Let us now consider the states of man after the death of the body and before birth, having looked over the whole field of the evolution of things and beings in a general way. This brings up at once the questions: Is there any heaven or hell, and what are they? Are they states or places? Is there a spot in space where they may be found and to which we go or from where we come? We must also go back to the subject of the fourth principle of the constitution of man, that called Kama in Sanscrit and desire or passion in English. Bearing in mind what was said about that principle, and also the teaching in respect to the astral body and the Astral Light, it will be easier to understand what is taught about the two states _ante_ and _post mortem_. In chronological order we go into kama loka—or the plane of desire—first on the demise of the body, and then the higher principles, the real man, fall into the state of _Devachan_. After dealing with kama loka it will be more easy to study the question of _Devachan_. The breath leaves the body and we say the man is dead, but that is only the beginning of death; it proceeds on other planes. When the frame is cold and eyes closed, all the forces of the body and mind rush through the brain, and by a series of pictures the whole life just ended is imprinted indelibly on the inner man not only in a general outline but down to the smallest detail of even the most minute and fleeting impression. At this moment, though every indication leads the physician to pronounce for death and though to all intents and purposes the person is dead to this life, the real man is busy in the brain, and not until his work there is ended is the person gone. When this solemn work is over the astral body detaches itself from the physical, and, life energy having departed, the remaining five principles are in the plane of kama loka. The natural separation of the principles brought about by death divides the total man into three parts: _First_, the visible body with all its elements left to further disintegration on the earth plane, where all that it is composed of is in time resolved into the different physical departments of nature. _Second_, the _kama rupa_ made up of the astral body and the passions and desires, which also begins at once to go to pieces on the astral plane. _Third_, the real man, the upper triad of _Atma-Buddhi-Manas_, deathless but now out of earth conditions, devoid of body, begins in _devachan_ to function solely as mind clothed in a very ethereal vesture which it will shake off when the time comes for it to return to earth.