The Rudolf Steiner Archive

It is in the nature of the case that the subject of a lecture course like this one is inexhaustible. Matters could be elaborated and looked at more thoroughly. But since, unfortunately, we must come to an end, we have to be content with given guidelines and indication. Today, therefore, I shall only supplement the scanty outlines and hints already discussed to that in a certain sense the picture will be rounded out.

Proceeding once again from the being of man as viewed by spiritual science, we must say that we member man into physical body, etheric or formative forces body, astral body (which essentially represents the soul life) and ego. Let us be clear that properly speaking the physical body resides only in the small part of the human organization that we can describe as solid and sharply defined. On the other hand, all that pertains to liquid or fluid forms is taken hold of by the etheric body in such a way that it is in a constant process of blending, separating, combining, and dissolving. It is in perpetual flux. Then there are the gaseous, aeriform elements, such as are active in oxygen and other gases. In these, the astral body is at work. Finally, the ego organization is active in everything that has to do with warmth.

What I have just outlined cannot, however, be reduced to a diagram. We must clearly understand, for instance, that because the formative forces body pulsates through all fluid and liquid elements of the body, it also sweeps along the solid substances. Everything in the human organization is in close interaction, in constant interplay. We must always be aware of that. But now let us also remember that this human organization has been experienced in different ways in the course of evolution. This was one of the main themes of these lectures.

What is described today as the subject matter of external physics or mechanics, was originally attained through an inward experience of the physical body. Our present-day physics contains statements that originated because there once existed an internally experienced physics of the physical body. As I have explained a number of times, this inward physics was divorced from man and now continues to function merely as a science that observes outer nature. During the decline of the medieval alchemy the same thing happened with what lives inwardly in man by virtue of the etheric body. The work of this body in the fluids was once experienced, but now it is only dimly perceptible in the fantastic, alchemistic formulas that we find in ancient writings. Originally this was intelligent science, but inwardly experienced within the etheric. In a way, this is still in the process of being divorced from man, because as yet we really do not have a fully developed chemistry. We have many chemical processes in the world that we seek to understand, but only in a physical and mechanical way.

In the beginning man experienced all this inwardly by means of his organization, but in the course of time he cast it all out of himself. In this process of casting out all our science developed, from astronomy to the meager beginnings of modern chemistry. On the other hand, thinking, feeling and willing, the subject matter of abstract psychology (which today is no longer considered real) was in former times actually not experienced inside man. Man felt himself at one with the external world outside his own being, when he experienced the soul life. Thus what was corporeal was once experienced inwardly, whereas the soul element was experienced by leaving one's being and communing with the outer world. Psychology was once the science of that aspect of the world that affects man in such a way that he appears to himself as a soul being. Physics and chemistry were cast out of man, whereas psychology and pneumatology (which I shall discuss directly) were stuffed into him and lost their reality. They turned into subjective perceptions with which nothing could be done.

What was experienced together with the cosmos through the astral body (which leaves us in sleep) has become the subject of psychology. What man experienced as spirit in union with the universe was pneumatology. Today, as I have already pointed out, this has shrunk down to the idea of the ego or to a mere feeling. Therefore we now have as science of external nature what was once inner experience, while our science of man's inner nature is what was once external experience.

Now we must call to mind what is needed, on the one hand for physics and chemistry, and on the other for psychology and pneumatology, in order to develop them further in a conscious way, since man today finds himself in the age of the development of the consciousness soul. Take physics, for example, which in recent times has become mostly abstract and mechanical. From all that I have said you will have seen that the scientific age has increasingly felt impelled to restrict itself to the externally observed mechanics of space. Long ago, man accompanied motion by means of inward experience and judged it according to what he felt within as movement. Observing a falling stone, he experienced its inner impulse of movement in his own inner human nature, in his physical body. This experience, after the great casting out, led to the measuring of the rate of fall per second. In our attitude toward nature, the idea prevails that what is observed is what is real.

What can be observed in the outer world? It is motion, change of position.⁸³ As a rule, we let velocity vanish neatly in a differential coefficient. But it is motion that we observe, and we express velocity as movement per second, hence by means of space. This means, however, that with our conscious experience, we are entirely outside the object. We are not involved in it in any way when we merely watch its motion, meaning its change of position in space. We can do that only if we find ways and means to inwardly take hold of the spatial, physical object by an extending of the same method with which we separated from it in the first place. Instead of the mere movement, the bare change of position, we have to view the velocity in the objects as their characteristic element. Then we can know what a particular object is like inwardly, because we find velocity also within ourselves when we look back upon ourselves.

This is what is necessary. The trend of scientific development in regard to the outer physical world must be extended in the direction of proceeding from mere observation of motion to a feeling for the velocity possessed by a given object. We must advance from motion to velocity. That is how we enter into reality. Reality is not taken hold of if all we see is that a body changes its position in space. But if we know that the body possesses an inner velocity-impulse, then we have something that lies in the nature of the body. We assert nothing about a body if we merely indicate its change of position, but we do state something about it when we say that it contains within itself the impulse for its own velocity. This then is a property of it, something that belongs to its nature. You can understand this by a simple illustration. If you watch a moving person, you know nothing about him. But if you know that he has a strong urge to move quickly, you do know something about him. Likewise, you know something about him, when you know that he has a reason for moving slowly. We must be able to take hold of something that has significance within a given body. It matters little whether or not modern physics speaks, for example, of atoms; what matters is that when it does speak of them it regards them as velocity charges. That is what counts.

Now the question is: how do we arrive at such a perception? We can discuss the best in the case of physics, since today's chemistry has advanced too little. We have to become clear about what we actually do when, in our thinking, we cast inwardly experienced mechanics and physics into external space. That is what we are doing when we say: The nature of what is out there in space is of no concern to me; I observe only what can be measured and expressed in mechanical formulas, and I leave aside everything that is not mechanical. Where does this lead us? It leads us to the same process in knowledge that a human being goes through when he dies. When he dies, life goes out of him, the dead organism remains. When I begin to think mechanistically, life goes out of my knowledge. I then have a science of dead matter. We must be absolutely clear that we are setting up a science of dead matter so long as the mechanical and physical aspect is the sole object of our study of nature. You must be aware that you are focusing on what is dead. You must be able to say to yourself: The great thing about science is that it has tacitly resolved that, unlike the ancient alchemists who still saw in outer nature a remnant of life, it will observe what is dead I minerals, plants, and animals. Science will study only what is dead in them, because it utilizes only ideas and concepts suitable for what is dead. Therefore, our physics is dead by its nature.

Science will stand on a solid basis only when it fully realizes that its mode of thinking can take hold only of the dead. The same is true of chemistry, but I cannot go into that today because of the lack of time.

When we look only at motion and lose sight of velocity, we are erecting a physics that is dead, the end-product of living things is then our concern, and the end-product is death. Hence, when we look at nature with the eyes of modern mechanics and physics, we must realize that we are looking at a corpse.

Nature was not always like this. It was different at one time. If I look at a corpse, it would be foolish to believe that it was always in this condition. The fact that I realize that it is a corpse proves to me that once it was a living organism. The moment you realize that modern mechanics and physics lead you to view nature in this way, you will see that nature is now a corpse so far as physics is concerned. We are studying a corpse.

Can we attain to something living, or at least an approach to it? The corpse is the final condition of something living. Where is the beginning condition? Well, my dear friends, there is no way to rediscover velocity by observing motion. You may stare at differential coefficients as long as you will but you will not find it. Instead, you must turn back to man. Whereas formerly he experienced himself from within, you must now study him from without through his physical organism, and you must understand that in man—and especially in his physical and etheric organizations—the beginning of a living condition must be sought.

No satisfactory form of physics and chemistry will be attained save through a genuine science of man. But I expressly call attention to the fact that such a genuine anthropology will not be reached by approaching man with the methods of present-day physics and chemistry. That would only carry death back into man and make his body (his lower organization) even more dead than before.

You must study what is living in man, and not revert to the method of physics and chemistry. What is needed are the methods that can be found through spiritual-scientific research. Briefly stated, spiritual-scientific research will meet the historic requirements of natural science.

This historic requirement can be put in the following words: Science has reached the point of observing what is corpse-like in nature. Anthroposophical spiritual science must discover in addition to this the beginning of a living condition. This has been preserved in man. In former periods of evolution it was also externally perceptible. At one time, the processes of nature were totally different. Today, we walk around on the corpses of what existed in the beginning. But in the two lower bodies of man, the beginning condition has been preserved. There we can discover all that once existed, right back to the Saturn condition. An historical approach leads beyond the present state of science. It is quite clear why this is so. We are in the midst of a period of development. If, as is so frequently the case, we consider today's manner of thinking to be the most advanced and do not realize that the real course of events was very different, then we are looking at history the wrong way. As an example, a twenty-five year old person need not only be observed in the light of the twenty-five years that he has been alive,—one must also observe the element in him that makes it possible for him to live on. That is one point.

The other point is that our psychology has become very thin, while pneumatology has nearly reached the vanishing point. Again, we must know how far it has gone with these two sciences in the present age. If one speaks today of blue or red, of C-sharp or G, or of qualities of warmth, he will say that they are subjective sensations. That is the popular attitude; But what is a mere subjective sensation? It is a “phenomenon.” Just as we observe only motions in outer nature, we study only the phenomenon in psychology and pneumatology. And just as velocity is missing from motion in our external observation, the essential thing—the living essence—is missing from our observation of the inner soul life. Because we only study phenomena and no longer experience the living essence, we never get beyond mere semblance. The way thinking, feeling and willing are experienced today, they are mere semblance. Modern epistemologists have the man who wants to lift himself up by his own pigtail, or like the man in a railroad car who pushes against the wall without realizing that he cannot move the carriage in this way. This is how modern epistemologists look. They talk and talk, but there is no vitality in their talk because they are locked into the mere semblance.

I have tried to put a certain end to this talk. The first time was in my Philosophy of Freedom,⁸⁴ where I demonstrated how this semblance, inherent in pure thinking, becomes the impulse of freedom when inwardly grasped by man in thinking. If something other than semblance were contained in our subjective experience, we could never be free. But if this semblance can be raised to pure thinking, one can be free, because what is not real being cannot determine us, whereas real being would do so. This was my first effort. My second effort was at the Philosophical Congress in Bologna, when I analyzed the matter psychologically. I attempted to show that our sensations and thoughts are in fact outward experiences, rather than inward ones, and that this insight can be attained by careful observation.

These indications will have to be understood. Then, we shall realize that we must rediscover being in semblance, just as we must rediscover velocity in movement. Then, we will understand what this inwardly experienced semblance really is. It will reveal itself as the initial state of being. Man experiences this semblance; experiences himself as semblance and as such lives his way into semblance and thus transforms it into the seed of future worlds. I have often pointed out that from our ethics, our morals, born of the physical world of semblance, future physical worlds will arise, just as from today's seed the plant will grow.⁸⁵ We are dealing with the nascent state of being. In order to have a proper natural science, we must realize that psychology and pneumatology must understand what they observe as nascent states of being. Only then will they throw light on those matters that natural science wants to illuminate. But what is this “nascent” or “initial state?”

Now this nascent state is in the outer world, not within. It is what I see when I behold the green tapestry of plants, the world of colors—red, green and blue—and the sounds that are out there. What are these fleeting formations that modern-day physics, physiology and psychology regard only as subjective? They are the elements from which the worlds of the future create themselves. Red is not engendered by matter in the eye or the brain, red is the first, semblance-like, seed of future worlds.

If you know this, you will also want to know something about what will correspond in these future worlds to the corpse-like element. It will not be what we found earlier in our physics and chemistry, it will be the corpse of the future. We shall recognize what will be the corpse of the future, the future element of death, if we discover it already today in the higher organization of man, where astral body and ego are active. By experiencing the final condition there in reference to the initial one, we at last gain a proper comprehension of the nervous system and the brain insofar as they are dead, not alive. In a certain sense, they can be more dead than a corpse, inasmuch as they transcend the absolute point of death—especially in the case of the nervous system—and become “more dead than dead.” But this very fact makes the nervous system and the brain bearers of the so-called spiritual element—because the dead element dwells in them, the final state not yet even reached by outer nature—because they even surpass this final state.

