The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Eleventh Lecture

[ 1 ] Yesterday I last attempted to discuss the development of memory. It is precisely in light of this development of memory that one can observe that people today, in their principles regarding education and instruction, pay very little attention to what a genuine understanding of human nature reveals—namely, the continuation and transformation of certain impulses into later human life. In fact, it is often the case today that adults try to understand the nature of their own organism and their inner life, and based on what seems comfortable and right to them as adults, they then quite unconsciously assume—I am not claiming that this happens with full awareness—that the same approach must be applied to childhood as well.

[ 2 ] But it is precisely this that leads to difficulties in dealing with the child. Just consider the following: the child must be treated in a way that is in keeping with its inner developmental forces; during childhood, it requires certain things—for example, precisely what I have described in the broadest sense as a sense of authority; by its very nature, the child requires what must be considered directly and in the context of its specific growth. Suppose, for example, that someone, upon reaching the age of forty, experiences something welling up from within their soul. Through external experiences, light suddenly shines upon what is welling up from their soul. And what is welling up from his soul—he may have absorbed it through the authority of a beloved teacher or educator when he was eight or nine years old. At that time, he could only accept it as a memory, for the inner understanding of such a matter may not be present until the age of forty—even though people today do not believe this. But one cannot wait until the age of forty to acquire such things; which is why one develops a longing for authority at the right age. But when the time comes—when what one absorbed on authority at the age of eight, in relation to experiences of the outer world, surges forth at the age of forty and thereby takes on a new light—then this process, linked to a sense of inner vitality, has a refreshing effect on the whole person. An inner strength develops through such a process, one that is sorely needed in later life. And if one has a great deal of this kind of experience—what one has absorbed out of a sense of authority, and what can then emerge from within the organism in this way through the circumstances of later life—then one possesses many sources of vitality within oneself throughout the rest of one’s life. Some people age mentally and physically so early today precisely because they lack this source of refreshment, since it has been far too long since attention was paid—in a reasonable, I mean in a reasonable way—to the development of that which, at school age, can only be entrusted to memory, since it must be absorbed in good faith and through a sense of authority.

[ 3 ] As I said yesterday, there are indeed still many opportunities to cultivate comprehension skills in addition to what is committed to memory. However, during childhood—between the loss of baby teeth and puberty—it is absolutely essential to adopt a rational method for developing memory as well; otherwise, one will be at a significant disadvantage later in life if this development of memory has not taken place.

[ 4 ] If I were speaking from the perspective of simply trying to please people with my words, I would have to say some things differently. But I simply want to state the things that arise from an understanding of human nature gained through decades of anthroposophical research, and that is why some things may sound paradoxical in light of very widespread contemporary views. Some things may give the impression of being outdated, others of being too new. None of that is at issue here; the only question is whether these ideas stand up to genuine knowledge of the human being or not. When one looks at the present, one must say, with regard to this contemporary understanding of the human being, that it has actually been acquired as if one were trying to understand a watch by looking at it only from the outside. One can, of course, learn to tell the time by this watch; one can also learn to recognize whether it is made of gold or silver, but one cannot become a watchmaker by doing so. Now, even what we today call biology, physiology, and anatomy is, after all, merely an external view of the human being. A true understanding of human nature arises only when the human being is understood in terms of body, soul, and spirit. But only such an understanding of body, soul, and spirit makes it possible to treat human beings in an appropriate manner. And so it is only through a true understanding of the human being that a correct judgment can be made regarding a question that can only be properly illuminated in its proper context: the question of student fatigue.

[ 5 ] Today, the question is framed in such a way that experiments are conducted to determine what causes a child to become fatigued—and the goal is then to structure instruction based on these findings, attempting to overcome whatever might cause the student to become overly fatigued. But this question is actually being posed incorrectly throughout the world today. One cannot ask the question this way at all if one has a true understanding of human nature. For just consider what we have emphasized in recent days: for school-age children, all instruction and education should be oriented toward the rhythmic and the musical, so that they primarily engage the respiratory and circulatory systems.

