73. The Divine is present through all time independently of time. As the Divine is present through all space independently of space, so it is present through all time independently of time. For no property of nature can be predicated of the Divine, and space and time are properties of nature.

Space in nature is measurable, and so, too, is time. Time is measured in terms of days, weeks, months, years and centuries, and a day then in terms of hours, a week and month in terms of days, a year in terms of the four seasons, and centuries in terms of years.

Nature has this measurement from the apparent orbital motion and cycling of the world's sun.

[2] The same is not the case, however, in the spiritual world. Progressions of life there in similar manner appear to take place in time, since people live in that world with each other as people in this world do, which is not possible without an appearance of time; but time there is not distinguished into periods as in the world, for their sun stands constantly in their east, never moving, because it is the Lord's Divine love that appears to them as the sun. Consequently they do not have days, weeks, months, years, or centuries, but instead of these states of life, which result in transitions, transitions which cannot be called transitions of time but transitions of state.

So it is that angels do not know what time is, and when they hear time referred to, they perceive instead a reference to state. Moreover, when state is what determines time, time is only an appearance; for a state of delight causes time to seem short, and a state devoid of delight causes time to seem long.

From this it is apparent that time in the spiritual world is nothing other than a quality of state.

[3] It is owing to this that hours, days, weeks, months and years in the Word symbolize states and their progressions in their sequence and in their entirety. Thus when times are mentioned in reference to a church, by its morning is meant its first state, by its noon or midday its fullness, by its evening its decline, and by its night its end. The same stages are meant by the four seasons of the year, namely spring, summer, fall, and winter.