124. At this point, I may add two secrets of angelic wisdom that will enable us to see what divine providence is like. The first is that the Lord never acts in any detail of our being by itself unless he acts in all the details at once. The second is that the Lord acts from the center and the boundaries at the same time.

The reason the Lord never acts in any detail of our being by itself unless he acts in all the details at once is that everything in us is so knit together and therefore so united in a single form that it does not act as a plurality but as a single whole. We know that we are knit together and therefore formed in this way as far as our bodies are concerned. The human mind is also in the same kind of form and has the same kind of all-inclusive connectedness, because the human mind is a spiritual person and in fact acts as a single person. This is why our spirit, the mind that is in our body, has a complete human form, so that after death we are people just as much as we are in this world. The only difference is that we have cast off the skin that made up our body in this world.

[2] Since it is the nature of the human form that all its parts make an inclusive entity that acts as a single whole, it follows that one element cannot be shifted from its place and changed with respect to state except with the consent of the others; for if one element were moved out of place and changed in state, there would be a gap in the form that was intended to act as a single whole. We can see from this that the Lord never acts on any detail without acting on all of them at the same time.

This is how the Lord works in the whole angelic heaven, because the whole angelic heaven is like a single person in his sight. This is also how the Lord acts on every individual angel, because every angel is a miniature heaven. This is also how he acts on each of us, most directly on our minds, and through them on everything in our bodies. This is because our mind is our spirit--an angel to the extent that it is united to the Lord--and our body is obedience.

[3] However, we need to be acutely aware that the Lord acts precisely, most precisely in fact, on every detail of our being while working through everything in our form. He does not, though, change the state of any part or any element in specific unless all the elements of the form concur. There will be more on this later, when I explain that the Lord's divine providence is all-inclusive because it deals with details and that it deals with details because it is all-inclusive.

[4] The reason the Lord acts from the center and the boundaries at the same time is that this is the only way the whole and all its elements can be kept connected. The things in between depend in sequence on the central ones, all the way to the boundaries, and they are all gathered together at the boundaries; for as explained in part 3 of Divine Love and Wisdom, there is a gathering at the boundaries of everything that comes from the First. This is why the Lord from eternity or Jehovah came into the world and put on the clothing of a human nature there in outermost form in order to be present in first and last things at the same time, and therefore from the first things to govern the whole world through the last things. This enabled him to save those people whom he could save under the laws of his divine providence, which are also the laws of his divine wisdom. This involves the fact acknowledged in the Christian world that no one could have been saved unless the Lord had come into the world (see Teachings for the New Jerusalem on Faith 35). This is why the Lord is called the First and the Last.

584. And the rest of the men who were not killed in these plagues.- That this signifies those who have not perished from the disorderly desires above mentioned, is evident from the signification of the rest of the men who were not killed, as denoting all those who have not perished. That to be killed, in the Word, signifies to be spiritually killed, or to perish in eternal death (morte aeterna), may be seen above (n. 547, 572); and from the signification of "these plagues," as denoting the disorderly desires above mentioned, or, the disorderly desires springing from the love of evil, and the love of falsity, also the lust (concupiscentia) of destroying the truths and goods of the church by the falsities of evil; all these are signified by the fire, smoke, and brimstone, going forth out of the mouths of the horses, (see above, n. 578). These are called plagues, because by plagues in the Word, are signified such things as destroy spiritual life with men, and therefore the church; they also signify those things that cause death understood in a spiritual sense, and these refer mainly to the disorderly desires arising from the loves of self and of the world; for these loves are the roots from which evils and falsities of every class and species are born and spring up.

[2] Such things are also signified by plagues in the following passages in the Apocalypse:

The two witnesses "have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with every plague as often as they desire" (11:6).

So again:

"Men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; for the plague thereof was exceeding great" (16:21).

And again:

"In one day shall the plagues come to" Babylon, "death, and mourning, and famine" (18:8).

And again:

"I saw seven angels having the seven last plagues, through which must be consummated the wrath of God" (15:1, 6, 8).

By plagues are meant such things as bring spiritual death upon man, which, consequently, altogether destroy and devastate the church with men individually, and thus generally, as will be seen in the explanation of the passages that follow where plagues are mentioned, and especially where the seven last plagues are treated of.

[3] Similar things are understood by plagues in the following passages in the prophets.

Thus in Isaiah:

"The light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, in the day that Jehovah shall bind up the breach of his people, and heal the wound of their plague" (30:26).

And in Jeremiah:

"Thy bruise is incurable, and thy plague is grievous. For I have smitten thee with the plague of an enemy. I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy plagues" (30:12, 14, 17).

Again, in the same prophet:

"Every one that goeth by" Edom, "shall hiss at all the plagues thereof" (49:17).

Again:

"Every one that goeth by Babylon shall hiss at all her plagues" (50:13).

And in Moses:

"If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of the law, Jehovah will make thy plagues wonderful, even great plagues, and of long continuance, and evil diseases, and of long continuance. Every disease, and every plague, which is not written in the book of this law, will Jehovah secretly bring upon thee, until thou be destroyed" (Deuteronomy 28:58, 59, 61).

Plagues here signify spiritual plagues, which do not destroy the body, but the soul, and which are also enumerated in that chapter in Deuteronomy (verses 20-68).

[4] What plagues signify in the spiritual sense, is described by correspondences in Zechariah:

"This shall be the plague, wherewith Jehovah shall smite all the people that shall fight against Jerusalem; the flesh of each one shall consume away so that he shall stand upon his feet, and his eyes shall consume away in their holes, and his tongue shall consume away in his mouth. And so shall be the plague of the horse, of the mule, of the camel, and of the ass, and of every beast that shall be in those camps, as this plague" (14:12, 15).

These things are said concerning those who endeavour to destroy the truths of the church by means of falsities. Jerusalem signifies the church as to the truths of doctrine, and to fight against her denotes to endeavour to destroy those truths by means of falsities. That the flesh of each one shall consume away so that he shall stand upon his feet, signifies that all the will of good will perish with those who attempt this, and that thus they will become merely corporeal-natural, for flesh signifies the will and its good or evil, while the feet signify those things that pertain to the natural man; therefore to stand upon the feet signifies to live from them alone. The eyes consuming away in their holes signifies that all understanding of truth shall perish, eyes signifying that understanding; and by the tongue consuming away in his mouth, is signified, that all perception of truth and affection for good shall perish. Concerning these things it may be seen above (n.455:8),where this prophecy also is explained. Almost similar things are signified by the plagues of the horse, the mule, the camel, the ass, and every beast; for by the plague of these is signified the loss of all understanding of truth, both spiritual and natural; and by the plague of the beast is signified the loss of all affection for good.

[5] In Luke it is said that in the same hour in which John sent, Jesus "cured many of their diseases and plagues of evil spirits; and unto many that were blind he gave sight" (7:21). The plagues of evil spirits mean the obsessions, and calamitous states at that time brought upon men by evil spirits, all of which nevertheless signified corresponding spiritual states. For all the cures of diseases wrought by the Lord signified spiritual healings, and therefore the miracles of the Lord were Divine; as for example, that He gave sight to many that were blind, which signified to impart the understanding of the truths of doctrine to those who were in ignorance of truth. So again, by the wounds (plagas) which the thieves inflicted on the man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho (Luke 10:30), are also signified spiritual plagues, which were the falsities and evils insinuated into sojourners and Gentiles by the Scribes and Pharisees, as may be seen above (n. 444:13), where the spiritual sense of this parable is explained.