The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Seventeenth Lecture

[ 1 ] It seems to me that, especially in our time, it is necessary for the members of our movement to know something about the state of the world. The reflections we have made here have, after all, served this purpose to a greater or lesser extent. When we speak of spiritual science in our sense of the term, it is indeed the case that we must imbue ourselves with the realization that our world—which we perceive through our physical intellect and the senses—is the manifestation of the spiritual world. As long as one conceives of the spiritual world only in abstract terms—by breaking the human being down into its various constituent elements and engaging in all sorts of theoretical speculations about karma and reincarnation—as we have, in fact, never really done in such a theoretical way—spiritual science cannot truly bear fruit in life. That is why I have directed your attention to external reality in a wide variety of ways, always keeping in mind what lies behind this external reality—whether these are directly occult factors or occult impulses, or whether occult impulses are utilized by people in this or that context.

[ 2 ] For those who have even a slight understanding of current circumstances, it will become increasingly clear in the future, when looking back on our times, that the old historical perspective—as it prevails today—is no longer sufficient to understand what is happening in the present. Certain occult teachings will emerge as necessary as human understanding matures in response to these circumstances, and those who close themselves off to such things will, in the future, be branded with the mark of ignorance and lack of knowledge.

[ 3 ] Ever since the 19th century, it has been customary—given the circumstances of the past—to construct history in a purely materialistic manner, based on the records, as they used to say. Even today, people fail to realize that this approach does not lead to a true revelation of historical impulses, but merely to a depiction of materialistic spectres—and though the phrase may sound paradoxical, it is true: a depiction of materialistic spectres. What appears today as history in standard textbooks and other accounts—the depictions of people and conditions from the past right up to the present—are, no matter how realistic they may be intended to be, ghosts without real life. They can only be phantoms for the simple reason that all reality is underpinned by occult impulses, and if one omits these, one is left with nothing but phantoms. Therefore, the portrayal of history to this day has been a phantom-like one, yet in a certain sense it has filled people’s minds; in a certain sense, it has had an effect. And the tragedy of our time is, in many respects, precisely the outworking of karma in such untrue, ghostly conceptions that people have gradually adopted. Yet even within our movement, the course of the world must not, so to speak, be split into two unconnected halves, as some people in our movement would like: On the one hand, revelling in so-called supersensory ideas, which, however, remain more or less abstract concepts; and on the other hand, persisting in ordinary views of reality, such as those developed by the vulgar intellect—which is thoroughly steeped in materialism—regarding external reality. These two things—external physical reality and spiritual existence—must be precisely united; that is to say, one must recognize that the previous approach to history must be replaced by what I have called “symptomatic history,” through which one will learn that historical development finds greater expression in certain phenomena than in others.

[ 4 ] Now, in recent times, I may have hinted at certain things in a way that was perhaps too realistic—but only too realistic for a certain mindset that asks: Why is he describing to us things that we hear about elsewhere anyway? — If you look more closely, you will find that you cannot otherwise hear them in the way they are described here—namely, not in this kind of compilation, in this kind of examination of symptoms, in which the various characteristic details come together to form a vivid grasp of reality. The question that naturally arises is: How do such symptoms, as I have described them to you, come about in the first place? — I would like to address this briefly.

[ 5 ] Over time, I have shared a number of facts with you—some of which people might call trivial, such as the story of the son of the Herzegovinian voivode Woidarewitsch, or what I told you about the Russian-Slavic Charitable Committee, and so on. On the one hand, such things can easily be regarded as insignificant; on the other hand, however, one might ask: How do such things come together at all? How is it that a historical perspective is taking hold among us that attempts to synthesize widely disparate details into a comprehensive picture? — Put more simply, if someone were to ask me this question, it might sound like this: How is it that you happen to know precisely these things—which must be considered characteristic of current events—and have gathered them up in the course of your life? — To this I would like to give an answer that will vividly show you how spiritual science can intervene in life.

