The Life of Man on Earth and the Essence of Christianity

GA 349 — 18 April 1923, Dornach

X. Why Don't We Remember Our Past Lives?

Good morning, gentlemen! Now we want to add to what we have looked at. I told you at the end of the last lesson that people mainly object: It may all be true about life before we enter an earthly body, and also about previous earthly lives, but why can't we remember it? And now I will first answer this question in detail today, why we cannot remember, and what this memory is like.

Now we must first consider something about the human body, because it is really a matter of expressing ourselves scientifically.

You see, in this respect, when it comes to the question of repeated lives on earth, people today are downright strange even when it comes to judging people who knew or know something about these repeated lives on earth. There was a very great spirit within German civilization, Lessing, who lived in the 18th century. This Lessing has achieved an extraordinary amount spiritually. He is still generally recognized today. And when the professors of German literary history lecture at the universities, they often lecture on Lessing for months. They also know that one of Lessing's researchers, as they say, a book can also be found in the Social Democratic literature, by Franz Mehring, “The Lessing Legend”. There Lessing is presented from a different point of view. You can't say that what is presented there is correct; but in any case, there is even a very thick book about Lessing within the Social Democratic literature by Franz Mehring. In short, Lessing is cited as a very great man. But this Lessing, whose plays are still performed everywhere in theaters today and are highly esteemed, wrote a shorter work when he was already very old: “The Education of the Human Race.” And at the end it says that one actually cannot come to terms with the contemplation of the soul at all, that one cannot really know anything correct about the soul life without the assumption of repeated earth lives, and that one comes there, when one continues to think, actually to those views which primitive people already had. They all believed in repeated earth lives. That is something that people only abandoned later, when they became “modern.” And Lessing said: Why should something be stupid just because the oldest, the earliest people believed it? — In short, Lessing himself said that he can only come to terms with the soul life of man if he adheres to this ancient belief in repeated lives on earth.

Now, as you can imagine, this is a terrible embarrassment for our so-called researchers today. Because these researchers say: Lessing was one of the greatest men of all times. But the repeated lives on earth, that's nonsense. — Yes, how do you get around that? — Well, Lessing was already old then. He became weak-minded. We don't accept repeated lives on Earth! You see, that's how people are. As long as something suits them, they accept it and label the person in question a great man. But if he has just said something that does not suit them, then he has become weak-minded for the time.

But sometimes very strange things happen. For example, there is a great naturalist, William Crookes. Now, I don't agree with everything he says, but in any case he is considered one of the greatest naturalists. He lived in our time, at the end of the 19th century. Now, he always dealt with natural science in the morning. He had to go to his laboratory, and he made great discoveries there. We would not have had all of this, Röntgen and so on, if he, Crookes, had not done the preliminary work. But in the afternoons, he always occupied himself with soul-searching. As I said, I don't agree with everything, but at least he occupied himself with it. People had to say, didn't they: Yes, he must have been clever in the morning and stupid in the afternoon, stupid and clever at the same time! That's the way things are.

Now there is something else. You will hear everywhere – I have already dealt with this when I was talking about colors – that natural scientists consider Newton to be the greatest natural scientist of all time. He is not, but they consider him to be so. Now there is another embarrassment. This Newton, whom people consider the greatest naturalist, has now also written a book about what usually forms the end of the Bible, about the Apocalypse. So again an embarrassment!

In short, those people who reject any possibility of soul-searching are in for a terrible embarrassment when faced with the greatest naturalists and the greatest historians, because if someone really takes science seriously, they have no choice but to extend this science to the soul. And for that you find opportunity everywhere. I have told you: you just have to observe. Now you cannot always foresee everything in everyday life, especially if you have not learned it first. But nature and sometimes humanity also do experiments for us that you should not artificially induce, but once they are made, you can study them. You can follow them, at least be inspired by them. Now there is an experiment that is actually important, characteristic, if one wants to accept something about the soul life of man. Everyone accepts the physical body, because otherwise they would all have to deny the human being. One does not argue about that. Everyone has one. Today, natural science says: the physical body is the only one, we have to explain everything according to the physical body.

