100 ROSICRUCIANCOSMO-CONCEPTION
one-millionth part of a grain instead of one-tenth of an
ounce.
It was the vital body which the scientist weighed. It is
formed of the four ethers and they belong to the Physical
World.
As we have seen, a certain amount of this ether is
“superimposed” upon the ether which envelops the particles
of the human body and is confined there during physical life,
adding in a slight degree to the weight of the dense body of
plant, animal and man. In death it escapes; hence the
diminution in weight noticed by Dr. McDougall when the
persons with whom he experimented expired.
Dr. McDougall also tried his scales in weighing dying
animals. No diminution was found here, though one of the
animals was a St. Bernard dog. That was taken to indicate
that animals ha ve no s ouls. A litt le lat er, however, Profes sor
La V. Twining, head of the Science Department of the Los
Angeles Polytechnic School, experimented with mice and
kittens, which he enclosed in hermetically sealed glass
flasks. His scales were the most sensitive procurable and
were enclosed in a glass case from which all moisture had
been removed. It was found that all the animals observed
lost weight at death. A good sized mouse, weighing 12.886
grams, suddenly lost 3.1 milligrams at death.
A kitten used in another experiment lost one hundred
milligrams while dying and at its last gasp it suddenly lost
an additional sixty milligrams. After that it lost weight
slowly, due to evaporation.
Thus the teaching of occult science in regard to the
possession of vital bodies by animals was also vindicated
when sufficiently fine scales were used, and the case where
the rather insensitive scales did not show diminution in the