ortation and exchange of the
products of field and factory, constitute nearly the whole of human
activity. In the astral life no food is required and one is clothed with
astral matter from which garments are fashioned almost with the ease and
rapidity of thought. No houses are needed for shelter. The astral body
is not susceptible to degrees of heat and cold, and nothing there
corresponds to our temperatures. There is no division of night and day,
objects being self-luminous and light being perpetual.

If we could drop out of physical life all need of physical labor,
abolish all response to heat or cold, the need of food and houses, and
add unlimited wealth or, to be more exact, give each person the power to
possess all that wealth can confer and much that it can not, we would
have an approach to a conception of the astral world from one viewpoint.
Each one entering the astral life has, of course, a fullness of liberty
and freedom from responsibility that is not instantly comprehensible to
the physical mind. There is nothing whatever that he must do. There is,
however, plenty that he can do if he desires to be active. On the
physical plane many people of wealth travel and amuse themselves with
sight seeing. Thousands of others would do so if it were possible. In
the astral world it is possible and large numbers of people drift
aimlessly about with no particular plans. Multitudes belonging to
various religious sects organize themselves into congregations, build
edifices and spend much time in religious services. Others amuse
themselves building houses and constructing landscapes. It is not at all
necessary, but the old habits live and influence activities.

The average person in the astral world gives himself to idleness and
the enjoyment of the intensified emotions of the astral life just as the
majority of people would do here if it were possible to escape the round
of duties so sternly imposed by their necessities. For a long time the
most of them also make daily visits to the homes they have left behind
on the physical plane. Those who have a strong tie of affection with
some member of the family frequently spend much time lingering around
and going on little journeys about the premises or elsewhere with the
loved one. They understand that the dead person is not perceived by the
living one, but nevertheless they desire to be near. They do not have a
full consciousness of all the living person is thinking and doing, b