[ 6 ] One comes to know such things in the course of one’s life if karma so dictates, and if one allows karma to take its truly sincere, truthful course. Many a person believes that they are letting karma run its course, that they are, so to speak, surrendering to karma; but this can be a great delusion. No one can observe external events in such a way that the truth reveals itself to them unless they truly surrender to karma, unless they leave much in the subconscious and let much pass by their soul; for through all manner of sympathies and antipathies, one clouds one’s clear perception. Nothing is more likely to cloud clear perception than what is today called the historical method. It is precisely this historical method that gives rise to ghosts, because today’s historian cannot surrender to his karma. He would, of course, if he had surrendered to his karma from early youth onward, fail every exam—that is quite clear. He must not surrender to his karma and know what karma brings him, but rather he must know what the exam regulations and so on prescribe for him. Yet these prescribe nothing but things that, of course, tear a person’s karma to shreds, so that anyone who simply follows the current prescribed for him can never arrive at the real truth. One can only arrive at the true truth if one takes these things—which are spoken of in spiritual science—dead seriously, not merely as theory, but with the utmost seriousness. Of course, one does not take these things dead seriously if one allows one’s clear vision to be clouded by all sorts of sympathies and antipathies. One must approach them more or less objectively; then the current of the world will bring one what is necessary for understanding.

[ 7 ] Now, part of this surrendering to karma in relation to the events of our present time truly lies in the fact that you, my dear friends, have been led into the Anthroposophical Society by your karma. Therefore, it must be possible within the Anthroposophical Society to speak about facts without being hindered by sympathies and antipathies; otherwise, karma would not be taken seriously even within this Society.

[ 8 ] I wanted to preface the reflections we are about to undertake with this introduction because I wish to present certain important occult facts to you—facts that we cannot understand unless we know how to relate them to life, and especially unless we can cut through the dense tangle of untruths that are swirling through the world today. The world today is indeed full of untruths, and a sense of truthfulness must be cultivated within the Anthroposophical Society if it is to have a purpose—a true purpose in life—during its existence, no matter how long it may endure under the present circumstances.

[ 9 ] I have now “bothered” you with various remarks I have made recently—not merely, I would say, to make this or that appear in a particular light, but because I am deeply convinced that it is important to correct certain concepts. Anyone who believes that I am saying these things out of some kind of nationalistic sentiment simply does not understand me.

[ 10 ] Now, among the serious accusations that are repeatedly hurled from the periphery of today’s world against its center—and which, as I have often said, boil down to a phrase uttered in one form or another—one is too embarrassed to say it in its true form: “Never mind, the German will be burned”—it is also common for certain people, whose works one naturally does not know, to be cited in the widest circles as the corrupters and perverters of the German people. And one of those cited first and foremost is the German historian Heinrich Treitschke. Now, as I said, I do not wish to consider such a figure from a national standpoint at all, but rather from a general human perspective. I have mentioned to you that I did not have much contact with Treitschke, but met him only once; I hinted at the time that he had a somewhat boisterous manner. Today I simply want to say that I was able to form a picture of his nature and character from that encounter with Treitschke, for he naturally did not speak only of what I mentioned to you at the outset, but we also discussed historical perspectives and historical publications that were causing quite a stir at that time, in the 1890s, and we were able to discuss many fundamental questions regarding scholarly history and the like over the course of a few hours—banquets always last a few hours—and I was certainly able to get to know the man, so to speak, at the threshold of his life—he died shortly thereafter—aside from the fact that I am well acquainted with his work as a historian in every detail.

[ 11 ] First and foremost, I would like to point out that Treitschke was a man who invites us to consider him from a somewhat occult perspective. In the positive sense in which Socrates spoke of a kind of daemon, one could also say of Treitschke that something of a daemon lived within him—not an evil daemon, but something of a daemon. And one did not have the feeling with him that he was merely driven by the considerations of the materialistic intellect, but rather that he was driven from within, precisely by what Socrates calls demonic forces. Indeed, I would say that this is what guided him throughout his entire life. The Saxon is an enthusiastic champion of the emerging German state; for Treitschke had already exerted a very significant influence even before this German state had been founded. He did, however, write his German History only after the state had been established. He possessed—in the characteristic manner typical of Central Europe—something unknown to those around him—not merely unwanted, but unknown and not understood—he possessed, if I may put it this way, a sense of concreteness, of reality. A certain aversion to mere abstract theories and to all empty rhetoric lived within him, and with such demonic force that one could, I would say, see through his personality to the intellectual powers that spoke through it. Moreover, Treitschke had become completely deaf at a relatively early age, so that he heard neither the voice of another nor his own, and he actually communicated only with his own inner self. Such a fate in life forces a person to turn inward. The complete absence of hearing brings a person—if he has a predisposition for it—much more easily than is usually the case with the complete absence of a sense into contact with the active occult forces, which are in fact ignored only because the human being is distracted by his senses from what speaks to the soul beyond the senses. Such karma—becoming completely deaf at an early age—therefore has a certain significance and is connected to what I call, in this case, a demonic nature.

