The Rudolf Steiner Archive

17. A Healthy Spiritual Life and Spiritual Research

Ladies and gentlemen!

[ 1 ] Spiritual science, as understood in the lectures I have been privileged to give here for years now, has—as is well known—essentially not only opponents and opposition from those quarters from which other worldviews, depending on their nature, have opponents and opposition—materialism has spiritualism, spiritualism has its opponents in materialism, idealism in realism, and so on—but one can still say, in a certain sense, that spiritual science today is opposed by all manner of ideological currents. And this inevitably raises the question: What is the fundamental reason that spiritual science, in particular, is so strongly rejected by contemporary society as a whole?

[ 2 ] I have, after all, repeatedly drawn attention here to what is truly important with regard to this question. What is peculiar about this particular spiritual science is that opposition to it does not arise from becoming more familiar with it or engaging with it, only to then disagree with it; rather, the opposition is primarily rooted in the fact that there is little inclination on either side to engage with what is truly essential and significant about this branch of spiritual science.

[ 3 ] Instead, people invent all sorts of characteristics that this spiritual science must supposedly possess, based on the ideas they form about it without actually knowing anything about it. People think something like this: Based on everything I know and on what I’ve heard here and there in passing, this spiritual science wants this or that—or rather, people think even further: it must want this or that. Thus, in this or that sense, it is naturally reprehensible.

[ 4 ] And this is where the peculiarity becomes apparent—precisely this peculiarity can be observed when one delves deeper into the relationship between spiritual science and other worldviews—it becomes apparent that many people raise this or that objection to spiritual science on the assumption that it might apply to spiritual science, whereas in reality, as an anthroposophist—in the sense that anthroposophy is meant here—one is in complete agreement with what these people claim; one has absolutely no objection to what they say; it is only that they believe one must, precisely because one stands on the anthroposophical point of view, raise this or that objection against them.

[ 5 ] What is peculiar, ladies and gentlemen, is that spiritual science is very often opposed by those with whom it actually agrees entirely on all the positive goals they advocate.

[ 6 ] A particular area that must, so to speak, be illuminated by the light just referred to here is the one that will be the subject of today’s discussion: “A Healthy Spiritual Life and Spiritual Science.” For it will happen time and again that precisely the procedures, the methods of spiritual scientific research—that is, the paths that spiritual science has taken—will be portrayed, particularly by those who, under the influence of today’s habits of thought, believe they have established their views on the foundation of pure natural science — it will turn out time and again that these methods, these approaches, are treated as something unhealthy, as something pathological, or at least lumped together with something pathological. And yet, ladies and gentlemen, one cannot even say that the cause of such misunderstandings lies solely with those who develop a misleading opposition from this side; rather, the causes lie in entirely different circumstances, which will also be taken into account in the second part of today’s discussion.

[ 7 ] First, however, I would like to elaborate on some essential points regarding the types of procedures used in spiritual science, in order to demonstrate—through the actual method of spiritual research—how unfounded it is to refer to this method as something that could even remotely be connected to a pathological mental state of any kind. In doing so, I will refrain today from discussing what I have often allowed myself to present here over the years; I will refrain from a more detailed description of what the human soul must accomplish in order to embark on the path of spiritual research and to walk that path. More detailed information about the soul’s inner processes can be found described at length in the books I have often cited here: in the second part of my *Outline of Esoteric Science*, also at the end of my *Theosophy*, and in detail in the book *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?*. [Much will become clear from these writings regarding the methods involved. Today, however, I would like to describe the effect of the spiritual research path on the human soul—that is, not so much what the spiritual researcher must do, but rather the effect on his soul of what he must accomplish.]

[ 8 ] One of the essential tasks the spiritual researcher must accomplish in order to advance along the path into the spiritual world is, as has often been emphasized, a certain transformation, a development of thinking—of human thinking. It is also common to distinguish between the three human soul forces: thinking, feeling, and willing. Under the influence of the spiritual scientific path, all three soul forces undergo a certain transformation, a certain inner development in the life of the soul.

[ 9 ] Such a direction of development now pertains to thinking. What, one might ask, actually happens to what a person calls “thinking” when he or she wishes to become a researcher in the humanities? In a certain sense, an impulse is given to thinking—an impulse arising from the will of the soul—so that this thinking becomes something different from what it is in ordinary life. In ordinary life, thinking develops thoughts. These thoughts serve to represent some external reality. It is said that a thought is true insofar as it refers to a reality that it represents. Such a goal of thinking is entirely sound for everyday thinking and also for scientific thinking in the ordinary sense of the word.

[ 10 ] For the spiritual researcher, this way of thinking—which is justified in everyday life and must be applied without exception in conventional science—is merely the starting point of his path of research. The spiritual researcher must devote himself to such inner activities that, within the thought process, he does not focus his attention so much on the content of the thoughts—which, as mentioned, is important for other purposes, but not primarily for the path of spiritual research— so attention is not directed toward the content of thoughts, but—since thinking is, after all, a specific activity, an inner process—attention is diverted; this is essentially what constitutes the cultivation of this kind of thinking referred to here; attention is diverted from the content of thought and is directed entirely toward the inner activity of thinking itself as it is carried out.

[ 11 ] The thinker becomes absorbed in the act of thinking, focusing his attention so intensely on this act of thinking—on what is actually taking place within him—that this attention is at the same time completely diverted from any specific content of thought—indeed, it goes so far that the content of thought is completely driven out of consciousness, and the person ultimately comes to do this themselves in an inner process of activity that is thinking, but which is not filled with specific thoughts relating to anything.

[ 12 ] In this way, however, one experiences the peculiar nature of the thought process involved in bringing something to consciousness—something that, in ordinary life and in ordinary science, must not be brought to consciousness through this thought process, because otherwise judgment regarding external, sensually real things would be clouded.

[ 13 ] Underlying our thought process, hidden from view, is a process of the will. This—which is the will to think, which in the thought process is actually an unconscious volitional process—is separated from what thinking otherwise is in life, and the soul focuses its consciousness solely on this inner volitional reality of thinking. Through this, something is detached from the thinking of ordinary life by an inner, spiritual-soul process—which is entirely real—in the very same sense, only spiritual-soul rather than physical—just as in the chemical process which separates hydrogen from water, separates hydrogen from oxygen—in which the hydrogen is literally released from the water—in exactly the same sense—only transferred to the spiritual-soul realm. Thus, a scientific method that is well-recognized in external life is simply transferred to the spiritual-soul realm.