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In order to find psychology and pneumatology in the outer world, we shall have to discover how the inanimate, the dead, dwells in the human organism; namely, in the head organization and in part of the rhythmic organization, mainly that of breathing. We must look at our head and say of it that it is constantly dying. If it were alive, the growing, sprouting living matter could not think. But because it gives up life and constantly dies, the soul-spiritual thoughts, endowed with being, have the opportunity to spread out over what is dead as new living, radiant semblance.

You see, here lie the great tasks that, by means of the historical manner of observation result quite simply from natural science. If we don't take hold of them, we move like ghosts through the present development of science, and not with the consciousness that an epoch that has begun must find a way to continue. You can imagine that much of this is contained implicitly in what science has discovered. Scientific literature offers such indications everywhere. But people cannot yet distinguish clearly; they like what is chaotic. They don't care clearly to contemplate physics and chemistry on one hand, and psychology and pneumatology on the other, because then they would have to consider seriously the inner and outer aspects. They prefer to vacillate in the murky waters between physics and chemistry. Due to this, a bastard science has arisen that has become the darling of natural research and even philosophy; namely, physiology. As soon as the real facts are discovered, physiology will fall apart into psychology on the one hand—a psychology that is also a perception of the world—and on the other, into chemistry, meaning a chemistry that is also a knowledge of man.

When these two are attained, this in-between science, physiology, will vanish. Because today you have a morass in which you can find everything, and because by juggling a bit to the left or the right, it is possible to find a bit of a soul or a corporeal element, people do quite well. The physiology of today is what above all must disappear as the last remnant of former conceptions that have become muddled. The reason physiological concepts are so abstruse is that they contain soul and corporeal elements that are no longer distinguished, thus they can play around with words and even juggle the facts. One who aims for clear insight must realize that physiology amounts in the end to fibbing with words and facts.

Until we admit this, we can't take the history of natural science seriously. Science does not proceed only from undetermined past ages to our time, it continues on from the present. History can only be understood, if one comprehends the further course of things, not in a superstitious, prophetic sense but by beginning now to do the right thing. And infinitely much needs to be set right, particularly in the domain of science. Natural science has grown tall; it is like a nice teenager, who at the moment is going through his years of unpolished adolescence, and whose guidance must be continued so that he will become mature. Science will mature, if murky areas like physiology disappear, and physics and pneumatology arise again in the way outlined above. They will come into being, if the anthroposophical way of thinking is applied in earnest to science. This will be the case, when people feel that they are learning something, when somebody speaks to them of a real physics, a real chemistry, a real psychology and pneumatology; when they no longer have the urge to comprehend everything concerning the world and the human being through bastardized chaotic sciences like physiology. Then, the development of human knowledge will once again stand on a sound basis.

Naturally, therapy is particularly affected and suffers under present-day physiology. You can well imagine this, because it works with all manner of things that elude one's grasp, when one begins to think clearly.

We cannot confront the great challenges of our time with a few anthroposophical catchwords and phrases. It also does not suffice to dabble with physiology on the borderline between psychology and chemistry. The only way to proceed is to apply the methods of spiritual-scientific anthroposophy to physics and chemistry. If you are lazy—forgive me for this harsh expression, I don't mean it in such a radical sense in this case—you say: These matters can only be correctly judged, if one is clairvoyant. Therefore I will wait until I am clairvoyant. I won't venture to criticize physics and chemistry or even physiology.

My dear friends, you need not have insights that surpass ordinary perception in order to know that a corpse is dead and that it must have originated in life. Neither do you need to be clairvoyant in order to analyze properly the true facts of today's physics and chemistry, and to refer them back to their underlying living element, once your attention is directed to the fact that this living element is to be found by studying the “lower man.” There you will have the supplement you need for chemistry and physics. Make the attempt, for once, really to study the mechanism of human movement.⁸⁶ Instead of constantly drawing axis of coordinates and putting the movements into them apart from man; instead of multiplying differential coefficients and integrals, make a serious attempt to study the mechanics of movement in man. As they were once experienced from within, so do you now study them from without. Then you will have what you need, to add to your outer observation of nature, in physics and chemistry.

In outer nature, those who proclaim atomism will always put you in the wrong. They even work themselves up to the very spiritual statement that when one speaks about matter in the sense of a modern physicist, matter is no longer material. The physicists, themselves are saying it;⁸⁷ our very opponents are saying it. In this case they are right, and if we in our replies to them stop short at the half-truths—that is to say, at the final conditions of being—we shall never be equal to that which issues from them.

Here lie the tasks of the specialists, here lie the tasks of those who have the requisite preliminary training, in one or another branch of science.

Then we shall not establish a physicized or chemicized Anthroposophy, but a true anthroposophical chemistry, anthroposophical physics. Then we shall not establish a new medicine as a mere variation on the old, but a true anthroposophical medicine.

The tasks are at hand. They are outlined in all directions. Just as the simple heart can receive the observations that are scattered everywhere in our lectures or lecture cycles, and that give spiritual sustenance, so too the need is to take up on every hand the hints that can lead us to the much-needed progress in the several domains of science.

In the future, it will not suffice if man and nature do not again become one. What physics and chemistry study in nature as the final state of being, must be supplemented by the state of being in “lower man” belonging to the realm of physics and chemistry—in man who is dependent on the physical and etheric bodies. It is important that this be sought. It is not important to single out as essential the valences of the structural formulas or the periodic law in chemistry, because these are but schemata. While they are quite useful as tools for counting and calculations, what matters is the following realization. If the chemical processes are externally observed, the chemical laws are not within them. They are contained in the origin of chemical processes. Hence, they are found only, if, with diligent effort, one tries to seek in the human being for the processes that occur in his circulation, in the activity of his fluids, through the actions of the etheric body. The explanation of the chemical processes in nature lies in the processes of the etheric body. These in turn are represented in the play of fluids in the human organism and are accessible to precise study.

Anthroposophy poses a serious challenge in this direction. This is why we have founded research institutes⁸⁸ in which serious, intensive work must begin. Then the methods gained from anthroposophy can be properly nurtured. This is also the main point of our medical therapy; namely, that the old, confused physiology finally be replaced with a real chemistry and psychology. Without this one can never assert anything about the processes of illness and healing in human nature, because every course of illness is simply an abnormal psychological process, and each healing process is an abnormal chemical process. Only to the extent that we know how to influence the chemical process of healing and how to grasp the psychological course of illness will we attain to genuine pathology and therapy. This will emerge from the anthroposophical manner of observation. If one does not want to recognize this potential in anthroposophy, then one only wants something a bit out of the ordinary and is unwilling to get to work in earnest. Actually, everything that I have sketched here is only a description of how the work should proceed, because a genuine psychology and chemistry come into being through work. All the prerequisites for this work already exist, because very man facts can be found in scientific literature that researchers have accidentally discovered but don't understand. Those of us who work in the spirit of anthroposophy should take up these facts and contribute something to their full comprehension. Take as an example what I emphasized yesterday⁸⁹ in speaking to a smaller group of people. The essential point about the spleen is that it is really an excretory organ. The spleen itself is in turn an excretion of the functions in the etheric body. Countless facts are available in medical literature that need only be utilize—and that is the point: they should be utilized—then the facts will be brought together and what is needed will result.

A single person might accomplish this if a human life spanned six hundred years. But by that time, other tasks would confront him and his accomplishments would long since be outmoded. These things must be attained through cooperation, through people working together. So this is the second task—we must see to it that this becomes possible. I believe that these tasks of the Anthroposophical Society will emerge most clearly and urgently from a truly realistic study of the history of natural science in recent times.

This history shows us at every turn that something great and wonderful has arisen through modern science. In earlier times, the truly inanimate dead aspects could never be discerned, hence, nothing could be made of them. In those times inward semblance could never really be observed; therefore, it couldn't be brought to life by human effort, and hence, one couldn't arrive at freedom. Today, we confront a grandiose world, which became possible only because natural science studies the dead aspects. This is the world of technology. Its special character can be discerned from the fact that the word “technique” is taken from the Greek. There, it still signifies “art,” implying that art reveals, where technology still contains spirit. Today, technology only utilizes spirit in the sense of the abstract, spirit-devoid thoughts. Technology could be achieved only by attaining a proper knowledge of what is dead. Once in the course of humanity's evolution it was necessary to concentrate upon the dead; it thus entered into the realm of technology. Today, man stands in the midst of this realm of technology that surrounds him on all sides. He looks out on it and realizes that here at last is a sphere in which there is no spirit in the proper sense. In regard to the spiritual element, it is important that in all areas of technology human beings experience this inner feeling, almost akin to one of pain over the death of a person. If feeling and sensation can be developed in knowledge, then such a feeling will arise, somewhat like the sensation one experiences when a person is dying and one sees the living organism turn into a corpse. Alongside the abstract indifferent cold knowledge, such a feeling will arise through the true realization that technology is the processing of the inanimate, the dead. This feeling will become the most powerful impetus to seek the spirit in new directions.

I could well imagine the following view of the future: Man looks out over the chimneys, the factories, the telephones—everything that technology has produced in wondrous ways in the most recent times. He stands atop this purely mechanical world, the grave of all things spiritual, and he calls out longingly into the universe—and his yearning will be fulfilled. Just as the dead stone yields the living fiery spark if handled correctly, so from our dead technology will emerge the living spirit, if human beings have the right feelings about what technology is.

On the other hand, one need only understand clearly what pure thinking is; namely the semblance from which can be brought forth the most powerful moral impulses—those individual moral impulses that I have described in my Philosophy of Freedom. Then, in a new way, man will face the feeling that was once confronted by Nicholas Cusanus and Meister Eckhart. They said: When I life myself beyond everything that I am ordinarily accustomed to observe, I come to “nothingness” with all that I have learned. But in this “nothingness” there arises for me the “I.” If man really penetrates to pure thinking, then he finds in it the nothingness that turns into the I and from which emerges the whole wealth of ethical actions, that will create new worlds. I can imagine a person who first lets all knowledge of the preset, as inaugurated by natural science, impress itself on him and then (centuries after Meister Eckhart and Nicholas Cusanus) turns his gaze inward and with today's mode of thinking arrives at the nothingness of his inner life. In it, he discovers that the spirit really speaks to him. I can imagine that these two images merge. On the one hand, man goes to the place where barren technology has left the spirit behind. There he calls out into cosmic expanses for the spirit. On the other hand, he stops, thinks and looks within himself. And here, out of his inner being, he receives the divine answer to the call he sent out into the distances of the universe.

When we learn, through a new, anthroposophically imbued natural science, to let the calls of infinite longing for the spirit, sent out into the world, resound in our inner being, then this will be the right starting point. Here, through an “anthroposophized” inner perception, we will find the answer to the yearning call for the spirit, desperately sounded out into the universe.

I did not want to describe the development of natural science in recent times in a merely documentary fashion. Rather, I wanted to show you the standpoint of a human being, who comprehends this natural-scientific development and, in a difficult moment of humanity's evolution, knows the right things to say to himself in regard to the progress of mankind.

• 83. See Drawings, pages 92, 95 and compare with the ones on page 125.
• 84. See footnote 45.
• 85. See Rudolf Steiner, The Karma of Vocation (Spring Valley, NY: Anthroposophic Press, 1984).
• 86. Literature: Adolf Fink has studied the mechanism of human movement and the heat produced by muscular work, and published in 1857, 1869, and 1882 Gesammelte Schriften, (1903–06 in German).
• 87. In the beginning of the century Rudolf Steiner pointed to the speech of the philosopher and Prime Minister A.J. Balfour of August 17, 1904, in front of the British Association, immediately after it was held; see Rudolf Steiner, Lucifer Gnosis (Dornach: Rudolf Steiner Verlag, 1969), GA Bibl. No. 34, p. 467. Often Steiner also mentioned the lecture of Max Planck of 1910: “Die Stellung der Neueren Physic zur Mechanischen Weltanshaung” in Max Planck, Physikalische Abhandlungen und Vorträge (Brunswick, Germany, 1958), Vol. 3, pp. 30–46.
• 88. In 1920 a research institute was founded in Stuttgart for physics and chemistry, with a biological branch through the joint stock company “Der Kommende Tag.” A few years later it was transferred to Dornach. The first works from the Institute were published in Der Kommende Tag: Scientific Research Institute News. It contains Heft I (1921), “Milzfunktion und Blaettchen Frage” von L. Kolisko; Heft II (1923), “Der Villardsche Versuch” von Dr. Rer. Nat. R.E. Maier; Heft III (1923): “Physiologischer und Physicalischer Nachweis Kleinster Entitaeten” von L. Kolisko. Later works appeared in the volumes Gaea Sophia, Jahrbuch der Wissenschaftlichen Sektion der Freien Hochschule fuer Geisteswissenschaft am Goetheanum, Volume I (1926), etc.
• 89. From this scientific discussion of January 5 no known copy exists.