[ 12 ] Now, this nature, this human being, was truly—in contrast to many, indeed most, people of our time—as if shaped from a single, unified source. In his case, it was never mere intellect at work, but, fundamentally speaking, always the whole soul. We have enough of those trite truths in the world that can be “proven” at any time with so-called “logical proofs”; but truths to which human blood clings, truths imbued with warm human feeling—these deserve our attention, whether one adopts the same point of view or a different one. For the human being is, after all, the channel through which the sensory world is connected to the spiritual world, and one does not reach the spiritual world merely through the study of spiritual scientific theories, but through the cultivation of the senses, just as the individual human being serves as a channel between the sensory world and the spiritual world.

[ 13 ] Above all, Heinrich Treitschke was a figure who sought to form his knowledge and ideas on the basis of a broad understanding—an understanding that was always grounded in the judgment of the soul, not in rational judgment. His judgments were always imbued with this spiritual insight. They certainly had a certain boisterous quality, but they were imbued with this emotional discernment. And from this perspective, at the center of Treitschke’s reflections was, above all, the question of human freedom, which for him—as a historian who had prepared early on to become the historian of his people—was always linked to the question of political freedom, the freedom of the state.

[ 14 ] Now there is a work in German literature—you can easily obtain it, since it was published in Reclam’s Universal Library—that addresses in the most compelling manner the question of the relationship between the omnipotence of the state and human freedom; that is, freedom not only as it lives within the human soul, but freedom as it is realized in social life. I know of no other work in world literature that addresses this question in such a compelling manner. This work is titled Ideas for an Attempt to Determine the Limits of State Power and was written by Wilhelm von Humboldt, a friend of Schiller’s and the brother of the writer Alexander von Humboldt. In this treatise, written at the turn of the 18th to the 19th century, the human personality is beautifully defended in its full, humane, and free development against all state omnipotence. It points out that the state should not interfere in the realm of human existence any more than is necessary to remove obstacles to the free development of the personality through its intervention. The essay, after all, springs from the same source as Schiller’s beautiful letters “On the Aesthetic Education of Man.” And I would like to say that Wilhelm von Humboldt’s treatise on the limits of the state’s authority is a sister work to Schiller’s “On the Aesthetic Education of Man.” It dates from a time when people sought to bring together, from intellectual life, all the ideas that could truly place human beings on the ground of freedom. For certain reasons, this treatise was not widely read in the 19th century, yet it repeatedly served as a text of study for those who, throughout the 19th century, sought to gain insight into the outer dimensions of the concept of freedom. Of course, the 19th century was the era in which the concept of freedom was, in many respects, laid to rest; but people still sought to orient themselves with regard to the concept of freedom time and again, and it was precisely from this perspective that Wilhelm von Humboldt’s treatise Ideas for an Attempt to Determine the Limits of State Power acquired a certain international significance in Europe. Both the Frenchman Laboulaye and the Englishman John Stuart Mill took this treatise as their starting point; for both, Wilhelm von Humboldt’s work served as an important point of departure. And for their part, each in his own field, they sought to orient themselves through the concept of freedom. Laboulaye found that his country’s political system, with regard to the relationship between the state and the individual, was suited to burying any real freedom—that is, any real development of the personality—under the concept of the state; John Stuart Mill, building on Wilhelm von Humboldt after discovering his work, forcefully argued in his treatise on freedom how English society is capable of undermining the genuine experience of freedom. This question is precisely the subject of John Stuart Mill’s essay—for Laboulaye it is the state, for Mill it is society: How can one achieve the development of the individual in the face of the lack of freedom fostered by society?

