An Outline of Occult Science

Occult science, therefore, recognizes three corpses,—the physical, etheric, and astral. The period at which the last is cast off by man is marked by the time of purification, which amounts to about one third of the time elapsed between birth and death. The reason why this is so can only be explained later, when the course of human life is examined from the standpoint of occult science. To clairvoyant observation, astral corpses, which have been cast off by human beings passing from the state of purification into a higher existence, are constantly visible in the world surrounding man, in exactly the same way that physical corpses, in places inhabited by men, are apparent to physical observation.6

After purification an entirely new state of consciousness begins for the ego. Whereas before death the outer perceptions must flow to the ego, in order that upon these perceptions the light of consciousness might be able to fall, so now in like manner from within, streams a world which attains consciousness. The ego is living in this world also between birth and death; only then this world [pg 071] is clothed in the manifestations of the senses. It is only when the ego, freed from all the ties of sense, turns inward to behold its own “holy of holies,” that its true innermost nature, which had hitherto been obscured by the senses, is revealed to it. In the same way that the ego is recognized inwardly before death, so, after death and purification, is the spiritual life inwardly revealed to it in all its fulness. This revelation really takes place immediately after the etheric body is laid aside; but it is obscured by the dark cloud of desires turned toward the outer world. It is as though a world of spiritual bliss were invaded by black demoniacal phantoms, caused by those desires which are being destroyed by the “consuming fire.” Indeed, these desires are not mere phantoms, but real entities, which become apparent immediately after the ego is deprived of physical organs, and is thus able to discern those things which are of a spiritual nature. These entities have the appearance of distorted caricatures of the objects with which the individual had formerly become acquainted through his senses.

Clairvoyant observation shows that this place of purging fire is peopled by beings whose appearance may well seem horrifying and painful to spiritual vision, whose pleasure seems to consist in destruction, and whose passions impel them to evil-doing of such a description that the evil of the physical world seems insignificant in comparison. Whatever desires of the kind described above are brought into that world by man, are looked upon by these beings [pg 072] as food, by means of which their powers are continually strengthened and invigorated.

The picture thus sketched of a world imperceptible to the senses may seem less incredible if we look with an unprejudiced eye on part of the animal world. What is a fierce, devouring wolf, from a spiritual point of view? What does it reveal to us through that which our senses perceive? Nothing else than a soul that lives in desires, and acts by desire. The external form of the wolf may be called an embodiment of those desires; and if man had no organs with which to perceive that form, if its desires appeared invisibly in their effects,—if, therefore, a force invisible to the eye were prowling about, and might be the cause of all that happened through the visible wolf,—he would still be forced to recognize the existence of a creature corresponding to it. Now the beings of the region of purifying fire are not visible to the physical eye, but to clairvoyant sight only; but their effects are clearly apparent. They bring about the destruction of the ego when it gives them nourishment. These effects are clearly visible if what began as a pleasure leads to excess and debauchery.

For even what is perceptible to the senses would attract the ego only in so far as the pleasure had its root in the ego's own nature. The animal is prompted by desire for that in the outer world which its three bodies crave. Man has higher enjoyments, because to the three principles of his bodily nature is added the fourth, the ego. But if the ego seeks [pg 073] a gratification which does not tend toward the maintenance and development of its nature but to its destruction, then such a craving can be neither the effect of its three bodies, nor that of its own nature, but can only be caused by beings, concealed from the senses in their true form, but able furtively to approach that higher nature of the ego, and excite in it desires which, though it is cut off from the senses, can still be satisfied only by means of sense-organs.

For there are beings which feed on passions and desires of a worse kind than those of an animal nature, because they do not expend themselves on objects of the senses but seize upon the spiritual element and drag it down to a sensual level. Therefore the forms of such beings are more hideous, more horrible, to spiritual sight than are the forms of the fiercest animals, in which after all only passions rooted in the senses are incarnated. And the destructive forces of these beings immeasurably surpass any destructive rage existing in the animal world as perceived by the senses. Occult science must in this way enlarge man's view so as to include a world of beings standing, in a certain respect, lower than the visibly destructive animal world.

