381. (iii) Hypocritical faith is no faith at all.

A person becomes a hypocrite when he thinks a great deal about himself and sets himself above others. For by so doing he directs and concentrates the thoughts and affections of his mind into his body, linking them to his bodily senses. As a result he becomes natural, sensual and corporeal, so that his mind cannot be removed from the flesh to which it clings and be raised to God, nor can it see anything of God's in the light of heaven, that is, anything spiritual. Because he is a fleshly person, the spiritual ideas that enter his mind, passing by hearing into the understanding, seem to him nothing but ghosts or motes in the air, or rather like flies around the head of a horse sweating as it runs. Consequently in his heart he laughs at them; for it is well known that the natural man regards the things of the spirit, anything, that is, spiritual, as hallucinations.

[2] The hypocrite is the lowest among natural men, since he is sensual; for his mind is tightly tied to his bodily senses, so that he does not like seeing anything but what his senses suggest. Since the senses are in the realm of nature, they compel the mind to think on every subject in natural terms, and this is true also of all matters concerned with faith. If that hypocrite becomes a preacher, he retains in his memory the sort of things that were said about faith when he was a boy or youth. But since they contain inwardly nothing that is spiritual, but only what is wholly natural, when he utters them before an audience, they are nothing but lifeless sounds. The reason they sound as if alive is that this comes from the pleasures of self-love and love of the world. These cause them to ring eloquently and charm the ears, very much as does harmonious singing.

[3] The hypocritical preacher on returning home after his sermon laughs at all he said and expounded from the Word to his audience on the subject of faith; and he may perhaps say to himself: 'I cast a net into the lake, and caught flat-fish and shell-fish.' For this is how all those who have true faith look to such people in their delusion. A hypocrite is like a carved image with a double head, one inside the other; the inner head is attached to the trunk or body, the outer one, which can swivel around the inner one, has its face painted with colours resembling the human face, rather like the wooden heads to be seen in the shop-windows of wig-makers. The hypocrite is like a boat which a sailor by trimming the sail can make go at will with the wind or against it. Such is his sailing that the boat is prone to everything which favours the pleasures of the flesh and the senses,

[4] Ministers who are hypocrites are consummate comedians, mimics and actors, who can play the parts of kings, dukes, primates and bishops; and a little later, when they have taken off their costumes, they go to brothels and spend their time with whores. They are also like doors hung on swivelling hinges, so that they can swing to and fro; that is what their mind is like, since it can be opened on the side of hell or on that of heaven. When it is open in one direction, it is closed in the other. For the extraordinary thing is that while they are engaged in their sacred duties and are teaching truths from the Word, they are quite unaware of anything but believing them; for at these times the door is closed to hell. But a little later, on returning home, they believe nothing, because then the door is closed to heaven.

[5] The worst hypocrites have an implacable enmity for truly spiritual people, resembling that satans have for the angels of heaven. They do not feel that this is so, as long as they live in the world, but it shows up after death, when their external, which allowed them to make a pretence of being spiritual people, is taken away, since it is their internal man which is this sort of Satan. But I will explain how the angels of heaven see these spiritual hypocrites, who are those who go around in sheeps' clothing while inwardly they are ravening wolves (Matthew 7:15). They look like clowns walking on the palms of their hands and praying; they cry from the heart with their mouth to demons and embrace them; but they clap their shoes in the air, and thus make a noise to God. But when they stand on their feet, their eyes have the look of leopards, their gait looks like that of wolves, their mouth like foxes', their teeth like crocodiles'; and as regards faith they look like vultures.