Page:The astral world, higher occult powers; (IA astralworldhighe00tiff).pdf/101

 medium, as electricity, we find it tending to produce the gaseous condition, the nebular condition. Form is not yet attained. If we unite with it still another medium which is a little different from electricity, forms of the mineral kingdom are produced. We have here the first degree of form, but as yet there is not life or individuality. Now the next advance is to induce in that form a condition which shall make it receptive of life, for that which is to be individualized is life. So, then, in passing through the elaborating influences of the mineral kingdom, it arrives at a certain point, a sort of culminating point, where it joins upon the vegetable kingdom; and the line between these kingdoms is passed by such imperceptible gradations—so slow in the unfolding of forms—that it is impossible for the naturalist to tell accurately where the one begins and where the other ends; but the vegetable kingdom is manifestly begun when there is found the incorporation of a new principle into a new form—a principle looking to organization—giving matter an organic structure. When the principle known as the life-force is introduced, then it is understood that mineral has passed and the vegetable is commenced. As soon as this is unfolded, we have a second advance of form—life in its first degree; or, in other words, individualization commences. Form has passed to its second degree, and goes on elaborating degree after degree, producing diverse organic forms, until it is prepared to receive another and a more interior principle—consciousness—until by imperceptible degrees we arrive at the animal kingdom. We have then the animal form, the third or finishing degree of form, and