The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Seventeenth Lecture

[ 1 ] Good morning, gentlemen! Have you thought of any questions to ask since last time?

Question: There are more questions about the effects of absinthe, as well as about bees and wasps.

[ 2 ] Dr. Steiner: Isn’t it true that we’ve discussed the effects of absinthe to the extent that I told you: they are, after all, similar to the effects of alcohol. Now, if we wish to go into this question in greater detail, I would like to say a few words about other influences on the human body in general. We must be clear, in fact, that we cannot speak solely of the solid components of the human organism, the human body. The solid components, as I told you, actually account for no more than ten to twelve percent. So when we see the human body depicted in a book, it can only be drawn in such a way that the solid components are shown. This leads to the belief that a human being consists of his brain, his lungs, his heart, and so on, and that he is actually composed entirely of such solid components. But I have told you that the human body consists, one might say, of about eighty-eight percent liquid—specifically, aqueous fluid.

[ 3 ] But from this you will also see that it is only partly true when we say: For example, we drink water, and that water contains all sorts of dissolved substances, and then the water enters the stomach, from there into the intestines, and so on. That is only partly true. When we drink a small glass of water, as I’ve already told you, we can create a mental image of how this happens. But with the second glass of water, what’s in the water is already being absorbed by the body’s fluids and does not first pass through all the organs in what I would call the prescribed manner.

[ 4 ] Now, however, it is the case that those parts of us that are solid are the least exposed to our entire surroundings. Of course, if we look, for example, at our solid heart, it grows larger and smaller with each beat, and so on; but overall, it retains the same volume and remains as it is. If, on the other hand, we consider that we are filled with fluid—yes, gentlemen, everything in the world has an influence on fluid! You know that when we take a very small amount of fluid, it takes the shape of a drop, becomes a drop, because the whole world is round and acts upon every single drop. Because we are fluid, the whole world actually acts upon us. And it is only because modern science has no longer properly taken into account that the human being is actually a column of liquid that it has forgotten that the entire world, with all its stars and everything else, exerts an influence on the human being. This influence on the human being has simply been forgotten.

[ 5 ] Once you realize that a human being is simply a mass of fluid, you’re not far from saying to yourself: Yes, but I’m also air. I’m constantly inhaling air and exhaling it again. So I am also air. And because the air within me is in constant motion, that is what actually makes me human. It is only because human beings are composed in this way that it is possible for them to be spiritual-soul beings. If we were merely solid, we could not actually be spiritual-soul beings.

[ 6 ] But everything has a very specific effect on people. You see, you’ve probably heard of what’s called lead poisoning. I’ve already told you about all kinds of different types of poisoning. Yes, gentlemen, if someone ingests too much—and this “too much” need only be a very small amount, but it must be too much relative to their needs—if someone ingests too much lead into their body, then it simply becomes too solid. Then these solid components become, I would say, chalk-like. So that when a person ingests even a very small amount of lead—because in cases of lead poisoning, only a very small amount needs to be present—their body becomes too rigid. So when you see that a person is beginning to become too rigid—they even age prematurely due to lead poisoning, and signs of aging become apparent—then you must give them silver in some form as a remedy. This restores their fluidity, allowing them once again to be affected by external influences. One can therefore counteract this with some form of silver—which must be chosen appropriately. Thus, all manner of things have an influence on human beings.

[ 7 ] Now consider that feminine and masculine natures are indeed very different from one another. The feminine nature, so to speak, contains more of the fluid element. One could therefore say that the feminine nature is more receptive to all external influences because it is more fluid. Male nature is less receptive to external influences because it places greater emphasis on the solid aspect of the human being. So one can say: In certain illnesses—let’s say, lead poisoning—one can better address female nature by administering less silver; whereas male nature requires more silver because it is difficult to make fluid. So you see, one must place great emphasis on all these aspects of the human being, and only then does one arrive at a true understanding of the human being. You see, therefore, that every substance has an immensely strong influence on the human being.

