The Rudolf Steiner Archive

5. Life Balance

[ 1 ] Today’s reflections will be related in a certain way to the more wide-ranging discussions we have frequently engaged in recently. As we have seen, it is by no means unnecessary today to consider what, in the actions, thoughts, and beliefs of our time, strives toward and stands in opposition to what we seek to recognize as spiritual science—and which we must regard as a necessary component of the spiritual cultural development of humanity in the present and the near future. Thus, what has been presented is by no means unrelated not only to the views of our spiritual science but also to the entire impulse, to the force that is to lie at the heart of our spiritual scientific movement. And it is precisely in this direction that I would like to offer a few supplementary reflections today.

[ 2 ] Time and again, we must remind ourselves that certain concepts, terms, and ideas—which must hold significance within our spiritual science—must not become mere verbal constructs; in particular, we must not approach these concepts of spiritual science—which in many respects represent a new spiritual heritage for humanity—with old preconceptions and ingrained mental habits. In particular, it is essential that we not approach concepts such as the “Ahrimanic” and the “Luciferic” with all the familiar feelings and notions that we simply harbor when we form the words in question. We need only imagine how, in more southern regions, a concept of demons prevails—one that we encounter with our own feelings when we utter the name Lucifer. However, when we form the spiritual-scientific concept of Lucifer, we should not have the same—I would say, thoroughly repulsive—ideas and feelings as those associated with the old conceptions of demons. Nor should we automatically apply the ideas that arose in the human soul when medieval conceptions of the devil were evoked to our concept of the Ahrimanic. We must be clear that the world, as it stands before us, is, so to speak, a state of equilibrium. The balance beam remains horizontal not simply because we have it as a balance beam, but because weights hang from it on the left and right, holding each other in balance. So it is with everything in our world. It is not sustained by stillness, it is not sustained by nothingness; it is sustained by the balance brought about by the fact that, on the one hand, there is the possibility of a radical deviation from what is right and good toward the Luciferic side, and, on the other hand, a deviation toward the Ahrimanic side. Anyone who simply says, “I must guard against everything Ahrimanic or Luciferic,” is in the same situation as someone who says, “I want to have a set of scales, but I won’t put any weights on the two pans!” We know, for example, that we could not have any art at all if the Luciferic principle did not play a role in the world. On the other hand, we know that we could not arrive at any perception of external nature if the Ahrimanic did not play a role. The only thing that matters is that a state of balance be brought about in the human soul. And because this is so, one can fall prey to the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic precisely when one believes one is rejecting everything Ahrimanic and Luciferic. One can indeed sin against reality, but reality cannot be suppressed! Thus, someone who wants to guard against the Ahrimanic will very easily fall prey to the Luciferic, and someone who wants to guard against the Luciferic will very easily fall prey to the Ahrimanic. The point is that we must find a balance, that we must not shy away from either, that we as human beings must have enough courage to confront both, let us say, Ahrimanic fear and Luciferic hope or desire. But our contemporary culture does not appreciate this. Our contemporary culture, without realizing it and of course without intending to, favors the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic in a certain sense. It believes it is guarding against them, but in fact falls prey to them all the more!

[ 3 ] Talking in general, abstract terms usually leads nowhere. We only make progress when we address such significant questions of life in very concrete terms. And that is why I choose so many specific examples that illustrate how a person can find balance in life—the equilibrium between rest and movement, between unity and diversity. There are philosophers and thinkers who say they strive for unity. That is fine, but it is purely Luciferic! Others strive for diversity and want nothing to do with unity. That, too, can bear fruit today, but it is Ahrimanic. Only those who seek unity within diversity—and, in turn, seek diversity in such a way that unity is revealed through that diversity—are striving for balance. It is simply a matter of finding the possibility to do this in reality. I can only ever cite individual transgressions against this balance.