[ 15 ] Treitschke, again in the spirit of critical reflection on the human soul that I just mentioned—and following in the footsteps of Laboulaye and John Stuart Mill—wrote his treatise on freedom in the early 1860s. And this work by Treitschke on freedom is of extraordinary interest precisely because, as a historian and a politician, Treitschke lives fully within the conflict into which the human soul is drawn when, on the one hand, it recognizes the necessity of that social construct called the state, and on the other hand, it is enthusiastic about what is called human freedom. Thus, with regard to the concept of freedom in the 1860s, Treitschke in particular sought to engage with Laboulaye and John Stuart Mill. In his essay “Freedom,” he sought to develop a conception of the state that does not negate the necessary elements inherent in the state structure, yet at the same time ensures that the state becomes not the gravedigger but the promoter and guardian of freedom. Such a concept of the state was what Treitschke had in mind. It was, after all, a time when, in response to the question, “What is your immediate homeland?”—one might hear a German reply: “Schwarzburg-Sondershausen”—or “Reuss-Schleiz, younger line.” — In the early 1860s, what is today called the German Empire did not yet exist. At that time, when a large number of people were thinking of some kind of union of the various individual entities inhabited by Germans, Treitschke, too, was thinking of the necessity of a state structure. But for him it was, I might say, an axiom that no state should come into being that did not grant the human personality the freest possible development. And even if one cannot say that Treitschke arrived at fully developed philosophical concepts, much that is well worth heeding was said precisely with regard to this point of view in Treitschke’s treatise on freedom.

[ 16 ] If one wishes to honor Treitschke and focus specifically on what is important to the occultist, one must not overlook the fact that Treitschke was a fearless individual who would serve no other god than that of truth. It is the height of folly to hear some quarters today passing judgment on Treitschke using terms that have nothing to do with objectivity; for the judgments circulating throughout the world are, for the most part, not even capable of gaining even the remotest vantage point, for the simple reason that they lack what I recently alluded to when I said that if one were to engage a little with the differentiation of national spirits arising from spiritual science, one would not spout so much nonsense. I was referring there to the various follies that were put forward partly by him himself and partly regarding Romain Rolland. I had to say this because a thorough examination of what one might call the national spirit is truly possible today only through spiritual science. Anyone who is unwilling to engage with this can then only arrive at such entirely subjective—and therefore foolish—judgments as those of Romain Rolland.

[ 17 ] If one is now willing to engage with what follows from a spiritual-scientific examination of national spirits, then one must, above all, be clear that in a person who is typical of his people—and this is precisely what Treitschke was, in that he possessed a demonic nature—certain typical national characteristics also come to the fore. This is also the case with Treitschke, and one can truly say: If one understands Treitschke, one understands much of German identity in the second half of the 19th century—not everything, but a great deal. Once one has the opportunity to gain a perspective from the realm of occultism, one must—not in the case of cosmopolitan but of national natures—address the fundamental difference that exists between Western European and Central European judgments. Mind you, such things cannot be taken into account when considering what is universally human, but they do come into play when the demonic-folk element lives within people’s minds. It is only with this qualification that I say what I now have to say. If one views this national character in the way it permeates people, then what an American means when he says—perhaps it is better if I do not use my own words now, but those of an American, because my words might be taken amiss—already applies: The French judgment, insofar as it is folk-based—that is, not the judgment of the individual Frenchman, who may well be cosmopolitan, but the judgment that arises from the folk substance, from the people—lives in the word; the English judgment lives in the political-practical concept; the German judgment lives in the non-national, in the non-national quest for knowledge. — So says an American who has traveled through Europe. But this implies that certain judgments made in the West take on a different character within the German national fabric than they do in the West. In the West, they have an abstract character. The German, as a German, is inclined to translate these judgments into their concrete forms and thereby to call many things by their true names—things that in the West are actually never referred to by their true names. Let us take a concept that is now at the heart of our considerations: the concept of the state.

