554. But even the most primitive of terrestrial people must certainly be able to see that there exists a "something" and that a "nothing" can only exist as "an imagined contrast to life". And it was exactly this factor that we arrived at through our cosmic digression beyond the faculty of perception. We found there an unshakeable existing reality, one with which we ourselves are identical to the very highest degree. We found our identity as "cosmic chemists" or "masters of matter" confirmed as a factual reality. And with this knowledge fully present in our consciousness, we will now attempt to remove all those veils which create the dark fate or suffering in existence, meaning those veils that prevent the living being from combining materials or substances correctly, and which instead make him their slave. Our analyses are intended to free the suffering, seeking investigator from this dark situation. It is precisely on this account that here in the midst of an ocean of matter, we have shown him his true identity as the veritable master of matter. And having understood our analysis, we can now begin to follow him through all the existing thought-climates of terrestrial people, that is to say all those forces and forms of energy with which terrestrial man maintains his entire fate in this present form of existence.