(from the 2nd German Edition, abridged).

NOTE BY EDITOR: The following pages are notes of collective conversations with Dr. Steiner on various occasions.

After the more or less harmful effects of mineral fertilisers had been referred to, Dr. Steiner said on one occasion: In view of the obvious increase in output which people today seem to, think necessary, this kind of fertiliser might perhaps not be dispensed with. But the harmful effects upon man and animal will not fail to ensue. Some of these effects will appear only after several generations have passed. Remedies, therefore, have to be found in time. Such remedies are e.g. the leaves of fruit trees. It can be recommended, therefore, to plant fruit trees around arable land.

In another discussion, Dr. Steiner spoke of the value of horn meal (ground horns and claws of cattle) as a fertiliser. He said that horn meal was one of the very best fertilisers if mixed with farmyard manure. The horn meal should not be sharply baked; the fresh horn meal is better because of its higher content of hydrogen. Hydrogen, Dr. Steiner said, is more important for its effect on the soil even than nitrogen. The Science of today has not yet discovered the importance of hydrogen for plant growth.

(Taken from a conversation between Dr. Steiner and Dr. chem. Streicher)

Dr. Streicher complained that modern agriculture confined itself to replacing in the soil the nitrogen, phosphoric acid and potassium, just as Liebig had suggested decades ago. Great danger arises from the nitrogen being compounded with very strong acids, which cause acidity of the soil and in case of drought in summer may become disastrous.

DR. STEINER: Actually, the only healthy fertilizer is cattle, manure. This should be our starting point. In addition to this a principle has to be found whereby a healthy nitrogen content of the soil may be brought about. I cannot yet tell how this can be done; it ought to be a principle which causes the earthworms and similar animals to “work the soil through.” Besides this, certain weeds have to be discovered which should be planted in the neighbourhood of the field. It is, for example, important to plant sainfoin on rye and wheat fields—at least along the edge. This influence actually exists. You have to test rationally [“rational” is often used by Dr. Steiner in the sense of Goethe, as opposite to mere empiricism.] by experiment the fact that it is good to have horse radish planted along the edge of potato fields, and corn flowers grown among corn and to have the poppies destroyed. It is such things as these which have to be considered in studying the whole problem of fertilizers. Otherwise you arrive at abstract principles and confine yourselves to the mere neutralisation of the acidity of the soil. This would kill step by step the fertility of the soil; it would make it “deaf” (taub).

Neither should one fall into the other extreme and use only plant manure. This is without doubt unfavourable to plant growth. The only ideal fertilizer is cattle manure. Besides this much depends on plant association, e.g. leguminous plants, especially sainfoin. And care should be taken to place all herbaceous plants in a dry soil, whereas cereals need a moist soil.

But importance certainly attaches to the personal human relation of the sower to the seed (paradoxical as this may seem to the modern chemist and biologist). If you observe carefully you will find a different effect produced by the way in which the sower proceeds, whether he simply takes the seed from out of the sack and flings it down, or whether he is accustomed to shake it a little in his hand and to strew it gently on the ground. These differences are of importance for the problem of manuring and it would be good to discuss them with interested farmers for they have experience in the things which are beginning to be lost in modern agriculture. I would advise you to examine old agricultural calendars to find hints on the problem of manuring. They contain ideas which sound strange but which could be formulated in chemical terms.

[DR. STREICHER here mentioned that the critical situation of the farmer has been aggravated by the infectious diseases which decimated the livestock last year, and by the shortage of food.]

DR. STEINER: Scientists should have the courage to point out where the principal harm is done. Stable feeding, which has been unduly praised in late years, has no doubt some connection with cattle tuberculosis as well as with the fact that the yield of milk is increased for a time and so on. The state of health, however, declines of course in the subsequent generations. And it is certain that the dung which the farmer's wife gathers in her basket or collects with a shovel from the meadow is better than the dung produced in stable-feeding.

Moreover, the animal should be prevented from taking in the breath of its neighbour while feeding. This is harmful. In walking across the pastures, you will see that the animals graze at some distance from each other, because they do not want to have the breath of the neighbour near themselves. It may also happen that an animal gets some little sores and if the breath of another animal touches this wound it will undoubtedly be a cause of disease.

[DR. STREICHER indicated that there are tendencies in modern agriculture to feed livestock directly on urea and to avoid the “indirect” way of feeding them on plants; the urea is gained from synthetic nitrogen. People think that the farding bag (rumen) of the cow contains certain bacteria which decompose the urea and builds it up into albumen. If these experiments are adopted in practice by farmers, the deterioration of the livestock may be intensified.]

DR. STEINER: With experiments of this kind no true results can be attained. We have to realise that in the sphere of vitality there is always present the law of inertia, if I might call it so. The effects may not manifest themselves in this or the following, but certainly they will do so in the third generation. The workings of the vital force will meantime veil the result. If such experiments deal only with one generation, you get quite a wrong impression. In the third generation one will have effects which have their cause in the feeding of the grand-parent animals, but science will seek for the causes elsewhere. Vitality cannot be broken down at once, but only in the course of generations.

DR. STREICHER mentioned experiments of the English botanist Bottomley who succeeded in producing in peat moss a certain bacterial life., which results in decomposing the humus substance to other unknown substances, which have a stimulating effect upon plant growth. He calls them `Auximones’ and puts them on the same level as biologists do vitamins.

DR. STEINER: If these substances are used to stimulate the growth of plants destined for human food, no ill results may appear in those who eat this food. But their children will perhaps be born with hydrocephalus. The procedure shows that the plants will become hypertrophied and if they serve as food, the nerve life of the succeeding generations deteriorates. One has to realise that certain effects upon the life process do not manifest themselves until the succeeding or even the third generation. Research has to be extended as far as this.

DR. STREICHER said that experiments of a scientist in Freiburg have shown that organic compounds of quicksilver have an extraordinarily stimulating effect upon vegetable growth« People hope that in this way vegetables can be produced in a very short time. The plants exhibit signs of hypertrophy.

Dr. STEINER: In this case one should find out whether the children of those who consume them become impotent. All this has to be considered. Experiments must not be carried out in too restricted a sphere, because the vital process is something which goes on in “Time,” and only in course of years does it degenerate in its inherent forces.

Further Indications on Agriculture given by Rudolf Steiner.

DR. STEINER in answer to a question by Herr Stegemann.: In sowing oats one should take care that the soil is dry; the same applies to potatoes and root crops. [Wheat and rye on the other hand should be sown in moist soil.] As marginal plants for cereals, Dr. Steiner named deadnettle and sainfoin; they should be planted at a distance of 4½ to 5½ yards. Turnips and potatoes can be surrounded by horseradish; this need only be planted at the four corners of the field and must be removed every year.

Animal pests, Dr. Steiner said, will vanish gradually with the cultivation of new kinds of plants.

To combat wireworms, Dr. Steiner recommended the exposure of rain water to the waning moon for a fortnight. The water must be poured on the places where the wireworms occur and must moisten the ground as deep as the worms go.

In order to prevent the degeneration of the potato, he recommended that seed potatoes be cut into small pieces with one eye only in each. This process should be repeated the following year.

To a question by Count von Keyserlingk: As a remedy against rust, the field can be surrounded with a border of stinging nettles.

Manure heaps should be carried out to the field and remain there until they are wanted.

Dr. Steiner recommended that an orchard on peaty ground be treated with Kali Magnesia.

On looking at the flower garden at Whitsuntide, 1924, Dr. Steiner said: “The flowers do not seem to be quite happy here| there is too much iron in the soil.” On coming to the roses, which were not flowering well and were suffering from mildew, he recommended that very finely distributed lead should be added to the soil.

When he was questioned about the enormous number of cow horns that would surely be necessary for treating the 30,000 acres at Koberwitz, Dr. Steiner gave the astonishing reply that when all measures were fully applied, as few as 150 cow horns would suffice.

When asked about sainfoin, his instructions were to use about 2 lbs. for sowing with one acre of corn.

To combat snails and slugs, Dr. Steiner recommended that a solution of 3-in-100 seed of conifers should be sprayed. This is understood to mean: obtain the sap of these seeds by pressure, dilute it in the proportion of 3:1000 of water and spray this on to the plant beds. Dr. Steiner encouraged such an experiment. Similar experiments should be made elsewhere. On a walk through the fields at Arlesheim and Dornach, Dr. Steiner told those who were with him that to increase the vigour of Preparation 500 for use upon meadows .and fields with fruit trees the following should be done: Take some fruit and a handful of leaves of the fruit trees in question and boil them in ¼ gallon of water so as to form a kind of infusion, then add this “fruit tea” when the content of the cow horn is stirred in the pail.

In order to strengthen diseased and weak fruit trees a 4-irich deep trench can be made around the stem at a distance corresponding to the crown of the tree and into this a considerable quantity of the diluted and stirred cow horn preparation (Nr. 500) can be poured.

Referring to the silica preparation (Nr. 501), Dr. Steiner said that it might even suffice to take a lump of quartz the size of a. bean and knead it with moist soil from the ground on which the preparation later on is to be sprayed; this mixture to be filled into the horn. If little pieces of it are diluted and stirred with water, this will hold sufficient silica-radiation.

Marginal plants for vegetables in the garden: sainfoin, dandelion and horseradish.

Concerning plant diseases, Dr. Steiner said that plants actually cannot be ill because the etheric principle is always healthy. When troubles appear, they show that the environment of the plants, and especially the soil, is out of order. Thus the soil has to be treated, not the plant. As an example, he recommended the strengthening of aged trees by taking fresh soil from the roots of blackthorn (Prunus spinosa) and birch and spreading that around the roots of the trees.

One can make the weed-destroyer (pepper) more effective by burning the root-stock together with the seeds of the weed in question.

(Report by Ehrenfried Pfeiffer)

Some years before the war, when asked about the use of human faeces, Dr. Steiner gave a warning against the use of them because the circle from man to plant and from the (manured) plant back to man is too short. The way should lead from man to plant, from plant to animal, from animal to plant and then back again to man.

Peat moss as a means of soil improvement was more than once rejected by Rudolf Steiner. It is, he said, neither suitable as manure nor for improving the physical condition of the soil. We ought to add humus again' and again in every form instead: as compost, leaf mould, etc.

To a question concerning mineral manure (cf. page 39, 47 of this lecture course) Dr. Steiner replied: If one is compelled to use it, one has always to mix it up with liquid or solid stable manure. The use of liquid matter from the closet he strongly objected to; neither should this be poured on fresh compost “even if the soil is not to be used for four years, it will still contain what is harmful.”

Under trees infested with Woolly Aphis, nasturtium (Tropaeolum) should be planted in a circle.

In the morning, Rudolf Steiner was visited by Emil Molt, Hans Kühn and Roman Boos in the “Gruppe” workroom.

Rudolf Steiner: It is quite terrible how little understanding there is in Germany of foreign policy. Even social policy must be treated as foreign policy today, because if the foreign policy is bad, all the fruits of a good social policy would only go to the Entente. - At all costs, further bloodshed should be avoided in Germany through rapid intervention. This will hardly be avoidable in Berlin anyway. For me, the most important task at the moment is to give the four lectures in Zurich. There is an international audience there. I will send these lectures to print immediately afterwards.

January 25, 1919, in the afternoon, at Hansi's house

Roman Boos begins by reporting on the socio-political commission of the “Federation of Intellectual Workers” in Stuttgart and the draft of the “memorandum”, and Emil Molt on the previous socialization efforts in Württemberg and the fact that belonging to the Anthroposophical Society has been perceived as compromising.

Rudolf Steiner: The most important thing is foreign policy. Above all, things like what is happening in Paris should be prevented. Poincare's speech, for example, has gone unchallenged. It is absolutely necessary to give a presentation of the outbreak of war from a suitable place. (Rudolf Steiner asks about Professor Wilhelm von Blume, but suggests that he does not expect much from this approach.) It is an absurdity that Ebert, Scheidemann and Erzberger are making peace. They let everything happen. The necessity to speak about the actual causes of the war is of the utmost importance.