Now there is something that, when we observe it correctly, suddenly shows us that the human being also has the other three bodies: the invisible etheric body, the astral body and the ego. There is one thing that can be observed quite scientifically – there are many things, but one in particular, that can be observed quite scientifically and that then shows how a person can actually get into states where it shows us that an etheric body is present and an astral body and an ego.

You see, there are people in Europe who feel the need to numb themselves. Now, of course, many other means are used. I have told you that now, for example, cocaine is used to numb the senses; but in Europe, opium has always been used to numb the senses. There have always been people who, when they were not satisfied with life or when they had too many worries, didn't know what to do, and so they got high on opium. They took a little opium, always just a small amount of opium. What happened then? First of all, when someone takes a small amount of opium, they enter a state of inner experience; they no longer think, they begin to dream in wild images. They like this very much, it does them a lot of good. These dreams become more and more intoxicating. For some, it is the case that they get the gray misery, that they begin to behave like a sinner; another begins to rage, to race, that he even gets murderous. And then people fall asleep. So this consumption of opium actually consists of people being brought violently, by means of an external poison, into a state that consists of slowly drifting off to sleep.

When we look at everything that actually happens to a person, we can see that the person first has very excited dreams, then begins to fantasize, and then falls asleep. So something has gone from him. What has gone from him is what makes him a rational human being, what lives in him so that he is a rational human being. That is gone. But before it goes away, and even after it has gone, he lives in the most desolate, agitated dreams. After some time he wakes up and he is restored to a certain extent until he starts taking opium again. So he makes himself, only stormy, into a sleeping person.

Now we can see that when a person falls asleep from the effects of opium, it is not the faculty that makes him rational that is at work in him, but rather the faculty that gives him life; otherwise he would not be able to wake up again, otherwise he would have to die. It is the faculty that gives him momentary life that is at work in him. And one can see how there is also a certain struggle in the body during the night, so that one can wake up again. So there is something at work in man where reason is not present; that which in turn animates the body. Through the poison, the body surbs something. That drives out reason. But the vitalizing principle is still in him, otherwise he could not wake up again. So what has been affected by a small amount of opium? The vitalizing principle. With a small amount of opium, the etheric body is affected.

Now imagine someone takes too much or deliberately poisons themselves with opium. The same thing does not happen, but – and this is quite remarkable – what happens last with a small amount of opium happens first with a large amount. The person falls asleep immediately. So it does not slowly draw away the rational, but the rational comes out quickly, very quickly. But now something remains in him that was not in him at all when he took a small amount of opium. You can see that again.

Physical body Aetheric body: weak opium use Astral body: strong opium use I: habitual opium use

Let us assume that someone takes so much opium that he is actually poisoned. First of all, he falls asleep. But then the body begins to become restless and unruly, he snores, snorts; then cramps set in. And you notice something very peculiar: the face turns completely red and the lips turn completely blue.

Now remember everything I told you last time. I told you that all breathing disturbances occur during exhalation. Now, what does snoring, for example, consist of, first rattling, then snoring – what does it consist of? You see, snoring is something people do who cannot exhale properly. When a person breathes out properly, when it is out of the mouth, then the air goes in, then after a while it goes out again; then the uvula, which you can see when you look into the mouth, is inserted into the air passage. And then at the top there is something that rises and falls, the soft palate; it moves. The uvula and soft palate are constantly moving as a result of inhaling and exhaling when it is normal and correct. But if the inhalation is incorrect and the exhalation is incorrect, if there is belching, then the soft palate and uvula start to tremble, which causes the rattling and then the snoring.