[ 14 ] What one arrives at there, ladies and gentlemen, can only be experienced—naturally, only experienced. And what is experienced consists in having now separated from the thought process a process of the will, of which one now knows that—by living within it—one no longer lives in the physical body. Of course, this sounds fantastical at first to those who have not familiarized themselves with these matters. It also sounds fantastical to many who believe that their habits of thought stand on the solid ground of natural science, and who from the outset regard something like what has just been said as fantastical.

[ 15 ] Nevertheless, the more one persistently and with unwavering energy continues to pursue the development of thought just described within one’s soul, the more one becomes aware of how, through this process, one ultimately lives in a realm in which one experiences in the soul only the will present in the thought process; but experienced in such a way that the experience is free from the body.

[ 16 ] One experiences this—that it is free from the body—in two ways, through two things: The first is that one can have the—and one may well say—shocking experience that, once one has reached the stage just described, one’s own physicality, including the physical experiences that one otherwise perceives as belonging to oneself, are now situated outside oneself, much as one would otherwise perceive mountains, tables, and chairs [— that is, external facts —] in one’s physical perception. — One experiences this stepping out of the physical body in that one no longer has this physical body within one’s subjective experience, but rather has it as an external object. — That is the first aspect.

[ 17 ] The second point, however, is that a very specific transformation of thought takes place as a result of the processes just described. Ordinary thinking—the kind a person must develop in everyday life and in conventional science—has the characteristic—and must have the characteristic—that the thoughts it produces can be remembered. For a healthy soul life within the physical body, it is essential that the thoughts formed in relation to external objects or inner soul processes—that these thoughts, if we may use a crude expression, remain imprinted as they live and can later be recalled from this soul life. This ability to recall experienced thoughts—this capacity for memory—must be connected to a healthy soul life in everyday life and in ordinary science.

[ 18 ] I have, after all, mentioned here on several occasions how this healthy inner life would be disrupted if we lacked the ability to remember back to the very moment when we first become aware of our “I” in childhood, in early childhood. A psychological life that has a break in its continuous capacity for memory—one that could not recognize that its experiences belong to its “I”—would be a pathological psychological life.

[ 19 ] Such disorders of the inner life do exist. There are people who find themselves in a state where they are fully rational and capable of intelligent actions, yet they forget how they perceive this or that approaching them in their inner life, or how this or that has come about in their inner life. Such people—in a sense because their “I” is disrupted within them, this “I” that is so intimately connected to the capacity for memory—may, even though they perform intelligent actions, appear to be afflicted with a diseased inner life as far as their capacity for memory is concerned.

[ 20 ] Thus, distinguished guests, memory is that which is connected with the cultivation of thoughts [in] thinking.

[ 21 ] The situation is quite different with regard to that inner spiritual process one arrives at when one carries out within the soul what has just been described. There one gains the ability to truly weave within an experience that is initially indeterminate. One knows quite precisely: one is within a new reality—a reality that differs fundamentally from external sensory reality and also [from] the reality that can be grasped by the intellect.

[ 22 ] But what one experiences—what initially manifests itself in the images interwoven into the reality of the will, so-called “imaginations”—you will find this explained in the books mentioned—manifests itself in such a way that, as it is in its immediacy, it cannot pass into the capacity for memory. And this is an essential aspect of this higher thinking. Since there is no other term for it, let us call it this: this higher thinking, which is developed out of thinking itself, cannot be recalled in such an immediate way. It belongs to a world in which one now lives and weaves, a world that is in constant becoming, a world that flits by. One could initially compare it to fleeting dreams that do not imprint themselves on memory—dreams that are simply of a different nature than the ordinary dreams of everyday life.

[ 23 ] If one takes this inner experience—which has just been described—in such an immediate way, then one can say: One experiences a certain inner content; it does not immediately imprint itself on the memory as it is—[in such a way, for example, that one could later say: What did I experience back then? And that one wouldn’t need to have the experience again, but could simply remember it; that’s just not how it is!] If one wants to relive what one experienced spiritually in this way, then it must be experienced anew in exactly the same way. And this is how one recognizes that one is truly immersed in the spiritual world—that no immediate remnant of memory remains of what one recalls in the spiritual world. This is precisely how one recognizes it!

[ 24 ] And this reveals something else: It reveals that everything which, like ordinary, everyday thinking, leaves traces of memory, depends in its course on the physicality of the human being as its instrument. And it is precisely the researcher of the spirit—who can fully agree here with certain schools of modern natural science—who recognizes that this ordinary thinking cannot take place at all without activating the physical organism, the nervous system, and that which is connected to the nervous system in the rest of the physical organism. And through the—speaking in broad terms once again—imprinting of the life of thought upon physical life, the remnants of memory remain.

[ 25 ] In this way, one can learn to distinguish what is truly experienced in the spiritual realm [from that which] is merely imagined and bound to the physical. And precisely by recognizing the spiritual experience of the kind described—that it essentially exists only in the experience itself, in its very unfolding—one learns to recognize it and [learns to] distinguish it from everything that is bound to physicality. For the moment any remnant remains in the physical human being, the physical life is also involved.

[ 26 ] Ladies and gentlemen, if one wishes to delve into spiritual science, one must, of course, make more precise distinctions. You might now ask: “So is there really no way for the spiritual researcher to recall what he once experienced in the realm of the spirit in the manner described?”

[ 27 ] To be precise, I have always used a certain word, which I would ask you to take note of. I have used the phrase: “The spiritual experience does not immediately imprint itself on the memory.” — Not “immediately”; but once it has been experienced, once this spiritual experience has taken place, then one can allow it to flow over into ordinary imagination. It can be transformed into an ordinary thought, and one can then remember this ordinary thought, just as one can remember an external event in life. One has formed a mental image of it. One retains that mental image; but the actual event itself is not carried along in one’s life. If one wants to retrieve it, one must experience it anew, just as with an external event, which also does not live on in one’s memory itself, but only in the mental image one has formed of it.

