7017. 'And I will see whether they are still alive' means a perception of that life. This is clear from the meaning of 'seeing' as understanding and perceiving, dealt with in 2325, 2807, 3764, 3863, 4403-4421, 4567, 4723, 5400; and from the meaning of 'being alive' or 'living' as spiritual life, dealt with in 5407. A perception of that life means a perceiving before-hand, for when anyone proposes something to himself he envisages it as if it were a present reality. He must project his mind into the situation involving that thing, and from this come desires, and from it a feeling of delight such as would belong to that thing if it were a present reality. In this way intermediate ends link themselves to the last and lowest end and make so to speak a single end. ¹

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5407. 'And let us live and not die' means spiritual life. This is clear from the meaning of 'living and not dying' as spiritual life, for nothing else than this is meant in the internal sense by 'living and not dying'. In the next life 'life' generally means heaven, but specifically it means eternal happiness, while 'death' generally means hell, but specifically eternal unhappiness there, as is also evident from many places in the Word. The reason why heaven generally and eternal happiness specifically are called 'life' is that wisdom, which essentially is good, and intelligence, which essentially is truth, are present in heaven, and the life of such wisdom and intelligence is received from the Lord, the Source of the whole of life. But because the contrary of this exists in hell - that is to say, evil exists instead of good, and falsity instead of truth, so that spiritual life has been snuffed out there - what exists there, compared with that existing in heaven, is death. For spiritual death consists in evil and falsity, and it exists with man as the desire for what is evil and a consequent thinking what is false. Evil genii and spirits refuse to listen when it is said that they have no life or that they are dead. For they say that they do have life since they have the power of will and the power of thought. But they are told that since life resides in what is good and true it cannot possibly do so in what is evil and false, because the two are contraries.