192 @ The Secret Lij2 feiVature
chorus can either press toward us and reveal itself to us if we willingly
take in spiritual ideas, or it can remain hidden from view."
All we have to do, says Steiner, is reach toward the spiritual beings
that hover behind the outer world surrounding us, for only if we accept
the wave of spiritual life that wants to enter our physical world wdl we
be able to achieve our own goals. We are urged to become acquainted
with nature spirits in the same way we have become acquainted with
oxygen, hydrogen, calcium, and so forth.We must meet the spirit world
at least halfway ifwe do not wish to degenerate along with our culture.
We are further warned that if we fail to learn about this spiritual world,
we run the risk of having the whole chorus of spirits fall into the hands
of opposing spiritual powers. "Unless man draws near to spiritual real-
ity something completely different from what ought to happen wd
happen to the earth."
Admitting that one needs clairvoyant slulls to discover the truths of
spiritual science, Steiner points out that one does not need such skills
in order to live by such truths. All one needs is to look with healthy
understanding at what has been laid before one. And even if one does
not want to apply oneself to acquiring supersensible perception, says
Steiner, one can still find life more comprehensible by accepting that
which such supersensible perception indicates and by applying these
indications to the world of one's experience. "If by a loving approach
to nature one acquires a consciousness unspoiled by the veneer of
knowledge considered authoritative today, one can gradually recover,
along with knowledge acquired through initiation, the knowledge
which mankind has lost."
In simple terms, Steiner advises that whoever becomes able to meet
the tree spirit coming out of the tree "as did his ancient forebears" will
also be able to see figures of his own previous earth lives and the devel-
opment of karma that proceeds from today's human beings, a vision he
says wdl lead to a comprehension of karma. "The more that associations
are formed, and the more that feelings of fellowship are developed in
complete freedom, the more will sublime beings descend to human be-
ings, and the faster the earth wd be spiritualized. Since the last third of
the nineteenth century we have had to do with a pressing-in of spiri-