Before physical birth the nascent human being is enclosed on all sides by an alien physical body. It does not come into contact independently with the outward physical world. The physical body of the mother forms its environment. This body alone can influence the maturing fœtus. Physical birth consists precisely in the fact that the physical body of the mother releases the child, thereby causing the surroundings of the physical world to influence him immediately. The senses open themselves to the outward world, and this latter is thereby able to exercise those influences over the child which were previously exercised by the physical body of the mother. For a spiritual comprehension of the world such as is represented by Theosophy, the physical body is then actually born, but not yet the etheric or vital body. As the child until the moment of its birth is surrounded by the physical body of the mother, so too until the time of his second teeth, about the age of seven, is he surrounded by an etheric and an astral covering. Not until the time of the change of teeth does the etheric covering release the etheric body. Then until the time of puberty there still remains an astral covering.[6] At this period the astral or desire body also becomes free on all sides, as did the physical body at the time of the physical birth and the etheric body at the time of the second teeth. Thus then, Theosophy must speak of three births of man. Certain impressions, which are intended to reach the etheric body can reach it as little, up to the time of the second teeth, as the light and air of the physical world can reach the physical body while it remains in the womb of the mother. Before the coming of the second teeth the free vital body is not at work. As the physical body, whilst in the womb of the mother, receives powers which are not its own, and within that protective covering gradually develops its own, so is this also the case with these later powers of growth, until the time of the second teeth. Only at this period does the etheric body perfect its own powers in conjunction with the inherited and alien ones. During this time, while the etheric body is freeing itself, the physical body is already independent. The etheric body which is gradually freeing itself, perfects that which it has to give to the physical body. And the final point of this work is the child’s own teeth, which come in the place of those he has inherited. They are the densest things embedded in the physical body and therefore at this period appear last.