[ 18 ] In his lectures on “Politics”—which have also been published—Treitschke spoke about the state. Of course, many people speak about the state; but let us now consider discourse on the state only insofar as it takes place within the national body of the people. In the West, people tend to speak of the state by taking the word and then attaching all sorts of concepts to it that, for whatever reason, they wish to associate with the concept of the state. Thus, they attach to the state as such the concepts of freedom, justice, and all manner of other things, and may even, in a peculiar way, rise to the following phrase: “The state must be stripped of all notions of power; the state must be a state governed by law.”—One can say this as long as one is not compelled to truly confront the concept of the state. But when one approaches the concept of the state as Treitschke does, one arrives at the mystery of the state. One does not then demand that the state adopt the principle that “power takes precedence over law”—a claim slanderously attributed to Treitschke—but rather one comes to realize that the concept of the state is simply inconceivable without the concept of power. One simply acknowledges the truth, because there is no way to establish a state other than by grounding it in power. And if one does not admit this, then one is simply not upholding the truth. Thus, Treitschke was compelled to speak of the state in connection with power. This is “twisted”—one might even say—in such a way that it is claimed Treitschke asserted that, according to the German conception of the state, power takes precedence over law. But there is no question that this ever crossed Treitschke’s mind; rather, the spirit of Humboldt’s debates was still far too deeply ingrained in his soul: “Ideas for an Attempt to Determine the Limits of the State’s Effectiveness.” Precisely because the state must necessarily exercise power, it must not become omnipotent. One cannot speak of a “constitutional state,” because that amounts to—well, not exactly wooden iron, but at least copper iron. The two concepts are, as one says in logic, disparate; they have nothing to do with one another. But only those who take things seriously come to realize this.

[ 19 ] And it was from this perspective that Nietzsche arrived at his concept of the “will to power.” It is, once again, nothing short of a baseless slander to accuse Nietzsche of having advocated the “principle of power.” He advocated nothing other than this: one should examine to what extent power truly thrives on human impulses. — It is indeed characteristic that Nietzsche puts forward the following from this perspective. He says: There are people who, based on certain principles of asceticism, advocate the thesis that power must be fought. Why do they do this? Because, given their particular nature, they attain a special kind of power precisely by fighting power! This is merely their particular will to power—to emphasize powerlessness in a special way! For it is precisely this—emphasizing powerlessness in an ascetic manner—that gives them a special kind of power, in their own way. — What lay at the heart of Nietzsche’s thought, and what also haunts Treitschke’s reflections, is this: not to confuse one thing with another, but to speak the truth, not to spin empty phrases.

[ 20 ] This shows you, however, that neither Treitschke nor Nietzsche was concerned with introducing any principle—as a principle of power—into social life, but simply with demonstrating how, wherever there is a state, power exists, and how, if one is to speak the truth, one has no choice but to state this. That, I would say, is the spirit in which Treitschke worked: to realize that it is absurd to delude oneself with mere abstract, empty concepts and to trumpet them to the world. He wanted to engage directly with reality; that is precisely what makes his writings so compelling. From this perspective, he also viewed the concept of freedom in such a way that he said: The question of whether the state exists to promote freedom or not to promote freedom is not a question at all. — So he set out to seek things where they exist in reality. I do not wish to defend this, but merely to characterize it today; and one truly cannot reduce the fearless man—who wanted to speak the truth as it presented itself to him in accordance with his sense of truthfulness—to the level of an agitator. Yet such reduction to the level of an agitator is practiced everywhere today. Treitschke is a fearless spirit who truly sets out to speak his mind without mincing words in any situation or context. And it would be wiser—I must say this again—to point out how Treitschke has, in a sense, become a kind of educator to those who were willing to listen to him. There were, after all, not as many of them as people would have us believe today. For when Treitschke speaks of freedom, he does so far less as a critic of other nations than as an educator of his own people. I would like to share with you a passage from his work Die Freiheit (Freedom), which deserves to be known just as much as certain statements taken out of context—statements that cannot be understood at all if they are removed from their context. After first discussing the social factors that promote freedom, Treitschke writes:

