5. Spiritual Forces in Education and in National Life

“By being placed at the summit of nature, man beholds himself as a whole nature that must bring forth a summit within itself. To do this, he elevates himself by permeating himself with all perfections and virtues, invoking choice, order, harmony and meaning, and finally rising to the production of the work of art, which takes a prominent place alongside his other deeds and works.” And as a complement to this thought is the other, which is in the book about Winckelmann, where the one just mentioned can also be found, when Goethe says: “When man's healthy nature works as a whole, when he feels in the world as a large, beautiful, dignified and worthy whole, when harmonious pleasure gives him pure free delight; then the universe, if it could feel itself, would exult as if it had reached its goal and would admire the summit of its own becoming and being. For what is the purpose of all the effort of suns and planets and moons, of stars and milky ways, of comets and nebulae, of worlds that have come into being and are coming into being, if not, ultimately, for a happy person to unconsciously enjoy their existence?"