Part 12 (1/2)

405. XVI. THE LOVE OF CHILDREN AND INFANTS IS DIFFERENT WITH SPIRITUAL MARRIED PARTNERS FROM WHAT IT IS WITH NATURAL. With spiritual married partners the love of infants as to appearance, is like the love of infants with natural married partners; but it is more inward, and thence more tender, because that love exists from innocence, and from a nearer reception of innocence, and thereby a more present preception of it in man's self: for the spiritual are such so far as they partake of innocence. But spiritual fathers and mothers, after they have sipped the sweet of innocence with their infants, love their children very differently from what natural fathers and mothers do. The spiritual love their children from their spiritual intelligence and moral life; thus they love them from the fear of G.o.d and actual piety, or the piety of life, and at the same time from affection and application to uses serviceable to society, consequently from the virtues and good morals which they possessed. From the love of these things they are princ.i.p.ally led to provide for, and minister to, the necessities of their children; therefore if they do not observe such things in them, they alienate their minds from them and do nothing for them but so far as they think themselves bound in duty. With natural fathers and mothers the love of infants is indeed grounded also in innocence; but when the innocence is received by them, it is entwined around their own love, and consequently the love of their infants from the latter, and at the same time from the former, kissing, embracing, and dangling them, hugging them to their bosoms, and fawning upon and flattering them beyond all bounds, regarding them as one heart and soul with themselves; and afterwards, when they have pa.s.sed the state of infancy even to boyhood and beyond it, in which state innocence is no longer operative, they love them not from any fear of G.o.d and actual piety, or the piety of life, nor from any rational and moral intelligence they may have; neither do they regard, or only very slightly, if at all, their internal affections, and thence their virtues and good morals, but only their externals, which they favor and indulge. To these externals their love is directed and determined: hence also they close their eyes to their vices, excusing, and favoring them. The reason of this is, because with such parents the love of their offspring is also the love of themselves; and this love adheres to the subject outwardly, without entering into it, as self does not enter into itself.

406. The quality of the love of infants and of the love of children with the spiritual and with the natural, is evidently discerned from them after death; for most fathers, when they come into another life, recollect their children who have died before them; they are also presented to and mutually acknowledge each other. Spiritual fathers only look at them, and inquire as to their present state, and rejoice if it is well with them, and grieve if it is ill; and after some conversation, instruction, and admonition respecting moral celestial life, they separate from them, telling them, that they are no longer to be remembered as fathers because the Lord is the only Father to all in heaven, according to his words, Matt. xxiii. 9: and that they do not at all remember them as children. But natural fathers, when they first become conscious that they are living after death, and recall to mind their children who have died before them, and also when, agreeably to their wishes, they are presented to each other, they instantly embrace, and become united like bundles of rods; and in this case the father is continually delighted with beholding and conversing with them. If the father is told that some of his children are satans, and that they have done injuries to the good, he nevertheless keeps them in a group around him, if he himself sees that they are the occasion of hurt and do mischief, he still pays no attention to it, nor does he separate any of them from a.s.sociation with himself; in order, therefore, to prevent the continuance of such a mischievous company, they are of necessity committed forthwith to h.e.l.l; and there the father, before the children, is shut up in confinement, and the children are separated, and each is removed to the place of his life.

407. To the above I will add this wonderful relation:--in the spiritual world I have seen fathers who, from hatred, and as it were rage, had looked at infants presented before their eyes, with a mind so savage, that, if they could, they would have murdered them; but on its being hinted to them, though without truth, that they were their own infants, their rage and savageness instantly subsided, and they loved them to excess. This love and hatred prevail together with those who in the world had been inwardly deceitful, and had set their minds in enmity against the Lord.

408. XVII. WITH THE SPIRITUAL THAT LOVE IS FROM WHAT IS INTERIOR OR PRIOR, BUT WITH THE NATURAL FROM WHAT IS EXTERIOR OR POSTERIOR. To think and conclude from what is interior or prior, is to think and conclude from ends and causes to effects; but to think and conclude from what is exterior or posterior, is to think and conclude from effects to causes and ends. The latter progression is contrary to order, but the former according to it; for to think and conclude from ends and causes, is to think and conclude from goods and truths, viewed in a superior region of the mind, to effects in an inferior region. Real human rationality from creation is of this quality. But to think and conclude from effects, is to think and conclude from an inferior region of the mind, where the sensual things of the body reside with their appearances and fallacies, to guess at causes and effects, which in itself is merely to confirm falsities and concupiscences, and afterwards to see and believe them to be truths of wisdom and goodnesses of the love of wisdom. The case is similar in regard to the love of infants and children with the spiritual and the natural; the spiritual love them from what is prior, thus according to order: but the natural love them from what is posterior, thus contrary to order. These observations are adduced only for the confirmation of the preceding article.

