ANGELIC WISDOM CONCERNING MARRIAGE. ¹

ORDER OF THE CHAPTERS.

PART FIRST.

I. - MARRIAGES IN HEAVEN [See the same subject treated of in the published work concerning Conjugial Love 27-41].

II. - THE STATE OF CONSORTS AFTER DEATH [Conjugial Love 45-54].

III. - LOVE TRULY CONJUGIAL [Conjugial Love 57-73].

IV. - THE ORIGIN OF LOVE TRULY CONJUGIAL, FROM THE MARRIAGE OF GOOD AND TRUTH [Conjugial Love 83-102].

V. - THE MARRIAGE OF THE LORD AND THE CHURCH, AND CORRESPONDENCE WITH IT [Conjugial Love 116-131].

VI. - THE CHASTE AND THE UNCHASTE [Conjugial Love 138-150].

VII. - UNIVERSALS CONCERNING CONJUGIAL LOVE [Conjugial Love 209-230]. ²

The delight of conjugial love is holy and chaste [Conjugial Love 144, 346].

Conjugial love regards the eternal [Conjugial Love 38, 44, 200, 216].

VIII. - THE CAUSES of COLDNESSES, OF SEPARATIONS, AND OF DIVORCES, WITH CONSORTS [Conjugial Love 234-260].

IX. - THE CAUSES OF APPARENT LOVE, FRIENDSHIP AND FAVOR WITH CONSORTS [Conjugial Love 271-292].

X. - THE CHANGE OF THE STATE OF LIFE WITH MAN AND WITH WOMAN BY MARRIAGE, FROM WHICH THE YOUNG MAN BECOMES A HUSBAND, AND THE VIRGIN BECOMES A WIFE [Conjugial Love 184-206].

XI. - CONJUNCTION OF SOULS AND MINDS BY MARRIAGE; WHICH CONJUNCTION IS MEANT BY THE WORDS OF THE LORD, THAT THEY ARE NO LONGER TWO, BUT ONE FLESH [Conjugial Love 156-181 ³ ].

XII. - BETROTHALS AND NUPTIALS [Conjugial Love 295-314].

XIII. - REPEATED MARRIAGES [Conjugial Love 317-325].

XIV. - POLYGAMY [Conjugial Love 332-352].

XV. - JEALOUSY [Conjugial Love 357-379].

XVI. - THE LOVE OF INFANTS, OR PARENTAL LOVE, AND ITS CONJUNCTION WITH CONJUGIAL LOVE [Conjugial Love 385-414].

PART SECOND.

I. - THE OPPOSITION OF CONJUGIAL LOVE AND SCORTATORY LOVE [Conjugial Love 423-443].

II. - FORNICATION; ALSO CONCERNING KEEPING A MISTRESS [Conjugial Love 444-460[*]].

III. - CONCUBINAGE [Conjugial Love 462-476].

IV. - ADULTERIES AND THEIR DEGREES [Conjugial Love 478-499].

V. - THE LUST OF VARIETIES [Conjugial Love 506-510].

VI. - THE LUST OF DEFLORATION [Conjugial Love 501-505].

VII. - THE LUST OF VIOLATION [Conjugial Love 511, 512].

VIII. - LUST OF SEDUCING INNOCENCIES [Conjugial Love 513, 514].

IX. - THE CORRESPONDENCE OF SCORTATIONS AND ADULTERIES WITH THE VIOLATION OF SPIRITUAL MARRIAGE, WHICH IS THE MARRIAGE OF GOOD AND TRUTH [Conjugial Love 515-520].

X. - THE IMPUTATION OF EACH LOVE, SCORTATORY AND CONJUGIAL [Conjugial Love 523-531].

GENERAL CONTENTS.

1. Marriages in heaven (2-30) [Conjugial Love 27-41].

2. The origin of conjugial love (31-76) [Conjugial Love 83-102].

3. The delights of love truly conjugial (77-146) [Conjugial Love 183; see also 69, 144, 155, 293, 294].

4. The connection of conjugial love with all the loves of heaven (147-222) [Conjugial Love 388-390].

5. Masculine and feminine conjugial love, specifically; and the intelligence of each (223-303) [Conjugial Love 218; see also 32, 61, 88, 90, 168].

