3020. Who administered all that he had. That this signifies the offices of the natural man is evident from the signification of “administering,” and indeed of “administering all things,” as being to discharge offices or duties. (That the natural man in respect to the rational, or what is the same, the external man in respect to the internal, is like the administrator in a house, may be seen above, n. 1795.) All things that are in man are as one household (that is, as one family) in this respect, that there is one who fills the office of master of the house, and others who fill that of servants. The rational mind itself is that which disposes all things as master of the house, and arranges them in order by influx into the natural mind; but it is the natural mind that ministers and is the administrator.

[2] As the natural mind is distinct from the rational mind and is in a degree below it, and as it also acts as if from what is its own, it is called relatively a “servant the elder of the house,” and it is said to administer all the things in itself that belong to it. That the natural mind is distinct from the rational, and is in a lower degree, and is as if in what is its own, may be seen from the things within it, and from its offices. The things which are therein are all memory-knowledges, thus also all knowledges of every kind whatever; in a word, they are all things in both general and particular that belong to the outer or corporeal memory (concerning which see n. 2471, 2480). To this mind also belongs all the imaginative faculty, which is the interior sensuous with man, and which is in the greatest vigor with children; and in the first age of adolescence; to the same mind belong also all natural affections that man has in common with brute animals; all of which shows what its offices are.

[3] But the rational mind is more internal. The knowledges in it are not open before man, but while he lives in the body are imperceptible; for they are all things in both general and particular that belong to the interior memory (concerning which see n. 2470-2474, 2489, 2490). To this mind also belongs all the thinking faculty that is perceptive of what is equitable and just, and of what is true and good; also all spiritual affections, which are properly human, and by which man is distinguished from the brute animals. From these things this mind flows into the natural mind, and excites the things that are therein, and views them with a kind of sight, and in this manner judges and forms conclusions. That these two minds are distinct is clearly evident from the fact that with many persons the natural mind bears rule over the rational mind; or what is the same, the external man over the internal man; and that it does not bear rule but serves with those only who are in the good of charity, that is, who suffer themselves to be led by the Lord.

2996. In this world it is a great secret, although in the other life nothing is better known to every spirit, that all things in the human body have a correspondence to those in heaven; insomuch that there is not the smallest particle in the body, to which something spiritual and celestial does not correspond; or what is the same, to which heavenly societies do not correspond, for these exist according to all the genera and species of spiritual and celestial things; and this in such an order that together they represent one man, even as to all his parts, in general and in particular, both the interior and the exterior. Hence it is that the universal heaven is also called the Grand Man; and hence it is that it has been so often said that one society belongs to one province of the body, another to another, and so on. The reason is that the Lord is the Only Man, and heaven represents Him; and the Divine good and truth that are from Him are what make heaven; and because the angels are therein, they are said to be in the Lord. But they who are in hell are outside this Grand Man, and correspond to things unclean, and also to bodily corruptions.