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Updated: May 4, 2025
A large section of these additional vibrations will still belong to the physical plane, and will merely enable us to obtain impressions from the etheric part of that plane, which is at present as a closed book to us.
This "dynamic correlate" is the manifestation of the activity of the etheric double; which sets into motion certain vibratory activities which, though they are not physical vibrations, are their counterpart or equivalent on the plane above matter the "astral" plane, if the term be allowable; which is parallel to, but not identical with, the material plane.
These are the endowments of the spiritual body with which the disciple is seeking to establish his identity that he may overcome the second death and become immortal in consciousness, here and now. Of this spiritual, or etheric body it is said, "Fire burns it not; water wets it not; the sword cleaves it not; dry winds parch it not. It is unassailable." Meditate upon this sutra.
If you looked at a man with both the sights in turn, you would see the buttons at the back of his coat in both cases; only if you used etheric sight you would see them through him, and would see the shank-side as nearest to you, but if you looked astrally, you would see it not only like that, but just as if you were standing behind the man as well.
So far we have thought only of an extension of the purely physical senses of man; and when we remember that a man's etheric body is in reality merely the finer part of his physical frame, and that therefore all his sense organs contain a large amount of etheric matter of various degrees of density, the capacities of which are still practically latent in most of us, we shall see that even if we confine ourselves to this line of development alone there are enormous possibilities of all kinds already opening out before us.
Here, as usual, the septenary character of our evolution shows itself, for there are seven such chief groups, related respectively to the seven states of physical matter to "earth, water, air and fire," or to translate from mediæval symbolism to modern accuracy of expression, to the solid, liquid, gaseous and etheric conditions.
In fact, each atom of "physical" matter by which is meant matter in the first condition floats in an atmosphere of ether as the solid earth floats in its atmosphere of air. "No two physical atoms touch," said Faraday. "Each physical atom is the centre of an etheric molecule, and as far apart from every other atom as the stars in heaven from one another."
Is it not fair to conclude that if the soul or 'astral' or 'etheric double' can act outside the living body, it can live and think and manifest after the dissolution of its material shell? Does not the experimental work of Bottazzi, Morselli, and De Rochas all make for a spiritual interpretation of life rather than for the position of the materialist?
They have as their lowest principle not the physical body, but the astral body with the ego. Hence they cannot express the experiences of their astral body in such physical and etheric bodies as those of contemporary man; they not only have an ego, however, but are aware of the fact, because the heat of Saturn brings that ego streaming back into their consciousness.
In the materializations seen at an ordinary séance, such matter as may be required is borrowed as far as possible from the medium's etheric double an operation which is prejudicial to his health, and also undesirable in various other ways; and this explains the fact that the materialized form is usually strictly confined to the immediate neighbourhood of the medium, and is subject to an attraction which is constantly drawing it back to the body from which it came, so that if kept away from the medium too long the figure collapses, and the matter which composed it, returning to the etheric condition, rushes back instantly to its source.
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