So you can see that it has something to do with breathing, because someone who merely gets high on a little opium enters the other states that I have described to you: a kind of opium delirium, a frenzy. He falls asleep slowly. But if he now falls asleep quickly through the intense enjoyment of opium, he comes to snoring, to convulsions; the face turns red, the lips blue. If you remember all that I have told you, you will ascribe great significance to the fact that the face turns red and the lips blue. For I have told you: Man has red blood because oxygen is inhaled. When the blood mixes with oxygen, it turns red; when the blood mixes with carbon, it turns blue. When it is exhaled, it is blue. So when you see someone with a red face and blue lips, what does that mean? Yes, there is too much inhaled air in the face, too much red blood, which comes from the inhalation. And the lips are blue, what does that mean? There is too much of the blood that is supposed to come out. It stops there. This could continue to the point in the lungs where the carbon dioxide is released, where the carbon dioxide can be exhaled. — So you have a person poisoned by opium, and their breathing is labored throughout. And this is shown on the one hand by the red blood in the face, and on the other hand by the blue blood in the lips.

This is extremely interesting, gentlemen. What are the lips? You see, the lips are very peculiar organs on the face. If you have a face, you actually have to draw it like this, with the skin turned outwards all over. But on the lips, it is actually a piece of inner skin. The inside comes outwards. There is a piece of inner skin. A person opens up their insides by having lips. If your lips are blue instead of red, it means that all your insides are too full of blue blood. —So you see: when someone is poisoned with opium, the body works in such a way that it sends all unused blood outwards – it pushes to the surface – and sends all blue blood inwards.

These things were also known once by primitive people, the story of blue blood going inward. If someone has too much blue blood inside, they said: the person who has too much blue blood inside is first of all someone who has little of the soul, from whom the soul has gone out. That is why “blue-blooded” became a term of abuse. And when the people called the aristocrats “blue-blooded”, they meant: their soul has gone. —- It is very strange how in folk wisdom these things live in a wonderful way. It is very interesting. You can learn an enormous amount from language.

Now you can see: there is something that works in humans that does not work in plants, for example. Because if you introduce a toxin to a plant, the toxin stays somewhere at the top and does not spread. For example, you can find a very poisonous plant in the so-called belladonna, in the deadly nightshade. Yes, the deadly nightshade leaves its poison at the very top; it does not allow it to spread throughout the plant. When a person takes such a poison, it takes hold of the body in such a way that it drives the red blood outwards and the blue blood inwards. Yes, the plants are alive too. Those plants have their etheric body within them, have within them what is left blue, what comes from the weak consumption of opium, not the strong. That is only caused by the sensation in humans. If the plant had blood, it would also have such a sensation, like humans and animals. Humans and animals have it without the use of opium, when the etheric body fights with the physical one; the blood is immediately pushed outwards, and something remains in the body, and that causes this disorder in the body. And that is the astral body. So that one can say: the astral body is influenced by heavy opium use.

Now there is still a third kind of opium consumption. This opium consumption is even very widespread in the world, although not in Europe, more for example among a certain type of Turks and namely in Asia and Hinterindien, with the Malay peoples. There these people take only such strong quantities of opium that they can just still tolerate it, that they wake up properly again, and do not die from it. In this way they experience everything that the opium eater experiences in a strange and interesting way. Only they gradually get used to it, and so they experience the story more consciously. The Turks then say: Yes, when I enjoyed opium, I was in paradise. — That is already the case in these fantastic interpretations. And the Malays in the Far East also want to see all that. So they get used to taking opium because they want to see all that too. This can be done for a relatively long time, and then you end up saying to yourself, “Well, there is something else.”

But now one must say: if these people, who always habitually eat the opium – they eat it habitually – if these fantasists would only see that, then after a while they would get the story. But, you see, it is very strange. These people are descended from the first people on earth who still knew something about the eternal soul, about the soul that passes through the various earthly lives. They knew something about it. Now that has been lost to people. These people, who have not gone through European civilization, put themselves into a state through the consumption of opium in order to feel something of the eternity of the soul. It is indeed terrible, but they repeatedly introduce an illness into themselves. Because the healthy body in the present, if it does not exert itself spiritually, cannot know anything at all about the immortality of the soul, these people gradually ruin their body, so that gradually the soul is pushed out.