6. The marriage of good and truth (304-407) [Conjugial Love 83-102, 122, 123].

7. The differences and the variety of conjugial love, according to the states of the church with men (408-568) [Conjugial Love 130].

8. The increments of love truly conjugial, and the decrease of love not truly conjugial (769-763) [Conjugial Love 162, 184-200, 213, 214, 432, 433]. ⁵

9. Conjugial similitude and dissimilitude (564-852) [Conjugial Love 227-229, 246].

10. The causes of coldnesses, separations, and divorces, with consorts (853-1018) [Conjugial Love 234-260].

11. Polygamy, or plurality of wives (1019-1110) [Conjugial Love 332-352].

12. Betrothals and nuptials (1111-1193) [Conjugial Love 295-314].

13. The difference between the love of the sex with beasts and the love of the sex with men (1194-1251) [Conjugial Love 94, 137, 230, 416; see also the posthumous treatise, Concerning Divine Love, 21].

14. The change of state of woman and of man by marriage; from which change the virgin becomes a wife, and the young man a husband (1252-1286) [Conjugial Love 184-200].

15. The state of widowers and of widows; also concerning repeated marriages (1287-1300) [Conjugial Love 317-325].

16. The marriage of the Lord with the church (1301-1344) [Conjugial Love 116-131].

17. Correspondence of the marriage of the Lord and the church with things relating to marriage with angels and men (1345-1457) [Conjugial Love 125-127].

18. Natural conjugial potency and spiritual conjugial potency (1459-1585) [Conjugial Love 220, 221].

19. The causes of love, friendship, and favor, between consorts (1586-1641) [Conjugial Love 180, 214, 290].

20. The love of infants, or parental love (1642-1700) [Conjugial Love 176, 211].

21. The conjunction of conjugial love with love of infants or parental love (1701-1718) [Conjugial Love 385-414].

22. The state of two consorts after death (1719-1737) [Conjugial Love 45-54].

SCORTATORY LOVE (1738. seq.).

1. Jealousy (1739-1791) [Conjugial Love 357-379].

2. Fornication (1792-1848) [Conjugial Love 444-460][*].

It there treats:

(1) Concerning keeping a mistress (1806, seq. [Conjugial Love 459, 460]):

(2) Concerning the lust of varieties (1811) [Conjugial Love 506-510]):

(3) Concerning the lust of defloration (1814) [Conjugial Love 501-505]):

(4) Concerning the lust of violation (1419) [Conjugial Love 511, 512]):

(5) Concerning the lust of seducing innocencies (1823) [Conjugial Love 513, 514].

3. Concubinage (1849-1873) [Conjugial Love 462-467].

4. Adulteries (1874-1909) [Conjugial Love 478-499].

5. The opposition of conjugial love and scortatory love (1910-1949) [Conjugial Love 423-443].

6. The correspondence of whoredoms and adulteries with the violation of spiritual marriage, which is the marriage of good and truth (n.) 1950-2001) [Conjugial Love 515-520].

CONTENTS OF THE REMAINING ARTICLES.

1. The perception and the wisdom proper to man and proper to woman, also the conjunction of man and woman by them (2007) [Conjugial Love 163-173].

2. Duties proper to man and proper to woman; also the conjunction of man and woman by them (2023) [Conjugial Love 174-176].

3. The transcription of the love of his own (proprii) with the man, into conjugial love with the wife (2036) [Conjugial Love 32, 88, 156[*], 192, 293, 353].

4. The faculties, inclinations, affections and qualities of men and of women, and their conjunction by marriage (2047) [Conjugial Love 163-180].

5. Proprium in man, and proprium in woman; and their transcription into conjugial love (2048) [Conjugial Love 32, 156, 163-173].

