very concepts that have been elaborated and presented to us today, feels the full expression of what has been developed here today in terms of ideas: I am referring to Robert Hamerling, Austria’s greatest German poet of modern times, who—feeling himself to be German in Austria—spoke these beautiful words: “Austria is my fatherland; yet I feel it: Germany is my motherland”—thus expressing the unity that is so firmly forged today between Germany and Austria, throughout Central Europe. To this Robert Hamerling, the entire distinctiveness of the German national soul presents itself, as I have attempted today to develop it from the idealistic worldview of the Germans — back when they believed they could retrace the path of the Germans as they came over from Asia, bringing with them the urge to grasp the Universal Spirit, which they would later express—not by suppressing the ego but by elevating it—in their art, their education, their philosophy, and in all their being and activity in the world. And here Robert Hamerling recalls, as in a beautiful poetic dream in his “Germanenzug” — where the ancient ancestors of the Germans still sit over in Asia, while these ancient ancestors of the Germans are migrating into Europe, toward the West — Robert Hamerling beautifully describes how these Germanic tribes are encamped at the border between Asia and Europe, how the sun sets — he beautifully describes the moon rising, the entire landscape — and how the Germanic tribes are encamped there. Only one remains awake: the blond Teut, the young man. But before Teut, the future destinies of the Germans are revealed in wondrous signs of the starry script. And the Genius of the Germans, the spirit of the German people, speaks to the blond Teut, to the leader of the Germanic tribes toward the German West. And Hamerling says so beautifully:

“To whom will words one day burst forth from the depths of the soul
As they did to your people—so rich, so tender, so powerful?
Who breathes so solemnly into the sounds of the strings
His innermost being? To whom does the mind so magnificently
Carve granite hieroglyphs into the blue of the heavens
Of the soul’s ascent from life’s confines?
Who, in the end, ties the strands
Of the inquiring mind to the stars
So boldly striving and fighting on every path?
Whom does his urge, his intuition, lead so high, so deep?
Who grasps the near and the far so faithfully?
Where does every zone of earth and sky
reflect itself as in your thoughts, O Teuton?”

[ 62 ] Not out of such an arrogant consciousness, not out of national hubris, as we often find among our opponents today, but out of a reverent contemplation of the essence of the German people—the spiritual essence that reigns throughout world history.

[ 63 ] The poet—the Austrian poet—speaks of a sense of duty, in complete harmony with those who have created a German worldview, an idealized vision of the German world, based on the German worldview itself.

[ 64 ] That is why what the “Philosophus teutonicus,” Jakob Böhme, said about all research and reflection on that worldview—which has its justification—is so profoundly true; for, according to Jakob Böhme, the search for knowledge and science must, in essence, be a path to God for the German people, even if it need not interfere with religion. Jakob Böhme expresses this beautifully from the depths of the German soul, thereby characterizing the guiding principle of the worldview of German Idealism. Jakob Böhme says:

“If You Feel the Depth”

[ 65 ] he refers to the depths of the heavens

“And when you look at the stars and the earth, you see your God. And in Him you live, and you are also part of Him. And that same God also rules over you.” “You were created from this God and live within Him. All your knowledge also resides in this God. And when you die, you will be buried in this God.”

[ 66 ] This is the union of the most beautiful aspect of the German national character with the highest striving for knowledge of that which, in a divine and spiritual way, floods, permeates, and interweaves the world. Thus, in order to elevate his ego, the German seeks to penetrate to the very core of things, and this is indeed something that is difficult to understand.

[ 67 ] You can see just how little it can be understood! There is one of those who, shortly before the outbreak of this war, used to roam around Germany as foreign spirits, speaking of all sorts of affinities with the German spirit, of all sorts of understanding they claimed to have acquired regarding the German spirit: that is Emile Boutroux. Just before the war, he even lectured at German universities on how one must revere the depth of the German spirit. And now this presumably genuine Frenchman [Boutroux] is telling his fellow Frenchmen—he wants to be funny, of course; good old [Boutroux] wants to be funny— he explains the difference between the French, the English, and the Germans; precisely what we—albeit, for the French, certainly in a joking manner—have today drawn from the depths of the German character—yes, Boutroux was chattering about this very thing to his fellow Frenchmen just a short while ago. He said: “Yes, when the French want to recognize a lion or a hyena—you don’t get the exact details, but that’s roughly what he said—and in any case, what I’m telling you isn’t inaccurate in essence—when the French want to describe a lion or a hyena, they go to the menagerie and observe the lion or the hyena; when the English want to recognize a lion or a hyena, they travel around the world and observe the life of the lion or the hyena out in the wild. But when the Germans want to recognize a lion or a hyena, they neither go to a menagerie nor take a trip around the world; instead, they retreat to their study and conjure up an image of the lion and the hyena from within themselves, without looking at the outside world!