Now one can observe something very peculiar when looking at such people who habitually take opium in this way and can therefore endure it for a period of time: after some time they become quite pale. Even if they used to have a good skin color, now they become pale.

1 This means something quite different for the Malay than for the European. The Malay really does look like a ghost when he turns pale, because he is yellowish-brown. Then, after a while, the people become as if they were hollow around the eyes. Then they begin to lose weight, after they have already started to lose their ability to walk properly; they just limp along. Then they begin to lose their will to think, become very forgetful. And last of all, they get the stroke.

These are the symptoms. It is very interesting to observe them. Before the limbs become stiff, so that they can no longer walk properly, they develop severe constipation; in other words, the bowels no longer function. From the way I have described this, you can see that the whole body is gradually undermined.

Now there is something very peculiar. Not much experience has been gathered in this respect, because people do not pay attention to it; but this experience could be gained very easily. We know how these people become habitual opium eaters, it has been described many times. But now people should just try it out – they do this very often in another respect today: if they give the same dose of opium that a person has for habitual consumption to an animal, then the animal will either become somewhat lively, thus entering the first stage, where the etheric body is disturbed, or it will enter the second stage if it gets enough, and die. The animal does not have what the opium eater, the habitual opium eater has, as I described to you last. The animal does not have that.

What does this show, gentlemen? Yes, this shows that when the opium, as strong as it is there, enters the astral body and causes an improper relationship between blue and red blood, then in the animal blue and red blood shoots in a horizontal direction in a confused manner. In the upright man, in the one who has learned to walk, the blue and red blood does not shoot in quite that direction (it is shown), but more so, because he is erect, into each other; no longer horizontally, but from top to bottom, from bottom to top. This causes that man can also become a habitual opium eater.

But now I have told you: It is because man is upright that he has an ego. The animals have no ego because they have a horizontal back. So what is it that is influenced by this habitual opium eating? The ego. So we can say: I - habitual opium eating. And now, through opium, we have discovered all three bodies of man, which are supersensible: for weak opium consumption, the etheric body; for strong consumption, the astral body; and for habitual opium consumption, the I. You can, if you can only observe correctly, develop this wonderfully in a scientific way.

But now you can also see: a Malay with his habitual opium consumption comes to something huge. He comes to the I. And what does he get? What does this Malay or this Turk look forward to when he habitually consumes opium? What does he look forward to? Yes, he looks forward to it because then his memory awakens in a wonderful way. He quickly reviews his entire life on earth and much more. On the one hand, it is terrible because he achieves it by making his body sick; on the other hand, however, the desire to get to know the self is so strong in him that he cannot resist. He is already pleased when this vast memory is established.

But let me explain: if a person does something too much, it ruins him. If a person works too much, it ruins him; if a person thinks too much, it ruins him. And if a person continually evokes a memory that is too strong, it ruins his body. All the symptoms I have described to you are simply the result of the memory being too strong. That is there at first. And later on – as I have described to you – the person becomes careless about how he walks. He no longer remembers inwardly how to put one foot in front of the other. That is unconscious memory, of course. And then he becomes forgetful. So the very thing he achieves ruins him. But one can see, become aware, recognize that the ego is present when the habitual consumption of opium is there.

What does today's natural science do? Well, if you open a book, you will also find a description of what I have told you; you will find a description that with a small amount of opium the person goes into delirium and so on, that with a large amount of opium the person first falls asleep and then his body is immediately destroyed. He dies after his face has turned red and his lips blue. And with habitual opium consumption, all these things also occur. But what do these people describe? They only describe the physical body, what happens there; they describe that the opium eater rattles, has convulsions, snores. They describe how the habitual opium eater loses weight, can no longer walk, becomes forgetful, and finally suffers a stroke because the memory destroys his brain; we have to look at it that way. All this is described, but it is all attributed to the physical body.