[ 28 ] Just as this is the case with external life processes, so it is with spiritual experience. It is not the spiritual experience as such that passes into memory, but only that which arises when one first allows the spiritual experience to flow back into one’s ordinary thought life through an act of will.

[ 29 ] As I have just described, this is how one aspect of the separation of spiritual and soul life from physical life takes place. But this aspect must not remain the only one. And that is why all the inner soul activities intended to point the way into the spiritual world are described in the books mentioned. They are structured so that this development of soul life, as it has just been characterized, is accompanied by another parallel development. And just as one development directs thinking in a certain direction through an inner impulse, so does the other direct the human will—the act of willing—toward a certain unfolding that, in and of itself, does not exist in ordinary life and of which ordinary science, including ordinary psychology, can know nothing.

[ 30 ] One can—as I said, today we are not to repeat things that have often been discussed here, but rather to describe the effects—one can cultivate the human will in such a way that one looks upon this will just as one would otherwise look upon external objects. In everyday life, one has a will. One has impulses of the will that arise from opinions, external concerns, and the like. But when one wills, what constitutes “willing” is so closely intertwined with what takes place as action and the like, or it remains contained within the feeling of desire, that the actual process of the will is not observed. Even self-observation—often referred to in mystical terms, which so easily believes it can achieve certain [goals] it sets for itself—even this self-observation knows nothing of a true observation of the will.

[ 31 ] This genuine observation of the will, in turn, must be achieved through a long, energetic, and persistent inner process. Through this, a person comes to give a certain form to this striving: to become an observer of their own will. But then something very strange emerges once again. By striving to become an observer of one’s own will—by striving, as it were, to view one’s own volition in the same way one otherwise views external mineral, plant, or other entities—one gradually comes to lose oneself quite naturally, to the point where one ceases, as it were, to be an observer.

[ 32 ] So the strange thing is that the very thing one must vigorously strive for—to be a spectator of one’s own will—is something that, in the process of developing this spectatorhood, effectively erases itself! One truly extinguishes oneself by trying to look more and more at one’s will; one extinguishes oneself!

[ 33 ] In contrast, the will that one observes will bear less and less of the character of the will, the character of volition. What one has hitherto experienced as volition will appear to one as a superficial manifestation of inner soul life. And from this surface—as it were, emerging from something subterranean through this surface, through something of which one previously knew nothing—one comes to recognize that something is hidden beneath the surface of volition.

[ 34 ] What I am about to describe is not merely an image, not a metaphor or an illusion, but it is a full reality—a reality that is even far more real than any external, tangible events! That which springs forth from the will—that which always remains unconscious in everyday life—is, indeed, consciousness itself. One comes to realize that throughout one’s entire life, one carries within oneself an inner, invisible, unconscious spectator of one’s entire will.

[ 35 ] This other human being within the human being is, in fact, very real. It is present in every human soul, and it can only be perceived by directing one’s gaze toward the will. And because one’s own consciousness is, so to speak, extinguished—[as another, higher consciousness emerges through the surface of the will], taking the place of ordinary consciousness—it is the reality of the will that is brought forth from thinking through spiritual development in the manner indicated earlier, and thus becomes accessible. Thus, it is a consciousness different from everyday consciousness that is now set free for the activity of the will.

[ 36 ] And one now learns, instead of merely observing the world through ordinary consciousness, to observe a [new] world through this consciousness—which one has oneself brought into being from the surging and striving of one’s will.

[ 37 ] But that which has thus developed out of the will—that which we come to know as a will-soul force—must unite with that which has developed out of thinking. This consciousness, which has emerged from the will, must—I would say—unite in a spiritual-chemical way with that reality of the will that has emerged from thinking. Then the inner spiritual human being is present—who now knows himself as the spiritual human being, completely free from the physical, and at the same time knows himself to be within a spiritual reality, just as the sensory human being, with his eyes and ears, knows himself to be within the physical-sensory reality.

[ 38 ] If one were to develop only what can be derived from thought, one would fall into an increasingly anxious—one might even say fearful—state of mind, a sense of inner loneliness. By separating from thought whatever can be separated from it, one actually finds only oneself—one’s own weaving and being within spiritual becoming—within a process of spiritual becoming. What one would experience there in a one-sided way could be compared to the ability to stretch one’s hands out in every direction, to make grasping movements in every direction, yet to be unable to grasp anything at all. One would experience one’s own spiritual-soul reality, but not a spiritual-soul reality outside [of] oneself. One experiences this spiritual-soul reality outside of oneself by raising the consciousness—which has been alluded to—out of the being of the will. And in and through this consciousness—in this and through this consciousness—one now experiences a spiritual external world, just as one experiences a physical external world through the senses.

[ 39 ] You can see from this, dear audience, that in all our efforts toward spiritual research, what matters is to develop something within the soul that makes that soul completely independent of all physicality. And the processes that truly develop the soul are solely and exclusively soul-spiritual processes. Everything that occurs for the further development of the soul consists of intimate, inner soul processes in which the body plays no part; for their very nature consists precisely in the spiritual-soul aspect being drawn out of the physical. It follows, however, that the physical, as such, cannot play a part in the development of genuine spiritual research methods, because their very essence consists precisely in becoming independent of all that is physical.

[ 40 ] At the very moment one believes that, through certain physical processes—which must be shed to such an extent that even memory itself is immediately excluded—one can enter the spiritual world through such physical processes, one is, in fact, completely mistaken.

[ 41 ] And now, dear audience, let us ask ourselves: How is it possible that an unhealthy human experience could be brought about by methods that lead a person to experience something that is completely free from their physicality? How can physicality be ruined or impaired by anything that is, by its very nature, independent of all physicality? It will, however, take some time before a wider circle of people with a scientific mindset comes to realize that genuine spiritual-scientific methods —and these are, after all, the only ones that truly lead into the spiritual world—render the human being so independent of all that is physical that it is absurd to speak of a diseased soul life in any connection with spiritual research methods! For spiritual research in particular—based on the premises just outlined in broad strokes—must, precisely because of its relationship to everything that modern natural science has to say about the dependence of the soul life on physical experience, be in full agreement with true natural science.