Emil Molt asks: Would something be possible with Eisner?

Rudolf Steiner: Eisner has begun to address the question of guilt, but has not pursued it further. It would be possible to approach Eisner. He is a bit of a fantasist, but he is receptive. Graf Lerchenfeld would not be the right person; there are class prejudices. He also has a habit of playing hide and seek. He does not say anything about spiritual science being behind it, and then you notice it anyway.

Emil Molt reports on Heydebrand's attempts in Berlin, also concerning] Prince Leopold.

Rudolf Steiner: Heydebrand is unsuitable because of his name. Prince Leopold was considered a great personality, but when I saw him, I thought he was a bit of a fool. As for Heise's book: Heise is not a writer. You would have to sift through the material. Heise also presents it one-sidedly. Regarding Mrs. Kautsky (with whom Heydebrand was): I knew her when she was still a young aunt, now she will be an old aunt. A publication of the war genesis by the Foreign Office would be done by Kautsky. But he can't do that. He writes in a style that only party members can understand. It would have to be discussed in a way that is understandable to an international audience, especially from the German side, about the causes of the whole catastrophe.

Without considering foreign policy, especially the question of guilt, we will get nowhere. It is disastrous that there is no interest in foreign policy in Germany. One must describe where it leads when nothing is done in this regard. One can calculate this in numbers, as Rathenau did in “Zukunft”. This appeal by Rathenau should be distributed in leaflets. One should tell people: This is what happens when you do not take up the spiritual impulses!

Roman Boos notes that Carl Unger wants to publish a lecture. Rudolf Steiner does not address this. He points to the signature under “The Guiding Thoughts of the Federation of Spiritual Workers” and says:

Rudolf Steiner: “Federation of Spiritual Workers” is a Bolshevik method.

In response to a question from Emil Molt, he explicitly confirms that it is not right to distribute these ideas anonymously and not to keep the magazine in his own hands.

Emil Molt suggests to Rudolf Steiner that they work out “something we can all sign”. He suggests founding a federation where Rudolf Steiner could appear.

Rudolf Steiner: There should already be a backing.

Emil Molt: The Anthroposophical Society is not suitable for this; it is not supposed to deal with politics.

Rudolf Steiner: Why? Who says that?

The three (in unison): The draft statutes.

Rudolf Steiner: But these are from 1911 and were long ago wiped out by the war. The Anthroposophical Society can certainly deal with politics. I always talk about politics too.

The three of them: Dr. Unger as well. But not the Society as such.

Rudolf Steiner: Why not?

The three of them: Otherwise a situation could develop like the one with the politicized Entente Freemasonry.

Rudolf Steiner: It would have been very good if German masonry had embarked on such great political plans.

Hans Kühn: Could the Society act as a party?

Rudolf Steiner: It is not an association, only a society. The individual has complete freedom. One does not need to choose this name for a party. Non-Anthroposophists should also be accepted as members.

Addendum

Rudolf Steiner: What am I supposed to do in Berlin? There is no point in giving lectures. The threads will not be picked up after all. Mrs. Kinkel, for example, is a very nice lady. But when people come to inquire after a lecture and she takes them around the branch house and tells them something, it is of no use.

We have to wait until people see that they can't do anything. They will prove that they can't achieve anything, they will run themselves into the ground.

When Roman Boos' draft of the memorandum was handed over:

Rudolf Steiner: “We will talk about it then.” Not so much about the content as about the way it is presented. It's easy to make a mistake with this.

Address by Rudolf Steiner before his Departure for Stuttgart

My dear friends! Since my departure has been delayed a little, I am now able to say a final farewell to you. You are aware, of course, that I am now leaving behind the care here in Switzerland for the publication of the essay on the social question, which has just been completed and which I hope will appear quite soon. After what I said here last Monday, I would like to once again strongly recommend this essay to you. I have indeed expressed the hope that here in Switzerland, in particular, something can be done in the sense intended by this writing, and in a particularly fruitful way, for the reason that in Eastern and Central Europe what has to happen first, what is an urgent necessity, has already been challenged, so to speak, by the immediate pressure for the very near future. Here in Switzerland, traditional conditions will continue for a while. Here, therefore, people are still able to do of their own free will many things that others are forced to do.

Now it so happens in our present human development that only that which happens out of free will, out of the free initiative of people, can be particularly fruitful, truly fruitful. If only people could pull themselves together in places where it is still possible without being forced by the terrible facts of the matter, if only they could be roused to do of their own free will what can ultimately only be recognized in a spiritual-scientific way, something tremendously significant could be achieved through this initiative of free will. For this reason, it may now be said, even on Swiss soil, that very special hopes are possible here.

Now, my dear friends, you know that what has been striven for as anthroposophical spiritual science for almost two decades has experienced many, many trials. It is to be assumed that what is expressed in this social writing will initially be met with strong opposition from many who are unable to rethink, because it still appeals to a broader, much broader public. People will find all sorts of objections: impracticality, fantastic flights of fancy, contradictions. People will take particular issue with the latter because the writing is taken from life and real practice, and life and practice themselves have contradictions, so it is easy to find contradictions in them. The philistines, the philistines, all those who like to grovel for contradictions, will have a rich pickings; all those things that, as you have often heard and also otherwise know, come from originate from gossip, which are actually such that one would not want to deal with them at all, and only has to deal with them again and again because there are always members of our society who cannot take the right view of things. I am always amazed, though, that – while my coherent literary work of world view has been available since the beginning of the 1980s and its most essential features can be examined by anyone in terms of its value and content – there are always people, even among the members, who cannot find the right point of view to naturally reject all the stupidities that arise when, for example, it is said here or there, as is now being said from a particularly foolish side, that what I have taught comes from this or that source, from this or that mysterious place or from this or that person; that not all our members are clever enough to object: Yes, the works have been available since the 1980s. And what kind of foolish, stupid things do you gossip about? It is not necessary to judge by gossip what has been publicly available for decades; the fact that not all of our members have already become so clever is something that could fill us with a certain bitterness. Because what is to be judged here is quite obvious to everyone, it is available to everyone. And when people still come to me and keep asking: “Is it true? Is it true?” and so on, there is a channel where this and that is said. All the material to refute the things is there. They have been around for a long time, in printed form. These are things that naturally, my dear friends, will also be attached to what is really coming out of the revelations of humanity right now, through this social intention that is emerging in this book. And so I would like to add a few words here today, that there should at least be a certain number among our members who understand what is being put into the world in the right way and really take it in terms of its content, not according to all kinds of mysterious ideas and suggestions and so on. It is not necessary, my dear friends, that we always color our things from mysterious hints, but our real task is to step forward boldly and fearlessly with what results from the deepest demands of the present, and to stand up for it in such a way that today only the anthroposophist can actually stand up for these things. For anthroposophy should not only give people something that they can think in one way or another. However strange it may sound, my dear friends, what is a major demand of the present day is that people become wiser. And anthroposophy should help people in all areas of life to become wiser, to make them more agile in their thinking, to give them what people today so sorely lack: the possibility of being convinced of something.

Yes, my dear friends, consider in this area what is perhaps one of the most necessary things in the present day. In response to that appeal, which appeared some time ago, which could have been read by thousands of people, which has been much discussed, even in response to this appeal, some characteristic personalities have said that they cannot understand what is in it. Yes, my dear friends, that is precisely the most saddening thing, that people who for years, in the last difficult, catastrophic years for humanity, have believed everything, have been able to understand everything that they have been ordered to believe, that people who are quite willing to accept what have nothing but an order from above, that they welcome that which appeals to their freedom, to their free understanding, simply when it does not run in the usual lines of thought, so that they say, 'Yes, there you need more detailed explanations, you can't understand that'. That is already one of the saddest things in the present, this resistance to being convinced, this brutal response arising from the most terrible lack of understanding of the demands of humanity: “You can't understand that, it's abstract, or something like that. It is precisely those people who, under the terrible straitjacket of censorship, or the censorship of different countries, have accepted everything, who have parroted every word that has come from above, no matter how idiotic it was, who cannot understand that which appeals to their free minds, to their free souls.

But today we have reached a point where only that which people allow to approach their free understanding will be decisive, only that which people do not allow to be commanded to be understood, but what people want to understand from their innermost being. That is why what a man of the local community recently said to me about the social lecture I gave here is very true: Yes, some people say that they have not understood it: these are just the people who did not want to understand. They did not want to understand. We must always keep this in mind, that must be our strict, straight direction, what is said with these words. That is what it is about. What is needed for the future is not a change of institutions based on old, familiar ideas. What is needed for the future is new ideas, new impulses and, in particular, the awareness that what we have been thinking in the old way is no longer useful.

And the present faces a momentous decision. You of all people should not keep coming back with: But that has already been said, that has been said, that has been said. Of course, many things have been said. But that is not the point. What it is about is summarizing from a broad perspective, from the perspective that follows from the demands of the immediate present. If we as anthroposophists can stand on this ground, then we will be able to place our personality here or there in the turmoil of the times, so that you can really throw something meaningful, no matter how small, into the present.

In particular, I would like to see anthroposophy bear fruit in this social work. I would not like you to regard these two areas as separate entities, but to see how one can support the other and you are aware that people who have never wanted to listen to any spiritual deepening of the world view in recent times are of course at first as unsuitable as possible to understand those social impulses that are given here. But all the more reason to remember our obligation, once we have the anthroposophical basis, to do something to make things understandable to people. Today, my dear friends, it is not a matter of asking for details at every opportunity. Those who ask for details at every opportunity only want to continue in the old tracks. Today, it is truly not a matter of having things worked out in the most specific details. What is at issue is the great, significant lines of a reorganization of things that extends across the world. And much of what still seems to people today as if they could not do without, much of it will no longer be talked about at all in some time, so it will be swept away.

This sense of being attuned to the times will have to provide the basic nuance for what the ideas and ideals and impulses that have grown on anthroposophical soil have to permeate. From this point of view, I would like to urge you not to take this matter lightly, not to take it lightly. As I said last time, it is not a matter of distorting these things into sectarianism, but it is a matter of thinking these things on a large scale, above all, of thinking that it is important to find as many people as possible who understand the matter. It is not so much the institution that matters today: it is people who understand that matter today. For everything that people think who do not want to understand what today's times demand must first go and will go. You can be quite sure: it will go. It must first go. Only that which those who really want to work with new human feelings strive for has validity. The greatest resistance will arise precisely among the so-called intellectuals, among the so-called educated. They are the least able to think outside the box. This is something we are experiencing again today. There is an example, an example that can illustrate what I am talking about here: a little book about a particular person's mental illness has recently been published in Germany. Of course, there are plenty of “academically trained” doctors who accuse such a booklet of amateurism, contradictions, and insufficient foundations - not well researched by an expert. They claim that you can only judge mental illness if you have observed a person for a long time, if you have been in their environment.

Now, in this case, we are dealing with a person whose actions were laid bare for the whole world to see, discussed daily in the newspapers and so on. The fools who have their academic years, their clinics and their specialization behind them do not consider that the case must be judged quite differently. One must have the courage to look into such things without prejudice today.

That, my dear friends, is anthroposophy, not the mere parroting or inward parroting of the individual content: when you go beyond what is today the ballast of humanity, in the so-called professional world - one could better say, in the professional talk - that gives off the worst impulses. If you can penetrate to an unbiased judgment of these things, then you will have done something tremendous for your soul. Because that is what it is about, that is what we need. Above all, we need a courageous penetration through the wild prejudices that come from science, intelligence, scholarship, and their institutions. Because that is what holds us back the most. Do you believe that all the things that have been dreamed of here and there in terms of social structure can be true? Now, however, people are no longer dreaming because they have experienced not construction but destruction wherever it was discussed. But what has been done? Somehow a few people at the top have been replaced by others – and the whole apparatus, the whole vast apparatus, has remained. Yes, my dear friends, what is the inner basis of this whole apparatus in human nature? During the last four hundred years, people have been educated in their youth – but on what basis? They are brought up by the “All-holder, All-embracing, does it not grasp and hold you, me, itself?” - from the state or from that which is in some way connected to the state: to get a job, to live from this job, to let what is necessary for life be passed to you as passively as possible, and then, from this public institution, I mean, from this res publica, to draw a pension for the time after you have worked, until you die. After all, pensionable or insured positions are particularly what people love. And when death comes, the church assures eternal bliss, to which one comes without having really established an inner connection with the divine that flows and weaves through the world. This life, as it has increasingly taken hold of humanity in recent centuries: to be educated as passively as possible for a job that one does on the orders of this or that public institution, then to receive a pension from the very institution one , and finally, after death, eternal bliss, without knowing how to connect with the soul to the eternal in any way, has educated those people who today face the terribly speaking facts so passively. We must rise above this passivity with a pension and an eternal claim. We must find that which is divine substance within ourselves, we must find the impulses that place us in eternal life. We must place ourselves in this, not in some external institution to which we slavishly surrender. Man must become active, find within himself the impulses that are world impulses. This is what is ultimately most necessary and what underlies the question that may be raised: Yes, but how do people come to arrange their lives comfortably? And so on. That will no longer be possible in any case. And unless you first seek the God in your heart, anthroposophy will not grant you any bliss. Hegel's words remain true: Man is not only eternal after his death, man must be eternal - here in this physical body. That is, he must have truly found that which is eternal in him. These things are all already in anthroposophy; these things also underlie the healthy social ideas, which are now being expressed in writing and which I commend to you. And with this heartfelt recommendation, I would now like to suggest to you, since we have to leave, that we stay together in thought. We should have learned that. Therefore, until we meet again, in whatever way, we will stay together in thought, my dear friends.

