Lecture XVIII

Now there is a special requirement of the human organism: all that is focused from out of the organism, in the heart's action, must be held apart from the forces that organise and concentrate themselves in the internal metabolism of the lungs. These two sets of activities may only interact through the barrier—if I may so express myself—of an etheric or even an astral diaphragm. They must be kept separate from one another. And so we come to the question: Does this diaphragm—and I only use the term in order to give a picture—really exist? Is there such a diaphragm, which prevents the activities of head, throat and lungs from blending with those of abdomen and breast, except through the external rhythm of the breath? Yes—there is such a diaphragm, and it is nothing less than the rhythm of breathing itself. Here you find the attunement of the upper with the lower sphere in man. What is termed rhythmic activity in man, the rhythmic pulsation, whose external physical manifestation is in the rhythm of the breathing, continues into the etheric and astral activities and holds apart the telluric forces of the upper human being, which centre in the lung, and the cosmic forces of the lower human being. The latter forces, with their expression ultimately in the heart, work upwards from below, just as cosmically they work from the periphery inwards, towards the earth's centre.