[ 42 ] Even ordinary memory—which is, after all, a power of the soul that is part of a healthy spiritual life—even ordinary memory knows: Spiritual research is linked to the instrument of the body, because thinking must function in such a way that, as it were, the fabric of thought ripples into it—sending its waves into the physical realm and thereby giving the physical realm its share by developing thoughts capable of being remembered.

[ 43 ] Spiritual science, in particular, arrives at a profound insight regarding the role of physical life in the life of the soul. And it is nothing but a mistaken and delusional belief when any branch of the natural sciences claims that true spiritual research seeks to deny the dependence of ordinary thought or even volitional life on the physical body. It is precisely through this spiritual research that it becomes clear that what is supposed to be an independent, soul-spiritual life must first be liberated from ordinary soul life.

[ 44 ] Ordinary spiritual life, however, is such—and this is experienced precisely from the perspective of spiritual life that has become free—that ordinary spiritual life is such that it is immersed everywhere, along with its activities, in ordinary physical life and is thus, to a certain degree, dependent on that physical life.

[ 45 ] Furthermore, the spiritual scientist’s experiential research reveals how other expressions of the soul—other soul experiences that are rightly classified as pathological—are thoroughly bound to physical life. When the natural scientist comes and says: We know of visions, we know of hallucinations, we know of illusions—even if we have not investigated every detail, we must certainly take the position that an illusory or hallucinatory soul life is rooted in the fact that the instrument—the body—which must be utilized by the soul life, is not functioning properly. If the natural scientist says this, he will find—if he is willing—that the true spiritual researcher is in complete agreement with him. For conflating visions, hallucinations, and illusions with what has just been described as developing within true spiritual research—this conflating amounts to conflating things that are as different as day and night.

[ 46 ] The development of the soul’s powers required for spiritual research lies in a direction exactly opposite to those processes in the soul that lead to hallucinations, visions, or illusions; and anyone who is engaged in the development of spiritual research abilities knows that they cannot give themselves over to those aspects of the soul that might lead to visions, illusions, or hallucinations, but rather that they must devote themselves precisely to those forces within the soul that alone are fruitful for them—the ones that alone lead them to something capable of dispelling, combating, and eliminating hallucinations, illusions, and visions. The development of the spiritual-researching life of the soul lies in an intensification of this process—in something that heals one from visions, hallucinations, and illusions. For hallucinations, visions, and illusions make a person, in the spiritual-scientific sense, far more dependent on his physical life than the ordinary life of the soul—the healthy, ordinary life of the soul that he develops in everyday life—would seem to make him dependent on the body.

[ 47 ] This, however, touches upon a realm in which, precisely as a researcher of the spiritual sciences, one may be misunderstood—perhaps not so much by the natural sciences, but by a school of thought that also claims to be spiritual research. And there one touches upon the very realm where some people [insist that] true spiritual research—which is, after all, difficult—[should not be difficult;] these things should not be difficult. Understanding a clock is difficult; yet one engages with it if one wants to grasp it; but the profound mysteries of the world and the mysteries of the soul—those are not supposed to be difficult to understand!

[ 48 ] But those who shy away from the difficulties of spiritual research find a convenient way to glimpse into the spiritual world precisely in the emergence of a visionary, hallucinatory life—even if this hallucinatory world appears in all sorts of disguises. And the problem is that spiritual research is all too easily lumped together by those who are reluctant to engage with the distinctions between it and all the amateurish goings-on that seek to capitalize on visions and hallucinations rather than true spiritual insight.

[ 49 ] The spiritual researcher takes the following standpoint regarding these matters; he takes this standpoint in such a way that what he is called upon to advocate from this perspective becomes practice in spiritual research. He takes this standpoint: Ordinary mental life, which familiarizes us in a healthy way with the physical environment and with much of what can be grasped in the physical environment through the intellect—which is bound to the brain—this mental life is, in its thinking, feeling, and willing, bound to the entire human body. The normally organized entire human body is the instrument for this outwardly healthy mental life. If true clairvoyance is to occur, so that one can truly gaze into a spiritual world, then the human being must rise above this normal, ordinary perception of things—one that is bound to the body, to the healthy body. One must make one’s perception more comprehensive. And above all: one must make it more capable, more subject to the will. They must do so in such a way that—while a large part of what passes in ordinary spiritual life remains unconscious precisely because the body serves as an instrument—in spiritual perception, a person cannot be as passive as they are in ordinary perception, but must be active in everything they bring to perception; they must develop will and inner alertness. In short, in true clairvoyance, a person must go beyond the experience that is bound to the body.

[ 50 ] But what is perceived in the hallucinatory, visionary, or illusory life of the soul is more closely bound to the body. Because it is usually not bound to the whole body but to a part of the body—so that another part of the body is even paralyzed—it is more closely bound to the body than the ordinary mental life that unfolds in everyday life.

[ 51 ] Thus, through visions, hallucinations, and illusions, one does not glimpse a spiritual world that can offer more insight than the external sensory world; on the contrary: one does not arrive at the supersensible, but rather at the subsensible. One uses a smaller part of one’s body as a tool than in ordinary life, in which one uses one’s entire body as a tool.

[ 52 ] But it is also for this reason that hallucinations, visions, and illusions are less subject to arbitrariness and less subject to the act of the will than the perceptions of ordinary life; whereas true clairvoyance is a more active form of perception—that is, it is more subject to the will than these perceptions of ordinary life. And far more than ordinary memory, the images that appear in hallucinations, visions, and illusions are bound to the body—much more so than the images of ordinary memory. And if a person were wise, he would value the occurrence of the images of ordinary memory more highly than all the flights of fancy that exist in visions, hallucinations, and illusions, insofar as these are bound to the body in the manner described. He would realize, this person, that it is merely his craving for sensation that leads him not to value what he sees in everyday life, but rather to value more highly what is rare, what is brought about by some rare process—to value this more highly for the exploration of life’s mysteries than everyday observation. And in this unfortunate, psychological thirst for sensation lies a vast number of aberrations that manifest themselves in an amateurish intellectual worldview.

[ 53 ] People are happy to be able to point out that they possess this or that medium. The spiritual researcher, after all, speaks entirely from his own consciousness; there’s no need to believe him. He speaks just as he does in everyday life—entirely from his own consciousness. There, one cannot be certain. There, there’s no need to believe. But when one has a medium, one can be certain, because the will plays no role there; everything happens through natural processes. There, genuine, will-free science exists!