In Switzerland, the former Entente countries and the neutral states.

Covering letter from the founding committee of “Kommender Tag” Switzerland, in future “Futurum AG”, regarding the founding prospectus in May 1920.

The undersigned are turning to you with the request that you participate to the greatest extent possible in the share subscription of the joint-stock company “DER KOMMENDE TAG” that is in the process of being founded.

From the outset, the new enterprise should be given the direction of impact that is necessary to approach the tasks that have been set for it, and to which the personalities in its service are dedicated with all their hearts.

It is important that as many shares as possible are taken up by people who are familiar with our ideas and aspirations. Because the larger the share capital subscribed by our friends, the larger the amount that outsiders can participate with can be set. Each subscription from our ranks has not only a dead weight, but also the weight of the amount that can be raised from outside as a result.

The initial capital should amount to at least 500,000 francs. However, it must be increased many times over as quickly as possible. The goal that the founders of the enterprise have set themselves is a distant one. The supranational spiritual healing powers that created the GOETHEANUM must be endowed with the international economic potential to exert a real influence on the ailing economy of the present day.

The scope of the entire undertaking is such that the resources needed for it can only be accumulated over a long period of time. However, since the foundation cannot wait until a capital is available that is sufficient to achieve the set goals, the small initial capital and what is done with it in a way that inspires confidence should be the biggest advertising factor for bringing together the full amount of working capital.

Each of our friends who subscribes for one, ten, one hundred or more shares is giving the personalities who are putting themselves at the service of the economic impact of the spiritual-scientific impulses something to stand on. But precisely by supporting a healthy undertaking that is steering a safe course out of the threatening collapse, he is investing his money in a place where it not only receives an illusory sham cover, but the best cover from the central constructive forces of the social future society.

Dornach, May 1920.

The founding committee:
Dr. Rudolf Steiner,
Dr. Roman Boos, lawyer,
Ernest Etienne, engineer at the Banque Suisse des Chemins de Fer à Bâle, Ingénieur-Directeur des Travaux de Pusine Hydro-Electrique de Chancy Geneve,
Ernst Gimmi, merchant,
Arnold Ich, graduate in economics and engineering.

Rudolf Steiner: Dearly beloved! Allow me to say a few words in advance of our discussion this evening. The subject today will be to speak very specifically about the foundations that can be seen as absolutely practical outpourings of our anthroposophical movement: “Futurum” on the one hand, “The Coming Day” on the other. It may perhaps be recalled that these two foundations did not arise out of nothing, because we have just found that something like this had to happen now in this time of extreme need. It is true that it had to happen now; but on the other hand, it is also true that something like this would have been realized long ago if the possibility had existed. And it is a pity that it had to wait so long until the hardship taught people a few things about these things and until the difficulties that face such things have actually become almost insurmountable. My friends in Basel will remember a remark that I made in a lecture in Basel that now lies far behind us, which may have seemed grotesque to them at the time. I was speaking about the origins of our mystery plays. And I said at the time – of course, it was a thought that was not meant to be quite so paradoxical, paradoxical, accusing – that I would much rather found an anthroposophical bank than stage mystery plays at the highest level, that is, in the realm of purely artistic appearance. At that time, we were still living in a time when it was extremely difficult to make it understood that such a straight line leads from the highest spiritual healing processes into the most practical life. But I think the Basel friends who heard the lecture back then will remember how long it has been since I spoke of such a very practical foundation.

Now, however, it is a matter of the fact that we, having to go to such a foundation, needed the courage to really make something out of the whole anthroposophical way of thinking and attitude and also to make it understandable to the world that something like this must arise today out of the anthroposophical attitude, and in particular out of the education of thinking - including the most practical thinking - that arises out of observing anthroposophical feeling and imagining.

Now, however, things are such that, on the one hand, the facts speak a very eloquent language – for many countries, an all too eloquent language, because the decline is already so far advanced that people simply do not want to admit it. And of course – since not everything is coming to an end at once – it is impossible to admit the decline for a while. Right? Even if a person who used to have something to wear hardly has the opportunity to buy a suit anymore, he can still wear the old suits until they are shabby. And so you can believe that the decline is not yet here. You just wait until the evidence is provided by the suit you are still wearing becoming shabby. This is already the case with much of our economic life and even more so with our intellectual life – not to mention public life.

Now the task is to create something that is so well founded and so well thought out that it can be maintained through its very essence, through the will. But the matter is very difficult, and the work of those who want to devote themselves to these things is truly one that demands all possible dedication. And I would like to say this in advance because I would like to say something in particular that seems important to me.

I just want to add here that for the “Futurum” we have won Mr. Ith right from the start, who is trying with all his dedication to achieve through the “Futurum” what is to be achieved through this “Futurum”. And he will report to you this evening about the “Futurum” from precisely this point of view, and about the intentions and goals, about the next goals, from the point of view from which, at this moment, that is, I would like to say, on October 13, 1920, it must be spoken.

It is self-evident that such a report is only valuable when it comes from the person who is doing the work. A report as such, or even a brochure that is sent around, is only a small part of what is important; a brochure has only one meaning as an expression of what is being done. That is why we wanted to give you the report today, from the very person who heads “Futurum” here.

But there is one thing I would like to emphasize in particular. You see, we had to have the courage to base the whole reasoning of both “Futurum” and “The Day to Come” on anthroposophical principles, if I may put it that way. We must be able to make the world understand that the old economic thinking has been run down because this old economic thinking was only capable of carrying out its calculations to the extent that the approaches and results ranged from production to bringing the goods to market , and because the factor that belongs in these calculations has never been included – that is, what goes on in the minds of the people who work on producing the marketable goods, from the raw product to the finished product that was brought to market. That is what is going on in people's souls. And what is going on there, that was not so much looked at that it really, I would say, is just as much in an accounting context as the numbers that are in the books, in the accounting. But that was left out of the calculations. Our industrial economy only went as far as the completion of the market goods and ignored what was to be included, ignored the people.

And if today it were only a matter of getting the calculation right, which goes from raw products to market goods, then it would be possible to reach some kind of end relatively much faster.

All it would take is to bring the state fanatics [...] to their senses, and so on. But the one thing that has always been left out of the calculation is now making itself felt as a real factor in the turmoil throughout the civilized world and will continue to make itself felt if we refuse to include this factor, despite the fact that people do not want to admit it, who again and again overlook the language of facts that is so loud today.

It is important to keep pointing out the way in which the leading circles slept during the 19th century. What did the leading circles do after all? Statistics, and in a particularly ineffective way. What did they do, these leading circles? Let's say, for example, that they were concerned with founding pansophies, speaking theoretically of the supernatural worlds, all by themselves; they sat together, sometimes even in salons with mirrored windows. They were well heated. But where did the coal come from? As early as the 1940s, the British government established how this coal was mined, of course through statistics, which then revealed it. They published some very strange things, for example, in figures, but these were simply left out of the calculations. The figures showed, for example, that children as young as nine, ten, or eleven were were let down into the coal shafts in the morning before the sun rose, and were brought up in the evening after the sun had set; how men and women sat together by the coals that were thus brought to light, while the others conferred about general moral and lofty ideals. Down below, the naked men and naked women, which did not exactly contribute to the improvement of morality, were standing in the shafts; the children did not see sunlight at all during the whole week except for Sunday!

Now, these things have improved to a certain extent. But what needs to be done in this regard has not been done by those who could do it, and it still needs to be done. But the matter is being ignored. Worldviews are being forged by the stoves that are heated with the coals that are unearthed in this way, and people have no idea of the discrepancy that this creates in the world; they have no idea how the factor that is now rumbling in the world has been left out. The moral and spiritual aspects have been eliminated, but in reality they form a unity with the other.

Therefore, it is not just a matter of founding financial enterprises with a healthy way of thinking and perhaps thinking through how one can apply anthroposophy to practical life, but rather it is a matter of ensuring that such enterprises have a basis. And this support is only possible if those who are able to go with the anthroposophical movement form this support; the support must be in all those personalities who belong to the anthroposophical movement. We must work to ensure that something like the “Futurum” becomes well known in terms of its tendencies, in terms of its goals, that it is maintained by what is disseminated for the understanding of its principles by those who want to profess anthroposophy. Because anthroposophy is not just some theory, but anthroposophy means precisely the force that transforms the whole person and can prepare him to bear life as it must be borne if we want to move towards a possible future, not the barbarization of our entire civilization.

That is why we would like you to hear what is meant by the “Futurum”. Because it depends as much on the response it receives from the world as it does on the sensible attitude and sensible management of the “Futurum” affairs, whether something thrives.

That is why we wanted to ask Mr. Ith to enlighten us this evening about the next goals and the whole essence of “Futurum”.

[The following contributions are made: by Arnold Ich on the “Futurum”, Carl Unger on the “Kommenden Tag” and its operations, Pieter de Haan on experiences in Holland, Francke Fadum from Norway (notes illegible), Eugen Benkendörfer on the drawing of shares. As no questions are asked, Roman Boos closes the meeting with the words:]

Roman Boos: It seems that no more questions will be asked. I assume, therefore, that everyone knows what he has to do with his money.

Economic Society for the International Promotion of Economic and Spiritual Values, Dornach near Basel, concerning the issue of 5,350,000 francs of nominal new shares

Prospectus, October 31, 1920

Series A: preferred shares at Fr. 1,000.
Series B: shares at Fr. 500.
Series C: shares at Fr. 1,000.

Letters of this kind usually end up in the trash. The sensible person understands this. Because more often than not, they promise things that the interested parties have often enough experienced not being fulfilled. But here is a letter that wants to talk about a special kind of economic and financial foundation. One that wants to be so strongly and seriously rooted in the social plight of our time that the founders would like to choose a more effective way of communicating than a brochure. But initially no other way is possible, and so one would like to build on the insight of those who begin to read and are then determined by the seriousness of the matter to read further.

The increasingly difficult global economic situation today, which is leading entire areas of Europe towards decline (see appendix I on the global economic situation), demands new ideas and new economic initiatives that work just as effectively in positive development as the forces that are currently evident in the decline of our culture.

1. The activities of Futurum A.-G.

The company FUTURUM A.-G. (Economic Society for the International Furthering of Economic and Spiritual Values), founded on June 16, 1920, with its headquarters in Dornach, wants to take up its economic activity in the spirit of the positive development referred to above. In order to fulfill its task, it is necessary for FUTURUM A.-G. to expand indefinitely and gradually develop into the economic associations that must be striven for in an emerging economy.¹

The FUTURUM A.-G. should work as a single enterprise in the way that needs to happen on the broadest scale if our ailing economic life is to recover. This is possible only if the sins of omission of the present economy are seen through impartially and consciously avoided in an undertaking that is capable of unlimited expansion.