[ 8 ] All of this, however, is in turn connected to the relationship between the masculine and the feminine, which is expressed in the patterns of inheritance. And these patterns of inheritance are, of course, extraordinarily complicated. You can see just how complicated these patterns of inheritance are from the fact that there is a certain disease—called hemophilia—in which the blood of those affected does not clot immediately. In a healthy person, the blood clots immediately when it reaches the surface. It turns into clotted blood right away. The blood is fluid inside the body; when it reaches the surface, it becomes compact, firm—it clots. In people with hemophilia, the blood does not clot immediately. It flows out of a small wound in a liquid state. Indeed, it even happens with such hemophiliacs that the blood seeps through the skin. It is therefore difficult to perform surgeries on such hemophiliacs. As soon as an incision is made, blood oozes out in people with hemophilia. While in others the blood begins to thicken immediately, in people with hemophilia it remains liquid, does not clot, and this means they can bleed to death very easily if they undergo any kind of surgery. So, for those with hemophilia, it is extremely difficult to perform surgery without them bleeding to death. Every moment, you can see blood flowing out here and there from people with hemophilia.

[ 9 ] Now, there’s something very peculiar. Imagine a man who has hemophilia. He gets married—that is, he takes a wife who doesn’t have hemophilia. He can have perfectly healthy children who don’t have hemophilia at all. Now, if he has only sons, that’s not a problem—the genetic makeup won’t show any signs of a serious condition. But suppose he has a daughter. The daughter grows up without hemophilia at all. She marries a perfectly healthy man. They have children. Those children could have hemophilia! You see, the peculiar thing here is that hemophilia is not passed on to the female line—that is, the daughters do not develop hemophilia—but the children of these daughters, even if they marry perfectly healthy men who do not have hemophilia, will develop hemophilia. So hemophilia simply passes through the woman and is transmitted to her descendants without the woman herself developing the condition.

[ 10 ] So we see just how intricately the conditions within the human body are intertwined with the laws of heredity. It is therefore extremely dangerous for a daughter of a person with hemophilia to marry, because hemophilia is passed on to the children even if she herself is completely free of the disease. This shows you just how carefully such circumstances must be taken into account.

[ 11 ] But all these issues can be addressed once medicine is placed on a sound foundation. Just imagine: you have a daughter of someone with a blood disorder, and you can intervene effectively right away by giving the matter the proper attention. How can you intervene? Well, before such a woman has children, one can give her a lead-based remedy as a prophylactic measure—as it’s called in medicine—as a preventive measure. And one can also ensure that her husband receives this lead-based remedy, thereby protecting the children from developing hemophilia.

[ 12 ] But of course, if one thinks of medicine solely in terms of always saying to oneself: “We wait until someone shows signs of illness, and then we begin to treat them”—then that is of no use. Medicine must become socially oriented. Medicine must evolve in such a way that preventive measures are also taken against the onset of diseases that are only just beginning to develop. Of course, this cannot be done if current mental images prevail. For, naturally, people do not seek a cure for a disease they do not yet have, but which they may develop due to hereditary factors. And it is particularly important that, during pregnancy, if there is even the slightest possibility of hemophilia, some form of lead-based remedy be administered.

[ 13 ] But one cannot understand any of this unless one knows that, in physical and material terms, only the human body is solid—only that is material. As soon as one approaches the liquid state, a much finer substance is at work within it. And this finer substance has been called “ether” since ancient times. The ether is everywhere. It is finer than all other substances—finer than water, finer than air, finer even than heat. But just as it cannot penetrate the solid components of the human being, so it is active in the human body’s fluids. And just as the human being possesses the ether in the liquid state, so too does he possess the true soul in the gaseous state; in what we carry within us as air, we possess the true soul.

[ 14 ] Once one understands that what is truly spiritual resides in the air, then one also realizes that with every exhalation one is actually breathing out the spiritual, and with every inhalation one is taking the spiritual back into oneself. Thus, through the spiritual, one actually lives in communion with the entire world. It is only because modern science fails to take into account that the human being also has an air-like organism that the spiritual aspect is completely omitted from people’s scientific considerations, leading them to believe it does not exist at all.

[ 15 ] The psychological must be considered entirely on its own. And then one also comes to understand how such liquid substances—such as absinthe, for example—take effect. You see, when I ingest any amount of absinthe, the absinthe is, of course, liquid at first. It mixes with our own fluids, which we have in such great quantities within us. But what does it do to these fluids? It makes them resistant to properly absorbing the airy element. So that when I ingest absinthe, I can no longer properly allow the airy element to enter all my parts. But at the same time, something else happens. If I cannot allow the airy element to enter all my parts, then this airy element acts in a very peculiar way. I want to use a comparison to make clear to you how this airy element then acts.