[ 68 ] Certainly, that’s a witty remark; and we’re used to the French speaking wittily, given their intellectual tradition; it’s just a pity that this joke is by Heinrich Heine, which Boutroux is repeating, since it comes from Heine; and the Frenchman, whom we’re used to hearing make good jokes, in this case told a German joke to make a witty remark about the English and the French! — This is also an illustration of how the opponents of German culture try to attribute to themselves something loftier than what can be found in the German way of life!

[ 69 ] However, this same man recently told his Parisian audience just what a barbaric people the Germans actually are; one can already tell that from the word itself. For example, he said: The Germans have no word for generosity; therefore, they do not possess this quality at all—it is lacking in them; only the French have it. On the other hand, the Germans have a word that the French do not have: the word “Schadenfreude”; thus, only the Germans possess the quality of Schadenfreude. The French do not possess this ignoble trait. — And it is remarks like these that reveal the spirit from which German character is reviled and disparaged today.

[ 70 ] But this German essence has not always been viewed in this way! And it would be particularly interesting to see which thinkers have attempted to understand this German essence—as one can see precisely from this, just how little account is taken of the actual significance of this German essence, this spirit. Take, for example, the author of *The Life of Jesus*—Ernest Renan—who, even during the Franco-Prussian War, wrote to David Friedrich Strauss, who himself wrote about the German spirit, in a similar vein. It is curious, indeed, what the Frenchman, Ernest Renan, wrote; he says that at a certain age he came to realize what this German spirit actually meant. And he makes an interesting comparison. He says that after incorporating the French essence into his education, he approached the German essence through Goethe and Herder; it was as if, instead of mere concepts, he were encountering realities, whereas before he had seen nothing but a pile of yellowed paper flowers. And then he compares the height of German spiritual life, which had become so clear to him—he compares it by saying: Everything he had come to know apart from this German essence seemed to him, well, like elementary mathematics compared to differential and potential calculus. — We will see shortly how such a mind, on an intuitive level, assimilates what has come to him through his encounter with the German essence.

[ 71 ] But for now, let us take a closer look at how this Central European, German essence is viewed further east—in that East, [under which] the European West, that is, our West, is currently suffering so greatly because of what this European West today calls its sphere of influence, its work for freedom and democracy. If we are to consider the Russian national soul, we must say: In the Russian national soul, that which we call the “immediate driving force of the ‘I’” does not yet live—and this is confirmed precisely when we consider its greatest works, the works of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky— the immediate driving force of the “I” does not yet live there in unity; everything still lives as something external, just as the Russian accepts his religion as a foreign one—the Greek-Christian religion—which he has not reborn within himself, as the German has experienced it from the depths of his innermost being, but which he accepts as something like a cloud hovering above him, something he has from the outside. While the Italian acts from the feeling soul, the Frenchman from the intellectual and emotional soul, and the Englishman, the Briton from the soul of consciousness, and the German from the true “I”—the one who truly belongs to the Russian national soul acts from the subconscious of the “I,” which still stands opposed to the “I,” which the “I” has not yet taken into itself, which the “I” still wishes to see in a mystical darkness. Like the national soul that has not yet fully come to consciousness, so does this Russian soul, this Eastern Russian soul, act.

[ 72 ] And this is connected to the fact that this still immature national soul has so misunderstood—so infinitely misunderstood—not only the German national soul, but the national souls of all of Western Europe, especially throughout the nineteenth century and right up to the present day.

[ 73 ] People haven’t really noticed what the relationship is—let’s say, for example—between the nature of the German spirit and the Russian spirit. With what was taken for granted as German selflessness, we have embraced precisely the great Russian figures—Tolstoy, Dostoevsky. They are not to be disparaged here; they can be fully acknowledged; but one must become aware of the gulf that exists between the Russian and the German nature, a gulf that, particularly in the Russian nature, has remained so immature that it has erupted and revealed itself right up to the present day.

