life by one which unravels itself in exciting pictures.
For the present it is not at all necessary to engage in reflection as to
the reason why, in the last example, the moment of the falling of a heavy
object expresses itself in a series of events which seem to spread
themselves over a certain length of time; it is only necessary to keep in
view that the dream transforms into a picture that which would present
itself to the waking sense-perception.

We see that the moment the senses cease their activity, creative power
asserts itself in man. It is the same creative power which is present in
absolutely dreamless sleep, and at that time recuperates man's exhausted
forces. For this dreamless sleep to take place, the astral body must be
withdrawn from the etheric and physical bodies. During the dream-state it
is so far separated from the physical body as to have no further
connection with the organs of sense; but it still maintains a certain
connection with the etheric body. The capacity for perceiving the
experiences of the astral body by means of pictures is due to this
connection which it maintains with the etheric body. The moment this
connection also ceases, the pictures sink into the obscurity of
unconsciousness and dreamless sleep has set in.

The arbitrary and often nonsensical element in dream-pictures arises from
the fact that the astral body cannot, on account of its separation from
the sense-organs of the physical body, relate its pictures to the correct
objects and events of the outer environment. It is especially
illuminating, in this matter, to examine a dream in which the ego is, as
it were, split up; as, for example in the case of a person who dreams that
he is a schoolboy and cannot answer the propounded question, while
immediately afterward as the teacher, he himself answers it. The dreamer,
being unable to make use of his physical organs of perception, is not able
to connect both occurrences with himself, as the same individual.
Therefore, in order to recognize himself also as a permanent ego, man must
first be equipped with outer organs of perception. Only when he has
acquired the faculty of self-consciousness without the aid of such organs
will the permanent ego also become perceptible to him outside his physical
body. Clairvoyant consciousness has to acquire this faculty, and the
method of doing so will be treated in detail later in this work.

Even death takes place for no other cause than a change