VII. Spiritual-Scientific Foundations for a True Physiology

Not only does the outer air waft toward man, but also the breath streams out from within him. The breath constantly passes through the nose, and within this breath lives the air being of man. We are water, and as I told you earlier, we are also air. We do not have the air within us just for the fun of it. Like the water within me, my breath is not solid. Just as when I reach out my hand and feel that I have stretched out something solid, so I stretch what I contain in my air organism into my nose. There I grasp the fragrance of the rose or carnation. Indeed, I am not only a solid being but continually a being of water and air as well. We are the air as long as it is within us and is alive. When we stretch our “air hands” through the nose and grasp the fragrance of a rose or carnation—bad odors, too, of course—we do not touch it with our hand but rather grasp it with the nerve bulbs, which attract the breath from within so that it can take hold of the fragrance.