When man has passed through the world of purification after death, he finds himself in a world the contents of which are spiritual, and which also creates in him longings which can be satisfied only by spiritual things. But even now man distinguishes between that which properly belongs to his ego and what forms the environment of that ego—one might [pg 074] say, its spiritual outer world. Only that, of which he becomes sensible in this environment, pours in upon him in the same way that the perception of his own ego poured in upon him during his sojourn in the body. Whereas man's environment in the life between birth and death speaks to him through his bodily organs, after death when all the bodies are laid aside the language of his new environment penetrates directly into the innermost sanctuary of the ego. Man's whole environment is now filled with beings of a like nature with his ego, for only an ego has access to an ego. Just as minerals, plants, and animals surround man in the sense-world, and compose it, so, after death, is he surrounded by a world composed of beings of a spiritual nature.

Yet he takes something with him into this world which is not part of his environment there; it is what the ego has experienced in the world of the senses. First of all, the sum of these experiences appeared, as a comprehensive memory-picture, immediately after death, while the etheric body was still united to the ego. The etheric body itself is then, indeed, laid aside, but something of the memory-picture remains with the ego as an everlasting possession. Just as though an extract or essence were made out of all the events and experiences which a man encounters between birth and death, so might we describe that which is left behind. It is the spiritual product of life, its fruit. This product is of a spiritual nature. It contains everything spiritual which is revealed through the senses, yet this spiritual [pg 075] treasure could not have been gathered save by life in the sense-world.

This spiritual fruit of the sense-world becomes after death the ego's own inner world. With it the ego enters a world, which consists of beings who reveal themselves in the same and only manner in which man in his innermost depths, can become conscious of his own ego. As a plant seed, which is the essence of the whole plant, grows only when buried in another world, the earth, so now that which the ego brings from the sense-world gradually unfolds itself as a seed under the influence of the spiritual environment in which it has been planted. Occult science can, of course, only portray in pictures what happens in this “spirit-world;” still those pictures present themselves as absolute reality to the clairvoyant's sight, when he investigates invisible happenings, corresponding to those which are visible to the physical eye. Whatever of that world can be described, may be visualized by comparison with the world of the senses for although it is of a purely spiritual nature, it nevertheless resembles the physical world in certain respects. Just as, for instance, in the physical world, a color appears when some object impresses the eye, so in the spirit-world a color appears to the ego when a being acts upon it. But this latter phenomenon is perceived in the same manner as the ego can be perceived inwardly between birth and death. It is not as though the light outside fell within upon the man, but as though another being directly affected [pg 076] the ego, causing the latter to picture this influence in a colour-form.

Thus do all things in the spiritual environment of the ego find expression in a world of coloured rays. As their origin is of a different kind, it goes without saying that these colours of the spiritual world are also of a somewhat different character from physical colours. A similar thing is true of other impressions received by man in the world of sense. But it is the sounds of the spiritual world that most nearly resemble the impressions of the sense-world; and the more at home a man becomes in the spiritual world, the more he realizes it as a life of self-determined motion, which may be compared with the sounds, and the harmony of sounds, of the physical world. Only he does not feel the tones as something approaching an organ from outside, but as a force streaming forth into the outer world through his ego. He feels the sound just as in the sense-world he feels his own speech or song, only he knows that in the spiritual world these sounds, streaming out from him, are at the same time the manifestations of other beings, who are pouring themselves into the world through him.

A still higher manifestation takes place in the spirit-land when the sound becomes the “spiritual word.” Then there streams through the ego not only the pulsing life of another spiritual being, but such a being itself communicates its own inner nature to the ego; and then, when the spiritual word streams through the ego, two beings live in one another, [pg 077] without that separating element which every companionship in the sense-world must carry with it. And this is really the nature of the communion of the ego with other spiritual beings after death.