6. Coldnesses in marriages (2049) [Conjugial Love 234-260].

7. Difficulties in understanding the conjunctions of consorts, and the varieties therefrom (2050).

MEMORABILIA.

Consorts from the third heaven were seen, borne in a chariot, and descending; described as to face and as to garments; having spoken with me, they let down a parchment on which were inscribed arcana of conjugial love (1, p. 16) [Conjugial Love 42, 43].

The correspondence of conjugial love with fire, with the colors of the rainbow, with fragrant things, with rose-gardens and arbors, with winged things and animals, represented by angels (29, p. 42 1/2, 43) [Conjugial Love 76, 293, 294, 316].

The nuptial garden which appears round about the houses while nuptials are celebrated; and the Divine Providence which encompasses marriages: from the discourse of a certain wise person in the garden (76, p. 49) [Conjugial Love 316].

There were seen consorts from the third heaven; at first appearing as infants decked with garlands, afterwards of their proper stature. They had lived a thousand years in conjugial blessedness. Conjugial love, as it is in that heaven, is described; it is from wisdom and from the love of wisdom, and it is with those who do uses, etc. (146, p. 50) [Conjugial Love 137].

Something about the magnificent and splendid things in heaven: next it is told whence angels have perpetual potency: confirmed by reasons, given by an angel (222, p. 46 1/2, 47) [Conjugial Love 12-20, 355, 356].

A paper on which was inscribed, "The marriage of Good and Truth;" - how it appeared on the way, when let down to the earth by an angel, and how it was changed: also many things about that marriage, in the whole heaven and in the church (301, p. 46) [Conjugial Love 115].

Adulterers seen like satyrs, in the company of harlots, in a wood and in a cavern there; afterwards in a house: where they were speaking heinous things about marriages, nature, and religion (407) [Conjugial Love 521].

A discussion concerning God and nature, - (1) Whether nature is of life, or life of nature: (2) Whether the center is of the expanse, or the expanse of the center: (3) Concerning the center and the expanse of nature and of life (568, p. 79) [Conjugial Love 380].

Concerning a certain garden, in which there were several married pairs; also conversations there respecting love, wisdom and use; that the three proceed from the Lord, and that hence are conjugial love and its ineffable delights: much concerning these and their origin (763, p. 41) [Conjugial Love 183].)

Concerning a young man who boasted of his whoredom; he was conducted into heaven, and there he was held by turns in his externals and his internals: while in externals he saw heavenly things, but while in internals he saw the opposite (concerning which see 852, p. 77) [Conjugial Love 477].

While following the light, I came to the Temple of Wisdom, around which there dwelt those who were wise; there I conversed with them concerning the cause of the beauty of the female sex (1018, p. 45) [Conjugial Love 56].

Of the new things revealed by the Lord: as concerning the spiritual sense of the Word, and concerning correspondences, concerning heaven and hell, concerning the spiritual world and the sun there; also concerning conjugial love, as being according to religion: but that these things are not received in the world was testified by experience (1108, p. 48, also 50) [Conjugial Love 532-534].

Discussions, by the wise, of the following subjects:

(1) What the image of God is, and what the likeness of God:

(2) That man is not born into love and into knowledge, as the beasts are, but only into capacity to know and inclination to love:

(3) Concerning the tree of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (1193, p. 60) [Conjugial Love 132-136].

Concerning Athenaeum, Parnassium, and Heliconeum: conversation with ancient wise men, and with two newly come from the earth, about men who had been found in the forest; also concerning things that were said in favor of nature and the life of beasts, compared with the life of men (1251, p. 64) [Conjugial Love 151-154[ ¹ ].

Again three new-comers were conducted to Athenaeum, - a priest, a politician, and a philosopher; who reported, as news from the earth, that a certain person had written various things about the life of men after death and about the spiritual world; and they told how these subjects were discussed on earth (1286, p. 66) [Conjugial Love 182].

A tumult against three priests, who preached that with adulterers there is no acknowledgment of God, and consequently that they have not heaven; also what happened to them, out of heaven (1300, p. 75) [Conjugial Love 500].

