In the Panama-Pacific Exposition, one of the exhibits contained a series of interesting pictures, or diagrams, which purported to be exact representations of the various aura of people under different mental conditions. In an article on this subject, written by a well-known authority, we are told that:
It is not around the human body alone that an aura is to be seen; a similar cloud of light surrounds or emanates from animals, trees, and even minerals, though in all these cases it is less extended and less complex than that of man.
The occultists assert that the aura is extremely complex in its character, in other words, that there are several aura superposed one upon the other. The first appearance is of a luminous cloud, extending some eighteen inches or two feet from the body, assuming a somewhat oval shape. Careful study, however, reveals that this first appearance is resolvable into several component parts, or separate aura, of different degrees of tenuity, and, apparently, superposed. Five of these have been defined. The first, or most material, is that pertaining to the physical body. In a state of health this is composed of separate, orderly, and nearly parallel lines, which radiate from the body in every direction.
When one suffers from disease the lines in the neighborhood of the part affected become erratic, and radiate less actively but in the wildest confusion, or, if the whole body be affected, all the lines are consequently erratic.
For a long time it was not known what kept these lines straight and approximately parallel in the case of the healthy person, until a second radiating aura was discovered. This comes from a healthy body in pulsating waves, with such vigor as to compel the rigidity of the health lines. These waves may be compared to the pulsations of the heated air which rise from the ground on a very hot day. Baron Reichenbach made experiments with certain sensitives who declared they could see these radiations, and he called them "the magnetic flame."
When these "waves" come from a sickly or weakly body they not only lose power, but seem to give a confused direction to the health lines.
Many observations also have led to the conclusion that when the lines are kept straight by the force of the pulsating waves from a healthy and vigorous body, "it seems to be almost entirely protected from the attack of evil physical influences, such as germs of disease—such germs being repelled and carried away by the outrush of the life-force: but when from any cause—through weakness, through wound or injury, through over-fatigue, through extreme depression of spirits, or through the excesses of an irregular life—an unusually large amount of vitality is required to repair damage or waste, within the body, and there is consequently a serious diminution in the quantity radiated, this system of defense becomes dangerously weak, and it is comparatively easy for the deadly germs to effect an entrance."
The third aura is that which expresses one's desires—a kind of mirror in which every feeling, every desire, every thought almost, of the personality is reflected. This changes constantly, in some people, accordingly as they are swayed by their impulses. Its colors, brilliancy, rate of pulsations, alter from moment to moment, or minute to minute. "An outburst of anger will charge the whole aura with deep-red flashes on a black ground; a sudden fright in a moment will change everything to a mass of ghastly livid gray."
Connected with this, and yet, seemingly, of a separate character, are the radiations of the aura that express the progress of the personality into higher and better appreciation of the things of mind and spirit. The more intellectual and spiritual one becomes the more steady and beautiful are the colors and radiations of this aura, and the variations and distressing manifestations of the evil desires of the third aura become less apparent and distinct.