For thousands of years, it has been the case that within the terrestrial human sphere there have been people who have accumulated an enormous amount of possessions, who have built up vast amounts of money, goods and gold, while the other members of society have languished in poverty and hunger, in need and misery and who, to a large extent, have been the tools that enabled the first group of people to come into possession of the exorbitant amount of the assets of society. In this way society has been divided into two groups of people, that have become known as "the propertied class" and "the lower class". In the worst case these two classes have been so divided that the relationship between them has actually been similar to the horrible caste system that we know from India, where the higher castes regard and treat the people of the lower castes almost like animals.

In the countries of the East there are families that in this way have "inherited" their subjects over many centuries. As this meant that these generations of princes could exploit their people, allowing them to work for them in return for a miserable keep with a pitiful allocation of the things necessary for living, they could gather the entire profits of all the people's efforts as their own private property, whether it consisted of buildings, castles, herds of animals, gold, silver, precious stones, valuable carpets or anything else that one could at that time, with the help of human hands, manifest and produce as goods. Because of this the family treasure chests became more and more laden as each new generation came to power, while the ordinary people really went on living in the same old oppressive and degrading dullness and routine. This has really been the state of affairs in the East for thousands of years, until more recent times when the people of the West gradually assumed power over the people of colour in order to gain a share of their riches. But because the people of the West were also for centuries the inherited property of the rulers, the state of affairs during these centuries was no better in their regions or part of the world.

But the oppression and degradation of the people gradually gave rise to ideas or thoughts of liberation, and in turn these thoughts gradually gave rise to the revolutions that overturned the form of government, so taking away the power from the monarchies. The form of government now became more or less "democratic" and instead of being a dictatorship it was based on the wishes and requirements of the people, which were established and rendered powerful and just by the right to a free vote. From now on the people were freed from the demands of the autocratic and sometimes despotic dictators. The right of ownership that such a being exercised over his people no longer existed, and never again will, except in those zones where people have still not had enough of degradation, brutality and enslavement of mind and body, so that they fall back on being impressed by the power of a dictator, placing themselves again under him only to realize that suddenly they are only a number in a concentration camp. All of a dictator's subjects appear more or less in a state of being deprived of their freedom. But every deprivation of freedom of a being's normal functions, including its ability to think, is imprisonment, and as the dictatorship can exist only by virtue of this mental imprisonment, everyone without exception within the domain of the dictator, is imprisoned. Whether one expresses this domain of imprisonment using every name other than concentration camp, is of no importance. Gilded names or expressions camouflaged by decorations of flowers do not remove the identity of the region as a domain where there is loss of liberty, which again is the same as a concentration camp. But just as it has already happened to the dominion of the princes or the kings, where they still exist as a mere shadow of how they were before, and where the king or prince has been made a subject of the people, the same will inevitably also happen to the dominion of any kind of dictator. Any loss of freedom, degradation or oppression can give rise to only one single concentration of thought, namely the longing for freedom, which in turn gives rise to the mobilisation of every available means whereby the people can bring about the fall of the oppressor or dictator. Revolutions, torture, executions and sabotage constitute the thick dark clouds that cause the sky of dictatorship to be constantly and inevitably overcast, preventing the mental sunshine of life from warming the hearts and minds of human beings. Private property in the form of a prince's or dictator's dominion is thus extremely unstable and transient.

