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Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings

This list of Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings was originally compiled by W. C. Henderson in 1960 but has since been updated.

Van Swedenborgs Werken

 

Conjugial Love #183

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183. The second account:

A grove of palms and laurels appeared to me in the eastern zone, with the trees planted in rings in the form of spirals. Going over, I entered and walked along paths that curved around through several of the rings, and at the end of the paths I saw a garden, which formed the heart of the grove. Between the grove and the garden stood a small bridge, having a gate on the grove side and another gate on the garden side. I approached, and a keeper opened the gates. When I asked him what the name of the garden was, he said, "Adramandoni, which means the delight of conjugial love."

I went in, and behold, I found olive trees, with vines running and hanging down from one tree to another, and with bushes in flower beneath the trees and between them. In the middle of the garden there was a grassy circle, on which husbands and wives and young men and women were sitting, paired off in couples; and at the center of the circle was an elevated piece of ground, where a little fountain of water spurted up into the air owing to the force of its stream.

When I moved closer to the circle, I saw two angels in purple and scarlet, who were speaking with the people sitting on the grass and talking about conjugial love, its origin and its delights. And because this love was the subject of their conversation, the people were listening with eager attention and full receptivity, producing in them a feeling of exaltation as though from the fire of love in the speech of the angels.

[2] I have condensed into summary form the following excerpts from their conversation:

The angels began by remarking how difficult it is to investigate and discern the origin of conjugial love, since it has a Divine origin in heaven; for the origin is Divine love, Divine wisdom, and Divine application to useful purpose. These three emanate as one from the Lord, and they flow as one from Him into people's souls, and through their souls into their minds; and there they flow into the inner affections and thoughts, through these into desires nearer the body, and from these through the breast into the reproductive region. Here all the forces derived from the first origin exist concurrently, and together with successive elements, result in conjugial love.

After this the angels said, "Let the interchange in our discussion be by questions and answers, because although a perception of something does indeed flow in when gained solely from listening, still it does not remain unless the listener also thinks about it for himself and asks questions regarding it."

[3] Then some of the married group said to the angels, "We have heard that conjugial love has a Divine origin in heaven, because it comes from an influx from the Lord into people's souls; and that being from the Lord, its origin is love, wisdom, and application to useful purpose - these being the three essential attributes which together make up the one Divine essence. We have also heard that nothing but what is of the Divine essence can emanate from the Lord and flow into the inmost being of a person, which is called his soul; and that these three essential attributes of it are transformed into analogous and corresponding qualities as they descend into the body. So now, the first question we ask is what is meant by the third essential Divine emanation, which is called application to useful purpose."

The angels replied that love and wisdom without application to useful purpose are only abstract and theoretical ideas, which, even after being entertained for a time in the mind, eventually pass away like the winds. "But love and wisdom are brought together in application to useful purpose," they said, "and in this they become a single entity which is called actual. Love cannot rest unless it acts, for love is the active force in life; nor can wisdom exist and endure unless it does so from love and together with love whenever love acts, and to act is application to useful purpose. Therefore we define application to useful purpose as the doing of good from love through wisdom. Application to useful purpose is what good is.

[4] "Since these three elements - love, wisdom, and application to useful purpose - flow into people's souls, we can see why it is said that all good is from God. For all action from love through wisdom is called good, and action includes also application to useful purpose.

"Love without wisdom - what is it but a kind of foolish infatuation? And love accompanied by wisdom, but without application to a useful end - what is it but an airy affectation of the mind? On the other hand, love and wisdom together with application to a useful end - these not only make a person what he is, but they also are the person. Indeed, what may perhaps surprise you, they produce the person. For a man's seed contains his soul in perfect human form, clothed with substances from the finest elements of nature, out of which the body is formed in the womb of the mother. This useful end is the supreme and final end of Divine love acting through Divine wisdom."

[5] Finally the angels said, "We reach the inevitable conclusion that all reproduction, all propagation, and all procreation stem in origin from an influx of love, wisdom, and application to useful purpose flowing in from the Lord - from a direct influx from the Lord into the souls of human beings, from an indirect influx into the souls of animals, and from a still more indirect influx into the inmost elements in plants. All these processes, moreover, take place in things that are last in order as a result of things that are first in order.

"Processes of reproduction, propagation and procreation are clearly continuations of creation; for creation can have no other source than Divine love acting through Divine wisdom in Divine application to useful purpose. Everything in the universe is therefore generated and formed as a result of useful purpose, in fulfillment of useful purpose, and to serve a useful purpose."

[6] Afterwards the people sitting on the banks of grass asked the angels, "What is the source of the delights of conjugial love, delights which are beyond number and description?"

The angels replied that these delights arise from the useful applications of love and wisdom, and that this could be seen from considering that to the extent anyone loves to become wise for the sake of some genuinely useful purpose, to the same extent he is in the stream and vigor of conjugial love, and to the extent he is in this stream and vigor, to the same extent he enjoys their delights.

"Application to useful purpose produces this result," they said, "because love [finds expression in useful purpose] through wisdom [and they] take delight in each other, and play with each other, so to speak, like little children. And as they mature, they congenially unite together, which is accomplished as though through stages of betrothal, wedding, marriage and the bearing of offspring, and this continually and with variety to eternity.

