4802. There are also spirits who, even though they are evil ones, do to some extent allow the light of heaven to come in and who accept the truths of faith, so that they have some perception of truth. They accept the truths enthusiastically, yet not so that they may live according to them, but so that they may boast about being seen to have more understanding and keen-sightedness than others. For the human understanding is such that it can accept truths, even though none make truths their own except those people who live according to them. Unless the human understanding was like this no one could be reformed.

[2] Those who have been like this in the world, that is to say, have understood truths and yet have led a life of evil, remain the same in the next life. But there they put their ability to understand truths to the misuse of gaining dominion over others; for there they know that in truths they have a means of communication with some communities of heaven, and consequently that they can exist among the evil and be strong; for truths in the next life have power within them. But because their life is one of evil they are in hell.

[3] I have talked to two who during their lifetime were like this. They were amazed they should be in hell even though they had believed very strongly in the truths of faith. But I told them that the light in them by which they understood truths was like that of winter in the world. I said that objects in all their beauty and colours were no less visible than in the light of summer; yet in that winter light everything died off and nothing at all pleasant and delightful showed itself. Then I told those two spirits that because the end they had in view to understanding truths had been their own exaltation and consequently had been a selfish end, the sphere emanating from their ends in view when these rose towards the interior heavens, to the angels there, who perceived solely people's ends, could not be tolerated and were cast aside. This is why they were in hell.

[4] I went on to say that in former times people of this kind, more than any others, were called serpents of the tree of knowledge; for when life is the subject of their reasoning they speak against truths. They are, what is more, like a woman who has a lovely face but a foul stench, and who is therefore an outcast from society wherever she goes. Like her, when such people in the next life move towards angelic communities they are in actual fact emitting a stench, which even they themselves are aware of when they approach those communities. From this also one may see what faith is when devoid of the life of faith.

9516. 'And their faces of a man towards his brother' means truth and good joined together. This is clear from the meaning of 'the face' as the interiors, at this point looking towards and being joined to, for when two are looking each towards the other they join themselves together on the level of interiors (interiors being meant by 'the face', 1999, 2434, 3527, 3573, 4066, 4796-4805, 5102, 5165, 5168, 5695, 9306); and from the meaning of 'man towards brother' as mutually, dealt with in 4725, so that truth joined to good is meant. For 'man' means truth, 3134, 3309, 3459, 4725, 7716, 9007, and 'brother' good, 367, 2360, 3303, 3803, 3815, 4121, 4191, 5409, 5686, 5692, 6756.

2401. 'And said, Rise up, go out of this place' means that they were not to remain in a state of evil. This is clear from the meaning of 'rising up' and 'going out', and also of 'place'. 'Rising up' occurs often in the Word, being one of the common expressions found there, but little thought is given to what else it may mean. In the internal sense however it entails, as it does here, being raised up from evil to good, for the mind is raised up when it draws back from evil, 2388. 'Going out' means drawing back or not remaining, while 'place' means a state of evil, 2393. From this it is evident what the meaning is here.

[2] The character of people who possess cognitions of truth but at the same time lead a life of evil has been stated frequently already - that as long as they lead a life of evil they believe nothing; for to will evil and consequently to do it, and at the same time in faith to acknowledge truth, is not possible. From this it is also evident that a person cannot be saved by thinking and speaking what is true, nor even what is good, if he wills nothing but evil, and as a consequence of what he wills does nothing but evil. Man's will itself is what lives on after death, and not so much his thinking apart from that which flows from his will.

[3] Since therefore a person's character after death is determined by what he wills, one can see what he is able to think about the truths of faith he has absorbed, indeed taught, seeing that these condemn him. He is in this case so disinclined to think from them that he avoids them altogether. Indeed insofar as he is allowed, he curses them, as the devil's crew do. People who have not been taught about the life after death may imagine that they will find it easy at that time to receive faith when they see that the Lord governs the whole of heaven, and when they hear that heaven is loving Him and the neighbour. But evil people are as far removed from being able to receive faith, that is, from having the will to believe, as hell is from heaven. They are in fact totally immersed in evil and in falsity derived from this. From their mere arrival itself or presence it is recognized and perceived that they are against the Lord and against the neighbour and so against what is good and consequently against what is true. There is an unmentionable sphere which emanates from the life of their will and so of their thinking, 1048, 1053, 1316, 1504.

[4] If it were possible for people to believe and become good merely by receiving instruction in the next life no one would be left in hell; for no matter how many, the Lord desires to raise them all up to heaven towards Himself. For His mercy is infinite since it is Divine mercy itself and is indeed directed towards the whole human race, and so towards the evil as well as the good.