But that is nonsense; otherwise, everything physical would have to be attributed only to the physical body. We also see all the phenomena that occur in plants. But we cannot say that a human being is merely a plant. For when opium is taken in large quantities, the effect is seen in the astral body, and only in the human being does that which is present in habitual opium use become apparent. If animals would benefit from habitual opium consumption, if they did not immediately perish from it, then you would see that there are many animals that would simply enjoy the opium found in plants. Why would they enjoy it? Yes, because the animals distinguish between what they want to eat and what they don't want to eat by habit. So if the animals would benefit from it, they would eat the opium that is found in the plants. If they don't do it, it's only because they don't benefit from it.

All this can be recognized through natural science. But now the question is: can all this, the memory that the Malay produces through illness, be achieved through healthy means? We must remember that the original inhabitants of the earth knew that people live on earth again and again. And Lessing, as I told you earlier, said: Why should it be stupid just because the original people believed in it? These original people, they didn't have abstract thoughts like we do. They didn't have any natural science. They looked at everything mythologically. When they looked at a plant, they didn't study: there are such and such forces in it, but they said: there is such and such spirituality in it. They saw everything in images. They lived more in the spiritual in general. ... (Gap in the shorthand.) The fact is that with progress, man can develop in such a way that he lives more in the physical. Only through this could he become a free man, otherwise he would always have been influenced. People in prehistoric times were not free; but they still saw spiritual things. Now we, gentlemen, as we are now, we really have the abstract thoughts that we are drilled in since school. You see, we can even say that the most important activities that humanity is so proud of today are actually something abstract.

Yesterday I said to the teachers here: Yes, when the child turns about seven years old, it should learn something. It should learn, after having learned all its life so far, that the person standing in front of it, whom it knows, is the father – it should now learn that this here (it is written) means “father”. The child should learn this all of a sudden. It has nothing at all to do with this “father.” These are very strange signs that have nothing to do with the father! The child is suddenly supposed to learn this. It resists it. Because the father is this and that man who has hair like this, a nose like this; it has always seen it. The child resists the fact that what is written should now mean “father.” Blackboard 2 Gentlemen, let us now take a brief look at history. As I told you last time, all of our souls were already there at a time when only a few people had learned to think. People did not think at all in the beginning. In primeval times, people lived in the spiritual. But it was already abnormal if someone thought in the beginning. In the beginning, in the Middle Ages, people did not think at all. They have only been thinking since the 15th century; they have not yet thought in the way we understand everything today. This can be proven historically. No wonder you do not remember your past lives today! Now people have learned to think. Now is the time in historical development when people have learned to think. In the next life they will remember their present life on earth just as a person remembers his shirt button in the morning. That is to say, history is such that if someone now really learns to think about the things of the world, learns to think as I showed you, then it is as if he is thinking about his shirt buttons. And the way today's natural scientists do it is as if one is not thinking about the shirt buttons. If someone merely describes: “You get delirious, your lips turn blue, your face turns red, and so on.” In the next life, he will not think of the most important things, he will not remember anything at all, and everything will be confused, like the other person who throws everything together because he has to leave quickly and cannot find his things. But the one who thinks that this simply comes from the etheric body, astral body, ego, learns to think in such a way that he can remember properly in the next life on earth. Only then will it become apparent. And only some are instructed at the present time, because there were few in the last life on earth who knew the matter. They come across it today and can draw the attention of others to it. And then, when they do this, as it is described in my books, when they do what is written in 'How to Know Higher Worlds', it may be that it also dawns on people in the present that they have already lived in previous earthly lives. But we are just beginning with anthroposophical spiritual science. Therefore, people will gradually remember.

The child has learned to say “Ah!” when it is amazed. Now it is suddenly supposed to understand that this is an A. It is just very abstract, has no relation to what the child has known so far. You first have to create a bridge for the child to come up with something like this. I'll tell you how to create the bridge.

For example, you say to the child: Look, what is that? - (See drawing.) If you draw this for the child and ask him: What is this? - What will the child say? - A fish! That's a fish! He will not say: I don't recognize that. He cannot say: I recognize the father in that (in the written word “father”). But he recognizes the fish in it (in the drawn fish).