"These conjunctions between love and wisdom take place inwardly in application to useful purpose. In their beginnings, however, the delights are imperceptible, but they become more and more perceptible as they descend by degrees from their beginnings and enter the body. They enter by degrees from the soul into the interior regions of a person's mind, and from there into its outer regions, and from there to within the breast, and from there into the reproductive region.

[7] And though a person does not perceive anything of these conjugal and heavenly interplays in the soul, from the soul they insinuate themselves into the inner regions of the mind in the form of peace and innocence, and into the outer regions of the mind in the form of bliss, felicity and delight, while within the breast they appear in the form of the delights of inmost friendship, and in the reproductive region as the delight of delights owing to the continual influx all the way from the soul, bringing with it an actual sensation of conjugial love.

"Such conjugal interplays of love and wisdom in application to useful purpose in the soul become lasting as they proceed towards their place within the breast, and there within the breast they manifest themselves perceptibly in an infinite variety of delights. And because of the marvelous communication of the interior of the breast with the reproductive region, in that region the delights become the delights of conjugial love - delights which are heightened over all other delights that exist in heaven and in the world, because the use served by conjugial love is the most excellent use of all; for it results in the propagation of the human race, and from the human race comes the angelic heaven."

[8] To this the angels added that people know nothing about the variety of the countless delights connected with truly conjugial love if they do not have from the Lord a love of growing wise for the sake of some useful purpose. "For," they said, "people who do not love to become wise in accord with genuine truths, but prefer to be irrational in accord with falsities, and who through this irrationality of theirs are motivated by some love to serve evil purposes - in their case the way to the soul is closed. As a result the conjugal and heavenly interplays of love and wisdom in the soul become more and more cut off, and together with them, conjugial love with its flow, vigor, and delights."

The people who were listening said in response that they perceived that conjugial love depends on a love from the Lord of growing wise for the sake of useful purposes. The angels replied that this was so. And then on the heads of some of the listeners appeared little wreaths of flowers.

So they asked, "Why is this?"

The angels said, "Because you understood more deeply." And then the angels departed from the garden, with these people in the midst of them.

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.

Van Swedenborgs Werken

 

Apocalypse Revealed #655

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655. To this I will append the following account:

I spoke with some of the spirits meant by the dragon. And one of them said to me, "Come with me and I will show you what pleases our eyes and hearts."

Then he took me through a dark forest and over a hill, from which I could view the pleasures of the dragon spirits. And I saw an amphitheater built in the form of a circle, with sloping tiers of benches extending up all around on which spectators were sitting. Those who sat on the lowest benches looked to me at a distance like satyrs and priapi, some of them with a cloth covering their private parts, and some of them naked without one. On the benches above them sat whoremongers and harlots. So they appeared to me from their behavior.

The dragon spirit then said to me, "Now you will see our sport." And I saw what looked like calves, rams, ewes, kids and lambs brought into the arena of the circus, and after they were all there, a gate opened and I saw what looked like young lions, panthers, leopards and wolves rushing upon the flock and savagely attacking them. They tore them to pieces and slaughtered them. And after that bloody carnage the satyrs spread sand over the site where the slaughter took place.

[2] The dragon spirit said to me then, "These are our sports, which please our hearts."

But I replied, "Get away from me, you demon! In a little while you will see this amphitheater turned into a lake of fire and brimstone."

He laughed and left me. And wondering to myself afterward why the Lord permits such things, I received in my heart the answer, that they are permitted as long as spirits are in the world of spirits; but that when their time in that world is over, such theatrical scenes are turned into dreadful ones in hell.

[3] Everything that I saw was a sight induced by the dragon spirits through beguilements. There were no calves, rams, ewes, kids or lambs, therefore, but those spirits made genuine goods and truths of the church to so appear, goods and truths that they hate. The young lions, panthers, leopards and wolves were manifestations of the lusts in those spirits who looked like satyrs and priapi. Those without a cloth over their private parts were people who believed that evils are not seen in the eyes of God, while those with a cloth are people who believed that evils are seen, but do not condemn, provided they have faith. The whoremongers and harlots were people who falsified the Word's truth, for licentiousness symbolizes the falsification of truth.

Everything in the spiritual world appears at a distance in accordance with its correspondence, and when these correspondences take manifest form, in objects like those of natural ones, we call them representations of spiritual entities.

[4] I later saw those spirits leaving the forest, with the dragon spirit surrounded by the satyrs and priapi, followed by their lieutenants and camp followers, who were the whoremongers and harlots. The troop grew as it went, and I was given then to hear what they were saying among themselves. They were saying that they saw a flock of sheep and goats in a meadow, and that it was a sign that they were approaching one of the Jerusalem cities where charity is primary. And they said, "Let us go and seize that city, throw out its inhabitants, and plunder their goods!"

They went to it, but it had a wall around it, with angels as guards upon the wall. So then they said, "Let us take it by trickery. Let us send in an artful person skilled in casuistry, who can make black white and white black, and color the reality of any subject."