Today's mode of production is based on pure profit interest. Both the entrepreneur (capitalist) and the wage earner devote themselves to production only from the point of view of profit. Therefore, in reality, the satisfaction of general needs is becoming more and more dependent on the pursuit of profit, while it is the consumption needs that bring the spiritual and moral aspect into social life. They alone give the entire economic life a meaningful basis. Today, production is carried out for the sake of profit, and the needs of consumers are only taken into account insofar as they can be made subservient to the pursuit of personal gain. Economic activity in the sense of meeting needs is considered obsolete. Consideration of the socially harmful consequences of the arbitrary business and production activities of the capitalist and the wage laborer is considered inconvenient because these harmful consequences only become apparent later. We are now in the midst of such social consequences and should therefore be able to understand the real connections between cause and effect in economic life. As a result of not taking consumer needs into account in production, these same needs became, as it were, fair game. We are experiencing this realization today in the revolutionary needs of the masses, which express themselves in strikes, etc. One produces on a tolerable basis and as a reaction one produces the revolt of those needs that arise as the highest possible business profit and as high wages from the interest in profit. A healthy modern economy must be supported by a practical intellectual life that will not advise a production that is based on the result alone, but on a production that arises from the realization of the connection between consumer interests and social conditions. Such companies will not be less profitable than the present ones. They will, however, avoid production methods that are harmful to social life. Our present-day economy is impractical because the scientific knowledge of the present does not provide any insights into the understanding of social interrelations. The ideas emanating from the Goetheanum in Dornach produce such a practical economic way of thinking because they grasp the individual and social nature of the human being. The sins of omission in political economy to date are expressed in the 90% increase in the need for strikes between 1913 and 1919 (see Appendix I).

It is out of such considerations that FUTURUM A.-G. intends to commence its economic activity. The statutes state the purpose of the company as: “the establishment, financing and operation of purely economic and economically-intellectual (educational institutions, scientific research institutes, etc.) enterprises, as well as participation in such. Individual transactions may also be concluded for its own account or for the account of third parties. The company is authorized to establish branch offices in Switzerland and abroad.” This general formulation of the company's statutory purpose can, of course, say nothing about the way in which FUTURUM A.-G. positions itself in practical economic life and how it wishes to be distinguished from other production and financing companies.

1. It is not a company that has been founded for the sole purpose of fighting in today's economic battle in a forward-moving line and thus generating a particularly high dividend. It has been explained above how such ventures gradually erode the economic and, indirectly, their own foundations. Article 29 of the company statutes therefore states, among other things:

“A dividend shall be paid on the share capital which, in line with the prevailing monetary conditions, represents an appropriate interest payment on the nominal value of the share capital."

This provision enables the management to focus on building their companies in a financially sound manner that avoids creating social tensions. The subordination of all business matters to an authoritative dividend policy is thus avoided.

2. The FUTURUM A.G. wants to bring together all those reasonable personalities as shareholders in an economic working group in the form of a joint-stock company who, based on their practical experience, have come to the conclusion that an attempt at reconstruction in this time of crisis can only be based on new ideas, as represented by the threefold social order.

3. The Society seeks to distinguish itself from conventional financial institutions by placing economic and practical considerations rather than profit considerations at the forefront of its financing activities. In today's banking system, capital is only made available in return for high rates of return and extensive collateral (guarantees, pledges, etc.). The lender pays no attention to whether or not these returns are achieved through unsound economic practices. Even if the managers of the companies receiving financial support are unable to guarantee that the capital they borrow will be used appropriately due to a lack of efficiency, a loan will still be granted today as long as the pledged assets or the available guarantees sufficiently secure the loan amounts. FUTURUM A.-G. cannot therefore be characterized as a moneylender. Rather, it seeks to participate in the management of the associated companies as an active business partner. This initially requires a close business relationship between FUTURUM A.-G. and the financed companies. The latter will therefore generally take the form of branches or subsidiaries.

4. It is mainly a matter of financing those undertakings that are designed to place economic life on a healthy associative footing and shape intellectual life in such a way that legitimate talents are brought into a position in which they can be expressed in a socially fruitful way. Furthermore, enterprises such as laboratories, etc. must also be taken over out of social necessity. These can only bear economic fruit after some time and above all through the healthy ideas that are now being introduced into them. This requires that other enterprises be affiliated that are currently profitable and able to cover the temporary loss of the former.

5. In a company like FUTURUM A.G., the managers should receive information, in consultation with representatives of the intellectual life, about the social consequences of economic actions. The assessment of these social effects, together with the economic aspects, will then be decisive for the realization or rejection of a proposed business operation. In this way, the present-day economic principle, which judges an enterprise only by its profit, and which has led to the severe crisis, will be overcome.

6. The realization that economic activity can develop branches that, while temporarily producing favorable results for the individual entrepreneur, have a destructive effect in the context of the social order, is of extraordinary importance for the future. Therefore, in connection with the information on the current global economic situation (Appendix I), it may be said in the introduction that tensions have arisen during the 19th century from the prevailing cultural conditions and attitudes, which could not fail to lead to world wars and social crises.

Many of today's companies are geared towards such socially harmful aspects. On the one hand, the entrepreneur makes a profit out of them and, on the other, generates a loss in the form of social destructive forces that destroy the profits in the economy as a whole. These types of enterprises must therefore be counteracted by those that, based on sound economic thinking and social sensitivity, can be integrated into the social order in a truly fruitful way.

7. A company like FUTURUM A.-G. can initially only overcome the socio-technical and financial crises. But the social difficulties that still arise from the current economic system in the form of the workers' question will also disappear in a company of the kind described, if it is managed correctly.

The socially favorable consequences will practically arise, and the example will be convincing. If a company of this kind begins to falter, the participating workers will work with their convictions to restore its influence. Only by uniting the manual workers with the spiritual leaders of enterprises in one interest, through a way of thinking that affects all classes of people, can the social forces of destruction be counteracted. It is a basic condition for this that the spiritual aspirations be intimately connected with all material intentions.

II. The capital requirements of Futurum A.-G.

In order to approach a task as it has been characterized here, and to be able to carry constructive forces into today's time of crisis as a practical example, FUTURUM A.-G. needs suitable employees and insightful entrepreneurs who are looking for a way to connect their businesses with our corporation in some way. Above all, however, it requires large resources to enable the company to properly tackle its task. Only when it is able to expand without limit can the broad economic basis be gradually created, from which the network of economic associations must grow, placing people in the economic organism in a socially healthy way. The initial capital of FUTURUM A.-G., amounting to 650,000 francs, was raised by the founders within a month. This was to create a concrete basis for advertising the actual initial capital of 6,000,000 francs as coming from a company registered in the commercial register. The objection that a single entrepreneur is not capable of making a significant impact on the economy is unfounded. FUTURUM A.-G. has placed itself squarely in the practical economy with the aim of rapidly expanding and creating the economic instrument with which this impact is to be achieved. Those who want to use their money in a far-sighted way will participate in the subscription of shares in promising companies such as FUTURUM A.-G. and thus work together on the economic reconstruction. If short-sighted people believe that such economic views cannot bear financial fruit, they overlook the fact that clinging to previous economic methods is synonymous with increasing social decline, from which their capital will be destroyed sooner or later. While the consumption of goods continues uninterrupted, production is diminishing more and more as a result of social conflicts. This reduction in manufacturing will soon spread to raw materials and agricultural products, which still exist as reserves today. However, since the available mineral resources can only be added to the social organism through work, the increase in unwillingness to work means a constant decrease in reserves. How the immediate future develops depends on whether a new spirit takes the lead in the individual companies. The FUTURUM A.-G. call for the subscription of new shares is therefore a response to the need to give the company the momentum it needs to bring this spirit into economic life.

Board of Directors' resolution on the new share issue.

FUTURUM A.-G. can only develop its desired activities if it grows quickly and without limits. The Board of Directors has therefore decided to increase the company's capital in stages, with an initial capital increase from CHF 650,000 to CHF 6,000,000 to be carried out immediately after the entry in the Swiss Commercial Register on October 27, 1920. In order to ensure that the company's purpose, as intended by the founders, is carried out, the voting rights of the 650 founders' shares will be increased from one vote to 20 votes each with effect from January 15, 1921. At the same time, it was decided to issue 350 new shares at 1000 francs with the same voting rights, which can only be subscribed by the founding shareholders or brokered by them to new subscribers.

III. Business activities of FUTURUM A.-G.

Since its establishment on June 16, 1920, FUTURUM A.-G. has already developed a lively business activity by acquiring and continuing to operate the fully operational companies G. Holz scheiter & Cie., a knitwear factory in Basel, and Minerva A.-G., an umbrella handle and cane factory in Bönigen (near Interlaken), and continues to operate them for its own account. It also exploits a peat field in the Bernese Seeland as a contractor.

In addition to these production companies, FUTURUM A.-G. has its own trading department in Zurich and a wholesale business in tobacco products. The banking department at the company's headquarters in Dornach accepts funds in the form of loan notes, savings books or current accounts, and also handles asset management, currency exchange and securities transactions.

IV. Excerpt from the statutes of FUTURUM A.-G.

The founding of FUTURUM A.-G. (Economic Association for the International Advancement of Industrial and Cultural Interests) - FUTURUM S.-A. (Societé financière pour le développement international d'intérêts économiques, intellectuels et sociaux) - FUTURUM Co. Ltd. (Economic Association for the international advancement of industrial and cultural interests) - based in Dornach near Basel, was established on June 16, 1920 with a share capital of 650,000 Swiss francs.

The purpose of the company according to the statutes has already been mentioned on page 2 of this brochure.

The duration of the company is unlimited.

The capital stock of 650,000 francs is fully paid up. It is divided into 650 registered shares with a nominal value of 1000 francs each. The Board of Directors is authorized to increase the share capital by issuing new shares up to a maximum of CHF 6,000,000 and to determine the terms and conditions of the issue.

The Board of Directors, which according to the statutes should consist of 3-12 members, currently includes the following members:

Dr. Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, as Chairman.
Dr. Roman Boos, Dornach, as Vice Chairman.
Ernst Gimmi, Zurich, businessman, as Secretary.
Emest Etienne, Chaney-Genève, Chief Engineer of the Swiss Railway Bank, Basel.
Joh. Hirter, Bern, President of the Board of Directors of the Swiss National Bank, Bern.
Paul de Kalbermatten, Luchon (France), Chief Engineer.
Christian Krebs, Paris, Consul and Industrialist.
Fred. Tharaldsen, Christiania, Industrialist.

The members of the Board of Directors perform their duties on a voluntary basis. During their term of office, they must deposit at least one share of the company at a location to be determined by the Board of Directors.

The management consists of one or more persons, who are initially appointed by the founding General Assembly and subsequently by the Board of Directors. The following gentlemen are currently members of the management department:

Arnold Ith, economist and engineer from Schaffhausen in Basel.
Ernst Schaller, Dr. rer. pol. from Lucerne in Dornach.
Adolf Padrutt, businessman from Pagig (Graubünden) in Basel.

The auditors consist of two auditors and one deputy auditor. They are elected by the Annual General Meeting.

The Annual General Meeting is normally convened during the first six months after the end of the financial year. Extraordinary General Meetings are convened as and when required. The Annual General Meeting is convened by the Board of Directors, the management or the auditors. A General Meeting must also be convened if one or more shareholders whose votes represent at least 10% of the share capital request this in a signed petition to the Chairman of the Board of Directors or his deputy, stating the purpose. The invitation is sent by registered letter.

Resolutions of the General Meeting regarding:

1. amendments to the Articles of Association;
2. the reduction of the share capital;
3. the dissolution of the Company,

require a majority of two-thirds of the share capital represented at the vote for their validity. In addition, at least three quarters of the total share capital must be represented for a resolution to dissolve the company. If this is not the case, a second general meeting must be convened at least one month, but no later than forty days, after this date. The resolution of the two-thirds majority of the represented share capital is still legally valid in this second meeting even if less than three quarters of the total share capital is present.

Accounting: The financial year is the calendar year. Within the first four months of the financial year, the management must submit the closing balance sheet, the profit and loss statement and a report on the development of the company's assets and circumstances, together with its proposal for the distribution of the company's profits. The amount of depreciation and any reserves are determined by the board of directors.

The company's net profit is the surplus of assets over liabilities and is distributed in the following order:

1. Five percent shall be allocated to the reserve fund until it reaches or once again equals one tenth of the share capital.
2. The Board of Directors is authorized to allocate further reserves as it sees fit.
3. A dividend shall be paid on the share capital which, in line with prevailing monetary conditions, represents an appropriate return on the nominal value of the share capital.
4. The General Meeting shall decide on the appropriation of any remaining profit.
5. The dividend shall be paid after the balance sheet has been approved by the General Meeting.
6. The reserve fund is the company's working capital and does not bear interest. It serves to cover losses that cannot be offset against the annual profit.

