Anthroposophy and the Riddle of the Soul

But there is a considerable difference between the various types of existential conundrums. Man is confronted with nature and must form ideas and feelings about his relationship to nature. And if I may use a comparison, I would like to say: When man has come to consciousness in the way I have characterized it, and he cannot find his way into certain things that confront him as mysteries of nature, then existence, to which he once belonged – as I said, it is only expressed as a comparison – appears to him as a spiritual darkness. He feels as if he has been placed in a dark world, and cannot find his way about in it. But to a certain extent this whole relationship to the secrets of the outer, natural world remains something external to the human being; it concerns his outer relationship to existence.