The Human Soul
Its Movements, Its Lights, and the Iconography of the Fluidic Invisible
Dr. H. Baraduc
Chapter II
Movements of the human vital Soul, interpreted by the biometer.
— Nature of the movements of the soul.
In this chapter where it is a question of the interpretation of the different movements of the vital soul by the biometer, the author takes up the triple point of view of the fact, of the interpretation of the phenomenon, and of its nature. (1)
1° The Fact is represented by a needle hanging from the end of a cocoon thread not twisted, which, from a distance, without contact with the hand, presents, at the approach of this latter, movements [18] of attraction or of repulsion, which record the direction and the behaviour of an intimate movement in us, a movement of the soul.
Repeated observation has allowed the direction of this movement of life to be interpreted, so well that, with due regard to its constancy, it has been able to be expressed in exact formulae. As verification, the doctor reproduced, at will, these formulae, by suggesting to hypnotised people the state of soul corresponding to the formula, which he had previously interpreted.
When we show, presently, that the movements of the needle are due neither to heat nor electricity, it will be proved by that, that life is not the chemical function of an organ, but the resultant of an intelligent element, and possessor of its own movement. And by biometrically recording the movements of life, the state of soul and the vital force, it is remarked in a person of well-poised mind as well in a neurasthenic, [19] nervous or hysteric subject, in such a manner, that the biometer, which seems only to be one with the biometrified person, gives a different formula for each of them.
This registration by the needle, from henceforth, makes the vital force enter the domains of physics. Thus the desideratum of Professor Lodge is realised, when he said: "Life is not energy. It is a directing element, which has not yet found its place in the domain of physics." No, cosmic life is not energy, it is neither heat, nor electricity, nor light, but it can give birth to them.
Soul or fluidic vital body. — From the whole of more than a thousand observations, arises a first law: — Half of the right fluidic body attracts the cosmic life, whilst half of the left body repels. The proportion is 3 to 1. There thus remains two unities of vital force in us, since three enter and one is exteriorised. These two unities constitute our fluidic double, that is to say, [20] an ethereal fluidic body, an exact double the socius of the material body.
The vital cosmic force, also called odic fluid — Od, a particular natural force, which extends over the whole Universe, and differs from all the known forces, — saturates the organism of living beings and constitutes our fluidic body, which may be divided into four vital centres or animistic powers, namely: cerebral centre, cardio-pulmonary centre, gastric centre and genital centre. Our organism is therefore divided into a cerebral segment, a pulmonary segment, a gastric segment, a genital segment, which have a radio-activity, a zone of vibration which is particular to each of them.
The fluidic body, or astral body is the intermediary of the material body and the spiritual soul. One might say, with the Pythagoreans, that the body is the chariot, the fluidic or astral body, the horse, and the soul the driver.
2° The Interpretation of the Formulae. — When the vital body is [21] in a state or in movement it determines in the apparatus a similar state or movement by means of the needle.
I recall to mind, that it was by multiplied observations; by statistics and suggestive reproduction of states of soul exactly repeating my formulae that I came to interpret them. The right side of the vital attractive body is in communication with cosmic life, and expresses the physical vitality, whilst the left side is in communication with the spirit and expresses the psychical vitality.
The behaviour of the needle of the biometer interprets that of our intimate movements, of which it reproduces the amplitude, the slowness, the rapidity, the oscillation, etc. This behaviour is remarkable in the states of neurasthenic double attraction, of expansive double repulsion.
In a normal state, the vital soul reveals its equality and its good vitality, by the equilibrium between the right attraction and the left repulsion. The [22] type of formula: Attraction5 — Repulsion5, is that of the well poised body in its material and moral manifestations.
The formula Attraction (Attraction indicating the weakness of the material vitality, that is to say, of blood, of nutrition, of the digestive tube, as well as the weakness of the psychical vitality) betrays the cerebral spinal neurasthenia with predominance in one or the other of its forms.
From the moral point of view, Att./att. means sadness, fear, contrition.