[ 16 ] Imagine, for example, that there’s a person somewhere who’s employed in an office and has to work there from morning until evening. He goes in in the morning and comes out again in the evening. The people who are in the office with him will think: Well, he’s just another person who comes into the office with us and leaves again. But imagine another person. He also goes to the office, but this guy is a joker. He doesn’t do much work, but he plays all kinds of pranks on the others from morning till night. They really, really like him. And they’ll say, “He’s one of us.” They’re happy when he comes in. The people he’s supposed to be working for won’t be so happy, because the work suffers as a result, but for those who are around him, his jokes are a lot of fun.

[ 17 ] Yes, gentlemen, that’s exactly what happens when we block the air with absinthe! Then it just sloshes around in the organs everywhere. Instead of flowing properly into the organs and filling the body completely, it remains isolated here and there, stagnating everywhere. It’s just like a joker in an office. She makes everyone feel good because she doesn’t have to do any work. When the air properly enters the fluids everywhere, it has to do its job, because otherwise it won’t properly supply the body. But when absinthe blocks the air, it just rolls around everywhere. Little by little, a person feels as comfortable as a pig. What is peculiar about the pig is that it constantly fills itself with air that is not properly absorbed. The pig is the most prone to shortness of breath.

[ 18 ] And just as the ether is present everywhere in liquids, so too is the soul-element present everywhere in the air—we also call it the astral element because it derives from the influences of the stars. Human beings absorb the soul-element everywhere; here and there they feel a pleasant warmth or coolness. When a person has this air circulating within them in this way, they feel thoroughly at ease. Yes, but the spiritual element is not present in the human body merely to serve the person’s pleasure everywhere; rather, it is meant to work on the organs, to function in the proper way so that the heart and all the organs are properly nourished. But if a person shuts off the soul so that it merely amuses them within the body, then what happens is that, although they feel—one might say—“absolutely wonderful,” their organs are not properly nourished. And above all, the organs that contribute most to a person having healthy offspring are not properly nourished. Thus we have this peculiar phenomenon: People who can obtain absinthe are actually striving to feel “absolutely great” on the inside—to experience this sense of well-being, this inner pleasure—but they do not ensure that they provide humanity with healthy offspring. That is the objection to absinthe.

[ 19 ] Now you might ask: How does this craving to guzzle absinthe actually arise in people? For if you trace the history of humanity, you will notice that vices such as drinking absinthe actually occur most frequently among those people who, as they say, are already in a state of decline—who are no longer truly at their full human potential—and whose bodies are thus already beginning to decay internally. Then people turn to the spiritual realm to find inner amusement. This is particularly the case with peoples when they are in a state of decline. The Orientals and Asians, in earlier times when these peoples were still on the rise, detested all such beverages. They only began to drink absinthe-like substances once they were already in decline.

[ 20 ] And that is also the case when one looks today at what is happening, when these vices get out of hand—trying to get all kinds of substances into the body. As I told you the other day: people are even trying to get cocaine into their bodies! The soul then acts in such a way that it actually squeezes the body dry, and as a result, they perceive something like snakes everywhere. I have described this to you before. All the poisons that a person inflicts upon themselves in this way—they actually do so because their entire being is already out of balance and they wish to indulge the soul as much as possible. In declining civilizations, those people who have the least to do will seek this sensual pleasure of the body the most. This is connected to the entire course of human history.

[ 21 ] We can say that it is rather strange how, as we move westward, people on the one hand—I would say—allow themselves to be enslaved by enacting all sorts of laws against alcohol, absinthe, and so on, while on the other hand they still seek to obtain these things in every possible way. This simply testifies to the fact that we are caught up in tremendous confusion in modern life. On the one hand, people want to live well, and on the other hand, they nevertheless want to ensure that they do not completely perish as nations. And that is precisely what causes this truly nonsensical confusion: the desire to introduce all sorts of things into the body, followed by laws to prohibit them, and so on—all because people refuse to come to their senses. The point is, quite simply, that people should come to their senses.