409. XVIII. IN CONSEQUENCE HEREOF THAT LOVE PREVAILS WITH MARRIED PARTNERS WHO MUTUALLY LOVE EACH OTHER, AND ALSO WITH THOSE WHO DO NOT AT ALL LOVE EACH OTHER; consequently it prevails with the natural as well as with the spiritual; but the latter are influenced by conjugial love, whereas the former are influenced by no such love but what is apparent and pretended. The reason why the love of infants and conjugial love still act in unity, is, because, as we have said, conjugial love is implanted in every woman from creation, and together with it the love of procreating, which is determined to and flows into the procreated offspring, and from the women is communicated to the men. Hence in houses, in which there is no conjugial love between the man and his wife, it nevertheless is with the wife, and thereby some external conjunction is effected with the man. From this same ground it is, that even harlots love their offspring; for that which from creation is implanted in souls, and respects propagation, is indelible, and cannot be extirpated.

410. XIX. THE LOVE OF INFANTS REMAINS AFTER DEATH, ESPECIALLY WITH WOMEN. Infants, as soon as they are raised up, which happens immediately after their decease, are elevated into heaven, and delivered to angels of the female s.e.x, who in the life of the body in the world loved infants, and at the same time feared G.o.d. These, having loved all infants with maternal tenderness, receive them as their own; and the infants in this case, as from an innate feeling, love them as their mothers: as many infants are consigned to them, as they desire from a spiritual _storge_. The heaven in which infants are appears in front in the region of the forehead, in the line in which the angels look directly at the Lord. That heaven is so situated, because all infants are educated under the immediate auspices of the Lord. There is an influx also into this heaven from the heaven of innocence, which is the third heaven. When they have pa.s.sed through this first period, they are transferred to another heaven, where they are instructed.

411. XX. INFANTS ARE EDUCATED UNDER THE LORD'S AUSPICES BY SUCH WOMEN, AND GROW IN STATURE AND INTELLIGENCE AS IN THE WORLD. Infants in heaven are educated in the following manner; they learn to speak from the female angel who has the charge of their education; their first speech is merely the sound of affection, in which however there is some beginning of thought, whereby what is human in the sound is distinguished from the sound of an animal; this speech gradually becomes more distinct, as ideas derived from affection enter the thought: all their affections, which also increase, proceed from innocence. At first, such things are insinuated into them as appear before their eyes, and are delightful; and as these are from a spiritual origin, heavenly things flow into them at the same time, whereby the interiors of their minds are opened. Afterwards, as the infants are perfected in intelligence, so they grow in stature, and viewed in this respect, they appear also more adult, because intelligence and wisdom are essential spiritual nourishment; therefore those things which nourish their minds, also nourish their bodies. Infants in heaven, however, do not grow up beyond their first age, where they stop, and remain in it to eternity.

And when they are in that age, they are given in marriage, which is provided by the Lord, and is celebrated in the heaven of the youth, who presently follows the wife into her heaven, or into her house, if they are of the same society. That I might know of a certainty, that infants grow in stature, and arrive at maturity as they grow in intelligence, I was permitted to speak with some while they were infants, and afterwards when they were grown up; and they appeared as full-grown youths, in a stature, like that of young men full grown in the world.

