90 Paracelsus 



" There are Bvestra in all things,^ and they are all 

 prophesying spirits, whether the bodies to which they 

 belong are rational or irrational, sensitive or without 

 sensation. These Evestra teach Astronomia (natural 

 science) to him who can understand what they say. 

 The character of each thing may be known through 

 its Evestrum, not by making astrological charts, calcu- 

 lating nativities, and composing prognostics, but by 

 looking at it with the understanding, in the same 

 manner as we may look at the image of an object in a 

 mirror or at the shadow of a body on the surface of the 

 water, or upon the earth. The Ens (the eternal cause 

 and character of a thing) is reflected in its Evestrum. 

 The form of the latter perishes, but the spirit remains. 

 The number and variety of Evestra are as incalculable 

 as that of the visible and invisible forms to which they 

 belong. The Evestra of human beings know the thoughts 

 of men, guide their instincts, watch over them in their 

 sleep, warn them of dangers, and prophesy future events. 

 The Sibyls of the past have read the future in the Evestra, 

 and the Evestra have caused the ancient prophets to 

 speak as it were in a dream " {Philos. ad Athenienses). 



" The world of the Evestra is a world ^ of its own, 

 although intimately interlaced and connected with ours. 

 It has its own peculiar states of matter and objects 

 that may be visible or invisible to its inhabitants, and 

 yet corresponding to a certain extent to ours. Still, it 

 is a world constituted differently from ours, and its 

 inhabitants can know as little about our existence as 

 we about theirs. The firmament of the universe ^ is 

 fourfold in its essence, and divided into four planes. One 

 belongs to Matter (Earth), one to Water, one to Air, 

 and one to Fire, but the firmament in which rests the 



^ See Professor Denton's "The Souls of Things." Every atom and 

 molecule, every ephemeron, must have its Evestrum, whether the com- 

 pounds are regarded as organic or inorganic. 



2 The Astral Plane. 



* The sphere of the Universal Mind. 



