WARFARE IN NATURE

HOW FOOLISH ARE YOU who always ask whether the struggle in Creation is right, who only perceive it as cruel!

Do you not know that you thereby appear as weaklings who endanger every present-day possibility of ascent?

Rouse yourselves at last out of this shocking weakness, which only allows both body and spirit gradually to sink, but never to rise!

Look about you, seeing and recognizing, and you must bless the great impulse which induces the need to struggle and consequently to defend, to act cautiously, to be alert and really to live!

It protects the creature from the deadly embrace of sloth!

Can an artist ever reach the peak of his skill and maintain himself there unless he continually practices’ and fights for it, no matter what his profession and how great the abilities he possesses?

The voice of a singer would soon lose in power and dependability, if he did not force himself constantly to practice and learn afresh!

An arm can only grow strong if it is constantly exercised!

If there is any relaxation in this respect it must weaken.

And so it is with every body and every spirit!

However, no man can be brought to do this voluntarily!

There must be some compulsion!

If you wish to be healthy you must care for your body and your spirit, that is to say, keep them in strict activity!

But what man today understands and what he has always understood by “caring” is not the right thing!

Either he means indulging in sweet idleness, which as such already implies a weakening and paralysis, or he practices’ this “caring” only one-sidedly, as with every sport, thus making the caring a “sport”, a one-sided exaggeration, and thereby a frivolous and ambitious abuse that is utterly unworthy of serious humanity!

True humanity must indeed have in view the highest goal, which cannot be reached by high jumping, swimming, running, riding or furious driving!

Mankind and the entire Creation derive no benefit from such individual accomplishments, for which many a man often sacrifices the greater part of his thoughts, his time and his life on earth!

That such extravagant activities could develop at all shows how false is the road on which mankind travel, and also how they divert this great motive power in Creation into nothing but wrong channels, thereby frittering it away in useless toying, if not even causing injury by hindering healthy progress, all the possibilities for which have been provided in Creation!

In their human conceit men so distort the course of the strong currents of the spirit, which are meant to further ascent, that instead of the intended progress stoppages occur which act as a hindrance!

In their reaction these stoppages increase the struggling instinct until finally, bursting all bounds, they carry everything along with themselves into the depths!

It is with such hollow pseudo-scientific toying and ambitions that man of today primarily occupies himself!

A mischief-maker, destructive of all harmony in Creation!

He would have long since fallen into the lazy sleep of idleness which must lead to decay had it not fortunately been for the fighting instinct resting in Creation which forces him to bestir himself in spite of everything!

Otherwise he would long ago have arrogantly assumed that God must care for him through His Creation, just as in the dream of a fool’s paradise!

And if he offers his thanks for it in a spiritless prayer, then that is more than enough reward for his God!

Indeed there are many who never thank Him for it at all!

Such is man, and in truth not otherwise!

He talks of cruelty in Nature, but it never occurs to him to examine himself first of all!

He only wants to criticize!

Even in the fighting among animals there lies only blessing, and not cruelty!

One only needs to observe some animal closely!

As an example let us take a dog!

The more considerately a dog is treated the lazier and more slothful it will become.

If a dog is in the study of its master and the latter always carefully refrains from stepping upon or pushing the animal, even if it lies down in those places where it is in constant danger of being hurt unintentionally, as for instance near a door, this is to the detriment of the animal!

In a very short time the dog will lose its alertness. “Kind-hearted” people will say in “loving” extenuation, perhaps even moved by the wonderful “trust” the dog shows in this, that it knows nobody will hurt it!

In reality, however, this is nothing but a gross diminution in its capacity to “be alert”, a marked falling-off in psychic activity!

If, on the other hand, an animal has constantly to be on the alert and ready to defend itself, it will not only become and remain psychically awake, but its intelligence will steadily grow keener and it will gain in every way.

It remains alive in all respects, and that means progress!

It is the same with every creature!

Otherwise it will perish, because its body gradually weakens and, having no longer any power of resistance, it becomes more liable to disease!

The fact that man takes an absolutely wrong attitude towards the animal in various ways will not surprise a keen observer, for man does the same towards everything, towards himself and towards the entire Creation, doing harm spiritually everywhere instead of bringing benefit!

If today there was no longer in Creation the fighting instinct which so many indolent people call cruel, the World of Matter would already long ago have been in a state of rottenness and disintegration.

This instinct has a preserving effect on the body and soul.

It is certainly not destructive, although it may appear so on the surface!

Otherwise there would no longer be anything left to keep this sluggish World of Gross Matter in motion, and consequently in good health and vigor, since man, through his errors, has so wantonly diverted the quickening effects of the all-pervading spiritual power actually destined for this purpose, so that it cannot act in the way it really should!