Repulsion/Repulsion indicates the animistic exterioration in the great movements of soul, just as joy, anger or exuberance of life.
The formula 0/0 gives the equilibrium between the tension of vital force in us and of universal force. From the moral point of view, it signifies calmness, coldness, indifference.
If Attr. 5/0 is a formula of vital refection, Attr. 30/0 is a formula of real nervous affection and of hypocondriasis, [23] fluidic diseases by default of ponderation.
Such is the interpretation of some formulae and their import: but it is further necessary to consider the behaviour of the needle, which moves gently, ponderably in ponderated natures or rapidly by jerks with the hysterical. The extremely nervous attract very rapidly from 40° to 50° by the right hand, the left giving nothing.
The hysterical type shows great oscillations, attracting and repelling in the same unity of time and on the same side.
The more the material body is lacking in force, the more the vital body makes attractive appeals to the cosmic life which surrounds it and with which it establishes an intimate and harmonious exchange.
The double role of the soul, its mediation between our body and our spirit, reveals a foresight and a wisdom, which [24] formerly made the vital force to be considered as a mother. It was also on the curative action of good Mother Nature that the expectant school of Hippocrates relied; it was through her, that Hippocrates awaited the return to health.
All these considerations bring into prominence the final aim of the Genius of life, which is in us, the Genius charged with the refection of the body and with the manifestation of the spirit. There exists therefore in us a real physical and super-material soul, fluidic double of the human body, the intimate movement of which may be recorded by the displacement of a needle at a distance.
3° Nature of the Phenomenon. — What is the nature of the needle?
A series of experiments has allowed me to reject the action of heat and of electricity, and to bring to light a special [25] force, vital force, which I should define thus.
Vital force is intelligence in movement, concreting matter, that is to say, that it is the creator of form. It is that which models the body.
In a vacuum. — Every one knows that heat is spread with difficulty in rarefied space, to witness the low temperature of intersideral space; well, I have been able to note that the influence of vital force, made itself felt on the apparatus, previously placed under a bell jar, in which there was a relative vacuum.
New Experiments. — The experiment of our vital force acting through a block of ice 10 centimetres thick, seemed to me conclusive; but since, I have learnt that a concentrated solution of alum was employed as the adia-thermic agent. I therefore made the following experiment: the glass covering of the biometer was wrapt in a sheet of alum, formed in such a manner, that by desiccation, a [26] thickness of 1/2 millimetre of alum was produced. Now in spite of this isolating carapace, and as if it did not exist, the needle had the same movements of attraction and of repulsion.
One can then eliminate heat as a moving agent of the needle.
Electricity remained. To make a conclusive experiment, in order to eliminate electricity, I enveloped the apparatus with a covering of mica, an adia-electric body, and the needle did not ceased to be influenced by the two hands.
It was then, definitely fixed, that the doctor constituted his biometer with a double adiathermic shield of alum, steeped in collodion, which did not let the heat pass, and with a adiaelectric covering of mica, which did not let the electricity pass, the whole covered with silk.
To confirm the character of the vital force with certainty, as a force independent of heat and electricity, the doctor took his own biometrical formula with the double-coated apparatus and that during ninety days. Then, he noted how his biometrical formula varied with his state of soul and bodily condition.
This justified him in saying that the movement of the needle is not produced by the climateric conditions but the observed formula was the expression of [28] the degree and of the nature of his personal vitality. As conclusion, it clearly follows from these experiments, that it is neither the climateric conditions, nor the calorific and electric phenomena of our material body which disturb the needle, but our own animistic movements, those of the soul in its physical and psychical manifestations.
These fair experiments carried on for three months on his own vital soul, by a living observer by the side of his apparatus, is a real page of the psycho-physiognomy of the soul; it reveals his states corresponding to the formulae taken. The biometrical formula by its sign and its interpretation, therefore, expresses the behaviour, the movement, the polarisation, even the direction of the human soul.
Footnotes for Chapter II.
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