[ 54 ] The true spiritual researcher knows that a medium’s field of vision into the world—even if there is nothing to be said against certain research methods involving interviews with mediums, as I have already discussed here—but the true spiritual researcher sees that the field of vision into the world during mediumistic vision is narrower, not broader, but narrower than during ordinary everyday vision. Through ordinary perception, through ordinary science—which simply arises from sound senses and sound reason—one learns far more about the mysteries of existence than through any form of mediumship, through which one can experience only something strange—something strange because, under abnormal conditions, one surveys a narrower field of vision. (Interjections: “That’s wrong!”; “Oh, really!”).

[ 55 ] But that is precisely the point: that for true clairvoyance, this field of vision must be expanded—and it must be expanded precisely by adding to what one otherwise experiences of the world’s mysteries in ordinary life that which is now experienced, completely independent of all physical activity!

[ 56 ] Everything, therefore, dear friends, depends on this: that gradually a number of people will come forward who recognize, precisely from the genuine, true principles of natural science, how all development in clairvoyance proceeds toward the opposite pole—the opposite pole from which the human soul develops when, through a decline in healthy living, it falls into hallucinatory, mediumistic, and similar states.

[ 57 ] As I have already hinted, distinguished audience, it will still take quite some time before such a spiritual path can be recognized on the basis of genuine scientific rigor. For the people who still today call what is presented as the essence of spiritual research “wrong”—these people will be around for a long time to come! These people will belong to the same category as those who initially rebelled when the Copernican worldview was introduced into human history; these people belong among those who are not taken into account when it comes to the course of humanity’s further development, because they are, quite naturally, subject to the law that everything which enters into the development of the world may at first appear to be false, or at least seem like something dreamlike, crazy, or fantastical. [...]

[ 58 ] But this, esteemed audience, already points to how—I would say—a balance between the spiritual sciences and the natural sciences is gradually emerging. The natural sciences will gradually come to realize that the true spiritual researcher is, in fact, firmly grounded in their own field.

[ 59 ] But today there is still a danger that must be faced head-on, and one that comes from another direction. This danger is not to be found among those who, perhaps out of well-founded habits of thought—because they are scientists, genuine, true, honest scientists—are opponents of spiritual science; rather, the danger lies with those who often believe themselves to be quite faithful followers of spiritual science; for spiritual science has much to shake off from its skirts—if I may use that crude expression—that clings to it. And above all, it must draw a clear line of demarcation between the paths it takes—which have been clearly defined—and those that lead into the realm of the hallucinatory, the visionary, and so on, into mediumship, and which do not broaden one’s perspective on everyday life but rather narrow it.

[ 60 ] Anyone who has become familiar with any field of the natural sciences—let’s say, since this is of particular interest to us in light of today’s topic, modern psychiatry grounded in the natural sciences—anyone who has become familiar with such a field today and who has gained experience through diligent, and sincerely intended scientific research—understands what the seriousness of scientific methods entails, who is familiar with the efforts required in the true sense of the pursuit of truth—efforts that prevail today precisely in the field of natural science where it is practiced truthfully and honestly—such a person must, in a certain sense, be given due consideration if, simply out of his or her habitual patterns of thought, he or she is not yet able to approach the spiritual sciences. And if what can easily happen occurs—that he does not immediately encounter spiritual science where it is represented by its serious methods—methods that are just as serious as those of the natural sciences—if he does not come to know this spiritual science from these sources, but rather through all sorts of followers, and if he then conflates these followers with what true spiritual research is, then a danger arises.

[ 61 ] I do not wish to speak at all of externalities, ladies and gentlemen; I do not wish to speak of the fact that even today there are still people who see something essential in the way one eats in order to embark on the path of a certain kind of spiritual research! Whether one is a vegetarian or not is a matter of taste; it depends on other factors. It may have certain advantages and benefits; but what one eats or does not eat has nothing to do—I say “nothing to do”—with the inner development of the soul life that generates the forces we have spoken of, which lead into the spiritual world. It may make one’s physical life more comfortable; but it has nothing to do with it directly. One cannot “eat one’s way” into the spiritual world by, for example, not eating certain things. And anyone who believes that through such external, materialistic practices—whether by eating or not eating—one can “eat one’s way” into the spiritual world—let’s say: fasting—is just as far off the mark as those who, out of their materialism, accept what de La Mettrie—whom I cited the day before yesterday as the father of modern materialism—believed regarding the influence of the food in a meal, the substances ingested, on the actual life of a human being. These things are, after all, self-evident.

[ 62 ] It is obvious, for example—much more obvious even than anything the researcher of the mind will have to present in future developments—that it is much more obvious when de La Mettrie says: What power joy exerts over us. Joy awakens in a sad heart; it spreads to the souls of one’s table companions and finds expression in those charming songs in which the French excel. And then de La Mettrie draws attention—to the certainly true fact—that Erasmus of Rotterdam and Fontenelle, for example, would not have become the geniuses they became if just one tiny cog in their brains had developed differently than it did.

[ 63 ] The truths that come from this perspective are characterized above all by the fact that they are self-evident—so self-evident as to be trivial—yet they do not even touch upon the realm that is the subject of true spiritual science. For such a statement—de La Mettrie makes it in reference to Fontenelle and Erasmus—can even be taken a step further. If one takes it a step further, one might say: Well, if Erasmus’s mother had been murdered by some bandit before Erasmus was born, then Erasmus as a whole would never have come into being. Here one sees the dependence of spiritual life on the physical.

[ 64 ] Yes, distinguished guests, that is indeed the crux of the matter: opponents of spiritual science have no idea, from this perspective, how much true spiritual research is, at its core, in agreement with their trivialities. — Nor do I wish to speak of other superficialities—superficialities by which, unfortunately, a spiritual scientific worldview is often judged—those superficialities that are expressed, for example, in the fact that—if it were not discussed, then there would be no need to comment on them at all—that certain women who consider themselves part of spiritual research wear their hair short—while men wear their hair long—that they wear certain clothes, and so on. Well, certainly, all such frivolities can be dismissed as a whole. But there is a much more serious area—the very area that is quite certainly ripe for the worst attacks and opposition against spiritual science to arise in the near future, and in the more distant future.