[ 74 ] Here we encounter the greatest Russian minds of the nineteenth century, who—I would say—express philosophically and artistically, as in a worldview, what, in political terms, the “Testament of Peter the Great” — whether it is a forgery or not is irrelevant at this point — seeks to achieve, namely the complete annihilation of and replacement of Western and Central Europe, as they exist today, by Eastern Europe! [The “Testament of Peter the Great” is to be regarded as the sole viable vision for the future.] But everything, I would say—including Russian literature, philosophy, and art—is in the service of this “Testament of Peter the Great.” And this is something we encounter time and time again throughout Russian intellectual life in the nineteenth century.

[ 75 ] Here we encounter the finest minds of Russia, who turn their gaze to what thinkers such as Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel have achieved. In the case of Herzen, one can observe this—I would say—in a single such mind. He seeks to delve into what Western culture has produced; he finds that it has all grown old, become senile, that it must all disappear, that it is all something external, because he cannot experience how deeply this worldview of German idealism is lived through and interwoven from within; and so it becomes worthless to him. In his book *From the Other Shore*, Herzen articulates how all these ideals that have sprung up in Western Europe must be destroyed, and how something else must take their place.

[ 76 ] One of Herzen’s opponents, also a Russian, wrote to Herzen in response: So you want to destroy everything that has emerged in Western Europe: Greater, more significant—as I said, a Russian wrote this himself, a Russian opponent of Herzen, to appeal to his conscience—Greater than all the ideals of Central Europe, is the Russian sheep’s clothing more important to you?—so wrote the friend to Herzen!

[ 77 ] What does he mean by the “Russian sheep’s clothing”? Well, Herzen put it this way: In what this European culture, this European intellectual life, has produced of its own accord, there can be nothing redemptive, nothing salvific for humanity; rather, that which is salvific for humanity is the Russian peasant; he is the one who, in his complete originality, embodies within himself that which must flood the entire European West and the heart of Europe. And this seems so firmly rooted in Russian souls—especially in the most Russian of Russians, for example in Dostoevsky, the great artist—whose skill we wish to acknowledge— becomes increasingly evident in his work, when we examine it closely, that he regards German culture in particular as senile and obsolete, and already sees Russianness as destined to be the savior. — Essentially, what is now set to sweep across Europe as a mania for war is nothing other than the brutal expression of this tendency, which found expression even in great Russian writers; admittedly, care was taken to ensure that the good Germans did not pay too much attention to this—which, I might say, has always lived and woven its way between the lines of Russian intellectual life! And so it happens that—and those who know me well know how highly I regard Tolstoy—but what is found in Tolstoy, especially in such earlier works as *Anna Karenina* and so on, does indeed show how he—Tolstoy—consistently sought to portray the German character in such a way that it appears senile and inferior.

[ 78 ] Why, then, have the Germans paid so little attention to such matters? Why are they now surprised by the fact that they are met with hatred on every front, from all sides? Well, one need only consider the fact that, for example, the older translations of Tolstoy, namely those works translated by translators whom people still read, right up to the last translation in the mid-nineteenth century by [Raphael Löwenfeld]—which people, however, no longer read—all of these translations have either completely omitted the relevant passages or translated them differently, so that no one actually knows the true Tolstoy!

[ 79 ] It will certainly be necessary, esteemed audience, to delve a little deeper into the nuances that live in the expressions of souls, so that the German may know how to fulfill his mission in the world. And so we have seen that even discerning Russian minds, such as the great philosopher Soloviev, have rebelled against this generally held Russian view—the view of those who have strived for a Russian worldview—that the European worldview is senile and outdated, and that Russian culture should throw itself upon this European entity.

[ 80 ] When I highlight individual figures, it is because I want to cite facts and use specific characteristics to illustrate how many there are.