[ 6 ] Now I ask you: Does the source of fatigue lie in the respiratory and circulatory systems—that is, in the average person, who is the primary focus for school-age children? No, you breathe throughout the entire night; you breathe from birth to death; your circulation continues from birth to death. This is never interrupted by fatigue, for it would be terrible if it were interrupted by fatigue. Thus, in the true art of education, one appeals precisely to those organs that are not subject to fatigue at all, and in this way, the question of fatigue is placed on an entirely different foundation through a methodology based on an understanding of human nature.

[ 7 ] Where, exactly, do the sources of fatigue in humans lie? They lie in the head system and the limb system. One must examine these if one wishes to understand the nature of fatigue. And fatigue takes on very different forms, depending on the head system and the limb system.

[ 8 ] That which acts from the head system into the entire organism affects it in such a way that it promotes the deposition of metabolic waste products and seeks to permeate the human being with all kinds of salt-like deposits. This is something that interferes with the respiratory and circulatory systems, but which is therefore subject to fatigue because it is connected to the outside world, because it is dependent on the outside world in a non-rhythmic, non-musical way; whereas the rhythms of respiration and circulation are so firmly bound to the organism that they maintain a balance within their own laws. That which is a self-contained system cannot become fatigued, at least not to any significant degree. One can cause illness through improper measures that disrupt the rhythm in a child or even an adult. But one must be fully aware that the system which is of primary consideration for an art of education in keeping with human nature does not tire at all.

[ 9 ] The limb-metabolic system becomes fatigued. You can observe this when you look at a snake after it has eaten. The limb-metabolic system becomes fatigued; it contains, at the very least, the source of fatigue for the entire human being. It becomes fatigued in a different way than the head system. The head system causes the deposition of salts and mineral deposits in the organism. The limb-metabolic system acts on the human being in such a way that it actually seeks to continuously dissolve him through heat. It acts in the opposite direction, but again in such a way that the manner of its action does not depend on the inner rhythm, but rather on what I do in the external world with my limbs and what I do with my internal metabolic system by eating and drinking. I often do this irregularly, after all, because very few people adhere to a complete rhythm when it comes to eating and drinking. I would say that this polar opposition has a wearisome effect on the human being.

[ 10 ] So what follows from this? That the entire issue of fatigue must be approached from a different angle; that we must ask: If the child gets tired too soon, what exactly was done wrong? — One should not simply assume a priori that the instruction is correct. And now one notes: after half an hour, the child makes so many more mistakes in a single line than before that half hour; or one notes: after half an hour, the child remembers fewer words that were thrown out aimlessly than before that half hour. In this way, one can never come close to understanding what true human nature is; rather, it can be understood only by learning to ask the right questions about life. The right question regarding fatigue is this: If fatigue sets in too early, one has either overloaded the mental system or the motor system; one must now, of course, begin by not overloading it. But one must not believe that this can be achieved merely by distributing the curriculum, for physical education cannot really affect the mind, and likewise, arithmetic does not directly affect metabolism, though it does so indirectly. It is therefore not a matter of achieving this through a distribution based on the class schedule, but rather through an artistic structuring of the entire system of instruction and education during the compulsory schooling years, so that one in fact builds upon the non-fatiguing system—in the manner I have indicated— and thereby also properly engages the other systems—the mental system and the system of metabolism and the limbs.

[ 11 ] So you see, the kinds of questions that are very often asked—precisely out of contemporary prejudice—about any particular educational method cannot actually be asked of Waldorf education, because it is based on a genuine understanding of the human being in its entirety. And because it also seeks to shed light on the spiritual and soul aspects of the human being, it can truly explore therapeutic methods that address the whole person.

