VIII. Supplementary Thoughts on the Law Of Reincarnation and Karma. The Development of Speech and the Planetary Evolution.

In the physical body we have first of all that which constitutes in a certain connection the purely physical organs. These organs are based upon purely physical laws—namely, the eyes, the ears, the larynx, etc. The eye is, to be sure, a living organ and it obtains its life from the etheric body which permeates and nourishes it, but seen from a purely physical standpoint it is a complicated apparatus, ruled by the same forces which are also active in inorganic Nature, for instance, in the crystal. We may therefore look upon the activity of the eye in accordance with purely physical laws.