There are three regions in the spiritual world, which may be compared to the three divisions of the physical sense-world. The first region is in a certain respect the “solid land” of the spiritual world, the second the “sphere of ocean and river,” and the third the “atmospheric region.” That which assumes physical form on earth, so that it can be perceived by physical organs, in accordance with its spiritual nature, is to be seen in the first region of the spirit-world. There, for instance, may be seen the force that fashions the form of a crystal. Only what is there revealed is the opposite of that which appears in the sense-world. In that world the space which is filled by a mass of rock appears to spiritual sight as a kind of hollow space; but round about this hollow is seen the force which fashions the form of the rock. The colour of the rock in the sense-world appears in the spiritual world as its complementary colour; thus a red stone is green when seen from the spirit-world, a green stone is red, and so on. Other qualities also appear in their opposites. Just as stone, masses of earth, and like materials make up the solid land—the continental region of the world of sense—so do the structures described above compose the solid land of the spiritual world.

All that is life in the sense-world belongs to the ocean-region of the spiritual world. To the physical [pg 078] eye, life appears in its effects in plants, animals, and men. To spiritual vision, life is a flowing substance, like oceans and rivers, diffused through the spirit-world. A still better comparison is that of the circulation of the blood in the body; for whereas seas and rivers are seen to be irregularly distributed in the physical world, a certain regularity in distribution of the flowing life reigns in the spirit-world, as in the circulation of the blood. This “flowing life” is simultaneously heard as spiritual sound.

The third region of the spirit-world is its “atmosphere.” What is known in the physical world as “feeling” is also present there, permeating everything like the air on the earth. We must imagine a rushing sea of feeling. Pain and sorrow, joy and rapture, flow through this region, like wind and storms in the atmosphere of the physical world. Imagine a battle fought on earth. There confront one another not merely human forms, as seen by the physical eye, but feelings opposed to feelings, passions to passions; pain fills the battlefield just as much as do the forms of men. All that is seething there of passion, pain, and the joy of victory is not only perceptible in its effects as revealed to the physical senses; it may be seen with the spiritual senses as an atmospheric process in the spirit-world. Such an event in the spiritual world is like a thunderstorm in the physical, and the perception of these events may be compared to the hearing of words in the physical world. For this reason it is said that as the air envelops and permeates earthly things, [pg 079] so do “interweaving spiritual words” pervade the beings and events of the spirit-world.

And still further observations are possible in this spirit-world. What may be compared to light and heat in the physical world is there too. That which permeates everything in the spirit-world, as earthly things and beings are permeated by heat, is the world of thought itself. There, however, thoughts must be regarded as living and independent beings. What is understood by man in the manifested world as thought is but a shadow of what lives as a thought-being in the spirit-world. Imagine thought, as it now exists in man, raised out of him and as an active, energetic being, endowed with an inner life of its own, and you have a feeble illustration of that which fills the fourth region of the spirit-world. In the physical world between birth and death what man understands as thought is but the manifestation of the thought-world as it is able to mould itself by means of the instruments afforded by the bodies. All such thoughts cherished by man, that carry with them an enrichment of the physical world have their origin in this region. By such thoughts are meant not only the ideas of great inventors and men of genius; but those ideas found in every individual which he does not owe solely to the external world, but through which he, so to speak, transforms that world.

In so far as feelings and passions are concerned, the cause of which lies in the outer world, these feelings are perceptible in the third region of the spirit-world; [pg 080] but everything which so lives in a man's soul as to make him a creator,—influencing, transforming and fertilizing his environment,—is manifest in its original and intrinsic form in the fourth division of the spirit-world.

That which exists in the fifth region may be compared to physical light. In its archetypal form it is wisdom in manifestation. Beings who diffuse wisdom throughout their surroundings, as the sun pours light on physical beings, belong to this realm. Whatever is illuminated by their wisdom stands forth in its true meaning and significance for the spiritual world, just as the colour of a physical object is seen when the light falls upon it. There are still higher regions of the spirit-world, which will be described later in this work.