[ 4 ] In our time, such a fall into sin occurs mainly because history is viewed in a very specific way. How is history viewed today? People study how events follow one another, how events are connected in time—as they believe—through cause and effect. People take the next event and try to explain it based on what immediately preceded it, though it should be noted that people’s memories are generally very short these days. We can indeed observe that for nearly two years now, people have been speaking about historical events—the events that led to these current, terribly tragic conflicts—as if the world had only just begun in July 1914. People forget so easily what happened before. In numerous analyses today, we find that what preceded these events is simply forgotten. But quite apart from that, when one looks at history, what follows is strung together with what came before, and what came before is in turn linked to what came before that. One does this by, I would say, stringing together the individual facts like the individual pearls of a pearl necklace. This is then called history. But in this way one can never find the truth—at least not a truth that can help us as historical truth for our lives. For although events do follow one another, one after the other, one event is far more important than another. And sometimes a particular event that takes place at a specific time reveals far more for understanding the next event than other events do. The point is to identify the right events, the right facts. I have often referred to this approach to history before you as a symptomatic view of history—in contrast to the merely pragmatic approach that is so widely sought today—an understanding of the inner, spiritual development derived from symptoms, in which one finds events at certain points that surpass the events around them in significance.

[ 5 ] This perspective is, if anything, a Goethean one; for Goethe incorporated into his entire way of thinking the principle of not simply presenting each event side by side with the next, but of regarding events as significant for the course of human history according to the extent to which the spiritual reveals itself in them. One day, a history will be written about the current tragic conflicts; it will recount very specific individual facts from the past decades, and from these facts one will recognize how everything unfolded, leading to the situation we face today. Today is not the time to recount such facts; they would only be misunderstood. But people will recount facts that, if read today, are simply overlooked—facts from which, if I may say so, the truth shines forth. I have always done this over the years: I have told you a variety of facts, never without the intention of speaking, through these facts, about the true spiritual course of events. Well, I had to speak more abstractly about this matter, for if I were to go into individual facts that could have a clarifying effect, especially for the present, I would probably have to discuss things that cannot be discussed today because people do not want to hear them. Anyone who does not view history in this way—who does not view it symptomatically—fails to find the balance between the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic; they fall into an Ahrimanic view of history. That is why today’s view of history is largely Ahrimanic. The facts are not evaluated. People may believe they are evaluating the facts, but they are not. In most cases, they are not even aware of the most important ones, because they regard the significant facts as trivial. But the opposite also occurs, and we can speak about that in more detail. The opposite occurs when a person pays no heed to the facts at all, but instead forms general truths from the depths of their heart and soul—truths that are supposed to apply, which they carry with them through life, so to speak, and which they wish to apply everywhere. Whether they find themselves in this situation or its opposite, they will apply the same truth everywhere. This is more of a Luciferic excess. But people love it today. They want, so to speak, a kind of essence of truth, and for this, nothing else should apply anywhere else; it should carry them through all, all the details—that is what pleases them. But it doesn’t work that way; one must find the balance.

[ 6 ] Now I want to help you understand what I mean by this in this context. You see, a person can walk through the world, can stand atop a mountain, can let the vastness of nature work its magic on them; well, yes, they look at it, but they don’t connect it to the spiritual. Then again, they go into the dwellings of human beings, where misery reigns. They look at it, they are moved by it, they empathize. But what they ultimately think about the highest things remains the same everywhere; they carry that through all situations. In folk wisdom—which, admittedly, is now fading more and more—there is a clear sense, indeed a clear effort, to seek balance within the soul. So it could happen—as I said, this folk wisdom is now gradually fading more and more—that someone would walk through a village at a time when sundials still existed. Now, of course, sundials are no longer common, because they simply couldn’t be set back or forward by an hour at will! That’s just not possible! So, back in the days when sundials still had significance, someone might walk through a village, see a sundial, and find words written beneath it. The words were such that they made an impression on him. For example, a saying beneath a sundial:

[ 7 ] I am a shadow.
So are you!
I count on time.
And you?