As the people reached the point of governing themselves, there arose another form of dominion to do with power and possession. This dominion is represented by such people as the modern-day Croesus, the multimillionaire, the tycoon and the manufacturer. At first the freedom of the people did not remove the difference between the upper class and the lower class, and it also did not remove the conditions that would prevent the strong from exploiting the weak. The possibility for this was just transferred to another principle, through which it could be camouflaged so that it appeared just and thereby lawful. This principle has been known over some decades as the so-called "business principle". Through this principle there has originally been a limitless possibility for the cunning to exploit the weak, even with the assistance or support of the law. Within the free government by the people, there could therefore arise not only one single dictator's dominion but several hundred small dictator's domains in the form of large businesses or private concerns engulfing all and everything. Have we not seen that businesses like these have been able to expand from quite small, modest concerns to gigantic enterprises with several thousand workers and with yearly takings in the millions? This annual income of millions of crowns [Danish unit of currency. Ed.] is just the same for this kind of business, as perpetrators of violence and slave-drivers are for a dictator. The businesses are perhaps regarded as being more humane but the effects are the same. Both phenomena are a means of capturing even more power and superiority and thereby a renewed ability to oppress and conquer other people's advantages and possessions. Is it not the case that such superior million-crown firms can easily outcompete other less economically stable businesses in order to cut for themselves their orders and their customers? In this way the owners can create for themselves an excessively luxurious private life, living in palaces with parks, gardens and servants. They can travel round the world in private yachts, aeroplanes and showy cars, and be feted, honoured and admired as "great men", and of whom it is seen as a mark of distinction to cover their chests with medals and ribbons or other dangling, golden objects, which should preferably reach right round to their backs, or they can dress up with ostrich feathers in their hats and wear brightly coloured trousers so that even the cocks in the farmyard go pale in envy and annoyance at this profane imitation of their domain of the dung heap. To say nothing of the hatred in the underground movement that ferments among the workers of such a smartly dressed Croesus as they trudge along on foot or by bicycle.

But, also these remnants of the dominion of dictatorship, this imaginary right of ownership, is short-lived. Apart from the fact that such a being will gladly feel motivated to leave by will its fortune, entirely or in part, to the community for cultural purposes, this private dictatorship, or its heirs, will gradually have to hand over some of its power to another power that oppression has gradually brought about, namely the trade union movement. The same fate that previously befell the princely dictatorship, and made the king into a subject of the people, is now making the employer a subject of the trade union. Side by side with the trade unions there exists another dictatorship, which is steadily undermining more and more of what people own privately, making it more and more difficult for someone to become a "wealthy man". All acquired goods or fortunes that have been accumulated are therefore subject to forces that cause them to flow back more and more into the community. The business principle is thus being dealt a blow to its innermost soul, if one can put it that way. When the businessman has to give up his large earnings to his workers and the tax authorities so that he can really keep only a fraction of them, the initiative and the desire to possess that made him into the great Croesus, is gradually killed off. He no longer wants to take the responsibility or the risk that it costs him to create the big business concern. He has experienced the perishability of private property and will gradually look on striving after possessions as foolish.

So as a result of what has been said so far, owning things becomes apparent as something unreal, as something that is not fundamental or stable. It is thus something that life itself works against to the very highest degree. It will become more and more clear that nothing material in the absolute sense can be anyone's private possession. Indeed, even the right of ownership of its spouse that a being believes it possesses is illusory. No one can be absolutely sure that their spouse will not end up becoming fond of another being and become unfaithful. The fact that a being can compel their unfaithful spouse to go on being married to them by denying them a divorce, or by other means, does not change anything. The beings were separated from the moment when the love urge and the affection in the unfaithful partner was transferred to another being. The psyche of the person in question is lost for the marriage partner who is left behind.

But we can go even further; in reality we do not possess our own organism either. We have received it at a certain point and will keep it for only a specific period of time, after which it disintegrates back to the matter to which it belongs. But even for the period of time that this material exists as our organism, we still do not own it. We have only a specific right to use it, and even then, only under certain specific conditions. In order to make use of our organism we have to fulfil a certain series of conditions. To the degree that we do not fulfil these conditions our organism becomes ill, and to the degree that it is ill we are unable to manifest ourselves on the physical plane. We have absolutely nothing at all time- and space-dimensional that is, or can become, our property. Everything that can be owned is transient, which means that it returns to Nature. The cycle brings it to us but it also brings it back to Nature. It is therefore correct when in the Christian funeral ceremony one says, "You have come from earth, you will become earth, and from earth will you rise again". One can also express it by saying: "The material of your body comes from the Earth, you have borrowed this material and will therefore give it back to the Earth, and this material will you once again borrow and from it build yourself a new organism". (This refers to the Scandinavian funeral ceremony. Ed.)

There is "something", expressed as the "I", that is the only thing that is not affected by something transient, therefore it is for ever our own absolute possession. In no way can we give away our I. We will go on being our I whatever we do. So, the greatest thing in life will be to understand that really the only thing we own is our I. Everything else that comes into our possession, from our own body to material goods and gold, we really only have the right to use, by virtue of the fact that we will use it to be a joy and a blessing for others, possibly even at a cost to ourselves. No one has greater love than he who offers his life to save others from misfortune and suffering.