412. Infants are instructed especially by representatives adequate and suitable to their genius; the great beauty and interior wisdom of which can scarcely be credited in the world. I am permitted to adduce here two representations, from which a judgement may be formed in regard to the rest. On a certain time they represented the Lord ascending from the sepulchre, and at the same time the unition of his human with the divine. At first they presented the idea of a sepulchre, but not at the same time the idea of the Lord, except so remotely, that it was scarcely, and as it were at a distance, perceived that it was the Lord; because in the idea of a sepulchre there is somewhat funereal, which they hereby removed. Afterwards they cautiously admitted into the sepulchre a sort of atmosphere, appearing nevertheless as a thin vapor, by which they signified, and this with a suitable degree of remoteness, spiritual life in baptism. They afterwards represented the Lord's descent to those who were bound, and his ascent with them into heaven; and in order to accommodate the representation to their infant minds, they let down small cords that were scarcely discernible, exceedingly soft and yielding, to aid the Lord in the ascent, being always influenced by a holy fear lest any thing in the representation should affect something that was not under heavenly influence: not to mention other representations, whereby infants are introduced into the knowledges of truth and the affections of good, as by games adapted to their capacities. To these and similar things infants are led by the Lord by means of innocence pa.s.sing through the third heaven; and thus spiritual things are insinuated into their affections, and thence into their tender thoughts, so that they know no other than that they do and think such things from themselves, by which their understanding commences.

413. XXI. IT IS THERE PROVIDED BY THE LORD, THAT WITH THOSE INFANTS THE INNOCENCE OF INFANCY BECOMES THE INNOCENCE OF WISDOM (AND THUS THEY BECOME ANGELS). Many may conjecture that infants remain infants, and become angels immediately after death: but it is intelligence and wisdom that make an angel: therefore so long as infants are without intelligence and wisdom, they are indeed a.s.sociated with angels, yet are not angels: but they then first become so when they are made intelligent and wise. Infants therefore are led from the innocence of infancy to the innocence of wisdom, that is, from external innocence to internal: the latter innocence is the end of all their instruction and progression: therefore when they attain to the innocence of wisdom, the innocence of infancy is adjoined to them, which in the mean time had served them as a plane. I saw a representation of the quality of the innocence of infancy; it was of wood almost without life, and was vivified in proportion as the knowledges of truth and the affections of good were imbibed: and afterwards there was represented the quality of the innocence of wisdom, by a living infant. The angels of the third heaven, who are in a state of innocence from the Lord above other angels, appear like naked infants before the eyes of spirits who are beneath the heavens; and as they are wiser than all others, so are they also more truly alive: the reason of this is, because innocence corresponds to infancy, and also to nakedness, therefore it is said of Adam and his wife, when they were in a state of innocence, that they were naked and were not ashamed, but that when they had lost their state of innocence, they were ashamed of their nakedness, and hid themselves, Gen. ii. 25; chap. iii. 7, 10, 11. In a word, the wiser the angels are the more innocent they are. The quality of the innocence of wisdom may in some measure be seen from the innocence of infancy above described, n. 395, if only instead of parents, the Lord be a.s.sumed as the Father by whom they are led, and to whom they ascribe what they have received.

414. On the subject of innocence I have often conversed with the angels who have told me that innocence is the _esse_ of every good, and that good is only so far good as it has innocence in it: and, since wisdom is of life and thence of good, that wisdom is only so far wisdom as it partakes of innocence: the like is true of love, charity, and faith; and hence it is that no one can enter heaven unless he has innocence; which is meant by these words of the Lord, ”_Suffer infants to come to me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of the heavens; verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of the heavens as an infant, he will not enter therein_,” Mark x. 14, 15; Luke xviii. 16, 17.

In this pa.s.sage, as well as in other parts of the Word, infants denote those who are in innocence. The reason why good is good, so far as it has innocence in it, is, because all good is from the Lord, and innocence consists in being led by the Lord.

