By the and of Professor Yaeger’s theory this difficulty can be explained, I am happy to say, in a most satisfactory way.

The seat of the vital principle, according to Professor Yaeger’s theory, is not the protoplasm, but the odorant matter imbedded in it.  And such being the case, the vital principle, as far as it can be reached by the breaking up of its animated protoplasm, is really indestructible.  You destroy the protoplasm by burning it, by treating it with sulphuric acid, or any other decomposing agent—­the odoriferous substances, far from being destroyed, become only so much the more manifest; they escape the moment protoplasmic destruction or decomposition begins, carrying along with them the vital principle, or what has been acting as such in the protoplasm.  And as they are volatile, they must soon meet with other protoplasms congenial to their nature, and set up there the same kind of vital activity as they have done in their former habitat.  They are, as the Esoteric Doctrine rightly teaches, indestructible, and when disconnected with one set of atoms, they immediately become attracted by others.

—­L.  Salzer, M.D.

Odorigen and Jiva (II.)

There is a well-known Sanskrit treatise, where most of the deductions of Dr. Yaeger are anticipated and practically applied to sexual selection in the human species.  The subject of aura seminalis finds a pretty full treatment there.  The connection between what Dr. Yaeger calls “odorigen” and jiva or prana, as it is differently called in different systems of Indian philosophy, has been well traced.  But his remarks on this subject, able as they no doubt are, call for a few observations from the point of view of occult philosophy.  Jiva has been described by a trustworthy authority as a “form of force indestructible, and, when disconnected with one set of atoms, is immediately attracted by another set.”  Dr. Salzer concludes from this that occult philosophy looks upon it as an abstract force or force per se.  But surely this is bending too much to the Procrustean phraseology of modern science, and if not properly guarded will lead to some misapprehension.  Matter in occult philosophy means existence in the widest sense of that word.  However much the various forms of existence, such as physical, vital, mental, spiritual, &c., differ from each other, they are mutually related as being parts of the one universal existence, the Parabrahma of the Vedantist.  Force is the inherent power or capacity of Parabrahma, or the “matter” of occultism, to assume different forms.  This power or capacity is not a separate entity, but is the thing itself in which it inheres, just as the three-angled character of a triangle is nothing separate from the triangle itself.  From this it will be abundantly clear that, accepting the nomenclature of occult science, one cannot speak of an abstract force without being guilty of a palpable