Now I say: Pronounce the “F” for me just once, now omit the i and the later one, just say the F with which the fish begins. Now, I will draw this for you: F. I have singled out the F from the fish. The child first draws the fish and then the F. It is important to avoid abstraction and to remain within the image. The child naturally enjoys learning in this way. This can be done with every letter. It is just a matter of gradually acquiring the skill.

At our Waldorf School, one of the teachers once explained very beautifully how the Roman numerals gradually came into being. Suddenly, it was not possible with V. How can a V be made? Now, see what is there here? (Dr. Steiner holds up his hand.) Of course, you say: a hand is still a hand. But is there not something in it? 1, II, III, III, V fingers. Now I draw this hand on the blackboard (see drawing) in such a way that I have stretched out the two things (the thumb and the four other fingers next to it). Now I have a hand in which the V is included; five is the pronounced number. Now I make it a little simpler, and you have recognized the Roman numeral V from the hand that has five fingers.

So you see, gentlemen, it is important that we are suddenly placed in a completely abstract world today. We learn to write, we learn to read; this has nothing to do with life. But as a result, we have forgotten what people had who could not yet read and write.

But now you must not say, as the other people outside of our opponents' kind do: Steiner told us in his hour that people were cleverer when they did not yet have writing and reading; then they immediately say: yes, he wants people to no longer learn to write and read! I do not want that. People should always keep pace with civilization, and certainly learn to write and read. But one should also not lose what one can necessarily lose by writing and reading. One must first come to understand through spiritual means what human life is.

And now I want to tell you something very simple about two people. One of them takes off his clothes in the evening and takes off his shirt collar, which has two little buttons, one in the front and one in the back. I use an example that is close to me because I wear a shirt collar like that. One person, he does it quite thoughtlessly, unfastens his first button, his second. Now he goes to bed. In the morning, yes, he walks around the room looking for and asking: Where are my shirt buttons? — He doesn't find them. He doesn't remember. Why? Because he did it thoughtlessly.

Now another. He has not exactly got into the habit of always putting his shirt buttons in the same place - you can do that, but that would mean making yourself lazy - but he says to himself: When I take off my shirt, I put one of the buttons next to my candlestick and the other one over there. So he turns his thoughts to it, doesn't just put them down thoughtlessly, but turns his thoughts to it. Yes, he gets up in the morning, goes straight to where he put them, doesn't need to search the whole room: where are my shirt buttons, where did I put my shirt buttons? What's the difference? The whole difference is that one person has thought about the matter and remembers it, while the other has not thought about it and does not remember it. Yes, but you can only remember it in the morning. It is of no use to lie down at night wanting to remember, you can only remember it in the morning if you thought about it in the evening.

Now it is said: Yes, but one cannot remember it; and if a person does not have a memory of previous earthly lives, then he cannot have had any previous earthly lives. — But in this way one can also say: A person cannot calculate, one can prove that a person cannot calculate – and now someone introduces a small child of four years as proof and shows that it cannot calculate at all. He is a human being and yet cannot calculate! One will say: He will certainly learn to calculate. If one knows human nature, one knows that he will learn to calculate. — If someone today points out a person who cannot remember his earlier lives on earth, one must say: Yes, but nothing has been done in the past to help people remember. On the contrary, there are still so many stragglers from earlier times today who want to keep people ignorant, so that they know nothing of the spiritual, so that they do not know at all what they are supposed to remember in the next life on earth, so that they become quite confused, like the man with the shirt button. First, man must learn to think in life, so that he can remember later.

So anthroposophy is there to make people aware of what they should remember later. And those who want to prevent anthroposophy want to keep people stupid so that they do not remember anything. And that is the important thing, gentlemen, to realize that man must first learn to apply thoughts correctly. Today people demand that thoughts be defined and that books contain correct definitions. Yes, gentlemen, even in ancient Greece people knew this. One man in particular wanted to teach people how to define. Today, in school, they say: You have to learn: What is light? I once had a classmate; we went to elementary school together, then I went to a different school and he trained as a teacher at the teacher's seminary. I met him again when I was seventeen; by then he was already a fully-fledged teacher. I asked him: What did you learn about light? He said: Light is the cause of the seeing of bodies. There is nothing to be said against that. You might just as well say: What is poverty? Poverty comes from pauvret@! That is about the same as someone defining it that way. But you have to learn a lot of such stuff.

