abstractions usually exercise over men in the present day. A faith in
abstractions reigns amongst us which is capable of far greater things
than faith in religion or faith in reason. We are surrounded by the
bustle of a fierce and ceaselessly increasing struggle for existence:
ideas are overgrown by interests; the motives of people in general are
trivial, and all spiritual aspiration is feeble, and along with this
there is an unutterable amount of pretence which permeates and distorts
all conduct. Yet the disagreeable aspect of this condition seems to
vanish as soon as the mere word "humanity" is mentioned. But what is
humanity from the point of view of Naturalism other than a collection of
beings of nature? How can a power to elevate and to strengthen proceed
from this conception, which in the naturalistic context signifies no
more than the subjective unification of the individuals? Or, again, the
idea of a ceaseless progress of humanity is placed in opposition to the
confusions which exist in the present. But how can this idea be
established if a compelling reason is not active within man? How could
the present be so incomplete and so full of perplexity as it seems,
especially to the advocates of the idea of progress, if century after
century had made progress upon progress? Rather, if man has such a noble
nature as he is assumed to have, life should be full of reason and
bliss. The old faith saved man by resorting to an invisible world; it
required a firm confidence in that which one did not see. The new faith,
which denies an invisible world, desires more: it desires that we should
be convinced of the direct opposite of that which we see and comprehend.
These considerations in no way signify a depreciation on our part of the
effort to attain freedom and equality--an effort that has an
indisputable validity. But this validity must be based upon a whole of
life and be more definitely determined, otherwise the effort is stifled
by the inconsistencies in which the conceptions of freedom and equality
are involved in the minds of their advocates.
The independence of the individual and the spontaneity of the spiritual
life are endangered not only by the mechanism of a bureaucracy
indifferent to spiritual values but also none the less by the movements
of the masses, which in modern life in particular surround and browbeat
the individual. The man of the present day often believes that he has
gained freedom when in reality he has only changed the nature of his
dependence. What makes the movements of the masses, with their so-called
public opinion, so irksome is the falsehood that is generally contained
in this opinion, which is presented as proceeding from the experience
and decision of a great majority, and therefore as having a definite
presupposition of truth. The fact, as a rule, is that a few venture an
assertion and urge it upon the others with unobserved compulsion, since
they proclaim as already existent the agreement that they are only
seeking. Of course sometimes there is much more in public opinion; it
may be the expression of a spiritual necessity which subjects to itself
the dispositions of men. Whether public opinion is to be an interpreter
of truth or a mere product of man remains to be decided; and this
decision can rest only with the individual. He will be equal to making
this decision if he possesses a spiritual experience, and has in this a
touchstone by which to distinguish the genuine from the false.
Philosophy can maintain the rights of the individual only so far as he
is rooted in spiritual relationships and derives power from them; it
must absolutely oppose all glorification of the natural, spiritually
destitute individual. We find such a glorification to-day more
especially in that which, with particular emphasis, is called "modern"
morality, but which in fact threatens rather to be a complete negation
of morality; even though this negation is against the intentions of its
advocates, mostly women, who display great enthusiasm for this "modern"
morality. It seems as though life is limited and degraded because
society, particularly in the matter of the sexual life, prescribes rigid
statutes which, if they were not irrational at the beginning, have
nevertheless become irrational, and tend to brand the right as wrong and
the wrong as right. The shaking off of these restrictions and of the
pressure of society in general seems to promise a form of life
incomparably more powerful, sincere, and individual: this life is also
to offer more beauty, for to-day generally the idea of beauty is
emphasised with great partiality where life has no clear ideas and no
significant content.
This criticism of the statutes of society is not entirely without
reason. Such statutes do not in themselves constitute a morality, as it
is easy to imagine they do; but they only advocate a morality; as life
undergoes such far-reaching changes, these statutes must continually be
examined anew as to their validity and value. But this relativity does
not make them worthless, and does not justify their complete rejection
in favour of an absolute freedom on the part of individuals. We could
expect an elevation of life by such an effort for freedom only if we
might assume that the individuals are thoroughly noble, energetic, and
spiritually rich, and if in the relations between the sexes a state of
paradisiacal innocence reigned which only the evil arrangements of
society had disturbed. But this is a way of thinking which does more
honour to the hearts than to the heads of its advocates. He who takes
men as they really are and does not paint them in romantic colours, and
who at the same time recognises the dangers of a highly developed,
pleasure-seeking, and over-refined state of culture, will not despise
those social arrangements, notwithstanding their relativity, but value
them as an indispensable safeguard against the selfishness, the greed
for pleasure, and the instability of the mere individual--a safeguard
not only against the tyranny of externals but also for the individual
against himself. It is unfortunate enough that such safeguards are
necessary; but, as they are necessary, it is better to preserve and
improve them as much as possible than to reject them, and to expose
humanity to dangers that might throw it back into the condition of the
animals. Man is not better because he is painted more beautifully;
rather Pascal is right when he says: "L'homme n'est ni ange ni bête, et
le malheur veut, que qui veut faire l'ange fait la bête."
