39. The Origin of Evil

We could speak at length about this if we let the thinkers pass before us, we could bring forward many examples from the great epochs but we would always get only a kind of philosophical answer. Today however we do not want philosophical answers, and so without deviation we would occupy ourselves with the spiritual world in order to get a firm point for the answering of our question. In order not to expand our mode of observation too far I should like at once to go to the heart of the matter, and for this we must bring quite briefly the nature of man before the soul. We are clear that evil must have something to do with human nature.