Concerning a novitiate who meditated about heaven and hell, and who was told to make inquiry, and to learn what delight is: he was led to three assemblies; in which he learned what the delight of heaven is, and what the delight of hell (1344, p. 54) [Conjugial Love 461].

A disputation by spirits concerning God and concerning nature, in favor of nature from devils, and in favor of God from angels: also that man may confirm himself in favor of God, more than for nature, from the things that he can see: those things are adduced which were written on this subject in Angelic Wisdom concerning Divine Love and Divine Wisdom (1458, p. 62) [Conjugial Love 415-422].

A melody was heard concerning chaste love of the sex; and that they have that love who are in love truly conjugial, and thence in fullest potency (1585, p. 64) [Conjugial Love 55].

Various reasonings about the soul; and finally that the soul is the man living after death, because it is the form of all the affections of love, and of all the perceptions of wisdom, and is their receptacle (1641, p. 70) [Conjugial Love 315].

After this there was a conversation about the spiritual and the natural; and it was shown what differences there are between them, as to languages, writings, and thoughts: the conversation was renewed when looking at a moth, and observing that when divided it was more and more multiform, and not more and more simple (1699, p. 72) [Conjugial Love 326-329].

Wise men were called together from nine kingdoms of Europe, to give their opinion concerning the origin of conjugial love, and concerning its virtue and potency; and at last the prize, which was a turban, was given to an African (1718, p. 30) [Conjugial Love 103-114].

Three orators from France discoursed concerning the origin of the beauty of the female sex; one said that it was from love, another from wisdom, and the third from the conjunction of love and wisdom (1737, p. 57 1/2, 58) [Conjugial Love 381-384].

Concerning two angels, who had died in infancy, and who could not perceive what whoredom is, because it is not from creation. Conversation about it, and concerning evil; how evil exists, when from creation there is only good (1738, p. 86) [Conjugial Love 444].

Exclamations were heard, "O how just," "O how learned," "O how wise;" and it is here said of those called just, that they were those who gave judgment from friendship, and were able skillfully to pervert all things; they had no understanding of things that were just: their assemblage is described (1791, p. 37) [Conjugial Love 231].

Preliminary statements concerning the joys of heaven, and concerning nuptials there (1826-1848, p. 1) [Conjugial Love 1-25].

Concerning the love of dominion from the love of self; with politicians, that they wish to be kings and emperors; with canons, that they wish to be gods. Concerning devils that were seen, who had been in such love; also concerning two popes (1873, p. 56) [Conjugial Love 261-266].

Again in Athenaeum; where three new-comers were heard to say that they had believed that in heaven there were no administrations and works, because there was eternal rest; and it was shown that doing uses is that rest; there was also mention of books and writings; and it was said that there are these also in heaven, for all substantial things which are called spiritual are there (1909, p. 68) [Conjugial Love 207].

Of those concerning whom was the exclamation, "O how learned:" they were those who go no farther in their reasoning than to question whether a thing is so, and who are called reasoners (1948, p. 38) [Conjugial Love 232].

Of those concerning whom was the exclamation, "O how wise:" they were those who were able to make whatever they pleased to be true, and were called confirmers (1949, p. 30) [Conjugial Love 233].

A conversation of angels with three novitiates concerning nuptials in heaven (various things, 2001, p. 17) [Conjugial Love 44].

Golden rain was seen: I was conducted to a hall where husbands and wives instructed me concerning conjugial love; also concerning its delights, from the wives there (2002, p. 34) [Conjugial Love 155 [*].

Conversation with those who lived in the golden age, concerning conjugial love, and in regard to their marriages (2003, p. 20, seq. [Conjugial Love 75].

Conversation with those who lived in the silver age; this, too, concerning conjugial love (2004) [Conjugial Love 76].

Conversation with those who lived in the copper age (2005) [Conjugial Love 77].

Conversation with those who lived in the iron age; they were polygamists (2006) [Conjugial Love 78].