So the spirits found a certain expert in the metaphysical art, who could turn concepts of things into considerations of terms and hide actual realities under strings of words, and so fly away like a hawk with its prey under its wings. They told him what to say to the inhabitants of the city, that they were people who shared the inhabitants' religion and should be admitted.

Going to the city gate he knocked, and when it was opened, he said that he wished to speak with the wisest person in the city. So he was allowed in and taken to a certain man, and he addressed the man then, saying, "My brethren are outside the city and ask to be let in. They share your religion. You and we both make faith and charity to be the two essential ingredients of religion. The only difference is that you say charity is primary and faith its effect, while we say faith is primary and charity its effect. What does it matter which one is called primary, when we believe in both?"

[5] The city's wise man replied, "Let us not speak about this matter by ourselves, but do so in the presence of a number of others, to serve as arbiters and judges. Otherwise no decision will result."

And at that he summoned some others, and the dragon spirit's emissary repeated to them what he had said before.

Then the city's wise man responded, "You said that it is the same whether one takes charity to be the primary concern of the church, or faith, provided one agrees that the two together form the church and its religion. And yet the difference is as the difference between something prior and something subsequent, between a cause and its effect, between a principal cause and an instrumental cause, between an essential component and a manner of expression.

"I speak so to you, because I have observed that you are an expert in the metaphysical art, an art that we call casuistry, and that some people call mumbo jumbo. But let us put these terms aside. The difference is as the difference between something above and something below. Indeed, if you would believe it, it is as the difference between heaven and hell. For that which is primary forms the head and breast, while that which is its effect forms the feet and the soles of the feet.

"But let us first agree on what charity is and what faith is - that charity is the love's affection for doing good to the neighbor for God's sake, and for the sake of salvation and eternal life, and that faith is confident thought regarding God, salvation and eternal life."

[6] However, the emissary said, "I grant that that is what faith is, and I also grant that charity is, as you say, an affection for God's sake, because it conforms with His commandment, but not that is an affection for the sake of salvation and eternal life."

Whereupon the city's wise man said, "Let it be as you say, provided it is for God's sake."

Following this agreement the city's wise man said, "Is not affection the primary thing and thought its effect?"

To which the dragon spirit's emissary answered, "No, it is not."

But he was told in reply, "You cannot deny it. A person is moved to think by his affection, is he not? Take away the affection. Can you form any thought? The case is entirely the same as if you were to take the sound out of speech. If you were to take away any sound, could you speak a word? The tone is also a matter of affection, while the words are a matter of thought, for affection produces the tone and thought the words. The case is also like that of a flame and its light. If you take away the flame, does not the light die?

"So it is with charity and faith, charity being an affection, and faith a matter of thought. Can you not comprehend, then, that the primary element is everything in the secondary one, even as sound is in speech? And from this you can see that if you do not make primary that which is primary, you do not possess the second element. Consequently, if you take faith, which is in second place, and put it in first place, you will appear no otherwise in heaven than as a person upside down, with his feet planted upward and his head pointed down. Or you will look like a clown turned upside down and walking on his hands. Since people like you will appear so in heaven, what then are your good works constituting charity but the kind that a clown might do with his feet, seeing that he cannot do them with his hands? As a consequence your charity is natural and not spiritual, as you yourself see, because it is turned upside down."

[7] The emissary understood this, for every devil can understand truth when he hears it, even though he cannot retain it, because when his affection for evil returns, it casts out thought of truth.

After that, then, the city's wise man described with many illustrations what faith is like when it is accepted as primary, saying that it is merely natural, that it is simply knowledge devoid of any spiritual life, and that it is consequently not faith. "For your charity," he said, "is nothing but a natural affection, and the only kind of thought that springs from a natural affection is natural thought, which is what constitutes your faith.

"I might almost say, too," he continued, "that in your merely natural faith there is scarcely any other spiritual life than in your knowledge of the Mongol empire, of the diamond mine there, or of its emperor's wealth and court."

When the dragon's emissary heard this, he angrily departed and reported to his companions outside the city. And when they heard that he had been told that charity is an affection for doing good to the neighbor for God's sake and for the sake of salvation and eternal life, they all cried out, "That's a lie!"

And the dragon spirit himself said, "What an outrage! All good works that constitute charity - if done for the sake of salvation, are they not merit-seeking?"

[8] The spirits then said to one another, "Let us summon here more of our colleagues, and let us lay siege to this city. Let us make ladders, scale the wall and attack them at night, and throw out those proponents of charity."

But when they attempted this, there suddenly appeared what looked like fire from heaven which consumed them. In fact, however, the fire from heaven was a manifestation of their anger, owing to their hatred of the city's inhabitants, because those inhabitants cast faith out of first place into second place. It appeared to them as though they were consumed by fire because hell opened beneath their feet and swallowed them.

Events similar to this occurred in many places at the time of the Last Judgment, and this is the meaning of the following depiction in the book of Revelation:

(The dragon) will go out to lead astray the nations which are in the four corners of the earth..., to gather them together for war... And they went up over the breadth of the land and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. But fire came down from God out of heaven and consumed them. (Revelation 20:8-9)

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.

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