[ 12 ] For example, it is a matter of recognizing that the human head system essentially contains within itself that which—most strongly in childhood and then to a lesser and lesser extent—permeates and infuses the entire human organism with plasticizing and formative forces. That which acts within as the guiding thoughts is, in fact, what the human being has brought into the world along with his or her predispositions through birth or conception. This has developed to the point where it is organized to shape the human being. If the head did not come into contact with the external world, and if this did not disrupt the rhythm within the human being, then—if I may put it this way—that which arrived in the head at birth would be content with the human being’s material organization. The human being would flow into his physical organization. It would fully absorb him; he would be completely absorbed in it, and he would not find a connection to the supersensible-spiritual world. His inner life would become more and more artificial, but he would be cut off from the spiritual world. And conversely, if human beings were not connected to the external world through their limb-metabolic system, they would not achieve the warming, the glowing through of that which, originating from the head system, would become ever more perfect and ever more artificial.

[ 13 ] These are two polar opposites. The head actually keeps us constantly cut off from the spiritual world because it shapes our body in such a way that we cannot establish a proper relationship with the spiritual world from within this body; for the head, with its contents, completed its development in prenatal existence, and that which the head materializes in us is constantly dematerialized by that which lies in the forces of the metabolic-limb human. This brings about a balance within our material system. And in between lies that which is like a self-contained system: the rhythmic system, the respiratory system, the circulatory system—like a self-contained world, like a true microcosm—but one that requires that the head not act to an extreme degree, as can happen under certain conditions, when the lungs become permeated with all manner of incorrect organizational principles. We then sense this in the hardening of the lungs and in the pathological growths in the lungs of people with lung disease.

[ 14 ] And yet, on the other hand, human beings need this polar opposition, which arises from their metabolic-limb organism and which actually dissolves whatever tends to harden from the head. This is also important in medicine; for when one recognizes the connection between what comes from the head and what comes from the metabolism, one can, for example, cure many symptoms that occur in the larynx, the trachea, or even the lungs—even though they originate in the head—by treating the metabolic system. People are then surprised when, especially in the case of childhood illnesses, something manifests in the upper organs, and the entire condition is cured by altering the metabolism, leading to a true healing. The human being is, after all, a whole and must be treated as a whole. This applies in all areas, both in the field of truly rational therapy and in the field of education and teaching.

[ 15 ] I ask you to note that, despite the great progress we have made in the course of the last few centuries in the pursuit of knowledge—particularly in our understanding of human nature—we have not been able to achieve anything significant, because the methods of modern inquiry are, in essence, limited to the physical and the external. Now, in order to practice the art of education—especially for the childhood years following the important turning point in life between the ages of nine and ten, and for the period between the age of ten and sexual maturity—it is particularly important to truly look deeply into the human being and see what the physical, psychological, and spiritual conditions of development are.

[ 16 ] If we observe the child with a genuine understanding of human nature, it becomes apparent that from the period between the ages of nine and ten—extending toward the age of ten—the child processes everything it takes in psychologically in such a way that the muscular system, with its growth forces, plays a primary role throughout. During this period, nothing else is happening in the child except that the muscular system is working in conjunction with the soul—specifically, through its more intimate growth forces. The inner swelling and lengthening of the muscles depend essentially on how the soul forces develop. And what is distinctive about childhood between the ages of ten and twelve is that the muscles have an intimate relationship with the respiratory and circulatory systems; they tend to lean toward the respiratory and circulatory systems. And this is precisely what we appeal to in a truly artful education. So we intervene in the muscular system indirectly, through the respiratory and circulatory systems.