Conversation with those who lived after those four ages; they were whoremongers and adulterers (2034) [Conjugial Love 79, 80].

Of the conversion of this age into a golden age by the Lord; concerning which the angels glorified the Lord (2035) [Conjugial Love 81].

Concerning one's own intelligence or prudence, that it, is not [anything] (2051, p. 59) [Conjugial Love 353].

Whether conjugial love and love of [their own] beauty coexist in women; and whether conjugial love and the love of their own intelligence coexist in men (2052, p. 52) [Conjugial Love 330, 331].

Again the golden rain was seen, and some arcana respecting conjugial love in women were disclosed (2053, p. 35) [Conjugial Love 208].

Spiritual coldness has its seat in the highest region (2054, p. 51) [Conjugial Love 270].

Concerning those who are in the love of the world (p. 90) [Conjugial Love 267-269].

The delights of conjugial love are delights of wisdom (p. 91) [Conjugial Love 293]. ⁵

And the pleasures of scortatory love are pleasures of insanity (p. 92) [Conjugial Love 294].

Footnotes:

137. The second account:

While I was once thinking about conjugial love, I suddenly caught sight of two naked little children in the distance, with baskets in their hands and turtledoves flying around them. Then, as they came closer, they looked like naked little children modestly decked out in garlands of flowers. Their heads were decorated with little chaplets of flowers, and their breasts were adorned with sash-like wreathes of blue-colored lilies and roses that hung diagonally from their shoulders to their hips. And round about the two of them appeared what looked like a shared chain of little leaves woven together and interspersed with olives.

When they drew nearer still, however, they did not appear as little children or naked, but as two adults in the bloom of their early youth, dressed in robes and tunics of shining silk, with beautiful-looking flowers woven into them. Moreover, when they stood next to me, a springlike warmth wafted down from heaven through them with a sweet-scented fragrance, like the fragrance of first growth in gardens and fields.

The two were a married couple from heaven, and they then spoke to me. And because I was still thinking about the things I had just seen, they asked, "What did you see?"

[2] So I told them how they had first appeared to me as naked little children, then as little children decked out in garlands, and finally as people more grown up, dressed in garments decorated with flowers. I also told them how an atmosphere of spring had then instantly wafted over me with its delights.

They laughed pleasantly at this and said that on the way they had not appeared to themselves as little children or naked or wearing garlands, but the whole time had looked the same as they did now. Their appearing as they had at a distance, they said, represented their conjugial love, its state of innocence being represented by their appearing as naked little children, its delights by the garlands, and these same delights now by the flowers woven into their robes and tunics.

"And," they continued, "because you said that as we approached, a springlike warmth wafted over you with its pleasant aromas, like those from a garden, we will tell you why this was.

[3] "We have been married for centuries now," they said, "and we have remained continually in this bloom of youth in which you see us.

"At first our state was similar to the initial state of a maiden and youth when they first come together in marriage. Moreover, we believed at the time that that state was the most blissful state we could experience in life. But we were told by others in our heaven, and we afterwards perceived for ourselves, that it was a state of heat not yet tempered with light. We found that it is gradually tempered as the husband is perfected in wisdom and as the wife grows to love that wisdom in her husband, which is achieved through and according to the useful services which each of them performs in society with the other's help. We also found that new delights then follow as heat and light or wisdom and its accompanying love are tempered each with the other.

[4] "A seemingly springlike warmth wafted over you when we approached because in our heaven conjugial love and that warmth go hand in hand. For with us, warmth is love, and light with warmth joined to it is wisdom, and useful service is like an atmosphere which holds both in its embrace. What are heat and light without their containing medium? So likewise, what are love and wisdom without their expression in useful service? Without expression in useful service, there is no bond of marriage between the two, because the objective reality in which they exist is lacking.

"In heaven, one finds truly conjugial love wherever there is a springlike warmth. One finds truly conjugial love there because a springlike climate occurs only where warmth is joined to light in an even balance, or where there is as much warmth as there is light and vice versa. And we like to think that as warmth works its pleasure when accompanied by light and conversely light when accompanied by warmth, so love works its pleasure when accompanied by wisdom and conversely wisdom when accompanied by love."