“It is still very much the time to speak of class prejudices in particular,” that is, in the early 1960s. “A disheartening thought, indeed, that this great civilized people”—he means the Germans—“still recognizes the barbaric legal concept of a ‘mis-marriage,’ which the ancients cast aside at the very beginning of their cultural life. As for that crude Junker class, of course—to whom a career in the stables seems more respectable than an academic profession, and the law of the jungle more noble than the legal sense of a free citizen—we are not speaking of them: this caricature of the nobility has had its day. But even the motley mass of the so-called educated, wealthy classes harbors and nurtures a wealth of unfree, intolerant notions of social class. What a heartless harshness of judgment against the shamefully so-called “dangerous classes”! What a heartless dismissal of the “luxury of the lower classes,” when a free and distinguished man ought to rejoice that even the poor are beginning to take some pride in themselves and in the decorum of their appearance! What a petty fear at every stirrings of defiance and self-respect among the lower classes! German kindness of heart has indeed spared us from these attitudes of the educated taking on such a crude form here as they do among the more brusque British; but as long as aristocratic inclinations—from which no refined mind has ever been entirely free—manifest themselves in this way, the state of our inner freedom is indeed lamentable.

We are entering a realm where oppression and intolerance run rampant when we inquire into the concepts of social class among the most powerful and closed of the “estates”—or whatever else we may call this natural aristocracy—of the male sex. Among us, the lords of the earth, there exists an incredibly widespread, silent conspiracy to systematically deny women a part of a harmoniously human education. For women acquire a part of their education only through us. Among ourselves, however, it goes without saying that religious enlightenment is a duty for the educated man, but ruin for the rabble and women; and how many find a woman particularly “poetic” when she displays the crudest superstitions. As for “politicizing women,” they are an abomination—we shall say no more on that subject. Is this our manly faith in the divine nature of freedom? Is religious enlightenment really just a matter of sober reason and not, far more, a need of the heart? And yet we believe that women’s warmth of heart will suffer if we allow them, in their own way, to take delight in the great intellectual work of the last hundred years. Do we really know German women so little that we think they would ever “get involved in politics,” ever rack their brains over property taxes and trade agreements? And yet the political misery of this people has a purely human side that women can perhaps understand more deeply, more subtly, and more intimately than we can. Should not a meager fraction of this abundance of enthusiasm and love—before which we so often stand cold, destitute, and heartless—be directed toward the fatherland? Must the shame of the French era be repeated before our women, like all their neighbors in the East and West for so long now, can once again feel themselves to be the daughters of a great nation? But we, in our unfree narrow-mindedness, have for far too long remained silent before them about what moved us most deeply; we considered them just good enough to tell them the most trivial of trivialities; and because we thought too small to grant them the freedom of education, today only a minority of German women are capable of understanding the grave seriousness of this momentous time.”

[ 21 ] You see, one can also attribute to Treitschke ideas that are quite generally human in nature, but which he demands as a national spirit for his nation. If one of the nations that today criticize Treitschke could claim for itself a spirit such as the one he embodied for the Germans, then one would see how he would be elevated to the heavens. Just imagine an Italian Treitschke, and what the Italians would say if the Germans were to treat an Italian Treitschke the way the Italians and many others have treated Treitschke. But what characterizes our age—and this is, after all, the infinitely sad thing—is ignorance and the exploitation of that ignorance. It would be utterly impossible for such falsehoods to be circulating throughout the world today if one could not always count on people’s ignorance. By ignorance, of course, I do not mean the kind that necessarily arises from the fact that not everyone has time to inform themselves about everything; but what is necessary is a little self-awareness. After all, one cannot judge certain circumstances without knowing certain things, and judgments about entire peoples that are born of ignorance have the most disastrous consequences. And today, an infinite number of things are born of ignorance. This is, of course, due to that black magic—which I have already characterized on other occasions—that is called journalism today; for it is a kind of black magic, and it was not without reason that, when the art of printing emerged with all the possibilities it opened up, popular legend regarded its creators as black magicians.