[ 8 ] Just imagine the profound words inscribed beneath the sundial: “I am a shadow. So are you!” A shadow cast by the sun! — “I keep track of time. And you?” How, in the immediate presence of a concrete reality, does the profound truth speak that human life is a shadow of that which works and weaves in the spiritual realm! How vividly this appears to a person—and how powerfully it imprints itself on the heart—when, weary from walking, they step beneath a sundial, see the shadow, and are now made aware: “You, too, are a shadow. I keep track of time. And you?” Imagine what a powerful question this is for humanity, for the human conscience: Do you keep track of time? Do you find your place within time? — That is what I mean when I say: Balance must be sought. It is significant that people do not simply go about their business and let facts coexist side by side, one as good as the other, but are made aware that there is a significant fact that can speak volumes to the human being, that can speak of eternal truths. There, that kinship takes place between what lives in the human soul and what is spread out in the world around us. And it is only in this way that we truly come together with the truth of the world—that, as we interact with the world, we always encounter the truth; that we do not simply want to carry the truth within us from the outset, passing by a sundial just as we would a plow and the like, but rather that, as we look at things, are simultaneously instructed about the highest and greatest things that can shine forth in the human soul. This coexistence with external reality, with what is spread out in space—this feeling, at the right moment, of being face to face with the eternal—is something entirely different from learning from a book that this or that belongs to the eternal truths. No matter how often we try to impress upon ourselves, in an abstract sense, that human life is a shadow of what happens to a person in eternity, no matter how many beautiful, ethical truths we commit to memory about the use of time: they will not take root as deeply as when we find the right relationship between ourselves and external reality. Then something significant will reveal itself to us in each individual, concrete fact. This means finding a balance in life—a balance that cannot be achieved if we lose ourselves in the external world, nor if we immerse ourselves solely in our inner world. Mysticism is one-sided, it is Luciferic; natural science is one-sided, it is Ahrimanic. But mysticism developed through the external—through the contemplation of external nature—and the observation of nature deepened into mysticism: that is the balance! Or take another example. Imagine a person hiking in a beautiful Alpine region who, let’s say, one morning observes the song of the birds, the beauty of the forests, and perhaps also the wonderful, pristine purity of the water trickling down in streams. And he continues hiking—perhaps for an hour, an hour and a half—and then comes upon a simple wooden cross bearing the Crucifixus, with Christ on it. He may feel joy within; all the joyful forces of his soul have been stirred; he has seen beauty, grandeur, splendor, and the sublime. He is also weary. Now, at a certain spot, surrounded by wonderfully sublime and graceful nature, he stands before a simple wooden cross bearing the figure of Christ, and on it are inscribed the words:

Stand still, you wayfarer,
And look at my wounds.
The wounds remain.
The hours pass.
Take heed and beware,
Of the judgment I shall pass upon you
On the Last Day!

[ 9 ] The experience one can have with these words can be greater, more deeply moving to our hearts, than the experience one can have with Michelangelo’s famous image of Christ in the Sistine Chapel. No one knows who wrote the words I just quoted. But anyone who understands poetry knows that the person who coined the words, “The wounds remain. The hours pass,” is among the greatest poets who could ever exist. But one must first have this feeling. One must first realize that true poetry is that which wells up from the human soul at the right moment. Not every jumble of words, not everything that exists as poetry, is true poetry. But it is true poetry when it springs from the eternal truths of Christianity:

Stand still, you wayfarer,
And look at my wounds.
The wounds remain.
The hours pass.
Take heed and beware,
Of the judgment I shall pass upon you
On the Last Day!

[ 10 ] Simple words, words of the highest, greatest poetry! And thus our attention is drawn to something of the greatest significance in the Earth’s development—in sublime nature, in graceful beauty—that is, experiencing reality in space together with the soul. It is just one example, even more striking than the one with the sundial. What matters is where and when this or that presents itself to us, and that we can develop this in life: not to pass reality by, but also—in what is not man-made, what is, so to speak, established by the eternal powers themselves—to experience this growing together of the human soul with reality and to maintain balance. We cannot arrive at a perception of the spiritual world until we strive in this way: not one-sidedly toward mysticism, not one-sidedly toward the observation of nature, but toward the connection between mysticism and the observation of nature.