415. To the above I shall add this MEMORABLE RELATION. One morning, as I awoke out of sleep, the light beginning to dawn and it being very serene, while I was meditating and not yet quite awake, I saw through the window as it were a flash of lightning, and presently I heard as it were a clap of thunder; and while I was wondering whence this could be, I heard from heaven words to this effect, ”There are some not far from you, who are reasoning sharply about G.o.d and nature. The vibration of light like lightning, and the clapping of the air like thunder, are correspondences and consequent appearances of the conflict and collision of arguments, on one side in favor of G.o.d, and on the other in favor of nature.” The cause of this spiritual combat was as follows: there were some satans in h.e.l.l who expressed a wish to be allowed to converse with the angels of heaven; ”for,” said they, ”we will clearly and fully demonstrate, that what they call G.o.d, the Creator of all things, is nothing but nature; and thus that G.o.d is a mere unmeaning expression, unless nature be meant by it.” And as those satans believed this with all their heart and soul, and also were desirous to converse with the angels of heaven, they were permitted to ascend out of the mire and darkness of h.e.l.l, and to converse with two angels at that time descending from heaven. They were in the world of spirits, which is intermediate between heaven and h.e.l.l. The satans on seeing the angels there, hastily ran to them, and cried out with a furious voice, ”Are you the angels of heaven with whom we are allowed to engage in debate, respecting G.o.d and nature? You are called wise because you acknowledge a G.o.d; but, alas! how simple you are! Who sees G.o.d? who understands what G.o.d is? who conceives that G.o.d governs, and can govern the universe, with everything belonging thereto? and who but the vulgar and common herd of mankind acknowledges what he does not see and understand? What is more obvious than that nature is all in all? Is it not nature alone that we see with our eyes, hear with our ears, smell with our nostrils, taste with our tongues, and touch and feel with our hands and bodies?

And are not our bodily senses the only evidences of truth? Who would not swear from them that it is so? Are not your heads in nature, and is there any influx into the thoughts of your heads but from nature? Take away nature, and can you think at all? Not to mention several other considerations of a like kind.” On hearing these words the angels replied, ”You speak in this manner because you are merely sensual. All in the h.e.l.ls have the ideas of their thoughts immersed in the bodily senses, neither are they able to elevate their minds above them; therefore we excuse you. The life of evil and the consequent belief of what is false have closed the interiors of your minds, so that you are incapable of any elevation above the things of sense, except in a state removed from evils of life, and from false principles of faith: for a satan, as well as an angel, can understand truth when he hears it; but he does not retain it, because evil obliterates truth and induces what is false: but we perceive that you are now in a state of removal from evil, and thus that you can understand the truth which we speak; attend therefore to what we shall say:” and they proceeded thus: ”You have been in the natural world, and have departed thence, and are now in the spiritual world. Have you known anything till now concerning a life after death? Have you not till now denied such a life, and degraded yourselves to the beasts? Have you known any thing heretofore about heaven and h.e.l.l, or the light and heat of this world? or of this circ.u.mstance, that you are no longer within the sphere of nature, but above it; since this world and all things belonging to it are spiritual, and spiritual things are above natural, so that not the least of nature can flow into this world? But, in consequence of believing nature to be a G.o.d or a G.o.ddess, you believe also the light and heat of this world to be the light and heat of the natural world, when yet it is not at all so; for natural light here is darkness, and natural heat is cold. Have you known anything about the sun of this world from which our light and heat proceed? Have you known that this sun is pure love, and the sun of the natural world pure fire; and the sun of the world, which is pure fire, is that from which nature exists and subsists; and that the sun of heaven, which is pure love, is that from which life itself, which is love with wisdom exists and subsists; and thus that nature, which you make a G.o.d or a G.o.ddess, is absolutely dead? You can, under the care of a proper guard, ascend with us into heaven; and we also, under similar protection, can descend with you into h.e.l.l; and in heaven you will see magnificent and splendid objects, but in h.e.l.l such as are filthy and unclean. The ground of the difference is, because all in the heavens wors.h.i.+p G.o.d, and all in the h.e.l.ls wors.h.i.+p nature; and the magnificent and splendid objects in the heavens are correspondences of the affections of good and truth, and the filthy and unclean objects in the h.e.l.ls are correspondences of the l.u.s.ts of what is evil and false. Judge now, from these circ.u.mstances, whether G.o.d or nature be all in all.” To this the satans replied, ”In the state wherein we now are, we can conclude, from what we have heard, that there is a G.o.d; but when the delight of evil seizes our minds, we see nothing but nature.” These two angels and two satans were standing to the right, at no great distance from me; therefore I saw and heard them; and lo! I saw near them many spirits who had been celebrated in the natural world for their erudition; and I was surprised to observe that those great scholars at one time stood near the angels and at another near the satans, and that they favored the sentiments of those near whom they stood; and I was led to understand that the changes of their situation were changes of the state of their minds, which sometimes favored one side and sometimes the other; for they were _vertumni_. Moreover, the angels said, ”We will tell you a mystery; on our looking down upon the earth, and examining those who were celebrated for erudition, and who have thought about G.o.d and nature from their own judgement, we have found six hundred out of a thousand favorers of nature, and the rest favorers of G.o.d; and that these were in favor of G.o.d, in consequence of having frequently maintained in their conversation, not from any convictions of their understandings, but only from hear-say, that nature is from G.o.d; for frequent conversation from the memory and recollection, and not at the same time from thought and intelligence, induces a species of faith.”