Into this world the ego is plunged after death, together with the results it carries with it out of physical life. And these results are still united with that part of the astral body which is not cast off at the end of the time of purification. In fact, only that part falls away which, in its desires and wishes, turned, after death, toward physical life. The plunging of the ego into the spiritual world, with what it has acquired in the physical world, may be compared to the planting of a grain of seed in the soil in which it can mature. As the grain of seed draws substances and forces from its surroundings in order that it may develop into a new plant, so the condition of the ego, when implanted in the spiritual world, is one of development and growth.

Hidden within that which is perceived by an organ, there lies the force whereby that same organ was formed. The eye perceives light; but without light there would be no eye. Creatures spending their lives in darkness do not develop organs of sight. Thus the whole of man's physical body is created out of the hidden forces of that of which he becomes conscious through his bodily organs. The physical body is built up by the forces of the physical world, the etheric body by those of the life-world, and the astral body is formed out of the astral world. Now when the ego is transferred to the spirit-world it is met by just those forces which remain hidden to physical perception.

What appear to man's view in the first region of the spirit-world are the spiritual beings that are always surrounding him, and that have built up his physical body. Thus in the physical world man perceives nothing but the manifestations of those spiritual forces which have formed his own physical body. After death he is in the very midst of these moulding forces, which, previously hidden, now appear to him in their true forms. In the same way, in the second region, he is in the midst of the forces by which his etheric body was organized, and in the third region there pour in upon him the potencies out of which his astral body was formed. The higher regions of the spirit-world also direct toward him those forces from which he was built in the life between birth and death.

These denizens of the spiritual world are at present [pg 082] working in co-operation with that which man has brought with him as the product of his last life, which now becomes a germ; and through this co-operation man is, first of all, built up anew as a spiritual being. The physical and etheric bodies are still joined in sleep; the astral body and the ego are, it is true, outside them, but still connected with them. Whatever influences the astral body and the ego receive, in such a state, from the spiritual world, can serve only to recuperate the forces exhausted during the waking state.

But when the physical and etheric bodies have been laid aside, and, after the time of purification, also those parts of the astral body still bound by their desires to the physical world, then everything pouring in upon the ego from the spiritual world is not only a reforming but a reorganizing force. After a certain period, to be dealt with in later chapters, the ego again gathers round it an astral body which will be able to live in such an etheric and physical body as man possesses between birth and death. A man can once more pass through birth and renew his earthly existence, in which, however, will be incorporated the results of his former life. Until the rebuilding of his astral body, man is a witness of his reconstruction. As the powers of the spirit-world are not manifested to him through external organs, but from within outward, like his own ego in self-consciousness, he is able to observe that manifestation as long as his attention is not turned to an outer world of perception. But from the moment [pg 083] that the astral body is reconstituted, his attention is turned outward; the astral body once more craves an outer etheric and physical body. It is thus turned away from the inner revelations. For this reason there is now an intermediate state, during which man is immersed in unconsciousness. Consciousness can emerge again in the physical world only when the necessary organs for physical perception are formed.

During this period, in which consciousness illuminated by inner perception ceases, the new etheric body begins to link itself to the astral and man can once again enter a physical body. In the linking together of these two bodies only such an ego could consciously take part as had of itself created the Life-Spirit and Spirit-Man out of the creative forces, hidden in the etheric and physical bodies. Until the individual has evolved as far as this, beings further advanced than himself in evolution must guide this linking together. The astral body is guided, by such beings as these, to parents through whom it may be endowed with the appropriate etheric and physical bodies. Before the attachment of the etheric body takes place, something of very great importance happens to the man who is about to re-enter physical existence.

