d possessed during the Moon period. But man must first be prepared to
receive this gift.

During the Saturn, Sun, and Moon evolutions, he incorporated within his
being the physical, etheric, and astral bodies. But those bodies were only
endowed with such faculties and powers as enabled them to have a
picture-consciousness; the organs and forms by means of which they could
attain to a cognizance of a world of outer sense-objects, such as is
requisite for the Earth stage, were still wanting. Just as the new plant
unfolds only what is concealed in the seed originating from the old plant,
so do the three principles of man's nature appear, at the beginning of the
new stage of evolution, with such forms and organs as will enable them to
develop only a picture-consciousness. It is necessary first to prepare
them for the unfolding of a higher state of consciousness.

This takes place in three preliminary stages. During the first, the
physical body is raised to a level at which it becomes able to undergo the
necessary remodeling which is to serve as a basis for consciousness of
outer objects. This is one of the preliminary stages of the actual earth
evolution, and may be called a recapitulation of the Saturn period on a
higher level. For during this period, as during the Saturn period, higher
beings are working only on the physical body. When the latter has
progressed far enough in its evolution, all beings must first again pass
into a higher form of existence before the etheric body can also progress.
The physical body must, as it were, be recast, in order to be able, in its
remodeled state, to receive the more highly constituted etheric body.
After this interval devoted to a higher form of existence, a kind of
recapitulation of the Sun evolution on a higher level, occurs for the
purpose of shaping the etheric body. And after another interval, a similar
thing occurs for the astral body, by means of a recapitulation of the Moon
evolution.

Let us now turn our attention to the evolutionary processes taking place
after the close of the third recapitulation described. All beings and
forces have passed again into a state of spiritualization. During that
state they ascended into higher worlds. The lowest of the worlds, in which
something of them is still to be perceived during this spiritualizing
epoch, are the same in which contemporary man sojourns between death and a
new birth. These are the regions of the spirit-world. Thence th