8. The second state is when a distinction is made between the things that are the Lord's and those that are man's own. Those which are the Lord's are called in the Word 'remnants', and here they are chiefly the cognitions of faith which a person has learned since he was a small child. These are stored away and do not come out into the open until he reaches this state. Nowadays this state rarely occurs without temptation, misfortune, and sorrow, which lead to the inactivity and so to speak the death of bodily and worldly concerns - the things which are man's own. In this way what belongs to the external man is segregated from what belongs to the internal. Within the internal are the remnants, stored away by the Lord until this time and for this purpose.

5033. 'Saying, This is what your slave did to me' means corroboration. This becomes clear from his firm belief that his wife had spoken the truth, and that as a result her accusation, so far as he was concerned, was corroborated. The wife who convinced him means unspiritual natural truth, though at this point falsity is meant; for unspiritual natural good easily allows itself to be convinced by falsity, see immediately above in 5032. It is Well known that falsities can be corroborated to look exactly like truths. This is evident from all heresies and from every aspect of any heresy. Though they are falsities, corroborations of them nevertheless cause people who adhere to a heresy to see them as truths. The same point is evident in people who are not religious. These people in their thinking set themselves firmly against things of the Church, so firmly that they see as the truth the idea that the Church exists merely to keep the common people down. They also see as the truth the idea that natural forces are the be-all and end-all and that the Divine is so remote as to be virtually nothing at all, as well as the idea that in death the human being is no different from any animal. People with whom unspiritual natural good resides allow themselves, more easily than others, to be persuaded and convinced of these and similar ideas, for they have no mirror so to speak within themselves, only one outside themselves which makes illusions look like realities.