After this, the satans were entrusted to a guard and ascended with the two angels into heaven, and saw the magnificent and splendid objects contained therein; and being then an ill.u.s.tration from the light of heaven, they acknowledged the being of a G.o.d, and that nature was created to be subservient to the life which is in G.o.d and from G.o.d; and that nature in itself is dead, and consequently does nothing of itself, but is acted upon by life. Having seen and perceived these things, they descended: and as they descended the love of evil returned and closed their understanding above and opened it beneath; and then there appeared above it as it were a veil sending forth lightning from infernal fire; and as soon as they touched the earth with their feet, the ground cleaved asunder beneath them, and they returned to their a.s.sociates.

416. After these things those two angels seeing me near, said to the by-standers respecting me, ”We know that this man has written about G.o.d and nature; let us hear what he has written.” They therefore came to me, and intreated that what I had written about G.o.d and nature might be read to them: I therefore read as follows. ”Those who believe in a Divine operation in everything of nature, may confirm themselves in favor of the Divine, from many things which they see in nature, equally, yea more than those who confirm themselves in favor of nature: for those who confirm themselves in favor of the Divine, attend to the wonderful things, which are conspicuous in the productions of both vegetables and animals:--in the PRODUCTION OF VEGETABLES, that from a small seed sown in the earth there is sent forth a root, by means of the root a stem, and successively buds, leaves, flowers, fruits, even to new seeds; altogether as if the seed was acquainted with the order of succession, or the process by which it was to renew itself. What rational person can conceive, that the sun which is pure fire, is acquainted with this, or that it can endue its heat and light with a power to effect such things; and further, that it can form wonderful things therein, and intend use?

When a man of elevated reason sees and considers such things, he cannot think otherwise than that they are from him who has infinite wisdom, consequently from G.o.d. Those who acknowledge the Divine, also see and think so; but those who do not acknowledge it, do not see and think so, because they are unwilling; and thereby they let down their rational principle into the sensual, which derives all its ideas from the luminous principle in which the bodily senses are, and confirms their fallacies urging, 'Do not you see the sun effecting these things by its heat and light? What is that which you do not see?' Is it anything?

Those who confirm themselves in favor of the Divine, attend to the wonderful things which are conspicuous in the PRODUCTIONS OF ANIMALS; to mention only what is conspicuous in eggs, that there lies concealed in them a chick in its seed, or first principles of existence, with everything requisite even to the hatching, and likewise to every part of its progress after hatching, until it becomes a bird, or winged animal, in the form of its parent stock. A farther attention to the nature and quality of the form cannot fail to cause astonishment in the contemplative mind; to observe in the least as well as in the largest kinds, yea, in the invisible as in the visible, that is, in small insects, as in fowls or great beasts, how they are all endowed with organs of sense, such as seeing, smelling, tasting, touching; and also with organs of motion, such as muscles, for they fly and walk; and likewise with viscera, around the heart and lungs, which are actuated by the brains: that the commonest insects enjoy all these parts of organization is known from their anatomy, as described by some writers, especially SWAMMERDAM in his Books of Nature. Those who ascribe all things to nature do indeed see such things; but they think only that they are so, and say that nature produces them: and this they say in consequence of having averted their minds from thinking about the Divine; and those who have so averted their minds, when they see the wonderful things in nature, cannot think rationally, and still less spiritually; but they think sensually and materially, and in this case they think in and from nature, and not above it, in like manner as those do who are in h.e.l.l; differing from beasts only in this respect, that they have rational powers, that is, they are capable of understanding, and thereby of thinking otherwise, if only they are willing. Those who have averted themselves from thinking about the Divine, when they see the wonderful things in nature, and thereby become sensual, do not consider that the sight of the eye is so gross that it sees several small insects as one confused ma.s.s; when yet each of them is organized to feel and to move itself, consequently is endowed with fibres and vessels, also with a little heart, pulmonary pipes, small viscera, and brains; and that the contexture of these parts consists of the purest principles in nature, and corresponds to some life, by virtue of which their minutest parts are distinctly acted upon. Since the sight of the eye is so gross that several of such insects, with the innumerable things in each, appear to it as a small confused ma.s.s, and yet those who are sensual, think and judge from that sight, it is evident how gross their minds are, and consequently in what thick darkness they are respecting spiritual things.