The tendency to think that man may be transformed inwardly and the whole
condition of life raised by changes in external organisation is most
definitely felt in the social movements of the age. In this there is a
clearly marked opposition to the earlier mode of thought, which, placing
a low estimate upon everything external, and finding greatness too
easily in disposition, overlooked how much the organisation of the
conditions of life means for men in whom the spiritual is only in
process of development; and, further, failed to notice that there is
also a strong movement from external to internal. Nevertheless, the fact
cannot be denied, notwithstanding all this, that the problems of the
whole and of man's inner nature require to be treated as of chief
importance. Otherwise, as Aristotle suggested, notwithstanding all the
alteration of conditions, the old problems will continually make their
appearance anew, and the substance of life might easily suffer from that
which was intended to improve its condition.
In conclusion, we may briefly consider the problems that have been
raised in the nineteenth century by the increased emphasis on the idea
of nationality. Influences of an idealistic nature first raised the
cultivation and establishment of a particular national character to the
position of a matter of the greatest importance. This character appeared
to be an extremely valuable form of individualisation of the spiritual
life, a form in which that life attains to concreteness and greater
definiteness and penetration. The co-existence of these individual
nationalities gave promise of an incomparably richer formation of the
life of humanity as a whole: the inner development of their peculiar
natures, and their lofty rivalry, also promised to bring a wealth of
arousing and elevating motives. The nineteenth century has, indeed, won
an incalculable amount through this movement; to take up an abstract
cosmopolitanism again would be decidedly retrograde.
But the more the idea of nationality has been brought from its high
place in the realm of thought to the domain of human circumstance, the
more has it been debased and the more dangers has it produced. If
previously the cultivation of an ideal type of life was most prominent,
and if the nations could thus permit one another to follow their own
courses peacefully, this has become less and less the case in face of
the desire and effort for power and expansion in the visible world; and
owing to the narrowness of physical space occupied by the nations, the
different strivings have clashed together more and more severely. If
this tendency continues without the counteraction of an inner task
common to humanity as a whole, and of unifying and elevating ideas, it
is hardly possible to avoid mutual hostility, a degeneration into
obstinacy and injustice. The idea of nationality may therefore become a
danger to the ethical character of life. This is the case if, by milder
or by severer means, one nation tries to force its own character and
speech upon another. The mode of thought based on the old _cujus regio
ejus natio_ is in no way better than that based on the old _cujus regio
ejus religio_, which we are now accustomed to regard with contempt as a
piece of barbarism. The desire for external power at the same time tends
to lessen the attention to the inner development and unification of
nationality, without which ultimately little progress can be made in the
development of power. It is through a common national character, with
its unification of the feelings and efforts of the individuals, that a
people is first elevated into a genuine nation; it is a character such
as this that gives to a people a power of influencing humanity as a
whole; it is a character such as this that gives to the individuals the
consciousness of being "members one of another," and with this a
stability and a joy in life and activity. Such a national character
necessitates certain natural conditions, that are like the veins in
marble which prescribe a certain direction to the work of the artist.
But these conditions must first be organised and by the complete
elevation of their nature spiritually unified; and this cannot be
achieved otherwise than through our own work, which through common
events and experiences follows its ideal. So far, therefore, national
character is not a gift of nature but a task which presents itself
distinctively to each people according to its nature and conditions. In
this matter a people must always in the first place realise a unity in
its own nature.
In the fulfilment of this task hardly any other people has had to
contend with keener opposition, both external and internal, than the
Germans. Our physical environment does not direct us so definitely into
distinctive paths as is the case with other peoples. But our inner
nature contains, before all else, harsh antitheses. Our strength lies
chiefly in arousing to life depths of the soul otherwise undreamt of.
