{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 4/l08/p010","lang":"en","edition":"RSPC1949","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"text":"The difficulty of seizing the essential nature of thinking by observation lies in this, that it has eluded the introspecting soul all too easily by the time that the soul tries to bring it into the focus of attention. Nothing but the lifeless abstract, the corpse of living thought, then remains for inspection. When we consider only this abstract, we find it hard, by contrast, to resist entering into the mysticism of feeling, or, again, into the metaphysics of will, both of which are “full of life.” We are tempted to regard it as odd that anyone should want to seize the essence of reality in “mere thoughts.” But if we once succeed in really finding the true life in thinking, we learn to understand that the self-abandonment to feelings, or the intuiting of the will, cannot even be compared with the inward wealth of this life of thinking, which we experience as within itself, ever self-supporting, yet at the same time ever in movement. Still less is it possible to rank will and feeling above thinking. It is owing precisely to this wealth, to this inward abundance of experience, that the counter-image of thinking which presents itself to our ordinary attitude of soul, should appear lifeless and abstract. No other activity of the human soul is so easily misapprehended as thinking. Will and feeling still fill the soul with warmth even when we live through them again in memory. Thinking all too readily leaves us cold in recollection; it is as if the life of the soul had dried out. But this is really nothing but the strongly marked shadow thrown by its luminous warm nature penetrating deeply into the phenomena of the world. This penetration is effected by a power contained in the activity of thinking itself which is the power of love—spiritual love. There is no room here for the objection that thus to perceive love in the activity of thinking is to project into thinking a feeling, viz., love. This objection is, in truth, a confirmation of the view here advocated. If we turn towards the essential nature of thinking, we find in it both feeling and will, and both these in the depth of their reality. If we turn away from thinking towards “mere” feeling and will, these lose for us their genuine reality. If we are willing to make of thinking an intuitive experience, we can do justice, also, to experiences of the type of feeling and will. But the mysticism of feeling and the metaphysics of will are not able to do justice to the penetration of reality by intuitive thinking. They conclude all too readily that they themselves are rooted in reality, but that the intuitive thinker, untouched by feeling, blind to reality, forms out of “abstract thoughts” a shadowy, chilly picture of the world.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"VIII. The Factors of Life","site_heading":null,"date":null,"location":null,"word_count":473,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l08/p010?edition=RSPC1949","alignment_confidence":"medium","alignment_reason":"beads:structural_identity","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":null,"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["AP1986","GPP1916","RSP1964","RSPC1949","RSPI1963"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/4/l08/p010"},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSP1964","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l08/p010","paragraph_aligned":true},{"lang":"en","edition":"AP1986","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l08/p010?edition=AP1986","paragraph_aligned":true},{"lang":"en","edition":"GPP1916","edition_basis":"Steiner 1894 first edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l08/p010?edition=GPP1916"},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSPC1949","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l08/p010?edition=RSPC1949","paragraph_aligned":true},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSPI1963","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l08/p010?edition=RSPI1963"}],"german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"l08","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 4/l08/p010","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/4/l08/p010"}],"bead_confidence":"medium","length_check":{"de_words":385,"en_words":473,"ratio":1.23,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. The German original passage(s) above are the edition-invariant anchor — fetch them (lang='de') to verify wording before quoting across editions."},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.15,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":2023,"original_word_count":1760,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"status":"unknown","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 4/l08/p010"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"medium","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. 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