417. ”Every one that is willing to do so, may confirm himself in favor of the Divine from the visible things in nature; and he also who thinks of G.o.d from the principle of life, does so confirm himself; while, for instance, he observes the fowls of heaven, how each species of them knows its proper food and where it is to be found; how they can distinguish those of their own kind by the sounds they utter and by their external appearance; how also, among other kinds, they can tell which are their friends and which their foes; how they pair together, build their nests with great art, lay therein their eggs, hatch them, know the time of hatching, and at its accomplishment help their young out of the sh.e.l.l, love them most tenderly, cherish them under their wings, feed and nourish them, until they are able to provide for themselves and do the like, and to procreate a family in order to perpetuate their kind. Every one that is willing to think of a divine influx through the spiritual world into the natural, may discern it in these instances, and may also, if he will, say in his heart, 'Such knowledges cannot flow into those animals from the sun by the rays of its light:' for the sun, from which nature derives its birth and its essence, its pure fire, and consequently the rays of its light are altogether dead; and thus they may conclude, that such effects are derived from an influx of divine wisdom into the ultimates of nature.

418. ”Every one may confirm himself in favor of the Divine from what is visible in nature, while he observes worms, which from the delight of a certain desire, wish and long after a change of their earthly state into a state a.n.a.logous to a heavenly one; for this purpose they creep into holes, and cast themselves as it were into a womb that they may be born again, and there become chrysalises, aurelias, nymphs, and at length b.u.t.terflies; and when they have undergone this change, and according to their species are decked with beautiful wings, they fly into the air as into their heaven, and there indulge in all festive sports, pair together, lay their eggs, and provide for themselves a posterity; and then they are nourished with a sweet and pleasant food, which they extract from flowers. Who that confirms himself in favor of the Divine from what is visible in nature, does not see some image of the earthly state of man in these animals while they are worms, and of his heavenly state in the same when they become b.u.t.terflies? whereas those who confirm themselves in favor of nature, see indeed such things; but as they have rejected from their minds all thought of man's heavenly state, they call them mere instincts of nature.

419. ”Again, everyone may confirm himself in favor of the Divine from what is visible in nature, while he attends to the discoveries made respecting bees,--how they have the art to gather wax and suck honey from herbs and flowers, and build cells like small houses, and arrange them into the form of a city with streets, through which they come in and go out; and how they can smell flowers and herbs at a distance, from which they may collect wax for their home and honey for their food; and how, when laden with these treasures, they can trace their way back in a right direction to their hive; thus they provide for themselves food and habitation against the approaching winter, as if they were acquainted with and foresaw its coming. They also set over themselves a mistress as a queen, to be the parent of a future race, and for her they build as it were a palace in an elevated situation, and appoint guards about her; and when the time comes for her to become a mother, she goes from cell to cell and lays her eggs, which her attendants cover with a sort of ointment to prevent their receiving injury from the air; hence arises a new generation, which, when old enough to provide in like manner for itself, is driven out from home; and when driven out, it flies forth to seek a new habitation, not however till it has first collected itself into a swarm to prevent dissociation. About autumn also the useless drones are brought forth and deprived of their wings, lest they should return and consume the provision which they had taken no pains to collect; not to mention many other circ.u.mstances; from which it may appear evident, that on account of the use which they afford to mankind, they have by influx from the spiritual world a form of government, such as prevails among men in the world, yea, among angels in the heavens.