[ 22 ] Of course, you might say: Now, on top of all the follies and intricacies of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, there is also this—that the art of printing is described as black magic. But I am only saying “a kind of.” I have often emphasized that it is wrong to always say: “Ahriman—oh, he must not come near me; away with him! Lucifer—oh, he must not come near me! I want to associate only with the good gods.” — Then you simply cannot engage with the world, for the world is, after all, in a balance between Ahriman and Lucifer. One cannot engage with the world if one wishes to hold this attitude, which is so frequently evident, especially in our circles. One must cultivate truthfulness even in the smallest things. That must be the practical result of our spiritual scientific endeavors—the practical result. You can already sense this: If one does not develop this impulse toward truthfulness within oneself, then one will always be exposed to the danger of being infected and influenced by the untruthfulness that prevails in the world. That is why I said the other day: Things will unfold in such a way that in the future, everything that existed as a striving for peace will be forgotten, and on the periphery, people will remember only what amounted to a shouting down of peace; but this will not be perceived as a shouting down, but as something entirely justified. Everything else will be forgotten. — That is indeed how it will turn out. And at the very least, these reflections should help create an opportunity to perceive things as they truly are. For today, one of the foremost requirements for anyone who is sincere about human well-being and human progress is not to allow oneself to be duped by falsehood.

[ 23 ] Let us consider a recent development—I would say, quite sine ira, though not sine studio; without sympathy or antipathy, but based on the facts. You have all certainly read what has become known as the Entente’s note to President Wilson. Well, from a certain point of view, compared to all that has come before, perhaps this very note can be regarded as a favorable sign for the future. For when things are taken too far, the bow is overstretched, and then there is indeed some hope—the hope that, where spiritual forces are challenged, a counterforce from the spiritual realm may also arise. It was precisely this note that surpassed everything that had come before.

[ 24 ] Let us now consider the facts. This would be roughly what Austria-Hungary looks like today (it is drawn). Here, for example, would be the Danube; here, for example, would be Vienna. Now let’s assume that the demands of the Entente’s note were to be fulfilled. The note states that the Italians—meaning the Italian-speaking Austrians—want to be liberated. The greatest flaw in this Entente note is the inherent inconsistency that stems from complete ignorance. That is why it is difficult to draw the diagram I am about to sketch. As you will see in a moment, this will therefore present some difficulties. But let us assume that the Italian Austrians were to be liberated. Well, the South Slavs are also to be liberated. That is, of course, difficult, because the liberation of the South Slavs would result in something like this; for they live everywhere.

[ 25 ] Now, strangely enough, they’re talking about the “liberation of the Czechoslovaks.” We know the Czechs, we know the Slovaks—but of course, only the Entente knows “Czechoslovaks.” So perhaps they mean the Czechs and the Slovaks. According to the terminology used among the Czechs themselves, this “liberation” would then mean the following. Then there is the “liberation of the Romanians.” That would mean this. Then, as it says there, “...according to the will of His Majesty the Tsar,” the Poles living in Galicia would still have to be liberated, but that is to be carried out by Austria itself. That would then be Hungary, that would be Austria.

[ 26 ] This map is the result of taking at face value what is said about Austria in the Entente’s note. And it also states that they do not intend to harm the peoples of Central Europe!

[ 27 ] The entire note shows that, for example, there is absolutely no awareness of the difficulties involved in reconciling the majority of the Slavic population in these areas with the vanishing minority in those areas. This entire note reveals the most arrogant, unscrupulous ignorance of the circumstances! And this is how historical notes are written today. And then they say that they’re actually aiming at—well, I don’t even know what—because it’s almost repulsive to repeat the platitudes that are being spouted there.

[ 28 ] But what could better prove that Austria was compelled to defend itself than this note from the Entente? What could provide better proof? In short, this note can only be viewed as pathological. It is a challenge to truth and reality itself. That is simply going too far. There is hope, however, that since it is a challenge to the spiritual world, the spiritual world itself must necessarily set the matter right—even if people from that spiritual world must, of course, serve as the instruments.