[ 17 ] Around the age of twelve, something quite different begins to occur in the child. The muscles turn away from their close relationship with the respiratory and circulatory systems and turn toward the bony system—the skeleton—developing in such a way that, from that point on, they adapt to the skeleton. Whereas previously their growth principles were adapted to respiration and blood circulation, they now adapt to the dynamics of the skeleton. Their growth forces participate in everything we do when walking, grasping, jumping—in short, in the entire limb system and the skeletal system. The muscle shifts from its close connection to the respiratory and circulatory systems to a close connection with the skeletal and bone systems. As a result, the entire human being adapts to the external world in a very powerful way—even more so from the age of twelve onward than was previously the case. Previously, the muscular system was, after all, directed inward. He allowed his muscles to grow as the self-contained rhythmic system within him is capable of doing. He moved by engaging the muscular system, and he merely carried the shape of his bones along with him. Now, around the age of twelve, things become quite different; now, through his muscular growth, he integrates himself into the mechanics and dynamics of the skeletal system.

[ 18 ] Anyone who truly understands what is happening to the child between the eleventh and twelfth years—how the child uses its muscular system and carries its bones up to this point, and how it then begins to project itself into the skeletal system, that is, into the external world—has gained a deep insight into the entire development of human nature.

[ 19 ] Such things lead us away from the abstract, intellectualistic approach we employ today—and which we also unconsciously carry over into education. They lead us, as educators, to relate to the child on a human level. When one approaches a child with such feelings, one certainly does not subject the child to the same treatment that was meted out to Marsyas, for example. People might, of course, recoil from such a transparent understanding of human nature, because they believe it involves dissecting the person, cutting into their soul. But that is not the case. This perspective is both artistic and an act of insight. Everything becomes artistic in this perspective, and that is what is necessary if one wishes to properly grasp this particular stage of life up to sexual maturity—this transition from the intimacy of the muscles and the respiratory-circulatory system up to the age of twelve, and the intimacy of muscles and bones from the age of twelve until sexual maturity.

[ 20 ] Notice how human beings actually adapt to the world: In very young children, the plastic, formative forces are located in the brain; they radiate out from there. Then the process shifts to the muscles. And when a person reaches the age of twelve, they place their entire being into the skeleton, and then it goes out into the world—only then does it go out. A person passes through themselves and then enters into a relationship with the whole world. First come the forces of the head; these forces of the head are later poured into the muscles, then into the bones; the person settles into the bones, and when they have reached sexual maturity, they settle into the whole world. Only then do they truly stand within the world.

[ 21 ] This point must be taken into account if one wishes to determine the proper distribution of instructional and educational content specifically for this age group. But today, we are truly not blessed with a thorough understanding of human nature. And now please forgive me if I must present you with a serious paradox. I am often compelled to do so because I must profess what is anthroposophical truth. It is a grave heresy and an abomination to today’s physiology, biology, and anatomy, but that is simply the way it is.

[ 22 ] You see, today—I would say—everything that people think about human beings has become centered on the head, and even though the head itself constantly pushes us into the material world—in fact, wants to kill us every day—all human observation today is, at its core, focused on the head. That is what is unhealthy about today’s view of humanity. This view actually stems from science, for people think: the brain is in the head, and everything is directed from the brain. Now, I don’t know how one would have developed this theory in an age when there were no telegraphs yet—when one could not draw an analogy from telegraph lines. But that need not concern us further. The theory of the nervous system was, after all, developed once telegraph lines were available as a point of reference for forming an analogy. And so the brain is viewed as a kind of central station—let’s say, London. (A diagram is drawn.) Then, if that is the center, perhaps Oxford is there, and Dover is there. And now, by considering London as the center, one says to oneself: there is a line from Oxford to London; the signal is switched there, and then it continues on to Dover. One can have a mental image of it under certain circumstances.

[ 23 ] Well, that’s the mental image we have of the brain. The nerve travels to the sensory organ; the sensation occurs and is transmitted to the brain—which serves as the central station, the “London” of the human body. Then the motor nerve travels from the brain to the organs of movement and, in accordance with the thoughts that are somehow situated in between, brings about the will and the movement.

