10050. 'And its legs' means purification of the more external things belonging to the natural man. This is clear from the meaning of 'washing the legs' as purification of the natural man (for the meaning of 'washing' as purifying, see immediately above in 10049); and from the meaning of 'the legs' as the more external things belonging to the natural man. The reason why these things are meant by 'the legs' is that one must at the same time understand the feet, since an animal's four legs are closely connected to its feet, and 'the feet' by virtue of their correspondence mean the natural or external level in a person, see 2162, 3147, 3761, 4938-4952.

[2] Much the same is meant by 'the legs' in Amos,

As the shepherd rescues from the mouth of the lion two legs or a piece of an ear, so will the children of Israel dwelling in Samaria be rescued, on the corner of a bed and on the end of a couch. Amos 3:12.

'The lion' here means those who lay the Church waste, 'legs' the external part of it, which is also the external part of the natural man, 'a piece of an ear' its discernment, and those 'dwelling in Samaria' those whose worship is external. 'The corner of a bed and the end of a couch' is the lowest part of the natural, which is external sensory awareness and its truth and good.

[3] In Daniel's description of Nebuchadnezzar's statue - its head made of pure gold, breast and arms of silver, belly and side of bronze, legs of iron, and feet partly of iron and partly of clay, Daniel 2:32-33 - what is meant by 'the legs' is the truth of faith in the external or natural man; and the same thing is also meant by 'iron', see 10030. The reason why the legs in the description are distinguished from the feet is that human legs are by nature different from animal legs.

259. 'The heel' is used to mean the lowest part of the natural, which is the bodily. This cannot be known unless one knows how the most ancient people looked on the things that are in man. Celestial and spiritual things within him they associated with the head and face. The things that sprang from these, such as charity and mercy, they associated with the breast. Natural things however they associated with the foot, lower natural things with the sole of the foot, and the lowest natural and bodily with the heel. Not only did they associate things within man with parts of the body, they also called them such. The lowest things of reason, namely facts, were also meant by what Jacob prophesied concerning Dan,

Dan will be a serpent on the road, an asp on the path, biting the horse's heels; and its rider falls backwards. Genesis 49:17.

And the statement in David,

The iniquity of my heels has surrounded me. Psalms 49:5.

A similar statement is made in reference to Jacob whose hand, as he was being born, was grasping Esau's heel, which was why he was called Jacob, Genesis 25:26. The name Jacob derives from the word for a heel, for the Jewish Church, meant by Jacob, was to bruise the heel.

[2] The serpent is capable of harming only the lowest natural things in man, but not, unless they are types of vipers, the interior natural, still less the spiritual, and least of all the celestial. These the Lord preserves, and stores away in man without his awareness. The things which the Lord stores away are in the Word called 'remnants'. But how the serpent through sensory-mindedness and self-love destroyed those lowest things with people before the Flood; how it destroyed them with the Jews by means of sensory judgements, traditions, and things of no importance, as well as by self-love and love of the world; and how today it is destroying them and has destroyed them by means of sensory judgements, material facts, and philosophical arguments, along with the same self-love and love of the world, will in the Lord's Divine mercy be discussed later on.