THEO. This can in no way alter a fact in nature, if it be a fact, or prevent such a thing occasionally taking place. The universe and everything in it, moral, mental, physical, psychic, or Spiritual, is built on a perfect law of equilibrium and harmony. As said before (_vide Isis Unveiled_), the centripetal force could not manifest itself without the centrifugal in the harmonious revolutions of the spheres, and all forms and their progress are the products of this dual force in nature. Now the Spirit (or _Buddhi_) is the centrifugal and the soul (_Manas_) the centripetal spiritual energy; and to produce one result they have to be in perfect union and harmony. Break or damage the centripetal motion of the earthly soul tending toward the centre which attracts it; arrest its progress by clogging it with a heavier weight of matter than it can bear, or than is fit for the Devachanic state, and the harmony of the whole will be destroyed. Personal life, or perhaps rather its ideal reflection, can only be continued if sustained by the two-fold force, that is by the close union of _Buddhi_ and _Manas_ in every re-birth or personal life. The least deviation from harmony damages it; and when it is destroyed beyond redemption the two forces separate at the moment of death. During a brief interval the _personal_ form (called indifferently _Kama rupa_ and _Mayavi rupa_), the spiritual efflorescence of which, attaching itself to the Ego, follows it into Devachan and gives to the permanent _individuality_ its _personal_ colouring (_pro tem._, so to speak), is carried off to remain in _Kama-loka_ and to be gradually annihilated. For it is after the death of the utterly depraved, the unspiritual and the wicked beyond redemption, that arrives the critical and supreme moment. If during life the ultimate and desperate effort of the INNER SELF (_Manas_), to unite something of the personality with itself and the high glimmering ray of the divine Buddhi is thwarted; if this ray is allowed to be more and more shut out from the ever-thickening crust of physical brain, the Spiritual EGO or Manas, once freed from the body, remains severed entirely from the ethereal relic of the personality; and the latter, or _Kama rupa_, following its earthly attractions, is drawn into and remains in Hades, which we call the _Kama-loka_. These are “the withered branches” mentioned by Jesus as being cut off from the _Vine_. Annihilation, however, is never instantaneous, and may require centuries sometimes for its accomplishment. But there the personality remains along with the _remnants_ of other more fortunate personal Egos, and becomes with them a _shell_ and an _Elementary_. As said in _Isis_, it is these two classes of “Spirits,” the _shells_ and the _Elementaries_,