‘There is one temple in the Universe and it is the body of Man.’ – Novalis How are the internal and external forms of the human organism shaped? How does human consciousness emerge? These are questions to which conventional science has no answers. In The Seat of the Soul, Yvan Rioux invites us to consider new concepts that can explain these phenomena. His exposition is based on the existence of external ‘formative forces’ – or morphic fields – which, he argues, create the human body or organism in conjunction with forces that resonate within us from the living solar system. The psyche – or soul – emerges progressively as an inner world of faculties that in time learns to apprehend and understand the outer world. In his previous book The Mystery of Emerging Form, Rioux explored the formative forces of the twelve zodiacal constellations. In this absorbing sequel, he investigates how such activity from the planetary spheres works within us, as ‘life stages’ or metabolic processes. Through seven chapters, he explores the impact of each of these planetary spheres on our complex organic make-up and psychic activity. The link between organs and tissues, he says, produces five specific ‘inner landscapes’ in relation to the external rhythmic environment. Rioux also gives a description of Rudolf Steiner’s seven ‘planetary seals’ from a biological perspective. According to Steiner, these seals are: ‘…occult scripts, meaning that, as hidden signatures, they show their ongoing etheric impacts on the seven stages of our metabolism’. Between Steiner’s indications concerning human physiology and the ancient Chinese view on the subject, there is a convergence of ideas – as synthesized here – that breaks through the boundaries of modern reductionist science, offering exciting perspectives for understanding the human being. ‘The seat of the soul is where the inner world and the outer world meet. Where they overlap, it is in every point of the overlap.’ – Novalis