[ 65 ] Spiritual science will be able to fully agree with true natural science, for example, as well as with true psychiatry. The spiritual scientist will readily concede to the psychiatrist that there is, for example, a certain pathological mystical disposition, and that simply due to some characteristic of the human body, a person exhibits a certain impulse toward inner brooding; that they then come to desire to find the solution to great cosmic mysteries within a certain chaotic inner emotional life. The psychiatrist today will have to assert that such impulses are connected to physical life. In this regard, the spiritual researcher will be in complete agreement with him! And he can do so precisely because what he must develop as a soul-spiritual being in order to enter the spiritual world must be made independent of the physical; it must therefore also remain independent of any potentially pathological physical condition.

[ 66 ] Anyone who adopts the perspective that spiritual research must take must look specifically at such a process of an energized soul life, even in the case of a pathological, mystical disposition of the soul. And so, even if one were to carry within oneself a pathological, mystical disposition, this pathological, mystical disposition could be viewed as an object, as something external. And one would arrive at a sound judgment regarding one’s own conduct precisely by striving toward a true, healthy spiritual-scientific standpoint.

[ 67 ] Distinguishments will be particularly important in this field. With regard to certain spiritual phenomena, the spiritual researcher must demonstrate how spiritual realities around him are experienced in such a way that these experiences can only be expressed through colorful images. You will find such colorful images described in my *Theosophy* and in my *Outline of Esoteric Science*. Such colorful images, such auric images, if they have arisen from true spiritual research, one must be clear that they are developed through inner will for what is actually experienced spiritually, and that such a description of a spiritual experience of color is not made by passively allowing some color impression—which could also be a hallucination—to act upon oneself.

[ 68 ] When it comes to hallucinations in this area, the spiritual researcher is once again in complete agreement with the psychiatrist grounded in the natural sciences. The spiritual researcher knows that such perceptions can, of course, arise from a disturbed mental state. There are people who simply experience very specific inner color sensations when they read certain words or when certain letters have an effect on them; there are people who, when something unpleasant is said to them, hear it only in their left ear; when something pleasant is said to them, they hear it in their right ear, and so on. These phenomena certainly belong to the realm connected to physical life—a realm more intimately linked to the life of the soul than is the case with the ordinary, everyday perceptions of the world.

[ 69 ] But when it comes to these matters, the spiritual researcher stands firmly on the same ground as the natural scientist. And even more precisely than the natural scientist, he can see how such involuntary hallucinatory visions arise from the body’s predestined surrender to its own processes, whereas in true clairvoyance, the free, independent exercise of the will—independent of the body—is involved in every detail one experiences in relation to the spiritual world. When a person succumbs, let us say, to delusions or obsessions — the researcher of the spiritual realm may, perhaps even more so in relation to these very areas, stand on the same ground as the psychiatrist trained in the natural sciences does today, and be clearly aware that certain ideas that arise—which exert a compulsion on the person that he cannot resist—are caused by a pathological alteration in bodily life. But precisely because his spiritual life has been liberated from the physical life, he will be able to look even more closely at this connection between all involuntary, abnormal ideas and the body and its functions than the natural scientist himself. If only people would come to understand more and more deeply that true spiritual science need not be in any disharmony whatsoever with what natural science asserts as a legitimate demand.

[ 70 ] But, esteemed audience, although it is true that whatever the spiritual researcher encounters—even if it is his own self— exists outside of him—and, in essence, is just as incapable of altering his body if it does not even come into contact with it—and although this is entirely correct, there will nevertheless be more and more people who believe they can recognize, precisely in a certain form of development bound to the body, that which also leads to genuine insights into a world entirely different from the ordinary one. And among them there will be misunderstandings; and these are often precisely those who draw on all manner of spiritual-scientific worldviews—including genuine spiritual-scientific ones—and by whom these spiritual-scientific worldviews are often judged.

[ 71 ] There are people, let’s say, who are afflicted from the outset with some predisposition toward an abnormal mental life. Had they remained outside a spiritual-scientific movement, they would naturally have descended into madness over the course of time. Now, due to certain circumstances, they have drawn close to a spiritual scientific worldview. Instead of indulging in all sorts of crazy ideas on the outside, they then give themselves over to their crazy ideas within this spiritual science. For then, if one fails to distinguish, one can of course quite rightly say: Well, spiritual science has driven the person in question mad! — But what, after all, are such statements worth?

[ 72 ] You remind us again and again, esteemed audience, of that old woman who cared for the great anatomist Hyrtl in his final days; and when he had died, she went out into the street and said: “Yes, now Hyrtl has died!” That’s what happens when you spend so much time studying! That’s when it hits you! — Hyrtl lived to be eighty-four years old!

[ 73 ] Surely this is some evidence that, in this particular case, studying was less harmful than drinking wine and beer is for some people, and that the stroke struck him at a much earlier age.

[ 74 ] Equally sound are those judgments that are often made when someone afflicted with some kind of mental disorder holds views based on spiritual science and, after some time, begins to exhibit signs of insanity—when it is said: If he hadn’t come to this spiritual science, he wouldn’t have gone mad!

[ 75 ] The truth is this: One can, of course, arrive at spiritual science just as easily through madness as through intelligence, and one can just as easily arrive at madness through one’s weak dispositions, or through some other kind of abnormal disposition, if one is dissatisfied with this or that aspect of life. One turns to one path or another to find satisfaction, and then naturally believes that one can find comfort in what initially seems difficult—by revelling in strange, obscure ideas that one makes no effort to clarify—believing that this will free one from whatever burdens life imposes. It is impossible to overstate just how much opposition to spiritual research comes precisely from this quarter, which must therefore be characterized!

[ 76 ] This, however, compels us—and compels us more and more—to point out that, by its very nature, any method of spiritual research cannot possibly have any connection whatsoever with any pathological mental state, because it is based entirely on freeing oneself from everything that might give rise to such a pathological mental state.