[ 11 ] This must be said today, for it pertains to that which present-day humanity has the least genuine sense of, and which is least likely to become a lived experience for present-day humanity. That is why spiritual science is so difficult for present-day humanity to understand: what spiritual science offers is overshadowed both by the one-sided pursuit of an insight that applies to all things and by the acceptance of the external world without paying much attention to the symptomatic manifestations and revelations of the spiritual in one event or another. Modern humanity has the very least understanding of this. If it did, there would indeed be far fewer rhymes in our time and, if I may say so, far fewer definitions. For through definitions, people only come to overestimate words, and through rhyming, they only end up misusing them. A poem like the one inscribed on this simple cross—we do not know who the poet is, but it was surely written at a time when there was a deep poetic receptivity in the hearts of the people, in one person or another, and a true balance in the soul. Alas, our age has become so desensitized to what true poetry is, precisely because we have far too much poetry; and poetry always begets poetry, just as an unhealthy lifestyle begets cancer, the carcinoma. For it is, after all, an identical phenomenon in the intellectual realm when everyone today is inspired to write poetry based on what already exists in poetry, just as the life process is stimulated to form a carcinoma. In this regard, we experienced the most precious fruits of the art of verse precisely at the end of the 19th century. You may know that one of Berlin’s most scathing critics even had to call himself Alfred Kerr, because his real name is Alfred Kempner—but one could not call oneself Kempner at the end of the 19th century, for that brought to mind Friederike Kempner. Yes, she wrote poetry, too! We need only recall that beautiful verse—I don’t want to recite many such verses to you, just this one:

America, land of dreams!
You wondrous world, so vast and wide!
How beautiful are your coconut trees
And your lively solitude!

[ 12 ] It’s just very noticeable here, but many works of poetry—where it’s less apparent in the present—are exactly the same, and many terms that are coined are just like Friederike Kempner’s “lively solitude”; for people often have no sense of how much the adjective contradicts the noun when they speak or write today. These things must be taken into account; there is no other way today. For today, some people speak in such a way that they do not merely regard the word as a gesture—for that is all the word is. You know, I have pointed out how clumsy a theory such as Fritz Mauthner’s is—he who, admittedly, wants to reduce all philosophy and every worldview to mere word meanings, and who has written not only three thick volumes but also an entire lexicon, two thick lexicon volumes, in which all philosophical words are listed alphabetically, but not a single philosophical concept. This completely disregards the fact that the word really does relate to the concept just as a gesture does. In worldviews, this is constantly forgotten. In everyday reality, one cannot forget it, for one does not easily confuse a table with the word “table,” and one does not easily think that one must come to know the table from the word “table.” But in philosophy, in worldviews, people do this constantly. I have told you that Fritz Mauthner should just once learn what is called a “Bohemian court councilor” in Austria; then he would look up “Bohemian” in his dictionary and draw all sorts of conclusions, and then “court councilor” and again draw all sorts of conclusions. Now, however, a “Bohemian court councilor” is neither a Bohemian nor a court councilor; rather, he might be a Styrian clerk. In Austria, anyone who advances by wearing certain shoes—no sturdier than slippers—and using his hands to push his rival aside without the latter noticing is a “Bohemian court councilor.” That is what is called a “Bohemian court councilor.” As I said, he need not be a Bohemian or a court councilor at all. One can derive absolutely nothing from the word itself; it is merely a gesture. The gesture is simply more pronounced here, but this is true of all our words. We must be clear on this: words are gestures. The larynx makes the gesture, and the gesture becomes audible through the air, just as the hand makes a gesture, or my arm makes a gesture—which simply isn’t audible because it’s too slow. The larynx makes the gesture so quickly that it becomes audible. The entire difference lies solely in the speed of the larynx. And just as it is wrong to describe someone’s arm movement instead of the table they are pointing at, so too is it wrong to use a word to represent a concept or a thing—even in the realm of the mind. Yet these mistakes are made all the time today. People get completely caught up in words. You see, when I was a young man—no, not yet a young man, but a boy, when I was in school in Wiener-Neustadt in Lower Austria—I took to heart a saying that has kept me from placing too much importance on definitions or explanations of words in general. This saying was written on a house as a motto, and it read:

I, Hans Prasser,
I’d rather drink wine than water.
If I’d rather drink water than wine,
I wouldn’t be Prasser!

[ 13 ] That’s pretty much how many of today’s explanations of words go. In other words, you first come up with an explanation for a word, and then you adjust the explanation so that it has to be correct; because if it weren’t correct, then things simply wouldn’t be the way they are. If you keep this in mind: “I, Hans Prasser, prefer to drink wine rather than water. If I preferred water to wine, I wouldn’t be a Prasser after all,” you will be protected from much of what appears today in so-called spiritual life, in the broadest sense of reality. Much, much is emerging in our time. But all these things are capable of increasingly diverting the world from its focus on the spiritual, from the awareness that spirit surges and weaves through reality, through that which surrounds us. More and more, we—and the world as a whole—are losing our connection to the spiritual. For merely speaking of the spiritual does not in itself make the spiritual a reality. If one person makes a gesture that points to a reality, and another person then mimics that gesture in a completely different space, that gesture does not signify the same thing in relation to reality. But where is the world headed when it loses all connection with the spiritual, when it casts all of this aside? It is remarkable how little people notice how they are gradually losing their connection with the spiritual world. Worldviews are a necessity for humanity, and after all, no one wants to be without a worldview. Modern times, however, are often devoid of spirituality, of faith, and of any inclination toward the spiritual. But not everyone who lacks an inclination toward the spiritual can do without a worldview. Oh, what strange justifications for worldviews then emerge!