[ 81 ] Take, for example, one of these men, Danilevsky, who attempts to address the question at length—entirely in keeping with that Russian spirit I have just alluded to—as to how Russia must expand, and how Western and Central Europe are ripe for destruction because they have fulfilled their purpose; and in a book that is so thoroughly is shaped by the Russian mindset—he asks: Why doesn’t Europe love us? Why does Europe fear us? —Now he seeks to answer this question from his own perspective, and there Danilevsky writes to his fellow Russians something to the effect of: Europe does not love us because Europe instinctively senses that we are the ones who, in fact, are the only ones still entitled to exist, and who are meant to replace that which lives in the rest of Europe. But Solovyov takes up this question, and Solovyov is one of those who has drawn inspiration from this very life himself. And the great philosopher Soloviev, who addresses this question more impartially from his own Russian essence: “Why does Germany not love us?”—he does not answer this question as Danilevsky does, nor as the most diverse kinds of Russian thinkers claim—that Europe feared Russia—but rather, Soloviev responds to Danilevsky’s question—“Why does Europe not love us?” “Why does Europe fear us?”—and to Danilevsky’s answer to that: “Because Europe instinctively senses that the Russians are the ones who, in fact, alone still have a right to exist and are destined to replace what still lives in the rest of Europe”—Soloviev responds to these words of Danilevsky:

“And yet, both the content of his book and his later admissions—as well as those of his like-minded friend”—

[ 82 ] This refers to a certain Strachow

“Another answer: Europe views us with hostility and fear”

[ 83 ] This is how Soloviev wrote his reply, and it is surely necessary for anyone who wishes to understand the conditions in the Russian East to listen to these Russians. Soloviev himself says:

“Europe views us with hostility and fear because dark and obscure elemental forces dwell within the Russian people, because their intellectual and cultural powers are meager and inadequate, while their claims, on the other hand, are clearly and sharply defined. The cries of what the Russian people want as a nation resound powerfully throughout Europe: that they want to destroy Turkey and Austria, defeat Germany, and seize Constantinople and, if possible, India as well.

[ 84 ] And when we are asked what we intend to offer humanity to make up for what has been snatched from us and destroyed, what intellectual and cultural renewal we intend to bring to the world, then we must either remain silent or spout meaningless platitudes. And if Danilevsky’s bitter confession—that Russia is beginning to fall ill—is true, then instead of asking, “Why doesn’t Europe love us?” we should concern ourselves with another question, one closer to home and more important to us: “Why and for what reason are we ill?” Physically, Russia is still quite strong, as was demonstrated in the last Russian war; thus, our suffering is a moral one. We are burdened, in the words of an old writer, by the sins hidden in the national character and of which we are unaware—and so it is above all necessary to bring these into the light of clear consciousness. As long as we are spiritually bound and paralyzed, all our elemental instincts can only be to our detriment. The essential—indeed, the only essential—question of true patriotism is not the question of strength or calling, but of Russia’s sins.”

[ 85 ] So says the Russian Soloviev, based on an intellectual understanding of the Russian essence; so says the great philosopher Soloviev about Russia itself. And it is now interesting to consider this one last thing: How have others understood this relationship of Russia to its West—and even to the broader West—with which it is now making pacts, or which is making pacts with it (one isn’t quite sure how to put it)—how have others understood this relationship to their broader West? Oh, there are some interesting facts there as well! For example, a book by the Russian writer Yushakov was published as early as 1885. In 1885, he wrote a book in which he speaks quite differently from what was said somewhat later regarding the views he attributes to his Russian people. It is interesting to take a look at these ideas of Yushakov’s.