If man had not failed so miserably to carry out the task for which he was destined, then much, everything, would look different today!

Neither would the so-called “fight” have taken on the form in which it shows itself at present!

The fighting instinct would have been ennobled, spiritualized by the upward surging will of man.

Its original uncouth effect, instead of increasing as it does now, would gradually have changed under the right spiritual influence and become a united, cheerful incentive to help one another forward, which would require the same energy as the most violent struggle.

But with this difference, that a struggle is followed by exhaustion, while in mutually helping one another a great increase in energy would be the consequence!

Also in the reproduction of Creation, in which the spiritual will of man is the strongest influence, there would finally have set in for all creatures the Paradise-like state, just as it is in the real Creation, where there is no struggle and no apparent cruelty required any longer!

This Paradise-like condition, however, does not consist of idleness, but is equivalent to being most energetically astir, to real personal fully-conscious life!

That this could not happen is the guilt of the human spirit!

I must again and again revert to the decisive fall of man, which I describe in detail in the lecture “Once upon a time”.

Only the complete failure of the human spirit in Creation through the misuse of the spiritual power entrusted to it, the effects of which were diverted downwards instead of upwards to Luminous Heights, has brought about the present unsound aberrations!

Man has already trifled or gambled away even the ability to see his mistake!

Thus if I wanted to say more about it I would only be preaching to deaf ears!

He who really wishes to “listen” and is able to seek earnestly will find all he needs in my Message.

And he will also find everywhere explanations about the great failure which has brought on such unspeakably serious disasters in so many varied forms!

He, however, who is spiritually deaf as so many are, has only the inane laugh of those who are devoid of understanding, a laugh that is meant to simulate knowledge, but which in reality merely indicates a careless superficiality, and is the same as gross narrow-mindedness!

And those on whom the idiotic laughing of such spiritually limited human beings makes any impression today are themselves worthless.

To such Christ’s words are applicable: “Let the dead bury their dead”, for he who is spiritually deaf and blind is spiritually dead!

With his ability the human spirit could make the earth, this replica of Creation, a paradise!

He has not done so, and therefore he now sees the world before him as he has distorted it through his false actions.

Everything lies therein!

Therefore do not out of false sentimentality disdain such an important matter as the warfare in Nature, for it restores the necessary balance to something which man neglected to carry out!

Nor be so bold as to call your sweet and sultry sentimentality “love”, with which man likes so much to cover his weaknesses!

Such falsehood and hypocrisy must avenge themselves bitterly!

Therefore, woe unto you, man, you degenerate product of your imagination!

You caricature of what you should be!

Try to observe calmly what you usually call Nature – the mountains, the lakes, the woods, and the meadows, at all seasons!

Man is enraptured by the beauty that meets his gaze!

And now reflect: That which gives you so much happiness and refreshment is the fruit of the activity of all that comprises animistic substantiality* which, in Creation, ranks below the spiritual, with the power of which you have been endowed!

Then seek out the fruits of your work, you who are spiritual and who should accomplish higher things than animistic substantiality, which is actually ahead of you!

And what do you find? Only feeble imitations of what animistic substantiality has already achieved, but no progress towards ideal heights in all that is living and thus in Creation!

With nothing but degenerated creative instincts mankind only try lifelessly to imitate existing forms, whereas with a free and conscious spirit, and their eyes uplifted to the Divine, they would be capable of producing very different and much more sublime things!

Men have wantonly cut themselves off from the greatness which is born only of a free spirit, and besides childish imitations they can therefore produce nothing but machines, constructions, and technical achievements in general.

All earth-bound, on a lowly plane, hollow and lifeless, just like themselves!

These are the fruits which man, as a spiritual being, can now compare with the activity of the elemental beings!

This is how he has fulfilled the spiritual task in the Subsequent Creation given to him for that purpose!

How do they expect to pass when the reckoning comes?

Is it any wonder if the sublime Paradise must remain closed to people with such base propensities?

And can one be surprised if now in the end the elementals, in reaction, will completely destroy the work so wrongly led by the human spirit?

And when now, owing to the lack of ability you showed, everything will collapse upon you, then cover your face and acknowledge with shame the terrible guilt with which you have burdened yourselves!

Do not again try to accuse your Creator of it, or to call Him cruel and unjust!

You who are seeking, however, examine yourselves seriously and unsparingly, and then try to readjust your whole thinking and intuitive perception, indeed your whole being, upon a spiritual foundation, which will no longer rock like the intellectual and thus very limited foundation of the past!

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