THE TRIUMPH OF LH^E 



melted back. Already it seemed to stand at 

 sharp line as if held back by a mysterious finger" 

 saying to it "thus far shalt thou go and no 

 further." At this mark the life destroying cos- 

 mical power ended and the favorable powei 

 once more won a place. Baldur, the sun godj 

 once more conquered the ice giant, the giant oi 

 the world space. But is not the earth finalb 

 doomed .^^ Is it not written in the stars that this 

 catastrophe will come again in a hundred thou- 

 sand or a million years perhaps, and come with^ 

 the pitiless inevitability of all great cosmic 

 events and then after so many times will no^ 

 the ice dragon eat its death meal of life.^^ 



Life in struggle with Cosmos — how shall ii 

 end.? , 



The answer is written above. That bein^ 

 whose form lies there in that dark shadow clii 

 in the reddish illuminated cave entrance is man! 

 In that moment when life was threatened by 

 Cosmic powers which lay beyond the earth, ii 

 created out of its marrow a living being, whicl 

 for the first time could look beyond this eartl 

 into the cosmos. It was that being standing 

 with his stone knife before his hearth flame wh< 

 marked the great turning point: the turnin^^ 

 point which indicated the change from adjust-* 

 ment to external things to the domination overlj 

 these things in the sense of an improvement for 

 a definite purpose. 



148 