[ 14 ] So, in recent weeks, I have found myself thinking of a man with whom I spent a great deal of time around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries—in 1898 and 1899— 1900, and 1901, who at that time was striving for a worldview but was unable to arrive at one. He tried to find it in Haeckelism, but it seems he was ultimately not satisfied. I had completely lost touch with him. And now I see that this same man, who is thoroughly educated in the natural sciences, does indeed strive for a worldview, but has the most peculiar ideas about the reasons why human beings actually arrive at a worldview—and by “worldview” he also means religion. If someone is completely immersed in the purely external, material perception of facts—in Ahrimanic reality—then he cannot really justify to himself the act of synthesizing those facts into a worldview. But if he is nevertheless seeking a worldview, one might ask: what is he to do with himself in order to justify this search for a worldview? Now, this very example shows the wrong turns people are taking today. They are, after all, all sincere, striving individuals. This man now says to himself: Based on what natural science provides, on what science in general provides—on what is so simply called “truth”—one cannot arrive at a worldview by that path. How, then, does one arrive at a worldview? The senses do not provide a worldview; the intellect, which must be bound to the senses, does not provide a worldview; what, then, provides a worldview? — And so this man came to the conclusion, quite in keeping with the spirit of our time, to seek the origin of the worldview in psycho-sexuality! How does a person arrive at a worldview? By virtue of being a sexual being! If a person were not a sexual being, he would not synthesize events, but would merely perceive the facts. I would like to read you a characteristic statement by this man. He says:

[ 15 ] “Psychosexuality, then, as one might say when following Schopenhauer’s line of thought” —he believes he derives this from Schopenhauer’s worldview—, “supraindividual tendencies and aspirations with which, in the final analysis, man’s metaphysical need must be associated, as it is expressed in the creation of religious feelings and ideas, and in the formation and development of comprehensive worldviews.” — So comprehensive worldviews and religious ideas are a result of psychosexuality! — “Yet, in accordance with the principle of polarity, we also find in psychosexuality a force that drags human beings down into the depths and the abyss. Criminal impulses also spring from psychosexuality.”

[ 16 ] So there are two poles in human nature that stem from psychosexuality. One pole: religious feelings, ideological thoughts; the other pole: criminal impulses. Isn’t it—I won’t say “sad,” I’ll say—“Isn’t it tragic where our times are leading us?”

[ 17 ] These ideas are not easy to accept. Anyone who observed such a thing saw the tremendous speed with which these ideas spread. In my youth, there was no psychoanalysis, no Freudian theory, and anyone who had proposed such a theory back then would have been considered insane. Today, not only is there a Freudian theory with its own journals and representatives in every country, but there are also psychoanalytic institutions everywhere where psychoanalytic nonsense is practiced. Today, the most important—and, as you can see, now even the most sacred—experiences of the human soul are attributed to psychosexuality! Humanity is straying far, far away from the paths it once followed, paths to which it must be guided back through spiritual science. For what is at stake here is certainly not something that can be easily refuted. These matters cannot be refuted with infinite ease, because it all depends on the entire orientation of the soul; the entire form and conception of the soul is what matters when one wishes to speak about these things. When a little book appeared within our own society—one that was, moreover, written in a rather amateurish manner—on psychosexuality, we had to wage a great struggle, one that is not even over yet. People simply could not understand why such a little book was considered unacceptable. I told the author: It is precisely for this reason that the occultist is cautious in these matters—because in these matters, misunderstanding of the truth is separated from it by nothing more than a spider’s web, and because the entire constitution of the soul is at stake, and because it is dangerous to speak of these things. — Such things must be discussed, for they are being investigated by external science and will play a certain role in external science. But one must first return to the direction the soul must take so that the human being may find the path into the spiritual realm.

