Wikner opened his lecture with the words: ”One of the conditions of finitude is this, that every progress within her is bought with a sacrifice.” What this meant was that here on earth, nothing is free. Wikner elaborated the thought: nature itself creates the conditions and the basis for the development of spiritual culture. Nature constitutes ”a totality of forces, which culture can take into its service”. The so-called spiritual forces, for example, must be supported by physical ones. Diligent studies, therefore, we have the strength to conduct only if we also take care of our body and our health.

But it is also the case that genuine studies require sacrifices. Poetical souls suffer in agony when they are forced to study dry philosophy, for example the philosophy of Boström, Wikner claimed; and he knew what he was talking about since he himself was a poet who had written the most abstract of philosophical treatises. ”Any major cultural ca...