there is no practical inconvenience in using the expression ‘astral body’ for the appearance so projected—­indeed any more strictly accurate expression, as will be seen directly, would be cumbersome, and we must go on using the phrase in both meanings.  No confusion need arise; but strictly speaking, the linga sharira, or third principle, is the astral body, and that cannot be sent about as the vehicle of the higher principles.”

As, however, “no confusion need arise” from my describing how I went about in my linga sharira, I will continue to use it as the term for my vehicle of transportation.  Nor need there be any difficulty about my being in two places at once.  I have the authority of Mr Sinnett’s Guru for this statement, and it is fully confirmed by my own experience.  For what says the Guru?—­“The individual consciousness, it is argued, cannot be in two places at once.  But first of all, to a certain extent it can.”  It is unnecessary for me to add a word to this positive and most correct statement; but what the Guru has not told us is, that there is a certain discomfort attending the process.  Whenever I went with my astral body, or linga sharira, into the mysterious region of Thibet already alluded to, leaving my rupa, or natural body, in Khatmandhu, I was always conscious of a feeling of rawness; while the necessity of looking after my rupa—­of keeping, so to speak, my astral eye upon it, lest some accident should befall it, which might prevent my getting back to it, and so prematurely terminate my physical or objective existence—­was a constant source of anxiety to me.  Some idea of the danger which attends this process may be gathered from the risks incidental to a much more difficult operation which I once attempted, and succeeded, after incredible effort, in accomplishing; this was the passage of my fifth principle, or ego-spirit, into the ineffable condition of nirvana.

“Let it not be supposed,” says Mr Sinnett,—­for it is not his Guru who is now speaking,—­“that for any adept such a passage can be lightly undertaken.  Only stray hints about the nature of this great mystery have reached me; but, putting these together, I believe I am right in saying that the achievement in question is one which only some of the high initiates are qualified to attempt, which exacts a total suspension of animation in the body for periods of time compared to which the longest cataleptic trances known to ordinary science are insignificant; the protection of the physical frame from natural decay during this period by means which the resources of occult science are strained to accomplish; and withal it is a process involving a double risk to the continued earthly life of the person who undertakes it.  One of these risks is the doubt whether, when once nirvana is attained, the ego will be willing to return.  That the return will be a terrible effort and sacrifice is certain, and