In his former life he created disturbing forces, which were revealed to him on the journey retraced after death. Let us again take an example. He caused some pain in an outburst of anger in the fortieth year of his former life. After death, [pg 084] the other's pain came before him as a force which had interfered with the evolution of his ego. It is likewise with all such events of his former life. On his re-entrance into physical life these hindrances to his evolution confront the ego anew. As, on the threshold of death, a sort of memory-picture arose before the human ego, so there now arises a vision of the life approaching. Again he sees a picture, this time showing all the obstacles which he has to clear away, if he is to advance in evolution. And what he thus sees becomes the starting-point for forces which he must bring with him into his new life. The picture of the pain he has caused the other man becomes a force which impels the ego, on entering life again, to make amends for this pain. Thus the previous life has a determining effect on the new one. The deeds of the new life are in a certain way caused by those of the former life. This connection, following the law, between an earlier and later existence is to be looked upon as the “Law of Destiny”; it has become usual to designate it “Karma,” a term borrowed from oriental wisdom.

The building up of a new set of bodies, however, is not the only task incumbent upon man between death and a new birth. While this building up is taking place, man lives outside the physical world. That world, however, continues to evolve during this time. The surface of the earth changes in comparatively short periods of time. What aspect did those regions which are now occupied by Germany bear a [pg 085] few thousand years ago? When man appears on earth in a new existence, the earth rarely looks the same as it did at the time of his last incarnation. During his absence from the earth all sorts of changes have occurred. Now hidden forces are also at work in this alteration of the face of the earth, proceeding from that very world in which man finds himself after death; and he himself must co-operate with these forces in the transformation of the earth. He can do so only under the direction of Higher Beings until, by the creation of his Life-Spirit and Spirit-Man, he has acquired a clear perception of the connection between the spiritual and its expression in the physical. But he takes part in the transformation of earthly conditions. It may be said that during the period between death and a new birth, man so transforms the earth that its conditions are in keeping with what he has evolved in himself. If we look at a given place on the earth at a definite moment, and see it again after a long lapse of time, under entirely changed conditions, the forces which have wrought the change have proceeded from those who are now dead.

Clairvoyant observation sees in all physical existence the manifestation of a hidden spiritual element. To physical observation it is the light of the sun, climatic changes, and so on, that effect the transformation of the earth, but to clairvoyance it is the force of the dead that acts in the rays of light which [pg 086] fall on the plant from the sun. The clairvoyant sees how human souls hover about plants, how they change the surface of the earth. Not alone upon himself nor upon the preparations for his own new earthly existence, is man's attention bestowed after death.—No, he is called upon then to work upon the outer world, just as he is in life between the time of his birth and death.

Not only does the life of man affect the conditions of the physical world from the spirit-land; but vice versa, activity during physical existence has its effects in the spiritual world. An example may explain what happens in this respect. A bond of love exists between mother and child. This love arises from a mutual attraction caused by the forces of the sense-world. But in the course of time it changes. A spiritual tie gradually grows out of the sense-bond, and this spiritual tie is not created for the physical world only but for the spirit-world as well. The same applies to other ties. Whatever is created in the physical world by spiritual entities continues to exist in the spiritual world. Friends who were closely united in life belong to each other in spirit-land also, and when their bodies are laid aside they are in much more intimate communion than during physical life. For as spirits they exist for each other in the same way as, in the above description, spiritual beings reveal themselves to others by inner manifestation; and a tie created between two persons brings them together again in a new life. [pg 087] Thus in the truest sense of the word we may speak of finding one another again after death.

What has once happened to a man between birth and death and from then till a new birth, repeats itself. Man returns to earth again and again when the fruit he has earned in a physical life has ripened in the spirit-world. It is not, however, a case of repetition without beginning or end; but man has emerged out of other forms of existence and passed into those which run their course in the manner just described, and he will again in the future pass into other forms. A viewpoint of these transition stages will be gained when the evolution of the universe in connection with man is subsequently considered from the standpoint of occult science.

The occurrences between death and a new birth are of course still more concealed from outer sense-observation than is the spiritual foundation underlying manifested life between birth and death. This sense-observation can see only the effects of that portion of the hidden world where they impinge upon physical existence. With regard to this the question must arise whether man, on entering this life at birth, brings with him any results from the events described by occult science as having taken place between his last death and re-birth. If one finds the shell of a snail in which there is no trace of the animal he will, in spite of that, recognize that this snailshell was formed by the activity of an animal, and he cannot believe that the shell constructed a form for itself, by means of mere physical forces.

