When the separation of the principles is complete, the Kâmaloka life
of the person is over, and, as before stated, he passes into the
devachanic condition. But just as when he dies to this plane he leaves
his physical body behind him, so when he dies to the astral plane he
leaves his Kâmarûpa behind him. If he has purged himself from all
earthly desires during life, and directed all his energies into the
channels of unselfish spiritual aspiration, his higher Ego will be
able to draw back into itself the whole of the lower Manas which it
put forth into incarnation; in that case the Kâmarûpa left behind on
the astral plane will be a mere corpse like the abandoned physical
body, and it will then come not into this class but into the next.
Even in the case of a man of somewhat less perfect life almost the
same result may be attained if the forces of lower desire are allowed
to work themselves out undisturbed in Kâmaloka but the majority of
mankind make but very trifling and perfunctory efforts while on earth
to rid themselves of the less elevated impulses of their nature, and
consequently doom themselves not only to a greatly prolonged sojourn
on the astral plane, but also to what cannot be described otherwise
than as a loss of a portion of the lower Manas. This is, no doubt, a
very material method of expressing the great mystery of the reflection
of the higher Manas in the lower, but since only those who have passed
the portals of initiation can fully comprehend this, we must content
ourselves with the nearest approximation to exactitude which is
possible to us; and as a matter of fact, a very fairly accurate idea
of what actually takes place will be obtained by adopting the
hypothesis that the mânasic principle sends down a portion of itself
into the lower world of physical life at each incarnation, and expects
to be able to withdraw it again at the end of the life, enriched by
all its varied experiences. The ordinary man, however, usually allows
himself to be so pitiably enslaved by all sorts of base desires that a
certain portion of this lower Manas becomes very closely interwoven
with Kâma, and when the separation takes place, his life in Kâmaloka
being over, the mânasic principle has, as it were, to be torn apart,
the degraded portion remaining within the Kâmarûpa.
This Kâmarûpa then consists of the particles of astral matter from
which the lower Manas has not been able to disengage itself, and which
therefore retain it captive; for when Manas passes into Devachan these
clinging fragments adhere to a portion of it and as it were wrench it
away. The proportion of the matter of each level present in the
Kâmarûpa will therefore depend on the extent to which Manas has become
inextricably entangled with the lower passions. It will be obvious
that as Manas in passing from level to level is unable to free itself
completely from the matter of each, the Kâmarûpa will show the
presence of each grosser kind which has succeeded in retaining its
connection with it.
Thus comes into existence the class of entity which has been called
"The Shade"--an entity, be it observed, which is not in any sense the
real individual at all (for he has passed away into Devachan), but
nevertheless, not only bears his exact personal appearance, but
possesses his memory and all his little idiosyncrasies, and may,
therefore, very readily personate him, as indeed it frequently does at
_séances_. It is not, of course, conscious of any act of
impersonation, for as far as its intellect goes it must necessarily
suppose itself to be the individual, but one can imagine the horror
and disgust of the friends of the departed, if they could only realize
that they had been deceived into accepting as their loved one a mere
soulless bundle of all his worst qualities. Its length of life varies
according to the amount of the lower Manas which animates it, but as
this is all the while in process of fading out, its intellect is a
steadily diminishing quantity, though it may possess a great deal of a
certain sort of animal cunning; and even quite towards the end of its
career it is still able to communicate by borrowing temporary
intelligence from the medium. From its very nature it is exceedingly
liable to be swayed by all kinds of evil influences, and, having
separated from its higher Ego, it has nothing in its constitution
capable of responding to good ones. It therefore lends itself readily
to various minor purposes of some of the baser sort of black
magicians. So much of the matter of the mânasic nature as it possesses
gradually disintegrates and returns to its own plane, though not to
any individual mind, and thus the shade fades by almost imperceptible
gradations into a member of our next class.