Thus in music and in poetry we have been able to surpass all other
peoples; again, we have been able to give to religion a wonderful
inwardness, and in education to evolve the leading ideas. At the same
time, however, we are driven to the physical world to take possession of
and to shape things; we are not the Hindus of Europe, as other people
indeed previously called us. We came into history by achievements in
war, and the desire for conflict and victory has been maintained through
all the phases of our varied history. By the continued diligence of our
citizens in work we have subordinated the world around us to our aims;
our capacity for organisation has been most marked, as the present state
of industry and trade shows. However, not only have these movements
towards inwardness, and towards the world, a strong tendency to oppose
one another, but also, in contrast with these magnificent gifts, there
are many defects and tendencies that make the development of a powerful
and unified life exceedingly difficult. We show a want of form and
taste, a heaviness and formality, a tendency to occupation with detail
and, in general, with what is petty in life, and, as a result of this,
an uncultured "Philistinism" in all spheres of society, and along with
this the inclination on the part of individuals to insist on the
correctness of their positions, and thus to cause division; finally--and
this is the worst of all--much envy and jealousy. None of these features
can be denied. There is an infinite amount which must be altered and
overcome amongst us if we are to become what we are capable of becoming,
and if we are to reach the highest in our nature. The limitations that
have been brought about by our history, which on the whole has not been
a happy one, constitute an important determining factor in this matter.
The more problems we bear within us, the more possibilities of genuine
creation that exist within us, and the more we may be to humanity in the
future, the more painful is it if attention and activity are diverted
from the chief task, and if an externalising of the idea of nationality
allows us to consider ourselves great rather than lead us to strive for
true greatness. The people that has produced Luther and Bach, Kant and
Goethe, cannot be devoid of true greatness, if it only remains faithful
to its own nature, and if it concentrates its power and treats the chief
thing really as such.
(e) THE LIFE OF THE INDIVIDUAL
The problems and antitheses that are to be found in the life of the
present penetrate deeply into the life of the individual, and often make
their appearance within him with a particular power. The antithesis that
exists between the conceptions of the world and the demands of life is
especially harsh. The tendency of the age is to form a conception of the
world which reduces the status of the individual in the greatest degree:
from the point of view of nature and of society, he seems to be no more
than a fleeting appearance, a matter of indifference, and to show no
independence, and never to be able to take part with spontaneous
activity in the course of events. On the other hand, the contemporary
form of life demands the greatest independence and freedom of the
individual. We see in him the chief bearer of life, and we expect
salvation from the severe perplexities of the time, primarily from his
strengthening. This state of inconsistency cannot be tolerated for long;
either the degradation of the individual, that is found in the
conceptions of the world, must be applied to life, and lead it to a
resigned submission to an impenetrable world-process, or the positive
estimate of the individual which governs conduct must be acknowledged in
the conviction concerning reality as a whole: only a weakness of
disposition and a feebleness of thought can divide our existence between
the one conviction and the other.
The course which our investigation has taken cannot leave any possible
doubt as to the direction which our conviction points out to us in this
matter: however much we also demand an energetic development of the
individual, that the stagnation of the age may be overcome, at the same
time we insist upon a necessary condition of this, on his inner
strengthening by an inner world present to him, on his elevation by a
spirituality transcending nature. Only if he thus acquires an inner
relation to infinity, and becomes an independent centre of life, can he
satisfy the demands that are generally made upon him, and, remarkably
enough, especially by those who theoretically deny the inner world as a
whole, and hail a most shallow Naturalism as a deliverance.
Of course that inner elevation of the individual by no means lifts him
gently and simply out of all the confusion that the experience of our
existence shows; at the first glance it may even seem to make the
confusion greater. For, if each individual can become a co-operator in
the building up of a new world, and if his activity thereby acquires a
value for the whole, then the complete indifference with which,
according to our human impression, the individual is treated by the
course of the physical world, the inflexibility and injustice that he
often experiences in this world, the defect of love and justice in this
world, in which the bad so often obtain the victory and the good are led
to destruction, are all the greater mystery. The more the development of
the spiritual life widens the field of vision; the more it leads us
beyond a lifeless resignation to the question of the rationality of
events and compels us to compare the destiny of one man with that of
another, the deeper must that feeling of mystery become. All attempts
at a theodicy founder on this difficulty; we must inevitably submit to
the view that with regard to this problem all is obscure to the eyes of
man. There is, however, no need on this account to doubt and to regard
our life as hopeless; our investigation also has shown this. For, in
contrast with the obscurity of the world around us, we are able to set
the fact of the emergence of a new world within us. Great things take
place within us; not only does a new world appear, but we are called by
an inner necessity of our own being to co-operate in its development,
and this co-operation is not limited to individual activities, but
involves our being as a whole. For it was just in this that we were able
to recognise the development of being as the essence of the spiritual
life--that the chief movement of our life is to win a genuine being, and
that in the development of personality and spiritual individuality such
a being is in question. We saw clearly enough that we are not
personalities and individuals from the beginning; but that nature gives
us only the possibility of becoming this. To realise this possibility
our own activity is necessary; and this activity is not a sudden
resolution, but requires a revolution of our being and the development
of a new nature; and this can only be achieved by a faithful and zealous
life-work, and even then only approximately. Thus life as a whole is a
task which includes all multiplicity within it, the task of winning our
own being completely, and just in this way to increase the kingdom of
the spirit at our point.