[ 86 ] This man looks over toward Asia and says: Yes, over there in Asia, we have peoples who have carried an ancient culture from times of old into the modern era. These peoples—how they have been mistreated by the Europeans. Russia must turn its gaze toward Asia, and must bring salvation to this sacred, venerable, yet mistreated Asian culture—this spiritual culture of Asia. Yushakov speaks beautiful words. He says that Russia alone is capable—because it can still perceive the human inner being without having been corrupted by the ego and made senile, as in Western Europe—Russia alone can feel a kinship with this Asia, which now lies prostrate, groaning under Europe’s oppression. And Yushakov recalls an ancient myth when he says: Over there in Asia, the Iranian and Turanian peoples are fighting. He himself counts the Indians, the Persians, and so on among the Iranian peoples. And Yushakov says: These peoples have found a wonderful, ancient myth about Ormuzd and Ahriman to explain their fate. But we always see Ahriman and Ormuzd at work over there in Asia, time and again. And there, in his book—published in 1885—Yushakov points out in his memoirs that the Iranians worshipped the good Ormuzd over there in Asia; the good Ormuzd had bestowed upon the Iranians all that the earth can produce in terms of fruit and culture; they appropriated it for themselves. Then they allied themselves with Ahriman. These Europeans have acted like Ahriman, like the evil Ahriman himself. Russia, however, by extending its influence into Asia, will liberate the people from the evil Ahriman. What the Asians received under the blessing of the good Ormuzd, the selfish Europeans have appropriated for themselves. Russia will come over to Asia and help by establishing—yes, Yushakov says this, and I must repeat it to you—an alliance that is pursued with the world’s greatest ideals, as the most spiritual alliance in the world — Yushakov says all this, not I; I merely have to repeat it —, which will be formed by Russian peasants and the Cossacks, [who will rush over to Asia, which is groaning under European rule, and who will carry over what Russia will be able to bring]. There, the peasantry and the Cossacks will advance into Asia, and there Russia will redeem Asia from Ahriman. 1885—consider this—written by Yushakov. It is interesting to hear some of what Yushakov said back then in the book titled *The Anglo-Russian Conflict*. It speaks of these peoples, the Iranians, the Turanians—[it states] that the companions of Ahriman, the evil god—from whom Russia will have to liberate Asia and bring order and harmony—are primarily the English.

[ 87 ] “The English,” says Yushakov, “have behaved in this part of Asia as if they believed that the Asian peoples existed solely to dress in English fabrics, fight one another with English weapons, work with English tools, eat from English vessels, and play with English trinkets.” And then he says:

“England exploits millions of Hindus, yet its very existence depends on the obedience of the various peoples who inhabit the rich peninsula.”

[ 88 ] And so Yushakov continues:

“I do not wish anything like this upon my homeland—I can only be glad that it is sufficiently far removed from this state, which is as brilliant as it is sad.”

[ 89 ] Apparently because these Russians were so determined to distance themselves from this “Englishness” in order to liberate Asia from this hideous England, they soon afterward allied themselves with England—not to liberate Asia, but to destroy Europe.

[ 90 ] One must indeed, from these depths, consider the development of the world—including its spiritual aspect—in the nineteenth century, and in this way delve deeply into what the German essence actually is and how it stands now—this German essence, which must defend itself against the ring that has formed around it, indeed, in a way that can simply be indicated by letting the numbers speak for themselves.

[ 91 ] In the name of freedom, the rights of small nations, and all sorts of other things according to their worldview, these people—who want to keep Germany and Austria enclosed today as if in a great fortress—are taking the lead. One need only look at the numbers: 777 million people in the so-called Entente surrounding the Central European powers, against 150 million; 777 million are “fighting”—let’s put that in quotation marks— “fight”—let’s put that in quotation marks—“against 150 million, and they fight in such a way that, to this day, the very essence of their actual bravery remains their desire to strike at the German spirit, which they believe they understand so well that 777 million people turn against 150 million, joining forces to starve them out, to defeat them through starvation—the better part of bravery.

[ 92 ] Actually, they had no reason to be envious of what these Central European powers were taking away from them; for the Entente powers possess 68 million square kilometers of the Earth’s surface, compared to 6 million square kilometers held by the Central European powers. One need only let these figures speak for themselves. These figures speak to this day, and will one day speak in world history as well, distinguished guests—that, after all, among these 150 million Central Europeans of today and on these 6 million square kilometers of Central European soil live those people who have the world-historical, spiritual mission of which we were permitted to speak, and which they do not attribute to—for which, thank God, we have no German word—national chauvinism, but rather to their spiritual dispositions, to the spirit of their Germanness, to which they have not committed themselves out of selfishness, but to which they must draw near if they wish to offer the best of their being upon the altar of this spirit of their people. And those who sense this German essence in Central Europe feel a strong connection—precisely the best among us in Austria and Germany—and I am qualified to speak on this, having spent thirty years of my life in Austria: It is precisely the finest in Austria—those who are deeply rooted in Central European culture, such as the distinguished philosopher Carneri—who understand the relationship between their own people and the German national spirit and German essence not out of national chauvinism, but from a firm understanding of their people’s essence.

