4. Anthroposophical Spiritual Science and the Great Questions of Civilization in the Present Day

What memory does with the otherwise fleeting images is that it gives them duration. This is what one first takes up and develops in the spiritual scientific method; one develops it through what I call meditation and concentration in the books mentioned. This consists of either seeking advice from someone who has experience in these matters or gleaning the advice oneself from the relevant literature, and of taking easily comprehensible complexes of images such as are geometric or mathematical figures, which one completely overlooks, knowing that these are not reminiscences from life emerging from the subconscious, but everything one has in consciousness is there through one's own arbitrariness in consciousness. One is not subject to auto-suggestion or reverie; one surveys that which one brings into the center of consciousness. Then one remains in consciousness for a long time with complete inner calm on this idea. Just as muscles develop when they perform a particular kind of work, so certain soul powers develop when the soul devotes itself to this unusual activity of remaining on such ideas. It looks easy, and not only do some believe that the spiritual scientist draws what he has to say from some kind of influence, but some also believe that what I am describing here as methods that take place in the inner, intimate life of the soul itself is easy. No, what I am telling you now also requires a long time; some people can do it more easily, others more difficultly. The depth of the performance is much more important than the length of time spent in such meditation.