[ 22 ] Well, I’ve already told you that the feminine is more closely connected to the influences of the whole world, while the masculine tends to shut itself off from these influences. So if the male population in particular succumbs to absinthe, it ruins the very organs that are supposed to ensure the continuation of the species by making people strong-willed and endowed with a certain strength of character. Drinking absinthe will cause people to become effeminate. So that if the vice of drinking absinthe becomes more and more widespread among men, we will end up with an effeminate sex, an effeminate offspring. Men will become effeminate.

[ 23 ] If women even give in to absinthe, it will result in their offspring being extremely susceptible to disease because they are exposed to and subject to this influence. Thus, if women drink absinthe, it will result in the birth of children who are extremely susceptible to all kinds of diseases.

[ 24 ] You see, such things must be viewed in the context of the whole world. Let me tell you something extraordinarily interesting. You might ask today: Where do we get much of what we actually know? Usually, people don’t even notice how much wisdom humanity possesses in the most everyday aspects of life. You know, we name the days of the week: Sunday after the sun, Monday after the moon, Tuesday—that’s after Mars; in French, *mardi*—Tuesday is definitely named after Mars. Wednesday—in German, it means “middle of the week”; but if you just take the French word, *mercredi*, there you have Mercury Day, after the planet Mercury. Thursday comes from Jupiter, the thunderer, but Donar is nothing other than Jupiter. In French, you still have “jeudi,” Jupiter’s day. Friday, after the German Freia. But Freia is the same as Venus, “vendredi.” The days of the week are named after the planets. Why? Because this naming convention arose at a time when people still knew: Human beings are dependent on the entire world. Because human beings are alive, all the planets exert an influence on them. That is why the days of the week were named accordingly. Today, people call this superstition. But to regard this as superstition is nothing more than ignorance. Thus, there is immense wisdom embedded in the naming of the days of the week. Yes, gentlemen, there is immense wisdom embedded in all these things!

[ 25 ] And when we ask ourselves: Where, for example, did the names of the days of the week come from? — then we look all the way over to Asia, where we find that as early as two to three thousand years before our current calendar, that is, before the birth of Christ, there were extraordinarily intelligent people living there. There were peoples—the Babylonians and Assyrians—among whom were very intelligent people who could observe the influence of the stars, and they were the first to name these days of the week. Others then translated these names into their own languages. We got the names of the days of the week from Asia, from the Babylonians and Assyrians, where people were already intelligent—incredibly intelligent—at a time when things in Europe were still quite different.

[ 26 ] Let’s ask ourselves what things were like in Europe when, in Assyria and Babylonia—over there in Asia—about four thousand years ago, there were already extraordinarily intelligent people, people who were truly much smarter than we are. They were smarter because they knew an immense amount more. It is not true that humanity always progresses smoothly. From time to time, humanity also takes steps backward. So they knew an immense amount. — But that knowledge is no more beneficial to people’s souls if they simply surrender to it than money is beneficial to them. As strange as the comparison may be, it is true: Too much money is not good for people; too much knowledge is not good for people if they lack a counterbalance, if they do not apply this knowledge properly in the service of humanity and the world. The Asians had gradually amassed an immense body of knowledge, but they no longer knew what to do with it.

[ 27 ] The regions here in Switzerland, for example, best illustrate what Europe was like back when the Asians still possessed immense knowledge. If you look at the rocks down in the valley here in Switzerland—the ones that have come down from above via the glaciers—you can see from these rocks how the glaciers have shaped them. These rocks bear glacial striations. From the way the rocks are shaped, you can tell how they came down from above and how they were shaped by the flowing ice of the glaciers. But in fact, you can tell from all the rocks here that the entire area was once covered in ice. Yes, gentlemen, the ground on which we walk today—where we feel so comfortable—was once completely glaciated.

[ 28 ] And again, if we go further north, we can still see today, based on certain rock formations in Prussia and throughout large parts of Germany, that all of this was once covered by glacial ice that flowed down from the far north. Just as glaciers today, for my part, flow down to a certain depth, so the glaciers flowed from the far north all the way into Germany, and everything was glaciated.

[ 29 ] Not too long ago, people had a certain fondness for really large numbers, and they would say: “Well, yes, of course, Europe was once covered in glaciers, but that was a long time ago—twenty to thirty million years ago.” — But that’s nonsense. It stems from a calculation that I’ll explain to you with the following.