Now, in ancient Greece, someone once ridiculed such clever learning. The children learned at school: What is a human being? A human being is a living creature that has two legs and no feathers. Now a particularly clever boy thought about it, took a rooster, plucked it and the next day he brought it to the teacher in its plucked state and said: “Teacher, is this a human being? It has no feathers and two legs!” That was the strength of the definition. So the things that are still in our books today are more or less in line with the definitions.

In all books, even in the social books that are written, the conditions of life are described in much the same way as the definition is given: A human being is a living creature that has two legs and no feathers. Then we draw further conclusions. Of course, if you start with a book that gives a definition, you can logically conclude all sorts of things from it; but it will never apply to humans, but may apply to a rooster that has just been plucked. Such are our definitions! The important thing is to see things as they really are.

In reality, the matter is such that one must say, as here for example (Schema page 183): physical body; etheric body, which is affected by weak opium consumption; astral body with strong opium consumption; I with habitual opium consumption. And when one now practices spiritual science, when one really learns to know the human being in such a way that one does not merely describe as in a dream: Such conditions arise —, but that one is familiar with them. The astral body is at work, the etheric body is at work, the I is at work - then one has right thoughts, not just definitions. And then, if one has absorbed right thoughts today, in the present life on earth, one remembers aright in the present life on earth. Just as one now only gradually remembers earlier earth lives with difficulty, as I have described it, so one will later remember them well if one does not make oneself ill, as through the consumption of opium, if one does not influence the body, but rather brings the soul through spiritual exercises to really get to know the spiritual.

So you see how truly a spiritual science arises in anthroposophy. You just have to bear in mind that anthroposophy is not about practising superstition. So, for example, when people find something extraordinary reported somewhere about spiritual things, they start saying: That's how it is when a spiritual world betrays itself. - But the spiritual world betrays itself in people! When people sit around a table and make it knock, they say: There must be a ghost in it. But when four people sit around, there are four ghosts! You just have to get to know them! But on the contrary, you'd rather knock people unconscious; there must be a medium among them. Look at the newspaper clipping you gave me a few weeks ago. For example, it describes how somewhere in England people were very much alarmed because during the night things fell off the racks, window panes were smashed, and so on. “Spiritual demons must be at work,” said the people. - What struck me most about the story - even though one can only say more precisely when one has seen it - but what struck me most about the story was that it was also mentioned that the people had a whole army of cats! Now, if you have a whole army of cats, and two or three of them get rabies, you should see how these “ghostly apparitions” all go! But as I said, you would have to know the details first; only then can you go into it.

You see, I was once very much urged to attend a spiritualistic seance. Well, I said I would do this because you can only judge such things when you have seen them. There was now a medium, he was actually terribly famous, a very famous medium, and after the people had sat down, had first been slightly numbed by some music that had been played – they all sat there numbed – the medium began, just as the people wanted, to make flowers fly down from the air all the time! Now every medium has a so-called impresario, if he is a real medium. Well, the people paid their mite after they had had their enjoyment. The main thing for those who had organized it was that the mite was left behind. And I said – people are terribly fanatical then, they start to scuffle with you when you want to enlighten them, they are the worst – but I said to some sensible people, they should investigate once, but not at the end, but at the beginning; there they will find the flowers in the impresario's hump inside! – So you will find things everywhere.

One must rise above superstition, gentlemen, if one wants to speak of the spiritual world. One must not fall for anything anywhere, neither for rabid cats nor for a hunchbacked impresario, but one can only access the spiritual world by no longer falling for anything superstitious and by proceeding with real science everywhere.