again and
again. But even if deeper knowledge of this kind is rejected, ordinary
observation of life makes it plain that human beings indulge in far too
many pleasures and desires which undermine the harmony of the physical
body. And the seat of pleasure, desire, passion, is not in the physical
but in the astral body. The latter is still so imperfect, in many
respects, that it is able to destroy the harmony of the physical body.

It should also be mentioned here that such explanations as these are by no
means intended as proofs of the assertions of occult science about the
evolution of the four principles of man's being. The proofs are drawn from
spiritual research, which shows that the physical body has behind it a
transformation, enacted four times, into higher degrees of perfection, and
that man's other principles have been perfected to a lesser degree, as has
been described. It is desired merely to indicate here that these
communications made by spiritual research relate to facts which are
visible in their effects even to ordinary observation, in the degrees of
perfection reached by the physical body, etheric body, and so forth.

-------------------------------------

If we wish to draw an approximately true picture of the conditions
prevailing during the Saturn evolution, we must take into account the fact
that while it lasted, there were virtually, as yet, none of the things and
creatures existing which now belong to the earth and are included in the
mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms. The beings of these three
kingdoms were formed during later periods of evolution. Of all the earthly
beings physically perceptible today, man alone existed at that time and of
him only the physical body existed as described. But there are at present
belonging to the earth not only the denizens of the mineral, vegetable,
animal and human kingdoms, but other beings as well, not manifesting in a
physical embodiment. Such entities were also present during the Saturn
evolution, and their activity on the Saturn scene of action brought about
the subsequent evolution of man.

If the organs of spiritual perception are directed, not to the beginning
and end, but to the middle period of evolution of this Saturn incarnation,
we find there a condition which consists principally of heat. Nothing is
to be found composed of gaseous, fluid, or even solid constituents. All
these states appear only in later incarnations. Let u