[ 93 ] Speaking of the English, for example, Carneri—the most significant Austrian philosopher—Carneri, a remarkable man who, out of the depths of suffering, established a spiritual worldview so very much in keeping with our times, a conceptual worldview rooted in German-Austria—Carneri speaks of how the English have truly directed their sense of self toward external, practical culture, and he says: “This culture has become so practical that the English had to learn from the Germans the fact that the great dramatist and poet Shakespeare had lived among them.” — For it is true: it was only because the Germans delved deeply into Shakespeare that Shakespeare was truly recognized. And if one were ever to write the history of Shakespeare’s greatness, one would have to write not an English chapter but a German chapter of intellectual history.

[ 94 ] All of this characterizes precisely the nature of the German worldview—which creates from the depths of the spiritual inner self—in contrast to everything that surrounds it. And so one may well believe that what the German must strive for above all else is spiritual science, knowledge of the spirit—just as there is knowledge of nature. Knowledge of the spirit, which must be grounded above all in the sources, in the roots that lie in the worldview of German idealism. As I have said, this is not a conviction born of blind national sentiment, but rather a conviction born of knowledge: that what humanity is to scientifically explore about the spirit in the future must grow out of the German national character—and above all out of the ideal worldview of the German national character—as has been attempted to be described today.

[ 95 ] And how little understanding there is among other nations today—let me say this in closing— this war can truly show the Germans just how little understanding there is on the part of other nations toward the worldview of German idealism and the German spirit, and how the Germans must first ensure and strive to make certain that what they are called upon to create from the depths of the German essence can take root in the global development of humanity. The French—how have they viewed this worldview of German idealism? Or the Russians, for example—how have they viewed this worldview that the Germans have formed, this worldview? The Russians view it as if it were there solely to be destroyed by them, as something senile and outdated. Whereas we must see in it roots and leaves, from which the blossoms and fruits must first ripen in the future! Let us commit ourselves to this perspective! But the Russians need a new delusion; because the “I” does not yet live in their souls, they must dream of a new delusion. They need a new delusion.

[ 96 ] What do the French need? What do the French need today if they wish to characterize their relationship to the German spirit? Well, one might perhaps cite something from one of their most recent poets—to do them justice. What do the French want? They have, after all, been so accustomed—just as the Germans freed themselves—to feeling within themselves the strength, the driving force behind what, for example, also lived in this worldview of German idealism, all the way back to Lessing, until the Germans had to free themselves—just as the Germans freed themselves—so too have these French been so accustomed to their essence living throughout Europe. And consequently, they believed that without what they did and produced intellectually, things simply could not work; that everything had to come from them; that they had to be the cause of everything. Their own poet, Rostand, depicted in a very interesting and witty poem in more recent times how the French—that is, his own—national character can be compared to the rooster crowing in the morning; and when the rooster crows, the sun rises. And precisely because the sun rises when the rooster crows, the Frenchman believes that his crowing causes the sun to rise. So he tells himself: If I don’t crow, the sun can’t rise!

[ 97 ] This is what the French poet Rostand himself says as a characterization of the French spirit. The Frenchman thinks: If he doesn’t crow, absolutely nothing can happen in the world. And that is why it is so unheard of that he no longer occupies the position he once did; for the truth is that the German character, as Ranke put it, must be defended against the delusion of the crowing of the French national spirit—just as, as early as 1870, the Germans had to stand up to the French: “We are still fighting against Louis XIV!”

[ 98 ] The French need a new cause. The Russians need a new mission. The English—well, one really wouldn’t want to do them an injustice. What can one say so as not to do them an injustice? They proclaim to the world: For the sake of Belgium’s violated neutrality, for the sake of justice and democracy, we must wage this war until the German spirit is annihilated; for these Germans are despicable people. They preach the principle: Might makes right. — One probably just forgets how, out of a particularly refined education, the English minister who decrees this—most recently, in fact—that the phrase “power takes precedence over right” originates from the English philosopher, the English utilitarian philosopher Thomas Hobbes. But: “Power takes precedence over right”—and England has adhered to this principle for centuries. [Gap in the transcript] as a professor in England himself, where he said: Freedom and democracy are things that cannot be reconciled—as recent English history demonstrates—but that Great Britain’s expansion [gap in the transcript], he asserts, is also a truth, a practical truth, to which the English worldview must aspire. Well, what can one say? “Power takes precedence over right”—ever since Thomas Hobbes, this has wound its way like a guiding principle through English history to conceal the actual reasons England has for trampling the entire mission of the German people into the dust. With such things—well, one wouldn’t want to do them an injustice, but one must say: The English need a new lie to drown out that which cannot be balanced out.