In the same way one who studies a man during life, and finds something in him which cannot be due to this life, might reasonably admit that it arises from what occult science describes, if by doing so an explanatory light is thrown on what is otherwise inexplicable.

Here, too, the unseen causes might appear intelligible to rational sense-observation from their visible effects, and whoever observes life with absolute impartiality will find that, with every fresh observation, this appears to be more and more true. The important question, however, is how to find the right point of view from which to observe their effects in life. Where, for example, are the effects of that to be found which occult science describes as incidents of the time of purification? How are the effects of the experience which, according to occult investigations, man undergoes in purely spiritual regions, manifested after this time of purification?

Problems enough press upon every serious and profound student of life in this domain. We see one man born in want and misery, endowed only with inferior abilities, so that on account of these facts, which are incident to his birth, he appears predestined to a miserable existence. Another, from the first moment of his life, is tended and cherished by loving hands and hearts; brilliant talents are unfolded in him; his gifts point to a successful and satisfactory career. Two opposite views may be taken when met by such questions as these. The [pg 089] one will adhere to what the senses perceive and what the understanding, relying on these senses, is able to comprehend. This view will admit no problem in the fact that one man is born fortunate and the other unfortunate. Even if the word “chance” is not used, there will be no question of thinking that such things are brought about through any law of cause and effect. And with regard to talents and abilities, such a view will consider them as “inherited” from parents, grandparents, and other ancestors. It refuses to seek the causes in spiritual events which the man himself met with before birth—regardless of heredity—and by means of which he shaped his talents and abilities.

Another view would find no satisfaction in such an interpretation. It would assert that even in the manifested world nothing happens in definite places or surroundings without our having to presuppose causes for the event in question. Even though in many cases such causes have not yet been investigated, they are there. An Alpine flower does not grow in the lowlands. Its nature has something which associates it with Alpine regions. Just so must there be something in a man which determines his birth in a certain environment. Causes belonging to the physical world alone are not sufficient to account for this. To a more profound thinker such an explanation appears in somewhat the same light as when one has dealt another a blow, the motive for which is not attributed to the feelings of the one but is to be explained by the physical mechanism of the hand.

Any explanation of abilities and talents solely by “heredity” is to such a viewpoint equally unsatisfactory. It is true one may say: “See how certain talents are inherited in families.” During two and a half centuries musical talents were inherited by members of the Bach family. Eight mathematicians sprang from the Bernoulli family, to some of whom quite different occupations were assigned in their childhood; but the inherited talents always drove them to the family vocation. It may be further pointed out how, by an exact investigation of the line of ancestry of a person in one way or another the gifts of this person have shown themselves in the forefathers, and only represent the sum of inherited talents. Whoever holds the latter of the two views above indicated will be sure not to let such facts pass unnoticed, but to him they cannot mean the same as they do to one who relies for his interpretation on the events of the world of sense alone. The former will point out that inherited talents can no more of themselves, combine into a complete personality than can the metal parts of a watch fit themselves together. And if objection is made that the co-operation of the parents may possibly produce the combination of talents,—that this as it were, takes the place of the watchmaker,—he will reply: “Look impartially at what is new in every child-personality, at that which is absolutely new; that cannot come from the parents, for the simple reason that it does not exist in them.”