[ 30 ] Just imagine: today I am observing the human heart. This human heart is constantly undergoing very slight changes. If I observe it again in a person a year later, it has become a little stiffer; after two years, it’s even stiffer, and I can now calculate exactly how much stiffer the heart has become. Now, by adding it all up, I can calculate how much stiffer the heart has become over the course of a century and what the heart was like a century ago. I can figure that out. I can say: Here I have a seven-year-old; three hundred years ago, his heart was such and such. Yes, but there’s just the small matter that he wasn’t alive back then. And if I calculate how his heart will have changed in three hundred years, there’s again just the small matter that he won’t be alive then.

[ 31 ] Such calculations have been made to determine what conditions were like, for example, here in Europe twenty or thirty thousand years ago. The Ice Age was then placed within that time period. But one cannot calculate that way. One must have a science that reveals what is happening on Earth, based on what we know about human beings—namely, that in three hundred years, they will no longer exist as physical beings on Earth.

[ 32 ] Well, lately even the scholars—and this must be said in this field—have become more reasonable, and those who are reasonable are actually well aware today that it wasn’t that long ago that everything here was covered by glaciers, but that at the time when people over in Asia were already as advanced as I have described—during the era of Babylonian and Assyrian civilization—everything in Europe was still frozen over. So we only need to go back a few thousand years—four to five thousand years—and everything in Europe was still covered in ice. And only gradually, as the ice receded, did people begin to settle here.

[ 33 ] Yes, gentlemen, these people did not have it as good as people do today. And they fared all the worse for it because they came from regions where they were not, I might say, constantly subjected to such severe cold, but where they were more comfortable. Nevertheless, these people moved into regions that had only recently been covered in ice. As a result, however, these people were spared the lust for wisdom that would gradually have crept up on them in Asia. And in Europe, because something happened in the universe—that is, because at a time when Asia already had a warm culture, it was still icy here—because, in other words, an influence from the universe was exerted on Europe, a better, more dynamic culture developed in Europe than could have developed in Asia. You see, entire cultures depend on the influences of the universe.

[ 34 ] And further. Yes, when someone thinks of the sea, they picture it roughly like this: If I pour a little water into a drinking glass, then I just need to add a little salt, and then I basically have seawater. Seawater is salty, and if I add salt to a glass of water, then I have seawater. Yes, but it’s not quite that simple. Because if you look at the sea—let’s say, the Atlantic Ocean—if you could look at it from the inside, there would be the surface (it’s drawn), there’s the water—it’s not just salt water, but the curious thing is: When summer comes, something begins in this ocean—yes, as if it were starting to snow in there. So there are constant, real snowfalls passing through the ocean. Yes, gentlemen, what on earth is that? In there, in the ocean, you couldn’t just look and say: Well, there’s this huge space, filled everywhere with saltwater. No, it’s snowing in there. Where does that come from? You see, it’s because there are very small animals in that ocean—tiny, minuscule animals, but an infinite number of them. These minuscule animals all have small, tiny calcareous shells. These animals are called foraminifera. As long as these animals are alive, they swim quite high up in the water. When the season comes when they can no longer survive, the animals die, and their calcareous shells begin to sink downward. And inside, these calcareous shells are constantly “snowing” down. It’s really just like the snow in the air here. The entire ocean is snowing with these foraminifera shells. And when these foraminifera shells settle down there (as shown in the drawing), their composition changes and they turn into red clay. And that is the ocean floor. These tiny creatures draw their life from the entire universe, and they build up the ocean floor.

[ 35 ] It’s just the same with the air here. We just don’t live in the sea—we live in the air. And when it snows in winter, what falls from the sky already contains what ultimately shapes our soil into what it is. For if there weren’t proper snowfall, plants couldn’t grow. The soil is shaped by what is there.

[ 36 ] Gentlemen, it is not the solid components, nor even the liquid components in our bodies that absorb the proper influences, but solely the gaseous components. Through our breathing, we take in what is right while it is snowing in winter. We absorb what the world of the stars sends us when it snows in winter, and we develop it in the proper way. For this, however, we need our soul to work on our organs in the right way; otherwise, our organs will wither away on Earth. If we now burden our bodies with absinthe, we cut ourselves off from the world of the stars. Then we no longer absorb any influences from the world of the stars. And the consequence of this is that we ruin our bodies, because we expose them entirely to the influence of the Earth alone.