What man of uncorrupted reason does not see that such instincts are not communicated to bees from the natural world? What has the sun, in which nature originates, in common with a form of government which vies with and is similar to a heavenly one? From these and similar circ.u.mstances respecting brute animals, the confessor and wors.h.i.+per of nature confirms himself in favor of nature, while the confessor and wors.h.i.+per of G.o.d, from the same circ.u.mstances, confirms himself in favor of the Divine: for the spiritual man sees spiritual things therein, and the natural man natural; thus every one according to his quality. In regard to myself, such circ.u.mstances have been to me testimonies of an influx of what is spiritual into what is natural, or of an influx of the spiritual world into the natural world; thus of an influx from the divine wisdom of the Lord. Consider also, whether you can think a.n.a.lytically of any form of government, any civil law, any moral virtue, or any spiritual truth, unless the Divine flows in from his wisdom through the spiritual world: for my own part, I never did, and still feel it to be impossible; for I have perceptibly and sensibly observed such influx now (1768) for twenty-five years continually: I therefore speak this from experience.

420. ”Can nature, let me ask, regard use as an end, and dispose uses into orders and forms? This is in the power of none but a wise being; and none but G.o.d, who is infinitely wise, can so order and form the universe. Who else can foresee and provide for mankind all the things necessary for their food and clothing, producing them from the fruits of the earth and from animals? It is surely a wonderful consideration among many others, that those common insects, called silk-worms, should supply with splendid clothing all ranks of persons, from kings and queens even to the lowest servants; and that those common insects the bees, should supply wax to enlighten both our temples and palaces. These, with several other similar considerations, are standing proofs, that the Lord by an operation from himself through the spiritual world, effects whatever is done in nature.

421. ”It may be expedient here to add, that I have seen in the spiritual world those who had confirmed themselves in favor of nature by what is visible in this world, so as to become atheists, and that their understanding in spiritual light appeared open beneath but closed above, because with their thinking faculty they had looked downwards to the earth and not upwards to heaven. The super-sensual principle, which is the lowest principle of the understanding, appeared as a veil, in some cases sparkling from infernal fire, in some black as soot, and in some pale and livid as a corpse. Let every one therefore beware of confirmation in favor of nature, and let him confirm himself in favor of the Divine; for which confirmation there is no want of materials.

422. ”Some indeed are to be excused for ascribing certain visible effects to nature, because they have had no knowledge respecting the sun of the spiritual world, where the Lord is, and of influx thence; neither have they known any thing about that world and its state, nor yet of its presence with man; and consequently they could think no other than that the spiritual principle was a purer natural principle; and thus that angels were either in the ether or in the stars; also that the devil was either man's evil, or, if he actually existed, that he was either in the air or in the deep; also that the souls of men after death were either in the inmost part of the earth, or in some place of confinement till the day of judgement; not to mention other like conceits, which sprung from ignorance of the spiritual world and its sun. This is the reason why those are to be excused, who have believed that the visible productions of nature are the effect of some principle implanted in her from creation: nevertheless those who have made themselves atheists by confirmations in favor of nature, are not to be excused, because they might have confirmed themselves in favor of the Divine. Ignorance indeed excuses, but does not take away the false principle which is confirmed; for this false principle agrees with evil, and evil with h.e.l.l.”

ADULTEROUS LOVE AND ITS SINFUL PLEASURES.

ON THE OPPOSITION OF ADULTEROUS LOVE AND CONJUGIAL LOVE.

423. At the entrance upon our subject, it may be expedient to declare what we mean in this chapter by adulterous love. By adulterous love we do not mean fornicatory love, which precedes marriage, or which follows it after the death of a married partner; neither do we mean concubinage, which is engaged in from causes legitimate, just, and excusatory; nor do we mean either the mild or the grievous kinds of adultery, whereof a man actually repents; for the latter become not opposite, and the former are not opposite, to conjugial love, as will be seen in the following pages, where each is treated of. But by adulterous love, opposite to conjugial love, we here mean the love of adultery, so long as it is such as not to be regarded as sin, or as evil, and dishonorable, and contrary to reason, but as allowable with reason. This adulterous love not only makes conjugial love the same with itself, but also overthrows, destroys, and at length nauseates it. The opposition of this love to conjugial love is the subject treated of in this chapter. That no other love is treated of (as being in such opposition), may be evident from what follows concerning fornication, concubinage, and the various kinds of adultery. But in order that this opposition may be made manifest to the rational sight, it may be expedient to demonstrate it in the following series: I. _It is not known what adulterous love is, unless it be known what conjugial love is._ II. _Adulterous love is opposed to conjugial love._ III. _Adulterous love is opposed to conjugial love, as the natural man viewed in himself is opposed to the spiritual man._ IV.