[ 24 ] Once you have concocted such a theory, you can even interpret the facts in a way that seems to confirm it. After all, you can pick up any physiology textbook today, and unless you’re very prejudiced—since everything looks quite plausible—you’ll simply see how the experiments involving nerve transection are conducted, how conclusions are drawn from the reactions, and so on, and everything fits together perfectly. It just doesn’t hold up in the face of a profound understanding of human nature. Ultimately, that’s not how it is.

[ 25 ] I will completely set aside the fact that, after all, sensory and motor nerves are anatomically almost indistinguishable; the former are, at most, slightly thicker than the latter; but in terms of structure, there really is no essential difference. What anthroposophical research teaches in this regard—I can only hint at it, only share findings; otherwise I would have to give a lecture on anthroposophical physiology—is this: that the nerves are entirely unified organs, and that it is absurd to speak of two kinds of nerves, sensory and motor nerves. Since the aspects of will and sensation are permeating the entire soul, I leave it up to each person to call them motor or sensory, but they must be regarded as a unified whole, for they are absolutely unified—there is no difference. The difference lies solely in the direction of the function. When the sensory nerve extends toward the eye, it opens itself to the impressions of light, and in turn, what lies at the periphery of the human being acts upon another nerve, which modern physiology refers to as a motor nerve. When this nerve extends from the brain to the rest of the organism, its purpose is to perceive what occurs during movement. Proper treatment of tabes also provides clear confirmation of this finding.

[ 26 ] The nerve, then, known as the motor nerve, serves to perceive the movement impulses—that is, what is happening during movement—not to initiate the movement itself. Nerves are, everywhere, the mediating organs for perceptions: the sensory nerves for perceptions directed outward, and the so-called motor nerves—which are also sensory nerves—for perceptions directed inward. There is only one nerve. And only a materialistic scientific mindset has invented this “telegraph” analogy.

[ 27 ] This materialistic scientific outlook believes, in fact, that just as sensation, feeling, and perception require the mediation of the nerves, so too do impulses of the will require the mediation of the nerves. But that is not the case. The impulse of the will originates in the spiritual-psychic realm. That is where it begins, and it acts in the body—directly, not via the detour of the nerve—directly on the metabolic system of the limbs. And the nerve, which enters the metabolic system of the limbs, merely mediates the perception of what the spiritual-psychic realm does in the whole human being with regard to the metabolic system of the limbs. We perceive what is a consequence of spiritual-soul processes of will in the blood circulation, in the rest of the metabolism, and also in the mechanical movement of the limbs; we perceive that. The so-called motor nerves are not motor nerves; they are merely what perceives the expressions, the impulses of the will. Until this connection is understood, we will not arrive at a clear understanding of the human being. But once you fully grasp this connection, you will also find it understandable that I must now present you with a paradox, a heresy: for then the spiritual-soul aspect does indeed affect the rest of the human being as a whole.

[ 28 ] In children, then, up to about the age of twelve, the effects manifest themselves—in accordance with what has just been described—in the muscular forces that are closely related to respiration and the circulatory system. In children from the age of twelve until puberty, these effects manifest in the forces that act upon the skeleton. Thus, before the age of twelve, we perceive through the so-called motor nerve primarily what is still within our muscles; after the age of twelve, we perceive through this so-called motor nerve primarily what is taking place in our muscles and bones. Now, if you consider that there is something volitional in all thinking—it is, after all, the will that is at work when I synthesize or analytically separate mental images; the will is present everywhere in this process—then you must also seek out this will within the organism. And it is precisely this will in the psychological function of thinking that is connected in the manner I have just described. As we enter the twelfth year, we learn a kind of thinking whose processes, in accordance with the nature of the will, take place in the bones, in the dynamics of the skeleton. Here we make the important transition from the human being’s soft system to the entirely hard system that, I might say, positions itself in the world like an objective lever system.