Inaccurate thinking may create much confusion [pg 091] in this domain. It is still worse when those who hold the second view are set down by the supporters of the first as opponents of what is, after all, borne out by “ascertained facts.” But it may well be that the latter have not the slightest intention of denying the truth or value of those facts. For instance, they see that a definite mental aptitude or predisposition is “inherited” in a family, and that certain gifts accumulated and combined in one descendant result in a remarkable personality. They are perfectly willing to acquiesce when it is said that the most celebrated name seldom stands at the beginning but at the end of a line of descent. But it should not be taken amiss if they are compelled to form very different opinions on the subject from those of people who are determined to accept nothing but material evidence. To the latter it may be said that it is true a man shows the characteristics of his ancestors, because the “spirit-soul”, which enters upon physical existence at birth, draws its bodily substance from that which heredity bestows on it. But this says nothing more than that a being shows the peculiarities of the body into which it has descended.

It is no doubt a singular—a trivial—comparison, but the unprejudiced person will not deny its justification, when one says that a human being, who shows the qualities of his forefathers, proves the origin of the personal qualities of that human being as little as the fact that man is wet because he has fallen into the water, proves something regarding [pg 092] his inner nature. And it may further be said that if the most celebrated name stands at the end of a line of family descent, it shows that the bearer of that name needed that particular ancestry to build the body necessary for the expression of his whole personality. But it is no proof that his actual personal qualities were transmitted to him: such a statement is, on the contrary, opposed to sound logic. If personal gifts were inherited, they would be found at the beginning of a line of descent,7 and starting from that point be transmitted to the descendants. As, however, they stand at the end, it is evident that they are not transmitted.

Now it is not to be denied that those who speak of a spiritual causality in life have contributed no less to bringing about confusion of thought. Far too much generalizing and vague discussion comes from this quarter. To say that a man's personality is a combination of inherited characteristics may certainly be compared with the assertion that the metal parts of a watch have fitted themselves together. It must also be admitted that, with regard to many assertions about a spiritual world, it is as though some one said that the metal parts of a watch cannot put themselves together in such a way as to enable the hands to move forward; some intelligence must therefore be present to effect this forward movement. In face of such an assertion, he certainly [pg 093] builds on a far better foundation who says: “Oh! I care nothing for your ‘mystical’ beings who move the hands forward. What I want to know is the mechanical construction by means of which the forward movement of the hands is achieved.” It is by no means a question of merely knowing that behind a mechanism, a watch for instance, there is an intelligence (the watchmaker); it can only be of importance to know the ideas in the watchmaker's mind which preceded the construction of the watch. These thoughts may be rediscovered in the mechanism.

Mere dreaming and imagining about the supersensual only result in confusion, for they are not calculated to satisfy opponents. The latter are right in saying that such general allusions to super-physical beings are not at all conducive to an understanding of facts. Of course, such opponents might also say the same of the exact statements of occult science. But, in that case, it may be pointed out that the effects of hidden spiritual causes are seen in manifested life. Let us assume for the moment that what occult science asserts, proven by observation, is correct:—that a man has gone through a [pg 094] time of purification after death, and that during this period he has experienced in his soul how a certain deed, performed by him in a former life, was a hindrance to his progressive evolution. While he was undergoing this experience, the impulse arose in him to make amends for that deed. He brings this impulse with him into a new life and its presence produces a tendency in his nature which draws him into conditions rendering the amendment possible.—Taking into consideration a number of such impulses, we have the cause for a man's being born into an environment corresponding to his destiny.

We may deal in the same way with another assumption. Let us again accept as correct the assertion of occult science that the fruits of a past life are incorporated in man's spiritual germ, and that the spirit-land in which man finds himself, between death and a new life, is the region in which these fruits ripen, and are transformed into talents and capabilities which will appear in a new life and will form the personality so that it appears as the effect of what was gained in a former life. It will become evident to any one who accepts these hypotheses and, bearing them in mind, surveys life impartially, that while, by their means, all material facts may be appreciated in their full truth and significance, at the same time everything becomes intelligible which, if only material facts were relied upon, must forever remain incomprehensible to one whose attention is turned toward the spiritual world. And more important still, that illogical reasoning of the kind indicated [pg 095] above will disappear, namely,—that because the most distinguished name in a line of descent stands at the end of it, its bearer must have inherited his gifts. Life becomes logically comprehensible through the supersensual facts ascertained by occult science.