[ 37 ] So you can see how immensely important this is for the proper development of human beings—that they do not ruin their bodies with absinthe in the first place. But one must realize this!

[ 38 ] And now you can easily create a mental image of how civilization has progressed. In Asia, there were tremendously intelligent people. They possessed a great deal of spiritual depth. But little by little, they came to regard this spiritual depth merely as a source of inner amusement, seeking only to experience inner sensual pleasure. Some of them migrated to regions that had previously been frozen over. There they weaned themselves off this inner sensual pleasure and strengthened their bodies once again. This led to the addition of a Western culture to the Eastern one.

[ 39 ] From what you can still see today—where the glacier reaches its highest point—you can tell that the earth here once cooled down significantly, so that the people who later settled here could strengthen their bodies.

[ 40 ] You see, this is also the basis for studying the fall of the Roman Empire; it takes you back to the time of Christianity’s initial spread. Yes, gentlemen, if Christianity had spread only among the Romans, something beautiful would have come of it! But at that time, the Romans had become so effeminate—because they had only the remnants of Eastern, Asian culture—that they could have done nothing. Then came the people from the northern regions, which were frozen over—these people had sturdier physiques—and the result was that the Romans perished. And these northerners with their sturdier physiques then took over the spiritual life.

[ 41 ] History describes what it calls the Migration Period; it describes how the Romans fell and how the Germanic peoples—the Germans, the French, the English, and so on—arrived, and thus how the people of today came to be, for they are all, fundamentally speaking, Germanic peoples. The French simply had more Roman influence mixed in than the Germans, for example. Isn’t it true that the whole thing is based precisely on the fact that these people—I would say—came from a region where they were able to absorb the influence of the entire world, while other peoples, with their wisdom, lived only on Earth, and that these people came and renewed the entire civilization? So, you see, nature is connected to everything that happens in history.

[ 42 ] And now you know just how strong an influence Roman culture still has. Just think: as late as the 16th and 17th centuries, for example, you couldn’t speak a word of German at universities in Central Europe. The professors lectured in Latin. Admittedly, it gradually became a peculiar form of Latin. Everyone knew Latin back then. Only gradually did people decide to lecture in the local languages. But this tendency—this desire to cling to what was actually fading away simply because it felt more comfortable, even in terms of language—persisted for a long time.

[ 43 ] Just think for a moment how long this practice persisted: whenever people wanted to appear a bit sophisticated, they would babble away in French even in entirely German regions. This was for no other reason than that they wanted to perpetuate the old Latin Roman tradition, at least in language. And it is indeed true that what has persisted in the language also persists in the other vices. The Romans began with this longing to feel sensual pleasure within the body—that is, to indulge the soul rather than use it to build up the body. And in fact, the legacy of this is still present in the desire to drink absinthe, and even to indulge in cocaine and so on. This is precisely what will produce a weak generation, a weak offspring, and what can gradually lead all those who indulge in such vices toward ruin. You can implement as many social reforms as you like—but nothing will come of these social reforms unless true insight takes hold. And this true insight can come in no other way than by replacing mere materialism in science and religion with a beginning to grasp something spiritual. And when one begins to grasp this spiritual aspect, then one will come to understand much of what is, after all, quite clear on the surface today, but which one will only be able to see through when one is once again able to view the spiritual correctly.

[ 44 ] The gentleman [one of the listeners], being an expert on bees, pointed out through his question the difference that exists between the life of bees and that of wasps. There are many similarities. I recently described the life of wasps to you. There are many similarities in the life of bees. But then again, the beehive leads a very strange, peculiar life. What is the basis for this?

[ 45 ] You see, you cannot explain this at all unless you have the ability to look into the spiritual realm. Life in the beehive is organized with extraordinary wisdom. Anyone who has observed the life of bees will say so. Of course, one cannot say that bees possess a science like that of humans, for they do not, after all, have a brain structure like ours or anything of the sort. So they cannot incorporate the general cosmic intelligence into their bodies in this way. But the influences from the entire surrounding world have an immensely strong effect on the beehive. And one could truly come to understand what bee life is actually like if one took into account that everything in the Earth’s environment has an immensely strong influence precisely on something like what exists in the beehive. The life of the beehive is based on the fact that the bees cooperate so perfectly—much more so than ants and wasps—and that they perform all their work in such a way that everything harmonizes. And when one tries to understand where this stems from, one realizes: The bees lead a life in which what manifests itself in the sexual life of other animals is suppressed—suppressed to an extraordinary degree. This is suppressed to an extraordinary degree in bees.

