19. But she being as aeriform as myself, could not be seen by me in her form of the spirit. (Do not the spirits see each other?).
20. I was of the aeriform spirit, and she also had an airlike body; and worlds appeared as empty air, in my airy meditation in aerial seat (of the sky where I was seated).
21. Ráma rejoined:—The body is the seat of the organs of sense and action of breathing, how then could the bodiless spirit utter the sounds of the articulate words which composed the verse?
22. How is it possible for a bodiless spirit, either to see a sight or think of anything (without the eye & mind). Explain to me these inexplicable truths, of the facts you have related.
23. Vasishtha replied:—The seeing of sights, the thinking of thoughts, and the uttering of sounds; are all productions of empty air, as they occur in our airy dreams (i.e. they are all caused by air). (The air being the receptacle of the light of things, the vehicle of sound, and framer of fancy).
24. The sight of a thing and the thought of any thing, depend on the aerial intellect, as they do in our aerial dream; and these are impressed in the hollowness of the intellect, both in the waking as well as dreaming states.
25. Not only is that sight, but whatever is the object of any of our senses, and the whole world itself, is the clear and open sky (and the idea of their substantiality, is altogether erroneous).
26. The transcendent first principle, is of the form of the unknowable intellect; which exhibits itself in the constitution of the universe, which is verily its very nature. (Hence called the mundane God or the god of nature; or as the poet says: Whose body nature is, and God the soul).
27. What proof have you of the existence of the body and its senses? Matter is mere illusion, and as it is with other body, so it is with ours also. (The sruti says: see the formless one under all forms &c.).
28. This is as that One, and that is as this. (i.e. The world appears to be as the intellect shows it &c.). But the unreal (matter) is taken for the real (spirit); and the real is understood as an unreality.