2955. I will bury my dead. That this signifies that they would come forth from night and be vivified, is evident from the signification of being “buried,” and of “dead,” as given above (n. 2917, 2923, 2925, 2931, 2948). They are here said to be vivified, because they are in the course of receiving faith; for from faith, that is, from its good, they receive life; their life is from no other source. That “I will bury my dead” signifies emerging from spiritual night and being vivified, is also for the reason that when a former church is dead, a new one is raised up by the Lord in its place; thus life is given in place of death, and in place of night there comes morning; and also for the reason that with everyone who is being reformed and is becoming spiritual, his “dead” is as it were buried, and that which is new, which is living, rises again: thus in place of night with him, or in place of darkness and cold, there arises morning with its light and its heat. Hence it is that the angels, who are in the Lord’s life, in place of man’s idea about the burial of the dead, have an idea of resurrection and of new life. And this also is the case, for there is always some church on the earth; and when the old expires, and night comes on, then a new church arises elsewhere and there comes morning.

2124. I have been told that the good of the will [bonum voluntarium] that existed in the men of the Most Ancient Church, was destroyed in the antediluvians; and that at the present day, with the men of the Christian Church, the good of the intellect [bonum intellectuale] is beginning to perish, insomuch that there is but little of it left; the cause of which is, that they believe nothing except what they apprehend by the senses; and that at this day men not only reason from the senses, but also, by means of a philosophy unknown to the ancients, reason concerning Divine arcana; whereby intellectual light is altogether darkened; a darkening that is becoming so dense as scarcely to admit of being dispelled.