The Etheric Being in the Physical Human Being

These similes are born out of the feeling that man stands within the life of Nature. Nevertheless they are not worth much, for they do not touch the essential. I have therefore told you many times that a comparison really in keeping with the facts must differ from the one in which Nature's course of events is compared with the processes of sleeping and waking. The course of human life during the space of 24 hours should instead be compared with the course of events upon the earth during a whole year. The simile will agree if we take the whole year and compare its events with the processes of waking up and falling asleep which take place within us in the course of 24 hours. It is quite wrong to compare man's waking life from the moment of waking up to the moment of falling asleep with the summer season, for man's waking condition corresponds to winter, when Nature outside is awake, and summer should be compared with man's sleeping condition. If comparisons are drawn in, we should therefore say: Man falls asleep; i.e., he passes over into the summer season of his personal existence; whereas his waking condition would more or less correspond to autumn, winter, and early spring.