The announcements of the company to the shareholders are made by a written letter and, as far as the legal requirements demand it, in the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce.

Dornach, near Basel (Switzerland), October 31, 1920.
FUTURUM A.-G.
The Board of Directors

Enclosures with this prospectus:
1. The current global economic situation.
2. The economic situation of individual countries.
3. Terms and conditions of issue and subscription certificate.

Appendix I

to the prospectus of October 31, 1920,
by FUTURUM A.-G., Dornach (near Basel),
(Economic Society for the International Furtherance
of Economic and Spiritual Values).

The present world economic situation.

The hopes that many had placed in the economic and political-legal organization of the post-war period have not been fulfilled. The cultural conditions and attitudes of the 19th century gradually gave rise to the social tensions that led to the economic revolution resulting from the political crises of the world war. Today, this revolution in the form of the social question is looming ever larger over the nations. The general economic situation, as will be shown below on the basis of figures, is therefore, whether it is considered as the result of the war or other events, always the direct consequence of these cultural conditions and attitudes, which have developed more and more clearly in recent decades. Its characteristic symptoms are, on the one hand, a decline in the joy of work and in production, and on the other hand, general inflation, social conflicts and increasing debt.

The heavy debt burden that the war brought to individual states amounts to:
the Entente states £24,845 million or 626,590 million francs.
the Central Powers £14,070 million or 354,845 million francs.
the total war costs 38,915 million pounds or 1,000 billion francs.

National debt of various states at the end of 1919.

The following figures have been converted into Swiss francs on the basis of the coin parities.

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This debt burden is accompanied by a reduction in the production of the most essential food and consumer goods, which gives rise to serious concerns. Thus, from 1913 to 1919, there was a reduction in:

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With a more than tenfold increase in the debt burden of the individual states, production has decreased in all countries. This fact justifies the necessity of a huge increase in the burden on the population if the amortization and interest payments on these debts are to be carried out. Transportation, as a factor that serves production, has also suffered major losses. The war's shipping losses are calculated at 15 million tons, worth 40,000 million francs, and the operating and balance sheets of the railways in the various countries have resulted in billions of deficits in recent years. On the one hand, increasing demands are placed on the individual and the state through increasing debt, while on the other hand, their ability to perform is constantly being reduced as a result of decreasing production. This increase in debt and decrease in production results in increased wage demands from workers and growing capital needs of companies, to satisfy which ever larger loans must be taken out. Since, as a result of the decline in production, the credits granted are less and less backed by real values in the form of goods, they increasingly represent fictitious values (unbacked paper money in circulation, fictitious credits, etc.). The increase in unbacked banknotes in circulation and in national debt clearly shows the extent to which such fictitious values have to be used to cover the need for means of payment.

During the course of this year, the issue of paper money has increased further in the former belligerent states. The uninterrupted activity of the banknote press in Central Europe is well known. In addition to banknotes, Germany is now also issuing treasury bills in order to be able to conceal the enormous increase in the number of notes in circulation in the Reichsbank accounts by transferring some of them to these treasury bills. But even Italy could not wait for the success of its new government bond and had to issue a billion new banknotes at the beginning of this year to meet its current cash needs. The increase in national debt, the increase in paper money in circulation and the decline in production have a knock-on effect on the general cost of living, making it alarmingly more expensive. The percentage increase in inflation in the various countries can be seen from the following figures. The last year of peace, 1913, was taken as the base year, with a figure of 100.

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The types of goods used to calculate the increase in inflation from 1913 to 1919/20 vary for the above countries. The figures given therefore cannot be compared directly with each other.

The following table contains the figures for the increase in prices in the individual states, converted to a common basis for comparison. The Swiss price compilations were used as the basis for calculation.

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For the retail prices of the most important foodstuffs, the percentage increase compared to the pre-war period as the basis for calculation (100%) is:

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Even if individual countries such as Switzerland and the United States of America show relatively favorable figures, it should be borne in mind that the global economic interdependence always ensures a certain degree of equalization. Because the more sustained the economic decline of a country is, the more intensively it will try to spread to economically healthier areas. Thus, in such times and in such countries, the national debts of countries facing economic decline, as listed above, mean the impossibility of continuing economic activity. In countries like England, whose economies are on the rise, the large national debts, which would mean economic ruin for Germany, for example, are much less significant. Nevertheless, this upward development in England will only continue as long as the economic decline in the rest of Europe does not undermine the demand for goods and the supply of necessary products for this country as well.

The trade balances in the individual states, the vast majority of which show an increasing surplus of imports over exports, also allow certain conclusions to be drawn about the state of the various national economies.

Trade balances.

Surplus of imports over exports in millions of francs!

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These figures clearly show that the value of exported products is steadily decreasing in comparison to the value of goods imported from abroad. Therefore, a permanent increase in domestic income, at least equal to the surplus of imports over exports, must be created in order to cover this shortfall. If such coverage by creating the necessary national income is not possible, the means of payment must be raised by attacking the national wealth (savings) and by increasing debt (loans and banknote issuance). Such economic management must logically lead to decline. However, the fact that economic management must actually be carried out in this latter way today, because national income is not increasing to a corresponding extent, is clearly shown by the figures given on the decline in production and on the increase in the debt burden and banknotes in circulation. At the recent international finance conference in Brussels, for example, it was clearly stated that the national wealth of Switzerland, a country that was directly spared from the war, has suffered considerable losses since the pre-war period. The surrounding countries were not only forced to incur enormous debts on top of the huge income taxes, but they also had to attack the national wealth itself by legally ordering the surrender of assets. The collapse has thus been set in motion.

America, the huge creditor and supplier of raw materials to European countries, also has an interest in the economic situation of these countries, as shown by Europe's debt to America in mid-1920.

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The seemingly solid economic area of America is also directly affected by the economic crisis, however, with labor unrest and strikes also constantly increasing in that part of the world.

In the United States of North America, the number of strikes and lockouts in 1919 amounted to 3,374, affecting more than 4,000,000 workers. The seven largest strikes there were:

1. Chicago stockyards strike, 65,000 men
2. Sympathy strike in favor of the Tacoma and Seattle machine workers, 50,000 men
3. Atlantic coast longshoremen strike, 100,000 men
4. Strike of the workers in the New York shipbuilding ports 100,000 men
5. Strike in the construction industry in Chicago 115,000 men
6. Massive strike of the steelworkers 367,000 men
7. Massive strike of the coal miners 435,000 men

An approximate idea of the decline in the joy of work and the increase in social conflicts can be gained from the total number of strike days in the most important countries in recent years:

1913 12,000,000 strike days
1918 5,000,000 strike

days (strikes were curtailed by the military dictatorship during the war and by the conscription of the male population into the armed forces).

1919: 1,341 conflicts with 22,750,000 strike days.

The total number of conflicts and strike days for 1920 will be significantly higher than for 1919.

These figures show that the desire to strike in 1919 was 89.8% greater than in 1913. The desire to strike is to be understood as the strikers' need for a means of expressing their general dissatisfaction with the existing social conditions. The following compilation, which only contains information about some of the major labor conflicts in the first half of 1920 and makes no claim to completeness, shows that the corresponding figures for 1920 will express an even greater desire to strike than in 1919.

America:
The two-month dockers' strike in Buenos Aires. The 100,000-strong railway strike in Brazil. Strike by railway workers in the United States of North America.

Asia:
strike by workers in the Japanese ironworks. (Loss of 10 million yen).
strike by 200,000 factory workers in India during the month of February. Various strikes by indigenous workers and Indo-European employees on the coffee and sugar plantations.

Europe:

Strike by Spanish railway workers in March.
Strike by Spanish metalworkers in April.
General strike in Spain.
Strike by Portuguese railway, postal, telegraph and telephone staff in March.
Major labor unrest in Poland.
General strike in Yugoslavia in April.
Strike by Romanian workers in the railway and tramway workshops. Railway strike in France. Italian railway strike. Italian agricultural and industrial workers' strike.
Italian general strike in February.
Italian general strike in April.

Switzerland:

Strike of Swiss construction workers.
Conflict between employees and employers in the Swiss hotel industry.
Major strike at the von Roll ironworks.
Wage dispute in the metal industry in Winterthur.
Imposition of a lockout at the Brown Boveri company in Baden.
Today, the movement among the entire working class is more serious than ever.

In Great Britain, after unsuccessful attempts at an agreement between the government and the miners' representatives, the miners' strike broke out on October 17, and it will only be possible to end it definitively after lengthy negotiations. The consequences of this strike for the English economy are particularly serious because numerous industries have been forced to stop working due to a lack of coal. The damage to the entire European economy can be gauged from the fact that, according to authentic estimates, the loss of coal production caused by the strike was estimated at around 15 million tons.

In Germany, in addition to ongoing workers' revolts, a momentous price war has begun between German mine workers, and in the Ruhr area, the socialization of German mining is already being demanded.

In France, the strikes resulting from the mass dismissal of workers in various French industries will soon take on a larger scale and more serious character. If the French mine owners do not accept the demands of the mine workers, a general strike of miners in France can be expected around mid-November.

In Italy, the revolutionary labor unrest in heavy industry has been temporarily resolved, but it was only one episode in the difficult struggle between the Italian bourgeois and socialist parties. That this struggle continues unabated today is proven by the ongoing strike unrest in all cities of Italy and the development of a project by the Italian labor federation for the control of Italian industry by the workers.

The Belgian trade union congress in Brussels recently decided on the gradual nationalization of all Belgian industry, with the railways, coal mines, banks, power plants, etc. to be the first to fall prey to communalization. In addition, the miners' general strike is imminent.

The strike unrest in America is causing constant disruptions to traffic and business in general, particularly in New York.

In addition to the ferment among the working classes of all countries, political events also indicate that what is currently happening in the cultural life of the individual states does not signify a constructive development, but rather a further sanctioning of the conditions and attitudes that led to the world war.

The consequences of the Polish-Russian war must be given a significance that deeply affects the current relationship between European states. In the south, the Adriatic problem and the Balkans question still await resolution. Personal sympathies and antipathies are irrelevant when it comes to assessing these events and their impact. In the case of the Russo-Polish war, the main thing is the economic and civilizational consequences that the outcome of this conflict must have for Europe. Likewise, D'Annunzio and his opponents, or the economic disputes in the Balkans, pale into insignificance compared to the great economic prospect of what should happen in the Adriatic and the Balkans to bring about the most fruitful exchange between the Orient and the Occident. Ireland is in a state of open revolt. In the East, the Bolshevik wave is spreading ever further and is already endangering the British possessions there, the mainstay of British world power. All these damages to our civilization cannot be resolved by measures in line with previous practice, but only by creations that form a basis for a healthy economic life.

