The Results of Vibration
 If we take up a modern book on physics, we shall find that it usually gives us a table of octaves of vibration, and we cannot but be struck by the fact that only a very small proportion of them appeal to our senses at all. Since all the information that we possess with regard to the outer world has reached us by means of the very few vibrations to which we are normally able to respond, it is abundantly obvious that the clairvoyant who learns to be sensitive to the whole of this part of the gamut will gain a vast amount of additional knowledge about the world in which he lives.
We shall notice that the slower rates of vibration (such as sound-waves) affect the comparatively coarse conditions of matter, and set the air in motion; while the more rapid rates (such as light) do not affect the air at all, but act upon finer conditions, such as ether. So that when we have realized the existence of astral matter, which is still subtler than the ether, we shall be prepared to find that the forces playing through it are still higher rates of vibration which do not normally affect any physical matter. Investigation shows us that among these higher vibrations are those caused by the desires and emotions of man, and such of his thoughts as are mingled with personal craving or feeling. It is found that such thoughts or emotions are outpourings of energy just as definite as electricity or steam; but this energy acts at its own level and in its own finer type of matter. That is not a mere supposition, but a definite fact observed over and over again by clairvoyant investigators. All the pictures that are drawn for you in our books, illustrating the effects of affection, of devotion or of avarice, are simply the tabulations of observations made upon astral matter - observations which have been repeated many times with substantially the same results. A whole new world is thus opened before us - a world of finer matter pressing upon us on every side; and to this finer type of matter the name "astral" was given by the mediaeval alchemists.
Since this matter surrounds us all the time, in what way is it acting upon us and in what way are we acting upon it? Once more investigate, and you will find that it is constantly reacting upon us, and that we can no more ignore our astral than our physical surroundings. As the world is at present constituted, physical surroundings are by no means unimportant, and we must learn something of the physical world and its forces if we wish to be able to utilize them to help others, or to resist their undue influence upon ourselves. In exactly the same way, if we wish to be able to protect ourselves from undesirable influences from the astral world, and to have its forces at our command for altruistic work, we must study its conditions and its possibilities; for in this case as in every other, knowledge is power.
How it affects us
This astral world affects us because its vibrations have the same qualities as all other kinds of vibrations - they radiate in all directions, and they tend to reproduce themselves. If two stringed instruments are tuned accurately together, and placed near to one another, it is found that when a note is struck upon one of them, the other vibrates in unison. The vibration of the note radiates in all directions, but when it falls upon something capable of exact response it at once reproduces itself.
If by emotion or passion you set up a vibration in astral matter, it acts in precisely the same way; and necessarily in its radiation it impinges upon the astral bodies of all those about you. If there be among them one which is in tune with that vibration, it will at once be excited to respond to it; that is to say, your emotion will be reproduced in that other man. If, however, that astral body is already pulsating strongly at some different rate, your vibration will not find it in tune, and so cannot affect it. Suppose a man is under the influence of anger, and you are full of gentleness and affection. His astral body is vibrating vigorously at a certain rate; he is in such a condition of palpitation that he does not even feel your gentle radiations; he goes on along his own line, quite uninfluenced by it, just as the man under the sway of wild passion on the physical plane is blind to all suggestions of reason. |
