Schopenhauer’s dictum: “The world is my idea” or “without the eye there can be no colour, no light”. To this Goethe replied quite logically: “It is true that light cannot be perceived without the eye, that without the eye the world would be dark and silent. But, on the other hand, without light there would be no eye; the eye owes its existence to light, it is formed by the light for the light. Out of indeterminate organs light has called forth an organ akin to itself — the eye.”
Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 175 – Building Stones for an Understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha: Lecture Five – Berlin, 14th April 1917
Translated by A. H. Parker
The great Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site 