[ 99 ] The Russians—a new delusion; the French—a new delusion; the English—a new lie. The Italians—yes, a truly outstanding man told me even before the Italian war broke out: “Italy needs this war!” There are, after all, people who are not so naive as to have believed that Italy might not join the Entente in this war. Italy needs this war; we must have this war; the Italians have become sluggish, listless, and lazy; they are actually well on their way to the abyss—said this prominent political figure at the time—and they need something to shake them up again, to bring them back to life, otherwise they’ll become completely lazy and sluggish! What do these Italians need? These Italians needed a new sensation in order to have something—just as the French needed an illusion, the English a new lie, and the Russians a new delusion and a new mission, so the Italians needed a new saint, something truly special! — They truly do have a saint, namely sacred egoism—sacro egoismo—which is preached everywhere and to which sacrifices are made on its altar. And the apostle of modern Italianism, the hierophant, is Gabriele d’Annunzio! Perhaps history will one day rank him among the buffoons of the spirit—one can say this entirely without national chauvinism. But he will nonetheless be remembered, without any dignity, as the one who also offers sacrifices to this new egoism—the sacro egoismo—that Italy represents, to which they have devoted themselves, to this new saint!

[ 100 ] When we see all of this around us, we can truly say—without the German people needing to become as nationalistically self-centered as those who are encircling and isolating them—we can truly say: We must not, out of arrogance, look to the history yet to come—arising from the inner fertility and the recognition of the greatness of the German spirit itself, to which we humbly bow—and tell ourselves that what we experience in the German spirit are seeds, roots, and leaves—and that the blossoms and fruits must develop from them. And with this, we may look to the future with confidence and hope!

[ 101 ] And ultimately, those who—I would say—shared a unified way of thinking have always understood how to sense the German essence in Central Europe; they have always felt it. One of my teachers in Austria once spoke some beautiful words. Perhaps I may read them to you at the end—a little poem. It’s called “Austria and Germany.” Today, now that Austria and Germany are united, perhaps I may read this little poem aloud:

“Let Russia and England consult wisely,
And perhaps not find it unwelcome,
If we get into a bit of a fight here,
If they seek to wrest our rightful claim from us!

You, German brothers, will not—advise here,
The enemy’s attack will only unite us
And among us, all ambition will fade
Before this: to be one people in word and deed.

And if one among us has failed,
If there was discord anywhere in German hearts,
There is but one thing that now inspires us:
What we share in joy and sorrow!
So let it also be our shared destiny:
A German war, if not a German peace!”

[ 102 ] Thus speaks the German of Austria in 1859. Such is the unity of consciousness among those who feel themselves to be part of the German national spirit—those who, without national chauvinism, recognize this in such a way that loyalty to this German essence springs from the soul. Then this Karl Julius Schröer, who has remained so unknown but who felt the German spirit in Austria with extraordinary intensity, said:

A spirit arises, a giant to behold
[He who has long failed to muster his full strength
The German spirit rises, inflamed with courage
Wherever you look, in every German region.
It has been called a master in many ways,
in art and knowledge, in building systems,
Once it is viewed as a whole,
then it is recognized by the world] all the more.

[ 103 ] To view it in its entirety, this also includes the very symptom that so clearly demonstrates how the immortal warlike forces stem from the German essence. Likewise, the idealistic worldview of the German people, which has borne its roots and leaves, stems from the primal force of the German spirit—and, looking toward it, we may have faith that in the future, undisturbed by the hatred of its opponents, it must fight its way through to its blossoms and fruits.

[ 104 ] This awareness springs from our being among the 150 million as opposed to the 777 million, from our standing on 6 million square kilometers as opposed to 68 million square kilometers; it springs from our intellectual, spiritual, and heartfelt understanding of the German spiritual essence!

[ 105 ] So let us speak these words based on this insight itself and on the most justified of feelings: Yes, by being conscious of our very essence, we may believe, we may hope, that the blossoms and fruits will unfold in the future from the roots and leaves of the German spirit.

[ 106 ] Therefore, we may look forward with confidence—even from the depths of the German striving—to the future of this German national spirit.

[ 107 ] And so be it, because that is how it must be!