The Present Age

Irene Vincent

~Let the augury of birds sing the melody of splendor
Before the dream of time began,
& I will count myself
Among the absolute
Which dwells in the numberless One
Where we 1st meet…
~hag

“…The present age is more than any other age demanding the one thing people least want to have: understanding based on the science of the spirit.

Strange as it may sound to the ordinary, average people of today — order will not be created from the chaos of the present time until a sufficiently large number of people are prepared to recognize the truths of that science. Such will be the karma of world history.

If people insist that this war is just like the wars of the past and that we’ll be making peace just as peace has been made before — let them talk. They are the people who love maya and do not distinguish between truth and deception.

Order will only arise from the chaos that fills the world today when insight based on the science of the spirit dawns in human minds. You may feel in your heart that it will be a long time before such order comes; you may think it will be a long time before people are prepared to let the dawn of such a science arise — and you will be right. You have to accept that it will be a long time before order arises from the chaos. For it will not come until human hearts understand the realm of the spirit. Order can only come when it is understood how this chaos has arisen.

Vasily Kandinsky

Chaos has arisen because the reality is considered in an unspiritual way — and the world of the spirit cannot be ignored with impunity. You may think it is enough to live with thoughts and ideas that are wholly derived from the physical world. It is what people generally think today, though this does not make it true. The most completely and utterly wrong idea humanity has ever had is — to put it simply — that the spirits will put up with being ignored.

The spirits take their revenge if they are ignored here on Earth. This is a law, an iron necessity. One way to characterize the present time is to say that the present human chaos is the revenge of the spirits that have been ignored for too long.


I have often said, both here and elsewhere: A mysterious connection exists between human consciousness and the destructive powers of decline and fall in the universe.
~Rudolf Steiner, Fall of the Spirits of Darkness, Lecture 1, September 29, 1917

1 July 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Venus and Mars point a line to Regulus in the western twilight. The stars of the Beehive, behind Venus this evening, are way too faint to be spotted. But they’re there. . .

Shannon Pierce

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day (RSarchives) 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY (Rudolf Steiner’s original Calendar of the Soul; The Present Age, Wikipedia)

Saint Gall, Enlightener of Switzerland (+ 646) | MYSTAGOGY RESOURCE CENTER

550 – Birthday of St. Gall – one of the twelve companions of Saint Columbanus. When Columbanus, Gall and their companions left Ireland for mainland Europe, they took with them learning and the written word. Their effect on the historical record was significant as the books were painstakingly reproduced on vellum by monks across Europe. Many of the Irish texts destroyed in Ireland during Viking raids were preserved in Abbeys across the channel.

Old European culture: St Gall and the bear

Legend has it that Gall delivered Fridiburga from the demon by which she was possessed. Fridiburga was the betrothed of Sigebert II, King of the Franks, who had granted an estate at Arbon (which belonged to the royal treasury) to Gall so that he might found a monastery there. Another popular story has it that as St Gall was travelling in the woods of Switzerland he was sitting one evening warming his hands at a fire. A bear emerged from the woods and charged. The holy man rebuked the bear, so awed by his presence it stopped its attack and slunk off to the trees. There it gathered firewood before returning to share the heat of the fire with St Gall. The legend says that for the rest of his days St Gall was followed around by his companion the bear.

Nicholas Down

You are welcome to freely view Video’s of past presentations

Listen on the ‘I Think Speech’ podcast

4 thoughts on “The Present Age

  1. Interesting thought you give from The Fall of the Spirits of Darkness, Hazel. Sounds like giving the spirits more attention is one of the best things we can do for Earth, and for human affairs.

      1. I was telling a friend about this lecture. I said that while it’s interesting hearing the different reports about the chaos in our world today, they never provide a solution to the chaos. Here Steiner gives us a solution – this is the kind of message the world needs, but most, sadly, will not heed. But hey, it makes sense to us, as you say – we’ll do our part to give the spirits their recognition.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.