A “spirit” or the spiritual Ego, cannot descend to the medium, but it can attract the spirit of the latter to itself, and it can do this only during the two intervals—­before and after its “gestation period”.  Interval the first is that period between the physical death and the merging of the spiritual Ego into that state which is known in the Arhat Esoteric Doctrine as “Bar-do”.  We have translated this as the “gestation period”, and it lasts from a few days to several years, according to the evidence of the Adepts.  Interval the second lasts so long as the merits of the old [personal] Ego entitle the being to reap the fruit of its reward in its new regenerated Egoship.  It occurs after the gestation period is over, and the new spiritual Ego is reborn—­like the fabled Phoenix from its ashes—­from the old one.  The locality which the former inhabits is called by the northern Buddhist Occultists “Devachan."[48]

So also may the incorporeal principles of pure sensitives be placed en rapport with disembodied Souls, although information thus obtained is not reliable, partly in consequence of the difficulty of transferring to the physical brain the impressions received, and partly from the difficulty of observing accurately, when the seer is untrained.[49]

A pure medium’s Ego can be drawn to and made, for an instant, to unite in a magnetic(?) relation with a real disembodied spirit, whereas the soul of an impure medium can only confabulate with the Astral Soul, or Shell, of the deceased.  The former possibility explains those extremely rare cases of direct writing in recognised autographs, and of messages from the higher class of disembodied intelligences.

But the confusion in messages thus obtained is considerable, not only from the causes above-named, but also because

Even the best and purest sensitive can at most only be placed at any time en rapport with a particular spiritual entity, and can only know, see, and feel what that particular entity knows, sees, and feels.

Hence much possibility of error if generalisations are indulged in, since each Devachani lives in his own paradise, and there is no “peeping down to earth,”

    Nor is there any conscious communication with the flying
    Souls that come as it were to learn where the Spirits are,
    what they are doing, and what they think, feel, and see.

What then is being en rapport?  It is simply an identity of molecular vibration between the astral part of the incarnated sensitive and the astral part of the dis-incarnated personality.  The spirit of the sensitive gets “odylised”, so to speak, by the aura of the spirit, whether this be hybernating in the earthly region or dreaming in the Devachan; identity of molecular vibration is established, and for a brief space the sensitive becomes the departed personality, and writes in