6. The Innate Capacities of the Nations of the World

Darwinism in its materialistic coloring has arisen from the British people. This is an entirely true principle—you can read this in my book, The Riddles of Philosophy. It is an entirely true principle that organic creatures have gradually evolved from the imperfect to the more perfect, even up to man. The perfect is derived from the imperfect. This principle is absolutely true if a person observes the physical world and in the presence of the Guardian of the Threshold comes upon the powers of death and destruction. But we can express this also differently; in other words, we can say that the imperfect is derived from the perfect. Read the chapter dealing with Preuss in my book, Riddles of Philosophy. We can just as well prove that the perfect existed first and that the imperfect comes into existence through decadence. In other words, that man existed first and that the other kingdoms later descended from him through decadence. This is just as correct. The situation in which a thinking person finds himself the moment he must say one thing is true and the other also true—to recognize this situation in its whole fruitful character was really granted to the German peoples alone by reason of their folk character. This is not understood at all anywhere else in the world. It is not at all understood in the world that people can argue for a long time over this question, one maintaining that the perfect beings are derived from the imperfect, as Darwin does, and the other maintaining, as Schelling does, that the imperfect beings are derived from the perfect. Both are right, but from different points of view. If we look at the spiritual process, the imperfect is derived from the perfect; if we look at the physical, the perfect is derived from the imperfect.