[ 77 ] But just as I was able to point out certain dangers and forms of opposition that arise against spiritual science in specific instances, so one can say: Even with regard to its representation in social life—indeed, in human life in general—it is all too easily lumped together with all manner of amateurish, even fraudulent and charlatan-like practices; and because these matters, esteemed audience, are now being discussed even in more materialistic circles of worldview, the spiritual researcher must necessarily point out how he draws a strict line of demarcation between what he pursues—in an honest quest for truth—as nothing but the goal of truth, and all the various things that are making their presence felt precisely in a field where one can so easily rely on superstition and people’s credulity, and where one seeks to spread so-called spiritual science—or, as some say, — “occultism”—in order to cloud people’s minds with all manner of distractions masquerading as occult knowledge, and once they have been clouded, to gain a certain power over them—even though in our present age it is said time and again: This is the time when we have finally broken free from the old belief in authority, and when people profess a commitment to “free judgment.”

[ 78 ] Well, the basis for this claim isn’t quite what it seems. It’s true that people make a big deal out of saying: “In earlier times, people believed in the dogmas of the Church Fathers.” Yes, for these people, the Church Fathers were Tertullian, Gregory of Nazianzus, Irenaeus, and so on; for modern people, who, in their opinion—and the fact that they hold this opinion is perhaps even more harmful than it was for the people of old that they did not— For modern people who believe they do not look to any authorities, the “Church Fathers” today are: Helmholtz, Haeckel, Darwin, Dubois-Reymond, and so on—they are merely secular Church Fathers. People speak of them more as a matter of principle; but the dependencies on them are exactly the same. One must by no means believe that credulity and superstition have declined all that much in our time. They have merely taken on a different form.

[ 79 ] And so the true researcher of the spirit must ensure—especially in these fateful times—that he is not lumped together with those who, under the guise of a so-called occult science, pursue all manner of dishonest and pernicious goals. So that he cannot be lumped together—for this is happening more and more every day, that everything belonging to the realm of the most blatant, most foolish superstition is lumped together with that spiritual science which, as can be amply demonstrated, possesses a brighter, clearer, and more penetrating way of thinking than even ordinary science does.

[ 80 ] And here it is necessary to draw attention to a certain phenomenon, because otherwise errors in this area could all too easily arise if one did not know what the spiritual researcher seeks to shed; it is indeed a duty to draw attention to certain matters that are also connected with the grave events currently unfolding in world history. However, as I said, in order to present spiritual science in its purity and to draw a line against dishonesty, the following should be mentioned. Only a few specific facts will be singled out, and only because they are being discussed in publications opposed to spiritual science.

[ 81 ] For example, for many years now, a prominent figure living in Western Europe—in a capital city of Western Europe—has been publishing a kind of “almanac,” a yearbook—one such yearbook was already published in 1912, which was the yearbook for 1913—a kind of almanac. In this yearbook for 1913, which was published in 1912, there appeared, ladies and gentlemen, the following words regarding the development of Austria—the words read: “He who believes he will govern will not govern; on the other hand, another young man, whom people believe will not yet govern, will govern.” — And in the almanac printed in 1913 for the year 1914, these things were repeated.

[ 82 ] The gullibility of our time, that foolish superstition, can of course easily believe in all sorts of prophecies. And how many must have believed in prophecies in this area!

[ 83 ] Perhaps, however, people will be less inclined to believe in prophecy when they learn that, almost simultaneously with the appearance of this passage in the aforementioned almanac, a completely ordinary Parisian newspaper—“Paris-Midi”—published statements to the effect that it was hoped Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria would be assassinated at the right time.

[ 84 ] The individual who wrote such things in his almanac is likely connected to certain circles that pursue this or that goal through all sorts of clandestine channels. And it is precisely those who are sincere about spiritual research who must also demonstrate that they agree with serious, scientific thinking in this field—even if it initially asserts itself from within the realm of materialism—and not with the fraud that, under the guise of prophecy, pursues all manner of charlatanistic or dishonest goals. The very same person who published this almanac, and who supposedly knew how to predict what would happen—as if in a prophecy of the future—traveled from Paris to Rome in the very first days of August 1914 to influence certain people there, in their own way, toward certain actions that then contributed at least something to the well-known involvement in current events, or were at least intended to contribute something.

[ 85 ] The person who wrote such things in his almanac is likely connected to certain circles that pursue this or that goal through all sorts of clandestine channels. And it is precisely those who are sincere about spiritual research who must also demonstrate that they agree with serious, scientific thinking in this field—even if it initially asserts itself from within the realm of materialism—and not with the fraud that, under the guise of prophecy, pursues all manner of charlatanistic or dishonest goals. The very same person who published this almanac, and who supposedly knew how to predict what would happen—as if in a prophecy of the future—traveled from Paris to Rome in the very first days of August 1914 to influence certain people there, in their own way, toward certain actions that then contributed at least something to the well-known involvement in current events, or were at least intended to contribute something.

[ 86 ] Because, as I said, these matters are discussed publicly, it is precisely the spiritual researcher who must point out that any unhealthy response of the human soul to this or that “revelation”—which is based on such foundations—must be eradicated root and branch through true spiritual research! True spiritual research will not aim at what is unhealthy, but precisely at what is healthy. For this true spiritual research is capable of not clouding thought, of not making people ignorant of the external, real processes of life. Everything that numbs the spiritual life and leads it astray in the ways described also clouds thinking; it also dulls thinking to the sober realities of life. Everything that broadens one’s horizons—these spiritual-scientific expansions of one’s field of vision beyond ordinary life—also illuminates sound judgment regarding this ordinary life. This does not compel people to allow themselves to be deceived by superstition, but rather leads them to perceive the circumstances of life with even greater clarity and insight.

[ 87 ] However, in this area, the humanities still have much to accomplish—and much of it is powerful. For today, my esteemed audience, one does not even notice how—I would say—dull the weapon of thought has become, how much thoughtlessness always prevails!

[ 88 ] To conclude, let me give you one more example of this, which will show you where unhealthy thinking lies and that this unhealthy thinking does not stem from spiritual science.

[ 89 ] I would like to say: It was by chance that I came to realize what I am about to explain regarding the following. Some time ago, ladies and gentlemen, I gave a lecture in a city in Austria. There I developed ideas—some of which I also elaborated here in Munich in the lecture I gave months ago on the worldview of German idealism, and others in the lecture I gave here the day before yesterday on the individual national souls.

[ 90 ] I think any sound way of thinking will be able to acknowledge at least this—even if one takes a critical stance toward it—at least to acknowledge that, when one truly understands the national spirits, the individual national souls, certain characteristics become apparent, so that one national soul differs from another in a specific way.