[ 29 ] This is the heresy, the paradox, that I must present to you: that when a person forms thoughts about inanimate, external nature, they do not do so directly with their head or brain, but rather with their skeleton. Of course, if you’re steeped in modern physiology, you might laugh at the idea that there’s someone in Dornach who claims that people think abstractly with their bones; but that is precisely the case. It would be easier not to say this, but it must be said, because we need a true understanding of human nature. The thoughts we have in the brain are merely images of what actually takes place in the real thought process. The brain serves as a tool for these passive images of the actual processes that occur during thinking. The fact that thinking becomes conscious depends on these images; but these images do not contain the inner force that acts within thinking, nor do they contain the volitional aspect of thinking. That which constitutes the essence of thinking has no more to do with these images—which require the brain as a prerequisite—than a picture of Mr. X that you might see hanging on the wall has to do with the real Mr. X. You must distinguish the picture of Mr. X from the real Mr. X. In this way, the actual process that takes place during thinking differs from the images. While thinking about physical nature, the process actually takes place within the whole, complete human being—specifically within the skeletal system. We also place our thinking within the skeletal system when we reach the age of twelve. This is what offers us a real inner point of reference for what we must do in the transition of the lessons to what I characterized yesterday: getting to know the plant world in connection with the Earth, getting to know the animal world in connection with the human being up to the age of twelve, up to sexual maturity.

[ 30 ] What is structured in the sequence of instructional and educational content must be connected to this focus on the psychological and spiritual organization. It is precisely this participation of the muscular system—which is internally soft—in conjunction with the respiratory and circulatory systems that leads one, upon looking deeply into all things, to realize that from the ages of ten to twelve, the child must come to know the plant and animal realms as described, that is, that which is even more closely related to the inner being of the human being than the non-human—the mineral, the dynamic, the physical, and so on—which no longer belongs to the human realm. Therefore, as the child approaches the age of twelve, instruction must appeal to that aspect of the human being which now reveals itself as its distinctive essence. Now one must begin to transform what was first held in the realm of the pictorial, and what was then transferred to the living plant realm and the sentient animal realm, into the realm of comprehension—specifically, the rational-intellectual comprehension of inorganic nature.

[ 31 ] Only now have we reached the point where human beings position themselves in the world as physical beings with dynamics and mechanics, and experience themselves as such. Only now has the possibility arisen to approach human beings through what physics and chemistry are, even in their simplest elements—that which, as the “earth” of chemistry, is subject to dynamics, and that which constitutes mineralogy, the knowledge of minerals. If one applies the mineral, the dynamic, the physical, and the chemical aspects to human beings prematurely, one unconsciously and harmfully interferes with human nature. On the other hand, what constitutes an understanding of so-called historical contexts—an overview of history—and an understanding of the driving impulses in historical and social development is merely a polar opposite to the understanding of the physical and the mineral. Children do not become ready for this until they are approaching the age of twelve. Historical ideas—the impulses that run through historical life and intervene in social structures—are, although they are in turn something entirely different in the realm of history, nevertheless, as it were, the skeleton of history, while the flesh and the muscles are the living human beings with their biographies and the immediate, concrete events of history. Therefore, in our approach to history—which we must already introduce between the ages of ten and twelve—we must proceed in such a way that we recount complete stories that can stir the emotions and inspire admiration: biographical accounts and characterizations of completed events, rather than abstract, ongoing impulses. These become accessible to the child by the time the twelfth year arrives, when that which is conditioned by the human being’s standing in the external world begins to take hold—for the child moves entirely from the inner to the outer; now the child can also learn to grasp what, as historical impulses from the outside, affects individual human beings.

[ 32 ] This must definitely be taken into account; otherwise, one projects what one experiences in adults—in oneself—onto children through certain symptoms. And then one says: Well, that’s how it is in science: first one grasps the simple physical and chemical principles, and then one moves on to the more complex ones; teaching must follow the same pattern. But that does not correspond to the child’s nature. The simplest thing in this regard—the abstract lines that run through existence, which are, after all, exhausted in the mineral-physical realm—are only truly understood by the child once the child is standing on its own two feet and moving dynamically and physically through the external world with its whole being, as if according to the law of the lever or other dynamic laws. We have once incorporated into our worldview the idea that we must increasingly transform everything, little by little, into a kind of natural law. And so we see how historians strive to treat the social element in history by bringing the impulses of history as close as possible to the laws of nature.

