Lecture III

The various lions on the physical plane are beings which, in a certain sense, have also something hidden behind them. Just as the central being belonging to the ten fingers is hidden by the partition, so something is also hidden which is common to all lions. It is hidden because it is not present at all in the physical world. The same ego-nature which in the case of man is present in the physical world is to be found in the case of animals in the astral world. The group ego of animals is in the astral world. From each single animal there stretches a sort of continuation of its being into the astral world, there these continuations meet together and form the garment or covering for the animal-ego. These group egos live as single individuals on the astral plane, just as human individual egos do here on the physical plane. When the clairvoyant enters the astral plane he encounters the various animal egos as separate beings which stretch forth their principles into the physical world. One must not merely picture this diagrammatically, but must accustom oneself to picture these egos in their reality. It must be clearly understood that we do not have to go into another region to enter the astral world; the astral world permeates our physical world. It is only a case of our being able to look into it with opened astral senses.