Through such clouds of blue will often
shine out golden stars of great brilliancy, darting upwards like a
shower of sparks. A mixture of affection and devotion is manifested by a
tint of violet, and the more delicate shades of this invariably show the
capacity of absorbing and responding to a high and beautiful ideal. The
brilliancy and the depth of the colours are usually a measure of the
strength and the activity of the feeling.

Another consideration which must not be forgotten is the type of matter
in which these forms are generated. If a thought be purely intellectual
and impersonal--for example, if the thinker is attempting to solve a
problem in algebra or geometry--the thought-form and the wave of
vibration will be confined entirely to the mental plane. If, however,
the thought be of a spiritual nature, if it be tinged with love and
aspiration or deep unselfish feeling, it will rise upwards from the
mental plane and will borrow much of the splendour and glory of the
buddhic level. In such a case its influence is exceedingly powerful, and
every such thought is a mighty force for good which cannot but produce a
decided effect upon all mental bodies within reach, if they contain any
quality at all capable of response.

If, on the other hand, the thought has in it something of self or of
personal desire, at once its vibration turns downwards, and it draws
round itself a body of astral matter in addition to its clothing of
mental matter. Such a thought-form is capable of acting upon the astral
bodies of other men as well as their minds, so that it can not only
raise thought within them, but can also stir up their feelings.

THREE CLASSES OF THOUGHT-FORMS

From the point of view of the forms which they produce we may group
thought into three classes:--

1. That which takes the image of the thinker. When a man thinks of
himself as in some distant place, or wishes earnestly to be in that
place, he makes a thought-form in his own image which appears there.
Such a form has not infrequently been seen by others, and has sometimes
been taken for the astral body or apparition of the man himself. In such
a case, either the seer must have enough of clairvoyance for the time to
be able to observe that astral shape, or the thought-form must have
sufficient strength to materialise itself--that is, to draw round itself
temporarily a certain amount of physical matter. The thought which
generates such a form as this must