[ 33 ] This tendency arises in children when the laws of physics and chemistry are taught before the age of twelve, and when organic or human subjects are not addressed until later. Because these elements have been placed in the wrong order, the child then carries what it has perceived from the mere laws of nature into social life and history as well. And because this has become ingrained in education, there is a large audience for the view that laws of nature should be sought everywhere, and that one should not speak of historical impulses that are directly spiritual and intellectual; and this, in turn, influences educational principles. Children are already being shaped in such a way that they develop a strong belief in the purely physical and chemical, which they then carry over into their entire worldview.

[ 34 ] What I have written down here comes from America: “Nature’s proceeding in social phenomena.” It has practically become a catchphrase, especially for a certain educational principle, to say: One should raise a child in such a way that it perceives natural processes in social phenomena, so that, in a sense, it experiences what is happening in social life as a kind of natural science.

[ 35 ] People keep coming up to me and saying: “In English, they say it differently—they say ‘progress of nature’—or something like that.” But as valid as this criticism may be from a linguistic standpoint—it’s just a quote, and it does indeed exist as a buzzword, especially in the context of educational science! So we must take into account that there might be room for improvement here. I would like to improve it, too—and in a universal sense! But linguistic improvement alone isn’t enough, because it essentially expresses the desire to see natural impulses within social impulses. We are shaping the children toward this end. But this is precisely what we must begin to do: to experience the natural in the sense of the laws of nature and the social in the sense of the higher social laws; we are not capable of that. — We ruin our entire worldview when we introduce the study of the chemical, mineral, mineralogical, physical, dynamic, and so on at the wrong stage of life. One must—as I have already mentioned very frequently—take our entire cultural milieu into account if one wishes to understand where the impulses for the art of education and teaching should begin. Please forgive me for interjecting here once again with a sort of aside—though it is a justified one.

[ 36 ] You see, when one approaches today’s scientific worldview with this insight, with this way of seeing, as described in my book *How Does One Gain Insight into the Higher Worlds?* , one approaches today’s scientific worldview, one gets the impression that the worlds described by the sciences today—which essentially reduce everything to the mineral-physical realm—are not at all the worlds in which we, as human beings of flesh and blood, live. They are different worlds. For when one looks into such worlds—as described by today’s natural scientists and as they are said to affect human beings—with the necessary imaginative insight, there are no human beings of flesh and blood there! Instead, nothing but skeletons are walking around—nothing but little bone men and little bone women are walking around there. It is a strange world. I once conducted an experiment by taking the description provided by a true thinker of modern times, the Swiss Vogt—the younger generation no longer remembers the so-called “fat Vogt,” who in the 1950s constructed a worldview out of robust materialism, a worldview that still haunts every corner of contemporary thought—I conducted this experiment: I tried to see what would happen if, in this world—where normally only walking skeletons could exist—a real human being with some flesh and blood were to find their way in. Someone endowed with normal flesh and blood cannot endure it there. But if a person with some flesh and blood were to wander in, what would happen to them? You see, due to all the influences described there—which are supposed to affect humans in the same way as they do in this materially conceived world—he would simultaneously become neurasthenic and hysterical in the very worst sense. He would be completely unable to free himself from everything that is acting upon him. Basically, modern science describes a world in which we could become neurasthenic and hysterical. And the only good thing is that this world described there is not our real one, and that our real world possesses forces other than those described there.

[ 37 ] Well, we really do need to break free from the standardized world—the illusory world from which we derive almost everything for our entire civilization today—and arrive at a true understanding of human nature; for only in this way can we also arrive at a true pedagogy and didactics.