This task cannot be completely recognised and adopted without making a
great divergence from the aim, harsh oppositions and difficult
conflicts, manifest in the inner recesses of the soul. If our life,
therefore, appears to be in the highest degree incomplete, a mere
beginning, then this increase of the task demonstrates more than
anything else that, in this matter, we are concerned not with phantoms
and imaginations, but with realities: so here, notwithstanding all our
incompleteness, we can obtain the certainty of a spiritual existence,
and even become strengthened by the direct resistance of the external
world, because that world is henceforth reduced to the secondary
position. Thus, as we saw, the question upon which minds separate into
irreconcilable opposition is whether they acknowledge in the inwardness
of being itself not merely individual problems but a universal task; if
this is the case, the seriousness of the task will give to them an
unshakable stability of possession and a security superior to all
attacks; if it is not the case, the spiritual world is an unintelligible
paradox, because the want of an independent inner life means that there
is no basis for the development of an organ for the comprehension of a
world of inwardness. In this matter there is no possibility of a direct
agreement; only the proof of the spirit and of power can decide.
But where the life of the individual acquires a genuine being and a
connection with the realm of self-consciousness, then, notwithstanding
all that is fleeting and insubstantial, the individual cannot regard
himself as a transitory appearance in the whole, even in the ultimate
basis of his being. Where, in contrast with all the meaninglessness of
mere nature and all the pretence of mere society, a movement towards
inner unity and substantial being emerges, the individual will be
elevated into a time-transcendent order, and must necessarily acquire
some position within it. The whole movement towards spirituality in the
human sphere would be vain, and all distinctively human life would be a
meaningless contradiction, if the individuals in whom alone the
spiritual life breaks forth spontaneously were included solely and
entirely in the stream of the process of nature. If the spiritual life
has once revealed itself to us, so far as to begin an independent and
distinctive being within us, then this being will assert itself in some
way. This does not imply agreement with the usual belief in immortality,
which would preserve man just as he is through all eternity, and thus
condemn him to the torture of rigid continuance in the same form; a
state that would, indeed, be as unbearable as the pain of the
traditional hell. As the world as a whole is in the highest degree
mysterious to us, so our future is veiled in the deepest obscurity. But,
if with the essence of our being we are elevated into a universal
spiritual life, and if in the innermost basis of our life we participate
in an eternal order, then the time-transcendence of this life assures to
us also some kind of time-transcendence in our being.
_So löst sich jene grosse Frage
Nach unserm zweiten Vaterland,
Denn das Beständige der ird'schen Tage
Verbürgt uns ewigen Bestand._
GOETHE
CONCLUSION
In conclusion a few words will suffice. The last section showed that the
present sets great problems and reveals possibilities in every
department of life; but that we men are very far from being equal to
cope with these problems. We are limited especially by the fact that we
are incapable of elevating ourselves inwardly above the present; that we
do not take possession of it sufficiently as a whole, and find an inner
independence in relation to it; and that therefore we do not enter with
the necessary vigour into the conflict against the trivial and the
poor-spirited, the decadent and the sceptical that the present contains.
To point out the way to attain such independence appeared to us to be
the chief task of philosophy in the present. In the service of this
task, which cannot be achieved without the manifestation of a new
actuality, without a fundamental deepening of our reality, we have made
our investigation, which contains a distinctive conception of the
spiritual life. In that everywhere we have pressed back from the results
to the experience, and from the wealth of achievement to the generating
basis, we have seen nature, history, culture, and human nature as a
whole in a new light. We have hoped, by widening and strengthening life
itself from within, to supply a substitute for the external supports
that life has lost. How far we have succeeded in our endeavour is
another question; we shall be satisfied even if our work only
contributes to bring the present to a clearer consciousness of the state
of spiritual crisis in which it exists and concerning the seriousness of
which it deceives itself in a thousand ways. There is an enormous amount
of vigorous activity and efficient work, of honest endeavour and serious
disposition, in our time, and the tendency to make life more spiritual
is also evident. But the movement is still far from attaining the depth
which is necessary to the chief question of our spiritual existence;
thus the conflict, instead of being between whole and whole, is divided;
that which is significant and valuable in the endeavour of the time is
in danger of becoming problematic, and of producing the opposite of what
it purposes, because it does not fit itself into a universal life, and
in this realise its limitations and at the same time its right. A more
energetic concentration of life in itself is therefore the first
condition of transcending the chaos of the life of the present and of
preventing spiritual degeneration in the midst of too intense an
occupation with externals. As for the rest, we may say with Plotinus:
"The doctrine serves to point the way and guide the traveller; the
vision, however, is for him who will see it."
INDEX