Intuitive Thinking As a Spiritual Path

Preface 1

Preface to the Revised Edition, 1918

Everything discussed in this book is organized around two
root questions of the human soul.First, can we understand
human nature in such a way that this understanding serves
as the basis for everything else we may meet in the way of
experience or science? (For we have the sense that what
we meet in this way cannot sustainitself, because doubt
and critical thinking can drive it into the realm of uncer-
tainty.)Second, can we human beings, as willing entities,
ascribe freedom to ourselves, or is this freedom a mere il-
lusion that arises because we do not see the threads of ne-
cessity upon which our willing, like any other natural
event, depends? This is no artificial question. It proceeds
naturally from a certain mood of soul. We even feel that
the soul would be less than it should be if it never earnestly
came face to face with these two possibilities: freedom or
necessity of the will. The purpose of this book is to show

[1]

NOTE: As an aid to readers wishing to follow the text in German, the

numbers that appear in the margins indicate Rudolf Steiner’s original

paragraphing in the German edition.