• 1. Dr. Rudolf Steiner: The Key Points of the Social Question in Present and Future Necessities of Life. Verlag Geering, Basel. [Note in brochure]

The purpose of the discussion is to reach an understanding about the tasks that are set in “Futurum AG” and that the gentlemen set for themselves. The basis for everything that is done in an external social relationship is the idea of the threefold social organism. This idea is not utopian; it is the most practical idea that can be thrown into life, but it encompasses all of life, and the first prerequisite for what can be achieved through threefolding is that it must take hold in as many people's minds as possible. Before the war, it would have been virtually impossible to come forward with the threefold social order; people thought everything could continue as it had been going before. The whole thing would have been seen as a fantasy. During the war, Wilson's utopian ideas emerged, which could not be realized by someone who was not really involved in economic life. The threefold social order was brought to the people of Central Europe in particular during the war, after Wilson's ideas became known. At that time, people were really only interested in victory or defeat. As far as the West was concerned, the war was definitely an economic war. We must not believe that we can somehow help economic life along by applying economic rules in the old way. The threefold social order had a much more international character during the war than it does now. The war arose from the fact that the big economic questions were decided not by economists but by politicians. The fundamental question is this: how can economic life be freed from the intervention of parliaments and governments? We must achieve the possibility of overcoming national borders economically. Despite the differences in language, the international would immediately arise. During the war, it would have been possible to think about promoting such an idea, directly as an economic experiment. After the war, the matter is much more difficult, because the national borders are much more closed than before due to the exchange rate situation. I then tried to initiate something from Stuttgart after the war ended. In Stuttgart, after the revolution had flared up a few more times and then got bogged down, it is now chronic and latent. It would have worked in Stuttgart if it should have worked only for obvious reasons. You need economically cohesive areas to propagate the threefold order. But of course you also need the population for that. In Württemberg, the propagation of the threefold social order went relatively quickly. At first, the Social Democratic leaders tolerated it, but when we became too strong, they stopped us by all possible means, so that it became impossible for us to implement the economic councils, which were to grow out of a kind of constituent assembly consisting of economists. We were then pushed into founding the Kommenden Tag. The Waldorf School is a spiritual undertaking. It would have been impossible to found a Waldorf School here, but it was possible in Württemberg. We tried to do it with the Kommenden Tag; this idea should also be realized in the Futurum. Now this is a purely provisional matter in relation to the threefold social order, because of course the threefold social order idea cannot be implemented on such a small scale. In Stuttgart, we can work quite differently. In Stuttgart, we started with ten million German marks. With these ten million German marks, we were able to acquire a number of businesses that are actually good businesses. Now the point is that something like the 'Kommende Tag' does not pay out profits like any other joint-stock company, but only profits that correspond to the respective percentage. If there is a surplus, it is used to help long-term enterprises and to create spiritual institutions. In Stuttgart, we are thinking of building several scientific institutes. In economic life, it is important to take into account things that may only become profitable after many years. All truly great economic things have emerged from such small things that have previously consumed money. In Germany, one works under different conditions because even the industrialists realize what it means to stand after the transformation, and one can say that success is there in a very short time. The “Kommende Tag” can, if it is supported and managed properly, become a large commercial enterprise. If we succeed in working in an exemplary manner, then I count on the effect of the example. I believe that our ideas will be able to establish themselves very quickly in economic life as soon as people see that they can be realized in practice.

If you have been following economic life since 1810, you will see that all the calamities are related to the fact that the monetary system has been emancipated from the actual economic life. Banking has increasingly taken the place of productive economic life. We cannot get out of the economic calamity if things continue like this. The point is that, while the monetary system must of course be retained, we must overcome the old methods of experience and their drawbacks, and we can do so on a small scale by ending the separation of the banking system from the rest of economic life. Here, once 'Futurum Ltd' is what it should be, an administration of the individual companies.

The “key points” were translated into English in May. This edition was discussed in all serious English newspapers. If the matter could have been pursued quickly in England at that time, speakers could have traveled there again, then something could have been done. We mainly lack people. At the same time, you can see that there is definitely an atmosphere in England that is conducive to such an economic re-establishment.

The most important thing for Futurum at the moment is to carry out the issue. We simply need these six million francs as quickly as possible so that we don't remain a so-called 'floundering company' and, above all, so that we can realize the idea of Futurum AG. To do this, it is necessary to make it clear to people: “If you have money, you must make that money fruitful.” It has ruined the world that everyone only wanted to gain interest from their possessions. In economic terms, this results in a lack of interest in the consumer. Today, the only thing that interests the business owner is the competitor. The world war has caused this. As long as economic life is built on seeing only the market side, it will go downhill. If the mere monetary system stops, [...] people start to take an interest in economic life, and things start to improve again. That is, as soon as people start pushing the banks together again with the rest of the economy, interest in the demand for any given article returns, and people start counting on the consumer again.

When any of us goes out, he must also gain economic experience. You can't really get to know the economy from what is available; you can only get to know it by trying to gain insight into the individual business sectors. These are the two main tasks: the realization of the issue and the gathering of experience.

The economy is still holding together like a skirt that can be worn for a while, but then it gets ragged, and it is only a matter of time before the Entente countries also start to get ragged, as has already happened in Central European countries. The point is that it is impossible to say what exactly “Futurum AG” wants. If Mr. X and Mr. Y join “Futurum AG”, then “Futurum AG” will want what Mr. X and Mr. Y want.

Rudolf Steiner asks for questions to be raised.

Hans Haas asks for information about the spread of the anthroposophical movement in different countries.

Rudolf Steiner: In Germany, the movement is quite widespread –

— see the 10000000 Marks of the Coming Day; one can also see this from the sales of Dr. Steiner's books.

the movement is spreading very strongly. In Germany the interest is very great, then comes Holland. I have the intention of going to Holland, after all I cannot go to the actual Entente countries myself. There is a great deal to be gained from Holland. In England a small group of our people has been working for a very short time. For the time being, things are moving slowly, but the 'key points' have been taken seriously. It will be possible to find much there in the way of preparation. I would be very happy if one or two of those involved could go there. There is a lot that could be done in America. In France, it depends on imponderables whether anything can be done there. But if I disregard France, I believe that something could possibly be done in Spain. But I don't know for sure. If I disregard the Romance-speaking areas, Switzerland seems to me to be the most difficult place to make headway. Switzerland suffers from conservatism. People here have no will to embrace something new. Switzerland is indifferent to material things; the most important thing for it is the monetary system.

Arnold Ith asks how propaganda work should be carried out according to the nature of different countries.

Rudolf Steiner explains that he will answer this question tomorrow.

Mr. Padrutt asks in what form the guiding principles should be expressed for the relatively small companies of “Futurum AG”.

Rudolf Steiner: We will gain a certain overview of the consumer base, so we will first try to expand the consumer base and then to understand it. We can take care of all our enterprises in the common consumer group. It is very good to have agricultural businesses on the one hand and industrial businesses on the other. In this way, one can achieve a balance of benefits. The idea is to have a range of different businesses that support each other in accordance with the principle of association. The ideal would be for the gentlemen to go out and look around to see what needs there are, and then the purchase of the businesses would be based on that. Of course, we cannot act on this yet.

In response to a question from Adolf Padrutt, Rudolf Steiner replies

that it is of no value to focus on just one industry. In the economy to date, the actual economic laws have been observed far too little. One of these laws is that in economic life one should work as little as possible for one's own account. See Stinnes.

For the threefold order, one must first create understanding, which is only possible by introducing people to the threefold order in a concise way. In some places, an understanding of an independent economic life separate from the state is beginning to emerge; however, people are still afraid of an independent spiritual life and it must be made clear to them that one cannot exist without the other. For example, you cannot educate practical people in state schools, you can only educate civil servants there. Preparatory schools for practical life (commercial schools, technical schools, etc.) only make sense if you have teachers there who only teach there for a while and then go out into practical life again, to be replaced by other practitioners. So there must be a constant exchange. Today, the calamity has broken out primarily in the economic sphere, and the sore point is that for about 150 years people have got into the habit of thinking only about economic life. Those who will now be working for “Futurum AG” are concerned with simply discussing the things that are contained in the key issues. If you look at the parliamentary reports, there is a lot of talk in the individual states about the introduction of the gold standard. A great deal of clever and ingenious thinking has been done for the introduction of the gold standard. In all these speeches in favor of the gold standard, there is one common thread: all the speakers were of the opinion that free trade would be significantly promoted by the introduction of the gold standard. The opposite was then the case later on. Those who spoke in favor of the introduction of the gold standard were all so-called practitioners, but in reality they were not involved in practical life at all. We have increasingly withdrawn from economic life. Once economic life is independent, national borders do not hinder anything. There were economic experts at Versailles, but their voice was not important because they had nothing to say.

Hans Haas asks how people will satisfy their greed for profit in the new economic life.

Rudolf Steiner: It is already very often the case that people only want money in order to have power. It is therefore important to make it clear to them that - if they have economic insight - none of their power escapes them. The only difficulty is that people collect money for their children and do not want this money to go to others. It must be made clear to them that the money will certainly be completely taxed away over the next ten years.

In Rudolf Steiner's view, the question Hans Haas has posed

At the Goetheanum, the threefold social order is fully implemented except in the legal sphere, which is of course missing. In the construction industry, everything that can be achieved has been achieved, if only we could still manage to get the workers to leave the trade unions. The aim must be to get people out of the trade unions, although this must be approached very carefully.

v

Arnold Ith asks whether it could also be said in answer to this question that in the threefold social organism, people's selfishness is also restrained by the fact that everyone controls and is controlled by everyone else.

Rudolf Steiner replies that this can certainly be said; he notes that, for example, one should not get too involved in ethical questions during discussions. It is not about promising people a paradise, but making it clear to them that everything can only continue with the help of threefolding. Rudolf Steiner says that everything you need to know about how to propagate the threefold social order is contained in the key points. The hardest part is teaching today's proletarians these things.

In response to a question from Ernst Gimmi as to whether it would be beneficial to propagate among the proletarians today, Rudolf Steiner replies,

that everything is arranged for everyone. It is very important for 'Futurum AG' to make it clear to industrialists that they now have to communicate with the proletarians. What people are experiencing today in terms of social issues and Bolshevism stems simply from the fact that people have been disregarded everywhere; there is no longer any trust anywhere.

Question from Eduard Wirz: Which circles should be approached primarily for the issue?

Rudolf Steiner replies that now, those who have been recommended should be used more to reach others in Switzerland. In Holland, it will be necessary to initially approach people who can further pave the way; Mr. de Haan, in particular, comes into consideration here. In England, it is a matter of initially approaching Mr. Kaufmann for certain circles, and for other circles one must work with the help of certain members - Drury-Lavin, Collison. It is important that one speaks only for “Futurum AG” and does not say anything more about the Goetheanum - this applies to all gentlemen present, except Mr. Gimmi. The brochure is the main tool for propaganda. You will approach people with the brochure by explaining to them: It is important that you not only receive large sums of money, but also small ones.

Arnold Ith asks whether Rudolf Steiner thinks it is a good idea to work in only two or three countries for the time being, to which Rudolf Steiner replies,

that only five countries can be considered.

Arnold Ith says that the gentleman going to England might as well spend eight days in Paris.

Rudolf Steiner also believes that it might be possible to make preparations in Paris.

Ernst Schaller wonders what would happen if an Englishman came here and was worked with for about a fortnight, and then travelled back to England with one of the gentlemen present to work there. Eduard Wirz asks whether this could then be extended if each country were organized within itself. It is replied that this is already the case, to the extent that it is necessary, in that the threefolding groups and anthroposophical groups are there.

Rudolf Steiner remarks that Futurum AG should not be decentralized too much; it would be quite wrong to found anything other than at most branches abroad.

Eduard Wirz notes that the new issue of other companies is always very well organized, and that the question now is how best to carry out the issue of “Futurum AG”.

Rudolf Steiner says that we have to expect that the banks will not accommodate us. But we also have to organize the prospectus. One could find the most incredible ways to do this. Rudolf Steiner says that, for example, someone can be found in all Swiss cities who could do something for the prospectus.

Arnold Ith believes that the gentlemen present must be the main driving force, and that they must motivate people to take action.

Rudolf Steiner believes that the threefolding office is the basis for “Futurum AG”; for example, all the address material is stored there.

Arnold Ith asks whether the gentlemen present would be best distributed among the different countries.

Rudolf Steiner replies that this would depend on the wishes of the gentlemen concerned, but that Switzerland, England, Holland and America are important for the time being.

Ernst Gimmi notes that Mr. Dürler in St. Gallen could possibly be considered.

Rudolf Steiner says that initially all attention must be focused on the issue.

Eduard Wirz remarks that he would have liked to take on England personally, but believes that he is not yet sufficiently established there and will not be able to familiarize himself quickly enough because he has no connections there.

Rudolf Steiner thinks that Mr. Gimmi is definitely a candidate for England, but he still needs a companion. He notes that he does think something can be done in England, and that it would have gone better in August and September, but it also needs to be done now.

The place of the Goetheanum in “Futurum AG”

From the point of view of the management of “Futurum AG”, the Goetheanum is to be regarded as an “economic-spiritual” enterprise, as provided for in $ 2 of the statutes of “Futurum AG” for inclusion in the business sector. (Economically spiritual enterprises such as research institutes, educational institutions, and so on). If the financial strength of Futurum AG allowed, the Goetheanum would have to be included in the business area of Futurum AG as a spiritual enterprise, as has already been done with the clinical-therapeutic institute and the chemical laboratory for remedies. The Goetheanum would then be regarded as a spiritual enterprise of this kind, into which long-term capital is initially invested, the fruits of which might only become apparent after a few years through the spiritual values of individual personalities. If the Goetheanum cannot be included as a spiritual enterprise in the business of Futurum AG, then this is solely due to the practical circumstance that Futurum AG, as a result of its short existence and relatively limited resources, is not in a position to invest larger amounts of capital over the long term.