[ 46 ] You see, with bees it is actually always the case that reproduction is carried out only by a very small number of select female individuals—the queen bees. As for the others, their sexual life is more or less suppressed. Yet it is precisely in sexual life that what we call the life of love is present. The life of love is, after all, primarily a spiritual matter. It is only through the influence of this spiritual aspect on certain organs of the body that these organs become a manifestation, an expression, of the life of love. And since the life of love is suppressed in bees—essentially confined to the single queen bee—sexual life in the hive is otherwise transformed into all this activity that the bees engage in among themselves. That is why those older, wiser people—who understood the matter in a completely different way than we do today—these wiser people attributed all the marvelous activity of the beehive to the life of love, to the life they associated with the planet Venus.

[ 47 ] And so we can say: When describing wasps or ants, for example, these are animals that are less subject to the influence of the planet Venus. Bees, on the other hand, are entirely devoted to the influence of the planet Venus and develop a life of love throughout their entire hive. This becomes a wise life, for you can imagine how wise it must be. I have described various aspects of the production of offspring to you. There is unconscious wisdom within this. The bees develop this unconscious wisdom in their outward actions. And so, precisely that which is actually lived out within us only when our heart develops love can be found throughout the entire beehive as a kind of substance. The entire beehive is, in fact, permeated by a life of love. The individual bees so often set aside their own love and develop love within the entire hive. Thus, one begins to understand the life of the bees when one realizes that the bee lives, as it were, in an atmosphere that is entirely imbued with love.

[ 48 ] But now, what benefits the bee most of all is that it actually lives on those components in plants that, in turn, are completely permeated by the plant’s love life. The bee draws its nourishment—which it then turns into honey—entirely from those components of the plants that are imbued with the life of love, thus, in a sense, bringing the life of love from the flowers into the beehive.

[ 49 ] So one must say that the life of bees must be studied from a spiritual perspective.

[ 50 ] This is much less necessary among ants and wasps. If one observes their lives, one will see that they actually defy the description given, that they, in turn, devote themselves more to sexual life. The bee is in fact—with the exception of the queen bee—the very creature that, I would say, tells itself: We want to renounce individual sexual life and make ourselves a vessel of the life of love. — So that they have, in fact, carried into the beehive that which lives in the flowers. And when you begin to really think this through, you have the whole secret of the beehive. The life of this sprouting, blossoming love, which is spread out in the flowers, is then also contained within the honey.

[ 51 ] And you can study this further if you now eat the honey yourself. What does the honey do? — Well, gentlemen, absinthe combines with the liquid part of the human body in such a way that it drives out the air—and with it, the spiritual aspect—causing the person to feel sensual pleasure. Honey, at most, produces sensual pleasure only on the tongue. The moment honey is eaten, it promotes precisely the right connection between the airy and the liquid elements within the human being. And there is nothing better for a person than to add a little honey to their food in the right measure. Bees actually work wonders in ensuring that a person learns to use his soul to work on his organs. Through honey, the beehive in turn gives back to a person what he needs: the industriousness of his soul within his body. So when a person drinks absinthe, he wants to enjoy his soul. When a person adds honey to their food, they seek precisely to prepare their soul in such a way that it works and breathes properly within the body. Therefore, beekeeping is something that actually promotes culture immensely, because it strengthens human beings. The drinking of absinthe is something that will gradually drive the human race to the point of extinction.

[ 52 ] You see, if one considers that bees are most strongly influenced by the world of the stars, one also realizes that bees serve as a detour through which what is right enters into human beings. Everything that lives, when combined in the right way, works together again in the right way. Anyone who sees a beehive should say to themselves, almost in an elevated mood: Through the detour of the beehive, the entire universe flows into human beings and creates capable people. Otherwise, if one drinks absinthe, one creates incapable people. — And this is how one comes to transform the study of humanity into a study of the universe.