Verse 18. And this brings deep sorrow and humiliation upon the higher faculties of the soul, which desire to receive the life of heaven, and, as in former temptations, a struggle for the mastery ensues between the spiritual and natural desires and perceptions: the spiritual mind can receive neither good affections nor truths from the Lord because of the evils committed by the natural man in turning away from the perception which is given of the Divine will, and thereby rejecting all the influence which proceeds from heaven.