7408. And they gathered them together in heaps and heaps. That this signifies that these false reasonings were arranged in bundles in the natural, is evident from the signification of “being gathered together in heaps and heaps,” as being to be arranged in bundles. That “to be gathered together in heaps” denotes these things, is because all things in the mind of man have been arranged into series, and as it were into bundles; and into series within series, or into bundles within bundles (see n. 5339, 5530, 5881). That there is such an arrangement, is plain from the arrangement of all things in the body, where fibers are seen arranged into bundles, and glandules into clusters, and this everywhere in the body, and still more perfectly in the purer parts not discernible by the naked eye. This bundling is especially to be seen in the brain, in the two substances there, one of which is called cortical and the other medullary. It is not dissimilar in the purer things, and finally in the purest of all, where the forms which receive them are the very forms of life.

[2] That forms or substances are recipient of life can be seen from every single thing that appears in living creatures; and also that recipient forms or substances are arranged in the way most suitable for the influx of life. Without the reception of life in substances, which are forms, there would be no living thing in the natural world, nor in the spiritual world. Series of the purest filaments, like bundles, constitute these forms. It is the same with those things therein which are highly modified; for modifications receive their form from the forms which are the substances in which they are, and from which they flow, because the substances or forms are the determining subjects. The reason why the learned have regarded the things belonging to man’s life, that is, to his thought and will, as being devoid of recipient substances or forms, has been that they believed life or the soul to be something either flamy or ethereal, thus such as after death would be dissipated; hence comes the insane notion of many, that there is no life after death. From all this it is evident how it is to be understood that the reasoning falsities were arranged in groups in the natural.

5339. And the earth made gatherings [collections] in the seven years of abundance of produce. That this signifies the first states when truths are multiplied in series, is evident from the signification of “seven years,” as being the first states, for the seven years of abundance of produce came first, and the seven years of famine came after (that “years” are states, see n. 482, 487, 488, 493, 893); and from the signification of “abundance of produce,” as being the multiplication of truth (n. 5276, 5280, 5292); by “the earth made” is signified that this multiplication took place in the natural, for the “earth” here is the natural (as just above, n. 5338); and from the signification of “gatherings,” as being series. In regard to the series signified by “gatherings,” the case is this. With the man who is being reformed, general truths are first instilled, then the particulars of the generals, and finally the singulars of the particulars; the particulars are arranged under the generals, and the singulars under the particulars (n. 2384, 3057, 4269, 4325, 4329, 4345, 4383, 5208). These arrangings or settings in order are signified in the Word by “bundles,” here by “handfuls” or “gatherings,” and they are nothing but the series into which truths when multiplied are arranged or set in order. With the regenerate these series are according to the setting in order of the societies in the heavens; but with those who are not and cannot be regenerated, they are according to the setting in order of the societies in the hells. Hence the man who is in evil, and thence in falsity, is a hell in the least form; and the man who is in good, and thence in truth, is a heaven in the least form. But in regard to these series, of the Lord’s Divine mercy more elsewhere.