Reincarnation | Page 4

artistic inspirations are
flashes which strike down into the awaiting brain, when maintaining
that passive expectant attitude which is the condition in which a higher
message may be received.
The senses are not the thinking-principle. They need to be controlled by
consciousness; thus, people blind from birth, when suddenly made to
see, cannot judge either distance or perspective; like animals and
primitive men, they see nothing but colours on a surface.
Science says also: the organ is created for the function it has to perform;
again a mistake. The eyes of the foetus are constructed in the darkness
of the womb. The human germ, notwithstanding its unconsciousness
and its simplicity of structure, develops a body that is complex and
capable of a considerable degree of consciousness; though itself
unintelligent, it produces prodigies of intelligence in this body; here,
consequently, the effect would be greatly superior to the cause, which
is absurd. Outside of the body and the germ is a supreme Intelligence
which creates the models of forms and carries out their construction.
This Intelligence is the Soul of the world.
If Consciousness per se, or the Soul, is above all direct proof at the
present stage of human evolution, the vehicles through which it
functions are more or less apparent to us provided they are capable of

affecting the brain. At the present stage of human evolution, this is the
case only with the astral body; the other bodies are too fine to manifest
through the nervous system such characteristics as are calculated to
furnish scientists with a proof of their existence; they can only be felt
and proved in and by Yoga.[3]
It is not without importance, however, to set forth the proofs of the
existence of a vehicle of consciousness immediately above the physical,
for it affords us a wider horizon and throws far more light on the rest of
the subject.
PROOFS OF THE ASTRAL BODY.
Certain normal and abnormal or morbid phenomena in man have
proved the existence of this vehicle, which we will call the higher
consciousness, for it is far greater than normal, waking consciousness,
that of the brain. In the somewhat rare cases in which this
consciousness is expressed in the physical world, it is forced to make
use of the brain. Now, in the majority of men, the latter is still
incapable of vibrating harmoniously with the matter which forms the
astral vehicle; this is because the density of the atoms of the brain cells
which preside over thought is incapable of reproducing the rapid
vibrations of the finer matter belonging to the body immediately above
it. By special training (the yoga of the Hindus), by a particular
constitution of body (sensitiveness), by certain special methods
(hypnotism), or in certain maladies (somnambulism), the brain may
become receptive to these vibrations, and receive from them an
impression, though always an imperfect one. The rarity of this
impression, its imperfection, and especially the necessity for the
vibration of the physical brain that it may be manifested in our
environment; all these have made it very difficult to prove the existence
of this higher vehicle; still, there are certain considerations which show
that it exists, and that it alone is capable of explaining the most
characteristic phenomena of the higher consciousness.
Let us first define these two states of consciousness rather more
completely, and fix their limits.

Normal consciousness is that which functions during waking hours,
when the brain is in full physiological activity, freely and completely
related to the outer physical world. This consciousness is more or less
developed according to the individual, but its component
parts--sensation, emotion, sentiment, reason, intelligence, will,
intuition--do not exceed known limits; for instance, we do not find
clairvoyance, the prophetic faculty, and certain other abnormal faculties,
which we shall class under the higher consciousness.
The higher consciousness works in the astral body, whether
externalised or not; it seldom manifests itself, and then incompletely; it
is accompanied by the more or less complete inhibition of the senses,
and by a kind of sleep in which the relations of the subject with the
physical world are wholly or partially suspended. The characteristics of
this state are greater keenness of the normal faculties, and the
appearance of new ones, which are often inexplicable and extraordinary
and the more remarkable in proportion as sleep is more profound, the
brain calmer, or the physiological state more abnormal.
How can we explain the paradox that faculties shown by a brain in a
state of inactivity cover an extent of ground which the brain in a state
of activity cannot approach? The reason is that the brain, in this case, is
not an instrument moved directly by the cause of consciousness, the
soul, but a simple recipient, which the soul, then centred in the astral
body,