[5] With us in heaven, the man said further, the light is constant, and we never experience the dusk of evening, still less darkness, because our sun does not rise and set like your sun but stands continually midway between a point overhead and the horizon, or as you would say, at an elevation of 45 degrees.

"That is why," he said, "the heat and light emanating from our sun result in perpetual spring, and this inspires a perpetual springlike state in those in whom love is united in even measure with wisdom.

"Through the eternal union of heat and light, moreover, our Lord inspires nothing that is not productive and useful. That, too, is why the sproutings of plants on your earth and the matings of your birds and animals take place in springtime. For the warmth of spring opens up their inner capabilities even to the inmost forces which are called their souls, stirring them, and imparting to them its own inclination to unite, and causing their reproductive instinct to come into its delight from a continual effort to produce fruits of use, which is the propagation of their kind.

[6] "In the case of human beings, however, there is a never-ending influx of springlike warmth from the Lord. Consequently they can experience the delights of marriage in any season, even in the middle of winter. For men were created to be receivers of light from the Lord, meaning the light of wisdom, and women were created to be receivers of warmth from the Lord, meaning the warmth of love for the wisdom in a man.

"That now is why as we approached a springlike warmth wafted over you with a sweet-scented fragrance, like the fragrance of first growth in gardens and fields."

[7] Having said this, the man gave me his right hand and took me to houses where married couples lived in the same flower of youth in which they were. And he told me that the wives, who now looked like young girls, had once been wrinkled old ladies in the world, and that the husbands, who now looked like adolescent youths, had once been decrepit old men there. They have all been returned by the Lord to the bloom of this youthful age, he said, because they loved each other and out of religion abstained from adulterous affairs as enormous sins.

He added as well that only those people know the blissful delights of conjugial love who reject the horrible delights of adultery. And no one can reject these except one who is wise from the Lord, and no one is wise from the Lord unless he performs useful services from a love of doing them.

I also caught sight then of the implements in their houses. These were all in heavenly forms, and they shone of gold that was practically ablaze with intermingled rubies.

415. To this I will append the following narrative account:

One morning as I awoke from sleep, while meditating in the serene morning light before being fully awake, I saw through the window what seemed to be flashes of lightning, and presently heard what seemed to be the rumbling of thunder. Then, as I wondered what the cause was, I heard from heaven the following:

"There are people not far from you who are arguing bitterly about God and nature. The flashing of light like lightning and the rumbling of the air like thunder are correspondences and thus manifestations of the conflict and clash of their arguments, one side on the side of God, and the other on the side of nature."

The reason for the spiritual conflict was this. There were satanic spirits in hell who said to each other, "If we could only speak with angels from heaven! We would absolutely and thoroughly show that what they call God, from whom all things flow, is nature, and thus that God is only a term unless by it they mean nature." And because those satanic spirits believed this with all their heart and all their soul, and longed as well to speak with angels from heaven, it was granted them to ascend from the muck and gloom of hell and to speak then with two angels descending from heaven. They were in the world of spirits, which is midway between heaven and hell.

[2] Seeing the angels there, the satanic spirits rushed up to them and in a furious voice cried out, "You must be the angels from heaven that we are allowed to meet with to argue about God and nature. People call you wise because you acknowledge God, but oh, how simple you are! Does anyone see God? Does anyone understand what God is? Does anyone comprehend how God rules and can rule the universe and each and all things of it? Who but the lower-class and common person acknowledges what he does not see and understand? What is more obvious than that nature is the all in all things? Who has seen anything with his eye but nature? Who has heard anything with his ear but nature? Who has smelled anything with his nose but nature? Who has tasted anything with his tongue but nature? Who has felt anything with the touch of his hand and body but nature? Are not the senses of our body the only attesters of truth? Who cannot swear on the basis of them that a thing is so? Do your heads not exist in nature? The thoughts in your heads - from what origin does anything flow into them but from nature? Take nature away. Are you capable of any thought?"

