775. Since there are genera and species to all things, that is to say, to spiritual goods as well as to natural goods, and also to derivative sensory and bodily goods, 'according to its kind' ¹ is said of each one. The genera of spiritual goods are so many, and the genera of spiritual truths are in like manner so many, that they cannot possibly be counted up, still less the species making up the genera. In heaven all celestial and spiritual goods and truths are so divided into their own genera, and these in turn into their own species, that the least significant of them is distinct from all the rest. And they are so countless that specific differences may be called unending. These considerations show how impoverished, and almost non-existent, human wisdom is, in that it hardly knows of the existence of spiritual good and truth, let alone what these may be.

[2] It is from celestial and spiritual goods, and truths springing from these, that natural goods and truths come into being and pass down. For no natural good or truth ever exists which has not come into being from spiritual good, and this in turn from celestial good, and which is not kept in being from these same sources. If the spiritual were to withdraw from the natural, the natural would not be anything. With regard to the origin of all things, every single thing comes from the Lord. From Him comes the celestial; by way of the celestial from Him the spiritual comes into being; by way of the spiritual comes the natural; by way of the natural comes that which constitutes the body and the senses. And just as these come into being from the Lord in this way, so in the same way they are kept in being, for as is well known, being kept in being is constant coming into being. People who assume that things arise and come into being in any other way, as those do who worship nature and trace the origin of things back to that, are governed by assumptions so dismal that the delusions of wild animals roaming the forest can be said to contain far more sanity. There are many such persons who seem to themselves to excel everybody else in wisdom.

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