IX. World-Thoughts in Michael, and World-Thoughts in Ahriman

> 1. Anything which is a working force in the world—as, for instance, the World-Thoughts—is not recognized in its true character and meaning for the world, if one looks only at the force per se, which is working. One must go further, and distinguish the Beings from whom the action of the force proceeds; with the World-Thoughts, for instance, whether it is Michael or Ahriman who brings them into the world and maintains them here. > 2. The same thing which, proceeding from one Being, may work healthfully and re-creatively because of this particular Being's relation to the world, may have a baneful and destructive action, when it proceeds from a different Being. The World-Thoughts carry Man on towards the future when he receives them from Michael. They lead him away from the future of his own welfare when Ahriman can instill them into him. > 3. By such reflections one is led more and more to get beyond the view of an indefinite spiritual existence, some pantheistic sea of causation at the base of all things, and to pass on to a view more definite and concrete, that rises to conceptions of the distinct spiritual Beings of the Higher Hierarchies. For, in truth, Reality consists everywhere in forms of living Being; whatever in Reality is not living Being, is action that takes place in the relations of Being to Being. And this action can only be understood when one has sight of the Beings who are acting.