[ 18 ] In connection with this grotesque fact—that the origin of worldview is sought in psychosexuality—I will mention another fact, one that is sacred to us all. That is the fact that the Hebrew word found in the passage of the Bible where the story of Paradise is told is, in fact, well translated into our language when it says: “And Adam knew his wife.” There, too, you have brought the concept of knowledge into the realm of sexuality. But how? In exactly the opposite way! A profound mystery lies behind this. When people approach the things that are true—but which may only be viewed from the spiritual perspective, lest they lead astray—by taking the reverse path, only then will light once again dawn upon them. People today must guard against the disrespect that exists toward spiritual research. And this disrespect does indeed exist. In the deepest sense of the word, there is a lack of respect for the spiritual world. Everyone believes they can intervene in the world in a reforming way, based on their most immediate experiences of what appears right before them, or even on yesterday’s experiences.

[ 19 ] A disheartening example came to my attention recently! One person reflected on the current tragic events of this terrible war and came to the conclusion that if peace were ever to return to the world, it would be a catastrophe; he came to the conclusion that war must remain, for that is the natural state of humankind. You can find these words on the person’s page:

[ 20 ] “War is not something you learn in a day. It is truly fortunate that the threats from our opponents are accelerating the process of adaptation—especially the most recent ones regarding the ‘complete destruction of our exports.’”

[ 21 ] As you can see, this was apparently written in the very last few days, since it already takes into account the Paris Economic Conference.

[ 22 ] “Now no one will be able to avoid the logical conclusion that peace would be a catastrophe, that war remains the only option. War—hitherto a reaction to a provocation, a means to an end—will from now on become an end in itself, and from now on all those still unredeemed German souls, perhaps even the last pacifists, will recognize their fall from grace; they will realize that their ideals are not relics but vestiges. The entire nation will, as one man, demand eternal war.”

[ 23 ] And the same author goes on to say:

[ 24 ] “Education in hatred, education in reverence for hatred, education in love of hatred, the organization of hatred! Away with immature timidity, with false shame in the face of brutality and fanaticism! Marinelli’s words apply politically as well: More slaps, fewer kisses! We must not hesitate to proclaim blasphemously: We have been given faith, hope, and hate.” In the future, according to this gentleman, it must no longer be faith, hope, and love, but rather faith, hope, and hate! “But hate is the greatest of them all!”

[ 25 ] Yes, my dear friends, it does exist! It can never be a matter of burying one’s head in the sand like an ostrich, but rather of knowing where materialism leads, especially in its latest phase, which has, however, been denied. It was actually better during the 19th century, in the era of Büchner and David Friedrich Strauss, and in the time of the great Vogt, who described the cycle of matter, and all the others who at least acknowledged it. Today, however, materialism goes about with a hypocritical air, as people claim it has long since been overcome. But what they put in its place—and which they hypocritically deny is materialism—is materialism, and an ever-worsening form of materialism!

[ 26 ] We need Goetheanism, my dear friends; we need a worldview that allows the soul to grow together with reality in the specific, characteristic manifestations of reality. For this Goetheanism is nothing other than the renewal of the true Christian life of feeling and emotion. Why do people in the East not understand the Mystery of Golgotha? They do not understand it because they cannot grasp that one event is more essential than another. One can understand the Mystery of Golgotha only when one understands the difference between the events, for only then can one rise to the realization that one event alone can give meaning to the Earth in the first place. When there are gradations between the events, then one can regard one as the most important. In the East, one arrives at most at a continuous cycle, since everything is always repeated. The fact that our Earth is entirely structured around a period of preparation leading up to the Mystery of Golgotha, followed by the Mystery of Golgotha as the pinnacle of Earth’s evolution, and then the integration of the Mystery of Golgotha—this is what humanity will gradually have to understand, but through a symptomatic view of history. Indeed, everything that spiritual science can offer us culminates in the Christian worldview that must emerge. Spiritual science, as I have often said, does not seek to be a new religion, but it aims to provide the tools so that humanity—which would otherwise inevitably fall completely into materialism—can once again fully understand the spiritual essence inherent in Christianity. It is absolutely necessary to look at our time with open eyes, for that is far more important than any sentimental view of it.