352. By pseudo-intelligence and wisdom we mean not seeing and grasping what is true and good (and therefore what is false and evil) from within oneself, but only believing that things are true and good or false and evil because someone else says so, and then ratifying it. Since such people are not seeing what is true on the basis of its truth but only on someone's authority, they can just as well latch onto something false as something true and believe it, and even rationalize it until it actually seems to be true. Whatever is rationalized takes on the appearance of truth, and there is nothing that cannot be rationalized. Their deeper levels are open only downward, and their outer levels are opened to the extent that they have made up their minds. So the light they see from is not heaven's light but the world's light, which is called "natural illumination." In this light, false things can shine as though they were true. In fact, once they have become matters of complete conviction, they can even glow, though not in heaven's light.

The less intelligent and wise people of this sort are those who have convinced themselves of a great many opinions, and the more intelligent and wise are the ones who have convinced themselves of fewer.

We can see from all this what pseudo-intelligence and wisdom are.

[2] However, this category does not include people who as children believed as true what they heard from their teachers, if in later youth, when they began to think on their own, they did not hang on to these opinions but had a longing for truth, sought it because of their longing, and were moved inwardly when they found it. Because they are moved by truth for its own sake, they see what is true before they make it a matter of conviction. ¹

[3] An example may serve to illustrate this. Some spirits were engaged in a conversation about the reason why animals are born into all the knowledge that is appropriate to their natures, while humans are not. They were told that this is because animals are wholly engaged in the pattern appropriate to their lives, while we are not; so we have to be led into that pattern by means of insights and information. If we were born into the pattern of our lives, which is loving God above all and our neighbor as ourselves, we would be born into intelligence and wisdom and therefore into a trust in everything true to the extent that our insights built up. The good spirits immediately saw and grasped that this was so, simply from the light of truth. However, some spirits who had convinced themselves of faith alone and had therefore pushed love and thoughtfulness aside could not understand it, because the light of false convictions obscured the light of truth for them.

Poznámky pod čarou:

9730. 'And you shall put it under the rim of the altar beneath' means that sensory perception on the last and lowest levels. This is clear from the meaning of 'a grating, a network', which was to be put under the rim of the altar, as the level of sensory perception, dealt with above in 9726; from the meaning of 'the rim', when it refers to sensory perception, as that which is last and lowest (external sensory perception forms for a person the last and lowest level of life, see 9726); and from the meaning of 'beneath' as outwardly, for by things that are higher those which are more internal are meant, and by things that are lower those which are more external are meant, 6952, 6954, 7814-7821, 8604, so that 'above' means inwardly and 'beneath' means outwardly. The words 'external sensory perception' are not used to mean the sensory powers of the body itself - its senses of sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch - but the ability that depends directly on them. For a person is called sensory-minded if those bodily senses and their appetites govern what he thinks and desires and he looks no further. If he does look further to examine what the senses desire and what his senses lead him to think, he is said to be raised above the sensory level, or to be drawn away from it, and to think on a more internal level. This happens to those at the present day who are governed by the good of charity and faith; and when it happens, the sensory level becomes dormant and is deprived of the life and activity that the world and worldly objects stimulate there.

There are two directions in which the things composing a person's understanding and will can be oriented. One faces without, towards the world; the other faces within, towards heaven. With natural and sensory-minded people the things composing their understanding and will, that is, their thoughts and affections, are oriented towards the world; but with spiritual and heavenly-minded people their thoughts and affections are oriented towards heaven, and also alternately towards the world. When a person is being regenerated he pivots round to face within, and so far as he can be turned in that direction the person can be raised by the Lord towards heaven, to Himself, and can as a result be endowed with wisdom, faith, and love. For the person then leads his life on the level of the internal man, consequently on that of his spirit, and the external man is subordinate to the internal. But if a person does not allow himself to be regenerated all the thoughts and affections within him remain oriented towards the world, in which case he leads his life on the level of the external man, and the internal man is subordinate to the external, as happens when the external man produces reasonings that lend support to evil desires. These people are called natural-minded, and those who are interested only in the most external things are called sensory-minded. All this goes to show what anyone should understand by the level of sensory perception.