[ 91 ] I also presented this in that city in Austria. Not only did a muddled mind in a “daily newspaper” at the time go on and on about this truth, which he did not understand at all; for he said: I had seized the opportunity—since, by chance, the military balance of power in the East, West, and Central Europe had brought them into opposition—to now construct an intellectual opposition as well. — Well, that was a confusion of the sort one can certainly conceive of and tolerate in a “daily newspaper.” But that was not enough; rather, a German magazine published a reprint of what had appeared in that “daily newspaper” at the time. And in a German magazine—according to his own statement, he is an Austrian German—a man writes the following words, truly the following words:

“The speaker’s accusation that Steiner has constructed opposing cultures out of the current constellation of powers is rightly directed at him. With the best will in the world, I am unable, like Steiner, to perceive any fundamental difference between Central European culture and Western and Eastern European culture. In my opinion, European culture is, in its essence, completely uniform.”

[ 92 ] Consider the light of thought that shines through such a statement! Consider this, esteemed audience! The same man, however, even finds a way to say:

“Intellectual life, too, has developed in this direction and is absorbed in this pursuit. The wild greed of the cultured European for the possession of earthly goods would degenerate into a predatory struggle of all against all, were it not for the fact that individuals are constrained by ironclad forms of government.”

[ 93 ] Now I ask you: Have “human individuals” declared war today, or have those at the helm of their nations?

[ 94 ] So, by throwing right in people’s faces what is accessible even to the simplest thought, one beguiles them! Such things exist in the world of that kind of thinking which people today refuse to acknowledge as unhealthy, because they have become too desensitized to it. On the other hand, the less one knows about it by name—specifically, in what is contained in true spiritual science—the more one finds there that which is intended to mislead people, that which is intended to create confused ideas in them.

[ 95 ] Truly, the spiritual researcher—if he could somehow find this compatible with his general disposition—might fall into a certain self-satisfaction upon seeing the confusion of ideas that prevails today due to a very common way of thinking—which, in truth, turns out to be quite unhealthy compared to the healthy intellectual life of spiritual research.

[ 96 ] It is possible—one really has to, I would say, in Hamlet’s words: “Give me a writing tablet!” so that one can write it down—it is possible that a person exists who is capable of pulling something like this off on humanity! And it is possible that a magazine exists that prints such a thing! The man who publishes the magazine is Dr. Friedrich Maier, and he lives in Tübingen. And attention must be drawn to such things so that one can see where unhealthy thinking and intellectual life exist.

[ 97 ] In this case, ladies and gentlemen, if some of you might be surprised that I am saying such things with apparent fervor—as one might always suspect in such a situation—perhaps out of wounded personal vanity, I can, in this case, provide the counterevidence—drawing it directly from the journal itself—although anyone who knows me and understands how I approach spiritual science will trust me when I say that, whether what I do and say is praised or criticized, it is as indifferent to me personally as possible! Truly, whether someone praises or criticizes what I do and say, it is of no personal concern to me. But when it comes to pointing out where public spiritual life is unhealthy or healthy, I feel compelled to speak out, precisely from the standpoint of pure spiritual science.

[ 98 ] As I have already said, I can prove that I am not dealing with vanity here; for I have published a pamphlet—“Thoughts During the War. For Germans and Those Who Do Not Believe They Must Hate—Berlin 1915.” It contains—albeit with somewhat different examples, but essentially—exactly the same thoughts that I expressed at that time in Linz on the Danube and in other lectures that I gave—as I have explained here—on the diversity of the European national souls. Those very thoughts are contained therein—the same ones about which the magazine in question, which I have just been discussing, spoke in the manner that has been indicated, in a truly absurd manner. — The next issue of this magazine contains the continuation of the article. In any case, it continues in the same vein. And at the end of that same issue, there is a section in which the pamphlet *Thoughts During the Time of War* is reviewed. And there, this book is praised very highly. — One part of the article was written in August 1915, and the conclusion in [October] 1915. And in this [...] article, alongside the passage containing the very folly I have cited, there is also a laudatory review of the book that says exactly the same thing! Here, dear attendees—I wanted to highlight just one example—we are dealing with a case that really ought to be examined, and through which one can see how true spiritual science is often embedded in the overall spiritual life of humanity. I have often pointed out how the very spiritual and cultural conditions of the present demand that, from now on and into the future, the spiritual-scientific impulse must become part of the development of humanity.

[ 99 ] Certainly, there will still be people for a long time to come who accuse, slander, and oppose spiritual science: But spiritual science, firmly grounded on the foundation it has been able to establish through the principles outlined today and elsewhere, will always have to be aware that the truth, if it is the truth — and if it is the truth, it will not harm humanity but will disappear of its own accord — that the truth, if it is the truth, winds its way through the narrowest cracks, no matter how massive the rock formations of prejudice, slander, and opposition may be, for they leave only small cracks through which the truth can pass.

[ 100 ] Therefore, esteemed audience, let me conclude today’s reflections—which were intended only to briefly touch upon a truly healthy spiritual life in connection with spiritual science—with that which lives within the spiritual scientist, who carries the very essence of his science within himself, as the source that gives him the persuasive power and certainty of action and will.

[ 101 ] To this researcher of the spirit—to put it figuratively—the human soul appears as a sister of truth. And as he cherishes this thought, he says to himself: One can fight against the truth, but it will assert itself again and again through the power of truth inherent in it, even if the struggle should make its existence difficult for a certain time. One can even use force to oppress the truth, to suppress it for a certain time; but one cannot suppress it for the entire course of human development.

[ 102 ] The suppressed truth will emerge again and again, for the human soul and the truth are siblings. And even if, in certain epochs—as is often the case with siblings—they live in a kind of disharmony and estrangement, there will always be periods in which truth and the human soul come together in their sibling relationship and jointly remember their origin—their common origin, their paternal source in the world. And this common, fatherly source in the world for truth and the human soul—which is at the same time the source for all true spiritual research—is precisely what spiritual science, in its sincere striving, seeks in a wholesome way. This is the World Spirit itself, which interweaves the world and ripples through it from eternity to eternity; to penetrate into it from the starting point of matter is the task and goal of all true and sound spiritual research.