Correspondence with Edith Maryon 1912–1924

GA 263 — 28 June 1919, Stuttgart

Letter to Edith Maryon

Rudolf Steiner to Edith Maryon

Stuttgart, June 28, 1919

My dear Miss E. Maryon,

I was very pleased to receive your letters and the pictures you sent. I will have to continue working here for some time yet. But I believe that this time it will not be too long. I long for the work in the sculpture studio in Dornach. And it may well be that after some time I will be able to go there again, and then come back here to set up a school that is planned for Stuttgart. But today nothing certain can be said about the next timing. The circumstances of the times do not allow for such certainty.

It is very difficult to find understanding, especially for what is most necessary in these circumstances. It is difficult for people of our time to understand these necessities from a spiritual basis. Under the influence of materialistic habits of thought, they have distanced themselves from understanding how the spiritual also works in the material. They believe that the material can only be improved by the material. And so they do not see that every attempt to improve the material by mere material must lead further into confusion. My book is incomprehensible to some people simply because it contains different material from what they have been accustomed to thinking. And though it is difficult for people to get rid of old habits, they find it hardest to change their thinking habits. And yet there will be no salvation for our time except through a change of thinking, relearning.

I often think of our work in the Dornach sculpture studio and would love to be there. Only the obligatory work has to be done and only thoughts can be there.

With warmest regards

Dr. Rudolf Steiner

currently Stuttgart, Landhausstraße 70 (at Kinkel's)