s finger and his body, it is
merely because the finger cannot walk about on the body as man is able to
do on the earth, and because on that account the dependence of the former
is more obvious.

In the same way that the physical body is embedded in the physical world
to which it belongs, so does the astral body form a part of its own world,
only it is torn out of it in waking life. We can form a clear idea of what
happens by having recourse to an analogy. Imagine a vessel filled with
water. No one drop is a separate thing in itself within that entire mass
of water. But let us take a little sponge and with it suck up a single
drop from the whole mass of water. Something of this kind happens to the
human astral body on awaking. During sleep it is in a world resembling its
own nature. In a certain sense it forms part of it. On awaking, the
physical and etheric bodies suck it up: they absorb it; they contain the
organs through which it perceives the outer world. In order to achieve
this perception it has to leave its own world, for it is in that world
alone that it can receive the models which it needs for the etheric body.

Just as food is supplied to the physical body from its surroundings, so
are the pictures of the world surrounding the astral body presented to it
during the state of sleep. There, indeed, it lives in the universe, beyond
the physical and etheric bodies: in that same universe out of which the
whole man is born. The source of the images by means of which man receives
his form is in this universe. He is linked in harmony with it; and when he
awakens he rises above the surface of this all-pervading harmony to attain
external perception. In sleep his astral body returns to the universal
harmony. He brings so much strength from it to his bodies on awaking that
he can once more dispense for a time with sojourning in the realm of
harmony. The astral body returns during sleep to its home, and, on
awaking, brings back into life freshly invigorated forces. That which the
astral body thus gains, and brings with it on waking, finds its outer
expression in the refreshment afforded by sound sleep.

Further exposition of occult science will show that this home of the
astral body is more extensive than that which belongs to the physical body
in the narrower sense of the physical environment. Thus, while man as a
physical being is a member of this earth, his astral body belongs to
worlds in which other heavenly bodies b