8298. 'They sought a deep place like lead' means that evils drew them down to lower levels like heavy objects in the world. This is clear from the meaning of 'a deep place' as lower levels and the hells in respect of evils, dealt with in 8279, so that 'seeking a deep place' is being drawn down by evils to those places. For their own evils cause the evil to fall, like heavy objects in the world, down towards the hells, see 8279. The expression 'like lead' is used because 'lead' means evil. But verse 5 above stated that 'they went down into deep places of the sea like a stone' because 'a stone' at that point means falsity. Both are heavy, both falsity and evil, and therefore they both fall downwards. Nevertheless evil is what creates heaviness in the spiritual sense and so is what falls as if by gravity. In itself falsity is not heavy; it is so only as a result of the evil that is present in it. For falsity by itself has no weight at all, but acquires it from evil, so that it falls downwards.

[2] It should be recognized that all metals mean good or else truth, and in the contrary sense evil or else falsity. Being less noble than all other metals 'lead' means evil at the lowest level, such as evil belonging to the exterior natural, but in the good sense it means good at that same level; as in Jeremiah,

They are all arch-rebels, ¹ disparagers, bronze and iron; they are all corrupters. The bellows have become hot, the lead has been consumed by the fire; he has thoroughly melted it in vain, for the evil have not been purged out. ² [People] will call them rejected silver, because Jehovah has rejected them. Jeremiah 6:28-30.

And in Ezekiel,

Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to Me; they are all bronze, and tin, and iron, and lead, in the midst of a furnace. They have become the dross of silver. Ezekiel 22:18.

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2418. 'Do not halt in all the plain' means he was not to linger over any one of these. This is clear from the meaning of 'a plain' as every aspect of doctrine, dealt with immediately below. What not lingering over any one of them entails will be stated at verse 26, where Lot's wife is referred to as looking back behind him. That 'a plain' in the Word means all aspects of that doctrine is clear in Jeremiah,

He who lays waste will come to every city, and no city will escape; and the valley will perish, and the plain will be destroyed. Jeremiah 48:8.

'City' stands for false doctrinal teaching, 'the plain' for all aspects of that doctrine. In John,

When the thousand years have come to an end Satan will be loosed from his prison, and will come out to deceive the nations which are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. They went up therefore over the whole plain of the earth, and surrounded the camp of the saints; but fire came down from God out of heaven and consumed them. Revelation 20:7-9.

Here 'Gog and Magog' stands for people whose worship was external devoid of internal and so had become idolatrous, 1151. 'The plain of the earth' stands for the Church's matters of doctrine which they lay waste, 'the camp of the saints' for goods that flow from love and charity. 'Consumed by fire from God out of heaven' is similar in meaning to that regarding the men of Sodom and Gomorrah, in verse 24. Also in Jeremiah 33:13 matters of doctrine regarding charity are called 'cities of the mountain' and matters of doctrine regarding faith 'cities of the plain'.