[ 29 ] It is high time that an illustration such as the one I have roughly sketched here were disseminated throughout the world to counter this most absolute ignorance and lack of understanding of Central Europe in the context of world history. It goes without saying that where violence prevails, rational arguments cannot have much effect. But the first step must be to recognize that when people speak of justice and freedom, they mean violence—they mean violence, pure and simple. Things must be called by their proper names. And this is precisely what ails our time: that people are unwilling to call things by their proper names. Many people fail to grasp many things. When one encounters something like this utterly foolish classification of the Austrian peoples, it becomes quite clear that the note comes from people who know nothing at all about what is happening in Central Europe, yet who have the arrogance to pass judgment on matters they do not understand and who want nothing more than to extend their tyranny over these territories; who are completely indifferent to the actual state of affairs. But one does wonder: How can such things come about at all? For example, there are some versions that speak of the “liberation of the Slavs, the Czechs, and the Slovaks”; the local newspapers, however—which probably translate more accurately than others—use the term “Czechoslovaks.” Isn’t it true that when someone says something accurate, one isn’t curious about where they got their information; but when someone spouts utter nonsense—such as the classification of peoples in the Entente note—then one looks to find out where that nonsense comes from. And it is not uninteresting to point out a certain parallelism—of course, without basing a hypothesis on it, without drawing any conclusions from it. I naturally asked myself: Where do these nonsensical terms come from? — Well, I’ll emphasize it once more: No hypothesis, no conclusion, none of that—just a mere suggestion.

[ 30 ] In recent days—and again, I am not passing judgment on the facts, but merely recounting them—the verdict handed down in Austria against the Czech leader Kramarz, who for a long time was one of the most influential figures in Austria, was made public. He was sentenced to death and then pardoned to fifteen years of hard labor. The verdict also mentions that certain articles that appeared in The Times—in English, of course—were found in Kramarz’s possession in his own language. Dr. Kramarz’s friend is Masaryk, the university professor who fled Austria and now lives in London and Paris. On the occasion of the verdict, let us take certain sentences from Kramarz’s program—on the basis of which he was convicted—and dwell on them. If one understands nothing at all about the situation in Austria, reads these sentences in The Times or elsewhere—they also appeared in Paris in the Revue tchäque—and twists their meaning—Kramarz, of course, speaks in proper terms—one curiously ends up with the very sentences from the Entente note regarding the Austrian nationalities. And if the term “Czechoslovaks” really is in there, it would paint the strange picture that Kramarz is inclined to found a state comprising the Czechs and Slovaks, which makes sense; but anyone in Western Europe who knows nothing about these circumstances will interpret it as “Czecho-Slovaks.”

[ 31 ] Yes, in this day and age, when so many underground channels are at play, it is indeed necessary to clarify certain questions regarding these connections. I do not wish to draw any hypotheses or conclusions from what I have said; but the fact remains that there is a curious coincidence between a verdict that has been handed down and the Entente note. Of course, depending on whether one takes one position or the other, one can hold the most diverse opinions about such a verdict; one might consider someone a martyr or a criminal, depending on the perspective. I do not wish to pass judgment on this matter; but what matters is being able to observe this remarkable coincidence. As I said, this occurred to me only when I was trying to determine where, apart from everything else, the profound ignorance underlying this note actually stems from.

[ 32 ] One must indeed speak of this staggering ignorance; for it is significant—and one of the defining characteristics of our time—that the side which dominates half the inhabitable world should pass judgment based on such a distorted view of reality. This is a challenge to the very spirit of truth.

[ 33 ] [The following sentences of this lecture refer to a quotation that the stenographer unfortunately did not record, and are therefore incomprehensible. It concerns a “document” dated July 25, 1914, which refers to Rasputin. The editor.)

[ 34 ] After all, whenever one has the power to do so—and one does have that power on the periphery—one will always be able to brazenly confront the facts. But you cannot defy the truth. And the truth speaks—and will hopefully also serve as an impetus that, when things are at their worst, can lead humanity toward some measure of salvation.

[ 35 ] We’ll continue our discussion tomorrow. Well, I don’t know—since some of our friends have expressed a desire to spend more time tomorrow looking at Reinhardt’s “non-art,” they’ve suggested that we end our meeting here a little earlier. I certainly have no objection. So when should we start, then? Perhaps someone could make a suggestion. When should we meet, then? It’s certainly a good idea to do this for the sake of those who are interested in these excesses and wish to educate themselves personally, from a cultural-historical perspective, about the decline of the art of acting.