United States or Liberia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !


Etheric substance is much finer form of substance than that which composes the physical body. It is really matter in a very high degree of vibration much higher than even the ultra-gaseous matter of physical substance. It may be sensed, ordinarily, only on the astral plane, which is its own particular plane of activity.

The calculation is based on experiments made with the radiometer of Professor Crookes, an instrument which in itself is held to demonstrate the truth of the kinetic theory of gases. Such an attenuated gas as this is considered by Professor Crookes as constituting a fourth state of matter, which he terms ultra-gaseous.

The existence of such an electrostatic, rhythmically throbbing force of a vibrating electrostatic field would show a possible way how solids might have formed from the ultra-gaseous uterus, and how transverse and all kinds of vibrations may be transmitted through a gaseous medium filling all space.

In addition to the forms called 'solid, 'liquid, and 'gaseous, respectively, science now recognizes a fourth plane of matter known as 'ultra-gaseous' matter, and there are indications of several even finer states of matter, known under the general term of 'radiant matter. In fact, modern science sees 'radiant matter' apparently fading away into 'radiant energy."

According to Sir William Crookes, the first of these are free electrons, or matter in an ultra-gaseous state, as shown in the cathode stream. These particles are extremely minute. They carry a negative charge of electricity, and are identified with the electric corpuscles of Thompson. Rays of the second kind are comparable in size to the hydrogen atom, and are positively electrified.

On some stars this unknown matter appears to be of a much lower form of vibration than that manifested by terrestrial matter; while on others, there appears to be a much higher vibratory rate than even that manifested by the most subtle forms of ultra-gaseous matter known to us here. Even on our own globe we can distinguish between several great class of matter.

The experiment speaks for itself, showing as forcibly as an experiment can show that so far the theory is right. This view of the ultra-gaseous state of matter is advanced merely as a working hypothesis, which, in the present state of our knowledge, may be regarded as a necessary help to be retained only so long as it proves useful.

It would tend to rehabilitate those notions of spirit as the most rarefied form of matter an ultra-gaseous condition of it which Stoicism and the Christian Stoic Tertullian postulated. The meaning of 'God is Spirit' could not be understood till this insidious residue of materialism had been got rid of. It is a retrograde theory which we are asked to re-examine and perhaps accept.