And they added many other things of a similar nature.

[3] After listening to this, the angels replied, "You speak as you do because you are merely sense-oriented. All spirits in hell keep the ideas of their thoughts immersed in the senses of their body, nor can they elevate their minds above them. We pardon you therefore. A life of evil and a consequent faith in falsity has closed up the inner faculties of your mind, so that to rise above things of the senses is in your case impossible - unless, that is, you are in a state removed from the evils of your life and the falsities of your faith. For a satanic spirit can understand truth when he hears it just as well as an angel, only he does not retain it, because evil wipes out the truth and introduces falsity. However, we perceive that you are now in such a removed state, and so can understand the truth in what we say. Pay attention, therefore, what we are about to tell you."

Then the angels said, "You were in the natural world, and died there, and now you are in the spiritual world. Did you know anything before this about the life after death? Did you not previously deny it, and regard yourselves on a par with animals? Did you know anything beforehand about heaven and hell, or about the light and warmth of this world? Or the fact that you are no longer in the confines of nature but above it? For this world and all things in it are spiritual, and spiritual things are above natural ones, so much so that not the least thing of nature can enter into this world. But because you believed nature to be a kind of god or goddess, you also now believe that the light and warmth of this world are the same as the light and warmth of the natural world, even though they are not in the least the same. For natural light here is darkness, and natural warmth here is cold.

"Did you know anything about the sun of this world, from which comes our light and our warmth? Did you know that this sun is pure love, and the sun of the natural world nothing but fire? That the sun of the world, which is nothing but fire, is the origin from which nature came into existence and continues in existence? That the sun of heaven, which is pure love, is the origin from which life itself, which is love combined with wisdom, came into existence and continues in existence? And thus that nature, which you regard as a god or goddess, is wholly without life?

[4] "If given protection, you could ascend with us into heaven, and if given protection, we could descend with you into hell; and in heaven you would see magnificent and splendid sights, whereas in hell we would see squalid and filthy ones. These differences exist, because all in heaven worship God, and all in hell worship nature. Thus the magnificent and splendid sights in heaven are correspondences of affections for good and truth, while the squalid and filthy sights in hell are correspondences of lusts for evil and falsity.

"Draw your own conclusion, now, from the one and the other, as to whether God or nature is the all in all things."

To this the satanic spirits replied, "In the state in which we are now, we can conclude from what you have said that it is God; but when the delight of evil seizes our minds, we see nothing but nature."

[5] The two angels and two satanic spirits were standing not far from me on the right, so that I saw them and heard them. Moreover, I suddenly saw around them a multitude of spirits who in the natural world had been renowned for their learning; and I wondered at the fact that these learned people would stand, sometimes with the angels, sometimes with the satanic spirits, and that they would side with those with whom they were standing. But I was told that their changes in position reflected changes in their state of mind as they favored now the one side, now the other.

"For they are chameleons," I was told. "Moreover, we will tell you a mystery. We looked down upon the earth at people renowned for their learning, who consulted their own judgment in what they thought concerning God and nature; and we found six hundred out of a thousand on the side of nature, and the rest on the side of God. However, we found the latter on the side of God because they frequently said that nature is from God - not owing to any understanding, but only in consequence of what they had been told; and frequently saying a thing from memory and recollection, and not at the same time as a result of thought and intelligence, induces a kind of faith."

[6] After that the satanic spirits were given protection, and they ascended with the two angels into heaven, where they saw magnificent and splendid sights. Moreover, being then in a state of enlightenment from the light of heaven there, they acknowledged that there is a God, and that nature was created to serve the life which is in God and from God; also that nature in itself is lifeless, and thus does nothing of itself, but is actuated by life.

Having seen and perceived these things, they descended, and as they descended, their love of evil returned, which closed up their intellect above and opened it below; and then above it a kind of veil appeared, flashing with a hellish fire. Moreover, the moment their feet touched the ground, the earth opened under them and they sank back to their companions.